Special Governing Body Meeting Thu, Jan 9, 2025 · Governing Body https://santafeminutes.space/meeting/9 == Executive Summary == The City Council held a lengthy meeting addressing two main topics: an appeal against the Planning Commission's denial of variances for a multi-family housing development, and a series of General Plan Amendments and rezonings for several tracts of land on the city's south side. The council ultimately denied the appeal for the housing development variances, upholding the Planning Commission's decision. Following this, they approved multiple General Plan Amendments and rezonings to change land use designations to Community Commercial (C2) for several tracts, with specific conditions to address neighborhood concerns about business types and operating hours. The meeting ran late into the night, prompting a vote to extend it and postpone a scheduled executive session. == Key Decisions == - Denied the appeal by Orion West LLC (agent for Bungalows on Ceros LLC) against the Planning Commission's denial of setback and slope variances for a 141-unit multi-family housing development. The motion to deny the appeal passed 8-1. - Approved amending the General Plan Future Land Use Map designations for tracts 21, 26, 23, and 24 to Community Commercial (C2) (Case 2024-7898) by a vote of 8-1. - Approved amending the General Plan Future Land Use Map designation for tract 19 to Community Commercial (C2) (Case 2024-81852) by a vote of 8-1. - Approved amending the General Plan Future Land Use Map designation for tract 20 to Community Commercial (C2) (Case 2024-854) by a vote of 8-1. - Approved the Master Plan Amendment (Case 2024-7899) for tracts 19, 20, 21, 23, 24, and 26 to C2 General Commercial, with conditions including prohibiting specific uses (gas stations, auto repair, package liquor stores, unassociated bars, cannabis production/retail, 24-hour restaurants) and limiting public business hours to 5:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. (excluding medical businesses), and reducing a utility access/trail corridor width. The motion passed 8-1. - Approved changing zoning from Mixed Use to C2 General Commercial for 9.11 acres (Las Solad Track 19, Case 2024-8853) by a vote of 8-1. - Approved changing zoning from Business Industrial Park to C2 General Commercial for 10.77 acres (Lades Track 20, Case 2024-8855) by a vote of 8-1. - Approved postponing the executive session to the next governing body meeting unanimously. == Motions & Votes == - Agenda Approval — Approved unanimously by roll call vote. - Inmate Confinement Agreement and associated budget amendment — Approved unanimously by roll call vote. - Motion to deny the appeal from the Planning Commission's decision to deny the variances for the multi-family housing development — Passed 8-1 (Councilor Lindell voted No). - Motion to Suspend Rules (initial vote to extend meeting past 11:30 PM) — Failed (Councilor Michael Garcia voted No). - Motion to Reconsider Suspension of Rules — Passed (Majority voted Yes). - Motion to Suspend Rules (second vote to extend meeting past 11:30 PM) — Passed (Majority voted Yes). - Motion to approve Case 2024-7898 (amending General Plan for tracts 21, 26, 23, 24 to Community Commercial) — Passed 8-1. - Motion to approve Case 2024-81852 (amending General Plan for tract 19 to Community Commercial) — Passed 8-1. - Motion to approve Case 2024-854 (amending General Plan for tract 20 to Community Commercial) — Passed 8-1. - Amendment to the motion for Case 2024-7899 (Master Plan Amendment) to modify business hours to 5:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. (excluding medical businesses) and list specific prohibited uses — Passed 8-1. - Main motion for Case 2024-7899 (Master Plan Amendment), as amended — Passed 8-1. - Motion to approve Case 2024-8853 (changing zoning from Mixed Use to C2 General Commercial for 9.11 acres) — Passed 8-1. - Motion to approve Case 2024-8855 (changing zoning from Business Industrial Park to C2 General Commercial for 10.77 acres) — Passed 8-1. - Motion to approve postponement of Executive Session — Passed unanimously. == Public Comment == The public comment period and discussions with council members highlighted significant concerns from residents, particularly regarding the proposed rezonings on the south side. Residents expressed worries about increased crime, street racing, and the potential for undesirable businesses (e.g., 24-hour establishments, liquor stores, cannabis retail) under broad C2 zoning, especially if the current developer's vision for a medical college doesn't fully materialize. Many criticized the late hour of the hearing, stating it prevented broader community participation. There was also discussion about the effectiveness of community engagement processes (ENN) and the need for 'guardrails' or specific conditions to protect residential areas. Conversely, the developer and medical school representatives emphasized the positive economic development, job creation, and healthcare benefits of their plans, including potential workforce housing, and expressed willingness to agree to certain use restrictions. == Topics == - Land Use Appeals - Zoning Map Changes - Inmate Confinement Agreement - Business Hours and Prohibited Uses - Meeting Opening and Protocol - Remembrance and Tributes - Wildfire Assistance - Executive Session Postponement - Procedural Votes and Motions - Technical Difficulties (Presentation) == Full Transcript == [Music] Mayor: Are we live? Assistant: Yes, we are live. Mayor: Very good. We are live, and in that case, I'd ask everybody to please take a seat. Silence your cell phone or other apparatus, please. No signs of emotion. If there are scores in the football game, keep it to yourself. Sig has it on at home, and she doesn't want a spoiler. We are calling the meeting to order at 7:34. It's a special meeting. Please, if you are able, please rise. We will have a Pledge of Allegiance led by Councilor Lee Garcia, a salute to the New Mexico flag remotely by Councilor Cassett, if you can do that for us, and an invocation from Councilor Castro. Councilor Castro: I pledge allegiance to the flag of the state of New Mexico and the Zia, a symbol of perfect friendship amongst United cultures. Mayor: Jeff Norris. Are there other people to be remembered? Yeah, thank you. Anyone else want to remember folks? I know Jeff is on everybody's... Councilor: Sir, I'd like to remember a dear friend of mine who passed away recently. His name is Paul Dado. He was an amazing musician and an incredible friend. Mayor: Anyone else? Councilor Lindell? Councilor Lindell: Thank you, Mayor. I just want to acknowledge, after spending the morning watching President Carter's funeral, that inspiring, aspirational decency, fine character, what a really, really humbling to watch that. So we're thankful, and President Carter's been called to his greater rewards for well-earned. Mayor: I want to join in the thoughts about Jeff Norris. I first met Jeff when he was publisher of the Reporter and was doing a horrific job as a business manager for the local alternative newsweekly. And then he came to work in city government and was tremendous in all of his different roles and just enormously decent, fun, creative, smart. As it said in his obituary, he was a rascal and a romantic and a writer and a public servant and a digital wizard. He won writing competitions, he worked in fiction, and he just really was one of those people who makes all of us feel better about being around him. I'd also like to give a thought to the people in California who are struggling with horrific wildfires. To the credit of our city team, we have sent help in the form of our wildfire team, who are the best of the best, and we wish them well and keep them safe and ask them to do their best on behalf of representing Santa Fe while they help people who are in such horrible dire straits in California. Come home safe. We really appreciate your dedication. Let's take another minute and just send our regards to people who are suffering here and elsewhere and who need our support. Thanks, everybody. Madam Clerk, if you could please call the roll. Clerk: Councilor Cassett. Councilor Cassett: Here. Clerk: Councilor Castro. Councilor Castro: Same. Clerk: Councilor Chavez. Councilor Faulkner. Councilor Faulkner: Here. Clerk: Councilor Lee Garcia. Councilor Lee Garcia: Here. Clerk: Councilor Garcia. Councilor Garcia: Present. Clerk: Councilor Lindell. Councilor Romero Worth. Councilor Romero Worth: Here. Clerk: Mayor Weber. Mayor: Present. Everyone is here. Thank you. Can we get a motion to approve the agenda, please? Councilor: So moved. Mayor: There's a motion. There's a second. Is there any discussion or changes to the agenda as it's been presented? Can you call the roll, Madam? Clerk: Councilor Castro. Councilor Castro: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Chavez. Councilor Faulkner. Councilor Faulkner: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Lee Garcia. Councilor Lee Garcia: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Michael Garcia. Councilor Michael Garcia: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Lindell. Councilor Romero Worth. Councilor Romero Worth: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Cassett. Councilor Cassett: Yes. Clerk: Mayor Weber. Mayor: Yes. Thank you. Madam Clerk, if you could take us to item 7A, the first item on our agenda, and give it a read so that everyone, both here and home, knows what is on deck. Clerk: Council, I'm sorry. 7A. Request for approval of an agreement with Santa Fe County for inmate confinement at the Santa Fe County Adult Detention Facility in the total amount of $4,800,000 for a four-year term with a request for approval of a budget amendment in the amount of $600,000 to the Detention Center fund using prior years' gross receipts tax revenue earned over budget estimates to fund increased costs in the inmate confinement agreement. And here to speak is Deputy Chief Ben Valdez. Councilor: Move to approve. Mayor: There's a motion and a second. Good to see you, Chief. If you want to give us an overview as to this item and what we are being asked to approve. Deputy Chief Ben Valdez: Yes, Mr. Mayor. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, Councilors. We're up for a renewal for the inmate confinement agreement with the County of Santa Fe. We don't maintain our own correctional facilities, so we have been doing this for quite some time. There is a significant increase in the daily rate from years past, and working with the county, they've said that, first of all, the cost of providing those services has increased, but there's also additional services that they are provided to folks that are incarcerated, which to us was a welcome relief, which included items in the area of mental health. So that was a very welcome relief, in addition to other costs. The City Attorney's Office, they did a phenomenal job to help us get this crafted. One thing I would just want to make sure that I highlight on this is there is a chance next year that there may be additional costs, and if that does come up, we'll make sure to bring Council the message. But our request is for this four-year agreement. We're hoping that the cost stays the same. However, there is a potential that there may be cost from next year. That's what's outlining. They have that. Mayor: Thank you. Are there questions? Any questions of anyone else? All good. Madam Clerk, we have a motion and we have a second. If you could please call the... Clerk: Councilor Chavez. Councilor Faulkner. Councilor Faulkner: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Lee Garcia. Councilor Lee Garcia: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Michael Garcia. Councilor Michael Garcia: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Lindell. Councilor Romero Worth. Councilor Romero Worth: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Cassett. Councilor Cassett: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Castro. Councilor Castro: Yes. Clerk: Mayor Weber. Mayor: Yes. Motion passes. Thank you, Chief. Appreciate it. Madam Clerk, that takes us to item eight, where we are taking up a land use item. You would introduce that to us. Clerk: Item 8A. Appeal numbers 2024-8995 DAP and 2024-8996 DAP of case number 2023-7662. Appellant Brian Ninger, sorry for mispronouncing, Orion West LLC, agent for Bungalows on Ceros LLC, appeals the Planning Commission's decision to deny a setback variance and a slope variance for a proposed multi-family housing development located at the northwest corner of Ceros Road and West I25 Frontage Road. Here to present is Assistant City Attorney Rebecca Monk Herman. Mayor: Before you begin, let me just quickly go through the process so everybody has the same set of understandings. We'll start by if anyone on the governing body needs to disclose any communications that were outside of the bounds of fair play, they should recuse themselves now. Then we will go to the staff report. The appellant will have an opportunity for an opening statement and to introduce evidence through sworn testimony. We will then go for a cross-examination of the appellant and/or others. Ultimately, we'll end up with the members of the governing body having the opportunity to ask questions, and then we will close the public hearing part and we'll end up with discussion by the governing body, a motion, and a vote. So that's a fairly standard operating process, and we'll just continue with our land use procedure. So you have, if you can get your laptop plugged in and the presentation working, you have the floor. Assistant City Attorney Rebecca Monk Herman: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Members of City Council, plugged in. Looks like nothing's coming up yet. Let me just one more shot. Bring it over. Let's see if we can have a little IT assist. There we go. Thank you for the help. [Silence] Assistant City Attorney Rebecca Monk Herman: All right, thank you everyone for your patience. So we're here to hear, it's two appeals tonight, but of the same land use case number. So it's appeal 2024-8995, appeal of a setback variance request, and an appeal regarding a slope variance request. These were both appeals by the applicant to the Planning Commission. These matters were both denied by the Planning Commission, and so those matters are being appealed to the governing body this evening. And for anyone who may not know me, my name is Rebecca Monk Herman. I'm an Assistant City Attorney with the City Attorney's Office here in Santa Fe. So the property that is the subject of tonight's hearing is an approximately 19-acre vacant lot located in the northwest quadrant of the intersection of Ceros Road and I25 West Frontage Road. The applicant is Bungalows on Ceros LLC. The agents for the applicant are Brian Ninger and Carl Summer. There's only one party to this appeal tonight, and that is the appellant. So there is no, there's no appellant, there's no, no one else other than the applicant. The standard of review for tonight's hearing is going to be de novo, or a new. So the governing body will be doing an independent review of the evidence in the record and also of any new evidence that is presented during the hearing this evening. And then the governing body will independently apply the law to the facts and the record and any evidence that comes in tonight. The governing body may take the commission or staff's experience and expertise into account when deciding this appeal, but the governing body is not required to do so. The requests to the Planning Commission were as follows: the appellant's requests were the following. The appellant requested a development plan for a 141-unit detached one and two-story multi-family residential development. And so in support of that development, the appellant also requested two variances. One was a setback variance. The applicant requested an 11-foot reduction to the 45-foot setback that's generally required in Zone 4 of the Ceros Road Highway Corridor District. And the applicant also requested a slope variance. They had requested a variance to the terrain management ordinance that prohibits disturbances of 30% natural slopes. So there's a couple of sources of applicable law in the matter tonight, and that's going to be, first of all, the variance criteria, and then also it's going to be the ordinances from which the variances are sought. So this is a, this is a chart that I know members of the governing body have seen several times before. This is the variance criteria. So these are the criteria that an applicant must meet in order to receive... Councilor: I'm so sorry, Mayor, if there's something that I'm supposed to be seeing on the screen, I am not seeing it. Can we fix that? Mayor: It is broadcast on the screens in here. I'm not sure why you wouldn't be able to have access to that. Yeah, I'm not seeing it on the Zoom. It's the materials in the packet. I do have access to it. Okay. Just concerned if anybody else is watching, something we should try to address. Oh, hey, Dan. Thank you. All right. Assistant City Attorney Rebecca Monk Herman: Please do speak up if something isn't working because I, we don't have a visual of you right now because we've got the, we've got the flowchart that, that is in the packet. Mr. Mayor, Mr. Essel just informed me that the way to broadcast this through Zoom is I guess I need to log in through Zoom. Would the Mayor like me to go ahead and do that so we can make sure anyone who's watching can see it? Mayor: I believe that typically the City Clerk shares the screen Zoom. Yeah, yeah. Sure. You can send the Zoom to Andrea, and then she can share her screen, and then the Zoom will be played, the presentation will be played through Zoom. Assistant City Attorney Rebecca Monk Herman: Okay. So I might need to escape the presentation just for a minute to send it to the City Clerk. So maybe if you could call out for just a moment, make sure we get back on track. That'd be great. Thank you. Mayor: Thank you. We'll get this fixed. [Silence] Mayor: Mr. Mayor, you want to go ahead and start from where we... Assistant City Attorney Rebecca Monk Herman: Yeah, I think you should keep, keep rolling. We, we can, we always add it to the record at the presentation of the record afterward. That's good. Go. Um, okay. So, uh, going to the variance criteria, um, this is a, this is a flowchart which is located on page nine of the memo that's I'm currently on Civic Clerk. Um, these, uh, this is basically, um, I'm paraphrasing, uh, Section 14-3.16 of the code, um, which is... written out in long form in Appendix 1 of the memo that's on Civic Clerk, and that's on page 8. So the criteria are as follows: The governing body must, in order to grant a variance, consider whether unusual physical characteristics exist that distinguish the land or structure from others in the vicinity that are subject to the same relevant provisions of Chapter 14. If the answer to that question is yes, the adjudicator moves on to Criteria 2, which is whether special circumstances make it infeasible for reasons other than financial cost to develop the property in compliance with the standards of Chapter 14. If the answer is yes, we move on to Criterion 3, which says, "Does the intensity of development not exceed that which is allowed on other properties in the vicinity that are subject to the same relevant provisions of Chapter 14?" Criterion 4 asks whether the variance is the minimum variance that will make possible the reasonable use of the land or structure. And Criterion 5 asks whether the variance is not contrary to the public interest. If all five of those criteria are met, then the variance should be granted. If any one of those five criteria are not met, then the code provides that the variance should not be granted. So, the first code section from which the applicant seeks a variance is Section 14-5.5b, the Cerrillos Road Highway Corridor Protection District, which is generally shortened to CRHC in the code. Boundaries of the CRHC are set by zones described in code provision 14-5.5 B2. That section provides that CRHC provisions apply to all legal lots of record that directly abut the Cerrillos Road right-of-way. The land at issue for the governing body tonight is in Zone 4 of the CRHC because it is between Airport Road to the southern city limits. And I've also included here some of the reasons for the faded reason in the code for the Protection District. The code states that Cerrillos Road is one of Santa Fe's busiest thoroughfares, one of Santa Fe's primary entranceways, and one of the community's major commercial strips. And for these reasons, it is the purpose and intent of the CRHC District to assure that Cerrillos Road accommodates through and local traffic, provides a visually attractive introduction to Santa Fe, allows for clear identification of and easy access to commercial institutional establishments, provides for a gradual transition between rural character of the county and the urban character of the city, and also accentuates to the greatest extent possible architecture and landscaping rather than parking lots and commercial signage. So, the specific section of the CRHC Protection District is code section B4 A3, which provides setback requirements. This is the code provision for which the variance is sought. And specifically, this requires that in Zone 4, in which this property is located, that there be a 45-foot setback or 20% of the lot's depth, whichever is less. So here, the 45-foot setback applies because it is less than 20% of the lot's depth. The property is in Zone 4. Here, the entire 19-acre parcel is not currently being subdivided. It's one single lot. So 45 feet is much less than 20% of the 19-acre lot's total depth. And so here's the purpose for the drain and stormwater management provisions. That section provides that the drain and stormwater management provision is intended to protect, maintain, and enhance the health, safety, and general welfare of the citizens in the natural environment of Santa Fe. There are a number of considerations when looking at this code provision and how to enforce it. Some of those provisions include protection from flood dangers, minimizing destruction of natural landscape, protecting the scenic character of Santa Fe from visual blight, indiscriminate cuts and fills, and respect, protect, maintain, and restore natural drainageways, wetlands, floodplains, steep slopes, riparian vegetation, and wildlife habitat areas. And so all of this comes from code section 14-8.2a. And so the drain subsection that a variance is sought from, specifically, is the grading subsection. That section provides that natural slopes 30% or greater shall remain undisturbed except for arroyo crossings and no more than three isolated occurrences of sloped areas where each individual disturbance shall not exceed 1,000 square feet as approved by the city engineer. This provision applies solely to the construction of roads, driveways, and utility placements and is not intended to allow development on natural slopes exceeding 30%. So this is the language from the code. The bolding is mine to kind of highlight some of the language that I think is relevant for the governing body's consideration tonight. Here, the applicant is asking to disturb about 4,765 square feet of 30% or greater natural slope, and this is for a residential development. The city engineer, therefore, doesn't have authority to waive or modify these requirements administratively in this instance, and that is why I believe the applicant proceeded with the request for a variance. Applicant has argued that they meet all five approval criteria in their petition, all five variance approval criteria. And so that is their burden. They do need to, in order to grant the variance, the governing body must find that the applicant meets all five of those criteria. However, I think the main focus of the governing body's attention tonight should essentially be on Criteria 1 and 2. Staff has basically concluded that because Criteria 1 and 2 were not met, Criteria 4 and 5 also were not met because if it was feasible to develop the property in compliance with the code, then the variance would exceed the minimum variance that would make possible the reasonable use of the land or structure as provided in Criterion 4. And that, and also that the variance is not in the public interest as is required in Criterion 5. So all of that analysis is included in the staff report to the Planning Commission, is included in your packet of materials, all of that analysis from staff. So, when considering the special circumstances, the governing body should consider whether the Arroyo de los Chus and the requirement to comply with certain NMDOT requirements constitute special circumstances. That is the position that the applicant has taken. While the Arroyo de los Chus is naturally occurring and the NMDOT requirements are created by government action, the governing body may wish to elicit some testimony or other evidence from the applicant tonight regarding whether these circumstances distinguish the land from others in the vicinity that are subject to the same relevant provisions of Chapter 14, as required by Criterion 1, and also whether the applicant received any benefit from the government exchange for the agreement to develop the property with applicable NMDOT requirements. If the governing body determines that special circumstances do exist, then the next step is to determine whether those circumstances make it infeasible for reasons other than financial cost to develop the property in compliance with the standards of Chapter 14. And so just here again is, the slide hasn't moved forward yet. Let me try one more time. It should be on, sorry. So, here again is the variance criteria. So, special circumstances is Criteria Number 1. So, the governing body has to make a determination whether there are special circumstances before moving on to any further variance criteria. So the next issue, the next issue on appeal, is whether it's infeasible to develop the property in compliance with the code for reasons other than financial cost. So the appellant has argued that construction of this development would not be feasible without a setback requirement. And so this is one of the images from the applicant's materials. And so as you can see, some of their development extends into that 45-foot setback area. And so that, that is the position that they've taken because the development that they have designed would extend into that 45-foot setback, potentially their project would be infeasible. Next. And so appellant also has argued that construction of this development would not be feasible without building on the 30% slopes. Again, here's another picture from some of the applicant's materials showing where some of their proposed development would extend into some 30% slopes. As you can see here, they've indicated 30% slopes are in red. And so some of the structures that they've proposed building, you know, would be in that area. And so just here again is the variance criteria, just kind of as a refresh on where we are. This is whether those special circumstances make it infeasible for reasons other than financial cost to develop the property in compliance with Chapter 14. So there are, and so we've suggested three potential motion options for the governing body tonight. Motion Option 1 is to move to grant the appeal, reverse the commission's decision to deny the variances, and direct staff to prepare findings of fact and conclusions of law consistent with this motion. Motion Option 2 is one could move to deny the appeal, affirm the commission's decision to deny the variances, and direct staff to prepare findings of fact and conclusions of law consistent with this motion. Or Option 3 is one could move to deny the variances on a separate basis from the basis described in the commission's findings of fact and conclusions of law. In particular, for example, if the governing body determines that the setback variance or slopes variance failed to meet code criteria for reasons that are different from those than that which the commission identified, and direct staff to prepare findings of fact, conclusions of law consistent with that motion. So that concludes my presentation, and I'll make way for the next speaker. Thank you very much. If we could now hear from the appellant, and perhaps you can use your time for up to 20 minutes of making your case for us. Thank you. Very good. Thank you. No, nor did we count the tech time for our staff. We're going to need to swear some people in. Maybe we can do that while we're setting up. Councillors, Mr. Summer, it just depends on what you're testifying. If you're testifying to facts, okay. If you're referring to facts in the record, then we would not require it. But that, yeah. May I, we don't have the language for swearing in at our fingertips. Do you, do you swear or affirm that the, help is on the way. Help is on the way. That's what I'm about to discover. Mr. Eshel, do you have the standard land use case language? Please raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do you understand the penalties of perjury? Anyone else going to be testifying? You want to do them all at the same time? Let's just do it in one fell swoop. Please raise your right hand. And if you can step up to the mic, please state your name and address for the record. 