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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes CC - 11/08/2010 - 11-08-10 W.S.Mins (Migrated from Optiview)Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 1 of 12 This summary is provided as a convenience and service to the public, media, and staff. It is not the ,m, intent to transcribe proceedings verbatim. Any reproduction of this summary must include this notice. Public comments are noted and heard by Council, but not quoted. This document includes limited presentation by Council and invited speakers in summary form. This is an official record of the Milton City Council Meeting proceedings. Official Meetings are audio recorded. The Work Session of the Mayor and Council of the City of Milton was held on November 8, 2010 at 6:00 PM, Mayor Joe Lockwood presiding. Council Members Present: Councilmember Karen Thurman, Councilmember Julie Zahner Bailey, Councilmember Bill Lusk, Councilmember Burt Hewitt, Councilmember Joe Longoria, and Councilmember Alan Tart. Mayor Lockwood: • Work Sessions are an informal setting to update Council on business items. • No votes will be taken during these sessions. • There are six (6) items on our Agenda tonight. • Public comment is allowed that is germane to an Agenda Item. • If you wish to speak you are required to fill out a comment card and turn it into the City Clerk staff. ,... • Public comment will be allowed for a total of 10 minutes per agenda item and no more than 2 minutes per person. • Public comment will be heard at the beginning of each Item. • Once the item is called, no other comment cards will be accepted. City Clerk Gordon read Agenda Item #1. 1. Introduction and Discussion with Group Representing Milton Equestrian Community. (Presented by Jack Flowers and Laura Bentley) Chris Lagerbloom: • I was approached a month ago by a group that wanted to represent the equestrian community. • This is not a committee that has formed from the city. • This is just a group of citizens that have come together to represent the equestrian community. • Jack and Laura have started this initiative. • Tonight they are here to introduce themselves. Jack Flowers: • Laura and I are both active in the equestrian community. • We have discussed amongst ourselves how to bring the horse community together to benefit ,.�. Milton and ourselves. • After a year of discussing this, we teamed up and were able to get a solid group together to be a „�.. part of this. • We have had one meeting so far and I believe that we are off to a great new start. Laura Bentley: Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 2 of 12 • We met as a group to become organized to start to lay the groundwork to see what this equestrian group wants to be. mod • We got a feel for where the group is going. • In the packets that you all have are the minutes from our first meeting and the agenda from what we have discussed. • Chris thought it was relevant to our introduction to state what the feel of the meeting was. • Sometimes we would like to shed some light on the horse community. • Horses are boarded here in a 12 x 12 box stall from 1,000 to 1,200 a month. • To become more horse friendly, we could teach awareness. • The first meeting we talked about land use designation for equestrian use. • We would like to help make properties more equestrian friendly. City Clerk Gordon read Agenda Item #2. 2. Presentation and Discussion with Liz Hausmann. (Liz Hausmann) Liz Hausmann: • Thank you for inviting me out to tonight's meeting. • I am happy to see that you have an active community out here in Milton. • I used to work on the City Council for Johns Creek. • I want to help the city in any way I can. • Water is one of the key issues that we face and I believe it is important that we work at this. Mayor Lockwood: • I just wanted to say congratulations and I am excited to begin working with you. Councilmember Thurman: • The decisions you make in Fulton County really affect our citizens here in Milton. • Congratulations and we look forward to working with you. Councilmember Lusk • We look forward to working with you. Councilmember Hewitt • We appreciate you coming on board and we look forward to speaking with you in the future. Councilmember Tart: • Congratulations Liz. City Clerk Gordon read Agenda Item #3. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 3 of 12 3. Discussion on Milton's Strategic Plan Process and Design. (Presented by Frank & Alysin Foster, The Centre for Strategic Management) Alysin Foster: • The purpose for our presentation tonight is to announce the beginning of the strategic planning process. • We want to be sure that you are informed all along the way. • We want to make sure you have key opportunities to react and respond. • The strategic planning team is comprised of members from the administration as well as members from the community. • We believe any plan for the City should be represented by the key holders of the City. Chris Lagerbloom: • As we tried to put together our core team we looked to some department heads. • We elected to get a representative from the Board of Education as well as members from our community. • We have the Assistant from the new Milton High School, Cliff Jones. • One of our key stakeholder members is Jack Flowers. • Representing the business community, we have Jimmy Carter who is the managing partner at Milton Cuisine. • Mike McAlpin is a resident of Milton representing the residential community. Alysin Foster: • On the internal