Flagstaff approves 54-unit Pine Canyon expansion with private golf course despite water scarcity opposition

to order. Notice of option to recess into executive session pursuant to ARS 38431.02. Notice is hereby given to the members of the commission and to the general public that at this meeting the commission may go may vote to go into executive session which will not be open to the public. Um, we would do that for legal advice and discussion with the commission's attorney on any item listed on the agenda today pursuant to ARS 38-431.03 A3. And now we'll do roll call. Errol Mandino present.

Joshua Mayor present. Christine Shehy here. CJ Luki present. Mary Norton, present. Ian Sharp, present. Megan Weller, present. Thank you. We are all here and in the house today. So um right now it's um open call to the public and at this time any member of the public may address the commission on any subject within our jurisdiction that is not scheduled before the commission today.

Due to open meeting laws, um the commission cannot discuss or act on items presented during this portion of the agenda. To address the commission on an item that is on the agenda, please wait for me to call for public comment at the time the item is heard. Is there any open call to the public? Anybody online? Hearing and seeing none, we will go on to approval of the minutes from the regular meeting on October 8th, 2025. If I can get an motion to approve. Move to approve.

So Ian has um or Commissioner Sharp has made a motion to approve the minutes from October 8th, 2025. Is there a second? Second. And that was seconded by um Commissioner Lukey. All those in favor say I. I. I. Any opposed? That motion carries. Um we'll move on to public hearing PZ2400124-08. Um I think that's Ben. That'll be addressing us. Good afternoon, commission. Uh, my name is Ben Mah. I'm a planner with the city of Flagstaff Planning and Development Services.

For your consideration today, we have a conditional use permit request for a golf course and facilities. Uh, the project title is Pine Canyon Expansion. This request is filed by Gamage and Burnham PLC on behalf of STL 405 LLC uh to establish a golf course use uh on a 20.86 acre portion of approximately 126 acre vacant parcel in the rural residential zone. And while it is currently 126 acre parcel, there is a subdivision that the applicant is currently working towards.

So, it'll be a track within that uh subdivision, but at this time it is it is the full parcel. Uh the proposal is for a private amenity for the members of Pine Canyon and will serve as a common space for the planned residential development. To the north of this uh site is vacant land in the rural residential zone. To the west is the existing Pine Canyon area. uh which is single family subdivision in the single family residential zone or R1 zone.

Uh to the south is the Cookanino National Forest in public lands uh forest zone and to the east is additional vacant land uh in the rural residential and then if you go a little farther the estate residential uh zones. The proposal is for a 9-hole golf course on 20.86 acres. Uh again, it will serve as common space for planned residential development uh that surrounds it. Uh there is temporary parking shown uh on the plans.

They will, as their uh kind of future development plans flesh out, uh redesign the parking for this area um to uh be coordinated with the rest of their development. There are no buildings associated with the golf course. Um it is just uh just golf course, just turf and uh associated uh landscaping. Now for a conditional use permit there are three required findings of approval. Uh they are under 10 20 4050 of the zoning code.

The first finding is that the conditional use permit is cons or the conditional use is consistent with the objectives of the zoning code and the purpose of the zone in which the site is located. The rural residential zone applies to areas of the city appropriate for both housing and limited agricultural uses that preserve the area's rural character. This zone is predominantly large lot single family development.

However, it does allow for cluster and planned residential developments which provide opportunities for higher densities. I'll briefly say that that's not entirely accurate. Um and but going back into the intent section of the zoning code, it says the rural residential zone applies to those non- urban areas of the city that can cannot be the utilization cannot be economically and efficiently provided with city services associated with urban living.

As such, it is designed for the utilization and enjoyment of the city's unique mountain environment with a minimum amount of municipal services and improvements. This zone is also intended to be used to protect against premature development in areas on the fringe of the urban service area. So golf courses provide an opportunity for its users to enjoy the city's unique mountain environment as is described in the intent section of this zone.

Uh and the only municipal service that is required for this proposal is reclaimed water. Uh there is no requirement for sewer or um other infrastructure to support this uh development. Uh, and the reclaimed water will be serviced through an extension to the existing private reclaimed system that runs through Pine Canyon. Binding two, uh, that granting the conditional use will not be detrimental to the public health, safety, and or welfare. And that's broken into three sections here.

Uh, property damage or nuisance arising from noise, smoke, odor, dust, vibration, or illumination. No nuisances generated uh arising from uh noise, smoke, odor, dust, vibration or illumination are anticipated beyond what is typical for the zone uh and surrounding uses. The development uses or the proposal uses landscaping and resource protection areas to buffer active play areas from adjacent residential lots.

Second part of this is hazard to persons or property from possible explosion, contamination, fire or flood. Uh no hazards from possible explosion, contamination, fire or flood are anticipated with the proposed use. The applicant states that uh golf course management reduces fire risk when compared to current conditions.

Uh they also state that all fuel and chemicals will be safely handled and managed and the project incorporates storm water management facilities to mitigate any flood risks resulting from uh this development and the surrounding subdivision. And then the third part of finding two is impact on surrounding areas arising from unusual volume or character of traffic. This is a private amenity for Pine Canyon members.

The applicant does not anticipate uh a great deal of traffic generation because it's it's the resident uh the residents or the members of Pine Canyon that have access to this site. Finding three, the characteristics of the conditional uses as proposed uh and as it is as it may be conditioned are reasonably compatible with the types of uses permitted in the uh surrounding area.

The cup shall be issued only when the planning commission finds that the applicant has considered and adequately addressed the following to ensure that the proposed use will be compatible with the surrounding area. and I'll go into each uh individually. So the first or a is access traffic, pedestrian, bicycle and vehicular circulation. Again, this is a private amenity. Traffic generation is anticipated to be minimal.

John Wesley Powell Boulevard, which will be uh developed to the north of this site, uh provides a sidewalk along the site's northern boundary. Um, vehicular and non-vehicular access to the site will be shared along private streets. Uh, those streets do not have sidewalks on them, but they are, uh, intended to be the primary points of access to this site. Uh, B, adequacy of site and open space provisions, including resource protection standards where applicable.

This project serves as an active common space amenity for the associated uh PRD subdivision. Uh the proposal maintains a forest preservation rate of 69% on the golf course tract uh exceeding the 50% preservation rate of residential zones. Uh this will be further evaluated during civil plan review.

There is a condition that staff has recommended uh regarding specifically resource protection to ensure that as the plans get uh fine-tuned that the uh preservation does not fall below what is required in in code finding 3C noise light visual and other pollutants. An outdoor lighting permit will be required to show conformance with code standards for lighting zone 2 3D. Uh proposed style and sight sighting of structures in relationship to the surrounding neighborhood.

There are no structures proposed as part of the golf course use. Uh the design of the site will be compatible with the adjacent Pine Canyon development. 3E landscaping and screening. A preliminary landscape plan has been approved with the site plan providing uh the required street buffer, peripheral buffer and parking landscaping. Uh further the uh plant species and sizing have also been reviewed and found to meet uh code requirements. 3F impact on public utilities.

The applicant has made improvements to irrigation strategy uh of the existing Pine Canyon Golf Course which reduces the overall water demand uh and allows for them to use uh that that surplus in this area. Uh the amendment to the reclaimed water agreement that was executed on September 29th, 2025 extends the place of use to accommodate this proposal.

And the amendment uh also uh reduces the uh annual aotment of reclaimed water by approximately 30% from 360 million gallons of reclaimed water to 253 million gallons uh per year with a monthly cap or maximum not to exceed 27 million gallons per month. The reduction in reclaimed water results in a net positive uh impact on public utilities and allows allocation of reclaimed water to other potential users.

And that's because uh with their original aotment of 360 million uh they've they've reduced that aotment and now now city has reclaimed water that can be given to other users. 3G signage and outdoor lighting. All signage and outdoor lighting will comply with signage and outdoor lighting standards. They will be uh separate permits if as required. 3. Dedication and development of streets adjoining the property. Uh dedication and development of streets will occur through the subdivision process.

3 I impacts to resources. So this is both historical and uh natural resources. So the the first I'll talk about is the historical resources. There was a cultural resource study that was done for this area uh that did not identify any historical or prehistorical resources. Uh that being said, the staff has been notified of the requirements in the event of inadvertent discovery of cultural resources or ground disturbances that were not captured in the the scope of the uh cultural resource study.

And going into natural resources, uh the proposal meets all of the slope category requirements for preservation and exceeds the natural resource preservation requirement for forest preservation which is set at 50%. Uh they're again identified uh preservation rate of 68%. And staff's recommendation uh includes a condition that disturbance of tree canopy areas be evaluated at civil plan review and that will allow for some adjustment of the preservation rate for citizen participation.

Uh, the applicant notified nearby property owners within 1,000 ft of the parcel boundary of this application via mailer and also held two virtual neighborhood meetings. The first was on July 2nd, 2025 at 5:30 p.m. and the second on September 18th, 2025 at 5:30 p.m. Uh, [snorts] the following concerns were raised in the neighborhood meetings. Traffic, water use, impacts on wildlife, impacts on the Arizona Trail, and impacts on Pine Canyon membership and services.

