Apr 08, 2026 Planning and Zoning Commission on 2026-04-08 5:00 PM

afternoon on this Wednesday April 8th 2026 at 5 o 2 p.m. I will call this work session of the City of Denton Planning and Zoning Commission to an order with the quorum present. First item of business is comments on the consent agenda from the public. I don't see any the next item of business is clarification for items on the agenda. Any questions on the consent agenda from the Commission? Yeah Commissioner McTuffin. Yes I have one question please. On the Triangle Engineering proposal of Jayombe Denton on the first one it says it's going to be platted for a hotel. Do we have any idea about with a hotel chain? It is a Live Smart by Hilton. Live Smart. I was getting my points ready. Thank you. All right. That brings us to our items for individual consideration. There are three items that have been pulled and all three I believe are recommended approval now. Is that correct? I'm sorry two items the other one was the yeah so that's fp26008 which is 2h and fp26006 which is 2b. So 2f and 2b are now recommended approval. Any questions on those two? Okay we've got a lot of the rest of the individual consideration items so instead of having the parade of people saying that we recommend that these be postponed. I believe all of them are recommended postponed to the next meeting date. Can staff just confirm that other than those two that I called out? Is that right? Okay we'll give everybody eight more minutes of dinnertime if that's okay. Excuse me. Yes Commissioner McDuff. Chair, sorry if I may back us up. Please. Just for a minute I had a question on the consent agenda if I may. Yeah. I am just looking at that on the cover on the agenda caption it says phase five and then I go into the information sheet and it says third phase. Okay yeah I think that's on the Hickory Grove. Devco, Hickory Grove. It's Ms. Hines. I'm just wondering if it's a batch. Mia Hines senior planner that item is for Hickory Grove phase five. You said the third phase is where? It's on the first page of the agenda information sheet and it says this in the background the last sentence this proposed final plan is for the third phase of this development. That is that is an error. My apologies. This is supposed to be for phase five. Okay and I believe it appears in the other in the individual consideration item two. Okay. And except it's for phase six. Oh for correction yeah this the item item 3B on the consent agenda is for phase five of Hickory Grove and then item 4D at P26-0003 is for phase six of Hickory Grove. Okay and that same Ms. Hines that same I don't want to say error I've done this batching before it says third phase as well. So Hickory Grove okay yeah those are the two corrections on that those are in error my apologies. Okay no no worries thank you. Okay thank you Chair Pruitt. Certainly. Any other questions on the items to be continued for the next meeting in the individual consideration. Commissioner Dyer. So we're not going to have any discussion on any of these items. We we certainly can it's just there's I know we have we have a heavy agenda tonight. Yeah yeah. But I do I do have some questions on item number and under individual consideration FP 26-0013 the equity engineering all of the apartments. Sure. Okay hi so just kind of looking at this information and looking at the background let me get back to that item on my screen. When you look at was it staff analysis in exhibit two. No it was not that one it was the exhibit one the agenda information sheet. You have in there the timeline that this started back in 2002 but then 2019 City Council did a zoning transition October 11th 2023 it came in front of P&Z for a special use permit and then it went to City Council for the same thing and everything got approved and then in 2025 the an extension for an approval period for the specific use permit did the owner of the land did they that owns it now to do all this development were they also the owners back in 2019 when they asked for the zoning change. So the 2019 zoning transition you'll see in several of our staff and or this would be on the AIS is sort of one of those it's almost a standing point and what that is is this reflective of the adoption of the 2019 debt and development code at which point our zoning districts transitioned from the 02 code to the 19 and so that's that's reflective of what it did transition to at that time I don't I don't know off the top of my head if the owner owned it in 2019 but they didn't request the zoning change of that that was a city request that was this that was the zoning transition that occurred with the adoption of the 2019 DDC they then in in 23 did submit for that SUP our SUPs are valid for a period of two years unless you're substantially underway and that includes approval of the final plots and CEPs due to financials and things like that they did request that additional one-year extension the final plot does conform with the SUP generally there are minor comments that need to be addressed which is the reason for the plot extension tonight okay I guess I just have you know I know we've talked a lot about apartments and I guess I just have a lot of concerns because looking at this area there are just so many apartment developments over there and to me this would be a great opportunity to take this land and build different types of housing zero lot lines your townhouses small single-family homes that are on smaller lots that might be at a similar monthly purchase rate that maybe a rental would be at because I have been doing some research it just shows that when you have homeowners you know property owners it tends to provide a more stable ability and I know because this is being recommended to be denied which is probably you know we'll probably vote on that I'm sure we don't want to have a lot of discussion but I guess maybe to give you guys a heads up or you know when talking to the developer and that's why I wanted to relook at the stats that you had sent off back in January of your what we're seeing in single-family and townhome and I don't know what the percentage is because I couldn't you know I was trying to quickly find it but I'm seeing here in my research that really because you do it's not that we don't want or need to have any apartments they definitely benefit the community and benefit citizens in a great way but I just wonder what our ratio mix of homeowners to rentals what that ratio is and it basically talked about that in a city if you build too many apartments and you don't have that ratio you really want to have 60 to 75 percent owner occupied housing and anywhere from 25 to 40 percent rental housing and then if you exceed that 40 percent mark you can experience slower property value growth higher infrastructure demand which is you know what's what we're seeing like we're dealing with that right now greater budget pressure increased political tension reduced long-term stability like there's all these negative things so I'm just concerned and I know this is one of the things I've asked for and I don't know we've had other than the report I don't know that we've had a really in-depth dive but how many apartment units are in the process of being under construction and how many are in the hopper to be built because in landmark in that whole development I know that there are supposed to be mixed use of apartments and rentals both in the commercial space on the east side of 35 and also on the west side I'm sorry on the east and the west side and everything with Quaver Ranch so I'm just kind of curious so sorry I know I know I'm on a tangent I'm sure I know Hillary probably doesn't want me to go on this but it's it is a bit it is just a big concern sure every time apartments come up yes and just to remind us about Platts they do have the approvals for the multifamily per the SUP the the plat is the legal subdivision of land and they are meeting those requirements largely apart from the exceptions noted in exhibit 2 so again they went through the channels and they do have their approvals for that I do think these numbers have been accounted for in some of the multifamily units we know that are coming online and some of the data that has been circulated we can look into that but as far as the plat goes this is zoned SC and it generally conforms to the lot dimensions and requirements for SC they do have some things to clean up but it is a plat at the end of the item so maybe this is where I need to be educated and I don't know if it's in a setting like this or if it's in with you know one-on-one that at what point because yes I understand if it's a plat and it meets everything legally we have to approve it but at what point do does the city and does planning and zoning and a city council you know kind of say okay hold on enough on apartments let's let everything that we have sift out because what if we are to the point where we're building too many so I don't know where that comes into play so I think that comes into play as we update our plans and we consider zoning change requests because the there's no zoning tool to to pull strings in the market such that you you can no longer do this full stop right we set the requirements for applicants we set the places where certain land uses can occur based on the zoning and then we have a market system for developing homes and businesses but according to zoning multifamily could be duplexes triplexes and apartments so if you're trying to get more duplexes yeah and you do that it kind of comes with the apartment so that's that's not yeah there's separate land uses allowed in a separate group of zoning districts I guess my point is just that our function as I understand it to to envision the future of Denton and that mix of uses comes in when we revise our plans and then when we approve zoning changes to be accordance to those plans not at the platting stage is that yes so as a commission on a grander scale you know that opportunity will come before you all when the city does things like city wide code updates like we did in 2019 where there's subsequent zoning changes that go along with that or when we update our comprehensive plan and reimagine what the future land use map you know how that might need to change in certain areas but as part of your day-to-day function the only opportunity that you all would have for that is to weigh in on an individual request for a zoning change or a specific use permit okay by the time something reaches platting that that ship is sailed they have the land use approvals that they have and can build any use that's permitted by right in that district the plat is strictly the subdivision of the property as Angie mentioned and it is largely a ministerial function for the board okay and and I think our development community depends on that certainty where they understand the things that are uncertain and they understand the things that are certain as we heard a few weeks ago about the state updates last time the several of the provisions now are in place because other communities did things like stick plats in the pocket for almost two years without taking action on them just because they didn't like the land use and and that is when the state stepped in to say you can't do that so is that my understanding consistent with yours the shot clock bill and the reason you see so many extensions as for the reasons you described yes thank you okay but I think you had is that all on this item or you may have had some other individual consideration items you wanted to see no that was that was really it on this on this side okay and again I'm not trying to skip anything I just I just don't want to shortchange the work sessions no I know it's just yeah yeah okay and and I'll just remind you know if there is something legitimate for a you know code reason within the DDC that you find to have issue with a plat then that's a valid circumstance staff would request that you state what that specific reason is yeah so that they can trace back because for for future reasons they would need to refer back to that Commissioner McDuff is a quick comment I did have another comment on individual consideration on the quiddity engineering in miss Angie's already sat down just a quick one but I will comment that commissioners dyers concern it will not go away for the record miss Angie we I have a question here on my just a quick question I believe this is for two lots of record and one is up for apartments the multifamily and one is parkland could could you give us a little more information on the park land sure so SUPs have a similar sort of negotiation opportunity that plan developments have in which we're seeking that a use has been adequately mitigated in this case so as part of this the area that you see shaded is the largely lot to some of this is on the the apartment tract but it'll remain as open space they're currently it's codified in the SUP that's approved and adopted and the applicant is working with parks as well to bring forward a development agreement that will dedicate that lower the second lot for future parkland for the extension of the pecan Creek trail so that will remain open space in perpetuity per the SUP the plot will not be approved until that is done that's one of the reasons it's on the agenda for an extension they need to work through parks board and City Council just like the plot needs to work through you all and City Council so that area that you see shaded is for future parkland it's codified in the SUP it'll remain that way all right thank you Angie anything else on the the items to be postponed in the individual consideration section okay thank you that brings us to sorry yes since we don't see the subdivision variances so often it's 4 ev 26 - 5 Matt if you wouldn't mind showing us that and reminding us what we do with these yeah good evening Commission Mapo Dean assistant planner here presenting a subdivision variance request V 26 - 0 5 so this subdivision variance is associated with the replat that is on the agenda today and it's with a lot that currently is both in the Sea of Denton and in the ETJ that's about a little short of a mile north of loop 288 so the reply is seeking to divide this property into two lots along city limits now the residential lot which is the one on the the right in the ETJ only has access to a public road via an existing private access easement now there is a provision in the code that no more than three residential lots can take access to a public road via a private access easement now in cases where that's where there is a hardship for a person being able to subdivide they apply for this variance and so as part of the larger as the larger presentation there are four criteria that need to be considered in order to approve a subdivision variance I go over those as more in detail in the in the presentation essentially staff is recommending approval of this variance which would then allow the plat to be approved due to hardships related to the particular layout of development in this area which has essentially led to this situation where this lot needs this variance before you today as mentioned I run to more detail in the as in the public meeting but can answer any questions at this time questions I have one just so that we help everybody understand I believe if this were an RR zoned lot within the city of Denton then our five acre minimum for platting would apply however because it's in the ETJ we don't apply that minimum is that correct you do not apply that minimum to lots in ETJ the zoning on the parshin that is in the city have a slide I believe it's our four doesn't meet those criteria I'm sorry I was thinking this was further north than it is it's it is pretty far north the city's there's a just a strip along North Locust that's within city limits that goes pretty far up there got it Commissioner McDuff did I see a question mark okay anything else I don't see any as thank you Matt okay that brings us to our first public hearing item 5a HL 26 - 1 good evening chair commission Cameron Robertson historic preservation officer oh it's right on the screen perfect and this is HL 26 0 0 1 a this is a request for historic landmark designation at 1403 Ken Dove Drive it is a Mount Miller home design circuit 1959 it doesn't meet approval criteria one three four nine eleven and twelve which I'll go into more detail during the public hearing portion it is zone residential three it is a rental property as well it does mean our done 2040 comprehensive plan goal community character to as well as our 2019 historic preservation plan goal number one policy 1.3 which looks at prioritizing eligible properties and areas for landmarking and historic districts so staff is recommending approval as it complies with the criteria criteria for approval in our section 2.9.4 B and does meet that dent in 2040 comprehensive plan as well as our 2019 historic preservation plan yeah Commissioner McDuff I'm sorry McDade I just had a question if something receives a historic landmark designation does it become property tax exempt or anything like that they would have to go through that process so that process for a tax exemption would be up to 50% of their city property tax that would have to go in front of the historic Landmark Commission as well as City Council but to be eligible just to even apply for that application they had to have spent a minimum of ten thousand dollars towards the improvement and maintenance of their property Commissioner McDuff yes a comment I have a concern rather I have a concern that what this is a designation for historic landmark and it is a short-term rental that seems incongruous to me didn't seem to match so I have a concern for the integrity of the property and the property camera correct me if I'm wrong I believe it is a rental home I don't know that it's I don't believe it has a short-term rental correct but regardless there there's nothing in the coder criteria that says how a home has to be used necessarily it's the structure itself that would receive the historic designation correct so it is currently a rental property it is occupied by a UNT professor this the AIS says short-term rental it used to be a short-term rental okay but it's a it's a rental property right currently yes occupied by a UNT member commissioner day what are the benefits to a property owner to get this designation so it would just be the one historic tax exemption so currently at the local level we only offer one historic tax assumption currently and it's that up to 50% of that city property tax otherwise if it was an income producing they could look to go for state and federal designation but that the city has no jurisdiction over so basically since this is not their primary residence there's no home studying so there's there's no protection in the valuation when I'm Denton cat assesses them so they're basically taxed a little bit higher than if it was their their main their main property so there would be a significant tax savings to the homeowners and actually a loss of money to the city if they got this and applied for the tax exemptions yes that is correct if they went for the tax exemptions there's no guarantee as that's a whole separate process separate from the actual designation but that is to say yes there could be a potential loss staff has done diligent research of that at the last two years and it currently the number of properties that are getting receiving that tax exemption it's only about six two thousand dollars that we're losing each year okay thank you okay just one question for clarification because I heard something new to me when you said that the income producing tax credit I don't remember if it's a credit or an exemption for commercial income producing properties that requires a historical designation separate from this one yes it would have to be at the state or federal level okay so at the local level this the only tax credit that we have available is for what is essentially would be an owner occupied home or a residence itself but not for income producing commercial property like you see downtown okay and maybe I'm just not clear on the definitions but does income producing property include a property that's leased out to a renter they can yes okay but that like I said that's a whole different process they would have to go through a nomination process with the county sure to then go for state and federal eligibility or designation and then they'd have to go through a separate tax exemption process where they would also not be able to do certain renovations and changes to the property okay understood any other questions thank you that brings us to our second public hearing item 5b DCA 26 - - good evening and just it's a lot of information on this I'm sure we will be properly briefed I will say we received a few written letters of support in opposition so once you get to the end or maybe it's already in the middle of it if you could explain how many of those we've gotten over the whole period of public engagement and kind of what staff's view is on that and if we have any idea what the issues are at that level we may not know but I will try to address that if I don't let me know we're good thank you for this work session I just have a really brief overview we'll be happy to answer any questions our our presentation for the for the regular session I think is 43 slides so we won't we won't do that to you on work session but I do and I promise we'll be quick at regular session but I do want to just talk briefly about what we're doing tonight so really excited as you may know we adopted the southeast in an area plan in July of 2024 as part of that area plan we did a tremendous amount of public engagement and we listened to the community and the concerns of the community and and some of the things that the community really indicated was that they wanted to protect their their neighborhoods and they also wanted to provide things that could strengthen their neighborhoods to provide to provide opportunities for the for the community members so we have three overlays that were recommended as action items in the area plan these were a pretty big priority of the plan they were short-term action items and so they so we wanted to get on them as quickly as possible so the proposal tonight before you is is to amend the didn't development code sub chapter 4 to add three new overlay districts within the southeast Denton overlay area the first one is the height overlay district and that one is the area in blue community members indicated to us that they were concerned about downtown style development encroaching into southeast end the height overlay district is intended to provide a more gentle transition for that area between the DCTA facility the transit station and then those those residential more residential neighborhoods so the height overlay is intended to just keep the heights a little lower provide a better transition the live work overlay I don't have a whole lot of