Fountainhills · 2024-01-18 · case details pending

everyone thank you for coming we're happy to have you all here please stand for the pledge and if you choose to please stay up for the invocation flag of the United States of America and to the repu for it stands one nation God indivisible liy and justice for all thanks so much um Kirk Kaiser from Fountain Hills let us pray most triumphant and loving God we come here tonight to discuss Town business we know that where two or three have gathered in your name you are there as We Gather may you be honored and glorified as the government is on your shoulders so we ask that we the people of the people and by the people assembled here tonight stretch forth your hand of favor and increase our faith because you remind us that all things are possible for for those that dare to believe for we still believe that the best is yet to come now receive all your honor your glory and your power forever in Jesus's name amen am thank you roll call please mayor dicki here vice mayor gzowski present council member Pell pres council member McMahon here council member calanis here council member to here council member skillcorn here anyone wishing to address the council regarding items listed on the agenda or under call to the public should fill out a request a comment card located in the back of the council chambers and hand it to the town clerk prior to consideration of that agenda item when your name is called please approach the podium speak into the microphone and state your name for the public record please limit your comments to 3 minutes it is the policy of the mayor and Council to not comment on items brought forth under call to the public however staff can be directed to report back to the council at a future date or to schedule items raised for a future Council agenda thank you Linda um I'm G make a little bit of an announcement first because tonight we have uh Stellar students here we have three proclamations with special guests and we have our poetry contest winners here and of course the rezoning item so these items and all of these folks have drawn a lot of interest and as you can see we have a packed house um and after we announce the contest winners and the Stellar students and do the proclamations though we're likely see some space opening up so you can probably find a seat so please hang tight with us and U we expect more room to become available I think we also live stream out in the uh Lobby so uh if you feel like you would like to go out there you can watch from there and also obviously from at home on Channel 11 and on YouTube so we're going to begin now with our usual reports from our town manager and Council great thanks mayor um thanks everybody for being here I'll be pretty quick since I know we have a a lot to get through um as you know we haven't had a council meeting since before the holiday season so I did want to give a little bit of recognition to our holiday program our annual light up the town um which is our driving holiday map of all of our decorated homes in the um Community we had over 30 homes participate um and I'm really impressed that we had over 18,000 views on the map so there was a lot of holiday uh cheer going on here so congratulations that's a great program um another uh highlight during that time was the onboarding of the Fountain Hills fire department they are 17 days strong as our official Town fire department so so we are very excited about that um that transition has gone very smooth um and has been a very exciting highlight um one of many for 20124 um a note uh one week from today is our annual expo at the community center um that is held from 3: to 5 it's free for all of our locals um and visitors it's a great way to find um your opportunity to get involved whether that is a club um whether that is a group whether that is a um Civic organization there's lots of different things 's more than 80 groups um that will be participating so if you're interested in being involved in the town in some way or form that's a great way to check out all the things going on and lastly we um as many of you know um our CFO director uh David Pac will be leaving us later this year he's going to be relocating um with his family out of state um and while we are very disappointed of that we um have been taking a proactive approach to bring um his replacement on board um and I'd like to introduce Paul Paul singer uh Paul is way back there somewhere in this crowd um today's Paul's second day with us um but you're going to be seeing Paul as we move through our budget process this year um he's going to be sort of uh director Puck's um right-hand man so to speak um as we move through the spring so um we'll look forward to what he can do with us and um bringing him on board so with that those are all my updates you thank you I have no report tonight mayor but I'm looking forward to all the festivities tonight hope everyone had a great Christmas and a happy New Year mayor the state legislator start a meeting again and that means our weekly call started with the Arizona League of cities and towns I did want to say thank you to the new Fountain Hills fire department for our t-shirts which were super cool although I am concerned you're going to ask me to be like back up back up back up to respond and I'm going to tell you I don't do other people's blood so I might not be the best person to show up just putting that out there in the universe now um also it's our favorite day of the month Hannah and mine it's Stellar student day we love today it is so much fun to have you guys here I will say usually I ask you guys to stay afterwards but I've seen the behavior of some of these adults on so social media the past couple of months and I'm going to suggest this might not be a good one for you to stay for maybe come back to another one where we're all a little better behaved but thanks for coming we appreciate you guys being here and congratulations to all of you thank you mayor just one quick announcement uh February is teen dating domestic violence month and we'll have some links that I'll share with our town staff and we'll be reading a proclamation next month uh to recognize that thank you mayor great good evening everybody since we have a packed house and a full agenda for the economy of time I'm just going to say Happy New Year and thank you for attending thank you Miss mayor hello everybody um thank you for coming wow this is really amazing um all the people on YouTube live streaming and Cox channel 11 Welcome to our meeting if you could be here you'd see it's packed house um just a couple things as part of my duties um I'm on the public safety military Affairs and courts committee um the Council on Foreign Relations just issued their 2023 year in review report which I read um quite a year um I have a feeling the 2024 is even going to be more Monumental so we'll wait and see um also I'm on the pedestrians and streets committee which we had a meeting with with the mayor Peggy Our Town engineer and other uh Select Staff um it's an honor to be on that committee when people report um anything from excessive speeding to any uh safety problems in our pedestrian walkways and our traffic areas um they notify the town and we personally look at every single issue and we discuss it we might uh put a speed truck out there whatever this was our agenda and as you can see a single space and it's packed and so we're looking out for the people's safety and their street safety um also um our Fountain Hills cares um I attended that as well with with the mayor and councilwoman McMan um we are going to have a meeting on March 21st 2024 at the community center the topic is going to be civility uh being civil in Fountain Hills um that's an important issue we have a gem of a town we have a beautiful place we have beautiful views beautiful hiking trails um you can always we just need to get along a little better so that'll be there I hope everybody can can attend it's going to be something that will be very meaningful um lastly and I'll try to keep it quick um we are going to have the Kite Festival this year it's going to be on March 19th at Fountain Park it's hosted by the Pakistani information and Cultural Association Pico um the Kite Festival is a seasonal event celebrating the end of winter and welcoming spring the Kite Festival is a major and most colorful event and so like I said that'll be upcoming it's it's a great event there has a lot of food kite flying and camaraderie and so um I hope everyone can attend thanks for being here that's all I have thank you madam mayor welcome Fountain Hills it looks like we have like 10% of the whole town here which is a fabulous uh and it was mentioned that our last meeting was before Christmas and stuff so I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and safe New Years uh and I did have an opportunity to experience the the Christmas lights and I did not only follow the map but there is some houses that weren't on the map which were fabulous um next year you guys got to get on the map you probably know who you are uh since then there's been a number of ribbon cuttings I've had an opportunity to attend a few I did uh hit the Wine Walk that was last week and it was amazing seeing a bunch of businesses that were just really um you know showing off it such a great thing um last week there was a greater Phoenix economic council meeting that I was able to uh take part in uh which was a great update of what's going on in the greater Phoenix area uh in the economic forecasts uh just this week I was able to meet with um the of the weblow uh Scouts the 848 pack and also the Boy Scouts the 440 pack uh and of course Monday was Martin Luther King uh day and I kind of want to just um you know very quickly everyone is very familiar with the I have a dream and that really the you know I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where we will not be judged by the color of our skin but by the content of their character everyone knows that part right but there's a a couple other things are in that speech it's very very quick here and I'm just going to so there is there's a quote in there every Valley shall be exalted Every Mountain and Hill shall be made low and every CR uh every crook crooked uh Creek uh shall be made straight and the rough places plain that's right out of uh Isaiah 44-5 right from Martin Luther's King's speech and then there's another one here um weeping may stay for the night but rejoicing comes in the morning and that is actually from Palm Psalm 35 uh and those are um just a couple parts of that I Have a Dream speech that I've had opportunity to read through the years over and over again and especially the students read that speech watch it on video there's such a great and there's more in it to it than that uh but don't just get sto by that one little spot uh take it all in uh and that concludes my report for tonight thank you councilman yes I had a special visit with Chief a and some Personnel on New Year's Day was their first day um our partner Scott stale fire uh lost a captain uh due to a job related cancer and um Captain Ule was uh married with four kids and um I was uh proud of my son Brian he was part of the arag guard and that was on uh TV yesterday I don't know if you had a chance to see it um but it's very moving um our condolences all because they obviously are our partners and condolences to you Chief um we are already practicing our mutual Aid with Scottdale the agreement will probably be on our next meeting uh but uh I had the chance to see some Fountain Hills fire and scottd fire trucks at one scene and so that was a a really good thing to see um attended chamber breakfast um we had a meeting with the Maricopa County Attorney's Office I was invited to attend a um update by Senator Mark Kelly uh I was uh also at the sheriff Penzone County Event where um a Board of Supervisors it was a like a farewell um they're going to be taking applications until Friday um at this point uh Chief Deputy Russ Russ Skinner is the interim sheriff for MCSO and that's our law enforcement um met with my East Valley mayor's quarterly meeting uh spoke at an HOA Gathering um there was a really neat ribbon cutting you were mentioning um that was at Safeway and the high school band was there uh gpeg that economic snapshot I think that's what you were talking about right um and the league legislative update and then last just want to invite you to the state of the town which will be on the the 31st of this month on Wednesday early 7:30 in the morning but we have breakfast and uh we'll probably start at 8 so you're all invited for that now we go right into our Stellar students which is the first item in this activity so the way we do this uh kids is um I read your name I read what your teachers or your principal said about you uh Angela over there we'll give you your certificate you gather up up here and then when you're all done we'll come down and get a picture so we start with the little Falcons and the little Falcons preschool our first one is L May jilliam is she here L May Gilliam come on up a go to that pretty lady right there she's going to give you a little certificate lah oh my gosh LTI is our newest edition and has had a fast and successful transition into the three-year-old room she's eager to come to school every day with the biggest smile on her face she thrives on our classroom routine and she's an excellent Falcon and demonstrates the Falcon way that's lah May yay lah our next little Falcon is Anderson de rapael is Anderson here all right come on up keep her company Anderson demonstrates all the characteristics of a great Falcon leader he is kind responsible respectful Anderson is a great addition to our classroom and has a huge heart Anderson gets very excited to come to Little Falcons preschool and sometimes he's even a little sad on the days they don't have school that's Anderson a okay we're going to move up to McDow mountain and Elliot baggot is Elliot here Elliot come on up Elliot is always a stellar student in the stem classroom in a regular classroom and the whole school for that matter she's just an incredibly hard worker and does her best all the time she's an amazing friend to others and is the first one to offer help whenever it's needed she's so bright and creative and I love to watch what she comes up with in the challenges that she Masters she's one of those students stud who just seems to enjoy learning and her teachers just love that thank you Elliot for being a stellar example of the Falcon Way your teachers cannot wait to watch and see how your future unfolds and the amazing things you will accomplish Elliott McDow Mountain we have Jacob langner is Jacob here oh come on up Jacob Jacob is a perfect example of a stellar student he's kind gentle nature and amazing positive attitude make him a delight in class not only does he always do his very best in his academic schoolwork but he's extremely polite and considerate of others oh wow Jacob is ready and willing to help anyone in need students and teachers alike he tackles any challenge he's given in stem class and always with a smile on his face I've watched Jacob grow immature since he was in kindergarten couldn't be proud of of this young man he's become thank you Jacob for demonstrating all the pillars of the Falcon Way Jacob okay we're moving up to the Middle School milela Holmes is Mila here come on up that is so pretty Mila is a sweet young lady who always does her best she's friendly and outgoing she's not afraid to ask questions and ask and give help she's a conscientious student a hard worker and always completes high quality work she's a pleasured have in class Mila Holmes next from the Middle School we have Jackson leilia is Jackson here all right come on up Jackson Jackson is an amazing young man he's a super student that goes above and beyond with his all of his work he's willing to participate in class and completes his work in a timely manner he's kind and a great example representing Fountain Hills Middle school by being responsible respectful and kind Jackson all right now we're in high school Maya Hinton is Maya here yeah come on up Maya academically she is a very gifted student she works hard to improve her skills and she turns in work of utmost quality she's also artistically talented and shares her artwork freely as she demonstrated by making vibrant Spirit signs for the girls basketball team she's a quiet leader who consistently adheres to the tenants of PBIS Maya Hinton and I think we have a brother here from the high school Maddox Lilia is Maddox [Applause] here very good Maddox has excellent attendance and he's very studious about his online courses I watch him take notes for his classes and he's shown these really thorough notes to me he's super polite and super friendly congratulations [Applause] Maddox youe all right look at the squeeze in thank you [Applause] right [Music] St thank you I [Music] want thank you everyone congratulations I don't think I see him do you I don't think I see him okay I I'm gonna our next item is a proclamation in support of Israel and condemning all acts of terrorism this item was brought to our attention by councilman Jerry fredell and he's going to take it from here thank you mayor is uh Rabbi Mendy in the audience no well I'll read the proclamation and we'll make sure we get it to him but it's a great honor for me to be able to do this to show show that the town is supporting Israel and our Jewish Community here in town so I'll start out with the Proclamation this is to support Israel and condemning acts of all terrorism whereas the town of Fountain Hills recognizes the deep and long-standing friendship between the United States and Israel built on shared values of democracy freedom and respect for human life and whereas the town of Fountain Hills condemns in the strongest possible terms all act of terrorism both foreign and domestic against innocent civilians and whereas we firmly believe that all nations have the right to live in peace and security within their borders free from the threat of violence and intimidation and whereas the town of Fountain Hills stands in solidarity with the people of Israel in their ongoing struggle against terrorism and their T tireless pursuit of peace now therefore mayor Jenny Dicky and the Town Council of the town of Fountain Hills do hereby Proclaim their unwavering support for the state of Israel and steadfast commitment to combating terrorism in all of its forms and urge citizens to remain Vigilant against extremism and intolerance and stand up for the values of Peace Justice human dignity that bind us all together and then this is uh signed by the by by the mayor so we'll make sure that this gets to the rabbi and his congregation thank you so much our next Proclamation is the designation of the week of January 15th as as Martin Luther King Jr week and this was uh about a year in the making right councilwoman and I'm going to hand it off to you okay U thank you Mr Mayor and I I just want to thank the the mayor and this Council and staff for just being so supportive of this effort that we've been working on for a year um I'd also like to extend a warm welcome to our invited guests here tonight um invited was the vice mayor of Chandler OD Harris who's sitting in the front row council member Christine Ellis who serves honorably on the Chandler city council and former councilman Scott September who was on the Gilbert city council thank you all for being here um the proclamation reads as such whereas Dr Martin Luther King Jr devoted his life advancing equality social jus Justice and opportunity for all and challenged Americans to participate in the NeverEnding work of building a more perfect union whereas Dr King's tireless leadership throughout nonviolent resistance including the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the March on Washington ignited a nationwide movement that forever changed the course of American History whereas Dr King's most powerful and enduring message was delivered on August 28th 1963 in his iconic I Have a Dream speech which he called for an America where individuals would be judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character whereas Dr King's Legacy continues to inspire civil rights activism and ongoing efforts to build a just Society with equal rights and equal opportunities for all Americans whereas the third Monday in January is designated as a national holiday in remembrance of Dr Martin Luther King Jr's birthday and whereas the town of Fountain Hills honors Dr King's courageous leadership in the civil rights movement and his vision of Hope and justice for the future now therefore mayor Jenny Dicky and this Council of Fountain Hills Arizona do hereby proclaim the week of January 5th 2024 as Martin Luther King Jr week in the town of Fountain Hills and call upon all residents to commemorate this week through community service and activities that promote Dr King's ideals of racial equality inclusion understanding and social justice proclaimed the 17th day of January signed by The Honorable Jenny Dicky and attested to by our clerk Linda menen [Applause] Hall and that's not all um we had the fortunate participation of the Fountain Hills Unified School District and again this Council and mayor to put together a poetry contrast to honor and commemorate the special occasion um the poems were written they were judged and we have the winners here in the front row and they are going to read their poems to us tonight thank you guys for [Applause] coming is [Applause] isero can we get a oh there we go read it right his dream lives on about how he wanted everyone you see to live together peacefully we're human you and me so let's be treated equally [Applause] next is going to be Vivian [Applause] thas in a Land of Injustice arose a man named Martin courageous and strong with a heart as warm as the sun standing up to the hate he created hope for others with a powerful voice and a heart filled with love Martin lit a flame in the darkness of Injustice he would stand for rightfulness and give Unity we shall remember remember his hope and power to care and love for those who [Applause] suffered okay hello hello yeah excellent okay lastly will be our the eldest of our contestants Charles split ORF um Charles Martin Martin Luther King Jr and what he means to me it was a quiet morning on April 4th 1968 decrepit and worn age classrooms filled with Lively students in a dark dull environment separated from others because of their color and for what reason does this call for hate are these not humans too whites separated from the blacks as if their humanity is not worth an ounce of their time why was it like this even in the darkness of the world something was going to change this had to change Martin Luther King a child of God who Moved many in love for one another for the future of men women and children through a confused culture Dr King LED people through Great Lengths to see what life could be like if we had unity and compassion he was a leader for a nation that was broken into two pieces hey Brenda Brenda you want the council people to come up for a photo too and you can present you want the council people to come up for a photo you can present come on up come back any time [Applause] thank you so much we have one other Proclamation was requested by not in our city the executive director is Kevin Campbell a Chandler councilman Mark Stewart and also former councilman Scott September from Gilbert who is still here so I'm going to go down and present this right now there we go okay all right thank you very much for coming really appreciate you um coming to Fountain Hills and as I said come back any time whereas human trafficking is a global plague that impacts millions of people every year including tens of thousands of Americans and whereas the United States ranks as one of the worst countries globally for human trafficking and Arizona ranks in the top 15 states with the highest rate of human trafficking per capita and whereas human trafficking impacts people across all demographics and ages including teenagers and children and whereas the battle against human trafficking includes supporting efforts in schools churches nonprofits law enforcement and businesses to prevent human human trafficking intervene disrupt and dismantle the syndicates and provide resources to and support for victims of human trafficking and whereas the town of Fountain Hills joins these groups Plus Federal and State coalitions and the nottin our city.org movement in our commitment to increase public awareness of the human trafficking epidemic that impacts our community our state our nation and the world so therefore I Jenny dicki mayor hereby do proclaim the month of January as anti-human trafficking month and urge all to work together to eliminate trafficking from our community and support the efforts of Frontline organizations and law enforcement in their battle against human trafficking and take a stand to say not in our city [Applause] um thank you mayor my name is Scott September as the mayor said earlier I'm a a recovering council member from Gilbert my service to Gilbert ended about a year ago but my service to the community has not I'm a part of um the not and our city organization and we are a Frontline organization that helps provide awareness for this issue because too many families and too many towns and cities aren't aware of what's happening and so that's one of the things that we do we have an annual night of hope this year it's going to be February 18th at the um Grand Canyon University basketball arena if you go to notar city.org you can learn more and you can participate you can join elected officials law enforcement Community leaders and churches um to be there and to take a stand and say not in our city and I want to thank the mayor and this Council for making this Proclamation when a City makes a proclamation they're saying something they're they're taking a stand and uh it's very powerful um and we appreciate you saying that it says something about who Fountain Hills is as a community and who who Fountain Hills is as a as a city in this Council and so we appreciate it thank you very [Applause] much minut you used to live in Gilbert so there you go so we actually the council member for your son in ch yes all right thank you so much thank you you all right thank you everyone so much um we next go to call to the public and I'm just going to remind because we have a lot of a lot going on tonight so um as we get started I wanted to remind everyone that call the public is for items that aren't on the agenda so if you're here to speak on the resoning please hold your comment until we get to that agenda item we'd expect we would appreciate that do we have any cards yes mayor we do we have three um comment cards and so um I will say in order what of when you need to come up okay so we'll have more on bat up to B so first we're going to start out with Barry walorski after Barry will be Larry Meyers and then Lori tler Barry W borski resident of Fountain Hills so this Council has members who strongly support business it has members who strongly support tourism it has members who uh strongly support getting more industry what I think is missing from this council is members who support the homeowners when homeowners complained about Justin weld's unsightly material dumps in town the council did nothing when homeowners adjacent to to the dark sky project complained about the construction impact the council did nothing when homeowners complained about the noise at Saro and and Gunsite the council did nothing after all the homeowners are responsible for the majority of revenues in Fountain Hills from their sales tax revenue and from their property taxes which go to the state and County and then come back to the town um homeowners are also the largest voting Block in Fountain Hills yet there is no one on the council who I can truly say represents the homeowners um but occasionally the homeowners have taken matters into their own hands as they did with Daybreak in 2019 using the referendum process to override the council that ignores them since there are no advocates for the homeowners then maybe they have to take the referendum process again about the rezone and the Target shopping center for high density apartment buildings by the way back East they call these types of buildings the projects and they're not well liked [Applause] don't bring me to the next thing I'm going to announce I was waiting till we get to the item but we will not have outbursts tonight um Larry mayor and Council while my comments May here may reference an agenda item they do not get to the heart of any agenda item issue quite some time ago a development agreement was struck a contract as it were for multiple phases of high density housing within the downtown known as Parkplace two buildings were constructed with hundreds of Apartments additional buildings with hundreds of Apartments were agreed to with one building containing commercial on the first floor which is mixed use to be constructed on the remaining uh land parcel down the Avenue and along Saro there are persons sitting on the Das as we speak that block the advancement of the second phase for over a year to the point that it ended up in court for whatever reason perceived bad dealing unscrupulous Behavior whatever I'm not privy to it unfortunately interest rates and financing became much more difficult during that time period and as a result the bare dirt with an ugly chain fence around what is is now graced the downtown to this day along with that when and if the second phase of the project comes to fruition those high costs will inevit inevitably be passed on to renters all this was done to a local developer while massive changes to our ordinance are being considered without getting all the questions answered by an out of the state developer further the out ofate developers currently in litigation in Superior uh court for I guess alleged bad dealing and unscrupulous behavior I'm having a hard time with how the town gives harsher treatment to our local developer and who answered all the questions then we give to the out of state developer who answers none of the questions also un fortunately all the things that were highlighted as benefits for the new agenda item that will come later Parkplace fits them all walkability less cars close to proximity to retail restaurant businesses and not to mention the vibrancy of the downtown so I don't know why stopped his other phases y'all might I don't so my question really is how many apartments is right for Fountain Hills that number has never been spoken and so with that I would like to um just ask the council to consider making the same Treatment available to all developers that they made to our local devel developer or maybe flip it and treat our local developer uh with a little more fairness and I thank you for your time good evening mayor council Linda Rachel Aaron Lori trer um in 15 days till the codification of when we get the um WF ordinance completed um the only way to legally protect this town um from telcoms coming in and giving us one application that will have over 2,000 um requests in it we're going to have to approve those there's going to be we'll have no choice after January 1st between the time we get that and the codification so if we don't get this now there's really no point in doing the ordinance we need to extend the moratorium uh regardless of how Aaron interprets the law moratoriums are very legal um and I would reference you to a house resolution number 3557 telcoms are trying to pass which exactly does that makes moratoriums illegal so they wouldn't be fighting and paying millions of dollars to do it if it was illegal already they are very illegal um so please extend the moratorium I would suggest till August 30th 2024 um otherwise load up the telcoms with the darts open your arms up and call yourself a dart board thanks thank you very much everyone um we go to our consent agenda now is is there a motion to approve motion approve second thank you uh roll call please council member to I council member fidell I council member skillcorn I council member calanis I council member McMahon I vice mayor gzowski I mayor dicki I thanks everyone m madame mayor uh I have a quick point of order okay and this is partially for Council and also for attorney the upcoming hearing is this legislative or is this quasi judicial you mean the upcoming hearing on the Target Center reone item on yeah on the spe site specific plan this is a legislative matter it's a legislative matter is anything we're doing tonight quasi judicial is anything we're doing tonight quasi judicial you mean from the upcoming hearings yeah I want to make