CHARLOTTE PLANNING COMMISSION
Minutes
September 5, 2002
7:00 p.m.
Town Offices
Members
Present: Jeff McDonald, Chair
Jim Donovan
Gene Diou
Gordon Troy
Al Moraska
Members
Absent: Dave Brown
Josie
Leavitt
Martha Perkins
Officials
Present: Dean Bloch, Planner
Mr.
McDonald reconvened the meeting at 7:10 p.m. from a deliberative session
concerning the Hinsdale site plan review. (Deliberation session commenced at
approximately 6:00 pm.) He reported
that the Planning Commission agreed that they did want to offer comments on the
project and would discuss Dean Bloch’s notes at 8:15 p.m.
Steven
Brooks made the comment that some agendas as a matter of form start with the
first agenda item as the agenda itself.
Second, he suggested that an early item should be public
discussion. There should be somewhere
in the agenda where the public feels comfortable that there’s a place for them
to bring something up. This encourages
more participation, he said. Mr.
McDonald asked the Commission if they thought it should be added as an agenda
item. Eleanor Russell said that under
the open meeting law, it is actually required to have time for public
discussion. Gordon Troy suggested putting
in something at the end of the agenda, which would direct people to contact
Dean Bloch in advance of the meeting with any matters. Jim Donovan suggested replacing “Other
Business” with this.
CHAMPLAIN
VALLEY CO-HOUSING. A motion was made
to allow an extension of the six (6) month timeframe for the submission of the
Preliminary Plat Application. Mr. Troy asked if they submitted an Act 250
permit yet. Mr. Bloch was not aware of
this. Following discussion, the motion
was seconded. All were in favor and the
motion was passed.
SKETCH
PLAN LETTER - BEAN. Mr. McDonald asked for any comments on this
matter. Mr. Troy said that the letter
looked fine. Clark Hinsdale inquired
what this matter was about. Mr.
McDonald explained that the purpose of the letter to Mr. Bean was to summarize
the sketch plan review and whether or not it was necessary for him to meet with
the town septic person to determine if the land met the wastewater
requirement. Mr. Hinsdale asked if Mr.
Bean would have to pay a PRD fee, to which Mr. McDonald responded by saying
that a PRD normally requires two hearings, but you can waive that and Mr.
Hinsdale asked how small a lot he could make. Mr. Bloch said that under the PRD
regulations, there is no limit. Mr.
Bloch gave Mr. Hinsdale a copy of the letter to Mr. Bean. The Planning Commission unanimously agreed
that the letter was satisfactory.
BURNT
ROCK ASSOCIATES. Brian Shupe and Sharon Murray from Burnt
Rock Associates addressed the meeting.
Mr. Brooks asked the Commission to summarize their purpose. Mr. McDonald said that they were hired to
review the Town’s land use regulations and the long-term goal is to present
changes to the regulations to the Town on town meeting. Burnt Rock has made its
review with the intention of sharing their review and proposed suggestions with
the Select Board and the Zoning Board.
Ms. Murray said that when they normally do technical reviews, they
ensure that the regulations are consistent with the Town Plan recommendations
and the statutes. Ms. Murray walked
through their observations and considerations.
She explained that they looked at the statutory considerations (changes
in Chapter 117). They also reviewed
the format to make sure it was user-friendly (e.g.: easy for someone to
navigate through that was looking to get a zoning permit).
Ms. Murray said that with regard to the Town Plan, Charlotte has one of the
better Town Plans that Burnt Rock has reviewed. First, she looked at the Town Plan to see what the big issues in
Charlotte are because the Town’s goals should be reflected in the regulations. Lack of affordable housing is one. Mr. Moraska inquired about the guideline
and Ms. Murray stated that Vermont is not a home rule state so the authority of
the Commission requires it to be enabled by State statute. Mr. Bloch has a copy.
Ms.
Murray then talked about the maps in the plan, the existing zoning map and the
proposed zoning map and that they propose no changes in terms of areas. The Plan changes by district are summarized
in the table in the report. She went
on to say that currently the maps are the same but when the Town goes through
the process of updating its zoning districts, it may need to do a plan
amendment along with that to make sure they are consistent between the two
documents. She said that the Town could
just adopt the village master plan as an amendment to the plan but again to
make sure that they are consistent. She
said that the Plan recommends written boundary descriptions, but Burnt Rock
suggests that the Town not include boundary descriptions in the body of zoning
text and suggested putting them on the map or including them in appendices in
the back, because of their detail and length.
