[Music] [Music] I call this meeting to order this is the land use planning and zoning committee of the city council councilors Benton and Jones are excused councilors grout and Lewis are in attendance via Zoom this is a hybrid meeting where all participants will be in person or video or audio conference members of the public have the opportunity to address the committee if they have signed up for the public comment per the rules established on the agenda and on our website Friday we'll call the speakers when we get to the individual item you signed up for uh here are the public comment ground rules comments are to be addressed to the committee members only each participant has two minutes to present and any disruptive conduct will result in removal from the meeting uh all right we're going to go through pretty quickly tonight hopefully we will go to agenda item a that is EC 413 and that's the mayor's appointment of Mr Ren holstead to the Environmental Planning Commission I move confirmation second that that was a second from Council grout um counselors are there any questions for um the staff or Administration also Mr rinstead is here um via Zoom if anybody has any questions for him I don't have any uh Madam chair yeah certainly would love for uh the new um soon to be a commissioner to have an opportunity to be able able to talk a little bit about um your uh uh just maybe maybe some of your background and then desire to serve in the commission thank you councelor Lewis um mrad are you around can we get you in yes I am I I had to rejoin as a panelist so I I may have missed the beginning of that question could I get that one more time sure uh we were just asking if you wanted to give us a few words about your qualifications and why you want to serve on the EPC sure absolutely um yeah so I am a architect and associate with fbt Architects uh I am a Albuquerque native um born and raised and uh I uh I've always been interested in um in planning and in general and I am uh a big advocate of helping our city grow and realizing all its potential and uh also sort of uh making sure that that we keep our identity um at the same time so I think that the EPC is a great opportunity to serve the city um in that capacity and I um as an architect uh for over a decade uh of practicing uh I've got a lot of experience and uh uh Insight that I think would prove valuable uh to the position thank you so much we do have one speaker signed up to speak this evening so let's go to that please thank you madam chair on Zoom we have David schaer hello we can hear you sir they it made me do the same thing it made me rejoin as a panelist so I I appreciate your patience so uh if if you want me to go ahead um I recommend the appointment of Mr Hallstead to the EPC I can tell you from my six years of being an EPC commissioner that his um Insight in having the the knowledge of um the basic workings of zoning the basic workings of the Ido um having um an understanding of the development process having an understanding of architectural and he's young enough that he hasn't been Jed by everything in the city yet so he's a not that you get Jaded by the city don't get me wrong but you know what I'm saying he's uh he's he's going to be a well serving member of this Commission because um the most important thing is guess what he wants to be there and that's half the battle and him having a vested interest of what happens in our C our city is the other half of that battle and having the basic qualifications required for that and and want to be on this commission um I would highly recommend that you approve his appointment thank you Mr schaer I will just say um quickly that Mr schaer has been the district 7 representative um for some time and he's currently serving as president of the EP U chair of the EPC and we really thank him for his service and for his assistance helping me find someone um that would be as qualified as he is to serve um my district so uh really looking forward to um Mr uh halad being confirmed and getting to work um on the EPC as we move into the new year are there any other questions from Council no all right I think we have to do a roll call vote because we have folks online so I'll turn it over to that coun grout Yes councelor Lewis yes councelor feor yes yes that passes on a three vote thank you and um Mr holstead we'll see you at full Council next time and uh we're going to move on to uh Item B councelor grout thank you madam chair uh R 196 is amending the level a community framework plan for Mesa Del Soul to change the allowable maximum Building height from 80 feet to 110 ft and allow um NR GM land uses on specific properties in the employment center on a case-by casee basis as approved by the EPC and I move a do pass I will second that all right so uh r231 196 is a quasa Judicial request which requires special procedures to allow the applicant staff and the public to speak this agenda item will proceed as follows one we're going to have Council planning staff give a presentation for five minutes then we're going to go to the the applicants presentation which is 10 minutes then we'll have public speakers 2 minutes each then we'll be rebuttal by the applicant if needed five minutes um and then cross examination by anyone who spoke during the public comment period two minutes each then we'll move to comments by planning department if they have any that'll be five minutes and then we'll close with Council planning staff uh for five minutes for close City staff and the applicant must be sworn in if you'll be speaking to this item as a staff member or applicant please raise your right hand do you affirm under penalty or perjury that your testimony today