Later, Peter. It's a fact. Yeah. I can't. It makes him laugh. It makes him laugh. You've got to be pretty, but credit is due. Exactly. Like the Yankees. I don't know if I should say this here, but Duke, as well, grown up in the U.K. And Duke. Like, I have to respect you, but I hate him so much. And remind us that Tom is here. I don't know who you got afraid of, but I've got a good one. Good evening. Welcome to the Durham Planning Commission. We're glad you're here this evening. I want to let you know that the Planning Commission, we are an appointed body, half of us by the city council, half by the county commissioner. So you should know that any decision made this evening is not a final decision. It will go to the governing body, the council or the county commission. If you wish to speak on an agenda item this evening, I saw a lot of you already signing up the table on my left and to your right. You can sign up to speak. So just take a look at the agenda item. Make sure it's the item you'd like to speak on. You can put down your name, your address, and let us know if you're speaking in favor or against that particular item. When we open the public hearing on that item, each side will have 10 minutes to speak, 10 in favor, and 10 against. And all motions are stated in the affirmative. So if a motion fails or ties, the recommendation is for denial. And finally, I've been asked to let everybody know here and at home that the, these meetings are televised and they are taped so you can go to the city of Durham NC website and these meetings are on YouTube and Facebook and also available on Spectrum AT&T Uverse Frontier and Google Fiber. So we are everywhere. With that, we'll have the roll call, please. Commissioner Williams. Here. Commissioner Morgan. Here. Commissioner Johnson. Present. Commissioner Bryan has been excused. Commissioner Durkin. Here. Commissioner Al-Turk. Here. Vice-Chair Hyman. Here. Chair Busby. Here. Commissioner Miller. Here. Commissioner Ketchum. Here. Commissioner Santiago. He's absent currently. Correct. We expect there's a good chance he will not be able to make it this evening so we can circle back and give him an excused absence. Commissioner Baker. Here. Commissioner Lowe. Here. And Commissioner McIver. Here. Great. Thank you. So we will move to the approval of the minutes and the consistency statements from our August 13th, 2019 meeting. And I know there's one change that we would like to make. There may be others but would like to note Commissioner Williams as an excused absence. That was an oversight. Correct. Staff has made that correction. We will in the previous minutes. Any additional changes or edits? Motion to approve the minutes and consistency statement from August 13, 2019. Second. Moved by Vice-Chair Hyman and seconded by Commissioner Al Turk. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. We'll move to adjustments to the agenda. Ms. Smith. Hi. Grace Smith, Planning Department. The staff has no adjustments for the agenda for this evening. And we would like to affirm for the record that public notices were executed in accordance with state and local law and those affidavits are on file in the Planning Department. Thank you. Can we have a motion to adopt the agenda as proposed? So moved. Second. Moved and seconded. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. We will move to our first item. So we have two cases that are future land use map amendments with concurrent zoning map changes. And the first is the Beth Page office. So that is case a one eight quadruple zero nine and Z one eight triple zero three three. And we'll start with the staff report. Good evening. Emily Struthers of the Planning Department. I will now be presenting case a 18, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 9 and Z 18, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 3, 3, Beth Page office. The applicant is Rob Griffin. This 23.06 acre site is located at 5621 Chinn Page Road and 3824 Page Road. This site is located within the city limits. The applicant proposes to change the zoning from industrial light with a development plan ILD to office institutional OI. There is no development plan associated with this request. The applicant also proposes to change the future land use map designation from industrial to office. Areas designated as recreational open space will remain as is. The proposed OI zoning would allow for uses including office and multifamily as outlined in attachment five. This site is showed in red located between Chinn Page Road and Chronicle Drive. Primary Drive and First Edition Drive are being constructed as part of the adjacent development. This site is located within the suburban development tier. The aerial map on the screen is slightly more up to date than the one that's available in your packet. The site contains mixed hardwoods and pine forest as well as stream features and floodplain. The site is primarily undeveloped. The adjacent area to the north and east consists of under construction apartments. The adjacent area to the south is currently undeveloped but a site plan for apartments, retail and restaurant has been approved. The adjacent area to the west is primarily undeveloped and within the larger area context, both townhomes and single family developments exist alongside industrial uses. This context map shows the stream and floodplain located on the site. The site is part of the Beth Page Village development plan and the applicant proposes to change the zoning from industrial light with a development plan, ILD to office institutional OI zoning. The property is designated industrial and recreational open space on the future land use map. The applicant proposes to change this designation to office and recreational open space. This chart identifies the OI dimensional standards in the suburban tier. In one street yard is 25 feet, side yard is 20 feet and rear yard is 25 feet. The maximum building coverage is 60% and the maximum height is 50 feet. If the site were to develop as multifamily residential, the maximum density would be 11 units per acre. The proposed OI zoning designation does not comply with the current industrial designation on the future land use map. The applicant has requested to change the future land use map in this area to office, which would be consistent with the proposed zoning. The proposal is consistent with comprehensive plan policies. The ones listed on the screen, I can go ahead and read them. 2.133F, 231D, 213B, 222B, 231A, and 232A. Further detail on this is provided in the staff report. Staff determines that this request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and other policies and ordinances and staff is available for any questions. Thank you, Mr. Others. We will open the public hearing and we have three individuals who have signed up all in favor. And so we can invite the three of you to come up and between you you have 10 minutes. Kevin Walls, Patrick Biker, and Charlie Yokley. And if there's anyone else who would like to speak on this item, you can just raise your hand and we can get you to sign up if you're interested. Good evening, Chairman Busby, Vice Chair Hyman, members of the Planning Commission. I'm Patrick Biker with Morningstar Law Group. I live at 2614 Stewart Drive. I'm here tonight representing tribe properties for this agenda item. With us tonight are Rob Griffin, Vice President with Drive Properties, who's our site engineer with McAdams. It's been my privilege to work with tribe properties on the Bethpage development for the past 12 or 13 years. Back around 2006, tribe properties was our lead office and industrial developer for Bethpage, an assemblage of property that amounted to about 450 acres, located in fairly close proximity to Research Triangle Park in Raleigh Durham International Airport. Pursuant to what we designed and what was approved around 12 years ago, the residential section of Bethpage has been built out, has been built out as an age-restricted community called Creekside. I hope you all have had a chance to drive through it recently because it represents a great neighborhood for Durham. Unfortunately, the office and industrial section of Bethpage has languished since it was approved unanimously by the Durham County Board of Commissioners. Back then, the Board of County Commissioners consisted of Becky Herron, Ellen Rackow, Lewis Cheek, Phil Cousin, and Michael Page. I recall County Commissioner Becky Herron being variant system that the Bethpage team create enough acreage-zoned IL to accommodate around 1 million square feet of space, and that is what we did. Back then, before the Great Recession, we thought Durham needed a large swath of IL-zoned property to compete for our major corporate headquarters. Well, the world has changed since then, and we have not had any takers on building office or industrial next to Creekside. Since the IL zoning on the 23 acres we were talking about tonight allows for either office or industrial uses, we wish to rezone those 23 acres to allow for either office or multifamily. We think this is a better fit for the adjacent Creekside neighborhood, and it allows tri-properties as one of the leading office developers in Durham to continue marketing the site for office use. Next, what I would like to discuss briefly is our team's decision not to submit a development plan to the zoning map change to OI. Again, going back 12 or 13 years, our team undertook a massive TIA for Beth Page, covering over 400 acres. The Beth Page TIA, as part of the development plan that the county commissioners approved, runs with the land as part of the zoning. That TIA accounted for potentially high peak hour traffic generation from these 23 acres within the IL zoning district. Any use allowed under the OI zoning district contemplated in tonight's agenda will be equal to or less than what we accounted for in that original TIA. In fact, the staff report, and I want to thank Emily for an outstanding job, states that the anticipated traffic generation will be reduced by over 2,700 trips per day. Also, since tri-properties does not have an end user at this time, it's impossible to scope a traffic impact analysis, but once an end user is identified, if a TIA is required, it will be done in conjunction with a site plan. Keep in mind, Durham city ordinances, including but not limited to the UDO, place limits on the site in regard to noise, building height no more than 50 feet, as Emily mentioned, and a pretty significant project boundary buffer under UDO section 9.4. So for all these reasons, we respectfully ask for your approval, and I'll be happy to answer any questions after our next speaker. Thank you for your time tonight. Thank you. Mr. Walls or Mr. Yocely? My name is Kevin Walls. I'm the president's there, who asked me if I would come. We're in favor of this because it meets the original design of Bethpage Village that we bought into. I bought in in 2015, and I expected this kind of office type of products to be marketed in those spaces. And of course, we haven't seen that. And the multi-use types of development that have been happening in the area fit what we would expect at this point in the development. And we're very negative issues are more against the city and its councils and planning that they have done nothing to start eliminating this, all this industrial land, its own on Jibade and Page Road. And that's been discussed in numerous hearings here. And yet it still stays and that people are coming in piece by piece when it should be zoned, cleared up and part of the future land use plan. That's all I have to say. Any questions? Okay. Thank you very much, Mr. Walls. We may, when we close the public hearing, if the commissioners have any questions, we may call you back up, but we appreciate your comments. And Mr. Yokely. And so that's it for who signed up for the public hearing. Is there anyone else who would like to speak on this item for the public hearing? Seeing none, we will close the public hearing and commissioners questions or comments. Commissioner Johnson. Thank you, Chairman. I just have a couple questions just for my curiosity and learning purposes. So for planning for the commercial property that's south of this site on the consideration, has the planning department or any other in the development process received anything about something that may actually go on that site? I don't have that site plan in front of me. It's possible that the applicant may know more specifically the approvals for the site to the south. Unfortunately, I don't have that in my case file at the moment. And maybe this is a question for planning and are the applicant, but do you have a sense of what, given the residential development that's around this site, what would be ideal light industrial that would be compatible with what's in that area now? Just your thoughts, not this practice or anything? I'm not sure. I can pull up the use table and run through that if that helps with reference to what would be great. I'm just curious because it just seems so out of place with what's there. Maybe there's something I'm missing that would be. Some of the light industrials aren't as industrial as the term comes to mind. I think self-storage is permitted in an industrial as well as office. So there's some overlap with uses in industrial and commercial. That's what I think. Thanks. Commissioner Johnson, if you direct your question to an individual, they can answer it. If you're interested. Rob Griffin, Tron Properties. He asked about property to the south of the piece we're rezoning. It's under a different ownership. So Beth Page has several owners come together for one master plan. That site, I believe there's a site plan for another phase of the livestock community's development. I don't know where it is as far as in the staff process. And that's that commercial property? Just south. And it's going in mixed use. Thank you. Commissioner Alturk. Thank you, chair. I have a couple of questions for staff. So typically whenever we get a case where the applicant is proposing an industrial to something else. You often put in here something about the industrial study that the city did. Is there, do you have any information from that that would be helpful? Sure, the industrial and new study. It's in the process of being updated a second look at and I've reached out to the folks who are working on that and they said that the site didn't come up as one that would be considered prime industrial given the size environmental features. The other question is that so if the rezoning goes through and it's office and institutional the developer or if the developer sells it to someone they can build up to from what I can tell 253 multi flex units, is that correct? It's 11 units per acre that doesn't take into consideration any site features that they would have to consider design around. Right, but they could do that without, they would not have to come back to the commission or the elected bodies, correct? Correct. And that 11 units per acre where does that come from, that number because it's not within a it would not be within the medium density residential, it'd be under office. That's based off of the residential uses that are permitted in non-residential zoning districts. Okay, multi, okay, right. So I guess on one hand I'm I would be on substantive grounds I guess I would be okay with having a 10, 11 units an acre, you know I'd be okay with 250 multiplex units on the site, I think it probably makes sense for a number of reasons. I am wondering however on I guess on questions of process, whether it makes sense to allow a rezoning that kind of, you know, where we are saying basically you can build a lot of different things here. You can either build office or you can build residential you know I one of the things that I appreciate about commissioner Miller's comments often is that he is more concerned about often concerned about process so much as substance and I think that if we allow this then we are saying well you know we don't give the public a real chance to weigh in neighbor, you know, neighboring residents a chance to weigh in on whether they want something like this or not. Now I understand, well and I'll let you answer that. Go ahead. Commissioner Alturge, if you could direct a specific Sure. So I guess is that commissioner or sorry, Mr. Biker is going to address a neighborhood meeting maybe that you had? Okay. I apologize, Commissioner Alturge for not knowing how many letters we sent out. I'm going to use a legal term. It was a ton. We sent out a ton of letters uprising everyone in Creekside of this and a number of them came to our neighborhood meeting and they heard the proposal. They weighed the pros and cons of industrial versus office institutional and Mr. Walls is the president of the HOA and he delivered their sentiments. So there was no shortage of neighborhood outreach to everybody who lives in the area. I think we sent out 200 letters I mean 200, 250 letters. Thank you. I think the difference to me between something like this and the kind of neighborhood meeting you would have if you had a development plan is that there is more concrete something for neighbors to know what might go there.  