And with that staff's recommendation, uh, in accordance with the findings presented in this report, staff recommends that the requests for the cup be granted by the planning and zoning commission with the requirements included in CUP number PZ-24-00124-08 and as follows.

uh the development of the site shall substantially conform to the plans as presented with the CDP application and that the final natural resource protection plan submitted with the assemble engineering plans shall evaluate the disturbance to forest resources based on disturbance to canopy in conformance with section 10-50.90.070 uh C.8 8 of the Flagstaff zoning code.

The final preservation rate of the site shall meet the minimum requirements as stated in 10-50 uh 90 uh 060 of the Flagstaff zoning code. I believe the applicant has a a presentation for you as well and staff is available for any questions. Okay. Thank you for the great presentation and does the commission have any questions for staff at this time?

Mary and I was wondering if either you or Tiffany could explain some historical background um that required golf courses to now have a cup effective 2011. And what I came across was a zoning code interpretation letter that was written by Tiffany in June of 2024 that explained why this golf course amenity would require a CUP and the reasoning being that cups were now required on golf courses due to the impact to water resources.

So I wonder if maybe there's some background that we should share with the public and the commission. Secondly, has any golf course had a cup uh or gone through the cup process since 2011 when that went into effect? I am not aware of of the history of conditional use permits for for golf courses since 2011. Uh, I believe the interpretation letter that you're uh referring to was to resolve a a concern as to whether a conditional use permit was required for a resident amenity.

Uh, and it was that the resident amenity on its own is not a use unless it is a golf course. And that the fact that it is a golf course established what what the land use was and therefore required a conditional use permit. was kind of hoping Tiffany would show up, but I think I I must have gotten it right. Um, and it's it's really in just doing my homework, it just came up on a Google search, frankly. So, it's a it's a letter that's out there for in the public domain. So, that's how I came up.

It's posted on the city website as well. Yeah. Um, I think Tiffany wanted to make a Tiffany, did you want to speak? Um we were request it was a formal request for an interpretation about what would require a conditional use permit and so that interpretation is posted on our website along with any other interpretations that have been made but Mary stated exactly what is in that interpretation.

Um, so when Pine Canyon was originally constructed, there was not a requirement for conditional use permit for a golf course, but that did change.

Could you speak to why the reasoning behind golf courses and cemeteries being pulled from that and requiring cups is I mean is the only thing that we have to work from in evaluating a cup for this usage is that with just with regard to water sources because that's what triggered it being removed and requiring a cup or so I just want to see the parameters of what we really need to consider.

I mean, I would So, it's been a while since I wrote that interpretation and I haven't looked at it in a minute. So, I think it's been over a year um since I've even looked at it. So, I apologize. I wasn't prepare prepared to present on the sort of aspects. I would just rely on what is in the contents of that zoning interpretation to date. Um, and I wouldn't want to speak without reviewing it again.

So, so, but no other golf courses have come before um the department or the or the commission that has needed as a a C. So, this is precedent setting potentially. Um, I don't know that it's precedent setting. I mean, it would be maybe I guess it's the first conditional use permit, but I don't know that it sets a precedent because each individual permit is reviewed individually. Yeah. And I think I again I think that that that interpretation was just questioning the land use and the process.

And I think as far as reviewing this application because it's a conditional use permit, you look at you look at all the findings. Um, as Ben pointed out, one of the findings does address um, infrastructure to support this and that, um, that the major infrastructure supporting this is that use of reclaim water. Um, so I I think that's where the the reclaim water comes in, but I would not say that's that's the only thing we're looking at.

We're making sure that that all those findings are being met. And then that would be my question is what is the capacity for reclaimed water for the city? I mean and how much will this uh you know I'm I'm not I don't work for water services but we do have uh Mac McNamera uh who may be able to address your question about reclaim for the city. So again the question is what is the capacity for reclaimed water and how would this impact that? Yeah. So I can hop in.

So MAC MAC the Maram engineering section for water services um for the city. So currently in our peak months uh May, June, July, August, September, we're 100% allocated for reclaim. Uh we do have a surplus in the winter. Um, this amended use agreement gives us back roughly 3 million gallons per month um that we can reallocate to others that are of uh express interest right now in those peak demand months. Thank you. Sure. Thank you.

Before you go away, um, so most of our reclaim water contracts have a renewal date. Do these ones have renewal dates? Uh, specifically this one, this new user or this amended user agreement does. Um, I think it's a fiveyear uh user agreement right now. And I believe that's and I do believe that's typical for all of our most of our reclaim user agreements. And um, who uses the most reclaimed water? What is there a certain business or certain company?

Um, you know, so in the in the summer months, um, all of our part most of our public parks use reclaim. Um, we've got several golf courses that use reclaim. Um, and then when the biggest user would be Snowball. I don't have the exact numbers in front of me. Um, I could get those for you tomorrow if you'd like. I don't know that that's necessary, but thank you because you I think you hit on the top users. So, thank you. Any other questions from commissioners?

Um, we'll move to the presentation from the applicant and please state your name and do I have to ask that for the applicant? State their name and address for the record. Does does the applicant need I'm sure Lindsay will identify herself clearly. Chivalry is not dead. Thank you, Ben, for pulling this up. Slideshow play from beginning. Okay, there we go. Do you guys all see that? Uh, chair, vice chair, for your record, Lindseay Shuby with the uh law firm of Gamage and Burnham.

Here on behalf of of STL 405, my client with me is Todd Severson and Hillary Turby. um as well as Sean Creek from from Gamage and Burnham. So, thank you so much for your time. Uh and a few questions and I can speak to some of them. Again, you know what is a conditional use permit, right? I've been in front of you for a couple. We did the micro hospital. I think some of you were on on the commission for that. We also did the conditional use permit for retail uses in industrial zoning.

And so, a conditional use permit and they're used all across the valley. You know, there is an assumption that the land use makes sense, but you want to evaluate the criteria as set forth. By the way, totally fibbing on a three-part test. That three-part test is like an 18-part test. Um, because they have so many different subp parts, but you look at the test and you look at all the elements and you see if you meet the test.

Um, as far as vice mayor or vice mayor, vice chair Norton and your question on precedent setting, you know, I would say that that all uses are different, right? Retail use in industrial zoning doesn't always make sense. It depends on on how it's laid out and and we got a CUP approved for that. There are new um golf courses in the valley that have night golf, right? The glow-in-the-dark balls and there's lights and there's music and all those things.

you know, I would say that would probably not be compatible on a site like this. So, all uses are different and that's the the gift of this three-part test with many subp parts. Um, is the ability to look at every use on its own. So, a little bit of background. I will get to the test. Ben touched on it on his great presentation. Chair, I agree. He always and I'll try not to reiterate too much.

I'm going to give a little bit of background information that will help, you know, kind of explain why I believe and staff agrees that we meet the test and then speak a little bit more to the two neighborhood meetings as we hosted them and and any questions and comments we had there. But the blue outline on your screen, right, that is state trust land 405. We call it STL 405. The first phase of this development is 126 acres.

It's a very um weird configuration because it allows for the dedication of John Wesley Powell and and the first phase of development of John Wesley Powell. Um so that's the purple that's 126. It is planned to include byite residential development as well as this amenity. Um really leaning into the outdoor beauty of the area and um outdoor beauty of the area. So the project proposal again we're zoned RR the the purple is the 126 acres and the green right is the low is the amenity area.

The amenity area meanders through the proposed homes. So again tract B which is in green is 20.87 acres and you know what's awesome? 7.9% acres and Ben touched on this is preserved. So 40% of the overall amenity is is non um non-disturbed open space. Um this also again includes 54 home sites uh and then a meandering health and wellness path through it. So this is and and Ben showed this too again. This is this shows our plat.

So this shows the 54 home sites as they're going to exist, the JWP expansion, and then there may be exist there or there will be additional residential um that will be come through either reszoned or platted in the future. But right now, this plat allows for 54 homes and this amenity as well as the outdoor uh walking path. And yes, the for easements and transportation, that's the strange looking land allocation we have there on our plat.

So this specific proposal this and you know it's interesting 4.9 acres of turf. So you'll see later in the presentation, but Pine Canyon did improvements to their golf course. Again, this is just background information where they were able to remove 10 acres of turf and make improvements. So, they're using less water, which is why we could enter into that amended water services reclaimed water agreement, which is done approved by council. And so, we do have reclaimed water for this area.

We do not need to ask for any more reclaimed water. 7.9 acres of this 20 acres is preserved. We have the linear trail 4,335 ft. Um, and then we also have streams and ponds for biodiversity. And I think one really interesting thing as we move forward to this development, you know, sustainability. We hear two things in Flagstaff, housing crisis and sustainability. And there are a lot of things that you can do with reclaimed water in terms of supporting wildlife and biodiversity.

So this is just the first phase of development for state trust land 405. Um the balance is is we're calling STL 340 and we look forward to coming to you with that with a reszone case uh next year sometime. So what are some the key points? Again this is a ninehole non-commercial kind of pitch and putt course uh practice course uh as well as a small putting green.

It also has a multi-use health and wellness trail and um an integrated and thoughtfully designed stream that's going to run through native uh and regionally appropriate landscaping. We do have an engineering uh appeal request in to remove some of the required landscaping that requires excess uh reclaimed water. So that's in front of the engineering department.

