Planning Commission · Regular Meeting · April 9, 2024

This evening may we have the roll call vote please I mean roll call please chair Cameron here Vice chair sheras requested an excused absence commissioner cutright here commissioner Graves mans here commissioner here commissioner Johnson requested an excused absence commissioner copac here commissioner mver here commissioner CE here commissioner Trent commissioner Valentine here commissioner Williams here commissioner woke here and commissioner young requested excuse.

Absence we have a quorum we have Quorum thank you all right we will move on to the there are no adjustments to the agenda I don't believe right now so let's move on.

To the approval of the minutes and the consistency statements we're going to take this in two parts first we're going to approve the minutes from the March 12th meeting does everyone review those if so can we have a motion to approve so moved second it's been moved by commissioner copc and second by commissioner C right to approve the minutes and consistency statement from the March 12th 2004 meeting all in favor please say I I any opposed the eyes have it the there were some errors in the February minutes those have been corrected so we need to re-approve the minutes from the February 13th 2024 meeting and the consistency statement may we have a motion to approve so move second second it been moved by commissioner cutright and seconded by commissioner CE all in favor please say I I any oppos OS the motion carries all right we are ready to move into the first public hearing for zoning map changes and comprehensive plan amendments we have case z22 48- a22 quad 03 Duke East Campus.

Edition chair Cameron yes I need to request recusal for both this case and the subsequent case through my adjunct teaching I'm an employee of the applicant thank you do we have a motion to recuse commissioner CE so move second it's been moved by commissioner cutright and seconded by commiss commissioner Valentine all in favor please say I I any opposed motion carries thank you may we have the staff report please good evening Brick roer City County planning this is for case z22 48 a223 Duke East Campus Edition Rachel saterfield of Duke University and Durham reality realy Inc is proposing to add three Parcels owned by Duke University into its existing East Campus development plan zoning to allow for future college and institutional uses the the existing East Campus development plan consists of 29 Parcels so with the addition of three Parcels there would be 32 properties within this updated development plan and approximately 126. 3 acres two out of three Parcels to be added are currently zoned downtown design and located within the downtown.

Tier the resoning application also proposes to change them to the urban tier moving on to the next slide Dukes East campus currently consists of 29 Parcels of land is located just Southwest of downtown Durham and is already zoned University and college with a development plan the total area for all Parcels together again is 126 Acres the current zoning of the three Parcels to be added is residential Urban multifam with the development plan downtown design S1 and University and college with a development plan plan to add the three new Parcels to the existing East Campus development plan zoning the entire existing plan and newly added Parcels must be rezoned to University and college with a development plan however nothing is changing for the East Campus Parcels that are already zoned UCD this is the aerial map which shows the general location of the project within the Durham comp hensive plan which is the Visionary document that guides how development should look like in Durham the properties are designated institutional campus and.

Recreation and open space on the place type map the proposed University and college with a development plan zoning is generally consistent with the designated Place type of institutional campus but not consistent with the recreation and open space designation as the proposal does not specifically designate area for open space or Recreation purposes is if the proposed zoning is approved staff recommend a change to the place type map to designate the entire property as institutional campus as you can see here there is a 150t transitional use area overlay proposed on site this is shown in pink hashing on the development plan as well the transitional use area would establish standards at the edges of Duke's campus with the intent to minimize adverse impacts of proposed development on adjacent properties the Tua regulates height outdoor lighting architectural standards Landscaping parking V vehicular use areas and signage a neighborhood meeting was held in accordance with udio requirements on June 28th 2022 where 20 community members attended the the meeting staff would also like to note that.

There were three additional meetings held with the Birch Avenue group that did not meet the the technical udio requirements for neighborhood meetings but we did want to note that moving on the applicant has included textual commitments only applicable to the three Parcels being added including restricting access between Campus Drive and stat Street liit limiting uses providing a pedestrian and bike path and the creation of a community Advisory Board of no more than three community members to provide input on the planning of the proposed project additional tax commitments are provided which exclude three Parcels in which in excuse me which exclude those three Parcels and that includes limitations of height and size of the University president's house prohibition of parking decks on East Camp campus and confirming the primary academic use of East Campus The Proposal would change the zoning designation of 32 Parcels of land totaling 126. 3 acres and bring three additional Duke own Parcels into the Duke master plan to the UCD zoning District the intended use for East.

Campus is for academic purposes with classrooms student resident Halls administrative offices and other support facilities however these are not committed uses at this time however any future development will need to occur in alignment with Duke's master plan the site is currently within the urban downtown and Suburban development tiers The Proposal would take reads 1033 34 and 10 3330 out of the downtown tier and into the urban tier to consolid valate the application and allow similar Development intensities Across the entirety of the Duke campus the properties are currently designated institutional campus and Recreation on the open space Recreation and open space on the place type map and as I stated earlier the proposed UCD zoning is generally consistent with the institutional campus but not with the recreation and open space designation so staff would recommend a change to the place type map to designate the entire property as institutional institutional campus finally as a reminder two motions are required for this application the first motion is for the zoning map.

Change the second motion is for the tier change thank you staff and the applicant are available for. Questions thank you thank you. At this time the chair is opening the public hearing may we have the applicant to the podium.

Please good evening good evening chair Cameron Vice chair oh Vice chair is not here and members of the Planning Commission I am Neil go with the Morning Star Law Group I'm representing Duke University with respect to these two rezonings I should also note I have my phone on because my wife is four days overdue so if my phone rings I will leave you promptly and you will know why and I'll request a continuance in that in that scenario but in the interest of brevity I know you got a long agenda and some time constra exp I wanted to talk about both projects at once both this resoning and the next and I don't necessarily need to give another presentation for the next one and evidently I'm losing my voice so this has been a very long and Technical process so I want to take a moment to appreciate staff for working with us you know they they their hard work guidance and probably thankful most of all for their patience with us.

Through this process which started about two years ago as you probably know I normally do not rely on visual presentations but I prepared one for these items because I think it can really be helpful to demystify these requests this first slide should be really helpful in that regard what this map shows are the four existing UC zoning districts that make up Duke University's campus and those existing districts are shown here in green blue yellow and orange now now the parcels shown in brown are the subjects of these two resoning requests and in total those are 13 Parcels what we are doing here is adding those brown Parcels into the existing UC districts that they abut out of the 13 Brown Parcels we are proposing to add 10 of them to the central campus UC District so in other words that means 10 of those brown Parcels would turn orange on this map if that makes sense and then the remaining three Parcels are proposed to be added to the East Campus UC.

District so those Parcels would turn blue on this map and that is all that we are doing with this resoning here the zoning of the parcels of any Parcels not shown in brown on this map is not changing in any material way we have preserved the commitments applicable to the orange and blue Parcels though the language may have been tweaked to match today's lingo for example we Chang the PIN numbers to Reids we've updated page numbers and references and things like that but materially they are the same commitments that have been that exist today on both the blue and orange Parcels technically to add the brown Parcels to either the blue or orange Parcels we have to reone all of the blue and orange parcels and the brown Parcels that are being added in and that's just a technical requirement nothing about the zoning is changing for any of the orange Parcels or any of the blue Parcels nothing about that is changing fundamentally Duke has acquired these Brown Parcels over the years none of.

Them currently are is owned UC I also should note that Duke owns other properties in the city which are not zoned UC but they're not part of these requests generally speaking the parcels that are part of these resoning requests are those which exist on the periphery of existing UC districts and they just want to add them into the fold of the existing UC Zone obviously the main reason to rezone is to allow other uses on the property and certainly that is the case here but the UC district has some unique advantages built into it U the UC districts were created specifically for Duke in North Carolina Central University from a use standpoint they allow of host of a host of uses and if you think about uses that a university might have on its campus it spans the gamut right so it's like offices Playing Fields classrooms research labs hospitals things like that and while those uses are typical in a university setting they might not they might seem a little odd it put.

Together outside of a university setting so that's just illustrates one reason why a special zoning District was warranted for our area universities the other Advantage is that the UC zoning District allows for campus-wide planning in a way that other districts do not the UC District allows UC Zone Parcels to be considered holistically at the site and stage and that means things like storm water infrastructure parking tree cover and more can be planned at the campus scale rather than on a parcel by parcel or project by project basis that is typical in other districts this is a key consideration for Duke in each of these resoning requests there also are some special requirements for the UC district for example the university must have an illustrative campus master plan which includes the parcels Tu Zone you see that is exhibit AG in your packet it's also reproduced here as well and I will say It's probably hard to decipher in either median but the illustrative campus master plan here does not show any new development on any.

Of the 13 Parcels requested to be reson in fact you can see that Duke owns a lot of land for which it does not have any concrete plans in this illustrative master plan to develop obviously this plan that's up on the screen here is not a regulatory document but as of December 20 which is the date of this plan Duke had no plans for these parcels and it still does not in the context of most other rezonings you probably would ask why reone if you have no plans to build anything there and I would say with the UC District that's exactly the point how these Parcels can be integrated into the campus depends greatly on whether they are zoned UC Duke already owns these Parcels but how they can be used especially considering the advantages of shared infrastructure that the UC District affords the University that will dictate how the master plan evolves also some of these Parcels already are used by Duke in their current zoning they just are not.

Integrated into the rest of Campus as they otherwise could be with UC Zoning for example the previous location of the International House of 300 Alexander which is shown here is zoned oi and is part of the rezoning request because it is a standalone parcel from a zoning standpoint it has its own driveway and parking lot that liter Lally is beside another driveway to a different parking lot on property Zone you see unifying the zoning can help eliminate those types of unnecessary redundancies throughout the process which has unfolded over the course of a couple years the project has evolved based on feedback from staff technical requirements and other feedback from Community stakeholders in fact Duke has had several meetings with various stakeholders over the course of this process originally there were a handful of other Parcels Duke was considering resoning some dropped out because lack contiguity with existing UC districts others dropped out because of community concerns and I have to say as a client Duke is taken Community engagement very seriously and sincerely.

I'm not sure I could quantify the number of meetings emails and conversations Duke has had with area stakeholders but I did want to share with you some of the changes that resulted from various conversations the first thing I mentioned I already mentioned which is that some parcels were dropped from consideration generally speaking these were Parcels closer to the Crest Street Community actually in our conversations with that Community we found that they were not necessarily opposed to the Duke re zoning nevertheless they were dropped because they lack contiguity with existing UC Parcels most of the input we receive comes from the Birch Avenue neighborhood association or bana and it has to do with the East Campus resoning where we are adding three Parcels to the existing UC District admittedly this is the most unique aspect of the proposed resoning because it represents an area where Duke's campus is meets an existing and established residential Community Duke has made a number of changes based on feedback from this community for starters the property at 922 Rome Avenue.

Is owned by Duke and was part of our initial resoning request the initial request from bana was to have Duke commit to never build anything on that property but given that that property is zoned in a way which allows it to be built do compromise and drop that parcel from the resoning application altogether and since dropping the parcel out of the application Bas concerns have focused primarily on one of the three Parcels requested to be added which is 400 gatis otherwise known as old laundry site Durham has met with I'm sorry Duke has met with representatives from bana several times and I believe we do understand the nature of their concerns we also understand that we may not have addressed every one of their concerns to their full satisfaction but we tried and Duke has made numerous commitments based on these Community conversations on this slide I've listed commitments that were added to the resoning request based solely on the feedback from bana we have prohibited through access across the old laundry.

Site currently the parcel is accessed from gadus and does not have any access to Campus Drive to the West the commitment here acknowledges that if the general public were allowed to cut through old laundry site to get from Buchan to Campus Drive it would greatly impact Birch Avenue and so we have committed to eliminating any through access we also have prohibited several uses on the property while Duke does not have a plan for this parcel today we recognize that the uses listed here probably would not mesh with the existing community and Duke wants to be a good neighbor while balancing the flexibility of this that this zoning affords them we also have agreed to require a TIA for any site plan on the old laundry site and to implement the improvements identified in the Tia I think that condition does a good job of addressing the neighbors's concerns about traffic while allowing due flexibility to plan this site for more specific use at a later date in my view.

It's a pretty big commitment because the UC District does not require the university to do a TIA for any individual project I see I'm running out of time I got a few more things to say the next commitment requiring a bike ped path across old laundry to Campus Drive that might seem a little counterintuitive given oh you want you want to cut it off there you're knocking out too yeah absolutely five more minutes sure almost done here the next commitment which requires a pip a bike ped access AC cross old laundry to Campus Drive that might seem a little counterintuitive given that we've you know prohibited through traffic across this but this is a concern that was raised by the neighbors and in our conversations with them we learned that their concern really is about vehicles and in fact many of the neb many in the neighborhood enjoy the existing foot paths and do use them to get out to Campus Drive or the Arts Annex so we have committed to.

Maintaining some sort of bike ped connection between this site and Campus Drive we also have committed to providing a landscape buffer along the east side of the property and preserving an existing tree stand in the Southeast corner of the property and finally I would say du has committed to meet with bana members in the future to receive their feedback before ever filing a site plan for the old laundry site and I think this commitment really speaks to Duke's pledge here to be a good neighbor and meet the community where they are it's true that Duke cannot tell you today what they plan to build on the site but Duke recognizes that the community has a legitimate interest in what will be built here and they are not running away from that I think it's pretty great commitment hopefully this gives you a better understanding of the of these two resoning requests the UC district is is a unique animal in the Udo it it is meant to provide flexibility to our City's institutions.

Of higher education so that they can continue to innovate and provide High Caliber services to their students and to the community at large a key feature of the UC districts is the flexibility they afford Duke and North Carolina Central both in allowed uses per but perhaps more so more importantly in campus scale planning and while this has been quite a technical process I think the colorful map I'll turn back to that I think that colorful map right there kind of sums up what's going on here Duke has Acquired and in fact they continue to acquire property around its campus around the city and you can see on the map from where these Brown Parcels are located that Duke is simply attempting to unify the zoning so it can better plan how those spels will integrate with the existing campus our team is available to answer any questions I thank you for the additional time and hopefully we I know this hearing is about East Campus but I will.

