City Council Work Session Transcript – 11/18/2019 Title: City of Austin Channel: 6 - COAUS Recorded On: 11/18/2019 6:00:00 AM Original Air Date: 11/18/2019 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== Please note that the following transcript is for reference purposes and does not constitute the official record of actions taken during the meeting. For the official record of actions of the meeting, please refer to the Approved Minutes. [9:10:50 AM] >> Mayor Adler: All righty then. I think we can start on this November 18th, 2018. Time is 9:10. This is a work session on the land development code revision. We're going to start off with staff making a presentation to us. The hope is that the presentation, we're going for let them run through the presentation without any questions from up here. Our hope is that at the back end of the presentation, which should be roughly 45 minutes, then we'll have like 15 minutes or so, we'll go around and let people ask questions, everybody could have a couple of minutes in that period. And then the way that we've talked about doing this is we have identified like six areas that cover like the universe. But I have no idea if the councilmembers want to actually talk about each of those areas or things within [9:11:52 AM] those areas but so that we end the day with everybody having had the ability R. Ability to speak to each of the different areas, I'm going to call the areas like that. I'm going to use what the mayor pro tem did as best we can because it seemed to work well. So we'll go through each one of the six areas. Everybody should know they have about 12 minutes to speak because if everybody speaks for 12 minutes we like exhaust the next little over two hours. Don't feel compelled to use your two minutes in any one of the six areas. You could use all 12 of the minutes in one area topic if you want to. I'm going to keep a running track of everybody to we can do that. We'll go through the six areas. At the end of going through the six areas if we have a lot of time left workshop open it up and talk about topic areas. If there's half an hour left to go, we're going to stop and talk about process for first reading so that people [9:12:53 AM] can talk about that. So that's how we're going to proceed. Thank you, mayor. >> Garza: There's a time certain end time. >> Mayor Adler: 1:00. >> Garza: Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: So basically the first hour is going to be this. If everybody has 12 minutes and there are 11 of us, that's a little over two hours. That's three hours. In if the last half an hour is process, that gives us 30 minutes of kind of flex time. >> All right, thank you, mayor. Good morning, mayor and council. Rodney Gonzalez, assistant city manager. With us today of course are anik Beaudet and Brent Lloyd, leadership members of the land development code revision as well as other staff members. As you may recall the planning commission adoed or approved the land development code revision last week. And we here today to talk to you about their recommendation and provide you an overview of that as well as to go over some planned refinements to the [9:13:54 AM] residential Zones and some mapping and not just talk about it in a text manner, but to provide you some illustrations as well to what those mean. And then of course to approve the November 25th planned second supplemental report. So with that I'll turn it over to anik Beaudet. >> Thanks, Rodney. Good morning. Here's our timeline. We always like to start with our timeline that is looking more and more robust every time we come to work session filling in where we've been in the community talking about the code and most importantly receiving input. The purpose today for showing this slide is to communicate that we've really moved from the October 4th draft in refinements and that's going to be what you're going to see today is refinements throughout the code based on hundreds of hours literally of office hours with the community. One on ones with your offices, town halls, with [9:14:55 AM] your constituents over the month of October. Our own city staff hosted open houses. And during the month of October we also did our testing, public testing and have learned a lot about reminements needed to assure the code meets our community values and goals that we've set out. So today we are going to go over those refinements. This is just a quick process update. We release October 25th supplemental report. And as Rodney pointed out, November 12th, after special called meetings, the planning commission was able to complete their recommendation to mayor and council. And we will be going over in the presentation today highlights of their recommendation and a final report of their recommends and where staff agrees, [9:15:57 AM] partially agrees or is neutral to their recommendations will be out later this week for you all. And the manager. Then we'll move into our supplemental staff report to be on November 25th and into council public hearing December 5th and first ordinance reading on December 9th. So today as I mentioned, we're here today with our consultant Peter park as well as members of the core team to talk about specific refinements to transition areas and high opportunity areas in response to down direction and a preview of what will be further solidified in our second supplemental staff report to be out on the 25th. So with that I'll hand it over to Brent to talk about [9:16:57 AM] some high levels that the planning commission went over and approved in their November 12th final recommendation. And then some more specifics related to nonresidential and residential recommendations and then we'll go into how that might look when on the ground. Brent? >> Thanks, Brent Lloyd. We'll talk briefly and give you an overview of the planning commission's recommendation in their report which we will be providing to you by the end of the week. As anik mentioned, the commission conducted multiple deliberations, including on veterans day, which to my knowledge is unprecedented for a city meeting and is a sign of their commitment to the process and their final action was taken on November 12th. And we are briefly just going to provide some highlights. This is by no means an [9:17:59 AM] exhaustive I will Louis addition of all of the recommendations, but some of the ones that we think are critical and worth mentioning. By way of their nonresidential recommendations, recommendations to the broader parts of the code, they recommended generally increasing transition area departmentth and intensity on corridors to better leverage the 2016 mobility bond program and this is definitely a theme that runs throughout the transportation chapter as well is utlizing -- utilizing the development code in a way that better aligns the city's transportation priorities and pools different resources to leverage the construction of improvements. Another recommendation is to count above ground parking against floor area ratio in all residential Zones that have bonus with unlimited F.A.R. To Taylor utilities view -- [9:19:00 AM] tailor utilities view for middle housing. In the October 25th supplemental we said that programmatically we will be recommending improvements and refinements to the utility process to better -- to better produce housing capacity. And this recommendation relates to that. Another recommendation is to further clarify and streamline site plan requirements for missing middle housing and we look forward to talking further with council about the site plan process and the process working group of the commission had a number of valuable recommendations with respect to the site plan process. And finally, one that's specific to downtown is whenever CC is zoned downtown, allow unlimited height in F.A.R. Through the downtown density bonus [9:20:00 AM] program. And again, this is just an overview of some of the highlights and there are lots more that we look forward to presenting in our report. And then before we turn it over to Peter and Laura, we'll summarize at a high level some of the recommendations with respect to the residential regulations. One of the themes that I think runs through a lot of the recommendations is to reduce the scale and intensity of lower unit yield residential projects and the first recommendation that we'll mention in that regard is to reduce single unit impervious cover. That was also a recommendation in our October 25th supplemental report and I think we'll be expanding on that in light of the commission's recommendation. Additionally to graduate impervious cover for more than one unit -- and again, this relates to the theme of really having enhanced [9:21:01 AM] entitlements serve the purpose of housing capacity in multiunits and looking at ways that the scale and intensity of projects can be reduced for lower unit projects. Similarly graduated floor to area ratio by unit count, exempt accessory dwelling unit. Cap floor area ratio and reimplementation of the garage can exemption, which I think Peter and Laura will touch on as well. And finally double height spaces would count twice toward floor area ratio under the commission's recommendation. So with that we'll dovetail in to a presentation with lots of good graphics by our consultant Peter park and Laura Keating. >> Thank you. So what we'd like to do is [9:22:02 AM] give you kind of an overview of some of the things that staff has been looking at. As anik mentioned through a lot of sources of input and testing, the staff has been looking beyond the October 4th draft. And making refinements and studying for the refinements to the code. In this diagram you can see per council direction from the corridor so when you see -- if you read from right to left here the red main vet or mixed use Zones or sometimes multiunit Zones along a corridor, and then counting that five lots in with a transition of rm 1 multiunit and rm 4 transitioning to the neighborhood R 2 scale, the house scale residential Zones. And we use this diagram just to reemphasize that these [9:23:04 AM] bands of transition areas are comprised of the R 4 and the rm 1, the remain 1 is the most intense active and the intention of council was to provide a smooth transition from the scale of the corridor to the residential scale. So for example, in an rm 1 typically mapped in the transition areas, mapped least actually, if there's a case where there is an existing single-family house or a small apartment buildingth building the scale of new discussion could be more, would be more per council direction of up zoning. Particularly in the rm 1 and providing that transition from the tall scale of the corridor. So we just want to emphasize that that only happens -- it doesn't happen everywhere where you have this juxtaposition. It is really where you have the rm 1. And then the R 4 is at that [9:24:07 AM] house scale where it makes the transition to the R 2. So we're going to go through some of the refinements that staff is considering right now and just as a starting point context, in this drawing you can see starting from the reading left to right now, if one would imagine an existing four-plex in an area that might be maybe today right behind the corridor. And on the October fourth draft you see the mold of a three unit that is potential and you see a mouth R. Model of a five unit in the October 4th draft. And next to the five unit building you see what might be an existing one story house from the 1950s or something. So again, we would find in these contexts' variety of [9:25:09 AM] building scales, but per the council direction this is right behind the corridor of more intensive scale and so that's why there are additional heights. Another thing that we would like to show to you is the way that we study these is we study them with the intention of understanding what is possible and what is likely under the code. We don't really study it from the theoretical worst case, but what is really likely to happen. As we study them we really look at them from the way that we all experience buildings and experience space. So when we take these views we study them at the eye level as if one were walking along the street and we just selected a few views here. But this is exactly how we studied the relationship of form and how new structures will relate to each other. And study how they will relate to existing [9:26:11 AM] situations. On rm 1 the F.A.R. For three units or more moves up to .8. As we've studied this, in this situation so this was about 7200 square feet. If one did 3 three units at a .8 F.A.R. You get an average of about 1900 square feet. In the October 4th draft the height limit was four stories and here tickly you would get four floors. You would be low, but you could potentially get four floors. So if one were to do a building with a lot of balcony and outdoor space, theoretically you could get up to those four stories. As we study this further and it the intention of focusing on adding capacity and encourageing more units, not necessarily out of scale units, but additional units, [9:27:13 AM] staff is studying a possibility of managing that to a .6. So if one did a three unit building on this site it would be 1400 square feet. We've also -- we are also thinking about other things, for example. If one did a duplex in the rm 1 or keeping that at the lower F.A.R., but if the site is smaller, and again, this is what we're still studying. If the site is smaller to the minimum of 5,000 square feet, maybe the F.A.R. Is .6 or 1500 square feet, whichever is more. So just as a way of making more likely the possibility of units when the site is on the smaller range of a lot. [9:28:17 AM] Then also we're looking at the height when reducing a unit. This is rm 1 after all and the intent is really to get more units than three units, three large units. The the intent is really to get if the base is six and the bonus is 10 is to really try to figure out how to create that capacity on the lot right behind the corridor fronting lots. Now we're moving to the R 4, some of the things that staff is reviewing in terms of refinements under the R 4. So in this context what you see is the potential of three units, reading left to right again under the R 4 in the October 4th draft. We're also showing a new duplex that is possible under the current code, and I think this is actually a from an approved project that is built or under construction. What you could do in four [9:29:18 AM] units under the R 4 from the October 4th draft and if you had an existing one story house currently in an R 4 zone. So if we go down to the street level what you see in the October 4th draft is the attic floor area under October fourth draft does not count F.A.R. And so in this case if one were to create a gable roof or some other roof form that maximizes the attic, you can get a fair amount more of square footage that does not count towards F.A.R. On the right in the blue outline we've simply drawn what the current mcmansion tent looks like under the current code and you can see a house that could be built in the scale of it under the current mcmansion tent. So one of the refinements [9:30:18 AM] that staff is looking at is similar to today, including in the far, the attic floor area with a partial exemption. We still have to calculate that. One of the intentions of not including the at that time tick floor area in draft 4 was really two things. One is under the current code it's pretty complicated to figure out how to counted the floor area in those attics. And so we're going to work on figuring out a simpler way to describe that. The second part of it was thinking about one's ability to use an existing attic in an older home, possibly for an Adu or for expansion space. And so the intention was to really allow homeowners to use that existing space [9:31:19 AM] under roof without it counting to F.A.R. So one further refinement of this thinking might be in the case of remodeling or using one's attic for an Adu expansion, then it does not count, but otherwise on a new build it would count. So that's something that we're considering. And again, you can see the mcmansion tent under the current code in relation to 1950's ranch house. Again, we are always looking at this in terms of how does the proposed code relate to what one can do under the current entitlements, under the current zone. Not necessarily always exactly as the world stands today, but what one could do with the property today. Moving on to the R 2. [9:32:24 AM] So we're here looking at calibrating the F.A.R. By unit again. Again, reading left to right you see a house plus an Adu that's possible under the current code. I think this is actually another project that's actually built. So this is approvable under the current code. An existing one story house. And then a duplex as could be done on the proposed draft in an R 2 zone, but for comparison sake the massing of a house, a single-family house theoretically with a lot of roofscape, theoretically a single-family house that could be built under the current code, under current mcmansion rules, and then again for point of reference an existing one story house. So when we go to the street level and see how these work, under the October 4th draft what it allowed under [9:33:25 AM] the duplex is it moved the F.A.R. From .4 today if one had 7,000 square feet to .6 if we set it at .6 for duplex. So in this case for a duplex this size that would work out to about 2100 square feet per unit. Under the proposed code. And just for reference so you know, if you look here you see the two wire frames? Those represent the current mcmansion tent. And the single-family house that's possible under the current mcmansion tent. The building that's between those two tents is the duplex at a .6 F.A.R., which again for this site ends up being about 2100 square feet. As we've looked at it based [9:34:26 AM] on testing and things that we've studied, we're looking at adjusting the F.A.R. Down to .4 for a duplex. So on this size of a site it ends up being 1500 square feet. Again as I mentioned before, one of the ways to deal with this is setting it at .4 as today but if the lot is smaller in a 5,000 to 6,999 square foot range, the language might read .4 or 1500 square feet, whichever is larger. So in this case at a .4 F.A.R. For a 5,000 square foot lot, that would allow in a duplex condition 1,000 square feet per unit. [9:35:28 AM] So in terms of input that we've heard from those that develop duplexes and develop these units, that's on the small range. So if the emphasis is on creating family friendly housing to create we're trying to strike that balance between what is likely. So the feedback that we've gotten is if it's too tight for the size of a duplex it won't get developed. And so what we're really trying to figure out is where is it attractive enough to get the duplex rather than just do the single-family with the Adu or just the larger single-family as it is, right? So this is again looking at calibrating far by unit, but also looking at -- looking at it from the size of the site at the smaller end of the lot sizes. As Brent mentioned, there are two refinements [9:36:32 AM] illustrated is under the October 4th draft as I mentioned earlier, the attic does not count toward F.A.R. And so we're looking at putting back with some partial exemption. Also putting back double height spaces or ceiling fights very similar to today. And also adding back including the garage floor area in F.A.R. With a partial exemption. And then the preservation incentive in the R 2 refinement. Again here are the ideas. Calibrate the F.A.R. By unit under the preservation incentive. Under the October 4th draft on the left side you see an existing small house, older house that gets preserved and a duplex gets developed in the back with a roof deck [9:37:34 AM] on the third floor. On the right you see the potential of doing two accessory dwelling units essentially behind the preservation of an existing house. So as we studied this further we are looking at something similar to the other refinement, under October 4th it was a .6 F.A.R. For duplex and would result in a 2100 square foot per unit again. And you can sort of make it out if you look through the mcmansion tent there you can see the top of the the duplex from where we're standing and the study that staff is looking at is dialing that again back down to .4 in which case that building again, unless one were to partially build a building that was all [9:38:34 AM] outdoor space and very little interior space, but in this case it would be less visible from the street and would result in a potential of 1500 square feet per unit if developed as a duplex in the preservation situation. So this is just kind of a summary of the sort of things that staff continues to look at. And we wanted to share with you how we studied these situations with these type of drawings. With a focus on how does one actually experience these, especially from the street, from the public realm. And there are some components of the existing code that you probably recognize. We're thinking of putting back in, but again, the goal would be to make it easier to use than it is today to figure out these situations. Also being very mindful of the diversions -- [9:39:35 AM] differences in the square footage that the lot could make relative to the F.A.R. And that we might provide for some adjustment when it is in that smaller lot situation. Now I'll hand it back over to anik. >> Thanks, Peter. So the next portion of the presentation is really three slides. The first just two points on revised -- our revised staff recommendation on transition areas. To be more clear, on October 25th, we signaled our intent to reduce transition areas in two ways and one is when the corridors are primarily residential in nature and in context that we would be reducing them and specifically the method would be counting the corridorred lot that's adjacent to the right-of-way to the street in the count [9:40:40 AM] of the transition area, which would have the affect of reducing the transition areas on those primarily residential corridors by one lot. And then also to continue to reduce the transition areas in areas of the city that are susceptible to displacement as part of gentrification per the UT study, particularly in areas that are susceptible in early stage and in a dynamic stage of gentrification. So being more precise on how we're handling both the residential corridors and the areas that are in susceptible and early ages of gentrification by further reducing the intensity and the area that is where we apply the transition Zones. And this is consistent with the planning commission recommendations they have as well in these areas. And you'll see the slight differences when the report comes out later this week. [9:41:41 AM] So as we looked at reducing and being more context sensitive about affordability and displacement, we also looked to the council direction at how we can still stay within the 397,000 housing capacity number that our report card saying that we are hitting at this point by looking at opportunities in high opportunity areas of the city, specifically learning from testing which we learned that corner lots in high opportunity areas than application r-3 zone, which hasn't been applied as robustly as the R 2 zone could be an opportunity to make up for that capacity. The planning commission also asked us to look at mapping our it 4, for example, adjacent to parks in high opportunity areas. And in our internal department comments and [9:42:41 AM] working with other staff throughout the city, grocery stores were another area where we're looking at how that might -- how we might apply an R 3 or an R 4 subtly and gentlely throughout the city to keep the capacity at the 397,000 as we're looking at being careful in the gentrifying we're look at centers that was planning commission recommendation that you'll see we're assuring we're maximizing the entitlements in the centers and perhaps around the periphery of the center, which has proven to be a little