##VIDEO ID:JwyQ_L2likM## e e e e e e e e e e good evening I'd like to call to order the city of St Paul Park Planning Commission meeting for Monday November 12th 2024 uh we'll take attendance uh Patrick DS I am present Mr glinton is excused this evening not available to attend Mr mackinery present Mr Diaz present Mr Hagerty you're on mute doesn't show he's on mute but I don't think we can hear him okay can you guys hear me now yes and commissioner hegerty is appearing uh via remote uh for this evening's meeting um and Tim Conrad council member liazon is absent for this evening also um and I also would like to thank tonight uh Lonnie Garland and Vera Garland for helping us with this telecast so thank you so let's stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands stand one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all okay I would be looking for a motion to approve the minutes of the Monday October 4th 14th 2024 meeting and wave reading of same I'll make a motion to approve the minutes is there a second okay having a a motion a second all those in favor say I I I any opposed that is approved tonight for commission actions we have four actions um the first is a public hearing concerning an ordinance Amendment and a cup change for St Thomas aquinus good evening honorable members of the Planning Commission it is a great and distinct honor to be here with you this evening um as so noted by the chairman we have uh ordinance Amendment and conditional use permit Amendment for St Thomas aquinus they years ago a couple years ago um seems just like yesterday this site was um at the church property there's an old rectory building I believe it's called where um people associated with the church used to live they don't follow that model anymore and they don't use it for that purpose so they began changing the use of that building but we gave like probably 15 20 years ago there was given to them a conditional use permit to run this as a battered women's shelter this building on the property and then a couple years ago that use was revoked and replaced with a little miniature Treatment Center in the same building that would serve the same number of people that the battered women's shelter did but it allowed for uh chemical dependency treatment to be offered to the people who are staying on the site and then just recently um they contacted the city and wanted to remove the programming piece the treatment piece and just have it be people living there who would be getting treatment offsite somewhere else more similar to what it was as The Battered Women's Shelter pretty much where it's just people who are in need of some assistance living in a church uh building together right but since we revoked that cup we had to um kind of start over from this and when we did the last conditional use permit for the treatment center it was very specific that that use had to be people in uh like we wrote it around the same type of language that a multifam district residential care facility would be but it would have to be that there was care going on in the facility right so it was more like a care facility this is just kind of a group residential situation and it's not licensed the same way so we couldn't figure out a way to fit this in and with the battered women shelter Cup being stated that the last amendment that that was revoked it put us in the position to where they would need an ordinance Amendment again to kind of go back to the way that it was before we did the last ordinance Amendment and then a new cup granting them the ability to operate in the manner that they're stating they want to operate under their application so the ordinance Amendment would essentially in this zoning District allow for these accessory care facilities to not be so explicit in stating that they have to be in Care on the site but just in care somewhere right so it just can't be like the idea would be that the zoning would be written to where it's not just people living in this building because that would be a zoning that would require rezoning right so to be accessory to the church it has to be somebody who's getting cared for in some manner somewhere but they can be residing there it would be the distinction and then we would write the cup to be around the limits and the number of people and whatnot that they show in their application and so that's where we've got this right now um because of the nature of how we're doing this it requires a public hearing uh but basically it's not changing anything than what's going on there now except for the fact that the Haven Homes program that they were in uh the for the chemical dependency treatment would be happening at a different location so the people here would be taken to that spot to have their uh chemical dependency treatment occur and then they would come back here just to stay so it's more of like a group residential facility but with the fact that they're being treated somewhere and I guess from the perspective of how this would work if you were to so choose to approve this we would be thinking that this would be also inclusive of if they wanted to go back to the other model like if Haven wanted to go back to having the treatment happen on site that's fine offsite that's fine too but just as long as there's some form of treatment going on to necessitate this to be here and that the finding would be that having this type of facility accessory to a church is fine provided that the church property is large enough to accommodate it right so in this case uh it's like a whole city block big it's two city blocks actually bits a big facility here they've got the buildings already there and all of this can be accommodated on site and we would keep the performance standards that you adopted related to the treatment center in place but just that now it's fine if if you so choose to approve this it would be fine that they are engaging in some form of treatment somewhere everything else would remain the same and so this would require an ordinance amendment to state that uh it's people going through get receiving some care or something to that effect on the property so that would be in the ordinance Amendment it just wouldn't say that it's a residential care facility it would be a facility to allow for the care onsite or off but just that they have to be in some form of care and then this way too this like other similar types of situations like The Battered Women's Shelter things like that would be possible again as well and so this would allow for all of these different types of uses that they've been doing here on the site would be available for their use so that's kind of the highlevel points of it um if you have any specific questions about it um we can answer them you've seen the applicants letter and what they're intending to do and how they're intending to do it on the site um it's uh I I should clarify it's Crescendo chemical health has taken over for Haven they're the same company though hav is um assumed ownership of Haven chemical health systems so it's the same company they the same operator it's just that they will be providing the care to the residents at a facility in a different location um so they call it a recovery residence and I think you know the applicant had kind of stated that um like they've got their proposed client popul ation in their application which they talk about it still be for women it's not uh no change there it's just really the only change would be that the people would be going off site for their care if you have any questions so I can so my my question is if we go to it must be the second page where it looks where it says proposed amendment on your packet yeah it says the text to be added uses would be facility occupied by no more than 16 persons that provides housing 24 hours per day to persons who are chemically dependent and considered to be handicapped you just said that don't we also want to include something in there that references that these people are receiving some sort of onsite or offsite care or programming yeah I mean when there we when we want to include a little Clause somewhere in that proposed language right that right so if I were to at some point if we're someone makes a motion like okay I think we should amend the the P2 District conditional uses right we would want to use the language provided but also add the but these people have to be receiving some sort of services or programming for chemical dependency right yeah or or similar yeah on onsite or off-site right uh program okay yeah so we if they wanted to switch the model back to the old way that cup is still valid so it would make sense sense to word it that way okay so onsite or on-site U programming my other question is now if you go to the next page where under staff recommendations yeah um if the Amendments approved appropriate staff would recommend the ordinance also be adopted with conditions that have the site at least four acres with one acre for each additional accessory use located on a higher classification roadway so would those conditions also have to be read into the conditional use Amendment so we've got you because you got that little section on the back back yeah they they would qualify for that so it wouldn't need to be into the cup Amendment okay because because they would meet that threshold out of the gate the conditions from the cup that were here previously on this site would actually be the same we we just have the same conditions and we'd state that it's just now adding for this new allowance by Cod so in terms of just the pure Amendment before we even get to The Cup right so in terms of just a pure Amendment we don't need to worry about that additional language in terms of the four acres one acre right so that that wouldn't be something we would say okay we were going to recommend that this language be adopted by the city council we don't have to include any of that right okay but as far as this but again so if we get to step two which is the cup review that would just then be a condition we would place so we have the general cup conditions and we'd say okay in addition we would have you know we're going to have these other conditions in order for you to to be able to get approval for the cop so that's where we would load in some of these other again the site has additional park or has sufficient parking and then the patients shall be receiving treatment specifically from you said the Haven turned into the who crescendo Crescendo same company though just the The Haven is part of Crescendo now so we can't just house so even if you were had a chemical dependency issue and even if you were uh receiving treatment but if you weren't a member of that program one of the cop conditions would say no we we just can't house you here right right so if this were to just turn because the thing you're trying to guard against is you don't want to just have like a like there'd be no purpose for there to be here just a group living situation it's not it's not a hotel right so we want to make sure that the spirit and intent of all these ordinance amendments are that the city has felt that on you know like institutional campuses having cuz like back in the day they had a bunch of uh religious guys living in in that building together right and they did stuff at the church they were there so having people who are doing something that necessitates them to be in an area like that is fine so the original Spirit intent of these zoning amendments was like people receiving care people who um you know and having all this on the grounds of a church isn't that odd of a concept right but you want you don't want just like a hotel on the ground of a church or just like a an apartment like a dormatory style thing for just people to live while they're working at the oil refinery or something right I mean that's just not what that type of thing's intended for and so that's how we come to these amendments so in that event if Crescendo or Haven ended up you know maybe they get bought out or maybe something happens I mean would we have to have a a new cup application no it runs with the land so like like if they wanted to go back to their original program from The Haven application that's fine you know that can it runs with the land as a cup okay so if they brought Services back in that's fine if they leave them out that's fine right and then this would also allow like The Battered Women's Shelter to come back to this amendment okay so is there any questions from so they have to be with that program then out of Woodbury or is it like a sober house well it it is like a sober house but they're in programming offsite so so so they have to be in that particular program though they have to be under the care of Crescendo okay to be there to begin with I'm assuming Crescendo is not just going to put ads on Craig's room for rent you know so yeah they'd have to be in their program to be residing there got you I was just thinking of some people that maybe if they deemed or they have to go to a sober house you know and they and they have relatives in town would they be able to go to this facility if they're in crescendo's program okay any other commissioner questions or comments no not for me um well let's uh let's close the commission meeting let's open up the public hearing so if anybody wants to come up and speak on this or have any questions for the commissioner or commission or or Mr Sparks you're welcome to come up and ask so just step up to the podium you just have to state your name and your address for the record my name is Jacob saxs I'm at 1139 Ashland Avenue on the road so you said that uh it would bring the battered women shelter back so I remember when the batter women shelter was there and the occupancy that he that you were talking about I feel like I'm talking about you in third person when you're right there but the occupancy he said was 21 people Max 16 that Max that state statute for this kind of facility or this kind of service yes so if if the max is 16 and you bring the battered women shelter perspective back and usually The Battered Women's Shelter had children with it does that reduce the number of adults that are able to be treated there or do the kids not count it well it would toward the occupany it would be an either or we're not having Crescendo and the battered women if for some reason if one if one use left or one was gone then another use could step back in it's we're not there's no there's not mixing is that that's how it is okay and that's currently being operated as a in-house treatment facility with a maximum of 16 people there yeah again I think the only difference is again is nothing's going to change except for like Mr spark said instead of receiving Services instead of there like maybe there's CD counselor coming in or they've got social workers that's obvious those services are going to take place somewhere else and I I I understand that but it also the language that was used is pretty light the language was they are receiving