hello everyone welcome to the october twenty seventh joint commission meeting between the planning commission the historic district commission i'm calling our planning commission to order will also call the start your commission order this time this time we're going to hear a presentation from the developer after the presentation we will open the door to any comments or questions questions from everyone will be taken from joel and he will present those questions to develop or at a later time in each person has five minutes correct ok five minutes to come up to the podium state your name and address and everything will be recorded yes are you in charge of the remark marvin is going to do it what he would clean up and a green light means you can talk you know what it means running out of time red light means stop i think they're all right here in front right ok great well i will open the floor to the developer to present  school building earlier this year we went through a selection process with the school district between us another developer submitted proposals we were selected we have the property under contract so now we're working through is our concept the right thing for the city and the residents so what we've come up with is a plan several boards you have them up on the screen the first board that we have basically identifies the location of the property we like the property because of its features of the building but we also like the property because of proximity to other things in holland with the college park the waterfront the downtown just a lot of public amenities within a couple blocks so which is something that very much attracts us to the neighborhood and to the site so the next site the want to spend the most time is the actual site plan the existing building itself unfortunately i can't read the small part of the building itself the about forty thousand square feet the main focus of our project is to renovate that existing building into thirty four apartments apartments themselves will be one two and three me units square footage of the units themselves are ranging between a hundred square feet and about thirteen hundred so we do have some common core doors common elevator stair towers and that type of thing that takes up a  portion of the square footage in addition to the apartments we have thirty four garages on the site as well as thirty four additional parking spots so we have two parking spaces per unit planned even though we have one bedrooms and two bedrooms which some of them probably have only one vehicle because the price point we're trying to reach and wanted to not have any cars parked out in the street we've tried to include as much parking as possible on the site  in addition to the apartments we have twelve row houses planned for those are all houses are in the historic district the other eight are on the north side of the property and not in the historic district  we have done some renderings of what those could look like if there's anything in our plan that isn't totally defined as probably the elevations realizing that we have to work through the historic district approval process materials design so on and so forth so i would hope that we wouldn't get too hung up on the elevation because to us it's our architects first concept and it by no means this is what we have to have we're trying to reach in the row houses is owner occupied units and we're going for a price point of two hundred fifty to three hundred thousand each unit would have an attached to stock and each unit also has a little bit of driveway so the concept there is each resident takes care of all their own vehicles essentially on their own site even though it's a condominium type situation so what else rowhouse sighs it was one of the questions last week we had a neighborhood open house and some of the questions came up one of the size of the units there too we haven't even done floor plans yet but we're thinking a finished square footage area of about sixteen hundred to twenty five hundred square feet so decent size units with the idea that we probably have families purchasing those somewhat also so other than that renderings we've given you three r one is basically looking at the call the six treat one is forgiven for not just that the one on the screen right now is maple avenue looking north along maple avenue as you can see the existing school building on the right and then the rendering of the four row houses on the left that driveway goes into a parking but not does not continue on to that call the six three i know there was a street that went through at one point we have no desire or intention to connect those so that's you know part of the reason why we don't have a connect these we don't want the traffic through there as well that is on the call the sec street  left side of that rendering would be where the old tennis court was the middle part is more i guess what would have been somewhat the playground area and then the first section to the right old gymnasium and what we're planning to do in the old gymnasium is to basically put in a second floor so we're going to make those units you have your own entry you have main floor living space you have stairs going up to bedrooms so  utilizing that existing structure adding some windows adding some entries to add some character to that big brick wall that sarah now so and how many rooms in the town the row houses were figuring it was probably three bedroom type units i say three bedroom but those are going to be somewhat customized per the buyers so i could see that we have some people saying the so basically you have a front porch type look out on the street on the sidewalk with drives in the rear protein attached garage a more questions from commission members one other quick thing or point zero is on the garage is for the apartment units we actually have two additional what appear to be garages one of them would be maintenance and the other one is a central garbage collection rather than having a dumpster that's exposed to the outdoors and what we're proposing is a combined garbage area inside of a building so that when the trash comes they roll the dumpster also people want to look at a dumpster great thank you and we will get public comment and then we'll be able to ask you a few more questions at the end at this time i will open the floor for anyone to come forward like i said you have five minutes and watch the lights in the front of the podium state your name and address good afternoon my name is stacy karp and i live at two to one last eleventh street and one of my questions is you speak of having a row how a thing would a homeowner have the availability of having you can address us enjoyed going to take all the no no no games to them later and so would the potential new homeowner have the veil ability of having a finished basement or a mother in law quarters which would allow more accurate pens for the how was this my first question and my second question just because i do live on eleventh street and my view as i look down the street as more towards maple street where you do have row houses and this side of the school currently how far back would the row houses be would they come up right up to the edge of where the parking is at this time or is it closer to the street because the parking is in the rear of the building because that would just allow maybe some confusion because it's not a through fare street with coming  p maple street thank you thank good afternoon my name is joanne trembly and i live at one thirty three west eleventh and my question also concerns the row houses my question for the developers is do they have any precedent of properties at the price point that they are hoping to sell the mat that have some of the limitations that city leave living has city living is one with very small yard it is one with very close proximity to your neighbors and many times my friends who do not live in the city those things as things that would prevent them from paying the big bucks for a city house so in short i'm wondering is that price play a realistic one to sell with what are the unique challenges and character and the things that we all love about living