571. Do solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury. Thank you. Please raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. Brian Ninger, 2213 Brothers Road, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the tes Testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury. I do. Thank you. Thank you. City Clerk: I would recommend maybe taking a picture of that since you're going to have to do that for all the other land cases. Councilor: Thank you. He is going to send it to me. Mr. Summer: Now your clock starts. Mr. Mayor: I have some photographs that I'm going to refer to. If I could hand those out and approach you all. Mr. Mayor: Is there any way that those could be somehow sent to me? I'm not sure there's... Can you take a picture of the pictures and send them to Councilor Cass? Councilor Chapus: I'll send them to you. This is Councilor Chapus. Thank you. We'll get them over to you right now. Thank you for... Okay, I think it's being taken care of. First of all, I just like to thank you all. This is a special meeting. We appreciate you having done this. Whatever angst was created last month among staff and getting the agenda and you all setting it here, I really appreciate that. We really appreciate it. Who are we? I represent Cabin Companies, and Mr. Jeremy Hall is the representative of Cabin Companies. It's a closely held family company that does rental projects in Arizona and New Mexico. They are fully vertically integrated. They buy, they develop, they design, they build, and they stabilize their projects. They're not somewhere in that chain, so they are making an investment in this city. They have already bought this property. They're not here going, "Well, if we get this approval..." They're in. They're going to develop this property. Why are we here? On the board are the two reasons why we're here, and staff went over those. I'm not going to go over them, but one of them is the reduction in the setback from 45 feet down to 34 feet at the most, and down to 9 feet in another part, and I'll go over what that looks like. The second one is there is 0.006% of this project that requires the disturbance of 30% grades, 0.6 acres. So it's 4,800 square feet out of this 19 acres that we're requesting the variance, and I'll go over exactly both of these. This first variance was granted when Beaver Toyota owned this property years and years ago, and I'll tell you why it is we're here. What I'd like to do tonight is I'm going to give you a little background. I'm going to go over the variance criteria. Mr. Ron Bohanan, who is an engineer who's done all the work on this project, is going to give you some geotechnical background about the variance information as well as the Department of Transportation requirements. There are $2 million of public improvements that the Department of Transportation says need to be made to make this intersection safe. Talk a little bit about that history. So what I'm going to do, and I'll do it as quickly as I can. I'm sorry I'm moving so fast, but this site, this site was graded, and here is a picture of it. You saw it in the earlier, but you see where the property is outlined in green. The area that's Cerrillos Road, the property is... This site was graded by Beaver Toyota when they bought the property years and years ago. They didn't develop the property, and there was a reason they didn't develop property, because they were not going to do the public improvements that the DOT was trying to make them do. We're willing to do that. I wanted you to see what this property is like. This is not mountainous terrain. It's not steep slopes everywhere, and the area for the variance is this one little patch of juniper trees. Used to be the bank of the Arroyo years ago before they put in the Cerrillos Road. It changed the course. This property was not developed by Beaver. It was not developed. Pulte Homes had it under contract, was going to do it. They didn't develop it for the reason of the DOT requirements. In trying to get their approvals, they could not come to an agreement. Cabin has come to an agreement. So why, how do we find ourselves in this position? This property was annexed by Beaver with the city by Beaver Toyota, and with the annexation agreement, they were granted variance for the 45 feet down to 35 feet. They were granted the, actually it was more, it was down to 25 feet. So the City Council, when they annexed the property, granted a variance of the setback along the highway. It's only, that's the only place we're talking about. That's where the corridor is, down to 25 feet. When Cabin bought the property, I didn't represent them when they bought the property. They understood, because the annexation agreement incorporated that variance, that they had that variance. This was prime for their kind of product. What is their product? They do a rental product that is made up of, looks like single family homes and duplexes spread across the property, but they're rental. They're not the typical restory large apartment buildings. They allow for private spaces or people who live in the apartment complex to have their own little private spaces. The open spaces you'll see in the development plan that Brian goes over. That's what they're doing here. They designed to that specification. Actually, they didn't even go down to 25 feet. Well, it turns out that they were wrong. Okay, they were wrong. That variance expired. They did their design, and they came in, and that's why we're here. It's not as though we came in and said, "Hey, can we just let, just change the rules for us?" Right? They understood, mistakenly, that this variance criteria ran with the land. It did not run with the land. The code changed, and it expired. So that's how we find ourselves here. It was an honestly held belief, and they designed to that, and I think that you will find that the design is something that this town needs, and I'll go over that in a little bit. So let me go to the variances themselves. This is just quickly, this is what was Beaver Toyota's design on this property that was approved. This design was approved, and you can see it was largely parking lots, and it was all over the same area where we're going to develop, and it came close to 25 feet up against that boundary line. We're not that close. I just wanted you to see what was there before. I've already gone over how we found ourselves here in the annexation. I'm not going to talk about that. So here is a bird's eye view of the product. It is one and two stories, single family, single family-like, and duplex-like properties. They're all one or two stories, and they have this neighborhood kind of feel. They have private little open spaces, public open spaces, trails, and the like. It is a different kind of product than you are seeing in the photographs that I gave you. The photographs that I gave you are the apartment complexes right across from Cerrillos Road. They're all three stories. They're all these tall buildings. They don't have these common and private open spaces associated with them. This is a very different, unique, and we think a preferable project to going up, and I'll talk a little more about that. That is what we're doing. The improvements that you see on this area, the intersection right down here at the bottom of the photograph, that is the intersection of Beckner Road and Cerrillos Road. These improvements off to the left, that's what the DOT says this property needs to be developed. It was the same thing for Beaver, same thing for Pulte, and they're saying the same thing for us. Why? Because Beckner right now is operating at a failing level. It is unsafe, and the radius and the sight distances on that frontage road as they are right now will not accommodate the development of this property in any measure that makes any sense for however this design has been approved. And Ron will talk a lot more about that, because you can see what it does is it takes about the bottom third of the property in order to make that intersection safe. The top 25% of this property is the Arroyo Chamiso. And so what is developable on this property is that area that is in the middle. I think it's about, I haven't done a precise calculation, but it's about 40% of this land outside the public, outside the right-of-way, is developable for this use. That gives you an idea of what we're talking about. Mr. Summer: And Mayor, I apologize once again, the images are not up on the Zoom screen. Mayor: Okay. How did you do it for? The presentation has to be sent to me via email so I can present it. Is it okay? Stop the clock if, while we're waiting, I just have a question. Was there Mr. R to the clerk? Councilor Cassid: Can you see that yet? Okay, she's putting it on. Sorry. No problem. Thank you for checking. And no, I cannot yet to answer your question. It's up. Thank you. Councilor: I appreciate you flagging that. It's important for everybody who's trying to watch this to have access to that, and your flagging it has really been helpful. Thank you. You're very welcome. Let's see, slide six. You ready to go? Which slide are you looking for? So we need to on six. That's it. Very good. Sorry to interrupt the flow of your... That's all right. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I didn't have this. Not good at this particular thing, but I want to give you a little context about this particular variance. This is a unique section of the right-of-way. As you can see, the right-of-way from the edge of the public right-of-way to the property boundary on the north side is 88 feet. It's larger than anywhere else on Cerrillos Road, and at the bottom it's 200 feet. So you have this sort of widening right-of-way from the edge of Cerrillos Road to our property boundary. The code, the district requires an additional 45 feet, which we are asking to make 34 feet instead of 45, so that the back end of these structures would be the 200 feet in that location. 88 feet plus 34 feet, that would be the setback under the variance. I wanted to give this to you because it is unique, and it goes to the purpose behind the setback in the corridor. The corridor, as was read to you, is intended to create an entrance and preserve this entrance to Santa Fe. Right? That's, we all know that's what setbacks do. They keep people from crowding up against roadways. They keep a visual character of a district, and they enhance it. That's what the purpose is behind this. So one of the criteria that you have to look at is, is it contrary to the public interest? Well, the public interest here is being preserved because the setback that we're requesting doesn't do damage to this visual impact in the city. We're not coming up against Cerrillos Road. We're coming... Carl: Stay by the mic, please. All right. We're coming closer by 11 feet in that distance. So is the public interest preserved? We submit to you it is. We're not doing damage or violence to the purpose and intent of the ordinance by asking for this variance. Let me go back to the first criteria, special circumstances that are unique to this property. There is no other property along Cerrillos Road that has this set of circumstances related to it. Special circumstances are not defined. They're what you all find to be special circumstances in light of all the facts. I leave it to you. This is a unique situation where the setback is already very big and will be maintained by and large. If we do not get this variance, we will lose 16 residential, 16 structures, which some of which are duplexes, some of which are single family apartments, and that's the impact on us. The second issue is, is relates to, are we being allowed a greater intensity than we otherwise would be for somebody else in the district? It really doesn't apply here because as staff has pointed out, well, you could just go up, just build the 44 units in three-story buildings and be done with it. So we're not asking for an intensity of use that we would not otherwise be able to use. Is this the minimum variance? That's one of the criteria you have to ask. So we're asking for 11 feet out of 45 in an area where the distances, as I've already described for, is that minimal? That's up to you to decide. The variance we submit to you is minimal. We're not trying to cut the setback in half. We're not trying to get right up to the property line and saying, "Hey, this isn't, the setback doesn't make any sense here." What we're saying is we need a variance for this, and we believe that that is minimal. I've already gone over the public interest; it is being preserved. Staff, as I told you, has said two things about this, and this is critical. They've said you can go up. Yes, you could go up, and that's what you get when you go up, and those are the apartment complexes in this district right across the road. They chose not to go up, and I think thankfully so, because what we're going to go through is what this property will look like in this area when you come into the city of Santa Fe. You're not going to see these large three-story groupings of buildings that don't have any common open space. The other thing that staff said in their memo and said this at the Planning Commission was this: "If the governing body determines that the property could be developed without the requested variances, the setback variance and the slope variances should be denied." That is not the standard. That is not the standard for granting a variance, but the Planning Commission took it as a standard, saying, "Look, if you could otherwise develop this property, you don't get a variance." That's not the standard. It's not the standard that you all have applied, and we'll talk a little bit about it. Across the way, where the apartment places are going up, there was a much larger variance granted with respect to the disturbances of 30% grades, and the standard wasn't, "Hey, can you do this some other way on your property?" And it was actually more pointed at the Planning Commission. Staff said, "If you could put a building on this property that complies with the code, you are not allowed a variance." That is not the standard, and I submit to you, you would never have a variance that met that standard. Obviously, that's not the way it's been applied, and I submit to you that the proper standard is following those criteria. And if you want, I read from page six of the city attorney's memo that I just quoted from you, and I submit to you that that's not exactly correct. I'm going to move quickly to the next variance. I'll have Brian go through the slides about what this looks like, but we put the project in context with a video, and I'm going to move through these. So this slide shows where on this property the 4,800 square feet is that we're asking to disturb, and it's in green. I'm sorry, it's on slide 11. The Arroyo Chamiso, before Cerrillos Road went in, used to swing south in this location, and the area of these remnant trees is a remnant bank of that older arroyo. The roadway went in, changed the course of the arroyo, changed the course of the floodplain, and in fact, that very concept was recognized by the Planning Commission by granting a variance right across the highway. The next slide is, was it 12? So the area on the left is the little red area where we're asking for a variance along that old southern bank. Across the highway, where that kind of long area is in red, that was granted the same variance on the same basis that those were remnant areas, and that right now that area is graded over, and that variance was granted so those apartments could go in. And if you go out there today, it's all building, it's all structure. The same set of criteria, the same factors apply here, and Mr. Bohannan will go through the background of that. So the question becomes, you have to look at whether or not it's feasible to do the development that we've talked about without the variance. Excuse me, again, feasibility is not defined. It's up to you all to define it, but I think you need to take it in the context that we're talking about. If you do not grant this variance, then the entire northern portion of this development cannot be developed because that grade is not going to be, we can't disturb the grade to get there. So the reduction of the site will take this down to less than 40% developability, and we will lose many, many units on that north side. That's the reason behind the variance. What are we talking about? We're talking about a clump of junipers that is in the middle of property that on the north of it is all arroyo. To the south of it has all been graded. Beyond that is all going to be roadway improvements. So I ask you to think about when the escarpment ordinance and the terrain management ordinances were adopted. You all know that it was to protect steep slopes in sensitive areas, habitat, all of the criteria that are in the purpose behind that code. And this was, this was done in the 90s, and the purposes behind it were so that you didn't have these big scars across sensitive and fragile properties. This is not that. This is not that kind of situation. In fact, this is akin to the area at St. Vincent's Hospital. They had a little clump of trees in an arroyo that was in the middle of that project. A variance was granted. That project is underway, and they're doing it. This is very similar to that. The purposes behind terrain management regulations were to protect areas not specifically like this. This is a small patch, 30% with about six or seven junipers in it, and you all drive by it, you all have seen it, you know what we're talking about. So I think that when you look at the criteria, is it feasible? Are we asking for something that would be otherwise more intense? Is this a minimal variance? In this particular instance, what we're asking for is 0.006 acres of this property, which is 30%, to be disturbed by virtue of this variance. That is fairly minimal. Again, it's up to you to decide what's minimal and what's not minimal. I'm going to turn it over to Mr. Ron Bohannan, who can talk about the geotechnical stuff that I referred to. Thank you very much. Mr. Mayor, Councilor, Bohannan, registered professional engineer, State of New Mexico, 5571 Midway Park Place. I'm going to go with this and go as quickly as I can. I'm going to go with this slide and then show you why the alignment of the extension of Beckner is the way it is. That's, that's really the important on this slide. The red line that you see right through there, that was really where the arroyo, over probably a millennia ago, where the arroyo did, and it created these banks that are on the south side, two banks. The one that was granted in question tonight, where the bank is now, is where the yellow line is, and what's in blue is the floodplain through FEMA. So over time, the arroyo migrated back north, leaving these two open 30% open spaces. And the one on the east side was granted a variance primarily for drainage. They had to do drainage improvements to stabilize the arroyo. We are in this, we are doing similar stabilization portions on our west side as well, but I wanted to show you that the intent, if this is part of a larger slope area, has been gone, and so it's been obliterated on the east side, and what's left is a very small remnant. I could go to the next slide. I do. Okay. What so what we have here is the old, and so what I did is I spent a lot of time, slide 14. So city clerk's name is Andrea Salazar. Thank you. You ready? Okay. So when we've, when we started looking at this project, I looked in through the three years that Beaver Toyota looked at trying to get an access control or access to the frontage road, and then also talked to Py, who spent another year trying to do the same thing. And what happens is under this existing circumstances, what you have is a very large sweeping 90-degree turn out of Cerrillos Road. Right now, it's operating at a level service. If you in hierarchy, you start with A, which is unrestricted, and you go in the alphabet. D is what's congested. E is beyond congestion. It's a level of service. In addition to this, you have long queuing links, and you have sight distances that are, that are an issue. And those were the reasons that, that and coupled with Beckner needs to be extended through this property so that you can connect to other roadway, Herrera Drive to the west. And so that is what was one of the reasons that was really creating that. So that creates the special need. Yeah, go to the next slide, which is 15. So when we looked at it, and we worked with the New Mexico Department of Transportation, we came up with a design. The, the roundabout at the end of this allows the flexibility and the ability to make that connection to the west, and there's another slide that really shows that alignment well. But what this does is this actually with this improvement brings us to a level service B when improvement for about $2 million, and we're giving up 2.3 or dedicating 2.3 acres of right-of-way. In the horizon year, which is 2036, when we analyzed it, it will also bring that to a level service C. So not only does this create a safer environment for today, it also is a much better environment to the, in the long term. It, it really does handle that. So I'm going to conclude with slide 16. So what this, what this does is this shows the development, and the dashed blue line is the connection over to, to the west. And so Beckner Road allows this alignment, and this development allows development west, this site in, in the city to continue to develop and connect to Cerrillos Road and Beckner, which is important. So the very fact that this property is special meets that by the criteria. We have been through the access control committee of the DOT and have approval. We're working on the design plans. Once the, the zoning has been approved, we will actually get a driveway permit with the New Mexico Department of Transportation. With that, I'm going to turn it over to Brian. Thank you, Mayor and Councilors. We'll try to make this quick because I know this, it's going a little long. So next slide, please. Okay. So I'm just going to tell you a little bit of background and then kind of close and reinforce some of the things you've already heard. And really what I want to do now is just kind of run through the development plan, the portion that has been approved. And this is 141 units. It is a build-to-rent multifamily that has one and two-bedroom and three-bedroom homes. It's well amenitized with the clubhouse. It's going to have the pool, fitness center, dog park. Very generous. There's still eight and a half acres of open space here. There's a very thoughtful landscape package that even moves a little bit into the arroyo with an extra trail that runs into the arroyo. We also, although our main access is off of the frontage road, and the frontage road has been redesigned, and I'll talk about that just real quick again. We have an emergency access off of Cerrillos Road. The redesigned frontage road and the new roundabout definitely, as Ron said, improves function and safety, and it also extends Beckner Road. And then one other really important thing is that we also extend the pedestrian trail and sidewalk from the corner of Cerrillos and the frontage road all the way to Herrera Drive. I think that's important so that our folks and residents and, and Santa Fe residents in general can get from those shopping centers over to this area. Next slide, please. So this is a view again, and, and this corner view really is important because it shows the importance, and I wish I had a cursor here, but it shows the importance of that anomaly that is the right-of-way that's 200 feet in that corner versus 45 to 65 everywhere else. Let's go to the next slide. Moving pretty fast through here. So this shows a close-up of the road improvements. These are the $2 million in frontage road improvements and safer intersections, better functionality, and a roundabout that allows a tie all the way over to Pueblo del Sol. And that, that is part of the NMDOT's plan on the website today. The other thing about the arroyo. Real quick, we did have some feedback from some neighbors that have some large auto body shops back in the area, and they wanted to make sure it was designed to handle a tractor-trailer, not only a tractor-trailer but a tow truck that tows tractor-trailers, and it is designed for that. So we'll go to the next one. I wanted to show this slide one more time. I apologize, something happened in our emailing that the Right-of-Way exhibit was off of the screen. If you look at this and you just look at what's in front of our site, we have 88 to 200 feet. Everybody else all the way to Airport Road, their right-of-way is 45 to 60 feet. So we already have a natural setback because of this deeper right-of-way, and that's been pushed on to us by the NMDOT. That happened when they designed this area. Let's go to the next slide, and this reiterates that as you can kind of see it in a little bit in context. Then let's go to the next slide again. I want to show that corner, how deep that right-of-way is, how deep that setback actually is. Previously, of course, the setback was granted, and it was 25 feet. In our case, we're only coming back to 34. Okay, so what I want to do now is play the video. So the next slide, and I just want to show what this looks like driving from Cerillos at the Frontage Road intersection heading north. I think you can just click on the... I'm going to ask a quick favor. I think because of the size, the video did not email. So can I switch back just for a moment and run the video for the folks here, and then I can put that in a Dropbox? It's a rather large file. I'll just do that quickly. I believe it's also in the packet, so anyone that's viewing online, I think that it's in the packet. Let me see. I don't know. Plugged in. I think I've got it now. So let's go ahead and try this. It's showing on my screen, but it's not showing. I think we're still looking at your screen. Michael, can you turn the screens on so when he plugs in his laptop it plays? What I'm seeing in the packet, it looks like it's a similar issue that the video is not playing. It's just showing up as a still image. So it is not available in the packet at this time. It's too large, unfortunately, to email. The idea is so that you get a sense of when you're driving by this property, what will you see? We could go to slide seven. Part of the reason for this is we were talking about the height of the buildings and the character of the Cerillos Road overlay. Versus a three-story project, we have one and two-story projects, and so it's not obtrusive from the road. Then we go to slide eight, and you can kind of see that from the intersection. Then we would go to slide nine. So we kind of go down, and I think that gives you a concept or an idea about the setback. I can fast forward and wrap up my part of the presentation. So we'd go to slide 24. As we look at where this project started many years ago in the annexation agreement, this is just a comparison to what we're doing today. With Beaver Toyota, we were looking at a car dealership and a body shop. Here we're looking at a nice residential community, and Santa Fe needs homes. With that project, there was 4.29 feet of open space. Here we have 8.55. They had a pretty big parking lot at 71 spaces. We have 300, and it's concealed from the road. There they had no roadway improvements. We have a $2 million project with significant improvements to this intersection. There was no connection to Herrera Drive. We have that. Both of their variances, slope and setback, were granted. In this case, our slope and setback variance are pending your approval. With that, we can... I'm going to turn over to Carl to wrap this up. We'll stand for questions. I just have one last thing to say to you, and then I'll shut up. What is significant about the Planning Commission's decision? Can you hear me? Sorry. What is significant about the Planning Commission decision is they approved this development plan. They went through all the criteria, and they said this meets our criteria. They did not deny the development plan. They just said we're not going to grant you these variances. I think for the reasons that I said is that they applied a criteria that is if you can do something else without a variance, you're not entitled to it. I don't think that's appropriate, and for the reasons that I've said, anyway, I wanted you all to know that the plan itself was approved. What does that mean? It meant all the criteria, the point system that you have to go through, open space, all of those things were met. This project meets that criteria. It's not getting away with anything in that regard, and the Planning Commission recognized that. I really appreciate your patience, and I'm sorry for the messes. Not your fault. Thank you, and thanks for trying to move as quickly as possible through. It's complicated and a lot of information, so I appreciate it. I'm going to ask if there's anyone here in the public who wants, or on Zoom, who wants to be sworn in as making a public statement on this for a two-minute statement. Is there anybody in the Zoom room or present in the council chambers? It is a public hearing, so please, if you have testimony you want to offer, please come forward or do it from the Zoom. Madam Clerk, we have several attendees. If you would like to speak, please raise your hand, and we'll have to swear them in. No one in the Zoom attendee room has raised their hand. How about in the council chambers? Anyone on this issue wish to be heard? If not, I will ask for the members of the governing body to take this opportunity to ask questions that occurred to them either after reading the material or after hearing presentations tonight. We'll just go down the row and ask people to try to be mindful of time but get your thorough answers that you require in order to make a good judgment. So, Councilor Castro, do you want to kick us off? Thank you so very much. Thank you everyone for being assistant, and I apologize for our complications tonight. I do have a couple questions, and I think they are most appropriate for Mr. Ron. It has a little bit to do with the relationship with DOT. Thank you so very much for looking on the NMDOT website and understanding that we need to help this intersection. There is a little bit of tension in this area between what is city and what is state, and what we're looking to as a highway and what we're looking to as a residential street. What is the future of this area if we are to develop in terms of walkability and usability of that street? The classifications will be the same for Beckner, so it'll be probably a collector or larger. It's designed for four lanes that'll go through that where it's a four-lane roundabout, what we call. So you can actually extend the four-lane to the west to that area. So it's what's doing from a pedestrian connection standpoint. We incorporated the trail in and around the roundabout, and we are doing trail improvements from Beckner along Cerillos down to the Arroyo to the north, as well as providing trail connections through the roundabout to the frontage road so that if a trail is ever built on the frontage road, we have an... So we've made provisions for pedestrian connectivity as well as bike connectivity. That's really important because I think we all understand we're looking at road diets and trying to actually go down to smaller lanes and not have as many medians in these areas. So I'm hoping that that is part of the development plan. Is that setback a requirement by DOT, or is that just an agreement that you've come to? The setback, the additional setback for the larger lanes and the faster, the sight distance. Thank you. Yes, it is a requirement. So we couldn't... So the DOT would have to address that eventually anyway, whether this project gets built or not. It would have to eventually work on that intersection because it's at a level of service E now. It's... We didn't pull the accident history, but over time, accidents are... The problem is as you stack, you can't see around cars in certain criteria. So what we did is we actually calculated what's the queuing length in the 2036 horizon year, and that's what actually set the distance to the roundabout. So we had to put it all the way on the very west side of the property. I'm just... We're sort of using some of these older rubrics when we're sort of moving away from some of these faster lanes, some of these larger thoroughfares in our city. So I am a little bit... I wonder if there was a variance that could be worked on with DOT as opposed to the City of Santa Fe. Are you talking about changing the actual roadway alignment? I would say changing that space in between. Yes. So actually, what's driving all of this is not only the DOT, but it's the NMDOT. It really needs that connection to the west. So even if the DOT were to give a variance to the curve, you still need to go west through this property because you've got development to the west, and you've got connections that need to connect to this roadway. But the four lanes and the speed, I don't think is a requirement, or it is? So the four lanes is based on the capacity that we anticipate in 2036. We couldn't get that same capacity with just two lanes. So I know that would be nice, but then your queuing lengths would be incredibly... I understand the complexities. As I mentioned, I think we're in transition. I would love for our Complete Streets Director to be part of this conversation. Thank you. No further question. You may need to do a little swearing in here. I know, but is this... I know you're volunteering your services here. Thank you. I appreciate it. Our staff is so amazing. Please raise your right hand, state your name and address for the record. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury? Thank you for stepping up. Do you want to... Mayor, I think he needs to identify what his role is because he is not the Complete Streets Director. That's true, but you may have relevant material here. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, counselors. I am under contract with the Public Works Department for DRT Traffic Engineering Coordination and the Traffic Engineering. I'm sorry, you really have to talk into the mic, otherwise all our people on Zoom can't hear you. Thank you, Councilor. Better. So I am the Traffic Engineering Agent for the Public Works Department, and I think it would be helpful for the council to know that as this development was going through, simultaneously, a Cerillos subdivision across Beckner, across Cerillos and Beckner, was also simultaneously under review. So with Department of Transportation, City of Santa Fe, and its agent, Wilson and Company, this developer's traffic engineering agent, which was Bohan and Houston, and I can't remember the development, but it was a seven-lot Cerillos subdivision where there's a coffee. It's famous right now. I don't know the... I can't... It's not coming to my mind because I don't go to it, but everybody drives through it. Dutch Brothers. That development. So all of that traffic was looked at holistically. This intersection is joint jurisdiction. It's shared by DOT and City of Santa Fe. So going south of Beckner and west under the frontage road is DOT jurisdiction. All of the improvements this developer is doing with respect to public infrastructure, with the exception of the one emergency access on Cerillos Road, is all DOT, and they're working with the DOT agents to make those changes, which are huge. They include dual lefts from the frontage road northbound onto Cerillos. Simultaneously, the development across the street will from Beckner have dual lefts south. So that signal operation was looked at as one holistic, what's happening with development. It includes pedestrian accessibility. bicyclists. He mentioned the pedestrian trail northbound to Agua Fria. The roundabout itself is a feature that is important for the Complete Street City objectives. You can't really go faster than 20 miles per hour around a roundabout. As you're coming on the Frontage Road, currently you're right on that signal, you're taking it quick, and you're basically on that signal. So they're pulling it back, making it safer. I don't know, was it 200 feet? So you're going to have better sight distance as you approach Beckner. It's going to be a superior intersection. Thank you so much. We appreciate you. Is there any concern about the speed or the size of those lanes? We have had a few fatalities. First of all, I think it's still conceptual. I don't think the design has been absolutely approved. But our lane widths and such are in the process of being codified. But we do apply them in our Public Works review from when it gets approved by the Planning Commission, per se, by the time it gets a building permit. We continue to interact with the developers' engineers to apply the most current standards. I can't speak specifically to what your lane intentions are on the plan. Is it 11 feet? That's typically on a collector what we'd have is 11 feet. Your sidewalks are five, six, so they're meeting the current city criteria. Perfect. So I guess just to be clear, a lot of my concerns are with the pedestrian and the bicyclist and the trails all in the same area where we are going to have large vehicles, where we are going to have possibly heavy machinery. It's something that we really need to look into. But thank you so very much. No further questions. Thank you. I'm going to not neglect our council member who's zooming in. Councilor Cassid, do you want to take the floor for a turn and ask your questions, please? Yes, thank you so much, Mayor. I appreciate it. And thanks everybody for making sure that the visuals were appearing on the Zoom. I do appreciate that a lot. I had a couple questions. One might be, I would imagine, for maybe Mr. Summer, in regards to the conversation around assuming that the variance went with the annexation agreement, or maybe Mr. Escel or Ms. Kerman might be from the city the ones to answer this. But don't our variances expire normally per the code? It's not that if a variance is applied that it always stays with that property. I imagine that there's, similar to our development approvals, those expire after, I think, three years. Do our variances normally follow that same pattern? The answer to that is yes, your variances do expire. Rarely do they show up in an annexation agreement, though. So in the chain of title, this property shows a variance, and the criteria at that time were a little different. Then the code changed, and I do believe that the original variance did have an expiration on it. I don't remember what it was, so it did expire by its terms. When the code was applied at the time of the annexation, and then under the new code, it also expires. I think it, Dan can probably say this, but I think that it expires after, I think, after a year, but I'm not sure. Mr. Is there somebody with definitive knowledge from the city who is responsible for the code? Dan, Mr. Escabel, do you know the terms of the variance of expiration? Mayor, members of the City Council, variances expire three years if not active. Okay. Then, and now, Dan, can you speak to this concept of the code changing in between when the variance was first granted during annexation as to now, and what those differences may have been? Councilor, I think referencing the code, I don't think staff needs to be sworn, but if it's going to be a historical account of what happened, then I think he should be. Okay, Dan, can you get yourself sworn in? I can provide you code references, but if we want historical values, Heather was the actual case planner on that case and would probably be the best person to talk to on historical actions for the Toyota case. For the variance criteria, the variance criteria back when it got approved was based on hardship, and all the findings were established based on those hardship criteria. Unfortunately, there were so many variances granted and so many appeals to the governing body, and I believe Councilor Lindell was there when they required us to change the variance criteria to make it tougher. So we did, and now the variance criteria is based on a special circumstance unique to the property, which makes it very hard for an applicant to obtain a variance or even qualify for a variance. And that's one of the reasons why the applicant in this sense did not qualify for the variance, as Ms. Manuk Herman clearly identified in her report, and the Planning Commission saw when they denied the variance. It's not a fact that they want the variance. They definitely want the variance, and they believe in their design. They need that variance for that design to occur. The problem is, is that's the, that's only one design, and you can achieve that same development, the density of that development, even more if they so choose, without the variance. Okay, thank you. That's helpful. So it sounds like previous version variances did expire after three years, as they do now. But it had to do with the criteria for whether or not a variance would have been granted, and there's the, that's where the difference occurs. Thank you. And then I did want to, and Dan, don't go too far, this is probably a you question, in regarding the consideration around a variance. I do think that that is an important conversation because, you know, there's a little bit of a difference of interpretation around, from what Mr. Summer is presenting, around, you know, that whether or not a different development, what I'm kind of struggling with here is it sounds like this development, as this plan, just does not fit on this site unless a variance is granted. And so then I understand where this concept of if you can design it differently without the variance, that's why we would, why would we be looking towards that? I'm not sure if that question makes sense. If anybody, Dan, were you able to interpret that and what I'm curious about from the city perspective and how we do assess variances and where they are necessary? The way, Mayor, Council, Councilor Casset, the way we interpret the variance is we require the applicant to first establish the criteria pertinent to Chapter 14, the criteria for the variance. And in that, that standard, the variance criteria identifies that the Planning Commission can only grant a variance if they meet those standards. The same thing with the Board of Adjustment. So when you start going through that variance criteria, the first standard is a qualifying factor. Do you have a special circumstance that allows you to move forward to the, to, to that public body to seek a variance? They certainly do with the terrain management issue. They did not have a special circumstance or special need for the setback variance because as you continue down that variance criteria, you start identifying with the second one, whether or not you're asking for a variance that is financial in need. And if they're going to knock down five or six houses because they can't get the variance, that, that falls under that financial area. But the issue here, when you're looking at the entire property, they came in with one design. It's a sprawling type of an apartment complex. It's spread out instead of going vertical. When you spread it out, you demand more resources, more land in order to achieve your specific design criteria. But that's the niche that they've chose to, to, to market at. It's not an absolute design that can fit on the property and still meet all relevant factors in order to build within the development standards of Chapter 14 without a variance and avoid all of the other areas that they're trying to seek a variance from. So the issue here is, do we grant, do we design our codes to meet a development, or should the applicant design his plans to meet our ordinance? And if that's, if the latter is true, then he, they didn't qualify for that variance. When you go tit for tat every time you go from their variance finding to the variance standards, they don't make it. Okay. Yes, absolutely. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thank you so much. All right, I'm going to try to be as speedy as I possibly can. I know we have a long night ahead of us. Is Ms. Bessner here tonight? D, I believe I see you on attendees. And if I could speak with her about the slope, that would be helpful. Or if anybody from stormwater management is here. I am curious about that 30% slope. This conversation around the change in the utilization of the Arroyo based on Ceros, or maybe it was Beckner, one of the roads, as well as I read something in the packet around the flood plain and wanted to understand where the flood plain would be on this property, if it would impact any homes, if, if we were to be, if we did grant that variance. So I believe D would be the person to speak with. I see D in the attendee room. Thank you. You have been promoted. Can I swear you in? Yes, please. Raise your right hand and state your name and address for the record. T. Bessner at 200 Lincoln Avenue. Do solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury. Thank you. Thank you. So, Councilor, do you want to repeat your question for D? Absolutely. Hi, D. Good to see you, or see your name. I was curious about the request for the building on the 30% slope. And I, there was some conversation in the packet around the flood plain, around, you know, how the Royal Chiso is utilized for stormwater management and how that is shifted. And so I wanted to hear your perspective around this arena, as well as if this variance were to be granted, if it would potentially negatively impact any residences that may now be in a flood plain where they otherwise would not be, or if it could have any negative impact on that property. Yes, Councilor Casset, Mayor, and Councilors, they are not in this phase going to be in the flood plain. They are working to remove a portion of their property from the flood plain through FEMA because they are above the base flood elevation in that property, even though it's still designated as flood plain. So in the future, another phase of their property will be flood plain, but it will be removed. So none of the, none of their, we wouldn't allow them to construct any of their in the FEMA flood hazard area. And the 30% slope that they are asking to disturb is, is a fairly small area. I have severe Juniper allergies, so I don't have an opposition to remove Junipers. If they were beautiful Pinon, that's another matter. I do believe that we should protect those areas. But so I, no objection to the concept of what they're doing. Thank you, D. I appreciate that. And my son has those same Juniper allergies, so we can empathize with you there. So thank you. I think that that was all my questions for you at the moment. I appreciate it. And then, Mr. Summer, I just have a couple of questions. One, how many units would be impacted without the variance? Are any of these units, would this impact potential any affordable units? I know that we have not discussed affordability, but I'm curious if that would impact affordable units if this was, if the Santa Fe Homes program was required here. And then also in terms of the parking and the fact that it is an over-parked property, or there is additional parking spaces than are required, and how much of the development is that taking up, and how would that potentially impact the number of units if it was not, did not have that excessive parking there? Thank you very much, Council. I'm going to let Brian address that, but in a broad sense, it would require a whole redesign of this project: circulation, parking, number of units, the whole thing. But Brian can talk to specifically how many units are affected by the variance for the slope and how many units are affected by the other variance. Counselor Cassett, thank you for your question. Just trying to address the question a little bit more directly, the units along the setback line would be roughly 16, and the units around the slope area would be 7 to 8. So that kind of puts that in perspective. So we would have, I guess, that would be a total of 24. And does this impact the number of affordable units that would be posted? Well, to address that, this particular project has taken, we do have an agreement with the Santa Fe Homes Program, but it is the fee-in-lieu. Okay, thank you. And then in regards to those extra parking spots, if those were not utilized, not built, how would that impact units and the percentage of the property or the number of acres that are being utilized for that extra parking? We haven't really done an analysis of how many units that would be, but as I kind of look at this and just sort of try to take a guess, it would be hard to, because of the way the circulation is laid out and the roadway, some of those extra parking spaces have to do with how that circulation is put together and designed. I don't think that we would actually gain very many units because it's very tight. One of the constraints that we have is the Arroyo and the flood plain to the north, and of course, the new requirement for the access in the street to the south. And this is very tight with this design. So, I would have to take a closer look at that. I don't think we would see any new or additional units gained. Okay, okay, thank you. I appreciate that. Mr. Mayor, I will go ahead and yield the floor for now. Thank you so much. Thank you, Counselor. Counselor Travis: Thank you, Mayor. I think Counselor Cass asked most of my questions, but I do have, I just want to hear from the developer. So I had some questions about the variance approval from Beaver Toyota to, like, the difference and the expiration was helpful knowing that whole process. So thank you, Mr. Escabel. I also wanted, had some questions about how many units would be impacted, but at the same time, I would like to hear from the developer on, has there been discussion or consideration of how you would compensate for those affected units? Because I believe that there is, you know, fact in the idea that there is room to place those units elsewhere if they are absolutely necessary for the development. So I'm just curious on your thought process to that, because I do, and I will just be very transparent, when I see something, and our staff has put a lot of thought and work in and says it's not approved, they're the reason why we have them in place, and it's because they're experts in doing that, and they're the experts in our code. And so when we have the confident communication from them saying that criteria was not met and there is room to alter the development in a way that still meets the developer's goal, but they're choosing not to do that, I would like to at least give you the chance to explain why that's the case. I can tell you why that's the case. So this particular developer is again a build-to-rent developer, and what that means in the industry is that basically these are, they look like residential homes, but they're run like an apartment complex. So they're for rent, not for sale, which means that, you know, there's a driveway and there's, there's sort of a parking lot instead of just a two-bay garage or something of that nature. So this is a type of product, and I think the only other product that I know of which has started construction is Verdo in Los Solarios. It's called Havenly. So this would be the only other product like that in Santa Fe, and it offers people an option. Some people don't, you know, are fine in the three-story apartments. Some people don't want to do that. They want to be more in a, in a home. So that's what this particular development is. The height, the, the tallest building, I think what we, what we advertise is 28 feet, but it's actually around 25 to the top of the roof line. That's our two-story building. The one stories are around 15. So again, it presents like a small community of residences, and that's what they do. That's what the developer does. And I know one could say, okay, we could come in and somebody could come in and build a three-story walk-up apartment. We got a lot, a lot of those, and there's some arguments that, yeah, we do need those, but that's not what this developer does. This is their product. They're good at this. This is what they build. This is what they operate, and that's what they bought the property for, mistakenly under the guise that the annexation agreement variances ran with the land. Great, thank you for that. And in respect to the developer and how they develop, I will say that the development with the need that we have in Santa Fe may not meet the need. We have a lot of individuals and community members that would love to live in a house that they could rent and it be affordable. That's not going to be the case with this development. All right, I appreciate you explaining that to me. Thank you very much. I yield the floor. Thank you. Thank you, Counselor Garcia. Take the floor. No, you're good. Thank you, sir. Counselor Leal: Thank you, Mayor. I have a couple of questions on this. Looking in the packet, and thank you, Dan, for referencing that. I was here 20 years ago on that Beaver Toyota project. On page five and six in the, I guess it's the staff report here, the bottom, it says, "Record reflects staff's conclusion that neither the Arroyo nor any requirement from Council, you're going to have to talk in your mic. Thank you. Do preclude residential development on the property in compliance with the code, and that the same number of units could even be built by using vertical construction. Vertical construction would be consistent with the code and would not require the setback variance or the slope variance." All right, Mr. Summers, talk to me about that and how many units would need to be redesigned, and does that require a redesign of the entire project? Mr. Mayor, Counselor, thank you very much. The answer is, you just don't take six or seven buildings out of a plan, seven or eight over here, and try and stick them somewhere else. This whole circulation pattern would have to be redone. And as I, as I heard Brian say, could not make up that 24 number units by the redesign. You don't gain the space to do that. Does that answer your question, Council? I think so. A comment that you made earlier, I mean, we're talking about 141 housing units here. I'm trying to find a way through this. We need housing. Editorially, we put up apartment complexes, people hate those. We're talking about a different model here. Well, people don't want that. It's, we're trying to thread the needle and find a way to get housing. That's what I'm doing with this. Talked about a standard of if you can do this building and have it comply with the code, then you're not entitled to a variance. That's what the, that's what staff said. That is not what your criteria is. Speak to that. Yeah, and Dan reiterated it. He, he said it again here tonight, and the staff memo says it. And the exact language is found on page six at the, at the bottom of the first paragraph of the staff memo. It says, "If the governing body determines that the property could be developed without the requested variances, if the property could be developed without the requested variances, then the setback and the slope variances should be denied." That is not the standard under the code. The standard under the code is, are there special circumstances related to this property? And there's a whole bunch of criteria. Is the development infeasible without the, it's not, can you develop the property in accordance with code on something on this property? That's not what the code says. And if that were the standard, the variance across the way would not have been granted. You would never grant a variance because always somebody can do something on their property that complies with the code. No one would ever get a variance, and that's why I think that's this, the criteria. Dan said that the criteria got harder. It did not get harder. It got more specific. Hardship was almost impossible to show. It was almost impossible to show. The code has now broken it into all these criteria that give you all the discretion to say, under these circumstances, this qualifies special circumstances. So I, I, I think I'm, I'm going a little far afield. I apologize. The standard is not, can you do something that complies with the code? Certainly we could build four office buildings on this property, and that would comply with the code. No variance required. History of this property is no one's developing it because this intersection cannot be used if this, this for, for the types of uses. Beaver Toyota, they had an approval for a project, didn't develop. Pulte, they pursued and pursued. They didn't, and they're one of the big home builders, as you know. This property has special circumstances around it, and it's not created by this developer's plan. In order to use this property, there is significant improvements that need to be made to improve that intersection. That's one of the special, special circumstances about this property. Address the, please, the variance granted on the same set of criteria across the rail. So, across the way, the developer who's developing those apartments over there, they came in and asked the Planning Commission for a variance to the slope, 30% grades. And what it was, was a remnant Arroyo right through the middle of their project. Now, let me tell you, they could have developed a whole lot of less units and preserved that little Arroyo. And if the criteria was, can you do something that complies with the code, no variance would have been granted. A variance was granted because the special circumstances were, were assessed by the Planning Commission, and those were that there is a remnant Arroyo. It's, it's about, from what I can tell, it's about three times the size of the variance that we asked for. But under the criteria of the code, Planning Commission assessed each one of those, and they said, with respect to infeasibility, what the, the finding was, this, this development with this number of apartments cannot be feasibly developed without this variance. Staff didn't say, the Planning Commission didn't say, "Well, just get rid of the units. Just plan to develop this in accordance with the code. Get rid of the units. You don't need a variance." That wasn't the criteria then. It's not the criteria now. But the variance was granted them. So let me be clear, are you telling me that we have granted a variance to a project across the road with essentially the same criteria that you're presenting us with tonight? It is exactly the same criteria. Okay. And the project that I'm talking about in the photographs is that one. And you could certainly take out a number of buildings and reduce the units, all of that to comply with the code. Okay. So I also heard Dan say that, is Dan still on? Yes, ma'am. We want to re-access if we, we have access to her. Yes, thank you. Hello, are you there, Dan? Yes, I am. Okay, thank you. I heard you at the end of your former questions saying that you, you really had no objection on the 30% slope disturbance. Is that what I heard you say? Yes, I mean, technically the code does say that there is no 30% slope disturbance allowed, but this, this area is, it's not a beautiful 30% slope area with lots of 20% slopes around it. It's kind of an odd little area. So it, it, it would be. incongruent to leave that with this development. So we're talking about, thank you, we're talking about a variance that on a 19-acre property encompasses 4,500 square feet, correct? Yes. How much? 4,800 square feet. Oh, sorry. Oh, well then I raised, I raised my hand not on the setback, this is on the slope. 4,800 square feet, right, Carl? All right, okay. So I'm done with questions on that part. What about the setback? Let's talk about that. Can you pull that slide up that shows us? You had a slide. It is, uh, slide number, yeah, yeah. You have a slide in your packet that shows a rendering and shows an awful lot of space between Cerrillos Road and your development. Is that what you're looking for, Counselor? No, I'm looking for the one with the rendering, like on the corner looking at. Oh, yeah, that, that one. I mean, that one does it, but I think the other one kind of shows a better picture. So if you go up to, uh, Madam Clerk, if you go up to number 18, that's the view. Yeah, that looks like a lot of space to me. Is it? It is. It's, it's, uh, to the back of these buildings, it would be at the widest 234 feet, and at the most narrow on the north, it would be 88 plus 34, that 42 feet. Okay. 14, 14, sorry. So in doing the roadway and putting in that over $2 million into the intersection, how does this, that's what New Mexico DOT wants, correct? What they required? Yes. Okay. And how does that help us in the future? What, what does that contribution get us in the future? It does the following things: it makes the intersection of Cerrillos Road and Beckner safe and improves its level of service from E today to B at full buildout. And it makes this intersection safer from the approach on the frontage road because right now, sight distances and the stacking are dangerous. And so what this does is it lengthens the stacking back with appropriate sight distances, slows the speed down. And then finally, that roundabout is situated for a connection to a roadway that is planned at the, to the north up to Pueblo. Is it Pueblo? Okay. Does this project have any long-term effect on anything going on with Herrera Drive? I think there are pedestrian connections that are improved by this, these improvements, both Herrera Drive and then also going west. Okay. So the six-foot sidewalks go all the way up to Herrera Drive, and you can see they meander through that open space up there. All right, thank you. Mayor: Thank you, Council Faulkner. Part of what's hard about being the ask counselors to have questions is our colleagues often asked a lot of the questions we were going to ask. Thank you, smart people. Just a couple of comments. I, I feel like if we can't chant that we need housing and we can't say that we're desperate for housing and then make it difficult for housing to happen. I know that there's not a lot of affordable units in this development, but there is the formula that the more housing you build, more housing becomes available for affordable units. I'm not sure I buy that 1,000%, but it seems like a good, there's some science behind that. So, um, I just have a question. I know this probably doesn't have standing in this discussion, but is anywhere in the code that we're, are we going to readdress this issue in the upcoming code rewrites? Um, I don't know, Mr. Escobedo, it was about the rewrite of Chapter 14 and whether there'll be changes around the variance process as we do a code rewrite of Chapter 14. The answer may be, we don't, you don't know at this time until there's more development of the process for getting new work done on the code, but that was the question. May members of the council, during this particular update, the variance criteria is not being updated, and that would probably take a lot more discussion. Has it, it went through a large discussion when it went from its original to what it is today. Okay, thank you. That's all I got. Thank you, Counselor Mayward. Thank you, Mayor. Um, I guess this question is for staff. I don't need either City Attorney's Office or Mr. Escobedo. So page six, if it can be developed another way, therefore you shouldn't, variance shouldn't be granted. Can you, can you all speak to that? I mean, is that what you're saying? Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Counselor, Counselor Mayward. Um, if I could, I just want, right in front of the mic, please. Um, if I could, I just wanted to read the, the relevant code sections that was fresh in everyone's mind. If you give me a moment, I'm going to pull it up. Um, so, uh, that, that's a reference to Criterion 2, and Criterion 2 provides that the special circumstances make it, for reasons other than financial cost, to develop the property in compliance with the standards of Chapter 14. So, um, it doesn't say to develop the project, it doesn't say to, um, provide housing, it doesn't say to, um, uh, meet the public interest. It says to develop the property. Um, and so in this case, it is a, it's in a C2 zone. Um, it's an extremely permissive zoning district. You can put pretty much anything there. You could put a restaurant there, you could put a store there, put housing there, you can put many types of housing there. Um, and so, I mean, what that code section says is develop the property. That's, that's the guidance that we have from the code, that's the directive from the code. We don't get into this discussion of whether it meets the public interest until Criterion 5. Um, and so that question of whether the property can be developed in compliance with Chapter 14 is a standalone. That is what the code says. May counselors, this is on page eight of the staff report as well. There's an appendix that has all the codes that are being referenced. So, And I guess so, based on that, we're supposed to take these sequentially. That's correct. So you first, you do one, which is maybe just read one, but let's just walk through them. So you do one, and, and then if you meet one, then you get to go to two. It's not a, you get to jump around, right? Excuse me. And so, yeah, so one is, um, one or more of the following special circumstances applies. Um, and I'll just, I'll just read the code language into the record. Um, this is, this is in the memo, but, um, A, unusual physical characteristics distinguish the land or structure from others in the vicinity that are subject to the same relevant provisions of Chapter 14. Characteristics that existed at the time of the adoption of the regulation from which the variance is sought, or that were created by natural forces or by government action for which no compensation was paid. B, the parcel is a legal non-conforming lot created prior to the adoption of the regulation from which the variance is sought, or that was created by government action for which no compensation was paid. C, there is an inherent conflict in applicable regulations that cannot be resolved by compliance with the more restrictive provisions as provided in Section 14-1.7. Or D, the land or structure is non-conforming and has been designated as a landmark, contributing or significant property, uh, pursuant to Section 14-5.2, Historic Districts. Um, and so, um, subparts B, C, and D, um, haven't really been discussed. They don't, I don't think that anyone thinks those are applicable here. And so only unusual physical characteristics applies. Um, and so that condition has to be met. If that condition is met, then we move on to Criterion 2, whether it's feasible to, to develop with, for reasons other than financial cost, to develop the property in compliance with the standards of Chapter 14. Only if that criterion is met, do we move on to criteria, criteria 3, 4, and 5. Okay. So, and in this case, I guess this question would be for, um, Mr. Summer. So in taking one at a time, uh, this, the, the setback, what's the unusual physical characteristic? The unusual physical characteristic of this property is that in this location on Cerrillos Road, this property, uh, there's three characteristics. This property is the 88 feet down to 200 feet away from the right-of-way. That's a physical characteristic of this property that is unique to this property. The second thing is, is that in order to develop this property, the southern, uh, let's, can we pull that map back up? Because I'm a visual person, and can you have somebody on your team walk up and instead of telling me southern, can you point to what you're talking about as you're giving me a narration? That, that one that Counselor Lindell pulled up is I think helpful because it's the one you can see the best. Yeah, that one. Okay. And can we move the captioning over to the side a little bit? Is that possible? Not get rid of it, but, so, um, the, this property is set back from the, uh, the right-of-way on the, on the southern part, 200 feet, and 88 feet at the top, at the top up on the right, on the right side up there. Right. That's unique to this property. On this property also, the top, uh, I'm going to say 20 to 25% are in a flood plain. That is unique to this property. That's not, not every property in this district that is zoned C2 has that criteria. The sec, and the third part that is unique and a special circumstance of this property is that in order to utilize this property for the, the, the approved development, just the number of units, 141, which is allowed, those improvements on the south take up 25% of the property. In order to do that, that property would be otherwise developable. That is unique to this property. Nowhere else in this district is there going to be that requirement for an improvement. Those are the specific special circumstances that relate to this property. Every one of those affects density. And I, I, I guess I don't, so on the right, the setbacks, but the setbacks are required by code. The setback is required by code, but the unique circumstance is, is that this, uh, property, which is for the reasons that I talked about, are squeezed down for development purposes, um, are, uh, uh, well, I, I guess I don't understand why that's a, a special circumstance when the code is telling you you have to do that. And, and you would think that, I mean, you don't want those houses right up against that highway. We, we do not want them up against that highway. Right. But if, if you were, so why is that a special circumstance? She knows that the setback is different than the right-of-way. The, the setback in this particular instance, um, a 45 feet affects this property in a way that it does not affect the other properties up and down this, this development because it adds a distance that is, uh, in addition to the 200 feet and 88 feet and the, and, and in between. That's, that doesn't exist anywhere else on this property. So, um, I think that that, what is for you all to determine is, do all of those, uh, attributes of this property create a special circumstance? This isn't a question of, does it create a hardship? Um, that was the, the, the old, uh, this is a simple question. Is, is a, in, in your opinion, is that a special circumstance? We submit that it is. Okay. And, and with regard to the, um, the other one, one, uh, slope, the slope. Thank you. Um, tell me, show me on that map, somebody, uh, where the slope comes into play and what's the special circumstance on the slope other than it's just unique and, uh, uh, not valuable because they're junipers. It is unique in the sense that, um, it is a remnant of an old bank of an arroyo that does not exist anymore. That is unique to this property. It's unique. It's, it's, it's, it was unique to the other property across the way, um, as it is unique here. So it, it is a circumstance that doesn't apply to properties generally. Uh, that's why it's, it's a remnant. Say that again. So the arroyo used to come up down to, now the arroyo's moved forward, uh, north, and what's left is this little patch of juniper that has a 30% grade around it. I mean, where they are. And along the rest of that bank, there's not 30% grades. It's not like there's this bank that is, uh, uh, the southern bank of the arroyo that's all been, it's gone, and this remains as a remnant. Okay. And so, Mr. Escobedo, you were saying that that, that does make that a special circumstance on the slope. Correct? Mr. Mayor, uh, members of the council, Counselor Romero Worth, we analyzed the issues for both of those variances, and with regard to the terrain management, When you have a terrain management condition that prevents you from developing your property throughout the property, there's an issue there which allows you to process the variance, meeting the first criteria as a special circumstance. It's when you get to the second, third, fourth, and fifth circumstances that if you don't technically have a mechanism that is preventing you from meeting the rules and regulations, you're going to have a harder and harder time as you progress through those standards. The way I like to explain it when I'm talking to some of my staff about variances is they have, think of them as an artist and a canvas. They are the artist of their design, and the land is the canvas of the property. They get to choose the design that's going onto that property. You can't go back to the store and ask for a variance to get more canvas because they didn't sell you enough canvas. You have to purchase that canvas. Here, they're asking the city, instead of purchasing that canvas, they're saying, "City, can you waive your rules so that I can have what I want?" Well, that's nice if the code allowed for that. Carl spoke of density. There are no density requirements in the C2 District. It's all performance-based. You ask for what you want, you design what you want, and if you can meet the infrastructure criteria for what you want, you get it. It's performance-based. It's not like an R21 or R29 District where you have setback requirements, where you have density requirements, and you're limited. Here, you are the complete designer of your project. If you design a project that requires the city to bend its rules, you did that. It's not the city that did that. Okay, and so the staff has been saying that there is no special circumstance for either of these variances, or there is for the slope, but not for the setback. When I looked at their variance criteria, I looked at their variance answers to the criteria line by line. In other words, they gave me an answer to criteria one. Did they meet criteria one? Then I did the same thing to criteria two. That memo goes to my supervisor, the Land Use Director, and to Legal for the complete analysis. And that's when we present it to the Planning Commission. And all of our analysis, including the Planning Commission's decision, identified that their criteria, what they requested for as part of their variance, did not comply to the variance standards, in which case they could not grant that variance. Okay, let's see what else I flagged here. Ten minutes are up. Who's whispering that? Okay, hold on one just thing. Okay, I will yield the floor. I know Council Garcia, you, sir, have the floor. Mayor: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and great questions. I just want a little more clarification on the railroad highway corridor and how that affects this. I think somebody touched on it. I don't recall who it was. Maybe Mr. Summer? Counselor: Yes, Counselor, the highway corridor, the Cerrillos Road Highway Corridor, has a setback along the entire corridor of Cerrillos Road. I think it comes from Airport Road down, and there is a setback unique to that corridor. It is 45 feet from the right-of-way up and down. And I think it's so the corridor has a specific setback in this corridor. So this project then would not meet that corridor. It would be 11 feet closer to our property line. And so that's the variance we're requesting is that we, instead of 45 feet, we would be 34 feet and 9 inches, 36 feet in another place along that line. The reason that we say it doesn't affect purposes is that we're so far away from the right-of-way. We're so far away from the roadway that was intended to be, the impact was intended to be mitigated. Mayor: Are you aware of any other property that has requested such a variance for the Cerrillos Road Corridor? Counselor: I haven't, I haven't seen any variance requests up and down that corridor. I'm just not aware of any that were potentially, would be the first to my knowledge. I don't, I'm not aware of any that were asked for. The one I was thinking about a moment ago was the bank property that was bought from Dicky Montoya on the corner there at Jaguar, but that was many, many years ago. The one that's graded, I think it's a parking lot now, but it hasn't been developed. I'm going to move on to another question. I think that this does go back to the variance that was granted to the Toyota dealership, and I know that was before. I don't know if anyone can speak to as to why that was given, and then I'd like to see if there is something that this current development, obviously we're hashing that out right now. Mayor: Counselor Garcia, I think that would be best answered by the Land Use Director, who would be the most familiar with that case. That was hers. Heather Lamboy: Thank you, members of the City Council, Mayor. Member, I'm wondering if this would qualify as the kind of testimony it would need to be sworn. Mayor: Please, Counselor Garcia, one moment. Please raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. Heather Lamboy: Heather Lamboy, 200 Lincoln Avenue. Mayor: Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do you understand and do this under the penalties of perjury? Heather Lamboy: I do. Mayor: Now you have the question. Heather Lamboy: Thank you, Mayor. With reference to Beaver Toyota, certainly that's ancient history, and I guess I was here then. That was a unique situation because that was a combination of an annexation as well as a development. So one has to remember that that is a commercial use, and Beaver Toyota had the desire to show their cars and their vehicles, and the product be illustrated or seen as one was driving down Cerrillos Road. But also with reference to that development plan that was created, there was a large amount of landscaping and buffering. The applicant, Beaver applicant, also put the building at the front of the site. They originally had requested for the building to be further away from Cerrillos Road, which would have been just one large parking lot. The intent was to really mitigate that impact by having the building closer to Cerrillos Road. And so it was a balance of having a building that fronts Cerrillos Road, the display space, and it was a commercial use rather than a residential use, so there was less concern at that time. Mayor: Do you recall how close it was to the road, the setback? Heather Lamboy: Yes, Mayor, Counselor Garcia, it was approximately 25, if I remember correctly, set of the four. Mayor: Thank you. And then I guess in reference to the current proposal or the current variance that has been requested, why again, I, this may be your opinion versus, you know, because we're hashing out the variance, but why it would have been granted again for that and not for this? Was it the residential versus the commercial use? Heather Lamboy: Mayor, Counselor Garcia, that is correct. The residential use was a major factor in terms of buffering to Cerrillos Road, as well as just the opinion of the Planning Commission through their decision that the site could be designed to comply with the setback. Mayor: Okay, thank you. I think that's all I have. Everyone else has asked questions that I. Thank you. Thank you, Heather. I don't mean to impinge on you, but if you could just hang around. I know you, I don't want to make you go zooming up and down the ramp if there are other questions coming your way based on the issue you just addressed so well. Thank you. Anybody want to have another bite at the apple? Go ahead, Counselor. Counselor: Thank you, Mayor. I just have a comment. I just, I know I, I want to just say I completely agree that we need housing, and I know that increase in housing has impact on affordability. We haven't quite seen it here in Santa Fe yet, despite how much has been going up. I'll just state that. But what I also want to say is though we have code, and we have our staff go through a very difficult process. We have developers go through a very difficult process. And if we are not going to follow the process and the code, it's going to become very, very messy. And so I just, we have a lot of documentation in front of us that shows how our staff has reviewed and assessed the criteria. This has gone through a process we put in place for a specific reason, and I just want to caution us and, you know, having this idea of like, well, the code may not be relevant because we need the housing. We have a lot of people going through this very, very tedious. Our developers know how the land use process goes. Our staff spends many hours on it. So I just want us to keep in mind, code is there for a reason. The process is there for a reason, and the information comes to us the way it does because that process has been developed. So I just wanted to make that statement because I think that's very important when we get appeals and reviewing the expertise that comes from our staff and their review. So I just wanted to emphasize that, Mayor. Thank you. Mayor: Thank you, Council Garcia. You passed the first. Council Lindell, any, this is still in the question area. So when we get done with questions, we'll close the hearing and we'll be able to offer interpretation or messages. Yeah, Counselor. Counselor: Mayor, so I, I guess this question is probably for the City Attorney's Office, and it kind of piggybacks on what Counselor Chavez was just talking about. So if we were to grant this variance, what's, what's the precedent that we're setting around our process and our, it's, I, I guess it, it depends what the, what the basis is that we think we're, we're granting these variances, that that we've somehow seen that there's, that all the criteria have been met, or that the criteria, I, I, I don't know. I'm not asking this question very well, and you're looking at me with deer in the headlights looks. City Attorney: Mayor, Counselors, I think Rebecca can answer this, but I'll start her off. I think, I think Counselor Maez, you're on the right track, which it would be, we need to know what the reason for granting is. So we need to be able to write those findings of fact and apply them to this project. So we'll need to know what those special circumstances are, et cetera. Right. So, so, and in terms of, yeah, precedent, it would be whatever we're saying the special circumstances, somebody else could say, well, you approved this project, and you said these were special circumstances, so you should do mine too. Counselor: So I would say that it would not be every piece of land is different, and I'm maybe Rebecca can go to that, but I'm not sure. I think you would have to make some pretty broad statements in order for it to be applicable to other places perhaps. So we, but we would want to know why you're making the decision in this case. City Attorney: I don't think I have anything to add. Yeah, it's, it's always a, it's always a case-by-case basis. I guess, I guess just one, one concern would be that, you know, if we didn't follow the code, that would, that would be arbitrary and capricious. We have, we have guidance, and if it's there and we can use it, then, then the director from the code is that we follow it. And Mayor, Counselors, if anything I said suggested that we shouldn't follow the code, please disregard anything I said that might have suggested that. Certainly we need to follow the code. Counselor: Right. So I guess the point being though then that we have a staff recommendation that the variance criteria have not been met. So if we're going to vote differently, we're going to have to give you guidance about why we think there were special circumstances and how, and how that, how you go sequentially down the list and of what it is we're determining we disagree with in order to arrive at the variances in both these cases. City Attorney: Yes, and also, right, that would be, we would need that to have a. good record and to have good findings and be able to develop good findings and conclusions. We would also hopefully have something in the record saying why it would be infeasible to develop the property outside of financial cost, why the project doesn't exceed intensity, why the project meets, isn't contrary to the public interest, and the variance is the minimum. So we just need something in the record to support all of those things. Okay, thank you. Thank you. May I be heard on just one point that Councilor Romero Worth asked about? It's precedential value. What I'm concerned about, and I think that people that are property owners are concerned about, is the precedent that would be set in denying the variance on the grounds that was set, which is if you can develop the property in some other way under the zoning, no variance allowed. It's never been the standard under the criteria that you've got. That's the precedent that I'm concerned about that is in this record, and that's all I wanted to add. Thank you. Thank you, Councilor. Any, Councilor Garcia, did you have anything? Director Lamboy, were you about to say something in response to the Councilor Mayor Worth's question? No, Mayor, I was going to be responding to Mr. Summer's comment as to the basis for the... Well, I think we need you to have a question in order to get into that. Well, I'd like to hear that. All right, Council, uh, Director, your thoughts on that matter are now open for discussion. Thank you, Mayor Weber, member, I'm sorry, Councilor Castro. With reference to the variance criteria, they were specifically addressed in the findings of fact and conclusions of law. So that may be more of a sort of shorthand reference to those criteria that was mentioned, but those specific criteria addressed by the Planning Commission are in those findings. Thank you. That help you, Council? Councilor Leal, you had your hand up. Yeah, thank you, Mayor. Right, I'm still not able to reconcile why a variance was given across Cerros Road with similar circumstances, or nearly identical circumstances. In fact, a larger area of the 30% slope. But this, this needs this variance. Staff, keep it down out there, please. This, this variance staff is recommending against. Why, why was the other one, or did staff recommend against that one and the Planning Commission passed it? I don't know if anybody has that knowledge. Mr. Escobel, do you know? Mayor, uh, Councilor, Councilor Leal, I'm actually not familiar with the variance that Mr. Summer is requesting. I know that the project across the street that I did was a subdivision of seven lots. There were no variances for that, which is directly across the street, directly fronting Cerros Road. That is triggered, that would trigger the Cerros Road Highway Corridor. If there's a variance that is behind that, it would not have been on the Cerros Road Highway Corridor, and the variance standards would have been somewhat different that they would have applied. But here we're talking about something that is within this Cerros Highway, the Highway Corridor, and then he has a variance to terrain management. If a terrain management variance was granted on whatever project Mr. Summer is showing the picture to, I don't know what that is. I don't know what project that is. I don't know the answers to that. Okay, we don't know the answer. But sir, do you... Sorry, I was just wondering if we were referencing this picture that was handed out as the property across the street and talking about the, the project that, uh, it is, it is the one that's under construction. I think the one that you have in front of you, Councilor Chavis, is the one that's already completed. This is the one directly across Cerros Road that if you're driving north on Cerros Road, it's, it's on your right-hand side and it's under construction right now. But it's also behind businesses. There are no businesses in front of this one. This is before you get to the bridge. The, the one you're talking about is behind the businesses. This is the one right before you get to the bridge on the right-hand side. Councilor Leal, back to you. If you, if you look at this photograph, this was taken from the right-of-way at on Cerros Road looking East. There are, there, there is a project north of the Arroyo Chamiso that you're talking about that is behind all the, you know, the whatever those places are there. Thank you, Mayor. Sorry, another clarifying question. So the variance is only though on the, um, on the slope, not on the setback, is that correct? The variance across the way was only on the slope. It was not, um, it was not the setback. And I think, Mayor, what, what we're saying is, is we didn't say that that one got set back. Okay, Mr. Escobel, that's a pretty old project that happened during COVID, actually, when everything was on Zoom. That particular case was handled by Lee Logston. Um, I am not familiar with the, the details associated with that particular project, what the variance was, was what they were granted, why they were granted, because that, that, that wasn't part of our discussion. So I'm not prepared to answer any of those design features of the approval. Thank you. Any other questions? I, I have a question for the applicant, the applicant's attorney. Um, I, I want to kind of build on what Councilor Marworth was trying to get at in terms of opportunity to, to clarify the record. You could very succinctly, um, I want to skip to Criterion number two. Do the special circumstances make it infeasible for reasons other than financial cost to develop the property in compliance with the standards of Chapter 14? So how, how would you answer that question? Okay, um, I'll be succinct. So the, the first part of that sentence says "special circumstance." That's the reference to the previous criteria. What are those special circumstances? And they're relevant because of what I, the three things, they're relevant to the question of feasibility of development of this property. And that question of infeasibility is not defined in the code. It doesn't say impossible. It doesn't say, uh, it says infeasible to develop the code in compliance, uh, uh, to develop the property in compliance. Staff is reading that and is saying expressly that if you can do something on this property to develop it, so this is C2, develop an office complex without a variance, you are not entitled to a variance. And that is not what that says. It's a question of whether the development is infeasible in compliance. And that's a discretionary thing up to you because it's not defined. It cannot mean that if you can put something on this property that complies with the code, you don't get the variance because there is no circumstance ever that that is the case. No property in the entire city of Santa Fe is undevelopable under the code. Let me, property, let me refine my question a little bit. Let's look at the second half of consent. Um, other than financial costs, what, what about your client's proposal, um, not about the interpretation of the language, but the proposal as advanced, uh, meets the test that it is, um, other, it is not a financial, um, hardship or difficulty or infeasibility. It is some other, other reason. What, what about the proposal meets that test, not about the interpretation of, uh, circumstances? Yes, sir. Um, I'm going to repeat the question so I'm answering it correctly. That's fine, that's fine. What about this property makes the development, uh, for, uh, infeasible? Um, I'm flipping it the other way, sir. My question is what about the proposed development is, um, is such that it is not, the infeasibility is not financial. Well, we're not talking about financial feasibility or not feasibility. The question is, is, is the project for 141 units in this layout feasible under these special circumstances? And we submit that it is not. Um, and, and the reason being is clearly if, if the interpretation of that section about, uh, feasibility and developing in the courts, certainly anybody could come in here and develop this property with towers. It could be done. Um, and I, I think that that's where the confusion in this criteria comes is what does this mean? It, if it means that if you can develop this property in any manner, then you can never meet infeasibility, then it's meaningless. It's meaningless. So it can't mean that because the whole idea here is develop what on the property and compliance, develop this on the property. That's the where I think we differ with staff. It cannot mean, a Mayor and Councilors, that a development under the code without C, anybody, that's what that means. It just can't mean that because it would be, no one would ever get a variance and the variance would be gutted. The ability to get the variance would be gutted. I think, um, we can discuss this among ourselves. Um, Director Lamboy, I, I just want to ask a little bit of a clarifying question because I, I don't mean to put the Toyota dealership on a pedestal, but I was, I was, I didn't follow the answer that the Toyota dealership is more or less objectionable or more viable because it's a dealership and not housing. I'm, I, I know you didn't exactly say that and so I'm asking you if you'd go back over to that for me as it did get a, uh, approved. Yes, Mayor. Um, it did get approved in conjunction with an annexation agreement as well. It was still in the county when the development plan was being considered. And at that time, under that Planning Commission, of the tradeoff, um, was that the, the building actually fronted Cerros Road at present, and that the smaller setback would, um, allow for the continuity or the success of the business by displaying their, their products. So it was specific to the use, but it, it was not, um, deemed these criteria weren't in effect at that time in terms of infeasibility or anything else. It was simply the fact that it's a car dealership and there's a big opportunity to see the vehicles through the glass window is beneficial. Yes, Mayor, that is correct. Okay, thank you. I appreciate, I, I was having a little bit of a struggle as to the benefits of a car dealership versus a housing units. Not that I have anything against car dealerships, just an interesting juxtaposition. Any other questions? Any other comments? Comments? Uh, I will, uh, if the applicant would like to make a brief closing statement, this would be appropriate now. Yes, I would just like also before I, let me check my, uh, my roadmap here. Um, actually, let me flip my, flip the switch. If the staff would like to make a brief closing statement. My only closing would be thank you for the time and thank you again for the special meeting and for the attention that you've given here. That's the closing. Thank you. Staff, do you have any last comments you want to bring forward to the governing body in a brief statement? Because it's been a lot of questions and a lot of, uh, back and forth, so please, if you want to summarize, uh, we'd give you this opportunity. Um, thank you, Mayor Weber, members of, um, City Council. I'll be, I'll be very brief. Um, just the, the one, the one, um, subject I wanted to, um, kind of follow up on was, um, there were some questions about, um, a variance on another property across the way. Um, we, the applicant didn't really give us a lot of information about that property. They didn't submit any findings of fact and conclusions of law. They didn't submit any reports. They didn't submit any information into the record that I think would be adequate to make a sufficient evidentiary record that we could really take a look at that case and consider it, um, in relation to the one that's actually before the governing body tonight. Um, Mr. Escobel did, did attempt to look at that property. It looks like there was some, there was a variance that was granted. Um, he had some information about, um, why that variance was granted. It looks like there was, um, kind of a discussion about, um, uh, compliance with some FEMA flood requirements and the feasibility of developing, um, in compliance with those requirements. Um, Mr. Escobel could, could probably talk to you a little bit more about that if you wanted to hear about. Mayor: But as could Miss Gestner, she could probably talk to you about those flood requirements. But I did want to caution the council that that development is not before the governing body tonight. We don't, the city doesn't have an obligation to give a variance to one entity simply because another entity received a variance, even if in some ways that other entity might have similar circumstances. We don't know if they were exactly the same. We don't know situations at the time. We don't know all, we don't have all the background information about why that development was built or why that variance was granted. We're not, we don't have the hearing transcripts. And also, it's always possible that it was a mistake, and it may have been a mistake at that time, and there's no obligation to repeat a mistake. And I would submit that if a mistake was made in the past, then it would be arbitrary and capricious to perpetuate a mistake just for the sake of the appearance of fairness. So, if the governing body thinks that information about that other property is critical, I think that we can, we have some information to develop the record a little bit more and answer some questions about it. I think that that would be a good idea if the body does think that that evidence is critical and that's going to play a major factor, a major part in the governing body's decision tonight or the movement, decision. But as I stated, I would submit that I don't think that it should be. I think that the governing body's main focus should be on whether this project meets the variance criteria and making a decision based on the facts and the record about this property. Thank you. Mayor: Thank you. At this time, we've completed the public hearing section, and I'm interested in any comments or thoughts members of the governing body would like to share, not in terms of questions, but your own thinking about the issue in front of us before we entertain a motion and a vote, or we could go directly to motions and vote. Any last thoughts? Anybody want to share their thinking or make a comment? No. Council Cassidy, are you still with us? Any last thoughts before we move to motions and votes? Councilor Cassidy: I am here. I have plenty of thoughts. I think many of them were covered both by staff and comments from my colleagues around this idea of whether or not a property could be developed. And I agree with what many colleagues have said, but Councilor Travis is coming to mind in terms of really being cautious of the fact that we do have a code. I know that we frequently will hear people say that our code has some challenges, and fortunately, we are in a place where we are working on it. But this is our code at this current moment, and so that is, those are my very, very briefly summed up thoughts for 10:21 p.m. Thank you. Mayor: Thank you, Councilor. So, we have sample motions in front of us. I'd entertain a motion from anyone who cares to make one at this time. Councilor: I move to deny the appeal from the commission's decision to deny the variances and direct staff to prepare findings of fact and conclusion of law consistent with this motion. Councilor: Second. Mayor: There's a second. Councilor Lindell's hand is up. Councilor Lindell: Don't we need to address each case separately? This is, there are two different numbers on the appeals. Mayor: Mayor, counselors, you could if you saw a distinction. I think staff is, I think the evidence proposed on both criteria were the same, is my understanding of this case. So, you could either make the motion for both or you could take them individually, but we should make it clear on the motion what which one we're doing. Mayor: Yeah, and at the top of the sample motions, there are case numbers. Anybody wants to reference whether it's the individual cases or the... Councilor: Okay, so what I just said for 2024-8895. Oh, that one. Sorry. Case number 2023-7662 and case number 2023-7 for the same case number 1662. They're the same. There's two the same case numbers. Mayor: The motion on the floor with a second is to deny the appeal from the Planning Commission's decision and deny the variances and direct staff to prepare findings of fact and conclusions of law consistent with the motion. Is there discussion at this time? Madam Clerk, can you call the on the motion, please? Clerk: Councilor Faulkner? Councilor Faulkner: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Lee Garcia? Councilor Lee Garcia: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Michael Garcia? Councilor Michael Garcia: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Lindell? Councilor Lindell: No, and I'd like to explain my vote. Clerk: Councilor Romero Worth? Councilor Romero Worth: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Cassett? Councilor Cassett: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Castro? Councilor Castro: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Chavez? Councilor Chavez: Yes. Clerk: Mayor Weber? Mayor Weber: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Lindell, you have the floor. Councilor Lindell: All right. If we'd have done these individually, my vote would have been different on one of them, but because we did them together, that's why no. Mayor: Thank you. Thank you, everybody, for your time and your attention and your efforts, and appreciate you sticking with us. Before we next move to the next item on the agenda, let's take a five-minute break and stretch a little bit, clear our minds. We'll be back in five minutes. If we can make it at 10:30, that would be very helpful. Mayor: I truncated it. I'm going to try and extend it to as much as I can meet five minutes, lucky. But I'm just going to kind of briefly go over these. You're going to go over all of these. I have the second one is I have this and I have their sample motion on page two so they can follow it, but they have to be in this, which is what Aaron wants, right? Aaron, you want these in this, the motion for the next case in this order, right? The order, the general plan, the master plan, the ordinance. All right, we're back in session. Madam Clerk, can you take us to the next item on the agenda, please? Clerk: Yes, Mayor. I'm going to read 8B through 8H all together, and then you will take each one individually as a motion, but the public hearing will be all together. Thank you. 8B, consideration of a resolution, General Plan Amendment, case number 2024-8851, a resolution to amend the general plan future land use map designation for Los Cetas tracks 21 and 26, plus or minus 8.18 acres, and for tracks 23 and 24, plus or minus 13.45 acres, from commercial office use to community commercial. 