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HomeMy WebLinkAboutminutes.apz.19920602 ~~u RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS PLANNING & ZONING COMMISSION JUNE 2. 1992 vice Chairman Bruce Kerr called meeting to order at 4:30 P.M. Answering roll call were Tim Mooney. David Brown. Sara Garton, Richard Compton, Bruce Kerr and Roger Hunt. Jasmine Tygre was excused. COMMISSIONER'S COMMENTS Bruce: I have a question for staff. We have talked about the Ritz and the construction worker parking. Was anything done on that? Leslie: Perry is pursuing the ability to use the parking lot that is used during the winter at Lift lA. I believe we have the ability in the code to require someone to go to the Zoning Board of Appeal when it has to do with storage of construction materials. We are interpreting that to mean construction worker's cars. It was a representation in all of their approvals that they were going to provide other kinds of incentives for worker bees to get out of their trucks. Bruce: Well you can pass along to Diane information that the problem is not abated at all. If anything it is exacerbated during the last 2 weeks. And I can identify specific vehicles that I know are construction workers. They are parking in front of and alongside my property specifically. And they are there every day. They are there from 7:00 and they leave at 5:30. It is obvious it is construction guys. They come down the street with their hard hats and styrofoam coolers. By 7:30 AM there are no parking places anywhere around the lodge and then not until 5:30 PM. David: It has become obvious to the Growth Committee and the Housing Committee that there is an extreme shortage of housing uni ts for the middle class in this community. There is a 600 shortage right now of full-time resident housing. Anything this committee or staff could do to move forward as fast as possible to rezone appropriate sites to resident occupied housing would be in the community's interest. It is a 2 year process to take a parcel through the rezoning process and get it ready for construction. The process is just so onerous. It takes incredible intestinal fortitude for anyone. The key is taking land that is basically upzoning land that is out there that might be zoned for one or two houses and rezoning it for higher density whether it is 10 units an acre or five or one house , on 6,000sqft. Just moving into that process is the way to go. Bruce: I am curious to know whether by initiating the zoning PZM6.2.92 ourselves, whether we really preclude someone that is the land owner from still doing the single family--as I understand most of our zones they are such that single family is nearly always a permitted use as of right within the zones. I am not sure we really gain a whole lot by sticking that zoning on there if we are seeking to stop somebody from doing whatever they want to with their land if they are the land owner. We have got to work with City Council, the Housing Authority to actually acquire some of these tracts or get options on them. Just putting zoning on there is not going to stop somebody from building the same kinds of home. Maybe staff can work with the Housing Authority to initiate a work session with this group on this. David: Between townhouses and single family is where I think there is a huge need. Roger: Modular housing or manufactured housing might be something we might seriously consider where there are areas where we may go below 6,000sqft per lot. I don't know how else we are going to crack this nut of land value. Richard: We should probably be talking to open space people as well so that we don't buck heads any more than we need to. I think there has been conflict in the past probably beginning with the Marolt project and the mistrust on certain people's parts that all that is on our mind is build housing and not leave any open space. Then all that dirt that was put behind the Eagle's Club for trails is no longer there. Leslie: Eagles rescinded their approval to dump the. dirt there to do the trail. I think it was a liability issue with the Eagles. Richard: All of the Clarendon units seem to be doing their upgrade at once. Leslie: The interesting thing about that--when we were reviewing their parking standards and we told them to go back and put in one more parking space because they never complied with conditional approval. Now I have had a call that to put in one more parking space we are going to have to tear down 2 of these huge trees. I said that was never the understanding. We never would have forced you to do a parking space when you have to tear down trees. So I have to go back out with him and work with him on that. If there is any significant change in the parking we will come back and give you an update on that. '-.. 2 PZM6.2.92 Roger: I wouldn't have voted for those expansions had they not been able to get that parking space. Richard: So we hit them for a mitigation fee if they don't provide the space. Tim: Regarding the completion of the Rio Grande trail underneath the new bridge. It is actually in the County down at Slaughterhouse. It is a dead end now. They have changed the route. Normally the Rio Grande went across the road and then into the park. Now they have taken the sidewalk down and under the bridge and the sidewalk ends and then it is an excavated part of the park that isn't completed. And they brought the guardrail all the way up against the bridge so that when you go up onto the road you literally have to walk up the road towards Whitehorse Springs to enter the parking lot and then go down on the dirt part. Leslie: It is real bad too because it is a dropoff. Tim: It is a dropoff. Before it wasn't that great because people were jogging down the path and pushing baby carriages or bikes and they would stop at the road but they at least had some place to go when they got out on the road. Now with the guardrail right against the bridge you don't have anyplace to go. And if you go under the bridge and follow the sidewalk, it just dumps you right in the river. "-.