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HomeMy WebLinkAboutminutes.apz.19880412 p RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS PLANNING & ZONING APRIL 12. 1988 Chairman welton Anderson called the meeting to order at 4:30 pm. Answering roll call were Welton Anderson, Jasmine Tygre, Roger Hunt, Mari Peyton and Michael Herron. David White arrived shortly after roll call. COMMISSIONER'S COMMENTS Roger: I was witness to a rather interesting fiasco last night, to use a pleasant term according to my feelings right now. The actions of the City Council I felt unfortunately allows a reasonable person to call this place bush-league and again that is being pleasant. But what really concerns me more than anything is that the community for a long time has been trying to get developers to work with us and I think we have had some success along that line and here we have got a developer that I think has worked with us supremely well and I think was indicating a willingness to work with us more and the action of the City Council was to pull the rug out from underneath them. All I can say is I guess I am glad I am not the developer because I wouldn't get mad, I would just get even. I really considered it a pitiful action last night. Now maybe the City Attorney will be able to protect them on a legal basis but from any point of reason I think it was grossly unfair. Jasmine: I wasn't there last night so my first information about what had happened came from the Daily News this morning. And I have to say that I was very perturbed also because I think that the City Council put the developer in a situation where he has to build a project which he doesn't want and that the community doesn't want in order to protect his legal interests or get involved with a lawsuit with the City neither one of which is a productive way to approach this situation. But we do have option. Since I am not a lawyer, I don't like to get involved in legalities because I don't know about them. But we do have an instrument of negotiability in the PUD process which other Commission members have pointed out. I think that the applicant, up until this point has shown an awareness of the fact that this is a negotiating process and has been very co-operative and has been responding to the concerns of the community. And has indicated a willingness to continue to do so in order to end up with a project that is acceptable both to the developer and to the community. I don't see why we should preclude working toward that end especially since most people to PZM4.l2.88 feel that the amended project represents a distinctive improvement over the original Robert's project. I think that it would be far better for all of us to try to work toward an acceptable solution rather than pushing people into a confrontation situation which I don't think benefits anyone. Mari: Last night the applicant said that they were willing to put scale, size and mass on the table to be discussed and that they were willing to spend 180 days reshaping the project to the point where it would be acceptable to the community. Evidently the consensus in the room was that everybody seems to want a project which is acceptable to the community. Therefore, I don't really see why that still isn't a possibility. I don't understand what the problem is with pursuing that goal still. If everything is on the table, now everything's really on the table. I don't see why we can't go on pursuing that goal at this point. What's the problem with that? Michael: I don't know that anything is on the table any mor e since they denied the extension. They have got one choice. It seems that City Council has elected to play poker with somebody. As Bill Tuite said with 50 million dollars on the table and unfortunately I think we are going to lose and one of the ways that we can lose is to end up with a big ugly Holiday Inn sitting up on that mountain instead of a beautiful Ritz Carlton which I think would be an asset here. I would like to recommend that we adopt a resolution recommending that City Council reconsider their decision and grant the extension. Jasmine: I would support that resolution. Roger: I would also. David: I wasn't there last night but everything that I have heard has told me how things went. I think that we have moved along and progressed very well. And I think that we should keep that open both for the City and for the developer. Before we have had battles with City Council and I don't know that a recommendation is going to do anything. I think the most important thing is that we have gotten to a better project so far and we want to keep on moving toward an even better one. We are moving along in a direction that is definitely better and that we should keep on moving. I heard that a lot of things were discussed before the vote was taken and a lot of things were put on the table I had an impression from talking with a lot of people that we had 2 PZM4.12.88 progressed somewhere and I think we should keep on progressing along those lines. Welton: I agree with everything that everyone has said. STAFF COMMENTS There were none. Welton: Let's find out what the applicants--how you all feel after last night. John Sarpa: Let us first say it's sure nice to be back. We really did work after our last meeting with you all. And there were some pretty clear signals set by you about where our strengths are and where you thought there was some more work to be done. So we went to work and talked with various members of the community and decided that as part of going in for an extension that we make some adjustments and that we did. And we thought they were rather substantial and significant adjustments to our approach to the project. And those were in the 2 areas that you all were aware of. One was in scale and mass and the other was employee housing. Those were still areas which maybe we had reached agreement on but there still was a lot of community concern. So we felt that in addition to the extensive work which we had accomplished with you all in and of itself we fel t indication of due diligence and moving forward and it was getting better all the time. We put even more on the table