Cave Creek Planning Commission unanimously approves $29M Gateway mixed-use development and state-mandated zoning shifts

Thursday, September 18th, 2025. And I now call the planning commission meeting for the town of Cave Creek, Arizona to order. Uh we'll begin with the pledge of allegiance. I allegiance to the flag of the United States of America or anything of the sort, you know, you have to bear with me a little bit here. So, uh okay. If you wish to speak to the planning commission tonight, you will need to fill out a request to speak form available near the entrance.

If you have any items you'd like to be considered, please give them to the clerk along with your request to speak form over here. Copies of any reports, photographs, diagrams, charts, maps, or other materials presented to the planning commission must be given to the clerk for inclusion as part of the official town record. The planning commission is the advising and recommending body to the town council on matters related to zoning, land use, the general plan, and the town core plan.

Our recommendations to the town council on matters are just that, recommendations. The town council is responsible for making the final determination, regardless of how you feel about any matters passing from planning commission with the recommendation to the town council. in favor, opposed or neutral, and you want your opinion considered, it is your responsibility to attend the town council meetings and express yourself. Your responsibility does not end with the planning commission.

So, I think we'll start with uh Luke here on the zoning mission or maybe Stephen, I got you. Okay. Uh so for the zoning administrator's report tonight, um vice chair uh Miller, acting chair Miller, uh we have quite a bit on the agenda this evening, so I'll be brief. Some time ago, I asked the planning commission if they were available for a council commission joint work session on Tuesday, October 14th. It seems as though that the meeting will be postponed and a new date will be selected.

Uh I will email the planning commission as to when that work session will be uh rescheduled to. Um the the other thing I wanted to mention or bring up for the planning commission to think about is the start time for the planning commission. If you recall several years ago, um the planning commission used to begin at 7:00 p.m. The town council rolled their meetings back to 6:00 p.m. They've done it again and actually switched days to Tuesday uh meetings starting at 5.

I wanted to know if um you don't have to answer me tonight, but it's something that I'll I'll ask you all at a later time. Is there an appetite for the commission to change the um meeting start time to an earlier time, or is 6 p.m. still pretty pretty good for everybody? Any opinions? Okay. Yeah. All right. I suppose we can deal with that later. Yes. That's uh that's all I have um for the commission this evening. Thank you.

So, the next meeting for the planning commission will take place on October 16th, 2025. Uh, do we have any any else anything upcoming or it sounds like you already covered? Um, yeah, I I don't believe we're going to have anything for the commission on o um for the meeting in October. Uh, but I'll advise the commission as we get closer to that date. Okay. Uh, moving on to draft minutes. Uh looking to approval of the draft minutes from April 17th, 2025 planning commission meeting.

Uh do any of the planning commissioners have any request or changes to the draft minutes? If not, I Yeah. Yeah. Second. All right. Second. Motion to approve. I I All right. On to new business. Uh first case, we've got four cases tonight. Uh so the first one, case Z-24-01, a reszoning request to change the underlining zoning of two parcels totaling approximately 2 acres from a current zoning of desert rural residential DR89 to a commercial buffer CB zone.

The parcels which are in Carefree Highway specific area plan, the SAP, are located at the northwest corner of Carefree Highway and 51st Street. Assessor's parcel number 211-47-089B and 211-47-089C. Uh applicant is Gamage and Burnham on behalf of SC Fullerton Properties LLC. Uh the request to change the underlining zoning of two parcels totaling approximately 2 acres from a current zoning of desert rural residential DR89 to a commercial buffer CB zone.

The parcels which are in the Carefree Highway specific area plan SAP are located at the northwest corner of Carefree Highway and 51st Street. The same parcels numbers. Uh I'm going to read the procedure which we'll do for all four cases. Um so it'll be the same for one but I'll I'll skip it for the others just to save some time. So the procedure for this meeting is that the chair will introduce the case. Staff will provide a case summary. Commission members may request staff regarding the case.

Public comment will be opened. The chair will close public comment. Commission members may question staff regarding any issues generated by public comment. The chair will ask for a motion and a second to proceed. Discussion by the commission. The chair will close discussion and then the chair will call for a roll vote. If you wish to make any public comment, we ask that when you come to the podium to address the commission that you clearly state your name and residency for the record.

If there are any people in the audience who wish to speak at any time, submit a request to speak form. To make efficient use of our time and conduct a full public hearing on all relevant issues, plea, please be respectful and courteous and non-confrontational. The public comments should be concise, targeted, and relevant to the case. We will not entertain comments on matters that are not contained in the application subject to tonight's hearing. Three minutes will be allocated to each speaker.

Although if we have other people speaking on behalf of others, we can make concessions or give you more time. Um we will try to give you a 30 second wrap-up warning. So I think staff want to the case the report. Yes. Record compliment staff on this report. It's big. There's a lot of it's clear. It's concise, raises the issues straightforward some good. I mean, I read it all and I usually cringe. This is one of the reports of agreed. Thank you, Commissioner Lamar. All right.

Uh, Vice Chair Miller, members of the planning commission, uh, staff is here this evening to bring forward, uh, to planning commission case number Z-24-01, uh, Gamage at Burnham zone change request. The applicant is Gamage and Burnham on behalf of SC Fullerton Properties LLC. Um, the parcels associated with the zone change request are parcels 211-47-089B and 211-47-089C.

The location is one parcel deep at the northwest corner of Carefree Highway and 51st Street and is within the Carefree Highway specific area plan. The zone change request is to change the underlying zoning and amend the town of Creek zoning map for parcel 211-47-089B and parcel 211-47-089C from desert row 89 DR89 to commercial buffer CB. The parcels within the specific area plan and consist of commercial land use designation per the 2021 general plan.

The current uh surrounding land uses are depicted in the map um as you see on the screen at this moment. Um as you can see it's surrounded um by existing commercial development. Uh to the north there is residential development. Uh the east is vacant property uh previously zoned DR89 but reszoned to commercial buffer in 2022 under ordinance number 02022-08 or 08. The east parcel is also located within the specific area plan.

Further east is commercial development located within town of Cave Creek limits. The property to the south is a commercial development center located within the city of Phoenix jurisdiction. The property to the west consist of vacant church which is zoned commercial buffer that was uh reszoned in under ordinance number 2014-05. And further west is commercial development within the town of Cave Creek limits consisting of a Verizon Harbor Freight.

