okay we will call the October 9th meeting of the Planning and Zoning commission to order can we have the roll call please Andre Spinelli here Rica Krishna here Jim Winchester here Scott pulus here Jeff Ron here Brandy Eber here Daniel George here Greg strike here Gardner is excused you have a quorum thank you we have a request from staff to reorder the agenda to place item G1 before item f5a are there is there a motion motion by commissioner win Winchester seconded by commissioner Ron is there any discussion uh seeing none any objection if no objection the agenda has been reordered uh next item any disclosures okay anyone have anything they wish to disclose hearing none disclosures are complete we will move straight to the public hearing items the procedures by which public may speak to the commission at this meeting is one after staff presentation is completed on public hearing items the chair will ask the public for public testimony on the issue two persons who wish to testify will follow the time limits established in the commission rules of of procedure a petitioners including his or her Representatives will receive 10 minutes part of this time may be reserved for rebuttal B representative of groups Community councils ptas Etc will receive 5 minutes see individuals 3 minutes when your testimony is complete you may be asked questions by the commission you may also testify one only once on any issue unless questioned by the commission for any party interested any party of Interest wishing to appeal shall first file with the planning director within 7 Days of the commission's decision made on the record a written notice of intent to appeal in accordance with amc21 350 a4a commission recommendations to the Anchorage assembly are not appealable now we are moving [Music] to what okay can we have the staff presentation for case 2023-24 thank you Mr chair um this ordinance ordinance two 223-9230 B uh that requires a major site plan review for non-residential uses between 5,000 and 10,000 square ft in the b1a district recognizing that the b1a district is often neighborhood serving and that not all uses create the same impacts on adjacent property the ordinance proposes to give discretion to the planning director to wave the requirement for major site plan review approval of this ordinance in some cases will save commercial businesses the time and cost of a public hearing ing but only when the planning director determines that there will be no negative impacts to surrounding property uh in your packet you'll find a map of all b1a zoned property within the Municipality of Anchorage as you can see um there are very few properties in in Anchorage that are zoned b1a but with that I would uh the planning department recommends approval of this ordinance with one correction uh the title block of the ordinance incorrectly cites uh the sub section 21 uh 21.4 do30 B the correct citation should be 21104 03b uh so with that I'd be happy to answer any questions thank you very much commissioner Ron uh thank you through the chair Mr Whitfield I I have a question about the language that's being used in the proposed amendment and um two specific areas um my first area of interest is reference to site design as being the driver for mitigation and the second just follows that um the language around any potential adverse effects so first part of the question um can you help me understand um definitional criteria for site design are we talking about actual design or could that also include operational controls um or engineer engineering controls or things that sort second part is the any potential adverse effects to me that feels like a really high bar um and if you could help me understand why that specific language was was chosen and whether or not there's any um potential to to adjust that language uh perhaps yeah uh through the chair Mr Ron very good question um site design is is usually um dimensional uh it's usually uh with respect to uh designing a site uh um there may not you may not be um there are creative ways that you can design a site that that mitigate impacts to adjacent properties uh that can be the location of your parking with relationship to that property that can be the location of your building that could be Landscaping that could be a whole host of of of um choices in in your design that maybe aren't necessarily code requirements uh so that's what we mean by site design uh with respect to uh adverse impacts um that is it is Broad it is open to um modification if you believe it it warrants it uh but we the the entirety of this ordinance is to uh provide discretion uh but at the same time mitigating any adverse impacts to residential property adjacent to the b1a district or adjacent to this uh this development so um not putting that in there uh seems to me like we're kind of well we're not giving the the planning director the ability to use that discretion uh and evaluate those potential impacts but I'd be curious to know if you if you've got suggestions we're all yours commissioner strike thank you and to the chair um this this question is kind of open-ended and it kind of parallels the prior commissioner's thoughts I believe and it's the types of uses that might take place on this site and I don't have my cheat sheet for b1a but um what comes to mind in the community and what we've heard in testimonies in the past everyone's afraid of homeless um hotels and in um buildings and apartments and so forth being built and put into put into the um different areas and some would