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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCity Council Committees - Planning and Economic Development Committee - 10/16/1989 KENT PLANNING COMMISSION MINUTES October 16, 1989 The meeting of the Kent Planning Commission was called to order by Chair Martinez at 7:30 p.m. Monday, October 16, 1989 in the Kent City Hall, City Council Chambers. COMMISSION MEMBERS PRESENT: Linda Martinez, Chair Tracy Faust Elmira Forner Greg Greenstreet Carol Stoner Raymond Ward Leona Orr, excused herself COMMISSION MEMBERS ABSENT: Anne Biteman, excused Gabriella Uhlar-Heffner, excused PLANNING STAFF MEMBERS PRESENT James P. Harris, Planning Director Fred Satterstrom, Planning Manager Janet Shull, Planner Lauri Anderson, Planner Stephen Clifton, Planner Kristi Robbins, Secretary Approval of September 18 , 1989 Minutes: Commissioner Forner MOVED to amend page 19, the third paragraph from the bottom to change R-1 to R-5. Commissioner Faust MOVED the minutes be approved as amended. Commissioner Ward SECONDED. Motion carried. KENT EAST HILL HOUSING IMPLEMENTATION (CPZ 89-3) Chair Martinez reopened the public hearing. (Verbatim Minutes) Tom Sharp: Thank you Madam Chairman. My name is Tom Sharp and I reside at 24254 143rd Avenue Southeast in Kent, 98042 and I came here with the understanding tonight that I was going to be able to talk on small lots, on small detached lots and I had read, I 've been in communication with the staff and I had read your minutes from October 18th and my partners have also read them and they 1 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 were, this is a separate subject now so bear with me, and the way the minutes are written it's, it talks about the normal workshop and we had assumed that this would be a normal workshop session instead of a deliberation concerning the East Hill and I respectfully submit that, that this, that the either the minutes are in conflict or that we can't read and I would ask that the meeting be postponed until your next meeting concerning the East Hill plan. Mr. Harris: Madam Chair may I interject a point here on page 24 of the minutes Chair Martinez says meeting will be continued until October 16th at which time we shall, will expect to see some design standards for the R1-5 zone, we also will begin our deliberations on the map and the comprehensive plan. Chair Martinez: And it says it's normally a workshop. . . Mr. Harris: Right. Chair Martinez: . . .but we would move this meeting. . . Mr. Harris• Yes. Chair Martinez: . . .so the deliberation can continue until October. Tom Sharp: But I 'm sure that you can see where we could have, reading this could have, could have assumed that the, that the meeting will be next week or at your next regularly scheduled meeting concerning the East Hill whatever you call it rezone or what have you. Commissioner Faust: Mr. Sharp, exactly what is there about the document that leads you to believe this? Tom Sharp: In that Chairman Martinez says our next regularly scheduled meeting. . . Commissioner Faust: What page are you on sir? Tom Sharp: 24. And at the top of the page Chairman Martinez our next regularly scheduled meeting which is normally a workshop is on October 16th. And then Commissioner Stoner says that I would move that we continue this meeting of these deliberations until October 16th. We had assumed that it was that the next meeting was the regularly scheduled meeting and this was just the workshop. That's the reason why I came to talk about small lots and never even prepared for this meeting concerning the East Hill. 2 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Tom Sharp: In fact until I walked in here tonight and I was talking to Mr. Harris, when I asked if I could speak I wanted to speak about small lots, never wanted to speak about the East Hill rezone. Chair Martinez: We will be considering small lots so you can talk about that but. . . Tom Sharp: Right, I 'd like to talk about that. Chair Martinez: . . .I think that at the end there's a paragraph that says that what we will be doing and what will be part of this meeting and I don't see that it's very ambiguous. Tom Sharp: Well Okay I, I don't want to belabor the point but we will take exception if there is a deliberation and a vote tonight concerning this. Now, I 'd like to wear my other hat and I 'd like to talk about small lots. Chair Martinez: Would you like to wait for that until after we have our presentation on the small lot. . . Tom Sharp: Yea, that'd be just great, sure. Chair Martinez: Okay fine. Tom Sharp: I thought that I had to speak about that now. Okay great. Chair Martinez: Alright fine. The staff has prepared for us a discussion of the R1-5 zoning and I think there's even a video. Who's going to do that? Mr. Satterstrom: My name is Fred Satterstrom and I 'll just kick it off. As you know Dan Stroh is unfortunately no longer with us and so you'll be seeing my smiley face out here on some projects, this being perhaps the most notable one before you. Just as a matter of introduction yes we are going to give you some information tonight on the R1-5 zone, we do have a video and we will be going over all of the R1-5 recommended sites both for the site specific as well as the East Hill reduction alternatives. But before I do that I just wanted to mention that I hope that you will look at the R1-5 zone with an open mind. I know that we have received a lot of negative reaction from the public on the R1-5 zone. I believe that some of the fears of individuals are founded and I don't mean to say, you know, that these cast dispersions so to speak on what these people are saying. On the other hand I believe that the Rl, I firmly believe that the R1-5 zone is not to 3 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 be confused with being the cause of all of the social ills of, that are present in the City of Kent. I believe that the R1-5 zone goes a long way in providing an alternative environment for detached single family housing, one that offers an opportunity for affordable housing as well as just another way of doing things on a site and still remain within the constraint of being a single family detached dwelling. This has been the stumbling block, I guess, last time for the Planning Commission proceeding on to make a decision on East Valley and hence a decision too on the Valley Floor. I hope that, and it's our intention, tonight to get you through the R1-5 decision to decide whether or not this is a zoning that district that will be in the Kent Zoning Code to determine whether or not you wish to apply it to any lands on the East Hill or ultimately on the Valley Floor so that you can go on and make the overall decisions that need to be made on this 20% reduction. And I do empathize with you, it's easy for staff to lay out the alternatives to you for you to decide which way you want to go, but as part of the decision making process I can respect your deliberations, the anguish, if you will, of having to go through this and decide in your own heart what is the correct way to do something that, to control the growth in the City of Kent. So with that, I will introduce Janet Shull who will show you a video and give you a little bit of background in what we've found in other jurisdictions as far as the R1-5 zone and then Lauri Anderson will go over the sites of the proposed R1-5 zoning both for the site specific and the East Hill reductions. Thank you. Ms. Shull: My name is Janet Shull and I 'm with the Kent Planning Department and I 'm going to just try to keep this very brief but also try to hopefully answer some of the questions that were brought up last time regarding the proposed R1-5 single family zoning designation. The first thing I 'd like to do is hand out a little, just a memo it's a two page memo that goes over basically what I' ll be presenting tonight but it's something for you to take home with you as well. About a month ago on the September 18th meeting regarding the East Hill, there was a request for some additional information regarding the R1-5 single family zoning designation that's proposed as part of the area housing studies. To respond to this, we first decided we better take a look at neighboring jurisdictions to see what they're doing in similar terms to the R1-5. We prepared another memo that was mailed to you, I believe you've all received that and hopefully had time to look over that. That describes some of the similar development standards that seven of our neighboring jurisdictions have and we found that King County, Kirkland, Renton, Seattle, Auburn, Issaquah and Redmond all have some sort of small lot single family zoning designation whether it's five of these cities allow for single family zoning designation for the 5,000 square foot lots, three of 4 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 these, Auburn, Issaquah and Redmond allow for it on a 6, 000 square foot lot. Both of these are still smaller than the current Rl 7 ,200 which is currently Kent's smallest single family zoning designation. We looked at those development standards and compared them to those that we had presented to you and found that the development standards we had initially recommended were very much in keeping with those that are currently in effect in these other jurisdictions. There was one exception to this, the City of Renton does have some additional requirements. Those additional requirements specify a minimum and a maximum site size for their R1-5 zoning designation and they also have language that states specifically where these zones can occur. They need to be adjacent, if they are a single family area, adjacent to multi family or higher density residential uses or they can be used in a lower density multi family zoning designation. I think it' s important to point out though that the Renton R1-5 designation also allows for attached single family dwellings, were as in Kent we're only proposing detached single family on the smaller lots so that could be why they have the additional restrictions. After we looked at these different design standards we decided we wanted to go out and see what these developments were looking like and we have a video that I 'd like to show at this time that shows three areas, they're all in King County, the first one is Windspur which is very close to here, it's just outside the city limits of Renton and it's near the Valley General Hospital off of Talbot so it's very convenient to anyone who would like to go take a look at what's being done on a 5,000 square foot lot and Stephen's going to start the video and I 'll just kind of talk you through it. Chair Martinez: Before we start, now this is one that is directly adjacent to a higher density or is it, where is it? Put it in context please. Ms. Shull: Okay, it's in the County and it's, if you were to take the Valley General Hospital exit off of 167. Chair Martinez: But it's county zoning. Ms. Shull: It's in the county, unincorporated King County and it's surrounded by slightly lower density single family, I would say 7,200 or 9,600 I don't know for sure what it is, but it is surrounded by single family on the other side of the street on Talbot I believe are some multi family developments. There's also as you know the Valley General Hospital is nearby and it is right off of Talbot, which is, does have some traffic on it. Commissioner Former: Was King County one of the jurisdictions that you're talking about? 