- I'd like to call to order this. Meeting of the Monroe County Planning Commission. It is Thursday, October
- 23rd. And if you could call the role, please. Sure, David Bush. Margaret Clements. Tron and Ray Randolph
- here. Scott Ferris here. Rudy Fields here. David Henry. Here. Jeff Morris.
- Julie Thomas. Here. Joe Vandeventer. OK, so we have six members attending in a quorum. Thank you so
- much and we'd like to move on to introduction of evidence, please.
- I'd like to introduce the following items into the evidence. The Monroe County Development Ordinance
- as adopted and amended. The Monroe County Zoning Ordinance and Subdivision Control Ordinance as adopted
- and amended. The Monroe County Comprehensive Plan as adopted and amended. The Monroe County Plan Commission
- Rules or Procedure as adopted and amended. And the cases that were legally advertised and scheduled
- for a hearing on tonight's agenda. Thank you so much. Could I have a motion, please? So moved.
- for adoption. Second. It's been moved and seconded to approve the introduction of evidence. A vote yes
- is a vote to approve. Tron Enright-Randolph? Yes. Scott Ferris? Yes. Rudy Fields? Yes. David Henry?
- Yes. Julie Thomas? Yes. David Bush? Yes. Motion is approved, six to zero. Thank you so much.
- And now I will entertain a motion for approval of the agenda. I do have one change to the agenda There
- has been a recognition that the Bell Vista section three Petition there was not a proper notice Sent
- out for that one. So we do have to recommend its continuance to our November meeting which will be
- November 18th. I'll make a motion that we adopt the agenda and continue item ASPP-25-2 to our November
- 8th meeting. Second. We have a motion and we have a second and I will note for anyone who's watching
- or here in person
- that on this agenda are a number of items that have been continued. All three items related to Holland
- Fields and Holland three lot minor subdivision have been continued as has under new business SIA 21-7.
- So it's been moved and seconded and I'll just correct the date, I apologize. It's been moved and seconded
- to amend the agenda to continue SPP-25-2, the Bell Vista section three, primary plot amendment for sidewalk
- and street tree waiver. It's been requested to be continued to the November 20th plan commission meeting.
- A vote yes is a vote to continue it to November 20th. Do I have to still accept that? No, okay.
- Scott Ferris. Yes. Rudy Fields. Yes. David Henry. Yes. Julie Thomas. Yes. David Bush. Yes. Tron Enright
- Randolph. Yes. Motion is approved six to zero. All right. Thank you so much.
- there are two sets of minutes. Motion to approve the minutes for. September 2nd and also September 25th.
- Seconded We have a motion and we have a second. Any comments at its
- commission to vote in favor, since we are just that majority. We have a six on line. Oh, there is a
- six on line. I'm sorry, Mr. Henry. All right. If you could call the roll, please on this item. OK, it's
- been moved and seconded to approve September 2nd and September 25th, 2025 meeting minutes. A vote yes
- is a vote to approve both sets of minutes. Rudy Fields. Yes.
- David Henry. Yes. Julie Thomas. Yes. David Bush. Yes. John Henry Randolph. It shows I was absent on
- the September, but I did watch the cats recording, so I'll vote yes. Matt Ferris. Yes. Motion is approved
- six to zero.
- Thank you so much. We have some administrative business if you would please.
- Yes, just a report for the CDO amendment prioritization list. We have not seen a change, substantial
- change to this list since June of this year. However, two items on your agenda tonight we will touch
- on are part of that prioritization list. So if recommended for approval or recommended positive
- recommendation to the county commissioners and those are adopted or changes are made, we would update
- that prioritization list accordingly.
- Thank you very much. Anybody have comments or questions for staff? Okay, great. Thank you so much. We
- will now. Move way down on the agenda. Look at how quickly we get
- amendment 25.1. The peach minor subdivision. Preliminary Platt Amendment one. With a road width waiver.
- This is a preliminary hearing and they've asked for a waiver of final hearing. Right so I'm
- This is two parcels, it's 57.74 acres in Beam Blossom Township, section 12 at 9175 North Mount Pleasant
- Road. And the owners, Richard Brown and Kimberly Gladys. All right, so the request is for a primary
- plot amendment to the Peach Minor subdivision. They are going to subdivide lot three, which is 57.74
- acres, to create a new lot, which is 10.01 acres.
- The CDO says that a minor subdivision can create up to four lots. And so the Peach Minor initially has
- created three lots already. They can add this fourth one during a primary plot amendment process. So
- the proposed lot 3A will contain 45.66 acres and has existing access to North Mount Pleasant Road.
- and the proposed lot 4A will contain 10.01 acres with proposed access to West Brown Road. The petition
- includes a road width waiver request. West Brown Road measures only 13 feet in width, and the CDO requires
- 18 feet for a subdivision. So here's the location here in Beam Blossom Township. The primary plot amendment
- is here on the right, so you can see lot
- 3a is the larger one which has an existing home and some outbuildings and then lot 4a is going to have
- a proposed home and septic system shown there on the plot This is it kind of Shown up a little bit further
- you have West Brown Road along the top there Which is only 13 feet wide and then down along the eastern
- property line is North Mount Pleasant Road something to know is that this
- Access point for lot 4a is not 200 feet wide at the road where it touches the road It does not reach
- that 200 feet wide until it gets to here. So this is sort of a pole For a flag lot and is not considered
- buildable, but they do have plenty of buildable area and this is kind of the lower half of the plat
- you can see that there are drainage easements that have been included and
- and the southern part of the lot here, lot 3A, with more riparian area and drainage easements. So there
- is a summary table in the packet that describes the statistics of lot 3A and lot 4A and the buildable
- area that they're gonna have. Staff confirmed that they do have appropriate septic permits on file.
- and we looked at their roadway access. Right of way dedication is already dedicated out here. We confirmed
- environmental conditions and existing structures. And then when we were starting to look at road width,
- that's when we noticed that West Brown Road did not meet the road width requirement. Sidewalks are not
- required out here. We do have capacity ladders and street trees. They do have a preservation area of
- 1.03 acres.
- And this is the street tree preservation area, it kind of overlaps between the two lots, sort of straddles
- the boundary line between the properties. So this is the original plat here, lot one, lot two, and then
- this is lot three across the street, and this is the one that they're subdividing and doing the amendment
- for. So the staff recommendation
- It's interesting because...
- Well, let's just go over the PLAT committee. The PLAT committee met on April 21st, 2025 and forwarded
- a positive recommendation to approve the primary PLAT and rode with waiver with a vote of four to zero.
- And the staff had recommended three conditions of approval and the fourth condition had been added by
- the PLAT committee. All of those have been completed at this point in time. And so really the recommendation
- is to approve the subdivision based on the findings that the proposed primary PLAT
- that meets the county development ordinance subject to the highway engineer and stormwater program manager
- reports and to also approve the road width waiver. Citing practical difficulties have been demonstrated
- with no conditions. Any questions? Thank you so much. Anyone to my left have a question for staff? To
- my right, online.
- See a hand raised. Okay, well, I actually have a question which is related to lot 3A because under lot
- 3A on the graphic on page nine of our packet, it says existing undocumented septic secondary permit
- and then it has a number.
- thinking that's secondary septic here and an existing septic on this one. Is that the graphic? It's
- in the table on page nine. Right. Okay. So it took a while. If I recall, they have a septic. We didn't
- have a good permit that went with it, if I recall, and so we had them
- Because it's older. Yes. Got it. And during their first subdivision, we did make them pull a septic
- permit. And so we were using that one as the secondary site and not having them upgrade their septic
- just because they were subdividing. But should it fail, they do have a secondary location. Got it. That's
- what I thought. But I wanted to be sure. Thank you so much.
- Thank you. All right. Um so now we will hear from the petitioner or the petitioners representative.
- May come forward in the Natu Hill room or raise your hand on teams to be
- If you could please give us your name. It's Richard Brown. Okay, Mr. Brown. Thank you for being here.
- Did you have anything you wanted to add about this petition? No, I think everything we tried to get
- everything that they requested. Does anybody have questions for the petitioner for my right? Online.
- There is a Matt Lowers. Is he part of your? That's that's our son. He's the one buying the smaller lot
- I will call on him and anybody have questions for these petitioners. Okay So we have somebody online
- whose hand was raised we could hear from them Looks like their hand is down now. Oh
- Yeah, I was sorry. I was just going to stand in if they did, so I'm just here for support. OK, great.
- Thank you so much. Good good alright. OK, alright, thank you. We will now open this up for public comments.
- See if anyone has anyone wishes to speak in
- in favor of this petition, you may raise your hand on teams to be recognized or come to the podium here
- in the NatU Hill Room. I don't see any hands raised on teams. Anyone wish to speak in opposition to
- this petition? Please come to the podium in the NatU Hill Room or raise your hand on teams to be recognized.
- Anyone on the board to my right or left or online have further comments before we get a motion. Okay,
- somebody like to make a motion. Please move with respect to case number SM November 25 one, which is
- the peach minor primary plat amendment one.
- we the motion to approve. One is approve the subdivision based on the finding that the proposed primary
- plant meets the CDO and is subject to the highway engineer and stormwater program manager reports.
- That's one. And also to approve the road width waiver request citing practical difficulties have it
- demonstrated. And as mentioned by the by the staff, the four conditions, all of which have been completed.
- And also a wave of the final hearing. Great. Thank you so much. We have a motion. Is there a second?
- Okay. Thank you. Thank you so much. All right. We have a motion and we have a second. It's been moved
- and seconded to approve both the subdivision as well as the road with waiver and
- also the waiver of final hearing. A vote yes is a vote to approve. David Henry? Yes. Julie Thomas? Yes.
- David Bush? Yes. John Henry Randolph? Yes. Scott Ferris? Yes. Rudy Fields? Yes.
- motion is approved six to zero. Thank you so much. Um, next we have, um, agenda item S M N 25-3. The
- John R and Mary Deckard minor subdivision primary plot amendment to
- sidewalk and street tree waiver requested. This is a preliminary hearing. The waiver of the final hearing
- has also been requested. Staff, please. Yep. Again, I'm going to cover for Drew on this one. This is
- two parcels on 64.78 acres in Richland Township Section 23 at 3805 West Walcott Lane. The owners are
- Stephen Deckard, irrevocable living trust.
- So this is a primary plot amendment to the John R. and Mary Deckard minor subdivision. It is to subdivide
- existing tract two, which is 64.78 acres, to create a new lot, which will be 32.14 acres. The CDO says
- a minor subdivision can create up to four lots, so this subdivision is bringing it up to three.
- The subdivision initially had created two lots and so this third one is allowed via the primary plot
- amendment process. The proposed track two will contain 32.64 acres with existing access to West Walcott
- Lane. Proposed track three will contain 32.14 acres and will also have access to West Walcott Lane.
- The petition includes a sidewalk waiver request and a street tree waiver request. The proposed subdivision
- is within the urban area boundary as defined in the CDO. So this is the location. It's pretty close
- to West Woodyard Road and Heart Straight Road. There was a, up here in this corner here is the original
- lot one. Lot two is this one here and then they're subdividing it.
- through the middle, kind of with this L shape. Things that you'll notice is that there is an easement
- that cuts through the property to access the subdivision to the south. And there is a special flood
- hazard area and a drainage easement that comes through here and also a riparian area. Both of these
- lots are essentially vacant. There is, I think, one ag structure on the property.
- more of a close-up of the easement that comes through to service the subdivision to the south. This
- is the summary table here. So again, we've got a summary of Tract 2 and Tract 3. There are acreage.
- We do have wastewater septic permit on file for these. The property access will... There's an existing
- driveway for Tract 2, and then we have a new driveway access for Lot 3 under right-of-way permit.
- RW 24-314 Right of way dedication. It's already occurred, but we're confirming it and then there are
- some DNR floodplains and some slopes that are greater than 25% The local road it is 19 feet wide so
- we're good on that it does
- encompass part of the urban service boundary, which will require the sidewalks. We do have capacity
- letters for electric and water. And then there are 32 street trees required. And they are asking for
- a waiver request from both sidewalk and street tree waivers. So this is the urban service boundary.