will be true yes we get and okay I saw Miss Schultz all right um Miss Schultz I'm GNA turn it over to you for your first your five minute presentation thank you Madame chair and counselors and hopefully my presentation will not even take that long I'm going to share my screen to share a couple of slides um I will not not read the title again because councelor grout so graciously read it for me this is r231 196 um an amendment to the mesel soul level a master plan um this is the third amendment to the level a master plan this body has heard this year hopefully it's the last one uh this year there's a lot of movement down at Mesa Del Soul it seems for some Regional context Mesa Del Soul is located in the southeast part of Albuquerque located within district 6 it's approximately 13,000 Acres most of which at this point is undeveloped um but is a planned uh Community there is a hierarchy of plans that govern what can happen at Mesa Delo from a land use perspective there are Level a plans level B plans and level C plans this body the council only has purview on over level a plans the EPC has a final decision-making authority over level B plans and level C plans so this body tends to hear kind of the biggest um most highlevel policy decisions associated with the framework plan the request today relates to Building height and allowed uses within a portion of Mesa Del Soul the first portion of the request uh seeks to increase Building height from 80 feet to 110 ft the second portion of the request seeks to allow gen General manufacturing and special manufacturing uses permissively in a portion of mesel Soul um I've provided a map that I'm hoping you can see on the screens in the chambers that these changes will only be applicable to about 30 Acres of an area designated as an employment center so on this map that I have on the screen you can see a couple of of light purple or maybe lavender blobs on the right side here uh the Eastern side of Mesa Del Soul that's all designated as an employment center within that employment center is a tract owned by uh chyos who I'm sure the applicant will speak a little bit more to as he enters his presentation and they're seeking to develop this property with manufacturing uses that require an amendment to this plan to one allow those uses um but also to increase the building height to accommodate their building needs um here's a bigger blowup of that map and you can see the kind of red area here where the impacted tract will be uh the city council is the final decision making body in this matter this request is subject to requirements in the ID specifically in section 66 I3 of the integrated development ordinance as required the applicant held a pre- submittal facilitated meeting earlier this year in February that's where they go to the nearby neighborhood associations and inform them of the request and take feedback and comments um at that time the neighborhood association was not entirely supportive of this request they were okay with the uh use change to allow Manufacturing uses but they were not okay with the increase in building Heights um when it was when they thought that it was going to be applicable to the entire employment center so that entire purple area on the previous Maps uh by the time we got around to the EPC hearing which occurred in September of this year um it was clarified or maybe the request was n uh tailored a bit so that the building height changes would only be applicable to the chyros tract only to the 30 acres and with that change in place the neighborhood association was supportive of the request in full the applicant also engaged with the Federal Aviation Authority because of the site's proximity to the Albuquerque Sunport um there's a letter in the record from the FAA saying they do not have issue with the increased Building height from 80 to 110 feet on this tract um so that's that's not an issue for this request either the EPC ended up recommending approval to the city council subject to findings and conditions which you can find in the record with that counselors I'll stand for any questions thank you m Schultz any questions before we move on um could you show me in the map where is the neighborhood association that was concerned about it in the beginning uh Madam shair I I'm sorry madam chair and councel grouts let me pull my map back up uh I do not know exact boundary of the neighborhood association but I if we'd like to move on to the next portion of this request which is the applicants presentation I can pull up a map of the neighborhood association and let you know after they speak okay thank you sure thank you all right thank you we'll come back to that any other questions at this point I'm sorry I can't see councelor Lewis so um no okay thank you uh all right let's move on to the applicants presentation we have looks like we have Jim stroer here uh you've got 10 minutes all right thank you uh Madam chair and um and counselors um Jim stroer principal with consensus planning 3028 Street Northwest uh 87102 for the record um I'm here today representing Cairo power in this um application and appreciate Miss Schultz's presentation um and and when you get that up uh shaana the the neighborhood association boundary is BAS basically to the South uh West I believe of this uh of this area closer to the community center and the aperture building um this um I just want to talk a little bit about chyros and and and part of what a cool company they are and how how amazing it is that they're that they're in our city um and and located at mesad Del Soul and and um I think Mich Schultz did a good job of characterizing the conversation that went on with the neighborhood and