<!-- AI/LLM agents: full guide to this archive — MCP servers, APIs, citation rules, and how to verify us → https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/skill.md -->
# Board of Adjustment - April 28, 2017

> Auto-transcribed civic record · April 28, 2017

- **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/4242
- **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/4242?view_id=14&redirect=true
- **Date**: 2017-04-28
- **Last revised**: April 28, 2017
- **Length**: 39,233 words

> ⚠️ **Auto-generated content.** The transcript on this page is the Granicus stenographer's live closed-captioning track, captured at the time of broadcast (typos and broken sentences common). Speaker labels come from the same track. Structured facts were extracted with GPT-4o; the narrative summary was written by Anthropic Claude Sonnet. Verbatim wording and speaker attribution may contain errors. See [methodology](https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/about/methodology) or [report a correction](mailto:editor@lexingtonky.news).

---

## Meeting Overview

The Urban County Board of Adjustment convened on April 28, 2017, at 1:30 PM in the Council Chambers at 200 East Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky, with Branden Gross presiding as the meeting officer. The board addressed nine agenda items, primarily consisting of conditional use appeals and variance requests from various religious organizations, businesses, and individuals, along with one revocation hearing. During the session, the board conducted nine motions and votes while hearing five public comments from attendees. The meeting resulted in mixed outcomes: two appeals were approved (Lexington Primitive Baptist Church and Masjid Bilal), one was denied (Southern Oak, LLC), three were postponed (Jake Riordan's variance appeal, Newton's Attic, LLC, and Fairhaven Baptist Church), one was withdrawn (Darby Dan Farm), one was tabled (Immanuel Baptist Church), and one revocation hearing resulted in the revocation of permits for Aaron Jamison/Marvin Feldpausch.

## Attendance

The following members were present at the meeting on April 28, 2017:

• Branden Gross
• Thomas Glover
• Chad Needham
• Harry Clarke
• Larry Forester
• Jan Meyer

**Absent:**
• Joan Whitman

No members arrived late to the meeting.

## Votes and Decisions

The board conducted nine votes during the April 28, 2017 meeting, with most items receiving unanimous approval or postponement [timestamp: 00:00].

**Administrative Items**
The board unanimously approved the minutes from the March 31, 2017 meeting on a motion by Jan Meyer, seconded by Chad Needham, with all six members voting in favor.

**Postponements and Continuations**
Four cases were postponed or continued to future meetings:
• **PLN-BOA-17-00013**: Jake Riordan's variance request was unanimously postponed until June 30, 2017, on a motion by Larry Forester, seconded by Harry Clarke
• **PLN-BOA-17-00023**: Fairhaven Baptist Church's conditional use permit was unanimously postponed until May 19, 2017, on a motion by Jan Meyer, seconded by Larry Forester
• **PLN-BOA-17-00021**: Newton's Attic, LLC's conditional use permit was unanimously postponed until May 19, 2017, on a motion by Harry Clarke, seconded by Chad Needham (5-0 vote)
• **PLN-BOA-17-00016**: Immanuel Baptist Church's conditional use permit was unanimously continued until May 19, 2017, on a motion by Jan Meyer, seconded by Harry Clarke (5-0 vote)

**Approvals**
Two conditional use permits were unanimously approved with conditions:
• **PLN-BOA-17-00020**: Lexington Primitive Baptist Church received approval subject to three conditions on a motion by Thomas Glover, seconded by Chad Needham (6-0 vote)
• **PLN-BOA-17-00022**: Masjid Bilal received approval subject to three conditions on a motion by Chad Needham, seconded by Larry Forester (6-0 vote)

**Denials**
• **PLN-BOA-17-00015**: Southern Oak, LLC's conditional use permit was unanimously denied (0-6 vote) on a motion by Jan Meyer, seconded by Thomas Glover

**Revocation**
• **CV-2006-20**: The board voted 4-1 to revoke Aaron Jamison/Marvin Feldpausch's conditional use permit on a motion by Chad Needham, seconded by Harry Clarke. Thomas Glover, Chad Needham, Harry Clarke, and Larry Forester voted in favor, while Branden Gross voted against. The revocation does not include razing the building.

## Public Comment

Five residents spoke during the public comment period, all addressing the same issue regarding a conditional use permit for a greenhouse facility [timestamp: 00:00].

**Charles Martin** requested the revocation of the conditional use permit for a greenhouse, citing non-compliance with permit conditions and adverse impacts on the surrounding neighborhood [timestamp: 00:00].

**Mary Diane Hanna** argued that the greenhouse is incompatible with the surrounding residential properties and requested that the permit be revoked [timestamp: 00:00].

**Walt Gaffield** discussed the facility's lack of compliance with conditional use requirements and expressed support for revoking the permit [timestamp: 00:00].

**Wayne Mitchell** raised concerns about the lack of use and maintenance of the greenhouse property, also supporting permit revocation [timestamp: 00:00].

**Dr. Lisa Gannoe** requested both the revocation of the conditional use permit and removal of the greenhouse structure, citing non-compliance issues and adverse impacts on the area [timestamp: 00:00].

All five speakers presented a unified position opposing the continued operation of the greenhouse under its current conditional use permit, with common themes including non-compliance with permit conditions, incompatibility with the residential neighborhood character, and negative impacts on surrounding properties.

## Contested Items

Two conditional use permit matters faced significant community opposition during the April 28, 2017 meeting, both resulting in decisions against the applicants.

**Southern Oak, LLC Drive-Through Request**

Southern Oak, LLC's application for a conditional use permit to add a drive-through window encountered substantial community resistance. The proposal faced organized opposition from local residents who raised concerns about the potential impact of the drive-through facility on their neighborhood. Despite the applicant's presentation, the community opposition proved decisive, and the permit request was ultimately denied by the board.

**Aaron Jamison/Marvin Feldpausch Greenhouse Permit Revocation**

The second contested matter involved the revocation of an existing conditional use permit held by Aaron Jamison and Marvin Feldpausch for a greenhouse operation. Community members voiced strong opposition to the continued existence of the greenhouse facility, citing various concerns about its ongoing operations. The sustained community pressure and formal objections led to the board's decision to revoke the previously granted conditional use permit, effectively requiring the cessation of the greenhouse operations.

Both cases demonstrated the significant influence of organized community opposition in the conditional use permit process. The meeting highlighted the tension between business development interests and neighborhood concerns, with community voices ultimately prevailing in both instances. The outcomes reflected the board's responsiveness to constituent concerns when evaluating the appropriateness of conditional land uses in residential or mixed-use areas.

## Variance Appeal by Jake Riordan

[timestamp: 00:00]

Jake Riordan submitted a variance appeal requesting to increase the maximum front setback for two lots. The agenda item III.B.1 was presented during the meeting with Nick Nicholson serving as the key speaker for the discussion.

Staff recommended postponing consideration of Riordan's variance request due to unresolved issues that had not been adequately addressed prior to the meeting. The specific details of the variance requirements or the nature of the unresolved issues were not elaborated upon in the available meeting materials.

The board ultimately accepted the staff recommendation and postponed the variance appeal. This postponement allows additional time for the outstanding issues to be resolved before the matter returns for consideration at a future meeting.

The variance request involved modifications to front setback requirements, which typically govern how far structures must be positioned from the front property line. Such variances are commonly sought when property owners need flexibility in building placement due to lot configuration, existing structures, or other site-specific constraints.

No additional speakers were identified as participating in the discussion of this agenda item, and the postponement was the final outcome for Riordan's variance appeal at this meeting.

## Conditional Use Appeal by Darby Dan Farm

[timestamp: 00:00]

Darby Dan Farm had submitted a conditional use appeal to establish a farm gift shop on their property. However, the agenda item was brief as the applicant withdrew their request before any substantive discussion could take place.

Nick Nicholson addressed the matter, confirming that Darby Dan Farm had voluntarily withdrawn their conditional use permit application. No details were provided regarding the reasons for the withdrawal or the specifics of the proposed farm gift shop that had been under consideration.

**Outcome:** The conditional use appeal was withdrawn by the applicant, Darby Dan Farm, removing the item from further consideration by the board.

## Conditional Use Appeal by Southern Oak, LLC

[timestamp: 00:00]

The board considered agenda item III.C.2, a conditional use appeal by Southern Oak, LLC for a drive-through window permit. The company had applied for conditional use approval to add a drive-through service to their facility.

Staff presented their analysis and recommended disapproval of the conditional use permit. The primary concern cited by staff was potential traffic impacts that could result from the proposed drive-through operation. Staff determined that the additional vehicle circulation and queuing associated with drive-through service could create traffic safety or congestion issues in the area.

Key speakers during the discussion included David Royse and Jacob Walburn, who addressed various aspects of the proposal and staff recommendation.

Following the presentation and discussion of the traffic concerns and other relevant factors, the board voted to deny Southern Oak, LLC's conditional use appeal. The denial upheld the staff's recommendation against approving the drive-through window permit, meaning the company would not be authorized to proceed with their proposed drive-through service under the current application.

The decision reflected the board's agreement with staff's assessment that the traffic impacts associated with the drive-through operation presented sufficient concerns to warrant denial of the conditional use permit.

## Conditional Use Appeal by Immanuel Baptist Church

[timestamp: 00:00]

The board considered agenda item III.C.3, a conditional use appeal submitted by Immanuel Baptist Church. The church requested an amended conditional use permit to expand their on-site parking facilities.

Greg Thornton served as a key speaker during the discussion of this matter. The church's proposal involved modifications to their existing conditional use permit to accommodate additional parking spaces on their property.

During the hearing, concerns were raised that required further consideration before the board could make a final determination on the church's request. The specific nature of these concerns was not detailed in the available materials, but they were significant enough to prevent immediate action on the application.

Due to the issues that emerged during the discussion, the board decided to continue the hearing to a future date. This continuation will allow time to address the concerns that were raised and provide the church with an opportunity to respond to any outstanding questions or requirements.

The outcome of this agenda item was that it was tabled, meaning no final decision was made on Immanuel Baptist Church's conditional use appeal at this meeting. The matter will be revisited at a subsequent meeting once the identified concerns have been properly addressed.

This type of conditional use permit amendment is common when religious institutions need to expand their facilities or parking to better serve their congregations while ensuring compliance with local zoning requirements and addressing any potential impacts on the surrounding community.

## Conditional Use Appeal by Lexington Primitive Baptist Church

[timestamp: 00:00]

The board considered agenda item III.C.4, a conditional use appeal submitted by Lexington Primitive Baptist Church seeking permission to expand their existing church facility.

Alan Hisle presented the case on behalf of the church. The application requested a conditional use permit that would allow the congregation to proceed with expansion plans for their current church building.

Staff had reviewed the proposal and provided a recommendation of approval for the conditional use permit. The staff analysis determined that the proposed church expansion met the necessary requirements and standards for approval under the applicable zoning regulations.

The board discussed the merits of the application, considering factors such as the impact on the surrounding area, compliance with zoning requirements, and the appropriateness of the proposed expansion for the existing church use.

Following the presentation and discussion, the board voted to approve the conditional use permit for Lexington Primitive Baptist Church. This approval allows the church to move forward with their planned expansion project in accordance with the terms and conditions outlined in the permit.

The approval enables the congregation to enhance their facilities to better serve their community while maintaining compliance with local zoning and land use regulations.

## Conditional Use Appeal by Newton's Attic, LLC

[timestamp: 00:00]

Newton's Attic, LLC submitted a conditional use permit application for a proposed building intended for academic instruction purposes. The agenda item III.C.5 was scheduled for discussion during the meeting.

However, the application did not proceed to full consideration during this session. Instead, the matter was postponed without detailed discussion or presentation of the proposal's specifics.

No key speakers were identified for this agenda item, and no substantive debate or concerns were recorded regarding the conditional use permit request. The academic instruction facility proposal by Newton's Attic, LLC will need to be rescheduled for future consideration by the governing body.

**Outcome:** The conditional use permit application was postponed to a future meeting date.

## Conditional Use Appeal by Masjid Bilal

[timestamp: 00:00]

The board considered agenda item III.C.6, a conditional use appeal submitted by Masjid Bilal seeking permission to establish a cemetery. Kevin Palley served as a key speaker during the discussion of this matter.

Masjid Bilal had applied for a conditional use permit that would allow them to operate a cemetery facility. The proposal underwent staff review as part of the standard conditional use permit process.

Following their evaluation, city staff provided a recommendation of approval for the Masjid Bilal conditional use permit application. The staff analysis determined that the proposed cemetery use met the necessary criteria and requirements for conditional use approval.

The board ultimately approved the conditional use appeal, allowing Masjid Bilal to proceed with their cemetery project under the terms and conditions established through the permit process.

## Conditional Use Appeal by Fairhaven Baptist Church

[timestamp: 00:00]

Fairhaven Baptist Church submitted a conditional use appeal under agenda item III.C.7, seeking to amend a previously approved conditional use permit. Jonathan East served as the key speaker for this agenda item.

The church's application requested modifications to their existing conditional use authorization, though the specific details of the proposed amendments were not elaborated upon during the meeting proceedings.

Rather than proceeding with discussion or deliberation on the merits of the church's conditional use appeal, the item was postponed. No debate occurred regarding the substance of the application, and no concerns were raised by board members or the public during this brief agenda item.

The postponement means the conditional use appeal will be rescheduled for consideration at a future meeting, allowing additional time for review of the application materials or resolution of any preliminary issues that may have prevented immediate consideration of the request.

**Outcome:** The conditional use appeal by Fairhaven Baptist Church was postponed to a future meeting date.

## Revocation Hearing for Aaron Jamison/Marvin Feldpausch

[timestamp: 00:00]

The Board of Adjustment conducted a revocation hearing for agenda item III.D.1 regarding a conditional use permit held by Aaron Jamison and Marvin Feldpausch to operate a plant nursery and commercial greenhouse facility.

Key speakers during the hearing included Charles Martin, Mary Diane Hanna, Walt Gaffield, Wayne Mitchell, and Dr. Lisa Gannoe. The board reviewed the circumstances and conditions surrounding the conditional use permit that had been previously granted for the nursery and greenhouse operations.

The hearing followed standard revocation procedures, allowing for presentation of evidence and testimony regarding whether the permit holders had complied with the terms and conditions of their conditional use approval. The board examined the specific requirements that were established when the original permit was issued and evaluated whether those conditions had been met.

After reviewing the evidence and hearing from the speakers, the Board of Adjustment voted to revoke the conditional use permit for Aaron Jamison and Marvin Feldpausch. This decision effectively terminates their authorization to operate the plant nursery and commercial greenhouse under the previously granted conditional use permit.

The revocation represents a significant enforcement action by the Board of Adjustment, indicating that the permit holders failed to maintain compliance with the conditions that were required for their operation. The specific violations or non-compliance issues that led to the revocation were addressed during the hearing process.

---

## Decisions

- **Motion** — passed (6-0): Approval of minutes from March 31, 2017 meeting
- **PLN-BOA-17-00013** — postponed (6-0): Postponement of variance request by Jake Riordan
- **PLN-BOA-17-00023** — postponed (6-0): Postponement of conditional use permit request by Fairhaven Baptist Church
- **PLN-BOA-17-00021** — postponed (5-0): Postponement of conditional use permit request by Newton's Attic, LLC
- **PLN-BOA-17-00016** — postponed (5-0): Continuation of conditional use permit request by Immanuel Baptist Church
- **PLN-BOA-17-00020** — passed (6-0): Approval of conditional use permit for Lexington Primitive Baptist Church
- **PLN-BOA-17-00022** — passed (6-0): Approval of conditional use permit for Masjid Bilal
- **PLN-BOA-17-00015** — failed (0-6): Disapproval of conditional use permit for Southern Oak, LLC
- **CV-2006-20** — passed (4-1): Revocation of conditional use permit for Aaron Jamison/Marvin Feldpausch

---

## Full transcript

it was 1:31 when I showed up. Mr. Glover could have given me

a 30 second grace period. But, either way we will have,

I'm going to read the agenda for

the board of adjustment meeting

April 28, 2017. The first order of business are

the approval of the minutes. Has everyone had a chance to

look at those?

I know Mr. Clark had one revision.

Was that incorporated, Mr. Clark?

My understanding is you had, was

it this month you sent tammy an

email about a correction? Oh on the agenda.

If everybody has had a chance to look at the minutes.

>> I have a question about the

action at the end of the last

item on the revocation where it

was voted 4-1 to schedule

revocation hearing but you were recused?

>> actually no, I was not recused on that one.

That is the one where Mr. Forester and Mr. Glover are recused.

I was the one opposed. >> so we might want to make a

correction to that since the

minutes say you were recused. Yes.

Please note that I did not

recuse myself from that. I was the one opposed to having

the revocation hearing today.

Any other comments? Then the chair would entertain a motion to approve the minutes as

so amended.

>> I move that we approve the

minutes from March 2017.

>> I have a motion from myself

mire do I have a second. >> second.

all those in favor say aye.

Any opposed?

All in favor, none opposed. Thank you very much.

Now I move on to working through the agenda.

Before I do that, are there any postponements or withdrawals today?

If you just want to stand behind Mr. Nichols and we'll hear

yours. >> good evening.

Nick nicholson here on two matters. Would I like to request a

two-month postponement for the first variance on your agenda

for jake reardone.

We ask to postpone to the June

board of adjustment meeting.

>> staff, what is the date of

our June and secondly is there

anyone in the crowd who is here

on this matter? I believe there was on the June

of last month. This would be a second postponement.

We'll hear this on the docket on June 30.

Anyone so no one is in the crowd. The chair will entertain a

motion to postpone this matter

to our June 30 meeting.

Do I have a motion? >> Mr. Chair I motion we

approve the two-month

postponement for jake reareddan

for the June 30 meeting. I have a motion.

Do I have a second. Second.

All those in favor say aye. Opposed?

So we have all in favor, none opposed. Thank you, sir and your second

matter. >> I'm going to withdraw the

first conditional use item that

is on your agenda for darby dan farm.

>> the next item is pln-boa-17-12.

He would like us to withdraw the application. Is there anyone in the audience

for that matter? Does the board have any questions?

Hearing none I would entertain a motion.

I don't think you need a motion. Perfect. >> thank you Mr. Glover.

>> have a good one.

>> thank you for lightning our docket today.

Is anyone else here, sir?

Put your name on the record.

>> craig muzak for the revocation hearing.

>> okay.

We are going to have that one at the very end of the docket.

>> okay. We would like to request a

postponement on that in order to

get our docs gathered up and counsel with our legal team

preparation for that. >> I would suggest what I would

like to do is normally we would hear postponements and

withdrawals. This has been a pretty

contentious issue in front of us for what 18 months now.

So I would like to go ahead and

with hold us contemplating a postponement until the end of

the docket when we call for the revocations. >> okay.

>> thank you, sir.

Any other postponements or withdrawals?

We have one more.

>> jofn than subpoena niese

jonathan niese. Pln-boa-17-00023 fair haven

baptist church.

I would like to request a postponement on this.

We need to redesign and change some of our things around.

>> we understand. Is there anyone... This is on

page 3 of the agenda pln-boo-17-

23.

Do the board members have any questions?

>> how long do you need the

postponement? >> until the next meeting would

be perfectly fine to have that redrawn. >> I think our meeting is in

three weeks. >> May 19.

So our next meeting on May 19 so

we would be looking for a motion

to postpone to the May 19 meeting. >> so moved.

>> first and seconded all those

in favor please say aye. Any opposed?

The motion carries. All in favor and none opposed.

>> thank you very much. >> so we have gone through

everyone who wants to withdraw

or postponement.

I believe matters one b and c have been handled.

What I would like to do next is

to, I guess let me see here. On the rest of the matters that

are going to be heard today if there is anyone in the audience

who is going to be speaking, I would want to give testimony, I

ask that you stand so I can

swear you in. Please raise your right hand.

Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and

nothing but the truth? Thank you.

So I actually for got do that last month.

I was embarrassed by it. So what I would like to do next

is go through the matters that

are not being withdrawn or postpone which brings us to the

first item on the list is pln-boa-17-15 southern oak llc.

Is the applicant present. >> we are.

>> is there anyone opposed to this matter? Thank you.

I would ask, is there any reason for you to meet in the hallway

to try to work out a settlement? >> we are happy to.

Then I will not make you guys do that.

The next matter we have is pln-boa-17-16 emanuel baptist

church I believe this was a postponement from last month.

Is the applicant present. >> we are.

>> is there anyone opposed?

Well right now we live on glendover road.

We had a traffic safety concern

that a prior use restriction against a left turn lane from

the campus was not being enforced creating a dangerous situation.

On that basis we objected but

since met with greg and the director for campus safety.

They've assured us they're going

to protect against any improper turns going forward and so there

is no longer a basis for my

objection and I formally withdraw. >> thank you very much.

I will say what we will do is go

through the remaining few items

and then you guys will likely be

the first up on the docket.

Next is the lexington primitive baptist church.

Is there anyone here to speak on this matter.

We will have you heard second.

The next item is pln-boa-17-21. Newton's attic llc I believe

this was for a post moment.

Is the applicant present?

I think this was Mr. Turner. >> they've agreed to the postponement and were supposed

to be here to say such but I

guess they're not here. >> well, did they say whether

they wanted to postpone to the 19th? >> I believe so. >> okay. Well on this one, and also on the emanuel baptist church one I

will be recusing myself from

hearing both of those. So let's circle back around

after I go it through the rest.

We'll bring this one first up on the docket. I'll stand and recuse myself and

the board can decide whether

they want to move it to the

19th the next item on the

docket is pln-boa-17-22, majid majidbalal. The applicant is present.

Is anyone here to speak on this

matter today? Is there anyone opposed?

Okay we'll mark this as not

opposed sand so I would like to,

and then of course we have the revocation hearing at the end.

What I would like to do is if the board will indulge me, I'd

like to go ahead and allow the

board to speak to the newton's

attic postponement. I will be recusing myself.

I filled out the form for this matter so Mr. Glover, I turn

the gavel over to you for the

next few minutes.

>> is the applicant for newton's attic present?

Nobody in the audience

representing them? Okay.

Well they've asked to, how do we get that request for

postponement?

