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HomeMy WebLinkAboutminutes.apz.19880719 A RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS PLANNING AND ZONING JULY 19. 1988 Meeting was called to order by Vice Chairman Jasmine Tygre at 4:30 pm. Answering roll call were Mari Peyton, Roger Hunt, Michael Herron and Jasmine Tygre. Ramona Markalunas arrived at 4:50. Welton Anderson, David White and Jim Colombo were excused. COMMISSIONER I S COMMENTS ',..,- Roger Hunt: Elections are coming up very soon and I am very interested in the parking project. I stopped by the ARA and suggested it would be a good idea if they got active in support of this. They already are doing that. Their board has unanimously voted to take a political position in favor of the parking structure. Apparently there is going to be ballot issues about employee housing. I understand the Mayor has been hot for the Red Roof to turn that into an employee housing complex which I don't agree with. But I have been wondering if our position has been brought before City Council concerning what we consider the priority of locations for employee housing. Michael: It was brought before the City Council because I was at the meeting when it was brought up. Alan: We have done that as part of the Housing Ordinance. Roger: My concern is that City Council in trying to solve the Red Roof problem is taking this to turn it into employee housing without taking a look at some of the side effects. primarily putting employees out there where right now there are music students and they are having all sorts of trouble from an accessibility point of view. The Mayor says we will re-route a bus. I talked to Bruce about doing that and there is no practical way of re-routing a bus and maintaining decent service on either of those 2 schedules and if you want to put in service equivalent to City service, it is about $200,000 a year. This should be made public knowledge so that the voters can make a knowledgeable decision on it. Whereas I don't have a problem with the use of the Red Roof in the interim as employee housing, I think if it is our charge to have to start redesigning that as an employee housing area, we had better start doing some planning along that line. ....,.""-', I~ PZM7.19.88 STAFF COMMENTS Alan: Brought John Cottle to show the Commission members a model showing changes to the southeast corner of the Little Nell building which were of concern to the members and left to the staff to finalize. Alan: We have been considering the comments you made last week about your concerns with the community. We met last night with Council about work program priorities. We brought both your concern and the concerns we have been having for some time about trying to prioritize. We have a list of code amendments to distribute to you today. I feel the first thing we should do as a group is try and come up with some kind of overall plan for land use to guide us in making the next set of code decisions. I am afraid if we jump in on this displacement issue with the growth quotas issue we might have some real side effect that we are not thinking of. Bill Tuite said he thinks we have already done it with some of the impact fees. We need to identify the problems as specifically as we can possibly get and then try and develop policies and develop some changes to the land use map that we can then use as a guide and go back and work on the code amendments. We really don't like what is going on in that east end neighborhood. We have to recognize change and deal with it as planners. Jasmine: My concern is that by the time we get this into action it is too late. This is what has happened with a lot of things where we are 3 steps late. Michael: idea of idea. The one thing that came out of the last meeting was the having a community rap session which I think is a good MINUTES OF JUNE 7. 1988 Jasmine made a motion to approve minutes of June 7, 1988. Michael seconded the motion with all in favor. PUBLIC BEARING BAMWI GMP/PUD EXEMP'.rION AND SUBDIVISION Jasmine opened the public hearing. Michael: noticed. There is a problem with a public hearing. It was not I don 't see how we can have a public hearing without 2 PZM7.19.88 having the public being noticed and then come back and do it a second time. Cindy: The situation is that the planning Office did not publish for this hearing. The applicants have waited and waited to be heard. They put in their application long before this time and we thought the best solution was to go ahead and hear the project tonight, give the applicants a good feel about how the Planing Commission feels about their project and then actually open the public hearing next week when we publish for the 9th of August. The applicant will have to come in at that time and the pUblic hearing will have to be opened. My feeling on it is that I would think the public would want to make comments. This site has had 3 other reviews in the past. The last one was in 1985. The records show that no one from the surrounding area have ever cared or come to any of the meetings. That doesn't mean the people won't now. The times are different. But to expedite this I think the Planning Commission could hear this tonight and then open the public hearing next week. Roger: We can hear it today with the understanding that if the public comes in on August 9th, we may have to go through the whole thing over again. Michael: We can hear it tonight but not vote on it tonight. Then on the 9th be the only people who can vote on it. Jasmine asked the applicant and members of the Board if this form of action was all right. All were in favor of this procedure. Cindy: Made a presentation of the applicant's proposal as attached in records. What they are requesting is that they be approved with the option to build an employee unit if they have the ability to do that. The reason I encourage that type of an approval is because the applicant is not required in this review to give us any employee housing at all. He just knows that there is that need in the community and he wants to put that on the market and has the ability to do it. Roger: Does the optional employee unit come in before the issuance of a building permit? Cindy: What happens is they have to make up their mind which option they are going to go for. My recommendation is that we allow either option to take place and that we record the final plat when they have made their decision. 