because we just didn't want to have a situation where the real dialogue was stopped. That is not the approach we take. We try to hear what is being said and then go forward. So needless to say having done that we were surprised and I think there were a lot of people who felt in terms of last night's audience that we had a lot of people there to speak on our behalf. And I am sure we had asked some people to come but there were an awful lot of people who spoke on our behalf last that none of us had any idea who they were. And we were, in fact, surprised that some of our most ardent critics that were here particularly from the architectural community even recommended extension. Even Alan Richman said "Give them some more time with conditions". It is just an unfortunate comment on the system as we al know. And now we are put in a corner. There is no way to get around that. It is a corner. And we are working as fact and as hard as we can to protect our rights. We, up to now, the staff has been very co-operative in that process and we are confident that by continuing to work with them in the next few days we can reach agreement on our building permit. That is the first phase 3 PZM4.12.88 because unfortunately until that clarifies itself since we now know we are not getting an extension the work that we have been pushing forward on will disappear or could disappear unless our rights are vested sometime between now and Friday. If they deny then there is nothing to amend. That is why it is a little hard to come back today and get right back into it. In fact I don't think that is appropriate. I think we can better approach this by tabling our efforts until a few days from now until we find out if there is something to amend. That is kind of the awkward position we have ourselves in and believe me, we meant what we said about the willingness to talk about the size of this thing and went on record and from everybody last night, the Mayor made it very clear I wasn't talking about tinkering with it, I was talking about reducing those sizes of the hotel. And the same with employee housing. People said "OK, even though you have come up with a formula that makes sense and meets all of the criteria, you have covered your bases, you have got to do more". We said "OK, we will do more". We even came up with an idea which we thought made sense. And that of itself was not an implant it was a beginning. So that is where we find ourselves. And we certainly appreciate all of the work that we were able to get accomplished in a very expeditious way. I know it improved that proj ect a great deal. And we will just have to see how things go in the next few days to see if that process continues or simply falls apart. Welton: What are you hoping or expecting in the next few days? John: My anticipation is that working closer with staff that we will be able to obtain a permit and then based on that permit, we will have some feeling that there is a no point of departure to get back and some real dialogue. Dialogue at that point will be there will be trucks and digging devices up on the mountain. They will be moving dirt and the process will be begun. So an awful lot will flow from that in terms of where we head next. It is, unfortunately, a much more adverse roll than we had before last night. That is just a given fact and there is not much we can do about that. Except do our best not to escalate it. We won't escalate it. We will meet it step by step. But we are not going to escalate it. Michael: One of the things that I was impressed with the project from the beginning with your operator, Ritz Carlton, does building the Roberts plan have any effect on your actual relationship with Ritz? 4 PZM4.12.88 Welton read a letter from James E. pavisha: "For immediate release. The Ritz Carlton Hotel Company is deeply disappointed with the results of Monday evening's Council meeting. We are al so surpr ised in that the Planning and zoning Commission have been so generous with their time and reasoned in their debate. We believe a very attractive plan was evolving both the City and the Ritz Carlton. Our commitment and desire to be part of the Aspen community remains strong. We will continue to support and back Mohammed Hadid and his efforts to develop a hotel that will be great source of pride and benefit to the community." John: The last thing about this whole process--I can tell you that we do not take the work that Alan and you did as a crap shoot. And those rules were changed a little bit last night on us so that is the real position where we find ourselves today. Mar i: OK. Last night you offered to put open space, size and scale and employee housing on the table. So my question is what rights do you want vested? If you are willing to put all of these things on the bargaining table? Parry: What we need, Mari, is a point of departure. We have an approval that has certain elements. One of those was X number of square feet above the zoning FAR and the terms were X level of improvements to the community. It was a negotiated position to throw that away for the PUD. It leaves no point of departure for discussion. What we have said is--the direction when we leave the gate is we are going down in terms of the scale of the hotel and the mass. We are going to re-look it. But we need a point of departure. What we want to vest is what was purchased and that is what was approved and that is the point of departure and to say that the other extreme is the underlying zoning as a point of departure, we are looking at a year a year and a half or two years and no one can tell me any differently because it is has never taken any less than that. Mar i: But from what I understand the City Attorney advise the Council last night agreeing to discuss reductions and agreeing to reductions were two different things. And to agree to discuss reductions--suppose you say OK we will cut it down from 292 to 282 rooms and if you don't like that, we will build the Robert's plan and then we will be back in the same spot again. I think that is the reason why the Roberts-- 5 .~.,-~...,."