some sort of treatment in some way through the crescendo program is there varying levels of treatment and is there well I mean that would be there you can have inpatient you can have outpatient you can have int ensive up I mean there's well so if I have a friend who is an alcoholic and he's been going to AA for 31 years that is some sort of treatment within the crescendo program let's say well I don't think a qualifies this treatment that that's just a that's a voluntary well that's what I mean is how is that is that going to be strictly defined or is it Loosely defined and therefore up for interpretation down the road well my guess and we don't have anybody from Crescendo or Haven here which would have been a nice have but I am here oh oh okay we have somebody so would there be a situation where someone's going to be there and not be actively engaged in some sort of recovery process no actually well hold on so would you just yeah just step back for second let's have you come on up to the to the podium state your name and probably in your address for the record sure my name is Ted Herman my address is 915 9th Avenue uh is who I'm representing today okay you're here with who I'm here with Crescendo chemical health also known as The Haven okay we're currently operating uh inpatient treatment chemical dependency treatment uh and what we're asking to do is have the opportunity to serve a lower risk lower needs clientele uh in form of intensive Outpatient Treatment is what we do in Woodberry uh and so we're hoping to provide this as a recovery residence similar to a sober living facility in concept however tied to the Intensive Outpatient Treatment is the model we're seeing that's more effective than just say let's have a sober house and everyone lives there so in the event that somebody were to stop services or refuse Services what would be the consequence of their of their living situation there at the at on the church ground sure I suppose that that would depend on partially what the council voted um I believe the the kind of guide rails that were put in place were were proposed by Nate to protect uh the city of St Paul Park I'm aware of some programs who would say that's fine you can discontinue uh programming and others that would say you need to be in programming as well uh we would be in suppor of either uh but would prefer people in treatment uh because it people who are in treatment have a tendency to embody the kind of sober spirit that we're going for uh and if there are people who are discharged say because they're no longer engaging in that process of getting well or getting better it can actually be disruptive to the rest of the people who are trying to stay and maintain their sobriety so you would understand that so let's say we approved amending the language and we we moved on to approving of the cop the cup is pretty clear right which is if you're there you must be going through the Haven or Crescendo program and you must be engaged in Services yeah right so as a condition of that cop would you agree that if someone said you know what I'm just not going to Services I'm not participating your program um that that would then make them ineligible to be a resident of that of that facility yeah we certainly wouldn't put them out on the street we would always find a referral destination for other uh places with looser restrictions I suppose if there's a concern with the clients only being in our programming the council could make a suggestion that they be in uh chemical dependency treatment at any license facility um that that would be another way to go as well if there's concerns with tying it to our specific programming well but the cup I mean the the recommended cup language is it's it's it's it's tied to your program specifically sure right so okay just kind of hypothetically speaking what is your process and what's a general timeline for discharging and getting somebody out of your program and what would what what would you see as the the the the process in the timeline for having them then be moved on from this facility sure it would be a matter of a few days uh we certainly don't want to just goodbye um we always want to make sure we find a place for people to land because we are in the people helping business um but it's not an extended multi-week process either okay okay so so if the gentleman say was going to continue doing AA at your facility kind of going back to what you were saying you know how how um confined is this how how how are the parameters right you know if they were to continue going with AA say at your facility out there would they then qualify to stay here at this facility as written I don't believe so but we wouldn't be opposed to it if if you were choosing to go that route well but the the route in the language of the route is they got to be in some sort of pre you know some sort of programming or or some sort of treatment process right and AA is a you know voluntary organization that that's not and I'm guessing you know your funding sources would probably if someone's not participating in the programming would that impact your ability to fund that person and to have them as a part of your program and have them as as a resident of this facility it certainly can uh we uh some of our clients will get County funding U it's called gr it's a housing subsidy for people who are focusing on their treatment getting better they're unable to work as a result of their addiction or illness uh and the county will put them up uh for a period of time while they're in treatment and once the counselor deems that they can work again then they're required to go go obtain a job at which point we would need to transition them out okay sir I mean did did you have any more questions did did did this did this exchange answers things you want I mean you're welcome to come on up and ask more questions or or or or see I don't have any questions I think that that was great I do believe that the question you're asking is how long is the average person staying there before they're cycled out not how long does it take you to kick them out if they're not following the rules oh okay sure great question uh we get that from pretty much every client uh we focus more on outcomes than uh it's a 30-day program it's a 60-day program it depends how ready they are when they enter a treatment to uh engage in the process there are some who don't really want to be there and it takes them a little bit to warm up to the group and work at it those folks can be in as long as a year uh and then there are other folks who are um maybe had they've had a slip up they've had multiple years of sobriety uh but they're ready to go uh their HR said you need to go get treatment uh come back when you're sober uh some of those folks we've seen as few as a month or two okay any commission questions or comments or public comments or questions I sincerely thank you for coming here today and thank you for offering up this information I think it it's it's very helpful to have so Absolut thank you for your consideration all right seeing no other public comments I'm going to close oh I'm sorry no you just come up to the day and give your name and address hi I'm Haley Ked I live at 845 Ashland Avenue which is directly across the way from the building in question um I just want to say I've lived there for almost 17 years so I've gone through the woman shelter I've gone through the church changing it from the Spanish Immersion School all the way to Haven and this last year where there's been no occupancy it's been the first time in the entire time I've lived there I've not had vandalism I've not had people outside in vehicles doing sexual acts and having two young boys that's really disturbing um the litter is down because people just Chuck their stuff out the window and then they drive off um it's been really nice and not having somebody there for this long it really brings back a sense of community because kids are outside playing they're not worried about What's happen happening in that parking lot or hey Mom why is this happening and I have to explain why these women are outside just an example we witness a lot of things living right there in our kitchen window our dining room window is right there and that's the building we see 24/7 and when you see a woman getting pulled from a vehicle and stripped from drugs and she's screaming and kicking and Mom what is happening oh honey she's just having a bad day that's called chemical dependency it's not okay that it's really hard as a parent to see that and I just want to say that haven Holmes had a 3-month span not when it happens or you know like 24 hours staff they had things put in place but we still saw a lot of First Responders we had firefighters we had ambulances we had all the you know police officers coming 24/7 all the time because they had to make those phone calls we don't have that anymore and it's quiet it's lovely it's not something I want to go back to and I don't feel like it's the right spot it's not there's a church there there's a school with kids k 12 that live there and now you're saying you want to have people there all the time is there going to be staff is there going to be like oh can you go walk in the community our community is very tighten it we want to be safe we don't want people there that are going through a hard time because we all are going through a hard time and we don't need the outsiders coming in and vandalizing and doing all those things that haven't happened in a year um going through all the things in 17 years I just there's so many other options I think that that building could be better used for um we've resided two doors in our house because people during the um Haven homes they would come and drop off supplies at our house cuz it's an unmarked building and it would be baked goods all the way to like weird wrap packages and we're like you're in the wrong spot that's across the street to the point where like I said we boarded off two doors because it was all the time I say it all the time like 15 times a week people were dropping stuff off thinking it was the shelter they had no idea where it was but they're like here bake some cookies what are in these cookies like what what am I supposed to do with this and now not having that I've lost two doors I've lost access but I still look at that building and I definitely do not want this there it's not safe for our community can you step up and maybe talk to us a little bit about kind of what having heard the concerns yeah right so let's start with maybe the simpler one which is identification of the of the property y right are you going to have any sort of signage or indication as to who's there and what's there and and and to know that you're there sure good question uh most sober homes do not put a sign out saying H Sober Sober Living facility just because the stigma uh well I don't um I'm not going to say what she report it didn't happen I'm unaware of the specific incidents that that occurred and my staff are always always available 24/7 when there's incidents so uh whether these happened while it was an inpatient residential facility in the last I think it's two-ish years two or three years uh versus when it happened before our tenure I'm I'm unsure of these incidents um and would dispute the frequency of which First Responders were uh asked to visit the facility we don't have any more than any regular neighborhood it's it's not a detox facility okay well in terms of so what what would be the anticipated sort of protocol in terms of like do you have checkin hours I mean are there are there hours where you have to be in the facility or out of the facility I mean I guess can you speak to that yeah yeah absolutely sober housing uh tends to have rules with curfews um the difference between recovery residen is and inpatient treatment a lot of our clients would call inpatient treatment um more like jail except more therapy and you can discharge yourself anytime you want it's a extremely restrictive environment 247 um people in in house with you uh and but this is about a transition to a lower level of care for people who have less uh less demanding conditions uh which is why we're moving towards that um there's will not be 24-hour supervision however we will have peer uh Recovery Specialists visiting and spending significant amounts of time working with each of the clients and we also have our counselors and management just up the road um if there were any issues so there's not going to be 24-hour staff no okay and so there's no curfew uh currently there's no curfew however we would definitely be imp menting one this isn't uh a party house this is a place to get well they're attending treatment starting in the morning at well it's 9:00 a to noon Monday to Friday okay and I guess one of the questions was you know obviously you're doing this in coordination with St Thomas acquaintance Church correct yes sir and they're aware of what you're what you're trying to put in and and sort of the param of what's happening there yeah they're overwhelmingly in full support okay have they expressed any concerns to you about what's been going on the property or in terms of has there been you know is there is there trash laying around or there are there people wandering the property at all or I mean have they expressed anything to you or have they set any demands or conditions on you in terms of being on their property not not ever other than being respectful to the neighborhood uh as neighbors um not being out at night in the there's a courtyard on the backside and also we definitely had rules and I think would Implement them here about not being in the front of the building only if they're outside being in the courtyard with the exception of Ingress and egress to to the street or Vehicles do you have any specific policies that you that you plan on give or that you do give residents there in terms of codes of conduct or acceptable and unacceptable Behavior absolutely we plan to align with the Minnesota Minnesota Association of sober homes short of for ash uh since in this state there is no licensing Authority for Recovery residences uh this organization has stepped up to kind of set parameters for uh acceptable codes of conduct for both clients as well as um the organizations that host them and so what are the consequences for conduct violations well not living there anymore okay and do you have a process by which you you would present people with allegations of conduct violations and is there is there some sort of process they would have to go through to either confirm or deny whether or not they're in compliance sure sure yeah a lot of that is integrated with their treatment the actual counseling side of things the most frequent frequent concern would be if anyone is using or disruptive to the household and that then gets handled as part of the therapy process in Woodbury do you have conditions or do you have rules concerning their interaction with the public or or people around the