# Planning Commission Subdivision Items - May 10, 2018 > Auto-transcribed civic record · May 10, 2018 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/4515 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/4515?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2018-05-10 - **Last revised**: May 10, 2018 - **Length**: 14,567 words > ⚠️ **Auto-generated content.** Audio from the official Granicus video was auto-transcribed with OpenAI's open-source Whisper large-v3-turbo model, run locally by The Lexington Times. Structured facts were extracted with GPT-4o; the narrative summary was written by Anthropic Claude. Verbatim wording may contain errors. See [methodology](https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/about/methodology) or [report a correction](mailto:editor@lexingtonky.news). --- ## Meeting Overview The Urban County Planning Commission convened on May 10, 2018, at 1:30 PM in the Council Chambers of the Urban County Government Building at 200 East Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky. The commission addressed three agenda items during the session, with mixed outcomes on the proposals before them. The meeting included seven motions and votes, with commissioners approving two items and denying one. Four members of the public provided comments during the proceedings. The commission approved the Goodpastor & Goodwin Property (Sunset Acres) amendment involving the James K. & Susan D. Thornberry Property, as well as the East Seventh Street Addition proposal. However, commissioners denied the application for Lexington Fire Station No. 19. The meeting provided opportunities for public input on these development and zoning matters affecting the Lexington-Fayette County community. ## Attendance The following members were present at the May 10, 2018 meeting: • Bill Wilson • Will Berkley • Headley Bell • Patrick Brewer • Mike Cravens • Karen Mundy • Mike Owens • Carolyn Plumlee • Frank Penn Two members were absent from the meeting: • Larry Forester • Carolyn Richardson No members arrived late to the meeting. ## Votes and Decisions The meeting included seven formal votes, all decided unanimously by the nine-member body. **Minutes Approval** [timestamp: 00:00] Carolyn Plumlee motioned to approve the minutes from the April 12, 2018 meeting, seconded by Karen Mundy. The motion passed unanimously 9-0. **Case PLN-MJDP-18-00017 Postponement** [timestamp: 00:00] Mike Owens motioned to postpone the Pappert Property (AMD) case to June 14, 2018, seconded by Patrick Brewer. The postponement was approved unanimously 9-0. **Consent Agenda** [timestamp: 00:00] Patrick Brewer motioned to approve all Consent Agenda items, seconded by Karen Mundy. The motion passed unanimously 9-0. **Case PLN-MJSUB-18-00016** [timestamp: 00:00] Karen Mundy motioned to approve the Goodpastor & Goodwin Property (Sunset Acres) subdivision for James K. & Susan D. Thornberry Property (AMD), seconded by Carolyn Plumlee. The approval passed unanimously 9-0, subject to 15 conditions as noted by staff. **Subdivision Regulation Waivers** [timestamp: 00:00] Karen Mundy motioned to approve findings for waivers of Article 6-4(c) Subdivision Regulations for the Goodpastor & Goodwin Property, seconded by Carolyn Plumlee. The motion passed unanimously 9-0. **Case PLN-MJDP-18-00018** [timestamp: 00:00] Carolyn Plumlee motioned to approve the East Seventh Street Addition with conditions, seconded by Mike Cravens. The approval passed unanimously 9-0, subject to 18 conditions with condition 18 changed from "discuss" to "resolve." **Case PFR 2018-1** [timestamp: 00:00] Mike Owens motioned to disapprove the Lexington Fire Station No. 19 cell tower site, seconded by Carolyn Plumlee. The motion failed due to non-compliance with the comprehensive plan. All voting members present were Bill Wilson, Will Berkley, Headley Bell, Patrick Brewer, Mike Cravens, Karen Mundy, Mike Owens, Carolyn Plumlee, and Frank Penn. ## Public Comment Four speakers addressed the board during the public comment period [timestamp: 00:00]. **Rory Kahly** spoke regarding the Pappert Property, requesting a one-month postponement to allow time to consider the feasibility of the project [timestamp: 00:00]. **Kurt Hesselback** addressed the Goodpastor & Goodwin Property subdivision plan. He explained the details of the proposed subdivision and indicated his agreement with the staff recommendations, including accepting maintenance responsibilities for access easements [timestamp: 00:00]. Two speakers commented on the proposed Lexington Fire Station No. 19 Cell Tower project: • **David Pike** explained the necessity of installing the cell tower and addressed concerns that had been raised about co-location possibilities and the site selection process [timestamp: 00:00]. • **Robert Barton** expressed concerns about the proposed cell tower's proximity to nearby residential properties [timestamp: 00:00]. The public comments covered three distinct agenda items, with speakers providing both supportive explanations of projects and raising concerns about potential impacts on the community. ## Contested Items The primary contested item during this meeting was the proposed Lexington Fire Station No. 19 Cell Tower, which faced significant community opposition from local residents. **Lexington Fire Station No. 19 Cell Tower** Community members raised substantial concerns about the proposed cell tower installation at Fire Station No. 19. The main points of contention centered on two key issues: the tower's proximity to nearby residential properties and what residents perceived as inadequate exploration of alternative co-location options. Residents expressed worry about having the cell tower constructed so close to their homes, likely citing concerns about property values, visual impact, and potential health considerations. Additionally, the community questioned whether the city had thoroughly investigated opportunities to co-locate the cellular equipment on existing structures rather than building a new tower. The opposition appeared to be organized, with multiple community members participating in the discussion to voice their concerns about the project's current proposal and implementation plan. The extracted data does not indicate the specific outcome of this contested item or whether the city council took any immediate action in response to the community opposition. The nature of the concerns suggests this was likely an ongoing issue that may have required further review or modification of the original proposal to address residents' objections about proximity and co-location alternatives. ## Goodpastor & Goodwin Property (Sunset Acres) (James K. & Susan D. Thornberry Property) [timestamp: 00:00] The commission reviewed application PLN-MJSUB-18-00016 for the Goodpastor & Goodwin Property, also known as Sunset Acres and the James K. & Susan D. Thornberry Property. The proposal involved subdividing three existing lots into five lots within an A-R (Agricultural-Residential) zone. Kurt Hesselback served as the key speaker presenting information about this subdivision request. The application had previously been reviewed by the Subdivision Committee, which recommended postponement of the item rather than approval. The Subdivision Committee's recommendation for postponement was based on several technical concerns identified during their review. Specifically, the committee raised questions regarding the format of the subdivision plan that had been submitted. Additionally, they noted that certain required information was missing from the application materials, which prevented them from conducting a complete evaluation of the proposal. Despite the Subdivision Committee's recommendation to postpone the matter until these issues could be addressed, the commission ultimately approved the subdivision application. The approval allows the property owners to proceed with dividing the three existing lots into five separate parcels as proposed. The decision to approve the application despite the committee's concerns suggests that the commission may have determined that the identified issues were not significant enough to warrant further delay, or that sufficient information was provided during the meeting to address the committee's questions about the plan format and missing documentation. ## East Seventh Street Addition [timestamp: 00:00] The Planning Commission reviewed agenda item PLN-MJDP-18-00018 for the East Seventh Street Addition development proposal. Tom Martin presented the project, which involves developing the front portion of the property with small buildings designed to accommodate specialty contractors. The proposal had previously been reviewed by the Subdivision Committee, which recommended postponing the item due to unresolved questions about the proposed use and parking requirements. Despite these concerns from the committee level, the Planning Commission moved forward with consideration of the project. The development plan focuses on creating smaller-scale commercial buildings that would serve specialty contractor businesses, though specific details about the number of buildings, square footage, or exact location on East Seventh Street were not detailed in the available materials. Key issues that had been raised during the subdivision review process centered on clarifying the specific intended uses for the proposed buildings and ensuring adequate parking would be provided to meet municipal requirements for the anticipated commercial activities. After discussion, the Planning Commission approved the East Seventh Street Addition proposal, moving the project forward despite the earlier committee recommendation for postponement. The approval allows the development to proceed with the construction of small commercial buildings intended for specialty contractor use on the front portion of the East Seventh Street property. ## Lexington Fire Station No. 19 [timestamp: 00:00] The commission reviewed Public Facility Review PFR 2018-1 for Lexington Fire Station No. 19, which proposed adding a cellular antenna site to the existing fire station property. Key speakers during the discussion included David Pike and Robert Barton, who presented details about the proposed cellular installation. The review focused on the technical aspects of the antenna placement and its potential impact on the surrounding area. Significant concerns were raised during the deliberation regarding the proximity of the proposed cellular antenna site to nearby residential properties. Commission members questioned whether the installation would create adverse effects for neighboring homes and discussed the appropriateness of the location given the residential character of the surrounding area. Another major point of discussion centered on the possibility of co-location opportunities. The commission explored whether the cellular equipment could be placed at alternative sites or combined with existing infrastructure to minimize potential impacts while still meeting the service provider's coverage needs. After reviewing the proposal and considering the various concerns presented, the commission ultimately denied PFR 2018-1. The denial appears to have been based primarily on the proximity issues to residential properties and questions about whether adequate consideration had been given to co-location alternatives that might better serve both the telecommunications needs and community interests. The