- Did I say that correct? Yes. And it does encompass this wall caught lane up here, which does require
- then that we look at it for
- this possibility of sidewalks or alternative transportation incorporation. And then we also have on
- the plat, well, we had the petitioner include some of the existing trees that are on the property. There
- are 40 existing trees, and there are images of those here on the bottom of the picture.
- And then there was a discussion at the Platt Committee regarding for the sidewalk waiver potentially
- adding additional easement to accommodate that. So we have a local road urban design which does incorporate
- a sidewalk and kind of a
- curb and gutter like roll curb. And we also have the local road rural, which is more of a 60 foot right
- of way dedication. And right now we have a 25 foot right of way dedication here and that's what is required.
- Should you want to do an additional
- five or 10 feet. One thing to keep in mind is that we do have street trees down here that we
- could potentially count towards that street tree requirement even though they are asking to waive those.
- Also, I think that sometimes the highway department doesn't always want to be responsible for the street
- trees and our ordinance in the subdivision doesn't allow us to count trees in the right of way towards
- that requirement.
- We would need to come up with a different solution, I think, for the street trees if additional right-of-way
- easement would be dedicated to encompass a future alternative transportation plan, like sidewalks or
- a side path. And then kind of looking at this is West Walcott Lane here in Turquoise running east-west.
- This is that access easement we did during the first
- amendment, we relocated the driveway. So this driveway is not valid anymore. It was in the floodplain.
- We scooted it over to be outside of the special flood hazard area. But this stretch could have alternative
- transportation along it to connect to the Karst Farm Greenway, which is 110 feet away. And there is
- not, I'm not sure how the easement would work there. The creek runs this way.
- And then I'll point out that we do have FEMA floodway. To get a permit for this, you would have to get
- a state permit and a local flood permit, and then also prove that your project creates a no-rise scenario.
- That does get kind of expensive. So that's something to also take into consideration if you want to
- decide to support the sidewalk waiver.
- And street true waiver and extra dedication of right of way would the county ever want to put a sidewalk
- here? So we do have the sidewalk waiver Findings of fact in the packet for both the sidewalk and the
- street trees we I touched on a lot of those So I'm not going to go over them here And then this is the
- Final Platt Amendment 1, this is where we altered the road access and added the easement. And then we
- do have our recommendation for SMN-25-3. So staff, well, let's see, we do have a Platt Committee,
- let's see, Platt Committee met October 16th.
- voted five to zero for a positive recommendation to the Plan Commission to approve the subdivision,
- approve the sidewalk waiver, and deny the street tree waiver as recommended above. The Platt Committee
- directed staff to converse with the petitioner about the receptivity to requesting the incorporation
- of an access easement along West Walcott Lane that would ultimately serve as the location for the multi-use
- path to improve pedestrian access to the Cars Farm Greenway.
- And then staff recommends approval of the subdivision based on the findings that the proposed primary
- plat meets the CDO and subject to Highway Engineer and Stormwater Program Manager reports. Also recommending
- approval of the sidewalk waiver, citing practical difficulties have been demonstrated. And then also
- to deny the street tree waiver request, preservation of existing trees can satisfy the requirements
- of Chapter 832-14C.
- and can be shown on the primary plat. Does anyone have any questions? Thank you so much. Any questions
- from my right? Question for staff. More. Yes, discussion from the Platte Committee and how that precipitated.
- Sure, OK, so. Just based off the location to a built
- trail network, which will probably serve as one of our main backbones to our trail network in the county
- that creates connectivity to the city and the town, maybe even beyond. But I guess I kind of brought
- that topic up because I'm very active in some of our trail projects. If that's even something that should
- be continued
- to be discussed, I would say that we should probably bring this back to the administrative meeting.
- Due to the Platt committee meeting being canceled, we kind of got not necessarily out of order, but
- usually we could have had this discussion at the Platt committee and then at the admin meeting. So it's
- just kind of how are we going to talk about these more rural areas and still be able to have access
- to continue our trail network or
- maybe at one point build sidewalks. I was pretty amenable to going ahead and supporting this and the
- practical difficulties of having to relocate the street trees to meet that requirement is one thing that was
- 50-50 for at least for my position. So I'm fine with supporting this as is, but I'm also fine with bringing
- this back and discussing how can we really look at retaining clean easements to expand our network in
- the future. I don't think by any means the property owner should go ahead and take on the cost of building
- out the trail.
- or a sidewalk at this point because the connectivity is very limited. But in 10, 20 years, one of the
- most difficult things we encounter with expanding our network is having a clean easement. So that's what
- kind of precipitate that discussion. I just wanted to bring a little more context to that. And again,
- I'll kind of defer to the rest of the plan commission of the direction they want to go. So, but I don't
- think we could kind of, I would recommend, let's not try to dice this out at today's meeting if it's
- even a consideration. Did you have any questions, Mr. Henry, council member Henry?
- I do not. Okay, any questions for staff from my left? Okay, thank you so much. Now we can hear from
- the petitioner, petitioner's representative, please come to the podium here in the NETU Hill Room, or
- you can raise your hand on Teams to be recognized. There is a hand raised. Deckard.
- You will need to unmute. I'm muted, I'm there. Thank you. Did you have any comments you wanted to make
- on this petition or anything you want us to know? No comments. I'm not opposed to maybe a 10 foot easement.
- I know that the embankment between Walkout Lane and the property is probably a
- 75 degree angle and eight feet tall. So to get a sidewalk there would be a lot of grading. We'll go
- from there. The street trees along there are like eastern cedars and almost fully grown. To remove those
- would be sad, so to speak. I'm sure the other neighbors would like it. I have no other comments other
- than if you have questions for me.
- Thank you so much. Any comments or questions for the petitioner from my left? Please. One comment. I
- was in the plaque committee withdrawn in that discussion and I believe that under the curtain book of
- words that they hit all the spots they need to hit and to ask them to do something else is exactly that.
- If you want to ask them about it, cool. But I just wouldn't want anybody to
- someone in a way that says, well, you know, we didn't do this, so we need that. You know, I think there's,
- I think there is a, in my view, I believe that these folks are, and based on the practical difficulties
- of things they've talked about tonight, that that waiver section needs to be deleted and approved as
- is. Okay. Thank you so much. Are you talking about the sidewalk waiver? Yeah, all the approval,
- that are marked for approval and the denial, which, you know, works in their benefit, too. I think those
- are all things I export. Great. Thank you, Mr. Bush. Yeah, I was on the plaque committee and was supportive
- of Tron's discussion and when the idea
- consideration of an easement was brought forward. I thought it was a good idea. I still think it's a
- good idea. I will not hold up this petition because of that, but I think that is something in the future
- we want to probably bring back to an admin meeting and tackle long-term how we're going to try to preserve
- accessibility to the trails. Thank you.
- Any comments or questions for the petitioner from Mr. Henry? None, thank you. Anyone to my right have
- a question or comment for petitioner? Okay. Great, so we will now move on to public comment. If anybody
- would like to speak in favor of this petition,
- you may come up to the podium here in the net you hill room or you may raise your hand on teams and
- to be recognized to speak. No one does anyone wish to speak in opposition to this petition? Again, you
- may raise your hand on teams to be recognized or come to the podium here in the net you hill room.
- Seeing none, we'll come back to the board for comments before a motion. Anyone to my right have a comment?
- Yes, I don't like kind of looking at a petition kind of as it's moving forward. I like kind of having
- those larger discussions and kind of having kind of some predictability and where it's applied across
- the board. So I guess I'm looking to support this as is today.
- but I do think it's a very important conversation to have about how we can secure easements or at one
- point when we want to build sidewalks to create connectivity that's contiguous, at some point we're
- going to have to decide to do that and over time it will create that contiguous connectivity that I
- think we're looking for.
- Like I said, I'd rather address that so it's more applied across the board versus case by case. Any
- comments from Council Member Henry? None at all, thank you. Any comments from my left? No. I have a
- comment which is that
- I think that. While I understand the desire ability to create sidewalks to connect to trails. We there
- are a couple of key issues with the lay of the land here. Um and I think that the way that the staff
- has organized the approvals and denials. Um
- the petitioner to try to overcome issues relating to floodplain and or deep ditches. And if we insisted
- on that easement, then we would have to revisit the street tree question. And I don't I'm not sure that
- that's fair to petitioner at this moment either. So
- I do support it as it is. And with that, we could see if anyone here would like to make a motion. Please.
- With respect to case number Sierra Mike November 25-3, which is the primary plat amendment two. The
- recommendation is to approve that primary plat amendment two.
- approve the sidewalk waiver, and to deny the street tree waiver. And also, we waive the final hearing.
- Thank you so much. We have a motion. Is there a second? Second. Okay, we have two seconds.
- Makes it a fourth. All right. Please call the roll on this item. The motion is on SMN-23.
- 5-3, which is the John and Mary Deckard Minor Primary Plan Amendment 2. This is for a sidewalk and street
- tree waiver request, as well as a waiver of final hearing. It's been moved and seconded to approve the
- primary plan amendment, approve the sidewalk waiver, deny the street tree waiver, and approve the waiver
- of final hearing. A vote yes is to do that in that order. Rudy Fields? Yes. David Henry? Yes.
- Thomas. Yes. David Bush. Yes. Tron on right. Randolph. Yes. Scott Ferris. Yes. Motion is approved six
- to zero. Thank you so much. Thank you. The petitioner. Appreciate bringing this forward. Um, we will
- now move on to item for triple S dash 25 dash to the domain sliding scale subdivision primary plat.
- Sidewalk waiver requests. This is a preliminary hearing the waiver of final hearing has been requested
- This is on two parcels of 15 plus or minus acres in Richland Township section 1 at 3500 West Maple Grove
- Road I'll just keep
- Presenting for Drew substitute of the year. All right. Thank you All right. So this is a sliding scale
- subdivision with a sidewalk waiver request There they have 15 acres the lot 1 they're proposing to be
- 3.8 to 4 acres and lot 2 will be 10.4 to 8 acres CDO says the parent parcel remainder cannot be further
- subdivided for a period of 25 years and
- Proposed lot 1 will contain 3.8 to 4 acres on West Maple Grove Road access and lot 2 is the is the 10
- plus acres with also access to West Maple Grove Road the petition includes a sidewalk waiver request
- and is classified as a moderate priority road improvement per the transportation alternatives map in 2018
- And in lieu of street trees the property has is required to exhibit a tree preservation area or tree
- planting area And this area is depicted on the primary plot So this is the location along West Maple
- Grove Road in Richland Township This is the proposed
- primary plat, so lot one is here on the left, lot two is on the right, which already has some existing
- structures on it. The other one is vacant, and I do believe they made this exactly 200 feet wide, which
- is the design standards for the AGR district. This is a little bit more of a close-up here, showing
- the right-of-way dedication. There is some utility easement that runs through the property that's depicted,
- and they are showing the septic locations.
- Here's the summary table of lot one and lot two. We do have some septic permit evidence on file. The
- access road, we have driveway permits for each of those. We're dedicating 45 foot of right of way because
- this is a major collector. No environmental considerations here. And there is a single family residence
- on lot two existing.
- The road is wide enough, it's 18 to 24.5 feet wide. Sidewalks, it is required because of the classification
- of it being a moderate priority road improvement. And then we do have capacity letters on file for electric
- and water, and we've discussed that there is a tree preservation area, and then they're requesting the
- sidewalk waiver.
- So the tree preservation area they're putting on lot two up above is 0.213 acres. And we've got some
- photos of the frontage here because of the sidewalk waiver request. And the PLAT committee met on October
- 16th, 2025 and forwarded a positive recommendation to approve the primary PLAT and sidewalk waiver
- by a vote of five to zero and the staff recommendation is to approve the subdivision based on the findings
- that the proposed primary plat meets the CDO subject to highway engineer and stormwater program manager
- reports and also to approve the sidewalk waiver request citing practical difficulties have been demonstrated.
- I'll take any questions. Thank you so much. Questions for staff from my left?
- Mr. Henry online. Any questions for staff? No questions at this time. Thanks. Thank you. Any questions
- from my right? OK, with that, thank you so much. We'll move on to petitioner petitioners representative
- if you'd like to come to the podium here in the net you Hill room. And bring your family. Please give
- us your name.
