Full Text
MISSOULA CONSOLIDATED PLANNING BOARD MINUTES June 16, 2009 - 7:30 PM Missoula City Council Chambers, 140 West Pine Street MEMBERS PRESENT: Don MacArthur Kelley Durbin Jonathan Haber Tim Ibey Heidi Kendall Jerry O’Connell Jerry Petasek (7:09) ALTERNATES PRESENT: Don Latham Tim Skufca MEMBERS ABSENT: Jennifer Clary John DiBari STAFF PRESENT: Mary McCrea Janet Rhoades Sharon Reed OTHERS PRESENT Dick Ainsworth Jeff Aresty Bill Bartlett Terryl Bartlett Lois Bellusci Sandy Behlman Wally Bell Donna Burgess Eileen Burgess-Watson Sidney Burgess Wayne Cahoon Sarah Cobler Michael Cropper Steve Earle Marcia Eidel Carol Evans George Frasca Millie Good David Greer Mary Gravning David Guelff Jan Guelff Cliff Hawkins Jay Haveman Marlene Haveman Nancy Heil Walter Hill Tom Ide Dwight Jenkins Linda Johnson-Neitzel Shirley Juhl Jeanne Koester Sharon Kreitzberg Mark Landkammer Addrien Marx Shari Marihugh Jim Mason James McCubbin David McEwen Bruce Menz Jack Miller Gary Miller Anne Nelson Don Nicholson Stanley Nicholson Patrick O’Herren Daniel Poole Richard Reep John Richards Kathleen Sims Myrna Solis John Ruyle Donald Sims John Stein Mary Stein Audrey Trautwein Les Turnbull Gail Vannoy Tom Vannoy Juanita Vero Klaus Von Stutterheim Bob Wasson Bonnie C. Wasson Mary Warner Kathy White Rich White Jon Wilkins Sara Wilcox Sam Woodruff William J. Yiengt Please Note: Written comment and meeting handouts received at this meeting are available for review at the Office of Planning and Grants. Planning Board, City Council and County Commissioners have received copies of the comments for consideration. Photocopies may be obtained from OPG. An administrative fee is required for photocopies. I. ADMINISTRATIVE BUSINESS Don MacArthur: I’d like to call the June 16, 2009 Missoula Consolidated Planning Board to order (7:05 pm). Can we have a roll call please, Sharon. II. ROLL CALL Roll call indicated that 6 members and 2 alternates were present. (Jerry Petasek arrived at 7:09 pm) Sharon Reed: Mr. Chair, you have one, two, three, four, six Board members present, or…with two alternates present, so can we have the two alternates fill in for the missing…oh, excuse me, Don MacArthur, are you here? Don MacArthur: I’m here. Missoula Consolidated Planning Board June 16, 2009 Page 1 of 6 ---PAGE BREAK--- Sharon Reed: Whoopsie. I’m sorry… Don MacArthur: Alternates can fill in, yes. Sharon Reed: Okay, thank you. III. APPROVAL OF MINUTES Don MacArthur: Okay, we have two packets of minutes to act on; any additions or corrections to the May 19, 2009 or the June 2, 2009 minutes? Tim Ibey: Move that they be accepted as written. Don MacArthur: Moved by Tim. Don Latham: Second. Don MacArthur: Seconded by Don. All in favor say ‘aye’. (All Board members answered ‘aye’.) Any opposed? (All Board members were silent.) The motion carries; the minutes stand approved. IV. PUBLIC COMMENT Don MacArthur: The next item on our agenda is public comment. Anyone who would like to speak on an item that is not on our agenda tonight, we have space for that. Okay, seeing none… V. STAFF ANNOUNCEMENTS Don MacArthur: Staff announcements, Mary, are you here somewhere? Mary McCrea: Good evening, for the record, Mary McCrea, Senior Planner with the Office of Planning and Grants. There are no public hearing items scheduled for your July 7, 2009 meeting. The following Special Presentation has been scheduled for your July 7th meeting to be held in City Council Chambers. It’s a zoning ordinance, the Draft Historic Preservation Ordinance. The Missoula Historic Preservation Commission has been working on historic preservation zoning for the past 10 years or more in response to citizen interest and requests from various historic neighborhoods in the historic core of Missoula for zoning rules to protect the historic integrity of the historic neighborhoods. While the historic neighborhoods and individual structures are listed in the National Register of Historic Places, the National Register has no authority for local zoning. Another concern was that the existing zoning would not allow rebuilding of historic structures without getting a zoning variance, since most buildings in historic districts were built without any zoning. Initial efforts began with working toward neighborhood standards for neighborhood overlays. Later it was deemed necessary to develop a city-wide basis for these local standards. The Land Use Clinic at the University of Montana Law School was engaged to study the legal framework for historic preservation rules and draft an ordinance that would be unique to Missoula, and that would be defensible. The Law Clinic’s work was completed 18 months ago, and the draft ordinance was presented to the PAZ Committee in the summer of 2008. The draft has been revised in response to questions from the PAZ Missoula Consolidated Planning Board June 16, 2009 Page 2 of 6 ---PAGE BREAK--- Committee members. The Draft Historic Preservation Ordinance comes before you on July 7th for a Special Presentation and introduction in preparation for a public hearing on the ordinance at the July 21st Board meeting. Phillip Maechling will be bringing that to you. There are also two following two Special Presentations that have been tentatively scheduled for