you
[Music]
okay good afternoon everybody welcome to
our special work session of the las
cruces city council and we'll should
have a member or two of our planning and
zoning commission but before we begin if
you please join me in the pledge of
allegiance please
[Music]
thank you is uh clint thacker here
[Music]
okay i don't see him how about uh dr
payadis hello there you are you're gonna
give
and dr payadis will give us our jobs of
the week
thank you mr mayor francisco payers for
the record members of the city council
for today's jobs of the week the city of
las cruces is hiring a human resource
analyst this position is going to be
closing on september the 1st of 2021
also msu is hiring groundskeeper and
this position will be closing on the
24th so actually pretty close
there's a cook and dishwasher for
discovery child development company this
one is going to be closing on september
15th there's also a cad tech for sauder
with miller and associates this position
closing on the 17th of september there's
also a position available for workforce
innovation and opportunity at wioa
administrator for the south central
council of governments and this will be
closing on the 9th of september for a
full list of jobs internships and
volunteer opportunities also for those
individuals that want to
show
advertise a job you can go to www.m
and also at governmentjobs.com for slash
careers forward slash las cruces
and the phone number for our partners at
the mexico workforce connections is
two five 575-524-6250
and they're located at 226 south alameda
boulevard thank you mr mayor members
council
thank you for that uh dr pirandas
okay so we have one item on the agenda
and that is the city of las cruces
development code update and code
diagnostics
and so it looks like david seville will
start this off
and then we'll go ahead and
see if there's any questions from
both our planning and zoning members
as well as our city council
well good afternoon mayor and council
pnz
chair and commission members
david seville public works director
and it is my honor to introduce to you
the city's consultant freeze and nichols
who will be presenting to you
the city's code diagnostics and analysis
report
this afternoon
with that i would like to introduce miss
erica craycroft
and
don warwick
they will be doing the presentation
and taking any questions after the
presentation
and city staff is also available for any
questions as well
thank you
thank you diva
okay thank you mr sedillo good afternoon
everyone and again my name is erica
craycraft with freeze and nichols and
thank you for having us we are excited
to be here with you to talk about the
development code update
so again with team introductions my name
is erica craycraft and i'm with frieza
nichols i am the project manager for the
consultant team also with us today again
is dawn warwick
and karen perez also with frieza nichols
representing our local las cruces office
fred lopez is with quantum engineering
and not with us here today but joining
our team is dana kyle a local attorney
to help out with any legal issues that
may come up along the way
in addition to the folks that you see on
the screen here we do have a deep bench
of other folks who are helping out
behind the scenes specialists
for our planners and engineers that look
at green infrastructure roadway design
and a number of different specialties as
well
our agenda for today starts out with an
overview of the process
information on the foundation behind the
code update
some highlights from the draft code
diagnostic report and then lastly some
discussion and
any q a that may come up
overall our purpose for what we would
like to achieve today we would like to
present the the draft diagnostic report
for your consideration
and receive any direction or address any
questions or comments that you may have
on that report
so first starting with the
process overview and looking at the the
scope that's included in the development
review so we are
looking at a major review at the zoning
regulations the zoning map the
subdivision regulations also the design
standards that are things like
landscaping and parking
drainage and flood control and signs so
those are the major focus but we also
are taking a look at your outdoor
lighting standards historic preservation
cross connection control and excavation
and curb cuts
so um it's also important to note what
is not included in our scope we are not
looking necessarily at things like your
building code or
impact fees any detailed engineering
design standards those are typically
addressed outside of the development
code so we are focusing on the topics
that you see on the screen now
our overall process is about a 24 month
process which seems like a long time but
we have a very busy schedule during that
time and our process is
across three phases we are approaching
the end of phase one
right now it has been a five month
process so far
and the purpose of phase one is to
really lay out our initial um game plan
for moving forward with the code update
we want to identify
what are some of the main issues that we
are expecting to address and what are
our proposed resolutions
to to resolve those issues and
it's important to note that the
diagnostic is not an exhaustive list of
all the issues that are going to be
addressed there will be other items that
we've heard that didn't necessarily get
included in the diagnostic report or
that may come up throughout the process
and we'll absolutely incorporate those
along the way this is just intended to
be
a high level overview and summary of
some of the main issues that we have
identified
so far but
to
do this process to do our diagnostic
evaluation we started with a detailed
review of your existing plans that you
have already adopted to date
also we have met with a range of
different code users so those are a
range of public officials also private
developers etc we'll talk touch more on
that in just a moment
but also we've been working really
closely with your city staff to develop
the diagnostic report draft that you
have available to you today
so again it's not an exhaustive list but
we are trying to establish a game plan
before we move into phase two
so phase two is the the bulk of the code
update it's about a 12-month process and
that is when
we'll be again working really closely
with your city staff
we have broken up the development code
into nine different sections where we'll
meeting we'll be meeting with city staff
to review those sections make revisions
and get those sections ready to go and
during that time
city staff will also be meeting with
both city council and the planning and
zoning commission to give you all
regular updates
on that process throughout and then
we'll also be joining you at for a
midpoint update
to present the progress so far and check
in if there are any outstanding policy
issues or anything that we may need
guidance on
we will have some time to talk about
that in the middle
also during this time in phase 2 we will
be doing
various updates to the project website
realize las cruces dot com
so anything that comes up during this
time that may be a notable change to the
existing
regulations
we'll present that
in an understandable form on on the
public website so we can get some
additional community input that way
and then lastly we have six months at
the end of the process to focus on
refinement of the complete draft code
at that time again we'll have the the
complete draft we'll meet with you all
for a joint workshop to review that
then present that to the community for
some feedback at an open house
and then a series of joint meetings
following that to make any adjustments
or modifications that we may need to
make sure that we are incorporating the
community input that we would receive at
that open house
next looking at the foundation and the
background for the code update so you
have recently completed the elevate las
cruces comprehensive plan and this was a
very significant undertaking with really
substantial public engagement and
involvement through that process
generally speaking a city's
comprehensive plan
has a very robust public engagement
program and that's where you want to
really get everyone involved in the
community and establish what the vision
is for moving forward and what are the
recommendations
that we need to make when steps to take
forward to help us achieve that vision
and then once the plan is complete and
adopted there are several different
mechanisms for how those recommendations
are implemented and one of those is the
development code so that's what we are
working on
taking forward
the public input that went into ella
we're not trying to recreate anything
that happened during elevate we're
trying to bring it forward into the next
step
the elevate plan had about 500 actions
and about 200 or so of those are related
to something in the development code and
so here's kind of a look behind the
scenes at what we have been working on
we took all
200 or so of those actions from elevate
outlined them in a spreadsheet and we've
been identifying where in the code each
one of those items is going to be
addressed to make sure that we are
really covering
everything from those plans
and so as an example
the text you see here in quotes that
comes from one of the actions to
incorporate form-based districts or
concepts to help implement the over the
place type overlays and achieve
consistency between between
existing zoning overlays
and so this is an item that we've
identified that's going to be addressed
through zoning through zoning districts
and also zoning design standards
in addition to elevate we are also aware
you have several other plans that are
following a similar process the active
transportation plan
parks master plan various neighborhood
plans
a range of others but so we are
reviewing all of those and bringing all
of those recommendations forward for the
items that are appropriate to be
addressed through the development code
so i mentioned form-based code in the
previous slide and it also comes up
several times in the diagnostic report
as well as in the elevate plan and so i
wanted to take just a minute to explain
what we mean by form-based code and how
that compares to
zoning that you have today
so on the left side of the screen here
you see traditional zoning sometimes
that's called euclidean zoning and that
is what you have in place today and you
see the the large use circle
the main focus on traditional zoning is
on the use of the land and then there is
a secondary focus on the building form
the difference for form-based zoning it
still considers both use and form but
the emphasis changes a little bit so you
see the use gets a lot smaller we're
maybe not as specific into
whether it's a real estate office or an
architect for example we if we just care
that it's an office
but the emphasis on perform becomes a
lot greater
[Music]
testing okay um so again they're they're
very um
similar just different approaches and uh
they both are considering use and form
but we are looking at a shift at least
in the
overlay place types at
increasing the focus on form and so as
an example of that you can see the
graphic here when we talk about form
this is what we mean what does the
building look like from the street is it
up against the sidewalk does it have a
setback how tall is it for example
are there any
breaks in the planes along the way so
just as some background information
about what we mean by form based code
so in addition to using all of the input
that we have received through all the
various plans we have also been reaching
out to various code users
and we reached out to a wide number of
people the folks that you see here on
the screen are who participated in some
interviews that includes many of you all
that are joining us here today as well
as a wide group of city staff
but we also wanted to be sure that we
were reaching out to a lot of the
development community and then also
media to help push out that information
to the community for any input
so with that i will turn it over to dawn
to give you some highlights from the
report thank you
thanks erica
mayor commissioners counselors um dawn
warwick with freeze and nickels
my part of the presentation is to really
highlight um not everything within the
diagnostic report because as you can see