I just want to remind the commissioners that two months ago when the developer for Chalk Level Road which is this case is coming back before us today when they came to us with a development plan that had the number of units and proposed on it we said to them that it was too ambiguous and that they should come back to us with more details. So I think in some ways I do not blame the applicant necessarily for not having a development plan. Part of this is that the policy, I think this is a best practice issue and a policy issue which is that we have we can allow an applicant to have a development plan can allow them not to have one and now we can allow them to have a text only with a development plan and I think that creates a lot of ambiguity which I do not think is good. So I am cautious about this because while I appreciate that there was a lot of neighborhood outreach I think there is a difference between when you are saying we are going to rezone it to a zoning designation that is relatively wide open to saying we are going to have RSM or something or RS20 and people can know exactly what is going on. Again I think on substantive grounds I would be okay with 11 units and acre here but on questions of process I think it is important to give residents an opportunity to weigh in even if I oftentimes disagree but I think that is part of the process that we should that we value so I will just leave that there and thank you chair. Thank you. Commissioner Miller. So I have some questions about the environmental impacts on this property and how much of it is really developable. When we get a development plan we get a big map and we have contours buffers and things are laid out and flood plains are shown but we just have this little sheet here and I see that in this property there is kind of a why a creek just on the other side of the chamber just inside this property the creek kind of branches up through the subject property and another branch goes up into the residential pod and then runs behind the lots that are on the east side of Bramble Drive so help me understand on the subject property let's talk about the subject property first help me understand what is developable in terms of acreage and what are the protections that because we are talking about just base code requirements what protections are we going to have for this stream here and how is that stream classified The Beth Bays master plan already has a Corps of Engineers permit in place for all the creeks and watershed there so there will be no change to that I would say there is approximately 18 do you have do you have the graphic because that will pull back up which color block can you show this it should still be on the screen I can come over if it's not I'll try you can see the stream buffer what you see here so what is that showing that stream buffer that's showing the flood plain that's showing the flood plain stream buffer is in here this area that you see of the 23 acres I'd say to the tune of maybe 18 net developable acres with an extreme topo to it which makes it even more challenging from an industrial standpoint how is this stream that runs in your property classified is it intermittent no no it's a protected stream it's already but how big is the required stream buffers 50 feet or 100 feet I think it's 50 each side so it's intermittent no it's not intermittent then maybe I'm it's right I'm sorry it's great 100 feet each side it's 100 on each side that's correct and so now I'm going to move off the property and ask you about to go into the the blue colored property next to it here yes there right now there's nothing in there and I notice that this stream as a branch that runs up that way too and so my question is how much of the residential pod that's up there I'm assuming that the development covers that sets a either a maximum density or a maximum number of units so is that piece of property going to stay natural like that or is it available? I'll answer your question the group of owners that own the property in question have this 23 acres and this piece here everything else is under different ownership what you see in blue really from page road wrapping up around this site is under the lifestyle communities plan that's under construction currently that's 540 units I believe in total this area in dark pink is the other lifestyle communities site plan I believe is actually going through staff currently to answer your question looking at the overall best page residential it's a pdr 4.733 taking the average of all the acreage which again is around 300 some odd acres it's a pdr 4.7 right and so I'm sorry to interrupt sir and that pdr allowed for single family townhouses and apartments as long as the overall density does not exceed right and I was just because I we're not briefed on the property that is around it I'm trying to anticipate what what might wind up be next to your property yeah that's going to be is that and so how much of how much residential development capacity under that pdr four point whatever it was is left go into those undeveloped blue spaces yeah that was that we don't know you don't haven't been involved in that in many years all right and that's fine but I think it is I think all the site plans are all done it's actually everything that's that was entitled by by commissioner here and commissioner recow and the others at that point time I believe in the residential phase has been fully entitled but Emily would know better than me the aerial image shows the under construction better than the aerial image so I'm just going to go back it yeah it's not it's not I'm just wondering how much and what can go where I don't have the number of units but outlines to the north is the the apartments which specifically so to answer your there is no three sides of this of the subject property we either have creek and right of way right of way along buffer which is we might be the extension of first edition drive or if there may not be an extension there where a buffer is going to go in depending upon what gets built under oh I if we approve this rezoning if we the community approves this rezoning so I was just wondering what would be the buffer requirement between the the shaded subject property and the blue property to the north so to the north a site plan has already been approved on that so the buffer would have been provided based off of the ILD for the ILD but vacant adjacent to the PDR and what would that buffer be if it is developed office as opposed to multifamily residential are you asking for the buffer on the subject site or the buffer on the adjacent site if there is any where you tell me so the buffer on the adjacent site would be based off of the ILD and I can pull up the dimensional standards for the proposed technical difficulties Commissioner Miller I know under what we're proposing tonight it's a 0.6 buffer between oh I and PDR the 0.6 opacity what's the buffer depth the standard buffer depth 30 foot shrinkable with structures and berms and dense plantings and those kinds of things and the mysterious magical buffer modeling program. And so I have one last question for staff. When Beth Page was approved it was approved in several pods and the pods were essentially defined by uses mostly. And so taking this property out of the Beth Page plan with this rezoning would not actually work to change density numbers in the residential areas because they were already segregated into pods. Am I understanding that correctly? All right thank you. I'm all done. Thank you Mr. Chair. Commissioner Baker. I thought that Commissioner Alturk's comments were pretty compelling. First of all I want to thank staff for adding in the dimensional standards. I think a lot of the time we talk about use, we talk about land use, we talk about traffic counts, we talk about density, things that you can't really know. You don't notice it when you walk down the street or when you're part of a community but you certainly understand you understand setbacks. When a building is 25 feet away from the sidewalk, when buildings are separated from one another, when there's a parking lot in front of a building and I think that those are things that we continue, we're talking about it more and we continue to talk about it more and I think that those really need to be our priorities and we need to transition from too much discussion about sort of land use when a lot of the time the land use that we're talking about are compatible with one another. A lot of the time we don't really need a dense buffer between different types of buildings. Of course if it's industrial or something like that, that's when we would want to buffer. That's when we want separation between buildings. The thing that I found compelling about Commissioner Alturk's comments is we had a long discussion a couple meetings ago about the uncertainty that we face every time we make these types of rezoning decisions. I would love for us to be able to come to these meetings, the applicant to come up and us to simply approve, approve, approve development knowing that the standards are in place, the standards that we care about are in place. They create walkable, sustainable communities. I've said this before, people may be tired of hearing me say this, but we need those. I do feel bad for applicants who come in and sort of have to face us and have to face council, not really knowing what's going to happen simply because we don't know what's going to happen because there are so many standards that are not in place that could be in place. So I'll just leave it there. I think that this, I've said this before, this applies to pretty much every single case that comes before us. I don't really know what else to say. I just, I hope that we can soon be in a place where we know what those standards are going to be and that they're good and we're pushing towards more sustainable, walkable community. Right now, this rezoning, whether it happens or whether it doesn't happen, it's not going to be the case that we're moving the community in the direction that we actually want to be moving the community from a big picture standpoint. A lot of this stuff is going to change after the comprehensive plan and that is a very important effort. We all need to be playing our part in that. And I do hope that we can make changes before, you know, three years from now when the comprehensive plan is over and an additional two or three years after that with the UDO rewrite. Thank you. Other commissioners, questions or comments? Commissioner Morgan? Yeah, I have one question for the applicant. Given that we've kind of been centering on kind of what's being developed, would the applicant consider reviewing with the neighborhood any kind of plans that they as they come up? Oh, of course. I mean, we have a very good relationship with Mr. Walls as soon as we have an end user, whether it's an office user or a multifamily user will certainly let Mr. Walls. Would that be a commitment that you could make? Yeah, sure. Okay, he's a great guy. Okay, thank you. Staff would just like to note that it's a straight rezoning, so we don't have an opportunity to implement commitments. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. But we will make sure it's on the record, Mr. Walls that you are indeed a great guy. Other questions or comments? And I will say actually, Mr. Walls, I think having you here this evening was helpful from my perspective to understand that the Neighborhood Association was invited to a meeting that the neighborhood and with your representation is in support. If you don't mind coming to the microphone. Thank you. All the developers within Bethpage Village have kept the Cree site at Bethpage residential folks in the loop notify us of what their intents were, invited us to hearings, whether they be neighborhood hearings or when there was going to be a hearing here. And so I don't think we have a problem that we know we're going to reach that we track the maps in the whole area on an active basis. So as soon as they do an application for anything, we spread that throughout our community and ask what do we want to do? We do our research and homework. Great. Thank you. We appreciate your time. Commissioner Johnson. Thank you. I'm sorry. So thank you, Commissioner Turk for for keeping that in the air that thought that comment, which leads me to to for the applicant in regards to when you reached out to the neighboring communities and you shared what this future land the zoning change and future land use map the request where we're thinking we're considering tonight. Did what was the extent of what you shared in regards to did you inform them that potentially 11 acre 11 units per acre would be on and what that density will look like with the surrounding neighborhoods and what kind of did you get any feedback from that in regards to you know what that would do to the look and feel of that area? Absolutely. We gave a comprehensive disclosure of what the available uses are under the OIs owning district with exactly the densities that you referenced, Commissioner Johnson. What we also referenced is the reality that under the I L zoning district warehouses and distribution facilities are allowed similar to the Long Beverage project they all approved whenever that was a year or so ago. So it was really looking at the balance. What are the pros of the OI district and what are the cons of the I L district because the current development plan that's in place today does not have any restrictions on the I L use. And so when that was evaluated by Mr. Walls and his neighbors, it was I believe unanimous. I don't believe there was any dissent. And again, we notified 200 250 people. You can see all the lot lines on the on the in the staff report for the individual homeowners that live in this neighborhood. And again, it's a it's a great neighborhood. It's one again, I've worked on for 12 14 years. I'm really happy about how Creekside turned out. It's a neat place. It's got a great feel. And we want to be a good neighbor. And so that's what we're doing. Thank you. And so my final comment is in and upholding my duty in regards to our role here on on the Commission. It seems to me that industrial light development will office will not come with the industrial light is not gonna come to this site given what's there. And I think if something tried to come that was industrial light that there would be enough blowback from the community that will be here hearing their concerns. And so in taking Commissioner Al Turks comments and to, you