foreign [Music] all right I'm going to call this meeting to order this is the land use planning and zoning committee of the city council all counselors are present or will be very soon this is a hybrid meeting where all participants will be in person our video our audio conference members of the public have the opportunity to address the committee if they signed up for the public comment for the rules published on the agenda and on our website on Friday we will call for the speakers when we get to the individual agenda items you signed up for so we're going to go first to agenda item a054 counselor Jones would you like for me to move it for you okay this is o54 adopting Citywide text amendments to the integrated development ordinance 1416 in conjunction with the 2022 Ido annual update process to address the need for more housing opportunities I'll move a do pass and we will now hear a presentation by Ms Schultz followed by a no just miss Schultz and Miss Schultz is ill so she is going to be on Zoom are you there Michelle I heard her earlier Miss Schultz are you able to hear us should we go ahead to public comment and come back to Ms Schultz afterwards is that okay with everybody up here all right let's go ahead and do that thank you madam chair we'll start with Joanna Stein followed by Evelyn feltner guess it's a good thing I showed up on time uh anyway well I really appreciated all of your guys's comments at the last meeting about all the Amendments I think uh it seems like you're going in a great direction from uh the perspective of people who need housing in Albuquerque so if you continue along that direction you will have more young people who continue to stay in the city more aged people who are able to stay with their families and individuals that have affordable housing so that they have a greater percentage of their income to use on other aspects of their lives some of the other comments that were made that like I think are not super meritorious are the ones that say you haven't spent a lot of time on us you guys have spent a lot of time I have written a letter to the editor in the paper I have come to more than half a dozen meetings in support of this there have been hundreds of people who've been asked and put their input into this process so I hope that you can finally make a decision today and that we can have uh more accessibility to housing here in Albuquerque and I appreciate all the hard work that many people here in this room not in this room and uh you know have done to make this process like one that uh is very thoughtful so I appreciate your work thank you guys Evelyn feltner followed by Alan lasek Evelyn felt nurse secretary district 7 Coalition and speaking as such we still think that a conditional use throughout the city for Adu construction is the best answer but we do have a possible compromise workable solution permissive use for Adu construction on lots of three quarters of an acre or larger conditional use for Lots below that threshold we also want to note that miss that counselor grout last session demonstrated how useful it can be to have the Adu construction person inform the neighbors what is going to be built and they might not oppose it as in her case she did not that is what a conditional use hearing would do again if you have to build a carport only after having a hearing for a variance it seems logical that you should have to have a hearing and let your neighbor know what you're doing if you're building an Adu in the backyard thank you I don't see the lights on for folks to see when their time is up are we doing that tonight okay our next speaker is Alan lasek followed by Miriam Hicks hello counselors Alan lesek here with the apartment association in New Mexico I just want to come down tonight and really thank you all for working on this I know that this is a very complicated process and and change is hard and you know I understand that there's never a silver bullet to to anything uh housing related or or development related but you know we truly believe that you all have done a great job and we wanted to thank you for that and you know I think that the important part about not only this bill but the next bill is that you're providing opportunity and opportunity is what Albuquerque needs and so for that we want to thank you and uh we wish you good luck on this thank you guys have a great evening Miriam Hicks followed by Joshua Butler Joshua Butler followed by James price hi Joshua beutler president of the Via Prada neighbor Association I'm a bit surprised to see this kind of legislation going through zoning land use this is a really complex legislation and sure it has a point here but we were talking about affordable housing this is a very very complex issue that goes way past zoning and it needs to be lumped all together in one piece of legislation and one law so looking at what I was able to see uh from where we're at right now mostly what I see is kind of one interest pecking away at the interest of another I don't see a whole lot of coming together a lot of collaboration and a whole lot of of addressing different things so let me kind of address some different topics that maybe haven't been addressed before one of the issues you're actually dealing with is that there aren't enough people that make enough money in Albuquerque to afford a house before the inflation that went on in 2022 and 2021 let alone now that's a serious issue and that goes back to education that goes back to opportunities in um in business the city has done a pretty good job of chasing away a lot of business lately and that's a serious issue it needs to be addressed I know that covert was hard but it didn't help other issues as well if you have so many people that are the lower end and they're competing for housing that won't ever be enough for all those people and as as much as it pains me to say it you probably need to suspend the sanctuary status of the city for this time if you can't address and take care of the people that are here with you right now and that are here in our city there's no need bringing more people in of course we want to do it of course it's the terrible thing to do but if we don't have the resources we can't figure out how to do it if we kind of suddenly come come to this realization that my goodness there are this many people at this low end of the Strata with regards to medium income we need to rethink those kind of things so there's enough housing for those that are here first before we care for the people thank you very much James price followed by Aaron Hill Aaron Hill followed by Rhiannon Samuel counselors we are staring down the barrel of a demographic disaster right now and it is because of housing alongside a variety of other issues as of 2017 Bernalillo County became a stage five demographic transition city or county and what that means in simple terms is that the economic pressures of living in the City of Albuquerque have outweighed the birth rate meaning that people are dying faster than they are being born because they cannot afford housing because they cannot afford child care because they cannot afford enough food so on and so forth and so what we are looking at here is a situation in which people in 20 years the population will not be large enough to sustain the current tax base simply because now people cannot afford to survive what does that look like on a policy level that looks like what Japan is going through right now Japan as an entire nation is stage five and what that means is that many of their social programs are collapsing their infrastructure is unable to be paid for because their tax base is too old too many of their people are retired and too few are in the workforce what does this mean as an individual this means that I know that my partner and I will never be able to have a kid this means that I know we will never be able to have a house this means that retirement is a word that's kind of on the same level of unicorn in terms of realism and so if you're looking at me and saying why isn't this person buying a house why aren't they having kids they should be a productive member of society it's because I am in my 20s and cannot afford any of that would be a nice solution to that maybe a retrofitted apartment would be what I need to get on my feet so maybe in my 40s I can buy a nice house thank you Rhiannon and Samuel followed by Donald meters here representing the commercial real estate Development Association for the state and speaking in opposition to the amendment that would not allow for duplexes and R1 zoning duplexes offer a variety of benefits both for the residents and for the community as a whole for an example they allow for more efficient use of existing land and infrastructure while also reducing the environmental impact of new housing construction they also provide more housing options for families of all sizes including those with elderly relatives or with kids who need their own space I understand that some people may be concerned about the potential impacts of duplexes on their property values or on their neighborhood character however I believe that these concerns are outweighed by the benefits that this change could bring into our community in fact Studies have shown that neighborhoods with a mix of housing types and densities are often more stable and resilient than those that are dominated by single family type housing please ease restrictive zoning to allow for us to be more Nimble and Innovative in our common goal of solving our housing crisis together thank you Donald meters followed by Leslie Padilla yes I'm Donald letters and I'm the product of growing up in a duplex in fact everything in our neighborhood was duplexes or fourplexes had the distinction of growing up in Los Alamos of course it was a converted military base at that point and so almost all the housing was duplexes and fourplexes until the big fires once the fires swept through the uh housing stock was severely impacted we probably lost half of a residential units because all the duplexes and fourplexes that were burnt down were replaced by mega mansions and so the few duplexes that were left were severely impacted by being the lowest priced houses in the neighborhood so uh it probably cut half the housing units in Albuquerque in Los Alamos and quadrupled the price of the new housing now most of us here couldn't afford to buy the houses we currently live in at today's prices so the housing problem is not going to go away by just waving a wand and I think that this is a good solution and there again I grew up in a duplex I haven't become an Ax Murderer Leslie Padilla followed by Rwanda Umber is Leslie Padilla I live in District Six there's somehow a belief that greater density in R1 neighborhoods will increase affordability so I wanted to share my experience of increased density in a former neighborhood of modest