in the document itself there are about
95 different items that are sort of
raised up and identified to
give us a guide
in moving forward as to how we will
shape the regulations to address those
issues that have been raised so we
picked
about seven that we feel are
relevant and
sort of all encompassing but again this
is not exhaustive this is just a
highlights reel
so the first item
is to ensure that you have a
user-friendly document that is
not only
highly functional for your staff to
administer but also very understandable
for users so that that's the development
community but it's also individuals
homeowners who may need to come through
some type of review process in order to
obtain a permit or an approval
so in order to do that we are looking at
ensuring that your processes are
streamlined that there are graphics and
tools within the code itself that make
it very easy to navigate and to utilize
so
we are big fans of utilizing flowcharts
and tables to help to explain uh
concepts
it's a lot easier to
to navigate through a flowchart often
than it is a bunch of text or narrative
we also will be focused on ensuring that
you have an organized document that is
very easy to
get through the online version will be
fully hyperlinked so you can move
between various sections of code that
are relevant very easily and we'll also
be consolidating all of the definitions
from various
pieces of the code right now into a
single definition section
another focus will be a roadway design
so several of the recommendations or
issues that are raised kind of circle
earth
circle around roadway design
in elevate and in your active
transportation plan
your policies speak to utilizing
context-sensitive solutions in your
design of roadways and also
in
emphasizing complete streets
so in doing so we'll be looking at
ensuring that there is compatibility for
all modes wherever possible
some of the challenges that we know you
have are how to address existing
conditions so how do we retrofit those
it's not something that generally
happens immediately but having something
in place having the street sections to
identify the various
elements of the roadway that need to be
in place
uh will be will be something that we
want to want to look at specifically how
do we address rural roads maybe these
are areas that
do not have sufficient infrastructure
maybe they were annexed into the city
that you know need to be addressed
somehow
so some of the challenges there of
course
in are making sure that we can ensure
that there's adequate infrastructure
but also address the fact that there's a
cost to doing that to ins to bringing
roads up to up to code and to providing
the necessary services
connectivity and access are definitely
focus points we want to make sure that
you have
roads that that connect where they're
supposed to that provide multiple ways
of getting in and out of locations so
that you can mitigate congestion
sidewalks and safety are also
top of mind to make sure that we're
providing pedestrian facilities in a
safe manner
all right
erica talked a little bit about the form
based approach to the
overlay place types
zoning districts as a whole will be
looked at within the update of your land
development codes
it's important that we are utilizing the
guidance from elevate to align your
existing zoning districts into the
necessary um
development patterns with the components
that address the
place type
desired development patterns
another thing that is very important is
to ensure that we're addressing
non-conformities anytime codes are
updated especially when you look at a
fairly large overhaul to regulations
you ultimately
end up with
conditions on the ground that may be
non-conforming
best practices is to largely grandfather
those properties into place so that they
have the right to remain as is
oftentimes there is some type of a
sliding scale or criteria that
identifies when those non-conformities
will need to be addressed and typically
that doesn't occur unless that property
is proposing some type of change
at which point in time it will
incrementally need to be brought into
conformance with the new regulations
so each section of
the regulations for instance
landscaping or lighting or
other components of the regulations will
have an applicability statement that
identifies how and when properties must
comply with that partial that portion of
the land development code
so we talk about
how
the existing zoning districts
will
sort of interface with the uh place
types that are identified in elevate and
so this is just a map from from the
elevate plan it identifies the various
place types and applies that to the
properties within the city limits
and this table identifies your existing
zoning districts so using the guidance
from elevate we've identified where
existing zoning districts are
appropriate or may be appropriate with
with certain conditions within place
types in the elevate that are identified
in the elevate plan so this is sort of a
road map for us to start to identify
what adjustments may need to be made
what might be appropriate within your
existing zoning districts to make sure
that they can be a better align with the
development patterns that are
supported and called for within elevate
another topic that sort of runs through
the um
diagnostic report is sustainability and
green infrastructure so this addresses
storm water renewable energy resources
how and where street trees and shade
kind of can can be utilized to improve
the environment but also improve your
sustainability and and just the the
the comfort of your streetscapes and
other development areas
how we treat environmentally sensitive
areas whether those are areas of you
know
detention or runoff
that have certain
specific development concerns and
and needs
so we've got a great group in
the freeze and nickels engineering team
that specialize in
green storm water infrastructure they're
helping to guide some of this and give
us ideas as to how this is best
implemented
one thing with regard to
sustainability green infrastructure
and roadway design
it's it's recognized that some of these
requirements will be public and some of
these requirements may fall on private
property so part of the update to the
code will be to determine
how those
regulations affect both public and
private properties and the
responsibility
of the um various
parties in ensuring that those
improvements
are installed appropriately and
consistently
another component is park dedication and
looking at park lands
both the parks and recreation master
plan elevate and also the active
transportation plan all speak to
developing some type of
program
for parkland dedication
that will likely include an option for a
fee in lieu for
developments of certain types or sizes
it may also include a park improvement
fee the dedication is to accommodate the
need for space for additional parkland
to
to meet the needs of new users as you
have additional residential units
built within the community
that doesn't necessarily
address the condition of existing
facilities so a park improvement fee
would give you resources to ensure that
your existing parks can be brought up to
code you know maybe
play equipment and other types of
amenities can be improved over time
and the third component to this is a
trail dedication just as there are
typically dedication requirements for
streets when a property is developed
adjacent to a corridor that needs
additional right-of-way for instance
having a trail dedication requirement
would also give you the ability to
ensure that as properties are developed
your trail corridors can be contiguous
and can can be improved and
create those connections for
walkers and maybe bicyclists throughout
the community to give opportunities for
safe
active transportation
residential density
the overlay place types identify certain
locations within the community that are
appropriate for
increased density and infill
so we want to look at how we can make
adjustments to
the zoning districts that will support
residential densities in appropriate
locations
this also
gives us the opportunity to ensure that
across the community housing choice is
available so
oftentimes
development codes that are kind of the
age of your existing regulations
sort of missed a whole group of housing
types in the way that they provided for
residential units
they provide for single-family homes and
then they address larger apartment
complexes but there's a whole range of
housing
types that fit within sort of the span
between those two extremes
oftentimes those are referred to as
missing middle
we really look at that just as choice
the ability for people to have choices
in neighborhoods throughout the
community that provide for
for your residents at really all stages
of their life
one component of that that's typically
addressed or typically
kind of falls into that category is
accessory dwelling units those may be
attached they may be detached
so we're going to look at appropriate
ways to incorporate those in locations
that they that they fit the context
we've also had several conversations
with staff with the development
community
about the city's substantial completion
policy
code is the mechanism your regulations
are the mechanism that ensures that
development is installed and accepted
and meets the criterias set by the city
and that
needs to happen in order for lots to be
filed a record and sold
so that
development can occur
so
we know that there have been some
concerns in making sure that development
specifically residential subdivisions
are complete before houses start going
in more and more specifically before
residents begin occupying those homes
so we're looking at
ways to
address that
the resolution that's currently proposed
in the
diagnostic report
is that all of the improvements that are
required for the development of
subdivision would be installed installed
and accepted by the city before a final
plat is filed so we expect that that's
um
something that may require some
additional conversation but again the
diagnostic report is
is just that it's a road map for us to
move forward it's not the code itself
it's a way for us to get to the code and
ensure that we are not missing any of
the big themes or ideas
that um that the city wants to see
embodied in its new land development
code
and
with that we're at the end of the formal
presentation erica and i are available
and will be happy to answer questions
okay i think how i'd like to do this is
i'll start with city council and then
after they're finished i'll ask the r2
plan planning zoning commissioners if
they had anything that they'd like to
ask so i'll start with city council
first so councillor flotus
thank you mayor mr vasquez thank you
mayor and thank you don and karen for
your presentation
um
i have a question about uh
the zoning
grandfathering in certain parts
of the requirements in a proposed
ordinance or an ordinance
um
can you
clarify what that means you said that
there would be a provision that would
grandfather in the existing properties
but that gradually changes could be made
and what parts of the city are would
this affect would it affect the
long-standing communities that have been
here for
over 100 years 200 years
or does it affect
new developments only
and how can you grandfather all of that
thank you for the record again my name
is erica craycraft and i'll start don if
you have anything to add feel free to
time in so
the updated code would apply to all new
development and then for any existing
development typically the the same
grandfathering provisions apply
city-wide it wouldn't be different areas
treated differently
but at the beginning of each section in
the code say
landscaping it would have an
applicability section and so in that
section it would say
if you're expanding your business or
your
your footprint your building footprint
by more than
10 50 percent that number varies and
that's something that we can adjust but
if you're expanding then that might
trigger those provisions where you would
have to comply with that if you're not
expanding if you're just going to keep
existing as you have been then
typically no additional standards are
are proposed everyone can keep doing
what they're doing as long as it is
legal today
they can continue to exist it's once
they start to