know, give them a given it the value that I think it warrants, it seems that that there's no immediate desire to develop the site. It seems that which this zoning change will hopefully make the property more valuable to a potential developer. Maybe you can do residential or office with with the change. And so it seems to me that not saying like this, the request is bad. But if the applicant waited and came back with a more concrete like we know that certain development is not going to come here. But there's a likelihood that residential would come with a development plan. I think that it seems that the residents right now don't want industrial light there. So it's like, that's something. But is it the best of what they can get out of the deal? And so if if we know that industrial light is not a desired program of this site, I think that if this is just my assumption that if you ask those residents, well, if we're going to get something better than the industrial light zoning, what we like to know more about what the potential would be from a programming under residential or the the OI zoning, they would probably say, yeah, like we would love to see what a residential zoning that allow residential, etc, etc, would look like. And so I think that I'm not going to say the bare minimum was is being presented here. But I think there's an extra layer because as a commission, our church says, if we approve the zoning tonight, we kind of like give up a couple layers of the local input that is important based on some prior cases that we have considered that were not as clear cut when you when you have the discussion versus what's on the page pages that we review. And so I'm, I'm reluctant reluctant to give a favorable vote on this in the sense that I do think that in many cases, the devil is in the details and the devil shows up sometimes when we're not expecting it. But to give the local residents an opportunity to see, can we go from good to better or good to great in regards to what could actually be done in this site is something that I think should be under consideration and as we try to make sure that there's a connection between public input and final decisions that are made regarding how the communities are going to be developed going forward here in Durham. And so that's my thoughts. Thank you. Commissioner Turk. Thank you, Chair. I want to build on what Commissioner Johnson just said and but I have a question for the applicant. So why I guess why do why ask for the rezoning at this point in time if you know if so industrials is not appealing or tried to sell it for 12 years with this zoning designation and nobody's made an offer. And I think that so that to me is actually a concern and I think Commissioner Johnson's assumptions are correct that this makes the property more sellable. And when the applicant or the developer sells it, the relationship with the neighborhood, there is no relationship with the neighborhood. So I appreciate that there is a good relationship now between the applicant and the neighborhood and one of the neighborhoods. But if it is sold, the new developer can do what they want. And so I'm not again, I'm not saying that that residential is not a better use in this particular property. I have no doubt in that. I just think that to preserve the process, which is to say that, you know, residents should have at least some say in, you know, what goes on a property and the delected bodies will still make the decision that we should we should safeguard those those processes or safeguard those mechanisms, I guess. So thanks. In a previous marketplace, I'd say I would agree with certain points you've made in the current marketplace in the uncertainty of getting projects and site plans approved. It can be a quite lengthy process. Buyers will no longer buy properties, quote unquote, sight unseen. They want to have the reasonings in place. Most, if not all contracts, we've got representatives from several engineering firms here require site plan approvals in place before they will close. So to your point, the relationship to the neighbors is still wholly intact until the site plan is approved, because most of these buyers want site plan approval before they will close. Now, that's helpful context. I will note, we're through with the public hearing process. So unless a commissioner directly asks you a question, we'd ask that you refrain at this point. We view that as a tag team response to the. Yeah, you aren't directly asked a question at this point. So please, if you're directly asked a question, you can answer it at this point. Commissioner Alturk. Well, that was a direct question that that was helpful. Thank you. Yeah. Any additional? No, I guess I'll still stand by my point, but I do appreciate the clarification. Thank you. If I may, Commissioner Alturk, in a in a perfect world, because I hear your point, I hear Commissioner Johnson's points. And I want to go along with those points. But at the same time, we do have the Neighborhood Association saying this is an improvement from their perspective. So I came and prepared to vote for this, especially when Mr. Walls came. So if if we in on your position, if I'm hearing you say you're ready to likely vote against this because you're trying to give the neighborhood additional opportunities for input, how would how do you see those opportunities for input being available? Because my concern is if we vote against this, we're actually denying the neighborhood an opportunity to have this become residential. So in your mind, how what are the steps you see from here forward that actually give the neighborhood more input, as opposed to taking away the one choice they're saying tonight we would like to have? Part of it. Yeah, sure. That's a great question. I think part of it is that if you had a let's say the proposal was to change it to RSM with the development plan, or even if it was just RSM, so we know that it's going to be residential suburban and we know what it might look like, then I think that probably the attendance at neighborhood meetings would be higher. Interests among residents would be higher and input into the process would be stronger. So and I, you know, it's hard for me to know at this point how representative Mr. Walls is of the surrounding neighborhoods. I'm not discredit his opinion, but because I think this is a kind of an ambiguous rezoning, it's going to depress you know, attendance at a meeting like this. I think, right? And I don't know what the attendance was like. And but I, to me, at the end of the day, more information is going to be better for something like this. So that that's it. Great. Thank you. Commissioner Miller. So I have to say that I, like Chairman Busby, I came thinking, having weighed this out and interested in what neighbors might say, but tending to think, well, what's being proposed is better than what's there. What's there wasn't working because it wasn't selling for industrial. I'm one of the Commission members who has criticized our land planning for this area for a long time by creating large swaths of industrial that nobody wanted. And now we have a patchwork quilt of residential and industrial in 10 to 20 acre blocks that's it's not land planning at all. So I and I still have all of those things in mind, but I'm very interested in the points that Mr. Alturk is making. And I guess some of this, and I don't want to put words in your mouth, so I'll put words in my mouth, is we have a couple of zoning categories. IL is one of them, OI is another one, we're there. It's too broad for us to do what we do is feel comfortable about what's going to happen in the future. We lost the gradation of zones that we had before we adopted the UDO. We used to have multiple levels of, well, not multiple, we had two levels of office institutional, OI one, OI two, and those sorts of things. And we have created a couple of zones that without development plans send us into too much what ifs, that's the uncertainty. And I know that, and again, I'm going to speculate with the neighbors, because I have a neighborhood point of view, they have to make, they have to weigh out things. And they had to weigh what they don't wanted, what they knew they didn't want, which is IL against not having the extra controls that they might have for what they do want residential. And those things are, you put them in the scales, but they're measured, they have different units of measure. It's very hard to do, but you have to do it because we have created a whole land use planning process that makes their position entirely responsive. They don't control it, the landowners and everything control the rezoning process. They decide when things move or don't move. And all the neighbors can do is respond to what's put in front of them. They have no hand on the steering wheel, they can only say yes or no. And that worries me. And I appreciate you bringing it up because it's a conundrum. And I hate to use cliches like the good being the enemy of the perfect or what have you. But these are in fact the kind of weighing out of the issues that has to have to happen all the time. Another way is to ask whether or not there is this developer, it would be willing to spend some time talking about adding a development plan to this rezoning and at least within certain perspective, realizing that they don't have an end user. But talking about with the neighbors about how they might use the development plan to control some of the things that neighbors and developers want to control when they go through development plan zoning. I mean, just because we're in early days here, we're at the planning commission, this is going to go to the elected body later, but unless they have somebody on the hook right now, they've waited 12 years, maybe there's time to fix this. If I was the neighbor of this development, the fact that you could build a 50 foot building under office institutional, you can have a 30 foot buffer with a 60% opacity, but if the building is really, really tall, it just doesn't mean anything. And so I would feel more comfortable if a development plan said, well, if we're going to build residential buildings are not going to be taller than 35, 40, 45 feet, which is kind of the standard that we've been working with and similar in residential projects around here. There are ways to do that and it's not too late. We're not making a final decision. It's not over when we vote. And I was wondering whether the developer would be interested in solving the conundrum that we've had here by saying, well, let's take a couple of months and talk about appending a development plan that that a property owner who wants to market his property and doesn't want to constrain it too much might be willing to, but might be willing to add some constraints if it involves the neighborhoods and the neighbors in a process that makes an office institutional use of this property more palatable and involves them and engages them at the level that you've expressed concern about. And I share your concern. So I'm going to, if I may, Mr. Chairman, I'm going to ask these landowners and their attorney whether or not they would consent to a 60 foot 60 day delay to talk about adding a development plan to this rezoning and working with the neighbors about constraining at least to some degree, some of the farthest limits of what rezoning might mean on this piece of property. So I would just like to clarify that a development plan would involve a new application. Well, all right. Yeah, can you, you may answer the question. Answer that question. And the owner may have another insight. Commissioner Miller, I appreciate that point that the issue we have gets back to what I was talking about with the TIA. We we already paid for it. This is a legal term ginormous TIA that covered all 450 acres. If we call out this parcel and designated for X, Y and Z uses, we got to do that TIA all over for that for this. And in every TIA costs 40 grand, 50 grand. It's another 40 or 50 grand that it costs just to go talk to Mr. Walls and his neighbors and say, well, we did our development plan, we did our TIA, we spent 40 or 50 grand, and we're going to give you the exact same information we gave you at the neighborhood meeting that we had quite a few months ago now. But I don't see how necessarily adding a development plan here that limits the height of a residential building is going to impact the TIA particularly at all. It would because the TIA is more than eight years old, you'd have to start all over again. The UDO specifies that. I don't, we don't really have a dog in the fight about that. There's just no mechanism to do it without going through those, I think, unduly burdensome requirements that the UDO imposes when the developer, when Mr. Griffin and our team has already done it before. So I just want to recognize Steph, just for a moment, they may have a point to make. Early in Thomas with transportation, I just wanted to point out this for a new zoning application. The TIA would be required if you met the threshold. So it doesn't necessarily mean that a TIA would be required. It would depend on what you were anticipating developing. No, we're on the same page, but we exactly, we anticipate that it would trip the threshold. Pardon me. We anticipate that what we would ask for in the development plan would trip that. And to further that point about going to development plan route, to be very clear, this is dirt that we are trying to sell. And going to development plan route, now we are going from a shotgun approach to a pool of buyers to a very specific rifle approach of buyers who are going to be willing to live with the conditions to get placed upon the development plan as it makes its way through all of these meetings. And that's a near possibility. They and their funders their investment committees can live with different levels of risk as they proceed them with these conditions they get placed upon it. Trying to find a buyer who's willing to accept that, that's a huge challenge. And I think it's quite an impediment. It's a challenge we're familiar with and we see all the time. The, what we're trying to do is to use our ability to advise elected officials and the planning apparatus to bend the process in favor of more community involvement. And I wanted you folks to kind of sign on to that. Not all commitments in the development plan necessarily are severe constraints on salability of property. They can be. You can make a really long list and pallets of colors and materials and all of that. I'm not sure that we're necessarily looking for that. But so I appreciate your answer. And I still am not sure I understand exactly why the development plan that reduced the height requirement would necessarily trigger a TIA if the current rezoning didn't trigger it anyway. So that's all I had, Mr. Chairman. I would like to make a clarification with regard to the height. The 50-foot height is tied to the non-residential height. If they were to develop multifamily, they would be subject to 35 feet, which is consistent with the RSM height. So it varies depending on the proposed use. All right. Well, that's good to know. Thank you. So we have a few other commissioners who have indicated they'd like to speak. Commissioner Kenshin and then Commissioner Durkin. Yeah, I have a quick question for Mr. Druthers. You talked about a zone now industrial. And I've heard that the neighbors don't really want industrial. And they think that this one will be better. And I said before, sometimes we make the perfect enemy of the good, I think, sometimes on the commission. I think this case may be making the better enemy of the perfect. I think we're going to move from something that's not desirable to something that's a little bit better. So if you don't mind, can you tell us what the uses are for the, you alluded to earlier, what are the uses for the