okay we will call the January 6th meeting of the Planning and Zoning commission to order and we have the roll call Andre Spinelli here Jared Gardner here radica Krishna here Scott pulus here Jeff Ron here Brandy Eber here Daniel George here Greg strike here Jim Winchester is excused you have a quorum thank you okay first item of business we have the minutes from December 9th and December 12th is there a motion to approve the minutes it's moved by commissioner pus is there a second seconded by commissioner Ron any discussion on the minutes hearing none any objections to the minutes hearing none the minutes are approved um any Commissioners have any items to disclose commissioner George thank you through the chair um for the case this evening um I don't have the case number in front of me uh dealing with Community Council boundaries I just disclose I serve as the vice chair of the Federation of community councils which is a 501c3 nonprofit contracted with the municipality to act as an administrator for the community councils of record I do not believe it will impair my ability to uh act rationally and fairly on this matter and I hold no Financial interest thank you um yeah I would uh accept that you could or I would direct you to participate unless anybody objects um I have a disclosure in case 2025 -001 and this case will be postponed but I will go ahead and disclose that I own property adjacent to the site I am negotiating to purchase another piece of property that's also adjacent to the site [Music] and I'm not positive I have a conflict but I might just recuse myself from that case so we I'll probably have to repeat that when it comes back commissioner Ron uh thank you Mr chair in case 2024 010 I have a disclosure as well uh my spouse is on the executive leadership team of our community council I have not discussed the case with her I have no financial interest in it I have not been involved in any action that the community council has or may take on the matter I don't believe it creates conflict but did want to make that disclosure thanks could commissioner George describe if the Federation of community councils will also be taking a uh Vote or any sort of um make any decision related to the boundary uh yeah I think the question was will the Federation be taking any votes or making comments regarding the boundaries is that correct commissioner Eber uh this is commissioner Krishna but uh sorry commissioner there will be uh whether the Federation will be um weighing in in any sort of a a vote or a formal way I don't believe so um I will have to see what our agenda is for next month I can certainly recuse if there is a position to be taken on that um the Federation of community councils um is a 501c3 just for the record that is separate from the community councils themselves uh which would be impacted I don't believe that the community Council that um I hail from and I'm a delegate from would be impacted by this ordinance either uh the Federation of community councils would be a provider of services on behalf of the municipality to those Community councils I can certainly recuse if it comes up before the the Federation Community councils if that would be sufficient thank you for the information uh commissioner Ron just to for the record I'm directing you to participate unless any Commissioners object okay okay that brings us to the staff presentation for case 2024-25 Highway merging queuing issues in maintenance uh members of the project team are available for questions tonight this concept report is in an information item the commission shall take no action the concept report is just to familiarize the commission with the project and it's distributed prior to the submittal of the 35% design level design study report uh that will be reviewed by the Planning and Zoning commission at a meeting in the future where you will uh take a vote to make a decision on the the case um but this is just an info item with members of the project team available for questions thank you are there any questions for staff see none would the petitioners team like to speak to the [Music] commission are there any questions for the petitioners see none we will so that will be a non-action item and we will move on to case 202 24-12 and is there a staff presentation thank you Mr chair I'll just be very brief um per Anchorage Municipal Code um title 21 the Planning and Zoning commission is tasked with an annual review of the Anchorage School District's Capital Improvement budget um we did have a work session prior to this regular meeting where staff from the Anchorage School District gave an overview of that budget um and uh planning staff has provided a brief memo with some suggested findings for the commission's consideration this evening and with that I will um turn it over to Anchor School District staff if there's any questions so thank you would you like to give a petitioner presentation' already done that okay so uh the petitioner yielded any presentation are there any questions from the commission for staff or the petitioner okay I seeing hearing no questions I guess we are oh we need to open the public hearing point of order Mr chair it's a non-public hearing item okay okay no public hearing but we will make a motion we have a recommended motion on the screen uh motion made by commissioner Ron seconded by commissioner pit commissioner Ron would you like to State your motion thank you Mr chair I move in case 202 24-12 to recommend to the Anchorage assembly and the Anchorage to the Anchorage assembly and the Anchorage school board approval