expand or for example if
for parking regulations if a new use
wanted to come into an existing site but
that new use required substantially more
parking that they didn't have on site
that might be something that needs a
closer look about was there a certain
percentage of the parking that we can
modify or do we need to to look at other
options for that site
okay so then um
it pretty much uh affects uh
subsequent development or new additions
for the
grandfather clause to kick or be
eliminated yes okay
and um
as far as the um
public private
uh versus private properties
um what exactly
uh were you
can you please uh re
restate that
sure way that i can understand it
thank you sure so
anytime development occurs
there is um
typically
the the burden of that development uh
for the improvements falls to the new
project
um oftentimes though
for instance
say there's a new commercial development
that
is going to generate quite a lot of new
or additional traffic to a particular
location
that development will be responsible for
the all of the things that happen on the
private property the parking lot um all
of the built form the signage the
landscaping
but oftentimes they need to share in
some of the improvement to adjacent
public infrastructure that may be
a turn lane that may be signalization of
an intersection that's adjacent to the
development and so that's where there is
typica that's where there's a decision
to be made about what the
what's the responsibility of the private
development and what is the
responsibility of the community
so that's something that the code is you
know
always trying to balance and ensure that
development pays its way but that the
city is also you know ensure is
providing the necessary infrastructure
to support the development that they
they desire
thank you and as far as
the park dedication on page whoops i
think oh i think it's page 21 it almost
looks like a board but it must be page
21. the land dedication or fee in loop
park improvement fee or trail dedication
or those are the three areas that would
that were addressed under that caption
what exactly is land dedication or fee
in lieu to whom does that fee apply and
what exactly does that mean
so this would be a new program for the
community
in what you see in a lot of
cities
when a new residential development is
proposed
they're bringing additional residential
units new residents to the community
that provides
a need for additional park space
to accommodate those new residents and
so
there will be a
a determination as to
how many units or single-family homes
for instance
will require a certain type of
dedication
i think that el paso is in the
diagnostic report as an example that
when 100 residential units are provided
in a new development that the
development is required then to dedicate
one acre of park space one acre of land
to be utilized as park space
that's just an example it would need to
be tailored specifically to las cruces
and what we meant what we mean by a fee
in lieu there may be circumstances where
it's a lower number of units
there's not available land on the site
or
there's adequate park land within the
area already so there would be a fee in
lieu calculated that would be commit
that would be um
consistent with the
type of dedication or the cost of the
dedication of the land
so if
if
if that
was in an ordinance if that language
what you're proposing would be in an
ordinance how exactly
would the measure would you include the
measurements would you include the
acreage insofar as
how um how many parks per area you know
that sort of stuff would that be
included too in order to
have this equitable for all prospective
developments
certainly there has to be some uh
utilization of the park's master plan to
understand what the needs are across the
city
and also yes we would look at the
calculation or the amount of acreage
required or the calculation of the fee
in lieu the formula would be part of the
ordinance so that it was clear
and consistent for any development that
came in and met those criteria that that
would be um a uniform requirement and to
whom does the fee and lou go to the fee
in lieu would go to the city
most of the time those would go into a
dedicated fund that would be required to
be spent within a certain service area
that is identified and it's typically
geographic based upon the location of
the development and how does that
compare with the park improvement fee
the park improvement fee can be utilized
for improving park facilities but it's
not exist in a new development that
would exist in
already existing parks
so
next to or
close to the new development again it's
probably going to be within a service
area that's defined geographically
so that that park improvement fee would
go to improved parks in the area that
the new residential units are coming
into the city okay so um then that means
that you're looking at our existing
ordinance regarding
the requirement for a developer to have
um to provide parks is that correct yes
and what we're facing is really a lack
of parks uh precisely for the reason
that uh there's a park maybe a mile away
and that isn't sufficient for people
especially when there's a problem with
crosswalks a constituent resident in
district five in fact with whom i was
speaking yesterday
said that a park wasn't being built near
their neighborhood and he has children
and grandchildren now living in that
district and that
the comeback from the city
is that a crosswalk cannot
be provided for them to cross to the
park
and we have that sort of problem
throughout the city and so far as how
the streets are being designed we have
streets that
don't go entirely across a
an intersection
which means that by law by federal
standards
there's no requirement to have
a crosswalk
so
i don't know how we would overcome that
i don't know if
i know that we've adopted the general
the federal guidelines
insofar as you know from the dot federal
d.o.t
the state of new mexico adopted the
entire
you know framework or recommendations by
the
feds
so
my concern is that all of this may look
really good on paper but in reality
we're facing that situation here right
now today
and are you addressing that at all or
do you raise it at any point because it
would look beautiful to say oh yes we
have all this or
it's okay to have a park a mile away
from a residential area
uh because oh you know i mean i've said
oh it's wonderful walking a mile isn't
that big of a deal you can walk in 15
minutes but if you have
you know a toddler and a baby in a
stroller and you have maybe you know
five and six-year-old and a dog to boot
it's virtually impossible right do you
address any of that by the way well all
of this is
guidance to dig in deeper and to really
start defining what the actual criteria
will be so yes we will take that into
account
and you're right there's there are a lot
of different components that all have to
work together
it's easier for new development because
you start kind of with a green field or
a fresh start
it's more difficult when you're trying
to retrofit and address how to integrate
amenities into already built areas so
we're going to work with staff and work
with stakeholders and yourselves to try
and come up with the right combinations
that will result in the kind of
development that you all want and then
another concern i have
and i didn't see it addressed
is the sidewalks and
uh what we have throughout the city um
we have a lot of uh i mean you did
address the issue of subdivisions not
being developed and just sitting there
um you know just uh and sometimes not
even maintained by the owner insofar as
trash accumulation and wind blowing all
the time and that sort of stuff
um but so do we have um
do you
so we have a lot of
lots that
aren't that are sitting empty without
sidewalks so people in those areas
cannot access
they have to walk on the street
to maybe
get from point a which is their home to
get to point b which is maybe the you
know
the place where they can go get an ice
cream
and um
so
do you look at any of that i mean did
you see did did you have an opportunity
to you know take a tour around our city
and see all those odd places where we
don't even have a sidewalk like on north
rise there's a portion there where
there's no sidewalk and the rule i think
is that if the law or whatever dominates
is that if you have
the other side of the street with a
sidewalk
you're okay but there's a certain area
there where there's no sidewalk on
either side of the street and it's near
uh road runner parkway and del rey
yes actually we were we've driven around
um we spent the morning touring around
today and have looked at other locations
as well
so we've gotten a first-hand look at
some of those examples
those are things that are under
consideration and again it's easier when
you're looking at new developments and
trying to find the right combination of
requirements to retrofit
in an existing condition if the property
is fully developed and they're not
proposing to make any changes
it may not be that the the city can
require anything of that development to
come in and retroactively install a
sidewalk
that may be something that falls to a
capital project later uh that that is
where the city is trying to like address
sidewalk gaps at various locations
throughout the city so not everything
will be
accomplished through
just establishing new regulations
because if a development is
fully complete and operational they may
not need to come in for any type of
approval that would then trigger a new
requirement
uh so those are things that we are
talking with the city about and they're
aware that you know there may be things
that that don't get accomplished through
these regulations immediately that
they're
they get they're incremental and that
there may be other projects that the
city has to fill in the gaps
so um
so that raises the question of roads and
any kind of
you did have those safe roads or
something there but
so that takes into account developers or
who who exactly would be looking at
making sure we have bike lanes and
walking areas and that sort of stuff is
is that covered by what you can talk
about
is that within the purview of your job
here
somewhat um so one one way we will be
addressing that is through the roadway
cross sections that show the total right
of way width and then what is within
that right of way how many lanes how
wide are they
is there a sidewalk a parkway a bike
lane for example
the locations of the bike lanes that's
not something that we would be
designating we would be relying back on
your active transportation plan and your
parks master plan to identify where
those are
but we would be developing the the cross
sections for those and that is one thing
we understand needs to be variable based
on the available right-of-way
right and so okay
and then as far as on page 26 um oh
excuse me before that
you you addressed residential density
and that the existing code has a missing
range which is the quote
um missing middle unquote what exactly
does that mean that's regarding housing
yeah correct yes it does so
the uh the term missing middle refers to
anything that's in between a detached
single-family home and a larger
apartment complex so that means things
like a duplex triplex quad plex
or even a detached single-family
bungalow court where you have a smaller
footprint of detached single family
maybe sharing a courtyard
so just some different options where we
can look to
increase density incrementally in a way
that's compatible with existing
neighborhoods or nearby neighborhoods
also to provide some affordable housing
options in the community so some of
those are addressed in the in the
current code it's just not quite as
refined as as we would recommend it to
be okay one of the things that we've
discussed previously is the
the uh and i know
sharon thomas uh
has uh been a proponent
as i'm i about having excuse me
counselor can you lift your microphone
up to your face right there oh okay you
mean my voice isn't loud enough
jeez then you didn't hear anything i
said that's good i'm glad you didn't
hear anything anyway we i wasn't talking
about you anyway so that's okay um
so
about having uh say changing the code so
that someone
in the um
existing communities not not new
development but existing communities
who would