- Thank you. Welcome. Thank you. No comments for me, but appreciate your support and happy to answer any
- questions. Great, thank you. Does anyone have questions for the petitioner? For my right online.
- For my left, look at that. No questions. That was easy. Alright, glad you could all make it for that
- excitement. Quiet this whole meeting, so they think good.
- All right. That's awesome. All right. Does anybody wish to speak in favor of this petition? You may
- raise your hand on teams or come to the podium. Anybody wish to speak in opposition to this petition?
- You may raise your hand on teams to be recognized or come to the podium.
- Seeing none, let's see if there's any final comment from the board. Any members to my right have final
- comments, please? Yes, and I think this is more meant for the public to understand kind of the discussion
- we just had with sidewalk waivers and the request here with a sidewalk waiver. This isn't really located
- right next to a built out trail. So, you know,
- That was the impetus of wanting to kind of try to stir a discussion up about how we could do a better
- job of addressing that, especially when there's not practical difficulties there, but just the lack
- of connectivity. I'm looking forward to supporting that, but I just really wanted to make it clear why
- there was a larger discussion just a few moments ago and that there isn't really any discussion I have
- here or larger concerns about
- you know, granting a sidewalk waiver. Questions? Any comments or questions online? None, thank you.
- Okay, anything from my left? Look at this. Oh gosh. Okay. All right. With that, we will entertain a
- motion please. Be happy to do that. In the matter of
- case number SSS-25-2, the Dolman sliding scale subdivision, recommend to approve the subdivision based
- on the finding that the proposed primary plat meets the county development ordinance subject to the
- highway engineer and stormwater program manager reports and approve the sidewalk waiver requesting requests,
- citing practical difficulties have been demonstrated. And with this final waiver, would this be a waiver
- of final hearing? Yes.
- Recommendation for a waiver of final hearing second. Thank you so much great We have a motion and we
- have a second if you could call the roll, please This is on petition sss-25-2 the domain sliding scale
- subdivision primary plat sidewalk waiver in plat approval with a waiver of final hearing It's been moved
- to approve all of the items requested a vote. Yes is a vote to approve Julie Thomas. Yes
- David Bush? Yes. Tron Enright-Randolph? Yes. Scott Farris? Yes. Rudy Fields? Yes. David Henry? Yes.
- You turn your camera on one more time. I'm sorry, I might have put it. He's there. He's there. Okay,
- great. I've got it. Thank you. Six to zero is approved. Thank you. Great. Thank you so much. Thank you
- for checking on that camera. Excellent. Thank you so much for being here.
- All right, we will now move on to item five, which is a rezone request, REZ-25-5-8383SVRLLC, rezone
- from mineral extraction agriculture to mineral extraction.
- This is a preliminary hearing. A waiver of final hearing is requested. This encompasses five parcels
- on 114.986 plus or minus acres in Section 20 of Bean Blossom Township at 8383 North Steinsville Road
- and 8436 West Hedrick Road. Staff, please.
- I'm gonna turn this one. Yes. All right Okay, Drew did us a great favor and did the power point at a
- time So to clarify this is going to be Technically a rezone of the whole property to clean up any zone
- map changes So it's it's stated as two hundred twenty one point nine eight acres that they have mineral
- extraction slash AGR and they want that solely to be mineral extraction
- The area that they're actually rezoning is is about 10 acres or less So it's we'll show in a few maps
- or a few slides from now a map kind of showing the cleanup that they're seeking So the petition excite
- exhibits an ongoing quarry activity at the address of 8304 and 8383 North Steinsville Road and includes
- approximately 189 point seven nine acres
- The remaining 32.19 acres at 8436 West Hedrick is sort of the area of focus here, and it contains a
- portion of property utilized for quarry activity. It was also established as track one of Indiana quarries
- and carvers type E. So there was a subdivision in 2020 that moved lot lines. So ultimately, the petitioner
- now intends to perform a plat vacation and subsequent second type E to combine the
- 2.19 acre property with the remaining 189 point seven nine acres and be all one quarry property one
- lot of record
- Before the type B, the 32.19 acre contained only 22.8 acres and was rezoned under a 2011 ordinance from
- AGRR to ME. So this is the remainder of that 22.8. Well, 32.19 minus 22.8 is about what we're looking at here.
- So again, before the type B, the 32.19 acre property contained only 22.8 acres and was rezoned in 2011.
- We went and looked at that ordinance and it did include seven conditions of approval, which we are going
- to be referencing again in our recommendation. One thing to note under number six, rock crushing is
- prohibited on the subject site.
- Remember that these conditions were really just with the 32.19 acre site in mind and we wouldn't want
- that to be applicable or the petitioner likely would not want that to be applicable to the entirety
- of the quarry site, the 200 plus acre quarry site. So here's a location map in Bean Blossom. It is several
- parcels that is contained in this petition.
- And circled here on the screen are the portions of the property that are either zoning map errors from
- lot line shifts over time or our parcel lines sometimes become a little bit skewed. So they want to
- clean up everything and also turn any green that you see circled in white to the grayish color mineral
- extraction, which is about 10 acres or so.
- So just for your reference and in the packet, there are definitions established for different zones.
- So agricultural residential 2.5 and mineral extraction, they are very different zones. But typically,
- if you look at some of our mineral extraction zones, they tend to be surrounded by agricultural. So
- it isn't unusual, as you see in this screen here, to have somewhat sparse residential uses surrounding
- our mineral extraction zones.
- So we do have under the county development ordinance a use for mineral resource extraction, especially
- for new quarry activities or expansion of quarry activities that are occurring under the CDO. One of
- the things I want to point your attention to is that number one, it says mining operations shall not
- be conducted on parcels located within residential districts.
- In the case of a mineral extraction zone property within the areas deemed to be determined logging comma
- urban area This is a reference to the Indian estate code thirty six seven four
- 1109 where it says that you have eight homes in a quarter mile square. It's considered an urban area
- So we've done that analysis on the 32 plus acre lot and the hatched area on the left is showing you
- Give or take the urban area So that's the area that's encompassed by eight homes and we shift the box
- and capture the eight homes and that's the maximum extent of that area deemed urban so they would have to
- going back to the standard either get a variance from that or Purchase further properties that
- are constituted as a home and remove those homes to be out of that urban designation So it's something
- we wanted to follow up from Plant Commission administrative meeting question
- And then on the screen, we do have the ordinance from 2011 with those reference conditions and also
- exhibit five from the original ordinance, which I believe is still exhibit five in your packet. There
- was a a a e com exhibit about the karst
- evaluation for the rezone request. And so that's in the packet as well for your review. I believe there
- may be a clarification needed by the petitioner for this, but I will get to that in a second. And then
- here is the Indiana quarries and carvers type E. Here's the subdivision transfer area that you can see
- with that. It says 9.27 acres that was not zoned. Mineral extraction is still zoned.
- AGR so with their purchase of this and wanting to have it all one zone. That's kind of the with the
- reason they're here today for the reason request and Then this is the big Creek limestone type II This
- was showing all the different parcels that they own and again their plan is to combine those into one and
- And then there was a recorded easement between Stigler and American Limestone. I believe this was a
- requirement and it was to discuss the, I believe it's for the pole of a flag lot or the track two parcel
- here, so off of Hedrick. So they're going to be limited for any quarry activity, it's going to be limited
- off of Hedrick, which will be one of the conditions that they've agreed
- Okay. So here's the staff recommendation that we have from the packet. So in regards to REZ-25-5, the
- rezone request from
- Me agr to me mineral extraction staff is recommending a positive recommendation to the County Commissioners
- of the rezone request subject to the conditions of approval set forth under ordinance 2011-27 For the
- same twenty two point eight nine acres of the property on the south end of the petition site so this
- is to be applicable to the now thirty two point one nine acre site and
- So number one, record the easement agreement between Michael Stigler and American Limestone. That has
- been satisfied. Number two, incorporate the recommendations of the AECOM CAR study for the subject site
- as part of the actual quarry operations. And we're requesting during the petitioner's testimony if they
- can confirm that from the quarry owner operator that this has been done already, therefore not needed
- as a condition.
- Access to Hedrick Road is restricted for all uses other than residential or agricultural purposes. Cory
- traffic shall use the internal roads of the American limestone property to the north in addition to
- their right away driveway access point on Steinsville Road.
- Number four has been satisfied, a driveway permit. They have received that. Number five, quarry activity
- shall not extend down into the 50 foot frontage access strip or flagpole of the subject site. That still
- would be applicable. Rock crushing is prohibited on the 32.19 acre site. And number seven has been satisfied,
- but it was requiring a 25 foot right away dedication on Hedrick Road.
- So with that, I can take any questions. All right, thank you so much. Go first. On item number two,
- with respect to the confirmation from the quarry owner and operator, should that be satisfied before
- we move forward with this petition?
- In looking back at the meeting minutes and trying to determine that It looks like they had satisfied
- a lot of these conditions So that was something that we wanted to just make sure we could confirm with
- them today If it's not something that they have an answer to then I would recommend we continue it until
- we get an answer for that I Guess my question is kind of the rock crushing is prohibited
- I think I'm fine with that due to kind of the proximity of the residential zone. My question is how
- are you going to regulate that? Or how are you going to ask them to delineate that if they're going
- to combine all of these moving forward so like we know where that area is?
- Technically speaking, if there's an expansion to the quarry operations, we should have a site plan on
- file. We do have site plans for other quarry operations where they show the locations specifically to
- rock crushing. So that would be something that we would be able to get a site plan for. Okay. It just
- seems like it's going to be kind of a
- interesting scenario is kind of making sure that they stay compliant because I know that some of the
- rock crushing equipment is mobile. But at least it's there. So if you get complaints by the neighbors
- and such, at least we have some ability to kind of get them to stop doing that. So thanks, it's just
- interesting. Councilor Henry, do you have a question for staff or comment?
- questions at this time. Thanks. Thank you. Anyone from my left? Yes, Mr Fields and question about again
- number two. Who and this is my I believe my first time I've come up on a zoning recommendation. Who
- within the county system evaluates the karst issues as drainage board involved is who all is involved
- in looking at this to see that their plan adheres to
- the setbacks provided in the CDO. That would be stormwater, but. It would be stormwater. So quarry operations
- are interesting in that they actually are permitted to quarry all the karst areas, whereas otherwise
- in the county we're protecting those karst areas from development by a buffer.
- to be a site plan. But typically if there were to be a site plan, then that is when our drainage board
- or stormwater program would be involved because there would be an actual plan for them to review. So
- since this is just at the reason stage, they didn't have any comments for they don't typically have
- comments on reasons. Um so my question relates
- They're still going to submit a site plan after this. If there is any plan for expansion, so they may
- be pre existing legal pre existing non conforming. So if they want to expand quarry operations with
- the combination of all these lots in the rezone, then we would ask them for a site plan for that is
- is moving the rock crushing operations considered an expansion, or is that just part of day to day business?
- On the 32.19 acre parcel, there is a little bit of quarry activity you can see. I don't know unless
- the petitioner could clarify. I'm not sure if they can point out to us where the rock crushing is currently
- taking place or if it's taking place. We assume it is, but we don't believe that it's on the 32.19 acre
- parcel as it stands today.
- that. Since they don't necessarily have to do a site plan. I wonder if. Staff would. Create a basic
- map. That combines the previous petition and this petition to indicate where they are not supposed to
- be. Performing rock crushing activities is
- Timmy's bringing up a good point since they are planning on platting we could add some of these conditions
- onto the plat Excellent. So do we need to add that to the conditions? Yes, that would be helpful. Okay,
- so we would need to say for item six Rock crushing needs to be indicated on do we call it on the platter
- on the site plan on the plan on the plan? Thank you if you don't mind and
- The other question I have is, and after reading through everything, I wasn't sure about that flagpole
- lot on Hedrick, but it is part of that 2011 petition that wasn't clear when I looked at the packet for
- the admin meeting, but it's clear now. So thank you for that. So I never asked a follow up question
- to staff on that, but it's interesting because it's,
- part of the 2011 plat or I'm sorry, ordinance. And it still says only residential or agricultural use.
