Planning Commission · Regular Meeting · August 13, 2024

You may we have the roll call please. Madam chair before I begin the roll call I just want to make sure everybody's aware that we do have two new Commissioners tonight Zach chowski sitting at the end of the de there and here in the middle Malcolm Gregory so welcome to you both new addition since we last met also with sadness letting everybody know that commissioner Grace mans has submitted his resignation and this will be his last meeting tonight so sorry to see you go but thank you very much for your.

Service so for the roll call chair Cameron here Vice chair sheras here commissioner cutright here commissioner chowski here commissioner Grace mans here commissioner Gregory here commissioner Johnson here commissioner copac here commissioner mver here commissioner Valentine here commissioner Williams here commissioner woke here and commissioner young.

Here we have perfect attendance wooo yes awesome I'm going to ask the two new Commissioners I know commissioner Gregory I believe you went last time but because we didn't have a well did you introduce yourself nope all right so if you would like to introduce yourself and then please say your name again Zach chowski Z chowski okay if you would go see this is going to be a test for me after commissioner Gregory that would be great thank you chairwoman Cameron so I'm Malcolm Gregory blessed to have two first names so that'll keep everybody on their toes I'm a full-time graduate student studying environmental policy with an emphasis on renewable energy development so in addition to studying conventional academic topics like climate economics and policy analysis I've also gotten a lot of exposure in some more pragmatic subjects like project Finance Community engagement and even construction bmps additionally I've also served on Durham's environmental Affairs board for over a year now and in that role I've cultivated a pretty robust understanding.

And some of the topics like our Udo our comprehensive plan as well as a landscape manual prior to coming back to school I was working as an environmental environmental analyst in the state of Wisconsin so one of three cheesee heads up here now low Badgers and in that role I was assisting with the review and permitting of utility projects so think transmission line retrofits pipeline repairs hydroelectric maintenance things of that nature for example and so to end I just want to say that I have a genuine passion for infrastructure Community Development and public service so I'm really looking forward to applying these passions and background to the important work that's undertaken in this chamber and getting to know my fellow Commissioners and planning staff better throughout my term so thank you hi everybody I'm Zack chowski most people just call me Zack because if you can see my last name it is a bit of a doozy sometimes I look at that and I'm like it just can't be right but it is.

I'm a longtime North Carolinian but a relatively recent durite I am a two-time UNCC attendee but never graduate ended up graduating from Elon University I left UNC twice to work on political campaigns once for President Obama's re-election and once for Terry mcalli U my wife Sarah Dr Sarah Cunningham and I are recent homeowners and we've wanted to get involved and shap shaping this great and wonderful city of ours it's been really really cool to see the momentum that Durham has and all these amazing things happening and and it's been incredible to see the work that the Planning Commission has done and how y'all have been a part of that process it's an honor to serve with you and I look forward to to learning more and and hopefully contributing thank you all right we're going to I don't believe there are any adjustments to the agenda now we're going to move to the.

Approval of the minutes and consistency statements from both July 20 I'm sorry June 11th 2024 and July 9th 2024 is there a motion to approve so move second it's been moved by commissioner cutright and second it by commissioner Valentine to approve the minutes and consistency statements both from the June 11th and July 9th 2024 meeting all in favor please say I I opposed motion carries we will now move into the public hearings the first public hearing is the initial zoning map changes and we will hear case Z24 quadruple 3 and quadal 0 3A windsford at the park may we have the staff report please thank you madam chair before Miss Long comes up with the the staff report I just want to State for the record that all cases being heard before you tonight have been notified in accordance with state and local laws and that affidavits on for that are on file in the planning.

Department good evening Sarah long with City County planning and I'm presenting on Z24 quadruple 03a wiford at the park Tim cers of City proposes is to change the zoning designation of one parcel of land totaling 1799 acres and located at 103 Zant current road the current zoning is residential Suburban multif family with a development plan this is a direct translational zoning where the where the Durham County zoning is identical to the Durham City Zoning and upon annexation the property will be brought into the city limits the applicant wishes to Annex a parcel into the city to allow for City Maintenance of infrastructure this parcel is owned by the homeowners association and set aside to serve as tree coverage and open space as required under the original develop development plan so again as this is a direct translational Zone annexation the parcel is going to come in with the same zoning designation and will only change from City to to from County to City jurisdiction also there are no.

Commitment M ments that can be made or profer through the development plan to further consist to have any further consistency with the place type designation again the existing zoning is residential Suburban multif family with a development plan as you can see in Orange it is surrounded by the same RSM and also residential rule or RR and science research park at the which is to the South there SRP and in green the aerial map shows the general location of the project is in southeast Durham.

County and the property are the property is currently designated Recreation open space on the place app map and staff has determined that this designation to be generally consistent there's an Associated contiguous annexation petition with this case and this proposal again is is to change the designation from residential Suburban multif family with a development plan County jurisdiction to residential Suburban multif family with a development plan City jurisdiction in order for the city to be able to maintain the existing infrastructure the request is again a transitional zoning of land currently owned by the homeowners association and no additional units or development is proposed on this land The Proposal is consistent with three applicable policies of the comprehensive plan and proposal is generally consistent with the place type map as the designation of recreation open space because the homeowner association is going to use this for the purpose of open space and adjacent to the adjacent residential development thank you very much and staff and the applicant are available to answer any questions you may have thank.

You at this time the chair is opening the public hearing is the applicant here to make a presentation.

Good evening Planning Commission members my name is Tim cyers I'm the president of community for those new members on the board tonight that you may not know us we are a civil engineering landscape architecture and land planning firm located here in Durham at 16 consultant place we'll start you off the new ones with a little easy case tonight because it is kind of a little different than the normal res in case that's in front of you so I'll take you back through a little bit of the history and then explain the proposal that's in front of you so tonight is a cleanup item from a development plan that was constructed over six years ago the first cosos were issued in 2015 the final cosos were issued in 2018 six years ago my office was involved with the rezoning annexation site plan and construction documents at that time and that was over 10 years ago when those plans were being prepared tonight we're here to clean up an error that was missed during the site.

Planine review and construction documents and was only noticed when the Public Works staff tried to accept ownership and maintenance of these streets that are now completed a year or so after the final Co was issued it was noticed that a portion of so high drive was never annexed into the city limits and that is why we're here this evening the work completed during the resoning and annexation over 10 years ago removed this portion from the Research Triangle Park and and unknowingly at the time placed it into the county limits and not the city limits the city cannot take maintenance of the street that is in the county hence again why we're here this evening over the past two years the developer myself have been as well as the city have been trying to work with the homeowners association and the land owners to agree with this annexation with no responses from either of those parties when finally getting received approval from the homeowners association we submitted the documents for this annexation the individual land.

Owners did not respond and therefore are not included in the annexation through discussion with the planning department and the public works we all agreed that it was proper to move forward to the annex to Annex the public rways along with the homeowners association parcel which will allow the city to follow their standard operating procedure of taking maintenance of these streets so tonight I ask for your approval of this annexation to F to Simply fix this error that was made over 10 years ago and Annex a small portion of public rideway as well as the homeowners association land so the city can truly take maintenance and ownership of these streets thank you if I have any questions I'm available thank you is there anyone signed up to speak for this.

Case in the galley anyone signed up if you're on Zoom please click no please click the raise your hand button if you're on phone please push star.

N all right I don't see anyone that would that is raising their hand on Zoom or in the galley so I'm going to close the public hearing at this time and we are now open for commissioner discussion and questions Mr. Johnson thank you chair just a couple clarifying questions if I could the document said that this would increase Revenue I'd like to know how that was one of the things that it said it would be positive on the revenue number two is who's doing maintenance who's paying maintenance today is it the county or nobody and then third for the impacted residents who didn't speak up which I appreciated that clarification will their property taxes go up as a result of not being part of the city all I am going to pass number one and three off I will answer number two which was the maintenance to date so one once construction is completed there is a one-year typical 12-month bond that is placed on all public streets that allows the city to.

Ensure that those streets are meet the standards so that street has to go through essentially a year-long process of residents on the street using the street driving it before the city takes ownership that's standard operating procedure that way the developers if needed need to make sure that that street is still in proper condition before the city takes ownership of it so to answer your question today the developer has been doing any maintenance of these streets as for one and three I'll hand that off to Aaron sure and and I may ask you to repeat one again to make sure I answer it but three I believe was the question about tax increases there would be no additional tax increases to any homeowner since no homeowners are being annexed on this there could be a minimal tax increase on the land of the homeowners association but it would be minimal at best and certainly preferable to having to maintain the streets yourself the first question was in the documented said it would be not Revenue.

Neutral but actually Revenue positive I was trying to clarify that yeah so that's that's standard language we have that we should not have included in that document for this case all right thank you any other questions commissioner KAC yeah I have a clarifying question so I hear you share that there is a question of the maintenance of the right of way just would like to understand how that intersects with the open space and if there is maintenance of that open space by the city in addition to the right of way and just how those connect together okay great question if you have the map in front of you it's the area of annexation so the area of annexation includes the public rways as well as the homeowners association area so the public right rways then become City Maintenance the HOA will still remain is today and will remain HOA maintenance so there's no intersection the city will have the city the HOA will maintain the HOA areas thank you thank you anyone else any.

Questions no more questions we ready to move this case forward all right chair as it relates to Case z2400 003a and and annexation bdg 24002 Winford at the park I make a motion that we move this 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 Z24 quadruple 03a bdg 24 quad 02 winsford at the park forward with a favorable recommendation to the City Council may I have the roll call vote.

Please chair Cameron yes Vice chair sheras yes commissioner cutright yes commissioner chowski yes commissioner Grace mans yes commissioner Gregory yes commissioner Johnson yes commissioner copac yes commissioner mver yes commissioner Valentine yes commissioner Williams yes commissioner woke yes commissioner young yes the motion passes 13 to zero thank you now we will we'll move into public hearings zoning map changes the first case is z23 quadruple 025 Oxford Ridge and this is also a continuation from the July meeting good evening chair Cameron Vice chair sharis and honorable planning Commissioners I'm brck rooper with the city County Planning Department Tim cyers of City proposes to change the zoning designation of three Parcels of land totaling 58.7 acres and located at 875 East Carver Street along with 955 and 10:07 old Oxford Road the current zoning is commercial center with a development plan commercial neighborhood with a development plan and industrial Light the applicant proposes to change this designation to plan development residential 5174 with a textual development plan to allow up to 300 residential units.

Limited to single family two family multifam and co- living uses and this would consist of a maximum of 75 single family and a minimum of 175 townhouse units the properties are currently designated mixed use neighborhood and Recreation on the open and excuse me and Recreation and open space on the place type map if the proposed zoning is approved D staff recommends a change from the mixed use neighborhood Place type to mixed residential neighborhood the areas currently designated Recreation and open space would remain so the existing zoning is commercial center with the development plan commercial neighborhood with the development plan and industrial Light the site is surrounded by industrial Light plan development residential and residential Suburban 20 the aerial map show show the general location of the project north of downtown Durham within the bragtown community as mentioned previously the properties are currently designated mixed use neighborhood and Recreation and open space on the place type map the proposed plan development residential 5174 is inconsistent with the designated Place type so if approved staff.

Recommends a change to mixed residential neighborhood and Recreation and open space there is an Associated contiguous annexation petition with this case case bdg 2316 here is a summary of some of the commitments The Proposal will not demolish the existing historical structure at 1015 old Oxford Road provide a minimum of 27 single family units as affordable for sale housing units for households earning at or below 80% % of the area median income for a period of 30 years con the construction of a 10ft shared path on Old Oxford Road the construction of a bus shelter as determined by God Durham ensuring all tree replanting are native Native limiting the maximum impervious surface to 50% and providing two additional site features along with a one-time contribution of $5,000 to Durham Public Schools a neighborhood meeting was held in accordance with udia requirements on March 18th 2023 where 18 community members were in attendance in conclusion The Proposal would allow up to 300 residential units consisting of a maximum of 75 single.

Family and a minimum of 175 townhouse units on a predominantly undeveloped property the census tract of the surrounding area has a higher tax value increase number of evictions and cost burden in renters than the Durham County on average say suggesting a higher displacement risk in the area the site is located Northeast of downtown Durham and is within five miles of a variety of uses and resources for residents however the area is generally autod dependent and lacking access to multimodal infrastructure as the proposal is generally inconsistent with the place type map if the proposed zoning is approved staff recommends again a a change to mixed residential neighborhood and the recreation and open space would remain thank you staff and the applicant are available for any questions thank you at this time the chair is opening the public hearing with the applicant please come.

Forward good evening again Tim cyers with City 16 consultant Place Sturm North Carolina tonight I'll providing a quick overview and then handing the the mic over to helina Craig and Ted helbron to provide additional details of the proposal this case in front of you includes three Parcels a total 59 acres of land which is approximately 45 Acres of developable area the required project boundary buffers stream buffers and an existing storm water control measure make up the nearly 14 acres of undevelopable land in this proposal this re this resoning request PD R of 5174 is a maximum of 300 units and is limited to single family two family multif family co- Living Spaces a minimum of 27 single family units will be provided at the 80% Ami for 30 years as Brooke mentioned Road improvements will be completed on Carver Street as well as old Oxford Road to accommodate the additional traffic proposed in addition to providing any Transit related improvements that go Durham go triangle request at the timeas site plan.

In addition addition to the environmental improvements that Ted will speak of shortly this development will also include native tree plantings 100-year storm treatment as outlined in the commitments and a maximum of 50% impervious area thank you for your time like to hand off the. Presentation good evening all I just wanted to speak briefly to the parts that don't jump off of the formal presentation that you see which is I was one of the 18 community members who would attended the initial Community engagement meeting and I think this project is really an unusual and hopefully not going forward would not be that unusual that really the community engagement process changed substantially what this project was so as one of the community members who actively resisted a prior implementation that would have been coming forward on this property I'm now actually through my nonprofit and active partner and the person who would be developing the 27 affordable homes for sale as well as some unique co-living spaces for seniors you will also.

Notice I'm the little wedge of an acre that is not included in this project so I have a very very much a vested interest but have been very involved with the neighbors in making sure that we assert what we want for our community and I just wanted to lift that up because it's not obvious in the application and then I would let Ted speak to the the major parts of the project thank you good evening Planning Commission my name is Ted hbr I'm an affordable housing developer I live in Raleigh so please don't hold that against me I am the developer of the Carver Street assemblage project which came before Planning Commission in a late 2021 it's the 130 Acres directly to the west of this site we stepped into what at the time was contentious rezoning that neighbors had pushed back on and effectively had killed and brought 198 affordable housing units into an otherwise residential development that didn't really contemplate affordable I only bring that up because through that.

