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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2014-07-10 - Planning Commission Minutesr Community Development Department t Planning Division Building Safety Division Environmental Health Division 117 NW Lafayette Avenue Bend Oregon 97701-1925 (541)388-6575 FAX(541)385-1764 http://www.co.deschutes.or.us/cdd/ MINUTES DESCHUTES COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION DESCHUTES SERVICES CENTER 1300 NW WALL STREET, BEND, OREGON, 97701 JULY 10, 2014 — 5:30 P.M. 1. CALL TO ORDER Meeting was called to order at 5:30 p.m. by Chair Christen Brown. Members present were Vice Chair Hugh Palcic, Steve Swisher, James Powell, Todd Turner Ed Criss. Staff present were Peter Gutowsky, Principal Planner; Paul Blikstad, Senior Planner; Will Groves, Senior Planner; Cynthia Smidt, Associate Planner; and Sher Buckner, Administrative Secretary. Minutes of June 12, 2014 were approved. II. PUBLIC COMMENTS (for items not on agenda) III. WORK SESSION: TA -14-5 — An application to amend the Sunriver Community General District (SUCG) Zone to allow wireless telecommunication facilities as a conditional use — Cynthia Smidt, Associate Planner Cynthia presented PowerPoint slides. Commissioner Powell and Cynthia discussed the facilities being proposed for this particular area and whether there are any deed restrictions. Cynthia said there are not. There has been one comment received in opposition; there are always some concerns about the visual impacts, which may be assisted by the use of monopoles, and there are also health issues raised. Commissioner Turner and Cynthia discussed listed versus non -listed uses in various zones of the County. Specific uses are listed; if a use is not listed, it is not allowed. Public Testimony Meridee Pabst testified for the applicant and said that they had looked at several locations; there is one other parcel that could be considered but it has limited roaming potential. The proposal would also go through a design review process with the owners' association. AT & T is looking at both private restrictions and Deschutes County's requirements. Commissioner Powell asked about the desired range of coverage. Meridee said that as far as she knows, the intent is to cover Sunriver and it will also help people traveling on the highway. Cynthia said that co -location is possible by other carriers such as Verizon. Commissioner Powell added that some areas of Sunriver do not have emergency coverage right now, and some of the area is impacted by topography. Commissioner Criss asked if AT & T has spoken with the Sunriver Homeowners' Association. Meridee said they have had extensive discussions. IV. PUBLIC HEARING: TA -14-4 - Legislative Text Amendment to DCC Chapters 19.04 and 19.106 to change the required rental availability of individually owned overnight lodging units for destination resorts within the Bend Urban Area Reserve from 45 to 38 weeks per calendar year, to amend the phasing of overnight lodgings required in the first phase of resort development, and to make other changes consistent with state law — Will Groves, Senior Planner Will presented a staff report. Commissioner Powell and Will discussed visibility and buyers having knowledge of what they are getting. Currently there are three things putting buyers on notice: deed restrictions; a CCNR that is enforceable by the County; and the plat designation. Commissioner Turner said that trying to get a deed restriction removed is cumbersome, and if these are individually owned and someone wants to rent one out for ten years and then retire there, it may be difficult. Will questioned whether, if he was an owner and found a loophole in the CCNRs and then the resort didn't have enough overnights, that would affect the entire ratio. It is something to consider. Public Testimony: Sharon Smith testified on behalf of the applicant. The challenge is getting everyone's signature when it comes to possibly changing the plat. You get a deed restriction that shows on a title report which is the effective restriction. This needs to be done to make a level playing field between Tetherow and the other destination resorts. Our goal is to have this approved by the Board; we do expect to come in with an overnight accommodation type product application shortly. We have a current pending application for townhomes and things are going well. Motion: Commissioner Turner motioned to close the public hearing. Commissioner Powell asked if the County had received other submittals. Will said he had gotten a single letter from Nunzie Gould who had misunderstood the text amendment and had no further comment. Commissioner Swisher said he was comfortable closing the public hearing and deliberating. Seconded by Commissioner Swisher. Motion passed. Discussion: Commissioner Criss asked Will about the comment regarding "leveling the playing field" with other destination resorts. Will said he believed that Title 19 will almost exactly mirror Title 18. Commissioner Turner asked if Title 19 had the plat restrictions now; Will said it did. Commissioner Turner said he would like to see more discussion and had no problem with the proposal; Commissioner Swisher agreed. Commissioner Turner asked about the process of getting the plat designation removed from both Title 18 and Title 19. Will said it would be undertaken either by the County or by an applicant; it would need to be put on the Community Development Department's work plan. 2 Motion: Commissioner