All right. Hello. Welcome everybody to the June 25th uh 2025 city of Mesa planning and zoning public hearing. We'll begin with a roll call. Chairs is present. Vice Chair Pitcher here. Board member Peterson here. Board member Blakeman here. Board member Carpenter here. Board member Farnsworth here. And we'll excuse board member Montes. And as part of the agenda today, we do have a consent agenda. will be read into the record and acted on in one motion. These will not be discussed individually. It's a long list today for our board member Peterson and that will read it for us. Move to approve item 2A minutes from the June 11, 2025 planning and zoning board meeting. Thanks Troy. Is there a motion to approve the second? Oh, you did miss your second. Sorry. All right. All in favor and board member Farnsworth, we'll need your vote. Yes. Mine's not working here. There we go. There we go. And looks like unanimously I'm guessing it's going to pass when we see it. What's a meeting without a technology challenge? Right. Should we just do a verbal? All right. Board move. And you got Farnsworth. All right. There we go. You know, consent agenda passes. Um, I think we are going to forego a presentation from downstairs we just had for the study session for item and I'm not looking at it right now. 3A 3A. Thank you. So, we're going to go ahead. Uh, is there anything from the board here that we need to No questions? Anything right? We don't have a presentation from applicant. So, we're just going to go ahead just move right into um some public comment. We'll open up the public hearing. Thank you very much. I was going to get there. Um and I'm going to go I So I do have some cards. Um so I'll be reading uh these individuals that come up. You'll each have three minutes. Please state your name and your address when you do come up. Uh we're going to begin however on couple of uh speakers that we do have online. Will you please formally open the public hearing? I did. Yes, I formally open the public hearing. Troy likes the backseat drive. Do we have both of them on? It chairs. It doesn't look like they're online yet, but if you want to call them to see if if they are online and they just haven't updated their name correctly. Okay. Do we have Kyle Mabberry? Oh, I see a no. Or Stacy Weber. No. Okay. We'll come back to those. Yeah. All right. We'll go ahead with those that are here and we'll go ahead and Russell Smolden, could you come on up for us? Appreciate it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members. I'm Russell Smolden. Uh I'm a resident of Phoenix, but I represent the data center coalition. Uh of the um data centers that you have in Mesa, about half of them are members of the data center coalition. Um my uh Emily Rice who spoke to you uh your last planning and zoning committee kind of talked about what the data center coalition was. It's a 36 basically largest entities on the planet that are in the data center business. Um this represents about 14,430 jobs in Arizona. Uh direct jobs about 81,730 total employment contribution in just in 2023. that's increased since then significantly and about 6.2 billion total contribution to the labor income uh as of 2023. So it's a it's a big group of players. You could imagine who they are. Most of them a lot of them are top 10 uh in the in the world in terms of uh their size and and um uh and what they do. Um, I just wanted to hit on a couple of things from a historic standpoint and then have you think about what's going to happen in the future. Um, Mr. Chairman, you talked about being strategic in your thinking and how you approach this this these issues. And I think that's really important. You asked several really good questions. Uh, the the committee did on um what happens in the future. And let me just tell you that when I started with the data center coalition, I I originally started planning this stuff when I was at SRP back in 2011 2012. We had just come out of the great or we're in the midst of the great recession. We were trying to figure out what to do with all the brownfields, all the empty buildings, strip malls, everything else that that was going on at the time. If you remember that, it was horrifying. And so the utilities had seen a drop in what's called their power capacity down below 50%. That's a death um spiral for a utility. It's not not good. We're trying to figure out how to get it back up and alive. How to get that number back up. How do you get nice steady power use so that you deal with the peaks of residential customers or commercial customers, right? You want nice steady load to offset the costs of everything else. So that's when we came up with this idea. Well, let's attract data centers. And so we did the legislation in 2013. I was involved in that uh greatly and I can tell you I've been involved ever since. And when we first did this, we talked about it being the second inning of spring training in a baseball season. Today, I'm telling you, we're probably in the first inning of that same season. And and we're all these years removed from that. 12 12 years. I will tell you that I had no idea when we did the bill in 2013, we had four certified data centers. Today we have almost 60 in Arizona. And I can also tell you that I had no idea what these things would look like when we did them. I mean, one of them, the the digital facility is the old print shop at the Arizona Republic. It's four stories right downtown Phoenix. There's a 19,000 foot data center in the middle of Park Central Mall in the basement. Nobody knows that, but that's where it is. We have those facilities all over the valley and we've done this incredible job of making sure that they're welcome