Planning Commission Work Session and Regular Meeting   2/13/2024

Madam Clerk, could you call the roll?

Mr. Moore.

Present.

Mr. Murray.

Here.

Mr. Bivins.

Here.

Mr. Clayborne.

Here.

Mr. Missel.

Here.

Mr. Carrazana.

Here.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Mr. Moore.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Are there any other comments from the public on items not listed on the agenda?

No.

Madam Clerk, could you call the roll?

Mr. Carrazana.

Aye.

Mr. Missel.

Aye.

Mr. Clayborne.

Aye.

Mr. Murray.

Aye.

And Mr. Moore.

Worthy staff.

So we're really excited to have her on board and to have her diving into the Comprehensive Plan as well.

Welcome.

Thank you.

Sure.

Is that accurate?

And that, you know, includes direction from the board to use that process as well.

And I just noticed it was a passive verb that doesn't explain who made that decision.

So to make it more active, it was direction from the board.

Thank you.

And so I'm wondering why they're lifted to that height.

I'll grant you they don't have quite the same budget power as the other folks you referenced, but I think that they do provide a connection to policy for people beyond the usual suspects right in our immediate neighborhood.

So your explanation is helpful, but I'm also sort of trying to explain why I think we should be more inclusive of our, even Augusta County.

Delay noted.

Of our neighbors.

Mr. Murray.

Because I think there's one thing to say, this is where we think people are going to go, but it's a very different thing in terms of where people actually go.

Commissioner Murray, could you please repeat your question?

Really looking at that data and finding ways to use that data in our planned decisions about people really, where they really are walking, running and cycling, and including that in our plans.

Does that answer your question?

So what are we doing to really engage walkers, runners, and cyclists in that conversation about the places they know are unsafe or that could be improved?

But I definitely hear your point and we can follow up with more information about how we're moving forward with getting more of that hard data that you're talking about.

If I could, maybe a way to look at this is a recommendation that you're offering, which is to continue to consider alternative data sources to inform the use of transportation infrastructure.

Thank you.

And Chair, I would also just add that we were talking about Ragged Mountain running shop, not the mountain.

Yes.

Okay.

And not the gospel.

Commissioner Murray, anything else?

I'll leave it, I'll leave it there for now.

Commissioner Clayborne.

And that's just one question before going to the next one.

and I think also measuring things like tree coverage and access to parks and how those things are distributed and if there's a more equitable way to plan for distribution and access moving forward.

Has that conversation been, or starting to think about that, I should say?

So we haven't specifically dug into that to look over time, but I think we're going to continue to look at that as we move into phase three when we start including specific action steps that will, some of them at least, have a public funding cost associated with them.

So thank you.

Commissioner Firehock.

Is General Comments at this time?

Yes, or questions.

That's all I have for now, I have like little comment bubbles on my document, but I can send those later.

Mr. Carrazana.

So thank you.

and

I've got several comments on several sections and I'm not quite sure how to parse them out in our questions is what it comes down to.

Great, and staff, tell me if this is not helpful too.

Yes, it's good, but I'm still hung up on how do you move these various pieces to be successful?

So you've got the quadrants are green and resilient, welcoming and equitable, which you touched on, thriving and prosperous, connected and accessible.

Sidewalks are not going to connect the development area.

I don't have an answer yet.

I think that would be something that would be very important here.

Sorry, do you say redevelopment?

and I'm not necessarily sure that we should infill all green fields.

I think what I was saying is within the development area that's already defined, helping us to maximize density through infill as well as reuse I think is important.

Because I think that even if, you know, we're going to have some, you know, if you have a parcel and it's mostly green, some development is going to occur there, but at least maybe we can develop policies that encourage that development to go up instead of out.

If not, I'm happy to just transition to the next one.

So anyway, in terms of the equitability, you know, we also, and you were talking about benchmark data, last real quick point, we could do a more detailed land cover map for the urban ring and know what our impervious area is, know what our tree canopy is, look at the equitability of which neighborhoods are hotter and less tree than which other ones, and then have a plan for, you know, adding that canopy back or incentives for tree retention, et cetera.

within the development area.

We don't know what we're losing, and we don't have a plan for trying to get it back.

And so that we don't lose those sort of tangent or cotangent spaces, opportunities to space that we already own.

Yeah.

Commissioner Moore.

I do remember seeing it in this 2021, I think, housing plan from the county.

In the housing policy, yes.

Great comments.

Thank you.

And I know the board hasn't been supportive of that, but I just wanted to plus 100 to that.

It's the status quo.

One thing that I might throw out there, and staff can help me with this, but, and I understand your point, just want to check, is this a conversation for zoning, or is this a conversation for comp plan?

It's both, but I think what he's referring to is the comp plan does have the yellow to use it vernacular, and so you can get rid of that and make it orange.

I guess the question there is, would if you kept it that color and gave it, you know, kept it yellow, would you not though, through zoning, have the ability to create more density within that and still provide yourself with the flexibility to not where you had natural features and other things that limited it?

And I think we ought to really consider widespread, making it possible for people to build more units on the lands that are up that way, to call it redevelopment or infield development or however you want to call it.

And that's what really has made it so toxic.

We don't want them walking on our streets.

That statement about kids, too, is actually made.

But we have every supermarket that you could possibly want.

And so we can help break some of those associations between your density and lack of service, and then address some of these equity issues in terms that have been created by these policies.

Sure.

And I'll just share a reference for you.

Exactly.

With that, I think I'm done with my comments, Mr. Chairman.

Do you think there's something like that that exists?

There's wildfires, there's floods and everything, so I'm happy to connect you with some folks that I know to have that conversation as well when the county is ready for that.