industrial? I know in our packet, we've got the office. I want to just hear the exhaustive list, if you don't mind, of what the uses would be. Because I want to know what the neighbors want to move away from. I always put myself as a neighbor, surrounded by real estate attorneys and planning professionals. I'm just a regular old person. And if I live there, what would I be thinking? And I'd be thinking, I'd be scared to death of some industrial use coming in. So just tell me what I'd be afraid of if I was a neighbor. You don't mind? As soon as it loads, I would love to. For reference, you can find the use table in section 5.1 of our ordinance. And that breaks down what uses are permitted in each zone. I'm waiting for mine to load. Mr. Kenshin, while we wait, if you do you have any additional questions? No, no, I just want to hear that. Because I mean, I heard, I agree with what Mr. Baker said, and I wish we had walkable, sustainable. I want to have it developed. I want it to be perfect. I want to have a development plan. I want to have all the uses laid out. I want it to be perfect. But I think if it can't get perfect, I want it to be better. And I just, I wonder if this moves us to better. So that's my question. OK, so within IL, I'm going to run through what is permitted as well as what is permitted with limited use standards. It's a apiculture, commercial crop production, multifamily, upper story residential. Oh wait, no, not that one. Sorry, the line moved. Let me start over. Apiculture, commercial crop production, forestry, clubs and lodges, daycare home, daycare facility, elementary school, middle school, university colleges, vocational trader business schools, government facilities with a major special use permit correctional facilities, medical facilities, hospitals, parks and open areas, cemeteries, mausoleums, columbarias, memorial gardens, let's see, passenger terminals, rail and bus terminals, places of worship. That's probably good enough. I think Commissioner Kanchin got his money's worth. OK, there's a lot more in the line keeps moving, but it's available. Great. May I ask a follow up question? You may. In the Venn diagram of the permitted uses of OI and IL, there's a huge overlap. Is there not? I would say so, yes. And I started reading from the top of the table, which is less industrial and less commercial. So as you get deeper, it gets a little more intense. And it's the residential that is actually an OI that isn't in the overlap. And there are some things in the industrial that have to do with light manufacturing that aren't in the overlap in that circle. Correct. And it is the movement between those two circles inside the overlap that appeals to the neighbors and to the developer in terms of the marketability of the problem. Commissioner Durkin. I just had a question, a clarifying question for Mr. Walls. At the neighborhood meetings, was it made clear what all of the potential uses under the OI zoning would be so that you're not focused just on residential, but you know that there are other uses that could be? We absolutely know that there are other uses. And we know that we don't want the industrial. Right. OK. We didn't go down through every possible use. We didn't have some kind of checklist up or anything like that. But the neighbors aren't. We do understand multiuse. Because we have multiuse in other pods of this Bethpage Village. Those plans have been approved. OK. And so we understand those. And we're accepting those. So we see this as just another possibility. OK. Also originally, all the drawings of Bethpage Village, the concept drawings that we saw all show this as office. And we all accepted that when we bought it into the properties. OK, I think that's a helpful clarification because some of the comments from fellow commissioners were under the assumption that you only wanted residential. But I heard in. No, no, no, no. We're not saying. We wanted to clarify. We understand the multiple uses of the new zoning that they're requesting. So leaving this the flexibility of O.I. actually is in line with what the neighbors are expecting and what they've approved. So I'm comfortable voting in favor of this. Thank you. Commissioner Wands. Yes, I am absolutely pleased with the planning commission wanting to be proactive in protecting the neighbors and making sure that the neighbors are heard and giving the cases that we have already been through and the things that we have done. But I do think that we are a bit overzealous in this point because we still will hear from the neighbors if what even if we rezone this and they decide, OK, well, they approved it and they said it was OK. And then the developer comes back and they designed something or they proposed something that they don't like. You can best believe the neighbors are going to show up. So whether we disapprove it now or if we approve it now and they don't like the plan later on is really not going to make a difference in terms of community involvement. But if we have a relatively easy plan right now that is before us just as an envisement topic and we're able to say, OK, let's move forward because we have somebody that wants to sell a property and not necessarily just for the sake of selling it regardless of burden, but wants to sell a property to make something that is useful. Then I think that we should look at it objectively because it's about no harm, no file right now. And even though we have one person here speaking, it doesn't change the fact that he may be speaking for 600 people just because they didn't show up. So I think that we have to remain clear and deliberate in what we're doing and for the right causes. And in doing that, we still have to talk about walkability and different things like that. But again, 10 Page Road, Page Road. I mean, I don't know exactly how far these people are walking, but there's not a whole lot there for them to walk to. So unless we provide places for them to build so that they can use the walkability that we are talking about with sidewalks and driveways and clear pathways and greenways and clear air spaces, if we don't make a way for them to have that where it makes sense, then we're diminishing some of the things that a lot of the commissioners are actually trying to accomplish. And in doing that, then we are handicapping the community. We have to trust a process that we have put forth in our various meetings before now, things in place that communities and people know that they can use the tools that they can come before this commission and know that they will be heard, but we also can't continue to push out developers and say, OK, well, because you don't have a development plan that you can commit to, then we don't feel comfortable when we have somebody at least willing to represent the community. I'm just saying, trust the process. Thank you. So Commissioner Alturk is going to make a brief comment. Just a quick comment, Commissioner Williams, the process would end tonight because the developer could develop anything within OI. And if neighbors don't like it, they would not have another chance to come back to the commission. They wouldn't come to the commission, but they definitely could go to City Council. At that point, it becomes a site plan issue. And it is only an administrative. So they're not fighting it. So I mean, I just wanted to clarify that point. Thank you. And this is a good. I think we're at the point where we're ready for a motion. So I will I want a commissioner. Hello. Yes, you have not been able to speak. This is a question of application for myself on the tons of letters that were sent out or the 250 letters that were sent out. Yes, sir. Did I understand you correctly to say there was no dissent? Everyone was in agreement with what you proposed to do. We did not. I would defer to Mr. Walls, but I personally did not hear any dissent from people that we sent the letters to. And my personal phone number was listed. If you have any questions or concerns about this plot project, please call Pat. Please call me at<PHONE_NUMBER>. They had my direct number. Talked to a few people after we explained the process to them. Mr. Walls has testified that it was unanimous support for this development, for this rezoning that's before eight tonight. So Mr. Wall, I can that that should be my takeaway from you as well that there was zero dissension or zero disagreement with the plan. I think we could poll the 397 homes that are already occupied in Creek City Bethpage. And you'll get zero wanting to have an IL zone. If that answers your question. And if you want that, I can make that happen. But we have 656 homes that are gonna be built there. And we're at 60 some odd percent built out. The rest are under construction. Our land is still being prepped. And you'll get nobody wanting an IL. When we found out that that area was IL, and that was two and a half years ago, we were in here for another piece of this whole pods. And we had this similar discussion. And we need to end those discussions and get this project completed. Commissioner Low, any additional questions or comments? We have a lengthy agenda ahead of us. So this, I will ask that the next commissioner I recognize, please make a motion. Commissioner Alturk. I move that we send case Z, or should I do the plan amendment first? Okay. I move that we send case A180009 forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation. Second. Motion by commissioner Alturk, seconded by commissioner Miller. We'll have a roll call vote, please. Mr. Williams. Yes. Mr. Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Alturk. No. Vice Chair Hyman. Yes. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes. Commissioner Ketchin. Yes. Commissioner Low. Yes. Commissioner Baker. No. Commissioner McIver. Yes. Motion passes 10 to two. Thank you. And a motion on the zoning case. Yes. I move that we send case Z1800033 forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation. Second. Move by commissioner Alturk, seconded by commissioner Baker, and we'll have a roll call vote. Mr. Williams. Yes. Mr. Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Alturk. No. Vice Chair Hyman. Yes. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes. Commissioner Ketchin. Yes. Commissioner Low. Yes. Commissioner Baker. No. Commissioner McIver. Yes. Motion passes 10 to two. Thank you. Thank you all for your time. Thank you very much. Thank you. We will move to our second case. And this is the 4809 Farrington Road. This is case A1900010 and concurrent case Z1900028. And we will start with the staff report. While we're waiting for the staff report, I think why don't we, this is probably an appropriate time to make a motion to officially excuse commissioner Santiago. So moved. Second. Second. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? And again, he had given us a heads up that he was very likely unable to make it tonight. And I think at this point it's safe to say he won't be able to be here. We'll start with the staff report. Good evening. I'm Jamie Sanyak with the Planning Department. I will be presenting case number A1900010 Z1900028, which is 4809 Farrington Road. Just as a little context, on December 3, 2018, the Durham City Council approved a future land use map amendment, zoning map change, and annexation for property generally located at 4809 Farrington Road. The approved zoning and development plan, which was ILD, limited the use of the site to a rail operation and maintenance facility, which is known as the ROMP, as part of the light rail system between Durham and Chapel Hill. No development activities have occurred on the property. But during the public hearing process for the zoning map change and the associated other requests for the ROMP, the city council had indicated that if the light rail project did not move forward, the city would pursue a zoning map change to change the property back to a residential district. As a result, the city has initiated a zoning map change for the 23.418 acre site to residential suburban multifamily. No development plan is prepared in conjunction with this request, as there is no specific development proposal. The properties are currently designated industrial on the future land use map. And the city proposes to change the land use designation to low-medium density residential to coincide with the zoning request, which would allow a density of 4 to 8 dwelling units per acre. As there is no specific development proposal, if approved, any use within the RSM district would be allowed. This is the aerial map. The property is shown in red. The site is located within the suburban tier. It falls within the Falls Jordan Lake watershed protection overlay district B and the major transportation corridor MTC I-40 overlay district. This slide shows the site in terms of photos. Most of the property is vacant on developed land with a number of single-family homes facing Barrington Road. In addition, there is a right-of-way Dabney Road that runs through the site. And the location of these photos have been identified on the aerial map within your staff report. This slide depicts some of the area conditions. The site is adjacent to the Patterson Mills country store to the south, the villas at Culp Arbor residential development to the west, and I-40 to the east. There are a number of nearby residential developments. Glenview Park, Prescott Place are located to the northeast of the site, across I-40, Meadowvale, Creekside, and West and Downs residential development, as well as the Creekside Elementary School are located to the west off of Ephesus Church Road less than half a mile away. The zoning context map shows the property on the left currently zoned industrial light with a development plan in purple. And the proposal is to change this designation to our residential suburban multifamily, as shown on the right. Future land use map shows the property in purple, which is designated as industrial, and we are seeking to redesignate the site to low-medium density residential, which would allow a density of 4 to 8 dwelling at its breaker. This chart, which has also been included within your staff report, provides a depiction of the dimensional standards allowed within the RSM zoning district. And the range you can see depends upon the type of housing that may occur. Without a development plan, the maximum number of units permissible in the zone would be eight dwelling units per acre. In terms of consistency with the comprehensive plan, the existing land use designation for the site is industrial, which is not consistent with the proposed zoning. As mentioned, we're seeking an amendment to low-medium density. The low-medium density residential designation for the track is consistent with the neighboring residential developments and is an acceptable designation within the suburban tier. It is the proposed low-medium density residential development of the site is consistent with the residential suburban multifamily development permissible within the suburban tier. Multiple residential developments are found adjacent to this site, ranging in density from 1.730 to 5 dwelling units per acre. So staff found that this request is compatible with the development patterns of the area. Existing infrastructure, such as roads and schools, are sufficient to accommodate potential impacts. And there is sufficient capacity within the school to support the additional school-aged children as a result of the proposed zoning. Staff determines that the request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and other policies and ordinances. And I will be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you. We will open the public hearing. We have four individuals who have signed up to speak. We have three in favor and one against in part. So we will start with the three individuals in favor. We'll have a total of 10 minutes for those comments. And then we'll move to the against. The folks in favor, Ruth McKinney, Philip Post, and Mimi Kessler. So you can come join us. Good evening. I've got a little laryngitis. Can you all hear me all right? OK. Chairman Busby and commissioners, thank you for letting me speak. Tonight, I'm Ruth McKinney. I live at 5139 Niagara Drive, and that's in the Culbarber community, which is the senior community directly across from this parcel. I'm here representing a number of people from our community who are here tonight in the surrounding communities. I'm speaking in favor of this proposal. I'm encouraging you to vote in favor on behalf of our neighbors. A show of hands for those of you who are here. From our area neighborhoods. And I'm also speaking, thank you. And I'm also speaking on behalf of a number of people who couldn't be here tonight. But they were at the Creekside Elementary School presentation that the planning department gave in, I guess, it was early July or late June. We had probably 35 to 50 residents there who had their questions answered and understand the proposal in front of us. So many of these people also who I'm speaking for and on behalf were here last November in front of this board speaking when the ROMPH proposal was first put up. So we're pleased to be here tonight with a proposal that we're much more comfortable with. We're much happier with this change. We appreciate the planning department and the city coming forward on their own initiative with this. And I'm encouraging you on behalf of these residents and individuals to please vote in favor of this proposal. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. Post. My name is Phil Post. I'm a 40-year resident of Durham County. I'm also on the homeowner's association for my neighborhood in Durham County, which is about 123 lots. And so I speak on behalf of my neighbors as a board member. Our neighborhood, and first of all, I wanna completely support the support that you've just heard from Ruth Ann. My neighborhood strongly supports this proposal for the rezoning. Our neighborhood was strenuously opposed to conversion of this to industrial. And so this is very much like the case you just heard where it moves us to much, much better, maybe not to perfect, but it moves us to much, much better and we totally support it. So it eliminates the industrial zoning which we strenuously disagreed with back to residential, which was the status quo ante before we began this foolish business in this part of our county. And the low to medium density is somewhat of a change, but as we go into life and we have to negotiate and make compromises, it's not perfect, but it's much, much better and our neighborhood totally supports that. So on behalf of myself and my neighbors, I ask you to support this rezoning. It does follow through, even though I think the city council acted foolishly to adopt this zoning for our part of the county, it does follow through on the commitment they made to us that night almost a year ago when they said if the light rail didn't go through, they would return it to residential. And so it certainly follows through on that public commitment that was made and we hold ourselves appreciate that movement on the part of the city. I have one other word of congratulations for what this board did a year ago today, but I won't do that tonight, but anyway, I just wanna end by saying that we ask for your support of this proposal. Thank you. And Ms. Kessler. Hello again. I'm Mimi Kessler, I live at 1418 Woodland Drive. I've drive past this parcel twice a day to commute to and from work and I support the neighborhood wish for it to go back to residential. I certainly was very aware of how much objection there was based on signage around this area while I was driving through. I have some questions that may be naive, but I wanna know who presently owns this property. Go Triangle. Go Triangle, okay. And it was... And I'm sorry, let me actually have the staff officially answer that for the record. Jamie Sanyak with the planning department. Yes, you are correct. Go Triangle is the owner of property. And the houses that are there were taken over by eminent domain, is that right? I really couldn't speak to anything involving that. Okay, because that's Go Triangle. The city's not involved in any of that. Okay. On your future land use slide, there was a pinky-purple area that then there was a superimposed thing over it, but there was still some pinky-purple area. So what is that? And Ms. Kessler, since it's a public hearing, why don't we have you raise your questions and then I will commit to you, we will make sure that we get those questions addressed and answered. Okay, the last issue that I have is that there is no rezoning sign posted there. I have a new appreciation for rezoning signs and I would have noticed if it was posted. And it says in the documentation that it is. Thank you. Thank you very much. So we'll finish the public hearing and then we can ask those questions. The final individual signed up is Mr. Isaac Woods. Yeah. I'm sorry, are you ready to? Yeah, I can certainly. So the pink and purple area on the left side shows the existing future land use map designation and the map on the right then changes the future land use map designation to orange which is the low-medium density. There is a, the property to the south is office. So that's still considered pink. But the existing future land use map designation changes from industrial to low-medium residential. We'll bring that slide up so everyone can see what we were just describing. Chair Busby, I just wanted to clarify for the record while Jamie is pulling up the slide that Commissioner Miller did actually see the sign. The sign has been knocked over. We do have to affirm when we post it and we occasionally ride by sites but we don't have the staff to babysit the signs the entire time they're out there and sometimes they do get knocked over but we'll be sure it's put back up. It was there today. Mr. Miller saw it today and it had been knocked over. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Does this help answer your question? Right, I think if you're in the audience you're not gonna get picked up on the mic but yes, to answer your question the area that we're talking about is the hatched red area. Great, thank you. And Mr. Woods, thank you for your patience. Thank you, Commissioner, Account Commissioners. My name is Isaac Woods. We're a lifetime family there. We stay right across from this property in Farrington Road, we own 23 acres. We're doing the family. If you probably remember, we were here when we were talking about rezoning but we opposed it. Tonight, I think there's been a lot of misinformation given in the package. First of all, there is one zoning signed up but we weren't contacted in regards to the meeting they had initially at Creekside and then the meeting tonight we received I think it was on the 29th of August. So if you were bare with me here, I'd prepare it. I would like to hand these out so you guys can see a picture of what we were referring to. You're welcome. We can just hand them down if you'd like. And I'm here on behalf of my family. This is one of the former homeowners, Aldo Term Time, my aunt, my grandpa. All this is the land that's been in this family since the end of slavery. We don't oppose rezoning to residential. It's just that the part that we own which you would just pick is the red part there that you see the arrow. That is our property there. That property that this commissioner as he mentioned before when Philip Cousin, Becca Herron, we met was always on commercial use. What we were active in bringing the infrastructure, the water lines and the sewer lines of this property and when the I-40 there, we knew it was gonna be costly and we asked that part of this little part be designated as commercial to reimburse us for the infrastructure that Goatrangle basically took over to build a rail. So we had the water is a 12 inch water line which is bigger than the normal water line and then there's sewer there. So we're saying that as you promised in the county commissioners and the city council promised that if it wasn't used for the light rail you were turning it back to the original zoning. And that's what we're asking for. We're not asking that this be returned to residential. That would do us a disservice. We're asking as that you've heard throughout the night that this property as you just see depicted in red which stands for commercial that you rezoned this back to the original plan that was commercial before it was rezoned to industrial not to residential rezoning it back to residential would do us a disservice at the worst case scenario because commercial property allows things that you can't have in residential and keeping with the commitment that the city council made and you guys made here at this meeting that if the light rail maintenance facility wasn't built that it would be returned back to commercial. Now that brings us to the next question which was raised. Well, who do who actually owns this property? Because as the lady mentioned earlier our profit was taken through intimate domain. We have not resolved that case as we stand here today. We have a trial coming up. We have asked that our property be returned back to us because it wasn't used for the intended purpose was to build a light rail facility. And therefore GoTriangular does not have a right to take a property with the intent to build a light rail facility. And we asked for the be returned. So I think you may have a little bit a lack of better words to cart before the horse because the final decision on the ownership of this property hasn't been determined by the court of law because until the case with GoTriangular file that we still have pending is resolved it's not really a clear cut to GoTriangular actually owned this property here in the red that's designated commercial. So this is sort of like an awkward position that GoTriangular owns the property and then the city of Durham is asking for a rezoning of a property that it doesn't own. And then you have the pending case that the ownership of the original owners is still pending. So that clarity has not been resolved. So to do a disservice, number one is you're working on something where you don't really know who the owner is. Second, you put in the future owner who was owned it before taking you put them in a worse position than they were before they took the land and domain and alleged protests of building a light rail maintenance facility. So in conclusion, we think going to residential is great. We don't oppose that part, but we're saying put everybody back in the original position of the land that they were before you took it on the intimate domain and rezoned. That's the ethical way to do it. That's the fair way to do it. Especially what you have pending litigation. It's not just us on these properties are still pending in the court of law on this intimate domain. All these cases on this 23 acres that you're talking about here the ownership issue hasn't been resolved. And I'm not trying to give you a legal advice but I think if you read the stature you can only use intimate domain for property taken for the intended purpose. If you don't use that property for the intended purpose which was the right oil maintenance facility the law is clear, you can't take the property. So we ask at the worst case scenario that you zone that partial there which was 4825 and 4815 and just to be brief, if you look at the the future land use map and staff has it they go trying to file here. They even file that this property 4815, 4825 Fertin Road was commercial property. It's right here in the case that became before you. And as you probably are familiar with the colors the red mean commercial on your legend there. So let's do what's right by everybody return everybody to at least the original position they were before we came up and had this quasi right light rail maintenance facility don't make somebody else better off than they were before you started it. That's the right thing, the ethical thing to do. And we ask that you take 4815, 4825 those two partials and make them commercial as everyone has agreed you need to be restored back to the original position you were before you started. And we appreciate your time and we ask that you do push right. Thank you very much. If you have any questions I'd be free to really clarify. Thank you. Thank you very much. Is there anyone else who'd like to speak on this issue for public hearing? Okay, I don't see anyone else who will close the public hearing of any additional comments from staff before the commissioners. Yes, Jamie Sanyak with the planning department just very briefly. First off, I did want to affirm for the record that GoTriangle is the current owner of the property. They have affirmed to the application they consented to this application. It was included in your packet. Representative from GoTriangle is here tonight. With respect to the neighborhood meeting we did send out notices to all the property owners within a thousand feet in accordance with the UDL requirements and to just clarify with respect to some of the comments that Mr. Woods was making. The site is currently designated or I'm sorry was previously designated non-residential under the future land use map but the zoning of the property was residential. So the council had made the statement that they would revert it back to the residential zoning, not the future land use map designation. Thank you, Commissioner Miller. So what was the zoning on for all the parcels including the parcels that belong to the family here? Yeah, my recollection was it was all RS 20. So it was all RS 20 but the future land use map designation for some of the property was office institutional and for some of the parcels here as the handout that he gave us some of those were red which indicates commercial. Correct, I didn't see his handout but that is correct. So that's the way it was. That's the comprehensive plan future designation but at the time of the romp rezoning it was all zoned RS 20 single family half acre lots. And my understanding and Ms. Smith can chime in if needed but my understanding for some of the rationale of the commercial and industrial form was that there was a intended intersection in that area in exchange, I'm sorry but obviously neither the romp development nor the interchange is going to occur. Other commissioners and we'll close the public hearing commissioners questions, comments, Mr. Johnson. So I'm just curious as to the pending litigation regarding property owners prior to the eminent domain situation, what is the city's take on that? And is the situation that any basically like it's a sign whoever if you were to sell this property, whatever litigation or other issues is assigned to the buyer or what's the why isn't the city waiting to resolve well go triangle is wait is why hasn't go triangle decided to wait until that situation is resolved before they go about potentially selling or transferring this property with that litigation or attached to it. I can't really speak to the legalese of the case. All I can tell you is that there was an action that was filed, right. I'm so sorry. There's two actions out there. It was an action that was filed challenging the zoning. That's in a state of enforcement pending a rezoning of the property. The city had agreed to rezone the property and that's what this process is about. Then there's the separate action of Mr. Woods family and their action trying to retain ownership of the property or backed into their ownership. So it's two separate actions and they're all private matters. The ownership of record is go triangle now. The city is the applicant go triangle has consented to the zoning and we're moving forward because that's what the agreement was. If the outset or