of the ASD six-year Capital Improvement plan including staff's findings on page three of the staff report thank you would you like to speak to the motion thank you Mr chair um I'd like to acknowledge and thank uh ASD representative who um was here during the work session to answer the questions um levied by the commission uh appreciate the additional context that was provided through that work session um and thank all those involved in the district for the development of this Capital Improvements um plan um during the work session we had some healthy discussion uh recommend uh those from the public who have interest uh finding that video um to uh get some better insight as to some of the questions and answers that were asked and and responded to one of them that I would like to call out for the record was a discussion had around middle schools understanding that the district has gone through a recent uh move of middle school students uh sixth grade into Middle School causing some capacity constraints that many those facilities uh would ask that ASD um you know continue to monitor that over time as projections either do or don't come true to ensure that um all our ASD students um are benefited um throughout their school lives um with respect to capacity um I'd like to close by acknowledging that the school district has a very tough job of keeping our students um safe um you know healthy uh and educated and in today's environment that's a very difficult thing to do in our community but it's not just the responsibility of the school district to do so it's all of ours so let's keep that in mind as we move forward and I intend to support this motion support the CIP and ask residents to support um School District as well thanks anybody else wishing to speak to the motion hearing none we'll call for the vote Miss Eber how do you vote yes Miss Krishna yes Mr strike yes thank you a motion passes now we will move on to the public hearing items uh um and I will read the procedures by which the public may speak to the commission at its meeting one after staff presentation is complete on public hearing items the chair will ask for public testimony on the issue persons who wish to testify will follow the time limits established in the commission rules and procedures petitioners including his or her Representatives will receive 10 minutes part of this time may be reserved for rebuttal representatives of groups Community councils ptas Etc will receive five minutes and individuals will receive three minutes when your testimony is complete you may be asked questions by the commission you may only testify once on any issue unless questioned by the commission any party of Interest wishing to appeal shall first file with the planning director within 7even days of the commission's decision made on the record a written notice of intent to appeal in accordance with AMC 21035 a4a commission recommendations to the Anchorage assembly are not not appealable following approval of the written finding of fact and decision any party of Interest May within 20 days file an appeal by filing a notice of appeal and paying the appeal fee and deposit in accordance with 21035 the notice of appeal must be filed with the planning director on a form prescribed by the municipality if the applicant is not the if the appellant is not the applicant the appellant's notice of appeal shall include proof of service on the applicant okay that brings us to case 20 24-10 can we have the staff presentation please uh good evening this is Tom Davis with the planning department to deliver a staff report to give you a brief overview of the process uh the public hearing schedule that we're laying out with you uh help you through the materials for review briefly go to review the comments received and then uh fifth Next Step uh Planning and Zoning commission is uh we're requesting the planning zoning commission to hold a public hearing and to make its recommendations to the Anchorage assembly regarding some amendments to the community council District District boundaries so these are the boundaries of our neighborhood community councils this is the 10-year review of community council boundaries uh the municipality carries us out every 10 years just a comprehensive review and that is by requirement set forth in the municipal code section 2.4.0 40 for the municipality to review the boundaries of community councils to determine if any need to be adusted or any committee council districts uh need to be reviewed and this requirement includes a public hearing before the Planning and Zoning commission the findings and recommendations from the Planning and Zoning commission forwarded to the assembly which must also hold a public hearing both bodies are required by code to take into account as solicit and take into account comments from the community councils uh just briefly this process is a 10-year process and it's laid out for us in chapter 2.40 and the chapter 2.4 also lays out the standards or criteria for how we delineate our community council neighborhoods in summary the assembly defines the community council districts by ordinance and it must do so to one group residents within quote natural communities I quote and secondly to recognize Community desires regarding boundaries population is not to be used as a Criterion to assist in the 10-year boundary reviews the materials that you have particularly in attachment three the main report translates these very generalized municipal code standards for establishing commun council districts into seven boundary review criteria that are