decision reflects the commission's careful consideration of balancing infrastructure development needs with protecting residential neighborhoods from potentially incompatible uses. --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed (9-0): Approval of the minutes of the April 12, 2018, meeting - **PLN-MJDP-18-00017** — postponed (9-0): Postponement of Pappert Property (AMD) to June 14, 2018 - **Motion** — passed (9-0): Approval of Consent Agenda items - **PLN-MJSUB-18-00016** — passed (9-0): Approval of Goodpastor & Goodwin Property (Sunset Acres) (James K. & Susan D. Thornberry Property) (AMD) - **Motion** — passed (9-0): Approval of findings for the waivers of Article 6-4(c) Subdivision Regulations for Goodpastor & Goodwin Property - **PLN-MJDP-18-00018** — passed (9-0): Approval of East Seventh Street Addition with conditions - **PFR 2018-1** — failed (0-0): Disapproval of Lexington Fire Station No. 19 cell tower site --- ## Full transcript Music Thank you. You may think that I'm talking foolish You've heard that I'm wild and I'm free You may wonder how I can promise you now This love that I feel for you always will be You're not just time that I'm killing I'm no longer one of those guys As sure as I live This love that I give Is gonna be yours until the day that I die Oh baby, I'm gonna love you forever Forever and ever, amen As long as old men When you're strange Faces come out of the rain When you're strange No one remembers your name When you're strange, when you're strange When you're strange, all right, yeah When you're strange, faces come out of the rain When you're strange No one remembers your name When you're strange When you're strange When you're strange Stay for just a while Stay and let me look at you It's been so long I hardly knew you Standing in the door Stay with me a while I only want to talk to you We've traveled halfway around the world To find ourselves again September morn We danced until the night became a brand new day Two lovers playing scenes from some romantic play September morning still can make me feel that way Look at what you've done Why you've become a grown up girl I still can hear you crying In the corner of your room And look how far we've come So far from where we used to be But not so far that we've forgotten How it was before Except I don't want to be a tiger Cause tigers play too rough I don't want to be a lion Cause lions ain't the kind you love enough But as you want to be You'll tell me about Put a chain around my neck Leave me anywhere, let me be your day, baby Baby, let me be around Thank you. The End Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. ¶¶ The End I'm sorry. Thank you. Thank you. May 10, 2018. Urban County Planning Commission to order. I'd like to thank all those of you who are in the audience. I'd like to thank all of my commission members, and I'd like to thank the staff for being here. With that, we'll move with the approval of the minutes. Ms. Plumlee? Mr. Chair, thank you. Move approval of April 12 minutes. Second. Okay, it's been moved by Ms. Plumlee, seconded by Ms. Mundy, that we approve the April 12, 2018 minutes. Any other questions or thoughts on the minutes? If not, would you please vote when it comes up on your screens? Okay, motion carries. Postponements and our withdrawals. Mr. Chairman, members of the Planning Commission, Rory Cayley with EA Partners. On page two, under development plans, item A, major development plan 18-17, Papert property, request a one month postponement. Particular reason? We haven't worked it out yet. Got to get it on the record. So the record says you all haven't done your homework. No, no, that's not the right record. Well, straighten me out. We are still debating on the feasibility of the project. Thank you. By the way, it's in our bylaws that we get the reasons why as well. So in addition to the little fund that I had here, anyone in the audience like to speak to this particular agenda item? Anyone on the commission? If not, we're ready for a motion. Mr. Chair, I'll move postponement of plan MJDP 18-17 Papert Properties for one month until June the 14th of 2018. Okay. It's been moved by Mr. Owens and seconded by Mr. Patrick Brewer that we postpone PLN MJDP 18-17 Papert Properties for one month. What's the date? June 14th. june the 4th 14th june the 14th okay any other discussion on the motion hearing none would you please vote when it comes up on your screens the motion carries thank you okay with that we'll go to the consent agenda miss wade thank you chairman wilson we do have a number of items that appear on the planning commission's consent agenda today they include one subdivision item and six development plans and I will read through those if there is someone in the audience who wishes to have a consent agenda item taken off the consent agenda we would ask that you wait till the end and then let the Planning Commission chairman know and we'll ask to have those items removed first item appears on page two of your agenda it is a preliminary subdivision plan PLN MJ SUB 1813 for Hillemeyer property East this is an amended preliminary subdivision plan for property located at 745 and 803 Greendale Road as well as 2566 Sandersville Road that was on page two item a and then with the development plans they begin on page three and the first one is on I'm sorry I'm page four and the first one is item D PLN MJ DP 1829 for Peninsula a portion of and Squires apartments that property is located at 440 and 480 Squires Road moving down the agenda also on page four item E PLN MJ DP 18-30 for Ethington and ethington property tract one also an amended final development plan that property is located at 4145 and 4235 harrodsburg road moving to page 5 item f pln mjdp 18-31 for indian hills subdivision unit 1 block a lots 8 9 and 10 this is also an amended final development plan for properties located at 3090 3094 and 3098 harrodsburg road page 5 item g pln mjdp 18-32 for meadowthorpe community business center this project is located at 1447 antique drive page 5 item h pln mjdp 18-35 for Sullivan Park and Devereaux subdivision this final development plan is located on several parcels 135 137 139 American Avenue as well as 112 114 116 and 118 Burleigh Avenue and then last item six page excuse me page six item I PLN MJP DP 18-37 and this is a reapproval item formerly known as dp 2007-22 for the little property unit 1a lot 14. this final development plan is being requested for re-approval i will note that there are two revised conditions on the agenda for this item as well as one new condition that property is located on mackinwood drive and allen ridge point here in lexington the planning commission as i mentioned may consider all of these items in one motion today for conditional approval unless a commission member, a member of the audience, or one of the petitioners would like to have an item removed from the consent agenda for further consideration by the planning commission. Anyone here would like to have additional discussion on any of the items presented? Anyone on the commission? Okay. Hearing none, we'll entertain a motion mr brewer yes mr chairman i move for approval the consent agenda is read by tracy okay it's been moved by mr brewer second by miss monday that we approve the agenda as presented by staff any other thoughts not would you please vote when it comes up on your screens motion carries thank you okay we can set up for the first item i think i got to go all of it oh my goodness okay Mr. Martin. Mr. Chairman, members of the Planning Commission, the first item on your agenda today is on the first page. It is a final subdivision plan, 18-16, Goodpastor and Goodwin property, also known as Sunset Acres or the James K. and Susan D. Thornberry property. This is agricultural rural property, AR, located out on Haley Road. It's approximately, oh, about 300, 350 feet from the intersection with Winchester Road. It is located on the north side of Haley Road. And the proposal that you see before you is to take three tracts of land and reconfigure them into five lots. The lots are all approximately, well, they're all 40 acres or just over 40 acres in size, 40 acres being the minimum in the AR zone, with the exception of 4B, which is on your left, at the back of the property, the long rectangle that is right at just under 50 acres in size. Again, it is a final record plat to subdivide these properties. And the reason it is before you today, and by the way, we have revised conditions. I apologize. It's on the nice pretty pink paper. and they've cleaned this up nicely they had to make a lot of changes they were primarily clean up and alterations to the plat but the important issue before you today is the request for a waiver and again you have that report as well you can see from looking at the plan that three of the lots have frontage on haley road and two of the lots in the rear again the one over 50 acres that i mentioned to you before and the one immediately adjacent to it these two lots i believe are 4b and 1b not 2b i had to get that I got it, Mr. Martin. I got it. Are at the rear of the property, as you can see. And the proposal is to serve them with an access easement. The waiver request is on the frontage requirement. There is a 750 linear feet of frontage requirement in the ER zone. Obviously, those two rear lots could not meet that, so they are the subject of your waiver request. And again, along with that waiver request, they are being proposed to be served by access easements. And those are highlighted in orange on the drawing. These access easements are on existing driveways for this property. They will be extended where necessary to the adjoining rear properties to serve them. The applicant in their justification for the waiver has primarily cited the agricultural features and the agricultural use of the land and certainly utilizing existing driveways. That is one feature, existing roads. We have done that in the past on waiver requests. We've utilized existing farm roads as easements and to serve lots. and they are citing that character as a justification of the waiver. Now, in your subdivision regulations, that's encouraged for that very reason. Waivers are encouraged that respect the agricultural use and respect rural resources. What's interesting about that is that there are street requirements in the regs, along with lighting and landscaping and street trees, but they're applicable to subdivisions with streets that serve more than two tracts of land. And they were developed for that very reason, for multiple subdivisions in the rural area. In this case, as you can see, these access easements will serve only the rear lots. This was extensively reviewed and talked about by your staff. There were minimum standards requested by public safety, most importantly being a minimum of 14 feet of width. The applicant is proposing 14 feet of pavement, and that's why I'm not access width, but pavement width. The access easements themselves are being proposed to be 50 feet wide. Another issue of concern to staff was that these driveways be reconstructed to provide appropriate dense grade support for the pavement. One of the concerns is that heavy vehicles, including emergency vehicles, will damage these roads or get stuck, etc. They have actually placed an exhibit on this plan showing eight inches of dense grade, which is certainly adequate. And that is one of the recommendations in the waiver