The property is also zoned commercial buffer um per ordinance uh 02021-01. The applicant has submitted a site plan review application concurrently with their reszone application and will be presented on the same agenda.

This case is solely to focus on the consideration of the under of the reszone change request to amend the zoning map and change underlying zoning district for parcels 211-47-089B and 211-47089C from desert rule 89 to commercial buffer case number Z-24-1 conforms with the requirements outlined in the zone change application is consistent with the general plan, the strategic plan, and the carefree highway specific area plan.

Again, this case is solely for a zone change request and whether the proposed commercial buffer zone is appropriate for this location. Members of the commission, uh, at this moment, are there any questions for staff? If not, the applicant is here to answer any questions. We have any questions? Yeah. Um, do we know uh what is uh directly north of this? How close are they? Is it it's I assume it's residential. Are there actual houses there? And have they spoken at committee me uh public meetings?

Uh Commissioner Spitzer, are you asking what is north of the property? Is it developed? Yes. Yes, there are uh homes developed on that area and um there's a 30- foot setback requirement off of each property and there's also additional 60oot setback requirement to north for this property. So the separation distance is is going to be about 90 ft from but they're not built up to the setback. So it's larger than 90 ft. Okay. Thank you. Any further questions for staff uh members of commission?

Uh if not, the applicant does have a presentation to go over um the reason case. And um Steve, would you like to load up? There we are. The council markers on. Oh, are they not on? They're they're powered up, but there's nothing. It is showing Zoom at the moment. Give me a moment. Text our tech wizard. Yeah. You can. Yeah. Should we just get turned on? Okay. It's an It's an evening of powerpoints, so we'll get it we'll get it rectified before the end of the meeting. Mr.

Chairman, uh, when you're ready. Yeah, proceed. Okay, Mr. Chairman, uh, members of the commission, uh, good evening. Uh, my name is Steven Anderson. For your record, my address is 40 North Central, 20th floor in Phoenix. Uh, we are here tonight. Let's see if this works. Oh, should check this part first. That just come up again. Oh. Oh, that seemed to work. Oh you'll I can do that. Thank you. All right. Great. Okay. Thank you. Uh so, Mr.

Chairman, uh again, Stephen Anderson and uh uh with Gaming Burham. Uh Michelle Santoro is with me this evening from our firm. She is a land use planner at the firm. Uh we are here tonight on behalf of SC Fullerton, our client, and Richard Cohen is here, uh who has traveled in from out of state for this meeting. He is a representative of the property owner SC Fullerton. Uh we're also joined tonight by our architects, uh Dean Machi and Ronald Devant.

Um and in addition, Sarah Simpson, our traffic engineer from uh United Civil is here as well. Can I have the next slide, please? Uh this is an aerial map of the site. Um you asked uh Commissioner Spitzer about our neighbors. Uh you can see in the aerial slide there are two properties to the north of us. One is developed, the other is vacant.

Uh the answer to your specific question, Commissioner, is that the neighbor to the northwest of us on the vacant parcel uh who owns the vacant parcel did attend our community meeting. Uh uh she came along with her nephew um and we were able to address uh her questions um and and and uh we're happy to do so. Could I have the uh next slide please? Uh so uh in his staff report uh Stephen already went through um our surrounding neighbors.

I will go through that again when we present the site plan uh because the detail becomes I think more relevant on the site plan review if we get to that part of the agenda this evening. Uh may I have the next slide please? So, uh, the first item in front of you, as has been noted, uh, by staff is the reszone to commercial buffer. And, uh, that brings us to the Cave Creek area carefree highway or town of Cave Creek Carefree Highway specific area plan adopted by the town in 2020.

Uh, that plan does two things. Um, uh, may I have the next slide, please? The first thing it does is with regard to the properties that are hatched in the red and gray striping there on the slide, all of those properties are to be zoned if possible to commercial buffer. Um, and that is the item that is before you this evening.

So, the proposed zoning will bring our zoning on this on the 2 and a half acres of our property that's the east west eastern 2 and a half acres of our property into conformance with the specific area plan. today as of the moment they are not in conformance with the specific area plan because they retain the DR89 zoning. May I have the next slide please?

Uh so this is uh the exact proposal that is before you this evening uh moving from the existing the DR89 as you can see matching the residential to our north and instead transforming it to the salmon color if you will which is the commercial buffer which would bring the um uh eastern two parcels into conformance with the specific area plan. The parcel to the west as staff noted which is also about 2 and a half acres total sites about 5 acres uh is already zoned commercial buffer.

Um since we are handling the site plan separately I will stop at this point um and uh reserve the balance of my remarks for the site plan issues um which are I think more complex and detailed but we would be happy to answer any questions you all have about the proposed reszoning. All right. Commissioners have any questions? Okay. Thank you. Uh being that there's no further questions for staff, can we open it up for public hearing? We have one speaker, uh vice chair, that is David Smith.

Thank you, vice chairman, commissioners. Um I was one of the several fathers of the specific plan uh many years ago and the purpose of that of the SAP was to uh address the an issue that had come up during the great uh recession where the town made a decision that uh uh 75 acres uh in uh on that part of where what we're talking about right now would become uh pure commercial. Uh a number of neighbors got together, talked to staff, the town manager and um Mr.

Lamar who was at that time a uh council member and uh I hope you remember that. Oh yeah, hard to forget. And uh we came away with a a decision from that group of people that there would be limited uh commercialization. Uh no auto repair shops, no uh drive-thru uh restaurants, no this and no that that would be uh ownorous to the uh uh people in the neighborhood. uh the whole purpose of the SA SAP was to limit the degree of uh quality of commercialization. This proposal will fit into that.

50% of the uh property between the two streets is already commercial buffer. Making the other part commercial buffer is only a reasonable thing to do. It will not detract from anything along the line there. And when we get to item number two, I will get up and I will support that as well. And I think that the commission should support it too. Thank you. Thank you. I have no other speakers. Okay. Being no other further comment, public comment, I will now close the public hearing.

