Planning Commission

Russellville Planning Commission Minutes April 27, 2015, @ 5:30 p.m. The Russellville Planning Commission held its regular meeting on Monday, April 27, 2015 at 5:30 p.m. in the Russellville City Hall Council Chambers. Members Present Chairman Dennis Boyd Jimmy Sims Vice-Chair Doug Skelton Wendell Miller Secretary Eric Westcott Herschell Hargus Todd Meimerstorf Peggy Stratton Council Liaison Bill Eaton Members Absent Mike Wilkins Also present:, Mayor Randy Horton, City Planner David Harris, City Attorney Trey Smith, City Engineer Kurt Jones, City Inspector Brian Holstein, Planning Assistant Lequitta Jones, Gregg Long/Crafton Tull, Dave Garza/Barrett & Associates, Mack Jones/Hammond Jones Real Estate Development, Aaron Nicholson, John H. Hawkins, and Thomas Pugh. Welcome The First Order of Business was a request to review and approve the March 23, 2015 minutes. Commissioner Miller made the motion to accept the minutes as written. The motion was seconded by Commissioner Hargus and passed unanimously. The Second Order of Business was a request to review and approve the Aspen Commercial Park Subdivision, located at I-40 Exit Ramp and East Aspen Lane. Submitted by Gregg Long of Crafton Tull on behalf of Russellville Properties, LLC. (SD.15.04.292) City Planner Harris reminded the commissioners that last month they granted a Special Use Permit for a billboard on this property with the condition that the applicants comply with the Zoning Code requirement that the billboard be sited on a separate parcel. To meet that condition, the applicant has submitted a three-lot subdivision. Lots 1 and 2 are intended for highway commercial uses, while Lot 3 is intended as the site for the billboard. Though no problems have been noted by the staff, this subdivision could not be approved administratively because Lot 3 has no direct access to a public right-of-way. However, the plat contains a note to the effect that the small lot will be used for a billboard and shows a 30’ ingress and egress easement. Mr. Gregg Long with Crafton Tull, on behalf of Raju Mehta, said he had nothing to add to what Mr. Harris said. He noted that the need for a separate lot was pointed out during the process for the Special Use Permit for the billboard and that is why this plat was prepared. Commissioner Hargus made the motion to approve the plat as submitted. The motion was seconded by Commissioner Meimerstorf and passed unanimously. The Third Order of Business was a Public Hearing requesting to review and recommend City Council approval of a Special Use Permit to allow an auto repair shop, for property in a C-2 zone at 3422 Bernice Avenue. Submitted by David & Carolyn Barahona. (SP.15.04.130) City Planner Harris said this building is just west of the D&R Crossing of AR 7T. This use is a perfect fit for this location. The area contains several automotive uses and some industrial uses. An auto repair shop should have no negative impact on the area. It is an existing building that is not up to code in some ways. When considering this request, I ask the commissioners to take into account the age and condition of the building, and the surrounding conditions. Sometimes it is hard to keep buildings like this occupied, and requiring the applicants to bring it into complete code compliance may price it out of economically productive use. Harris said they have an unpaved parking lot with a short paved apron where it enters the highway. My recommendation is to require extension of the apron so gravel and mud will not migrate into the street. However, requiring them to pave the whole parking lot probably puts this building back to being vacant for a while longer because of the expense. Mrs. Carolyn Barahona said gravel from the parking lot does not enter the highway because the drive is lower than the highway where they meet. She said their long-term plan is to pave the driveway, but financially right now it might be a burden on us to do that. City Engineer Jones said he agreed with Mr. Harris. Requiring the entire parking lot to be paved is not warranted, but extension of the paved aprons would reduce the amount of gravel and mud being tracked onto the state highway. There is some deteriorated asphalt close to the highway that should be replaced. I recommend a paved apron 24 feet wide and 30 feet long. Mrs. Barahona said she was not sure yet what the highway department was going to require since it is a state highway. She said they wanted to pave it all later. City Planner Harris recommended giving them an extension on paving because of the front-end expenses. If this were a permitted use they would be allowed to move in as is. There wouldn’t be any less traffic in and out of the street if it were a permitted use rather than a special permit use. We don’t want to make it too burdensome for them to get in the building and into