Planning Commission

Draft PC Minutes were reviewed and approved at the June11, 2025 PC Meeting. Wilsonville Planning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes May 14, 2025 Wilsonville City Hall & Remote Video Conferencing https://www.ci.wilsonville.or.us/meetings/pc CALL TO ORDER - ROLL CALL Chair Hendrix called the meeting to order at 6:02 pm. Present: Nicole Hendrix, Jennifer Willard, Andrew Karr, Ron Heberlein, Sam Scull, and Yana Semenova Excused: Matt Constantine Staff Present: Miranda Bateschell, Daniel Pauly, Amanda Guile-Hinman, Kimberly Rybold, Cindy Luxhoj, and Mandi Simmons PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE The Pledge of Allegiance was recited. CITIZEN INPUT There was none. ADMINISTRATIVE MATTERS 1. Consideration of the April 9, 2025 Planning Commission Minutes The April 9, 2025 Planning Commission minutes were accepted as presented. PUBLIC HEARING 2. Housing Our Future (Rybold) Chair Hendrix called the public hearing to order at 6:05 pm. Planning Director Bateschell stated tonight’s hearing on the Housing our Future project was an important milestone for the City, and the next chapter in the City’s work, setting the stage for bringing homes to all community members in the future. The project had resulted in the Housing Needs and Capacity Analysis and Housing Production Strategy being considered by the Planning Commission. Wilsonville has a long history of inclusive housing planning and ensuring that a variety of housing is planned to meet the needs of all community members and as their needs change throughout the different stages of their lives. The City was also proactive in projects that would provide homes for low-income households as well as the most vulnerable community members, including Creekside Woods, The Raingarden, and Vuela. She thanked the Planning Commissioners, Task Force members, and the project team for their help in reaching this milestone. Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 1 May 14, 2025 Senior Planner Rybold highlighted the following items included in the meeting packet: • Attachment 1. Housing Needs and Capacity Analysis (HNCA), proposed as the sub- element to the Comprehensive Plan. • Attachment 2. Housing Production Strategy (HPS) , a standalone strategy document not part of the Comprehensive Plan. • Attachment 3. Proposed Comprehensive Plan Text Amendments that reflected adoption of the HNCA and HPA documents as the City's guiding documents for housing planning going forward. • Attachment 4. Findings Report, which demonstrated how the HNCA and Proposed Comprehensive Plan Text Amendments complied with applicable City, Metro, and State policies and regulations. • Attachment 5. Public Record for Housing Our Future Project. • She then began presenting Wilsonville Housing Our Future via PowerPoint by highlighting the City’s key housing work since the last Housing Needs Analysis was adopted in 2014, including master plans for Town Center, Frog Pond West, Frog East and South, as well as Development Code amendments to support Middle Housing across the city, the Equitable Housing Strategic Plan adopted in 2020, serving as the current strategic framework for housing projects, and the Vuela Project. These efforts focused on many different housing needs throughout the city and served as the basis for the Housing Our Future Project work and the actions selected going forward. (Slide 2) Beth Goodman, Project Director/Senior Planner, ECONorthwest, continued the Housing Our Future PowerPoint, providing a project overview, highlighting public engagement, and reviewing the HNCA and HPS documents, results, and related actions with these key comments: • Taken together, the HNCA and HPS helped answer questions about the expected growth in the city over the next 20 years; the amount, location, and characteristics the buildable land and if there was enough to accommodate expected growth; and the policies needed to meet housing needs beyond land use issues. Both the HNCA and HPS included information about demographics and housing markets; however, the HNCA focused on buildable land and the HPS focused on the actions necessary to support development of housing in Wilsonville in the next six years. (Slides 3-4) • Various community engagement activities had occurred throughout the project starting in 2023, including work with a conversation guide to facilitate wider engagement, enabling the project team to gather information about the issues present and not present in Wilsonville and why: for example, people who were unable to access housing. These issues were folded into and throughout the HPS especially. (Slide 5) • HNCA: Land Capacity and Sufficiency • The Buildable Lands Inventory revealed the 269 acres of buildable land throughout Wilsonville is mostly within Residential Neighborhood designations in the Frog Pond areas with additional acres scattered throughout town. She noted Villebois had been completely built out since the last buildable lands study. (Slide 7) Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 2 May 14, 2025  • Based on Metro's growth forecast, Wilsonville would need 2,815 new dwelling units over the next 20 years, and the city had capacity for approximately 3,600 new units on its existing land base, so the City would be able to accommodate growth if it occurred more quickly. Much of the multifamily housing capacity was located in Town Center, and the City's ability to accommodate multifamily growth would depend, in part, on redevelopment of Town Center. The HNCA would be revisited in six years when more would be known about what was happening in Town Center, any issues and what the City could do to support that redevelopment. Most