-. Is there a schedule when that is going to be completed? responsibility is it? Whose Cindy Houben: We should check on that. STAFF COMMENTS Leslie presented reso for signature. (attached in record) Cindy Houben: I want to encourage everybody to come to the meeting tomorrow night to the Oversiqht Committee meetinq at 5:00 at the Aspen Institute. PUBLIC COMMENT There was none. MINUTES FEBRUARY 4. 1992 After corrections: 3 PZM6.2.92 MOTION Richard: I make a motion to approve minutes of February 4, 1992. Tim seconded the motion with all in favor. ASPEN SAVINGS & LOAN CONDITIONAL USE Bruce opened the public hearing Kim presented affidavit of public notice. (attached in record) She then made presentation as attached in record. Sunny: This building had an approval as a business and professional office. Roger: As a financial institution. And the reason it got that is that we felt that a bank fits very well with the Neighborhood Commercial. ,.c.,.......'...... Now there is that whole first great big floor on that thing which is a nice great big space and very appropriate for a bank use which was very appropriate for Neighborhood Commercial. As I recall that sort of thing was supported. ,- All I see now is professional and office space. I assume the whole thing is going to be cubicalized to professional and office space where our thinking in the Neighborhood Commercial way back when was that that was a perfectly good use for the second floor. On the first floor we really wanted in the larger square footage areas something more on the permitted level of the Neighborhood Commercial. Sunny: There is no reflection of any of that in the minutes. It was approved as a financial institution. It was built to be occupied in it's entirety by a financial institution and at a later date the upstairs subsequently went into one of the insurance companies in town. I can find no record of a subsequent conditional use approval to use it for that purpose. All I can figure out is that once the determination was made and a conditional use approval was given for business and professional offices that they were allowed to occupy the building without coming through for approvals. We were of the opinion that we would be able to -business and professional offices. But contemplating perhaps to do condominiumization occupy it today- the owner was for sale of the 4 PZM6.2.92 ""-' building and wanted to confirm that. That is why this application is pending today. Kim: Permitted use includes drugstore, food store, liquor store, drycleaning and laundry pickup station, barber shop, beauty shop, post office branch, record store, TV sales and service shop, shoe repair shop, video rental and sales shop, accessory residential dwellings restricted to affordable housing guidelines and accessory buildings and uses. The conditional uses are service station, laundromat, garden shop, hardware store, paint and wallpaper store, carpet, flooring and drapery shop, business and professional office, free market dwelling units accessory to other permitted uses, home occupations and satellite dish. sunny then gave historical backgro~nd on this building. My client wishes to condominiumize the building to use for those uses which are permitted by right in the NC zone district and require no review. And also to use it for business and professional offices as a conditional use if that is what the market demands. If the P&Z imposes conditions on this approval as suggested here and the spaces were subsequently sold then those conditions run with your title to the space. You are bound unless you come back in and get permission to change that. If you wish to use your space for another conditional use you, as the individual owner, would have to come in and apply for conditional use approval and probably you would have to get permission of other owners of the building because the condominiumization association would require consent. Bruce: As I understand what is happening here is we are basically doing some housekeeping. The record is not real clear but apparently this has already been approved at some time in the past through the SPA process or the conditional use process as a conditional use. And you are just wanting to clean up the record so that you can sign leases or sell or condominiumize. Sunny: That is my intent. And the other was to have the City acknowledge the existing survey as the SPA plan of record. So that if there were any proposal for changes to the building--remodel or expand--we have additional floor area availability down there, we can compete under Growth Management and expand the building. Roger: I could fully support professional and offices on the second floor. When it comes to the first floor I have problems with that because it is my conception that when the approvals were 5 PZM6.2.92 '.