Any further questions? Yes. Good. Okay. Do I have a motion? You have a motion, Mr. Chairman. Excuse me, Mr. Vice Chairman. I I move for um approval of case number 70 Z 2401, a reszoning request to change the underlying zoning of two parcels totaling approximately 2 acres from the current zoning of desert rural residential DR89 to commercial buffer CB zone. The parcels which are in the Carefree Highway specific area plan SAP are located at the northwest corner of Carefree Highway and 51st Street.

um assessment parcel numbers 211-47-0898 and 211-47-089C. I'll second that. Yeah. The only comment I have is that I I concur with the one speaker we've had here and uh I was on council at the time of this uh during the great recession. Um but included in that special area is a lot of cooperation and a lot of negotiation and a lot of thought about the setbacks and helping to preserve uh the residential community to the north of this area.

Uh if you look if I look at the I think the most telling thing is the the sky view of the area it is essentially commercial to have anything other than commercial there it defies the reality actually. Um we've got four criteria for reasonzoning. They're all met with specific uh support in the report. Uh I don't see any issue. Uh and that's why I vote uh yes. I echo Commissioner Lamar's comments and Mr. Smith's comments from the audience and I would too support it and vote yes. I vote yes.

We're not voting yet discussion. Give comments. No comments. Okay. Now I have no further comments. It it just makes sense to do the the the few remaining parcels um to change them to be the underlying zoning. Yeah, agreed. I think uh much of this is a no-brainer. So I think we can close discussion on that and take a vote. Commissioner Lamar, yes. Commissioner Mleski, now yes. Commissioner Silva, yes. Commissioner Nison, yes. Commissioner Spitzer, yes. And Vice Chair Miller, yes.

We're all set up there. Yes, sir. Second case. Yes, sir. All right. Case number SRP-24-01 Gamage and Burnham site plan review for the development of a retail and restaurant commercial center located north of Carefruit Highway between 50th and 53rd Street. Applicant is Gamage and Burnham on behalf of SC Fletton Properties LLC.

Request recommendation for site plan approval for case number SPR-24-01 on parcel numbers 211-47- B 211-47-089B and 211-47-089C located north of Carefree Highway between 50th and 51st Street for the development of a commercial retail and restaurant center within the Carefree Highway specific area This will be the same procedure that I outlined uh previously for the first one. So I think we can carry on from that and I'll ask Stephen to give us our report. All right.

Uh Vice Chair Miller, members of commission. Um so staff is here to present the uh site plan case for uh Gamage and Burnham. Uh so the site plan review application case is SPR-24-01 Cave Creek Gateway. Um applicant being Gamage and Burnham. Uh the parcels included in this are uh 211-47-04B, 211-47-089B and 211-47-089C. Location is one parcel deep north of Carefree Highway between 50th and 51st Streets and is within the Carefree Highway specific area plan.

The request is um recommendation of approval for case number- SPR-24-01 Cave Creek Gateway site plan view for commercial development for retail and restaurant restaurant commercial center. So the zoning for these parcels um at the moment uh parcel 211-47-040B is commercial buffer and that was um reszone to commercial buffer in 2021 under ordinance 0 2021-02. Uh the other parcels included in this are uh parcels 211-47-089B and 211-47-089C. Current zoning is DR89 uh desert 89.

The request is for commercial buffer zoning. Uh that's subject to case Z-24-1 01. Um so what we have is uh on the screen here is the surrounding zoning. Um where you'll see that the uh commercial buffer is to the east and to the west. Uh, desert rule 89 is to the north and commercial south uh, which is in the city of Phoenix jurisdiction. So we have depicted on the screen now is surrounding land uses. Um, and north of this property is residential development.

East is vacant property uh previously zoned DR89 but reszone to commercial buffer in 2022 under ordinance number 02022-08. The east parcel is also located within the specific area plan. Uh further east is commercial development located within town of Cave Creek limits. Property to the south is a commercial development center located within city of Phoenix's jurisdiction. The property to the west consists of vacant church which is own commercial buffer.

Uh and further west is commercial development within the town of creek limits consisting of Verizon Harbor Freight. This depicting the similar surrounding land uses and the reszone case. The proposed site plan depicts a commercial development of retail and restaurant commercial center with associated ingress, egress, and parking area configuration, pedestrian pathway connection, location of proposed structures. I'll leave this up for a moment to get a good glance at it.

So the site plan case depicts conformance or uh demonstrates conformance with the zoning ordinance and carefree highway specific area plan. Uh going off the permitted uses allowable uses of carefree highway specific area plan requires a zoning uh to allow for commercial buffer zoning between 48th and 53rd streets one parcel deep.

The uses within the carefree island specific area plan state that there shall be no drive-through uses for fast food restaurants where the primary business is the sale of quick service food and further restrict the hours of operation to be limited to 6:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. The proposed uses from the applicant are for retail sales and restaurant. The uses are compliant with the town of Kay zoning ordinance and carefree highway specific area plan.

Uh the zoning ordinance is to care for a specific area plan consist of bulk regulations that shall be adhered to for all developments such as building height, building setbacks, landscaping, parking, screening, etc. The applicant has demonstrated compliance with the bulk regulations. Uh here the the building height requirement for the care specific area plan is 22 feet in height from natural grade to top of roof outline.

They also allowed an additional 5 feet in height from the top of roof for architectural enhancements. The proposed building height is 22 feet in height from natural grade top of roof. Um the proposed uh building height from the architectural enhancement um for screening purposes of mechanical equipment is going to be 27 feet in height from natural grade of top uh top of the architectural enhancements.

The building setbacks the property conform the project conforms with the minimum yard setbacks and lot coverage for properties within the career specific area plan. The requirement for north property line is 60 ft. The south property line is 30 ft with a 10ft landscape buffer. So the north and south rights of ways or 30 ft with a 10ft landscape buffer. and the interior lot lines have a zero foot um setback requirement.

The applicant is required to provide a solid method screening that is a minimum of 6 ft in height where they are adjacent or abuted to residential zones. The applicant is proposing a 6 foot high CMU wall along the north property line to meet the required screening requirement. The applicant also adequate also adequately screened trash enclosures and HVAC units with a solid method of screening.

The applicant proposes a two-way access drive off of Carefree Highway as well with access ride off 50th and 51st Street where there is existing rightway. Two access points will be provided off of 50th Street. Development will consist of a crossaxis easement to allow for adequate on-site traffic circulation. The town engineer uh will assess his proposal at the building permit stage. The per specific area plan the applicant is limited to 18% lot coverage of lot area.