Not take 10 minutes for the next one thank you thank you so much thank you all right at this time we're going to start having the Community give comment as a reminder we have two minutes per person so I think we have we have two people even though they signed up later that have PowerPoint presentations is that right so I want to get those out of the way first cuz that sometimes has gets time to get y'all set up up there and it's Ben Andrews and Janelle barley so if we can get them set up with their PowerPoint presentations and let them get that.

Done.

And I can advance it with the with the mouse air. Down hello everyone Thanks for allowing us to join in this community engagement name and address Ben Andrews 508 North Buchanan thank you sure I understand that the primary discussion this evening is on the three Parcels that we saw in in the map that will be added to East Campus and to be honest I am I don't object to those Parcels being added and and I don't object to to development in many ways I'm Pro development and pro density but but when we do those things I think we have to do them thoughtfully and to make sure that we are addressing storm water and other infrastructure issues although where I live is slightly farther from those three Parcels I've spent about the last 10 years working with the storm water department and Durham ironically I moved this area when we got flooded out of New Orleans and we were so excited to live near East Campus and then shortly after moving into our home.

Realized that we have far worse flooding issues on Buchanan than we had in our small house in New Orleans over the last 10 years or so the discussions with the storm water department have essentially gone have essentially communicated to me that the storm water generated from Duke's East Campus has to be you know no pun intended kind of absorbed by The Neighborhood until there was such time as a rezoning or a demolition and addition of a new building on East Campus and that time appears to be today when I saw that this proposal was being made I quickly read through it and and was concerned that there the city's request for Innovative storm water policy 117 wrap it up in 10 seconds your time is up was not met this is the storm water coming from East Campus it backs up behind the wall which is terrific because it doesn't flood by front yard but that head pressure creates flooding all the way Downstream so you know hurricane or not.

Just a summer storm I have thousands of gallons under my house and I pumped them very similar to a New Orleans pump system I pumped 365 days of the year and I manage those I try to deal with freezing I try to deal with power outages cut we need something similar to what was done close to Broad Street and thank you for thank you for your time thank you next up we have Jean barley yeah those two minutes go.

Quick thank. You good evening and thank you for the work that you do on behalf of Durham and its residents and thank you for hearing from us tonight my name is Janelle vley I live at 508 North of Buchanan Boulevard near the intersection of Buchanan IND Avenue that's right across the street from Dukes University East Campus my family and I have lived there since 2013 so that's a little over 10 years now we love our neighborhood and our neighbors and we really enjoyed living there but I'm here tonight to share concerns with you regarding traffic issues on Buchanan Boulevard that we've experienced and seen during the last 10 years my husband has prepared the PowerPoint slides that are submitted regarding the traffic issues that are referenced our neighborhood is a residential neighborhood that borders the east campus walking trail there are many pedestrians Runners dog walkers strollers children school children scooters and cyclists that travel on Buchanan and or cross onto the east campus at Buchanan and however many drivers drive too quickly on Buchanan.

Between Main Street and Club Boulevard there are a few crosswalks existing but there is not a crosswalk at Buchanan and so we are here advocating for additional crosswalks at Buchan inundation and or a four-way stop sign at Buchan inundation additionally I think my husband has noted that that intersection accesses the East Campus cafeteria or student cafeteria so there are a lot of deliveries large trucks Etc that come up there so again if any additional development or growth is approved on Duke's East Campus we anticipate that would add to or compound the existing traffic issues and as a result we respectfully request that you please Implement additional safety measures or features if any additional growth or development is approved with the goal of keeping neighborhood families Duke faculty and Duke students safe so those additional safety features might include as mentioned crosswalks or other methods of slowing traffic down on Buchanan as it borders Duke's east campus thank you for your time tonight thank you.

Next we have Adam cther.

Cther so my name is Adam Crowther I live in the 900 block of exm Street in Birch Avenue along with my wife 7-year-old daughter 2-year-old son and my 10-year-old dog who is a very good boy is you may be aware a significant portion of blocks in our neighborhood lack sidewalks including the portion of G Street which serves as one of the primary access points to the old laundry which is one of the properties the Duke would like to rezone I have significant concerns about this rezoning application because of Duke's repeated refusal to incorporate into their application common sense traffic mitigation recommendations including those that were specifically requested by Durham's transportation department I believe there were two different Redline additions into their application both of which they refused our neighborhood is a quiet residential neighborhoods there are a lot of kids I think there's 15 kids on my block alone resoning the site must come with additional guarantees so there'll be no additional traffic impact coming through Gattis Street to the site absent these guarantees.

Do have concerns about my ability to travel on that and other blocks within the neighborhood with my young children with other children with my dog with my parents anybody who happens to be on that block I am in favor of responsible Redevelopment of this site but I cannot support this rezoning and I want to be clear that my comments are not driven by Spite for Duke I am a Duke graduate Duke itself is a significant reason why my family chose to live in Birch Avenue but I also expect Duke to be a good responsible neighbor so that my family and I continue to quietly enjoy our neighborhood and I want to note one thing about sort of the through access concession that Duke has made one of the critical issues is traffic accessing the site from gatis not necessarily through Campus Drive to gtis and so considering limiting traffic being able to access the site from gatis itself is a critical issue for our neighborhood thank you thank you next we have Doug.

Conie these.

Name my name is Doug coonley I and my family have been Duke neighbors for 17 years at 502 Gattis Street where we own a home we appreciate the thankful development of the Arts Annex and the satellite Park and we anticipate similar improvements for 400 Gattis Street the laundry building to make it safer and beneficial to everyone the site access from Gattis Street requires a careful and complete review of any development to ensure compatibility with the existing fan familyfriendly and quiet residential neighborhood it is critical for everyone's safety that traffic volume be limited to the values directed by the Durham Transportation Department and that traffic be routed from Campus Drive should review of Duke's proposed development exceed that number Duke has not Incorporated any of these logical requests into their proposal nor have they provided any indication of what development might take place therefore the present residential zoning should remain until Duke provides development plans for the laundry building site at 400 G Street and a complete review of their impact.

Has been made by the appropriate Durham city departments we look forward to working with Duke to create safe and enjoyable places beneficial to every everyone and without negative impacts for our residential neighborhood thank you very much for your time thank you sir next we have Charles Duna hopefully I said that.

Right my name is Miss Charles dunigan my family has lived at 920 Rome Avenue 50 years we' seen a lot of changes in the neighborhood some we like and some we don't my main concern about Duke is the assets of of G Street actually if Duke gets to do something I would like for them to access a road from Campus Drive I did the measurements from The Watershed to have PL room either way or not they have plenty of room thank you very much thank you sir Russell.

Lacy hi my name is Russell Lacy and I live in the Birch Avenue neighborhood at 407 gatis street directly across from 400 gatis and I am in favor of development at 400 gaus but not of this rezoning first speaking narrowly on the feasibility of addressing traffic there is already a Duke owned and maintained Road of 337 ft headed directly towards Campus Drive down the hill to finish making the connection to Campus Drive Duke just needs to extend their route another 176 feet continuing at the same grade and the nearby stream is well beyond the 50-ft buffer I'm not an engineer but it's clearly possible to extend their current road to connect to Campus Drive it will just take time and money if Duke won't connect to their existing road to Campus Drive they need to commit to keeping TR traffic loads at current levels now speaking more broadly 400 gatis is zoned Rd and that is the correct zoning since we are a neighborhood it should stay Rd until Duke Forest puts forward a compelling.

And binding site plan for why this parcel should be rezoned this 3.2 acre parcel could currently be developed up to 64 residential units rezoning would allow Duke to build a parking lot a parking deck a steam plant a bus depot or any other number of uses that are totally unsuitable in a neighborhood the entire point of zoning is protect against cases like this where Goliath likee Duke has the power to build anything they want without restriction and accountability to the neighbors in the community why would you give Duke the right to develop anything when Duke says there are too many unknowns to make any meaningful commitments when this parcel in the urban core of downtown Durham could provide the housing we so badly need here in Durham we became aware of a 2020 study that was commissioned by Duke's senior leadership to use 400 gatis for faculty and staff housing Duke Representatives actually provided us with some details of this study it is 40 to 50 residential units.

Which are a mix of single family homes and Tow houses this thoughtful plan takes into account the health and well-being of our neighborhood and is an obvious win-win I ask you to inquire why Duke is not moving forward for with this plan for faculty and staff housing at for Gattis and instead here are asking for rezoning today thank you for your time thank you we have Richard Ziggler then Rob kushman and then Tom delviso in that order please if you could.

Speak I'm Richard Ziggler and I have lived at 918 Birch Avenue for the past 17 years basically everyone in this room knows that UC is a very wide ranging broad development Zone that allows a laot intensive development and that's appropriate for a college or university as on west campus but a little over 20 years ago when that zone was created it was created in consultation with a lot of the neighborhoods around East Campus and East Campus specifically got a lot of committed elements to protect itself from the intensity that you can create so for example on East Campus multi-level parking decks are prohibited there's no access to East what we think of East Campus proper from Broad Street there are a lot of things that were put in place to protect Trinity Avenue and the Neighbors in that area and basically what I what I would like and what I think a lot of my neighbors would like is for us just to be shown the same consideration you know their their attorney said oh.

Well we're going to prevent through traffic well you can put a gate between gtis in their property but if they have a 78 n 10 story parking deck if they have enough intensive development on that site just Duke itself will drive what we think of is too much traffic to our neighborhood this lot that we're talking about at Birch Avenue it's at the intersection of two dead end streets in a neighborhood that was cut off from the city grid by the building of I4 Highway 147 because of the building of 147 the whole neighborhoods like a culd AAC and if you've ever driven down Buchanon when Immaculate Conception is getting out of school and I love Immaculate Conception they're a great neighbor but when their school gets out around 2:33 every day it creates a traffic jam through our neighborhood and we're just asking Duke to tell us you won't put a parking deck there thank you very much thank.

You good evening my name is Rob kushman I live at 828 Wilkerson Avenue I've been there for 30 years raised six children at that location and I actually bought into the neighborhood with help from the city this was kind of a blighted neighborhood at the time and there was a firsttime home buyer program that I I was that I went through to buy this property and I got a lot of help from the city and since then I've been hired by the city and I've been made aware of just how how limited the affordable housing is in the downtown area I too am worried about the traffic since the pandemic we already have more Prime delivery FedEx all this our our traffic volume has gone up and as they said the the the school at Immaculate Immaculate Conception adds to the problem as well I am so fearful that some big traffic engine will happen on that 400 gatis property that the only access to it is is from is right down my street and.

This neighborhood has changed a little bit over the 30 years it's not as it's certainly not as blighted as it once was and there are many more children than there were at the time my kids were coming up but the neighborhood has put a lot of effort and money into putting traffic calming devices that are Pleasant children friendly out there they you know they've got the pastel colored turn things and they painted the lines to make the parking area wider so that people just are forced to slow down a lot of effort has been put into making this other a livable lovable neighborhood and residential zoning is appropriate for that that piece of land they could use it for family student housing I I did that at Carolina I lived in that way it would be a wonderful place for young students with kids they'd be welcomed by our neighborhood adopted by us and be a huge addition that that's a good neighborhood relationship idea that I think they should consider resoning this without.

Any kind of constraints on what they could do a parking deck would be murder that would just kill the neighborhood unless they do all their access from G from Chapel Campus Drive thank you for your sorry for.

Going good evening my name is Tom dovio and I live at 817 Burch Avenue I'm here to express my concern the Burch Avenue neighborhood has made every attempt to engage and collaborate with no better sense of what the plan for the old future for the old laundry facility will be my family has lived in the neighborhood for nearly 15 years and one of the reasons we stayed was Community neighbors talk they share plans they help out that's the definition of a good neighbor in our talks about this situation there are many many examples of specific situations where Duke over the years has professed to be a good neighbor and then when it suited them has cut out stakeholders that's my concern that's not what a good neighbor does there's been significant development in our neighborhood already and it's putting pressures on the community a lot of that have been talked about but I'll stop and I'll pause here to just reemphasize we have increased traffic we've heard a lot about that but.

Richard was right I mean it's a culdesac neighborhood essentially there's only one way to get to that point one way to get out every single day when school lets out on the other side people speed right through on Birch Avenue in wierson to cut through past that traffic I sit our house is across from the park we watch every day sometimes in Terror as little kids toddle out that Park and nearly get run over by people speeding through the neighborhood a development on the back of that neighborhood is going to push and consolidate more and more that traffic we're going to see more and more Danger we also have skyrocketing costs it's harder to live in our neighborhood more development without thought is going to bring more money and more development to that neighborhood and make it even harder to live in there and so I think my takeaway here is that I really urge you to not give Duke that blank check that free pass to develop any way they.

Want in the future we want to work with them we're happy to work with them but we need to know the details of what's going to happen so that we can actually give informed feedback thank you thank. You the next three speakers in order are Kristen. Paige John fit Stephanie Grant and I apologize in advance for butchering names I really did go ahead I am Kristen Paige I live in the Birch Avenue neighborhood at 825 Birch Avenue I am an active member of our tiny little Community I'm on the board I'm a founding member of the Birch Avenue run club which starts its weekly fun run at the corner of birch and gtis and I've helped resurrect our newsletter which lets folks know about events like the one we just had this last weekend at the community garden only a few hundred feet from the old laundry building and events like this hearing that we're all here for tonight I also have a 2-year-old dog named Juniper who I walk three times a.

Day all over our neighborhood which almost always includes a trip down gtis street and past the old laundry building there is no sidewalk so we walk in the street and to be clear Juniper walks me on our walks we waved to the kids at the bus stop at the corner of birch and gtis we passed Duke students cutting through the neighborhood from Campus Drive we talked to Neighbors about the latest home on the market we wave to folks riding their bikes to and from work we say yes when the kids cross the street to ask can I pet June and Juniper greets her friends who are also out walking their person we feel safe I feel safe and I am forever changed because I get to live here in my precious neighborhood there are so many things so many exciting things that Duke could do with the old laundry property I hope that one day they do but as it stands right now they could absolutely destroy the safe neighborhood I cherish by.