in the city but the things that don't necessarily appeal to the larger home buyer clientele thank you thank you know your face my name is ian mcknight i live at ninety four west twelfth street i'm a former youth representative on the planning commission and i met kalamazoo college now where i'm studying among other things public policy and urban affairs i made the hours drive here today because washington school is so important to me i'm all for the renovation of the existing building but i don't think we should build up the green space i was in the last kindergarten class at washington school and when i went to school there it was the center of the community when it closed which was and still is a huge source of sadness in the neighborhood its center of the community ness did not change washington state washington school is still at the heart of our neighborhood we refer to our neighborhood as the washington school neighborhood because even though it is no longer a school washington school is what we all have in common the part of town where i live is boxed in by four very busy streets nine sixteenth river and van roll to the streets form a natural boundary and inside of that boundary washington school is the only green space the washington school property may never have been meant as a park but that is what it has become and it is the center of the place where we live in urban planning and sociology there is this term third place it was coined by an urban sociologist called ray oldenburg he says that in any person's life there are essentially three important geographic places there's your home the first place your workplace or school the second place and then there's the third place it's vital for community civic engagement and a sense of place in the world generally third places are like a home away from home their social equalizers their easily accessible and they provide a universally welcoming and playful atmosphere a solid third place is key to the kind of community that holland and more specifically the historic district prides itself on having the kind where kids can have the kind of rare upbringing that i had the magical kind that seemed so rare now in two thousand and five teen and seems to come out of a movie from the fifty's the kind that would make a college student like me consider moving back to holland much of the work done here in city hall is in pursuit of good third places a solid third place is what we're aiming for with the civic center it's what we truly hope all of our parks can be the tragedy of these plans that i see for washington school right now is that they will completely obliterate the only good third place in the washington school neighborhood and possibly the best third place in the city of holland which seems to me like a huge step backward when we look at the big picture in our community the volume of units particularly rentals and the amount of new building is completely unreasonable especially when we consider the extent to which rentals destabilize our neighborhoods the option to develop using this plan is nothing more than a short term option for sure short term gain that we will ultimately regret much like the initial closure of washington school which still haunts much of the neighborhood today washington school is a place where i ha spent many afternoons playing capture the flag and many thanksgivings playing football if you go to washington school on a summer evening you'll find people playing tennis on the tennis court and when it gets dark you'll find the kids of the neighborhood my successors playing ghost in the graveyard on the old field if the current plan goes through i think that we will all find it to be an irreversible mistake if you go to the former site of the tennis courts on a summer evening you will see a parking lot if you go to the field where the neighborhood kids play capture the flag and football and ghost in the graveyard a clump of row houses and another parking lot that doesn't sound like it's consistent with the neighborhood that i know and love to many of you this field is an undeveloped useless space and to many of us it is the center of our community in a way that other people will never understand to carry out this plan is to destroy a very good thing in favor of some new rentals and condos so please renovate the old washington school building don't let me scare you away let it in all of its fireplace in a kindergarten classroom kind of magic find a new life but please leave us with our third place intact and don't take away the center of our community thank you thank you my name is andrew speedo i live on one thirty five at one thirty five west tenth street and i am in the role of neighborhood connector and have been for the last two naff years so in that role i like to read to different letters from neighbors and i might say that i am humble mcknight first one as a person who has worked in community development in holland i cannot stress to you enough the importance of a neutral gathering place such as washington school green space to facilitate interaction and community between neighbors regardless of cultural and economic backgrounds especially in a time where we are becoming more isolated due to technology the people that live in the course of you do not have big yards we need washington school park to let our kids stretch their legs throw a baseball and to kick around a soccer ball with neighbors centennial park is not the place for a pick up game of softball in college park even with the new crosswalk has accessibility restrictions due to traffic on van royalty and it is not a place where a parent would let their kids run around minimally supervised in fact just last year edgewater resources was contract by the city of holland parks and recreation department to make recommendations here is their conclusion regarding outdoor sports facility access and  quote the sports facility access map shows that the majority of residential neighborhoods within holland are within a half mile of at least one park with outdoor sporting facilities of the two neighborhoods lacking access to these facilities one is ho heights neighborhood north and east of holland hate school the other is the neighborhood between collin park and centennial park furthermore holland is marketing itself as a green city with a new energy plan it sounds a bit hypocritical to say this and to take away a public green space how about we embody the whole lifestyle that comes along with being green the soccer field especially helps facilitate diversity in our admittedly not so diverse neighborhood why can't we raise funds to revitalize this neighborhood park a lighted soccer field pick a ball a safe playground a fitness park or just some ideas to start can we be a little creative when it comes to fund raising and partnership what if we could vote on a neighborhood milage tax to maintain the property please consider the future of the well being of these neighbors this piece of property is the glue to our neighborhood and a huge reason why we love where we live please don't take this away from us second letter to the city of holland planning commission in any public conversation that involves big changes it is important to be firmly grounded in the agreed upon vision and mission of our collective life the vision of holland is a vibrant world class community in a beautiful lakefront environment where people work together celebrate community and realize dreams as a city our mission is to provide quality municipal services defined with citizens through their participation and representation to provide the best conditions under which citizens live work and play to provide compassionate leadership in meeting the needs and vision of our community and to provide a government that serves with honesty and integrity these from a wide embroil of noble ideals under which we can discuss particular as they arise such as the sale and development of washington elementary and the adjoining property as i have witnessed this process and the proposals set forward in the past months i have seen notable attempts to uphold our vision and mission of working together and citizen participation and representation