sure the hearings are fair you know we want to you know be respectful that someone wants to invest in our town but we want to make sure it's fair for both the people and the uh and the developer well certainly and whether whether quasi judicial or legislative I mean I would anticipate the hearings would be fair certainly okay well but and part of my my curiosity is if people in you know in this Council have expart communications with them and either accuse themselves or have taken you know campaign contributions from them nether accuse themselves I'm just I'm just curious if you people on the record you know have they had expar Communications have they taken con you know contributions from the developer and I would think that if there's a conflict of interest i' we've given instruction to the council before and to members of the our boards and commissions that if there's a conflict of interest they know how to disclose it in the public records of the of the town and how to declare a conflict okay thank you we're on our our first regular agenda item which is the rezoning um I just wanted to say a few things before we get started um this so that everyone knows what we're expecting um because of the lik numbers obviously of people speaking we're going to be enforcing our rules strictly so everyone has a chance um everybody please speak through the chair and wait to be recognized once an agenda item starts the clerk will not accept any more cards these are all new rules that we have but sometimes we like to to be a little bit more flexible everyone has the chance to speak once on each agenda item for up to three minutes speakers may not Reserve time or transfer unused time to another um like I was just saying if you've come to our meetings a lot um I usually like to give a little extra time but with the number of speakers it's just not going to be possible tonight um feelings are strong of course on both sides of this issue we're going to hear everyone out and be respectful of it you know a lot of people have worked hard to prepare for tonight on in in all ways um and again um you know you applauded before I just wanted to remind you that we will not be doing that um I could um I don't want to have to Res or do anything like that so please uh refrain from disrupting any of the speakers uh the staff the applicants um any each other or the council so again whether you agree or disagree with an item we're going to follow the rules and we're going to be respectful um I appreciate it so um and process-wise a little bit what you were just mentioning I'm going to open the hearing we'll start with the presentations by development director Wesley followed by the economic development director Amanda makeups and then the applicants I will ask Council to please jot down your comments or questions during the presentations um so that they can get through there and then we will be able to ask them during our discussions and as you know sometimes you get your question answered if we uh if we wait for the whole presentation we'll then take public comment I'll close the hearing staff and applicants uh can respond the council uh can start discussion and they can ask questions of staff and the applicants um and a motion can be made at any time but does not preclude Council discussion or questions so that's um that's the process that's the way uh we we'll do this tonight and hopefully we'll be orderly and respectful and everybody will feel like they've been heard so we are going to start Rachel if you like to kick it off please absolutely um I'm going to ask director Wesley to step forward and begin his presentation oops good evening mayor and Council I do have a presentation this evening to guide you through some of the questions and the issues associated with this proposed rezoning so to start with just to make one thing clear because there's a little bit of confusion when we were at the planning zoning commission there are two separate requests each one is independent of of each other the Western request The Villages at Four Peaks p is a request to rezone that portion 6.7 Acres from its current uh C2 PUD I I IND ind1 to this Four Peaks uh uh pad Village at 4pak pad and then the Eastern portion separate request really just dealing with signage on that parcel uh rezones it to a Four Peaks Plaza pad so again two separate things but they are adjacent to each other I'll be covering the first item the evening the uh rezone for the uh Villages at Four Peaks little timeline associated with this we received the application for this request in March of last year uh the standard timeline for an application received on that date would have had it before you uh in August however the applicant took a lot of time working with staff to uh delve into the request and respond to some staff comments and concerns and continue to refine the request ordinance requires them to hold at least one uh citizen participation uh meeting they held two when they were ready then uh and staff was ready uh to move forward to the public review process notice was provided in November for the December pnz and the January uh Council hearings the request is for 316 unit R residential Community what that means is it'll have an embedded parking structure with the uh apartment units wrapped around uh uh that parking structure rather than having a lot of surface level parking four stories one two and three bedrooms 561 parking spaces it'll have two interior Courtyards with perimeter Landscaping then a pedestrian Mall connectivity area associated with the Four Peaks Plaza General plan for this area designation the character area is the Shay Corridor designation we'll talk more about that in a little bit again site showing the the location for this specific request there along technology and sha Boulevard at that Southeast corner so west of the Target Center that strip area and a couple of out Parcels here's a representation of the proposed site plan for the uh for the building and you see the parking structure wrapped by the building main entry uh here facing shap main entry into the parking structure off of techn ology see the interior uh Courtyard areas and then this pedestrian uh area along here that helps provide connectivity from the different exits so that again it has a pedestrian walk and then can also connect over to the Target Plaza some views uh of the facility this one looking from Sha Boulevard towards the M entry you can see the architectural design and shows materials there in the Box Bo that will be used here's a A View From technology to the entry into the parking structure and then one from uh the adjacent uh shopping plaza to that pedestrian connection so I've heard a lot of discussion questions about p and what does that mean so I wanted to cover that for a few moments before we go into the request itself so pad or planned area development is a base zoning District just like r110 is a base zoning District or C2 or IND D1 or any of our other zoning districts we have it is a district in and of itself this is different than our uh we used to have years ago when this property was previously zoned to its current designation we had a ped or planned unit development overlay district with that you use an existing zoning District in this case a C2 and then you use the Pud as an overlay to allow modifications to the standards in that underlying District that was done away with several years ago and so now we have the pad and so part of this uh is bringing the zoning into our current uh definitions and current uh districts available within our zoning ordinance so this request will create basically a unique zoning District that'll be called The Villages at Four Peaks pad and that's what you'll see on our zoning Maps If This Were to get approved instead of a again a C2 or whatever that will be the the designation up for the zoning The Village at Four Peaks p it'll have its own standards as they get adopted through the council again if that is what the council does to help this process the pad typically does reference standards in another zoning District that's similar to what they want to do so they can say it's like this but with these modifications or differences so what are the the development standards being requested for this pad uses to be allowed are residential and the commercial use is similar to the C2 Zone District then lot area 6,000 ft uh residential being allowed at one unit per 1,230 gross square feet minimum lot width maximum Building height of 55 uh building length uh 200 ft setbacks uh and then the parking uh as they calculated it so as staff looked at this and worked on this with the applicant we saw three things in terms of their uh proposed requested development standards that we thought deserved review and evaluation consideration uh by the pnz Now by Council I want to go through each of these u a little bit more information about each one of them so with regard to the uh area per unit and the density again they're requesting one unit per 1,230 square ft so that equates to about 47 uh dwell units breaker the closest we have to that currently in our zoning ordinance is the R5 which is 1740 Square ft per uh a unit for approximately 25 uh units per acre Parkplace is is at a similar density to what's being proposed here at 46 units per acre when we look at the Town our existing development pattern and uses we see that we have about 81 Acres or 6/10 of percent of the town area developed with multif family non- condo and most of those are at four units or less we see that we have about 15% of our dwellings are renter occupied this compares to 30 plus% when we look at Maricopa County Arizona or across the country a whole so we're really very low in terms of a percentage of our uh population that are renters and when we look at the history of the town I'll go into this in just more than a minute multif family zoning has been significantly reduced from the original plans for Fountain Hills General plan has uh several uh goals and policies that address some of the things uh with regard to this request I've included a couple here uh probably the main one that we support a housing strategy that encourages a broad range of quality housing types to address needs currently and into the future so I mentioned a minute ago Fountain Hills in our history has evolved quite a bit uh with its zoning we're always uh adjusting things to respond to Market changes population changes trying to get that best balance of uh zones that provide for the uses in the community originally planned for around 70,000 population a lot of commercial zoning was put in place up front uh the population has been significant reduced through resoning and actual development a couple of examples here we see in kind of the yellow on the upper left area in 79 was uh zoned R3 as a medium density residential area it was changed to r110 and developed with kind of a medium lot single family development the lower right one in the green uh was originally planned an R4 um high density area uh was re it was actually reson to an r10 r110 single family uh development much lower density also we have areas that maybe retained their similar zoning in this case uh generally r5s but not developed with really the density that goes with an R1 or an R5 or an R4 density so because of that uh we didn't really get the population density that was originally expected in the town to go with the amount of commercial development so again we we strive constantly uh to adjust zoning as different requests come up to get that optimal mix of land uses that will work together provide for a vibrant Town areas with significant multif family have been reduced through different resoning actions over the years those were just a couple of several examples that could be provided this particular area long sha is so probably about the only area in town uh where development of this scale and density could occur to help offset uh some of the reductions of the density that have occurred elsewhere it's an area that's separated from other lower density residential uses uh and is along the primary arterial Street Network which is good for this type of density with regard to height the uh main parit line for the proposed development is 49 ft maximum height will be 55 ft uh with some of the uh popups for the parit to provide some articulation to the massing of the building uh in comparison Parkplace was approved a maximum height of 54 ft uh believe the current buildings top out at about 50 ft at the top of their parapets coer wind pad known as ad darl Scottdale is approved at 75 ft of height for phase one and 60 and and 50 for the the upcoming phases and this particular uh location because of the topography the actual building site compared to shap Boulevard is lower and so that Building height will not seem quite as significant as it might in other cases here's an example of the visual impact from uh across the street and so in the upper right you're looking out from from this property towards uh the shopping center where the development will be built and so here it's been put in and so you can see it but uh it doesn't really significantly impact uh that view shed uh from across the way the other item was again the parking they're requesting 561 spaces uh Parkplace was approved with a 20% uh parking reduction uh the pillar uh pad was approved with 18% reduction of parking on site but then also allowed to include the parking on Westby that they added into that mix so when you combine those it uh a 10% reduction parking this uh request is asking for 11.9% uh reduction from what the standard parking would be we did some uh research of a variety of uh areas looking for data about renters and and cars and how much parking they need and uh found these various examples uh particularly in Fountain Hills 55% of renters have one vehicle uh when we apply those types of numbers at uh one vehicle uh basically per unit uh for half of the units and then two for the remainder you'd estimate you need about 480 parking spaces if you use one parking space per bedroom you need around 498 spaces uh to meet the uh needs of the residents again they're requesting 561 spaces so that leaves approximately 60 to 80 spaces for guest so is that sufficient number of guest parking for this development uh that's uh one space for about every four units five units something along that line uh excess parking uh if it were to occur would likely occur over on the Target parking lot uh technology is signed for no parking obviously not going to park along shave so that would be the logical place for any overflow parking actually happen so approval of a pad the ordinance uh sets forth some criteria for the council to consider and use as a guide for consideration of a pad and it says that U council is to base this decision on is a plan consistent with the general plan any applicable um specific plan as it meet the stated purposes within the pad District so there are many different uh items from the general plan I used a couple earlier in the presentation the uh vision statement in the plan uh has a couple of items uh felt applied to consideration of this request in terms of helping with the economy and providing um uh residents who can help uh stabilize and invigorate the economy and also the having the variety of housing options available and the neighborhood goal uh with again with regard to supporting a broad range of housing types and the economy goal to attract families uh particularly working uh professionals with regard to a specific plan we don't have a specific plan uh for this area but we do have the uh description in the general plan for the Sha Corridor character area and it recognizes there the need to redevelop some of our overbuilt commercial areas and provide some stability likely through uh a greater mix of uses and and multi residents that may require greater height as far as meeting the purpose of uh the pad the stated purposes of the pad are to redevelop the property with quality residential land use to provide a residential land use that can help provide activity in the center and help reinvigorate the remaining Plaza and also provide housing opportunities for young professionals empty nesters and lo those that want a lock and leap type lifestyle planning zoning commission as you know reviewed this at their meeting last month there was a motion made to approve uh the request but that did not receive support from the council or from the commission excuse me staff does support the recommendation for approval I feel it's consistent with the general plan it will continue to find a balance of uses and densities for a thriving community it's consistent with the car area plan meets the pad District purpose provide unique uh development re Redevelopment opportunity for uh the plaza and the corridor visual impacts are minimized provides high quality building design materials and exceeds base standards there are some stipulations that the council does vote to approve this uh that would need to be included uh with that approval uh these are listed here in our in your staff report so that is the end of my presentation so I believe you want to go right on to uh okay there we go good evening Madame mayor members of council members of the audience happy New Year I first want to get started um so most of you know um but I haven't met all 24,000 of our residents but I've been in local government for over 20 years um it is not typical or best practice with the resoning case to hear from Economic Development um however on Thursday December 7th so the Thursday before the Planning and Zoning commission which was on December 11th um the chair um of the commission asked me to speak and so to keep um with consistency um that is why I am presenting and then of course these do have economic impacts I'll have several slides um that are data and then we'll go into the recently ad adopted Community Economic Development strategy so everyone should be familiar uh with this our demographics again won't go through all of it but looking at the median household of 87,000 the median sale is over 660,000 I am not a mathematician but those numbers don't add up and as we've talked with Council during the summit uh last year I had the opportunity through the greater Phoenix Economic Council that's the regional um Economic Development organization so gek the Edo I had the opportunity to meet um with site selectors um throughout the United States and one of them came to me and he said I know that you know this you've been doing it a long time but once you fix that come to us because this is an issue our major employers again you are familiar with are mostly Serv service based the annual salary of a service-based employee is over $40,000 our Apartment occupancy so we've added a little bit more data than what you typically see during my quarterly reports but showing the number of units the occupancy rate and so since I started almost two years ago the occupancy rate has remained over 90% and it's continued to be a challenge our supply demand issue I shared with you too personally as um I was going through the interview process and then looking to um get a home here in Fountain Hills I only had a couple um of options luckily the Stars aligned um and I am a Fountain Hills resident um mayor Dicky was on a call last week at sounds like council member skorn was on a call yes uh last week with gek and and so as we look at to the economics the inflation what we're seeing with mortgage rates that is driving people to rent versus buy because it's just not affordable we received some comments um from the community about when you bring more Apartments you are just bringing retirees and winter visitors St staff reached out uh some to some Property Owners um Apartments don't always uh feel willing to share data um I am very grateful uh to the current owner of Parkplace um who shared this again will not go line by line um but if you look at the demographics and then where it says retired it's 15.2% and so that is a a false statement I have also shared to being a renter uh when I first came here people were quite a bit uh older were retired but what has been lovely to see is the change in demographics and when it comes to ethnicity and age there are single people there are young couples there are families with young kiddos some of them not quite school age and so it's been uh refreshing to see our apartment pipeline so there's been um inquiries in regards to council has approved um some multif family apartments and so what does that look like so you have the apartment names the number of units are 324 and again pipeline kind of depends on what you're we're talking about so when it says the status we've got two waiting for submitt so what that means is when staff and this is under the development services department and the pery division they will come in with a formal submitt it will go through an internal review with development services engineering fire Etc and if there's comments it gets kicked back and so as you can see staff right now is waiting for submitt and with these two properties it's been over a 100 days so not close to breaking ground anytime soon if you see the Five Below it says waiting to issue so what that means is we could be waiting for something from the Sanitary District we could be waiting to collect permit fees so we're in a status of of waiting you can see one is over 306 days that is almost 365 which is a year there's one below that that says na what that means is um that applicant chose to use a third party so unfortunately staff can't uh track that data in our system below that you will see three properties where no application has been submitted so we have not received a formal application I will say that there is one property that reached out in December and are just fine-tuning things but again until we get a formal application we cannot divulge that and again the na is because we don't have any data it's not being tracked through the system so again there's 300 24 I also want to point out that thank goodness we live in the United States of America and we have choice and so why we show this pipeline it's not Apples to Apples to the resoning that will be before you and when Mr Morris gets up um so again when you see eight or five it's going to be a little different than what I live it's going to be different than what Parkplace is offering as well as what the applicant is proposing got a little music going on all right all right so now we're going to go into our community Economic Development strategy that is SS and we're going to highlight our business attraction so Council unanimously adopted um the community Economic Development strategy in September I want to point out that it says collaborate with the property owner of for Peaks Plaza located in the sheay corridor to redevelop the commercial center to a mixed juuse property so on my sixth day um as the economic development director I had the opportunity to meet with sandor I bring that up because in March it'll be two years and so change doesn't happen overnight this was not a rush process um when I met with sandor um I asked them what are your plans um they shared they were opened they asked me if if I had ideas and I said hold up boys I've only been on the job for six days um give me the opportunity to connect with our community members and look at the data and so over several months I had the opportunity to meet with hundreds again not our 24,000 and this particular shopping center was brought up I was told Amanda they wanted to bring forth a a multifam um property what can you do to bring that so looking at the data and talking to our constituents our residents our business owners and it's wonderful that most of our business owners are actually Fountain Hills residents but also with my experience in talking with Council and talking with our constituents um some of you all checked me out um and know where I came from with my almost 20 years so 19 years I had the great pleasure of working with bioscience companies aerospace companies hospitals and then I don't know if you guys have heard of Arizona State University or University of Arizona but things that they asked of me in that other municipality was we need diverse housing and we need multif family these young professionals that we're bringing up we need to give them options in order to have that Talent attraction and so months later I did follow up with sandor and said um that I was in support of this project it still took several months for them to do due diligence um one of the sandor Reps was invited last January to our Economic Development Summit and had the opportunity to hear from Business Leaders Commissioners residents and one of the them that came up and you all know I was walking around to make sure I was available to make sure to get deeper conversations was housing and diverse housing before I move off of this bullet point there has been question about mixed use property so some of us are used to mixed use being vertical and that it just has to be apartments on top and then some commercial on the bottom that is not true um and again as us professionals um we're used to some of these I'm not sure how many of you too are native to Arizona I am um and so we'll look at horizontal as well or mixed uses a variety and so this is a mixed use property second exploring opportunities um to revitalize and redevelop I ask you to imagine that if this project goes forward that you start to breathe life into the commercial that we start to reimagine the Target uh Center and being vibrant I ask you to look at I've heard that Walgreens has been closed for many many many years sometimes it's on the market off the market that does that motivate them to reopen or to attract somebody else I've shared with you it was in the staff report I brought it up in the Planning and Zoning commission a week prior to the Planning and Zoning commission a local developer reached out to staff and said Amanda John we've been sitting on property for 20 years vacant land commercially zoned we heard Council approved Apartments 316 people that's demand we said time out we still have to go through Planning and Zoning we have to go through Council and they said if you move forward with that we will keep our commercial zoning and we will move forward we've got ideas for retail for restaurants and so let's re imagine let's motivate people diverse housing opportunities um there's been questions about diverse so diverse means variety can look it up in the dictionary and then housing what we mean by that is again single family could be Town Homes condos giving people choices and so that's what that means we work specific with multif family and Workforce housing some people have questioned Workforce housing um our folks again want housing opportunities for the workforce that's what we mean that's the intent by this um there are opportunities where some municipalities um provide some type of tax incentive or tax rebate that is not this project we have two more slides thanks for hanging in and so something else one of our Focus areas is business retention and expansion I have told the council it is not um traditional to invite council members into our site visits with the chamber and myself just because of council manager form of government but I have invited you to hear from our businesses what they need and several of you have heard they need housing they need Apartments they want to be heard some of our Trends last year was communication check we took care of that that was our fall and spring guide um sign code check um temporary signs Council passed that and so we're needing a little help is this Workforce available and a variety of housing options so also received comments Apartments bring no value value can mean a belief value can be monetary um as professional experts we look at the monetary and that is a false statement so if you look at the first three lines those are our one-time revenues our state shared revenues um annual is over 169,000 so again that is false there is value and value in the sense that again population brings demand this is my last slide so I'll ask Mr Morris to start getting up but again mayor and Council um Economic Development does support this we have talked privately openly in front of everybody um you have asked where you can help and so I ask respectfully that you pass this item put us in the right position to change our major employers um we're excited to have those business but again if we want to start attracting more assembly and bioscience companies we need to fix the diverse housing options otherwise you again make it difficult we talk about open for business putting handcuffs take the handcuffs off of Fountain Hills and please off of your economic development director and Aaron I'm going to open the hearing now when we hear from the applicant and then Madame mayor we are inviting Mr Morris who is the representative um for the applicant hi mayor council members Jason Morris withy Morris on behalf of the applic thank you uh it's a pleasure to be here this evening obviously there's great interest in this application and we have a lot of material but I would say that your staff both in Economic Development and planning have laid a tremendous groundwork and really talked about the recommendations for approval on this site uh and I also want to say as a precursor the applicant appreciates the opportunity to be heard and they also appreciate the opportunity for the entire town to weigh in on this and they've been following the comments that have been made uh both at Planning Commission but more importantly the comments that have been made through your website I'm sure the comments were he we will hear this evening uh but also having this dialogue has only reaffirmed the applicant's desire to reinvest in the town uh they are one of your largest land owners within the town and at times some of the dialogue hasn't really encouraged them to be a landowner within the town but listening to the support listening to the dialogue and listening to the encouragement has really led us to this presentation this evening so thank you as you're aware from the the overview uh The Village at at Four Peaks is really a a focal point from an arterial roadway and one of the things from a land use perspective and knowing that land use has been my sole profession over these last now 30 years looking for a location for multif family that can do the benefit to the surrounding retail while not being a detriment to any of the surrounding land uses is an anomaly it is very difficult having done precisely this type of zoning and we'll talk about what that looks like in some of the other jurisdictions having done this before finding a site that's so ideal so beneficial is rare but as we'll see from later slides seeing a site that also includes support from the documents of the Town your general plan your Economic Development town is also almost unheard of the site itself has challenges uh it's not a secret that it is largely vacant um we're talking about 65,000 square feet of unoccupied space that is a major amount of the overall unoccupied retail space within the town itself it's a significant number when you look at the use restrictions that are a part of this and I'm sure you understand Target owns their parcel so while sandor owns the shopping center they do not include the target parcel that is owned by the Target Corporation before Target will locate to a site they must come to an agreement with the underlying landowners as to what the restrictions on that site will be because they don't want to compete for use they don't want to compete for circulation so they deed restrict the property we'll we'll talk about what some of those deed restrictions are but they limit the uses the landowner can bring into the balance of the shopping center and that is important when we also look at when this Shopping Center was developed now going on 25 years ago and what happened to our shopping patterns all of us recognize any of us who have gone to our front door and picked up an Amazon package recognize that our shopping patterns have changed we need fewer retail square feet to support our shopping needs and at the same time the buildings that will exist because of services and other uses are shrinking they're not growing in size so that leads to vacancy and it leads to opportunity in this instance also the demographics of Fountain Hills itself we've heard from your staff as to what's happened both the expectation for the population in Fountain Hills but also the recent changes and the land use changes that have limited the opportunity for additional population so all of those things challenge a major shopping center owner so what does that mean for this site and we've talked about