Building what who knows too many unknowns by adding how much additional traffic can't say too many unknowns since Duke will not commit to keeping me and my neighbors safe by at minimum diverting any additional traffic this property generates to Campus Drive then I cannot support this rezoning application thank you very much thank. You chair Cameron my name is John J Fric and I live at 911 exm Street in Durham I've resided in the Birch Avenue neighborhood since 2008 with an exception of a one-year Hiatus in Morhead Hill and a four-year suburb in the western suburbs I'd like to extend my appreciation to each of you for your service to the city of Durham helping our region really navigate this challenging growth I'm here to advocate for 400 Gad Street to retain its existing residential zoning I'm open to supporting non-residential uses of the property should they not negatively impact the adjacent neighborhood and be accompanied by reasonable committed elements to that end I'm particularly excited by the opportunity for Duke to.

Redevelop this blighted industrial site to house Duke University student and staff families enhancing our neighborhood connections to the institution whose success is so interwoven with durs the National Historic designation of the Birch Avenue neighborhood reflect not only the diversity of our dwellings but also our neighbors where we have Blended relative newcomers like myself with families who Who tie back generations to include those from historic brooktown and African-American Community largely displaced by Highway 147 in recent years we welcomed new neighbors some fleeing war and violence from Far Corners of the world and others simply seeking Refuge from cold winners and poorly performing minor league baseball teams from our diverse backgrounds we've worked together and often in wonderful partnership with Duke University to foster a safe and friendly place for raising families and not surprisingly we've experienced our own baby boom over the last decade and now our thorough far is frequently host the big wheels and basketballs of this demographic alongside the bike and scooter traffic of more mature commuters I encourage the.

Planning Commission to consider denying Duke's request to rezone 4 Gattis from its current residential designation until such time that Duke develops with ready and willing neighborhood support plans that complement the Vibrant Community made many of us call home thank you thank you. Good evening my name is Stephanie Grant and I live at 829 Birch Avenue I've been a part of the Birch Avenue neighborhood since 2006 when my partner got a job teaching here at Duke and we moved down from Massachusetts we love the neighborhood because of because it is both racially and economically diverse even as pressures of gentrification continue it's not perfect but there is a diversity in the neighborhood that's not shared everywhere in Durham it's very welcoming to queer folks like myself it makes spakes for Duke students Duke faculty and staff there are I think six student houses in the neighborhood two Legacy fraternities and four group houses it's welcoming to families that have children as you've heard but also to families that don't.

Have children to Young Folks and to Old Folks it's a vibrant mixed neighborhood immediately immediately adjacent to Duke and it has none or perhaps very little of the Town gown animosity that plagues many universities and many University towns we're the kind of neighborhood that Durham likes to advertise as being comprised of and in order for that neighborhood and that diversity to continue we really need Duke to be behave responsibility Duke's desire to reone coupled with its what feels I I think to us like a koi refusal to commit to sharing its plan does not feel neighborly and the planning board has a responsibility to require that Duke behave in neighborly fashion which is to say collaboratively until Duke is able to collaborate by sharing its plans and asking more fully for our input I understand they have in the past but the sharing of those plans is a different story this parcel should not be rezoned I'm sure it's clear to you from many of our conversations why it's in our best interest to have.

This not resed but it's in the city's best interest and it's in Duke's best interest in terms of continuing this Good Neighbor policy thank you thank you next we have Betsy Michael Lorie sler and Tom.

Miller good evening planning Commissioners thanks so much for your time my name is Betsy McMichael and I'm a longtime resident and homeowner at living at 909 Burch right around the corner from the 600 block of Gattis and here's the biggest reason that I oppose du zoning request for East Campus my family moved here in 1997 from a rural area outside the us where we worked we left careers and moved to have better medical and other opportunities for our second child Janie who was four at the time and recently diagnosed with a serious genetic condition as we began meeting people Janie zoomed with her walker up and down the neighborhood and made close connections with people of all ages and backgrounds many of whom still will ask about her 15 years worth of friendly impromptu conversations with a little girl that couldn't speak when we arrived Janie now 32 lives in an apartment with many of with supports in downtown Durham and I firmly believe that this would not have been possible without the.

Confidence and social skills she gained through her Birch Avenue relationships Janie uses a wheelchair now and is legally blind there are lots of things she can't do but with friends in her life she gets help with what she needs and gives back just as much in other ways the thing is we don't have good sidewalks in our neighborhood and certain blocks are so narrow that two cars cannot pass without one of them moving over and parking because Duke has not agreed to the most critical of the committed elements we proposed significant traffic and noise are serious threats from my view that that concern me it would eliminate the natural Community Building opportunities that help helped our daughter Janie and other marginalized people have a chance at a wonderful less lonely life thank you very much thank you Lori schake Scher yes I redeemed myself my name is Lori schleker and I live at 510 gatus Street in the Birch Avenue neighborhood I along with other representatives in the neighborhood have been actively involved in the.

Discussions with Duke regarding rezoning for several years now I feel like we made great progress in our relationship until John Nunan vice president of facilities at Duke declared at one of our meeting that Duke would not put committed elements in their application to adequately address our concerns for the safety and character of our neighborhood based upon and I quote too many unknowns regarding the future needs of Duke while I understand that they don't want to tie the hands of someone who will follow in their footsteps to develop this property in the future I certainly don't understand why the residents of Burch Avenue should bear 100% of the risk so they can be flexible the laundry facility if you has heard is located right in our neighborhood at the end of a narrow dead end street with no sidewalks my street committed elements one and three do not guarantee access from only Campus Drive as we requested to maintain our safety combine this with the small list of limited uses in number.

Two we have no sense that Duke respects the character of our neighborhood we do not need to live with the too many unknowns that will come from resoning it to UC allowing Duke in essence to have a blank check to do what they want if you do not reject this resoning requ request and recommend it remain befittingly residential the only fair option is to ask Duke to give us parody with the residents of Trinity Park and the holistic committed elements Duke put into place for them regarding any future development of East Campus which preserves their neighborhood a neighborhood already buffered by wide streets sidewalks and multiple access points the res of Birch Avenue deserve no less consideration than our neighbors at Trinity Park from this commission and from Duke University thank.

You hey Tom good evening Madam chairman and members of the commission my name is Tom Miller I live on Virginia Avenue I was until recently a member of this commission I know how important the work you do is is and I hope you've paid attention to the members of the community tonight who have made really good points about this old laundry property my comments are going to focus on that the Udo declares that the purpose of the UN University College District is to allow for growth and development of colleges and universities while protecting the larger Community nearby neighborhoods and the environments from impacts accompanying major new development the proposed rezoning of this track fails to make measure up to this purpose today access to to the tract is had from a neighborhood street to reach the property one must drive through the historic Birch Avenue neighborhood the property belongs to Duke University but as long as it is accessible only through the Burch Avenue neighborhood it's a neighborhood property it's not a campus property.

The property is currently zoned for residential use a use consistent with the residential character of the neighborhood if it is rezoned UC it could be used for just about anything except housing except housing and so in this way it's actually going flying in the face of policy 90 of the newly adopted comprehensive plan Duke could change this the property adjoins other Duke land that is zoned UC that land has a long Frontage along cap Campus Drive which as its name implies is essentially a campus thoroughfare through thoughtful commitments in its Pro proposed development plan Duke could cut the property the subject property off from the neighborhood and reorient it to the campus so that it becomes part of the campus it becomes suitable for U UC zoning today it is not so if Duke wants UC zoning from this parcel at the very least it must agree to disconnect it from the Birch Avenue neighborhood and join it to the campus thank you very much thank you next we said have Sam hmel Ryan.

Aser and Janine privet I believe.

That forgot this. Part oh yeah hello my name is Sam hmel and I live at 826 Birch Avenue and my comments are in reference to the Duke zoning of the annex next to the Birch Avenue neighborhood obviously my neighbors have all made really excellent points about our support and our concerns around the development of of this parcel so I'm not going to spend your time reiterating those points instead I want to talk about the implications of your vote on Democracy as Duke's lawyer has said the neighborhood has has a legitimate interest in what gets built here I believe that's true and if I understand correctly if you vote for this resoning we will lose the ability to come before you at the time that Duke actually does have a plan for this parcel and express our legitimate interests in the same way that we're able to do today so given that Duke has presented you with no specific plans it seems to me that Duke's request is not really about planning at all instead.

It is about reducing Democratic participation in the Redevelopment of this parcel so with their request you duke is is asking you to ensure that we the immediate neighbors will not have that same type of participation available to us at that time and so my ask is that you not make a vote given that that is is the only essential effect that I can see of this proposal and given the fact that there's nothing to stop Duke from coming back with a resoning request when it does have a specific proposal thank you thank.

You hello my name is Ryan Asher I live at 824 Birch Avenue I've lived there for over a decade I was heavily involved with bike Durham which helped with traffic calming in the neighborhood one of my major concerns is the safety of everybody in this neighborhood because I walk in bike everywhere I almost never use a car gatis as others have said has no sidewalks and is very narrow I'd invite any of you to come out and see it it's already dangerous enough as it is with traffic volume as it is if this resoning happens we would add greatly increased traffic to the neighborhood there is already the Arts Annex out there which is used sometimes by Duke students and anytime there's an event there which are 15 to 20 people it makes gatis extremely unsafe to walk on at once those people are released so any further rezoning would be extremely unsafe for the neighborhood so I'd ask you to consider that and again please come out and visit our neighborhood and.

You can see how this is a residential neighborhood that absolutely cannot be resed with the blank check and we heard that people Duke University would like to be good neighbors we heard that they'd like to make concessions to us but would any of you take a blind bet if nobody tells you what's going to happen in the future they have said there are unknowns they've repeatedly told us this Lori pointed this out that we were told this to our faces I don't think anybody would like to take a blind bet on please rezone and we will let you know what we're going to do in your neighborhood this is a residential neighborhood with a school a park a co-op and a restaurant it's already very busy we have to know what would happen before we approve rezoning so I would ask you to consider the safety and the structure and the Peace of our neighborhood when you vote on this thank you for your time thank.

You.

I'm jine privat I live at 827 Wilkerson Avenue zoning is supposed to provide predictability and stability Duke's current application to rezone the old laundry within a residential neighborhood fails to accomplish either Duke cites too many unknowns that allegedly prevented from making meaningful compromises or common sense commitments to preserve the safety character and quiet enjoyment of our neighborhood I would like to talk about some known I know the pretty Maps show Duke's campus with a large continuous section of UC zoning which makes the old laundry look like a weird cutout all of Duke's vehicular access must enter and exit from our neighborhood with those narrow streets frequently used by pedestrians joggers dog walkers cyclists and children I know this is different from the other you see Parcels on that map it is a different piece of property we have different issues it cannot be treated exactly the same way Council wants to integrate the property but it cannot be integrated without vehicular access it is a separate and apart piece I know there are capable Engineers.

Who can plan a road from campus and I know Duke can pay for it I know Duke has chosen to pursue resoning the property with too many unknowns I know Duke can control those unknowns and has chosen not to look into those unknowns I know Duke's application for all its words and illustrations barely says anything at all because almost everything on Duke's end is an unnown without Duke providing some common sense protections against traffic like those recommended by Transportation or committing to build a road from campus when the property is developed are providing the same committed elements applicable to East Campus with respect to our neighbors and Trinity Park I cannot support this application I know that an abandoned building contaminated with its besta sits on the property I would love to see responsible and smart development this application is not the right way to accomplish that why does Duke not want to truly integrate the property with a Road thank you we have wter.

Baron hello thank you my name is Walt Baron I live at 607 watt Street been there since 2013 I live right behind Ben and Janelle I want to be really clear I am not necessarily against rezoning we love living near Duke near East Campus it's a gift for me my wife our two teenage daughters and our our two dogs Duke has been a great neighbor but there has been one big issue that been introduced and that's storm water paint a picture nearly every drop of rainwater on East Campus East tennis courts East flows down the alleyway alley 13 between dasan and Monmouth Buchanan and Watts and it's caused huge problems several years ago it took sink holes on both sides of watch Street before the city was is able to come in and temporarily fix the issue a little sectional repair we appreciate that but that was a Band-Aid it's going to happen again and what we've been told by the city is that the city cannot act until Duke takes some action toward.

Development and this is the time to do something we don't want to lose our opportunity to fix this issue we want to ask the city to ask Duke to address this now while we have the chance we want Duke to agree to a text text commitment to make this a low impact development to match the post-development hydrographs to the pre-level Natural condition and ensure that this won't damage our neighborhood again thank you very much thank you do we have anyone else in the galley that I have not called that would like to speak all right we're going to move to the zoom oh okay please come to the podium state your name and your.

Address good evening I'm Kay Alexander I've lived at 820 Wilkerson Avenue for 37 years so I remember what it was like when the Duke laundry was open and there were big rattling trucks going up and down the street day and night as well as management and employees of the laundry speeding up and down the street in their cars this is not something we want to go back to what all my neighbors have said about the character and personality of of our neighborhood is true we would like Duke to live up to its rhetoric about being a good neighbor to us instead of acting like a corporation that has the city at its control to let it do basically whatever it wants without accountability to us I've been on numerous Town gown committees and negotiated with Duke over central campus rezoning off-campus student housing a number of other issues I personally have no reason to believe that the working committee they say they will convene when they do decide to develop the old.

Laundry is actually going to happen and if I had more time I could tell you a lot more about projects that Duke has initiated on the old laundry site and the site that is now the Arts Annex that we found out by Word of Mouth by reading about them in the chronicle by finding out about them in the Durham Herald or the news and observer without being informed in advance and again my personal experience is I have no reason to think that any of that's going to change I urge you not to support this resoning application thank you you thank.