8C, consideration of a resolution, General Plan Amendment, case number 2024-8852, a resolution to amend the general plan future land use designation for Cetas track 19, plus or minus 9.11 acres, located southwest of the Walking Rain Road, Breckner Road roundabout, from transitional mixed use to community commercial. 8D, consideration of a resolution, General Plan Amendment, case number 2024-8854, a resolution to amend the general plan future land use designation for La Cettus track 24, plus or minus 10.7 acres, located south of Railrunner Loop, from commercial business use to community commercial. 8E, consideration of resolution, Master Plan Amendment, case number 2024-7899, a resolution to amend the Los Cetas Master Plan to allow for the rezoning of tracks 21, 23, 24, and 26 to be consistent with the proposed rezonings from mixed use business industrial park and C1 general office to C2 general commercial, and to reduce the width of the utility and trail corridor, La Rambla Trail, from 90 feet to 45 feet on the south side of Breckner Road. 8F, consideration of Bill number 202-1550-790, a bill to rezone Los Cetas tracks 21 and 26, plus or minus 8.18 acres, located at the southwest quadrant of Los Soleta Brecker Road roundabout, and tracks 23 and 24, plus or minus 13.45 acres, located at the southwest quadrant of Los Cetas Breckner Road roundabout, from C1 general office to C2 general commercial. 8G, consideration of Bill number 202-02, adoption of an ordinance 2025 TVA rezoning, case number 2024-8853, to rezone Lettus track 19, plus or minus 9.11 acres, located southwest of Walking Rain Road, Breckner Road roundabout, from MU mixed use to C2 commercial general commercial. And 8H, consideration of Bill number 20253, adoption of ordinance number 2025 TBA rezoning, case number 2024-8855, a bill to rezone Los Cetas track 20, plus or minus 10.7 acres, located southwest of the Walking Rain Road, Breckner Road roundabout, from BIP business industrial park to C2 general commercial. And here to present is Case Manager Dan Escobel. Mayor: Thanks very much. I, it's useful to have it close up, but we also have some folks who may be obliterated by the screen. Can you all, are you okay where you are on this side of the auditorium, or do you, do you want to relocate? We're relocating things. I wonder, you might want to relocate for the moment. You're okay. Okay, thank you. Mr. Escobel, you have the floor, sir. Dan Escobel: Mayor, members of the council, this is an abbreviated presentation from what I presented the Planning Commission, so it may not quite make five minutes, but I can make it last if you like. I won't go over the first seven captions since they were, they have already been read. See if this thing will work. Okay, so the Planning Commission recommends the governing body approve the following cases in the following order, and the sample motions are on page three of the staff report to the governing body. So, I didn't put the sample motions in here because it took up too many slides. So, the recommendations were to approve case 2024-7898, Los Cetas tracks 21, 23, 24, and 26, General Plan Amendment. Case 2024-8852, track 19, General Plan Amendment. Case 2024-8854, Laris track 20, General Plan Amendment. Case 2024-7899, Laris Master Plan Amendment, subject to the master plan conditions listed in consideration E, attachment A, in the Planning Commission report, section two, table one, master plan conditions, and the master plan technical corrections listed in the consideration E, attachment B, DRT comments. So, when you, those conditions were just only for the master plan since we don't attach conditions to an ordinance or resolution. Case 2024-7900, Laris tracks 21, 23, 24, and 26, rezoning. Case 2024-8853, Los Cetas track 19, rezoning. And finally, case 2024-8855, L track 20, rezoning. So, the location of the property is south of Beckner Road and just north of I-25. And and what they're requesting, and you'll find that they're, they're, they're requesting, it's all in that red area with the little where it says site on the site on the site plan right there. My notes aren't coming up for whatever reason, so I'm having a hard time here. The general plan feature land use maps was originally adopted in 2010, and there, there's been several amendments since then. The ones that we found were September 9th, 2015, September 24th, 2016, September 12th, 2018, and a more recent one which happened May 31st, 2023. That one is still being recorded, so it, it, it's not finalized yet, and the recordation of that master plan has to come first before we can actually file this master plan. This is a good comparison between 2010 when it was originally annexed in and what the general plan amendments have, the changes that have occurred over the course of time. And you can see that the park has increased. You might have some residential low densities in yellow that are now medium densities. Some of the medium densities have decreased to allow for residential low densities. We've definitely got a lot more residential use within this area that was originally anticipated, but everything is still following the master plan approvals and conditions of approval that were originally adopted as part of the annexation and that were originally adopted as part of the master plan. And the current applicant is maintaining those conditions and moving forward with those conditions. With regard to rezonings, it will make some changes. You have the current, the 2010 rezoning map, which shows you how it looked like under the master plan when it was rezoned, and you have the 2024 zoning map, which shows it today, which is very different from what it was back in the day. And it should say general plan, it should actually say master plan rezoning on the top, not general plan. I'm sorry. And then, The general plan master plan amendments, as they're shown here, identify which areas are actually being shown for change. I've circled those areas so that you can clearly see which areas are going to change from the light blue and the purple and the brown over to the red, so that you can see those changes clearly as they move forward with the general plan amendments. These are the rezoning maps so that you can clearly see those changes. The mixed-use is going to completely go away. The BIP is going to completely go away. You're going to have a smaller grouping of C1, which is your general office use, and you're going to replace that with general commercial, which is your C2. What I did for the Planning Commission, I kept it in the slideshow, is I analyzed all of the acreages within the Larious Master Plan so that we can identify how the changes across the board, acreage-wise, occurred and how the zoning has changed across the board. If you look at the bar graph, it shows that C2 has definitely bumped its presence within the Laris area more so than any other zoning in the area. We will be losing the MU district altogether, which is mixed-use. There is an easement that cut across from what was supposed to be a train stop that was nixed by Governor Martinez, and that goes right up the middle. That was supposed to go to the Los Park. The proposal is to reduce that easement to match it up with the reduced size that happened across the street for the Verrox apartments. They also want to be able to move the plaza area up and down that area to integrate with their future development so that it better aligns with how they're going to manipulate the trail and that open space park use for the development that's moving forward. That is part of the master plan approval. The applicant has complied with all of the application process requirements pursuant to City Code Chapter 14 as follows: The applicant complied with the following steps required by the City Code pursuant to 1431E, the pre-application conference. The applicant conducted a pre-application on March 9, 2023. Then, pursuant to 1431F, early neighborhood notifications, the ENN, the applicant conducted this on November 14, 2023. The applicant has addressed the master plan approval criteria per Section 1439D1, all of the necessary findings. The applicant has addressed the general plan amendment approval criteria per Section 1439E1 for all the amendments to the general plan. The applicant has addressed the rezoning approval criteria per Section 1435C approval criteria. The land use, together with DRT, have analyzed the project. The applicant has addressed all the criteria necessary to submit an amendment for review to the Laris Master Plan Amendment to the general plan future land use map and zoning for Losis Tracks 19, 21, 23, 24, and 26. The Land Use Department recommends approval of the project subject to the master plan conditions listed in Section 2, Table 1 of the staff report that went to the Planning Commission, which I provided a path to early on. That does conclude my presentation. I could extend it longer if you like. We'd love to hear from the applicant with any sworn witness testimony, but certainly an opening statement at this time. Yes, we've got one other person that needs to be sworn in. Scott, you want to come down and get sworn in? City Clerk: Please raise your right hand. State your name and address. Ryan Ninger: 2213 Brothers Road, Santa Fe, New Mexico. City Clerk: Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury? Ryan Ninger: I do. City Clerk: Please raise your right hand. State your name and address. Scott Herbert: 33 Spirit Court, Santa Fe. City Clerk: Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury? Scott Herbert: I do. City Clerk: Thank you. Thank you both. Just a quick request, Mayor, if there, I have the Zoom, I'm on the Zoom, but I'm not exactly, I don't see the share option for the public Zoom. Is there a different Zoom link I should pick? That way I wouldn't have to burden you with messing with the slides. Okay, I think we have success. This may go a little smoother at this time. Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay, I think everybody's seeing that clearly. This very first slide is actually instrumental. By the way, first, thank you for your time, Mayor Weber, City Councilors, for hearing this case. Obviously, my name is Brian Dininger again, with Orion West, and representing the applicant tonight. We're going to talk about the site, and the site is shown there clearly in green. We also show the Nexus Health development next door, and that'll become apparent why I'm showing that, as well as the Los Solaris Bridge and Drive Extension, which as we get in this presentation, that'll become clear also why we're showing that. As we've discussed, we're here tonight to look at rezoning our existing parcels. Really, what we're trying to do is rezone six parcels, and our concept or our request for that is because we want uniform C2 zoning across this entire development. The reason for that is that this was all done in 2009. A lot has changed since 2009. A lot has developed, and the lots as they were originally conceived no longer really make sense for the uses that we're looking at here in 2024. So that's the, that's the purpose of the uniform zoning is to have easy administrative ways to move lots, and I'll get into that in a little more detail here in a moment. So the other option, or the other reason, is that the master plan does need to be cleaned up a bit, and this basically includes resizing the RBL so it matches the park or the RBL across the street. Also, we want a little bit of flexibility to move the parklet up and down that rambla area. So this is just a little bit better look at what we have. If you look, the red area there, that's the parklet. All we're asking for is the ability to move that up and down across the rambla area. We're going to maintain that parklet, but we want some design flexibility on where it goes. The other thing to look at is that if you look at the yellow highlighted area, that was where Rail Runner Road originally terminated. So it went right through the Py development, the Aanas development that is there, and terminated into that point. So these lots were sort of developed around that. Well, since that no longer is the case, the new requirement is that the road lines up with the current Rail Runner Road, and this is Rail Runner Loop Road, and we'll see that a little more detail in a moment, which makes these lot configurations not make a lot of sense. There's not a road or drive there anymore. Dan's already kind of covered this. This is the existing zoning. This is today's condition. So we do have C2 general commercial as part of the, as part of the lineup, along with, of course, C1 and MU and BIP. The MU strip that you see here is the last MU-zoned parcel within Los Lis. All the other parcels over time were zoned to something else. So this is what we're, we're proposing. These are the applications, and Dan read those off to you, so I won't go into a lot of detail, but I think it's important that as we looked at this and considered this, we spent some time in the general plan and some of the, the main criteria that we wanted to apply here. So what our application is trying to do is we want to clean up the master plan. We want to lay the groundwork for a lot more effective use of these parcels, and this is through the administrative lot line adjustment process. We also want to provide a little bit of improved flexibility for our neighborhood services, and this also includes some food and beverage along with the other uses that we're planning for the site. So this is just a look at the relocated Rail Runner Loop Road. So it's fairly clear on what that needs to do. This road will be dedicated back to the City of Santa Fe after it's built. This is again a look at the rambla and how that's going to line up when we're, we're finished with that. Let me, let me back up though. I do want to back up and make something clear. The underlying buildings and information you see here is part of a test fit, and the question is, why do we do a test fit? What does that mean? This is a concept. This is a concept on what we could develop if this was had uniform C2 zoning. Doesn't mean it's exactly what we're going to do, but we needed to put together a concept so we could test how it impacted the infrastructure that was installed in this area. So that was the purpose of this. So Dan's already showed this. When we're complete, if we're approved tonight, we'll have this uniform zoning that allows us to easily adjust these lot lines so they make sense for the users that we're talking to now. So this is what I started out alluding to earlier with in terms of the general plan, and I think the economic development pieces are very important. So our goals here and what we're trying to do with this work and effort is to address these policy items. So the important part is jobs, small business, retail uses that serve the needs of the community, not just our 57 acres, not just as Stony as across the street, the other developments are going in, but this is really something for the south side of Santa Fe. So the types of mixes and uses that we're, we're proposing are kind of listed here. This is what our target is. This is what we'd like to see and do. So we have this sort of core services area that we put in the test fit. It's not very large, it's about six acres, but that's where we see a mix of restaurants, maybe some bakeries and coffee shops. There could be daycare, maybe a marketplace or a co-op grocery co-op. We also were thinking about some dry cleaning as a possibility. When we get beyond the services and then look at the other options, we're really trying to build this around a medical hub, a medical campus, and that's why I showed the next Health Center where it's at, because that's where this starts. We'll hear from Dr. Herbert a little bit later, but Dr. Herbert, who is a big part of the Nexus Medical Center, is also one of the investors in the 57 acres, so he wants to talk a little bit about that right now. We're also considering some multifamily and maybe some medical education. On the multifamily piece, the importance of that, the goodness of that, and I know Councilor Chavez brought this up earlier, is that we are talking right now with an affordable developer who will actually put the affordable in the units. Not only is he going to put the affordable in the unit, the 80% below AMI, he's also talking about another range he's calling workforce, which is 80 to 120, and then beyond that is market rate. So it's going to be a tiered type development. So that's important for us to get the rezone complete so that we can give them a legal lot of record that meets their needs. Dr. Herbert will talk a little bit more about the Ed medical education piece. There's some important meetings taking place tomorrow. So we're also looking a little bit about, you know, what the transit or improvements are. Right now, we are one of three different developments that could trigger the completion of the L L Bridge and L Lish Drive, which is now unfinished. I'll get into those triggers a little bit more, but because we want that project to be shovel-ready, because we think that that's an important part of all of this, we've already started the planning and design of the bridge, and we're doing that in conjunction with Public Works, and we're right now, we've got the 60% design set complete, and we're moving towards a 90% design set. There's also a FEMA application involved in that as well. It's in process. We've talked about the trail system a little bit through the Ramble and the parklet, but there's an expansive trail system beyond that. That development will complete as required for the master plan. There's also a bus stop on Rail Runner Loop Road. Then we're still looking, even though it may be off into the future, it may be a little bit of a long shot, we're still wanting to have a placeholder for the Rail Runner station. So here's a little bit more detailed look at our test fit. If we take just a quick run through what we have here, oops, let me go back up again. Orienting ourselves, the Ramble, the parklet, this is an idea of where for services could be. We've got some medical office over here, we've got some multi-family over here. We show a hotel here, whether that comes to fruition or not, we don't know. Again, this is a concept, probably not how it's exactly going to be finished out, but it's something that helps us determine if the infrastructure can handle what we're asking it to do. So the result of the test fit was that the existing water and sanitary sewer, along with the storm sewer, is more than capable of handling the demands. There was a TIA submitted, and the TIA basically kind of says that, and there's, I'm going to talk to this a little bit more, but there could be an expansion of Beckner Road. There may be an expansion of Beckner Road from two to four lanes, which has been anticipated from the beginning of the master plan. It's not something we're advocating for, it's just something that the traffic study said that from Losis Drive up to Rail Runner Road, there's the possibility that that might go from two to four lanes at the buildout of our conceptual plan. Now, from where we're looking at, from Rail Runner Road all the way up to Walking Rain, right now that looks to stay at two. And again, it's all based on the city's code and requirements around traffic studies. Okay, one of the things that we talked about earlier was the trigger on the bridge. And so if we look at the map here, this area in purple, and it looks like for some reason this is slightly, slightly off on the drawing, but there's three areas. There is the combination of the DeBartolo project and this parcel to the south. There's the combination of the Verto project, and then there's ours. And they all have different triggers, but they reach some point of development, and then the bridge needs to be completed. Okay, just looking again at the conceptual test fit and how that all plays out for our trigger, we have to develop 300,000 square feet and 20 acres to trigger the bridge. Just a quick rendering, we had a few renderings down of some of the concepts. Okay, so that's just a big overview of what we are planning to do. One of the things that we have done, we've, of course, taken note of the Athanas petition, and we have been discussing things with the Athanas neighborhood. And we just wanted to address a few things there. So they had three primary concerns. One was notice, the second was widening of Beckner Road, and then the uses allowed. So just with regard to notice, I just want to clarify that we have adhered to the noticing requirements in Santa Fe city code, and we've also followed what's the land use division in terms of procedure. We determined around the beginning or mid-September, first saw it on Nextdoor, that there were some concerns within the Athanas neighborhood that they weren't getting noticed. They didn't think they were getting noticed. They had some concerns. So we reached out to them, and since about September 25th, when we first started talking to the HOA, we've had two in-person meetings, and I've sent about 11 email blasts out on things that are going on, when hearings are scheduled or getting rescheduled, what's going on with the Ambulatory Surgery Center, anything that we're involved with out there. This is above and beyond the noticing requirements. So I wanted to clarify a few things with regard to widening of Beckner Road, because the petition states that the applicant desires to widen Beckner Road to four lanes, and that's really not quite a correct view of that. We are only going to widen Beckner Road if it's required through traffic analysis, and that will happen based on individual developments and development plans that will also come back before the Planning Commission post uniform zoning. So not only, you know, this rezone and this test fit makes it seem like there's some development here, it's detailed and planned, but the reality is these are concepts. The detailed development will come with development plans and actual uses. So the uses that we're considering, I think is important. So during the two in-person meetings we had with the HOA, we communicated to the neighbors that we agree with them on some of the things that they don't want to see. And the list that we have here is the list of items that the client and the applicant says, not only do we not want it, and we agree with the neighborhood on that, we will not allow it, we will not develop it. So this includes gas stations, auto body and automotive services. We also no packaged liquor stores. Bars must be associated with a restaurant and serve food. No cannabis production, manufacturing or retail. And there were some concerns around a 24-hour all-night restaurant like a Denny's, even if it's not serving alcohol. We have no interest in that. That's not our plan, that's not our concept, that's not where we're going with this. We also, you know, would agree to some limited hours of public operation. So we're proposing, you know, between 7:30 and 11:00, nothing after that in terms of public. So let's talk about the uses that the current zoning allows today. When you look at all the different zoning types and districts that are within this 57 acres, the top list of items that we just said we will not do are allowed today. So even if we decided that, you know, the council decided uniform zoning was not the approach, these things could still happen today. So what we're saying is we need the uniform zoning so that we can easily move these lot lines administratively to meet the current uses, not what was just conceived or thought of in 2009. And we're willing to prohibit these uses. So it also allows for multi-family apartments and hotels now, which is, as we've discussed, those are two things in our test fit. And one of, one of the items, the multi-family, we do have somebody we're in serious conversations with. So what I want to do, I want to just go ahead and give this over to Scott Herbert, because I'd like Scott to talk a little bit about his vision for this property and project, what he sees happening here. Scott Herbert: Hello, Mayor Weber, city councilors. Thank you all for tonight and having a special meeting. You know, when an oncologist tells you guys you have a tough job, you have a pretty tough job. This has been a long meeting. I'm a medical oncologist. I'm the current president of Nexus Health, and I'm not a developer. You know, we acquired this land, which was originally a 74-acre parcel, in order to have the 18 acres we needed to build our practice and our medical facility. And in order to do that, we had to acquire all 74 acres. And so the 57 acres between us and Presbyterian was part of that deal. And it came with a legacy of eight parcels, different sizes and different zoning, which makes it exceptionally cumbersome. It makes it very, very hard to develop, to try to find users that want that specific size and shape. So what we're, what we're really asking for here is assistance to have uniform zoning so we can have an administrative process, move those lot lines, and facilitate development. Now, our vision, even though we didn't set out to be land developers, we're physicians. Our vision is that this is one of the last areas in Santa Fe that I think could develop into a work-live-play type of area. You've got us on one end, you've got Presbyterian on the other. You have medical services that are very, very needed in Santa Fe. And what we want to put around us are types of businesses and types of things that support those, that medical industry and those uses. What we, what we attempted to do with the neighborhood is talk to them. This is a unique situation because you've got a landowner here that is also a neighbor. I'm very concerned about what goes in next to my practice because I've, I got to tell you, I've put my entire life into that practice, and I have no interest in putting uses or things there that diminish that, diminish the neighborhood, not at all. You know, tomorrow morning we have a meeting with the group that developed an osteopathic college in Orlando, Florida. They've identified New Mexico and specifically Santa Fe in this site as a potential location for an osteopathic medical school and dental school. These are the types of projects we're trying to attract to this area, and I think would benefit everybody. I'm really excited about that. You know, the neighbors have expressed the notification process. I think Brian addressed that. The neighbors are concerned about the four-lane Beckner Road, and I think Brian addressed that. That's a project-by-project traffic study thing that has nothing to do with really our discussion tonight. The use cases, while I agree and understand, I do want to point out that all of those uses are already allowed on 70% of this parcel. So that doesn't change tonight's discussion. And there is a process in place to have that discussion. You know, any new project that would come up would go through a Planning Commission process, and the neighbors would have an opportunity to discuss it at that time. What we're trying to do tonight is simply, what I'm asking for is simply help in making this a developable parcel of land in a way that is conducive to the city of Santa Fe, south side of Santa Fe, and the neighbors, which is me also. So thank you all for your time. I really appreciate it. Mayor: Thank you. I wonder if you could wrap up your presentation. We try to keep it within bounds, and it's a fascinating presentation, but the hour is late. Scott Herbert: We are all done. Thank you very much for your time. We'll stand for questions. Mayor: Thank you. Before we do anything else, I think we are going to need to suspend our rules. It's 11:50 already. So I'd entertain a motion to go beyond 11:30. Councilor: So moved. Councilor: Second. Mayor: Is there any discussion? Madam Clerk, can you call the roll on suspension of our rules? Clerk: Councilor Lee Garcia? Councilor Lee Garcia: Yes. Clerk: Councilor Michael Garcia? Councilor Michael Garcia: No. Clerk: Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Councilor: Did I lose audio? Councilor: No, no, I'm counting votes. Councilor: Oh, God. Can we start discussion and ask what how our agenda is looking at our next governing? Councilor: In the middle of a vote? No. Councilor: Well, that's why I was asking if we could have a discussion. Thank you. Not going to pass. Clerk: No. Councilor Cassett? Councilor Cassett: Yeah. Clerk: Councilor Castro? Oh. Councilor Chavez? Councilor Chavez: Yeah. Clerk: Councilor Fuller? Mayor Weber? The ayes have it. Councilor: Move to reconsider. Councilor: I think you have to be on the winning side. You're on the winning side. There you go. Look at you. Councilor: Okay, look at me. I'm the parliamentarian. I actually do know the rules. Mayor: Okay, so you have a motion to reconsider, and you wanted to discuss it. So is there a second to reconsider? Councilor: Yes. Councilor: Yes, and a second to reconsider. And yeah, can we talk about this now? I think we should absolutely talk about it. I think that's what Councilor Chavez was asking. Thank you. I just want to see, talk about timelines. So how do our agendas look at the upcoming governing body meetings? Like, I don't, I know that we