Planning and Zoning Commission

Jim Liesen, Chairman Lake Havasu City Jim Harris, Vice Chairman Donald Bergen Lake Havasu City Police Facility 2360 McCulloch Blvd North Lucas Still Mychal Gorden Regular Meeting Minutes - Final Lake Havasu City, Arizona 86403 www.lhcaz.gov Neil Ott Chad Nelson, Alternate Planning and Zoning Commission Daniel McGowan, Alternate Wednesday, February 19, 2014 9:00 AM Regular Meeting 1. CALL TO ORDER The February 19, 2014, regular meeting of the Planning Commission was called to order by Chairman Liesen at 9:00 a.m. 2. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE 3. ROLL CALL 4. MINUTES A motion was made by Mr. Harris, seconded by Mr. Gorden, that the minutes from the January 15, 2014, meeting be approved. The motion carried by the following vote: Aye: 6 - Bergen, Harris, Liesen, Still, Gorden and McGowan Absent: 2 - Ott and Nelson 5. CORRESPONDENCE AND ANNOUNCEMENTS Mr. Schmeling stated that this was the first packet that was sent to the commission as part of the new Legistar program. You were sent an email that had a link on it that allowed you to get into the City's website and obtain your agenda and commission information and it is very similar to that of the City Council. I realized that none of you have had any training or any formal information given to you on that and what I plan to do at the next meeting which will take about 15 minutes or so either at the beginning or the end of the meeting and go over how you can find your way through the City website in order to get your agenda. The idea is to ultimately just send you an email with the link so that you can pull up the agenda and each individual packet with all the attachments and everything. 6. PUBLIC HEARING Lake Havasu City Page 1 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final a. ID 14-0097 To discuss possible code amendments related to the keeping of chickens on residential lots throughout the City. Mr. Liesen said that normally we have items which we vote on, but today we have two discussion items. What we will do is have staff present the items and then open it up to the public for anyone to speak on either item. At that time, please come to the podium, state your name for the record and we will give everybody three minutes or so to speak. We will keep this informal since these are not action items and because there is a State law relating to one of these items we really cannot do much, but we do want public input. Mr. Schmeling said first I will just give a little background for the benefit of those who are not following this particular topic. City leaders have received requests from City residents to allow the keeping of chickens in Lake Havasu City outside the RA zoning district which currently does allow chickens. Also, the Arizona State Legislature is in the process of reviewing Senate Bill SB 1511 which will prohibit cities from adopting zoning to forbid fowl in residential rear yards, but it will allow municipalities to regulate the number allowed and the ownership of roosters and other issues associated with the raising of chickens. Our current regulations state that with the exception of the RA district, no animals, livestock or poultry of any kind shall be raised, bred or kept on any lot. Basically, that is saying that all of the other residential lots it is prohibited; however, in the residential agricultural district, they can keep poultry. He showed a zoning map of the City and pointed out the approximately 136 RA lots in the northeast corner of the City. All of those lots are at least an acre in size. To show the potential impact, if the Legislation is passed in its current form, it will affect all of the beige color lots which is approximately 70 percent of all lots in Lake Havasu City, but it will also affect the R-2 lots and many of them are developed with single family homes, as are some R-3 and R-4 lots, so it will some of those as well. Potentially, it could affect about 90 percent of the 36,000 residential lots. The points that I would like to get out into the open today and just have discussion on and lets just assume that SB 1511 gets adopted and we are prohibited from not allowing fowl or poultry. We should look at defining poultry and fowl because the State definition as it sits now, speaks of birds raised for consumption which could include a number of different birds, such as geese, ducks, turkey, cornish hens, partridge, etc. We should also talk about accessory structures as to setbacks, separation, the location and permits. Should we require permits for chicken coops and that sort of thing. As the code currently exists, chicken coops are traditionally under 200 square feet; therefore, they would not need a building permit and typically there is a separation distance between a residential home and a chicken coop, but at this time, obviously, the code is silent because there is no need to have that. We might also want to discuss the maximum number of fowl allowed. Cities across the State vary; some have maximum of 20 to 24 and some have no limit and some limit just roosters. We might want to talk about egg sales because the citizens that approached us specifically asked about eggs, the consumption of eggs and potential sale of eggs, and then you get into the home occupation regulations and these kind of things. We might also want to talk about the mitigation of predatory animals because chickens in Lake Havasu City Page 2 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final any large number will potentially make any predatory animals more aggressive. We might also want to talk about slaughter activity because once a chicken quits laying eggs, the slaughter would be an outdoor activity and I don't know if we want that going on in our residential neighborhoods. Those are issues that we may want to discuss and get out there today to see how the public as well as the Commission feels about that. I also received two emails in the last few days, both stating that they are against this policy, but I don't know if they are totally up on the entire picture with regard to this. We do not have any policy now, but they are against having chickens in residential neighborhoods. Also, for those of you who want to track this issue, there is a website called backyardchickens.com which is kind of a forum for Arizona cities that have put down in a summary what their ordinances entail and like I said they range from allowing a maximum of 20 chickens or 24 chickens, 50 foot setbacks or 200 foot setbacks. It just depends, but most cities allow chickens in some capacity, whether it is just in an agriculatural area or large residential lots. There are