holland public schools the property owner partnered with the city taking initiative to hear dreams and needs of a community of community members through the i challenge you program where areas students came together to dream up their best options for re sing the school building and property based on research and neighbor input sessions the resulting proposal was a surprisingly attractive mix of apartment and condo redevelopment with enhancement of the green space and public play areas that included a skating rink for winter use as well then is a request for proposals was put out by the school board they graciously invited leaders in the historic holland neighborhood true view ideas and possibilities we saw several options which sought to include green space and minimal impact on areas that are well used publicly while still adding family homes we were then asked about our concerns they included some preservation of the neighborhood park and open space and a desire to see owner occupied dwelling over rental units in a way that continued the existing density architecture land use and general character of the neighborhood thirty seconds the majority consensus after that meeting was that we were pleased with the proposed plans these i believe are good examples of the city's public institutions seeking to live up to their vision and mission statements but throughout the process there was also a cautionary rhetoric put forward that this would be an enormous undertaking an expensive project for any developer and that they would have to find ways to make good on their investment we had to repair selves to perhaps get less than we dreamed of for the sake of any development at all and public schools also reminded us that they needed to receive revenue from the sale to benefit the entire district not just this neighborhood conversations with citizens about what would be best conditions in their mind what they would like or dream of seemed to end or at least be checked by the quote unquote realities of revenue in rome and business concerns your time is up and i request additional time as reading two different letters of the waters one of the authors one o and the other author is myself but i chose to remain anonymous as until now as as my role as neighborhood connected seeks to be a voice for the neighbors and so checked by the realities of revenue in roman and business concerns and so too unsettling possibilities emerged one the grounds of what we were trying to do together had shifted from a long view guided by our shared vision and mission to a short view dominated by financial gains and efficient turnover or to the ideas set forth shaped by the dreams and participation of citizens are really just a placation device intended to further a different agenda that our input never mattered i choose to believe the first option rather than the second because i believe our civic literacy leadership is one that serves with honesty and integrity therefore as a neighbor and citizen i ask you the planning commission as you seek the best conditions for this property development to go forward to consider the long view of our shared vision and mission not the short view of revenue to which we have somehow shifted these developers come highly recommended they have already taken steps to inform neighbors with their open house last wednesday introducing themselves and graciously answering our questions and many of our community members know them and know they that they do care about holland's share mission and vision and they do want to create something good for the community we could hardly hope for a better team to take on this project next door so far neighbors primary concerns in this have been around density rentals and green space we would hope that the project would provide moderation in residential density appropriate to this neighborhood that it would include less rentals and more owner occupied dwelling units and that it would seek to preserve and enhance green space for play and yet in the plans that were put forward we noticed a significant increase in density a large number of rentals and no preservation of existing green space we want these developers to proceed but with your compassionate guidance under our shared vision to provide the best conditions under which citizens in this washington school neighborhood can live work and play time sincerely good perfect thank you thank you again i'm stacey carver in a two to one myself i haven't i didn't prepare a speech or anything like that but i just hope that i as each one of you make a decision and move forward in the best interests of not only  the historic district but for our community is i just want to explain something that is very unusual and very unique to holland that many of you may not know  our neighborhood is truly a leave it to beaver neighborhood you know it's something that we can watch on t v but you think doesn't exist anymore and it really does i have a neighbor across the street from me and i will mention her name because she's such a wonderful lady pat behind if you just cough and say oh i'm not feeling well today pat just seems to come across the street with a pot of soup saying oh i just happened to make soup could you use some soup have another neighbor two doors down who makes wonderful zucchini bread and banana bread and big that usually five loaves at a time and send tax to many of the neighbors saying i just happened to make bread does anybody want some of course i've never said no but this is also the neighborhood where people give you the keys to your home and trust you and ask you to walk their dog and get their mail for them all the while they leave on vacation this is very unusual and very unique and to bring a large volume of homes to this area and traffic will change the demographics and as many of the speakers of said today that the park is utilized and it is it's utilized countless hours anywhere from our party ice cream party that we have where the fire department comes and sprays their waters and the kids runs through it to sunday night sachar games where people from the historic come together and play soccer both parents and adults two parents that are just concerned about not dry or not going across to  to college park because of the volume of traffic even though some of us has came to meetings and tried to change that please again know that we want to preserve our wonderful neighborhood and i think many of us  look forward to change because change is good but we also want to keep the old it's kind of like silver and gold with our friendship so more isn't always better and i think that we all know that  i think that we all have hearts and want to work together so please keep in mind the volume and the dynamics that will change taking the green space and adding a lot of traffic even with some of the surrounding church it is very hard to pull off and pull out when there are church functions like on sundays just seeing and creeping out that will be a whole nother dynamic that we have to look at as well thank you thank you i'm carol meyers and i live at one o nine west wall street david and i have been residents in the historic district since before it was a historic district we've been there thirty three years and i think it's obvious that the historic district anchors the central city for holland and part of that is because of the ambiance that we enjoy even though we live on some highly trafficked roads i'm one house away from pine avenue and there's lots of traffic there but we still think of our neighborhood has quite and with a limited amount of traffic and it's important during tain the character of the district that that doesn't change has already been mentioned our neighborhood was considerably weakened when we lost washington school we still talk about it and we still miss it what we have appreciated is the green space that has remained and we used to take our little granddaughter who has just started kindergarten now she's moved away this year but we've enjoyed that playground space at the school and we're so grateful that it had lasted as long as it did and we recognize that obviously things do change and david and i are strong supporters of