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HomeMy WebLinkAboutcoa.pz.gmc.burl.061599Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 BOB BLAICH Well, we’ll open the Growth Management Commission th Special Meeting of June 15 . Roll call please, Jackie. JACKIE LOTHIAN Okay. Sanzone SHERI SANZONE Here LOTHIAN Unfug DOUG UNFUG Here LOTHIAN Martin PETER MARTIN Here LOTHIAN Tarver CHARLIE TARVER Here LOTHIAN Semrau TIM SEMRAU Here LOTHIAN Buettow STEVE BUETTOW Here LOTHIAN Erickson RON ERICKSON Yo LOTHIAN Mooney TIM MOONEY Here LOTHIAN Hunt ROGER HUNT Here LOTHIAN Haneman 1 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 ROGER HANEMAN Here. LOTHIAN Tygre JASMINE TYGRE Here LOTHIAN Blaich BLAICH Here. Is there anybody in the audience that’s here to speak about something that’s not on the agenda. Okay, then we’ll start with commissioner comments. We’ll just go around. Why don’t we start over here, on your side, boy . TARVER I think that life’s good. BLAICH I gave you all the time Charlie, nobody was saying anything. You could have the rest of the free time. BLAICH Staff, no comments from staff. Approval of minutes of 3/16/99. HUNT I’ll move to approve the minutes of 16 March 1999. ERICKSON Second. BLAICH All in favor. Aye. BLAICH, SANZONE, TYGRE, MARTIN, HUNT, UNFUG, MOONEY, TARVER, BUETTOW, ERICKSON, SEMRAU BLAICH Is there anybody at the table today that has a conflict of interest. Declare it. SANDOZE I do. BLAICH Did you discuss it with David. SANZONE Yes, and I’ll be stepping down and sitting in the audience. TYGRE So do we have enough people. 2 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 BLAICH Yes we do. MARTIN The minutes report reflect she’s present in the room, but she’s absented herself from voting. BLAICH We have a quorum, we’re fine. TYGRE Three. BUETTOW There’s three. TARVER We’re fine. HUNT No, they have a quorum TARVER That’s all we need BLAICH They have a quorum present, that’s all you need. TYGRE Okay. MARTIN If she were required to break a tie, she could vote under our rules. ? Thank you BLAICH Okay. The public hearing, we declare that to be open. And LOTHIAN Notice has been rec eived. BLAICH Notice has been received. Chris Bendon. CHRIS BENDON This is a public hearing to consider an exemption from the growth management scoring and competition procedures for growth management for 101 units of affordable housing to be located at Burlingame seasonal affordable housing. This project is currently under review for PUD, subdivision, with the planning and zoning commission under a separate public hearing and then will go forward onto city council. The growth management commission is charged with making a recommendation on the exemption from 3 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 growth management for city council to consider and also the method under which the affordable housing is being provided. The proposed project is 100 seasonal units , there’s one 2-bedroom manager’s apartment that’s being provided. The city P&Z has seen this presentation a couple of times, it’s gone through conceptual approval. County P&Z has not, and I asked Jim to present the project and there will be some redundancy on behalf of the city’s part. But I told Jim to kind of be quick about the presentations. And however, it does create a redundancy on the city’s behalf because the county has not seen this project so, with that I’ll pass it over to Jim. BLAICH Jim, take over. JIM CURTIS If I may. Jim Curtis, I’m representing the MAA, who’s the applicant with the consent of the city of Aspen who is the property owner. Also here is Robert Harth to answer any questions. I will defer to the two chairpeople. I can give a brief update on all of the Burlingame activities, primarily on behalf of the county’s, but since we’re running slightly behind in schedules. If it’s okay probably, the best thing is just to specifically jog down to a quick overview on the seasonal housing application. And that’s the application before everyone tonight. Whatever the preferred approach of the two chairpeople is fine. BLAICH We’ve had a rather in depth, last week, presentation, unless somebody wants to go through that whole again. So it’s up to you. MARTIN I’d opt for the shorter version and if we have time you can bring us up to date on the rest of it. CURTIS Okay, in a nutshell, this is the project that’s proceeding, no activities is taking place on the other portions of the property at this point in time. Regarding what is called Parcel B in the application before you tonight, is the seasonal housing application. The city purchased the Burlingame Ranch property in January of 1997. The property is about 222 acres. 90 acres on the east ± side of highway 82; 132 acres plus or minus ( ) on the west side of the highway. The property was purchased from the Elizabeth Paepecke Trust. The property was purchased with affordable housing funds from the city allocation of funds. The intent with the purchase was to use the property for combination of affordable housing and open space. Concurrent with the purchase of the property in January of 1997, the __ park approached city council about some type of cooperative venture or some type of partnership where the MAA could be the lead in creating a seasonal housing project. So the first question is why does the MAA want to be a developer. I can assure you, Robert doesn’t want to do that. It’s basically out of 4 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 dire necessity. For the last four to five years, approximately 178 music students have been housed in the Grand Aspen Hotel in town. To my best knowledge, that project is scheduled for demolition this coming fall, so the MAA is seeking replacement beds. So the first thing is, these beds are not proposed for any new growth by the MAA or an expansion of the student body of the MAA. The beds in the summer time are proposed simply to replace those beds that are being lost by the demolition of the Grand Aspen Hotel. The second reason the MAA is taking the lead in this; basically the MAA feels it correctly needs to step to the line and deal with it’s future for the next 50 years. I think as most of you know, the MAA is th celebrating it’s 50 Anniversary this year and what the institution is trying to do is stabilize it’s operation for the next 50 years, not to grow this operation. To stabilize the operation, probably the biggest problem facing the future of the MAA is securing a long-term set of affordable beds for the student population. So that’s the primary objective in taking the lead in trying to work some type of cooperative arrangement with the city on this piece of property. Early on there was the possibility of discussions about the Aspen Skiing Company being the wintertime partner in the project. Being the financial partner with the MAA. At this point in time, the Aspen Skiing Corporation will not be the wintertime partner; the MAA is having discussions, positive discussion with city council about the city council being the wintertime partner. Under the discussions that are presently taking place, basically this project of 200 seasonal beds would be operated and controlled exactly like Marolt Ranch. The MAA would pay its fair share of the beds and the development cost and the students would use the property June, July and August. In the wintertime the city would pay its fair share of the project cost and the 200 beds would be open to the general public in the wintertime. The project is proposed to be fully deed-restricted, comparable to the way Marolt Ranch is deed-restricted; the project is proposed to be operated virtually identical to Marolt Ranch. That’s the format that this project is coming to you tonight. The project has been through a series of design revisions , we’ve had quite a few discussions with city P&Z and city council. I can assure you, I think all of those discussions has lead to a better design for the project. Where the project stands today, is 200 seasonal beds and we’re looking at basically small cottages. And ofthese cottages, there is four units, 8 people per unit. The biggest difference between this and the Marolt Ranch units, the biggest sets of improvements, Marolt Ranch in the summertime will have 3 students per unit and sharing a unit and in the wintertime there’s either be a combination of 2 or 3 people per unit sharing a unit. Learning from that experience and speaking with property managers, there’s only 2 people per unit. And so it’s a very compatible roommate situation; there’s 2 small private bedrooms, so there’s no shared bedroom facilities and these units will have a small kitchen, which is not in the Marolt Ranch project. 