3 PZM7.19.88 Michael: Is there still going to be II units? Cindy: No. The II units were the ones they are offering to vacate. Now there are just 4 units. Michael: So the old plan they have II approved. This one they are either going to have 3 and one employee or just 3 free market. Cindy: Right. The 1985 approval would be vacated. Michael: They don't have to have any employee unit? Cindy: Right. Because what they have got is 3 replacement units. They don't have to come through growth management and no employee units are required. The setbacks work with the exception that the applicant has placed 2 corners of the patio within the setback. My recommendation is that either they move the building back by a couple of feet where they have a lot of room available in the back or the patio size be reduced so that we wouldn't have the problem. There is a request for an exemption from the mandatory PUD requirement. If this were a PUD, we would have to go through a 4-step process. Because it is a simple project I am recommending that we not have to go through the entire process and that we do exempt them from the mandatory PUD. Stan: Under normal circumstances, we are allowed to encroach in the front yard, side yard and rear yard setbacks with patios and decks that are less than 18 inches from natural existing grade. So while it looks like we have room on the site to push back those 2 feet we really don't because of traff ic. The vehicular traffic in the back is pretty tight so we really can't move that back. We can reduce the size of the patios but I don't see why we would have to do more here than we would normally be required to do by the Building Department. It was decided that Cindy would look into this with the Building Department before August 9th public hearing. It was decided to close the public hearing. 4 ... __"U--"'~'~_ ,fi''';'---' PZM7.19.88 Roger: I would really preferred to have seen the II-unit project on this site in that area and have housing be available for residential. Now I have the feeling that this is going to be fairly high-end housing. Paul: We would have also. We just went through a numbers crunch on the II units. By the time we pay the sewer tap fees and the water tap fees and the new park dedication fees and what have you, we would have to sell the 3 free market units in excess of $450,000 to break even. It is impossible to do employee housing because of the fees. We just can't do it. Our original intent was to do II employee units. But by the time we get done paying you people off, there is just nothing left. The City prohibited us from doing what we wanted to do. The subdivision fees have gotten to be in excess of $8,000 apiece. Originally we were allowed to build 11 units--7 of which were free market, 4 of which were employee units. And they were all to be low cost units--even the free market. But now the City is nailing us in excess of $8,0000 per unit to subdivide, You are nailing us for the tap fees, sewer, park dedication--so that by the time we get done paying you people off it is totally and completely out of the question. Actually I am looking into and in the hopes of being able to give you an employee unit. And I don't even know if I can afford to do that with the fees being what they are. I talked to Mr Tuite about it and he said it is not within City Council's area to be able to waive any tap fees or do any of this type of thing. Basically between City Council, P&Z and the Housing Authority--nobody is in a position to work with us. I know the Housing Department is sitting on a whole bunch of money. It would be great to see them help finance something like this but that doesn't work either. So we have been reduced to 3 free- market units. Molica told me that, based on all the costs involved, we would be absolutely insane to try and put II units on it because even if everything went smooth, we would lose everything. Michael: For a while now I have been saying that all the costs we have got are just work ing to dr ive the costs of what we sell up. This is just a different result from all of the fees we have got. Now instead of raising the pr ice we are getting an awful lot less. I would think that this would be a good opportunity for the Planning Office to do a "For your information only" to City Council and let them know about this. Everybody has lost on this project. 