of the surplus capacity was for single units and missing middle housing types. (Slide 8) • The City would need to continue to plan for a variety of housing types to meet changing demographics, for instance, more townhouses and fewer single-family detached houses than seen in the past, but similar to the types of housing seen in the last few years. (Slide 9) • HPS: Understanding Unmet Housing Needs • The model of housing affordability featured different income levels, assumed a household of four, and indicated the median family income (MFI) needed to afford homes at various price points within the Portland Metro region. The median sales price of housing was considerably above what the average MFI income could afford, while rent, including some basic monthly utilities, was affordable. • Newly built housing was typically income-restricted due to federal and state funds that support development of such housing, while the private sector did not generally build affordable housing in the less-than-60% MFI range. In the upper income ranges of 60% to 120% MFI, the market was starting to build newly built and affordable housing, much of the time for rental housing. (Slide 11) • In Wilsonville, 75% of the households had income below 120% MFI, which was the focus of the HPS, thinking about what needs to change and what the City could do to support that change for building more affordable homes in those income ranges, and for those below 80% MFI. (Slide 12) • Market-rate multifamily housing started to become affordable around 80% MFI and older multifamily housing would be affordable below that level. Small and large lot, single-family tended towards the upper income ranges, while townhouses, condos, and some middle housing types would be affordable in the 80% to 120% MFI. (Slide 13) • A key measure on affordability is that households that spent 30% or more of their gross income on housing are considered cost-burdened, and households that spent 50% or more, severely cost-burdened, so about 55% of renter households are cost-burdened and 30% are severely cost-burdened. Homeowners were less likely to be cost-burdened due to the nature of obtaining a home loan, and these cost-burden statistics were looked at when thinking about different groups who have difficulty affording housing, a pattern not unique to Wilsonville. (Slide 14) • Discussions were had with different groups of people, including service providers about certain housing needs, as well as people in the Latino population seeking larger, affordable housing for extended multi-generational families; those with disabilities and Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 3 May 14, 2025  their need for accessibility; those without homes, who often need housing that includes mental health and substance abuse services; seniors often require housing similar to those with disabilities and are also more smaller households; low-and-middle-income workers and students are often about finding houses they can afford. (Slide 15) • With regard to actions the City might take, the City's role in housing development was considered. While housing was not generally developed at the City level, public policy could be influenced, as well as the availability of land and infrastructure and market feasibility through things like property tax exemptions. (Slide 17) • The City’s actions included land disposition to build the Vuela Project, affordable, permanently supportive housing with services to enable people to stay in their housing; providing nonprofit corporation low-income tax exemption; SDC waivers or deferrals, depending on housing type; and accessibility requirements in Frog Pond. (Slide 18) • The Housing Production Strategy’s requirements informed its actions. One key requirement was ensuring the actions in the HPS help Wilsonville achieve more fair and equitable housing outcomes, including: increasing housing stability and housing options for people experiencing homelessness; locating housing in compact mixed-use areas where greenhouse gas emissions could be lower; increasing housing choice in affordable and safe neighborhoods with high quality amenities, as well as fair housing and the access to it, especially for people in state and federal protected classes. (Slide 19) • Additional considerations when selecting the HPS’ actions included: addressing housing needs for the 20-year period in the HNCA; however, the actions would be implemented over the next six-year period, 2026-2032. In adopting the HPS and its actions, the City was committing to making a good faith effort to implement those actions within the context of the funding, staff capacity, and resources the City had available. Resources available in the future could be different than now due to legislative changes or other programs, so actions not in the HPS could be explored or swapped in at the midpoint review. (Slide 20) • The HPS contained seven different recommended actions. (Slide 21) • The Planning Work Program Actions primarily regarded things Planning Staff could do and have considered as separate projects for implementation by the Planning Commission, with public outreach, public hearings, and adoption by City Council, etc. • Foundational Actions for the Future included scoping out a Housing Specialist Staff person to help execute on the future housing programs, such as rental inspection programs, community land trusts, etc., which existing City Staff did not have the capacity to do. • Establishing a funding source to support affordable housing development was another Future Action, which could be something like a construction excise tax. • The actions in the Future Housing Program were actions that