more easily equitably applied and that the planning department and a boundary advisory committee has applied to individual boundary study areas to identify those boundary study areas I ifying boundary issues to evaluate how do we do that we're bringing forward to you approximately 40 boundary study areas that have been evaluated that were identified for evaluation based on the public process the process began in late 2022 with Outreach to the Federation of community councils and to all of the community council's executive boards an online questionnaire interactive online questionnaire regarding Community Council boundaries was posted online for four months and with the help of the community council Center we distributed that to approximately 9500 households recipients excuse me in response we received approximately 410 questionnaire responses regarding satisfaction with committee council districts and boundaries and an additional 10 or so comments via email and letters these members of the public identified a range of boundary issues of concern to them and these became the 40 boundary study areas evaluated in this project for you the process continued in 2023 with individual Community Council consultations and a community council's boundary advisory committee with the help of the Federation we uh organized a committee of approximately 12 members the municipal Ombudsman as an ex-official member essentially leaders presidents from geographically representing uh all parts of the municipality from the community councils and this boundary advisory committee held six public meetings we basically ran it as if it were a municipal commission uh publicly noticed meetings with minutes and these this committee assisted the planning department in evaluating these boundary study areas against the boundary review criteria we also invited public comment and frequently or on every meeting we had uh guests from Community councils to explain their positions in most of the 40 boundary study areas after applying the boundary review criteria and considering the public feedback the planing department and Boundary advisory committee have recommended no change I.E to retain existing boundaries in all but nine cases in nine of the 40 boundary study areas changes to District boundaries are recommended of these nine changes two are recommendations to uh merge or absorb two existing Community councils into a neighbor neighboring Community Council the remaining seven are boundary adjustments between districts these n changes are identified for you in attachment three that's the main report main report documents the process but in its executive summary in Pages 1 through three it's a nice cliffnotes version of the process and it on pages one and two it identifies for you where those changes are recommended so of all these boundary study areas and all these materials you could go to the pages one one and two the executive summary of attachment 3 the report and recommendations and quickly see what are the changes recommended um they are described there in addition the executive summary also provides you on page three with a quick uh index cross reference table between everyone of the existing 38 community councils and all of the boundary study areas that involve or touch on that Community Council I'll briefly secondly go over the materials before you because they seem like a lot but I'll help you um zero in on what you want to look at depending on what you want to look at uh first of all uh the materials include tonight's memorandum G1 a brief introductory memor random that uh introduces you to the materials in process and it includes seven attachments so attachments one and two are the draft assembly ordinance the draft assembly ordinance that the commission would make recommendations about and that the assembly May adopt and it is simply uh indicates how the code would change to uh change the the list of the recog recognized community council districts and the list of community council District Maps attachment one is the text of the ordinance and attachment two in 11 by1 17 are the um is exhibit a would be the maps that the assembly would uh adopt and these Maps would replace the existing atlas of community council district map in section 2.40 of the code we're recommending a complete replacement not because we're changing a lot of boundaries but because the maps in the code are 22 years old and they are looking quite out of date in fact most of the information the rivers and coastlines on those Maps uh don't match our latest information or best information about these Geographic um landmarks so attachment to the community council District Maps you be adopted doesn't show you where the changes are being made so let's move on to uh attachment three and its appendices attachments four five and six attachment three provides you with the uh summary of the public hearing process it's and the um analys is of all the boundary study areas and it's called white paper report and recommendations and really it's it's really primarily just call it a the main report and recommendations uh public hearing draft recommendations based on the planning department and Boundary advisory committees uh review together of these boundary study areas and it begins with the letter from the chair of the boundary advisory committee uh who is still following in this process and describes um that committee's process for you it moves on to its executive submit summary which I think is a great cliffnotes version for you it's only three pages of the process uh and then part one of