5 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Ms. Shull: Yes. Unincorporated King County. Commissioner Greenstreet: Are all three of them county it looks like? Ms. Shull: Yes. They are all in the county. All three that we visited. Mr. Harris: (unclear) . .county are urban development type scenarios in these areas, it's not like. . . (unclear) Commissioner Greenstreet: I just meant to establish that as criteria on this list. Janet Shull: Okay, go ahead. This is Windspur which is just outside the city limits of Renton off of Talbot Avenue and we're looking now over some open space that's been provided in this development. This is a result of the requirement they had for open drainage on the site and they decided to incorporate with that some open space so they turned it into an amenity for the development. These lots range in size from 50 x 100 square feet and they have some that are as wide as 60 and some that are as narrow as 45 but primarily 50 x 100. These homes, currently everything in phase I of this development has been pre sold, there is only one home available that you can even buy, they're selling from anywhere between $148 to $168 thousand dollars with anticipation that phase II will be selling for even slightly higher. These homes range in, you' ll have to excuse this it was my first time with the video camera, this will end very quickly and we will take you inside one of the homes so you can see what type of construction is being built on smaller lots. These range in size from 1, 660 to 2, 324 square feet so I would say they're pretty standard size single family homes, but the way they've been able to develop the site plan, or the, excuse me, the building plan for these homes they're able to fit very well on the smaller lots. This is a very important issue for smaller lot design and sometimes I think you can get a better home out of it because you're challenged to design a better home to fit on the smaller lot. We were able to get inside one of these homes, we're looking now at the living room area and it does have quite a bit of daylight in the home, they've placed the windows very strategically to let quite a bit of light in, there's quite a few skylights in the home. And this, this goes on for a few minutes now, we just basically take you through the whole house, this house has four bedrooms upstairs and has a potential fifth bedroom downstairs, there's a den which could be a fifth bedroom if you so needed. This is the kitchen area there's a little eating nook to one end that's like a bay window area, 6 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 hardwood floors in the kitchen and there's a greenbelt that backs up to the back of this property and separates it from a single family development just directly adjacent to it. This is the family room area here, this is all. Mr. Satterstrom: (Unclear) . . .very quickly here, pay very close attention to where windows are not because in higher density single family you have to very strategically locate your windows and other spaces so as not to look into your neighbors, (unclear) . . .you'll find this outfit has done a good job of it. Ms. Shull: This is that potential fifth bedroom or probably would be used as a den or a study, and now we're going to go upstairs and hopefully you won't get dizzy, I get dizzy sometimes when I watch this video. But we were very fortunate to be allowed to go inside this home, I think there's been a lot of concern that these homes will be inhabited by low income people, But I really wonder how many low income people can afford $1, 500 a month payments for a home like this. This is the master bedroom, I 'd call it the master suite, we have a soaking tub and a separate shower in the bathroom, etched glass window and two sinks and the vanity and a walk in closet with the mirrored doors, it seemed like a very large room. There are three additional bedrooms upstairs and pretty average size except I 'd say the front bedroom was a little bit, was maybe 10 x 12 or even bigger, I mean it was fairly large. This house is about 2,000 square feet I 'd say it's probably not the largest one in the subdivision, but it's probably one of the largers, I mean it has four bedrooms, but I think they did some real good planning as far as the floor plan of this house, they really seemed to make it work. And then the final bedroom here. Some of these homes do have views of the valley, just kind of nice. And then this is the final bathroom, again with the two sinks. Tile on the counter tops. It's almost sad to say that these homes you know, we'd like to think of them as affordable, and indeed they are more affordable usually than other homes, but they're really not the most affordable homes you could probably find, anything new construction isn't. We're now in Juanita, this is the second place we visited, Springbrook Square, this is part of a PUD development. There was no additional open space in this development, but it does have some town homes and some attached singles in the same development. You could kind of see those down below. Now we're just outside of Federal Way in King County, this is Westbury, this is the last place we visited. This is a little more established neighborhood, it's been here for a few years, you can see what people have done with landscaping, they're obviously taking very good care of these homes, a lot of people have been worried that these kind of homes are going to become real run down over the years, but sometimes with a smaller lot you can even afford to put more into the 7 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 landscaping per square foot, sometimes you have a large lot and you can only afford a few trees, but we talked to an older couple here and they were really, really seemed to enjoy living here and were out in their yard gardening. Commissioner Ward: What size are these lots? Ms. Shull: These are all 5,000 or about there. They do vary somewhat within the subdivision, but they're all averaging 5,000 square feet. Chair Martinez: And there was no requirement for green space. Ms. Shull: No. The first one was the only one that had the green space and that, as I said, was because they had these drainage requirements and then they turned that into an amenity and it is selling, I mean people are, I was there Saturday and their little model showroom was packed. Chair Martinez: And King County has no additional design standards that apply to these. Ms. Shull: Right. I think what we're seeing here is just what the market is demanding. People want single family housing and they'll pay for a quality home, whether the lot is smaller or larger. So here we're just, we're still in Westbury and we're basically trying to give you an idea of what the streetscape could look like rather than just showing you individual homes, we were trying to sort of pan the neighborhood and show you what had been done with landscaping and how the homes look. And that's it. Chair Martinez: Elmira, you had a question? Commissioner Forner: Yes. In all of your researching that goes in, is 'nt there talk of limiting the amount of 500 square foot lots that could go into an area, I mean could you have 80 acres of 5, 000 square foot lots. Ms. Shull: Right. The City of Renton was the only city we found that had a restriction on a maximum and a minimum site size, they restrict their, they require at least three lots or 15,000 square feet in their R1-5 and they require, or they only allow a maximum of 8 acres. They were the only jurisdiction that had those restrictions and they have, their ordinance, or their is so new that they don't they didn't have anything we could look at, but they're the only ones that had that requirement. Chair Martinez: Three lots minimum max is 15 acres? 8 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Ms. Shull: 15, 000 square feet, 8 acres was the maximum that they allowed. Commissioner Greenstreet: Minimum of three lots with 8 acres maximum. Ms. Shull: Right. So in a sense they were trying to avoid one singular lot, they had to have at least three. And it was also interesting, Lauri Anderson talked with someone from King County who told her that they have currently, and this is unincorporated King County, they have currently 394 parcels zoned at this density and they have permits for 280 something of them already, so two thirds essentially are vested to develop and they've had quite a bit of interest from the development community for this size zoning. I mean they can't zone enough land, because of the citizen concern and, but they feel that I guess in the development community they feel this is a marketable housing type and there is demand for it. Chair Martinez: And with the exception of Renton it is not specifically identified as a transition area. Is that correct? Ms. Shull: Right. They designated it be adjacent to a higher density. Chair Martinez: But only in Renton. Ms. Shull: Only in Renton, yes. Chair Martinez: Not in any other jurisdictions. Ms. Shull: Right. And in fact we have proposed language in our proposal that states it as being used for a transition district so that it wouldn't be surrounded by just lower density but it would be as a transition between higher density and lower density residential zoning districts. And basically what we'd like to do is recommend that you do adopt the amendment to the zoning code to create the R1-5 and we did make one small change, we recommend a change in the allowable maximum building height that it be reduced from the 35 feet to 30 feet and that's to recognize what we found looking at neighboring jurisdictions most had 30 feet as their height requirement I think a couple had 25 and also the fact that with the smaller lot size that the height of the home should really be held down a little bit more just to keep it in scale with the reduced size of the lot. 9 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Stoner: Janet, does that fit the, would 30 feet fit the ones that we've seen today on the video tape? Ms. Shull: Yes. I believe so, I'd need to look and see what the County, these were all in incorporated King County, so whatever King County's requirements are. Commissioner Greenstreet: I noticed Redmond on their depth and width have a building restriction of 60 feet? Ms. Shull• Yes. Commissioner Greenstreet: What exactly would that give on your design on lots, or what are they trying to keep with that plan. Ms. Shull: Yea. Let's see. I think what they're trying to do there is they're trying to just, I think they're trying to be less restrictive, but ensure that they have, what they're essentially saying is there's a minimum lot width of 60 feet and a minimum lot depth of 60 feet. But you still have to meet the, is it 6, 000 in Redmond or 5, 000? Commissioner Greenstreet: Six. Ms. Shull: So essentially you'd have a 60 x 100 or 100 x 60 but you'd have to have a minimum, if you had your house and could draw a circle around it that circle would have to be 60 feet in diameter. Does that? So if you could take the center of the house and draw, take a little compass and draw a 60 foot circle around it, so they're saying, essentially a minimum 60 foot width and 60 foot depth to the lot. Commissioner Greenstreet: And the amendment that you're proposing has what as. . . (unclear) . . .of a size of the structure. Ms. Shull: A 50 foot width, I 've got to find, copy here. . . (pause) Okay, it's on page 10 of the East Hill report, so the minimum width is 50 feet and the maximum site coverage is 40%, that's slightly higher than what we allow on the, under the other single family zoning designations, the set back requirements are front yard 20 feet, side yards 5 feet, rear yard 8 feet and 15 feet on a side yard, that would be on a corner property and these are the same set back requirements for all single family zoning currently in the city. And in the height limitation is the one that we're recommending a change from 35 feet to 30 feet and that was the change that we recommended after reviewing these neighboring jurisdictions requirements and also going out and seeing what had been built. 10 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Forner: Why wouldn't you put a minimum and maximum area that could be serviced by the R1-5, (unclear) . Ms. Shull: Right. If that's something that you're interested in if that could make it or break it for you I guess, I mean that's something we could consider, we've considered looking into that. In the short period of time we were given to come up with our recommendations we don't know where Renton got these minimum and maximums from and whether that we could adopt those for the City of Kent or whether we'd need to look at, you know we probably need to look a little more in depth into it since that's the only example we found, we didn't feel comfortable making a specific recommendation for that. If that's something you'd like us to look into, we'd be open to it. Commissioner Forner: I 'm very interested in it, not for the City of Kent with it's present boundaries, but if we start annexing out 232nd, there are an awful lot of huge big plots of land out there, I live next to a 60 acre and a 40 acre, and I don't think I 'd like to see 60 acres of 5, 000 square foot lots, so I think that in the present configuration there probably isn't that many large pieces available in the City of Kent. Ms. Shull: No, there aren't. Commissioner Forner: But, if we look at, the future plans of Kent there is an awful lot of land out beyond the City limits right now that may fall into this category, so yes, I 'm very interested in the maximum and the minimum allowable, and I don't know about the rest of the Commissioners, but that was one of my concerns when we first looked at this was how much are we going to allow in a specific area. And I realize I 'd like to get through it, but that is a concern of mine. And I ask the other Commissioners to give their comments on it. Commissioner Stoner: I guess I would ask if the purpose statement that you have here about providing increased single family residential densities as a transition might in the context that we're currently working in on East Hill if that isn't going to limit the size of those parcels. Ms. Shull: I 'm sorry, I didn't quite understand your question. Commissioner Stoner: Do we have any significant large parcels lying adjacent to, that would serve as a buffer area between more intensely developed uses, I mean if we're saying that this 5, 000 square foot lot can only go as a transition between more intensive 11 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 and less intensive residential uses, do we have any large parcels like that? Ms. Shull: We don't have any large parcels, the largest parcels, Lauri could probably give you a better idea since she's the planner working on the East Hill, but I don't think there's anything larger than four or five acres. I still don't know if I understand the question. Ms. Anderson: This is Lauri Anderson with the Planning Department. I might just respond to that, inside the City we are proposing the R1-5 in our site specific recommendation only on one area which is about eight acres in size. We don't have that many very large pieces on the East Hill and none that we're proposing the R1-5 for in the site specific recommendation. In terms of using the guidelines for the R1-5 in annexation areas if that is what you're getting to, at the time of annexation zoning the zoning for the whole area would be applied and certainly we would look at the R1- 5 in terms of a transition area but we're also going to look at surrounding uses as we get out toward the eastern border the eastern boundary of Kent we have a fairly low density development out there, there are some commercial nodes further out in the County and I would think that at the time of zoning if it were appropriate we would look at the R1-5 but I certainly, if we're looking at it as a transition use I certainly wouldn't see us zoning all the way to 132nd in the R1-5, I mean they're, that wouldn't fit the criteria of a transition use any more than we would zone from the east boundary to 132nd in the multi family zoning category we tend, and the new housing element of the comprehensive plan, tends to center the multi family around commercial nodes or transportation quarters in a similar way the R1-5 is a transition between a high density use and a lower density single family would be restricted in that way. Did that help at all or confuse the issue. Chair Martinez: Tom Sharp wants to speak on this. Does the staff, oh yes I 'm sorry Greg. Commissioner Greenstreet: I have a question. Do we know how long Issaquah and Redmond have had the lot size of 6, 000 feet close to communities, is this new for them, have they had it for 10 years? Ms. Shull: I 'm not sure how long they've had that. I think King County's had theirs since the early 80 's, and I don't think any jurisdictions had theirs for too long because we haven't, most of the examples we've found have been in King County, in unincorporated King County. I don't know if any of the other planners know how long, we didn't ask them how long they'd had 12 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 them, we just asked them for their development standards and asked them what they had that we could come and look at and basically everything we were told was in the county even when we asked other jurisdictions, they directed us to these places in the county. Commissioner Greenstreet: When the amendment by staff was proposed how did you come up with 5, 0000 as opposed to 6,000 when you decided to go down. If Redmond and Issaquah have went to 6, 000 what made you follow suit to even go smaller. Ms. Anderson: Janet was not here when we were making these, she's in a tough spot, she wasn't even involved in the housing study at the time. I 'll try to respond to that, this is Lauri Anderson again. We chose the 5,000 I think because of the nature of this task. Our situation was to look at an alternative to a multi family zoning which is a very dense zoning and so in an effort to address concerns about removing density in various areas, we were looking at some way to achieve our housing goals increasing single family and yet retaining some density in areas that it was appropriate for people who might be faced with a zoning change under the 20% reduction requirement and for that reason I think we went to the 5, 000. There was no strong reason for going to the 5, 000 or the 6, 000 except we were looking at density. Commissioner Greenstreet: Okay. Chair Martinez: Any other questions? Anything else to say? Ms. Shull: No. There are two issues that I didn't cover that I 'd planned to cover I just remembered, there were other requests you had looking at open space requirements I believe and also there's been a lot of concern about design standards for these smaller lot homes. As you can tell, we didn't find any requirements for open space or design standards. It's not to say these things aren't important, but we currently in the City of Kent do not have open space or at least we don't have a useable open space or children's play space type requirement for single family or even multi family. It's not to say this isn't important, in fact it probably is important it is in the updated housing element there's language to the importance of this, if this is an issue, I think the Planning Department recommends that you look at this in a comprehensive manner, look at this for all single family or at least the higher density single family zoning and also for multi family that we wouldn't want to attach that requirement specifically to one single family zoning designation that it is probably equally important to multi family and perhaps R1-7.2 even maybe R1-9. 6 zoning as well. And that's the similar case with design standards, we don't currently regulate the design of single family homes and the 13 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 standards we have for multi family are basically dealing with bulk and scale landscaping and buffering, we don't get into requiring a certain quality of material or we don't for instance require brick on 20% of the facade or those type of things that we normally think of as better quality and it's not to say these things again aren't important but to tack them on just to one zoning designation would be unfair and it needs to be looked at more comprehensively so for that reason we didn't propose any additional standards for the R1-5 and those are the two other things I did want to cover this evening, other than that if you don't have any more questions I think I 'm. . Commissioner Ward: Did you find in the examples of the one 5, 000 lots that whereas the design standards weren't of the higher caliber as you showed in the slides here? Did you find any? Ms. Shull: We didn't find any it's not to say they don't exist but when we asked people where we could find the R1-5 or the smaller lot single family developments, these were the places we were directed to, it's not to say that there could be some older developments, I 'm sure we could challenge people in the audience to go and find something for us that isn't as nice as what we've seen tonight but if we're looking to the future in what's going to be built these are the types of homes that are being built on small lots, they're similar to the homes being built on larger lots, I think you will find these homes sell, these homes are selling for $150, 000 new home construction in King County is going for $180, 000 so they are slightly less, they are slightly more affordable but they're by no means affordable to probably the majority of the people, you know, middle income people. Commissioner Ward: So smaller lot size didn't generate a cheapy type of a house for the most part. Ms. Shull: No. I don't think, lot size really doesn't designate design quality, they're really independent issues. Commissioner Ward: It's the market. Ms. Shull: We can look at the Strawberry Lane again, we can bring that one up again we've determined those homes are on lots smaller than 5, 000, one of those lots is 11,000 square feet, most people agree they didn't like those homes, well we can't guarantee any kind of quality on any sized lot. They would hopefully be a little more affordable but new home construction just generally in this, unless you can go way farther out, maybe even outside of King County in this area, it's just, we're not finding "low income" single family new construction. 