always tend to postpone, and then we postpone and postpone and postpone because those agendas get packed. Clerk: So I can, Councilor Chavez, to answer your question, I know we do have two H-Board public hearings at the next governing body meeting. In terms of on the consent agenda, I know right currently it goes to Z, but that's, that's as much. information as I have for you, but it does start at 5:00. Okay, so in regards to, I think staff from Land Use could answer that. Is there anything timeline-wise we need to be aware of in making consideration in postponing this? We also had a lot more people willing to talk on this, and they are gone because this is a ridiculous time. And so I think, and I feel bad for the individuals that stayed the whole time, but I think the community really tried to come together on this topic, and we did not set this up in order for them to do so. Having this heard at 7:30 was hard for a community that had that much concern. So, but Land Use, is there anything time-wise we should be aware of? Mayor, members of the council, the only time that we are usually constrained is typically because of the applicant and what they're trying to push forward in terms of their timeline. So, I would probably defer to the applicant. As far as staff is concerned, we will do whatever the council wishes. Applicant, could we hear from you? I'm sorry, do you guys mind taking the presentation off the screen so that I can have a better view of you all speaking as opposed to the slides? Thank you. And I would say I would vote to postpone to a date as soon as possible. I feel like our next agenda seems like a possibility, but I just want to hear from you. Well, I would say that time is getting of the essence for us for this project. We've been postponed several times. We really do need to get some legal lot of records. We are concerned that we might lose the developer who's looking at the multi-family. Okay, there's only one other apartment project I know of in Santa Fe that's even come close to bringing the actual 15% in. So anyway, Councilor Michael Garcia, and then Councilor. May I? Yeah, absolutely. I'm so sorry. Brian is correct. We are trying to establish a legal lot of record for two projects currently. One of the important projects is what we're speaking about tomorrow morning, which is the Orlando College of Osteopathic Medicine. It has to do with the accreditation process, and they have an 18-month window in order to move forward on this type of project. They have their accreditation already, and so if I cannot give them a legal lot of record, we are stalled, and we will lose that window. I don't know how else to say this. This is hard. Councilor Michael Garcia: Thank you, Mr. My question was for the City Attorney, given we have the executive session lined up after this item, are there time-sensitive issues on the executive session that need to be heard tonight? Mayor, councilors, in terms of the appeal opportunities, it's after the next regular meeting, so we could meet in executive session next week on that topic. And the personnel matters, I think we could also, it's up to the governing body, we could also provide opportunity for updates and feedback at that meeting. Okay, that was my only question. Thank you, Mr. Councilor Lindell, and then Councilor Cassidy has her hand up. Thank you, Mayor. I voted no on this because my thought was that we could get through this particular item and that we could push the executive session issues off to the next meeting. I, no, she put no. Do I ever vote yes to extend? No, I always vote no. I see us as getting through this if we can. We've got 45 minutes. We can get this item done. Midnight, 11:00, I can do that. Councilor Cassidy: Thank you, Mayor. You know, I agree with Councilor Chavez, that what's one of the challenges is so many individuals who would have wanted to speak to this. But I believe that again, when there are development plans that have to come through, there will be other opportunities. And is my understanding that correctly? Because this will not be their last opportunity to weigh in on precisely what goes into this. That is correct. This area. Okay, so that does help me in feeling better about moving forward with that. Sounds like maybe Dan has some other things to say. Mr. Eschel, Mayor, members of the council, you know, the applicant could certainly submit an application for a lot split in order to establish a legal lot for their client. We could certainly process that application in a timely manner, which wouldn't really hinder the rezoning process unless it's the actual commercial zoning that they're looking for for financial requirements for any kind of loans or assets that they need for the construction. Okay, any other comments? I'm just curious about, you know, kind of, say our Councilor Lindell had mentioned we could probably get this done by midnight, maybe extend past 11:30. But are we able to put a limit on ourselves to say, hey, we'll be done at midnight and then move the executive session to our regularly scheduled meeting on Wednesday? Well, I'm not the parliamentarian or the City Attorney, but we could extend the meeting past 11:30 and do our very best to wrap this item up and then have a motion to postpone the executive session to the next governing body meeting without any trouble whatsoever. Okay, all right, thank you. We have a motion on the floor to reconsider the vote to go past 11:30. Is there any other, and the discussion was Councilor Faulkner, how critical to the total development is the medical school? Because you mentioned that there was an issue with that being time-sensitive. An opportunity like this provides an anchor to the entire thing that changes the flavor and the pace at which something like this gets developed. This is an opportunity that does not come along easily, ma'am. Councilor Romero: So, so just a point of order. So, and I'm going to confer with the City Attorney. So, this is a, this is a motion to reconsider. We have to first pass this to say we're reconsidering, and then we have to have another motion, I believe, in order to decide what exactly we're doing. Am I? Councilors, that's correct. And I do just want to maybe add on to what I said earlier. If we want to have a vote on an appeal on the agenda, I will need to add it to the agenda tomorrow. So, I was hoping to talk to folks about that today during executive session. Otherwise, I can just send out information via email. You can let me know if you want to put the matter on the agenda. No matter what, we can have an update about it. But if we're going to have a motion and an action item, which there is not just one version of an appeal that's possible, there are various versions, then I would need to know what we're putting on the calendar for next week. You do have the ability to query folks without having an executive session. I can speak to folks, then we'd have to put in a decision on the agenda. Yes, correct. Okay, any other thoughts about the motion to reconsider? Madam Clerk, do you want to call the roll on the motion to reconsider? It's a, it's a motion that would give us an opportunity to have another vote on going past 11:30 tonight, which is now 10 minutes away. Michael Garcia: Yes. Councilor Lindell. Councilor Romero Worth: Yes. Councilor Cassidy: Yes. Councilor Castro. Councilor Chavez. Councilor Faulkner. Councilor Lee Garcia: Yes. Mayor Weber: Yes. I now entertain a different motion, or the same motion under different circumstances about 11:30. So moved. Move to go past 11:30. What are you so moving about? To go past 11:30. Okay, and to postpone, could we do the motion to go past 11:30 and to postpone executive? Can we do it all at once? No, I think we should do, we should go past 11:30. We should then do this case, and then if it approves, and then we should decide what to do with our agenda. Let's take this in a sequential order. The motion on the floor is to go past, to suspend our rules, which allows us to go past 11:30, and we would continue with the consideration of the cases that are in front of us. Is there any further discussion? Madam Clerk, could you call the roll on that motion, please? Councilor Lindell. Councilor Averworth: Yes. Councilor Cassidy: Yes. Councilor Castro: Yes. Councilor Chavez. Councilor Faulkner: Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia: Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia: Yes. Mayor Weber: Yes. Motion passes. Thank you. So, in our process, where we are in this, this plan amendment matter, we have now heard from both staff and the applicant. I would like to open the floor to sworn public comment. Hopefully, two minutes per person. Anyone either in the room or on Zoom who wishes to speak to this item would need to come forward or raise their hand, and the clerk would swear that individual in, and they would have an opportunity to speak on the proposals in front of us. And there are people in the Zoom room. Madam Clerk, let's go there first. Darla, I'm going to allow you to talk, and then I will swear you in. Okay, please raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. I'm Darla Frons, 4696 Ohas Ferus. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury? Yes, you may speak. Okay, first of all, I mean, it's 11:22. I have a 6:00 meeting, and so I think most of the neighbors who really wanted to speak tonight have not been able to stay on the call this long. So, I think it's inappropriate, first of all, that we go forward without the neighborhood having any ability at this hour of night to be, to participate in what's happening in their neighborhood. I also think it's inappropriate that the Planning Commission voted to approve this when this particular district is not fully represented on the Planning Commission. There's an empty seat on the Planning Commission representing this district, and so I don't feel like we're fully represented. I appreciate the phys and his team making more of an effort to try to communicate with the neighborhood, but I think what you also have to recognize is that the neighbors here are already dealing with street racing up and down Beckner Road. We're already dealing with kids that are hanging out at the nearly vacant Santa Fe Outlet Mall down the road, racing up and down the street. We have skid marks going off of Beckner Road toward sidewalks and toward the backs of people's houses where racers have, I don't know, missed turns or missed going around roundabouts. Just tonight, I was walking my dog in one of the pathways along Beckner, and there are broken liquor bottles all up and down Beckner Road. And so I think the neighborhood has a valid voice, and I get it that we want to put in, you know, work-life, healthcare, kinds of activities. I'm a healthcare provider myself. I don't necessarily want to work right in the backyard of the place where I work or right where I live, but I understand that there's a legitimate and maybe noble cause here. But I feel like this is just one more experience where the neighborhood has been pushed aside. We haven't been listened to, and to now have this debate happening at 11:24 in the evening when everyone else that wanted to speak tonight is not able to do so. I mean, I appreciate that you guys want to stay here until midnight, but it's not fair to the neighborhood to not allow us to have an opportunity to speak. And so I'm not representing the petition group that's part of the HOA. There is a whole group of people who've signed a petition and who had talking points prepared for tonight, and none of them have been able to stay on this call. So, I really do think that it's, I, I, I appreciate that you've got a deadline with a potential buyer or a potential medical college tomorrow, but maybe you shouldn't have planned that for the night after this hearing when this hearing is going until midnight. So, I really do believe that the neighborhood has a right and and has an, should have the opportunity to participate in this sort of undertaking, and the fact that we're sitting here and I'm the only person on this call probably that can speak is ridiculous. I think, I think the City of Santa Fe, we deserve Thank you for sticking with us and for speaking up. Madam Clerk, do we have another person with a hand up? Joan Dickerson, you may speak. Are you swearing people in? Yes, and I will swear you in. Yes, can you hear me? Yes, I can hear you. Thank you. Please raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. My name is Joan Dickerson. My address is 4721 Los Placeres, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury? Yes, I do. Thank you. You may speak. First of all, I'd like to thank Dr. Herbert and Mr. Nard for communicating with us and working with us on the concept, and I appreciate that work and that concern about the neighborhood. My concern is similar to Darla's concern, is that we do have a lot of street racing, crime, illegal consumption of adult beverages, and that sort of thing in our neighborhood. We do not have the same level of police protection that we should have in a neighborhood that's affected by this sort of thing. And I'm concerned that a C2 designation is overly broad. We did have one of the lots across from the neighborhood, in particular, that was zoned MU. And my understanding of the MU designation is that it has guardrails over what kind of businesses can go in, and that the hours of operation of those businesses would be limited to standard business hours, rather than say, an all-night restaurant or an all-night convenience store or something like that. My concern is that if Dr. Herbert's vision does not pan out for this parcel, that it will still have the C2 designation, and he will be forced to sell to someone who does not have the concern for the neighborhood that he does. And that will possibly increase crime, possibly increase the lack of safety that we exist with today. And it's a scary proposition. Thank you for speaking. Thank you for your time. Thank you for speaking. Madam Clerk, we have other folks in the Zoom room with their hands up. There are several people in the Zoom room. Do any of you want to have your, are any of you going to raise your hands? Sorry, new individuals who haven't spoke. Lorraine Lasswell, I'm going to unmute you. Can you hear me? Yes, I can hear you. Can you hear me? Yes, hi. Please raise your right hand and state your name and address for the record. My name is Lorraine Lasswell, 4713 Los Placeres. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury? I do. You may speak. Okay. I agree with everything that has been said previously. My concern is mainly that the zoning is changed to C2, and it does allow different things to go in than we anticipated when we moved into the subdivision. We realized it was mixed-use. We're not against development, but I do feel that there is a chance that things will go in that will really impact the neighbors, especially that live along Beckner, directly along Beckner. And I don't understand why it has to be C2, and we can't have some guardrails. Perhaps there could be some sort of contingencies put upon the type of businesses that go in, or the type of things that are developed. Maybe there's a way to do that. So I think that my other concern is that if you do allow C2 zoning, that Beckner will eventually be widened, and we do have problems with speeding. And it puts the neighborhood in kind of a different light than it is today, as far as having a walking community or kind of a neighborhood community feel. It's going to be vastly different with a 45 mile per hour speed limit and four lanes of traffic. And that's about all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you very much. Madam Clerk, we have some more hands. Anyone else who has not spoken? Mr. May, can we, Madam Clerk, can we make sure, since there's two Darlas, that the one who had her hand up isn't the one who spoke before? No, it's the, it's me, the same person. But I think the other thing that hasn't been taken into consideration here is that there are enormous apartment complexes now going in along Beckner, between Los Placeres and Presbyterian Hospital, and just past Presbyterian Hospital to Cerrillos. And there really hasn't, I mean, we don't know what the impact of those is going to be yet, right? We're putting in hundreds of units of housing, and those, that housing is not built, I'm sorry, I don't even know the impact of that yet. Thank you. I apologize. We don't have multiple opportunities. I apologize for giving you the impression you had a second chance to speak up. It's pretty much everybody gets one turn when it's testifying in a public hearing. But that was my mistake in not asking that more clearly. Are there any people in the Zoom room who have not spoken and would like a chance to speak, or in this, in the Council Chambers, who have not spoken and would like to speak? If you are here and present, please come up to the podium and have a chance to be sworn in. And each of you will have a chance to speak as the people in the Zoom room did. Please raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. My name is Gary Lasswell, and I live at 4713 Los Placeres. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury? I do. Thank you. Members of the governing body, thank you for staying. I'm not going to belabor this. You've already heard from some of my neighbors, and the only thing I want to reiterate is that we're just interested in guardrails on the types of land uses that may occur along Beckner. We certainly appreciate the comments made by Dr. Herbert and by Mr. Nard. They have good intentions, but again, we're not naive. Things like this can change rapidly, and we may end up with an overly broad zone. classification that allows uses that would not be favorable to our residential community. So I want to just go on record as opposing the rezoning to C2 General Commercial, and that's all I need to say. Thank you for your very good... **Mayor:** Thank you, sir. Anyone else here in the chambers who wishes to be heard? Or if you haven't spoken and you're on Zoom, if you have spoken, please do take your hand down. If you haven't spoken, put your hand up. Yes, please come forward if you wish to speak at this time. Dr. Philip Shields, address is 90 Coach Road, Santa Fe, 87506. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, and do this under the penalties of perjury? **Dr. Shields:** I certainly do. **Mayor:** Thank you. You have the floor, sir. **Dr. Shields:** Thank you. Thank you for staying late, and I certainly apologize to the neighbors that are not able to stay online or be here, but I just wanted to just make a brief comment that we're neighbors too. We spend a lot of time at the facility. We leave late at night, and one of the last things we want is to invite crime, invite racing, invite businesses that would attract bad actors. And we feel very strongly that, the same as our neighbors, that we don't want to attract that to this neighborhood because we're there late at night walking, we're there late at night, early in the morning. And certainly, businesses that promote that, we would not encourage at all. And I think things like a medical school bring not only people that want the same things we want, it also brings security. So I think that those are things to think about when we look at what we want there. We have, we look at a restaurant, we want a nice restaurant. Again, it brings security to the neighborhood. So, and I hope that we are all in alignment on that, and that that's what I'd like to say tonight. Thank you. **Mayor:** Thank you. Anyone else in the room or in the Zoom room waiting for a chance to speak on this issue? Madam Clerk, do we have other hands that have not yet spoken? **Clerk:** I do not see any other hands. **Mayor:** Anyone else here who's been waiting their turn very patiently? Now would be the time to come forward. Okay, in that case, we will turn to questions by members of the governing body. Before we, it's still a public hearing, and I will entertain the same thing we did with our last case, which is individually try to spend a few minutes, five to ten minutes, with the questions that you feel need to be answered before you could entertain a motion. And if you could be specific who you'd like to come forward to answer your question. We'll start with you, Councilor Lee Garcia. **Councilor Lee Garcia:** Thank you, Mayor. I think that I'd like to start off with the general consensus. And this may be for somebody that has been involved with the master plan of that area in its initial stages. And how does that, obviously there was a lot of work put into that and foresight to create a plan that was supposed to be the plan. And I know things change, but what's the percentage of change that this rezone does to the overall master plan that was originally adopted, I think, in 2010? I miss, I think I'm guessing that's for our staff to address. Okay, yeah, for staff. **Staff:** First off, Mayor, Council members of the, or Councilor Garcia. My apologies. So, members of the council, if you look at the 2010 zoning map, this is the original zoning configuration adopted, or when the original master plan amendment came into play. This is what everything started from. So you definitely had quite a bit of mixed-use. A little bit more, the mixed-use north of Beckner Road has long since gone. That is now R21 and General Commercial. The mixed-use left is the little boot just located left of that intersection, left of the C1 and, or right of the C1 and sort of southeast of the intersection and left of the C2. That's the last of the MU, which is part of this request. So what it would look like once the zoning has occurred is you're going to take it from what it is today in the 2024, what says future land use map, and you're going to convert it to all the red. That's the difference between what it was, well, where it is now and where it's going to be. And if you looked at where it came from back when it was originally adopted, it's completely different. And I think a lot of that stems from the fact that the train just didn't stop there. It was, it was meant to stop there. It had a different direction when the train was supposed to stop there, but that was nixed by the governor at the time, and everything went in a different direction in order to accommodate what they believed the market was going to bear for this area. And that's how Laris has been developing. The master plan amendments that have come before this body have been adopted, and we're at this master plan amendment, which will completely eliminate the mixed-use altogether. And I think what I wanted to do for the Planning Commission is I wanted to show them exactly, you know, what those acreages are. So for R1 zoning, in 2024, you had 3.02 acres. For R6 zoning, you had 46.9 acres. For what was RMLD, or what today is either R10 or R12, you had 81.9 acres. For RM1, or what is now commonly known as R21, you have 28 acres today. For mixed-use, you have 9.11 acres left. If the rezoning is passed, you will have zero. For C1, it goes from 50 acres down to 30 acres. And for C2, it goes from 171.5 to 21.1. And then the SC district is still the same at 20 acres. The hospital district is still the same at 39 acres. The BIP, which has an acreage of 10.7 acres, that one goes down to zero in favor of the C2 district. So as you look at the bar graph to just to the right, it shows in green how the C2 district has moved over time and what it would be with the proposal. **Councilor Lee Garcia:** So it sounds like mixed-use, obviously in this area, I mean, what, what are the type of things that can be done with mixed-use and why do you think that it's not being attractive in this area for people to know? **Staff:** Across Santa Fe, mixed-use has somewhat not been really looked at. You'll find that many people have just used the residential component of mixed-use, but because it's attached, the mixed-use zoning attaches density based on the height of a building, and that's not really conducive to how developers today wish to increase that density. And then you're required to have a ratio of a percentage of commercial and a percentage of residential, both in the mixed-use district. You can't have one or the other, except for residential. So if you have commercial, you can't, you have to have residential. So it's limited in scope with what most people feel is flexible in order to achieve their goals. And that's why you don't see as many mixed-use zonings across the board, and that's why we don't get as many. And it's, as you can see, it's not working for this developer either, so they're changing it. Mixed-use did have categories that had distances from certain uses that were adjoining the property, 50 feet. If you take into consideration Beckner Road, it's going to meet those standards. If you eliminate Beckner Road, then they would need a setback of 50 feet from the property line. But as it stands now, with Beckner Road in place and having that 50-foot distance from the property line, most of those uses that are allowed within that MU district that would be triggered, that would trigger a setback, would already be met. What the C2 district does, it does allow for the majority of uses across the board. And it's not that a C, an MU district is limited in scope, it's just that a C2 district is more performance-based. It doesn't have the height restrictions based on density. It's, it's all performance-based. So if you can fit it in there and meet the development plan standards for health, safety, and welfare for all the categories within Chapter 14, we're going to permit it. **Councilor Lee Garcia:** Thank you. No further questions at this point. **Mayor:** Thank you, Councilor. I think we'll go to Councilor Cassutt now. If you'd like to ask some questions of either the applicant or staff, or for that matter, any of the people who testified as community members and were sworn in, you have the floor, Councilor Cassutt. **Councilor Cassutt:** Thank you so much, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, everybody, for being here. First of all, I, I do agree that, that, you know, we've had many conversations that starting land use cases at 10:30 at night is not something that works well. Unfortunately, this meeting did start later. So, you know, that is something for us as we look at these special meetings that we do need to be aware that the reason that we do these special meetings is because we're not supposed to be doing this work late at night. Unfortunately, that did not happen in this case. And, you know, we need to, this cannot happen again. If we're scheduling a special land use meeting, we cannot be starting it at 7:30 p.m. for the precise reason. I am, you know, glad that the petition was able to move forward so that we were able to see those concerns and and how represented they were throughout that neighborhood. I, I do have some questions speaking to the specific uses that were really called out as ones that the neighborhood did not want. You know, based on my understanding from the presentations, those are currently, they currently could come to fruition under the current zoning standards. Is that correct? And I think Mr. Escobel or the applicant, I'm not sure who, who's there to... **Mayor:** I think staff would be best equipped to answer that question, Mr. Escobel. The question is, some of the concerned uses, are they currently permitted under the zoning as it stands now? **Staff:** I have never done an actual comparison, but I will bring that up now and put it up for all to see so that it won't take very long. Do we get to pull up my favorite table of permitted uses chart? Yes, ma'am. You know how much I love that one. And while we're pulling it, well, actually, go ahead. I don't want to bifurcate your attention. All right, so what we're looking for is a comparison. So the mixed-use is all the, is the last column, oh, the second to last column on this table. And you're C2 is kind of in the middle. So for continuing care, group care, group residential, group residential boarding, those are all permitted. They're all uses that are allowed either by special use permit or are they're permitted outright. **Councilor Cassutt:** Well, it sounded like some of the concerns had more to do with, you know, 24-hour commercial districts, commercial districts of gas station, those types of pieces. I also know cannabis was in there, which I'm curious about because I know that the state put a prohibition for us to actually ban them from any zoning district. So that does become interesting that I'm curious how that works within a specific development plan. Am I, am I recalling that? No, wait, no, hold on. There was something that the state did that made it so we couldn't, make it very, very difficult. We were able to put some zoning restrictions on them, but I know cannabis has some, some interesting considerations based on state law. **Staff:** Cannabis consumption is a prohibited use in an MU district. Cannabis manufacturing heavy is a prohibited use in a, in an MU district. Cannabis manufacturing light is a prohibited use in a, in an MU district. Cannabis producer micro business, 200 miniature plants, that is also a prohibited use in the district. Cannabis producers is a prohibited use in an MU district. Cannabis producer indoors prohibited. It definitely looks like most of the cannabis uses are prohibited in an MU district. **Councilor Cassutt:** Okay. And then we also, I know the BIP was also another one. So, so I think that, and it looks like with BIP, some of those would be allowed. So it does, it does look like there's a lot of overlap between what is currently allowed per zoning and what would be allowed in C2 in terms of what are things that are not desired and which the developer sounds like they are very willing to not have. So, I guess, Dan, my next question is, when we are looking at conditions of approval, are there mechanisms by which we can tie the prohibition of those uses? Oh, thank you, that's helpful. Tie the prohibition of those uses to our, if we were to approve a rezone in this area. Mayor, Council, I have, in conjunction with working with the neighborhood as well as a developer, I think some of you will remember the school that went, that came in, probably the first ever with 100% support from the neighborhood because the developer worked with them. We did condition a master plan that restricted uses, and we attached that master plan with the ordinance so that it went in perpetuity with the ordinance. But the more restrictive use for limiting uses would be through a PUD. A PUD is an ordinance as opposed to a master plan, which is a resolution, so it carries more weight when it comes to enforcement. While a master plan does have to be followed when a development plan comes in, it's still not as strong as a PUD, which is an overlay. The developer would have to buy into those restrictions to make them really work. Otherwise, they still could come back and request for amendments and augmentations to those conditions at any time, as opposed to having to amend an ordinance, which comes back to the governing body. So you can implement conditions, and you can subject a master plan to conditions, and the developer will have to follow those conditions. But typically, because we've been told by legal that you don't want to restrict a zoning ordinance that allows somebody with the same district in one area not to have the same rights and privileges of the same district in another area, it could become problematic. So it would require the developer to agree to some of the use conditions associated with some of those uses within the MU District to apply within that C2 District as a condition of approval of the master plan, which would work better because the developer would be cooperative with that master plan. Okay. Now, does it have to necessarily be based on what's permitted in the MU District, or just, I mean, there's, it sounds like there's been a lot of conversation and agreement of what should not be there. But does it necessarily have to align with MU, or can it just simply be based on agreements for the master plan because this is already a master-planned area? It just wouldn't restrict those