detail if you have specific questions I'm going to bring me up on that one but that is intended to to really do two things protect residential homes while reintroducing a variety of small businesses in an area that was historically had some businesses throughout the area planning process we heard that Prairie was was a main street for southeast end for a very long time and and that's kind of the zoning doesn't really allow those types of uses right now so in order to can bring back that that type of use that live work district is is proposed once again with items that are with protections for the surrounding residential neighborhoods because we want to make sure that that they they mesh together well and then finally the residential overlay district this is this is proposed to really maintain the scale and character of existing residential areas the southeast end developed over many decades starting in the 20s all the way up to even homes are being built there now and so we want to make sure that anything that is built in there is reflective of the special character and and and the look and feel of southeastern so the the proposed regulations within that that residential overlay district aren't you spaced they really are design based so that was all I was going to talk about for the work session I'll be happy to go through any oh engagement sorry I looked at you and then I remembered I we have a we do have a slide on public engagement we have listed out all the things we did we had a we had 40 engagement opportunities when we prepared the southeastern area plan we estimate that we had about 529 people participate with the area planning effort which is about 16% of the residents in southeastern we heard from the community and that's and what their concerns were and and that's how we got to those action items that we're moving forward with tonight but we wanted to validate make sure we had all of that information correct so we went back to the community in March of 2025 for a block party to really ask some more deep dive questions about what these overlays would eventually look like took that information went back start writing started writing up the the regulations we took those back to the community for Juneteenth last year we also held neighborhood or community workshops last fall for both property owners and for non on owner occupied properties we've gone to Sedna we go pretty much every month to talk to them and say are we on the right track is is this what the community is looking to see we put out boards and flyers at MLK and American Legion and then also of course we've had a lot of phone calls and emails with community members as far as specific concerns it probably would be specific to each overlay and we could certainly talk through those at the work session if would you want to talk through those really quick I'm happy either way yes I'm seeing nodding heads all right okay so in terms of what we really got a lot of information it was at the block party last year that's where we really had a pile of questions and we asked the community what do you what do you think we had boards stickers all those think Mia had jars where people could put a marble in it so we tried to do some fun things with the community but in terms of the the residential overlay prior to the block party we went with the planning staff did a windshield survey of Southeast Denton and drove through the community and looked at common characteristics of properties things like what how many stories do they have a front porch do they what kind of garage setup do they have what is the kind of architectural theme that the that that emerges from the different the different parts of Southeast Denton we took all of that information and then we created this list things like hey do you think that a front entry garage fits within southeastern ask the community members and and they responded to those or do you do you want to encourage front porches or stoops and the community gave us feedback on that so based upon the feedback that we got from that that's what that's what we went forward with we did we did go we made some other or provided some other questions you know asking do you want something like narrower lots or or shallower lots would you want would you want to be able to subdivide lots so that each side of a duplex could be on its own lot so we asked some kind of other questions too we heard from the community on those types of things that that wasn't what they were interested in so that that's why we are really just coming forward with the things that we heard from the community that they were interested in in terms of opposition not not many of them gave the reasoning we've had a lot of calls because this is kind of complicated and so we we did talk to the property owner or did talk to those who called into us kind of gave them just a description in more plain language also provided the the little cheat sheet that we've put on your desk we've emailed that out to a lot of people we also had to translate it in Spanish in case a in case a community member spoke preferred to speak Spanish so when we talk to people you know they seem to be like oh okay they understood it it just I think there was some confusion about oh what is this because it is a it's a pretty it's a pretty big deal in terms of specific for the live work I will have Mia come up because I do not know that so Mia hunn senior planner just in terms of general community feedback that we got from the live work component the first time around or with doing the area in adopting the area plan we talked with our with the community in general that's when Julie heard or what Julie mentioned we got the feedback on the historic district or a historic business district of southeast end in the area along East Prairie the community wanting to see that restored but we also had some conversations subsequent conversations and implementation with trying to figure out specifically what non-residential uses what community-based uses they wanted to see throughout the community and in terms of the the specific feedback that we got from that share one of these slides here and we presented some of this information the last time we we brought a work session item before this body since then we did relaunch an online survey asking similar questions about the uses that the community felt were appropriate so these numbers are slightly different from what we presented at first but essentially this is what we got back in return and that the community overwhelmingly or the respondents who participated overwhelmingly had support for general retail like small-scale retail restaurant service sit-down restaurants not drive-through restaurants personal service so that's your barber shops nail salons things like that daycare was a really big one childcare facilities wanting that to be permitted in the area mobile full court was a little iffy just because some people wanted the opportunity to be able to have those types of things but understanding that typically with those are outdoor gatherings that comes with noise and more traffic in the area so we're wanting we have that proposed as a specific use permit option to really add that extra layer of check with the community as well as you know the Commission and the City Council and then other ones include business and trade school at 79% of acceptable professional office at 74 and then self-service laundry at 77 percent of the area and I think the big thing to note about the live work overlay is that you'll look you look at the action and the way that it's written from the southeastern area plan and it does specifically mention that the the goal of this action is to allow for basically a vertical mix of a residential unit use and a non-residential use within the same structure what we're actually proposing is to allow for standalone non-residential businesses to be operating on East Prairie Street and this is just a response to the community and the uses that they wanted to see there and and some of the the challenges that we have come to know that are associated with trying to mesh and have both the residential and the non-residential use and the same structure there's more believe it or not that we can go over within the work session but happy to answer any questions that you only have any questions yeah Commissioner McDuff I have not have you did you receive any negative or opposition to the plan in the proposal because I haven't heard any we did not know not necessarily we've heard concerns just in general about the implementation that's why we've implemented some of the like the buffering requirement between a non-residential use and a residential use people in general talk about you know things that are associated with bringing businesses into an area more parking others other things of that nature and so some of the things that we implemented like the limited hours of operation our response to you to that as well as like Julie mentioned the ensuring the that the character the architectural character of the area stays the same so that way if someone is interested in constructing a completely new building and implementing one of these small uses it still looks like it fits in with the with the area so I think we have heard some concerns nothing in total opposition unnecessarily towards the live work area and then even with those concerns we try to work them in with the operational standards and things that we are proposing thank you very much anything I just want to say thank you to staff for looking into the live work or code it's called work live it just depends well you're looking at our zoning code or the building code or who knows but you know I think this is a good first step to to start essentially making sure that our zoning code economically allows them to happen in order to not get in the weeds and confuse public members I'll say this here instead of in the the session tonight but I do believe that allowing these while the AIS spoke to the fact that we haven't seen any applications yet and they typically have higher building code standards and that's this sort of thing if they are five thousand square feet or less then or three thousand excuse me per the building code they're allowed to use the IRC to build them which is a heck of a lot cheaper the only stipulation is that they have to have a 13 D sprinkler system which is a whole lot cheaper than the sprinkler system you put in a commercial building so I just want to put that out there yeah for future consideration my my other concern other than hey let's let's make sure these things that our code says we want are viable options in other places is that since we define them as it must be greater than 50 percent commercial I'm concerned that our existing code would have an applicant come in and say I'm gonna build a seven thousand square foot commercial building on this one acre lot with a 400 square foot apartment and there's nothing you can do to stop me so yeah what this sort of also is playing because we did look into that after the last conversation that we had and we confirmed that yes basically our code is the kind of the opposite or the automate automatically kicks you into the IBC because it requires the no more than 50% be residential instead of non-residential this I think with the with the you specific standards that we're proposing for the work live on in this overlay it is kind of a soft launch to reversing that to see and if that works better as a land use option within this overlay district and then potentially we could consider a code update related to the just the use across the city as well okay yeah I just want to thank you all for looking into that I know it it takes time away from urgent things to dive into the weeds and I appreciate it anything else Commissioner McDev thank you just a question had did any of the property owners in these areas or is there any request for any type of historic designations for any of the properties there not that I know of I look to Julie she looks like make that is a great question with as part of the area plan historic preservation was one of the action items both in trying to find if the community would like historic districts or protection but also education about the value of historic preservation the city applied for a grant from the National Park Service to conduct a historic resource survey in Southeast Denton it was awarded we they would the money was was sent was funded and we are in the RFQ process so we hope to be to start the historic resource survey in late summer early fall to find those properties that would potentially be interested in preserving are there some designations currently because I was thinking some of the churches had that historic designation now I'm gonna bring camera sorry yeah hi Karen Robertson historic preservation officer so a lot of the properties in the southeast end neighborhood have subject markers but they're not actually designated themselves so they have the recognition from the state but they don't have that additional layer of protection with the destination was that a no no Commissioner McDuff yes I would just say I agree with Chair Pruitt on thank you to the staff I had a note for that this is a lot of work by any measurement by any means Julie and Mia in particular but also I'm glad that Commissioner McDuffie has talked and brought some ideas forward some concepts and I hope you'll do the same thing when we get in the public hearing I'm sure you will so we can hear that there was some public comments and third thirdly there were some some input that came in Chair Pruitt you were probably going to talk about this some things that came in at 2 30 this afternoon I was watching my voice record and these came into the into my email but just some concerns it looked like same several from the same property owner but there was one in particular that I'm interested in I'm going to read it if I may it's from Leona Franklin and she says why I pose this request can't be in favor of where I've lived for 57 years not knowing changes or what to expect planning and zoning will move forward regardless so I just I wanted us to acknowledge that and sounds like you know a long time property owner sure and I hope some of those who sent in the written notices will will be here tonight anything else okay that brings us to our one work session this evening which is easy something 26 - 55 have we really had 55 work session that must include Council's numbering - yes sorry complete tangent I'm just surprised it's 55 because that's usually the number within the year let's let me just ask you Angie about how long do you think this would be because it could be three slides or it could be 38 given the subject matter I don't know it's 22 okay some of them go quick but I'll leave it up to you I think I probably talk for 15 minutes okay but why don't could be faster yeah why don't we go ahead and take a short break to grab dinner then if the Commission's okay with that and then we will enjoy hopefully you'll get a chance after that to get some as well so at 551 we'll take a eight-minute recess and be back at 559 and at 6 p.m. with a quorum present we'll reconvene for the work session report PZ 26 - 55 thank you chair members of the Commission Angie Mangleris assistant planning director today we're gonna do a work session spurred by one of the matrix items just about zoning following annexations we're gonna cover a couple topics because they all kind of relate to one another but we're gonna talk about annexation subsequent zoning after that and then we're gonna touch a little bit on municipal utility districts as well so again we'll go through some key definitions we'll talk a little bit about state law annexation in the city of Denton rezoning after annexation and municipal utility districts also known as MUDS before we dive into annexation it's important to understand some of the definitions of what we'll be talking about so annexation is the means by which cities expand their boundaries the process of land transfer from one unit of government to another cities can only annex land from our extraterritorial jurisdiction or ETJ ETJ is the unincorporated area contiguous to the corporate boundaries of a municipality the area or distance of the ETJ depends on the municipalities population so the city of Denton is greater than a hundred thousand people that means our ETJ extends five miles out from our corporate boundaries our ETJ doesn't doesn't continue to get bigger it's kind of set where it is today but it is good information to know speaking of ETJ we have two types of ETJ we have ETJ division one which you see in yellow on your screen and ETJ division two which is the pink areas that you see in green are the city of Denton's corporate limits in ETJ division one we do have some authority we predominantly platting so subdivision requirements in ETJ division one do apply on occasion there may be CEPs associated with an ETJ division one project but predominantly you may see some plats and we'll note on those that this is in the ETJ ETJ division two we really don't have much to say we do have an interlocal agreement with Denton County development and subdivision of land and ETJ division two largely follows the requirements of Denton County and any state law that they need to follow this little handy chart breaks it down even further this covers just some of the big topics we talk about zoning subdivision regulations tree preservation and gas well regulations so you can see in the city limits we we can regulate all of those things in ETJ division one we can regulate subdivision so that's sub chapter 8 in the Denton development code and in each year division 2 we really don't touch any of it state annexation law is a very intense history to try and dive through tonight but some of the important takeaways are the state legislature has gradually taken away city's abilities to annex over time this this timeline kind of starts in 1963 and as we as we go through state really limited how cities can annex requiring non annexation agreements for properties that are used for ag wildlife or timberland it further got limited in 2019 and really limited the involuntary annexations that cities can do and then recently in 2023 state law allows residents in the ETJ to submit a petition to remove themselves from the city's ETJ so our ability to annex especially involuntarily has really kind of been chipped away at session over session and that's important to just understand this is a fun video it shows how the city of Denton has changed over time so we're gonna it's about 30 seconds the area that you see in gray is the corporate limits and then the green will be when we add new property so you can see for a while there was quite a bit of annexation going on especially strip annexation along our major thoroughfares and the city continues to grow around its periphery we start adding areas like ropes and ranch and then that was later followed by some of the hunter and coal properties and we see properties grow around the north and then annexation after that has really been some of those we call them donor holes but those areas in sort of like little holes around the city limits it's the same video today we we have what we call non annexation agreements and so state law did require for any property the city was interested in annexing if it was used for agricultural wildlife or timber use the city had to offer a non annexation agreement which was setting the terms under which the city would would not annex your property the city extended these types of agreements to owners in the ETJ between 2010 and 2016 we also extended it to individuals who use their property for single-family only the initial agreements expired in 2020 and we offered extensions until 2040 within the NAA a development plan is stipulated it typically requires that lots can't be subdivided smaller than five acres that it continues to be used for single family use if a property owner wishes to subdivide smaller or maybe wants to have a different use on there at that point annexation is triggered the city also has several restrictive covenants which operates similar to NAAs but they're actually a little bit more restrictive platting is the mechanism for which annexation is required and so those are spelled out in the agreement that at any time basically they want to develop they need to plot they need to annex into the city annexation procedures annexations take a little bit of time to get through there are procedures spelled out in the Texas local government code chapter 43 and then the city of Den both in the city charter and in subchapter 2 outline several steps state law requires that we allow for the continuation of use so if you're using your property in one way and we annex you we have to allow that content to continue state law also authorizes or requires that we agree to provide services it sets a minimum width for the land area that can be annexed it requires continuity of city boundaries so you can't leapfrog and there's a maximum amount of 10% of the municipalities total land area that could be annexed in a given calendar year what that looks like when it when it comes down to it when we see an annexation there's two council meetings at the first council meeting we're first adopting a municipal services agreement which is essentially saying we're interested in annexing this property these are all of the services that the city provides we are agreeing to provide those services to that landowner and City Council adopts that agreement following that there's a public hearing regarding the annexation anybody is welcome to comment on that and then we actually read the caption of the ordinance into the record at that first meeting following the first meeting the entirety of the annexation ordinance is published in the Denton record chronicle and per our city charter that cannot be acted on for another 30 days so we'll publish it and we'll just kind of hang out for 30 days and we'll have the second meeting at which point we read the caption again into the record and City Council can take action so that's kind of that's the process in which a property can be annexed into the city post annexation annexation ordinances are effective immediately and per state law we have to assign them a placeholder zoning designation in our case we assign the rural residential zoning designation and it's only after annexation can zoning action occur so we don't notice properties for public hearing prior to them being in the city limits because we don't have that land use authority yet and then from there the property will follow our typical rezoning procedures for development that's a that's a lot of information so we're going to walk through two examples that really show how different the process can be or how much time it can take when we're talking about annexation the subsequent rezoning and development so here on the left side of the screen we have coal ranch