here. I I want to applaud staff for the great job that they've done. We had great conversations uh with with your team. Um I I appreciate where they've where they started and where they are today. My fear from this industry is that in the future companies will look at this will look at me and go I think we'll look at someplace else. What I found was when we first did this, eBay came to town and PayPal came with them. It brought a data center and 2,000 jobs. The issue that I have is that we have no idea what AI does. SoftBank just there's an ABC news piece that says that SoftBank is going to spend a trillion dollars on robotics and AI. There was a tweet I think yesterday or the day before. A trillion dollars. I don't know if that's real or not, but I am telling you, we spend billions of dollars in this industry that directly benefits not only our economy, which we've done a masterful job of changing into a tech economy from a homebuilder economy. And I wouldn't want anything to impact that negatively going forward uh for these either for these c companies or for Arizona. I I think we are are the silicone desert when it comes to this stuff. These jobs that are produced at data centers, although there may not be a whole bunch of them, their average salary is about $100,000 a pop. And I can tell you that of the one every one job in a data center, there are six jobs that are created outside that data center. Think about all the jobs that are created with landscaping companies, physical, cyber security companies, all those different types of entities that service the data centers, plus all the jobs associated with the constant construction. Mr. Mr. Chairman, I probably used up my time, but I thank you very much and I I thank staff. I'm hoping this becomes an ongoing conversation that we have on how do we make this better moving forward. Appreciate you coming here, Mr. Spalding, to speak. Thank you. Thank you. Uh Ben Graph, I think I saw him. There you chairman, members of the commission, my name is Ben Graph with the law firm of Corals and Brady at 2 North Central Avenue, Phoenix, Arizona. Here representing Nova Holdings LLC. Uh, as I stated uh at the last hearing, Nova is the holder of a reasonzoning and site plan approval for a data center at Ellsworth and Warner Road. Um we talked briefly about kind of the three different categories of uh land owners, data center developers or data centers in existence um that are impacted. My testimony today is obviously very much focused on the middle section, those that have site plan zoning approval um but not yet uh shovel ready, if you will, or uh started construction. Um, I am the first to reiterate some of the comments from the study session that uh staff and especially uh Rachel have been incredibly responsive. In fact, I think if I sent her an email right now, she'd respond to it. Um, she was responding to some of our questions up to 1 p.m. today. So, there's there's no dispute that staff has gone above and beyond to answer our questions. Um, I do think that there are some answers we've received that the industry is is correctly characterized as not happy with at this time just because of the concerns and maybe unintended consequences or clarifications. Um, first, we don't see why the LI zone couldn't be included as a permitted district in general. Reason being is that the ordinance does require resoning. Therefore, even within LI, there would be discretion as to whether that LI property is appropriate place for data center. that would go through planning commission and council. The waiver itself is ambiguous truly in the language as to whether recently approved or existing data centers would be able to be eligible for a waiver. Some of the examples are much more helpful, but I think there could be some clarifying language. We're still very concerned that the definition of reszone within the ordinance is not crystal clear. for example, adding a CUP or even a PA AD to an existing LI as our client has. Does that or does that not mess up your waiver? Does that wave your waiver? For example, um we would contemplate that something as simple as the ordinance's requirement for a cup for a substation to be built on site would actually add a new land use, but one that is appropriate with data centers. As of right now, that seems to destroy your waiver. Um, which adds some concerns. Um, we are especially concerned with NOVA's example as to minor or even major site plan amendments because the waiver is only to uses. We strongly believe the waiver should also be to development standards. uh Nova and others with existing approvals, even existing data centers should be held to the development standards in place at the time of their site plan and zoning approval. Therefore, a site plan amendment or a campus expansion would not be held to the current standards. Um there's a lot of ambiguity there. I mean, are the new notification and neighborhood standards applicable now to expansions of existing campuses? These are all questions that can be answered with more time. you clearly have a city staff that is working through these issues. I just am before you today stating that we do in fact need more time to review this before it goes to council. The ordinance is already better than it was. uh moving forward. Um I would I would also say our last major concern is that it is very odd that the PA AD standards cannot be deviated from um in a data center reasonzoning case as any other reasoning case for a PAD. This commission and the city council should remain to have its discretion to deviate from the PA AD standards if so fit. We as the applicant would have to ask for it. you would have to evaluate it and both