She went on to say that another option would be to put interpretive guidelines on the maps.
Ms.
Murray said a purpose statement is helpful in defining the character of the
area and making sure uses are appropriate for that district by looking at the
use list. For instance, the five-acre
minimum lot requirement is at odds with the goals of Town plan. Also, she noted that there should be a
distinction made between West Charlotte and East Charlotte because it was not
clear if they are to be handled the same way or differently. Mr. Moraska said that there is a committee
established to study this issue in operation right now. Ms. Murray noted that there are agricultural
issues within the rural district and there are four planning areas not defined
clearly enough to apply in a regulatory situation. She said there could be a separate agricultural district or an
overlay district. Currently, there are
no agricultural districts in Charlotte’s zoning. Another option would be to
consider setting a maximum lot size for a subdivision. Mr. Moraska asked if she meant to suggest
decreasing density to which Ms. Murray responded by saying that as parcel size
increases, the proportional number of units you could develop decreases. Mr. Shupe said that five acres may be land
consumptive and that large lot zoning has been used to protect farmland in the
upper Midwest. Mr. Donovan said that
the commission needs to look at separating lot size and density and look at
other means of keeping the five-acre minimum.
Ms. Murray said that was possible.
She
went on to note that the TDR needs to be more carefully defined and that it is
difficult to include the whole rural district in that. She suggested tightening it up at least for
the TDR program. It has a lot of
sending area and not a lot of receiving area.
Mr. Donovan said that he would prefer it being based on criteria and not
geographically.
Ms.
Murray next addressed the shoreland issues.
She suggested adding requirements under the subdivision or conditional
use review for a shoreline management plan.
The Shoreland Seasonal Homeland District (Thompson’s Point) is very
unique. She said that seasonal vs.
year-round needs to be clearly defined in zoning. A member from the Zoning Board present at the meeting (Harley
Allen) said that the State is overstepping its bounds as far as
reclassification of the wetlands, i.e.
maybe a certain plant is growing there this year because the area hasn’t
been mowed last year or the last five years and this certain plant makes it a
“wetland.” The options are not to
regulate and let the State do its thing or to regulate locally. The Town does not have to tie its
definition of wetland to the State’s definition, Ms. Murray said, and she
suggested to tie into the inventory base or site investigation.
Mr.
McDonald asked Burnt Rock to speak more about the overlay district as noted in
their review document. Ms. Murray said it overlays what underlying
land use might be specified for the geographic area and to apply it to the land
when it falls within the definition of the overlay zone. Mr. Shupe said that you can define them for
“view sheds” (as a example) where the view is along the ground or look at what
the view is, i.e. open land, etc. Ms.
Murray said that another option is to put basic design standards in the site
plan review but it is difficult to do with off-site projects. Also, you can define scenic roads and make
corridors defined easier.
Ms.
Murray noted that the uses mentioned in the plan are good. The member of the Zoning Board present
(Harley Allen) said that the present zoning regulations have permitted and
conditional uses. If it is not listed,
it is prohibited. Many people, he said,
have inquired of their board why a certain use cannot be permitted if it is
allowed in another town. He said that
they had an applicant that wanted to build a crematorium in Charlotte. They have been built in other cities, with
no odor, no sound and well-constructed, but because it was not permitted, the
applicant went to a neighboring town and Charlotte lost that potential
business. Ms. Murray said there are several options to this problem, but it
goes back to the statute, which says that if the Town is not allowing that use,
it is prohibited. There isn’t use
variance in Vermont, but under strict interpretation of Chapter 117, if the use
is not allowed in that district, it is prohibited and if the Town wants to
allow something, they need to amend their zoning and go through the process to
allow a crematorium, for example. For
high impact uses, Ms. Murray noted that it is not necessarily a negative thing,
because it provides public input. She
recommended to really reviewing the “uses” list to make sure that it includes
everything that they want to have in the Town.