and then on the right hand side of the screen we have Dentex coal ranch is sort of near Robeson Ranch off of 35w and its annexation patterns varied but it was largely annexed between 2001 and 2006 so they're annexed and they're assigned a placeholder designation following that they were initially zoned MPC for their master plan community in 2008 and then not much happened really until 2020 when they sought major amendments to their MPC and we have the the zoning that we have today where you see the different shadings for the the base zoning districts which are most familiar with it wasn't until a couple years later that we started seeing preliminary plot approvals for coal ranch and even today you know they're still working on some of those CEPs and final plots for their first phase so we're talking in over 20 years before we're even seeing dirt moving on a project like the coal ranch scale on the other hand Dentex which is just south of Allroad Road north of Johnson Lane it's by the country lakes development in South Denton this was annexed in 2024 immediately following their annexation they took forward their zoning and comprehensive plan amendment cases and those were also approved in 2024 and then today in 2026 they have received approvals for their CEPs and their final plot is up for consideration so that just there is no one-size-fits-all path for annexations there is no real linear way it's very development specific obviously these large master plan communities when we're talking about 2,000 plus acres that's going to take some time to plan out and develop Dentex is kind of one of the donut holes that we referred to this was all not in the city limits however it was surrounded with the exception of these areas by city limits so it's kind of a little bit of a hole within our municipality so it's it's filling that in and following some of the existing development patterns so that's kind of two different ways that annexation the subsequent rezoning and eventual land development can play out there no one case is alike is a good way to put it that's all I know about annexations we're talking a little bit about MUDs which are municipal utility districts and municipal utility districts are special-purpose districts special-purpose districts are created to provide a mechanism to fund infrastructure in areas where they otherwise wouldn't be MUDs specifically are created to provide infrastructure for development in most cases it's residential development but there may be a commercial component associated with it MUDs can be created in one of two ways either by an act of the legislature or through TCEQ following a consent process through the city there are stipulations for some MUDs and they can annex into the city following repayment of their bond funding MUDs are are kind of a hot topic we do have several they do operate in our ETJ this map shows sort of where they're scattered but for placement this is 156 and this is 380 so we have crumb and Sanger a lot of these are out west in the city limits we have several that we've provided consent to and then we're also aware of a handful more that are interested in in joining in on that process what that means is we expect MUDs to have a population impact of approximately a hundred and eight thousand people accounting for just under just under thirty four thousand housing units through MUDs we are agreeing to provide utility services to these areas usually negotiated through a development agreement in 2022 the city did adopt a MUD policy this helps guide the framework for development agreements and gives us a little bit of ability to ensure that we're getting utility services the way that we would like them and we can have some say and how those areas develop Denton is a full-service city which does make us an attractive place the development agreements do help us to ensure we're building to city standards and give us that opportunity for future annexation should we wish to pursue that and then just a reminder again most of these MUDs occur in our ETJ I'm sorry all of our MUDs occur in our ETJ it's not really an option for in city we don't have land use control in the ETJs we kind of discussed earlier when we adopted the 2022 comprehensive plan we noted that we had several MUDs we were aware of and had been approved and we tried to outline those in pink so you can see them obviously from the map we saw earlier today it has changed a little bit but we did try to at least reflect and account for that it's kind of ahead on MUDs I'm happy to answer any questions you may have about either topic questions I'll kick it off with the easy and fun questions if you could go early back in the mud I think that the actually that last one will do just fine yes I've always been curious how the ETJ borders operate between us and cities within our ETJ 2 to determine the line between our ETJ and their ETJ I think from looking this at this map it tells me that essentially their ETJ 1 beats our ETJ 2 and then is that accurate I'm just I'm just curious if we know it looks like Hillary were you preparing to chime in this gets a little bit out of some of my competing ETJ area of expertise I think it's to be quite informal more of a dib system like whoever got their first and staked claim but you can see looking at like Sanger and Crumb they because of their population size only could go out so far so that enabled us to further surround them and limit any potential growth of their ETJ by then laying claim to the other areas and I would say the ETJ 1 and 2 I believe is probably unique to Denton I've not heard of other cities that have that that is actually just a product of our inner local agreement with the county and us divvying up who was going to have subdivision authority over those areas but feel free to chime in if I misstated anything there I would only expand on one concept is that the calling dibs is governed by when a city reaches those different population thresholds that Angie showed earlier in the presentation so if Sanger got out to a one mile radius before we were at our five mile radius that's why you see us kind of surrounding them thank you the more you know with the whole rainbow thing interesting and then I've also always been curious I understand that the non exit annexation agreements that we have have those requirements that you described is council bound to continue all of those agreements or if they wanted to in the future could they release the landholder of their requirements sure so they they have set expiration dates and the the initial ones in 2020 at that time we evaluated because we can offer them for a period of up to 45 years and so the the question at that time was do we want to continue to to honor this and just only trigger that annexation when either more really in that case when they want to develop so currently right now we're still working through some of those ones that haven't quite responded and the action has been if they're not renewing to annex but we're not actively looking to break any of those agreements okay questions yeah Commissioner McDuff a big date so do muds have any type of authority to work they get their authority from the state yes so do they have the ability to levy taxes or anything like that in their mud or additional tax they do but I'm gonna let Charlie address that because he's very knowledgeable yes so the muds do you have the ability to either levy ad valorem tax on the property itself or they're able to recover those costs through special assessments in the way that they're handled so then does it become some type of additional agreement or with whoever purchases a property within a mud they already know they're gonna pay additional taxes because of the mud yeah so it's it's disclosed at the time that the property is sold that they're within a mud and it's similar to what you would see on your own property taxes where it's like different layers of city county ISD and then they would have a separate line item they would say it's mud name and then that property tax amount so the city would collect those taxes and send it to the mud the appraisal district would collect those taxes and remit it back to the district itself thank you chairman can I piggyback on that please this is why you always ask your real estate agent when you're looking for a house if you're looking in an area that has a pit and a mud so you know if there's any extra taxes that you have to pay outside of your city your county and your school taxes any other questions all right thank you Angie very much that brings our work session to a close I believe so at 620 p.m. we will break and reconvene at 630 in council chambers thank you good evening at 632 p.m. this Wednesday April 8 I will call this regular session of the city of Denton planning and zoning Commission to order with a quorum present let the record show that Commissioner Riggs is absent our first order of business is to stand and say the Pledge of Allegiance to the U.S. and Texas flag that brings us to our next item of business item to a PZ 26 - 51 consider the approval of the March 18th planning and zoning missions minutes Commissioner catcher said and Commissioner Garland seeing no discussion I'll call for a vote on the board that item passes 6-0 brings us to our consent agenda I will note that there was a typo in the agenda information sheet on item 3a this is actually phase 5 of this plot as opposed to phase 3 however because the plat approves the the plat that gets recorded with the county as opposed to the edge of the information sheet there's no issue to to approve this from a correctness perspective do I have any discussion or motion Commissioner catcher said a motion to approve the consent agenda Commissioner Garland and I second that motion thank you any discussion seeing none I'll call for a vote on the board and the consent agenda is approved 6-0 brings us to our items for individual consideration for a FP 26 - 11 good evening chair members of the Commission Ashley exit associate planner this is FP 26 11 this is a final plot for honey farms estate this is an approximately 9.24 acre site on the south side of Sanders Road at this time the staff does recommends denial as they do not meet the criteria for approval however we have no objection to the requested extension to a date certain of April 29th 2026 and I'm happy to answer any questions any questions or emotion Commissioner McDuff yes I'd like to make a motion for the extension of this proposal to a date certain of April 29th 2026 and sorry Commissioner Kester said I second that motion seeing no discussion with the motion and second on the board I'll call for a vote on the board to continue that item passes 6-0 brings us to our second item for individual consideration for be FP 26 - 6 good evening chair members of the Commission Angie Mcglares assistant planning director this is FP 26 - 0 0 0 6 this is a final pot for the bridal ridge subdivision it's generally located north of Johnson Lane and approximately 2,400 feet east of John Payne Road this plot does now meet our criteria for approval and staff is recommending approval this evening I'm happy to answer any questions you all may have thank you Commissioner McDuff yes I'd like to make a motion for the approval of this proposal in line with staffs recommendation this will be a second extension to a date certain of April 29th 2026 part pardon me to approve the application or approve the extension approve the extension okay in line with staffs recommendation sorry can I get clarification on his staff recommending approval or extension yes this is one of the ones that they addressed all our comments this afternoon we are able to get them for approval so staff is recommending approval this evening so just can you restate your motion yes I'll recite my motion for the approval of this proposal and Commissioner Ketchus said I second that motion and a second not seeing any discussion I'll call for a vote on the board that item passes 6-0 brings us to item 4 CFP 26 - 13 thank you Angie Mingler's assistant planning director this is a final plot for the Alevo apartments is approximately 18 acre site located south of Duchess Drive approximately 800 feet west of loop 288 in the city of Denton at this time the plot does not meet all of our criteria for approval so staff is recommending denial but has no objection to the requested extension which could be granted to a date certain of April 29th I'm happy to answer any questions y'all may have thank you Commissioner Ketchus said a motion to approve the extension certain to April 29th Commissioner Garland and I second that with a motion a second no discussion I'll call for a vote on the board that item passes 6-0 brings us to 4d FP 26 - 3 evening chair members of the Commission behind senior planner this item is FP 26 - 3 a final plot for Hickory Grove phase 6 the property is 66.5 to 1 acres located at the southeast corner of Jackson Road and Nail Road in the city's ETJ and further or closer to the western edge of the city at this time the plot is not meeting all our criteria approval so we have we are recommending denial however we have no objection to the requested extension to May 13 2026 and this would be their third extension for this final plan happy to answer any questions you may have yeah Commissioner Garland the previous item is still on the screen I was just I don't know if it's an issue sorry okay now we're back okay you're good now thank you I have one question just that I didn't catch in the work session this is recommended extension to two meetings from now instead of one meeting I'm sorry no what is the what's that next day it would be the April 29th that would be April 29 2026 okay would be the next meeting my apologies okay just wanted to confirm that open the floor for a discussion or emotion yeah yes Commissioner Ketcham I motion to approve the extension request to a date certain of April 29 2026 Commissioner Garland and I'll second the extension with the motion and a second on the board seeing no discussion call for a vote that item passes 6-0 brings us to 4E V 26 - 5 good evening Commission map or Dean assistant planner here to present the triptych addition subdivision variance so a little bit of background this subdivision variance is associated with a 10 acre lot located about just under a mile north of loop 288 there's an existing family residence on the site it's associated with a final replat that's also on the agenda tonight pushing to subdivide into two lots one of those lots the one in the city's ETJ only has access to a public road via an existing private access easement which brings us to the subdivision variance request there is a requirement in our subdivision regulations that no more than yeah no more than three single family lots may access a public road by means of a private access easement just do the configuration of this area there are already more than three residential lots that access the existing easement and so in order to approve this final replat a variance request was made to allow more than two residential lots to access a public street by means of a private access easement so there are four criteria for approval of a subdivision variance I'll go through each one individually and staff's assessment of them so the first one is that in granting the variance it not be detrimental to public safety health and welfare is found that these are the purpose of this replat is for two single-family residents lots we do not see any detriment to public safety just due to no increase in traffic burden on FM 2164 the second criteria is that because of any particular conditions of the property or its area that the strict regulation of the code creates a hardship staff finds that the peculiar pattern of development in this area creates this hardship this property cannot subdivide under the current DC regulations as is since as shown on the screen we can see there are 12 lots that takes access off of this existing private access easement also called the concrete road of which at least nine are for single-family residences the third criteria is that the variance not very any provisions of our long-range planning documents or the DDC this the final plot associated with this variance follows all other requirements of the DDC in addition the plot does make right away reservations for future corridors that are called for on the mobility plan fourth and granting this variance request the peculiar conditions should not be the results of the action of the owner or any prior owner subsequent to the date of the creation requirement as seen on the abstract survey shown on the screen this particular configuration of lots with well more than three having sole access office easement has been in effect since at least 1987 which is well before this criteria of the DDC was put in place as such staff is recommending an approval of the requested subdivision variance as it complies with the criteria but here to answer any questions any questions for staff or emotion commissioner dire I move to make a motion that we go ahead and approve a recommendation to do the subdivision variance commissioner I second that motion okay any discussion not seeing any with a motion and a second I will call for a vote on the board that item passes six to zero brings us to item 4f fr 26 - three giving Commission again assistant planner I'm here presenting this final replat I was associated with the subdivision variance that we just approved and since PNC did vote to approve that subdivision variance staff is recommending approval of this replat as it would meet all the required requirements of the DDC thank you and this would be refer to the the version of the plot that was emailed to the commissioners this afternoon okay Commissioner Kettreson I recommend approval for this final plat and Commissioner Dyer I'd like to second that motion and seeing no discussion having a motion and a second I'll call for a vote on the board that item passes six zero brings us to item 4g mp 26 - four good evening Commission here to present a final plot of lots one and two block a was that Zipetta edition located in the city's ETJ off of Gribble Springs Road and north of Shepherd Road at this time this plat doesn't meet our criteria for approval however staff has no objection to their first extension requests to a date certain of April 29th Commissioner McDuff yes I'd like them to make a motion to approve a first extension to a date certain of April 29th 2026 which would be in agreement with the staff recommendation and Commissioner Garland and I'll second that recommendation having a first and second and seeing no discussion call for a vote on the board that item passes six zero moves us to item 4h FP 26 - eight good evening Julie Wyatt principal planner of the city of Denton I'm presenting FP 26 eight to you this evening this is a single lot located on the south side of Vintage Road just east of I 35 West the purpose of it is sorry it's two lots the purpose of it is for a charter school and then a commercial lot for future development your your agenda posted had a staff recommendation of denial they still had some final items to work through however they have worked through those with staff and so staff has changed its recommendation to approval you should have received that revised plat today so I'll be happy to answer any questions any questions Commissioner McDuff yes that's why thank you for that information want to make a motion to agree with staff recommendation for approval and Commissioner Dyer I'll second that motion having a motion and a second not seeing any discussion call for a vote on the board that item passes six zero brings us to four I FP 26 - 12 good evening this is a final plot for an industrial development the property is located just east of I 35 south of highway 77 and north of loot 288 they at this time the plot does not comply with our criteria for approval so staff is recommending denial however we have no objection to the requested first extension to April 29th and I'll be happy to answer any questions Commissioner Kutcher said a motion to approve their recommended the requested extension to a date of April 29 2026 Commissioner Garland and I will second that extension having a motion and a second not seeing any discussion I'll call for a vote on the board that item passes six zero brings us to our last item for individual consideration for JFP 26 - for Canadian Chair and Commission this is for the final plot for landmark phase two north it is approximately 184 acre site generally located north the north side of Robson Ranch Road approximately one mile west of I 35 West at this time staff has no objection to the first requested extension as they do not meet the current criteria for approval but we are looking at an extension date to a certain of April 29 2026 I can say for any questions I guess I have one we earlier we had one that we had the date wrong for an extension do applicants have the ability to ask for an extension that's longer than the next meeting they only have this so so for bigger ones where there's more things to address we just have to keep coming back okay thank you Commissioner Dyer I would like to go with staff recommendation and extend this petition to April 29th meeting Commissioner Kutcher said I second that motion with a motion and a second not seeing any discussion I'll call for a vote on the board that item passes 6-0 brings us to our public hearings this evening first public hearing is 5 a HL 26 - one Canadian Chair and Commission Cameron Robertson historic preservation officer I stated this is a historic this is a request for a historic landmark designation at 1403 Kendal Drive it is located approximately 370 feet north of the intersection of Kendall Drive and Whippoorwill Lane the owners are Jennifer and David Morales and the construction days 1959 the property itself is located within that Denia neighborhood it is an R3 zoning it is currently a rental property and it sits on approximately 3.23 acres so looking this is looking at the property from that front west facade and then it also shows that rear east facade there and then we're also looking at the north and south facades of the property so before I dive into staffs analysis looking specifically at section 2.9.4 B I did just want to point to the AIS that backup packet in referring to the work session question I just wanted to note that for historic landmark designation process it is not subject to compliance with our criteria in 2.4.5 E of our debt and development code which specifically calls out minimizing fiscal impact and criteria so just want to make note of that that specifically for historic landmark designations we're solely looking at the criteria in section 2.9.4 B listed here so going into staffs analysis 1403 Kendall Drive does meet the following it meets criteria one which looks at that character interest or value as part of the development heritage or cultural characteristics of the city state or the United