two provides you with the uh ins and outs of the the public process we've used and the the boundary uh criteria the code-based boundary criteria that we use to resolve boundary issues and Boundary disputes uh this process and and set of criteria is rather laudable we've used it twice before uh 10 years ago and 20 years ago 20 years ago when I was a staff member on this project uh and it's a great way to resolve uh boundary disputes perhaps better than we see in many areas of the world today uh part two uh excuse me part one ends with the criteria part two is the boundary study areas evaluation but the first thing it does is it gives you a summary of the results of our questionnaire survey sent to about 9,500 households again we received more than 400 responses has some graphs and charts kind of giving you a sense of the Public's uh satisfaction with whether their neighborhood boundaries are reflect their actual neighborhood whether the size of their Community Council is too large and too small and just an overview but the main part of the report from page basically for about 40 pages is the evaluation of the individual back boundary study areas it provides you with the criteria and how we reviewed the pro each Community Council boundary study Area 1 through 40 through the criteria and then we lay out for each criteria or for each boundary study area the options we looked at we looked at options a b c and onward uh for most every boundary study area and then it identifies for you which of those options were recommended by the planning department and which of those options were identified uh recommended by the boundary advisory committee option A is always no Change option b see and onward are uh options where there are changes and they're generally in order of increasing magnitude of change I mentioned that all of these boundary study areas were identified by the public it wasn't the planning Department's intent to propose a lot of big changes ourselves um so these changes these study areas excuse me the boundary study areas come from the public and when we began this project we figured there'd be about 6 to 10 boundary study areas uh identified for us uh so uh there were actually 38 specific areas uh a number of areas we uh we group together in study area 39 uh boundary study area 40 was eventually identified by the planning department uh and that is uh what we see of primarily technical Corrections and updates to community council boundaries where they AB but chugat State Park and secondly where they have Coastline on the Cook Inlet including the the Nick arm and uh the turning in arm uh we identified boundary study area 40 as we were working up developing the maps uh rather late in this process and we found there were some um um out ofd uh or inaccurate um boundaries in these in in against Chat State Park and the coastline and so we've introduced boundary study area 40 the remaining 39 came from the public I'll move on to the public review and public hearing schedule just let you know that the the public hearing draft materials were posted on the project web page um on October 30th and we notified all Community councils a day later on November 1st um the public hearing draft materials were posted on the planning cases online website and distributed for agency and public review and Community Council review on no November 15th 2024 and scheduled for a hearing this evening as indicated in the memo uh our plan and recommendation is to continue this public hearing to February so the planning department requests that the Planning and Zoning commission open the public hearing for case 2024 0100 on on uh this evening uh and then uh to continue the public hearing to February 3rd continuing the hearing to the 3rd of February is necessary to give the community councils and any other organization that meets monthly enough time to deliberate and then develop a resolution and vote on a resolution indicating the the community council's position as to its boundaries uh especially regarding any boundary study areas uh for the commission's consideration and we have requested and are working with community councils that they each develop formal resolutions that are voted on by their members not just a letter or or testimony but uh a a formal resolution in this case uh 2024 100 providing enough time for all affected Community councils to convey the recommendations to the commission is essential to meet uh public process requirements set forth uh in AMC 2.40 for these boundary reviews and this code session establishes both the commission and the assembly must each solicit and consider the recommendations of the community councils um and so we are at a phase in the public process where it is time for the community councils to weigh in formally phase one was the questionnaire identif the public identified in the community council uh excuse me the boundary study area issues to address phase two was the boundary advisory committee's process uh and now phase three it's time for the community councils to formally weigh in uh I'd be remiss in uh not clarifying attachment uh three this report recommendations has uh three appendices appendices A and B document for you in uh detail the first two phases of the public process attachment for known as appendix a is uh a document containing all of the questionnaire responses and emails and public comments we received establishing the boundary study areas attachment five in your packet which is appendix B to the reporting recommendations is the action summary and the summary minutes from each of the