COMMISSIONERS PRESENT: Lee Riechel, Chairperson; Sandra Jones, Ken
Platt, Ron Shearer.
STAFF PRESENT: Joy Gipson, Planning Secretary; Greg Perkins, City
Recorder
I. CALL TO ORDER
Chairperson Lee Riechel called the meeting of the Dunes City Planning
Commission to order at 7:05 pm. Greg Perkins conducted roll call and
then announced that Troy Ronning had tendered his resignation from the
Planning Commission and concluded by declaring a forum and added that he
along with all of the others present appreciated Mr. Ronning's term of
service.
II. APPROVAL OF MINUTES
Lee Riechel suggested tabling the approval of the minutes from March 27
and 31, 2008, pending location of the commissioners' written and signed
statements about desired changes to the stormwater ordinance to be
included. Lee stated that the City Council had decided to dedicate a
second meeting to the stormwater ordinance and that he would like the
Planning Commissioners' written comments to be available to the
council-members as soon as possible for them to review as part of their
deliberations. Lee invited discussion of tabling the minutes until the
statements are found vs. approving the minutes with the exception that
those statements would be added when found.
Ken Platt moved to approve the minutes with the above-mentioned
exception and Lee Riechel seconded the motion. The Motion was adopted
unanimously 4-0.
III. ANNOUNCEMENTS
Lee Riechel affirmed that Troy Ronning had indeed decided to step
aside as Planning Commissioner. Lee asked for suggestions of persons to
replace Mr. Ronning. Greg Perkins advised placing a notice to interested
persons in the following week's Siuslaw News and notifying a previous
commissioner who is believed to be possibly interested in filling the
position.
Lee Riechel added that along with discussions with Sandy Jones
resulting in her appointment to her Commission seat, he had discussed the
position with Dave Bellemore and that Mr. Bellemore expressed willingness
but a preference not to serve at that time. Mr. Riechel added that he had
discussed with both of these candidates his desire to add a Commissioner
who would be willing to replace him as Chairperson when his term ended,
and that that had contributed to Mr. Bellemore's reluctance. Mr. Riechel
further expressed appreciation for the new Planning Secretary, Joy Gipson.
Greg Perkins expressed regret that in the turnover from the previous
Planning Secretary to the new one, documents that the Commission expected
to have available were not available, i.e. the commissioners' written
statements. Greg stated that the responsibility for this oversight is his
as the responsible party during the transition. He stated that he and Ms.
Gipson would continue to search for the statements, and asked Lee Riechel
if Lee still had a copy of the statement that he had written. Lee stated
that he would search for it.
At this point Mr. Perkins left the meeting.
Lee then stated that during the public hearing regarding the stormwater
management ordinance Mr. Norman Martin had introduced references to a
number of various documents for the record and that Joy Gipson and Greg
Perkins had reviewed them and would insure that the information would be
kept in the record for that meeting and available for public viewing.
This statement was followed by discussion as to whether all documents
referred to by Mr. Martin belonged in the record. The consensus was that
these documents consisted of too many sheets, totaling more than 100
pages. It was agreed that the statement "the material is
available" would suffice.
IV. OLD BUSINESS
Business Licenses
Lee stated that he had asked Joy Gipson to
Ms. Gipson presented information regarding the formation of new
business license requirements based on an analysis produced in December
2001 by the League of Oregon Cities titled "Business License
Ordinances: Policy Considerations and examples from Oregon Cities."
Joy presented some of the key considerations for deciding whether to form
business license requirements and what requirements to include. She also
entered into the record two examples of business-license ordinances from
other smaller cities as a visual aid.
Lee Riechel explained that the original impetus for desiring business
licenses was the Commission's wish to have improved ability to enforce
contractor compliance with building and development code requirements. He
stated that the desired outcome would be business licensure tied to
business practices, so that the Commission could revoke the licenses of
builders, contractors and other development-related businesses whose
operations do not follow the City's building and development code
requirements.
Lee added that in his opinion optimal regulation of business licenses
would involve an administrator for day-to-day processing, but in case of
problems would take advantage of current procedure using the Site Review
Committee or the Conservation Committee to investigate and make
recommendations to the Council. He suggested that the City of Reedsport's
license code and requirements be examined as an example, because he likes
their format. He stated that an important consideration would be to have a
code that would be usable when the contractor requirements were 'plugged
into' it.
