1 CITY OF
2 LAND USE AND ZONING
3 COMMITTEE
4
5
6 Proceedings held on Monday, November 3,
7 2008, commencing at 5:03 p.m., City Hall, Council
8 Chambers, 1st Floor,
9 Diane M. Tropia, a Notary Public in and for the State
10 of
11
12 PRESENT:
13 ART GRAHAM, Chair.
STEPHEN JOOST, Vice Chair.
14 JOHNNY GAFFNEY, Committee Member.
RAY HOLT, Committee Member.
15 JACK WEBB, Committee Member.
DON REDMAN, Committee Member.
16
17 ALSO PRESENT:
18 BILL BISHOP, City Council Member.
MICHAEL CORRIGAN, City Council Member.
19 WARREN JONES, City Council Member.
CLAY YARBOROUGH, City Council Member.
20 JOHN CROFTS, Deputy Director, Planning Dept.
SEAN KELLY, Chief, Current Planning.
21 BILL KILLINGSWORTH, Planning and Dev Dept.
STEVE SMITH, Planning and Development Dept.
22 JASON TEAL, Office of General Counsel.
23 DYLAN REINGOLD, Office of General Counsel.
MARILYN ALLEN, Legislative Assistant.
24 MERRIANE LAHMEUR, Legislative Assistant.
25 - - -
Diane M.
Tropia,
2
1 P R O C E E D I N G S
2 November 3, 2008 5:03 p.m.
3 - - -
4 THE CHAIRMAN: Good afternoon, everybody.
5 Let the record show it is 5 o'clockish. It
6 is Monday, November 3rd. This is the Land Use
7 and Zoning Committee meeting.
8 If we start over here on our right with
9 Mr. Crofts, let's introduce ourselves.
10 MR. CROFTS: John Crofts, Planning and
11 Development Department.
12 MR. KELLY: Sean Kelly, Planning and
13 Development.
14 MR. KILLINGSWORTH: Bill Killingsworth,
15 Planning and Development.
16 MR. McEACHIN: Joel McEachin, Planning and
17 Development.
18 MS. ELLER: Shannon Eller, General
19 Counsel's Office.
20 MR. TEAL: Jason Teal, General Counsel's
21 Office.
22 MR. REDMAN: Don Redman, Council
23 District 4.
24 DR. GAFFNEY: Councilman Gaffney,
25 District 7.
Diane M.
Tropia,
3
1 MR. HOLT: Ray Holt, District 11.
2 THE CHAIRMAN: Art Graham, District 13.
3 MR. JOOST: Stephen Joost, Group 3
4 at-large.
5 MR. WEBB: Jack Webb, City Council,
6 District 6.
7 MR. CORRIGAN: Michael --
8 MR. WEBB: Corrigan.
9 MR. CORRIGAN: -- Corrigan, City Council,
10 District 14.
11 Thank you, Mr. Webb.
12 THE CHAIRMAN: Let the record show that
13 Richard Clark has an excused absence, and I
14 think we're ready to roll.
15 As our practice normally is, if we have
16 visiting councilmembers, such as Mr. Corrigan,
17 here, we'll take their bills up first, and then
18 we'll do everything else pretty much in order.
19 So, Mr. Corrigan, what is your wish?
20 MR. CORRIGAN: I'll do it either way, sir.
21 I have two items. Item number 7 and item
22 number 80 on your agenda. The item number 7 is
23 an appeal and item number 80 is another bill
24 that I have. I'll take either order you'd like
25 to do it in, Mr. Chairman.
Diane M.
Tropia,
4
1 THE CHAIRMAN: You said 80 and number 7,
2 correct?
3 MR. CORRIGAN: That is correct.
4 THE CHAIRMAN: Let's go ahead and do
5 number 80.
6 Turn to page 20. Get that out of the way,
7 send some people home.
8 2008-923. We have an amendment.
9 MR. HOLT: Move the amendment.
10 MR. WEBB: Second.
11 THE CHAIRMAN: The amendment has been moved
12 and seconded.
13 Any discussion on the amendment?
14 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: (No response.)
15 THE CHAIRMAN: Can we hear the amendment?
16 MS. ELLER: Mr. Chairman, the amendment
17 will be your recommendation regarding the
18 special magistrate's recommended action to the
19 council, and I believe Dylan Reingold is here to
20 explain what your options are, and I think
21 Councilman Corrigan also has a presentation for
22 you-all to consider on the amendment.
23 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. Mr. Reingold.
24 MR. REINGOLD: To the committee,
25 essentially right now what you have before you
Diane M.
Tropia,
5
1 is a special magistrate hearing. And, as
2 Ms. Eller stated, Councilmember Corrigan, I
3 think, is going to kind of explain the history.
4 I don't want to steal his thunder.
5 But what the amendment would be from the
6 committee is to either accept, reject, or accept
7 with modifications the special magistrate's
8 recommendation.
9 And, with that, I guess I will turn it over
10 to the councilmember.
11 MR. CORRIGAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
12 I'll give a little bit of background since
13 a number of you on this committee weren't here,
14 and I'll try to be as brief as possible.
15 This particular issue is located at the
16 intersection of
17 Drive in my district. Back in 2004, we did
18 months of negotiations with the developer and
19 the neighbors and finally passed a PUD
20 application that was approved by this council in
21 2004.
22 The main focus -- one of the main focuses
23 of it was the height of the finished building.
24 There is a commercial building located just next
25 to this development that has a maximum roof
Diane M. Tropia,
6
1 height of 55 feet. That was an area of great
2 concern during our negotiations of this PUD back
3 and forth.
4 We eventually -- this council passed an
5 amendment -- or passed the PUD that capped the
6 height of the buildings at 55 feet. The -- what
7 we considered the height at that point was the
8 peak of the roof.
9 We found out during our negotiations and
10 after the PUD was verified that that's actually
11 the eave height of the building, so the actual
12 buildings being built, the peak of the roof is
13 higher than 55 feet. So that's quite upsetting
14 to the neighborhood because they thought they
15 were getting one thing and now they're getting
16 another.
17 Then the developer has -- now has three
18 buildings. Originally, there was one building,
19 now has three buildings, and he filed a minor
20 modification request to increase the one
21 building to 65 feet, so even 10 feet higher than
22 they were already.
23 The Planning Commission reviewed the
24 documentation and denied the minor
25 modification. This LUZ Committee then upheld
Diane M.
Tropia,
7
1 the Planning Commission's decision to deny that
2 minor modification, then Council supported the
3 LUZ's work.
4 Now, the developer had sought review by a
5 special magistrate in a special magistrate
6 proceeding. The special magistrate looked at
7 the facts of the case and he said that the City
8 should grant the minor modification to allow the
9 increase of height by another story on that
10 building.
11 He said that no further changes to the PUD
12 should happen unless there's extraordinary
13 circumstances. There have been a number of
14 changes in this PUD in the process, and he says
15 no more, no more changes after this point.
16 And the part that really has some concern
17 that this committee should really focus on is
18 that they reviewed the legality of a
19 councilmember's involvement in a PUD
20 verification process.
21 If you're a district councilperson, you
22 know that when a PUD comes back for substantial
23 compliance to what we passed, we review it and
24 then have a chance to send comments to them.
25 And the special magistrate really questioned
Diane M.
Tropia,
8
1 that and said that that was -- he thought above
2 what we should be allowed to be able to do, and
3 issued a 26-page order. He substituted his
4 opinion over the City Council's on the impact of
5 the view corridors and everything else that will
6 happen because of this increased height.
7 His decision was based on the expectation
8 that the developer had a conversation with me.
9 After I initially questioned the PUD
10 verification on this, I met with the developer
11 and one of the neighbors to talk about what --
12 what I thought the issues were, and the
13 developer thought that that was the final
14 ruling. They thought that I was the -- they
15 called me a "super councilmember" as part of
16 this process, and I didn't have a
17 properly-noticed public meeting with the
18 developer.
19 So really what I had was just some opinion
20 conversations, which I then disclosed during
21 this -- the appeal process. They said that the
22 councilmember's conversation shouldn't trump the
23 council and the council's decision, the PUD
24 deal.
25 And he also said in the order that he
Diane M.
Tropia,
9
1 confused -- that in the order he presented, he
2 confused the minor modification process with
3 what -- the PUD verification process that we all
4 look at as district councilpeople. So he really
5 had some confusion in that and probably didn't
6 totally understand the processes that we used.
7 So having said all that, there's several
8 things that I'd wish this committee would do. I
9 would like this committee to reject the increase
10 in height as the special magistrate suggested.
11 I'd like to accept his recommendation as to
12 limit future changes in this PUD.
13 The reason you do a PUD -- and I don't have
14 to remind this group, it's a planned unit
15 development. Well, if you're still planning,
16 they probably shouldn't have passed the PUD, so
17 they need to stop making changes to this PUD
18 that was approved four years ago.
19 And I'm -- I regret -- probably
20 hesitantly -- probably accept his recommendation
21 in part to review the legality of our PUD
22 verification process.
23 They brought up some pretty good points I
24 think we need to consider, and I personally have
25 been and will continue to work with the General
Diane M.
Tropia,
10
1 Counsel's Office to do legislation to address
2 the issues that were raised in the hearing, and
3 then I'll bring that legislation back to this
4 committee prior to introduction to be able to
5 have your -- this committee's opinion on it
6 before I introduce it to the full council.
7 So there's four things -- or five things,
8 Mr. Chairman. Well, really four actions:
9 Reject the height; accept his recommendation to
10 limit changes; accept his recommendation to
11 review the legality of our PUD verification
12 process; and then, finally, work on legislation
13 to address the issues that were raised at the
14 hearing.
15 THE CHAIRMAN: Well, Mr. Corrigan, I can
16 tell you, because I lived the whole site plan
17 verification thing -- I think it started in my
18 district, and it kind of mushroomed from there,
19 so -- and on top of that, I think you are a
20 super councilmember.
21 MR. CORRIGAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
22 THE CHAIRMAN: That being said, committee
23 members, we have a request for -- I think it was
24 four amendments, or we'll call it the Corrigan
25 amendment. But since he is not on this
Diane M.
Tropia,
11
1 committee --
2 MR. WEBB: Move the amendment.
3 MR. HOLT: Second.
4 THE CHAIRMAN: I have a motion and a second
5 on the Corrigan amendment.
6 We'll call it the Webb amendment.
7 And we are -- discussions on the Webb
8 amendment?
9 Mr. Joost.
10 MR. JOOST: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
11 Through legal, the magistrate recommended
12 the increase in height, and I guess what I'm
13 kind of reading between the lines is that he
14 implied that there must be an issue with some of
15 the legality of where we came down on this, and
16 that -- you know, and that's why we should be
17 reviewing these legal issues.
18 If we go against the magistrate's
19 recommendation, what are the legal implications
20 of our actions?
21 MR. REINGOLD: To Councilmember Joost,
22 first off -- there were a lot of parts to that
23 question. I'll try to deal with them as best I
24 can in the order that they were presented.
25 First off, the first question that the
Diane M.
Tropia,
12
1 special magistrate had was -- the special
2 magistrate was given the job of determining
3 whether the decision of not allowing the
4 increase in height was unreasonable or unfairly
5 burdened the use of the property.
6 In the special magistrate's order, the
7 special magistrate talks about how that there
8 will be a partial but minimal viewshed blockage
9 for a few units, but such restriction is not
10 significant given, you know, the other units in
11 the building.
12 On top of that, though, the special
13 magistrate did state that MLG/Ortega had a
14 reasonable expectation that the City's Planning
15 and Development Department and Councilmember
16 Corrigan would not oppose the height increase.
17 Additionally, the special magistrate
18 discussed the issue that the actions of the City
19 representatives are an important consideration
20 in this proceeding.
21 So there was kind of a combination, as
22 Councilmember Corrigan talked about. His first
23 thought was maybe it has a minimal impact on the
24 view corridor, but also to look at the
25 additional actions of the City's representatives
Diane M.
Tropia,
13
1 in coming up with a determination as to whether
2 ultimately the decision of the City was
3 unreasonable and unfairly burdened the property.
4 Now, to go to the question of the future,
5 sort of where we go from here, is -- first off,
6 I will tell you there is a pending writ of
7 certiorari petition that has been filed, that
8 has been put on hold for the determination of
9 the special magistrate proceeding.
10 That simply would require an answer brief
11 from the City. The issues at hand in that case
12 would be whether we offered due process; whether
13 there was proper notice; whether we applied the
14 correct law; and, finally, whether there was
15 substantial competent evidence on the record to
16 justify the decision.
17 That's one aspect of future legality. And
18 it's not a damages claim; it's just a simple,
19 straight-up review of the record.
20 After that -- I mean, the applicants
21 certainly have the right to file whatever
22 other -- other lawsuits they may care to bring.
23 It's kind of an awkward position for me to
24 advise you as to what lawsuits they could
25 bring. They could bring a Bert Harris Act
Diane M.
Tropia,
14
1 claim, they could bring a takings claim. I
2 mean, there are other, you know, options
3 available to them.
4 But those are sort of where we are, how we
5 got here, and where they could go from there.
6 MR. JOOST: Just as a follow-up, why did
7 the magistrate come to a conclusion that the
8 developer or the condominium people would have a
9 reasonable expectation that this height
10 restriction would not be imposed?
11 I mean, why would they -- was there
12 existing evidence or existing cases before where
13 we had allowed this and therefore they have a
14 reasonable expectation of this height? I mean,
15 why would the magistrate say that?
16 MR. REINGOLD: To Councilmember Joost, to
17 go into the history of the case a little bit
18 more, to answer your question, what essentially
19 happened -- and Councilman Corrigan was
20 getting -- or addressing this issue -- was
21 during the PUD verification process, the
22 Planning Department had rejected the plans that
23 had been brought to the Planning Department.
24 There were supposed to be three buildings, one
25 at 65 feet in height, one at 55 feet in height,
Diane M.
Tropia,
15
1 and another one at 55 feet in height.
2 The Planning Department met -- the
3 applicant met with the Planning Department and
4 also the councilmember, and the Planning
5 Department or the councilmember made clear to
6 them, well, if you don't like it, you can come
7 in for a PUD to PUD verif- -- you know, I mean,
8 rezoning. You can go for a minor mod. You
9 know, there are aspects of this that you can
10 do. There are processes that you can utilize to
11 change the PUD.
12 The applicant talked to the Planning
13 Department and Councilman Corrigan and said,
14 well, I'll do 65 feet on one building, 55 feet
15 on another, and 45 feet on a third building.
16 And they said, and we'll come in for a minor mod
17 for the increase in height for 65 feet. From
18 the record information, it appears that the
19 Planning Department had agreed we'd support you
20 on the increase of height from 55 to 65 feet.
21 Councilman Corrigan has stated all along, I
22 stated this was a minor mod; this doesn't come
23 to me; this doesn't come to the City Council;
24 that's a Planning Commission decision.
25 And the applicants have essentially stated
Diane M.
Tropia,
16
1 we felt that that meant that Councilmember
2 Corrigan would support us.
3 I'm of the opinion -- and I made this case
4 very clear at the special magistrate hearing --
5 even if the councilmember had said he would
6 support it, he certainly doesn't have the right
7 to bind the City Council to any future decision.
8 So, in my opinion, they had been -- it had
9 not been a justifiable expectation on their
10 part, knowing that if it -- it was going to go
11 to Planning Commission. And then, if appealed,
12 it would have to go to City Council and it would
13 go to 19 council members and not one.
14 That was kind of the issue with respect to
15 the expectations of the developer.
16 MR. JOOST: And I'm sure Councilman
17 Corrigan would like to speak for himself.
18 On the other two, on the 55 and 45, those
19 buildings, have those -- I'm assuming that's
20 passed and they're ready to go on to those two?
21 MR. REINGOLD: They've actually almost
22 completed building the 45-foot building. I
23 think they're under construction on the 55, and
24 the whole issue right now is whether the final
25 building will be 55 or 65 feet.
Diane M.
Tropia,
17
1 MR. JOOST: And my last question would be,
2 in your vast experience, how often do we go
3 against what a judge/magistrate recommends in
4 our council history?
5 MR. REINGOLD: In the three-and-a-half
6 years that I've been here, I think this is the
7 first one that I've seen -- that I've been
8 involved with under Section 70.51. I don't --
9 so I don't recall us going either way with
10 respect to a decision in this regard.
11 MR. JOOST: Thank you.
12 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Corrigan.
13 MR. CORRIGAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
14 I'd just like to further clarify to
15 Councilmember Joost and the committee, there was
16 a great deal of discussion about this meeting
17 that the developer and a neighbor and I had.