Process and and we're breaking ground on the Lite portion of the project at the end of the year so very excited to actually get a shovel on the ground here in bragtown through the process of developing the Carver assemblage project we came to get to know the neighbors in the community and spent a bunch of time with the BCA and spent a bunch of time with the Myriad of other groups who have strong thoughts and feelings valid Fair feelings concerns Etc about the trajectory of the bragtown neighborhood we watched from next door effectively the multiple rezonings that the BCA and the Oxford Hamlin Community Coalition effectively killed off which included a portion of this site which was intended to be retail and a project across the street which is not included in this rezoning that was intended to be a gas station a sea store and I think a fast food pad we really never intended to develop the site but we were approached by ownership who saw our ability to work.

Productively with neighbors and from the GetGo the only way we're going to enter into this project was if we had sort of the time and the flexibility and the ability to communicate with neighbors figure out what the community want to see out here and actually find a feasible economic way of implementing it which launched this poll effort now that's been going on for the last 18 months that brings us before you tonight so the the first thing I'd point out is that we we started with a different concept for this site we developed ltech Apartments we thought that we might build more of those as we move farther east on Old Oxford we thought a community center might make sense we took a number of meetings with neighbors and heard one Mantra over and over and over and over and over again which was the desire to see affordable for sale housing the the challenge as you all are intimately familiar is that there is no tax credit like there is in.

The litech program to help subsidize the cost of affordable construction and so finding a way to put together a project that doesn't need City resources because as you are all also intimately familiar the city is not brimming over with affordable funds right right now and hopefully there's a new bond that might get passed in the next couple years to remedy that but the ability to put together an affordable for sale project it didn't require City resources has has has led us down the path that brings us before you tonight I would also point out that the diligence that's happened over the last 18 months has involved a significant amount of time spent with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality so the old catsburg store which is at the corner of Oxford old Oxford Carver and Hamlin was a set of an old gas station that when it was removed the cleanup was botched gas ended up in the water table and Benzene is currently leaking East headed across hold Oxford onto the.

Parcel that this site includes and so part of our delay in getting before you all was that we weren't going to move this forward until we had an environmental solution that was acceptable because there was no way we're going to build affordable housing and have it sort of Downstream of this slow Benzene migration through the bragtown neighborhood so we've made a ton of progress with DEQ we're happy to speak about that in more detail this project will involve a comprehensive remediation of all the Benzene that's sort of plaguing this north east corner of the bragtown neighborhood so I I'll defer the rest of our time or make ourselves available to answer any questions but thought the background might be helpful in terms of sort of how we got involved in the project and what has has driven it into the form that you see before you tonight thank you let's see here we have it's freedon signed up to.

Speak you come up so I'm calling any person in person Community member that would like to speak.

Good evening I'm Donna federick I'm a resident of bragtown and was one of the people in that original meeting where we discussed that I'm here in support of this resoning and congratulations with all the people who have come together to put this project forward it is definitely a labor needed because we need more affordable housing as we know in Durham here is a different take on getting it done and also with affordable housing for sale so which breaths Legacy you know we need more of that as well so I'm just here in support and hope you know that we can get this done and move forward quickly thank you thank you is there anyone else in person that has not signed up to speak wishing to speak on this case no all right all right is there anyone on the zoom please press raise the raise your hand button or Star n on your phone if you would like to speak on this.

Case chair is going to now close the public hearing and we are now open for commissioner discussion and questions commissioner cut right thanks chair I'd like to say that T and his group have come before the commission you know before this case and he continues to present what I would considered the bar for projects and Durham you know 300 units and almost 9% or roughly n9ine almost 10% affordable for sale affordable at that that's something we don't see he should be commended for that it also goes to show that what's possible I think you know as we look at other projects that come before the commission we should take note of this and as we think about approving projects we should note that developers like Ted are out there and and can do things like this I'm not suggesting that it's easy in any way but it is possible and you know I think he's the the gold standard for how we should be devel veloping in Durham so.

I appreciate it if you can't tell I am in favor of this project and would recommend moving forward with this thanks anyone else commissioner Johnson first of all I would Echo commissioner cprit's comments it is a balanced approach I also applaud the neighborhood for stepp in up and speaking I I just want to clarify a few things if I could this will have a fairly significant impact on schools in the area if I recall there's about 84 yeah U about $800,000 impact about quite a few about 130 140 students the $5,000 proper which I appreciate the recognition can that be increased as far as the impact on the infrastructure for schools that's question number one yeah there's there's room I would say to increase it as you obviously aware everything's a Balan but you know again in a project of this size and scale There's an opportunity to increase that number and are you willing to make that profit tonight to support a higher amount to the schools I am and what would that be.

I guess the question is and maybe you know this better Tim what the more appropriate figure would be is is a $50,000 contribution more in line with what you might think is appropriate your oh yeah I got to lean in okay that that's helpful the other question I had was the tree coverage there's quite a quite a group a number of trees and you have 20% coverage is that sufficient for the overall development and where it's going to be located because you will be removing quite the tree coverage is a little more of a hard and fast Line in the Sand what we have to do to make this all pencil is to develop as many units as we can out here and so leaving substantial portions of trees untouched above the 20% of the Udo requires is just something that's not possible to sort of balance everything that we're pulling together here so what I'm hearing you say is to meet the objectives for both affordable and other.

Housing you have to squeeze things in a little bit that's correct okay and my last question in Reading the meeting notes which were very helpful from the community because I always like to support the community's input the traffic study at the time of the meeting it was pending the traffic study and there was supposed to be a get back on the traffic study to the community that was one of the IUS did that happen and are there any other unknown issues from the community that they still have other than what was spoken on tonight thank you absolutely I meeting minutes I think were included from a meeting from 2023 there have been a number of follow-up meetings not necessarily as a group collectively but with the BCA we went and met with the Oxford hlin Community Coalition and had more of these conversations in more detail as follow-ups I think maybe helina and even Donna could speak to whether there are ongoing concerns as it relates to the traffic study I'm not sure we've shared.

A copy of that which we totally can a cop I mean obviously a traffic study was done as a part of the vetting of the rezoning application and that study indicate any major issues if I were to read it no as you might be aware there's a fair amount of development that's happening in the north portion of the bragtown neighborhood currently so a lot of the major infrastructure is being picked up by Carver assemblage or there's a large industrial project that's coming just down the road from here there are some curb cuts that are required through the median on Carver but there's not a a significant traffic footprint coming off of this project in the scheme of the other infrastructure improvements that are happening currently in the neighborhood thank you for those answers and again thanks to the community thank you chair thank you anyone else any other commissioner Valentine oh sorry you're pointing over here commissioner Williams might be a followup there so yeah also would like to commend the developer and the.

Community for working together on this project and it's been helpful to hear your responses thus far just a couple other points I wanted to raise the first was is along with the the the place type map of mixed residential neighborhood I was curious to get your thoughts about the open space and questions I saw in notes from staff around public accessibility and then also given that this develop development you know abuts East Carver which is a fairly large U thoroughfare there U saw comments from bpac with suggestions in pursuit of protecting pedestrian bike safety including painting high visibility crosswalks and having shared paths connecting to other neighborhoods in the area it was curious to get your thoughts on on those two topics I apologize the first question out of the sure yeah no problem about the public access to the open space Yeah Tim do you want to speak to that.

Oh okay I I think honestly our intent from a safety and just managing the public spaces that would be in the project would have them be specific to the residents within the project I the goal is not to provide a sort of insulting non inclusionary type response but as we think about managing the development and the HOAs that will come out of this it's just difficult to contemplate having private ownership of improvements that the public has access to try to understand how they're managed and the risk associated with managing them so I think our our just from a drisking perspective the intent would be not to have them be available to the public from a connectivity perspective you know we certainly are in support of the thrust of the bike pedestrian advisory committee's comments I don't think we quite see the need for crosswalks sort of midblock they're already crosswalks at the that main intersection the Carver old Oxford Hamlin intersection I think our team had discussed when this comment was.

Raised I think safety concerns that come from starting to place these crosswalks midblock but I think right now with the infrastructure that's in place on Carver and the infrastructure that will be building the bike lane the sidewalk Etc on Old Oxford I I I welcome to to further discussion about this and certainly not trying to stiff arm the question but I I I think our our hope is that we're bringing forward something that's quite additive to sort of kestian pedestrian connectivity and public infrastructure already in the neighborhood thank you for that and and I think the notes came from staff so I'm just curious if staff had have any comments about the open space yeah so the open space on this site and I think it's noted in the staff report is on the Northern and kind of back portion of the site so we did flag that in the report just because with the mixed residential or mixed use Place type that is something that is brought up having publicly accessible.

Open space so that was flagged but it wasn't a I'll say it wasn't a large concern that it wasn't publicly accessible but we did make note of it thank you good commissioner Williams first and then I just wanted to Echo my fellow Commissioners thoughts in terms of the project as a whole I really enjoy hearing that you kind of approached the community and to figure out what it was that they looking for as well as the affordable housing piece and also having more than one housing type so I just I remember when you came last and it was very impressive and I feel the same this time around so I am in support of this project thank you thank you commissioner gry man I Echo everything that the fellow commissioner said and just want to can you tell me when you all started this process of working together how long you absolutely so we put this site under contract in middle of 20 late 22 early 23 and knew after Community meetings.

That we were going to need an affordable housing for sale component we talked to Habitat who's obviously awesome but quite busy building across the rest of Durham and realized that we had a developer in the community already who was active across the city obviously very intimately familiar with what's going on with the site cuz she lives adjacent to it's putting it lightly and that started sort of a longer conversation about how we could practically pull this off so at this point there's been a year plus worth of meetings with design consultant and a builder who helina and her nonprofit interface with on another work and we're really excited about the team that's in place to execute on this project but it's been a multi-year effort to sort of pull all this together thank you and just I I I I want to see more of this I would love to see you all hold court with more developers to explain to them and pencil out how this can happen so starts with really.

Active Community groups to be honest because our Carver project would have never happened if a previous developer had sort of wted through the city approval process in the BCA stop that in track so from my perspective this we're active in a bunch of other communities across the State this happens when Community groups are Super Active that's that's the answer thank you thank you any other commissioner Valentine so thank you for your comments you had talked about the environmental concerns on this project and so how how was the how are we going to be monitoring that yeah absolutely so DEQ right now is actually out in the field doing a significant amount of testing to prep for what's called an injection and so Ben is a compound that breaks down over time not fast enough for our comfort level in terms of developing residential adjacent to it the injection will accelerate the decomposition of the Benzene in a manner that will enable residential development but specifically without the need for a.

Vapor barrier what we did not want to do was end up building housing specifically affordable housing and have it done on a vapor barrier with a concern about future contamination and so we were told by DEQ that we were being too conservative in our respons to them was that's our decision not yours so DQ I would say rarely shows this level that DQ has been working with these neighbors for 15 plus years I believe because there's been a significant amount of monitoring the the incident that led to the Benzene getting released happened in the mid 2000s and so for 15 years DEQ Sort of hope they're not listening hasn't really done all that much they tested some wells that's about it and we've been able to impress upon them the need for this to get solved because of the residential development the affordable residential development the sort of frankly what will be a high-profile nature of a project that is able to accomplish what we hope to accomplish and they've gotten.

On board so they are stepping up and spending money which is a great start but our group in developing this is going to sort of back stop the cost of whatever it takes to get the site to a place where the benzene's no longer a concern not even for existing residents in the current layout of the neighborhood today you had also discussed the amount of development going on in this particular area of the city that I'm familiar with actually a resident on Hamlin Road and so how does this project fit into all of the other development that's that's going on which is considerable absolutely absolutely so I I think the biggest thing I'd say is that there is there's been a ton of affordable rental development that has been proposed and is occurring along Old Oxford as you extend from really duu East right so Oxford Manor is there and has been for years and years St Kofa Landing which came before you all I assume a couple years ago and has been renamed ever.

Since but that's 150 ltech units that's across the street we're building 198 Li Tech units and using rad vouchers from Durham housing authority to accomplish that just up the road and so our sense was you know large concentrations of affordable housing we need to build more affordable housing but you know a mixture of product is something that we thought that old Oxford needed and so as we contemplated endless into neighbors who specifically asked for affordable for sale but our biggest takeaway was that the project was a departure from what had been coming east on Old Oxford just because we're not including three four story Garden style dents affordable rental development all right thank you it's your five minutes is there anyone else on the commission that would like commissioner well first you it'll be a second time for you so anyone else with first questions or comments yes so I think there are many wonderful things about this project one one thing though that I'm am concerned about the elementary school is already at 113%.

Capacity and this is going to add 93 additional students to that what's the plan to address and resolve that. To be honest I our job is to build housing I I don't have a broader plan for Durham public schools we would anticipate that they'll continue to address the needs that they have up in the bragtown neighborhood I hate this as a cop out answer but we're we're we're trying to build housing and affordable housing specifically yeah I I for sure I you know I'm not sure 50,000 solves any Durham public school budget issues specific to this specific corner of the city but certainly increased the profer and again our our hope is that over time that will be remedied and in the meantime we're focused on building housing thank you anyone else first time question for commissioner first Madam sh I don't know if that the bail going off while I was speaking was for me to wrap up my comments but I I did have one more thing that.

It yeah you reached your five minute limit okay all right sorry and then then I'll come back to you after everyone else has thank thank you yes hi so I noticed that across the street across Oxford old Oxford Road the north Durham Farmers Market is located and I was wondering if in your community engagement and interfacing with neighbors did they discuss any concerns or opportunities pertaining to the development proposal proximity to the farmers market I'm best served to talk about a lot of parts of this project the woman who runs the farmers market is our partner in the project so I'm going to hand off to helina and get out of the way yes so I own that parcel as well and really in understanding I was in an uncomfortable position being now transitioning to developers it's been a very active conversation with the neighbors but really one of the ways we're hoping the trans transtion as that neighbor as the neighborhood changes like making that softer transition to.

