May 13, 2024 Historic Landmark Commission on 2024-05-13 5:30 PM

So note that quorum is achieved. Historic Landmark Commission is convening a regular meeting today, on Monday, May 13th, 2024. Terms three, four, and five at the Development Service Center. That's us, okay. So I'll call the meeting to order at 5.30 p.m. Our first order of business is the pledge. The U.S. and Texas flag. - I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. On the Texas flag, I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one indivisible. All right, play ball. All right, so with that done, we now have a new exciting segment called Presentations for Members of the Public. I believe we have a card here from James, something happened with your last name, James? - That's how you do it. - That's how you do it. Come on down. (paper rustling) Mr. James, you will have three minutes. I will start the timer as you say your name. - I hope everyone can hear me. My name is James Atellian, good evening to everyone. On May 4th, I sent to all members of the Historic Landmark Commission an email regarding three historic and artistically significant buildings on the Texas Women's University Denton campus. Since May is historic preservation month, I sent this email to the commission members to bring awareness to these three buildings. I know that the Historic Landmark Commission does not have any power over what happens to any historic buildings on state property. However, maybe the commission can make the TW administration specifically Chancellor Dr. Kareem Faith and the TW Board of Regents aware of your interest in seeing these buildings and seeing both the buildings and the artwork preserved. TW and the City of Denton have had a long history of working together in partnership on projects that have been mutually beneficial to both entities. By letting the TW administrators and Board of Regents know of your interest in these buildings, that might open up a dialogue with the city regarding the preservation of these buildings. These buildings could be spotlighted by TW's marketing and communications group to further the prestige of TW and to promote interest in TW. Denton could showcase these structures through various groups and media that focus on art and historic buildings here in the city. Some outreach to TW by the City of Denton should happen soon to have on record if TW recognizes the significance of these buildings and what their plans are for these buildings. And if nothing else, the Historic Landmark Commission and the Special Collections and Archives Group of the Denton Public Library should gather information and photos on these buildings before they're torn down. The information could be used for future presentations and research. Thank you for your time this evening. - Thank you, Jane. - Yes, thank you for calling it to our attention. - And thank you for being our inaugural commenter. All right, I'm just gonna take a quick check to see if anyone else has some public comments they wanna make or so they can fill out a card. Only once, only twice. All right, let's move ahead to number three, items for consideration. So item 3B is number HLC 24-014 on our agenda is to consider approval of the March 18th minutes. - And I would enter a motion to approve those minutes. - Any further discussion? And the meetings are accepted. - Can you go vote? - Oh, that's right, we'll go vote. All in favor? Any opposed? Universal consensus, it passes. All right, we'll move on to the next item. Item 3B, number HLC 24-0001 on our agenda is to have a public meeting and determine whether the presented expenses resulted in permanent improvement and a restoration of local historic landmark property. Located at 903 West Oak Street and Oak Hickory District. The site is located on the south side of the Oak Street between Fulton and Mounts Avenue. - Thank you so much. As stated, this is 903 West Oak Street and we're looking at a historic tax exemption for the property. This is the Oak Hickory Historic District. The owners are Dudley and Deanne Reed. Just to give you all some background, it is also a local historic landmark. It is known as the G.H. Bluett House and it's built circa 1900. So tonight's request is for the historic landmark tax exemption, looking at section 10-128, which is that partial tax exemption for designated historic sites. In your backup, I provide a list of repairs and updates, but kind of to highlight all of them and not look specifically at the invoices themselves, we're looking at a total cost of a little over $30,000. But looking further at that request, staff during their analysis did feel that the new storage space and the trash haul that were mentioned as part of those invoices do not meet the qualifying improvements and/or restoration to a historic property. And this is due to the fact that they do not pertain to general maintenance and/or restoration of a historic property. And so that's what I highlighted here in the real process. So that total expense that we're looking at now that does qualify is around $19,750 and 44 cents. So just to show you all some pictures of the work that was done, we're looking here at the sub pump that was installed, the crown molding to match that historic crown molding and then interior doorway and architectural detailing to match original trim of doorways throughout the house, as well as utilizing a historic