All right, I will call the meeting to order at 7:01 p.m. Please stand for the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. >> Um any changes to the agenda? >> No. Okay. Anyone want to make a recommendation to approve the agenda? >> So moved. >> All right. Anyone want a second? >> I'll second. >> All right. All in favor? >> I >> I >> Okay. Public comment. Um, this is a time to comment on anything that is not listed on the agenda. I don't think there's anyone else online. Okay. Announcements. Okay. All right. Approval of the minutes. So, consider approval of the following minutes for January 27th, 2026. I didn't notice any corrections. I thought they look good. >> Agreed. >> All right. I'll make a motion to approve them. Anyone want a second? >> Second. Right. All in favor? >> I. >> All right. Public hearings. There are none. Um, so we're down to general business concept plan review for Boulder Heights South KGW um, Incorporated applicants. I'll be handling the presentation on this agenda item and my screen. Okay. So, um the development on the agenda is uh we've been calling it Boulder Heights South. It's the property immediately south of the existing Boulder Heights development. Um just a little background, the property, there's approximately 30 acres that is currently owned by KJW Walk. They purchased it um within the last couple years with the intention of developing it. It's currently located in New Market Township, so will require annexation. One of the challenges and uh with the site is that the city doesn't necessarily know the long-term alignment of Beard Avenue. So, we are going to be studying um some access points along County Road 86 on the south side of the development. Um the developer has submitted two concept plans um which contemplate the realignment of the or and keeping it where it's at at on its existing alignment. The owner is interested in seeking feedback on the concept plan and proceeding with developing a portion of the property that would not be impacted by a potential realignment of um that shows the location in relation to the existing city limits. The an annexing this property would bring us right up to the county line to Rice County. Concept plan number one, which shows uh the existing Beard Avenue alignment shows 80 single family residential lots and then an area reserved for town homes um approximately 72 units. Now, we haven't seen any detail on that. So, that unit count is just strictly taken from what the developer indicated on the concept plan. And the second content plan which shows a realignment of beard um shows 71 single family lots in an area reserved for apartments or town homes approximately 88 units. So just reviewing the neighborhood conditions. You can see to the north is the uh existing Boulder Heights development uh that contains 125 single family detached lots. And this development is mostly built out. I think about 10 lots left to be built on. Uh to the south of the development is agricultural rural residential properties located in Webster Township of Rice County. Um again outside the city limits, but the even the area within Rice County is within the city's 2040 um ultimate service boundary. Uh so we envision that will ultimately be part of the city, but it is outside of the 2040 plan boundary. Uh to the east of the proposed development is a one kind of large lot 40 acre uh site single family home and there's also a wetland area DNR protected wetland to the east and then to the west is also large lot approximately 10 acre parcels but built with single family homes guided to uh residential and within the cities everything north of 280th is within the 2040 plan boundary. This is shows the comprehensive plan. The north half of the development is guided to low density residential. That's that 2 and a half to five units per acre. And the south half uh everything along county highway 86 is um guided to medium density at 5 to 10 units per acre. Uh this map is just for reference that shows the ultimate service boundary of the city what could ultimately be the city of balcony market. Uh the property is currently zoned um the current zoning authority is Scott County and it is currently zoned urban expansion reserve. The property would be automatically zoned urban reserve if it was annexed into the city and then future zoning must be consistent with the city's 2040 comprehensive plan. So the northern portion be R1 or R2 and the southern portion um R3 zoning would be the appropriate zoning district. So, in that R2 um area that uh the developers indicated they would be seeking R2 zoning on the northern portion of the site, the minimum lot width is 65 ft and the minimum lot area is 80. The change just made the last planning commission meeting. It has now been approved by council. And then in the southern half of the site, u single family detached twin uh twin homes town homes or apartments containing eight units or less are permitted. So um for reference here the lot minimum lot sizes and setbacks in that R3 district. So single family detached in the R3 is minimum 60 foot wide lot. um to note uh regarding landscaping that additional lot depth must be provided where back lots back up to a major or arterial roadway. So additional lot depth would be needed for lots that back up to Beard Avenue or up but county road 86. And then at the time of building permit trees have to be planted in each uh Attached housing at least 30% of the total site area must be landscaped and inground verification is required. We do have tree preservation requirements that require 40% of any significant trees be preserved. The site is largely agricultural. Look like there's just a few uh trees along some property lines or the edges of the field. tree inventory is required or a statement from a qualified professional. Um, sanitary sewer. This slide just depicts the city's sanitary sewer plan that's included in our 2040 comprehensive plan. Um, the property lies within sewer district 1-6. Um, the city engineer or former city engineer has conducted