Carrazana.

in determining those factors.

I'm talking about what... So if you go to... No, I know, but are you leading towards, is it really about a location or is it really about a group of conditions that would lead themselves?

It could talk about proximity.

So there are group of services or group of facilities and things like that?

Title, page seven and eight.

I think it was related to, you know, like access to services and also connections, like transportation connections.

It says assess.

Yeah, we can definitely make some clarifications there.

So I think just how that incremental growth outside of the development area is managed is really important.

So that type of cleanup, not kind of individual requests.

But I'll go to you.

There's many more, but I'm not going to sit here and babble.

Madam Clerk, if you could call the roll.

Mr. Carrazana.

Here.

Mr. Missel.

Here.

Mr. Clayborne.

Here.

Mr. Murray.

Here.

Mr. Moore.

Staff, could we have your report, please?

With that being said, I'd like to open this up to any questions from the Planning Commission.

Start down with Mr. Moore now.

So there are two kennels and so even though the two kennels, one for the puppies and then one for the adult dogs, so are we saying that when you have the special use permit for the kennels, are we including both of those in that special use even though they're in separate locations?

Yes, that is correct.

Could I do all the other kinds of things that I might want to do with big hooved or non-domestic animals?

So agriculture and forestal uses are a lot.

Like the ones on Barracks Road.

If you go, Commissioner Murray.

In situations like this where you do have crossings of the stream buffer and crossing of the stream, what are the design standards that we have for those crossings?

And that's where engineering and Virginia Department of Transportation will really examine the impacts to the driveway and entrance.

Mr. McLaren, Charlottesville,

Please state your name and general location of residency.

I'm the executive director at Service Dogs of Virginia, and my property is the one that's next door on Turkey Sag Road.

Great, thank you.

Thank you.

and at this point, I'm going to turn it over to Eric Ross and let him talk about the architecture because it's really cool.

When the light turns yellow, you got another extra minute because it took a while to get the IT going.

Great.

Commissioner Firehawk.

I know, it was very thorough application.

Is that something that's built into this plan?

She's more about adding more people to help in the future.

They look pretty intentional.

That was it for me.

Nelms.

And it just doesn't seem like, if it needs that level of attention and maintenance, which it probably does, I think it needs to do it someplace else in an area that will be less impacted by it and a road that is pretty narrow to begin with and not entirely paved all the way through.

Mr. Jeff Erickson, Hendrickson, not even close the first time, sorry.

in that location, and I really encourage you to drive out there and look at the property if you don't believe me.

Lisa Bites.

And that never happens.

One for three.

Thank you.

Jessica Neal

Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

But could you just say?

So thank you for your consideration and time.

Gavin Sherwood.

Thank you very much.

You're on deck.

Thank you.

I wondered, Robert Hackster would be following this week's Good afternoon, my name is Megan Weeks and I am a Charlottesville resident and a veteran of the United States Navy

Thank you.

Robert Haxter and looks like Walsh Jackwith is on deck.

Thank you.

Well, Jackwith and then Marty Silverman.

Great.

Marty Silverman?

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I saw another hand.

Thank you.

One.

I have two.

OK.

You can start now.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

I'd have no objection.

Thank you.

Next we have Rami, Rami, Rami please state your name and location and you have three minutes as soon as you start talking.

Thank you.

Madam Clerk, anyone else?

Maybe they change their mind and they don't want to speak.

to reject their application.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That's it.

And I would like to give the applicant an opportunity to respond to some of the comments that have been raised.

We're not proposing to build 50,000 square feet of building.

Can you please state your name again?

So it's not going to be the size of public lands or a target.

Thank you.

Firehock, would you like to?

Or it would not be possible because it would just be like there's lodging there and a future kennel could also have lodging there for whomever?

Or I should say the enabling authority for that isn't entirely clear.

Okay, but we can do things like limit the number of dogs, limit the hours, limit whether or not people would be able to stay there on the weekend, although I wonder about that one because maybe that's the only time someone is available to stay there is on their weekend.

The conditions should be tailored so that they can run with the land and not be specific to any particular owner.

Okay, thank you.

Great, thank you.

Commissioner Carrazana?

Just following that trend, that trend of thought, I mean, if limiting the number of dogs, when there's a small operation on a very specific niche that they're servicing, a kennel needs to operate with certain volume.

Yeah, I think that's a good idea.

Mr. Clayborne?

Commissioner Murray.

Since this is both a kennel and lodging, is it conceivable that someone could come by after this and propose once this is over to just have straight up lodging there?

So lodging may be sort of a vernacular term that's used for housing dogs, but under the zoning ordinance, housing dogs equals a commercial kennel.

Someone could come by and propose a private school and that would apply.

So if the special use permit were granted, there would be authorization to have a private school, but only with the conditions included on the special use permit.

Only for dog students.

Commissioner Bivins?

Thank you, Commissioner Moore.

And so, yeah, I think it's a use that makes sense for the time and space where it exists.

And so there would be enough traffic on that road that would make everyone's hair stand up if something were to go drastically wrong in the world right now, of which these dogs would not be one of them.

Any other before I guess?

So is that something that we can, because that factors into my liking this proposal is the minimalist impact of the building design.

Those would be the types of conditions that the Planning Commission should be considering, conditions to limit discernible impacts of the proposed use.

That's a question.

Well, and certainly that's an argument that could be made.

Okay.

They could create housing that would be completely different and move more of the mountain than this use looks like it will do.

I don't see the need for that after every read that.

Those would be required of any commercial kennel approved under special use permit in the rural areas.

So essentially, if a future kennel came there, you have to apply the 5.11.

Thank you.