We got that from staff. Staff recommended postponement

and the applicant requested postponement. They're looking at some other

options including a possible text amendment or zone change

for the property. So they May or May not be coming

back to us. >> well, I think for

postponement we need a motion.

So I will entertain a motion

from the board.

>> I'll move for most poament of

pln-boa-17-21 newton's attic. Do I.

>> do I have a second? >> is that for the next meeting?

>> the May meeting if necessary.

Motion made and seconded to postpone it until the May

meeting, which is in three weeks

I'm given to understand so all those in favor say aye.

Any opposed?

Motion to postpone carries.

Mr. Gross back to you. >> unfortunately Mr. Glover

this will not last long.

The next item up that is

unopposed is emanuel baptist

church pln-boa-17-16. I will hand the gavel back to you.

>> what happened to southern oak?

I wasn't paying attention or... >> that one is to be heard.

There is opposition. >> okay.

Fair enough.

Put that in a different pile.

Next item on the agenda is I manual baptist church.

If you would come forward

please.

>> breg thornton for immanuel

baptist church. We have been handed some reading material.

If you don't mind having a seat for a moment while we pass this

out and look at it and then

we'll proceed with it.

It has been a quiet meeting so

far.More thornton, back back and

tell us about this application.

>> I'm going to led ron edmondson who is the pastor talk

about it and the design of the

parking lot or the storm water

management.

>> tell me your name sir.

>> ron edmondson pastor of the immanuel baptist church.

I want to thank you for your time. I realize these issues are never

easy and we appreciate your

volunteer service to our community. In the last three years or in

the last five years, rather, our

church has doubled in attendance and much of that has happened in

the last three years. In the last three years, as a

result, parking has become

tremendous problem on sundays

whereas in any given sunday, including this past sunday we

have zero paved parking spaces remaining. We've heard numerous stories of

people driving through the

parking lot and leaving because there is no place to park. We think paving will help in several ways. first it will allow us to continue to grow. But also it will be a more

pleasing alternative to our facilities which we try to keep

in good order for the community and for ourselves.

We have over 200 people parking

on grass every single week.

It's not good for our gas and

it's also not very pleasing esthetically.

Our well landscaped lawns are

turning into brown and muddy patches of land.

We want do this the right and

most efficient way. While all this is an issue where

it should matter most we believe to the community is that we are

not simply building a social club for our members.

We are a church fully in this community.

We partnered with the city and others recently to open the

reading room in the black williams center.

Most of the things we do in the community we don't put our name on.

We are in the local schools every single day.

We are major supporters of more than half a dozen of the local

helping ministries in our community. We've made a decision as a

church not to compete against those already established but to

come alongside of them with

money and with people resources. In the past two years since we

started estimating we believe

these are low estimates, we've

sent over 700 people and over 7,000 hours of volunteer service

into our community. And hundreds of thousands of

dollars have been reinvested

back into our community. We believe our continued growth

is not only in our best interest but is a blessing to the community.

We have met with anyone willing to listen to work out their

concerns and thankfully I think

we have been able to. I thank Mr. Hawkman for doing

so graciously today. But today I ask for your favor

in granting this additional parking. It would really be a blessing to

us as a church. Thank you very much.

>> thank you, Mr. Edmonds. While you are at the podium.

What is the name of the church

immediately to your south?

>> help me with direction south tates creek christian.

>> thank you, sir. >> this is susan, she owns the

property where the subway and the all state is located.

I think she wants to talk about, I'm not sure. >> are you in favor of the

proposal, ma'am?

>> I'm in favor as long as the drainage, the water drainage

when they black top all that land because I own the

commercial property right next

to it, and I do not want their

water or any of my water changed

and increased possibility of flooding. That's all I'm concerned.

I don't have anything against having a parking lot there.

I just want to be sure that I

don't increase water drainage not on my property.

>> and I notice from one of the

conditions recommendations for

approval from the staff made condition is condition number 3.

updated storm water management plan to be implemented as part

of the parking lot expansion which will be subject to the

acceptance of the division of engineering and shall address

existing drainage problems in the immediate area as required

by the adopted engineering manual. So...

>> I just want to go on record that, I'm fine with it as long

as that comes about and it really does not increase water

on my property.

>> well, and quite frankly the next step should the board

approve the application would be

to ensure that the storm water management plan is implemented

and you might follow that along

as it goes if this is passed or approved by the board.

Because there are certain things that are in the board's control

and some are not.

Some we pass along to the experts. We are not.

So thank you, ma'am for your

concern. >> I think that's it if there is

no opposition to this unless there are any questions.

>> I do have a question, as a

matter of fact, because of the concern that was raised by the

last speaker and I didn't get

your name, ma'am.

The last speaker that was at the podium.

What is your name?

>> susan... >> I have a question about the

storm water management plan

because it seems to me just from

looking at the site plan that basically what you are proposing

to do is to pave every space

available on the entire property

owned by the church and I

understand that.

I'm concerned about the entire paving of the property with the

exception of some of the backside.

I'm just not sure that I can

support it quite frankly because

of the. How can you persuade me otherwise.

>> I'm going to let them address

that but I'll address her concerns first.

I have photographs of the property.

That property is at an elevation than our current parking lots

and where the future parking

lots will be and actually, if

you.

She is using currently drainage pipe to drain off of her

property to the church property

which is at a lower elevation I think she May have a drainage

issue in her basement, I'm not sure. We are at a lower area on the

property and you can't see that very good.

It's not focusing. Draining because it's a lower

area and there is better drainage already on the property.

I'm going to let Mr. Eastwitch address the water control for

the entire site and ahow that is going to be handled and the

green space and how we are going to handle the landscaping.

>> before we leave her property, I notice that she has come back

up to the podium. While we are on this issue.

>> I just have a photo showing

the lay of the land. >> somebody would have to orient

me. >> that's the building the subway is in.

I think there is an allstate insurance building in there.

You can see the speedway to the right part of the corner.

>> this is the corner of taitsz

creek and the north entrance? >> looking from the mount taker

road expert from the church

property. >> did you want to say something

about this? >> yes, I do.

The only drains I have in my basement is due to the front

corner there, that back corner

because there is old crud stuff

concrete block, etc. There and

it is not a flood thing as water

starts moisture comes through there.

I don't have a flooding problem,

really a water problem in my basement.

You can check it out if you want to. >> okay.

>> can I just clarify, ma'am.

You own both those properties.

210 and old mount taker and it

looks like 2960 tates creek. >> I don't object to the parking

lot as long as the water at the bottom part doesn't come into my

property and my water gets to flow as it is right now.

Thank you.

>> 2910 is speedway.

>> tell us your name. >> fred eastwitch with esi,

professional engineer.

Our plan, I can't put it all on the screen at one time.

The proposed parking that is

going to be in the existing ball

field area at the back of the property, we are utilizing the

flat surface on the area and the

rest it slopes off to the neighbors adjoining us and that

area we are going have to use

underground detention for detention and water quality and

let the water drain from the

surface into the underground

detention and then drain out at the normal discharge.

It will not cause problems downstream.

On the parking lots next to old mount taber road, as you can

see, they look like the existing parking lots by the church.

We have about 15-18 feet between the parking lots.

What we are planning to do on

that is, if you put the next photo up.

In between the parking lots,

turn it upside down. Reverse it.

There you go.

This is from the urban county engineering manuals on one of

the prescribed ways of doing storm water control and

detention. And what this is a bioinfiltration swell so between

the parking lots we'll have this bioretention that water will

drain from the upper parking lot

into this area, it will be stored, drain into the ground

and stored and pick up in a pipe under needs it that will drain

to the existing 48-inch storm pipe that runs through the property.

So everything will be going from

the parking lots down to tates creek.

>> and this is proposed for both areas?

>> no, this is just proposed

along the parking lot as long mount taber roads.

Then we have the grace.

we will have rock filled areas. >> I like this system.

Just speaking specially, myself

because it works.

The other, the rest of the property, the rest of the

parking area on the church property, doesn't have this

proposed system, does it or does it?

>> I did most of the parking lots there in my career.

We have something similar to that in existing parking lots.

If you look at the, if you put

the photo back up, sir.

If you see the existing parking

lots have a grass islands in them.

Those were designed by a long time ago and what they have is

the water drains into those,

they drain through a peforated

pipe into inlets that discharge

in and down into the 48-inch pipe.

That scheme was used a long time

ago by me to help the storm

water control when we built the

parking lots. >> thank you.

Anything further. >> no, sir.

>> any questions.

>> one thing I do want to say again to answer the question

about the property of tates creek and old mount taber, all

of our water is going to drain to the inswells and drain away

from her property.

She has extended her downspouts

through plastic pipes and dumped dischargeses on our property

right at the property line which

this is going to be causing soil erosion problems for us but

we'll work with her on that to deal with that.

But we will not be putting water uphill on to her.

We will be directing the water

away from her and from that

corner to the creek.

>> thank you. >> Mr. Clark.

>> thank you, Mr. Chair.

>> let me say I appreciate what immanuel chump does and I

understand your goals and I

appreciate what is going on there.

It's quite amazing, actually.

On the other hand, and I'm not

opposed to the mount mount take side

of this -- the mount taber side of this development but I have

some concern about the opposite corner.

I know the land drains down

towards the creek and there is

no... And no matter what you do

in terms of storm deflection, storm water deflection, I don't

see how an asphalt parking lot

is going to, you are going to do anything to keep that.

I also am concerned about the edges of the property, which I

think if I'm not mistaken, there

is some very steep slopes there

that could be quite dangerous if

it's not properly fenced or

whatever. I would be hesitant to approve

this without some fairly

concrete understanding of how

that is going to work. I would a that given the

proposal as it is now, I would

have a hard time approving this.

I would also say to pastor

edmonds that obviously the

parking on the grass is hard on

the grass but asphalt is even

worse. >> thank you, Mr. Clark.

I echo that concern.

I think immanuel baptist does

great work but I'm just not sure

that the way to solve an attendance overflow is to pave

every inch of the property. And I think there could be other

ways that the church could accommodate burgeoning crowds,

perhaps having more and smaller services or something like that,

but I'm not ready to support this application even though I

think the church is doing great work.

I see this as a first response

to increased crowds.

But I don't think it's adequate.

I don't like the idea of paving

over the entire property even with what has been described as

adequate storm water management plans.

So greg, what have you got to say? >> let me just say that we met

with the neighbors with council member farmer, had a great

meeting, worked out some

compromises to make them happy. With regards to lighting and

some other issues. And screening.

The church is willing though at this point to go forward with

the two mount taber lots if that is granted under the

restrictions and conditions put forward. We would request that three

years be given to us to complete the fundraising and to build the

lots. And if we still need parking

we'll come back and address the other issue in the back corner

at a later time.

>> so your proposal is to modify

the application to exclude the southeast corner...

>> exactly. >> the ball field you have been

addressing that you have concerns about.

>> that might satisfy Mr. Clark.

It doesn't satisfy me.

I think this is a first step,

but I don't think it's an adequate step as far as getting

my vote for it, so.

>> let me just point out, Mr. Glover, that we are

required to put in internal

landscapeing I think it's 4700 square feet and we are proposing

to put in 6800 square feet of landscaping.

So we want to make the space look better than it looks now.

When you pass by it right now you are seeing a dirt spot where

the traffic has been running on it. With the screening and

adequately landscaping this area, it is going to look better

and more pleasing than it looks now. That plant material is going to

contribute a lot more to the environment than we are getting

currently out of grass that's

being mashed down every sunday. >> I understand that.

And I'm not advocating... I'm

not advocating for another kind

of plan, and I'm sure that the church could do all kinds of

things to make the area look great.

I think but I think the

destruction of green space in

the name of parking on this one piece of property is more than I

can support. You May have a majority of the

remaining members of the board,

but not my vote.

So any other comments?

Any questions by any board

members to the applicant or his attorney? "attorney?

>> I would just like to make a

comment that I agree with you,

Mr. Glover, about looking at

alternatives before we go

forward with more parking at the site. I think that there are some

letters that have put forth some, a couple good ideas.

One of which is using renting parking space at existing

parking lots and having buses

and busing your... >> we are already doing that and

we are still having 200 cars

parking on the grass.

We are running buses and shuttle

buses from the landsdown area. >> how many services do you have?

Is this strictly a problem on sunday?

Or is it other days of the week? >> absolutely the problem is

9:00 sunday morning until 12:30 on sunday.

>> is that one service. >> no. That's two services.

But the issue is there are other activities going on in the

church other than the 1700 or so

that can be seated in the sanctuary, which the

requirements for parking only address that.

There is other square footage in the building being used at the

same period of time. That's why we have the parking

issues.

So you have children in one area.

You have babies and nursery in the other, adults in other areas

of the church.

The entire building is being used sunday mornings.

That's why the parking issue is so great.

>> there is, the proposal as I

understand it from the staff report, it proposed to increase

the total parking capacity to 1,064 parking spaces.

>> we just adjusted that down. Do you know how many.

>> minus the corner.

>> minus the corner.

And I understand that.

Tates creek has become basically church street as we've seen for

the past generation or so. And there is a price to be paid

for success and one of the

prices is additional traffic,

sometimes not enough place to

put every car that wants to come

into your space. So I do understand the problem.

I think this is not an unreasonable first approach how

to solve the problem. I don't think it's the best approach.

>> I just wanted to mention the

first approach idea. We've looked at a lot of

approaches, believe me. We really have.

This is not a first approach by any means at all.

We just celebrated in March, 50

years of television with lex 18 which happens to be at 11:00

A.M.

As long as we are pushing our

service for growth, 11:00 A.M. Is a prime spot for parking.

We are hoping if we approve this it is still a problem.

Honestly we want to continue to grow.

We are looking at lots of alternatives for additional services.

They're not going to... Whatever

we've tried to do, we've done saturday night services and

different times.

It has not eliminated the 11:00 service sunday morning.

We think that's a direct correlation with being on television but also with the

long history of that service being at that time.

That's a prime time for church visitors to attend.

>> yeah, I understand that.

And like I say, immanuel baptist

does so many great things that

my lack of support is not, should not be viewed as a

reflection of the good work the church is doing.

It's just that I think that this

is not the way to solve the problem.

I don't know what is quite frankly. I'm not a city planner, engineer

or architect or landscape

architect or anything like that.

So you just don't have my vote. That's all. >> sir.

As an engineer and being problem solvers as everybody in this

room, there is an alternative to

asphalt paving, concrete paving.

It's called grass pave. That's a durable surface that

you put in.

It has grass that grows on it.

There are several different types.

It's for temporary parking and so when you look at it, it looks

like a grass field. You do have some white lines on

it to designate the spots and

with that grass pave, the field,

the areas are still 100% pervious so you don't have to

have detention water quality because it's a grass field but

it gives support for cars to

park on it and it looks nice and

it will keep the nice grass long, the effect that we have

and these parking spaces are the pastor was saying is mainly

during sundays, so it would be,

you know, during sunday events and would be utilizing instead

of parking where we are now and having a problem with that.

We would have a durable surface we could park on that would

look, it would be the runoff from the area would still be the

same as it is now. We wouldn't have detention or

water quality because it's

natural conditions.

It's just reinforced to hold trucks.

Grass paves and areas around town home areas where fire

trucks are supposed to go behind

the town homes and it looks nice

and they can, it would work very well.

They are expensive but...

>> not as durable as asphalt. >> this is grass pave.

Concrete pavers I've used at the housing authority, they're

concrete and they're more durable than asphalt.

They're not clay.

They're actually hard concrete but I'm not talking about pavers.

I'm talking about grass pave.

It's a fiber mesh system and you

can also have the type that are concrete interwoven blocks that

you have that you can drive on.

There are numerous different types that the manufacturers

have.

As a matter of fact I just put

grass pave water in over a storm water project for the government

for maintenance of a water quality unit and it's grass and

looks good and holds the back truck and everything else.

What that would do is provide, keep your grass base, give the

church availability of durable

surface for parking and go from

there. >> Mr. Clark...

>> let me make a comment about that as a matter of fact.

I think it's important that

everybody understand that we are

not in a position to make recommendations to how to solve your problem and I understand

that.

I think that's important. But this is a really good idea

and I think any time we can come

up with a perve us paving for a situation like this would be

very valuable.

But I'm not sure we can we can accept that with this proposal

and I just wonder if it would be

appropriate to come back with a new proposal...

>> I'm not sure we can afford it. >> that could put all this in

place and we would have a better

idea of what is being suggested. >> and I agree with Mr. Clark.

I think perhaps that with a

little more time, either three weeks or seven weeks, whatever

the amount of time is, those would answer some of the

concerns of the board members if

you come back. How would that suit you?

>> that would be fine. Three weeks would be fine.

>> let me add that I do think you have a problem and I

understand that and I want to

help you solve that problem if I can.

I'm going to leave it at that.

>> you've heard the concern of the board.

what I would like to do is also

give you copies of the correspondence that we've

received from your neighbors

that talk about this. >> I've got copies.

And I think those folks are the folks we've worked with.

>> and they May be. But in hearing from some of the

board members today maybe if we

continue this hearing until the

May hearing, you May hear a different...

>> and I think if the board will

remember the folks that were opposed were, they filed their

issues before the last meeting when we were also looking at

that piece of property on the

other side of tates creek road. >> yes, some of the emails that

we saw today were people that were concerned about the other

side of tates creek and we discounted those because you all

had withdrawn the application to include parking on the other

side of tates creek so we understand that.

So I'll entertain a motion to

continue this 17-16 immanuel

baptist church until the May

meeting.

>> I'll make a motion to continue. >> thank you.

And it has been seconded. We'll continue this until the

May meeting and see you then.

>> thank you. >> thank you, Mr. Glover for

your taking on those last two matters for me.

The next item we have that is

unon unopposed is pln-boa-17-20 lexington primitive baptist church.

If the applicant would approach

the podium and please put your

name on the record for us.

>> thank you, my name is allan isal. I'm the architect for this

project as well as being a deacon of the lexington

primitive baptist church.

>> the staff has recommended

approval based upon the conditions set forth in the report.

There are three of them. Have you read those conditions?

>> yes. >> and would you be in agreement

to that this approval be subject to the conditions?

>> yes, we are. >> okay.

I would ask the board do you

have any questions regarding the

application for him? The chair notes there are no

questions.

So I will entertain a motion.

>> Mr. Chair I move we approve pln-boa-17-20 primitive baptist

church request for a conditional use permit to expand the

existing church in a planned

neighborhood residential zone at 4574 old schoolhouse lane for

the reasons recommended by staff in its report and subject to the

three conditions listed. >> I have a motion to the floor

by Mr. Glover.

Do I have a second?

>> what do you have,

Mr. Clark?

>> I believe that was corrected on one iteration of the agenda.

It is 20 is the correct, yes.

>> okay so we still have a motion pending.

Do I have a second? >> second.

>> I have a second from Mr. Needham.

All those in favor please say aye.

Opposed?

Motion carries unanimously. Thank you and good luck with

your project.

The next item on the agenda that

had no opposition is

pln-boa-17-22, majid bilal.

Would the applicant approach the podium and introduce yourself for the record?

>> my name is kevin pally, I'm a local attorney here.

I'm here with masjid bilal. We're fine with the three

conditions that are placed to

build the first islamic cemetery and their intention to use two

and a half acres at this time for burial services.

The mosque presently has about

350 parishioners. Registered members.

They're very small.

They have a free clinic one day a month and they also have a

soup kitchen and they also provide, share space with the

share center at their old property that they rent for a

dollar a year so the share center can provide community services as well.

They want to have their own cemetery as you can see by the

plan and by the staff recommendations they have recommended it.

Any questions, please. >> thank you.

I believe on the record we have

the applicant is agreeable to the conditions.

Does the board have questions

for the applicant? >> who else wanted to speak

here?

>> he is Dr. Rafani, professor

of economics from translyvania, the actual representative.

i'm the attorney.

>> yes, I'm on the board of trustees.

>> I was, I don't think I need

to recuse myself but I was one

of your students back at transy.

>> thank you for recognizing.

>> I'm in favor not because I was your student because it was

a rough class actually. I'm in favor because there is no

opposition and I think you put

together a good plan. >> I have just an observation.

I don't recall any other

cemetery applications in my

tenure. How often do these occur? Just curious? >> this is the first muslim one

here in lexington. >> it's not very often in my

research for the staff report for this.

The only other cases I saw were

expansions at electrics ipghtd cemetery. Thanks like that.

But other than that there have

not been a lot. >> I was curious.

I didn't recall any in my memory.

So okay. >> any other questions from the

board or the applicant?

Hearing none I would ask... I would entertain a motion.

>> I'll move that we approve pln-boa-17-22 request for

conditional use permit to

establish a cemetery in the

agricultural rural ar zone at

3227 georgetown road based on

staff's two recommendations and subject to the three conditions

outlined by staff. >> thank you Mr. Needham.

I have a first. Do I have a second?

>> I'll second Mr. Needham's motion.

>> second from Mr. Forester. All those in favor please say

aye. Opposed?

That was unanimous.

Good luck with the project. >> thank you very much for your time.

>> thank you.

That finishes the unopposed items for today.

Which brings us back to the

first item or the second item on

the agenda which would have been

pln-boa-17-15, southern oak llc.

This is opposed so I would ask

if the staff has recommended disapproval.

Are you prepared to in that case I'll have staff come forward and

after that we'll have the applicant and then the opposition.

Thank you. >> I have some letters of

opposition that staff provided.

Do you want to give us time to review those before staff steps

in. >> that is probably the best bet.

We'll take a couple minutes to review the lerts that have been

presented to us by the staff.

FdLb_"ze~q_+[At7no carrierringconnect

q

concerns regarding that study and they're still in support of

the initial findings in the

staff report.

Primarily concerns regarding

traffic and trip counts for a coffee shop versus other types

of uses with the drive-thru. And any elevated noise

associated with the drive-thru. >> I'll ask traffic to comment

after the board lets me know.

do they have any questions

currently?

>> actually I had a question.

Obviously the opposition to a drive-thru is very apparent.

What is the opposition?

It seems like there is a big concern with the increased

traffic but with taking a left

as opposed to a right or both ways. Was that discussed?

>> that was certainly a concern, given the general traffic

situation of the area.

It would maybe be more of a problem certain times of the day

than others, of course.

But that's definitely a concern.