facility uh it would be to act like responsible neighbors um as any neighbor should be um not knocking on doors not going around the neighborhood um trying to think really the church has been welcoming and has invited our clients to come and 10 Church um just be normal good sober community members well having heard the concerns I mean is is it appropriate or is it possible that maybe you could maybe develop some sort of more specific or more robust set of guidelines or policies that you would give tenants there that say you know hey if we're going to be in this neighborhood here's some expect here's some some specific expectations we have I mean is that something that that you think is appropriate or inappropriate for in your role as as the owner or the operator of this or certainly we would we would definitely want to to align with the Minnesota Association of sober homes rather than just defining our own they have uh developed kind of the single source of authority in the state so we would want to adopt uh their their rules and regulations and conditions I guess again how serious of sort of a rule violation or sort of how how serious of a of a sort of a misdeed would you have to engage in to sort of lose the privilege of staying there I mean let's say you're littering in the front of the house or let's say you're walking up the down the streets you know creating a disturbance you know two or three nights a week I mean I mean that would be unacceptable okay 100% are we talking a single incident we're talking multiple incidents I mean I'm not I suppose it would depend on the severity of the in ENT if um say someone were just sitting out on the front stoop rather than in the courtyard that's one thing uh if they're out yelling at neighbors that would be quite a more severe incident and quite honestly we um we would partner with the police department just like we did when we had inpatient and they had cell phone numbers of people to call 24 hours a day uh to handle incidents but they were few and far between okay any other questions I mean you're you're absolutely welcome to come up and and uh say what you want to say I guess my other question is if it's not supervised 247 can they have visitors over is there people coming and going because if there's nobody there to say oh yep she had so and so over they spent the night or friends family whatever um another incident that came to mind when you were talking is we literally saw a person climbing a tree and hand off drugs through a window and then came on down blew a kiss and then they drove away um the these are things that are just unfortunately have been our normal and I don't want that anymore so like I have hard questions I have a mom heart and we have a young neighborhood coming in and young families and it's really hard to hear that this is happening again um so just 24/7 somebody there I would feel more comfortable if you guys do choose to allow this to go through I would 100% want that to be a thing and not just oh yep but somebody will call it in the cops will drive by more whatever like there has to be somebody there on your end to monitor that because they're there for a reason and as a community we don't trust them and when they are out in the community even on a nice day going for a walk it's going to be like oh go to the other side of the street like they have to earn that trust and it's not there that building has bad stigma and just having somebody there would be a huge thing is that something that you guys implement or would consider uh 24hour supervision is inconsistent with the type of recovery residence similar to The Neighbors in the neighborhood don't also have supervision these are uh free citizens they're not in jail they're not in prison right they're sober in recovery and in treatment and I I respect your concerns uh had I known of any of these things happening they would have been stopped full stop okay um hotels have 24 concierge so maybe the verbiage is maybe a little different that you could Implement and hire somebody and not treat it like a jail for for starters and more of just somebody there to check in and out that front door service so what's so you said you have a facility you had staff close by to so where are they and what what what's the response time of this staff let say there was something going on at the facility what what's the response time um my administrator is at Woodberry so 8 minutes okay um disingenuous that so one someone would have to okay no and the only reason we asked this because this is a public meeting and we want everybody who watches this so everyone can hear what's being said because sometimes if you if you're missing something it might be something important that somebody out there wants to chime in on or talk to us about so yeah so I grew up in St Park I lived in kaj Grove for 17 years and on 78 Street Court and for the first 10 years it was great it was just great then for the last seven years the house at the very end of our court directly across the street this White House became one of these types of facilities I'm not saying it's with your organization but one of these types of facilities and you hit the nail on the head I mean my stuff started disappearing we started getting vandalized we had people having sex in the back you know because I lived at the end of this court so there was this Valley right behind St Rita's church and it was it was crazy right and it didn't get better it didn't get worse because it was just bad right and to say that you know you have an administrator in Woodburry and they're going to be there in eight minutes well who's calling them so do we have a 1 1800 number that we call and we're guaranteed someone's going to show up 8 minutes later do we I mean what would the process be in order to be able to be to have someone activate and then be there in 8 minutes and to be there in 8 minutes means they're in their car right they're not putting their kids to bed and they're not you know I mean and well my my my take was that you're partnering with St Paul Park police and the St Paul Park police would obviously be the people responding but they also have a line of communication to your staff and that that's basically what you said earlier right correct any conduct that the neighborhood would Dean unacceptable like police would I would consider that to be equivalent or right and I I think the first call I mean it wouldn't be it would be a 911 call I mean that and I agree in certain circumstances but that's not what she's talking about right and I I live in the neighborhood i' I've lived here almost my entire life um if you consider K Grove part of St Paul Park which I do sometimes but the uh the fact is is that having someone on site whether you don't have to call him a cop you don't have to call him a security guard but having someone from the staff living on site just so that when someone is climbing up a tree because I've seen that at the White House in kage Grove when people are doing weird stupid things because you're right they they're having current issues they have chemical dependency issues they have whatever problems going on and that leads to erratic behavior and that erratic Behavior affects you know I have a six-year-old right I have a 30-year-old old who lives a block away from here in a different in his own house and I have a six-year-old at my house and I want to be able to ride down the street and I do remember two years ago when there was weird people standing outside all the time and it wasn't the women it was the men that were in the parking lot because I'm assuming you're in that greyh house right across the street the the people who are sitting in the parking lot waiting for the women that's those are the those are the people that are the problem but they're only there because the women are there well this isn't a this is going to be a co-ed facility right no women only women only I'm sorry women I was okay it's the men visiting okay um no and here's the thing and everything you're saying is good but I mean the The Challenge from the from the Planning Commission point of view which is we're more like hey what are the zoning what what what are the things that that could potentially be there we can't necessarily reach your fingers into like okay this is how you're going to run it like we can't say well you know what appliances you put in your house or what color you paint your house right we say Okay want your house to be set back so much from the property line it's got to be so many square feet you can't have too much of this so but the finer details of how they run their business and again every single comment made is a valid rational reasonable concern right but the question is is how far can we reach into what they're doing and when an applicant comes if they fill out the application they pay the fee and then they present their plan I mean our goal is to say okay have you met some of the certain minimum threshold criteria is if you have our job is to then recommend to the city council okay they came to us they filled out their plan they've made some recommendations to us have they have they met some minimum thresholds right so and I'm hoping that all these concerns are being heard tonight that they're going to go back and that that somebody you know at Haven is going to listen to these and and and think about you know when we're coming into this community if they do you know here's some things you know if we want to stay here right here's some things we got to we got to do here's some policies here's some procedures here's some guidelines we've got to make sure that we're that we're living up to right so it's it it it it's not that we don't want to address the problems but the Planning Commission may or may not be the right tool to fix some of the things that are that that may or may not happen on this property and I agree but I do believe the Planning Commission that one of the roles of the Planning Commission when they're reviewing an application is to determine is this is this a public benefit I mean is there a benefit to the public the people who actually own the houses and own the property around it does it benefit us to have this in our neighborhood or would it benefit us to not have it in the neighborhood well I mean but it's already there I mean it has been there I mean there's been something of this nature there for quite some time but it's not there now it's not there now no I understand that and as she said it's this is the best it's been in the how many years have you lived there 16 16 years that she's been there no again and I'm not disagreeing I I wouldn't I'm not challenging your perception right but um I'm also and I would have actually might have even been nice to have somebody from St Thomas acquaintance here tonight um they kind of talk about you know their perspective on what happens here but I mean I'm imagining you know St Thomas is a is an institution in this city it's been here forever um I spent 11 years going to and from that building at least twice a week through Scouts so I I you know I had an opportunity to meet and and deal with a lot of people down there and it's a it's a it's a nice place I enjoyed my time there and my suspicion is that you know it's also a funding and viability issue for the church right I mean this is a income generator they've got this property they got this building and it's sitting there vacant and it's probably you know how they keep that church going and how they keep that a vital viable operation so I I when we so when you say I'm looking at the neighborhood I'm looking at the interests of the people in the neighborhood the neighborhood includes the church and it includes the people who go to that church includes the people who want to keep attending that church and see that church stay open and it's also the people who maybe send their kids to this you know to the school or or who go to the to the to the building next to it I mean so the community is the neighbors it's the it's the homeowners but the community is also the church and the school and the people who go there right so that doesn't it doesn't excuse it certainly wouldn't um give license to the people there to misbehave to take advant to take advantage of that opportunity or to or to misuse that opportunity but in terms of like assessing what's the public good the I I see the public good as I mean it's a very broad category and I agree which is why I think that you know this type of but there isn't someone here from St Thomas I know right so the people who care about it are here and you know if if we're if we're using the leveling stick of well this is what keeps the church open then that's one thing then then that should be something that's stated and then we can figure out the money right because then it's a money issue it's not a whether or not we should have a um a treatment facility or a a different type of facility it's and they may also see it not just as a f viabil mean they may also see it as a public service I mean they are a church it's a charitable organization and and again my 11 years from there I mean you know Vol I mean volunteerism was big through the church it was big through our troop I mean it was Community it was engaging the community um so I mean I you're right I'm not a spokesman for St Thomas acquaintance and I and I and I tread lightly saying that but I having had some interaction there for over a period of time I'm I'm I don't think I'm EXA I don't think I'm I'm stepping into like unknown territory when I say my suspicion is that they see this as part of their economic viability they see it as part of their mission win-win yeah on their side and I I get that and I also agree that if this was something that was set up for it's they're not helping the people in this community they're helping people in general right so General are coming in but we don't know who's using those I mean that well we know that they're not going to be from St Paul Park we know that they're not going to be from this general area because in general you're not going to put someone in a treatment facility in the area where they we're having a problem that's inacurate we've absolutely treaded people from St Paul Park Cottage gr they live they live in this town and then they move three blocks over to live with your place yeah how often is that it was a handful a couple it's not a big city either right yeah well anyways I just if we're weighing it out public good and I think that is what the Planning Commission is what's one of the parts of of of of granting a a conditional use I mean because it's an amendment to a rule and we have the rule for a reason right so come on up you're getting your steps in today I all day um I guess I just have one question of the planning Community Committee is are you all currently going to St Thomas aqu Church or are you going to other churches where your vote could maybe be swayed in a way of making sure your church is being upheld in a place of financial responsibility