this before Target is a great indicator they are an incredibly successful retailer they know how to do business they know how to operate they know how to advertise they know how to choose locations and they know how to be successful so what does it say when we look at this site and recognize that out of every Target within the State of Arizona this is the single worst performing Target I think that says something not only about the needs of the shopping center but also about the visibility the signage and the times what we are facing as a land owner within Fountain Hills but also what's happening to the shopping center itself and what the opportunities are but we can also see some of the other tenants are equally impaired and some of that is because of that visibility but a lot of it is success breeds success and when a shopping center starts to empty out it is a tremendous challenge you're catching a Boulder Running downhill and this is an opportunity for the landowner to reinvest to make it successful I hope I'm not done uh with that we talked about we referenced some of the use restrictions uh retail office and I mention this because in reading some of the comments from the public and in hearing some of the comments from the public at the last hearing I think there's a misperception of what can be done on this property today so irregardless of the existing zoning retail office and other business office can only be a maximum of 10 10% of the total floor area of any other building in this particular shopping center because of the restrictions on it Warehouse operation assembly manufacturing are prohibited so when we talk about hey we ought to dream big and just change everything that's not possible due to the deed restrictions on this property training or other educational facilities I know I've heard those mentioned again restricted prohibited Health Spas gyms uh you we're allowed one grosser restrictions so many of the things that appear to be Solutions aren't even Solutions because of the deed restrictions on this property which cannot be changed without Target's consent we look at the the visibility challenges uh frankly the grade differential the irony of this gr differential is that it works perfectly for multif family if you're going up on a site the idea of being depressed of being in a bowl of being below the grade of the roadway is ideal but being a retailer and not having that visibility plus having a 75 foot wide drainage easement that's well landscaped that kills visibility which kills parking which kills ultimately the ability to shop and the desire to shop I referen this as well the general plan and I'm going to show you some shopping centers that have been saved through exactly what we're proposing here this evening but in none of those cases did I have the benefit of a general plan for that jurisdiction that calls for precise prely what the applicant is proposing literally this town has laid out a road map for this area through your general plan and it's not just the general plan that you've taken an oath to uphold it's also a general plan that just less than a handful of years ago your own residents voted on and supported so this is a general plan that has been adopted for this area that specifically calls for the mixture of uses that we're proposing that is bolstered even further by what we heard Miss Jacobs talk about which is your Economic Development study which is fresh these are not documents that were adopted years ago and have been sitting on a shelf this is from September and it talks about this site in particular and the uses that are proposed specifically so where have we done this is this is this a shot in the dark or has this been successful before it's been done in jurisdictions in the valley successfully time and time again these are just examples that my office has been fortunate enough to represent where new life has been breathed into sites that are over retailed because the square footage is over Brad for the use in that area which we have seen here you know whether it's Scottdale Mesa Phoenix or Chandler uh all of them have the same pattern which is large retail cented that have lost either minor tenants or major tenants or a combination of both shopping needs which have regressed and users going out of business because they don't have enough people on site or nearby spending money at the shopping center so I wanted to point out a a Target Center and this is an interesting case study because uh it a it's not that old B it's almost identical to what we're proposing here C it involves a a Target anchored Center that other stores had gone out of business Target stayed in there but some of the smaller users and and what they call the mini Majors had left and Goodyear was looking for a proposal to save the shopping center they accepted this proposal the land owner worked with them they've put residents in there and true to form stores have come back retail has come back into this Center numbers are up so sales tax sales taxes are up none of this was done with public money it was all private money as is the case here but the difference between Fountain Hills and Goodyear is that Goodyear did this while still being one of the fastest growing jurisdictions not only in the valley but in the country in terms of overall growth and that's something that Fountain Hills has is not enjoyed so if we look at this as a solution for Good Year it makes perfect sense as we look at it for this site within Fountain Hills so the request itself takes approximately a third of the overall property not the entire property and I want to reiterate that because I know there were some concerns that this was cart blanch a blank check to put apartments on the entire site that is not the case the application before you and what we're asking your approval of is just a third of the site uh adjacent to technology that is important because our surrounding Property Owners or our surrounding uses are an arterial roadway on one side a collector on the other and the shopping center and Industrial the conceptual site plan U that we've already heard discussed but I'd like to go into a little bit more detail involves 316 units but it involves those 316 units in what's known as a r app format that is to say parking is enclosed it's a structured solution it is a a higher end solution it's certainly more expensive because you're building a parking structure that suits the needs of the residents in essence the residents can drive to their level in the building and oftentimes walk directly to their unit despite being on the second third or fourth floor it's also important because often times when you create new multif family you're often creating parking lots large expanses of asphalt uh that aren't particularly pretty can also add to the heat island effect they need to be lighted this is an enclosed parking solution it adds to the the Ambiance of the overall development but it's a better solution and it's a more modern solution so what we've done here is we've wrapped the parking structure with the units themselves we have Courtyards uh full full of am entities we have open space both internal and external as well as pedestrian connections to the shopping center itself in terms of design uh we've been inspired I don't want to say stolen or or borrowed we've been inspired by some of the best not only best performing but be well-received uh apartment communities in the valley uh as you can see from this the design is is heavily inspired by the Waterfront uh the design is Desert Hues but it's very simplistic and the idea is to take the design cues that we're proposing here and incorporate them in the rest of the shopping center if we are successful with this application this evening this angle shows not only the building but the landscaping and more importantly The Pedestrian connection to the balance of the shopping center this is indeed a mixed use application it's a horizontal mixed use application it is not a vertical mixed use application meaning we take advantage of being on the same property of having access both vehicular and pedestrian but also knowing that it is meant to support the businesses The Fountain Hills businesses that will be in the shopping center and alleviate that 50% occupancy or vacancy the amenities themselves include a Pool Spa area Cabanas uh fitness center co-working space uh we have Wi-Fi throughout it's a pet friendly Community it is essentially state-of-the-art but it is done in a manner that supports all types of residents and I think that's important because as we hear from the residents of Fountain Hills it's not just about a solution for somebody who's working nearby it's not just a solution for retirees it's not a snowbird solution it is 316 units of one two and three-bedroom units of varying sizes that suit all Lifestyles and that's important although we've seen from your vacancy rates or occupancy rates within the town there is such a pent up demand that it's more important that the housing be built for no other reason is to offer new residents and existing residents opportunities that just do not exist today I want to talk a little bit about what we typically see with multif family and the development of multifam on any site and that is one of the first things that comes up is what does this do to either views or privacy as I mentioned earlier we're talking about an eight foot differential from Shea Boulevard which is significant because that takes a good portion of the first floor and puts us below the roadway I know much has been made of the total height that's being requested and we can show what that looks like uh not only graphically but we'll show how it it compares to the balance of the shopping center but it's important to understand that 8 feet of that height is actually below grade often times we hear from residents uh fortunately in this instance we 580 ft from the nearest resident which again makes us an ideal site but the concern is either that privacy is impaired because somebody is looking in to homes or backyards or that viewshed is compromised and that views that were otherwise available or somehow blocked by this community both of those prove untrue in this instance because of the distance the roadway and the topography uh this was actually taken from a resident uh a resident driveway up against the home to get a sense at the request of the resident to get a sense of what that differential is and what that does to the view shed you can see from this none of the viewshed is lost and really what you're looking at is the remainder of the shopping center as well as the buildings that are being proposed as you go higher uh and further away from this and other residents we were also uh requested to take viewshed shop from those areas few things that are important to look at here first of all the the shopping center itself is much more perceptible than the the residential buildings secondly none of the HVAC or roof mounted equipment is visible it's all uh screened behind a parit which is actually part of the height request but more importantly there's no privacy concern and no uh loss of the horizon so how does this compare to the buildings that are on site well the target building we know at its peak is 42 ft we also recognize that our roof line is 51 fet so that is essentially the request we are asking for it is it is a 9 foot variance between those two points the peak of the Target and our roof line we did ask for additional height but only for the parit meaning the areas that screen any materials to make sure that no matter how high you are in Fountain Hills you're not looking at any mechanical equipment the other item that's often mentioned when it comes to multif family and you know this because you've heard multif family cases that revolve around traffic traffic is not a concern in this instance because the existing traffic from a C2 shopping center such as this actually exceeds what will be the traffic ultimately at buildout it's one of my favorite songs uh so at buildout we are looking at 680 less trips per day with the proposal in front of you than what could occur at full occupancy on the shopping center that means that the level of services do not change on your roadway even at full occupancy much has been made Parkplace so I just wanted to give some quick comparisons uh so that we understand how this does compare and how this Stacks up we are fewer units overall uh the density is approximately the same uh the parking is actually better equipped on this site uh the parking that is proposed is at 12% variance from your code rather than the 20% variance uh the park place is as asked for and in terms of Building height there similar Heights but as I mentioned earlier earlier this building at Four Peaks is below grade uh for the first8 Ft economic benefits and I I don't want to reiterate everything that miss Jacobs covered but obviously without asking for a single Dollar in terms of any type of uh community help the private property owner here is bringing Revenue to the town and and I I think it's more important than looking at these numbers and the one-time revenues of over a couple of million dollars and the annual spending of the population or even the state shared revenues all of those pale into comp in comparison to what happens with the rest of the shopping center there is a fork in the road here economically and one fork leads to the status quo and that hasn't been a winner for this property owner and it hasn't been a winner for the town and it results in a precarious situation for the one tenant that is generating revenue for the town the other branch of that decision is a reinvestment of tens of millions of dollars by the private sector to benefit not only the shopping center and bring new tenants in there which is really the end game here to bring new restaurants to bring new services but also ultimately to benefit the town one of the questions that came up and I I've looked at this online was you know whether Target even wants this well anyone who's ever worked with a large corporate entity for years and understands what it takes to get their name on the dotted line in support of a new proposal will appreciate what we were able to achieve in December uh which is their signature on the dotted line in support of this so I've discussed most of these I know there'll be questions uh and I know there are comments from the community I want to be cognizant of the time you've already spent on this but please understand this is not just an application which you see every day for the benefit of one property owner this is truly a collaboration and if done successfully a collaboration that works well for both the town and the applicant so thank you thank you very much so um before we start our um public comments I'm going to take a little break if that's okay because um I've been requested so why don't we take like five or 10 whatever we think but uh be back for sure um we'll be back by 7:30 for sure thanks us the break so we're going to um have the uh public now give us a their comments um then I will close the hearing and we will discuss so Linda we ready to roll yes I'm ready to roll mayor all right so we do have 23 comment cards in person but what I'm going to talk about right now is just so that um we have on the record we did have quite a few quite a few written comments and so and even from our last meeting on December 19th I mentioned that I would be bringing those comments to this meeting Council has received all those comments from the December 19th meeting we had 25 in favor and five opposed the comments specifically for this meeting were 86 in favor and 43 opposed day of comment cards that were turned in at this meeting were four in favor and one opposed so that means a grand total of 115 in favor and 59 opposed Now comments inperson comments um first is Tammy Bell and on Deck is Cindy Couture good afternoon mayor vice mayor council and staff I stand before you today as a proud member of our community eager to express my support for the development of sandor's proposed highquality apartment complex within our town I understand that there are concerns among some members of our community about potential issues related to the safety and the demographic impact of such a development however I firmly believe that this proposed multif family residential complex with its focus on luxury Community amenities aligned seamlessly with the lifestyle many of us cherish in our town this proposed project is not just an apartment complex it's a vision for a vibrant and inclusive community space that complements our general plan and the essence of our multi-gen generational town the amenities offered are vast and are designed to enhance a quality of life for our residents let me draw your attention to the similarities between the proposed apartment complex and many of our homes just like many homes in Fountain Hills this development includes an outdoor pool with sunning deck and Cabanas mys a fire pit seating area grilling stations and indoor parking this proposal is an investment that's creating an environment that resonates with the preferences and lifestyles of our current residents it's essential to address the concerns raised by potential changes in our community's demographics however as I mentioned above this highquality apartment complex offers a lifestyle that should eliminate any fears or presumptions of a radical demographic change by embracing this de this development we demonstrate as a community to offer housing for people of all generations who enjoy similar amenities as many of us I ask you to consider consider the profound positive impact this development will have on our community unfortunately I've become aware of concerns that some of you in your votes tonight may be influenced by political considerations rather than reflecting the majority voice which both Republicans and Democrats by the way have overwhelmingly expressed support for this project it's disheartening to hear that some may be using delay tactics to push the developer out some weighing consequences to their political careers or facing external pressures within their party potentially affecting the Integrity of their vote it's I applaud any of you today who are willing to rise above these concerns any of you who are willing to rise above any personal agendas political influences stand against intimidation and prioritize the well-being of our Fountain Hills Community please cast your vote based on the greater good show respect for our staff help Foster a healthy business environment and re represent those of us who are actively working to make a positive impact in our town I believe this is an opportunity for us to evolve while maintaining the unique charm and character and lifestyle of our town thank you for your time and consideration Madame mayor and Town Council my name is Cindy Couture I will be short and sweet I had a bunch of things written down but Mr Morris is amazing he caned anything I think I think if you are looking for something to vote against this apartment complex on you're going to have to dig really deep because he answered everything in fact I'm thinking maybe when it gets done I might want to move there um so vote Yes support the town this is a good thing next we have Crystal Kavanaugh and on Deck Jeff Yetta good evening please consider the consequences of a rezone that allows a rental project well beyond our highest R5 zoning which could significantly change the intended character of Fountain Hills as has anyone seen the master plan for this whole Plaza to those that minimize this as just some apartments at the edge of town I hope you consider the bigger impact on our community and the possibility of even further expansion of such a project some are pushing Apartments as the solution to promoting Commerce but what what well-paying industries compatible with Fountain Hills have they even tried to bring in or even something like a destination shopping experience with Premium Outlets that could overflow into our downtown area with Shoppers Shay has access to both the 202 and the 101 with Apartments renters will most likely just hop on Shay and go towards Scottsdale this location could benefit Fountain Hills economically if the zoning request was industrial Arizona is a big tourism State Scottdale has Ping golf a Ping golf industry for example who has tried to bring something like that here a rezone for a manufacturer would be welcome they mention Workforce housing but for what work Workforce not the service industry they mention rentals for families which is unlikely since these are the most or these are higher priced Apartments small one and two bedroom units at 744 to 950 Square ft these are promoted as Luxury Rentals but for who part-time residents are permanent residents depending who rents these the economic impact numbers presented can be dramatically skewed I hear the term walkability but where will they be walking to and to classify this as mixed juice at the far end of the plaza is deceptive Parkplace is mixed juice it's surrounded by businesses mixed with residential and speaking of Parkplace there'll be plenty of rentals available once that gets built we have quite a few rental options already here in Fountain Hills a reone for a smaller development of condos with ownership would be more suited to Fountain Hills expanding available housing with high density builds because some people want to move here but can't afford it isn't logical there is no such thing as a right to live in Fountain Hills at a specific price point we are a Scenic bedroom community people who can afford to live here do just like other higher and desirable locations and our property values are then maintained many specifically choose to live here because of the small town feel easy access to other areas and an emphasis on single family homes not high density rentals people don't always live where they work either I'm opposed to this high density rezone the allegation that developers won't bring projects here is wrong wrong Fountain Hills is not difficult to work with if you bring the right project thank you good evening mayor council staff Jeff Yetta Fountain Hills resident for two years and also a renter um I'll keep this brief I know there's a lot of comments on the docket today so I used to work in local government and can appreciate the spirit of dialogue uh that we're having this evening about this proposal uh wanted to share I am in support of this project because it meets the provisions set forth in the general plan also the new development will help Revitalize the shopping center which has been faltering for some time and the residents will shop and dine locally which would benefit the town of Fountain Hills as a whole I feel like this project with its aesthetic amenities and ease of access to both Tempe and Scottsdale could potentially attract a much needed younger demographic to this community this property is underutilized in its current state and we can debate on and on about what could or should be implemented Ed here but at the end of the day something needs to be done to revitalize this area and we have a developer that is willing to invest in Fountain Hills which I believe will make a positive impact in our town I hope you will support this proposal thank you so much for your time next we have former mayor J schlum and then on Deck Steve bagio hey mayor council staff good to see you uh the land here is currently uh not being used in this area as you know we had an A&W Root Beer maybe you don't it's been like 15 years since it closed it's an empty building that's uh periodically uh lived in by people that don't live there um so this property is not being used retail world has changed completely we need to reuse this uh land with something that'll work for our community traffic not a real concern on Shea Boulevard seems like a really good location to consider a Redevelopment uh blocking views always a sensitivity we got great views in in Fountain Hills uh it sits way below the road takes away a lot of that concern we're short Apartments we definitely are there's mixed use or multif family units short in the entire Valley fills uh we did not build Apartments that's why a lot of our condos get rented out we don't have apartment communities like most other places we need more more multif family uh obviously supply and demand you get more Supply typically the prices will come down not saying it's going to be affordable CU things are crazy right now it is clear that people of Fountain Hills love their Town we're pretty well engaged here we're a community where you can come out and be heard uh you may have issues at the federal level and you don't feel you're heard guess what Fountain Hills you can be heard and sometimes it cuts both ways we're extremely fortunate here um and we are apprehensive to change because we love our town so much we don't want to screw it up we are the greatest town in the world you recall the fears that we had when the Parkplace was being was coming forward very similar fears height traffic on and on same fears here park place has turned out pretty incredible and hopefully the rest of it will get developed here soon we've got year- round residents there uh supporting the businesses of our downtown the same thing is likely to occur there one of the things we all agree on is we demand quality design and and quality development and we continue to trust you and hold you into account and be at public meetings to make sure that's what we get here in Fountain Hills this location and the plan also uh proved to be a very positive thing for our community in the future and uh here the Greatest Town of Fountain Hills so appreciate you listening and there's always uh tweaks that'll be needed as this goes along and hopefully it'll get through this process so it can be understood better and also we can be open to developers uh putting in uh good money into our community and bringing us quality developments here in the future thank you hello mayor hello councel my name is uh Steve bajo and I'm a resident of Fountain Hills excuse me I'm all for these apartments I didn't come up with any fancy speeches I'm going to speak from the heart I'm a renter due to unfortunate circumstances that happened to me me I can tell you firsthand there's a huge need for apartments condos and outer housing in this community and a lot of people want it now I keep hearing negatives NOS no NOS all these people say no you know what they have no Solutions you know what that's called that's called complaining and I'm a doer I like to do things I do things for the community I do things for businesses I'm doing a food drive right now and you know what the problem is a lot of people in this town they always want stuff but they don't want to do things I'm telling you guys you need to go with this project if you say no to it imagine what a builder or developer or these developers thank you for choosing found Hills imagine any development is going to say wait a second this town said no to an empty parking lot with buildings they're going to s or anything else no that is not progress that's not how this town was founded that Fountain right there Rises to the Top If you do not pass this the fountain is not going to keep Rising the only thing that this F's going to be is flatsome and Jetson thank you thank you next we have John Meredith and Pamela Curtis on Deck hi Council I'm John Meredith I live on East Travino but I can't see it from where I am um I'm more interested in the direction of the Town um the most valuable zip code in Arizona is Paradise Valley and there isn't even a close second the most valuable zip code in the whole country is uh Atherton out in the Bay Area and if you look at maybe the most 10 20 top zip codes they have things in common and most of them are close to uh amenities like businesses and shopping and uh and the theater everything that people want culturally but they don't have them in their Community they have easy access to them so Fountain Hills already has just down shet you can find anything you want the other thing they have is that they're almost all single family residential and so it's it's a pretty simple formula people with money don't like being stacked in like sardines and um if you make Fountain Hills a really valuable zip code then you're not going to have to worry about commercial everybody wants to sell the people that have money nobody you know anyway um that's my my point is that if you sit down and you decide to take that approach then every decision you make you just sit down and say does this raise the value of the single family residential owner in the town and if it does well I guess it's a good decision but if you look at all these well look at Paradise Valley they don't have multi-story buildings they don't have Apartments they they have single family residences that's where all the money go gravitates to so um to me Fountain Hills is a has a huge it it's never going to be another Paradise Valley but it might be end up in the top five with the right decisions where you follow that model and uh and try and attain that kind of a situation for the town thanks sorry so this area was zoned industrial and changed to commercial because the town's people decided they wanted shopping close to home Four Peaks Plaza was built taking into account the neighborhoods around and across from it keeping the height down the lighting low the store lights off at night when the stores are closed and signage back lit and within a reasonable height sadly the complex was not well managed and stores left all prior to covid this is one thing that cannot be blamed on covid now this developer comes with a request to reone 6.7 Acres of the property to tear down half of the center to build Apartments to revitalize the center how does taking the commercial space away Revitalize it it is gone period with no opportunity for stores to exist there and they want 316 apartments on that 6.7 acres of land how can that be justified when Daybreak wasn't approved with 400 apartments on 60 acres of land also with all of their experts lawyers and well-paid employees you'd think the developer would be aware of the codes regulations and resp restrictions that apply to the resoning request I.E density or number of Apartments allowed height restrictions setbacks required and sufficient parking to name a few so why would they come in with something that doesn't adhere to their request and who is going to want to rent the units on the back side of the complex where the view consists of an RV parking lot U-Haul storage units and another new storage facility that has two very bright lights on all night this group should get a failing grade for their homework you should deny their request and send them back to the drawing board better yet tell them that the space will remain as is and that they should get the businesses in there there are thriving centers out there Desert Ridge Tempe Marketplace Mesa Riverview The Pavilions the prominade to name a few entice Trader Joe's in and out Ulta Bath and Body Works the Yard House and more to set up shop here people like One-Stop shopping in a place to grab something to take home for dinner without having without having to de with the traffic and the time to go to the other thriving centers out of town the problem is this group is not getting on the phone not putting in the time or shoe leather to do this instead they are discouraging business from coming there what is the feasibility of a store that charges a125 an item being able to sustain half a million dollars a year in rent I wouldn't be surprised if you allow this apartment facility to go through that in a year or two someone come back someone comes back to tell you that although they really really tried to fill up the remaining commercial space it just couldn't be done so they they need to tear it down and build another apartment complex taking away that c commercial space forever and sending the people of Fountain Hills back to Mesa Tempe and Scottsdale to do their shopping and look at Parkplace or don't I should say as all we've seen there for quite some time is dirt and fencing what a welcome site for those that come to attend our fairs and community activities let's at least get that completed before ENT maintaining another complex and Builder that may sue the town repeatedly instead of completing the build please just say no okay uh we have Lori Shiner hopefully I said it right but you can correct it for the public record and then on Deck Kathy marks hello my name is Lorie she my husband and I have been here for over 12 years now um we have grandchildren we had kids so now we have grandchildren anyway so but we have retired and one of the things that attracted