single-family homes I moved back to Albuquerque shortly before the pandemic from Austin Texas which was experiencing a massive affordability crisis one attempted solution increased density through accessory dwelling units like what you're considering here my Austin neighborhood was a prime target for Adu developers and they set about buying and raising almost every affordable older home they could get their hands on they bought out long time residents the impacts of this during Demolition and construction we had to live with noise dust pollution practically every single day of the week did this result in more affordable homes in my neighborhood absolutely not in fact it resulted in many small quickly Built Homes that were less affordable on a per square foot basis than larger homes and many of those unfortunately got turned into short-term rentals and it made the entire neighborhood less affordable as property taxes went up for everyone so today I was wondering what the research was to support the proposition that increased density improves affordability so I did some research interestingly I found a recent Urban Institute study that looked at this exact question it's just for March of this year and I want to quote from the summary quote we find no statistically significant evidence that additional lower cost units became available or became less expensive in the Years following land use reforms so I ask that you either reject this now or delay consideration until un City staff have had more time to study this including the recent Urban Institute study and allow residents to understand the implications and develop a more targeted proposal and I wanted to say something about Equity it seems highly inequitable that only certain special areas of the city would be exempt from this I understand that people in those areas are concerned about maintaining the character of their neighborhoods but shouldn't the character of our neighborhood to be important to all of us I know it's important to me and my neighbors so I ask you to either postpone or reject this thank you thank you thank you I'm Wanda umberg from The Singing Arrow neighborhood and I greatly appreciate your work trying to balance the needs of all the conflicting stakeholders here I know in affordable housing is important to all of us I'm sure most of you have had the experience of going to the store and trying a one-size-fits-all garment and if you're like me when you left you probably found out that one size really doesn't fit anyone and I feel that way a little bit about this legislation let me tell you a little bit about our neighborhood and singing arrow we have businesses high-rise Apartments four and ten plexes duplexes and single-family homes these structures were designed according to the Past zoning and building codes where there was far less demand for electricity water sewer and certainly parking over time there have been remodels construction of additional structures including adus some permitted some not we now have major parking issues in some areas of our neighborhood we have streets that were not designed for off-street parking and odd sections in our neighborhood that have only one way in and one way out and they're now lined by cars on both sides of the street i weekly watched the sanitation trucks and they're juggling act to try to get through and empty our trash without damaging anything and they do a great job we have had situations where emergency vehicles can't get to the houses they're trying to get to um we've had issues with electricity and Sewer blanketly reducing parking requirements would not serve our neighborhood we have had poor success in getting code enforcement to enforce the existing parking requirements and safety has been a Paramount concern in some of those cases well we have one or two wider streets that could benefit from this legislation it doesn't really help us please listen to the EPC and eliminate the changes in parking and entertain counselor grouts amendment to make adu's conditional remember your experience with that one-size bits none clothing thank you so much Michelle meters followed by Sarah Walker Sarah Walker followed by Timothy Krebs um I think yes Albuquerque needs infill I just would like it done thoughtfully carefully I've been rethinking I mean I I didn't realize that you voted down duplexes last week but duplexes within a house that's there fine but according to but what I saw in Denver were were beautiful neighborhoods were 50 torn down and the duplexes were mono architecture unattractive it's like cutting down a rainforest and replacing it with pine trees if if there's very planning and control like owner occupied duplexes limiting teardowns I don't know if that's possible um home Casitas only rented out by the homeowners that live there um because potentially I have right now I have eight households surrounding me and potentially I could have 24 households surrounding me and it's just kind of incomprehensible if we could just I mean maybe that's the future but if we could just slow this down without destroying neighborhoods without destroying their character Parkland Hills had no murders last year the murders surrounded Us in all the multi-dwelling neighborhoods and that's because we have um we don't have absentee landlords we don't have rentals the rentals we do have our now short-term rentals we lost those rentals but anyway I'm done Timothy Krebs followed by Renee Horvath Sheriff people corn and counselors my name is Tim Krebs I'm a professor of political science at the University of New Mexico I've been helping the mayor's policy team with research related to housing forward ABQ I want to urge the committee to adopt the zoning the zoning changes in the proposed ordinance research clearly shows that market conditions associated with rental prices and Rental vacancies is the chief cause of homelessness it also shows that housing is less likely to be produced in cities that favor single-family zoning to multi-family zoning increasing density will increase the supply of housing which drives down rental prices it will also produce economic environmental and Public Safety benefits research shows that more densely settled places are more economically vibrant provide greater access to public goods and services they reduce environmental impacts associated with sprawl development reduce pressure on infrastructure and maintenance and are better for Crime Control and prevention increasing housing densities will also make our city more attractive to younger college educated workers who have radically different vocational housing and lifestyle preferences than their parents and previous generations of Americans I support making zoning regulations in our community more flexible to further these positive benefits thank you Renee Horvath followed by Miriam Hicks Miriam Hicks followed by James price we will now shift to zoom and try to come back if people join the room we'll start with Jane Beckley followed by Dan Regan Jane you are muted thank you and Madam chair and counselors um the Santa Fe Village neighborhood association has submitted multiple written comments there are actual people behind those comments we are the people who know our neighborhood well we are the people who are delivering and delivering Flyers to our upcoming membership engagement event every one one of the 1033 homes in Santa Fe Village we are the people who participated in Saturday's Albuquerque spring cleanup we have a pretty considerable expertise about Santa Fe Village and we are community members committed to supporting our neighborhood we were not included or consulted in the planning of o2254 despite narrow's indication that neighborhood associations actually are actually are Central or should be to planning for social change and Community issues um fairly opportunities and choices in housing increasing those strengthens our city and neighborhoods but not all strategies are equally appropriate or likely to be effective in all areas and all neighborhoods and each deserves adequate vetting the process to date of considering oh 2254 can best be characterized as quote a means of appeasing obligations to take input while seeming to pursue contrary objectives we respectfully request that you defer and or amend a 2254 to ensure that going forward there is genuine public Outreach and engagement and ongoing accountability for its results and its impact both across the board on neighborhoods and on the the central need for additional housing thank you so much for your time and attention Dan Regan followed by Sarah Manning do you know how to turn on my camera I'm here we can hear you sir can you hear me we can hear you okay it doesn't matter with the camera then chairperson and I start my video can you restart my clock go ahead Mr Regan uh I'm with khna and b4c Lou Wallace after trying to govern the territory of New Mexico wrote that every calculation based on experience elsewhere fails in New Mexico some take that as a bad thing I've always seen it as a society level form of the ancient adage to know thyself cabq and the council is again trying a new thing based in part on calculations made elsewhere if we consider the last decade of new things try out on experience elsewhere you've got the art project that was created in major part by a Chicago consulting firm a very large majority of businesses and residents along Central were seriously against this project from the 23 million dollars in EV buses that never worked the risky and confusing bus lanes that still cause accidents not so good an ivr outcome November 13 2017 in the wee hours of the night council passes a brand new Ido written in large part by a consulting firm from Denver ninety percent of residential owners giving input were against that evening two property developers one from the East side one from the West Side both stated that we should let the markets decide what gets built where by whom and for what reason the markets and the zoning processes since that night have removed the awareness of and inputs from close to 97 percent of all residential property owners the city says it's draw it drew from experiences elsewhere in bringing up the housing forward process and we heard the saying let the markets decide twice at the last Lux meeting we're repeating mistakes again Sarah Manning followed by Evelyn Rivera thank you I am Sarah Manning I'm a resident of this District 2 and a member of the alliance for Local Economic prosperity a famine cannot be prosperous without a place in which to live our city Albuquerque is lacking three excuse me 30 000 Living Spaces of all sizes and all price ranges at the moment so there must be at least thirty thousand people struggling in our city for survival not only Prosperity this property this problem affects us daily for those of us up those of us who wish to help expanding the options for