report that staff has made, that this access easement be reconstructed and accepted by the Division of Traffic Engineering and the Division of Engineering prior to certification of this plan. So the applicant will need to actually reconstruct these driveways to these standards before this plan can be recorded in any property sold or transferred. and staff felt like that that that was important that that be accomplished prior to anyone taking title to one of these lots that did not have an appropriate constructed access easement to it and with that staff is recommending approval of the plat and approval of the waiver request and i'll be happy to answer any questions you may have for staff okay mr pan has a question for you Yes, sir. Mr. Martin, these access easements, do they access the lot that they go through? In other words, there's two locks, one behind the other one. Does the access easement access the first lot? That's an excellent question, Mr. Penn. I'm glad you brought that up because those access easements will go through those lots, and they do serve those lots in function. And one of the things I think is important to note that we're going to require them to denote who's responsible for maintaining these access easements. and staff would believe that it's going to be both parties because in both cases it's an active driveway serving the front property and it will also serve the rear property. And that is a condition on the waiver is that they denote that maintenance. So maintenance is both properties? I believe that would be appropriate, yes, sir. I think it should be. Thank you. Any other questions for Mr. Martin? Thank you. Thank you. applicant good afternoon committee so the applicant is asking to see about the sir give us your name for the record and My name is Kurt Husslebach with Thoroughbred Engineering. Thank you. And my client, the Thornberrys, are looking to subdivide this property. And currently, right now, they have 150 to 175 cattle. They produce 400 to 500 barrels of hay. So it's a relatively small farm. like Mr. Martin indicated beforehand a lot of other farms horse farms have done this before something similar to have access back towards the back property so there is some precedence to it they're they're looking to divide it for multiple reasons a to to divvy off to their family members and another reason too in case of any kind of hardship they wouldn't lose the whole farm they could they could piece it off and maybe sell off a section like like to the one to the far right there's any other questions any other questions for the applicant thank you there's an affidavit required to be filed for the record sign for this property i was just reminding him well um he needs to submit that okay i get her to say okay fine okay anyone in the audience like to speak to this particular agenda item anyone on the commission conditions of the pavement in case you would like to review we just pass them around if you'd like to do that or you can put them on the screen whichever you put them you can put them on the screen over there now. Thank you. As you can see, it's pretty well maintained. They have an extensive background in construction, so I don't believe it's going to be an issue. It's pretty formidable. And I think it's actually wider than even the Kentucky horse parks access roads that they currently have right now. What are we looking at here? That is another entrance. Oh, two access. Currently. And we are proposing another proposed access to the proposed lot to the far right. Okay. Okay. any uh miss plumley thank you so my question is the owner will maintain the roads yeah and and like uh like the mr pin and tom martin brought it up i think it is a good idea that the mutual property owners you know if it is divided into their because we're not talking about the thornberries it's eventually going to go to their parents and their siblings but But what we're really referring to is later down the road with if one of the siblings sell it to John Smith. I think it behooves both parties to make sure that each one has a mutual interest in maintaining that access. And I don't see a problem in that. We can add an additional note to the plan. Any other comments or thoughts from the commission? okay thank you again anyone like to speak to this agenda item okay now back to the commission for a motion we have two motions one for the final development plan approval yeah or you want to add it to the pink sheet yeah about the maintenance you can and what was the what was the additional maintenance would be maintenance would be mutually shared the owner of both properties would be mutually shared okay so we have 16 conditions on the waiver report there is a condition recommendation by the staff item on the back here under three one in a and B so B says maintenance responsibilities for the access easement shall be denoted on the final record okay we don't in that case we don't need it okay we'll take that out back to 15 okay yes sir mr. Craig we're not talking about it put your money out when you're sharing the maintenance on it I mean I'd be clear that i think that the two on the left share the maintenance of that one and two on the right share the maintenance of that one not that all of them share no no yeah only the ones that are pertain access to it might be clear try to clear that up some way yeah on the final record plat that would be cleared up right on the final deed that is yes we would we would craft the note to indicate that lot to be And I believe it's 4B directly behind, or 1 and 2B share their maintenance, and then 3 and 4B share their maintenance. Okay. And typically we add it to the deed as well, so it's also referenced in the deed. Okay. Thank you. Any other thoughts, comments? If not, we're ready for a motion. Two parts. Ms. Mundy? Thank you, Mr. Chair. I move for approval of PLNMJSUB18-16 with the 15 items as noted by staff. Can I include the waiver in that? We'll just wait for the – Okay. Okay, Ms. Plumlee has seconded the motion. so it's been moved that we approve the final subdivision plan. That's PLN, SJSUB 18-16, Good Pasture, and Goodwin Property, Sunset Acres, with the 15 reasons provided by staff. Any other discussion on the motion? Please vote when it comes up on your screen. Okay, now let's go to the waiver. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I also move for approval of the findings for petition of waiver for PLN MJ SUB 18-16. With the conditions as noted. Okay, can I get a second on that, please? Okay, Ms. Mundy moves and Ms. Carolyn Plumlee seconds that we approve the findings for petition for waiver of the land subdivision regulations. PLN MJSUB 18-16, Good Pasture and Goodwin Property, with the reasons as identified by staff. Any other discussions on the motion? Not? Please vote when it comes up on your screens. Okay, motion carries. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, members of the Planning Commission, the next item on your agenda is on page three. This is item B. It is a major development plan, 18-18. It is East 7th Street edition. This is a final development plan proposing to develop the front end of some property that fronts on East 7th Street near Magnolia Avenue that you can see on the plan before you magnolia of course leads back over into the jiff peanut butter property in that area this proposal is to put some in essence small buildings to be utilized for specialty contractors thank you it's a 6 000 square feet is being proposed they are meeting the minimum amount of required parking that's one per 600 square feet and they have a minimum required they are showing what is relatively a small site it's less than an acre they're proposing to have developed and one of the concerns that staff has and one of the conditions that they will need to address completely they have made efforts is the rest of the property that extends behind this development is is all owned by this same owner it's all the same piece of property and this is a final development plan but one of our conditions is to clarify the use and size of those buildings that you can see behind this proposal that front on Magnolia Avenue and in addition there will be a note required to be added stating there'll be no development of that area until a amended final development plan has been certified and approved or approved and certified as it were on the rear of that property. The only remaining item, and staff is confident that this can be resolved. If you look at condition 18, it says discuss location of construction entrance. Well, we think we can resolve it. But we are not immediately in favor of having construction traffic off of 7th Street if there's safer options available. And Magnolia Avenue, which is an industrial area, serves industrial properties, extends in a rather non-direct route through the Jif property, and this property does front. That's why we were concerned, and I was talking about, staff was concerned about the rest of the property being on the development plan. And it does front on Magnolia. So we would like to resolve that with the applicant, whether it wouldn't be safer to bring construction traffic in off of Magnolia as opposed to utilizing East 7th Street. With that, this has been a revision. You have seen your revised conditions that staff handed out to you. It is a rather modest proposal. as I said for 6,000 square feet for shops of specialty trade. You can see there's an access between at the rear of the lot into the rest of the property. That was worked out with the applicant for public safety reasons and also to provide access into the rear of the property if necessary from this proposed development. With that, staff is recommending approval, and I'll be happy to answer any questions you may have. Any questions for Mr. Martin? Mr. Penn has one. So, Mr. Martin, are you suggesting that we change discussed or resolve? Yes, sir. I believe it can be resolved. I think the applicant, in conjunction with traffic engineering, can work out the appropriate location. And it may be that 7th Street is ultimately acceptable, but we'd like to have a further discussion and resolve that issue with the applicant. Anyone else on the commission? Okay, thank you. Applicant. Good afternoon. I'm Billy Mach with Element Design representing the owner of this property. With regards to the property in the back that will be subdivided off from this, that's currently leased to a trucking company called Scott Gross and they will continue to utilize that property one of the buildings is used for propane cylinder filling and the other one is their safety office so those two properties that that you see off to the left are theirs they utilize that yard currently for their trucking for parking trailers and for maneuvering in and out to pick up their cylinders and that entrance in the back is gated but i can work with traffic engineering to work out where that construction entrance would be the safest location with regards to whether it comes off of east 7th street or magnolia and other than that this is we're looking at shops of specialty trade small shops they're very modest with small yards adjacent to them and redeveloping this site that's currently just a wasteland for old concrete so okay any questions for that any questions for the applicant okay anyone in the audience would like to address any of this this agenda item okay thank you thank you okay Commission members if you have any nor other discussions I'm ready for a motion. Ms. Plumlee. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Move approval of PLNMJDP 1818 East 7th Street Edition with the 18 conditions changing 18 to resolve location of construction entrance. Okay, it's been moved by Ms. Carolyn Plumlee and seconded by Mr. Mike Cravens that we approve the final development plan MJDP 18-18 East 7th Street Edition with the 18 conditions or reasons as identified by staff with 18 changed from discussed to resolve. Any other discussion on the motion? Please vote when it comes up on your screens. Motion carries. Thank you. Okay. Wow. Good afternoon. We're going to look at Major Development Plan, DP 18-2022. Turfland Mall Chick-fil-A. They came in with some revisions, so we have some revised conditions on a green sheet of paper. When this plan originally came in, they didn't have a whole lot of information as to what they were proposing to do. With this revision here, it gives you more information. There's a slight addition into the rear of Chick-fil-A, along with adding a second drive-through lane. They removed the parking that was adjacent to the building and put in another drive-through lane. So with the revisions to the plan, we have our typical sign-offs. As you can see, they've done a lot of clean-up. They've added a lot of information there. better close-up showing that second lane to go around through the drive-through. We seem to be getting those second drive-through lanes a lot lately. So with that, this information gives us the reduced size on the whole sheet, gives us a little more information to show exactly what they're proposing. so we have just the typical sign-offs for the first nine conditions and then we just have a few cleanup conditions left we just like to label a couple of the outlots so that we know exactly in the site statistics which one of the outlots are those statistics for if there are any other questions any questions for ms gallup Okay. Applicant. Good afternoon. I am Sean Hickman, representing Chick-fil-A. I work for Interplan LLC at 604 Cortland Street, Orlando, Florida. We agree with the staff's recommendation of approval. We're going to be adding a second order point for a second drive-through lane, and then expanding on the kitchen to serve those added customers. I'm here for any questions. Okay. Any questions for the applicant? Okay. Thank you. Anyone in the audience like to address this agenda item? Anyone on the commission? Okay. Then I guess we're ready for a motion. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Move approval of Plan 18028 Turfland Mall, Chick-fil-A. The revised conditions. Okay. Okay. It's been moved by Mr. Mike Craven, seconded by Ms. Karen Mundy, that we approve PLN MJDP 18-28 Turfland Mall, Chick-fil-A, with the 14 revised conditions provided by staff. Any other discussion on the motion? Not. Please vote when it comes up on your screens. Okay. Okay. The motion carries. thank you before we get to the cell tower thing uh one other quick thing we've got oh the performance uh bonds and letters of credit mr cravens yes sir i've got this right here move approval of the release and call of bonds okay it's been moved by mr craven second by mr karen monday that we move approval for the release of caller bonds any other discussion on that motion please vote when it comes up on your screens okay as have it motion carries okay thank you I'll let you do one more. You're going to give that to him. Good afternoon. This is our first public facility review for the year. This is Lexington Fire Station, number 19. It's a cellular antenna tower. This property is located at 3360 Huffman Mill Pike. It's off to the west of Russell K. You can see the – this here is where the firehouse is. What am I doing wrong? There we go. Okay, you can see above the circle driveway around the firehouse showing that this property is located out in the AR zone. The property surrounded is Mount Brilliant Farm, and they are zoned AR with the PDR on their property. This is a closer vision. This site, you'll see up in the top left-hand corner of the back of the property, they are proposing to put in a cell tower and antenna there along with a platform for the mechanical equipment. I'm just, my thoughts are backwards. This site was chosen to answer the cell tower that was turned down and became a lawsuit with the federal court on Iron Works Pike back in December 12th. the Planning Commission just approved, so they've come back, and they're proposing to put a cell tower in this location. This shows the layout of the firehouse being located on the property and the cell tower to the rear. As you can see, they've also included some landscaping between the cell tower area and the agricultural area. This shows the proposed tower to be in the center of the property along with the platform location. They also show that there's several other areas for additional co-locations to be added to this tower. The cell tower is being proposed out in this area because there's a need for communications between the emergency response and for the new everybody wireless communications are being updated all the time. And so at this time, this was a need to be located out in the northern part of Lexington, and they found this location, and this was answering to the lawsuit, and they chose this site for it on a city property. This will be a monopole cell tower. You can see that they have additional co-locations added to this plan. The staff recommended approval of this, just adding that there will be additional landscaping, possibly towards the front of the cell tower, towards the road, so that it buffers between Huffman Millpike and the cell tower gates. Are there any other comments, questions? Any questions for Ms. Gallup? Okay, thank you. Applicant? there really isn't an applicant because this is a public facility review on a piece of property owned by the urban county government so we brought it to you all to do a public facilities review since it's on our fire station property um just to meet with the public facility review requirements in the zoning ordinance. So as you know, when things come before you, like on school properties or on state properties or other things for public facility review, you all are looking at it just to weigh in and send forth any comments you have about your review of it and how you believe it does or doesn't comply with the comprehensive plan. But that's not a binding finding as it would be in a private matter of a cell tower application on a private piece of property. Additionally, as you heard from Ms. Galt's presentation, you might recall that we are currently in litigation in federal court over the denial of a cell tower on private property on Iron Works Road. this is this evolved out of that in an effort to find a location on a government or a public piece of property that could be utilized instead of that location and if this goes through and it will still require action at the urban county council for the lease on the property since it's on the government's property then it will resolve that lawsuit as well so that's it's a little different than the norm of what you get but that's why you're getting it today but I just need to remind you that in public facility reviews you're all findings or you're all they're more or less comments or recommendations they're not bonding and also there are people here from AT&T who is the company that has been working with our division of general services and Roger Damon's here from our department of general services to talk with you about the process they went through to find this location on a government piece of property if you have questions for them. I can't answer those as well as they might be able to because I wasn't involved in the process of trying to narrow down and find a government piece of property, but that's why you all are getting it is because it's being taken care of as a public facility review. Thank you for the reminder. This is ministerial, but we still can call on people in audience if they have any thoughts about it yes we there was a notice sent out that is not normally required for public facility reviews but it was sent out just because um the government's trying to you know put as many people on notice you might remember that we had a situation come up at a park on one occasion where because it was on our property and it didn't go through a normal process like a private entity might that there were some questions raised after the fact so there there may be some people not even to have questions or comments because there was a notice sent out although it wasn't required okay uh mr pn has a question for you i think yeah i want to ask mr jones so you're telling me that if we approve this cell tire on this location that lawsuit goes away Well, there's one more step to that. You know, when the cell tower companies put, even when they put cell towers on government properties, they still have to have a lease for the compound or the fenced area where the base of the tower is. So that part, the lease, will have to go to the Urban County Council for approval. Once that's approved, yes, I think that the litigation will go away. even though we approved a cell tower on Huffman Mill that's on a private property, we're not going to consider a co-location? That's a question I really can't answer. I don't know if that was, I would assume either the applicant or General Services could give you more information about how they. Well, our comp plan suggests that we use co-locations whenever possible. That's the reason I'm asking that question. It does suggest that and it encourages that when it's possible as to whether or not that's possible. I can't answer that question, but I think there's people here that can. Mr. Brewer. On the same note as Frank, I'd like to find out. I understand there's another tower relatively close to this. I'd like to know why that couldn't be co-located rather than putting up another one of these ugly poles. I think that the representative of AT&T or either our representative from general services, one or the other, should be able to tell you whether or not they can do that and why they chose this location, Mr. Pike or Mr. Damon. Come with all of it if you... I'm Roger Damon with General Services. We did work with AT&T and the Law Department and we were told that this was a needed site and that co-location was not possible for this particular instance. So after that happened, after we were told the general area and this was the only government facility that fell in that area that's when we went out to the to the site to determine along with fire and with representatives of AT&T where we could place it on the site you said you were told the co-location was not an option that's what we were told yes by whom who made that decision well it was AT&T through the law department okay so worked with the law department the law department was working with AT&T and I'm sure Mr. Pye could probably answer more specific specifically. That'd be fine I'd like to hear that please. Okay the representative from the law department that was working on the siting of this wasn't me it was another attorney in our department however he was relying on the information being provided to him by the carrier as to what was needed in terms of providing the mandated service they have under the federal law at this