us to Fountain Hills was having open space no homes right on top of each other we both you know save our whole lives uh to be able to afford a home like this we've been through many rentals and we've done lots of things in our lives all of us have to be able to afford to get a home the kids are great we have grandkids they come they visit they go we moved to Fountain Hills because of the wide open space and because people weren't right on top of each other and I don't think there's anything to be ashamed of of by saying that we like to have our space um you know and I don't think there's anything wrong with saying we worked really hard to get where we're at today I don't think having three or four people in an apartment because the rent so darn high is going to help a bloody thing I just don't um I don't think I I think that when in I'm I'm a nurse so when in doubt don't what's the hurry why can't we we never heard one thing about about this project not one but I hear that council members didn't even hear about it until we heard about it and it's been going on they talked to Target April of 19 and for over nine months people have been meeting about this project we never got a notice not one notice or opportunity to go to a meeting and voice our concerns and I'm very very annoyed and offended that the developer would say yeah well we had two meetings and gosh only you know three people showed them three people you know what gosh darn it nobody came to montere drive let me tell you because no we I have walked the block I've W I've walked too my friends can tell you I have walked and walked and walked to try and spread the word you know what it's not nice we should have been in on those meetings we should have at least had a say and been informed and then to hear that a lot of people have requested the big plans and not had one single meeting even when request to answer questions about the complete project I have a problem with that and I don't like a liar either I think people need to be upfront what's wrong with putting this on hold for a little bit and getting more information I didn't say no let's just get some information and let us we look at it it's right in front of my house the my back deck looks right at it you know what it's easy to say when it's not in your face and I love Fountain Hills I know all you guys do too but you know what it's very easy when you're not the one looking right at it so let's just wait a minute let's look at a few more things thank you thank you Madame mayor Town Council my name is Kathy marks I suggest we also take a breath before we do anything that is irreversible it appears to me to be a very shortsighted to change zoning because our strip mall is failing just like thousands across the country just because business models change it doesn't mean that our business model should change and a comparison between Goodyear and Fountain Hills is apples to oranges who would have guessed when the town planning was done 50 years ago that instead of driving all over town to find that rug you want you just stay at home in your pajamas press a button and 5 days later it shows up but that's progress that doesn't mean we throw away our initial Town plan and make Shay and Saro Corridor high density residential it means we work harder to attract new businesses with high-paying jobs that will attract High earners and families Ur urban planning guides tell us that you create the jobs and the people will come right now the high-paying jobs are not here to attract young professionals and if we sign away this amazing parcel there is no turning back I also keep hearing we must save Target why why is it our responsibility of Fountain Hills residents to save one location of a $65 billion company um I just heard that we have 324 possible apartments in the pipeline plus this 316 that's Apartments remember once built they're built there's no turning back I also hear now the term is Workforce housing is that a new name for affordable housing in according to the US Department of Housing and Urban Development affordable housing is defined where the occupant is paying 30% or less of the gross income on total housing including utilities that means for the smallest Department it's estimated that the individual has to make at least $61,000 a year and we just heard our average Workforce here in Fountain Hills is 40,000 affordable housing is also used as a general term to refer to housing assistance for low-income individuals which includes housing vouchers Are We Now talking Section 8 ass government assisted housing if that's the case that's a totally different conversation we will soon have the Dark Skies Discovery Center in our town we will have a small town Vibe with Advanced science and Technical Education and Research would it make sense to have Science and Technology employers right where we always planned keep to the plan even planning and zoning agree we just can't make this irreversible change we will regret it 5 to 10 years from now when strip malls are truly a thing of the past and our only option will be to add 316 more Apartments because we gave away on a whim our Prime commercial real estate I will be sorry to see Target fail but I will be even more sorry to see us lose this opportunity to create future workplaces for the next generation of Fountain Hill citizens thank you next we have Bart Shay and on Deck Betsy Lavoy mam mayor council staff ra you look good up there um so I'm probably half of the units that everyone keeps talking about and informatively we're going to be starting probably the next 45 days financing has been a little rough this year I don't know if anyone's watched the interest rates go up and down but it's uh it's become a little more expensive to build than it used to be I'm here to talk in favor of this project I'm here to tell you right now that the competition that's perceived in this whole complex is absolutely phenomenally wrong the number of units that we're putting into this town right now wouldn't touch the need if we doubled them you think about it we're the the I think John came up with 15% as the natural the national average we'll be at seven maybe if everything gets built including the 316 units for the population in this town I've heard nothing but negative comments from everybody who had nothing but positive comments about Parkplace and I've heard nothing but positive comments from people who had negative comments about Parkplace it's this talking to AR ear's it's kind of like this diametrically opposed positioning for political whims this town deserves this project this town needs this project this town doesn't have another chance it's not golden bullets and the Market's going to drive it anyway if they get to the point where they actually get to go build this thing you're going to give them permission tonight to go start at that point if everything worked just perfect and it wasn't referendum these guys are two and a half years before they get a shovel in the ground nobody has any idea what the interest rates are going to do no one has any idea what the economy is going to do Lumber could go up to 1750 a th000 and it'll put it on hold again so these guys are asking tonight for permission to go spend two three four million dollar to finish planning this thing and get what everyone thinks is this ultimate plan about well it's going to work and go together they're going to spend a ton of time and a ton of money and a ton of engineering to see if they can make this thing work and at the end of the day at the very end of the day what's going to drive this is the market it's not going to be what we feel is best it's not going to be what I feel is best for my competition it's what's going to be best for this town and if the market does says no you can't put a part here hey they just wasted 3 million bucks I know how that feels these guys are literally standing on the precipice of getting permission to start not permission to finish not permission to put in what is it Section 8 housing heard that a lot when I put mine up too we have 400 people that live in Park Place we'll have 800 people that live in Olive Parkplace when it's done I I I'm sorry um but this needs to go through this needs to give you got to give them permission to start or they'll never finish thank you for your time good evening happy New Year Betsy Lavoy Fountain Hills resident and CEO and president of the Chamber of Commerce sandor and esteemed Representatives we express our gratitude to you as we move forward to shape the future of of our town I kindly request that all of you to stand and remain standing for this significant occasion if you're willing bear with me guys come on the town of Fountain Hill staff has recommended approval of this transformative project out of respect for our town staff may I invite you to town staff to please stand in the audience come on Amanda and crew stand the fals Chamber of Commerce board of directors has wholeheartedly endorsed this project providing a letter of support I now invite the board members I've lost four they had to leave but I now invite the board members to please stand and additionally I call all of our Chamber of Commerce community business owners Community Partners and supportive residents to stand if you are in favor of this revitalization project and thank you for your vision you can all be seated thank you very much I was glad that there people were standing behind me okay and in addition to the strong local support the Fountain Hills Chamber of Commerce organized our quarterly FH connect breakfast on January 4th where sandor and withy Morris Bo engaged with our business Community presenting the Redevelopment project and addressing questions there were 110 people in attendance following the presentation and Q&A session we distributed a survey with Anonymous feedback 93 people completed that survey 95 % Express support for the project this underscores the board of directors representation of the business Community as a whole notably Chambers of Commerce typically hold an 8% market share yet our Fountain Hills chamber boasts 62% of the town's local business licenses as chamber members this positions us as the largest possible sampling of the business Community grounded in data and facts in addition to the substantial evidence of support I personally engaged with business owners and managers in and around the plaza including Target with Target perhaps being the most speculated about I personally met with them and will share that Target expressed excitement for this project Target cited positive communication with sandor and their representatives they confirmed that the developers have accommodated their requests and they've been a pleasure to work with businesses such as Francis and Sons Car Wash comfort in Denny's Bell's Outlet Subway O'Reilly Crossroad Auto Works Discount Tire and desert dog all overwhelmingly support this Plaza's Redevelopment as elected officials I encourage you to base your vote on data rather than speculation opposition to this project often relies on fear and speculation with the latest talking point being density while this will be the most densely I'm almost done this most densely populated development in our town it's crucial to note the increase is minute it's less than one unit more per acre of land it's actually 0.2 that's the size of a closet per acre of land larger than Parkplace I will challenge anyone to provide evidence and data to support that the notion additional point two thanks Betsy is problematic thank thank you here's next we have Larry Meyers and on Deck Nancy or OSI Orosi mayor council I recently have just become aware of that revenue and economic impact study that was commissioned by the town I don't know who did it but I applaud the Endeavor and while at the same time I see some generalities assumed undoubtedly coming from Census Data from which they derive their numbers it doesn't it does create a margin of error for some of the projected Revenue which I think may be a bit generous but it also s dispels the complete misinformation put forth by certain chamber board members and leaders as to the sales tax revenues that we will achieve by having 490 or or so more re residents if discretionary spending from the mean Fountain Hills income holds up with people living in SE 760 foot Apartments the numbers are probably high so I'm against this land use for the same reason I was against the land used 20 years ago when it was bare dirt and it happens that your economic impact study says the same thing I was against a commercial use turning industrial land into commercial a long time ago and as it turns out myself and others were absolutely correct as now we Face a failed commercial shopping center okay so no applause necessary Andrew Lyle from sandor says we don't think the amount of retail that we have there and where it's positioned as a fixable problem as retail so does he mean that's a quote I have the audio file does he mean the center or the 6.7 Acres I don't know what he means back when the commercial rezone was prosed promot proposed the council then jumped at the first thing proposed in a short-sighted now proven to be not astute because retail centers were the flavor of the day and Barkley made a lot of money sandor comes in and now the flavor of the day is Apartments they propos to make a lot of money so I'm going to read to you from your own economic impact statement and it basically says the industrial scenario would have minimal short-term tax impacts but would support quality jobs and the largest annual economic impacts Apartments would create new housing but not new jobs I'm going to skip to the end of it because it basically says that Industrial would be the best longer term development for the town and I would ask our economic development director who seems to think she's going to bring some industry here where's the land she's putting it on because that's it right there it was 27 years 20 years ago and it is today so I thank you for your time and please take the Long View not the short view that the people the council 20 years ago did because you can see where it got us thanks good evening mayor and councel my name is Nancy owski I've been a resident of Fountain Hills for over 25 years I've probably attended more than 75 Council meetings not so much in the last few years but in the time I've been here and the time I was attending all I heard is there's no space for industry in this town how can we bring jobs to Fountain Hills and that land up there on Shay where Target is is the space It should be we need people to be able to make a good living in this town and we need to build that as an industry space instead of just this commercial space I happen to not be one of the ones that support Amazon it's taking away our small businesses we're being lazy just to have something delivered to our door I like to see what I'm going to buy but that doesn't happen and we need to have this land this space turned into an industrial let's offer some jobs let's make something available I've heard over and over oh there's no land oh there's no land and what was just said what are they going to do where are they going to put this new industry we don't have that kind of land in this town that is the area that it needs to be placed in it's where we need to have it how do we know Target's not going to leave and why do we keep changing all of our um oh now we're going to use the p zoning and we're going to do this zoning and we're going to change our zoning here and there um we need to bring jobs for our residents keep saying housing's expensive here but we don't have where our people are earning $40,000 a year there are technical jobs medical jobs research companies that need space and we should be offering it please consider a no vote on this apartment complex thank you next we have Kristen Moses and then on Deck skip mayor mayorana skip okay thank you and then in Skip's place we have Aaron Brown mayor council staff thank you I'm Kristen MOSI the Redevelopment of the Four Peaks Plaza in Fountain Hills promises a transformative revitalizing impact for our beautiful Fountain Hills Community as a citizen in support of the Redevelopment of the Four Peaks Plaza in Fountain Hills I'd like to share that my family relocated to Fountain Hills for its community in ample opportunities we left behind a community that was no longer thriving a community with neglected public spaces that contributed to a sense of despair we left a community that decades prior had said no to growth opportunities we looked at our future and the possibilities available to us as we became older the possibilities available to our children as they became adults our choices were clear stay put and live a stagnant life or move where opportunities flourish one where our family could flourish alongside Community I invite you to imagine Fountain Hill 10 20 or 30 years into the future if new opportunities are not embraced what does it look like are families and individuals exiting Fountain Hills what businesses or jobs Remain the Redevelopment of for Peaks Plaza ensures a thriving future for our town thriving neighborhoods are a key component of thriving communities embracing this Redevelopment is an investment in the future prosperity of Fountain Hills I urge you to make a decision from a perspective of abundance rather than scarcity one that will uplift our community and leave a lasting positive impact I urge you to Champion this transformation for the betterment of Fountain Hills not only for today but also for tomorrow thank you hello mayor uh staff councel my name's Aaron Brown I'm a resident of Fountain Hills uh I own property on both sides of this uh the development and it's quite obvious something needs to occur it's been uh vacant for some time and it's a detriment to the uh areas around it but I can't say whether or not this is the best move um uh obviously the the business um that's going to be doing the development there isn't here to make money that's and that's why they're here not doing anybody favors but uh understandably uh they were to maximize that and my only concern is the following of the rules that are set in place and uh with density Heights things like that but it's on a larger picture in that uh and I I defer to all of you to look at this and figure out what the best plan is are we going to continue to let those things occur to go exceed what's already in place or make changes so that it is within the guidelines and I know everyone's referred back to the Parkplace you know it's not going to be higher than that and everything else but Parkplace obviously exceeded that when it came to be and um you continue to do that and then you know it just will snowball and maybe someday we end up with six stories and maybe that's okay but I think uh if anyone's going to do development it should be within the existing guidelines and um it may reduce some of the profitability but I think the um the council in the town has set those things in place uh for a reason and that's all to say thank you next we have John headed and on Dak we have Jean selecta hello my name is uh John headed I uh am probably the closest business to this development I'm uh directly across the street on Technology Drive a lot of you know it as the the monks building uh I own the 30,000 squ foot building and five acres of land there um just to give you a little bit of History uh about me I'm a MIT degreed ocean engineer I'm kind of an odity there are only two ocean engineers years in my graduating class and uh spent some time at the Woods Hole oceanographic institution worked with the guys that discovered the Titanic and have been involved in a lot of uh government uh subc work my company prevco is uh strictly subc we're I boldly state that we're the only subc company uh in the whole state of Arizona and uh if there is anybody else that does that let me know um uh anyway we are uh very high-tech and what we do we build uh very expensive uh metal enclosures that go to 20,000 ft underwater and are used for various incend purposes for defense uh uh for u oil field development and for uh environmental purposes uh we do we sell all over the world and uh uh we have uh Engineers that work for us and technicians that work there I'm concerned about this development uh being across the street from me owning the property and the land there in that um I'm I'm afraid first of all it's going to uh decrease the value of my property by having this massive development with you know potentially 500 to a thousand people living there it seems to me like uh you know is there anywhere else in town where there's a four-story parking garage and I know whenever I go to town I try not to park in a parking garage just going around and around in circles um I don't think there's adequate space around here for that many people probably a lot of young children that uh where are they going to go they're going to come over and hang out over at prevco in the in the parking lot over there um anyway uh you get the idea that I'm not not for the development and uh I do believe that uh a better idea would be to bring in some sort of uh some sort of a company that has needs offices and doing high-tech development uh whatever that it'll bring in a a a higher paid clientele that'll help the people to be able to afford the housing that's here in Fountain Hills and um and I think that it would help to support uh you know even if you put that building right there um it would help to to support the local businesses by bringing in potentially 500 or a th000 workers uh every day coming in from town from other parts of the town to work there some of them would live here anyway uh if uh anybody's a retired engineer uh we're always looking for engineer we've hired a few retired guys you know as old as 80 years old uh let me know pepco.com thank you mayor council my name is Jean selecta I support wholeheartedly the proposal to Breathe new life into the Shay Boulevard Corridor I won't bore you with more numbers you've heard too many already let me give you some perspective though traffic I keep hearing about traffic Shay is a six Lane Road for most of its journey through town we should hope for more vehicles on that Highway it is not in a residential neighborhood anyone that's lived here any length of time knows the bulk of traffic is either Weekend Warriors going up to the lakes or weekday residents commuting to or from work in the morning in the afternoon work work the three largest centers in Maricopa County for employment are sky harbor downtown Phoenix and Scott state Air Park and Scots was just recognized as the number one job magnet in the United States so let's take advantage of that we know that Engineers it professionals business Executives young doctors they can afford the rent at that apartment complex that's being proposed moreover do you think that young professionals single or married children or not would be not be salivating to have quick access to a higher speeded road to their job in nearby Scottsdale or they may be working from home and then return each evening to the beauty that is Fountain Hills they then Park their vehicle in a secure dark sky compliant garage and have dinner or they walk next door to the restaurants that have sprouted out up because of the new residents next door this is enticing finally target has been painted as a failure it's not it has performed as well as possible with the lack of population density we should be thankful for them their existence for 20 years has brought in huge amounts of sales tax revenue more than the dirt that was there beforehand they took a chance on us we should take a chance on them and support their efforts to adapt and survive one last thing I was employed in the town's planning zoning department for 5 years and a p andz commissioner for 3 years never had I seen an elected official attend a commission meeting and speak in an attempt to influence the commission you Mr skorn you were the first now it may not be unethical but it sure was inappropriate and if you want to do the right thing you should recuse yourself I won't hold my breath thank you just to give you an update we we only have four speakers remaining on this item next is uh Joanne ly on Deck is um former council member Alan magazine I'll wake it up in a minute it's coming good thank you for the opportunity to address these agenda items my name is Joanne Lyles and I'm a resident in Fountain Hills I'm a mom of two young adults here and I operate um I work from home and I'm against the proposed development I'm afraid I absolutely love what this town has become and like many fellow residents um I have a great deal of life experience and education and I speak from not fear or um speculation I have degrees in civil engineering and and a master of architecture from a school of urban planning and architecture I mention this solely to address the notion that Fountain Hills is comprised of varied hardworking and intelligent individuals whose understanding of public policy should be respected and weighed in the same vein as those who hold elected office like I said I love my town the problem I see is the Four Peaks development is a contrived Urban idea that has nothing to do with the idelic landscape we know as Fountain Hills the four peak's development is a nod to an urban planning concept which is a trend called walkable mixed juuse development and unfortunately the walkable movement has its origins in political sociology it's not necessarily sustainable in the environment that we find ourselves in and this ideology often goes against what we uh consider ourselves to be intelligent self-governing people we have a right to determine and preserve the nature of our hometowns Fountain Hills does not need housing on the order of 316 units 700 plus people 500 cars wrapped around dwelling units packed like sardines onto the dollar store parking lot I think that there's a concept A lot of people understand called defensible space defensible space means that when you're outside your home you're protected by the visibility that you enjoy from other people looking on a wraparound part paring lot does not provide that kind of space I think this project is unsustainable in large part good urban planning builds housing where there are jobs there are no suitable corporate entity for this location likewise there aren't any new jobs the commuter scenario that it is promising is illogical because there really is only one road out of town and I think that everybody's going to be going the same way at the same time it's right now it's it's not easy commuting in the morning walkability where 8 months out of the 12 are north of 100 degrees fahit is unsustainable I know that there are questions about the density issue although that is a huge issue excuse me um the the time is up can you make one less less sentence please I think the idea that we're using Parkplace as a precedent is telling what happens when we start using Fountain View Village as a precedent that is not what these people here are expressing as a desire these are huge projects thank you we I got to go with the three minutes here May and councel it seems a little odd for me to be on this side of the day um I want to announce something startling uh Bart Shay and I find ourselves in agreement I'm not sure I ever remember a time when that happened before Bart um I'm here to support this application with modifications some will tell you to outright outright oppose the application almost every case where a major rezoning is considered uh there are discussions between the staff the applicant and the councel to see if there can be compromises to see if things can be worked out um no resoning is ever perfect when Park Place came before you or us um there were many months of discussions compromises and so on before it came before the council and was essentially approved by the council um you as council members have received um the applied economics analysis at 92% occupancy which we're told is pretty typical it will generate 9.3 million in taxable local retail spending annually which is certainly uh would be a tremendous boom to our businesses ask yourself if Target leaves what business would come here you know I think it's interesting that people say well you know Target wants to be here they love it here tell me how many uh general managers or owners corporate owners of a business are going to announce their thinking of leaving it doesn't happen it just suddenly happens they take a look at the numbers they take a look at what they're doing and they say well maybe not um and I've heard number of people talk about the need for um an industrial project I haven't heard anybody talk about the fact that there's a deed restriction on the property a deed restriction and I haven't seen any companies lined up to try to test that deed restriction so and it's been what we're almost 50 years old as a town I haven't seen any businesses come to the council or the staff and say we we have a project in mind and we want to take a look at it um imagine in your mind's eye what look like if the target does leave right now as of two days ago because I drove through it there were 20 vacant Stores um I want to change Tanner a little bit an eight-page email was sent to Republicans uh a while ago to asking people to show up and oppose this project many of you have probably received it that's not a problem everyone has a right to express themselves but not to bring politics into every decision couple of quotes from that email we meaning Republicans wanted to flip the council to 5 to2 liberal to four three conservative who generally lives in apartments answer is simple Democrats who pushes arguments of this and other dense housing projects Democrats time sorry I only have another half an hour thank you um next we have Dan kosovic and on de edza hi I'm Dan kovic um although I'm member of Planning and Zoning commission I write this as a resident of Fountain Hills um and I have 40 Years of uh experience in the real estate business um we have a wonderful town here in Fountain Hills and the ordinances have served it well the highest density codified in the town ordinances is 25 units an acre this Project's 45 if the vision for this town was to have this kind of density there would be an r45 zoning classification there isn't the site's requ requesting Parkplace variances despite none of the residential amenities Parkplace has there's no public transportation it's hard to get an Uber this is not the central business district on the Avenue this site isn't walkable Park PL Parkplace residents walk their dogs in Fountain Park down the Avenue of the fountains a park-like setting Four Peaks Plaza residents be walking their dogs through an industrial park where there's no sidewalks on the side streets there's a sidewalk on technology there's no sidewalks on the side streets this is not a good residential site it's a residential site by default and it doesn't warrant any uh variances when the V ordinances aren't working you put it through a process we've heard on Planning and Zoning we've heard um signs General Plan update community homes we're looking at 5G right now there's has been no request to look at changing 25 units per acre but if you really don't agree with me and you think that 2 to 2 and a half% of the town population belongs on less than S acres in the town 90 units above ordinance at 30,000 a door is creating $2.7 million in land value and that's just over and above what's in our ordinance what's the town getting in return once built 90 units is $32 million in asset value over the just over the ordinance what's the town getting for its part and creating that kind of value if the town's going to give petition opportunities above and beyond the ordinance the town should get something in return above and beyond the ordinance if you're inclined to allow this project please negotiate a good deal for the town uh I'm not against apartments on this site just not at this density petitioner stuck in a bad deal the retail is a blight for our community and apartments are the fastest way out as a citizen of Fountain Hills I'm requesting you insist petitioner bring back a plan that conforms to R5 density and conforms to a parking ordinance um in summary it's not a residential site it's a failed retail site with residential is its only other option the amenities of a neighborhood like parks and schools aren't here Fountain Hills is not Urban two to 2 and a half% of the town's population doesn't belong on less than seven acres in this community the site doesn't warrant trashing our ordinance we have a wonderful town and the ordinances have served it well if petition says they can't make 25 units an acre work then let's live with the resent with the vacant retail and