housing under o2254 makes sense these options allow me and all other homeowners in our four Z zones to decide how and whether I want to add additional housing in my property to make Albuquerque a better City I don't have to do anything of course I can always not make any improvements whatsoever but with this ordinance I can choose to build a casita or expand to Second living space and so can my neighbors nothing is being forced on us we are simply receiving more options on how we use our property and what we are willing to do for the betterment of our city thank you councilors Evelyn Rivera followed by Alex Applegate Evelyn you are muted okay can you hear me now we can hear you thank you can you start my time anew thank you as a multi-generational New Mexico Ido amendments as a form of modern colonialism whereby those in power imposed new values on our cultural values and way of life at a neighborhood meeting a city planner said that our neighbors neighborhoods needed to be Diversified we are a multicultural cities and our neighborhoods are diverse I know this because I've appraised over 4 000 homes in New Mexico in Albuquerque as a certified residential appraiser and a homeowner I had major concerns about the accessory dwelling units section of the housing forward plan in the context of this plans these will actually be rental units the neighborhoods will drastically change in character more cars will be parked on streets from an Appraiser's Viewpoint having a rental unit next to a single family residence in a neighborhood of single-family residents would be considered a negative external value will the city compensate me as a homeowner for my loss in equity or value the addition of a rental unit will not automatically add market value to the home letter an appraiser must prove that the structure has contributory value if the value is not supported by comps in the market area that structure will be deemed an over Improvement every single homeowner needs to receive a letter from the city notifying them of these proposed amendments the amendment affects the value of a typical homeowner's greatest asset the real beneficiaries of these proposed amendments are investors this will further reduce the number of homes available for aspiring homeowners as single-family homes are converted to rental units thank you for your time Alex Applegate followed by Terry Storch uh chair and committee members thank you for the opportunity to speak my name is Alex Applegate from District Two and I am chair of the transportation and housing working group of the environmental justice caucus we wholeheartedly support these changes the transportation sector is the largest and fastest growing contributor to climate change and the leading cause of this is our Reliance on single-family housing and the need this creates for everyone to have an automobile Albuquerque is dominated by single-family homes which make up 68 of our community in an average R1 Zone a person has to drive about three miles to get to a grocery store more high density housing on the other hand coupled with small businesses located within a neighborhood make communities more walkable and bikeable which reduces the need for everyone to get in a car and drive to fill their basic needs high density housing is also more physically sound imagine 40 people living in one block as opposed to 40 people occupying 10 blocks which is going to cost less to maintain our city is unable to afford nice things because we are always having to maintain roads and services spread out over miles of space for all these reasons and more we support the changes as a start to making our community a more vibrant and healthy place thank you Terry Storch followed by Patricia Wilson um thank you um city council and committee members and thank you for all the work you've done on this um doing nothing is not an option given how much um homelessness we have in Albuquerque and how um low the housing stock is um I am concerned like a couple of the speakers that uh this isn't necessarily going to make housing more affordable but when housing stock increases in kind of a capitalist market system like we have um the reasoning is pretty sound that prices will go down so we have to have enough housing for the people who live here and who will be coming here to live and so I do support the Ido changes in o2254 thank you very much Patricia Wilson followed by Julie dryke thank you well I believe that o2254 should be deferred for at least 16 months tonight my comments pertain to one failed Amendment at the April 12th lups hearing A4 the Adu setbacks failed I missed the discussion regarding that Amendment there's no video available and all I can tell from the minutes is the motion failed for lack of a second I've asked lups members why they opposed this amendment but have yet to hear anything while the Ido allows accessory buildings to be located anywhere in the side or rear yard the city's residential regulation FAQ sheet adds quote provided the accessory building is no closer than 10 feet to a house or other living quarters unquote all residential zones in the Ido from the smallest R1 to the multi-family high density still require a five foot interior side yard setback with rural Agricultural and Corner Lots requiring at least 10 feet fire there's there's a good reason to have your house or your apartment building be at least 10 feet away from its neighbor fire is one but another is privacy while building on the property line may not result in a physical or regulatory taking it presents what I consider an emotional taking living in a denser environment has challenges and maintaining one's privacy is key staying five feet from the property line or three feet with no openings is not an onerous requirement in exchange for denser more walkable and livable neighborhoods thank you very much Madam chair I'd like to respond to those comments uh Ms Wilson's an architect I think she may recall that we had a zoning code prior to this Ido that zoning code had the exact same Provisions uh that this one has without that Amendment you can build on the property line as long as you comply with the fire code and a an accessory dwelling accessory building of any kind was always allowable on the property line whether it be residential or not so uh that's that's what that's the discussion that you missed last time right and thank you for clarifying that councilor Benton I I am aware of that and I then am still concerned about the conflict with the city's uh residential regulation FAQ page if it if it says you need to be 10 feet away from your house why don't you need to be 10 feet away from your neighbor's house thank you thank you yeah and just uh again that provision of 10 feet distance between an accessory structure in the main house was always in the previous zoning code as well so this doesn't change any of that thank you all right we're going to move on we've got a long list of folks to get to Julie dryke followed by Maureen scoren thank you chair and members of the council I submitted written information in support of the amendment to make adu's conditional use in R1 and r1a Zoning a couple of points to support conditional use approval there are four areas in the city that are conditional use now as identified in the Ido and in R1 for adus without kitchens are conditional I understand from public meetings if ordinance 2254 goes through as written the four areas will continue to be conditional a positive effect of conditional is that neighbors would be would have a facilitated meeting if requested arranged regarding the planned Adu having participated in facilitated meetings for conditional requests I found them to be very useful and in most resulted in compromises that all parties could live with the conditional use approval process is not burdensome notice goes to the neighborhood association if there is one and neighbors within 100 feet as I understand it I have reviewed the last six months of the zhe agenda and decisions there were only eight Adu conditional requests submitted an average of 1.3 per month I was able to find approval for all of those other than the two most recent or the decisions are not yet posted ordinance 2254 has some good good Concepts to it and a major change to zoning affecting neighborhoods the positive effect of conditional is the facilitated meeting a positive reflection on our city to support communication and resolution of questions at the earliest point remove conditional with permissive you lose the opportunity for win-win and replace it with suits and court dates thank you all very much for your hard work Maureen skoran followed by Michael Brasher or um my family about about two years ago we moved from an apartment to a house that's about 50 percent bigger than the house about a year and a half after we moved the apartment we moved from cost more than the mortgage on the house so we drastically need more housing and I hope you'll support 2254. thank you Michael Brasher followed by Deborah Conger thank you very much Mr chairman and members of the committee I think we need additional time to study the housing forward initiative I think much work still needs to be done questions need to be answered the website statistic uh for the City of Albuquerque quotes the city is saying there are a total of 224 300 occupied house housing units in the City of Albuquerque it seems doubtful to me that all those committee all those community members all those people living in those houses are fully aware of the of the uh planned Housing Initiative and I think it's a missed opportunity because we uh hear from government it also gives us an opportunity if more people are aware of it to hear from the general public as well I will say that the uh Council has done done a good job in attempting to try and reach the public but the meetings generally result in 75 to 100 people attending sometimes without a PA system to hear and I just don't think we've reached everybody we need to reach also if you want to want a suggestion one suggestion might be to create a pilot program to see if it works in some area to find out the problems I think that a pilot program might be a good way to start this off and uh and uh if we created a conditional uh conditional program it might be helpful to understand what are the problems and what are the needs of the community and what changes need to be made is it working and if it's not working do we do we get rid of the program it's very difficult to get rid of these measures once they're instituted so we ask for your consideration uh to hold off on this and let's not rush into it thank you very much sir [Music] Deborah Conger followed by Richard Shafer hi my name is Debbie Conger I'm a resident of the Northeast Heights thank you counselors for letting me speak um last reps meeting counselor feeblecorn said that this process has been going