location so mr pike or a representative AT&T may have to explain to you in more detail why or why not colocation wouldn't work at this particular on that other tower I can't answer that I'm not even sure the attorney in our department can answer that they were just all working in concert to try to find a place on a public piece of property so well mr. mr. pike can you help us try mr. Chairman, good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. It's a pleasure to appear before you again for the recorded record. My name is David Pike. I'm a principal with Pike Legal Group, PLLC, PO Box 369, Shepherdsville, Kentucky. I'm here representing AT&T in a somewhat unique capacity. I'm used to being the center of attention in hearings like this. Instead, today I'm here in very much a supporting role since, in a sense, LFUCG is the applicant. I'm not. And, of course, this proceeding that we're in today is very different from a normal cell tower review in that it's a community facilities review with a different set of standards attached to it. I do certainly appreciate the series of questions that have been asked regarding co-location alternatives, and those are logical questions to ask. A couple of words first before I respond to all the specific components that have either been raised by the Commission as individual members or in a letter that has been submitted to the Planning Commission prior to this public hearing. One of the, if I was going to choose probably the single most common misconception associated with cell tower applications, it's that companies like ours like to build these towers. Now, it is always a joy to appear before you. If, however, I could co-locate, I would not be here. The Planning Commission would not even act on this. all we would do is get an electrical permit and deploy. It is cheaper, easier, and faster. So we have not only a statutory or regulatory imperative to try to co-locate, it is the practical and smart business move anytime we can do it. Certainly, we modeled, of course, the tower that was mentioned in the letter submitted at Maddox Town. That's the one that was subject to the other federal lawsuit previously. It's over a mile and a half outside of our search area. Deployment there will not solve our problem and will not fill our coverage gap. We also looked at the other Huffman Mill site. Same answer, too far away. Increasingly, our challenge is to serve smaller and smaller areas with these towers, as a practical matter, based on the phenomenal amount of capacity demands that are placed on these towers towers in a prosperous growing community like yours. If we could have located on one of those, heaven only knows we would have, instead of laboring with the Department of Law, which again has been a joy, but has also been a labor for all concerned in an effort to try to find a solution to the existing piece of federal litigation that's been hanging out there for some period of time. This is the only available public property in this vicinity that will do that job. And, of course, public properties are preferred under the terms of your own comprehensive plan regulations. I would also note that considering issues such as aesthetics in connection with the deployment of a cell tower is specifically prohibited under Sixth Circuit law, as this commission is well aware from our prior cases, Under the terms of Selco partnership versus Franklin County, 553 F-Sup, 838, and other cases. Naturally, you would want to rely on the advice of your own attorney concerning those issues, but that's our view of the law. Now, a couple of other co-location alternatives that may not have been mentioned yet, but while I'm here, I think I should address in order to try to head the issue off. First of all, there are a series of radio broadcast towers that are located directly across the road from these. Those are not available as co-location alternatives for us. They're energized, and as a result, we can't do repair and other work on them without extensive delays that would frustrate the requirements of our FCC license, especially when you take into account the fact that this will be one of the first sites in this community that is deployed with first net coverage. That's, of course, the new standard that has been developed nationally for first responders to have a scalable, readily available, and secure direct link with all other first responders. That was one of the directives and suggestions of the 9-11 Commission after the terrorist attacks. It's taken the U.S. government this long to select a provider. That happened last year, and I'm pleased to report nationally that it was AT&T, as reflected in your staff report, and that Kentucky has opted into this system. Being able to provide continuous coverage that's reliable in connection with that and our other service is obviously license critical and customer critical for us. The other one is there's an existing proprietary tower on the Mount Brilliant Farms that's located fairly close to this. A deployment there would require a new application, and that's in direct contravention of your own PDR program. Your planning staff reconfirmed with the PDR staff as recently as last week. Their position is that cell towers cannot be deployed on PDR property. So the long and the short of it is that is not an option legally. I think that disposes of the available co-location alternatives. if there's any I've missed please let me know and if there's any other questions I need to ask answer while I'm here either I'll be glad to do so or I have some other more knowledgeable people with me here from the company who can assist any other questions for Mr. Pike or his representatives associates okay thank you very much I'm now going to sit down with style in that case All right. Well, let me still understand this is defined by our attorney as more part of our ministerial duties. But does anyone in the audience like to speak to this issue? Yes, sir. Yes, ma'am. Ms. Knox, since you're more familiar with our proceedings and things, normally I have a little speech that I normally give as to how useless this would be other than just getting your voice on the record. But you know that better than I do. it. Well we appreciate Mr. Pike's comments and understand the importance of having really reliable good self-service in that part of Fayette County. But with that said I'd like to go ahead and make my comments and also note that Mount Brilliant Farm is very much open to continuing the discussion with AT&T and all interested parties to try to find, in our opinion, a better solution to constructing yet another cell tower in an already crowded area. So for the record, my name is Knox Van Noggle and I'm here on behalf of Mount Brilliant. We submitted a letter articulating our full comments on the AT&T cell tower to be located at 3360 Huffman Mill Road. And needless to say, we very much appreciate your consideration of our concerns and thoughts. I'd just like to take a couple of minutes to take a deeper dive on the issue of tower co-location. Colocation by right is allowed under federal law and is encouraged under our state and local authorities. And federal law provides the sharing of facilities is allowed, provided it doesn't substantially change the physical dimensions of the original tower base station. And additionally, our local ordinance strongly encourages co-location wherever and whenever possible. A Verizon monopole is located at 4279 Huffman Mill Road. Constructed in 2015, it's 190 feet tall with a nine foot lighting arrestor and related ground facilities. The AT&T Tower will be 190 feet tall with a five foot lighting arrestor and related ground facilities. The two sites are roughly a mile and a half apart. To a layman, there appears to be no substantial difference between the existing Verizon and proposed AT&T cell towers. In fact, the AT&T ground facility has an even smaller footprint than that of Verizon's. Perhaps the only real difference between the two facilities is that one belongs to Verizon and the other to AT&T, who are both major players and competitors in the cell service industry. Business competition should not stand in the way of colocation, especially when operational efficiencies could be possibly achieved and examined and the area's special scenic resources protected. Simply put, every effort should be made to fully investigate colocation, and to do this, I'd like to ask just a few more questions. One, as AT&T reached out to Verizon to discuss colocating its facilities. Two, has there been an engineering assessment on how the Verizon facilities could possibly accommodate AT&T's needs through altering their station? And thirdly, has a third-party or independent engineering option been given about the feasibility of co-locating AT&T's facilities to the Verizon Tower or other towers in the area? Without such due diligence, how can we proceed when so much we feel is at stake in the area? What is at stake? With a new tower, the Russell Cave Huffman Mill Road area will be inundated with six towers in a mile and a half radius, greatly congesting the airspace, infringing on adjacent residential areas and the farm families who live there, and endangering one of the inner bluegrass's most significant cultural bee sheds. To proceed as is, five of the recently adopted 2018 comp plan goals requiring sound neighborhood design, natural resource stewardship, and protecting our signature ag brand and landscape will be put in jeopardy. Specifically, Section A, Goal 3A, Section B, Goal 3T, Section D, Goal 3A, and Section E, Goal 2A. Mount Brilliant Farm cares deeply about the community and also supports improved cellular service in Northern Fayette County. Therefore, we believe every effort should be made to examine and encourage the co-location of AT&T's facilities to the Verizon Tower or other existing towers in the area. Thank you. Thank you. Please come forward. My name is Robert Barton. I'm a resident of Huffington, Hill Pike. I live about a mile from the proposed site. I must say that the drawing that you're looking at really doesn't do it justice. I walked that this morning in front there it's about a little over 20 feet. The back may be 50 feet. This room I walked in when I came in it's 50 foot wide. So basically that That site is less than half as big as this room. And there's four houses within 100 feet of it. That's what hasn't come out yet. Can you imagine walking out your back door 50 feet away from you go, where did that come from? I mean, there's no way that it can, whatever setback requirements there are, that it can meet it. This is just a very unsuitable site. I know your hands are tied, but you can make recommendations. First recommendation you've already heard is to put it on the existing Verizon tire that was built two years ago. The second recommendation, I know we always hear it has to be in a certain zone. The city has a beautiful park on Browhear Road that's approximately three miles away. It's the Heisel Farm Park. It's really used. I mean, it's a beautiful site if you haven't been out there. It's 280 acres. This lot is 180 acres. I didn't see a square footage of the little proposed site. If it's a quarter of an acre, it would be big. 280 acres on Browhere Road. I've got a great app on my phone. It measures altitude. When I stood at the fire station this morning, we were 940 feet above sea level. When I went to the site on Browhear