operation. Commissioner Skelton asked if they would be storing salvage vehicles or parts for vehicles. Mrs. Barahona said they are going to repair cars and send them on their way. We are not going to store or junk cars or trucks. Commissioner Westcott asked Mrs. Barahona how long it would take for you to be able to have the apron paved 24 feet wide and 30 feet deep? Mrs. Barahona said one year. 2 Commissioner Skelton said due to the site's proximity to the Premium Protein Plant that there is not going to be any development in this area that would cause us any concerns. So I really don’t have any problems with this. Commissioner Westcott asked City Engineer Jones what he thought about the 12-month time span on having that repaved? Mr. Jones said he didn’t have any issue one way or the other. First of all it is a state highway not a city street, so it is more a state issue. Mr. Jones said he did not have any issues with it at all. Liaison Eaton asked City Attorney Smith if the commission approved this with simply a recommendation that the paving be completed within one year what the process would be if they did not meet that obligation. City Attorney Smith said that he didn’t know, probably because the Zoning Code has no provision for such conditions. Liaison Eaton said okay. Commissioner Skelton asked whether we could make it part of our motion, that is, “authorization to do business is revoked,” if the paving is not provided in one year. City Attorney Smith said you can but it is not allowed. There are a lot of questions as to how to get it back. Technically it is possible, but in reality it might be difficult to act after they are in business. We are not allowed to give permission to do that. Commissioner Skelton said we are authorizing him to do business at this location with the condition of having a 24 foot x 30 foot apron and that he has to have it in place within one year and if he doesn’t meet that condition, his approval is void. City Attorney Smith said there still is not anything in the Zoning Code to make an exception. You do not have authority to do this just because it is a financial hardship. Commissioner Westcott asked City Engineer Jones what would be an estimated cost of paving the apron. City Engineer Jones said approximately $900 to $1,000. Chairman Boyd asked Mrs. Barahona if that amount would be doable right up front. What we are wrestling with is that we don’t appear to have the statutory authority to grant a one-year extension for the paving. We are trying to help you get your Special Use Permit, but is it too much of a financial hardship for you to go ahead up front and do the improvements to the approach apron? The chairman also asked if they would like to postpone their request until our next meeting to give them time to think about it. Mrs. Barahona replied that they would go ahead and meet the requirement. Chairman Boyd asked if there were any members of the public who wished to speak in regard to this request. There was no response. Commissioner Skelton moved to approve the Special Use Permit with the requirement that applicants provide a 24 foot wide x 30 foot long paved approach apron to the property and agree 3 that no salvaged vehicles will be allowed in front of the building. The motion was seconded by Commissioner Miller and passed unanimously. The Fourth Order of Business was a Public Hearing of a request to review and recommend approval to City Council to rezone property at 501 North El Paso from C-2 and M-2 to R-3. Submitted by Thompson Revocable Trust. (ZO.15.04.183) City Planner Harris said this property is on the west side of El Paso, running from West E Street to just beyond Prairie Creek. It is currently zoned C-2 along El Paso, with the zoning changing to M-2 Heavy Industry about halfway deep into the property. They are requesting R-3. Planner Harris said he would leave it up to Commissioners as to whether or not they wanted to allow the applicant to talk about their development plans. Planner Harris said he generally opposed discussing development plans as part of the rezoning process, but Mr. Mac Jones would like to talk about how his firm has developed similar projects in other college towns. As long as everyone understands that such discussions are not binding, he was amenable to Mr. Jones talking about their plans. Chairman Boyd said he personally was in favor of letting Mr. Jones tell us what he has in mind. However, I remind the commissioners that if we rezone this property any of the uses permitted in R-3 will be authorized. I’m sure he’s a man of his word, but we have had cases in the past where people have asked for a rezoning for a specific use, but once the property was rezoned, the applicants developed a different use. Mr. Mac Jones, speaking for Hammond Jones Real Estate Development Company of Austin, Texas, said we have been in business for 