on since November and I do understand that however most homeowners do not read the legal notices in the journal they do not go to the city website just to see what's new and most are not members of the neighborhood associations so I would really like to see this deferred until some first class mailing can be sent to All R1 Property Owners I think this is really important and that everybody needs to be notified of it so that even if it does pass they will know they will have some ideas of what the rules are and what to look for so I ask that you try to defer this until all R1 owners can be notified thank you Richard Shafer followed by Meredith Paxton come on Richard where are you Richard Richard Schaefer are you there yeah one of the guys in town wanted to do it with John we'll try to come back to you Meredith Paxton followed by Roger McNew I don't ever do a good job on those Meredith Paxton followed by Roger McNew Roger McNew followed by Maurice Collins can you hear me we can hear you uh thank you madam chair and counselors my name is Roger McNew um longtime resident in North Valley uh District 2. along with my wife uh Jane Yee we support this amendment because I see we see the desire the dire consequences of the city of Albuquerque's housing shortage every day we all see the many people who are unhoused on our city streets we see the many people who live in substandard housing we see the many empty houses that are condemned and uninhabitable our local governments and elected officials need to do better in providing adequate affordable housing these conditions stem from deficient deficient public policies in other words there are not individual they are not individual problems they are problems that we must solve as a community ordinance number zero two two five four will allow for higher density zoning in residential neighborhoods it is one step in the right direction towards establishing public policies that will ensure adequate and affordable housing I think it's important to point out that the Democratic party of New Mexico State platform and resolutions committee has already approved this resolution and we expect that the Democratic party State Central Committee will approve it shortly uh thank you for your time Richard Schaefer followed by Meredith Paxton um thank you can you hear me just we can at this point Thank you so um um I do question uh what we want Albuquerque to become uh I would argue that we're a middle class to lower middle class housing market right now um where our houses according to uh case Schiller index are 29 cheaper or Phoenix is 29 more expensive than we are Austin is 51 more expensive the entire national average we're 14 below the national average um I'm not there is a need there could be a need for rezoning it should be done smart it should be done uh very transparently with a lot of upfront discussion um last time we tried to deregulate housing across the board as a country I know we're chasing HUD dollars but those dollars are aimed at much bigger cities with much more extensive housing last time we tried to chase um uh a goal of allowing very low-income people into homes uh the Bush Administration pushed it from 2005 to 2007 resulted in a housing bubble and a lot of Wall Street folks got rich and the people who were pushed into those homes lost a lot of money and the average American citizen lost over 42 000 dollars per person in wealth one size fits all isn't perfect for Albuquerque and the to deregulate zoning across the entire city I think would be a mistake Meredith Paxton followed by Maurice Collins please incorporate the concept reflected by finding 33 of the January 19th EPC decision in the implementation of 0.2254 this would limit the concentration of the proposed R1 density increase to prevent the conversion of every property in a neighborhood to the maximum limit it was added in response to a comment by one of the Commissioners who observed that there are some neighborhoods where this just won't work Spruce Park my neighborhood illustrates the destructive capability of Limitless imposition of the ordinance the area has many advantages yet as fragile due to its location directly across the West boundary of the main UNM campus this already brings strong incentive for landlords to densify every home unbridled imposition of o2254 would only increase this problem and would be unfair to Spruce Park because Lots here are substandard in comparison with Modern Plating requirements our curbside links are generally only 50 feet and some are narrower although the increased sparking demands brought by 0.2254 are referred to as off Street it is ironically permissible for them to be met on the street the sum of two 20-foot long parking spaces a three foot Clear Sight triangle and the typical 13 foot wide driveways is greater than 50 feet there would be no place for trash bins mail delivery vehicles Tradesmen or visitors fire trucks and other emergency service providers would be impeded Spruce Park is incapable of bearing the burden of the o2254 up zoning it should not be asked to do so because the existing mixture of multi-family dwellings with single-family homes here means that our aggregate density is already greater than that of some other neighborhoods that would remain nearly unchanged by the transformative zoning Maurice Collins for the time Maurice Collins followed by Angela merkert hello uh good evening and thank you for affording me the opportunity to speak uh before you I represent a team uh currently undertaking a large-scale ground Hotel development project at 2026 Central Southwest that would be detrimentally affected by ordinance 2254 introducing a lower height limit for the building on our site on behalf of our of my firm our team project members and the residents who stand to benefit from the incremental tax revenue that our project would create I have permanently oppose both the intent and method of introduction of this legislation given the unreasonable timeline in which this amendment has been proposed introduced to vote and could be enacted 2254 offers little recourse to accommodate design changes for projects already in Redevelopment and in design it forces an unrealistic timeline to enter permitting after we entered our project in through the proper DFT channels the obligations created by this ordinance would effectively kill several underway developments pots including are resulting in the forfeiture of sales tax revenue hotel tax revenue and property tax revenues of over 600 000 a year on average or 12 million dollars over the 20-year life of our hotel franchise more generally will effective will negatively affect projects already in design per the existing Ido specifically at Central Avenue Main Street and along premium Transit corridors which serve as the backbone for increased economic growth throughout the area thank you very much for the opportunity to speak Angela merkert followed by Ian Robertson counselors thank you for addressing this need and the potential for increasing the housing opportunities here in Albuquerque I'm Angela merkert a steering Community member of sustainable Equitable economic democracy New Mexico or seed New Mexico and I'm also executive director of Alliance for Local Economic prosperity and I speak in favor of oh 2254 we need to expand the affordable housing Supply in our city and we need more Equitable access to housing small business owners will stabilize Staffing and their revenues as the housing as their housing is stabilized research identifies that stable safe affordable housing contributes to at least 50 percent of a family's ability to support Children's Learning outcomes in school and also the parent stability in keeping their jobs and sustaining their family's support thank you Ian Robertson followed by Tim nissley my name is Ian Robertson and I'm a privileged enough to be a homeowner in north campus and I'm also the vice president of the Idaho neighborhood association this is a critical moment in our City's development where we as New Mexicans have to decide what our values are I use the term critical because we are in fact in the midst of a housing crisis and there are people at this very moment deciding whether they can stay in Albuquerque whether they can pay rent or whether they can keep a roof over their children's head Decades of fearful and misguided sentiments have resulted in a crisis that centers around the simple fact that our city has chased unsustainable suburban sprawl and also spread misconceptions about both renters and apartments those misconceptions have slowed and prevented the creation of new higher density housing for decades I'd like to address some of the comments from Neighbors who claim that the Uli studies indicated housing was not made more affordable by upzone as a former resident of Austin I watched that City reject new units for decades much like we're doing here in Albuquerque until the situation became untenable there oftentimes they use the same misguided opinions echoed by some of the speakers here tonight and in fact I would say that recent studies show that as of March 2023 rental rate increases have leveled off in Austin how did that happen by upzoning and building new units so tonight I'm asking city council to approve the Amendments and create a pathway forward for more adus and duplexes in R1 zoning the city in the state needs your boldness and they need your courage and I do not think we need more time while people are wondering whether they can keep themselves in an apartment thank you to the city council and to the city planning staff for putting this forward Tim nissley followed by Anne Lynn Hall you were muted sir good evening everyone thank you for the work you're doing and thank you for the opportunity to speak my name is Tim knisley I'm a former Economic Development Community Development professional also a board member at the growls Community Coalition and on the city's small business advisory Council I'm here to speak in favor of o2254. um the housing crisis is enormous challenge for advocacy these changes to the idea that allow increased density parking height restrictions adus and duplexes or easing height restrictions are the best solution I've seen to make more housing affordable and available people have spoken eloquently about the benefits of these Ideo changes and increased density on affordability transportation and availability of Housing and Albuquerque agreed I was part of the community meetings around the original Ido and they were inclusive I believe this continues the vision of that audio process we simply can't continue this for all and we need more houses thank you for considering the solution and Lynn Hall good evening Madam chair and council members my name is England Hall I am the CEO of prosperity Works our work is to advocate for systems that support economic prosperity and I am here today to ask