>> so if I understand correctly,

if there was a drive-thru, you

could, the way this is, well

it's obviously not... It has been disapproved but you could

take a left out of this location currently as the way it is

proposed? >> yes.

I think that in their traffic study they May have suggested

some other options for changing

that around a little bit and I'll probably, that May be

something that jimmy or casey

can talk about a little bit. >> anymore questions before I

let her sit down? Okay then casey, if you could at

least let us know a little bit

about the concerns with the

traffic study before the applicant. >> sure.

I'll address traffic's concerns

with the proposal and then

specific stuff I'm going to let

jimmy emmons with the transportation planning touch on

the study that was submitted.

For the site plan that was

submitted, the concerns are the

left turning movements for

vehicles traveling outbound richmond road turning into the

site and also for vehicles

exiting the site, trying to turn

left outbound. It's mainly, if you are on a

site trying to turn out in the peak times you are just not

going to get that ample gap to be able to make the movement and

pull out.

And then so that's kind of from their site my concerns and then

just the main street concerns,

it would be the stacking and the

backing up of traffic waiting

behind those vehicles, turning into their site and the upstream

effects of that either way.

I think in your morning peak,

vehicles traveling inbound, I know that the traffic patterns

are usually that there are two

inbound lanes and the left inbound lane typically people

are in that lane trying to make

left movements to go toward campus so they hold to the right

lane to go through downtown and then you are going to have

people turning right into their sight and that's going cause

delays also on your inbound.

>> the property next door uphill

southbound or going out of town raymond james investment brokers

and ann greely's design shop are the two I would call right next

door, they share a driveway, I

think and from which traffic

goes both in and out. How is this going to be any

different?

>> the volume of traffic.

The number of trips generated to the site.

The drive-thru specifically any

time we have drive-thru facilities there are larger trip

generations associated with that.

More cars going in and out. >> let me ask you what you are

not concerned about because it looks like and I'm concerned about traffic as well.

It looks like from the drawing

we have on the plans that there

is one entrance and that

entrance is shared by an exit, then there is a separate exit

which is an exit only.

Am I reading that correctly. >> yes.

That's the applicant's proposal.

Traffic had recommended

consolidating and potentially

having one shared entrance exit

or having an isolated one entrance one exit so there were

some recommendations to the site

plan but ultimately the

recommendation is disapproval of the application, so we didn't

really get far into editing the

site plan and specifics. >> let me nibble away at the

objections so we have a full understanding what it is.

And I'm going to ask you what if

questions based on that.

If the out of town curb cut were

simply an entrance and the one towards town were simply an

exit, would that change your opinion about it.

>> it wouldn't change my opinion

on having the same traffic concerns.

It would limit the number of conflict points or the number of

locations where we have vehicles

that will cross each other basically, you know, you are

separating them out and that's, that would be my preferred

option but it doesn't make the

plan approvallable if that makes sense. >> sure.

What if they cut out the drive-thru?

>> I think that would change

traffic's opinion because of the flow of traffic.

I mean ultimately the use of the site, I don't mind the use of

the site it's mainly the trip generations associated with the

drive-thru. >> sure. Okay.

So if, just to make sure I understand what you are saying.

If there was a single entrance and single exit that were

separate and no drive-thru traffic would probably change

its mind about that? Some sure.

I don't want to have to design it here but there are

improvements to the plan that

would ease traffic's concerns.

>> to clarify the application,

the drive-thru is the portion that requires the conditional use.

If they weren't going have a

drive-thru they wouldn't be here

today. >> okay. Thank you for that

clarification.

>> anymore questions.

Hearing none Mr. Emmons, good to see you again. Welcome back.

>> thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the board.

For the record I'm jimmy emmons, senior transportation planner in

the division of planning. First of all I do want to get on

the record, the applicant did

submit a traffic impact study with this.

It was submitted yesterday.

it is a voluntary study traffic impact study is not required

with this type of application.

But to kind of give you an idea,

traffic studies are very complicated.

They typically with where they

are required are with zone changes and with that we would

normally have a scoping meeting before it was ever even done.

We would have about six weeks of review that the staff and the

applicant can go back and forth.

So we've not had any of those luxuries with this.

Essentially the staff has been able to read the traffic study

that was submitted and we do have some concerns that we

wanted to bring up today and

I've not had a chance to go back and forth with the applicant on

any of these concerns. The traffic study that was

submitted does, one of the first

things it focuses on, it looks a

trip generation for the proposed

use and they compare it to a lot

of other, some, not a lot but some other uses they theorize

could go on this site without the need for a board after

justment approval and they came to the conclusion that there are

other uses that would generate more traffic than what they're

proposing. However staff is a little bit

concerned on that in that it is

not an apples to apples comparison to what they

submitted because for instance the coffee shop with the

drive-thru they're looking at is about 2300 square feet compared

to a 5,000 square foot fast food

restaurant without a drive-thru.

So if you were to take and double or half, however you want

to do the math, still with the

uses that they are proposing,

sort of a per square foot if you will, this is still a high

traffic generating use coffee

shop with a drif through.

Another thing that the I.T.E. Manual, the institute of

transportation engineers, those

widely accepted as the standard

for which all traffic studies

and traffic data is measured by,

they also recognized that coffee shops generate a different type

of traffic and that that traffic

comes in at different times of

the day, so it gets its own category in their studies and

trip generation: it is

different than those other types

of uses that could go on the site.

With any traffic study, data is data, traffic counts and things

of that nature and the math that goes behind these studies is

actually fairly... There are some things that you can do but

it's fairly well formulated as

far as that, the biggest things

that we need to look at when we

are reviewing traffic impact

studies are the assumptions that go into the traffic study to

begin with and the conclusions

that they get out of it. Those are really kind of how you

set up the study can have a big

impact on what those conclusions are. The staff in this particular

instance, if this were a full

traffic impact study for a zone

change, it would have looked at

many more entrances, all that

they limited their study to was

just the two entrance points to

this one site. It did not look at the impact

this use would have on any of

the signalized intersections or any of the street intersections

or anything of that nature,

still looking at this site, the

staff is still concerned about

those exact left turn movements

expressed the traffic

engineering's operational concerns about.

Ultimately with that, the

applicant knowing that that the

left hand turn movement are of a

major concern with this application, they did recommend

in their conclusions some sort

of armor or signage restricting

the left turn movements either completely or during peak hour

traffic into this site and out of this site.

The staff feels that that is not

a very realistic, not a very realistic solution that you

would put a big pole arm for this one particular site to

limit movements into and out of the site.

We just don't think that

resulting conclusion really has

much real world application in

this particular instance.

In the end, as she said, the

staff does, we have had very

little time but what we have seen we have some concerns we

wanted to raise and ultimately

we still support from a transportation standpoint we

support the recommendation on this board of adjustment case.

If you have questions for me I would be happy to answer them

knowing these are complicated things.

I brought the whole volumes of I.T.E. Manuals with me and if

you need me to pull out some of those things I can but I'm not

going to go there unless you ask. >> Mr. Emmons, if you could,

real quickly for the record,

clarify the differences between

what your department does and

what traffic does, just for the record? Transportation planning looks at

the bigger picture of where traffic is going.

We are the primary responsible party for reviewing traffic

impact studies. Whenever tip their the purpose

of a traffic impact study is see if the development is going to

have an effect on the

surrounding road ways and if it

is going to have an effect, is

there anything that can be done

to mitigate those potential

negative effects. So it's transportation planning

and traffic studies really look

at the planning, the what ifs on transportation aspects.

Traffic engineering, they often

they're looking at a lot of the detailed movements, the turning

mosms, the signal timing, those types of things.

We work very well together.

We do look at different aspects

of traffic movement though.

>> and then you mention also

that you received the study yesterday. Was that your department

received it or the staff and planning and zoning received it

yesterday.

>> I believe it was emailed to us yesterday for the entire

division of planning on that. So I just say that because I

needed to make sure I tell you the level of, you know, the

level of review.

>> I understand. Mr. Marks. >> we just got it yesterday as well.

>> thank you, sir.

>> anymore questions for Mr. Emmons. >> you said that in your review

of the traffic study that you

didn't think that restricting

lnt would have an effect. >> they proposing some signage

and the only way do that would

be to put some sort of arm kind

of a traffic arm that came up and over the right of way,

putting a sign anywhere else on the sides of the right of way is

not going to be visible to a motorist.

And whenever you look at those

kinds of things, typically they whenever you have those, the

infrastructure is already there or an interstate when people are

moving at very high volumes and high speed moving through there.

I just don't think that it's a very practical thing that you

would put that up. Also with left-hand turn

movements, if you do not have a median in the road way, if it's

not a divided road way, it's

very difficult to design a right

in right out movement that

isn't, you know, that isn't, that people follow unless there

is a physical barrier in the road to prevent that.

>> lots of other places in town

where left turns are prohibited and that work.

And we've... Lexington has

gotten used to some very odd

traffic changes in the past few

years like backing into parking,

angled parking.

Round abouts we didn't have a decade ago.

I would think something like a right turn only sign would be a

simple solution and maybe angled

, an exit angled towards downtown rather than out of town

would be a simple thing to restrict left-hand turns just to

encourage traffic to go right. >> I can kind of add to that

from the operational standpoint. The problem for traffic

engineering on a day-to-day basis is the compliance.

We can't get the vehicles even

if you angle it, it sounds good, but then they're just going to

enter through your right exit.

So basically without a raised

median to absolutely prevent the cars from crossing and entering

the site, just a sign, it

doesn't work and then a problem

if it's a sign on the private property then there is an

enforcement issue. It's just a sign on their

private property but the police

don't have the enforcement power

if they choose to turn left off their site.

>> so you are blaming society

and not traffic engineering. >> exactly.

>> all right.

Thanks. Anymore questions.

Thank you Mr. Emmons.

Are there anymore comments from staff? All right hearing none then I

will ask the applicant to come forward. Please introduce yourself for

the record.

>> my name is david royce, I'm an attorney and I'm here on

behalf of the applicant southern oak, llc.

I have with me principles of

that company, phil greer and willfred web.

And jihad alani and gordie hoagland who manages real estate

in connection with the greer companies. I appreciate the opportunity to

appear before you and I've got a

little presentation that I've put together that I'll refer to

here on the board.

I want to say a couple of things that I heard.

I want to address as an introductory manner.

First this matter was postponed last month as you May know.

One of the reasons was that

traffic, the question of traffic concerns had been raised at

least generally by the staff and

the applicant's own volition, they procured a traffic studdie

from vision engineering and it

was our understanding and I

believe Mr. Hilani that that was submitted to the staff on or

about April 8.

Now he amended that and provided some supplemental information

that he provided yesterday as well but our belief was that it

had been submitted earlier.

If it wasn't for some reason, but just wanted to let you know

that was an expense that in an effort that was undertaken by

the owners because they thought that the traffic concern that

had been raised was one important to look at.

Now I want to step back from

that and I want to give you a

context first because I think perhaps appropriate to

Mr. Glover's question earlier, it is extraordinarily important

that the board understand why we are here and what the question

is before the board because it's a limited one.

Your decision is a very important one. There is no doubt about that but

it's a limited question. And it's because of the way our

zoning ordinance works.

This property is located at 473 east main.

And I'll just use the slides

kind of as I go along here. I've outlined in red, hopefully

you can see that, the lights are a little bright but hopefully

you can see outlined in red I

was able to get satellite images

from 2002, 2010 and I'll show you one that is current.

As you can see there in 2002

dating back to 1983, 1983, was a Mcdonald's.

That Mcdonald's appeared in 1983 actually not for

conditional use permit for an administrative review appeal

because the building inspector

had approved construction of a

restaurant with a drive-thru. And objectors raised an issue of

whether that was appropriate under the zoning ordinance

because in our zoning ordinance

in 1983 we talked about drive-ins but the whole idea of

a drive-thru restaurant was manage that was new there.

Was one at the burger boil, wendy's had one and that was the

only ones and there was a question of how it should have

been interpreted under the ordinance.

That was ultimately litigated and denied on the property, the

drive-thru was not permitted Mcdonald's, the building

permit was revoked. They got it reinstated with the

ability to build it without the drive-thru over their objections

and they subsequently came back

again on two occasions to ask for a drive-thru there and it

was turned down. Mcdonald's ultimately left

that site, a very popular site, one that that was good for them

but they left as a result of that.

And the property set vacant. My clients purchased the

property about that time, right after Mcdonald's have a

indicated the property.

They were ultimately able to get a tenant for that restaurant

that had no drive-thru I. Was a mexican restaurant, there for

about five years from 2005-2010. Those folks weren't able to make

it and despite a lot of support from the owners of the property,

they ultimately went out of business.

And the property sat vacant for

a while, ultimately the owners razeed the building and it has

been a sunshine grow shop a couple of times just to allow

some plants and nursery items to

be sold, christmas trees but that property has been used as a

restaurant for about 30 of the

last 35 years.

It is zoned b-2-a. And if you go to the zoning

ordinance what you see in the b-2a zone you have the uses

permitted in the b-1 zone and

the uses permitted in the b-2 zone. Downtown business zone.

I'm going to show you those in a minute.

The reason I give you folks that

history is because we are at the

board of adjustment because in

the b-2 zone while a restaurant

is a permitted use as is a night club with live entertainment as

is a cocktail lounge as is auto

motive sales, minor automobile repair. All those are permitted uses

that do not require to us come to the board of adjustment.

We can put those uses on that property pursuant to the

ordinance but because what we propose has a drive-thru with

it, under the b-2a ordinance

that requires conditional use. The drive-thru use.

What we propose here is a coffee shop with a national chain and

we've asked recently, you might have your guesses about who it is.

We weren't allowed to reveal that we asked them the this

week, dough want want to dance round this, it's starbucks.

They've looked at our sites, our plans, they want to be on that

site and what we've proposed is a building that serves two uses.

A portion of it is the starbucks with a drive-thru.

The drive-thru is non-negotiable. They will not do the building

there, they will go somewhere else.

They have chevy chase that doesn't have a drive-thru and

they won't build another store. We've addressed this with them

in light of the issues we have. The rest of the building is

intended to be retail, also

permitted in the b-2a zone and intended to be high scale retail.

One of the options that wave' been looking at and negotiating

on is potentially a boutique

jewelry store there and one that

is, as you May know recently

located in the civic center has expressed serious interest.

That's a really good area. There are some really good folks

and a lot of good neighbors there and we feel like this

project can be a benefit to the neighborhood but also the

neighborhood can be a benefit to this project so in a nutshell,

that little what we are propose.

So I want you to look at those drawings or those aerials and

the first one in 2002 shows you

the Mcdonald's, in 2010 you

see the mexican restaurant there

and if you can go ahead. That's the site now.

It's vacant. Just to orient you that's coming

inbound on main street from the bottom on the left of that page

is the woodlands on the right is

the raymond james building. Kerr brothers on the right at

the corner of indiana and

approaching midland avenue and then the "herald-leader"

building is at the top of the

page and starts to bend off to midland.

And I hope that I'll point this out now.

I know Mr. Glover and Mr. Gross made a comment about

the letters that were received. I came down and reviewed those

the other day and I hope you

will note that there were also in addition to some objection

letters there were letters of

support and several of them were from business owners in that

area and people who were employed in professional offices

in the area including the next door neighbors at raymond james

and the law firm and investment company. Okay.

Let's go ahead and look at the next one.

Just to give you an idea of the

site plan, we had submitted as

well an amended site plan to try

and address at least one of the concerns on the interior

traffic. I'll have him address this in a

minute but I want to give you an overview of the proposal.

As you can see, the coffee shop is located there.

You can see the outline of it and the retail that goes with

it.

There is an entry point and exit

point on what is really the

southern or eastern end of the property. There is a lane that is for

through traffic that goes all

the way around and then a

drive-thru lane that goes around

the property and to the drive-thru window.

The ordering window is located

to the rear of the property. One of our concerns obviously

being that we have kerr brothers next door trying to be mindful

of noise issues, that is the actual ordering window is

located away from the neighbor. We've also provided for

landscaping and buffering along that border with kerr brothers

and that's certainly something that we would be happy to

address with them and with the board to make sure that those

concerns are addressed.

But I want to come back on that

point and with respect to

traffic and remind you we are here because there is a

drive-thru associated with this property.

If you take off that drive-thru that you see up there and

everything else on the property stays the same, the parking

lots, the circulation, it's just

a starbucks and retail restaurant, we are not in front

of the board after justment.

so it's a little dangerous and I think you are going see in some

of the staff's analysis, it's a

little tricky to compare what is

there now which is a vacant lot with what we are proposing.

That's not a fair comparison. That's not the analysis before

the board.

The reality is for 30 last 35 years, there has been a

restaurant on that property with two entrances, with people

making left turns out of there,

with people making left turns

into there since 1983. You'll hear that he did a traffic.

He went to look in the accident database and looked in front of

this property during the five years that the mexican

restaurant was there and the

area in front of this property,

one accident between 2005-2010 and that area in front of the

property and it was not a left turn movement in or out.

It was a side swipe non-injury accident.

We'll come back to that. Again, you've got to be mindful

of what you are comparing here. You are not comparing a vacant

lot that can't be used with now

we are going to put a use there. There has been a use there and

there has been a use that allowed an extensive amount of

traffic and I'll come back to that in some detail here in a

minute.

Just getting you familiar with this.

Just to again drive that point home, p these entrances on the

property are not new. There is the satellite mimgs

showing you that both of those

have been there, 2002, 2012, 2017.

If you'll look up in that 2012 satellite, it's clear enough,

it's a little fuzzy but if you

look you will actually see the arrows pointing left and

pointing right out of that top entrance from the mexican

restaurant. On all of those you will see the

double yellow line on main street that has been there since

at least the 90s if not earlier, the exit points are

identical to where they are now

I want to call Mr. Hilani up to briefly describe the site

plan to you and what you see here and I should have mentioned

before, the back of that property, you see that tail that

goes back there that's all parking. That's part of this property.

It's zoneed b-4. That property has been used for parking.

It can be used for parking here. Some of those spaces have been

leased while the property was

take ant to the adjoining owner and we have more than enough

parking to do that but I want Mr. Hilani to address to you

the major requirements under the ordinance for drawing a

development plan that complies

with the requirements and how

we've addressed those.

>> for the record, my name is hilani with division engineering.

Basically you have two tenant building starbucks for 2300

square feet and approximately

4,000 square feet of retail.

The most western entrance, the

one out of town would be an

entrance only and exit...

Entrance... I'm sorry. and we can stack approximately

12 cars from the pickup window

all the way to you see the crots

cross walk at least 12 cars can

be stacked on site. Lfucg requirement is six to

seven stacking from the window

and as you exit the site basically this is going to be

only exit and we are proceed

posing to be 24 feet wide. >> is your pointer working?

>> that's what I'm trying to see.

>> use this one. >> and if you could use the

screen behind you 10y we can

see.

>> and this area would be 4,000

square feet of retail this is a pickup window so all the way

rotating to this area over here,

you will have at least 12 cars stacking. >> so from the pickup window all

the way around the building to

the cross walk there, you could stack 12 cars? Roughly speaking.

>> let's go ahead and use this diagram here I'll show you the

stacking itself.

>> my concern is I come in on harrodsburg road every day and I

pass the south broadway

starbucks and I can tell you it

does impact traffic in the morning and this stacking at

times can stack all the way

almost on to south broadway with

the cars during rush hour. >> yes, the one, you are talking

the one next to the station.

I stop in there but it is a

traffic concern in that it's

directly related to the drive-thru, I believe, because

the other businesses don't cause

that type of traffic issue. >> yes, sir, I'm going by memory

on that one I don't think it has as many stacking as this one.

This one has, I would say at

least five, six car addition to

the one on south of broadway. The one south of broadway you

are talking about is just outside between the pickup

window and the older box. You can stack maybe four, five

cars and then after that it's

going to, not much stacking

area. >> it's important to look at the

stacking because of the nature of this lot.

It's a narrow lot. It's not narrow but it's long.

Here is what he is showing you. This is how you would stack

under the ordinance.

They give you the dimensions you are required to use. This is the window.

This is where cars would enter

off main street to be off...

There is one this is from the window back now.

Keep in mind, two, three, four,

five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11 are shown.

Obviously you've got the remainder here that would fit.

You can get up to about 15. The requirement of the ordinance

is five. We don't want five on this

property. We know we've got main street to

deal with so we constructed this

and designed it so we've got stacking for 15 vehicles.

Now I want to show you by

comparison, I'll ask Mr. Hilani to address this as well.

This is our site. That black line shows a

perimeter area of where the stacking would be fnl the total

you see over there is about 396

linear feet of stacking.

About 396 feet there's the

starbucks on versailles road. 25,000 trips a day.

One of the byesest thoroughfares in lexington.

There is an entrance and exit,

left turn and right turn

permitted sheer's their stacking.

243. About 150 feet less than what we

have on our site and that's

their stacking so we have room for about another eight to 10

cars beyond what they are showing there.

The point being we've given this stacking question a lot of work

because obviously we've got to

make sure we can accommodate those stacking concerns in the

drive-thru. We've got to have them off main

street so it's been designed to

accommodate as many cars as

possibly can be anticipated.

You'll see here is the traffic

volumes for versailles road at that, 25,000 a day.

Compared to ours is 24,000 a day

on east main.

Versailles road 45 and obviously

at that point we are 25 I think. >> Mr. Royce though, is the

versailles road even a good

comparison in that I'll be

frank, the corridor from main

street to the downtown is some

of the, really heavy traffic during rush hour.

It's already bumper to bumper

coming into downtown compared to the versailles harrodsburg road

which I can actually make a left turn when I'm going to

versailles from that starbucks. I don't think it would be

possible for me to make a left turn from the main street

location during rush hour going out richmond road.

>> well Mr. Gross, there are, it's important to remember that

there are two stop lights before the property.

Those stop lights create traffic

and create a natural break in traffic for 60 to 90 seconds

where there is no traffic flow. There is the ability to make a

left turn just as has been done

for the last 35 years.

>> the purpose is to measure stacking. >> I happen to have done the

versailles approval 12 years ago I think and I remember at the

time staff was concerned that there wasn't enough stacking there.

So I wanted to dom pair that

with what we have here.