staff, we tried to get a mix of both operational, administrative, and support so that we can bring all three perspectives to the planning table. • There will be other people involved. • We may have a situation where we need to ask a subject matter expert to come and join the conversation. • Those folks will be there for the purpose of providing their perspective. • You can see the time commitment has been decided to do half day meetings. • To keep the momentum going, we will be doing them every two weeks or as frequently as they need to happen. • The official start date will be November 17th 2010 through April 2011. • We think that the timing of this couldn't be more perfect for the city of Milton. • You don't want the budget to drive the direction of the project, you want the direction and the desired outcomes to drive and inform your budget. • In the lower part of the document, we have set a few dates and talked with the staff for dates. • Starting tomorrow we will be doing one on one time with each member of the team and we hope to have those conversations with the community representatives. • It will help inform and expedite the process is to hear a little bit about what is believed to be critical issues for the city of Milton in the future. • There will be an orientation on November 17th. Councilmember Tart: Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 4 of 12 • Thank you to everyone for volunteering for this project. • Can you speak to how those community representatives were chosen? Chris Lagerbloom: • The Board of Education seemed like a natural fit since it was our largest High School. • With the equestrian community, we went to someone that has represented the equestrian community that was a council appointee. • We had a great discussion with the President of the Milton Business Alliance with who would make a good selection from the business community and Mr. Carter rose to that level. • As a Milton Citizen, we tried to find someone who was a Milton Citizen who could represent the residential community who 1. Had a history of doing this type of work. 2. Someone that could represent the community on a more neutral basis. Mayor Lockwood: • Chris and I were on the same page when it came to selecting these individuals. Councilmember Tart: • Are we confident that Mr. McAlpin will represent the common interests of the citizens that are in the Highway 9 area in addition to those who are more central and in more rural areas. Chris Lagerbloom: • I have a high level of comfort with who we selected for this project. Mayor Lockwood: • As you work with these individuals, feel them out and see if it works. • If you start to sense that we didn't select the right person as we go along with this, let someone know. Alysin Foster: • One of the things we have here is the parallel involvement process. • At key junctures, the team will actually take the product out to the stakeholders to make sure we are on the right track. • We will be collecting input throughout the project. Councilmember Zahner Bailey: • Are these meetings open meetings? • Is the public invited to attend? • From a legal perspective, are we advertising the meetings? • How is this going to ducktail the comprehensive plan that we have for Milton? Chris Lagerbloom: • We will probably have both styles of meetings. • Some will be working meetings and some will not even be in this building. • We will probably get the bulk of the earlier work done if we don't have a room full of people. • This is in no way intended to be done privately. • There will be plenty of opportunity for the public input. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 5 of 12 • 1 don't believe, legally, they fall into the open meetings. tafto • This is more of an extension of the staff. Alysin Foster: • There needs to be a linkage between the strategic plan and any other plan in the City. • This would include comprehensive, transportation, and any other plans so that they all support each other. • A previous city had a document that linked all of the plans they had done before and that information will be provided to the strategic planning team so they can readily see where the links are and they are all in support of each other. • We will work with some core pieces and then get feedback while making this plan. Councilmember Thurman: • What do you expect to have for us going forward and will it cover 2012 to 2015? Alysin Foster: The final document will have the values, measures, core strategies, strategic action items primarily. Most of the cities that we have done so far has been about 40 pages but that is mostly for the people that have the appetite for that amount of data. There can be abbreviated versions for other audiences. City Clerk Gordon read Agenda Item #4. 4. Presentation of the Status of the City of Milton Highway Design Guidelines Document by the Highway 9 Design Guidelines Committee. (Presented by Highway 9 Design Guidelines Committee) John Bratten: • I am a member of the committee that has been working for the last couple of years on the Highway 9 design. • We wanted to capture the character of the City so we took our time to think through guidelines so you know when you're in Milton. • It was a great committee to work with and a great mix of business and residential citizens. • We started in March of 2009 and proceeded to today. • We did a preference survey where we spent time taking pictures and looking at the design element that we liked. • Staff created a template of what we needed to know to help jump start our process. • We wanted an overall picture for this assignment. • We wanted this to be a unifying document as well that covered all of Milton. mom Matt Cherry with Urban Collage: • I'm a landscape architect and with me today is my colleague Eric Bosman. ftkk , • Eric helped work on the plan with me. • We worked with City staff and the committee for the past 6 months. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 6 of 12 • We were hired by your city staff to decide where the buildings go, where the parking is in om relation to the buildings, and what it feels like as a whole. "" • The easiest thing is to skip to page 13. • This is where we picked up with your staff and your committee. • We have 3 character areas such as commercial such as the Wal-Mart area and another more near Bethany that is more of a neighborhood commercial area. • Then we have a non-commercial area that is mostly residential with some other things in there. • The last thing is secondary areas and those are the side streets. • The other part of the fundamental question was more technical. • Since this is a state route, everything you can do hinges on the speed limit. • The GDOT has specific instructions as to what can be on the side of the road near a traveling lane. • If you can lower your speed limit to 35mph from 45mph, you can place vertical elements such as lights and trees along the side of the travel lane. • If you cannot change the mph to 35, all of your vertical elements are on the backside of the sidewalks. • Our recommendation is changing it to 35mph. • Secondary streets are not state routes so we can put things closer to the curb. • This is meant to be a flexible document and be able to have a variety to multiple scenarios. • You can use this document if you change the speed limit or put in bike lanes. oft • As far as outside furniture, we decided on something that has more of a traditional tone to it. • We worked with Georgia Power on recommendation for wattage for which would be better. %so • Staff came up with ideas for fencing and we worked with our landscape architecture on ideas for street trees. • We had a lot of conversations about informal planting and discussed how you would put it together. • We provided a list of plants that are more low maintenance and are common in Georgia. • This guideline is made to be very flexible. • If you are not able to reduce the speed limit, we can swap out the graphics and have a backup plan. Robyn MacDonald: • The remainder of the packet is more self explanatory. • We want all of this work to be a big part of our development of State Route 9 area. • It is going to be ongoing development and redevelopment and that is the goal to implement it. • We had a lot of comments and concerns and we are trying to take it all into consideration. • The guideline will be available on the website when it is complete under the Community Development department. • The Community Development Department is the overlooking department for this development. • When people come in with new buildings and ask for the requirements this will be a great tool to show some of our guidelines. • It shows a great pictorial of what we would like to see here in Milton. • We see some of the guidelines changing based on the recommendations that are coming in. • The next steps will be to implement some of these design ideas. • I am going to cite each page for our new requirements and/or guidelines. • On page 6 we have access. 60r Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 7 of 12 • Internal access and rear service drives should be designed to join together existing streets and to afro connect adjoining properties. Vehicular circulation between parcels should be encouraged by inter -parcel access in order to minimize traffic on streets and to encourage pedestrian traffic between parcels. • The public works department encourages inter -parcel access and sometimes zoning may require it. • The staff believes that the secondary way to get back and forth between places is important. • Urban Collage also spoke about building placement. • We talked about building placement as a committee in general and through the visual survey, we saw the places we really liked. • To produce more of a "town feel" we would need to bring buildings closer to the street. • On page 7 of the document, we have pictures of the different placements based on the square footage of each development. • For parking and paving, onsite parking shall be located to the side and rear of the building when buildings are located close to the road. • Newly developed street shall be designed to accommodate on street parking. • We should try and minimize the amount of impervious paving materials used. • The committee felt that the black for the furniture and the lighting was appropriate. • We don't want white or red fences but we do want variety in the scheme of the fencing. • We encourage all color pallets to be within in a scheme. • For the amenities, we decided that for developments over 75K square feet, we would like them to provide and furnish amenity areas such as pocket parks, plazas, public art, and public recreational trails. • We are proposing to create a subset of the state route 9 overlay district. • Specifically we have had issues with architectural treatment. • We want to be able to business friendly and not make it difficult for people to develop areas. • We anticipate starting on this as soon as possible. • We did not specifically speak to conservation