call that at least let's have a review on those types of activities if that's even applicable here again I don't have my cheat sheet for I think it was B3 that we had changed once before uh through the chair uh Mr strike great question uh if if a homeless and Transit shelter is the concern uh homeless and Transit shelters are only permitted in two districts uh the pl and V3 districts uh and they're and they're uh only permitted by conditional use which is a higher level of review that would come to the Planning and Zoning commission so that's really not on the table um there are a whole a whole host of of permitted uses uh within the uh the b1a district it's that um it's that area between 5,000 and 10,000 square feet that we're talking about here so um it would be a use that would be otherwise permitted but because of the the size of the use and the potential uh impacts has typically or or I should say historically required uh a major site plan review but not all uses are created equal and as such we believe that uh the planning director having discretion uh to evaluate that use and the and the potential for impacts uh so as to not require a major site plan review is appropriate and and I and I agree with that and but the that level that bar of adverse impact and who determines that the adverse impact to the director to the the this body and to or to the neighbor that's right next door where it's happening to them we're all going to have three different definitions of adverse impact and what constitutes that so I'm just trying to find some quantitative qualitative um range for the director to have some I I agree we the director should have some flexibility there um but how do we make sure sure and this is wrong term how do we how do we all get on the same page so that his definition is ours and I'm going to tell you you can ask nine Commissioners we're going to have nine different opinions on that topic anyway through the chair Mr strike precisely the the challenge that we're facing here obviously adverse impacts is not defined by Municipal Code um and and anyone that uh uh that might be looking at or I should say answering the question as to what an adverse impact is uh is probably going to have a different definition than the next guy um but it the the the intent of the ordinance is to allow the planning director um his professional discretion in evaluating those impacts it is that appealable meaning oh certainly and absolutely so in this in this memorandum or in this agreement giving them that that option I'm just looking that the public should have a um path of ease in the event they need to or want to appeal what the planning director has approved through the chair Mr strike absolutely um the the public has the right to appeal a planning planning director's um decision always so there there is a path in Chapter 3 of title 21 that gives the the public the ability to to uh appeal that decision should should that appealable um path be identified in the in this ordinance and I guess when I the reason I'm asking that is Joe public many times isn't aware I mean they they're not going out there and hiring an attorney and hiring a group unless it's coming through the um um Community Council um so that appeal process is not as knowledgeable to them and now we're putting the onus and the cost on them when in fact we're trying to take the cost away from the developer which I'm all all for I'm all in I just want to make sure that the public has a pathway of lesser resistance so to speak um than they had in the past uh through the chair Mr strike I I appreciate your concern there um in terms of organization uh I don't think that it's appropriate to put language in the uh District specific standards um that refer to uh an appeal there is an appeal section uh that identifies the appeal process for all entitlements whether it's a conditional use site plan review director's decision Etc uh that's outlined in chapter three of title 21 and that's you know quite honestly where I think it should be okay thank you commissioner George thank you I won't bager the point too much I think that my colleagues who both spoke before me hit most of the points that I was going to hit but um it got me thinking a little bit um it's probably not as likely that a decision that is approved will be appealed by the public is so much as a decision that is denied by the director could be appealed um and then what are those measurable grounds criteria benchmarks you know is it ambiguous or arbitrary and capricious as they say in case law um how you know is is are we just trusting the director to make the Judgment call and if it's appealed one way or the other how do you uh demonstrate that a criteria has been met um and I'll also leave with one other point the uh the memorandum mentions that um the the director must determine there will be no negative impacts to surrounding property and the actual wording of the um the ordinance is uh they must demonstrate that the site design mitigates any potential adverse impacts or effects excuse me um and mitigation uh simply means to make less harsh or less severe um not that there won't be impact so um I think it's important to Bear those in mind when we're talking about impacts in a neighborhood from commercial uses thank you um seeing no further questions we will open the public testimony seeing no public hear to testify we will close the public hearing staff have any additional comments uh no additional comments thank you what is the will of the body moved by