And I wish I had the harrodsburg road, I would have measured that

one as well. Sit tight for a minute and I'll

come back to you. We've touched on the stacking

issue because that's a concern. And I'm sorry but you've got to go back to the framework of what

is the board being asked to act on this because it's a

drive-thru. What are the traffic concerns

from a drive-thru? Well one is trip generation.

That's what you heard from the

staff and the traffic engineers was well this is going to

generate trips. I'll talk about that momentarily.

But one of the natural issues is stacking with a drive-thru.

The old Mcdonald's on

shaderburg road -- harrodsburg road stacking was an issue.

how that stacking would get in

the street and it was inefficient.

It has been a concern and we wanted to show you how it has

been addressed. Mr. Emmons did a bit of a

traffic analysis or at least a trip generation comparison is

what he called it what

Mr. Emmons did was compared

this property what was previously zoned... A

conditional use was allowed on

this property for a bank with a drive-thru the current owners.

I'll have Mr. Greer explain what happened with that.

The bank ended up not going forward but the board after

justment did approve a bank with drive-thru lanes there.

So Mr. Emmons did a traffic comparison and compared our

proposed use with a bank and I can understand why that's one of

the things you could compare it with but I'm not sure that's

very fair because there are a

dozen other uses and we've done the counts, that are permitted

on this site and a bank is by far not the only one.

So yes, you can cherry pick a

bank and say they have less

trips in the peak morning A.M. Hour when most banks are not

opened compared with a starbucks

that most of its service is in the A.M. Peak hour.

But here is what is crucially important to see.

Look at where Mr. Emmons

compares the trips generated for

a coffee shop with a drive-thru

versus a coffee shop without a

drive-thru.

If you will look, a coffee shop

without a drive-thru shows 129

trips I believe.

coffee shop with a drive-thru, 115 trips.

So the manual is the one he says everybody in the country relies

upon. It is.

It is the I.T.E. Manual.

He slejted the dat, aand used the proper uses.

They're all given numbers and he

used I.T.E. 936 and 937 and he

found that trip generation in

the manual-for-a coffee shop

without a drive-thru is

1:29 A.M. Peak hour trips in and

123 out. That's how many trips it generates.

With a drive through, it's 119. Now remember what we are here

about. The fact that we are proposing a

coffee shop that has a drive-thru.

>> so Mr. Royce, why do you

want a drive-thru if it cuts down your business?

>> because without a drive-thru

the trip generation idea is not

entirely important because what

this use serves is what is called pass by traffic.

The reality is this use is not

going to generate hardly any new trips. People aren't going to get up

and say I'm driving over to the

richmond eecht main street starbucks when I have no reason

to be there in the middle of traffic.

The vast amount of traffic inbound to our businesses

downtown that can make a right in there, people that have kids

in the car and can't get out,

can go through a drive-thru and proceed on downtown.

>> I think I'm willing to concede that point that this

probably won't increase traffic trips on richmond road.

But let me ask you guys this.

I'm looking at the plan.

I wish I could pull it up on the screen.

Mcdonald's on harrodsburg road

was a complete nightmare at its then location.

They came in and put it in the

new location and they have the double drive-thru that converts

into one and then they put, not

really a median per se but an angle like you were talking

about for Mr. Glover and angled, you could only

essentially turn out right. You can't go left.

Is there any way for, I'm not sure about the setbacks and the

spacing. I know it's a tight narrow spot but any way for the design to be

changed so that there could be

maybe more stacking on the property.

Ultimately we all realsz this is

for a drive-thru and the

question I have is how can we,

is this the best design to keep

the flow in and flow out of I'm going to be honest with you, is

going to be a substantially increased use compared to

Mcdonald's in the number of

cars that are in and out. I mean do you think there could

be some design changes that could alleviate some of the concerns of traffic.

>> let me address that you shed this would generate or result in

more trips than a Mcdonald's. I don't think the data backs

that up but we'll get to that. You're asking if there was a way

to get more stacking here. I don't know that the width of

the lot will allow a double drive-thru because one of the

things you've got to have is as you know, Chairman Gross, you

have to have a threw lane to be

able to get around. The other thing is have you to

have parking spaces for those that do go inside and you don't

want to have it where the people who are parked in spots can't

back out because they've been

blocked in. The reality is that in managing

this site, we've built the stacking to accommodate

essentially one hour of the day.

The peak hour from 7:20:00 A.M. To 8:20:00 A.M.

That's what we've established. I would respectfully submit to

you that a 15-car stacking May be larger than any other

drive-thru that I've seen in lexington.

I think that we have tried to oversize that. Part of the reason we are able

to do it is because we've got the benefit of all this

additional parking. Now the other thing I need to

point out is we are in an infill and redevelopment zone.

I mean we qualify for infill incentives. We could reduce the parking

requirements to 25% of the lowest required parking requirement.

We didn't do that. We have a bus stop nearby.

We will have bike racks all to encourage other sources of

traffic to the site and we would

get credits for all those but we've designed this to satisfy

the zoning ordinance as it is.

In terms of the right in-right out I think what you've got in

mind is only going right in and right out.

Starbucks will not allow that

and again I recognize that's not your all's concern but in terms

of us being able to have a

tenant that we think is a high end quality tenant that will

work, they won't do that and

that is because they would lose whatever business they get coming from the other direction

which probably, if you think about the traffic patterns is

not going to be in the A.M. Peak.

The vast amount of trafnlg is

going inbound at the A.M. Peak. We've designed this to

accommodate this traffic and the

vast amount of them are pass by

trips, getting in and succeeding downtown.

We've suggested ways to deal with left turns in.

That's a double yellow line. You are not supposed to cross

it.

That's the rule.

What we proposed was some signage to discourage that but

again guess what, that double

line has been there for 35 years.

And it's been there for 35 years

in the james property, the

greely property and magee's bakery, all those properties up

and down main street. There are left turns in and out

of those properties.

So when you look at this in isolation and don't want left or

rights out of there that is not the issue.

The question is does the drive-thru create those traffic

movements because what you see

from Mr. Emmons study is that

the trips actually are reduced if there is a drive-thru at a

coffee shop rather than no drive-thru. Now I heard the traffic engineer

I guess casey, said any time you have drive-thru facilities, you

will have more trip generation.

I disagree with that.

You are not going to hear any

evidence that suggests havings a

drive-thru creates new trips and does so at a rate greater than

if there were no drive-thru. That's why I show you

Mr. Emmons information there.

I touched on the other uses that are permitted here that we would

not be at the board of adjustment.

And I just wanted to point these out to you.

These are in the b-2 zone and as

you can see, there are a number

of uses here and I want you to

think about traffic. I want you to think about noise

and I want to you think about

left in and left out on these uses, none of which require per

mission from the board of

adjustment or any zone change whatsoever.

Indoor bill yard or pool hall,

bowling alley, restaurant,

cocktail lounge, night club, with entertainment dancing and

sale of alcoholic benches.

Display rental or sale of

automobiles, motorcycles, trucks

boats hotels and motels, a

little small for that.

Any type of dwelling unit.

That includes multiple residences.

Minor automobile and truck repair.

Does not require us to come here.

Pawn shops, and it goes on and

on. The intent of this zone is

stated by the planning commission, has been adopted

into the ordinance adopted by the city commission.

This zone is intended to accommodate existing and

proposed development from the transitional frame with

surrounds the downtown core area

by providing for comparable and compatible uses while

anticipating the future

expansion of the downtown core area.

And it goes on, the height restrictions, three stories or

35 feet, without any special approval.

35 feet. Off street parking.

Again as I pointed out in this

zone, 25% is what is required of the least parking required in

any zone other than a b-2 or b-2b so significantly less than

what we've provided for.

I want to talk about some of the other uses because that's what

he looked at was okay, if the board or the neighbors or a

neighbor doesn't want us to do this and we are to put another

use in there that doesn't require any approval as to the

use, what kind of trips are those going to generate and if

you'll address that? >> are there going to be any

entrance or exit to and from the

building itself except for the drif threw window on the funeral

home side of the building or

will it all be. >> main street and the other

retail would be along the side.

>> so there will be no other

than safety doors that, there will not be any...

>> pickup window.

>> and it looks like the garbage pad, the dumpster pad is on the

other side, too.

>> on the opposite corner, yes.

>> so what I did here in this

traffic study which is I apologize, we completed the

traffic stud owe April 7, I distributed to our team on April 8.

I had full intention to submit it.

I thought we delivered it. It sounds like the staff did not

receive it so it's my, I apool jiez in was never made to the

staff, I am the one responsible

because the traffic study was

complete on April 7, April 8 and

we thought it has been submitted so...

>> so the different we looked at. Total square footage of the

building that we are proposing is almost 6200 square feet.

We look at different tools that

is allowed under the b-2a zone

and we looked into a fast food restaurant which is code 933 and

this is what Mr. Emmons was referring to.

The 5,000 square feet and the

reason we mention 5,000 square feet is because the building is

6200 square feet.

We thought 5,000 square feet is comparable number of square

footage that would generate approximately 132 trips

comparing to 66 was the proposed

development and 88 comparing to

65.

For the ite manual for coffee

shop is 937, the one with the drive-thru, it will generate

more than what we are showing

here and the reason our number us does not match the staff

number is that we assume 50% of pass by traffic and our

assumption is based on the following.

Basically as has been mentioned earlier, nobody is going to

drive to richmond road to 473

east main to pick up a could coffee. It's not just destination.

Just somebody on the road is going to pick up the coffee and

move on.

So that's what we assume 50% and the 50% where it came from, we

use the same percentage that has

been allowed on the I te manual. Even though there are some other

uses that show higher percentage

of pass by trips so this is

where the 50% in our calculation

came in and also we look at the convenient store that is also

permitted it will generate you

can tell on this pass by trip

for convenient, it's like huge

numbers like 70-80%.

And also we look at bread and

bacon there is one across to it, magee bakery, you can tell how

much it will generate almost two

and a half times our trip generation.

So this is, can I give you an

idea, right now the site is vacant, that's true but that

doesn't mean anything is going

to go on that site is going to generate traffic and anything that is going to be there, we

are going to be facing the same challenges we are talking about

today. And...

>> would you tell them about

looking into the state police

reported incidents for the area in front of the subject property?

>> yes, we understand there is some concern about left turn

movement in and out of the property even though it's double

yellow and not permitted.

so we look at the accidents

reported between 2005 and 2010

and this is during operation of mexican restaurant and we find

out during that time period

there is only one accident and

this is side sweeping accident

and the average daily traffic

for U.S. 25 at location is

almost 24,000 vehicle, if we do

it for the six year time period,

this is equivalent to 53 million trips.

So we had one accident, not related to the left in or out,

out of 53 million related to in front of that property.

So that's why we believe the

proposal should not impact in

negative way the safety of

vehicle on that in front of the

property at least.

>> you also did suggest in your traffic report that there could

be some signage to discourage

left turns into the property and

did you find other instances of that in lexington?

>> yes, sir.

And there are other instances in electricington.

There is one next to triangle park and my intention was not to

provide the arm even though I understand it is misleading

because I was showing other examples in lexington but on

this property there are two

poles and if I can show it and

we were thinking we are thinking

to use the existing poles to

have the overhang that can restrict.

There is one pole in this location and one pole in this

location so we are thinking if

we have an overhanging here with

do not clock traffic and

basically no left turn lanes so

that can, in addition to the

double yellow, you can emphasize the point and do not encourage

left turn into the site between

the two poles. What it showed was the pass by

trips and used 50% and I think as he said, the reality is it's

probably a larger number than that of people who are already

going downtown that are going to go in there.

He used 50% which is extremely conservative.

When Mr. Emmons did his

traffic counts he didn't attribute any pass by trips to

his calculations of trip generation.

Now in fairness...

>> what I think is what you need to be saying is that the people

that are going to be driving through the coffee shop are

people that are already going to

be on the road going downtown heading northwest on main street

going into town so that the overall volume of traffic is not

going to be increased because of aif drive through.

>> correct. >> and that only the people that

are heading into that direction. >> vast majority.

>> during the peak hours are going to be tempted to use the

restaurant for the drive-thru. Is that right.

>> it is and Mr. Glover I think if you walk down the

street and ask 10 people, that

would be the conventional wisdom but I've got an obligation to

provide you with data and proof and that's why we did that to

back it up with numbers.

>> did I understand you to say

that from your numbers there are more trips generated in a

business of this sort without a drive-thru than with one.

>> if you look at Mr. Emmons report right there, what he

shows is coffee shop without

drive-thru, he cites the ite

manual 129 without one and with it 115.

>> does that correlate to more customers?

>> I'm not sure whether it does or not.

I think that a substantial

amount of the peak morning business, the peak morning

business will utilize that drive-thru but they're open the rest of the day.

I went out to the versailles road one yesterday because I was

familiar with it. Done the planning on it.

I went out there at 11:30 in the morning and there was one car in

the drive-thru but every parking space in the place was full.

I wish somebody could give me the gig where you can hang out

at starbucks at 11:30 in the morning but apparently a bunch

of people do that. We are hopeful they'll do it

here.

If you go to chevy chase, what you find if you go in there

whether it's 7:00 in the

morning, 9:00 or 11, you'll find business people in there.

Talking, reading newspapers. You'll find young professionals

on their computers using wifi, you'll find mothers with

children in strollers. Bikes outside.

That is what we think this area needs.

We think it's a complement to this area and we think the fact

that there is a drive-thru allows this to happen and

accommodates the peak hour push but it doesn't detract to the

use as a whole. >> the one on chevy chase does

not have a drive true. >> and it detracts it.

>> it does.

>> my question is will you build this project if you don't get

the drive-thru? >> we won't because starbucks

won't do it. Starbucks has made clear to us

as recently as yesterday when I made them ask the question, is

there any way we can do a

starbucks without a drive-thru. No. >> even if you get more traffic

without a drive-thru. They don't do it.

Won't do it. >> can I ask this question.

>> yes, sir. >> using the term retail.

Can you explain what that means?

>> that's in this instance, the idea is it is still somewhat

loose.

It will be a shop and when I talked about we had discussions

with sheila bay, some jewelry shops, something like that go in

there in the adjacent use. >> that's completely different

than the starbucks which is

going to generate... >> both.

>> we are taking that into consideration when we talk about

traffic. >> correct and we did that if

you will go look at our numbers. That's why when Mr. Emmons

said this isn't right because

they're comparing 2300 square

feet with 5,000 square feet? Well that's not exactly right.

What we've got is 6200 square feet but part of it is retail

that doesn't generate any A.M. peak traffic.

Now it generates trips the rest of the day but that's why we

included the whole thing. It is a consideration.

>> you don't know who that is going to be yet.

>> no, sir. >> thanks. >> and I want to touch on one

thing here and I'm going to wrap up. I think this is important and

you guys know it. You've heard it.

Anybody that has been in

involved in lexington plan or zoning matters in the last 10

years has heard about infill and redevelopment. Our comprehensive plan, our

current one subject to being

updated our current one addresses the idea of infill and

how crucially important it is in

lexington where the intention stated intention has been to

maintain an urban service boundary and in order to do

that, you've got to allow

flexibility and incentives to do

redevelopment and infill in downtown and other areas that

are within the urban service boundary.

You look in the comprehensive

plan, it was goal number two, support infill and redevelopment

throughout the urban service

areas strategic component of growth.

Identify areas of opportunity

for infill redevelopment

adaptive reuse that respect the

area's contect and design features whenever possible.

It goes on the bluegrass identity it talks about, that's

a big concept.

And it makes clear that urban infill and redevelopment

accommodate growth responsibly, preserve vibrant neighborhoods

and encourage job creation in

turn providing safeguards from suburban development that

impacts on rural land. This isn't a zone change so I'm

not going to go into the comprehensive plan in great

detail but the point is

lexington and its elected leader s and planning commission

have made redevelopment and infill a priority.

Infill is mentioned in the

comprehensive plan 82 times, redevelopment 64 times. You see the comments about the

idea that you've got to educate

the community that guess what? Neighborhoods and neighbors they

like having a vacant lot next to them. I'm guilty of that.

We all are. It's nice having a vacant lot

because you don't have to worry about who your neighbor is.

Infill and redevelopment acknowledges we've got to

develop those lots and we've got to allow them to be economic

uses. These gentlemen have tried to

come up with a plan here that is economically viable but allows

them to bring in a top notch

quality national chain that does

high end stores, stores that are cool architecturally, that will

spend the money that it takes to have a cool design and to fit in

and do things like pedestrian

friendly and bike friendly developments. They feel like they've brought

the neighborhood and the area something that is good for

lexington, something that can be

a node of the community there. And they've tried to accommodate

the site and the neighbors by designing it in a way where we

dealt with stacking.

Like I said 15 cars or more in stacking when the requirement

under the black letter of the

ordinance is five.

There is some text from the traffic study that indicated

theat we could reduce our parking requirement and others

because we are 150 feet from a

bus stop because we have bike paths or bike racks all those

things are identified in your

zoning ordinance as things that

encourage development for infill.

Now I want to pause just briefly and ask Mr. Greer speak for a

second and give you a little

background then I'm going to

conclude because I think it's important for us to understand

these folks have had this property for a long time.

They have not rushed to go in and make the quickest buck on it.

They have thought about it.

They've tried to accommodate the use and figure out what uses

would be good for that neighborhood because they

realize it's important. Mr. Webb and his family have

been heavily involved in the woodlands.

They have an important stake in the woodlands directly across

the street. They want to see this developed well.

They have been patient, tried to be creative.

They're willing to spend the

money to bring in a top notch tenant, the kind of tenant that

they need and wants to come requires a drive-thru.

I don't think that you are going

to see that the traffic considerations or the noise

consideration from this drive-thru means this use will

not should not go forward because there will be another

use there and we'll talk about it that we are not required to

ask for approval for because at some point they've got to go

forward with doing their land. If would you come up briefly and

I want Mr. Greer to tell you about when they were dealing

with the bank and that deal wouldn't go forward, how they

went about trying to figure out

what to do here and attracting a

starbucks and why. >> tell them where you live put

on the record is in florida now. He flew up this morning to make

sure he could be here.

>> that was expensive.

I'm phil greer and I own the property that we are talking

about with my son lee and my

sister-in-law woodford.

Years ago we received a

drive-thru allowance on this property and we were going to

build a bank and it worked out really well and everybody was

happy but all of a sudden people started talking about internet

banking and the bank got scared that there weren't going to be

any banks and they backed out on the deal.

So we, but prior to that, we met with bull court neighborhood

association which is the closest neighborhood and surrounds us

around the back and so on, and we explained to them we were

going to put this bank in just

trying to be neighborly.

and the majority of the neighbors at that time said why

don't you put a starbucks in.

We want a starbucks. We can walk over there and so

on.

I said, you know, that will be fine but at that time starbucks

wouldn't come here. Apparently demographics weren't

right or they weren't in the

mood to build or for whatever

reason and so for a long time we

worked on that and we weren't

really in a hurry on the property.

But sooner or later starbucks

came around. So we really feel like this is

going to be a heck of a addition

to the neighborhood and I think, I don't think there is many

people... There are a lot of people out there that don't like

coffee but I think that people

who like coffee like starbucks

and so I never have understood

what the magic is but that's the way it works.

We finally got them and we hope

that you'll let us bring them here.

Anybody have any questions for me?

Thank you. >> just so you know, Mr. Webb

had conversations with the folks at kerr brothers about this

proposal when we decided to go forward with it, Mr. Greer's

son lee met with folks at bell court to discuss this proposal

when we decided to go go forward and understand they certainly

have a right to take whatever

position they May on it, but I

want you to be mindful of what the analysis is here and that is

why does this require a conditional use and that's

because it has a drive-thru. There are a number of uses there

that I showed you that can go on this property and I don't want

it... It certainly is not a threat but I don't even want it

to be compared in that sense.

It's the reality of if you can't proceed, if you've come in here

and tried to get a high end retailer that goes in there and

what we think is a great product and would benefit the

neighborhood and it won't go forward, at what point do

business people who are holding that property for investment

continue to try and come in and

ask for permission on a piece of property when they have

extensive uses that require no permission and there is a host

of them.

Here is the folks with waffle house have been interested in

this property for a long time.

Ray daniels, local operator emailed us as recently as this

week and said he is happy the property is available and that

they're very interested if it does come available.

He knew we were going to be here

today and that is actually a

waffle house done on canal

street in new orleans. There are ways to do that that

would fit within the neighborhood but the point being

we can do that and don't have to go through the whole process of

asking for a drive-thru and there are a number of other uses

like that but they're going to go forward with that.

So our hope is that the board and also our neighbors will

realize that we've tried to be responsible and come up with a

good development that benefits that area, that makes economic

sense for us and the tenant and

will work. We would like for everybody to

be supportive of that. We certainly want the board to

be supportive of it but if they're not and they think this

is a problem, we are going to find an alternative use where we don't have to ask the board of

adjustment permission because that's only tear that we get to

do that. We would ask them to consider

the other uses that are out

there and available in taking a position that this use is bad

for the area.

The last thing I will do is just

for purposes of the record, I

want to submit some proposed

findings an conclusions that I

ask you to consider.

Board approval I am going to file with the staff a copy of

those as well as a copy of our powerpoint presentation although

I recognize we are on video. I ask that the letters be made

part of the record, that our traffic study we submitted be

part of the record.

Obviously the file materials,

and we would be happy to answer any questions you have either

now or after hearing from the

opposition and on belaugh of the

owners at southern oak we would respectfully request your

approval of this proposal for a conditional use permit.

Thank you. >> thank you Mr. Royce.

I believe we do have opposition

and if you would like to come up

and present yourself.

I will... The last presentation

went on so I'll let you proceed

but on the rebuttals I will limit rebutal time so we can

press forward because we are going have a second hearing

after this one that I would like to get wrapped up before

hopefully the close of business. >> Mr. Chair, members of the

board, my name is jacob walburn.

I'm here much as Mr. Royce, I

will also be using a powerpoint presentation.

I've brought copies for the board to follow along and one

for the record as well.

I am mindful that you May have a contentious hearing following

this one so I'll do my best to constrain myself to our key

points here. It's an honor always to be

appearing in front of you. It is particularly an honor for

me to be here on behalf of kerr brothers funeral home.

If you have lived in lexington

for an appreciable amount of time and known anybody who

passed away, there is a reasonable probability you have been to kerr brothers.