the holland public schools and the hall and public schools are dealt us a blow when we last washington school and we realize that this school district needs to sell and wants to sell the washington school property but i would hope that they along with the planning commission would recognize that this neighborhood doesn't need to take two hits from the school district that we need a plan that is good for the city good for the neighborhood and works for the public schools even if maybe it isn't the top dollar for the public schools in order to develop this property and so i would just speak to the concerns that have been mentioned the density of this proposal and the increased traffic and the effect that that can have on a very significant neighborhood in the city thank you thank you felt it would we could start a family grow our family and one which we felt would be a community friendly and an open space we have for young boys and i love the fact that i can let my boys ride their bikes down the call this act can let my boys walk cross the street play tennis they can play the park down the street it's a great neighborhood and while i understand the need for development and i see fully supported by one concern is that perhaps the approach taken is somewhat short sighted which i understand is a bit of an anomaly because here we are talking about historic district where we've had houses there but around forever things take a long time it seems to me that perhaps this project is being constructed in a way which is focused perhaps more on the immediate needs for the developers to make the numbers work versus something a little longer term and i think especially inside of the fact that there's a lot of very positive changes being planned by you all for the down town hall an area which i think over the long term or over the medium term will increase the value of that property and which would potentially allow for the developers to think about maybe putting in an owner occupied condos riches rentals in the school building because they'll be able to attract people who are looking at the broader development in the downtown area and it may enable them to make the numbers work while still preserving the green space and allow for owner occupied units versus rental units so i just wanted to make they're just plant that seed into their minds and maybe think that you know that's try to make jane hall and historic district as more of a longer term vision community and maintain some of the green space which my family and my hundred forty seventh avenue i used to reside at one fifty six west eleventh street this property for eight years working there quite a few hours a day so i can touch eyes for you as a planning commission a couple comments that were shared tonight that i think will be helpful as you consider this the board of education not speaking for them but representing them decided to liquidate this asset due to a variety of circumstances here in the city one of the declining enrollment faced by the school system contrary to what was reported the how and sentinel public schools  net gain of school choice district from every traditional public school in the area where our decline results from as over a thousand students who attend the charter schools have been allowed to grow and enhance and become part of the community so that's part of the challenge has cre decline that's required public schools like holland and across many urban centers and cities across the state to have to find themselves in this position the board decided to liquidate because our budget is based upon a limit to utilize of funds from this to offset or balance we're trying to do this project with a sense of urgency to oppose state receivership that would come in and liquidate this property for the school district which then we would have limited choice or control over what that looks like certainly there's the planning commission would have the opportunity to work with developers through that process the school district loses all control then we're about one and a half years away from that occurring we went through a very comprehensive process to try to seek developers to develop in the context that was described in some aforementioned letters and we had no developer step forward at that price at that time the city also had the opportunity to purchase that property again with budget limitations that's not something that can easily be done we have a great two great firms that came forward the need to be able to do this project in a way that can develop the building in the way that it needs to be developed from a start commission standpoint and provide quality housing for the residents in the area unfortunate there is some realities of doing business at a time of construction and that's the development then in part or all of that green space that is there and we have a two companies that have come together to work on a development to try to take all that piece in the consideration and so there's going to have to be some level of development i think to make that project occur the sense of urgency on this is the longer that it takes to do this the more challenging becomes for the district who the board of trustees are responsible to represent everybody and through state statute to get the largest return investment that they can so we're balancing multiple forces here as you are this evening to take into consideration what changes if any that you need to make the development i would just encourage us all to contain to have the conversation and work with that sense of urgency in mind we don't have years and years on our time to do because with each passing day that bill becomes greater challenge to renovate and more cost to put into that to do so which one of contention has a couple of comments to that i heard this evening as you make your consideration for the discussion thanks for the opportunity thank you hello everybody my name is mark backman i live at one ninety eight west eleventh street i am a member of the holland historic neighborhood association and a member of the ministry so i deeply care about developing development within the the holland area and so i'm very excited to see something happening in washington schools and suspend vacant for quite a while we've lived in our house for about five years and we really love the area we really see the  need need for new things and new development in the city and obviously the same same reasons that developers are coming here and a lot of our friends you know would like to move into the city and there's not many options but there are some concerns that i have as well looking at th development one of them being the issues that we've been having with rentals in the city with with it being so at such a high level and i know that these are different types of rentals than what we've typically been concerned with still having such a high density of rentals and how you design and build a building for rentals is drastically different than how you design and build a building for condos so one question that i'd like to see from the developers is a breakdown of these thirty four units what is their square footage and you know what number of bedrooms because if you have a thirty four you know so thirty four units seems very high to me in this very small school and so my guess is there's many many one bedroom apartments which in transitioning to condos later on down the road as they propose that makes it very difficult to do and i just really like to see more owner occupied people who are invested into the neighborhood because in the historic district the one thing you find is everyone is extremely invested in their homes and there's a lot of care and love that goes into these houses and so having a huge pot of rental properties where no one really cares everyone's trant see it moving in and now that's that's not good and build in the neighborhood so one one issue i have is the number of rentals i'd like to see more order occupied i'd also like to see lower density as as  our neighborhood is a part of the the city where we have some larger lots and this just kind of seems like an odd fit where we're it's fully surrounded by residential