The applicant proposes 17.2% lot coverage for the proposed project. The landscaping requirement is 15%. The proposed landscaping for this project is 26.2%. The applicant will be parking over 10% of the minimum parking space minimum parking requirements and will be planting one tree per five parking spaces to comply with the zoning ordinance requirements. The minimum undisturbed requirement is 20%. Uh the proposed undisturbed requirement is 0%.

And this complies because the uh the client or the applicant uh they went through a transfer development rights uh to where they required hillside property and traded that for the undisturbed requirements of the 20% and that was approved through town council to resolution 2025-112. The parking requirements for retail is one one per 250 of gross building area. Parking requirement for restaurant is 100 200 one the 200 square ft of gross building area.

The total parking spaces required is 123 spaces. The proposed parking spaces are 140 spaces. The developer will be required to record a shared parking agreement for this development to comply with the parking requirements. For the outdoor lighting, a photometric was reviewed by the town for compliance. Lighting will still be reviewed for compliance with the ordinance at the time of a building permit submitt. At this time, there is no signage that's been proposed or reviewed.

Um, but that will still be reviewed and required to be submitted uh with the building permit for us to confirm that it does comply with the zoning ordinance requirements. Town staff has proposed a list of recommend re recommended conditions of approval for commission to consider at this as demonstrated in exhibit E. Staff would like to note that it has been requested by staff to add an additional condition.

The condition states prior to permit issuance, the developer shall record a crossaxis easement in a shared parking agreement for the development and provide the town with the recorded document. The access easement shall be depicted on all feature plans and must plans with the Maricopa County reporting number. If this condition is accepted, the vice chair Miller motion shall be read as is uh but should also include the additional condition.

The applicant has demonstrated compliance with the general plan, the strategic plan, and the carefree highway specific area plan, and also the zoning ordinance in the town of Cay technical design guidelines. The site plan does not constitute approval of required improvements, including but not limited to building construction plans, salvage and landscape plans, grading and drainage plans, etc.

The applicant is still required to apply for all necessary permits to demonstrate compliance with the with the requirements of applicable codes, ordinances, and guidelines of the town of Cave Creek. Staff would like to note, according to the zoning ordinance, site planer view requirements enable the town to mitigate potential land use conflicts resulting from proposed developments. Site planner view is not intended to evaluate proposed uses or their aesthetic or structural design.

Further, the adopted uh specific area plan does require the applicant to incorporate such architectural features. Specifically, materials for buildings and site walls will be predominantly stone, wood, and metal and reflect a western design theme. So, with that, this project has demonstrated compliance um with town codes, ordinances, adopted technical design guidelines, and carefree highway specific area plan. Um at this moment, are there any questions for staff?

If there isn't, then there aren't any questions and the applicant is here to go over the development. Do you guys have any questions? Commissioners, um, what kind of requirements are there for on the developer to provide or to to ensure that there's enough water for this usage. So, that is that is dependent on the review by the utilities director Sean Cruzner and he has not had any object objections.

um to the water usage and has reviewed that it is going to be in compliance with the town code requirements for water. Thank you. Thank you, Stephen. Will this site also be connected to the wastewater system? Commissioner Madison, that is correct. And the town and the utilities director has confirmed compliance with that as well. Okay. Uh, if there's no further questions, I'd like to pass along to the uh, applicant Gamage and Burnham, Mr. Steven Anderson.

Will I be advancing or will you be advancing? I'll be advancing again. Okay. Thank you. It may work. It It kind of has a mind of its own. I can try. You may have to advance the first slide manually and then it should we'll we'll find out. Okay. It's always an adventure at town of Cave Creek Council Chambers. Oh, well, there you go. Oh, it's working. All right, there it is. I bestow upon you the power of the clicker. Thank you. Uh, Mr. Chairman, members of commission, again, good evening.

Uh, Stephen Anderson. Uh, I'll forego the introduction for the record. Uh I did want to mention though however that uh we obviously brought uh a large part of our technical team and ownership representation here this evening. We brought uh so many folks because we wanted to make sure that we were available to answer uh any questions that you have. Hopefully between uh all of us to the extent you have questions we can get those addressed as you consider the site plan.

We obviously appreciate the staff recommendation for approval um as well as the staff conditions. Uh we are in agreement with all 19 slashnow 20 of the staff recommended conditions. Um obviously as you might have guessed that that's all the result of a great deal of work that has occurred on the project to ensure that we are in compliance with the specific area plan.

We hope that you will agree uh when you're done that all of that work is paid off and that you will conclude that you too have applications before you tonight that you can recommend for approval to the town council. Uh again, aerial map of the site. Again, this is the site. Five acres now uh between 51st and 50th Street uh bordered on the north uh on the north side of Carefree Highway. This is uh uh the area map uh similar to the one that you saw from staff.

I'm actually going to walk through this one in a little bit of detail. Um again, we've got uh single family residential properties to our north uh zone DR89. Um and as was observed already, one of the main goals of the specific area plan is to protect those properties from the commercial development that is now appropriate along the Carefree Highway. To our east and west, we have a variety of properties uh some developed, some are vacant.

Uh and we'll talk about some of those in detail uh in a moment. Uh to our south uh is the Carefree Highway Community Church, what I like to call the real church, uh the functioning church. Uh and that church property is located in the city of Phoenix. Uh obviously to our southwest we've got the 800lb gorilla uh which is the Home Depot Fries uh project which is clearly located in the city of Phoenix and is a little bit more intense than what the specific area plan allows on our property.

Finally to our immediate west uh is the Carefree Highway Community Church's old site. Uh and as mentioned before, that site uh is vacant or at least it appears to me to be vacant and not in use any longer. Again, uh we begin with the specific area plan uh which we talked about before uh adopted for uh I mentioned two specific reasons before. One being uh to zone the property CB.

The second reason that I did not mention in my prior remarks is to establish development standards, very detailed development standards designed to provide that good transition between the residential properties to the north that will remain and the reality as was obser observed before along Carefree Highway where we see uh that residential property is no longer development is no longer appropriate.