could be taken if the City had the capacity and resources within the six-year period but certainly revisiting them at the next HPS. • HPS implementation would begin in 2026, and the City’s housing production actions must be completed in 2031. The implementation schedule considered the capacity of Staff and Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 4 May 14, 2025  the time required to think about and develop the actions. The schedule indicated the years that the City was committing to having Council actions or decisions. While there were no penalties for early adoption, there could be consequences for not meeting the scheduled actions at the midpoint review in early 2029. Senior Planner Rybold stated that the accompanying Comprehensive Plan Text Amendment (Attachment 3) included a series of limited edits to the Residential Development Section of the Comprehensive Plan, reflecting the role that the HPS and HNCA would play in the City's housing planning. For example, edits would be made to the Comprehensive Plan’s tables listing different supporting documents to reflect the adoption of the HNCA as a sub-element of the Comprehensive Plan and replace the 2014 Wilsonville Residential Land Study. • No public comment was received as part of the hearing process for the Housing Our Future Project. The public comments received over the course of the project, along with the other public feedback, were included in the record as Attachment 5 to the Staff report. • Staff recommended the Commission approve of Resolution LP-250001 recommending to City Council adoption of the HNCA, HPS, and the related Comprehensive Plan Text Amendments. Commissioner Semenova: • Noted the metrics tables and asked how success of the strategy would be measured, such as forecasting the need for a certain number of housing types by a certain date, and checking that progress, or would those targets be established at a later point. • Ms. Goodman explained that at this point, the City did not have a target for the number of affordable units at specific income levels. In Chapter 2 of the HPS, Exhibit 8 listed the amount of housing needed over the 20-year and 6-year periods. For instance, approximately 308 new households with income between 60% and 80% MFI were expected over the 20-year period and 90 new households over the 6-year period, which was certainly a target. The City could hold itself to that target as it wanted but was not held to that target by the State. When looking at affordable housing at less than 60% MFI, for example, approximately 350 new affordable units would be in that income range. • The monitoring program included suggested monitoring indicators the City could add to its existing monitoring program. While there were no specific goals, monitoring development of housing, especially in the less than 80% MFI range and monitoring different types of housing, would help the City understand where it was headed and also provide additional information for the next HCNA. • Senior Planner Rybold clarified that Monitoring by Strategy was Exhibit 18 of the HPS and was information the City could start collecting and including in annual housing reports to track things. • In terms of unit production and affordability, the State had recently established some targets and had created a dashboard that tracks overall production, as well as the production of some of the subsidized housing units. The dashboard was another mechanism that tracked how many units were coming online each year by City and Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 5 May 14, 2025  State. Although not currently incorporated into this HPS, those metrics would be a part of the work going forward for the next HPS. • Ms. Goodman added the State’s housing dashboard would compare Wilsonville in relation to its peer cities and the region in terms of percentage of expected units produced, etc. The information was not currently sensible because there had not been targets. • Stated it was a phenomenal recommendation, strategy and report, she just wanted to ensure the City had good measures of success throughout execution to ensure the HPS was working. Commissioner Heberlein asked if the intent was to document the Planning Commission in its current state and assignments only or to also include former Planning Commissioners within the HPS and HNCA acknowledgment section as done with the City Council. • Senior Planner Rybold noted Staff typically documents any member who was part of the process since the project started, and while there had not been any changes in the past year Staff would doublecheck to ensure no one was missed. She confirmed that the incorrect information regarding the Chair would be corrected, as well as the misspelled name. Commissioner Scull: • Noted the Planning Work Program Actions were the formal HPS actions scheduled by year and asked if the intent was to implement or act on the four future actions listed on the right at some time in the future, or if that was at the discretion of the Planning Commission or City Council. (Slide 21 ) • Senior Planner Rybold replied that as a part of this HPS framework and action plan, those future actions were not in the implementation schedule; however, the actions were reflected in the HPS document because the Task Force, Planning Commission, and City Council, specifically, saw these as actions they valued and believed would be important in the future, so they were documented with the intention of carrying them forward to highlight their importance. • In City Council's recent goalsetting, a goal was adopted around a rental housing inspection program. At present the goal’s wording was exploratory, but if implemented, there would be an opportunity at the midpoint check-in to bring the program back into the strategy document. However, the City was not tied to a timeline or to reporting the program’s progress to the State. • She noted that when the Housing Our Future work started, Staff had used the strategies that had not yet been used in the Equitable Housing Strategic Plan as a starting point. She suspected that any unused strategies on the right would be prioritized as part of the next HPS process, although in many ways they were contingent upon identifying funding sources and technical expertise. • Believed a couple of the future actions were very important, so it was good to keep them on the radar. Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 6 May 14, 2025 Chair Hendrix confirmed the potential to swap out actions at the midpoint check-in and asked what kind of reporting the State was looking for at the midpoint check-in because there were three actions they hoped to implement that year, and she wanted to make sure the team had enough capacity to stay on track with the timeline. • Ms. Goodman replied Wilsonville already had a monitoring program, so that work was done. She expected the DLCD would start with monitoring each of the actions; however, she did not believe DLCD had developed the specific contents of a midpoint review as they had only recently adopted some HPSs. Because a number of other cities in the Metro region were ahead of Wilsonville, the City would have the opportunity to see other cities go through their midpoint reviews before Wilsonville. Chair Hendrix confirmed there was no public testimony and closed the public hearing at 6:43 pm. Commissioner Heberlein moved to approve Resolution LP25-0001, a recommendation to City Council to adopt the 2025-2045 Housing Needs and Capacity Analysis as a Sub-Element of the Comprehensive Plan, the Housing Production Strategy, and related Comprehensive Plan Text Amendments, including updates to Acknowledgements in Attachments 1 and 2 to update the Planning Commission Chair and add any additional former Planning Commissioners. Commissioner Scull seconded the motion. Commissioner Karr commended Staff, the consultants, Planning Commission, City Council and all involved for the efforts made on the Housing Our Future Project, encapsulating what everyone wanted to see and envisioned for Wilsonville in 20 years, which was difficult to identify so far into the future. Having steps along the way to validate the City’s efforts and allow for alterations was important. The tremendous effort was enlightening and provide hope for an effectively planned city in the future. Commissioner Scull added that the information prepared and provided was very good and provided a direction for Wilsonville to move into the future. He commended the team for their great work. Chair Hendrix echoed the comments made, also commending ECONorthwest for the great visual presentations, especially on housing affordability compared to income levels which helped in being able to speak with others about the city’s housing needs. She looked forward to being involved in the action implementation moving forward, noting this HPS was a continuation of all the good work the City has been doing. Ms. Goodman acknowledged the great work done by City Staff on the project. The motion passed by a 6 to 0 vote. (Ayes: Hendrix, Willard, Karr, Heberlein, Scull, Semenova Nays: None.) Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 7 May 14, 2025 City Attorney Guile-Hinman left the meeting at this time. WORK SESSION 3. Wilsonville Industrial Land Readiness (Basalt Creek) (Luxhoj) Associate Planner Luxhoj noted Staff sought the Planning Commission’s input on the proposed new Craft Industrial (CI) Zone intended to reflect the Craft Industrial land use identified in the Basalt Creek Concept Plan. The zoning district could be applied in other parts of the city where similar uses were appropriate. She presented via PowerPoint details about the Craft Industrial Area and existing residential development, Craft Industrial examples that could be used as the area developed, as well as the purpose statement and some potential uses within the CI Zone. (Slides 2-8) Questions for the Planning Commission’s consideration were displayed on Slide 9. Commissioner comments and feedback were as follows along with Staff’s responses to questions as noted: • The Craft Industrial area was a great use of the space and a great bridge between what was zoned in Tualatin versus farther south in Wilsonville. • CI Zoning would not prevent residential use in the Craft Industrial area currently or preclude those properties from being used exclusively residentially if sold. The zoning would not be applied until a property was annexed into city, and until then, the property would continue in the FD-20 Washington County Zone. • The list of potential CI Zone uses captured what the Commission envisioned, but perhaps excluding contractor establishments as a use should be explored. • Some contractor establishments may be appropriate for very small contractors with an office and a couple trailers, but not a lay down yard. Limitations on outdoor storage could be considered given the mixed-use area. Balancing the flexibility of use while having strategic performance standards to prevent undesired portions of use would be key. • Because contractor establishments were not on the list of permitted uses, it was essentially not allowed and would require an exception, which may need further clarification. • The potential list of uses was for discussion purposes. Like any zone, a list of potential uses would be compiled when the Craft Industrial area is assigned as a designated zone. That list would be part of the Development Code amendments and become the list of allowed uses within the zone. • While some of the listed uses were vague, some were very specific, making it hard to account for future growth of technologies, etc. and requiring a variance process for any uses not on the list. • One option was to include “other similar uses” in the language. The list could be further refined to ensure Staff was consistent with the level of specificity in the list of uses. Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 8 May 14, 2025 • Professional services and retail and service commercial uses were carried over from other Planned Development Industrial (PDI) zoning areas in the city that were limited to 5,000 sq ft per building. The City wanted to ensure opportunities for property owners to offer smaller scale retail and service uses, so the intent was centered on the physical size of the establishment, not the type of ore expectation around the establishment. • One reason the potential uses list was different was because the uses were substantially limited in footprint. The Craft Industrial area was a fairly inclusive zoning district, and excluded establishments should be incompatible in the zone or create demand that would remove land from the inventory for other intended uses. Small scale commercial establishments would fit the zone footprint, not take up a lot of land, and have the opportunity to serve the nearby commercial areas. • Planning Director Bateschell provided background for the size limitations included in the PDI Zone, some of which came from Metro Title IV requirements. The majority of the industrial land within the city, including the Craft Industrial area, was Title IV; therefore, certain restrictions like the size limitation applied. Given the uniqueness of the area, the City could attempt a Title IV Map amendment with Metro. However, because the area was highly parcelized and would likely have only small-scale buildings, the small-scale retail and service/commercial probably still fit with the character of the CI Zone, at least in Basalt Creek. • While specifying prohibited uses might be easier than listing potential uses, the latter approach was used to achieve consistency across zones. Typically, people wanted to see what could be put in a zone, not what could not. • When taken out of the subject context and applied citywide the last sentence of the Purpose Statement was concerning, "It may also include limited residential and commercial uses that serve as a transition to and support more intense urban industrial areas nearby." Did this mean the CI Zone could only apply when other large industrial areas were nearby? The sentence made sense with regard to the Craft Industrial area, but not in other parts of the city, perhaps. • Making the statement more generic so it applied generally to transition areas, while still being applicable to the subject context was acceptable. • The Craft Industrial examples were more about aesthetics than building height and purpose. Given that the Craft Industrial area was seen as a transitional area, large buildings towering over private backyards would be awkward; however, as a true mixed-use area with residences added above businesses, building height provided flexibility to add more units and provide more housing. • Currently, the PDI had no height limitations. During concept planning, discussion centered around two- to three-story buildings in the Craft Industrial area. Building economics and development also needed considered as mixed-use buildings were often pushed to four stories for building economics. • Input from the Commission on building height was welcome since building height would be considered as Staff moved into drafting the Code. • Defining “limited residential” was suggested. Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 9 May 14, 2025  • Residential in the CI Zone would be limited to business-integrated or live/work dwelling units; some type of industrial use with a residential component. A lot of residential already existed, and perhaps those property owners would like to add some type of a craft industry to their home that would eventually transition into a business integrated unit. The intent was to acknowledge the existing and nearby residential and continue to allow it in some way within the Craft Industrial area. • Further consideration was needed about what would happen to existing residences that otherwise would not be allowed in the CI Zone when someone wanted to add a small business on their property. While live/work units and integrating living spaces into a business were anticipated in the future, in the interim, if someone wanted to develop half and keep a home on half of their site, would a detached home be a grandfathered use, legal conforming, or an outright allowed use still had to be determined. • Grandfathering uses on an existing property made sense, but new property owners might assume they could do the same thing as the existing landowners. Subdividing an eight-acre property into four detached homes should not be permitted, and Staff would look at making that language crisper. • Key Development Code definitions written for Frog Pond were written with the CI Zone and potentially other zones in mind. Business-integrated, home business, home occupation, live/work dwelling unit would be specifically listed as permitted uses in the CI Zone; uses associated with any industrial/commercial uses allowed in the zone. • The Basalt Creek Concept Plan seemed to emphasize small-scale commercial that may include live/work units, while the Purpose Statement emphasized industrial and creative