not many that prohibit them straight out, but you are welcome to read them. Mr. Liesen said he has a question. If the State adopts this policy, will that nullify any City ordinance that we already have? Mrs. Garry said yes it would, anything that would conflict. Mr. Liesen said, procedurally, would it be your best advice to postpone any action on this item until after the State gets done? Mrs. Garry said she does not think that we want to go through any process of enacting a new ordinance for the City at this time. We were not sure where this was really going to go in the legislature and now it just passed the Senate 29 to 1, so it has legs and it is moving so it is more likely now to go through than we originally thought. I think it is important to get your feedback today in the event it does not pass, what direction should we go after that so we are not wasting any time today. But at this point in time we are not going to put an ordinance together and start that process until we see where this goes. Mr. Liesen asked if staff has any idea how many coops we may have in the City at this time in the areas where it is allowed? Mr. Schmeling said he has no idea. Mr. Liesen said that would make sense that there would be no code enforcement issue in those areas. Mr. Schmeling said we would have heard some complaints if there were problems. Lake Havasu City Page 3 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final Mr. Harris said this might be directed to Mrs. Garry. If we are required to accommodate this State mandate, do we not already accommodate it by already having the capabilities of raising chickens in the RA zoning district? Mrs. Garry said no, the way that the State bill is written is that any single family detached residence can. It would not be allowed in a multi-family area type of situation JH: already have, but any single family residence would be allowed to have fowl, not just chickens. Mr. Harris said we already have an ordinance that precludes pigeons. Mrs. Garry said the City does not have an ordinance specific to pigeons; the County regulates pigeons through its health ordinances. We did have the pigeon fiasco where we discussed that years ago, but that would be an issue. Mr. Harris said, for the record, he does do not get it and does not know what they are thinking. Mr. Still said he does not know where to start, but it seems today that if we are going to have to adapt to this, that we should talk about how Lake Havasu City might look at it. If there are setbacks and things we can do to protect what I think is a pretty common theme in a residential zone, then we should talk about that today. I don't read the code to say that we should have to allow chickens; it says we can't forbid fowl, so can we create some standards that can make it in line with what the intention of the zoning really is. Mr. McGowan asked if there are roosters involved in this? Mrs. Garry said part of the bill allows cities to forbid the male species unless they have no way of making noise. Mr. McGowan said that would be a terrible thing. Also, the coyote population; I live in an area where two or three coyotes come by every day and I think if you put all these little animals in peoples' back yards, it could be a big problem. The RA lots are one acre so there is not another neighbor. How about the people who bought homes here and they are only a few feet from the next home and now they've got chicken coops with 20 chickens on both sides? There are going to be a lot of people who are not happy. I don't know how we are going to address that or what it is going to do. This is going to open up a lot of questions. Also, when we went through the issue with the in-home care, that escalated into bigger things. Are goats and cows next? I don't know where this stops and it is scary. Lake Havasu City Page 4 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final Mrs. Garry said I do not know when this movement started, if people took it seriously and I don't know now if we are realizing that this is moving forward and now a lot of questions are being asked about things that have been brought up such as setbacks, chicken coops, requiring fencing, all of these things that you would think would be reasonable, but the bill doesn't allow for that. It says the municipality may limit the number of fowl and may restrict the males species unless they are incapable of making noise. That is it; that is all that it says so that brings up a lot of questions. What about other regulations to protect health and safety and whatever the case may be. I just do not know if those quesstions have been asked yet because I don't know if this has been taken seriously. I think some people and some cities may be contacting their legislators and asking these questions. If this is going to go forward and is something that the State feels strongly about, what other regulations can we have in this bill to allow the cities to put together the regulations that will at least offer some protections from the things that we fear. There is nothing that we can do as far as the State bill and where that is going, but what we can encourage people to do is if you don't like it or think it needs some more teeth or at least some guidance, you need to start contacting your representatives and making that known Mr. Still said that 29 to 1 seems awfully strong. Is there something that is behind this legally that the State is afraid of saying no to? I just don't understand, I guess. Mrs. Garry said we are kind of scrambling to catch up. Honestly, when we first saw it, we didn't believe that this was of State-wide concern. And although this might be an important local matter for us to discuss, but for the State to come in and mandate it on localities, it is surprising. This isn't something that you would think a State would take such a concern in. I am not sure what is driving it, who is behind it or what lobbyists are behind it. We are just not sure at this time, but it is very forceful. I think it is on a national level also. There is this movement and I think the theory behind the movement is good, but you are losing some of your local control in whether it is appropriate or inappropriate and what kind of measures you need to put into place to make sure you are controlling everything else. Not everyone has coyote problems, but that is something that we have here that we need to address. By having something like this come down, it is taking away some of the things that we may want or need to control some of these issues. Mr. McGowan asked if this bill is for every city in Arizona? Mrs. Garry said yes. Mr. McGowan said even Scottsdale, with $6 million homes are going to have chicken coops? And everybody in Phoenix would have chicken coops? You wouldn't be able to hear your television. I don't know where this is going or even how this got started, personally. There are a lot of small towns in Arizona where you have acreage and lots of room and you want to have chicken coops, then I understand that, but in the metropolitan areas, it just doesn't make any sense to me. That is just my personal opinion. Lake Havasu City Page 5 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final Mr. Gorden asked what can we do when the State passes a regulation like this. If we are coming up with an ordinance that allows it, and we deal with this on a lot of other subjects, but whether it is setbacks or conditional use permits, this will take a while to work out, but can we ultimately create regulations that allow it but maybe not on every single lot in town? Mrs. Garry said at this point in time, I do not know and can't give a specific answer to that. I can tell you that specifically in the bill, all it says a city may do is limit the number and limit the male species. It does not say anthing else. Then you kind of get into this analysis of what regulations do you think you can put on it before you force a challenge. During the discussion yesterday in the mock City Council with the student government, they wanted to permit it and maybe require a fee. That definitely sends up a red flag for me. That probably wouldn't go over well and that would likely be challenged by somebody saying that we are trying to circumvent the State bill. It is kind of a balancing act of what regulations do we think we could put into place before we reach a point where somebody is going to say no, we are going to challenge you. Or the bill might have more information put into it about what we can do. We just need more language. If this is going to go through, it would be nice to have more language that gives some flexibility because otherwise it is possible we could be challenged on any regulation we attempt to do. Mr. McGowan said this bill going forward, is it going to have a limit of chickens in the bill? Mrs. Garry said no, that will be up to each municipality to decide what the appropiate number is. Mr. McGowan said so we do have some kind of control, then. Mrs. Garry said there will be some control over the number, yes. Mr. McGowan said, if they limit it to five, who is going to go out and count chickens every month. Mrs. Garry said that brings up a whole other issue with code enforcement in general. Who is going to enforce the number of chickens and if you do prohibit male species, we are going to have some kind of enforcement mechanisms there. Also, this bill is specifically for consumption, so the idea that you are raising these chickens or fowl for eggs or meat for food, I don't know how all that is going to work. You raise them and then I suppose you take them to the butcher to have them slaughtered, but if you can't do that or you decide not to, what if all these chickens get set free in the wild? Then we are inviting coyotes. It would have a snowball effect. We just have not had an opportunity to wrap our minds around this. Mr. Liesen said he would suggest that the word "fear" has been mentioned. I think there is a lot of fear around this that is a lot of false evidence appearing real. We worry about things like disease, but where do chickens come from? They come from coops. I think we are kind of fearful about having two or three hundred chickens next door and coyotes every night, but I would guess that most people don't have that intention. They want a couple of chickens and a few free eggs once in a while. Lake Havasu City Page 6 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final Mr. McGowan said what if they start selling chickens out of the garage or a dozen eggs? Mr. Liesen said that is something that we will all address at a later time and that is in the law that you can't sell them. Mr. Gorden asked if City Council been in touch with any other cities in terms of what they are trying to do proatively? Mrs. Garry said not to my knowledge. Again, this is kind of catching us and we are all a little surprised that it is moving forward with the force that it has. Mr. Bergen said the only comment I wIould have at this time is that we have had a lot of comment about the Federal government infringing on State's rights. think now we have states infringing on municipal rights and I don't think that they should be involved in this at all. Mr. Liesen opened the meeting to the public. Ms. Cassandra Mooneyham said I wanted to bring a little more background information to the state-wide bill. This originated in a district that has had an on-going battle. Many residents have wanted to have chickens and their City Council hasn't allowed it for several years. So they felt that they needed to go to a higher level and they contacted their representative and he brought it forward. I am not supportive of this being a state-wide bill. I believe in local government and I believe in controlling it here at our local level. With that said, though, I am in support of chickens and I would just like to bring up a couple of points. I am not in support of roosters. Chickens are no more noise than a dog and I think all of us have had that neighbor with the barking dog that never stops. Chickens are not that noisy. They do not produce any more waste than a dog would and their waste can be used for such things as compost and it can be useful. I also think that we should keep in mind that because we allow chickens in Lake Havasu, that doesn't mean that everybody is going to go out and get a chicken or 20 chickens or however many are allowed. It is still somthing that I imagine would be very limited and you wouldn't see much buy-in to it. I think it is important to limit the number, but also to remember that chickens are social creatures and so you need two chickens for the health of the animals. I also think it is important to look at it from an educational aspect. When we have a food culture today where children don't know where our food comes from. I encounter children constantly who are bewildered about what a steak is or what a chicken is or what eggs are and I think that is kind of strange, that we don't know where our food comes from. It also provides opportunities for participation in things like 4-H. Most families can't afford horses or animals like that, but this gives an opportunity for chickens. But that also brings us to rabbits and I believe our current City ordinance doesn't allow rabbits and I think that might be something we would like