door. So as stated, staff did look at section 10-128D, and this is allowing for an additional 10 years of that tax exemption. If the applicant does demonstrate that they have qualifying expenses of a minimum of 10,000 or more for improvements and/or restoration to the property. So staff is recommending a favorable determination that the expenses presented with the exception of the creation of the new storage space and the trash haul resulted in a permanent improvement and/or restoration of the landmark property at 903 West Oak Street. Also, with the exception of the trash haul and that new storage space, the applicant does meet that minimum of $10,000. Any questions? - It is certainly a lovely home. - It is. - Okay. So we have options to entertain motions on make a favorable finding of improvement and restorations to deny or continue the item to a later date. Any wishes? - I am in the approval of the request. - Any use for approval? - I have a second. - They meet the minimum even without the bathroom or the storage of the trash haul. - Correct. - Well over. - Yes. - I'll second the motion. - All right. Ms. Craver. Seconds the motion. Let's have a vote. Those in favor, raise your hand. Any opposed? Motion passed. Thank you, Tammy. - Thank you. - All right, so now we'll move on to our work session. Item 4A, number HLC 24-018 on our agenda is to receive a report and hold a discussion regarding the economic impact of this historic preservation program. - Okay everyone, this is an exciting presentation tonight. I was gonna say, I feel like some of y'all have been hearing enough about it. We're finally here. So my name is Cameron Norbertson, obviously. - I'm Justin Stackhouse. - And so tonight we're talking about our Denton Historic Landmark Designation Incentives and are we doing enough for residential property owners? So to run through the table of contents, not gonna go into detail, but we're kind of gonna give a background about our current historic landmark designation program, what that process looks like. We're also going to be looking at some of the current challenges faced by our historic tax exemption program and what that current tax exemption looks like. Then Justin's gonna jump in and he's gonna go over the staff assessment that he conducted and then we're gonna look at next steps and discussions and questions. Any questions? So looking at our current state of the historic landmark designation process, we currently do have 66 structures that are historic landmark designated. 42 of these are residential properties and the remainder of those are made up of government-owned vacant properties as well as commercial properties. In addition to those 66 properties, we do have over close to 3,000 surveyed properties that are determined to be eligible for historic landmark designation. Of those are around 2,300 residential properties. So just to take you all through that historic landmark designation process to kind of give you guys kind of that foundation as we go through this conversation. So the first step is filing the application with the historic preservation officer. So in this case, myself. As part of that application process, there are 13 approval criteria. So that's pretty significant in comparison to at the national level. As a part of that, you only have to have a minimum of one criteria that you have to meet. As you can see, there are a number of people who can file that. It can be the owner of the property, owner's representative, the historic landmark commission, city council, myself, or even planning and zoning commission. The applications are prepared and they're submitted. They do have to get the owner's signature or owner's plural, unless city council themselves or the historic landmark commission creates a resolution, my apologies. So looking at that step four, as you all know, this is a zoning process. So it does require historic landmark commission review, the planning and zoning commission review, and then the city council review and decision. So it's that zoning action that's taking place here during this public hearing process. And city council decision is final and it cannot be appealed by the applicant. So once you do it, it cannot be appealed. Essentially, if you want it removed, you've got to go through the exact same process. So then exciting step five, once you are approved, the historic landmark commission medallion, it can be prepared and they can put it on the property. It does have to have owner approval. You can't just go on the property and place it up there. And then additionally, you would be added to the discovered Denton landmarks map. Any questions before I move on? Awesome. So kind of diving back into some of the current challenges faced by our historic tax exemption program, which is tied to our historic landmark designation program, is right now what we're hearing is that there are minimal incentive and the cost to maintain a historic property is very expensive. So looking at the minimal incentives, currently right now, our current tax exemption is that 50% of the city property tax. Also, the application process. You're looking at documents needed, the application to go through it. So some people see that as a hurdle. In addition, you're looking at future city oversight. Once you become designated, you're looking at having to do servatificates of appropriateness in the future. You're