You hello my name is Beth steenberg I live at 403 gtis street it's the last house before you get to the laundry building I have lived at 403 gtis and in the Birch Avenue neighborhood for 28 years I have lived in the neighborhood when it was the laundry building building when it was vacated the Arts Annex opened it has become The Unofficial neighborhood dog park and everything in between so Birch Avenue is a safe and walkable neighborhood with single family homes duplexes a park nearby stores and food establishments it's a lovely neighborhood that has become a hot spot in Durham the laundry building is currently Zone residential and is actually tucked in and behind this Compact and long-standing neighborhood I'm here tonight to oppose the rezoning application because it would change it from a residential Zone to University College and Duke has not indicated what it plans what its plans are to develop the property it has not responded to the neighborhood or city transportation department concerns about traffic nor address them in their.

Application so I don't oppose change or growth or Redevelopment it's justs that Duke has been unwilling to disclose what the plans are or to hear the neighborhood's concerns thank you thank.

You hello my name is Brenan bodison I live at 600 Bard Street and I'm a masters of public policy student at Duke University I am personally very interested in central campus and East Campus Redevelopment I think it is is a wonderful opportunity for Duke to enact its master plan and serve its Community reading through that master plan and those updated planning principles it reads as duke is University in the forest Duke is a leader in environmental stewardship Duke is a pedestrian campus Duke as a community of communities Duke as a citizen of dur in the region and Duke as a premier University all of the variance requests that are inside of these planning proposals are in my opinion opposed to the Core principles that are inside of this master plan I believe that this request right here is a wonderful public opportunity for Duke University to commit to its master plan to make itself a good citizen to all of you fine residents to become a premier University using Innovative storm water.

Management and the integration of Wildlife and Wildland areas into its site to mitigate harms and I would like to see the proposal reflect that thank you thank you. All right one more last time anyone in the galley before I put my head down and missed anybody all right we're GNA move to the zoom first we have Thomas. Naron hello my name is Thomas nton I am a resident of 1509 Pine Crest Road in Durham I am actually not in the neighborhood that others have spoken eloquently about but I am very near the proposed zoning changes I got a message I got a notice in the mail I was scratching my head when I got it my neighbors were scratching their heads when they got it this is near the owl ber trail that goes around the golf course and it extends all the way to 15501 far away from the specific changes that have been discussed on the call today I have lived your almost 25 years and I simply do not understand the.

Implications of this change for my neighborhood I do not understand the Practical impl implications and in particular I'm really concerned about the change related to not consistent with current open space rules I can also state that on our neighborhood list we've had several discussions about this over the last couple of weeks and nobody understands what this is about or why we are impacted it may appear that the main changes that are being discussed relate to a small area away from us but the rezoning is not restricted to a small area the rezoning impacts a broad stretch of land and so it is simply premature to approve this in its current form the resoning request is essentially trust us don't worry it'll be okay in the end and the community needs time and dialog to understand what this is about and that is simply not happened within our neighborhood so so again it's premature to move forward with this resoning request and I thank you for your consideration thank.

You next on the zoom we have Alysa. Lopez hello can you hear me yes hi please state your name and your address and go ahead did she drop Alyssa. Lopez can you hear me now yes please introduce yourself hi my name is Alyssa Lopez my neighbors probably know me as Alyssa Ellis I was recently married I'm a resident of 1018 Birch Avenue and I have been an owner of a dclt home since 2018 that will be ad adversely impacted by this rezoning request if it is implemented it is clear that the Duke Administration is not willing to create a rezoning plan that addresses months of recent conversations with neighborhood residents and leaders their current rezoning proposal omits critical elements requested by the neighborhood and is overly permissive as mentioned by many of my neighbors leaders of my neighborhood and surrounding neighborhoods have worked for over two years to have Duke commit inwriting to development that would respect and maintain the residential character of our neighborhood and mitigate any negative traffic effects I personally do.

Not have the flexibility to meet most evenings and I'm grateful to The Advocates within my neighborhood who are not compensated unlike the lawyer representing Duke to support our neighborhood unfortunately despite clear serious concerns Duke is still requesting a rezoning that would allow them to create intensive harmful development that would disrupt the character and safety of our small neighborhood community by creating construction trap and congestion issues with no Community input or oversight as residents we deserve to have our voices heard despite the Duke administration's wealth power and influence so that our neighborhood can maintain its character I personally grew up in Chapel Hill a town and gown Community where we have seen rampant University development and how that can quickly displace historic neighborhoods and communities and destroy the communities that previously existed for years please do not let this happen here in the Birch Avenue neighborhood please do not approve Duke's zon application as it is currently proposed thank you thank.

You we have Mimi.

Kesler go ahead good evening can you hear yes can you my name is Mimi Kesler my address is on record I have been sick from for a week in bed and someone called me and told me that this resoning was much wider spread than I realized and I have concerns about that I share with the Birch avenu neighborhood but I also have concerns about the fact that this also involves the golf course and and I think that it would be and the aler trail that goes around the golf course and it would be a genuine tragedy that this particular area which provides a great deal of recreational satisfaction to the residents would be re redeveloped into something else and and it's one of the few places that the huge Duke campus offers something to the people of Durham and I don't think that resoning in this widespread way is legitimate and I would like you to vote again thank you thank you is there anyone else in the zoom meeting platform that would like to.

Speak we have Angela. Fox hello can you hear me yes bless you my name is Angela Fox my family moved into our first single family home at 909 exom Street in Birch Avenue neighborhood and I am also a proud Duke Blue Devil I want to speak about the old laundry site on G Street I encourage the commission to deny Duke's request to reone without clear commitments and propers from duke to be clear only restricting public use between gtis and Campus Drive is not an appropriate profer public use is only part of the issue since 2016 there's been a growing number of children that feel free to play in our neighborhood due to the community coming together to create a safe environment for them we've educated the kids on bike safety crossing the streets using crosswalks and sidewalks when they're available and many of us have also had to explain the memorial in our neighborhood for a bicyclist that was murdered by an aggressive driver on a daily basis our kids still encounter aggressive drivers.

Drivers are speeding honking at kids and and these are driver drivers that are using our neighborhood as through traffic we've rosed the occasion as a neighborhood and done the things you're supposed to do we've asked for traffic studies we've implemented our own traffic calming measures we've protected our bike Lanes with the help of bike Durham and we have many yard signs making it clear that children play in and around our neighborhood streets we're already on the verge of having something traic tragic happen again even without an increase in car traffic we are here again to rise to the occasion and protect our kids Duke can and should commit to creating and using their own private Street for entrance and egress it's unfair to our kids to have to deal with Duke's private traffic Duke has the budget and physical space on Campus Drive their private Street to create a side street to this area and the the planning commissioner you should feel an obligation to do the due diligence when.

We're telling you that our kids are at rest not just our peace but there's real There's real risk for them please don't allow this reone without a profer of creating Duke's own private entrance and their written commitment to not use the neighborhood for their private traffic thank you we can only expect so much our families thank you next we have jaselyn Al hi can you hear me yes thank you my name is j alcot I live at 407 G Street across the street from the parcel at 400 G Street I moved to Durham in 2002 to take a job at Duke University history department where I'm currently a full professor and I have served in many capacities a Duke including his department chair and have sat through countless meetings in which administrators have insisted upon the University's commitments to being a responsible partner with Durham and to reducing its environmental impact however Duke's response to the reasonable concerns about resoning this parcel has repeatedly demonstrated both its disrespect for Community m members.

And it's disregard for the advice of Durham city transportation staff the parcel is unusual as you've heard perhaps it's even unique BEC among Duke's properties and that it is nestled within a residential neighborhood with vehicular access only on the neighborhood side I urge you to vote against this proposal to reone the parcel to UC particularly given Duke's refusal to commit to access from Campus Drive and to rule out any conspicuously inappropriate uses such as a parking deck or a sewage treatment plan instead with the current medium density residential zoning Duke can develop the parcel in a way that not only is appropriate for the neighborhood but also would Advance an objective shared by both the city and the university that is increased availability of affordable housing within the urban core indeed given the neighborhood's history as you've heard the most appropriate development would be a pro would be to provide affordable housing for employees at the lower end of Duke's wage scale dining hall workers and bus drivers landscaping and custodial staff hital.

Technicians and adjunct faculty this parcel is steps away from an existing Campus bus route that could take employees to locations throughout campus at no expense meeting the city's most daunting challenges the shortage of of affordable housing and the need to address environmental impacts will not succeed by converting centrally located Residential Properties into UC Zoning for an unspecified and potentially damaging purpose thank you thank you next we have Sophia califano califano thank you I'm Sophia califano I live at 809 Wilkerson and I thank you for the opportunity to speak and and for the work that you do for our city my family lives in the Birch Avenue neighborhood and we're asking you not to approve Duke's request to reone the East Campus Parcels including at 400 gatis our neighborhood is residential and that is how the land is currently zoned it's home to Children Neighbors in wheelchairs dogs elderly neighbors families and we have additional young pedestrians because our neighborhood also has a school a church a city park.

And the Emily K Center some of our neighborhood is still without sidewalk or shoulder and that includes gtis which is the road to the old laundry at 400 gatis kids cannot walk or ride bikes around the block without walking down gatis Duke's stated plan is not binding it leaves them open to build parking a bus depot a dorm and to bring heavy traffic through residential streets with our kids we do support development of the space we don't support giving Duke cart blanch to put our children and our neighbors at risk if the only route in is residential residential zoning is correct it's inappropriate and irresponsible to move forward with no detailed and binding plan for an entry other than through the the center of a residential neighborhood Duke owns the land on the other side of the laundry there's no reasonable argument for the zoning to be changed now before Duke makes a plan and a binding commitment to reroute traffic to any new development through their campus rather than through.

Our neighborhood we have good neighbors many of whom you've met tonight so you know exactly what that means and and Duke keeping an option open to root heavy traffic right where our families walk and play is not being a good neighbor again thank you for the work you do and for your time tonight and thanks in advance for upholding reasonable guard rails to keep our children and neighbors safe thank. You Alexander Tilly is.

Next hi good evening my name is Alexander Tilly and I live at 821 werson Avenue with my two children who are four and six years old and my wife of 10 years My Two children are part of the scooter and bik contingent that JJ mentioned a little while ago I live 300 yards from 400 gtis term the old laundry in in sort of the the discussions that we've had and I live along the most direct route from East Campus to the parcel and currently experience the effects of non-resident traffic coming to that site through a residential neighborhood and the education that has to occur even every year for the Duke students that live in our neighborhood with regards to the risk associated with driving too fast in our neighborhood with as many young kids as we have Duke has not agreed to eliminate access to the site via Wilkerson and Gattis despite recommendations from erene Thomas of Transportation and I would respectfully request that the zoning of 400 gatus be kept as.

Residential until such a time as duke can present a clear plan for the site that presents an alternative route of access to 400 gatus that does not increase traffic or the risk and danger to our children thank you thank you next we have Elizabeth Brown rid. Hi can you hear me yes thank you my name is Elizabeth Brown rig I live at 2711 Circle Drive in the Duke Forest neighborhood even though we've been told that nothing has changed I'm concerned about the implications of the removal of the recreation and open space designation for the Duke East Campus Edition the the land that surrounds the Washington Duke innn and golf course in the alular trail and fitness Loop is an important resource for the entire Durham Community the trail and fitness Loops serve many more people than those associated with duke or who live in nearby neighborhoods as our area continues to be heavily developed these Trails offer the rare opportunity to exercise in a beautiful natural area within City Limits they are enjoyed by Durham.

Residents from all neighborhoods and every economic status I walk there frequently one reason my partner and I chose to live in this neighborhood was a proximity to the forest and walking trails the forest that surrounds the Washington Duke in and Golf Course trails are an important resource for wildlife that is under pressure from development the area is a designated eird site because of its excellent habitat thanks to Duke's efforts the entire area serves as water as a water filtration system that prevents pollutants from flowing Downstream the change in zoning and removal of the recreation and open space designation would allow for development that would hire the N harm the natural habitat diminish opportunities for Community Health and Recreation and make the surrounding neighborhoods less desirable places to live thank you thank.

You Patrick.

Halpen yes can you hear me yes thank you I'm Patrick halin I live at 1712 Woodburn Road my property ABS the East Campus UCD near the alular trail I'm also a faculty member Duke University at the school ofly environment as others have mentioned my question is not focused on the proposed properties of Birch Avenue neighborhood but further focused on proposed changes for the entire zoning District to drop Recreation at open space from zoning designation this change could be appropriate for some portions of the East Campus UCD but is entirely inappropriate for the large area of the district including the aler trail and recreational Forest areas for many of the reasons that have already been mentioned the overly broad East Campus District the geographic range is massive spanning all the way from the actual East Campus to the very West Campus West of West Campus where the aler trail is located if any changes to the recreational designation are to be made or considered it should consider dividing this into different representative UCD districts because.

It's very inappropriate to make a change to Recreation open space to cover the entire Zone thank you very much thank you. I think that it is there anyone else that would like to speak in the zoom.

Platform I don't see anyone another hand raised so at this time we're going to close the public hearing we are now open for commissioner discussions and questions Comm can the staff explain the transportation requirements that lot of part community members have mentioned that applicant didn't incorporate please I yeah one second I'm I'm sorry I should have let the applicant you had about 3 minutes left to respond to any concerns that the community brought up go go ahead attorney go I'm sorry yeah yeah thank you and this is Neil GH attorney for the applicant speaking once again I did want to address a couple things so first of all there were a few people in particular on the zoom who had concerns about this open space designation changing and I want to be real clear about that that relates to the place type map that is not a zoning change and nothing about the Golf Course zoning or the zoning on the ALB Trail is changing as part of this resoning request that's just on.

The place type map which is not a regulatory document it is a policy document which I know you all know must be consistent ultimately with the zoning that gets approved which is why iol staff is recommending a change to the place type map for those particular areas but the Zoning for those particular items are not changing I did want to take a moment to explain kind of the the scenario that Duke and I would assume any well Central would find itself in with the UC zoning District the UC zoning district is unlike other zoning districts in that the opportunities that affords the university weigh greatly on how the property can be used ultimately so whether the property is zoned UC will definitely have an impact on ultimately how Duke decides to use these properties and so that's why there is no specific plan for this development Duke does not have any plan to develop any of these 13 Parcels under their current zoning and they don't have a plan to develop it.