the planning commission and city council would have to approve it. But to stay within rigid standards and take that authority away from the commission and city council seems odd and out of line with other land uses. So with that, I thank you for your time. Thank you for all the input. I know staff in this commission in particular have been looking at this very closely. We appreciate it. Thank you. Appreciate you coming up for your testimony, Mr. We won't hold you to oath there. All right, we've got let's see. Oh boy, I am not going to be able to read this and I apologize right now for what I'm about to say. Uh let's see. Can you make that up? We We know who it is. Oh, we know who it is. Who is it? Oh, he knows already who it is because I I shared with him the last time. Okay, state your name for me because I don't worry about it. Uh, thank you all very much. My name is Sepand Alazada. I am with the Arizona Technology Council. Uh, grateful to be here again. Uh, before I start my testimony, I really wanted to say congratulations to the city of Mesa for being named by Wallet Hub, one of the bestrun cities in the United States. And this whole experience has kind of shows why Mesa is one of the bestrun cities in the country and the best in Arizona. The everyone's been responsive. Everyone's been really informative. Everyone's been very helpful from the city attorney staff to development services. You all get it. You all are thoughtful, deliberate. Uh take your time and that's what makes a city run really, really well. when it is run by individual when it has individuals who think that way. So you know Mr. Smolden and Mr. Graph both made some excellent points. I'm not going to repeat what they said. Um obviously there's economic development benefits to data centers uh tax revenues, sighting fees, etc. jobs. Uh but once again I'm going to repeat my story from two weeks ago and today I'm not wearing my brace. Um, shout out to Hand Therapy Partners of Mesa. Uh, my OT doesn't want me wearing it as much, so I'm not I'm not wearing it today, but as you all know, I was in a car accident last year in Phoenix and I nearly lost my life. City of Phoenix Fire and Medical Rescue showed up thankfully and, you know, helped me and took me to a facility, the nearest facility. And it's a part of Phoenix I've never go to. or never been in. But that facility had all my health records ready to go. They had all my pre-existing conditions. They knew what medicines I'm allergic to, what I'm not allergic to. So these data centers, we think of them as these big box facilities that are uh just, you know, two stories or three sto. But these facilities are more than that. These facilities are are saving lives. And the fact that I'm standing here before you today just like I was two weeks ago is testament to that fact that these servers in data h data centers have important information and are helping people in more ways than one more ways than we know. So as you all move forward in this process once again thank you to staff thank you to everyone. Let's be deliberate. Let's take our time. Let's come up with an ordinance that really stands out from what is being proposed in other communities because at the end of the day, Mesa is a special place. Mesa is a well-run city and Mesa is a place where these businesses want to come to. So, let's keep that in mind as we move forward. Thank you all very much. Thank you. And again apologize. I don't know what my parents were thinking man. Uh, Anthony Grinovich. Welcome. Uh, thank you, board. Um, I'm a resident of Eastark and I just wanted to come out because I think a lot of residents don't really have time to come out in the middle of the day, but there is a big concern about data centers in our community. You have people who feel like they're trapped in their homes because the 95 foot high data center was built 40t behind their house that when they go out in their backyard to play with their kids, it's all they see. Um I think a lot of the neighbors have concerns about the red wines and how that'll affect our area. Uh specifically with existing projects. So uh we don't have a lot of retail. I feel like a lot of the tax revenue in our area escapes to Gilbert and Queen Creek. Um, and when you guys undertook the I believe it's the retail coach to try to attract uh like retail initiatives to come to Mesa, one of the concerns they cited was um Mesa's aesthetics essentially. Um, if we don't have design standards in place, how can we hope to attract like higher quality restaurants or retail that would actually drive like sales revenue that would directly impact the the revenue fund? Um, I know we have like a lot of data centers around this plan that would kind of qualify for red wines as they stand now, but I'd hope you'd kind of consider possibly looking at the aesthetic. I understand that you can't take away like an entitlement to build, but maybe we could hold them to a re a re-review of design standards to ensure that our area like continues to improve and we can bring in retail and other businesses that are compatible with a higher quality development. So, sorry for shaking. I'm very very uh nervous of public speaking, but thank you. Yeah, no worries. We appreciate you coming in providing some commentary. Uh Tom Maples. Thank you. uh come here uh as last time representing the Arizona chapter of 7x24 exchange and the 60 members that uh exist to foster the development of uh technology in Arizona. Uh sorry, but we are asking for more time. Staff has worked tirelessly and has done a great job, but just the statement that you know there there was an email at 1:00 today. I don't know what it was. It probably didn't affect me in