States criteria three reflects a distinguishing characteristic of an architectural type or specimen criteria four identification as the work of an architecture master builder criteria nine exemplification of the cultural economic social ethnic or historical heritage of the city criteria 11 identification with a person who significantly contributed to the culture and development of the city state or the United States and then lastly criteria 12 a building a structure that because of its location has become a value to a neighborhood community area or the city so I kind of grouped criteria one three and nine they're all very similar so I wanted to show those on one slide so this property specifically 1403 Kendall it shows how Denton especially during this time as post World War two we saw it embrace that kind of mid-century trend especially in the Denia neighborhood as a whole we saw a lot of innovative designs kind of that international mid-century design style we saw a lot of servant suburban style where we see that attached carport we also saw the integration a lot of natural landscapes so a lot of large windows a lot of window walls and a lot of natural light as stated it captured a lot of those distinguishing elements of mid-century modern design so that indoor outdoor flow we have that we have also seen with some of the other Denia properties that have come forward for designation specifically on Willow wood we also have that natural light and then some of those exposed structural elements trying to show the innovation of the architectural style at that time it also shows once again dd neighborhood has a strong presence of mid-century modern homes we saw kind of see that modernism towards the 1960s late 1950s and just this is another example of a modernist architecture in Denia and this is specifically along Whippoorwill I'm looking at criteria for the property was designed by the Mount Miller architects Tom Polk Miller and Isabelle Mount and they became an architecture firm in 1946 Mount Miller a lot of people are familiar with that name they designed and remodeled between 203 home 300 homes and commercial and institutional properties between 1953 and 2000 within Denton and a lot within Denia so some of the exam noted examples of Mount Miller work in Denton we have the Denton Unitarian Universalist Fellowship we have 1900 Westridge Drive which was designated in 2024 and then we have 2012 26 Kendall Drive and then looking at approval criteria 11 the original owner who actually worked with Mount Miller to design the property is dr. Hiram J Freedman he served in the US Marine Corps during and after World War two he had a long career at UNT as professor and administrator he was the chair of the sociology department he was the first chair of UNT Center for Studies in aging he also served on the White House conferences on aging in 1961 1971 in 1981 and he also has an award at the national level named after him lastly looking at approval criteria 12 a lot of people have started to kind of associate Denia with these mid-century modern homes specifically this property this property has been called out in walking tours you see here the map from 2023 this was a walking tour of historic preservation in that neighborhood and then that was done by the county and then we have a screenshot here of a video that was done on a walking tour last year during historic preservation month for Denton revealed in 2025 so as I say it's been featured in lots of public architectural tours and it's kind of part of that core group of Mount Miller homes in that area so staffs analysis also looked at our 2019 historic preservation plan as well as our Denton 2040 comprehensive plan specifically looking at goal one policy 1.3 and goal goal community character - - public outreach was done newspaper postings website postings and property sign were posted in March mail notices went to 200 feet went to 25 people 500 or 156 notices we do not receive any responses in opposition in favor or neutral so staff is recommending approval of the request for a historic landmark designation of the property located at 1403 Kindle drive as it doesn't meet our approval criteria historic landmark Christian did recommend approval 7-0 and the next steps would be going to City Council on April 21st 2026 and I can stand for any questions thank you this is a public hearing so I will open the public hearing at this time Cameron let me let me ask with the update that you gave after the work session on the the lists of criteria that the planning and zoning should consider for these items I see the new list in two nine four D where is it called out that the standard list of criteria should not apply for these applications so that is specifically it's a big development going you don't have to apologize so it's specifically just listed on our section two point nine point four B stating that the HPO and the HLC shall HLC compliance with one of the following criteria and that's under I believe it's also listed our historic landmark and historic preservation procedures earlier in that chapter okay so this is a public hearing I I will ask I have one card in support but an agenda item is not indicated from mr. Donald McDade is that for the next one okay just wanted to check so I don't have any cards to speak or in opposition or support at this time but if you would like to speak you can come down at this time not seeing anyone I will close the public hearing Commissioner catch his head I motion to approve the historic landmark designation and Commissioner McDade they will be able to come back and request tax exemption for this property as long as they have spent a minimum of $10,000 on the property for improvement and/or restoration to the project art to the property itself so with the owners submit documentation invoices from yes they would have to submit documentation showing that they've received building permits that they followed all proper city procedures if they are required to get a building permit and they would submit that to staff staff would review that and then it would go through to the historic landmark Commission and the City Council for final approval and then with that designation remained yes unless the property owner chose to remove the designation in the future thank you I'm gonna go ahead and take the she asked specifically designation we do have a second on the board so I'm gonna take that before the other request to speak but we'll we'll get to everybody I promise Commissioner McDuff yes I'd like to put a formal second on the floor please thank you and Commissioner Dyer um so are the applicants here yes applicants are here okay so just a quick question I know we kind of talked about this in earlier if they get this designation and they apply for the historical tax exemptions I know you said that was just on city taxes unless they get it correct from or get approval from the federal or the state correct correct and because this is not their primary residents when it's not a primary residence they do probably are paying more in property taxes to all the entities to county school and city so there is going to be a significant amount on this one property that they could possibly not have to pay correct potentially I don't have the numbers in front of me and that's all up to denton CAD but I will note that we do have other former residences that are historic or their landmarks locally that have businesses in them or income producing that are utilizing that tax exemption and how many in this DNA community have this this designation to other communities to other properties to other properties okay thank you any other questions or discussion I guess I have one the sorry is it's more of a comment than a question sorry to go a little field a little bit here you know in a lot of these historical designation applications I I have a hard time viewing or understanding the relative value of one property versus another in this case I think there's precedent here of the prior tours of this area and and two other properties of this ilk to support the continued designation in this area I'll say that I I disagree with staff's analysis that the the traditional or or the the basic criteria for approval for all items does not apply here I think it does so I think fiscal impacts is fair game I I'm in general concerned that our policy opens up the situation where higher value landowners can do something very minor and get a very large tax exemption however in this case that's not what has happened there has been major you know to to the beam investment in this property to be able to preserve it I watched the HLC meeting on this and and it was pretty clear the the extent of the process that the property owners have gone through and now I remember my question to you so with that said it is HLC looking at this historic designation and tax credit policy at a broader level to to make sure that we are incentivizing it to the correct degree with those requirements is that something on their matrix that's something that HLC was working on from 2024 to 2025 but with the budget deficit that were experienced that was put on pause okay I appreciate that I know we can't all do three people's work I guess I'll just say I'll be supporting this however I would hope that staff would include some clear messaging from what what you all have heard from the board at the work session and here in this session in order for them to understand the the concerns around the relative benefit versus the cost and whether that's well calibrated so Commissioner Dyer in looking back at some of the notes that were included in our exhibits with the agenda I noticed it did have kind of the breakdown of the committee's recommendation and it like you said it was seven to zero were there any concerns whether you know they're similar to chair Pruitt's or maybe similar to mine about you know the the tax exemptions and kind of taking advantage of that because even though you can still kind of object of some things or have some concerns but still vote to approve it but those exact discussions aren't in there it just says there was a discussion that took place so was there any concerns by the committee so there were no concerns regarding the tax assumptions the only concern that they had is that the property owner did with their renovations and looking at the historic construction plans they did add an additional awning in the back just to cover the porch and they did change up some of the landscaping in the front so they just wanted to ensure that they met the rest of the criteria and then that would not affect them with those additional additions and so staff walked them kind of through that if those additions were to be removed it would still be the exact same footprint and the same construction that was done back in 1959 okay thank you of course and Commissioner McDade do the repairs have to be done before during or after the designation so do they have to get the designation first then do the repairs or do they have to have to have them done before they have to have the so in this case the renovation and the restoration project took place between 2013 to 2014 so is a year-long process so they are coming about 12 years after the renovation and restoration process to apply for this designation but 12 years yep so once they if they were to go through City Council and be approved for a designation then they would be able to utilize any work that they've done for the two years leading up to this designation to utilize towards their tax exemption application if they sought to seek that and Commissioner Dyer do you have something else okay no worries any other discussion or questions from the Commission Commissioner McDuff I'm gonna wrap this back around to neighborhoods in just a little history on top of it as a and take this as a comment for my support of this proposal and that is if you were indenting back in the day during this time and you were in education you know who dr. Friedson was so this would be an honor to support this I had the good fortune of studying in the summer in the Center for Aging so I'm very familiar with him and his works his national reputation did just want to remind the Commission that what's before you tonight is just the designation that should be looked at on the historic merit of the property itself if the owner does apply for that tax exemption that will go to City Council for their consideration as a separate item in the future thank you yeah all I ask is that our discussion be faithfully represented as I know staff always does a good job of not seeing any more discussion I'll call for a vote on the board on this item and this item passes 6 to 0 springs us to our final public hearing of the evening so thank you for everyone being patient for the rest of the items on our agenda let me call them sorry item 5b DCA 26 - - I'll make a brief statement just to the the members of the public first of all thank you for coming thank you for being engaged I would just ask that know that everyone up here is eager to understand what your hopes and dreams or concerns or confusion or questions are but we will be much better informed if when you come up to speak if you so choose that you would be very clear about the provisions that staff is about to explain that concern you or the things that you are concerned about that were not spoken to because then we can take direct action and better understand what those things are so please do good evening all right I'm Julie Wyatt this is DCA 26 to South East Denton overlay districts I'm gonna kick this off and then me'll come in and she'll she'll do the the second half of the presentation so we are here tonight because in 2024 the City Council approved an area plan for southeastern as part of that area plan we had a tremendous amount of public engagement residents and stakeholders communicated to us that they were concerned about community protection and neighborhood protection and also providing some some additional benefits in terms of in terms of businesses that could be brought back to the Prairie Street area and taking that information from the community the Southeast Denton area plan has three has three action items related to this so I'm going to talk first about what the what the overlays are and then we'll talk about those action items so tonight we are proposing to amend Denton development core didn't development code sub chapter 4 to establish three new overlay districts in Southeast Denton to implement the Southeast Denton area plan first we have the height limitation over to overlay district that is intended to limit the heights in that area in blue the community was very concerned about town downtown style development encroaching into Southeast Denton especially adjacent to the neighborhoods so that height overlay is there to try to create a more gentle direct transition between the residential areas and the DCTA facility on the live work overlay district that is to protect residential homes while adding in some some small businesses in the community Mia knows a lot more about that and she's going to talk to you about that in a little while and then the residential overlay and that is intended to protect the character of the neighborhoods of Southeast Denton by encouraging a compatible architectural design as well as building scale for new structures so and that's that area in yellow so after we set the table talk a little bit about why we're doing this the Southeast Denton area plan as I said was adopted in July of 2024 as part of that there were six goals that that that based upon community engagement and input were in were embedded within the plan we won't talk about all six tonight just the three we're talking about our honor the culture and heritage of Southeast Denton invest in economic prosperity and strengthen neighborhoods and housing affordability in order to achieve those goals that the community said that they would like to see for the future of Southeast Denton there are those three tasks and those are related to these overlay districts and they're on your screen right there before we go into the deep dive on what we're actually proposing just a little bit about overlay districts I know everybody knows this but just a reminder overlay districts are tools to implement area plans they sit on top of the existing zoning and they they those regulations for the existing zoning stay in place except for those things that the overlay changes so it often enhances those zoning regulations they often require substantial coordination between staff community and stakeholders and and so in order to make sure we get those overlay districts correct we talked about in work session public engagement throughout the 18 months that we worked on the Southeast Denton area plan we had 40 engagement opportunities we talked to about 529 folks throughout the the process after adoption and as we started to move forward with these overlay districts we we had a block block party in in southeastern in March of last year to have some additional surveys to confirm that we were on the right track in terms of where we needed to go those draft overlay regulations went to Juneteenth last summer as well as some community workshops last fall we had community workshops not only for residents of Southeast Denton but also for those non owner occupied property owners to make sure that we talk to all folks we also had online surveys as well as we said no meetings boards and flyers at the MLK and American Legion and then emails and calls so we're going to first talk about the residential overlay so that is that area in yellow and again this is intended to maintain the scale and character of neighborhoods while fostering community investment so what we heard during the Southeast Denton area plan preparation is that maintaining the single-family uses and protected neighborhood scale and character were of utmost important with for community members we also through our data collection learned that there are 60 acres of privately held land that are potentially developable in Southeast Denton that provides an opportunity but it also can cause some concern and what we wanted to do is make sure that we had the proper regulations in place so that anything that would be developed on that property would be consistent with the community's vision so taking that information we we went we did a windshield survey of the community so the planning department drove around Southeast Denton and looked at all of the different facets associated with the architecture things like building scale architectural details architectural styles what what types of elements were were found on the homes in Southeast Denton we compiled that information and that is what we took to the block party with a series of questions and surveys about hey do you want more of this or is this what you want and to try to get feedback from the community about what they would like to encourage or what they would like to see the regulations today are based upon that feedback as well as other feedback so we combined that information with with kind of what what the intent for the residential overlay was and and really it falls into three buckets we want to know what the applicability is so who it applies to we want to make sure the building scale is consistent with what the community wants and we also want to make sure the architecture is the same is what the community would like to see so first we want it we looked at the existing zoning to see what was in place to make sure that their regulations adequately addressed what what what wasn't what wasn't desired in the existing zoning so Southeast Denton for them for the vast majority of the of the residential neighborhoods is our four district that allows for a maximum building height the 40 feet and it's primarily single family but it would allow townhomes or duplexes with approval from City Council through the specific use process there is a portion of our three and Southeast Denton again maximum 40 foot height single family our seven 40 feet height and it provides it allows for a variety of residential uses as well as some very limited commercial uses we see that a little bit along Prairie and along Dallas or near Dallas Drive and then we've also have a little bit of mixed use neighborhood around Robertson Street and that also allows that 40 feet based upon its context and then we have planned development for a little bit in Southeast Denton and also public facilities the public facilities are things like the parks the semia is the school so we knew we had a bit you know a maximum height the 40 feet which you could potentially build a three-story building or two and a half story building with that height but the community said that really one to two story buildings were most appropriate for Southeast Denton so we're proposing to lower the maximum height within the Southeast Denton residential overlay to 30 feet that would still allow a two story home but it wouldn't allow those those structures to go up to three three stories the maximum height proposed height for accessory structures like garages accessory accessory dwelling units would be 20 feet as proposed and that would allow one and a half stories we also looked at architectural character we have regulations within the Denton development code that applies citywide to residential development it is looking at things like how much of the front facade can be in windows and doors what kinds of architectural interesting elements you have to have on the front of the of the structure how big the garage can be so those are things that apply to the city citywide but after doing the windshield survey and talking to the community we we and the special nature of Southeast Denton how unique it is in terms of of how it relates to the street how the streetscape and and the front porches we felt like this list probably wasn't consistent with what the community's vision was especially in terms of like recessed entries and other things that just wouldn't necessarily fit so we are proposing a different list of regulations and that would be that all new homes would would have to provide either a porch or a stoop and it would have to be usable so the porch would have to be either 25% of the ground floor facade and the stoop 24 square feet we're also proposing to increase what what the windows and doors that that transparency in the front from 15 percent to 25 percent and as well as having three and a half inch trim around the windows that's more consistent with the bug bungalow and craftsman and in ranch style homes that you see in Southeast Denton roofs should be gabled hipped or a combination thereof that gabled is the is the point and then hipped are our roof lines that look like this there are other modern roof lines that houses can have things like flat roofs or mansard roofs but they aren't necessarily consistent with the with the architectural character of Southeast Denton where you've got more