Our County neighbors and the north dur Farmers Market filling at least some part of food Security in the community has been really important to. Everybody commission chair Vice chair Shara sorry yes I'm I'm interested in this Benzene remediation project I know you said DQ is handling it do you know anything about that or is there a contact person yeah we i' not off top of my head but I'd be happy to provide that VI email offline for sure yes thank you anyone else first time question no commissioner Williams first in regards to the environmental things going on with the site are you all looking into the brownfields program and I know that there are certain tax credits that go along with that would could those be potentially passed on to the residents the owners so we've been I would say lucky in that DEQ has prioritized this project over others and it's got more projects than it has a budget to accomplish across the state right now it's not.

In a brownfields program but it is I think the funds that are being user through their underground storage tank program their us program right now we're not anticipating applying for credits so there would not be credits to pass on to Residents our largest priority honestly right now is just finding a way to get the benzing cleaned up because for 20 years it hasn't been and there are I'm not going to I'm going to trip over myself if I start speaking to some of these compounds but there are vapors that are emerging in Tess and Helen as well and other neighbors who are on the county side behind the site so there there continue to remain to be ongoing issues with this and so our biggest priority honestly is making sure all of this gets solved and the fact that we have DEQ at the table actively doing the work necessary to test and likely profer mediation solution we think is great progress that is a better result than we could have expected at.

This point Thank you thank you commissioner Johnson did you have something else follow up no commissioner Valentine you had followup yes thank you Jackson interesting I said Johnson oh Johnson okay I thought you said Sorry's my Wisconsin accent coming out yeah so I just wanted to go on record and say that I meant to say this said I meant to say this previously but the affordable housing provision in this project is to be commended I agree with my colleagues in in that regard but I would be remiss if I didn't say that I'm have I have some concerns about the infrastructure in this area and also the impact that it's going to have on traffic and so that will have no bearing on how I vote this evening I think this project is worthy of an affirmative vote but I I still have some concerns in those areas Commissioners are we ready to move this project forward commissioner Johnson thank you chair I just want to Echo my concerns also about infrastructure notwithstanding how it.

Will reflect my vote I look at our staff to continue to educate us on the overall impact in those areas and highlight things that will raise concerns on infrastructure my one or two quick follow-ups is do you have financing when will this start if you get approval just curious yeah so let's say we get through Council before the end of the year site plan would be plus permits would be 18 months I'd anticipate sticking a shovel on the ground by by early 2027 okay and then for the staff I heard that there were multiple meetings we had meeting notes for one do we get those multiple meeting notes that we can use to bridge what happened originally to what has happened today what I would say before turn this to staff is that we we did the formal noticing process for the first meeting but we're because of work we're doing elsewhere in the neighborhood like I'm at BCA meetings a couple times throughout the year like some of these.

Are more informal and so there was not a staff representative I don't think it like the Oxford Hamlin Community Coalition meeting so I don't think there are notes from these other meetings some of this is just like we're in the neighborhood frequently and talking about what we're doing my one takeaway for you and staff is it's always helpful even if they're informal to memorialize those conversations like with transportation and so forth so if you can convey that to developers generally it's always help to fill the gaps thank you thank you chair thank you Commissioners are we ready to move this project forward staff yes the staff just wanted to confirm the additional profer or the update to the Durham public schools in the amount of $50,000 is that correct thank you may I have a motion to move this case forward chair as it relates to case z23 000025 Oxford Ridge I make a motion that we move this case forward with the additional propers to city council with a favorable recommendation second it's been.

Forwarded I mean motion moved by commissioner cutright and seconded by commissioner copac to move case z232 Oxford Ridge forward with a favorable recommendation to city council so may we have the roll call vote please chair Cameron yes Vice chair sheras yes commissioner cutright yes commissioner chowski yes commissioner grav mans yes commissioner Gregory yes commissioner Johnson yes commissioner copac yes commissioner mver yes commissioner Valen time yes commissioner Williams yes commissioner woke yes commissioner young yes the motion passes 13 to Z thank you all we appreciate it having a good night thank.

You we now have case z230 34 3 O2 Marine Road a case that has was continued from July may we have the staff report please thank you good evening again Sarah long from City County Planning Hamed aari an individual property owner proposes to change the zoning designation of one parcel totaling 0.51 Acres located at 302 Morin Road the current zoning is residential Suburban 20 and residential Suburban multif family the applicant proposes to change this zoning designation to residential Suburban multif family to allow up to four dwelling units or if utilizing the small lot option six dwelling units the property is currently designated established residential on the playsite map and staff does not believe this does not recommend changing this designation again the existing zoning is residential Suburban 20 and residential Suburban multif family as you can see in the zoning context map the site is surrounded by by residential Suburban 20 and residential Suburban multif family as well as plan development residential the general location of the site is to the west of downtown Durham.

Just west of Highway 147 again the property is currently designated established residential on the playsite map and staff does not recommend changing that designation so as this is a general zoning where there is no text or graphic development plan associated with the resoning proposal no com no commitments above the Udo requirements can be made and any future development May proceed according to what the the zoning would allow in the Udo a neighborhood meeting was held in accordance to Udo requirements on June 14th 2023 with three community members in attendance so staff has determined that the proposal is generally consistent with the play typ map designation of mix use neighborhood The Proposal would allow up to four units or six units with a small lot option and these units are limited to single family dwellings tow houses duplexes and Multiplex The Proposal is generally consistent with the playside U map designation and thank you and the applicant is available for any questions as well staff.

Thank you at this at this time the chair is opening the public hearing and may the applicant please come forward you have 10 minutes hello everyone this is Hamed sorry this is my first time so I'm not sure that what I supposed to tell here but please state your name and your address to begin with yeah hammed AAR I'm located at 1 18 Meadowbrook Drive in Chapel Hill North Carolina 27514 and yeah this I got this lot back in 2020 I started the whole process with the help of the like the Duram planning stuff I really appreciate all the support that arum provided me to bring this like U case moving forward as you saw in the the my application the like lot is sitting like partially between RSM and rs20 what I'm trying to accomplish here is like making the the whole lot in the RSM which is medium density residential and the plan is to having like based on whatever the Duram like rules and regulation ordinances.

Allowing me up to like four or six residential unit there so if you have any question I will be more than happy to answer that thank you are there any community members other community members in person that would like to. Speak community members on Zoom that would like to speak please press the raise your hand feature or Star N9 on your phone.

All right at this time we're going to close the public hearing and we are now open for commissioner discussion and questions just briefly I want to make one correction to the presentation the the actual Play Type designation is established residential okay and but staff still considers to be consistent with that place typ designation thank you any commissioner questions commissioner Johnson no commissioner Graves man yes have you given any do you have designs for what you plan to put on the site whether it's four or six units or how you envision the properties being situated on the site no no not yet I'm waiting for this like resoning process to see like I am up how many lot and based on that but roughly it's going to be like I'm thinking like 1500 up to like 2,000 square ft like through three like bedroom single family residence so as it's very close to the Durham University and I have a like very like dense background in like higher education I'm thinking providing some sort of like.

Affordable rental like places for University students good yeah so you you have experience in developing properties I'm I'm going to hire like a general contractor and all those like a license contractor for doing that yeah I've done one project here in Durham in like U Gran Street which i' I've I've followed my background is engineering electrical engineering so I I'm learning the whole process but I in that project I was closely working with like City Planning and trying to like understand the rules and Regulation and properly follow those so thank you thank you commissioner Johnson thank you commissioner chair so are these just to clarify in my mind my first these are rental units will there be one building with rental units or mult multiple buildings I'm trying to get it it's going to be like four residential single family residential or six and yeah all of them going to be rol okay and you mentioned affordable a moment ago if I heard you what does that mean to us affordable.

Rentals you know as like based on this infl inflation going on and lots of other things I'm thinking they have I have opportunity to like subdivide this property then the cost of each property for me will be much lower and based on that the rate of return for me will be like acceptable so I can have like I don't know something that this student at the University can afford to stay there and finish their like undergrad or graduate program so but definitely the the market is like U telling that okay how much the rental will be but as I have more lot and then I can like build more property there so the cost of like construction will be for me will be like lower and put me in a position that I can put like provide more property in order to offer in a market so and as having like having more Supply in the market then based on the supply and demand it's kind of balanced the price so the math is still.

To come up I understand the math is I think so yeah are there any rentals in that immediate area if will you be the first group of rentals I believe that like a developer put lots of townhouse in the other side of this Wheatfield Street and my understanding at least like majority of those properties might be rental so yeah okay and this is a question for staff because of my ignorance so I apologize staff it said here that allow up to six dwellings but it could go higher if I read this correctly based on this change of up to 12 units per acre just trying to clarify that that's my last question thank you sure so 12 units per acre this is a half acre site so it would be no more than six units on this particular.

Site thank you any other questions from commissioners going once going twice commissioner Gregory just one last quick question I'm curious can you describe real quick just what the nature of parking infrastructure is and proximity to the site is it street parking do you envision lot construction no I'm not considering like street parking so the way that I'm envisioning to like do the development there at least providing like two or three parking it it it's not be like a covered parking but there should be a room like inside each lot that those student can like Park their car but also the pro proximity to the Duke University and I know that there is a bike lane going on in across the Marine Road I believe that also will be helpful for those student that they can commute to the university by by b instead of like having like a car ownership thank you are we ready to move this case forward may I have a motion to move this case forward.

Please chair as it relates to case z2300 34302 Marine Road I make a motion that we move this case forward with a favorable recommendation to city council second that commissioner Valentine I could see okay moved it's been moved by commissioner cutright and seconded by commissioner Valentine to move case z230 34 302 Marine Road forward with a favorable Rec recommendation may I have the roll call vote please chair Cameron yes Vice chair sheras yes commissioner cutright yes commissioner chowski yes commissioner Graves mans yes commissioner Gregory yes commissioner Johnson yes commissioner copac yes commissioner mver yep commissioner Valentine yes commissioner Williams yes commissioner woke yes commissioner young yes the motion passes 13 to zero thank you all righty let's move on to case z 2344 Mineral Springs town houses also a case continued from the July meeting May we have the staff report please course Brook roer City County Planning Dev pbaa of Yeti Hospitality Group LLC proposes to change the zoning designation of two Parcels of land totaling 10.8 Acres located at 1402 and.

1412 south Mineral Springs Road the current zoning is residential Suburban 20 the applicant proposes to change this designation to plan development residential 5349 through a textual development plan to allow up to 58 townhouse units the properties are currently designated mixed use neighborhood on the place type map the proposed zoning is consistent with the designated Place type the existing zoning is residential Suburban 20 the site is surrounded by plan development residential and residential Suburban 20 the aerial map shows the general location of the project in Southeastern Durham the properties are currently designated mixed use neighborhood on the place type map the proposed PDR 5349 zoning was determined consistent with this place type there is an Associated contiguous annexation petition with this case case bdg 23028 the proposal commits to numerous text commitments of those being 50% impervious surface an additional amenity in the open space area five affordable units for households earning at or below 80% area median income for a period of 30 years a 10t but shared path along the.

Sight's frontage a minimum of 25% tree coverage 60% of trees vehicular use area plantings and vegetative buffers to be native species and at least three distinct open space areas on site a neighborhood meeting was held in accordance with Udo requirements on July 26 2023 where two community members were present in summation the proposed would allow the development of 58 townhouse units the site census tract has a lower tax value increase in percentage of cost burden renters than Durham County on average and the number of evictions is consistent with the county rate these statistics suggest a lower displacement risk in this area the site is generally autod dependent lacking access to multimodal infrastructure and is in not in is not in close proximity to daily services while compliant with Udo requirements the transportation department did request that the applicant commit to the construction of a 10 foot concrete shared path along the south Mineral Springs Road for the frontage of the three Parcels to the South parcels 16547 16544 and 1651 143 to avoid gaps.

In the sidewalk system the applicant declined to make the request to profer and did not provide additional details there is currently a commitment for a 10- foot shared path along the sight's frontage however the proposal is generally consistent as previously stated with the place type map designation of mixed use neighborhood thank you staff and the applicant are available to answer questions thank you the public hearing the chair at this time the chair is opening the public hearing may we have the applicant come forward please good evening chair Cameron Vice sharis members of the Planning Commission my name is Patrick biker I live at 2614 Stewart Drive and I'm with Morning Star Law Group thank you Brooke for the excellent staff presentation and I'm here tonight for the applicant of this resoning and annexation which is yeti H Hospitality Group LLC as Miss roer just stated this is an annexation and a resoning for about 10.8 Acres off of Mineral Springs Road the requested PDR zoning will facilitate a town home development with.

A maximum of 58 Town Homes three sides of this assemblage are already in the city of Durham and therefore annexing this property will close most of a doughnut hole in the city's jurisdiction which of course is one of the goals in our new comprehensive plan in addition residential development here is appropriate this location is very close to the highway 70 commercial Corridor and it's surrounded by current and future residential development I hope you all have taken the time to drive around this area the neighborhood across the street is already developed with single family homes and the property is bordered on on three sides by the future Micah Ridge residential development and that was rezoned and annexed in February of 2023 this residential type of development tow houses and the density proposed at this location are very appropriate the existing neighborhood homes are mostly single family so introducing Town Homes would increase the diversity of housing types along Mineral Springs and this density will ensure that we are maximizing the use of.

This land and create creating as many homes as possible to address our local housing shortage lastly I want to briefly go over the Project's compliance with the comprehensive plan this resoning has several tax commitments M rooper highlighted some of them and I want to emphasize them that will help to bring this project in into compliance with the new comp plan I wish to highlight five of our text commitments first there will be five income restricted Town Homes to be sold to Durham residents making 80% or less of our area median income that is for 30 years and I want to emphasize that is 88.6% of these new town homes that's a very strong profer I want to piggy back on what commissioner cutright said during Ted hbr's presentation that's a strong commitment and it's a serious subsidy coming from the development team second we are increasing the tree canopy coverage from 20% to 25% and there's also a commitment that this coverage comes from preserving existing trees third we have decreased.

The impervious surface on this site for from 70% to 50% fourth we have a commitment to promote Native species and fifth there's a commitment to break up the open space into three distinct areas which will create a more interesting layout in addition to those commitments we wish to State on the record tonight that we provide $6,000 to during public schools which is the traditional $500 per new stent per new student profer I'll be happy to word Smith that and share it with Mr Kane and his team tomorrow we'll make that payment prior to issuance of a certificate of occupancy again for all these reasons we respectfully ask for your approval we'll be happy to try to answer any questions thank you thank.

You are there any community members present that yes ma'am please approach the podium and state your name and address.