my section of concern, but we're still working and you're still working and there's time to get it right. What Mesa does really matters. Your actions will reflect and they will cascade. And next year, somebody's going to be citing Mesa's standard the way that you guys cited Chandler's standard. So, it's not just about what happens today, but what happens for Mesa for the next however many years, right? um acknowledge the the hard work that everyone has has gone through. Hit hit just a couple of points here. Uh restricting data centers to the GI and HI is overly restrictive. I have been a developer. I'm a builder. I am not going to buy property that requires a waiver. I am going to go somewhere else. And somewhere else may be San Antonio, Texas. Right? It's it's easy to say it's just going to go to Gilbert or it's just going to go to Goodyear. But when you put up those kind of barriers, it really is a barrier and the waiver process is correct to you. It's intimidating and it's unclear and uncertain to people that might that might be investing tens of millions of dollars. The accessory use definition is overly restrictive. It's been improved, but 10% of the space being the limit for data center use, I don't know if that works. I sure don't know if that works in the world of AI. And I don't think that works for advanced manufacturing. Consequences that we all need to digest, but restricting that the heart of advanced manufacturing is the is the data and and and the the processing that's going on there. The setback is excessive. There are proposed screening measures and massing measures and facade enhancements and sound studies to limit the impact of the development on the residents. As written, they're all required, but they're somewhat redundant and I would suggest a 50 foot beyond what the base zoning requirement is. Is there some setback? Sure. But taking 400 ft away from the developable property for that property really is restricting its use a lot. Um requirements for the the uh loading docks. I I think that uh and I sorry for the short hand F5A is probably sufficient. That's quality development guidelines. The MEP orientation really is confusing and I'm not sure that you can put an MEP yard on any face of a building because it's adjacent to so many other pieces. I think that those are things that need to get worked on. Acoustics recent submission because of the time frame needs to be talked about. There are specific good require good suggestions that have been made that should be incorporated or should be responded to and that comment came in after the deadline of Tuesday at noon. So I understand that may not have been responded to yet. Separation, accessory use, the orientation, the screening of MEP should be the same as the screening of substation. Substation screening the language got improved a lot in the last week, but MEP didn't get touched. So you're almost there. Switch switch metaphors. You're on the 10 yard line. It's not a touchdown yet. You've worked your butts off, but it's not done yet. Let's let's get it right. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Maples. Um, okay. Mark, is it Baller? Bower. Bower. My bad. Hello. Um, again, Mark Bower with JLL and uh I represent uh I'm on the 7 by 24 board as well as uh represent site selection for a number of data centers both data center developers as well as the large hypers scale uh companies. Uh we do that nationally and I can tell you I've been very proud to be here in Phoenix and help build our data center you know um industry to where it is today. We talk about these data centers. I was involved you know in 99 1999 and 2000 with 120 East Van Beern which was mentioned earlier the carrier hotel that's owned by digital realy. Um that is a property that is still today 25 I was just thinking about that almost 25 years ago. Um it's 100% leased. The customers in there are the same customers and they've updated the building but that is 100% leased. If you look at some of the buildings today, many of the buildings that are being built today are being built for today's standards and it's may look different in another 10 or 20 years. Um, as far as site selection goes, Phoenix as well as the greater Phoenix area is I'd like to say that, you know, five years ago people said, "Mark, you watch. This is going to be another, you know, uh, Virginia." And I kind of chuckled, but truly it has. We've we've really moved ahead, uh, with the type of companies that are here. Um, uh, I've got a tour this Saturday with a group and it's a company that's, you know, uh, has made a commitment to put 20 billion dollars invested in North America. um we were focused on one site here in Mesa and they've asked me now that I need to expand and and go to other areas of the valley all because of some of the um the unknowns of what this amendment might look like with the city of Phoenix amendment might might look like and so again I think I would say you know taking your time to make sure it's properly messaged out there of your commitment with the data centers and open to feedback because these data centers want to welcome to communities. When they put billions of dollars into a community, they do not want to feel like they are the bad person. They want to be the the good developer and the good operator and that they're bringing something to good to the community. So, um, a lot of others that I've been working with for many years have already made a lot of comments. So, like to stop there and just say, you know, let's do it right. Mesa is a great community and a lot of people want to be in Mesa, but recently I was shocked too with this push back here. So, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Ber. Appreciate