Turner motioned to forward this proposal to the Board and recommend adoption, including the plat designation, with a caveat to add an item to the work plan to consider removal of the plat designation in Title 18 and Title 19. Seconded by Commissioner Swisher. Motion passed. V. PUBLIC HEARING: TA -14-2 - Text Amendment to Chapter 18.32, Multiple Use Agricultural Zone (MUA-10) and Section 18.128.050 of Title 18 of the Deschutes County Code (DCC) to allow the potential for the creation of new manufactured home parks in the MUA-10 Zone, and lessen the requirements for expansion of existing manufactured home parks in the same zone — Paul Blikstad, Senior Planner Paul said the applicant is trying to get a variance instead of waiting for this text amendment, regarding requirements for upgrading existing manufactured home parks. The applicant is also willing to limit the number of manufactured homes to 17, to avoid addressing the Transportation Planning Rule (TPR). Paul also discussed adding the RR -10 Zone to this proposal. Commissioner Swisher asked if there are any health or safety concerns in existing parks that are not being addressed. Paul said he is not aware of any at this time but that it had been discussed and is important. Commissioner Powell asked how notice for the hearing was given; Paul said we are only required to publish notice in the paper, and if it had been everyone in the MUA-10 Zone, it would have been in the thousands. Commissioner Powell said that if this text amendment is limited to existing manufactured home parks, he is concerned about the language. It says that wastewater can be accepted by another parcel, yet we cannot do that in South County, for example. One of these tax lots is held by a Delaware corporation — are the homeowners on that lot who are paying taxes aware of this process? Commissioner Turner asked if the project still has to go through site plan review and conditional use approval; Paul said yes and the surrounding owners would be notified at that time. Paul also discussed the variance and the applicant not wanting to wait for the text amendment. Commissioner Turner asked if the applicant can keep adding 17 more units later on to avoid the TPR; Paul said he was not sure if that could be problem. Commissioner Criss and Paul spoke about the applicant applying for a variance; Paul said it is a nice park but does not quite meet today's standards. Public Testimony: Alex Robertson, a realtor whose primary emphasis is mobile home park sales, testified that he has sold many of these including the ones currently being considered. The County needs affordable housing and this is probably the clearest -cut way, at no public expensive, to provide it. The requirement that, to expand an existing park the current park must be updated, is not realistic. Setback requirements, the sizes of the homes, the placement of the homes, would all be difficult to get to comply with current standards. Some of the units are single-wides from the 1970s and 1980s. This particular park was expanded by 12 units in the late '90s/early 2000s through the City of Bend without having to bring all of the other units up to current standards. We need more entry-level housing in Bend. Many people have been displaced from their homes and apartments are at 100% occupancy. 3 Commissioner Powell said that when Country Sunset was revamped, they had to bring some of their infrastructure up to standards. Although Alex may be a very conscientious owner, that has not always been true of other mobile home parks in Bend; some land has been converted to other uses without permission. What he wants do is not reduce creation of more affordable housing but to make sure there are some safeguards. This text amendment does not have sufficient concerns for the public's interest. We need to make it clear so that if someone comes up next time with no code of ethics, we can prevent problems. Alex said the key issues are water and septic and we need to make sure capacity is there and expansion is reasonable. This could be specified in the text amendment — we don't want any "outlaw parks" either. We can add standards for sufficient well capacity, fire access, etc. Commissioner Turner asked how the septic systems operate. Alex said they are cluster systems, mostly, with multiple collection tanks. The pipes are perforated PVC pipes and every tank is pumped very 18 months; if there is a problem with something like a tree collapsing into a pipe, you find out soon because it backs up. There are reserve wells as backups. There are no fire hydrants in the parks because they were not required when the parks were built. Commissioner Criss and Alex discussed the RR -10 zoning and Alex said he felt it makes sense. Gary Knight testified as the applicant for a new mobile home park at the north end of town, which would be subject to new standards. They want to limit it to 17; the State is putting a stoplight at the south end of it. Heidi Kennedy testified that she was working with Gary on his application. Commissioner Swisher asked about Gary's parcel; he said it sits in the "Y" as you are going out of town and it is 10 acres. It has Avion Water and he gave them the right-of-way with the stipulation that he could expand. They have already installed a fire hydrant. ODOT is putting a sidewalk and they already took part of his property to expand the highway. It is really not an agricultural plot. There is a possibility for a later tie-in to the City's pump station at the edge of his