if you do decide to ignore the town ordinance and create a large windfall for the petitioner the town should be compensated for that windfall mayor Dicky Town Council if you really disagree with me on what this vision for the town is please take the time to negotiate a good deal with benefits to the town beyond the standard fees otherwise you're leaving a lot on the table and you can do better for the town thank you for your consideration and thank you for your service to our town good evening Madam mayor good evening Town Council Aaron staff Rachel everyone so uh it's quite amazing to me the dialogue in the conversation that this has created and it's been great because it does show you the cross-section of what the majority of Fountain Hills wants to be okay and uh I can't say enough for Planning and Zoning um commission and what they put this particular project through yeah it was a 4H hour long um conversation and uh certainly there were reasons that it was denied and I I think you all need to take a look at that and nobody's against the apartments as either our Chamber of Commerce I see a lot of heckling back in the crowd on people speaking up for what they believe in everybody's Viewpoint is very important I don't care who you are so but that seems to be get it's getting sidestepped here we're so divided right now on stuff instead of trying to make things work for the better of Fountain Hills make these guys work for the betterment of Fountain Hills the way it sits as proposed breaks all of our breaks ordinances period and just like you just heard from one of our commissioners that is the most important there shouldn't even be a conversation here they should have several plans in front of you so in order to make a correct decision not just one and not just one that they want these guys are going to make a boatload of money and Dan's right what is the benefit to Fountain Hills I want you all to remember what is the benefit to Fountain Hills when you let a Daryl Canyon get destroyed how much money has that made the town seriously so everybody's out to make money you can't fault them for that but my god there are so many people that moved here that don't that really don't want this type of density so take a look at all that and please make the right decision on this I mean there still needs to be more discussion and I said that a month ago this has been going on for over a year I heard some dates that I couldn't even believe I didn't even know what was going on that long neither did the residences and that should tell you something this was purposely pushed through and quickly at Christmas because of that the residents did not know there were so many people in this audience that have their ear to the ground and I don't think that was correct so that's why you're having a debate instead of a discussion and if we had a discussion we would get what we want so hopefully you vote accordingly you get these guys to go back to the books and make that the best development and we are not against there is not a bunch of people that are being told that they're against the Departments we the apartment in this complex we are not just want it done right thank you next and the last speaker on this item is former council member art Tois thank you good evening Council mayor good evening Town attorney uh nice to be up here and councilman magazine we agree tonight there are so many good points in so many uh discussions tonight that are so valid uh last gentleman that spoke and Dan who I have a lot of respect for with his commercial development experience and previously managing with the bashes Plaza uh there's so many mo so many points uh making the right deal and making sure this works uh I posted a video on December 15th and in that video I shared my thoughts on this and my reasons why I think right now this time is the right time to approve this back in 2019 there was discussions as to how are we going to solve the economic issues longterm of this community so that we can maintain the infrastructure and we can pay for and maintain this community in the highest highest degree of Beverly Hills of Arizona as I always would say if you don't we we did not pass a property tax the community has voted down bonds for the schools our Revenue sources are sales tax revenues development fees and ultimately we're going to need to have those sales tax revenues and this Plaza is a critical component to this community and the strength of this community Target in that entire Plaza there was one gentleman that talked about uh being against this 20 years ago the plaza has never worked that's not the case I I was here and I I was uh in town 2002 this Plaza at one point was vibrant we had a golf store there we had the whole a matter of fact I think it was 100% and and and as times it have changed you've seen changes and you've seen vacancies Amazon it's the same principle of what happened to malls and how the downtowns were destroyed by malls because people went to the malls to shop because they wanted an experience well now that's kind of coming back a little bit that people want to have an experience I think this in this project the Vitality of this I think it's a phenomenal project I think it's designed off of the Scottdale Waterfront project I think it's going to look very very high-end I think it's going to track a lot of the high-end business people that are going to want to live outside of what's happening in the Scottsdale Market which is really becoming way overbuilt and the traffic down there is going to be excessive so this is going to be I think a highly desirable project I think it also is going to do something that no one's brought up yet but I think it has happened at Parkplace you're going to see a lot of transitional housing and what I mean by that is and I'll preface this I'm the co-chair of the Scott salale Association Realtors marketing session here in Fountain Hills I've been a realtor I've been a mortgage loan officer I own a mortgage company I'm in the Housing Industry and I own a fitness center so I mean business-wise I think this is great it's going to bring people and it's going to bring the revenues necessary and people that live in town now that have large homes that want a downsize that want to stay in our community live here and be have a vibrant place to live the walkability of that Target Plaza I think you can have a lot of people that put their houses on the market that now opens up inventory for high-paying Executives with families to move to community and to ultimately help the school dist so this is a win-win negotiate a good deal there is some litigation on some of the project I hope you resolve that Aon said you can go into executive session tonight if you had to deal with any type of real estate negotiations I hope you get it done thank you okay so aarin no okay I'm going to close the public hearing and what I'd like to do is um there were some points that were brought up um I'd like to give the applicants an opportunity because there'll probably be questions that we have and maybe you can address them and then um we can ask questions of staff and the applicants some that were probably generated by what we heard but if there was anything that you heard there that you want to maybe um address you can do that right now and then we will ask questions thank you mayor thank you Council and thank you to the citizens that spoke tonight all of the citizens who spoke tonight it speaks well of your entire town that people are participating uh and we've heard both sides of this coin we've heard a lot and I'm speaking just of the folks who weren't supportive of this application this evening but I I think those comments could be broken down into really three or four categories the the first was make it something else and you have a lot of power as a Town Council but you don't come equipped with a magic wand and you can't just decide that you're going to make this something else by virtue of the fact that there's an active zoning application in front of you it's as irrelevant as saying let's make it a park the reality is it's owned by two different parties one of those parties will enforce the deed restrictions and the deed restrictions are extensive so when we talk about making it something else we have to be realistic about what we can make it we can't manufacture on this site because it's prohibited offices very very limited if allowed at all even other retailers have been kept out of this because of the exemptions on the property so you don't have the world of choice on this property what you have is an application in front of you and and we'll talk about what that application brings but to those who say make it something else even This Town Council can't make that happen so then we hear the the second group of comments what I which I put in a different category those are try harder just make it work it's a retail Center you wanted a retail Center you got a retail Center put retailers in it that would require changing shopping patterns not only nationally but internationally this is a remnant of a bygone retail era and we know that because we've seen this happen in other jurisdictions we've seen this happen in other jurisdictions adjacent to you we're bringing a population in bringing people with wallets to the site saves the retail and what does that do that puts money in the town's coffers but I want to talk to you a a little bit about that try harder ethic because this is a property owner that has gone so far to keep tenants and and want to point out they could fill this site with other tenants because what they've tried to do is keep the quality of the tenants in place because quality begets quality as you start going down the road of lower quality tenants that's an easier fruit to pick from the tree but it's worse for the town and ultimately not as good for the shopping center owner but I'm going to tell a quick anecdote mayor and councel about one of the tenants there one of the tenants is Petco uh I think we're all aware of that Petco had the right to leave this property owner and I'm going to use a word that's not too strong in this context begged Petco to stay in place begged them to extend their lease and promised them that they would forward this application to the town and the only way the property owner kept pedco in that site was to paint a picture of what could be just give us a little bit of time we're going to request a residential Community as part of this where we're going to redevelop the center if you just give us time and that was the basis in keeping Petco so nobody has tried harder and I'll I'll go a step further and this probably will not Shock anyone on the Das or in this room nobody wants to hire a lawyer I I love what I do for a living but I recognize that their first choice they own a shopping center they are a very successful shopping center company based in the valley I'd like to point out but they're smart enough not to hire zoning lawyers I'm just an expense what they would like to do what they want more than anything is to lease their space that's the driving Factor behind this they're not keeping that space empty despite the town or despite themselves and they don't want to go through this process but they recognize they have to go through this process the other comments we heard come from a line of just follow the rules why can't you guys follow the rules if this application weren't following the rules of your ordinance from your town and your town code we would be up here requesting an amendment to your ordinance we would have to amend the text of your ordinance to allow what we're doing we're not what we are requesting is permitted by your code and that's because your code is a modern zoning code that recognizes when the zoning laws were written it didn't contemplate every type of development that could occur so there's flexibility in that code the other reason we know we're not violating your code and not breaking the rules is because your professional planning staff the only really truly neutral party here is recommending approval of this application and has told you in your staff report we're not breaking the rules we're playing by the rules and your professional planners have said this is what's best for this property and for the town and and lastly this idea that well where are the benefits what's what's in it for the town I'll answer that in two ways one what's in it for the town if this isn't approved this is already a half vacant Center we've kept tenants by promising a better future by virtue of this application without that promise of a better future we're not going to be able to hold on to our tenants and the only person the only group that isn't our tenant is Target and if Petco is the worst performing Petco in the state and if Target is the worst performing Target in the state it doesn't take a under ocean engineer to figure out what will happen with these stores we're not going to be able to hold on to them and that isn't good so what's in it for the town new new development new tax dollars new residents a stable shopping center that's redeveloped and an investment in the town of Fountain Hills that pays dividends not just for this applicant but for the town with that I'd be happy to answer any questions I appreciate all the time you've given me thank you thank you and we'll probably have questions for staff too so um Council discussion have a quick question before Jason sits down sorry it just wasn't fast enough you did mention that one of the reasons why you can't do manufacturing is because it's prohibited when you first mentioned it you mentioned that it was prohibited by Target so I just wanted to reiterate that when the second time when you mentioned it you forgot that by Target part so I just wanted to put it out there that Council didn't prohibit this this was a part of Target's agreement with you guys mayor vice mayor I apologize yes I should have mentioned that both times the Restriction is by virtue of a deed restriction it's civil enforced but it's clear and it's been signed uh and into signed and recorded So it's easily enforceable thank you Mr Mayor um thank you for your thoughtful presentation really appreciate it um I do have a question and it's it's about speculation that I've heard about this project um all over town and so I just want to hit it head on um there is speculation that sandor and your Law Firm has an alternative master plan one that doesn't seek to rehabilitate this mall and build 316 Apartments but one that seeks to close the Target store and to turn that area into 1,000 lowincome housing units that will be a blight on Fountain Hills forever um could you address that mayor council member thank you I appreciate the opportunity to do that uh first and foremost this this concept of wanting a master plan that is hidden sandor has been very successful fortunately they're one of the the top 10 largest privately held shopping center owners in the country but the emphasis is on shopping centers they aren't an apartment developer they aren't an apartment portfolio residential developer they have no desire to do anything other than make their shopping center successful the application is for six acres roughly a third of the shopping center we cannot and will not develop anything beyond that six acres and the impetus for doing so is to create success in the rest of the the shopping center I'd also like to point out that even if we had a dastardly plan to make everything Apartments we couldn't because we don't own the Target Center the target parcel so we would have to develop around it more importantly Target would not have agreed and signed on to this application if they believed this was somehow working toward their demise but you mentioned a word that's a a trigger word and something that I should have addressed earlier and that is the idea that this is lowincome housing I heard the term Section 8 thrown out there uh I've heard Workforce I want to be clear this is a market driven project this is market rate development now the sizes of the units obviously allow for a variety of people to take advantage of the fact that this is is being developed this new housing but it's not being subsidized in any way shape or form and not intended as such thank you anybody want thank you yeah John could could I address something with you please um how long have you been doing developmental Services uh mayor council member I've been in Fountain Hills for almost 5 years total experience is over 40 over 40 years yes so would you consider yourself an expert most days uh something I'd like to address is um the parking situation um that's another concern that a lot of our citizens have had that um this is out of zoning normal regulations and that um there's something unored about this does this project have adequate parking or does it not mayor council member some of that was contained my presentation earlier I can go back to that if you'd like but maybe taking a little different approach to it this time as I've heard this comment I think at least at the planning zoning Commission meeting and maybe not specifically here but we did recently update our parking ordinance the council approv that a couple of months ago which includes our standard uh minimum parking requirements uh for development and in doing so uh we kept at that time the standard we've had for a number of years in terms of number of of spaces for the one bedroom two bedroom and so forth as part of updating that ordinance I looked at aot lot of other ordinances from across the country and I saw where they were going many uh communities are starting to actually eliminate parking requirements for this type of development and let them let the market determine how many they should have but in doing so I saw that that what our uh requirements were were uh middle of the road to the high end of what most communities require uh for parking but it served the community well and for most development that happens here it's typically a smaller type development uh as we've seen recently the logo or the Gunsite apartment uh type development and it works well for that but it's not necessarily geared to a complex of this size and when you get a larger uh project such as this you get a lot more variety in the types of renters uh get more of the uh the single uh person type household I think we talked about and expect this to be uh the empty Nestor and the young professional type primarily and as we reviewed uh some national statistics and even some local ones on how many cars people actually had U that was what was uh in the report that uh one per uh unit is fairly common and so with those numbers uh I feel like this is going to be adequately parked and if there does haveen be any overflow uh that there would be space in in the Target lot that those people could go on the as needed basis so I take it you don't anticipate really any overflow based on the national St statistics and the type of person that's going to be living in that unit those units mayor council that's correct one other thing I I I failed to mention is we've looked at this also the two other examples that we include both Parkplace and uh the pillar development which were approved with lower than our normal standard uh they have not had any issues with parking those places there's adequate parking uh at both locations okay good and I would like to point out that in Parkplace the Overflow parking is in Municipal parking spots correct that's some of what helps meet their their requirement yes right and in in this case um and I know again one of the allegations out there has been they there's no parking agreement and with the target people and um the people are not telling us the truth or there's misinformation and I'd like to address that I have a copy of the parking agreement that was signed by Target and I can substantially identify that as an authentic document and so that has been taken care of if there was any overflow parking in this case it wouldn't be on Municipal grounds would it that is correct the technology is posted as no parking and certainly wouldn't park on Shay so the Target parking lot would be the place if if there is any overflow that's where we need to go okay thank you John I have a question um the general plan's been brought up a lot tonight yes I've gone through that General plan several times and I don't ever remember seeing anything specifically addressing high density housing down in that Target Center um can you comment on that uh mayor council member Fel uh there is a provision in the character area descriptions for the Shay Corridor and it's the language that was included uh in presentation comes directly from that page of the plan um let's see where uh yes these these statements come directly from that uh page of the plan and that says creating an integrated mixed use environment now I could see that down in town with Park Place but this is a little bit different it's kind of set far away from the downtown area I don't agree with the fact that it's walkable walkable to to what Target great that doesn't that doesn't resonate with me and then um I had a question about attracting families to this uh this project um we only have what a little over a dozen three-bedroom apartments I don't know too many families that are going to be raising a one or two-bedroom apartment maybe the applicant would want to comment on that sure mayor council member him come up Just moment but this slide takes what's in their proposal for what their target is and it's young professionals empty nesters and those that want to lock and leave a lifestyle while some families might come uh that's not really their target mayor council okay so getting to the attracting families to this project um you have a very limited number of three-bedroom apartments which typically would be housing families um I don't see many families in one maybe two-bedroom but um you don't have enough in my mind enough three-bedroom apartments in this project to attract families um and then what other uses are down there for families now I know you're going to have a pool but is there a playground area is there anything family oriented down there um and then get into the walkability of where are they going to walk to down there versus um the Parkplace development which is down in our town they can walk to the lake they can walk to the some of the schools in the area and library and the museum and the soon to be uh dark sky Discovery Center if you could comment on that thank you mayor councilman uh few different thoughts on that first of all in terms of the number of three-bedroom units uh what we're being allowed to do if this application is approved this evening is a maximum number of units if during the time of planning when we get into engineering when we get closer to actually breaking ground we feel that there's a a demand um for larger units we can convert some of the smaller units to larger units and actually the density will drop so that is one option secondly it also depends upon how you define families I mean uh whether the family includes a child or not is also optional uh it could be just couples because couples are a family as well lastly as we look at the amenities for this area um because you had a question about what amenities would be available and whe whether we were contemplating uh doing active amenities for children uh I point out that a typical home if it was a single family home may have a backyard they may or may not have a pool uh they may or may not have a spa we will have those amenities we will have open space with active and passive amenities so whether it's a parkour surrounding the area we haven't programmed those because we don't know our tenant mix and we also don't know what our approvals ultimately will look like but we've reserved two or three open space areas to be programmed within the community itself and that programming if Justified could include a playet we've already no ified or identified one of our Open Spaces as a dog park area and so it very well could have a children's amenity if we find that those are the tenants who take interest in this because you have to remember when you develop these first of all there's a period of time between Council approval as as Mr Shay pointed out and actually breaking ground once you break ground there is a lead time on construction during which you will pre-lease and if during that preas release period you find that your demographic is something that you weren't expecting or there's a better amenity for that demographic we still have the ability to make those changes lastly you had asked about the walkability of this project and the answer to that I think lies in other projects that are similar to this and I'll give you just a a few answers uh one Scottdale rod and Thunderbird where we've done precisely the same thing with a shopping center that was too large for modern-day shopping needs it was housing a church and the idea was what could keep this shopping center viable long term so they chose the city of Scottdale actually it's on the Phoenix side of Scottdale Road uh the City of Phoenix in that instance allowed a multif family development to save that shopping center and if we look at what surrounds that shopping center it's the Air Park so you've got the air park on the east side of Scottdale Road you have some stores and then you have have neighborhoods and businesses in the area very similar to what we're talking about here in that there's no immediate large Park but Urban dwellers and what we're finding more and more whether it's Scottdale Road and mcdal where we did exactly the same thing in the city of Scottdale or Scottdale Road in Thunderbird or in Chandler they're not looking to be on the the Town Square and have a 40 acre Park immediate adjacent to them but if they do it's fantastic what they're looking for is activity and that activity may take the form of being in the middle of a shopping center we also have other retail at that intersection so not just the the four Peak Center but in addition a short walk from there you have access to Trails so it's not impossible to think that of this as a very walkable mixed use can can you give us any any kind of assurance that Target is going to stick around what what's your plan for that that parcel that development if uh in two years you get ready to build and Target is packing up and they're leaving what happen what happens then and I let me finish one one more Point um do you have any kind of a agreement with Target to to move them out at any point mayor councilman I'll answer the latter part of that no we do not there is in fact I'll go a step further not only is there no agreement to move them out there is no ability legally despite the zoning regardless of the zoning to do Residential on any other portion of this property because it is still under the deed restrictions that don't permit residential it is only on this portion of the property uh that Target has permitted residential so quite the contrary there will no there will be no no more ability to do that unless Target agrees moreover what we can guarantee because as I mentioned this is a shopping center owner this is not a a residential developer what we can guarantee and what is a as close to an absolute as possible is without this target will leave can I promise that Target will stay forever if this is built no because Target will do what Target wants to do but we will we are assured that the reason they are staying the reason they are working with us and working with the town to make this happen is so they can stay and so that they can be more successful one final question um you mentioned that you don't know your tenant mix is there any possible um taking another look at the density on this on this project and coming up with something that would fall a little bit more in line with what our uh ordinance calls for um mayor councilman these are all good questions and these are thoughtful questions so I appreciate them and I I want to make sure the council understands this wasn't our first blush this we didn't just throw together an application to see if this would work or to see if this could happen this is something that has before we even thought of applying there were years of plans and thoughts about how to save this Center that led to a multif family component in choosing the multif family there are basically three different types of multif family you could look at we could have looked at a garden style Garden style buildings are typically three story walk-ups I'm sure you're familiar with them I lived in enough of them and they're surface parked so they'll have some carports and three-story buildings and that's that's typically like 22 units to the acre somewhere between 18 and 22 units to the acre and then there are Podium projects Podium projects aren't wrapped around a parking structure those have a parking structure that sit underneath them and they're built on top of them those are typically taller buildings and more dense because the cost of that type of construction is is higher a wrap the type that's being proposed here this is actually on the low end of the size the density for a wrap because wrap buildings are higher quality because you're building a parking structure which is expensive but it's better looking but it needs that just the the density to justify building this type of project and it works well on a site like this that's an odd shape where you've only got six acres on six acres you really can't do garden Style so you're looking at either Podium or wrap and a wrap is less dense the other thing I'd like to answer because you you've brought up density and and how that works almost every other jurisdiction that we've worked in when we do this type of mixed use considers the entire site to be a mixed use if we were to consider our entire site as a mixed use we would actually be well within your density limits uh under the low end of those it just so happens that our density is only calculated on the small portion that we're building on rather than the shopping center which is really truly how this works if it was calculated on the the shopping center it would be closer to 12 units to the acre but because we're talking about just that piece in this instance the density is higher I um sorry Brenda I want to ask um probably Aaron I think a question and has to do with with the tools that are available to any developer or any applicant to most cities and towns if they are requesting something that's outside of the existing zoning ordinance so when a city in a town or a town creates their zoning ordinance they create the tools for applicants to ask to go be outside of those boundaries is that is that a fair statement uh mayor and councel that is correct um essentially any as the applicant's attorney put it any modern zoning code is going to have a provision which ours does for something that's either pad PUD PUD is a little bit outdated nowadays but a planned area development or for some other form of rezoning whereby an applicant can say we're requesting something that's specifically or something specific that is a deviation in some form or fashion whether height density setbacks from your existing zoning ordinance um our ordinance does indeed have that process in place and that's the process the developer has chosen to um apply for and utilize here tonight um so the idea that it's not that it's it's uh saying our ordinances aren't good or that we're going around them or we're breaking the rules we're actually following rules that are written in our zoning ordinance to give applicants an opportunity to say look this you know and we've seen it a million times um because there's other sometimes our ordinances uh the hillside Ordnance for example which you know is great and I'm really glad we have it but sometimes we we make a build or do something that makes makes it look worse so you know it's worth having these tools and the other part of that question is though we have the tools to request variances or changes why would that mean that the applicant owes us some sort of reward or um you know there seemed to be some idea that we should be getting some sort of a deal out of this and I actually question the legality of that but I also qu question why if they're following our rules and are just asking us do we want to allow this change why would that mean that we would require some some kind of a reward um so mayor I actually have a a couple of thoughts in response to that if if you'll allow me if the council allow me um the typically when there's some sort of bargain for consideration at I give this and you get that and vice versa you're going to do that in the form of a development agreement which is possible Right In in