I personally wouldn't feel comfortable myself answering that question and I don't know if anybody else on the commission would answer that I mean cuz I know that that's a thought that's gone through quite a few of the community's heads and friends that I've spoken to is well they go to that church they're going to make sure that church stays alive so I just wanted to bring that to your attention as well that I mean if you've been there and going to you know Boy Scouts and things like that we kind of assume that and we just hope that that is put aside in your judgment when it comes time to make that vote yeah and I'll answer I I go to the church every once once in a while but not all the time but I really like that you people have showed up today because if I see two people out there I could guess that there's got to be at least at least 20 people for each one of you that's out there that said they would like to show up but they have not showed up mhm I'm perfectly comfortable saying I've never stepped foot there in day of my life so okay and I'm I mean I'm reasonably confident most of the people here are are here on to promote the the city's interest they're here to do the job of the of the Planning Commission we're not I I've never seen anybody necessarily sort of beholding to any particular public or private entity or person I mean it's the Planning Commission it's it's not it's interesting but it's just not uh that exciting or I don't we don't have we don't have the authority to really make a lot of things other than recommendations ultimately the city council has the final say they're the ones that take the votes that matter sure um this is just sort of a way for again to have an opportunity for the public come in few extra Minds have issue some thoughts and then it goes to the the city council and then the city council again you know there's five more people with five more different perspectives and five more ways of looking at things so hopefully somewhere between you know the five of us the five people on the council and the people that show up you know some maybe not a consensus but some ideas get get put forward and some don't sure yeah okay thank you come on up uh hello my name is Zach Zacharias I live at 845 Ashland as well and I just have a couple questions so the Haven house wasn't all that bad um overall we did see some In-N-Outs with paramedics and you know we did see one altercation where you know cuz it was a facility you could leave whenever you wanted right you left to discharge yes but they did and a lady was pulled over right in front of our house actually kidy corner to our house and Contraband and everything was put right on the vehicle so the St Paul Park cops would know all about this as well one of our clients one of your clients that stayed in your facility or was bringing it to somebody there I mean we witnessed these ladies walk by almost daily which they're Pleasant they waved they were kind but it was just one of those things Haley's mainly talking about when it was a halfway house or not the halfway house but the battered women's shelter where all these horrible things happen right on front of our house I wasn't there unfortunately I didn't see any of this cuz I definitely would have been banging on doors but my other fac question is like what happened to The Haven house it was thriving it was doing well and then all of a sudden door shut so do you know uh The Haven house we're talking about the last three years yeah so I mean it was there thriving for two two and a half years in the last what 68 months poof it's just gone it's like magic they disappeared overnight do we have a reason why be happy to answer that sure sure step on it yeah [Applause] yeah so in the last couple years effectively postco uh We've seen uh dramatic changes in client preferences for how they want to receive treatment we have uh had regulatory increases put on us by the Department of Human Services and all the while insurance companies are refusing to provide residential care and cover Residential Care at increasing rates so effectively your costs keep going up and your Revenue keeps going down uh as a result of some of the insurance battles that we faced uh we actually had one uh client who we ate his entire stay this was at a men's residence but he had one day of sobriety when he came to us so the insurance company said no he's good good to go uh and so when you face those kinds of financial obstacles uh we ultimately made the difficult decision to close down as an inpatient Residential Treatment Facility uh just because it it was uh nonviable quite frankly hemorrhaging money uh I just was actually at the Minnesota Addiction in recovery conference uh downtown St Paul at the River Center and we heard that over and over uh I'm not totally sure residential inpatient facilities are going to be a thing we see here in Minnesota in the next five years okay what is the primary addiction that you guys treat sure great question uh I would say roughly about half our alcohol uh and then the other half would be a smattering of your usual uh methamphetamine just on the road it was none of our clients or anyone we know but Cottage Grove I believe PD found 186 pounds of methamphetamine in someone's house it's in the neighborhood uh methamphetamine cocaine fentanyl uh it's a crisis uh right now it's getting a little bit hard to tell who is taking what because it's all being mixed together um the drug dealers are kind of cutting it in new and innovative ways um and so they have kind of funny street names and a lot of the clients don't know what they're using they just know it's it's the pink stuff from this guy thanks couple more for me um okay so yeah Zach again thank you thank you for answering that but yes it would also be a little you know less disheartening if say someone like St Thomas Aquarius would turn that into helping old folks turning into Old Folks facility you know instead of housing something you know that can maybe hinder a community something that would definitely just bring joy and it wouldn't bring all the chaos that potentially could come with what's going to happen well the problem with that would be well the in patient the nursing home industry is one of the most heavily regulated industry I mean it it is it would probably be cost prohibitive and the part of the problem I think and I remember this from past meeting stuff which is that building is set up again it was original St for people to live in I mean it's not it you couldn't turn it into a commercial use really cuz number one the building not set for number two it's on the church grounds so we we're not going to rezone a square the prog for some other I mean so the church itself has got some real limitations and restrictions on what to do with that building and and how to make it functional so when it was zoned to The Haven house that just zoned it to I mean cuz that was a livein facility but it also had people staying in facility right and like Mr spark said they had the cup yeah so it was zoned and then they had a cup that allowed them to to run the programming there yeah sure and then I guess my other question was you said you have a facility in Woodbury right yes and is that facility in Woodbury similar to where it's majority neighborhood and then just a church and then a school next to it and then the rest is all residential it's an outpatient treatment faciliity so it's more in like a I say commercial but it's more like Medical Professional space so that's exactly where I think that should be but that's my opinion but I appreciate you guys letting me speak thank you my Su suspicion would be that you want you're you're looking for a less industrial commercial space and probably a more Community Style Space right which is why it's an outpatient low intensity right so I mean to to your comment which is I think certain kind I but I think what he's what he was saying was this is the kind of place where we would want this kind of service provided right because these are people who aren't they're not coming out of detox they're in there for so we want them to have to maintain a Community Connection a community thinking and not more of a institutional sort of mindset so that's what I got and if I'm wrong you can correct me right that's correct okay so you're right there are some places that should be a different areas right like you know whether it's a if it's inpatient or if it's if it's an intense outpatient right those might be better suited other places but for what they're saying is you we want this to be uh again for people who are who don't need the higher level of supervision or intervention they need a place to live yeah one more okay one all right I name name is Jack La at 1010 eth um I'm assuming their rent is going to be subsidized through either GA or Haven's going to pay part of their rent at St Thomas aquinus or is St Thomas going to cover the entire bill for them to live there because there's a lot of discussion now I don't know if youve read in the newspaper you know new way and the anti-kickback laws that are going through legislation right now that might cause a lot of other treatment centers that are doing the same exact thing to look at how their model is going to change do you guys have plans in place right now to where if that does happen hey we're going to switch funding from a different Source here uh yeah great question so we are of the opinion that it is a kickback when you uh in exchange for outpatient treatment allow someone to live somewhere for free uh so there you're talking about a Star tribine article I'm guessing uh that was just in the paper uh we would not St Thomas aquinus is not paying for any of this uh they they wouldn't pay for the people's housing and we also do not believe subsidizing uh is a a legal way to go and we don't want to cross that boundary so it comes from um either grga type County type funding uh or some maybe uh private pay that really it comes down to finding it a cost effective and cheap way not cheap but our clients aren't buying houses they're not affording $3,000 a month rent neither mine for a shared room sure so right now their housing is subsidized through the Haven it is not okay so how do they pay for their residency at we this is our first sober house under our umbrella right now we partner with other organizations who do silver housing and recovering residences there housing is separate in that instance so in that in that case I most of them are gr is my understanding um but since we're it's not our programs I can't give you any number breakdowns how that works okay so are you aware if they do enforce this anti- kickback law on the way people live when they're in IOP and things like that do you guys have a plan B if you are affected by that yes gr G funding it would be County County funding for people who need that assistance okay and then thinking in the future is the county going to have enough funding to support everybody else that's going to have to switch to that type of model we very much believe they will okay um and then I think it's important for the Planning Commission that the amendment is just for P2 so it does it's not just St Thomas equain any company in that zone can then see if they can can build the same type of facility and not work with just Haven because that's not in the amendment is spe it's specifically Haven it's people in a chemical dependency program and covered under the the fair housing act so it's not just St Thomas quaintance Church that's affected everybody else in that zoning can then follow the same model but they would also have to follow all of the other space parking they they have to and right now they only have four to eight parking spots at least from what I read 16 bed facility if everybody has a car you're having eight other people park on the street how is that going to affect the winter zoning laws that come in effect are people's cars going to be towed every single day are they going to have to move them into my driveway where are those cars going to go so by doing a code Amendment to that to the P2 that's just one part of the P2 code all the other code requirements are still there plus there's also the cup process which says this is a this is a we're saying we're GNA we can amend the code to say this is something that could possibly be done but you still have to come in and ask for a conditional use permit we're saying this is possible now you've got to come in and specifically convince us that what you're doing meets all the general criteria and meets the specifics that we set forth in the C and as a part of the cup we can add additional regulations we can add add additional conditions which is and I don't know if you were here earlier but you know we were talking about you know in in the in the packet we got you know there if this gets to the point of the CP there's going to be even more conditions that are placed on on Haven that would be very specific to them specific to this site spefic specific to what they're trying to do there so so your concern is legitimate and valid but it's the thing we're that we're looking at possibly changing or actually we wouldn't change it we would make a recommendation to city council that we think this would be a reasonable or acceptable thing to change and we then we still would have to get to the cup issue so I mean it's a there's several hurdles that any particular business would have to overcome in order to actually be able to open up a facility of this type so it wouldn't just be oh we made one amendment to one section of the P2 it doesn't just give a green light to anybody or any or everybody who wants to kind of come in and do this thing and frankly this is doesn't seem to be probably a use that is all that particularly popular or in demand particularly maybe not even in this you know in this city so so I hear what you're saying but I mean it we s the again this is a a narrow Amendment inside of a much larger framework that still has to be complied with okay thank you well you don't have to promise it's okay you can be you'll be done when you're done okay um just a question about living there you have all these people cooking cleaning things like that are they responsible for all of their own cooking because when Haven went in I remember that there is no Community Kitchen where they did like full-on meals they catered a lot of stuff in I know tanucci was there twice a day um with all of their whatever they ordered so are the these residents going to be doing all of their own things are they going to be doing all their own shopping things like that and like um he said vehicles are they going to be going to the grocery store going to be going doing doing all their daily living tasks things like that um how does that work has there been any revamps inside the building to accommodate just like almost like a single family kitchen and not you know a cafeteria style kitchen for you know maybe people that aren't used to cooking for themselves yeah there's