Planning and Zoning Commission

Lake Havasu City Jim Liesen, Chairman Mychal Gorden, Vice-Chairman Lake Havasu City Police Facility Don Bergen 2360 McCulloch Blvd North Doug Hardy Special Meeting Minutes - Final Lake Havasu City, Arizona 86403 www.lhcaz.gov Dan McGowan Chad Nelson Lucas Still Planning and Zoning Commission Christy Cunningham, Alternate John Kendig, Alternate Allen Windholz, Alternate Wednesday, April 29, 2015 9:00 AM Special Meeting 1. CALL TO ORDER Chairman Liesen called the meeting to order at 9:00 a.m. 2. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Chairman Liesen lead in the Pledge of Allegiance. 3. ROLL CALL Mychal Gorden participated telephonically. Present: 9- Donald Bergen, Jim Liesen, Chad Nelson, Lucas Still, Mychal Gorden, Dan McGowan, John Kendig, Christy Cunningham and Doug Hardy Absent: 1- Allen Windholz 5. CORRESPONDENCE AND ANNOUNCEMENTS None 6. PUBLIC HEARING ID 15-0131 Planning Commission Hearing to Review and Discuss Concerns and Comments Regarding the General Plan Update from March 17th and 18th Public Meetings and Possible Recommendation to City Council Mr. Schmeling thanked the Chairman and informed the Commission that Darcie White and Don Elliott with Clarion Associates were participating telephonically. He explained today’s meeting is to raise the comfort level of the Commission with the General Plan so that ultimately it can get a vote and move forward to the City Council for their ultimate review and approval. Lake Havasu City Page 1 Printed on 5/20/2015 Planning and Zoning Commission Special Meeting Minutes - Final April 29, 2015 Mr. Schmeling began a PowerPoint presentation including narrative and information touching on the following key points: • General Plan Update Work Plan • Current General Plan • New General Plan Elements • Opportunities to Participate • Written Comments Received • Community Vision Statement Mr. Schmeling stated that Mr. Still provided written comments regarding land use, capacities, ratios, market, etc. There were recommendations made as a result of that but I am going to let Darcie talk about the capacities and projections and how she handled that and then I will return to the presentations other points. Ms. White addressed the following topics, which resulted from questions raised at the last Commission meetings: • Growth projections • Capacities • Detailed actual market demand study (not in scope of this project) • Proposal to add densities to land use categories • Proposal to remove references to ultimate population numbers • Clarified the proposed adoption draft of the General Plan has flexibility within the land use categories to accommodate the ebbs and flows of the market Following Ms. White’s comments, Chairman Liesen posed several questions to staff and Clarion: • How do we predict how many additional single family residences will be built on multi-family properties? • Regarding commercial development, the draft General Plan says the developer pays for it, but the City infrastructure will be provided. We currently have several commercial projects where the applicant is being told; no you don’t have that access. How do we address these issues in our General Plan now so that we have something more realistic for 10 more years? • Have you seen the email from the AZ State Land Department regarding combining Resort-Related Mainland and Resort-Related Island? Ms. White responded that the need for reinvestment in infrastructure is a very good point. I think trying to come up with a specific number for those is not something that we can get to. What you need is to have a policy focus on upgrading the infrastructure in those particular locations. That question had not come up in the context of our early discussions so we didn’t focus specifically on that. Certainly in terms of implementation strategies that may be something the City wants to take a closer look at in terms of the overall infrastructure needs. We can’t pinpoint what that number is going to be. Lake Havasu City Page 2 Printed on 5/20/2015 Planning and Zoning Commission Special Meeting Minutes - Final April 29, 2015 Ms. White stated that Mr. Schmeling would be circling back to address the State Land email. Mr. Still asked if it would it benefit us to disallow down zoning from an R-3 or an R-4 standpoint to preserve some of those multi-family areas that are being built out as single family. Ms. White responded you could certainly discourage it but there will be opportunities come up that you may want to consider. A policy direction to try to preserve as many of those areas as you can would be a reasonable approach. Mr. Elliott added it is hard to prohibit it in the plan. The plan can’t prohibit Council from doing what it wants to do. We can discourage it in the R-3 and R-4 context. The R-M is what we are calling it now. There being no further questions at this point, Mr. Schmeling continued the PowerPoint slideshow including narrative and information on the following key points: • Clarion Summary of Comments Received • Email Comments from State Land Department o Department Mission Statement o Urban containment boundary text o Description text to distinguish State Land Department from other agencies o Request to combine Resort-Related Mainland and Resort-Related Island and extend it over all of the trust land except the existing RV parks and the Nautical Inn Mr. Schmeling’s narrative included recommending accepting three of the four requested changes from the State Land Department. He recommends including the Department Mission Statement, urban containment boundary text and the text language to distinguish