-,- made for the Aspen Savings and Loan that that was a banking facility and we felt that that was very appropriate use in the NC. So in order to get it as an appropriate use for the NC we indicated that would come under professional office. Now the banking facility is no longer there. Now to conditionally zone that first floor as professional and office is an expansion of a conditional use. I foresee it as being the whole thing cubicalized into professional and office and I think NC is a preferable zoning for the uses of that first floor. What I am saying is because the bank is no longer there as an entity occupying the first floor, then if they are going to cubicalize that first floor into smaller pieces to sell off as offices then I consider that an expansion of a conditional use. Sunny: Let's just say we are applying to use this building. It used to be a bank and now we are going to use it for offices. The criteria are not what you would like to see go in the building. The criteria are the appropriateness of the use in the location based on 7 criteria which we have addressed in our application. The criteria allows an office there as a conditional use. There is nothing in there that says we can't meet that criteria. The fact that you would prefer it to be saved for shoe shops or something else I don't think is a criteria. The uses that will wind up there will probably have less impact than the bank. -",-- Leslie: What I hear Roger expressing is that he is not comfortable within that carte blanc conditional use approval of the entire building. And that you are going to be condominiumizing that entire building. He is not comfortable with having the whole building be a conditional use in the NC zone district. Sunny: You are saying then that each individual office should have to come through with a conditional use in that zone district? Roger: No. I am no saying that but-- Leslie: If you had a little bit more clarity on offices and how much of that building is going to be condominiumized. You started off by saying that part of that building will be used for those permitted uses within the NC zone district. Now you are asking for conditional use for office. Sunny: What I said was the building would either be used for permi tted uses in it's entirety or part of it sold off for conditional use for office purposes. I am asking for approval in the worst case to use the entire building for office purposes. 6 PZM6.2.92 If you are asking for a specific listing of offices, what you are really saying is that each individual office will have to come through because until we decide who buys it or whether an office buys it at all, we won't know who the applicant is. Roger: I would be very comfortable with the second floor approving a conditional use of professional offices on the second floor. I am not comfortable doing that without knowing the nature of the office on the first floor. If the nature of the office was a banking institution of the first floor I can go for it. Sunny: What if it is a real estate office or a lawyer? Roger: I am less comfortable with that mostly from the viewpoint of--well, the game that is being played here is of course trying to get as many people as possible in as small a space as possible to maximize the yield. In the NC areas we have identified those areas that sometimes take larger square footages for the type of uses that are allowed or permitted uses. I wish we had put in as a conditional use "Professional offices on second floors only". Sunny: There is no criteria that says your preference for a large office vs a small office in terms of square footage is a criteria. Dave: If this were a blank piece of land, I couldn't agree with you more. I think that given the fact that the building is existing and it is unlikely that in the near future the building will be torn down that the layout of the building and the parking is backwards to be conducive towards a retail use. Therefore looking at the circulation on the street, looking at the parking in the neighborhood I can't think of anything more appropriate. In spite of the fact that we need more NC I think staff is correct that having this building be entirely office is appropriate. It supports the use of the Rio Grande. I think an office use across the street from the Rio Grande garage is more conducive toward the use of the garage. On a retail use if there are any offices that take this the ones that have that greatest traffic will tend to be the ones on the first floor. Looking at the overall picture of town I think there is a need for some small condominiumized office space in this community. So even though that is not a specific criteria of the review I think that it interacts with the neighborhood, the traffic patterns on Mill st, I think are more conducive to less traffic going in and out of this driveway than more traffic. I know a grocery store was looking at this building at one point. The site just does not lend itself in the traffic and the parking 7 ,~'~...... PZM6.2.92 - does not lend itself to an easy operation of circulation in and out which would be necessary to support parking. In addition the parking is only half what would be necessary to support retail. It is half of what is necessary to support office too but given the fact that it is next door and additional parking is available for Rio Grande that makes it compatible and I can see fully supporting this application. Tim: I agree. I think that NC should provide services and should make life easier for the community and there should be services there that are needed by the community. I don't know how we can regulate is that people are going to be living here and running long distance companies. And the services that those spaces could provide to the street traffic of people who need commercial retail or commercial shops, just are not going to be available. We now take and provide space for people to run offices that really don't provide any service to the community but are accruing resources to them. I think there is a need for the office and I think a lot of businesses in town would love to get out of the rent that they are paying and buy a space and stay within the business triangle. I think it is a really unique opportunity. .''''