you to support increased housing options for our community I'm also a resident of District 8. we have a housing crisis in Albuquerque we are short 15 000 affordable housing units right now it is also important to recognize the disproportionate impact on communities of color and low-income communities when we don't have safe and affordable housing available in our community the changes proposed in the Ido that provide additional housing units are important changes including allowing duplexes duplexes are a way to increase units without huge impacts to neighborhoods and they are an easy way to increase our housing units overall I urge your support and include of including duplexes and R1 zones to the Ido to increase housing access I want to live in a in a community where we have safe and affordable housing for everyone thank you we will now backtrack to three people that may have entered the room a little late we have Miriam Hicks followed by James price I'm Miriam Hicks I'm the director of Housing Development for the greater Albuquerque Housing Partnership and I'm an executive member of the Albuquerque affordable housing coalition I hear a lot of statements about that impact my work there's too many affordable housing developments in one part of town we need to limit construction to only parts of the city that have greater opportunity we can't have pockets of poverty all of these statements are made regularly and right now single-family homes are excluding people in 68 percent of the city that zoning was created as an exclusionary measure in the early 1900s it Hoards wealth into certain areas of the city therefore concentrating poverty and others you see those resulting concentrations of poverty in town kids aren't safe getting to school the schools aren't performing well and businesses are closing in every way they are barriers to access quality housing and Economic Opportunity I believe there are only winners when we all have access to housing to the housing options we need and can afford to support our families when we each have access to Economic Opportunity and access to better schools for our kids we see communities thrive we all want to thrive and have our kids in good schools in a safe neighborhood where they can build friendships ride bikes and go to the park we need to make this change to R1 zoning it affects everyone in the city and it affects my family my daughter will be a UNM Lobo next year and I want her to taste that Independence and take charge of her own life and not not end up stuck back in her childhood bedroom these changes matter to our Workforce our labor market college enrollment successive small businesses please approve the housing forward zone changes without further restrictions thank you James price followed by Renee Horvath Renee Horvath foreign good evening I'm Renee Horvath I live on the west side of town and I finally made it so thank you um so um you know I'm very concerned about the housing board it's not because I'm not concerned about affordability but I do think it's misleading I'm not sure that these amendments will lead us to affordable housing and I think it will affect the quality of life for our citizens in Albuquerque I'm all about good design and to get a better product out of this and address those issues so I do think that the um we the neighborhoods were not engaged initially we just went straight to EPC and then we went to those quadrant meetings and they said we have to come to you to get these amendments I know that Renee grout tried to get some amendments to address some issues with the adus and I put some ideas in my letter to make sure the Lots large it's enough to address setbacks and parking and not impact your neighbors a lot of people are worried about that as far as adding additional stories to Apartments we're building building a lot of apartments on the west side and they're taller than they used to be and they're making people mad because they're shading their backyard why do we need to make them taller why don't you just require them to be 20 affordable automatically I hear Santa Fe does that so why don't we do that and then you want to make them taller and more dense and less parking we already reduced parking last year in the ideal annual update so why should we reduce more parking even the planning department says you don't need to you already reduced it last year so and we don't have the transit to transport people everywhere so I'm thinking we're going to ruin the quality of life we don't get this right I think we need more time to get this right I'm not sure that this is going to get unhoused that are camping on the streets because they need more subsidized they need more treatment facilities and so I think we should hold off before we approve this thank you Madam chair that concludes comment on o2254 thank you Mr Cornelius all right we are going to go back to Ms Schultz for the overview if she is online there she is Michelle go ahead Madam chair committee members thanks and I'm sorry for that brief delay at the start of the meeting I'm going to share my screen um so the first bill the bill we're on right now o54 does adopt proposes to adopt city-wide text amendments to the Ido uh specifically related to the housing forward initiative as a reminder um there are three criteria within the integrated development ordinance that must be met for any text Amendment to the idea to be approved first um that text amendment has to be consistent with the Albuquerque Bernalillo County comprehensive plan and any other policies and plans adopted by the council second the proposed amendment can't apply to a single lot or development project and third the pro the proposed amendment has to promote the public health safety and Welfare so as the committee and the council continues to consider amendments tonight and in the future these are the three criteria that must be met for any Amendment I went over the public process at the left meeting two weeks ago um but I thought it would be helpful to just review again that prior to this Lep's meeting tonight there have been 13 opportunities for members of the public to come learn about the proposal provide public input on the proposal and talk to either City staff or um appointed boards or elected officials about this dating back to October of 2022 when the planning department first did some kickoff meetings related to proposed amendments to the Ido and kind of talk to the public about what was maybe going to be on the table and took inputs the EPC the environmental Planning Commission had a study session on this matter on December 1st of 2022 there was not an opportunity to provide public comment on that meeting an APC study session really is for the EPC to understand the proposal at hand but moving on from that there were two more meetings in December related to hotel and motel conversions that is one component of the housing forward bill this evening and then on December 8th the EPC had their first hearing on the matter it was an all-day event and there were many public speakers on January 10th um there was an online meeting about housing forward where again the administration wanted to engage with the public talk to them about the proposed changes and receive feedback that led into the second and final EPC hearing on the matter on January 19th uh the EPC again at this hearing took public comment and ultimately did forward a recommendation of approval to the city council in March of 2023 City staff held five public meetings across the city that were very well attended where we spent time with the community for a couple hours each and presented housing forward and took questions and comments and concerns and then of course two weeks ago this body had their first hearing the first hearing of the land use planning and zoning committee on this matter of which there were 45 public speakers who spoke to o54 and then that leads us to the April 26 meeting tonight and then beyond that the next step is that this will go to the full council at some points for review by the by the full body and again that will be another opportunity for folks to provide public comments I'm not going to do an intense Deep dive into the bill because I did a 40 slide overview of it two weeks ago so I'm just gonna kind of hit some of the high notes which is Ino 54 there are six sections that all address kind of individual topics related to uh housing the first one is related to allowing duplexes in the R1 Zone District the second one relates to allowing accessory dwelling units within the R1 Zone District section three talks about multi-family conversions from non-residential developments section four relates to Building height restrictions and eliminating those as it was originally proposed Section 5 relates to exempting affordable housing development from off street parking requirements and section six proposes a more General reduction of parking requirements for multi-family developments sections two through six of this bill were successfully amended two weeks ago section one was not amended at that time but all other sections in some capacity were changed by this body if folks are interested in seeing what those changes were there are summary packets available on the planning Department's website which is www.abc-zone.com you can also reach out to City staff through email if you'd like to receive a copy of that summary packet um Madam chair that's my very brief overview of o54 and I'm happy to dive into any proposed amendments that are on the table for tonight unless the committee would like to have discussion instead thank you Miss Schultz um counselors any questions for staff or I guess the administrations here as well if there's any questions before we move on to amendments councilor Grant thank you madam chair thank you Shanna for that presentation again I have a couple of questions for the administration and specifically Mr griego good evening counselors good evening a couple weeks ago we learned I had asked you if you had who were the stakeholders involved when you guys were putting this housing forward initiative together and I asked specifically if neighborhood associations were involved and you didn't say yes that they were definitively so in that time in the last two weeks can you tell me if any neighborhood associations have come forward and asked had shared any thoughts with you foreign thank you for the question um so uh the first part of the question is how do we how do we get to the proposal and I think I think what we've heard from um uh several experts tonight is we tried to figure out uh the best way to tackle some of these issues and the way we typically start this not unlike some of the legislation that some of you have sponsored as we tried to figure out what was working and not working in other cities um so we looked at the research we also talked to some smart people who were