Thread by @shayshinecastle

OK, we're onto the discussion about land use changes as it relates to the opportunity zone development ban. First up are the business commercial zones.

I might actually be confused about that. This appears to be a discussion about all the zoning districts within the opportunity zone.

Staff is suggesting creating a new use category: Limited. Basically, it would be uses that weren't straight-up allowable by-right, but have only one standard deviation from allowable uses and not require a conditional review by staff.

Good time to review that there are a few categories for use, the big ones being: Allowed, Conditional, Use Review, and Prohibited

Allowed means you can just build it; only need a permit or biz license
Conditional needs a staff review to get permitted
Use Review typically requires public notice and potentially planning board OK
Prohibited = you can't built it. Duh.

In industrial zones, staff is recommending allowing retail use by-right, provided they are 2,000 sq ft or less.

In Business Zones: Efficiency units would become Allowable uses; residential would be banned from the ground floor UNLESS all the affordable housing was provided on site. Office uses couldn't be more than 25% of the site, again, unless afford housing was on-site; then 50% office.

Also, financial institutions would be now allowed on the ground floor downtown. Finally, Boulder pursuing its bank ban in a more permanent way.

In residential and mixed-use zones, staff wants to prohibit single-family homes in high-residential zoning districts and mixed-use zoning districts.

Also, offices could be prohibited from residential zones, too, if council wants.

Young is the first to bring up efficiency units, which PLAN earlier said they weren't a fan of.

Right now, if more than 20% of the units in a project were efficiency, it requires use review. Staff is suggesting making them completely allowable. No use review.

If it was a big enough project, it could trigger site review. But theoretically, a project could be 100% efficiencies and be built by-right.

Max size for efficiency is 475 sq ft. I could live in that. Easily.

Technically, I live in 1/3 of 1,100 sq ft, so 366. But I also have a garage that I use approximately 1% of, so there's that.

I think Young is suggesting that efficiency units could move into being a limited use, with some ties to affordability.

Jones just said "when-ish"and I'm a big fan of this word

I'm having trouble following what council is talking about now. Something about retail in neighborhoods. Morzel is rambling; staff clearly having difficulty following along as well.

Young hitting on PLAN's other talking points: Personal use in mobile home parks. What are some examples, she asks?
Staff: Establishment that provides personal services: bike repair, hair salon, laundry, massage, etc. Staff is recommending moving that to a prohibited use.

Jones: Why are we doing that?
Carl Guiller: There's a policy in the plan about protecting mobile home districts from other uses. There could hypothetically be a personal service biz that displaces a mobile home.

Morzel: Yoga, massage, etc. all happens in my single-family neighborhood. Why not in mobile home parks?
I think the answer is that if you live there, it's still allowable. You just can't replace a mobile home with a building where the primary function was not residential

Quite a few moments being devoted to the bank ban: Recommended changes would not allow financial institutions on the ground floor in the downtown and Business Main Street districts. Except with a use review.

Jones: "I always get in trouble for championing this issue, but I think we have a plethora of banks. … They would be much better (as) second-story uses."

Morzel asks if there can be requirements for efficiency units to be affordable, echoing Young.
Karl Guiler, senior planner: It's possible

Moving quickly through council feedback:
Cool with the creation of a new use category, Limited
OK with restricting where offices can be to "mitigate the jobs:housing imbalance"... except for Brockett, who wants to exclude the 29th Street area from that. (Folsom to 30th ish)

Weaver: We want mostly retail there. Do we want to allow that to convert to office? I think no.
Brockett: As proposed, I think it's too restrictive. (At 25% office)

Sorry; I'm not sure that made sense. Essentially, office uses would be capped at 25% of the total building size in those business areas.

OK, back to council as a whole feedback:
Regarding efficiency units, council seems to want to make them a Limited use, which would allow them without a use review if a certain % of them were affordable.

They're haggling over what % now. They're currently allowed if fewer than 20% of total units (or square footage; I can't remember which) are efficiency. Some council wanted to stick to that.
Jones: We say smaller is better; but we're not incentivizing that.

Brockett: Fewer, larger units just contributes to our affordability crisis.

Weaver: I think we don't want ppl building a whole bunch of efficiencies and wiping out ppl living affordably now in bigger units.
Brockett: But isn't that a demolition question?

Young: I do think it has implications that have not been vetted.

Council members not budging on efficiency units.
Carlisle: Just bc it's smaller doesn't make it more affordable.
Jones: Yeah but if it's bigger, it's *really* not affordable. We're not being consistent. It's not the size; it's the demolition we need to address.

Moving onto disallowing single family in high-density districts: Council appeared to be OK with this until staff said there are a few single-family homes on the Hill, so this change would incentivize creating more, smaller units there. Now council is pausing.

So council might be OK with that, but exempt the RH zone on the Hill

Council also good with not allowing ground floor housing in business zones and transitional zones.... except for Brockett. "It's discouraging housing. We have a housing crisis. It goes too far."

Actually, Morzel, too: "I'd like to see housing in BR-1." (Business Regional) "A lot of BR-1 is one story."

OK, jk, maybe....? Fuck, who knows anymore.

Young is agreeing with Brockett to allow housing on the ground floor. "That's, by the way, where Macy's is, and we're trying to get housing on the ground floor."

Morzel jumping on board, too: "When I go down Hotel Row (makes a little scoffing noise) I would prefer to see apartments there."

Weaver referencing 29th Street apartments: They have dwellings on the ground floor and it's not the end of the world.

Jones moving us along.

Brockett always wants to consider allowing small restaurants (under 1K sq ft) in industrial zones.

Council cool with that.

Brockett also revisiting the suggested ban on office used in all residential zones. "I think small offices should be allowed." It creates walkable neighborhoods, live/work opportunities, etc.

Weaver: In downtown RMX zone (Whittier, where he lives) that's "fought long and hard" against offices. So I don't want it there.
Carlisle: Same thing with west Pearl.
Jones: So do we need to protect those?
Sure, council agrees.

OK, we're wrapping this. Please unroll, @threadreaderapp