- But now there's absolutely none of that anywhere on the property. So what can they do with that?
- That's a good question. So with the urban area analysis I think that also further prevents the quarry
- activity in that flagpole lot We're asking that if they combine this parcel They essentially give up
- the rights to access to Hedrick and only access from the north. Okay, so I think that they would have
- to basically comply with this buffer or seek additional approvals and
- And then if they wanted to farm the rest of it or do something to that extent, we could look into a
- possible driveway for that kind of activity. OK, so we can leave it leave the text as is in the conditions
- and still be OK. The text as it is today applies to that property right now, so I think that we would
- if you want to carry it forward, you could still carry it forward. OK, great. Thank you, yes. So Jackie.
- Based upon this discussion, going back to item number six as a condition, how would you rewrite that
- condition? Our council over here as well reminded me that rock crushing is typically or sometimes mobile,
- so it may be challenging to add it to a plat, but the idea was to reword this to say,
- Rock crushing is prohibited on the thirty two point one nine acre site and that all We could say all
- possible locations for rock crushing be indicated on a future plat And then they could put it Or they
- could mark the areas where they will not It might be easier. It might be easier either way. I Just think
- it would be cleaner if we had a map
- to go on because typically this is complaint driven, right? And so if we heard from a neighbor who said,
- oh, it's rock crushing, it's like right at my back door, we could say, well, here's the map. We know
- where it's permitted or where it's not. And so perhaps it could be written either in the prohibited
- or only allowed in sense. So yes.
- Yeah, I like this discussion. I think making sure wherever it's prohibited, we delineate that on the
- plat when they go to the replatting. Maybe make sure it's pretty apparent hatching or something. We
- don't want just the dotted line because if it's a neighbor wondering if they're kind of too close doing
- the rock crushing, I would want them to be very aware of where that location is and not necessarily have the
- the skill sets to read a survey like, oh, look at this big hashed area. They're definitely within that
- area. My thoughts into Mr. Ferris's question, if you ask him to delineate the areas that are prohibited,
- I think would go very well with that amendment or that condition. So much as we did on the previous
- petition, anything that's marked satisfied, we,
- we don't have to add as a condition. My question is relating to the karst features, and I don't really
- understand what that looks like. What does it look like when the karst study is incorporated? What does
- that mean? I'm trying to get a grasp of what it is. Is it a document? Is it a plan? Is it a procedure?
- How do we know that it's been addressed?
- Yes, so this is what we have from the minutes was that it was a memorandum back with the 2011 ordinance
- and it essentially has the the outline of a typical Karst evaluation that we receive So I think that
- there were maybe some recommendations on maybe some amendments to how they could
- that they could. Work into their quarry operations. Some of these recommendations, but we can't tell
- based on the aerials whether they've. Done some of these recommendations, so we were hoping that they
- could speak to some of this. So that's why you're saying all we really need at this moment is just a
- verbal acknowledgement. That there is a car study that it still
- Yes. Does Stormwater monitor ongoing quarry operations throughout the life of the quarry or is that
- something just on the front end? There are a lot of protections for quarry operations under the state
- code that minimize our ability to regulate them.
- We don't necessarily take them into our inspection inventory. We're not necessarily going out there
- all the time. I will say some of the quarry sites that we will get complaints on are related to blasting,
- and there are some that have, like there's one south of the county that was established only in 2005,
- and that one
- We do have some litigation or past case history where we can ask them for blasting reports and things
- like that, so they have to keep track of that kind of information. My sense is there's just so much
- sediment generated from crushing and cleaning and all of the things they do. You know, is that sediment
- stream monitored so they're not pumping it into a sinkhole? You know, so that's my thought is how do
- they incorporate this
- and what do they do with that incorporation during the life of the operation? Questions, OK, yes. Really
- good questions. Alright, anything else from the board? OK, let's see if the petitioner petitioners
- representative is. Here to speak on this item may come up to the podium.
- Welcome, please give us your name and we'll have you sign in as well.
- Thank you for your time this afternoon and considering this request before you. My name is Kevin Buckheit
- and I am a land use planner working for the law firm Creek Devault out of their Carmel, Indiana offices.
- I am here today to represent the petitioner 8383SVR LLC. With me is David Edgeworth. He is a member
- of that LLC and he's also the president of Big Creek Limestone. He'll be able to address some of the
- operational questions that you raised. There are a number of
- what I'll call housekeeping items that are happening on this property today. One is what you're addressing
- in particular is the consolidation of the zoning to make sure there are no gaps internal over time.
- And we're using a single new perimeter description to handle all that. We've talked about the vacation
- of Track 1 from the earlier subdivision. We've talked about creating a new administrative subdivision
- to incorporate this one big lot now.
- That then will allow us to go back to the assessor and finish the work that I started in January to
- consolidate the parcels. It was actually that discussion that they could not incorporate the track one
- that led us to the planning department that helped discover that the zoning was amiss on this property
- as well. So we're just trying to clean things up for going forward and let everybody know that what
- is out there today is what's going to continue.
- What happens through this rezone application isn't going to change any of that. It's just trying to
- clean up the process. Staff report is awesome, thorough, very complete, and I commend them for that.
- You have a great staff. We agree with their recommendations, and I'll come back to those individual
- conditions of approval that they've pulled forward.
- We understand that they did an urban area delineation. If we want to pursue activity in that area, we
- understand that we have to come back for a variance. So just want to acknowledge that. Looking at the
- conditions of approval, at the bottom of page 96 in your staff report, as has been mentioned, number
- one has been satisfied.
- We acknowledge that it exists. We acknowledge that it applies, and it is incorporated into the operations
- of the site, and Mr. Edgeworth can answer any specific questions you may have about that. Access to
- hydrochrome, we understand and accept that. It's just an oddity that it exists, and it doesn't make
- sense to try to go in there and mine anything because you'd maybe get a foot wide to work with.
- Um, driveway application has been satisfied for Steinsville Road. Um, quarrying activity shall not extend,
- uh, down. It's number five. Um, I, and, and we talked about that. That should still apply. Um,
- rock crushing, I think if you can figure out what needs to happen and delineating, I think perhaps prohibited
- areas on the Platte might be the way to go. Um, we can certainly agree to that.
- And then number seven has been satisfied as well. Once the discussion is done for today, we are respectfully
- requesting a positive recommendation to the county commissioners for the rezone. And we respectfully
- request, if you are satisfied after the discussion, a waiver of the second hearing.
- Thank you so much. Why don't you stay here as well? Let's go ahead and hear from Mr. Edgeworth, and
- then we'll come back for questions if you don't mind staying close. Sure. I'm David Edgeworth, a member
- of 8383 SVR, the landowner. Point of clarification, if I could have that site map up. The one with the
- circles on it? The one that it was in color that had yellow outlines. It was up just a second ago. I'm sorry.
- Can you go back to the mic? I'm sorry. It's going to be really hard. Yeah. The northern tier of that
- property, it's a rectangular box, long east-west. That is leased to Lincoln Park. They run the crushing
- operations. It is a fixed facility and they have a lease and the land is limited to that period. So
- we can work with your office however need to be to fix that in place and address the issue of any mobile
- crushing, which will not occur. It will all be limited to the existing lease along that northern tier.
- And again, we can provide any information we need to your office to get that taken care of. Also, it's
- my understanding, just briefly on that ACOM report, the recommendation was just to protect several karst
- features from runoff.
- And they're identified in the report. And we're not active in that area right now. And I understand
- that if we do become active in that area, we'll have to go back to that report, make sure we know exactly
- what sites have been identified, and do the runoff and the protection to protect those. So we understand
- that. Excellent. Excellent. All right. Good, good.
- Okay, let's go ahead and see if there are any questions for either petitioner from my left. Questions
- from my right. Mr. Henry, questions for the petitioner? Petitioner's representative? No questions,
- thank you. I don't either. Everything, yeah, you're right. Staff is awesome and you all are great. Thank
- you for your input and information today. Appreciate that, thank you.
- I would recommend just before motion. I think that the conditions that are important to remain. I would
- suggest it would be 235 and six on the screen with edits, right? Yeah, yeah, thank you. Let's let's
- go ahead and see if there's any public comment on this item. Anybody who wishes to speak in favor of
- this petition?
- Please raise your hand on teams to be recognized. They come to the podium here in the net. You Hill
- room or raise your hand on teams to be recognized. Being none. Is anyone wish to speak in opposition
- to this petition? Please raise your hand on teams to be
- Seeing none, any final comments from members of the board, or did you have anything else you wanted
- to add? Okay, any final comments or questions from members of the board to my right? Mr. Henry, questions
- or final comments? From my left, nothing, okay.
- All right. Uh, we are ready for a motion. Mr Ferrer. Oh, yes. Just wanted to acknowledge that the conditions
- outlined by staff numbers 2, 3, 5 and 6 are acceptable. Okay, great. Thank you. Thank you for that.
- Thank you for that clear. Please. With respect to case number Romeo Echo Zulu.
- 25-5 which is a reason request to change for mineral extraction and AGR agriculture to all mineral extraction
- and also a final hearing as well we We the motion is to forward a positive recommendation for the reason
- request subject to the conditions set forth in ordinance 2011 27
- And for the same 22.89 acres of property on the south end of the petition site, specifically conditions
- two, three, five, and six. Is that correct, Jackie? Yeah. Like I said before, and waiver of the final
- hearing. May I offer a friendly moment? I do think condition six was a
- change to delineate the areas that are prohibited. Would you accept that as a friendly? Absolutely accept
- it as briefed by Jackie when she provided an explanation of what numbers six would entail. Second. Okay.
- Thank you. Thank you. Okay. All right.
- And I will just note for the record that for item number two, we have received confirmation, um, from
- the quarry owner operator about. The e com car study being, um, considered and incorporated, but I do
- think it's good to leave that in, um, just for the future. Okay. All right. Um,
- I'll call the roll. Please call the roll. Thank you. It's been moved and seconded to send a positive
- recommendation to the county commissioners based on RAZ-25-5, which is the 838SVR LLC rezone for mineral
- extraction and agricultural residential 2.5 to mineral extraction.
- And it also includes a waiver of final hearing and the following conditions, which I will read into
- the record. And this will apply to the now 32.19 acre parcel of the property. So number two is incorporated
- as a condition which says, incorporate the recommendations of the AECOM CAR study for the subject site
- as part of the actual quarry operations plan.
- Number three, access to Hedrick Road is restricted for all uses other than residential or agricultural
- purposes. Quarry traffic shall use the internal roads of the American limestone property to the north
- in addition to their right-of-way driveway access on Steinsville Road. Number five, quarry activity
- shall not extend down into the 50-foot frontage slash access strip or flagpole of the subject site.
- And number six,
- Rock crushing is prohibited on the 32.19 acre site. The future plat should delineate the 32.19 acre
- site as no rock crushing permitted per ordinance 2025- to be determined. A vote yes is a vote to approve
- or send a favorable recommendation and waiver of final hearing. David Bush? Yes. John Enright-Randolph?
- Yes. Scott Ferris? Yes. Rudy Fields? Yes. David Henry? Yes. Julie Thomas? Yes. Okay. Motion is carried
- six to zero. Thank you for your time. Do we have an idea on what the council or the commissioner's meeting
- date might be?
- We will let you know they meet every week. So we'll just try to get you on accordingly. So we'll be
- in touch. All right. Thanks so much. Thank you. Right. I just had a request to go ahead and note for
- anybody who's joined us on teams or is here waiting for item number eight, the Bell Vista section three
- subdivision.
- that that item has been continued, um, to our November regular session meeting. So just a reminder for
- anybody who's involved in that. All right. Um, so, um. Leave two more items on our new business
- which are amendments to the county development ordinance specifically relating to the sliding scale
- subdivision. This is a preliminary hearing and a waiver of final hearing is requested. If you would please.
- Okay, so I'll go ahead and start by saying this is one of the CDO prioritized list items that we discussed
- at the beginning of the hearing. So it was tabled during the CDO approval to be discussed by the full
- plan commission as a separate item. So this is the separate item that has been reviewed by the ordinance
- review committee discussed at length.