14 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Forner: Did I hear you right when you said you wanted to deal with open space that we should treat all high density, we should deal with that as an overall comprehensive plan other than doing it individually? Ms. Shull: Yes. It's the Planning Department's recommendation that if this is an important issue, and in fact it is addressed in the updated housing element that this should be looked at for single family and multi family development for future development, that it would be unfair to tack, now this is on the table right now, this R1-5 district so it's very easy to look at it and say wouldn't it be nice if we had open space requirements and indeed it probably would be but we need to look at it comprehensively, we need to look at all the children living in apartments for instance, and their open space requirements as well. So we recommend that if it is an issue it should be looked at citywide and comprehensively to all residential designations. Chair Martinez: Other questions? Okay, thank you. Ms. Shull: Thank you. Chair Martinez: Now we do have Mr. Sharp, oh, did you have something else you need to say? Ms. Shull: I 'm sorry. Lauri Anderson was going to talk a little bit about how the R1-5 specifically would be applied to the East Hill both on the site specific and the East Hill reduction alternatives. Ms. Anderson: This is Lauri Anderson with the Planning Department. The first thing I 'm going to do is hand out a couple of maps that I hope will make this easier, I 'm going to talk only about the R1- 5 on the East Hill and how, where the staff is proposing that it go and then if you have questions about that, so let me hand out these maps. The first one shows the only, the single R1-5 site under the site specific alternative, the other map shows the proposed R1-5 sites under the East Hill reduction option, which is the 100% multi family reduction on the East Hill. I'm going to start with the site specific recommendation, under this recommendation we're proposing that one area in the East Hill planning area be changed, rezoned to the multi family, pardon me, from multi family to the single family 5, 000 square foot lot size. This is area multi family 15 which in your East Hill report is on page EH-73 . This was a site that we went to on our tour of the area last week if you'll remember it's off 100th place, in other words if you go out Canyon Drive you would take a right on 100th 15 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 place and you go back in this small residential neighborhood that's already established, it's sort of sandwiched in between some multi family development and the commercial and office development to the east. We drove down to the end of that road, it dead ends down there, came back around, to the south of that neighborhood there's a large vacant parcel of land. So that the total development is about eight acres in size, maybe about half of that, I 'm sorry 6.71 acres in size about 4 acres of that in the vacant parcel. That's the area we're proposing as I said for the R1-5. We choose that zoning designation and chose this as sort of a trial area for that designation in an effort to protect the existing single family, which is in an area that typically we don't see single family, it's as I said between the multi family and the commercial and so we felt by putting the R1-1 in this area we would protect what was already there and provide an opportunity for some new single family housing. So that's the only site under the site specific that we're recommending the R1-5. Do you have questions on that or I 'll, yes. Commissioner Forner: There were apartments close to the west of so that it really doesn't stick to the criteria as a transition zone (unclear) . Ms. Anderson: Right. And adjacent to sort of a higher density type of a use. Did you? Chair Martinez: I just wanted to interject for the public that's listening it was announced at our last meeting and we did in fact go on a tour of some of, of most of the areas that are included in the East Hill study of most of the Planning Commissioners went and a map is available for anyone who's interested in the sites that we, in our route as we took it so that's just to enter that into the record. And we'll be talking about it and refreshing our memory as we go. Ms. Anderson: Okay. The next option that I'm going to talk about, again this is one of the four alternatives we had the no action alternative, the 20% text reduction, the East Hill reduction option and then the site specific reduction option. This is the 100% East Hill reduction option, and you can see there are 13 sites and in your map they're highlighted in yellow, but these are the 13 sites under the 100% East Hill reduction that we would recommend for the R1-5. The rationale for that is that under this reduction option we would be removing all multi family zoning. Many of the parcels that we would be removing this multi family zoning from are completely surrounded by multi family zoning, in fact all of them are at some point contiguous to multi family zoning. Many of them surrounded on three sides by multi family or by multi family and 16 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 some sort of commercial or office zoning. For that reason if, in these cases we had under the site specific option recommended probably a lower density multi family. We had felt that it was an appropriate area for a lower density multi family. If we did not want multi family of any sort we felt that a low density, I 'm sorry, a high density single family the 5, 000 square foot lot single family would be more appropriate, since these were typically areas that could accommodate the higher density. I 'm willing to go through these site by site if that would prove helpful, on the other hand I don't want to go through 13 if you don't want me to. Chair Martinez: I have some questions, one of them is that as we go through from time to time on the site specific we get more, actually more housing units with the R1-5 than we do with the recommended multi family, is that not the case? Ms. Anderson: Are you talking about the East Hill reduction or the site specific. Chair Martinez: The East Hill. Ms. Anderson: Okay. If you go to the East Hill reduction and if you want to turn to your matrix which is page 18 of the East Hill report, we can look up here at a couple of typical ones, multi family 3, as you can see is one of the ones, it's currently zoned medium density multifamily if you'll follow that across under the site specific we were recommending a garden density which would have resulted in 107 multi family units. If you' ll then go over to the far right hand column, that's an area where we were recommending R1-5 and it would result in approximately 54 single family units, so in that case no, in that case the multi family option would result in far more units than would the R1-5 option. Now let me look down here and see if I can find one. Chair Martinez: I think I misread this when I was going through it, I don't see what I saw before. Ms. Anderson: Okay. If we had a case where there was for example a duplex zoning, there still should be a reduction that, the duplex zoning is about 10 dwelling units per acre, the R1-5 is about 8 dwelling units per acre so on every case there should be a reduction although the duplex and the R1-5 are very close. Commissioner Stoner: Lauri, much as I hate to do it to you, I am going to ask you to go through these and take a look at them site by site for all R1-5 zoning. Ms. Anderson: Okay. 17 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Greenstreet: Can I add to this, to go through site by site, I just have a question of why it should be 5, 000 and not 6,000, why would we have 40% lot coverage and not 35% lot coverage, why is it better for us to have the type of land, front side and rear, instead of a 60 foot circle, I see the different criteria different cities have and the numbers that we have before us, why are they better for this pattern of lots, better than taking, maybe we see better from Redmond and something from Renton, can you see what I 'm asking? Ms. Anderson: Yes. I 'm going to let Fred respond to that. Mr. Satterstrom: Fred Satterstrom again for the record. The answer to that question is quite simple, I think that the Planning Staff felt that 5, 000 square feet, a square foot lot laid out with the development standards that we recommended here for the R1-5 zone would provide a reasonable building site, would provide the necessary set backs from, particularly the front yard and also allowing a substantial rear yard that is consistent with the other single family zones that we have in the zoning code. We feel, staff feels, that a 5, 000 square foot lot will provide an adequate, more than adequate building site for single family homes. Whether or not you wish to go for 6, 000 or 6, 500 or 6, 100 square feet is completely up to the Planning Commission. We feel as low as 5, 000 square feet is a reasonable lot size. Chair Martinez: If we had 6, 000 square feet, how many units would go on an acre, I 'm a little weak there. Mr. Satterstrom: On what size, six? Chair Martinez: 6, 000 as opposed to 5, 000. Mr. Satterstrom: Well, there's 43 , speaking from gross terms, 43,560 square feet, so roughly seven units. Commissioner Stoner: At best. Mr. Satterstrom: At best, right because you've got roads and so forth that, easements that would be, that would come off that. So gross unit density of seven. Commissioner Greenstreet: And then the 40% site coverage, that Redmond and Issaquah at 35%? Why did we pick 40%? Is there a type of house, a rambler as opposed to a split level or why did we pick 40% site coverage for the building, and they have 35%? 