Under UC zoning because they're not zoned UC but they are ultimately part of the illustrative campus wide master plan one of the other benefits I think think maybe is super important for Duke and and maybe misunderstood is the ability to handle storm water kind of on a campus wide scale such that the development for example let take the old laundry site which is the one that has been discussed most the old laundry site could be developed and then the storm water for that site could be treated and piped to a different area of campus to treat the storm water thereby having fewer impacts on that property and that that's true of every property not just the old laundry site but I wanted to mention that with respect to traffic and and access I think it's important to touch on so number one we've made a commitment on this parcel that is actually I believe in excess of what transportation suggested we have said that we will do a traffic study Tia for.

Any site plan regardless of the number of trips have produced for any site plan on Old laundry which I believe is an excess of what Transportation had requested and I I'll be happy to stand corrected on that the other thing I just want to note I was a little bit surprised by some of the tenor of the conversation here I have right here the original letter that the Birch Avenue Association sent us for their requests and one thing I just want to read from it and this is Rel about 30 seconds and I'm going to cut you off this is related to Old laundry site this was the request the original request no vehicular access to 400 GA Street shall be permitted from Wilkerson Avenue or Wilkerson Avenue Extension no access from campus drive or any other contiguous Duke University property shall be permitted that was their original request now I want to acknowledge U that the conversation has evolved since then but to suggest that Duke has not listened and has done.

Nothing I think is just plainly false and and Duke has made some serious concessions here with respect to both traffic and access thank you very much thank. You all righty now we can. Proceed earling Thomas Transportation so what we requested as a part of the zoning application was that a access from this from the laundry parcel be provided to Campus Drive you know for connectivity and do to pass and current concerns from the neighborhood with traffic and traffic calming that's been already completed to date so that is not something that Transportation could require even at the site plan stage for redevelopment because it would be a new access point it would need to be a voluntary proper to make that connection because they do have existing driveways you have to follow up no commission go back thank you a couple questions for the applicant I was hoping to dig into potentially some more concrete examples of why Duke would be limited or or what the the real implications would be for Duke if it did.

Not rezone now and waited until there was a more concrete development plan is my first question yeah so I think the reality is that without without this parcel or these Parcels being zoned UC that Duke's long range plans for them would be to develop them under their current zoning so the planning would look completely different as has been mentioned this in particular the old laundry site is already zoned for multifam I believe it was mentioned that it could already be built for 64 multif family residential units and if they were to do that they would include all of the parking for that on that site they would include all of the storm water for that on that site they would include all the open space tree save everything would be on site for that development and I I also just want to I I thought it was a little bit of a red herring my understanding is that the current zoning of the old laundry site does not require affordable.

Housing I know that was mentioned a couple times that oh it should be Zone residential so that we have more affordable housing I'm not sure that that commitment necessarily exists in the zoning but Duke is not a provider of housing generally speaking however the housing they do provide for their students is some of the most affordable housing in the city of Durham because it's affordable to students and why not connect to Campus Drive and take on the responsibility a great question that traffic and divert it from the community the issue is is not about not connect Duke doesn't have an interest in not connecting to Campus Drive what we can't tell you today is whether that connection is possible I know it was mentioned that there's a road that goes over there I'm not sure which road that talks about and that it only need to be extended I don't know 100 more feet or whatever the the number was and I mean I think two-dimensionally that could be true I I.

Don't have a reason to doubt that however in looking at it in the context of this rezoning there are streams and low-lying areas potentially Wetlands that are between old laundry and Campus Drive so what we don't know is whether we can actually complete a a vehicular connection to Campus Drive so the parcel today is accessed only from Gattis Drive which is why we can't also agree to eliminate access from gtis drive right to mhm because if we eliminate from gtis and then aren't able to make the connection to campus well now you can't access the parcel so what we have done is eliminate through access on this parcel okay so so I'll just voice that that I have some concerns about the inconsistency with the comprehensive plan both in the move away from residential and also just because of the lack of specificity that Duke is able to provide at this time about what might be done and so it's hard to know how to evaluate this case without more of.

That specificity I think we've heard it shared that there are unknowns and I think those unknowns probably make it hard for Duke to move forward and also make it hard for us as a body or me particularly as a commissioner to evaluate whether this will ultimately be consistent with the the goals and objectives of the comprehensive plan I actually see the mutual engagement as a real positive that's happened thus to date between Duke in the community and I've seen efforts to be flexible on both sides and I think it would make a lot of sense to me to see that discussion continue up until which time when there is a specific development plan to react to but I thank you for for your time on the community for the time this evening commissioner mans you have a question this might be for staff how many times has this been brought to the commission and is a Cadence of time I'm relatively new to the commission but this seems like a this has been a.

Long standing.

Concern thank you commissioner so this is the first time these specific proposals are being brought forth however there have been rezonings from Duke in the past I believe the last one and Duke and the attorney may be able to speak to it may have been 20 years ago ask a followup question to you so H how long have you all been engaging with the community directly and how many Community conversations and meetings have you all had about this oh I think it would be difficult to quantify the number of meetings conversations emails and and I will tell you I was not at all of those meetings or on all of those emails or phone calls Duke has has had several Representatives not just the folks that I'm working with directly on the resoning several representatives from duke have met with area stakeholders about this resoning specifically I don't know how to quantify that but I think we've been in this rezoning process for something like two years two years thank.

You yes yeah about two years all that's all I wanted to know cut right thanks chair this feels fairly like I it feels fairly obvious to me that there's a development to be done here just like any other development that comes before us and any other development that comes before us with lack of clarity doesn't it just doesn't get approved it doesn't make sense when we don't know what's going to be developed I understand the need for flexibility I also understand the need to plan in the future this doesn't prevent that right it puts a caveat on the future plans and I think that's okay I think the I agree with commissioner copac about the community engagement I think that should continue I think some reasonable Solutions have been proposed and I think that everyone on the team Duke's team is capable of figuring out the things like three dimensions whether or not you can actually connect to Campus Drive those are fairly simple things to figure out and determine whether or not it makes.

Sense and you can actually cut off from the neighborhood I think those are things that can be worked through and figured out and thinking through what we need to do here today again my question is can I don't know if this is a question for staff can whether you guys agree to this or not can you pull out the single parcel and allow for the resoning of everything else and allow the all laundry site to be considered in the future for rezoning whether that's something you consider is one thing whether we can actually do that without going through another resoning application I don't know the mechanics of that that's my thought about this and what needs to happen again these are fairly reasonable asss I think as it relates to this site specific specifically and I feel like they should be able to be worked through in a reasonable manner so with respect to that request specifically I mean something I could discuss with the client we certainly have pulled Parcels.

Out of this resoning I think I mentioned 922 Rome which is essentially adjacent to this site it's just kind of up up on the more within the neighborhood I guess this is kind of at the periphery on the far side of Gus and and that one is on the other side so I think that's a possibility something I could discuss with client but I do want to you know just I I think it's I think to assume that it's fairly easy to figure out whether this connection could be made is is maybe trivializing a pretty complicated scenario and it also depends greatly on what the site is developed for it's it's there are streams potentially wetlands and environmental features between this site in campus I feel fairly certain that you that the site cannot essentially you can't just punch a road from this site to campus it probably have to take a more circuitous route through other Parcels which again will depend on how those are developed.

So I I I hear what your opinion was and I will say in my opinion Duke has also offered some workable Solutions here which is number one we do a TIA no matter what right whether it's required or not we would do one for any site plan on Old laundry and number two if we are able to make an access to canas drive you can't drive through from gtis to campus drive across this parcel those are those are the types of commitments that I think address the neighbors concerns and I understand that they would prefer now they would prefer that the parcel not take access from gtis at all but I I just want to reiterate that's a goalpost that has moved over time as well thank you any other questions Madam chair yes thank you first of all congratulations in advance thank you my question to you is so when do you think is appropriate time for your client to actually provide some information that would a make it more.

Palatable for this body to make a decision but also for the community when do you think the appropriate time is if if not tonight when is the appropriate time the application is before you tonight and I'm not sure what would make the application more palatable to this body I there's no two ways about it Duke does not have specific plans to develop that parcel today and this is a zoning exercise to take so that Duke could take advantage of a district that was created for Duke so I can't tell you more about that parcel today so I'm not sure that I could make it more palatable if if your if your sense there is that you need need more definition of what it is what we have done is provide some prohibitions on what it will not be and those are directly responsive to feedback we've gotten from the neighborhood I as I mentioned earlier I think it was a little upsetting to hear some of the tenor because Duke has made.

A lot of commitments here we've come a long way and I I recognize we're not there 100% but that is not the definition of any kind of compromise at least not my definition ultimately for the Community what Duke is committed to here is to have continued conversations with in in particular bana mer Avenue neighborhood association related to any development on this site prior to ever submitting a site plan right so I mean I think that's a very appropriate type of commitment I believe a similar type of commitment was used for the L Park development and you know that it's a commitment where Duke is saying look we they are acknowledging we don't know what we're building here now but you should know what we're building here before we build it and so we will meet with you to do.

That I guess my concern is is that you're essentially asking the community to agree this to an agreement that's be made later but the fact of the matter is that can change after tonight correct no the commitment to a community Advisory Board is a zoning commitment that could change if we rezone the property but I don't expect that any kind of rezoning to get rid of that requirement or that commitment would be very popular I would agree with you on that which is why we've committed to it in the.

Zoning Mr C. Right I think the question here is twofold one I don't know if you'll have an answer to pulling out this particular property for this particular parcel for rezoning tonight if the answer is no I won't have an answer to that are you open or would you consider U bringing this back later 30 days continuance to have that conversation consider pulling this parcel out or working through something that is more agreeable to the community I I'm looking for Solutions here to help get this through and it seems like we've got one parcel in out of all of this between both East and Central that's a challenge and I feel like we should be able to work through that yeah no look I don't disagree with the statement you just made I will say that this parcel this one parcel that is the issue is in the east campus resing one of one of three parcels and the answers to these questions are not different on any of the other two.

Parcels for this right like I don't know what Duke doesn't know what they're going to be building on those Parcels either I the application is before you I'm happy to have that conversation with my client but I would ask that this body would vote on the application before them if we're going to pull it out we we can pull it out before city council based on the feedback we get here but like we have heard what the community has said and we're aware of I mean I want to be real clear about that it's not that Duke has ignored the community we understand the concern I wish I had a better answer for you but the Udo and the UC zoning District work the way they work and the the illustrative master plan is what it is Duke simply doesn't have a plan and I the way that planning their campus works I doubt they will have a plan for that parcel if it is not Zone UC because.

It it could not be developed under those types of rules if it's not so you see obviously so what I'm hearing you say is no you're not willing to do a I'm not goingon to pull I'm sorry say it again I wouldn't pull that parcel tonight but I will have the conversation with Duke do you want to have a continuance on this or do you want us to vote on this tonight as it sits I don't think a continuance is going to be helpful like I said we've heard the concerns got it it's not that we're not acknowledging them but I recognize they still concerns okay I appreciate it though.

Still got questions go ahead oh well any other questions before we want to be. Sure Mr Valentine you have a question no all right are we ready to move this case forward all right may I have a motion to move this case forward chair as it relates to case z2200 048 and a223 Duke East Campus Edition I make a motion that we move this case forward to city council with a favorable recommendation and we have to do two votes remember so is this the zoning map change or the tier.

Change as it relates to z2200 I'm sorry the a223 Duke East Campus Edition I make a motion that we move the annexation forward with a favorable recommendation to city council tier change tier change sorry tier change second it's been moved by commissioner cutright and second it by commissioner copac to move case doing a22 c03 tier change forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation may I have the roll call vote please chair Cameron yes the change commissioner cutright yes commissioner Graves mans no commissioner Gham no commissioner copac no commissioner mckyer yes commissioner Valentine no commissioner Williams yes commissioner woke no motion fails five to four all right are we ready to move this case forward for the zoning map change may I have a motion for.

Huh no we need to have a separate motion it's two separ yeah chair Rel to case z2200 z48 Duke East Campus Edition I make a motion that we move this zoning change forward to city council with a favorable. Recommendation second it's been moved by commissioner cutright and seconded by commissioner copac to move case z22 48 zoning map change forward to city council with a favorable recommendation may I have the roll call vote please chair Cameron no did you say no no commissioner cutr no commissioner Grace Ms no commissioner Gham no commissioner copc no commissioner mcber yes commissioner Valentine no commissioner Williams no commissioner woke no motion fails 8 to.

One okay so the the applicant I presented do you have anything to add on the Duke central campus Edition you have five more minutes nope all right we going to open up the public hearing for case z22 oh I'm sorry do we what oh I'm sorry we need a break yeah it's 7:34 never mind we're not doing anything right now we have a separate staff rep I don't know this central campus.

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Alexander Alexander Cahill Alexander Cahill Alexander Cahill we have a question for.

You.

All right planning Commissioners if you can make your way back to your seats please so we can get the.

Shower all right we're going to call the meeting back to order we're going to open the public hearing at this time for Duke central campus edition case z22. 47 and are there we don't have anyone signed up to speak on this case let me see is there anyone in the galley that would like to speak on this central campus case we're here got questions yes no one in the galle on Zoom we have Mimi Kesler go ahead Miss.

Kesler can you hear me yes we can thank you my name is Mimi Kesler my address is on record I would like to suggest that Duke make a commitment to build Workforce housing to support the University campus and the Medical Campus with housing that their minimum wage earners could afford to live where they could even walk to work but there is also public transportation I think this would be an enormous gesture of gratitude to those people who now can't afford to live in Durham and I think that that it would be you know even if they don't want to maintain the the housing units but I think it should definitely be excuse me lots of units I I can't remember what the what the document said but there were there was a count of how many multif family units and and make and make them make their workers be able to live where they work thank you thank you there is there anyone else on the zoom platform that would like to.