back when the property was rezoned the first time that it would be reverted back to residential which is what this action would do. So I'm not sure which one you're asking about but the ownership action is a private action between Mr. Woods and go triangle. Thank you. So I'm gonna stick with Mr. Woods, the gentleman who in his comments tonight. So I'm not a lawyer and if we have any lawyers on the DS here, please raise your hand and help me here. But whether it's a private or a private whether it's a private lawsuit or the city or whatnot the reality is that I don't know how the legal the opinion will turn out and if the city sale will go triangle sales this property and the courts decides that Mr. Woods and his family are actually warranted what their claims are and then we have a boomdouble here. And so not necessarily the zoning is the zoning the ownership is a whole different matter. The zoning is would be placed on the property and if they were to the property would revert back to another owner they could certainly request a rezoning. We don't we cannot be involved in the private matter between the ownership issue. Right. But then there's there's like damages and I mean if they go through the process of having to get back to where they started or they started based on the comments then they could sue the go trying on the city for potentially they could. And so I guess this leads to the question. Last follow up is why is why didn't go triangle actually be the one before us rather than the city and making this request? What was the rationale for the city carrying the bag for this request? The city made that commitment when they resumed it the first time that they would come back if they had to they would come back through and request the rezoning as the applicant. But go triangle could have had it opted to. They could have but they've consented and they said that they would go along with what the city requested. Okay. Just just clarifying. And there is a representative from go triangle if you'd like to hear that they have consented and agreed to the rezoning. The process is if it if it checks out I was just curious as to the logic and you provided that. So thank you. No problem. Thank you. Other commissioners questions or comments? Commissioner Miller. So I've had very strong feelings about this piece of property for a number of years now. And I have to start by saying I wonder about a comprehensive plan that permits to consistency analysis in 10 months that finds it appropriate to go industrial one month and low density residential in 10 months later but setting that aside maybe we'll fix that in our new comprehensive plan. So I have concerns about I had very strenuous objections to the way this property was rezoned for the romp. I think we trampled on a lot of principles relating to planning and what have you and I realized that there was a strong political motivation connected to the desire for light rail but I thought that we I thought we were selling ourselves too short and our rush to accommodate that plan. And so now we're back and the question for me now is what's being proposed by the city of Durham and I will say I'm pleased the city did make a representation in the course of that other rezoning that they would come back and that they would do this and they didn't just say okay we're putting it back they had a collaborative process and they went to the neighbors and some of that's related to the lawsuits and at the risk of getting it wrong I'm gonna go ahead and talk a little bit about my understanding of litigation on this property, realizing that it's imperfect and I would defer to anybody who knows better which is probably just about anybody. There are two lawsuits. The one lawsuit relates to eminent domain and that's Go Triangle using its power as an agency of the state of North Carolina to take property for a public purpose. And normally in an eminent domain action the government agency takes the property and takes title and the litigation is over the value because under the constitution the government can take property but it has to give fair value to have to return fair value for it. And so normally the litigation is about what the property is worth. It doesn't necessarily have to be limited to that and without actually having followed the litigation and involves the Wood family. I'm not sure I can see where now that the property is not going to be used a certain way that one way to resolve the question about compensation is one way to do it would be to give them their property back and so that may be on the table, I don't know. So that's one litigation and that's with Go Triangle acting as a state agent not the city of Durham. The other litigation is litigation that occurred of a lawsuit that was filed earlier this year that perhaps maybe even at the end of last year as a result of the city council's decision to rezone this. And some of those party litigants are in the room today and essentially that was a challenge to the validity of the rezoning for the romp. And so part of this, I am guessing is the idea is that if this all works out and having met the city of Durham as a player and the neighbors who were the litigants and the neighbors who are not litigants but who are going to be impacted by zoning decision all getting together and trying to get come up to an agreement that satisfies the most people not necessarily all that may be too high a standard about how to go back or to go forward actually and have everybody reasonably be happy and settle that lawsuit. The two lawsuits are on different issues and they concern different things it's possible to resolve one and not the other. People don't own zoning. Public gets to change it. The city gets to change zoning and they can do it over the owner's objection. And that's allowed. You can under the current statutes the owner of property can commence a rezoning or the city can do what's called a city initiated rezoning. This is a city initiated rezoning go triangle consented, but it didn't have to the city could have rezoned the property without their consent. But I do think that everybody to the best of their ability is trying to get together and saying if it's not going to be zoned for the romp what should it be going forward? And this is what it's come up with. Now having said all of that my own analysis of this is I don't think I have concerns about having this RSM zoning and my concern about the RSM zoning is exactly the same concern that Mr. Alturk articulated so successfully in the last case that he had me almost convinced and maybe I was convinced. But here it's the same issue is that without a development plan we have neighbors who are saying well this is so much better than industrial that we're gonna go for it. But in a better situation we would have had a developer who's not the city of Durham or not go triangle come along and ask to rezone this property. So the question is is RSM the right place for this to be because the city of Durham's not going to develop this piece of property. Go Triangle is not going to build apartments on it or townhouses. So whatever it's owned to is could just be a holding zone and if it's going to be a whole if what we're trying to do here is accomplish a holding zone a springboard for the future development of this piece of property I wouldn't have chosen RSM. I like the future land use designation because I didn't like the way the land was designated before they romped rezoning having this little pod of office and commercial in this narrow piece of property up against a major transportation corridor buffer in with wetlands and things in the middle it just didn't seem like a very good arrangement. So I like the movement here but gosh if I was going to set this piece of property up so that a developer somebody is really going to develop it in a way we want to see it developed with community input and involvement I wouldn't have chosen RSM and that's been my problem here. RSM essentially allows the developer under the new designation under the flume the one that's being proposed to develop it at the top of the density range and so there is no motivation to ask for to a development plan and in concert without the development plan there's no further community engagement as Mr. Alturk says this rezoning goes through nobody's going to call them you're not going to be invited to the site plan review and so that worries me just as it worried Mr. Alturk in the last case it worries me in this case but I've heard the neighbors just as we heard the neighbors in the last case I'm going to vote for this not because I think it's perfect but I do think what I see in it that I like and admire is the city keeping its word initiating in other words taking on the considerable cost of the correction of this it costs a lot of money to apply for and get a rezoning so the city has done all of that none of these other people not even go triangle is burdened with that cost it was a collaborative process it may have been imperfect not everybody evidently was at that meeting but a lot of people were and so and this is as the the one gentleman said this is a lot better it may not be perfect that cliche that I don't like to use but in this instance if I voted for the last one I'm going to vote for this one I do think that in the end it's going to be a lot better situation it's not you know if they had called me first it wouldn't necessarily been my advice to do it exactly this way but nobody did so that's the way it goes Thank you Commissioner Miller Commissioner Durkin I just wanted to say I'm voting for this but I feel a little low to not just put on the record that I'm sorely disappointed that we're in this position and that the light rail is completely taken off the table I was excited to be a part of that process and I'm sad that it's not happening but I am voting for the rezoning other commissioners Commissioner Baker I'll second that I'm disappointed in Duke and this feels like a funeral a little bit I think that that was a huge potential for Durham I'm very proud of the work that Jamie did I mean getting the site rezoned I think that it showed great leadership on the part of our cities elected officials and those who were able to vote in favor of it I think also showed great leadership I would also just I agree with a lot of things that Commissioner Miller was saying I do want to push back a little bit on some of them because I don't think that it's necessarily good planning to on a case by case basis sort of have neighbors be able to dictate whatever they want on a particular property I think that they need to have a position where they are where they have a voice in community planning and they're contributing to small area plans and neighborhood plans and looking at it more holistically, more comprehensively and then they do have some sort of say on a local level when there is some sort of rezoning or something else but I think the most democratic way for to carry out good planning is when you really get to know what's going to be on the property early on and I think that that's also just a fair balance between whatever applicant there is who's going to be pursuing development on the property and balancing that with the desire of the greater community as well as the neighborhood that it might be adjacent to and also this is on an industrial site it's going to remain industrial sites directly adjacent to a heavily industrial use which is a freeway typically the people who end up living next to a freeway are people who can't afford to live somewhere else so we tend to see low income populations who live next to these giant industrial uses which are freeways, arterial roads and these other types of automobile oriented transportation modes that we continue to build so I appreciate the things you were saying Mr. Miller and I like the discussion that we're having I'm going to be voting in favor of this, thank you. Thank you, additional questions or comments and if not I wish to hear Hyman. Let me ask just one question because I want to be sure that I'm clear about what part of it the underlying rationale for what I'm voting for in other words because the Go Triangle is not going to be able to build a light rail there was a promise or a commitment by the city then to revert this back to the original zoning so is it the original zoning because I'm hearing something different as I and I maybe caught up in the weeds a little bit with Mr. Wood's comments because he was citing an additional zoning that appears not to be a part of what we're doing am I, did I miss something? So Jamie Sanyak with the Planning Department so the commitment was to revert the property back to residential zoning it wasn't a commitment to revert it back to the previous residential district. We staff looked at the property and for a number of reasons included in the staff report made a recommendation to the RSM zoning district Mr. Wood's is referring to the map that he's headed out depicts the future land use map designations which are different than the zoning designation. Thank you. Okay, I'm here. Commissioner Alturk? Thank you. And we'll go to Commissioner Alturk and then Commissioner Lowe. Thank you, Chair. So there are a couple of things about this case that make me a little bit more comfortable than the last one. One, I think is that the neighbors have now had over a year. I mean, they know this site very well. They've had some input. Again, we may have disagreed on this commission about it but we've now heard from you on a number of occasions and that to me is a little bit more of a robust democratic process. The other thing that I think is different is that again, this is a, we're proposing to change this to RSM which is a much more delimited zoning designation than OI which is much more ambiguous and that was my point about the last one. But that's, so in some ways, this makes me, I'm a little bit more comfortable with this rezoning. I guess I'm still a little concerned about what I've heard from Mr. Wood's and the effect that this would have on him and his family. I mean, so from what I'm hearing from Jamie in your response to Mr. Wood's is that the agreement was to revert it back to the previous zoning designation which was all RS20, or sorry, to revert it back to residential, all of this shaded hatched area was RS20. The agreement was to get it back to residential in any form. And so now we have RSM. But we could technically revert it back to the previous flunk, correct? Where some of it is commercial and some of it is residential or is it office? I don't know what. You would not be able to do that because the zoning then would not be consistent with the future land use designation. You couldn't have an RS20. In fact, before it was changed to industrial and ILD, the zoning and the future land use map were inconsistent with each other. So you would not be able to revert the property back to the previous flunk designation and at the same time RS20 or RSM. But there are some, you can write it in commercial, in the commercial flunk. You can have some residential zoning districts, right? Which ones are those? CG, I believe. And no, the CG commercial district allows for residential development. Okay. Okay, thank you. That's helpful. It's not a residential zone. Right, right, okay. So I would like to ask Mr. Woods again, or if you wouldn't mind coming up. I guess I am curious why you would like this, the future land use map to be commercial for these two parcels that you're talking about, 48, 15 and 48, 25. Thank you. And I appreciate that question because I wanna make sure everybody's clear. We want that because as I mentioned before, the total ownership of the property hasn't been resolved. We asked for the return of the property since it wasn't used for the intent. And we're asking for the future land use map, which was commercial, the red part