--- PZM4.12.88 John: There is no sense in pursuing that discussion. We have been down this road. I had all the discussion last night with a bunch of official representatives when this very same tack was taken and I am not going to do it again today. There is no point in pursuing that. We have been given our mandate and we are pursuing it. Parry: We were told "Built the Robert's plan". That is what we were told last night by City Council. Mari: I don't agree with that. Parry: Well-- Roger: I sure do. Mari: If you sincerely want to build that I don't know what is stopping you from trying to build the hotel that everyone wants. Parry: We have two issues that are before you tonight. One is the restoring of the residential, the other is resolution. And as John mentioned it would be our request to table this. PUBLIC HEARING Welton opened the public hearing on the GMP residential rescoring and asked for public comment. There being none he then continued the public hearing to April 19, 1988. David: I have heard from a fair amount of people that before the vote last night, there was some actual common ground that had been attained, talked about and things looked like they were coming closer together. Is ther e anything that we can do to start talking about the common ground to move this thing along because I don't want to see the old hotel built. I think our feeling on P&Z is that we don't want to see that. This is definitely a better proposal and we are moving along. Parry: with the can do. We want to have the time to work with the Ritz and work financing and the parameters and give the City what we David: The things we have talked about are the scale and the mass, the open space to the community and employee housing. Those ar e the main things. Some people have talked about the number of rooms. But to be honest with you, I don't hear people screaming about the number of rooms. There is nobody on P&Z who has said we do not want.a major hotel on that site. We have got some givens. Let's try to move from those givens on to something. 6 PZM4.12.88 John: We have got a problem with the Council. To the extent that you think it is appropriate to do something via the Council, that is the first way to assist us to get back into a real dialogue. Until something occurs so that we all know that we are not just sitting here talking to each other for the hell of it then there is not much point. Part of that will be helped and answered in what occurs over the next few days via the printed process. But that is only part of it. There is a whole other agenda there I think that probably would be helpful. Alan: The point is if we are going to have real reductions in scale, it is not going to happen by making the size of the rooms smaller. The only way that we are really going to end up with reductions is by shifting rooms or reducing the count. We did not ask for a reduction in count because the applicant said they wouldn't be willing to look at an actual reduction in count for the whole 2 phases of 447 rooms. What we were point towards was shift. To try and bring the size down and one way or another we are going to need to look at numbers--not because you may be unhappy with 292 but you are not going to reduce the size of the conference space. You are not going to reduce the size of the food and beverage. You are not going to reduce the size of the rooms. David: However, when they are saying they want something--I mean we want a hotel there. So there is a common ground there and we work from there and we work from some other common grounds to start to build something. I heard from a lot of people that things were going pretty well for a while last night. We have gotten to a certain point and I think we should move on from that point. I think there can be some negotiations with Council to move on from this point. Wainwright Dawson: Last night a very nice attitude developed. Sure there is some opposition. What was nice last night is this beauty was speaking with an attitude of consensus--people said "Well, they are opening up so can we". The shock value when Council turned that down was incredible because it was not fair. It doesn't matter how big it is or who was told what--it was not fair. And I don't care if they have got 50 million or 5 bucks, that is not the way you treat people. And when you have tha t many people in Aspen that long representing that many cross sections of this community wanting to do something together, this is the way we can solve problems. That is something you should work with. You of the P&Z have taken leadership in this. You have worked with these people. As a result, they have responded. You have worked together. Is there a way taking more of this leadership 7 . PZM4.12.88 through the P&Z to say with a resolution or whatever it takes-- get the Council in here. I talked with the Mayor later today and he said "Well I am ready to talk". Last night was government at it's worst--throwing power at people, not refereeing, not creating, not helping, not listening to consensus. And it is damned dangerous when people come together with that sincerity and that continuity of purpose--if you all can take the initiative and get the damned Council in here and say "OK, you don't have to do anything but listen. And get these guys here and you be here and whoever else wants to support this and bring this community back together again, we can go ahead and stop the nonsense. Legally they are backed into a corner and legally you can't do too much because Council has got it and Council is now backed up because they are confused and brickbats are going around. Cut the crap, bring it in here and get at it. Give them the table. This is stupidl Nobody wants the Roberts plan. And Roberts went through nonsense and lost his financing partly because of government nonsense. Is there a way to get at it? Let's try, because this is all stupid. It is wasting more money and more time. John Busch: I would recommend that you do pass a resolution asking Council to reconsider their position. The Council, particularly the Mayor, I saw him getting his back up in the air last night turning red in the face getting real stubborn and if you can come up with some little angle in your resolution which allows the Mayor or