18 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Ms. Satterstrom: I think if you look around you'll find that the site coverage probably differs from all of the ordinances. I think that 35% is what we have now in the 7,200, I think we have 35% site coverage in our existing 7, 200 square foot lot, which is obviously 2,200 square feet larger than the 5, 000 square foot lot. We felt some additional site coverage would be advisable, given the fact that you have a smaller lot to begin with, in order to get a substantial home on there, you're going to need a larger amount of site coverage. If we put a smaller site coverage figure on there, then we'd end up, theoretically, with smaller homes. Although that doesn't hold true if you've got two story designs. Commissioner Greenstreet: Yea, I didn't know if you were trying for ramblers or split level homes or what the. . . (unclear) . Mr. Satterstrom: I really think we're trying for a variety, and with the 40 foot, or with the 40% we may end up with a variety. We're not trying to discourage the one story homes, older people prefer, heck I prefer, I 'm 40 years old, I prefer a rambler design and we're finding that I think Janet mentioned that the R1-5 zone is attractive for older persons without children. I'm an older person with children. Chair Martinez: Are there any other questions? Ms. Anderson: Do you want me to go through the sites? Chair Martinez: Yes. Is that the feeling of the rest of the Commission that you would like to go through each one of the 13 sites? One, two, (unclear) . Commissioner Forner: I think we have to establish whether we want, if each site does fall under the criteria of the recommendations of the R1-5, then I don't really want to go through all of them, what we have to establish is whether we are going to accomplish that goal, whether we want to hit East Hill that hard. I think we need to establish that, I think I know what you're doing with the R1-5 now, and I feel comfortable within the guidelines that you've specified, within the existing city limits, I'm not really sure what's going to happen when we go beyond that. Commissioner Greenstreet: For right now, it would be probably good to just get a feel from the Commission. Chair Martinez: Yes. I would like to know, how many people would like to go through site by site on the R1-5. 19 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Greenstreet: I 'll go through each site of the Commission is considering the R-5. I need to find out, that's what I need to find out, I mean why go through each site if we're not even going to consider it. Chair Martinez: Because we still have someone who wants to testify about it. I think we need to take the testimony first and then decide. So we may ask you back Lauri. Ms. Anderson: Right. Fine. Mr. Sharp: Thank you Madam Chairman. My name is Tom Sharp and my address is in the record for this evening. I had read your minutes of your meeting for September 18th and one of the things that hit me loud and clear was, my gosh these people aren't talking about lot size, they're talking about design considerations. And I think in almost every instance where you had adverse testimony concerning small lots, your concern was what those people do with those lots and it came right down to a design consideration. And the reason that I 'm here is because I want to, for one thing I have no lots, believe me, I have no lots in the 5,000 square foot range. Or 6, 000 or anything that I 'm even contemplating. So I don't have any ax to grind, except that I'm a firm believer in lots that meet the market and one of the things that we're seeing, I guess you all drove through a development that I 'm involved in up on East Hill and it's not Strawberry Lane it's called Eagle Lane, and it's South 240th Place and that's duplexes and it's 8 duplexes, 16 units of which 10 of them are sold and the highest price is about $180, 000 and the lowest price is right now $142,000 was the last one that was sold. So the issue is, that is a small lot, it's not affordable housing. Affordable housing as Mr. Ward had stated and small lots are not necessarily the same thing. The lots right now in that particular development is driven by the market, is driven by the availability of land. And the reason that those have sold out is because people want to live in Kent, they want to live on the East Hill. Almost to the person I can think of one, and I 'm giving you an example, there is of the ones that are sold the one particular unit is sold to a lady that has one child. All the rest of them are what we call the out-of-nester market and they want the small lot, they want the high quality development. They don't want the large lots and most of these people could afford large lots, but they don't want it, but they want the quality and they want to be in town, they want to be near transportation and they want to be in the City of Kent. I think that we have to forget our personal prejudices of what happened way back when, out east of Kent when they first, back 20 years ago when we had small lots that were developed and I think we all think that way, gee, is this 20 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 going to happen again. I can't say 100% but I would say that with the cost of land and the cost of building that you're not going to have that. You have a market driven thing and our personal prejudices I think, we just have to forget those and look at some of the examples the staff has given you. They're fine examples and I 'd be proud to even build some of those houses. One of the other areas that I'd like to discuss and one of the things that hasn't been discussed and maybe you handle it through a special study area or something is infill lots. A 5,000 square foot lot gives you the ability to infill lots in the City of Kent that are non conforming and Mr. Harris and I had talked about that and I don't know whether you handle it in this case or whether you handle it later, but a 5, 000 square foot lot allows you to do that. 5,000 square feet is just a little bit over the size of those duplex lots that we're building on, I think they're 8,400 or 8, 000 or something like that, I forget, but maybe they're 8,800, I forget, but anyway those lots have 40% coverage not including the private street. The private street is on the lot. So you can see there's plenty of landscaping around them, they have a 5 foot set back on either side, most of the rear yards are 15 to 20 feet and I think the front yards run somewhere around 20 feet, 22 feet it depends on the design of the particular building. And they're 80 feet wide and each one of the units is about 40 feet so there's an example right in the City of Kent where we basically have something that is very close to what the staff is proposing, 5, 000 square feet and you may or may not like the development, that's up to you, but, and it looks like a construction site and it's kind of messy I understand and all that, but I 'm glad that you got up to look at it and the 5, 000 square foot lot I think is a minimum size, I think it allows a developer or a person, it doesn't have to be the bad name of a developer but just an individual to infill, to build a house on non conforming lot in the City of Kent. In terms of the maximums and the minimums, if you had a minimum then you couldn't have infill lots. If you had a maximum, maybe you'd prevent a hillside from, a hillside that's developable in some way, in some ways unesthetic and that the Planning Commission would see there could be a development, maybe you could prevent that from being a development because it would be over the maximum size in terms of the total square footage and I would urge you to go along with the staff's recommendation and I wholeheartedly support it and I wish you would look at the infill lots in the City of Kent also. Chair Martinez: Are there questions? Commissioner Forner: I just have a comment. You mentioned, at least my criteria was never affordability when I was considering the 5, 000 square foot lots, that was not one of our considerations. 21 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Mr. Sharp: Because one of the things that I think people started talking about when we start talking about the rezone on the East Hill was either or. Either you had multiple family or you had 5, 000 square foot lots and boy I don't see that. I see it as infill, I see it as buffer, as a buffering somewhat like MRG and duplex, but I do not see this thing as being sold as an alternative to multiple family housing or as affordable housing. We could have gone up there and done exactly the same thing. We could have put cheap siding, cheap roof, no brick, no condominium association which controls, very strict controls. We could have done all those things and the place would have looked totally different. Absolutely totally. But it's the market that drives it. I just hope that the market stays good enough that we don't get shabby developments because we all have examples of one. Commissioner Stoner: Could you tell me what the square footage of your duplex units are? Mr. Sharp: They're 2,400, the smallest is 1,850 and the largest is 2, 470. Commissioner Stoner: Okay, so they're very similar really to the kind of examples we saw in the video tonight. Okay. Mr. Sharp: Right. The only difference is, and these could be built as houses, the only difference is that they have a common wall. Chair Martinez: Just as a matter of interest, at our last hearing there was a number of people that talked about duplex as a failed zoning. Would you have any observations to make on that? Mr. Sharp: Well, I don't know, maybe you could talk to the ten people that have bought these and put out good money. No, I don't think it's a failed zoning at all, I think one of the things is we don't have enough of it or enough people that want to work with it. It's not the easiest thing in the world to work with. And it took my partner quite a, not my partner on that project, but another project, quite a bit of time to work through that and as you see, there's a private road there. The private road does not permit parking on the road by the residents, they have to park in the garage, they can't even park in their driveway except, at certain times, and if you want to have a quality development, you have to control it. You can't just throw it open to the wind, we could have sold those as duplex lots, we could have sold them as each individual building instead of a condominium where each unit is sold. And turn it open to investors and in two years down the road it would have looked like, not very nice. It's not a failed. 