commissioner strike second by commissioner Krishna M commissioner strike would you like to speak to your Motion state your motion thank you I move in case 2023-24 to recommend to the Anchorage assembly approval of ordinance 2023-24 0.30 B to 20.04 do30 B and to speak to the motion would be I I would point out that there was no public testimony heard um I guess that's more of a finding but it um I think it's it's thought out I think we've G given some latitude to the director that's needed um and it's this is this is a course of action that's been spoken by this commission for at least nine years that I've been on and it it goes to the heart of putting some of the not challenging issues but putting the administrative type issues back into the director's hands and the staff's hand to be able to process and prosecute these um requirements or these requests from developers more rapidly thank you commissioner Ron uh thank you thank Mr chair um thank you commissioner strike uh for putting forth the motion and seconding um commissioner Krishna um I would uh move to amend the motion on the floor um by striking the word any from uh line seven of section uh 2B uh 2 I believe it's notated as line 19 um in terms of yeah page lining yeah line 19 any yeah okay we have a motion up seconded by commissioner strike commissioner Ron would you like to speak to the motion uh thank you um Mr chair um commissioner George I appreciate uh your clarification around mitigation and its role um both in this language and in in practice um and in so doing uh made me realize that you know I don't think the intent here at least as I'm interpreting it is to have a result that really has no potential adverse effect but it's one that speaks to the commissioner's um opening up the commissioner's ability to uh evaluate and for an applicant to work through the process in terms of Designing mitigation and that can be a back and forth process um I I feel that the word any is a tripping Hazard that really maybe doesn't need to be there um and um when I spoke to the high bar earlier it could be interpreted perhaps incorrectly um in its in its current um presence uh so for those reasons I I I would like to strike it that's it commissioner strike thank you and while I do agree with commissioner Ron's um take on that my question to him might also be um does the word any in line 10 have the same implication or hold the same implication uh commissioner strike I appreciate the question I haven't reviewed that section um I've only focused on the proposed a Amendment at this time okay well I I appreciate the amendment and i would support it thank you seeing no one wishing to speak we will vote on the motion motion passes uh we are back to the main motion as amended is anyone else wishing to speak to the motion hearing none seeing none we will call for the vote motion passes before moving on to case 2023-24 we had a request from staff that we should postpone this item since there is no one from uh om here to speak to the CIP commissioner Ron um Mr chair I'd like to hear from staff um uh both the a little bit of context around the recommendation I I think I know why but also the potential implications uh if we were to delay uh thank you uh this is Ria with the planning department um in terms of uh implications if we postpone uh I can't say for certain I do know that it's part of the budgeting process that the um CIP go before the Planning and Zoning commission who will then issue a recommendation to the assembly um in my discussion with uh om staff I do believe that there is some slight leeway in this time frame so um given the fact that uh a presentation really should be given in front of Planning and Zoning commission to fully grasp uh all of the items that are within this um uh case before you this evening um I do believe that uh planning zoning commission should hear that presentation before issuing any recommendation um and have the answer to ask questions as well so for that reason I would I would recommend postponement um if we do have a meeting scheduled for this month still and we could postpone to that meeting if not um it will have to go to the next available uh commissioner Krishna has a question maybe more of a comment um yeah I believe that it would have to move to the um November 4th meeting would be the next one available um I will say that this is uh one of those items that we see annually where I I really do feel like our recommendation comments are um you know may or may not go into the e um I I for one would be comfortable um you know with some basic questions and discussions here that enter the record understanding that the assembly will be having work sessions on this topic over the course of this month and if um we do hear it on November 4th then they would likely only be received by the assembly before the final public hearing um that I believe the assembly will be looking at you know maybe a few days after that meeting um I I do feel like it's such an enormous um book that we we mostly just kind of hear a summary of what's in it we do get to ask questions questions that is helpful but um I would say that ifer one would be comfortable providing some written comments based on the commissioner's um you know thoughts here so that we might participate earlier in the process rather than later that that's just my opinion though before moving on I have another question for commissioner strike does staff have a response to that uh Mr chair I I believe that um the the commission has been provided the