trickier than it sounds. Many of our centers have major either txdot roadways or major roadways that intersect, and the edges are pretty much the highway boundary, so it's hard to look at the edges for that stepdown because they're not contiguous with the center, but we do think there is some room to add [9:43:41 AM] some more capacity through the concept of the centers as well as the planning commission, which we agree with, wanted us to look at not only bus routes but high capacity transit with regards to the existing red line and the planned green line with regards to where the stops might be, so we'll be coordinating with capital metro in that respect. So that is how we're balancing out a more fine-tuning throughout the city with the capacity. And then in the supplemental staff report, we'll have more detailed recommendations consistent with today's presentation that Peter went through, and we look forward to your questions about that and input about that today. We're gonna additionally show recommendations based on community feedback in our internal department staff review, which we're just combing through those recommendations as well. And then some significant background and framework on how all the existing regulating plans and [9:44:43 AM] neighborhood plans work together and how our approach to the current recommendation for keeping f25 on some of those properties has been a lot of feedback we've been -- we've been asked of what was the criteria for title -- for former 25 per the council direction to limit it and use our new tools in the code as much as possible so we'll have a robust explanation for y'all and the public. Again, next steps, 25th is the supplemental, moving into the public hearing, city hall 10:00 A.M. December, and first ordinance reading 10:00 A.M. City hall, December 9. With that we'll open it up to your questions. Thank you for your a attention. >> Mayor Adler: Thanks for the presentation. Questions or comments on this? Jim, do you want to go first? >> Flannigan: Just a quick one related to the transit [9:45:47 AM] stops. I think that's going to be a challenge because the transit stops farther along the line are all surrounded by pud zonings or existing regulating plans. Not the two -- not the one in mine. Not the ones in councilmember pool's district have any flexibility surrounding those transit stops. The ones that do have flexibility are in the uprooted areas. So I think you might find some conflict on that. I just wanted to make that note. I would love to see some of the land around the lakeline station redeveloped but it's really locked up in what a private landowner is willing to do at the moment. >> Mayor Adler: Anyone else want to make comment on this? I think the maps are really good. And I like that you put on the map the range. You put in what is existing with the 1951 story bungalow. You put what was allowed in [9:46:49 AM] current code and what would be allowed under existing code. I think everybody then can make their own comparisons on what it is they want to use for comparison. I would just say that for me the relevant comparison in that is if I own a home and the lot next to me gets sold to somebody else, I want to know what somebody is gonna be able to build next to me. So the relevant comparison for me will be in today's world, if we don't change the code, how big is somebody gonna build next to me? And then under the new code, how big is somebody gonna build next to me? And I'll make the same assumption that that person who is buying it is going to max out whatever it is they can do in terms of my analysis, so that's what I'll be looking at. How are you going to get these maps out to the public for them to see? >> We will post a presentation on our project website, and we may -- we'll [9:47:51 AM] make them available at the various meetings that we're continuing to go to with the public throughout this week and throughout November. But mainly through our web presence. It should be posted actually this morning already. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Would you just -- for emphasis, would you send the link to that map site to each of the council offices? >> Yes. >> Mayor Adler: Just to make it super easy for us to be able to send out? Leslie. >> Pool: Thanks for the updates. I'm looking at just pick 1 of the pages, page 19. And I was curious on the setbacks from the property lines and the easements, are we implying there that the setback from the curb is -- let's see, 3-foot wide sidewalk, so edge to edge to the curb that would be 6 feet and then -- I'm trying to figure out how deep is that lot and the [9:48:52 AM] proportions, dimensions of the lot. It would be helpful to know what -- how deep is that lot and how wide? And then how close to the curb are the fronts of the homes? Because I know that in our previous conversations we've talked about pushing the structures closer to the road. So if you are going to send this out, I might ask that you would give us a sense of how that fits on the lot and the setbacks on all four sides. >> We can relabel that. >> Pool: Yeah. I think that would be really helpful. I know some of this is being done because we were looking at Chris and gene yeah Allen's renders and this is an attempt to show y'all's interpretation of the proposed rewrite. So that being the case I would also ask that you take the same kind of perspective that they have so that we can also aim it to look at apples and apples. [9:49:55 AM] Bird's eye view is a little difficult to interpret so the street slide closer rendering like you have on page 15, for example, is helpful but it's also kind of skewed. If we could do a version of this rendering that looks straight on at the homes so that it lines up a little bit more about what the lens have proposed. Because this is going to be used as a way to compare with what Chris and Gina have done as a way to say, well, they're wrong, we're write, or we're right and they're wrong or vice versa, and in order to -- in order to reduce the amount of conflict between there it would be great if we could more directly model to show how staff thinks those rendering are different from what y'all are coming up with. Does that make sense? >> Well, just to reinforce the way these drawings and [9:50:56 AM] views are taken, the tear taken is the way a person about 5-foot 6 would see and actually experience what buildings look like along the street. We didn't show what it's like as if I was, you know, flying up at the second story looking at the building. But rather the way that one actually experiences it. So this is at an eye level. The horizon is at a eye level, the way one views it. >> Pool: That makes sense. What is the distance away from the home? That would be a way for us to compare the volume. The birds eye one of course is like what's on page 11 or the drone, actually. >> Yeah. So the bird's eye view we provide just to explain contextually to show what's going on. >> Pool: Exactly, yeah. >> Again, that's taking that -- I don't know where, about 60 feet above or more [9:51:56 AM] looking down. A few of us have the experience to see buildings -- neighborhoods that way, unless we had drones flying around. >> Pool: Right. >> The other views that we show are at eye level the way one typically sees it. Not at that drone level. >> Pool: If we could get kind of situated with what were the parameters that you put in to establishing this drawing so we can get the sense of size and volume and placement. >> Mayor Adler: Sounds good. >> Pool: There's one other question. When -- on page 5 you were talking about making it cheaper. I think it's on the tailor utilities review and requirements. I'd like to know how that aligns with council desire to make development pay for itself. And if that is being focused [9:52:58 AM] at developers or at individual owners who are redeveloping their own home. Thanks. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Thank you. Four and a half minutes. Mayor pro tem. >> Garza: For context -- >> Mayor Adler: I'm sorry. Did you want to get the answer to that question now? >> Pool: I'm fine with them giving it to us later but if you have an answer that would be great. >> It was in regards to the planning commission recommendation for tailored utility requirements. I think the way -- I think there's a lot of different approaches to that recommendation but I think one of them is simply looking at the sizing of easements and being a little more tailored about how utility easements are applied and required on particular projects and I think that, you know, the degree to which staff will be able to address that as part of this process remains to be scene. We definitely have proposed that going forward following [9:53:58 AM] code adoption there be an interdepartmental work group assembled to really look at utility requirements over a broad category of development and look at ways we can approve them. There was a joint statement from the utility providers and members of the ldc team that was included in the October four staff report and so I think this relates to that, but we'll objection -- it will remain to be scene if we can implement this as part of the code rewrite but it was definitely an issue that the planning commission emphasized in a few of their recommendations. >> Pool: Is that the same -- the first one of their recommendations about generally increased transition area depth and intensity on the corridors? That's going the other direction from what we're hearing residents emphatically saying, that there's too much density and intensity and too deep of a transition area along corridors so that seems to [9:54:58 AM] be coming at it from exactly the opposite, 180 degrees from what we're hearing the residents say. >> Agree that this recommendation was not so much directed as just sort of expanding the depth as a general matter so much as looking at the corridor, the 2016 mobility bond program as a guiding criteria for the placement of transition areas and not so much a blankets direction to expand transition areas. >> I took it as an interpretation of more in comparison of balancing all of the things that we've rewards to reducing against residential corridors that we should be mindful in however we expand or reduce that we should be mindful that the largest amount of area should be adjacent to where we have mobility funding going. So just in relation to each other is the way I took that. >> Pool: That aligns with what we have been saying [9:55:59 AM] from day one. >> Yes. >> Pool: Okay. So this very first recommendation is in fact them affirming the direction that the council had put forward? >> I don't want to speak for what they -- what they were intending. I have to look at the transcript closer. But generally I got the sense that they just wanted to make sure we're balancing all of the other things. They were also sensitive to areas vulnerable to gentrification and wanting us to look closer there as well with tools to assure where the greatest area is mapped that it would be in the areas that are consistent with our investments. >> Pool: Okay. Then my last question is, did they talk in terms of how this plan aligns, as state law requires, with our comprehensive plan? >> They -- I do not believe that they passed any motions or recommendations on that issue. They did vote to incorporate [9:57:04 AM] the October 25 supplemental staff report into their recommendation and that includes the proposed amendment to the growth concept map and imagine Austin and as annick mentioned we intend as part of the next supplemental to provide kind of a fuller discussion about sort of the former title 25 zoning district, how that relates to neighborhood plans, nccds, neighborhood plan combining districts and sort of the full range of different kind of related ordinances that the city has used over time. But I do not believe the commission passed a recommendation directly on that issue. We'll have to -- we'll review the transcript to make sure. >> Pool: Thanks. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. That was nine minutes. Mayor pro tem. >> Tovo: On slide 8, I'm just trying to understand the context to the other. So is the -- where it says existing fourplex, behind that, that the corridor behind that where those taller buildings are? [9:58:08 AM] >> Yes. Excuse me. Yes. So that where it says existing fourplex? >> Garza: There's a taller building behind it, that's the side of the corridor. >> Yeah, mm-hmm. >> Garza: You said there's very little-run? >> Right. Of the transition areas they're surprised of r1 Zones and r4 Zones. In terms of the number of lots that would typically get mapped, so, for example, let's say all criteria were met and legal five lots deep, typically the r1s would be mapped two of those five and the r4s would have been mapped three of the five. >> Garza: Okay. And then the -- >> I'm sorry. And remember also that in cases where areas vulnerable, the rm1 is not even used at all so the transition is just the r4 [9:59:08 AM] zone. >> Garza: So in this case, the very next block, is that rm1 or is that r4? >> The next block, that would still be rm1 and then it turns to r4, yeah. >> Garza: Okay. Okay. And I appreciate -- thank you for the canopy of the mcmansion which illustrates -- you could actually go bigger but it would only be one house as opposed to possibly a unit of -- 3 or more units smaller than what would be allowed right now under the current code. Is that what that is supposed to -- >> That's correct. >> Garza: Okay. I just want to say I think we need to be careful about asking our staff to do things to compare to what non-staff folks are doing. And I tremendously appreciate the perspective of this is how somebody [10:00:09 AM] experiences it because that's exactly what -- the perspective that we need to be thinking. I especially appreciated the comment about this is not the theoretical worst case scenario. So thank you for these renderings. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Two and a half minutes. Greg. >> Casar: Thank you all for the presentation, and I appreciate many of the suggestions staff is making for further refinement. Before we send this out to anyone, I think what y'all were saying when you went through the slides is really helpful, and I want to make sure that I'm saying accurately what you all said. On slide 9 for example, I think what I heard Peter say, but I want to make sure that I don't misrepresent anything, is that you -- that even if this building with balance -- balconies is technically buildable right [10:01:10 AM] now before staff make their edits, it sounded like you were saying somebody building this much outdoor space versus indoor space is very unlikely if even feasible. >> Yeah. So as the staff reviewed this one, it's a lot of outdoor space, right? So when you look at the floor area, I think the calculation of one that we saw that was submitted top somewhere near 75% of the floor area so that outdoor space comprised about 75% of sort of the amount of the indoor space, which is -- I mean, as someone who really loves being outside but it also means it's a lot of roof exposing over floors and so forth. But in doing, so what happens is the F.A.R., as it was proposed, anyone could [10:02:10 AM] build a very tall building that has smaller footprints per floor but gets up higher, right, and a lot of outdoor space. Nevertheless, what you see on the right inside screen is a five unit building in rm1 versus the three unit building that's model, the taller one. So it's possible under the current code to get five units at scale, right, designed significantly bigger. Nevertheless -- could you advance to the next slide? >> Casar: I just want to make sure I can describe that. We know you then are making changes from what you said that would get us to the next slide but I want to make sure that people understand what is on this slide. >> Okay. >> Casar: You said it but you were trying to get that you your presentation quickly and I appreciate that. What you're saying is the building that is on the right side of the screen, the shorter building, is five units, and then that's [10:03:11 AM] more generally what you thought would get built compared to the 75% balconies building? So is it -- accurate to say that 75% balconies building you're showing us that technically what somebody could build that most people don't build something that's that much balcony and you weren't anticipating anybody would do that but just in case they are interested for some reason in building something that looks like that as opposed to five units that look like the other building, y'all are considering refinements which are on the next slide? >> And may I say that, again, the rm1 is the zone adjacent to the corridor zone. Mighting across an alley but it's the one next to the corridor zone. So it isn't so much -- I just want to be clear. It isn't so much the height. Because even if one were to build a four story building [10:04:11 AM] like this, adjacent to a main street building that was 60 feet high, that would provide the transition that council is calling for. Right? The reason why we're adjusting the F.A.R. Has to do with reducing the likelihood of fewer units that are much larger getting built and to really put a governor on -- disincentive, if you will, a duplex ortry plex getting built in an rm1 and really privileging the ability to provide more units in the rm1. >> Casar: Right. You keep jumping to the next slide question, which is a great one, but just to understand this one, it's not -- you are making suggestions so that we privilegemore smaller units as opposed to bigger ones. >> Can correct. >> Casar: And making adjustments -- and that frankly what you've also described is you are not [10:05:11 AM] generally testing and building a world of worst case scenarios where somebody decides to do 75% balcony space but you're showing us that anyway just to show what somebody could do if they wanted to do that. >> Right. >> Casar: In case for some reason somebody chose to do that. >> Correct. >> Casar: Right. Then so the next slide if I were to describe what these are is given what staff wants to present to us as some of your recommendations still what's more likely to be built would be the five smaller units right next to the corridor, which is the building that looks closer to us on the right but if somebody wanted to do a bunch of balconies still because that was their thing then with your adjustments it might look a little bit more like the picture there. >> Yeah. Yeah. And, again, this -- I just want to be clear this adjustment that's being proposed, if one does three units, so ratchetting the F.A.R. From .8 as in in the [10:06:11 AM] October 4 draft to .6, it doesn't -- we are not at this point limiting the height. So, again, if one wanted to make that other building at .6 F.A.R., four stories, it would be a lot less square footage per floor. It's a very inefficient way of building a building, right? But, again, it's not so much the height that is the concern as much as the unit, the unit -- getting the smaller units. >> Casar: That makes sense to me. That was the very first edit that I posted on the message board and wanted to see in the code that as people graduate to more units that we try to incentive those being smaller than all of that being taken up by one big one. I think that then to folks that want to see drawings of what transition Zones might look like that staff showing this makes sense to me, and I hope that maybe even if they're -- I know they're [10:07:12 AM] labeled as under consideration but if we can make sure that people understand what one means versus the other and if people still want to do large amounts of balconies I guess in this case they still could but it definitely looks better than the previous slide, and so I appreciate the changes. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Seven minutes. Alison. >> Alter: Thank you. I wanted to just say appreciate the modeling. I think the modeling is really important for us to visualize what could be. I had some questions on -- with respect to the adjustments and I think some of the adjustments with respect to F.A.R. And the direction and where we're hoping to go by having the modeling that's out there in the community. I wanted to confirm that you will also be looking at adjustments for r3 Zones, not just r2. You only mentioned r2. [10:08:15 AM] >> I don't know what we've been looking at adjustments to r3 but we can certainly double-check and see if there's anything along the same lines of what we've been hearing from the community that would apply where we'll take a second look. Absolutely. >> Alter: Okay. I may be wrong but I'm pretty sure these were both r2 and r3. >> Okay. >> Alter: I have parts of my district that are r3 that were modeled that I think -- we can look at this. >> Sure. >> Alter: So I appreciate that we have these districts modeled. Will you be looking at the other districts in the same way? The visuals are really what help us to understand what we have to do in terms of the F.A.R. And other kinds of things, but we haven't seen those for the rm2 to rm5, mu, Ms, so will we be seeing those models being able to have similar [indiscernible] As to what we're doing? It can go in either direction, but -- >> Yes. We will. As -- yes. The answer is yes. [10:09:15 AM] >> Alter: Then in the models that you presented in these diagrams -- I'm not sure I would call them maps. I think that might get a little dangerous with people. Are you maxing out entitlements in the examples? >> Yes. Yeah. >> Alter: Is your -- are your corridor examples maxed out, along the corridors, the size of the corridors, have those been maxed out? >> Let me make sure I know what you're talking about. So the main street buildings? The back of the main street buildings? >> Alter: Yes. >> So the one in the right is an example from testing and that's showing current code subject to compatibility. And then the one on the left is showing a 65-foot main street building and that is maxed out. [10:10:16 AM] >> Just to be clear, the one on the right is the building just below the label that says five units rm1. So there's a building that has a stepdown. So that is an example of what one could do under the current code. If it was subject to compatibility. Right? And then the larger building, taller building, demonstrates a maxed out main street building that is not subject to compatibility per council direction when adjacent to transition areas. >> Alter: None of these consider the bonuses? >> That's a main street 2 with bonus. Yeah. >> Alter: So the one on the left has a bonus but in terms of the rms and R4s in these examples do any of them have bonuses? >> No. >> Alter: Okay. Do we know what happens with the bonuses when we model these out? [10:11:18 AM] >> Yeah. Again, we can -- we have some of those examples. The bonuses in this size site, the units get smaller. >> Okay. I think it would be helpful to see those as well. As you're presenting those if you can make sure that you max out entitlements, my experience here in Austin is that people are going to max out the entitlements, and I don't want to spend much time on it, but, Greg, it's an office building not a residential that has all these balconies, I don't know if it's 75% but way more than you might expect and it's a pretty cool building so I would expect that people would be building that out if they could get that outdoor space and make more money in the process. If we don't change things. >> -- So more modeling that includes more variation on with bonus, without bonus, and maxing out, just to be clear? >> Alter: Yes. My earlier yes was the need [10:12:19 AM] to model the other Zones P all of those need to be -- ones that the community has modeled as well in terms of these examples and we don't have -- the folks in the community don't have the bandwidth to do all of the other models, you know, to push this forward. So I would like to ask that you guys go ahead and do that . I think we'll learn a lot and it may be that things go in different directions depending on what you're looking at if it's commercial or whatnot but we won't know any of that unless we model it. >> Modeled may street and mixed-use Zones, again, we're showing you a sample of, again, the things that seem to be of great interest so rehighlighted for today those topics. >> Alter: I appreciate that but as a policy maker the visuals are really helpful to me to be able to understand what kind of building we're incentivizing [10:13:20 AM] so I'd appreciate seeing those. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. That's five and a half minutes. Colleagues, some of you weren't here when we started off. We worked through how much time we had available if we were actually going to be able to touch on topics by one. That comes out to roughly 14 minutes a person to be able to hit areas not including the last 30 minutes which we would spend on process for the first reading. >> Alter: Can I clarify one thing? >> Mayor Adler: Yes. >> Alter: I think I said r3 and I meant to go to 2a and the 3a, not r3. So I apologize for that. >> Mayor Adler: Got it. Paige. >> Ellis: I appreciate the comments on kind of the compactness and square footage that Greg and y'all were having conversation about. Were there other considerations to suggesting changing duplexes from .6 to .4? It seems to me that there's kind of a big shift between 2100 square feet per unit to a thousand, if I wrote my [10:14:21 AM] numbers down correctly. I'm kind of approaching this from a standpoint of who lives in these units and who -- it's a thousand square feet that seems kind of tight for families with, you know, maybe two or more kids. And I just kind of wanted to think about the reasoning behind kind of suggesting that lower square footage, even though I'm on board with compact and connected, I'm just kind of endures that thought process. >> Yeah. So the -- going to the .4, right, ringing back to .4 for the duplex on a typical 7,000 square foot lot would allow 1400 square feet per unit, right, 2800 square feet total, 1400 square feet per unit. >> Ellis: Okay. >> When we look at the minimum lot area in this zone, which is at 5,000 square feet, at .4 that's [10:15:25 AM] 2,000 square feet in total. So that is where you would end up with an average of 1,000 square feet per unit. So this is where the additional thing that we mentioned is on lots less than 7,000 square feet perhaps the language could speak to .4 or 1500 square feet, whichever is larger. >> Ellis: Okay. >> So if I had a smaller lot and my F.A.R. Was bringing down really what is more -- I'd say usable square footage for a unit, the code would allow that greater amount. >> Ellis: Okay. And was the approach generally just trying to not to have buildings that looked too large? Just, you know, for character and context of different neighborhoods? >> Yeah. So the idea is really to [10:16:27 AM] discourage the underdevelopment in terms of your capacity goals, right? So if, for example, the F.A.R. For a duplex was so low I might just build a single unit. In other words to build two -- to build a duplex, those two units that are small and not as desirable in the markets I might choose to just do one big house and sell that. So we're really trying to figure out where that -- strike that balance between what is a viable size of a unit and then calibrating the F.A.R. By that. >> Ellis: I appreciate that. I know our goal is to get more units, and I know annick spoke to keeping an eye on that, you know, originally 400 5,000 units, so I appreciate you all being mindful of that. >> Mayor Adler: Three and a quarter minutes. Kathie. >> Tovo: As I understand it [10:17:28 AM] we get 14 minutes total for the work session and you're deducting from our 14 what we spend on each section? >> Mayor Adler: Yes. Plus the process time is 30 minutes at the end. >> Tovo: I'm gonna make my questions super quick. Thank you. Thanks for, right, modeling. I agree it's helpful. I would like to add and this overlaps with some of the requests you've heard, I would like to see a slide with the perspective of nine of what we see on slide 9, if we could go there for a minute I would like to see that mapped with six units. I see that this rm1 is mapped at three units but the baseline is six for that category and I think we need to see what six looks like on this tract. And I think we need to see what ten looks like on this tract. And I don't know whether just in looking through I'm not sure that there are any models that actually show us what the maximum -- this built out to the maximum entitlements with both the baseline number as well as with the density bonus and I really believe that with the [10:18:28 AM] price of real estate the way it is that we're going to see when the tracts redevelop at the maximum of their entitlements, not the minimum. So I would also like to see that with -- I'd like to see that perspective with existing one story houses on either side because that is the conditions on the ground in some of the areas that I represent that have been mapped for rm1. So I think it's very helpful as we try to communicate with our community members about what the -- what this would look like or could look like on the ground, I think it is important for them to see that mapped with the existing entitlements. And then I'd like to just ask -- circle back to a couple of -- couple things that have come up before. As you talked about some of the recommendations that will be coming out in the report on November 25, I want to be really clear on whether there are any other changes proposed for -- I [10:19:29 AM] know, Mr. Parks you mentioned a few times that in the transition Zones typically two of the five have been mapped for rm1 and three of the five have been mapped for r2. As I've mentioned in every session we've -- sorry. I'm sorry. R4, yeah, thank you. I keep getting the codes confused. As I've mentioned in every work session we've had that just isn't the case in nearly -- in most of the areas I represent. It is -- and we can continue to have this conversation, but I think at some point I hope we have enough minutes allocated to councilmembers to really talk about that, that while that may be true in some of the other council districts, there are 14 tracts, 16 tracts, I mean there are -- the instances where there are two to five, where we've actually mapped -- where you have actually mapped two to five are very few. So is the intention then to standardize that and make that two to five in all the transition Zones? Is that something that we'll [10:20:32 AM] be able to -- can I let the community members know that that's a recommendation that is going to come back in the report, that those actually be standardized so that every district that was transition Zones mapped. >> At this point we're not recommending changing our criteria. We are recommending reductions based on context but not to the criteria that we applied, which was to be equitable on -- with all of the different, unique and complicated configurations of our streets and frontage. So at this point we're not looking at a different criteria, but we are looking at context sensitive reductions. >> Tovo: Do you have a sense of whether any of those will happen in any of the multitude of areas where they far exceed five? >> Yes, it will. >> Tovo: In district 9. >> Have the effect of reductions, yes. >> Tovo: Okay. >> But I couldn't tell you [10:21:35 AM] at this point how much and whether it would go down to five, for example. It may in certain areas when we look at the reductions we're teeing up and also looking at what the planning commission recommended in fine-tuning on November 25. >> Tovo: Again, I hope that we can find time within this group to really address that. I don't think we ever -- I mean, the council direction to do two to five never said if it's two to five on this slide and the equivalent space on the other equals tract 15 on the other side. I contend that that should be addressed. And as that is the proposal at the moment, I would like to request that we have some mapping of those areas, and I can potentially suggest a few so that we can see what that looks like, what that could look like on the ground if you had redevelopment of a significant number of tracts where you have, you know, currently one story houses and ads or duplexes or [10:22:37 AM] very small-scale four units kinds of complexes and then for areas back mapped to have between six and ten and then four to eight units behind it so people can get a realistic sense of the extent of the changes that are being suggested in very particular areas of the city but not citywide. And then have you contemplated -- did the planning commission recommend any kinds of recommendations that would prevent against the accumulation of lots? So along some of these areas where you have rm zoning, my thought is that on some of these tracts which are currently, you know, basic 5500 square foot lots, that it would be hard to achieve ten units in that space. However, it might be more likely you could achieve 20 if you aggregated it with [10:23:39 AM] the lot next to it. So have you contemplated that? Are there any recommendations that would prevent against that so we don't have these tracts just adding two and three and creating -- just redeveloping them all together? As much larger scale apartment complexes. That's not the intent of the direction. >> So in the staff proposal that came out on October 25, which planning commission incorporated, we included based on community feedback a recommendation that the use of unified development agreements, which is basically a tool that the city has long had in place that allows in certain instances lots to be treat the as a single site, that that be limited to two lots. So we included a limitation on that for the transition area Zones. But then as far as [10:24:40 AM] preventing subdivision, the subdivision process electric used, we have not looked at that and that would I think be a difficult thing to do. But certainly the subdivision process opens the development up to -- you know, that's a more extensive process than just using a unified development agreement. And in recognition of sort of the potential that das if not limited to be used to create a dense pattern of development we proactively propose to limit that to two. >> Tovo: Thank you. I missed that change in your report. I think that, too -- I think that would be the third request I have in terms of modeling that we see what that looks like to have lots two aggregated and then again the maximum built out on those, the maximum number of units that is included within the baseline and then with the affordable housing bonus. Thanks very much. I know that you're working and getting lots of good recommendations from our preservation community about the preservation incentive. [10:25:41 AM] And I hope that that's -- and I have some ideas about that as well based on my conversations. I think it's very important and it sounds like the will that everyone has to really make sure that that preservation incentive truly preserves the existing structure for a reasonable period of time, and so I hope that we can, too, talk about what that looks like when people violate it so that we don't have a situation where, you know, all of those walls are suddenly gone or they're mostly gone and then, you know, development proceeds on there. So one thing that I think should be considered is what the impact is on your ability to actually use the other structures on that site. If you've made use of the preservation incentive, I think you -- and then you go ahead and violate it or demolish more of the house than is allowed I think it should be very -- we should have very tight restrictions, including potentially you can't get a certificate of occupancy for that third structure. The second one I think you [10:26:42 AM] should because in most cases you already have the ability to do two units on that site but if you're using the preservation incentive -- actually that's not the case for many of our sf-2 properties that would be converting to a 3 with the preservation bonus. Anyway, something along those lines should be important, to really make sure our preservation bonus has teeth. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Nine and a half minutes. I think Kathie brings up kind of the gaming of the system issue with respect to tearing down and leaving two studs up, and as a recurrent thing that I see here as well. And maybe there's a way for us to catalog those things, the kind of the gaming things that feel like abuse to us. There's also the one where you build a duplex but one of the sides of the flux really isn't anything other than a wet bar, pool room for the duplex and it's really small and it's not really a dwelling. I've read the definition of dwelling. Maybe that needs to be tightened up, although [10:27:42 AM] reading it I'm not sure how you do that and I'm not sure how someone gets away with doing the pool house with the definition we already have. But to deep track of those -- keep track of those kind of gaming things because I think those are real touch points in the community. Pio. By the way that was an additional minute for me. Go ahead, Pio. >> Renteria: My question is -- and I really want to thank you all for all that information that y'all have given us. And I've learned a lot. So what do you mean about r3 corridor lots? What are those? >> R3 is a zone that allows three units by right, up to three units. It's a residential scale zone. And what we've learned from testing is that because corner lots, the way they're [10:28:44 AM] configured, a lot of times they're a bit larger and configured in a different way that they lend themselves to full use of the r3. So that would be a good way to subtly add more capacity throughout our city and I'd ask Peter to add to that if you'd like. >> Just as a way of following council direction in high opportunity areas to find opportunities for missing middle because of the attributes of corners as annick was just describing, this is -- what it also would allow then is the design of three units, let's say, one unit might face one street and two units faces the other street. So it really is a -- from a design perspective it's actually a very useful way to scale down essentially the effect of buildings on these corner conditions. >> Renteria: Okay. [10:29:44 AM] Now this new code also, like, if you have an Adu and back then when you were building them they required parking garages on the bottom floor, you couldn't build livable space on the first floor, [indiscernible] If you were building a garage apartment. Are we doing away with the requirement of keeping those garage apartments? I mean, the garage itself. >> Mayor adler:go ahead. >> I couldn't see the red. >> Mayor Adler: That's okay. >> Ms. Alter Wendy [indiscernible] Planning and zoning. Yes, we removed the requirement of where the Adu can be placed on the lot, including it can be inside, outside, attached, not attached, and it doesn't have to be above the garage. It can just be on the ground [10:30:45 AM] floor if you wanted it to be. >> Renteria: Also on the single-family houses that have garages there's people that have been converting them into rooms. Are they gonna be able to do that? I mean, right now I know it's -- I don't think it's legal, but they have closed off their garages and converted them into a room, basic living room. Do you know if that's gonna be allowed or. . . >> I believe garage conversions is something we're still looking into. If you did a building permit and got all your requirements it could be an internal Adu, but I know that there was some questions about garage conversions a few years ago, so we can look further into that. But internal ads are definitely allowed. So if you converted your garage with a building permit that would be permitted. >> Renteria: Okay. Thank you. >> Councilmember Renteria, I think that as long as there was a way to accommodate parking and all the other [10:31:49 AM] regulatory requirements, a garage could -- but I mean for the overall site, a garage conversion would be possible, but you'd have to make sure that doing that didn't render you in violation of other requirements. >> Renteria: Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Three and three quarter minutes. All right. So I want to now move us again obviously everybody can use the time however they want to -- I'm sorry, Ann, your light was on? Okay. Go ahead. >> Kitchen: I'm sorry I was late but I'm focusing on asking them about -- >> Mayor Adler: That's fine. You have 14 minutes. You can use it however you want to. >> Kitchen: Quick question on slide 21 about the transition areas. I'm trying to compare real quickly, but you're using a different term here. You're talking about reducing transition areas in susceptible early and dynamic stages of gentrification, which is a different term than what we used in our council direction. I don't think there's a difference in looking at the maps, but I can't quite tell. Can you just tell me if [10:32:49 AM] there's a difference between using these titles and using the term vulnerable, which is what we used in our direction? >> Yes, there is quite a difference. >> Kitchen: There's a difference from geography perspective? >> Yeah. >> Kitchen: My question is why are you using different criteria than what we specified in our direction? >> Allow me to clarify. The vulnerable area is the umbrella for which susceptible, early and dynamic lie within. So we are absolutely following council direction to use vulnerable areas in our October 4 release, we used vulnerable areas as the way to describe the geography it's an immense geography in the eastern crescent and other sparse areas census tracts. And if you dig into the report, there are geographies within that whole sewage of an umbrella of areas vulnerable to [10:33:49 AM] displacement as part of generate extrapolation they're in varying stages and there's five stages. It goes from susceptible -- >> Kitchen: Ative right here. I'm looking at it. I understand all that. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. Just because our time is tight, what I'm really trying to understand is, is -- I understand these are a subset of vulnerable. So my question is, by taking this subset, are you missing some areas of geography that are on the other map? Because there's two maps. There's a vulnerable map and there's a gentrification map. So you can go back and check if you're not clear right now. But that's what I'm trying to understand because I'm looking back and forth between the two maps right now, and there seem to be some differences in geography between them, depending on which map you use, and so that's really just my question, is am I reading that right? And are there differences? [10:34:52 AM] And if so, are you leaving out areas that you would if they were vulnerable or are you adding areas? So that's what I'm trying to understand. And, you know, you can answer that off-line if you're not entirely clear right now. Or it sounds like -- looks like -- >> Yeah, we'll get back. So really quickly, Erica, neighborhood hour, I have discussed with the authorses of uprooted and there is a difference between the vulnerable areas which basically are our -- are places where there are vulnerable populations at a higher rate, but those areas may not be gentrifying. And so the other maps with susceptible, et cetera, those are places that are currently gentrifying. So that's the difference. >> Kitchen: Okay. But I noticed that you don't include all of the categories that are on the gentrification map. So you chose some of the categories that are on the [10:35:52 AM] gentrification map but you didn't include the one that says continued loss, for example. You only include the susceptible, early and dynamic. You didn't include them all. >> Initially we did, and we did -- >> Kitchen: Okay. >> We did not map as much or as -- as intense Zones in all of the areas. So when we're talking about -- so further reduce might be a better word in front of that second bullet and that is the language we report. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Is that as we continue to get input from the community and concerns in October, we wanted to look at further reducing. When we looked at how we might do that, which is great, which is -- I'm glad you're asking these questions because that's the point of as we move towards November 25, is to look at these areas that give us more information. That's why these three are listed. But we would still continue -- have them and continue the approach that we took in the later stages. [10:36:53 AM] >> Kitchen: Okay. So why would you not further reduce in the continued loss area? Because that's one of the areas on gentrification. >> Laura, planning and zoning. So the continued losses are not identified as vulnerable in this study so those did not get the vulnerable transition area Zones. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> And then the rest of them got the just r4 zoning. >> Kitchen: Okay. That's what was -- what was confusing me. So -- okay. So there's areas on the gentrification map that weren't mapped at the lower end because they weren't on the vulnerable map? Am I understanding? Okay. So now you're taking -- you're further reducing the areas that you -- that you used before from the vulnerable -- map? [10:37:54 AM] Am I understanding correctly? >> Yes. So the late stage, which is part of the [indiscernible] Map would stay the same and the word further reduce and dynamic, early and susceptible. >> Kitchen: Those aren't on the vulnerable map. They're on the gentrification map. But I hear what you're saying. >> But the overlap between those is 100%? >> Kitchen: I'm sorry. Can you say that one more time? >> So susceptible to late on the gentrification map, which includes susceptible, early, dynamic, late, are identified as vulnerable. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Continued loss is the only gentrification stage that's not identified as vulnerable on the map. >> Kitchen: Okay. All right. That makes it clear. So then I just wanted to mark that I would like to have a conversation as councilmember tovo said about the two to five lots, and I just want to mark that -- I think we need to find a time to talk about [10:38:54 AM] that? Because I'm seeing the same thing in some of my areas, where it is deeper than two to five lots and it's deeper in areas that are vulnerable. So. . . >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Further discussion? All right. Just by way of prompt, we had six areas and I'll just call these areas. Again, you have the time that you have to use. Residential house scale Zones, transition Zones, residential multi-unit, mixed use, main street, and the other Zones. The fourth is affordable housing, density bonuses and the like, fifth one is non-zoning, which would be drainage, water quality. And then the process within the code itself, site plan, subdivision, variances, appeals and that kind of stuff. Again, you don't have to speak on every area if you don't want to and you can use your time however you want to. The prompt right now is the residential house scale Zones for people to ask questions. I was with some people in the neighborhood the other [10:39:55 AM] day and they were commenting we had done a good job of not upzoning existing housing stock that had multiple units. But there was a cutoff point where we stopped and below that we didn't preserve those units. And one of the questions was, does it make sense for us to try heard, take a more specific look or as part of our process between December and February identifying where there might be a quad somewhere that we want to also seek to preserve by not the upzoning. Can you talk about that issue? What we did with respect to that and what the thinking was. Did my question make sense? >> Yeah. The data that we used only [10:40:55 AM] captures five units and higher, and that was the data that was available to us to not upzone what we could think of as market rate affordable multi-unit communities. And so we can look to additional data as we continue to fine-tune where there might be existing fourplexes, as you said, or triplexes as you said. I think we'll need every inch of preservation we can get so we can certainly see working with our housing department how we might do that, and real estate department. >> Mayor Adler: Great. Thank you. >> Tovo: Mayor. >> Mayor Adler: Yes. >> Tovo: If I may, I know in some of the neighborhoods I represent they were very careful and did inventories of their housing stock in the last three or four months so I think this is an example of where the community and the people who actually live in the neighborhoods can be of extreme value in helping provide that level of information. >> Thank you for that reminder. I do have maps from many in Hancock and Hyde park who [10:41:55 AM] did submit, and we'll look at those as well as what additional data we might find. >> Tovo: I know heritage also has mapped their inventory and some of the other neighborhoods as well. >> Okay. >> Tovo: As we've -- in the past done that kind of context-based planning where we've indicted the people who live in an area and work in an area or have businesses in an area come in and provide information, I think this is a place where we need to make room for that kind of community-based planning. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Three quarters. Jimmy. >> Flannigan: One mapping thing related to house scale/residential, there are a handful of tiny little condo develops developed under sf-6 that resulted in individually platted lots, not contiguous condo regime that got mapped into r4 in areas where there is no r3, no transit, no other types of reasons to have r4 and it [10:42:56 AM] would be good to go back and think should those be a r2c that have a smaller lot size when it's to make more contiguous with our other objective. I've got those specifically in canyon creek and in river place but in other areas where the sf-6 was not individually platted I think it appropriately got rm1 so I think this is just kind of an interesting sf-6 translation issue. >> Mayor Adler: Three quarters. Other comments? Greg. >> Casar: I appreciate the refinement of the preservation bonus and preservation incentive. I said this in the last work session but I really would love the staff's help and people that are modeling and testing this help to really try to make it work. I mean, it's something that a lot of people seem to have a lot of -- of energy and excitement around, adding that kind of housing into the city. So I just want to reinforce that I think it has a lot of promise and everybody putting work together on it [10:43:56 AM] makes sense to me. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. One quarter. Anybody else want to speak to this topic while we have folks here? >> Kitchen: Which topic? >> Mayor Adler: I was just on the residential house scale Zones and maps. I was in one of our downtown neighborhoods, and someone asked the question as to could we make this whole thing simpler but doing rf3 throughout the city and just doing r3 throughout the city and I don't know how that would impact any of the numbers, I don't know how crazy an idea that would be because I haven't looked at it at all but I just throw that out there because I hadn't heard anybody suggest that simplicity. >> We have not looked at that. But we certainly can discuss it. >> Mayor Adler: I just don't know what that would do to [10:44:56 AM] [indiscernible] In the city overall,ing and so I just throw that out. I haven't looked at it. Kathie. >> Tovo: I'm interested in thinking about that kind of an approach. I think that is -- you know, as I thought about at the current r2, that creates -- once it creates provisions for that front structure to actually remain so that we're not losing our existing housing stock but you're allowing people to add two units in to the back in a way we've talked about all along adds invisible density I think would have far less impact on the wholesale redevelopment of certain areas than going to the rm1 and r4 and so I think that is -- I think that is -- that kind of an approach I think is a much better one. I had another question but it's not immediately in my head. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. One quarter. [10:45:57 AM] Anything else on this prompt? Yes, Alison. >> Alter: Thank you. I think your models cover the need to recalibrate the F.A.R. And we've had a lot of conversation about the size. I just wanted to inject some history that I've been digging into a little bit more, which is the history of the mcmansion ordinance, you know, back in I think it was 2006, the council actually declared an emergency for something like months because the houses were too big, but it wasn't just single-family houses. It was duplexes that were too big and it has more that the duplexes were too big than the single families. And, you know, we have to just neap mind that the mcmansion ordinance was not about aesthetics. We think of it that way now in hindsight, but it was about compatibility. It was about the economic and the physical and there's lessons that we can be learned -- that we can learn from that for how we are [10:46:59 AM] thinking about the kind of duplexes that we're getting, you know, whether these are going to be economic and affordable and helping, do they actually need to be -- to achieve our goals? And the bigger we make them, the less they meet our goals in terms of affordability because bigger is more expensive, and there -- you know, there was such an outcry in 2006 over the size of duplexes that they had to call an emergency, and so I just want to underscore that as we're thinking about calibrating, that we need to remember the history of where we got here so that we can do better moving forward. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Minute and a half. Anybody else on this prompt? Okay. The next prompt we have is to talk about transition Zones. Does anybody want to comment [10:48:02 AM] on transition Zones? Leslie. >> Pool: Yeah, just to follow up on some of the comments that we've all made already this morning, I'd like to see staff redistribute the transition areas to align with the growth concept maps that are attached to our comprehensive plan. These would be for areas that aren't currently zoned f25 or that have existing regulating plans like [indiscernible] Ranch, north burnet gateway. I'm looking at the missing middle piece and looking for the equitable distribution between the r4 and rm1. There are some districts that don't get very much. If we move in the direction the mayor just mentioned, which is to zone everybody r3, that would deal with equitable because everybody would be treated the same but right now the way the Zones are distributed and the missing middle housing is not. So if you guys could focus on that, that just is a [10:49:02 AM] reteing up of a request already made. We have the [indiscernible] You need to be looking at where the population is expected to really tic up over the next ten to 40 years when we are pulling these -- and that should be informing the equitable distribution question. You all have a copy of the demographer's population projections, I'm hoping? >> Yes, we have access to the projections. >> Pool: Great. We might also want to put up that on the ldc website, the link for that. So and that speaks to our concerns about access from transit with our corridors and how much housing is being built in areas where we have a locus of activity like our regional centers and our town centers. Thanks. >> Mayor Adler: That was a minute and three quarters. [10:50:05 AM] Anything else on transition Zones? >> Ellis: I have a quick one. Councilmember pool, is that based off of our current land use planning or is it -- I haven't looked at it. I apologize. >> Pool: So the demographer used census data so these are population numbers that according to the footnotes, census 2010 data used to draw council districts in 2013 and consequently reflect the population gained from annexations during that period and then he has other footnotes in here, Brian Robinson is the one tasked by the city to do these presentations -- or these data assumptions, and this would also be informing the conversation that's I think the redistricting folks will be having in about a year or so. But everybody should have this. I think it was sent out to everybody. >> Ellis: That was exactly my thought, that we're currently going through that process. So I appreciate you [10:51:05 AM] mentioning tt. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. That's three quarters. Ann. >> Kitchen: I wanted to drill down and make sure I'm understanding the criteria that are applied for the transition Zones because we were talking earlier that it wasn't -- there was some complexity to the two to five lots, so in other words it wasn't just the two to five lots. So and I understand that at this point in time you're not going to actually change the criteria but you're looking for at some context sensitivity. So help me understand why you wouldn't change the criteria? And I don't mean that as a you should. I'm just trying to understand the thinking. What is the thinking around not changing the criteria? In other words, what is the criteria -- what does the criteria get us in terms of our goals that would make you say you wouldn't consider actually changing the criteria back to just [10:52:05 AM] two to five lots? Is my question clear? >> Yeah the question is clear. Well, right now, given that we have the capacity analysis and where it stands, we are focused on looking at the context sensitivity and how we might further reduce in response to the comments we've heard here and from the community as well about the two to five lots and then have a further conversation from there and see how we can -- like I said earlier, make up offend for that capacity in other ways that are acceptable and in line from what we've heard from the community might be acceptable and from you all. So that would be the thinking. Also that we're still trying to -- we have a slide we're trying to bring up but I don't know if we can about -- that we showed the planning commission about on the equitable nature of the process that we used. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> So if we can get it up as soon as the folks come back we'll try and do that and bring it back. >> Kitchen: Okay. So does the -- are you -- [10:53:06 AM] does that mean -- I'm trying to understand. Does that mean you're thinking that if you just kept two to five lots that that wouldn't be enough capacity? Is that what you're saying? >> Yes. >> Kitchen: Okay. That wouldn't be enough capacity as opposed to yield? >> Correct. >> Kitchen: Okay. Using the way that you've analyzed capacity currently? >> Correct. >> Kitchen: Okay. Which is something for another discussion because I would -- I'm concerned that the way that capacity has been counted that it's actually giving us yield, and so we're comparing yield numbers to a target that the council set as capacity. So, I mean, we can get -- I know -- that's not on our calendar right now to talk about capacity, but I'm just teeing up that that's something that I want to have a conversation about. So let me ask you the other question then. Just so I understand -- oh, is this -- you brought it up [10:54:07 AM] on the -- I want to understand what you mean by equitable and -- >> We're going to show you a slide right now . >> Kitchen: Great. >> Go ahead. You can do it Peter. >> Here's the situation of -- if we had a perfect grid, so the corridor and then the current -- residential corridor, council direction was two to five lots depending on how many criteria are met. For example, if all criteria are met it goes back five lots. It's a symmetric corridor. If your criteria met two lots and in areas most vulnerable, not using the rm1 but just with the lower density, the r4. And so as staff prepared the maps they looked at this distance of sort of newly [10:55:07 AM] what is sort of the equivalent of five lots deep, and what happens is if you take a bandwidth in that situation on the one side, your left side, you would end up with 35 missing middle lots. If we went literally five lots deep on the other side where the lots turn, you would get ten missing middle lots. And so the way the staff looked at it is saying how do we capture as equitable number of lots on either side of the corridor? And so if one counts -- and, again, on the right side, you see it is not literally five lots deep. It is more. But in terms of what it captures in that bend with -- along the corridor, it ends up in this situation 30. So what the staff has drawn [10:56:08 AM] here is lots that are exact -- the residential lots are exactly the same, but as the lot turns you get a different result. If you literally count five lots on that side, this is how many you'd get on either side of the corridor versus this. >> Kitchen: So what did you use as the average lot size to come up -- did you do this -- did you apply this everywhere or were you using an average lot size? I mean, in other words does this distance actually vary depending on happens on the ground or -- >> Ye. So when we look at a particular corridor, we would look at the lot configuration on the left if it was present. Then we would use that measurement along the corridor. And so that's why the depth varies from corridor to corridor. You're kind of looking -- if there's a condition of the corridor that looks like the [10:57:09 AM] left, where it's the long side of the lots it's five lots deep or three if we were doing three on that door, we would establish that distance and apply it else where will to all the other lot configurations along that corridor so it had some context sensitivity to it. >> Kitchen: How did you decide which side of the corridor to count the five lots in? In other words, you could have matched the left side of the corridor to the right side of the corridor on there, but you didn't. You matched the right side to the left side. So how did you decide which side to use? I mean, what was the criteria to do that? >> Is so as we started to look at the city, we found that the three to five lots using the long side of the parcel would still be within the walk shed to the corridor and it would give -- make it easy to give a certain range. So if you had the five lots [10:58:11 AM] on the right, which is the short side of the lot, on the other side it would be one, maybe two lots and you wouldn't be able to adjust based on lot configuration. But the more -- I mean, the primary reason was we were staying within that walk shed to the corridor. >> Kitchen: Quarter mile? Is that what you're saying? >> Yeah, it's less than -- so it's less than a five minute walk. The maximum was 850 feet, and so it's less than a five minute walk in those situations so we applied those distances. >> Kitchen: Okay. So really the -- so really the -- I'm just trying to get down to the criteria. So the criteria that was applied was really the walk shed, not to the two to five? Or it was a combination thereof? >> [Off mic] >> Kitchen: Okay. All right. Then I'd like to see one of these where the streets come in at an angle. I don't know if you all have [10:59:12 AM] that right now. So -- if you don't we can look at it later but I'd like to see how it works coming in at an angle. And then, let's see. So -- by equitable, you -- why -- what is the thinking -- what is the thinking and what's the criteria around both sides of the corridor have to be the same distance? >> We're trying to maximize the walkability to the corridor where we're guiding growth to serve the corridor and the multimodal investments and other amenities on the corridor while staying true to balancing the capacity and -- >> Kitchen: Okay. Sounds to me like it's more waiting on the walk shed aspect of it than the two to five speak to of it, if you were having to weight those [11:00:19 AM] different criteria? I'm getting into too much weeds here. What I'd love to see is if there's a written description of exactly how you apply it. Because I'm hearing different criteria and hearing that you need it to balance and that sort of thing and I appreciate all that. I'm really trying to understand exactly what the criteria was and how it was balanced. So. Something written that describes that? >> Yes. It was one of our most recent or early on blogs. >> Kitchen: Independents if I didn't see that but I'm talking about in detail. What I would like to see is these are the five criteria that we used. This is how we weighted them and this is how -- you know, so I can understand from a policy perspective -- I understand our policy, the way we adopted things didn't get down into the complexities and what's actually on the ground so when we said two to five lots that was probably a more simple way of saying a policy without understanding [11:01:20 AM] all the -- I just want to understand -- I understand the staff needed to -- you had to look the at the complexities. >> Mayor Adler: Ten minutes now, so you're combined 17 and a half minutes. Let me move it around so people get a chance to ask questions. >> Kitchen: My request is simply I'd like to see that level of detail in a document that explains it -- >> We have a technical document that we -- that be we will reduce [indiscernible] But we can send you the technical document. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Mayor Adler: Kathie. >> Tovo: Thank you, councilmember kitchen. I think that was a helpful dialogue. I think what is the kind of general -- the general conversation around this is still not getting -- is still not providing answers to the mapping that I'm seeing, and so even the -- you know, the two lots on -- I mean, the five lots on one side equating to 14 on the other does not explain the mapping I'm seeing in many [11:02:21 AM] areas. So what I would suggest, I'm going to submit areas to the q&a portal and I'd encourage my colleagues if you have areas it's not clear how the transition policy direction was applied that we do that and then we have a conversation about what's really -- what the actual mapping looks like with relationship to this. And I -- especially since it sounds like some of this -- some of the transition depths were extended to help meet the capacity objective, I think it's absolutely critical that we do -- that we schedule very, very soon the topic that councilmember kitchen mentioned, that we really have a conversation in this room about the extent to which yield -- the difference between yield and capacity, and I think what would help me, I asked questions about capacity through the q&a, but I think what I really would like to know is how many -- how many properties were -- are proposed for rezoning for those two transition zone categories and the relationship between those [11:03:22 AM] total numbers of rezoned properties, district by district, and the yield? Because I think what we -- what I'm sensing from these conversations is that you have mapped far more than the yield. You have mapped far more than the capacity goals because we're assuming the yield is gonna be smaller and I think that's really what I need to better understand. So I will submit that as a q&a -- is that accurate? Is that an accurate assumption, that the proposed rezonings in the transition zone are more than the 397? >> I don't understand your question. But you can submit it and we'll ask for clarification if we need it. >> Tovo: Okay. Thanks. But, I mean, it just gets to the point that councilmember kitchen said, that there's a difference between the capacity objective that the policy -- that was in the policy document and the expected yield, and so I believe from the conversations we've had and the information we've gotten [11:04:23 AM] back so far, that what's been mapped is more than the capacity. >> That's not my understanding. >> Tovo: We can get -- >> It's a more sophisticated feasibility study than just a raw calculation of the different Zones and what can be produced by the raw age rath of those Zones by unit. It definitely looked at land values and highest and best use so it's a very data-driven sophisticated capacity analysis but we still expect the yield would be less than the 397,000 and we can certainly explain that when you submit your question. >> Mayor Adler: Three minutes. Mayor pro tem. >> Garza: I have concerns about the suggestion for y'all to look into r3 everywhere because it's an interesting suggestion in that, you know, there was a lot of talk about Minneapolis doing away with single family, and my assumption would be if we had started there, there would be a lot of pushback, [11:05:25 AM] but now seeing corridors and the intensity, now people are suggesting r3 everywhere, and I want to get us back to the goal of how this is supposed to be align with the asmp. And the whole purpose of these kinds of transition Zones and these -- this intensity at the corridors is to put people closer to transit, to get us closer to our 50/50 mode share. This is not for staff. I'm looking at you but this is more for my colleagues, to have people closer to grocery stores, closer to parks. So I think r3 everywhere is a great idea, but that doesn't mean we don't put more density on the corridors so people can live near things, and so councilmembers are not pushing for five years to try to get a grocery store to people who have been asking for it for ten years. That was the whole point. So r3 everywhere? Great. But maybe that means less -- a little less intensity and [11:06:25 AM] that gets us to our housing goals number-wise, but I just want to bring us back to the purpose of this type of process was to get people closer and align with our 50/50 mode share, to fight congestion, get people off the roads, get them on our buses, so I don't want staff to waste time going and seeing what r3 everywhere is going to do because that was not what we were trying to do ever, I don't think. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. That's a minute. Could you address the residential corridor transition zone thinking, now, that you're going through? >> Yes. So with the comments that we've heard, we are looking at the transit priority corridor, imagine Austin corridors that are primarily [11:07:27 AM] residential in nature, and also looking at -- per the planning commission recommendations, they also fine tuned how we might look at capital metro's service and plan service. And not only looking at where there's residential frontage but where the transit priority network maybe doesn't have as many steps and it's used as a turnaround, for example, and really getting more context sensitive in those areas for reductions. There's a lot of work to be done on those residential corridors to reduce. >> Mayor Adler: So one of the questions that I hear is on a residential corridor we have rm1 mapped and then we have r2 behind it. Is there any consideration to taking out the rm1 and just keeping it r2 on residential transit corridors and counting from that first one back as opposed to the others? Are you contemplating or looking at any of those issues? All four rather. >> Yes. [11:08:27 AM] So it would be both the -- yes, both the reduction of the area by one lot or potentially more. We'd have to look at the context. And then also by way of the zoning and looking at reducing to r4 as well where it might be appropriate. >> Mayor Adler: Reduce it, so not doing rm1 on the corridor and just beginning with r4 or no? >> We're looking at both. We haven't landed on -- it might be appropriate in some areas to have the rm1 as the first lot, depending on the nature of the area. So those are both options at this time that we have not decided? >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Two and a half minutes. Thank you. >> It would be similar to this. Which is -- it would be doing mover what the staff has been doing okay, which in this case is [indiscernible] Rm1, the two residences r4, and in some areas it's only r4. So it's something very [11:09:30 AM] similar to that situation. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Thank you. Three minutes. Councilmember Casar and then back to Kathie. >> Casar: And, again, I want to emphasize in my view the term "Equitable" means closer to the idea of just than the idea of it being exactly the same, understanding that each of our districts -- each of our districts has a different amount of land area, the percentage of transition area in our area versus the gross number versus where there's gentrification versus where there hasn't been. To me just trying to say we have more similar level of transition area per district doesn't to me equate to equity so I think I appreciate that the council's direction earlier this year was centered on equity and that that's what the staff is grappling with and I look forward to, as we go through readings, keep trying to make it more eligible and that doesn't mean to me that we're going to keep trying to get the transition areas to look the same in each district but [11:10:30 AM] we'll try to get to the goals of maybe everybody's lives better. >> Mayor Adler: Kathie. That was three quarters. >> Tovo: I have a question. I heard you mention an idea about the transit priority network and transit vehicles, identifying areas that are opportunities for transit vehicles to turn around. Is that something you've described somewhere in a document or is that coming forward in your text later? >> That was described in the planning commission recommendation. Is that correct? As they made their deliberations. And it's an idea that we potentially agree with, and so -- >> Tovo: So that's where. >> -- You'll see it in the report. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. That was half a minute. Anything else on transition zone on this one before we move to the next prompt? Yes, Pio. >> Renteria: Yes. Can you explain to me how -- how did y'all go around looking at -- at historic districts and, like, we have one in -- I have one there [11:11:32 AM] in the willow street neighborhood up to waller street, it's a historic district where it's all these historic homes. How would r4 fit into one of those types of structures? >> So, councilmember Renteria, if a property has the H or HD in the zoning string that was retained, but those properties were also mapped as part of the transition area criteria. So they're mapped, but the -- any development would be subject to the limitations -- the appropriate historic limitations. >> Renteria: Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Say that again. If it's in a historic district the historic district trumps the transition zone issue? >> Absolutely. Any development would have to comply with the applicable historic guidelines. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. I know you've said that twice now and I really appreciate you doing that. Can somebody -- send me a [11:12:32 AM] one-line email to council that says that because I'm being asked to forward to people that's in writing so if you can give me a link to it or send a one-line email to council that says that, I think that would be helpful. Anybody else before we -- >> Tovo: Just on the lhd. I think it's very unclear how if -- if multiple, multiple properties within an lhd are rezoned for much higher capacity, I think it's very unclear to people how those two things are in line. I mean, the reality is it's -- I think we will see people coming and asking for removal of H zoning or -- and I don't know how the staff are going to balance those requests. I mean, it's unclear to me how that -- how people make use of their entitlements if they're within a lhd if their entitlements are three times what they are now. I don't know that that was also a question for the [11:13:32 AM] constituents who are asking you and me and Pio, you know, how those things mesh when you have very significant entitlements proposed for areas within a lhd. >> Mayor Adler: I was a conversation yesterday, that was half a minute, I was in one of the neighborhoods yesterday and if we can pass a rule and the rule applies, so even in a wide does disparity we would have a rule that is the rule. So your question is would we compromise the rule if someone came in and asked for an exemption or something like that. I think people were surprised to learn on the council action that we took last week with respect to the slab issue that we -- I mention that parenthetically. Leslie? >> Pool: Just to follow up on that, Ann and I put some additional topics up on the message board that we want to have a discussion of and so preservation account is the incentives there is one [11:14:33 AM] of them and as is the -- then the bonus also, the hrc preservation bonus. And I think mayor you mentioned something about we want to make sure that the preservation bonus is handled properly so it isn't seen as a loophole to get extra units. I just want to make sure that we also had a chance to note, which I guess we will at the end of our discussion today, about the other topics. So we're hoping these topics would happen the discussion on the 3rd and maybe the 4th as a wrap-up for anything we don't get time to. So tax impact, which is the discussion with the central appraisal district parking. I think Ann mentioned the [indiscernible] And protest rights. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. The next prompt we have is on residential multiunit mixed use, main street and [11:15:35 AM] other Zones text object map. If anyone wanted to make a comment there. This was the third comment, multiunit, main street, multizones. >> Flannigan: This is another map artifact and this might be some happening some other districts where some properties that got zonings what appears to be post annexation that got cs zonings because they needed to do -- they wanted to do a storage facility. And those got in some cases really translated to mu-5-b in areas that I don't think we inpinned to have mu-5- b because there's again no transit, it doesn't tick all the other boxes where where we're looking for intensity. So are something too long that I've found in my -- that's something I've found in my district where I think mixed use 3 would be more appropriate just thinking [11:16:36 AM] where some of the zonings that we have because some of the code is so born that you had to really shoe horn certain things in. We'll get to this on process about how staff wants us to daylight map issues. >> Mayor Adler: Now is a good time to do that, thanks. So that was one minute. Anybody else have a comment? Kathie I think was next. Kathie, you're at 14 and a half minutes, so you're over. So do it quick. >> Tovo: I'll be super quick. I think we should consider setting minimum requirements for housing within the mu categories so we don't run into the same issue we did with smu where you can create a vmu project. I think we should do the same thing of requiring housing be a component of that though that would likely require creating a new commercial category because there may be some commercial uses that aren't compatible with residential. I think it would be a value especially if we're making other changes, and potentially reducing the capacity in other [11:17:38 AM] categories. I think we could pick up some additional capacity in both of those categories in ways that would be very compatible with the original imagine Austin plan. >> Casar: Which two Zones were those one more time? >> Tovo: Am I allowed to speak? Mu and Ms. Mu would be set a minimum requirement for housing and Ms would be potentially need to be split into Ms and something else to capture the commercial Zones that are compatible with residential and those that we don't want to pair with residential. >> Mayor Adler: See, that quarter minute got charged to you. [Laughter]. The next prompt that we -- it's also curious in that conversation because I know sometimes you end up with multi-family, but you don't get like the little grocery stores underneath and motor we can have that closer to where people are living in dense communities I think the better. So I'm excited about that conversation. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. [11:18:38 AM] Quarter. Jimmy? >> Flannigan: One thing that we talked about on Thursday that several of us talked about is allowing more cup uses of the zoning case we had where we had to sue horn restaurant limited for a food truck that is headed for maybe rm maybe being more liberal with our cup designations and uses so it can be site to site in more of the rm and mu Zones. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. That's a quarter. Alison? >> Alter: I was in the restroom for a second, but I think councilmember tovo brought up the issue that we have areas that are currently zoned commercial only that now are being allowed residential and they're not required to have affordability which there was clear direction and this is happening in Ms and high opportunity areas particularly. So I want to make sure that we address that. I'm not sure where to put this under the categories we [11:19:39 AM] have, so something that's of concern to me and I believe that councilmember Flannigan also had raised it in an earlier session is that the current code has a development reserve category and the new proposed code does not carry that forward so there are properties that are zoned development reserve today that need some kind of new proposed zoning designation. Like some properties coned by hoa, they're zoned development reserve, but they've now been given the zoning of the adjacent properties but you can't build on them. So I think it would be better to be clear about what can be built there because there can be confusion over time. So it seems like we might need some kind of zoning code for that kind of unbuildable space. The ones I'm familiar with are open space, but I don't know what else -- I'd be comfortable with them being zoned some kind of open space category or preserve [11:20:39 AM] or whatever is appropriate, but I think we need a new category for that. >> We've been looking at perhaps use f-25 in the Dr development reserve for that and that was input we've heard from meetings in your district. So we are keeping those Dr. >> Alter: There's a difference in my mind of keeping something f25 and calling something Dr. I think I would prefer for it to be called Dr and have a category where it's Dr, but some of it is conditions Faye be f-25. But I think it would be somewhat clearer. I don't want to get rid of conditions if they have other conditions that I'm not aware of. But it seems like it's sort of a category noose different than f25 -- that's different than f25 in some way. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. That's two and a quarter. So the next area that we had was affordability as a [11:21:39 AM] prompt. I'll repeat again what I said earlier, there's a lot in this code. One, I think you did generally a really good job of carrying forward the intent and policy of maximizing opportunities for affordability. I remain real concerned about how fact dependent these things are as they go through and I would urge again that we have the expertise independent on staff to be able to calibrate correctly and be able to adjust that yearly as the market changes. And I think we should be, and I support what Alison said in terms of if we're letting someone get residential in an otherwise commercial area to take a look at that as an opportunity to be able to get affordability. For me in part, it goes back to the calibration issue. If getting residential increases the value of the property, then there's value [11:22:39 AM] captured there that we ought to be able to then fly to affordability. But someone is going to need to take a look at and to confirm that once you get the residential use it actually increases value because if it doesn't then we're just setting ourselves up to a place where we'll never get the residential ability. So it has to be calibrated in a way, but always being mindful to get us affordability every place that it can calibrate and work that way I think is an important thing. That was a minute. Greg? >> Casar: I'm inclined for is to take existing vmu sites and to generally leave the affordability sections on those the same. So that we are better calibrating and coming up with solutions for the expanded affordability areas as opposed to the existing -- it's not that we wouldn't change anything about existing vmu sites, [11:23:41 AM] but essentially to keep the affordability requirements and provisions intact because we are so expanding the affordability bonus program, which I think has you guys saying we're increasing that capacity by six times the number of low income units. I think that's great. Sing we should be focusing on continually calibrating the new things that we create rather than -- rather than going and editing some of the existing programs. Around I know it's not that simple, but if you all can think about how to make that sort of thing work I think that would be helpful for folks because now people are starting to look backwards and say on this existing site is it better, is the affordability requirement better or worse than it used to be? And I think there's so much promise in the new stuff that if y'all can find a way to leave that program more intact on existing sites and then use the expansion. >> Mayor Adler: Ann? >> Kitchen: I think you are talking about the same thing I was asking about. [11:24:41 AM] Let me just double-check. I had heard that the vmu right now requires a minimum number and that was one of the things we lost in this. Is that the kind of thing you're talking about? >> Casar: In some places and I think it is better to leave it alone [indiscernible]. >> Kitchen: I would also look cos, there's a few places we put the co's in place with the affordability that didn't seem to carry over. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Anything else in the affordability prompt here? Yes. >> Alter: I'm not sure if this goes in the code or not, but something that councilmember tovo and I have been talking about is the creation of a fund to allow homeowners to access low interest loans to build actionry dwelling units -- accessory dwelling units. Access to capital is actually a way of getting the ads. I'm not sure if it goes in [11:25:42 AM] the code or somewhere else. >> Mayor Adler: To that end we had talked about at one point having established Adu plans and things so that it was much easier for someone to be able to build ads. I think it may have been something that you brought way back when two years ago, but to have standardized things so that someone could pretty sum marily go through the administrative process because plans had already been approved. >> Flannigan: To that point that might have more impact, are there things in the code that allows ads to be sold as separate property, fee simple, blah, blah, blah, so that we might allow a substandard lot to be carved out because it makes it easier for a real estate transaction that would help develop a capital market that I think is more what I'm thinking about in terms of the code impact that would facilitate it. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. That's a quarter. Yes, mayor pro tem. >> Garza: You may be referring to the homestead initiative what was kind of [11:26:42 AM] separate but there is an organization, the alley flat initiative does exactly that. They offer programs and free services for people, but the problem even if you offer low interest loans, it's still a matter of the person's income and like low interest loans doesn't -- can help if you qualify for a loan even to begin with. So I think that's the biggest hurdle, but I think it is an important as one of our future topics, while it might not be directly related to land -- to the code, people do have valid concerns about how they can maximize the benefits of their property and be able to stay there. So I think we need -- we do need to have a discussion on what programs we have available as we're moving this forward. You know, developers get the evil developers, but they are people that build [11:27:45 AM] houses. And so if we can somehow educate homeowners -- and that kind of was the point of the homestead exemption and we'll have to go back and see how we can talk about that again because that was the idea is how do we get homeowners educated. Maybe it's a home equity loan they can get to build something. And maybe it's subdividing the lot where they sell a lot and then we talk about minimum lot sizes. But I think there are some -- there are some valid concerns and the more we can help homeowners realize that they can benefit from this and be able to stay in place, I think the easier we make this big change happen for austinites. >> Mayor Adler: Two minutes. Pio and then Alison. >> Renteria: And there is a way for homeowners to do those kind of things and it's through the state. [11:28:48 AM] Right now they condo their property out. I have one friend that he was thinking about moving out and I said why don't you? They had a lot on the corner and he had the lot right next to it. And they had -- we had vacated the alley. So it was very easy for him to vacate unit in the back and sell the one in front. He kept it for $350,000, kept the backyard and built a house there. Took the fence down between him and his dad. There are opportunities out there, but I don't think we have that in the city, do we? Where you can condo your house out? If you can look into that. >> I would just point out briefly that one of the planning commission recommendations was to look at utilizing a provision of state law that's intended to facilitate easier subdivisions for six or [11:29:48 AM] fewer lots and we're going work with the law department on exploring the possibility of that and in certain circumstances. And as you noted, councilmember Garza, that also implicates lot size in many contexts, so that would be something that we would have to address as well. But we will be -- in looking at the planning commission recommendation and preparing for first reading, that's something we'll be looking at. >> Alter: So in talking about codenext, I was talking about the code templates and how that would facilitate things and having the smaller adus. I just want us to make sure that as we're thinking about the code we're thinking about who we're creating these incentives for. Developers build houses after they displace the occupants who live there, so we need programs that create opportunities for the existing occupants to build the ads or to take [11:30:48 AM] advantage of the Adu being built. And there's some other things in the way that we have the current draft that really emphasize the developers as opposed to the person who lives in the house building the other thing. And obviously they have to have someone to build it, but in terms of who is being able to take advantage of it, there are different incentives that are being created by what we're doing, than we seem to be talking about. >> Mayor Adler: Do you have an example of that? >> Alter: Sure. Just as we were talking about if I have a how long and I want to preserve it and I want to build two units in back that could be these giant units, if I'm living in a 1400 square foot house that I want to preserve, I'm in on the going to have the the money to do the other part in back and I'm likely going to have to sell the whole lot to the developer. So that would be one example. And then the access with the ads, it takes a lot of capital for the average person to be able to build [11:31:50 AM] that Adu, particularly when we have the large size ads. Generally the stuff on the arm 4 and those -- on the rm 4 and generally those people can't build. If I'm in a 1200, 1400 square foot lot on an rm 4 I can't build a 10,000 square foot building on it and stay in one of those apartments because I won't be able to get the capital to do that. So I will be displaced if I'm in that situation. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Yes, Paige. >> Ellis: I didn't know if you had another comment. >> Garza: It's like I have to push back against the developers build stuff after people are displaced because there was just a zoning case in my district this last council meeting where nobody was even living there anymore and there is, I guess, a developer that is wanting to build units there to create housing. [11:32:55 AM] As well as developers also help people build ads. So the hyperbole is a bit much sometimes. >> Ellis: We spoke a few months about clarifying the process for ads and I don't think there was an action item out of it, but I didn't know if you had a brief update or could give us an update at a future work session on the understanding of making it easier for a general resident of than doesn't quite know the building process to be able to build something in an Adu especially in a district like mine it helps with aging in place where people may be ready to downsize out of a larger home, but still stay in their neighborhood and on their property. So I didn't know if that was in the works or if we just need to pull that back up at a future time. >> Councilmember Ellis, the planning commission's recommendation definitely [11:33:55 AM] speaks to the site plan process. This would be site plan exempt, but it also speaks to just generally facilitating permitting of missing middle housing. So that's definitely something we're going to look at. I don't know as that would entail any code changes. We've already tried to really streamline the universe of code requirements that the projects would have to meet, but I think at a minimum there could be a programmatic measure to address that and make it as user friendly and straightforward as possible. >> Ellis: I would appreciate that. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: That's a minute. Jimmy. >> Flannigan: I wanted to to reiterate what the mayor pro tem said because I agree with that. Sometimes developers are building a house because somebody got a job in another city or some person passed away and family doesn't want to keep the house. There's a lot of reasons why properties turn over. And it's important to keep that in mind. In fact, the more we allow people to maximize the use of their properties the less pressure there will be on [11:34:55 AM] folks who don't want to redevelop because the folks who are willing to sell who don't want to live there will sell cheaper than the ones who are fighting to stay in their homes. So there is a benefit to liberalizing the zoning where you put that pressure where it can flow easiest. That's where capital will go. That's what we heard from the neighborhoods surrounding west campus on Thursday. That increasing entitlement in west campus relieved pressure they were experiencing in surrounding neighborhoods. So I think these are lessons that we can take elsewhere. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. That's a minute. >> Kitchen: Mr. Mayor? I would just like to say that I didn't hear councilmember alter -- maybe it was just me, but I didn't hear her saying that in all cases developers built for that reason. So I just want us to be careful to hear that perhaps people are just giving different perspectives and that's not hyperbole, that's [11:35:57 AM] their perspective. So I didn't hear it that way. Maybe others did. I heard it as one perspective. It is true in some circumstances that we do have investors from other places investing and that's just one piece of -- there's also the facts that you all said, mayor pro tem, in terms of people selling their houses. So all of those things can be true at the same time. I just want us to hear people. >> Thank you. Greg? >> Casar: When we first edited the Adu ordinance we did have recommendations to staff to come up with some of those templates and I know it's things that some existing work has been done on and at some point we should close on that work. I want to highlight councilmember Flannigan's point from right before when councilmember alter expo is if there are opportunities where somebody has a very large lot and they may not have the capital to build an Adu, but would like to work with a company that can do [11:37:00 AM] so and therefore make some of their asset liquid for them that we should continue to look for opportunities for someone to sell off a portion or to shelf off a portion or lease out a portion of their property even if they don't have the capital upfront. And I think that that's something like everybody is interested in that we'll keep working on. >> Mayor Adler: That was three-quarters. Thank you. I'm going to move now to the non-zoning. I will say because this chart is up on the board and several people talked about it. We gave the instruction that said two to five lots. And with no superior description than that. And I see that what you were wrestling with in terms of the geographic difference and I think what you came up with was a very reasonable reaction to the overall intent to have a certain amount of area. So I think it's an important conversation for us to have. I'm most interested in seeing what Kathie raised where she said now that I've heard the explanation, I still have areas I don't [11:38:01 AM] understand. But in terms of the explanation that you gave generally I think for me was an appropriate response. >> Mayor Adler, the direction, just to be clear, the direction was generally two to five lots and then further context sensitivity. And definitely staff viewed the two to five lots as more than just a criteria, they viewed it as sort of the starting point and there were only certain circumstances where it was deemed appropriate to deviate from that. But it's definitely something as anik indicated that we'll look at further in looking at criteria for the transition areas. >> Mayor Adler: Sounds good. Let's talk about the non-zoning stuff in that area. Jimmy? >> I have a few quick things. In the transportation chapter where we're talking about trip counts I would like to revisit what we learned during the river place case where we might want to allow a measured trip count for that site. If it's different from the manual in terms of trip counts. I think there will be areas where trip counts will be higher than the manual. There will be some that are lower than the manual [11:39:02 AM] because of walkability and transit. That would really speak to context sensitivity. I've had constituents submit draft language for that, but that would be something I would like to look into. So -- another thing that councilmember kitchen and I talked about on Thursday about cost participation in transportation for land uses that when they're putting in money, I think this might be solved by some of the impact fee stuff that we're doing but that the city could be cost participating, but not waiting for a project to be fully funded before we built it and then reimbursing the city from the fees from the next three or four projects. I'm not sure if that's in this or if that's separate to the impact fee system, but that's something that I'm interested and that way we can get the roads built and still have the next two or three developments pay for it and not be exempted from it. In the infrastructure chapter I'm curious why we penalize wastewater infrastructure in the drinking water protection [11:40:04 AM] zone because it seems to incentivize septic systems and field distribution when we don't allow cost participation or payment plans for wastewater like is allowed everywhere outside of a drinking water zone. It seems like that's where we would want formal wastewater infrastructure as opposed to other ways. Also in that chapter, I'm curious if we've thought about allowing ads or cottage courts or even townhomes or single-family attached to share a water tap. If there are reasons why we won't allow that that would be good to know. I've certainly met constituents who want to convert a garage on the back side of their property, but the tap fee is the thing that's stopping them from doing it. So it would be interesting to know if we can get that section to allow a single tap to serve two units on the same property, for example. And then this is small, but 239 C 4070 we talk about [11:41:07 AM] impact for certain affordable housing. In C 3 it seize newly constructed single-family home or multi- family housing unit. And I'm worried that's going to conflict with how we've defined different types of housing elsewhere in the code. So should we be allowing that -- does that include duplexes, ads? Is an Adu a single-family home? I don't knowhat it is based on where we've defined it elsewhere. That's my notes. >> Mayor Adler: That was two and three-quarter minutes. I'm still not clear on the modeling that was done with respect to the corridors because I'm hearing different things in the community about whether or not we're able to achieve the density and the residential and the supply and the like on corridors. I think that's real important. I think it's one thing that we have all agreed on as a [11:42:08 AM] group in terms of being a real high priority. We need to be able to realize that. But I hear different things about the modeling that have gone on. I would like to have a better feel for what the modeling showed. I want to make sure that we can -- I think the priority was set by the council to make sure that we're able to achieve that on our corridors. And I don't know if the concerns are valid. If they can't I want to know what we're doing to adjust them. I hear parks in that context context. So I need to better understand if there's an issue there or not that needs to be resolved. Obviously we just adopted the parks plan. It's important for us to have park acreage. I don't know if there's a trade justify there that we [11:43:13 AM] tweak the levers to get greater parks some other way or in N some other place so that we still achieve the same kind of park standards in the city, both geographically and totally, but still allow the corridors to develop so I'm better interested in knowing what the modeling shows or not shows that is significant. And to that end I hear about what's in the code versus what's in criteria manual. I think that one of the things that we're trying to achieve here is some measure of predictability with respect to what can be built or how things are going to apply so that whether should be looking at a -- when someone is looking at a piece of property they should know what they can do on it without having to enter into a city process to determine what it is they can do on it. And generally speaking on the criteria manual I think that there's a lot of kind of angst in the community on all sides as to what it's going to show or not show. And I wonder if rather than trying to resolve all of those questions in this [11:44:14 AM] forum and in this way, whether it makes sense for us to say that the initial adoption of the criteria manual comes to the council and then and a half it can be amended but so as to provide that place for people to know that there's going to be a place to have that discussion so that the code itself and -- the code can move forward knowing that the -- at least the initial adoption of the criteria manual comes back to the council. But I'm real concerned among development on the corridors. And that was three minutes. Y'all want to comment on that? >> Yes, mayor, just with respect to the criteria manuals. If council gives that direction with respect to council approval we can certainly work with the law department as. As a general matter the criteria manuals are administrative rules so they are on the manager's side of the line. However, I do want to point out to your comment about the need for a public process and the need for [11:45:16 AM] predictability, the council did -- the planning commission did in its recommendation suggest that there be a public hearing before the criteria manuals are adopted and so that would be -- again, we'll work with the law department on exploring that, but that would be a process above and beyond just the stakeholder review process that occurs for the adoption of administrative rules so that would -- while it wouldn't provide an approval by the commission, it would provide a more robust opportunity for engagement and for a public hearing. >> I would like to explore it. I wasn't picking one solution over the other. I just think we'll be able to better facilitate the adoption of this code if there's a way for us to better address the concern about the criteria manual. That went up to four and a quarter minutes. In this area here, the prompt is non-zoning. [11:46:16 AM] So drainage, water quality, transportation, tree protection, parkland signs. Paige? >> Ellis: The good stuff. Can you talk a little bit about drainage and water quality? I know there's some places that may see, you know, small amounts of accumulation of water that they're worried about additional units equating to flooding and kind of how our better practices can avoid that? >> >> Thank you, councilmember, Matt Holland with watershed protection and that's definitely an issue that we've been looking at very closely as we monitor your council guidance to limit impervious cover to existing levels of entitlement. And we've also as you guys already know, we're looking closely at these new plumbing code options to avoid lot to lot flooding problems. We did announce to the planning commission that we're going to take another [11:47:18 AM] look at the transition area impervious cover. We know that's been a very strong community interest. Our early out analysis shows that there are very few areas that are going up very much in terms of impervious cover entitlement, but we're going to take a second look and look at those few areas that do look like they're going up even more than a couple of percent entitlement. And I'm happy to elaborate more if you have additional detailed questions. >> Ellis: Maybe offline we'll get together and look neighborhood by neighborhood and understand how that relationship plays out better. >> Absolutely. >> Ellis: I appreciate that. I guess I'm going to switch topics a little bit. I'm interested in the idea of a heritage tree preservation bonus of some sort. Is there discussion of if you're making adjustments to your site plan to avoid your impacts to heritage trees are they allowed to build a little taller to help keep them in that same square footage allowance? Is there any attention being [11:48:19 AM] paid to that at this time? >> To my knowledge I think the one area where that's addressed is the board of adjustment has been given clearer criteria to consider tree preservation in granting zoning variances. But as far as any sort of administrative bonus based on tree preservation, I don't believe there is one there. There definitely is -- where trees are on public property or in easements, there's a greater ability to consider I think transportation impacts because there definitely has been some -- trees, there are issues with regard to driveway placement and access, but in general I don't think there's anything that quite speaks to what you're describing, councilmember Ellis. And Matt, do you have any other comments? >> Not at this time. >> Ellis: Okay. I'm interested in that. >> It's something certainly we can look at. There's certainly -- [11:49:20 AM] definitely are -- there are things that we could consider that would get to that for sure. >> Yeah. I think it could help make sure that we're able to keep as many trees as possible and still provide the housing space. So I'm kind of interested in how we might be able to blend those together. And then I've been talking with my own staff a bit about parkland dedication and kind of the ability, who gets to decide at which acreage whether people are are paying fee-in-lieu or on site directly. So I just wanted to kind of -- hello. I wanted to maybe have a chance to kind of talk about that and see what might be in the works if there's any updates to the way we're currently doing it and who gets to decide whether it's on-site or fee-in-lieu payments that are made. >> Thank you. Scott Grantham, parks and recreation department. In terms of the decision making it is an [11:50:20 AM] administrative decision of -- check. Of whether it would be fee-in-lieu or actual land dedication. There's also an option sometimes of off site dedication and that's something that we also can apply our criteria to to see if there's an area within a quarter mile that would meet parkland criteria. We are going off of the previous council direction, which says that all citizens of Austin should be within either a quarter mile or half mile walk of a park. And just to get the last part of your question that there have been minimal changes from the previous parkland dedication ordinance, which was passed in 2016, and the current draft of the ldc. >> Ellis: Okay. I appreciate that information and I think it may be advantageous as we look at our trails planning [11:51:22 AM] and other things we're working on in this city to kind of make sure we're closing those gaps where we can. If it's helpful to have it on site or if it's helpful to have them provide that missing piece of a puzzle and some trail network that's very close by I think that could be an opportunity that we have here. >> Absolutely. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. That was four minutes. And to that end on the park, the issue that I just had, I want to know how it relates to the testing that was done to make sure that what we're doing with parks and with what we adopted in 2016 isn't impacting what can be developed on the property in terms of realizing the densities and the housing supply questions that we had. Recognizing that our instruction was if you have to compromise that in that area, find another way to compensate for it, then I would be interested in knowing how else we're going to compensate for it in order so that every one of [11:52:24 AM] those is not a negotiation between our parks department and people that are trying to work on property. >> Thank you, mayor. We -- insofar as possible we try to make it a very transparent process and so we have criteria that are part of the code. We also have a parkland deficiency map which is public, and which anybody can go and look at. Those are some of the criteria. One thing I would like to specifically address is the size of the parcel. And when you're thinking about some of these urban areas where with smaller lots typically we wouldn't look at parkland dedication on site for any lot that is under 1.66 acres. The reason for that is that per the -- those lots would generate a park that would [11:53:24 AM] be smaller than a quarter acre and a quarter acre is really the minimum that we would like to accept as part of the parks department. >> Mayor Adler: So does our code say now that there is no dedication on a lot smaller than 166? >> It doesn't specifically say that, but it does say that the land must meet criteria and so that is in one of our manuals. >> Mayor Adler: So if that becomes an issue, to then put it in the code so people would know it would be applied that way. I don't know the 1.66 is right or the number that is relative to the goals that we had with respect to what we wanted to be able to achieve on that property in terms of density and the like. I'm just raising that issue as -- and I think it goes back to the testing issue. We just need to find out whether there's an issue here or not. And if there is, then how do we address it? >> Yes, mayor. I would also add one thing, which is that the 1.66 wouldn't be an absolute because in some instances [11:54:24 AM] there is either a critical connection which we were looking for, which could be a piece of a greenbelt we're trying to acquire, or perhaps a way for a multi-family complex to reach an existing park. So it's just one of the criteria that we look at. It's not the only one. >> Mayor Adler: What I'm trying to do is get to it and put that in so when someone is looking at a piece of property and they know that if they have that critical connection they're going to be asked to give it. If they don't have the critical connection they know that it's just -- that that kind of discretionary thing just isn't going to come up. Just so that someone can look at a piece of property without having to engage our staff and have a really good idea of what it is that they can do. >> Yes, sir. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Jimmy. >> Flannigan: I just want to reiterate what councilmember Ellis said. I have the same thoughts about parkland dedication and kind of thinking about it in that way. And thank you, mayor, for going a little bigger on that. So signs, my understanding is that there's some changes [11:55:24 AM] made. I don't know that I am wanting to contemplate sign regulation changes in the middle of this process. I feel like it's a different conversation with the community with a different set of stakeholders and I would prefer not to make changes to the sign regulation in this process, but doing sign regs in a parallel process to this. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. >> If I can briefly address signs, so I think there's dined of two aspects to the -- kind of two aspects to the sign regulations as part of this process. One is just the basic revised sign code chapter. And that is an inevitable part of this process our existing sign code chapter is written, you know, with zoning districts that would change based on the adoption of the new code. And so it will be imperative that some revisions to the sign code occur. The basic draft that was provided on October 4th is consistent generally with draft 3. There are a few procedural [11:56:25 AM] enhancements, but it is not not -- other than the removal of the relocation provisions for off premise signs, it is not -- it is not world's apart from the current code. I think it's clearer, it includes greater use of pictures, it's kind of more tightly written than our current code, but it's not substantially different other than the issue that I mentioned with regard to relocating billboards. Subsequent to the October 4th draft, staff in planning and zoning and the law department came forward with an appendix to our staff report from October 25th that includes some amendments that would provide new opportunities for off-premise advertising that are consistent with a council initiation from last year. So that's kind of a separate item than just the base draft of the sign chapter and that would be sort of further refinement and revision to the draft sign chapter that was provided with the October fourth draft. [11:57:27 AM] >> Flannigan: It's not clear to me based on what you said if the sign chapter in this draft is similar to draft 3 or similar to current code. Because I heard you kind of say both. >> It's similar to draft 3, but draft 3 is not that far apart from current code. It's clarified. It's refined. I think it's tightened up. But the one exception to that is that both draft 3 and then this draft as well removes the relocation provisions for off premise billboards. >> Flannigan: I don't know how others feel. I don't know that I'm going to be ready in the same timeline as I am on other chapters for first reading for signs. I might want to come back at second and third with better thoughts on the sign chapter because I've spent my time really thinking about the other ones because they full fit together in a specific way but the sign chapter doesn't necessarily fit together in that same way. This sounds like no matter what we're going to have to look through it at least once to make sure that the sign -- that the Zones are [11:58:27 AM] translated correctly and other things. But I might want to be able to reserve comments on sign regs until February. >> For draft 3 we did prepare an overview document that was kind of like a staff report specific to signs, just to kind of give people an idea of the changes that are occurring from current code. And we can certainly update that if you all would like an overview of the sign chapter. >> Mayor adler:thank you. Alison. >> Alter: Thank you if I was actually very pleased we kept the parkland dedication as-is in this draft. I think it's really important as we grow as a city that we have an opportunity to increase our parkland or increase our funding for our parks. And having worked on that ordinance it kicks in when you really need the parkland the most and we really need to keep that in mind. It also has a lot of things built in that protect for some of the situations that [11:59:27 AM] we've been talking about, and just one of those that I wanted to highlight right now since it hasn't been mentioned yet is that you can go in and you can get a binding statement, I believe it is, a year out as to whether you'd be required to have parkland or not, and then obviously if you after that point came up with an option that was very close by or off that -- or a connection they hadn't anticipated that that would be something you could still be having the conversations about. But that is something that is built in and many folks have taken advantage of it, so you have quite a bit of certainty up front about we know which areas are parkland efficient, when are in the urban core, which are not, so it's pretty easy to calculate as a formula. I don't think there's a lot of uncertainty. What is uncertain is when you can get it waived, not when you are required to do it, and then you would have to engage in those conversations and find solutions and there's flexibility built in, I [12:00:27 PM] believe, to do that. I wanted to just flag that I'm not ready to talk about them today but I'm gonna want to dive into the administrative procedures at some point. I haven't really been able to to do that yet. So I'm not sure what's in there at the moment. I wanted to talk about a particular issue that some of us are experiencing in our districts, where we have proven localized flooding that have been seeing some big upzoning, so we'd be putting more units in areas that we already know flood, and that is problematic and I'm not sure that I understand the logic but I don't know if we have time to go into that here but I would like to see us consider prohibiting impervious cover increases in those areas identified with local area flooding, and I want to request that staff examine those areas that have documented localized flooding and determine how housing [12:01:28 PM] capacity would be impacted if we had equivalent existing impervious cover entitlements maintained in those areas. We just pressed atlas 14 and we wouldn't allow you to have more units in a flooded area without making certain steps, et cetera. I don't quite understand where we're adding some very considerable density into areas that have localized flooding which is not providing, you know -- technologies seems to be exacerbating the problem as I understand it. >> Council, we will be looking into that in more detail. Again, the data we have showing now, most of those areas go up very minimally, if at all. However, there are some that do go up and we want to take a deep dive into that and we'll have more specifics in the future for the council. >> Alter: Thank you. I would really appreciate that because some of these neighborhoods have really been trying to work closely on the localized flooding and to get solutions and there don't seem to be any [12:02:29 PM] solutions so kind of adding more density in an area where we have no solution and adding the density is not going to help any seems kind of counter to what we're trying to achieve. >> We definitely hear you loud and clearly. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Thank you. That was three and three quarters. The last section you can segue into it was the process site plan, variances, appeal process. Does anyone want to weigh in on this area? Still working on it. Anything else? All right. I think were all the prompts we had. Before we get into the process for first reading, before we get to that, does anybody else want to raise anything else on this issue? Ann, go ahead. >> Kitchen: I didn't understand your question. I don't now. I just wanted to put a marker in for next time. >> Mayor Adler: That's fine. You can do that. [12:03:29 PM] Do you want to put a marker in? >> Kitchen: Councilmember pool had already mentioned it. We put it on the message board. I don't have the list in front of me. We had proposed some additional topics to take up on December 4, I think it is, and then use December 5, it is, for anything that people still want to get to. >> Mayor Adler: We've got the third, fourth, and then we have a public hearing then on the seventh, and I hope that serve gonna make real liberal use of the message board with respect to posting ideas that people should think about but also getting on there and commenting on people's things so that we might be able to advance some things before the third and fourth in terms of what people are thinking or whatever. I think that would be really helpful as we get into that. Paige. >> Ellis: I just generally wanted to thank staff. I know you all have been working really hard on this for a long time. Because things like this are so difficult to update, this code is from 1984, we need to anticipate this code is going to last maybe another [12:04:30 PM] 35 years, maybe longer, so I would hope that we could find a way to build in some triggers to make sure that it flows as our city grows, too. I don't quite know what that looks like yet. I'm still kind of thinking about it but I think whatever we can do to make sure it's flexible enough to grow with our cities over the next few decades, the better off we'll all be. We'll know the expectations of building, and there will be fewer surprises for people if we're trying to do this every 35 years it could be really cumbersome. >> Mayor Adler: All right. Let's talk then about -- >> Casar: To what councilmember kitchen and councilmember pool raised, I like the categories as the planning commission used, and then I think generally as you used, they seem more or less the same. If I can mention councilmember kitchen and councilmember pool's staff, whoever is watching, of the things that y'all listed on the message board it seems many fit into these categories but some don't. I think in particular the tax issue doesn't. [12:05:30 PM] I think the protest issue is a process issue around when do things go into effect because I think there's lots of questions about, you know -- on the codenext process we were thinking about about how many months it would take to go into effect but it seems the tax one doesn't fit into those six categories pulling the others ones do. For me parking is an issue in and of itself. If we could talk about what people's concerns or questions might be in parking in residential Zones versus the corridor zone, to me it's more useful to break it down still into these sort of six categories as opposed to talking about parking entirely separate from which area we're talking about it in. So if we could -- mayor, I would like to discuss parking, but if we could actually discuss it at -- figure out which areas it relates to of these categories we went through today, planning commission we went through, I think it's easier to keep track of. >> Kitchen: Mayor. >> Mayor Adler: Yeah. >> Kitchen: I don't have a thought on how it's [12:06:31 PM] categorized. I wasn't thinking that -- so did I understand correctly that -- so that we're trying to organize things around the six categories that were presented this morning. Is that what you're saying? >> Casar: If possible. >> Kitchen: Okay I do think taxes don't fall into that. >> Mayor Adler: That's how the planning commission did it. >> Casar: It was useful for organizing my thoughts up to today. So and I think corridors is one of them and y'all have capacity on corridors being one of them. The capacity analysis and exactly how that works might fit outside of the code itself. So imagine if we want to go over capacity analysis like today and taxes, to me those don't fit into the six categories that we went over today because that's not in the code as much. >> Kitchen: But you're not suggesting we don't talk about them. >> Casar: No. I would like to talk about all the things you raised. I'm just saying when we have specific amendments to the code, I think these categories seem to actually be pretty useful. But then there's some things that don't exactly fit in the code like taxes or how [12:07:35 PM] did the staff do capacity analysis, that might need to be separate. >> Kitchen: That's fine. You're just talking about -- >> Casar: How we towing. >> Kitchen: I'm fine with that. >> Casar: Historic preservation bonus, you mean that -- >> Kitchen: Yeah, preservation incentive is more the thinking around the mcmansion concept or concern? And the other issue relates to actual preservation for historic properties. >> Casar: Got it. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. So let's get into our conversation about what's coming down next, Alison, before we get into that topic did you want to say something? >> Flannigan: >> Alter: Yes. I wanted to just flag a couple things that I know that councilmember pool wanted to mention and then I want to talk about. So she is likely interested in reserving impervious cover increases in r4 and rm1 for on-site affordability so that will [12:08:35 PM] be something she'll want to talk about. And then she had some specific ideas to leverage tree preservation that she'll probably want to talk with you about as well. I don't know all of the nuances. Then I just wanted to flag for my colleagues that the mayor and I posted just before we started today a message to the message board. I don't want to go into detail of it now. I just wanted to flag it for you and since I have copies I'm going to pass it out. These are some areas that we've talked about already today, but that we want to have an opportunity to have staff look at. I think that on many of these there's large agreement, but we thought it would be helpful to pull them together into one place, and just to kind of be able to illustrate some of the things that we were thinking about in that [12:09:35 PM] regard. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Thanks. All right. With respect to where we go, today you guys are going to come out on the 25th with additional information. We have a work session on two days, the third and fourth, I think, and then we have a public hearing on the seventh. And then we then meet for first reading on the ninth. I think we're setting a hearing for the ninth and also for the 11th. Hopefully we'll get the tenth off. I guess it's conceivable that we could carry over from the day before. But, you know, if everybody can keep that in mind. What I had suggested and proposed was the posting that went up on the board about a month ago and it was generally recommending that we stay at a pretty high level when we do the first reading, that we're not making individual map [12:10:37 PM] changes at that point or my suggestion we're not making, you know, interlineations in the code itself but we keep it at a pretty high level, you know, the kind of conversation that we're having here today and the kind of conversation that we had back in April. The ability to be able to say to the council we don't think you hit this direction right or we -- now that we've seen these things we want to change the direction that we gave. But we try as best we can to keep things at a pretty high level. So that was my suggestion for how we approach this. Ann. >> Kitchen: I think -- I passed out a document that tries to just give us something to talk from in terms of approach, and I think it is consistent with what the mayor posted, and it was -- my intent was to [12:11:39 PM] be consistent with what the mayor posted in terms of a process. So I'd like to just walk through it real quickly. So the thinking is that on the -- you know, I've got the wrong date. It's the ninth. Whatever the date is that we're -- is the day that we -- >> Mayor Adler: It's the ninth. >> Kitchen: I'm sorry about that. >> Mayor Adler: It's okay. >> Kitchen: We pass on first reading the staff's revised approach, understanding some of us may have caveats like councilmember Flannigan raised earlier about the sign portion. Anyway, point being is that our goal is to pass on first reading on that day. But then I wanted to suggest that we -- each of us may have areas that -- where we want to move the ball forward and pass on first reading. We may have areas that we still have some questions about. So I wanted to suggest an approach to actually get at those questions that is something that narrows us [12:12:40 PM] down from the kind of questioning that we're doing right now. My thought there was to do something similar to what we do in the budget process, and that's why I called this direction. So I might say, for example, that I want to vote to move forward on first reading. I have questions about, you know, this one area, for example, and I'd like to ask staff to come back to me with certain changes or options that might address that area. So that's what I mean by direction. I would think that we would want to make sure that our direction stays within the scope of our policy direction that we adopted in may. And so I would be thinking that we might be thinking of direction that addresses policy matters that were not addressed in the code or perhaps they're policy matters any one councilmember may think were not interpreted within the meaning of the code or perhaps they're ones we have questions whether we're actually achieving what we all thought we were trying [12:13:41 PM] to achieve in the code. And I give an example here, which may not be relevant anymore because we seem to be moving forward on this issue but to my mind I was thinking it would be direction like direct city manager to propose additional options for achieving more affordable units along corridors to include options for maintaining new standards for minimum affordable units and options for accepting voluntary distributions-affordable housing units. I put this here just as an example of what I mean by direction. Maybe "Request" is a better word than direction. But basically what I'm trying to do is say that narrow us down as a council to pass on first reading and then be clear on the additional things to the extent that we can that we want to ask for options on. That's what I mean by directions. So that's my thought. And then with regard to the [12:14:41 PM] mapping, again, that's December 9, not the seventh, that we would not be addressing the mapping on the ninth but we do need to understand what our process is for that so I was going to propose that we as councilmembers submit our map changes by a deadline, whatever deadline we want to set. What has been happening so far is our various folks in the community or in our districts have submitted their thoughts to staff and staff has bundled those up and sent them to us and then I think sending everybody a memo about them. So my question is, okay, so what do we do with that? My thought is as councilmembers we submit our map changes by a certain deadline and then I would hope that we could handle mapping on consent just like we do consent right now and we'd be presented with a total map but just like we do with consent right now individual councilmembers could pull parcels off the consent map, keeping in mind our goals for the capacity, [12:15:41 PM] which is what we're trying to get at as an overall. And I would hope that we would have a minimum of pulling items off of consent of the map. I'm hoping that what we can get to is a place where we can all adopt a map on consent. And then we would pass that in February. So that's my -- just strawman for us to talk from. It helps me to put some more specifics to it, and that's why I wanted to put it on paper. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. >> Kitchen: So thoughts? >> Mayor Adler: Mayor pro tem. >> Garza: So I guess my thoughts on the direction and no votes taken, I feel like what the mayor proposed on the message board was trying to keep this first reading as clean as possible. And the all direction will be adopted -- I don't know what happens when there's a [12:16:43 PM] difference in interpretation. I mean, we just had a difference of opinion in the interpretation of a hyperbole. So, I mean, what happens when there's a difference of opinion in how something is interpreted or not? And so in my mind, if there is direction given, I think there should be votes taken. Because -- >> Mayor Adler: Let's give other people a chance to talk. Everyone is gonna be talking about this. >> Garza: I guess generally this just feels like another concept list, and we've learned from that. >> Kitchen: That's not what I meant. When I get a chance I'll explain? >> Mayor Adler: You'll get a chance. Alison. >> Alter: I just wanted to point out, again, that we have a campo meeting on the ninth night, so as we're factoring how long this is going to be and what's going to take place in our timing we need to be over at the Thompson center at 6:00 for [12:17:45 PM] that. >> Mayor Adler: Whether&whether there are action items or nonaction items up that night. Hopefully we'll make that determination here real quickly. >> Alter: Okay. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Leslie. >> Pool: I had to step out for the press conference and I'm trying to catch up. Are we only talking about the ninth? >> Mayor Adler: Mm-hmm. >> Pool: Okay. Based on what Ann was saying and then what Delia was saying about direction, I think the fact is that there may be some areas where we are not in agreement and we need to have that highlighted so we can have the discussion about where we may or may not agree and how wide is that gap? So to the extent that we may have conflicting direction, I think we already have some in from -- even from the guidance document from may, I don't see that as a an estoppel of that process. I think we actually embrace that and move forward with it and talk about the things we around the dais may have [12:18:46 PM] different interpretations and agreements on so then we can kind of lay it out and, again, my goal in the end as I've been saying numerous times is the folks in -- or citizens, the residents, the public, our communities need to know what it is we're doing and they have to have an idea about what we think we're doing and how it affects them because we want them to support what we're doing. Because our job here is to represent them. And I think we do that through the way Ann is describing it, where we have direction to the extent that it may be counter manded by somebody else's direction that's okay. Hope there aren't too many of those instances but I expect there will be some but then we need to discuss them and come to some kind of agreement even if it's a hard vote and some of us are in a minority. I certainly have a lot of experience with that, in this process, being in a minority on the vote. So that's fine with me. >> Mayor Adler: Jimmy. >> Flannigan: I agree with mayor pro tem. I think I heard councilmember kitchen say [12:19:46 PM] maybe she was talking about requests and not direction. So there may be -- the types of things where we're just all -- sure, staff can go out and answer those questions, but I think there are gonna be places where there will be disagreement on how much staff resource we want to apply to fleshing out different options. So I'm not gonna be comfortable with a process that doesn't allow the council to deliberate and decide and choose. I feel like our direction earlier this year was that process, as others have noted there is conflicting stuff in that direction. Staff has come with their best opportunity and analysis of how to split those differences and I wouldn't want to add more conflicting direction or conflicting requests to the process. It's time to take the votes. >> Mayor Adler: Greg and then Paige. >> Casar: I generally -- I feel comfortable with the way the mayor had this laid out on the message board for some time because I do think it's important for us to [12:20:48 PM] vote on more -- on things for the -- to bless changes the staff has recommended, to pass more significant high-level changes for the staff to work on in the map and text over the period between December and February so that folks don't continue sometimes sending us -- you know, if we have a sense of where we're going, I don't want community members to have to send in comments about the October draft if in December the council can move forward on a first reading draft that incorporates community and council feedback on that first draft. I don't read what councilmember kitchen has laid out here as saying we're not going to do that but I feel very comfortable with what the mayor has put forward. Then as it comes to staff time, if these sorts of directions that ask for staff time to sort of flesh output ideas or options could also be posted in time for that posting deadline, December 5, we may find that [12:21:49 PM] some of those questions may not take up that much staff time and I'd be fine with having those requests go in. But if it seems like there's a really long list of a lot of -- for staff to investigate a lot of stuff I would really want to hear from the staff and dais -- I just don't -- all requests immediately being incorporated and staff being asked to do all of those things I don't know if that's a short or long list, and I don't know what those requests are. So I -- upon reading this upon the first time I would just want -- I think if those things are also posted that council can decide those and I would be inclined to have some amount of exploration of new ideas but I think most of what the staff and council need to do are decide hard questions, take some votes, not do the really technical stuff, remapping this specific parcel and that specific parcel in December but instead doing the sort of bigger ideas, the kinds of [12:22:51 PM] things that y'all laid out in this presentation I think is what we need to decide on first reading. >> Mayor Adler: Paige. >> Ellis: I agree with that. And I also am a little worried just because of what -- the different direction, we already gave the city manager a 20-page document, and I would worry that additional direction might conflict with that and I think staff has been very diligent with saying we are going to get through first reading, take on the list of toos back and work on them over the winter break and I worry about staff time during those weeks, incorporating more work that may ultimately conflict. I kind-want to be protective with what was been approved and what the direction has been for months. If we all agree on what should be answered or what should be looked at then that's one thing but if it's just everyone throw your ideas in the hat and see what comes out, I'm -- that really worries me about this process. So I feel like we're on the right track and I want to be [12:23:51 PM] very guarded about what has been approved, council approval, moving forward. >> Mayor Adler: Ann. >> Kitchen: Well, okay. I understand what people are saying. It's a matter of degree and you can't really get that until you see what those requests are. And I should have used the word "Requests" because that's really what I meant. So perhaps what we can do is ask that they be posted on the message board and people can take a look at them. Because what I have in my mind actually aligns with what everyone is saying. Because when I'm talking about requests, what I'm really trying to say is that within the parameters of the document we already made decisions on, but within those parameters there's still some question marks, and I want us to be open as a council to thinking about a range of options that might still get us what our goal is, and if we just shut [12:24:53 PM] that process down and say I don't even want to hear any other options, then we may not even -- we may have some better options to actually get us there. So what I'd like to suggest is, well, let's just post things on the message board, think about them as requests, because the bigger picture that I'm trying to get at is I want us to still have the opportunity to think together and to brainstorm together within parameters about how we're going to get to a result. So -- and I don't want us to shut each other down if we're going to ask the staff to address something that could get us there. And then I want to give some guidance to the staff because, I mean, I could just ask questions outside of this process, but then that's even a bigger range for the staff to have to deal with as opposed to a smaller group of things. [12:25:57 PM] So that's what I'm trying to get at here. I want to give an example that perhaps -- so that I can understand what everybody is thinking. So earlier there was this -- mayor, I think you made a -- you raised the question someone had made a suggestion to you what would it look like if we did r3 everywhere and there was someone else that said they thought that might be a good thing to think about and I think, mayor pro tem, you suggested we shouldn't go down that road because we've already decided a different way. So in that -- so what do we do in that kind of scenario where someone has raised an option, some of us think it might be an option worth exploring others of us think it's not? So do we get to explore that option or not? That's really what I'm trying to get at. Maybe that's not the best example because maybe that's one that after a little thinking we all agree it's not one to go forward with, but if there is something that some of us think is an option that's worth asking a [12:26:57 PM] question about within the parameters of what we already decided, within the goals that we already set, I think that we would have a stronger code and a stronger ability to bring -- to work together with the community if we allow those options to be considered. So that's all I'm trying to get at. >> Mayor Adler: I think a lot of this I think is consistent with kind of what I had in my -- in writing this down because I think people should be able to develop concepts. My recommendation would be that we pass on first reading in December both the map and the plan. I would pass them both on first reading so that they both move forward. That said, I like the idea of requests that people have so that they can develop ideas. I think it does go to the issue of we don't really know what that's going to look like until we get there and one of the chief things I think we can do is to be narrowing down the issues and give the community direction as to where we [12:27:58 PM] are. And I think that the best way to do that would be to have us doing -- we could continually do two different things. We could be passing the code as recommended by staff with what the staff changes were that would be coming in and as part of the November 25 work or those kinds of things we'd also pass if we need to direction that would reflect the sentiment of the council but then we give people the opportunity to be able to make requests for things that they want to be able to otherwise develop so that they can bring back on second reading to be able to make a case for something else. I'd also suggest that we have a lot of time between now and December 9 and the more people can go on the message board between now and December 9 and say "I'm interested in this kind of request being made. It's a little bit different or different way of looking at stuff," I think if we make real good use of the message board that would be [12:28:59 PM] a real efficient way to be able to do that. I'm not sure about adopting the elements of this because I'm not sure how they would be applied. Obviously when we're doing mapping we'll be taxicab into account district unit capacity, city capacity, asmp, the points that the mayor pro tem made earlier with respect to not just having capacity but having capacity in the right places. All those things get considered as part of the universe. But what I would recommend is that we stay close to what I had proposed, with further kind of description for what Ann had, I would have us passing on first reading both the map and the plan. I would have us giving direction both to the plan and direction to the map. But the map direction would be at a high level. It wouldn't be parcel specific direction on the map. It would be broader kinds of things that translate in [12:30:01 PM] larger geographic areas or across the city but that the individual map changes I think we need to be teeing up as early as councilmembers know in December and in January to start saying, hey, there's some areas in my district that I know about that this didn't pick up the context sensitivity that I think that it should. Again, getting those things as elevated as best we could. Mayor pro tem. >> Garza: I mean, you know, it's all about interpretation, and I know, councilmember kitchen, you said maybe this isn't the best example but that's the exact example that I'm worried about that I think councilmember Ellis is talking about. Like, just throwing stuff -- new ideas out there when that one in particular I'm looking back at the policy direction, and the very first line talks about a development pattern that supports a 50/50 transportation mode share by [12:31:05 PM] 2039 and I think we could all agree rezoning everything r3 does not align with the very first line in our policy direction. And so, you know, this feels very similar to the same difficulties we have when it councilmember tovo the -- came to the budget, is reopening something that doesn't need to. I agree that we need to have important conversations and vet, you know, different ideas, but I don't know if first reading is -- maybe it's we pass, you know, what's proposed so far and then have those discussions and, you know, we each have the ability to ask staff, you know, you suggested maybe I can just ask a bunch of questions. We can do that now. Every single one of us, it's my understanding, can ask staff any question. It might take them time to give us answers for all kinds of different scenarios, but the whole purpose of this policy direction was to create some kind of box, and I agree [12:32:05 PM] that there is a lack of, I guess, unity on what -- how we interpret it, but if we're gonna change -- or if we're gonna start talking about have interpretations I do think there needs to be I guess votes taken on that because -- anyway. >> Mayor Adler: Pio. >> Renteria: Mayor, I agree with you. I would feel a lot more comfortable if we took the first reading including the maps. I think constituents in my district really want to know what direction we're gonna go and the way we're gonna be able to see that is by taking that first reading. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. And providing the direction. Alison. >> Alter: So I'm fairly uncomfortable deciding what kind of process I want on December 9 when I haven't seen the planning commission overview, I don't know what's in there, I don't [12:33:07 PM] know what staff's recommendations are, I don't know what staff is gonna come up with on the 25th. I'm heartened by hearing the presentation today that they have heard the community and they're making some important changes, but in the absence of knowing what is -- you know, I don't have a full overview of what the planning commission said. We have one slide that tells us what the planning commission did. They spent will meetings on it and had I don't know how many votes. So I just want to, you know -- I'm willing to have the mayor's as a stronger with some additions from Ann right now but I don't really know what I'm voting on at the moment, so it's kind of difficult to say this is the best process moving forward. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. >> Alter: And I also want to add some of us have asked questions and we still don't have answers to our questions, and that is a source of frustration because we don't know if the answers to our questions will be regulatory in terms [12:34:09 PM] of next steps or not and it is important those questions get answered. Many of them are not difficult questions. I know that they've been very busy, but if we can't get our questions answered through the mechanism that we are supposed to do that, that is problematic for us moving forward. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Ann. >> Kitchen: I have a question about the map. So I have a question about what you're thinking in terms of the mapping. So I'm hearing a desire to move the maps forward, which makes sense. But we don't have a process yet for how we're supposed to propose changes to them, nor do we have a map altogether. And I also did want to talk about the process of consent. So are we thinking that -- are we thinking -- because we set up a process whereby the -- we invited the public to make proposals to us. [12:35:10 PM] So what we haven't closed the lid on what was supposed to happen top those proposals? >> Mayor Adler: My suggestion at a high level with the maps would be that the kind of thing that you're thinking about would be what we would be spending a lot of January doing, that in December -- or the second half of December doing. >> Kitchen: Right, mm-hmm. >> Mayor Adler: In that two-month period of time after December 9, so on December 9 we would approve on first reading the map but we would also conceivably -- also have ability to give direction. You need to cut transition Zones half the depth, there's way too much transition zone here, cut it in half, the depth, or come up with an overarching policy about we don't want any M -- rm1 on suburban transit corridors. That kind of higher-level kind of direction. Some of the map changes I guess that would come from neighborhoods would be susceptible of kind of a general policy statement and some of them would be more context specific. [12:36:10 PM] They would be saying when you look at our neighborhood this is a better way to do these -- this lots or this area. I don't see us considering those things for December 9, but I do see those things airing and getting elevated after December 9 and before we vote on second reading, which as a practical matter will probably be the first week in February, although we haven't set those dates yet just because we're where we are with the clerks and our meetings and the like. But that's, I think, when we would be looking more at individual district councilmembers coming in and saying these are the lots that I think should be changed. So we would have a high level map kind of direction being given for December 9 and then the more specific direction being given -- elevated on message board and presented in December and January. >> Kitchen: Questions? [12:37:13 PM] Okay. So I guess we can wait until we get into January on that detail. I'm just -- I'm not really thinking that as a council we want to sit through amendment by amendment of the changes that each of us might want on the map because there were errors or because there was all kinds of things. You know, councilmember Flannigan raised a few kinds of things and stuff like that and I've raised a few things and many others have. So I'm working back from that, I think that's a very awkward process for each of us to have to go parcel by parcel, and that's why I was suggesting a consent process. >> Mayor Adler: I don't have a problem with that. So -- I just didn't address that. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Mayor Adler: I think that as people would elevate things, as a councilmember elevates things in December and January and says these are the changes I want to be able to make, everybody can look at that. And I'm fine with having a consent that said here are [12:38:14 PM] all the changes that the councilmembers made, they're all adopted unless they're pulled off. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Mayor Adler: Then anybody could pull off changes that they wanted to have pulled off. I don't have a problem with that at all. >> Kitchen: The reason I'm getting into that detail now, I'm just trying to make it clear for staff however we're going to proceed, and if people aren't ready to decide that's okay. But I think staff need to understand. And we need to be clear on what our path is. So -- and that's why I'm suggesting that approach. >> Mayor Adler: I would say in December and January if people could start posting changes we want to be able to make. It may very well be in January we schedule a work session on mapping where people can lay out these are the changes I wanted to make but I don't know at that point in time and I think we have time to figure it out after that. But I -- I don't have a problem with councilmembers coming in with changes they want to make in their area and having everybody have a chance being able to look at it outside of a meeting and seeing if there's anything [12:39:15 PM] they want to pull or otherwise discuss. >> Kitchen: Okay. From a staff perspective those changes would go into a consent map. Everybody would have the opportunity to know what they are so that they can know what they wanted to pull. But for staff -- from staff's perspective, they would put them all together into a map so we would have the opportunity to pass it on consent. >> Casar: Mayor. >> Mayor Adler: Greg. >> Casar: So would the -- what I've been operating off of from the mayor's post is that it would be best on first reading to refrain from line by line amendments to the text or parcel by parcel changes because minor changes would likely impact other sections and we have all this other work to do. So we would suggest that we have that be -- we focus on first reading higher level policy direction so we don't get bogged down on specific code language or specific tracts. Wait until later readings for specific mapping changes. >> Kitchen: I agree. >> Casar: Are we describing something different than that? Because if we have parcel by [12:40:15 PM] parcel work, I'm really ready to get into that in February, which will most likely frankly be on most parcel by parcel changes councilmembers would suggest I would assume I'd probably be fine with lots of different little corrections. I would want in the course of those weeks coming up to February to better look at those and say I agree with all five of these, I just have a problem with this one, that way we're only debating on second reading the one instead of somebody having to explain all six to us. >> Mayor Adler: So what we would pass on first reading would be the map with direction? >> Casar: Right. >> Mayor Adler: What we will get back from staff is the map adjusted with the direction that we gave on December 7. Separate from that would be councilmember changes that would -- councilmembers -- everybody on council can elevate whatever changes they wanted to be able to make in December or January that were outside of the direction that as a council we gave on December 9. Then when we got together in [12:41:18 PM] February then we could pass the mapping changes. >> Casar: And I just -- all I'm saying is -- >> Mayor Adler: On second -- it would be part of the second reading approval. >> Casar: I don't have an interest in any of our work sessions leading up through December or on the December hearings to discuss or hash out parcel by parcel changes because I think if people post those online and raise them our staff can look through them and probably a lot of them aren't worth discussing. Right? A particular thing, this church got upzones to this thing and didn't realize it was a church and we're going to fix that. A lot of that I just don't know whether any of us have to discuss in work session because I imagine a lot of that is going to go consent so I just don't have an interest -- I personally would be opposed to us spending time discussing parcel by parcel stuff and between here and February people gold uploading as much about their district that they can and having our [12:42:18 PM] council staff vet most of that for us off-line because a lot of it I think is going to be so minor that we shouldn't be discussing this little thing. >> Mayor Adler: Ann. >> Kitchen: Yes, I'm sorry. I was talking about the process in February. >> Casar: Okay. >> Kitchen: So -- and the reason I'm, you know, getting into specifics now is because we promised the neighborhoods a path to look at their areas and, you know, understanding that we're -- our goal is capacity and our various other goals. We promised them a path. And I think that if people are talking about passing a map on first reading, which I need to withhold judgment on that at the moment because I'm not sure I agree with that. Without the public understanding what their path is for what they just submitted to us, I think it's going to create a level [12:43:18 PM] of angst that's not necessary. So that's why I think it's important to be real clear right now and stay with it. I mean, I don't mean right this minute but I mean at the point were so people understand they submitted some understanding, it's being allocated at and what is the path for it to be considered. That's what I'm trying to get at. I agree with councilmember Casar. I have no interest in going through parcel by parcel what's happening in other parts of town. That's not the areas that I know best. And so I think that -- that's why I suggested the consent but I want our staff to be clear us from and us to be clear with our staff what we're expecting them to do. And to my mind, we're expecting them to present a map that we can deal with on consent that has all those parcels in it. People can think about it. We don't have to decide [12:44:19 PM] today. But my goal would be by the time we come out of December 9, we're very clear with people about what's gonna happen next on the map. >> Mayor Adler: Mayor pro tem. >> Garza: I'm still not understanding, mayor, what you said. You said we could pass the map with direction. Are you talking about in December? >> Mayor Adler: Yes, on December 9 we would pass the map that the staff presents to us as we go into December 9. It could be as part of your November 25 your work if there are changes that you think need to be made in the map based on the conversations you have you're going to present to us on December 9 your best map taking into account what you've heard and the changes you'd make. It could be the same map but you'll give us whatever is the best state of the map at that point. We approve that on first reading with direction. And -- >> Garza: That's what I'm confused about. >> Mayor Adler: And the direction wouldn't be individual lots. I want to change this lot from rm1 to r4. [12:45:20 PM] It would be more global map direction, if we made one. Transition Zones should be twice the size they are, we think transition Zones should be half the size they are. They would be global directions. >> Garza: Okay. For example, there's one theme that keeps going is some transition Zones go deeper than others. My understanding that is because most of those are in high opportunity areas where we want people close to grocery stores, et cetera. So if a councilmember says my direction is transition Zones throughout the city will only go up to five -- >> Mayor Adler: We'll take a vote on December 9 that will either pass or won't pass. >> Garza: Okay. There will be a vote. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Ann. >> Kitchen: Okay. So I'm not sure if I'm clear on how we're doing mapping, but we can think about it. So I'm not comfortable but I mean I'll try to get comfortable, but I'm not comfortable passing a map on [12:46:21 PM] first reading that we haven't had the opportunity to address the kinds of concerns that awful user interface have been raising. I mean, some of them are -- so, for example, I have a few parcels that really I have thought should be P's because they're parks but that change hasn't been made. So I'm concerned -- I would feel much more comfortable if we just put the map aside. We can pass direction on the map but not pass the map on first reading because I haven't -- there's -- you know, there hasn't been an opportunity to make the changes even on individual things that appear to just be mistakes. >> Casar: Mayor. >> Mayor Adler: Jimmy and then [indiscernible] >> Flannigan: So I think it's important for us to -- I mean, very few of us are left in the room now but I think it's important for us to remind ourselves that we are not -- and the community that we are not passing anything in December. We are moving the process forward through first reading. I have seen content coming [12:47:21 PM] out some of community groups that claims, oh, the council could adopt the whole thing in December and everybody freak out. We all have a responsibility to make sure the community knows that that's not the case. That we are not going to be adopting anything in its final form in December. We are all universally in agreement to that even though there are people in the community saying otherwise. And I think this is just like we do on zoning cases, just like we do on all things, we move stuff forward on first reading with any of the things that we want to see come back at second and third with no guarantees that we're gonna adopt stuff at second and third. We don't -- that's how everything works so I think it's important that we move everything forward together through this process noting at first reading the things that we want to see coming back from staff at second. Just like we do on everything else. >> Mayor Adler: To your point on parks, I think it would be appropriate on December 9 for someone to say there's a lot of parkland in the city, properties being used for park that aren't zoned as P, they're zoned as whatever the adjacent properties are and we think after discussions all those tracts [12:48:23 PM] being used as parkland should be zoned P. I think that would be a appropriate kind of global instruction to give to the staff on December 9. I don't know if that even makes sense. But that would be. A discussion about this particular tract should be zoned P is a conversation that we would have as part of the process in -- people would post those in December and January. >> Kitchen: Okay. Just one last thing. I hear what you're saying, councilmember Flannigan, and I have been -- you know, I think we've all been trying to do that, but all I'm just saying to folks is that I think if we are -- I think the public will not trust us if we pass a map on first reading that we haven't had the opportunity to actually suggest or consider changes. I think it's easier to say -- not easy is not the right word. I think it's more credible -- that's not the right word either. I feel like we can do that [12:49:23 PM] with the text, but I don't feel like we can do it with the map because of the level of concerns that people have. And I also don't think it's necessary. Because I don't think it closes -- I don't think it slows down the process. And I think what's really important is that people have some level of trust in the process. And so that's just my initial reaction in terms of the map part of it and voting on first reading. So. . . >> Mayor Adler: Greg. >> Casar: First I'll say that I would like to figure out what the process is in February if we're doing the parcel by parcel and the consent thing, makes sense to me on first blush, and maybe laying out that process for people will be something we can communicate. The reason that I would rather move the map forward for now, I'd be open to hearing others, continue thinking about it, moving the map forward rather than pulling particular parcels now, and I think this will make sense to people when I explain it, is if there's a [12:50:26 PM] motion to double transition areas in a certain area or if there's a motion to half them in other areas and that direction then passes and staff works on it, then we're gonna come back -- there's gonna be a new staff map that comes back to us and I would want to be doing my parcel by parcel edits the best I could informed by those staff changes, if ma makes sense. What I'm telling folks is this preliminary map is certainly getting changes so before I finalize what my parcel by parcel work is, I want get the bigger, the round two of our April and may deliberations done so that way I know what I'm parcel by parcel editing. >> Mayor Adler: Maybe, Ann, there's a way -- and I would work on it with you -- to create another document or instrument that is happening contemporaneous with our vote to approve on first reading the map, which would be a list of things that had been identified by any councilmember as to particular things on the map that they knew that they wanted to be taking a look [12:51:26 PM] at or offering changes within their district or otherwise. So maybe there's a vehicle or an instrument or something we could create so that councilmembers would have ability to be able to ear mark those things or book mark or park those things so that that could be shown to people in the community that were in an area that can see that that was still -- their councilmember was still putting those in play or wanting to put those things in play. >> Kitchen: Okay. I will think about that. I hear what you're saying, councilmember Casar. And I agree with all that. I just don't think passing a map on first reading is necessary to do all the things that you said. So. . . >> Mayor Adler: All right. Anything else? Yes, Leslie. Leslie and then mayor pro tem. >> Pool: I just want to make sure for December 3 and December 4 we have our list of additional topics so that our staff can -- and we can prepare for it and I'll point, again, to the [12:52:27 PM] capacity, parks the two types of heritage preservation -- or preservation, protest rights, and there might have been one more on the list that Ann and I posted because I know we didn't get to those today but we weren't expecting to. >> Mayor Adler: I'd order everybody to go ahead and post those things. >> Pool: Tee them up for the third. >> Mayor Adler: The other thing I mentioned in the post I think would be significant is it would be my intent when we get together on the ninth to deal with those amendments first that were published and posted by the sixth. Because those would be the universe of things that people have the most chance to really get ready for and think about. Those would be the things that the public had the chance to react to at the public hearing on the seventh,you know, and I say that with the understanding that of course this council is free to consider anything it wants to and I'm not proposing we not consider anything that someone wanted to bring up that day. But I will bring up those other ones first so if [12:53:29 PM] you're interested in having something brought earlier please make sure you -- >> Pool: Are you talking about on the third or ninth? >> Mayor Adler: On the ninth. >> Pool: I just wanted to get confirmation for you, though, the items Ann and I posted will be on the agenda for discussion on the third. >> Mayor Adler: Absolutely. I'm urging everybody else to go ahead and do that and the more those things come in I have the best chance of being able to organize the third and fourth in a way that's constructive. As we start meeting on the ninth and actually start considering directions on the part of the first reading I'm going to start with the things that are posted by whatever time it was on the sixth as per the post. Okay? We done? >> Pool: I was -- >> Garza: I just I would caution us creating two maps. If we're trying to be transparent and clear and not confuse the public, I appreciate any discussion on trying to get us to an easier place, but I think there's already confusion on [12:54:30 PM] things that so-and-so posted about renderings and whose is the right model and then, you know, to have two different maps, what does that map and what is that, I just -- I would just caution that process. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. All right. That said it is 1:53. 12:53. Thank you. 12:53. And this meeting is adjourned. [ Adjourned ]