and then also we have a highly highly dense development right in the middle where we have other developments similar to this like baker lofts or scrapyard lofts they're in not very residential areas there they have already had large parking lots and there seems to be a lot trying to jam onto this parking lot  and so another thing that i'd like to express to the historic district is as you're approving the plans i'd like to i'd like you just to approve the full set of plans i know to help development in the in the past you've approved  footprints and tried to help in developing you know all the other parameters later on that down the road but as we've seen we've we've been taking advantage of a lot by developers who they you get you sign off on the footprint they get the builders permit and they build the place up and they don't do exactly what they said and then we don't have any course of action other than a couple hundred dollars fine to really go after them so i'd really like to see some really good planning in a really good thought you know i know i understand there's a lot of there's a time crunch to this but if we work really hard together and make sure that everybody gets everything on the table and isn't just saying a word going to fill in things at a later date i'd really like to see that so thank you thank you my name is corey farmer and of that one twenty nine west twenty eleventh street and i'm relatively new to the neighborhood we were we just moved in a few months ago but i just wanted to support some of the other neighbors that have spoken and  lived here much longer than the the we have observed that there have been numerous kids that utilize some of the park space surrounding the school and  you know i guess i disagree that it would be a shame to to have all that space is lost because i think it does provide a space for kids we have three kids ourselves and although some of the two of them at least are older and don't really utilize it anymore if they were younger i would that would be a huge attraction to to the neighborhood and i also agree that some of the other even though there are other parks that are nearby they are just they're too far away and have to busy or roads you know that separate this neighborhood from those parts to allow the kids to go off on their own the only other other comment i  make you know not knowing anything about the past work that was done to develop the different concepts and so forth was whether or not any consideration was given to removing the gymnasium since that seems to be in my amateur opinion i historical part of the building it seems to be a newer edition and it's not terribly attractive as long if any consideration had been given to demolishing that and which would provide the lower density  of the units on this on the lot and also might help provide some space for to accommodate and green space and whether or not any consideration was given to the fact that having some green space in  close proximity to the all the units that are being built would be a huge draw to you know potential buyers for those housing  cotton i'm city manager and i also live at one sixty eight west eighth street i want to thank everyone in this room for being here tonight especially those of you who serve on our ports and commissions which make so much difference and need to make tough decisions i want to say something about the planning i will defer eventually to others of course in the detailed review i will say that this is in compared to other communities where schools have been  unoccupied in the fake end and it's been a responsibility of people like me and planners to figure out how to redevelop them something like this that involves a looks like a carefully thought through proposal is is quite joyful to see compared to the alternative of an empty school and all the problems social and neighborhood problems that occur from that kind of thing so that is a big plus i will say that the actual details on the density i think is up to others to analyze consistent with whatever the codes require and the plan residential developments typically have had in the community and your judgments and well as everyone in the audience i have asked the the the consideration be given to leaving the sidewalk open for public access through and have volunteered the  city resources to keep that free of of snow and ice so that that can be continued connection for our community which i think is important so either than that i am look forward to your considerations and i appreciate the developers for helping to make something good long term happen at this location  thanks good evening jay peters i live that one twenty five west eleventh street and i've lived there since one thousand nine hundred ninety four do a long time i wasn't planning on speaking but to date to this point no one has brought up a portion of the plan that is particularly kind of soft in my heart and that is on the cul de sac portion of eleventh street there where you got the that what appears to be all of the exiting from the building out on to the called the sac in between the garage is facing i mean there's some grudges facing the sidewalk on eleventh street and i'm pretty familiar with there infill ordinances and some are saying that i i can't imagine we would want to have these of the back of a grudge or the side of a grudge butting up to the sidewalk on any of our public streets so that part of the plan is it's kind of disturbing to me i'd like to think that that's  that's that smell of will here a little bit i do think the density is a bit high i don't know i'm not a developer i know we have some great people at the table i have no doubt in my mind and i know everybody wants to work hard at this i understand the school district's issues but i want to make sure we get this right too parking lots themselves i i don't any time there's a parking lot somewhere that's just not an attractive thing it's not a good thing it doesn't anybody any good and the only reason we have so much parking is because we have so much density here so i'm just wondering if there isn't some way to lessen the number of dwelling units in the school building itself that would require less parking again i'm not crunching the numbers not my business i'm just trying to do my job and protect our neighborhood here a little bit i like the idea of the town houses i think those make sense i think that we want them to be brick we want them to be handsome we want them to be owner occupied and that's the plan so i really like that part of it i don't know why we're not talking about condos as living there as long as i have i'm looking at that building it's in that property as long as i have always envisioned twenty or twenty some condos in washington school and that ugly gymnasium block becoming kind of a garage for parking for that i'm sure these gentlemen behind me would say that's really nice but you can't make those numbers work but i just want to make sure they thought about it i don't know and the parking the flow of parking through there if i look at that document the way it is we've got a lot of traffic especially behind the building flowing through there and coming out onto ninth street and that's that's a big big difference from what those people on eleven street me included are used to we bought therefore we experienced our whole time there i'm not saying change doesn't happen but as i look at the plan it feels like there's some winners and losers in this thing in the folks on eleventh street and those nine houses are suddenly faced with thirty four new neighbors units plus all those cars plus one bedroom two bedroom three bedroom i'm all for density scuse me i'm off for mixed use i'm all for new neighbors but i just five years from now in my heart of hearts i don't want to look back at this and say man that was not a good thing we didn't do that right because that could seriously jeopardize probably one of them it's been there a long time but it's a fragile thing the historic district has been a very very positive element to downtown  holland someone mentioned it being the acre i think that's true from a tax base perspective i think it's probably some of the