Hi sorry I wasn't planning on speaking tonight my name is Lisa Roman Schaffer and I actually live in the development right across from the site I have a question for you sorry oh c in one video too I have been informed oh before before even say that you had said that the community was made aware and we were able to see and go to this meeting I didn't hear about any meeting for this development or for the one on Sharon Road that is why I'm here tonight to inform and educate myself on this I have been shared information that the board did pass saying for the Watershed because there is a little creek that's right on that property as well as the one on Sharon Road all of this development although it is great for our community it has been damaging we also own a home on Stallings Road which we are planning on moving into however we stopped fixing up our house to be able to move into it to enjoy the.

Countryside because our well water which was super clear is now this really nasty murky clay almost like like a a tomato soup kind of color so that is a huge concern for me as well the plan that has been passed for the southeast Durham Watershed Improvement plan I've been told has is going to cost the city and the county taxpayers over $3 million so I'm just wondering it's already damaging our water now let alone continuing to build the way that we're building at the rate that we're building is not only damaging our water source which is affecting every aspect of Our Lives it's also caused Wildlife to seek refuge and trying to find other places we've had our cattle our chickens our pets even our kids in our neighborhoods scared and some of them have been dying because we've had a lot of coyotes just looking for refuge and trying to find food or a place to live sorry ma'am your your time is up thank you you it's okay.

Thank you is there anyone else in the audience that would like to speak all right we will move to the zoom I see Donna stck with her hand up please go ahead good afternoon City County Planning Commissioners I'm Donna stainbeck and I'm a core member of The Preserve rural Durham team we have some concerns and I sent an email out highlighting some of those this afternoon but I'll have to go through this fast the blasting concerns continue we still do not have anybody paying the people who've had damages to their Wells and to their homes so you know we need a commitment to no blasting as the lady was just talking about that stream on the western portion of the property flows directly into liit Creek to hold a road it only to grow Park it's new restoration that area floods already and we need a commitment for the 100e storm water plan because it definitely flooded with what we just saw the other week and it's done it some other times.

So we the Wetland on site has no buffer proposed and Wetland lands are important to keep from flooding and we got minimum open space which and then the additional 391 vehicles per day well as they were saying take a time to drive out there well it'll take a long time because the traffic is bad and entrance and exits are tough and you it it's really hard to get onto your property or out of it into the traffic there's no parks in the area and time is up Miss standbag thank you next we have Pamela Andrews good evening can you hear me yes we can thank you tonight I just want to reference you know this is another 58 Town Homes as was referenced but there are town homes that have been recently passed an inex on Sharon Road a short distance away including the offer track last Monday night or two weeks ago for 100 town homes so there are lots of town homes in the area it is designated M mixed use neighborhood.

On the place type map and so we're interested in what other mixed use properties would be on site the streams on the western portion flow to Little liit Creek down to holder Road where Mr Ellis's property floods after each heavy rain this then runs over to the grow Park new restoration project which cost $1.4 million to fix 6,000 linear feet of that Creek Wetlands on site are concerned along with only 25% tree preservation as we know the trees and the roots of the vegetation hold the soil in place schools are overcrowded as well 27 additional students will be added with no profer per student although I did hear that change tonight Bethesda is 17.91% over capacity with Neil 110% overc capacity 391 additional vehicle trips per day will be added to the heavily congested area the cumulative impact studies are needed desperately for this out of town thank you for your time thank you is there anyone else on the zoom wishing to speak please use the raise your hand.

Function or Star n on your phone no one else on the zoom wishing to speak all right at this time the chair is closing the public hearing we are now open for commissioner discussion and questions commission cut right I will say Mr biker appreciate the five for sale affordable units it's impressive at 86% of the total I think you should I think you should go six units and get a 10 and really set the bar High I don't have clearance for my client to do that tonight commissioner C Comm I was committed to five which is 88.6% which again is to my knowledge for for sale product where there's no subsidy there's no federal tax subsidy for that it's it's purely a hit on the bottom line so that's the best we can do at this.

Juncture thank you commissioner jurowski did I get close yes chair thank you so much so I see the recommendations made by bpac and I'm wondering why the commitments will not be provided on three out of those four oh that's because there's I'm glad you asked that question there if you drive down Mineral Springs it's a two-lane ditch Section Road that RightWay is quite narrow it's there's simply not adequate public right of way to construct those improvements in the public RightWay re I wish I could remember what year it was Sir I apologize within the last several years the North Carolina court of appeals handed down a case called town of Apex V Rubin and that said cities in North Carolina may not use their power of imminent domain to assist public to assist private development that's why we can't commit to that if they're adequate right of way I don't think it would be an issue but Mineral Springs is a is a is an old two-lane dissection Road it.

It's just simply not legally possible to commit to Pro to commit to improvements on other people's property and in the past you know 10 I've been doing this for a few years it's not my first rodeo it was more common and we would work with the city of Durham to to put in exactly those types of infrastructure improvements we would partner with the city the core of appeal deals have said that's not permissible so I wish we could we see the need if there were adequate right of way I I think we'd be happy to do it but without right of way it's not possible so it's that y'all are unable to commit but it's not that it's not doable is that correct it's not doable because you'd have to get the permission from the property owners and if they don't want to give their permission we committ if we committ it to something and just one of those three property owner says no we're not doing.

It we're not going to let you on our property that kills the project because it's a zoning commitment that runs with the property that has to be done prior to a certificate of occupancy so it's a challenge I've seen it change a lot over the course of my career thank you thank you commissioner woke hey so I've heard you know the community has mentioned a couple times a creek on the property and and so it does I when I was reviewing it I just wanted to see so I saw that there's no commitment to protecting the environmentally sensitive areas on the property is that correct I'm not I don't believe there are any that that showed up on the property so what we did commissioner is only 15% of the site is required to be tree coverage we increased that to 25% so we felt that was the best way to address those concerns by Saving a significant increase of the trees on site than what the Udo requires and are those in that.

Environmentally sensitive area on the property that's something we'd have to work on on a site plan I'm sure the site plan team under assistant director der brinsky would direct us to do exactly that thank you commissioner talb grahams and then commissioner Valentine yeah I'm sorry Graves man what did I call you me by my first name my last day crazy sorry you you speak a little bit about how the developer plans to Market to the to the potential owners that are going to be for the affordable ownership yeah I think we'd reach out to different for for example Duke University by far our largest employer we would reach out to their home they have a home buyer Club at Duke University we prepare their employees nurses maintenance workers who are saving up for a home want to become a first-time home buyer we' reach out to the local groups who are are preparing people to become homeowners so it's a local development team we're happy to do that yeah we'll be very.

Intentional about that make sure we get the word out to our local employers work through the I'm on the board directors of the Home Builders Association we'll certainly Market it through all of our community outreach and events that we hold in the across durum to let people know that there is a an 80% Ami opportunity for people on Mineral Springs Road followup question I should have asked this the other developer earlier M how is that going to shape up is it do you know if it's going to be is it a down payment assistance program is it a reduction in reduction in the purchase price I reduction in purchase price you have you established what that reduction is going to be yet but it's hard to hit a moving Target because I think as you all know it takes a long time to get through site plan and then drawings and then to build it every year I believe in June the Department of Housing and Urban Development revises what the area.

Of mediate income is for for Durham so we don't know what the area of median income is going to be in 20207 or 2028 when when the units will actually go for sale but it'll be pegged at that 80% of that number thank you yes sir staff like say something commissioner Graves man if I could just give you the HUD calculates the Ami and they do it by number of persons in the household so just to give you an idea in 2024 an 80% income household with four persons in it is $84,700 a year that's right so would that's the earning that's the earnings of the it's the earnings of the of a four-person family correct and it goes down as there's fewer people in the family it goes up as there's more people in the family for those those who might have a lot of kids that seems counterintuitive but that that is the way HUD does it.

Okayif oh yeah you say you don't know yeah it's it's hard to it's hard to guesstimate that I mean it's in the tens of thousands there's no doubt it's it's a significant discount that that makes a real difference and as we were talking about I think on on the bragtown project this is what builds generational wealth you know it's great we we have the low-income housing tax credit program for 60% Ami rentals and that helps people save but in terms of actually creating generational wealth I think the these tow houses at 80% Ami is actually going to be what actually makes a difference for people who otherwise may not be able to to afford a home I'm 100% on board 110% on board I should ACC this ear I'm so sorry it's your last meeting I I'm really going to miss you I hopefully it'll invite me back you're not moving are you no good property line my neighbor yeah but had the I should maybe some other Commissioners can help me.

Understand a little bit more about how we're thinking about this affordable ownership opportunity are there how are your your development team and other development teams thinking about the parameter they put around the time of ownership for the the new owner to be able to hold on to it to keep their incentive yeah I mean that's a that's a you know some people support a shorter time frame we committed to 30 years yeah so what what it you know what it says is you're going to have to we're going to preserve this townhouse as an affordable townhouse for 30 years after it's built that's great for the community for the family who buys it maybe they'll live there 30 years I'm actually hitting 30 years in in our house that we own and it was the first house we bought so some people live there for a long time it's it's a you know the good it the equity will build up with essentially the cost of living or inflation so it's not like it's.

Static so but it it does of course not open the townhouse up to being subject to the wild increase and prices that we've seen in some Durham neighborhoods over the last several years so it's a delicate Balancing Act in this case we we went with I believe it was the 30-year time frame I'm sorry call yeah your your time is up beer study here we come going on to commissioner Valentine yes so thank you for your presentation counselor will there be any blasting that's required in this this project at this juncture we don't know I you know again it's a very small site so be cautiously optimistic that it's and and again it's it's pretty much surrounded by new development so hopefully the sewer tie-ins are very straightforward but like I said the good news is it's a small site the bad news is we don't we don't know well there is some concern in the community about the possibilities of blasting at this particular yeah the good news is it's a very small site.

So as it relates to the the larger community that is a sector of the county where there's also a lot of development that's going on and we already know that the impact a blasting has had on this sector in in the county and so I think that's something that we collectively particularly this body should take a look at we look at these projects as sort of one-offs but really they have such large implications for our community ac across the county and so I think we we are doing a disservice by not looking at the collective nature of how these projects impact on our community and so you'd also talked about actually the the the young lady who came and spoke about the concerns with what she described as sort of a tomato type a tomato pasty type impact on her water and so we know that to be true I mean there's been multiple times that people have come before this body and talk to us about the impact that these projects.

Are having on on the water and it's quality in fact I believe there there's a lawsuit currently in this particular particular part of the county where this issue is being address but on this particular project what are you doing to try to to deal with some of the concerns with particularly on the western portion of this project the flow into lit Creek which is being damaged tremendously by the the nature of our development here in D dorm County yeah I think at the time of site plan we'll certainly be looking at the especially the large area that's going to be the tree safe components I mean we wanted to break that up so it' be a very attractive neighborhood but obviously we want to be be sure to at the time of site plan that do the best we can to preserve trees and again these are preserving trees so the good news is we're not replanting we're preserving what's on site and that's a commitment many developments that we work on.

Have to re have to replant trees but in this case we're fortunate enough to be able to preserve an extra 10% so I think that'll help address that concern so that the time of site plan we'll make sure that we're preserving 25% of the trees are on site which I think is the best you know really the best type of buffer it's not the buffer in the Udo sense but the buffer in the in the physical sense so you're reserving the trees that that way those root zones are not going to be disturbed that retains the rainfall on site to the best of our ability and and one last question it was already brought up by someone who spoke earlier about the 100e storm water plan yeah this juncture I don't think we've been able to run the calculations to see if that would if that would if that would fit so we'll certainly look at it prior to city council but at this juncture I don't think we're able to.

Commit to that but we'll certainly look at it between now and city council appreciate you bringing that up good commissioner Johnson so do you commit to doing no blasting if it's if it's not required I mean it's a simple question for me blasting is a problem for me if it can be avoided through costs incurred by the developer to do other means do you commit to doing everything possible to avoid blasting I I would have to defer to my friend Aaron Kane if that's an enforcable commitment certainly nobody wants to do it because it's an expensive undertaking we would hope that we don't find any subsurface rock that impedes the lines I'm not aware of how that could be an enforcable commitment yeah we would need something much more specific than you know other otherwise avoidable or something like that we would we we can't enforce something like that we would need some very specific parameters for that that I don't know that can be provided this time I've never seen an example of.

A conditional no blasting commitment yeah the reason I raised it is for the obvious reasons we've heard about water about flood all those other things that we have to look in the global sense silly question but was the one property owner who didn't offer up his land for sidewalks and whatever was were they offered any compensation for offering that or could they be offered any compensation well it it's a it's a chicken and egg problem commissioner in that you could have an agreement with a homeowner but until you actually close on the property you wouldn't have the right to build the sidewalk so it's again something that I I honestly legally I don't know how you fix that problem given what the court of appeals has has said that there is no recourse for eminent domain for public improvements so we certainly would like to see better pedestrian connectivity in the area but and if the city would just acquire the right away that would that would make everything that would make everything.

Work but most but when you're on something when you're on a road like Mineral Springs that's just a ditch Section Road you have that problem if it if this were a a a newer street with curbing gutter I don't think we'd be having this problem but it's an old it's an old ditch two-lane ditch Section Road and it is what it is but it does create a problem to the staff I did the calculation on school impact I think it was understated it said 64,000 I think it's actually 145,000 if I did my math right you've proferred 6,000 believe are you willing to raise that higher and staff please inject no it's if I may commissioner there's 12 additional students and for as long as I've been doing this type of work it's been $500 per new student as the profer from the development community and that's 6,2 time 500 sure I but I thought you calculated on the total impact of the number total students which I calculated on other.

Forms So currently we have in our staff report that it's per pupil it would be $537 and that's that's a number that was created in in collaboration with DPS to to kind of rightsize what what that contribution would look like but of course any contributions to Durham Public Schools is is not a requirement and above any standards that we have no my my point is if I I think it's based on potential students generated not the increased from the original zoning to the new zoning so it' be 165 + 6 * 5,000 gets me to be 145,000 so we gen we produce the staff reports with the understanding that it's based on the new students generated the the the Delta between what is allowed under the current zoning that somebody could develop by right and what would be anticipated based on the new zoning and not just the total number of students but the Delta on that thank you I did the calculation on others it doesn't appear that but I'll look again okay we.