enterprise that may include residential or commercial. Had the original emphasis on small- scale commercial in the Basalt Creek Concept Plan morphed into something a bit different with the Master Plan wanting more commercial development? • When analyzing development types, Concept Plan assumed six residential units in the Craft Industrial area, so very limited residential use. • The Purpose Statement would need reviewed further to address questions and be more specific about residential use because the City did not want additional residential coming into the area, which could happen due to its proximity to other residential development in Tualatin. • Planning Director Bateschell noted that when the land use term Craft Industrial was first coined during the Concept Plan, no other examples of this type of adopted Code existed. She believed the Purpose Statement was consistent, adding it was a good question for the project team to ruminate on. • During the concept planning, a consultant looked at development typologies to run performance metrics to help determine the outcomes and performance in the area in terms of jobs, trips, etc. Performance metrics for different building types outside Wilsonville were used since Craft Industrial was not a land use Wilsonville had at the time. • These really small sites would require smaller-scale development and the building types that fit often had more commercial; examples included coffee-roasters, beer brewers, photographers, etc. that had a retail space to sell their products. In Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 10 May 14, 2025  recognizing that, primarily commercial was preferred, as opposed to primarily retail, like a retail strip. There had to be an enterprise component, which is why ‘enterprise’ was in the Purpose Statement, and it would be more commercial than more traditional large industrial type uses. • The Craft Industrial area could be a destination, like the Hood River waterfront, and if the City wants those small craft businesses to be successful, some type of language had to be incorporated into the Purpose Statement to help build that visual. • While the area was not seen as a destination during concept planning, it was worth exploring. Property owners were already running businesses on their home sites, and the City recognized that and acknowledged the area would likely morph over time. It would not be the first area to develop in Basalt Creek and would not develop with large industrial uses like the flat vacant parcels on Green Hill Lane would. • While food carts or trucks may not be appropriate within the Craft Industrial area, food being prepared onsite for food trucks to load and drive out to sell elsewhere in the city could fall under the Artisan Food and Beverage Production category. 4. CFEC Parking (Pauly) Planning Manager Pauly noted the work done at prior work sessions on the CFEC Parking Compliance and Standards Reform project and presented on the Parking Lot Design Review Standards via PowerPoint, comparing the City’s current and enhanced design standards to the CFEC compliance standards and providing the updated recommended Code amendments based on further analysis and feedback from both City Council and the Planning Commission. Questions for the Commission’s consideration regarded design standards for the solar option and several questions to help finalize the draft Development Code amendments for the public hearing. (Slides 7-8) Commissioner comments and feedback were as follows along with Staff’s responses to questions as noted: • The proposed language regarding the tree canopy and allowance of solar made sense, although the solar language was a bit wordy and confusing in terms of the calculations. • In Section 4.A Internal Pedestrian Walkways, the existing language about walkways being designed to channel pedestrians to the building’s front entrance would be changed to “main entrance”, which would also be consistent with language in the ADA Parking Code. • In Section 2.E.i, the purpose of parking areas with 40 or more spaces having at least 25% of the required trees planted in the interior of the parking area was either CFEC rules or the current Code. Staff would confirm and email the Commission. • Section 4.B appeared to specify acreage not parking spaces. Because the CFEC rules and current Code did not align, Staff decided to go with spaces, which could vary as a 200-space Costco parking lot was bigger than a 200-space Wilsonville high school parking lot. • Most of the existing City Code language used spaces which would likely be used fairly often going forward, but this was the one existing Code standard that used acreage, which was intentional in the event a certain land area was dedicated to parking Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 11 May 14, 2025  regardless of the number of spaces. The street-like features were required to break up large expansive parking lots. • Staff recommended keeping the language as is for two reasons. First, there was a direct nexus to the requirement to acreage rather than number of spaces, and there was a reason that choice was made in the Code. It was not an obvious error or typo, so better to defer to what was written. • Only the portion of canopy that overhung the parking lot would count towards the 12-ft landscape buffer requirement (Section 4.C), otherwise it would be a street tree if on the exterior side of that 12-ft buffer. Any trees right in the middle of the lot may just be a pretty tree with stormwater benefits, etc. • The Development Code did not specify tree types as doing so in the early 2000s resulted in problems seen currently after learning new things about