22 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Forner: I don't mean to put you on the spot, but I 'd like to pick your brain. . . (unclear) . Mr. Sharp• Sure, go right ahead. Commissioner Forner: Being a developer, one of my concerns when we're going through this whole process and the reason we're going through it is to try and reduce the number of multi family because of the stress. . . Mr. Sharp: That's not music to my ears, pardon me. Commissioner Forner: . . .stress in the infra structure and the traffic and there's another phase to it and that's provide a better balance between single family and multifamily and when we reduce the number of multi families, say we went to the East Hill reduction, you had mentioned affordable houses as far as what I can see, it's actually going to, when we put the single family housing even if they are on 5, 000 square foot lots that it's actually going to increase the value of the property and the property in the whole area, so it's not going to make it more affordable it's going to make it more expensive. . . (unclear) . Mr. Sharp: Exactly. Commissioner Forner: So we'll have to provide affordable housing in some other way, we're going to have to find affordable housing this zoning is not going to have anything to do with affordable housing, in fact it'll increase the value of land. Mr. Sharp: It will increase costs. In the short term it will probably decrease the value of apartment property, because right now it's based on a per unit price in the short term. In the long term, the land is going to continue to sky rocket in the City of Kent, and also the cost of housing, the largest single increase in the cost of housing is the price of land and the development of the land and the increase of apartment the increased cost of apartments because of the non availability. And you may say well that's crazy, we aren't going to see that, but that's, it's going to happen and but one thing that I think that responsible people can do is take a look at what's been done and what's being done in terms of small lots and say gee, you know this is an alternative to the large lot and this is an alternative to the large single family home on 5 acres which we'd all love to have and this does give everybody the American dream of a single family home, it's just on a smaller lot and that's what a lot of people want. I mean I 'd love to have one except I couldn't put my greenhouse there and I couldn't put my garden, I couldn't do those kinds of things. 23 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Forner: And I don't feel it's our responsibility to control the market but I have that feeling that that's what's going to happen, and I just wanted your opinion on it. Mr. Sharp: Yea. It's going to drive it up, and that's just my opinion. . Commissioner Forner: Thank you. Commissioner Ward: You mentioned one thing that we haven't dwelled upon very strongly, the fact that you said that the R1 5, 000 would cause a lot of non conforming lots to be built out. In other words, these are smaller lots, which are smallest conforming lot size. Mr. Sharp: Right now they would not conform to our current zoning. Commissioner Ward: Right, and therefore we would in essence increase the single family dwellings being built out, right. Which I think is a very positive thing, I think perhaps should be strongly emphasized. You also mentioned another term which I wasn't familiar with is something about land fill or some kind of. . Mr. Sharp: Infill. Commissioner Ward: Infill. Is that the same as land fill or what is it. Mr. Sharp: No no. Infill development is where you have parcels of land that have not been built on as the and that has not kept up with the general development of the area. There's some areas in Northpark, Southpark, Scenic Hill there are lots, some of them are non conforming some of them are conforming to the current zoning code but they just haven't been built on for some reason or another and I think that Mr. Harris could probably name all of those for you but, I don't know but. Commissioner Ward: And I think that's some information I would need further from staff is to, as to how many non conforming, presently non conforming lot sizes could be built up of the R1 5,000 went through which would in essence increase single family dwellings, which would increase, would in essence be a back door approach to reduction of multi family and. . . Mr. Sharp: I 'm not suggesting it for that reason, I mean that's another hat I 'll put on. 24 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Ward: Only in the sense that it would allow additional single family units to be built on presently non conforming lots which is. . . Mr. Harris: Not the way that we're approaching the R1-5. If you were going to go into Scenic Hill or some other neighborhood and identify the lots that this person owns and there's a legal lot line there and because the person owns this lot and this lot, this lot's 5, 000 square feet and this lot's 5,000 square feet, today we don't allow that person to build on this 5,000 square foot lot because he owns both of them and so it's one big lot. We would have to do something else that we're doing this evening, we would have to go in and identify those lots and propose a different change which would be to take that restriction off those kinds of lots and say that those lots now where the person owns both legal lots and cannot build on both of them today, can only build on them as one lot, we would take that restriction off that's the only way we could do the infill. What we're proposing here is raw land R1-5. Commissioner Ward: Okay, but it wouldn't apply to present non conforming lot sizes. Mr. Harris: No, that's something that could be entertained and could be looked at and what we did about fifteen years ago was go the other way, and decide that, we decided as a city that we were going to the R1-7 and so when we spotted these kinds of lots well, in fact we just made a flat statement to the zoning code that those kinds of lots are not legal lots if, unless they're owned by two different individuals. But most of them aren't. You'll find almost all of those lots are owned by one individual. They've got the lot one and lot two but the person owns both of those. Chair Martinez: But, we actually amend the zoning code to allow for R1-5, does that not allow us to, someone to come in and ask on a conditional use permit to do some of those sorts of things that you just outlined? Mr. Harris: I don't think so, maybe they can go into it a little further. I think you'd have to unravel what we've already got in the zoning code which says those lots are not legal. Chair Martinez: Okay, thank you. Mr. Sharp: I just threw that out as a red herring. Commissioner Martinez: Well, we managed anyway. 25 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Mr. Clifton: Stephen Clifton, Kent Planning Department. Could you re-state your question? Chair Martinez: If we amend the zoning code, as it's proposed here, with or without the language about transition zone, but if we just amend it to create an R1-5, that's now on the books, then if I had a 5, 000 or 6,000 piece of property in a 7.2 zoned area, might I not come in and ask for a conditional use permit or something to make, to ask to be allowed to build on that. Mr. Clifton: Actually, it'd be a rezone application process and anyone could come in and apply for that, however in any rezone application process, you do have to, we do have to create a staff report, we make a recommendation and the Hearing Examiner makes a decision on it then in a rezone application it also has to go to the Council. So it would go through a pretty thorough review in order to do that. Chair Martinez: And do you believe that by us amending the zone, I know that the Hearing Examiner has to take all that sort of thing into consideration, so does the Council, about what we meant to do when we changed the language, do you think that would be taken into consideration. Mr. Clifton: Oh absolutely. And also in a rezone application we do look at the goals and policies of the housing element in the comp plan and then we use those to back up our recommendations so we would look at that and also, those are subject to also public testimony as well, because it's a public hearing process. Mr. Harris: Let me caution you though, knowing human nature if you did that and my neighbor who is perhaps, my neighbor doesn't have a lot like that, but let's say my neighbor has a little, two little lots like that, he's got a house here, or she's got a house here and this nice little vacant piece of land next door, and applied for 5,000 square foot lots, R1-5, this room would be so full of neighbors so mad at the Hearing Examiner that, I mean it would be, I think that would be almost unfair to do that. I think what we've got to look at is what we're looking at this evening and not for somebody on Scenic Hill to go for a spot zone of 5, 000 square feet on a 50 foot wide by 100 foot long lot. If we want to remedy that situation and that may be something you want to remedy, I think 15 years ago we were going the other way, we wanted everybody to have nice big fat 7,200 square foot lots or 8, 000 square foot lots, whatever, if you want to remedy the number of lots on Vandevanter Chicago Street in that neighborhood that I 'm familiar with or on lower East Hill then you'd have to go in and do something else to the zoning code and say that lot that this person legally owns here 26 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 which we will now let that person build on if it's 5,000 square feet they can now build on that lot, period. Commissioner Ward: To be a separate issue. Mr. Harris: To be a separate issue. Otherwise you'd have little spot zones where people would be trying to get a 5,000 square foot zoning district on one lot and that would just infuriate the neighbors. Mr. Clifton: Any other clarification? Chair Martinez: No thank you. Yes. Commissioner Forner: I have a question. If we adopt this, this applies to the West Hill, Valley Floor and East Hill? Ms. Anderson: If you were to, did you want me to? This is Lauri Anderson, Kent Planning Department. If you were to create the R1- 5 zoning district that would be a city wide action. The application of that zoning, in other words actually putting places of R1-5 on the ground is a separate issue and is handled through the area study so you would work up a map for East Hill and then work on that for Valley Floor separately. So creating the zoning district is a different issue from actually creating a spot where that zoning applies. Did that help at all? Chair Martinez: Once we've created it, it's created. Commissioner Forner: Yea, right, that's my concern. Chair Martinez: Where it's applied. Commissioner Forner: Then we can deal with that. Commissioner Ward: On an individual section basis. Chair Martinez: We don't have commercial everywhere just because we have commercial zones. Commissioner Forner: I agree to adopt a 5, 000 square foot lot with the additional recommendations from the Planning Department. Chair Martinez: Is there a second? Commissioner Stoner: I would second that, and I guess I would like to suggest a (unclear) of 15, 000 square foot minimum. The Renton 27 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 