be able to we'd have a code that allows
a
residential dwelling to perhaps
add a second floor
and
make it a home and a business or or
maybe not at a second floor but any
modification perhaps that would allow a
business and a home type of use for that
dwelling business
so
number one are you addressing that and
number two
would then that kick in the grandfather
the grandfather clause would it kick it
out of a use
or do you know
um
you're asking a couple different
questions here let me make sure i'm
getting them all so um as far as whether
you can have a business and a home
there are a couple different regulations
that apply there one of those is home
occupation codes and so that's something
that we would be looking at
to make sure that if someone is just
working from home not really generating
any extra traffic we generally want to
want to support that
in people's homes there are some other
provisions that come up outside of the
development code that affect that some
commercial
building codes that
is not included in in what we're looking
at that's something that would be
separately updated to see whether
a commercial business could be
constructed and conducted inside of a
single-family home so there's some other
conversations that would need to happen
with that too
we are looking at accessory dwellings
whether those are part of the house or
detached from the house and sometimes
that's something that folks will
construct an accessory dwelling unit and
maybe would they want to use that for
their home business
so that's something that that we'll be
looking at as well
did i miss any other parts of your
question there
no i think you did but
and i'm thinking also specifically of
infill
an infill type of development where
there is perhaps an opportunity to
purchase land
in an area that isn't definitely zoned
one way or the other i mean i you know
so
would then that kick in that i mean kick
out the grandfather clause of existing
you know
whatever
i think it depends on which part of the
grandfathering clause you mean and if
there's a new development that's coming
in so if i have a single family home and
i'm going to add a second story and i
want to have a business in there so if
i'm expanding
my floor area by 50 to add a second
story
then that may trigger the
um
compliance with parking standards for
example if i'm putting in a business
oh yes okay and okay i think my last
question is about
on page 26 the substantial completion
policy
and you addressed uh
[Music]
at least a couple of things there but
one of them was the incomplete
subdivision would you please
explain to me
what
how that affects the developer or the
city or
so really what it comes down to is how
much of the required infrastructure
is complete installed inspected accepted
by the city before a developer is able
to file a final plat
and that's
basically a trigger point to determine
that you know the lots are now available
they can be transferred they can be um
submitted for building permits for now
existing residential lots
and
i think that what we've seen
is that in the past there have been
different
levels of completion that have been
accepted
for
uh reaching that final filing
benchmark and so it's not been it's not
been inconsistent it's not been
consistent across the board so what we
want to do is ensure that
all projects that have the same criteria
are meeting those standards and
that the final plat comes
when the city has inspected and accepted
all of the necessary public improvements
so that
we're not in a position the city's not
in a position
that
someone now occupies a lot within that
new development but it doesn't have the
necessary infrastructure
so that's that's really where we're
trying to find
the right way to codify substantial
completion
so
is that a way of expediting development
for someone who's already started it is
that is that the goal
it's the goal is not specifically to
expedite it it's to
ensure that the city is not at risk
for the improvements not being installed
adequately and people occupying a new
residential lot but not having adequate
utilities or streets i see so that would
require a lot of inspection along the
way
it's it's required now so it's not
necessarily a change but it may
it may sort of change the the order of
the sequential order of things
great
well thank you very much for your
presentation and thank you for
addressing my questions thank you mr
mayor
before i get to councillor vasquez i
just wanted to um just kind of briefly
just mention that
the city
in 2001 we did we did a zone quote and
if you recall sometimes once in a while
we have
some vacant land that that never got
rezoned and so they'll come before us
and maybe once upon a time it was zone c
one and they had a different use and
then in our new zoning code it's really
a c2 so that's why sometimes you see me
putting on the consent because they
really didn't change anything it's just
that they never got it approved way back
then
and so
you know we'll just go ahead and approve
it and so i think counselor when we talk
about the grandfather is as long as they
don't do anything with that land they're
under that old code once they want to
try to sell it or do something with it
they got to bring it up to the new code
so this new code what we're looking at
is really based on elevate las cruces
when we had all those community meetings
people from around the city came and
gave their input so what what
freeze and nickels is doing is they're
taking all that data and all those
comments and bringing it back to us in
what they what they want to see the
future of las cruces look like and so
so so
and what we did in 2001 is there was
like a
a certain time period that if you wanted
to bring your land up to to standard you
could do it
and a lot of people did it but then a
lot of them didn't that's why oh gosh i
still remember those days uh 2002 2003
we had so many different
approvals that we had to do
that was technically what they talked
about the grandfather so it was under
the old code as long as you don't do
anything with it or you add don't add to
it then you you still follow the old
code and so all we're all
and that we we hired this company to do
because it took back then it took uh
staff years to finish that zoning code
and and
freeze and nickels are professionals who
that's all they do and so that you know
and and our city staff is con
continually doing their other things
that they're doing so this is why it's
worked out pretty good this first time
we've ever done this
doing this and i i think it's a it's
really a great opportunity
and for other local governments to see
how
you know because business continues that
we have to do and
if we didn't have freeze and nickels
then
they'd have to be doing this and they'd
have to stop and then go work you know
kind of like studying at night you know
do this simulator and then i go back and
go back and forth back and forth to take
years so i just wanted to share with you
a little bit about that but i want to
tell you briefly about the parks
i think we had a successful geo bond and
that may be something that we may want
to look at in the future
because
to come up with the different parks the
money and then what we have to do in the
city is come up with the money for the
employees to maintain them so those are
some of the things that i think we're
going to
have to look at in the future so i just
wanted just share that with you
counselor vasquez thank you
well i think it was uh
councillor vazquez and then councilman
coleman
thank you mayor thank you ms craig croft
as well for your presentation
um
so i understand you're just giving us
kind of an update of where you're at in
the process and so
um
just want to ask a couple of questions
and and um make sure that there's a
couple of points made i think in this
process in terms of
uh where we go from here
so i think land use regulation can
really
help
or hurt a community depending on how
it's implemented and how rigid it is
since i've been here on the council i've
really been promoting
more flexible uses especially within
infill areas
of things like
residential retail allowing
things like galleries for example or
small retail operations like a jewelry
maker or a shoe repair business or
something with minimal traffic that
would actually be allowed in a
residential area that's not just a
home-based business
you know that you're running from your
computer
and so i think that's really important
to continue to consider even if it may
be non-traditional because that
the barrier i think to
access even something as
common as a storefront for an
entrepreneur to have
an opportunity to sell a product that's
not available to everybody that's
available to people with certain access
to capital and certain income levels and
certain requirements to even get a loan
from a bank and so i think
being as flexible as we possibly can
in allowing those types of uses where
there are existing low-income
neighborhoods
is really important because we talk a
lot here about
building wealth and i think more
restrictive land use regulations
actually benefit people who have access
to the places where they can build where
they can have access to capital um
versus um more flexible uses in in
particular areas um so i just want to to
point that out and i know that will all
be part of the public process um
but i but sometimes we also have people
that are involved in the public process
that aren't um 100 reflective of the
community because again those are folks
with more time on their hands with the
ability to participate um the tools the
internet um transportation to get to a
meeting and so i just wanted to make
that point
um
i did have a couple questions here one
was around the the building heights and
and signage regulations
what part of your process here
would look at
essentially recommendations for building
height
or height restrictions and and
signage and i guess in density as well
at what point in the process are you
kind of making those decisions and
putting those things together for
yeah so this will be addressed in a
couple of different areas if you look at
the the proposed new code outline in the
in the zoning regulations we have a
subsection for building form
so that would include things like
building height setbacks um things like
that and then the sign regulations um
the design standards chapter has a
subsection for signs so assigned height
sign placement sign types things like
that would all be included in in the
science section
thank you and when those recommendations
come in the form of a report to counsel
will there be kind of how will those be
recommended to to the council
in what form or how could we expect to
see those you'll be seeing those
sections come in in draft form so
the various sections will be developing
with city staff as i mentioned we have
eight different segments that we're
reviewing with city staff and then our
ninth meeting with them is a complete
review
so
you'll you'll be seeing those
small segments as they're drafted so you
don't just get a
600 page document at the end
so yeah we'll be reviewing those in in
small trunks but you'll see them in
complete draft form
some of them may have
editors notes throughout them if there's
a particular area where we might need
additional guidance on something or
something that we think might be a hot
button issue we want to make sure that
we're getting it right so it will be in
draft form but likely with editors notes
thank you so much um
and just to add some commentary to to
that i think
uh
in in the city proper in our infield
area here
i think
we we should be more flexible with our
height regulations and height
restrictions and we should
try to promote greater density i think
part part of the way i think about
not just access to services and and
the transportation system that we're
building that we don't want to expand
far enough that we don't you can't pay
for the service or you know we stretch
ourselves thin as a city
but also this
home ownership right thinking about
where you can where you can afford to
build wealth by buying a home
um mostly homes and most new
developments are happening in one part
of the city uh and there's not a lot of
new areas in the inner part of the city
that are more affordable and so thinking
about how somebody builds equity in a