Steven
Brooks asked, with regard to East and West Charlotte, when Ms. Murray had made
reference to them, he said that she had made a general characterization to the
tasks that needed to be defined and what that means in each case, and
specifically said that the Commission probably would want to talk to those
folks out there in the East Charlotte Village area. Mr. Brooks asked Ms. Murray what she meant by that. Ms. Murray
said that her interpretation is that the plan split them out based on the
master planning process and that there should be some input from residents of
West Charlotte. Mr. Brooks said that he
only went to that issue because “there are some fascinating dichotomies between
cultural and class characteristics.” He
also asked if there “were any tools available or mechanics that can be utilized
as far as encouraging or discouraging development, i.e. to the extent the
community embodies a vision of itself to maintain itself as a more rural, urban
community to the extent that that vision is present and embraced whatever it
might be and which of those tools in case of rural community do you recommend
to discourage development?” Ms. Murray
answered by saying that they have touched on that some already, but it depends
on specific circumstances. She went on
to say that first you have to define what rural character means to the
community and then once you do that, there are variety of tools depending on
how you define rural character, e.g. Hinesburg came to realize that they wanted
to be rural/residential and not a farming community, but still wanted
rural/residential character and that is different from an acting viable farming
community. Mr. Brooks asked if our town
plan is distinctive in identifying Charlotte or does the Town need to develop
the view more? Ms. Murray said that
Charlotte wants to be rural.
Ms.
Murray moved forward with the discussion of their review document and reported
that the Town has good, basic subdivision regulations. She explained that Traditional
Neighborhood Design or urban renewal is a concept of trying to create a village
pattern within subdivision regulations with interconnected streets and blocks
and a higher density development in those areas to create more of a traditional
village feel. There is a mandatory
provision for affordable housing (referring to State statute) and Ms. Murray
recommended the Commission to do background work before they go down that
road. Mr. Troy said there is a notion
that Charlotte hasn’t been pulling its fair share. Shirley Allen said that “inclusionary zoning has been in effect
for 7 or more years. How many
affordable subdivisions have been made in the town of Charlotte? Zilch.”
Mr. Troy said that it has been ineffective and needs work and that’s the
issue Burnt Rock is addressing. Mr.
Moraska noted that affordable housing should be next to town services when
built.
When
discussing the section of Facility Infrastructures provisions, Ms. Murray
cautioned the Commission about the language requiring a developer to turn
facilities over to the Town, especially with trails. She noted a recent Supreme
Court case that dealt with the trail issue requiring that a trail be dedicated
and the court said that it was not established how the trail particularly
related to the developer’s project.
Therefore, it wasn’t a proven relationship with the development and
facility.
Mr.
Shupe explained that Burnt Rock uses a checklist to perform their statutory
review of regulations to ensure that mandatory requirements are being met. He noted that there is inconsistency with
mandatory apartment requirements. The
State says that you have to allow for accessory apartments to be enclosed or
attached to single-family homes or limit to a handicapped relative. Also the maximum 650 square foot rule may be
low in this town because of the large size of many of its houses.
Mr.
Shupe said that he did not read every definition, but suggested that some terms
or multiple words that mean the same thing, i.e. block, parcel. He suggested putting all definitions in one
place. He also suggesting treating day care, churches, schools all as
independent uses and not “grouping” them.
Mr.
Bloch asked about allowing accessory permits and Mr. Shupe said that the Town
needs to allow a minimum, but could have different categories of accessory
permits.
Mr.
Shupe moved on to the Shoreland Seasonal Home District section and noted that
it was a complicated district. He
suggested that “ordinary maintenance” be defined because it is not clear
whether the Town requires a permit for certain things and he recommended an
administrative section which more clearly delineates projects such as dog
houses, new roofs, etc. The member
from the Zoning Board (Harley Allen) asked if the new State regulations for
demolition are superceding local ones to which Ms. Murray responded only for
on-site systems. He asked that if the
Town has current regulations that are stricter than the State’s, does it have
the option of keeping their current ones to which Ms. Murray said yes, for five
years. Mr. Bloch clarified that there is a community system at Thompson’s Point
and that the Town owns the land and that that district is basically a sewer
district.
As
regards to sign standards, the Town currently allows the zoning board to allow
them without any standard. Mr. Shupe
recommends tying everything to conditional use review and not subject to
variance requirements because variance is stricter.
Mr.
Shupe asked what triggered the three categories of home occupation
standards. He suggested that if the
Town wants to keep three tiers, to allow home occupation and allow some other
occupation defined as separate use and place review criteria and any other
standards in another section (i.e. outdoor storage as opposed to day
care).
Mr.
Shupe recommended that elderly housing be a defined use. Under Section 5.19, Mr. Shupe said that
principal structures are confusing and he recommends making a provision for
mixed uses. Under Section 5.20, he said
that if the Town is going to prohibit Champlain Water District, it should “just
say so.” He also suggested that it
would be a good idea to have a provision on temporary structures. Mr. Moraska asked him how he defined
“temporary.” Mr. Shupe said it would be
a structure used temporarily for a special event, wedding, etc.