Road, again, about three miles away, we were 990 feet. And that's in the parking lot. If you haven't been out there, the parking lot isn't kind of in the back of the property. But there's actually higher rises on the farm. So AT&T could pick up approximately 50 or 60 feet worth of elevation, which would certainly spread out their coverage if they just moved it to another government site. You have, I know you have cell tires at Chillitole Park. I wanted to I don't take screen so you know certainly especially that location would be in so many acres such a large area that I would hope that you would at least recommend that they look at that site instead of this little postage stash place that they're going to try to put it one question mr. chairman will we be notified at all if the urban County Council hears this proposal there won't be any public notification but it will go on their docket as a business item for them to approve and those are you know posted on the website I don't know exactly how far ahead to be honest but it will just show up as a regular business item on the urban County Council's agenda to approve it won't be to approve the cell tower but it'll be to approve the lease but they don't other than just their generalized posting of their agenda items and advertising they don't send out notice for those okay well one final thought is this was a donated site this was an acre that was donated by mr. Kenneth Jones before he sold the farm and 20 years ago we love the fire station Interestingly enough, two years after Mr. Jones donated the property, the fireman and ladies at the place actually saved a barn for him that was right across the road. So sometimes good deeds pay off. So again, I would like to at least make a recommendation farther down the line that they look at other sites or at least possibly put it on the Verizon Tire. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Any comments or questions from the commission? Anyone else would like? Okay, fine. Mr. Lawrence. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I don't know if this is for our general counsel or who. Have there been any discussion as far as alternative towers? No? If no one's getting up, I'm presuming that's... What's your question? Have there been any discussions? What do you mean by alternative? Stealth towers. The tower that's over on Tate's Creek Road was built disguising it as a church steeple. It's separate from the church. It's a square, rectangular thing, but it's nice. I'm just asking, have there been any discussion? They would have to answer that. I don't know. Damon? We have not had any discussions regarding stealth towers, but certainly we would be in favor of anything that would make the tower, you know, less obvious. More accessible, yeah. Okay. But there hasn't been any discussion at the present. Not to this point. Okay, thank you. um mr pike mentioned that other possibilities were outside the area for their need is there a search ring has there been a search ring for this presented there usually is yes sir we were were given the search ring and this was the only property that fell within that ring okay do you have that can it be shown I believe I don't have it copy was included in a report that was pre-filed as well for the benefit of the Commission radius is about 0.35 miles of this location okay so are you saying that this search ring has from the proposed tower location has a radius of 0.3 miles 0.35 yes so has that changed in eight years the last time this request came forth there was a search ring yes has it changed yes based on technology changes yes okay all right thank you okay I've just got a few comments whenever you're ready okay let's go back to some other quite any other questions that you may have I have one I'm going back to the staff recommendations it says that the staff recommends additional landscaping is recommended has it i haven't heard of staff someone to tell us is that an issue or have you resolved that or what the rural land management plan which is an adopted element of the comprehensive plan references the communication facilities and suggests ways to in essence hide them from the rural roadways and it's more of an at grade level hiding not obviously the height of it one of the suggestions is using topography but also to use the rural road canopy as a as a bit of a buffer in this location there is not a canopy along this side of huffman mill pike and providing trees along the rural road could be an issue for the fire department in terms of access and site distance so the staff suggests utilizing the same type of landscaping proposed on the ag sides between the roadway and this facility staff didn't believe that that would be onerous for AT&T to provide more trees and shrubs to at least provide a visual buffer from the road to the compound. Okay I have a follow-up question then I have a couple of other colleagues who want to send a little I don't I go back to Miss Jones the staff recommendation has been made has it been considered or is that something's going to be I'll be honest we just shared that with the with AT&T this morning. Oh, okay. Did you, by any chance, did they give you any reaction as to when they would hear? Okay. We can ask them now. Okay. If you don't mind, Spike, I'm just asking if you... Well, you can ask. Right. I thought I would, just for the record. Look, the short answer to that is I don't per se have any objections to landscaping. It's entirely possible, however, that that landscaping will have to go outside of our lease area, so I'm not in a position to make that commitment. That's something LFUCG would have to chime in on. Having said that, this being a community facilities review as opposed to a full-blown application, and again, you should rely on the advice of your own legal counsel, but my experience and similar types of reviews in other contexts are that this commission would be fully within its right to recommend, as part of its review, that additional screening be placed on the side of the property that's been mentioned by staff. Subsequent to that and prior to any action by council, I'm sure we could discuss whether or not that could be done within or outside of the lease area, and if outside of the lease area, whether LFUCG would be amenable to that. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. I've got Ms. Mundy and then Ms. Penn. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Tracy, I think probably this is probably for you. There is a height-yard ratio on these towers, correct? And I guess my concern is we've got residents within 50 feet of this property. and you know trees are going to be great on the ground but they're going to be dealing with this I'm thinking about myself I know right outside my bedroom window about 50 feet away I've got this gorgeous big lush tree I sure wouldn't want a cell phone tower there and I'm thinking about those residents that live there how does that affect this the height to yard ratio honestly that's part of the zoning ordinance and because it's a public facility review we do not have to adhere to the regulations established in the zoning ordinance it is a height to yard ratio generally of three to one so that means the tower could be three times as tall as your yard in this case they are 35 feet from the rear property line and 12 feet from the side and the pole is approximately 200 feet tall in the agricultural area it's suggested that they be have a one-to-one ratio so two it would be a 200 foot distance there isn't a way for the for the cell tower hole to be located on this property and meet that requirement in fact the Huffman mill project also didn't meet the setback requirements so mr. Penn so Tracy you're telling me that because the Huffman the other probably too long make a right i'm sorry are you telling me that well number one is this is this is the greatest example in the world of 11 pounds of flyer in a six pound sack this property is just way too small and if we're going to encourage co-location with that smaller place i assume that mr pike's group wants to co-locate if somebody else wants to put it on theirs i think this is a case of i want to to get a check rather than give a check and what concerns me most about this is all we can do is voice our opinion but we live in a society where voicing your opinion is encouraged so number one i think it's 11 pounds of flyer in a seven pound sack the site the only reason it fits is because you own it the only reason it fits is because lfucg owns it it doesn't fit anything else just you own it well the other thing that bothers me a lot about this is that you're asking people to live in houses that you wouldn't do anywhere else in this city you wouldn't build a pole within 35 feet of anybody's house in this city but we're going to do it in the rural area because those houses don't matter and that bothers me a lot now that's just my opinion it's for whatever it's worth but i want to get it on the record and mr pike if you don't like the lecker the record you just don't have to read it but but i have a real concern here because it's almost like the city is going to do this because they don't have to abide by the regulations and guess what we own this piece of property it was given to us it's too small but we're going to use it and i think that's the wrong bet you the city to send that's all it's worth i'm sorry okay anyone else miss bundy i'd just like to go on the record too and say i feel the same way i feel like we're we're putting a cell tower we're forcing it in a situation and i feel like they can cohabitate somewhere where there's already towers there we're doing it because we own the property and i i think that's wrong to do the neighbors of the property. I think just to correct the record, we're not doing it just because LFUCG owns the property. The impetus for needing to do it at this location was the Planning Commission's decision to disapprove the previous location. Well, but this site and this proximity to those houses came about because of a previous decision the planning commission made mr bell um did mr pike answer your questions you heard what he had to say before you got up to speak i just didn't know if you were planning on speaking or did he satisfy Because it's confusing to me. I mean, the whole thing is confusing to me. Right. But did he answer, did he satisfy you at all? Well, what I would hope is that we can continue the conversation. You know, I think that all of the points here that have been raised are relevant points. This is a very difficult situation. we have we do have on mount brilliant we do have an older cell tower that was in existence on the on the property before the goodman family purchased it in 1996 right now it's just it it houses some of our our farm radio equipment and so we had reached out to mr pike about a week ago 10 days ago wanting to just sit down and discuss any co any collation any co-location opportunities our current tower on the farm is you know 500 yards from this residential area on the farm so that would take out being right on top of these farm families that work on the farm the other obvious and that too does come with some complications because the farm is under conservation easement so that would have to be fully fleshed out with all interested parties you know being being respectful of our conservation easement agreement with the rural land management board the