home means they have to be able to
access
a loan that they can actually buy an
apartment or a home or that middle
that missing middle housing that you
talked about and so i think
if we promote higher
uh
higher height restrictions and more
density
we
turn down the cost of some of those
places whether they're renting or buying
but certainly want to promote home
ownership so that those folks in this
part of the city can really build that
wealth by buying a property rather than
continuing to rent or being priced out
of other existing neighborhoods so i
just wanted i wanted to mention that
um
[Music]
and yes the the only other thing to take
into consideration along in those lines
for for me and thinking about a new land
regulation code is
that the developers
who are coming to our city for both
housing and commercial developments
are looking at these blank canvases that
we have in places like the east mesa
where they can build out
you know purpose
um facilities and shopping centers and
retail areas uh which is very attractive
to a developer who has an opportunity to
have the land
and so some of that growth will
inevitably continue um we've seen some
really beautiful master plans of like
these integrated neighborhoods with
their own town center almost replicating
like a downtown right in in the middle
of an existing subdivision
and i think all those things are great
but to be competitive with that growth
and to provide that same quality of life
in the inner part of the city where we
have more low-income areas where we have
building that are aging where we have
more non-conforming properties
to be competitive and have local folks
or even other developers from out of
town look at the inner city as a viable
investment
promoting a land use in those areas
that it makes it competitive and
attractive and perhaps lower cost of
entry
than in the cities east mesa or other
places of quick growth
i think is really important so that we
don't
so that we don't promote economic and
racial segregation um from one side of
the one one part of the city to another
where one is really invested in and the
other one is perhaps
not not as invested so um those are all
my comments and questions thank you so
much thank you thank you thank you
counselor before i get to council been
cuomo i want to say a couple things
because a lot of
my
last state of the city address was
was some of your comments when you
talked about
being able to build wealth and for your
residents to do that and so that's why
we included or i included a duplex the
triplex and vorplex
and i think that it speaks to the very
heart of what you were talking about and
that i think is what this this document
is here and first i just also want to
mention that this is more of a living
document even though if for something
like for example about the business that
you're talking about if for some reason
it's not included
we you know we can have a work session
on it and then we can always add to it
but i i just wanted you to know that
that i took to heart what you said and
and i wanted to use this as an example
because i know you're familiar with is
that piece of property on nevada
remember that big lot that we no one
could it was zoned residential but if we
could if that could be zoned uh for a
triplex or fourplex it probably would
have sold because then they could buy it
and what's the most important part of
this
is that a duplex a triplex and a four
plex can get single family
uh financing you can go fixed for 30
years you can't do that on a commercial
property it's
you have to change it every three or
five years so those are the positives
with that and that's what this is this
document is i think helping to do help
our residents if they want to buy an
investment property so they can build
wealth so i just wanted to let you know
that
i was listening to you and
i think what you want is incorporated in
this document thank you mayor
uh councillor bencomo thank you mayor
those are great comments and thank you
to my fellow colleagues and thank you
all so much for the update and the
presentation i certainly look forward to
more
um you know since literally my first
time my first meeting on the council we
had a zoning issue
and very quickly i had to learn about
um at least some basic understanding of
this and so i'm very excited to learn
from all of you as we go through this
process and from staff certainly
but also very quickly i realized how
much zoning and code development
are layered by class and issues of class
and race very quickly i i started doing
research and
um everything i really uh started
reading on this is is how do we ensure
that
um you know we're protecting the
interests of low-income families and and
particularly those who are um people of
color communities and so that's how i'm
coming into this conversation um and
certainly the the priority that i want
to keep in in in code development and
the issue of equity
as we move forward i did want to have i
had to follow some follow-up questions
to counselor florida's regarding the
incomplete subdivisions
i'm curious about how often this is
happening in our city
and if this code development update will
impact
those in complete subdivisions or if
we're served just at a loss when it
comes to that
um but not only
well i'll stop there and then i'll ask a
follow-up
um i'll defer to david sidio about how
often it's happening but generally no it
would only affect future subdivisions
okay
and mr said maybe as you answer the
question too i'm just curious about
then what does accountability look like
moving forward to ensure that
neighborhoods get completed
thank you mayor councillor ben cuomo
so
as far as how often those things hit
they happen actually quite frequently
so some most of our developments
do lack at least some part of
infrastructure that is still not
completed
right now the way substantial completion
is written is it states that all the
utilities roadway work kermit gutter and
drainage needs to be installed
that policy was in place
before other changes happen to other
infrastructure systems like lighting
that's what we're looking at now so
although we do have some subdivisions
that are
basically having all of those items
completed
and we move forward with substantial
completion
the acceptance period is
somewhat
relatively
soon when i say soon anywhere between
three to four months we do have a lot of
developments that do exceed that that's
where the problem comes in where we're
having
people
that are able to pull a permit
get their cos start living but then we
still have other infrastructure that's
lacking within the development
so what that causes is basically two
things
it causes inconvenience to our residents
because they're having to deal with
those improvements and not having them
completed
before they were able to move in to the
subdivision
second it also prolongs the maintenance
costs for those items as we move forward
so what the proposal would be is to have
everything completed out the way and
then we move in
so basically residents can experience
full complete
infrastructure as they move into their
neighborhoods
and also that allows those developers to
also move quickly through their
developments and possibly move on to
other projects as well
again that's an item
that as
erica and don mentioned that's going to
be an item that we will discuss as we
move forward with the development
community with residents
again following those initiatives that
are already listed in elevate las cruces
because again this code development
is codifying
that vision from elevate las cruces
and that's what we're using to move that
plan forward basically we're saying
elevate was our vision that's how we
want to move forward
the development code and how we write it
with design standards that's how we get
there
okay thank you that's that's true this
is really important to hear because i
think well first of all i don't want
there to be
i'm sure none of us want there to be
tension between the development
community and the city right but then
additionally i don't want there to be
tension between residents and the city
because that
that's who residents will
turn around and point to and say hey why
isn't this finished why isn't this done
and so i think it's important to ensure
that
again there's accountability measures to
to make sure that neighborhoods are
complete as
you know residents deserve to have
complete neighborhoods
thank you chancellor thank you mr
cedillo
um actually maybe you should stay up
here the follow-up question to that is
about commercial
incompletion and we've got an email
today but i get emails all the time
about
what residents have very cleverly named
skeletor the building on main street and
amador
that has just been incomplete for
a decade maybe longer
and how do we avoid those kinds of
situations
with this code development update and
perhaps even address
lingering concerns around some of these
issues counselor bingo great question
i'm going to have to defer we do have on
the line
catherine harrison rodgers unfortunately
she couldn't be here in person today but
she is available by phone i am going to
defer to her but i do agree we do have
to have those mechanisms in place to be
able to address those concerns that not
only the community has but us as an
organization have as well too for
everyone to
just feel so i will go ahead and turn it
over to catherine at this point in time
thank you hopefully hopefully everyone
can hear me sufficiently thanks
councillor benkoma that's a great
question
um it's a problematic building i think
that there's some things that we can
look at as part of this code update for
those types of issues
i think it's something that we also need
to review um our building practices and
our building codes as well
um but yeah it's a complicated issue but
i do think that maybe in terms of some
timing provisions
or
um some rules about a vacant properties
and how long they can stay that way
those are definitely things that we can
cover but i don't think we're explicitly
outlined in the code diagnostics
thank you catherine for addressing that
and yes that's something that would be
really important for me
for this update to be addressed and
hopefully you all can look at it do you
know what building i'm talking about
yes i know exactly what building your
house yes
yes we all know even our guests no
yeah thank you catherine i appreciate
that i wanted to make sure i raised that
concern today not just for that build
definitely for that building because i
think it's honestly
such an eyesore for a part of town that
we are investing so much time and energy
and resources on for that still to
continue and so that it feels really
important that that be addressed and
then not happen ever again for sure
thank you all
um
i'll move on to a couple other questions
i had so recently census data thank you
david i think that might be it actually
i have a question for david you want to
stay
after you finished i was going to ask my
question along what you had asked well
go for it mayor because i was going to
move on to something else so david did i
hear you say that
that some of the developers
uh you gave me the impression that they
actually do have the means to complete a
subdivision but for whatever reason they
haven't yet on some of the things that
were lacking like the drainage and a few
other things
is that what i understood you to say
mayor there are some uh that do have
those abilities too now it every every
development is a little bit different i
was going to ask you is do we have a in
do we have uh ordinance in place or we
maybe we need to look at this to put a
lien on that other
land that they haven't finished to kind
of prod them to hurry up and get this
thing finished
because i can assure you if they have a
loan on that then the bank finds out
that we have a lien on there because we
jump into first position they will they
will really come down on that developer
to hurry you know they don't want that
lien on there and and then it'll force
them to finish that
mayor to my knowledge i don't think we
have an ordinance stating at that set
but what i will do is defer to catherine
to see if they have anything uh but i
don't think we have anything in place
right now
catherine
thanks david
so
this is sort of a complicated matter um
when we're sort of in the earlier stages