We'll we'll make sure that we have that math because if it's more then 6,000 gives me PA well yeah so 6,000 is what's being proferred that's not no I understand yeah okay thank you so much and I'm also concerned about the road Improvement the answer I got in the meeting notice was that other developments in the area will take care of the road Improvement so you don't in your development have to address it could you explain that more and by the way 10 acres to me is a lot of land not a small project it it's relative to many projects it's fairly small in terms of acreage and number of units is so far below the Tia threshold that under state and federal law it's you're not allowed to impose off-site Road improvements for a project that does not require a traffic impact analyses in terms of the number of town homes that are required that would have to be built in order to require a TIA I see my I see M leene Thomas.

There it's around 300 I think 300 town homes in order to require Tia and tonight we are at 58 so that's why the in terms of the roadway Improvement ments it's limited to the U essentially the frontage along Mineral Springs Road that facilitates safe access in and out of the site and that's a again that's a limitation that's been articulated by both state courts and federal federal courts right earing Thomas Transportation I just wanted to add to and and make one clarification Mr biker is correct so the improvements that would be required for this development would be the turn Lanes associated with any direct access to Mineral Springs off-site improvements cannot be required as a traffic study was not required for this project in the previous project a traffic study was required reviewed and improvements were required of that development also improvements that were identified of other developments would need to be constructed before that last development could get a CO as well so if those improvements had are not.

Completed that development would need to construct those as well so I just want to clarify traffic study was done for that one and improvements required as needed to accommodate that development both at the access points and off site Miss Thomas for that clarification you're welcome Miss Thomas Sharon and Mineral Springs are both ncdot roads is that correct yes that's correct so so both NCD and the City of Durham review our our access plans to make sure that the Road widening at the at the access point is going to create safe traffic movements both the the district office on Stadium Drive and c and the city transportation department Commissioners any other questions yes it says in the proposal I supposed to call your name oh I chair Shar is yes Vice chair Shar is here impervious surfaces are limited to 50% of the site so you're committing to since it's only a 10 point some odd Acre Site five acres could you also commit to making sure that those impervious surfaces.

Aren't subject to blasting if blasting is required you wanted staff wanted a specific number yeah I I I hear the concern the the the the challenge we have is that you really have no idea where subsurface Rock exists on 5 Acres 10 acres 50 acres and so it could and it's just random where it shows up there's just no way to anticipated you would have to do so many borings which is not cheap prior to a resoning being approved to to to be able to answer that question and make a commitment that would run with the land so your your point you're your spot on in terms of it's 10.8 Acres that means 5.4 Acres will be perious yeah so it' be 50/50 under the Udo you're allowed to go up to 70% impervious surface only 30% is required to stay pervious we're taking that an extra 20% higher to 50% so it's 50/50 on this so technically during the construction process the whole place could be blasted and then you would just.

Come back over that's not realistic ma'am it's only sewer lines nobody wants to do blasting we only have to figure out where the sewer lines tie into the existing Mains and hope there's no subsurface rock where that trench has to go and sometimes those trenches are quite deep in order to have gravity sewer okay thank you commissioner copac yeah thank you chair Cameron first I just want to acknowledge the comments and concerns by residents here in person and on the line I know it's not easy to come before a group like this up on the Das especially for the first time under a time limit and so I appreciate you sharing those comments from your personal experience and I share the concerns around blasting water quality and storm water and I do want to urge you counselor to go back and work with your client to see particularly around the 100 year storm water plan to see if that's something that can be added to the application before going to the city.

Council it seems like something that that is something that's more within the control of the applicants and I appreciate commissioner Valentine's call to trying to address this outside of the case by case basis it seems that this I don't mean to interrupt but as as a board member of the home builders I I we would like to have the home builders partner with the Planning Commission to investigate this blasting issue so we can bring all the home builders to the table hear the concerns of the community and try and I apologize for interrupting but I wanted to I remember what I had for breakfast this morning so I didn't want to lose that thought but please commissioner I I I'm sorry about that no problem at all great Point yeah you know it seems like we are seeing pretty astonishing growth and development in this part of the county it also seems like that is the result of an INT of intentional policy Decisions by elected officials to drive development patterns.

In this way and so I look forward to when you were on the County Commission for this body to work with you and and perhaps you would have to wait that long to look for ways to partner and and address some of these issues at a broader policy level versus looking at it Case by case like we do here just looking to see if it's squares with the comprehensive plan so I appreciate that that that comment you made also you know the affordable housing commitments are definitely commendable I do appreciate the call for the canopy beyond that that minimum I think we need to see that and more that protection of existing trees which is just planting new because it's not the same agreed my my main question is for the is for our staff and about the place type of of mixed use if I have that right mix use neighborhoods mix use neighborhoods and I'm just wondering and it's not just this application but just wondering about the alignment with Place type map.

And the comprehensive plan for mix use neighborhood when it calls for centrally located Civic institutional commercial uses you know it calls for resid non-resident uses it talks about like 15 minute walking distance U about Transportation infrastructure that encourages safe walking biking rolling and and and riding transit in areas with development patterns in roads where there is no right of way to be able to actually help put that in place and so how are we supposed to think as a body about that place type and how these sorts of proposals were were you you know I think staff is even is encouraging us to think about this as like a mixed use neighborhood development like how should we be thinking about some of those tensions yeah definitely and the so the place type map and the comprehensive plan that it's a Visionary document you know created from you know Community residents and this this body here y'all's job is to really interpret and weigh those tensions so I don't have a.

Great answer for you in our staff report we do try and highlight you know we look at all the characteristics of the different place types so we we do have at section L the place type consistency where we go through the transportation characteristics the the types of uses being proposed for the site or whichever project Service Pro provision and green space so we try and and touch on those topics there are also specific Place type policies that we touch on in our consistency analysis did you have a specific question for this site I guess for this site then with that you know with that commence background is mix use neighborhood like the closest fit even though there's inconsistency as you see it with the different types of place types and that's why it's recommended as falling under that so we said for this case that it would be consistent with mixed use while there are some tensions with you know the there's only residential being proposed on the site.

Which I think has been brought up due to the site's relatively small size it's only about 10 acres which we consider relatively small that you know we've we've looked at the immediate surrounding area for instance there is mostly single family housing in that area so planners on our team we were thinking to to kind of look a little bit broader out for the full mixed use neighborhood area Place type this is adding a new type of housing to to that General mixed use neighborhood area I I think that was one of the the tensions that you brought up okay thank you all right we have 3 minutes till 7:30 if when we need to take our break are we do you still have questions or do we want move this case.

Forward anybody else have questions one minute please the blasting are these Town Homes going to have basements or are they all going to be on slabs I don't know but my I hly don't know the answer to that question that's again that's something we tend to figure out the site plan issue when you really get into the what the grades are on the site and if you have a would have a walk out basement it could very well be a combination of both sir may I have a motion to move this case forward chair as it relates to case z23 0044 Mineral Springs Town Homes I make a recommend ation that we and its add I make a recommendation that we move this case forward with its additional profer of U $500 per student to dur Public Schools yeah 6,000 okay thank you and just to clarify $6,000 profer to dur Public Schools thank you yes sir with a favorable recommendation thank you is there a i second seconded by.

Commissioner woke it has been moved by commissioner cutright and seconded by commissioner woke to move case z23 trip 44 Mineral Springs tow houses for with a favorable recommendation may I have the roll call vote please chair Cameron yes chair sharis Vice chair sharis no commissioner cutright yes commissioner kakowski no commissioner Graves mans yes commissioner Gregory yes commissioner Johnson no commissioner copac yes commissioner mver yes commissioner Valentine no commissioner Williams yes commissioner woke no commissioner Young no the motion passes 7 to six thank you at this time we're going to recess until 7:40 p.m.

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Alrighty we are rejourn moving on to case z23 45 Sharon Grove may we have the staff report please of course Brook rooper City County Planning Sean gtis of the Drees company proposes to change the zoning designation of three Parcels of land totaling 24.2 acres and located at 8039 91 and 903 Sharon Road the current zoning is residential Suburban 10 with a development plan residential Suburban 20 and residential rural the applicant proposes to change this designation to residential Suburban 8 with a textual development plan to allow up to 120 single family and townhouse dwelling units the properties are currently designated mixed residential neighborhood on the place type map the proposed residential Suburban 8 with the development plan zoning is consistent with the designated Place type the existing zoning is residential Suburban 10 with a development plan residential Suburban 20 and residential rural the site is surrounded by plan development residential residential Suburban 20 and residential rural the aerial map shows the general location of the project in Southeastern Durham the properties are currently designated mixed residential.

Neighborhood on the place type map the proposed RS 8 with the development plan zoning was determined consistent with this place type there is an Associated contiguous annexation petition with this case case bdg 2329 The Proposal makes textual commitments and excess of Udo requirements including the limitation of impervious surface to no greater than 50% contributions to Durham public schools in the amount of $188,500 and the Durham dedicated housing Fund in the amount of $40,000 the construction of a 10-ft shared path on the site's Frontage native tree Native Street tree plantings a minimum of 25% open space and at least two recreational amenities such as a pocket park playground dog park or gazebo a neighborhood meeting was held in accordance with yudia requirements on August 22nd 2023 where 11 community members were in attendance finally The Proposal seeks to allow the construction of up to 120 market rate single family in townhouse dwelling units with a minimum of 80 townhouse units upon completion situated in eastern Durham the site is within approximately 5 miles of various daily.

Services however the area is predominantly autod dependent additionally the census track with the which the site is in has a marginally higher incidence of evictions but lower percentages of tax value increase in cost burden renters compared to the Durham County average this indicates a lower risk of displacement in the area again the proposal is generally consistent with the place type map designation of mixed residential neighborhood thank you staff and the applicant are available for questions thank you may we have at this time the chair is opening the public hearing and the applicant is welcome to the podium good evening chair Cameron Vice chair sharis members of the Planning Commission my name is Patrick biker with Morning Star Law Group I live at 2614 Stewart Drive I'm here representing the Drees company for this relatively small infield development Drees is a family-owned homebuilder with a great track record here in durum especially nearby they were one of the home builders in the very successful bright leaf at the park neighborhood and I work.

Worked on that quite a few years ago tonight I'm joined by Sha Gattis of the Dre company the subject Pro property we're looking at tonight is made up of three parcels and just a just a little bit over 24 acres and that's on the east side of Sharon Road only one of these properties 803 Sharon Road is located out in the county but the others are are already in the city limits this proposal includes annexing about 62 acres again located at 803 Sher Road into the city limits and that's to gain access to public utilities the City Council approved the annexation and the resoning for the other two properties 901 and 9903 Sharon Road which is about 7 which is about 17.5 acres and that happened back on May 15 of 2023 the 803 Sharon Road property we're discussing tonight essentially phase two of the project that the City Council approved 15 months ago there will only be tow houses on the 803 Sharon Road parcel in total the development will.

Have about 120 units or up to 120 units and this parcel we're talking about tonight will have at the most 57 Town Homes 901 and 903 Sharon Road currently are zoned RS10 with a development plan 803 is zoned rural residential and rs rs20 so for the sake of uniformity and to accommodate the neighborhood concerns that we heard during our community engagement primarily about storm water we're going to reone we wish to reone 901 90 3 and 803 Sharon Road all to Suburban residential Suburban 8 with a development plan again I'd like to point out as M roer stated the project is consistent with a designated Place type map designation on the place type map since it's designated mixed residential neighborhood and so we have a a text commitment to have a mix of single family and Tow houses furthermore the site is in CL fairly close proximity to grocery stores and employment and Retail opportunities and Healthcare facilities as I mentioned we had our team had a neighborhood meeting in regards to.

The resoning of 803 Sharon Road on August 22 of 2023 we felt this was a positive meeting on the whole in regards to the project but the main concern was the water runoff and storm water concerns we explained that the main reason we're resoning 803 and joining it to 901 and 903 is so that we changed the Contours on 803 so that the water instead of flowing towards the neighbors that are on Foxboro it'll instead flow which is in an East direction we're instead going to regrade and rebalance the site which we think is going to cost you know ballpark half a million dollars we're going to regrade the site so that it in fact slopes away from the neighborhood on Foxboro and all the storm water will go to the West in connection with this development among other commitments we will construct a 10-ft concrete shared p path across the full Frontage of this on this side of Sharon Road and that will accommodate bicyclists and pedestrians we'll also have an.

Exclusive southbound left turn lane and exclusive Northbound right turn lane on Sharon Road and we'll also dedicate 25 ft of additional Frontage along Sharon Road in addition We've committed to provide at least two of the following a minimum 10,000 square foot park playground equipment a minimum of 5,000 ft dog park or a Zebo in a Gathering Place other commitments include a contribution to Durham Public Schools and Durham dedicated housing fund which are consistent with what the city council approved last year and so we believe this resoning will facilitate highquality infill development and provide a mix of housing opportunities for the needs of our growing population accordingly we respectfully ask for your recommendation of approval I'll be happy to answer any questions you may have and thank you for your time tonight thank you at this time the chair oh I'm sorry the public hearing is open are there any community members in the audience that would like to.

Speak hello again my name is Lisa Roman schaer I just wanted to State for the record the both the Sharon Road and the Mineral Springs projects the elementary schools are already currently 11791 over capacity the milal school is already over 10.25% over capacity so if there can be something done about that that would be amazing as well a huge concern that we're also having is the traffic trying to in case of an emergency I myself was pregnant in 2022 had an emergency 911 was an answering the Sheriff's Office wasn't answering so my husband and I tried getting to the hospital as quick as possible right where the ball fields are to get to the stop sign to get on to Patterson to get to the light we sat there for over 30 minutes unfortunately 30 minutes when you are having I lost my baby so that is a huge concern just literally yesterday there was a lady who lives in one of these new townhouse developments she was.

Trying to get out of her driveway and accidentally hit another vehicle because there's no parking in these townhouse developments that have been built and she had called 911 the the other person had said please don't call the cops please don't call the cops and just wanted to leave so she did call 911 no response she called the Sheriff's Office no response I gave her the non-emergency number no response our emergency personnels are just so overwhelmed right now that they cannot accommodate what is already here the fire department isn't equipped with all of the equipment that they need to be able to help us for example there's no fire hydrants on Stallings Road they just put brand new ones in on Sharon Road we all assumed it was because they were going to be developing and they're developing so that is a huge concern for all of us one is our safety God forbid any one of us need an ambulance or fire to come as possible they can't get through as he.

Did say on Mineral Springs Road sorry your time is up ma' okay thank you well thank you very much I appreciate your time thank you is there anyone on okay we have zoom the first hand I see raay is Donna stainbeck.