having to reapply every 10 years for that historic tax exemption. So those are some of the quote unquote obstacles that people are seeing. In addition, cost to maintain a historic property. Home ownership in general, especially in this economy, is expensive. But when you add it being a historic property that you're having to maintain to a certain degree, that gets even that much more expensive because you're adding the craftsmanship involved. And in addition, we're looking at the cost of historic preservation applications as well. So therefore, it's the lack of historic landmark designation interest. And then looking to our designated historic sites tax exemption. That's the name of our tax exemption currently. So that's any property that is designated at the local level. Our first landmark property was landmarked in 1980. We did not introduce a partial tax exemption until 1987. And I've listed the ordinance number there. So if you all ever want to look at it, I'm more than happy to provide that to you. So that ordinance that was introduced in 1987, it stated that 50% of the assessed value of the designated historic site is exempted. That partial tax exemption remains the same to 2024. So we're almost to 40 years that we've had the exact same tax exemption. But what we've added over time is we've added the requirement of spending a minimum of $10,000 on qualifying expenses for improvement and/or restoration to the property. - So here in the table is an example of a property that is appraised at $300,000. In this table, we see that the historic designation will save the owner $841 in taxes for the 2023 tax year. That's in comparison to if it was not designated a total cost of $1,682 for the city of Denton. I mean, included Denton County as well as the ISD rates and what they would owe, just as a comparison. And so jumping into staff assessment, feel free to jump in with any questions if you have any. All right, so first, for an overview of the data set, I started with the roughly $3,000, 3,000 structures that have been surveyed as eligible. And I landed at 2,275 structures after removing the properties that don't pay property taxes, such as governments, facilities, and churches. Commercial properties that are in the form of large commercial as well as attached downtown and Price Street buildings, just because it's very different from the homeowners we're looking at, as well as properties that have been significantly altered. So a lot of these are buildings that have been torn down, replaced, or just lots and lands, as well as there's a few that were, the original building is still there, but then there's been additional like apartments as an example built on the same parcel as were taken out for the calculations. All right, and so for a view of where we are today, at least in terms of property values, I calculated the average appraised values for homes in Denton. The green values on the left are the appraised average appraised values for each category in 2012. Whereas the columns on the right are the average appraised values in 2023. First, we're looking at historically designated structures. Those are the 42 homes that's taken out the government facilities, as mentioned before. In the middle, we have the historically eligible structures. Those are the ones in the survey data and the change that they've had over the time. And then we looked at the city of Denton overall, which is the buildings that existed both in 2012 and 2023, and comparing the change of value of those buildings that existed. So it's a like for comparison, not including new construction that was appraised after 2012. It's worth a note that with the historically designated structures, that does include the Oak Hickory Historic District, which typically has larger square footage homes and I can skew it with a small sample size. So next, we'll look at how the current program impacts property owners. Here in the table, we're looking at an annual savings in 2023 in the middle column. While the column on the right shows the savings over the previous 10 years. In the first row, we're looking at the currently designated structures. In the last year, the average valued one would save $1,300 roughly and $10,000 over the last 10 years. Whereas when we look at the surveyed, eligible structures that are not currently designated, those are seeing less with the lower average values of $665 this year and shy of $5,000 over a 10 year period. And these are adjusted for prior rates and values over that time. - And so I just wanted to jump in here as highlighted in bold, as part of just kind of providing that context again, historically designated properties have to spend that minimum of $10,000 every 10 years to reply for improvements and/or restoration. So we want to provide some real world examples. These properties are locally designated. They are considered to be well maintained in terms of the historic landmark designation program. So as you can see, some of those property owners are saving around or just a little under $10,000 every 10 years from this tax exemption. And it's really the West Oak area property that is really seeing those additional savings in addition to that 10,000 with that additional around $4,000. - And I know it's a larger sample site, but the eligible average in 10 years, I mean, you're not even saving what you are investing to maintain, right? You're