craftsmen bungalow and ranch style homes and then we are proposing that in addition to all of that two of the following architectural details would be required either dormers projection window like a bay window a split garage doors so if you had a front-facing garage door a split sort of a this is shown as the masonry column a railing or low wall enclosing the porch or stoop and then either multi-pane or mission style windows on the front facade so what would this apply to we talked about this and the Plains Zoning Commission may remember a quite a bit of discussion we had about this over the summer and fall is what should it apply to and and where staff has landed and what we're proposing is that it would apply to all new construction so of that 60 acres if if the property owner did want it to develop with with single-family homes or homes on it it would it would have to comply with the regulations if approved for expansions it's a maybe that you wouldn't have to change the front facade if it didn't have a porch you wouldn't have to add a porch but that the route the heights and the roof lines would would have to comply that way you still get sort of that that same scale that you find in Southeast Denton and then standard maintenance would not apply so that's the Southeast Denton residential overlay now we're gonna talk about the height overlay this one's really simple compared to that one so this is that area in blue if you recall that area in blue has zoning of public facilities and mixed-use neighborhood public facilities under current zoning can go up to a hundred feet and mixed-use neighborhood can go up to 65 feet if if if it's not adjacent to residential zoning or if it's adjacent to residential zoning and it gets a and the property owner gets approval of a specific use permit we're proposing to cap that at 40 feet so and and with no provision for additional height with an SUP so that way as as you're moving from the east to the west or or the south to the north adjacent to to these areas right here you would have the maximum building height in in the residential and then gradually move up to the 40 feet and that way it wouldn't the intent is not to have buildings just loom over the residential areas so with that I'm gonna have Mia come up and go over the live work thank you Julie Mia Hines senior planner good evening again chair members of the Commission I am going to talk to you about the live work overlay portion of what we are proposing this evening I start reminding you all just of the action from the liver that references the live work overlay district to remind you that the intent originally here was to establish a district that focused on allowing small mom-and-pop retail such as bookstores toy shops coffee shops things of that nature into a portion of a single-family home with a portion being used as a resident simultaneously and I'll keep that have that at the top here because what we are proposing is slightly different from that but the intent of it and the reason behind why it's different I'll explain here in a second so just Julie went over where we are talking about here but the live work overlay essentially covers properties along East Prairie Street between the cemetery and the railroad on the west side of Skinner Street and then properties along the north and south side of Robertson Street as well as the east and west side of Cook Street we have further subdivided this overlay into a couple of different sections based on the fact of the existing the collection of existing uses and some of the land use characteristics of the properties as they exist today as well as what we have in shown in our future land use on our future land use map as the future land use designations for these areas so that section a as you can see is approximately six acres just along East Prairie that is where you'll see that we're really trying to push for the reestablishment of the historic business district that Julie mentioned and allow for standalone businesses in that area section B is the has a moderate residential designation so you'll see more of mixed missing middle housing options available there and then section C is are really that low residential future land use designation area that's really intended to serve as a transition and just allow for live work and residential uses so I mentioned in the action that what we're proposing is slightly different from what the the language in the action leads us to propose and the reason for that is because we we established the live work dwelling as a part of the area planning process to come up with the sort of creative solution to reintegrate small business opportunities into the southeastern area this area like you said was identified as an area that historically had some small scale neighborhood type of businesses within it and we were tasked with just coming up with a creative solution and overlay to allow for businesses to be in this area again the live work dwelling overlay was our approach to that with the intent to hopefully start with the base of what a live work use is and then work from that to establish some standards that work specifically for the southeastern area well what we found when we looked further into how our DDC defines the live work dwelling use is that we require that for live work dwelling units the residential component should not exceed 50% the residential component should be located above or behind the non-residential portion residential dwelling unit must be a minimum of 400 square feet which is pretty standard and the non-residential use should be owned and operated by a resident of the of the residential portion and with that we found that in trying to address or trying to implement this as a land use it sort of contradicts what we have in the ICC and how that land use is defined in the ICC which ultimately kicks it into some higher regulations and some restrictions that ultimately defeats the purpose of why we were trying to integrate live work as a use within this area which was to allow for the reuse of some of the existing structures in that area and to really create more opportunities and remove some remove barriers not add on additional barriers to allow for small businesses to operate in this area. Mia sorry I'm not gonna butt in here just for the benefit of the public yes can you define the acronyms there of IBC IFC ICC yes apologies yes so ICC is the International Code Council and they are essentially what our from building safety purposes what our building safety team goes by to evaluate the safety of the structural safety of buildings within our city the IBC stands for International Building Code the IFC is International Fire Code and the IRC is International Residential Code and basically depending on how what your use is and what what you are doing in that building those different codes have different requirements and things that you have to do to your building to make sure that it's structurally sound and safe for that use. So we went back to the community and asked specifically what types of small business opportunities would they like to see within the area and what we heard from the community is shown here on your screen as far as support for the uses the community was generally in support of restaurants general retail personal service uses so those are your barbershops nail salons and things of that nature daycare and child child care support excuse me was something that we heard throughout the area planning process mobile food court was a place for gathering essentially but there was some concerns about noise and things of that nature so we have addressed that in this proposal as well and then other uses like business or trade school professional office self service laundry facility banks or financial institutions and medical offices the community we're generally okay with just again at a neighborhood scale. So with that in section A what we are proposing again with the characteristic of the the mixed-use neighborhood future land use designation the moderate residential there's some low-density residential in there we are proposing to allow for some of the uses those uses that are listed in the above to stand alone so what we have here and this is similar to what we see as the table of allowed uses within the DDC this is essentially the table of allowed uses for section A of the overlay so we are proposing to allow for those uses that I mentioned earlier we would propose or we are proposing to implement operational standards that would limit the hours of operation of businesses in this area from Monday through Thursday 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. and then Friday through Sunday 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. as far as architectural standards for new new structures and new businesses they would have to apply to the residential architectural standards that Julie mentioned as a part of the residential overlay and then additionally any new business that locates within this area would have to construct a 8 foot tall double face face fence or director approved screening if there's like a line of trees or something like that that's there that provides for adequate screening and then additionally a 15 foot wide landscape buffer between the non-residential use and the residential use that's adjacent to it so those general standards do apply to this section as well as the following two sections so keep those in mind hours of operation architectural standards and landscape standards would apply to all other sections this table and what we're proposing as standalone uses only applies to section a additionally we are proposing land use specific standards for these uses in section a for the most part these are simply I won't read through all of them the details provided in your backup for the most part these are max on the sizes that these uses can be again to maintain the neighborhood scale and still opening up that use one of the other special use land use specific standards is permitted hours of operations for daycares which would be 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily if you look back at the hours of operation limits that we're placing on the area that is the earliest that you can drop off your kid would be 8 a.m. we figured that 6 a.m. time window gives parents a little bit more time in the morning to drop off kids while still respecting the later hours of operations for the sake of the residents and then finally like I mentioned earlier with the sort of contradiction of the live work dwelling unit as a what we have in our DDC versus what's in the ICC we've proposed some standards to sort of mitigate that to where a work live dwelling unit excuse me simply defers to how the IRC IBC RFC defines it and then you have to meet their requirements as far as building safety to ensure that that use can can operate there as far as section B and this is just a property along Skinner Street again we have that moderate residential future lanes designation so with this one what we are proposing is to allow for those missing middle housing types duplexes for plexus triplex is townhomes and again that work-live restriction like I said if you look at the general standards that we have here hours of operation architectural standards and landscape standards all of those are the same for this portion of the overlay and then again that work live dwelling unit just defers to the ICC and then finally in section C with along Robertson Street this is more of the transitional area with low residential and so this is essentially saying the same for the most part within the overlay simply deferring to whatever that underlying zoning is as far as permitted land uses and then allowing for that work live dwelling unit used to again defer to the ICC and be constructed in accordance with architectural standards and opera hours of operation of the rest of the live work overlay so that pretty much concludes what we're proposing for the for those three sections of this overlay with this project of course we did send out public notification to the entire majority of the entire overlay as well as 200 fit around it and 500 feet residents around it we received a few a couple of responses in favor and 15 responses in opposition that were forwarded to this body this afternoon with that staff is recommending approval of the southeast in overlay district as it is consistent with the southeast didn't actions and the criteria for approval in the DDC and I'm happy to stand for any questions I did have a couple of frequently asked questions based on some of the calls that we got from residents typically with us when what we've seen is we sent out the notices and response and then people have called trying just because the caption really can't answer everything that we try to explain here so they've had questions about what the details of the case are and in talking with them we've we come up with a list of frequently asked questions that we've gotten and maybe I know we're probably about to hear from some people from the audience but maybe could answer some of the questions that we might get this evening so why is the city proposing this Julie kind of did a really good job at introducing that into at the very beginning of this but essentially this comes comes from the southeast in the area plan we are proposing this as a result of the community engagement and the staff coordinated coordination to implement several actions from that plan what is that plan Julie again did a good job at sort of covering what that is but for the people in the as a reminder this is a document which aims to rebuild trust between the city and the community incorporate resident and stakeholder ideas and aspirations and provide recommendations for strategies and implementable action steps to address resident concerns encourage investment in the community while minimizing displacement and providing guidance for future land decisions is the city taking property and southeast didn't know that this is not a part of that is not a part of what this proposal is we are proposing this again as a result of the feedback that we've heard from the community essentially to add regulations to enhance the existing base zoning districts and if this is approved it will impact how private property owners can develop in Southeast didn't but again this is not the city taking or appropriating private property similarly we are not planning to we are not building homes as a part of this designation the purpose of this again is to implement the area plan which includes the protections of the architectural character so essentially sets regulations for people who are interested in building homes in Southeast didn't for those to look similar to what we already see in Southeast didn't will the overlay district allow multifamily no the said southeast residential overlay district regulates building design and height it does but does not allow higher density residential uses the small section of the South work Southeast didn't live work overlay district which does have moderate residential as a future lanes designation does allow for more of those missing middle housing types like townhomes duplexes and triplexes but again that is not multifamily that is a completely different use there and then finally will the southeast didn't overlay district increase traffic essentially the district doesn't isn't proposing to develop property like I've said in some of these answer they make the rules for private property owners to follow nevertheless didn't is growing and so traffic is increasing everywhere including Southeast didn't so we want to keep in mind that you know property private property owners have the right to develop their property in accordance with the regulations the latest regulations of things as didn't grows traffic will grow but we try our best in ways to mitigate that as much as possible sorry there are two more one other question I noticed that the overlay district didn't include all of the Southeast didn't area why well that was decided on in the area plan process and is specifically called out for the specific subject areas that we've approached today or that we propose today and then finally how does Southeast in the residential overlay impact the an existing home if you do not intend to tear down your home rebuild it or add on to it too much it should not impact you basically this regulation is intended to apply to new primary or accessory structures and only the height limit and roof forms applied to expansion of existing structures and regular maintenance of like facade and general things for your residential property are exempted from that so that that now concludes our presentation and happy to stand for any questions you have Julie is also to my left questions thank you Mia I will open the public hearing at this time Commission it's a lot to work through I'll just ask for specific questions of staff at this time for anything that that we want to kind of get out there so that the public as they come to speak can understand and respond to those things before we hear from them is there anything on that order commissioner catches it so if somebody wanted to do some home rehab or updates would they have to comply with this overlay no all existing homes would be conforming under this even if the front facade did not include all of those elements in the proposed overlay the only thing that would apply is if they were going to add like maybe a second story then or change the roof line we are proposing that that height limitation applied any expansions as well as the roof line okay any other questions Julie I have a few I'm gonna be that guy going through the southeast Stanton area plan gentrification is mentioned in several places that's a word that people think of different things when they see that word can you describe to us what the community conversations were about that and what aspects of gentrification were most concerning there was concern about gentrification and displacement throughout the area planning process you know it it starts fundamentally from from the events of Quaker town and the forced displacement of the residents of Quaker town and that that concern has has has stayed with the residents that as a very traumatic event for the community so so we're so that is kind of that basis additionally you know every year everyone's taxes go up or neighborhoods change we've had a lot of demographic changes in southeast Stanton so a lot is changing and and and so where the discussion landed is we wanted to to have a plan that encouraged actions that would allow anyone who wanted to live in southeast and could live there stay there stay in their homes but you know make sure that there are affordable options so as part of this this the the residential overlay was intended that if if if somebody wanted to build a new home in southeast Stanton that it should look like it fits there and and now that was was important from what we heard from the community and so that's why we wanted to take this forward as quickly as possible thank you and maybe I'm the dense one here can you just give us a brief clear definition of what gentrification is for those purposes we're on the same page I don't know if there is a one-size-fits-all definition of gentrification but but there are several facets and things that we talked about as part of the area plan so there are there's gentrification when it terms of you just can't afford to live in your house anymore right either either the real estate values are so expensive your kids can't buy a house there or the property taxes are so high that it really does price people out of their neighborhoods so that's one part and that's a really big part it's challenging to tackle that and we're so we are there is an there is there are parts of the area plan that do talk about that part of that 53 actions there's also just just changes in the neighborhood where really it does physically change that that kind of just doesn't look doesn't look the way it did it so it changes from a fundamentally and spatially aspect in that respect the residential overlay can assist that because if if there are new structures in southeastern that they would continue what what is existing but when one definition is really hard to do I appreciate that because I would hate to try to summarize that but what I'm hearing primarily is displacement economic displacement or forced displacement as well as building intensity and feel of of the architectural continuity is that kind of the and demographic change yes yeah I would for the purposes of this area plan those are the elements we looked at in terms of gentrification thank you very much a couple brief things the can you speak to I believe there's both a senior homestead exemption which the city offers as well as the tax freeze which was voted in by voters seven years ago maybe sorry I'm not great in remembering number of years it's my understanding that those taxes or those two elements would both afford a property property tax discount to those sixty-five or older as well as fix their property taxes to a dollar value so they would not increase as valuations change is that correct that is correct for over sixty-five okay and I think that's it commissioner McDade thank you chair I had a couple questions regarding your presentation trying to find did you find any one architectural design in Southeast Denton that could be was there any one architect that ever came and designed anything in Southeast Denton we have not found that we may find that as we continue on with our research our historic research of Southeast Denton and the future of cult the future cultural district for Southeast Denton but at this point we were looking less about the architects or or or who built them and more just what the form is at this point a few more questions so a clarification to on the height building in the blue area and the height overlay district are you saying that no three-story buildings or structures would be allowed in the blue area so the proposed 40 feet could allow a three-story building within it so it wouldn't it wouldn't necessarily cap it at that it would have to it would be whatever whatever a person could develop up to 40 feet but it wouldn't it would it would allow three stories it's possible you possible and maybe maybe I don't know if you could get four stories out of it but three stories you could you could get would take you there another question regarding the live work overlay are there any existing live work areas in Southeast Denton or in the small area no what we found is that just the use in general live work use there isn't any across the city because speculatively most likely because of the the challenge of how it's defined in the DDC versus how it's defined in for ICC and then would bars be allowed in that area no restaurants would be and they could serve alcohol but they would it would have to be less than a certain percentage of