actually quite a large kitchen I I paused to say it's a commercial kitchen because there's certain requirements for that uh we did not cater any meals to our clients in that facility any deliveries would have been for staff our clients were not allowed to receive uh door Dash or anything like of that nature U so there's actually quite a large kitchen um looking out the window towards if I'm think where you live out towards your property it's toward the front of the building M um quite a large it's a I think a six burner stove uh with a M multi-section sink very large refrigerators two of them there's actually quite a very nice kitchen one that I'm a little envious of sure okay uh and parking most of our clients do not have cars that's that's something that turns out when you have addiction problems you lose your license a lot um so we tend to have uh clients who do have vehicles because they haven't lost their license they haven't driven under the influence and so as a community they find ways to um share rides with each other uh to to treatment a back yes they would be going to a grocery store like anyone else in the neighborhood um and also to treatment um daily okay and just as a rough estimate I know that schedules change in things like that but when would they be leaving and going and coming back just as a sure group runs from 9:00 to noon on day to Friday uh so I would expect around 8:30 you you would see them leave and they would come back sometime after lunch okay thank you so just out curiosity Nate do I mean I don't mean to put you spot but I mean do you have from your from your perspective I mean do you have any concerns about parking or the ability for there to be sufficient parking for the for the facility on the St Thomas lot the parking lot that's on the facility for the facility is large enough to accommodate based on like the type of facility this is the number of stalls it would be required um versus what the church requires and then the uh like anything else that's on the site the parking lots big enough to handle all of those independently and then together as well okay okay but we you know I should caution that if like this facility starts having like a parking demand to where like they're using up bunch of the parking lot and then the church service can't like fill you know they don't have parking so then they're parking all over the neighborhood then that would be something that we would argue that the facility can't handle their parking on the site and that would be grounds for us to hold a hearing and take moves towards revoking the permit if granted Okay so Final Call for comments or questions before I close the public hearing just want to know how far this letter got mailed out this why I'm here I got this notification in the mail how how how much space was it sent to do you know ter I would have to find out do you donate this by state law we as a city are required to send a notice from the property the legal description of the property out 350 feet okay so anyone within that radius so you're talking about the St Thomas campus yes not just the building right the campus 350 ft okay so that went to a fairly sizable number of people then because if it was uh the number of envelopes was like this bit it was it was a lot of lot of them that went out okay okay yeah so depending P whether you're in a long block or a sharp blocker you know I mean and again it's from the campus so it's not just 350 ft from the building so the whole campus yeah so and I'm going to think if it's if it doesn't look like a check or or a bill or something like that it might go in that pile and you know that's junk mail that's junk mail you don't even look check your check your mail then I guess so yeah yeah yeah um Okay so last call for public comments or questions I'm to this is there a hearing after this about public concern in regards to individuals house and their activities outside of treatment so so what so what we're I mean as a Planning Commission what we do is you know we listen to comments we listen to concerns I would close a public hearing the Commissioners would have another opportunity to chat or or discuss ideas and at some point I'll call for a motion which is hey do we think that you know St Thomas and and Haven have have presented a a proposal that meets the minimum criteria of the ordinances and the statutes and whether or not we think we should forward it with a recommendation to say yes or no to the city council so there's going to be another hearing at the city council level where there can be public input you know kind of replicates a little bit of what happened here yeah yeah and um terara is over there diligently taking notes so there'll be there'll be a a summary of what happens tonight that gets then transmitted to the city council plus this meeting will be it's on YouTube it's on the South Washington telecommunications commission website so it's viewable um you can save the link and send it to your you know your friends and your neighbors um so the the the point is be transparent get this out there right I mean you know we're that's available for six months yeah well six our city is allowed to have it on there for six months yeah some cities have it you can go back we're six in perpetuity yeah so um so to answer your question like as far as tonight goes it's I'll close a public meeting we'll have a discussion motions will be made a vote will be taken and then this is going to go to the city council and then you just got to you know kind of watch your flyer when when it comes up on their calendar and you're welcome to come in you sign in and you know you can State the same or different concerns or if you have new things coming up it's it's really up to you okay last call oops okay I'm going to close the public meeting all righty um commission comments commission thoughts commission questions for for Mr Sparks each other or well I'm just thinking I I've got some friends who are involved in recovery business and I would like to see what some of these safety nets that they have come up with I've I've seen I've heard of of some of the people in the recovery programs were uh a person came in drunk and and the house kicked him out they said that's not what we wanted at the house you know um I I've heard of time when when they tried to kick a person out the guy took a a screwdriver went to electric box and he punched the electric box and shut off all power for the whole facility you know uh different things like that so I guess I kind of like to see what what they have done for safety nets for to keep their homes calm I wouldn't want to to to block off my door like that I wouldn't no no no and so that's where well with um how do to say it um I'd like to get some more information from these other guys on how they have been able to tweak their homes to make it U safer for the community that's what I would like to do and that's a good idea but I mean the question that gets put to us is you know has has has the applicant put forward a plan or have they put forward a proposition that meets you know some minimum threshold of of the ordinances and plans I mean because again we're it's not our job to run a business or or to set their policy and procedure right we're just trying to say okay is this something that is this is this is this something that can be in the P2 District right have have they has what's been presented to us sufficient such that um a ordinance amendment is appropriate and warranted right I want to be real careful that we're not running businesses or telling homeowners what to do at at some level like I said we're not picking their appliances and picking the color of their house it just you know well how big you know how big is it you know where's your driveway need to mean that that's the stuff we're that we should be interested in right I guess I'd like to put out for more discussion you know well unfortunately tonight's the meeting and tonight's the vote so I mean there's not and and that discussion is a good discussion it's discussion worth having but I don't know if the Planning Commission is a place to have it right right cuz that mean that that that's about somebody running their business and setting policies and procedures that's why I was asking which is hey do you have them what's in place what are your timelines you know you know because we're not running it we're not going to be there we're not going to see the inner workings we're not at their at their corporate offices in Woodbury wherever it is I mean that that's beyond anything that we would have any involvement with but so good question but probably a good question for them or in some other forum right possibly yeah I I'm I'm I'm somewhat new to this and I'm I'm I'm learning you know and that's said that's something you know when you see people come up and and talk about what they want in the community you know for us up here to listen and and well kind of vote what they say with with with like what you say too we're up here to try to make sure things go correct I do recall what you were saying last week or last month thank you other comments questions uh no I don't think I have any cu the main the main difference right Mr Sparks is just that it's going to be they're not receiving treatment within the facility correct that's the main Crux of our proposed amendment correct just uh that's correct the ordinance amendment is because right now what was put in code was that it have to be a residential care facility type place where you're rece receiving Care on site the ordinance Amendment would allow for the change to be where the care can be provided offsite but then the conditional use permit then would be so like it says now um like chemical dependency treatment um but it could be offsite too so it would be like a residential facility for people either receiving the Care on or offsite and then that would the CU would be the same cup that they have now just allowing for the offsite chemical dependency treatment so that's that's pretty narrow view of it that's the only change is being proposed um you know if there's concern about operations of the facility which um we you know when we held the last hearing did make that change we heard similar things that there's you know people weren't enthus I Astic from the neighborhood about this use and and that was something that was brought forward to the Planning Commission at the time and the council at the time and you know so there are concerns about doing something like this at this site and there always have been and you know that's it's in a residential neighborhood this type of use sometimes isn't found always in a residential neighborhood like this and it's always been a balancing act of having like conditions on the approval that can guarantee the safe and orderly operation of it that we can monitor and then if something were to be done on site that isn't supposed to be happening and the city becomes aware of that then the city can enforce the terms of the permit and potentially revoke the permit is how that process would go and that's why it's a conditional use permit instead of just a permitted use so but actually in theory there's nothing to stop them from reopening the place tomorrow right I mean they can open it as an inpatient right right facility there's I mean so that permit is active right they're just saying we it's not financially viable to to right now to open it up to reopen it as inpatient but it's financially viable for us to have people residing there but have Services probably at a centrally located operation where they can maybe manage cost to manage you know what they're doing right and I guess what we're talking about here in terms of this concept of a sober house type Recovery House thing that I mean these are popping up all over the metro area this is becoming a thing that other cities are discussing and talking about in this case is different from the zoning perspective because one it's on a P2 property which is an Institutional use property zon for an Institutional use and it is viewed as being like an accessory to the institutional facility right and it's has to be on the site of the institutional use we wouldn't our zoning would not allow this in a residential neighborhood right other than the fact that it has to be on the grounds of a P2 zone property so this isn't like we're not getting into the concept of this being in the in the neighborhoods because it has to be on the grounds of an Institutional use and so what we're talking about here is simply more narrow focused on right now it's inpatient only can it be also outpatient are we accepting of that concept that's what they've essentially brought forward to us is that concept and if they wanted to do something where it's they're just living there there's no programming going on they're off going getting programming elsewhere I think this would be a different discussion but because of the fact that they're a vendor in the field of providing the treatment that this makes it a slightly different discussion more of a similar type of use than what it has been the past couple years and not something that's completely new because the way that we're looking at this from how we've got this written is that it's based on that existing model simply though that that treatment is being provided at a different location instead of on site um if it were just an aggregate Living Community I think that would be viewed to be a different use by zoning that even even situ like situation like that I think would be appropriate even if it was on the St Thomas campus just some communal living right I mean unless it was they returned it back into the rectory where the this the the church staff would live but yeah just but to just say but I agree would just say if this was just some a place for people to live dormatory style or whatever yeah that would be I don't think that I don't think that would meet the CP for P2 in any in any real shape or form okay okay um I'm I'm good my question was answered I think I started it all up thank you I think um Mr haggy said he wanted to make a motion on the on the virtual you put a chat in there I'm I tried to get see if you could catch it but it it went away um sorry about that no I is is your volume up do they have you on see can you hear me okay y we got you all right so okay so okay assuming there's no other discussion there's no other questions or comments from commission so that when we we move into if somebody wants to bring a motion forward I don't have any further comments or questions yeah so you uh said you wanted to bring a motion Mr hegerty Right yes and and I would bring the bring a motion uh just that because there's so many citizens that are very concerned about this uh uh change uh that I propose uh that we uh make a motion uh to say that uh the uh Haven Homes has to have some sort of 24-hour uh staff present uh uh in order for this uh facility to to reopen well yeah I to change right right right right so so you're right