20 years. We specialize in building high quality multi-family projects near universities and in cities like Russellville. We generally stay with schools with around 10,000 students. We look for enrollment growth, growth in the city, and we build a smaller boutique-type product. We usually stick to around 70-units, which is what we propose here. My partners on this project are a group out of Little Rock. Two of them actually own businesses and property in Russellville. We did a project in Conway called “The Edge at Donaghey.” What we build is a very high quality project. The amenities include exercise facilities, tanning beds, gaming areas, computer labs, large pool and high speed internet. This is what students request these days. Security is a big part of what we do and we will have onsite management by our company. We will have gated access and a courtesy officer that lives onsite. The officer is usually a member of the local police department. We use a high-tech camera surveillance system, we do not allow parties, and we run criminal background and credit checks on every tenant and grantor. We also require grantors on every single tenant, every single bedroom. Commissioner Sims asked if the units that you are going to build here will look like the ones shown in the Arlington, TX plan he provided. Mr. Jones said our intent is to place the buildings near the street with no parking between the building and the street. It is more of an urban look and feel. It looks better than looking from the street and seeing 50 feet of concrete and cars before see the building. It will be a three-story building, faced with a mixture of brick and stucco. 4 Chairman Boyd asked if there were any members of the public who wished to speak in regard to this rezoning request. Mr. Gregg Long with Crafton Tull asked to speak. He said we are also the civil engineers on-call for the University of Central Arkansas. We are very familiar with the Conway facility that Mr. Jones described. It is a beautiful facility, very well done, and the university there is very pleased to have that as part of their community. So I would speak in favor of this development. I think it will be a very good enhancement to that area as well as Arkansas Tech University and the City of Russellville. Commissioner Hargus made the motion to approve. Commissioner Skelton said he was excited about this prospect, but listening to Chairman Boyd’s concerns at the front of this presentation, he asked Mayor Horton if we should be looking at a Planned Unit Development (PUD) on something like this or what do you think the City Council wants to see out of this? Mayor Horton said I have a hard time envisioning that, but in listening to Chairman Boyd’s comments, that was a thought that had run through my mind and that is something the Planning Commission should consider. Mr. Mac Jones said they considered requesting a PUD review, but since the apartments will be occupied primarily by students of Arkansas Tech, we have to finish the project before the fall semester starts next year, or we have lost an entire year of occupancy. If that were to happen then financially we could not do the project. Construction takes about 12 months, so if you work backward we need to start in July to be ready for the 2016 fall semester. I spoke to City Planner Harris about a PUD. We just simply don’t believe we have the time to go through the PUD process. I have no problem committing to any of what I just said if there is a legal way for us to guarantee our intentions. We are concerned that we just don’t have time for the PUD process. If we had to do that we might have to wait a year and I’m not sure that is something we want to do. Mr. Holstein asked if everyone understood that this will be reviewed as a Large Scale Development. Chairman Boyd said “yes.” Commissioner Meimerstorf asked Mr. Jones how far along they were in the process. I’m assuming you have plans, specifications, and everything. Mr. Mac Jones said they were well into the process. The property has several physical issues, including areas of floodplain and floodway, and a big utility easement running right through it. We spent a great deal of time and effort planning this site to get to the point where we have a site plan that conforms to the City of Russellville’s codes. Also, we are going to have to fill part of the site, at least for the building pads. We have spent a lot of time planning in that regard. The construction documents will take us 30 days to do. We haven’t cut those loose yet because that is very expensive to get those drawn. I just want to get though this step and the first City Council meeting before we spend that money. I would be willing to enter into an agreement regarding site and building standards. I would be happy to do that. We only found this site about three weeks ago. 5 Chairman Boyd said I