their menu sales so restaurants can but no not bars and then in this area do any of the owners of the property live in this current existing area now that own the property there in this area so are there owner-occupied and that there are a few yes there are a few on East Prairie just I think a handful along East Prairie in the properties along Skinner are undeveloped and then there is a I want to say was about 50/50 owner-occupied in the Robertson cook Street area do you recall if you had any input from those owners for that area not specifically I do not recall receiving any letters and then regarding the small area plan that has already been proved by council and which is your what you're using as your working document who were the members of that committee for the small area plan I could pull that up real quick I do not have the list but yes I could pull that up the steering committee the area plan steering committee small area the southeast end small area planning yeah we could get like okay you don't have to go get it right now if you can look it up for me and I apologize folks but the other question was are there and I'm glad you brought up about the tax exemption so there are seniors in the southeast den area who are already receiving property tax exemptions due to them even before all of this or was that included in the small area plan the senior in the tax freeze so the over 65 exemption has been in place in Denton for I don't I don't remember when it passed but it's it's it's fairly new in Denton but it it predates the area plan it wasn't necessarily a part of this it's it's just something that residents over 65 homeowners over 65 can avail themselves of it's available and then a clarification you mentioned that there were approximately 60 acres of land available for development in southeast in yes let me let me go back to that so yes there's actually 70 acres about 70 acres of privately owned land in in southeast end ten of those are undevelopable just because of floodplain issues but but yes everything in green is is undeveloped and then they did you find any historical designations in Southeast Denton I think we I think Cameron said that there aren't any locally designated they do have signage again that's something part of the plan that we are we are working toward working with the community to see who if if someone would like to designate their property and to to help them through that process thank you very much sure thank you and I'll just thank the the Commission for remaining true to my request of asking questions that everybody can hear the answers to it instead of dipping into deliberation at this point a few more people to speak Commissioner Kettresett I have a couple of questions the first one is are there any limitations on like demolition any anything that will hold off while we look at things maybe for rehab purposes there are no limitations on on demolition so someone could demolish their home but if it's approved if they wanted to build rebuild it would have to be in accordance with the with the regulations okay and then I also have a live work question so on the daycare it's the officer from six to eight does that that seems pretty limiting for people that might do shift work and need daycare for night because these are home daycares correct like that would be the so why would we limit that good question so in general all non-residential uses we're proposing to limit them to a closing time of 8 p.m. on weekdays so that's kind of just where that closing time fell into place we did think about just in general the need for an or earlier drop off and basically trying to main have that balance of wanting to be as as flexible as possible without you know it was still respecting later hours of operation for their residences but we could look into that if that's the will of the Commission as a modification to this Commissioner Dyer I think Hillary will appreciate this um you were talking about the 65 and older exemptions I would just like to say that none of us are property tax experts here so we have to be very careful on you know the advice that we're given because I don't really feel like some of that was accurate I am in I am in the industry and it's Texas codes on their property taxes is very confusing so I went to Denton CAD just to clarify and that basically when you turn 65 it's effective January 1st of any year in which he or she turned 65 or purchases a residence after they are already 65 or older every school district is required to exempt up to 60,000 of the assessed value and to place a free ceiling on the their tax amount other jurisdictions in Denton County can elect to give an optional over 65 exemption and Denton County has elected to place a free ceiling on all accounts with an over 65 exemption so it's really just on the school tax it doesn't always apply to your city or your county tax and that's why it's always very important to protest your property values every year when assessments come out in April to try to keep up and lower your tax assessments anything else no that I just want to make sure because that was the whole thing is very confusing I know there was a lot of discussion about that no I appreciate that thank you Commissioner McDuff yes and Commissioner Dyer I thought you were going to talk about apartments and that we had too many but I will address me is miss Hines comment on middle housing and could you talk about that and what that means we're talking about new development I think I believe in these overlays yes new builds so the missing middle is what we is a term that we use to cut sort of lump in like duplexes triplexes forplexes town home so those are the the more dense housing options that are available than just single-family residential but not not multifamily which we classify as up to I believe five or more units on one single lot so what we are proposing as a portion of the live work overlay dwelling which which has a future land use designation of moderate residential to allow for a slightly higher density than the rest of the area is to allow for that missing middle I will say in full transparency one of the tracks in there is zone MN so multifamily could be permitted there but the way that the properties are surrounded it would have to ensure access proper access through a zoning district that does allow for multifamily and majority of those properties result are seven so it's what we are proposing as a part of this does not propose to allow for multifamily as a an additional use but it does propose to allow for triplexes forplexes and duplexes and it doesn't necessarily restrict multifamily where it's already permitted either well I just know that's been a ongoing concern in district one and we're now we're concerned in Denton about too many apartments thank you Mia thank you I don't see any more speakers on the board before we hear from from the public I'll just ask Charlie not to call you out do you feel confident to speak on some of the property tax and exemption rules as you're coming up I'll just say I want to make sure we get this very clear it yes I I agree that's the the statement from the Denny count Ninton County it's my understanding that the school district is required by the state to freeze over 65 that Denton County has frozen their portion and that the city of Denton has also elected to freeze their portion is that yeah that's correct the city also has property tax freeze on over 65 okay any other and that's why it's very confusing yes and so that's why you just have to be very careful and make sure that you clearly understand what your tax bill saying yeah no absolutely agree I don't want to get the impression that what we're speaking of here would apply to any other jurisdictions county or cities we're really just looking at this this overlay that's within the city of Denton thank you for that clarification okay this is a public hearing I have one card wishing to speak so I will pull this up first miss Francis punch if you'd like to come forward state your name and address and you'll have four minutes good evening I'm Francis punch I live at 2002 Busteria Street Denton Texas thank you to the staff who has worked so hard on this this is not an easy task and you asked who was a part of the advisory group I was one of the members I was one of the members and I came tonight and was quite frankly irritated because a lot of the people was confused they didn't know really what are we voting on and but I think you got ahead of a lot a lot of my questions by asking the put placing the questions at the end thank you thank you for that I still do have a couple of concerns if the residents can't afford the changes that required changes what happens Airbnb's or being built in communities like these and will there be a limit of Airbnb's and should be a limit it if our new policy hasn't been amended and I thank you for answering the questions about the taxes so because those remind big three big questions thank you can they answer can they answer my questions yes I don't see any questions from the committee but yeah Julie if you'd like to address those thank you I'll start the answer but I probably won't finish it um okay in terms of affordability that was something that was on our mind and in fact the Planning and Zoning Commission kind of kind of helped guide that discussion because there were concerns about what are the costs of front porches because our original proposal was if you expand your property more than 50% you have to comply with everything but after doing after talking with builders and and some some other contractors and understanding how just how expensive doing something like putting a front porch on or a or a window we we we took that out of it because we felt like it just didn't also meet our affordability standards and in terms of affordability of the other items so if you were going to build from the ground up we did try to look at different options in those in those architectural features to to provide a choice based upon budgeting or a really personal style and so that was that was the intent to have some choices there and then Airbnb is hi Angie minglers assistant planning director just to speak a little bit about Airbnb's and short-term rentals generally the southeast Denton overlays that we're talking about tonight don't necessarily amend any of those adopted provisions but just wanted to remind everybody of what we do have in place for STR's so those were that a portion of our code was amended a little over a year ago maybe closer to a year and a half at this point the city of Denton in residentially zoned areas which predominantly is the area we're discussing this evening citywide has a cap of 1,000 short-term rental units in residential areas in addition to that property to property they cannot be closer than 100 feet from one another so if I have one my neighbor would likely be prohibited but maybe two houses down could have one in residential areas only in our commercially zoned areas in our mixed-use areas it's slightly different where those distance separation requirements do not apply but any given multifamily development would be capped at no more than ten percent of their overall units so we have that generally and the city is committed to evaluating that on an ongoing basis but it isn't necessarily a part of this overlay discussion thank you this is a public hearing so anyone who would like to come down and share their thoughts is perfectly willing to please sorry for the sake of mobility oh nevermind well sorry yeah I have two cards it's confusing on the color so I apologize but yeah are you one of these white cards yes are you in favor or do you oppose this plan are you in favor or do you oppose the plan yeah sorry just so we have it on the on the record if you could come back up and answer the Commissioner's question quite frankly I was waiting to hear the rest of the discussion to make my decision because I think a lot of people think they understand but I think it would provide clarity if we had things side-by-side and say it was this and now it's this because when you go you use a lot of acronyms that we don't know I may know they don't know and they think they know but they don't really get all the details they just don't get it so I'm holding my vote but thank you thank you looks like we have one more question I'd like to ask a follow-up question ma'am well because you said you were on the committee I like to discuss all this correct correct yes and thank you for that thank you for having that input do you feel like a lot of your concerns your suggestions during that process was really listened to and you can see a lot of them implemented in in the plan that Julie and Mia shared during the process I am the consultants and we yes I thought they listened I thought they came back with them with revisions that's why I was surprised I said what's being what's now being revised what was wrong with the original plan but I see definitely the height definitely the height I see that I'm a little confused still with the mixed use and always creates pause but so yes I do think that we they listened and did best that the best they could with the limitations okay thank you thank you Mr. Willie Sellers if you'd like to come up state your name and address and you'll have four minutes thank you yes Willie Sellers 930 Scott Drive Den Texas I would like to know why is this section of then being targeted for this type of development also I know you've set a standard for the developers that are coming in you know the 30 feet height on the houses and stuff like that also you had some things we're gonna have a tremendous parking problem with anything that you bring in I know you're talking about Skinner because you already have existing homes across the street on Skinner I know you're talking about the area that's next to Morrison Mills so if you have that area right there you can only come so far out and then you got to accommodate parking for your tenants or for the individuals that are using the mix use what is that work live work work live of one of those things and you also have a church around the street around the corner there their hours are they have hours and church is held all the time and then these people are going to be there 24/7 you know trying to make money with their business so it's going to interrupt the church services etc whatever you know they don't only meet on Sunday choir rehearsal prayer meeting Bible study etc and I have one other question who are the stakeholders I heard that term mentioned stakeholders so I would think the stakeholders would be the individuals that are living so are you talking about the people that may buy the property or the people that's going to develop the property so those are the stakeholders or are you talking about the individuals that's actually going to be there 24/7 all right I noticed I noticed that you mentioned the area on shady shores that would be an ideal problem I mean place for any development because UPS is gone the shingle place is gone and that would be an ideal place for anything else over there I know it's in the red and the red was targeted that's uh yeah that's shady shores okay anything else is going to be an impact to the community based on the fact that we're going to have a parking problem you're going to have traffic right now if you try to navigate coming up Prairie Street right there I think that's Locust coming back in again the street right here those apartments are sitting here those apartments sitting there you have to drive in the middle of the street when you exit that street are you coming straight across if there's a car coming and that you get that you're going to introduce that same problem because we already have that problem at the corner of Bradshaw and Prairie Street now where you put the four you put the four-way stop there and the people that live there already they parked their car right in the mouth of Prairie Street so when you come up to stop you're literally sitting in the middle of the street and I can see a lot of problems until you address the parking situation to their affairs this is going to be a cluster of a mess because everybody has anywhere from three two and a half to three cars and I'm talking about mom pop and maybe one kid has a car so you're gonna that's going to be a total congestion because none of those their affairs can address navigating me through there safely already so I can see us having a problem I mean I'm not in an opposition of development or improvement to southeast in but I think that we need to revisit some of the other opalescence that may occur due to the increase and bringing additional development in thank you okay let's just go one by one I think that'll be clearer if you could come Julie and address the specifics that I heard about were parking how that's regulated and maybe Mia you want to jump in I don't know as well as the stakeholders in the public engagement so stakeholders that we we we had a few groups residents so people who lived in Southeast Denton property owners who maybe own property in Southeast and but don't necessarily live there and then also churchgoers or other other folks who visit Southeast Denton on a regular basis and those are really the kind of the groups we we try to talk to as much as possible so that that's really the group we identified as stakeholders in terms of of parking me I might want to talk about the live work as far as residential we did not as part of this proposal touch our parking requirements so single-family residential and in the city of Denton requires four parking spaces for for each dwelling so and this would not change that if if you did build a home in Southeast and you'd still have to comply with those regulations and then just to adjust parking for the non-residential uses that are proposed as part of the live work we do have that they they need to adhere to whatever they have to supply parking on site if it's a new non-residential use so ideally we would like we would like to see that like an existing home transform transforms its structure into like a bookstore a small retail store something like that the home itself could be I think like 1200 square feet which might for retail be a parking ratio of like one per 300 one per 350 which would be just under four spaces I believe essentially with this overlay what we are proposing that even if the the ratio makes it so that you can do under four spaces you have to provide at least four spaces on site for your parking lot so it's even an increase from what we have with the current and a lot of the the the residences the current single-family situation that just has a narrow driveway with maybe two or three spaces on the on the lot and then I did look up our full steering committee list it is for anyone interested in our in the actual plan itself for everyone who was on the steering committee we have Alexandria Valdez Raymond Redmond Reverend Reginald Logan Clifton Maxfield Jacob Moses miss Francis punch Paul Juarez Howard Clark and Cherica Campbell we're all stakeholder or steering committee members thank you I have a card from mr. Donald McDade would you like to just be good afternoon Commission my name is Donald McDade I live at 926 East Prairie in Texas and before I get into the logistics I just want to say I look at the goal that you have and I really wish you would take out goal number one like you're saying rebuild trust you cannot rebuild something that was never there in the first place Southeast Denton has been around what a hundred and something years and if it takes 2026 to start building that trust that's embarrassing it's disrespectful now heard y'all heard you talk about gentrification I'll go back to the trust I don't think the fear of gentrification would be as high as the city not I think it was 2009 come in here and rezone Southeast Ding and not involve these people they had no idea until the project was already started that scares anybody so I don't understand how you're gonna try to rebuild something that you didn't want them to know about and now you're coming to him saying hey we made a mistake that mistake is a hundred years old stop putting lipstick on that pig because there's still a pig okay take it out also before I thought I mean I don't have an issue with what we're doing as far as the overlay I just don't want to I'm happy with the houses that they're gonna build I just don't want to see any eyesores like we have on cross timbers and mill and wood and McKinney any other house I can deal with the other issue is a lot I lost train of thought here on my last thing I have an issue that I want to see if we can get it corrected before we leave today and that's in the the live work a these prairie between the railroad and Oakwood Cemetery I would love to see that between the railroad and the DCTA track because when you go on the east side of prairie those are resident that's a residential area I don't want these people living in fear that something may come because you've already pushed it out to the cemetery these they're homeowners you have the west the west side of prairie you can do whatever you want with that but I don't want these residents living in fear because you have something in here that that may or may not happen let's take that out of their mind right now and let's change let's amend the what is I don't have said the SED LWL at least the man number a and just leave it from there from the railroad track to the DCA track also I know that the three years that I spent on planning and zoning after what had already been done the South East didn't I knew I could I couldn't save it I was here for one reason and one reason only that was to keep these people informed that what the city was actually trying to do in South East didn't I knew I wasn't going to succeed but they had a right to know that's something that they never had we've had a lot of I hate to say it we had a lot of poor representation in district one we did we voted for a lot of people who didn't have our best interests at heart and we've always been used to being stabbed in the back but what's gonna get us now is when y'all turn around and find out who was holding that knife that's what's really gonna upset you because there's people who look like us who was holding the knife thank you mr. McDade I think sorry I have one question just so I'm clear on the concerns first of all thank you for being that conduit to the community to make sure your your neighbors really understand what's happening I appreciate that but on your concerns with the live work it's my understanding from statements before that we don't actually have any of those uses now so it's hard to envision what that would be my understanding is it would conform to the architectural standards that we're putting in place so it would largely that the building itself would look like a home typical in the area but it might have a sign I'm looking at you know the main commercial hub uses