5 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 To deal with the bulk and the mass of the project, what we decided, what have come to, is breaking the project down into these modules that are repetitive. The, we are looking at a modular building system, and basically, these structures are 22 feet 4 inches to the top of the roof. And then the project site will be excavated down 10 to 12 feet, in that range, such that from existing natural grade these units would be no more than 15 feet above natural grade today. So we’re sinking them down, we’re making them low and we’re trying to break the bulk and the mass by going to the small individual buildings. The 4 sets of buildings, each of them focus on their individual private courtyards and then the whole project focuses on a central commons. There’s a common building, that building will have a common laundry facility, it will have a bus waiting area, it will have a property manager’s office and there will be a 2-bedroom property manager apartment for year-round property manager. Once again, all of those recommendations are coming from discussions with the property managers out at the Marolt Ranch project. Basically, we tried in the design point of view, to try to learn from and improve upon the Marolt Ranch situation based on 10 years of experience. The proposal before you is for the MAA to use the beds in the summertime and the beds would be open to the general public in the wintertime. The project would be fully deed-restricted comparable to Marolt Ranch and the project would be operated comparable to Marolt Ranch. We agree with the planning office recommendation concerning the exemption and so in the interest of time, I would just like to respond to any specific questions. Thank you. BLAICH Commissioner’s questions, comments. SEMRAU Chris, you want to talk about the allotments. BENDON Yes, I did. Actually there’s a couple things I want to mention. One is this went to the housing authority board, they recommended the mid-cap or mid-price of category II rental, that’s about $350.00 a bedroom ; $700.00 a unit. There was some discussion about the conversion of 2-bedroom units into 1-bedroom units ; to divide the larger size unit. There was also some discussion of a few of the units having longer term leases, not being seasonal in nature. Both of those things, the 1-bedroom conversion and the longer term leases, they wanted to defer that to council. The number of units, there are 103 currently available in GMQS. This is, there’s 43 available each year and those build-up; we’ve had an allotment that’s been in excess of what’s been demanded or provided in the last few years. There’s 101 that are being requested, that leaves 2. The, I’m, this is something that’s an aside from this project, but it’s a significant issue for the P&Zs to consider in relation to the community plan. There are a lot of projects that th are being discussed: 7 and Main; Truscott; Stillwater; Burlingame Village; the 6 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 Bavarian; Aspen Mountain PUD; Downtown in-fill development; that won’t happen or in jeopardy of not happening without that allotment pool being increased on a yearly basis. That’s an aside from this project, there’s currently the allotments available to accommodate this project. That’s the only additional thing I wanted to mention. BUETTOW So you’re saying that if we use up the 101 of these units, then for the rest of the year there will be no more available units for any other projects. BENDON Right. SEMRAU Then at the first of the year there’s the additional 43, right. BENDON Yeah, and the growth management year is every June, so we’ve just passed it, we’re in the first month of the year. ERICKSON Then wouldn’t it be 146 units available if we started the 1999 calendar year. BENDON No, we’re in the new year now with 103. BUETTOW So you’ve added the 43 into this number. BENDON Right. SEMRAU So once this is approved there’s only 2 left for almost a year, 11 months. BENDON Right SEMRAU What’s the technical part of it. If we want to approve another AH project and there’s only 2 allotments left. BENDON They, there’s been a few projects approved in the county where they agreed to take them off the back. To count the units off of the total that are allowed for the 20-year growth management period and just to reduce the overall number that’s being considered. The community plan committee is doing something that’s very similar it’s to not have the yearly allotment but just to 7 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 attribute those allotments to the overall, kind of the big picture, the 700 or 800 whatever’s being discussed for the 20-year plan. SEMRAU Technically who decides that, if we get another project in 3 months, that requires allotments, how would that work. BENDON They would be competing in allotments in excess of what’s allowed. There’s a provision, and I’m not sure how many units it results in but there’s a provision for kind of a back-up pool. There’s a calculation for it, it’s not that great but it’s a, there’s also a provision for applying for units in the future. SEMRAU So is your feeling, if we approve this, does it put any of the future projects in jeopardy. BENDON It does, yeah thoroughly. SEMRAU Okay. BENDON I think it’s a discussion for the community plan groups, both city/county P&Zs. TRAVER This was brought up 2 years ago when the officials made the agreement of 500 units in 3 years, which was made at a housing seminar a year and a half ago. And there were 2 questions of where to get the allotments for 200, 500 units in 3 years and also where they were going to get the money. And so in a year and a half, or however. That was that a year and a half ago. I haven’t heard anything going forward on either of those in a year and a half, so it would. It greatly scares me that you would close the door on, if we haven’t got anything in a year and a half to work towards that, in other words changing whether the allotment goes up from 43 or whether we look at --- a 20-year pool. Why do we believe that will happen now within the next 6 months when the next project comes in . ERICKSON Well, I think that would put the pressure on city council, they’re the one who makes the decision to open this thing up. Right now they’re under no pressure, the only people under pressure are these people because of something that city council didn’t do, they’re being held for ransom, and