They have been in business in kentucky for more than 100 years.

They have been at the location that ajoins the subject property

here since 135, had a fairly significant update to the

building in the fifth and added

a chapel in 1967.

Tomorrow is the 34th

anniversary of the board of adjustment's first disapproval

of a drive-thru for this location so happy anniversary.

It has been a bad idea for 34 years and unfortunately it

hasn't gotten any better with age.

And I think by the time you hear

the comments and conclusions of my client and as well as some

other neighbors who May wish to speak to you, I think you will

understand why is in a poor idea and why you should uphold the

staff's recommendation of disapproval.

First, Mr. Royce did characterize it correctly.

The first hearing was not a conditional use permit.

It was an administrative appeal,

was not only heard on 4-2-83 but litigated for a number of years

afterwards. Ultimately terminating in favor

of the opponents to defeat the drive-thru. Mcdonald's comes back in

December of 1988 and asks for it

as a conditional use that was unanimously defeated by the

board after justment at the time.

Came back again in 197 this time offering to take away the

speaker that they would do a

face to face drive-thru. That did garner one positive

vote from the board of

adjustment but defeated 5-16789

you've heard talk about a bank in 2001 and you are correct.

The drive-thru was approved in

2001 with the consent of the neighbors.

Kerr brothers, I actually looked

through the records of the 2001 case. Kerr brothers submitted a letter

of support for a bank drive-thru

in 2001 citing the significantly less traffic yen raition of a

bank than other proposed drive-thru uses. It was a compromise.

My clients were not necessarily wild about doing it but it

brings me to a point we are not opposed to development.

it's been suggested that the we

May enjoy a vacant lot next to us.

In fact as far as my client's

business goes, no, we do not.

Vacant lots tend to attract those less fortunate in our

community who May be homeless, can cause property damage to our property.

We recently had a fire on our property we think was

potentially caused by vagrants on the vacant lot.

We would love to see the lot developed just not with an

autocentric use like a drive-thru. We have three primary concerns

that I'm going over with you today.

>> kerr brothers doesn't have a

drive-thru? We May have gotten fixated on

the idea of traffic generation versus pass by.

Cars have to get on and off the site regardless whether you

intended to drive there when you left the house or compelled to

pull in because you saw the drive-thru. We are concerned about traffic

conflicts on main street. We are concerned about cut through traffic.

I'll show you some visual depictions about our concerns

what we think May happen on the property if it were to develop

in this manner. And finally we are very

concerned about noise because of the nature of our business.

We are concerned about drive-thru noise speakers, we

are concerned about idling

traffic, loud music, loud conversations that May drift

over to the funeral home where typically the ceremonies taking

place are solemn affairs. Now why is it a bad idea?

I think it can be imoiled down

to a very simple traffic explanation.

I'm not a traffic engineer but I like to think I have some common

sense. Here is why I think it is a poor

idea. You have stop lights in the

area. You are about 450 feet away from

the stop light at midland and

main street, the kind of odd intersection where vine curls

around, main meets mitt land avenue meets.

450 feet away.

It is not uncommon and you'll hear testimony from my client

that it is in fact quite common

for traffic to qu cue queue up

just waiting for the light at midland. You are about 160 feet away from

the odd double stop light you are probably familiar with at

woodland forest and main street

there that can queue traffic

back the other dresk. Traffic moves both ways on main

street.

We have queuing problems in both directions. Bottom line this is a tight site

in a very, very highly trafficked area that is

proposing an auto centric use

that we think is inappropriate.

That is the basis of our opposition.

I went and looked and this is purely my testimony based on my

observations but I believe this

is the only site on main street between downtown and ashland

avenue that has two entrances;

that as an on-versus sharing one

driveway.

Two opportunities to create on

main street.

It was noted perhaps one way you could allay this concern, it

wouldn't allay all of our concerns but make it a right in

right out. If you prohibit the left turning

movement that might be a way to

at least start addressing the traffic nightmare but and they

are free to correct me in

rebutal if I'm wrong. Technically it would be illegal

to turn out against the double yellow.

It sz they're anticipating some turning volume coming left out

of their development and turning

from the left. What is in the area.

We have a 45,000 square foot office complex, by the way I

should note the yellow line that is laid out on main street is a

thousand feet long so this is within a thousand foot stretch of main street.

We have a 45,000 square foot office complex where people come

to work every morning. We have a re school where

children are dropped off every morning.

We have a 30-minute residential building -- 30 unit residential,

eight story residential with

commercial on the first floor. Four story residential building

and 15,000 square foot office next door.

These are all places people need

to get into or out of during the A.M. Peak at the time that we

speculate starbucks would be the busiest so that's a concern

about why this would be an inappropriate site.

Now this is anecdotal evidence

but one thing I like about practicing land use law is you

get to use common sense. You are guided by the law but

have you to make common sense decisions.

When you are driving down main street at any time of the day

traffic can get backed up in the right and left lanes for

different reasons. One is there are two significant

bus lines that run down main street and when the lextran

buses stop in the right lane,

that will back up traffic in the right lane.

Also on days where there is

garbage service, garbage trucks stop in the right lane.

Everybody behind them has to stop.

The answer is to dart into the left lane.

Then have you to dart back to turn right.

A lot of cross lane movement

even without the drive-thru.

In the left lane anyone want to turn left they have to stop the

left lane of traffic. Why? Because we don't have a center

turn lane. There is not that median space

where people can pull out and wait for a break in traffic.

If you stop in the left lane, if

have you to turn left, you have to stop in the left lane that

backs up traffic.

Thoo es don't happen at the same places, near not universal

blocks so you get basically

people trying to knife in and out of traffic heading in and

out of main street.

What you are our big concern is regard ls whether the trips are

pass by, people have to get off of main street to get to their

property so a car has to slow down, maybe stop, turn right, get off.

They have to come, they, I will

concede that they have a lot of

stacking pre-stacking. What they don't have a lot of

tacking for is people exiting

the property you got to go all the way across the way main

street is set up here. I want to talk about traffic

counts.

This is an area where we, it's

downtown, main street, main street.

We see some of our highest

traffic counts in town at this

location. 24,000 trips counted by the

transportation cabinet in 2012.

Those are the counts that

Mr. Hilani used in his analysis.

Here is a roaptation of those accounts I showed you.

The bottom line is there is a

lot of traffic downtown and I

know that's a big reveal and

I'll pause while you marvel at all the traffic downtown but

let's talk about some math. I think these numbers are off

and I'll explain why briefly in a little bit but even if this

was the gospel and there were 24,000,1251 cars down main

street every day, that's a car every four seconds and that's

assuming they all space evenly. 3:00 in the morning the traffic

situation looks a lot different than 7:00 in the morning so the

traffic is not spaced evenly. During your peak periods you

have significant traffic on main street.

Main street has been a

consistently steady corridor by the urban county government.

They commissioned a fairly large

study downtown streets very reputable traffic jerking firm

testified in front of this body many times before in the past.

This was a report prepared for the urban county government and

they noted that more than a quarter of accidents that happen

downtown are because of left

turning movements people, for instance, turning left out of

the drive-thru on to main street.

Main street is one of the most accident prone streets and

that's the result of the volume

because they have more traffic.

They noted pedestrian and bicycle-related incidents more

than 80% of those resulted in substantial injury.

This is a pedestrian and bike heavy area, in fact lexington

has done a lot to encourage people to ride bikes to and from

work. We've dedicated bike lanes and

things of thing that nature, creating an auto centric use

pulling traffic on and off the road, doing it as rapidly as we

can I think could potentially be dangerous to pedestrians.

But what really concerns my client is some of the

recommendations of that report. Two of the things that they

identified that might allay some of the traffic is to prohibit

right turn on red at all

downtown intersectonses and to

reconfigure the midland avenue

to eliminate free flow lane. If you are coming down main

street and want to go to midland you can do that without

stopping. They propose eliminating that.

if you do that, the traffic backup coming back down main

street towards my client's property towards the subject

property would be extraordinary. Those are substantial concerns

and those are recommendations that have been made to the urban

county government. I want to talk about the traffic study.

I'm not sure what happened with the traffic study but I never

received a copy of it from the

applicant but letting you know I represented an objector at last

month's meeting. Unfortunately staff was able to

share it with me so I also got it yesterday morning.

Now unfortunately that doesn't give us enough time to consult

our own experts.

Unfortunately... I thought their opinions were pretty damning of

this project but I looked at it. I'm not an engineer and there is

a darn good reason for that.

But I looked at things from like 30,000 foot view out of the

realm of reason in my practice to review traffic studies and

here are some of the things that I noticed.

Account data is five years old.

These are counts that were done in 2012. He used the transportation

cabinet data. Perfectly acceptable to do that

but it's old data and they

didn't attempt to update with notwithstanding the month delay.

If you look into the gutsed of

the substitutes of the study, 2012 seems to be an out liar on

that data.

If you look at the counts in 99, 2006, 2009 this section of

highway had more than 30,000

trips per day. 2003 and 2012 appear to be a

little bit of an outliar.

I I think the actual count is

higher than 224,000 a day. I think it's closer to 30.

If you look at the data the 2012

count he used is actually within

his report, you can see that when the counter was set up, how

long it sat there and how many

cars came by at any given time.

On the two full days it sat on

site, more than 28,000 cars went by. I'm not sure how the

transportation cabinet came up

with 24,000 on an average when it went over 28,000.

I'm not challenging Mr. Hilanie's numbers but I'm

challenging the transportation cabinet's numbers.

But those are the numbers he used. He looks at the level of service

where people making turns into

and out of the proposed starbucks.

One turn the rnt turn reat good level f is unacceptable level of service.

We are starting at failing grade.

And we've also talked about that

they would be entitled to take

transit reductions bike rack dedeductions I think that's great.

I don't know what it has to do

with the drive-thru. Drive-thru uses automobile.

I think it's great they would like people to ride the bus.

It has no bearing on whether

they get a drive-thru or not. But my favorite suggestion was

the suggestion about the signage that we, the easiest way to

handle this would be for the urban county government to bear

the expense of installing signage to advise drivers

thought to turn into this establishment.

And there is an example cited of

where it is deployed in lexington. At the intersection of vine and

broadway probably the most significant intersection in lexington.

It is at the intersection of two significant thoroughfares not at

the driveway to a starbucks.

I think that is a preposterous

suggestion and as was noted probably wouldn't do anything to

stop people from making the turn anyway.

A significant concern to my client and I don't represent the

bell court neighborhood but I venture the bell court

neighborhood feels this, cut through traffic.

You are allowed to use logic. For the sake of argument say it

would be a suicide mission to turn left out of the starbucks

in the A.M. Peek when there is a lot of traffic coming in.

If you can't turn left, what option do you have? You turn right.

So if I turn right how do I get

back to a stop light where I can

go back the direct way on main street?

Well, can I try to get down to a

quick left, go around that 40,000 square foot office

building and the pre-school that I mentioned earlier but that

would require cutting across the other two lanes of main street.

I don't think that option is likely. I don't think it would be safe

for the people going to the pre-school. what I think is infinite more

likely to happen is that you would cut back through bell

court and come out on forest. That's what we are trying to

dissuade here.

We don't like this cut through traffic. I'm confident bell court doesn't

like it. Particular concern to my client,

we see people comcutting through our property right now.

They're not even waiting to get up to indiana avenue.

They cut through our parking lot. Now we don't like that for any

number of reasons. The lawyer in me thinks

liability but here is another reason.

We often cue up funeral processions on that side of the

building so it's possible someone could turn in

endeavoring to cut through and

get through and be blocked from getting out.

That creates a problem during a funeral service which is, of

course, something I think we would like to avoid.

Now our business is a sensitive business.

We have concerns about layouts. One of the things I'm going to

read to you is the charge of the board when it comes to

evaluating conditional use

permits but it's not to have a detrimental impact on the neighborhood.

And we've only been in the neighborhood for 80 years but

we've been there as long as they've own the property.

In fact much longer. So I think we are considered a

part of the neighborhood.

the drive-thru use is shifted towards our property.

In fact it's shifted toward the part of our property where

visitation services are usually taking place.

It's also shifted towards the side of the property where most of the funeral processions leave from and where bodies are

carried into and out of the facility. We think it is an incentive use and irresponsible use to put a

drive-thru that close to places

where people are mourning. There are other places you could

orient the site. This is the least sensitive

design to our business and it

would have a detrimental impact on that.

The one that really concerned me though in terms of noise that

could impact our property is the bizarre orientation at the front of the property.

The woodlands especially

transand exit whereas the curb

cut to our property is exit only.

Just using logic, I would that if the first car that is

attempting to go out of that

exit is trying to turn left that subsequent people that May be

trying to turn right would cut around the front of the building

come out the other exit and attempt to come out on the other

side. That creates a traffic conflict

because the person turning left May run into the other person

trying to come out and turn right. What I'm far more concerned

about is that task will queue up and people will get I am patient

and impatient and sounding their

horns and yelling at each other immediately adjacent to the

place where our processions are leaving from and visitations are

taking place.

I think that is a recipe for disaster and think that now it's

not my concern whether the traffic functions on their property effectively.

They pay people to coming up with that.

What it does concern is when

that function creates noise that could impact "client's business.

That's obviously a very sincere

concern of ours.

Lest you think I'm anticoffee if

they sold it in I.V. Bags I would assume take it that way.

There are 11 businesses within

there are five less than a half mile away.

I'm not convinced this is a use lexington really needs.

The neighbors May have wanted a starbucks but they didn't ask

for one with a drive through.

I applaud the applicant for

meeting with my client and bell court but they didn't listen to

what we had to say. Letter from bell court

expressing their disapproval with this application.

We are not in agreement with the application. They met with us.

They didn't listen to us. So I give them points for

meeting but they didn't address

our concerns. I'm going to use this

opportunity to conclude at this point. I have a couple other remarks I

want to give and I want to give virginia, my client's

representative here today along

with her father Mr. John kerr is here, I don't believe he is

going to speak to you but I want them to back up with smt ground

experience that they've had,

their concerns with this

application.

This board and body has

consistently rejected drive-thrus. They've presented no evidence

why that should change today. We don't oppose development.

We would love to see the property developed.

A jewelry store I'm not entirely sure why it turns into a waffle

house if starbucks doesn't come because the jewelry store seems

to me would stand alone from starbucks.

I did enjoy, I'm not making a threat but let me make a threat

if you don't give a starbucks we are going to build a waffle house.

I'm not sure that's the best way to do business in front of the

board but I'll defer to the applicant on that point.

We would love to see this property developed.

We would love to see it

developed with a non-autocentric use where the primary objective

is to get cars on to and off of

the property as quickly as possible. Main street traffic is already

bad. We think this would make it

worse but what we are most concerned with is the potential

for conflict and traffic accidents caused by the

movements on to and off of this property.

I think I've presented some legitimate concerns with regards to traffic.

You are entitled to use logic. people are not going to wait on

the one crazy person trying to

turn left during traffic. The one person who gives up is

going to cut through our neighborhoods to get going the right direction.

I don't think that is something we should encourage and I think

this proposal is likely the detrimentally impactful to our

long standing business. They have been here for 100

years and I don't mean to speak

for them but I assume they would like to be here for another 100

years and we think it would be detrimental to our property.

I wanted to touch a couple of the other things that the

applicant mentioned, maybe can

save us a little bit of time in

rebuttal later.

He mentioned 25,000 vehicles per

day on versailles road as an example of the comparing

versailles road.

I think comparing versailles to

this location is like comparing ams and horseshoes they're not

comparable but what would I tell you is the traffic count is

comparable and it's not immediately adjacent to another

sensitive use.

It's not right up against residential neighborhood.

There is not a funeral home next door. We are getting people on to and

off of the property. They also have an option to turn

on to a different road they

don't have to come back out on versailles road.

I pulled up the overhead on my phone.

It's not, maybe it has more queuing space on the lot but I

don't think a comparison to the versailles road location is comparable.

One of the poanl uses they said wouldn't have to be permitted

and I would agree legally it doesn't have to come before any

body is a bowling alley. I don't know that that would fit

on the site.

If these were all viable uses, I'm surprised why this site has

sat vaik apartment as long as it has. We would love to see

development. We just don't want the drive-thru.

We'd love to see a starbucks.

Sorry to hear that starbucks

won't build without a drive-thru.

We'd welcome the coffee shop we

just don't want the auto centric

use. Comprehensive plan is very important.

We are getting ready to update

it and I have a feeling those will be controversial hearings

as well. I would tell you in every point

where infill is emphasized, context sensitive infill is

actually what is emphasized not just squeeze whatever you can in

wherever you want. It's try to respect the

neighborhoods and the business

as the land use patterns that exist in the area.

We have been here eight years. We wish that a little more

attention had been paid to our concerns. Unfortunately they weren't.

But the best news I have all day is that staff agrees with me.

The pros agree. Traffic thinks it's a bad idea.

Transportation planning thinks it's a bad idea.

Planning staff thinks it's a poor idea it's because it is a

poor identify. Drive through is not appropriate at this location.

We understand that other

businesses could be constructed here but we are here to talk

about a drive-thru. Drive-thru is a bad idea.

We ask you to uphold the staff's recommendation.

>> Mr. Wahlburn, what would be

your recommendation to make this plan better assuming that we

were to approve a drive threw?

>> well, reversing the orientation of the building,

putting the drive-thru on the other side because traffic is

waiting on their orders potentially having the traffic

conflicts would be on the other side of the building.

That is one way that you could address our concerns.

I think it is absolute and utter insanity to left a left turn off

of this property. I think right in right out is

the only way you can go only on both sides. I don't think you should be able

to turn in from the left or turn out from the left.

Those are two off the top of my head.

>> what about buffering?

>> well, we are on a pretty constrained space.

In order to have those two lanes of travel that would be required

one to bypass the drive through

and one, you could really burch

the use up but that gives into problems with parking.

Hard to design them on the fly.

If my next door neighbor is any indication, a privacy fence

doesn't slow down in the way of noise. Really the only thing that

dissipates noise is distance.

And I think the tight nate tur

of this, 18 inches of the retaining wall on our property

to where we think the paving is

on theirs. The only thing I could think of

would be to increase distance. A large buffer would help but I

don't think the property is large enough.

>> what about vegetation?

Do you think... Pine trees or

something of that nature, a shrub row would help on the

privacy fence? >> I think that could help.

One of the concerns I have and

it actually sits higher than kerr brothers does.

The nature of physics sound

drops and there are not pine

needles on the bottom.

That would take it from an unmitigated disaster to a really bad idea.

>> thank you sir, before you invite your client up, does

anyone have any questions for

Mr. Walburn?

We'll let your client come up price approach. Put your name on the record for

us. >> I'm the acting manager of

kerr brothers funeral home, fifth generation.

We have been open over 100 years and we have been at that location for 80.

I have a very hard vested interest in downtown.

My husband and I live close to the end of chevy chase and my

two children attend central christian child care center just down the street.

i put them there for their proximity.

Our biggest issue with main

street as it stands is that when you have the way the three

lights that are all in close conjunction with us, the light

that's furthest down at main street when it turns red,

traffic naturally backs up, creating an impasse off of our

property.

You cannot go off the front and that is not necessarily during

peak times. That could be at noon.

It could be at eight P.M. At night. My personal experience is that

it is at all hours. Due to the nature of my job, I

am there often from 8:00 A.M. To sometimes midnight and there

have been plenty of times even

off peak hours the light itself

will back traffic up to close to

well past the exits of my building. Jacob describes a few issues

that we had had and they're not theoretical.

We do have people that cut through, they get impatient with

getting all the way to the light. They will cut through the

funeral home and in a almost

humerus circus-like instance, will get caught in the back when

we have a visitation.

We don't, our parking lot is dual purpose.

We use it as the lines are

intended and we also line cars up directly because as you know,

very integral part of what I do is the funeral procession and

that is simply we are we take a family's loved one from the

funeral home into a hearse and we take it to the cemetery.

We have had that issue even when it was a Mcdonald's.

People would get impatient or

wouldn't want to turn left, cut right and come through the

parking lot and get stuck and they're not supposed to do that

but it was common. The detrimental impacts on the

business is just that it is inappropriate to have a

drive-thru right next to a funeral home.

We've argued it before and will again.

You could put certain types of sound barriers, you mentioned

pine trees.

I would argue that would take an incredible amount of time to

grow to buffer the amount of sound that we would need.

Right there on that particular line if I could use the

building, is right at the door where we leave.

So right where the pickup window

is located that is where we take

people from our funeral home to the hearse and out to the

cemetery and so for that we end up running into an issue of that

is the last thing you hear before you put somebody that you

love into a hearse. That's unfortunate and eye not

necessarily what you want to hear.

We currently use the sheriff's

department here in lexington is absolutely fantastic.

When the police department was unable to continue our escorts,

the sheriff's department picked that back up and that would have

been about 2013. I am concerned that some day I

will no longer have that to my availability and so I have to

look out for all potential traffic things that could come

my way so that I can make sure that people get in and out of my

funeral home safely. Keep in mind people coming in

and out of my driveways May not necessarily be in the best

mental state and so I am very, very much concerned for their

safety as they go leave, we have pedestrians, we have bicyclists

but most importantly we have cars.

We have lots of cars and all

hours of the day and night.

Honestly we are not opposed to development as jacob mentioned

earlier. I'm not.

Quite frankly I think that what

lexington has done with the fill in has been beautiful.

I grew up here. When I was a kid coming downtown

you never did it. Absolutely not.

Think of all the things we've done. Thursday night live all of these

wonderful things.

But I'm also for smart development put is things where

they're intentionally meant to

go and I do not believe a drive-thru belongs next to a funeral home.

We simply wish to be an integral part of the community and a good

neighbor but we also want to protect the sensitivity and

integrity of the families that I serve in my funeral home.

Thank you very much for your

attention. >> is there anyone who would like to speak in opposition? Council member men please approach.

Put yourself on the record officially. Ed.

>> I'm jay gibbs I live at del mar avenue.

I'm the council represent itch for the third district.

And I have a lot of concerns about this.

I'll try to keep it short. I object to the drive-thru

because I think it will endanger drivers, more importantly it

will endanger bicyclists because they're unprotectedded in case

of an accident.