-''' But I am concerned about just what offices are going to be there and if we are providing space for people that come here and run remote businesses but not provide NC services. Dave: I call attention to the Durant street Mall. There are a mix of office and retail functions in the NC zone. Some of those office functions are on the main level. Most of them are upstairs. There is some retail on the main level. That tends to mix and change. Given the flexibility of the NC zone and that this is just one of the possible uses--for all we know somebody could buy 2 or 3 stack condominiums put their house--but to put housing on the upper level, office on the second and perhaps even have retail function on the main level. Sunny: The desire here is not to go out like the Aspen Ski Company and create a bunch of 250ft cubicles for sale for office purposes. That is not necessarily the best use of the property. Sara: I understand that we can ask for conditions. we would like to see the first floor for specific doctor's or dentist's offices. And wha t if services or Sunny: If you look at the provision that allows you to establish criteria it says that if you make findings on these conditions then 8 .~.~. .~" PZM6.2.92 - you can establish such criteria as you believe necessary to enforce that. Sara: We are giving you a good deal. Sunny: It is not a good deal, Sara. The issue is not whether or not--you can simply say I would rather that it would be NC shoe shops on the ground floor. It is not whether I am allowed to have a good deal or business offices on the second floor. That is not the point. What we are saying is can we use this building for all office purposes. Sara: NC zone is a very, very valuable zone. The Aspen Area Comprehensive Plan is asking us to make larger NC areas in fact. If you have got a building that is in the NC zone and aSking for some more conditional-- Sunny: We are asking for a use that is allowed in the zone district-- Sara: Which is a conditional use. ". Sunny: Subject to our ability to demonstrate compliance to these criteria. Sara: But be specific with these criteria. Roger: within that criteria is to carry out the purpose of the zone. So let's go back to the purpose of the zone. We approved the travel agent in the Clark's building on the basis that--what they presented did fall within the purpose of the zone. So not only is there the criteria that is written out for conditional uses but we have to go back in the context of the purpose of the zone. I can see where a travel agent could be within the purpose of the zone. However if I as a business man wanted an office in that building giving you willy-nilly conditional approval I could go down there and set up my office and it would not be within the purpose of that zone because I make my money from Los Angeles. And all my office would be doing was basically a fax and telephone center to perpetuate my business from Las Angeles. That does not fall within the purpose of the NC zone. Kim reading from code: The purpose of the NC zone district is to allow small convenience retail establishments as part of the neighborhood that are designed and planned to be compatible with the surrounding neighborhood, to reduce traffic generation and mitigate traffic circulation and parking problems and to serve the daily or frequent trade or service needs of the neighborhood. ."" Sunny: The way you are looking at it no office could meet that ........... 9 PZM6.2.92 criteria. Roger: A dental office, a doctor's office and we have determined that a travel agent could. And we have determined that in the first floor of the Durant Mall. It happens to be the type of office we are talking about and does it fall within the purpose of the zone. On the second floor I can go for the willy-nilly office. Kim: I think I have to agree with David in that functionally the site is not a convenience oriented site. Secondly I think what Roger's intent is business and professional office is very vague. I see it as we either approve it or don't approve it. I think for us to make a determination and start determining which offices are OK is--to include a dentist or include a real estate office is going above and beyond the black and white of the code. I think a conservative approach would be that it be very clear--a business or a professional office. Roger: It wasn't beyond the black and white of the code when it came to the Clark's Market building and that travel agent. Sunny: The travel agent professional office, was it? wasn't approved as a business and It was approved as a specific use. Leslie: It had to be approved as a professional office. It lists travel agent separately. So that is the only one it could come under. Sunny: or as uses. That is what I am