Planning Commission

MINUTES PLANNING COMMISSION REGULAR MEETING DECEMBER 10, 2012 – 5:00 P.M. CITY COUNCIL CHAMBERS PRESENT: Chairman Sookram, Members, Barton, Emanuel, Fooken, Ridder, Sawyer, Synovec and Winter, Planning Director Rian Harkins, Chief Building Inspector Don Simons and Secretary Deb Pruss ABSENT: Member Wiese Chairman Sookram called the meeting to order. Roll Call Vote was taken – 9 present. Chairman Sookram read a statement that this meeting was preceded by publicized notice in the Fremont Tribune and the agenda displayed in the lobby of the Municipal Building and posted online at www.fremontne.gov; and distributed to the Planning Commission, Mayor and City Council on December 5, 2012 and is open to the public. Chairman Sookram also stated a copy of the agenda was kept continually current and available to the public at 400 East Military, 3rd floor and a copy of the open meeting law is posted continually for public inspection located near the Council Chambers entrance door by the agendas. It was moved by Ridder, seconded by Emanuel, to dispense with the reading of the Minutes of the November 19, 2012 Regular Meeting and approve as received. Roll Call Vote showed all members present voting aye – 8 ayes. Motion Carried. Chairman Sookram stated the general public is invited to address the Planning Commission regarding any item on this agenda at this time or wait until discussion of their request is taking place. No public comments were received.  Consider request of Keith M. and Jacqueline A. Roumph to rezone Lot 9 and tax Lot 79 (380 East 30th), Meierhenry Subdivision, Fremont, Dodge County, Nebraska from LI – Limited Industrial District to GI – General Industrial District. Planning Director Harkins stated this agenda item accompanies the following request to combine lots. The property owner who is here is looking at intensifying the use of the property by adding storage units on site. In order to do that without having to provide green space under the landscape regulations, the applicant is looking at up zoning from Limited to General Industrial. Under General Industrial zoning, that type of landscape buffer requirement does not exist so hence the reason. In terms of the property itself, it is in the Meierhenry Subdivision. There are some tax lots as well as some platted lots. Some of the properties have been reconfigured over the years since the original plat but the applicant owns two lots at this location so he is looking at rezoning both of those. You will notice to the north is General Industrial and Limited Industrial on the other three sides. The railroad angles across the north side of the proposed property that is looking at being rezoned. General Industrial again is to the north. You have some residential uses farther away but they are not specifically impacted right now at the present time but the proposal. The land uses that surround this proposed development are a mix of warehousing. There are some vacant industrial lots on this side of the street to the south, contractor yards and warehousing and then vacant industrial land and the railroad. The proposed rezoning, if approved, would not alter requirements of the GI District regarding 1 setbacks. Staff is recommending approval based on the fact that even though it is surrounded by LI on three sides it is not spot zoning because the railroad is considered more of a General Industrial and heavy type of industrial use. This is toward the lighter side of General Industrial in terms of warehousing. When you look at the adjacent page in your packet, this is the layout that they got -this existing building with paving. This is how they are proposing in the staff report we made the recommendation instead of allowing this access off of 30th, maintaining one access and then just having come over here to this existing drive and then letting them do concrete around the proposed self storage building. That was the only change that staff made from their proposal. Harkins stated he would be happy to answer any questions and believes the applicant would be happy to answer any questions as well. Chairman Sookram stated the only thing going on then is that they are changing it from LI to GI because of the landscape buffer requirements. Sookram stated there are some differences such as maximum height correct. Harkins stated there are. Planning Director Harkins stated the applicant is looking at taking an existing building and moving it onto the site and it wouldn’t be an excessively tall building so staff isn’t feeling like it will be something that sticks out or is obtrusive. Staff feels like in terms of fit it would be generally ok in this area and be pretty in conformance with the surrounding buildings. Sookram asked if there was somebody present to speak. Applicant Keith Roumph of Nickerson, NE was present. Sookram asked him if the reason he was requesting the zone change was due to landscaping. Roumph stated he had discussed it with Rian. Harkins stated the applicant wishes to basically not have to deal with the landscape buffer in order to have traffic circulation. They could build as is on LI but they have to have the landscape buffer. By going to GI, the landscape buffer requirement no longer exists and they could do paving as you see proposed here. Harkins stated that is the only difference. Chairman Sookram stated this doesn’t appear to be spot zoning. Harkins stated it would not as there would be a finger of GI coming down across the tracks essentially. It is not spot zoning because this would have to be LI for that to be a spot. Member Synovec stated it will almost let it fit in a little better