um half dozen boundary advisory committee meetings and so um when you go into the report and you're reading its evaluation of each boundary study area for each boundary study area it provides you a cross reference to every public comment from that's provided in um attachment 4 and also cross reference to where in the minutes in attachment five the boundary advisory committee um deliberated on the topic so you not only have the evaluation in the attachment three the main report you have cross references from the main report to the public comments and the advisory committee deliberations about each that study area finally attachment six attachment six is the boundary study area maps so each and every boundary study area in your in the report in attachment 3 gives you the very first thing it does it highlights in yellow it cross references you to the boundary study area maps that show you where that boundary study area is relative to the existing Community Council boundaries so if you want to know where the existing Community Council boundaries are you can go to these Maps boundary study area maps and you see those and then you see highlighted in yellow where the boundary study area is so if somebody from the public identified you know my neighborhood you know I live I live in university area Community Council I live east of bonfice Parkway I feel in my neighborhood east of bonfice Parkway is really more naturally a part of Scenic Foothills Community Council so you can see where that study area is in these Maps so as you read the report or you want to read the report for particular boundary study areas you can reference the map and see where that is boundary study area map not only shows you where the existing Community Council boundaries are and where the boundary study area is but also highlights and hash lines where um the planning department and the boundary advisory committee actually recommended a boundary change that an area be shifted so in most of these areas or most of these boundary study area maps um you see yellow areas but you don't see hatch cross-hatch lines through them uh but in several areas um you see some cross-hatch lines and those show that a boundary change is being recommended so you can see where the boundary study areas are and you can see where changes are being recommended and uh for those for an example if you were to flip to page 15 of attachment see the 11 by1 17 of the appendix C containing the boundary study area maps it's attachment six in your packet if you go to page six uh 15 of excuse me page 15 of that attachment you would see uh boundar stady areas map number nine and it happens to show the kind of the upper Campbell Creek vicinity uh community councils in the university area Campbell Park abot loop taku Campbell so you see um some numbers um and highlighted in yellow those are your boundary study area numbers when a boundary study area number like um for example in the upper left corner you see number 29 and spinard Community Council you see number 28 in Midtown and you don't see any yellow highlighted area that boundary study area applies to that entire Community Council for example in boundary study 8 boundary study area 28 in Midtown somebody recommended that Midtown be removed and be absorbed into its neighboring community councils so that boundary study area applies to the entire Community Council in tutor area just to the right of Midtown similarly you see a boundary study area at 12 and you see a hatch lines through tutor area somebody recommended that tutor area be absorbed into its neighboring Community councils the hatch line tells you that that there is a recommended change there and in fact we are recommending that tutor area be merged into a neighboring community Council meanwhile in Midtown there's no hatch line we evaluated it and came to the conclusion that Midtown should be retained so there's no changes recommended to Midtown uh further to the right I wanted to pointed out to you two examples of uh boundary study areas that are a cover a part of a community council and how those look on the maps so if you look at boundary study Area 13 it's just south the university area covers a large part of Campbell Park but not all of it boundary study Area 13 addresses a variety of public comments recommending changes in Campbell Park but not to the whole Community Council um you don't see any hash lines there you just see yellow there's no recommended change to the Campbell Park Community Council boundaries from boundar study are 13 flipping to the north of university area you see on that same map boundary study area 16 seems to have hatch lines in it's very small it's in the Eastern end of the existing boundaries of Rogers Park boundary study area 16 covers that part of Rogers Park that's east of Lake Otis there's hatches through it boundary study area 16 with those hatches indicates to you that A change is recommended there lastly I'll I'll I'll help you understand boundary study area number eight same map eastern half Eastern end of university area boundary study area 8 covers all of the university area Community Council that's east of the University UAA and Apu campus east of the umed campus so umed District everything east of that is highlighted in yellow but only the section of that highlighted area is excuse me only the portion of that highlighted area that's east of bonfice Parkway has hatches through it that means that in boundary study area 8 the Eastern portion of boundary study area 8 is being recommended to be transferred out of university area Community Council