property. Commissioner Powell asked about sewer on the opposite of the railroad tracks and Gary said there is none — it's all septic. He discussed advantages of drainfield expansion. He wants the area to be spacious and have a park area as well. The north end of the property would be the main access, near Juniper. The secondary entrance would be more of a fire exit. Commissioner Powell asked if there are any intentions to connect to Juniper Hilltop to the north, and Gary said he has gotten water from their well, but they are now giving back water from Avion. Commissioner Powell asked if by some fluke the Urban Growth Boundary expands, would Gary convert the use or would he want to maintain the mobile home park? Gary said he would maintain the park. His home is across the highway and it will be his retirement project. Rick Morrow testified as an owner with his wife of Green Acres RV park. Their park consists only of long-term residents; average is two and a half years. They have had college professors, dentists, people who have lost their businesses, people on Social Security, various reasons, and it is run more like a mobile home park than an RV park. They are the ones who asked for the language about effluent and neighboring parcels. Their park was also built in the 1960s and 1970s, with old drain fields and tanks. They have five different areas right now with one failing due to age. Some of the drain fields were inadequate when built and many are time bombs right now. Right now they are 4 going through a very expensive process with DEQ to ugrade. The problem is that there is not a lot of space. They are just asking to include a line for effluent, for example, for a nursery next door — right now that would be considered an expansion of their park. If they were in the City they could connect to the public sewer system; if they were in the UGB the DEQ could declare them a risk and they could connect. But right now it would be considered an expansion and would not be possible for them. They would like to be able to move their effluent to a neighboring property — all of the other parks will have the same problem eventually. They have people living at their park that would lose their self-esteem and be living by the railroad tracks if there wasn't someplace affordable for them. Commissioner Powell asked if Rick knew about the problem with effluent is State or County related. Rick said it is the County, and DEQ fully supports this. Peter Gutowsky testified that he believes one cannot have a wastewater treatment facility offsite unless it serves only one dwelling. When you are talking about designating another parcel to serve multiple dwellings, that is not permissible under State law. It is a Goal 11 exception and you have to demonstrate that there are public health issues. The statewide land system can provide burdensome land use restrictions and this may be one reason to continue this hearing to clarify some of the issues. Commissioner Powell asked how we deal with this issue — all septic systems are basically time bombs. Peter said that some of the State land use system may be two-dimensional for situations such as this. From a Code standpoint, you may have to modify this language and consider the exception language — we do not want to give false expectations when considering the Statewide land use system and its requirements. Commissioner Swisher spoke of parcels in Sisters that were linked to common fields; Peter said it was because they were in the middle of a growth boundary. IT is this rural urban divide that the State system prioritizes and does everything it can to minimize dense rural development. Rick said he talked to someone at LCDC about this situation and their suggestion was just buy a piece of property next door and he could do it. Is this viable, rather than effluent going to a neighbor? Peter said that on the face of it, it is logical to buy another piece of property and consolidate the lots. You would be treating the wastewater onsite. Rick mentioned running into problems with County Code if it was treated as an expansion. Commissioner Powell asked we could get some people like Jon Jennings to come and talk about this issue so we can craft some language for this amendment that would meet the letter of the law as well as what people want. Paul said it was a good idea and we can contact someone at DEQ as well. When he first got the request he thought it was just effluent and not septic drain lines which could be part of the Goal 11 exception. Peter also said that Peter Russell, the County's Senior Transportation Planner, talked about a way to address the TPR and we need to discuss how to implement that. Commissioner Turner and Commissioner Criss felt we need to have other input and continue the hearing. Commissioners Swisher and Turner agreed. Motion: Commissioner Turner motioned to continue the hearing to August 28 and leave the oral and written record open. Seconded by Commissioner Powell. Commissioner Swisher thought that maybe a month was too long for the owners and potential health impacts. Peter Gutowsky said that it would be helpful to consider what the expectations 5 are when the hearing is re -opened. The Commissioners could submit questions to Paul to convey to meeting participants ahead of time. Commissioner Criss asked Rick if he has an immediate problem and he said they do. They are going to try and revitalize an old drain field and if that goes well it would last for a few years. The end of August is okay with