bust tax highest taxes that are being paid other than lakefront property so the city has an interest to make sure that five years from now we're not saying man those forty four rental units didn't turn out so well in fact there's a lot of problems with that and i would say that we have a history of doing some rental problems i've been on the planning commission where we said well i want you specific addresses but we said this is women also it's going to do all the things that we say we really want to see happen here but when it all shakes out things happen plans don't work out and there it sits so i think i really think we're on the right track sure but if we can sit down with the developers tweak the density and by all means get rid of some of that parking and find a way to keep some park some green space not only for the people  there and become accustomed to it but to attract the people that we're going to want to live there and be our new neighbors because as ian articulated i think well that has become to those people who live there as long as i have that is a really really really key part and that's why these people are behind me talking about this it's a key part of our experience living there and i'm sure most people would have would agree with that so again i i think we're on the right track but i definitely think there's some room for anyone else to come forward that brownson some of you know me i live at three fifty five washington jonathan and i just purchased a house at one thirty nine west eleventh which is right across from the cul de sac they are my only input is going to be that there is a shortage of of one in two bedroom homes and apartments in holland and as a broker in holland particularly in this neighborhood i i see the need for not only family staff rentals but we are having a huge influx of young professionals that have college debt who may or may not be able to buy a house who are looking for a nice rental who can afford a nice rental  so i like the thoughts that other people have expressed about condos because i think that would create less density and traffic but i'm just weighing in on the fact that we have a lot  of professionals moving in both for short term work at j c i gentex and some of the companies that employ people and have them come for like three months six months and they have no place to go because they don't want to sign a lease so i know there are people landlords kind of renting out rooms which the city doesn't always know about or approve of so i don't know how we're going to fix that problem but i'm just weighing in as another side of it sometimes we think about affordable housing being for  people of demographics we don't want whether it's economic or racial i think we have to really be careful about how we are welcoming others into our community and that there should be room for people who do need a one bedroom apartment or condo and just going to leave it there thanks for listening to me for the city just one ok  because we do have a rental issue on our street my concern is like the city is offered grants to the historic district where  whether you're it's not an income based opportunities and income based opportunities to enhance the homes for garages siding and so forth but if you are to purchase a pay in this program the city if i  call correctly wants you to make a long term investment yourself because you're utilizing that grant i think it's five years if i remember correctly so i just think it would be awkward if the city wanted rentals to be at this facility when they're asking the homeowners please if we're investing into you invest in staying into our neighborhood and then move rentals and where perhaps their short term like the previous speaker just spoke of  like three months or something like why would we want a transitional small section of our community when the city is already shown through other opportunities that they want that the residents to make a long term investment just through their grants that they've already offered the residents in the historic district so and it also kind of you know one thing that the people of the historic district like is that we wanted it area where there there is green space bigger and bigger yards parks and so forth and if you look at this i think that there's obviously been a lot of thought into it but it is kind he reminds me of chicago in the fact that there's just some and brick everywhere and that's just heartbreaking to me personally because we love nature so much that maybe if maybe perhaps it could be a win win where maybe condos could be made at the school and maybe we could eliminate if dollars allowed the some of the row the row houses in general and just allow park space in one of the benefits i used to work for a company that did run told that used to be the in the country years ago and one of the benefits that we would always do is we would tell perspective people that look over here we have community gardens over here we have a small pool over here we have a mailbox station so that people felt like they were part of a community and here i don't see any of those amenities it's just all cement and and buildings and i just don't i'm not in chicago for a district in the planning commission can ask questions of the developer so because so far really we're talking about a planning issue i feel like this portion of the room until we get into the details the actual h d c part of this i don't think we have a whole lot of comments so far so i  will speak more to what the conversation has been so far regarding the planning and let me begin by saying thank you this was a difficult project i know a lot of people pass on it because of neighborhood concerns because a historic just your concerns you guys are willing to look past all that or maybe know what you're getting into and take this time to go for that i very much appreciate you taking taking the sonnen potentially bringing something that would be fantastic for the neighborhood we heard a lot of subjective concerns about density and we met as a neighborhood and that was probably one concrete concern was density is very subjective he would say well it's going to be more dense it's you know that's a problem we wanted to put that into objective terms so this has been entered into the record but we did a study most of that was provided by the city the vehicle information was provided by a neighborhood survey when it came down to four key comparisons to help understand what this project could do beneficially and negative for our r two blocks and so again it's in the record and hopefully we provided to the developers on the first comparison was let's look at the two blocks before and after development they are right now because of school development naturally the density is going to go up that's expected the density specifically of dwellings on the two blocks which comprise this property will go up by two hundred twenty one percent of the vehicle density assuming full occupancy which may not be the case but assuming full occupancy of the spots in the new project will go up by two hundred seventy percent on these two blocks that i don't believe is a very fair statistic because of course we're going to increase a density and i believe the majority of the neighborhood welcome some increase in the dent city on our block so what if we compare these two blocks to very similar blocks so if we look immediately to the west the blocks and in the figure you'll see a outlined at the blocks outlined by maple comprise a very similar housing stock some larger high property value homes but also some smaller lots is similar mix of owner occupied and ronald units pretty fair comparison for our neighborhood and you see what's the difference between these two two areas after the development the dwelling density goes up it's one hundred seventy five per cent in the developed blocks with redevelopment versus the adjacent neighborhood the vehicle density goes up correspondingly it's one hundred  seventy three percent as compared to the two blocks just to the west these once very similar blocks i would argue at one hundred seventy five percent increase will no longer feel like similar blocks i