and the part of the boundary study area 8 that's west of bonfice that doesn't have the hatch is not recommended to be transferred anywhere that's about the most complicated one on there maybe a couple others uh lastly on the map just noticed that down by D Diamond Boulevard everything south of diamond um uh at the south end of taku cambos being recommended to um be transferred to another Community Council in this case b or clat uh comments received so far almost done here um so far we've received comments from two members of the public individuals um and those are in attachments seven of your packet along with um the uh resolution of nine Community councils stating their voted on adopted positions concerning their boundaries and in each of those resolutions those Community councils are addressing the boundary study areas that touched on their community councils and we recommend it to each Community Council even if a boundary study area didn't recommend a change in your District if you were touched by boundary study area we highly recommend you state your position I as to boundaries to the planing and Zoning commission uh just a quick note the r rabbit Creek community council resolution still indicates draft on it rest assured that that was that word draft is they didn't mean for that to be there they've submitted a final version uh very same resolution um it's just they forgot to eliminate the word draft and and we're going to give you that final resolution before your hearing closes uh we an we anticipate more resolutions coming um uh on these boundary study areas throughout January we are also seeing several new proposals from Community councils um for boundary study areas boundary changes that uh are not covered in the public hearing draft materials that are new to us they'll be new to you we will cover those in the final report and recommendations to come to you before the February 3 public hearing a Basher Community Council is proposing to expand its boundaries and uh we anticipate another Community Council I can't confirm is proposing to expand its boundaries um so stay tuned on that several areas where we think there will be disagreement that we wanted to just be aware of uh and our goal has been to seek agreement as much as possible so it's the easiest on the commission and the assembly but just to give you a heads up uh we do anticipate disagreement um for several boundary study areas um some disagreements uh related to boundary study areas [Applause] um bear with me boundary study area 23 boundary study area 20 21 boundary study area [Applause] 8 boundary study area 32 spinard Beach Park boundary study area 40 brought forward to you by the planning department again we uh request to continue the hearing to February 3rd uh this will also give the Commissioners uh more time to absorb all this and ask questions um project staff is uh requesting to the planning department that we schedule tentatively schedule a work session for February 3rd on at 5:30 p.m. but we are available um at other times as well as the commission wishes thank you for your time and I can take any questions questions from commissioner Gardner thank you for the presentation and the thorough materials Tom um I just wanted to confirm my understanding and I'm looking at the the executive summary and the report and attachment three where it lays out the recommended changes to to community council boundaries and the the first seven or so say that they're recommended both by the boundary advisory committee and the planning department and then you noted 32 which uh is the spinard beach park which is maybe one of potential contention and then study area 40 are those recommendations for 32 and 40 in the current draft ordinance and revised Maps uh yes uh through the chair boundary study area 40 and the recommendations of the planning department in boundary study area 40 are reflected in the ordinance and the exhibit a Maps so if those Maps were to be adopted as they are um those Maps would reflect boundary study area 40 boundary study area 32 I have to look at the map to jock my memory on that question does boundary study area 32 reflect whose recommendations does it reflect um does the uh um the maps public hearing draft ordinance Maps reflect and so the planning department recommends retaining spinard Beach Park entirely within turnig again Community Council and on page 14 of the ex exhibit a Maps it does indeed show that spinard beach park is um it show reflects it remaining inan Community Council uh and that the boundary advisory committee uh had a different recommendation which you can see thank you so was the recommendation on spinard beach park to put spinard beach park into spinard Community Council that was one of uh yes in response the question uh yes that was one of the options what what would be the other I guess I'm just trying to wrap my head around what the controversy that you told us is going to be coming our way right um B you told us a lot of stuff but you didn't just cut to the Chase and say Here's what's happening here's what people like and don't like so if you could just tell me that that would be great so in the executive summary the nine areas of changes are shown on on pages one and two want to cut to the chase where the changes if you want to know where people agree and disagree uh I think I I listed those um boundary study areas that I'm aware of however I I imagine there are going to be other areas and I can't predict for you exactly which areas are going to be disagreements uh but one of those areas where I do anticipate