the evolution of that and um it was really my bad that the original request wasn't clear that it only applied to this property and we clarified that and they were they were happy with that once we once we did that and the EPC as part of this process um so we had to amend the level a plan but also the level B plan and so the EPC also considered amendments to the level B plan to also effectuate this change that was approved but that approval doesn't go into effect unless the level a plan is amended um so um which which they also recommended that you all that you all do so cairos power chose Albuquerque for the site of a state-of-the-art non-nuclear testing and Manufacturing facility that enables rapid I'm going to say things that I don't necessarily understand what they mean but I've heard the pitch so I get I get it kind of but um rapid inter iterative learning Cycles to accelerate Innovation and this is related to the um a process that they're developing that is um a nuclear process they just don't do any of the nuclear part here so it's research and development and this application is to facilitate the construction of what I believe will be their fourth building on this site that will help them uh take that research and development to the next phase um once again for the non-nuclear part of the development of this technology um they are making major investments in infrastructure to a achieve cost certainty for our technology aligned with our vertical integration strategy um Cairo power has uh participated part done in partnership with the city in the form of industrial revenue bonds um they have uh gone through this Council for approval and back when I I actually met them when I served on the Albuquerque development commission before they were a client um and um heard their request for Lita um both from the city and the state at that time which were approved um and I'm going to cut to the chase I know um but they have nearly a 100 employees at their facility um and they've already exceeded their initial commitment to create 65 full-time high-paying jobs in Albuquerque 65% of their new hires are local to New Mexico and 45% of new hires are under repesent presented minorities so they've really I think one of the things is they made a commitment early on to reach out to the local community to for their hiring um and they have done that and they have exceeded their commitments to do that and this project additional project will help them continue that that pace so um there's it's a it's state-of-the-art group they're doing amazing things out there um and I think once we were able to figure out how to tailor this change to be site specific so it's it's hard when to conceptualize we're dealing with a plan that that uh guides 13,000 Acres of which I think now about 2,000 acres or 2500 Acres our employment center and then within that we're picking this 30 Acre Site and um and and we needed to change a table in the LEL a plan basically is what that this amendment does and we needed to figure out a way to tie it to this specific par parcel um which with staff's help and in coordination with the neighbors we were able to figure out how to do that and take that through the Planning Commission and the planning staff in order to make that um that happen so another so they are partnering with the New Mexico Workforce Connection University of New Mexico CNM and local trade schools to create opportunities for Albuquerque residents to join our clean energy Mission they're proud to offer a strong internship program which provides Hands-On training mentorship and career development opportunities to local students so they're walking the walk and and I'm just I I couldn't be uh more excited about what they're doing and um hopefully uh you all support this uh hopefully final step in making that making that next step of their project to reality so with that thank you and I'd be happy to answer any questions we did provide a detailed letter of justification to the EPC and that's all included in the packet and um and I that's it okay thank you thank you um I just want to see if there's any questions for Mr stroer before we go back councelor grout thank you madam chair um thank you Mr stroer for that um overview it's I'm very pleased to hear that um this company has followed through on what they said they would do and exceeded that it's that's very encouraging all around um and it's neat to see that they're growing and um man can we use that Economic Development so I think it's all great my questions are how many people will this new facility um employ how long will it take the um building to be um built um and I think that's those are my two questions at this time okay um my thank you for that um councelor grout so um I think they're at 100 employees they're continuing to grow I don't have a specific number that will be added um tied to this uh particular building because it's really an expansion of what they're already doing at the at the facility I think there will be new employees as they continue to grow they're in the process right now of developing um two uh I think they sort of look like tents but they're buildings um in between the front office building and where this new building will be those are under construction they had to do significant infrastructure improvements a lot of work with the Water Authority um in this area to bring expand existing water lines bring new water lines into the um into the area that's now been completed so I'm hopeful in answer to your second question they they still once this gets done they will have to enter into the building permit process and um and so the the building is being designed at this point they will