to consider as well. I believe that is the majority of my points for today. I think it is appropriate to limit the numbers and to put some sort of regulation, but at the same time Lake Havasu City Page 7 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final we can consider things like the ability of families to provide for themselves and have a better understanding of the care and raising of our own food. Mr. Harris asked what district was it that was looking for stronger teeth so that they could have chickens? Ms. Mooneyham said I cannot recall, but it was in the greater Phoenix area and I believe the senators name was Coleman or something. Mr. Herschel Cecil said I really question that fact that if you allow this that code enforcement is going to be responsible for monitoring the numbers and the fact that it is a nuisance or not because I had enough experience with the dogs that bark constantly and nothing gets done, with the junk cars that are parked in people's front yards on my street that have been there for four or five years that don't have licenses on them and don't have windows in them. The guy comes out to discuss it with the homeowner because I called him on it and he says that if you just put it on a licensed trailer you can do that and it sat that way for another couple years until he moved. I have another neighbor that has accessory structures that he has started and never finished and it has been over seven years. It still has a plywood roof on it and it is not finished. These chicken coops are not only going to be noisy, they are not only going to smelly, they are going to haphazard, unfinished messes and it is going to devalue the whole neighborhood worse than it is now with the junk and the cars and everything else. I know it says will be kept away from primary residence, but they are going to put in on the far back corner of their lot which is going to be right next to someone's yard. If you have a pool in your back yard and you want to sit out by your pool, you are going to be smelling and listening to chickens. I live close to a sewer dump station and I get to smell that and that is nothing like chickens, believe me. If you haven't lived in an area where they raise chickens, you have no idea how bad that smells. I think the thing to do now if you are against this is to really put some pressure on the legislature. I don't know what they are thinking about doing this. I understand that Kelly Ward was supportive of it and that is baffling to me, but that is all I have to say. Mr. Clayton Seagal said I live over on El Porto Lane. My first though here is the health issue. There are some species that share communicable diseases with human beings. With chickens, eggs, pigeons, whatever, you have avian TB. I grew up with chickens on two sides of my house when I was a kid and pigeons across the railroad tracks. I carry encapsulated TB virus in my lungs right now from avian TB. I cannot get a negative TB skin test. That can break loose at any time; I'm getting old enough and my lungs are in bad enough shape that it will kill me. I really don't want somebody next door to me with chickens. Not only because of the communicable diseases; we have one problem already, we have Valley Fever. Avian TB is carried by fowl feces that blow around with the dust. So now we are going to allow another whole series of illnesses to our children and ourselves by having chickens in the City. There is a reason for livestock being outside Lake Havasu City Page 8 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final of the City and we all know what it is - it is a health hazard and it is a smell hazard. I have two dogs that came back from Africa with us and they grew up chasing chickens. If somebody raises chickens next to my house, the next thing I am going to end up with is lawsuits because one of the chickens flew over the property line and my dogs killed it and ate it. They are real nice right now because they chase the pigeons out of the yard. I can't take my BB gun and get rid of them, so the dogs take care of it. The only thing is, the coyotes do come through the wash behind my house every night and the dogs howl at the coyotes and the coyotes howl back at the dogs, but it only happens when they walk through. But I find enough feathers in the empty lot next to me where the coyotes have gotten these pigeons that are roosting in the bushes at night. We are just adding one thing on top of another. There are very good reasons for not having livestock in the City and once that chicken ordinance opens the door, the next guy is going to want to have a pot-bellied pig and now you are going to have trichinosis problems with kids running around in bare feet. Take your pick; there are reasons for not having livestock in the City and I didn't buy this lot and spend all this money on building my house and improving it to have somebody come down to City Hall and get a permit to have three chickens in their backyard only to find out that they have 15 and I call Code Enforcement and the code is enforced like they enforce the lighting ordinance and the junk car ordinance. When I was building my house, I had Code Enforcement over there all the time because the guy behind me was a complainer. Now they have all disappeared and we don't have those people any more. I go down Saratoga at night and we may as well have city street lights because everybody has lights that are shining out on the street; nobody follows the lighting ordinance and no code enforcers take care of it. So thinking that Code Enforcement can handle any kind of a chicken ordinance, forget that, it isn't going to happen. We know that and we're fooling ourselves if we think it will. Most people enforce code with the city police force. We got rid of our code enforcers. I am just totally flat-out amazed that Kelly Ward with the physician's training is even contemplating an ordinance that puts chickens in an area with young children and lung diseases and whatever. When I was living in Wisconsin, the doctor said go to Arizona for the dry air, it is good for your lungs. And now we are here putting chickens next to my house; no thanks. We have to be proactive. This City has to do something proactive to defeat anything that the State is going to do. If we have to do it by lobbying, ok. This afternoon I am ready to write a letter to Kelly and express these views. I think the majority of people in town feel the same way I do and I think that the City has to take something that is proactive to stop this thing. I don't know who came up with this crazy idea, but every city throughout our history has moved livestock out of the city, both