disagreement is spard Beach Park spard Beach Park uh the the both Community councils those being turnig again and spinard they each would prefer that spinard beach park be in their Community Council uh they each lay out reasons why it should be in their Community Council which we have attempted to ref reflect in the evaluation of this study area on page 50 of of the report um on page 50 of your attachment three the community councils had a meeting the Presidents had a meeting or a couple people had a meeting and they said well why don't we have spard Beach Park located in both community councils and our community councils would overlap so we both get it another option was to split the baby in half planning department uh recommends just leaving it and turning it commun Council we believe there well you can lay out the reasons however the boundary advisory committee um recommended placing spinard Beach Park in both community councils so their Community counil District boundaries overlap uh there are other options listed on pages 50 and 51 but you can see that option A no change is recommended by the planning department and then option C in Charlie C it placing it and sharing it placing in both Community councils is recommended by the boundary advisory committee thank you and then real quick I guess for my clarity here so 40 was another one I circled as uh contentious yeah and so I'm I guess I'm just curious like is the recommendation to take the mud flats out of the community council and they're wanting to keep it in is that what's happening is that is that the conflict we should expect to hear uh correct okay that okay that please no more commissioner Ron thank you through the chair uh Tom Eko prior commissioner's comments an impressive amount of work here that you've um helped us better understand or at least helped me better understand uh based on your presentation and so thank you for that my my question is around um the so what of all of this and maybe it's a a bigger question than I should be asking in this forum and you know can have a side conversation later about the role of community council in our community but can you distill for for me as a commissioner with respect to Planning and Zoning what are the implications of some of these changes to community council boundaries and how we plan and move forward as a community um through title 21 and planning and zoning and I guess a finer point on that question would be are there any implications around things like Assembly districts or voting districts things of that sort that would be informed by these changes thanks commun C ccs are recognized by the municipality by its Charter code as the voice of neighborhoods as to Future development in the community the community councils don't have any power they simply comment and advice however the community council for your area does represent your neighborhood when um land use decisions that do affect your neighborhood are are um are are are being made Community councils also have a say in public Investments so there's a there's a a CIP uh and uh so for example university area Community Council is very active and they're very active in in advocating for particular prioritize improvements in their District next door tary Community Council has not been able to meet as quorum to area and Portage Valley down in the Atty an arm have not been meeting regularly Property Owners businesses residents in those areas aren't being represented and so it's very important that those areas be represented if your neighborhood is in a community council in which your area is really peripheral to their interests peripheral to their attention and you're more aligned with a community council that's active next door then again it's important that the community council District boundaries reflect your neighborhood if your community council has 30,000 residents and it is struggling to provide representation on issues across the width of his community council then maybe that Community Council should be considered for possibly being divided or parts of it being moved uh we ended up not recommending such a thing for Northeast but looked into it so these uh some of this is uh a little uh tedious and it doesn't seem very important um the mud flats is very uh it's easy to to feel like w are we really going to debate that uh but we uh you know we we believe it's uh helpful to have the Maps Accurate and have the community councils reflect the actual natural neighborhoods and uh we think that it it really uh it also helps the community councils do their business and it strengthens them they don't have to chase their tail or fight with one another over boundaries if we've figured out the problem and and we've done so in the past and and we we hope generally hope to these processes that we we strengthen them and help everyone focus on the important issues at hand which are land use and zoning and housing um so regardless of whether the community council is in the mud flats or not so thank you I guess I just add on this mud flats topic that Municipality of Anchorage ends at mean high tide so those Community Council boundaries are technically outside the municipality that's my understanding I don't know that we need to in response to that we're we're not so sure and we think it it might be to to to mean low tide uh and getting help for the municipal surveyor and we're also seeking comment from the state of Alaska you know both for Chat State Park and the mud fls the a $64,000 Question for the community councils is even if the district is or is not in my