thought let's go a step further there are other very dense areas in our city if you go you know five six blocks to the south you're going to find some very dense neighborhoods i was curious how this project in terms of density would compare to some of the densest blocks that we have in our neighborhood so i looked at this look at between pine and river and seventeenth and eighteenth the tween pine river and eighteenth and nineteenth and seventeenth and eighteenth between venner altie in washington these were the densest blocks i could find in the core city and i said let's look at what the density  those of those blocks and compare it to our two blocks after this proposed development we will be the densest two blocks as compared to all those blocks i just mentioned with much different lot sizes much different property midtown center baker las fairbanks townhome simply for paul let's look at those blocks because we're going to be in the same situation now we're going to have a block which contains a plant residential development within it again the proposed washington school block with the development as proposed has a density of eight point nine six units per acre looking at these two boxes and entirety if you look at the midtown village block a three story building but that's offset by a park in the middle of it a lot of open space a commercial neighbor the density of that block is only seven point two units breaker fairbanks townhomes whole college housing somewhat fairly dense but contained within a block where the properties are slightly larger again the overall density for that block is much lower at five point one two the only place i could find that will be denser than this these two blocks after this project is completed is baker lost some hundred units and baker lost i think  park the school railroad tracks on the back with very little residential frontage directly facing the building i put in if you factor in that baker loss does have prospect park as a front yard the density drops once below what we're looking at at seven point four four units breakers so i think there are good points to increasing the density of our block and i look forward to that i think that there is too much of a good thing at times and i think this data in the overall development not just the school building however you want to tackle it help us understand the rationale it's a pretty simple economic model quite frankly  you look at the cost of acquiring the property the cost of rid of ation of the property or new construction as the case may be what are the market demands for rentals owner occupied housing what rents can be paid for rentals what the market will bear as fires up purchase price of of housing and you work all of that together and we figure this is this is the  t our opinion the the way to optimize this property in a development through consider and were blue skying here correct did you consider taking the properties that the town homes are on and reverting back to a single family detached and selling them to individual developers are individual property owners and using that to offset some your costs how much of how much of the town homes are current carrying the of renovating the school i don't know the answer to how much you know the allocation of purchase price we did look at that i believe we could sell for i believe it five lots on tenth street it didn't make economic sense to do it that way quite frankly but we did look at that ye and the cost of running the existing building hard tends not to go in and tear out every interior wall if that were the case we'd have much more flexibility for unit sizes and unit numbers were basically working within the confines of an existing co which we plan to make somewhat smaller and have some jogs to it by adding square footage inside there but the actual footprint of each classroom is roughly seventy eight hundred square feet so that is a big indicator of some of the size now that's not every classroom but there's a lot of classrooms so now you have some classrooms where the base size the seven hundred square feet and then there's an adjacent room or two well those become the larger units so our unit mix is made up financial but also just an architectural building also the size of the structure itself i mean we could we put in twenty units yes we could but we wouldn't be utilising a big portion of the building and quite honestly there's no mixed use potential in our opinion to put some other use in there so unfortunately i'm a nuts and bolts guy so are the numbers have to work here the cost of the building of the cost of the development of across the land and you know the cost of capital and you know if the return isn't there for the capital the capital not going to come to the projects so it's a it's a constant balance but it's not all dictated by dollars it's also dictated by the building itself and what we're working with from  there was a comment about knocking that out completely in making that green space unfortunately we are buying the entire building i mean our purchase price is based on square footage of existing building right and so when we start paying the cost of tearing down square footage that we've actually had to purchase it makes it very difficult  justify that expense and who would be managing the apartment building basically our firm manages other multifamily so we would manage this property as well you have an idea as to what your market rate for those units is going to be or what you can get for them we have one bedrooms at nine fifty up to three bedrooms of sixteen hundred a month we basically do twelve month leases we're not we're not in a run for three months a lot of our communities we have people that live for several years i mean it's very common for our residents to be there you know three or more years can you name some that one's across growing we did grand central los which is across from cooley law school those are conversion of existing buildings that have been vacant we have a property in genesis and called the rick apartments typically those are two bedrooms three bedrooms ranging from nine hundred twelve hundred a month attached garage is typically people drive by and think they're condos and we have some duplexes up and again we have a hundred forty four units  you stated that you have one garage for each apartment around ok one garage and one surface spot for every apartment for every part but there's been a lot of talk about green space for neighborhood use by i'm curious have you thought about integrating any green space or patio zari rooftop terrace is there anything for the people who would be occupying the spaces they are producing basically that existing sidewalk that goes east to west we're maintaining a fair amount of green space around to the building between that sidewalk in there do we have any outdoor patio planned no we do not most of our you know s as has literally no green space and no parking so we're not proposing that type of environment here our residents typically want to use the public amenities that are within a couple blocks of the facility so in some of your other developments looking at the websites there was the opportunity to fill a say three bedroom unit with three individual people in your service sort of a range that is that something that you don't dissipate doing an hour that was student specific yes we're not intending to market to students at all in this case yes i mean hops and flats was intended solely for student housing and the part of the reason it was for student housing was there again the building structure itself did not lay out well for a traditional apartment complex you had a square box of a building versus a long rectangular configuration so i just wanted to comment that although it may be difficult for the historic district commission to comment on any architectural details at this time since it's all very preliminary and we do still look at size scale amassing so for new structures and additions of anybody  and i'd say that what's being proposed is definitely not consistent with the rest of the historic district at this time can you cure that will further describe or explain why it's  not just