- the ordinance review committee and has been introduced to the planned commission as an administrative
- item. Um, we will go ahead and go through some of the changes that have been recommended. So the first
- change is under chapter 8 31 in the beginning, and the suggestion was that we go ahead and put together
- a visual of the different subdivision types. So we have table one dash 8 31, which is the different
- subdivision classifications. But we get a lot of questions in the
- of what's a minor versus a sliding scale versus a major. So we have examples with some context now added.
- So the first one is an example of a minor subdivision, four lots or less, each with at least 10 acres.
- And these are connected by a private sewage disposal system, or IE, a septic system, each lot.
- Okay, and then this is a minor subdivision in a more urban area. It does have access to a public sewage
- disposal system, i.e. sewer, so they were able to meet the minimum lot size requirements for the zone.
- The top of the screen is an example of a sliding scale.
- Three of the lots are exactly two and a half acres in size and then you have the large what we call
- parent parcel That's at least 55% of the total. These are also on a septic system But it's allowed to
- be subdivided into three smaller lots with one larger lot being reserved for a 25 year period which
- we will discuss below and then lastly we have an example aerial of a major subdivision of
- five lots or more. These are all connected by sewer. So under Chapter 831, Section 4, we did have two
- additions to the purpose statement after deliberation by the ordinance review committee about the
- of the sliding scale subdivision. So I'll just go ahead and read those. So number seven was added to
- state allow the flexibility to create smaller residential lots served by private sewage disposal systems, i.e.
- septics, while also preserving a majority of the original tract for agriculture or conservation purposes.
- And then number eight was amended to add, it says permit development in rural areas that will not overburden
- existing infrastructure and services
- And to not adversely impact existing low traffic roadways police and fire coverage emergency service
- response times and other governmental services So one of the discussions that we had is that a sliding
- scale subdivision in a rural area They're not required to put in the infrastructure that may be associated
- with a more
- Dense development such as a major subdivision. So that's the limitation of the four lots and also Also
- discussion of reserving that parcel the parent parcel to not create a further dense area in a rural
- area so then the the last change that was recommended to us was under the current text in the county
- development ordinance it states that
- under the discussion point, letter B, it says the black text is existing and not changing, but the red
- is new. So the designated parent parcel remainder shall not be further subdivided for a period of 25
- years from the date of recording of the secondary plat unless connected to a sanitary sewage system
- or further subdivision of the properties authorized by ordinance. This restriction shall be noted on
- the secondary plat.
- The county commissioners legislatively find and conclude that the 25 year restriction is reasonably
- necessary to accomplish the purpose of the sliding scale option. And as a matter of legislative policy,
- see ordinance 2015-02, which is the ordinance that created the sliding scale subdivision. It represents
- a reasonable trade off for the opportunity to create smaller lot sizes than otherwise allowed under
- the minor subdivision.
- So that's all I have for that text amendment. And then I will let you discuss this one separate from
- the second text amendment. Thank you so much. Any comments or questions for staff from my right? I'll
- have a comment. I'll wait until we go through the public. Mr. Henry, any comments or questions?
- or comments for staff? The same as Mr. And I'll follow with hold until public comment is over.
- Thank you. Okay, thank you. Any questions or comments for staff from my left? I don't have any either,
- but I will point out that this is really a minor thing, but on point number six, which is on page 137
- in our packet,
- The words should appear provide the opportunity. I don't know if that's something we could do without
- even Worrying about it's really not part of this, but anyway, just bothers me Okay So Let's go ahead
- and hear from the public if anybody wishes to
- speak on this amendment which is Presented here you may come up to the podium here and offer your input
- Good evening. Ms. Pearl Good evening All right Thank you so much. My name is Jen Pearl and I'm from
- the BEDC and
- I'm also a member of the CDO coalition that presented the white paper last fall. I wanted to start by
- thanking the plan commission and staff for pursuing this item following public feedback. We know that
- the team has spent many hours looking into this issue. We've sat with you in the room for many of those hours.
- We are concerned about this item for a couple of reasons. Our community is facing some parallel challenges.
- Number one is an aging population with the need to attract and retain working age families. Number two,
- Monroe County offers 78 percent the national average of private sector wages, but we are 99 percent
- the national average of cost of living. And third,
- Following SEA 1, there's a strong need to raise revenue for local government through business AV and
- local income tax. The BEDC and our partners are working to attract and grow jobs to increase wages,
- but housing and cost of living is a critical other side of the coin. Prospective employers often ask
- us about available talent and where they live. These are critical elements that allow their operations
- to thrive.
- In an expensive market, sliding scale subdivisions are just one important tool in the toolbox for creating
- that place for families and their children to grow and build wealth. We agree with many of the comments
- from the August 11th ORC meeting, including this is a very technical issue and it's complex and hard
- to follow.
- 25 years has a very big impact on families and Infrastructure is an important question around development
- and soar is always best But if city soar is not available as we've seen there are other options through
- package plants or regional sewer districts So we come with a request for two things number one is
- that the 25-year reservation be reduced or even better eliminated, similar to the 2015 version. This
- impacts families and generational wealth. This change won't alone solve cost of living or housing challenges,
- but it's one tool in the toolbox for growing a thriving workforce that enables us to attract and grow
- quality jobs. Number two.
- Please do anything you can to simplify and communicate the sliding scale requirements to residents and
- let them know this conversation is happening, especially given the interest last year. We still nearly
- missed this item this week buried in the agenda, and we make it our job to follow the public calendars.
- This is an important issue that many people are interested in. Anything that can be done to clarify
- the language and communicate what is happening is critical. Also shout out to planning staff. You guys
- are saints in
- I'm not going to go into too much detail, but I'm just going to give you an explanation explaining this.
- So thank you so much for your consideration. Thank you. Does anyone else have public comment to offer
- on this item? Good evening, Madam President. This is Christopher M G from the Greater Bloomington Chamber
- of Commerce. I want to echo. Our
- working group that put together that CDO paper. We want to just confirm her comments and then go to
- really the 25-year moratorium piece of this and where it kind of comes into our advocacy as something
- that doesn't appear as reasonable as I think it maybe it should be. It's just a rational planner and
- we'd like to think of ourselves the chamber's rational individuals. 25 years is more than a generation.
- It's longer than most residents' mortgages, longer than mine, business leases, economic development
- cycles. No private business agencies, the planning department even, goes on a 25-year-old,
- 25-year assumption. Things change in that time. The environment, infrastructure, all things. Just think
- about 25 years ago we didn't have cell phones. This rule kind of locks property and investment for a
- quarter of a century, prevents some adaptive
- land use, a key ingredient for both responsible growth and economic resilience, which I think we all
- in this room support. If you go back to the 2014 Plan Commission discussion that we heard from
- the administrative meeting back on June 3rd, that 25-year number was sort of bantied about, and it was
- deemed, I quote, anecdotal and really unsupported by data, with members admitting it lacked sort of
- evidence of validity.
- And this is where Monroe County kind of stands alone here on the restrictive use. I think Tippecanoe
- County has 10 years. None of the, I think, Donut counties have this. So it kind of puts us in a competitive
- disadvantage. When we're attracting new agriculture enterprise, rural investment, small-scale development,
- we need all the advantages we can get. It doesn't seem like a big thing, and I don't think this is going
- to change the course of housing or anything like that, as Ms. Pearl alluded to.
- But we have to sort of balance this sort of growth and preservation, and this doesn't quite do that.
- A more transparent evidence-based approach would be maybe a 10-year review period tied to measurable
- infrastructure benchmarks or something. Something that seems a little bit, I don't know, maybe
- one generation, 15 years, 10 years. So I think it's unrealistic to expect landowners, investors, and future
- boards to operate under a moratorium that will outlast the policy cycles. Look at the driveway that
- they didn't even realize that they had paved it and it was against the PUD. These sort of things in
- long periods tend to happen when you have things that are that long in scope. So I encourage you to
- not take on this 25 years and to have amendment maybe changing that something much lower. And I thank
- you for your time tonight. I do appreciate it. Thank you, Mr. Emgy. Appreciate that.
- Does anybody on teams have any comments? You can raise your hand to be recognized, or if there's anyone
- here in the NET-U Hill Room who wishes to speak, who has not spoken yet on this item, you may come up
- to the podium. Okay, seeing none, we'll go ahead and,
- public comment and we'll go ahead and hear from members of the Planning Commission on any final comments
- or statements or suggestions, et cetera, that they may have. We'll go ahead and start online with Councilor,
- County Councilor David Henry. I'll pass and wait for other comment by those in the room, thanks.
- Okay, this would be this would be the last comment period before a motion. I appreciate that. I'm literally
- parking, so go ahead and talk in the room and I'll be there in a minute. Okay. So he's asking to be
- you want to be recognized Asian after I'm asking to pass my turn and so others speak and if I can get
- please withhold until the end. I'll hold till the end.
- Okay, so we'll come back to you. I'll come back to you. Okay, I'm sorry, the sound is a little distorted
- in here, so that's why I didn't understand what you're asking. Anyone from my right wish to comment?
- Surveyor and Ray Randolph. Yes, thanks. I've said a lot on this topic. Some of what I'm gonna say, and
- I'm sorry that it's gonna be
- repetitive for my colleagues up here, but I think it's really important for the public. As elected county
- surveyor, I'm the only one that's directly elected
- to serve on the planning commission. We do have other elected officials, but they are representative
- of their bodies, one from the county commissioner and one from the county council. So it's very important
- for the public to understand my position on this because this was a pretty large discussion. I am on
- the ordinance review committee, but I was not there when the vote was had to move this discussion forward.
- I'm very, very concerned that if we go ahead and, you know, decide to approve this, which is a very
- interesting position to be in because this does bring some information and clarity to what the sliding
- scale is and what that tradeoff is, moratorium reservation, I understand that.
- But I also think this will remove it from the prioritization list. And I think the main discussion there
- was the reservation or moratorium, more commonly referred to prior to one of our ORC meetings. So I
- do not think we really had the discussion, in my opinion, of should we reduce that 25 years. And I did
- mention at the admin meeting, and if anyone wants to
- watch that meeting, you'll get your typical Tron in right Randolph, you know, speaking as I normally
- do, very blunt, straightforward and putting my cards on the table. I'm gonna be a little more concise
- with this because again, I've spoke a lot about it. We need to ensure that we are making good decisions
- choices for the entire county, and there's a lot of things that have bottlenecked our ordinance. Getting
- sewer provided to us is one of them. I feel like, in my opinion, we're getting ahead of ourselves, the
- cart in front of the horse, but that could just be my opinion. A lot of people will say, no, we're focused
- on this, but if we're focused on this, we should then address it fully, and I think we need to address the
- moratorium. We don't know what's going to happen, and the fact that everything in our ordinance is contingent
- to septic or sewer, and if you have to go the septic route, you have to have a minimum of 10 acres.
- We saw some examples, which I appreciate, that can show you what type of lot sizes you can have if you
- can have sewer, but we don't know when that's going to happen.
- If we were addressing things in an order where like we were providing another option, then I think I
- could go ahead and leave the sliding scale as is because we have other tools. But right now, if this
- is the way that we're going to move forward, I feel like we're, you know, not really adequately addressing
- what the sliding scale tool is.
- for folks and I would really, you know, it'd be hard for me, but probably support a reduction in the
- moratorium to something like 10 or 15 years versus 25. I don't foresee when we're going to get,
- you know, the opportunity to have sewer extended into some of these areas that have appropriate infrastructure.
- to sustain density. But that's kind of the way I feel about it, the same type of analysis I do from
- a GIS perspective of looking at infrastructure, looking at kind of roads that have been built out, looking
- at large sized lots that weren't hooked up. So now they're just limited to a sliding scale or 10 lot minimums.
- Um, and if you have 50 acres and you don't want to do the sliding scale, you can only create five lots
- and that's bothered that bothers me. So, um, thank you. And I won't be supporting this. There is a lot
- of emotion on this topic.