I don’t think that’s fair to them. I think that the only, if we approve this, and I think that puts it on city council. If they want any of their housing projects to go forward, their housing group is going to come in front of them and say listen, you have to do 8 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 something to open this allotment up or else we can’t build the things that we are building. BLAICH Tim MOONEY I’m concerned that if we use these allotments to build this limited style of housing and the city is going to be responsible for using it for 9 months out of the year, let’s say, and the MAA is going to use it for 3 months out of the year, why aren’t we building it to the standards that the housing authority needs to supplement the permanent population that wants to move back to the community. BENDON Well, I think they have stated that the lower category rental units are one of the primary goals. MOONEY In this configuration with a marginal kitchen. BENDON Well, I’m referring to the housing guidelines, which just states things in general, not this configuration necessarily, but it doesn’t refer to one. It just says the lower category rental units are one of the highest priorities. They set out some priorities for both themselves and for private developers to look at to see what are stated goals of the housing authority. MOONEY And I have another question. I’m, I can wait. BLAICH Yes. CURTIS Point of clarification, at one time in the looking at design revisions, we proposed or looked at a 4-bedroom module sharing a single kitchen, and under the discussions or classification of units that would be 50 units. At that point in time, the feedback we received both from the housing office and city council and I believe the P&Z, but I distinctly do not recall that discussion, was, well would it not be a better product if you take a 4-bedroom and essentially split it into 2 smaller units. And we’ve done that. And I think it does make a much better product. Now the consequence of doing a better product is under the definition of a unit, the unit count has gone from 50 to 100. Representing the, representing this project, I would hate to see maybe the tail wagging the dog, not creating the best physical product in terms of compatibility, usability, livability that I think, all of us sitting at this table, would like to achieve, if anything. 9 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 BLAICH Before you, there’s something I neglected to do, it was called to my attention, I just want to state that prior to this meeting I was contacted by a member of the group that’s putting this forward and there was less than a 1 minute conversation about the project. And they just indicating a sense of urgency and they hoped to come to some conclusion. And I just, wanted to bring that to your attention and I was not a prejudiced by the statement, as a matter of fact I think that we all knew about this urgency before. I should have brought that up at the disclosure. I checked with David Hoefer and he said there should be no conflict of interest. I was, legally, I declare that. Steven BUETTOW What’s the construction schedule on this project, between now and next June. CURTIS We would be prepared to break ground in 45 days th st between July 15 and August the 1 and we feel confident using the modular st system. We would be in and operating by June 1 of 2000, when the MAA students would come into town. BUETTOW So you would be ready to go by next June. CURTIS Yes BLAICH Tim SEMRAU Am I correct, that these are technically considered dormitory rooms. All of them right. BENDON No. We actually had that discussion as it relates to school impact fees, but we defined dormitory units and one of the critical things that qualifies a dormitory unit is that the unit itself is dependent on some sort of common facility. A common kitchen, kitchen, a common bathroom and these units, the way they are designed are really stand alone units. They have their own kitchens. They have their own bathrooms. SEMRAU Sure, but I can’t quite read the dimensions here but isn’t the footage of each 2-bedroom unit way below the minimum net livable. What’s the footage of each, do you know, 2-bedroom unit. CURTIS The 2-bedroom units are 480 square feet. 10 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 SEMRAU Okay, so if I’m correct, that’s under the net livable for a 2-bedroom unit. Correct. BENDON You are correct, in the housing guidelines. SEMRAU Right. By quite a bit actually and the reason for that is, if I recall originally these were considered dormitory, so they could be a lot smaller. CURTIS The housing guidelines has a special review provision for dormitory units and that’s the way these were envisioned and will function. I mean, a duck will be a duck. In the hope to make the project better, getting feedback both from the property managers at Marolt and from the housing office staff itself, they said we encourage you to do small private bedrooms. We encourage you to do a cooking facility and we encourage you to try to minimize the number of people in a shared space for compatibility. We think that helps the project and that’s how we should proceed at this point. SEMRAU Actually , I think that you’re totally right. It has helped, that they are more livable. My point is technically, we’re giving away 99% of the allotments to units that are 60% of full size units and I just wanted everyone to be aware of that, what we’re doing here. It has nothing to do with the livability, which I think you have vastly improved, I agree, but we ought to be careful of what we’re doing here. BLAICH Yes, Tim MOONEY I’m wondering about the wintertime use and I can understand how the MAA can make assurances that when their students are occupying this facility there won’t be a growth generation factor. But during the winter what are the assurances that you can give us that those occupants won’t be generating growth. CURTIS The only, I can only say it will be operated like Marolt Ranch, be no private entities for the city. No party is requesting any more mitigation credits for these units. That issue is dead. TARVER There were requests when the Ski Company was. CURTIS At one point in time when the Ski Company was considering being the wintertime partner, the Ski Company had made a request for mitigation credits on a pro rata share. At the discussions between the Ski Company 11 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 and the MAA and city council, it was decided in the interest of the community it would be best to not have had any mitigation credits associated with this project. That’s acceptable to the MAA, the city being a wintertime partner is not receiving any mitigation credits. BLAICH Ron Erickson ERICKSON I th ink that the MAA, which represents about 35% of this project is very well represented at this meeting. However, I feel a little uncomfortable with the other 65% that represents the city’s usage of this product, in terms of what they’re actually going to do with it, in terms of who’s going to get it. I was reading through this whole mass of information and it was almost like all right, we’ll approve the parking but you have to give us a couple of units. And we’ll approve the transportation, but you’ll have to give us a couple of units. So it seems like a certain amount of units have already been promised to specific government entities and I think that’s appropriate that we know what that is. One of the things, the big issue that was raised here, specifically was about this school land