Three, four, three, two, one. Three, four, three, two, one. Welcome, everyone. It's 3 o'clock, and I'd like to call to order the Lexington-Fayette-Irvin County Council Work Session, and today's May 13th, 2025. Now, our first item of business is public comment for issues on the agenda, and we have an unusual situation in that two people have ceded their time to a third, but the third isn't here. So we'll see how that plays out. So I would like to go ahead, then, and call on Alan Overmyer, who is our first speaker, and the way this works is you'll come to the podium, and you'll need to state your name and your council district for the record, and you'll have three minutes, and here's the podium. So I know Alan, Colonel Alan Overmyer from UK Army ROTC. Welcome. Ma'am, thank you very much. Lieutenant Colonel Alan Overmyer here. I'm the professor of military science on the University of Kentucky's Army ROTC program. We're on the docket for our memorandum of understanding for the use of Hazel Park this afternoon. I appreciate what Lexington does for the cadets and the staff and faculty at UK. Go Cats, and here to answer any questions if you have them. Thank you very much, ma'am. Thank you so much. Next is Mike Brower. Mike, are you here? All right. Welcome. Thank you, Mayor and council members, for giving me the opportunity to speak. I'm Mike Brower. I live in the third district under the watchful eye of Council Member Legree. I spoke at the last work session on House Bill 443, and I mentioned that Representative Chad Aul, who is a co-sponsor of that bill, had a letter, an op-ed letter in the Herald Leader a little bit ago where he clearly stated that it was not his intention or the other co-authors of that legislation to in any way reduce public input. And I believe there's a copy of that that you should have, and you see the highlighted portion of that where he adamantly makes this statement several times. I actually spoke to him this morning, and he agreed and asked me to go ahead and distribute that letter to you. And I just wanted to reiterate, I'm here as the vice president of the Southern Heights Neighborhood Association, and our executive board is adamantly opposed to anything that reduces public input, and we hope that you are too. We believe that this is a misinterpretation of the legislation. The bill, if you've looked at it, is ten lines, maybe one or two more than that. It says absolutely nothing about public engagement, and for it to be interpreted in such a way that keeps the public out of the room during the final development plan conversation really puts us in the dark, and that's never a good thing. Public input might slow the process down a little bit, but the results will be better if the public has an opportunity to weigh in, because when you're talking about our neighborhood that we live in, as I've lived in mine for 30 plus years, we know a lot about it, and we know what we can help, but we need to be in the room. So I would again suggest that you seek out Representative Aul, or other co-sponsors of this legislation, or have your legal teams do that so that you can come to a better understanding of what their intention was in order to not leave the public out of the process. Thank you again for this opportunity to speak. Thank you. Now, I would like to confirm, is Jeffrey Beatty here? Where are you? All right. You are yielding your time to Representative Brown. Is that correct? All right. So you'll need to stay until he gets here and speaks. And then is Vicki Mitchell? Are you also yielding your time to Representative Brown? He is not here yet, so you'll both need to stick around in case he comes, and we'll just go on with our agenda, and then we'll come back to the public comment. I'm sorry? I'm sorry? There's more people signed up. You might need to refresh. Okay. For issues on the agenda? Okay. They are not showing up again. Okay. All right. Okay. We now have a new batch. So the way this will work is I'll call your name, and you'll come to the podium, and you'll restate your name and your council district. So first will be Walt Gaffield, followed by Darnell Tagaloa. I'm so sorry. Tagaloa? Where are you? Thank you. I'm sorry if I massacred your name. Welcome, Walt. Mayor Gorton, Vice Mayor Wu. I'm Walt Gaffield. I'm President of the Fayette County Neighborhood Council, and I live in Council District 10. I have several points to make. One, removing public engagement is another step away from democracy, and I don't think any of you favor that. Two, House Bill 443 is oriented towards small rural counties that lack serious professional planning. Lexington simply has a different history than that. Three, the requirements in House Bill 443 for magisterial decision making and objective standards require that previously flexible requirements become objective. Consequently, the Urban County Council needs to pass the proposed ordinance. The state law takes effect on July 1st, so there's time, you just don't have the time to do much else. Four, FCNC does not believe that checking or unchecking boxes determines when planning staff should determine when a final development plan requires a waiver and be heard in the planning commission. The new state law requires that the basis for that decision be public health, safety, and welfare, and that's kind of a subjective decision in our opinion. Five, FCNC does not believe that passage of the ordinance will be very helpful in solving Lexington's housing crisis. In conclusion, I want to give you an example of how the proposed ordinance includes standards that do not work well together. Open roads, cul-de-sacs, parking near railroad tracks, bike lanes, private roads, and drive-throughs and drive-ups. They all tend to conflict with each other. If you look at them closely, I think that section needs some work as well as some others. In conclusion, I believe that the council will be revisiting this ordinance once it passes. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next, Darnell, and following him will be Dee Heedley. Welcome. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Darnell Tagaloa. I reside in the 1st District, and I came up here because I was brought to light of this happening today, so I just picked my son up from school to come straight down here so I can sign up in time to make sure I just, like last time, I don't have a lot to say, but I do have some questions. On February 25th, I asked a very good question to the council, and I wanted to know if he was talking about business development or people development, and based on me being here today, I think I got my answer. So I'm kind of confused. If I understand this right, we want to take away the public input, and this is the same voices that you all want to speak for you and advocate for you all to be in the positions that you're in. So I think that's pretty plain as day where we stand. I think the majority of the people, I don't know, but are opposed of this because you're basically trying to take our voice away. And I'm also kind of confused because on February 25th, I witnessed some body language of not being so happy to be here at 11, after 11 p.m. That's part of it. So I don't know what's prompting this. I don't know what decision you all will make, but I just came up here to voice my opinion that it seems to me you want to take away the voices of the same people that voted for you all, the same people that's going to come up here and help you all make this community a better place, as you all can't be everywhere at once. So that's the point of a community. So with that being said, I pretty much, oh, one last point I will make is don't think about me and these adults here, I'm glad my son's right here with me. Because y'all have a lot of youth watching all of this, and they are the future. So what message are we sending to the youth? That you can go vote, but you can't have a voice. That's pretty traumatic to me. So with that being said, 47 seconds left, got plenty of time. Same thing that I did last time, and I'm going to be very redundant because it's the exact same prayer, but I pray for this public hearing tonight, give the council members wisdom and guidance as they deliberate on the items before them. May everyone act in good faith and every decision be righteous in your sight, for our benefit and for your glory. I pray regardless of the outcome of this decision, I pray it does not divide our communities within Lexington, but instead brings our communities closer together according to God's will. In Jesus' name I pray and love, thank you, and thank you for your time, amen, and thank you for your time. The council has some rules that prohibit clapping, just for future knowledge. Next is Dee Headley and then Rolanda Woolfolk. If you have something, please give it to the clerk. Welcome. Hello, ladies and gentlemen, I'm back again this week. My name's Deval Headley, I'm in the third, but I also represent voters across the other 11 districts. While we celebrate Lexington 250, are we planning for Lexington 500? In the past generations, we seem to be moving the city in a direction of millionaires and out of state transient college students by promoting national, regional, international players at great expense to local retail and local voters. You are the vast majority, not the minority, that they are being treated like. Last year, the local voters stepped up and spoke out, the developers went oh and three, and now their lawyers appear to have reverted to a form of three-card Monty to use a state bill to allow the locals to override the will of the people and say they must follow state law. Oddly, in that person responsible for the law has stated in print, and I will read you from the print, HB 443 does not prohibit public hearings for the review and approval of development plans. No sponsor of HB 443 supported the prohibition of a public hearing during its adoption. Lexington is the only community in Kentucky to propose removing a public hearing from its processes. The language of HB 443 does not say anything about removing the public engagement. He emphasized I would never have co-sponsored a bill that removed the public's voice from the process. My record on public engagement and transparency is strong. Just this past session, I voted against legislation that reduces access to the public records. This was the person who was responsible for the bill. I think their statement should be definitely a part of the conversation. We have a council, we have a law department, and we have a zoning people. Surely with all those people that are paid for by the voters through taxes to represent the actual voters, I think this is kind of important. And if they're saying state law supersedes city law, then doesn't federal law supersede state law? And if that's the case, it seems like there was a document about 200 years ago that had 10 amendments. And if I'm correct, the First Amendment, the Fifth Amendment, the Ninth Amendment, and the Tenth Amendment could be applied to this process because it clearly states in that Bill of Rights that the people are what this country is about. I don't live in China. I don't live in Russia. I don't live in Japan. I live in the United States of America, by the grace of God, and a Kentuckian. I'm blessed. But because of that, it's what's here. And when they say a city or a state from somewhere else to act as our comparable, that is illogical because if we're here, we're paying taxes here, we're voting here, we choose to live here, not in another state and another city to be compared to. Thank you all. Thank you. Now, is Rolanda Woolfolk here? Okay. And are you yielding your time to Mr. Willington? Okay. Thank you. Next is Jock Wiginton, who will then have six minutes, followed by Amy Clark. Welcome. Hey, you're welcome, ma'am. Thank you. To the mayor, to this honorable council, especially noting that I'm from the second district and my council member is Council Member Lynch, the honorable Council Member Lynch, I am glad to stand here, joining in with many of the neighborhoods that have asked me to- Will you state your name for the record, please? Oh, forgive me. Reverend Jock Wiginton. Thank you. Thank you. And once again, I rise, as I did last week, concerning the impact, potentially, of House Bill 442. I want to go at it a different way, if you'll allow me. Last night, I happened to be at a meeting. Last night, I was at a meeting. Last night, I was at a meeting at the Oakwood Shelter, and I was in a conversation and there was a scream that could be heard. It was loud, it was violent, it was nerve-wracking, sent chills down your spine. Chuck, you would know I would just look to try to override that, act like we didn't see it, didn't hear it, keep it moving. And it happened again. It came from the new Eastern State Hospital facilities that back right up to the Oakwood Park. In that same lot, we had to speak over the loud noises that could be heard from the trucks that are right beside the park and behind people's homes. To go and talk about the park and the new possibilities in terms of equipment, you couldn't see the playground because it's down a hill that has beside it not only an industrial place but really high weeds and such. What am I saying? For the residents, that all comes as a result of planning. They saw where somebody thought it was a good idea to put an Eastern State beside kids and now they're afraid to go to a park because they can hear the screams and there was no wall put in. They saw a city that thought it was wise to put a truck, a full 24-hour truck operation that you would see on the highway right behind somebody's backyard. They thought it was wise to put a housing complex that requires you to have children next to a railroad track. And then in terms of public nuisance, we knew a pool, that they thought it was wise to put a homeless shelter between a YMCA and that same residential development. Fast forward, they thought it was wise to put a trailer park beside an existing residential neighborhood. They thought it was wise to put an eight-story high building beside small, single family homes of one level. What I'm trying to help you to see is that all of these are seen as planning, decisions that were made by the city that people have to live with. It's one thing to have seven people who come out of town and have designs and desires about what they want to see, but there's also a quality of life that has been adopted, that has been fostered, that has been perpetuated, that people love. The idea that there's this mystical Mount Olympus that has where folk plan their future and they have no real say-so is beyond problematic when they've invested and have more vested into the situation than anybody down here would. Please keep in mind that this is a conversation about public input and the idea that you still are responsive to the people, that these are people who have given their time, their sweat and energies. If you go up to Douglas Park, that shelter wasn't built by the city. Look up the Herald-Leader articles and you'll find it was the neighborhood that came together and built that first shelter. I need you to recognize as council that the way you view planning and the processes has to translate into what makes logical sense to people who have to live in it and live with it, who've invested themselves. The idea that they can't have a full voice, the idea that they can't be heard, I appreciate none of us really were crazy about, come on somebody, about the long nights that we used to have when we had to have those zone changes. May I know you know. But it was part of the job. If you don't like listening to people, if you don't like taking the time to hear people whose lives are going to be affected for now and generations, then maybe this isn't for you. But I would ask you to consider, if you have a conflict even with the law, err on the side of the people. Don't do it. Allow them to sue the city and then they'll flesh out this issue. Thank you. Thank you. Next is, and we're still on public comment for issues on the agenda. Next is Amy Clark followed by Leon Slatter. I didn't do that. Copy for the record. I'm Amy Clark and I live at 628 Castle Road. You have in your email delivered in time for my talk the text of what I'm reading from and referring to. I ask you to look through it afterward if you can't now. I have three things to ask. Restore the commission as the approving authority per the plain language and intent of the new statute for review the approving authority for review and decision on all plans in a public hearing. The language of the statute says there are two cases where the approving authority may apply discretion. One is if the applicant for the plan asks for it, seeks a deviation from the objective standards. The other is the approving authority determines based on substantial evidence that a strict ministerial application of these standards would pose a specific threat to the affected area. The question is if you have here a process very changed from what is currently in operation, shortened to leave both the planning commission and the public out and in fact as was brought forward the other day, even council members who may wish to arise on behalf of their constituents in plan review before the planning commission. Authorities should remain with the commission to hear publicly and grant approval or disapproval of each plan in the body's ministerial capacity. So act like a minister judging according to the statute, explaining their decisions with clear reference to the adopted ordinances and regulations as pertinent. Currently all development plans get a public hearing before the commission with notice given on a published agenda. There is a consent agenda for plans with clear standards clearly met. They can go on the consent agenda and they really meet that intent of the statute to save time and money and trouble in going forward. Under the new process, the planning staff advises the commission there is substantial evidence of the threat, but if such a threat exists, how is the commission ever to come to know of it save through the staff once all commission review, the public and the hearing are cut out of this process? In my view, this is ministerial overreach, ministerial on the part of the staff and corporate capture together, the staff deal constantly with the developers and it's their responsibility. It's not pruning the record, but still more. Thank you so much. Now at this point, we're going to hear from Leon Slatter and then two more people have signed up to give their time to representative Brown, but we already have filled his time. So when we come to you, I'll ask you if you want to speak yourself. Welcome. Thank you, mayor and council. Let me say to you when, you know, somebody, some person said to me as I came in because they know me, they said, maybe you ought to give your time to somebody else. It's my right. I am a citizen of Lexington, Kentucky. You as the government, you are elected by the people for the people. You know, I don't have all of this, that, and other, but the thing that kept coming to me, I'm the pastor of Kingtown Missionary Baptist Church and I'm the president of Oakwood Subdivision Association. The word that kept coming to me, I had to look it up because I wasn't sure I could pronounce it. Authoritizenism. And I know I didn't say it just right. I hear you all, I just got it last night. This council is on the verge of becoming authoritarian. That's what I'm hearing from my president. One of my problems is, I just tell you like I see it. You are in the process. Now, maybe you're not. Maybe you're just discussing. Nobody really has it. But you know what it sounds like to me, and I told them last night. For some people that's a part of our local government, this has become personal. Personal. The commissions and those people who ever do whatever they do, don't want me to say to them or you don't want me to say to you, I don't disagree, that I disagree. That's my right. Can you see that? Please don't take that away from me. That's my right. You cannot rightfully make decisions for me. Thank you. Next, I will ask, is Rosalynn Robinson here? Representative George Brown already has his full time assigned to him. So would you like to speak for yourself? Do you want to speak yourself? Okay. Well, he's already spoken. So Robin Connor, are you here? So would you like to speak for yourself? Yes. I will. All right. Thank you. And following Robin will be Michelle Davis. Welcome. Robin Connor, Oakwood Subdivision. You guys, you council members, were elected by the people. And we want a clear understanding of where y'all stand for the people. Because y'all got to be elected again. So we need y'all to stand up for your community and do the right thing. Because you got to be elected again or you're moving up to another position. You still got to have the support of the people. And we will be paying attention to how y'all dealing with the community. Because if you're not doing right by the people, you will not get elected again. Thank you. Thank you. Is Michelle Davis here? Would you like to speak for yourself? Mr. Wiginton has finished. Okay. Thank you very much. Now is Representative George Brown here? All right. I'm going to go back for the two of you who gave your time to him and see if you would like to speak. He's not here. Jeffrey Beatty. Yes. Would you like to speak? All right. Welcome. Thank you. My name is Jeffrey Beatty. I am a citizen and I live in the Oakwood community. Tyler Morton, I'm sorry, is our councilman. The one thing that I don't understand, and I'm trying to really, really get this, is that according to Kentucky state law, Bill of Rights, is that I do have freedom to speak. So what I'm trying to understand, and if y'all can help me understand, is that all of a sudden that's taken away. Why? That's my right. So if it's my right, why should I give it up for a project that hasn't been discussed with us anyway? I should have a right to have a say in what can be in my community and what cannot be in my community. I can't speak for the rest of them, but I feel like my rights are taken because the Constitution says that I've got freedom to speak. I've got freedom to protect what is mine. And all of a sudden, now it's taken away. So I'm trying to have an understanding of why is it taken away. I understand that we have to grow. I understand that. But we have to grow in a way that it doesn't take away from the people who have worked hard for what they have and for what they're paying for. And we pay taxes to you all every year, property taxes, school taxes, the whole nine yards. So I'm trying to have an understanding. And if someone will from the council sit down and talk to me and give me the reason why I don't have a voice anymore, thank you. Thank you very much. Our final speaker is Vicki Mitchell. Welcome. Vicki Mitchell, 66 years of age, 66 years in Lexington, Kentucky. 