Go ahead unmute yourself okay good evening Durham planning Commissioners as she just mentioned one of myid I'm sorry please state your name and your address before speaking oh yes I'm Donna stainback at 4825 Jimmy Rogers Road Duram North Carolina a key concern is the roads there they treat Sharon Road like it's a freeway it's it's very difficult and it backs up so far I've been caught in it and just but I've never had something as bad as what she just mentioned also we have the blasting concerns continue to be a problem out there what was also mentioned by U Mr B was that they were going to divert the water to the West well on the west side of the property flows the liit creek within 400 feet of the Creek flood zone it is against the settlement Pollution Control Act to have any settlement flowing outside of your pro the property being developed but that continues to happen the U minimum Udo storm water plans is what the plan said.

Now we're requesting the 100-year storm water plan with this property as you you've already heard they they had problems with that we got we need more than the minimum of 20% tree coverage right now only 40,000 is being contributed to the Durham dedicated housing fund where are we going to put the wildlife I mean nobody seems to care but that is a reality and the we there there are no parks in the vicinity and this adds 9993 additional vehicles per day to Sharon Road which is only a 10- foot Road only 15 policies out of the 23 comprehensive plan policies were met that's only a 65% that's not a passing grade thank you thank you next we have levius Allen go ahead please unmute yourself go ahead please state your name and.

Address let's move on to the next person I see phone number 919 982 wait 9198 2. 46607 please state your name and address hello my name is Stephen Barnes I'm at address 203 foxb Lane and right on the corner of Foxboro and Lum please go ahead sir yes and so my yeah my concerns are the biggest concerns I have listen to everything and even the last one that was approved one by one vote is that you know I don't think people are really considering the with with I'm right there on that hill where the the ground is not stable and we've already got the land caving in as it is and they're talking about building right there so the land the instability of the land is a big issue also the drainage I have pictures and video of the flood that's going in our backyards already from that Hill coming down so the storage the drainage is an issue and also the the two-lane road that's not sufficient enough for space the.

Traffic congestion and just for everything that they're building right now I don't think it's appropriate or timely for them to open up this whole building project with not enough space for traffic to actually easily go through through and and without causing other hazards it's a lot being said about this property I've been in the last meeting I also requested from the builders that were trying to take over this property about retainer walls to actually take care of some of those issues if they were to pass this I'm asking I'm St most of our neighbors are really against this because we don't feel like it was properly planned nor do we feel like all the things are done that to make sure that things are we don't we don't mind if it's done but they need to take care of it and make sure stuff is done so I'm requesting that this be delayed for now and that they do more planning and that they come out and really see what's going on with the.

Flood areas that are already going and the land caving in it's three houses on that right on that back slate where I live and we're all really affected by this this thing that is about to happen so I'm asking that this Board of Commissioners and all right thank you sir time is up. Sorry next we have Pamela is Mr Allen able to talk now we just muted him again are you able to hear us sir all right if we can remove him from the screen and go on to Pamela Andrews good evening can you hear me now yes okay my name is Pamela Andrews Wake Forest Highway Duram North Carolina my is my address Sharon Road has been slammed by development this small two-lane road was once tobacco Farms today it is saturated with development especially Town Homes just two weeks ago off for track was approved with 100 Town Homes coming soon there's Sharon Road Town Homes there's Sharon Place Town Homes lar project Orchard Ridge Le.

Another 24 Acres will be mcrad to allow for 120 single family homes and town homes with a minimum of 80 as we know this Mass grading will disturb large quantities of Triassic Basin soil which will flow into a stream on the west side right into lit Creek the lit Creek flood zone is 200 feet away our Creeks were not only tomato red tomato soup but many overflowed its banks during this last storm the southern environmental law Center lawsuit has moved forward in federal court against the violations of the Clean Water Act in this area sediment is not supposed to leave the job site as mentioned with the minimum of 20% tree preservation the amount of mass gradient and likely blasting will be great the schools are over capacity is stated 65 additional students spring Bley is 117% overc capacity with Neil 110% overc capacity note the cumulative effect on these development in this area it's not just individual capacity what we have it we need to look at the environment the.

Schools and traffic 993 additional vehicle trips per day as mentioned by the last speaker only 15 of the 23 policies were met this is not a great process we've got to do better thank you for letting me speak tonight have a good evening thank you is there anyone else in the zoom that would like to speak please use the raise your hand function or hit St.

N at this time the chair is closing the public hearing and I'm sorry you already spoke at this time the chair is closing the public hearing and we'll now open for commissioner discussion and questions.

Commissioner Johnson I'll kick it off chair thank first of all going back to schools they are over capacity and I understand that but it's the development the profer U could I clarify with staff from the convers this one's calculated a little bit differently than the prior one which is correct just for my clarification yes so apologies for the confusion the we like to calculate using the Delta the the what would be changed with the rezoning so the the numbers that you're seeing in this calculation in this report I've already noted are incorrect and we'll go back and update them before city council so it it should be I think 118,000 instead of the number that you see in the staff report apologies again thank you for and again the actual impact notwithstanding the change is going to be higher because of the number of units so so general question for the developer attorney you heard about a number of issues flooding you heard issues traffic you heard issue environmental response of those.

Before I go into specific details sure I wanted to mention we remember Mr Barnes being at the neighborhood meeting and this feels like no good deed goes unpunished we listen to his concern and we said okay we can rebalance this entire site so you're complaining about water runoff going towards your house we'll rebalance the entire sites because right now if you look at GIS topography it the water flows just the way God made it it flows downhill towards Foxboro Lane we're going to regrade the site so it drains instead towards the SCM on Sharon Road so we're actually fixing his problem by if this resoning is approved we can rebalance the site which is going to cost ballpark half a million dollars which is 10,00,000 per townhouse so we heard his concern we are addressing his concern with this proposal and this should be a market Improvement to the water condition storm water condition he is experiencing on his property right now in terms of traffic it's very similar to the previous project where.

This is such a small project it's not even close to the threshold for traffic impact analysis therefore the site access is reviewed by Miss Thomas and Mr sandor at ncdot make sure that we're providing the turn lanes and the access so that the Ingress and egress to the site is safe and efficient the other I would draw your attention to the staff report which shows that the capacity on H Sharon Road is is 14,000 something and the current traffic count was 11,000 so the road is in fact underc capacity and I'm sorry I missed your third one what was that no I was just repeating I wanted to hear about all the issues so let me move on with my time mhm couple clarifications you said minimum 57 the paperwork said not minimum 80 Town Homes which is it oh oh on the phase that we're talking about tonight on 803 would be a minimum of 57 the overall project which is 24 Acres would be a minimum of 80 but the only.

Part that's being the only parcel that's being annexed is the 6 and half acres at 803 Sharon Road. My my comment for staff just to clarify Vision zero which is looking at traffic trying to reduce traffic this is not having public transportation have they provided any sort of feedback on this. Project so not to my knowledge we I don't believe we include we have a new vision zero staff member part of the city and I don't believe we received any comments on on this case I'll close with an observation and first of all the propers you offered I recognize I think you know you stepped up I think there will be concerns I think any concerns need to be heard but I did notice some changes that you made to address those my concern is there's a large development just north of this that's been building over the last few years so you've got that impact you've got this impact even though it's smaller but it's you got all the area impacts.

And all those issues that just talked about seem to roll down to the latest one which happens to be you and my concern is it's not so much a question is how do we address those so the community at large community at large isn't dealing with the type of issues that we heard about I don't have an answer per se I'm thinking about the best way to approach it but I do want to step back and recognize what you've done to try to address those but those concerns haven't been allayed in my mind especially traffic 85% by the way once you add your traffic it goes up to 85% capacity I don't know about the others I know the staff does a great job of looking at those thank you thank you sir anyone else can't see.

Commissioner Gregory hi so I definitely appreciate the textual commitments in excess of the Udo requirements that yall have listed out but in examining the satellite imagery of this site that you that was included in the the zoning map Change Report clearly it's heavily forested and so it's really no wonder to me that residents are posing concerns regarding about regarding erodability and runoff when evidently a lot of trees are going to have to get cut down and this is already on a site that's got Triassic Bas and soils so I guess my question to you is is looking at those textual commitments is there any possibility of the developer re-evaluating the possibility of canopy preservation or buffering around the 5,000 square feet or so of wetlands that are on site because those those carry out really essential functions I Sean and I were working on this we're going to do our very best to commit to detaining the 100-year storm before we get to City Council and have that as a text commitment so it's.

In front of the City Council when they consider this project I do want to emphasize though that like the other site this is a 24 Acre Site the total project we've again committed to a 50/50 perious impervious so that means that at least 12 acres will remain perious your comment about trasc soils is is is spoton so what we've tried to do to address Mr Barnes and his neighbors concerns is say out of the 24 Acres at least 12 is going to be pervious remain perious so we don't have that Triassic Basin soil and then again we're regrading the the entire develop where the development is going to happen so that the water will drain 180° opposite essentially from what Mr Barn is experiencing today so we looked hard at this site and that's why we brought in the piece that today is cleared I guess it's been a it was a farm right I mean so it's been cleared for a long time we don't know when that.

Exactly happened but we brought that in to address his concern and try to be a good neighbor regrade the site keep it 50% pervious and and again I I I apologize I wish we'd had our engineer I you know just wasn't able to run the calculation see if we we can detain the 100-year storm but if you can rebalance the site so it drains away from Mr Barnes and his neighbors and detain the 100-year storm I think that's a that's a win-win so I appreciate the concern that's what we heard loud and clear during the neighborhood meeting and I I I I have to really thank Mr Gattis for doing the hard work of figuring out what it is to rebalance the site cut and fill so that it drains 180° basically from what it does today and impacts those homeowners on Foxboro Lane so it's we agree 100% with what Mr Barn said and we're doing our doing everything we can to fix it thank you anyone else commissioner.

Zakowski thank you chair so so I'm new to the commission so I'm still learning some of this can you help me understand the decision not to include any affordable housing units yeah the cost to rebalance to to grading costs are very significant and so looking at the proximately 12 acres that'll be developed you know we think we'll develop with the with the resoning we'll develop right around 50 additional tow houses we think to regrade the site so that instead of being like this it's like that that's probably going to cost about half a million dollars that's about $10,000 per townhouse pad townhouse lot that's a significant increase in our site preparation costs I I we're obviously going to look at it as we move forward but at at this juncture given the uncertainties with the grading costs or or the impact of the grading cost we're not able to commit to actually providing affordable units like the Mineral Springs project did I I would understand a lower number but.

If the proposed sale price valuation is 416 and that's a you're describing a $500,000 problem I understand a lower number of units but zero I don't understand why yeah because the site preparation costs are so high relative to the overall project that's why appreciate it not to say we won't look at it but at this juncture that's where we are thank you anyone else this side question nothing are we ready to move this case forward commissioner Valentine. No ready to move this case forward yeah okay chair as it relates to case z23 000045 Sharon Grove make a motion that we move this case forward with a favorable recommendation to city council I'll second it's been moved by commissioner cutright and second it by commissioner woke to move case z23 45 Sharon Grove forward with a favorable recommendation may I have the roll call vote please chair Cameron yes Vice chair sheras no commissioner cutright no commissioner chowski no commissioner Graves mans no commissioner gregory no commissioner Johnson no commissioner copac no commissioner mver no commissioner.

Valentine no commissioner Williams no commissioner woke no commissioner Young no the motion fails 1 to 12 all right thank you next we have case Z2 z23 43 is that. Right ly L Lenley tow houses may we have the staff report please yes Brook Roper City County Planning far farasat Sayad proposes to change the zoning designation of two Parcels of land totaling 12.25 acres and located at 1343 Ellis Road and 1326 Clinton Road the current zoning is residential rural the applicant proposes to change this designation to plan development residential 8326 through a textual development plan to allow up to 102 tow houses the properties are currently designated mixed residential neighborhood on the place type map the proposed plan development residential zoning is generally consistent with the designated Place type the existing zoning is residential rural the site is surrounded by plan development residential and residential rural the aerial map shows the general location of the project in Southeastern Durham the properties are currently designated MRN mix residential neighborhood on the place type map the.

Proposed zoning is determined consistent with that designated Place type the proposal makes several textual commitments in excess of Udo requirements The Proposal includes commitments to storm water management strategies incorporation of native plants for Street tree vehicular and buffer areas limiting impervious surface to a maximum of 80% in a monetary contract contribution of $6,000 to Durham Public Schools a neighborhood meeting was held in accordance with Udo requirements on June 88th 2023 where eight community members were present finally The Proposal would allow the development of up to 102 tow houses on a vacant and undeveloped property the total unit count a minimum of 5% or up to 5 units would be designated as affordable for households earning 80% of the area median income or less for a period of 30 years the site for the proposed townhouse units is located southeast of downtown Durham and is situated within 5 miles of a of a variety of services for residents however the area is predominantly autod dependent due to a lack of pedestrian and bicycle.

Infrastructure with the exception of Transit stops about a mile away Additionally the site exhibits lower rates of evictions a lower percentage of tax value increase and fewer renters burden by H by housing costs compared to Durham County average suggesting A reduced risk in displacement for this area's census tra again the proposal is generally consistent with the place type map designation of mixed residential neighborhood thank you staff and the applicant are available for any questions thank you at this time the chair is opening the public hearing may we have the applicant present please for the last time good evening chair Cameron Vice chair sheras members of the Planning Commission my name is Patrick biker Morning Star Law Group I still live at 2614 Stewart Drive as has been stated this request envisions up to 102 Town Homes at this location which is along Ellis Road just west of I85 which is what we call the Durham freeway now this site is made up of two Parcels totaling just over 12 acres.

These two Parcels are in the city limits and very close to many companies that offer strong employment opportunities to the north along Briggs Avenue and Ellis Road there's candle science fidelitone brain Specialty Products in the future there'll be 140 light manufacturing jobs at the building center I think it is important to note that there's a lot of Redevelopment happening in the northern section of Research Triangle Park right now and that will continue over the next several years with RTP 3.0 accordingly we have many jobs located within a very short commute of this location as the place type map suggests this is an ideal location for residential development at around 12 acres our understanding is that having one housing type is still consistent with the comprehensive plan guidance and the mixed residential Place type designation the property is nestled between two existing single family communities and though the place type designation for those communities differs from this site we're discussing tonight we felt the addition of town homes would help to address the variety.