So that that is what the staff report is primarily about on the site plan is making sure that we stay within the limitations created in the specific area plan to protect those residential areas to the north while also achieving appropriate uh commercial development along the freeway. And again staff report says that we have done that and that was our goal.

I should mention that SC Fullerton when it bought the property was aware of the specific area plan and bought the property knowing uh that they would have to comply with all of the limitations of the specific area plan and they were happy to do so. We already talked about the resoning so I can skip that part but I did want to talk about the TDR invent because that is one part of this project and development that is not before you this evening but it's an important part of the development.

The town council unanimously approved our TDR back on June 2nd. And in doing so, they spoke about how it was good to see the specific area plan and the TDR program coming to fruition and securing not only tax revenue from the properties along the highway, but also simultaneously preserving important open space identified with inside the town's limits.

Under our TDR agreement, SC Fullerton acquired a parcel in central part of the town that is on a pre-identified list that has already been created by the town that says to the development community, go buy some of this property. And so SC Fullerton bought a parcel that's 115,000 ft, about 2.64 acres.

And as you can see from the aerial photograph down in the lower right hand corner, that's the property that we're looking at or that we have acquired that's located south of the intersection of Linda Drive and Skyline Drive. If the town council ultimately approves the Cave Creek Gateway project, our project, then SC Fullerton is going to preserve the eastern 34,000 square feet of that larger parcel in perpetuity.

In exchange, SC Fullerton will be permitted to mass grade this property on the Carefree Highway after, of course, as staff already noted, we do the appropriate landscape salvage plan of what can be saved and used, reused on the property after we uh complete our construction. So you can see that SC Fullerton already has skin in the game, if you will. Uh we've already invested heavily and of course uh we did so at our own risk. Um we'll find out what happens in the next couple of weeks.

Now we are here primarily this evening to talk to you about the site plan. Uh and so here are our landscape plan and renderings. Um and that's the main item before you. Again, Kate Creek Gateway meets all of the requirements of the town specific area plan and we are in agreement with all 20 of staff's recommended conditions. I'm going to begin with the site plan. Kreek Gateway is proposing three buildings. Uh one building on the east side of the property, two on the west.

On the west side, uh the two buildings are smaller, 4200 ft² and 5200 ft. On the east side, the single building is proposed to be 19,500 ft². We do not have a signed agreement uh with a tenant for that building at this time. Here is what I can tell you. We are very deep into lease negotiations, very deep indeed uh with a ger to occupy that major parcel on the east side of the site. However, until that lease is signed, I am not at liberty to identify that potential tenant for you.

Sorry about that. Uh hopefully we'll have the lease signed up here relatively soon and we'll be at liberty to disclose who they are. Moving on to the renderings of the project. All three of the buildings are one story with a maximum height of 27 feet to the top of the parapit uh which is consistent with the limits of the area SAP. The staff has encouraged us to use the building materials specified in the specific plan. As would not noted in the staff report split face masonry, wood and metal.

These materials feature prominently across our elevations. We definitely think that we have uh featured those materials more prominently than the Harbor Freight building did in its development. uh a little bit to our west. We also think that uh we have done a better job with the materials than uh the Verizon store also to our west and even the pet suites uh site uh which is located uh to our east.

In addition to our our building materials, our larger building features a sharply angled roof uh which is again unique to the site you just saw to break up the planes of the buildings um and provide a significant visual element to the project. Again, all of the colors and woods are in desert pallets of brown, tan, and off-white. Pivoting to the landscape plan, as the staff report indicates, a little over 26% or a little over one quarter of the site will be preserved or used for landscaping, 26%.

Uh the landscape uh will be a mixture of the salvaged plants um and new plants that we bring into the site uh for installation at the end of construction. The buildings are set back to meet or exceed plan requirements with a six-foot buffer wall along the north side of the parking and drive areas again as the plan requires. Returning to Commissioner Spitzer's question before, the wall is clearly visible in this landscape plan. That's the main reason we bought it.

As you can see, there's a jog in it. So, it's actually uh broken up a little bit visually. And this was the question that the neighbor to our northwest wanted to talk about at our community meeting. Kay Free Gate Gateway also meets the town's parking requirements and in fact exceeds it by 17 spaces. So there should be uh plenty of parking on site. No risk of parking bleeding into the neighborhood. Hey Creek Gateway has four uh points of access on the project site.

Two driveways along the east side of 50th Street. Uh one driveway along the west side of 51st Street. One driveway along Carefree Highway. The driveway along Carefree Highway will be right in right out only. our traffic engineer Sarah who's here tonight uh has recommended to us and the town is in fact requiring us to install a pork chop in the middle of the driveway to make sure that the driveway functions as a ride in ride out.

You can see the pork chop there uh in the middle of the driveway on the landscape plan. In addition, our traffic engineer and the town are also in agreement that we will need to install right turn deceleration lanes uh along Carefree Highway into both our uh Carefree Highway driveway and along 50th Street. Uh that's similar to all of the commercial development that's occurred already and those are shown on the landscape plan as well.

Of course, there's already a traffic light at 50th Street and and uh Carefree Highway. Uh but the town is going to have us further improve that intersection as part of the development of this project. And that completes my review of our site plan for Cave Creek Gateway. Again, fully in full agreement with the 20 uh conditions from the staff. The town uh as some of you have already noted, adopted the specific area plan to encourage and manage commercial opportunities along the Carefree Highway.

Carefree Highway is a heavily trafficked street, so it's not appropriate for residential uses. And Carefree Highway and Cave Creek Road are where four different jurisdictions come together in a very complicated jigsaw puzzle. As I think you all know, those four jurisdictions don't just meet at this intersection. They also compete here for vital sales tax revenue dollars that provide public services for all four of the communities that meet at that intersection.

We are seeking your approval this evening in no small part because we find ourselves right in the middle of that very competitive environment, which is why we propose a plan that complies completely with your specific area plan and seeks no deviations from its requirements. That has secured us a staff recommendation for approval. It's also why we bought the preserve land uh that to do to the T the TDR with the town council.

Hopefully uh we with all of those results, we can secure your recommendation for approval this evening as well, which will give us yet another important step in that very aggressive economic competition that continues along the Carefree Highway. We appreciate the opportunity to speak with you this evening and we would be happy to answer any of your questions. Yeah. The commissioner have any questions, Steve? Well, I guess you consider this a rhetorical question.