for the noise and smell problems and the health problems. If you want to teach your kids about where the food comes from, take them to a petting zoo or take them out to visit somebody on a farm, but we don't want chickens next door. I think my dogs would really enjoy having chickens next door, but I wouldn't enjoy the lawsuit and neither would my insurance company. That is my feeling and I think it is probably shared by a lot more people than I have talked to in the last couple of days which is quite a few. Jim Galliet said I think we have to understand that being proactive is somewhat helpful, but if the Lake Havasu City Page 9 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final law has the wheels or the legs that Ms. Garry said it does, we have to come from the aspect that it is going to be passed and how we are going to deal with it. I was raised on a chicken ranch and I know chickens, I know the problems they can create, I know the good that they can create. But here in the residential area, I think we have to look at ways to attack this law, statutorily. We have to come up with setbacks; what about a setback that a chicken coop has to be 150 to 200 feet from the next occupied dwelling? So if my neighbor has a chicken coop, it has to be that far from my house. That would pretty much eliminate most of the residential areas from having chicken coops. I don't care if they put it next to their house; I don't care if they put it up under their patio, just keep it 150 feet from mine. If the State law gives us an opportunity to regulate the number of chickens, then that is what we must do. The State doesn't say we have to give them 20 or 25 chickens; we can limit it to 2, 3 or 4. If the State gives the cities the authority to regulate the number of chickens, lets regulate the number. As far as disease and everything goes, that I am not an expert on, but I will tell you one thing I do know about chickens. They are affected by the heat, dramatically. On the chicken ranch that I was raised on in the greater city of Chino, California, once it got into the mid-90s, we had to turn on sprinklers and large fans and we would still lose 8 to 10 percent of our laying hens. If they are going to have chickens in this City, why not enforce humane coops. The coops are going to have to have a cooling system; they are going to have a fan system. I don't know how an unprotected chicken at 120 degrees in this City is going to survive and it is inhumane to have that chicken die from heat exhaustion. Go to Phoenix where they have the big commercial outfits; they have cooling systems, irrigation systems, fan systems, in order to keep their chickens alive. We can accept that the law is here, but work within the guidelines and the openings the State gives us. Reglate how far the coops have to be; regulate the size and condition of the coop; and regulate the humane treatment of those chickens. And every neighbor in this City who has a chicken next door, can be the eyes and ears of reporting this. We just need somebody in the City to go out and enforce those rules. Mr. Earl Lawrence said I came from Southern California and I do know the area. Most of the cities have welcomed the housing market and the chickens all left. We live, I believe, in a resort city and I don't know of any resort cities in the world that have chickens or the amount of chickens that the State of Arizona wants to put in the cities. If we have X number of lots, multiply that by 5 and that is the number of chickens you have to anticipate being allowed here in the City. I don't understand it; I don't like it, but along with Mr. Galliet, if we can put some teeth into what is actually legal and move those chicken coops 200 feet away from my house, they also have to be 200 feet away from the people that want chickens, you would not have very many chickens. If we have to bite the bullet and allow chickens, I would like to have stiff standard rules and have them enforced. Mr. Ralph Chandless said most of you know how I feel; I have emailed you and my letter to the editor explained my feelings. I think that as far as the State mandate, we need to fund it ourselves since they are not giving us funding and I think licenses, just like a dog license, to have a chicken in your yard so the City knows where to go to monitor those chickens and make sure that you are Lake Havasu City Page 10 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final within those regulations, is not a bad idea. The City is struggling right now to fund its animal code enforcement program and we need to fund it with license fees. That is my suggestion. I agree with all the other people who spoke about sanitation and coyote problems. I live in the center of town and I have coyotes giving out litters every year right in the wash at the back of my house and I have seen them kill animals, domestic animals, and I have seen them attack people. And just like a trapper does, you put more bait out there, you are going to get more of your coyotes coming in. Ms. Brenley Mosley said I just want to speak out about having the chickens. I am also against the State law. I think it should be left to the cities, especially with the diversity of the cities. I think we should put limits on the parcel lot and how many, but I still think chickens would be a great thing. I would love to have two chickens in my yard for my kids to raise eggs and to eat healthy. I also want the City to remember that there might have been a lot of emails that were sent because a lot of young families are not here because they both work, so I just want to make sure that we are not just listening to these people and the emails that were received on this issue. Mr. John Kendig said a lot of the problems that people have spoken about already, our family has faced with lung problems caused by chickens. Both my wife and her sister have that problem. One of the most vivid memories I have, and my attention was brought to the forefront by your discussion points, the very last one. Not too long ago, there was an outcry about the feeding of certain animals to other animals and the whole world was up in arms. My most vivid memory as a kid was that my neighbors had chickens and once a week, the wife of the household went out a killed the chickens. Now, if you know anything about it and I won't give you any details about it, I grew up in a butcher shop and I know about killing animals and the humane way of doing that, but when your neighbor starts slinging chickens around and then they run around the yard for a half hour before they die, you are going to have an outcry like this City has never heard. And if you want