materials you know you will have time to review them between now and November uh clarification on the hearing date in November it would be November 6th um in case you were to postpone to that date but if there were um questions that you would like uh to be passed on to om staff um we could certainly do that commissioner strike yes thank you and to the chair um I bring your attention to section I5 or I introduction page five with the preliminary calendar which was identified and this it appears that this was capital budget was not intended to present to us under the original plan until October 16th so taking a look at the plan there um I don't know if this makes any difference in that determination but it seems like it would support the delay just what is the will of the body commissioner Ron is back in the queue not making a motion not making a motion I I want to better understand commissioner krishna's uh uh proposal perhaps um please please clarify commissioner chrisna um yes I I won't do a back and forth I'll just say that you know in my five years in the commission I don't believe that the commission has ever had a substantive amendment that has um either swayed the assembly or Chang the the course of uh the capital budget proceedings so um I don't believe that I I won't speak to whether we're able to even provide notice for a meeting next week um I I don't personally think that's worth it and I think that um I I believe that we're able to provide questions through staff to om staff or provide a recommendation to the assembly with some additional questions and comments that would be satisfactory for our um level of involvement um in this process commissioner strike yes thank you and to the chair I I agree 100% with what the pre previous commissioner has identified in the years's experience on the commission of adding anything substantive and getting something back into the assembly my only query at this time is that I believe in the last election we saw a least one if not two Bond issues fail because of the misunderstanding or the understanding of how some of these bonds are approved and circumvent the um the tax cap issues and therefore the approval of some of these bonds and this is where an open question the approv of some of these bonds also require and come with it the tacet approval for the support and maintenance of those items through the general budget which is not subject to the tax cap and I think this is a large segment of what interrupt disrupted the previous election with the bond approvals and so for that matter that's that's an area I would like Clarity from um on how any of these relate into thex tax cap and therefore because of their capital budget and the bond because they're bonded unless I'm somebody has the answer to that he and can set me straight uh through the chair I do not commissioner strike it sounds like you're in support of the motion that's on the screen in front of you and all you would need to do is push the button cowards we have a motion and a second uh motion to postpone to November 6th commissioner strike would you like to speak to your motion I think having the um representatives for this budget being able to answer some of the questions regarding the bond levels and the question answers that come back on some of the items lend to the clarity and the tent and purposes of some of these um Capital expenditures as well um now I am going and recalling that we've had s situations where we have advocated different bonding um criterias and segment and breaking up and the school district in fact took those recommendations to heart um after learning the hard way that large Bond issues weren't passing but it um I think this is an educ time for Education that transpires or transcends um across the board rather than looking to this commission to be a rubber stamp and putting forth anything to the assembly um because it looked looks good so let let's do it and let's do it right anyone else wishing to speak to the motion commissioner Ron uh thank you for the prior commissioner's comments um more of a question perhaps um going back to previous commissioner's comments about um relaying inputs or requesting inputs to om uh do we need to do that now um uh as findings to this motion or do it thereafter informally through requests and I'm think I'm gathering that we can do it after we act on this this motion staff uh Mr chair U Planning and Zoning commission members of course I've been provided the materials you can feel free to read through those and then compile any questions you may have if you do um email those just be mindful of the EXP parte communication and making sure that um all members of Planning and Zoning commission are looped in on that email um and then those emails will go into the record as part of this case uh commissioner abber perhaps I should have asked this question earlier but can the assembly move forward without our recommendation uh through the chair I believe they can um you the planning zoning commission issues a recommendation that is the process but um I don't mean to demean this process in any way but it is a recommendation um it's not a decision thanks anyone else wishing to speak hearing none call for the vote e that motion passes okay uh commissioner Ron uh thank you through Mr chair um having gone through that I maybe am misremembering but wasn't the commission called here tonight for for that item okay thanks nothing further okay do we have a motion to adjourn moved and seconded any opposed hearing none we are