Um, having spent nearly 40 years representing towns and cities around here and u having been on the planning commission first time in 1986. Uh, I want in front of your clients to compliment you on this presentation. It was excellent. It was it was easy to read. It was easy to understand. You raised issues. You answered the questions. it could flow right through it. Uh, and um, anyway, thank you. Thank you. That's all. I have a couple questions if I may. Yes.

My first question is um, you had mentioned Well, first off, it looks like there's availability for seven tenants. You got an anchor tenant and then three in each of the two other buildings. Okay. And you're in deep discussions with the anchor tenant. Are you in deep discussions with to fill out the other six locations? Mr. Chairman, members of the commission, we are um I can tell you that we've had discussions with uh convenience restaurants, not drive-thru, of course.

Those are not allowed by the specific area plan. We've also uh been uh in discussions with a dental practice. Um Richard, is there anyone else we are prepared to identify at this time or is that fair enough? Oh, that's right. um Heartland as well, but that's a that's a vetinarian or is that the dentist? That's a dental practice, correct? Yeah, I'm guessing your goal is to fill them once they become available when you're finished your construction. Mr.

Chairman, members of the commission, uh that is of course correct and and we would like to market them as quickly as possible. Um obviously the construction time frame here is going to be relatively um involved. It always is as I think has been discussed earlier this evening. Uh my guess would be six months on site plan construction CD review with the town staff and then probably 12 months uh for construction. So 18 months um uh before we see first occupancy.

Um and uh I'll go ahead and put a card on the table. Um as you know uh Carefree's got a gigantic site um that they're trying to tee up. Now that site has its own challenges. um uh some very significant infrastructure challenges that the sites that are in town don't face but we would like to be ready to go and available uh before that site gets gets too far down the road. Great.

My other question or another question I have is I did look at the feedback from the local meeting had with the residents. I didn't see any major push back from anybody. However, I I want to ask that question because sometimes not everything gets captured. So, did you get any significant uh push back or negative feedback from residents? Uh, Mr. Chairman, members of the commission, um I I of course I'm going to say no. Um the meeting uh was uh pretty well attended.

We thought uh we had nine folks in attendance. Um some of them, one of them, as we already talked about, is adjacent to the site. others were relatively close uh within visual distance of the site and then still we had some folks who were uh further away. Um in addition uh the meeting covered the waterfront um uh we went through everything um uh that is in the specific area plan. To give you a specific example, uh we talked about hours of operation.

Um and one of the details that we got into is we observed that the hours of operation cover the business hours, but they don't cover the um necessarily the delivery times. Um so we feel like we got into um uh some good detail uh at the uh community meeting. Um and uh I don't think we've had any additional feedback since that time. Um uh the city or the town got one letter if I recall correctly uh which they addressed independently of us. Uh but we've had no calls since we've had a call.

Two calls. What did they say? question. So, for your record, since Michelle was not at the microphone, I'll repeat what she just said. We had one call which we attempted to return um but did not have a dialogue. That person never followed up. And then the other call was some questions uh that we addressed apparently to the satisfaction of digress. Okay. Um, and then I just have two comments really, not questions. Those are in one.

The first one is, uh, as you're looking to looking for tenants for this site. I would highly recommend maybe collaborating with our town staff. They have a lot of experience. They know what businesses do well here. Uh, might be worth your time to engage with them on that. And the second one is when you look to landscape, and I like the fact that you're doing all desert landscaping. That's great. Um, just maybe look for engaging local landscapers.

We're not a big town, so all the business that our local companies get is appreciated. Thank you. That's all I have right now. Commissioner Spitzer. Yes. I have a a comment and a request. The comment is that we really do appreciate the fact that you're abiding by the SAP rules and regulations and aren't requesting a large raft of or even any uh changes to that. That makes it much more easy to vote on.

The request I have is because you're you're approximately 13% over parking over minimums and because developers tend to to call a twig in the in the in the ground a tree. I would suggest you because the the heat island effect will affect that whole area and and the more it's built up the more that's going to get worse that you consider using something that would be more um heat friendly for for paving materials rather than just black asphalt. Thank you Dean and Ronald. You heard that? Okay.

Okay. Uh, being there's no further comment. Thank you. Uh, I think we can open it up to public hearing. Uh, Chair, Vice Chairman Miller, we have one speaker, David Smith. today. Fair enough. Thank you. That was the only speaker. Okay. Uh we will close public comment and then uh I have a motion. Yep. Commissioner, I move for approval of case number SPR24- well SPR-24-01.

uh Gamage and Burnham uh site plan review for the development of the retail and restaurant commercial um center located north of Carefree Highway between 50th and 51st Street. Second it. I have a an addendum to add to that. Is this the right? No, except it meets all the criteria. Uh uh staff has prepared a proposed list of recommended conditions of approval for commission consideration.

I I'll accept the friendly amendment and yeah uh subject to the uh conditions uh from staff and the additional commission additional condition mentioned in the meeting. Okay. So, we're okay then or do we need them? Um, Vice Chair Miller, members of the commission, does it have to be read per the condition?

I got um move to recommend approval of case number SPR 2401, a site plan review for the development of a retail and restaurant commercial center located north of Carefree Highway between 50th and 51st Streets, subject to the conditions of approval prepared by staff with the additional condition. Okay. Perfect. I have a second. Second. Any other additional discussion? Any other comments? Okay, we'll close that and uh call for vote. Commissioner Nison. Uh I'm going to vote yes.

Um, Commissioner Spitzer, yes. Commissioner Lamar, yes. Commissioner Mleski, yes. Commissioner Silva, yes. Vice Chairman Miller, yes. Okay. Should we move on to our third case? Thank you guys for coming. Right. Commission discussion and possible recommendation of approval for case A25-03 amendments to the zoning ordinance. Chapter 2, residential zones. Chapter 3, commercial zones. Chapter 12, site plans. Chapter 14, officers, boards, and commissions.

In chapters 15, zoning procedures, zoning ordinance amendments related to HB 2447 and associated administrative updates. Applicant is the town of Cave Creek. Request recommendation of approval for case A-25-03 amendments to the zoning ordinance. Chapter 2, residential zones. Chapter 3, commercial zones. Chapter 12, site plans. Chapter 14, officers, boards, and commissions. and chapter 15 zoning procedures, zoning ordinance amendments related to HB 2447 and associated administrative updates. Mr.