because driving down 30th there is not a whole lot of landscaping on that street anyway so it seems like a better fit. Member Ridder asked if Planning Director Harkins could explain his suggestion for using the existing paved drive versus the one proposed. Harkins stated the property already has one access so instead of trying to have two access points that close together and crowding them into a lot, going with one shared access for this property off this existing drive and then just taking the concrete over this way allows for a little bit easier turn radiuses to come in here and then a person coming into one of the units can essentially pull in here, have the concrete attached to this pad around the building and then they can just drive around with a little bit easier turning access in and out rather than maybe multiple tight turns through here on and off, around the building and then on and off the street and then additional potential turn movements at the same time. Mr. Roumph stated the existing drive to the back lot is now located exactly right here and it is rocked road. That is the rock road that would have to turn into landscaping, a rock road right there which would be extremely hard to do. That 20’ would then be totally isolated from anything else. It would shove this building as they say right over to here. He would have nothing at all left here. This will allow the building even with all the concrete required if they can slide it over it would leave the green area here which would be much easier to maintain and allow him some separation between this project and his existing building. Member Ridder asked if the applicant would be able to do all of that by just using the existing paved drive and not putting in the new one. Would you be able to eliminate the proposed new entry as Rian has suggested. Mr. Roumph asked the reasoning for that. Member Ridder stated Mr. Harkins just shared that. Harkins stated the reasoning behind the recommendation to just use one access would be the potential of turn movement conflicts on and off of 30th onto the 2 property for one. You would use probably about the same amount of concrete to pour to make a connection from this existing drive over to the slab that goes around the proposed building. If that is the case, you might as well just maintain one access point instead of developing two. You could even make one where the concrete connects to the existing drive over in here so trucks can essentially come in and out pretty quickly off the existing drive onto the slab of pavement and it leaves this area at the south untouched then and leaves it as green space so as water comes off here it has where to filter before it hits the side ditches along 30th. Member Synovec stated Mr. Roumph just stated he was going to have some green space between the existing drive. Harkins stated if the proposal is approved as it, this would be green space is what he is saying. Member Ridder stated Harkins was suggesting there could be traffic issues with cars moving in and out of both. Harkins stated there is that. You get multiple vehicles coming in and out of here and you could have potential turn conflicts. The other part of it is there is no reason in terms of conventional wisdom to believe even though that stays as green that it is not going to get driven on a lot. So even if one gate is closed, is the other one is open traffic will come in here, cross that green space or that dirt, go onto that concrete. So, why not just leave it once access, paving connected instead of driving through and creating ruts. You would eliminate the green space but you are adding some on the south side. It is not the same proportion but you are eliminating a potential greater hazard through here as well as here along 30th with turn movements. Member Sawyer asked Mr. Roumph if he did not want people coming into your existing drive now. Applicant stated they would put a fence all over here if they have to. He stated they have to separate these two projects. Member Sawyer stated what Mr. Roumph was trying to say is that’s his own personal shop and he doesn’t want 50 different people that are coming into a storage unit coming into his shop area and park on his property also. Mr. Roumph stated plus there will be video surveillance and the fence all the way down separating the two. He has enough problems with theft out there in back. He has to keep it totally separated. Planning Director Harkins stated this is staff’s first notification of the fence between the buildings unless the Building Inspector has been told of it. Applicant stated they didn’t talk about a fence. Harkins stated not telling us doesn’t help your case. It makes it a little difficult to recommend a business operation right next to your own personal self storage, it really does. Eventually you are probably going to want to take that north lot after you combine everything into one property and expand in that direction too. So then you are trying to fit and accommodate this with everything else. That makes it really difficult potentially in the long run with regard to traffic flow and access in and out. You would eventually not only have to do a fence through here you are going to have to do a fence across this way. He would almost recommend he take his existing building and put it up here at the north end of your property so it is back away from everything else but that would be cost prohibitive. Staff can live with the second access point. That’s not a problem but they just felt it would be a case of using one that’s already there rather than again building a second one and creating potential problems. Member