18 And, as Mr. Reingold said, they asked at that
19 meeting to the Planning Department, would you
20 support this minor modification of 65 feet? And
21 the Planning Department's reaction was, I don't
22 think we would oppose that.
23 They turned and asked me, and I said -- and
24 I would swear to this on a Bible under oath, I
25 said, I believe those go to the Planning
Diane M.
Tropia,
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1 Commission. The Planning Department verified
2 that, and then they -- I said, so, therefore, I
3 don't need to have an answer because it does not
4 come to us.
5 I knew -- I know the law that I operate
6 under. I knew that if I took a position there,
7 it would have jeopardized my ability to come to
8 LUZ and discuss it or take a position there, so
9 I did not take a position at that meeting, and
10 now I'm glad I didn't because I still have the
11 ability to come and talk to you.
12 Remember, this started out as one building
13 at the maximum height of 55 feet. It's now
14 turning to three buildings with the 45, 55, and
15 now they're asking for a 65 foot height. It's
16 the fourth time that this committee has had to
17 take time and taking time away from other issues
18 you could be discussing to discuss this.
19 So I appreciate your patience and your
20 understanding and hope that I have your support.
21 Thank you.
22 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Corrigan, did you have a
23 town meeting when you first dealt with this
24 entire piece of property?
25 MR. CORRIGAN: Councilmember Graham, we had
Diane M.
Tropia,
19
1 a town meeting. We also had another meeting the
2 night of LUZ. We went into the Renaissance Room
3 for all the parties to come in kind of separate
4 for them to air some differences. It was
5 deferred several times. I think there was a
6 total of about 14 meetings that took place
7 leading up to this with various different
8 entities trying to come up with a compromise, so
9 it's been very well vetted.
10 The problem is the people that are being
11 cut out now is the public. The developers had
12 all these other special meetings and everything
13 else in this case and the public has never had
14 much of a chance to give their input again.
15 If they'd done what I suggested originally,
16 which was a PUD to PUD change to do the changes,
17 we wouldn't be sitting here having this
18 discussion tonight.
19 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Mr. Corrigan.
20 Well, I know this is -- we're not going to
21 fix the whole PUD process in this -- this bill
22 that's before us, but, you know, any one of you
23 council members that had a town meeting and
24 talking about a rezoning understand, when you
25 walk out of that town meeting, all those
Diane M.
Tropia,
20
1 constituents think that they made a deal and
2 they've worked out what this PUD is going to
3 look like.
4 And when that PUD changes on them, they
5 look at you thinking that you have lied to them
6 and you've misled them, and so that's why this
7 process is just -- you know, it's a great
8 process if you can lock it down.
9 And that's also why we went round and round
10 and round with the whole site plan verification,
11 because that's one of those things when you work
12 it out and the constituents think that they cut
13 a deal and it's going to be a certain height,
14 it's going to be so far from the road, there's
15 going to be so much foliage, it's going to be
16 this and that, you know. And if that doesn't
17 come out that way, you are the one that lied to
18 them, you're the one that misled them.
19 So I can understand where Mr. Corrigan is
20 coming through with this thing, and he wants to
21 make sure that his constituents get what they
22 agreed to.
23 That all being said, I don't see anybody on
24 the queue, so we are on the Webb amendment.
25 All in favor say aye.
Diane M.
Tropia,
21
1 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: Aye.
2 THE CHAIRMAN: Those opposed.
3 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: (No response.)
4 THE CHAIRMAN: By your action, you have
5 approved the amendment.
6 MR. WEBB: Move the bill as amended.
7 MR. JOOST: Second.
8 THE CHAIRMAN: The bill has been moved and
9 seconded as amended.
10 Any discussion on the bill?
11 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: (No response.)
12 THE CHAIRMAN: Seeing none, please open the
13 ballot.
14 (Committee ballot opened.)
15 MR. GRAHAM: (Votes yea.)
16 MR. JOOST: (Votes yea.)
17 MR. GAFFNEY: (Votes yea.)
18 MR. HOLT: (Votes yea.)
19 MR. REDMAN: (Votes yea.)
20 MR. WEBB: (Votes yea.)
21 THE CHAIRMAN: Close the ballot and record
22 the vote.
23 (Committee ballot closed.)
24 MS. LAHMEUR: Six yeas, zero nays.
25 THE CHAIRMAN: By your action, you have
Diane M.
Tropia,
22
1 approved 2008-923 as amended.
2 Now we're going back to which page,
3 Mr. Corrigan?
4 MR. CORRIGAN: Mr. Chairman, page 4,
5 item 7.
6 THE CHAIRMAN: Committee members, page 4,
7 item 7. We have an appeal.
8 That being the case, we are going to let
9 the applicant come forward and give his song and
10 dance on why he thinks he needs what he needs.
11 Let's do the ex-parte before the appeal.
12 Mr. Joost.
13 MR. JOOST: Yes, Mr. Chairman.
14 I had ex-parte communications with
15 Mr. Bajalia and Mr. Skinner on November 3rd at
16 the location, and we discussed various aspects
17 of the project.
18 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. Mr. Corrigan.
19 MR. CORRIGAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
20 I had ex-parte on this issue about a year
21 and a half ago or maybe just over a year ago
22 with both Mr. Bajalia and
23 Preservation Organization that this area is --
24 this appeal is in.
25 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. Mr. Webb.
Diane M.
Tropia,
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1 MR. WEBB: Likewise, Mr. Chairman, I
2 declare ex-parte. Approximately a month ago, I
3 had a conversation with the applicant in this
4 matter regarding the quality of the vinyl
5 siding.
6 Thank you.
7 THE CHAIRMAN: Dr. Gaffney.
8 DR. GAFFNEY: Yes, Mr. Chairman.
9 I wish to declare I had a meeting with the
10 applicant and also with
11 preservation, ex-parte communication.
12 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Redman.
13 MR. REDMAN: Yes. I'd like to declare
14 ex-parte communication I had approximately a
15 month ago with the applicant and residents of
16 the Avondale association.
17 Thank you.
18 THE CHAIRMAN: And I will also say that I
19 met with the applicant, and I've also met with
20 the -- some representatives of RAP on this issue
21 as well.
22 That all being said --
23 Okay. Mr. Yarborough.
24 MR. YARBOROUGH: I didn't know this was up
25 tonight. I should mention, though, I had
Diane M.
Tropia,
24
1 ex-parte with Mr. Ernie Isaac briefly about this
2 over breakfast on Memorial Day, May 26th, about
3 7:30 in the morning, just very briefly, but we
4 did talk about it.
5 Thank you.
6 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. Thank you, sir.
7 And, by the way, welcome.
8 That all being said, Mr. Bajalia, we will
9 let you give your side of the story, and then
10 we'll let anybody else that came to speak to
11 this get three minutes to speak, and then we'll
12 let you rebut, and then we'll close the public
13 hearing and we'll go on from there.
14 That all being said, we will open the
15 public hearing.
16 Go ahead.
17 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
18 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
19 My name is George Bajalia. I live at 4638
21 I'm a
22 many of you are and love
23 to do anything to help serve and improve
24
25 The building in question is in the
Diane M.
Tropia,
25
1 Riverside area, in between Park and King and
2
3 owned the building since January 1982, nearly
4 27 years. And I've lived on and off in the
5 Riverside/Avondale area my -- for much of my
6 life.
7 And I do agree with the Historic
8 Commission's desire to maintain the integrity of
9 the area, yet have alternative views as to how
10 to do that as many historic areas have done
11 around the
12 The building -- you'll see -- the area may
13 be difficult. I don't know if you can see it,
14 but I -- there's a handout that you have that
15 shows the zoning --
16 overlay map, which identifies where the building
17 is, and the recent zoning overlay map that was
18 done earlier this year -- which there was a
19 town hall meeting with Mr. Corrigan, Mr. Kelly,
20 and many others there -- that identifies the
21 property in an office/commercial area, not in a
22 residential historic area.
23 As I said, I've owned it for a long time,
24 since 1982. It currently serves as lower price
25 apartments. And my desire is to upgrade the
Diane M.
Tropia,
26
1 property to a -- more of a professional use,
2 which is what the area has, and at a cost
3 effective way.
4 And the vinyl siding, the product has
5 improved over the years. I'm sure -- I believe
6 there are some people here that could talk
7 specifically about the product. I have a couple
8 of samples of the product that I'm happy to pass
9 around.
10 And it's a cost effective way to improve
11 the building, to provide lower cost maintenance
12 over the life of the product, over -- and also
13 for me to convert -- to have enough funds to
14 convert the inside of the building.
15 As mentioned, it's located on
16 in a commercial area. The building includes
17 major additions. I -- many years before I
18 bought it, probably two-thirds of the exterior
19 of the building was -- was modified. The front
20 area was modified, the back area was modified,
21 and some of the side areas were modified.
22 So the siding that we're referring to here,
23 much of the siding is not original historic
24 siding. It's -- it's siding that was put in in
25 the -- I don't even know when it was put in. It
Diane M.
Tropia,
27
1 was before I owned it in 1982, but it's not
2 original.
3 In 2006, I made some improvements to the
4 building because there was a lot of -- a lot of
5 wood that was deteriorating.
6 THE CHAIRMAN: We can't see that from
7 there. You'll probably have to put it back on
8 that easel.
9 Thank you, sir.
10 MR. BAJALIA: The top photos, which are
11 also, I believe, in your slide -- probably
12 slide 2. Slide 2, 9, and 10 is the building
13 before I made the improvements. You'll see that
14 there's a lot of the wood deteriorating and the
15 soffits and the fascia board and some of the
16 siding.
17 And I made a number of improvements to the
18 building. And in 2006, early 2007, the
19 bottom -- the bottom three photos are the result
20 of those improvements, which basically is the
21 best you get with the improvements that I made.
22 And I've researched the product and found
23 that the product and the installation of the
24 product is very high standards, much higher
25 standards than in 1998 when the rules changed
Diane M.
Tropia,
28
1 and did not allow vinyl siding. I think the
2 rules changed here in 1998, and the product has
3 improved significantly since then.
4 I believe all of you many have received a
5 package from the Vinyl Siding Institute, which
6 I've passed around some information as well.
7 The improvements I'm requesting is a triple
8 vinyl clapboard, which meets high quality
9 standards. And here's an example (indicating).
10 I'll pass around an example of what these look
11 like.
12 Once you see that, you'll see that the
13 vinyl siding -- the manufacturers have put a lot
14 of research and development and a lot of work
15 into trying to provide siding that meets many
16 historical standards.
17 There's also trim and -- trim and millwork
18 that you also have in your handouts that also
19 improve the architectural integrity of the area,
20 which I intend to do as well.
21 Nearly all of
22 Street to the river, are commercial buildings.
23 And this is one of the only buildings that's not
24 commercial, and I intend to -- and it's
25 currently zoned for office or residential
Diane M.
Tropia,
29
1 multifamily, and I intend to eventually convert
2 it to a professional use.
3 Approximately eight buildings within two
4 blocks of my building have vinyl or aluminum
5 siding on it. You can refer to slides 5 through
6 8 in the PowerPoint presentation that you have.
7 And that was all done before 1998, before the
8 guidelines came into effect.
9 And as you can see in almost every case,
10 the -- ten years later the product is in good
11 condition. And if you compare it to my
12 building, it's in much better condition than my
13 fooling with the siding that's deteriorating.
14 I note -- I'd like to note slide 4 in your
15 handout shows the exterior consistencies which
16 is the reason for my request. Since most of the
17 building is not a historic structure, the
18 product, the wood does not maintain very well,
19 and I'll have to continually repair and replace
20 the siding as I upgrade the building
21 continually, probably every three to five years,
22 which is really not cost effective.
23 I'm almost done.
24 You'll see on this -- on this board and
25 also in -- I believe it's slide -- slides both
Diane M.
Tropia,
30
1 9 and 10. I compare a rendering of the building
2 with siding only on it, with no architectural
3 trim, to the building as it was before the
4 improvements and the building as it is today.
5 And you can see that, at least in my view, it's
6 a much better looking product and probably more
7 particularly meets the areas -- of upgrading the
8 area and, once again, cost effective to make
9 sense for me to do other things with the
10 property.
11 One of the other things I've researched
12 is -- all the buildings here (indicating) and
13 maybe one or two others. I compared the value
14 of those buildings to the value of buildings
15 within two or three buildings of similar size
16 with wood siding. And at least half the cases,
17 the value of the building with vinyl or aluminum
18 siding is greater than the value of the building
19 with wood siding.
20 And I have a handout, if you're interested,
21 to show you each of those buildings and the
22 value.
23 As I mentioned, the cost of this product is
24 much less than just repair and replacing certain
25 pieces of the wood siding. And what I estimate
Diane M.
Tropia,
31
1 from some contractors' estimates, it's half the
2 cost.
3 Today, if I were to repair and replace some
4 of the bad wood on the building versus apply a
5 quality vinyl siding product with architectural
6 features, it will probably be -- it will be
7 approximately one half the cost of the repair
8 and replacement of wood, which I'll have to do
9 in three to five years as well.
10 I appreciate your time and you considering
11 my request, and be happy to answer any questions
12 at any point in time.
13 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. Thank you, sir.
14 Do we have any public comment cards on
15 this?
16 MS. ALLEN: (Tenders speaker cards.)
17 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. Our first speaker is
18 Kay Ehas, followed by Greg Thomas.
19 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
20 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good evening.
21 My name is Kay Ehas. I reside at 2322
23 I'm also the chair of the board of
24 Riverside Avondale Preservation.
25 You know, adding vinyl siding to a historic
Diane M.
Tropia,
32
1 structure is one of the instigating factors for
2 the neighborhood movement to become a historic
3 district, and I would have to disagree that the
4 majority of the wood on Mr. Bajalia's property
5 is the original wood.
6 I'd like to speak briefly on our main point
7 in opposing the vinyl siding, and then the next
8 four speakers will elaborate on those points.
9 Vinyl is actually an inferior product that
10 results in damage to the historic structure.
11 The long-term cost of vinyl is actually greater
12 than the long-term cost of wood siding.
13 Allowing vinyl in this house means you'll
14 have to approve vinyl for any structure within
15 our historic -- city's historic district,
16 effectively destroying the historic character,
17 the economic value, and the cultural legacy
18 these districts give to the city of
19
20 And if you grant the appeal, it will be the
21 first time, to our knowledge, that vinyl siding
22 will be allowed in any historic district in the
23
24 the Secretary of Interior's guidelines as we did
25 in 1998.
Diane M.
Tropia,
33
1 In fact, the historic districts Mr. Bajalia
2 cites in his materials as allowing vinyl siding
3 do not allow vinyl siding. That's a fact. It's
4 been -- staff has researched it, we've
5 researched it.
6 Various
7
8 decisions of Historic Planning Commissions in
9 similar cases to this. At -- also the structure
10 in question, if renovated appropriately,
11 qualifies for a property tax exemption and for
12 tax credits.
13 Thank you for your time.
14 And Greg Thomas is next.
15 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Ms. Ehas.
16 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
17 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good evening.
18 I'm Greg Thomas. I reside at 2818
19 Street in
20 I am an architectural project manager with
21 Richard Skinner & Associates, architects, and I
22 serve as the chair of RAP's Design Review
23 Committee.
24 Prior to moving to
25 worked in an architectural preservation firm in
Diane M.
Tropia,
34
1
2 I'm fairly qualified to speak on the issue
3 before us.
4 Before I make a few points, did everyone
5 receive a packet from our organization?
6 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: (Nod heads.)
7 MR. THOMAS: Because the rest of us will be
8 referring to that packet as we speak.
9 I'd like to briefly point out the physical
10 harm that the vinyl siding would do to this or
11 any historic building.
12 Generally speaking, there are two types of
13 physical damage that will occur. The first and
14 the obvious one is the structural harm in the
15 form of water damage, rot, termites, and mold.
16 And the second type, which is just as important
17 from a preservation standpoint, is the damage
18 that will be done to the physical
19 characteristics of the building that make it a
20 contributing structure to the historic landscape
21 of our city.
22 To the structural damage, it's just poor
23 building practice, poor building science to put
24 vinyl siding and soffits over an existing
25 building. The construction technology that was
Diane M.
Tropia,
35
1 available in the early 20th century required
2 that a wood structure be able to breathe, not
3 only through its windows and doors, but through
4 the walls, the eaves, and maintained a moisture
5 content that was healthy. It did not promote
6 decay, provide breeding grounds for mold or
7 offer food for wood-destroying insects.
8 Vinyl siding by design, despite all the
9 improvements that have been made over the years,
10 lets rain and moisture underneath it and it
11 keeps it there.