saving about half, okay. - Correct. - Oh, sorry. - And so just want to highlight some other city subsidies. So looking at our application for both a historic landmark designation as well as a certificate of appropriateness application, which you would need moving forward after designation, it currently costs the applicant $101, which the city is around $8,200 in terms of the cost to the city. It does include the processing of the applications, public hearings, after hour meetings, public hearings, all of those things. In regards to the tax exemption application cost itself, it is free to the applicant, so that's a perk. In terms of the historic preservation program as well, that does have administrative costs of just managing the historic preservation program as a whole, so it does include that kind of marketing, code amendments, website updates, all that kind of stuff. - All right, and then lastly, we'll look at how the current program impacts the city's property tax revenues from the city's perspective. Of the currently designated properties, the do-o property taxes, so taking our government ones, the total revenue in 2023 was roughly $85,000. Looking ahead, just for calculations to show potential impact, if more buildings were being designated, if 10% of the eligible surveyed structures did become designated, then the total property tax revenue loss annually will be $235,000 to the city, and that is inclusive of the current designation, so that is inclusive of the $85,000, and this is in 2023 values and taxes. Then looking at, again, if 20% had become designated, so that would be 461 buildings, that would be a cost of $385,000 annually in loss property tax revenue. And then we showed that in 2023, the overall revenue for the city then was $104 million, so the current program is revenue loss compared to if there was no designation of just 0.08%. And then we're looking at 10%, that would be 0.22% of the overall and 0.37 for 20% designation. - So just looking ahead, we will, in the future, probably in June, we'll have a presentation about other city incentive programs, so not specifically only looking at historic landmark designation processes or historic district programs for incentivizing, we're also gonna just be looking at historic properties in general, 50 years and older, and seeing what other cities are doing. And then also, we just wanna continue the conversation. This is part of the 2019 Historic Preservation Plan, which states that we need to update and look at our historic tax exemptions, but also this is something that we're starting to hear from property owners, especially owner-occupied property owners, so we just wanna keep the open conversation going. But before we conclude, I definitely would love for us to have a discussion, and I pose you all with a question about is the city doing enough to incentivize residential historic destinations, yes or no, or why? That's something I think we need to kind of have an open dialogue about. - Can I just ask a question first? The differences between the sheet in our packet and what's up there. - Yeah, those were just little adjustments, meaning as we were just trying to clean up more clarity on things, I guess I'd be curious if there's anything specific that was different, and I should be able to explain any difference. - No, it was just that the numbers were different. - Yeah, so I think this is-- - We didn't have it broken down by percentages either. - Oh yeah, that was added as new. And that's something that came up as a suggestion for more clarity, and also originally these calculations did include the downtown area and Fry Street buildings that had been taken out for calculations. That was additional information that was removed for clarity, so recalculated based on only the residential focus. But let me know if there are any other specific questions I can dig into. - Thank you. (papers rustling) - Cameron? - Yes? - The attachment that you emailed out earlier today was that the latest version of the presentation for the commissioner, was it? - No, the adjustments were made about an hour before the meeting to provide a little bit further clarity in terms of percentage change. So after this meeting, we're happy to set out the most recent presentation to you all. - I think it's just one page we need. - Just the one? (laughs) - Well, I didn't see any going through the other one. - Yeah, don't let me anything else significantly. - Yeah, this was the only change that was made was this person. - I actually did. - Oh, and then your column changed. Okay, so the columns did change a little bit? - I'm going to lower it a little bit. - Okay. - To answer your question of if we're doing enough to incentivize residential historic designations, I would say no, it doesn't seem to. I mean, if you look at it purely, and I know it's not purely financial, but due to the work from a homeowner to go through the process, it seems like something that they have to personally be passionate about to receive that designation because the financial incentive, especially when you look at that number of eligible properties, the average over 10-year savings is half of what they are required to invest in the property to upkeep it. So I mean, just from purely financial, I would say no. I would say also it seems perhaps it's not enough, but I think we have to consider all of the property