dedication standards with the idea that they are not going to have to any more, they weren’t going to have any children. Well I don’t think you can discriminate against families or single parents, if the city is housing their employees. So there’s certainly going to be school land dedication considerations here and I think the city should be prepared to present those things. And I haven’t seen anything from the city about this project, I mean they’re like a silent partner, the city in the background. But they are the major partner here, they’re the major user in this project. And what’s happened, what are they going to do with it. We know what the MAA’s doing, I have no problem with the MAA, I know what they are doing with it. What’s the other 9 months going to be used for . BLAICH Chris or Julie Ann, do what to try that question. BENDON Maybe I’ll give it a shot. RFTA has, as with several applications that have come through in recent, requested a few units as mitigation for their service that they provide. There’s nothing in the land use code that sets up that as an impact assessment. ERICKSON That’s fine Chris, what I’m saying is, not what they’re not going to do, not what the code says they can’t do. I want to know what they are going to do. Do they have any plans . The MAA has a lot of plans and they’re the one who is driving this thing and they are the ones who are designing these units. 12 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 BENDON Not that I know of. ERICKSON What’s the city going to do. BENDON As far as I know, it’s open to the public in full. ERICKSON So 70% of this project is blue sky, right. BENDON Right. It would be managed just like Marolt is managed in the winter. Like Truscott is, if you want housing you sign up and try get housing. That’s the way I understand it. There’s no, to my knowledge, any designation to any certain department or user group. JULIE ANN WOODS I can BLAICH Julie Ann please. WOODS I can tell you that’s it’s factual at this point in ti me that we have not been privy to any information from city council, city manager or whatever that would say that some of these units are ear marked specifically for the city, that’s not part of the discussion. ERICKSON Well, we’re thinking of granting 95% of the allotment and the city is going to be using this allotment and it’s going to come into conflict with many of their other projects that are going to coming forth. You would think that someone would come up with some sort of position statement on this project, for the city. WOODS Well, the citys interest is to provide affordable housing even if it’s 9 months out of the year and that the position the city is taking on it , they’re saying that, you know, we know that this going to be used 3 months out of the year for music students, the rest of the 9 will be filled by people who can qualify and be placed into these housing units. What I’m saying we don’t have, unlike Water Place Housing, which is specifically earmarked for city employees etc, that’s not the case with this. This is just. ERICKSON No, what I meant is that it’s like, we’re taking about fees, various fees, park fees, school fees, is there an agreement between the city and the MAA that those are going to be prorated on the basis of usage. So in other words the city is picking up 70% or 65% of the costs associated with these mitigations. 13 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 BENDON That I don’t know about. WOODS That’s a decision that would have to be determined by city council. ERICKSON No, I think a lot o f these things have to be determined by city council. BLAICH Jim, do have some input on this. CURTIS Ron the discussion with city council has been that yes, you’re correct any fees, costs, etc associated with the project are proposed to be shared one-third two-thirds based upon the allocated use of the two parties. ERICKSON Where did that come from Jim . CURTIS It’s just breaking down. ERICKSON No, I mean is that a resolution from city council, is that something that’s been formally proposed. It’s that in writing and signed or anything like that. Or is that just something that somebody told you. CURTIS It’s been proposed by the MAA and the city council is aware of it. No. ERICKSON So there are no agreements. CURTIS So there’s no agreements. Both parties have looked at preliminary development performas, operating performas; both parties have investigated the ability to do tax exempt financing. Like any two partners considering a cooperative venture. The, let me clarify one point, and I think it’s a very good point, the MAA in a cooperative basis, we went before the housing th board, let’s see today’s the 15 , we went before the housing board on June the 2nd and we said if the housing board would like, the MAA is prepared to look at converting 2 buildings into year-round units. And the housing board was very appreciative of that offer and basically said city council should decide that, but yes we are appreciative the offer. ERICKSON Anyone from housing here. BLAICH Yes. Peter. 14 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 PETER MARTIN I was oblivious to this problem until I opened my packet this weekend, about what this does to other housing projects. We did not get a heads up on this and I’m very concerned about it, as to whether I can vote intelligently. We should’ve had a heads up and I apologize for our ignorance or my ignorance at least, but I did not know that we had this problem until Sunday when I was reading the materials. And I am concerned about my qualifications to vote on this, particularly when it makes moot all the other housing projects that we have been studying and everything we are doing with the Aspen Area Community Plan. It seems like a wasted effort on that. BLAICH Steve BUETTOW Oh, has the applicant considered building 60% of this project in a phased attempt, because there are 60 allotments that are unused to this date and that would, and the problem approving those and that leaves 43 for the coming year free to be allotted to other perspective projects. CURTIS We have not consider ed that and from the applicant’s point of view, it really defeats the purpose of having to make this thing cost effective working with the modular system, working trying to standardize the units. Where we could do everything fairly quickly, bringing the units in, set them, have st the project ready to go by June 1 of next year. BLAICH Charlie TARVER I look at this a little differently, housing’s housing. Here’s somebody who’s willing to build it. We need to , we should be using every allotment we have. We should be borrowing form the future, not worrying about saving them for a group that has so far has been unable to build them very fast. Housing is housing. If you do not build this 100, 200 units. This is housing 200 kids , they are living in other housing which just displaces someone else. So I don’t have a problem with the allotment, yet initially it kind of bothered me some, saying well, what about other projects. Well you know , there hasn’t been this great amount of projects being built. And I guarantee, I agree, you know, Mr. Erickson here that if the city has a project here that they want built, they’ll change the allotment number. So that’s never been our problem, just like in a free market, if they came in, on a free-market house. There’s 15 allotments and Hines comes in and wants 15 and there’s 15 there, we say okay. You know here is somebody who is actually willing and they’ve got something going forward and they’re going