downstream analysis of any limiting factors in the sewer system and has determined that the downstream sanitary sewer is capable of handling the additional sewer flow from this property. Uh this slide you can kind of see lightly the light green lines to the north um shows the existing sewer system. There is sewer available uh at the south end of Oxford Lane. So the development would feed into that se and Boulder. The existing Boulder Heights development is served by a lift station and then there are se several other stations downream. Um the devel developer will be required to sewer to adjacent undeveloped properties particularly to the west. Um this slide depicts the city's water plan that's included in our comprehensive plan. Um and depicts uh the desire for a 12 in water lane running north south along the east side of the property. Uh water service is available uh to the site um on oops I missed a slide there. Uh water services available currently through the Boulder Heights development again at the south end of Oxford and then also over at Beer. So we would want to see water looped through the connected to both of those and then we would seek uh that extension of the 12in water man through the development and to the south. Um the property lies within um about threequarters of it our estimation lies within the Scott wershed management organization and about a quarter of it appears to be within the Canyon River wershed um district. The concept plans show one centralized area for storm water ponding. concept plans show in the same general location one storm water ponding area. Um no further details have submitted. So at this point this is pretty high level. Um and just note or reminding uh for the developer that there is a 10-ft vegetative buffer and a 35 foot building setback required for all ponds storm water ponds from the ordinary high water level. Um, we do not have a wetland delineation uh report. I don't believe one has been completed at this time, but will be necessary as part of any future planning applications. There are no FEMA designated flood planes on the property. There are no DNR protected wetlands on the property. Um, the property abuts three existing streets. So, Oxford Lane that comes in from the north, County Road 86 on the south, and then Beard Avenue on the east. Um, again, Oxford Lane is an existing city street. The street's 28t wide within a 60oot right away and is proposed to be extended into the development. Um, County Highway 86 on the south side is a two-lane rural highway that lies on the border of Scott and Mass counties. most recent traffic volumes are uh just under 2,000 cars a day. Uh Rice County's most recent transportation plan um identifies the functional classification of county road 86 as a minor arterial roadway and Scott County's transportation plan identifies it as a principal arterial. So there's a conflict between those two transportation plans and um we're working together with the two counties to identify what the appropriate planning would be for that. Uh determining the appropriate functional classification is important in determining the future rightway needs or recommendations assoc associated with the plat. Using the most conservative approach would be using principal arterial And that's a recommended total weight 200 ft. So 100 ft from each direction. Um we at the time of the staff report we were still waiting back from Scott County this afternoon um with some questions and don't have a lot to report on that right now but um really looking uh for some feedback from them on uh the um the access proposed access in the realignment scenario and the rightway recommendations. Um Beard Avenue um the east side is currently a gravel road that is under the jurisdiction of New Market Township. Um the city collected traffic counts uh on Beard Avenue in 2019 um at two different times actually. That's when the development was under construction and when Boulder Heights was under construction. Um at that time they show a approximately 360 cars a day. We don't have anything more recent than that. Um the city's transportation plan identifies Beard Avenue as a future major collector street and um with that designation private accesses would not be the driveways. Um all access should be made by a local street connection. And then the city's currently adopted um rightway guidelines or um st section for that type of street would be a 32 foot wide road within 100 foot rightway. Two 16 foot travel lanes and auminous trail on one side and a sidewalk on the other side. and the expanded rightway allows for expansion of the road in the future if needed. So, um just reviewing again a little bit the Beard Avenue realignment concerns. Um the city city staff and uh engineers have just have concerns about the existing approach on the gravel road on 86 that approaches at a curve and then there's some grade there that um doesn't give the greatest sight distance. So we have gotten together with Scott and Sewer counties and Bolton Bank has uh provided a proposal to help us with the study um that would help us figure out the the correct alignment. So the study will study really a larger corridor between um Texas Avenue and Pillsbury to look at where the longterm access point should be. But uh at this point the developer is only seeking approval of lots that would not be potentially impacted by that realignment. Um Staff is opposed to recommending approval of the full development, but we are supportive of um recommending approval of lots that we don't anticipate would be impacted by. Uh because Beard Avenue is a um gravel road, we do have some recommendations for improvement of Beard. Um there is currently only one way into Boulder Heights development uh on Oxford Lane and it was not designed as a collector street, but it's kind of acting that way today. And with the additional uh approximately 50 lots or or maybe more, whatever they uh could possibly plat uh within the development that would be adding all that additional traffic up through the