42 years for the U.S. Postal Service. So I have a voice. I voiced on my job. My father, who when we moved to Oakwood, he voiced his opinion. Came down here, probably done the same thing we're trying to do. If I don't have a voice, what's my purpose? Just to roll over and let anybody do what they want to do? Then my vote shouldn't count either. But it will count if my voice is not heard. Thank you. Thank you very much. All right. We have one person who is signed up for the later public comment. So we have no docket today. And we do have May 6th, 2025 work session motions. If I could have a motion to approve. Move to approve. Second. Thank you. Council Member Curtis. Council Member Gray. Second. Are there any corrections? Additions? Anything? All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That motion passes. There are no budget amendments, no FYI budget amendments. So that brings us to new business. Could I have a motion? Move to approve. Second. Council Member Reynolds moves. Council Member Curtis seconds. And please log in when you have a question about new business. Council Member Gray. I have a question regarding letter A. And that would be Director Conrad. Welcome. There you are. I know about this. But I would just for any of the 6th District residents and especially those who live along Liberty Road, I would like for you to explain what number one is. Yes. So A, Council Member, thank you for the question. Is in regards to some improvements that Kentucky Transportation Cabinet will be doing along Liberty Road. So this gives them a .026 of an acre to do that construction and also to provide an easement. So we feel like it is good not only for the road, but for the residents near and around Liberty Park. Thank you. Yes. And that is all. Okay. Thank you. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Mayor. Yes. Commissioner Ford, I think is on here. Welcome, Commissioner. I can kind of surmise from this, but what is the remediation of unsuitable soils? I'm not sure. I've never heard that term. So yes, we are, as everybody knows, as most of them know, we are constructing a new Senior Therapeutic Center in Shillitoe Park. It's an 8-acre site. And it's primarily park land, previous to that, just green space. It was our contractor's attempt and need to make the site where we're going to build suitable to hold the facility that's going to be built there. Okay. So it was, the soil wasn't firm enough, the foundation wasn't firm enough, so we had to fortify the foundation, if you will, before we go vertical with the structure itself. That makes sense. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Mayor. This is item L, Director Conrad. He's too late. Thank you, Ma'am. As far as for the Heisel Park, I was just trying to confirm that there would be adequate signage for the public to know when and where the ROTC would be participating activities, and or if there would be a permanent schedule at Heisel Park where there would be kind of a list of future dates. Yes, Council Member. Thank you for the question regarding Heisel Park and the U.K. Army ROTC. Lieutenant Alvarez is here with us today, as is Deputy Director Adrienne Tucker, who have worked very hard to find an agreement that we feel like will benefit both the park and also U.K. Army ROTC. We are working on the signage piece. The sessions have concluded for this year, but when they come back in the fall, we have an opportunity to do some temporary signage on the days of, and also some more permanent signage. We're thinking a banner large enough so that people can see that when they're coming in and out of the park. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. Are there any other questions about new business, Council Members? All right. All those in favor of approving, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That motion passes. As far as communications from the Mayor, there are no appointments, no donations, and no procurements this week. That brings us to continuing business. I'll entertain a motion to approve Council Capital Funds. Motion approved. Council Member Ellinger, seconded by Council Member Curtis. Are there any questions? All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That motion passes. And now I'd like to turn the chair to Council Member Hannah Lagree, who chairs the Environmental Quality and Public Works. Thank you, Mayor. I have the report out summary for the April 22, 2025 Environmental Quality and Public Works Committee. The meeting was called to order at 1 p.m. The first item on our agenda was approval of the March 11, 2025 Committee Summary. There were no additions or corrections, and the summary was approved without dissent. Heather Wilson, Urban and Community Forestry Section Manager, provided an update on urban forestry. She reviewed the canopy tree coverage statistics and future goals for the program. She spoke about the Let's Grow Trees campaign and reviewed the target areas for funding. In areas where several trees are planted but trees are not growing, Wilson suggested mulching and pruning, the ideas to eventually have a program dedicated to mulching and maintaining the canopy. She talked about the impact of this program, and she also discussed the tree canopy website, and she stated that the tree plotter tool is live and that she can work with each office to navigate the use of this tool. No action was taken on this item. Fred Combs, General Manager of Lextran, provided an overview of Lextran's services and environmental impacts. He reviewed highlights for 2025, which include renovations to the transit center, microtransit feasibility, technology systems improvements, and paratransit outreach. Combs reviewed the microtransit feasibility study, including data analysis, case studies, and preliminary findings. He also shared that Bus Rapid Transit is a bus service that mimics light rail with high frequency dedicated lanes, faster boarding times, and unique branding. He reviewed environmental impacts, such as replacing diesel with cleaner fuels, expanding CNG fueling, and installing solar lighting at bus stops. Combs confirmed the feasibility study for microtransit will not be complete until after the fiscal year, and no funding is requested for microtransit in their budget because their priority is service frequency on the whole. No action was taken on this item. The meeting adjourned at 2.26 p.m., and that concludes my report out. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you very much. Does anyone have any questions for Councilmember Lugri on her report? All right, thank you again. All right, this brings us to a proclamation. All right, we're going to have Mike Thomas and Streets and Roads Director Rob Allen with us today, and a few other folks. Mike is a project manager senior in our Division of Streets and Roads, and he's also the President Elect of the American Public Works Association. That's a big deal, and I thank you all for being here. Thank you. National Public Works Week is coming up next week, and it's no secret that our public works professionals keep our city running. Through snow, through rain, through storms, through wind, all of that, whether it's waste management, engineering, streets and roads, environmental services, water quality, traffic engineering, building inspection, we want to thank each and every dedicated member of our public works for their service to our city, because their work is not easy. At this time, I'd like to present a proclamation declaring next week National Public Works Week in Lexington, and then ask Mike to say a few words. So here's how it goes. Whereas Lexington depends on public works infrastructure to ensure the health, safety and well-being of all residents, and whereas Lexington's public works professionals plan, design, build, operate and maintain transportation, water supplies, sewage and disposal systems, public buildings and other structures and facilities essential to a successful community, and whereas it's in the best interest for Lexington residents to gain knowledge of the importance of public works and programs in public works in our community, and whereas this year marks the 65th annual recognition of National Public Works Week, and whereas this week and every week we celebrate the hundreds of men and women in Lexington who provide and maintain our community's infrastructure and public works services, and whereas we thank our city's public works professionals for their hard work and unwavering dedication to our community, now therefore I, Linda Gorton, Mayor of Lexington, do hereby declare May 18th through the 24th, 2025, National Public Works Week in Lexington, and thank you for all you do. I would like to thank you all from the APWA. Thank you. Thank you. All right, thank you very much. Now we have continuing, and it says a presentation, of the efficiencies in our development processes and compliance with House Bill 443. So I believe this is discussion, Vice Mayor. So who would like to speak? Council Member Brown. Thank you, Mayor. Before my time goes, since it's labeled as a presentation, can we ask Commissioner Horn to come up and maybe give just a brief overview of what we're talking about? I think they were targeted this item, but I think it just needs to be clear that we're talking about the development plan process and not the council meeting, not work sessions, or anything else that is in place that has public comment. Would that be appropriate? Yes, that sounds perfectly fine. I'm going to start with the example of the state law passed by the legislature last year, effective July 1st, and it applies to final development plans and subdivision plans. Most of the examples you've heard, I'll make one comment, relate to zone changes, and the zone change process is not changing. It will remain the exact same process that everyone's used to. Preliminary development plan filed, zone change going through the planning commission, all the way through a public hearing, final decision on a zone change coming to the council, and then the final decision on a subdivision. It's up to the council to decide whether or not they will have another public hearing, or if you'll go with the recommendation of the planning commission as it relates to the zone change request. Planning commission had a whole process related to the proposed zoning ordinance text amendment. The work started on it last year by all the staff in the government who are involved in development plan review and sign-offs on development plans. The work started to meet the first part of that law, which is objective standards. Words such as reasonable, sufficient, appropriate, had to be removed in order to create standards that have no discretion. Objective standards remove debate and discretion from whether or not someone meets the requirements for the plan. Second part of the statute says applied ministerially. If they go through the process, they file a complete plan, all the boxes are checked, they get approval on the plan. If they want to deviate from any standard that this council ultimately has authority over, then they have to ask for a waiver from the planning commission. If they do that, the process again looks like what everyone's familiar with. It would go through the planning commission committee process to a public hearing on the waiver where there is public testimony and comment made on any waiver request. Presented last week by Daniel Crum from planning services was not only the timeline but the process that went through and was continued today for the council to continue discussion of that zoning ordinance text amendment. Thank you. Councilmember Brown, did you have three more? Yes, ma'am, I do. Thank you, Commissioner Horne, and thank you all our community members, our neighbors that showed up today to speak to this. I think it's just clear. I think it's just clear that we have to eliminate public comment. In the last few months, I think we've added opportunity for public comment and that we value public input, public engagement, and we'll continue to do so. I think what we're talking about today is how do we move forward with a law that was passed at the state to help more efficiently move along development plans. That takes me right to my first amendment that I want to make. This is in regards to, it's not an amendment to the ZOTA, so to speak, but more of a directive for our planning staff and law department in regards to making sure that this happens. It addresses the lack of notification and then also the opportunity for the public to share comments to development plans that will go through the ministerial process. So, I make a motion to require the applicant in a development plan process to post signage at the development site announcing plans and include the division of planning's contact information. In addition, I would like to mandate that the planning commission agenda to include a list of recent certified development plans and to provide a list of the planning commission's contact information. I would also like to mandate that there be an opportunity for public comment about the certified development plans at the planning commission meeting immediately following the aforementioned agenda item. So moved. See how much we value public comment? I heard Councilmember Ellinger first, who seconded it. All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? All in favor? Any opposed? Any opposed? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? All in favor? I mean, an existing development plan in place already had a zone change where that was a part of a preliminary development plan or meets the criteria to kind of require a development plan. So multiple buildings on the same property, a large kind of scale development. But what you see on most given properties in Lexington, where you're just taking a lot that doesn't have any other special restrictions about it, constructing a home in an R1C neighborhood on an empty lot. That would just require the requisite building permits. That is action that's available by right. This is just speaking to the final development plan stage for where that's required. Got it. Thank you very much. Thank you. Council Member Gray. Thank you, Mayor. You just kind of confused me. Could you restate what you just said there? My question was originally just to say that I support Council Member Brown, but I just need clarification on what you just said. Yeah, so not all development that occurs within our community requires what we are looking at today and what House Bill 443 is requiring us to kind of fix the process for. So kind of low scale, say in a B1, a neighborhood business zone. If you don't already have a development plan and it is just, I'm going to build a restaurant or a retail store. There's not anything that, there wasn't a zone change involved with it in the past. There wasn't multiple buildings being included in it that requires a final development plan. Then you can just as simply apply for building permits. So the same process that we've been going through and has been the standard for quite some time now. This is just impacting kind of the most involved developments or developments where, once again, zone changes and the like have been involved. Okay, thank you. And thank you for also the clarification, Council Member at large, James Brown, that this council has never said that we would ever take away public input. And we have actually increased our amount of time in the community intermingling with our residents as well. So this council right here is all about public input and speaking directly with our residents. So I would like to clear up that misconception or the lies that have been spread throughout our community. Thank you. All right, next is Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Council Member Brown. We've been talking about this amongst the council, trying to figure out a way because of what we were told by House Bill 443, what we could and couldn't do. But I think this gives us an opportunity because we all want to have public input and comment. Could you, Mr. Crum, go to the mic and tell us what your understanding by this amendment would require the planning staff to do then going forward? So in respect to how the development plan process would go out moving forward? Exactly. Yes. Okay, so once again, just to reframe the conversation, the current process for development plans, once again, when it's required or when it's applicable, is the council considers it. Staff makes a recommendation, but ultimately the planning commission looks at that and they make a discretionary review. They have public comment, it's a public hearing, that process is kind of what serves it currently. They're able to weigh the comment that they receive. House Bill 443 changes that whole dynamic. It makes it so that we can only evaluate them using objective standards, and so we have to update our standards to do so. It also changes the process to ministerial. So once again, we're talking about a staff level review that if you meet all of objective criteria, you do not require a hearing unless the specific threshold conditions are met. So what that means moving forward is that the technical review committee, which is the technical staff that were reviewing the specific criteria, are making the determination that yes, you agree with all of the standards and would approve and certify a plan that. So it shortens that time frame, but most importantly, it changes the dynamic where the planning commission has discretion, has the ability to hear this because under the new truncated and more efficient process, they won't see it unless there's a waiver or staff raises a health, safety, or welfare concern. But could you also include what is going to happen now with this amendment that Council Member Brown's doing on- Yes. What the extra ability for public input now would be? Yes, so what was being described is less of an ability to weigh in on a plan as it's being considered, and more of an informational presentation or however that took place. A recognition at the planning commission level that the following plans had been approved and certified. It would give the public the ability to come and comment on those items. However, knowing that those have already been approved. So really, it's an informational type thing to keep the communities kind of aware of what's happened. The planning commission as well, and that plays into the ability for things like zoning ordinance text amendments. So they can synthesize that, and while House Bill 443 clearly lays out the standards in which you can judge any individual development plan. It informs the policy makers and the folks like the planning commission who have the ability to kind of put legislation forward that may address concerns or things that they see when those come up. And on the notice, how would that be done? Yes, so once again, House Bill 443 is silent on a lot of the other information outside of objective standards and the ministerial process. So this would be something, a sign would be posted, and ostensibly obtained from planning staff for some fee, would be posted on the property. And it would really serve, rather than to let folks know that this would be an opportunity to speak on a particular item. To be informational, letting them know where they could find the plan, what the process it is for the review. When the planning commission, it would then, I guess, appear on the agenda if it was so approved. But it's really, once again, an informational versus the signage we have today is almost always associated with a public hearing. And letting folks know when they can come and speak on an item that is still under deliberation. Would you be sending out, like you do, another, the 500 feet rule, where you would send out to the neighbors that were within that perimeter? Are you planning on doing that? So I believe the council member's motion was just for signage, as well as that planning commission feature at this time. Okay, okay. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. One more speaker to the amendment, Council Member Reynolds. Thank you, Mayor. May I call Commissioner Horne up for a second, please? We're going back and forth about this public comment issue. I know it's really challenging. When we get a law from the state level, and like this one, who interprets legally what it means for us? If you want an official opinion on it, the law department. The law department. So the law department takes the laws and then decides what they think is the best interpretation for us to follow. I think that's a fair statement. Okay, so council members didn't just take this and think this is how to interpret it. That's certainly correct, and I don't want anyone under the impression that there was not significant discussion among all the government divisions, including the law department, about this law. And it passed. And if I can add one other comment to Daniel's statement about the sign notices. The other important part of that potentially becomes, as I've said before, once someone knows that there's a development plan filed on a piece of property, they're certainly free to reach out to staff at any time, call, send letter, email, etc. So it does create an input point, not to confuse people that this impacts objective standards, it doesn't. But it would give them an opportunity to ask questions and express any concern that they may have. Thank you. Well, I'll be in support of this, and I want to thank Council Member Brown for bringing this forward. I think we need to find a way to include people's input and public comment in a way that also is in spirit with the bill. So I'll be in favor of this. I think signage is good. I think allowing people to comment if it's on the agenda of a planning commission is also good. And moving forward, I'm open to other amendments as well, so thank you. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak to the amendment that's on the floor? All right, all those in favor of the amendment, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Now, although Council Member Brown is out of time, he has told me he has another amendment. What is your pleasure, to let him go ahead or back? All right, by consensus, go right ahead. Thank you, Mayor. I actually have two more quick amendments on the floor. So, and this amendment is to the ZOTA, and it's in section 12-9, referencing design standards for big box retailers. And I make a motion to delete 12-9B, so move. Second. Council Member Baxter seconds. Now, may I see your hands if you wish to speak to this amendment? We'll start on this side this time. Council Member Morton, Vice Mayor Wu, anyone else? All right, Council Member Morton. This is the same one, so Council Member Brock, could you just tell me your reason behind this amendment, and what it'll do? Yes, there was concern shared by the development community that this would hinder development, and after conversations with our planning department, and I don't want to speak for the planning department, so if you don't agree, I think they were comfortable with going ahead and deleting this portion of the ZOTA. Okay, and then for planning, can you just tell me your thoughts on this? Yeah, so this entire section, so 12-9, it's a very specific set of provisions. It's talking about a very specific zone, the B6P zone. Specifically what you do when you have big, large, sort of big box developments. And so it arose out of a series of guidelines that we had previously put in our zoning ordinance that sort of guided development, but once again wasn't an objective standard. And so the language that you see was staff trying to kind of codify what we had been looking at previously when we looked at the design of these structures. So this section specifically deals with, if you have a building that basically fronts on multiple streets, that you have a pedestrian entrance on both sides. I think there was some concerns that were voiced on operationally if they wanted to include things like a pharmacy that may have some implications with that. But planning staff's kind of intent with the big box design standards was just making sure that we are keeping the pedestrian facilities, that these are walkable, and ensuring that we have kind of a quality level design. But this, obviously, they would still maintain at least one entrance, and there's other specifications within the rest of the sections that talk about making sure that there's pedestrian connectivity. So that was something that staff was comfortable with alterations being made. Okay, and then will this impact our existing communities any? Will this have any impact or negative impact on existing communities? No, so this would be for new development when one of these specific zones meeting the specific criteria. So this would be new construction moving forward. It wouldn't affect development plans. And obviously, if the developer wanted to improve over what is the baseline of development, they are free to do so at any time. Thank you. All right, Vice Mayor Wu no longer has a question. Does anyone else have a question on the amendment? All right, all those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. And you have one more, is that correct? Yes, ma'am. Okay. And I also want to make a motion to amend 12-9C, and that's loading docks, trash collectors, areas, and outdoor storage of material, items not intended for sale should not be located within the front yard. Accessory outdoor sales areas for merchandise shall be permitted within the front yard. So move. Second. Council Member Baxter seconded. Who would like to speak to this amendment? Anyone? Council Member Morton. Council Member Brown, same question, just what's your reason behind this amendment? I think the intent was to make sure that in big box developments that the front yard of the facility was being used to sell merchandise and not used for loading or storing merchandise. Okay. So that was the clarity. And just to staff, it could be yes or no, no impact on existing communities. Thank you. Does anyone else have a question? Council Member Sheehan. Thank you, Mayor. This is a definitional question. So what counts as a front yard? I just want to make sure that this wouldn't block any accessibility pathways or sidewalk space. Sure, sure. So the front yard we define as anything within the, between the front plane of the building on the sites of the principal structure and the road itself. So anywhere basically from the building forward. So they would have to, under this language, any of those either storage areas or areas that are not intended for the public or service areas would be to the side or the rear of that line, essentially. But all of the pedestrian areas, access points would still have to stay open. Yes, yes. So this does not give them the ability to waive or otherwise circumvent any of the other standards we have in the ordinance. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Brown, I just wanted to make sure that we're all voting on the same thing. What you had read out doesn't fully match the written amendment we have. So I just wanted to double check with you and make sure exactly what the amendment is. I may have to apologize because there's been various versions of this going out, but this last version is the one I read, covered with planning. We might have it. And I think they're okay with what I read, unless I, do I need to read it again? You left off the last sentence and then you said the word materials, which was strike, struck. Okay, so what I intended to read was the motion to amend loading docks, trash collection areas, and outdoor storage of items not intended for sale should not be located within the front yard. Accessory outdoor sales areas for merchandise shall be permitted within the front yard. Okay, thank you for that clarification. Does anyone else wish to speak to the amendment? All right, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Thank you very much. Now, we are back to House Bill 443, Council Member Reynolds. Thank you, Mayor. I have several amendments as well. And I'm going to continue with the design standards for Big Box Retail Establishments 12-9, and then under that, it will be 12-9D. So I am just adding a budding. So I move to amend to say sidewalks a minimum of five feet in width are required along the full length of any exterior wall featuring a customer interest or an abutting off-street parking lot, and alongside off that lot abut a public or private street. Second. Vice Mayor Wu seconds. Who'd like to speak to this one? Council Member Morton, anybody else? All right. And just in the same tune, so I guess, what is the reason behind the amendment? We just wanted to make sure that it wasn't confusing, that we weren't saying that you actually had to put a sidewalk around a whole building if there was no pedestrian connection there or need. You know, like you're in the back of a store, you don't need a sidewalk there to connect. Okay, cool. And then staff, you support this amendment? Yes. Thank you. All right, any other questions on this amendment? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Thank you. Council Member Baxter. I'm sorry. I have quite a few more. Okay. The next one under the same section, 12F, is I move to amend for it to say, instead of saying a maximum of one, it will be a maximum of two crosswalks are allowed to make the connection. So I'm going to read the full thing. I move to amend to say sidewalks a minimum of five feet in width shall be provided to connect the customer entrance location to the public or private right of way, a maximum of two crosswalks are allowed to make the connection. So moved. Council Member, I heard somebody over here. Baxter? All right, anyone wish to speak to this? Vice Mayor Wu, and then Council Member LaGree, Council Member Morton. Thank you, Mayor. Mr. Crum, can I ask you about this one? I'm trying to visualize what the initial intent of this item is, and then how that amendment changing it from one to two will impact the intent of this particular item. Perfect, we got pictures. That's what I was looking for. So, just a slight disclaimer. I do have a master's in city and regional planning from Clemson University. I got a fronty face for art from James Lonell Elementary within town. So, and it probably, okay, I guess I'm not able to point from the clicker here. So, essentially when we're talking about this section, and this is on a much smaller scale. So this is a development plan that accompanied a zone change back in 2024. But specifically what this provision is speaking to is trying to basically provide for connectivity that crosses from, creates conflict between the pedestrians that are looking to access a use. And the vehicular users that utilize the site as infrequently as possible. So the current standard says that when you are coming in from a public or private right of way. So you are a pedestrian coming in, in this case on Harrodsburg Road for this example site. That there has to be a way for you to access this site using at a maximum of one crosswalk. So that you have the ability that as a pedestrian to only have to cross the traffic one time. Essentially the thought behind that is the fewer conflict points, the fewer times that you are putting those two groups at odds and creating a potential issue. The proposed amendment would expand that to two, so that if the, basically provides additional flexibility to the developers to arrange their site. Once again, so they would be, you would have to find some way to get the pedestrians from the road to your building. They've only had to use two crosswalks to get there. So it's a flexibility measure designed to afford some additional flexibility to the developer. So in lieu of a laser pointer, am I looking at the little triangle right under the word US on US 68 there? Is that sort of the example? I was going to show you. Because it looks like it's two small crosswalks with a little triangle in the middle. So yes, so under this development plan, a pedestrian would say coming from Harrodsburg Road, be on the public right of way, they'd come in, they've got a crosswalk, and that takes them to this red hatched. Well, I probably should explain what the diagram even was. But red hatched areas being the building, so that they have a way to access that with only one crosswalk. So that's generally what we are trying to accomplish there, is an example of what that would look in practice. The kind of opposite would be something to the effect of how this building in the back is sort of set up, where you're coming from the right of way, you're crossing the drive aisles here, and then eventually having to do the same so in the rear. So once again, that's just kind of an idea of how those two flesh out and kind of the way that it dictates kind of site design, if that makes sense. Okay, and for our purposes, and does this change continue to align with our sort of thinking about complete streets, multi-modal transit, and particularly pedestrian safety? I think as a kind of whole, this is just kind of a shift in philosophy of, it is one extra time on a particular development that they would have to make that crossing. Whether or not that that's unsafe is probably dependent on the site itself. But the existing language recognizes that they're going to have to cross probably at some point. This gives the developers more freedom, but does create kind of a balance and it would create an additional conflict point potentially with pedestrians, so it's kind of a mix. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Okay, Council Member LaGrie. Thank you, Mayor. I think the Vice Mayor asked the bulk of my questions, but I just had a question about, I guess, the original language. So when you open the original language of a maximum of one crosswalk, being allowed to make the connection, is that just from best practice in urban design, or could you explain a little bit about the origin of the original language, please? Yes, and let me bring up my original text here real quick. Okay, and to give just an understanding of how the current B6P development works. Under the current process, it's a lot more subjective, so a B6P development has what's called a multi-modal plan. So as a submission with it, there is a larger exhibit that kind of talks about connectivity and kind of how the entire site is going to function. Here is an example of, with that going away, and the ability of the transportation staff and the bike and pedestrian staff to kind of weigh in, having to kind of codify those connections. So essentially, I think it's best practice to, once again, minimize the number of times that we have a pedestrian vehicle conflict. And this is something that, to my understanding, has been able to be met through site design without creating an unnecessary burden. Okay, thank you. That's helpful and sufficient to answer my questions. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Morton. So, would this have any impact on existing neighborhoods? No, once again, this is applying kind of future to new development that would then come through. So no changes to anything that's been approved today. Thank you, and I understand the intent, so. Okay, thank you. Anyone else want to speak to this amendment? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. Council Member Reynolds has four more amendments, so what is your pleasure? Do you want her to just roll through them? Okay, Council Member Reynolds. Thank you. The next one is from section 16-6. This is 16-6A3C. This is about vehicular use area, pedestrian facilities, loading and unloading areas permitted in non-residential and mixed use zones. I want to explain before I make my motion that the reason why I think that this should be changed is because this would require a pedestrian walkway that is raised and it is in an area that it can be confusing. Because sometimes the amount of feet that are permitted are 24 feet, sometimes there's a fire lane. And then if we are just requiring a raised crosswalk at a store or an area that is very large, that would just be one, five foot one. And then the rest of it would not be a raised crosswalk, it's a little confusing. So I think that the best thing would be to refer this to general government and planning committee to do a little bit more work on what the best practice for this would be. Therefore, I move to send this section to general government and planning committee. Is this section 16-6A3C? Yes, ma'am. Okay, is there a second? Second. I did hear Council Member Curtis. All right, any questions about the motion? Vice Mayor Wu and then Council Member Sheehan. Thank you, Mayor. My question for this and really any amendments where we're kicking stuff back into committee. And I voiced this concern in our earlier discussions about the Zoder writ large. Is what happens on July 1 if we get an applicant, a developer applicant who comes to us and has a circumstance that relates to, I don't want to get ahead of ourselves with the other amendment, but with this particular issue when we don't have the objective standard in place. How do we make that decision? Are there things already on the books? And this might be a Mr. Crum question. Are there things on the books either through the UGM Zoda or some other mechanism that can stand in place of that objective standard? because what I really don't want to get into on July 1 in order to come into compliance with 443, I don't want to get into a circumstance where we have holes in our list of objective standards. Where suddenly certain kinds of applications will go through and then once we set them, then it's different. I just want to make sure that really our bases are covered on the day of compliance. Yes, so once again, this provision relates to basically that interaction between the pedestrian and the vehicles on any given site. So essentially what this provision says is if you're asking a pedestrian to cross that vehicular area for anything greater than 24 feet, you should provide this additional consideration, this raised pedestrian feature in order to kind of create that separation and then that enhanced safety. The implications of not including this language would be come July 1st, they would be able to have a crosswalk of any length. It could be 30 feet, it could be any distance without needing to additionally provide any enhanced pedestrian features with that. So we don't currently have anything else on the books that could stand in for this missing objective standard? Not as it relates to having to provide an enhanced pedestrian feature like that, no. Okay, in some other discussions that we've had on this particular item in specific, but also just generally about any things that applicants might have objections to. This is why we built in the waiver process. So if an applicant decides that this doesn't suit them for their development in whatever way, that's what the waiver process is for, for them to kind of file a waiver for a change and make their case in front of a deliberative body. In this case, the planning commission. So I have faith in that waiver process. But again, we've talked on this council about having reviews either on a six month, 12 month basis and kind of a look back so that, for example, this particular item. If we see, looking back, that out of 20 applications, eight applicants filed for waivers on this particular issue. That to me is a flag that says we need to look at this particular item and make some changes to it. But this time, I'm very, very reticent to support anything that creates a gap in our list of objective standards. So I will not be voting for it to be referred to committee. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Next is Council Member Sheehan, then Council Member LaGrie. Thank you, Mayor. I share some of the Vice Mayor's concerns about not having a standard in place. We know that the longer a pedestrian has to walk in a space, the more danger they're in and vertical deflections and raised crosswalks are a way to increase safety for pedestrians. We know this. So I don't feel comfortable not having this one in place. I also just want the entire body to be aware that currently for general government and planning committee, we are scheduling the agendas for next year already. So it will be about six months until we can actually review these items on our agendas. So keep that in mind, please, when you are voting on the items that are going to committee. It's going to be a while before we can actually have those heard based on what is already scheduled. So respectfully, Council Member Reynolds, I am not going to support this particular motion. But thank you for working to try to find some middle ground in these. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Legree and then Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Mayor. I view the inclusion of a raised pedestrian crossing at an intersection as a major win for complete streets. I think it's a big step forward to integrate this item as written into the ZOTA. As the Vice Mayor shared, the waiver process is there if people want to deviate from that requirement with their plans. And the waiver process also gives us a clear understanding of how many people are asking for that deviation. We know that raised pedestrian crossings not only slow vehicles, creating a safer situation for all road users, but they also increase visibility for the pedestrian so that they can be more easily seen no matter how they're navigating the crossing. So I can't be in support of moving this to committee because I would like to keep it in the ZOTA. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Mayor. I think the main reason that I'm in support of the referral is simply because I think there's just a lot of question marks around this provision. Currently, if it doesn't get added, there's already provisions about connection standards and internal pedestrian walkways. Essentially what it would look like is if you're coming out of Kroger, instead of there being a gradual decline to the parking lot where you would have a walk zone, the sidewalk would still be elevated at six inches, and then we would have an elevated six inch sidewalk into the parking lot. So that's just, in my opinion, I feel like we are assuming that all individuals who are transversing the parking lot are going to use that one five foot crosswalk. I think it's a really important traffic calming measure to use if we are using multiples potentially. But there's just too many question marks for me right now to not refer it, and I'm not comfortable passing it the way that it was proposed. So that's where I'm at currently. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak? Okay. Okay, who's over here? Raise your hand. Savigny, then Morton, then Gray. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. And I do tend to agree that I'd rather have this standard in place than not. But I also know that with the timing of it, with the timing being extended to get it into GGP, it's somewhat problematic. I don't see why the work cannot be done and a walk on motion be made at some point to change this section once the research is done. So I'm not going to be in favor of this particular motion. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Morton. Staff, could you just tell me what would be the impact of not including this in our proposed language and what your thoughts are on this? Yeah, yeah, and if I can go back to my drawing here, we can kind of walk through what some of these implications would be. I fall. So, Justin, once again, for your presentation. Testing, all right. So once again, this is talking about the relationships between how much pavement are we asking the pedestrians to cross at any particular time. Before we start thinking about what are the significant kind of pedestrian facilities that are needed to kind of ensure their safety. This is a view of a site plan that I believe meets the requirements here. So we have a number of places, basically anywhere that a sidewalk shown in blue stops and has to cross that vehicular use area to get to this building, it's shown with a hatched crosswalk. 24 feet corresponds to kind of the typical width we see for two lane traffic. So the developers usually don't want to have to put any extra pavement that they don't have to pay for, so it's a pretty typical dimension. So these here, these crossing here, these crossing here, all meet the dimensional requirements to where they would not have to provide those. Really, this is serving to prevent the instances where we're asking the pedestrians to cross 30 feet of pavement, 40 feet of pavement, larger. Basically, when we have a site that's oriented towards vehicles, this is really kind of serves as a check that with deliberate site design, they may never have to construct a sidewalk. This is something that when staff was kind of crafting the language, kind of doing self-reflecting based on some of the feedback we heard from the community. We had a chat with our transportation staff, with our pedestrian staff of, I don't see a ton of crosswalks. And they are occasionally provided, but this isn't on a development by development basis. And the answer is that it's almost always easier to design a site around that. So between the flexibility afforded by pure site design and adding a single island there breaks up that median so that you've got that space, or seeking a waiver that it would be able to kind of address the corner cases while setting a floor to ensure that our pedestrians are being asked to kind of navigate manageable distances without putting them in full conflict with vehicles. Thank you. Council Member Gray. Thank you, Mayor. So I just need clarification, as always. So if this motion, if we decide to keep as is, as the planning is the team has written, we can still continue to work on the sections, correct? Because I recall that we can still, I mean, no law really and truly that we ever work on is totally set in stone. We can always come back to it and redraw the picture that we want, correct? Mr. Crum. Yes, at any time, you all can initiate another text amendment to touch up any portion of this document. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Vice Mayor Wu has another question. Thank you, Mayor. I echo Council Member Gray's comment about that. My preference is I think it's much safer to have these standards in place and then make tweaks and adjustments rather than leaving a gap which realistically may exist for six, seven, eight months based on when we'll be able to see them. And to kind of echo Mr. Crum's comments, I'm kind of restating this for my own brain here. It sounds like developers and builders have and can work around this 24 foot limit, right? I think we have to take a step back and look at what is the intent of this particular item, and it is pedestrian safety. How do we achieve the pedestrian safety? We can do it a number of ways. If that roadway is narrower, generally speaking, that motorist traffic is going to go slower. So we don't have that need for that raised sidewalk. We can do a regular striped sidewalk, and that's safe. If it's wide to a certain degree, cars are going to go faster, and we want to calm the traffic and slow it down. We do that by putting in a raised crosswalk. If a developer doesn't want to go through that expense or do that, they build a narrower road. And if it's under 24 feet, they don't have to build the raised sidewalk. Either way, we get our result of more pedestrian safety, and the builder has several options. They can adhere to this and build the raised crosswalk. They can build a narrower road so they don't have to, or they can file a waiver. They have, in this circumstance, at least three options. So to me, having this gap, especially when it affects pedestrian safety, is not a great way to go. So thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak to this amendment? Yeah, Council Member Reynolds. Thank you, and thank you colleagues for all your input. And I understand and hear your concerns for pedestrian safety. I care a lot about pedestrian safety. I always want to slow traffic down. What doesn't make sense to me about the way this is worded is we could have a big box store. And you know how box stores have large entrances and exits. It's not a single door. And then we could be requiring people to build a, what is relatively small, crosswalk. We have the big doors here, and we have all of this area that goes to the parking lot. And we have one little crosswalk. It could be over here, it could be over here, but the idea is to take people to the parking lot. We all know that everybody has carts, and that there's not going to be a magic line on that crosswalk. Because we know people go around speed tables all the time, and they don't stay on the crosswalk. Usually, all this area is almost painted as a crosswalk. So I just think it needs reworked. I don't think it's going to accomplish exactly what we want it to. And I agree with, I think it was Council Member Baxter that said, if we had multiple crosswalks that were slowing people down a lot, and multiple areas of crossing, that would make more sense. So I'm just, my point here is I think it needs reworked, and it's not, it has the potential to not be practical. I want pedestrians to be safe, I want cars to slow down, so please hear me on that. That's all I will say. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone else who wants to speak to this amendment? Council Member Sheehan. Just a quick question, this might be for Daniel. Section 16.6 isn't just for big box stores, correct? because on our document it is under the section. Yeah, that's a separate section. But 16.6 is not just big box stores. No, that is, yeah. Okay, thank you. Anything else? All right, we're voting on the amendment to refer 16.6A3C to General Gov and Planning Committee. And will you take an electronic vote, please? Please log in your vote. All right, do we need one more? There we go. It's, well, are you, is everybody settled on their vote? It is, will you show the vote? I believe it was 10 nay, 5 yay. Is that correct? All right, so that motion fails. Did you have other amendments? Yes. Under section 12-8, minimum design standards, 12-8H1. Just to clear up some of the language there, change the top line instead of located along to a budding. And then there's an and in there that we crossed out. And then on the bottom, sidewalk is crossed out and pedestrian is added. So it would read like this. I move to amend section 12-8H1 for all commercial centers abutting a transit route. A minimum of one transit shelter with seating shall be provided on such route and shall have sidewalk connections a minimum of five feet in width to both the internal and perimeter pedestrian circulation systems. Such transit shelter shall not be required when an existing transit shelter is present within one-fourth mile of the development along the same side of the roadway and connected to the development with a continuous pedestrian network. All right, Vice Mayor Wu seconds. Now, please let me know if you'd like to speak to this amendment. We have Council Member Morton, Council Member Sheehan. All right, we'll start there. Council Member Reynolds, can you just tell me your reason behind this amendment? Well, I think pedestrian rather than sidewalk says that it could be a little bit more broad, a continuous pedestrian network. And then abutting means next to or have a common boundary. So that it wasn't just on it. Okay, staff, your thoughts? We have no issue with the proposed changes. Thank you. All right, thank you. Council Member Sheehan. Thank you. What is the practical difference between continuous sidewalk network and continuous pedestrian network? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So once again, this provision is talking about the circumstances in which these kind of large commercial centers need to be providing these transit accommodations. One of the circumstances in which it probably wouldn't be as appropriate would be in a situation where there is a bus stop within the close vicinity. The way staff had it written out originally, it was a sidewalk network, which really means along the roadway. A pedestrian network would give them flexibility, say, if there wasn't facilities along the frontage, but if it was a trail or other facility that's, once again, still designed for pedestrians. So I think it provides some flexibility, but meeting the intent that folks that would be within that distance walking to the development, so there's not any opposition by staff. Do you see a pedestrian network as having to meet ADA standards like a sidewalk would? I would say so, yes. Thank you. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak to this amendment? All right, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Thank you, Mayor. Next, in section 21-9, about waivers. And I am going to make a motion to amend and change the word compensate to mitigate. I move to amend section 21-9A1CI. The applicant has incorporated other design measures that exceed the minimums of the zone and mitigate for non-compliance with the requirements to be waived, net beneficial effect. Is there a second? Second. Council Member Baxter seconds. Now, who would like to speak to this amendment? Anyone? All right, all those in favor say, I'm sorry. Council Member Lickery. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to ask the difference between compensate and mitigate in practice. It's not clear to me. I was concerned that compensate could have negative meanings. I don't know what- What does it mean in practice? Or is it just a synonym or? Yeah, so once again, words have different kind of meanings and intentions. I believe the intent behind the amendment was to make sure that when we're talking about considering waivers, that we're not asking for money to consider that. So compensate being switched to mitigate achieves the same effect. Essentially, this is giving the applicant the ability when they're asking for relief from a particular waiver that they somehow have the ability to make up for changing one particular aspect, and it's related to that, and they're kind of mitigating the effect in some form or fashion of any impacts of not including the standard. Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you, Council Member Reynolds. Does anyone else wish to speak to the amendment? All right, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Lastly, 21-9E, we're just adding a word called in there specific, so it will read. I move to amend section 29E. I'm sorry, 21-9E. The commission may impose additional conditions or restrictions intended to mitigate the specific impact of the modification or waiver. These conditions or restrictions shall be noted on the plan and are only able to be modified by the planning commission. Council Member Gray seconds. Any questions, comments? Council Member Morton. Council Member Reynolds, can you just speak towards your intent and why you need this? I think this is similarly, we want to make sure that we're not being subjective again, and that we're saying that this has a specific meaning for a specific purpose. And staff, you agree? Just to expound a little bit, so staff is in agreement with the included language. Basically, this section deals with the guidelines or the process that the planning commission makes a subjective decision on whether or not the applicant's request to change or alter one of the specific objective standards is appropriate. They've got the ability currently to put conditions on a waiver. However, this kind of directs them to be specific. So in the sense that if they have a condition, it needs to be related to the nature of things being asked of them. And not to kind of veer off into an unrelated condition relative to what the applicant is seeking. Thank you. Any other questions? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Okay, Council Member Baxter, back to the house bill itself. Yes, ma'am, thank you, and bear with me. I've talked about this so much I've lost my voice. Okay, so we are going to stay on the same page that we just were. I'm looking at section 18-3, B4C. This is where landscape material is required. We are proposing language to remove the five feet when no trees are provided minimum. And just as a note, the eight foot was a recommendation from our environmental services division. Because that is what is conducive to a tree growing well. So we want to encourage trees to be planted in double-loaded parking. So did you want to read the motion? Yes, ma'am, so I move for section 18-3, B4C to read. Every other row of double-loaded parking requires a continuous interior landscape area of a minimum of eight feet in width when trees are provided. So moved. Second. Second by Council Member Reynolds. Are there any questions or comments? Council Member Sviggum. Thank you. And I probably need, I kind of need your perspective on this. So basically, we could literally just have a parking lot without trees in it. Is that correct, if it was just continual? So, once again, I may put up a graphic again. Yeah. And while you're walking over to it, it just seems like by taking out, I mean, it just seems like it's, I mean, so if I don't want to do an eight foot wide thing in my parking, I don't have to put trees in it, I can just basically do a big old parking lot, right? So let me kind of back us up. So we have existing language in our ordinance that speaks to kind of a variety of ways that a parking lot's designed. Specifically within the past handful of years, we've significantly updated that. So when you provide a vehicular use area, we are looking at ensuring that a minimum amount of tree canopy is provided, interior landscaping in kind of in accordance with those items. This language pertains to a very specific subset of that. So once again, on the diagram with the green being the landscaped areas. These long sections here, where you have, once again, kind of these double rows of parking. You've got these big, long sections here. This is specifying that when you're providing those, and the ordinance tells you you have to, it didn't provide a dimension. So you could provide that at the width that you'd want, which you can also, once again, locate your interior required trees to provide your canopy in those landscaping islands. It's a great idea to provide shade, heat island, et cetera. What it didn't provide was a minimum width. So you need, based on our experts within that, eight feet was what was conducive for the tree's growth in those areas. This would have been something that would have been negotiated under the current standards as a part of the sign off. They would have taken a look at a three foot and said you can't put a tree there. That's not going to realistically grow. So this is, once again, codifying something that was a part of sort of the common sense regulation that we have as a part of the current process. Thank you. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Mayor. Mr. Crum, similar question, and I just want to make sure I understand the wordage. Minimum of eight feet in width when trees are provided, and then five feet, what we're cutting out is five feet when no trees are provided. What do you mean by trees are provided? Yes, so there is what the ordinance currently specifies is that this is an interior landscape area. You could theoretically decide that you didn't want to put trees in this section. You would still have to find a way to meet your tree canopy requirements. We almost always see those folks utilize those in the same manner. However, if you just wanted to have that where it was shrubs or flowers or plantings, suddenly that nexus or that need for a full eight feet suddenly isn't as apparent. So it allows them to have some flexibility in areas where trees are not being planted. But if you are showing us on your development plan, I'm using this area to meet my plantings, my required tree canopy coverage, that we could then verify and see, that's eight feet. Or kind of make that judgment from there. Okay. I'm still having a little bit of a hard time kind of grasping, and I kind of will maybe echo or ask Council Member Savigny's question again. Will this change enable this type of sort of double stack parking to not have any landscaping or green requirements or tree requirements? No, it is still required under the current ordinance. This is just giving it a dimension when it is acting in a very particular way. It still has to do that under the current ordinance. Okay, thank you. Okay, thank you. Anyone else wish to speak to this amendment? Council Member Sheehan. I'm going to continue asking about this particular thing. So that I can make sure that I understand. So if there are no trees in that small little green area that goes between those parking spaces. If we take out this language, or five feet when no trees are provided, what is the size of that space? It could vary, even if they were saying that this was going to be the location that they could plant the trees. So once again, this was intended to make sure that we had the minimum width to support the landscaping that we are calling for as required within the ordinance. But otherwise, they could show that as three feet with trees, or two feet, or etc. But I love the eight feet with the trees, but I'm talking really more about the five feet without the trees. Like what happens in the space when there isn't a tree there? Yeah, yeah, so that was sort of a useful threshold of just providing an additional room. But that being sort of the main consideration was the trees. They still have to provide it, even if that bottom floor part was removed. But they would be able to say, make that two feet. But really the intent behind that is to break up the non-stop parking, the impervious surface. And so staff felt comfortable with five feet as sort of the bottom floor of that. Especially considering the conversation that we had around storm water today and paved areas. I will not support this amendment because I do think those green spaces are important. And so having that minimum of five feet for me is an important thing. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Mayor. Mr. Crum, to kind of follow up on that then. So in theory, if there are no trees provided between those stacked parking spaces, that green space could be any size up to, I don't know what. Realistically, how small can those green spaces get? Like for them to still kind of fulfill the requirement, what is the absolute minimum? minimum that you think people would do. Yeah, let me grab my ordinance real quick. And again, I'm just trying to get some clarity and I echo Council Member Sheehan's concern about any sort of either gap or leeway where people can sort of get out of creating green space. There really isn't a bottom floor that as long as it was still able to grow grass and have vegetation on it. Do you have a sense of is there such thing as either an industry standard or what just, you know, I'm assuming like you can't do a four inch green space, like that would be unrealistic, right? So like do you have a sense of realistically if I were a developer and I said give me the smallest amount of green space I can squeeze in between parking spots, what would that look like? I don't know if I'd be able to answer that, but this once again was some language forward to us by our DES staff, but I unfortunately don't have a background where I feel qualified to answer that. Yeah, and so for me, like the lack of answer to that question is a little bit concerning to me as well, and I would prefer to have that minimum standard in. You know, I think we can have a conversation of should it be four feet, you know, we can have conversations about it, but to eliminate that sort of floor is a little concerning, thank you. Thank you, Council Member Brown. Thank you, Mayor, and I'm gonna support this amendment. I think, you know, I think this provides flexibility for the development to happen, and I don't think it's a waiver for them to get away from the open space requirements, the landscape requirements, or the tree canopy requirements. I think it just gives them flexibility in regards to designing the parking to just have flexibility, but I think we still have enough teeth to make sure that those requirements are gonna be met during the development, so I plan to support it, thank you. Thank you, does anyone else wish to speak to this amendment? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? No. Okay, if you'll do a electronic vote, please. All right, there are eight nays and seven yays, so that fails. All right. Still have a few more, Mayor. Okay. Okay, I'm gonna jump to section 1612. This is Bicycle Parking and Storage. This is 1612D. Stephen, I think I'll put the language up there. So we are, I'm just amending a few of the words to clarify some of the meanings here. So you'll see we have added the word directly adjacent, changed the word dwelling to structure because this is in an area, this is under non-residential mixed-use zones. Yep. And stricken secure, mainly because your definition and my definition of secure are different. That could mean behind a locked door, could mean a place for me to time a bike to, and then change the last sentence to read, bicycle parking shall be allocated proportionately between the residential structures on a development based on the number of residential units in each structure. Essentially meaning that there wouldn't be a centralized location for bike storage. Each building within, if you're looking at an apartment complex, each building would have its own bicycle storage as opposed to a centralized bike storage area. So motion to amend section 16-12D to read, 50% or greater of the required bicycle parking for multifamily developments shall be covered and either located directly adjacent to the structure or in a location internal to the structure. Bicycle parking shall be allocated proportionately between the residential structures on a development based on the number of residential units in each structure. So moved. Did I hear a second? Council Member Beasley. All right, who would like to speak on this? We've got Council Member LaGreve and Vice Mayor Wu. Anybody else? All right, Council Member LaGreve. Thank you, Mayor. My question I suppose is for the planning staff. Would you be willing to explain kind of like the delta or the variation in practice between the proposed language and the amended language? And I would also be interested in whether or not the amended language creates any kind of situation where potentially there would be fewer areas to park a bicycle as a result. Yeah, yeah. So once again, this is talking about when you provide vehicular parking, our ordinance dictates that you provide a certain amount of bicycle parking as well. And so this particular section of the ordinance deals with how you allocate that with a multifamily development. Once again, I'd split up between a number of structures. There really isn't much of a sort of tangible real difference as far as the language proposed, talking about it being directly adjacent and then the secure location versus just a location internal to the structure. The intent behind this is that we're providing these facilities with the ability either to be located in a building or covered, so once again, we want to encourage multimodal transportation and make that easy, convenient, and applicable for all users. The last portion was basically an attempt to simplify or codify the language. It's still the same components that you should allocate your bicycle parking based on the, basically proportionately, so you don't have, once again, a concentration of your development was required to have 50, and they are all at the very beginning, and there's six buildings down. You have to walk all the way in. We want to make sure that those are split up between the units based on, or the buildings based on the number of units, so I believe that that was a way to set that up that didn't sound like an SAT question. Okay, that's helpful, and just so that I'm understanding, I know that Council Member Baxter, you changed the language from dwellings to structure because this could be for like a mixed use, and not simply a residential, but then it also says here, bicycle parking shall be allocated proportionately between the residential structures on a development, so would that- This just applies to multifamily, multifamily residential, so. Okay. So if we're talking about mixed use, I just, I thought maybe it had to do with residential and also commercial uses in the same space, or I'm just trying to understand if there's any kind of situation where we could create it so that if there weren't any dwellings, or there were fewer dwellings and more commercial uses, we could add more bicycle parking in. Yeah, there are other sections that also apply to kind of our commercial standards for bike parking as well, and those have their own requirements, especially when we're talking about within parking structures, et cetera. This is really sort of meant to supplement that on the residential side, so this would only apply to a pure multifamily residential development, so a mixed use development, this would not apply, a commercial development, this would not apply. Okay, okay, then maybe that's why- Well, you also could think maybe of a multifamily development where there's a clubhouse, or like a centralized leasing office, or something like that, this would maybe allow for bike parking in that area. Okay. Okay, that's what I'm hearing too. I'm not sure if I have any prepared amendments. What I'm looking for is more bike parking, not less, and then the bike parking spread out, you know, in a way that makes sense for all users or visitors, and I wanted to try to understand what those would look like in practice, so. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Mayor. Mr. Crum, when it says at the end, it says based on the number of residential units in each structure, so if in total the development has 30 units, is that 30 bike spaces? It would be based on the number of, the standard, I believe, is based on the amount of parking being required, and it's derivative of that, so essentially, if you are required to have 30 bicycle spaces, and you have three buildings that have 10 units each, you would split those up evenly, and it would serve through that function, but it's a function not of the total dwelling units, but of the parking, and once again, they have the ability, they being the developers, have the ability to provide extra bike parking. This is, once again, the intent behind a lot of these regulations is to set the floor that if the applicant wants to exceed, they absolutely can. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak to this amendment? All right, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Looking forward to section 16-15, commercial access standards. So, my motion here will be to replace this entire section, and I want to explain why. So, as I was looking through this section, and I was getting feedback from the community, a lot of what I was receiving was, where did these numbers come from? Where did our entrance, you know, our widths of commercial entrances come from? And they were all, this section was essentially drafted by traffic engineering, which is great, because there's a standard in place. My concern was, and my request was, is that we reference a standard that we have already adopted, or there's an external industry standard that could serve as a reference point for our own ordinance. Therefore, like, if that ordinance changed, standards updated, ours would essentially update as well. So, I don't know if you want to take a moment and read through it. You were provided this information ahead of time, but my motion will be to replace the section 16-15 with the provided language. So moved. Is there a second? I'm sorry, who's second? Council Member Beasley, thank you. Is there any discussion? I'm happy to answer any specific questions. Council Member Sviggum, anybody else right now? Thank you, Mayor. Could you, because I'm trying to figure out, again, because we got this sheet, is all the new red underlined yours as well, or only the blue and the striked-down red? This is an entirely new section, period. Yeah, it's entirely new. And the, so if it's stricken, that is part of the new. Right. The blue is new language over what planning gave us originally. So, if it's just red and underlined, that was the original language. Okay. If it is stricken, we, like, if we're looking at C, F, G, those were taken out because they all apply to the engineering standard drawing 307. Got it. Okay, so all the. Kind of clean up. Yeah, so it sounds like you added a few words here and there, you struck some areas. But there's some of the basic stuff that was there before is still there. Yes, it's just taking out where, well, it's, you know, like, one of the, I mean, I'll tell you one of them as an example. One of them was an entrance, a commercial entrance should be between 20 and 30 feet wide. Yeah. Well, we were hearing industry standard is larger than that. So, if we're referencing an industry standard or a traffic engineering standard, it's more efficient. And could I just ask planning, were you okay with these changes? Yeah, so planning staff in conjunction with folks from the division of engineering took a look at some of the concerns. And once again, that's where a lot of these references to that industry standard or that standard drawing that resulted in some duplication. So, the text that you're seeing includes the changes and tweaks that were recommended by our traffic engineering staff. Thank you, that's all I have. Thanks, Mayor. All right, does anyone else wish to speak? Vice Mayor? Thank you, Mayor. To follow up on that, Mr. Crum, would you agree that this is essentially a cleanup of this particular item? And or are there any changes that you would consider substantive? I think for a lot of it, there's the recommendations that we initially saw were in line with, once again, when traffic engineering gave us the language on this. And this is a brand new section. Those were based off the same thing. So, it basically simplifies it, it consolidates it. There was one in section A, there was some clarification on kind of the relationship that we were measuring. And just that's a, once again, cleanup on those items, not a real change in the character or the type of development that we want to propose. Okay, great, thank you. Does anyone else want to speak to the amendment? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Okay, last one. Okay, so this is for section 16-9, drive-through facilities and drive-up windows. And my motion will be to refer to General Government and Planning Committee on this one as well. My main rationale is that I, myself, spent significant time during the UGM ZOTA to address drive-throughs and drive-ups, and we just passed that in the fall. So, further restricting those right now doesn't really feel awesome to me, nor do I agree with some of the standards and even just like the organization of it. We've got a lot of feedback from the community. Bankers Association has chimed in. We've had, you know, retail associations have chimed in. There's just a lot of questions about this particular section. And because we have updated regs from the UGM, I felt comfortable letting that ride until we could address this. So, my motion will be to refer the entire section 16-9, drive-through facilities and drive-up windows to the General Government Planning Committee. So moved. Is there a second? Second. All right, Council Member Reynolds seconds. Any questions? Okay, we have Council Member Sheehan, Council Member Legree, and Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you. I do want to confirm what standards would be applied without this? Yeah. So, the work that went on with the UGM ZOTA was really focused on clarifying, from a zoning perspective, so the zones that these things are allowed in, whether it was accessory, conditional use, but that still left kind of that discretionary review under our current system with how each and every one of these were designed, what best practices fit, et cetera, within the Division of Traffic Engineering and the other respective divisions. Under the current books, as it stands, we have a stacking requirement, so a number of spaces that a drive-through has to provide to allow for traffic, and that standard is in place. But the other things that are in this text that speak to the location of where those facilities are, the pedestrian connections to that, it's also worth noting that the current ordinance does not make a determination on the amount of stacking relative to the use. The proposed language actually is more flexible in several instances than the current language for less intensive uses. Basically, in a way, before we had to treat everything, if you have a drive-through lane, that is, you had the point of order and then five spaces behind it, you had to show this provides some additional flexibility. So, it basically is trying to, once again, codify things that were coming up as a part of the review process that traffic engineering and our other divisions were doing. Those are not in the ordinance today, and so, moving forward, if they were not incorporated, it essentially would be stacking requirements and then the screening you have to do for any parking lot as far as landscaping and the like. Thank you for that. And I know that one of the concerns here in part of the discussion with the urban growth management ZOTA was around particularly neighborhood business zones where we were trying to restrict some of the drive-through use there because those are more pedestrian-heavy areas. So, I can be comfortable with this discussion. I'm interested to hear what my colleagues have to say, but because I know that we did work on this for the urban growth management ZOTA. But I do have a question about, particularly in the amended language for section 6-9 under A-7. It mentions an operational plan about, it has a site plan that includes the required stacking area, the drive-through width, and the pedestrian circulation. So, is that pedestrian piece something that comes up and is discussed in the technical review committee? Like, how do you get that information without this operational plan being required? Yeah, and just to specify, under the current proposal, what the operational plan does is it provides insight to the planning commission with a waiver. So, the section above where it talks about what is incorporated in an operational plan, that is talking about what the planning commission is supposed to consider when they ask for a waiver. Otherwise, it wouldn't be required. When we look at how this review would look at it, a technical review committee, absent these standards, they would check for anywhere in the ordinance where they say you have to have sidewalks provided, landscaping, screening, those sorts of considerations. What they wouldn't look at is the directive to say, locate your drive-through lanes to the rear of the structure or provide a designated pedestrian crossing that doesn't have to cross the drive-through lanes. Those are things that are not in our current ordinance but are part of that, once again, that review that our divisions were telling us, hey, this is what we need to preserve moving forward in order to codify under 443. Okay, and thank you. And just as a reminder, I'm gonna put my chair hat on for a second. General Government and Planning Committee, it will be six months at least before this is on our agenda to discuss. So, if you're interested in these items being moved forward quicker than that, then I think you should consider that as we are considering this motion. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member LaGre? Thank you, Mayor. I just have a couple of follow-up questions to what you've already shared. So, there does seem to be a bit of a narrative about this, what we have in front of us, this ZOTA making drive-throughs more restrictive. But it sounds like that's not what's happening. Unfortunately, I don't love that. So, does this ZOTA in front of us today actually further restrict drive-throughs beyond the urban growth management, or does it simply clarify the requirements so that people can come into compliance and know what standards they need to follow? Yeah, yeah. So, it is undeniably more text that is speaking to that particular subject. However, it's affording flexibility. So, just to read off some of the provisions. For banks and pharmacies, a minimum of three stacking spaces shall be provided for the first drive-through lane with no additional stacking spaces required for multiple lanes. Under our current requirements, you'd be showing five per lane. That is a reduction in the current review, current standards that these entities would have to go through. So, a lot of this is clarifying based on particular uses and their general level of traffic impact what is kind of most reasonable and appropriate. The rest of the options were things, once again, that would have been reviewed under the current UGM framework or the framework we have today. Where are you locating your drive-through facilities? Is that having an impact on adjoining residential use? Those sorts of considerations, along with sort of the pedestrian circulation as well. So, we think in general that this is not going to be prohibited for the operation of drive-throughs and that it gives flexibility in a way that our system right now is one size fits all, five stacking spaces per drive-through facility lane. And what would be the intention of putting it into committee? Can you clarify that to me again? Sure. Those individuals who are building drive-throughs currently requested it to go to committee. And I do have my own personal concerns, like I said before, just about organization, a bunch of things that I can still work on and bring amendments before we have second reading. But if the organizations who are constructing the drive-throughs are okay with being more restricted for the next however many months, then okay. I think that the vice mayor, are you going to ask your question that you've been asking about the loophole He's next to speak. Well, I'll just go ahead and ask it. So, if we do put this in committee, then none of this is in the text, right? But if we keep it in the text, then it continues, there's a waiver process, we could amend it, we can learn more about what it looks like in practice. But if we put it in committee, then what happens? They apply the section as it currently is stated, where there is a singular stacking requirement and no additional criteria that apply to drive-through facilities. I can tell you my plan. All right, council member. Do you want to share anything else? If it's okay, mayor, just my plan, if it goes to committee is to gather those individuals who had strong feelings about it and create a focus group to create a section that is amenable to everybody. Well, as many people as possible. Well, it sounds like there are various kind of routes to that outcome, potentially, whether it's in committee or not in committee. Ultimately, I'm not in favor of it going into committee. I'd like for us to move forward and have something codified to work with. But, and as a reminder, all of our existing drive-throughs still stand. There are many of them, but that's the end of my inquiry, my line of inquiry, so thank you. Okay, I'm going to call on Vice Mayor Wu, and I, unfortunately, have a 5.30 meeting, so he will take over the meeting after he's finished speaking. All right, thank you, mayor. Mr. Crum, to follow on, and council member Legree, you almost asked all of my questions, but you were getting there. If this gets shelved into committee, and we rely on the UGM ZOTA to kind of fill in for these objective standards, does that, by itself, put us into compliance to be able to kind of do this process in a ministerial way? Yes, so the current process, I mean, the current standard is ministerial. The stacking spaces, it's outlined. What we lose is, once again, the things that were the expectation for the review for drive-throughs in our communities for a number of years. Okay, and so the idea of putting this into this current process, into this current ZOTA, is to basically bring all of these objective standards in line with our city's stated goals and values in all of our various documents. So it sounds like, you know, this is a little bit different than the other amendment to put 16-6 into committee, because it sounded like that left kind of a gaping hole, whereas, in this case, we can still go into compliance, but it's not kind of what we're really looking for. Okay. All right, thank you for that. Any other comments or questions or discussion on this particular motion? Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I think, ultimately, we all want to pass legislation that is meaningful and that achieves our goals and objectives for the community, and I feel like we're just shy of that with the proposed language, and I would just feel more comfortable if we had some more time to dig into this and make sure that we were presenting our best to the community. So, yeah, thank you. Any other discussion on this motion? Let's go ahead and bring up electronic vote. All right. Is that everybody? We got a couple more. Two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Four, five, six. We're missing, oh, well, Council Member Beasley is not here. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Whoops, where'd it go? It's eight yeas, six nos, so that motion passes. That is all I have, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Council Member. Next up is Council Member Morton. Thank you. So, I have one amendment. I'll speak to it a little bit. So, currently, there is no notification in place related to proposed development plans that are within the existing zones. With HB443, we know that the process is streamlined, allowing for less time to get information related to upcoming developments. Before adopting 443, there was time to get information about development plans, whether it be from word to mouth, whether it be through government meetings, or whether it be the process. But once 443 is adopted, the only way our communities are going to be informed is essentially now through a sign, thanks to Council Member Brown, which I supported. But other than that, it'd just be through when dirt is moved or when trucks come and when they see trucks. So, with that being said, I am making the following amendment to ensure that neighborhoods and existing communities don't learn about development when the dirt is moved. All communities are curious and want to know what is occurring in their neighborhoods and the timeline for what the project may be. And I wholeheartedly believe that they have a right to know that. So, therefore, I make a motion to amend section 214C to include the following statement. And I'll read it. Well, I'll just read the statement at the end. The applicant shall provide mail notification of the development plan to all property owners within 200 foot radius of the subject property. Addresses shall be obtained using the current available data from the property valuation administrator. Such notice shall be given to no less than 10 calendar days prior to the technical review committee at which the request is to be considered. So moved. Second. Thank you. We have a motion and a second. Council Member Morton, do you have a copy of this that we can put up at all for the public? Yeah, I can. All right, so let's see. Discussion on this, Council Member Reynolds first. And Council Member Baxter. I have a question for Council Member Morton when he's ready. Council Member Morton, first I want to thank you for bringing this forward. I really appreciate your desire to notify neighborhoods and make sure people know what's happening. I have a question for, first of all, is it 200 feet or 250 feet? I might have stated 200 feet, but I meant 250 feet. But I will say I'm willing to move from that number. Okay, could I ask planning a few questions about this? Okay, so 250 feet. Do we know, first of all, this would be the developer, on the developer to do this, is that right? Yes, the way this is worded, the applicant would provide that mailing. Okay, and do we know about how many people that is? On average, I'm trying to picture 250 feet and who it would be. It certainly depends on the density of the neighborhood and the land uses, but for a zone change, the requirement is 500 feet notification. And we may have 150, up to 200 notifications there. So I would say anywhere from 80 to 125 would be captured in something like this. Okay, and do we know what is the cost of sending that many letters? Yeah, these are first class letters that are sent. So with postage, I believe, is approaching a dollar now. So probably at least a dollar of mailing per one. Okay, and then is the intent behind this just to notify people when a development plan is happening or when a waiver is happening? So this first motion, 214C, is regarding notification of the development plan. This is when there is existing, the zone is existing. So for instance, I'll use the example of St. Martin Village. We know that the request to put the mobile home between St. Martin Village. St. Martin Village is R1. So right now, technically, if a developer that owns that property wanted to come to St. Martin Village and put R1 houses on there, they could do it right now with the streamlined process, almost with no notification to the community. So it's just to provide the community and to provide transparency to the community on what's taking place and when it's coming. Okay, once again, I'm supportive of the intent. I just was curious, how much longer do you think this would add to the process? Well, Council Member, this would be the responsibility of the applicant. So they would need to have all of this prepared in time to file for the Technical Review Committee. So they would have to have that and bring that in, certify that they had complied with the ordinance in order to get this mailed out to serve sufficient notice before the Technical Review Committee. So on the front end? Yes. Okay, great. Thank you very much. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Director. Thank you, Council Member. Yeah, thank you. So before I continue, if my colleagues are okay with it, I obviously also have questions during this process. Instead of handing the chair back and forth to Council Member Brown, I plan to just speak after all of my colleagues have spoken on any particular amendment, if that works for you all. So next up is Council Member Baxter and then Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Morton, for bringing this forward. I think it's an important conversation that we're having. I know that the radius is a little different from what we typically notify. How did you land on that number? I know you said you were not married to the number, but. Yeah, so I'm not buried to the feet. I'm okay with the consensus with this group. How I got to it is I know that right now it states the two adjacent properties. And I went, well, excuse me. My bad, I'm thinking about the next one. Right now, it has nothing other than the signage. So, I mean, there's just no notification. So this just provides some notification. Yeah, and that's it. Okay, thanks. Provides a notification. And then the, how, is the Technical Review Committee once a month? I'm kind of building on Council Member Reynolds' question about the lenient process. Yes, it is. It's generally the last Wednesday of the month. The last Wednesday of the month. And the filing deadline is? In the beginning of the month. Monday of the month, okay. Yes. Is that the same timeframe that we give for zone changes? Is it 10 days, is that the same timeframe? For a zone change, the letter should be received 21 days prior to the hearing. Do you all foresee any issue with this? Like difficulty in complying? Do you see any reason not to move forward with this measure? Well, this would be a responsibility of the applicant. So verification would be a challenge. And they'd sign an affidavit, but we would be taking their word that they complied. So whether that would be effective, we don't know. So they essentially just have to sign a document saying we complied with this ordinance. Yes. And that's it, okay. All right, that's all my questions, I think. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Chair. One of my concerns is if we have public comment after it's certified, then the public's really not having public input. Now, with what we're doing in this situation, we would be giving them notice on the 250, which I think we might want to make 500 just because to keep it consistent with what we do with the other. But we can talk about that. But if they get the notice, then where can they go from that point going forward that they would be able to have comment before it's certified? Council Member, there still would not be an opportunity for them to address anyone. However, they could share their concerns with the staff. They would have information in advance, and they could share their concerns with the staff if they had any. They could also attend the Technical Review Committee, which is not a public hearing, but it is an open meeting. So they could attend and observe what was being said. And if they weren't able to attend, the Technical Review Committees will be televised so they can watch those as well. Okay, thank you. No problem. And I'll speak, just one sec. Like I said, I'm okay with that. Change the foot radius to whatever the consensus of the council is. I started off with 500, moved it down just so I thought it would be a little bit, could get a better consensus of the council. But I'm okay with moving it to 500. I'm okay with increasing it more than that, I would say. Council Member Brown, and then Council Member Gray, Lynch, Hale. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And thank you, Council Member Morton, for this amendment. My question is with who we're sending the notification to. Would it be, and because I'm thinking about the role that the staff has to play in verification, but then I'm also thinking about who actually gets notified. And I think Council Member Morton's intent is for the neighborhood to be aware of what's happening in their neighborhood. Would it be, I think it might be more, is it easier to confirm when it's just the radius of the residence that we send it to as opposed to property owners? Because a lot of time, the property owners may not reside at the residence or the address. Does that make sense? Does my question make sense? Yes, sir. The mailing, though, is easier to property owners because whether they live at that site or they live across the country, we have the verified PVA address of where to send to property owners, and we have their name. If we send to, otherwise, we're just sending it to the occupant. So, okay, so to do that, we would have to modify this to say the address as opposed to property owner? Because right here, I think in this version, it says property owner. We said if you want more than just the property owner, Council Member, yes, it would need to say occupants as well. So I wouldn't want both. I would just want to send it to the address, the physical address, because I think that serves the intent, and I could be wrong, but I think it would be more beneficial to the neighborhood to know what's going on with the folks in the community. So that's something that I'm interested in. Staff responsibilities in regards to the, it's just verify the addresses. So would we provide the list to the applicant to mail, or would they be responsible for receiving the list? We would, under this scenario, Council Member Brown, we would expect the applicant to obtain the list and to prepare the mailing and to do all of that on their own without staff being directly involved in the verification. Okay, okay. And then at the technical committee, so the application gets made, it starts the process, it gets a date set with the technical committee. Does the technical committee make the decision on whether or not it needs a variance or a waiver? Or is that already determined? Or that could be, I mean. You've got a couple of ways on that. Certainly the applicant may know as they're making their filing that they are seeking a waiver. So they would start that process at the beginning. But that they could also file not realizing that they haven't complied with all of the regulations. And so therefore, the technical review committee would identify a deficiency or a mismatch, point that out to the applicant, give them the opportunity to correct that. Or if they wanted to request a waiver, they could do that as well. Okay. All right, so, and I'll just kind of wrap up here. I'm in support of the 200 feet. 250. Well, I think he said 200 feet. I like 200 feet. The other thing is, I wonder if the date, I wonder if the 10 calendar days prior to the technical committee review if we need to do that. I just wonder if it'd be hard to comply with that timeframe in applications. I think that would all be on the applicant, but I think there may be a challenge. So I'm interested in hearing what other council members have to say, but I may, depending on comments, may change that property owners to adjacent addresses in that radius. Okay. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Gray. Did you want to respond to that, Council Member Moore? Yes, just quickly. Well, I agree with, I guess, two-pronged. The footage, like I said, that's up for conversation. Maybe more than 200, but regarding the change in, from property owner to occupant, I'm more than okay with that. Just speaking with staff, they felt that it would probably a little bit be better to verify if it was just property owner. So that's why I put that in there, but I'm okay with changing. Okay. Council Member Gray. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Hello there. I love your suit, Director Springy. So my question is, our city does have a texting alert system. We have that people can now get alerted about my bill, you know, construction blasting, for thunderstorms, what have you. Can't we put in our system a way for text notifications to residents if they would like to sign up about, like we could do like a neighborhood, their neighborhood say, oh, let's give one in my district, Eastland. The Eastland neighborhood, there's something coming up in the Eastland neighborhood, and everyone that signed up for text alerts for zone changes or any planning issues in Eastland, boom, they get a text. Or we have a website, which we do, that has a listing. Something like that. I know that you said that the developers are typically the ones who are granted with the duty to notify, correct? Under this scenario, yes. Okay. So that's just something, just an option. I believe in technology, our city has it, and I believe that we can use it in an inventive way. So just something to think about. That's all. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Lynch. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And thank you, Council Member Morton, for this proposed change. I'm in agreement with it. And my question is, did you give any thought to giving some specificity about what that notification should say? Because I worry that a development plan is filed, and the notification is mailed out, and it's a whole lot of legalese, or it's very general and doesn't provide any context. So when the neighbor gets it, they're like, what is this? What does this mean? So I would, I'm wondering, did you think about providing any specificity as far as what the notification would say? No, that is a great question. That's a great question. I didn't, yeah, I didn't add it to the amendment, but you are 100% correct. And I think, at the least, it should say, one, the current zone that it is, two, the proposed development that is being proposed, three, who's doing the development. And I think just my main intent is just to notify them. But I agree, I think it needs to be in language that they can understand and that is understandable. And I'll be willing to heed any amendments that emphasize it. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Hale. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And thank you, Council Member Morton, for this. And just to echo with Council Member Lynch, I'm in total agreement with this. I would say my only concern is the mail notification, how we going to confirm that developers complied with that. Not just saying anyone is untrustworthy, but I don't trust nobody but God. I'll just say that. So they could just sign and say, yeah, we've done it. So with that, I just think that we probably need to find a way that we can confirm that they actually complied with this. And so I'm in agreement with it, but I just think we have to probably look at some ways. How can we confirm that they actually complied with this? Because I want to make sure that they actually. No, I 100% share your concerns with that. I don't trust a lot of people either. But I think we do need to take steps to have this language put in, and we just have to look down the line and see if something. One, with our verification process within staff, but then two, look down the line and see if it's actually working the next time these conversations come up. But I would not want to not include it due to that reason, I would say. Any other council members have comment at this time? I have one question for either Director Duncan or Mr. Crum. This requirement, would this be considered one of the objective standards that the applicant has to basically bring and be able to check off to say this is one of the things I did in order to be part of this ministerial approval process? Yes, if this goes in the ordinance as written, we would expect that to be something that the applicant said that they completed, just like posting the sign. Okay. Colleagues, this is something philosophically that I agree with, but I do feel like there have been a good number of questions raised about enforcement, distance, who the notice goes to, the 10 calendar days. So if there's no more discussion, I will entertain any potential amendments to this amendment before we take a vote on it. Council Member Curtis. Yes, so I want to make sure, get my mic on, thank you, Vice Mayor. I want to make sure I get the process right. Do I need to read the entire text with changes? Or can I just amend us? Yeah, I would move to amend it to say the applicant shall provide mail notification of the development plan to all property owners and occupants within a 250 foot radius of the subject property, so moved. Second. All right, we have a motion and a second. Discussion on this current motion, Council Member Baxter, then Council Member Brown. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Curtis, I understand the intent of that, of your amendment. I have concern that we are, that some properties would be receiving dual notices, which then, there's a cost that is incurred at that point. I would say on average, a notice costs about $1 per. So I just want to make sure that we're not adding more cost to a developer, especially if there was a zone change before the development plan. They would have to go through this process twice. So I just want to be cognizant that we're not sending double mail. That's it, thank you. Thank you, Council Member Brown. Thank you, Vice Mayor, and I'm going to support the motion as presented. I think there might be opportunity to have some conversations and maybe make some changes, but I think right now, I'm just going to support it as is. And I'm not going to support the amendment just because I think it's either or, but as opposed to both, so thank you. Any other colleagues? Council Member Morton. I agree with both Council Member Baxter and Council Member Morton, but I am going to support it because I believe in communication to communities, so why not? Oh, excuse me. Do you agree with yourself? I definitely agree with myself. Council Member Brown and Council Member Baxter. So I definitely understand the sentiments, but I plan to support because I also agree with notifying community as much as possible. So a point of clarity maybe from Director, if this amendment from Council Member Curtis would mean that a particular property, if a renter is in there, they would get a notice, and then the property owner, wherever they lived, would also get a notice. Is that your intent, Council Member Curtis? Yes. Any other discussion on Council Member Curtis's motion? All right, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any, oh, my apologies. Just, I appreciate the comments and concerns from my colleagues, but speaking as somebody who is a renter in a complex where I have literally hundreds of neighbors, if one notice goes out to the property owner, that's not going to reach any of the people who actually live in that area. And so I do believe that it is important that we create policy that takes into account those people because we do make up a significant portion of our population. Thank you. Thank you. Any other discussion? Council Member Brown. Thank you, Vice Mayor, and I appreciate your comments, Council Member Curtis. I'm just going to say that we ran a pilot a few years ago where we tried that, and I think we had minimum success. I think some of it's on us as Council Members to try to get this information out, and I think some notice as opposed to no notice is going to be beneficial. My concern is that all this is new, and the intent of the law that we're trying to adhere to is to streamline the process. And I'm just concerned that if we do something to slow down the process, we don't know what the state may do next that may make up for it. So I think some of this, no matter what moves forward, we can still look at it and make improvements, but I think we just got to be cautious about how we move forward because all of this and a lot of this is new, new territory, new waters. So thank you. All right, any other discussion on Council Member Curtis's motion? All right. Now, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right, let's bring up... All right, looks like the yeas have it. That motion passes. Thank you. We go back to Council Member Morton's amendment as amended discussion here. Council Member Lynch. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I have an amendment to the amendment. And it's basically just adding, and I'll say what it is before I make the motion, that the mail notification should state, and this will go after the sentence, the applicant shall provide mail notification of the development plan to all property owners within a 250-foot radius of all subject property. So next, it will say the mail notification should state the developing plan has been filed, one, two, address of the property to be developed, three, a graphic of the plat that's going to be developed, and four, contact information for the division of planning should neighbors have questions. So that is what I want to add. So I move to make this amendment to the amended ordinance to add in everything that I just stipulated. Okay, do we have a second? Seconded by Council Member Gray. Yes, I can repeat. Yes, please. Number one, the development plan has been filed. Two, the address of property to be developed. Three, a graphic of the plat that's going to be proposed to be developed, and then four, contact information for the division of planning should the neighbor have any questions. So four items in that description. Thank you. So we have a... I think you said that it should occur. Shall. I said should. You say shall. Shall? Okay, I think you shall. I meant to say shall. All right, everybody good with that friendly adjustment to Council Member Lynch's? Yes, Council Member Reynolds. Can, I don't know, maybe Director Duncan. Director Duncan. It's okay. Are we able to send out a plat? Is that something that's allowed, that we can do early on? Well, what we would, I was missing everything that was stated in there, but what we would do is information on how to find that, what was filed on Acela. So that's what we would direct people to, then to find, to read the plan or whatever information was filed in the Acela program. Not actually send out the plat. Because I don't have an issue with anything that Council Member Lynch said, except I was a little concerned about that aspect. And let's make it clear, most of what we're going to see are plans, not plats. So development plans. So Council Member, that may have been what you intended, but yes, the letter would reference a way for constituents to find that on their own, and then call us if they had any questions about that. Council Member, are you okay doing a friendly amendment to change that wording? Yeah, that's fine with me. Okay, thank you. Will you clarify that? So instead of plat, it would include information on how to find the file development plan. Yes, yes. Okay, thank you. Okay, everybody good with that? Okay. Discussion, Council Member Savigny. Thank you, Vice Mayor. So my question really, once again, is going to be to staff, because I'm getting concerned that we're kind of drafting something kind of on the fly here, but what Council Member Baxter said is the thing that's kind of concerning me, that if I've went for a zone change, I had to do these notifications anyway, okay? So those notifications were done, and now I've got my zone change, or I didn't. So let's assume I got it. Now I'm going to do it, my final development plan, and I'm going to have to send out another notice on my final, yes, yes. That is what you are approving here. So that is what I do not agree with, okay? So let's be clear, you are making a developer send out a notice twice during a zone change, and that I don't think is what you intend. And so when we're drafting things on the fly, that's what happens, okay? So I'd be okay if you wanted to add and amend language to this thing that basically says, unless you've already done it for a preliminary plan, then this is waived. But right now, I would never approve someone having to do this twice, okay? It's just not worth it. And I think the fact that if we have approved that that land is zoned R1, then by God, they should be able to put in a development plan for R1, and if it meets the requirements and all the boxes are checked, it doesn't, like, that is going to be developed into an R1 lot, whether it's ugly houses, pretty houses, you know, whatever it happens to be, that's what it's going to be. So I don't necessarily have a question, but I just wanted to make sure that they were going to have to do it twice, okay? And then if they're going to have to do it twice, it should be the same exact, should be the same exact wording as the original, and it should be waived if they've already done one. Council Member Gray. Thank you, Vice Mayor, and thank you, Council Member Sviggumy. That is not the intent. So, Director, in the pink suit, and the tie. So, restate what you just said. So, as of with this vote, was, I guess, the original vote that we've already voted and passed, right? Or is it this? We currently are talking about Council Member Lynch's amendment that is adding specific language to what the notice is. That's the discussion right now. And so what Council Member Sviggumy was mentioning is the effect of the first, what we've already passed. Is that correct? Or we, not passed, but we've already voted on. I don't want to speak for Council Member Savigny, but it felt like what you were talking about was the fact that a developer, if they've already gone through a zone change process having to give notice to the neighbors and now they're in the development plan stage that this would require them to give a second round of notice essentially to the same neighbors. Is that weird? And that's what they, I believe I got confirmation from them that that is the case. Yes, but it could also be dozens of times also. Development plans get amended many times, so yes, there could be many notices. I do really think that zone change process is, like, it's really not affected by this House Bill 443 because all the standard stuff happens, all the input from the neighborhoods happen, everything happens with the zone change. I think you're specifically trying to deal with when it's zoned properly and someone wants to develop the land, you want some sort of notification to go out so that people can give input. That's why I'm still going. And point of order, Council Member Savigny, I want to redirect us back to Council Member Lynch's amendment about the specific language before we talk about the overriding amendment. Council Member Morton. Okay. So my time is still going. I'm sorry. Go ahead. Yes. I reclaim my time right now. So, in accordance, okay, so I understand what Council Member Savigny is speaking about now. And that, I know this is not pertaining to Council Member Lynch, that is not, we do not want to put an unfair hardship on developers. That right there is extremely concerning, but I do approve of the language. But I just, I feel that I want Lexington to be a home for development where we also include the residents in the process. We have to figure it out. And I don't know about this, developers having to send out multiple postcards or notifications. Again, Council Member, I'm going to advise you to kind of redirect back to Council Member Lynch's current motion on the floor, which is specific to the language. As I stated, Vice Mayor, I agree with it. But back to what I was saying. We don't want to put an unfair hardship on our developers. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Morton. I indeed agree with Council Member Lynch's amendments as well. But I'd be remiss if I just didn't tag in real quick. So I think my intent is, and I guess the question would be, I'll just keep using St. Martin Village. When was St. Martin Village zoned? That could have been in that area, 19 whatever, right? So that same person, you know, may be having to send a development plan or send out a mail piece upwards of what, 30, 40, 50 years later. So I don't think, I think that argument is kind of conflated. I could agree if it's in the sense of if they have to file for a zone change to keep going. But more so, we're talking about existing zones where it's already existing and notifying the community that something is coming. I mean, I think it's quite that simple. We're talking about saving dollars. I agree in saving dollars. But I think the burden should be on the developers and not the community. And that's just where I land on it. All right. Council Members, again, I'm going to advise you all to redirect towards Council Member Lynch's specific amendment at this time. We can always come back to the larger amendment. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Director, is there an approved letter or a format that is already in place for developers to utilize, like a template that currently exists for notification? We have the template for the zone change letter that they use and for the Board of Adjustment, yes. And they're very similar? They're complete, I'll say that. They provide all the information that we're trying to inform and how the recipient can get more information if they would like it. And is it more in-depth than what Council Member Lynch has proposed or similar information? Could we reuse what we already have? Well, right. Of course, each letter has to be somewhat customized. And so this would be simply announcing a development plan, not a zoning application. And we would need to make clear in this letter, as opposed to the other letters that we send, that there is no opportunity for public comment. This is just for information only. Whereas in the other letters, we are inviting people to come and express their concerns to the Planning Commission or the Board of Adjustment. Okay. I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Sheehan. I'm not sure when the best place to say this is, so I'm just going to say it and apply it to all the amendments that we're talking about right now. I appreciate this discussion, and I think particularly around changing the language around property owners versus occupants. I do worry that some of this is getting out of compliance, or not compliance, but out of, we're becoming inconsistent in who is going to get notified about what. So I'm wondering if for this particular discussion, if this would be a place to put something into committee so we can review it and look at all of the notification processes instead of just this piece, and have that discussion there. Because I do think we've already made some amendments to the notification with Council Member Brown's earlier amendments. And I want us to have this discussion further and look at this, but I'm not sure that in this moment that we're ready to do that. So that's it. Thank you. Any other discussion on Council Member Lynch's motion? Council Member Gordon. Oh, my bad. My apologies. Oh, okay. Council Member Brown. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I appreciate Council Member Lynch's motion and do understand the intent and am supportive of most of it, but I wonder if Council Member Sheehan is right. Maybe there's an opportunity to have a further discussion about it, but not necessarily to Council Member Lynch's motion, but to Council Member Morton's original motion, if he's interested in having that conversation in committee before we finalize. Correct. You know, well, I would just, two things. One, I would go back to the argument that if it's put in committee, we'll have to wait so long. If it takes that much time that the community is not informed, July 1, this starts adopted July 1 until it's presented to committee, that means no notification to the public. That would be my concern with that. Two, I am okay with what Council Member Brown said. I'm okay with adopting the first, the motion that I put forward and then place it in committee and to talk about further discussion of how to make it better or how to address it, but I think sticking this in committee and not doing something with it right now is going to leave the community in limbo. So I would not support putting that in committee, and I would believe the community wouldn't want that either. Go ahead. Would it be appropriate, I mean, and nobody has to, but I wonder if it would be appropriate for both of the amendments to be rescinded, well I guess we already approved one of them, but maybe put the original motion in place and look at all the other aspects, because I think there's other things to talk about. Are you asking if we can put Council Member Lynch's amendment aside or resolve it in some other way, is that what you're asking? Yeah, I don't know, I'm looking at law now, I don't know what the proper way is to maybe pull some of this back, but I think folks would have to be, I think folks would have to be receptive of it, pulling some of these amendments back to put the original intent forward and then maybe looking at some of these other amendments and the real impact of it. The mover can always rescind it if they wanted to, but it's a question of what other paths are there. At this point, the way the conversation is going, you'd really have to have the person that made the motion, you know, rescind it, or make a motion to change it at this point. Yeah, so currently we are still on the conversation of Council Member Lynch's motion, so that needs to be resolved before we move on to the underlying motion. Any other discussion on Council Member Lynch's motion to, that's specific to language on the notice? Council Member LaGrie. I'm really appreciative that you're working to add in these details on the spot. I know we just talked about some items that actually were more detailed and in our legislation that we still felt, the majority of us, still felt needed more work, so I appreciate what you're trying to accomplish, Council Member Morton and Council Member Lynch, with your amendment. I do think that if we're going to do this, we want to do it right, we want to make sure people have clear information, we know when we're sending it, we know what that process looks like, we can provide clear guidance to developers, we want them to be able to check that box, you know, and know that they're complying and understanding what we're asking, so my inclination would be to suss it out in committee. I think it's really important work informing people about what's going on in their neighborhoods, doing that in a consistent and clear way, and using language, as you said, that makes everything as legible as possible, so that people know how to engage, when to engage, what's happening, etc. So I say my thoughts about putting it in committee because that's the outcome that I would want. And I don't know where that, I know law just explained to us that we would have to rescind and then rescind again, or else the motion would have to fail and then we'd have to put it in committee. So I guess my inclination is to work it out in committee because it would be helpful for us to be really, really clear on this. So what you all need to do is dispose of these amendments. If you get back to the underlying motion, you all can make a motion on that to do something else. But because you're in the process of making amendments to change it, you really need to decide what to do with those amendments at this point. Yeah. So again, we're, Council Member Martin. I would still emphasize my concerns, the concerns that knowing that it will be longer to discuss in committee, the same concerns, the same argument that's been put forth for the other committee assignments. But then also, knowing that we have already discussed that we're going to come back and look at this in about a year, or whenever that is. So I think that would be a great time to come back and look at it. So I would still not want to put that in committee. Any other discussion on Council Member Lynch's motion, which is currently on the floor? Could you have it restated, please? Council Member Lynch, will you restate your motion, please? Sure. I think there were a couple of friendly tweaks to it earlier, so. That the mail, starting after the first underlying sentence, so the applicant shall provide mail notification of the development plan to all property owners and occupants within a 250 foot radius of the subject property. Then the mail notification shall state when the development plan has been filed, address of the property to be developed. And I said I mentioned a graphic or a way to access that graphic, information to access that information via our city's website or CELA. And then for contact information for the division of planning for questions. All right, thank you. So that is the motion on the floor right now. Is there any more discussion on this motion? All right, let's go ahead and bring up Granicus for a vote. All right, that motion passes. We are back to Council Member Morton's original motion as amended twice. Discussion, Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I think that we all can agree, and we've said it a few times tonight, that we all value public engagement and want to make sure that our neighbors are informed, but I also want to remind everybody that at the beginning, if you remember back several hours, at the beginning of this meeting, we did go ahead and add a layer of notification with the signage on the property itself. And then if any waivers are requested, there's a notification process for that as well. So I do think that we will have a little bit more than what we currently have if we move forward and consider further notification at a later date and give us time to kind of put something together that is a package deal. So we are better than where we started at the beginning of the day. I feel good about that. I just, at this point, I don't know that I am comfortable supporting the motion just because there's a lot to work out. Thank you. That is fair. I would say that, like I said, July 1, that's when this starts. That means that burden falls on us as a council member to communicate to our neighborhoods. And then when that doesn't take place, who's the burden on? The burden turns to the council. When this amendment can put in place, at the least the first amendment that I put forward, this first notification piece at July 1, and then we can further have conversations about what that looks like as we work through this process. So I would say that still puts the community in limbo when it comes to notification. And while there's a sign on the property, I'd be remiss if I didn't say that just because the sign on the property does not mean that folks are actually notified. Sometimes direct notification is a decent next step to help get people engaged. So I definitely agree that the sign is a great first step, but I believe that this kind of molds that together and makes it that we have that notification place in peace. Thank you. Council Member Gray, any other discussion? I have a question that kind of jumped out at me. I think it was during Council Member Savigny's conversation about notice as it relates to zone changes and that sort of double noticing. And I think Director Duncan, you said something to the effect that it could be a dozen notifications. Can you kind of elaborate on that notification process as it relates to development plans and how development plans change and morph over time? Certainly, so for a green field development, a new shopping center in particular, or a mixed use development that needs a zone change, then that's the beginning of that process. A notice is sent to property owners within 500 feet. And then that alerts them that there is a zone change. And then, of course, our process has a preliminary development plan that accompanies the zone change. So citizens and anyone following the process, particularly at the planning commission, can know not only what the zoning request is, but also what the development plan is proposed to look like. And then once the zone change is finished through the council, whether at first and second reading or a second hearing, then they proceed to finalize their development plan and then build off of that. And that development plan, very likely, particularly with brand new development, gets amended multiple times in the first few years as they're organizing the tenants that will be coming in and perhaps changing the layout of the roads and that sort of thing. That process goes through the planning commission only, and there is no notification for that. So all of the development plans that subsequently follow the zone change do not get any additional notification. But there's no limits to how many there can be over the years. Okay, so if I'm an applicant and I have to go through a zone change, so I've notified the neighbors once, right, because of the zone change process. From there, currently as it stands right now, is there any other notification that I'm required to give once I get my zone change? No sir, there's no sign posted, there's no letter sent. There is still a legal ad, and then it's posted in the cellar for those who are following that. But as far as individual notice, no. Okay, and I want to note one of the differences too between notice that we're talking about here and notice to a zone change, as you clearly stated, when we notice neighbors for a zone change. We are inviting them to come and give their input. So I want to make sure that we are not conflating public notice with public input. Those are two separate things. Sometimes they're linked, but they're two separate things. So under this amendment, as it's written and amended, and as you understand it, would it mean if I were an applicant coming in with a development plan that did not require a zone change, that I would have to give notice? And then if I change my plans and come before planning commission or the technical review committee again, would I have to give notice every single time that I apply with a changed version of the plan? Yes. And I don't know that you would necessarily know this number off the top of your head. How many times, on average, do you think a developer comes to planning commission or the committee with an amended or a changed plan? How many goes do people? Particularly a contemporary commercial development, mixed use development, especially in the first seven to ten years, may have six or seven amendments. Yeah, so I want to kind of be aware. I think we have conflicting, not even conflicting priorities. I think we share a lot of the same priorities that we want to make sure that the neighbors do get notice and are understanding this is happening. The public input that we get often in this room is folks talking about things happening around them and nobody's telling us and nobody knows and there's no way for us to know. So philosophically, I like the idea of notification. Going back to what this whole thing is about in terms of complying with HB 443, it's to streamline our development and approval processes. And so I would be very cautious about adding things in that could be potentially adding a lot more time and expense to these developments. Especially if we're talking about potentially two, three, four, six times noticing every time these development plans change, and they do change. So just something to think about. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I wanted to offer something. So I said earlier that we are better than we started with the signage, which is great. I currently do have, how do I have it worded? I have in committee currently a review of the zone change public engagement process. I'd be willing to incorporate the entire development process in that. And when I put it in, in my mind, it was notification processes and everything. So, I mean, if you're willing to, I know you had said that you wanted to work with me on that anyway. If that's something that you would be interested in, I could just transfer or edit my referral to committee to include notification and include development plan process, if you want, just an option. Well, I definitely, I appreciate the intent, and I understand the intent. I just think it's just two separate matters. Well, I know it's two separate matters. HB 443, like I said, we're going into July, July 1, it's going to take effect. And I think it's about, one main thing, it's about transparency to the public, keeping the public in the loop and informed for this amendment. That's it, that's all. Now, the conversation's changed when we start talking about cost for the developers, let's be frank. That's where we are now. So, I'm going to stick with my stance on this. I think that we need to inform and be transparent to our community when development is coming forward in existing zones where we know that there is not going to be that same long withstanding process. Three to four weeks, they see dirt move, we will be getting calls at this council office. What is taking place? What's going on? Why didn't you let me know? All these different things when, at the least, we can pull back and say, hey, we have a notification in place. Maybe it doesn't reach as far as we want it to, maybe it's a little bit less. But the burden is not on us as council members, it's on the developer and also within the standards to say that the developer did communicate, and that's just where I am. Any further discussion on the underlying motion from Council Member Morton? All right, let's do a vote, let's bring up Granicus. We're voting on Council Member Morton's original motion as amended by Council Member Curtis and Council Member Lynch with the new language in there. Whitney, are you in there? All right, the yeas have it, that motion passes. Council Member Morton, did you have more amendments? I have one more. One more, all right, here we go. Okay, currently we have notification to adjacent properties when developers are looking to seek waivers. As highlighted by staff, these waivers could possibly be more impactful rather than just to those adjacent properties. It could impact the community and the community as a whole, possibly. So depending on, excuse me, it can impact the community. So depending on which one can technically affect, like I said, and impact almost the entire community and communities adjacent. So with that being said, I am introducing a motion almost in the same light to amend 21-4C to include the following statement. My apologies, I'm all turned around, excuse me. To, along the same thoughts, I move to increase the notice requirement of waivers from adjacent property owners to radius of 250. Aiming to expand notification when waivers are requested. And let me, I want to go back, because I want everybody to be clear on what I'm doing. So, currently we have no notification to adjacent properties when developers are looking to seek waivers, as highlighted by staff. The requested waiver, depending on which one, can technically affect and impact the surrounding community more than just the two adjacent properties. Along that same thought, I move to increase the notice requirements of waivers from adjacent property owners to a radius of 250 feet. Aiming to expand notification when waivers are requested. So that should just read 21-9B, which is related to just when a waiver, when the developer is seeking a waiver. Notice requirement following receipt of completed application. Staff of the commission shall provide notice of the request of modification to property owners within a 200 foot radius of the proposed now under construction, excuse me, under consideration for a waiver. Address shall be obtained using current available data from the property evaluation administrator. Such notice shall be given no less than ten calendar days prior to the meeting at which the request is considered. So moved. Second. All right, we have a motion and a second. Discussion on the motion, Council Member Brown. Council Member Morton, I appreciate this amendment. I wonder if you would entertain putting this item in committee because the previous action that we approved put a notification in place that wasn't there before. So I wonder if it's a way to continue this conversation, to flush this out as opposed to putting more undue burden on everybody involved with the development process. So then I'll, let me, so staff, staff. What is it now? So, so, so what's proposed in the, so what's, so can you, can you propose what, can you remind us what's proposed in the ZOTA now as far as waiver notification? Yes, Council Member, the, I'm sorry, were you speaking to me? Yes, sir. Okay. The, the currently 219B reads, instead of the property owners within 250 feet, it says adjacent property owners or something to that effect. The property owners that are adjacent to the parcel that is seeking a waiver would receive written notice. And, and my thinking was, is, you know, what we just did created, it should bring and create awareness, so this may not be necessary with the waiver process, but. I'm conflicted. I, director, in, in, in 219B, we, we have language talking about neighborhood associations, correct? And what, what, what other, what other folks are we communicating with in 291B? What, 219B was, was just simply associated with the waiver. It was the first introduction of a notification requirement for a development plan. As, as the council member said earlier, there isn't any right now. So when staff was looking at this and, and realizing that, that there would not be a public meeting where people could come and address. We felt that it was important to at least serve notice when a waiver was being requested from the objective standards. So that was the, the reason that staff recommended this to begin with. Okay. So I, you know, I'm okay with putting this in committee. All right. Council member, are you- Council member Brown, if you still have the floor, I would like to say, however, this is, this is part of the trouble when the director volunteers to take over writing text. I have not gotten it quite right. It should say, it should mirror the same requirement as the previous one. Rather than staff of the commission shall provide notice. If we're increasing the notice, it should also say the applicant shall provide mail notification. And that is entirely my fault. I let this come out without, without catching that. But that would be, that would not be the intent of staff to be able to check for 250 foot notice for the 10 or so waivers that we're going to get each month. Council member, is that, is that your intent for the motion? Is for the burden to be on the developer and not our staff? Council member Morton, are, are you withdrawing this motion? I want to be clear. I don't want to withdraw, but I will heed someone putting a committee. Okay. I was just getting clarification. Council member Savigny. Thank you, vice mayor. I actually agree with council member Brown on this one. And not that it's unusual, but I do, but I do think council member Morton, since the council just passed the one above it, any time a development plan is done, the neighbors get notification. So that's what you changed in number one. So if someone is requesting a modification on something, it's kind of a plan and they already have been noticed. So you're going to do a notice on another notice. So you're just, the first one covers every single thing I think that could happen. Isn't that right? And now I'm looking for your opinion. Yes. Well, yes. Council member, the difference is when you're notifying for the waiver, you are actually inviting people to come and participate in the meeting, because that will be a public meeting where public comment may be taken. Okay. All right. Then I retract that. I think that it's two different things. Okay. It's okay. I'm learning as I go, just like we are on this text. 100%. So question for Director Duncan then. Council member Morton's amendment isn't creating a notice for the waiver. That's in our current ZOTA as proposed by planning. What council member Morton is proposing is to increase the radius basically to it and specifically put in the words property owners. Is that your understanding? I don't have the stricken red line language. Yes, that's the text that we provided to council member Morton. In the earlier one, he added the word occupants as well. But this only says property owners. Can you tell me again what was stricken from the amendment? Yes. Instead of property owners within 250 feet, it said adjacent property owners. Okay. So the property owner isn't even a change. It's really just the distance. Right. It's just a change in the amendment. Yes. Okay. Thank you for that. Council member Baxter. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Is there a potential for a developer to have to give multiple notices within like the same 30 days? They file at the beginning of the month. They have to issue a notice saying we're filing a development plan and then they file for a waiver after that and then now we would be asking them to notice again within that same time frame, correct? Yes, because that waiver letter would be different than the other letter because we'd actually be alerting them that they can participate in the process if they want to. Okay. I actually probably would have preferred this notice than the other one. At this point, I feel like the wording as it is is sufficient because I'm not going to ask the development community who has been solely impacted by House Bill 443 to then have to send multiple notifications within a short amount of time. I'm not doing it. Thank you. And I'll piggyback on that, Director. So for every single waiver that the applicant files, they would have to file a notice no matter what the timing was. If I filed a waiver today and filed a waiver three days from now, that's two separate notices in a row? Vice Mayor, we haven't worked out the details. I would say that if an applicant was filing multiple waivers on the same plan, that would all be in one notice. However, if they sent out the waiver notice and then later discovered that there was another one, they would need to notice that one as well, yes. Okay. My explanation is, the way you see kind of how this process would go, if I'm an applicant, I'm trying to check all the boxes and I see two or three things, or let's say two things that I want to file waivers on, I would hopefully be sensible enough to file them together, right? But there's also a chance that, I'm trying to game this out, thinking about what scenario would I, as an applicant, file two or more waivers consecutively and not together? Can you see a scenario where that makes sense? Well, certainly, if an applicant overlooked something in the regulations that was then identified at the Technical Review Committee and they wanted to proceed on that schedule, then they would have to go ahead and immediately notice that waiver as well. Okay. Okay. Any other discussion on this motion? Alright, let's bring up… Just to sum it up. I mean, so I guess I'll speak towards my intent. I think Director Duncan has highlighted it directly, exactly. It's just to change, it's literally just changing from adjacent properties to a broader notification range. But like I said, I'm more than willing to discuss this at a committee if that's the consensus of the council. I guess just for clarification, because I said that I didn't want to withdraw the motion, but is that the practical way to do it, to put it in committee, or could it… For this one, you can withdraw the motion, I believe. I'll speak for the commissioner. You can just withdraw this one and then basically make a motion to put it in committee. That way, you've disposed of the motion on the floor, and then… Or you could just move and do a friendly amendment to the motion on the floor to place it in committee. Either works. Council Member Adams. I will make a motion in the spirit of, I think, the desire of my colleagues, even though I understand the intent and agree with it, to place this item in general gov and planning committee. Second. All right. We have a motion and a second. Is there… Discussion is allowed on this sort of motion, to place it in committee? Is that correct? Okay. Discussion on this motion? All right. Council Member Moore. Yeah. So I thank you, Council Member Reynolds, for doing that, and thank the council for heeding this motion. I guess, you know, I look forward to working on that. But also, I would like Lexington to know that each of you are able to get notice of all developments and building plans directly to your email by going to agency counter. A lot of folks don't know about that, and I think that's something we should be emphasizing. Agency counter, where you can just put in some information, and they will… You put in the zip code, a lot of other information, and it will tell you when development is coming. This is a great resource that anyone can utilize to be more aware and informed about the development that is happening in your area. So again, I encourage you to locate the resource agency counter for more information and development in your neighborhood, and I look forward to trying to get this through at a committee. Thank you. Director Duncan or Mr. Crum, I am sorry to my colleagues for belaboring this. Thought popped into my head. The two amendments that Council Member Morton has brought seem like they have the same intent of sort of making sure we notify people within a certain area. I find that they are categorically different in that the first amendment is basically notifying what an applicant is doing without any expectation or invitation to input from the public. The second one, because the waiver process goes through the planning commission for a hearing, which includes the invitation for input, and so I'm a little leery about the idea now of putting that off, because what happens on January 1st when an applicant comes, they want to file a waiver. Now folks aren't getting noticed and aren't getting the opportunity to be invited to speak. I guess my question would be then, without this in place, if we put this and took it off the ZOTA, what happens then in a waiver process before the planning commission? I want to make sure everybody is on the same page about what I think you all have done or are trying to do. So this is going to revert back to the language that planning had suggested before the amendment. So I think there will be some notification, it's just not going to be the level of notification that Council Member Morton was trying to get to. Okay. Thank you for that clarification. I'm going to walk back my comments there. So what we're taking off the table as it were and putting in committee is the idea of expanding the notice distance and we're not touching the original motion, which still has the requirement for the waiver to invite people for input before planning commission. So I panicked a little bit, am I correct here? Okay. Everybody, we're on the same page, so apologies for panicking slightly. Okay. So we have a motion on the floor to put this item into committee. Is there any more discussion on this item? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion passes. Council Member Curtis, you're still on the list. So thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you, colleagues, for your patience. I know this is not the most fun way for any of us to spend our evenings. I'm going to keep my line of questioning brief, so I have a couple questions for the law departments. I don't know if, David Barbary, would you be willing to come up and answer a couple of A, B, C questions to round us out? I just want to bring us back full circle before we wrap up here with an understanding of why we are putting ourselves through this exercise in self-torture. So these are some basic questions, and I think can mostly be answered with a yes or no, but please feel free to elaborate if you would like to. So number one, when Kentucky's General Assembly passes a law which impacts the city of Lexington, are we required to follow it? It really depends on how it's written. In the case that you're talking about, the answer is we're going to have to comply with this law or we're going to be violating it. Cool. So number two, when our law department here at LFUCG interprets a law passed by the General Assembly, what has more bearing, the text of the law itself or an op-ed written by the author of the bill? Well, typically, I would explain it like this. We believe the law is unambiguous the way it's written, and you normally don't get into what the intent of the law was unless you get into an ambiguity argument, in which case you really can't tell based on how the text was written what was meant. So you're not going to get into that intent angle, I believe, the way the law is currently written. Okay. So you would say that House Bill 443 is written in an unambiguous manner? Yeah, that's correct. All right. Following that, does House Bill 443 allow for the Planning Commission to take public input into consideration, or would that by definition be a violation of the requirement that we administer these processes that are in question today in a way that is both, quote, objective and, quote, ministerial? I think the issue is that they can't meaningfully consider it. I think you could arguably set a process up where there is some public input given to them, but what they can do with that becomes the issue. The way the law is written, they really don't have discretion to change those criteria that we come up with. So that's what the struggle has been, meaningful public input. Right. So again, for clarity, we could allow public input, but that could not be taken fully into meaningful consideration. I think you would get into a situation where people would become increasingly frustrated by the fact that they participate, but nothing they say is taken into consideration when the decision is made. And one final question for you. Does the Lexington-Fayette-Urban County Council have the ability to override a law passed by the Kentucky General Assembly? Well, I'm not going to tell you all what—I mean, you're so—whatever law you all adopt is going to have—in order not to be unlawful at some point, at least you might go through a judicial process before this is determined—is going to have to be consistent with the state law. So you're not going to be able to adopt something locally that's inconsistent with the state law that was adopted. All right. Thank you very much. I appreciate that clarification. I did have some questions for Representative George Brown, who was here earlier. He arrived about 36 minutes late and missed his opportunity to give public input and left about an hour and 20 minutes ago. So I think it's just important to remember that the authors of these bills are not lawyers. They are not otherwise qualified to provide legal advice or counsel to LFUCG, and I don't think it is appropriate for this body to disregard the text of state law and the advice and interpretation of our legal counsel, all because some state representatives didn't understand the impact of a bad bill that they worked to pass. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Baxter has a motion. Yes, sir. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I move to place on the May 29, 2025 docket ZOTA 25-00001 as amended. So moved. Second. Motion and a second. Discussion on the motion. Council Member Ellinger. Yeah, I still wasn't quite finished. I had one question that when we start talking about, I know, I know, the health, safety and public welfare concerns, could you explain who is or is it just the planning staff that can make that or can other people make that issue? Yes. Yes. Just to, once again, reorient everybody to the process, a plan gets filed meeting whatever requirements that we set as far as notice going through that process. Staff then begins our technical review of that process, so approximately three weeks. During that time, staff is available to be reached for any kind of public comment, but ultimately the identifying the health, safety, welfare concerns is the job of the technical staff that would then forward it on to the planning commission to have their subjective review of that item. That's what I thought. But that's the only way. Is that by how you all defined it or would that be with what House Bill 443 has said? So the House Bill 443 sets out the criteria for when, so you follow, it dictates first the objective standards, the ministerial process, and then it kicks in and describes the process in which you can exercise discretion, in which case here our interpretation is where the planning commission can consider it at their public hearings. And so it would not rise to their review unless that was raised. So it would be the technical staff's level. So the public couldn't bring that up as an issue then? You're saying just the staff? So the public could contact the staff and we would evaluate that, but it is asking for a specific health, safety, and welfare, so it would need to be backed by evidence and be something that could be identified by the staff. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Any other discussion on the motion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right. That motion passes. All right. Moving on to our last two items, council reports. Council members, please sign in. Oh, I don't know, kept disappearing there. Council Member Morton. Can I, I guess, just, maybe it's a parliamentary, but I guess, Council Member Riddles has the week. Can I let her speak first? Go ahead. Thank you, Council Member. That's very kind of you. I'm sorry, I have a neighborhood meeting. I just wanted to first mention that this week is National Police Week, a time to recognize and honor the service and sacrifice of law enforcement officers here in Lexington and across the country. I want to say a big thank you to our men and women who work every day to keep our community safe. I know you often work long hours with little appreciation, so today we remember those who have lost their lives on duty and those who go above and beyond to serve our city. So once again, thank you, and we need to remember to thank you every day, not just National Police Week. We have a couple of great community events this Sunday in the 11th District. The first is a neighborhood cleanup at Oxford Circle from 1 to 4 p.m. It's time yet again to get ready for the return of the GOATs. That's right. The GOAT project at Vons Branch at Oxford Circle is happening again, so there will be trash bags and gloves provided, and if you want to help out, please wear long sleeves, long pants, and sturdy shoes. So come join us. I want to extend that to all my colleagues if they want to come help out on Sunday. Also Sunday, AVAL is hosting the Kentucky AIDS Walk beginning at 1 p.m. starting at the Courthouse Square. This event helps raise awareness to fight the stigma surrounding HIV. It's free and open to everyone, and you can find more information on AVAL's Facebook page. Council Member LaGree and I share a neighborhood association, Historic South Hill, and they're having their Spring Social from 2 to 4 p.m. at the corner of South Mill and Pine Street. So if you're in that neighborhood, come join us. And there's also an ACLU event, it is the Lexington ACLU of Kentucky State of Civil Liberties event, Fighting Back, Fighting Forward, that will be at the Lyric from 5 to 7 p.m. And if you are just tuning in and you have 20 minutes, you can make it either to the Valley Park Neighborhood Association get together at 7, I'm sorry, Cardinal Valley Neighborhood Association meeting at 7 in Valley Park, or Meadowthorpe in the Meadowthorpe Community Center at 7, and that is all. Thank you so much, and thank you, Council Member Martin, once again. Thank you, Council Member Lynch. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I want to remind my neighbors in District 2 of the amazing events going on this weekend in our district. This weekend is yard sale weekend, so McConnell's Trace, Garden Meadows, and Madison Station will be having their yard sales this weekend. McConnell's Trace and Garden Meadows and Madison Station all on Saturday, and then Madison Station also has Sunday as well for yard sales, so come on out to District 2. Additionally, we will be planting trees on Saturday with Trees Lexington, so come on out to God's Pantries location, the new location on Innovation Drive, and help us come plant some trees for District 2, and that will be from 10 AM to 12 PM. Also, this weekend, the BMW Academy will be celebrating their 20th anniversary. Celebration that will occur at Bracktown Church and starting at 1 o'clock with a phenomenal speaker, my sorority sister, Keisha Lance Bottoms, a former mayor of Atlanta. So please come out to celebrate BMW's 20th anniversary at Bracktown this Saturday. Also, the Rainbow Run 5K is happening Saturday at 6 PM at Coldstream Park. We are the 5K race capital of Lexington. Come on out, support a great cause, the Lexington Pride Center, and have a good run in Coldstream Park. And then lastly, also this weekend is the 15th anniversary for the Sheep and Fiber Festival happening in Madison Station Park. This one almost missed me, but come on out Saturday and Sunday. If you've never been to the Sheep and Fiber Festival, it's an experience you will never forget. So just fair warning to my neighbors, traffic's going to be a little hectic this weekend out on Leastown Road, because there's so many events going on this weekend. But I hope you all can come out. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Council Member LaGre. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I have a motion, because we didn't have a docket today, the mayor requested I do it now. So I move to place on the docket for the May 29th, 2025 council meeting a resolution amending resolution 684-2004 to revise various parking restrictions and to revise various parking restrictions on Cherokee Park. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion on the motion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion passes. All right. And Council Member Morton, are you going to talk about Street Fest? No, no, no, you do it. Okay, all right. Just a reminder, you all this weekend at Street Fest, I'm going to send around some additional information, but it's happening over on Shropshire. It's going to be a really fun day, and lots of activities for people who are walking, rolling, biking, and learning all about transportation and our options here in Lexington, so thank you. I look forward to seeing you there. Thank you, Council Member Hale. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Last night we had our district wide meeting at Edith J. Hayes, it was a great success. But first I want to thank Vice Mayor Wu, I want to thank Kyle Bailey and Daniel Crum from Planning, and Mike Vaughn from Kentucky Transportation Cabinet for attending our meeting, answering questions, and providing so much helpful information to District 7 residents. I especially want to thank my neighbors who took time out of their busy lives to come and meet with us and ask so many thoughtful questions and engage with the neighbors. I want to say that I always stand for public input. And that's the thing that I even ran, I campaigned on. I want to give a voice to my community. So I just don't want that narrative out there against this council that at any time that we want to take out public input, that's one thing that we stand for. And that's one thing that I stand for, is to go out into the community and to hear from the public. So last night was a great opportunity to go out and hear from the public. And we're going to have more meetings like this just throughout my tenure, so I can hear from the public and what they want to discuss with us. Also this morning, I was able to visit District 7's Black Hamlet of Cadentown, including the historical site which houses the Cadentown School and Cemetery. Touring this site was a wonderful first time for me. Thank you to Director Conrad and park staff, as well as architect Lisa Grober, who has been overseeing the most recent restoration work on the property, for taking time to show me around and share with me about the work that is being done on the site. I'm looking forward to hearing from the steering committee of a sense of place, as they strategically think about and plan for the future of this valuable historical site. I also hope many of you will plan to join me at the Juneteenth celebration in Cadentown, the details of which I'm told will be coming soon. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Martin. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'll make this quick, very quick. So this week I had the great opportunity, actually yesterday, had the great opportunity of touring Broke Spoke Community Bike Shop with Brad Flowers on the board. The shop is a volunteer run space focused on bike access, education, and empowerment. They offer affordable bike repairs, used bike and parts, and mechanic classes. Broke Spoke accepts gently used bikes and bike parts. If you're interested in volunteering, no bike knowledge is needed. There are plenty of ways to help out and earn some shop credit. That's Mr. Brad, great guy. Great information. I think I'm going to go get me another bike soon. Moving on, today I had the opportunity to visit the Carnegie Center. And I met with the Executive Director, Ms. Jennifer Maddox. Their mission is to empower people to explore and express their voices through imaginative learning and literary art with programs that support lifelong learning, youth education, and writing development. And it was a great, great tour. And actually, one of my great constituents did that art piece. And that's just their Hall of Fame, excuse me, their Writer Hall of Fame in Kentucky. And then keep going. Our office had the pleasure of attending two important neighborhood association meetings yesterday. Northside Neighborhood Association hosted their inaugural meeting. It was a pleasure to connecting with the residents and hearing firsthand about their priorities and concerns. And how we can make the district a better district, but also how we can address concerns in their neighborhood. And moving on to Green Acres Neighborhood Association also gathered. And we're grateful to Code Enforcement Officer, Director Lee Steele, and the Division of Planning team for attending. Their guidance helped address several ongoing issues facing the community. And I will say that the Green Acres Neighborhood group was impressed and very appreciative of both Director Lee Steele, but then also our planning staff that came out and spoke to them. And it was the whole entourage came out, so thank you to those folks. And then we'll keep going. So upcoming events in the, well, I didn't, my bad, my bad. So our second podcast is out, and it's on our Facebook page, on our Spotify. And we're talking about safe communities, strengthening our communities and building safe and healthy communities. I think it's something everyone should tune into, so please look out for that. And then this Thursday, the Williamsburg Brown Neighborhood Association is hosting their ice cream social for their monthly meeting, neighborhood association meeting. This will take place at the Lyric Theater, Thursday, May 15th from 6 PM to 7 PM. A sweet evening of community fun and connection with ice cream. And then lastly, the community block fair at the historic Paul Lawrence Dunbar AME Church on 251 North Upper Street, Saturday, May 31st from 10 AM to 4 PM. That will be family friendly, a lot of activities, vendors, resources, food, and more. And I look forward to seeing all my great neighbors there. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Curtis. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I am going to genuinely be very brief so that we can all get out of here. But I just wanted to say thank you to all of my colleagues. For those of you who don't know, and you might not be able to see it on television, I'm sitting on a pillow right now. I'm hobbling, I'm moving a little slower. On Friday, I had surgery to remove a couple of masses from my lower abdomen. Thankfully, they came back non-cancerous. I'm good, but I want to use this as a reminder that folks, regardless of age, don't do what I did and get in an argument with your doctor saying, can't we just wait until the July recess? Go on and get it taken care of. And I just wanted to say thank you, especially to council members Brown and Baxter for their flexibility and support in helping me navigate the budget link meetings around that. And to everyone else for their patience and grace as I move a little slower and carry this weird pillow around with me. So, thank you. Thank you. Our one public commenter abandoned us. So, with that and with thanks to our staff for sticking with us for a very long night, we are adjourned.