virtually any circumstance whether it's desirable in a given CC circumstances a different story and Mr Morris does a lot more work in this area than I do but my experience with this is okay if you're looking for some a project that's going to happen with phase development or where there's roadway or infrastructure that's going to be deeded to the town or where there's necessary additional assurances or bonding that's going to need to be given that's when you would enter into a development agreement but it is by no means a requirement or even necessarily all that common for them to happen in every instance and indeed we've done plenty of rezoning requests granted plenty of rezoning requests that aren't accompanied by a development agreement and the last point that I'll make mayor is even when you do have a DA rezonings don't happen via a DA they're a companion right you have a companion rezone with a development agreement so either way if you're changing building standards if you're changing height if you're changing setbacks you're going to be getting a companion one one way or another so this application is is not out of the ordinary from a legal perspective if if that answers the question okay thank you Mr Mayor um my last questions and I promise I'll be brief to director Jacobs could you please come back yeah you're still under oath oh under [Laughter] oath um council member no right hand yeah thank you very much um I just wanted to drill down just on a couple things that were mentioned recently um as far as walkability is concerned um I'd like to just make a short statement and then I'd like for you to um describe to the the audience and to the council about vertical versus horizontal um multi-use agreements um but before I do that um as far as the walkability is concerned if you were to purchase or to lease an apartment from here the way I look at it um it's walkable to go to Target of course um that's a general retail store and it's also got a grocery store and so you've also got a grocery store and a retail store um you got two restaurants you got Denny's um streets of New York we got a clothing store a dollar store and you mentioned we might even have a walg grains um if if they're induced to come back so it seems it seems like you could live here without a car survive and walk everywhere you need to go um to survive and of course there's the Amazon option too but could you describe the what I just asked you Madame mayor council member calan OAS I think you described it for me can say and can say yes that is true um so walkability again from the proposed Apartments to Target pedestrian Pathways we have sidewalks along sheay so again if you you choose to walk and want to grab a bite at the Denny's if the Walgreens were to reopen or be redeveloped um of course you can walk that's walkability um through sidewalks um or again through The Pedestrian Pathways um that the applicant um and director Welsley described and then as far as unless you wanted to clarify more about um the mixed use and the vertical and horizontal so again as Mr mois said looking at the whole shopping center and again you really are looking at this one um particular area um but I like to look at the whole shopping center again in Economic Development future uh thinking and so this is a mix of uses having residential so the population feed leading into the commercial and so what I meant to about horizontal and again being native to to Arizona and you guys know from the Southern Arizona um we appreciate the the mountain views so you would see a lot of the the horizontal the shopping maybe then a mixed use of apartments and so mixed use again if you're from La if you're from Chicago from New York you may be used to what you're seeing at Parkplace um and again if you've just moved here you're used to it can just be residential to the top and commercial on the bottom that too could be different you could put apartments on the bottom you could put a major employer on top again there's there's a variety of uses and and of course you want to look at market demand um as again professional staff has um and the applicant with the proposed um project yeah and thank you and and I think that's precisely it I think people think more of Parkplace and the traditional uh retail on the bottom and housing on the top but there's also another model that I think were entertaining here and so thank thank you for Illuminating that because I think a lot of people they just don't understand and and so they say that well this can't be a mixed use um it actually can if it if you consider it horizontal not vertical um lastly and this will be my last question is there there was some confusion as to you know does this meet the needs and demands of our general plan and and could could you again just Enlighten us on how this has a symbiotic relationship with the general plan of Fountain Hills so Madame mayor council member calanis again Mr um Wesley director Wesley pointed those out um with the housing again a div diverse mix of uses um being attractive I don't have all of of of the verbage um but it ties into that it ties into our strategic plan and then of course all those documents fed into working on for over a year our community Economic Development strategy so it's it is all in alignment thank you you're very welcome may be seated by was standing so um did anybody have any other comments or questions I did sorry I thought she was looking at me I'm sorry mad mayor um if I could ask the applicant's attorney a quick clarifying question it should be fast um I just saw a couple eyebrows raay when you were commenting earlier you had mentioned that there was the possibility of filling the retail area with maybe lower quality business owners and I just saw a couple questions it seemed like so I wanted to give you the opportunity to expand on that what would the what would an example be and don't say a business name I'm not trying to get you in trouble but what would be an example of a type of business that was a lower quality or however that was worded um that was denied the ability to be in there as an example of looking out for us thank you mayor council member I should point out that they do not want lower quality tenants and they do not want less desirable tenants and when we talk about that their business model is creditworthy National Credit tenants because that's the best tenants you can have it makes the shopping center more valuable these are typically tenants that pay the best rents and are more importantly more reliable you don't get the turnover with a a national credit tenant when you don't have the ability to draw a national credit tenant and you have vacancy and without mentioning the types of businesses or certainly not business names all I can ask you to do is think about arterial roadways that you have driven down where there is no National tenant there's no brand in that shopping center what do you typically see you'll see some Services you may see some uh I I I'll call them non non-charter financial institutions uh you'll see various businesses that may not be National they may be and and they may be struggling local businesses who deserve a shot at being in a shopping center with other National tenants but by and large you find businesses that don't necessarily add value to the shopping center or the community and I I don't want to disparage any industry I'll just say you've probably seen them okay thank you so much for that clarification um piggybacking off that with the national credit of the businesses that are currently there what would be the best descriptor for why preo we had some issues trying to get retail or any industry in there mayor council member I I think most people in the retail industry will tell you co didn't cause and hopefully I didn't point out CO as a cause for this because Co didn't cause the vacancies Co contributed to them and Co to a large extent was the nail in the coffin of a retail industry that was already going in a certain direction preco if you looked at the size of a just to pick a business Best Buy versus what Best Buy really needs today by virtue of the online business that they do it was already trending in a direction where the United States had more per capita retail space than any other Nation on Earth and if you looked at the west in the United States versus the East we had more per capita retail space than the East and if you look at Arizona and then you you drill down to the Valley you saw that our per capita retail space was far in excess of national averages but more importantly what was deemed now necessary based upon how many different shopping options we had that maybe weren't available 20 years ago so Co didn't cause this but Co just cemented the Comfort level of not going to a store so it really was the demise of a lot of uses so what's happened what have we seen we've seen now retail come back because new retail is being built smaller and the retail spaces that exist are largely being taken by experiences experiential Services Fitness things that you cannot click a button and have to deliver to your door so restaurants the types of things that you're seeing centered um or shopping centers built around are those type of uses with a contributing factor of having a residential component so I I think I've shared with you some of the other projects that I've worked on uh those projects when redeveloped whether it's a shopping center at you know Osborne and 7th Avenue that's now a new sprouts and uh a residential component and it was just a large strip center when I look at uh what was across from laros Mall papao Plaza and it's now a residential Community much like this and Sprouts is going in and you're getting different retail they're new retailers but it's heavily skewed towards restaurants spa services uh quasi medical and medical and then the ability to do Services uh along with retailers that you typically won't be able to find easily on the internet so handmade Goods uh unique Services unique soft and hard Goods which is really the hope and the light at the end of the tunnel for what we're doing today well thank you so much for those clarifications I had one final question and you know what it left my brain so I guess I'll pass over to councilman skill cour until I remember mayor council member that's my strategy I knew if I talk along enough thank you madam mayor uh so I really believe the process matters on this um so there's a couple questions that I kind of want to let ask us and staff um you know I'm concerned curious because this obviously is a hearing you know has anyone on this Council been lobbied or had exp parte conversations with sandor I mean I I'd actually like the camera open angle opened up so we can see I mean go let's go down the row have have you been lobbied or had expar I have I have the accusation to make and I'm just I'm just curious this hearing is over because I I the hearing is over I'm just I think the public has the right to know if anyone's had xar conversations with the sandar can we go down can we go down the row no we're not doing that you are you going to refuse the public from this saying this is there anyone here want us to is there anyone here who's taken campaign campaign cash from sandor oh my gosh let's I would like I would like the people of the town to know we don't believe in trans we're going to rush this through process to be damned and we're not going to answer questions like this process I mean we're we're watching this through we don't know that and we having no transparency here is this the process we want in this town council member I object to your and I'm going to use this word vulgar accusations they're inappropriate you have no proof of that that I know of and I this is not a hearing any longer you know maybe it's you that's doing that since you're making the accusations how does it feel well someone here asked me to recuse myself so I'm I'm curious if some anyone else here this is so inappropriate for what's happening right now I'm asking you to not to just not continue with it so is that is that you're saying that you're against transparency speak please not speak until you recognize Aaron yeah mayor I understand the councilman's question seems like that that we've he's made his point and the council's not we're not going to entertain the discussion mayor I would suggest that we move [Music] on thank you vice mayor I don't have any questions I'm ready to move on with comments or whatever else we want to do if there's no other questions from anybody else I'd like to make a motion to table so we can go to Executive session um I would like to make a comment and thank you I firstly I would like to say thank you for everybody for your public comments I would like to thank staff and sandor for their very very informative presentations you have really addressed a lot of my questions I would also like to ask to thank mayor and councel for their inform their intuitive questions as well so I'm not going to reiterate them because they have answered my questions and what I've heard tonight is most everybody has said that this is a failed retail Center it has major deed restrictions on what can be there but we need to do something about it and in addition this is happening on the local and the national levels it's not just happening in Fountain Hills nationally um federally efforts are being made to encourage through financial incentives converting these vacant commercial centers to reson them for residential use to provide new housing opportunities for our communities in addition this is happening right now at our state level as well representative Ortez just introduced legislative bill number 2997 that mirrors this type of change in commercial zoning the bill when passed will make it easier to make zoning changes on these dormant properties and convert empty commercial buildings into mixed use for residential purposes as stated tonight this is in our strategic and general plan this has already been planned for in general for the Shay Corridor in addition as Amanda stated this is a financial opportunity for the town and it is going to provide much needed housing taking all of this into consideration I can't help but support this I think sandor has presented a very welldeveloped presentation and I am for the resoning and when it's appropriate I'd like to make a motion to approve this as stated in the agenda thank you uh okay and I know that uh the vice mayor has some um just comments not questions right is that what you say that was my point was I just didn't want to go on until we were sure there was no other questions okay uh Council okay and I'd like to say a few things too but okay uh vice mayor first thank you guys for coming I appreciate those of you that came and spoke I appreciate the written public comments that we had which was a whole lot I already forgot how many it was um one of my pet peeves sitting up here is everybody has an opinion but you're not letting us know where you stand and then you give us crap when we get off the deis because we didn't agree with whatever your magical thought in your head was we need you to speak up we need more of this we need more of the spoken we need more of the written I appreciate it one of the things that I did not hear today and I really appreciate it because there was a crap ton of it on social media and online nobody used the term those people or r rph and I totally appreciate that because honestly many of us started out as Ren Runners and some of us are actually Runners now what I am going to ask you in your head and those people watching at home that I know have used the term those people because it was used for Daybreak it was used for the Mountainside property take a second and think about how you define Riff Raff or how you define those people good news our reputation precedes us and they don't want to live here they don't want to live with us to them we are those people to them we are rwas and I will only tell you what the RW stands for you can Urban Dictionary the a the RW is Rich and white which a lot of people online are going to be happy with because of some of the really horrible comments we've all read um let's not forget no matter where you live or how much you spent on your house you never actually know who your neighbor is there are currently six sex offenders registered in Fountain Hills four are a level two which is a moderate risk of reoffending and two are a level three which is a high risk of committing another sex crime there are 58 people with warrants that use Fountain Hills as their residential address I reviews reviewed 25 of those 64 people and none of them gave apartment addresses for our pillar Parkplace or Four Peaks communities our Town's character is already defined we're just trying to give people a choice in their housing type while we get rid of some of the commercial vacancies which everybody agrees we have too many of I've spoken with people that currently rent or have rented in pillar fountains Peak F Four Peaks Parkplace and lunar Apartments my very informal survey of over two-year apartment residents say that their complexes average age reflects that of the town's average age and the character or vibe that their complex gives off is identical to that of the Town my personal experience in pillar in one and a half years is very similar to what I just told you there many of us in pillar have sold our homes here in Fountain Hills and have downside and most of my neighbors are full-time residents not everyone wants a 3500t home home not everyone wants to spend a million dollars on a house not everyone wants to buy some of us like that close the door and leave the house without any worries kind of lifestyle that my husband and I have just recently gone to this complex that we're talking about allows people Market priced apartment living notice that I said Market priced I didn't use the word affordable because I've read your Facebook posts and I know you automatically he here lowincome in Section 8 when somebody uses the word affordable that's not what we're talking about here according to zumper.com as of December 2023 the median rent for all bedroom counts and property types in Fountain Hills is 36% higher than that of the national average side note I have been informed that we do have some people that own houses that accept Section 8 for tenants just letting you know it's already out there you already know a lot of people that will live there people that want to sell their home in downsize the teachers in our schools our new fire women and men your kids and your grandkids I'd be negligent if I didn't remind you that we have business owners in town that don't live here that would like to live here and this might give them an opportunity to do so I'd like to address some of the concerns that I've heard over the past couple of months traffic a full capacity strip mall brings more traffic than an at capacity apartment complex during a 2-hour car count on my side of the pillar complex which is 92 units there were a total of 51 cars and six Walkers when I'm stopped at the stoplight to leave Target there's generally at least four cars that are there with me if you factor in a two-minute light cycle which I'm guessing and I didn't actually time it that's about 120 cars per hour and the Mall isn't fully occupied density one of the complaints that I've heard about this that we heard about Daybreak and that we heard about or actually one of the complaints that I've heard about Daybreak at Mountainside was that the property was too dense in that area for the single family homes that were around it those kinds of complexes should be downtown is what I was told about Daybreak and Mountainside with this layout with commercial on the East and residential on the west you're creating a downtown type environment and allowing them to walk to shopping in restaurants yes even in 110° in pillar I walk to the chamber I walk to American Grill yes 110 degrees I'm outside for eight minutes it doesn't kill you walkability is subjective a reminder actually I believe the councilwoman already mentioned that we've got grocery inside of Target so you've got grocery you've got shopping there's restaurants and I know a gal that if this goes through she's got a very unique business that she would like to propose to the owners which I'm not going to mention because I don't want to spoil the fund for her but walkability is subjective one of the comments was loss of views they've gone to Great Links to make sure that we don't block the views from your home and they had some great uh Artistry work on that too many apartments is one of the complaints I've seen on social media as well our apartment vacancy rate is less than 10% now I think it's like 5 or 7% you may think that apartment management companies want consistent at capacity housing but that's not so I understand they prefer an 88 to 90% occupancy as a good number it allows for showings immediate movings and allows them to switch out a dishwasher for an existing tenant instead of making that tenant wait two to four weeks to for a new one to arrive because you know that'll drive to Home Depot and get a dishwasher they go through their people and that always takes a couple weeks to happen adding this to our diverse housing will not flood the market and there's no worry about having too many rental units we've heard that we heard that from Mr sha when he spoke earlier and we've seen that in an email that we all received from a formal council member as well and one more thing I'd like to say is we lose relevance if we don't change with the times and I think this complex allows us the opportunity to change with the times thank you mayor thank you mayor um I just want to make a brief statement uh I want to thank all the residents who came to the meeting tonight it's great to see all this community involvement and hear both sides of this and all the comments so again um I I appreciate that I also want to start by saying I I really like the project uh it looks great uh the reason it's coming to this council is because it doesn't fit within the the town's current zoning code and not just by a little bit but by quite a bit um that 30 plus increase in density also creates a a parking shortage whether it's addressed or not with an agreement through Target um who knows and who knows where these people will end up parking uh it may not be at the Target store so that's a concern that I have I also want to note that our Planning and Zoning commission denied this request when it came before them earlier this month for some of the same reasons I'm I mentioned here I understand that our exist existing apartment complexes are doing well and have excellent OCC occupancy rates and that's great we currently have over 300 more Apartments uh in projects approved already by this by this town so how many nobody has said how many apartments are adequate for this town we still don't know that number um you know including uh Park Place which hasn't been completed yet so we're waiting on that as well listen Chang is an evid we all know that and it must be done clearly measured and to the benefit of all our 2020 General plan adopted by the town and its residence by a vote was put in place to help us monitor this change and and for the protection of our residents and the town to maintain that special and unique character which was mentioned in the book that was written on the history of this town when um Mr Mulla originally started this town he said this town is unique and the character is uh going to be different different we he set this town up to attract people here from metropolitan areas so my concern with this density is that we're going to become another one of those metropolitan areas like Scottdale or or something like that so again I want to State I would not be opposed to this development at Fort Peaks Plaza if it fit within our Town's zoning ordinance developers overbuilt that retail space probably some 20 plus years ago in fact I was cleaning out my car I found the original newspaper article uh where it says Target Target was tabled again so they had questions when that was put into place that's 23 years old how I had this I don't know uh but it just it just so happened that I that I found that in my car so again there were questions it was in a box with my jumper cables but anyway um there were questions when that was built there's questions with this one being built right now too so um my my point is um I guess I don't want us to create another problem let's make sure we do this the right way so um and within our codes so I will I will be a no vote on this proposal as written um and follow the recommendation of our Planning and Zoning uh commission uh that doesn't mean it can't come back if it doesn't if it doesn't fly but that's that's all I have to say thank you mayor yes counc thank thank you Mr Mayor I I'll just make a very brief statement I had written a very inspirational and eloquent close to tonight but I think um that's all been done by the citizens of our town and by the presentations here tonight so I'm going to save everybody my presentation um I I would like to state that um Mr skillcorn and his accusations are basically slander they're in a public forum and he does a discredit to to this entire Council by making empty allegations um as far if I'm keeping my facts straight the only one currently under ethics investigation is you um but back to the project I don't want to beat a dead horse because if I were to sit here and pontificate that's what they would accuse me of so tomorrow on Facebook they would say not only with the people be against me but then I'd had the anal rights people against me too so I'm going to keep it short and uh I'd like to Second uh Peggy's motion to go to vote thank you it um I do have a couple things to say as um I know that some of you may have lived here longer than I but not many 40 years I know that uh yes I know some have not many so what I want to address first is uh this two things the the redefining of the community by people that haven't been here for 40 years and um the policy plans that we've talked about quite a bit tonight I'm going to start with the most obvious one which is the general plan they just brought that up 2020 you've already heard verbatim why this project perfectly aligns with it overbuilt retail areas need to be redeveloped we need multi residential development that is geared to creating an integrated en mixed use environment but maybe people are under the impression that the general plan is just some kind of top down unrealistic document that's on a shelf someplace because that's what um you know or that is not actually being used but in fact a general plan does guide the town like Jerry said uh staff and making decisions as the town continues to grow and experience changes it's the foundation used in establishing zoning regulations zoning regulations that include the tools to ask for uh consideration to go outside those zoning regulations they're there for that reason develop our strategic plan create Capital Improvement amend the town code and and also it's a good thing to have if you want to go for Grants yet not only is it a good thing to have though the Arizona law requires that we have a general plan and it needs to be updated every 10 years so the and the plan the state says the plan has to include land use circulation open space growth environment and such but it also might may include Economic Development and housing which ours does so I just found this in my cartoon no um but this is a list of the people that were involved with our uh General plan um directly involved 2020 you probably can't see it but plenty more and a lot of um of meetings um that we had had and so there was a lot of input not only into uh the general plan but also it was ultimately approved by the council and put before the voters in 2020 and much like the Target Center which was approved twice your newspaper um by two to one margins because it was a zone change and it was a general plan change so it went and then the voters so it's put to the voters and it was approved 2 to one in 1998 and uh the general plan passed with 71% of the vote so it's kind of a similar margin there um as an aside um when when they were talking about Target the town agreed to split the sales tax with them um up to about I think it was like it was $900 something thousand so like a million dollars and that was supposed to be a 10year plan but they met the million dollar threshold in five so we've been collecting 100% of the sales tax ever since uh whenever that was uh 2004 or 5 next the Strategic plan so this strategic plan that was in existence at the time when the general plan was voter approved um and is imp is is part of the general plan includes this quote increase population and residential densities to sustain existing and future commercial businesses in town by a rezoning underuse underutilized commercial property to residential where feasible and as opportunities to do so present themselves B allowing residential uses on commercially zoned properties as appropriate and beneficial to support commercial activity and that character area and C rezoning unplanted land for greater density and affordable family housing that was in the uh strategic plan which obviously Council approved was part of the general plan approved by voters similarly Vision Fountain Hills which was a work product of f fhca many many volunteers lots of meetings put forth the goal of attracting younger families in intergenerational community so last and most recent the economic development plan was adopted 70 as you've heard last September after the presentation when Amanda said we would be pursuing re Redevelopment of the Target Center specifically collaborating with owners everybody there was very supportive of the plan I read the minutes last night and happy that it wasn't just a plan but there was going to be action not one person including this Council or public members here now or who may have been there then objected to this particular goal that I just mentioned there were some um you know some people that were did not like if we did more administrative changes or things like that there were little things people liked and didn't like not one person had an issue with this housing part of it um and working with sheay um and again collaborating with the property owner of Four Peaks Plaza just like she has or that like she said in her presentation and it also included this phrase diversify housing opportunities within Fountain Hills by pursuing multif family and Workhorse Workforce Workforce housing developments with amenities that are desired by a younger professional that was written down it was in that Matrix of the implementation of the economic development plan um the idea that this tonight is somehow a surprise I look back on my last two states of the town I've mentioned Shay redeveloping of Shay twice so not even just last January the January before so the idea that it's underhanded or secret or we're getting money for it or it's ill conceived does not jive with the history or or with reality but I do want to talk a little bit about history because there's a lot of talk presuming what this town how to define it why why you all know how why I moved here or we all know why each other moved here um views desert Beauty the things that we all know obviously that's why uh you know those are going to come to mind but it's quite a leap to say that we were escaping you know Urban nightmares or something like that I understand you know the fact that we even were formed was because President Kennedy at the time said we want to make one it was supposed to be 100,000 populations but we want 100 cities it's called The 100 cities thing and they grabbed it Mulla and came out but the idea that it was an escape I mean I moved here from New Hampshire so it wasn't like the urban uh you know nightmare um one resident said no one has actually two said no one has a right to live here people earn the right by being very productive in their lives so with you know police firefighters teachers nurses are saying that they're not productive enough in their lives another said we should promote condos to bring a better class of people here some went further and I know we said about going there but some did go further talk about party affiliation and race they so when I moved here 83 We Were Young obviously not yet very productive you know in our 20s we were not wealthy we weren't white and I do I will give you this I was Republican so but we lived in several places in town and I've rented in several places in town my family likes going to Target they've always liked going to Target I don't think it was a mistake 20 plus years of shopping and we had