- It has been discussed for decades. Within this body, speaking for myself, I've got over a year and many,
- many hours of talking about this and gnashing of teeth and trying to truly understand what the heck
- we're talking about with respect to subdivisions. We talked about the 25 years in detail in the ordinance review
- committee, we did talk about it. There were four of us and three of us support the changes that you
- see in front of you as part of this amendment. What I personally was concerned about is an explanation
- about the major, the minor, and also the sliding scale, because it was clear to me after going through
- the public hearings that there was a tremendous amount of confusion on what was and what is.
- come to find out that after the meeting was over, the Planning Department met with any number of people
- and explained to them the differences between the subdivisions and, in fact, what was doable.
- In some cases, and actually most cases, they found an alternative, something other than the sliding
- scale. So as our discussions continued over time, that what you see now
- on the front end on the subdivisions is an explanation of those subdivisions and also more importantly
- we wanted to have the overheads and examples of those type of subdivisions pictorially so people could
- take and see them and apply them on it might apply to their petition on whatever they're wanting to do.
- By adding an explanation and also the overheads, as you see as part of this amendment, I think the staff
- has done an outstanding job of laying out the differences. And most importantly, in something that was
- said in the very beginning and has been said over and over and over again, if you have a question, contact
- the plan department and talk to them about it.
- And they will walk you through what you can and cannot do. And in most cases, you're going to find that
- you're going to be able to do what you want to do. You just didn't necessarily have a very good understanding
- of what the ordinance said. Adding the paragraphs in there on the front end hopefully allows for an
- explanation to at least answer some of the preliminary questions coming from the petitioners. So I support
- this amendment. Thank you.
- All right, thank you so much. To my left, do either of you have comments to make? Please, Mr. Fields,
- we'll start with you. I am pretty new to the Planning Commission. I did not sit through any
- of the discussions about the ordinance review and all that when it happened, and it baffles me. I do
- not understand it, and so I can't vote for or against because I just don't understand the driver for
- it. The driver for?
- 25 years. Okay, got it. Thank you Mr. Bush. Yes I'd like to compliment staff on what the changes they
- made. I also love to see the pictorial presentations which takes what could be a very confusing
- and makes it a lot more easy to understand. The only place where I am stuck on this, once again, is
- the 25 years. I don't know where that number came from. I personally think it's long. I don't know that
- I have a better recommendation, maybe 15 years.
- And I get why you don't want it to be too short, because then that tempts people to buy the property,
- sit on it, and try to make a lot of changes and maybe prematurely alter the county's flavor. But I do
- think 25 years is too long. Thank you. Thank you so much. Council Member Henry. Thank you.
- Commissioner and thank you for the grace there to find parking on a Thursday in Bloomington from Indianapolis
- getting in here. So I want to thank the public for comments on this particular amendment and I want
- to echo some of the sentiments of my colleagues up here in terms of the origin of the 25 years. We had
- a discussion in the administrative meeting that I still think has not really been fully addressed in
- the document about the
- The origin story of that that rule and the only reference we have is the meeting minutes from the June
- meeting that was referenced in public comment where a four four vote of this body in 2014 a split vote
- Failed to amend it the last time so it did not pass without controversy 11 years ago about half of 25
- years if we think about it pretty close to that so
- As I said in the administrative meeting, the argument is circular because it is self-referencing back
- to previous decisions of the commission. And the evidence of the 25-year rule is going back to site
- itself. And so it doesn't have a basis in law. In those transcripts, then Richard Martin, I think, made
- the comment about it not having an analog or being data-driven. Mr. Schilling was there and, of course,
- has also reiterated in the administrative meeting this month that it's a policy preference. It's not
- found in code.
- as a rule. And so I think the other comments, where we would have to point to where else in code or
- practice 25 years equals a generation, is hard to do. We wouldn't have a TIFF that's 25 years, for example.
- I think there's some other references that have been made to other instruments of time that we'd have
- there. And even demographers would say that the boomer generation, Gen X, millennials, are 15 to 17
- year generations. So I think on this, if we can
- do two things still one is you know when we say in that particular space we're pointing back to policy
- or decisions of the commission if it is circular and we're pointing back to just previous discussions
- instead of a ordinance that is sanctified Monroe County that we when we say generations it's 25 years
- here is something that we need to think about otherwise I would
- I would like to. Open maybe an amendment to this this evening. Is a as a way to fix up or address the
- 25 years as a generation rule. So I would offer today amendment to this if we can do that meeting today
- to move that we amend section 8 60 dash 10 dash B dash three to read 15 years instead of 25 in that
- for clarification purposes. Is that the only amendment that you are offering on this section?
- On that section, at this time, unless there's a friendly amendment to clarify or extend other references
- to the 25-year rule, I would entertain that. I would ask maybe if you were willing, I hate to do this
- for being the second, but there was an area where we could add the, would you go to that area?
- right there on the six would be the. But willing to I would entertain that sure I accepted friendly.
- My second stands. We have a motion. To amend this portion of the CDO regarding the sliding scale subdivision.
- We haven't actually even put this on the table yet. So I know that's okay. I can wait. I'm sorry, it
- was a point of order. Did we not introduce this item into? We haven't. We haven't. Well, that may have,
- I'm happy to wait, but I. So I would ask that you go ahead and make a motion to approve and then
- with that amendment as well, if you would please. That's my apologies. I thought we already introduced
- a motion. So I'll make a motion to proceed with approval of the adoption of this adjustment to the CDO
- as presented with the amendment that I've offered. I'll still second. Okay, thank you. So at least we
- have something on the table to talk through. Thank you. Does anyone have
- Any comments on this motion? Or the amendment with the amendment amended language? Did you have anything?
- Okay, I have my case already. I have not spoken yet, so I'd like to please. And that is to say that
- I do appreciate the interest in this. This ordinance was created to protect
- farmland and if we're not Getting food from farms. I don't know where y'all think it comes from but
- But really it's about the rural parts of the county and these rural parts of the county can't handle
- extensive high density development as much as people may look at
- large lots of land, for example, things we've looked at today, and kind of think, wow, I could put 100
- homes there. Well, you could, but they'd be 20 miles from the nearest grocery store. And then that creates
- road issues, and it creates septic issues, and it creates, well, of course, we'd have to be on sewer.
- It creates other issues as well. And that is difficult.
- And so for those who don't want to create a minor or major subdivision, which you're always welcome
- to propose, any property owners is invited to do so and make that proposal, that can be done. But if
- you are a person who wants to conserve land, perhaps it's not buildable.
- You want to conserve land that perhaps is in your farming family. And you still want to maintain that
- conservation or that farm, but yet you have. You would wish to sell off a small piece to help fund retirement
- or you wish to sell off a couple of small pieces. Just for homes for relatives, for example.
- then you can do that without going through a minor. And unless you're seeking a sidewalk, road waiver,
- other thing, you can actually do that without coming before us, right? And so that's the benefit, right?
- Is if you don't wanna have to come to the Planning Commission to rezone your property and then
- the commissioners, because we're such evil commissioners, you can avoid doing that and just work with
- the planning department, our magnificent planning staff. And unless you're seeking certain waivers,
- it doesn't even come across our desk. So that's why it was created. Now, one of the suggestions is,
- well, just get rid of the 25 year. Well, then this becomes a different kind of subdivision.
- And if and if folks don't want to have this, then what will happen is almost immediately has been pointed
- out. It'll get chewed up and land just becomes housing prospectors dreams. What this piece does do is with the
- images and the graphics is it does present to the public what these options are and how they differ
- from one another and Where you need septic where you need sewer how it all works together What it looks
- like on a map or in an overhead on a GIS? And that is brilliant, and I hope no matter what that you
- don't get rid of that and
- So I would hope that we're going to vote for clarity and for our residents. So worst case scenario,
- if we don't vote for clarity with our residents, I would ask that the staff at least use utilizes these
- images at the front desk where residents may come in with questions.
- Now, I do understand that if sewer became magically available and widely available and things changed,
- I think we would be looking at a lot of the parts of the CDO or considering other options. So I don't
- think that
- that doing it now will bring sewer. So I do get it that sewer changes things, but it doesn't change
- intersections and roads and other infrastructure that's needed. It's one infrastructure piece that's
- vital, but it's not the only one. And so then the question becomes, do we have the road width? Do we
- have the intersections? Do we have the ability to
- insert a large population away from the city center. Ah, who pays for it? That's always a good question.
- And how many deputies will that take? And how do we pay for fire? And is there a nearby fire station?
- And all of the other hundreds of questions that we ask petitioners to consider when they bring in a
- petition. Do you have hookup? Do you have access to this utility, that utility, and the other? Do we
- have water? Do you have electricity?
- that. We ask every petitioner to do that, so I'm not sure why we wouldn't do that. So um, so that is
- what I wanted to say. I think if, um, folks. Want to open this up yet again or keep talking about it
- in perpetuity. We could do so. Um I would much rather we give this arrest for a few
- I don't want this to be on our agenda. Um nonstop because staff has already got enough to do and I don't.
- And I don't know that this is, um. The right way to approach this, but that's what I wanted to say,
- and I appreciate
- Um, all right. So, um, any other, um, I just have a point of order. Okay. And it's really, I don't know
- what it is. It's a comment. It's a statement. It's a question. We have a motion and a second on the
- table and we're having our comments before we vote. That's correct. Yeah. If, if for some reason this
- is voted down, what happens to this topic?
- Is it completely removed from the list? Well, this is a, this will be a recommendation to the board
- of commissioners. So tonight if we let's assume, let's assume that we have a, have a, uh, a fail, a
- failed motion. The recommendation would go forward with a failed motion, correct? We would need a majority,
- either no recommendation, a recommendation for negative or recommendation for positive. So it's still
- up to that point for the county commissioners to make a decision.
- what we see in front of us. I mean, I understand it. I just want you to say it. If we don't get majority
- by rule, it defaults and it proceeds to our next scheduled meeting. We had that occur during the CDO
- process where we weren't able to get a majority either way. Am I correct, Mr. Schelling? Yeah, I mean,
- if you get a positive recommendation and negative recommendation or no recommendation tonight, that
- takes it off your plate.
- Period. It's in the commissioner's court at that point. So, yeah. But that needs a majority vote. We
- need a majority to say. To say one of those three options. Right. If we don't have a majority vote because
- there are only six of us here, then what happens? I think was the question.
- Well, typically someone will make a motion to send it forward with no recommendation or you'll continue
- it to the next hearing where there might be Other members present. Okay. Thank you and just to be clear
- the Motion that included an amendment Is part is can be considered right? Yes. Thank you. I just want
- to make sure that that's true. Okay
- We'll go back to Mr. Henry. Thank you. I'll keep it brief and I appreciate your comments, Commissioner.
- I would agree with much of what you said. I don't think what you offer in terms of what this amendment
- does or what the motion does really
- It has anything to do with the 25 year rule, whether it's 15 years or 25 years, we still have the instruments
- inside the CDO to review the use the sliding scale the divisions and so really the amendment itself
- is only addressing in what time span that those conversations happen, whether it's a real generation or the.
- 25-year concept of a generation. So I don't necessarily disagree with most of what you presented there.
- I will say, and I think it has been brought up a few times around this topic, I am the current county
- councilor sitting here. And things have changed in our county where when we think about how we generate
- revenue, the state of Indiana has shifted its tax policy from property owners to wage earners in our
- county, which means we're going to be drawing more and more from income tax to fuel our government.
- And when we do not have opportunities to develop and attract those
- taxpayers that are wage earners to live in this county. If they work in our county and they reside in
- other counties as we all know that income tax goes home with them. And so the culture has changed a
- little bit since 2014 when this was discussed last and certainly the 1970s the last time our tax code
- has been so changed dramatically that I would I hear the comments about infrastructure development.
- I understand the scenarios that have been presented in the room but those aren't the only scenarios
- and there may be good planning I
- we do for cost benefit analysis to figure out the breakpoints of what would be a reasonable development
- that could occur on a property where we could afford the extra deputy or the fire service. But that's
- the work of plan commissions. That's what they do, right? And that's what planners do. So I think to
- have all that in our minds as we're trying to say, well, do we try to protect all that right here in
- a vote, or do we actually do the work as things are presented to us within 15-year increments is totally
- fine. We're going to have to reimagine
- the way we do protect our spaces and we do build in a way that is meeting that triple bottom line for
- our community that protects people and the planet and shared prosperity in our community. So I don't
- disagree with much of what you said. I think the issue just floats around what is this idea of 25 years.