uses. My belief would be that if the developer and the neighborhood have talked about specific uses that are of great concern, it can be mitigated through utilizing, like, for instance, number two of the notes, hours of operation, 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. for, let's say, your bars, your restaurants, some of those uses that could get loud that the neighbors would like to have peace and quiet from at certain hours so that they can rest. I mean, that would be a way to mitigate those if the developer is willing to accept those conditions. Okay. And then in terms of the expansion of Beckner, my understanding based on the presentation is that that is not necessarily triggered at this time. That is a potential that could maybe happen in the future, but at this moment is not a necessity if this were to be approved. Am I understanding that correctly? That's true. The master plan is not going to trigger the widening of Beckner itself. That's going to come from the development plans or the developments that come on the property, and based on those traffic analyses that have to be reviewed by our traffic department. And it is, they are coming pretty close. I would say there's a good chance that the other lanes are going to be triggered once development starts on this property. Okay. And then this may not be a question for you, as I'm not sure that you are. I know that this is kind of coming out of the Complete Streets Division. I know that there's been a lot of discussion with our traffic engineer, with the MO, looking at the development of new streets and how those are built in such a way that would, that would discourage in some ways, help prevent, that would provide more traffic calming just on the physical characteristics of the street, as well as providing more safety for multimodal. Is that something that could then be really built in as those developments potentially come forward, are proposed, and then a triggering of the expansion of Beckner? I can certainly include discussion with our traffic department when those issues arise, but I would not be able to speak for them. Okay. Okay, thank you. I believe those are all the questions that I have for you, Dan. Would you mind exiting out of the sharing screen? Thank you. Now I can see you nice and big. If I could speak to the applicant, that would be extremely helpful. Yeah, be mindful of trying to keep within 10 minutes per person. We can come back around, but all right. Great. Last question then. So, based on that conversation around putting limits on the development, on the master plan, on agreeing to those uses that were most concerned, really tying that to the master plan, is that something that you guys are willing to be doing at this time? So we listed those uses for a reason, that we would not do those things and will not do those things. And to the extent it doesn't add months to the process, what we're, what our goal is, so that we don't lose an affordable housing developer, I'd say we could agree. But anything that would require, you know, another six months, I just don't think makes sense right now, and I don't think it's warranted when you look at what we're asking and that the development plans will be reviewed and come later. So there might be a faster solution. I wouldn't be opposed to it. I don't think my client would not be opposed to it. We just, time is of the essence. Yeah, I understand that. That is definitely something that, that is very crucial. Mr. Mayor and Counselor, yes, there is on the agenda a master plan amendment. You could approve that master plan amendment with the condition that you're talking about at this hearing and say that list of uses, and Brian can tell you what they are because they're in consensus with the petition. So there is a mechanism in front of you tonight to approve the master plan amendment as proposed with the additional conditions. So I think you can achieve what you want to do, what we want to do, going any further than tonight's hearing, if that's what you prefer. Wonderful. Thank you so much, Mr. Summer. That was very helpful, and I will go ahead and yield the floor for now. Thank you all. Thank you. Thanks. And we can come back around. Counselor Mayor Worth. Thank you. Mr. Esau, I need you again. Just so we heard in public comment talking about guardrails, and we've heard a little bit tonight, Counselor Cassett's questions, about some of those guardrails. So we're approving tonight a master plan and a general plan, but to carry out these things, each of these projects are going to, anything that's, that is done within these plans has to come through the process. Can you, I just help the public and the council understand what I've just said and maybe say it better than I did. So, the term guardrails is not a term in Chapter 14 with regard to MU as they were iterated by somebody who was making comments. There are certain requirements within an MU District that they were talking about that have certain limitations, and one of them is where any of the following uses exist on an adjoining site, group living or household living uses shall be separated from the following uses by a minimum distance of 50 feet. And then it lists a host of uses that would automatically probably meet that 50 feet because of Beckner Road. When Counselor Cassett was bringing up the uses, we went over some of those uses, and some of those uses had additional notes in an MU District that limited operations or required special use permits for additional review by a public body. It's no longer administrative. Those are also guardrails that limit those within an MU District. And the reason for that is an MU District is both commercial and residential, where here they're just going commercial. Those limits have gone away. So if you wanted to include those uses with those guardrails on the master plan, when the master plan is, if the master plan is approved as part of this project tonight, then when they come in for their development plan, the staff looks at all of those conditions of approval adopted by the governing body and enforces those conditions when those developments come in for development and then ultimately for a building permit. So they're, they're restricted based on those conditions. Okay. And what we're doing now, I think, does allow for housing, which is it more than what we're, the way it's currently zoned allows for? Yes. Okay. And if, if the housing is built out, if the residential areas are built out, it seems like that would help with some of the problems that, or some of the things people are afraid of, right? If you, if you build out an area and it's, you know, more mixed in terms of residential and some of the things that have, have, they're outlining, you maybe you don't have as much room for the racing, or you don't have as, you know, there's just more people watching and living and, yeah, I don't know, maybe that, maybe it doesn't bear fruit, but what I heard from one individual is they're using Beckner Road as a drag strip. The development is going to go either south, is going to be south of Beckner Road, so it won't really limit that. And if development in it triggers another road, then you'll have four lanes instead of two lanes. So the uses that will go on this property won't technically interfere with problems that they're having with Beckner Road. That would have to come from another solution, possibly through some, you know, slowing down of the traffic somehow, speed bumps, the normal course of action that when a neighborhood comes to the Public Works Department with a petition for mitigating those issues, that's the, that would be the only way that would happen. Okay. That's all I have for now. Thank you. Counselor Faulkner. Okay, just to address some of the community's concerns, I know some of us are working on aggressive driving legislation right now, and obviously can't go into a lot of detail, but just know that we are working on this problem. If I could get Dr. Herbert. Yes, sir. Don't be scared. Okay, I'm a little scared. No, first of all, you have a good reputation. I work in doing healthcare policy at the state level, and so I, I come to us with a good reputation. I just have some concerns around the medical school being the anchor for the project. I know that right now in New Mexico, there's a, a capacity on residencies and proctors, and that there's very few places to build more residencies, and there's not money to build more residencies at the state level. There's a group of us in, I believe your lobbyist, she's spectacular, by the way, she works on doing the, building the residencies, as do about a team of seven of us in getting more money for the residencies throughout New Mexico. But the math that I know of is there's a piece of legislation that requires new medical schools to build, I think it's 80 to 100 residency programs. And my concern is that there is not capacity with the existing hospitals to do that. So that's why I'm concerned about it being an anchor for this project, because there, and there isn't money to build those residency programs. And so someone would have to privately fund those residency programs. But even if you had the money through the private sector to do that, those residencies don't exist and can't be built because a lot of the hospitals are capped on their residencies. And so my concern is, how do we, is there an alternative to the medical? if the medical school can't, is the possibility? I appreciate the question. I brought the medical school project, the dental school project, because it's a pair, actually, as an example of something we're trying to develop in this area. Current anchors of the Las Solas project or Nexus Health, which is about 41 providers. We see about 160,000 patients a year. On the other end is Presbyterian Hospital. We do believe that that medical focus will draw additional projects. I think the medical school discussion will be really good tomorrow. I think there are a lot of possibilities. We have all the right people in the room to make the decisions, and I'm well aware of the barriers you're talking about, and we have ways to get past all of them. We have representatives from Presbyterian Hospital, Lovelace Hospital, Nexus Health, all of them coming to the table to support GME. But to be honest with you, this is an aside. Our issue tonight really is about allowing us to get uniform zoning so we can move forward in an efficient way and move lot lines. All of the uses that everyone's talking about are already allowed. They're already allowed on this property. We want to be good neighbors. We want to be good partners. We don't want to develop anything that shouldn't be there. I think this is a great opportunity to do it together, but I don't believe that we're focusing on the right thing. I think it is about road. You wanted a little flexibility with our parklet, and if we can get our uniform zoning, then we can move forward with administrative lot line adjustments and develop this in a reasonable pace. So, does that answer your question, ma'am? The only reason they brought it up as a concern of mine is that when we were discussing whether or not to this item or to table it, I asked the question of how important the medical school was. Oh, it is an exceptional opportunity that I think we have figured out how to address the barriers you're discussing. Okay. And then I would also say that there are far less barriers around a school of dentistry than there will be around a medical. Agreed, ma'am. You will get, if you just did a dentist school, you would get, you could pull the whole state into that area, 100%. I know the difficulties of medical schools, and dentistry, you will face no obstacles. You will face some sizable obstacles when it comes to a med. I agree. Thank you. Councilor Lindo: Thank you, Mayor. I feel a toothache coming on. So, no. I just want to reiterate with Mr. Escobedo that staff is recommending the approval of these items, correct? Mayor: Council, Councilor Lindell, yes. Councilor Lindo: The Planning Commission approved them, correct? Mayor: Yes. Councilor Lindo: Okay. Just one more comment because of this time of night. Don't really need to drone on about this. I think vacant areas draw problems, and probably the sooner this gets developed, the sooner some of these neighborhood problems will go away. Big vacant areas with a road going through and a lot of vacancy around there, the vacancy of the mall at this point, those kinds of properties draw problems. So, good luck with all of this, and thank you, Mayor. Mayor: Thank you, Councilor. Councilor Carr: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Earlier, a colleague had asked if it was necessary to rezone for housing, and the answer was no. Is it necessary to rezone for affordable housing? So, I guess this is for staff. Mayor: I apologize, Mayor, Council. When Las Solas was originally developed, it actually set aside a parcel for affordable housing, which is now developed. If the applicant is bringing in more affordable housing, then that would be a benefit to the city and for the area. Councilor Carr: So, my question still stands, is a rezone required to bring in affordable housing? Mayor: No. Councilor Carr: Okay. It's been proposed that, you know, justification for this is to for lot splits. Is a general plan amendment required for splitting a lot? Mayor: Council, no. But I did find out what their issues were for dividing the property. Chapter 14 requires the lot lines to follow the zoning lines. So, if you have a C1 district and a C2 district, but that lot is going to be split somewhere between the two of them for an arrangement, they wouldn't be able to do it until they rezone the property, in which case the lot itself couldn't be created until those lot lines were established by the zoning boundaries. Councilor Carr: Understandable. It's going to be split within the specific zone. So, I took a look at the different land use codes that are posted on our website. Are those updated? Are those current, Mr. Escobedo? Mayor: You're talking about muni, in the, it's called the uni code. Councilor Carr: Yeah, it's, it's permitted uses by zone, and then it lists them all out. If you click on it, for example, I click on C1 permitted uses, it pulls up a document that, and in this instance, C1, it lists 42 different uses for C1 use, and it lists things such as banks, manufactured homes, museums, preschools. So, those are still applicable. Am I understanding that correctly? Mayor: Yes. Councilor Carr: Okay. So, there's, according to what it's currently zoned, which is C1, C2, MU, and BIP, I couldn't find BIP on our website. There's a significant, various amount of uses based on the current zoning, if that currently stands, which includes housing, which includes the restaurants that were identified tonight, which were included retail. And so, I'm, I guess I'm having some concern around here, you know, in regards to the restrictions. Yes, there are restrictions based off the current zone of the area. I think that pertains to any land. And furthermore, I got some concerns because, you know, the case earlier, we were kind of given the guidance, we've got to follow the code. Well, shouldn't we be following the general plan amendment, I mean, the general plan? And so, I guess the last question I have is, aren't we going to be updating the general plan soon? Okay. So, why should this proposal not be rolled up into the general plan amendment versus having, you know, as, as identified in one of the slides earlier, there were, I think, four different times it was amended instead of having an additional time, additional amendment so close to the time period where we're going to be amending the general plan? And I understand the expediency requested by the developer, but I'm sure there's probably another 100 developers that are wanting land rezoned, and they can do so because of the general plan. And I think this, the general plan amendment or the general plan revision and restructuring process is an opportunity for anybody and everybody to bring those requests before. So, I'm just of the mindset, if we're going to follow the code, we got to follow the general plan. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mayor: Thank you, Councilor. Mr. Escobedo, can you actually just respond to Councilor Garcia's point? I felt like maybe you had something to say. Mayor: Council, Councilor Chavez, I'm not quite sure if he was making a statement or if he was asking a question. The general plan is what we use to develop our ordinances for the City of Santa Fe. It establishes a zoning pattern for the City of Santa Fe. And then we as planners put those puzzle pieces together to follow the will of the council. So, when somebody is asking for a rezoning, if the general plan future land use map has it designated as something different, they have to change the general plan in order to change the re, in order to make the rezoning for what they want. They can't just do the rezoning without the general plan saying, yes, we are, we're in agreement with this. That requires the council to agree to that general plan and agree to that rezoning. The council has adopted a set of findings within Chapter 14 that if somebody is to bring forward a general plan and rezoning, they have to at least establish those findings within Chapter 14 that say, yes, you know, if we are to approve this, we know you have met our standards. The council is not under absolutely no obligation to approve any general plan or rezoning. It's not a right given to the applicant like a building a house in an R1 district. It's not a permitted right. It's a discretionary item that the council has to agree to. If the council felt that this was the zoning in place and the general plan in place was what they wanted in the today as it was yesterday, you don't have to approve the general plan. You don't have to approve the rezoning, in which case the master plan itself falls away. Mayor: Great. Thank you. Okay. So, it is very late, and I felt like I was more prepared for my questions like five minutes ago. I think the first question I have, well, comment, question. So, I really like the idea of this medical plaza. I think that as a state, we are in crisis in regards to medical providers, more so behavioral health providers. Say that one more time. We so behavioral health providers. So, I just wanted to get some ideas about or more information about the discussion in regards to workforce housing. Is it geared to recruit medical providers or medical professionals to Santa Fe? Because I feel like it could, if we're targeting that population specifically, and I think the medical plaza idea really would do that, which is exciting and could be very beneficial for the community. Currently, we have about 41 providers at Mexel and almost 200 staff members. 30% of my staff commute into Santa Fe because they cannot afford to live. Presbyterian Hospital has close to 550 employees, and 20% of their staff commute into Santa Fe because they cannot afford to live here. We are absolutely committed to finding a workforce housing developer to help my staff live and work in the same city. You know, one of the problems with medical care here, it's not only there's not enough doctors, there's not enough staff to take care of people. They're not radiology techs, there's not ultrasound techs, there's not lab technicians. They can't afford to live and work here. And so, part of our desire is to is to create a place where we can have projects like this, and the way it's currently broken into eight different pieces allows us absolutely no flexibility. Thank you. That's very exciting. I feel like it's needed. I'm aware of just the struggles we have, especially with the providers, like you mentioned, some of like, I'm losing my voice too, some of like the text. You know, it's really hard when individuals get into the doctor and there's a pending diagnosis, but it's they have to wait three months for imaging, and that's where we're at right now. And it's because those individuals can't afford to live in Santa Fe, or those individuals can't afford to live in Santa Fe with that job. So, I think that's very exciting. As for, I want to thank the community for the petitions, the concerns, our concerns that need to be addressed, whether this would be approved or not. And so, I just want to make that statement. And I think Councilor Cassidy and I like literally texted each other at the same time, like, this is something we have to loop PD in and have a conversation with HOA. So, please know that being against this project or opposed to it is not going to necessarily fix the problem, but there are definite things that we could do immediately that would. I also just wanted to, I don't know if anyone could speak to this to confirm it because I'm not the expert, but I agree with what Councilor Lindell said with with empty lots bring in concern. I actually feel like having more businesses and having more traffic not only will fill the empty areas, but will also bring more public safety professionals to the area, right? The more populated we have, the more people are going to be patrolling because they have to. So, I just wanted to kind of broaden that and just, I don't know if we have any research as a city or anything like that about the empty spaces and crime. I think you could drive down Cals and see that it draws, it draws, you know, certain behaviors that could be risky to the community, but I don't know land use or if anyone here can kind of confirm that statement just because We do have community members that are concerned about filling in the empty space may bring more public safety issues, but I think in fact, filling it is going to actually help. I don't know if anyone could speak to that. Councilor Carlsommer: I'm not staffed, but I could tell you precisely. The vacant property next to the Regal Theater, or what used to be the Regal Theater down there, I represent the people that own that. We have had to, they spent in excess of $40,000 just trying to keep the place from, I mean, the drug and homeless, homeless is a problem, but the crime that is being committed on that property is because it's vacant. Now there's going to be a hotel going in there and that will help alleviate that problem. But you are right, exactly. That big open space, we spent in excess of $45,000 just trying to police it. Great, thank you for that information. I think that it's a kind of a reverse way of thinking, but it once you hear it and can envision it, it makes sense. I also, but I do have a concern because I have mentioned this and I'm probably going to go past 10 minutes and I'm sorry because I always complain when people do it. I'm going to try not to, but I had mentioned a concern on prior land use cases about the ENN process. I'm sure there is no developer watching us right now, but those of you that know them, it is essential and will lead to your success if you involve the community from the start of your thought process. I've had developers approach me and ask this question, "How can I get the community to buy in?" Make them part of your process. I did see a concern on the petition that there wasn't really good communication with the HOA when the whole ENN process started. And I'm sure there's two sides to that. I'm glad that there's conversations with that now, but it's an absolute must to the success of the community as a whole. And when you're developing in a community, you're becoming part of that community. So getting the community involved with the plan, the vision, is so essential. But since that was a listed concern here, can someone tell me when communication first occurred with the HOA? Because it's in September, but was that, when was, I don't have the date in front of me, when was the ENN held? The ENN was, I think, November 14th, 2023. And I can tell you an answer to that. So I went back and looked at my communication because I keep all the communication on noticing. And I sent a note to the City of Santa Fe, Daniel Alvarado, that handles that. And I said, "Who is the association for contacts for the Avenidas?" He sent me a list. And on that list, there was a person's name. I emailed her. She said, "No, that's not us anymore. I think it's this association." So I did some research and found out who it really was. And I sent the email and I've got a copy of that. I called them, talked to them, but I don't think they relayed that information back to their own HOA, is my guess. And so, but we did the mailers, we did the notice poster. And I know that there's sometimes the mail is not so reliable. I get that. And I know sometimes the assessor information maybe is a little outdated too. But we do our best to get that right. It's really important to me. And I agree with you, you have to engage your neighbors from the beginning. Absolutely, thank you for that clarification. And I don't know how we can do it better. I know that we probably already do a lot to just make sure everyone's aware of the ENN, but this has been a constant complaint from community members. And it might be down to the HOA or leaders within their community or neighborhoods, I don't know. But I don't know how as a city we could support that process better. It's something we have to do. I totally agree with everything, but I do think that I would want to see the conditions so we can approve with the conditions. I would like to hear from staff. I know that you said that you were okay with that. I was just going to put on absolutely the uses that we had talked about so you had them fresh in your mind. Okay, they were gas stations, auto body, automotive services, packaged liquor stores, bars that are not associated with a restaurant serving food, cannabis production, manufacturer, retail, 24-hour restaurants. Then there was a condition aside from the medical businesses, services, which operate at odd hours, that business hours that would be open to the public would be limited from 7:30 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. Those are all conditions that you could place on the master plan amendment approval and that would not require anything, wouldn't be in an ordinance, but it would be a requirement of master plan that would be enforceable by your land use staff. Great, thank you. And on top of these conditions, there's also the process. So any development that would come would go through committee. And we have our community members here that would communicate that we hold this process accountable for what was decided this evening. So I just want to emphasize that. And I think that's it. Thank you. I often comment when I'm not supposed to, Mayor, so we'll have an opportunity for that too. But thank you for calling for the moment. Councilor Castro, you have the floor. I will just echo the sentiments of my colleague. Last time, all the smart people made all the smart comments and thank you so much. I am a little bit adverse and concerned about some of the rhetoric around crime and the unhoused, in particular, around some of these developments in empty spaces. And so I just want to remind our community members that crime doesn't necessarily go hand in hand with being unhoused. And there was recently a large criminal operation in the middle of a neighborhood. So based on the zoning, that doesn't really change the circumstances. And I will leave it at that. Thank you. Very good, thank you. That was very, very succinct. I just take a couple minutes and then we can go around again if anybody didn't get their questions answered or you want more exploration. I think the guardrail comment has resonated with all of us tonight. I don't think anybody disagrees with that. And I think we need to explore ways, not just tonight, but going forward with staff to, and with the neighborhood and with the developer, and not just in this instance, but in all instances, to see that where appropriate, we can find ways to reassure people that change is not going to be an unlimited Wild West operation and that there are safeguards and there are both guardrails in terms of uses and also guardrails in terms of changes in ownership or changes in mind of people coming along if the overall plan or ownership of the plan would overtime alter. I want to come back to a comment that Councilor Garcia made just because I think it bears clarification. Mr. Eshel, if I could borrow you for one minute, sir. So we're talking about redoing the general plan, which I think is a wonderful thing and I'm very excited to see it happen. Has that, we have, we're about to kick that process off, am I correct? Mayor, Council, that is correct. You'll be getting a presentation by Janice Bernoff. I believe she's already been in contact with many of the members. So that is moving forward full steam ahead. And it's about a three-year process. It will take some time. The amount of time I was informed would be in the neighborhood of three years. That's the time frame that they're targeting. But so, all right, so it may be a little more, it may be a little bit less, but true, it's not an imminent opportunity because we do have commitments to do all of the things that everybody on the governing body has stipulated tonight ought to be done, which is great outreach, enormous community involvement, input. It's about an eight or nine step process to go through the effort to update the city's general plan, which has not been done in a comprehensive way since 1999. That is correct. So I do believe it's correct to say it's going to happen. I don't believe it's imminent by most definitions. While you're here, let me ask one other question for the record. I know you leaned into this once, but we got, this is our second land use case tonight and they're both very complicated and they're not easy. They do raise issues not only of public interest, but also of due process and also of our own zoning rule, our own rules, our own land use rules. It is correct, just for the record, that the Planning Commission and staff both recommend what is before us tonight. Mayor, Council, that is correct. So what, as we had in the last case where there was a recommendation in front of us from the Planning Commission and the staff to deny the proposal, in this instance, it is to accept, accept the proposal. Mayor, Council, that is correct. Okay, thank you. I just wanted to make sure we weren't, there was no ambiguity about what the process is that brought it to this governing body tonight. Mayor, can I ask another question? Councilor May. And as long as we're on this, the last case to this one, I also just want to point out there are, as we saw in the last case, rules around what we have, what has to be shown in order to grant a variance. And the last case, we voted that that was, that the criteria weren't there according to our rules to grant the variance. In this case, we also have rules, correct, Mr. Eshel, about what, how a rezone, rezoning gets done. Mayor, Council, Councilor Mayworth, that is correct. You have three sets of findings for each request. So you have a set of findings for the general plan amendments, you have a set of findings for the master plan, you have a set of findings for the ordinances. And the applicant has met the criteria for all three components for each and every one of their requests per Chapter 14. That is why we recommended approval to the commission and that is why the commission recommended approval to the governing body. Okay. And so, you know, we do have, you can make changes to a general plan, you can make changes to rezoning, but there are rules that have to be followed per our code for how you go about doing that. Yes. And so we are not, I want to point out, being inconsistent between the last case and this case. Thank you, Mayor. Any other comments? This is still the part of the proceeding where having the open hearing. There are no other questions from the governing body. Councilor Cassidy, I'm not seeing you on the screen at the moment. I don't know if your hand is up, but I don't want to ignore you. I'm good, Mayor. I do not have any more questions, just a comment, so I'll wait till that. All right, you're exactly right in terms of our process. If we've completed our questioning, then I