so so the first step is is whether or not we would recommend an amendment to the P2 C criteria so so no you're right no no so you kind you kind of jumped a little bit which is when we get to like the actual Cup right so we can make recommendations for conditions as a part of the acceptance of this CP right so so so first step is if someone wants to make a motion concerning whether or not we would recommend to the city council that they adopt an amendment to the P2 District using that language that's found in our packet so that would be the first motion which is could we make that recommendation do we want to make a positive or negative recommendation concerning that language and then depending upon how that goes then we would move into your suggestion which is okay we would whether or not we would make a recommendation to the city council to adopt a cup and then we can add or we can we could suggest criteria for the city council to then put into the final um motion or their their final approval process so so let's start I would make a motion then to deny uh the uh uh cup proposal uh that aen homes has currently well so okay so let's be more precise so you want to move that we not recommend Amendment to the P2 conditional use um ordinance correct okay so council member hegerty has made a motion is there a second I would second it okay having heard a motion in a second um because we have a remote participant all votes have to be done by roll call okay so I'm just going to go down here so um I'm going to vote nay Mr mackinery um nay and wait wait wait I'm clarified so he's saying I don't I don't we don't want it we don't want our recommendation is no I I vote I'm in favor of the denial so you're a yay yes okay Mr Diaz are you a yay or an A once again I for the definition on that yeah so easy do you think that we should recommend to the city council that they modify the conditional use no ordinance so you're a nay or you're a yay okay so that's three yays and one nay so so the vote of the commission is that we would not recommend that the city council adopt any amendments to the P2 cup District ordinances Okay so so if the vote is no then do we even need to move into the cup um discussion we we can have it I would suggest that it mean just so have a record right and we'll have a public hearing and then right you held the public it was both applications and basically all of you could just I mean because you can't Grant a cup for something that not in the ordinance that well well we're not granting we're making recommendations so we can make a record we can take a vot make you could say you could also pass comments along to the council that if right if it were to be approved you'd want to see XYZ conditions added to it do that okay so let's let's Okay so let's so let's let's take a look at okay so this whether the cop so there is language about the cop criteria there is some language concerning uh staff recommendations about you know if if a cup so if an if the ordinance were to be modified and if a cup were to be granted the city could say well here's our general rules which we want you to follow but we're going to add some specific tailored rules or conditions as a part of the give and take right which is you want to do something a little different and that's fine we'll let you but there's going to be some give and take and so far the suggestions are that the site would have required Park the required necessary parking which I think you've kind of addressed and the second one was that that the P that the people residing there would have to be receiving some sort of active ongoing programming or treatment those were the two recommended um additional conditions as a part of the cup right so we can start off so let's start off with with a brief Council discussion on whether or not we we should make any other additional recommendations I'll open up to a public hearing we'll close a public hearing then we can have another Vote or well we won't well we won't vote we'll just say what we want these recommendations passed on so Commissioners this is your opportunity to make comments or to offer up suggestions on the issue of a cup for this particular use I think one recommendation especially in hearing some of the concerns and some of my own thoughts is a recommendation that it would be uh staff 24 hours or have availability for at least the public to be able to contact someone there 24 hours should any issues occur that would be a recommendation I would have well for the and correct me if I'm wrong but you guys were operating the facility previously and you said your intention was that you'd be working with the St Paul Park police that they would have right the contact information they would have the ability to reach out and get get a hold of your staff at any hour of the day correct I think that's how they operated but I don't know if that's in this in within the cup so I guess my recommendation is that in the cup we would have it state that versus it just being a a nice to have or something the facility chooses to do right but that may or me not going into no I understand business operation which might be like outside of the council's ability I get that I think that would be a recommendation I would have and then should the council decide to take it that's yeah their decision any other commissioner comments otherwise I'm gonna open up a public hearing I I just well okay okay so I'm gonna open up the public hearing on the issue of the cup okay so I know everyone who's made a comment if you want to make any additional comments or make any additional recommendations this would be the opportunity again this is more on the should we do we think we need to have any additional rules or something about how the property is used and again I would invite anybody everyone's made all the comments they want okay well I'm going to close the public hearing on that so then I guess our recommendation would be to then we want to have a vote since we didn't follow through on the ordinance so um I guess we would just pass on Mr maer's um request that the they would consider well maybe we need to find out whether or not that's an appropriate consideration about Staffing or or supervision levels at their business about whether or not that we could put something like that into a cup [Applause] okay um I think we're ready to move on to the next public hearing which would be an amendment to the St Paul Park um uh cop Amendment for as requested by the St Paul Park refining company Mr Sparks well as you may or may not be aware there's an oil refinery in the city um and when they add facilities to the site because it's the site predates the existing zoning so when they add um facilities to the property that requires a conditional use permit Amendment so because they have a conditional use permit and it's it just it doesn't have like future things on it right so it's basically been adopted as what it is and then when they add something new they got to come in and ask for it which you might think well that's that's honorous but most of the stuff that they do on the site because we don't have zoning that directly fits an oil refinery right so most of the stuff that they do is going to be too big made of metal all these things that you wouldn't normally allow in that zoning District right so this requires like a cup Amendment and a variance technically to be for the fact that it's a a structure that's on the property that's above the height limit height and size limits for that and it's just it's just a 70ft tall vessel in their DDS unit um Mr schaffers here if you have uh deep questions on what exactly that is you see the engineering plans associated with that but uh basically our it's not going to be the tallest thing on the site but it's going to be taller than our height standard and it requires a cup to be added to the site and it so what we would do is you know part of this is in the river districts the DNR has to look at it and what the DNR really looks at is this going to be the biggest thing there it's just going to change the view because it doesn't they view it to be acceptable and in the past the city has viewed things that Aid and assist in better operations at the site as being acceptable for variances and conditional use uh consideration so in that intent and spirit we recommend approval of this uh but uh it technically requires a variance as well because of the height standard but we typically kind of handle that in the same manner because if it's just something added to the site that helps with the operations of the site without causing negative impacts around it's been viewed as being acceptable so if you have any questions DNR had no comments because of the fact that it isn't going to really significantly change the view from the river which is their primary concern so we just have to decide whether or not we would pass a recommendation on it at the cup level or do you want us to talk about the variance level too you should can I mean the variance is just so it's outside the normal height envelope right it's just a height thing which because we have a height cap for buildings and it's kind of a different structure so if it meets the cup review criteria and you find the fact that they're adding this facility to be acceptable the variance would also be Mar uh positive consideration okay all right so open up to commissioner comments or questions so just out of curiosity could you maybe step up and tell us uh who or who you are or let us know a little bit about the what you want to build just state your name and address for the record please um my name is Greg schaer I'm a project manager for St Paul Park refinery 301 St Paul Park Road okay so what is I guess the purpose or function of this additional uh unit that you want to build so the um function of this is part of the refinery process um which um this piece of equipment has Catalyst in and it's part of the chemical reaction um that catalyst is um it gets spent or it doesn't function as well after a certain period of time um we have to take the unit down and replace that Catalyst with fresh Catalyst um we currently have two reactors um that is in this process stream um adding this third reactor will give us a bigger volume of catalysts um so we can we can run the unit longer before we have to shut it down um and have to replace the Catalyst and what hopefully will be three reactors um in refining trying to keep units up and running um be it it's it's a good business um but um keeping units in steady state there is a safety factor to it um steady state is the most controlled um time of operation um so limiting how many times we have to come um down for Catalyst Replacements um it it's not just a economic incentive it's it's also safety and all those things okay okay thank you I I don't know much about oil refining and that uh that's probably the most I've learned in my many years on this planet So yeah thank you okay um any commission thoughts comments questions no not for me I think they they're pretty good they got a good safety record so yeah okay so oh Mr Hager I'm sorry right sorry yeah so I was just GNA make one comment yeah so the the refinery there what he's talking about he kind of glossed over a little bit bit of it but uh it's a platinum Catalyst that they use uh in this process I'm very familiar with the refiner process um so when he's saying after they're spent it's not like as if something gets wasted or thrown away uh all this Platinum is 100% recycled uh they just it's a it's a different process I don't want to go into too much detail but this will help improve the refinery's efficiency which will also help reduce um their emissions and things like that so this is actually a very good thing for our community because anytime you improve the efficiency of the refinery uh you're going to uh reduce emissions which is better which is great for everybody okay that's the main thing I wanted to say okay well that's good thank you I would approve yes yeah okay so I'm gonna open up the public hearing on the uh cup request so the hearing is open um anybody has any comments concerns or thoughts from the public you're welcome to step up and speak your peace seeing nobody approach the podium I'm going to close the public hearing so I would be looking for a motion concerning the applicant's cop I'll I'll make a motion to approve the cup i' second yeah um I would move to amend that such that we would approve the cup request and also Grant um St Paul Parker Refinery the variant to allow them to build the structure above our normal um height envelope so any so any so do you want to second that okay Mr D has a second that Amendment okay okay okay so um having heard a motion a second and an amended a second motion um I will'll do a roll call vote uh starting again I'm just I'm picking the order that the names are printed on my uh scorecard so I don't want anyone to feel like you know I'm picking first for any particular reason other than I'm at the top uh so uh I Patrick DS would uh say yay uh Mr mckin erne yay Mr Diaz yay Mr Hagerty yay okay so it carries for to nothing so again we would move the cop and the variance request onto the city council with our recommendation that they approve the variant and the cup thank you sir all right moving on to our next topic a subdivision concept plan for single family home development uh at 18th Avenue in Lincoln Street um Mr Sparks Gentlemen by me this is the map of the city this is the property in question so this this is Lincoln here it's called Geneva down here in Cottage Grove this is uh Summit this is Ashland and so this this is 18th Street this is technically I think part of summit and so this is the property in question Zone R1 guided low density single family residential which allows single family residences our onean allow single family residences provided they meet certain uh criteria and we've got on it for this property a concept plan for the home builder lenar to uh put uh 48 units of single family housing on that property and the proposal is for houses that meet the minimum standards of our ordinance if not exceeding them and the Lots would be meeting the code requirements um so there aren't a lot of big concerns there uh when you talk about a subdivision there's certain things that go into a subdivision application like Parks utilities you know things that are Beyond just the lot size and shape circulation access things of that nature and like I'm mentioned the Lots meet your code requirements uh the density meets the requirements of the comprehensive plan which allows up to four units per acre and this is well below that this would be about you know it's 48 units on 29 Acres so it's quite a bit lower than that uh we don't have any active Park uh programming necessary for this area so we'd be looking at cash and Li of Parkland dedication and more you know expanding upon that we'd be looking for like something to help create a pedestrian way to the park that's located to the north of this site