it. All right. Just looking at I had a couple still. I want to see if they are online. We haven't heard anything new. So, Stacy Weber. No. Or Kyle Mabberry. No. Okay. Well, with that, we'll go ahead and invite staff to come up to to respond to some of these. I guess you get to talk some more, Rachel. Yes. Uh, chair, board members, I guess I would ask if the board had any questions based on comments from the public that I could clarify. Actually, if I could, chair um, there's there are a couple of things um, in some of the notes that I was taking. I know that the question was there about again giving more time to address the comments related to even the comments that we received today at 1:00. I just want to reiterate that those comments that were brought up today about the waiver, the heights, the setbacks, the screening, the acoustics, the accessory uses are all comments that we heard during and after the last meeting and have been addressed by staff in terms of the recommendation that we're putting forward. So additional time I'm not sure is really going to buy us anything because staff's recommendation is is you know based on what the the best practices are that we've seen in the area as well as what we've we've seen um out of the area. The other thing um in terms of the definition not being for resoning not being clear that's actually defined in the zoning ordinance what a resoning is at a different chapter of the ordinance. It's not part of the data center ordinance but it is in the zoning ordinance. Is it chapter 76 I think. Is that correct? So that is defined. Um the waiver not being clear, what I'd like to um state is that we have done the waiver process. We did it very successfully for the drive-through restaurants. It was very successful for anyone who wanted to put that waiver on their property. There's no cost associated with it. If you want to sell your property and you have that waiver on the property, then that waiver goes with the land as you sell it. It doesn't go with the owner. It goes with the property. So that waiver actually gives assurance to someone who comes in who wants to buy that land that they're still able to do that. Uh the the PD deviation staff actually intentionally had put that in to so that we could make sure that we're protecting the character again, balancing that character of what these data centers might be um impacting the surrounding land uses around that. So the the not enabling a deviation those P A standards that again was very intentional from staff's perspectives in our recommendation because we want to make sure that these data centers again not being prohibited in the city just being able to regulate them in terms of mitigating their impacts. And then finally about allowing them in the LI district. Again the waiver is in place for those properties that are in the LI district. if they wanted to put that onto their property, they still would maintain the right for that use. What we're trying to do is really look at, again, as as Jay had talked about downstairs, providing opportunities to diversify our economy. And again, you can put them in the LI district with that waiver, but then restricting them with those resonings into the GI and the LI. The one for me that the one question I wrote down that you did not hit which thank you for summarizing. No, you hit almost all of them. Um the one that I'm actually interested is existing standards not just the uses on the waiver. Is that something that we consider to allow the standards to also be part of the waiver? Um so if I if I can chairs and and board it's the only one you missed. I think I I I tried to write them all as people were talking so I apologize if I missed that. Um, the waiver only applies to the use. And again, if you've got a site plan that's been approved and you follow the site plan that's been approved, you're not required to follow those standards. Those development standards would apply to someone who has a waiver who puts a new data center in. So, they have to follow the development standards. If they don't, it takes away kind of the the value of the text amendment in terms of being able to mitigate those impacts. So you've got a waiver, so your use is protected, but the waiver protects the use, not the the standards that go hand in hand with that use. Any other questions from the board? Troy's again. All right, go ahead, Jason. Uh, regarding the 400 foot separation. Um, so say you have a waiver now, you're subject to that 400 foot separation and your property is across the street from a residential use. I'm I just want to make sure I understand how the 400 foot is calculated. So imagine your site, your data center site has like a 30-foot landscape setback. So you've got that 30 feet, say the roads 65 ft wide, so there's 95t two sides 120 130 ft. So now you're at 160. Say there's a green belt around the the residential community that's maybe 50 ft deep. So is that all included? Is it up to the property line or is it up to the edge of the residential? Is it up to the house? I just want to make sure I understand. Um so chair, board member Carpenter, it would be to the property line of the closest residentially zoned property or residential use. So it would be let's say that that green belt was a residential like owned community space. So it would be up to that point. So the the equipment in the data center building itself would have to be 400 ft away from that property line. Not the property line of the data center I think. Yes. Okay. Just making sure that was clear. Yeah. So if they have to have space to create that 400 ft that could be another use ancillary to the data center like