will close the public hearing portion and I will open it up for discussion and deliberations by members of the governing body. And since you said you had some, Councilor Cassidy, I will turn to you first. Thank you, Mayor. I am happy to start. I do want to follow up a little bit of what Councilor Chavez did start discussing in regards to some of the concerns that there are definitely, these are problems that we're seeing in the city in terms of feelings of safety and aggressive driving and racing. And that are not necessarily going to be exasperated by a change in zoning, but that, you know, we do take very seriously and as she mentioned that we, we have already started the discussion on how we will, you know, work with the HOA and and continue this discussion with different neighborhoods in our district. But, but I do actually want to discuss, you know, kind of this, this concern around, around some of these really challenging issues. As, as many of you who are my constituents may know, my, my background is in public health and actually doing a lot of work with the unhoused population. And we often take a look at some of these short-term Band-Aids that we have to put on these issues. But really, we have a very robust conversation in the field around what are those long-term investments that we have to make to look at prevention. This project is actually a very good example of a lot of the things that we need to be addressing these issues on the whole in terms of prevention, which we may not see the benefits of for 10 to 20 years. But when we are talking about jobs, when we're talking about housing, when we are talking about opportunity for our youth, that makes a really big difference when we are looking at the prevalence of future mental health issues, issues with addiction. Homelessness comes down to poverty and to housing expenses. When you really start to boil it down and look at the root causes, it's financial issues, and then things often will spiral from there. So I do think that while I understand the very real understanding about concerns of what could potentially happen if things do not go according to plan, and we have had some really wonderful discussion about this today, there's also the question of what happens if things do go according to plan. What are the opportunities that are here? And this is a project and a vision where I really do see a lot of opportunities. I do also want to speak to the conversation on access to amenities. And this is something that I have always taken from Eric Anie of the no, I will always give him credit for this phrase, that it's not just about affordable housing, it's about affordable living. A lot of people do not have access to cars. Our public transit system in this area is not as beneficial as it could be, as it is in some other parts of the city. And so when we look at having things like grocery stores or childcare or other amenities close by for those individuals that are going to be able to live in these affordable housing units, the proximity to these types of amenities can actually make the difference between that affordable house meaning an affordable lifestyle for them, as opposed to an affordable house that does not necessarily have these resources within walking distance. So I understand a lot of these concerns and a lot of these broader social issues that we are dealing with in our city. It is one of the reasons I have fallen in love with land use, is because things like this, which seem like a very, well, land use is complex, but really seem like we're just talking about zoning and what buildings go where. The quality of life, the social health and public health of our city, the implications for those issues, cannot be understated. So this is why I'm in support of this project, and it is also why I will be looking at how we, as mentioned, we can put this in the master plan amendment right now, putting down those conditions that have already been discussed and approved, so that we can really make sure that we are moving towards that vision that is going to be beneficial, while also, as we've used the words guardrails a lot, guarding against those concerns. The other thing that I would hope to see with this is, there was a lot of discussion around the Rail Runner. Again, back to public transit and the importance of public transit and a multimodal transit system. We frequently discuss this in terms of sustainability as well as affordability in our city. We, it's a bit of a chicken and an egg with public transit. And we talk about, well, we need to create public transit so people can live there, but it's often density that starts to drive better public transit. So whether this becomes an opportunity for us to advocate for the Rail Runner, I actually had a constituent in this neighborhood reach out to me and say, you know, whatever happened to the station? Are we ever going to get it back? Or how it impacts the city's own public transit system. The density in this neighborhood actually provides an opportunity that could mitigate that traffic that we are worried about on Beckner, because people would have alternative modes of transportation. But really, density does become a necessity for that. So those are my only comments. And that is really to say, to really tell, to speak to the neighborhood, that it's not that these concerns are not valid. I very much understand them. And yes, these are things that we are experiencing within the city. However, I do think that this project done right, as well as some of the other projects that we are pursuing in this district and around the city, Midtown, of course, always coming to my mind, are some long-term solutions to these issues. While we as a governing body and Councilor Travis and I as your representatives for District 4, need to and continue to and have been and will continue to be working on how we, how we kind of deal with these issues in the short term, while looking to prevent them in the long term. I hope that made sense at 12:49 at night. And I really do want to thank everybody for being here. Thank you for staff. Thank you to my colleagues, for the applicant, and really thank you to the constituents who came out, because this is a really crucial conversation. Mayor: Thank you, Councilor. I think Mr. Escabel, your hand's up. You have something to add to the conversation, sir, before we go back to the council members? Mr. Escabel: I did. I just, I took the liberty of constructing a second condition for the master plan, if the governing body so chooses to accept it, based on the conversations that were presented. And I've showed it to the applicant, and they are in agreement with this. That would be the following: Uses shall be prohibited for this master plan amendment affecting Losis Tracks 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, and 26. In addition, except for medical business, oh, those uses are gas station, auto auto body and automotive services, package liquor stores, bars that are not associated with restaurant serving food, cannabis productions, manufacturing, retail, 24-hour restaurants. In addition, except for medical businesses and services, business hours open to the public are limited between the hours of 7:30 and 11:00 p.m. If you so choose to accept that condition. Mayor: Thank you, sir. I'm going to ask other members of the governing body if they have comments they want to make or observations at this time. Councilor Michael Garcia. Councilor Michael Garcia: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I'll keep it quick. You know, just going over the current use is allowed. I mean, we've talked a lot about this kind of medical base camp. I mean, every single identified zone is allowed medical, dental offices and clinics. In addition to, I couldn't find the Business Industrial Park identified on our city website, but we've got something called the Business Capital District that also includes medical, dental offices and clinics. So that's where I've again, I've got my concerns of having to justify this rezone when it's currently allowed. In addition to the medical and dental clinics, there's things like gym facilities, daycares, grocery stores, restaurants, and additional schools, vocational and trade. So I think with the current use, it could be done. I think I don't want to be led down a path of saying you're not going to get these amenities unless these changes are made. And I just like the prior case, it could be done with the current zoning that's currently allowed. So thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mayor: Thank you, Councilor. Other comments from members of the governing body at this time? This is not question time. It's an opportunity to identify your thinking or your thoughts on the matter. Councilor Fuller, and then we'll go to Councilor Lee Garcia. Councilor Lee Garcia. Councilor Lee Garcia: Sir, Mayor, you know, I think a lot of times we want to give foresight as to what's going to happen here. And at this point, it's just we're changing the zoning. And with that change, and we got to focus on that, is the zoning change going to be beneficial to our communities? And there's a lot of fear in that change because we don't know what it's what's going to bring. I would hope that if this does go forward and it does pass, that once again, those that are responsible for making sure that the community is developed in a way that is beneficial to all. I think that some of the comments, there is being a good neighbor. If you are to develop commercially, how are you a good neighbor to the people who are living there? You work there, you probably spend most of your time in that area. And so I kind of have faith that that that would be your intent. I feel that there will be processes for each individual partial as it goes forward, which again, can be tedious. But I feel that also within the code and the land use department, in collaboration with the community, this could potentially be something that's good for the community. I really feel that having these assets for not just District 4, but the whole city, is kind of like the direction that that we're looking at. So those are just my comments. And I'll leave it at that. Thank you, Mayor. Mayor: Thank you, Councilor. Councilor Mayworth, I think your hand was up. Councilor Mayworth: Yeah, just a quick comment. I think the developer is not seeking a change in zoning so that they can necessarily get different things. I think it's more for having what they keep calling a consistency of zoning, so that they have similar rules for the entire area and can better plan and actually execute the vision that they have. And so I just want to make that comment. Thank you, Mayor. Mayor: Thank you. I want to just make one comment and then I'd happy be happy to entertain motions. I really am struck by the sincerity and the earnestness of the neighbors, and I think they deserve respect and consideration. I'm also very impressed by the vision of the applicant. We hear a lot, and it's a sensitive issue, that the city doesn't give the Southside the same consideration that it gives to other parts of our community. This to me is a big idea. It is a big idea in the, and it will, it has the opportunity to benefit the Southside the way big ideas can. A lot of what we do in our zoning cases, in our land use right now, has to do with the case we had earlier tonight. It's a, it's not insignificant, but it's a specific small piece of land with a very specific use. We do a lot of infill decisions. We do a lot of partial by partial decisions. This transcends this small partial by partial decisions to try to offer something much more significant and ultimately much more, as I said, visionary for the Southside, to have the benefits of a real integrated development that includes the benefits that we see in lots of other parts of Santa Fe, including amenities, walkable amenities, affordable amenities, healthcare amenities. If we do it piecemeal, we won't get those amenities. If we do it in a comprehensive and thoughtful, strategic way, this stands to be the kind of project that will really, really remarkably bring new services, opportunities, jobs, housing, healthcare, and quality of life to the Southside in an area that is really important to the city's future. And I think it done well and done right and done carefully, really does indicate that this city cares about the Southside in ways that go beyond just one smaller project at a time, but really wants to work with the neighbors, with the investors, the developers, the health community, to provide something significantly better and significantly more comprehensive and thoughtful and integrated as a development than would otherwise take place. And so I know it's tough to think about change and to think about the downside. The potential that change can sometimes trigger, but as Councilor Cassett asked, in our jobs in city government, we often think about what if something goes wrong and we try to prevent it from going wrong. What if this project goes right? What if it works out? What if it provides these amenities, affordable housing, workforce housing, really thoughtful development, integrated development, coordinated in a way that is really bringing new positive energy to the Southside? I think it has an enormous amount of upside potential. I know we have to put in those guardrails we talked about, both procedurally and substantively. I think I'm seeing leaders of this proposal shaking their heads yes because they agree, and I think the governing body as a unit agrees. So I see it as something that is a constructive response to a feeling of not having enough positive benefits. This could be a step in the right direction for an integrated and coordinated development that would provide those kind of positive developments, and that to me makes it worthwhile voting for. Any other? Yeah, Councilor, go ahead. I think we've got multiple. Start the motion process. All right. Yeah, I think we've all had our chance to speak our piece. I think I could piece it together. I will entertain a motion or series of motions. Can I read this? A motion to approve case number 2024-7899, Lellis Master Plan Amendment, changing land use designations for Laris Master Plan tracks 19, 20, 21, 23, 24, and 26 from MU Mixed Use, BP Business Industrial Park, and C1 General Office to C2 General Commercial, and reducing the width of the utility access and trail corridor, LBLA Trail, from 90 feet to 45 feet, subject to the master plan conditions listed in Section 3, Table 1, Master Plan Conditions, and Master Plan Technical Corrections listed in Attachment A, and with the following conditions: that under the new land use designation of C2, that the following uses will be prohibited to include gas stations, repair shops, package liquor stores, bars, or any restaurants that are 24 hours, limiting opening hours from 7:30 a.m. to 11:00 p.m., and any cannabis stores or facilities. There's a motion. Let's have it. Let's see if there's a second, then we'll take discussion. Second. There is a second, and I think Councilor Cassett and Councilor Lind both have their hands up. Yes, I believe that we do need to make our motions in order based on the, on the, whatchamacallit. That's the first one listed. That was the first one listed. Yeah, because I had that as the fourth one listed. Correct, Mr. Eshel? We're trying to get our ducks in a row here. What is the correct order for whether it's to approve or not to approve? What is the correct order of the considerations for voting? So within the, within this, the staff report that was provided, we outlined an exact order of how those amendments, how the, the recommendations have to be structured in order for this to work. It starts with the general plan amendments, moves to the master plan amendment, and then it ends with the ordinance changes, and you're adopting resolutions with each general plan amendment. So they'll have to have a number given to you with those resolutions so that they can be added to the resolution when you adopt that resolution, and I think the clerk is ready to issue those numbers when those resolution numbers are requested. We were looking in the wrong place, so that's on us. So that, yes, so we're looking at page three, I believe, where it identifies the list, and then I do have, if you want to just say per the condition, and I'll just read the condition that I constructed that the applicant has agreed to, and that would be on number four, right? But we, we have to withdraw the first. I withdraw my motion. I withdraw my second. Okay, hang on a sec. So we're back at square one, and we're looking for a new motion following the order that is laid out in the P3, whether it's to approve or deny, but we need a motion. I'll move to approve case number 2024-7898, adopting a resolution amending the general plan future land use map designation from commercial office use to community commercial for Losis tracks 21 and 26, plus or minus 8.18 acres, and for tracks 23, 24, plus or minus 13.45 acres. Second the motion. And a second on the first of seven motions. Is there discussion of that item? Madam Clerk, would you please call the roll? Councilor Marworth? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Felner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? No. Councilor Lindell? Mayor Weber? Yes. Motion passes. I'd entertain a motion on the second of the seven motions. Move to approve case number 2024-81852, adopting a resolution amending the general plan future land use designation from transnational, traditional mixed use to community commercial for the last Solidas track 19, plus or minus 9.11 acres, also located southwest of the Walking Rain Road, Begner Road roundabout. Second. There's a motion and there's a second. Madam Clerk, did you, you get that? No, Mayor, I did not. I apologize. Can we repeat the, who made the maker of the motion and the second? I made the motion on number two. Second. And Councilor Faulkner seconded. Discussion of that motion. Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll? Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? No. Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes. Motion passes. Do we have a motion on to approve case number 2024-854, adopting a resolution amending the general plan future land use designation from commercial business use to community commercial for Los Salaris track 20, plus or minus 10.70 acres, located south of the Rail Runner Loop. Second. There's a motion and a second. Is there a discussion of this motion? Madam Clerk, can you call the roll? Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? No. Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes. Motion passes. Next, move to approve case number 2024-7899, adopting a resolution amending L Sola, L Soleta's master plan land use designation for tracks 19, 20, 21, 23, 24, and 26 from mixed use and Business Industrial Park and C1 General Office to C2 General Commercial, and reducing the width of the utility access and trail corridor, Lamla Trail, from 90 feet to 45 feet, subject to conditions of approval and technical corrections, subject to the conditions and the additional condition which will read: the following uses shall be prohibited for the master plan amendment affecting Laris tracks 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, and 26. In addition, except for medical businesses and services, business hours open to the public are limited between the hours of 7:30 and 11:00 p.m. Second. Is there a discussion of this one? Councilor Lindell, you have your hand up. I just wanted to make sure that the applicant agrees with those conditions that have been put on. Mayor, Councilor Lindell, Councilors, I guess the answer to that is yes, based on what Dan read. What we were trying to ascertain is to make sure that the medical services were excluded from the hours of operation because, as you know, medical, you can have emergencies and situations that go outside those hours. Thank you. I have the, those conditions read again, please. Sure. The following uses shall be prohibited for this master plan amendment affecting the Laris tracks 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, and 26. In addition, except for medical businesses and services, business hours open to the public are limited to between the hours of 7:30 and 11:00 p.m. Well, it excludes all medical services. I'm not comfortable with that. What if some restaurant wants to open up to start serving breakfast at 6:00 in the morning? I don't see why that couldn't happen. I think that, you know, if we're trying to have restaurants and have a community out there, I don't know why we would not allow a restaurant to open early in the morning. Mayor, Council, Council Lindell, this condition was developed by the applicant. Well, it wasn't a condition. These were the, the, the matters that were of concern to the neighbors when they, when they went and discussed with those neighbors, and because of that discussion, they brought that forward to the, to this council. All I did is structure their agreement in a conditioned form to attach to the master plan. So you structured that. What if I want to structure it so that it says 6:00 in the morning? Then we'd have to withdraw a motion and make another motion. Not counselors. You could amend the motion. You could amend the motion if there were a concern about uses that are, I, I, I don't, I think Councilor Lindell raises an interesting question, which is what we're regulating things from here that may end up in the neighborhood's interest not necessarily being what they want, which is, could we please have an early bird breakfast opportunity? It's really hard to legislate these things at 1:10 in the morning, right? But we're talking about a lot of medical people that work over there, and whether it's on their way to work or done with a shift and want to get together and have breakfast together at an early morning, or people in the neighborhood on their way to work. Is your breakfast place open? Now we're going to, yeah, we're going to find out. We go to, can we go to breakfast after? Is always open. I think that it serves the neighborhood better to change that hour of 7:30 is late. Just amend it so that you're just focused on a closing and not an opening. I see Councilor Cassett's hand is up. She's a breakfast person. I'm a coffee person, and I will say that I know that most of the time when I do not have coffee at home, there's nowhere open except for Starbucks before 7:00 a.m. So that, that is actually a trend that I see throughout the city now. I find it very irritating because if I wake up at 6:00 a.m. and I don't get coffee by 6:15, the world doesn't want to be around me. So, but in general, I, I have seen that to be kind of the trend in the city. I don't know if this is something that can be, you know, discussed later, but, but I, I, I do really appreciate the, you know, the, the applicant being willing to take a look at what, what the neighborhood is requesting. I think Councilor Travis has a solution. Let's not belabor this any longer, please. I have a solution. I think that we just need to focus on a closing. I think that's the bigger concern. So let's do within the condition a closing of by 11:00 p.m. However, I'm going to throw another thing into this is when we heard from the developer, it seemed like there was agreement on specific facilities that you were okay with not being developed in these areas, and I would like those to be listed on those conditions. Oh, he's got them. Okay, I just wanted to make sure. So that was something that was missed. So if we could just re, so amend the condition or motion to amend the condition. Dan, you're the man. Give me just one moment to, thank you. Mr. Merritt, sorry. There's, I could just see a loophole there where somebody closes at 12:00 and opens at 12:30. I mean, it is, it's a bit of an arbitrary number at this point. It's, yeah, it's a very, it's an odd. Let's do 11:00 to 5:00 a.m. I mean, 5:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. So the, the amended condition based on the conversation, I have the following uses shall be prohibited for this master plan amendment affecting Lawaris tracks 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 20, and 26. In addition, except for medical business and services, business hours open to the public shall cease by 11:00 p.m. I didn't open a, I didn't put an opening because we're going to put an opening in there. 5:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. So I can keep the previous, leave that out and say, except for medical businesses and services, business hours open to the public are limited between the hours of 5:00 p.m., 5:00 a.m. and 11:00 p.m. Second. Okay, we have an amended motion. We have to vote on the amendment, but then we have to talk about whether we... Councilor: Clarifying comment on this. There was a list of uses that included gas stations, correct? Gas stations, auto body and automotive services, packaged liquor stores, bars that are not associated with a restaurant serving food, cannabis production, manufacturing or retail, and 24-hour restaurants. And that'll be on the condition. So everything Mr. Escabel just read, there's a motion and a second. There's an amendment motion, second. Okay, we have a motion, we have a second. Madam Clerk, can you call the roll on that? Mayor: Chavez? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Faulkner? Councilor Lee Garcia? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Michael Garcia? Councilor: No. Mayor: Councilor Lindo? Councilor Romero Worth? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Cassett? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Castro? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Mayor Weber? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Motion passes. Move to approve... Oh, we have to vote on the main motion. Move to approve as amended. So the motion is to approve it as amended. Is there a discussion of that? Madam Clerk, can you call the roll on the motion as amended? Councilor Faulkner? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Lee Garcia? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Michael Garcia? Councilor: No. Mayor: Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Cassett? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Castro? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Chavez? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Mayor Weber? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Motion is approved. Thank you. We need another move to approve case number 2024-7900, adopting Bill 2025-1, changing the official zoning map designation from C1 General Office to C2 General Commercial for Los Cettas Tracks 21 and 26, plus or minus 8.18 acres, located at the southeast quadrant of the Los Cettas Beckner Road roundabout, and Tracks 23 and 24, plus or minus 13.45 acres, located at the southeast quadrant of the Los Cettas Beckner Road roundabout. Councilor: Second. Mayor: Motion and a second. Any discussion? Madam Clerk, can you call the roll? Councilor Lee Garcia? Councilor Michael Garcia? Councilor: Nope. Mayor: Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Cassett? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Castro? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Chavez? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Faulkner? Councilor: Absolutely. Mayor: Mayor Weber? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Motion passes. Move to approve case number 2024-8855, adopting Bill 2025-3, changing the official zoning map designation from Business Industrial Park to C2 General Commercial, Lades Track 20, plus or minus 10.77 acres, located southwest of the Walking Rain Road Beckner Road roundabout. Councilor: Did you skip number six in our... Mayor: Oh, I apologize. I skipped number six. I will withdraw that motion. Move to approve case number 2024-8853, adopting Bill 2025-2, changing the official zoning map designation from Mixed Use to C2 General Commercial from Las Solad Track 19, 9.11 acres, located southwest of the Walking Rain Road Beckner Road roundabout. There's a motion and a second to approve. Is there discussion? Let's call the roll. Councilor Michael Garcia? Councilor: No. Mayor: Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Cassett? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Castro? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Chavez? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Faulkner? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Lee Garcia? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Mayor Weber? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Pass. Move to approve case number 2024, adopting Bill 2025-03, changing the official zoning map designation from BIP Business Industrial Park to C2 General Commercial, Losis Track 20, plus minus 10.70 acres, located southwest of the Walking Rain Road Beckner Road roundabout. Councilor: Second. Mayor: Any discussion? Madam Clerk? Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Cassett? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Castro? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Chavez? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Faulkner? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Lee Garcia? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Michael Garcia? Councilor: No. Mayor: Mayor Weber? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Motion passed. Thank you. Councilor: To make a motion that we postpone our executive session to our next... Mayor: Yes, but before you do that, I just want to thank everybody for coming tonight, staying with us so late. I apologize that it dragged on so long. Land use cases, including the one that was prior to this, have a tendency to be complicated and require a great deal of discussion before we get to an outcome. And so thank you for being with us, whether you're on Zoom or in the room. It's worth the time and energy. These are really important issues, so thank you all. Now with that, I turn to you, Councilor Castro. Councilor: I would like to make a motion that we postpone our executive session to our next governing body meeting. Councilor: Second. Mayor: Can we have a just quick conversation here? Yes, about the caption for the agenda. You can just make it generic, right? Something is to like, consideration of, I don't know, around whether just to put it on the agenda so I can, I can do the executive session generally as it is now regarding the, I mean, regarding the specific case. I think we, it would be helpful to know what the interest is before then, but you can make, yes. Okay, we don't need to include one if no one wants to appeal that. Okay. Okay. And you can, you can talk to everybody prior to that. Everyone is, yes. I, okay. Yes. Okay. All right. So that's, I just, I was confused about how you were going to proceed or whether the caption needed to be generic so that we could have an executive session and and have hold out that option. Thank you. Any other discussion about the motion to... Yes, Councilor Garcia. Councilor: I'm sorry. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I think it'd be better to be safe than sorry. Just add a vote on a potential appeal to the agenda, and if we don't need it, we can dismiss it. Add it to the agenda. I mean, it's as easy as that. If we don't need to take action, we won't take action on it. Mayor: Very good. Any other comments? So the motion in front of us is to take the executive session and postpone it till our next governing body meeting. All in, all in favor. I guess it's not a voice vote. Would you please call the roll? Councilor Romero Worth? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Cassett? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Castro? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Chavez? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Faulkner? Councilor Lee Garcia? Councilor: Hi. Mayor: Councilor Michael Garcia? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Councilor Lindell? Mayor Weber? Councilor: Yes. Mayor: Thank you, everybody. Thank you for hanging in there. We're going to be adjourned.