Chair, can we take a five minute? Yes, we can take a little five minute break. Recess. Thank you. We're not being too cold on you tonight. For four cases, this isn't too bad. I mean, they made that one pretty easy. I was like tempted to ask, but I'm like, it's just the 200 pages, I think, summed it up. You guys' monitors are working. Okay. Yes. Is there water over there? Yeah. You guys need water? I'm sorry. I'm a terrible host. I appreciate. Yeah, we're uh she gets quite moving on up.

Yeah, they little soros here. Uhhuh. That's probably Teresa. She just got back from uh England yesterday. Once our on our escapement guidelines for our inert materials like our crushed rock. What's the standard for that? To approval by the town arborist and zoning administrator. Uh we do have because I was you know it's like I looked at Harbor Freight and they got in minus the uh hospitals minus the sprouts is like a half inch straight.

That was the only comment I was going to possibly bring up was just like they should maybe do like a hospital. like we've been promoting other stuff. So I don't know if that's more of a staff than you guys just kind of like Yeah. So we have we tried to educate as far I don't really care about the material.

I looked at the plant list and it's all very native all pretty good but the the 2 inch of half inch screen was like exactly I don't I don't like I'm not crazy about like material I don't I really don't have a What material? Madison gold, this palino whatever. It's It's always the broadcast. Yeah. If it's more than two inches, it's just too much. Well, yeah. Because the goal is you want it to turn over time and bring up the latest meetings. Yeah, exactly.

I'd suggest that whatever they used to possibly hit in like superior gold red line there. plans, but I will. I think Thank you. That's what I do every day. So, that one's easy for me. We're ready to next. I don't think anybody loves us anymore. They ever. All right, Eric. Full house, man. Don't let me down. I'll do my best to uh zoom through this presentation. I did one presentation that covers both um agenda items. So, I'll try to get us out of here as quickly possible.

So, both amendments before you tonight are amendments. The first being amendment to the zoning ordinance, the second being the amendment to the subdivision ordinance related to House Bill 2447, which was signed by the governor earlier this year. And what the bill basically did, it struck the word may and now says shall.

And so it basically it reads municip municipalities shall by ordinance authorize administrative personnel to review and approve site plans, land divisions, lot line adjustments, preliminary plats, final plats, and plat amendments without a public hearing. And then the additional part of the bill states that municipalities now shall allow at risk submitts for grading and drainage work and expedited review for applicants with a history of compliance.

But the amendments are related to that first uh bullet point with the public hearings for site plans in flats. So going over the implications of the house bill, uh the bill does state that we have to have the amendments in place by the end of this year and this impacts our site plan review, preliminary and final plat processes as well as uh lot splits of less than two and a half acres.

Um the lot split portion is uh related to the town code and the commission doesn't oversee the town code amendments. So, we're just seeing the zoning ordinance and the subdivision ordinance amendments tonight. And the last bullet point is this does have a greater impact on the town compared to other municipalities due to our current procedures.

And I'll kind of highlight that here on the next slide which shows um we did a sample of 12 various municipalities varying in size um and location throughout the state. And if you look on the left hand side, 11 of the 12 municipalities already do their site review administratively. We still do it with a public hearing carefree as well.

Um has a hybrid some somewhat a public hearing but theirs is more design uh review focus for site plan review where if you look on the right hand side uh the larger municipalities have already shifted their preliminary plat review to administrative and then the smaller municipalities still do it with the public hearing for plats.

However, all the ones that have the box check public hearing are in the process or already have amend amended their ordinance to be um an administrative process for plats as well. So to do some quick planning and zoning 101 site plan review is the process that entitles new commercial and multifamily development where the zoning permits that particular use.

Um so if you take Aldi or the previous uh reszone in site plan case uh for example once the zoning was in place you can't go back and evaluate the use. Uh so once once the zoning is in place the use can't be can't be changed or or I guess debated upon what the use is. The zoning ordinance section 3.5 kind of establishes um what uses are allowed by right and which require a special use.

And so those uses listed with an SU are the discretionary processes where um the use can be evaluated uh given that specific circumstance. So a great example is a drive-thru in Towncore Commercial. Um that's one where the use can be established because it requires a little bit more research and sensitivity based on that that proposal. And then the uses with a dash in section 3.5 are just uses that are permitted outright.

So a good example of that is taverns, bars and nightclubs in the commercial buffer zoning district. So this chart kind of outlies outlines which amendments going which applications going forward are discretionary and which are non-discretionary. So on the left hand side are the applications that are administrative with objective criteria.

So the ones on the left have specific requirements in our ordinances that if they meet these requirements and aren't requesting any deviations, town staff has to approve those applications. Where on the right hand side, these are the applications that the commission and council will still be seeing where commission has full discretion to approve or deny the application. So our site plan review current process is a six six-step process. First being the pre-application conference.

That's where we meet with the applicant initially and that's planning and zoning utilities engineering building. We all get in a room and go over maybe the the major obstacles and hurdles that are uh presented before the project. And then after the pre-application conference, then they formally submit their site plan review application. And then during that submitt prior to the planning commission, town staff reviews the application for compliance with the zoning ordinance.

And then only then once it's compliant, we bring it to the commission and council for public hearing. And then after the council public hearing, only then they can apply for the building permit application. So this amendment will wipe away steps four and five. So it'll be a quicker, more expedited process for site plan review applications. So some recent history with the site plan review. This has been a topic of discussion at both the commission and council level um over the past few years.

starting back in 2022 when the commission initially asked staff to examine the site plan review process and to compare that with other municipalities. And during this process, the commission recommended to remove themselves from the site plan review process. And that was largely because of two things. First, you saw back on the initial slide, most municipalities do their site plan review process administratively.

And second, it's because the commission or council can't impose greater conditions than what's required in the zoning ordinance. So because of that, commission recommended to remove themselves and gave council the option to do the same. Um, however, council did deny that commission recommendation and our process remained the same after uh we went through that process in 2022.