there, that you allow that to be commercial. You can still build residential based on the future land use map in the commercial zone, but don't prevent us on something that city council, county commissioners and then their prior decision when we did this rezoning was based on my interpretation of what the city council said was return it back to the original state that the properties were zoned for prior to the rezoning to the industrial for the light rail. I don't recall and I was at this meeting and the city council meeting and that may be a language that maybe got murdered up, but we may need to quote that. It was returned the property back to the original state. What you're doing here tonight is you're rezoning this and not returning it back to the original state. You're given higher density and then on our property, 48, 25, 48, 15, you're saying the future land use for this property is no longer commercial, which we decided that 25 years ago that that part would be commercial. And that's what we're saying. We can amend this rezoning application to make those two lots 48, 15, 48, 25 include rezoning future land use for commercial and they can continue to have their residential. That's not a complicated process and that's what we're asking. You can also be a commercial in the commercial zone. You can build residential as well, but we do not feel like we're being returned back to what the great city promised that if it wasn't used them for the light rail that we will be returned back to the future land use map which was commercial. And I think you have two applications before you now. You have a future land use application before you tonight and you have a zoning application before you tonight based on the information we receive. So I suggest you strongly consider at least on the future land use map to continue to keep these two partials as commercial. Mr. Alturk, any additional questions or comments? Thank you, Mr. Woods. Thank you. No, I'll wait to see if other commissioners have anything to say. Thanks. Great, thank you. Commissioner Lo has been waiting. Thanks for your patience. Yes, thank you. It is very concerning to hear that this property was taken on the imminent domain not used for that intended purpose. And it's still under litigation as who's the right for ownership of the property. Having said that, I'm still not quite clear of the rezoning was it originally commercial or residential? Because I keep hearing this read. I'm not clear on that part. Ms. Zanick. The property was originally zoned RS 20 which is a residential zoning designation. The future land use designation was commercial and institutional. It was not a commercially zoned piece of property. Okay. I thought I heard Mr. Woods say that some years ago it was commercial. And I'm wondering where did you get that information from? If, go ahead. Thank you. The handout here, which is unquestionable came from the city planning department website prior to this property being rezoned to office, to industrial or the go train or rail. This is the red part. This is a printout from the staff. And just to make clear, I'm not trying to ambush the staff. I have talked with her over the phone and I have talked to the rest of the neighbors in regards to making this commercial future land use back to the original state. But nobody has given me an explanation on why that would not be feasible here at this hearing. The back to your other question was the end of it domain part. I think the commissioner may need to put this on hold to get legal opinion on this end of it domain action pending to see what the attorney would say on your advice, can we proceed forward when you have the ownership being questioned in a court of law that hasn't been finalized? What type of liability that puts on the city in regards to taking our commercial property away from us that we have to come back and hear and do a new future land use map and carry additional expenses? Because the question on the ownership of this property hasn't been resolved in a court of law. Great, thank you. Commissioner Lowe, I'm gonna just see, recognize the staff, but then the floor is still yours. Thank you, Sarah Young with the planning department. I wanted to address the issue of adopting a different future land use and a different zoning that are not compatible. And there were some recent changes in state law and by recent, I mean maybe a few years ago, whereby municipality or even a county, if they change a zoning and the zoning is incompatible with a future land use, then the future land use is automatically changed via the zoning action to be compatible. So we cannot adopt a different zoning with future land use that doesn't match. So I just wanted to lay that out there. That's the reason, one of the reasons why we're having to choose something that is compatible with the commitment that the city council made to return the property to residential. Thank you, Commissioner Lowe. One final comment. I think Mr. Woods make a very good point being that there's pending litigation concerning this property. I think we should consider about putting this particular case of issue on hold. Thank you. Great, I will note for the commission, we can, as we knew with expending housing choices, this is our first cycle. We have the ability to continue this for two additional cycles, if we would like. I'm personally ready to vote this evening. I'm not convinced that the legal action would be finished by the time we'd have to vote on it. Anyway, number one and number two, it sounds like, again, I'd like to ask the staff, am I correct in hearing you that the legal action that you've referenced isn't tied to this zoning decision that's in front of us this evening? Is that correct? So correct, this is a Grace Smith again. And I'll be clear right there. There's two different legal actions going on, and the one with the ownership issue is a separate legal action, and then we have one about the zoning. And this particular case is tracking forward and hopefully will hopefully get to city council and be acted on while that zoning action is still in a state of enforcement. But I can't speak to the other case. I don't know how far along it is tracking the ownership issue. Right, but the ownership issue, and I stated my question in our police, so thank you for pointing out the two cases. The ownership case is not connected this evening with this zoning decision in front of us. It is not. Thank you. Commissioner Miller and, hold on, you spoke into the fair amount. We will get back to you. Commissioner Morgan. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just to be clear, I just wanted to clear with staff, just got to be clear with them, is before this zoning change was done about a year ago, the future land use was inconsistent with the zoning. And given that we're switching it back, we couldn't switch it back to the way it was because it's inconsistent. So that's really just want to be sure that, want to make sure that Mr. Woods understands that he's presented the future land use designation and not the actual zoning of the land. And by reverting everything back to the way it was, it can't be done because of state regulations. That's correct, Mr. Morgan. Okay, thank you. And thank you. Additional questions, comments? Commissioner Johnson and then Commissioner Miller. And I just want to make a quick point based on my knowledge of real estate, transact, et cetera, et cetera. The issue about the real estate ownership litigation is basically covered with title insurance. They would not have been able to close on that, the purchase go triangle, without having a clear title insurance policy. So whether the dispute is over who owns it, insurance is going to cover whatever the legal disputes that comes out of that, but go triangle if that property was sold, they had to get title insurance on it. So the baseline default should be that it would be Mr. Woods to take an actions to say that title insurance is basically not relevant. So just think, but we're not even focused on that. We're focusing on the zoning aspects. And I think that staff's feedback makes it impossible from a policy standpoint to even consider doing what has been proposed by Mr. Woods. Commissioner Miller. Yeah, so I just wanted to point out that we're talking about two different levels. The zoning is the law that the city imposes upon development of the property. And it doesn't have anything to do with their owns. It doesn't matter who owns it, because it's a police power. It's the right to essentially regulate the land. The future land use map is a component of the comprehensive plan, which is a policy doc. So, and it is true that before this property was zoned for the romp, the policy that said moving forward, if at some point in the future, somebody wants to rezone this property away from RS 20, it would have to be zoned in a way that was consistent with either a one of the commercial designations for the Woods property, or if we were in the portion of this parcel that was future land use office, that it would have to be a zoning that was consistent with the office policy. And we have a, in the zoning side, the UDO, which is the law, we have a graduated scale with a lot of steps in it. In the policy side, we have a graduated scale with categories that don't necessarily line up with the zoning, because it's policy, it's broader, and it's not law. You could have a piece of my lot could be designated for commercial use on the future land use map, but I can't use it for commercial unless it's also zoned for a commercial use. And so that's what's happening here. This property was zoned RS 20, which is the least dense zoning category, which you could do with the property was as you could build single family homes on it at the rate of about two per acre. And that's what the zoning allowed for all of this property prior to the romp rezoning. The city of Durham has tied in section three of the UDO has tied rezonings to future land use policy. And so if somebody comes along and wants to rezone a piece of property to something different, that zone has to be consistent with the policy statement and the future land use map. That's why we have these cases where there are changes. And so that's why we can't go back because our city rules say you can't go back. You can't have an inconsistency. We had inconsistencies and in fact, the law allows inconsistencies and the law says for other cities, it says, all you have to do is prove that you considered the comprehensive plan and you're rezoning. That's why we have the consistency statement. That's complying with the law, but Durham has a tougher standard in its UDO. And so that's why we cannot go back no matter what. The question is, I suppose a different agreement would be is that for part of this property, we would rezone it residential and we would change the comprehensive plan future land use map category to a consistent residential category. And then we could say for this other piece of property, for the Woods property, we're going to designate that future land use commercial and rezoning commercial which would not be going back in either instance to exactly where we were, it would be going forward to a new place that everybody was happy with. And then that opens up a whole bunch of policy questions that I think we would have to explore, but that would be another way of going. So I wanna make sure that we all understand that the Woods property was never available for commercial development without a rezoning to a commercial zone that has not ever happened. It doesn't mean that it couldn't happen. It's all, then we would engage in the policy debate on the future land use map, whether this is the appropriate place for a commercial node along Farrington Road near its intersection with Ephesus Church Road. It is a debate that if we were to stall this process and start it up again, that I would be interested in engaging in, but I also am not demanding that we do that. I like Mr. Busby and prepared to vote on this tonight because I think it gets us to a place where we are correcting something that I thought was done poorly a year ago. And it gives us a new starting place for moving forward for deciding how we will use this whole area in the future. I will note for Mr. Woods and for everybody else that we're about to go through the comprehensive plan process. We will be looking at the future land use map designations, not just for his property, but all the property. And if this is moving forward an appropriate place for commercial node in this area, then maybe that's the place to have that debate. Commissioner Miller, I think this is the floor is yours if you wanna make a motion or two motions. All right, so I will make the first motion at any rate. So, Mr. Chairman, with regard to the plan amendment case A19-00010, I move that we send this forward to... That's not the right number. Am I in the wrong case? No, that's right. Is that right? Oh, I'm sorry. I was looking at the legacy number. You are correct. Thank you. I would change that one too, if I could. So with regard to the plan amendment case A19-00010, I move that we send this forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation. Second. Motion by Commissioner Miller, seconded by Commissioner Morgan. Will have a roll call vote, please. Commissioner Williams. Yes. Commissioner Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Alturk. Yes. Vice Chair Hyman. Yes. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes. Commissioner Ketchin. Yes. Commissioner Lowe. No. Commissioner Baker. Yes. Commissioner McIver. Yes. Passes 11-1. So that's 11-1. And a motion for the zoning case. Mr. Chairman, in connection with the zoning map change in this matter, case Z19-00028, I recommend that we send it forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation. Second. Motion by Commissioner Miller, seconded by Commissioner Johnson. A roll call vote. Commissioner Williams. Yes. Commissioner Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Alturk. Yes. Vice Chair Hyman. Yes. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes. Commissioner Ketchin. Yes. Commissioner Lowe. Yes. Commissioner Baker. Yes. And Commissioner McIver. Yes. Motion passes 12-0. Great. Thank you all for your time. As we move to our next case, this is the Chalk Level Road case Z19-07. I want to recognize Commissioner McIver. Yes. I'd like to be refused from this case because of a professional conflict of interest with the applicant. Great. We have a motion to recuse the commissioner. So moved. So moved. Second. So moved by Commissioner Alturk, seconded by Commissioner Morgan. Yes. Thank you. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. We'll let you know when you come back. So we'll start with the staff report. Good evening. Jamie Soniek with the Planning Department. I'll be presenting case number Z19-0007. This is Chalk Level Road. Subsequent to the July 9, 2019 Planning Commission meeting, the applicant proffered the following text and design commitments, which have been reviewed by staff and have been deemed legal, enforceable, and consistent with policy recommendations. There may be some modifications to the text commitments that were included in your staff report. But I'll just go through these here. Text commitments include townhouses will be the permitted building type. The maximum building height will be limited to 35 feet. The maximum unit count shall not exceed 97 units. Staff also received the following additional text and graphic commitments that have been reviewed and accepted. Entrance number two will be a public access. And it shall end in a cul-de-sac and serve a maximum of 20 units. A graphic commitment, including the buffer width along the Western property line, may be modified as per UDO section 9.45f. And general note, per UDO section 12.24, a maximum of 90 units shall be sure from any single point of access. And then finally, a minimum of 80% of the townhouses will have habitable square footage that will not exceed 1,500 square feet. It should be noted that the text commitment regarding the sidewalk improvements along adjacent pids 126011 and 126012 have been removed. It is my understanding that the applicant has all intentions of constructing a sidewalk in these locations in order to provide connectivity. But between now and the City Council meeting, the applicant will work with staff to better hatch out the language that was previously included with respect to timing mechanisms, locations, and parties responsible. Staff determines that these requests or the request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and other policies and ordinances. And I will be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you. So we'll open the public hearing. We have two individuals signed up in favor, Robert Schunk and Keith Greenwood. Good evening, Chairman Busby and fellow commissioners. My name is Robert Schunk. I reside here in Durham at 2627 University Drive in the Rockwood community. Thanks, Jamie, for covering a lot of the points. To kind of go back a little bit, we heard July 9th. We left that hearing with a strong statement to go back to the neighbors, listen to them, give them some concrete plans. At that July 9th meeting, I had indicated that we would provide a mix of rental and four-cell units, I pretty clearly stated that we would do 60% AMI units that we would take advantage of the city Durham's affordable housing density bonus with an effort to increase the density to maybe 150 or 175 units by using that at the site plan stage. That was something that threw out the whole zoning we were committed to. We also then had one of the biggest contentious issues we had at the last hearing was the connection to River Rock Drive. And at that time, there could have been a connection for all of the units between River Rock Drive and Chalk Level Road. We've got three of the residents here from the adjacent Laurel Meadows resident that shared their thoughts at that hearing and also when we met. So having a resounding voice, hearing a resounding voice from you all to go back and work with the neighbors, we did do that. First off, we met with Mr. Greenwood, our developer, our client to determine what approach he wanted to go through. So we revised, we came up with a new plan.  At that meeting, the ladies here were all in attendance to that, what we communicated to them that we would change direction and develop a community with all four cell townhouses. Because of at that time, we were still having to connect to River Rock and the Chalk Level, we felt it was appropriate to restrict the development to 97 units to reduce the impact to reduce is what we could end by half the impact of the River Rock. And then subject to the approval of the owner to the south of the property to the south, we would look to connect Laurel Meadows Drive. The very next day, Friday, August 2nd, we were required to resubmit the development plan back to planning staff before doing that. We met with Erlene Thompson in transportation and tried to figure out a way to how could we not connect to River Rock Drive. Is that all I get? You may continue. OK, thank you. Legacy buzzer. Thank you. So in that discussion, Erlene had suggested that we could actually put a cul-de-sac at the end of River Rock and have all of the traffic go out to Chalk Level. And if we were able to make a connection to Laurel Meadows, that would also suffice. So when we did resubmit the development plan on August 2nd, we had that language. And then last week, work with staff through their review, they had asked that we rewrite that commitment to say, because there was ambiguity. And if we could, should, would connect to Laurel Meadows, that we would just basically commit to providing a cul-de-sac to River Rock. And along with that, we would commit to a maximum of 20 units on that. So the important part there is that as the case was previously presented, you would have had a through street between Chalk Level and River Rock potentially down to Laurel Meadows. And that anybody that wanted to get out the stadium drive could have gone through there. So you might have had the 97 or plus units going through River Rock, which I contend was, it would have been unfortunate. So I think we've made a big effort to reduce that number of units that would be served by Laurel Meadows. So this plan up to 20 units would access Laurel Meadows and River Rock community. 87 or no, 77 would go out to Chalk Level. Let me see here. One point about the Laurel Meadows, we did reach out to that owner. Keith Klein had done that. Phone calls, emails, met out on site. At the end of it, dealing with his family members, they felt that extending Laurel Meadows was not in their interest. So right now what we have is a commitment to the residents that live on River Rock in Laurel Meadows that they have a definitive commitment that no more than 20 units would access their community versus the 100 plus or 97. To talk about affordability, because I know a couple of you had expressed some concerns about not being able to utilize the affordable housing density bonus, what my client also did was looked at what the comparables were in the area. Through his research within a two mile radius, what they found was that for three bedroom townhouses that range from 1,300 to 1,600 square feet, those homes sold for a range of $212,000. Understanding that a developer cannot price himself out of a market, he'll need to build townhomes within that price range. He can't go in there and build 250, and because it's not comparable to what's there. So the idea is, the understanding is that we'll be building at or below the $200,000 mark. We also reached out to Karen Lado. For those of you who don't know her, she is the Assistant Director of the Community Development Office. Prior to that position, she also was a consultant to the city Durham to help, I might get this wrong, but re-work the affordable housing program. Staff can correct me if I'm wrong about those specifics. So we shared our math with Ms. Lado, and she replied that what we're proposing, the proposed sales prices for the units. I'm going to read this here from her email. Our proposed sales prices for the units is still well within what would be affordable for the household at 80% AMI. So well within would be 80% and below, which is the typical threshold the city uses for affordable home ownership. If you recall from the first neighborhood meeting, Ms. Brenda McDonald, who is here and is still here again tonight, if you recall, she lived in public housing. She owns the first house right at River Rock, and she was able to move up and to have a home ownership and give her an opportunity to develop wealth and be a homeowner. We think that as this project is currently proposed, this community will allow other people that might be in the adjacent apartment developments, also in public housing, to also move up and afford what we're considering entry-level affordable community to build wealth. A lot of this discussions we've had over the last month, really, at the neighborhood meeting, they were certainly happy we modified to this for sale units that the one sticking point was still this connection to Laurel Meadows or, I'm sorry, to River Rock. We hope we feel like we've made a strong commitment to reduce that, or to reduce that connection by cul-de-sac-ing it and limiting the units out there. The other thing Karen mentioned is that I understand staff will be bringing the city council in the coming weeks a modification to the density bonus program to where changing that program from 60% AMI to 80% AMI. Part of me at this point, and things have just happened over a cycle of this, is it'd be nice to not have this project limited to 97 units, but to be able to take advantage of that program. But those are all the comments I have, and welcome any questions. Great, thank you. We may have questions after the public hearings. Very well. Mr. Greenwood? Thank you. Is there anyone else who'd like to speak during the public hearing? We would welcome anyone who'd like to speak. If you can just come up, give us your name, your address, and your remarks. Sure, it looks like you. Hi, my name is Tammy Yancey, and I'm at 2209 Elk River Drive. So River Rock is here. Elk River Drive is here. So he's proposed, and he showed us the picture today. I've proposed in the cul-de-sac to come in to the end of River Rock with 20 units. So I'm looking at it now. And right now on River Rock, we have 12 houses. I think it's about 12 houses. So that's a double. What you're putting out there is double what we have out there now. So to me, I feel that the traffic is going to be still heavy throughway from the new development through Elk River Drive. So I'm still not for it. I do oppose it. You did ask in a meeting before, what can we do for you? And I said oppose it, and you said OK. But then I guess that wasn't an option after all. So I just do not want a connection to our development. So if all possible. Thank you. And anyone else that would like to speak during the public comment, public hearing period? Mr. Schunk, you still have additional time if you would like to make any final remarks that will have you come. Yeah, to respond to her comment, I think we would be willing to reduce that down to 10 units to that connection on the cul-de-sac instead of 20. There are, when accounted, the GIS, it looks like there's about 19 or 20 homes that are on Elk River and River Rock Drive combined that then go out to Stadium Drive. But we would be willing to reduce that down to 10 units to reduce that burden. Great. Thank you very much. Ma'am, you may join us. If you'd like to speak. My name is Brenda McDonald. I live at 1209 River Rock Drive, the entrance that he was talking about. And I didn't see the blueprint. I just saw the, he just called me today. He told me that he had made it a cul-de-sac as opposed to opening up the street, which I was fine with. But he said he was putting 20, but I said he just reduced it to 10. But again, that's a little neighborhood. And when we moved in, it was single family. And townhomes, even with 10 townhomes, that's like having many, it's still about double or triple the neighborhood that we have, which I don't mind growth. But it is a little dense for the neighborhood that we have now. It's really small, quiet. The cul-de-sac that I, because like I said, I didn't see the picture. I just saw, I just picture a cul-de-sac just being closed in, not coming through, or the residents being able to go to the cul-de-sac and live there. I was thinking it was going to be closed here and that it would not necessarily be so connected to our neighborhood. I thought it would be, I thought our neighborhood would end here, and then the next neighborhood began there on the opposite side, opposite street, coming in that way. And he did ask us, he said, if we don't want it, you won't get it. And we said then, we don't want it. But it is what it is. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else who'd like to speak? I am Barbara Stokes. I live at 1301 River Rock Drive. And I do want to say that over the course of this, I think that the number has gone down. And to what Brenda and Tammy said, ideally, we would like no change in our area, because it is such a small community. But the number has gone down, and the 10 is much better. But if we had a choice, we would want nothing. The one thing that concerns me is a comment that was made looking at the numbers for the affordable housing program and whether that could be 97. So whether he's now saying that number could potentially go up. And so that is even more of a concern when you said that today. Thank you. And just what I'll do, I'll bring out the, when we get to comments with the commissioners, we'll bring out the form that you could each just sign in as speakers this evening. Any other individuals who'd like to speak during the public hearing? I don't see anyone else, so we will close the public hearing. Before we come to commissioners, I'll recognize staff for any comments. So Jamie Sanyak with the planning department, just to cover all bases, the applicant has revised the proffer relative to the number of units at the, I think, its entrance number two to include no more than 10 units. That is correct. Staff finds that acceptable. Thank you. Commissioners, questions, comments? Commissioner Durkin. OK. So I was really disappointed to see the revised version of this. I wish that we had voted on it in July when it was first before us. I would have voted in favor of it. I do, although I would like to say I do really appreciate all of the neighbors participating and you coming out to see us again and to all speak. So I'm not dismissing your concerns at all. But I do think that this property could be developed and you would have a connection where you wouldn't have a cul-de-sac stopping the potential number of users going through River Rock. So to think that nothing will happen to the site, I don't think it's quite realistic, unfortunately, to dampen your lovely little sort of rural suburban area you have over there now. I'm personally very disappointed that we're taking the affordable housing density bonus off the table and the possibility of that. I completely accept that's not something that's an appropriate proffer at this stage, but we've taken the potential of it off the table. So I would rather have not a number of units that are specified here, but maybe size of units or something that would allow some flexibility to take advantage of the density bonus if that's feasible in the future. I don't know if Jamie, if you have a response to that. Yeah, again, Jamie Sanyak with the planning department. I don't think the intent at all and the applicant can get up and clarify, but the intent is not to take the affordable housing density bonus provision off the table. That can occur by right by any development and can occur at the time of site plan. They don't have to commit to it on a development plan. But how does that work if you have a max number of 97 that's listed as a proffer as a commitment on the development plan? They can that it still is applicable for the development. So the development plan can say only 97, but at site plan, you can say I'm using the affordable housing density bonus and that number will be greater than 97. That's correct. OK. Any additional questions? No, that's helpful feedback, so I'm actually comfortable with that. Great, thank you. Mr. Schunk, I know you were referenced as adding any context. Yeah, I think I just for the benefit of the neighbors, the commitment to River Rock Drive would that there would be no more than 10 units to their through their community, that this density bonus comment you're mentioning does would not affect their traffic capacities. I just want to make sure that they are clear about that. Great, that's an important clarification. Commissioner Baker. Yeah, I second some of the things that Commissioner Durkin was saying. I actually like the first proposal more than this one. I think there were a lot of things that we were uncertain about, a lot of things that we were talking about up here. And well, I want to say thank you to the neighbors who showed up, and I think that it's really important that you all got involved. And I also want to say that the applicant has clearly done so much more than many of the other applicants that come before us, and so they deserve some credit for what they've done. I think this is a great example of why we need to have a better vision for what's being placed in some of these places and not simply allow neighbors to completely dictate the number of units. I don't think it's good planning that we've reduced the number of units.