Speak all I would like the applicant like to address that concern sure you're not a developer of affordable housing nothing I should be coaching onto the suggestion I mean Duke is doesn't doesn't build housing so I'm not sure that this a commitment that Duke is prepared to make also just want to note I'm not sure which document to which document their comments were referring about multif family units but there are no plans here either for any development from duke so I don't think Duke has ever said they were Building multif Family on any of these Parcels thank.

You seeing that no one else would like to speak in on the zoom platform or in the galley the public hearing is closed and now we are now open for commissioner questions and discussion commissioner G I just have a question to the applic were were there any public comments on this central campus case on the 10 Parcels so we have treated these resoning cases together even though they are two separate zoning cases and I think you just heard the bulk of the commentary I won't say that there were no discussions about central campus but I think we have in large part addressed those and I don't know that there are outstanding concern concerns from community members we've spoken to about the central campus resoning thank you any other questions concerns from Commissioners commissioner KAC thank you madam chair I just wanted to raise the mobility question brought forth by the transportation department around the 10- foot shared path and just you know curi us your thoughts about that and what would.

Be the possibility of committing to that now versus committing to talk to it but outside the context of a resoning if I have that correct yeah sure I'm happy to talk about that I would say my response will be the same as the written response and we've not had any further conversations with the city about that but we have I mean as is written expressed an interest to discuss that outside the context of the rezoning reason being the city has indicated a particular path and Duke actually has has been looking at pedestrian bicycle mobility in the same area albe it the path that they have looked at is different than what the city has suggested so I think the goals here are aligned the commitment I is not the the requested commitment is not really in line with what Duke has discussed for this to to address the same concern in this area so we want to have a further conversation with the city about that But ultimately Duke does plan to invest.

In bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure in that Pratt elf Elba area thank you do anyone else have any discussion are we ready to move this case forward may I have a motion to move this case forward chair as it relates to case z22 0047 d central campus Edition I make a motion that we move this zoning case forward to city council with a favorable recommendation second it's been moved by commissioner cutright and seconded by commissioner Valentine to move case z22 trip40 I'm sorry z22 47 Duke central campus Edition for to city council with a favor recommendation may I have the roll call vote please chair Cameron yes commissioner cutright yes commissioner Grace mans yes commissioner Gham yes commissioner copac yes commissioner mccyber yes commissioner Valentine no commissioner Williams yes commissioner woke yes motion carries 81 thank you.

All right at this time we will have case z221 19 sagebrook may we have the staff report please good evening brck rooper City County Planning just going to wait for Alexander to get the slides pulled up thank you Jason Morrow of Capitol City Homes proposes to change the zoning designation of three Parcels of land totaling.

17.36% proposes to change this designation to plan development residential 6943 to allow up to 120 townhouse units the properties are currently designated mixed residential neighborhood on the place type map the proposed plan development residential 6943 zoning is generally consistent with the designated Place type this case was initially heard by Planning Commission on June 13th 2023 followed by City Council on October 2nd 2023 in January 20 January 2nd 2024 where the case was continued at the February 19th 20124 city council meeting council members voted to send the case back to Planning Commission to reconsider in light of additional commitments the aerial map shows the general location of the project in eastern Durham the existing zoning again is residential Rural and the site is surrounded by residential Suburban 20 in residential rural the place type is mixed residential neighborhood which is consistent with the proposed zoning there is an Associated non-contiguous annexation with this application as you can see the city of Durham boundaries are shown in yellow the applicant has included textual commitments including storm.

Water control measures a minimum of 10 units to be income restricted to households earning 80% area median income or less for a period of at least 30 years a contribution of $60,000 to Durham Public Schools and additional impervious surface tree preservation and steep slope requirements a neighborhood meeting was held in accordance with udio requirements on January 20th 2022 where no community members were in attendance The Proposal is generally consistent with the place type map designation of MRN mixed residential neighborhood staff have determined this is consistent due to the introduction of a new dwelling type in a predominantly uniform single family area the development plan commits to a minimum of 10 units again to be designated as incom restricted addressing affordability for the 120 H townhouse unit development while two two vehicular stream Crossings and one utility Crossing are proposed the development plan does mitigate other environmental disturbances through limiting the amount of impervious surface to 37% of the site committing to 25% of tree preservation and limiting disturbance of steep slopes to only.

10.4% per udio paragraph almost done sorry wrapping up for Udo paragraph 1.2 2.1 this proposal is potentially in the public interest due to increasing supply of market rate income restricted housing available to Residents in Durham The Proposal is potentially not in the public interest due to the unique environmental features on site and the variables identified in the climate justice justice Impact Tool thank you staff and the applicant are available for. Questions thank. You at this time the chair is going to open the public hearing and call the applicant.

Forward is the applicant. Present are they in the hallway do you know.

All right we don't have the applicant present we're going to call the have community members that are in person present and we have everyone that has the slideshow presentation Alexander is someone ready to assist them to get the slideshow up we have Rebecca and Pam and Pam and W and Donna are you all g go you all lined up in the areir okay all. Right.

Hi I'm Wanda Allan and my address is on record I want you to look at this map look at the northern part of the map it clearly states that this development is in the environmental justice population also note the N the numbers we have already in this area 16,22 dwellings have been approved which includes town homes and apartments look also at this map or this chart there are nearly 20,000 dwellings that are pending so tonight when you make your decision consider the lack of the infrastructure in this area Durham fire and EMS Department audit clearly states that EMS and the fire department are not meeting the standards also in their audit the Durham fire department continues their number one statement was two recommendations please you need to continue monitoring the response time and the service time and make sure they're in acceptable basis of City risks number two the fire department should incorporate in their decision the impact of future growth when carrying out policies and services policy 119 ensure new developments that are are.

Which are established are within the level of service that EMS fire department and police can service the area 122 says monitor it continuously the audit clearly says the most important thing is the response time in a person's life so I ask you tonight to please consider the infrastructure when you make your decision thank.

You good evening commissioner Madam chair and Commissioners thank you for letting me speak tonight I'm Rebecca Freeman at 1818 southvw Road in southeast dorm I've lived there for many many years I many many years this this site is not within a 15 U minute walking distance of stores jobs and businesses and the other thing with with this site is that we want new development according to the comprehensive plan to design to respect support and ex and fit into existing neighborhoods and for residents to be involved in those decisions as you see on the slide here the proposed zoning map change designation is not contiguous with other Pro City properties in the area it is not within the existing Community character as you heard earlier there are lots of single housing in here and they're going to put only town houses on this very sensitive site also for proximity to schools and businesses grocery stores and Transit stop it's over miles to get there they would take about two hours to walk it and they.

Would have to go on five different roads with no sidewalks no bike lanes and very small shoulders these are roads and not streets that they would have to access anything if they were trying to access to school a park in the in the closest retail or commercial area they would have to go between three miles and 3.8 miles to get there taking them between 1 hour and 3 minutes to walk or 1 hour and 17 minutes to walk to those areas down roads they would have to go on one road for for the school and the park which is down cheek Road and I know if you any of you have gone down cheek Road or not but it's very narrow and then they have to go two roads for the retail Health Care would be over five miles and two roads one Highway 90 Inc 98 and then also one city street with sidewalks and bike paths but for the two roads in the highway there are not bike paths thank you very much.

Thank. You good afternoon my name's Pam Williams and my address is on file I would like to state that I have nothing against development but this property needs to be a a more of a low impact development and not quite as dense there is over 4600 annual average daily traffic traffic comes from North thuram and Granville County to use burnt Road as a cut through from I85 to RTP Granville County is growing and traffic will be increasing and I don't believe this was taken into account into the carpent of Falls Tia this project did not require Tia because it's considered a low impact due to there's no more than it's less than a, ADT average daily traffic this is a prime example of risk we take when cumulative impacts for the area isn't taken into account the Tia that was done on Carpenter files did not include the proposed development nor did it include Panther Creek which is across the street from carpent preserve thus the the level of service for 2026.

Build out for AM and PM and 124 second delay will be worse than expected models are only as good as the information provided and being an engineer I know that very well as proposed no improvement will be made made at the Chek Road intersection 500 ft South but some improvements will be made at the intersection 600 ft north of car for The carer Preserve project most of the people in the community who travels these roads don't understand this logic especially when CH road is equal within the amount of accidents that there even though these roads at this site are state roads the approval of high density developments has increased the vehicles at or above the roadway capacity to how narrow it is and how many driveways it has on it per dot standards and there's no plans to improve the roadway system out here just so you know what level service D is please see the the block and 2026 the level service f as predicted by Carpenter preserves is on the right thank.

You thank you good evening Pamela Andrews Wake Forest Highway greetings everybody tonight we ask for commitment to no Mass grading due to the pollution and the destruction of sensitive wetlands in our Creeks we heard a lot tonight about sensitive areas this is sensitive we ask for the commitments to one stream Crossing and one Wetland Crossing not the two to reduce the damage damaging the streams and wetlands comes with huge consequen quences to the environment Mass rating increases impervious surface destroys mature trees with only trees in the creek beds being spared this increased flooding sediment lad in creeks and high turbidity in Creeks which flow into Falls Lakes apps we've seen over and over again we also ask for commitment to no variances in the wetlands and buffers which have has been the case recently the neighbors already suffer from tremendous look at these pictures it's unbelievable how much flooding they have on this road this friends driveway on Burton Road which massive flooding with every rain an additional 12.94 Acres cleared will increase the flooding.

Problem tremendously the southern environmental law Center publicly quoted this this week Wetlands prevent flooding improve our water quality and protect Wildlife as well saving the wetlands protects our communities when it rains our Wetlands act like natural sponges that absorb flood waters lowering flood levels and slowing the r of waters Downstream a lifesaving combination for North Carolina a one acre Wetland can typically store up to 1.5 million gallons of water so when developers and Industry destroy Wetlands communities lose flood protection damaging the wetlands will cost millions of dollars to property damage be honest he's saving you one acre but it's only because he can't develop in the flood Plains the wetlands and in the creek buffers is that really a gift to the environment no please say no thank.

You good afternoon a good evening my name is Donna stainback I live at 4825 Jimmy Rogers Road in Durham and I'm actually a member of this particular Community been in this community all my life and I know the ins and outs and the traffic problem there I just wanted to state that before I went into my topic about committing to no blasting the developer did say that at one of the meetings that he would commit but we need to have it finalized because blasting causes well damage permit violations like with well testing home damage cracks and walls and ceilings Foundation damage septic system damage and it impacts the groundwater pollution and location it destroys the habitats and for the Wildlife so it's very important to not have this in this sensitive area if blasting occurs then over 150 homes will be at risk for home water well or septic damages with no recourse we've not been able to get any recourse so definitely L need a no to blasting for this one and I.

Am not for this particular project for the other reasons I mentioned now the other thing with this property was that it was a landlock property and we wondering has the solution for the landlock properties been resolved so I guess we won't get that answer without the representative here but thank you very much thank you is there anyone else in the galley that would like to speak is there anyone on the zoom platform that would like to speak we have Gan.

Sadat yes hi good evening everyone my name is gasan Zat and my address is on file I on the lot right behind the development where the where is in the last meeting in in the plan that presented they land lock in the Lots behind them I'm one of the owners behind them so that will render our lot land lock and they did not propose any any connection or any ways to not to lock land us and that's all I have for that I don't know if they have a a new planning for not to lock us or or a new blueprint that's my concern is the landlock I own you're welcome thank you next on the zoom we have Amanda.

Belgrave hi my name is Amanda belgrave and I live at 4103 cheek Road just behind this development I have major concerns over the impervious surface being projected at 37% which was addressed when this initially came before you all previously and they're committing to a 100-year storm water runoff originally they proposed to play areas which now have subsequently disappeared they have 120 Town Homes which means you need 240 spaces I just don't understand how everything is going to fit within what they are committing to I did want to mention he did commit to no blasting previously before the council and I think that they act staff maybe captured that but my other concern is the tree preservation being 25% we've never gotten a clear answer and clearly we won't tonight as the applicant isn't there as to how much of a buffer will be behind that as that whole property is going to border that back end anyway up against the pre-existing Neighbors and then with any incline I mean it's a straight shot.

Down into your neighbor's yard so any of that water is just going to run off I'm not really sure how they're going to be able to mitigate that and what the consequences will be for my neighbors and then you know obviously Burton and Chek echoing you know Pam's statements earlier about traffic and whatnot it is a very dangerous intersection and if any accidents happen on 85 it's an immediate everybody's off the highway onto cheek I just asked you guys to reconsider saying no to this development and hopefully you know they'll find a better use for this and keep it you know what it already is known for thank you thank you next we have Tina matley.

Pearson. Can we unmute her okay I'm sorry can you hear me yes all right good evening my name is Tina mle Pearson I am a Durham County resident and my address is on file I I'd first like to reiterate that there is a lack of infrastructure in this area and often times when developments are considered you know you aren't really considering the Collective impacts from other developments that are in the works or not even built yet because you've got Panther Creek Panther Creek 2 Carpenter preserve the Villas at Carpenter woods and now sagebrook and all of this development is a strain on the environment it's also a strain on the current residence and the infrastructure and I I mean I don't know what the hurry is to keep passing all these developments I will say that it seems like most of the Prime locations have been built out in Durham so now developers are scouting out environmentally sensitive areas to build on such as highly eras of traffic basing.

Soils and areas with Wetlands but you know there's a cost to this there are sensitive wetlands in the area but I would just like for you to please consider the collective impacts we know from experience that development practices such as Mas grading and Blasting have been detrimental to the residents and the environment so I just ask that you vote no on this project thank you so much and have a good evening thank you. Don't see anyone else is there anyone else on the zoom platform that would like to.

Speak again there's no one in the galley the applicants there was someone who nope it was not all right we're going to close the public hearing and open it up for commissioner comment and discussion questions and discussion anyone have any questions CU we the applicants not here you have go ahead commissioner CE just one quick question for staff could you just clarify what changed from the last time it appeared before us and the form that it's in today yes thank you for that question BR crer City County Planning so the changes included the additional Durham Public Schools contribution the applicant was going to look into the one foot strip of land that buffer along the western side or sorry Eastern side and providing ownership of that strip of land and then also the contribution of the 10 income restricted units as well any other questions no commiss cor can staff confirm if there's any changes in the blasting language I I saw in the city council results that it was mentioned there would be no.

