11-14-16 Zoning and Annexation - Laserfiche WebLink

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insight based on his experience in planning and zoning. He stated, This is one of the most important land -use decisions this Council will make. I have spoken with several of the Councilmembers— present and past Councilmembers —and zoning petitions are probably one of the most emotional and important decisions you ever make. This will determine the balance of the development on the East Bank, one way or the other. It will be almost impossible, if you want approval for this, for the ABZA or the Area Plan Commission or the Council to deny future height variance requests anywhere. So, pick a plot of land on the East Bank that you're familiar with ... just put a twelve (12) story building on there, and then determine —going back to the criteria — whether that affects the character of the neighborhood, and whether it affects property values in the neighborhood. Approval of this plan, as a final point, will cast public doubt on the ability of current and future planning efforts. We're always doing lots of plans. If approval is granted to this plan, which is a major plan—my opinion is that there will be public doubt on future efforts. Committee Chair Oliver Davis asked that all members of the Committee and Council comment or ask questions regarding the bill. Committee Chair Davis suggested that they go around the table in a counter - clockwise fashion, starting with Committeemember Gavin Ferlic. Committeemember Gavin Ferlic stated that the Council was used to getting a staff report for a PUD followed by a presenter giving a favorable, negative, or neutral recommendation from the APC. Committeemember Ferlic asked why this was so different. Ms. Smith clarified that that was because this bill came with no recommendation. She stated, And that was one of the options that they have, as the Plan Commission: to send it with no recommendation. Since this time our Plan Commission Executive Committee has gone a step further and are looking at changing their bylaws to —in all possibilities —a forced decision, they don't believe that they should be sending stuff to you with no recommendation. I think they had regrets for that. I think what happened was that they had a staff report and they had information, they had a large public hearing, and they had a situation where the Department of Community Investment had the offer of one recommendation and then changed it at the meeting, and they [unintelligible] or done something to get more information, but they didn't, so they just sent it with no recommendation and left it at that. She assured the Council that it would not happen again. Committeemember Davis stated that he made the recommendation to send the bill with no recommendation. He explained that Area Plan and he, as representative of Area Plan on the Council, received a packet from Community Investment outlining the reasons why they totally disagreed with the project being discussed. He stated, Then, at the last testimony, it was shared with us that there was a meeting held in the afternoon that changed everybody's thoughts, and I said, A meeting held in the afternoon changed everybody's thoughts? Really? On something this major? We had no documentation in front of us. It was embarrassing. He stated that he'd gotten in touch with the Mayor that afternoon and nothing came of it. He explained that the bill had to come with no recommendation, because there was no way to move forward with the issue after Community Investment had come to favor the project at the last minute. Committeemember Ferlic stated that he already knew why Committeemember Davis made his recommendation, and Committeemember Davis explained that he wanted the public to understand the reasoning behind