different species and cultivars over the years. Now it was more performance-based, as any tree that would provide canopy and could be pruned to provide clearance was preferred. Otherwise, the actual tree species were at the landscape architect’s discretion. • In lieu of made sense if the solar was installed in the parking lot, but not if it was installed on the roof. • While installing solar in the parking lot made sense, 30% tree canopy was also required for the parking lot, making the roof a more functional placement, likely with more climate benefit than being under a tree in the parking lot. • The .5 kw generation capacity of an onsite solar panel noted in Section 2.D.i to exempt a parking space was not an industry standard, but a State rule the City was complying with • The trees in the parking lot would reduce the heat island by generating shade. Any solar would have to be installed at a height to meet parking clearance requirements, making it tall enough to generate an equivalent magnitude of shade achieved by the trees. • The solar requirement stated onsite, not in the parking lot and would apply to multi- family development. Smart designers would not necessarily install the solar panels in the lot, but likely on the roof of the building or elsewhere onsite, which would be more beneficial from a climate standpoint. Solar panels would either be on the roof of the building or on a full row covering parking. Trees would not go in that same location. • California and Arizona had parking lots with rows of parking stalls with solar panels across the entire section. In Arizona, parking lots frequently had trees around the perimeter and the center featured covered parking with solar panels on top. • If the City wanted to encourage solar, figuring out where to place solar panels should not be so complicated. The solar option should be as easy as possible to adhere to the standards; otherwise, it was easier to plant a tree. • It was funny the canopy had to be over the parking lot, yet solar panels could be on the roof, because the point was to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The canopy would reduce emissions whether over the parking lot or in another green space, so it should count no matter where the tree was planted. Installing solar panels could be cost-prohibitive if everything had to be run into the parking lot. Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 12 May 14, 2025  • Per the Development Code, 40% of the parking spaces had to be wired for EV, and those charging stations would likely have a solar panel on top, so the lots would have to be designed such that the tree canopy did not shade the EV spaces. The Commission unanimously supported the three-tier parking area design standards. Mr. Pauly stated he would follow up on a few of the questions via email, adding he had worked with the consultant and the State to not have to speak two different languages when discussing the solar panels, the number of parking spaces and tree canopy percentages, but he would review the language to see about simplifying the language further. INFORMATIONAL 5. City Council Action Minutes (April 7 & 21, 2025) (No staff presentation) 6. 2025 PC Work Program (No staff presentation) Chair Hendrix noted she would not be present at July’s meeting due to a conference. She thanked Staff for having the questions in the presentation match what was in the Staff report, which made it easier to understand. Vice Chair Willard reported on the Westside Economic Alliance Conference, which included all the westside communities and addressed economic development. Key takeaways regarded the magnitude of housing being built in Hillsboro, the strong case made about the industrial land crisis in Oregon, the Metro Area, and on the westside; and how the entire region and state had benefitted from Hillsboro's aggressive growth and posture, but now Hillsboro was out of urban growth reserve. • She highlighted key points of ECONorthwest’s Regional Economic Update Report, noting the vital importance economic developments being connected, the interesting connection to social services; how economic development impacted counties in different ways; and concerns about industrial land inventory being way too low to attract development. • People who wanted to bring business to Oregon were turning away because they were being asked about their tolerance for lawsuits, delays, etc., and if it was low, they were told they probably should not build in Oregon. • ECONorthwest’s main message was for regulatory relief of land use planning and had brought up Wilsonville and Basalt Creek as a wonderful opportunity to invite industrial jobs into the region. However, Wilsonville was unable to maximize the opportunity because City Staff were not given any funding or relief from mandatory items to be able to bird dog all the different tax lots and property owners to create a coordinated, deliberate plan to develop Basalt Creek into something big. • She loved the conference and thanked the City for the opportunity to attend. She believed attendance should be mandatory for planning commissioners and city Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 13 May 14, 2025  councilors, as it was really eye-opening, and had said as much in the post-conference survey. • She noted that former Commissioner Aaron Woods had recently passed away. Commissioner Karr noted Chris Neamtzu had retired after 30 years, adding he was a great guy he had loved working with. Commissioner Scull thanked the City for the Volunteer Appreciation event earlier in the week. ADJOURNMENT The meeting was adjourned at 8:07 p.m. Planning Commission Meeting Minutes Page 14 May 14, 2025