Blasting and the language is to be finalized thank you commissioner gam that is correct the applicant had made a comment or a profer at city council that they would make a commitment around Blas in they have not responded to any language changes as of this time also staff wants to know we did reach out to both the applicant and the agent and have not heard back either do with that with as you will so sorry so that that would mean we are not like the case that we are Ting on right now won't have the commitment right it's not in your packet right now because we have not fleshed out language with the applicant yet okay thank you.

There any other questions are we ready to move this case forward may we have a motion please chair as it relates to case z22 0019 bdg 2200 013 sagebrook make a motion that we move this case forward to city council with a favorable recommendation there a second second it's been moved by commissioner cutri and seconded by commissioner CE to move case I lost the number z221 19 Sage Brook forward to city council with a favorable recommendation may we have the roll call vote please chair Cameron no commissioner cutright no commissioner Graves mans no commissioner Gham no commissioner copac no commissioner MacGyver no commissioner CE no commissioner Valentine no commissioner Williams no commissioner woke no motion fails 10 to zero thank you all righty is 816 so St if if staff would like to clarify so as if this is okay the newly adopted rules of proced procedure this didn't change from the old ones but per 2.6 temporary chair in the absence of both the chair and the vice.

Chair the DPC May appoint any of its members present in session to service temporary chair so we read that as we need to finish this last case at the very least we need to open the public hearing do a staff presentation and if we don't have a chair we can appoint a temporary one to finish the case all right so do we have a nomination for temporary chair is that how we're doing it or we're just saying we have a nomination yourself nominated sure all right I nominate myself second second second all right all in favor of commissioner cutright as temporary chair and a succession plan for chair in the future I'm sorry that I'm just joking let me make that a real motion all in favor all right the motion caros you just nominated yourself okay I will can we just take a five minute break so I can just clean up and then you can just take every over all right thank you just five minute recess real.

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All right we're ready to resume all right we'll move forward with case z23 z31 and bdg 2320 the Alfred trck we'll have staff report great thank you chair cut real quick I just want to introduce Sarah long who is who is the newest member of the grth management team so you'll be seeing her more at Planning Commission along with brick rooper she's not new to the department she worked on the comence of plan so we are bringing the breath of knowledge and experience from her work in that into this space so we're super excited to have her and with that I'm going to turn it over to you thank you Alexander good evening my name is Sarah long and I'm with the city County planning and I will be presenting on z233 bdg 2320 Alfred trap Erica letham of Mi holes proposes to change the zoning designation of one parcel of land totaling 13.22 acres and located at 433 Sharon Road the current zoning is residential Rule and residential Suburban 20 the applicant proposes to.

Change this designation to plan development residential 7698 to allow up to 100 town home units the properties the properties are currently designated mixed residential neighborhood on the place type map and the aerial map shows that the general location of this project is Southeastern Durham the existing zoning as I mentioned before is residential Rule and residential Suburban 20 and the place type is mixed residential neighborhood which is the project is consistent with this place type and finally the the annex the annexation map shows us that there is an Associated contiguous annexation with this application and you can see the city of Durham boundaries shown in yellow here a neighborhood meeting was held in accordance to the Udo requirements on June 6th 2023 12 community members attended this meeting the applicant has proposed T show commitments including storm water control measures a $ 120,000 cont contribution to the Durham dedicated housing fund a $24,000 contribution to the public schools and the use of native species and trees and other plants as permitted by the Durham landscape.

Manual and so this proposal would allow the development of 100 Town House units on a vacant property while none of these units are proposed to be income restricted or affordable the applicant has committed to a one-time contribution to the germ dedicated housing fund of the amount of of $120,000 the proposed The Proposal also includes additional com commitments to improve storm water management a one-time contribution of $24,000 to Durham public schools and a commitment to planting native species econom in addition economic and demographic data show that this area is relatively representative of Durham County as a whole with slightly less cost burden renters but slightly more evictions in this part of Durham thank you very much and staff and applicant are available for.

Questions thank you we'll now open the public hearing we'll have the presentation from the applicant. Please so good evening Keenan cond with Morning Star Law Group at 700 West Main Street thank you so much Sarah for your presentation and welcome to the growth management team that whole team does really wonderful heroic work so you're you've got good company I'm representing the applicant in this case which is MI Holmes was represented by Erica leam we also have Sam NY who is the site planner for this project I'll be giving the presentation but Neil go who's if he may have any voice left he did the Community engagement at the beginning of this this process so for specific questions about that he may step up and answer but as been stated this is a resoning for resoning an annexation of a 13.1 acre parcel of Sharon Road in East Durham today there is a house on the property with a U-shaped driveway but it's actually mostly clear of trees it's mostly free of trees and other.

Obstacles the trees that do exist do exist around the perimeter of the site which actually makes it easier to potentially save them when eventually this goes through the site plan process this location is for some it is ideal for development just based on what is around it it has two developments two residential subdivisions on both the east and south side and I believe one that is under construction right now on the west there are also two stub streets that stub onto this property one from the south and one being constructed on this property's web West Side so that once this property is developed you are going to create greater connectivity with the existing homes that have already been built or are currently under construction that's going to improve pedestrian flow traffic flow and really be a benefit to these neighboring properties as well additionally those three sides of the property already annexed into the C Durham therefore by annexing this property you're closing a doughnut hole in the city's jurisdiction which is one.

Of the goals of the comprehensive plan additionally this residential property product type Town Homes really is a good fit for this place because U most of what exists already are single family homes the less dense housing type so by introducing a maximum of 100 Town Homes you're increasing density and you're also increasing the diversity of housing types in this area it's also consistent with the comprehensive plan when you have a a parcel of fewer than 20 acres to only have one housing type but the housing type that the applicant's going for is one with greater density so it will add density this area it will create greater diversity of housing along Sharon Road and last thing I want to say is is again on on trees as I said this area is mostly free of trees and so potentially be able to save a lot of the mature trees along the perimeter but we expect that as a result of adding the Udo required plantings we will actually increase the number of trees.

And vegetation on the site based on what is there currently so and of those required Udo plantings we have pledged that they will be native species so what you have currently the site is almost a free field without many trees we'll be capturing the hundred-year storm on that site and we'll be adding vegetation as well as much needing much needed housing density so given all those factors I think this is a very reasonable request and the project will benefit our our City's housing Supply so please let me know if you have any questions but we hope for your support on this project thank you thank you now we'll move on to public comments we have Rebecca Pam Wanda and this it's.

Williams. Donna oh my okay. I'm not as fast as Alex but I get there it's up thank you Alex oh thank you Alex sorry I'm the first Speaker my name is Pam Williams my I'm D resident and my address is on file I want to bring to your attention this map of it's mainly liit Creek which is all this area and then over on this area it's little lit Creek right now in this area we have 42 dense developments under construction 17 more are approved and pending construction of the 40 the ones that have been approved 41% are approved are Town Homes 20% are approved for apartments and only 39 approved for single family I would say this area is already dense you know do we need more more dense housing in this area and I want to bring to your attention you see all these triangles these green triangles they are town homes that's already been approved a lot of these are Under Construction such as this at Wesley Downs harlo Point the red.

Dots mean that it's under construction so as you can see we have a lot that's under construction out here a lot of dents and we doing a lot of impact to our area here Southeast durh has approved over 16,22 new dwelling units which equals to about 37,000 people coming in this area this is the size of weight forest and all y'all know about the growth that's going on weight Forest now well weight Forest is only 37,000 but weight Forest is continuing building roads and infrastructure they have their own hospital or two down there and this is not the 37,000 300 is not counting the existing population plus there is a plan charter school out here that's 1,250 students which is going to increase the population and the traffic flow out here quite a bit in the four areas of L U of Southeast Durham we have 49 subdivisions under construction now please consider the lack of infrastructure in this area we have none there's none proposed thank you thank you.

I'm Rebecca Freeman and U thank you for letting me speak again I wanted to talk about this is a crisis a Lo crisis a local resident posts emergency calls on Facebook he doesn't monitor them all the time because he does have a job but these are many examples right here of a crisis just recently that shows there is a current emergency service gaps in our city on as you'll see on there's a on Tuesday there was a fire truck wreck with a car and there's a car with with injuries there's a home Breakin all in our particular area EMS advising police there no units available three calls are on hold the female is in pain and we'll have to wait until EMS units become available the next one in the middle column Durham has no EMS units available to respond to calls requesting durman wait to help the next one active fire 15 units from surrounding areas are being dispatched they had to call in their local surrounding areas to help.

Them out and then then the on the last column there they were at a restaurant at South Point Mall the manager can't get an answer when calling 911 a 50-year-old female needs EMS and there's they had trouble getting help for her and just in the last few weeks specifically in the Southeast area in which we live I just looked on Facebook Rec before coming there was a motorcycle wreck fatality on Monday morning on Stallings Road loud explosions and multiple calls calls on Chic Road and EMS needed on Carpenter P Carpenter Road so we do have a gap in Services we don't always get answered when 911 is called and there many times their police are not available and many times there is a concern about whose jurisdiction is it is a county is a city and there is a conference call on that and the person is waiting for for help so we do have crisis out in that area thank you thank.

You Pamela Andrews wait for us sideway greetings everybody again so I just want to hold this up because people don't know what we're talking about this is the audit that was done on October 2022 of the Durham fire and EMS report if you've not seen it please take time to look at this fire and EMS are not meeting the standards there were two recommendations from this audit the first they should continue monitoring response times the second an outside experts were to perform a study that incorporates forecasting to determine the impact of future growth on its current resources have either of these been done I can't say next slide engine eight this one engine in this which is supposed to answer these calls that you're looking at tonight this resident this one ran 1,614 calls last year there is no ladder truck at this station no ladder truck at this station how are they going to answer apartment fires Town Home Fires I don't know without a ladder truck how we handle all the new.

People in dwellings when there are 49 developments as Pam just told you with 17 additional already pending at what point are we putting people's lives in Jeopardy this is an additional 37,000 people plus and over 5,000 Acres cleared that is a lot my friends it's a lot policy 119 tells us we're supposed to look at these new developments and establish that we have emergency services and then lastly in your you new comprehensive plan this was identified three areas in southeast Durham needs fire help before we should pass more stuff Fletcher Chapel stying Road Southeast Durham we are in a crisis in southeast dur we don't have the infrastructure and then lastly the consequences of approving this develop M application without addressing basic health and safety concerns is clear approving a development plan that fails to meet the safety needs with no enforceable way to ensure it is addressed in the future is unprincipled please help us in southeast term thank you thank.

You good afternoon good evening again I'm Donis stainback from Durham County if blasting occurs then over over 200 homes will be at risk for home well water Air Blast or septic damages with no recourse why are blasting damages being covered by other counties and not endure them Raleigh caught a blasting company drilling without a permit and this same company had a rock go through a second row home now this same company does a major portion of the blasting in Durham County East Coast drilling the city holds the bond on the blasting companies the responsibility should be on the city to provide an independent third party to evaluate the damages and pay restitution for damages we you know we're continuing to develop and then nobody's taking care of all these people that have had this Damage Done to their homes and Wells and water and so also I traveled this route often and my cousin called well she sent me I think of Facebook and said okay when did they.

Turn Sharon Road into a freeway the traffic is so bad and so fast down it it's dangerous because people were trying to get there and I got backed up to Hut Road and I had to cross over 98 which is quite a distance and they had taken the turn Lane and another Lane and got the lanes in parallel because the traffic was so bad C Crossing 98 and the same thing happens Crossing 70 of a morning it is atrocious there now on infrastructure my son had to could not get an emergency vehicle when he had he was having a reaction to his chemotherapy last year my husband had to drive like a maniac cuz the oncologist said to get in there and the oncologist was very upset and said bring him to wake Med I know I can get somebody to work on him quickly there so you know a city of medicine you know if we don't have the infrastructure we can't support that thank you thank.

You hi I'm Wanda Allen and my address is on record I want you should notice the settlement based in the left photo it is in within 400 ft of the little lit Creek which is on the 3od impaired list which the city is supposed to take special efforts to protect it okay it say seven days this water has been sitting in the settlement Pond for 7 Days the new regulations that we have put in place at the city and the county put in place says all it has to be is in there four days okay four days it's not working you guys as you can see the settlement is going directly into the creek who's modern TR it where are the notices of violations why do we keep continuing to dump in our streams in our Waterway why do we continue to destroy Falls Lake and why do the taxpayers have to continue to pay for this cleanup the consequences the settlement is going into Falls Lake okay the policy 8C 886 clearly.

States that we should Pro protect the water sources that provide drinking water for adjacent counties you guys we're not meeting it we are not meeting it we would like to recommend that at a minimum at a minimum that we meet the state's design standard in the sensitive Watershed use it as a basic for the development of these properties thank you thank. You all right chair we can help with the zoom part and the first would be Mimi Kesler go ahead Mimi good evening again I I I feel I don't know how to express this but I don't think that we should be here Time After Time time after time saying the same things other than it has to be in the public record and I would say again which I have said to you before this area needs to have a moratorium on development we have plenty of things in progress and we just need to stop thank you thank you chair cut right the next speaker would be Scott Garner.

Yes H hello my name is Scott Garner I live at 1711 n Laura Lane my property AB buts the Alfred track and also with is within feet of the development that is currently under construction right beside it I have a few issues with this development one is storm water issues I have an inlet on my property the other construction has already caused the inlet to become clogged and you know we had pretty significant flooding in our yard that had to be addressed and you know there's also existing Wetlands on the property and and you know I I think that there's a lot of pressure that currently exists there I don't know that we need to add that my other issue is this is a cleared lot you know there's been a tremendous number of trees taken down on the other lot and you know my one request was you know to just preserve the existing trees and I can see that they're going to be cut in into and you know.