the July 7th, 2009 meeting. Both presentations were intended to be brief introductions to projects Missoula County Rural Initiatives staff is currently working on; however, if after tonight’s public hearing Planning Board requires additional time for review of the Seeley Lake Plan these two presentations could be rescheduled for a later date. The first is the Lolo Regional Plan Update – County Growth Policy Amendment. The Missoula County Rural Initiatives Office has been working with assistance from a consulting team, Soapbox Enterprises, on an update to the 2002 Lolo Regional Plan, which would also update the Missoula County Growth Policy. At the end of March, the County hosted a series of small group meetings to consider whether a limited plan update is needed and/or warranted and is there support for zoning implementation of either the current plan or an amended plan. The consulting team report was available on June 15th. Rural Initiatives staff will give a brief introduction and Special Presentation on their work to date on the Lolo Regional Plan Update. And in your member, I have a website for you to get more information. Karen Hughes will be presenting that. And the second Special Presentation Item is PLACE Project—Practical Landscape Assessment for Conservation and Enhancement. The Missoula County Rural Initiatives Office is leading an effort to gather information from resource specialists and community members about which places are most important for conservation or enhancement. As Missoula County’s population continues to increase, so have concerns regarding the potential for growth and development to affect rural ways of life, as well as the abundant natural areas, waterways, ranch, farm and timberlands, and other resources that make our county special. The PLACE project is an opportunity for rural communities to work with Missoula County to identify areas of special importance, specify strategies for protecting those important places and resources, and lay the foundation for future community discussions about conservation and planning for future growth. Rural Initiatives staff will give a brief introduction and Special Presentation on their work to date on the PLACE Project. There’s also a website for more information. And I have no governing body actions to report this evening. Don MacArthur: Thanks, Mary. Any questions for Mary? VI. PUBLIC HEARINGS Don MacArthur: Okay, so we have two public hearings tonight, rezoning request for 2330 Higgins Avenue, Denny’s Copy Stop; and the Seeley Lake Regional Plan update. I imagine most of you are here for the second item. I’ll start out with a couple of guidelines about how we do business here. In the rezoning request, we follow a pretty strict of doing business. We’ll hear first a Staff Report from Janet, then we will hear a report from the Proponent, the person who’s proposing, and then we will hear testimony in favor, and testimony against and a chance for rebuttal for both sides. So that’s kind of the format we’ll follow for rezoning. On the second public hearing, The Seeley Lake Regional Plan, we’ll hear a presentation from staff again, and then we’ll move right into public testimony and not back and forth presentation and surrebuttal, rebuttal, just every person will have a chance for a three-minute opportunity to Missoula Consolidated Planning Board June 16, 2009 Page 3 of 6 ---PAGE BREAK--- speak at the mic. So we will be kind of keeping track so that everybody gets a chance to…gets a chance to speak. We have limited…we stop our hearings at 11:00 pm. So we’ve got…that’s late enough, we’ve found that we can’t do real good business after that time period. If we get to the point, which I think is likely, that we haven’t completed our review of Seeley Plan, we will continue it to a date that will be figured out by the Planning Board at that time. Missoula Consolidated Planning Board June 16, 2009 Page 4 of 6 ---PAGE BREAK--- A. Rezoning Request – 2330 Higgins Ave (Denny’s Copy Stop) A request from Dennis Louquet, represented by DJ&A, P.C., to rezone the eastern portion of Lot 12A of Block 13 of Residence Addition, located on the northeast corner of the Higgins Ave / South Ave intersection, from R-1 (Residential, 8 dwelling units-per-acre) to BN (Neighborhood Business). Don MacArthur: So without further ado, we’ll move right into the 2330 Higgins Avenue Denny Copy Stop Rezoning. Janet, do you have a Staff Report for us? Janet Rhoades: Yes I do. Good evening, Planning Board Members, for the record, Janet Rhoades with OPG. This request is to rezone a portion of the Denny’s Copy Stop property at 2330 SW Higgins Ave from R-1, which is a residential district, to BN, which is neighborhood business. The property is located just to the northeast of the intersection of Higgins Avenue to South Avenue, you can see it up there outlined in yellow. Both Higgins and South are classified as minor arterials. The western portion of the property, approximately 11,000 square feet, is currently zoned BN, Neighborhood Business; the building houses the Denny’s Copy Stop business and five apartments located above the main floor. The eastern portion of the property, which is approximately 3,000 square feet, that’s this portion right