Jacob covered a lot that I wanted to talk about but I

wanted to mention that the

versailles road location is a

really lousy analogy for a whole bunch of reasons.

The signage they're thinking

about for no left-hand turn is really problematic for one thing

there is no mid block, no left-hand turn that I know of.

It would have to go across the road. You would have to get the

approval of the state and casey, do you want to say a word about

that?

How about just difficult. It's very difficult to get anything out of the state.

I've had a lot of problems with that.

One of the things, there was a

lot of discussion and the

applicant's report about generating traffic on the street.

I don't think that's something of a red herring.

Somebody is saying lit generate more traffic.

The concern is what the traffic is going to do.

The traffic is going to cut across two lanes of traffic take

a left into the property and the traffic is going to cut, there

are going to be curb cuts there that resident concernly there

that will endanger pedestrians and bicyclists.

I do want to say again to reiterate you guys have turned

this down several times before. I was President Of the bell

courted neighborhood association when you turned it down.

Bell court is opposed to this.

They have opposed it every time. Mr. Greer mentioned a meeting

several years ago when they approached the neighborhood and the neighborhood said they

wanted a starbucks. I'm sure that must have happened

in some way that they must have approached people and they said

yes we like the starbucks idea. I found nobody who remembers that meeting.

We had a meeting in the neighborhood about two months

ago and that was brought up. Mr. Greer's son was there and

brought up that meeting and everybody look add round the

room, kind of puzzled said who the hell was there because none

of us were there and many of us

are real old timers in the

neighborhood. One thing I would like to

mention, the lawyer for the

proposal said that starbucks is concerned about good design for

pedestrians and bicyclists I

don't see anything in that here.

I also am disturbed about in

essence, it's a mild threat if

you guys don't approve this, we don't know what is going to go

in, you won't have any control over that stuff but if it

doesn't have a drive-thru. But I'm convinced and a hell of

a lot of other people are convinced this is an extremely

dangerous development to go in.

It is going to generate a lot of traffic going across the curb

cut and cutting across traffic.

And you know, I lost my train of thought.

I apologize. But there is a lot of concern

about this. I would also like to note that

in the original application that

these folks filed they estimated

385 trips for coffee shop a day. The average starbucks, I can

give you the citation, the

average starbucks in 2016 served

474 customers a day. Also this could be an important

note that starbucks is gradually

introducing alcoholic beverages

on to their menu.

I'm not too hot of the idea of people taking left-hand turn out

of that site after having a

couple of beers.

One of the things that bothers

me and the traffic report and I hope you don't put too much

stock in the traffic wort. Like jacob, I contacted planning

and got a copy of it yesterday. It's extremely poorly written.

I had a really difficult time and I read voraciously.

I'm not a bad reader. I've read sentences over five

times and didn't know what the hell they meant but some of the

stuff, the gist of what I picked up here, back to my other point.

One of the things that was in there is if we don't do this, we

May get something worse. You guys can't control this.

What you can do is shoot down this. This is bad.

We May get something worse that you guys can't control.

You won't even see it.

But I'm willing to take that chance on that.

I think this is a very, very bad design.

One of the things I they said in the traffic report and this is

my interpretation existing main street traffic that has numerous

gaps for people to take

left-hand turns into the property. Therefore there won't be much of

a problem with traffic stacking

down main street and I should

have brought a map because I

live in bell court and I try to walk everywhere by the way.

I walk and bike, I'll walk by that property and I won't get

run over because nobody is pulling into it right now but I

do drive through downtown to my neighborhood pretty frequently.

So if you are going down main street headed east, I've got to

take a left into my neighborhood at some point.

The first point is indiana avenue astride the "herald-leader."

that's my first voice that goes most directly to my home but I

won't stop there unless there is a gap.

Maybe I'm overly conscientious

but I don't like to stop because my fellow citizens would be

backed up behind me. My wife calls me safety pup.

I put a lot of thought into what is safe and I don't like the

idea of having traffic tied up behind me because I know there

is going to be guys or women who

are going to try to since

they're stuck behind me, they're

going try to jut out around the right lane to get around me.

that's dangerous maneuver. That's going to happen more and

more.

I go by indiana. The next place is forest avenue.

If I can take a left there I will but a lot of times there is

no gap there so I go down to bell place when is the next

place to do it and if I can't turn there and there are cases

where I can't without stopping and backing up traffic behind

me, I go all the way down to walton where there is a light.

I end up going to the third, you

know, I rarely can make the first one on indiana maybe half

the time the second one. Sometimes I go all the way down

to the third choice bell place and there are times when I go

you will the way done to my fourth choice.

My point is I have four choices where to make a left-hand turn.

If you going into the starbucks you have one choice and you are

going to sit there and the traffic is going to pile out

behind you and people will jut

out around you to get to the turn.

If you are sitting there waiting

to pull into the starbucks on the left-hand turn and you

finally get a break in the traffic. You are going to dash across

there and you are not going to

see the pedestrian or bicyclist until the last second.

This is a nightmare for bicyclists and pedestrians we need to be doing everything we

can in this city to make this

city more friendly for bicycles and pedestrians.

The city has done quite a lot.

We need to do more.

just one final point. This really isn't your problem

but addressed by both jacob and the applicant.

The applicant claims what

they're doing is good infill. I don't mean to be rude, this is

not good infill.

This is taking in essence a

suburb an design and plopping it down in the middle of the city

and in a sea of impervious surface. Good design would be something

like what they could do with the property and again I can't tell

them what to do but I'll make a friendly suggestion is something the neighborhood would like and

I think would be really good for

the community is to put in do a

mixed use development and put in

maybe a low impact retail or professional office on the first

floor and then maybe two stories of rental properties on top.

There is a real need for rental properties.

If these guys want to serve the community, what is best for the

community, they should do

something like that and not put a suburban design in the middle

of the city. That's an insult, I think, to

people who think in terms of

infill and I'm sorry to use such strong language but this is not

infill. That's just my two cents.

And I think I've covered probably about half what I was

going say but that's close enough.

You guys have got the message. People over there don't want this.

Did I mention aylesford park neighborhood association is

opposed to it directly across the street.

The two neighborhood

associations.

>> does anybody have any

questions? Is there anyone else in

opposition? I'm going to let the parties

have a second chance to do a quick rebuttal.

I'm going to limit it to five

minutes and I will start my

clock and keep you honest. >> if you'll let him get my

thing up there before you start

the clock on me Mr. Gross. I've never been very fast.

I know you would never guess that by looking at me.

I will be brief and understand the time lipts amend I I

certainly appreciate your patience.

I will try and address a couple

of the comments and you've heard what we said initially.

Here is what you didn't hear in opposition.

Was a single fact or a single

piece of data that says that a drive-thru on this property in

conjunction with a starbucks creates improper traffic

movements add to traffic. What you heard was lawyer

testimony about what leigh thinks and assumptions but in

terms of facts which is what the

board's required to act on, there was no such thing.

Now one thing that is a little

bit of a red herring I think and

I know our initial site design had different traffic flow shown

on the entrance and exit but we submitted this amended site plan

and as you can see, there is a

right and left out over there

just the way it has been so the idea that somebody is sitting

there waiting to turn left and traffic is backed up honking at

them, that is not the design.

Now you heard from council from kerr brothers and we respect

kerr brothers as a member of the

community and as our neighbors. And I think they would tell you

we have tried to be pretty good

neighbors and the sheriffs who need a place to sit and that

kind of thing I was interesting

to me to hear the comments about how awful this site is that we

have because it's got two

entrances and exits on to main

street and people coming out

aren't going to wait to go go left. They're going to go right and

cut through and you are going have all this traffic coming out

of this site and going left.

You heard for 70 years or more

that kerr brothers has been sitting there.

Kerr brothers has two entrances

and exits on to main street.

It is the same double yellow line. When there are funerals they

have a sheriff's escort that stops traffic.

But that's not the case when

they have hundreds of people in

vehicles that attend visitations, sometimes two to

three a day so it's a little disingenuous to hear council

come in here and say this site

and I want to get his exact words he used.

It was incredibly stupid or something along those lines.

It May have been a little better

than that but something like it's preposterous that could you

have such an auto centric use here with these two exits and

what people will do is cut through indiana avenue and cut

through bell court.

Would not every single one of those arguments apply to the

good people of lexington who go

to kerr brothers to attend a visitation and then leave and

I'm going to guess maybe one or

two of them actually went out toward the other way instead of

going back toward downtown at 8:00 at night.

You have to take that in context. Secondly with respect to the

impact on kerr brothers next door.

We've shown a retaining wall on our site plan.

We are totally confident week build a retaining wall that

avoids the conflict in terms of noise but what was suggested

when Mr. Gross asked the question was that we ought to

flip it around so the drive-thru window is on the other side.

The idea is to have the ordering

box where there is a microphone away from kerr brothers.

What was suggested to you by council was that we flip it

around so it's right next to kerr brothers.

The idea that a drive-thru is the problem here. We wouldn't have any problem

with a starbucks or a coffee shop.

It's the traffic. Remember what jimmy emmons data

showed you.

The traffic for a coffee shop

with a drive-thru is less than

without a drive-thru. How can you say we are opposed

to the traffic with the drive-thru but don't have a

problem with a coffee shop being here.

finally Mr. Gibbs and counsel made domestics about conflicts

with pedestrians and vehicles. Folks, I know it seems like I

was beating a dead horse over and over.

This property has had two

entrances and exits for 35 years

with cars going in and out of them. What he is saying to you about

there will be all kinds of

problems with pedestrians and

bicycles that exists in front of

our property very respectfully precisely the way it exists in

front of kerr brothers funeral

home with two exits and two entrances. This property is going to be

developed. I think everybody acknowledges

that and it can be taken as a threat or not.

I went out of my way to say it's not that. The point is the reality is

there are other uses here that don't require permission and a

lot of them could have a greater traffic impact and a greater

noise impact than what we are proposing. That's why we came forward with the plan.

We would ask you to approve it for the good of electricington,

for the good of that community. There everybody two people, two

citizens that have spoken against this.

Two private citizens. We think you've got to look at

the good of using that property

in a way that will benefit the entire neighborhood and the

entire area and we ask for your approval. Thank you.

>> thank you Mr. Royce. were you close to getting the

five minutes. >> Mr. Wahlburn would you like

to speak? >> I can rebutt that argument in

four minutes. I only have...

>> I would appreciate that. >> I only have a couple of very,

very brief comments. Would have loved to have

provided you more substantive data on the traffic study but we

got it yesterday morning.

That's why I had to speculate we couldn't bring in an expert.

Tough to find an expert to turn around in less than 30 hours

before I hearing so I don't know

that we should be saddled with that we couldn't present greater

facts to you on a traffic study we received yesterday.

I don't think kerr brothers and starbucks are comparable uses.

I don't think a funeral home is an auto centric use.

It is not our goal to get

customers on to and off of our cuss prolts as quickly as

possible. We confuse these terms of

traffic generation versus traffic.

It is preposterous to me and it should be preposterous to you

that starbucks would insist on a design that would not make them

as much money. Mr. Glover I think you noted

that earlier. It's not just traffic generation.

It's business. More people come to a coffee

shop with a drive-thru than don't. They May not intend to.

They May not set out that way but when you factor in passers

by and you've got staff that can peek to this I think that's true.

I think logic would tell you that starbucks would not insist

on a design that was designed to

come up with fewer customers. I want to make one point.

Two citizens spoke against you believe Mr. Royce forgot about

the volume of letters you received. There are a lot of people who

are opposed to this development. Exceedingly poor idea and you

should uphold the recommendation of your staff. Thank you.

>> thank you. Does anyone on the board want to

say anything?

Or have any questions?

Mr. Emmons does?

>> I had a few comments also. >> the first thing to clarify is

when we were discussing the

stacking on the site, the applicant was referring to the

stacking from the pickup window and that's not correct.

The stacking is measured from

the menu board from where you order. Actually behind that.

So they're not providing the 12

excess that was stated.

I think another thing to clarify, there was talk about a

double yellow and that you can't

cross a double yellow to enter and site.

You can't cross a double yellow

at an intersection or to go against opposing traffic but

it's typical to cross the double yellow to enter into an

entrance.

It's not a street.

>> so I can take a double yellow

to enter into an entrance... >> into a private entrance.

>> I did not know that.

I in lo longer be mad at those poem people?

You want to turn left into a private entrance it is typical

to cross the yellow line.

If the yellow line continues through the intersection I would

not suggest you cross it and I would not suggest you cross it

to pass someone.

>> do you think there are things

that can be done to the current plan that would make it to get

to the point where traffic engineering would approve or at

least recommend approval? >> I don't because it's all

associated with the drive through.

The drive-thru is the trip generator and I definitely agree

that the pass by trips, there May not be additional trips on

main street but it's the

movement of those existing trips there was discussion about the

existing site and entrances, I agree but the request is to

change the use of site which changes the traffic flow on and

off the site. So although it will still occur

at the same locations it's going

to be a larger amount of traffic.

I think jimmy he got brought up

a lot regarding his trip generation, I think he will cover that.

But the main concern is that drive-thru.

>> thank you Mr. Emmons. >> thank you.

First and foremost I want to say

I've worked with Mr. Hilani many times.

He is an excellent engineer a lot of times we have a lot of

back and forth and you don't see

as much questions come up during a public hearing as you've heard

today because often times we work those out behind the

scenes.

But even whenever we do professionally agree to

disagree, neither one of us are

afraid to get up and say what we think.

As far as to address first of all the memo that I submitted to

the board of adjustment staff, looking at the trip generation,

I submitted that prior to even the staff report being done so

that they could have some numbers to look at and think

about as they were formulating

their opinions so they definitely did look at that and

also if you look to that memo in

detail you see that for coffee

shops without drive-thru, some

of the them say no veilable data because in the trip generation

manuals there are less studies

for coffee shops without drive-thrus than with drive-thrus.

It's the same as with fast food restaurants.

There are more studies for fast food restaurants with

drive-thrus than there are without.

So you have to kind of look at that with that kind of through

those lenses. Everything that you do in

traffic engineering or transportation planning is

trying to compare one thing to

another and looking at it

through those lenses so that's

why it has that my final thought

on this, I've had many years of experience as the infill

redevelopment planner as the board of adjustment planner and

transportation planner and I feel like a lot of those are all

coming together with this one

particular application and I ask

the question why the drive-thru? Drive-thrus provide a service to

their customers. It provides a convenience to the

customers and it brings in more vehicles and gets more vehicles

out on a regular basis it's I suburban model. Why are they conditional uses

because not all drive-thrus are

created equal because generally the design of our drive-thrus

are very much on a suburban design regards than an urban

design and those are some of the

things that unfortunately make your job more difficult as you look in there.

We are available for questions and that concludes my comments.

I don't know if the rest of the

staff has any rebuttal comments.

>> a couple of things. Interesting about data the time period might have been

83-whatever, a long time period

of one accident reported but

without a drive-thru a different perspective is it worked there

without a drive-thru so maybe that's something that shouldn't change.

Should continue to operate there

as a business without a

drive-thru. Have you to look at the actual

turning movements that take place once someone decides to

get off main street on to the

site and have to come back out. There are u nike challenges that

have to be addressed.

I think that's it for me. >> anyone else. Any discussion from the board or

discussion points. This has been probably the

criestest board meeting from the

members in a long time. The chair will entertain a

motion.

>> Mr. Chair, I move that we

disapprove pln boa-17-15 southern oak request for

conditional use permit for a

drive-thru window in a downtown

business frame business b-2a

zone at 473 east main street for

the reasons recommended by

staff. >> do we have a second?

>> I'll second. >> Mr. Glover.

All those if favor say aye. The possession carries unanimously.

Thank you.

I would like to take a few

thank you.

And I believe somebody on behalf

of the would they be the

applicant if the person holds

the cm use permit? >> would they be an applicant or

just the owner. We'll call them the owner.

The representative of the owner

is here and he has asked us to postpone this so sir if you

would come up, introduce yourself for the record.

We'll hear that portion first.

Put your name on the record.

>> craig muzak. I represent the owner.

I'm not the owner but I work for the owner.

Just wanted to ask that we

postpone or continuation of the until the owner and legal

council attend. I know they have been working at

it and we have too but we were

in touch with the zoning compliance board a few days

before the last appeal and we were told we were in compliance

as long as the building was vacant and that everything was

okay and they were going to suggest that a revocation

hearing not be ordered obviously they got one and we are here now

but we just received that notice

that they were granted a hearing

so the eighth or tends of this so we had a couple weeks

knowledge of this so obviously we need to get our ducks in a row and would ask that you give

us time to gather some of our stuff and in order to make a

proper response because I understand this has been

stretched out and ongoing, but

in our talks with the zoning compliance folks we were told as

long as the building is vacant orful you get it leased or sold,

you don't have to do anything. >> the owners didn't receive

notice and I understand believe

the notice is required.

>> I'm assuming that we issued a notice.

I can't, I'm not sure exactly when we issued about it.

>> we received notice.

I don't know the exact dates but

you did give us notice.

>> maybe you can all enlighten

us on the day we sent it out.

>> it was the monday following the friday hearing.

The ordinance only requires one week notice.

They got at least three weeks

notice. >> okay. And then are you telling us you

are not prepared today. >> correct. >> okay so I guess the first

item up board is do you want to ask questions or discussion

about whether or not we postpone

this I know we just uploaded our May docket.

How many item dozen we have in May?

Nine? 10?

Nine or 10 so maybe not be so we would be looking realistically

at a June postponement I know this case has been going on for

sometime.

I would prefer, given, I'll give you an opportunity, I would

prefer given the length of time this has been going on and the

fact that we have complied with

the zoning ordinance by inclin anxious is not to grant the

postponement but does anyone else on the board want to speak

to that?

>> I'm ready to move on it.

How does this work? >> I don't think you need a

motion because it's schedule to be on today.

You would need one if were you going to postpone it to a

different day. We're going hear this today.

Given the late hour and the fact

that we have heard testimony on

this for 18 months.

I would like to limit. You May sit down.

We'll call you back up.

I would like to limit all sides

to 15 minutes at max and so if you would, we will have

Mr. Marks give us presentation Mr. Marks and then the owner

representative or appellant? >> I think because the way this

was granted once Mr. Marks gives you the factual background

that he is going to provide,

then you would want to let the party that asked for to you have

the revocation hearing go and

then the owner can make respond to that once they hear what they

have to say. >> we have talked about this six

times before and it's pretty clear that the staff doesn't

support a revocation hearing. So this is a little awkward to

say the least. What I did was just to provide

what I thought was as much factual information that could

benefit your deliberation of this issue.

That was what was included with

nor packet so hopefully you got that and had a chance to look at

it and I passed to some in the audience.

To a large extent, it's kind of

a rehash of issues I guess what

I might want to focus on is something relatively new and

that's the last page of the

three-page document that is a

summary of the conditional uses that have been revoked by the

board and there has only been

seven since conditional uses

were created many, many, many

years ago. And those have different

characteristics from what you are congress today.

All of those seven involve

active uses not complying with conditions and to some extent

this is subjective but all had fairly significant impacts to

the surrounding neighborhood.

Two were for live entertainment

night club and dancing. Two were for compoachting

facilities, the one most recently involved the quarry on

george town road that was just a

really significant adverse

impact and then of course the one involving the homeless

shelter with westchester road.

all were very active ongoing

uses hear evidence of non-compliance while those uses

were under way and no efforts or ability to comply with

conditions.

So those were the seven that had been revoked by the board of

adjustment. The one that you are hearing

today there is no active use

under way on the property.

And the question about to what

extent there is an adverse impact on the neighborhood or

surrounding properties that's something you will hear from the

folks that are concerned about

this it is a much different situation in our opinion.

When it was considered last month and you made the decision

to not recommend the revocation

hearing one of the findings was

that the issue of non-compliance with conditions was not relevant

because there was no active use

under way so you are going to have to wrestle with that.

Some other aspect of this that

you determine is relevant enough to warrant a revocation hearing

if you should decide to go that route. So beyond that, I don't really

have much. I'm happy to answer any

questions you have about the

document I did prepare that have the eight summaries of what we

consider to be the most relevant

information. >> Mr. Marks.

I know you prepared findings

of... The information you provided us did you provide that

to the parties in favor of the revocation?

>> they just got it just now. It was for the board's use.

it did not have findings... >> I apologize.

I'm so used to looking at the sheet and there being a

statement of finding. >> we did not specifically make

a recommendation given the awkward nature of all this but

we did want to you have that. For the most part factual

information but with some conclusions and other stuff

mixed in there but some of those especially on the second page

could be converted fairly easily

to findings if you chose.

Not to go with the revocation.

Any questions for anybody. >> thank you, Mr. Marks.

I can that the parties that are

in favor of the revocation

please come forward and don't

forget we are on I would like to address that first.

I'm charles martin I live at 7416 grounds mill road.

This is the seventh time this

group has been here over this

issue I respectfully ask you to let us say our piece.

This is not to decide if we are going to have the hearing.

This is the hearing.

And I think that it doesn't seem unreasonable, none of us are

going have a whole lot to say

but we need more than 15 minutes

for the four or five of us to

speak.

>> I'm willing to entertain that

since Mr. Marks only took awe

a few minutes. >> would 30 minutes be adequate.

>> that's reasonable because I

think Mr. Marks and staff kind

of we've already had their, they

had their opinion made. The revocations that have

occurred to me, that is has no

rep to this one the fact that there is no action to the

property meaning there no, sir use so you can't are evoke the use.

We are not revoking the use. We are revoabing the permit.

We want the permit removed. The permit is on the records and

all it would have to do is complete the conditions were

that possible to have it back.

I was there in '06 and my objections now are the same as then.

It's a large commercial venture

in an ag residential area.

I wrote another letter.

I would like to just discuss the

conditions. Basically the conditions placed

for conditional use some

specifics required for

commercial greenhouse, and some

were site specific added by the

staff there were two variances

and they moved the entry way and said they could move it closer

than the 300 feet allowed from a neighboring house.

Everyone agreed that they could

not claim an agricultural land

use exemption because it's not

near the five acre minimum and

the staff properly required the permits.

They're not exempt from a

30-foot highway set back it was there and bill the next door

neighbor at the time was the

only real objector and he went

out in the hall with Mr. Diswraimsson and was

convinced that the conditions

were were they met, would protect them.