Of housing available in the area I do want to emphasize that this site is located just about A4 mile south of the Shephard Square townhouse community and then maybe a quar mile north of the Braxton tow houses but the immediately surrounding area is predominantly single family you may be aware that a resoning for this site was previously denied back in 2022 our firm was not involved at that time U but we've reviewed the the public hearings We've Incorporated a lot of feedback that heard from the neighborhood and one of the nearest one of the biggest concerns that was expressed by property owners in the area was the overall density back then the project was proposed at approximately 147 tow houses at 102 town homes that's before the Planning Commission tonight we have reduced the unit count by 30% now that sort of cuts both ways but the reality is at 147 tow houses could not fit on this property nevertheless that reduction is respons responsive to the community engagement that we have had another.

Concern of course is storm water management in that regard I want to emphasize two commitments first we are managing the 100-year storm on this site in addition we have limited limited the maximum impervious surface to 80% this area of Durham that sort of stretches from downtown to the northern part of RTP is outside of our Watershed overlays and therefore you're allowed to go up to 100% impervious surface I guess if you did under underground storm water you could do that so we have limited impervious surface to 80% and we've also committed to using native plant species for the required plantings so while the site technically has Frontage on three roads ncdot has made it clear that the access from Ellis Road will not be allowed as a result this project will connect only to Carwood carywood drive and Linley road if you've been out to Lindley Road you know it is not up to City standards it's just a gravel Road this project is required to improve Lenley road all the.

Way up to City standards before we can have even one certificate of occupancy and finally I want to touch on affordable housing we have committed to 5% of the final unit count being affordable for sale at the 80% area median income level for a period of 30 years I thought the staff department was strong so I want to thank Brooke for the superb staff reports this evening we respectfully ask for your recommendation of approval I'll be happy to to answer any questions and we did receive a petition from one of the property owners that attended a neighborhood meeting be happy to discuss that as well thank you for your time tonight thank you there anyone in the audience that would like to.

Speak good evening Planning Commission Thomas lines 1220 Theodore Lane u in the southern Terrace neighborhood I've been a resident for 27 years I'm here to reiterate my concerns for this project which was shot down four years ago that parcel is if you look at at the top graphic map it's it's Steep and it's a rock ledge basically and water runoff at 80% is just going to be a torrent and if you look at the property the sewer line goes bisects it and there's streams going through it and it would be very difficult to put 102 town houses on on that site based on the offset the riparian offsets and and the the sewer line I don't know how they can how they can do it so I ask you to please not approve this project thank you thank you moving to the Zoom we have Adam Castille.

Hello good evening planning committee my name is Adam Castile I am at 1311 Theodore Lane I'd briefly like to contrast the approach of the projects this committee has approved tonight in the project that's being proposed here the developer has not approached us to ask what we the current neighbors who would be impacted by this project might like to see out of it we have only had one virtual call where they heard and quote unquote answered questions with no plans considered for basic questions their proxy who held that meeting seemed to had little or no interest in the concerns of the neighbors who were on the call between one year ago and now I I have not even heard from them at all I bought this property because of the envir and have enjoyed living in this very special part of Durham the negative impact on me and my neighbors private enjoyment of our property will be felt very very very much some of my neighbors have lived here for decades and I'm very worried.

That the property value is going up and increased taxes will significantly impact their way of life I respectfully urge you to please deny this approval to move this rezoning forward thank you thank you next we have Gabe Carillo yes great thank you so much I appreciate this opportunity so I am the gentleman who has been I should say voicing the same concept of the disagreement with what the applicant has put forward on multiple levels and we we have not per se looked at what Mr bulock the actual applicant we don't have like a problem with him doing the things that he's done to try to develop his land and we do believe he has that right to do it and we actually support folks who like himself are trying to be small business owners that rise up and do some great things in the community the problem is is that we didn't see that in action over the last Hall and what really came down to was a slap in the face to the.

Community we weren't listened to we were pushed aside and then when we found out this second time you know they hired some attorneys to come in there which I have no problem with and deal with attorneys and in fact M1 as well but what ended up happening was a series of bad steps that I think ultimately led to where we are now and that was that we have seen Time and Time Again The Cutting of Corners the sounding of the alarm from the community and we have our petition with over 4 47 individuals who signed that agreement and also wanted it to be shared with you today and we still weren't able or given that opportunity to voice it to the applicant Because by the time he made it in front of the city council everything had fallen apart and they realized that this had gone nowhere really fast so this time it does seem different and we're willing to engage and we want to extend the Olive Branch.

To try to make this work and we hope that our petition in particular the things when I look out my back door and I see that there is a pond that was busted and it's left in shambles I see a a property that currently has a home that's carved up in six different sections now is being basically rented out in pieces and then a a massive amount of construction de I'm sorry you're at time okay pleas please do not we thank you very much for your time next we have have Kellen Arnie Johnson yes I'm Kellen Ernie Johnson they 1334 Ellis Road I like to say that this is the same proposal that was shot down by the committee a year or so ago there's basically no change to the proposal whatsoever they're still asking for the same zoning that they could build up to 144 to 147 tow houses the same zoning design as I said before the the the topographical area is very unfavorable towards that now we've.

Reached out to the the Builder you last you know last time and provided some compromises one of the biggest things that we need to look at where this place is it's not just side by side by other developments it's slap dab in the middle it is in the middle of several single family homes which will be drastically impacted by the design of tow houses you know with 80% you know impervious surfaces in place there we really feel that the development should reflect the current established community and positively impact those who have already built generational wealth who have been there for 30 40 years who have bought homes to to raise their family you want to build homes in that area that that looks similar to the houses that are surrounding it one of the biggest things we've advocated is that you know focusing on single family homes and if they came back and said hey we're not going to build more than 65 single family homes in this area it.

Would have the community's backing a lot of the people in this community would appreciate because it would positively impact this neighborhood and create nice homes for the people in this in this community we do have a lot of tow houses there's several hundred tow houses just south of us a quarter mile south those that still are under development and we don't know the impact of the traffic those will have because they're still being built and adding more tow houses to a very you know dense area is going to be not less and favorable not to mention the one of the entrance points is go from Southern drive onto Ellis Road if you zoom out you'll see that as a double blind Corner car it's a 35 mile road I'm sorry your time is up I just ask that you guys reject us thank thank you next we have Jessica Dewey hi can you hear me yes okay hi Duram Planning Commission my name is Jess Dewey live at 1310 Theodore Lane in.

Durham my property touches the proposed Development Area I'm speaking today similarly to my neighbors in opposition to this town home resoning request a defining attractive feature of our neighborhood is the beautiful Green Space full of mature trees that provides privacy and peace to current residents and is a refuge for so many species in the face of constant habitat loss the proposed Town Home Development would take all of that away it would require disruptive clear cutting of nearly 12 acres of mature Forest as well as mass grading as you've heard from others even though these activities are discouraged in the Durham comprehensive plan in policy 84 the clear cutting and mass grading would result in a major loss of biodiversity and additionally there are multiple streams again as you've heard that are already nearly overwhelmed when the receive large storms such as tropical storm Debbie last week so the removal of trees and changes to grading is going to cause major issues for deal deal with heavy storms in the future I also want to.

Point out that Durham is designated as an official B City meaning it commits to creating and maintaining sustainable habitats for pollinators this project goes completely against these commitments and would remove many trees such as Maples and tulip popplers that are vital to pollinators in Durham I recognize that Durham is growing and has a continued need for housing options but there are numerous apartment and town home communities within a couple of miles of our neighborhood that are not currently full and are still developing ultimately I don't believe our area in this project is a good idea it creates barriers between current neighbors and residents and it puts profits over impacts on the environment and people we should not be taking away valuable Green Space for town homes in a less accessible area that might not fill so I urge you to not move forward with this proposal thank you thank you is there anyone else on Zoom that would like to speak.

All right going to close the public hearing at this time and we are now open for commission discussion and. Questions commissioner Valentine yes thank you Sher this is for the applicant with respect to the affordable housing profer would you consider something in addition to what's being offered right now our team can support 5% at 80% Ami and again that's for 30 years and as I hope you recall this is a for sale community so there is no federal tax program in order to assist with the construction cost this is purely reduction in the in the profitability of the overall project so it does I think check the box in terms of a aable housing most of the projects I've worked on have been in that range I think it's very difficult to go higher than that especially with a a for-profit and looking at the the additional cost that's associated with detaining the 100-year storm which is another commitment on this development plan oh the the other con concern that I I.

Have here is that since I've been on this commission I've talked a lot about the importance of Engagement with communities it sound like there has been disconnect on this particular project with with the engagement with the community maybe I'm wrong about that but maybe you can share yeah no I'd be happy to my understanding my partner Neil go handled that he had the neighborhood meeting that was referred to in your staff report and then he followed the advertising requirements and noticed a meeting a virtual meeting and unfortunately he noticed the virtual meeting gave the required advanced notice and nobody attended so our experience was we tried to reach out to and that was our experience we can try to reach out again prior to the City Council meeting but that was so I think the experience went both ways in that regard but you know you had the staff report document what we did and Mr go notified a second meeting virtual but my my understanding is nobody nobody.

Registered and then at the time nobody even called. In cut right sorry commissioner cut right thanks chair I think first thing I want to know is on community engagement frequently hear that notice has been sent out nobody engaged that's always the bare minimum I'd like to start seeing developers do more oh yeah reach out to the churches directly local community centers like there needs to be more if you really want to engage the community we know sending out the notices is what's required but that's bare minimum and what we're finding is it doesn't work it's ineffective so we'd like to see more in that regard I'd also like to see more affordable housing I think we're seeing 8 10% now I think that's a good bar 5% feels a little like we're checking a box as well it's appreciative yeah no it's appreciate it I should say especially on for sale right regardless of whether it's for sale or not I I think doing more affordable housing is is warranted and so we'd.

Like to see more of that going forward where the opportunity presents itself thanks thank you thank you commissioner Graves man yes thank you yes sir in my final minutes here this is a followup to my question earlier about how the developers thinking about the ownership of the affordable affordable units is there going to be a covenant that's attached to those five properties that is in place for 30 years yes sir so the person the first person that buys the property gets the affordable the discount mhm what are they doing passing that discount on when they want to sell it yeah what happens is there be a formula in the deed that state what the HUD approved appreciation would be in order to maintain affordability at the 80% level so that's a standard that'll be drafted as a deed condition that will run with the property for 30 years so if you buy the property in year 20 you probably want to hold on to it for 10 years but yeah no it's it's it's tied.

To a a HUD Housing and Urban Development formula tied to 80% Ami that runs for 30 years so it's again it's one of those difficult policy decisions on the one hand if you had a shorter yeah period that might increase the generational wealth for that one particular family but if you maintain the affordability for 30 years that helps everyone in the community who's in that income level our First Responders are teachers who need who want who want a Housing Opportunity and if it if expired in 10 years then that opportunity wouldn't exist for as long a time it's kind of a bit of a conundrum for it's a tough nut to crack it's a and we have we've had very it came up during scad sorry simplifying codes for affordable development what should be the period of affordability there is no right answer it's a tough call I I don't know that the I even know know the planing department has a specific number in mind I I I I I.

Completely agree it cuts both way ways on the one hand you want to build generational wealth and if people own a house for 10 years maybe they should get more than what just the increase in the Ami is but on the other hand if you if you say that what about the teachers 10 years from now what about our First Responders 10 years from now they won't get that opportunity and the first home buyer got a windfall it's a tough policy decision perhaps Mr Kane has insights on what the Department's thinking is but we we committed to 30 years looking at it as a community benefit which could you know which could benefit families significantly but it's not the quick appreciation that that you might want to see and I I I don't mean to put you on the spot Mr Kane but that's it's a very difficult policy decision and I don't know what the right answer is I'm just saying in this case we committed to 30.

Years and part of it if I could I apologize for rambling on part of it is because this is located so close to Research Triangle Park you know we have the statement that we need affordable housing everywhere well we're committing to 5% affordable housing only a mile from Research Triangle Park what's really helpful is to have short commutes if we committ it to 5% or 10 say we committed to 10% but it's out on Umstead Road well you got to drive 20 miles to find jobs from that location this is so close this is so close that it's a game Cher for people because you lower not only do you lower their cost of housing you lower their commuting cost considerably you all probably know this but in terms of the distance of the commute Raleigh Durham is the worst in the country our people don't commute the longest in terms of time but they commute the longest in terms of distance and that was in Forbes Magazine so we.

Have a problem in that we've sprawled from meban to Smithfield and we call that the triangle and I've done projects up out in zebulin I've done projects in fuk wave Arena you think those people work in zebulin no they they're driving all the way to Durham there are people you know I've worked on projects in treyburn Corporate Park and I go there you see Virginia license plates they're commuting from South Boston so I mean that's the reality of it so that's why it's important to put affordable housing opportunities close to where we have major employment centers and that's what this does so you know the the 5% that we're adding here of affordable housing is a real game changer because it's at such a convenient community location and I'm sorry Mr Kane I didn't mean to take up your time oh that's fine yeah just to to answer your reference the Udo does Define affordability at a of a 30-year period of tenure for 60% Ami for rentals and 80% Ami for home.

Ownership okay all right thank you so that's following the Udo definition that's a tough call all right anyone else have commissioner zc and then commissioner Johnson thank you chair it's good so you know in the community engagement process it sounds like there was limited engagement but we've just heard quite a bit from the community and their concerns are there any commitments that you or the team are willing to make that might assuage some of their concerns well I think we've got a a bit of a disconnect here we had a very lengthy process in Durham to adopt our comprehensive plan last October and my takeaway from that watching it as closely as I could was that the purpose of the new comprehensive plan was to promote infill and densification and I know I've been a clanging symbol in that regard but that was my takeaway from it was that we're going to really discourage sprawl going further east north Southwest focus on internal that are already in the city limits that are.

Already surrounded by development and we're going to increase the density there so what the neighborhood has proposed at 65 units on 12 acres is really just a single family pretty close to just a typical single family density I think it's a better use of this property to move forward with a townhouse development because it creates more home ownership opportunities while using fewer acres of land again I think the propers on this project are pretty strong when you look at what what was stated by some of the nearby residents you know we came out of the box with a 100-year detaining the 100-year storm and we're you know again trying to put at least 5% of the development in the affordable house in a in an affordable housing program that creates permanent affordable housing right by Research Triangle par you've got the Public's grocery store just down Ellis Road you've got great job opportunities I think the I think this project reflects what the overall comprehensive plan was driving at now you can always find.