a couple blocks um I do note that the neighboring City Cottage Grove has a par in their park plan has a park has a trail Corridor on this right of way adjacent to the property where it's on the border of the two cities and and on that point the as I pointed out here you know this property goes down down here and this is Cottage Grove here and this is a road here that's kind of in both cities the right way for that road and they show a uh Trail in that right of way as part of their Trail plan is what I'm talking about um so that's what they called Geneva it's our Lincoln so that something that is that they would have to discuss with us if this were ever go to pre- Plat the development isn't in their City though it's in St Paul Park so that's their thing not our thing when it comes to that now when it comes to though the roads and circulations there is a thing it is a border road it is shared between the cities it's uh we've given this to them for comment and when we receive their comments we'll pass this along to the applicant we'll probably have to discuss this with them a little bit but either the road has to get built or it has to be secured in some fashion to be built in the future is is the gist of it because it's a road that's there and it's just something that would have to be addressed at the time of preliminary plat the applicant is well aware of this and has been notified of that and we will work that out with the neighboring City in the future but if there's no development imminent on their side having an interim condition where the road isn't built yet might be an appropriate uh situation and if that's the case you can only secure Road improvements at the time of subdivision as part of that and it may be ideal to just have that taken care of and then defer the road construction into the future but something will have to be resolved with that and it's not something that at a concept plan level we usually get into that specific of the detail on that's something that we have to figure out at pre- plat at concept we just have to identify the issue so right so I mean so would they be responsible then for for pulling electrical water I mean they're going to be they're going to be so the developer is going to be responsible for pulling Services down into this area correct oh yes definitely and they're going to be responsible for for the building of the road Maybe not immediately but at some point well they would have to like I guess one concept would be they build the road they build um or they pay for half the road's construction to happen in the future there's there's different ways we can handle this and it's just that something needs to be resolved with that road that they would be building all the roads within the subdivision if that something has to be improved on the North Boundary to assist this they would have to potentially deal with that but we don't know of anything that would need to happen other than the construction of Geneva being secured into the future for at least half of the but is is is Cottage Grove going to pull Geneva down to another to another connecting Road or I mean they have it identified as like a future collector in their city so it's supposed to come down and connect with other stuff further to the South and to the East and that's kind of their their thing what happens with it we don't know what they are going going to want to do with Geneva at this juncture and it's something that you know we can't resolve at necessarily a concept plan level all we have to do for the to conclude the concept review is identify it as an issue that needs to be addressed at the preliminary plat because at the preliminary plat we'd get the specificity so what we're doing is we're informing the applicant that this is an issue that needs to be addressed at the pre-at and it helps them decide if they want to go forward with the application right cuz cuz if cter Grove doesn't build out Geneva further south basically you've you mean you've only got a couple all I mean you're just going to be it's just going to be link an Avenue right you're just going to be that's going to be the main in- and- out right well the ins and outs of this subdivision in the if if Geneva doesn't get built right now would be it would come up to Ashland and Summit would be the roads that they're connecting to and they go up into the neighborhood to the north there okay so that neighborhood so until so until Geneva is fled out they're not going to get into L on LOL potentially you mentioned that uh the Trailways you said that there might be a you might be a connector between this subdivision and a local and the and the park which which Park you talking about the park is is it Heritage yes Heritage Park is right here so what we do in the city is we have like sidewalks Trails things of that that nature just intended to connect you know neighborhoods to the most adjacent park that's what our plan calls for so likely what we would do in this situation the way you apply these principles is you'd take the cash andl of Park dedication because you're not seeking land you take that money and you apply that money to your broader connectivity strategy for all the parks and you let the park commission weigh on which ones go first things like that so you would just take the cash and Lee of Park dedication because your Park plan does not call for any active parks on this property because there's I mean there's no sidewalks on Lincoln there's no I mean there's no sidewalks I mean so you'd actually have to yeah you actually were going to literally connect the subdivision to Heritage I mean you'd have to build a you'd have to build some sidewalks but the way you do that for this situation was be they would just pay money yeah into the park fund and then you'd figure out later how you're going to do it so so it may it be be probably pretty unlikely that would be turned into sidewalks between this and Heritage well the city would have to take a longer look at how I mean you'd probably want the sidewalk to go up Lincoln someday and um not Ashland or Sumit maybe who knows that'd have to be an evaluation that's done we have a sidewalk plan like a Trail sidewalk plan in the in the comprehensive plan I mean just be following those general principles which I mean already without this subdivision you're already committed in your plan to examining how to get that neighborhood from the south of that park into that park right so it's already on the maps that that's some connectivity that you want to build in the future so it just be still working on the same kind of concept um I mean have they addressed the fact that I mean there there's a I mean this is kind of there's a pretty steep slope on some parts of this property isn't there yeah there's there's a slope on the property and they've designed the development to make use of that slope um as you can see from the concept plan uh they've got um you know they they understand what they're dealing with um so so the property is designed to be based around the Contours and the and the way that the land is laid out and they they have professionals who look at the well no because it kind of get into like you know the the the retaining pond the you know runoff I mean um just out of curiosity do you know is the is the Bedrock I mean are these going to be are these going to be slab on grade are these going to be do we do we is that am I getting too far into the Weeds on this one well at this juncture I mean we're looking at like kind of just the land uses okay lot layout circulation Parks can utilities serve the site so we had our Engineers look at this they say there's capacity for this that there's uh water available and they identified that there's there are some you know they commented on how the ponds would work and and again we provide these comments to the applicant who has relocated closer to the microphone during this discussion as you can see that what we can do is one this is these are the things that we're looking for when you come back to pre-plate we we want to itemize these things and so we're we provided some technical comments that they can then address when they come back and we're also just stating that got figure out Geneva so they're aware of that but then that generally though what they're proposing for this site you know this property has development rights we said so in the comp plan that it's can be low density residential they're demonstrating to us a development plan that meets our comprehensive plan and also meets our zoning and that therefore in general form on a staff level we see no concerns with this moving forward to preliminary plan my only thoughts are a couple thoughts is we're not we have they consider like the possibility they're going to run issues with gas lines I mean we're not going to move any of them or that's not going to be an issue can I sure that's he's got the podium you got to talk to him well um we don't view that as being an e an existential issue at this point it's an issue that can be dealt with and it has it's reflective in their design of the subdivision okay that the gas line chin eement and whatnot are put you know they designed around that for the development the only I thought I had is I mean this um this piece of property is nestled snugly between the tank farm and the future you know uh Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad uh car park so I mean I'm kind of wondering you know are I guess I would propose that at some point we would maybe want to discuss you know what are we going to do to kind of address the fact that you know the this the surrounding area of of this uh plat is maybe not the most attractive or appealing and you know we have correct me if I'm wrong but we don't have any real you know if if the railroad decides they want to build there and do what they want there like we don't have a lot of options we can't Zone them right we can't so if they want to run a yard there at 24 hours a day with 40ft tall you know you know neon white bright lights all day long I mean that's there's not a lot we can do about that correct well I mean at the time of the comprehensive Plan update when we deci we were re-evaluating what cities are going to be Zone what portions of the city were going to be zoned residential industrial commercial these Concepts that that would be the time to discuss this right it's but it's residential and if there's some mitigating factor that needs to be considered like you know I mean you can your ordinance does not require that they put like a row of seoa on the uh redwood trees on on the side of the property to block potential lights and it's not you know if that would be entirely something that you could though theoretically say that if you'd be looking for but I mean that's kind of incumbent upon the developer to uh make those Concepts in their site design okay it's in the developers best interest to do those things so we have to rely on the developer to do those types of things yes because yeah we're going to be sandwiched in between the tank Barm and the potential railroad aspects and we don't require correct yeah so like in this case you know the more intense use is required to be screened to the Lesser intense uses right not the other way around and so but but the problem being is like if we can't if we can't Zone the railroads property then we're all all we have left is to try to figure out what can we do to enhance what we can control or what we can kind of have in some influence on that that that was my only my only yeah that's exactly right but uh the applicant is present uh if you'd like to hear some enhanced commentary sure um although um I mean from a staff perspective this meets your comp plan meets your zoning and the issues the technical issues related to things here feel are easily achievable and that this concept plan would be uh a good addition to the city that the traffic being generated is not going to be anything that we can't be handled by the city streets um and that is just uh have to address a couple of these minor things and then when we get comments if we get comments from Cottage Grove we'll pass them along to the applicant and further discussions to happen in the future but other than that we see no issues with this on a staff level okay so so water and septic would would not be a problem with something like this big sewer and water no I mean the engineer looked at it and there's a couple things that they noted um the the only thing that from the engineering review of it was that um some of the soils on site with the storm water management might you know have something that they need to work out together but not that it's not doable that it's just something that need to be looked at and that that happens with every development I mean at this stage of development they're not like completely aware of all the details it's just this is the concept this is how we're going to do it and if the city is in favor of this generally then they'll go forward and fully engineer a plan but there's no reason to increase the size of the the pipes in in the ground not not for this development though okay that was just thank yeah good thought yeah any other questions for you no no I'm going to go over here now and okay no if the applicant wants to come up and uh share some words that be fine so just have to state your name and address for the record hi there good evening Steve try with Lenard 16355 36th Avenue Plymouth thank you Nate so lenar is the largest home builder in the state of Minnesota we've been the largest home builder for the last 18 years we're going to do about 2,000 homes in the state this is our First Community in St Paul Park I know you don't have a lot of uh new builds here so we're excited so and Nate gave a a quick overview but really a project of this size is really a three-step process we have the concept plan where our Bean counters and and folks like me look at a a graph in a aerial photo and say do we have something here and if the Planning Commission and the council say yes in we generally agree with what you're going to do we move forward we do soil tests we do surveying uh exercises we do all sorts of really complex technical stuff that's above my head but that's why we have civil engineers and the city has civil engineers so the concept plan that we're looking at now is not necessarily set in stone as far as this lot line is going to be here this road is going to shift exactly this way we're really looking for your support to say lenar we agree that this is a good project we agree that it complies with the comprehensive plan in the zoning which uh Mr spark said it did so thank you uh so if we get your blessing and the council's blessing then we re really begin the hard work of saying okay engineering wise how do we make this happen it's in our best interest when it comes to things like neighbors traffic Landscaping we want a high quality Community with high quality products we want to attract highquality residents to your community