to put one year from now, 200 new pillows into an affordable housing project that meets a lot of the criteria. And while I think we can find problems with 15 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 everything, you know, Peter, housing, so we save 40 of these for what. For another housing project that gives us 40 more pillows. It’s still the same number of people can sleep in the upper valley at night and don’t drive and don’t everything else. Now, there is a little bit of a question of are we giving them all to one person, but if someone came under free-market just looking for houses, we would give them all to one person. MARTIN I guess part of it has to do with the timing, that we’re just, takes it out of this fiscal year. TARVER But it’s a pillow is a pillow, is a pillow, and it’s one less person driving from Basalt. MARTIN What if this were conditioned upon change in the code that could go through an emergency ordinance. TARVER But don’t penalize someone who is building housing for our general ineptness of, you know, seeing far enough ahead that we’re saying we’re going to build 500 units in 3 years but we only have 46 units a year. BLAICH Do you want to answer that. And then you’re next. BENDON I just want to mention that that issue has come up and the housing committee that met, the AACP, that there’s this demand, this pent up demand for housing. This kind of fist in hand, 500 units in 3 years, all these projects that are, you know, technically in the pipeline but have not formally come forward, then 43 units a year, is that really relevant. And, you know, maybe that should be raised or just done away with, and I think that’s an on-going discussion. BLAICH Do you want to respond to that, because there are other people that also want to speak. MARTIN Just for clarification, how can that be accomplished. nd Just for some code amendments here. Your 2 paragraph addresses that. BENDON Yes, it’s a very, extremely simple code amendment , it’s just an acknowledgement by the city council and the BOCC that they are going to change that yearly allotment. The code amendment itself is just changing the number. 16 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 UNFUG Are you saying that that is something that we should put in a condition of approval, at this point. BENDON I wouldn’t condition the project on it, because the project has allotments that can go forward, but if the GMC wants to, in a separate resolution say this is an issue that has some bearing on the community and provide in a separate resolution your recommendation. UNFUG Well, I find myself caught on this, on the horns of this dilemma because I can remember when I first moved here in ’85 going out to visit a friend who worked for the MAA at Park Meadows, which was about 100 yards from here. Which was a bunch of modulars that were dragged onto what’s now the Golf Course, and it was a wretched spot but it was housing. So here we are 15 years down the road proposing a decent version of that and we have to have the discussion of not having enough units, or whether they are the type of unit that we need. Clearly this town needs this type of unit. It has for a long time and will continue to and I would like to get something into this approval directing staff to proceed with the code amendment. If it’s possible. BLAICH Unless you want to respond to that statement. CURTIS Well actually, I have some information from city council that took place last night that may be relevant to this discussion. I actually attended city council last night, just for the swearing-in ceremony, and no specific things. You know, there was no basketball game on, no hockey, I’m too thin to drink so what do you do. But, last night city council adopted Resolution 52 series of 1999 which was a reaffirmation, reconfirmation of the city’s long range affordable housing code. And basically this resolution said historically the city has been very aggressive in affordable housing, affordable housing is, remains a major community concern. And demand the city council reaffirm our commitment to construct, try to create 716 deed-restricted affordable housing units between now and the year 2010. So, there is a reconfirmation, even as of last night, the city would like to create affordable housing. So I think if some form of a condition or recommendation relative to a code amendment would not be inconsistent with this resolution. BLAICH Jasmine, you had your hand up. TYGRE I just wanted to make a comment to the fact about the type of hearing that we’re involved in right now, which is to decide whether or not to exempt this project from growth management scoring and competition. 17 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 Therefore I think the question of allotments and number of allotments is really relevant, in the old days when everybody used to have to go through growth management, you wanted to, there were only a certain number of allotments available and only those projects that scored the highest were the ones that were given the allotments. I think that most of the people on the commission who have expressed concern about this project, so are we precluding the better project or perhaps the project that would have gotten higher scoring down the road, if it had had a chance to compete. But we’re not asking this project to compete, and therefore I think the question of allotments becomes really serious. I know that I for one, if I think that nobody else would ever get an allotment in this year to build permanent housing for year-round residents, I couldn’t possibly support this. And I think that the allotment question is something that is really basic to this whole discussion. BLAICH Tim Mooney. MOONEY I agree. Taking out of the proposed 1998 community plan it says housing policies should emphasize development of neighborhoods and community, not just units. Housing sites should be rated with emphasis placed on living within walking distance to transit, employment areas and social connections. When we delve into this, we find out there are more marginal aspects to this design, to this location. We find out that it can’t adequately sustain the amount of parking that it needs to be an MAA project let alone be a city project for 9 months. And that one of their alternatives is to park their cars at Truscott where I think the housing should be and I think this is where the parking should be. So, the aspect of it being within the airport no-build zone gives it an aspect of marginality for me, and just the aspect of all the transportation loopholes that aren’t in place yet. To say that you can walk to this or there’s going to be a light here, or to, you know, really not having information in place that says what the transportation costs to the city are going to be for 9 months. And is that really something that we can afford to add on to this project, to the city. It’s about $100,000.00 a year to run buses out there, if I understand it correctly. I don’t know if that makes this one of those projects that we really need to put on a fast track. I guess that’s it. BLAICH Yes, go ahead. CURTIS I was actually going to save this to the second part of the hearing, which was the PUD discussion, but Tim did make 2 factually incorrect statements. One concerning the summertime parking and the other one concerning the project being within the object free zone of airport, neither of those are factually correct. 