parking or whatever it may be. That is correct. It could be used for landscaping for the retention for parking. It could be used for the office space to support the data center the utility space. Not for any of the mechanical. No. Okay. Um and one other question I had was say this goes through three years passes a property owner who has uh an agriculture property for example but it's in an LA area can they apply to have that reszoned to GI or do they have to is that kicks off its own independent process correct like they'll always retain those rights and the ability to reszone to whatever they want. It may not be approved but they have the ability to try. Is that correct? Board member Carpenter, are you asking in relation to the effect on the waiver or just if they have the ability to reszone? Just the ability to reszone that they probably enjoy today with any property. Properties all have the ability to seek a reszone. Okay. That that was that was yours. Okay. Anything over here? No. Board member Farnsworth. Any questions for you? take that as No, I think we've had a good discussion. Thank you. There we go. All right. Nothing with that. All right. Thank you, Rachel. Appreciate it. I will go ahead and close the public comment part of the meeting here and then open that up to conversation for the board. Happy to have a conversation if anybody would like to make a motion. Anybody brave enough? I mean, I'll start into it. So, I think a couple things. Um, so this one I think I've made more notes on this meeting than I've ever done on one of these, which is interesting. Um, if you're in the study session and we talked about this, right, guys? I I I have some thoughts on this. Um, I I I really wish that um I feel this is a little reactionary versus kind of looking forward personally. It's just just my thinking. And I think that however with that being said um you know I well let me start I also recognize the concerns that we've seen with the speed of this effort that has moved forward. I I understand that I've gotten quite a few emails, letters, phone calls about that. However, you know, at the end of the day, I think what this is doing is this is echoing kind of the the public commentary, the wishes of the constituents that are here for the most part. And I think that's something that's really important for us to consider. Um, I will applaud staff. Uh, they've spent a lot, especially Rachel, I think, has spent a lot of time on this, working through a lot of the comments, a lot of the, you know, adjusting what what was kind of proposed as far as these changes to the ordinance. So, that is kind of where I'm landing on this a little bit. Um I do wish that as a municipality that we were did think maybe a little bit differently um about this because I do believe you know one of the interesting comments I heard earlier you know and I and I apologize I don't remember who it was but talked about we don't know how buildings are going to be 100% guarantee they're going to be not what we're thinking in any way shape or form and we've talked about I've had conversations about the future of this from as a use this is not going to go away it's actually going exponentially increase. We're going to need more and more of these facilities. The impact to the growth from an advanced manufacturing perspective, I think, is incredibly critical. Uh, and if we want to be the center of that, I think it would be really interesting to lean into that as a municipality if we did. But the reality is a lot of the con constituents here don't want to do that. Um, and so that's where I'm weighing this. So that's my thoughts right now. Uh, I I agree. I think we do want to be in the center of this. We want to be able to reap the benefits. I also like that this puts in protections for existing residential uses. Nobody wants to live somewhere where their backyard is a a massive wall with lighting that's on 24/7 and there's a constant hum. So, I appreciate that that may not always be the case, but I I like that this has some protections for residents to enjoy where they live. And it doesn't chase away the data center data centers. It just puts in some standards that says, hey, also respect and protect those that have that are there already existing. So, I I kind of lean that way where I see it as, okay, now we have some more guidance on the standards. we wanted you to come, but we want you to just put these protections in and then everybody can it makes each case less contentious. You know, we've got standards that we can point to rather than kind of living in the wild west. So, that that's kind of how I see it. Well, well, it's interesting to kind of just come at that a little differently, too, is I I agree with everything you said, and I actually think those are all good things. I think that the reality is because of where we are from a timing standpoint, that perception is king, right? And there's there's the development a lot of the developers and and everybody that works in this industry knows it's going to go to the path of least resistance and if there's a perception that it's not seen as right so but the reality is like everything in the world eventually it's going to come back to the middle right and so I agree I I think a lot of what you're saying is right on Troy I know you want to speak yeah just uh uh I I think and appreciate All of us are are being very thoughtful in this process and balancing I mean all all of us are are residents of the city of Mesa and are and uh and all of us have um professional experience in in dealing with um the development side of things as well. And so so I I guess that's why we're here on the board. But uh um yeah, being being