really had studied this including some of our own staff who have frankly been looking at what other cities uh have tried to do with the specific challenges that we have um cities that look like us demographically maybe the same size economically and we did our best to try to get a good cross-section of of cities that we could learn from so the first thing is we've had to we had to have a proposal to put together to have people react to including industry folks including neighborhoods including Advocates so um so our team together and it was it was a lot of folks in the uh in the administration who tried to say okay um based on what we're hearing and all of us hear lots uh from from constituents we get lots of letters and emails and so on and we tried to figure out what are the issues that we're trying to address the first step was really what are we hearing um including from neighborhood folks and and what are some of the things that uh that we can learn from so then we put a proposal together and yes we absolutely got input from from Advocates we had meetings with Advocates folks who do affordable housing folks who work with a house Community we definitely talk to people who actually in the industry who know uh who know what what it will take for example uh to build some of these affordable housing projects what are some of the barriers to the current construction for example um and when we pulled all that together uh we had what was a proposal and that the next step was to start to start getting reactions to that proposal so I think as Ms Schultz mentioned uh we tried to then start really getting input from um not just neighborhood associations but individual members of the community everybody from the Urban Land Institute uh to uh folks who who do uh housing affordability at the University um to try to say okay are we on the right are we addressing the main concerns here so um so when so the second part of the question was so when when did we actually say to Neighborhood associations like what do you think um so Shannon as Ms Schultz mentioned we tried to encourage folks to participate in the EPC process um and I know our planning staff can speak to what they did before the EPC process because in fact and I know all of you received lots of correspondence from from Neighbors and from from stakeholders to to make suggestions about the process but the first formal attempt was um for us was a VPC and we were all part of that and there were many many neighborhood association folks who were part of that process I know that they received lots of letters and lots of written comments as you all have um so it's not just folks showing up but it's people saying like make sure we make sure you take into account parking or whatever their concern was so we had two of those which we think were pretty well attended the EPC accepted some of those recommendations from the from Neighbors back in December and January um and then um we did something we haven't done before in the with other zoning and other housing and other proposals is in addition to the EPC process and the process we know that was going to be happening here in front of council is we decided to go out and actually have some additional meetings so we plan together with Council staff five Community meets I I'm going to stop you real quick I do understand all of those meetings and all of that but they were not involved the neighborhood association leaders were not involved in the initial planning is that what I'm hearing that's what it sounds like to me I would like to know what are the recommendations that you did take from the neighborhood leaders um when they came to EPC could you please tell me what those are specifically please so so um uh Madam chair counselor so I want to be clear from the very beginning I think from the very beginning everybody involved in this process including myself and other folks who live we are we're all neighborhood people we all live in neighborhoods so some of the problems we have like I we may not be neighborhood president Association presidents or Coalition leaders but many of us participate in our neighborhood but I but we try to listen to all the concerns we're hearing from from the community as a whole okay I understand I'm also a neighborhood so it's not unlike that she didn't have any leaders no neighborhood association leaders uh in the in the drafting of The Proposal we do not we don't we did not it's unfortunate um uh I think I think it's I think it's the way uh Madam chair counselor I think it's the way we all make policy I'm not sure that on on the um uh catalytic converter legislation or on some of our MCI legislation or on lots of legislation we do that we uh that we go to neighbors associations and say this is a big deal it is a big deal when you're changing R1 from to something else I think it's a big deal and I think it is it is an important process and that's why we continue to welcome Madam chair and councilor um input from the community um including here tonight we hope to have two more hearings and continue to hear feedback from them and we're getting lots of feedback and we're trying our best to incorporate some of those changes thank you that's it right now thank you thank you Mr griego any other questions all right um we're going to move on to um amendments I'm open to amendments I'm told that we are not moving what was in the packet um so we can disregard what was in the packet anybody have any other amendments that they would like to move Madam chair councilor Grant thank you I do have an amendment that I'd like to offer um could miss Schultz put it up on this screen Madam chair counselor grout I would be happy to do that and I would also be happy to explain it if you'd like councilor grout I would like that very much thank you madam chair committee members this is um an amendment that would create two new use specific standards one within the accessory dwelling unit use and a second within the two family detached dwelling use which are what we call duplexes to specify that if you are developing on a property that has an accessory dwelling unit then you cannot also have a duplex and conversely if you're developing on a property that has a duplex you would not be permitted to have an accessory dwelling unit you would only be able to have either an accessory dwelling unit or a duplex thank you yes I would like to move a committee amendment number one to o2254. okay you have a motion in a second any questions or comments on this amendment Council grout Madam chair um I'd like to get administration's thoughts on this amendment Mr White um Madam chairman councilor grout this is the first that I've seen it I did hear there may be something like this of the administration I think is believes that the way the bill came from the EPC with regard to this matter is the appropriate way to approach it but as we move forward we've always said that we're willing to work with the council in terms of building a consensus in the community but at this time this is not something that we would actively support okay any other questions comments okay hi councilor grout thank you um I do I did speak with Administration and they at that time uh they did say that they would support it so it's very interesting that today we're not Mr griego did you wanna oh they would not oppose it that's what he said that's what I was told and I and I offer this Madam chair I offer this in compromise in the spirit of compromise it seems that we're doing everything and we're not listening to our neighbors in our neighborhood associations and I think it's important that we try and so that is why I'm offering this Madam chairman counselor grout to clear up any confusion it's my understanding that they said they were the administration would be willing to explore it that's what I tried to reinforce there um with regard to actively supporting it I cannot say that the administration actively supports it but we continue to be able to work and if this is a reasonable way to reach a compromise with regard to some of the issues of the administration is certainly committed to trying to find those areas of compromise that will bring the bill to conclusion okay I think at this time I want to withdraw it and we'll just bring it back another time does we have a second so we need the person on the second end to agree to the withdrawal right oh okay okay oh all right so we are going to withdraw it any other amendments any other discussion we have a motion 4054 and a second all those in favor raise your right hand and say aye we're voting on the bill no well yeah there is no Amendment the amendment was withdrawn withdrawn so we have a motion and a second on o54 um as amended those in favor say yes yes those opposed passes on a three to two vote and it will go to full Council um yes counselor Benton Madam chair um I think there's uh this would would normally go to which meeting of the city council this this bill would go to it would be read out on the first and then it would be heard on the 15th which will overlap with our budget so you know we had we had discussed the possibility of immediate action so that we would not have one giant meeting for all of those topics and all of those folks to speak on so we would get work done before midnight um but that is up to this committee uh Madam chair I mean the the means on the operating budget are going to be by definition lengthy and and uh this would not be to to rush this but rather to get discussion started at the council because I'm we we will have more than one meeting on the Ido um with that counselors I would you know I would move for uh immediate action and and ask for your support on that for that reason alone I would second that um I you know I do agree that there's going to be a lot going on on the 15th and we will have a lot of folks who want to speak on Ido and a lot of folks that want to speak on budget issues there will already be some overlap there's no chance that this is going to go to City Council and be heard once and then be passed but it would separate out the budget discussion and the Ido discussion at least a bit so that we would have um you know more more focus on the topic of the day so sure yeah counselor Lewis I'm sure I think um uh I mean even the administration just said that they expected several more hearings on this um and I and I don't think that we should bring it from this Council to the next council meeting for immediate action and that's just not the pathway that that most of these bills would follow and especially something like this which is such a massive sweeping change to our R1 um and uh and already you know I think the the the public thinks this is rushed and so that would certainly send a wrong message I think it's entirely inappropriate counselor Benton I'll withdraw my emotion all right all right so we have o54 um three in