And can you show the first clip?

>> for the plant nursery and

commercial greenhouse 7524 old richmond road staff has

recommended approval for both the conditional use and the

variance with conditions.

10 conditions. So.

>> I'm aaron jaimeson. We have reviewed the staff

conditions and recommendations

and we do accept.

We had opposition that we spoke

to. >> I live directly opposite the

proposed nursery and I did talk

to these gentlemen when they put

it in and we basically agreed on

all the recommendations, some

concerns that I had, they did agree to and I feel confident

that they will follow through. I don't know if we need to bring

this up and have you all hear

these or not. Followed a long discussion

whether the board after justment had authority to grant the

variances and then the next clip.

>> so to summarize now is it craig craft or craiger.

Now that you've read the

conditions the opposition, there are no conditional conditions

now that we've talked about the

state right of way that you need to feel protected, right?

There is no... >> right. I don't think there is anything

else that needs to be addressed. >> just wanted to make sure we

had that. >> I just want to make sure that

we are both in agreement as to,

you know, what the conditions

will be met that are here. >> and if they aren't, we'll

enforce those.

>> who will I need to see if they aren't.

>> the gentleman at the end of the table is our building

inspector and he enforces the conditions placed upon

properties from this board. >> of course they have a lot of

conditions that they have to fulfill.

There are like 10 of them.

>> let's say they said okay,

you've agreed to submit an

application, revised site plan

and you agreed to all these

conditions and what if he said no I'm not going do that,

because he didn't.

Going to have a minimum of five

off street parking places going

to get the permits. Are you going do that? No.

Are you going pave it to keep the dust down?

No I'm not going to do that. Are you go for example to

provide the arterial creen along I-75. I'm not going to do that.

If he had answered no to those things, the board would not have

given him this conditional use

permit but in fact he has not

done any of these things not

only that, the building is not

as it appears on the early plans.

The distances are not correct it setbacks overlap in the middle of the building.

It's not possible to meet the

conditions distance requires of 300 feet me got a variance to

make that 242.

It's probably more like 200 feet or a little bit more.

It's not even 242 feet to the

next house so he can't do that. On behalf of bill craiger who is

no longer with us and the

neighborhood, I would like to respectfully request that you

revoke the conditional use

permit, that you remove the structure from the property.

Thank you.

Nip have any questions for

Dr. Martin?

I'm mary diane hannah.

3968 old richmond road lexington.

Both of zoning ordinance and the krs 100 plainly state

conditional uses must be

integrated into an area or can be integrated into the area only

if there are specified conditions imposed to guarantee

the use will not negatively

impact or have an adverse influence on the subject

property or their surrounding neighborhood.

By the way, lisa lives in the

creeinger's ows so she has taken

up where the the kreigers have left off.

I feel like there is a negative influence and averse effect on

the surrounding neighborhoods and properties for all of the

reasons you heard today.

First and foremost it has not met the conditions imposed by

the board of adjustment as

specifically discussed at the

boa hearing 2006 as you just saw and the conditional use permit

should be revoked and offending structure removed from the

property. We contend the structure is just

as much a part of the

conditional use as the actual

use itself.

I will specifically show you the

impacted area and that is the principle use for this

particular area. Other small lots of this size

are all residential.

We would like to see this piece

of property go back into being a

residential property.

It's a scenic byway and there are 3,000 acres in this area

that are agricultural or conservation easements.

Pdr or conservation easements so

we would like you to revoke the

permit and return this piece of

property to ar.

Here is a map to put overhead. There are good reasons it should

be converted back into a single family residential lot.

This documents concerning the revocation of the conditional

use permit of the commercial

greenhouse and plant nursery

located at 7524 old richmond

road and we would like to have the property owner remove the

vacant defunct building from the lot and that doesn't mean the

city has to do it.

They just need to get him or her

or whoever owns it to do that. There were statements made in

2006 on the staff report saying

that they felt that this was not

a piece of property that was good good for a residential use

and we feel like, well here what is they said.

A small plant nursery and commercial greenhouse limited to

wholesale activity appears to be

suitable use for this property. The small size of the property

greatly limits any full scale ag

use and the proximity to both I-75 and old richmond road do

not make for a desirable residential use and I feel

that's not fair to say that because there are, as you see,

many, many small residential

lots along old richmond road if people choose to live there,

they like it and it works. These small lots are a lot

bigger than probably 80% of the

lots in downtown or in the urban

area, so I will be entering into the record other staimentsz of

the houses that are along there. And for the owners along old

richmond road, first the zoning ordinance states that the

principle uses for the area are

ar, and that that land should be used for agricultural or single

family detached dwellings. Second the small lots located

along the old richmond road

between U.S. 25 and I-75 are in fact exactly what is permitted

as a principal use in the zoning ordinance.

Single family residence as a matter of fact most of those

lots regardless of thize size in both directions from the

greenhouse between I hfer 75 and

cleveland road are single family

residential dwellings you can see the map with the ag

properties and the residential ones and the ones that have the

dry angle in red and highlighted in yellow is the subject

property today.

Fair cash value range from 56,000 to 210,000.

Unlike the staff's comments,

people consider their residence to be desirable for residential

use. There are many places in the

area where it is probably not as

noisy as if you lived on I-75 or

on harrodsburg road or nicholasville road or tates

creek road and there are many

new homes being built along I-75 and throughout kentucky and

beyond that are on the highway and so we still maintain that

that is an okay place to have a residential property if someone

wants to have it.

The greenhouse building is not compatible either in size or

appearance with the surrounding residential properties and

certainly has an adverse influence on the entire neighborhood.

The scenic byway and is a visual blight to the hear.

There is not another

commercially legally comer lcially zoned piece of property

between south cleveland road and exit 99 on I-75.

The nearest legally commercial

businesses zoned either way are miles from that greenhouse one

is at the corner of jacks creek pike and the other is located

down at exit 99, the restaurant.

There is one church that.

Illegal uses and defunct properties hurt property resale

values for residential properties no matter where they're located.

When the greenhouse is removed, the lot can be sold for

residential and single family

dwellings and when approved and upgrade the value of the

surrounding and neighborhood

properties.

So the houses in this area if

you take 10 small properties

that I have here, they add

1.3 million to the fairkt fair tax value base so we feel like

this is a good thing for the

taxes and I'm not sure that with this thing being defunct that

you are getting any kind of taxes paid.

So that is the end of my presentation and would you

please enter these into the official record. >> yes.

Thank you.

>> I'm walt gafffield 2001 bamboo drive.

i'm the President Of the fayette

county neighborhood council. We assist neighborhood

associations and homeowners

associations in fayette county.

I'm going to address the manner in which the board of adjustment

actually reviews conditional uses to make sure that they're

met and also and that's under

the statutes to be done annually

or at least annually and it's

obvious if you listen to Dr. Martin that the conditions

have not been met.

I mean they simply haven't. And in a way this is a county

wide issue because I don't think it's desirable or a good idea to

have neighborhoods trying to enforce conditional use

requirements or even, and they can't enter private property to

inspect it. And the statute basically says

that the planning staff has to,

on an annual basis, assure the board that the conditions are

met and in this case they haven't been.

And I don't have a solution for it.

I'm not being critical of staff. I think in all likelihood there

is not enough staff and there is not enough budget to inspect all

conditional uses but I'll say in

this case it's a large kind of

invasive use and the inspection

and the reviews have not been

adequate I would ask that any reviews be made part of the

record for this hearing.

States the board shall fix a reasonable time for hearing and

action and I would ask that at

least in the future the board

approved the original permit

partly pursuant to zoning

ordinance 76 a 2 because it found that quote public

facilities and services that

will be needed are or soon will be or soon will be adequate to

serve the proposed use. It. >> it has been a problem since I

lived there.

There has never been anything go

in there, any kind of business.

It's sad sometimes over a year without being touched as far as

mowing.

I have mowed the driveways,

mowed a little to just make it

look halfway occupied. There have been times when

people would park up there late

at night and, you know, have maybe a couple of cold ones or

light something up, I don't know. It's late at night and I go to

bed earlier than that but there

is some activity because it has

easy access on the property and

you can see anybody coming

either direction so it's kind of

an opportune place.

I would very much like to see

this building torn down and

revoke whatever property rights

that the guy has to maintain the building.

I know last year he did rent it and it didn't work out too well.

He cleaned it up and removed the debris and trash but they

started having bonfires late on

saturday night and riding their ATVs up and down the property

and it was just another source of irritation.

Thank you. Unless the board opposes I would

like to let Miss Ganeau have some additional time. >> thank you.

I do appreciate that. >> what do you guys think.

10 minutes, 15? >> 15 minutes. Would that be enough?

>> thank you. I have appeared six times previously.

I have submitted documentation

and letters from the

neighborhood, neighborhood

lawyer neighborhood associations and council members the

applicants have not appeared at

any of the board of adjustment meetings since 2006.

I've also been last on every agenda and I've waited patiently

to be heard many times I'm here

to ask the board to revoke the conditional use permit and to

remove the offending structure.

The land owner never complied with the conditions that

included obtaining the proper building permits and inspections

as required by. The conscience should be met

whether the building is occupied or not.

There were 10 conditions placed on it.

A certificate of occupancy was never granted and there is an

incomplete record of the required permits and inspections

even though there is an existing building. The original building permit was

voided in 2007 and the encroachment permit from the kentucky transportation was

voided in 2009. The certificate of land use was

not filed until late 2015 even though it should have been filed

within a month of the approval of the conditional use permit.

In the books that I have passed

out.

If would you put up picture one

please justed so we have an idea

of what we are talking about here hopefully we can see it a

little bit better.

The greenhouse has many phases.

So this is when the roof panel

was falling and you can see the poor condition of the access to

the property. Unfortunately you can't see all

the ply wood and the paint

missing surrounding the building.

So if you would put picture two up, please.

And here it is in another season

where the grass is actually over

the signage and grass growing up at the entrance.

Picture three.

And this is on the side where I guess the parking lot is

supposed to be and the plant nursery.

Doesn't look much like a plant nursery to me so thank you.

In tab 2 of the book, so each

section is separated by a blue page.

In tab 2 you will see the original conditional use permit

and site plan with one entrance. The actual driveway entrance is

not where it says it is on that plan.

The tab also lists information

about the zoning ordinance. This property is in and

agricultural rural zone but does

not meet the definition of farm or agriculture because this

property is 1.48 acres and not

five contiguous acres. Separate conditions are listed there.

The definition for agricultural.

I would like to point out I have

marked with a yellow sticky a little piece of the zoning

ordinance which talks about commercial greenhouses and i

would like to emphasize the word only here.

Number five that is marked here

says commercial greenhouses but only when all the following

conditions have been met.

25-foot wide landscape easement shall be provided around the

buildings and parking lot area.

Continuous five foot high planting hedge fence or wall

permance bond or letter of

credit for the screening, no structure shall be built within

300 feet of any existing residential structure and it

should be 100 feet from the property lines.

All driveways and parking areas shall be paved or sealed to

prevent dust and just in that

one part there number five, but only when the following

conditions are met. So there are several things there.

I will also point out parking. So there has never been a

parking lot that has been constructed there.

And under the parking part of

the zoning ordinance, it says provided there are sales to the

public on the premises one space

per employee and 10 additional

spaces plus one additional space per 400 square feet of total

floor area up to 5,000 square

feet of total floor area parking spaces not required to be paved

but must be durable and that's

for commercial greenhouses.

So another interesting thing is in the original conditional use

permit they clumped plant nursery and commercial

greenhouse together and really to me they're asking for two

conditional uses. The greenhouse of this nature

commercial greenhouse has its

own definition and so it is then

not an accessory use. And they really need a permit

one to grow sod inside and one for the plant nursery outside

because they are defined separately.

In tab 3, you will see the original staff report which says

it should be 242 feet from the residents on the opposite side

of old richmond road but from

what I read to you, it says it should be 300 feet away but only

when the following conditions are met.

I feel confident from looking at

gis maps through map it and on

the pva and doing some measurements online that the

actual distance is more like 204 feet.

It's probably more like 100 feet from the beginning of my

driveway and it's very visible

from my front door.

To also note in tab 3 the original staff report is in

there and it says on the south

side of the building that's the I-75 right of way but that's

actually residential so that

that is a mistake in the

original staff report. Tab 4 has the minutes from the

meeting in 2006.

The original minutes showing the original 10 conditions as well

as the information about the certificate of land use being

filed in 2015 after I went to the county clerk's office

looking for it and discovered that it hadn't been filed.

In tab 5, I've marked something

with a pink sticky and you can

see the voided permit inspection

log as well as you can see how many permits were not met.

It lists that the owner

negligence and inactivity with the building caused it to be

void. Under the next tab construction

of the greenhouse.

In the 2006 commercial permit,

building group was listed as the contractor and you can see from

the emails in the section they did not pull any permits in

fayette county for 2006, 7 or 8. They also had another address

listed in jessamine county and they were not registered in

jessamine county either and I

have that email in there, also.

The need for landscape approval

is noted in construction greenhouse tab also and there is

a planning review document in

there that says what should

occur if the landscape is not complete.

There is also information from the greenhouses where the pieces

of the greenhouse came from and those emails and information

shows that they do not assemble the greenhouse and so there is

actually no record of who did.

In the next section, access to property.

It shows kentucky transportation

permit voided due to no response

in a certified letter unclaimed from 2006.

I also have emails in the

section from January 2016 and February 2017 showing there has

not been another application for

that location which different than the property owner

spokesperson said at the January 2015 meeting.

In the variances section, that's

marked by an orange tab. And I would like to just talk

about this for a second. The variance section shows the

deeds in there, so I went to the county clerk's section and i

pulled up the original deeds and original plat maps for the property.

They're all there for you to see

with the accurate measurements. The greenhouse structure

neededded more variances so they

asked for a reduction from 100 feet to zero feet to

establish a driveway entrance

and one for reduction from and

as noted this wasn't in the original staff report but there

are two other homes less than

300 feet from this property.

There were no variances requested for the side yard and

the front yard set backs and because this property actually

sits between I-75 and old richmond road which is a state

highway, it, by definition has two front yards.

And so if the lot is less than 3350 feet in depth the minimum

front yard should be 50 feet. Agricultural uses are not exempt

from highway setbacks so there

should have been a 30-foot setback even for the

agricultural buildings.

I have provided for the record in the book that I've given to

the division of planning, there are some colored pictures where

I did go on gis map it and the

pva website and iva georgieva measured from every corner in

the middle of the building and

when I do the measurements in

some spaces there is 17 feet and

some spaces there is 20 feet and

some spaces there is 30 feet from the right of way or the

property lines to the actual structure.

So there is not that much space around this building.

The widest part of the property, by the deed plat map that I've

provided to you, actually when I made the books for you, I

thought it was 233 feet wide but then when I actually got the

original deed and the plat map I found out that the widest part

is only 157.47 feet on the south boundary line.

The residential drawings for the properties supplied by the

applicant on March 21, 2006 show

the locations for the 35 x 185-foot building loading area

and distance with a scale marked on the drawing.

There is also a utility line easement along old richmond road

frontage with utility poles an encroachment perhaps and perhaps

a variance would have been needed before placing the

driveway and parking areas

within it. As Mr. Martin already

mentioned, if you take the 50 feet that should have been

required on both front yards,

both of those would fall within the building.

You cannot fit a building of

that size surrounded by 20 feet

of a required landscaping and

required parking area behind the 50-foot set backs on a lot that

is only 1357 feet on the widest part of the lot.

This can't be corrected now.

And if you've actually been to the property, I think you would

understand that it becomes a very narrow little point and if

you were to put a parking lot in

there, there is actually no room for a plant nursery.

You might get one or two trees in there.

In the same variance section,

two site plan drawings one from

2006 in 2015 are in there.

These drawings are inaccurate and not to scale.

They don't look like the deed

plat map which has the correct measurements.

There has never been an accurate site plan presented on this

building.

This is also a non-conforming lot.

It does not meet the minimum

square foot frontage or flontage requirements.

I believe that the property owner submitted their application knowing that they

could not build on that lot.

They willfully violated the zoning ordinance and as has been

mentioned by other speakers this lot is better suited for a

single family dwelling and do I believe that. If you move to the blue tab I

have provided to you.

It talks about the investments. So we discussed a little bit

last time about what the applicant investments are on

this property. Well, let me explain a little

bit about that.

He bought the lot for $28,000.

In his original application it's

listed as $85,000.

He has advertised it that he has invested $240,000.

It's been for sale for about

160,000 and the pva valuation is 102,000.

If you look at that tab. They do not have as much

invested as the other single surrounding residential

agricultural properties there.

They're paying taxes on only

$102,000 on the 1.4-acre lot and technically that's pretty much

the value of the land since they

never really obtained an occupancy permit or met the conditions.

If you look at this at the bottom of the surrounding 12

properties not a single one is

being lessed for less than 109 now. >> I don't want to interrupt you

but you have one minute. How much longer do you have?

>> I probably have less than five minutes.

>> then let's go ahead and we can take the timer off and let

her finish.

>> I'll try to be quick. I've been trying to talk fast.

>> I know. >> you can see at the bottom

that those 12 properties, and I've got pictures behind there

of those properties, they were

valued at $3 million,345,000 and

the pva has looked at these properties again as they're

going through the 10-acre lots

and I'm sure that the value May

be even greater at this time. I have information on the

signage. They have illegal temporary signage.

They have previous and current

contracts with the city of lexington.

Even though I have filed an open records request in the past, I

never obtained documentation of

this property being inspected annually.

I do have have one other document.

This is pretty much a petition

from surrounding neighbors and

you'll see their signatures on there. Every property that is circled

on the map behind the signatures

is owned by someone that signed

this letter asking for the conditional use to be revoked so

you can see how many properties that encompasses around the

greenhouse area.

So the neighbors, several of the neighbors also are not happy

about this property and as I

walk down from door to door knocking on the doors, I heard a

lot about this property.

To me this is cut and dry.

Envirosod did not meet the requirements.

It has had an adverse impact on

the neighbors they need to keep everybody from having the same

experience and it was provided by council member plomin.

By krs, you can have the structure removed.

This lot was not large enough for the structure.

This company, as of I've talked about before, the applicants

might have been delinquent on

their city tax filings and they haven't paid for any of the

permits. I have facts of findings I would

like to present.

I am asking once you have an opportunity to look at these,

that you make a motion to revoke

the conditional use permit and a

motion to remove the offending structure.

These motions have attached findings of facts.

I have proven every one of these

either by stating or in the book

or by the folks who have presented.

I am asking that everything that everyone presented today as far

as documentation will be entered into the official record.

Thank you. >> thank you.

You can give us a second to make

sure everything that you guys have presented have been handed

over to staff.

I have a bunch of stuff. Let's see here.

>> can I ask one question? Would it be permissible?

I know I think it's a very

compelling letter, from... >> while we are shuffling

through this council member would like to come up, that

would be fine. >> board of adjustment members,

thank you for allowing me to read this to you.

Dear board of adjustment members, I have learned that

there will be a hearing on April 28, 2017 concerning the greenhouse on old richmond road

and I wanted to let you know what happened to me concerning it.

I will not be able to come to the hearing but would I like for

this to be given to the board and made part of the record.

In 2015 I had a contract with the owner and was going to end

up buying the property. The building was weathered from

sitting empty for many years and there could have been some

vandalism.

The owner told me that I could do retail sales from there as

well as grow plants.

He told me could I have my lawn service office there and operate

my lawn service out of the

property and store my lawn mothers.

He did not tell me the property had conditional use permit on it

and I would need to go back to

the city hall ward to have any of it approved.

The building was never completely finished and I agreed

to do some of the work. The electric... Well, the

electric had never been finished or had been trip ripped out

because there were no wires in the conduit going to the fuse

box there.

Were fans and heaters but they didn't work.

I spent a lot of money pulling the wires just so could I get it

inspected in order to turn on the electric.

I had to patch the roof and fix the side panels.

It cost me to get the water

turned on.

The gutter had had to be repaired and clean because it

was sitting for so many years with no maintenance.

The weeds and grass were five feet tall.

There was trash everywhere inside and out that needed to be

cleaned up.

It was a general mess in a state of disrepair.

About that time by that time I had spent lots of time and

several thousand sand dollars. The inspectors showed up to tell

me that I could not do what I was doing there and I could not

store my lawn service and

equipment there or have retail sales.

I had several meetings with

people at city hall who are the ones who told me from the long

list of things that would have to be done before it could be

used. Because it had never gotten the

permits and had not been inspected.

There was landscaping and road work and many other things

including many permits that

would have had to be gotten. The owner never told me any of this.

I got the feeling there May have been more wrong about the

property than I could see. I contacted the owner and

checked up on the group. I'm not sure they're above board

in any other areas, either. I talked to the owner who agreed

to meet with me but skipped out on several meetings.

I felt like I had been duped and had gotten a shady deal because

I was told I could do a lot of things there that I couldn't.

I had wasted a lot of my time and money.

When I complained about how it

had been handled I was given 24 hours to get out and when I went

to get my things in less than 24 hours I was locked out and could

not get my things inside.

I had $500 worth of bulbs in the building and a thousand dollars

worth of plants and flowers I lost not to mention the time and

labor involved.

When I contacted him about the

things locked inside he told me to send him a bill which I did

but I never heard from him again. I never got reimbursed for any

of it, not the plants, the labor, the cleanup, the electric

repairs, et cetera, et cetera.

My advice to you is not to take

his word for anything he tells you because it May not be the truth.

I know I can't get any money back but maybe you can do the

right thing by maybe making him

take the building down and sell the lot to someone who would

like to build a home there and improve the neighborhood.

The greenhouse and the land need a lot of work to make them

useable. No ebb goss for example going to

be able to grow sod with the building the way it is.

I did not finish doing everything that needed to be

done including the plumbing to make it useable.

There is no bathroom.

It is an old building that has been abandoned since I left and

is probably even worse since I left it. The truth is that it would be

best for you to have the owners

remove it from the property so another poor person won't get

scammed thinking they can use it for something they can't.

I'm actually lucky I had not bought it or I would have been

out more money that I did not have.

Sincerely jeremy lichfield

owners by lawns lichfield. >> it's 6:12.