so it's in our best interest to make our communities as as beautiful and well built as we possibly can so that's what we're looking to do here on this site and we did try tried to uh talk to some folks nearby we were unable to get any purchase agreements at this point to to go elsewhere in the community so uh excuse me to expand this area so that's why we're working in this little area that you've said is kind of wedged in between a few things so long term you know who knows where it's going to go with the city of Cottage Grove but uh to Mr sparks' point we're aware of Geneva we're aware that at some point a public Road's going to need to go there unfortunately because it does straddle two cities we can't just put it all in and say okay good we're done with that so that's one of the discussion items that lenar our engineer and the city's engineer will work through as the details become available happy to answer any questions you may have no no I mean it's I mean I I getting more single family homes in a St Paul Park is I mean you can't I don't think can go wrong I think it's a great thing I mean we need them I mean it just the more the better right that's that's broader tax base a healthier tax base um it it it certainly fits the whole you know small community Feld that most people want to kind of preserve around here so no I'm I would be extremely pleased to see more single family homes coming to St Ball Park thank you yeah nothing for me yeah thank you it's always interesting to go to a brand new community that we've never worked in before kind of learn the staff learn the process get to know the neighbors learn the quirks of the land itself so um this is an exciting process for us to come to a new community so thanks for having us we look forward to your support yeah so I don't think this requires any official voter action so we basically would recommend or we would forward a comment on to the city council that we think that it meets the General parameters of of the the the co the ordinances and the code and so we've it had a discussion we've talked about some thoughts and that's up to the city council to decide whether or not they like it such that they would recommend moving to the next stage correct you're not obligated to give a formal approval or denial but you're look to to give a general consensus that you feel it this is a this will work or not work oh no I I think I think I mean so you'd want to get everybody on the record and then gather that well well-founded wisdom and then pass that on to the council all right so I'll look my other Commissioners to start making some comments well I've seen some of the developments he done and like you said they do nice nice homes um yeah another common for me is I'm in support of their proposed plan so all right so we we've heard from everyone supported it too thank you they want to be lot okay well I mean so we we would certainly want to pass on to the city council that you know we we think that it's a it's an appropriate uh use of this land and I think it'll be a welcome addition to St Paul Park all right should we move on to our our final agenda item Mr chair that is a fantastic idea yeah we're really oh my God Marathon session tday okay so our final agenda item is the hidden Harbor uh Tiff District so Mr uh Sparks will you uh walk us through this one well several months ago this August body reviewed a uh concept plan just like you did tonight for this one but you reviewed one for a development project on the grounds of the Hidden Harbor site that included some multifam sing uh Town Homes a variety of Housing and then preserving the commercial area of the marina you provided them with a bunch of comments that what you'd be looking for if they went back back to the pre- plat stage if they came back to the to you for the pre- plat right but um the applicant on this project uh decided that they wanted to see if they could get their tax increment financing uh package approved by the city council prior to proceeding to the preliminary plat this is the same thing that the last developer that we had that was doing something in Block 89 in that area they did the same thing because in you know right now in this day and age development's kind of expensive and then also when you're dealing with some site constraints like the high bedrock and things of that nature you uh also end up in having kind of a more of an expensive development and because of that they wanted to make sure that their tax increment financing seem to be acceptable to the city before they pursued full fully engineered uh preliminary plat plans so because of that that means that this stage that you're at is that the planning commission's asked to pass a resolution for this Tiff process that states that their General plan is consistent with the comprehensive plan and the plan that they have is what you see before you which is they've got some apartments some Town Homes some single family homes and then the commercial area around the marina is what the development plan is and it's you know provided that it's meeting the density requirements found you can make a finding that it's generally consistent with the comprehensive plan and therefore the city council's free to cons consider the Tiff District now I say all that but keep in mind a couple things number one we don't know that the the city council has to review this and determine if they want to engage in the Tiff District they could say no they could say yes your findings are just that this is something that can be done under the comprehensive plan so it's it's eligible for consideration as a tiff District that that's simply put all it is then also it does not obligate you to say anything about the concept plan that you see before you other than it is generally consistent with the comprehensive plan and because of that it can gain consideration for the Tiff District now when they come back with the preliminary plat when you look at all the details you may very well say this doesn't fit the vision that we see in the comp plan or you may say this zoning that needed for this isn't going to work unless they change certain things you're free to still say all that and you're free to recommend denial of it in the at the preliminary plat State you're not obligated to approve it because you you passed this resolution all this does is allows the Tiff to the tax increment financing to move forward to be considered by the city council also my question is I mean is it I guess I'm kind of ConEd like is this like a horse and cart thing which is I mean do we want to have more detail and specificity and know more about what's going on before we would say it meets the comp plan it meets our general ideas because here's thing I I would I've been here long enough that matter of fact I went back and looked on my bookshelf and I found the planning Memo from June 8th of 2023 from when this was ini ially submitted this was a pretty lengthy pretty detailed you know response to the concept plan and I guess you know it went right has you talked about the concept plan talked about the zoning designation and the the concern I had was so this came out 17 months ago and you know the final page it says you know it's a Planning Commission review Planning Commission should review the concept plan provide comments and there's about a dozen bullet points in this that talk very specifically about hey um said from the staff perspective the project appears to be close to the city's Vision the plan is somewhat lacking detail but if applicant can meet can meet the following comments it would appear that the project would be meeting City standards and there's about 12 bullet points on this so my concern was I you we came here today and I've got you know a onepage planning memo I've got the the Maps but I you got the there's a resolution to no and I saw the resolution but what I'm saying is I mean the the applicant was literally given I mean a word for word bullet point road map on here just give us these things just tell us these things talk to us about these things so that we have enough information that we can make the determination you're requesting and I didn't see any of that as a part of the submissions today well to use your cart and horse analy it's not that the cart and horse are out of order it's that this is neither the cart nor the horse that we're talking about here we're talking about like the apple tree next door right it's um the what we're talking about here is is this generally consistent with the comprehensive plan that this mix of uses on this property is it or isn't it I mean from you're not fully auditing this plan for consistency to the zoning ordinance you're not fully auditing it for um like all the specific details like we were looking for in that memo that's for pre-plant so this is what they're doing is they want to know if the council's going to give them consideration of the Tiff District so are we voting on a tiff then right now to rec you're not voting on The Tiff District what you're voting on is whether or not this is generally consistent with the comprehensive plan in order for them to gain consideration of the Tiff district for the city council so this is one of the things that if the city council is to Grant the Tiff District the Planning Commission needs to make a finding that a development that is generally like this is generally consistent with the comprehensive plan you don't need to worry about all the details the lot widths the what the houses are going to be exactly because they still have to come to you with the pre-plate and you could say well this is a disaster we don't like any of this and that's fine but what this is generally is a mix of housing which is like when you look at the comprehensive plan for the marina mixed use District what does it allow mix of housing types some commercial stuff that helps support the marina the marina it's itself I mean and this has all those elements right we had a lot of discussions about the balance about like you know not letting you know somebody come in and build too much business so then they couldn't have any more business they have all the rest would have be houses so this is this is trying to address the first and time set if you're you want to be the first second or third person because as you're the second third or fourth person trying to get in here you may be constrained in what you want to do by what happened prior because we got got to have this this percentage balance about what's housing what's commercial what's whatever yeah and you have on your Maps the areas that are supposed to be commercial and the marina site is one of those areas the entrance into the marina from the road which isn't part of this site was another one so so generally I mean it generally meets can I say the word generally enough the comprehensive plan from that perspective we can't do like a full audit of this plan because it's a concept plan it's not a preliminary PL where they've done all the engineering data because they have to prove that it meets like you're talking about the percentages there's percentage thresholds that they have to meet that they have to prove that they meet to get the pre- plat across the state and then I mean if they can't get the pre-plated approved none of this really matters anyway because then they can't get a tiff district for some something that didn't happen so but because of the fact that they wanted to know before they completely did the pre-at if the Tiff District would be granted we tested with looking at this and passing this resolution to get to that point and it doesn't obligate any it doesn't obligate the Tiff District to happen Tiff District could very well not happen the council be like we don't we don't see this being a project that Merit to they very well could it could come back where they get the details together and they say even with the Tiff District we can't make this work thanks guys or it could come back with you guys saying we don't like this plan when we got all the details so we recommend denial and the council deny there's so many things that could happen that I could sit up here and ren numerate all of them for the next hour plus if you like but for the stage that we're at it's kind of binary it's like does this generally meet the comp plan or doesn't it and if it does then they can you can pass that resolution which goes with the review of the Tiff and says Planning Commission thought this generally does meet the comp plan and so we're good we're we're okay with the concept but of course we need the detail of the pre-plant where we're going to make sure every little T is crossed and I is dotted right so I mean it generally is I mean it is a plan that proposes a mixed use right which is what we wanted it to be down there so I guess I think you'd have to I shouldn't see you have to I would be inclined to think that at least at this stage the they're they're moving in the direction that the comp plan and the zoning ordinances wanted development to be in right so and that's a good thing right so if they're moving in that right direction then you know maybe the the recommendation be yes that you know at this stage they've got the right ideas right and at some point we we like you said we'll call them the task and they'll have to prove that they can execute the ideas but it would appear that they're at least making good faith efforts to try to you know comply with that so that that would be my my reading of of of what's been presented tonight other commission comments thoughts no not agree um looks like he's done a lot of work out there so does it require a formal Vote or do or do you would you like us like previously to each one of us maybe express some particular opinion that could be collectively passed on you have to pass the resolution resol to vote okay okay um I guess I would be looking for a motion on this hidden Harbor Tiff review I'll make a motion and approval of the Hidden Harbor Tiff review okay is there a second a second I'll make a second okay having a first and a second um I will do a roll call vote Patrick DS yay Mr Macker yay Mr Diaz yay Mr Hagerty yay all right it passes four to zero so we would authorize the what did you call it Nate I'm sorry the um the resolution uh that it would be signed and then passed and then forwarded onto the city council for for their review and for their um ultimate recommendations all right um next item new business does anybody have any new business they would like to discuss not here no nope uh we don't have staff reports any unfinished business that anybody's kicking around that they want to talk about do we get paid time and a half for this no dble you're gonna get paid double what you got paid last time okay there is nothing this is definitely our longest meeting yes so far you know yeah yeah um okay um I guess I would be looking for a motion to adjourn a motion to adj is there a second I'll second all those in favor all any opposed this meeting is adjourned thank you wow e