OFFICE OF
THE CITY COUNCIL
CHERYL L. BROWN 117 WEST
DUVAL STREET,
DIRECTOR 4TH FLOOR, CITY
HALL
OFFICE (904) 630-1452
FAX (904) 630-2906
E-MAIL: CLBROWN@coj.net
LUZ COMMITTEE WORKSHOP MINUTES
December 3, 2013
4:30 p.m.
City Council Chamber
1st floor, City Hall
117 West Duval Street
Attendance: Council Members Lori Boyer, Bill
Bishop, Jim Love, Ray Holt (arr. 4:40)
Also:
Philip Zamarron – Legislative Services Division; Jeff
Clements – Council Research Division; Folks Huxford and Kristen Reed – Planning
and Development Department; Jason Gabriel – Office of General Counsel; Steve
Cassada – Council Staff Services
Council Member Boyer called the meeting
to order at 4:38 p.m. and asked the members their feelings on potentially
moving the Planning Commission meeting from Thursday to Monday of City Council
weeks in order to overcome the current difficulties with the Planning
Department staff being able to process all the actions of the Planning
Commission and report them to the LUZ Committee with all relevant materials in
a timely manner. The current Thursday/Tuesday
timeframe makes it extremely difficult for departmental staff to prepare
minutes, process amendments, draft conditions, and produce the materials needed
by the LUZ Committee to make informed decisions based on the Planning
Commission’s record just a few days later.
Jason Gabriel was asked to draft the necessary legislation to change the
commission’s meeting day, with the goal of making the change next spring
(assuming the City Council agrees) when advertising and meeting notices can be
adjusted to reflect the change.
The committee then discussed the small
scale land use amendment process. Ms.
Boyer indicated that she has heard from several developers who believe the
City’s process of holding applications for small scale amendments and processing
them in batches several times a year is unnecessary and detrimental to their
ability to move projects forward in a timely manner. She stated that she has
not heard back yet whether Gary Kresel, Chief of Community Planning, and Calvin
Burney, Director of Planning and Development, have met to discuss this issue as
was agreed at an earlier LUZ workshop.
Ms. Boyer suggested that the LUZ Committee introduce a resolution urging
the Planning and Development Department to process small scale land use amendment
applications as received, if the applicant is willing to pay the cost of the
required newspaper advertising him/ herself.
Kristen Reed of the Planning Department
stated that the Ordinance Code fee schedule sets the fee for advertising a
small scale land use amendment at $7 per notification and does not specifically
authorize a stand-alone billing for newspaper advertising for an individual,
non-bundled application. The committee discussed how a lack of either
authorization or prohibition could be interpreted and what authority the
department may have to adopt an administrative policy to accomplish the
goal. The committee requested Jason Gabriel
to draft the necessary language as a Code amendment to allow an applicant to
pay the necessary advertising costs in order to have an application processed
individually and not batched with others for advertising purposes. This should be done separately from his re-draft
of the small scale land use amendment process so that the two items can be
voted on separately.
There being no further business, the
agenda meeting was adjourned at 4:55 p.m.
Jeff Clements, Council Research
Division (904) 630-1405
Posted
12.4.13
12:00
p.m.