12 Its application introduces thousand of nail
13 holes into the existing wood siding and trim
14 that it would be applied over, and yet it can't
15 be caulked or waterproofed because it is so
16 thin. It leaves the job of moisture control to
17 the surface underneath it that's now full of
18 thousands of nail holes, which, you know, of
19 course, doesn't really make a lot of sense.
20 The wood structure can't breathe the way it
21 was meant to, and its integrity as a weather
22 barrier is compromised. The problems start
23 arising, sick building syndrome, et cetera.
24 As to the aesthetic damage, it's not about
25 whether we like the look of vinyl or not. These
Diane M.
Tropia,
36
1 standards place value on the physical
2 characteristics and aesthetic features which
3 make the building a document of its place and
4 time in history and worthy of preserving. And
5 by applying this vinyl, those features would be
6 irreputably lost.
7 And if you refer to page 6 of the handout,
8 we have a good example of the three buildings in
9 a row. Mr. Bajalia is in the middle. And you
10 can see that, even though it's dilapidated,
11 those features are still in intact. We've got
12 beaded board soffits, eave brackets, the fine
13 wood lap siding, the routed corner boards, just
14 to name a few.
15 And the building on the right, which has
16 been covered in vinyl, all of those features are
17 lost and cannot be regained.
18 And those are the things that would help
19 qualify this building for tax credit and also
20 make it a valuable record of what's in the city.
21 Thank you.
22 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
23 The next speaker is Jeffrey Graf, followed
24 by Jennifer.
25 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
Diane M.
Tropia,
37
1 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Holt.
2 Hold on just a second.
3 Mr. Holt.
4 MR. HOLT: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
5 I'd just like to ask a question. I guess
6 the last speaker would be as good a person as
7 any judging from your background to ask this
8 question.
9 What exactly would you guys feel like would
10 meet the requirements that you would recommend?
11 And I'd also like to ask Mr. Bajalia what
12 the cost difference would be between what you
13 folks would expect to meet the requirements and
14 what he's proposing, what the cost difference
15 would be.
16 Is that a question that you can answer?
17 MR. THOMAS: We recommend like material,
18 meaning wood.
19 MR. HOLT: Okay. And do you guys have an
20 idea of what the cost difference would be
21 between that and what he's proposing?
22 MR. THOMAS: We're going to get into that a
23 little bit, but at this point, I don't think --
24 MR. HOLT: Okay. Well, if you're going to
25 answer the question later, that's fine.
Diane M.
Tropia,
38
1 MR. THOMAS: -- we have enough information
2 to give you an apples-to-apples comparison.
3 MR. HOLT: Okay. Mr. Bajalia, could you
4 come up and answer that question for me first so
5 that later when they answer it, I'll have a
6 background.
7 (Mr. Bajalia approaches the podium.)
8 MR. BAJALIA: I had an estimate of the --
9 of siding replacement and repair of the bad wood
10 on the building and windows of $50,000 compared
11 to siding and windows of $22,000.
12 MR. HOLT: Okay. Thank you.
13 I'll just wait to hear their answer later.
14 THE CHAIRMAN: Go ahead, sir.
15 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Okay. Mr. Chairman,
16 Jeffrey Graf,
17
18 I am the vice chair of
19 Preservation.
20 If you have your handout with you, I'd like
21 to have you look at the bottom of page 13 where
22 there is a quote -- excuse me while I put my arm
23 extenders on here -- from a Daniel Buckles
24 (phonetic), who says vinyl siding does not
25 increase the value of one's home and in some
Diane M.
Tropia,
39
1 cases can actually diminish its value if the
2 home has historic value as located in a nicer
3 neighborhood.
4 In fact, this, as everybody knows, is
5 located in a historic district. And the issues
6 and citings that we mentioned from JHPC earlier
7 on in our package, if held up, which we're
8 advocating, would, in fact, protect this
9 building because it would not allow the vinyl
10 siding.
11 And Mr. Bajalia talks about his quotes. If
12 you look at the bottom of page 14, you can see
13 his numbers are at least what we had.
14 Moving on to page 15, some examples of his
15 vinyl pricing quote versus a wood price, about
16 the fifth bullet point down on the vinyl price,
17 we noticed in looking at his estimates that
18 nothing that was on the wood estimates was
19 included in the vinyl price.
20 Now, we know there's certainly wood items
21 that wouldn't be, but there are items that
22 should be on both sides of the ledger, if you
23 will.
24 If you look at the wood price side of his
25 cost estimate, about five lines down, you see
Diane M.
Tropia,
40
1 that the wood price includes stucco repairs and
2 foundation work. Two more lines down from that,
3 it includes electrical work and interior
4 repairs. Two more lines down from that, it
5 includes two rear windows.
6 So as best we can tell from reading the
7 information that was supplied to us, they're not
8 apples-to-apples quotes.
9 Direct your attention to the top of page 16
10 where it's quoted a study from
11 vinyl siding is now the most common siding
12 material for low- to moderate-priced housing.
13 If that's what it is, it is certainly not an
14 upgrade for a building in the historic
15 district.
16 It goes on to talk about vinyl siding being
17 maintenance-free. It certainly is not. After
18 ten or so years, it's going to need painting.
19 It will mold just like paint does.
20 But it has another interesting side
21 effect. It if catches fire, the fumes are
22 toxic, unlike wood.
23 Moving on to page 18, a Consumer Reports
24 study says over a cost-per-year basis, vinyl is
25 not the cheapest either, among it, the higher,
Diane M.
Tropia,
41
1 low-quality options. Vinyl siding, according to
2 what we've been able to tell, has a life span
3 expectance of about half of what wood is.
4 Mr. Bajalia bought this building in 1982
5 when it was 67 years old. He's owned it for 26
6 or 27 years. This building is 93 or 94 years
7 old now. And even given the lack of care that
8 it's been given, this building is still
9 standing.
10 So, in closing, I don't think it's a quick
11 fix. It has a very negative short- and
12 long-term effects, not only on the structure but
13 the district and
14 And, with that, I'd like to turn it over to
15 Jennifer Mansfield.
16 Thank you very much.
17 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
18 Jennifer, you're up next, followed by
19 Carmen Godwin.
20 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
21 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you.
22 I'm Jennifer Mansfield. I live at 2043
24 One of Mr. Bajalia's arguments that we've
25 become aware of is that the housing district was
Diane M.
Tropia,
42
1 established after he already owned the
2 property. That's, quite frankly, irrelevant.
3 It was passed through a democratic process and
4 is an ordinance of
5 therefore, it applies to everyone.
6 Courts, including the
7 Court, have upheld historic district regulations
8 and their application, even in the face of
9 having to spend money in order to meet those
10 standards.
11 The ordinance must be applied evenly to
12 everyone, and what applies to everyone else in
13 the
14 apply to Mr. Bajalia equally.
15 The courts that have upheld similar design
16 regulations, those regulations, just like
17
18 Interior's design guidelines and despite the
19 fact that -- some cost to the property owner in
20 the district.
21 Although the LUZ Committee's review is
22 de novo, the LUZ is still required to apply
23 those design regulations, just as the
24
25 did. It does not matter what use the building
Diane M.
Tropia,
43
1 has in the district. All buildings within the
2 district have to have -- must comply with the
3 design regulations.
4 In essence, what Mr. Bajalia is asking is
5 to be treated differently than anyone else
6 because the factors that he's pointed out --
7 such as he thinks that it looks better and the
8 cost, value of his property, value of vinyl
9 properties -- really are not considerations
10 under the design regulations. He's essentially
11 asking you to ignore the design regulations.
12 Approving vinyl siding would eviscerate the
13 historic district ordinance and design
14 regulations because, again, what applies to
15 Mr. Bajalia also applies to everyone else in the
16 district. This is precedent setting.
17 So granting this appeal, LUZ would be
18 making a finding under the design regulations
19 that vinyl is an acceptable alternative to wood
20 siding, and thus everyone else who wants to do
21 it would be able to do it because of that
22 finding.
23 This would be precedent setting, even in
24 its own right. It's even more so though because
25 LUZ has previously denied an appeal of a
Diane M.
Tropia,
44
1 homeowner in a historic district for vinyl
2 siding.
3 It's also our understanding that during the
4
5 staff investigation of this, that not only did
6 none of the historic districts mentioned by
7 Mr. Bajalia approve of vinyl siding, but some
8 actually laughed when asked the question.
9 And so that is a demonstration of how
10 farfetched and beyond the design regulations
11 that this request is.
12 Thank you.
13 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, ma'am.
14 Carmen.
15 (Ms. Godwin approaches the podium.)
16 MS. GODWIN: Thank you.
17 Carmen Godwin,
18 Thank you.
19 I'm the executive director of
20 Avondale Preservation, and you've heard a lot of
21 evidence tonight about why historic districts
22 throughout the country do not allow vinyl
23 siding.
24 We ask that you trust those who are
25 appointed by the City to make educated decisions
Diane M.
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45
1 on historic landmarks and historic structures.
2 The mayor appoints seven experts in various
3 disciplines -- architecture, construction,
4 preservation and law -- to serve on the
5
6 study the design regulations for the national
7 historic districts of both
8
9 neighborhoods and the laws that govern
10 alterations to property within those
11 neighborhoods.
12 While the group is not overly concerned
13 with property values, their decisions help
14 maintain and grow those values because they help
15 retain the historic character of the
16 neighborhoods and the specific building features
17 of the unique structures within them.
18 This seven-member panel of experts has
19 never once approved the use of vinyl siding as a
20 replacement material on a historic structure in
21 either of our two historic districts, whether
22 commercial, residential, office, whatever the
23 use.
24 And why do you think that is? It's because
25 they know and understand the Secretary of
Diane M.
Tropia,
46
1 Interior Standards, they know and understand the
2 law contained with the design regulations and
3 all the details within those regulations, and
4 they know the irreparable damage that vinyl
5 siding causes, not only to the wood structure,
6 but to every single detail and unique feature on
7 those structures which are removed and destroyed
8 when vinyl siding is put on them.
9 I know that tonight you've heard talk of
10 precedence, and we really feel -- and I've
11 spoken with SPAR as well -- that this is one
12 precedent that neither one of our historic
13 districts would be able to live with.
14
15 original suburbs to downtown, and we want to
16 maintain them. They help make our city livable
17 and interesting among other
18 So please help us to maintain that historic
19 character and please uphold the decision of the
20 Historic Commission.
21 Thank you.
22 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, ma'am.
23 The next one is Joann Purdie.
24 Does not wish to speak.
25 Bob Chamberlain, followed by William -- and
Diane M.
Tropia,
47
1 I'm going the butcher your last name --
2 Leuthold.
3 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
4 THE CHAIRMAN: Sir, name and address for
5 the record, and you have three minutes to
6 speak.
7 AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Bob
8 Chamberlain. I live at
9
10 First Guaranty Bank.
11 It's important in the
12 area that we maintain the integrity of the
13 housing and also of our commercial areas. We
14 have, today, several buildings being remodeled
15 along
16 other areas, and they are fulfilling that by
17 staying to the standards that are set by the
18 historic district.
19 I recommend that you deny the request of
20 the applicant.
21 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
22 William, followed by Doug Coleman.
23 As I call your name, make your way down
24 front, please.
25 (Mr. Leuthold approaches the podium.)
Diane M.
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48
1 MR. LEUTHOLD: My name is William Leuthold.
2 I have just finished serving six years in
3 the
4 Commission.
5
I'm an architect in
6 office at
7 corner from the subject property here.
8 In serving on the commission, you probably
9 have my comments as part of the minutes of the
10 meeting in which it was stated the same thing
11 that's been stated by the experts here today
12 already and that the use of vinyl siding is
13 never allowed in historic districts, the reason
14 being that -- mostly that it destroys the fabric
15 and the character of that individual structure.
16 When you use vinyl siding on a structure,
17 you end up -- can I hand out a couple of
18 pass-outs?
19 I just took one photograph that has a
20 vinyl-sided structure on the top and a restored
21 structure on the bottom.
22 One of the instances -- one of the great
23 things about historic architecture, the old
24 structures that were build in town, is that they
25 were -- they use simple detailing of quality
Diane M.
Tropia,
49
1 materials. Vinyl is the opposite of that.
2 Vinyl is a cheap material that is really more
3 appropriate on a low-income house or even a
4 mobile home. Most of the mobile homes you saw
5 for years had vinyl siding attached to them, had
6 vinyl soffits. What they were covering up was
7 junky construction.
8 But what happens here, if you allowed vinyl
9 siding, would be you would start to cover up
10 quality materials that were installed by
11 craftsmen. In doing that, you're taking away
12 the character of that house.
13 There are certain features of a house that
14 need to be looked at. In looking at this, the
15 bottom one, you can see it's simple horizontal
16 siding. It meets a solid wood casing around the
17 window. There's a little bit of detail on the
18 top of the window that's a little head trim
19 there. When you go with the vinyl, you start
20 taking that off or you cover it up and destroy
21 it by taking it off.
22 The materials are not installed in a
23 historic way. When they put the trim on it,
24 it's trim that's designed to mechanically fasten
25 these items. These lesser expensive, these
Diane M.
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50
1 lower quality pieces. That's very different
2 from the way they put together the old houses,
3 and part of that craftsmanship is very important
4 in these structures.
5 You also lose the frieze board, you lose
6 trim under the soffits if you put the vinyl in
7 the -- put the soffit in the cornice, and you're
8 changing the direction of the material. You're
9 putting in a vented or a very cheap-looking
10 product and, again, covering up quality
11 materials that were installed by craftsmen at
12 the time.
13 I'll just pass this one more out. This is
14 one sheet. I should have brought more, but I'll
15 describe it first. This is his building
16 (indicating), and this is a building that was
17 restored in the neighborhood (indicating).
18 And just to show you the difference that
19 you can get, in the restoration of this, the
20 exterior -- there wasn't more than $30,000 that
21 was spent on that, but -- and it could easily be
22 done.
23 He quoted a price, and in that price it --
24 THE CHAIRMAN: Sir, your three minutes are
25 up.
Diane M.
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51
1 MR. LEUTHOLD: Just remember in his price
2 that that was to put cheap materials on there,
3 not quality materials, and it hurts the historic
4 structure.
5 Thank you very much.
6 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
7 Doug Coleman.
8 AUDIENCE MEMBER: I'll waive.
9 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
10 Larry Craven.
11 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Waive.
12 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
13 Your wife.
14 AUDIENCE MEMBER: I waive.
15 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you.
16 Michael O'Connell.
17 AUDIENCE MEMBER: I waive.
18 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
19 Sally Robson.
20 AUDIENCE MEMBER: She's left.
21 THE CHAIRMAN: Let the record show that she
22 was opposed to this as well.
23 Bud Paka.
24 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Opposed.
25 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
Diane M.
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52
1 Let the record show he was opposed.
2 Kevin Kuzel.
3 Kevin is followed by Wayne Wood.
4 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
5 THE CHAIRMAN: I do appreciate all you guys
6 waiving and not being duplicative. That makes
7 this process a lot easier.
8 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
9 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Kevin Kuzel. I live at
11 two blocks away from 1609 King.
12 I've been in
13 years, and I made some notes over here just to
14 kind of sort out what had been said and things I
15 don't need to cover.
16 And one of the things I definitely want to
17 say is my house has had wood siding on it for
18 93 years, and I don't think there's any vinyl
19 siding that's going to last anywhere near that
20 long.
21 Furthermore, I've got a study here, and
22 this is from the Marshall -- or the Haag
23 Engineering Company out of
24 is one -- if you go to the Internet, this is one
25 of many, many studies that has been done by FEMA
Diane M.
Tropia,
53
1 and other engineering firms as well as other
2 government organizations that have shown what
3 hurricane damage and tropical storm damage can
4 do to structures that are clad in vinyl siding,
5 and every study shows the vinyl siding is
6 substandard compared to wood.
7 And we're in a period right now where we've
8 got more hurricanes, more tropical storms than
9 normal, so this is not -- this is not a good
10 answer for storms.
11 Finally, you know, we all in the historic
12 district have to maintain the architectural
13 integrity and heritage of the area, all the
14 property owners. These rules and laws apply to
15 everybody, and I don't think that they should be
16 changed for anybody.
17 Thank you.
18 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
19 Wayne Wood, followed by Louise De
20 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
21 AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Wayne Wood. I
22 live at
23 four-and-a-half blocks from this site.
24 And just by way of qualification, I'm the
25 author of several books on
Diane M.
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54
1 architecture, including
2 Architectural Heritage, which may give some
3 credence to what I have to say.
4 You've heard some very good details that I
5 think speak very straightforward to why this
6 should be defeated. I'd like to take a little
7 bit bigger picture.