and a developer chooses to utilize the
letter of credit method
we do have the ability to try to draw
down on that letter of credit or pull
that letter of credit and finish
improvements
most of the issues that we've been
experiencing lately are towards the end
where it's really those punch list items
um
that are sort of lingering out there but
can really really add up and it is
problematic and in that case you don't
usually have a letter of credit that we
can pull on but i'm unaware of of any
ordinance that we have out there where
we can put a lien on a property um that
may be something that eagle can answer
i'm not quite sure
okay well that's perfect with him we'll
just look at we can do this another
meeting but i just was asking since you
were here we can look at the letter
credit first you know that's good that
would be easiest and then if we have to
default to some other means we can do
that so okay i i was just trying to
clarify for counselor ben cuomo and i
didn't know and then when i heard you i
thought this might be
something that we can talk about okay
thank you mayor
thank you
um i was going
my next couple of questions about our
growth so recent census data showed that
las cruces grew about 14
i'm curious how you're taking that data
into consideration as we move forward in
the development
code
um the 2020 census data has been coming
out
we have just started reviewing that as
it just came out last week or so
i think the important takeaways from
that is that the community is growing
and we need to continue to accommodate
the the growing
uh community over time and anticipate
that that will likely continue
thank you i
yes thank you i i would love to hear and
maybe not today but maybe from sonia in
the future or from any of you since we
have grown so much in the last 10 years
i would be curious to know
how many new parks got built in the last
10 years to accommodate the growth
unless you know that already that would
be great
i think that's a question yeah i do not
um the parks director made
thank you
while she's making her way down here
counselor i have to tell you i'll take
the fault for that structure because
in in 2019 you heard it here
i think i think you you barely just came
on board or 2020 we had a meeting and
all i remember just to jog your mind is
memory is you said hey don't touch my
my
uh
window tinter or something like that
okay if you remember that and and then
covet hit and so during 2020 i never
reached back out to the person we need
to reach out i just texted the person
who knows that owner
i'm going to commit to you something was
significant one way or the other in six
months great thank you mayor and my
window tinting guy moved so no worries
[Music]
hi sonia
good afternoon mayor members of council
sonia delgado director parks and
recreation councillor ben cuomo i don't
have that number with me right now but i
will get it and i will send that to you
thank you sonia sorry i made you walk
all the way down here for that i
appreciate that i think that will be
helpful information as we continue
having this park conversation which we
are also having in our tsi prc uh just
so you know as well um
my last few questions are just about
affordable housing and ensuring that we
are very very intentional about
um that being at the forefront as we
move forward
um
just to make sure that you know we're
including pieces in here about
streamlining processes and review
that process
for people who are for developers who
are interested in affordable housing
development especially within the city
because i think
i mean to be honest right that 14 growth
we can probably all
sort of guess where it where those folks
are living right and it's in the outer
edges of town which is good and and
they're beautiful development and
important
and you know as council vasquez was
saying it's so important for us to
continue to to
invest in affordable housing
developments within the city where
people have access to their jobs a lot
faster to transit to some of those
pieces right and so to me that feels
really important and i was reading
over the weekend around some of the
measures other cities have taken to to
make sure housing stays a priority in
code development around
easing height
easing height restrictions or density
district restrictions and
some in minnesota have gone even as far
as eliminating single family
uh housing i'm curious about sort of
where
you know in that line you're thinking
you'll fall
in terms of ensuring you know affordable
housing is prioritized
um well back on the the
minnesota example so yeah they they have
been in the news they are the first
major city to eliminate not necessarily
single-family homes but only
single-family homes so in any
single-family district you can do a
duplex or a triplex citywide so that is
an approach that they have taken
there are a number of different things
that the code can do
in terms of affordable housing like you
mentioned some of the
bonuses in terms of density or height
things like that
also
sometimes we have offered a
kind of a fast track development if you
provide
a
development concept consistent with some
of the city's objectives so one of those
objectives could be affordable housing
if you do affordable housing here's a
faster development review process or if
you do
a particularly
sustainable low impact development you
can also follow that track so that's
something that we could look at if we
wanted to to look for ways to
incentivize affordable housing
so the looking at the processes and then
also the the housing types like the
missing middle that we've talked about
those are the main ways that the code
would be addressing affordable housing
and of course it's a it's a big issue
it's addressed by a lot of different
approaches not everything is going to be
in the code but those are definitely
elements that we can be sure to look at
i appreciate that thank you so much yeah
when i read that about minnesota i don't
necessarily hate that i don't
necessarily hate eliminating only
single-family housing um to ensure that
there's more inclusion for
um housing unit and that it doesn't
concentrate any particular group of
people into
parts of the community right and that
it's it's a mixed beautiful mixed
community and i think the size of our
community is really
um great for that so to me that feels
really important as we move forward um
but i'll stop there mary
thank you so much for entertaining our
questions today
thank you we have mayor pro tem and then
counselor sword
thank you mayor thank you so much both
of you for being here and your work
and driving around our beautiful city
and we love it here and we want to make
sure that it's
you know accessible and equitable for
all people and so i appreciate the
my colleagues comments it really
has me thinking about some things but i
represent the historic district um and
so really concerned about you know a
group spent almost four years
um
developing this historic preservation
plan so i wanted to understand more from
your perspective how that is um how
you're weaving that into what's
happening today related to you know the
the
the code here
so in our in our code structure we do
have a separate section that we've
proposed for historic preservation and
we know that there has been
some recent efforts in that area and
you noticed probably on the scope slide
that we had at the beginning that was
more on the the minor review minor
alignment making sure that
we're not conflicting with anything
there if there's any other processes
that we need to streamline
that is the main involvement and there
are a couple of overlay districts that
we've looked at that
aren't necessarily zoning related
they're more historic preservation
related so as we are working on
streamlining some of the overlays some
of those may come out of zoning and
exist separately under a historic
preservation umbrella okay okay thank
you for that and then interested along
those lines lighting sidewalks all those
things are really important
in my district but
you see very little of that in in some
in some ways
like for example in the mesquite
historic district right and i hope
you've had a chance to
visit and walk around um and so
tell me very specifically what it in
terms of lighting because it piqued my
interest when you made mention of it i
saw it there tell me what that consists
of
yeah um thank you i'll i'll start and
i'll ask don t to add on so lighting and
sidewalks are
kind of a tricky issue in infield areas
as i'm sure you know a lot of the what
the code is looking at is new
development and whenever we're looking
at retrofitting existing areas
again if if they aren't really making
any changes to their property and
they're just existing as they are
they're grandfathered and we don't
typically require them to come in and do
any private improvements
in those cases it would be a city
capital investment to come in and and
make those changes unless they were
undergoing some kind of substantial
revision on the properties john do you
have anything to add to that i don't
think i can ask
that's exactly what i would have said
thank you thank you and then lastly
um your slide on sustainability
um can you talk to me
about sort of
i
wrote a bunch of notes but i can't seem
to find them related to that oh yes um
storm water water conservation
renewable energy
yeah yeah
how is that
being woven into our codes specifically
so you have several plans that are in
place today you have a water
conservation plan for example several
sustainability related plans so we've
been reviewing those as well as the
active transportation plan also plays a
role here as well
so we are looking at opportunities for
both
new construction and then also if
there's an option to retrofit existing
roadways where we can include some
drainage features like what you see here
in this picture where it's taking the
storm drainage and using that for
irrigation for
adjacent street trees
also for water conservation sometimes
that's things like just making sure that
we're allowing
rain barrels rain cisterns and where
those would be for both residential and
commercial properties how that water can
be used
renewable energy sources sometimes
zoning regulations will address
the presence of solar panels or wind
turbines how those
can be placed on a particular lot
street trees was a major major
recommendation coming out of both
elevate and the active transportation
plan
so we went to to look at that and also
urban shade i know that was an equity
issue that came up with the cool
corridors making sure that that is
something that's accommodated so we
would be looking at that and then lastly
the environmentally sensitive areas
those are the drainage areas and also
the hillside slopes so making sure that
the development that would be happening
in those areas is sensitive and
appropriate for for those conditions
so thank you thank you for that um so
where i see some of this stuff happening
retro
actively i guess is
um around our infield opportunities so
many of us on here have lots of
of that and so
is there um some you you made you made
mention of this fast tracking sort of
thing so that's what i'm thinking about
right when it relates to something like
this
um encouraging people to
to
build on infill and and then tying in
some of these things and incentivizing
um and that and so
what would be an example of something
like that i mean you see all across the
nation i'm sure you work in different
municipalities can you give me examples
about
something like that that has been
positive positively received by the
community sure um a lot of these
approaches that you see here can you
step further i can't hear you i'm sorry
i'm sorry
a lot of these approaches are on a
larger scale it's not necessarily for
one individual infill lot
so again that that focuses more on
new development rather than infill
development
but if there were individual upgrades
that were happening on a particular site
some of the examples of the fast
tracking
would be
administrative approval for certain
things that meet a
predefined set of criteria or
waiving application fees in some cases
which although that may not be
committed to in the code that would be
something that could be on the policy
level to help encourage
sustainable practices that would be on
an individual site