Now, outside of this request, uh, and the project does not include any planned buildings, as Ben mentioned, limited hours of operation, and limited traffic as it is a private amenity. So, what what are the benefits? The project requires again less than 4 acres of turf. Pine Canyon Proper Golf Course did remove 10 acres of turf a couple years ago. A normal regular championship size golf course is 90 to 125 acres of turf. Here we have four.

Uh it'll minimize grading um and you know allow us limit the turf area to just play areas only. Really this is a beautiful part of Flagstaff and we really want to limit grading and really enjoy the the topographical you know mother nature what mother nature gave us out there. The picture that you see uh on on the top right hand side of your screen actually is an Osprey nest at Pine Canyon.

With the expansion with State Trust Land 340 and the expansion of of this small Pine Canyon expansion with the 54 lots, we're really looking forward to expand on the the um Osprey population that we have in Pine Canyon. And then this uh picture on the bottom is just an example of a pitch and putt course. again much smaller, far less turf than what's normally required. As stated in the staff report, you know, golf courses are great. Um they can reduce the severity and the spread of wildfire.

Um that's an important element right in your uh regional plan as you guys are bringing forward. Uh and we want to make sure we brought that to everyone's attention. well-watered um closely mowed turf. Again, only four acres of it can really slow down um the potential negative impacts of wildfires that I know you guys have have suffered with up here. So, the Pine Canyon irrigation and we hit this uh in both neighborhood meetings and did have some questions about it.

Again, Pine Canyon voluntarily made uh irrigation improvements. They made 30% efficiencies where we can reduce the sprinkler head uh emissions on the existing course and we took out 10 acres of turf. Uh again, this was a we also voluntarily relinquished 30% of the water allocation in our in our reclaimed water amendment earlier this year and also as Max stated uh gave back 3 million gallons per month in the peak season months.

that was requested if you're water services director and we were able to do that. So, we're we're really happy about that. We hosted the water commission on a tour on October 6th. 22 people participated and really hope that some of your other golf courses can follow the lead of of this new technology. It was um a big investment and Pine Canyon did it without being asked a couple years ago.

So, the new amenity, the new pitch and putt, um, again, it only is 3.75% of a traditional championship golf course, 4 acres of turf as opposed to the normal 90 to 125 acres that you find on a normal golf course. We actually did our neighborhood meetings virtually and I said, "Pitch and putt." And someone asked what baseball had to do with this. And so, I was kind of standing up and I'm like, "Not pitch, it's pitch. It's a small but you know this is a small uh a small amenity area.

It's called it is a golf course but it is called a pitch and putt because it is multigenerational. It is family oriented and it's way different uh than the other golf course opportunities that you that are available at Pine Canyon. Again overall and I want to focus on this there is a net reduction even if this is approved of six acres of turf overall at Pine Canyon. Um and we are this is proposed to be irrigated entirely with water that is in the existing Pine Canyon agreement.

No other reclaimed water um is going to be requested or or needed for this application. Uh and this is my last slide and then I promise I'm getting to the test and then get to my conclusion. But Pine Canyon is a proud member of the Ottabon. Took me actually a minute to learn that word. Apparently you guys in Flagstaff know that word better than I do. Ottabon Sanctuary program for the naturalization of golf courses reduces the need of gasoline, pesticides, fertilizer and water.

It lowers the maintenance cost. It allows for the diversity of plants and animals. Improves water quality. Minimizes erosion, protects ecosystems and maintains the gene pool of plants and animal species. Because when we did take out those 10 acres of turf, we were able to reveate with the natural vegetation that should have been there in the first place. And you know for the golfers it adds natural beauty. That's and that's the purpose also of this amenity that we have in front of you.

It increases wildlife sightings uh and defines kind of play and non-play areas. So the additional uh amenity will also be a member of the autobond sanctuary program. So CUP findings right the three-part test that has more than three parts. The first one actually just does have one, right?

the conditional use is consistent with the objectives of the zoning code and the proposed uh zone in which the site is located and uh again vice chair that does get to the question right the zoning interp was from me and we are asking Tiffany if it's a private amenity does it need a cup that was the intent of that question uh again we're in the RR zone the RR zone allows for the approval of a conditional use permit It's con it's consistent with the objectives um of of the district.

As Ben also stated, the outdoor amenity space creates a sense of community along with the meandering trail that goes through. Um it has been thoughtfully designed in terms of again respecting the natural topography, limit grading and then allow for the stream to go in there for biodiversity and wildlife opportunities. Number two.

So the two part the number two has three parts and Ben already brought you through this but again just to reiterate we need to ensure right there's no property damage or nuisance arising from smoke, odor, dust, vibration or illumination. This is from state statute. Uh no, we we will not have any of those things. There's no smoke, there's no odor, there's no dust, and we will be dark skies compliant. um not a hazard to persons or property for explosion, contamination, fire, or flood.

Again, as mentioned um by Ben, we're outside of the flood plane. We don't have any flood issues here. Uh we will adhere to all relevant health and safety codes as far as far as fires and chemicals. All of those are already safely stored on for the Pine Canyon Golf Course. And this is just a relocation of some of the golf turf that we already had. Uh again, in our natural slopes and drainage patterns, it we very carefully integrated that into our plan.

Impact on surrounding areas from unusual volume or character of traffic. No, this is a private amenity, right? For better or for worse, it is. Therefore, as far as this part of the test, I believe we meet it. There will be a golf cart, um, bicycling as well as as some vehicular connection, but it is a non-commercial amenity. Therefore, will not add to traffic in the area. The threepart, this is the funny one. The number three has nine parts. Uh, but get Ben got through them and I'll do it too.

Uh, again, the first, and this is the surrounding areas, right? We want to make sure that we're being a good I call this kind of the good neighbor policy. Again, traffic, pedestrian, bike, vehicular. No, this is a non-commercial element. As Ben stated, there is a sidewalk along the new proposed John Wesley Powell and connectivity through a road that we're calling Telleluride to the existing Pine Canyon development. Um, all multimmodal circulation is being encouraged and provided.

Adequacy uh of site, common, open space, including resource protection where applicable. Ben really hit on this and I appreciate it. Again, the resources, the tree resource protection that's required is 50% and we've got 69. I remember when I came to you on that 1.8% deviation on slope. Uh but here we far exceeded and on both, right? We exceed slope, we exceed trees, and that's part of why we want this.

We want to lean into the natural beauty and aesthetic of the area with an outdoor uh use, noise, light, visual, and other pollutants. Again, this is are you a good neighbor? We will. Any lighting will require a a different permit, and we uh intend to be dark sky compliant. Um dark sky compliant. We do not intend any light pollution to any of our neighboring property owners. the proposed style uh style and sighting of structures. It's going to be okay. We don't have a structure. Good check.

We've got that one. Again, this is a fully outdoor amenity. And I think this is important too in looking at the cup test and and not this part of the test.

that there are other things we can do by right and and I got myself a little I got some residents mixed up on the on the first neighborhood meeting because I talked about I spoke to you know we could do pickle ball by right we can do buildings by right but it's this use that we need a conditional use permit for those are non-pervious they potentially have more noise um and those types of things uh but I would argue you know our nice nod to the outdoors here will not have a negative impact on our neighbors.

Landscaping screening including additional landscaping u meets the minimum requirements. Correct. We will meet the minimum requirements. We have asked for reduction on some of the landscaping that's required by code that uses an excessive amount of reclaimed water. Um and and we're working through engineering on that one. But again envisioned to be natural and character uh indigenous to the Flagstaff area. Impact on public utilities as Alex said, right?

This is one part of the nine-part test on number C. Uh but we don't need sewer. We don't need uh potable water. It's just reclaimed water and the agreement is already approved. So we don't need any more reclaimed water. There is reclaimed water that is allocated uh to Pine Canyon Golf and and it will meet the needs of this uh amenity as well as gave 3 million back per month. We're really excited about that and 30% overall signage and outdoor lighting.

Again, we will it'll be minimal harmonizing with the surrounding area and will be dark skies compliant. Dedication and development of streets adjoining to the property. Yes, our pre-plat was approved. Our final plat will be approved.

With this, we dedicate the the entire John Wesley Powell corridor that goes through the entire state trust land 405 and will help spur that development, which is really important to the region and and we're really excited about all the interior treat streets uh will be dedicated. The plat process is underway. We're in the final plat process now.

impacts on historic, prehistoric and natural resources again exceed slope, exceed trees and there are zero there's cultural resource study and there are no um prehistoric issues with this site. So I submit to you that we meet this finding.

Um, also I would say I believe with this amenity again as opposed to other amenities that we could do by right like pickle ball like you know things that that are allowed and and concrete and all those things that we really do uh already foster native biodiversity on the site. We want to preserve natural habitats and support local habitat and local um wildlife and plant species.

So we see this as an extension and then again when we get back back in front of you for state trust land 340 the intention is for that continuation to support the biodiversity and wildlife in the area. So neighborhood meetings again we had two what were the questions traffic and construction right there will be a new entrance off of John Wesley Powell so it will not go through the existing Pine Canyon development or impact neighbors in other ways. uh membership and access.