here, is currently zoned R-1, residential. It contains a parking area for the Denny’s Copy Stop building. The property boundary for this rezone is this here, but the rezone request is only for this small portion here that’s kind of colored a blue color. This portion here, in purple, is already zoned Neighborhood Business. So the request is just for this small portion of the property, about 3,000 square feet, which is currently zoned R-1. The comprehensive plan land use designation for the property is Neighborhood Commercial, you can see the outline of the portion of the property that the rezone is request for is up there, it kind of centers around the intersection of Higgins and South. The existing zoning is BN for the portion adjacent to the portion that we’re looking at and R-1 for the portion that we’re looking at tonight. You can see some of the surrounding land uses are R-1 in that block and then there’s commercial uses in other locations around that intersection as well. Just a close up for the existing zoning and then you can see here is the proposed zoning which would be, so it’s R-1 to BN like that. And in summary, staff recommend approval of the request; there’s no conditions, it’s not a zoning district that can be conditioned, so I’m here for questions. This completes the Staff Report. Don MacArthur: Thanks, Janet, is there a proponent who would like to speak. As you come to the mic, please state your name and spell your last name for the record. Mark Landkammer: Good evening, everyone, I’m Mark Landkammer, for the record, L A N D K A M M E R, I work for the firm of DJ&A Engineering and I’m here tonight to see who has more white in their beard, me or Tim Ibey. But besides that—I think Tim wins on that one, by the way—Mr. Louquet has owned Denny’s Copy Stop for quite a long time and the building has been there many, many years and the whole crux of this effort has been to make the parking on the east side of Denny’s Copy Stop conforming. It’s been used that way, you can see in the aerial photo that was taken some years, it’s been used as such, so there’s really nothing physical changing, there’s no more parking, no more business happening, none of that. Mr. Louquet just desired to make his entire Denny’s Copy Stop compound conforming. So a number of months ago, I think, it wound up being approved in March, we helped him Missoula Consolidated Planning Board June 16, 2009 Page 5 of 6 ---PAGE BREAK--- through a boundary-line adjustment which shows…it’s really shown by the eastern yellow line that you see on the map and now we’re coming back to ask for just that little portion to be zoned BN to accommodate the parking that has already been occurring there. So, the bottom line, in short, and I think this is a fairly simple request he’s asking, is that he would like to rezone that portion of the Denny’s Copy Stop property so that it’s…the use that’s already occurring there is conforming. And I think that’s all I have to say and I’m here for questions. Mr. Louquet is here as well and he may want to speak. Don MacArthur: Thank you, Mr. Landkammer. Any other proponents who would like to speak. Anyone else like to speak in favor? Jon Wilkins: Good evening, Jon Wilkins, City Council, Ward 4, Denny’s Copy Stop is in Ward 4 and I’m strong support of what Denny wants to do here, Denny’s been a good business in our area, it’s been there a long time, he’s supported our neighborhood and we, in turn, support him. So just to let you know, I felt that it was important that I come down and let you know that because generally I’m coming down and saying other things in not support. So I’m glad to support something for a change, thanks. Don MacArthur: Thank you Mr. Wilkins. Any other proponents. Any opponents, anyone like to speak against. Okay, seeing none, we’ll close the public portion of this hearing and move to Board questions, discussions…or motions, if no one has questions. Don? Don Latham: A motion? Don MacArthur: Okay. Don Latham: I would move that the request to rezone property legally described in Attachment C from R-1 (Residential District) to BN (Neighborhood Business District) be approved based on the Findings of Fact in the Staff Report. Tim Ibey: Second the motion. Don MacArthur: Second by Tim, discussion on the motion. This may be a new record for speed. Tim. Tim Ibey: This is a question for staff. I was reading in here—when they did the boundary relocation, did they create a new lot, Lot 12A, and that…the whole thing is Lot 12A now? Janet Rhoades: Janet Rhoades, OPG, yes, the whole portion for the proposed rezoned and this portion of the lot is all lot 12A. It was boundary line relocation and lot aggregation. Tim Ibey: Thank you. Don MacArthur: Can I just say that I’m in support because in large part because it does conform with the Comprehensive Plan and it just seems to just make sense with the rest of the uses around the neighborhood and we’re certainly not seeing any concern from neighbors that this is going to have a negative impact on them. Okay, we’ll have a voice vote. All in favor say ‘aye’. (All Board members answered ‘aye’.) Any opposed? (All Board members were silent.) The motion carries. Missoula Consolidated Planning Board June 16, 2009 Page 6 of 6