thank you thank you miracles for all my
questions thank you so much thank you
counselor
thank you mr mayor and thank you for all
the information you provided so far
um i'd just like to go over a couple
areas that are
uh of interest to me
um and it also adds to what's been
talked about of the council so far too
and let's begin with incomplete
infrastructure and complete subdivisions
excuse me as you put it
um
now i the electricity for each
parcel or lot that a house is going to
need is part of that
infrastructure is it not
it is okay
so
this would mean that
before a housing permit before somebody
can start
digging in the ground to build their
house
they would have to have
electricity as well as all the other
utilities and so forth in place ready to
use
correct
yes sir okay um i think we have some
situations where that's not being
happened
um that's not happening what about a
neighborhood park
would that be infrastructure that would
be necessary before we can
start building houses
i think that's something that we would
need to look at but typically
what i have seen is that the dedication
would need to be required would need to
be accomplished but the park may or may
not need to be fully developed it would
really
i think that the criteria still need to
be evaluated and so we'll have to we'll
have to get a little bit deeper into
into that discussion to determine what
the what the
benchmarks are
okay can that be one of the benchmarks
can we make it one
that would certainly be the city's
prerogative
okay
i'm going to put in a request right now
that that be one of the benchmarks
before we start building houses you get
all the utilities including electricity
as well as the park designated for that
subdivision
i mean either built or being built at
the same time
um there's a process in building a city
and i think we should follow that
process
and that's is this is one piece of it is
to have the subdivisions completed uh
their infrastructure completed before we
start building houses on it
i mean every subdivision i've known
with possibly one exception
possibly two
um there has been incomplete
infrastructure in this city and
i'd like to see that corrected as fast
as possible
so that's what i would request is that
we do that
as one of our first steps in adopting
the
comprehensive plan or the elevate las
cruces
another thing
in the same vein is parks
so how many
units does the city require
to uh or how many
how can i say this how many units does a
city
have that requires uh an acre of park in
this
in our pla and our codes now
um i i don't believe the city currently
requires any parkland dedication right
now um the city staff works to negotiate
with the development community but
there's nothing on the books this
specifically says what that requirement
would be so that's what we would be
proposing codifying okay so we could set
say like el paso has 100 units per acre
we could set that correct
let's do that next
okay okay um
uh
okay so and then i would like to comment
on the fact that
all the growth in this city is not on
the edges of the city there's not enough
growth in the middle granted but there
is growth in the middle too of the city
and some substantial subdivisions too
i'd like to show everybody here where
those subdivisions are
um they're within
i'll just say it's on this side of i-25
yeah i'll show you let me take you i'll
give you a tour
okay so that's all i have mr mayor
thank you
okay so we're going to be going to the
pnz
members here in a minute but counselor
in theory what you're asking sounds good
but in reality it'll be extremely
difficult we can have a work session on
it we take a look at it but what you're
saying is i think what i think what
you're trying to say is if a if a large
subdivision has been approved not just a
regular house a large subdivision been
approved that before houses start going
up if that if a park
because
let's say there's a hundred units like
what you're saying there there are park
impact fees or that they're supposed to
be paying towards and in the past the
city would
try to add up how much it is and then
figure out
with this kind of money what are we
going to do for a park
so i i think is what you're saying is
you want to see that
built first
but
you know because you made it sound like
any house that gives go gets built has
there has to be a park so
there's more to it than that and we have
to take a look at it but i think what
you're trying to say is if there's a
park supposed to be built
instead of it being built at the end to
have it be built at the beginning
and it's been done it's much like
moscato did in his development yeah i
hear you so bertie is done now okay i
think if we look at use that as a model
then we can take a look at it but that's
why i just okay okay thank you clarify
something there okay so now i'm going to
go to uh
our council member uh planning the
zoning commissioner so
chairman thomas did you have uh
something you'd like to add
okay i think i have to hold this down in
order to be able to speak so
that's a little complicated
commission a question that somebody else
asked earlier is is this happening
around the country
city's moving to form-based code and um
when i looked i found a lot of cities
doing forum based codes for particular
areas because there was a certain
context there that they wanted to make
sure they were dealing with
and so
i didn't find very many examples of
of
doing corn-based codes for a whole city
i think minneapolis is one i found and
maybe albuquerque did miami kind of
hybrid so
um can you give us a little overview
like this is how much is this happening
across the country and how is this kind
of approach you're suggesting what we're
seeing in most places or are there other
approaches
yes great question um so a handful of
communities have opted to do city-wide
form-based codes um there are not not
many
miami is the one i can think of that
comes to mind that it's generally
larger scale
more developed
cities that are in in redevelopment mode
that already have the urban fabric and
framework already
established there's not a whole lot of
green field development in those cases
but yes the the trend nationwide is
definitely moving toward more of what we
call a hybrid approach that is a mix of
the traditional zoning
that i mentioned with the the circle and
the square right and the transition to
the the form based so
the form base is typically used in
special areas so in this case and coming
out of elevate those are the
place type overlays
for for those special areas the town
center type areas
would be
more more appropriate for form based
so that chart that's on
[Music]
where you have the use zones and the
place types
so
before we go very much further one of
the earlier
next steps
can you flesh that out a little more so
we can kind of see
what kinds of place types you're
suggesting and what kinds of
zones um sure i'm sure you're talking
about this t-bar yeah and and my um
what i'm looking for is and i think it's
a lot of what you've been talking about
here is that this will not really affect
much new suburban
because it would be too expensive to
retrofit it and
that's probably not going to happen
you're primarily focused on new
subdivisions in it
but um
as councilman boxes brought up we're
very concerned about the older
neighborhoods around the downtown um
we've been studying uh both corridors
a couple of quarters that salon on
alpaseo and we would like as he was
saying those neighborhoods to be able to
have more uh commercial mixed in to have
this ability to do this uh missing
middle build wealth have a duplex those
kinds of things
will this so with what we're doing here
will that help that or do we need to do
something else
yes yes it will so um backing up to this
map this is from the the elevate plan
this is the development plan
and this is showing the different place
types and this is a
a long-range guidance map that whenever
a rezoning request would come in this is
something that pnc and council would
both be looking at okay what does our
comprehensive plan say that this you
should be in
or excuse me this land type should be in
10 years or 20 years maybe it's not
always appropriate right then but in the
foreseeable future so this is the the
guiding document and within elevate
each one of those place types those
categories from that map are shown on
this matrix along the left side of that
the vertical column
and in elevate each one of the place
type descriptions included a list of
appropriate zoning districts for that
particular place type so it's not
necessarily one to one this place type
equals this don't need sony district
there can be some some overlap in those
and
in this chart um this is something
that's still a work in progress but we
wanted to show our our starting point
and how the what the relationship is
between the place types versus the
zoning districts that they they are
different
so this is something that would be used
to consider if a rezoning request came
in is it consistent with the place type
that elevate identified for this area
and some of these we show them here with
the hollow circles so possibly
appropriate with conditions so
for example business park industrial may
be compatible with o2 zoning
so it may be compatible but may not so
maybe that's something that would be by
sup or it might require some additional
buffering
or a different
excuse me additional restrictions that
may go along with it
so one thing that we have talked about
different from from these really are
looking at the
overlay districts and i believe these
are all base districts right now so
the base district is of course the the
base every every area in the city has a
base district zoning assignment and then
the overlay districts are in addition on
top of that so they can add standard
sometimes they actually even remove
standards
or uses as well
and so what the overlay place types
recommendations look at is
in those particular areas looking at
some additional design standards and
those would be the the form-based areas
and so as i mentioned earlier about how
different cities are handling form-based
versus traditional
the traditional
approaches are more for
greenfield development is but how a lot
of cities are using them whereas form
based is more for infill so for your
question about
does this help with downtown and
allowing the flexibility in those areas
yes it does by relying more
on the forum and less about the the use
okay so you're going to use both the
traditional
and you're going to use them to in
parts of what's in the oven yes ma'am
okay um
on the phone the other day i think i
talked to you about the international
energy conservation
um
counselor
sword was asking about the completion so
there is um
there
was an ordinance passed for the city to
use the 2018 code but it's not been
implemented
and so
if it if it's implemented is that doing
the completion that it would include
that kind of electrification
of homes i mean what if a
developer wants to do a totally electric
subdivision with heat pumps and
then that means they don't have to put
in any gas lines so
um and these are some of the
conversations that are going on around
in the community
here and so i think we
that whole issue needs to be covered
somehow
i know it's not actually in land
development except
that they don't have to put in the gas
lines right sure yeah as you mentioned
that's not typically covered in the
development code specifically
in the diagnostic report we do have a
section for
items that aren't covered directly by
the diagnostic report but through the
input we've heard these great ideas that
should be carried forward we could
definitely add that to that list and
make sure that there's nothing in our
code that would prohibit that
but we wouldn't
really include the the adoption of that
code within the development code
it would be nice to make it an option
you know and there is a group of people
in the community and and people at the
university that are interested in this
and i can give you some more contacts if
you want for you know people
local people
to talk to um
and there's a similar problem with the
water conservation regulations you said
a lot of things about
um suggest or
but
i'm what i'm asking is are we going to
have to do
we need ordinances
to get some of these things included and