8 Riverside Avondale is one of the largest
9 historic districts in the south, perhaps even in
10 the
11 district by the Secretary of State as a resource
12 and a heritage site for the
13
14 As a separate level, the City of
15
16 that recognizes
17 historic district, and the Historic Preservation
18 Commission is our expert that tells us how to
19 safeguard that entity.
20 Now, none of you are architectural
21 historians and so you have to rely on the beauty
22 of consolidation wisdom in appointing
23 commissions to have expertise in this, and the
24 preservation commission has said firmly that
25 allowing vinyl siding on a building is against
Diane M.
Tropia,
55
1 the whole principle of the historic district.
2 Historic districts give value to the city
3 to save our unique resources. And, you know,
4 you can say, well, what is it if just one
5 building gets messed up and is taken out of the
6 historic district's character? Well, that's the
7 way we lose historic districts.
8 I've been working in historic preservation
9 in
10 house go down, be demolished, and the next house
11 go down, and then the whole neighborhood goes
12 down.
13 The whole purpose of the historic district
14 legislation is to protect this very fragile
15 resource. And it is fragile. And if you allow
16 one building to supersede the guidelines that
17 have been set up, have been voted on, they've
18 been set up by the City and the
19 government, which in the historic preservation
20 guidelines is the Secretary of Interior, vinyl
21 siding is not allowed for a very good purpose.
22 Then you will have allowed a toehold into
23 the deterioration of the whole historic
24 district.
25 It is your job -- I hope you feel it is to
Diane M.
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56
1 help protect these valuable resources, and to
2 the good of the community sometimes has to
3 supersede the wishes for shortcuts by
4 individuals that would deteriorate the entire
5 neighborhood.
6 We're living in a world that is so
7 artificial and is plasticized, and here we have
8 a building in a historic district that's the
9 real deal, it's made of wood. There are
10 buildings in
11 200 years old made of wood. That building will
12 be there a long, long time if it's maintained.
13 And your vote against this will ensure that
14 there is no chip in the armor of us trying so
15 very hard to preserve what is valuable to this
16 city, and it has been legislated and appointed
17 as such, and it is our job to try to keep it so
18 that generations from now our historic district
19 will still be intact.
20 Thank you.
21 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
22
Ms. De
23 (Ms. De
24 MS. DE
25 Thank you.
Diane M.
Tropia,
57
1 I'm here representing SPAR and the
2
3 go on record that we also oppose the use of
4 vinyl siding in our district as well. That is
5 officially representing SPAR.
6 From the standpoint of a private citizen
7 who had to take aluminum siding, vinyl siding
8 off of a house that somebody had put on illegal,
9 a house that I now own, the house is beautiful.
10 It covered up all the beautiful historic
11 character of my house because the siding was
12 used.
13 And so I would ask you to please oppose
14 this because it doesn't do anything for the
15 historic value of the house, and I had to pay to
16 have it taken off.
17 Thank you.
18 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, ma'am.
19 That's all the speaker cards I have. If
20 there's nobody else that wants to speak --
21 Mr. Bajalia, I will give you five minutes
22 to rebut, and then we'll close the public
23 hearing.
24 (Mr. Bajalia approaches the podium.)
25 MR. BAJALIA: Five minutes.
Diane M.
Tropia,
58
1 Well, I'd like to thank you again and
2 appreciate the passion of all the folks from the
3 Riverside Avondale Preservation area.
4 I'd like to say that I represent the silent
5 majority.
6 A couple of things that I want to point
7 out: First of all, vinyl siding is the number
8 one siding used on homes in the
9 and I suspect that probably 75 to 80 percent of
10 the people in this room, including all of you,
11 have some aspect of vinyl in your home, whether
12 it's soffit, fascia, or the actual siding.
13 And so I -- while I do respect the past, I
14 don't live in the past, and I don't believe that
15 vinyl siding is low to moderate -- for low- to
16 moderate-priced homes. I don't have a low- to
17 moderate-priced home and I have vinyl soffits
18 and vinyl fascia board on stucco in my home.
19 Number two, one of the speakers referred
20 to -- that the siding was the original
21 structure. I'll point out, this -- this front
22 area here (indicating) was an addition to the
23 home and there's an equal addition in the back
24 of the building as well as another -- another
25 modification on this northwest side of the house
Diane M.
Tropia,
59
1 which is not the original structure, could not
2 possibly be the original structure because there
3 were major additions to the home.
4 And so I'd like to point that out.
5 I'm going to jump through some of these
6 things.
7 I don't think the hurricane argument was
8 relevant because we're going to apply it to the
9 existing structure. We're not going to replace
10 the existing structure. And this is not a
11 mobile home, which I think is what the
12 implication was.
13 First time -- I do understand it's the
14 first time it's done. And I, once again,
15 respect the fact that the -- all these people
16 stood up and agreed to -- or stating the case to
17 keep it as it is and therefore spend my money.
18 I don't -- I haven't found a price to their
19 price. I'm very interested in a grant to do
20 what they've asked me to do. But it just
21 doesn't make economic sense, and I'm a business
22 person, an investment person, and so it just
23 doesn't make economic sense what they're
24 saying. And, therefore, if a grant is available
25 to me, I'll take it and be happy to consider
Diane M.
Tropia,
60
1 what they're asking for.
2 As far as other locations not allowing
3 vinyl siding, I disagree with that, completely
4 disagree with that, and will provide you a
5 handout of the cities that have allowed siding
6 in homes in historic areas.
7 With respect to the value position that it
8 impacts or negatively impacts the value of the
9 house, I'll provide you another handout that
10 shows the houses with vinyl siding on it that --
11 and the comparable homes nearby that are either
12 equally -- some are a little -- some of them are
13 higher priced, some are lower priced, but for
14 the most part there's -- the majority of them,
15 the value of the vinyl or aluminum is higher.
16 And when I speak of value, I speak of value
17 as provided by the City of
18 appraiser's office, the market value.
19 Okay. Other cities that are not on that
20 list are
21 believe you did get something from the
22 Vinyl Siding Institute on; and Buckhead, in
23
24 With respect to the precedent, in all due
25 respect, you know, times do change. I mean,
Diane M.
Tropia,
61
1 tomorrow we're going to have an election and
2 we're going to have a precedent-setting election
3 on -- whether it be a vice president or a
4 presidential candidate.
5 So it's just -- it's just -- if something
6 makes sense and it's happening all throughout
7 the country, just because one building that's in
8 a commercial area that's not in a residential
9 historic area as appointed in the zoning overlay
10 map, to me, it doesn't make sense that this is
11 not being considered since it is in a commercial
12 area, and that I could be, you know, hamstrung
13 to spend any money on the property. And,
14 therefore, it's going to look more like this
15 (indicating) in the next three to five years.
16 Once again, very interested in a grant if
17 that's available to me.
18 I disagree completely with the -- for the
19 point that it's toxic. Once again, number one
20 siding product in the
21 therefore, if it is toxic, every one of us ought
22 to be considered with that.
23 One last point. The guidelines -- if
24 that's okay, Mr. Chairman.
25 THE CHAIRMAN: Sure.
Diane M.
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62
1 MR. BAJALIA: I was not disagreeing that I
2 should have a precedent because I've owned the
3 building since the guidelines. What I'm saying
4 is the buildings here (indicating) are each
5 ten years -- at least ten years old with a
6 product that's -- a siding product that's on
7 there, except for my rendering here, and they
8 all look much better than my building.
9 Once again, thank you for your time and
10 everybody's time tonight.
11 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
12 We will close the public hearing.
13 And, Mr. Bajalia, I'll tell you, we allow
14 vinyl siding at the beach if you want to move
15 your house out there.
16 MR. BAJALIA: I know you do.
17 THE CHAIRMAN: Let's go with -- let's go
18 with staff.
19 MR. TEAL: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
20 Through the Chair to the committee, this is
21 an application that was actually three items.
22 Mr. Bajalia got two out of the three that he
23 wanted as it relates to this structure. The
24 third item was the vinyl siding, which you've
25 heard about today.
Diane M.
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63
1 And, obviously, you've heard from
2 representatives of both historic districts and
3 the impact that the granting of this application
4 would have on the contributing structures in
5 those historic districts.
6 Also, you've heard that the primary reason
7 for the formation -- and I'm sure Councilmember
8 Corrigan can testify to that since he was one of
9 the driving forces behind the creation of the
10 Riverside Avondale historic district -- was the
11 application of vinyl siding to structures such
12 as these.
13 Mr. Bajalia pointed out several examples of
14 where vinyl siding had been applied to
15 structures, and he admits that those all
16 occurred prior to the 1998 formation of the
17 Riverside Avondale historic district. There has
18 never been an application approved in either
19 historic district since their creation that
20 would approve what he is proposing.
21 In fact, of the 32 applications that were
22 processed for certificates of appropriateness,
23 eleven of those were to actually remove the
24 vinyl siding, six of them were to repair the
25 vinyl siding, and the remainder were to try and
Diane M.
Tropia,
64
1 get vinyl siding, which were all universally
2 denied by the commission.
3 Not only that, the City Council has had one
4 appeal of a vinyl siding in 2000, and that
5 appeal was upheld. The commission's decision to
6 deny the vinyl siding was upheld by the City
7 Council.
8 So the precedent before the City of
9
10 use in the historic districts.
11 Mr. Bajalia made a lot of comments about
12 how the folks were seemingly wanting to spend
13 his money and that he was seeking a grant. It's
14 funny that he would mention that because, in
15 essence, what the reason, in large part, for why
16 we're here is because he hasn't spent any
17 money. He's owned the building for 27 years,
18 and the reason it's in the condition that it's
19 in is because of deferred maintenance of
20 patchwork repairs and of Band-Aid applications
21 since he's owned it.
22 So, in large part, the 25 -- the 27 years
23 that he's owned this building, the reason why
24 it's in such bad shape is because of the fact
25 that he himself hasn't put any money into it in
Diane M.
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65
1 order to upkeep the building.
2 He brought up the fact that all of these
3 governments, local governments have -- have
4 approved this vinyl siding for use in their
5 historic districts. Well, it's interesting that
6 he would bring that up because staff called
7 every single one of those local governments, if
8 they exist. Three or four of them don't even
9 exist. But every single one of them,
10 universally, 100 percent, do not allow vinyl
11 siding in the historic districts in the manner
12 in which he's proposing it.
13 So to make the argument that local
14 governments across the country are using vinyl
15 siding, flying in the face of Secretary of
16 Interior reports that they've done of all of the
17 reports, as testified by one of the speakers
18 today as a historic preservationist/architect in
19
20 that none of these would have approved the vinyl
21 siding as he's alleging.
22 He said the rules changed in 1998. The
23 rules didn't change; they just became rules.
24 That's when the historic district was formed.
25 Every property owner was allowed to vote on the
Diane M.
Tropia,
66
1 creation of the historic district. It was a
2 democratic process. The ownership of all the
3 properties overwhelmingly supported the
4 formation of the historic district.
5 Not only that, but the University of
6
7 study in 2006 as to what's the economic reality
8 of creation of a historic district and
9 maintaining of a historic district across the
10 state of
11 Universally they have found that where
12 historic districts were created and property
13 regulations were in place to maintain the
14 historic characteristics of those neighborhoods,
15 every single one of those -- every single one of
16 those entities, the historic districts have
17 shown an increase in property value.
18 So property values have increased because
19 of the fact that historic districts are in place
20 and because property owners can know what they
21 can expect from their neighbors in that they
22 know what's going to be allowed and what's not
23 going to be allowed.
24 Any vinyl siding, again, that's existing in
25 historic districts was either done illegally or
Diane M.
Tropia,
67
1 was done prior to the formation of those
2 historic districts. There's never been an
3 application approved to do that.
4 HPC has never approved -- the Historic
5 Preservation Commission has never approved the
6 use of vinyl siding to replace wood siding.
7 And he made the argument that including
8 vinyl siding makes it cheaper to maintain and
9 makes it more durable. You've heard a lot of
10 testimony tonight about how that's just simply
11 not true, and I think the clearest example of
12 that is the gentleman who spoke that said he's
13 got the same wood siding on his house for
14 96 years.
15 So to say that vinyl siding is easier to
16 maintain, it's more durable, it's longer lasting
17 is not proven by, you know, the reality that
18 exists in historic districts.
19 Finally, he points out that because he is a
20 commercial structure that -- or he wants to
21 become a commercial structure that he ought to
22 be allowed to do this. I would point out that
23 if he does do this with a commercial use, he is
24 going to be giving up federal tax credits and
25 property tax exemptions.
Diane M.
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68
1 Commercial properties that maintain their
2 historic features are -- you know, have federal
3 tax credits available to them if they were to
4 apply for them. If you destroy that historic
5 fabric, if you pave over that historic fabric,
6 those tax credits are very unlikely to be
7 granted.
8 And, finally, I think the last point is
9 with regard to his estimates for the cost to
10 repair the vinyl siding and the wood siding. He
11 quoted $50,000 to do the wood and $22,000 to do
12 the vinyl, but I think it is important to look
13 at the evidence that's actually out there in
14 his -- in his estimates.
15 He's including in his $50,000 figure wiring
16 inside and out, removing air-conditioning --
17 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Teal, you're being
18 duplicative.
19 MR. TEAL: Okay.
20 THE CHAIRMAN: We've heard that.
21 MR. TEAL: With that, Mr. Chairman, I will
22 wrap up and request that the decision and the
23 past decisions by the Historic Preservation
24 Commission and this council be followed and that
25 the application and the appeal be denied.
Diane M.
Tropia,
69
1 Thank you.
2 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
3 Mr. Corrigan.
4 MR. CORRIGAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
5 I didn't know if I'd ever get a chance to
6 talk. I appreciate it.
7 A couple of things. To the committee, one,
8 I appreciate your patience during this appeal.
9 Nobody likes appeals. They're very
10 frustrating. I don't like them. We try to get
11 our different committees and councils to try to
12 help us out to get -- save some of this work, so
13 I apologize in advance about taking so much time
14 to allow -- to do this tonight.
15 There's really three basic points that you
16 need to be considering. One is vinyl siding has
17 never been allowed in any historic district in
18
19 residents, the neighborhood association and the
20 businesses all which confirm that.
21 Number two is we're talking about the law
22 here. These are not ideas that we think ought
23 to be done or something else. This is an
24 ordinance that was passed by this council back
25 in 1997, '98, and became law.
Diane M.
Tropia,
70
1 It's -- to be -- using a couple of
2 analogies for you. If you live in a
3 neighborhood that has covenants and restrictions
4 and one of them is that you can't have a
5 motorhome parked in your yard and you buy a
6 motorhome and want to park it there, you don't
7 have that choice. You can't park it there.
8 It's against the law. You have to -- you'd have
9 to park it where you can.
10 But this is a little more stricter since
11 this is actually a law. This isn't a covenant
12 and restriction. It's more like a one-way
13 street you go down and it's much easier and
14 faster and less gas for you to turn the opposite
15 way on a one-way street because you can
16 accomplish that faster, but you can't do it
17 because it's against the law.
18 In this case, he's asking to do something
19 that's against the law and shouldn't be allowed
20 to be done.
21 And it's interesting, much of the
22 conversation you've heard during this discussion
23 tonight, terms used by the applicant, who has
24 done a great job trying -- we're trying to find
25 compromise between him and I and the
Diane M.
Tropia,
71
1 neighborhood, and there just isn't one here.
2 He spoke a great deal about cost
3 effective. He talked about low maintenance
4 cost. He talked about the fact he'll have to
5 continue to repair and replace the siding. He
6 said that cost is much less. It's half the
7 cost. He said he's willing to look into the
8 grant process. He said it's the number one
9 siding used in the
10 He never said that this is an economic
11 hardship, that he has an economic hardship. And
12 one of the things you need to consider when you
13 consider allowing something like this to happen
14 is, is it an economic hardship on the applicant
15 to be able to do this? And I don't believe
16 that's the case here. And even if it was, you
17 really would be setting a precedent.
18 You think this appeal is long and tenuous
19 and it's taking a lot of your time tonight, if
20 you allow this one, you're going to have dozens
21 of them coming behind him to do it because
22 they're going to say it's a cheaper way to do
23 it. So it's just not the wrong way to go, it's
24 not what the people in this area bought in this
25 area and continue to buy in this area for.
Diane M.
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72
1 They're there because they want to avoid vinyl
2 siding on the sides of their houses.
3 I know there's a whole bunch of cities that
4 allow vinyl siding on a house.
5
6 that allows vinyl siding, and I think it should.
7 But my house, I painted it three years
8 ago. It's all wood. I don't have any vinyl.
9 Unlike the applicant, I don't have any vinyl on
10 my house. It's now been three years and I'm
11 getting ready to paint it all over again.