a Ross so we had the Pier One Petco still there so on meetings at Starbucks even going to Blockbuster remember that so those are Memories the memories in our lives to say that today is a proof that something TW that's in been in existence and still exists for 22 years is a mistake I'm sorry many people had jobs there people have jobs there now excuse me some people were going through hardships they had jobs there help them go through some illnesses help you get through a divorce no one's going to convince me that bringing my kids and their friends at the time or my grandkids now down to Target during the holidays is all for not because a mistake was made by the populace who voted it in twice in 1998 I'm proud we voted that I'm proud of the council at the time that made that decision even though an email that we got called them all kinds of ignorant name names that they were ignorant to do so I think it was a a great decision and I would just like to say that I think there's been plenty presented here to indicate a very thorough a very responsive process one with careful experienced staff who participated and made recommendations in order to support moving ahead this is a business a school and a community-friendly multi-million dollar investment in the town Fountain Hills and I think we should support it any other comments or questions I think yes ma'am thank you mayor I know we have a motion on the table I started out with this much to say ended up with this much to say realized we'd all want to go home before midnight tonight if possible so I scratched most of it out so bear with me if it's a little disjointed um first and foremost I want to make it extraordinarily clear that I have not been bullied politically pressured or otherwise unethically swayed in my decision making I will also make it clear I have neither the impression nor suspicion that the ear earlier accusations are based based in reality uh if the former is a rumor being spread I would highly encourage the spreader of said rumor to learn a very important difference between voters holding someone accountable toward uh for their own words and bullying or political pressure I've heard that language before in other issues and it just perked my ears when it came up today that I think there's a huge difference between a voter saying you said you'd stand a certain way on issues like this and now you're not what's going on and something that would be considered unethical um moving on from that I when we first heard about this project I was so excited that we're finally looking at new ideas for the area I think I don't quite have our mayor's record I'm at 25 years but we're get in there um in my defense I wasn't born yet but but this has been an area that's needed to be looked at since as far as I can remember which which wasn't too La into its life this development and I were born in the same year um um I for one would very much like somewhere to live in town um full disclosure I know what it's like to be a young professional I am one I have $300 to my name and 200 of it is because the council paid me today um I'm I'm well aware what that struggle is like and I'm well aware what it's like right now to be looking for places to rent in town I'm fortunate to have somewhere to stay in town and I also recognize that I'm in a unique position where I need to stay in town I'm on the council and so my original understanding of this issue was that heck yeah where do I sign let me live here but my perspective was broadened um specifically from people that I know that currently live in Scottdale and are concerned about the overdevelopment in that area I have a friend from Florida that experienced that in her small town near Tampa Bay and under understanding that yes there is the question of if we get a business then where would they live but even more so if we get Apartments where will they work if we're trying to get this cycle going as a town as a community where we have young professionals moving in and staying here in town people are willing to commute we're very close to Scottdale we're very close to Mesa there are apartment options and there's some here in town I've been looking at them um some are already aware I've been touring some homes and hoping to find somewhere within the community to live with a friend of mine but without getting too long too LA on this rant I felt as though I owed everyone an explanation for why I'm voting the way that I am and it's out of concern for this town and out of the long-term vision of what this community needs to be which is welcoming to Young professionals and able to provide the opportunity that gives them a reason to stay at the moment if we don't have jobs that pay so that people can afford the rent which is more expensive then we can't guarantee a thriving Community until that problem is solved okay thank you so um is that it all right well we have a motion and a second on the table could we get a roll call please just to clarify the motion is approve as written correct thank you council member fidell no council member skillcorn permission to explain my vote so a couple hours ago I asked the attorney if this was a quasi judicial uh hearing or if it was legislative and it really didn't get an answer on that so I did look it up you know and I see here K issue has a do with sight specific zoning uh this is something that is definitely sight specific it doesn't comply to the zoning and there's a specific application uh for zoning so it sounds like it is quas profession quasa judicial uh I see here the definition of that is the council members have to act as judges rather than legislators uh so some of the questions I had had very much Merit and I'm just I'm not making any accus ations I'm just asking serious questions that would have to matter in a quasi judicial setting uh a couple people like to th accusations back at me that's fine but that's not how I play I'm just asking serious questions I wanted more transparency I think this process has flawed I think this has moved way too fast uh I'm concerned that planning zoning voted this down and yet here we are trying to push it through uh so that that's my thoughts on that and I'm a no council member calav anakis I would be a yes council member man yes council member to no vice mayor gzowski yes mayor dicki I it passes 4 to three thank you very [Applause] much please um yes do you want to break oh thank you this next item is related uh do you do you want a break or I I'd rather keep going if you if you may as you know this item is related um Rach may maybe just give it a minute while people vacate yeah just a suggestion I got a little late I'll see y tomorrow I e we like to get going if we can please we have three more items spe Alan Alan said he can't let's go guys Alan said he can't speak to me have to speak the mayor says we're rolling yep um all right thanks everybody um mayor our next item um as you know is a is kind of a um it's regarding the same space but it is a separate item our senior planner farad is going to be presenting that item for us tonight all right so uh uh good evening uh Madame mayor uh council members so as uh John said uh in the very beginning of his presentation um there are two separate distinct pad requests associated with the Four Peaks Plaza first one quite obviously was uh in regards to the proposed Apartments this one is in regards to well I should say the scope includes the target owned parcel as well as the um as well well as the parcel do we have order please guys we're trying to get work done here it's late right okay oh no it's okay just want to make sure when the time's right um so the uh the scope as I was saying includes the target owned parcel and actually you don't see the uh um the uh parcel boundaries here but the target owned parcel is generally right here and immediately to the east is uh another uh property owned by sandor and um uh the spaces are tenant occupied so this is as I mentioned a separate uh pad request uh entitled a Four Peaks Plaza uh what the applicant is proposing to do is to rezone from the existing C2 cupd uh zoning designation as well as the i1 which only uh covers the 75t wide drainage Channel just like as in the previous case um to uh establish it as a uh a pad now I'm going to go straight to the last bullet the current standards for the uh C2C upd shall apply the uh primary purpose for this pad is to uh for the developer to create its own allocation for for signs uh particularly as they relate to uh Monument signs and in that regard um the applicant is proposing to replace the existing 12 foot high sign uh which is also 14 ft wide um with a 20 foot high sign and a little over 20 21 and A2 ft wide um that being uh the existing sign again at the southeast corner of Shea Boulevard and center lane which is the signalized intersection indicated here by um marker a and also to add a new 12 foot high sign and a 14 foot wide Monument sign at the driveway midway between sha uh Shay and Saro indicated by marker B this is about 530 ft uh or so east of the uh Shay and center lane intersection and as I mentioned all other C2 cupd standards that um have been effective since um uh the um when this reone request came before the council at the time back in late 90s shall remain in place so again uh this is to replace number one the 12T High sign with a 20-ft high sign the applicant has included uh a rendering right here to uh uh to better illustrate the uh the height and uh the number of uh tenant signs that will be um also on this sign um and keep in mind the tenant signs the colors will be muted um as uh the rendering here indicates and again on the left is the the existing 12T High sign sign B will uh be an additional sign uh it would be a new 12T High sign much like the existing sign at the signalized intersection it would also be ft wide um at the driveway between sh and SAR so uh how does this uh deviate from the existing s cone in uh sign code in the zoning ordinance well with regards to uh sign a the sign height is limited to 12 feet the applicant is proposing a 20 foot high sign as I mentioned earlier um also the uh the base uh zoning ordance standards in when it comes to sign area is limited to 50 square ft for a monument sign the applicant is proposing 210 square feet um and this again is is the uh the is in regards to the removal and the replacement of the existing sign at Center and Shea Boulevard with regards to sign B now I should mention that the sign that a monument sign would be allowed uh at this proposed uh driveway midway between uh sha Boulevard and uh and Saro a biger part in center lane in Saro um because of the distance separation from uh the existing sign um but here the applicant um is proposing 80 square feet of sign area which is a little over 30 which is actually 30 square feet uh above what the base Zing standards uh allow so uh now the uh a motion uh to approve at the uh Planning and Zoning commission meeting was uh was denied um however staff is still supportive of a recom or I should say approval of this uh P request with the sign allocations that the uh applicant is proposing um we believe the approval would address some challenges due to limited visibility from Shea Boulevard and much like the previous uh uh pad it provides uniform zoning throughout for Peaks Plaza there are some stipulations uh for approval uh included in your staff report uh all four of them are listed here um there will be uh during the building permit uh review we will also require a uh encroachment permit to be reviewed by our public works department um and also uh a stipulation here to uh ensure that the final design does not conflict with uh the existing sewer line uh with that I'll conclude my presentation Jason also has some exhibits to share with you as well I have a couple questions for far okay far will that sign be illuminated it will mayor council uh Council mayor F Del it will be illuminated uh from the inside from the inside and do you know what hours of Illumination I'm concerned with a 20 foot sign um any neighboring properties and people looking down on it will it be 24 hours lit uh mayor council member I'm not sure if there's any regulations in place that would limit illumination uh for the sign I could check that for you um while the uh applicant is presenting sorry open the hearing so we can hear from the applicant uh like we did before so that way maybe your questions get answered while we listen and then um we'll close the hearing and or we'll hear from people and then we'll close the hearing that's okay mayor counsel thank you uh we're almost halfway through the evening so thank you thank you mayor and Council I will be brief uh Farhad has done a very good job sort of setting the the groundwork and I I have an anticipation of what your questions may be so hopefully some of these slides will answer those questions uh you're aware of the size of the shopping center we've obviously had that conversation even after the action that the council just took it is one of the largest if not the largest shopping center in town so the town code doesn't necessarily speak you know the town code and the signage code speaks to every sign within the town for every commercial parcel regardless of size so where we're asking for flexibility really is a matter of the size of the shopping center and also the unique constraints of this particular shopping center from a uh topography standpoint so so as we look at what we're doing this is also a cleanup of some of the uh parcel you'll see in the parcel map the portion that we are changing to a pad is being changed from the Pud which is an older District the pad is a more modern contemporary district and it cleans up the zoning and Zoning lines on this piece and continues it as one zoning District this is really the issue at hand uh this is our where's Waldo sign there is a sign there uh as you're driving but you can't see it and for a retailer that is and can be the death now that's one of the things that they rely upon while residents who have lived here for 40 years will know this is where Target is not everyone who's traversing Shay has had that experience and often times if you think about some of the the goods and services within a Target you are relying upon that signage uh so not having visibility at all even if you could see the target the smaller tenants are really who suffer in that instance so for businesses signage is key um the sign itself that exists today that the 12T sign is uh excuse me away from let mecap thanks uh away from the intersection itself so even as you're traveling because of the topog graphy and how inset it is because of the the easement that's there you don't have sign visibility until you almost on top of that intersection which again is less than desirable farad pointed out where those signs are the only thing I will mention and it's probably evident from the exhibit is although we are asking for a 20 foot sign and there's an existing 12T sign so we're asking for eight additional feet 5 feet is the base this is a an upgraded sign package it is actually a much better looking sign a a more contemporary look with the shopping center and this is part and parcel of what we're trying to do to the entire shopping center it's creating the residential it's upgrading the remaining uh commercial to match the new residential and new signage so these are things that are key to bringing the the shopping center as a whole into this decade uh so the first 5T although it's a 20ft sign is the base which is a stackstone base again when we talk about existing signage versus proposed part of that justification for the sign is the distance and this gives you an idea once that sign is built obviously it is more visible but not garish not outwardly signed uh or outlandish for the site that we've selected just to give you an idea of some other uh Target signage around the Valley Fountain Hills is unique you certainly don't need a pylon you certainly don't need the size of all of these uh and in fact what we're requesting is smaller lighting uh mayor and counsel that the question has already been asked by councilman Ferell this is Halo illuminated so although it's inter internally lit it's lit just so it backlights it's not a cabinet lighting which I think is what you may be concerned with and in fact at development if we're fortunate enough to have this approved it should Al uh emit the same or fewer lumens which is how you uh measure light this actually is probably a better exhibit for that it shows that these are not cabinet lit they're intern they're Halo alumin ated and in terms of light spillage you get a sense where between four street lights at that location and the traffic uh light signal itself so it's not creating additional uh light spillage thank you I'm I'm going to um ask if there are any speaker cards first before we discuss okay thank you mayor uh yes in your packet you have some comments on this um item and there was 13 in favor of it and five opposed we had two people come in and give their written comments one opposed and one was in favor so a total of 14 in favor and six opposed we do have speaker cards it shows I have nine but some of the people may not be here so um we're going to start with Kathy marks are you still here okay Kathy marks is first and then Pamela Curtis okay you're on Deck don't give up easy all right thank you so much for being here and um everything so thank you uh the purpose of the new signage on the proposal says uh and I quote in addition to efforts to bring more activity to the property and in order to increase visibility of the shopping center assist in wayfinding in the visibility of the remaining tenants within the shopping center we have to have these larger signs yes people who live here no targets there but people who are visitors it's called a GPS I don't really think we need a 20 foot sign my guess is that people who don't see this as a big deal don't live along montere Travino and parts of Nicholas I do I currently see the casino sign all night long the lights of the Shell station car wash comfort in Denny's Target building sign all the way through the CVS Pharmacy signage the way Shay kind of turns the way my house is um what'll happen is I can see the intersection of sheay and center lane so when that 20 foot sign is put up I will have the full facing 20 foot Target sign back lit facing my back deck don't forget phase two of the hospital was approved and with it will come additional signage on the corner of Shay and Saro with an existing light source from McDonald Senor Taco in Bank of America in all actuality it already looks like a mini Las Vegas strip it feels like sometimes all we need is an Eiffel Tower in a volcano it's lit until midnight according to what I can see in the proposal it's supposed to be off from Midnight to 6 I do welcome before you make this decision on this 20 foot sign which seems absolutely ridiculous to me me I welcome anyone on the Town Council to visit my home at night to see outside possibly other people that live on monery and travina would do the same so that you can actually see that maybe upgrade the existing signage at 12 feet but 20 feet it just seems absolutely ridiculous for this dark uh Sky City in such a small town it makes no sense whatsoever so thank you very much and I appreciate you staying so late so this developer has already come in and put up an overly bright Dollar Tree sign which is on all night even though the store isn't even located where the sign H is and it is not Halo illuminated they're also wanting to double the size of the existing signage longay stating obstruction and that it cannot be seen there is one tree I drive by there every day to and from work there is one tree it is large it is spread out it could be trimmed or taken out and the problem will be resolved should the change in signage be approved what's to keep the rest of Fountain Hills businesses from demanding the same this the signage should adhere to that that was agreed upon and approved and once again I please ask that you just say no also I want to quickly address that sandor rep stated extra cars can park in the Target lot however there are signs there that state no overnight parking and it appears that the comments that have been spoken and written only represent less than 2% of the Town census you need to hear from more of the residents before you let all of this happen and backing up on what she was saying about the illumination I don't even have to turn the light on to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night thank you next we have Betsy Lavoy and then on Deck Lori sheer are you still here Lori she's gone then on Deck is Larry Meyers good evening I live um near this area as well and when I purchased my home I knew I was purchasing near Commercial therefore I don't complain about living near Commercial um the letter of support from The Fountain Hill's Chamber of Commerce board of directors also advocates for an improves the zoning change essential for a comprehensive revitalization the rezoning specifically pertains to the signage for the rest of the development Plaza as the current zoning is not current the approval of suitable signage is crucial element that commands attention guaranteeing the visibility and acknowledgement of the plaza is pivotable for its Prosperity I urge you to consider this factor for the overall success of the project thank you is it tomorrow anyway full disclosure I purchased my house and actually built it when the property wasn't commercial so I live with what became and it's okay I don't think we need a 20 foot high sign I did particularly tell these guys at planning and zoning that I like their new sign design better than the existing sign design the back lit it's more modern looks better less Lumin I probably won't see it as much from my house but I see every Speck of light down in that Valley from my back windows my entire back of my house I see everything I see the video board from the casino which we can't do anything about it actually presents an image on my bedroom wall at night because we don't have window coverings so the dark sky seems to not be too dark depending on where you live and so we've cut the size of the commercial down there down by what a third because now we're going to have Apartments but we're we're increasing the signage by fourfold so according to the farhod and farad's illustrations don't look like um Jason's illustrations so I'm hoping that his sign design is what we're going by because if I have a big red Bullseye that's 20 20 feet in the air I'm going to be really pissed and I'm pissed off enough already because like I said I built my house when it wasn't commercial and so you know usually I don't speak from my own specific Viewpoint of what I see and what I like and what what should be for me um but I am certain that there are probably 30 40 houses that are going to be impacted by the 20 foot high sign and I'm sure they would all say the same thing so while I want to if we're going to have this project uh be partially commercial I would like to see it succeed I have my doubts but um I don't think four times the sign ordinance that we have is appropriate and I would make one our comment on our sign ordinance we had it we didn't have it we had it again and in the meantime what happened at the bottom of the hill that I'm talking about is now an electronic messaging board coming for the medical center right next to a giant Monument sign so we make ordinances and then we go like this and I think that this is one where it actually is uh not in accordance with what we've felt for the town thank you I think Joanne ly left okay so then the last speaker is Ed sza okay long night mayor counsel uh Aaron staff Rachel and Linda so again let's try this again so you're going to let them break the sign and ordinance why do we really need this no I've been all over Chandler and Gilbert and everything else over the past couple weeks on job sites that's a whole different Community okay so let's take a strong look at what we're doing here right that area is becoming lit we have no Dark Skies over there anymore so are we going to continue to keep busting this up like that it doesn't make any sense you guys so let them build the sign rebuild it yeah the Design's better of course it is it's newer and it's going to look better and certainly with the illumination but at the same token 20 by2 ft are you kidding me come on come on so at some point in time you've got to live listen to the residents and regardless of this project you know going forward I I just everybody wants it to be successful you know but at the same token we are giving up something here and we are giving up what Fountain Hills was originally founded on so you're giving up a part of it and this you will also give up on so I just don't think that it's that critical that it's going to make that much difference difference if you tell me it's going to make a 20% difference in sales and you're going to actually stand behind that then maybe we can listen to something you know but this part of it shouldn't be approved and before I forget seems to go without any sort of conversation since we're talking about the pad and changing the zoning on this what's going on with the building that has been sitting there empty in the front does anybody got a plan for that does anybody what what are we doing with it so the sign will cover that building up for a little bit so that's cool right so a 20 by 20 foot sign so what are we doing with that building it wasn't even asked you know or talked about so just a little bit skeptical on all of it and you know I wish everybody the best of luck but you are changing Fountain Hills and I'm not so sure it's going to be for the better so just take that into consideration please thank you thank you um so I think we have some questions oh I'm going to close the hearing and um Council woman thank you mayor I'm having a I'll be honest with you I'm really having a difficult time with this request um especially given my position on signs in town um and you're also asking for two signs um I have a question I don't know if it's going to be you or John or perad that's going to answer it but stacked stone base not to ask us new question and a monument sign is that part of the sign part and parcel or is it not computed in this part of the lit up sign do you understand my question okay uh mayor council member McMahon uh the base is not computed as part of the sign area so the sign area is in addition to the base correct okay so it's going to be actually bigger than what they're requesting for the sign it's not totality it's 20t it okay is the stone taking away the stone base what is that is 20 fet the size of the sign or is it the whole thing with the stone base 20 ft includes the stone base okay thank you all right thank you um the sandor development person I'm I I'm for moving it Forward because I can understand where it's situated and it's hard to see Etc but I'm I'm concerned with all the residents concerns here in addition I'm concerned with making a sign exception because down the street in the older um Shopping Center where um Wendy's is ETC they have built-in Monument signs I think that's what they're called I'm not sure and they're a lot smaller than this my concern is that if we Grant this we're going to have to Grant it for all other businesses because um I would think that they would ask for it but I understand why you're asking and I understand you know you have a big apartment building now you have a smaller commercial center Etc but I I I'm just not in favor of the 20 foot sign I mean I'm okay with two signs within the limitations and but not with the large one and then a small one on top of it okay I mean thank I just wanted you to understand that thank you mayor council member McMahon uh there are a few significant differences between some of the other sites that we're talking about the 1D sites and others in that we have the obligation and if we're going to characterize this application this is a small business application uh because the small businesses the smaller tenants the ones we're trying to lure back into this site are the ones that are relying upon this sign Target less so but certainly they they benefit from this but it's the small tenants and the small businesses that are set so far back from the roadway and also now behind that 75 foot uh easement as well as the foliage that their stores you know to the the member of the public who commented you know just Google or Map Quest whatever you're using to find these stores you may find Target and they may show up on a map an elect a digital map but it's the smaller tenants who need that space the 20 feet in height is significantly smaller than you would see in a major Center of this size in another jurisdiction but we also understand Fountain Hills isn't every jurisdiction you do things on a more delicate basis which is why we only asked for 20 uh 20 feet was actually smaller than we would typically have on a a shopping center even after the resoning so as we looked at the options one of the things that we did was lower the light source because much of what we heard here today is oh this is this is about light I don't want to see any more light you've seen the illustration you will not see more light as a result of this it's actually a better looking sign overall and we mentioned that 20 feet of height we're at 12 feet now we mentioned the additional 8 feet we're talking about a significantly taller base too which is why you're at 20 feet but signage in general this essentially now 15 foot tall sign is also a function of speed it's not just a function of the size of the shopping center but the speed of the cars on any given roadway because you have to accommodate that when you're creating signage so right now as you pointed out it it's a situation that doesn't work it's almost a useless sign you catch the target portion so moving it out does help but the size actually allows us to advertise the smaller tenants which frankly are the tougher tenants to get because they need more of that signage um I understand your concerns I really do and I I hope you're taking into account that we're trying to lower the lighting in order to make this a justification for the sign itself um thank you very much for addressing my questions and concerns but don't you think that having two signs is going to help this shopping center and the smaller business in there be more noticed and more attractive without having a use uge 20 to me it's a huge 20 foot sign like that or mayor mayor council member significantly it is a tremendous help but we're also focused on the directional traffic so if we're looking at eastbound versus westbound on Chay only one sign is going to help us depending upon the direction you're going in so it does help if you're coming westbound to have that second sign but having that primary signage for eastbound traffic becomes essential um thank you but are you going to redo the signs no matter um is that part of the the um develop that is this are you going to make new signs regardless of what size we approve here tonight or are you only going to change the sign to be larger if we okay it to be larger does that make sense well let me put it this way mayor council member we won't make it larger unless we're allowed to uh so I I assume what you're saying is are we going to rebuild the signs regardless it doesn't make sense to rebuild the signs in their existing location so that wouldn't happen unless this application was approved we were able to move the signs themselves and expand the size uh we're certainly willing to work with the town to make sure it's what you want to see but these tenants are so far buried these smaller tenants there is no way you will know that there is a hobby store or a craft store or a new restaurant unless we can have a sign that above its base is is 15 feet tall so if it's the larger side size isn't approved you're not going to move that the existing sign closer but you're um so that won't change you're going to keep it there regardless even if we say you can move it closer um and so I mean I guess if you want more visibility I'm wondering why you wouldn't do that especially if you're adding another sign and you're dealing with signage anyway and I I think I better understand your question which is if we're just given the I I I think the question is if you're just given the ability to move the sign closer to the right of way uh and you're given the ability to do the second sign at the size requested will you will you develop that I I think we're going to be challenged obviously any signage to your point better signage is better signage so we do appreciate that the the signage size for the smaller tenants is also a function of what Target will allow us to do and what we've agreed to do with Target Target started out at a taller sign in keeping with their other signs we before we filed negotiated a smaller sign with Target because we had spoken with staff and we thought that this was a sign that was more in keeping with what would be approved we are now obligated some degree to create this signage um and we want to do that in keeping with what the town wants to see so we're certainly willing to work with you to create something that works but I can't emphasize enough it's absolutely essential to these small businesses can I ask you a question that base is going to be 5 feet tall yes why don't you cut the base down to 3 feet give these residents a little something and then you can probably get your sign and also you mentioned the speed uh there's several stop lights along that road so the speed is going to be controlled for you guys I get that um and also um I don't know John is that vegetation is that on their proper prop or is that on our RightWay can that be thinned out to help your uh your situation uh mayor councilman thank you for the suggestion on the speeds we do understand that our experience has been because of the higher volume of traffic even with the the stop lights that does make a difference if you can time your stop lights to keep them there 10 15 minutes they'll get a better look at the the shopping center so we can talk about that but in lie of that the the trees aren't on our property they're uh not on land controlled by us and I do understand your comment and I will take it back to my client see if there's some opportunity there I I think if you could lower that a couple of feet we might have the residents on board with this and we wouldn't have um an issue um you're looking at 20 ft if we lowered it to you know 17 or 18 feet I think it might be something that we could probably get some people to buy into and might make it a little easier to get that done for you understood thank you counc thank you madam mayor actually I have a a question for director Wesley I can start talking while you walk come up you um one of the uh comments was about uh you like midnight to 6:00 a.m.