Lee stated that he did not think that the next meeting would be the
appropriate time to further address the issue of business licenses,
because the Montgomery View Estates Subdivision would be on the agenda and
would require all the time available.
Sandy Jones inquired whether the license would only be for contractors,
or would apply to other businesses also -- to home businesses, for
example.
Lee responded that home businesses are already regulated by current
City code, although it might be useful to include them for purposes of
having accurate records of them; but that otherwise the issue with
noncompliance with building and development regulations involves other
kinds of businesses in addition to building contractors -- tree-service
and septic contractors, for example. He added that the City could be held
liable if it listed businesses affected in business-license code and
excluded one or more categories of business.
Ken Platt inquired whether businesses out of compliance could
Sandy Jones inquired who is responsible for code violations by licensed
businesses operating within the City -- whether the responsible parties
are only the businesses, or if the responsibility can be attached to the
actual persons running each business so that they have no opportunity to
continue operating in violation under a different business name. Ms.
Gipson replied that within the LOC analysis one of the questions to be
resolved is who the business licenses themselves will be attached to,
whether to the businesses, the owners, or all persons working in each
business.
Montgomery View Estates Subdivision 01/07
Joy presented a brief report on the status of the Montgomery
Subdivision application. She stated that Hilary Dearborn with Lane Council
of Governments was still working on the Findings of Fact and
recommendations for the application, and that Joy hoped that Hilary would
be able to pass these completed documents to Joy's office within a few
days.
Joy added that the area covered by the Subdivision application, which
had been logged and not yet replanted, had not yet reached the State
Forestry Department's deadline for re-vegetation; and that if the property
was intended for residential development then Mr. Montgomery would not be
required to plant trees.
Joy inquired whether the May Planning Commission meeting was too soon
to include a hearing about this subdivision, given that no one from Dunes
City had been able to review the information yet. Lee recommended posting
the notices for the hearing in order to be able to include it if possible.
Lee then stated that he was unsure whether Ms. Dearborn was referencing
Dune's City's Comprehensive Plan in her analysis of the application, given
that the Plan had not existed when she processed previous applications for
Dunes City; and that he was not sure whether she needed to reference the
Plan. Joy stated that she would find out. Lee suggested that a table be
created to explain which elements of the Plan each Code section
implements. Lee mentioned that Joy would need to look at State
limited-land-use regulations about reference to the Comprehensive Plan,
but for the time being she should use the Ordinances Code's
"Type-III" process as guide. He stated that the new Code
ordinance 182 does not refer to Limited Land Use Decisions, and relies on
the Type II and Type III processes described in the code.
Lee stated that the lot in question needs a re-vegetation plan, which
will have to be approved by the Council, not the Planning Commission; and
that this requirement might add a long space of time between approval of
the Subdivision application by the Commission and the final sanction for
the owner to begin work on the site.
Lee stated that he would like to handle this application as a Type III
change, and reminded the other Commissioners that they needed to review
Code section 155.4 regarding Type-III process, Code section 155.3
regarding development in various Zones, and Code section 155.3 regarding
all zones. He also reminded them to review the staff report and findings
of fact in this application.
Lee stated that unless the hearing for the Montgomery application was
delayed they would not be addressing business licenses at the next
Commission meeting.
Joy requested confirmation that the Commission wanted her to send out
all appropriate notices that the May Commission meeting would include a
hearing of the Montgomery Subdivision application, and Lee answered in the
affirmative.
Sandy inquired whether the Commissioners would receive copies of the
application materials. Lee responded that they would receive large packets
including all pertinent material. He asked how large the lot in question
was, and Ms. Gipson replied that it is 60.6 acres. Lee then stated that
the division would result in a lot of redevelopable lots, and that they
would have to request a redevelopment plan 'when it comes to that.' Lee
added that he would like to see the preliminary staff report.
Lee also stated that Ms. Gipson would have to ask for the redevelopment
plan.
Lee asked if Ms. Gipson had anything else to mention. She replied that
she did not have anything directly related to the Planning Commission,
although she had been working on a Comparative analysis of City fees, with
an eye to raising ours to meet our Planning costs. Lee stated that the
current process of charging a deposit at the beginning and then charging
costs later on is not working. He added that to make this process work
well the actual hours spent on each application would have to be recorded.
V. ADJOURNMENT
Lee moved to close the meeting at 8:01, Sandy Jones seconded and the
Motion passed unanimously 4-0.
_________________________________ ____________________________________
Lee Riechel,
Chairperson
Planning Secretary