him. Gary said that Rick is not part of this application, so his concerns are not relevant to what Gary is doing. Rick said that he could come back later and does not want to hold Gary up. Commissioner Criss pointed out that the transportation issue is still on the table for Gary. Commissioner Powell felt that the issue and text amendment are County wide. If you have a potential problem of expanding which is part of this text amendment and you want to move effluent, move drain fields, increase your water supply, etc., those are part of this process. Commissioner Turner added that RR -10 isn't really part of this but has been thrown in. Peter said we can contact some agencies to attend a meeting and see if the issues match the text amendment as proposed. The sooner the Commissioners can provide their questions to Paul, the sooner he can relay them to the State agencies, etc. Commissioner Turner asked if the applicant could make the amendment specific to this property by adding parameters. Paul said Gary was worried originally that the Commissioners would feel he was singling himself out by saying, "next to an urban growth boundary, next to a railroad track..." etc. Commissioner Powell suggested that this be referred back to Paul and the applicants to make it clear what they want us to consider. This material as submitted covers the entire County and if that is not the intention, why are we considering it? We have to deal with what we have been handed and the issues are much broader than this single piece of property. Peter said that is an applicant -initiated text amendment with some complicated issues such as the TPR and Goal 11. This could be a significant public policy change. We do not have the resources to lead this process, and the applicant can make a decision as to the type of application submitted once we have heard from the agencies. Commissioner Swisher felt there is a County -wide policy we need to be concerned about, but he still comes back to some concerns about economic feasibility for the applicant, and this is different from expanding a park relating to effluent fields. Alex said that combining the issues has confused everyone and we should bifurcate the issues. Commissioner Powell felt the text amendment needs to be cleaned up. He would like to see the agencies present at a hearing. Paul said that Alex and Gary need to decide how they want to move forward. Gary said that he was the original applicant and Alex wanted to join in later. He understands there are second and third steps before he can apply for a park. Even if his park is approved, he still has to go the State and have an exception approved. Heidi has told him the chances for new park approvals would be slim except for him. The State is still in control, and currently he cannot even apply to the State. Paul said he would have to apply with the County and get a Goal 14 exception. Peter said that a new park is not presently allowed under County Code. Exception processes are incredibly onerous — you go through a County Comprehensive Plan Amendment with an exception to Goal 14 that would run with a conditional use permit. The burden of proof has to be very, very descriptive; you would have to go through a hearings offer. If there was opposition it would also go to the Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA). The State does not approve an exception. It goes through a local process but is subject to appeal to LUBA. 9 Commissioner Powell felt there is a desire to create a new mobile home park which is not currently allowed. There was an attempt to tie this to a text amendment for the zone in which the applicant's parcel lies and limit it to saying it has to be adjacent to an existing mobile home park to create a new one — that was the basic text amendment. This makes it County -wide. The expansion of an existing mobile home park is currently blocked by the requirement of bringing everything up to standards. Those are the two main parts of the text amendment. If there are agencies that can answer feasibility questions and make it easier to craft the language to make the text amendment either specific to this parcel or broad for the entire County, we would know if it is possible and reasonable. Peter said that description conveys the application and mobilizes the coordination to see if it can be more narrowly tailored or will have more County -wide ramifications. Commissioner Turner revised his motion to keep the hearing open to either August 14 at the earliest, or August 28 at the latest. Seconded by Commissioner Criss. Heidi said they would like to narrow it down as much as possible and would like to include that language. Peter suggested recommending the hearing be continued to August 14 and if staff is not ready, there will be a staff member here to open the hearing and then continue to the 28th if necessary. The applicant said he cannot attend on the 14th, so the motion was again amended to have the hearing continued to the 28th. Motion passed. VI. PLANNING COMMISSION & STAFF COMMENTS Peter mentioned another joint meeting with the Board to further discuss the agricultural lands program on August 25. Commissioner Criss mentioned the large number of attendees at the recent COID hearing before the Board. VII. ADJOURN There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned. Respectfully submitted, Sher Buckner Administrative Secretary The video record of this meeting can be located at: http://deschutes.granicus.comNiewPublisher.php?view—id=5 7