favor to opposed go into full Council we're going to now move on to agenda item b-07 that's okay um all right we're on to 0.77 counselor spenton and Jones oh uh 23.77 all right we have a presentation from Ms Schultz um Miss Schultz are you you are still there so I'll let you proceed and then we will go to public comment after this thank you madam chair and committee members again this presentation will be very brief as we Dove very deeply into the details two weeks ago oh 2277 is another set of text amendments to the Ido distinct from the last bill and the last bill was narrowly focused on um proposed changes to promote housing developments this set of amendments is more on a city-wide scale and touches almost all sections of the Ido and is not topic based in nature I'll give the same Spiel very quickly that I gave it the last bill which is that for the council to approve a text Amendment to the Ido it has to meet all three of these criteria consistency with the comprehensive plan and other adopted policies and plans the council it can't apply to only one lot or development project and it has to promote the public health safety and Welfare I'll talk a little bit about the public process associated with this bill it was not as quite as lengthy as the housing forward changes in o54 in October of 2022 the planning department held public meetings to invite members of the public and other stakeholders to say here's what we're considering putting forth as changes in this year's Ideo annual update what ideas do you have and what do you think of our ideas um those uh that packet of ideas was finalized and submitted to the EPC the EPC had one study session on that matter on December 1st of 2022 again there was no public comment taken at that study session the study sessions are not intended to take public comment they are for the benefit of the eepc Commissioners solely the EPC had their first hearing on the matter on December 8th and then a second hearing on the matter on December 19th they took public comment at both of those hearings the land use planning and zoning committee heard 0.77 for the first time two weeks ago and this is the second land use planning and zoning committee hearing on the matter very similar uh to my last public process Slide the um this bill will next go to the city council if it is the will of this committee to move it out of committee tonight um o77 itself contains about 50 changes that are in kind of a spreadsheet format that came from requests by neighbors developers City staff who have to implement the idea on a day-to-day basis members of the city council and members of the administration again none of these changes are topic specific in nature they're very broad broad it's a very broad base of changes um and along with 0.77 there is what's called an exhibit a which is a full version of the Ido all 600 something Pages where the EPC recommendations that made it out of that body up to the full city council are depicted in red text so there's there's an exhibit that's a full version of the document that you could flip through Page by page to see what all the proposed changes are that is my overview for 077 Madam chair I'm happy to dive into amendments unless you would like to um move to committee discussion first thank you Michelle so I'll just make sure if there's any questions from counselors on any of the issues in the bill all right we will move on to amendments and there are three in your packet but I do want to I I don't we're not going to move A6 the major public open space one so that is not being moved tonight so we're going to move on to A7 which will be now um amendment number one for this bill tonight um and this is in response to discussion that we had last time about you know the demolition of of older buildings it's a complement to councilor Jones's amendment that we passed last two weeks ago and I won't read it all but I will move amendment number one and a second any questions or comments we do have Miss Morris online if anybody has any technical points on that but again this is really just we did not want to have the demolition disallowance for relatively new buildings but we did want to preserve those you know buildings that are that are very old pre-1945 so that we have a little bit more process for the demolition on those any questions comments seeing none all those in favor of A7 which is amendment number one oh are we ready okay amendment number one raise your hand and say yes anybody opposed all right on a three to two uh that Amendment passes and we will move on to A8 councilor Benton uh thank you man I'm sure I'll move uh amendment number two second and um this has to do with parking maximums these are uh this is uh something we we've had in the packet for a while uh was discussed at EPC and I'll ask Miss uh Schultz tell us where we are now um one thing as we discussed this um we've been talking with um folks in the community about about this a specific requirement and we're my intention I'm not going to move it right this second but have a description of the bill first but then uh we want to make one change to the numbers here uh from 150 percent to 75 percent which is something that's been discussed at length Madam chair um councilor Benson I would be happy to explain this one Mr Cornelius can you please stop sharing so I can share um the proposed version of the amendment thank you um Madam chair counselors this amendment proposes to amend the parking maximum language as the environmental Planning Commission recommended it the EPC had quite a bit of debate about parking maximums and what was the right number and what was the right fit and what they decided on was 125 of the required off-street parking spaces would be the maximum number of spaces that you could provide for development in urban urban centers Main Street corridors and premium Transit areas and for areas that have zero parking requirements um that that kind of ceiling that would create the maximum would be a hundred percent what got put in your packets last week was an increase of those percentages to 150 percent what councilor Benton has referenced tonight is through discussions this week There's a desire to increase that percentage again to 175 percent uh which would take an on-the-fly amendment of the sponsor if so desired okay thank you Ms Schultz and Madam chair I move a uh an amendment to amendment number two which would change the percentage that's in red on the printout uh from 150 to 175 percent second and uh this granted is a considerable spread from what the EPC recommended at the same time retina folks in the development Community feel like 175 is something they could support and it would it we would at least have some limits on the construction of excessive areas of Parking On Any Given development so uh in facing reality I I'm going uh away from what the recommendation of EPC was but uh but I think this is something that'll be better than nothing all right so we are voting on the amendment to the amendment and this is just the change from 150 to 175. correct all those in favor of the amendment to the amendment yes so that's five to zero we're back on the amendment with the 175 provision any further questions all those in favor say yes yes anybody opposed to the amendment this is the this is the amendment right we're going to go to public Communists we get all the Amendments finished so we're on the amendment um A8 as amended and we had a vote of three four those were four okay unanimous vote all right so I just wanted to let that be done so that folks know what they're commenting on again we did not move the open space Amendment we did change the parking requirements from 150 to 175. and so with that let's go to public comment so that they can be commenting on the final version thank you madam chair our first speaker is Dan Rich followed by Evelyn feldner um I may have jumped in late in the game um I'm not completely familiar with the process but in the last week I've been in communication with some of you and I have a better idea this is something that maybe has to be pushed until August which I understand but I already signed up for my three minutes so I figured I'd come here this is also about housing but it's about people whose houses have wheels and there's a lot of people in our society who come to work in Albuquerque on contracts as Travelers there's digital Nomads and I think that the Ido has been responsive to that in that um the density for like an RV camping kind of setup it's it's gone from 15 to 25 per acre and and the allowable is now one acre instead of five acres the only provision that oh and one other thing is about a year and a half ago there was a Amendment um which was sponsored by Gibson councilor Gibson that allowed for an expanded presence of camping and RV kind of setups in non-residential neighborhoods which is great the only disconnect is the old code had a provision that allowed for a reduction in the mandatory 20-foot setback if there's certain circumstances like a screening while that the setback can be reduced and that got removed when the Ido was established and I I um Lobby and Advocate that that provision gets put back that that's a hardship for developers people who want to provide this service have smaller infill Lots but they're limited not able to um develop the land in a way that is beneficial because of this 20-foot set time I think we've always many of us have responded to you I just want to make sure that you get in touch with the right Folks at the Planning Commission to get this into the process for next year so again I think we've sent you that information please make sure you follow up yeah I will hit Mr Cornelius thanks for your time and I'm glad I could Evelyn feltner followed by Rhiannon Samuel yes the district 7 Coalition members are not against the hotel conversion idea but we think it's probably a temporary solution we think more direct Solution on a permanent basis would be negotiating with property management companies the largest being gray star if you ask them and subsidize them in some way for doing so to put 30 percent of their apartments in affordable status you would make a big Gantt in the affordable housing crisis it doesn't help that there are constant building of houses and I just passed one on Indian School on the way into the meeting those houses those apartments will probably be market rate so you will have more houses but you will not have more affordable houses subsidies for rent are the way you're going to get that either directly or through negotiation with the large Property Management Company and we had other one other recommendation coming out of the executive committee meeting for district 7. if you have duplexes in a neighborhood they should be no higher than 75 of the houses or other buildings in the neighborhood what makes duplexes stand out as eyesores is if