asking. Do you approve it as an office a use that was interpreted to be similar to the other NC Tim: Can you give us any indication as to what the specific uses are going to be? Or do you have anything? Sunny: No. Because the I read it it is the use as business and professional office. It doesn't have a sub-set. It doesn't define a list of business and professional offices. What we want to do is maintain the flexibility for the building. So one of the uses that we thought about was business and professional offices. At this point there is no specific type of office use. Tim: Maybe on the first floor we can say we are in favor of a certain percentage of the square footage to be used under this conditional use. And otherwise we want to know that the other square footage is going to be used for uses that are in compliance. Kim: Reading from code: Office means a use where business, professional or governmental services are made available to the public. Office, business means a building for use by those such 10 PZM6.2.92 ""'-- as realtors, travel, advertising or insurance agents and property managers providing both products and services. A business office shall also include the home office of the company which sells retail or wholesale products or which provides professional services. Professional means a building for use by those such as physicians, dentists, lawyers, architects, engineers, accountants and other professionals who primarily provide services rather than products. sunny: All those uses are potential tenants or purchasers of space in this building. Never understanding that we had to apply for specific business office. If you approve a dentist and he either moves somewhere else and they re-let the space or he owns it and they want to sell it, does the next potential tenant have to come in and apply for conditional use approval because he is a real estate agent? He falls in my opinion within the definition of business and professional office. Tim: This is a NC. We are thinking about the neighborhood. A business and professional office should have something to do with the neighborhood. Are these offices going to benefit the neighborhood commercial zone? The key word there is "neighborhood". Richard: I tend to agree with David on this issue. Given the building and the neighborhood that it is in and it's historical use I think this is appropriate. It was built as a bank with some offices upstairs. It would be appropriate for another bank to move in. But that is something we can't require or expect. And the design of the building is not appropriate for retail. Maybe put one in front on the ground floor. The parking on site is behind with a one-way access so that I don't think that it is appropriate for Roger's Lock Repair to move out of the Truman Building and over into this building. In that neighborhood there are already a dozen or two dozen small services bases available. It is not that this specific neighborhood needs more shops. Ideally if we were developing it from the ground up we should be having the discussion we are having. But given what we are dealing with I think the application fits. Sunny: Offices are a very generic category whether it is being operated by a real estate agency or a title company have very similar types of operation. And there has been no real distinction in this code to make sub headings other than business and professional. Other than those 2 distinctions there is no further fine tuning of what is there. 11 PZM6.2.92 David: I would like to see this be retail on the first level, office on the second level and housing above. Just to try to move toward a consensus I think it would be useful to read permitted uses from the code. A drugstore, food store, liquor store, drycleaning and laundry pickup, barber shop, beauty shop, post office branch, record store, TV sales and service, shoe repair, video rental and sales shop. None of these would be precluded on the first floor. They would all still be allowed. So if somebody wanted to come forward buy a condominium and operate one of these uses what we would be doing here is not precluding one. All it is doing is giving the opportunity for someone else to use it for a professional office. Sunny: This provides the ability to allow a conditional use which is office and business and professional office many of which could be local service business in this building. Sara: I just think though that any applicant from now own especially when they are in an NC zone should be aware that we are going to ask for conditions on conditional uses. And those conditions might be very specific whether it is professional office or a business office. Sunny: That is not the problem. If you can make a distinction between as far as the criteria is concerned I don't have a problem with that. Sara: When you come in for a some very specific conditions. vested rights and everything. conditional use you should expect And especially if you are getting Sunny: If they are warranted I then I don't see why you should farther than the criteria. agree. If they are not warranted burden the application to take it Bruce: That is the problem, Sara. When we start asking for conditions that are outside of the criteria that our code tells an applicant and they come in through the process--"This is what I have got to show" and they feel like they have done that then they think it is unfair for us to provide other conditions outside of the scope of the code. Sara: I see what is probably going to happen to this new plan is we are going to add criteria to the NC zone--especially mixed use. Sunny: work. I think all the commercial districts in town need some Tim asked regarding parking. 