Uh there were a lot of questions about that. It will be this is um an existing P. This will be added to the Pine Canyon membership and that's what the use is for. Uh uh how how big is the course? Right? Again, this is much smaller. This is 3.75% of a normal three, you know, four acres of turf versus 90 to 125. So while it is a golf and again vice chair getting to your question is this a precedent?

Well maybe and maybe a good one right if you want a golf course you can have four acres of turf instead of the 90 to 125 that a normal golf course uh requires or asks for. Um uh this amenity will uh housing and community character. Uh again as part of the plat we have 54 more homes and then we'll have more residential opportunities. don't think that has anything to do with the cup test, but it was a question that was asked. Water and sustainability.

At the time we were going through our meeting, um we had not yet amended our agreement. Um but the answer to the public was we were working with the city on the reclaimed water agreement for Pine Canyon and and expanding it here. Uh we also asked about the Arizona Trail. There have been many discussions. I'm sure you all followed the regional plan very carefully. The Arizona trail was well originally was supposed to go through the state trust line property.

Then there was an idea of taking it more through the Riota flag through the Little America property. Um I think that was not necessarily accepted um for those property owners at this time. And so you'll see with our reszone again has nothing to do with this application and nothing to do with the cup test that you have to look at tonight. Um, but the Arizona Trail will go through the balance of our property.

And we actually have redesigned our entire reszone to lean into the Arizona Trail, biodiversity, um, and five parks that will be open to the public. We're really excited about our our reszone that gets to come in front of you. And yes, and the trail does not intersect with the amenity in any way. There was also a question um about the existing use of the Pine Canyon Golf Course. Again, that's outside of the the test. So, our first neighborhood meeting was July 2nd at 5:30.

We had 51 members of the public and 10 members of the development team. Second neighborhood meeting September 18th. Seven members of the public, five members of the development team. Again, overwhelming communication. were either in support or just inquiring as well as two communications that were negative. Alex has a copy. Um, Alex has a copy. And also, one thing that's interesting, as uh Ben said, we notified a thousand 1,000 feet around. We're only required by code to do 300.

Um, we did staff asked for I didn't volunteer to do a thousand. Staff asked for a thousand. We agreed to do a thousand. Um, so we did triple the notification. These what Alex has are uh letters and there were some when I was reviewing the staff report I saw there only four letters. Um, we had more. I don't know where they all came from. Um, but again overwhelming support from the community. Um, we have 15 letters of support to an opposition. Uh, we're really excited to be here.

We have a recommendation of approval from staff uh and respectfully respectfully request approval from the commission and apologize you got these letters in advance or late but I also didn't want to say in front of Alex and Ben that we had seen more letters so we wanted to make sure everyone had them. Uh respectfully request approval and stand for questions. Um yes I have a couple of questions and I'll ask other commissioners. Um, so you you're talking about there will be no building.

So how will people register for this course if they want to get on this course? How will they go about doing that? Chair, uh, that's a great question. It again will be all managed through Pine Canyon. And so at this point, I don't know if uh, there's going to be reservations, if it's going to be more, you can just come up and and play a few holes, but it'll be managed the same way. and through the clubhouse, the existing clubhouse for the existing Pine Canyon Golf Course.

So, is this a walking course or would this be um also a course where there would be golf carts? And and I can get I'm going to I'm going to start chair and then Todd is going to correct me if I'm wrong. Um it will I would assume it will be mostly a walking course. Again, there is the meandering path that goes through.

If you have any type of accessibility issues or you need a a cart to help you get through, I'd imagine most people will walk, but there is the ability for the golf cart to go through as well. Correct. Oh, Todd is going to come up. He's going to say his name and address for the record and then he will give a succinct answer to your Thank Thank you very much for giving my spiel. Good evening. Todd Severson with Symmetry Companies and STL uh 405 is the applicant.

Um yeah, we're currently exploring both routes whether we make it a walk-on course or um a uh golf cart access, but um the intent is to continue to to operate it at a enjoyable level. Um and so it's currently 1.3 miles and about 220 feet of elevation change. And knowing that it's multigenerational, we want to make sure that both children and grandparents can enjoy that walk. Um, and so we need to build the paths as if they will accommodate a cart in case that's needed.

So the walking path and the cart path, will those be one and the same? They are. and and a lot of our residents and members use those cart paths in non-golf hours um pre and post kind of um you know typical golf um tea time hours. Okay. And then I I guess my other questions because some of these letters were put on our agenda so we had some advance on um two of the letters that were negative. one talked about uh major elk herd passing through that area um and that it's a birthing area.

Has there been any study on that? Um actually yes. Pine Canyon has historically worked with Arizona Game and Fish. Um, one of the concerns that they've had, um, as development, uh, pushes out in this area, um, sometimes the the kind of more extra vegetation that comes with Pine Canyon landscaping, uh, actually attracts, uh, the elk in a nonpositive way. Uh, it increases their population beyond a healthy, um, kind of herd limit.

And so Arizona Game and Fish would actually like to see the herd pushed out back into the forest um to ensure that you know kind of herd sizes maintain a healthy level for the elk themselves whether that's disease or um kind of overconumption of resources from from the animal side. So we have had those conversations with Arizona Game and Fish um regarding elk habitat.

So, are you saying that currently the elk herd is too big with the current or that it could expand once the golf course was built and that you're going to somehow limit elk being on the golf course? Our approach was to to try to work with them to understand how we could um not encourage the elk to come onto the golf course. Um, other golf courses have that issue as well. it kind of creates an artificial habitat for them.

Um but uh so at at times we had discussed alternative um you know measures to help meet that uh need to push elk away from development uh in which they indicated that obviously the future development of JWP will help that as well as there'll be more residences and more traffic along JWP. Yeah.

I I sure chair I'd say I'd say from a you know from a land use perspective right that you guys as a planning is a Todd is working closely with game and fish to support the elk and also support you know to make sure there's not overpopulation um I'd say you know Todd correct me if I'm wrong you're everyone loves the elk they love the elk out there they're fun to look at when when people are playing golf we want to be supportive of their natural migration patterns right if it's up the Rio um again this is a natural habit habitat which will encourage wildlife.

The offspray we love and the osprey are great because they're up above. Uh and and hopefully, you know, with the trees, we'll have more offspray. I think just the Pine Canyon ownership has worked very closely with Game and Fish to protect um to protect the elk population and and to work with Game and Fish as to the best way to support to support them one way or the other, right? And that you just don't want an overpopulation and create an artificially safe environment.

Yet at the same time, we want to support the elk and and where they should naturally be migrating. Right. I guess I guess my question is, is the elk herd too large now or is it predicted to be too large if you did not have something to block them from the golf course? Their concern is that it's too large now. um and that it's not necessarily um it's just a it's a situation that they have around Pine Canyon around that area of town.

It's not specific to something that we're we're doing or creating. They just have concerns. Okay. Thank you. And then um I'll ask for other questions while I think about my other question as well. So, are there other questions from commissioners? Mary, um I I did watch the city council meetings when you did your symmetry presentation on STL 340 as well as your um reclaimed water amendment.

Um, so I've seen some of this, but I want to make sure um, and kind of for the record here, is this the only golf course amenity of any kind that you have intended for the entire 405 acres on state land? Chair, vice chair, very good question. Yes, the reszone application that is in with planning right now. We just responded to our with our first round of our first resubmitt. We we submitted in August does not include a golf course. Correct. There is no intention.

There was we had an application in that did have a golf course um gosh a year and a half ago. Um that has been withdrawn. The new reszone that hopefully will come in front of you. it. The amenity set is definitely Arizona Trail, five parks, uh, and includes zero golf courses. And can I piggy back on that question? So, um, that was another question of mine was that 10 years down the road, do you see an extension of this ninehole golf course to being an 18hole golf course? Chair, great question.

No, I mean, the where where it is now, there's no intention of that. Um it's nestled in between 54 homes. I mean it's very and it's very specific. We're conditioned on the the specific site plan. There is other area and the 126 acres. There is Z the plan that is in front of you right now does not include any extension of this nine holes to be 18 nor any golf on the northern portion. Thank you Mary. Yeah, I just wanted to touch on the golf court, a golf cart and scooter access.

Um, which would end up going across JWP. Um, being that I live across from Pine Canyon, I see golf carts and scooters zip across JWP Pal all the time just to get into Pinnacle Pines or Juniper Point. Um, I would encourage that you not encourage further traffic of golf c golf carts and scooters across JW PAL, especially as it develops out into this major arterial road. Um, so that would be um a concern there that I hadn't even thought about until uh that was brought up.

Um, so yeah, and I'm very familiar with the large elk herd and the way they split up, but during time different times of their life cycle during the year, unfortunately, I've seen hazing going on, that Pine Canyon that um does stress the elk and pushes them into running. Um, I've seen the newborn calves, all that. I I share those concerns. Um, I don't know what the answers is. I'm glad you're coordinating with Game and Fish. Um, but it, you know, I they were here too. They were here first, too.