areas. Councilmember Tart: • I am very pleased with this document and the recommendations. • I noticed that the streetscapes are largely based on reduction of the speed limit. • How likely would it be for us to be able to reduce the speed limit from 45mph to 35mph? Chris Lagerbloom: • The difference between our discussion tonight and our prior discussions is that the prior discussions were more about whether or not we lost our ability to enforce on a road that we could actually reduce the speed limit on. • I don't know that we have that luxury on highway 9. Carter Lucas: • Just like any other road that we look at actually, they would look at it from an engineering standpoint and whether or not the road would support a lower speed limit. • They would look at the rates that traffic is currently driving and if you would be able to reduce it or not. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 8 of 12 • My experience with them in the past on Highway 9, we have not been able to reach that threshold. • We were able to get it from 45 to 40, but not down to 35 on other sections. Councilmember Lusk: • What affect will the completion of the new high school have on the speed limit on highway 9? • What will it take to modify our requirements for parking? • I feel that we have too much parking for stores. • I would like to see more discussion on this. Carter Lucas: • None at this point. Councilmember Hewitt: • What is the process of going through and changing the name of state route 9 in our area? • I think it would help brand this area a bit more. Robyn MacDonald: • We did discuss this issue but we didn't come up and settle on a name. • We did feel like Highway 9 doesn't give us the type of branding that we wanted. Lynn Tully: • The parking issue is part of a much larger subject. • Some of the latest in parking is not specify anything about parking. • Allowing flexibility in a range of parking is more feasible such as shared parking. Councilmember Zahner Bailey: • I would like to ask that we revise our big box ordinance. • I think the big box ordinance that we have currently is one of the largest impacts. • I hope the discussion on impervious surfaces comes up sooner than later. • I think we should encourage more environmentally friendly changes such as green roofs etc. • When would you want any suggestions from Council as you finalize the document? Robyn MacDonald: • The next 15 to 21 days would be ideal. • Lynn and I are working on making a resolution for some time in December. Councilmember Thurman: • Even in parking if it is behind the building, we should require islands with trees in the lots. • I like the idea that the fencing is not completely standard. • I think we need to find a way to reduce the parking for buildings so that we don't have over parking. L Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 9 of 12 City Clerk Gordon read Agenda Item #5. 5. Discussion on Traffic Signal Mast Arms. (Presented by Carter Lucas, Public Works Director) Carter Lucas: • Mast arm for traffic signal use requires Mast arms, when used, shall be GDOT standard galvanized steel not of a decorative nature. Decorative mast arms will be reserved for overlay districts and consistent with design standards as outlined in the overlay district. • Do we want to move forward to the revision to the code and the design standards to identify a specific type of mast arm to be used throughout the city? • I would prefer that we standardize the equipment that we have. • Currently, we have 14 signals throughout the city. • We have five signals that are the span wire type. • We have one galvanized steel pole. • We have four Painted/powder coated. • We have wooden poles. • We have four decorated mast arms currently. op.- • If you were to look at the costs on these: Span Wire $120,000 - Galvanized Steel $165,000 +$45,000 Painted/Powder $175,000 +$55,,000 Coat Steel Decorative $215,000 +$95;000 Councilmember Thurman: • Personally, I like the decorative. • I think that we spend a lot of time at those lights and the difference between the galvanized steel and decorative would be worth it. Councilmember Zahner Bailey: • I think it does make a statement and it's a great way to separate Milton from surrounding areas. • Sometimes these mass arms are shared expenses. • I would support having a standard pole. *00 Councilmember Lusk: • I think the span wire has use in some locations. • It's in the mast rather than in the arm when it comes to the difference between the Painted Powder Steel and the Decorative. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 10 of 12 • We're looking at $40K difference to have the fluted look. mam • I sit at these intersections and I don't care what they necessarily look like. • I would like to see the incremental difference in price when putting the skirt and light on etc. • Maybe we can do the powder coated as the standard with overlay areas using decorative. Carter Lucas: • The decorative pole that we have in storage have the light on top. • The other mast arms are just the black that don't carry the light. • The skirt runs around 5k for the four mast arms for each intersection. Councilmember Longoria: • I would like to see what it would come to be and how much it would cost to revamp all of the lights and when we add new lights in. • Will this amount affect our budget? Councilmember Tart: • I would go for more of the black or decorative lights. • In the internal areas maybe do the powdered steel and black. • I've heard that the galvanized steel mast arm is not what we want to see. Mayor Lockwood: • Maybe we should make them all black. • The ones in the overlay areas go with the decorative with the lamp. City Clerk Gordon read Agenda Item #6. 