12 Should I strip every piece of paint off and
13 start over? I could get vinyl siding and apply
14 to do it if I really wanted to go through that
15 process that Mr. Bajalia has had to do.
16 But you know what? When I bought my house
17 five years ago, I knew I was going to have to do
18 it every three to five years. And it's kind of
19 a pride of ownership that I do that. And
20 there's thousands of people that are doing that
21 in the historic districts in
22 they understand it.
23 So while I sympathize with Mr. Bajalia and
24 while I do want him to continue to fix up this
25 property, I will tell you that I cannot and I
Diane M.
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73
1 urge you not to support his appeal because it
2 will cast a dangerous precedent, and you will --
3 as I said earlier, you will see many more of
4 these in the historic district that I fought so
5 hard to create back in 1997 will become eroded
6 at a much faster pace than we have restored it.
7 So thank you.
8 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Mr. Corrigan.
9 I don't have anybody else in the queue.
10 MR. WEBB: Move to deny.
11 THE CHAIRMAN: It's been moved to deny.
12 DR. GAFFNEY: Second.
13 THE CHAIRMAN: It's been moved and seconded
14 to deny the appeal.
15 Any discussion on the amendment?
16 Mr. Joost.
17 MR. JOOST: Mr. Bajalia, I'd like to ask
18 you a question.
19 MR. BAJALIA: Yes, sir.
20 MR. JOOST: First of all, thanks for coming
21 down.
22 And I found your arguments somewhat
23 persuasive, but after I had left your location
24 when we had our meeting there, I actually did
25 some research on vinyl, and what I'd found
Diane M.
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74
1 out -- I'm trying to find the exact thing it
2 says.
3 What concerned me is during my research on
4 the Internet, it said, unlike wood and masonry,
5 vinyl siding presents its own breed of
6 maintenance worries: Moisture trapped beneath
7 the vinyl will accelerate rot, promote mold,
8 mildew, and invite insect infestation.
9 Left uncorrected, dampness in the walls
10 will cause wallpaper, paint -- blah, blah,
11 blah -- to blister and peel. To avoid hidden
12 decay, you will want to frequently recaulk
13 joints between the vinyl siding and adjacent
14 trim.
15 And then it talks about leaks, faulty
16 gutters, and other sources of moisture which
17 would cause extra repairs in the vinyl if not --
18 your attention was not brought to it
19 immediately.
20 Would you like to rebut? Is there any way
21 you can rebut that?
22 MR. BAJALIA: Well, the -- there's a --
23 there's a program certification process for
24 installers to properly -- certified installers,
25 of which I intend to use, to install the product
Diane M.
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75
1 in the proper manner. And I think that that in
2 itself would prevent some of the issues that you
3 pointed out. Plus, it's also recommended that
4 the vinyl siding is cleaned and pressure-washed
5 once a year.
6 And I think that that would -- I have some
7 other -- another property with vinyl siding, and
8 I do that once a year to prevent any mildew
9 or -- on the building on the siding, and that's
10 why it's preventive.
11 I haven't experienced it. I've prevented
12 it from happening, and so that would be -- that
13 would be my response to that, sir.
14 MR. JOOST: Okay. And then there was one
15 other thing that I was reading where it said, if
16 you had to put vinyl siding on, that you would
17 have to replace a lot of the historic features
18 on most older buildings.
19 Can you rebut that?
20 MR. BAJALIA: Yeah. The -- one of the
21 handouts that I provided you was architectural
22 millwork and trim accessories for -- that are
23 used in historic districts, and I guess the
24 cities -- the cities that were provided to me by
25 the trade association and the manufacturers of
Diane M.
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76
1 the product.
2 MR. JOOST: Okay. And then one last thing
3 that concerned me also regarding durability. It
4 says vinyl is less durable than wood and
5 masonry. Vinyl -- wind can get underneath the
6 thin sheets of vinyl siding and lift the panel
7 from the wall. Wind-blown debris and strong
8 hail can puncture vinyl.
9 Can you rebut that?
10 MR. BAJALIA: Well, this product will be
11 applied to the current structure. It's not
12 going to be replacing the current structure, so
13 I'm not going to tear down -- I don't intend to
14 tear down the wood siding. But as far as
15 puncture, it's a vinyl product. So if somebody
16 wants to puncture it, I suspect they can, as
17 they probably could wood.
18 MR. JOOST: All right. Thank you.
19 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. Anybody else on the
20 amendment?
21 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: (No response.)
22 THE CHAIRMAN: Seeing none, all in favor
23 say aye.
24 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: Aye.
25 THE CHAIRMAN: Those opposed.
Diane M.
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1 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: (No response.)
2 THE CHAIRMAN: By your action, you've
3 amended this to deny the appeal.
4 MR. WEBB: Move the bill as amended to deny
5 the appeal.
6 MR. HOLT: Second.
7 THE CHAIRMAN: The bill's been moved and
8 seconded as amended.
9 Any discussion on the bill?
10 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: (No response.)
11 THE CHAIRMAN: Seeing none, please open the
12 ballot.
13 (Committee ballot opened.)
14 MR. GRAHAM: (Votes yea.)
15 MR. JOOST: (Votes yea.)
16 MR. GAFFNEY: (Votes yea.)
17 MR. HOLT: (Votes yea.)
18 MR. REDMAN: (Votes yea.)
19 MR. WEBB: (Votes yea.)
20 THE CHAIRMAN: Close the ballot and record
21 the vote.
22 (Committee ballot closed.)
23 MS. LAHMEUR: Six yeas, zero nays.
24 THE CHAIRMAN: By your action, you have
25 denied the appeal 2007-1350.
Diane M.
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1 MR. CORRIGAN: Mr. Chairman, thank you very
2 much. I appreciate the committee's patience.
3 THE CHAIRMAN: Is that it, Mr. Corrigan?
4 MR. CORRIGAN: That is it, sir. Thank you.
5 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir, for
6 visiting.
7 Mr. Bishop, welcome.
8 MR. BISHOP: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
9 THE CHAIRMAN: You had something that you
10 wanted to bring up.
11 MR. BISHOP: Yes, sir. It's item 39,
12 2008-857.
13 THE CHAIRMAN: Council members, page 12,
14 2009-857 [sic].
15 Would you like to start or should I just
16 open and close the public hearing for you?
17 MR. BISHOP: Go ahead. You can go ahead
18 and take it in normal course. That would be
19 fine, Mr. Graham.
20 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. We will open the
21 public hearing of 2008-857.
22 Mr. Hainline.
23 (Mr. Hainline approaches the podium.)
24 MR. HAINLINE: Mr. Chairman, my name is
25 T.R. Hainline,
Diane M.
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1 I'm here representing Gate Petroleum.
2 This is a transmittal of a land use
3 amendment in the area where
4 the Wonderwood Expressway --
5 slash, the Wonderwood Expressway intersects with
6
7 This amendment involves a proposed
8 redevelopment at that intersection, specifically
9 the demolition of an existing older gas station,
10 convenience store and strip center at one site,
11 then placing that site in the conservation land
12 use category and donating it to the City as park
13 and greenspace, and then the construction of a
14 new gas station and convenience store with
15 substantial design controls and buffers at a
16 retention pond site that is owned by the JTA
17 across the street.
18 The idea of this redevelopment at this site
19 arose several years ago as a result of the JTA's
20 planned improvements on the Wonderwood
21 Expressway.
22 This proposal has been the subject of
23 numerous community meetings. Gate received
24 positive feedback in the initial meetings, and
25 so it proceeded with the next steps, which is
Diane M.
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1 this land use amendment of the JTA pond site,
2 some preliminary designs, and then continued
3 meetings with the area residents regarding the
4 design and various conditions.
5 We've moved from concept to specific
6 design. And as we've done so, questions and
7 concerns have arisen specifically and
8 particularly about the JTA's clearing of the
9 site. The site was once wooded and it has been
10 cleared for the JTA's pond construction there at
11 the site.
12 Gate has been addressed -- asked to address
13 not only issues of design controls and buffers
14 for its convenience store -- the proposed
15 convenience store, but also buffering and
16 security and maintenance for the JTA pond.
17 We're making every attempt to address these
18 issues. And even though we're only at
19 transmittal, we're essentially -- we have
20 PUD-ready plans and conditions here that we're
21 ready to propose that deal with both the JTA
22 pond and with the convenience store. We've
23 proposed those conditions there in the booklet
24 that I have passed out.
25 This is a step in a long process, and we
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1 ask only that you approve this transmittal so we
2 can continue that process, continue our
3 discussions with the neighbors, with Councilman
4 Bishop, with the Planning department; and then,
5 of course, adoption of a plan -- a consideration
6 of adoption of a plan amendment and a PUD would
7 come up in February.
8 But these discussions and this possible
9 redevelopment and the positives of it, which
10 involve land -- parkland on both sides of the
11 road -- possible parkland on both sides of the
12 road, the positives of this cannot continue and
13 these discussions cannot continue without
14 approving this transmittal tonight.
15 We have -- I'm pretty much through with
16 what I'm going to say, but we have some others
17 coming up. Jim Robinson is going to talk some
18 about traffic conflicts at the existing site,
19 Drew Frick will give you some history of this
20 particular issue, and then Ken Wilson will go
21 through the specific conditions. And we're all
22 here to answer any questions when they're
23 through.
24 Thank you.
25 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Mr. Hainline.
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1 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
2 Jim, welcome.
3 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
4 Jim Robinson. My address is 6500 Bowden
5 Road,
6 I was asked to evaluate this site, both the
7 existing store location in the triangle area, as
8 well as its proposed relocated site across the
9 street.
10 And in the third page of your little
11 booklet on this matter is an aerial photograph
12 that shows this, and one of the things that I
13 would briefly characterize as the difference
14 between before and after is the nature of -- and
15 number of traffic conflicts that exist.
16 Today, the -- in the condition where the
17 Gate store is located, traffic that is coming
18 from the west headed east, in order to enter the
19 store location --
20 THE CHAIRMAN: Jim, can I get you to flip
21 that over so north is on top? You kind of
22 weirded me out.
23 MR. ROBINSON: Okay.
24 THE CHAIRMAN: Thanks.
25 MR. ROBINSON: I'll leave that alone.
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1 Anyway, the -- now you've got me flipped
2 out.
3 So we've got from the west to east and --
4 for traffic to enter the store location, this
5 entering off of McCormick has to actually make a
6 U-turn at the location into a driveway that is
7 very close to the intersection of this little
8 cross-street here (indicating) or
9 cross-connection between
10 McCormick.
11 Looking at this location during peak
12 periods, both in the morning and the afternoon,
13 that causes a lot of extra conflict coupled with
14 traffic that's coming from
15 back to the west on McCormick with the very
16 short distance from the intersection to the
17 driveway. Actually, even this afternoon a
18 couple of near-miss rear-end collisions were
19 witnessed.
20 If the location of the store is over at the
21 proposed site, then access is controlled in a
22 very standard, signalized intersection,
23 something that drivers are comfortable with
24 negotiating and expect to -- as they would come
25 and go.
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1 The other point about the site as it exists
2 today -- it is true that the Gate station
3 portion of the site is expected to have
4 additional fueling stations in the new
5 configuration. And presumably if it were to
6 stay and be redeveloped in the triangle, it
7 would -- it would want to have those additional
8 fueling positions as well.
9 So it's likely that the after condition
10 will, in fact, be an increase of traffic and
11 that will be dealt with during concurrency, but
12 that would only exacerbate the problem in the
13 triangle area if there was more traffic there.
14 It would be much safer to be in the proposed
15 location.
16 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
17 Drew.
18 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
19 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Drew Frick with Gate
20 Petroleum Company,
21
22 I want to tell you a little bit about the
23 history of this process because we've been
24 working on it over four years.
25 But before I start that, I wanted to make
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1 it clear what we're not doing, and that is Gate
2 has not done any clearing on the site.
3 Everything that has occurred to date is the
4 JTA. They are working on a retention pond for
5 that site. That will go forward regardless of
6 what happens with this transmittal and what
7 happens with this Gate station.
8 You've heard of the impacts from that. You
9 will hear of the impacts from that. You've
10 heard of the impacts to the triangle parcel.
11 And what we did four years ago is we went to the
12 community with an idea and a plan to try to
13 offset some of those impacts and really come up
14 with a community plan for this area and an
15 overall improvement to the area, and what that
16 involved and what evolved from that process was
17 taking the existing uses on the entire triangle
18 parcel -- there's both the Gate station as well
19 as a strip center. Those are outdated, 40 years
20 old or so, and certainly in need of improvement.
21 And what we have committed to do is to
22 close, remove, and demolish those existing uses;
23 to clean the site; donate it to the City in a
24 clean, clear state; place it in conservation to
25 prevent any future development of that site,
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1 which will certainly address the traffic impacts
2 that we just heard of; as well as create a
3 greenspace area and really a better front door
4 for the community as a whole.
5 Along with that, we worked on the retention
6 pond site with the JTA. Originally, it had the
7 rectangular-shaped pond that you see all over
8 town. That was reshaped to be a more
9 curvilinear-type design, hopefully more
10 aesthetically appealing to the community.
11 And in doing that, we're also able to
12 create another -- a second greenspace area that
13 we will donate to the City as well. And that is
14 here (indicating), adjacent to Buck Park and the
15 Holly Oaks Community Club.
16 So the first big benefit is, obviously, the
17 greenspace areas that are created along
18 Wonderwood Expressway to help alleviate some of
19 the impacts that are already there and deal with
20 the traffic safety issues that occur in and
21 around the triangle parcel.
22 We worked on relocating the Gate site
23 across the road. This is a four-way lighted
24 interchange, so safety is also a big reason for
25 doing that. And then here recently, we have
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1 worked with Councilman Bishop on creating a
2 site-specific store, and his charge to us was to
3 create a residential-looking convenience store.
4 And if you flip through the packets that
5 you have, you'll see some of the details of that
6 architecture, and we've certainly gone to great
7 lengths to try to create a residential-looking
8 store.
9 And in a minute, Ken Wilson will come up
10 here and tell you about some specific conditions
11 that we've also worked on with regards to that
12 store. One big one is that we have committed to
13 maintaining this lake. And if you look in your
14 books, you'll also see some pictures of not only
15 the rectangular ponds that the JTA uses -- they
16 have so many ponds that at times they get a
17 little overlooked as far as maintenance.
18 And there's some pictures in that store of
19 our
20 pond in it that we maintain. And having us
21 there on the site to maintain that pond will
22 improve the quality of that site.
23 So we believe, from a community
24 perspective, we've created some public use areas
25 to offset the impacts, aesthetic controls,
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1 conditions on the actual use as well as improve
2 the safety by relocating to a lighted
3 interchange.
4 I'll let Mr. Wilson come up here and tell
5 you a little bit about the conditions we've
6 worked out with the specific neighbors in the
7 community to address their impacts.
8 Thank you very much.
9 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Drew.
10 Ken.
11 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
12 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
13 My name is Ken Wilson, 3929 Charter House
14 Drive.
15 You've heard the history, you've heard
16 we've come through four years. We haven't come
17 through four years because it's been road
18 blocked. It's just been a lot to accomplish in
19 four years.
20 As we get to this point in our history, we
21 have tried to address each of the concerns of
22 the adjoining residents. We're still working
23 our way through some of those. We also have
24 tried to address some of the common sense
25 concerns that you'd address in any situation
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1 like this.
2 I'd like to cover those with you if I can.
3 A list of these are in the back of your booklet
4 you have. There's also sort of a bullet list of
5 the 13 conditions back there that summarize
6 them.
7 The first one is to place the triangle
8 properties in conservation land use. You heard
9 that. That's pretty self-explanatory. That
10 would be done before we operate this store. We
11 cannot open the doors on the store without that
12 happening.
13 Donate the clean triangle property to the
14 City. We would be responsible for all cleanup,
15 along with JTA, of the existing facilities, the
16 fish market, the dry cleaners and the Gate
17 station on the property. We do all the
18 environmental cleanup and site clearing.
19 Limitation of use under neighborhood
20 commercial. What we're proposing is the land
21 use change and ultimate zoning would only allow
22 for a convenience store operation such as a Gate
23 store on this site. No other commercial use or
24 any other use would be allowed.
25 Access to McCormick was an issue with the
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1 Holly Oaks Community Club. We addressed that.
2 We removed the access drive to McCormick -- to
3
the
4 access will be solely to the McCormick
5 right-of-way, which is now the Wonderwood
6 Expressway, at the signalized intersection and
7 possibly a right in, right out as depicted on
8 the site plan.