So, that's all I'll have to say about that is just that what I've witnessed. Thanks. Chair, if I may, just vice chair, to answer your question, the golf carts would come through a road called Telleluride that will be parallel to JWP. So, hopefully there would be no golf carts acrossing or on JWP that it can come through again because this amenity is south of JWP. Thanks for that clarification. Any other questions from commissioners?

Thank you very much for your presentation and I will open this up to the public. So I have two speakers for this matter. Um Nat White, if you'll come to the podium and please state your name and address for the record and then you'll have three minutes. Thank you. Nat White 1120 North Rock Ridge. And first of all, I'd like to thank you for volunteering to do what you do here. So, thank you very much. I just want to share um an opinion and a related suggestion.

uh Flagstaff population is some 70,000 and that produ that population produces the source of reclaimed water and it for my my opinion is it should be used for the public good. the value of reclaimed water will continue to increase uh as our drought continues and if that drought is related to climate change um that's what the future holds for us.

So reclaimed water is of great value and therefore reclaimed water use should be particular principally for public purposes purposes where the public has free um or paid access. I appreciate the effort to design the golf course to minimize irrigation. And I also appreciate Pine Canyon's new uh reclaimed water contract which reduces the original total by amount of about 30%. And I also appreciate uh Pine Canyon's interest in preserving the natural resources. It just makes good financial sense.

Um the fact remains though a few hundred people will excl exclusively benefit from a resource produced by the other 70,000 folks. Reclaimed water should be used for the public good. And my related suggestion is that reclaimed water contract should go to the city council as a policy. It should not be a discretionary item. Um, the reason is, as I stated before, it's a valuable resource and it may be more so in the future. So, thank you. Thank you, Nat.

Next up would be Michelle James who's with Friends of Flagstaff Future. Hello, chair and commissioners. Michelle James, executive director of Friends of Flass Future. And um I'm just going to give you a a an a just want to tell you that Nat and I did not coordinate on these comments at all, but they're very similar.

Um Symmetry's proposal for a 9-hole pitch and putt practice course on a portion of Pine Canyon expansion will utilize the city's reclaimed water from Symmetry's existing allocation, which was recently set to 253 million gallons per year versus the previous 360 million gallons. The staff report outlining inviting number three states that the reduction in overall reclaimed water use results in a net positive impact on public utilities allowing reallocation of the water to other potential users.

FQ believes that continuing to provide reclaimed water for private economic benefit is irresponsible. Eventually, the city will need to use all available reclaimed water for direct potable reuse to meet public demand. continuing to provide this water for private uses such as golf courses, sets up the private land owner, in this case, Pine Canyon, preventual failure as a city clause back all or a significant portion of the reclaimed water it previously allocated.

FC understands that the city is not in a potable water crisis at this point in time. However, it is coming and perhaps sooner than we expect. The Flagstaff population is likely to grow as impacts of our warming and drying climate are felt throughout the region. The city will continue to await the $800 or more million dollars in funding from the federal government for the red cap red gap grant ranch pipeline and the treatment plant and then will wait multiple years for its completion.

FQ believes the city must act now and start valuing its reclaimed water as at a significantly higher level. One means of planning for the future starting today is no longer to no longer provide reclaimed water for private benefit. For these reasons, FCubes opposes the granting of this cup to symmetry. Thank you. Thank you very much. Are there any other comments, questions? Okay. Okay. I'm sorry. That's for the next issue. if I'm reading it correctly for middle housing. So, sorry.

That's all right. Yes. This question is for uh water service staff. Uh, is there anything uh in policy that would um allow the city to um reig on its current contract or somehow uh restrict use of um reclaimed water for uh private use? Yes. So, this is Mac. Mamero again. Um I may defer to our legal department on that. That sounds contractual to me. Not sure if Christina is still online. Yeah. Um Christina Wilcott, senior assistant city attorney.

I am happy to answer any questions about the contract, but to be honest, we'll need to do that into executive session. If the commission wants to go into executive session, happy to talk about um the contract, but but don't want to do that here in a public session. I do not uh chair if I may.

I also just wanted to there are members of the public here who are in support and they I think they put in cards speak if needed if they just want to raise their hands people who are in support of this application uh and have Ken speak if needed but wanted to make sure sometimes when two people speak and others don't they wanted to make sure they're protecting your time and yeah commissioner I would just say it is a five-year agreement right and so they are revisited every five years um but not give you legal Thank you.

Any other questions, discussion? Anybody want to make a motion? If there's discussion, do you want to do it during the motion period or do you want us to discuss more? Now, I suppose we can make a motion and then have discussion over the motion. Okay. Do you want to make a motion [laughter] regarding PZ24-00124-08? I move that the planning and zoning commission grant the conditional use permit in accordance with the findings and with the two conditions presented.

Is there a second to that motion? Second. [snorts] There's been a motion and a second. Okay. Now we can open the floor for more discussion from commissioners. Yes. Thank you. Um, I absolutely agree with what F3 said and so I don't need to add any more to that. I've been studying a lot about water lately and you know people say we have enough water for 100 years. It looks to me from what it's on our website and other data like 40 years.

So we've really got to start looking at ways to recharge that groundwater. And I think once we get the reclaimed up to a tertiary standard which is drinkable, it'll be safe to put into the groundwater. And so I don't want to tie up anymore. Any other discussion, Mary? Yeah, I'm going to I'm going to go through the findings as as I interpreted them.

Um, you know, finding one talks about the consistency um and it talked a lot about the rural residential zoning and you know that this um how it fits into that and you know the description that was used as far as how this is very uh rural and there's not a lot of services to the area. But yet keep in mind that the homes that are going to be there are going to have city water and sewer. Um so it's not like this is an undeveloped area or an undevelopable area.

Um also just you know we always talk about state land um has this holding zone of RR um and it's you know the intention is is that it gets reszoned and gets uh utilized at a at a higher use. Um so you know I just felt that sort of that explanation of how this fits into RR and the fact that it is state was state land. um you know was just um a little bit cherrypicked in in my opinion. Um finding two as far as and we know that that is somewhat of a subjective finding in some cases.

And so I was concerned about the welfare portion because I do believe that the future welfare of the city um could be harmed by this think being that water is a limited resource and this is an exclusionary use in a private community that doesn't benefit the entire public of of the city. Um and in finding three my my issue with that is is of course the impact on the public utilities.

Um, again, you know, we're watering [laughter] a we're watering golf courses and we just spent so much time on the regional plan talking about a housing emergency and a climate emergency and yet we're approving a golf course. And granted, it's half the size. Um, nine holes as opposed to 18. Um, you know, but I I think of it as like if I spent $1,000 on something a luxury item that only benefited me, um, but I got it for 30% off, I still spent 70 $700 on something I shouldn't have spent.

And I that's how I see with this water usage. It's like you had this allocation. Yes, it's admirable and should be um modified to become more um more efficient in our resource use. Um but it's still being utilized for something that I I don't think is um a a good use at this point in time and in uh for our future. So I will be voting no on this. Any other comments or discussion? I just have an um an overall comment.

Um you know, over my career, I've worked on a lot of golf courses, a lot of water issues, and water, I used to say to clients, if I start getting into it, it's just dangerous. There's so many components of it, and we don't want to get into their contract tonight or any of that stuff.

But I think overall it might be a good thing for an educational purposes to explain in a little more detail maybe a study session how um these allocations work for reclaimed water because some of this could be historic. There may be agreements that have been done years ago and I mean there's issues with paper water, there's issues with wet water. Who has legal rights to the water?

So I think it might be beneficial as we move move forward just from an educational perspective to kind of get some overall um education on this topic. So as we see other projects um we're more I guess informed. That's it. Thank you. I I just have a few thoughts. Um so my my personal opinion is I'm not a big fan of golf courses. I don't think we need any more of them, but I don't think this is our role. And what I'm hearing are more policy decisions and not planning and zoning issues.

And and so again, it's outside of our role. And so if the city wants to change how we use reclaimed water, that's not something we can deal with. I think that's the larger discussion and we're all just kind of yelling into the wind right now. Um I think in the end, if if there is a lack of water in the future, it's going to be a self-correcting problem. Reclaimed water will find a different home.

Right now you can use it for its use, but the other thing I see reclaimed water as currently it's a waste product that needs a home. So you build golf courses, it gives it a home. Eventually, if there's a better use for it, we we'll just redistribute it to that. So I I don't see any reason to hold up this conditional use permit for the arguments presented. Any other discussion or questions? Discussion. All right, I think we're ready for the vote. All those in favor of the motion say I. I.

All those opposed? Nay. So, we have two votes against and how many of our five votes four. Okay, the motion passes. [snorts] Thank you very much um both Ben and our presenters. We'll move on to um issue 5B PZ250027 middle housing zoning code and text amendment. So our audience leaves. [laughter] Okay. Um, good evening. Thank you. Sorry. Tiffany Antal, zoning code manager, um, part of the planning and development services division tonight. Here to talk about the middle housing text amendment.

We had a great work session. It was now three weeks ago. This still says work session. It was so great that I wanted to just reiterate that. I'm just kidding. Um, so I won't belabor all of these points. Again, I I will go through and sort of summarize. Again, this is coming from the House bill um 2721. That's what initiates this middle housing conversation. We don't have that central business district.