Synovec asked Harkins if he was guessing that those two drives are going to be 20’ apart, 30’ maybe. Member Sawyer stated he was thinking it would be more than that if the whole lot is 211’. Harkins stated that new approach because it is zoned LI would under Street Department policies would 40’. Synovec asked Harkins if he would be o.k. with this additional drive, the one that is being built, moved to the west so he had more distance between the two, the existing drive and the future drive. Harkins stated you are talking about 60’ as it is proposed here, moving it west it would give you greater separation but then you are getting it closer to the adjacent property that could create some additional problems. Staff would almost recommend just leaving it in place. Chairman Sookram stated the fence puts kind of a hook on things because it wasn’t even mentioned. Planning Director Harkins stated he could make it work but he just wishes the applicant would have …..we can make it work. Harkins stated it is an interior fence essentially separating a couple of buildings. We can make it work. 3 Chairman Sookram stated we needed to make a motion then on okaying this without the condition. Moved by Sawyer, seconded by Fooken to recommend approval of the request as the blueprint shows. Roll Call Vote showed 7 ayes – 1 nay (Sookram). Motion Carried.  Consider request of Keith M. and Jacqueline A. Roumph to combine Lot 9 and Tax Lot 79 (aka Part of Lot 1), Meierhenry Subdivision to the City of Fremont, Dodge County, Nebraska into one lot. Planning Director Harkins stated these are the same two properties. This is a lot combination to take the two into one lot so this is the simpler part of the development proposal request regarding this property. Again, here is the location. The adjacent zoning. Here’s the layout of the two lots right now so what you would see is the center property line here would no longer exist as they would be combined into one lot. This is pretty similar to what the Planning Commission has done on many other occasions so staff doesn’t see any issues with the lot combination itself. Therefore, it is recommending approval. Moved by Fooken, seconded by Emanuel to recommend approval of the request. Roll Call Vote showed all members present voting aye – 8 ayes. Motion Carried.  Review of the 2013-2019 Capital Improvement Plan for conformance with the Comprehensive Plan. Planning Director Harkins stated this is an annual step that they are going to be starting to take. One of the implementation steps in the Comprehensive Plan talked about doing a Capital Improvement Plan to better coordinate planning and finances for the community and also to be a little bit more forward thinking in terms of how infrastructure needs are addressed. Harkins stated he put a little bit of background on the staff report in terms of some of the projected spending. This is a draft of the CIP in terms of some of those numbers. Right now staff is at the state of doing some final revisions as it is taken to Council so the Planning Commission is welcome to suggest changes as it is gone through. The CIP is developed as a six year document. It is designed to take multiple departments into account. Six years was set to be in conformance with the One and Six Year Street Plan that the City is required to do in order to obtain street and road funding. Harkins then went through the slide presentation illustrating the highlights of the Capital Improvement Plan. He stated staff’s recommendation is that you find this in conformance with the Comp Plan. Moved by Synovec, seconded by Emanuel to recommend approval of the Capital Improvement Plan as it is in conformance with the Comp Plan. Roll Call Vote showed all members present voting aye – 8 ayes. Motion Carried.  Study Session – Annexation Strategy. Planning Director Harkins went over the annexation strategy during the Study Session. Member Winter suggested another study session on annexation before the item comes before them. He stated that would enable them to provide answers to anybody that would ask those questions and they would know what they are talking about. Harkins stated he would also submit to them that the City Council has a retreat Saturday and annexation is one of the items they would like to look at again so they will be talking more about that then as well. Member Ridder questioned whether the Planning Commission will have another opportunity to study before public hearings. Harkins stated they would and it could definitely be brought back to them. Chairman Sookram asked that Harkins forward his presentation via email or get a printout if requested. Member Winter asked what they would do if they have an interest in the 4 property that is being annexed. Harkins stated when it comes to the Public Hearing point, the member should call is a conflict of interest and follow the procedures as part of the bylaws. Member Synovec respectfully resigned from the Planning Commission. With his pending seat on the Dodge County Board of Supervisors he feels there is a conflict of interest so he will have to resign. He has enjoyed his two plus years here. He also stated if anyone has any needs at the County level they should feel free to give him a call. Harkins stated for the benefit of the Commission members that Terry was the representative from the city’s extraterritorial jurisdiction so they would be looking for a replacement that is in kind so someone that also lives in the ETJ. If you know of someone that lives out in that two mile area that would be interested, please let the Chairman as well as the Mayor know. Meeting adjourned at 5:50 p.m. 5