9 Architectural controls. Those are pretty
10 self-explanatory. You've seen the quality of
11 what we'll do. Those will specifically be
12 attached as depicted. This isn't we're going to
13 build it somewhat like this (indicating). We'll
14 build it like you see it as depicted.
15 The buffers around the store. The store
16 will have a 50-foot natural buffer along the
17 western property line abutting residential. It
18 will have a 25-foot landscape buffer along the
19 southern property line abutting the lake, which
20 is still several hundred feet before you get to
21 the southern property line of the JTA property
22 as depicted on the site plan.
23 Limitation on store hours. The operations
24 of the store will be limited to 6:00 a.m. to
25 11:00 p.m. Deliveries, dumpster service will be
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1 limited to 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Limitations
2 on lighting controls and on lighting design,
3 we've already gone through some specifications
4 with Councilman Bishop. We're working on an LED
5 light system that would be recessed. There
6 would be no sort of lighting visible such as
7 this to any of the adjoining neighbors. You'd
8 have to be directly under the canopy to see the
9 light source.
10 Our parking lot lighting would be handled
11 the same way in some of the areas around where
12 there's parking. There would be no visible
13 light sources. And LED, if you're familiar with
14 that, is a lower intensity lighting.
15 Location and screening of dumpsters. That
16 has been moved to the eastern property, away
17 from residential, and will be screened with
18 construction materials similar to the building
19 itself. A buffer around the JTA pond -- an
20 additional 25-foot buffer will be placed around
21 the JTA pond.
22 Security fencing provided around the entire
23 property, securing the site from vagrants.
24 Maintenance of the JTA pond is on Gate Petroleum
25 Company. We will maintain it.
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1 There's a couple of pictures in that
2 brochure also of a typical JTA pond on
3 Wonderwood --
4 THE CHAIRMAN: Ken.
5 MR. WILSON: -- currently built and
6 established. You see what is typical of the
7 Transportation Authority's maintenance. I'm not
8 picking on JTA.
9 There's also a picture of the
10 retention pond that has JTA water in it --
11 THE CHAIRMAN: Ken.
12 MR. WILSON: -- from the interchange that
13 we maintain.
14 THE CHAIRMAN: Your time is up.
15 MR. WILSON: Okay.
16 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay. The next speaker is
17 John Fox, followed by Dianne Wiles.
18 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
19 AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is John Fox. I
20 reside at
21
22 Thank you committee, chairman, and members
23 for the opportunity to speak today. I'm a
24 resident of the Laudonniere neighborhood, and I
25 am objecting to ordinance 2008-857 for the
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1 purpose of relocating the Gate gas station on
2 the south side of
3 I have a list of items I'm entering in the
4 public record tonight, which are being given to
5 you right now.
6 On page 1 is a June 2nd, 2006, letter to
7 St. Johns River Water Management District in
8 opposition to JTA's request for pond number 6
9 redesign for the purpose of making the parcel of
10 land a residential low density attractive for
11 commercial development.
12 On page 2 of the letter shows JTA pond
13 number 6 design plan with a new Gate facility
14 included on this, and this is dated 2006.
15 Next on page 5 is a letter dated
16 September 25, 2006, to Mike Saylor, director of
17 Planning and Development --
18 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Fox, can I get you to
19 slow down just a little bit. It's kind of hard
20 for our court reporter to keep up when you're
21 reading something.
22 MR. FOX: Sure.
23 -- which expressed our neighborhood's
24 concerns with JTA's pond redesign in order to
25 prepare the parcel of residential low density
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1 land for relocation of the Gate station or a
2 commercial development without having to go
3 through the land use change process, which shows
4 disregard for preserving the current residential
5 land use and assumes that the land use change to
6 neighborhood commercial is a done deal before
7 the process is even started.
8 On page 8 and 9, our supporting technical
9 staff report comments evidencing commercial
10 development intent by JTA, which we feel
11 undermines
12 Development process.
13 On page 11 is our objection to support in
14 detail, which, in summary, notes the proposed
15 ordinance is inconsistent with several elements
16 of the 2010 comprehensive plan. One of -- the
17 Wonderwood connector corridor land use and
18 zoning study dated April 2002 and adopted by the
19 City Council, the neighborhood commercial land
20 use category definition, and it generates
21 several community safety concerns.
22 On page 14 are comments addressing the
23 staff report for the Planning Commission.
24 On page 18 is a CPAC opposition letter.
25 On page 20 is the Greater
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1 Council opposition letter.
2 On page 22 are petitions with 34
3 Laudonniere neighbors' signatures in opposition
4 to ordinance 2008-857 and the proposed
5 relocation of the Gate station, which are
6 represented by the shaded area that's on your
7 screens in the neighborhood.
8 The only one is the pie slice in the
9 middle, and that was the letter that is in
10 Gates' package.
11 In addition, starting on page 48 are
12 several miscellaneous letters of objection over
13 the past three years.
14 This is just a bad thing for the
15 neighborhood. We do not want it.
16 And we thank you very much.
17 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
18 Ms. Wiles followed, by Mr. Hawkins.
19 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
20 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good evening.
21 Dianne Wiles, 10663 [sic], 32225.
22 I'm passing out a couple of handouts. The
23 first one I'd like to go over is the stipulated,
24 amended, and restated taking of this land. I
25 really just want to go over item number 6, which
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1 is on page number 3, and it states, "The
2
3 that any use or conveyance of the surplus land
4 will be limited and restricted to those uses
5 currently permitted either by right or by
6 special exception under the existing land use
7 designation of low density residential in either
8 the primary or secondary zoning districts,
9 except those uses as follows: any uses
10 consisting of adult entertainment, services" --
11 and it goes on to say what is not allowed on
12 this land.
13 This is an eminent domain case. I don't
14 even know if this is legal. I know there was a
15 law passed this year -- actually in 2006, saying
16 you can't take surplus land and convey it over
17 to commercial enterprise or a private person, so
18 I think a little bit of research needs to be put
19 into that.
20 Also, when this was from -- this is from --
21 I'll submit this for the record (indicating); I
22 didn't have time to make enough copies -- from
23 John T. Davis to the development committee to
24 recommend that the board authorize for this to
25 go through.
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1 And one of the paragraphs he says,
2 "Additionally, the City desires to have the site
3 currently occupied by the Gate station in the
4 JTA-owned commercial building to be cleared."
5 I'm not sure who initiated this from the City.
6 That sounds a little different.
7 But anyway, to the pictures, I just wanted
8 to go over a little bit with the pictures just
9 to kind of show you up close and personal what's
10 going on here.
11 JTA actually only took five feet of the
12 Gate property where they currently are. They
13 redesigned the road and moved it behind the Gate
14 gas station and took most of the property from
15 the post office that's behind there.
16 The Gate gas station has been there for
17 20 years. That's where the community accepts
18 it. It is totally surrounded by roads. Once
19 everything opens back up,
20 open, Wonderwood. They'll have an entrance on
21 each side and they could actually demolish the
22 unsightly strip center that's there and have
23 three entrances. And they don't abut any
24 residential property where they are now, and it
25 functions just fine.
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1 The applicant has stated that it's not
2 functional. I go in and out of that shopping
3 center. It functions just fine.
4 A lot to get in in three minutes, five
5 years of history. I apologize.
6 Number 2 is another view of the existing
7 Gate gas station showing the JTA surplus land
8 there in the triangle which they could turn over
9 to Gate or sell to Gate -- I don't know what
10 would be proper -- so that Gate could expand and
11 add more gas pumps there. Of course, you
12 wouldn't be able to have a 16-pump gas station
13 which they're proposing across the street.
14 There's a lot of information here and not
15 enough time to do it in three minutes, but I do
16 greatly appreciate your time and the careful
17 consideration to the legality of this.
18 Thank you.
19 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Dianne.
20 Lad, followed by Karen Finnell.
21 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
22 AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Lad Hawkins.
23 I live at
24 I'm the president of the Greater
25 Civic Council. I'm on the
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1 Zoning Committee, and I'm a past president of
2 the Holly Oaks Community Club adjacent to this
3 proposed gas station site.
4 Both the Greater
5 and the CPAC have unanimously opposed this for
6 years. Now, how anybody can come up here and
7 say that this is something that this community
8 wants -- I've been to two community meetings
9 where there were a couple hundred people and
10 everybody there opposed it, so I'm not seeing
11 any people that think this is a great idea.
12 Gate needs to stay right where they are.
13 Right now they have a piece of land that is
14 about an acre. They're taking 2,160 feet off of
15 that, which is only 4.9 percent. This is a
16 tiny, little strip.
17 Under our zoning code, when eminent domain
18 is involved, you can actually get a waiver for
19 your setback, your 10-foot landscape from the
20 road because it's eminent domain, so they could
21 have the same exact area they have now.
22 In addition to that, JTA owns the fish
23 market and the cleaners, which is a chunk out of
24 this property, which JTA has offered to give to
25 Gate. This adds another 12,506 square feet,
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1 giving Gate 1.28 acres in that triangle that
2 they could develop a nice gas station.
3 JTA has worked very hard to move this
4 roadway over into the post office property so
5 that the Gate property is virtually untouched,
6 and there's no reason why they cannot stay where
7 they are.
8 The traffic here -- in their analysis, they
9 say that there's so many square feet of building
10 now and there's so many square feet later.
11 That's all good and well, but they're going from
12 four pumps to sixteen pumps. And the traffic is
13 going to increase from 312 to 360 percent. It's
14 a huge increase in traffic that's going to occur
15 on this piece of property above and beyond what
16 was in that triangle before.
17 This is not appropriate. It's spot
18 zoning. And, as such, the Wonderwood corridor
19 study very clearly states that this is a -- this
20 is something that will set a domino effect. And
21 once you approve a land use, a gas station in
22 low density residential, then somebody down the
23 road is going to come in and ask for the same
24 thing and we're not going to be able to tell
25 them no.
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1 The whole reason we had the Planning
2 Department do this study was so that we could
3 hold the line on this sort of thing, and this is
4 exactly what we do not want to start.
5 Thank you very much.
6 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Lad.
7 Karen, followed by Oz Baker.
8 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
9 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello.
10 I'm Karen Finnell,
11 Laudonniere,
12 First of all, I want to say I'm extremely
13 opposed to ordinance 2008-857, and I would like
14 to say I do not know what neighbors Gate refers
15 to when they say they have talked to some of our
16 neighbors and they are for this. I have yet to
17 have one person I know or anybody representing
18 any part in the neighborhood stand up at any
19 meeting and say they want it.
20 Also, where the traffic light now is, we
21 have to do a U-turn when we come out of our
22 street to make a left going west. The Gate
23 station, where they propose it, is right smack
24 in the middle of where the traffic light is. It
25 will be very dangerous to have that intersection
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1 there with Gate as they propose.
2 Over 30 years ago, my husband and I
3 searched for a location to build a house. We
4 chose
5 the property and of the neighborhood. We built
6 our house and left the entire lot as it is,
7 retaining all the trees, bushes and undergrowth
8 as nature grew them. A Gate station would
9 greatly reduce the way of life we currently
10 enjoy and our tranquility.
11 For more than 30 years, our neighborhood
12 has coexisted with the current Gate station. We
13 endure the noise and lights there now. The
14 noise level will be quitely [sic] increased if
15 the Gate station is moved to South McCormick.
16 The safety of our homes will also be in more
17 jeopardy, and any lights they use reflect or
18 brighten our area. The retention pond that JTA
19 is building will amplify those problems.
20 We do not want a Gate station at the
21 proposed location. There's enough property
22 where the Gate station is now to build a bigger
23 Gate station. Maybe not 16 pumps, but more than
24 the four they have now.
25 If money is the only consideration that
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1 Gate's using, then maybe they do need to build a
2 16-pump station there. If Gate truly cares
3 about the neighborhood, then they will not move.
4 Thank you.
5 THE CHAIRMAN: Oz, followed by Brenda Fox.
6 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
7 AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you, council.
8 My name is Oz Baker,
9 West.
10 The current gas station has been, you know,
11 at that location about 35 years, as you've
12 already heard.
13 The JTA can make whatever deal necessary
14 for Gate to develop its approximately 1.5 acres
15 of that triangle land where it now sits. We
16 suggest that the extra land, which is the
17 proposed gas station site, be incorporated into
18 the Buck Park and
19 and Swim Club. This would provide a usable,
20 expanded community gathering place and benefit
21 the whole community.
22 A gas station at this site will reduce our
23 real property values greatly. We have already
24 had to endure noise, lights, and such strong
25 vibrations through our homes and every cell of
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1 our body that they rival seismic activity. A
2 gas station will cause irreparable damage to our
3 safety due to criminal activity which will
4 endanger our children. And you can imagine all
5 the ways. You've heard them before.
6 Then there's the inherent dangers from fuel
7 spills, fires, explosions, poisoning in the
8 environment. Frankly, oil and water don't mix
9 well and would ruin any so said environmental
10 preservation.
11 We respectfully ask that -- a vote against
12 this site to mitigate the deterioration of our
13 safety and life-styles. The so-called traffic
14 problems with the new U-turn -- it didn't used
15 to be that way. It was created by the JTA and
16 could be reversed.
17 The part of the land that they said --
18 which is actually south of McCormick and on
20 have as much land. Well, they only used about
21 five feet of their land. They took the road
22 into our properties on our side.
23 And what they didn't show you -- I'm
24 sorry. What they didn't show you in this
25 picture here is where all the trees were.
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1 Can I pick this up?
2 THE CHAIRMAN: Sure.
3 MR. BAKER: Okay. Great. All right.
4 This used to be all forest right here
5 (indicating). Okay. With foxes, owls, all
6 sorts of wildlife.
7 Now the light -- the eastern light comes
8 through the windows of our homes.
9 We actually reside right here (indicating)
10 at this property, but all these properties along
11 here (indicating) in the -- I'm sorry. They
12 live right there.
13 But the east light comes into the windows,
14 and there's plenty of room right here
15 (indicating).
16 And when -- the other thing they had up
17 here like this, they showed it all nice and
18 green like a cartoon, you know. But actually
19 our home is right there. And the 50-foot buffer
20 of vegetation, that's ours. You know, it's not
21 like they're giving us anything. They've
22 actually promised a 20-foot buffer here
23 (indicating), but they mowed all those trees
24 down anyway.
25 And then -- we don't need it in our
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1 neighborhood, and we respectfully ask that you
2 please vote against this.
3 Thank you.
4 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Baker, I've got a
5 question for you.
6 Now, it's my understanding that this was
7 all done by JTA and not Gate; is that correct?
8 All those trees you're talking about got mowed
9 down?
10 MR. BAKER: Yes. I kind of think JTA and
11 Gate are kind of connected. You know what I
12 mean?
13 THE CHAIRMAN: Sure.
14 AUDIENCE MEMBERS: (Applause.)
15 THE CHAIRMAN: Brenda Fox, followed by
16 Jack Miller.
17 (Audience member approaches the podium.)
18 AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Brenda Fox,
19 and I live at
20 And I ask your patience. This is a very
21 emotional subject for me.
22 I was raised adjacent to the gas station,
23 just like I will be when this gas station gets
24 here, so I know the effects of a gas station on
25 a child when you are trying to play in your
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1 yard, and I cannot go into all the specifics.
2 Anyway, that's why I may give the facts to
3 everybody else, and I ask your patience for me
4 to try to read this e-mail that I received from
5 a neighbor who could not be here.
6 It says, "Please see the e-mail that we
7 sent to Mr. Ken Wilson. Since we cannot attend
8 the meeting tomorrow, may we ask that you submit
9 this e-mail into the record."
10 It's very short. It's page 49 of your
11 booklet, but I wanted to be sure you hear it.
12 It says, "Dear Ken.
13 "This e-mail is from both Robena Crook
14 (phonetic) and William and
15 told that at the last meeting, in which neither
16 of us attended, gas representatives may have
17 said we were in favor of the Gate gas station
18 relocation on McCormick. That is not accurate.
19 When you called Robena for a visit, you
20 indicated that you had some ideas that could be
21 of help to us."
22 As I read this, I want you to realize that
23 this has been a four-year nightmare for our
24 neighbors. This is not a day at work for us.
25 This is energy zapping. I'm sorry.
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1 To go on, it says, "The three of us met
2 with you, at which time we shared our concerns
3 with you regarding the Gate gas station as well
4 as the JTA, and you presented some options that
5 you may have and possibilities of getting us a
6 fence regardless of Gate coming in.
7 "During our discussion, none of us -- none
8 of us indicated in favor of the Gate gas station
9 being relocated to McCormick and any
10 representation of such kind are inaccurate.
11 "We appreciate your input and consideration
12 of our concerns and regret any
13 miscommunication.