6. Further Discussion on RZ10-04 — Approval to Amend the City of Milton Zoning Ordinance to Create a Required Distance for Convenience Stores and Service Stations from Residential Uses/Zoning Districts within the Northwest Fulton Overlay and State Route 9 Overlay Districts (Chapter 64, Division 5 and Chapter 64, Division 6). (Presented by Lynn Tully, Community Development Director) Lynn Tully: • We discussed potential buffers from residents and gas stations. • We were asked to go back and figure out additional direction to find what we are looking for. • The more we looked at it, we realized there are many ways to go with this. • Based on this list, we are still not narrowing it down to what it is that the Council is trying to protect. Mayor Lockwood: • Is this really an issue of picking one use or are there several uses? • How do we pick convenient stores and put the requirements on versus a dry cleaners or something else? • I would want to see what other cities and jurisdictions do. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 11 of 12 ,a,,,, Councilmember Thurman: • I think one issue is that we have some parcels that are zoned something other than commercial that are in the middle of a commercial district. • It makes it complicated when you have to look at restrictions as to what is adjacent when it is clearly in the commercial area. Councilmember Zahner Bailey: • I think it comes back to buffers relevant to residential uses. • I think there are certain uses that have a greater intensity of uses in proximity of the residences and it wasn't enough. • I think it's not to say that you can't have a residence next to a C 1 area. • I think we should look at a larger buffer between convenience stores and homes. • How do we increase the buffer for places that have higher use of traffic or hazardous materials, per resident's definition? • I like the idea to look at other potential uses. Councilmember Lusk: • I really haven't come to a clear decision on this. • I feel like you're not able to please everyone. +^ • I don't feel like we can make a standard setback. W Councilmember Hewitt: • If we were to go with something, whether it changes our buffer or not, but I feel that there might be some confusion with the definition of the buffer. Councilmember Longoria: • I have spent a lot of time thinking about this and I still haven't come up with a definition to explain the complexities of it. • All I know is that when we listen to the citizens that live the closest to the property such as this, they had issues with what they were going to open their front door to. • The problem in putting that into words and making that into our ordinance is a significant one. • I believe it is a complicated issue but I have no idea how to make the language work. Councilmember Tart: • It is a challenge. • The citizens seem to be pretty absolute with wanting there to be certain uses with buffers. • We haven't been presented with some other kind of use that has citizens have objected to. • The biggest concern has been the gas stations or convenient stores. • I think the issue does go further than just gas stations but we haven't been in that situation before. ""'""'"' • I think it does go back to the intensity of use for most people. • If we could look at other municipalities and see how they dealt with something like this, it would be helpful. • I don't want this issue to die but I don't have the answer. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 8, 2010 at 5:30 pm Page 12 of 12 • I think we need to continue to look at this issue and see if there is something we can do such as la enhancing buffers between certain high intensity uses and residential. Ken Jarrard: • I know this issue is a challenge. • At the end of the day, this is a planning decision. • I think the context had to do with adult entertainment, you do have to accommodate it in the City or in the jurisdiction to some regard. • I don't think these sorts of businesses will fall within these protective classes. • I want you to have a reason why you would be singling out a convenient store or service station and imposing that buffer on them. • Aesthetics, safety, health, property values, density, generic planning, and convenience are all reasonable concerns. • In making your decision, you need to articulate why you're doing it and find a reasonable buffer. Mayor Lockwood: • What if we asked staff to come up with out of the typical uses of our property, if we could rank them. • Put them in groups such as convenience stores or high intensity uses. • Come up with some examples based on other jurisdictions and what the buffers are for high intensity uses. • Then we can capture something reasonable that we can enforce. • Maybe we can take 200 cities that are like Milton and find an average buffer for service stations. Councilmember Thurman: • We have heard that fast food drive through places are higher intensity than a lot of people want around. Councilmember Zahner Bailey: • In addition to your point, Mr. Mayor, could we also put the size of the building into this consideration as you evaluate everything? Ken Jarrard: • I am okay with that. After no further discussion, the Work Session adjourned at 8:51 p.m. Date Approved: December 6, 2010 - �� A,�7 b7� Sudie AMG don, City t lerk Joe Lock d ayor