the State Land Department from other agencies. Mr. Schmeling provided a detailed history and definition of the Resort-Related Mainland and Resort-Related Island categories and how they came into existence. His recommendation is not to combine these categories as the State Land Department has requested. Staff's recommendation is to change the designation of the State Trust land on the island from from its current designation of Resort-Related to Resort-Related Island, giving them an expanded option of uses. Chairman Liesen had questions/comments regarding the following key points: • Requested clarification of history re: cap numbers for Resort-Related Mainland and Resort-Island Island • Nautical Estates impact on capped condo numbers • Existing map and proposed map as it relates to open recreation • Personal opinion that State Lands in trying to justify a residential push on the island Lake Havasu City Page 3 Printed on 5/20/2015 Planning and Zoning Commission Special Meeting Minutes - Final April 29, 2015 • Concern State Lands may not be interested in combining parcels on the island • Regarding Resort-Related Island, does the draft General Plan have capacity to encourage medium to large resort development Discussion on the above topics continued, including Mr. Liesen, Mr. Schmeling, Ms. White, and Mr. Elliott. Following the detailed discussion, Ms. White stated we are looking at the Resort-Related Island definition and it is a pretty broad definition as it stands so I think as you proposed if you went forward with the Resort-Related Island you would have a lot of flexibility in there to do exactly what Commissioner Liesen described. Alternate Commission Member John Kendig requested to address the Commission. Mr. Kendig posed concerns regarding the race track beside Crazy Horse Campground and the potential impact that could have on future developers looking for land to develop. Discussion on this topic continued including Mr. Still, Mr. Nelson, and Mr. Schmeling. Mr. Bergen referred to one of the sentences in his written comments regarding public lands. I would encourage the City to explore potential reassignment or transfer of State and Federal lands to City owned land for public or private use. I think this would be a good goal to mention in the Plan. Mr. Schmeling responded that if that is the desire of the Commission we can put that language in there. Just so that we understand it will be expensive if we start down that path with discussing with the State Trust about potential purchase from Lake Havasu City. But yes, we can put that in there as a goal. Chairman Liesen opened the public hearing. Laura Smith addressed the Commission with concerns that historically, the State Land Department has not made efforts to comply with the local General Plan. Regarding the request for Resort-Related Mainland, she is not in favor of that. Ms. Smith asked why are we moving from our Development Code, the land use classifications and our allowable zoning districts. I would prefer that these not be in our General Plan for the citizens to vote on. I would rather it remain in our Development Code which in my perspective is where it belongs. Mr. Elliott responded that we find it is very unusual to put into a Development Code the Plan classifications and align them. I know that you have that in your Development Code; very early in the process we did that. The way most Plans and Codes work is that the Plan is giving you advice to help guide the decisions of the Development Code. The alignment between specific land use Lake Havasu City Page 4 Printed on 5/20/2015 Planning and Zoning Commission Special Meeting Minutes - Final April 29, 2015 designations and the zoning districts is usually not a regulatory matter. Mr. Elliott provided a detailed explanation surrounding the alignment between the Plan and the Code. In summary he stated the solution may be to take the column of the zone districts out of the table in the General Plan. Diane Klostermeier addressed the Commission and stated concern for the zoning changes on the map. She stated I think having this chart is wrong. It should be in the Development Code itself not in the General Plan. Ms. Klostermeier continued with additional comments on the above mentioned topic. Chairman Liesen closed the public hearing. Mr. Schmeling asked if there was any additional discussion regarding any of the elements that were discussed today and/or a recommendation to move forward. I am going to add at this point that if the Planning Commission’s level of comfort with the document is such and you are ready to move forward with a recommendation to Council, there are things that you need to include in your recommendation. • Amendment or change to the Vision Statement • State Land Mission Statement information • State Land urban boundary information • Resort-Related Island State Trust holdings • Table that we just discussed, to leave it as is, or to remove the zoning district portion Chairman Liesen thanked Mr. Schmeling but stated I am hoping we can get to some of the other points before we are ready to get to that. Chairman Liesen referred the comment summary and a comment made regarding Chapter 5. Housing and Neighborhoods. Regarding mixed housing, without any changes to the draft General Plan as it is written, does it show flexibility to have the loose type of development we have had in addition to planned developments. Ms. White responded that yes it does. In response to that comment, there has been some ongoing uneasiness related to what is old and what is new in the Plan, so what we have done is try to clarify that further. Additional