5 ft.""'''' PZM7.19.88 Cindy: What is the possibility of, if in fact a unit is to be deed restricted and sold on the employee market, waiving a fee or of reducing a fee? What are those possibilities? I think that is something to explore. Ramona: But economics don't just back up. You don't just waive fees. The City has obligations to pay for the water plant. The Sanitation District has bills to pay. That is all built into the rates. Jasmine: One of the things that we as a commission have been talking about is the question of displacement and construction of multi-million dollar homes for people and people who live in the community not being able to find places to live whether they are buying or renting. This kind of project triggers interest in that a lot of things we have to take into consideration for all projects. Paul: We tried. Stan actually had a plan for taking the II unit project and deed restr icting 8 of the II units. It is a shame it is working out this way. The idea that the Housing Authority has all this money they are sitting on--all this cash-in-lieu. It would be nice--maybe not waive but to financially help the developer in some of the fees rather than try to finance one grand iose dorm. Try to help the development of many long-term projects. I think this solution would be a heck of a lot better. I am all for a dorm but that is going to solve any long-term problems like a thumb in the dike. It is not going to do a darn thing. Where if you could finance a half dozen of these for a third of the money you are talking about--not finance but just help in paying the fees--not waiving but paying. That way you would be going toward solving the employee problem. Your approach right now I don't feel is solving the employee problem. And this is one of the few pieces of property in the City of Aspen that allows this kind of construction--this amount of square footage to be put on it. It would be nice if the Housing Office and the City could get together with the people who are developing and become a team and help pay for these things because the cash-in-lieu money is not working with the Housing Office. If they would get together and chip in because the pr ice that you can charge for sale or rent does not cover the cost of construction and land cost and fees. My clients are coming to me and looking at GMP applications. We are going out and we are buying up free-market units because it is cheaper. We can buy them and sell them under the guidelines 6 , PZM7.19.88 and lose less money than the cash-in-lieu. situation you have got yourself into. That is the kind of Jasmine: wonde r . Why isn't the Housing Authority buying these units I Cindy: We talk about having a lot of money in cash-in-lieu right now and we really don't. We have got a lot of promised money. Mari: I have always wondered why the Housing Authority feels like they have to build something with the cash-in-lieu instead of buying something. We are talking about all the old lodges disappearing and employers are going to start snapping those up. Why doesn't the Housing Authority snap them up? Paul: We have gone through months of this and Cindy has been very patient with us. She has watched this project get pared down and go through tremendous metamorphose from II units, to five units, to 4 units to 3 units. This is not our original direction. It is what we are forced to do at the present time. Jasmine: If you had relief in the form of some sort of fees in working with the Housing Authority, would you still want to do an 11-unit project? Paul: Stan has a client right now who would love to do an II unit project on that. In fact up until yesterday he was trying to crunch numbers with the Housing Authority to make it work before we came before you people so we wouldn't have to give up the II units. And so I think that up until yesterday morning everyone was still trying very hard to make that work. That was 3 free-markets and 8 restricted for rent. And this original approval was for 4 restricted and 7 free market. Roger: And the Housing Authority couldn't make it work? Paul: I just don't feel that anyone of your entities feels that they have the authority to make that offer--make that decision and as Stan says, since you are all acting as individual entities rather than as a group team, no decision can be made. The City Council says "Why doesn't the Housing Authority say something?" And the Housing Authority says "Well we don't have the authority". Jasmine: I f it was poss ible for us all to work together on something like this, if you are interested, I feel there is 7 1"';-""''''' PZM7.19.88 ,- interest on the members of the Commission to see if there is anything we could do to make it work. Paul: At this point in time, I cannot afford to sit on this project any longer. We have been kicked back once because you were so busy with the Hadid operation. I have been kicked into winter construction now. And if we mess around with this another month and a half, I just might as well fold it up for another year. I am not in a position to do that. But nothing is cast in stone. Stan: If there were a way to get this worked out--my client is still interested but they don't want to lose money on this. Paul: Until we start pouring the foundation, if all of a sudden we can get something worked out, obviously if we re-apply it is going to be looked on very favorably by you people and so it should start through very quickly. And so if this process could work, then fine let's look at it. It is great to hear some encouragement. Everyone else has just kind of shrugged their shoulders. Cindy: It is my understanding they are not giving up their formal approval of II units until they have approval from this. Marty: #4 in your conditions regarding the letter from the Water Department--we will have an answer on that by the 9th. #5 ask ing for utility easement of 7 1/2 ft. What we would like to ask is that on the side yards where there is a 5 ft setback, if that is sufficient for the easement. Cindy: That is what the Engineering Department had requested. We