Again, we did a lot of work sessions and decided to take this particular amendment citywide and not limit it to just certain areas of the city. Um these are all of the things that 2721 does not allow us to do. Um and so what does that mean? It means a lot of changes with inside of our code. Um pretty much, you know, we're touching almost every chapter um for different bits and purposes. A lot of times it's just cleanup in terms of the administration.

The short and simple is um anything that is considered to be a townhouse, a duplex, a triplex, or a forplex. And remember that definition of those is kind of a little different than we would normally define tri duplex triplex and forplex. And that's it could be all in one building or basically four units on one lot. So if you're four units on one lot or less, you're going to be treated the same as a single family home.

So that means in terms of how we handle permitting, how we handle our IDs review, all of those things will um you'll be treated the same as a single family home. And so single family homes have a lot of leeway. Essentially, they go straight to building permit. We do not take them through our IDs process. So that will be a speed up um for middle housing types. That's that common to procedures, that concept plan review, that site plan review.

Um, there's just a little cleanup in our non-conforming uses. Again, just trying to get the terminology throughout the zoning code correct and the same as we move on. Uh, in the general to all um because public improvements do not apply to individual single family homes, they will not apply to up to a forplex. um they public improvements still apply to all residential subdivisions. The same is true for our site planning design standards.

I did talk about the fact that this was the the saddest part for me, but but it's going to be okay. I'll live through it. Um, and the specific to zones, you know, we changed our allowed use tables and the use tables instead of being dwelling, single family, dwelling, duplex, it's now going to be um one unit residential development, two unit residential development, three, and then four. So, that's the big change on all of these tables.

Um in the specific to zone section um we have two versions of the code because there is an impact to high occupancy housing. So this is why I pulled the removal of potential removal of a conditional use permit from single family high occupancy housing from the last previous amendment. Um so let's talk about it. Like I said, we have to treat um these middle housing types the same way that we treat single family.

So right now in our code, we have a definition of single family, high occupancy housing, duplex, triplex. Anything above three was multifamily and so fell in this category. So I had to shake it up. There are two options here. The first option is to remove all high occupancy housing uses when they're under five units. And that is staff's recommendation. Uh the second option replaces the single family duplex and triplex and changes um the high occupancy housing that is there now.

Instead of four units and greater, it would be five units and greater because that's what multifamily is. Um and basically then we would have high occupancy housing less than four units. However, having to treat everything the same. Right now it's seven be b it's seven bedrooms or five bathrooms that trigger high occupancy housing for single family home. So any one unit in a forplex then under this version would trigger a conditional use permit.

The likelihood of seeing that is fairly low in a fourunit development. Seeing one unit that's seven bedrooms, it's not impossible. I don't want to say that it's never going to happen. Um the the big change if you do want to go with version two is my big suggestion is to make it the seven bedrooms and bathrooms. um because we've seen so many single family homes just get triggered on bathrooms alone. That would be the recommendation here and that is what's included in version two.

So there is the differential. Staff does recommend that we go with version one. It makes a cleaner distinction in the code and is in alignment with the high occupancy housing plan as originally drafted. the specific to uses. Um I made one small fix in our accessory dwelling unit section. This was a cleanup. Um I had uh changed uh a requirement about water meters and I was asked by the water services division to put that back and so that's what I'm doing.

So I wanted to get that done as quickly as possible. Um and then high occupancy housing section gets changed basically as discussed. you know those there those two versions. So we just have to change that section to reflect which version um you want to go with. And then mixed use we did some clarification.

So, as we were going through the code, there were some issues with the um it's amended to clarify that mixed use is a combination of commercial uses and residential uses and not just a mix of commercial uses on the same site as well as cleanup references to the regional plan. So, that that regional plan cleanup was part of the big reason that I pulled this and also as we adjusted the table wanted some clarity in those mixeduse standards. um for middle housing. All righty. Transex zones.

So basically everything that I talked about changing the land use tables for all of the the residential and the commercial zones for the transex zones. It's a little more complicated. I will tell you that this work almost killed me. Um this is the worst section of the code to try to fiddle with or adjust. Anywh who, um, essentially what it means is we had to go back and allow building types in each of these zones that were single family was allowed that would allow up to four units on a lot.

Now, our building types aren't perfect. So, for example, uh, a um, a bungalow court can go up to six or eight units. In this case, in these zones that didn't typically allow for multifamily, we limited those building types to just the four units. Um, so there is some caveats when we add in some of those building types, but it does change the T2, the T3, the T3 N2. Um, so T3N1, just so you know, is what actually exists out there in the world.

T3 N2 is something sitting in the code that if a developer wanted to come in and use the formbbased code, that's what would be applied. Um, but there's nothing in the city zone T3 and two now. So, uh, the transsect zones, all of the allowed use tables were updated in the same way that the conventional zone allowed use tables would do would be done. I did also do a little bit of cleanup as well because I forgot to update these tables previously when I made some changes. I maybe didn't forget.

I just didn't want to do No, I'm just kidding. I I did forget. All right. Uh supplemental design to zones. So, there's lots of other things that will no longer apply to four units and lower. And that includes architectural design standards. And I got to be really honest with you. Architectural design standards on this size of building on a forplex really amounts to, you know, a little bumpout porch and a bellyb band.

Um, and maybe breaking the building up so that it doesn't exceed a 75 ft wall plane. It's not a it wasn't really ever huge to begin with. Um, I would say the site planning design standards had more of an influence over the design of these buildings. it it so I just don't want you to cry over the loss of the architectural design standards. Um landscaping standards will not apply to these or you know would be the same as single family dwellings.

Again, I I I will tell you some heartburn I've had over trying to apply the landscape code previously to like a duplex and all of a sudden a duplex was required to have 10 trees and 20 shrubs and you're like what am what do we I can't even fit it if I wanted to. So, not a huge issue there. Parking standards, um, we won't require bicycle parking for, um, residential developments of less than five units, uh, because we do not require bicycle parking for single family homes.

In terms of the parking standards, um, the the duplex, the townhouse, the triplex, and the forplex, we cannot require more than one parking space per unit. So it only makes sense to make that true for single family development. I I can't remember the last time though that I saw Yes. that I So that's what I was noticing between the um version one and two was that version two had higher parking um rates is um so like a studio in version two has 1.25 spaces per unit.

I think that might be the affordable housing section. Let me So this is on it's on page 560. I was you know if I'm looking at the two of them those that was one of the things because it was like a two to threebedroom on on the version two had two spaces per unit.

fourbedroom would have 2.5 spaces per unit and a fivebedroom plus would have three but on the other version on version one it was I think one parking space for studio one parking space for bedroom one so I know I had a typo in version two um so hold on yeah because that was didn't do something crazy I was trying to you know it's hard to kind compare the two when you can only open one at a time. So, and I didn't want to print out 60 some odd pages of paper and waste that.

I was trying to go back and forth, but that was one of the things that I did note in version two was a higher parking space requirement. Well done. Thanks. If you were to email me and ask me to print stuff out for you, I wouldn't say no. [laughter] Well, thank you. But I think um you know when I'm looking at it at 4 o'clock on Tuesday afternoon, you're probably going to say no because you may not be here. [laughter] You should see me when I'm working in this.

I have to like blow it up really big to be like, "Where's the Did I Did I get that?" Yeah. So, no, I'm just Yeah, because I was looking at the I had to do grading first and then after my grades were done, I went and looked at everything. Um, and that that was, you know, I'm trying to compare the two and it's really So, what happens in version two is there. So, there's a table now that says residential development with less than five dwelling units. So, and that's one space per unit.

And that's the typo that I had. I just had one spice one one space and the clarification of per unit is in here now. So in version one they're broken out one unitit development, two-unit development, three-unit development, fourunit development. In version two they're collapsed into residential development with less than five dwelling units. So they are the same. The numbers that you're seeing apply to multifamily which is five units and above.

So when you see the 1.25 spaces per unit, that's for multifamily. So that doesn't apply to the middle housing types. But that was different than the version one. Correct. Version one, the same page had less parking. Version one still has multifamily in it, but right, but it had less required spaces. Double checking. I knew I should have brought these up again. It was on page I'm on page 60 of 67. I just want you to work for your, you know, salary. [laughter] Always. Nope.

The multif family is still there the same 1.25 spaces per unit. Okay. They just structurally look different because the way that they're broken out. Okay. So, it's the same. It's It is the same. It just looks a little different. And the reason why I then lumped everything as residential development was because there in version two, there's a different parking calculation for high occupancy housing that is four units and less. So, that's why they get grouped differently.

Version two is the version that keeps high occup a land use called high occupancy housing four units and less. Version one does not keep high occupancy housing. And then my question is why did you present if the staff likes version one why did you present us with two versions? Because I had not had a pre-work session with you all on what would happen with high occupancy housing.

This was something that evolved out of our legal review in terms of how we needed to treat um these units the same as single family homes and how that then impacted um the those HOH specifically. So for this because of the time frame in which we have to get this done and this needs to be adopted by January 1st, the easiest thing to do was to prepare you for two copies. So but whatever it is you recommend tonight, that's that alone is what I'll be taking to city council. Okay.