Individual policies and say well you don't mean that policy don't mean that policy but my perspective on it sir respectfully is that the new comprehensive plan directs the development Community to find infill sites and increase the density and that's exactly what this project does because it's a pro it's 12 acres it's been the city of Durham for many many decades and you know we we we really missed the boat by not developing housing closer to RTP in the previous how you know since the 60s when RTP started up so I I think we just have a disconnect between what the neighborhood wants and what the comprehensive plan says in terms of the direction it gives for how property especially these smaller INF site should be developed you know again we'll look at increasing the affordability percentage we'll certainly look at at these other environmental features but as of tonight that's that's I think that's my answer to your question and and I it was it was a long process that.

Comprehensive plan was a long process and I think it was a very good process and it it that's that's my takeaway from it I I maybe I'm wrong but that's how I just to make sure I understand no no additional Comm no additional profits tonight we'll certainly look at it taking commissioner cutright advice to look and see if that that percentage can be increased but as of tonight my our development team is needs to move forward with what's been been in the stated in the staff report thank you yes sir Mr Johnson thank you chair I EO lot of the comments I heard from my other members about Community engagement and I don't challenge you I just make an observation that there is a disconnect and heard people here in the room and on the on the line raise that question and I take it very seriously commissioner cutright suggestion to go above and beyond is is on the mark So I want to ACC that so here here's the thing 8.32.

Six units per acre that's the the highest density of any project that we've looked at tonight which is like five so if I take the five I I hear density but then there's density plus so if I take the average five across the board that gets me to 65 units which is fair not 6 60 yeah something about 65 or so consistent with Dr carillo's so why would we approve 8. 326 and not ask you to reduce it to 265 which seems to be more consistent with the density for mixed use because I my personal perspective commissioner is that is an inappropriately low density for an infill site that's only one mile from Research Triangle Park I think that when I started out sir I thought it was a good idea to do pdr2 with water and sewer and now I am kicking myself for having advocated for all those projects back in the when was it early 2000s can you imagine if we had done pdr4 instead of pdr2 we'd have so much.

More Supply to address the affordability crisis that we have right now so pdr5 is just sort of I think that's basically a single family density that's that's just slightly less than 10,000 squ foot Lots per acre I'm so I I don't I I just I just respectfully disagree with the contention that 65 units is a wise use of the 12 acres located here if I could move on close yeah so there's two water line feeds I want to hear more about is that going to create any water pressure issues is it going to have any effect in the surrounding area in terms of additional water supply into this small development no that's required sir that's the Durham as long as I've been working here in Durham since the 90s the city of Durham has required two water line fees for any any development with more than 100 dwellings and that can be houses that can be tow houses that can be Apartments doesn't matter if you have more than 100 dwelling units you have to.

Have two waterline feeds in order to provide redundancy so that's been a Durham requirement as long as I can remember with my time the third question is we are over capacity in one school and nearer capacity at the other about 36 new students I think and a $66,000 profit her that seems low to me not withstanding the comments about affordable housing are you willing to address that concern right we'll certainly look at that inance in advance of going to city council your point is well taken and yeah we need nothing tonight to I don't have authorization from our team client team to increase that but we certainly recognize the recognize that situation and then my last comment I was reading the notes and again I think Dr kriller did a good job of echoing what I heard the the statement but the question number 23 why would you even consider resoning this property or building here your answer there's probably is a reason why this property has not been developed previously but.

The reality is we're running out of Land There Are No Easy Pieces of land left to develop so in order to gra to deal with growing need of housing more challenging pieces of property must be considered for development why is this a challenging property I want to try to understand that based on the answer you provided or something if you look at Lindley Road that's going to be a major infrastructure cost for the development team it's just a gravel I guess it's a road but it it's not even close to City standards so that's a significant upfront cost that the development team has to take on before they could get get even one certificate of occupancy so Lindley Road was never paved it was a dedicated public right away never paved so there's there's infrastructure challenges there's the Dual water line requirement which is actually not required in many other municipalities around the triangle that's an extra cost the that's actually a pretty standard answer we give sir the all the.

Land and Durham that's flat square and on a and and on a well paved curban you know curbing gutter road that land's all gone so we are back to having to evaluate these infill sites that are that that present challenges but nonetheless my my understanding of the comprehensive plan having studied it having listened to all the policy arguments on both sides and watching it be adopted by our city and county officials there's an emphasis on finding these difficult sites and then making sure that they're developed at a density that that is the most efficient at creating an incre a increase in the supply of housing thank you yes sir Vice chair scares so this might be for City staff or maybe you Mr biker if you can answer in the report I see that there are no steep slopes there are no regulated flood planes there no Wetlands on the site that yet the community rep reps these things exist there which one is it I agree with the staff report if.

They have anything to add I I I thought the staff report was a spot on I mean numerous numerous comments from the community were reporting these things but the staff says no so you know lacking the community engagement I I don't know which one's true so we use a variety of GIS resources to identify whether or not there are steep slopes Wetlands flood plane or Watershed overlays and there were there were just none identified on this site okay thank you commissioner copc thanks CH chair Cameron question for the staff did I read it correctly that you deemed this application to be not compliant with either place type map or goals of the comprehensive plan and if so was there a reason for that can you give me just one moment to double check.

That see if I can find the page reference here oh I see I think that's a minor typo in our staff report my apologies yeah in section I is that what you're referring to I think the knot was just you know sometimes we have track changes and they're not alwaysed so okay so that was an error that's all right all right thank. You anyone else commissioner Gregory thank you chair this is also for planning staff I know that somebody from the public had commented on a concern over a pond on the site and that's clearly not outlined at all in the planning report but looking at a couple of federal Wetland overlays there does appear to be at least an ephemeral pond in the southwest corner of the site so I just would like to bring that to our attention going forward.

Was was there a question there or was that just a statement I I guess question being so so planning staff is reviewing it you guys have GIS tools that you're using to assess the the surface water resources correct and state law indicates which GIS sources we can use outside of a stream determination to determine whether or not there is an active stream on the site and in order to be regulated under the Udo that stream needs to be either intermittent or perennial ephemeral streams or other ephemeral water bodies are not regulated under the Udo and do not require any buffering okay thank you for the clarification thank you any any other questions I can't see what these classes going once going twice commissioner Johnson just briefly one of the U public mentioned SK rock landscape sewer lines dissected running across water sources can you clarify what they were talking about I wrote it down as the it was more of a concern about the sewer lines running across water sources or Creeks.

Or whatever if they inter if I interpreted their comment correctly and given the Steep rock landscape well I would Echo the staff report there are there are no udod defined steep slopes on the site in terms of we appreciate those concerns and that's why we said we we would detain the 100-year storm on site so I think the only way to address those concerns is to increase the storm water control measures that are being used on site again it's it's a it's a it's really a textbook infill site because it's got water sewer and public rights of way that just have not been upgraded to current standards in order to support increased density and and increased home ownership opportunities thank you commissioner copc thank you so echoing my colleagues about the desire to see higher levels of affordable housing also recognizing the benefit of this being close to RTP and the benefits of an infill site I hear the resident concerns about the increased density and I can see why.

Having single family homes in the site would be desirable at the same time it's my understanding if a developer would have brought and staff maybe check me on this a proposal that was 100% single family housing for this infill within a single family neighborhood that that may not have been consistent with the place type around the comprehensive plans goals around diversity of housing is that correct generally yes when we are looking at the mixed resident Neighborhood Place type we're not only looking at the land within the place type itself but also the surrounding community so for example in this case it is immediately surrounded by single family housing we have comprehensive plan policies that guide us towards having a mix of housing in various AG in in in all areas in order to be able to provide different price points different products and so forth and really diversify the types of folks we're living in any particular area so when we looked for example at the site we saw okay this is primarily single family.

Immediately surrounding it introducing a new a new residential type a new residential stock product to that area would be in furtherance of those of those goals of those objectives of the comprehensive plan does that answer yeah it does thank you and so it sounds like there was a gap from a starting point between the applicant and and the desires of the community with that said the process around Community engagement does seem to have left a lot to be desired particularly in comparison with some Exemplar examples we've seen this evening and so I think we have to go beyond some of the minimum expectations around engagement and there may have been a better solution that could have been arrived at if there had been deeper listening and so I want to encourage you and and any applicant coming forward to really think about what that next level of engagement can look like yeah no I I I agree 100% and that's why we notified a second hearing we wanted to get more feedback but no.

One attended so I'm I'm sorry that happened I I I was the attorney for the brag the large bragtown case I spent hours I don't know hundreds of hours in bragtown listening to the community concerns working with Ted HR and Tim cybers on the large 130 acre project that's I consider that one of my strengths well you know that we campaign for County Commissioner together we actually enjoy doing this so we actually enjoy it but and so we're happy to notify another neighborhood meeting in advance of city council explain where we are see if there's any other commitments we can do see if we can you know we we talked about other potential profit so we're happy to do that it's Neil and I enjoy Mr go and I enjoy it that's why we live here but you know when we when you notify the second meeting and nobody even bothered to even call in for 5 minutes I mean if the if the answer is we despise town homes and we're never.

Going to support any of them then we can't really have much of a conversation now we can make some modifications based on the input we've received from the Planning Commission tonight and we'll do our best to Ren notice another neighborhood meeting but that's that you know again there's two sides to each story I'm sorry it happened and again I I you know I we enjoy doing the community outreach the community engagement we're happy to do it we're happy to rent a room in a church I actually prefer that I prefer to sit down with people in person as opposed to doing it on Zoom but you know sometimes one works better than the other I'm not going to pass judgment on that but by the same token we en we enjoy it so I'm sorry that we didn't have more Community engagement I personally I'm sure Mr go would say the same thing if he if if he were representing this Project tonight based on his experience with this particular site so your.

Point's well taken couldn't agree more I'm sorry we didn't have a more robust conversation I'm sorry we couldn't meet in the middle but again I I think 65 units on 12 acres is simply too low when it's one mile away I think it might even be less than a mile from the boundary of Research Triangle bar thank you any other questions comments are we ready to move this case forward yes I have a motion please chair as it relates to case z2300 043 L Linley Town Homes I make a motion that we move this case forward with a favorable recommendation to city council second it's been moved by commissioner cutright and seconded by commissioner Valentine to move case z230 43 Lenley Town Homes forward with a favorable recommendation may we have the roll call vote please chair Cameron no Vice chair sheras yes commissioner cutright no commissioner chowski no commissioner Graves mans no commissioner Gregor.

No commissioner Johnson no commissioner copac yes commissioner mver yes commissioner Valentine no commissioner Williams no commissioner woke no commissioner Young no the motion fails 3 to1 all righty do we have any Community updates I mean committee updates I'm sorry not. Community what's up with the Udo so I don't know what's up with the Udo committee commissioner CE was chairing that committee so we probably need to do some adjusting rearranging on that and then we'll we'll go forward four right usually we have three you want a chair sure all right new chair chair the committe all righty any new business just a couple of things to bring to the committee's ATT commission's attention first off next month you will be doing your annual officer elections just want to make sure you all were aware that chair Cameron has agreed to serve again as chair for a second year if you also choose to vote her in next next month and vice chair sharis has agreed to serve a second term should you all.

Choose to reelect her as well if there is any if there are any other nominations anybody would like to make please get those to me by August 30th so we can make sure that the commission is aware before of the meeting on September 10th second as I emailed you earlier we are planning to hold the planning commission's annual Retreat after your October meeting the plan is to hold a smaller agenda of about three cases we hope to be done by 7 or 7:30 we'll we will then move to another room dinner will be served it will not be cheap pizza or box lunches we will do something good to entice you to stay we hope that you all can make it if you have any topics that you'd like to see addressed at The Retreat please again also get those to me by August 30th we're looking to I've reached out to the city attorney's office about providing a presentation on any legal changes that you may need to be aware of.

Since the last Retreat we also have a couple of other topics that we can talk to you about but if there are some kind of burning questions or Burning issues or ideas that you would like to bring forth please again just feel free to email me by August 30th so we can have those materials ready and so if we start at 7:30 we're going to end by 9 9 is the is the goal basically we're talking about working dinner and three three topics of 30 minutes each is the okay and if you could send a reminder email for our feedback that would be very helpful sure yeah I'll when I I'll send a reminder when I send y'all the reminder to get your written comments in speaking of which the I believe the written comments link did work I think we've with Chris's help we have gotten that situation figured out glad to have him there to help us out with that so please get those in by the 20th and then finally for those.

Of you who are new we do provide parking vouchers if you've parked in one of the city decks I can provide you a voucher for to cover your parking fee and that is all I have all right may.

Make a comment on new business sure just it's just very brief it's just to say that first of all I thank chair Cameron and and vice chair Sharon a great job in these roles and I'm glad to hear you putting your names in I'm not putting my name in I just want to say to the on the commission that it's always healthy if other folks are thinking you might be interested to definitely put yourself forward and it's always healthy to have other folks to to consider so with all due respect to the folks who've served if you're thinking about it don't hesitate to to to put your name out there and and just to make sure everybody's aware especially I know we have a lot of new members who haven't been even on the commission for a year officers are term limited to two terms so this would be chair Cameron second term and then she would be term limited and not be able to serve another one after that just make sure everybody's.

Aware Che not cheer I was about to Tau you chair no no you won't so I just wanted to say thank you all this is my last meeting it's been an honor to be on the commission I really wanted to do this unfortunately unfortunately I had a baby about 11 months ago and it's been a challenge cuz as the baby has been in DC I've been commuting back and forth a lot so please excuse my absences and I hope to be able to reapply to be a commissioner once my life is more settled but I've learned a great deal in working with each one of you and thank you for the opportunity thank you phone number if you want to send me money and I was you beat me to the punch I was going to thank you for your service and your overall commitment to the Durham community and the other things that you do for Durham just besides serving on the Planning Commission yes I'd also like to thank.

You for the suggestion to have some of our personal information removed like our addresses and stuff good idea I thought it was a requirement it was and yeah and just so everyone knows my my time on the Planning Commission ends June 3 2025 so I wouldn't even have a year left so you would be taken over oh yeah if I changed my mind are you saying that that you will be term limited as a planning commissioner oh wow M yep y so I yep it's a lot of us who so if you if it's three years two three years so it could be a total of six but if you are coming on if someone resigned early you finish out their term and then you get your own three year so I came on yes M even though so even if someone had served two years and you came and you finished out there one year and then you only have three more years yeah so you took yeah I took from somebody's.

Somebody resign and so I think it' be change that five years just be six years yep that's what I was told you just finish out someone's turn all right everybody we journ thank.

You how did developers do what I'm sorry.