discussion on this topic continued between Chairman Liesen and Ms. White. Chairman Liesen opened the public hearing for additional public input. Lake Havasu City Page 5 Printed on 5/20/2015 Planning and Zoning Commission Special Meeting Minutes - Final April 29, 2015 Mr. Craig Geary addressed the Council with a request to change the R-1 City owned parcels to parks & open space designation. He stated that basically, my vision is to have those parcels identified as open space and change them from yellow to green. Further discussion continued with Mr. Geary, Mr. Liesen, Mr. Gorden, Mr. Still, and Mr. Schmeling detailing the current policy direction of City Council with regard to those parcels and the processes in place currently and hypothetical processes if future changes were to occur. Ms. White addressed the Commission to clarify that the existing policy in the proposed draft Plan, if you look at page five of the comment summary, it does call out this particular comment that was received and what the language is now, so that may help you as you deliberate further. At the conclusion of discussion on this topic, Mr. Gorden stated I would be all for some statement encouraging the development of open space and potentially through the use of some of those parcels. Laura Smith returned to the podium as asked why this meeting is a Special Meeting when the Commission called for a work session. Kelly Garry responded that this is called a Special Meeting because it is not at the time and the place that is stated within the City Code. It is called a Special Meeting for that purpose, but otherwise for all intents and purposes, it is a work session. Commission members provided input regarding their support of the summary comments document. Following their discussion, Mr. Still gave the following direction to staff and Clarion: • Change the Mission Statement to the proposed Mission Statement that was worked on by the Committee • Change the Resort-Related Island for State Land purposes and exclude those parks as suggested • Change the table regarding land use and total build-out etc. to include the column that would show the existing densities and remove the column with total population • Include a statement in the General Plan regarding the promotion of developing open lands for the betterment of the City and citizens • Regarding the zoning table, it is confusing, left out it does not change anything in the General Plan Mr. Still asked if with these recommendations could our next meeting center around a revised General Plan so we can read through it one more time before the meeting. After I have a chance to review it I would feel comfortable making a recommendation to Council. Mr. Schmeling asked if he could summarize. We are directing Clarion to make the following changes to the document: Lake Havasu City Page 6 Printed on 5/20/2015 Planning and Zoning Commission Special Meeting Minutes - Final April 29, 2015 • Accept the new Vision Statement as created by the group • Resort-Related Island as it exists in the text, changing the map to put that on the State Trust holdings as they asked • Taking the table that currently exists with regard to land use and zoning districts and remove the zoning district standards from that table • Add densities to the land use table • Text change to encourage the development of open land that is currently owned by the City Mr. Schmeling asked the Commission if other than the State Trust recommendation, does the Commission agrees with the other amendments as proposed in the comment summary? Mr. Still stated he also agreed with the amendment putting a better clarifying statement regarding urban boundaries and the ability to develop outside of them at the developers cost. Mr. Schmeling stated the direction is to have Clarion amend the document with all these suggested changes and then bring that document back to the Planning Commission to review and vote on at a future meeting. I will allow Clarion to begin work on this and then they can tell me when they will have it ready and then we will get it to you well ahead of that meeting so you have the opportunity to review it. Regarding the Nautical Condos, Mr. Still asked Mr. Schmeling if we could look into the island and the existing residentially developed areas and whether or not we have to shift our map to reflect that. Ms. White stated that they will look at that and clarify that. Chairman Liesen asked questions regarding the capped number of residential units on the island, as it pertains to Resort-Related Mainland and Island in the current Code and the General Plan. His concerns were centered on capped numbers and percentages and the potential development issues that can result by have those defined in the General Plan. Discussion on this topic continued between Chairman Liesen, Mr. Schmeling, Mr. Gordon, and Mr. Elliott with detailed scenarios of potential issues and possible solutions. At the conclusion of this discussion Mr. Schmeling stated that at this point I think Clarion has clear direction with regard to the General Plan. I think we can move forward from this. 7. CALL TO PUBLIC None 8. FUTURE MEETING Wednesday, May 6, 2015 @ 9:00 a.m. - Regular Meeting Lake Havasu City Page 7 Printed on 5/20/2015 Planning and Zoning Commission Special Meeting Minutes - Final April 29, 2015 9. ADJOURNMENT Chairman Liesen adjourned the meeting at 10:58 a.m. _______________________________________________________________ Jim Liesen, Chairman _______________________________________________________________ Diane Libby, Recording Secretary Lake Havasu City Page 8 Printed on 5/20/2015