the probably the old guy on the board, I you know, over the years seeing different reactions to different land uses as they they've come. it um it that this feels appropriate and I think I'm uh I'm I'm good to proceed with a recommendation on this and I think if there's any legal clarifications on the waiverss or other things that staff has heard that they'll continue to refine those as it gets as it works its way to city council. Anything on this? Go ahead. So, um, I certainly think that it seems as though a lot of progress has been made here and I think every single person who spoke today seemed to acknowledge that. So, certainly kudos to the city of Mesa and to all of you who's who's chimed in on that. I think that's what we're really looking for. I I always find the win is when the city's winning and also development's winning as well. I think that's the perfect harmony when both are in that winning situation. Um, the one thing I would say is folks are still saying that they're they're they're there. They're 90% there. We're throwing some numbers there, but it seems as though it's come a long way. They're pretty happy, but there's a few more things to work through. And I know just even from two weeks ago that changes obviously got made. Um, things were put before us today that are we're still kind of seeing, although not for the first time, but still within days, right? We're still seeing them within days. And that's a lot of I don't know all the repercussions of of all these these moving parts and pieces. Um I'm not sure. It seems as though folks have expressed that they theyms themselves don't understand all the parts and pieces and how they fit together asking for a little bit more time. I think my only question at this point in time is is is the timing like why why can't we take it to the next step and give it a little more time or is that something we plan to do between now and city council to work through it folks seems as though a lot of folks are here for the most part pretty satisied but feeling like there's a few more steps that haven't quite gotten there. I guess I feel that way regardless of I think maybe Mesa feels like they've answered, but I would love for folks on the other end to feel the same way and that's the full wind. And board member Blakeman, I don't want to cut you off in your thoughts. I just want to um acknowledge that board member Montes has now signed in. So, we wanted to get that on the record. I I didn't want to cut you off. I apologize, but I needed to get that on the record. No, I was I'm that I think that was it. That That's all I have to say. That's a proverbial hook, right? I'm kidding. I'm kidding. Did you want to? No, I'll I'll my concern is similar in in the sense that, you know, I hear a lot of clarifying. It's not clear. Again, you know, there's some some other some comments that were made about some specific changes that would have to be made. Um, I know that that uh the director says that a lot of these are repeat comments that that things have been made. I don't know that, but um if if it does get kicked up to the city council, I would hope that these these issues that seem to be still coming up are addressed by the city council and and staff to to maybe there's some merits in some of these things that need to be changed. So, I mean, I'm I'm landing where yeah, we we've heard a lot of the concerns from the residents. I think there there's a need and I don't think anybody in here says that there's not a need that there that an ordinance needs to happen. It's just I think landing on the the language. So, um, my my suggestion is that, uh, if it does go up to council that that there is some some additional consideration about some clarifications that need to be made and that time is is given for those clarifications to happen. Sorry, I know I'm going again, but I know we heard a lot of folks today, but then um I printed out what was uh actually spoken to. And I may not have spent as much time as Rachel has on this. I'm certain I haven't. But even within this, and I could point out that there are letters and folks that say that they have they they would request more time representing different groups and organizations um individuals. Um folks that I saw letters and I did I didn't see a response to it, but doesn't mean there hasn't been one, but I guess I saw a letter a certain date and I was kind of looking like what resolved out of this. So I I just want to point that there's still other folks as well in as addition to me. I say represented in the packets we were given expressing the same things. Thank you. Anything else? Board member Farnsworth or board member Montes, did you guys have anything at all? Um I'll just share maybe um a couple comments for one for the record, maybe two for consideration. Um, I know there's some concerns about conflict of interest and just want to maybe state for the record that u my employer Mortonson and their property um in this adjacency called Pursuit Park though it was originally um marketed towards data center users which would potentially be affected by this um action that we're considering today. It's actually been repositioned now and um I can't speak to all the details due to confidentialities but we have actually repositioned it more as a user for um advanced manufacturing. Um and so just want to clarify that for the record. And then secondarily on the clarification side for the record um personally my specific business interests within Mortonson have nothing to do with data centers. They're actually in other sectors. Um, so again, just stating that for the record, but two, the things that I guess I'm maybe still a little bit mindful of or