12 PZM6.2.92 Kim: The building is non-conforming by current parking requirements. When the building was approved it was approved with the parking numbers based on the recommendation of Planning Office for reduction in parking. In the staff memo it says "Minimal parking shown which is 17 is in conformance with our recommendation to minimize car access and use of the site". sunny: In this case the actual employment will probably go down. The theoretical generation of all the square footage is actually less than what was there before. So the way the code is set up there is no increase in net leasable. There is no trigger for additional parking. We are not going to increase the building size so we are not going to trigger the city's requirement for additional parking. The parking was reduced at the City's request. It appears to function perfectly fine for the financial institution that was there. And we anticipate having no greater impact than the institution in terms of our use of the building. I f we don I t add additional square footage technically speaking the City has no way to trigger additional parking. Roger: But this is a conditional use and I could conceive of the building being cubicalized into 25 spaces and you end up with a deficit of--25 one person cubicles and you don't have one space per cubical. I think we should discuss that under the terms of the conditional use. Sunny: There were 35 employees there. Clearly all 35 employees couldn't park on the site. So they probably parked over on the Rio Grande. So if it is to be used even for an NC use the demand for parking is probably higher than it is for Business and professional office. And there are other cases like a doctor's office which would be the same as a travel agent. There is adequate parking in the immediate area. We are right across the street from the municipal parking garage. If you say we can only do 12 condominium spaces even then one of the spaces could be a 2 person professional office that works with the telephone or it can be a doctor's off ice and the parking requirements would be completely different. I don't know how you would get to that high a level of detail. David: National standards are real simple for retail and office. It is 4 per thousand for both. So the parking demand whether it is retail or office is going to 13 PZM6.2.92 '-' be about 36 either way. And only half is provided on site. That is why I saw the office as being a less demanding use of this particular site because of the relationship with the parking garage. Kim: The site has a SPA overlay which and other dimensional requirements. drawings for the structure it sits on it obviously--it received--the setback at this point for the bank use. allows variation to parking According to the as built the one lot line also. So and to parking requirements If one were to go back and try and again legitimize a parking variance in this particular location for this set of uses which has already been determined equates to what was approved use as a bank what could become of it is an SPA variance to parking. We are not going to get any more parking. The NC zone doesn't list payment in lieu of parking although the Council in approving an official variance-- Leslie: In approving the SPA plan they could approve a parking plan that incorporated all sorts of things. Sunny: The building was approved with 0 setbacks on the south side with parking less than what was required in the zone district and some other limitations imposed on it. The fact that the City changed it's code and are taking the policy regarding the parking- -so what happens when I come back in and I need approval for a financial institution. Bruce then asked if there were any comments from the public. There were none and he closed the public portion of the hearing. ASPEN SAVINGS & LOAN CONDITIONAL USE MOTION David: I make a motion that whereas the Aspen Savings & Loan building conditional use application for business and professional offices in the N/C zone district is sUbstantially in conformance with the conditions A through F as spelled out in this packet (attached in record) and in the zoning ordinance for the N/C zone, I move that we approve for business and professional offices at this location on all levels of the building as a conditional use within the N/C zone with the following conditions: e'.... ............. 14 -~...... ,,~ PZM6.2.92 ,,~--- #1 through #4 as itemized on page 4 of our memo dated June 2, 1992. (attached in record) Richard seconded the motion. Discussion: Richard: On the issue of parking this is an application for a conditional use. Doesn't that, by itself, trigger parking review? Kim: Typically we look at parking increases of a building to triggering an increase of what is existing on site. What was originally approved in cases where there is a non-conforming situation. Conditional use is--it is correct in that any reasonable condition can be applied to an application that is coming through this particular project. Sunny: I guess what we are asking is if we expand the building we trigger more parking. Under conditional use for business and professional office we are asking you to say "Well the existing parking and the available parking in the area is sufficient. until now this building functioned as a business and professional office. There is no history of a parking problem associated with the building. It was reduced at the request of the city. It seems unreasonable to come back and penalize us now to add additional parking and the use proposed for the building should have no greater impact than prior use. Roger: The only point I wanted to make was that yes for one of two of these conditional uses or uses that fall within this conditional use approval, I can say yes because the parking is there, it is adequate. But when we get up to 20 uses within this conditional use I start having doubts about the adequacy of the parking. 