can come back on that on the 9th. Jasmine: What is the feeling about the optional unit? Is that a problem or not? The optional employee unit on the proposed plan is at the applicant's option. Roger: And it basically has to be done within that building permit time. Ramona: I think the optional unit is fine. Michael: I have no problem with the application and the 3 change conditions. Roger: I have no problem so far. 8 , PZM7.19.88 Mari: The same. Jasmine: Do any members of the Commission feel that there is any point or interest in our attempting to pursue a multi-unit application closer to the original application which would provide more employee housing? Michael: I don't know that the Housing Authority guidelines allow them to spend cash-in-lieu for the fees that these people are looking to get. We are no going to re-invent the wheel in time for these people to go forward. We might as well forget it. It is a great idea even if we put it into a memo explaining where the problem is and where the solution could have been. But I think that solution is too late for this particular project. If their guidelines allow them to spend the money and if that would resolve their problem then I certainly encourage some input from the Housing Authority as to why they wouldn't spend the money that way. Cindy: I will try to get a memo back as to why the Housing Authority hasn't felt like they couldn't work out a solution. Roger: Along that line I feel that what the Housing Authority would pay is basically an amount necessary to get a control of those units. They may not get a fee simple deed but if they have the control of the units, that is what we are after. Maybe the Housing Authority shouldn't be approached on the basis of "If you will pay my fees, I will give you the units". Maybe there should be a negotiated fee for the control of those units. They are your units for a certain amount of money. 727 E. BOPKINS CONDOMINIUMIZATION Cindy: The applicants have asked that they be reviewed in a mixture of the old code and new code. Our recommendation is to give us all of the Engineering Department requirements as well as to have the minimum 6 month lease restriction in the house on the duplex because the applicants have not submitted under the new code the criteria and responded to the criteria as to whether or not there should be short term situations in this neighborhood. Marty: This is one of those last groups that came through in the revision where we did apply under the old code and had the option of taking certain things under the new code. But in the 6 month restriction area--this is in that block right behind the Athletic Club. Catty corner on the other side of the block is the Hodge 700 East Hyman group project that is an O-Office zone that was also exempted from the 6-month rental restr iction. Although we 9 """" PZM7.19.88 .- didn't apply under those specific criteria, in the new code we have asked for exemption under the 6-month lease restriction by virtue of the location and being in the Office zone. Michael: You can't pick and choose. You have to be one or the other. The City Council said you can either apply under the old code or the new code. So if you are ask ing for ce rtain things under the one and certain things under the other I don't think we can even address it. Cindy: They applied under the old code and therefore we consented that they would not have to pay the affordable housing impact fee for these units. However they would have the 6-month minimum lease restriction placed on them. They could apply under the new code. However, they would have to pay the affordable housing impact fee. So they need to choose which code they want to be under. That is my position. Marty: That is fine. And we have chosen under the old code. That is what I am saying. We didn't go through the criteria under the new code. We are going under the precedence of the old code that other areas in this same block have had that 6-month lease restriction. ><-- Cindy: Under the old code technically there was never a waiver potential for the 6-month minimum lease restriction to be waived. It didn't occur on any project that I had personal experience with but I know it did occur at the units that are just to the-- Michael: Not by our decision. Cindy: City Council will hear this because it is under the old code. Michael: My point is we are considering something that we have no authority to consider. Under the old code we can't waive it. Mari: I am confused about how if the code does not allow for a waiver, a waiver can be granted. How does that happen? What process allows them to do that if the code says no. It seems to me that we don't even have the right to recommend. If the code says no, the code says no. Roger: My concern is not with this project by itself as much as it is that we are becoming a defacto tourist zone here outside of the lodging zone by virtue of what is happening with all of the "duplexes". That is contrary to what I think everyone wants to happen in this zone. I don 't know how to control it at this point. 10 "".;'".