children to know about chickens, our community thought that would be a great idea, so the local theaters gave away chickens on Saturday. Red ones, blue ones, they were all dyed and they ended up in somebody's basement or back yard or dinner table and it just grew to the point where our city said no more chickens. Those are farm animals. We don't allow horses and cows and we don't allow chickens. Things to think about. Mr. Victor Otto said my wife and I are long time residents of the beautiful city of Lake Havasu. We are absolutely opposed to rezoning of the residential properties to the RA zone for the benefit of raising chicken, fowls or any other domestic animals. I am sure that Mr. Robert McCulloch, the great visionary and developer of Lake Havasu City along with his partner C. V. Woods, certainlly did not have that intent in mind. They wanted to provide a beautiful city for people to be able to enjoy the wonderful weather that we have. That's all I have to say. Mr. Liesen closed the public hearing. Lake Havasu City Page 11 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final Mr. Schmeling said if the Commission is done with the public portion of the meeting and discussing this item as well, at this point, I think it was expressed earlier that there is really no desire on the Commission's part to give direction with regard to the possibility of creating a code section until we know for certain that this is actually adopted and we know what we are dealing with. Mr. Still said I think it would be wise to prepare ourselves for this in that we really don't know these questions that were brought up in terms of health. I don't really have an answer to that. It would be nice to know that when we have to make a decision if there truly are health ramifications and if there is a scientific link there. As far as setbacks and limiting the numbers and so forth, I would like to set up a structure and at least know what we might be able to do with that when the time comes. I understand that is very difficult without having the law actually passed. If we can do things that are specifically meant to undermine the law, that is not going to work very well. The way the law reads is that we can't forbid, so it seems to me that we shouldn't create any laws for allowing or for forbidding, but we should have other things in place to protect health and safety and so forth. Mr. Gorden said along with that, I think there were some good points brought up and comments on how it could potentially be regulated. It would be nice if a lot of these topics were something we have dealt before and if there were some examples that staff could bring to us from other cities that regulate them, even if it is not city-wide, but in various zoning districts so we can understand what does work in other places in terms of setbacks or health-related code issues and that sort of thing. If we are going to be moving toward putting an actual code in place, some background information would be very helpful to me in terms of what we can and can't do. Mr. Liesen said I agree. With the way the State legislature works, things go back and forth from committee, things get added and things get subtracted all the time and things just die and sometimes substitute language gets thrown in, so there are is a long way for this procedure to go before it becomes a law. I actually sympathize with everybody. I think everybody had a lot of interesting points. We had nine people come forward with different things to say, all universally saying they didn't like the State law. But everybody likes chicken; I know what I'm having for dinner. I wish I could have chickens; I would love to have a couple of chickens and free eggs, but in a city which is kind of like a large HOA that has been intact since 1970 something, how can you just impose one thing onto another like that. This is just the same thing when people move into the area next to the pig farm or out next to the airport and then complain about the noise. We've got an established situation and now people are moving in and wanting to change it. I don't know how this is going to work at the State legislature, but I would encourage us to all think about what we can do legislatively when the time comes in terms of limitations, distances, etc. The setback issue is an excellent point. We did that with the cell tower ordinance. Geographically you have to be of a certain size because of the height of the tower and I think that was a very effective method to use. Lake Havasu City Page 12 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final We will have to tackle this when the time comes. Mrs. Garry said beside the State bill going through, there was a request to the City to allow chickens in residential areas, so are you just declining to make any comment at this time, or you have no recommendation or anything? This was originally brought to you based on inquiries that came to the City Council. I hate to have this just left hanging. Mr. Liesen said maybe we should poll the commissioners without a vote to see how they feel? I am not opposed to chickens in residential areas, but I am extremely sympathetic to Code Enforcement and the neighbors and the coyote problem that we have, so I think we should be very careful about whatever we do. Mr. McGowan said I did not know that there were already individuals that have applied. I think we have to be very careful about the whole thing. We have to think this think out. Obviously, the majority of the people who live here are not going to have chickens. There will be a small amount of people who want them, but it is going to affect a great number of people. I don't even know if you could go so far as to say home values. I don't know that I would want to buy a house with chicken coops on each side. At least I would know going in that they were there, but the people who bought their house already would not. We are here to protect all the people; I feel that is our job. Fair and equal for everybody as best we can but I don't know how this is ever going to be fair and equal for the population. That is an issue that I don't even know that we can correct or do anything about. Mr. Still said I grew up on a farm. My stepdad still raises chickens and I raised pigs in 4-H and the basis for wanting this is a good one, but I think it is discriminatory if chickens should be raised and pigs shouldn't based on the only idea that people want them. A pig certainly provides a better feasible livestock if you are trying to help with your grocery bills and provide an organic meal. Goats provide milk. There is an argument to extend this well beyond just fowl and I