development. staff is recommending that um Beard Avenue be opened at Lydia Lane. Um Lydia Lane was barricaded because um the township well short the township's recommendation was to uh pave 275th Street out to 91 in li of paving the adjacent and barricade so traffic wouldn't be coming from onto a gravel road. So, um staff is recommending that Avenue with the first phase of the development be paved from 275th Street to land and that barricade be removed. Um uh with that uh staff's recommendation is also that that section could remain a rural section and just pave the surface um as we've done in a couple other uh situations. And then Beard Avenue south of 275th Street would be improved incrementally with future phases. The long plan is known. If the if realignment of beard is required, that's the best alternative. The road could transition to an urban section through the development. Um there are a number of local roads that are um identified in the concept plan. Uh staff doesn't have a lot of um comments about the local road layout. local road connections to Beard Avenue must be at least 66 feet apart. So that is one thing the developer should look at. I don't think that um that might take some analysis and then our other local roads would be 28 ft wide again within the 60 foot rightway. STEP is recommending that um a road connection be provided to the property to the west because there is some upland on the there's two 10acre properties immediately to the west and although there's a big drop off to the west there is some upland area I don't I didn't measure it but probably at least 10 acres maybe a little more um so we should provide some kind of road connection so that they could develop in the future road and utilities and then we would seek high level concept plan showing that wherever that road is stepped in would be in appropriate location that could be reasonable for future development. um staff for the entire development using the uh numbers provided by the developer. I try to run some traffic um projections based on concept number one and two. Um both result in estimated traffic from this development of about 1300 cars a day and we will typically that would trigger the developer to do a traffic impact study to show how the velment would affect the surrounding transportation system and intersections. But we will try to incorporate that into our study with and the developer is going to be participating in financially participating in that study also. based on city code and comprehensive plan. And uh five foot sidewalks are required adjacent to all local streets and then a 10 foot um trail on the west side of the required recommended in related to parks. The city's subdivision ordinance requires land dedication or cash in uh based on our comprehensive plan. There are no park search areas identified um on or near the subject property and the property is within a half a mile um of Boulder Heights Park which is considered the service area of neighborhood park or plainly speaking within a reasonable walking distance. So staff is recommending cash in of land dedication. Uh the parks commission has not yet reviewed the concept plan but uh we intend to seek a recommendation from the parks commission in March to develop the property. Again, the annexation is required. The property owner may petition uh the city for annexation. Uh the city would then work with the township regarding a joint resolution for orderly annexation and we the city would recommend that a pre-development agreement be entered into between the city and developer that um clearly identifies the expectations regarding the development. Um we've sought uh comments from the city engineer and public works director. Uh their comments have been incorporated into the staff report and the comments uh today uh the police chief only noted uh recommended temporary culde-sacs at the end of dead end streets. The fire chief has no comments. Um that we did not see comments yet from the building inspector or city attorney or school district. Um New Market Township is aware of the proposed development and we had a zoom call with their engineer and uh but we haven't had formal presentation at the township at this point is here to represent the township as well. miscellaneous items. We would recommend that the developer hold a neighborhood meeting. Um it is identified in city code as a recommendation and it it helps we've seen recently uh once we get to a public hearing level and just miscellaneous ghost plat of the adjacent property to the west in particular. And the planning commission is being asked to provide feedback regarding the concept plan, whether annexation of the property into the city would be recommended based on these concept plans and what was presented to you. Do you support development of the property not affected by a realignment? And do you comments that were noted by staff? I don't Okay, thank you. >> Luke from KJW Walk is here if you have any questions or comments. >> Do you have anything you'd like to add or share with us? >> Hi, my name is Luke Rosson. I'm with KJW Walk. Um, no, Renee did a great job kind of covering all the bases. Uh, since I got the preliminary report on Monday, we have made some adjustments to try to accommodate a lot of the comments that were in there. So, I don't foresee those really being much of an issue. I think we can can incorporate all that in there without it it being um a big deal. and a little bit feels like deja vu because everything that we are dealing with here we dealt with on the original Boulder Heights development with having to do the annexation and and all that stuff. But uh with Beard being a little bit of a a new one for us, but uh no, we're looking forward to to doing it. Like she said, we already purchased the land. We're we're hoping to try to get this in this year if possible. So, whatever we can do, that's why we said, well, maybe we can develop part of it that we know for sure won't be impacted by the beard realignment and and they've been good to