get them codified because
i didn't in the water conversation
regulations i don't know how much of
that has become ordinances or if it's
all just suggestions
so in our in our process we have been
working on refining
for green infrastructure in general how
much are we looking at
promoting and incentivizing versus
something that would be required
so
we're balancing that and it might be a
combination of those things
but water conservation would be included
within the code in some capacity
for things like reuse of rainwater for
irrigation for example
i think it would be useful for the
council to know
some of the things you're recommending
and then knowing if there are ordinances
or if
possible that's
some
council needs to consider and we need to
look at forward so
traffic impact analysis comes up all the
time
in planning and zoning and the people in
the community always want to have it
done earlier than it's done
and i don't know how to address that
it's what's the best time i think that
i think that we need to be aware that
that's a big issue for most people and
they want to see it done earlier i don't
know if
that's relevant to what you're doing but
it's an issue that we see all the time
yes so that that has certainly come up
as a key topic of discussion and as i
mentioned we have some other folks
helping on our team behind the scenes so
we have a couple of transportation
engineers who are helping us with that
and working with the city's
transportation engineers to make sure
that we're all on the same page about
the issues and the best practices for
that
we we can definitely update the
draft diagnostic to identify
specifically when in the process
the tiaa would occur
so something else that we talked about
the other day is that
i looked up the definition of parkway
and the city definitions and it parkway
means the space between the sidewalk and
the
and the street and you had this other
term median parkway
that confused me because that made me
think it was in the middle of the street
so
um
i guess i'm can we stick to the city
definition and leave the median up yes
yes we can okay i think
let's see what else are there
oh missing middle i wanted to say to you
in the last decade missing middle
there have been permits for
five duplexes
four triplexes and three four plexes
in the last decade
so i this is an area that i think is
going to require a lot of education
it's going to you know people are not
familiar with it they don't see it on
the ground
um we have one coming in and that's good
i think he asked for a four plex and now
he got it down to a duplex and so then
the
neighborhood was much more willing
to do it we have that example and it
the rest of us mostly single-family but
until we have that on the ground in a
lot of places and it's not familiar
and so we're going to have to bring in
examples and
help people understand them so i hope
that's going to be
part of the planning so i think i'll
turn it over now to
the other
commissioner who's here
thank you
my name is harvey gordon
first of all thank you very much for
your presentation i think it was very
thorough i think this has been our first
look
i think we have a little way to go yet
before we're going to be finished with
this
many years that i've been on the pnc
we've had many requests for zoning
changes
and i think that when we get into
at a later date when we get into the
specific
zoning areas we could probably deal with
a lot of thoughts that i have now in
mind
but tonight today rather i would have
just one concern it's not even a
question
and it goes along very similar to
catholic florence
that
i have in the past
been very concerned about when property
becomes and has been said non-conforming
and either due to either annexation for
example or
land taking or land swapping or whatever
land purchasing
uh people would be subject down to what
would be
the zoning requirement that they have
been put into that they didn't expect to
have when they were initially on the
property
and i think that we have to come down to
some kind of a reasonable conclusion
i don't know if grandfathering is the
solution
but something has to be done
to protect
the fairness to those people who have
now subjected to city law
where perhaps they in the past may have
been subject county law where the zoning
requirements are different
so
we can look at this in the future and i
don't want to deal with it at the moment
but this is a concern and i think it's
something that that you have to look at
especially when you get into the
specifics of changing zoning laws in
particular areas
other than that i think that
we've had a first look and this is very
very thorough people done a nice job
excuse me
and i'm looking forward to when we get
down further into the nitty-gritty
thank you
well thank you commissioner gordon i
appreciate that
uh councillors you had a closing comment
yeah
a couple in fact i got a question to
start with us when will we have our this
is for staff not for the consultants
when will we have the complete streets
ordinance ready to
take up
mayor councillor sorg we're still
working on that at this time we should
be bringing that forward here in the
near future
okay
um and also i would like to comment on
your slide i don't know what page is on
but the sustainability and green
infrastructure
um
that is something i would like to see us
do a lot more of i see
parkways and medians and other places in
the city here where we could capture
storm water to water our our
landscaping
across the city this picture here you
have on the side of the slide here is
is perfect it's
captured the water off the street runs
it right into where the trees are there
and the grasses and so forth
that is what we need more of and i see
multiple places across the city where
that's not being done
and it could have been and it's been the
last 10 15 years we've not
done it
thank you mayor
and councilor you bring up a good point
so depending on how long ago it was that
that type of
forward thinking wasn't apparent or
wasn't there so that's why this is
something that we should incorporate in
the future for future developments and
and how to encourage and really uh maybe
kind of
strongly encourage them to do what
you're referring to because i agree with
you
it'd be nice to be able to recapture all
that or reusable
it was over five years ago we right in
this chambers here was mentioned that we
were having we were trying to do storm
water capture i know but you said the
buildings were like 10 or 15 years ago
so
buildings well that's what you said the
buildings you said 10 or 15 years old
well the streets and new streets yeah
and then they're older ones too yeah
okay i thought you were talking about
the buildings because you know you know
like lead certainly buildings too but
mainly the streets i'm thinking and the
medians and parkways i i think all of
our new streets have storm drains don't
they david
for the most part and anything built in
the last five years
mayor anytime we do a reconstruction
rehabilitation project we analyze if
there's no storm drain system there we
look to implement stored drain features
on there so i think specifically what
counselor sword was talking to was the
green infrastructure and those are some
of those things that we're still looking
at how to incorporate based on the
specific location that we're at but on
new development if a new conte if a
developer comes in let's say they want
to build on a completely different area
of the of the city that is in the city
aren't storm drains required in in those
um
in that in that division if it's you
know a number of streets
yeah you're correct
okay yes counseling uh yes thank you mr
mayor i think what counselor
sword he's able to speak for himself so
if i'm in correct apologies but i think
he was calling he was addressing capture
i mean there's storm drains but then is
it capturing rain water
so that's the question
thank you
well it goes into the to the sewer
system and then it gets re
goes through its process depending on
what it is if it's no no no what's
specific on the page where it has
sustainability and green infrastructure
the first one is storm water retention
and reuse
we're reusing it we're not sending it to
the river
well some of that water i know we use
for our
water reclamation plant
is that what you were referring to no
no we put it put it where the trees and
other plants are growing in the
landscape
put their storm water there
capture that
instead of running down the street
ending up in a storm drain that ends up
in the river can someone speak to that
either david or or
erica
yes thank you so
yes the storm water currently right now
we have a storm drain system throughout
and as part of new development those are
the requirements that they capture any
excess runoff
and hold it
what we're i think what counselor sorg
is talking about is instead of sending
that water to a facility
through that drainage system is
incorporate and use that water to either
rate
retain it on any landscaping along the
roadway or
use it to divert it to other areas that
can supplement the growth of the water
use
where is that being done at all in the
city and if not is
are you aware what cities do that and
and is it costly or how does that work
just never thought about that
so
i am going to ask mr tony tavino to come
up here and answer that
he'll have a little bit more detail on
that thank you mr mayor this is mainly a
passive way to capture that water
it it just use gravity to channel it to
where
the landscaping is
and curb cuts to allow it to get in to
the median for example as one example
tony knows yes
good afternoon mr mayor commissioner
sorg uh you are exactly right
the
rainwater harvesting is a current
is an existing
uh toll method to capture the
the rain water however
for um
rehabilitation of existing roadways it
is quite tough due to the constraints in
the right of way but with new
development in new roadways when we do
provide these complete straights we will
have some room in the parkways as
mentioned or in the medians to harvest
this water
and
hold and maintain this excessive runoff
one of the constraints that we're dealt
with is the
is any water that is uh
created due to
an increase in impervious surfaces
from the historical runoff of each site
must be retained on site so all
uh current all um
commercial developments subdivisions or
any development must retain those water
on sites where they have those ponds
most of these new sites have ponds in
the front of the
of the property or in the back where it
retains the increase of the existing
runoff all existing runoff is required
to maintain its
existing direction path to the river in
our case is burn lake where our where
all our storm drain goes into burn lake
all of our
el molino our offal channel it all goes
to burn lake where it's retained
okay thank you for that tony thank you
counselor for those ideas and at least
we can take a look at that in that
okay so anything more on the
presentation
yes commissioner
thomas um thank you mr mayor i just want
to say when i tried to find a website
i just put in realize las cruces you
know with a space like you would when
you search on google and it never came
up i only it only comes up if i put it
in like it is in the address with no
spaces
i don't i think some people are going to
try to search through google and maybe
not find it and so
maybe you can fix that somehow
okay thank you yeah we will take a look
at that and then i think it's also it is
linked already on that on the city's
website as well but we will take a look
and see if there's anything we can do
about promoting that in the search
results
okay we're very good well thank you for
your presentation we appreciate the
update and
looking good so far
absolutely thank you thanks to our
members of the pnz for your input this
uh this afternoon so if there's nothing
further entertaining motion to adjourn
so moved second
motion made by councillor
is second by mayor pro tim gandanai
christine
this is on the motion to adjourn the
special work session counselor beta
stevie is absent counselor vasquez yes
councilman cuomo yes
counselor sore yes
counselor flotus
yes
counselor candidate yes mayor yes
okay we're adjourned it's 2 59 p.m give
us a couple minutes and then we'll start
our work session
[Music]
momentarily
i