20 separate cubicles. Sunny: It is only 7,660sqft of floor area. offices you can only have 10 or 12. If you had 500sqft Bruce: Technically we are only talking about a very few number of uses as uses are defined. We are talking about business and professional offices within those categories. That doesn't trigger, for example, a change in use kind of proceeding which it does also kick in some parking. Kim: Then you are definitely looking at some litigation for parking. Tim: Because of circumstances that the city let them not comply 15 PZM6.2.92 with the number of spaces, could we put a conditional use in that if it maximizes the parking there that they are required to buy monthly parking spots at the garage and that we have the right to review the parking as a condition. And that we want to know that they have a remedy to this problem. It goes back to not having to provide them in the beginning but now that the code is different we want to make sure that we have a remedy for them and we want to review the problem as it comes up. Leslie: In the past on your conditional uses you have included a condition that you wanted the applicant to come back in a year. And you wanted to double check that the applicant was complying with their conditions. We did that with the Silver City Grille- -the numbers of chairs, employees and things like that. You could put in a condition that if parking became a problem or people start receiving complaints that you could require the applicant to enter into a parking plan. The SPA overlay gives us a little more flexibility because the SPA overlay you can vary parking. Typically the way we do that with PUDs and SPAs is we identify the entire parking plan--not just cash-in-lieu but the whole thing. Sunny: We are right across from the parking garage. What is it you want us to provide? Leslie: with respect to the underlying zoning the P&Z can put a condition on it that will require you to report to them in a year. Sunny: What I am saying is what is the problem we are fixing? Has someone come forward and said the parking is inadequate for this building for business and professional office use? Leslie: No. Tim has said if in the event there is a problem can the P&Z impose a condition of approval. Tim: it is least And it is my idea that since the parking garage is so close the remedy we could say that with these cubicles that at the people have to acquire a monthly parking in the garage. Kim: The employees. To allow the customer use of the 17 spaces. Roger: Or they have to come up with a mitigation plan which includes parking passes, maybe transportation passes for employees so that the employees don't use cars and things like that. Bruce: It seems to me we are wanting to have it both ways. If this applicant was in here not asking for a conditional use but wanted to put in a Neighborhood Commercial type use without any question they require a whole bunch of parking, we wouldn't be 16 PZM6.2.92 saying anything to them about parking. They are already there. They are in the N/C and there is all kinds of cars flocking up to this and now we are talking about a type of use that is typically less intensive in terms of parking than Neighborhood Commercial and we are trying to somehow back in to sticking some kind of parking requirement. And I just find that-- Leslie: I don't think it is clear. The problem is when the building was built and it was approved with less than what was required parking that the P&Z was looking at a bank. And they were saying that given this use 17 spaces was fine. Given a professional office use in the N/C requires 4 per net leasable. So I am not sure if this building was zoned to what was a permitted use there would not be some way that we would have to look at a more creative parking situation. Richard: The reality is that people are driving and parking somewhere to access this building. It may be the parking garage. It may be over at Clark's Market. They are parking somewhere and is it incumbent on the owner of the building to provide some sort of mitigation. Sunny: The basic trigger for parking is when you increase the square footage. If you are non-conforming--you are not penalized for being non-conforming. But if you expand the building you have to comply with the regulations that are in effect today. So clearly an expansion of the building and the intensity of use as a result of the additional square footage requires mitigation. The question is can this space which was formally used for a bank which had parking that was provided in compliance with the conditions at the time be also used for an office and the same parking be adequate. We have no reason to believe to the contrary. If it is a concern and you want to revisit that if there is a problem at some point in the future, I guess that is reasonable too. David: I call the question. Bruce asked David if he wanted to change his motion. David: Not at this time. Sunny: The conditions are fine as drafted. I would like some clarification on #2. There could be building permits issued for interior remodeling that don't have anything to do with drainage. I would suggest maybe we could clarify that to say "Any building permit resulting in a change to the site's historic drainage that then a drainage plan is required to be submitted to the Engineering Dept prior to issuance of permit". 