Planning Commission

SUMMARY MINUTES Regular Public Meeting Eugene Planning Commission Sloat Room–The Atrium Building–99 West 10th Avenue September 27, 2004 11:30 a.m. PRESENT: John Lawless, President; Mitzi Colbath, Vice President; Rick Duncan, Adell McMillan, Jon Belcher, Anne Marie Levis, Charles Rusch, members; Tom Coyle, ex officio member; Susan Muir, Kurt Yeiter, Steve Nystrom, Allen Lowe; Planning and Development De- partment. PUBLIC COMMENT ON NON-AGENDA ITEMS I. PREP FOR JOINT CITY COUNCIL/PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING II. ITEMS FROM COMMISSION AND STAFF A. Other Items from Staff B. Other Items from Commission SUMMARY MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 1  MINUTES Regular Public Meeting Eugene Planning Commission Sloat Room–The Atrium Building–99 West 10th Avenue September 27, 2004 11:30 a.m. PRESENT: John Lawless, President; Mitzi Colbath, Vice President; Rick Duncan, Adell McMillan, Jon Belcher, Anne Marie Levis, Charles Rusch, members; Planning and Development Di- rector Tom Coyle, ex officio member; Susan Muir, Kurt Yeiter, Steve Nystrom, Allen Lowe, Planning and Development Department. Mr. Lawless called the meeting of the Eugene Planning Commission to order. PUBLIC COMMENT ON NON-AGENDA ITEMS There was no one present wishing to offer public comment. I. PREP FOR JOINT CITY COUNCIL/PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING Ms. Muir announced that Ms. McMillan won an award from the American Planners Association for outstanding leadership in a citizen planner position. The award was to be presented in Portland at 1 p.m. on October 4. She invited the Planning Commissioners to join her in attending the award ceremony. Mr. Belcher arrived. Ms. Muir reported that she and Mr. Coyle met with City Manager Dennis Taylor and had brainstormed on the format and goals of the meeting. They compiled a draft power point presentation, which she intended to present to the Commission for feedback. She noted they had discussed having each of the Commis- sioners make part of the presentation, adding that the meeting would be informal. Ms. Muir related that she had checked into the rules and the City Council was bound by its rule that dictated that no one could speak for more than three minutes. Mr. Lawless asked if the Planning Commission could submit written statements or lists of questions. Ms. Muir assured him the Commission could do so. Ms. Muir explained that part of the packet the councilors would receive would be the list of Planning Commission accomplishments. Ms. Colbath commented that the Planning Commission obviously did not think checking in with the council on an annual basis was adequate. Ms. Levis said she was not inclined to ask the council if they felt yearly check-ins were sufficient as had been suggested in the draft power point presentation because, should the council indicate satisfaction with the current procedure, the conversation would end there. Ms. MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 1 Muir agreed. She felt biannual joint meetings would be better. Mr. Duncan advocated for recommending biannual meetings to the council. Ms. Muir suggested that staff make another slide entitled Planning Commission Needs. Mr. Belcher suggested asking them how the Commission could more effectively work with the council. Mr. Duncan recalled past incidents wherein the council misunderstood the intent of the Planning Commission. Ms. Colbath thought a slide entitled Planning Commission Recommendations for Success would be apropos. Mr. Duncan averred that the council needed to be reminded that it was within the Planning Commission’s charter to study the information and make planning recommendations. Ms. Muir asked if Commissioners thought that they should ask the council if the presenting that the commission did worked for them. Mr. Duncan replied that the council had been asked this the previous year and took it under advisement. To date, it was still “under advisement.” Ms. McMillan noted that the commission had previously avoided the three-minute rule by presenting as part of the staff presentation. Ms. Muir deleted the wording regarding the adequacy of yearly check-ins from the third slide, entitled “Are we meeting your needs?” Regarding the “adoption” of certain councilors by Planning Commissioners, Ms. McMillan related that one of the councilors she was paired with had instructed her that she did not want contact regarding planning issues as the councilor felt she received enough information. Her other “buddy” councilor, Nancy Nathanson, called her with questions when she needed information. Mr. Duncan stated that he had several conversations with Councilors Papé, Meisner, and Poling. Ms. Levis noted that she had not called Councilor Bettman over the course of the year, but this was largely due to the lack of prominent issues to discuss with her. Mr. Lawless suggested the commission identify internal issues and assign themselves to call councilors. Ms. McMillan noted that there had not been as many issues brought forward to the council level from the Planning Commission over the past year. Mr. Belcher pointed out that the Hospital Zone issue had been one larger issue. Ms. Colbath related that she had spoken to Mayor Torrey once and that she had found it very helpful to listen to his perspective on planning issues. Mr. Belcher recommended the commission formalize its “council buddy” system. Mr. Lawless thought that, fundamentally, it was a great idea. He felt the question was one of format. He advocated for bringing forth the ideas and issues that were most important to the Planning Commission and for determining