~ PZM7.19.88 Cindy: I think that the argument under the new criteria in the new code in the Office Zone District for the waiver for the 6- month minimum lease restriction can very easily be made in this area. The proximity to the Gondola, the proximity to the shopping areas that this is an appropriate place to have short- term accommodations. I think that this argument can be made. The 1973 Land Use Plan which we all want to update even shows that this is a mixed tour ist residential area. In the Office zone I think there are some real arguments for having short term. Ramona: Are there any parking requirements on this? Cindy: There has to be one parking space per bedroom. Michael: I don't really have a problem with waiving the 6-month lease restriction because I think it is silly anyway. I have clients who come to see me about it and I have told them it is not enforceable. I think if the City wanted to enforce it they could. But you are never going to know who is doing what there anyway. ..,,-- Ron Austin came before us and his project was across the street. We denied it and the City Council denied it. It really concerns me to do that although I can easily vote in favor of this because I voted in favor of Ron Austin. But it seems we are not being fair. Cindy. My real distinction there is the Original Curve. And because the 1973 plan shows a distinctively different zone for mixed residential. Michael: If that is the case I can really be in favor of it. Jasmine: On the other hand under the code if we are going under the old code then it is not a matter that we have discretion on. Only City Council has discretion. Cindy: But we do have the ability to make a recommendation and my recommendation to you is that we not waive the 6-month minimum lease restr iction as the applicants have requested it. But the recommendation is that we uphold the 6-month minimum lease restr iction in the subdivision exception agreement because we don't have the ability under the old code to waive it. Michael: You are telling us we are going to make that recommendation in a vacuum. If we are going to make it in a vacuum we might as well go for it if we think it is appropriate. 11 PZM7.19.88 Cindy: Well, if you think it is appropriate. But I am saying I don't think it is appropriate because the old code did not allow us to do that. Marty: The only other comment we would make is that #3 where it says "Drainage retention shall be verified by the applicant". We can certainly do that. There are 2 dry wells that are planned. The 5th one to verify the first right of refusal--that is taken care of. Roger: How many bedrooms were there total and where are the on- site spaces? Aug ie Reno: There are 4 bedrooms between them. unit there ~s a 2-car garage. There is a driveway allows for parking of 2 cars. Then in each in front that MOTION , Michael: I make a motion that we approve with conditions (attached in records) and with one additional condition that if we had the condition to be able to waive the condition that we would waive the 6-month minimum lease restriction. '.,--- Ramona seconded the motion. Mari: I could not support this because I feel like we don't have any discretion over that lease restriction. I don't understand why we are even talking about it. And from what I can understand the City Council doesn't even have any discretion. It seems to me we are recommending doing something which is illegal. So I am not in favor of recommending this. Roger: Maybe we could do it this way. Changing condition 4b to read "A 6-month minimum lease restriction with no more than 2 shorter tenencies per year and at the discretion of the City Council" . Michael: authority we are in That is what my motion is. That if we or the City Council has the authority to waive favor of waiving it. If they don't, then no. had the it, then Mari: I think we have established that we don't and they don't. Michael: Since they have already done it, obviously they do. Roger: The way I feel about it is that they should either fully comply with the old code or the new one--one or the other. 12 " PZM7.19.88 Michael: months. Let I S assume you have the author ity to waive this 6- Would you waive it or not? That is the issue. Roger: To me the cat is out of the bag at this point because it has already been done. And that is my problem. I think they should comply with one code or the other. Those in favor of the motion were Ramona, Roger and Michael. Those against the motion were Jasmine and Mari. Motion passed. ?: On that project you heard just before ours, we came to that same conclusion--that is that we would love to do it but we could not afford to do it. The intent is terrific. The neighborhood is a perfect neighborhood for that, too. But we decided to let someone else lose money on it. Jasmine: We are trying to figure out a way that we can make it possible. I think it is a great thing. If you know of anybody else in the development area--if any of you have any suggestions to things like that, we are planning to hold a public hearing about some of these things and we would really like to hear from you on this. You can come up with things that we haven't thought of that might very be helpful. COSNIAC STREAM MARGIN REVIEW Cindy: Presentation as attached in records. The one questionable area is to the back of the lot towards Castle Creek. However as the applicants meet the setback requirements, there are really no problems with this application with regard to stream margin review. And the recommendations are mainly recommendations dealing with at the time of construction that a construction plan be given to the Engineering Department so that we can make sure there is no pollution to the stream during construction. Jasmine asked the applicant if they had any problems with the conditions of the Planning Office. There were none. MOTION Roger: I move to approve the Cosniac Stream Margin Review with 13 '\ PZM7.19.88 the conditions being the same as listed 1 through 3 of the Planning Office memo dated July 19, 1988. (Attached in records) Michael seconded the motion with all in favor. Meeting was adjourned. Time was 5:55pm. J,~~,!?lci~~Cie;k """",.. 14