Based on the context provided and the content of the transcript, this is a **Planning Commission** meeting rather than a City Council meeting. I have identified the speakers as the Planning Commission Chair, Planning Director Maura (or Mori), City Staff member Mr. Dempsey, and the applicant's representative. [0:02] **[Background Audio]**: foreign [0:08] **[Music]** [0:17] **[Music]** [0:25] **[Music]** [1:27] **[Background Audio]**: foreign [1:51] **Chair**: ...third Planning Commission meeting together. Could you please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance? [2:16] **Chair**: Ms. Maura, would you take the roll, please? [2:20] **Ms. Maura (Planning Director)**: Zuzak? (Here). Colusa? Lindley? (Hi/Here). Zimmer? (Here). Ike? (Here). [2:24] **Chair**: Thank you. Do we have any changes to the July 6 Planning Commission meeting minutes? Alright, we will let those stand as recorded. Planning Director Maura, do you have any announcements for us tonight? [2:45] **Ms. Maura (Planning Director)**: Thank you, Madam Chair. Good evening, Planning Commission members. I don't have any handouts for tonight, but I do have a couple of announcements. First of all, we just have the one public hearing tonight. If that item is acted upon and forwarded to City Council, we will be canceling the August 17th meeting because we do not have any new public hearings scheduled for that date. And then also, I would be remiss if I didn't mention that this is our Video Production Specialist Tim Sheehan's last meeting. He is leaving the city to go find job opportunities elsewhere. This will be the last meeting—you don't usually see him as part of the meeting, he's behind the scenes, but that doesn't mean he's any less important to running these meetings than the rest of us are. He's been here about five years and has been part of over 120 Planning Commission meetings during that time, and we really do appreciate the work that he's done here. We will miss him and we wish him well. So thank you, that concludes my announcements this evening. [3:54] **Chair**: Thank you, Ms. Maura, and thanks to Tim for all of his work. If anyone's here that would like to speak at the public hearing, please sign up in the notebook at the back of the table. We'll call that to order at this time. We'd like to open the public hearing for All Energy Solar on behalf of Matthew Homuth for a conditional use permit to allow a ground-mounted solar energy system as an additional detached accessory structure and combined accessory structure area exceeding 1,500 square feet in the RS-2 Single-Family Residential District located at 10530 175th Street. At this time, I think we have the applicant, Mr. Homuth, joining us via Teams on the phone. We'd like to ask you to please present to us. [4:47] **Colin Beekel (Contractor)**: I'm also here, the actual contractor for the project as well. I was planning on presenting; I'm not sure if Matt is on or not. But anyways, yeah, this is an installation of a ground-mounted solar project. The reason this was proposed as a ground-mounted solar project was because there's quite a bit of shading on the rooftops available on this property. This is a pretty standard residential system in terms of size; it's an 11.2-kilowatt system which, like I said, is kind of our typical residential system—right around 10 to 12 kilowatts DC. This is proposed as 28 solar panels with a production that would offset the yearly electricity use at the property. And as far as actual square footage, I think we had that in there, but it's 579 square feet of solar panels. And like I said, 28 solar panels for an 11.2-kilowatt system. [6:29] **Colin Beekel (Contractor)**: Yeah, Colin Beekel, I work for All Energy Solar, the contractor for the project. [6:35] **Chair**: Excellent, thank you so much. And I will ask Mr. Dempsey with the city to present. [6:43] **Mr. Dempsey (City Staff)**: Good evening, Planning Commissioners, Madam Chair. The request this evening is for the property owner, Matt Homuth. The property is at 10530 175th Street and the proposal is to install a solar array on the property. This is a three-acre parcel that is located south of 175th Street. Three acres in area is consistent with the other larger lots that are in this vicinity. The property is zoned RS-2, which is a Single-Family Residential District, and that district allows up to 1,500 square feet of accessory building area and two detached accessory buildings unless a conditional use permit is approved. A little background on this: the Planning Commission may recall last year that Mr. Homuth had requested—or was going to apply for—a variance, which would have been an option. But the Planning Commission at their work session determined that the preferred option is to study this a little bit further and potentially amend the zoning ordinance to allow a larger system array through a conditional use permit process and treat them as accessory buildings like any other accessory building. We went through the public hearing process for that zoning ordinance amendment as part of our annual update, and the City Council approved that on June 5th. So, a little bit more information on the property here: this is the zoning, it's RS-2. This is the site plan submitted by the applicants. Here is 175th Street; here is the house, it's a rambler. This is a detached garage that was constructed sometime in the 1980s. This is a detached accessory building that was constructed in about 2015. And then there's also a detached building located a little further south. This is the solar array; you can see it's located a considerable distance from all property lines. This is an image of the array; it's 11 feet tall and 42 feet wide. This diagram demonstrates an underground supply of power to the house. I put this together to show a recent aerial photo showing the house, the detached garage, the 16x24 shed, and a three-sided shed located here. This last one was installed without a zoning permit, and the applicant has agreed to remove it. The solar array will be the third detached building on the property. These total accessory building areas are in the vicinity of 2,300 square feet total. With the solar array on the three-acre property, it is just under 1% of the total coverage of the entire lot. One of the conditions for larger accessory buildings is that we typically require screening. As you can see, there are considerable trees adjacent to the property. Staff stipulation number six is recommending that three trees be planted to screen that from the public view of 175th Street. There are six stipulations in total and findings of fact for your consideration. I'll stand for questions. [11:33] **Chair**: Thank you, Mr. Dempsey. I don't believe we have anyone coming forward or anyone on the phone? No. Okay. Seeing no one in the audience and no one on Teams, I move to close the public hearing. [11:45] **Commissioner**: Second. [11:46] **Chair**: Any further discussion? All those in favor? (Aye). Thank you. The public hearing is now closed and we'd be open for questions from Commissioners. [12:09] **Commissioner Lindley**: Sure. I'm thankful that this came to us in a work session. We had a chance to review it and over time got a good solution coming in. Thank you. [12:17] **Chair**: Doesn't look like we have any further questions. I'd be willing to entertain a motion. [12:21] **Commissioner**: Madam Chair, motion to recommend approval of the Homuth conditional use permit subject to the six stipulations listed in the July 26, 2023 planning report as amended and approval of the findings of fact dated August 3rd, 2023. [12:51] **Commissioner**: Second. [12:53] **Chair**: There is a motion and a second. I don't think it was amended... I was going to ask that. I think we need to restate the motion because there was no amendment. Could you restate the motion? [13:06] **Commissioner**: Yes. Motion to recommend approval of the Homuth conditional use permit subject to the six stipulations listed in the July 26, 2023 planning report and approval of the findings of fact dated August 3rd, 2023. [13:28] **Commissioner**: Second. [13:29] **Chair**: Motion and second. Ms. Maura, will you please take a roll call? [13:35] **Ms. Maura (Planning Director)**: Zuzak? (Yeah). Lindley? (Aye). [Unintelligible]? (Aye). Zimmer? (Aye). Ike? (Aye). [13:45] **Chair**: That motion will pass. I would like to say thank you for your time and for the presentation by Mr. Beekel and Mr. Homuth in previous materials. Ms. Maura, when will this be before the City Council? [14:14] **Ms. Maura (Planning Director)**: At their August 21st meeting. [14:17] **Chair**: I don't think we have any other business before the Commission, and I would make a motion to adjourn the meeting. [15:01] **Chair**: Thank you. Thank you. [15:12] **[Music/Outro]**