And that's just the minimum it's just the you know we're just talking about the 20% the tree preservation is 20% it's the minimum they're also you know just meeting the mini minimum on impervious surface the traffic situation on Sharon is is getting to be miserable we have multiple projects on Sharon Road already development and mass clearing you know there's you know I and it's all just on one small Road I mean I don't know where you're going to expand to when traffic becomes a problem there everything is built right up to the road I just don't know what you're going to do there in the long term the other development did blasting thanks Scott I appreciate it chair cut right the next speaker is Rebecca Hunter hello can you hear me yes wonderful hello everyone my name is Rebecca Hunter and I live at 1716 noora Lane so many folks who have spoken today are well researched and passionate and I am nowhere near as well researched as.

They have been but I am very passionate about Durham and therefore I would like to speak this was kind of a last minute choice of mine today I moved to durh in 2019 and I very quickly fell in love with my community here when my partner had the opportunity to move down here a few years later we decided we'd be time to buy a house and as his body knows it was difficult for us to do so due to Rising housing costs and eventually we found a home near one of the subst streets that the applicant mentioned earlier I bring this up to say I am generally in favor of more housing but in addition to what others have said tonight I have some of my own opinions I love our home and our neighborhood but there's one thing I don't love and that's my commute not because of the distance but because of the danger when I leave our neighborhood to go onto Sharon Road my commute is stressful and.

At times dangerous which continues onto South Miami Road which I affectionally referred to as the worst Road in Durham because of the traffic this has become such a problem that I now go to my office later in the day which is a luxury many of my neighbors do not have I'd like to take a second to note that I would take the bus if there was a stop I could get to safely but there is not not only because it's far away but because the roads to reach the closest one is unsafe for pedestrians or cyclists this area is designated as an ond demand Zone in the Durham Transit plan which the city is a partner in and this indicates to me that there is existing need here that is not being met with the current density that we have at hand and given my own experiences I believe that to be true I'd like to close out by saying I like the idea of more housing especially housing at a reasonable price and.

Density as noted earlier this development does not have any affordable unit plans and I would like to push for that not necessarily in this development but in general there has not been a comprehensive traffic study in recent of the area that I'm aware of and given my own experiences I would like to push for that as well so at this time I oppose until we can address the traffic study as well as the environmental concerns other folks have mentioned tonight thank you all so much for your time and for staying late this evening thanks Rebecca chair cut right there are no other hands raised in the queue thank you any other any other speakers want to speak on the zoom or or in.

Person applicant would you like to address anything you've heard so first of all thank you for everyone who's spoken however I would like to respectfully push back on a couple of points one of the things we just heard from the speaker on online is about concerns about flooding in storm water right now the site is mostly free of obstruction and storm water tends to flow as it follows the topography and has the potential to flow onto other people's properties whereas what is proposed here is a plan to contain the hundred-year flood and increase the storm water protections for this area so hopefully that will address the person on the phone's concerns that hopefully this will improve storm water in the area another thing I wanted to discuss is that most of the concerns we heard today are related to development in this region generally and and few are specific to this project and you know I think I I I think we have heard these concerns a lot and they are very valid.

But I did just want to highlight that point another thing to add I think we wanted to address blasting if we could briefly the development across the street that this developer worked on did not require blasting unfortunately we're not ready today to make a commitment that's that no blasting will be required but I did just want to point that out at thought onset so and those are the few things I wanted to address if I could briefly so thank you thank you shair cut right we have another speaker online okay is Tina mle crew.

Pearson hey good evening again my name is Tina mle Pearson I'm a Durham Durham County resident my address is on file there was a slide that it was like the last slide on the presentation that Pam Andrews and all of them did and so I don't know if you can see that or not anyway I'm just going to talk but on March 16th of this year Samantha Crop the news River Keeper led a group of us to go visit liit Creek and she actually provided waiters so we could go into the creek and if you can see the photo it's easy to to see that Martin Creek has significant impact from Upstream development actually that's the the stream that the southern environmental law Center got involved with but anyway with with that development but it there's an obvious delineation of sediment in Martin Creek as it flows into lit Creek so the turbidity in Martin Creek far surpasses the state standard of 50 NTU in fact it was actually recorded at over 2,000 into.

On several occasions and there's really Critters can't live in this type of water you know the sediment is detrimental to Creek life and most Creeks Downstream of development look like this especially you know if it's Mass grading sites really all of Southeast DM is in the Trias Basin which means the soils are highly erosive and the Topography is generally heilly in the area so Mass grating and Blasting are what developers do no matter what the impact to the environment or how it affects residents homes and Welles so please consider the collective impacts of all of this development in southeast Durham I will say it is seriously too much and if you haven't been out there just go out there and see it for yourself anyway thank you so much I really appreciate you listening all right good night thank you any other speakers online anyone else public hearing is now closed we're open for commissioner discussion and.

Questions thank you the concerns that the community has expressed that we've heard time and time again in general for this portion of the county are serious ones there are ones that need to be addressed in a comprehensive way and I think that's well understood by this body from an individual perspective I I probably have voted against more projects in this area or at least as as much as others have in this area I think I've been pretty consistent in that particularly with the larger projects to me this particular proposal is is different than a lot of the large scale projects that we've seen in this area and I would just want to briefly point out a few of the things that I think are relevant to the question that is before us and to me the question that is before us is not one of being part of any type of moratorium I think that that provokes an entire set of legal and political challenges that are problematic in the context of our.

Current state legislature that being said this project is what's the acreage 13 acres it is located directly on Sharon Road which has its transportation problems but that that is what it is this project is a site that is already clear-cut I think it would disturb just glancing at the development plan probably less than half an acre of existing trees and it would connect three points it would connect sharing road to the north the existing subdivision to the South existing or subdivision under construction to the West would my preference be for there to be something else there absolutely my preference would be to have something that would serve as more of a neighborhood center for the existing those existing subdivisions the newer ones that are south of Sharon the older ones that are north of north of Sharon Road but the you know the market dynamics are are they are what they are are so you know I think the the decision here is is one of not do we approve.

Development or not it's do we approve development that would allow 100 town homes with some Financial propers or do we allow the existing zoning to stand which would allow 28 homes so it's a you know it's a Delta of of whatever that is 72 homes and I I you know think that that this this track cannot carry that larger Community burden that is very real thank you thank you anyone. Else commissioner copat thank you chair so the applicant you'd spoken about promoting greater connectivity with some of the other communities and so having visited the site I see how they are adjacent to each other but I also saw a number of suggestions about ways to help promote that connectivity for walking and biking to help Pro promote safety at least among those residential communities if not addressing safety issues in the broader context but I didn't see much of that offered in the application I'm curious if you have more you can share about specific ways particularly regarding the U the.

Bpack recommendations around bike ped connectivity and safety and if there those are ones that am I home considered and and already taken into account so I think your first question was about connectivity within the properties East of Sharon Road with some of the already developed areas so again we'll be stubbing there's already existing stub Street to the South that is part of the developed property there to the West they're constructing a stub Street on that side that this property will connect to with roads as well as I believe sidewalk walks so you will be able to walk throughout these adjacent communities as well as the drivers coming from these existing single family home residences will now be able to drive through this property and enter Sharon Road and have another point of access to Sharon Road so you are diffusing some of the traffic that's going to a single point potentially on Sharon Road through another Outlet point so that that does improve connect it for vehicles as well as cars in that area.

And I I think we have discussed the the bpack recommendations and my understanding is we've chosen at this time not to proceed with them okay all right thank you and also just comment that I don't have a further question but just to comment as well having visited this area it is incredible to see the amount of development that's happening right now and it was helpful to hear from the community residents to quantify the number of developments planned the number of residents that they will accommodate and just appreciate hearing those concern raised because it's very evident to anyone driving through and visiting just the level of of development we're seeing right in this one concentrated spot it's almost like we're building a new city you know I think it makes me think of the the plan development for shadam County except I'm curious if you know for that development if there's more comprehensive thinking around infrastructure than what is currently happening but that also requires more education on my part about you know what.

Is ultimately driving a lot of this development patterns and leading to this kind of crush of development we're seeing right now in this one spot so just want to acknowledge having heard that and having seen it the reality of that is very clear and that's very that's very known as well to the applicant the fact is I think as we all have experien is that this area is going through pretty incredible growth there are people that are moving to this community at a pretty incredible rate and if you look at our community not as just the Durham community but as the Research Triangle community and you ask you know where where is there availability for homes where is there land available and where do we want to put them on a on a kind of a more of a global thought we could put them at the far periphery of our community our Greater Community like creedmore and meban in Pittsboro like the community you mentioned in chadam park or you.

Could build them closer to the core of this region closer to our biggest job centers and Research Triangle Park areas where there is still land available that can be developed I think that's what is driving these changes there has been some infrastructure increases in this area it's clearly not enough for everyone and that's understandable because growth is happening incredibly fast that as a result of of Market realities and as a result of so many people are moving here but an example is the the Cal's lift station the city has invested money in this area of the city anticipating that growth is going to happen in Durham and suggesting that this is where it should.

Be any other questions comments from Commissioners no commissioner Val yes so this is for the the applicant so I consider any affordable housing Provisions that are part of these projects to be one that's shared with our community and this particular project it doesn't seem to be a commitment to that can you share your your thoughts about that yeah absolutely so this developer really prefers to address the accepted the widely accepted and the the the fact that we all recognize that that housing is becoming less affordable this developer likes to address that by providing cash profit it just works best with their model and so that's what they have done by providing $120,000 profer to the Durham affordable housing fund with that said we are continuing to evaluate very sincerely opportunities to provide units as well in fact the developer has had a conversation with Habitat for Humanity the developers actively seeking a partner we can't be sure if that will those talks will come to complete fruition before city council but.

Sincerely the developer is working on trying to find a partner to prev provide units in addition to the the cash. Profer I I'll just piggy back on that I as well typically like to see some sort of affordable housing especially in these nor developments I understand what works for the developers model but injecting cash into an inefficient bureaucratic system doesn't work well for the housing model and the needs that we have so I don't think that's the best use of funds in this case the other thing I've talked about before is sacrifice environmental housing sometimes you have to to to make a choice in this case I feel like we're sacrificing both so we're not getting any affordable housing you're impacting all the Creeks so this doesn't feel like I don't feel like there's a win here there is housing stock being added that's great but there are there are some pressing needs so I'll leave it at that and that's very as noted we're working on the affordable hous of potentially providing.

Units but that is noted and then on the environmental Point I think this is a situation we're very fortunate where environmental impacts of development that comes with any development are somewhat mitigated here by the fact that the site is already clear of trees and so if you're going to build density someplace this seems like a good spot where you're not cutting down as many trees as maybe some other spot yeah and acknowledging the lack of Need for clear cutting and the the contribution to the fund I would just appreciate and Echo the comments made by Commissioners Valentine and cutright especially when you have you know potential sales price Val valuation at 400,000 I mean it's not like we're trying to you know trying to keep the the the whole like project at like affordable 80% Ami anything like that like you know it seems like there is more potential as we seek to have housing available to people at all levels but you know when I think of the broader picture of serving the.

Objectives of the comprehensive plan through individual projects it seemed like almost through precision and effort to to offer a project that delivers at the minimums you know across a variety of of of our community goals including environmental and then housing with with a contribution and so I just would would like to see would have like to have seen more across the board in order to to continue to support these Community goals we have while we wrestle with some of these tensions that do exist when we see these projects and just real quickly on on kind of the same point of mixing the housing affordable housing on the project itself I'm just curious what is the advantage of the Tex commitment that limits you to providing a townhouse versus not having that limit so your question is whether it'd be preferable if there was no condition limiting the type correct and part of it is to allow flexibility should whatever conditions change preferences thinking about habitat and some of the other affordable.

Housing providers to have flexibility in the actual unit type but even just the project itself with this being mixed residential Place type I I'm this is as much of a general question as a specific question but just the sentence housing type shall be limited to townhouse maybe that's truth in advertising but why limit it to townhouse in that text commitment and cut off the potential for accommodating onsite affordable housing that's provided in a different type right I I think it's I I think the project is envisioned as a town house project right now and there's just a general practice to provide some specificities to give people who come to Neighborhood meetings to give people who evaluate the the applications some even clearer idea that we are committing that this what we envisioned and we're going to put that in writing so I really think it's it's it comes from that desire but well I just personally I think that I understand what you're saying and I know that's typical practice that also Cuts.

Against kind of the spirit I think of the mixed residential type and so I would you know discourage the Embrace of that convention thank you any other questions comments one question really quick for staff think this has come up previously with Brooke and then this last one how were we thinking about mixed residential as a place type as it relates to the broader neighborhood I didn't think we were considering the broader neighborhood in looking at a specific site that's mixed residential but it sounds like that's something we're starting to consider is if the broader neighborhood has a singular housing type that a site can have a singular housing type and help it qualify for the Mixed residential Place type is that what I'm hearing thank you for that question commissioner cut right so there's a policy about mixed residential neighborhoods if there's 20 acres or more they're required to provide two different housing types or more there's also a 50 acre threshold this one's obviously only 13 acres when it's.

Under 20 the way we've been treating it and the transparency we've provided to applicants online is that we look at the surrounding context and we are looking to introduce an additional use a residential use in in the area that does not preclude them from providing two or more residential uses if it's less than 20 that's just how we're evaluating it for consistency that's right thank you I forgot about that anything else anyone else ready to move this case forward can I have a motion.

Please chair I would like to I propose a motion to move the case z230 31 bdz 2320 Alpha track to this city council with favorable recommendation second it's been moved by commissioner gam and seconded by commissioner copc to move case z23 000031 the offer track forward to city council with a favorable recommendation may have please CH cut right no commissioner Graves mans no commissioner Gham no commissioner copac no commissioner mver yes commissioner CE yes commissioner Valentine no Commission Williams no commissioner woke no and because chair Cameron's vote counts as yes motion fails 73 thank.

You I don't have anything else on the agenda no committee updates. New business any announcements staff you have three cases I believe three or four on the May agenda all right there's nothing else we'll adour the.

Meeting.

Than.