the most effective way to do so. Mr. Belcher commented that the commission generally talked about legislative issues to the council. Mr. Lawless felt the Planning Commission provided good input on broader issues. Mr. Belcher suggested MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 2 scheduling a monthly call to councilors. He felt monthly contacts would help to build relationships. Ms. Levis was unable to commit to monthly contacts. Mr. Lawless agreed, and iterated that an as needed basis might be more appropriate. Mr. Belcher said both ways could work and, perhaps, councilors should be asked as to whether they would prefer calls on a regular basis or on an as needed basis. Ms. Muir suggested the following wording: “How can Planning Commissioners weigh in on broader topical matters?” She said there was one caveat in that the commission ruled over quasi-judicial hearings and such contacts could be those that would need to be declared as ex parte. Ms. Levis opined that the commissioners had done a pretty good job with its first year of trying to initiate contacts with the councilors. In response to a question from Ms. Colbath, Ms. Muir stated that people who were trying to win a case did many things to further their cause, including pitting the Planning Commission and the City Council against each other in certain settings. Ms. Levis commented that the commission almost helped that along because of the appeals process. Mr. Belcher likened the relationship to that between the Circuit Court and the Supreme Court, as one works through the levels of jurisdiction until the final result was delivered. Mr. Coyle stated that the differences between the Planning Commission and the City Council were less apparent to the public. He noted that there was more public participation in planning, citing the example of the Broadway design working group. Mr. Lawless said the stakeholders had been aggressively integrated in the Broadway design process and had been engaged long before there was a final product. He commented that in a perfect world the City Council would have looked over that process and approved it, because of the level of public input. Ms. Levis felt this was a good thing to bring up to them. She thought they might recognize the process behind it and then spend less energy belaboring the details. Mr. Rusch recommended citing a couple of good examples in order to allay any fears the council might have of how creative the commission might be. He noted that the East Campus neighborhood process had been completely different and produced a positive result. Mr. Lawless noted that at the last hearing before the Planning Commission the “pros” and “cons” had the opportunity to mediate and work things out themselves. Ms. Muir added the following wording to the power point presentation: “Allow for creative integration of citizen involvement roles into projects using East Cam- pus/Broadway design standards and collaborative process during appeals.” Ms. McMillan cited the Crest Drive process. She remarked that, from the outside, it had looked good, but the hearing before the Planning Commission was negative and the public hearing before the City Council was negative. She related that it was back in the citizen involvement process again. She could not think of a way to let the neighborhood know there that the City was not “out to get them.” MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 3 Mr. Belcher opined that the Crest Drive neighborhood had been a problem since 1999. Mr. Duncan commented that the neighbors there truly feel that the City wishes to build a freeway through the area. Ms. Muir proceeded with the power point presentation. Regarding the Goal 5 Update, she noted that it had been appealed to the State after the Department of Land Conservation and Development (DLCD) had ruled in the appeal of the County and now the Land Conservation and Development Commission (LCDC) was slated to rule on this in December of this year. She stated that protection measures were to be completed by June, 2005. Regarding the Cell Tower Amendments, Ms. Muir explained that Lane County had adopted its ordinance, which included a 1,200 foot buffer from all residences and school sites. She reported that the City Council wanted to amend the City’s cell tower ordinance and the City Attorney was drafting language to that end. In response to a question from Ms. Colbath, Ms. Muir explained that the City ordinance did not include a buffer. Mr. Duncan questioned whether there was a place in Eugene with enough room for such a buffer. Ms. Muir said staff would bring a map indicating where cell towers were located to the commission in October. Ms. Colbath asked if the commission was seeking feedback at this point. Ms. Muir replied that the commission was reporting on the work items at this point. Regarding Mixed Use Neighborhood Planning, Mr. Belcher suggested the third bullet point under Two- Year Work Program indicate that the planning process may add, delete, and revise nodal boundaries and not that it will add, etc. Ms. Muir reworded it to read, as follows: “Will May add, delete, and revise potential node boundaries through citizen input.” Mr. Yeiter explained, in response to Ms. Muir, that he had taken out the reference to “site specific planning.” Ms. Muir noted that the Planning Commission had written a memorandum to the City Council indicating that the commission did not want to focus on site specific work. Mr. Lowe suggested that, should it be raised as an item for discussion, the commission could discuss the Chambers neighborhood planning process as it was similar to site specific planning. Mr. Coyle commented