17 PZM6.2.92 David: I agree to change the wording in #2 to reflect this wording. Richard: I amend my second. Roll call vote: Tim, yes, David, yes, Sara, yes, Richard, yes, Bruce, yes, Roger, no. Motion carried 5 to 1. TEXT AMENDMENT FOR PARKING REOUIREMENT IN THE OFFICE ZONE DISTRICT Leslie made presentation. (attached in record) Richard: It seems to me that in section 3 there is an opportunity for the applicant to be creative and deal with the parking in other way than providing it or paying for the City to provide it so that the emphasis is on that final sentence. "The applicant shall demonstrate that this works." The onus is on the applicant to say this works just as well as payment of cash-in-lieu and that applicant agrees to provide us with monitoring system. That is not the City's job or the Planning Department's job to do that. Leslie: In the office zone district an applicant could not propose and the Commission could not approve anything below 1 and 1/2 spaces per thousand square feet on site. What we are attempting to do is give the Commission and the applicant the ability to go below 1 and 1/2. Then instead of saying straight cash-in-lieu we want to give more flexibility. Bruce: Are there objective standards for us to make that determination? Sunny: For the potential applicant if I say I have 10 bike racks and 2 transit easements and 5 spaces and I am going to rent 3 spaces and here is 45 thousand dollars for 3 spaces--what concerns me is how you objectively say that mitigates your requirement. Tim: If we decide they haven't mitigated their requirement with this quasi judicial right that we have, do we say then automat- ically you have to pay cash-in-lieu. You had your chance and you didn't perform so now we demand that you do what we say. Leslie: Yes. It also is going to be very site specific because, for example, the library situation we can only fit one space on 18 PZM6.2.92 ,- site. So we have to come up with a plan that works. But to say given the location, given the burden that is on the neighborhood already by people parking we want to support the parking garage. Sunny: But how are you going to know? What is the standard. What is the criteria? How do I say this represents the equivalent of- Richard: If we are dealing with a shell such as you have at Aspen S&L building, you don't know who is going to be in there it is hard for you to put forward a parking mitigation plan when you don't know who is going to be in there and where they-- Sunny: I can't sell it unless I solve the parking problem. I don't think this is going to come up that many times. But in those cases where you have older buildings in the 0 Office zone that met a criteria that was less than it is today I think as a practitioner what I would represent is I would stay away from things like carpools because they are a nightmare to enforce. I am basically going to say I can't provide on-site. I can't afford to pay $500,000 or whatever and there is X spaces over here across the street and there are some down here and it doesn't seem to be a problem in the neighborhood and I am happy to replace the parking when the building is demolished and I will give you $50,00 or whatever. What worries me is the deal is on the table, I am here at special review--#l how does staff say that is OK and #2 how do you make findings that are appropriate that Joe Blow across the street doesn't sue me or sue the City over it? Where it really becomes a problem is like the Aspen Savings & Loan or the Library where there is an existing facility. I can't expand it or put in any more parking. I can't pay cash-in-lieu. I can't pay a million dollars for a piece of land and then write a check for $350,000 to the city and then rent it to anybody at a rent that will cover all of that. So it just sits there. And that is the real problem that the County has at the moment. Sara: How about what Harley suggested with the development he would like to do affordable housing where he literally provided little wagon carts for the grocery-route going. There are just so many different things that are more interesting than cars. Sunny: It is a step in the right direction. It certainly is better than anything on the books today. Out of specific applications, maybe we will get some and I can fine-tune it and make it work. The first couple of people are going to be guinea pigs under the regulation. 19 ,..,.... PZM6.2.92 ""-<-" Roger: Paragraph 3, page 3--That first sentence--something like applicable only to existing structures in the Office district. Leslie: Or "Only in the Office zone district". MOTION Roger: I move to approve Ordinance 35 series 1992 as written and amended in our discussion here tonight and present to Council. Richard seconded the motion with all in favor. Roll call vote: Tim, yes, David, yes, Sara, yes, Richard, yes, Bruce, yes and Roger, yes. Bruce then adjourned the meeting. Time was 7:10. Clerk M. 20