work with us and trying to figure out a way to make that work. So, uh that would be our our goal to try to get that through the process and and get uh dirt moving this year still and and maybe even get some lots ready to go. So, >> Okay. Thank you. If >> you have any other questions, I'm here for you. >> Okay. Thank you. Appreciate it. with I guess I have a question. So with like you said the the 86 being um determined principal and >> is that a big I know it's a big deal but does it impact >> what they're looking for for that first initial development? opinion. Um the and who can weigh in also after my um discussion, but typically with uh arterial minor arterial roadway, we'd be looking for 150 ft of total rightway. With the principal arterial, we'd be looking for 200 feet of total rightway. So, it's really a right ofway issue. And um the south half of the property wouldn't it would be platted as an outlot. So, there'd be opportunity to make those determinations in the future. Um I think we put on notice or document that potential for 200 right. >> Yeah. Nothing really from same thing. It's just rightway width. So not touching that southern area right now. So not an immediate concern. >> Any access to a planned access to the county road would require their approval. So it doesn't really impact what they're looking for. >> I don't see it impacting >> right at this moment. >> You're right at this moment. >> Or at least getting the north stuff on the north side. >> Okay. >> Yeah. My recommendation would be to annex the entire property. Otherwise, we have to do a split >> uh in town while it's in the township and it it's just another added step in expense. >> Has anybody talked to the homeowners that are right on the 86 and beard right there as to whether or not they're ready to sell maybe? Or >> the property is under You mean that the brick home? Yeah, the old school house. >> Well, the property's on the MLS, but it's under contract. >> Oh, it is. >> There's a purchase agreement on it, but Luke was the day it went on the market. Luke was informed, and I think he's >> Yeah, >> we we did look at it briefly. Um, what they were asking didn't make a lot of sense from a development perspective. Um, so it and it it went pretty quick, too. So, we didn't we didn't put in an offer or anything on it, but we did look at it and and consider it. So, >> okay. >> On the MLS, as of >> last Thursday, it was under a pending status, but haven't closed yet, but >> Gotcha. >> So, one of, you know, looking at, you know, we always try to plan ahead and try to remove those access points off of the county roads or the arterial roads when we can. So that is one of the recommendations as part of the report is to plan for a future alternative access to this property. Um should the county uh want to close the access at some point. Um I think that can easily be achieved through uh beard you know either Beard Avenue or uh even if Beard Avenue is realigned they could use the current alignment you know more as a a local road with a culde-sac or a driveway or there's a lot of ways to do it, but that's one of the comments in part >> to be addressed. So, right now you're looking at just doing the northern half just homes, right? Not looking to do the lower half. >> Yeah, we would be focusing on the single family stuff on the north side. >> Okay. Do you have a time frame for South Half or >> I think we are so 8 unit uh town homes is what we would be looking at putting in there is our our preliminary concept for down there. Um, and we would probably do that within a year or two as soon as we can once the Beard Avenue issue is resolved. We we'd work on it pretty quick after that. So, >> what's Rice County has been a big hold up? Apparently, there was a transportation committee meeting. Scott County has approved the contract. Um, we were waiting for financial participation from Rice County and they apparently had a transportation committee meeting today. So, I'll be meeting with them tomorrow and if we can get the contract with Bolton and Mink signed here within the next several weeks. Uh, then we'll be up to B. >> Yeah. I don't foresee a large or long on our end. Yeah. >> Yeah. Any other comments or questions? I'm just reading through the staff all the staff recommendations. There's a lot of them. Um, so I'm just sorry. and KJW Walk feels the staff recommendations as written right now looks like there's 30 of them. um that that those aren't really an issue or >> I didn't see anything that um >> jumped out as >> okay >> as being ownorous. I think it all seemed like it would be doable. So >> like the pavement of beard and opening up that >> yeah I don't know beard north of our site. I don't I guess I didn't see exactly how that was phrased. I was looking mostly at the plans. I'm an engineer, so I I was looking at the comments on the plans and I jumped into that and I maybe didn't read through the report as thoroughly as I should have. So, um, but paving north beard north of the development sounds great. I don't know if you were hoping we'd be on the hook for all that or not. I think that's a >> Yeah, most likely >> topic for discussion. We already paved >> 275th all the way out. So um you know >> I mean those things will be you know more uh negotiations with the um I mean the financing of it will be discussions with the city administrator and city council. >> Yeah. >> Um but from a planning perspective I think this this board is just responsible for planning level you know >> that number of homes from that local road connection is just too much. >> Yeah. paving it and then connecting Litty Avenue definitely does make sense from a >> right >> logistic standpoint. Yeah. Traffic standpoint for sure. >> Yeah. >> Yep. >> And hopefully some of the eastern you know portion of the Boulder Heights development then would take that out. So disperse some of the >> sure traffic. We do already um have gotten a handful of you know complaints about from residents that live on Oxford about traffic and species. >> Yeah. And I in the reporter talks about the speed limit of beard and >> Yeah. >> addressing that as well. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Um is there a requirement of a time frame of when the neighborhood meeting is supposed to happen? >> We just asked that the neighborhood meeting happen before a planning commission public hearing. >> Okay. >> So, you know when you would hear any public hearing for reszoning and platform that so >> um the last two developments so and we've done this recently on Highlands and Meadows >> um they did it just a couple weeks before the city's meeting and I think it's going to work really well. And is the desire for splitting it residential in the northern half like single family and um multif family below just because of the way the planning lines out and >> I mean >> thanks. Yeah. Is it just because of that or is it just >> Yeah, I mean basically that I guess the the differentiation. >> Yeah. So it's it's just to comply with the comprehensive plan where it had low density on the north half and and medium density on the south half. So to meet that threshold of at least five units per acre, you got to do something other than just single family >> because you'll never get there. So that's why we're showing some single family down there, but the bulk of it would be town homes to >> Yeah. to utilize the the higher density that's called for in the comprehensive plan. >> Yeah. So they they have pushed the single family a little bit into that medium density area to get more single family than town homes. I would say, but Luke's right. I think what we're seeing even with the 65 with the 65 foot wide lot, >> I think like three units per acre is about the most you're going to get. >> Yep. By the time you get ponding and streets and all that stuff in there, it's just five five units per acre. You just can't do that single family. So, >> and I like the mix of housing type. >> I'm sorry. Do you think that you would transition to a 60 foot wide lot on that very southern part or you think you'd stick with all 65 or 70s? So, I I think we'd stick with the 65 just because that way it's the neighborhood's got uniformity to it and the same same houses fit all the way through. Okay. >> And then we would just do the 8 unit town home buildings south of that. >> Okay. And were you able to confirm that the house styles that you're planning for would fit on a 65 or 70? >> Yeah, we've talked to Solenar. Um they bought a bunch of our lots in the Boulder Heights development. They're interested in this phase as well and they confirmed that they like the 65 foot lot wide lots versus the 70 that we had before. I mean, they like those two, but they said the 65s work. So, we're looking at relaying out the site with all 65 foot lots >> throughout the entire property >> for well for all the single family would all be 65 foot and then that south third or so would be the town homes. Okay. It would be a similar housing product uh that you see in Boulder Heights. >> It would be similar to Boulder Heights. Yeah. Um a lot of those houses will fit. Some of them are a little bit too wide, but u most of those houses would still fit on the 65 foot lot. So, and it still takes a three-car garage and everything. So, it'll be very similar product to what's already in Boulder Heights. interrupt. >> No, you're good. >> I appreciate the additional questions. Thank you. >> So, really as of tonight, you're looking for just recommendations on annexing the property and >> and the general layout of Do you support development of the property not affected by fear questions comments? I see any issues with it. >> Anything from that township? >> No. >> So with that then everybody's okay with the going forward with proceeding with the annexation in regards to the in addition to the 30 staff recommendations. >> Um So then we would forward unless there's one of those that you didn't agree with, but we would forward all those comments from you to the city council. >> Yes. >> Yeah. Nothing sticks out to me. I think all the staff recommendations are reasonable and took in good consideration of traffic. Um, for sure. >> Motion. >> I'll make it a motion. >> Anyone want a second? >> All right. And I'll second. >> All right. All in favor? >> I >> Okay. Thank you. We appreciate your time. Thank you so much. >> Very good. Thank you all so much. Have a great night. Okay. And then we'll move on to miscellaneous um 2026 vacant lot inventory. >> Yeah, just uh put that in your packet for information and try to update at the beginning of every year. Um there's 133 vacant single family residential lots and that it seems like we've been platting a lot of lots but last year at almost the exact same time we did it I think it was 125 lots. So even though we've a whole bunch more lots getting built on we've issued I think last year it was 70 or 71 building >> really unusual for being so early in the year that we already have approved essentially 13 >> permits and three applications and then community development updates. Um I think at the last meeting I had suspected that we would have a public hearing at this meeting for me >> and we decided to require a traffic impact study and they did not that was one of the initial recommendations that that might be a requirement and so they get that done or submitted before this meeting. plan for next meeting. >> Okay. >> And really, we're looking um I don't think it's even that we suspect that there's going to be any big areas of concern, but we wanted to look at the impacts to Dakota and County Road and impacts to County Road 91 and 255th Street as a table. on that one. And we did receive application for final approval for Highlands at second phase. So that won't come before this board, but they intend to build a second phase. >> Okay. Luke, anybody else have any questions or anything? Okay. All right. Um, make a motion to adjurnn the meeting at 7:46 p.m. Um, anyone want a second? >> I'll second. Great. >> All in favor? All right. Meeting adjourned. Thanks, everyone.