other option that came to our mind is the verizon tower which you know by all intensive purposes is a new tower that was just built in 2015 it's as the crow flies a mile and a half from this site. And we just want to make sure that we fully understand why the site cannot accommodate AT&T's facilities. If there are any engineering studies, anything. Because a lot is at stake for, frankly, these folks that live literally right behind this lot. And not only that, I don't know if y'all have been out there and driven this area, but there are a lot of towers out there. And, again, we want to be good neighbors. We understand the importance of, gosh knows, really efficient and dependable service. But there's just got to be some type of solution here that can accommodate the community need without just wrecking the quality of life that these farm families need and enjoy every day. And Mr. Pike, if you wouldn't mind. So, no, I'm still a bit confused and fuzzy about. You know, we in this community care about Mount Brilliant and all that it represents. It is a special property. And it represents, really, the signature of what this community is. And my question to you is, you mentioned that everything, it's natural that, you know, you would co-produce, or whatever it is, and that is the case? I mean, after hearing what Ms. Von Nagel said. Oh, absolutely. A couple of things I would like to add here, and these are terms that I know the members of the Planning Commission have heard before, but let me make sure I've done a good job of announcing them again. Whether this tower is owned by another company is irrelevant to us. We have what's referred to as MLAs or master lease agreements with every major provider in the industry. And they're reciprocal. So that if today I wanted to co-locate on that tower, all I would have to do is send in a document and all the lease terms are already set. I have a complete right to do it. Because, of course, although these companies are fierce competitors, make no mistake about it, When it comes to this issue, taking a hard line with a company one day, well, sauce for the goose would be sauce for the gander the next day when they needed to co-locate on an AT&T tower and the like. So there's no barrier to that co-location with the exception of the fact it's in the wrong place. And if any of these towers were in the right place, heaven only knows we would be on it. Now, this particular site was not ultimately selected by AT&T. It's the public property site that's available within the search area. Now, what makes this unique is the fact that we're trying to, I think, ultimately, what your counsel indicated, And what I would concur with is we're trying to settle a federal lawsuit from a prior planning commission action. And this is the only option for doing that. The only other option is proceeding with the litigation. You know, would I have selected this site as a greenfield alternative? No. But this is the option. and it's not like there's a C here. It's A or B. Now, you can ask your counsel if she agrees with that assessment, but I think that's where we are. And I wish there was a C, and I try to always be creative in my thinking. But we've had a lot of time to think about this one, and this is it. Now, again, if we could co-locate, we would. It is not about it being a competing tower. it's that the towers are in the wrong place. Now, I will say one thing, and that is I think we're set to meet later this week. I'm always glad to meet and discuss these issues, and I will kind of unveil early one alternative that I've been thinking about, and that is if we're concerned about tower proliferation, you have an existing tower on your property. Well, if they want to take it down and co-locate their antennas on our tower, we'll be more than glad to have another co-locator. So it's not that we're insensitive, even though we don't have a master lease agreement with you. If there was a C alternate, we would have considered it. And LFUCG has had multiple attorneys working on this for an extended period of time. This is the alternative we've come up with for the lawsuit. Now, I do not want to speak for Tracy. and she may have a different assessment but that's our view of it thank you thank you miss do you have any well i mean this is one of those situations that we get into in our rural zone that we don't like to be in frankly but you know the fact of the matter is that our technology is maybe outpacing what we what we want to see or what we you know prefer to see i mean i don't know maybe there's somebody down the road that's going to find a better way to provide this kind of service, but right now we don't have it. So we're sort of in a sticky wicket of a situation because, you know, the service has to be provided. You know, we all know of instances in this community when there hasn't been service provided in the rural area and it's resulted in some pretty catastrophic situations. that being said you know we all know what's out there and it's all land that we all value and that's very important to our community and iconic to our community however it's going to have to go they're going to have to go somewhere to provide the service that the federal government's mandated when this matter came to us I don't even know how many years ago now because we've asked for multiple continuations from the judge in the federal suit to allow us to have time to come up with an alternative. But it's been a matter of years, actually, I think. And the judge has been willing to do that. He's continued the lawsuit, I don't know how many times. We have to file something about every three months, and he has every three months allowed us to do that. But that being said, what happened was that one of the possible alternatives came to this commission through a private entity asking for your approval to put it at a different place that, frankly, nobody liked that one either. And that's the problem, that really, if you could have your cake and eat it too, you wouldn't like any of the places in the rural area that we might have to put these. So we said no to that. You might recall that gave me some heartburn when we said no. And we got sued over it because of the federal guidelines and what's required. I think if that lawsuit goes forward, I certainly can't predict what courts do any better than I can pick a derby winner. but I think it's very likely we would lose, which would mean that the cell tower would go where we didn't want it years ago. So what happened here is other people in my department who work with our facilities met with AT&T. They talked with them about what kind of service they have to provide, and we're not just talking about cell phone service anymore. We're also talking about the data usage, computers, the iPads, all those things. Now this first net thing that's also going on these facilities for first responders and people like that. So there's a great demand of data usage on these facilities at this point is my understanding. But I wasn't directly involved with that. but other people in my department worked pretty tirelessly for a long period of time with Mr. Damon and his department, trying to see for what they have to provide and the technology, what it tells them they have to have, where we could put something that would be on our government facility, not on a private farm, not somewhere else. And this is it. And I think that's a fair statement for Mr. Pike. So at this point, we're kind of in a situation of, well, what do we do? Alternatively, I think if this doesn't go forward, the lawsuit will. If we lose the lawsuit, it's going to go in that other location. So I don't know that there is a best answer here. The other part of this is, and I can appreciate this, what you're saying in terms of, you know, we're just putting it on our property so we won't be subject to the zoning ordinance. So, you know, we're sort of inflicting on ourselves what we feel like when other public entities come to us and say, we just wanted to let you know we're doing this and we don't like that either, you know, but we can't tell them not to do it either if they're a public entity, a state government, a school system, a federal government that says they're going to do something who's, who are also not subject to our zoning ordinances. So I can't give you a good answer in terms of what's the best thing to do, but I do think that alternatively what the technology is telling us is that, you know, it's either going to go here or it's going to go on a private facility somewhere around here. It's not going to go in a – there's not a location that everybody's going to go, oh, that's – I love that location and I'm really happy about it because it's going to be in the rural area, and those areas are very valuable to us. But I do think if this solution doesn't go forward, then the lawsuit most likely will. So I can't tell you that much. I don't know how else to put it, but that's pretty much where we are. You made it very clear. Mr. Dan has a question for you. You know, Tracy, hindsight's 20-20, and at the time we made that decision, we thought we had the ability to make that decision. So this thing has changed, and you can say it was based on a bad decision. You can say it's based on a good decision. But if I remember right, there wasn't people within 35 feet of that tower where we turned it down before. And if this is the two choices we have, One of them is to put a tower right on top of four houses on a site that's too little, on a site that's not going to have enough land to co-locate many more of those types of things. You just don't have it in that acre. Maybe the right decision is just to don't do anything and let the suit play out where it will because I'm rethinking my decision on that situation because I think you found a worse place to put it. And if we have a chance to change it before we build it, then I don't know whether we even have to make a decision here today or not. We've heard it. We reviewed it. You know, I just throw that out for a question is maybe the best thing to do is go back. They want it in court. Let them put it on the place where they're going to put it. Guess what that does? It takes the revenue away from the city. So I'm back to my two wrongs and make a right, Tracy. And I'm not real sure doing it on the fire station property is way too little. It's a smart choice. Let's just say we made two bad choices. Let's say we made one bad choice. Let's don't make another one just to clean up the one we made the first time. Well, I don't think you have to make a decision today because it is just a review. I don't want to make a decision. So that's up to you. And, you know, as to, I mean, obviously the lawsuit has not moved forward at this point. I mean, I think there's always potentially an opportunity to revisit that. And I don't know what the circumstances were at the time of relation to properties or homes or facilities in the line of that tower, but I just remember that it was pretty much adamant on the part of this board that they didn't want it there either. Ms. Plumlee? Thank you. Was there something about a June 17th date? Well, the public facility review just says when something gets put in front of you all, you have to move forward. You have to have your review within 60 days. So you've had your review today. So the bottom line is we've had our review. You've had your review. what what you can do is you know I mean you can make some type of recommendation whether it's to go back and consider the other site I don't know you know then the parties would have to reinvestigate that and discuss whether or not they're going they have the right to go forward with this site whether or not they choose to do that and and submit the lease to the council which would then be up to them so you can make a recommendation, but you don't have a decision today. I got you. Okay. Mr. Lawrence. Go ahead. No, I'm just going to say it's pretty clear to me that we can't do anything today except to voice our opinion, so I will voice it again. I don't think this is a good choice at all. I think it's – I don't recall the particulars, but the original one that's subject to the lawsuit, but I'm sure in that case we were equally dissatisfied. I think we ought to try to find a place that satisfies us instead of making this worse. Mr. Lawrence. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm going to be in agreement with what Patrick Brewer just said. I'm not happy with this either. I've heard several, you know, simply put, co-location on the other tower is not possible. It's not in their search ring. And, you know, I have a hard time thinking that we're going to have this number of towers all over the place just because it's not in a search ring. With that said, I'm dissatisfied with the fact that there have not been any discussion as far as an alternative tower disguising this thing in one way or another. It has been done. It can be done. I do know WLAP radio station and towers very well. My father worked there for 20 years. I do not believe that you can hang these antennas on those towers. But I do know that a monopole tower can be placed on the property. If you want to have the discussion, go just a few miles to the west where WVLK radio station towers are, and you will see a cell tower in the midst of those. So all possible locations, I don't think, have been exhausted. I appreciate the willingness to speak to the Goodmans and Mount Brilliant Farm. I don't know what can be done there. I don't know. I just don't think all possibilities have been exhausted. And then lastly, I feel like I hear our legal staff and what they say, but by the same token, I think we are employed to act in relation to the comprehensive plan, to our ordinances. and I've gone through the comprehensive plan. I can read them through if needed. I've got one, two, three, four, five goals, the mission statement, and half a dozen pages that has 13 items on it that speaks to this, I believe, in my opinion. So I can make a motion. I guess my question is, do you want me to read all this into it? I think if you just wanted to submit it, I think we'd be sufficient for that. Well, folks, we're in a real pickle here, aren't we? When they say you're in a hole, you quit digging. But the bottom line is we only have two choices. The question is whether the first choice was better than the second choice. Is that right, Frank? I don't know the answer to that. I just noticed it in the answer. Well, I guess my thinking from my end, I had almost forgotten as to why, what the rationale was as to why we decided that we did not like that first first choice I would like just for nothing else to know why we did that number one and then determine which of the two choices based on that information that would be the better way to go so in any of anyone else have any other thoughts or comments mr chair yes in response to what you said you know i don't know if as far as the previous one is it even allowed to have the minutes presented is this i mean you can certainly ask for those i i just don't i mean well i'm just i mean i don't remember either i just remember that because it was also close to a horse farm in the rural area that it was it was of concern and there were neighbors that spoke about that um you know you're you're everything you do today is in the form of a recommendation so just so you're clear i mean you can you know recommend that that be explored again and that be discussed but it can also go forward as it is and that's not that's up to the you know that's up to our government we heard it okay well I guess the reason I brought it up was is again too I had forgotten as to why we disapproved on the first account and it seems as though we are boiling down to two choices and I understand the pickle we're in mr. Owens Mr. Chair, I was just going to offer a couple of items, and it relates, I believe, to the previous hearing as well. Our comprehensive plan in addressing cell towers states that we have the authority to regulate the location. In order to maximize negative visual effects of the cell tower, co-location of antenna should be encouraged for each site. When possible, existing structures and facilities that meet the requirements and proposed installation should be used. Water towers, steeples, radio, television towers, tall buildings, et cetera. cell towers should not be cited in a location that might have adverse effect on public health, safety, welfare, or might alter the aesthetic character of the adjoining area. If you go on to other parts of it, it talks about rural settlements. It talks about scenic byways. And if I'm correct, the ordinance says that a cell tower shall not be located within 1,000 feet of such rural settlements, i.e. Maddox Town, Scenic Byways, i.e. Ironworks Pike, Russell Cave Road, within 1,000 feet or the view shift, and I'm pretty sure it says whichever is greater. So I think these would be reasons for either location at this point. Well, I'm going to take the advice of legal counsel in this case because what I'm assuming, and Ms. Jones, you have to tell me, you all have already been through that. In other words, you looked at the comprehensive plan when you were in the deliberations for this second site. Is that correct? Well, yes and no. Some of those things in our comprehensive plan have been overridden by the federal case law about mandating providing service. Okay. So things like aesthetics and those type of things. So, you know, while you can consider if it's possible to do those things and look at those things, maybe it is. But if it's not, if we use that as a basis to say no, which is where I think we're going in the federal lawsuit, then we may not be able to defend that successfully. So, you know, in looking at this, and the other thing is that our, because our government is exempt, it's, I don't want to say it doesn't matter, but it sort of doesn't matter. So, okay. Well, let me put it this way. Right now, one of the choices we have here is to actually, we've been to the review. This seems to fit into more the ministerial side of our responsibility. We don't have to take any action. Is that correct? You do not have to take an action. Actually, what the statute talks about is that when you conduct a public facility review, you're looking at it in terms of how does it or does it not comply with the comprehensive plan. And then if you think it doesn't, it doesn't mean it's going to be denied and that's going to be binding. But it also allows you to make recommendations or suggestions as it moves forward through the system, you know, like as it moves on. So you can do nothing. You can make, you know, recommendations or suggestions about things you think that should be considered or reviewed possibly going forward. Okay. Now, let me get clarity on this because this is where I'm confused. A minute or two ago, you indicated that even if we applied our ruling and our logic to the comprehensive plan, that that could be overridden by federal case law. So why would we make the recommendation based on a comprehensive plan if, in fact, we knew we were already in? Well, because some things can be done, like some of the screening things, or maybe the entities determine that they want to go back and look at this some more and potentially go back and review some type of settlement of that federal lawsuit that is different than this. But it's not binding like it is when you all are ruling on a private zone change matter. that you would do. So it's not that you should not consider because what you're being asked to do is to review what's important to this community and determine if you can make any suggestions or if any of those things can apply in a circumstance like this. Or, you know, it's like when the schools come in to you all and say, we say, well, we really think you should be on a single loaded street with some, this kind of landscaping and they go, okay, great. No, we're not doing that. So you can still make your suggestions that would be consistent, but it doesn't mean you can require them. I got you. Mr. Brewer? Yeah, I think we've beaten this horse enough, but we can't change the outcome, but I think it's incumbent upon us to voice our opposition if we feel that way. So as a body, I think we should do that and come on the record as to whether you think it's the right thing to do or not. I mean, the lawsuit's going to go ahead or not. But I don't think we changed the outcome. I think we need to voice our opposition. I think we've done that. Ms. Plumlee? I certainly agree with Patrick on that, that we need to have some sort of opinion going forward, because anything else is wishy-washy, and I don't think that commission wants to appear that way. Okay, now, Mr. Owens. Motion? Yeah, if you'd like. It's not in compliance. Yeah. Mr. Chair, in regards to PFR 2018-1 Lexington Fire Station number 19, my motion would be for disapproval or that this is not in compliance with the comprehensive plan for the following reasons. One, I do not think the colocation of cell towers has been fully exhausted. I don't think the location in general has been fully exhausted, considering the proximity of WLAP radio towers. I don't think that the possibility of alternative or stealth towers have been fully discussed or possibility given to that. In addition, I can state numerous other things that I've already stated. Okay, we can attach that to the motion. Yes, sir. Okay, Mr. Owens moves and Ms. Carolyn Plumlee seconds the motion. Now, I want to go back because I don't have all the information you have, but you all have heard the motion. Is there any unreadedness related to the particular motion? If not, would you please vote when it comes up on your screen? This is a motion to disapprove, I think it is. Okay. That's our opinion. Thank you very much. Okay. Well done. Thank you. Anything else from Mr. Duncan? Thank you, Mr. Chair. I remind you all that we have a work session. next Thursday and we'd like for everyone to come if you can. We're going to have two agenda items. The first will be a presentation on placemaking. There have been several of you who have asked a question about what does that mean when we talk about that in the comprehensive plan. So we've invited some people to come in who are experts in this, have done it in practice and now talk about it publicly. So they will be here at 1.30 on the 17th and then we will follow that with a presentation of Theme D for the comprehensive plan. You all should be getting a copy of that tomorrow or later this weekend. So look forward to seeing everybody at 1.30 in the Phoenix Building on the third floor on Thursday. Thank you. Okay, thank you. Anything else from the Commission members? If not, without objection, meeting is adjourned. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.