don’t believe there is anything that the Planning Commission can do legally regarding any type of agreement. The City Attorney could probably shed some light on this. We are here strictly to review the rezoning and we have given a lot of leeway in regard to allowing an overview of the proposed development that we normally don’t allow. And in my mind, I believe you are going to follow through on what you are telling us that you are going to put there. City Planner Harris said that doing this project as a PUD had been discussed some. You could consider Large Scale Development as sort of PUD 'lite.' The city doesn’t have quite the grip on the development as they would with a PUD, but the LSD process allows the commission to require the developer to make changes to the plan. It’s not to the level of a PUD, where the city can dictate every little thing but, within reason, you can require that the submitted plans be modified. Liaison Eaton asked if the Arlington, TX plan showed the buildings close to the street with no parking between the building and the street. Mr. Jones said that is correct. Mr. Jones said the El Paso improvements make it perfect to do what we want to do. Liaison Eaton said this is something that we would like to see done as well. Chairman Boyd pointed out to the commissioners that the current C-2 and M-2 zoning allows a lot more egregious type of developments than the requested R-3 zoning would allow. Commissioner Skelton seconded the motion which passed 6-0 with Commissioner Meimerstorf abstaining. The Fifth Order of Business was a Public Hearing requesting review and recommendation of approval to City Council to rezone property in the 2700 block of South Ithaca Avenue from C-2 to M-2. Submitted by Dave Garza of Barrett & Associates on behalf of Randy Barefield. (ZO.15.04.184) City Planner Harris said this property is north of 28th Street. There are a lot of similar auto-related uses nearby including auto repair, body and paint shop, and auto salvage. The request is to expand an existing auto salvage use to the north through undeveloped land. The request is in conformity with the Comprehensive Plan which shows this land as Industrial. There is much vacant land to the north with most in single ownership. Dave Garza, on behalf of Randy Barefield, said the existing facility was in operation prior to annexation in 1984. There is some natural screening along the north edge of the property. We have to rezone it in order to expand the process. It is a quiet business. Chairman Boyd asked if there were any members of the public who wished to speak in regard to this rezoning request. No members of the public asked to speak. Commissioner Hargus asked about screening. Is the required screening an eight-foot fence? Mr. Gaza said they were hoping to use natural screening. 6 Chairman Boyd asked Planner Harris if a natural buffer would work in lieu of requiring an opaque fence. Planner Harris said if the screening requirement could be worded in a way that would make it enforceable, a natural barrier would be better. When opaque fences are used, they immediately begin to suffer from damage and deterioration, which makes them visually unattractive, and a blank wall hundreds of feet long is not that pretty to begin with. A vegetative buffer would be far superior as long as it is reasonably dense and functions as it is intended. My main concern is where the salvage yard abuts the cemetery. Also, though the residential area south of 19th Street is a long way from the subject property, in the future that residential zoning and the requested industrial zoning will grow toward each other. We don’t want to create something we are going to have to deal with in five or ten years where the salvage yard and residential neighborhood converge because we didn’t address it now. City Planner Harris said trees instead of fencing would be great if sufficiently tall and dense. You may want to specify that it has to be opaque. Commissioner Hargus questioned the drainage in that area. Mr. Garza said to his knowledge there were no problems. Commissioner Skelton made the motion to approve the M-2 zone. Commissioner Hargus seconded the motion and it passed unanimously. The Sixth Order of Business was a Public Hearing requesting to review and recommend approval to the City Council for a Special Use Permit to allow storage of used/wrecked vehicles, for property located in the 2700 Block of South Ithaca Avenue. Submitted by Dave Garza of Barrett & Associates on behalf of Randy Barefield (SP.15.04.131) City Planner Harris this is part two of the rezoning just recommended for approval. Commissioner Miller made the motion to approve the Special Use Permit as submitted. The motion was seconded by Commissioner Sims and passed unanimously. Meeting Adjourned. ___________________________________________________ Chairman Dennis Boyd 7