that there was a vocabulary that should be set forth that separated what was being done in the Chambers neighborhood from what was being recommended in the broad-based applications. Ms. Colbath suspected that the council may want to see more site specific planning in the future. She felt there should be some idea of how that might occur. Mr. Lawless recommended taking a historical look at what happened when detailed planning was employed, such as the planning that went into the Chase Gardens node. Ms. Muir suggested they call it “neighborhood puts input into design.” Mr. Lawless related that he had no issue with approaching neighborhoods and engaging them in the process so long as the result remained within the parameters of design code. Mr. Coyle stated that planners could not use the same process for development of nodes as it did for developing its parks property, given that a private developer was involved. MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 4 Ms. Muir surmised that the commission wanted language suggesting the allowance of more flexibility. Mr. Lowe added that the simple explanation was that the City was still developing its planning “tool kit.” He said determining the right process by which to conduct planning in a given area with its own unique issues was the challenge planners faced. He supported utilizing context sensitive design as there was no universal way to plan development for an area. Mr. Duncan felt councilors thought the Planning Commission wanted to set down a model on the table and make the City look like the model. Ms. McMillan commented that there were not many green field sites left within the City of Eugene. Ms. Muir added a bullet point under Mixed Use Neighborhood Planning that read, as follows: “Context/Issue-driven compatibility process and flexibility for developing tool kit.” Mr. Coyle felt the process was not that complex. He noted that Arlie and Company surveyed neighbor- hoods surrounding its development sites to identify the constraints and then produced a site plan that responded to the issues. Ms. Levis said good planning did not just look for constraints, but was aspirational and sought to make a place a magnet for the neighbors and a “real gathering place.” Mr. Yeiter stated that though the focus was on the two-year program list, what was not put up there was that if the opportunity came up to do specific area planning, they would conduct the planning in that manner. Ms. Muir noted that the City Council would instruct the Planning and Development Department (PDD) if such an opportunity arose. Mr. Lawless thought a discussion needed to be held on what sort of guidelines such development should be provided with. Mr. Coyle commented that the public really did not have a strong concept of planning. He wanted to design a way to frontload the process so that the department could go into a site and determine which view not to obstruct and which neighbor not to offend, as examples, and provide this information to a developer. Ms. Belcher opined that PDD was trying to do something different in a community that wherein the sides did not trust one another. Ms. McMillan asked if the /ND Nodal Development was slated to be amended or would PDD get “rid of it altogether.” Ms. Muir changed the wording for the bullet point regarding /ND Overlay, as follows: “Reconsider Amend /ND Overlay.” Mr. Duncan remarked that he would like to do away with the overlay. He thought people wanted to know how to proceed and not have another layer of planning. Mr. Lawless suggested a goal of creating a set of development tools that were context driven. Mr. Duncan noted that the East Campus process had brought people together and given them the MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 5 opportunity to work together and trust one another. Mr. Duncan wished the commission could have a luncheon discussion with the City Council without the three-minute clock. Ms. Colbath suggested an informal treat as an alternative. Ms. Muir recommended suggesting to the councilors that that they join the Planning Commission at one of its meetings and under its rules. Mr. Belcher opined that there would be more value in bringing three or four councilors come to a Planning Commission meeting for a discussion on the technical aspects of planning. Ms. Muir continued presenting the power points. Regarding Tier 1 – Minor Land Use Code Fixes, Ms. Colbath recommended more explicit language for the bullet point “conceptual buy in by PC.” Ms. Muir called the conceptual buy-in by the Planning Commission a step in the process toward determining code language. Ms. Muir noted that the Tier 2 – Key Amendments were an issue-by-issue item, and the first one facing the Planning Commission would be a large code amendment. Continuing, Ms. Muir indicated that the last power point slide was entitled Alternate Path. She encouraged the commissioners to think of what it was or what it might be and what problems it was intended to solve. She noted that not much discussion had occurred regarding the Alternate Path, with the exception of the Chambers Street test case. She predicted the commission would be called upon to formulate policy recommendations to forward to the City Council. Mr. Rusch asked if it was similar to the Nodal Development Overlay or the Mixed Use work the commission had done. Ms. Muir explained that those pieces of work had come out of the Land Use Code Update (LUCU). Mr. Duncan commented that there was quite a lot of work done on those items. Mr. Nystrom said there was a contingent of people who would say that the Alternate Path was a voluntary method to find alternative ways to