the Council to say "Oh I didn't understand it that way"--you have to offer an out to save face. If you can figure a way to do that you may be able to accomplish what you want. I did have a comment about the Mayor. Maybe I am wrong and I am going to look like I work for Hadid--I do not. He paid 45 million bucks for a piece of property with a project in place. That property is worth a lot more because that project is in place than it is if that project did not exist. And it all relates back to his ability to finance the project. It is not a matter of a club to hold over anybody's head, it is a matter of financially protecting himself to be able to realize what he paid for the property. And I was there for the whole meeting last night and never once heard any word mentioned about "If you don't give us this, we are going to have to build the Robert's project". That was never mentioned I think they had to be consciously trying to keep that out of it. The Council put them in an impossible situation last night by saying "Just sign off to say you are going to forget that whole 8 .- PZM4.12.88 project that was in place when you bought the property and then we will talk". It really was not fair. Mari: My answer to that is that the approvals that were on the property when they bought it were not approvals for infinity. They were approvals with expiration dates on them and the expiration dates go back to the code that says it is up to the Council to decide if it is in the best interest of the community. Now it has been 4 years since those approvals were given. As far as what they paid for the property I don't think that is not the problem of the City or the community. If I went out and paid too much for my land that I was going to build something on, would I come to the City Council and say "Hey, I paid too much, you have got to let me build more because I paid too much". Parry: When it was purchased we had plans at the Building Department to get a permit to construct. We went to the Council and asked for an extension to do some work to amend it and they gave it to us. We vested our rights through an extension. That is the same thing we asked to do last night. When we were not given the right to vest our rights in the property through the extension process, we have to vest them through the permit process. It is very, very simple. Mari: The thing that I still am not understanding as much as I am hearing what you are saying, I am not hearing any reason if you sincerely want to build a nice hotel which is acceptable to the community in terms of scale, open space, employee housing and you hear a consensus last night that this is also what the community wants, this is also what the City Council wants, this is what the P&Z wants, why it can't be done. Why do you say you have no choice? Parry: All we said was we want a point of departure for what was approved. Ramona: I watched the meeting last night on television. I saw Bill Stirling sitting there who had approved the Robert's plans. I saw Pat Fallin who was, at that time sitting on P&Z who had approved the Robert's plan. And I saw them do a complete turn around. I think that this community needs to look at what was approved, the sketch of the original plan that was approved. Maybe the Aspen Times could print it so people could see what people are really talking about. That way they could see how P&Z came to its conclusion and then I think we all have to talk to Council members to reconsider their vote last night because that can be done. 9 PZM4.12.88 Roger: I have to answer Mari a little bit concerning the last issue she raised. The very reason, it seems to me, they want to protect themselves is example--last night is the best example of why they should protect themselves. Mari: Are you saying that you are afraid that-- Roger: Do you trust the City after that last night? I wouldn't trust them. Mari: Are you afraid that they could not come up with a project which is acceptable to the community without a threat of a worse, uglier building. Roger: I don't know what their threshold of acceptability is. And these people don't know what their threshold of acceptability is. So consequently they have to have some place as a reference to work from. I understand that. Welton: It has been suggested by Mickey and some members of the public tonight that we take the lead and ask Council to become a working partner in the process that we have been involved in. And John has suggested we do the resolution in a way that doesn't necessarily indicate the way we really feel about their actions of last night. We should do this in a fashion whereby they can change their minds which they have done on a number of occasions. MOTION Welton: I desires to reconsider would entertain a motion as to whether the Commission send a resolution to City Council suggesting they their denial of the extension. Jasmine: I will so move. Roger seconded the motion. David: I would like to have the resolution go to the point of saying that we want to keep our relationship and work on the grounds that we have already worked for here at P&Z level with the developer and we offer to Council to come and be a working partner with us. I think that concept gives them a way out without totally making them re-go on the vote. I want to get beyond hassling about the vote and getting on to working together. Everyone voted in favor of the motion except Mari. 10 PZM4.12.88 welton then asked for suggestions to Alan for the resolution to be presented to City Council. Discussion followed and suggestions were presented to Alan for the resolution at this time. MOTION Roger moved to have the Planning Office prepare these suggestion into final resolution form and written up by Thursday for individual review and signature of the Chairman of P&Z. Ramona seconded the motion with all in favor except Mari. MOTION Roger made a motion to table action on the Ritz Carlton project to April 19, 1988. Ramona seconded the motion with all in favor. MOTION Mari made a motion to move the meetings back to 5:00 now that we are in daylight savings time. The motion died for lack of a second. Meeting was adjourned. Time was 5:40 pm. cuI!; Clerk 11