And then in 2024 recently, that was last year, during a site plan review public hearing, the commission chair did not take public comment. And as a result, staff was directed to prepare amendments to require an informal open house as part of the site plan review process.

But as many of you remember during uh the commission meeting for that uh the recommendation by the commission was to uh explicitly require public comment in lie of the informal open house and council did decide to go forward that recommendation by the commission. So, moving on to the subdivision ordinance uh part of the amendment, which is that last agenda item.

Um, preliminary plats and final plats are reviewed based on objective criteria set forth in the zoning ordinance and the subdivision ordinance. So, it's very similar to site plan reviews if they meet the objective criteria. Uh, town staff must approve that application. And that's it's a three-step process. You can argue it's it's a it's a four-step process. Um but it's follows a pre-application conference.

Then it goes to the preliminary plat where currently that's when the public hearing occurs with both planning commission and council. And then should the preliminary plat be approved uh the final plat gets approved on consent agenda. And once again this bill requires both preliminary plats to be fully administrative. Do I do want to point out that exceptions to the subdivision ordinance are going to remain legislative.

So that's whenever an applicant wants to deviate from any requirement in the subdivision ordinance, they'll be coming before the commission and council uh for you guys to decide if the exception is worthy uh to to go forward. And then I did want to note uh since 2008, we've only had two subdivisions that's obtained final plot approval.

Um and then one additional application has is in the works uh and they've obtained their preliminary plat approval and is awaiting final plat approval and that's Hidden Canyon behind town hall. But in the grand scheme of things, um we're not going to see many subdivisions um moving forward. So hopefully we're not going to have to worry too much about the subdivision ordinance side of the amendments. The last slide I have for you is public notification.

So again, I just wanted to reemphasize that if all objective criteria are met for any of these applications, the town is obligated to approve that application. uh despite that informing residents of recently approved site plan reviews, plats uh preliminary plat and final plats remains important. So we did a five or six uh different items that we're going to emphasize for our notification moving forward. First is a mailing notice of approval to residents within 500 ft of the project.

That's currently what we're doing for site plan reviews. So we're keeping that the same. Um in addition to that, these are some new things we're adding which are um we're going to inform the planning commission at the next meeting of any recently approved plat or site plans along with the development services council quarterly report um for town council to hear the updates as well.

And then we're going to post updates in the K3 prospector which is that town quarterly published um newsletter that goes out to residents. And then we're also going to do a GIS dashboard on the town website. It's basically an interactive map where anyone, any member of the public can go on and basically see where certain applications are occurring. Um, and it'll provide staff contact information and some brief details of the proposal.

And then the last slide is the slide or last bullet point is what we always try to emphasize, which is town staff is available whether it's at the counter, uh, phone call, email to answer any questions from residents. So, with that, um, I'd be happy to answer any questions. Any commissioners have any comments, questions? Commissioner Spitzer? Um, there's a point uh 1.3 on page 161. Is that for this one or for the next one? I don't really recall. I apologize.

I don't have my page numbers in front of me. Oh, it's it basically there was a a big block of red text which means it's usually an addition and then it's it's struck through which is a deletion. So I don't quite understand. It's the it's the part where um the town was asked to create a selfcertification for developers. Oh. On the house bill itself. Yes. Yeah. So that um it it gave the town the option. it didn't require us to do that. So, the word it has the word may in front of it.

And so, town staff is not recommending at this time um adopting any of the self-certification. Okay. As part of this amendment. Thank you. Anyone else? Okay. Thank you. public hearing. Let's skip that. There's no one in the audience unless we had any pre comments. Luke, any letters? Any whatever. Okay, I can move that motion. Yeah. I move to recommend approval of case number 20 A2503, amendments to the zoning ordinance. Chapter 2, residential zones. Chapter 3, commercial zones.

Chapter 12, site plans. Chapter 14, officers, boards, and commissioners. In chapter 15, zoning procedures as depicted in exhibits one, B1, B2, and B3, B4, and B5, and to be in conformance with HP 2447 and complete necessary administrative updates. I'll second that. Any additional comments? anything. I rarely find uh legislation by the state legislators as heartwarming, but I'm heartw. Commissioner Spitzer, yes. Commissioner SOA, yes. Commissioner Nison, yes. Commissioner Lamar, yes.

Commissioner Mleski, yes. and Vice Chairman Miller. Yes. All right. Last case. Case AS25-01, amendments to the subdivision ordinance. Chapter 1, principles and policies. Chapter 2, planning standards and procedures. Chapter four, engineering standards and procedures. Chapter six, lot splits, slot line adjustments, and assemblages. Chapter seven, financial assurance agreement. and Chapter 8 definitions in response to HB 2447 and associated administrative updates.

Applicant Town of Cave Creek request recommendation of approval for case AS25-01 amendments. The subdivision ordinance chapter 1 principles and policies chapter 2 planning standards and procedures. Chapter 4 engineering standards and procedures. Chapter six lot splits lot line adjustments and assemblages. Chapter seven, financial assurance agreement. And chapter eight, definitions in response to HB 2447 and associated administrative updates.

Vice Chair, I already covered it in the last uh presentation, but if there's any questions, I'd be happy to answer. I'm assuming there's no further comments, so we'll we'll carry on to the vote or or the motion first. Do I have a motion? We'll open uh public comment at 9:14 and close public comment at 9:15. Okay. Thank you. Do I have a motion? 7:15. We'll make it. Go ahead. I don't know if this is the right one. It's on the town agenda. So you got this.

So if you got the current one ordinance chapter one principles and policies chapter two planning standards and procedures chapter four engineering standards and procedures chapter six splits line adjustments and assemblances chapter seven national insurance agreement chapter eight definitions as depicted as exhibits Excuse me. One, two, three, four, five. Let's see. 1 2 5 and C6 in compartments with HB 247 and complete necessary administrative updates. Second. Should we take a vote?

Yeah, no comment. Commissioner Mleski, yes. Commissioner SOA, yes. Commissioner Spitzer, yes. Commissioner Lamar, yes. Commissioner Nison, yes. And Vice Chairman Miller, yes. Meeting adjourned. So move meeting. In fact, I would say it's the most efficient meeting. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate that. Meeting adjourned. Think I didn't want to do that at all. Well, yeah. down so much. Steve made it easy for me. Yeah. Actually, really see