And I did I looked it up and you're right. It's the same. I Yeah, I'm looking at both. I don't know why I I think I was looking at that second part. I love your eyes because it was already pointed out to me that I did have a typo. So, okay, we're good. Thank you. And you you can proceed with your All right. presentation. Um, so I had to true up this specific to building type table. All that is is a summary table of what building types are allowed in which zones.

I like to call it a one of those pitfall traps in the zoning code where if you change something over here, you got to change something 80 pages later. um because they're related and we put them 80 pages apart. All right. So, there are some changes to the definitions. Um we add new definitions of 1, two, three, and four unit residential development.

Um you know, it was working with current planning trying to figure out what was the best terminology and really we're trying to separate out that building type again from what the land use is. And the land use now is very clear about what it is. It's this many units. um as part of a development. It this is also that is also more in alignment with building code um talk. So now zoning code and building code are going to talk a little bit better to one another.

Um other definitions we would change the high occupancy housing again to versions based on what is adopted here. So if we do away with all of those then high occupancy housing becomes five units and above. If we keep some form of high occupancy housing, it we add a new definition and there's new standards. And then lastly, we changed that mixeduse definition to make it really clear that mixed use is residential and commercial.

It's not just there were times when um some staff members would get confused because of the way it was worded. It made it seem as if multiple commercial uses on the same site were mixed use, and that was never really the intention. Mixed use is really a mix of commercial and residential. So, a shopping center, for example, that has restaurants and retail, we wouldn't consider that to be mixed use. And here we go. Findings.

So, the current regional plan is sort of silent on that term, middle housing. It's a a new buzzword that's evolved since the adoption of our previous regional plan, but it doesn't mean that the current regional plan doesn't support this. It absolutely talks about having a variety and a diversity of housing types. Um, and that's exactly what middle housing is meant to do.

Um, the new regional plan, just I'm just going to start throwing these in here just so you know, there is a very specific policy. What I would tell you is is that there's far fewer policies in the regional plan overall. Like so when you look in comparison, don't be alarmed. There's only one policy that addresses middle housing. It does address it by name.

So it is supported um to be adopted, but or to in reference to the regional plan, but just know that overall there's a lot less policies in the new regional plan than there was in the old. Uh the proposed amendment should not be detrimental to the public health, safety or welfare. Uh this is about meeting the requirements of that recently adopted state legislation. Um however, we are implementing this on a city-wide basis rather than that limited basis as proposed by the legislation.

Uh also the amendment is internally consistent. Yes, that's what took so much time getting this one out of the hopper is how many different pieces of the code we had to look at to make sure that we were keeping with the consistency. So staff recommends the planning and zoning commission in accordance with the findings in the report make a recommendation to the city council for approval of zoning code text amendment PZ25 version number one.

Thank you for giving us this wonderful presentation and for all your work on this and going from page one to page 80. Oh, whatever. And [laughter] uh um that's sometimes hard to do. I mean, it's not sometimes it's hard to do. So, thank you for that and we appreciate your work on this. Um are there any questions or other concerns? Mary, even though I missed the last meeting, I did watch it the other day just so I could hear your discussion on this.

And when I walked away from it, I thought, "Oh, I I know which version I would want." But I want to clarify my understanding. Um, vers does version one take remove um any CUP process for HOH period. Version one removes the land use of high occupancy housing single family uh duplex and triplex and converts and makes it HOH only apply to developments of five units and above. So there is no HOH land use below. So there would be no conditional use permit.

There are no limitations on those land uses as is the in alignment with the high occupancy housing plan. So the high occupancy housing plan only applied to largecale developments. So it just are are you removing whatever might get triggered in the same vein as the way the like the largest state homes get triggered with with HOH. Are you removing that potential for a trigger in whatever configuration might come across your desk with in middle housing?

So, we're removing the land use entirely, which means when somebody comes in with a single family home that is six bedrooms and five bathrooms, it will not there it's just a single it's one unit. It's that that's just a a single family home and that's how we're going to permit it. I think I'm still confused on um potentially how much the guard rails of the HOH are being removed.

And I think because my hesitancy hesitancy with this is, you know, this being that this came from the legislature, we're required to put this in it. Yes, it makes sense because this is the kind of housing we do want to foster. Um, I I'm always on guard for, you know, removing too many guard rails and unintended consequences. And, you know, I just keep thinking back to, you know, when they put short-term rentals into the legislation and we've been fighting on everybody's behalf for 10 years now.

I don't want to, you know, I don't want to have us lose the ability to um catch something crazy that might start coming up out of this legislation like was there any ulterior motives by those that lobbyed for such legislation as a beyond the the good the goodness of creating more housing? So I I don't think that there was much thought to how this middle housing would impact this type of land use, this high occupancy housing. I know that Tucson was struggling in their code as well.

While they don't have high occupancy housing, they had some other things and really what they call them are mini dorms in Tucson. Um which I So in Flagstaff it's one of two things. It's either a very large party short-term rental house, right? or it is um a mini door. It's one of those two that generally most folks seem to take issue with in terms of large homes. Um I I live next to a I think it's I think it's like a sevenbedroom house. It's pretty it's pretty substantial, right?

But it's just it's just a family that lives there and it's not an issue. um you know the big issues with with STRs um is you know their parking issues and party issues and all those kinds of things. Um I think there's other ways that we can look at addressing that at addressing that and a same and same with that sort of mini dorm idea. So right now I I have a list of upcoming text amendments. One of those is group living. We will be looking at the definition of family.

that is probably the more appropriate route to go to look at in terms of the number of unrelated folks that we have living we allow in a in a structure while at the same time still making accommodation for group homes um that meet the needs of ADA or ADA qualified folks. So we can separate those two out. We've sort of bled the issue through our definition, but there's some work to be done. There are definitely risks where we go from here.

Um the point uh today about high occupancy housing is is I cannot keep high occupancy housing for duplex triplex and four and four units the way it is today. It has to mimic that single family. Um, and if you think it's still I if the commission still feels that it's viable to make the trigger be seven bedrooms and five bathrooms as high occupancy housing, I it's fine. That's why that's there to be presented into you. That's what we can do in terms of high occupancy housing.

As staff, I'm going with what the original intent of the high occupancy housing plan was, which was to simply remove it. Because had I removed it out of the code previously, had I removed the single family conditional use permit, we would be in this, we would be where we are with staff's recommendation. Um, I didn't want to do that without having this full conversation with you about now what middle housing would do. So, you can see what the options and what it looks like.

version two is kind of messy. It doesn't really It doesn't even meet the intent of what the original code was doing, but that original code went so far beyond what um the high occupancy housing plan intended to do. Um so, you know, we've never had anybody come forward with a conditional use permit on anything other than single family for high occupancy housing. So, it's hard to tell you what the unintended consequences would be.

And the number of Prop 207 waiverss we have are all predominantly in that range that would accommodate metal housing. So, there are a lot of folks out there that, by the way, already have 207 waivers. All right.

Are there any other I'm I'm trying to think of because I'd like to know again go over the differences the major differences not all the differences because there weren't I don't think there were minor differences between version one and two but you say version two is messy and when I really read through them I for some reason I like version two better. So version two simply is just about high occupancy housing.

It's that you would keep high occupancy housing four units and less and that's if any one and the only thing that triggers it is if any one unit is seven bedrooms and five bathrooms and that's why it's messy. I think the likelihood of you honestly seeing somebody come in with a forplex that has a 7 unit or or unit in it is is low is unlikely. I mean of the triplexes that I've seen that people were most concerned with, they were five bedrooms.

And again, last time when we discussed, I think I asked if there could be some kind of like you did with the um ADUs that there could be some type of a plan where you would have a you know mapping out of certain triplex duplexes how they might look like they could come and get a plan from you rather than having developed their own plan on duplexes, triplexes and forplexes.

I don't know if that's I think I asked that last time you said yeah you could do that but I don't know if that would be in the well we have there's another state bill right now that is forcing us to come up with house plans. What gets tricky at triplex and forplex is you're generally involving a design professional um which isn't always required on the single family. So there are some other building code issues that there the building code still looks at these differently.

The building code is not looking at them as a as if they are all single family. The legislature tried to write the bill this way. That way they wanted to put it's their attempt was to make the IRC apply the international residential code apply to up to a forplex. They however did not write it correctly. They wrote the commercial code like commercial code doesn't apply. Well, no, that's that's not the correct language.

So, my understanding is is that most of the building officials in Arizona have not moved that forward and are not because the the law has to say what it means, right? So, when you write the law, it's got to say what it means. Um, it doesn't say that the IRC shall apply to all of these. It was not all of these laws come out written really well.

So anyway, um the the long and sweet and short of it is that we you know there's a trick on the triplexes and forplexes that they apply to different building codes. Um and they generally require a design professional that's different than on a single family home. So we we can I can absolutely bring that to the building official. We are already mandated to have that done. So we will have it done for ADUs.

We are mandated to have a whole another round of it done by July of next year just for single family homes and there has to be multiple options for those as well. There's a lot to do in the pipeline. A lot of work to do. Is there are there any other questions or concerns? Yes, madam chair. Um, first I want to thank you. This is a yman's job doing this and um it's very complicated in having to pull all this together. I can appreciate that.