minimum of 15, 000 square feet. The minimum area in which you can apply the 5, 000 square foot lot. Commissioner Greenstreet: A minimum of 3 lots. Commissioner Forner: Oh, a minimum of three lots. That's acceptable. Chair Martinez: Is that acceptable to the seconder? Commissioner Stoner: I am the seconder. Chair Martinez: Oh you are the seconder, I 'm sorry. Commissioner Forner: That would eliminate your spot (unclear) because you have to have a big lot before you (unclear) again and they may have to, that would eliminate that, that would take care of that. Commissioner Ward: I don't know whether that's right. Chair Martinez: So is that acceptable to you? Well we are open to discussion now, we have a second. Commissioner Stoner: And I would speak to my addition, I think it's not inappropriate to use the 15, 000 square foot minimum to get around the issue that (unclear) of having just one small lot in an otherwise uniform neighborhood. You'd have to have at least a community of three houses that fit that zoning type and I don't think that's inappropriate. Chair Martinez: Other discussion? Commissioner Greenstreet: You went for the Renton minimum (unclear) add the Renton maximum. Commissioner Forner: Well that (unclear) because there are no lots within the. . . (unclear) . Commissioner Greenstreet: In all of Kent or all the zoning to cover the whole city for all annexations you'll never have (unclear) . Commissioner Forner: That's what they say. Eight acres is the biggest they have under that zoning. Commissioner Stoner: I think you can add a maximum to it but I sort of felt the maximum was addressed in the issue of location, 28 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 the fact that it was going to be transitional but I 'm not adverse if people feel that they feel that they need to have a maximum. Chair Martinez: I don't feel a compulsion to have the maximum as long as we have, I think the language is very clear that it is transitional and that that's the way it's to be applied. I don't envision that anyone would ever try for 100 acres as a transitional area without being turned down immediately by the Planning Department. Commissioner Forner: Well, there are 40 acre lots up there, 40 acres is a lot of little houses. Chair Martinez: But would you imagine that the Planning Department would see that as transitional? Commissioner Forner: Perhaps not between high density but maybe single density and rural, I mean that's a transitional area between say high density single family and then rural areas as you get up toward the edge of the city limits. Commissioner Stoner: But you can't have a higher density transition and. . . Commissioner Forner: And a rural, you have to have a high density and then this and then a lower density, that would be. Chair Martinez: Not if you were going from singles you know, 9, 7.2 to 5 to rural, that wouldn't. . . Commissioner Stoner: That wouldn't be a transition. Chair Martinez: That wouldn't be a transition. It would be the other way around. Commissioner Greenstreet: The plan unit developments in that make sense to me I don't know if our Planning Staff will always be as responsible as it is now 10 years down the road. Commissioner Forner: And I have no problem putting a maximum on. commissioner Greenstreet: So I 'd just throw in the maximum and maybe it's just not even needed. Commissioner Stoner: We're conservative kinds of people. Commissioner Greenstreet: Yea, I 'm a conservative type of guy. I ' ll just go with the 8 just because. 29 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Chair Martinez: Are you making an amendment to the motion? Commissioner Greenstreet: Well I guess I was just discussing. And I would support the motion. . . (unclear) . Commissioner Ward: A maximum. Commissioner Greenstreet: Having a maximum included. Commissioner Ward: We might as well, we've got a minimum. Commissioner Forner: Shall I restate the motion? Chair Martinez: Oh, would you please? Commissioner Forner: I move we adopt the recommended 5,000 square foot lots which is the recommendation by the staff and a minimum of 1,500 square feet and a maximum of eight acres. Chair Martinez: Is there a second for that? Commissioner Stoner: I will second that. Chair Martinez: Now, is there further discussion of that motion? If not, all in favor. Voices: Aye. Chair Martinez: Opposed (silence) . Thank you. Okay that is, so we have approved the zoning code amendment. I would entertain a motion on what we want to do on East Hill. Commissioner Stoner: I will move, and I 'll move in several parts because I think this needs to be gone through. I would move that we adopt the East Hill reduction and then go into workshop session to amend any specific sites that we are concerned about and if you want, that would be my motion and that would be the direction that I would want to take to go through site by site and look at it and make sure that the East Hill reduction was what we wanted to do on all of those sites. If we wanted to modify them, we could do that. But I would think we'd want to do that in a workshop session where we could really go through them site by site and know. Commissioner Greenstreet: If that follows proper procedure, I 'll second that motion. Just because I 'm not sure if we can move to accept East Hill and then go to workshop and do a site specific, because the general picture. 30 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Stoner: And then come back and amend that, but what I was trying to provide was a general framework and I would like to work in the framework of East Hill reduction and then go back and say these are the kinds of adjustments we'd like to make to that this is a site that we don't, that we think we need to do something else with. Mr. Harris: Madam Chair, that's perfectly kosher to do that, the way that she's doing it. Chair Martinez: Okay, so there is a second, okay now, discussion? Commissioner Ward: I need clarification of the motion. There's a motion then for a 20% reduction or a site specific reduction or what? Voices: The East Hill. Commissioner Stoner: The motion is the East Hill reduction which would eliminate all multifamily zoned land that is not developed on East Hill. I am looking at the last column on page 18. And I guess if you want me to speak to that, I will, if there's an issue, but I think I guess my ultimate goal is to think about transferring some of that density to the Valley Floor. I know that there are some areas there that in which I have some concerns about applying this just blanket across the board, but I think this is the framework I 'd like to work into and under and that's why I 'm making this proposal. Commissioner Forner: I just have a question, we could have worked under the same premise going with the site specific and adjusting each site too, so you're saying what, you're just approaching it from the. . . Commissioner Stoner: From the radical end, yes. Commissioner Ward: That's why I radically object. Commissioner Faust: I'd like to speak against that and in favor of doing exactly the same thing but using the site specific plan. Commissioner Ward: I would second that motion. Chair Martinez: Wait, you can't we're in the middle of a motion, just a second. 31 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Faust: So, I would rather us use the site specific reduction that the City has labored long and hard on and then adjust and plug in, because frankly in my research and I spent a fair amount of time on it just this evening, I found myself a lot of the time in agreement with the site specific reductions, I have a few changes that I 'd like to make, but far fewer changes then I would, and comments that I would make if we used the East Hill reduction, so I 'd speak against using East Hill reduction as our basis. Chair Martinez: Is there further discussion on the motion to consider the East Hill reduction. Commissioner Forner: Call for the question. Chair Martinez: Okay, all in favor of the East Hill reduction as our discussion point, please signify by saying aye. Commissioner's Stoner and Greenstreet: Aye. Chair Martinez: Opposed? Commissioner's Faust, Ward and Forner: Nay. Chair Martinez: Okay that motion was defeated. Is there another motion that someone would care to make? Commissioner Faust: Yes, madam chair I move that we use the site specific reduction as our base and go from there into workshop session and make specific recommendations for changes within that as this group feels necessary. Commissioner Forner: Second. Chair Martinez: Okay, there is a second. Commissioner Ward: Could I offer a friendly amendment, in the sense that we go into workshop to look at the site specific based upon what we're supposed to be doing of trying to reduce that only by the 20%. Commissioner Greenstreet: No. Commissioner Faust: Would you elaborate? Chair Martinez: You want to put reins on us, is that what you're saying? 32 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Ward: The reins have all been made by. . (unclear) . Commissioner Stoner: I would speak to raise comment and that is that our charge is to reduce density 20% over the whole city, but I don't think it necessarily has to be equally across all the planning areas and I see a need to perhaps put more density on the Valley Floor for, and I will site you a specific example, the Soos Creek Plan has looked at what they are going to do with housing units in Soos Creek and when they model what they are projecting that they need to take to handle their fair share of growth, there is no capacity on any road that is in existence today. The only place you have any capacity and it's very small are in roads that don't exist. And I think that gets to part of what we're dealing with on East Hill and that's why I think we need to transfer some of that density down into the Valley because people can't get off East Hill now, and it looks like they're not going to be able to get off of East Hill real soon. Commissioner Forner: I agree with what you say and I 've sat on several transportation committees in the last 10 years and even though at present there is problems getting off of East Hill, but we have to look at the proposed transportation plan what we think of East Hill too, and we do have the 272nd corridor, we have the 288th coming off of Kent Kangley, we have the (unclear) of Kent Kangley so it's not like we are in a complete stalemate of east. west traffic coming off of the East Hill and depending on how fast East Hill builds up, I 'm not talking about beyond City Limits, I 'm talking about East Hill of Kent, I think we have to look at what transportation has proposed too, and I absolutely agree with you that I would like to concentrate more heavily on the Valley in the hopes that someday we might get light rail or some sort of transportation that would support and we absolutely do need in our zoning to support the transportation, otherwise it would be a burden on the taxpayer