18 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 MOONEY Well, that’s your opinion. UNFUG W ell, I mean, if we’re talking about this project being under-parked, is that what you’re saying. MOONEY There are 2 alternative plans that being proposed by the applicant because there is inadequate parking on this. And UNFUG Well that’s fine by m e. I think that’s what the land use code needs to start doing, have maximum parking requirements and minimum density. So, for me that’s if the inverse is true. You know , I find this to be a better project because of that and because having known music students tend to ride bikes, they don’t want to bring their car in for the summer. It lends itself wonderfully to that aspect. I haven’t seen the other alternative but to me that’s just BLAICH Peter MARTIN The county P&Z has not seen the project as far as its design and stuff like that. I’d like to add input from you guys or tell us what you think of design before I can decide what Tim just said. SEMRAU It’s come a long way. BLAICH We’ve been through this several times, and I would say that we’ve had a lot of sessions, work sessions, critiques and every time they’ve come back, the plan has improved. And, I think the questions have not been so much the physical facility or the housing units themselves. The question obviously is one that is this the proper location and what other, what it might displace in the case of allotments in other cases. That’s sort of a general statement but other people on the commission might want to elaborate on it or disagree with me. TARVER What official thin gs have you done with this. BLAICH Well, we, if you had seen the whole series of plans that came in front of us, a lot had to do with the allocation of parking, the location of parking, the way the buildings were designed on the site. And actually the structure, the design of the buildings themselves and every time the objections came up or the recommendations came up from commission, they went back and came back with a new proposal. Which, In my recollection we always thought it a 19 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 better solution in terms of where it had been before. So we saw steps throughout this whole process of improvement on the overall design. ERICKSON Height, height, excavation of lots, size of berms, BLAICH We recommended excavation ERICKSON Leaving the berms as potential parking areas and so there were a lot of areas that we discussed that have been given consideration and been implemented and at least attached to these newly revised plans. BENDON There’s 2 site plans attached to conceptual approval that were vastly different but one was a kind of a courtyard scheme with the removed crescent shaped parking. The second one was ERICKSON Parking in the center BENDON Parking in the center ERICKSON Basically the same structure around, this is really different than what we first saw. BENDON Right ERICKSON Both in terms of individual buildings, number of units per building and site layout. TARVER But this was approved at conceptual by the City Planning & Zoning. BENDON It was approved at conce ptual but ERICKSON Approved at conceptual BENDON at both the commission and at council, there was no, I guess satisfaction with the site plans that were approved and there was a request that the applicant come back to these work sessions and to work on site planning. And that’s what this has resulted in. BLAICH I think in many cases conceptual is just for that purpose, you want to see where you’re going with it, get your input. And my reading on this 20 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 is that the applicant listened to the input from the commission and went back and restudied it and came back with better solutions in all cases. So there’s a different issue then what seems to be coming on the table tonight. Jasmine, did you have a question . TYGRE Yes, I just wanted to say th at I don’t mean disrespectful to the county P&Z but what we’re talking about now is the GMQS, our GMQS exemption aspects of this plan, I think that you should try to stick to that at this particular point. TARVER You’re not being disrespectful, you’re not understanding what we’re asking. There has to be, in order for us to give an exemption, and I’m speaking for myself, you have to have an understanding of why, of a project, to a certain amount so that you can feel comfortable in saying this is something we want to exempt with a possibility of future projects having a little rougher time. Which is what we’re being asked to do. MARTIN May I ask if you’re satisfied with the quality of the project. TYGRE What me personally. I prefer not to comme nt at this time. MARTIN Well we have this big emphasis throughout the AACP on building in quality and I’m not hearing a word except that it’s been improved. BLAICH Well I think that, Ron you had your hand up, is that a response to that question. ERICKSON Yes and no. I mean a lot, I’m not so sure, I’m caught in a quandary here. We’re supposed to, our one decision here is are we going to exempt this from the growth management plan. And it’s got conceptual approval, it’s approved, it’s had an improved process all the way through the whole situation with 4 to 5 different sessions. Specific design questions, do I like everything about this, that’s something I’ll deal with when P&Z deals with this question in the next hour and a half or six hours or whatever it takes. But just for, I mean the thing is, we approved this under conceptual, as I understand it, that we felt that this was an appropriate project for that piece of property in that location and that it was consistent with the Aspen Area Community Plan and city guidelines concerning affordable housing. 21 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 MOONEY It wasn’t a unanimous vote. ERICKSON It was not a unanimous decision. Okay, but I mean it was approved that way and I think that city council approved it that way. So where are we going from now . I mean the thing is, we only have one question. Should we exempt this, if there is a question about allotment . I think if we exempt this, city council is going to have to do something to increase the allotment or non of their housing project in here go forward. And I just don’t think they’re aware of it or the importance of it. BLAICH Before Roger, Julie Ann had here hand up, I think, in response to this. WOODS I want to make a point here because, you know, when we do the competition part of this, or when we have these exceptional projects those are the projects that don’t fall under this category. This is an exempt project. We still have to take it out of the bucket, but basically the point that I’m, that staff is trying to make, is that yeah there’s this pool of x amount but we’re just bringing it to your attention, we didn’t need for it to be, the end all here. But clearly with the direction we’ve been going with the community plan and clearly with council knowing and endorsing a resolution last night. They know that they are going to have to be looking at this pool and reallocation of growth management allocations in the pool. So I really don’t think it’s fair to say I don’t think they’re aware of it, they’re very aware that they’re going to have to be looking at increasing them in order to meet the community’s goal of affordable housing. And I think that Charlie is right, that the benefit of a project like this, is that is going to move some people out of what it is being occupied otherwise in the community. And I don’t think you can dismiss that, and I think that’s an important aspect of this plan that you need to really be giving some good hard thought to. I do