they are two stories in a one-story neighborhood or three stories in a two-story neighborhood keeping them to the same height as 75 percent of the other dwellings would make a big difference in their acceptability third I've been asked by Northeastern resident to make sure that you know the fire code distances are very important he feels that insufficient attention has been given to the idea that if you are five feet from property line wall that could make a big difference in fire suppression thank you Ms feltner Rhiannon and Samuel followed by Donald meters hello members of the council I was going to talk about the two amendments but um I want to just thank the council and Council staff for working with us as we continue to Crunch the numbers on what it meant to have both parking minimums and parking maximums and what that reality played out as uh one thing I'd want to caution you to or just flag is as we were looking at the demos we appreciate Council feeble counselor feeblecorn for addressing the date or putting it at 1945 but I would encourage the council to balance this amendment with the need for the city to have something on file that shows that the building dates back to that point I've heard some feedback from some of my members at neop that not all buildings have records that go all the way back and they're having some challenges with like differences and plots not something for the idea right now but just letting you know as you're tweaking it if there's something we can do and look into it but overall just thank you all for your hard work on this we're continuing alongside you every step of this process and every point that we can chime in and you all have been so receptive to our tweaks or concerns as we we address our zoning changes so thank you Donald meters followed by Leslie Padilla yes Madam chair Commissioners I'm back again uh thank you for not hearing the uh major open space thing tonight but I feel we must make our statement the open space Advisory board has submitted the letter uh to all you folks the osab recommends that the ideal Amendment not be discussed or considered promotion or approval at the land useful and zoning committee on April 26th osab was not consulted or notified in any way concerning the original strategies and drafting of the ideal Amendment the Ido Amendment proposes major changes to the site planning process of mpos and not Consulting with osab is a serious oversight and dismisses legislative processes in the public trust in favor of expediency asking osab to make amendments on such short notices irresponsible and demonstrates a lack of understanding of the complexities surrounding the site planning process of the Open Space Program and how the osab staff environmental commission EPC and the general public are part of the site planning review process per o 1563 osab is to advise the EPC the mayor and the city council as an appropriate City Open Space Program which advice shall include basic policies on management of sydney-owned open space evaluation of proposals to install extraordinary facilities on city-owned open space in the mpos facility plan page 22 usab makes recommendations recording extraordinary facilities in the city's EPC the osab also advises the EPC mayor and city council as to appropriate policies management activities and programs implementations adopted mpus plans and proposed to sell these for exchange of land bank lands and lands to be acquired with open space funds okay well anyway I'll skip to the end here there's no evidence the current site planning review process thank you Mr matters I'm sorry your time is up but I did want to make sure you you got that we did not move that Amendment so that is not in here yes I saw that thank you we're aware that they had a press conference this morning and yes there is no more plan for an educational facility in the Lady Gaga thank you we're gonna have to move on Mr um followed by Barbara Taylor this Padilla isn't here anymore Barbara Taylor followed by Renee Horvath Madam chair thank you very much for the opportunity to speak I'm not going to repeat um what Don matters our chair of the open space Advisory Board just said um I would like to thank you very much for withdrawing this amendment and I would like to say that I think you sparked a very Lively conversation on the process by which we approve extraordinary facilities there has been a tendency in the past to uh for a packet to come to the open space Advisory board at the point at which there is a site plan and I think um speaking now for myself as we think about this site plan is too late it's a sort of coercive because so much effort and money has been spent so um as a board we will be considering how to strengthen the process and we will come back to you with recommendations on that the other thing I wanted to point out is that the council always has the last word so the intent of your amendment is alive in that anything approved by EPC can be appealed to the full Council thank you very much Renee Horvath followed by Carlos Benavides just really quickly in response to Ms Taylor and uh and the chairman um an apology server not letting you continue to speak I bet uh anyway um we appreciate your comments we are very much appreciate the open space Advisory Board and its role um this is a unique board amongst the city and that it has an extraordinary role in in how changes the open space system are made and um and we appreciate that diligence that that the board um including longer serving and and some of the newer members I know are very engaged and we appreciate that so I'm looking forward to hearing the suggestions of the osab on how we can strengthen the open space ordinance uh with regard to this process of the review process um I think there was a everyone here was very well intentioned including our co-sponsor who is not on this committee but uh but I think this is has generated a discussion that's valuable so so thank you for that Renee Horvath followed by Carlos Benavides good evening just real quick uh I'm always interested I'm still interested in those historic buildings so uh 1945 while there may be some really cool buildings out there that may not be as old so we may want to say something that if they have some unique this uh architectural features that represent the Southwest like Adobe Styles I'm thinking of the pool property was probably built in 1957. it unfortunately was demolished but some of those Old Homestead still have some unique characters so if there's a little room to allow the landmark committee to evaluate something that they think hey maybe we should save this you know allow some flexibility there so just want to bring that up so thank you Carlos Benavides followed by Patricia Wilson on Zoom Patricia Wilson followed by Josh Rogers Madam chair and counselors since the ido's adoption and inner Coalition Council committee has reviewed hundreds of proposed amendments in the Ido annual update process and every year has asked for a better process last year thanks to councilor Davis's sponsorship an amendment passed that added at least a numbering system for better reference and a source column that only identified gross categories such as staff admin counsel or public this year's update started with 49 changes the Charlotte North Carolina's unified development ordinance has four text amendments this year the stated purpose of our comprehensive plan revision was to quote consolidate many overlapping and conflicting regulations into a new user-friendly integrated development ordinance unquote if the Ido continues to need so many substantive changes addressed as text amendments I can only assume the comp plan's goals haven't been all that successful my favorite part is question four of the cover analysis which asks how much will it cost and the answer is quote there is no cost to the city unquote I would argue that the cost is tremendous including the unrealized value of hours of public review the loss of trust in elected officials and the marginalization of neighborhoods I'm not opposed to o2377 merely continuing to be opposed to the process thank you very much Josh Rogers followed by Rosemary Blanchard good evening counselors I'm Josh Rogers with Titan Bellman thank you all for the tremendous efforts towards this year's IDL amendments and for supporting the package of amendments to support housing opportunities in Albuquerque we're in full support of these amendments and creating housing opportunities throughout Albuquerque thank you all in particular for you all counselors that are sitting up here tonight for producing the change to the parking maximum amendment to 175 percent we can support that and at the end of the day we're aligned with the concept of parking maximums is we don't want to provide any more parking and is absolutely needed to satisfy the demands of our tenants last year Titan spearheaded the amendment to the parking minimums get them changed from 1.5 spaces per unit down to a much lower ratio that was based on the unit type we thank you for listening to the feedback and making this change work for multi-family developments in these critical areas for our city thank you so much Rosemary Blanchard thank you very much uh members of the committee and members of the council um I had actually asked to speak in regard to o2254 but this one I relate to as well basically I am encouraging you to go with these changes to the Ido that will increase housing in the city it will not only I I think there's been a lot of awfulizing about what will happen if we make any changes but we have pretty serious problems because we have not made changes not only the problems of people who are unhoused but the problems of younger Generations who leave because they can't afford to find a place here while they are moving their careers up and we're also stressing elderly people like me who would like to be able to share the area where my daughter's home is without having to be underfoot or they underfoot with me so I these are very necessary for every generation they are very new Mexican which we are an extended family culture and they are at least doing what we can to deal with the fact that housing is becoming generationally unavailable in ways that are affecting who comes here who stays here so please I encourage you to adopt both of these uh both of these ordinances these changes to the idea we will be a better City for it we're not doing ourselves any favors by staying the way we are thank you Madam chair that concludes comment on o2377 thank you Mr Cornelius all right we are on 077 as amended any questions comments all right we have a motion in a second so all those in favor of o77 as amended say yes yes all those opposed on a three to two that motion carries it will go to full Council there being no further business this lups committee meeting is adjourned thank you it was faster [Music]