of offices schools daycare I mean that's fine if it's from the the regular railroad track to the DCA track that I mean that that's commercial already they push the boundary all the way down to oakwood cemetery yeah yeah let's take that out of the equation and just focus on right I guess my my question is you know we've heard things about parking we've heard things about height and other things is there a particular aspect of those proposed uses that is most concerning to you or the community members you've spoken to not really because it's hard to talk about that when you don't really know what's coming I can say to him say well you know if it's gonna be you know a barbershop they don't need they don't need that much parking but until that is actually built that's when the concern is gonna happen so I mean I don't want to go hypothetical and not knowing what's gonna be built there so I really that's about the best answer I can give you that until that's built then we can come back and have that conversation fair enough I appreciate that I have I appreciate you reminding me that we'll make sure to hit that I have one more card wishing to perhaps wishing to speak mr. Donald Cox if you'd like to speak you're welcome to come down if you state your name and address you'll have four minutes good afternoon my name is dr. Donald Cox I live at 913 Cole Avenue I don't have a question I just have a concern starting in 19 well I don't live in southeast Denton I have been very involved with what goes on in that department that community I'm starting back in 1979 I have been very active with youth activities and periodically we have secured facilities none residential facilities for those operations based on the time limit that you gave or that is before you that would have curtailed some of our activities in the 8 o'clock would not work kids get out of school by the time they got over to us it would generally be around 6 so and so we would often it would not be unusual for us to function until 9 930 it was so they could get home by 10 o'clock except in the summer when we would go even later under your proposed plan that would not work we have recently I have recently been looking at reviving some of those activities again this won't stop me from doing it but I would appreciate if you would revisit that or put some kind of something in play that would allow us not to break the law by functioning after the closing hours that's all I have to ask thank you thank you mr. Cox actually I have one follow-up just just so we all are aware as you speak to the types of facilities and activities that you've done elsewhere I suppose for those purposes can you describe what what those activities were and whether they were indoor or outdoor I think that would help our staff respond to that a little bit more clear it to what you're talking about it included a lot of things from individual activities like tutoring recreational activities mostly indoor things the outdoor activities took place elsewhere on a regular basis and if you know I can't really put them down into we did everything you name it we did it I should take this opportunity to say one of your fellow members at 16 years old was one of the participants call any names but she has to be smiling right now very good thank you very much your legacy is present yes that was all I don't see any other questions that's all the cards I have but like I said I think there was one more person may be willing to speak come on up my apologies for the low chairs name is Willie Hudson I live at 623 Newton Street can you move the slides to a to one of the pictures that shows the County Jail and Thomas Rivera school is that the drain area right in between okay that's good in about 2005 I believe that's when they widened that this Creek area here or the cursor okay how can I indicate where the Creek is well the area that I'm concerned about as I said 2005 they widen they meaning the city widened that drainage area and this area is widened the Creek areas was widened and I was told that the reason that they widen it so that the water would flow would it not mean a restrictions but now the silt and silting has taken place and dirt is now back in the Creek and I've requested that they do what they said they would do they would clean it out in five years ago but no one's been out there yet to clean that drainage area out I don't know that this is the place to bring that up but if we're planning for that area I have property there and I own the part of the Creek area bright that's behind my house but I can't do anything to it it's an easement area the city has the right to not allow things to be built there so that it wouldn't impede the water but I can't get anybody over there and I've talked to the park department several times to clean that area out so that now when it rains it's on my property way much larger area of my property is flooded because of the dirt that is in that Creek area so if you're talking about developing Southeast Denton well I'm just one homeowner that's concerned about that Creek area but I own quite a bit of it and I haven't gotten any help with trying to get keep it cleaned out now it's a it's an area that I would like to develop and continue developing my homeowner my home in that area but I need to know what is the plan if any to deal with that area that's being filled in with dirt now that was removed several years ago thank you I'll just say I will take it upon myself if I'm still here on this board when the citywide stormwater plan comes to us to make sure that that issue is is addressed I think there's there's a number of different ways to to address stormwater and I'll be looking for for a plan to keep those maintained anybody else who would like to speak is welcome to come down yes if you'd state your name and address you'll have four minutes Zalinda P. Graham 1501 Val Verde according I just have one question because I think everything's been addressed that I was concerned about but I think it was Mia that said that 15 people voted no do you know what the reasons were they for this proposal well it wasn't you okay please yes so the majority of the response letters did not have really a reason but there there was I know there was one that that was concerned about changes to the property without without how was it said changes to the property without consultation from the property owner because he had lived in Southeast Denton for 57 years and was concerned so but the others there weren't any real specific reasons as to why if I recall correctly okay Commissioner Dyer Julie sorry so kind of going back to that because I noticed was that Leona Franklin who had that concern so I I know that you guys did so many different events and did mailers and did surveys and all this stuff and I think you said that there was like five or six hundred participants that you had was that all different people or were you just telling the people that you talked to so some of them could have been repeated because I just came to multiple events I would imagine we do have some repeats in there but we with the area plan we tried a variety of ways because because when we first started the first series of listening sessions we really had a very specific you know an older community member and primarily homeowner community member and we wanted to branch that out so we actually did additional to make sure that we hit all the demographics we want to get younger people and and families and so so that was really important in the plan so we tried to do a variety of ways so we did do the you know the the standard postcard and then we also did things like intercept surveys where we essentially stood in the community where people were going to be and and tried to talk to the community members we were really successful on pop-ups at Juneteenth as well as national night out talking to parents as they're picking up their kids at MLK going to set in the meetings so we we tried to get creative to make sure that we talked to people who wouldn't normally sit in a postcard to to the to the city and then and then for the block party we actually kind of retooled we thought about we're like okay how do we get more we started putting on door hangers on the door so for these community meetings we put door hangers on on residence doors and then we also mailed postcards to properties maybe it wasn't unoccupied or it wasn't developed because we wanted to get here from everybody we also Spanish speakers we we made sure that we had everything translated into Spanish as well as had someone at the meeting to translate if that was necessary so we tried to we tried to him all we probably didn't get everybody we could have gotten but we yeah well obviously it's so hard to get everybody but I'm you know I'm going to ask kind of a difficult question and I don't know that you can provide an answer but you know hearing a couple people having concerns about you know past distrust and and things like that and some of the concerns tonight like do you feel like you got a good representation of feedback do you feel like hearing some of the concerns you need to go back and kind of get some more or do you feel like you really got a good sampling of the community with the recommendations that you know you and the staff have all made you me and the staff well I'll start it and Haley may jump in and but so the southeast end area plan we had you know we really had good coverage we talked to a lot of folks but but as you keep coming back you it kind of gets less and less and so for instance our community meetings last fall we're not very well attended so we we kind of felt like we were at a point that everybody who was going to give us feedback had provided that information to us but we're always willing to hear more so and I don't know if Haley wanted to correct me or add anything said yeah okay thank you I guess to follow up on that I saw one of your slides that said there was like a 14% response rate or something yeah I got the percentage wrong I got it's 16% my recollection is you know if you look at like local election turnout in this area it's typically sub 10% so it seems like through this process we were able to to hear from even more than the number of people who typically vote is that accurate well we talked with other members of the city especially looking at what kind of responses did they have for the community survey and they got a response rate of 9 to 11 percent so I felt like we were within that ballpark on that I looked at survey monkey to to see like what they said you should do and they said anywhere between 10 and 30 percent is good of course a higher percentage is always better thank you just to follow up on a couple of questions from the public there was one about the community services use for for some young members of the community and whether the hours at 8 p.m. would be the limiting factor or whether we have other provisions in the code to allow that is that something we can clear up not as it is currently proposed if they if that user their operations would be operating out of a non-residential building in this area then they would be restricted to those if it were at like American Legion or MLK or something like that then they would just be restricted to whatever those hours operations are so I'm not sure where but we're I'm happy to get some more information from that individual to see what we can if we can propose something that might help okay and then there was there was also an additional item from sorry from mr. Sellers that I had in my brain and now I've let it why targeting the area exactly so I can I can set up an answer and then maybe can see if Julie or Haley wants to correct me so the southeast in area plan as a as an area plan was was a recommendation that came out of the broader comprehensive plan to with of many areas of the city including the northeastern area and the downtown area to lock in on because we as a city have experienced some development interest in those areas so we know that they're either they're sensitive areas because of the existing land use context or in this case because of the culture and the history and the the sort of current zoning as it's situated now and some of the things that we've heard or concerns from the areas these plans were attempted to get a full understanding a comprehensive understanding of what those concerns are for this area and then adopt a plan that allowed us to deal with the development interest that we've been seeing around those areas in a way that meets the community's needs and vision for those areas so Southeast didn't is is one of those areas that was identified by the comp plan and which is a policy direction from council that's why it was that that area plan is was adopted and we took on that process and then that's why this is this is an action out of that area plan that's why it's before you this evening thank you this is a public hearing would anyone else like to come down and speak you're welcome to I'm not an auctioneer but once twice thrice yes come on down grant glass 1121 Hill Street in Texas so this is the first notification I've gotten about anything that we have going on here right now so we have the 40 engagement opportunities did did you guys send this or did you guys send this who sent this one yeah I can address that so so the the people on the Commission with the exception of the two next to me are residents of the city who've been appointed by City Council to serve on this board so luckily we're not in charge of doing those important items because we may not follow through on things but the people who you've heard present the various applications those are city staff that that do the sending of the notifications okay so in the in the process of everything that's going on if we were to give a percentage of this is how close we're being we're done to being finished where are we right now that's a great question whoever wants to take that it's been a while since I looked at the implementation chart I know we're marching down toward that so the area plan is is a 10-year plan with most of the action items really were kind of short-term to get them done as quickly as possible in terms of percentage complete we are still working on all the items but we're working on a variety of them so for example the neighborhood empowerment zone our community services is working on that our our engineering and transportation folks are working on some of those pieces of it planning zoning is is kind of in our wheelhouse so that's what we're working on so it's there's a lot of different pieces all kind of working right now but it it is it is a long-range plan so and the long-range plan set that policy tonight we're doing that that zoning that law which which is support which is consistent with that policy in it thank you Commissioner Kettreson is there a place people can go see that so the area plan is online you can just Google Southeast Denton area plan and it'll it'll come up you can look at not only the document but we also have a dashboard on Invisio that shows everything the the staff members provide updates on a quarterly basis of what what's been what's been happening so you can look at both of those things just Google thank you this is a public hearing anyone else wishing to speak I yes I'm sorry yes Commissioner McDade Julie we have another question referring to that the question from the the gentleman that just spoke I think we were trying to get some type of timeline as far as the date so when did the small area plan start and finish and then when did this plan start and finish thank you thank you so the small area plan the kicked off in March of 2023 and so we went through all of that public engagement and then ultimately to counsel for approval in 2024 as part of that plan and the implementation it had that 53 items we started immediately working on how are we gonna work plan all of these items because I believe it was Commissioner Pruitt who said come you get these done so so we started working on those we started working on these overlays in earnest the December of 2024 with I know from the residential and then I believe also with Mia just doing the research like doing that windshield surveys and looking to see what those things are or what's in the community and and that any historical knowledge and then we and then we really started talking with the community about the overlays with the block party in March 2025 I'm sorry so the part of the question was so tonight what we have tonight and what it will go to council next is there anything tonight from what you've heard that would make you a staff want to go back and change or modify anything mr. hud's best comment about the drainage is that something that we can put in this plan to address the drainage and then also mr. McDade's comment about can you move the line from East Prairie to West Prairie I was trying to follow that I'm not real good with maps but I was trying to see understand what he was talking about is there things today that are available to do some of those type of things to address them today in the plan I'll leave that part up to Mia in terms of your first question oh the drainage so as part of the area plan there is a section about infrastructure which includes some drainage drainage improvements because we actually did hear with the area planning process that there were concerns about drainage and that makes sense because there is the the the floodplain that kind of cuts through Southeast Denton so that is that is part of it it's not part of this specific thing because these were are just the the development regulations in the in terms of zoning but it is certainly something that we will talk with our drainage folks and and see where they are and see you know what the next steps would be in terms of moving forward with those and then I'll bring me then in terms of the live work overlay boundaries currently where where we are proposing is what was approved with the area plan as far as the the the limits of those general boundaries I had not heard that particular concern before so we hadn't considered amending the boundary of the live work overlay but if that is the the of course the direction of this body we can consider that with our recommendation to council I didn't want to get clarification I suppose if that if that's the case of where he was referring to I think this is there is there are two railroad train or tracks here I believe this is one right here and then this one is the this one is the other one so is this just the area that you were referring and then everything else you would like to see removed from the these here again yeah I'll leave that to the Commission to consider see if that's the direction she want to take I'll just add just one note for the live work piece of it just this is this is a these proposed uses are providing the opportunity it's not saying that any of those homes would would have to convert to any of those businesses so if there are currently property owners that are currently living in those homes they of course have the option of remaining that remaining homes until they wish to do something else with it but I understand correct me if I'm wrong but it's also not suggesting that any new development there must have a non-residential component so you'd still have the option of building a single-family home or something else there right Commissioner Dyer me and Julie just a quick question if for some reason this got approved to move on to City Council and City Council approved it one is the next opportunity that this could be revised is this like it for like the next ten years or can there be revisions to this down the road like any ordinance or code amendment there could be revisions Haley no that's exactly correct so this would be adopted into the DDC so it's just like any other part of the DDC that if staff receives direction to amend it it can be amended at any time so basically if the community members are like hey this isn't working they could reach out to any of us I mean I'm sure most of us here would would welcome feedback or City Council members and then we can talk to you guys to say this might need to go in front of DDC sure yeah okay thank you Mia any other members of the public wishing to speak without seeing any motion I will close the public hearing and I just want to thank you for for everyone who participated and spoke it's it's given us a lot of good information now open the floor for discussion or emotion from the Commission okay I'll start Julie just a couple things to wrap up here I'm sensing that one of the the challenging lines to walk here is the concern for increased demand of people living in this area of town driving up prices of housing versus the desire for continuity of design and also function of those housing options is that a correct assessment I think that's consistent with what what we're hearing with it from the community okay yeah because I guess I noticed when looking through the Southeast Denton area plan there were many comments about hey we we want more housing options from both the steering committee as well as some of the some of the survey responses but then when you did the survey specifically asking hey do we want to allow duplexes here that aren't currently allowed then then the answer was more mixed because some concern there wasn't overwhelming in terms of in the the the neighborhoods in the kind of the historic neighborhoods that are nested within the Southeast Denton boundary so you know we we heard from the community and there we heard just overwhelming concerns about additional densities within the neighborhoods and so that was why we were very careful on the residential overlay to really not touch the uses to keep that in place keep minimum lot sizes in place keep that the setbacks all of those elements in place and really just focus on those design elements okay no I appreciate that clarification I think you know we all are sensitive to affordability and price points of of the housing that is there is it fair to say from a planning perspective that as a region grows in demand that one of the biggest tools in our planning tool bag to allow prices to stay affordable is to to allow that gentle density of that missing middle where it is appropriate it is certainly something that could be used where appropriate at this time because of what we've heard from the community we don't feel like it's appropriate within the residential overlay thank you Commissioner McDuff yes I want to just assure everyone that's come here this evening that we've heard all your concerns and I believe in my heart that the staff is being wonderful in addressing our concerns and the community members concerns and I feel certain as I make this motion for approval of this proposal this evening that anything that comes up will be addressed so I make the motion for approval of this proposal chair prove it thank you Commissioner McDuff I'll just ask for clarification on