14 "Since we cannot attend the meeting
15 tomorrow, we will give a copy of this e-mail to
16 John Fox to insert into the record.
17 "Sincerely, Robena Crook, William and
19 I have been praying for four years, and I
20 pray that somehow you open your hearts and do
21 not listen to the sales pitch and please listen
22 to the people who will be affected. Where they
23 are now could be beautifully done if they wanted
24 to do it. They do not want to do it.
25 And forgive me, but what more can it be
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1 than greed when you could have maybe 10 there
2 and you need 16 here.
3 It would be beautifully done where it is.
4 I please ask you to consider this.
5 If you have any questions, I've been
6 keeping up with everything for four years. I've
7 been losing the night sleep which didn't happen
8 before. I'm a child advocate and we like to
9 spend time with children in our back yard.
10 THE CHAIRMAN: Ma'am.
11 MS. FOX: Does that mean my time was up?
12 THE CHAIRMAN: Your time is up.
13 MS. FOX: I'm sorry, sir.
14 THE CHAIRMAN: That's all right.
15 Thank you.
16 The last speaker is Jack Miller.
17 AUDIENCE MEMBER: I'll waive and stand
18 opposed.
19 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
20 That is all we have for the public hearing.
21 If there's nobody else to speak, we will
22 close the public hearing, and we will bring it
23 back to the committee.
24 Mr. Bishop, did you want to speak before or
25 after we hear the amendment?
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1 MR. BISHOP: I'll wait till after the
2 amendment.
3 Thank you.
4 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you, sir.
5 Staff, let's hear the amendment.
6 MS. ELLER: To the committee, the amendment
7 adds the language that was proposed by
8 Mr. Hainline. If you could confirm the subject
9 of that, I'd appreciate it. I think Mr. Crofts
10 has the e-mail, but I'd prefer to have it read
11 into the record.
12 (Mr. Hainline approaches the podium.)
13 MR. HAINLINE: As I understand, you're
14 asking me to read the conditions into the
15 record, which is fine.
16 THE CHAIRMAN: Yes.
17 MR. HAINLINE: Okay. What we submitted was
18 a list of conditions that had been requested
19 by -- over the course of many community meetings
20 and had been requested by Mr. Bishop to be
21 placed into this transmittal legislation as
22 conditions.
23 So I'm going to read from the last couple
24 pages from your booklet is where you can follow
25 me, and stop me if at any point I've read enough
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1 or I don't need to read any more.
2 It would be to add a new Section 3, which
3 is called "Approval subject to conditions."
4 "The approval of the transmittal of this
5 future land use amendment to the DCA and other
6 State agencies for review is subject to the
7 following conditions, which also shall be set
8 forth in the application for planned unit
9 development rezoning of the subject property as
10 a companion to the adoption of this proposed
11 amendment, in addition to any other conditions
12 in the PUD rezoning which the City Council may
13 deem appropriate.
14 A. Prior to the adoption of this
15 transmittal ordinance an application for an
16 amendment to the future land use map of the
17 comprehensive plan shall be filed with the City
18 of
19 Petroleum Company, paren, approximately
20 .55 acres at RE number such and such and
21 approximately .23 acres at RE number such and
22 such, closed paren, and the
23 Transportation Authority, paren, approximately
24 .5 acres with no RE number, close paren, located
25 across
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1 subject property, collectively the triangle
2 properties, requesting that triangle properties
3 be designated as conservation, paren, CSV, close
4 paren.
5 Alternatively, prior to the adoption of
6 this transmittal ordinance, the owners of the
7 triangle properties shall authorize or consent
8 to such amendment being initiated by the City of
9
10 period.
11 Come down, sub B.
12 Prior to the issuance of any certificates
13 of occupancy for proposed structures on the
14 subject property, number 1, a bond shall be
15 posted naming the City of
16 beneficiary for the demolition of all structures
17 on the triangle properties, debris removal, and
18 site stabilization by the owners of the triangle
19 properties.
20 And, 2, Title to the triangle properties
21 shall be conveyed to the City of
22 its designee at no cost to the City of
23
24 or development by the city as greenspace/public/
25 community use, period.
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1 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Hainline.
2 MR. HAINLINE: Yes.
3 THE CHAIRMAN: I don't see any need in you
4 reading all that.
5 MR. HAINLINE: Okay. That's why I
6 confirmed. I mean, I'm happy to read or not
7 read.
8 THE CHAIRMAN:
9 specific you want to make sure that's in the
10 record? Other than that, let's move on.
11 MS. ELLER: The Planning Department
12 indicated that there was potentially some
13 removal of properties, so that would require a
14 revised legal or a revised map.
15 Can you guys confirm that for me, if that's
16 part of this amendment or if that's not?
17 MR. KELLY: That's not one of the
18 agreements.
19 Through the Chair, it was to remove the
20 access from
21 conditions, so -- negating the need for the land
22 use change on that portion of the property.
23 MR. HAINLINE: Yes, sir, Mr. Kelly.
24 That certainly shows on the site plan that
25 we have submitted in the booklets that there is
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1 no access over at
2 us to remove that from the transmitted
3 amendment, we're happy to do that. And if you
4 want to either pick a number like 20 or 50 feet
5 so you know that we're not going to access
6 there, we can do that, or we can attempt to
7 scale off at what looks like -- at what looks
8 like at least 50 feet from
9 take -- we can take that property -- we can come
10 back 50 feet off of
11 amendment. That way it's absolutely crystal
12 clear that we will never, under any
13 circumstances, be accessing
14 MS. ELLER: Then just to confirm, the
15 Planning Department will provide a revised map
16 showing that revised property boundary for
17 transmittal to be attached to the ordinance, and
18 we can less and except that portion from the
19 attached legal.
20 MR. HAINLINE: Okay.
21 MS. ELLER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
22 MR. HAINLINE: That's fine.
23 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you.
24 Thank you, Mr. Hainline.
25 MR. HAINLINE: You didn't enjoy my
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1 reading?
2 THE CHAIRMAN: No, I did not.
3 Okay. We've got an amendment, and it was
4 moved and seconded.
5 Mr. Bishop.
6 MR. BISHOP: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
7 Most of my comments I will have we'll save
8 until after the amendment is dealt with, but
9 suffice it to say that the contents of the
10 amendment are essentially what we discussed, are
11 appropriate.
12 THE CHAIRMAN: Okay.
13 I see nobody else wants to speak to the
14 amendment.
15 All in favor of the amendment signify by
16 saying aye.
17 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: Aye.
18 THE CHAIRMAN: Those opposed.
19 COMMITTEE MEMBERS: (No response.)
20 THE CHAIRMAN: By your action, you approved
21 the amendment.
22 MR. WEBB: Move the bill as amended.
23 MR. JOOST: Second.
24 THE CHAIRMAN: The bill has been moved and
25 seconded as amended.
Diane M.
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1 Mr. Bishop.
2 MR. BISHOP: As everyone has stated --
3 thank you, Mr. Chairman -- on this whole thing,
4 this has been a four-plus-year ordeal for a lot
5 of folks for a lot of different reasons. And
6 it's interesting that every time there's a
7 meeting or a discussion about this, something
8 new pops up.
9 This is the first time I'd seen a copy of
10 this court order having to do with the
11 condemnation of property, and it brings some
12 interesting things to light because we did spend
13 quite bit of time with the applicant to work out
14 what -- in a sense, while it may not be ideal,
15 certainly does do a number of things that can be
16 positive.
17 Number one, it does not increase the total
18 net commercial in the area. It moves it from --
19 it does move it from one side of the street to
20 the other. The configuration of that road in
21 there is an abomination and I think anybody --
22 if you're here from JTA, you ought to be
23 embarrassed by that thing because it's just a
24 traffic travesty.
25 And if you ask me later, I'll tell you what
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1 I really think about it.
2 But be that as it may, it isn't very good.
3 And this does, I believe, help create a
4 situation that would be safer than if the thing
5 was in the middle of the triangle in some
6 respects. Not to say that that can't be fixed,
7 it certainly can, but what they built doesn't
8 work very well.
9 It provides for an opportunity to provide
10 for some increased park space. It does provide
11 for the maintenance of a pond that otherwise, as
12 we all know throughout the city, would end up
13 being a rat trap and a weed haven.
14 And it does provide for the opportunity for
15 that lake to become actually a public amenity on
16 the park because it will be maintained and it
17 will be contiguous with properties that will
18 become expanded park space. All those things
19 are good.
20 The bad part of it is it would get moved
21 across the street. And also this document does
22 create some question that I think legally ought
23 to be answered because, while I had a discussion
24 with Mr. Kelly a second ago, neighborhood
25 commercial zoning is an acceptable secondary
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1 zoning district in LDR, which I found
2 surprising, but it is -- that's what's in the
3 code.
4 This document would prohibit the sale of
5 alcoholic beverages for either on- or
6 off-premise consumption without permission -- or
7 without approval of the defendants in the case,
8 which would be the McCormick trust folks.
9 Now, I don't know if anybody has asked them
10 if this is a good idea and have they given their
11 permission for this. That's a legal question I
12 think we ought to have answered somewhere along
13 the line.
14 If they say no, then what does that do to
15 this whole thing and what does that do to their
16 standing in this case? That's just a question I
17 ask because I don't know the answer to that.
18 And, Ms. Eller, you might know, but I
19 don't.
20 Do you know?
21 MS. ELLER: No. I haven't reviewed that
22 document.
23 MR. BISHOP: Okay. I would suggest that it
24 might be a good idea for you to do so before a
25 vote is taken, that we don't go down a road
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1 somewhere that we get ourselves in trouble.
2 Now, granted, this is only transmittal
3 round. It's not the final round and it will
4 come back again, but somewhere along the process
5 that ought to be identified. I guess that's my
6 only real hangup at this point.
7 There's a lot of good things about it,
8 there's a lot of bad things about it. At the
9 end of the day, on balance, I think it's -- it
10 has the opportunity to create something
11 positive, even though it is not exactly the best
12 thing in the world.
13 But this little deal right here probably
14 ought to get answered before we get down the
15 road too far on this thing.
16 Thank you.
17 MS. ELLER: To the Chairman, the -- if
18 there are -- if it's a restriction regarding
19 permitted uses, as long as the City does not
20 permit those uses, you're in compliance, and
21 that can be prohibited in the PUD.
22 Neighborhood commercial in and of itself is
23 a broad permission under land use, so I don't
24 think that by designating it neighborhood
25 commercial somebody can come back -- it's if we
Diane M.
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1 ended up issuing a permit under the PUD for a
2 convenience store to open with that use that
3 we'd likely get into trouble.
4 But, again, I haven't reviewed it, so I can
5 review that in more detail for you.
6 MR. BISHOP: Through the Chair to
7 Ms. Eller, I agree with that. It does tend to
8 say that. What it would tend to me to say is
9 that you would -- a convenience store, it would
10 not be allowed to sell beer and wine is what
11 would be allowed under -- at least according to
12 this document.
13 MS. ELLER: (Nods head.)
14 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Webb.
15 MR. WEBB: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
16 Through the Chair to General Counsel's
17 Office.
18
19 this is voted down this evening, what is the
20 posture with respect to the next round of
21 transmittals?
22 MS. ELLER: The typical transmittal cycles
23 run six months apart, so if you vote this down
24 this evening, the next transmittal cycle it
25 could be brought before you again for
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1 consideration.
2 The reason why is because the transmittal
3 is not the final vote on the land use. If you
4 transmitted it, it came back, and then denied it
5 at the adoption round, it may come into play.
6 There may be some res judicata -- administrative
7 res judicata or limitations on bringing back the
8 same application within a certain amount of
9 time.
10 But with regard to transmittal, again, it's
11 the preliminary step. If it's denied for
12 transmittal at this point, there's nothing that
13 prevents them from coming back in six months to
14 try for transmittal again.
15 MR. WEBB: So (inaudible) the same effect
16 and come back in six months?
17 MS. ELLER: Yes, sir.
18 MR. WEBB: Okay. Through the Chair, I
19 guess -- I had a prior conversation with the
20 developer. I didn't declare it because it's
21 not -- ex-parte is not necessary in this --
22 inasmuch as this is legislative and not
23 quasi-judicial.
24 However, to the extent that we're tacking
25 on conditions that would ultimately be
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1 incorporated into a PUD, it is effectively
2 quasi-judicial.
3 But that -- having said that, I think that
4 begs the whole question and another flaw in the
5 process of the PUD process. Maybe the zoning
6 process that we were faced with, this is the
7 tail wagging the dog again, and I think this
8 raises a serious issue.
9 And I did commit to the developer or the
10 applicant that, you know, given -- I would defer
11 to the district council representative on this
12 insofar as he was supportive of it. I don't
13 hear that the district councilperson is, in
14 fact, supportive of this project.
15 That being the case, I do have some serious
16 questions as to the propriety of the process as
17 it's being outlined here for us. Again, I go
18 back to my comments. This is the tail wagging
19 the dog.
20 Again, what we're doing is we're putting
21 the transmittal that the comp- -- above -- and
22 we're putting -- we're bootstrapping. We're
23 effectively making a determination as to what we
24 want to put on this property and then going back
25 and reinventing the wheel or modifying the comp
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1 plan to provide for that appropriate use.
2 Okay? That -- that's a problem. And I think
3 that's something that we need to be very mindful
4 of. It's coming up in the context of this bill
5 and another bill that's before us this evening.
6 That being the case, notwithstanding my
7 prior discussion with the developer, I'm not
8 going to support this.
9 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Yarborough.
10 MR. YARBOROUGH: Thank you, Mr. Graham.
11 I appreciate yours and the committee's
12 indulgence.
13 I too had met with -- I met with Mr. Frick
14 and Mr. Hainline last week and had expressed
15 general support. They listened to some concerns
16 that I had, but tonight I have to say there were
17 two serious questions that I have, even in light
18 of that meeting. And I know I'm not a voting
19 member of the committee, but it will affect my
20 final vote on this if it's at Council Tuesday,
21 and one relates to what I was told last week.
22 Mr. Frick, I believe you shared with me
23 that Mr. Wilson had talked to
24 others that were on Challeux Drive South that
25 are on -- that would abut the south part of the
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1 property, just south of where the lake would be,
2 and I believe -- and please correct me if I'm
3 wrong -- you're Mr. Wilson. I want to make sure
4 it's right. I know it's on the record.
5 But to my recollection, you had said that
6 after speaking with them that they were --
7 (Mr. Wilson approaches the podium.)
8 MR. WILSON: Yes, please.
9 MR. YARBOROUGH: -- that they were not
10 opposed to it. And the reason I'm bringing that
11 up is because Ms. Fox pointed out this letter
12 from Ms. Crook and Mr. and
13 being one of those, that says they're -- they
14 are not supportive of it. So I just wanted to
15 clarify it. I really can't tell, so --
16 MR. WILSON: I understand. I appreciate
17 the opportunity to clarify that, Councilman.
18 We did meet last Wednesday night at Benny
19 Crook's home, and the Lanes live directly
20 adjacent to them. The discussion went
21 comfortably well. We had some give and take.
22 We discussed the issues of security and
23 buffering, noise. A lot of things the
24 conditions address.
25 We ended that meeting talking about how the
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1 fencing would take place, what visual screening
2 would be committed to and done by Gate. And
3 went over the conditions that you've read
4 tonight, some of which we've added to since that
5 time.
6 At the end of that meeting with
7 Ms. Crook -- the Lanes had departed at that
8 point and gone home. They were very
9 complementary of the project at that point, but
10 I wasn't representing what they said.
11 But I asked Ms. Crook. I said, based on
12 the meeting this evening -- I don't want to
13 misrepresent anything that's been said here --
14 is it accurate to say that while you do not
15 embrace Gate's zoning of this site for a
16 convenience store, you would not oppose it if we
17 meet these conditions? And she said that's
18 accurate. You're welcome to make that statement
19 to the councilmember and to my neighbors.
20 So that was the nature of the response.
21 There was no they've approved our zoning.
22 Likewise, Mr. McDermott at the Holly Oaks
23 Community Club, I don't feel I got a raving
24 endorsement of the zoning. However, he agreed
25 he was not opposed to our zoning if we cured the
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2 been cured.
3 MR. YARBOROUGH: Okay. And I appreciate
4 that.
5 You said after the -- this was after the
6 Lanes had left when that --
7 MR. WILSON: Yeah, the discussion about --
8 MR. YARBOROUGH: -- when that conversation
9 transpired?
10 MR. WILSON: -- not opposing the zoning
11 took place with Ms. Crook.