the lights are supposed to be off in the signs and was mentioned the Dollar Tree I don't know if that's included in the ordinance or not get back to that and and I know I just read it in terms of the monument sign but let me see if it applies to all of them uh the monument signs have that uh 12 to six limitation I'm not seeing it for the uh wall mount signs so it's a monument sign and and you know and maybe would look at that and see if it's there or not uh those comments about the signs they comments of the light light down there are very concerning to me I almost wonder though if it's dimmer we're going to see more of the casino sign uh which is a little bit annoying and I've actually always thought of Monument signs as good Economic Development um but I am very concerned about the comments we had I mean they residents had real comments about the light and such um so that's concerning also concern according to notes that I've read only three planning zone members supported this so that's giving trouble but I kind of like Monument signs especially if they're not high resolution LED with motion Las Vegas style so it's kind of a tough situation I don't know if you know there's you know planning someone planning zoning could comment on this uh and and explain you know why there was three and other concerns that would be helpful um but this this is a tough one for me because I like monum signs I've always thought about putting another one in that location I also believe that they have they can put an additional sign by right uh at the second location I think the B location is that that correct they can put one there by right a mayor council member skill corn in this case no because the approved PUD prohibits that and so that's why they're here requesting the change okay okay thank you very much excuse me if you don't mind mayor like to add to that uh response just a little bit so this is a case again so the existing sign ordinates like we talked about before sets certain parameters but the reason we have a pad ordinance is to allow site specific uh adaptations of this of the zoning ordinance so that we can address uh specific uh locations of need so this is again a a great reason why we use a pad to allow you know looking at what the needs are of a specific location I would also um I don't want to put words or thoughts into them but the idea if you want a sign like this it would sort of quell the idea that if it looks like another big investment in keeping it commercial so you know some of the folks that were worried that everything was going to get raised or whatever um it shows that you want it I mean that sign can't be nothing I'm sure it costs quite a bit and and again all of this represents investment of somebody that wants to be in Fountain Hills so I understand you know I'm not the sign lover but I've always I've said to folks who that I don't like that the so many signs that I've said in the past Monument signs are good and they're a good alternative so that's it seems like a a good option in a commercial area that large to me anybody else uh let's see yeah I do Council John could you elaborate a little bit more on what you just said about looking at the size of the pad or the Stopping Center and then being able to for lack of a better word adjust a sign to that size even though we have a sign ordinance that says differently or is that a contradiction could you please explain that a little bit more for clarity purposes thank you American counil member I between here and there when I came back to add that response I kind of forgot even half of what I was going to say then so um as I'm trying to think through all this so the the current signed ordinance as opposed to when uh this was developed does now allow would allow the two Monument Signs by right smaller size but would allow it and so they're actually uh amending the Pud that restricts them to something the code now allows to to letting them do what the code allows by having two Monument signs uh for this property but again just back again to the the basic purpose of a pad it's not trying to go around the zoning ordinance it is what the zoning ordinance establishes as the way to look at specific property and its specific needs and applying appropriate regulations so that it can be properly developed and used in this case if that applies to the signs it may be allowing for larger signs more signs taller signs than what the ordinance typically would allow so there I understand that they're allowed to have two Monument sign okay but the size of one of them is that issue right now so I guess what I'm asking you does that development pad plan allow for the larger size even though the signed ordinance yes has a specific set amount yeah yes mayor council member Yes again part of the zoning ordinance any provision in the zoning ordinance except uses I guess even uses can be thinking of a variance anything in the zoning ordinance can be uh adjusted because a p a establishes basically its own mini zoning ordinance for that property okay thank you oh I I I was I'm sorry Brenda do you want to council do you want to go first really up to you Erin um but I I might be able to add a point on something that that the developers Council said that I might Short Circuit the discussion and maybe get us where we need to go I is it correct it it sounds like part of fulfilling their obligations to Target in whatever Arrangement they've reached are contingent upon approval of this request am I understanding that correct correctly mayor council yes yeah so that's what that's what I ultimately wanted to get to is that I not to put to fin a point on it it in order for them to fulfill their contractual obligations to Target an affirmative vote is is needed and requested that's that's what I'm trying to get at here and mayor and counsel and that's right that's Mr thank thank you for for bringing that out screwed it all up and what I should I I want to put an even finer point on that because it is part of this Redevelopment plan and it's part of why we were having t I think we were having this conversation very early on in the process about you know we have to make this more viable and that was part of targets rationale of being more viable was being more visible that being said uh mayor councilman fedell had a suggestion Our obligation is signage score footage of the signage the base isn't signage um and we can lower that to feet which would bring it down down to 18 ft uh for the signage which obviously is not something that we're anxious to do uh but we understand you know to the councilman's point it it shows some flexibility and still allows the signage now what I will and I want to reiterate this our sign panel today because councilwoman you you raised that sign panel it permits three other tenants on it um so and those are some of the larger tenants because is obviously they have the the uh ability in our negotiations to demand those sign panels but if you're a smaller tenant you don't have signage on that on our existing sign today which is why the new sign design which if I heard correctly is endorsed by Mr Myers uh allows those smaller panels and those smaller tenants which is why I opened this presentation with this is really about a small business argument it does allow Target but those small business panels are essential thank you Mr Mayor um yeah the first thing is to the residents that live in that area you know my my heart goes out and this is such a difficult decision because if you live there and like Mr Meyers said you know it's it's a disturbance to his home and there are other residents and so I I really understand that and I I take that to heart um when I lay in bed at night that's the kind of things we got to do right by our citizens on the other hand um the the point that our town attorney brought up is really an integral part of this package it is a package deal if vote vote one down vote them both down it's really that's what we're talking about here um as I made my decision my difficult decision to vote Yes a big part of that was my pledge when I ran to support revitalization and smart growth this project fits the criteria on which I ran if unfortunately we we don't do this then that might lead to the area of town not revitalized not growing and and becoming you know I I don't know if people know this but a lot of the empty buildings in there are being stripped of copper because of the homelessness and the vagrancy down there it's it's a terrible thing you can reach the police reports if you don't believe me last week I believe they had SE several incidents of of breaking into buildings because there's nothing down there it's it's turning into a ghost town um and so we we really need to think about this and I guess the question I would have for you is in in the the process by which they go by to say we need a larger sign um I know some of the people here said I I don't think you need it is is the process they just flipped a coin and said oh that would be nice or is there a process by which experts and people that are much smarter than us marketing experts say in order for this project to S succeed we need the larger signage we need to promote the smaller businesses if we're going to do what we said we're going to do which is to fill that vacant complex with viable businesses create a vibrant vibe in that town I'm sure they don't just wing it is I'm sure there's experts that have looked at this and said no if we don't have this we're going to hurt our our whole operation could you explain that process mayor council member I I can and I can tell you first of all the building design and the site plan layout you saw was designed by an architect and a site planner that works specifically on those two aspects of the building our sign package is from a sign expert they only do signage and it is more than the flip of a coin these are sign package Specialists that are approved by Target and other National retailers because they trust the quality and the consistency of the signage what I want to point out is the first question that is asked by a tenant who is interested in any of the spaces that are available is what does my signage look like and as it stands now even though the code as we just heard your current ordinance would allow us a second uh sign we don't have one and on our existing sign we don't have room for the smaller tenants so we worked backwards from the number the square footage and how that is demised the size of the shopping center and the frontage space and came up with the sign package that would be necessary to accommodate in terms of square footage those tenants with a new sign our number actually brought us to a 24 foot height we then worked with staff who suggested a smaller size which meant limiting the panels but at 20 ft we were and that's with the base we were still able to accommodate the majority but not all not every tenant would get their own sign but more tenants would have that signage ability and with the second sign we can almost guarantee that there will be some visibility for every tenant so it is more than just guessing at what works and we've actually squeezed ourself the only place left is the comment that was made earlier we could possibly lower the base uh but not change the the signage itself thank you I think you made a really good point that the larger sign gives an advantage of allowing placards for more commercial space um obviously adding the second sign adds more more commercial space that strip mall you don't see it when you're driving sure I can Google it before I leave the house and I see that what is there but you don't see it when you're there and that was actually one of the things when we first moved into T into Arizona as a whole was the color coding of much many of the signs in some of the areas and and how far down some of the strip malls were how it how difficult it was to find places I'm used to great big signs that tell you that Target is here or whoever so I think you made a really good point by the larger sign and the second sign allowing some of those commercial spaces to have a placard which is very important as a business owner to be able to get your name up on the up up in lights so to speak on the on the signage um I was a little iffy on it but I'm going to say I support this and if Council wants to ask them to cut the base down a couple of feet I'll support that as well but I do support the signage size as it is because I think that is very important to the smaller businesses to be able to be accommodated in there to help it be visible thank you and mayor vice mayor to emphasize your point I didn't leave my house today thinking I needed a Euro but I saw signage as I was driving in Fountain Hills and there's a Greek restaurant across the street from the shopping center and I found myself eating there so those signs do have that impact on your small businesses all right I don't see any other thank you signals so anybody want to venture motions on what we got our new screen here I can't see the page number yeah I'd like to make a a motion to approve with any adjustments she doesn't have to someone can amend it if they want yeah I I'd kind of like to go with the 2 feet because um we're not we're not reducing the sign just the base well just make a motion if you want to make a motion as is someone can amend it yeah I'd like to just make a motion to approve as is is there a second second okay I'd like to make a motion to amend it to to 18 feet tall with the shorter base as councilman fidell suggested is there a second I bet um so we vote on the amendment um roll call please on 18 ft all right um council member calanus no council member mcmah this is really this is really a hard decision but given everything that I've heard and we're going to reduce the base size then I'm going to say I council member to just for the sake of consistency I vote [Music] no council member fidell I council member skillcorn permission to explain a vote I think 18 is better than 20 yes vice mayor Gris Bowski I mayor dicki I thank you so 18 yeah oh Brenda had to go first sorry but we understand what you were doing Aaron just yeah so now we vote on the main motion as amended as amended and we don't need to make any more motions because we have that okay so we'll take a roll call that council member skillcorn commission explain vote uh I see someone walking out that was against it I I do apologize I agree with your argument but I think signs are necessary I'm sorry I I will I will do that I I will I will go check it out um and if I'm wrong we will do BU should reconsider um but yes council member calan OAS I council member McMahon council member to I council member Ferell vice mayor Grabowski I mayor dicki I okay so decision time what these next two items um are they are they timely they're timely aren't they yes they are okay mayor they are timely but I believe we can move through them pretty rapidly there's there's nothing new to really consider here okay and maybe I'll even do it without my presentation because it doesn't want to see seem to come up you have the information there it goes uh CU and this is very brief you have the information in your packet this is request for an extension of a special use permit uh for residential on Fountain Hills Boulevard and Glenbrook Council approved this back in June for the 10 units in three buildings uh the ordinance requires that they uh apply for their building permit within six months and then another six months to uh get the building permit approved they have submitted a site plan it was submitted uh which is first step prior to to getting the building permit it was submitted in October we provided comments uh to the applicant back in November uh in the report when I wrote the report they had not yet resubmitted they did resubmit now the revised site plan there's a copy there of what was recently submitted haven't had a chance to study it yet it just came in but at a quick look it it appears they have addressed what the staff comments were previously and I expect this site plan can be approved uh fairly quickly and they'll be able to move on then to the building permits uh fairly soon I have a question this is this is is this the ones across from McDonald's no no this is the one up at Glenbrook and P Hills Bard okay thank you okay go ahead councilwoman toes thank you vice mayor I apologize I did not realize the mayor had had left so I was very thrown off by that but I'd just like to make a motion to approve a six-month continuance of the Su I'd like to second we can still make comments I assume the mayor would say yes John how many times have we extended this this will be the first one on this one first one okay and how many times are we allowed to there's no uh specific limit in the code There's No Limit okay just wondering thank you councilman skellorn thank you very much vice mayor uh director uh Wesley uh refresh my memory when did this get approved is it like uh last spring it was on June 6th C me the exact date I love it thank you are there any other comments before the mayor makes it back in case she has something she wants to say no call for a vote vice mayor oh mayor's back okay um I think one I think one of the issues I had was do they have a a community living space on this um is the driveway access okay I mean has any of that been changed or is I I confusing it with a different development mayor council member no I think you are uh remembering the discussion when we came through uh with this uh request uh back in June and so one of the problems are concerned at the time was this driveway and some issues with its width and how it worked they have resolved those issues it appears again I haven't studed in detail but it looks like they have uh another thing that we did bring up was that there really wasn't much of any uh communal space in this one it's a small site so there's still really is not much on here there's a little bit around the units they are providing some uh opportunity for connectivity uh into uh communal space in the the in the commercial area but there's very little onsite thank you we have a speaker card yes mayor we do we have two we have Ed sza and Matthew Corgan on Deck I'll be quick so I know everybody wants to go home so um it was like say so is as far as the uh so I thought we made a limitation I know this is not falling in that on uh sus didn't you propose that or that we were only going to allow that because you got another one coming up right after this so might as well just ask it now to be quick so I'm sorry j there mayor Dicky I I I said did I thought we put a limitation on sus I I could have swore we did didn't we this is just extending no no I know what it is I I just thought that there was only so many extensions allowed so if I may may just real quick to to answer that so what we did do uh when we revised the section of the code it used to require to get your building permit within six months because we were reviewing a lot of these weren't quite able to make it that fast we moved it out so you only have to apply for your building per within 6 months to give them more time to get the site plan approved and that's the change we made we still there's no limit on the number number of times they can request an xgp extension okay so that answers the question hopefully before you vote John gives you the overall look at everything and before you grant it but he's going to do that anyway so that's it thank you councilwoman has a question oh I'm sorry go ahead Madam mayor and council members Matthew Corgan uh homeowner full-time resident Fountain Hills um just a little background I my whole career has been building an and construction related I worked for two major Fortune 500 companies uh construction related and growth related uh owned my own business construction related growth uh related and so you might say my entire livelihood throughout my career has been based on construction new construction with that said a couple of things although the Town Council did last June approve the Glenwood project through a variance the new special use permit request goes beyond that and expands beyond that variance the plan was originally a fourplex Triplex and duplex and now that's changed to a basically a uh it's it's it's instead of nine units it's now 10 so the fourplex has gone to a fiveplex which really Narrows the entire existing uh land I think it's a a third of an acre so now we're getting into what I'm concerned about that's density housing again uh you've made your decision on a couple of projects here tonight that are very high density but I would uh remind you that spot zoning can be many times create a a problem a greater problem uh in the long run uh beyond the original uh intent of what you did last June what I'm saying here is special use use permits can be abused and this plan seems to extend far beyond the original intent uh and is now creating more dense footprint which I believe is inconsistent with the Fountain Hills plan in general and I'm talking talking about the general plan so um I think the quality of life in all neighborhoods should be based on uh in my opinion the existing residential commercial development this obviously is kind of residential development in a commercial area but I in short I support the original plan the forx the triplex and the duplex but I am concerned and uh without more information I would oppose going to a fiveplex um a threx and a duplex and U thank you for your time question okay John um on the original item report it says at the end there are several issues that will need to be resolved in the concept plan and it is likely at least one unit will need to be removed to provide for required parking in an amenity area so instead of a unit being removed it's being added so is is there adequate parking or is that a concern mayor council member um so it was approved uh in June for 10 I know units and they've got that they have uh resolved the driveway issue and parking issue I believe again I haven't gotten to study this in detail but it looks like they have uh the one thing that you know could still be considered uh not quite up to what uh we were looking for would be an amenity area uh the only amenity area they have are are up at the corner uh the connection to the uh the commercial space and uh right around the mailbox area so they're small but there are some there any other questions from Council I just have a quick comment I've had a number of developers tell me that six months really isn't a good amount of time for a lot of these projects so I don't want to always hold that against them and first of all we did already approve it is 10 units so I don't think we can reconsider that especially if they're meeting their other um considerations um it does say that I failed to make a note on it but that they have turned in the site plan um just late based off of the way timing was for things to be turned around and again I have heard from a number of people that 6 months just really isn't enough time so I don't have a problem with this particular um extension at all thank you can I get a motion what you did it well there you go uh roll call please oh I just want to make a note there is a comment card that in favor of this project in your packet um council member McMahon nay council member to I council member Ferell I council member skellorn no council member Cal anakis I vice mayor Gris Bowski I mayor dicki I passes 52 thank you and our last regular agenda item is similar uh mayor council members uh as you indicated this is similar to the previous Su extension request um this is in regards to a proposed 17 uh unit town home style uh uh development that was uh proposed and ultimately approved through an Su um for uh the area just uh north of the intersection of Shay and sawaro on the east side and this is council member McMahon the one across from the McDonald's um that you referring to earlier so the uh the Su again was for uh 17 residential units as I mentioned two stories uh tall um consisting of six buildings on the 1.2 uh 1.62 acre parcel um I uh I've provided a a timeline here I in the interest of time I won't go through it word for word but I'll leave it right up here but um this is the third uh extension request from the applicant um I should however mention that uh the applicant site plan was approved within the six-month uh time limit that they were allowed uh that um so that occurred before uh June 7th and um as the applicant indicated in their letter um requesting this extension um they are they were have been been awaiting some critical documentation in the form of drawings from the epcore water company um that is largely as they've indicated why um this has been going at the pace it has been uh I'm told that they should be getting um they will be receiving those documents soon if not all uh they've already received it and we should expect uh their second submittal for the uh building plans within the next couple weeks and uh with that I'll conclude thank you we have any speaker cards we have one Ed sza yeah you're okay any uh Council discussion or questions councilwoman I just wanted to I just wanted to uh just reiterate that the market demands have impacted the availability of Engineers to perform the traffic study needed to proceed that's verbiage taken directly from the staff summary report um so it sounds as though it's really no fault of the um applicant to me is that correct uh uh mayor council or vice mayor uh that's what they've indicated in the in the letter is that it's uh really uh something that they've been awaiting uh epcor uh uh basically the ball's been in epcor court to provide them the critical documentation they need to continue okay thank you so and the um carried for everybody's time I'm ready to make a motion as approved if nobody else is anything else going on second yeah yeah just one quick question um this letter was dated November 29th do they have the approval from epcore am I sleeping here have they got everything straightened out um I if mayor you would allow I could have of course the council members um my name is k I'm the applicant um we have been waiting three and a half months uh well a little background um six month is not enough time to get uh building a permit it's and not to take a whole bunch of time but let's say you can get your uh site plan approved in six months which is really tough um you've got another uh six months to get a building permit approved at the point that you get your site plan approved you have just some basic drawings uh you know a plat layout with where your roads and and parking spots are going to be you know at that point you then have to design your plans you have to go through all the engineering for your site for water and power like in the case of this in the water the water has to come across uh sorl Boulevard and um three almost three and a half months ago we were told that we had to get and I don't remember the exact name of what an ATC and it's approval to construct you have to get that from Pierce count or sorry I was thinking of Washington uh Maricopa County be and we were not aware of that and so as soon as we were told that we contacted EPC waterer three and a half months ago and U we've been told I I specifically have been told three times now in the last six weeks that they were going to look at it by Friday they still haven't looked at it our time has run out and you know we're frustrated and yeah that sounds frustrating yeah it we spent we spent a lot of money and you know really a year you should a year would be a challenge to go from a site plan to full plans full engineering all the stuff you have to go through having to continue to waste everybody's time stressing yeah that's all I have for you I'm sorry that they're giving you so much hard time but yeah i' give this request for sure thank you thank you I appreciate the development but given where it's situated I still have really big traffic concerns especially across from the hospital McDonald's Etc so thank you councilman thank you M mayor um you know I do remember this one and when I look at the site and like it's very odd shaped parcel I don't think it's overly dense but I do remember residents being concerned about traffic um so at the time you know I was a no I'll have to stay a no um but it sounds like there's majority support for this so I'll actually make a motion to approve this not for six months but for months extension do that okay so an amendment to the main motion oh was it was it motion yeah we had we had a motion Motion in a second so you're just proposing an amendment then don't worry oh okay all right unless someone wants to make that motion six months is short in development yeah I don't care if someone wants to just if someone wants to accept councilman skor's friendly Amendment that's fine doesn't matter to me I'll go ahead and second that considering the applicant's statement so who made the main emotion I did okay are you okay with that change what's the change she's changing it to 12 extending it for 12 months so my original motion was six months and if my second person whatever you're called is okay with changing it to 12 months then I will change my motion to 12 months all right and my second person still says Okay okay so we have a motion to extend for 12 months um can we get a roll call please yes um council member M to I council member fidell I council member skillcorn the friendliest now you've ever had right yeah council member calanis I council member McMahon vice mayor gzowski I mayor dicki I thank you passes okay um Council discussion Direction I don't think there's anything future agenda items no please councilwoman I'm sorry speaking about beating a dead horse um I'd like to put on the future agenda item the extension of the moratorium on 5G and Broadband for another six months and I think I need to I'll second that okay I think I need a third third if you need it um and and I have a question for research um I don't remember us giving away our rights to have three council members add something to an agenda even though we did change it to be at the end of the council meetings can we research that and see if we if we gave away our right to do it either way I I think you amended the policy to say that you're going to do it in a public meeting okay yeah that's what the amended policy says all right so that is that is in fact true and and I'll confirm it with you but I'm like virtually certain that's what they yeah M anything else from anybody thanks everyone for hanging in there um and we're adjourned