owners within the city because when we give a tax break to anybody, that means more property taxes for those who are paying a full amount. And I don't think we do enough to inform and educate the general public about why that would be to their advantage if they're not one of those property owners. - Yeah, piggybacking a little off Ms. Lenny's comment, one thing that occurs to me too when I see the district, the area, that it's these bigger houses, it's these bigger, more pricey, right? And so it also raises questions for me of like, how can we incentivize maybe smaller ones, right? And is there any way that we could think about percentages wise, like how much, 'cause they may not spend $2,000 over 10 years, but it may be for smaller houses that are smaller projects, maybe trying to, I guess I'm looking forward to your presentation of what other cities are doing in terms of that. Because yeah, the larger houses, it seems like that's, they're the ones that pick up on that and run with that. But as you're saying, in this economy, how do we think about like the smaller little craft houses, the cottages, and also mix of different types of architecture styles and things like that? So I'm just thinking out loud of things that might go into the mix that. - And I think the average, barely able to afford their house at all homeowner would say, why should I pay what I'm supposed to pay on this amount while that wealthy property owner with huge, beautiful home gets a tax break to keep their house up just so we can have those properties in our city? What does that do for me? - So you're essentially saying, or I guess you're asking the question of, why should we have a tax break that is the same across the board? Maybe it needs to change based off your property. - Square footage. - I'm really saying it's gonna take a lot of education. - Communicating the value of what historic properties can do to the culture. Is that, is that correct? - Yes. - Yeah. Which, we kind of talked about it before, like how do you market and advocate for, right? And educate people to understand the value that this kind, that historic properties can bring. - We have a price on small town trauma. - I mean, but I didn't know until we were doing our walking tour that you mentioned that people go, people seek out areas, right? - Yeah, one of them. - People seek out areas. And so, but I mean, I'm here and I didn't know that, that people, right, that's part of, that's a draw, that's an incentive. It brings people to the community, you know, there's value to it. - Yeah, money is put back in the local economy from people visiting, wanting to visit the local historic districts, national register, record Texas historic landmarks, all the historic properties. Yeah. Anything else? - Anything that you were surprised by? - $840 a year in savings is not a lot. I mean, just to see like that actual. - Yeah. - I mean, it's not nothing. - Right. But the fact that it's a locally landmark property and you're requiring them to spend 10,000 just to reapply and they're not hitting even that 10,000. It strikes me that someone who's looking to buy one of those houses wouldn't buy it just for that. I mean, that would have very little really to do with it because the housing itself and the general upkeep is so expensive. You have, you would pretty much be committed to doing that. So I wonder if they're, well, I think it takes a lot of education. I also wonder if there's other kinds of things. I'll be interested to see what other cities are doing. See if there's anything else that you could do to sweeten the appeal. - Yeah. - Well, thank you for the report, very informative. - Well, it was a very nice report. - Yeah, I really appreciate it, yes. - Of course, we'll get you the updated presentation. - Efforts are clear, you're successful. - Okay, perfect. (all laughing) - Okay, so I guess that brings us to the next item on the work session, item 4B, number HLC 24-012 on our agenda is to, I'm sorry to do that. It's for landmark mission quotes for local historic designation of eligible historic properties. - Did anyone bring a property? - I meant to, 'cause I was gonna look into, I was gonna look into that in a further place. - Okay. Oh, Mr. Frosty. - Mr. Frosty, I'm gonna make a note to myself. - I say we've got lots of eligible properties up there. Just waiting. - Right? - You do. (all laughing) - All right, set it, no others bring forward, okay? And I guess moving on to item 4C, number HLC 24-011 on our agenda is to hold a discussion regarding our Historic Landmark Commission Project Matrix. - Yes, so obviously today we covered the request in regards to the economic impact of preserving our historic properties. So that's gonna be taken off. We do have the discussion regarding benefits for preserving historic properties and how other cities are incentivizing owners to designate their properties. So that's gonna be in June. I will, when I'm making that presentation regarding other cities, just so you all know, I will be utilizing the numbers from ours and doing kind of like a comparison. So you will be able to kind of see what we're dealing with locally in comparison to other cities. I think that will help give a fuller picture. But we just wanted to do the intro tonight, obviously, just so you know what we're working with. And then we do have a template agenda to be utilized by HLC members