things that come up would be addressed we heard several things from the community is there anything like the community serving youth activity things or operating past 8 p.m. or other things that you would like staff to look at within this motion between now and council well yes I will say that in course that Donald Cox was gone but I've known him also from back in the day in fact we worked on programs together at UNT and TWA so that's certainly one of them we're all concerned about our youth I wasn't I think more needs to be addressed on the parking problem I didn't hear quite enough on that with all the building of the new retail establishments the restaurants I think all those are good things but the thoroughfares are small like anything and didn't and not built for all the traffic and development but those are two things I have stored and then whatever else comes up as another point though we did have a rather focused comment on the revision of the sections of the map so we want to make sure we take a look at that as well East Prairie Street between the railroad track and DCTA track was the recommended area but I believe we have taken note of that mr. McDade sorry so I just want to be have some clarity on what the motion is so is is it to have staff look at these things but our recommendation is as presented or is it that we would like to modify the the recommendation from staff yours do this to me chair prove it let me go again on this I want to make a motion for approval with suggested input being a price of suggested input from the citizens in the neighborhood yeah I'll just let me let me be very clear if you want to wordsmith that that's certainly fine but my first motion stands for approval of the proposal okay so if I can try to get us focused really what I'm hearing is two potential provisions that you would like modified one perhaps the the community services use and the hours of that and the second one being whether any adjustment to the the first piece area sub area a of the live work overlay is is desired so I think those two are questions to us as we need to deliberate and and see what direction we need to give staff I'll accept that so so just for for procedure wise is your motion to recommend the proposal as is but monitor those two things or is your proposal to to include one of those or both of those within the motion I would say include one the revision of the map and monitor the other okay the use services if that's acceptable to you it's not me it's the Commission as a whole yes so let me let me just restate so that we're on the same page you're moving to to recommend to council the proposal as presented with the one amendment being that the eastern boundary of the live work overlay sub area a be at the DCTA train tracks instead of on Bradshaw that's what I'm hearing okay I'm getting an affirmative from the audience yes okay so I'm sorry I misstated the street name on the eastern boundary of the current area it's the cemetery yes thank you for that correction so understood I have one one person on the other board Commissioner McDade excuse me I was wanting to get the clarification also from Commissioner McDuff and to is there a way that we can vote and with amendments and the amendments also include addressing the drainage Creek would you accept that friendly yeah let's hear from staff on the feasibility of that so the drainage issue is something that Julie mentioned is it's acknowledged in the plan that that's something staff needs to work on I believe and Charlie feel free to correct me if I'm wrong we would need to potentially do a lot more work there and that might be something not knowing the scope of the issue that could like require a bond election or something to even provide funding for that work to be able to be done because it could be hundreds of thousands of dollars of work that the city may not currently have funding set aside for but it is because it's an action in the small area plan to address it is something that would be allocated into a future budget year for us to be able to do that but at this time I don't think we know the full scope of that work to know if it's like something that could be a quick reasonable fix or something that is like a future budget item that we would need to allocate funds for good evening Commission Charlie Rosen all interim director of development service I will stick around and talk with mr. house with afterwards about that that particular issue and and Haley what Haley said was correct since this is related to the zoning it wouldn't really have any effect over the infrastructure but that is something that's part of the plan and depending on the scope it is something that we can work on and at least get a response back to appreciate that I don't see anybody else wishing to speak I'll I appreciate very much the the motion as we narrow in on these things my preference would be to actually flip the precedence of the two things we heard to suggest that we recommend it on the condition that staff works with community leaders to to allow community services uses past 8 p.m. in some form or fashion for the proposal that goes to council and the live work overlay boundary as is for now and monitor that primarily that's just because I'm looking at a variety of a public feedback that we've gotten over the last three years three and a half years on this plan and while there's a lot of value in the you know current thoughts and concerns I think there's also a lot of value in the other five hundred some odd people and the hopes that they had and I saw several of the percentages fairly high on that those small neighborhood uses but that's that's just my my feeling Commissioner McDade I think you're on the board for a second oh I'm sorry I second it the motion from Commissioner McDade got it so we have a motion and a second any further discussion okay just so we don't get in a quagmire of people being concerned to vote for and and having a split or denial on this I'm gonna make a superior motion to amend the motion to follow what what I was proposing that that I think is a little bit more fair from the type of feedback that we got one so so leave the boundaries as is but staff to implement some ability for community services uses after 8 p.m. and so that's I'm moving for that it would need a second and then we would have to vote on that amendment and then whether that if it succeeds then we would vote on that motion if it fails then we would vote on the original motion Commissioner McDuff see you're on the board I would have accepted an amendment to my motion to include both of those items okay for modification understood Commissioner Dyer I guess I'm just a little concerned that we've got individuals that came here and feel like this was the first time that they really heard about it and I understand of those that participated the percentages were high but when you only have 16% of your community I mean I know you're not gonna get everybody and you may not even get half the community but to me 16% seems so low and I know that even when this has been in front of our Commission last year and we started talking about some of these responses and everything I know I made the concern about the communication and getting the word out and utilizing I mean we probably had close to 30 people in here and a lot of the individuals did not even so you know even I apologize I can't remember your name but the nice lady that was on the you know on the committee she didn't even understand some of the stuff so I'm wondering if city staff should do one more public meeting just one where they can hear more concerns because now you got 30 people that they probably have a bigger understanding of being in this presentation and if a presentation can be made to the community make it at the church or at you know the nearest nearby school or something where you're going through the whole presentation in front of the community that this is what we proposed this is what it used to be this is what we're proposing to make the changes what do you all feel about that how do you all think and so I I mean I don't know that I can make a motion but if I could make a motion my motion would be let's pause this and let's instruct city staff to have one more community meeting to share that just so that city staff that the community feels like their voice was heard that maybe more than 16% because I have a feeling that the 30 people were here are going to tell their neighbors you've got to get yourself there you've got to know and maybe that's one little thing that will help bridge and build back the little building blocks of trust so that the community feels that they are heard like that's that's what I would like to do and I would second yes I just wanted to throw out there while I feel like we have done far more in engagement than it I mean my whole staff went door-to-door putting out flyers in Southeast Denton twice during this process so I do apologize if some people didn't find out but we have far exceeded public engagement I would propose rather than pausing and coming back to P&D that perhaps you give us the opportunity to do we can make one more attempt and host a meeting prior to City Council but rather than putting the whole effort on pause I would suggest maybe we we do one more meeting between now and City Council and we can take that feedback to council and I under and I understand that and I recognize 18 months oh I mean a lot of work and I totally 100% get that but if you're hearing from the community that there was a lack of trust that might be why you didn't have some of the response because they weren't sure what the motivations in that were and so I'm just I would again just point out the history of the area plan I mean we went so far as to have our consultant do their own engagement without staff to avoid that perception of mistrust so we please trust us when we say we've gone above and beyond and done more engagement than has ever been done for a city project and please know I'm not I'm not saying that you haven't gone above and beyond I 100% know that y'all have I like to call the question please we have a motion on the floor in a second we have a motion and a second just to yeah yeah so so to be clear the the motion to continue is a superior motion and we have a second I believe still from Commissioner McDade is that correct I withdrew my second to the original motion right were you intending to second Commissioner Dyer's motion to continue okay so that's what we have on the floor I'll say I believe I'm the only one here on the board who's been here through this whole process I have never seen a planning project either in the city of Denton or read about something outside of the city of Denton that has gotten as high as a 16% response rate I understand we all want a hundred percent but just just for clarification staff has moved mountains I think staff's proposal that they go through especially with the people that are here tonight and their neighbors and and have one more informational moving informational meeting to sort of make it very clear what the proposal is preserves that opportunity for feedback and still preserves the opportunity for council to hear that and take that into their considerations I'm concerned that postponing again is going to going to not necessarily create a whole lot more feedback because what it's possible that that would delay the process and then the people who have come here tonight won't hear about that next meeting and it just seems clearer to me to keep going but to but to make sure that there's one more opportunity to to fully explain what the proposal is so I won't be supporting the motion to continue but as I understand it the motion is to continue to an event certain of the of staff holding another meeting and then bringing this proposal back to the planning and zoning Commission is that correct Commissioner Dyer well do we have I mean Robert's Rules of Order Commissioner Macduff made a motion but nobody's second the second was withdrawn you've made a motion but nobody's second it so are those two motions kind of dead they are okay so then yes I would like to make a motion to pause and have city staff go for one last public community presentation so that more of the community feels like they are have been informed and they can give any final feedback so that way if there's any last changes then when they come in front of planning and zoning it's a good solid plan I mean I know we're not gonna have hundred percent I'm not asking for a hundred percent just hoping that more than sixteen percent would come and that everybody you know people at the next public hearing people feel that you know they were informed and not feel like this was the first time they knew about it or that they didn't that they've known about it but just didn't have a clear understanding okay thank you and Commissioner Ketcher said I second the motion to table this okay I think we had a previous seconder but I appreciate that because I just wanted clarity on the motion like I said I won't be supporting this not because I don't believe in public engagement but because I believe we would have to double our tax rate in order to have enough money to to far exceed the 16% because we've we've done a lot with that said that's that's the motion and staff have any more Charlie yeah just a couple more things to add as far as the 16 percent goes that's of the entire population so our respondents like in a household for instance maybe we got a single respondent that responded for the entire household so just provided some additional context to that 16 percent since it's a population of the entire area and then another thing that I wanted to add on this is we still have the ability at City Council to have another round of engagement we would be happy to go and meet with the community again and talk about it and this this would also have another round of public hearing for PNC so it'd be the community coming out to this again so it's just I want to be cognizant of that too you know often we see is we have additional public hearings less people wanting to come attend and provide input in those public hearings so just want to be mindful and have the Commission consider that as well but this group would come out another evening to have these conversations thank you Commissioner McDade I live I work in the neighborhood I don't live in the neighborhood however I was I'm able to receive some of the notices even being there I only recall receiving one notification so I can understand that some people did not get it here to see it I attended the meeting the community meeting in framework part of course this is prior to my appointment on this commission and I think that the staff did a great job I really did enjoy this setup the community enjoyed that setup and I I believe you received a lot of feedback at that time with this being a public hearing tonight with the actual plan being here this is my first time seeing it so to speak to this is the plan this is what we're trying to move forward this public hearing has informed us that there are a few people who do have some modifications changes and issues and questions about what's in the plan now I say yeah let's give staff if they will please one more time and maybe we can get somebody pay for pizza again give the community one more chance to see what the staff actually came up with one more time and that's why I'm seconding the motion thank you for that clarity yeah I think we're gonna vote on this very soon unless there's any other comments only thing I'll add to that is that I I'm sorry but the public hearing is closed it sounds like no matter what the outcome is here there will be opportunities to work with staff as we move forward but I'll just say I get it if if going back for another round is is what the commission votes for I would expect certainly all those commissioners who are voting to do that to make every possible effort to actually be at this community meeting and see how much effort and time and what goes into these things we are asking and as we ask staff to do things that the capacity is not unlimited and so if this is the the priority of the Commission that's great but it does mean that other things that we put on our matrix are going to be delayed etc implementation of the southeast Denton area plan and the future steps would be delayed because it would take organizing the meeting notifying for the meeting making any changes then re noticing for the public hearings so we're probably talking about three months before it gets to council if if this is postponed as as the motion is ready is that fair okay that's that's all did you have something no okay any other comments questions I don't see any so I would call for a vote on the board this is a motion to postpone to an event certain of staff holding an additional input meeting for for the residents of the area and that item passes four to two so Julie just for the benefit of here people here can you explain the outcome of this motion and what I know we don't have any schedules yet but just so people understand so they can stay informed sorry maybe Haley I'll take it so following this motion what I've heard is we will do another round of community engagement in the form of a meeting so that will look like another postcard or door hangers whatever method we can can come up with to notify for that public engagement meeting and then there will be another round of notices sent for a future P and Z public hearing as well as a council public hearing so it was probably about a three month timeline on that at least is there a reason why you can't utilize social media and put the plan on and say hey we're having a meeting here it's that it's at this location on this date so that way you're covering lots of different forms of communication so if if we were to utilize the city social media channels that would invite the entirety of the city of Denton and whoever else might follow to that meeting whereas we are seeking a targeted audience for this so if someone is aware of a social media platform that is exclusive to southeast Denton and would like to to share that with us so that we can possibly put something out that way we can but we would prefer not inviting the entirety of Denton to weigh in on a matter that is not pertinent to the entirety of Denton doesn't Sedna have their own but my staff has been at every step in this has been I understand there's feelings here and I'll just I just wanted Hillary to to explain what the process was our staff does an amazing job of figuring out who the stakeholders are whether that's I don't know if any commissioners here have been to the Southeast Denton neighborhood Association meeting every time I've gone which is at least half a dozen times in the last three years staff have been there there are many other neighborhood associations in the city where that is not true so our staff take this area seriously okay and and as I think it was former Commissioner McDade said there's a concern that yes we want trust even a simple thing as the plan when we adopted it saying rebuilding trust instead of building trust can be interpreted as an affront so I just want people to understand but I understand we'll we'll go for another round but but nobody nobody said that we didn't have faith in the city staff or that we didn't think they were working hard we just we were just hearing the comments from the community and felt like you know maybe there's just an opportunity to have a final presentation and basically give the same presentation that they gave to us sure and and just and show it to the community so that way there's just a deeper understanding that was all I mean I know that I know the city staff works hard and and so I'm not I'm not trying to imply when I made that motion that they don't understood and sorry if I was implying the counter to that I was mostly responding to the the suggestion of reaching out to the churches yes those are all good ideas these are things I'm sure that the staff has already done in previous rounds and I'm sure they will do this I think they are taking the the will of this body with a lot of weight tonight because it's no small thing to to delay this for for doing this again they will take that seriously and and that's their job to implement the will of the body so I look forward to seeing what we can do and I will make an effort to be there as well any other questions about the process before I move on okay that's that and and just for public awareness if there's any confusion or questions that you have about when this is all gonna happen how to make sure you're notified all that kind of stuff we've got staff still here they they love the city more than they love their family so you're gonna you're gonna have time to ask them and make sure you get on a mailing list or something some method to make sure you hear about the future changes or or events with this plan with that we will move to item 6a the planning and zoning Commission matrix yes so I have a couple of items for you all first Kathy has asked me to request that everyone bring the iPads that have been issued to them to our April 28th meeting she will be collecting those and if you would like a new iPad those will be made available at the May 13th meeting if you do not want a new iPad you can also let her know that and she will not bring one for you at the April 28th meeting yeah yeah and the tech services will be working on a new set of iPads for you all that we'll have at that first May meeting for everyone to get at that time and that's the next scheduled meeting three weeks for tonight yes correct and then in terms of recent council actions just to keep you all apprised of we did have a annexation for approximately one acre of land off of Swisher Road that had an expired non annexation agreement that was recently approved that will get that placeholder zoning and then if and when that property owner wishes to do anything you'll see that come before you all for zoning and then just last night we did have two non annexation agreements that were extended to 2040 for a couple of properties on Mills Road as well as the zoning change that you all saw it's been a few weeks at this point that was a rural residential to general office off of Barthold Road that was approved by council last night and I believe we'll be marking one item off the matrix with tonight's work session as well as the memo that was circulated to you all earlier this week from our transportation services team so happy to add anything else to the matrix you might like but we will make those two updates any additions to the matrix from the Commission I don't see any and concluding items item 7 any concluding items from the Commission not seeing anyway any at this time we'll thank the public for coming and like I said we all value your input look forward to where this is going to go and at 9 23 p.m. I will without objection call this meeting to a close.