- And I think there's a reasonable adaptation as we move forward in this. I also want to say too, for
- the record too, which is really important, I understand
- Fair has presented the procedural piece of this which is we'll vote and that goes to the board and the
- board will make their decision. Is that I think it's just that I mean we understand we understand that
- procedural space but bear in mind we have a CDO list of amendments that has been sitting
- and we've been working through since December. It is now October. And we're working maybe at the speed
- of government here, which maybe frustrates the speed of commerce about how quickly we're resolving some
- of these issues in the CDO so partners know what the playbook is to do the work in the community. So
- I feel that, you know, we probably need to get the rest of that list handled in short order as a promise
- to the public. I'd hate to be here in December with languishing amendments that took a year to get to
- when some of these decisions
- really need to be brought front and center, but I appreciate the work of the ERC and revisiting this,
- and I'll just rest my comments there. Thank you. Great, Randolph? Yeah, I'll be pretty quick. I'm torn.
- Like, the comments you made, Commissioner Thomas, are very applicable, and also the comments that the
- rest of my colleagues have made. That's why I've never even
- suggested getting away from having that type of reservation. I think 15 years gives us appropriate time
- to plan. These documents are fluent. If somehow the city starts extending sewer, then we can petition
- the plan commission to bring forward an amendment and we can go back to the 25 years. I think that tool
- was very helpful for all of the reasons you expressed, but we're in a new
- time where it's not business as normal. Also, I think one other thing I wanted to make a comment is
- the people that want to carve off those lots, they still have the opportunity. What we're discussing
- is the reservation and moratorium. The people that want to preserve that land and be good stewards,
- they still can. That doesn't change anything. What the time
- difference in my opinion does is people that might want to then maybe carve out another lot. And I think
- if they go through 15 years and we see some issues with this, we can readdress it. We could put a longer
- timeline. I guess that's what I really want to get across with my comment here is like these aren't
- static ordinances. They're fluent. We should be addressing updates to our CDO every five years. We start
- in 2016 slash 17. It's about the end of 2025. It took us this long just to get to this point to have
- this discussion. And I feel like the 15 years is a medium.
- And if we need to address that in 10 years from now, that still gives us five years on the people that
- would choose that approach. Some of the people that had already chose to do it might just be getting
- out of the moratorium and reservation and be able to then maybe go in subdivide again. But I'm not going
- to get in a position where I'm hyperly concerned about someone
- going through a sliding scale every 15 years to subdivide a large lot because you still need the minimum
- lots. So if you wanted the three, that's 7.5 and you still need 55% in the parent parcel every time.
- So eventually that becomes limited itself. And I really think that like it's the best thing we could
- do right now
- unless we went through a different sequence of discussions to address the hardship that some of the
- property owners in this county are dealing with, and that would have been maybe creating another subdivision
- process. But I'm not gonna go down there. I already said I'm gonna try to stay very on topic and refrain
- from some of what could allow me just to not
- be too concerned about 25-year, but we don't have other tools in our toolbox, and I am not willing to
- pass anything until we address this. I won't support anything unless the timeline is reduced, because
- this needs to stay on our prioritization list, where it was put. In my opinion, we haven't really addressed
- it fully, and we have
- quite a bit of few new Plan Commission members, and I think allowing them time to really grasp the gravity
- of this is very important, because I don't know if everyone's under the same assumption as if we move
- this forward. It's off our prioritization list. It's off. So who knows when it comes back? So this is
- our opportunity to address it.
- We're not the final decision makers. I understand that part, but I do think the 15 years is a is a balance.
- And if I do think that we can address this moving forward when, you know, things go back to normal,
- which is probably a term I shouldn't use because I don't know if that will ever happen. I said this
- in previous meetings, I apologize.
- I was a planner for 40 years. I've dealt with all types of plans. The argument I'm hearing or the discussion
- that I'm hearing is, why 25? And how do we get 25 years? Because it's generational. I now hear an argument
- about 15 years. Why 15 years? And if I go back to what
- David says down here about how do I argue the point with anybody who's asking me the question, why 15
- years versus 25 years? I don't have something, I don't have legislation, I don't have statutory requirements,
- I don't have anything. It's based upon the judgment of this body and previously to the judgment of a
- former planned commission, going back what, 10 years ago? And even though that vote was, I believe it was 4-4,
- what everybody's hung their hat on for all of this time, 25 years. It's in the ordinance right now.
- That's what the ordinance says today. So why 15 years? I mean, I heard what the chamber said, noted,
- and I heard what the BED said, noted. But why 15 years? And so why do I want to change it? I mean, you
- had a sovereign body, a planned commission,
- based upon judgment at the time, making an informed decision based upon the argument that was put in
- front of them. And that's what they came up with. We, this body, or not necessarily the new folks, because
- they weren't part of the discussion before we formalized this ordinance, we spent an enormous amount
- of time talking about this. And as you can see, there's still not a common understanding. We do not
- have a common ground here yet on 15 versus 10 versus
- 25 versus anything or doing away with completely like BEDC suggests. I would love. Let me let me finish.
- And then you can I mean just I mean we've been talking about this for a long time. There are really
- very few instances with petitions that in fact this will even apply to. As we've discussed in our meetings
- it's really a handful
- And again, in most of those cases, they've been resolved by doing something other than a sliding scale.
- We're talking to Wednesdays and Tuesdays, and we're spending an enormous amount of time on something
- that was agreed to years ago. So I go back to Y15 versus 25. And I can't answer that question. But I
- have to rely upon the judgment of our predecessors and the discussions they had
- If you want to make it a different time frame, give me the argument other than, well, it makes sense
- because of. And I understand what you said. But there's other folks who think differently. And so we
- really don't have a consensus. And what's going to probably happen here is that because we continue
- to have this discussion, none of this is going to take and change. And we're going to go back to what
- the ordinance originally said that we approved.
- back in December of last year. So why 15 versus 25? Mr. Thomas, I have a motion, if you'd entertain
- it. I was just wanting to address kind of the, I thought I, I don't want to hijack the meeting either.
- So I am happy to make a motion, but I refer back to the chair for who speaks next, but yeah.
- If you will, he was kind of, he wasn't saying names, but alluding. My reason is,
- the difficulty we're having with the extending of sewer and a lot of our focus with building out this
- ordinance, that was not an issue. It is an issue. That's my why. And if we were able to kind of build
- the ordinance out with the same expectations of how we were developing the county as we started the
- ordinance, as our predecessors developed this ordinance, I have already said, I don't think this would
- be that big of an issue.
- The fact that we don't know that, I feel like the 15 years creates a better balance. Now, as far as
- why 15 and 25, yes, but the reason why, the reason I'm making is due to the fact that the sewer's not
- being extended, all of our ordinances contingent to septic or sewer, and they allow different types
- of lot sizes and developments in infrastructure, and I just think
- Right now we could find a middle ground at that 15 years. And then if that becomes a bigger issue, we
- can readdress it, move it back. If we are able to, you know, get the ability to have sewer again, then
- we can maybe move that back. Because I do think the intention is pure and I'm in support of that. That's
- why I've never said let's do away with it. So I just really wanted to make that clear.
- just based off of your comment, so. David, can you say one thing? Sure. Can I say one thing? Please,
- and then I need to go to my left. Okay. I'm sorry. That's okay. The whole issue of annexation. I'm just
- telling you, the whole issue of annexation for a lot of us who have been involved in that, and the whole
- issue of whether or not it's actually going to happen, and whether or not sewer is actually going to
- be extended outside the city limits, to me is a non-issue.
- at this point in time. Let me finish. Because it is at this point in time. And what may or may not happen
- in the future can be addressed in the future. But that's not what we're talking about today.
- That's all. All right. I'm going to go to my left again and see if anyone has any follow-up. Don't look
- to your left, Mr. Fields. Do you have anything else you'd like to add?
- I struggle with understanding the driver. I heard your point. Got it. I hear their points. I just, I
- really have a hard time understanding it. I just, you know, I mean, the annexation thing, I don't understand
- that very much either. But does the 25-year thing, does that, you know, tell the city of Bloomington,
- ah, you don't have to worry about it. Does, you know, would more development give them more encouragement to move?
- some infrastructure? I don't know. I don't know. It's a really big, hairy problem. I don't get it. Did
- you have anything else you wanted to add? Reluctantly, I don't know the number either. I'm hearing two
- compelling arguments, both of them valid
- I suspect that's what happened the last time this was batted about in 2014 or whatever. I don't see
- the link between a
- Let's say someone who is a large landowner selling off a portion of their property to automatically
- charge again and putting in an infrastructure, because we know that the cost of the infrastructure is
- exorbitant, even if all participants are willing to expand that infrastructure, which it appears not
- to be the case in today's climate.
- I'm thinking from a personal point of view If I were to want to sell part of my property, I would like
- to have that option Which I do obviously and and subdivide a portion of it But as as was pointed out
- by one of the other members there's there's already limits in there as to what could be to subdivide
- how much can be subdivided and how many times a
- in a 25-year span or a 15-year span, that can be replicated. So I think it is self-limiting to a degree.
- I'm still struggling with the number. Other than that, I think everything that's here, that's been presented,
- I support.
- I'm just going to say that I think a good question is, if you say why 25, then the question why 15 comes
- up. I do think that if sewer services became available, we would be looking at the CDO anyway. So I'm
- not sure I would say, well, let's just prepare the way so that when sewer is available, it's, you know,
- so I would, because we don't know where
- And it may be a zone or a region. So it's not gonna be everywhere, certainly. So I think I would wanna
- wait and see where that is. I'm not, to this day, heard any complaints from anybody, any property owner
- who has utilized the sliding scale and said, but I wanted to do this and I couldn't, and I wanted to
- do this later and I couldn't. I've never had anyone say that.
- And that's interesting, because I'm sure I would have heard it. And I have not heard that yet. So that
- also makes me feel like this is a problem that actually doesn't exist, that we're uncomfortable with
- a number that I agree we should consider, readdress when infrastructure changes.
- one of the and I and I do want to say this I've said it before and I'm so sorry for those who hearing
- it again that one of the reasons we went with this number back then is because this is about how often
- road infrastructure transportation plans are made and that's why because John Irvin used to talk about
- road sheds like you would talk about watersheds you would talk about road sheds and it was
- How much road do you have and how many people can live on that road? And it was an interesting way to
- think about road sheds versus watersheds and other sheds. But anyway, that's also part of this mechanism
- here. And I just wanted to make sure y'all knew that. So I don't know if you wanted Mr. Henry to-
- Okay. Yeah. So it's changed since this discussion, but I will now actually, because in honor of Colonel
- Farris's analysis that we don't want to be arbitrary and create another circular self-referencing date.
- And I hear the comments that were made. I've of course reviewed those transcripts as well.
- So it's interesting how I think all of us might be selecting what
- in the transcript we want to pull out in terms of evidence or not evidence, I don't want to create another
- circular self-referencing random generational date here. So I'm going to motion to table this back to
- the ORC and direct staff to conduct an analysis that is not time-based, but maybe capability-based or
- use-based instead of time-based and come back with recommendations on how to address this part of the CDO.
- So it's motion to table and to address staff to investigate another way to do this other than a time-based
- approach unless they can find a definition of generational that we can cite. I'd be happy to go ahead
- and second that too because I'm not going to support anything that we see today, which makes me feel
- like if we don't get a majority, it'll just come right back to us next month. This kind of goes in with
- Some of your comments of giving it a little space to breathe. So it would go back to a smaller group
- and then back to the plan commission administrative with a new proposal and then back here because we
- can keep picking at years until we settle on one. But I think we need some data to back up our choices
- here. So back to the RC to figure it out.
- And we have a motion in a second. Did you want to add anything or ask any questions? Please some clarity
- there. Yeah You're afraid of that Okay, so what it does is it would take it off of oh this goes to the point
- the county commissioners next. We don't change anything at all with this vote. Everything stays as it
- is while we go back to the drawing board, as it were, in the ORC. And I just want to make sure we're
- all on the same page here. We all understand. Okay. Any other comments? Anything? Okay. Great. Great.