Mr.
Shupe suggested that, under Section 5 – permits and approvals, he would like to
see spelled out what the user is going to need to know to not require him/her
to have the statute in front of them. Therefore, he recommends more detail on
application requirements, etc.
There was a discussion on how the two processes are
coordinated for approval (site plan first, then conditional use). Mr. Shupe said that the relationship between
the two needs to be looked at. The
Commission reported that there was a motion made on this issue at the last
meeting.
Mr.
Shupe said that the Town might want to consider a Development Review Board. Mr.
Troy said that it is important because so much of the subdivision regulations
as they exist currently are not as specific as they should be and it might be
easier for the Planning Commission to remand issues over to a Development Review
Board if such standards are more fully developed. The Commission agreed.
Mr.
Shupe went through the rest of the recommendations on the attached report and
he noted that the Town might want to restructure the regulations to make them
easier to read through by consolidating related district standards under a
separate section. He also suggested
doing more cross-referencing; rearranging chapter headings and creating more of
them to be more specific about what is included. Also, he suggested including more statutory language and defining
uses. He suggested folding subdivision regulations into zoning regulations to
allow for better integration between the two. He said that the rural district
standards are a bit vague and aren’t going to achieve as well if they had more
concrete standards in all of the districts.
He also suggested to be more explicit about what resources can be
impacted, i.e. farmland, cultural soils.
There is room for creativity in subdivision regulations, he noted.
.
Sylvia
Sprigg said that the issue in town is the big farmhouses in the non-village
district wanting to create apartments in them and they are not accessory
apartments, but existing apartments or an apartment, so that people can stay in
the houses (i.e. the house was divided into apartments), but has insufficient
land based and therefore difficult to do.
She asked Burnt Rock if they had any thoughts on this matter. Mr. Shupe
said that the Town’s use of historic structures is broad and has been extended
to homes and therefore, there could be a problem with density provisions. Sylvia Sprigg said that maybe a new category
could be created or the issue could be further addressed. Mr. Shupe said that they have a tool for it
(sending/receiving) that could be a way to deal with this certain house. He said that if the Town does that, there
could be a tracking system established and a density bank.
Sylvia
Sprigg expressed that a commercial use that was processing of an agricultural
product but not created on the property and was not a home industry and that
the Town has fairly limited commercial sites.
It didn’t seem to be addressing those kinds of businesses in the
community or allowing businesses that expand beyond home occupations to stay in
town, so businesses move to another town because they outgrew Charlotte because
they didn’t fit in the guidelines.
Jonathan Fisher said that this issue needs to be addressed in a
rewrite. He also said that “the Zoning
Board has effectively stopped granting variances or conditional uses on the
ones that are on the historic list which appears to be very arbitrary in
Charlotte and we’ve stopped giving any permits or approvals for anything that’s
listed as historic and it seems fairly arbitrary as to which ones are on there
and which ones are not so folks are upset because this changed a year ago (our
interpretation of the results changed), so that should be addressed and the
small structures. We did a findings last fall that was a result of a feud
between two neighboring houses in the Hills Point section– one acre lots with
big houses on the lake with same setback requirements almost the same as a
rural district – one guy piling up accessory structures as a fence and the
neighbors were suing each other and the Zoning Board ruled that accessory
structures even though they were under 250 square feet were still structures
and therefore anything (dog house rule) is a structure,” so as a board he feels
that that needs to be addressed, “to set parameters to have a school bus
shelter and some small structures but
as a board we’re caught with misuse of small structures.” Harley Allen said that a number of things
need to be taken care of; the Zoning Board has an “oops” book. Harley Allen also said that we need to be
more explicit as to what the Town really wants. Some people feel regulations are not being enforced, as they
should be, he added.