at community meetings. So I'm working on that. Hopefully gonna create a nicer looking flyer besides me just typing in Times New Roman and having one sheet that you all can kind of take with you when you're going out to public meetings or neighborhood meetings, whatever it may be, or if you're just talking to individuals. And then we have the rest of our requests. So, and also just wanted to mention, since this was our first public, yes, member of the public speaking, you all are able to add those persons if their topic is of interest to you, to the matrix. It's just something that you all would have to take a vote, get a minimum of three votes, add that to the matrix for it to move forward. So you all are welcome to do that tonight. If you don't have interest in pursuing it, that's fine too. So I just wanted to mention that as well. - I'd like to know what we might reasonably do to bring this to the attention. I was disappointed when I looked at the pictures that we received about the TWU properties and they're looking so shabby and ugly, obviously not being taken care of. But again, I don't want to suggest that the commission should step out of its authority. So what can we logically do just to kind of call to TWU's attention? - Can we invite speakers? Can we like invite, like Chancellor Clayton, President Clayton to speak to the group? - Or can we write her a little letter? - I would have to look at Scott in terms of the letter. I'm not sure where that falls within our legal purview. - We can post for that discussion. I think right now we're just talking about what's being added to the matrix. - So they can add things to the matrix. It's just, so they can vote to add it to the matrix and then we can actually bring it back for discussion. I think that's what T knows. - Is that how you're gonna post it for action for discussion? - That is how we've done it for the last. - So if there's interest amongst the HLC and being able to discuss this further, then our recommendation would be is why don't you go ahead and add it to the matrix if the concurrence is there. We can add to the matrix and then Cameron can bring this back on our next agenda and we can have this conversation about how am I gonna go about it and then that also gives Cameron a little extra time to be able to prepare for that. - Yeah, who's like a discussion and make recommendation regarding that letter if you want? There's also, I think it is possible to invite someone to come speak, whether they come or not, it's up to them. - Sure. - It's a piano, but you can. (all laughing) But again, I think whether that goes, whether you want to put that on without knowing whether that person's actually going to-- - Sure, right, right. - Up in here too. - I think the best thing to do would be able to coordinate with somebody on behalf of the TWAU and find an appropriate person to come and address if they were interested in addressing the issue. But I think that's something we can do. We're gonna further bring it back from our person. - We don't wanna seem heavy-handed, but it was just-- - Well, no, we're here inviting for tea and some cookies and we'll, you know, just, you know. - What they might do. We'll talk about that in the chat room. We'll talk it over. - We have a program that might help them and we are not sure they know about it, yeah? - Yes. - So what's the direction? - I guess we're looking to see if there's a motion to add. - Yeah, so moved. I'm moved that we add this item to our matrix. - Do I have a second? - Second. - All right, let's take a vote. All those in favor of adding, exploring these three TWAU buildings that were brought forward by public comment and entering those into the matrix. Raise your hand if yes. Any opposed? It looks like it passed the name, so let's add it for future discussions and recommendations. (indistinct) - Sorry. - Sorry, what? - No, he just explained to me how moving forward was important. - Got it. - Yeah, sorry. - Okay. Right on. Okay, so let's see, having done that, is there any other discussion for the project matrix? Besides thanking our gracious presenters for their work and sharing this information, very much appreciated. All right, any other further discussion of the project matrix? Then I guess we'll move to our concluding items. Does the board have any other business to discuss? - I have one that's been kind of announced. - Of course. - So I just wanted to share this week's Dent Revealed Preservation Month events that are happening. So tomorrow is the Cooper Creek Cemetery Tour at 6 p.m. Then we have our Clear Creek Walking Tour at 10 a.m. on Friday the 17th. We also have our Imagine the Possibilities, which starts at 10 a.m. at Stoke. And that's also on Friday the 17th. We also have Story Time at the Bloomfield Schoolhouse at 10 a.m. on the 17th. And that's in Pilot Point. And then lastly, we have our Historic Bar Tour on the Saturday the 18th, starting at 2 p.m. in downtown. And that's it. Awesome. I'm looking forward to all these things. Excellent. Any other announcements, comments? Heck, I didn't even take poetry or any other business to discuss. All right, there's no other business then. Now adjourn the meeting at 6, 10 p.m. Thank you for your service. Thank you for the presentations, public comments. I already got out of here, I appreciated that. And I want to recognize Council Member Becker. Thanks for coming.