because their historic district is made up of single family homes from the well for the most part which have yards usually it we look for garages being placed at the back of a lot behind a home and in this case would be very and we're as each individual property in a storage district for the with a couple of exceptions naturally breaks up the rhythm of the other block the type of structure that i see here at the  place with higher density of this like you would see in i gave you samples a much larger cities but when places really don't have a lot of space to develop normally this in this particular case the homes that are adjacent to a manner with which you know it would try to think exactly how to say it when you're when you're when we're looking at the particular design of the of a proposed  at is the holistic appearance of the property itself and how it relates to the rest of the district that abuts so when you're destroying your district for instance you would feel like that property belongs there would necessarily period piece would be a copy of something that's in there but people wouldn't necessarily want to have some stop and go that doesn't belong so when that because when you do that when you develop in that way you change the makeup of the district you kind of segregate off that property is saying this is different from the rest of it and it changes the district and she may add a new border to it so what i would want to see and what would be consistent with the secretary of interior standards that we use would be something that is consistent with the rhythm of the block of the homes and also something that would be more in would be would take some of the cues of the other property ones we tried to hide so that they wouldn't be as evident and the comments on density to compare to dr howells comments on  compares comparison of different blocks the ones a little further south that his comments were the probably the most dense i haven't studied it but just they should provide some clarification we don't normally meet with the planning commission at the same time so when i was referring to density referring to visual density or the density of the actual structure itself  so they're still here yes right hate crime how many can you you mentioned i'm not familiar with as familiar with this is i'd like to be can you talk a little bit about other developers that passed on this and why how many there were a what their concerns were we received no developments or are of piece from original public process that we went through as a result of that was just seven channels that powers that communicate was that posted or how that was posted that was communicated through the media it was used through social media it was communicated by contacting individuals developers directly after that fact we hired phil meyer who represents now his own company to contact individual developers and one of the consistent messages was a concern of developing this property is uniqueness and that part of the property is part of the historic neighborhood and part of the property is not and how to blend those two pieces together and make both entities amicable i'm happy with that and so we had developers not submit bids for that i think because the hasn't been seen or anxiety at why we're here tonight how much of the public process how many contacted there were zero bids from over about a six eight month period of time he contacted about six individuals that we know that develop projects like this and have the reputation for doing so ok thank you comments i think as a neighborhood lee expected the density along tenth and if not in our boundaries and we knew that that was a possibility i think at that middle black that's giving the neighborhood the most anxiety and i think it's important to realize that little sidewalk so long the school itself that's like the main artery for us that live there as far as right as far as getting from our homes to downtown and now we walk through and it's grudges on one side parking spots on the other side i appreciate that there's trees and there's some green but i think that's kind of the sad part of it for us it's so tight there are so many graduates and that's where we walk is that way they don't go along mable i don't know that's just sort of a part i think is tough and a spot right think there could be potential for green one last townhouse a few less of placement of the garage is was dictated by a two eight to eight in the first of all we are maintaining existing entrances to the school building so you've got intern says and roughly four or five locations  the concept of having all of our garage is located in one area versus another got to be somewhat of a travel distance so we deliberately split them on the site the other reason being puttin all of the garages in one location puts a lot of grudges and parking in one location so we deliberately did that yes you know the site it avenue of this is you know we put in garages versus just surface parking because we want to make sure it's a higher end product if some point in the future five to ten years down the road whatever it is we decide to convert  condos and start selling i'm selling a condo without a garage at all is is almost impossible than one with garage so do all of our communities have garages no but we put the garage is there specifically to get to a higher price point and then we also put an additional parking space for every unit specifically to make sure we weren't adding cars to the streets so i mean we've tried very hard to make sure the impact it's a lot of units a slot a garage it's a lot of parking but we're trying to get everybody you know we're not trying to put in you know forty units and say hey go find a spot to park somewhere in the street so the townhomes have a double stroller single double and can you fit the length of a vehicle in the driveway space i believe that's over twenty feet so it's intended to yes ok you know my scale on it but that's what i directed him to and just as a clarification since up here we actually looked at this property when it was first put out to bid and quite honestly did submit a bid because as a general rule as a developer it costs a lot of money and a of time and a lot of effort to go through this process so we try to select projects where we're not facing an uphill that so why there was less interest wasn't because we don't think it's a good project we don't think it's a good neighborhood it's just a lot of cost to go through the process and you know you want to have some success potential for success to go into it so that's why we turned it down the first time so hey you could be in holland heights i'm going to make a final comment and this is not necessarily related density but the row houses the town houses and i appreciate matt's comment about that and i spent some time driving around historic district you basically have even numbered townhouses on tents an even numbered town i was on maple and we have a lot of warred single family homes in that neck of the woods and there's pretty couple of pretty good examples of duplex so all of forward to when you get back and tell me why i was  any other comments or question i will just say for myself i like the idea of time homes i know a lot of people in their middle age years they don't want to take care of a yard they still have kids that come home from college and this would provide that kind of market for those people also i have a lot of friends and family that are in that stage where they're looking for a job they find a job and they need a rental property and they don't have one anywhere this would also provide that for them and you're talking young professionals teachers social workers they don't make a whole lot so they're trying to find an affordable house or a four apartment and i think that this would have that for them but thank you everyone for coming tonight i didn't clarify earlier but we do have the planning commission the historic commission here and i know that joel took notes and nancy took notes of questions and comments that you made  we think the developers for coming tonight did i miss any other comments or questions and i really had no right