not think that it’s important for you to be hung up on this issue about we only have x amount of allocations and a better project may come along. Do you know what, this is the best project we got on the books today. ERICKSON It’s the only one that we have on the books today. BLAICH Roger Hun t HUNT My only question really is could this project be improved if it had to go through GMQS. Because it has not reached my threshold of acceptability yet and is the GMQS the proper mechanism to get what I think 22 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 should be done with this project. That’s my quandary and probably part of the county P&Zs quandary as well. BLAICH Could I raise a question on your statement, what would it be at GMQS that would be different then what we are already doing in the Planning and Zoning and what we are going to be doing in the next ERICKSON Well I think that’s where it’s appropriate it, I don’t think that it’s appropriate here. BLAICH That’s what I’m saying, is this, or what improvements you might feel or others feel can be made and held at that level. Because we had this kind of dialog throughout the whole project and we’ve gone step by step improving, everybody seems to think that we’ve improved the process. Although there’s still questions MOONEY Well HUNT If it’s in the doldrums already and yo u have 50% improvement and you haven’t quite gotten up there, you know, so it’s an improvement, yeah but, as I said I’m in a real quandary about it. You know , if this project had to compete, maybe they would have done better, is all I can say. BLAICH I guess we have TYGRE I have a point of clarification BLAICH Just let me make one comment on that, it isn’t competing with something and that’s one of the problems. If it was competing, we would sit here and we would have a little competition going. But the thing is, this is the only thing, this is the only game in town right now and we don’t have something to compare it to, I don’t know what people are eluding to, comparing it to other projects, I don’t see other projects. TYGRE No, no. BLAICH But Tim Mooney had his arm-up, hand-up. TYGRE I have a point of clarification. BLAICH Please go ahead. 23 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 TYGRE On this particular issue. In, under growth management, projects must meet a threshold, regardless of whether there’s another project in the works or not. And that’s the threshold issue that Roger’s talking about, that all I’m going to say, it’s a clarification. BLAICH Thank you. Tim Mooney. MOONEY And another point, in a PUD design is everything. And if there are marginal aspects to this site, can the design carry the site. For me, in this project, it can’t. BLAICH I would like to suggest that we listen to some comments, we can come back to the table afterwards with some comments. I think that the public is here and we ought to hear from the public. TARVER Did you guys score this on. With respect to the interim housing plan, which you guys adopted, that we can up with a year and a half ago for all employee housing parcels. BLAICH An actual scoring process. TARVER Yes. BLAICH No, we did not. UNFUG Is staff bringing it forward with reviewing it for the criteria in the memo. Organized it. BENDON Yes, I did. I did look at the interim housing guidelines, those, this is kind of an aside, those unfortunately weren’t being as corporated as much as the county P&Z would like in the AACP. TARVER Right now that’s the adopted plan for the county and the city of how to decide where housing goes. And here’s the first project that comes up and it’s not used. BENDON I’ve reviewed the interim housing guidelines, it’s adjacent to existing developments, it’s adjacent to transit service, it’s, I don’t believe and these are kind of conjectured maybe opinions, but I don’t believe it’s the problem. I don’t believe it’s sprawl. It’s an appropriate use of funds, yes, it’s 24 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 compact development, it doesn’t chew up the countryside. It takes advantages of efficiencies and infrastructures TARVER I mean the idea of that, those guidelines in that plan, was so that we didn’t have nebulous conversations. And you had things that you could go through and say , yes it does well on criteria 1; 2 it does bad on; 3 it does good; 4, 5, 6 & 7. So that we wouldn’t have circular discussions for hours on end, as to whether this is an appropriate allocation of our resources of the valley. And here it’s not being used, and that doesn’t make sense to me. Thank you. BLAICH Okay, well I would like to open it up so that we can come back to the table afterwards anyway. I would like to open it up to public discussion. There’s no comment from the public , then we’ll come back to the table. Peter MARTIN I wasn’t trying to get the cart before the horse, but I did want to defer to a consensus if there had been one up here. And I would do that respectfully because you’ve looked at this for a long time. But I cannot and should not be asked to vote on this in an intelligent manner based upon the information which I received in the packet, which just had a chance to peruse in the meeting. And accordingly, I’m going to move to table this for a period of 2 weeks or until it can be rescheduled, so that we can study it a little bit more. And at least I can vote intelligently. I don’t expect it will be a motion for a second, but that’s my motion to table for a period of 2 weeks. BLAICH Is there a second to that motion. BUETTOW I’ll second BLAICH Discussion LOTHIAN Who seconded, please. BLAICH We have 2, Steve was first. BLAICH Discussion, yes Charlie. TARVER You know, Peter I think, the design part of it is in very capable hands. Your assumption has to be, or at least my assumption has to be that the design part of this, you know, we’re saying yes to give the allocation, it doesn’t get built tomorrow. It still has to come to final design, so the things that I think 25 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 that you are worrying about, design, parking and stuff like that has to go through a planning and zoning commission still. And so, my assumption has to be, if it’s a terrible design and it’s in the wrong place, that’s Mr. Mooney’s job. Mine is if it will pass through this board twice, should it get an allocation. And so hopefully, without an issue, even without knowing the design parameters of this, your assumption is it has to pass these guys twice. So it’s going to be, it’s going to go through all those filters. Your only choice and your only charge is if that happens, should it get its allocation. BLAICH Yes, Ron ERICKSON I agree with him. TARVER For one night BLAICH And he hasn’t even been sh aring his chips with you. ERICKSON Or his diet coke. CURTIS If I may, this is the public review draft of the Aspen Area Updated Community Plan as dated on about 45 days ago, April of 1999. And it is a draft and clearly is subject to change, like any draft document. But in reviewing this document, just as a citizen of the community, I was very interested on page 13, of the document, it had the oversight committee reached a consensus in February of 1999 on listing what they determined or identified to be high priority affordable housing sites. Basically it says, the oversight committee, the oversight committee in February of 1999 consensus was established on a number of sites identified as being high priority for affordable housing in the near future. The committee determined that we should focus our energy on developing affordable housing on these sites. This proposal and this location is located as one of the sites and if I may, for the record, I would just like to pass this out. And as I say, it is a draft document, clearly is subject to change. But I did find it interesting that at that point in time there was a level of consensus. HUNT And it was also found that it was one of the most difficult sites to deal with to. MARTIN In response to that in that very document, the third line down, it says 50 allocated units. MOONEY This is the revised. 