Steven
Brooks thanked Burnt Rock for a “terrific report.” He asked what is the follow-up work now and what is their
fee? Mr. Shupe answered by saying that
they did a review and the intent is to begin an update process and address
bringing zoning into conformance and which better implements the new Town
Plan. The follow-up task is how much to
bite off and what direction? The
Planning Commission would like to have something ready for hearing by November
to pass for the Select Board to get ready for town meeting. Mr. McDonald said
that a decision needs to be made in a couple of weeks. He said that the legal
issues would be corrected now and in a 2-year process, maybe do the whole
project. Mr. Brooks said that the
motive of his question was “why not engage them more and move this thing?” Mr. Troy thinks that the most logical thing
to do is to come back with a proposal of what they can do with different
scenarios (Plan A to have ready for town meeting day, Plan B would be to take
Plan A and move into the next phase which is the comprehensive rewrite or look
at Plan C, which would be to do the whole comprehensive rewrite and work out a
schedule and costing of it for town meeting day a year and a half from
now. Non-compliance issues are not as
significant. Mr. Troy thinks that it
would be good to work out a year and a half plan to rewrite this as a
comprehensive land use plan. Option D
would be to attack one part of it but that perpetuates what has already been
done.) Mr. Troy’s suggestion is for
Burnt Rock to come back with proposals as to what we should do next in a
variety of scenarios and then the Planning Commission would ask the Select
Board to fund the project. Eleanor
Russell said that she supports it and thinks it is a very important thing for
Charlotte and the Planning Commission has lots of other things that are high
priority. Mr. Donovan thinks that
the Planning Commission needs to talk more about how it wants to proceed
because in this recent scenario, the Planning Commission would be
requiring/asking Burnt Rock to perform the Commission’s work for free and it
needs to give Burnt Rock clear directive of what it wants. Therefore, Mr. Donovan said that he is
moving towards Ms. Russell’s suggestion of digesting it and then having them do
the whole thing. Mr. Troy suggests to
schedule a time at the next meeting to each come up with a suggestion or have
an email conversation between the Commission members and give direction to
Burnt Rock to give a proposal to do a certain scenario. Mr. Donovan said that if it gets past a
certain size, the Commission can no longer just hand it to Burnt Rock. Mr. McDonald suggested putting it on at 7:00
p.m. as an action item for the next meeting, and circulate comments by email on
this before the next meeting. Mr. Troy
told Burnt Rock that they will hear from the Planning Commission in the next
two (2) weeks. Mr. McDonald directed
Mr. Bloch to circulate a scope of work as well to the Planning Commission
members.
HINSDALE
REVIEW. Mr. McDonald said that there is not time to read
through the comments tonight, but said that it follows the site plan review and
the Planning Commission will put it on the agenda for September 19, at which
time a draft will be ready for distribution. Mr. Bloch asked when the
application would be complete. Mr.
Hinsdale said that he has to depend on other people to do parts of it, so it is
not completed yet. He said the Planning
Commission will have a draft of a proposed letter to Mr. Hinsdale offering
comments and a copy will be sent to the Commissioner. He said the Planning Commission decided tonight in closed session
that it would offer comments following the site plan review. Mr. Bloch came up with a draft of comments
and list deciding what they’re doing.
Mr. Hinsdale will comment to Mr. Bloch on his draft. Shawn Bedard clarified on page 3 of the
notes (#3), referencing that applicants install monitoring wells. He said that this was not factual.
VILLAGE
PLAN. Mr. Donovan asked the members present if the Plan was
fine with them. He said he received
some comments from Mr. Bloch, which he will incorporate. Mr. Diau asked if any
comments from Burnt Rock would be incorporated into the village plan to which
Mr. Donovan and Mr. Bloch both answered “no”.
Mr. Hinsdale asked if the Planning Commission had completed the plan and
Dean Bloch answered that it was very close.
The goal is to have one for September 19 for public distribution, Mr.
Donovan said. One will be passed out
and scheduled for comments on September 19. Text and plans don’t necessarily
directly support the zoning district that they talk about and Mr. Donovan asked
if the Commission wants to do any modifications to them or leave them. Mr. McDonald said to leave them. Mr. Bloch asked about maps and septic
areas. He will clarify where
information is and he will make those small modifications. Mr. Donovan said that, because he doesn’t
have all the information, the information he will put in is the septic
information that CEA knows about.
BURNS
PROPERTY. There is no meeting set up currently. Eleanor Russell told the Planning Commission that Charles Burns
directed her to tell them to go ahead and schedule a meeting. She said she doesn’t think they have had the
meeting. Mr. Moraska said that they did
want to get something going in the middle of the week.
MINUTE-TAKER
DECISION. It was decided by the Planning Commission to wait until the next
meeting to decide on this issue.
OTHER
BUSINESS. Mr. Brooks
asked if the Select Board has asked the Planning Commission to ask the Zoning
Board to send enforcement letters to out-of-service dry hydrant
violations? Mr. Donovan said no. Mr. Brooks also noted that the Planners’
notes are available on the bulletin board and copies are available if someone
comes to the office. He asked if they
may be available by email, to which Mr. McDonald responded that they can discuss
it and Mr. Donovan said that they would take it under advisement.