- Can we call a vote? Can we have a vote? Please. Just so we're clear, please restate what we're voting on.
- Motion to table this item back to the ORC and the direct staff to review capabilities or other basis
- for the rule and to identify what a generation is for the purposes of this ordinance. Okay. Could we
- do the December 8th ORC? Is that reasonable? Yeah, that'd be great. Okay. All right. It's been moved
- and seconded to
- Continue this item to the ordinance review committee meeting date of December 8th a vote. Yes is about
- to continue John Enright Randolph Yes Ferris Rudy Fields, yes David Henry Julie Thomas I'm gonna be
- a no because I feel like we already did this but I'm gonna say no David Bush. Yes
- Okay, motion fails four to two. I'm sorry, motion passed four to two. I'm sorry, I'm gonna go ahead
- and change my vote and say yes. Just for the sake of moving on. I appreciate it, thank you. And for
- the sake of moving on. We have one more item. We'll just make it six zero.
- Thank you all for being here. All right, so thank you. Um, do we need a quick break? Yeah.
- that's okay with everyone. And we will come back at 8 10. Look at that. It's eight o'clock. It's almost
- time to ring the bells. It's we'll come back at 8 10 for our last agenda item, which looks like a doozy,
- but it really isn't. It's not all right. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to going
- And we are now on item seven, ZOA 25-6.
- So this is a different amendment to the county development ordinance. This is more of the result of
- staff edits as well as Some of the house bills that have come down as particularly the one that's in
- relation to stormwater house bill 1037 So we are going to go through a series of amendments and I'm
- going to do so quite quickly they are mostly just
- Corrections and things like that. But if there's anything you want to discuss more fully I'll pause
- and I can do that So on page 151 of the packet we are keeping this table updated with each amendment
- It's going to have a summary or revision history So that anyone that goes through the ordinance can
- see what changes have been made since its original adoption
- I'll go ahead and take out for now the upper red text, which is regarding the sliding scale. But leaving
- the last column that you see in red here, this is a good summary of just what we're doing today. So
- we're changing some language. The language design standard does not show up in the Indiana code. It's
- only referred to as development standard. This is a requirement to just meet what the state code reference
- is instead of having our own version of that.
- And then we also have some changes and corrections to logging comma urban area and artificial lake or
- pond. This is as a result of the stormwater changes. Changes to fueling station parking minimums, removing
- the requirement for sidewalks if located near a moderate priority Green Lake corridor. That's something
- I want to talk about a little bit more in depth. And then we're also going to be seeing changes regarding
- reference to soil and water conservation versus
- resources, natural resource conservation, and then some clarifying language throughout. So I'm going
- to go ahead and get started and go through these. So I won't go through each change from design standard
- to development standard. It's sprinkled throughout the ordinance. So I will go ahead and start at just
- a note. So since the
- Since the CDO is linked, whenever we do a word to PDF, it keeps showing up that there are changes that
- are not. So if you actually look at the strike through on some of the text, it's not actually a change.
- I just want to point that out because I can't seem to get rid of that. But this is not a change, but
- it looks like we're changing a lot. So just as an FYI.
- The first substantial change is on page 204 of the packet. This is to the use artificial pond or lake.
- And like I mentioned, this is in regard to the transition of review
- for some of these things coming back to the planning department. They were transferred to stormwater,
- but then there was a house bill that said that they basically cannot do some of these reviews. Planning
- still retains the ability to review some of these things, so that's why these changes are the way that
- they are. So artificial pond or lake, it is a use in the use table. People want to build a pond or a
- lake. These are the standards for which they have to go about
- getting that review approved. We also have a change to the logging urban area. So this is taking out
- the applicability of stormwater doing that review because they're no longer, they do not have that in
- their ordinance any longer. So it is going to be solely with planning. I'll also note if you see,
- An error of zero and then a strikeout of the real chapter. That's not what we're proposing We are proposing
- it stay chapter 817 not zero. So that's somewhat of an error And then we found a spelling error so we're
- gonna fix that page 248 just site design items and then this is an item I want to spend a little bit
- of time on we are
- suggesting that for subdivisions, we remove one of the requirements for sidewalks. You saw tonight a
- few sidewalk waivers. We're realizing that adding in the reliance on the alternative transportation
- plan is causing people to have more requirements for sidewalks, which is good if in a place that makes
- sense. But we also realize that we need to update our alternative transportation plan map.
- The moderate priority greenway corridor, I'll just share the map right now. It was, I think, envisioned
- as more of a hopeful plan to come up with trails. It is the purple line. When we followed the purple
- line on most of these, it was, we think this was the 10 o'clock line.
- This might be a Duke Energy power line. This is following a creek bed, we believe, which would be all
- floodplain. And then there were just other lines that when you followed them on the aerial, they just
- didn't seem to follow consistently along a road exactly, or we just weren't sure what their
- purpose was, to be honest. They seem to be kind of floating lines. So we're recommending that the purple
- not be a requirement for subdivision. And that's something that's open for discussion. There was a correction
- needed. There was an error based on the
- Linking so we just fix that under section a here. So we're going to be fixing that Section under the
- eco chapter we did have some disturbance of point seven five acres as a requirement for stormwater grading
- permit and Right now we are going to keep that language just more
- in line with what the state code requires, so sites may also require a stormwater grading permit and
- refer them to Chapter 761 to make that determination.
- So under the agricultural activities for Eco and Lake Lemon, we originally had the Natural Resource
- Conservation Service as preparing conservation plans for us. This year, we had somebody who wanted to
- start a new agricultural activity in the Lake Lemon area. And they went to Natural Resource Conservation
- Service and said, unless you enroll in a federal program, we cannot help you with the conservation plan.
- So Water stepped up and said that they would be able to help us and that they're used to doing
- these types of plans. So we've happily changed it to Soil and Water, who can handle both people in federal
- programs or people that just have smaller programs just starting out. So that's a change.
- The change here for 394 is that this looks like a lot of change, but again, it's the linking. We're
- not changing the code references. The only thing that's changing here is that we added a sentence for
- the exception under the eco area, and it says, in evaluating the request for an exception, the director
- shall consider the section below.
- which has been added as part of the CDO and was never linked to say to look at that. So that's something
- that we want to fix just for clarity sake. Make sure that I got that. Okay. And then under the policy
- for emergence of new sinkholes, again, we had to kind of create the language that just
- points people to Chapter 761 instead of saying it did definitely require applicability under 761. And
- we're hopeful that with some future changes in the CSGP requirements that we can still review those
- items. But just for now, this helps us in the interim to be compliant with state code requirements.
- And then we had a word
- Error here. We changed preliminary plat to primary plat
- And then we have had some interest in a new administrative subdivision type that we've created, which
- is one that is exclusively to create a parcel for agricultural or conservation purposes. We wanted to
- make sure it was clear that you can create one new lot for a maximum of two lots included in the Type
- G, the original lot and then the one new lot, since that had been a common question in our office.
- Then question on that since you said so that is already doable This is just for clarity. Okay.
- Thank you. Yep under our chapter for site plan plot plan and certified plot plan one of the
- listed requirements was a holdover from the prior ordinance, which was that
- The surveyor or the person had to put down the nature and intensity of the operations involved with
- the project under the CDO We no longer assign automatic intensity of use to the use table. So that's
- something we decided needed to be cleaned up and Then we made two quick changes to the definition section
- under commercial mixed use we used to have a separate
- use for shopping center, but now we find that that can be combined under just commercial mixed use.
- So even though this is out of alphabetical order, what we've done is indent shopping center and say
- that it includes this definition and use here. And it's green text, which means it was just moved. It
- didn't actually change any substantially. It didn't change substantially. OK. Oops.
- The last definition change is in regard to sewer. We wanted to make sure we reference sewer because
- it's stated both ways in the code. So under the state code, they refer to sewers as sanitary sewage
- system, which we have a definition for as well. So we're just pointing people to the right definition.
- So with that, that's all I have. I can take any questions.
- Great, thank you so much. Any comments or questions from my left? From my right. Just really brief and
- it's about the multi mobile transportation plan that is completely outdated. We have built trails that
- don't even show up on that. Another I think reason why we should kind of try to start looking at that
- a bit quicker is like whenever you're talking about regional connectivity, if there are
- Places, destinations that are mentioned within our transportation plan or alternative transportation
- plan, it could significantly help increase their opportunity to secure different types of grant and
- funding to build out their trails. We encountered that just recently. I kind of reached out to see if
- there was any other language.
- it would be nice to update that even if it's just updating the map, but not the entire plan. I know
- that's just adding more work to your table, but it's been a long time. And I guess I'll just repeat
- myself once. We have built trails that don't even show up on that map. So outside of that, I'm in support.
- I think that is something that came out of
- I think it's a good question. What was the highway in the past with consultants? Transportation alternatives
- plan actually was a group that we hosted. It was a committee, but we've since created the internal trails
- group, which includes a lot of members, so I do have it on the agenda to start there. And hopefully
- we could either we could get some direction on where to go because we'd have to get some consultant
- money. I just think it goes to a
- It would, yeah, miss things, you know, right? It would have to be passed by resolution as well. It's
- not just something we can do at staff level to fix, right? Yep. Thank you. All right. Um, any public
- comment on this side? There's no one here in the Natu Hill room, but, um, anyone on teams? Raise your
- hand to be. Okay, seeing none.
- Can someone make a motion, please? Thank you, sir. I'll try. You'll be fine. With respect to Zulu Oscar
- Alpha 25-6, which is the amendment to the CDO, item 13, I motion that we take a positive recommendation
- to the county commissioners on this item. Second. Are we waiving the final hearing? And we also want
- to say it's late. I know. It's not in my notes. And we waive the final hearing. All right. Second stands.
- Excellent. Anybody have other comments or questions? There is Santa. OK. Great. Great color roll.
- So that's been moved and seconded to send a positive recommendation to the county commissioners and
- waive the final hearing for zio a-25-6 Which is an amendment to the county development ordinance primarily
- staff edits item number 13 from the prioritization list a vote. Yes is a vote to send a positive
- recommendation Tron Enright Randolph. Yes Scott Ferris. Yes, Rudy Fields. Yes, David Henry. Yes Julie
- Thomas. Yes
- David Bush? Yes. Motion is approved, six to zero. I do have two quick reports. Please. So first is that
- we were notified by the Purdue Extension Office that they have appointed a member, Joe Vandeventer,
- as a temporary appointee that's allowed under state code.
- to be the position for the Purdue extension in the vacancy of that position. So that position has not
- been filled by Purdue. So the extension board is able to offer a temporary fill of that position. They
- say that they approved that vacancy position on October 15th. And according to Purdue extension, it
- would be valid until December 31st.
- of twenty twenty six. So we hope to invite we invited Joe to this meeting. He wasn't able to make it.
- So we hope to see him at a future plan commission and from there and then the other.
- Other announcement that we have is that we'd like to let you know that one of our planner twos, Anne
- Christelius, has taken another position. So she has put in her two weeks with the county. Just want
- to spend a minute just thanking Anne for her service to the county in her tenure of six and a half years.
- She's done quite a bit to streamline our department, keep us organized. Her GIS skills have been
- invaluable. She's also earned her AICP in that time period and just helped us all with a lot of different
- projects here and there. So just really a good team player and the that wish her well in her next position.
- So her last day will be November 5th. Do you think we could get a card and have the Planning Commission
- sign it and circulate it? I think that would be nice. I will see you on the admin meeting the day before
- her last, so I will. I can do that. Awesome.
- Okay. Yeah, so I do want to wish Miss Priscilla as well, all of her future endeavors and thank her for
- her time here. We've all learned a lot from each other. And I will be seeking a request from the council
- to fill the position since we're under a current hiring freeze. So we will be trying to seek approval of that.
- Everybody turn to your right. I already reacted to that. Okay. Just adding it in there. All right.
- Thank you. Ms. Schilling, did you have anything for us? I do not. Oh, lovely. Well, thank you all for
- a scintillating discussion, an interesting meeting, and we are adjourned.