community council if someone is going to develop a parking lot in chickat State Park just outside my community council boundary or someone's going to build a pipeline in the mud flats just outside my community council boundaries what kind of notice does the state give me what kind of com common opportunity does it give the community council and does it matter whether the community council is in that area or not uh and that's an assignment that the planning department has to bring to to this body in the community councils this month yeah I guess and on that topic if we're we're hearing a case on spinard beach park and spinard Community Council brings us comment I don't see that we're going to weigh it any differently the turnig again comments versus the spinard comments at least me personally and so I I guess there is a lot of it that doesn't I don't quite understand why it's so important but either way I think we should move on any other questions okay just for clarity are we opening the public hearing tonight yes please okay seeing no more questions for staff we will ask for the petitioner presentation which is Staff which we just had so we will open the public hearing anybody wishing to testify please step forward I see nobody is there anybody on the phone okay we've been requested to postpone and continue this public hearing is there a motion to do so move by commissioner George seconded by commissioner Gardner commissioner George would you like to speak to your motion thank you Mr chair uh I moved that we postpone this uh public hearing to February 3rd 2025 to allow community councils and any other organizations the necessary time to deliberate and provide resolutions uh to the Penning and Zoning commission for review uh many of the community councils did not meet over the holiday break or if they did it was simply a potluck uh now that this has been presented to the commission uh many of the community councils will resume their uh monthly meetings in January and this will afford them the opportunity to digest the materials and weighin for the commission's review at our February meeting thank you Mr chair um yes thank you Mr chair just a question uh for the clerk is there a difference because the motion on the floor is to postpone um but we'd like to continue the public hearing is there a a a difference between postponing to next month versus continuing the public hearing to next month no difference we can do it we're good all right thank you Mr chair appreciate the clarification okay anyone else wishing to speak to the motion I I will speak to the motion this is commissioner strike I believe that there is a question on postponement versus continuation that if postponed then this public hearing notice never applied so I think it is correct that we show a continuation because this was an open valid and posted public um testimony opportunity true the chair Mr strike um if if the postponement or the continuances within 30 days we do not have to Ren notice is that what you're asking no I'm saying that the terminology of postponement would imply that we never had a public hearing tonight we're going to continue the continuation which is what the original motion said I think the wording does matter oh well if the original motion said to continue then I was just misspeaking and that's we're doing what the motion says but but what the verbiage was was a postponement what the motion written shows continuation it's just should be a matter of commissioner George acquiescing to the written motion commissioner George would you like to restate your motion for clarity thank you for the opportunity Mr chair uh to clarify this is a motion to continue the public hearing uh to February 3rd 2025 any further comment we'll call for the vote Miss Eber how do you vote Yes Miss Krishna yes Mr strike yes thank you the motion passes next we have case number 20 25- z001 and now we have had a request from staff to postpone this case and there's a recommended motion moved by commissioner Ron second by commissioner pulus commissioner Ron would you like to speak to the motion thank you Mr chair I move to postpone case 2025-the else wish to speak to the motion hearing none let's call for the vote Miss Eber how do you vote Yes Miss Krishna yes Mr strike yes thank you motion passes that case is postponed uh next order a business title 21 discussion anybody care to discuss any of the items um there is a memo uh commissioner Ron thank you Mr chair just briefly again appreciate the planning department for providing us with the memo tonight uh question on item 14 B um I have not had a chance to review the recording of the December 17th regular meeting um what appreciative staff could provide any insights as to what transpired there um thanks to the department this commission heard a case we you know deliberated and provided some feedback and I understand through aim that the planning department provided that information and its own as well to the assembly was any of that incorporated um that's that's my question uh through the chair we'd have to follow up on that commissioner Ron I can't say off the top my head I can tell you that the code was published today so you can now read it okay any other comments from the Commissioners on title 21 or anything else prior to adjourning and just to note there's no meeting next Monday and we are ready for a motion to adjourn now we're accepting verbal motions to adjourn move that's motion by commissioner pus is there a second second uh by commissioner Gardner and George any objection hearing none we are adjourn e e