Um, as far as the two choices, I would support choice one that the staff is recommending because we were seeing all these um, conditional use permits on just large homes and it's an expense for housing. We're trying to reduce the cost of housing. it didn't seem like it did anything because they're just big houses. The short-term rental is a whole separate thing we can't even deal with. So, I would be in support of um the staff recommendation.

Um, the only other comment I had is the last meeting we talked about putting some type of disclosure in and I don't know if you talked to um that, you know, city attorney um other municipalities that I've worked in, they do have um had to put language in their codes to basically say the city has nothing to do with CCNRs. They don't enforce them. However, CCNRs can be more restrictive than what the ordinance says.

That way, they don't go to a lot of expense trying to say, gee, I'll add a forplex to my property where the CCNRs say one house per lot. And I've worked on tons of subdivisions and when you do the CCNRs, most of them historically only allow one house per lot. So even though the legislature went barreling down this path, I don't think now if no one opposes it, the city has nothing to do with it, but at least it gives people pause that gee, what are the CCNRs?

Most people don't even know what they are. Um, I mean, even some builders, and we've had that happen. They're like, well, wait a minute.

the code lets us zoning code lets me do this and my HOA is telling me I can't I would ask that whatever version you vote on make that a condition that I add that disclosure okay thank you that's it okay Mary so um let's say worst case scenario we go with one we remove that land use but this becomes a problematic you know people get real creative I don't I don't know what happens there's some unintended consequences that are down the line and we we you know city says we we really should revisit this and put a cup process on this.

Does that does that put the city even in more danger of Prop claims because now you would require a CUP? I mean are we better off to go with any extra protection and remove it later if it's proves to be useless? Well, I mean, I I it it's it's it's hard to say, right? I mean, sometimes we want to we want to reach out and regulate a lot of things and we want to try to resolve the problems in ways that we can for things that we can't, if that makes sense. Right?

I think some of the frustration, right, is when we see a party short-term rental house and it's, you know, it's eight bedrooms, eight bathrooms, and they're having big rowdy events or, you know, those kinds of things. and there's not a lot we can do. And I think that's some of the like more frustrating parts for staff, right?

Is especially when we have to tell a member of the public when they're living next to one of those like, "Sorry, there's just not a lot we can do." What I can tell you is is that there's a lot more attention being placed on short-term rentals. The league is working on it. Um I don't know where it will get to. I love where the league is pushing. Um which would give us back local authority.

and it's local authority without a lot of it has to be this or it can't be that and you know with a laundry list of things we tying our hands behind our back that we can't calibrate it to our own location. Um because I mean here's the thing is these legislation they've been good and sort of pushing the ledger and the mark in terms of zoning reform and getting us all to move in a direction and getting folks more comfortable with it and that's a good thing.

Um but losing that local calibration and that local control I know has been just completely frustrating for folks.

So um you know what I would say is let's solve the the problem that it is rather than the problem that it's not in anticipation that it become do you know what I'm saying is I I I always I I understand that there is always somebody out there who's going to go out and do something that is just a nightmare for everybody whether it be staff whether it be the public but if we constantly try to hold back our code and redesign design our code for the one bad instead of the 95% good, we aren't moving the mark either.

And so alls I would tell you is is that we can take the jump. We can, you know, when we added high occupancy housing, we faced Prop 207. Um, at that time we have over 200 HOH uh waiverss already. So, I mean, how but there still was not this storm of new projects that came in and I have I've only maybe seen one or two of those waiverss ever you utilized.

So, um I guess that's what I would tell you, right, is that is that there the potential that something's going to happen that you didn't really like and didn't really want. Sure. Sure, there is that potential, but that's not the majority of what's happening within the code. And so, how do we want to react and move forward? That's all. And I I appreciate that.

I I think from like what I see is there's so few tools that we have in this state because it does lean so heavily to property rights and such. Um that I I I'm always um hesitant to to let go of, you know, a guard rail. Um me, too. That's just that's how I feel about it. So, I've been doing this for um 27 years now. [laughter] And um you looked at your watch for that. Yeah, it's been a minute. Uh 27 years.

And definitely how I started and my thought process as a planner has completely changed and evolved. And I get it. I understand the guard rail. But I think that applying sometimes we put too many guard rails on and it bites us in the face. and that we do, you know, you if you lose out on the good for the perfect, I hate to, you know, say that's the case, but um you'll lose out on the good. Any other comments or questions from the commission? Commissioners, can I ask a question? Maybe.

Tiffany, can you clarify version one vers versus version two? What if I came in with a forplex, what would my parking requirements be under each version? So, under version one, if you came in with a forplex, your parking requirement would be four. If you came in under version two with a forplex and it was HOH and it was HOH, you'd provide more parking.

So more parking is required for that HO that's the only reason it's kept that I mean it the cup and the the parking that's what you get is additional parking. Is is that the same if you were going for a triplex or a duplex? There's if you are if you come in for a forplex and all of the units are less than seven bedrooms and five bathrooms, then you're going to provide four parking spaces.

If one of the units is over seven bedrooms and five bathrooms, you're going to provide a higher number of parking spaces and it's going to be on a per bedroom ratio. But again, that's highly unlikely in a forplex. So that basically the parking levels are the same in version one or version two because more than likely nobody's going to come in with a sevenbedroom forplex that that's going to be correct pretty hard to achieve on a on the lot that they would have. Correct. Okay.

Um thank you Alex for that question. Do you have any other questions Alex? Oh no. I just I think that in my experience part of why high occupancy housing was applied to smaller units was this fear of parking. I also think the city man can mandate these parking requirements, but I also think that developers can understand their market and if there is a demand for parking that they there's nothing there would be nothing stopping them from providing it.

So that if I decided to build the forplex that it might make sense for me to have more than four parking spaces, right? And then the also though, if we're not requiring more than four parking spaces unless they have seven bedrooms, then the cost might be less to the builder. So, and what what we're trying to achieve is maybe more affordable housing by having middle housing. And, you know, I've said this before that, you know, my first home in Flagstaff was a duplex.

Um, it was something I could afford. Um, and then I was able to move up to a single family home. But I don't think if I, you know, at the time, and this is back in the 70s, if I was buying a home then I, you know, I I there was no way I could have afforded a home otherwise. So that's what I'm hoping to see is that we have more affordable housing with the middle housing. So, I can understand why version one would be a preferred version. I I didn't see that at first.

Are there any other comments or questions from commissioners? If not, I will call for the general public. And Tyler Denim has um asked to speak. So, Tyler, if you can come up and give your name and address for the record. Hi, my name is Tyler Denham. I live at 538 South Fontaine Street. So, I'm speaking today as the executive director of Flagstaff for affordable housing, and I'm here to express support for the middle housing ordinance, specifically the citywide approach.

That approach better serves Flagstaff's housing goals, particularly to increase the variety of available housing. Adjust this real quick. Citywide also avoids some of the issues with displacement that would come with concentrating those property rights in uh central older neighborhoods. And areas like townside, southside, and north side are already brimming with middle housing, which is great.

Uh the real benefit is in incorporating middle housing into new developments and making sure that they better resemble existing neighborhoods. Also, I've been following the House Bill 2721 conversation as it plays out across different cities, and I can say with absolute certainty that the the ordinance under consideration tonight is the best in the state, and by a long shot, too.

So, every other Arizona city is pursuing a version of it that produces far less housing, concentrates it in vulnerable neighborhoods, and is more complicated to implement. I mention this because I believe the city staff and the members of the public, including yourselves, uh, that have weighed in on this to create this version of the ordinance deserve a lot of praise.

And if we get it over the finish line, I expect it will generate a lot of buzz at the state level and an acknowledgement of Flagstaff as a leader in the state, which I'm super excited about. Finally, while I'm so excited to see this ordinance go through, I want to mention I'm also looking forward to the results of the code analysis project because we'll need to update property development standards to really unlock middle housing. Uh, but that's all I got. Uh, thank you. Any questions?

Thank you. Anybody have any questions for Tyler? I don't know that we can answer them in 53 seconds, but [laughter] thank you very much. Christine, do you want to make a motion because you had something in there that Yeah. give you a minute or two if no other questions or did I know that it's just CCNR's disclosure and I know exactly what you mean and can rely on what you've already said. Okay. Thank you.

Madam Chair, I move that we approve PZ250027, middle housing zoning code text amendment um with the recommendation to the city council um for approval um including middle housing version number one in addition to adding a disclaimer regarding CCNRs. Is there a second to that motion? Second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any other discussion to that motion? Any questions? Discussion. Discussion. All in favor of the motion say I. I. I. All opposed. That motion carries. Thank you.

Um, and now we'll move on to miscellaneous items to and from commission members. Um, I just want to thank you all for doing this rescheduled meeting tonight instead of last week. So, thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. I want to thank the staff for all their hard work in both of these items and especially this one. So hopefully um yeah, hopefully this will be voted on by the city council and pass as well.

So if there's no other miscellaneous items other than their miscellaneous talking, um can you tell I'm a teacher? Yeah, this m Yeah, if there's no other miscellaneous from to and from commissioners, we are adjourned at 6:01 p.m. Thank you.