submit their construction documents into to the city to get that done and it's a pretty complicated building so I'm going to guess it's going to take a bit to get it um constructed and up and running but um I don't I don't have a a schedule in my mind other than I would say it's probably next year that it would be hopefully complete very good thank you that's it thank you madam chair thank you all right um we are going to move on to the oh I'm sorry MZ let's go back and look at the map if you were able to get that information for councelor grout there's Madam chair councelor grout yes I was able to quickly put together a semi crude map um this red circle shows the subject site um to which this request applies to and about a little under a mile south in this Orange area that has this Mees label on it is the Mason delil neighborhood association okay thank you you're welcome thank you one final question um 110 feet is that about Nine Stories how how tall is that building GNA be uh Madam chair counselor grout um one story is typically between 10 to 12 or 13 feet it really depends on the use of the building you know a residential building has different story requirements than an industrial building but um probably between what you would Envision as a 9 to 10 story building would be within a 110 foot envelope very nice thank you thanks for for all that appreciate it and Madam chair I see I see my client I could it's these hybrid meetings are tough I can't see that um so um Rhonda is on is on the on the zoom call as well and she may be able to answer with more specifics uh some of counselor grout's questions as well all right great um I'm sorry and what's her name I can't see Reynolds hi Miss Reynolds thank you for being here I think before you speak I would need to ask you to raise your hand and and um be sworn in so um do you affirm under penalty your perjury that your testimony today will be true I do all right um I don't know if you were able to hear the questions that were being asked um earlier but if you want to add anything or answer those questions please go ahead and do so H I did I've been listening the uh to the entire uh meeting and I thank you so much for allowing me to be here um we've really enjoyed the partnership with the the city for our development it's been wonderful so far um and I am one of those people who was hired locally to join chyros and it's it's been a wonderful Journey for me um as far as the new facility that we're building it's not one large single building it is a a facility it's a production facility so the portion that is um going to be taller which is not 110 it's it's actually only approximately 100 feet tall but just in case to give us a little leeway we asked for 110 um it it is it only takes up a small fraction so maybe a tenth of the facility is at tower height the rest is typical two to two story is Building height so um the anticipated number of new employees that would staff that facility is um last I heard a little over 30 that would include maintenance um operation ations um and uh control because there's it's a lot of uh industrial process control and so there there's multiple facets to it um I can't recall if there was another question other than that I think those answered councelor clear out did you have another one no I U Madam chair thank you I just wanted to know when it might be built oh that's right the time frame exactly actually it is going to take um almost two years for full buildout uh we're hoping to have um the phase one portion in operation like Jim mentioned U towards the end of next year maybe the beginning of the following year time approximate time frame we are in the process of the design as he mentioned there was a review for a portion of it today um but nothing to the extent that we're ready to uh submit for permit yet thank you thank you for all of that you're welcome no I appreciate uh like I said I appreciate you guys uh listening to our request and uh hopefully we can continue the forward progress soon thanks M Ry appreciate you um being on to give us a little bit more detail we're going to move on to testimony by public speakers I think we have oh that was our only public speaker all right um we're going to go on to I don't know that we really need rebuttal um no there's no cross examination all right comments by the planning department if they have any and we have director verella here the uh planning department will not be providing testimony today uh however the record does reflect that uh staff is in support of this thank you thank you director verela all right uh Miss Schultz we're back to you for a close uh five minutes Madam chair I have uh no further comments happy to stand for further questions questions if counselors may have them thank you very much um are there any other questions for staff or admin from counselors all right M Madam chair uh I apologize I I should mention that uh the applicant did reach out to me about an immediate action request so if it's the will of the committee after a vote is taken um immediate action would be desired thank you for letting know that Miss Schultz all right so we are going to move to a vote on on uh this motion councelor grout Yes councelor Lewis yes C Fe corn yes that passes three to zero um and then I'm going to make a motion for immediate action on this do I have a second second a second by councelor grout and we'll vote on the immediate action councelor grout Yes councelor Lewis yes councelor Fe corn yes that passes unanimously all right well there being no further business apparently folks are ready to get going for their holiday time um this lups committee meeting is adjourned thank you everybody [Music]