and I think that's responsible planning as you look at the transportation growth and promote that kind of zoning and I agree with you. Commissioner Stoner: But there is nothing in our zoning code that allows us to zone and yet delay in any kind of significant way the development of that zone until infrastructure is in place, I mean there are some techniques to work in that direction but we don't have any kind of clear policy of clear way of putting those restrictions on and I guess I would say that under those circumstances and the planning horizon for the Soos Creek plan is the year 2000, it's 10 years out and I 'm not sure given the funding situation that we have right now that we will have the kind of transportation network that we need to service the buildings we have now and the people we have now let alone to keep it even at 33 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 the level it is with the kind of growth that's projected for the year 2000. Commissioner Greenstreet: (Unclear) . . .hearing from developers that single family is a real hot item right now and part of phase II of our objectives is explore ways to encourage new family residential development, maintain existing single family residences, make single family housing play a major role in the City's housing mix so if we zone more RI 5,000 or 7.2 or whatever, we are meeting those objectives and the marketplace is asking for that and if we can change the flavor of the city with more single family I think it's a way to go, the county hopefully would follow suit if the market will, the market out there is asking for single family and multifamily both, I would prefer that it be single family. The single family is selling. *Tape Changed (Voices unclear) * Commissioner Stoner: My comments were directed to raise concern about limiting it to a 20% reduction because I really think we need to look at the fact that we may want to reduce more on East Hill to provide more opportunities in the Valley and get the 20% reduction overall. Commissioner Forner: I agree with that. Commissioner Ward: Can I respond? I feel as though one thing that hasn't been mentioned here in our plans of reductions and what have you is those people who've I 've heard appear before this group indicating their investment in properties for retirement and income and what have you for future years pay taxes to hopefully one of these days be able to develop that property to derive that income from it and we're considering reducing that possibility or eliminating it. That weighs pretty heavily with me, I am against a 20% reduction in the first place but it is quite simply the guide in which we have to go by. And that's why I made a recommendation to support the, to review it in workshop session but towards the end of the 20% reduction because that's what we're supposed to be doing. I quite agree that we should reduce more on East Hill as compared to the Valley Floor, I would like to see more multi family go in the Valley Floor, I think that's basically where it should be closer to the rail, closer to downtown and what have you but one point that we can't consider so far as traffic problems and litigation is concerned what the county does just outside the line and that same traffic is going to cause a clog up further and the transportation system so we go right back to square one. So I would like for this group to consider that major factor because, believe me, then I will certainly try to give it consideration 34 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 those people saying, I purchased this land some years ago, I purchased it for a reason it was zoned multi family then, I paid taxes on it all these years as being multi family and I don't think you should take away that. So that's it. Commissioner Forner: Do you feel that it is our responsibility to, in our planning, to assure. Commissioner Ward: Concerned people, yes. Commissioner Forner: No, I'm not saying concerned people, but I understand we can't offer them a (unclear) but that we have to assure people will make a profit on their land? Commissioner Ward: No, I don't think, I 'm business oriented and therefore my indications would be strongest in this given line, but the net result and the fact that you mentioned earlier about, when we were talking about 1 to 5, 000 that there's a parcel of land about 40 acres that was nearby to you that you didn't want to see become 1 to 5, 000. Well, these people obviously had a plain intent when they invested in that property some years ago, the taxing structure didn't give them any allowance for the fact that one of these days some group would come along and take that away from them, or change it or modify it or whatever the case might be. They pay taxes on it, they pay taxes based upon that so called right which for that given zoning or designation. And I don't know, it doesn't set very well with me when I 'm placed in a position of deciding upon something that will more than say for an example in some cases it's completely changing from multi family all together. Chair Martinez: Okay. We have a motion on the floor, the motion is to, oh sorry, Tracy. Commissioner Faust: That's Okay, I was just going to call for the question. Chair Martinez: Oh, Okay fine. And the motion is to accept the site specific reduction and then go into workshop and look at sites that we wish to withdraw or change in some way. Okay, all in favor? Voices: Aye. Chair Martinez: Opposed? (silence) Motion carries. We will now go into workshop session and let's have a 10 minute break. And then we'll come back and discuss the site specific concerns that the panel has. We'll attempt to finish at 10:00. 35 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 **Break and Workshop** Chair Martinez: We will go back into our regular hearing procedures and I will entertain a motion. Commissioner Stoner: I would take, move that EH1, 21 31 4, 5, 6, 70 8, 9 and 10. Voices: Not 10. Commissioner Stoner: Excuse me, to 9, 11. Voices: Not 11. Commissioner Stoner: 91 12. Voices: Nope, yes we had a consensus on 12 . . . (voices unclear) . Commissioner Stoner: 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 and 20 be adopted per our consensus and I ' ll go through and give you the zones that I have but I trust you. Commissioner Faust: Second. Chair Martinez: Is there further discussion on the motion. Question. All in favor Voices: Aye. Chair Martinez: opposed (silence) . Voice: Who seconded that? Chair Martinez: Tracy. Voice: Oh, that's right. Twelve. . . (unclear) . Chair Martinez: The motion has carried. I would propose, I mean I would entertain a motion to continue this hearing until, yes sir. Mr. Satterstrom: For the record, the record doesn't know what the consensus is so I do think you do need to go back and go over those sites. Chair Martinez: Alright, fine. Commissioner Stoner: To clarify my motion, EH1 is MRD. 36 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Greenstreet: No. Voice: Yes. Commissioner Greenstreet: It is 7.2 on number 1. Voices: Its MRG on number I. . . (unclear) . Voice: MRD. Voice• MRG. Commissioner Greenstreet: No. 1 was 7.2 . Voice: Are you talking about MF1. You said there was no discussion on it. Voice• It was MRD. Voice: You left it alone. What do you guys have? (Voices unclear) Commissioner Greenstreet: Maybe it was. . .You are right. Voices• D D D Commissioner Stoner: MF2 is R1-7.2. Voices• Right. Commissioner Stoner: MF3 is R1-5. Voices• Umhmm. Commissioner Stoner: MF4 we left as is, which is MRG. Voices• Umhmm. Commissioner Stoner: MF5 is R1-7.2 . Voice: Umhmm. Commissioner Stoner: MF6 is MRD. Voices: Umhmm. 37 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Commissioner Stoner: MF7 is MRD. Voice: Umhmm. Commissioner Stoner: MF8 is MRM. MF9 is MRM. MF10. Voices: No. Commissioner Stoner: No consensus on 10. Skip 11. MF12 is R1- 7.2. MF 13 is MRG. Commissioner Ward: Plus recommendation for park. Chair Martinez: Yes, but do you want to make that later. Commissioner Stoner: MRG is. . .or MF13 is MRG. Voice: Umhmm. Commissioner Stoner: MF14 is R1-9. 6. MF15 is R1-5. MF16 is RA. We don't have consensus on 17, 18, 19 and MF 20 is R1-5. Voice• Umhmm. Commissioner Stoner: For the record. Mr. Harris: And what was 21. Voices: We don't have consensus. Commissioner Stoner: The ones we do not have consensus on are MF101 11, 17, 18, 19 and 21. Chair Martinez: Okay. I would entertain a motion to continue this hearing to. . .date. . .did we agree on a date? Mr. Harris: Your next public hearing date is November 27. Chair Martinez: Okay, but before we do that, I do think I need. . .do we need a motion on the facts and findings on R1-5. Mr. Harris: Rl-5, I don't think you need to do those findings of facts until you get this whole thing done. Chair Martinez: Right. And we don't need a motion to do that. Commissioner Stoner: Because we aren't done yet. 38 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Chair Martinez: Okay, so November 20th would be our, for those people who did not understand that it is normally our workshop but we would be continuing the discussion and the hearing to the 20th, November 20th. Mr. Harris: So this would go to the 20th, not the 27th. Chair Martinez: That would be. Commissioner Stoner: It's a workshop, but I think we can probably get through the number of items we have left in fairly short order and then go to workshop. Chair Martinez: Right, because we do need a workshop on that date as well. Okay. But this would not be a workshop, this would be continuance of this hearing. Is there a motion? Voices: And a workshop. Plus a workshop. Mr. Satterstrom: That would be good because we'd be able to come back to findings and conclusions the following week. Chair Martinez: Yes, on the 27th. Mr. Harris: I 'd like to declare that the findings of fact for everything will come back next week. Chair Martinez: Okay, all right, fine. Mr. Harris: (unclear) act on within 14 days. Chair Martinez: Okay. Is there a motion? Commissioner Ward: So moved. Chair Martinez: A second? Commissioner Faust: Second. Chair Martinez: All in favor? Voices: Aye. Chair Martinez: Okay, the meeting is continued until the 20th. For everyone's information, on the 20th we will workshop the non consensus items, we also, from, as a result of our retreat, have some items that we need to begin work on and begin discussion on, and so we will plan to do that on the 20th as well. 39 Kent Planning Commission Minutes October 16, 1989 Voice: Have we adjourned our meeting? Chair Martinez: We have not adjourned our meeting, that was just an announcement so I would move, I mean I would entertain a motion to adjourn the meeting. Commissioner Stoner: I so move. Chair Martinez: I need a second. Commissioner Faust: Second. Chair Martinez: All in favor? Voices• Aye. Chair Martinez: Opposed. (silence) (End of Verbatim Minutes) The meeting was adjourned at 10:30 p.m. Respectfully submitted, ames 'P. ar�is, Secretary 40