12 At the same meeting, at that point the
13 Lanes had just departed and left. So the two --
14 two parties that have indicated they would not
15 oppose based on these conditions is
16 Mr. McDermott at the Holy Oaks Club, and
17 Ms. Crook. Just those two.
18 MR. YARBOROUGH: Okay. I appreciate that.
19 Thank you, Mr. Wilson.
20 Mr. Chairman, the other concern I had --
21 And, Mr. Fox, if you could come up and
22 answer one question for me.
23 In the packet that you gave us, the 50-page
24 packet or so, page 2 has a drainage map
25 rendering, and it looks like many others that we
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1 see. It's got the reconfigured pond 6 and it
2 says New Gate facility on it. And the date here
3 was interesting to me. I think it reads
4 June 30th of 2004. I just wanted to see -- it
5 says Boeing Engineering on it. Where was the
6 map? Just so we know where the --
7 MR. WILSON: That map I received on
8 June 1st, 2006, from JTA, from Bob Oakland
9 (phonetic).
10 MR. YARBOROUGH: It was from JTA?
11 MR. WILSON: Yes.
12 MR. YARBOROUGH: Okay. And you concur the
13 date on here is June 30 of '04 that's on this
14 drainage map here?
15 MR. WILSON: I believe so.
16 I -- the date I received it was on June --
17 like it was June 1st, 2006.
18 MR. YARBOROUGH: Okay. I appreciate that.
19 I just -- I wasn't sure who it was received
20 from.
21 Mr. Chairman, the reason I brought it up is
22 because it's just very peculiar to me. It says
23 New Gate Facility on it, but this is dated over
24 four years ago. And I guess just the point I'll
25 make is, how -- how it -- how, four years, ago
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1 would anyone have known that there would be
2 approval for a Gate station to be there? It's
3 just kind of interesting.
4 It's a JTA map, so I think somebody else
5 put a -- I don't know, just something that stood
6 out that I hadn't seen before.
7 THE CHAIRMAN: It just looks like somebody
8 just stamped an old map that says "New Gate
9 Facility."
10 MR. HAINLINE: If you'd like clarification,
11 we can provide that, but it's up to you.
12 MR. YARBOROUGH: Mr. Hainline, if you would
13 like to try to clarify what I've asked -- that's
14 the way it appears to me.
15 MR. HAINLINE: Mr. Yarborough, there were
16 community meetings as of 2004 between Gate
17 Petroleum and the neighbors. It was no secret
18 in 2004 what was being discussed. Remember that
19 Mr. Frick stood up and spoke and said this has
20 been discussed for years.
21 We submitted to the Planning Commission,
22 and I can go back and get it and submit it to
23 you, correspondence from -- who, at that time,
24 were purported to us to be representatives of
25 the neighborhood behind where they stated that
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1 there was no opposition to the Gate station.
2 So the Gate station was openly being
3 discussed between Gate and neighbors as of
4 2004. It was no secret then, it's no secret
5 now. So I don't know who wrote that on that JTA
6 map, but it certainly was no secret then.
7 MR. YARBOROUGH: I appreciate you
8 clarifying that. I had not seen it. I
9 appreciate that. And, like I said, it was dated
10 June of '04. And then two pages back, there's
11 one from the same contractor of May of '06. And
12 all it says is future commercial development.
13 It doesn't make any indication that it may or
14 may not be a Gate station.
15 MR. HAINLINE: If it would be helpful to
16 you, I can provide you with the letter from the
17 community member regarding 2004 meetings when
18 the Gate station --
19 MR. YARBOROUGH: I recall there were
20 meetings at the time. I did not know that that
21 was discussed specifically at that time, though,
22 so I appreciate that.
23 Thank you.
24 Thank you, Mr. Graham.
25 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Joost.
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1 MR. JOOST: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
2 A couple of questions. First would be
3 to -- through the Chair to legal. Under this
4 document right here, the
5 Transportation Authority is the petitioner.
6 Okay. On page 3, paragraph 6, can you clarify
7 to me exactly what that is saying? And, you
8 know, break it down.
9 MS. ELLER: (Peruses document.)
10 MR. JOOST: Okay. While you're looking
11 that over, I've got a couple of other questions
12 or points I'd like to make.
13 If this is turned down at this process and
14 Gate doesn't go through with this, what are the
15 residents left with? I mean, they'll be --
16 number one, I hear you, Mr. Webb, talking about
17 we've got the tail wagging the dog, but -- and
18 there may be flaws in the process, but you've
19 got to look at what is there right now. I mean,
20 the land has already been cleared by the JTA,
21 you know. There's nothing that can be done
22 about that. That's all water under the bridge.
23 If we don't do this, what kind of buffers
24 will the residents have? Will there be any
25 buffers at all and they're just looking at
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1 barren land or a lake?
2 Can somebody from the Planning Department
3 or over there tell me, if this doesn't go
4 through, what will the residents be left with?
5 MR. CROFTS: Basically, they'll be left
6 with what is there now. They'll be left with a
7 retention pond and a -- somewhat of a buffer on
8 the west. But, as I understand it, there is no
9 basic buffer, just a wire fence on the south
10 side. It's pretty much open. So it's the
11 status quo.
12 MR. JOOST: It sounds pretty -- I mean,
13 just to me, it sounds like they'll be left -- it
14 will kind of look somewhat blighted. I don't
15 know if there's another word for it.
16 THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Bishop could answer for
17 you.
18 MR. JOOST: Mr. Bishop.
19 MR. BISHOP: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
20 Through the Chair to Councilmember Joost.
21 JTA is responsible for replanting a buffer
22 around the pond as a part of their work in
23 building that retention pond.
24 MR. JOOST: Okay. And then my last
25 question, I guess, would be for Mr. Bishop.
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1 As amended, do you want me to support this
2 or not?
3 MR. BISHOP: That's a very good question,
4 and the problem that I have with this is what I
5 said at the very beginning. This is not -- this
6 is -- this has positives and it has negatives.
7 In my ideal world, we would defer this
8 until we could get answers to some of these
9 things. As I understand it, we've got a
10 transmittal problem because this is a package,
11 part of a bigger thing, and so therein lies the
12 problem.
13 At the end of the day, I'm probably going
14 to do something I'm going to regret, but I'm
15 going to say that I don't have a problem passing
16 it because, again, it is only a transmittal.
17 And I hate doing that. I don't like doing that
18 at all.
19 But at the end of the day, there are still
20 a lot of unanswered questions that if we can't
21 get proper answers to them, we can kill it at
22 the final. And that doesn't hold up everybody
23 else that's tagged along under this semiannual
24 package.
25 MR. JOOST: Thank you. I appreciate your
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1 candor.
2
3 paragraph?
4 MS. ELLER: I have.
5 I'm hesitant to tell you exactly what it
6 means because my --
7 MR. JOOST: I didn't understand it when I
8 read it. I mean, it says --
9 MS. ELLER: Well, I would like to first --
10 I'd like to true up the legal description as
11 to -- as to the property that it applies to, and
12 then I'd like to see if this is the final final
13 or if there was any subsequent action under this
14 case number, and then to find out if there's
15 been any -- you know, any discussions between
16 JTA and anybody who could enforce this
17 particular restriction, to find out if anything
18 has been done to remove the restriction.
19 So I just -- I can't provide an answer
20 as -- I mean, on its face it says that whatever
21 the subject property is, that if the JTA
22 transfers it, that they would, as a condition of
23 that transfer, not allow certain uses.
24 But, again, I think that it needs to be
25 vetted and, you know, I just need to get the
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1 whole picture on what this applies to.
2 MR. JOOST: I guess I have one more
3 question for Mr. Wilson of Gate Petroleum.
4 Can you come up here, sir.
5 (Mr. Wilson approaches the podium.)
6 MR. JOOST: Thank you.
7 Were you aware of this possible
8 restriction?
9 MR. WILSON: No, I wasn't. I'm not clear
10 on -- I'm kind of in the same boat with you on
11 this restriction. I'm not aware of what that
12 is.
13 (Mr. Frick approaches the podium.)
14 MR. JOOST: Would it be beneficial to you
15 if we deferred this? We could figure out what
16 exactly this means or no?
17 MR. WILSON: Can I allow Drew Frick to
18 speak to that?
19 MR. JOOST: Yes, please.
20 MR. WILSON: I think he's more clear on
21 that subject than I am.
22 MR. FRICK: I can speak to that.
23 Drew Frick.
24 This has been going on for a number of
25 years. And actually when it started, we were
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1 working with both the JTA and the McCormick
2 family on this whole process.
3 During the process the McCormick family and
4 the JTA went forward with the takings on that
5 piece, so they were aware of everything that we
6 were doing. And I can't speak for the McCormick
7 family, but they were working well with us on
8 this very plan.
9 On the zoning, I think the Planning
10 Department can talk about it being allowed as a
11 secondary use in that category. Again, they
12 were aware of this before they drafted that
13 document.
14 On the liquor sales, my understanding of
15 what they were trying to do -- and it's not very
16 well drafted -- is to prevent a liquor store
17 from coming to that site. And we will vet all
18 that out, and we can do that between now and the
19 rezoning, but it was not to prevent a Gate
20 station from going on that use and something
21 that sells beer or wine only for off-premises
22 consumption.
23 So I can ask -- I don't have the document
24 in front of me.
25 MR. JOOST: Well, it says -- and we'll
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1 provide a copy, but, I mean, it says, quote, and
2 service of all alcohol beverages, including
3 liquor, beer, or wine for on-premises
4 consumption or off-premises consumption.
5 MR. FRICK: Right, Councilman Joost.
6 And my point on that -- and I think it's
7 poorly drafted, but what they were trying to do
8 is say something that serves all of those: a
9 liquor store that has liquor, beer, and wine, or
10 a bar that has liquor, beer, and wine. They
11 weren't intending to prevent beer and wine.
12 It needs to be clarified and we'll get the
13 clarification. Certainly we can't get a zoning
14 and work with the JTA on this unless we've got
15 support of --
16 Really that agreement is between the
17 McCormicks and the JTA. And the McCormicks can
18 enforce it against the JTA, and we'll have to
19 work with them to get that clarification, but --
20 MR. JOOST: Let me ask you this: If -- I
21 mean to me it's pretty clear. It says liquor,
22 beer, or wine. I can't really read intent
23 between the lines. I mean, it's kind of like
24 the election trying to read doubles. That's
25 probably bad to bring up now.
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1 But I can't read the intent on this. I
2 mean, to me, it's black and white. It says
3 including liquor, beer, or wine. So if you're
4 not allowed to sell beer or wine, does that
5 change your business model?
6 MR. FRICK: It will do two things:
7 Obviously, before the PUD goes forward,
8 we'll have to work that condition out. We do
9 sell beer or wine. That's a big part of our
10 business.
11 And, again, the word that I look at
12 there -- and it's not well drafted -- is the
13 "all." They were looking at something that
14 encompasses all three of these things.
15 The zoning code -- I think they may have
16 picked some of it up from the zoning code. It
17 makes distinctions at times between the sale of
18 all liquors versus beer or wine, and I think
19 they were trying to catch that broader category.
20 I understand your point in reading it, and
21 you can read it on a plain face way to say it
22 looks like they wanted to exclude everything.
23 We'll have to work that out with the
24 McCormick family. Again, that's an agreement
25 between the McCormicks and the JTA. And we will
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1 be working with the JTA on acquiring a portion
2 of this property to do the Gate station, and
3 that Gate station we intend to have beer or
4 wine.
5 So the PUD that gets approved, they could
6 certainly have beer or wine. It would put us
7 and you, rightly so, in a position where you
8 approve something that's not allowed with what
9 the JTA agreed with the McCormicks. JTA would
10 have to answer that, we'd have to answer to that
11 and fix that problem, but we're going to do it
12 well before then is my point, and we'll get
13 clarification to that agreement between those
14 two parties because, again, the McCormicks were
15 side by side with us whenever we started this
16 process, as well as the JTA. Those three
17 parties were working together towards this
18 goal.
19 MR. JOOST: Okay. I got you.
20 One last question to legal. I may think of
21 something else.
22 THE CHAIRMAN: You said one last question
23 three times already.
24 MR. JOOST: Yeah. One last, last, last
25 question.
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1 When you say "conveyance," does that mean
2 it's actually restricted in the deed and title
3 of the land and, therefore, at that point going
4 forward you can no longer sell beer or wine
5 because that's a restriction that the buyer
6 agreed to and now that becomes part of the land
7 deed or title?
8 MS. ELLER: Well, I think that, as Drew
9 mentioned, it's poorly drafted, but I think the
10 most restrictive reading would be that -- when
11 it says any use or conveyance of the surplus
12 land will be limited and restricted, I think the
13 words "limited and restricted" could be read to
14 put a deed restriction on it so that whoever
15 acquired the land would be prevented from doing
16 the things that are enumerated.
17 But, as Mr. Frick mentioned, this is an
18 agreement between JTA and the McCormicks, and so
19 those two parties have the right to modify this
20 upon agreement of those two parties.
21 MR. JOOST: Okay. Clear as mud because
22 it's not perfect -- it's not clear to me that
23 the JTA and the McCormicks have modified it.
24 MS. ELLER: You are correct.
25 There's nothing that we have before us
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1 tonight to confirm that the conditions, however
2 poorly drafted in this particular document, have
3 been modified. All you have is the commitment
4 from Mr. Frick that they've all been working
5 closely together and that that issue will have
6 to be ultimately resolved before this committee
7 and the council makes their final decisions on
8 the uses and the zoning.
9 MR. JOOST: Okay. And, I'm sorry, but it
10 just keeps going on.
11 Are we setting ourselves up for possible
12 litigation down the road if we continue forward
13 with this?
14 MS. ELLER: I don't think at this point
15 we're setting ourselves up for litigation
16 because, again, it's just a transmittal and the
17 neighborhood commercial land use designation is
18 just a policy decision regarding future uses on
19 the piece of dirt.
20 Ultimately, when you do approve a
21 particular land use on adoption with its
22 companion rezoning, you'll be taking a look at
23 the uses.
24 You know, whether or not it's appropriate
25 for you to permit a use if you know that there's
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1 some outside document that prevents it -- you
2 know, it's not as if by approving it you're
3 guaranteeing that it will happen. But, again,
4 it is an issue that will have to be resolved
5 because, as I understand from the discussions
6 here, you wouldn't want to grant a use through a
7 PUD zoning that you know is somehow prohibited
8 by this other document between two other
9 parties.
10 MR. JOOST: One more question.
11 Mr. Hainline --
12 (Mr. Hainline approaches the podium.)
13 MR. HAINLINE: Yes, sir.
14 MR. JOOST: -- would you rather proceed or
15 defer until we get this straighten out? Because
16 I don't like doing something I'm not totally
17 clear about. And then if later on we go down
18 this process and at some point we're going to
19 get to the hour and to the point where we either
20 do it or we don't do it -- and now we've had an
21 11th hour change to the business model of Gate
22 Petroleum, you guys want to go back and
23 reconsider this situation knowing that there's
24 probably -- I would say at this point at least a
25 possibility, if not a probability, we're not
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1 going to allow beer or wine sales at this
2 location.
3 MR. HAINLINE: Mr. Joost, I would answer
4 that pretty much the same way as I stated at the
5 outset.
6 We don't view this transmittal vote as an
7 approval of the station there, as an approval of
8 a PUD, as an approval -- as an adoption of an
9 amendment. We view this as a transmittal, which
10 is a step in the process in which we continue
11 discussions with Mr. Bishop; with the neighbors;
12 with JTA; and, if necessary, having looked at
13 all the legal documents, with the McCormicks and
14 the JTA.
15 This is just a step in the process, and a
16 deferral of this would slow everything down for
17 six months. It wouldn't -- it wouldn't help us
18 resolve or not resolve the issue one way or the
19 other. It would just be another slow-down in
20 the process that has been slow to begin with.
21 So we view this transmittal vote as simply
22 a step in the process. That is an issue which
23 we will need to resolve. If it doesn't resolve
24 in a way that's satisfactory for us, we'll
25 either withdraw the amendment or appear with
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1 some modification at adoption time.
2 But this is just a step in the process, and
3 the way we look at that is one of many issues,
4 in addition to our continuing discussions with
5 Mr. Bishop and the neighbors to resolve that.
6 MR. JOOST: Okay. I think that's -- that's
7 fair enough. I just don't want anybody to come
8 back -- say we do move forward, and then come
9 back in six months and say, well, we really
10 hadn't anticipated this in --
11 MR. HAINLINE: No, sir. Clearly --
12 clearly, we're now -- and Mr. Frick was on
13 notice of that provision.
14 And when I was doing my reading of the
15 conditions, you may have noticed that at the
16 beginning, not only did we say the conditions
17 that are in this, but we understand there may be
18 additional conditions that Mr. Bishop, the
19