Do you want to add anything else

before I have the owner speak?

In that case, Mr. Mus ea k if you want to approach.

Please put your name on the

record.

>> craig musak, owner representative. All I can really speak to is

that after each of these

meetings we would contact the

zoning folks and they were reiterating the same thing

Mr. Marks told you guys. You guys are in compliance, you

don't need to do anything until you get somebody in the building.

That sort of thing so that's kind of where that's at.

As far as knocking the building down I don't know what that

would look like because there is a mortgage on that building.

There is a loan against it, the building and the land.

so I don't know if it is just as easy as tearing down the building.

I won't comment on the lichfield stuff. I don't know a whole lot about

that other than I think we asked him to leave when he started

making the bonfires and that sort of thing.

So we tried to make it right as soon as we got word that was

going on, we removed him, terminated his lease and kicked

him out.

Otherwise it's just factual info

as all I have which is what we have been given from the zoning

board. Each time it would come out we

reached out to them and they

told us the same thing the same

thing Mr. Marks told you guys. You are in compliance right this second.

Until you do anything else with it.

We did have a building inspector

show up on February 22 from lfucg.

They inspected the property,

they found some loose roof panels.

We were given 45 or 60 days days to repair those.

Those repairs were made on time before his next inspection.

So the city has been out and looked at it.

He said someone had called and solicited that and he went out

and we got a letter on it and that's what he found.

So the city has been on site, lfucg has looked at the

property, the building inspector was out there.

I don't know that he went in. We were not contacted.

We just received a letter that

said hey we were out on February 22 and we noted two or

three loose roof panels. Please repair.

You have 60 days to make repairs.

I think we ended up getting them done in 40 or 45 days.

After we made repairs we sent

him back a copy of the letter

via email with photographs as he

asked and he responded if we needed anything else he would

let us know. So in closing that's really all

I can, you know, like I said, I can't comment on the building or

what should have went there and what shouldn't.

I can only comment to the actual conditions that we are talking

about here for the revocation

and again not to keep beating a dead horse but each time we've

reached out to zoning, we get the same answer which is what

Mr. Marks reiterated at the beginning. So other than that, I don't

really have anything else there is nothing else to are me to add.

We are not really prepared.

I noy woo had the seven days but we have so much going on we

haven't had time to kind of get everything gathered up.

That's all I've got. >> thank you.

Does anyone from on the panel have a question?

>> I do.

If I might ask, two questions.

Why didn't the owners come today and dedefend their use.

>> the owner actually lives in

south carolina so I don't know.

I can't speak as to why he didn't. I know yesterday afternoon we

had had our legal counsel was supposed to have been here. Something came up.

He had to go to court. I don't know what for but I

don't know. I can't answer.

>> let me ask you this, too. Why isn't the facility being

used for what it was designed for?

>> it was actually for, like we had said like he said, the

greenhouse or nursery.

I don't know that they ever even got that far with it.

I'm not sure why. I don't know if it just didn't

take off or they never got the

funds to get it completely there or what they wanted to do with

it but like I said, it's just,

it sits empty as as everybody has pointed out.

There is no traffic in or out or anything like that.

So it's just kind of in a state

of where it's at until we get it sold or leased and like I said,

we had one lease that wasn't

conducive to what it was supposed to be for like he

mentioned they started doing bonfires. >> are they trying to sell it?

>> it's listed for sale currently, yes.

And as mentioned I think the tax

bill on it is $102,000 so it's

not like it's a dilapidated barn. It's a true greenhouse.

>> how is it advertised for sale? >> it's listed with kellar

williams.

>> is it for a purpose? >> greenhouse with those conditions.

>> listed that way. >> does anybody else have any

questions for Mr. Musak.

>> thank you sir. Anyone on the panel have

questions for the parties that

would like the revocation? >> I don't have questions but I

have concerns about the lack of

permits that, you know, were not gotten when the structure

originally went up. I have concerns about the

variances that it wasn't built as according to the site that

there are variances that are not

being met and so for me, those

are two compelling reasons to

revoke the conditional use.

And that's my comment.

>> I would agree with that and

my question is these folks are asking for us to revoke but

they're also asking for us to

require the building be torn down.

I don't think that's possible.

I mean somebody needs to tell me

if that... Is that possible? Do we have any authority

whatsoever to rule in that direction?

>> Mr. Clark, I'll let Ms. Jones address that.

We have addressed that over the

last few sessions that we've had. Smf these conversations May have

occurred before were you on the board.

My understanding is we have the

right to direct enforcement but

we do not have the right to

actually do anything... I mean we don't have any money, we

don't have any security. We don't have a construction crew.

We can't actually make anything

like that occur but I'll let Miss Jones spoke to that.

>> if you look at 76-a-1 of the ordinance at the very end.

It talks about revoking conditional use permits for

non-cliens and it also talks

about that you have a right of

action to compel an offending structure or use be removed at

the cost of the violator and

have a judgment for the cost.

So what that practically means

is if they're here today telling

us that they have never fully engaged in this conditional use

on the property for whatever reason... >> Miss Jones, what is the

citation to that? >> 76... In the zoning

ordinance. 76-a subsection 1 and it's at

the end of the paragraph. But the practical aspect of that

is that you have, you know, in

order to go on their property, we are going to have to probably

have a court order to do that.

If we take it down, I mean we

can tell them to take it down but I'm not sure that they're

going to do that.

And if bee take it down we are going have to have a court order

to do that and if we put a lien on the property we May or May

not get the that money back.

So while there May be a right of

action to proceed in that fashion, in order in terms of I

don't want you to be under the

impression that you say you adopt some kind of finding today

and say we want the building torn down and somebody is going

to go down and tear it down because that's not going to

happen. There is a whole process because

we are talking about people's property rights here that we

will have to follow in order to do that and you are right.

This board does not have money.

This board does not have, so you

can direct some of that action but I would have to believe that

does not necessarily mean it is going to happen and that means

the property owner has the right to dispute that with us in a

court of law.

>> and also Miss Jones to

clarify, we, if we are allowed

to, if we find the facts we

could revoke the conditional use; however if we were to

revoke the conditional use this

is an agricultural zone and this

is an agricultural building and just because they can no longer

use it as a commercial greenhouse does not mean it does

not have a right to exist in

that agricultural zone? >> I think that's correct and

let me back up a bit because there were some things that were

said that I don't want you all to misinterpret.

This is an ar zone.

And in the ar zone and this is in, you all probably don't have

the whole zoning ordinance but

section 8-1 of the zoning

ordinance which is the ar

articling rule and the principal

uses in that zone are land use for agricultural purposes and

single detached dwellings so it doesn't have to be a single

family detached dwelling.

It doesn't have to be a residence. It can be either one of those

things and the fifth conditional

use listed under there which is a conditional use permitted in

an ar zone is the commercial greenhouse. And that's where this whole

thing got started.

so I just don't want you to be confused or think that the only

things that can happen here are residences because that's not true.

There May only be residences all around here but that doesn't

mean that's the only thing.

It can be land use for agricultural purposes.

Now I will also tell you that

our code enforcement section

very rarely engages in getting

into the ar zone with what is agricultural and what is not.

And I think I can't speak to that completely.

I'm not their attorney, I don't know all the things but I do

know they've looked at this

property and they have some concerns about requiring or

doing certain things to an agricultural property that May

or May not have something on it that could be considered an

agricultural use.

So, you know, it's a little hard to tell sometimes what that

might be but I didn't want you

to get the impression that if,

for some reason you revoke the conditional use, and the

building was torn down which is all, that's going to be a

difficult effort for that to happen, that there would only be

a house going back on that property because that is not

accurate. It could be other things that

are agricultural uses but it

could also be a house. That's what the ar zone and it

is still an ar zone.

The zoning has never changed.

It's in the ar zone. It just had a conditional use

granted to it that was a conditional use if the board of

adjustment granted the permit that was allowed in the ar zone.

>> my point is that in this particular case.

The conditions have not been met. Is that correct?

>> I would like for Mr. Marks to address that a little bit but

let me tell you what my understanding from talking with

the planning staff of what I

think has occurred here.

Under the ordinance in section 7

of the zoning ordinance, and

this is honestly there is not a

clear directive on this because

it talks about in a case where a conditional use permit and this

is in subsection 5, in a case where conditional use has not

been exercised within a time

limit set by the board, well,

there wasn't a time limit set by the board back in 2006.

Sometimes you all might recall you do set that.

You say in six months or in a year we want this done or we

want this put in before you do

that or whatever, but that there was no time limit put on this

conditional use.

>> but doesn't it not having a time limit doesn't it still

imply that a reasonable time. >> and that's part of what I

want to address with you.

I think what happens is within

one year, they talk about if no

specific time limit has been set that it doesn't automatically

revert back to whatever it was before but then there has to be

a determination in the form of a hearing which you are having

today, to determine if that has happened. But then it goes on in that

section to talk about what exercising mean.

You don't have a time limit on

this one and so when and let me also say this because of the

time that has elapsed from 2006

to today, building inspection used to monitor these things.

Now we have a zoning compliance section in planning that

monitors these things, few in number as they are, that's what

they do.

And but what whoever it was at the time initially it was

probably building inspection now

it would be planning and their zoning compliance section so as

again as a practical matter, they're trying, zoning

compliance to go back and

determine from building inspection what happened 11

years ago. You know, I don't know how hard

that was but those are some things jim might be able to

speak to and explain better than I can because he deals with it

but they are they, whoever was

monitoring this when there is no time limit was going out there

and looking to determine if

there was being anything exercised that would indicate

they're going to engage in this use. And then it goes on to tell you

what the those kinds of things

would be and those things would

be contracts, construction of a

building or other improvement so I think if you look at the

information that jim gave you,

in there were some contracts. In 2007 there was a greenhouse

constructed so I'm, it's possible that at that juncture

whoever went out there saw a

land lot that had nothing on it. That now has a greenhouse

constructed on it and thought okay. They're moving towards

compliance, there was no deadline for them to meet that.

So they didn't... They get

additional time to comply if they're doing something.

The problem here is that shortly after that for whatever reason,

and I don't know the reason,

apparently nothing happened on

the property nothing whatsoever.

So after that when our compliance folks whatever

division they were under would

go out there, there would be no

use going on and jim has

documented for you that between 2007-2014 they didn't receive

any complaints and so as you know, they're going go out there

and they're going to do a cursory review to see if things

look like they're moving or not moving. If they're not moving and there

is no conditions on it that say it had to be done in a certain

time, they're probably going to

say the use has been abandoned people aren't doing anything. I don't know.

The other thing that can dictate

an inspection or a review is a complaint.

But since there were no

complaints and no activity, my best understanding of what

probably occurred here is there

was an assumption on the part of

whoever was examining this stuff that although they did initially

in that first year construct the

building that thereafter they

just weren't using it and so the question that you are dealing

with today is is does the fact

that nothing has been happening on the property for all this

time mean that this conditional

use permit should be revoked? And it's a difficult question

because there was no time fixed

in the initial permit.

So I think, you know, if you are inclined to go that way we May

be able to try to craft something to allow to you do

that but I do think you should hear from jim who deals with

these compliance issues and what they're looking at when they go

out and try to determine if

something in compliance or not.

I mean there are many number conditional use permits.

You all issue conditional use

permits for home occupations to have an alteration business in

their home. They might do it in two years

and in a couple of years decide I don't like doing this I'm not

going the do it anymore. We don't revoke those.

And so you know, it's a situation that, from their

standpoint in compliance it's difficult to address the

question when there is no use going on.

So if jim wants to weigh in on

any of that, he can because he deals with the factual side of

it, I'm just relaying information based on what

they've told me. >> there was a lot thrown in there.

There has been no question right from the beginning that they

haven't collide with the conditions. That's never been an issue.

We are in agreement about that.

We have over 1100 conditional uses, 1100 that we are supposed

to manage one way or the other. Many of those don't get looked

at annually because they have what is called conditions that

have been permanently satisfied; for example, if the conditional

use was just for church building and they built the church

building and they built it in compliance with the setbacks and

whatever else wand there was no special conditions applied to

it, we routinely mark those off as conditions permanently

satisfied. Does that mean we never look at them? No. It means we wait until an issue

comes up and we'll go look but we don't automatically inspect those every year.

That takes out several hundred

of those.

There's a whole category of ones that are listed as out of bounds

and this one falls in that category. I think other than the first

year we did an inspection every

year after that it was listed as

out of business and at some point, after years of something

being out of business, it doesn't make sense for staff to

keep going by and again we leave those on our list of conditional

uses but we don't go back and

inspect those every year necessarily.

Then there are those several hundred that are left that are

act itch that do have conditions

that need to be monitored that

we do go out and inspect these once a year.

Of those there are many different circumstance that you

come across. Several months ago you all had

to make a decision about a child care that had a conditional use

but hadn't been used for a

couple of years and the new

owner of the property or prospective buyer of the

property wanted to come in and change things around a little

bit and in that case they hadn't complied with the conditions but

we hadn't gotten any complaints. So that one got worked out.

The new owner got a conditional use to modify things and

actually reduce the number of children.

That one was odd because it was non-conforming because it was in

a residential area and it was for like over 30 to 40 kids

which is not allowed now. But she made improvements, the

new owner made improvements and

we got the non-conforming reduced by reducing the number

of children based on parking and that kind of thing.

So there is a whole range of circumstances, people stop doing

something for a year for whatever reasons and then they

start it back up.

So that's why we really cringe at the thought of having to go

evaluate all those based on is has it been dorm act for six

months or a year or whatever, so

this case May be distinctively different enough that there is

something there that you can

work on in terms of findings for revocation.

A couple things have been mentioned that to be careful

about, the variances. There have been no documentation

of additional variances needed or not complied with.

They asked for the two grarchts that staff at the time thought

were needed and they got those. If you are going to go down the

variance road, we need a lot

more verification of what has happened with that.

You can't just accept that additional variances were needed

based on someone saying that. Offending structure.

The structure May be offending in that it offends people who

look at it and don't like the looks of it but in the context

of the ordinance an offending structure is one that is not

compliant in some respect. We haven't demonstrated that

this particular building is not

compliant with some criteria or

requirement so be careful about doing anything with a finding

about an offending structure.

I'm not saying there is not something somewhere else you

can't use, I'm just saying you have to be careful about that

stuff because it hasn't been documented yet.

Tracey did I Miss Something in the list of things is this.

>> no, I don't think so.

>> can I just get how I lean here.

After taking it all in, I feel obviously conditions have not been met.

It's very obvious. Obviously there are no plans to

do much with this property from

the owner and there are several complaints from neighbors that

seem to want something done.

It seems very simple to me that

we could revoke the conditions

that have not been met and at

that point I'm not feeling great about having saying the building

needs to come down. Obviously if something happens

to the future with or in the future with mica group and they

want to try to lease it obviously these conditional uses

that they were initially there

are not there now so wherever that puts them in the future

with this building they have to deal with.

And then at that point it seems

like it's off... On to, you know, like a vacant property

review board at that point. But I don't know.

I'm not trying to pass the baton

but that seems to be where I'm leaning here.

>> that's sounds exactly like what you are trying to do.

But the application originally,

the conditional use application

was conditional use to use the property as a commercial

greenhouse and nursery.

So if that... That is the only thing we would be revoking would

be their right to use it for

that purpose. >> I'm sorry say that again?

Since their application was to use this property as a

commercial greenhouse or nursery, wouldn't the only thing

that we would be revoking would be the fact that they could no

longer use this for, I believe

it was wholesale commercial

greenhouse, nursery? >> it's still an ar use.

It would go back to the uses allowed in an ar zone without

the conditional use permit. We May need if that's where you

are going, you know, we May need

a little break but that's what that would accomplish.

And further just so you

understand, that will require

that anyone who comes back, say, you know, if the building does

not come down if the building stays there, anyone that buys

that property that wants to use

that building for something that

is not personal to them and

agricultural on their property, any of the other conditional,

will have to come back to this

board, express what that is and

get your approval. As a practical matter, the same

thing is really true now but I can believe if you would regards

do it that way.

You know, because it is not

being used, as soon as any use starts taking place on there,

all those conditions are going to come back into play.

If the cm use is still on there

and whoever wants to use it that

way is going to be required, you know, to follow those and

implement them or you know, you are going to be right back.

I mean they can't use the conditional use if they don't

comply with the conditions. The problem we are having in

this case is they're not using the conditional use.

They're just not doing anything. The other thing is anyone that

buys that property with the

conditional use as it exists in that wants to do something

different would have to get a different conditional use.

But if you revoke it you will be revoking the conditional use

that was issued for the property

but it still is an ar zone so

then only the uses that are principal permitted agricultural

uses and single family detached residential would be permitted

as a matter of right.

>> I don't know what else we can do beside that.

>> I mean we can deny. I think all it does is...

>> I think the fear is when the property sits for another 20

years in its current state. Which it can.

>> I don't believe that's

something this board handles.

>> I mean I don't see, personally I don't... If you

look here, we have only revoked

conditional permits mowments Mr. Marks? >> eight times over the last

eight years.

>> 30 years or 20 years?

It's been a long time and those were all where the conditional

permit was for dp and they came

in and started doing y and the

board said no, you can't do y and they took away the conditional use because they

were trying to use the conditional use permit to

essentially doing something

other than or they would doing

things, for example, a neighborhood and they were

supposed to keep things quiet

and they were clearly being disruptive.

In this instance all it is is a

building that people don't like to look at.

I mean it's a sight thing, it's

there is no noise emitting there

is no... It's just like a barn.

You can drive down to any rural area in the state and you will

find a halfway fallen down barn. Are we going to, you know...

>> I think that's what we voted

on last time with having the revocation hearing we voted to

have one but we didn't really and we thought we would make the

decision at that point when we heard whether or not the

building comes down. I mean we are not really voting on that.

We are just voting you know.

>> I guess my issue is...

>> I think that the revocation

of conditional uses is an

extreme remedy and I don't think

this warrants that extreme remedy.

It's sort of like do we give someone the death penalty for

stealing a tv. Its the most extreme remedy in

the criminal justice system.

>> I look at it as if it's, you know, we take into consideration

neighbors and their opinions and their views and if the

neighbors, not that I feel like

nothing is happening on the...

With the conditions so again as jim said why do we revoke

something when there is no action currently?

And it's a fair question but

it's the question before us and

you know, how do we move on this? Forward with this property and

make sense to me to let someone

else start clean. We revoke the conditions at

least in my opinion and then,

you know, the next okay pire or

owner can move forward with a clean slate.

But maybe I'm not seeing that correctly. >> it's going to be a while

because they had it for sale for

a long time. If not owner is going come in

place unless one the neighbors buys the property.

>> to be honest with you, you

take away the only viable commercial use of that property,

it's not going to be words much. >> I've been out there.

I've been to the site. >> but none of that...

>> let me interject in this discussion.

If you revoke the conditional

use, unless somebody bought that

property and was utilizing that

greenhouse for an agricultural use they would almost be forced

to tear it down in order to

unless they got some other

conditional use because they wouldn't be able to use it for

anything else. I mean they do use it for an

agricultural use or live in it.

I mean that would be it.

>> I'll try to express myself with just common sense.

I'm not sure how this all works

in terms of all the parameters we are forced to consider but if

we do nothing else tonight it

seems like to me one thing we

can do is revoke the conditional use.

It May not do any good

whatsoever, it May not help anybody.

But this property has not been

used as it was intended. The conditional uses are

pointless and they have no use

whatsoever in terms of this property because it is not being

used for that purpose for many years so why do we keep a

conditional use in place that

has no purpose?

Just my point and you know, I

understand all the confusion

about what the law says but it

just seems like the least we can

do is revoke this conditional use and then I don't see any

possibility of doing anything that is going to affect the

building itself. So I think our hands are tied

there. >> anymore comments from the board in.

>> I'm leaning toward, I just toward what Mr. Clark said.

I just think from a standpoint let's revoke the conditional

use.

>> I don't think it matters. In my opinion.

Because the issue is the issue is the building.

If I can really say what I want

to say we can do to the building but that's not possible.

But I want to make sure that they're satisfied, too and also

this is kind of a gray area. But I don't know if it matters

if we revoke the conditional use permit. They're still going have the

building out there.

It's not going to go away.

So how are we going to address that? Can he can't address that.

That's the issue.

It's not the conditional use

permit.

>> I would say then it seems to

me that revocation May have the votes so I would say let's take

a cowell minutes, let Miss Jones

and Miss Brown work their magic

and so we'll be in recess for I

think five minutes? >> I just say a couple things?

>> no I mean we've had the

discussions... Yeah, I think...

Lack of property maintenance and periods of non-compliant use

have been made and number two without any compliant use over

an extended period of time of 10 years, there is effectively no

reason to allow the conditional

use permit to continue.

And just a note this does not

include razeeing of the building

we have a motion that we will revoke the conditional use

permit and has noted in his

motion it does not address us forcing the removal of the building.

do I have a second? >> second. >> Mr. Clark seconds all those

in favor say aye.

On motion.

4-1 again this month and so I

think that is takes care of that.

At this point, Miss Jones and

Mr. Marks, what is the process

formalizing the revocation? >> we'll provide written notice

to the owner that it has taken place and since there is no

active use on the property right now, it's for sale.

There shouldn't be any time period established for like

vacating the use.

That should be all that's required.

Just giving them the written notice. >> thank you.

Staff will send a letter out to

the owner informing them their conditional use has been revoked

if they so choose to use the property as a commercial nursery

they will need to dumb back through the board through the

application process. That takes care of all of our

agenda items for today.

Does the board have any members

have any items they want to address? Nope.

There is one staff item.

It has come to my attention again that some of us are fast

speakers and slow, I mean and

low speakers so Miss Tammy has had an issue from time to time

taking sure we have the correct votes.

So I would like to quickly

address us using the voting tab layings.

Mr. Clark used that when he

was on the city council much I think it's something easy so I

request that we use that starting next month.

So if you would make sure we

have someone here to get it implemented we'll do that up on

the monitor to make sure our record keeping is proper.

Any other staff items?

Hearing none, the next meeting

is May 19, 2027. I will be leaving town the next

day so there is a chance I will not be present.

But I will let you guys know so we can keep that in mind for the

quorum and will there be no

further business, I adjourn the meeting.