just don't see where you draw that line. I think the point about people moving into a neighborhood where they have an expectation of having privacy and I think that needs to be protected and I am sorry that it outweighs these other things. But there are places in the City where you can buy a lot if that is a primary concern and we could even see co-ops of people if people buy lots and raise chickens for their kids. There has to be another solution rather than infringing on people's rights, in my opinion. Mr. Harris said no matter what the reason for wanting this, I think that is somewhat irrelevant. We have zoning ordinances for a reason and I would stand firm on being opposed to the raising of livestock, fowl or whatever in an urban residential setting. I would not want it next to my home even though I live in the RA district. Mr. Bergen said I still cannot understand why the State wants to get into this. Certainly they have Lake Havasu City Page 13 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final more important things to do than this. They are trying to say what the municipal governments should be doing and I don't think that is correct. What is proper in Lake Havasu City and Phoenix is different than what might be appropriate in Bouse or a small rural community and they are trying to make an overall law for all municipalities and that is wrong. I think this should not be a State law. Mr. McGowan said I have one more question and correct me if I am wrong. The RA lots are one acre? Mr. Schmeling said yes, the minimum lot size in the RA zone is one acre. Mr. McGowan said he can understand if they are one acre, you can build a house and put a chicken coop in and it will be a long way away from your neighbor. But where a lot of these people live and where I live, they put three or four houses on an acre, so there isn't going to be any room anywhere. I don't know how you can put a structure 200 feet away from anybody's home? I just don't understand how the State can even consider this. They live in an even bigger metropolitan area than we do. I don't even know how this has legs, Mrs. Garry. It blows my mind and I think it did yours, too. There is a lot of open land in Arizona, but here, I couldn't agree more and I don't think there is any way to stop it once you open the door, how do you turn down the cow and how do you say no to the next animal. They have those large birds that lay eggs, ostriches, so why don't we have them? I'm trying to make light with this because it is a serious problem and I agree with Mr. Bergen that the State is pushing this problem onto us doesn't make any sense. arry: beside the State Mr. Gorden said I would agree with all the comments from my fellow commissioners. We have in our code that it is allowed in the RA district. I don't know the county's code, but I would assume that there are options outside of the city limits if you want to raise chickens and other such animals for consumption or hobby or whatever the case may be. It doesn't fit and it opens a can of worms we don't want to open at this time. If we are mandated to deal with it here in the future by the State, then we will have to roll up our sleeves and figure it out, but at this time, I don't think it is something we want to try and tackle. Mr. Liesen asked Mrs. Garry if she feels that is a comfortable poll. Mrs. Garry said she does, thank you. b. ID 14-0098 To discuss possible amendments to the pool and spa regulations contained in Section 14.30.090 to allow pool alarms as an acceptable safety option for doors that access residential pools. Mr. Schmeling stated that this item was brought up by one of the Commission members. I will start off with the current code language in Section 14.30.090B7. The City regulates pool enclosures and Lake Havasu City Page 14 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final basically it reads the same or similar to almost every other zoning code in the State in that it requires self-closing, self-latching doors, opening outward from the pool. The latch has to be 54 inches above the grade of the exterior enclosure. Some cities also allow alarms as well, some cities allow both and some cities do not allow alarms at all. I did a survey of just over a dozen communities and found that three of those allowed alarms as an alternative to the 54 inch latch above the grade. The Fire Department did a more extensive search and they looked at 20 different communities and found seven that allowed them. The Fire Department recommended that we just stay with our current ordinance and not allow alarms as an alternative, but allowing it in addition to the safety latches. Now, I don't know of any studies that have been done or anything as to whether pool alarms are more effective or less effective, but I can tell you that the State has pool regulations and the majority of the cities have regulations that read identical to one another and on average less than 50 percent of the cities in Arizona allow pool alarms as an alternative. That is basically what I have and I will let Mr. Harris give his summary of why he asked for this information to come before the Commission. Mr. Harris said the origin of this request is, having been building homes here since the inception of this ordinance, it has always been difficult to alarm a patio door. The code requires self-closing, self-latching (I said difficult to alarm it; it is difficult to comply with the code on a patio door). They are large and heavy with big glass and we have seen a lot more patio door applications with larger doors and it is almost impossible to make these self-closing, self-latching to comply with the code. So there are other municipalities in the State, i.e. Scottsdale and some of those that do have a lot of homes with these types of applications that do have an alternate method of compliance and that is the alarm method. I thought it might be a good solution to include that in our ordinance because it is something that has been difficult to do since the inception of our pool code in 1991, I think it was. That is the reason for the request. Mr. McGowan said I have a question and this is the first I have heard about this. I have a pool. Are you talking about the fence around the pool itself? My sister in Bakersfield has a big 7-foot fence and she has to have a pool fence around the pool. I don't have a fence around my pool; I have two exits from my house to the pool area. The handles to open the door are up high so a little kid can't get to them. But when my grandkids came, they figured out a way to put a chair there and got to the door. This is new to me and I'm just asking because I don't