26 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 CURTIS That was when we were looking at 4 4-bedrooms BENDON 4 4-bedroom units CURTIS 4 bedrooms per module MARTIN I understand th at you split them, with this document it was going to use up 50 allocations. BENDON Right. There’s been changes in the numbers but the beds have the same but at that time there was 50 units. BLAICH Well. We have a motion on the floor. Is there further discussion on that motion. If not, then I think that we should take a vote. TARVER Oh, I have one. What are you going to know more in 2 weeks . Because you’re not going to meet with these guys in the next 2 weeks. MARTIN I hope I know a l ot more in 2 weeks. But I TARVER Just a question, make sure that we’re not wasting peoples time. MARTIN I think that we should have had a heads up on this Charlie, I resent that we didn’t have it. You live here in Aspen to see all that, so I’ve read the newspapers but I was not alert to all the problems on this. BLAICH Julie Ann you had your hand up. WOODS Yes, I want to you know, to try and focus, and I know that this may be after the fact, because I know there’s a motion on the table. However, Exhibit A is intended to give you the criteria by which you are supposed to be judging this process. And you have as much information, I believe, that you need to have to make a decision on this. And I agree with Charlie, I don’t know that there’s much more that be brought to the table in 2 weeks that’s going to be more than what the commission, the growth management commission, is seeing at this point in time. Now we know that we have another hearing on the final PUD following this action, and so I would welcome the county commissioners if they want to hear more information about the project, they could stay for that discussion if it would help them. But I think that the criteria, to the best that we can provide it 27 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 for you is in this Exhibit, is here in your hands now. I would ask you to focus on that if you can, so that we can come to some conclusion on this rather than tabling it. BLAICH Well, I think that we should call the vote on this. Jackie would you please roll call. LOTHIAN Okay. ERICKSON Would you read the motion. LOTHIAN The motion is HOEFER It’s a motion to continue. LOTHIAN To continue for 2 weeks to re-study the application. Are we ready . BLAICH Yes, roll call please LOTHIAN Charlie TARVER No LOTHIAN Tim Semrau SEMRAU No LOTHIAN Peter Martin MARTIN Aye LOTHIAN Tim Mooney MOONEY No LOTHIAN Ron Erickson ERICKSON No LOTHIAN Doug Unfug 28 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 UNFUG No LOTHIAN Steve Buettow BUETTOW No LOTHIAN Roger Hunt HUNT Yes LOTHIAN Jasmi ne Tygre TYGRE No LOTHIAN Bob Blaich BLAICH No ERICKSON Get everybody HOEFER 8-2 LOTHIAN Roger, 8-2. BLAICH 8-2, we’re back to the table, the motion was defeated. Ron. ERICKSON I think I’d like to make a motion that we grant the 1 01 units exemption from the growth management. TARVER I’ll second that BLAICH Charles second. LOTHIAN Charlie second. ERICKSON Somewhere in here there’s a recommended motion. LOTHIAN I’ll do that in the minutes. UNFUG Would you accept an amendment 29 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 ERICKSON I’ll be happy to hear it. UNFUG To have staff pursue a code amendment allowing a change in the allotted number. ERICKSON I would like to have a separate motion on that, I’m in favor of it. I’d like to do that , I’d like to make it official to city council that they have to do something on the allotment process. However I don’t think that it’s appropriate within this motion for this project because we should be as Julie Ann said, we shouldn’t probably even have thought about that. That’s not part of our reasons for denying. UNFUG And I agree with you, this will turn up the heat, regardless ERICKSON I’d love to see a motion to that and I’d support it, so I would not like to amend it and BLAICH Roger Hunt HUNT Your motion did include the recommended conditions. ERICKSON Oh, okay. LOTHIAN Okay, on page 4. ERICKSON Recommended, let’s see, I move to recommend to the city, Aspen City Council the growth management exemption of 101 affordable housing units for the “Burlingame Seasonal Housing” project, with the conditions th listed in the Community Development memo dated June 15 1999. LOTHIAN Charlie, do you amend your second . TARVER Yes, dear. BLAICH Further discussions on the motion. No further discussion, roll call please. LOTHIAN Doug UNFUG Aye 30 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 LOTHIAN Steve BUETTOW Yes LOTHIAN Tim Semrau SEMRAU Yes LOTHIAN Peter MARTIN Abstain LOTHIAN Charlie TARVER Yes LOTHIAN Tim Mooney MOONEY No LOTHIAN Jasmine TYGRE No LOTHIAN Roger Hunt HUNT No LOTHIAN Bob Blaich BLAICH Yes LOTHIAN Ron Erickson ERICKSON Yes LOTHIAN 6-3, 1 abstention, It passes. BLAICH passes, thank you. And you are invitied to stay for the next step to this process. 31 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 UNFUG I would like to move to empower staff to do the necessary code amendments to increase the number of allowable housing units to 100 or any number that they see fit. BLAICH second BUETTOW Second BLAICH Discussion, Jasmine TYGRE Do we really want to give them a specific number or should we tie it to the number that have been discussed in the catch-up plans. UNFUG That’s a good question, I don’t know that we need to. ERICKSON No, I don’t think so. I think that the county is doing it, borrowing from the total allotments, all the code amendment has to say is let’s get rid of the yearly allotment and then just have an overall allotment that we can use as necessary. UNFUG Right, my feeling is it will probably be similar to what they are talking about with the AACP update. The overall number may not change but the allowable per year increases. TYGRE I think your motion says that. BLAICH Do you want to restate your motion. Let’s restate the motion and see if it’s incorporated. LOTHIAN Doug, we can restate it just to increase. UNFUG Okay. LOTHIAN Move to empower staff to pursue the necessary code amendment to increase the allotment. Is that good enough . UNFUG For affordable housing. BLAICH Do you want to amend your second. BUETTOW yes 32 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 BLAICH Amended, seconded, approved. Comment. Discussion. Vote, Jackie please. LOTHIAN Okay, here we go around the table, Charlie. TARVER Yes LOTHIAN Ron ERICKSON Yes LOTHIAN Tim Mooney MOONEY Yes LOTHIAN Rog er Hunt HUNT Yes LOTHIAN Jasmine TYGRE Yes LOTHIAN Bob BLAICH Yes LOTHIAN Steve BUETTOW Yes LOTHIAN Tim SEMRAU Yes LOTHIAN Peter MARTIN Yes LOTHIAN Doug 33 Transcript Growth Management Commission June 15, 1999 UNFUG Yes HOEFER Sheri can actually vote on this LOTHIAN S heri SANZONE Yes LOTHIAN Sorry Roger, second Roger. Next time. TARVER Is this the very first one. MARTIN Thank you LOTHIAN 11-0 Thank you very much BLAICH Let’s take a couple minute break and start the second meeting. Just a couple minutes for necessity. 34