concerned about is I appreciate some of the comments relating to, you know, why do we need to write a completely different text as opposed to just modify the existing LI language. Um, I think there's some worthiness to consider that a little bit further. I'm personally that type of person that likes to just clarify existing language as opposed to reintroduce um all new or wholly new cloth. And then the second thing that I'm mindful of, I think it was Mr. Maples that made the comment um is relating to the future of AI. Um certainly chairs, you were right in what you said. We we don't know what that future looks like. I think the one thing we do know about AI already um as it comes to the constructibility and then the actual implementation is adjacency is king. Um and so I think that the comment about the 10% in advanced manufacturing potentially not being enough um of a allocation of space to data center usage. You know again we don't know what the future of AI holds. And so I just want to echo that comment that maybe that 10% is potentially not enough. And maybe there is some mindfulness for us to consider, you know, the future and how are we framing language to be broad enough and expansive enough to be able to embrace that future that we don't know as opposed to looking back to a past that is rapidly um becoming obsolete. Thank you. Thank you. Anything board member Montes? Um first of all, so sorry that I'm I'm late. I was my plane was delayed and so just getting on. So, um just for somebody who lives in the area of where our data centers are popping up, I just um really want to make sure that we consider that there's good balance out there. I'm on a lot of the Facebook groups and stuff in here. So really just to understand that there's a good balance in the neighborhood, someone who's invested in the neighborhood and making sure that there's balance and that we do watch for that. And I know that we have approved quite a bit, but the data centers do take our building quite faster than the other parts. And so it may look like it's not balanced. So that's all I wanted to say for the record to make sure that the neighborhood is balanced with other things that belong in a neighborhood and not just data centers. Thank you, board member Montes. Appreciate that. There anything else? Troy, Jason, you guys are good. Okay. Well, I'm going to um I'm just going to go ahead and and make a motion here. Uh so couple things I want to say just before this. So I think um e echoing the concerns we've talked about you guys have heard me talk about this already so I I think you all know how I feel about it in many ways I'm a little bit torn but I think that because of this this this is not a complete restriction to data centers for that reason also the the you know obviously kind of echoing the wish of of the constituents that we're seeing in Mesa I recognize this is imperfect in my opinion a lot of this I do wish we did have a little bit more time to think about But the reality, so I'm an architect in my actual job and if you know design is something I could design to infinity and beyond doing stuff. I mean anybody that's involved in this industry, if you let us go forever, we will just keep designing, right? So it's the nature of it. So the reality is I don't know if we if more time's really going to get us further along. I think we have a pretty good feeling of where most people will land on this on the issue. And I don't think we'll ever land on a quote unquote perfect kind of resolution at the end of the day for the ordinance because unfortunately it's just that's the nature of it. So with that, I'm going to go ahead and make a motion on item 3A which is a PZ 25507 proposed amendments to chapter 672 3132 and 86 of title 11 of the Mesa City Code pertaining to data centers and planner development overlay districts. The amendments include, but are not limited to, adding a definition for data center, modifying land use tables to add data center, establishing development, and other standards specific to data centers, adding a minimum parking requirement for data centers, amending the purpose, land use regulations, and development standards related to the planning area development overlay district to, among other things, allow land uses to be permitted through the approval of PD overlay districts, modifying the def definition of indoor warehousing and storage. And I realize I probably don't need to read all of that, but I'm making sure the lawyers are happy in the room. My recommendation or staff recommendation is adoption and I would move to approve item 3A. Is there a second to that motion? I'll second it. All right. Go ahead and vote. Board member Farnsworth. Yes. Board member Montes. Yes. Thank you. And with a vote of six to one, the motion passes for item 3A. Anything else on this one uh that we need to talk about or anything else in particular? So, chairs, the only thing I would um give you is a quick update that at the planning zone or sorry, at the city council meeting on Tuesday, July 1st, um they will be considering uh for final action the subdivision regulations, the formbbased code, the marijuana uh text amendments, and the adaptive reuse that you the uh planning and zoning board has already provided a recommendation to. And this item will be on city council for introduction. Um, right now it it looks like it'll be on introduction for July 1st. Okay. Thank you very much. All right. With that, is there a motion to adjurnn? Motion to adjurnn. Second. Someone second. Thanks. All in favor, please. Board member Farnsburg. Yes. Board member Montes. Yes. And with that, we are adjourned. Thank you everyone for being here today. We appreciate it.