know. Mr. Harris asked Mr. Schmeling to explain the basics of the pool enclosure code, fence versus direct access from a residence. Mr. Schmeling said we are not talking about the fences or anything today, but the City code does have a section that talks about the enclosure which is either a perimeter wall of some sort and/or a four-foot fence between the house and the pool itself. You can have a perimeter fence just around the house and the pool itself; you can have a perimeter fence just around the pool and have a Lake Havasu City Page 15 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final complete enclosure with a gate. This doesn't have anything to do with the house itself. All we are talking about is the one small portion of the code that specifically deals with the doors that lead from the house to the pool area and that would include whether it comes out of a bedroom or a main room. Mr. McGowan says one of my doors comes from the master bedroom and the other one comes from the dining area to the pool. Mr. Schmeling said it sounds like your doors comply because they have the elevated handle and some kind of a latching mechanism. Mr. Harris said if they are self-closing. Mr. McGowan said they do not. Mr. Harris said then they don't comply. Mr. Schmeling said what we have allowed traditionally in Lake Havasu City because the sliding glass doors are heavy and usually do not self-close, we have allowed the screen door with a return mechanism on it to be a self-closing, self-latching, with a high handle to meet the code requirements. I think what Mr. Harris is suggesting is that on a lot of these custom homes and getting into different sizes and shapes of doors and access-ways into pools, that it is becoming more and more difficult to retrofit those with a high handle or self-latching because some of those are not made to do that. I noticed that just looking at the houses in the valley, the higher-end subdivisions or the designer homes, many of them do allow alarms as an alternative and I think it is for that very reason. Mr. Harris said no patio doors are designed to self-close, self-latch, whether it is a 3-foot wide or a 6-foot wide in a basic residential home here in town or when you get into multiple sliding panels. None of them self-close and self-latch, so this would be an alternative to having the barrier intact to have the door locked. When the door is unlocked, the alarm goes off. That is what other municipalities allow. Mr. McGowan said I think this is a good idea. Mr. Gorden said I would agree with Mr. Harris. I have been involved in a lot of construction of homes and pools in this town and in the county and the issue is the same. The reason I like the alarm is at least the mechanism is in place because what happens because of this code, is that these homes get built, the pools go in and the self-closing screens and doors go in and the minute all of the inspections are done, the self-closing stuff comes off and now the home is not protected at all. You can do the same with an alarm; you can de-activate it, but at least the mechanism is there and has been put in place. If the owner chooses to de-activate it, that is their choice. But if they have kids, there is the alarm for protection. I think the alarm is a very important part of the code to give flexibility but still meet the safety concerns. Lake Havasu City Page 16 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final Mr. Harris said all this would take would be a very minor amendment to the code; maybe one or two sentences to allow this aspect to our existing pool code. Mr. Liesen opened the meeting to the public. No one spoke. Mr. McGowan said he is fine with it. Mr. Still said it makes common sense and he leans toward Mr. Harris's opinion and the experts in the field. We are only protecting people from themselves with the code as it stands, anyway. However, with that said, the Fire Marshall's concerns do concern me because they are ultimately the ones in charge of safety. But if other cities are living with it and as Mr. Gorden said, I go out and see houses all the time and in a lot of cases, those alarms aren't hooked up any more. An alarm is very annoying if you forget to shut a door, but anything else that was put in place might not be there, either. Personally, I put an additional fence around my pool when I had kids of the age who could have fallen in. There was no way they could have gotten inside that fence. I still think this is a good alternative. Mr. Harris said I am all for putting some sort of verbiage in the ordinance to accommodate this situation. I think it would go a lot further to preclude people from immediately taking off the self-closing screens and latches. I think the alarm would be left intact and would be a viable solution to this. Mr. Liesen said I agree. Mr. Gorden said I agree and I think there are a number of codes out there that have a similar thing intact and I don't know if someone wants to make a motion to that effect or not. Another big part of this is that we live in an environment where the weather is so beautiful that we want the doors and windows open to enjoy it and to have self-closers forced to be slamming on you and be closed is against the lifestyle that we are all trying to enjoy here. I think the alarm is a great alternative and we just need to craft some language that can be added as an option to this code. Mr. Schmeling said, to summarize, the direction to staff would be to create language to allow alarms as an acceptable alternative to the self-closing, self-latching, at least 54 inches above; is that correct? Mr. Harris said I would like to further narrow that to sliding glass doors, not hinged doors. I think we already have appropriate mechanisms for hinged doors. Mr. Schmeling said it would be for only that case of a sliding glass door. Mr. Harris said only for large, stacking sliding glass doors. Lake Havasu City Page 17 Printed on 3/19/2014 Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes - February 19, 2014 Final Mr. Liesen said I agree. It is that the industry doesn't have an adequate solution. Mr. Schmeling said I will bring that language back at a future meeting. 7. CALL TO PUBLIC None. 8. FUTURE MEETING Mr. Liesen said the next regular meeting is scheduled for March 5, 2014. Do we have anything for that meeting? Mr. Schmeling said at this point, there is nothing for that agenda. 9. ADJOURNMENT The meeting was adjourned at 10:13 a.m. ___________________________________________________ Jim Liesen, Chairman ___________________________________________________ Jean Vinson, Recording Secretary Lake Havasu City Page 18 Printed on 3/19/2014