achieve planning and design goals. He did not think everyone’s definition of it was the same. Ms. Muir thought some ideas would come out of the Chambers Street discussion. Mr. Yeiter explained that the Chambers discussion had two main purposes, to discuss transportation issues and to determine what would be compatible there. He averred that part of the result that was hoped for was the creation of another way to do it. Mr. Coyle called the Alternative Path a conceptual zoning application. He felt the result would provide cures for overarching planning problems. He opined it was not an onerous thing in and of itself. Mr. Coyle suggested the second bullet point under Alternate Path be exchanged with the first bullet point. The Planning Commission concurred. Mr. Coyle commented that in a simpler time the alternative to prescriptive development was called a PD permit, but over time so many “ornaments” (i.e. code changes) had been hung on it that it could no longer function in that way. Ms. Muir reiterated that the City Council should investigate the Alternate Path as an alternative to MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 6 prescriptive zoning. Ms. McMillan pointed out, as an example, that when redoing a code the Planning Commission had decided not to pursue the Alternative Path because it did not have the resources to pursue it. Instead, she said design standards had been developed. She related that the development community responded negatively to the design standards. She recalled that much of the discussion centered on how to meet the needs the design standards arose from without following them to the letter. Ms. Levis recommended providing a summary to the council. She thought, as the commission only had 90 minutes, it should focus on three major things: the discussion on how the commission could better work with the council, the mixed use neighborhood development, and the alternate path. She expressed concern that the commission would not come out with anything if it gave the council too much to consider. Mr. Belcher agreed. He supported structuring the presentation around those three items. Commissioners discussed how best to structure the presentation and feedback. Ms. Muir recommended using all of the presentation time first, covering the three main issues during that time and then let the council go around the table. Mr. Duncan indicated his willingness to write a letter to the council regarding the Planning Commission’s concerns. Ms. Levis felt a letter should be from all of the commission. Ms. Colbath recommended that the three items be presented separately with a time allotted for each one. She expressed concern that a presentation of all three followed by council feedback could mean that the commission only received feedback on one item. Ms. Muir agreed this was an option. Mr. Coyle predicted that less than half of the council would have an active knowledge of Alternative Path code procedures. He recommended that the council be given an educational presentation on it by the commission and staff at a later date. Ms. Levis agreed, suggesting that the commission first address how to work together better and then address mixed use neighborhoods. She did not think the time allotted would allow for a larger discussion than that. Mr. Lawless asked if it would be reasonable to deliver the message on these three topics and then have a follow-up meeting for input on prioritization. Mr. Belcher recommended leaving everything in the agenda item summary (AIS) with the exception of the discussion about the role of the Planning Commission. Mr. Lawless disagreed. He felt that all three presentations should be presented initially and then the council should be asked questions that were specific to each item. Ms. Muir summarized the discussion, stating she would edit the power point presentation to the three main issues. She asked the commissioners to consider what questions they wanted to ask of the City Council. She provided a brief overview of the agenda for the next meeting. MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 7 IV. ITEMS FROM COMMISSION AND STAFF A. Other Items from Staff Mr. Belcher asked about the recruitment for new commissioners. Ms. Muir said it had ended and council interviews for all of the boards, commissions, and committees were scheduled for October 12 and 13. Mr. Coyle noted that 11 people had applied for the two positions. B. Other Items from the Commission Ms. McMillan reported that the Historic Review Board (HRB) had met. She related that the main topic of discussion had been what the citizen involvement portion of the River Road neighborhood historic context statement would be should the neighborhood receive the grant from the State Historic Preserva- tion Office (SHPO). Ms. Levis asked if anyone had volunteered to replace Ms. McMillan on the HRB. Ms. McMillan replied that no one had done so to date. Mr. Duncan noted the change in traffic flow on Willamette Street, calling it a “great improvement.” Mr. Belcher thanked the commission for the opportunity to attend the Oregon Planning Institute (OPI). Ms. Muir announced that the City Council work session scheduled for September 29 was to inform them of the ramifications of the passage of Ballot Measure 37. Mr. Belcher noted that he intended to write a letter to the editor in his capacity as a Planning Commissioner opposing Ballot Measure 37. Mr. Lawless adjourned the meeting at 1:30 p.m. (Recorded by Ruth Atcherson) m:\2004\planning and development department\planning division\planning commission\pc040927.doc MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission September 27, 2004 Page 8