welcome one and all to this special meeting at a public information meeting for the astray and valid which means zoning in subdivision regulations thank you all for coming and hopefully we're not going to have weather related issues we're going to try and not go too late tonight just out of concerns for that but we'll try and answer as many questions as possible tonight and give your body chance to top it said j going to be very brief i think most of it is not new information for people here in the audience but what really people really want to talk about are the details of the document at that point we'll take a question and answer it will have participation from members of the planning commission the town planner and chairman is like we're going to direct that question it's or sash windows to make sure everybody's clear and where we are now in this in this is up for vote on november sixth so of a week from tomorrow they cannot be modified prior to that voted this point so the choice that we all have is either to vote yes or no on information meetings public hearings that in the past nine twelve months on these so wrong going to do is give a brief overview of some of the changes and then we can talk about the details later they started off  the planning commission wanted to have a link with regulations and the richmond town plan state statute requires that the bylaws conform with the town plan the current two thousand and twelve town plan is essentially the same document as the two saw two thousand and seven town plan and there those plans are the basis for the new violence the compact village center surrounded by the rural countryside drove the major changes in the d moving from the town plan to the by laws the town hired a consultant brandi saxton of plaisance consulting and she reviewed creative development techniques in two thousand and eight and began developing draft language for these via laws in two thousand and nine there were two town wide general discussion meetings and sovereign seven neighborhood meetings throughout the town to try to answer questions that the planning commission had and build support for some ideas and we also had to town wide discussions as specific bylaws many of the provisions in the current zoning and subdivision regulations that are in effect now remain in place in the new document some general highlights of the proposed general proposed regulations one of the major changes were the real major changes the expansion of zoning districts the bylaws implement the two thousand and seven richmond town plan by creating several new reconfigured zoning districts with different characteristics of proposed densities commercial and higher density residential areas are proposed for the village center and support that surrounding neighborhood special zoning districts in jonesville reflect a unique claim to use patterns in that area on base businesses farming in forestry and lower density residential zoning oppose for areas farthest from the village is or water in the agricultural residential now the propose owning rep districts outside of the village also incorporate principles given landowners who want to develop their land more flexibility to create well planned development in areas and ways that fit the area and respect the environment and consistent with the underlying density allowed for a given district th residential density in the village center meaning houses on smaller walks and immediately surrounding neighborhoods and lower residential density in areas outside of the village meaning larger residential produced setbacks in the village reflect the historical building building patterns meaning structures can be built closer to the street to property law and richmond village in jonesville the character of neighborhoods is protected by providing for a mix of residential uses primary single family homes and comparable non residential commercial uses these show up as mixed districts and the commercial oriented zoning districts such as the general business district more intense commercial industrial land uses are encourage density based zoning for determining the number of residential dwellings the first step would be use the entire parcel and then you would subtract land subject to easement lands within the existing rights of way and lands unable to be built upon these or environmental restrictions or flood plain with wetlands or other state federal regulations the third step is to divide remaining land by the lot density for the applicable zoning district to determine the maximum total number of walks so for the are three of the are ten goes back to that density calculation that excludes environment also environmentally sensitive areas and also other restricted areas so that your density calculation for the minimum age courage is restricted to build a lean density base zoning these are some examples on how you might be able to divide up certain properties it doesn't have to be strictly three acres per home it can be clustering of homes on smaller acreage as long as the overall density remains the same this gives you more examples of what  and a change to the allocation must be approved by the d r be on to business related changes in the business district maximum traffic generation standards are limited from every zoning district this means number of parking spaces that are required in every other zoning district is because of the lack of parking in the village and most zoning districts parking to the side rear is now encouraged not required to encourage owner occupied businesses  the general business district one dwelling unit on the second floor per watt is allowed business yards are allowed in the gateway in jonesville mixed districts and in the general business district per site more specifically with the village business district historic architectural styles multi story structures close to the street village scale developing a mix of uses are incurred this has to do with the historic building patterns of the village and doesn't regulate historic style of appearance for the structure for residential uses one dwelling per point one two five acres which is an eighth of an acre and quarter acre of wausau there is no ground for residential one hundred percent watt coverage is a lot for the village mixed you can have a mix of residential and nonresidential uses buildings that match historic set backs and whose main entrance faces the street are encourage him to remain live coverage of eighty percent mixed use required in all and that is part of the last five acres or more this means of are if there are any parcels of five acres or more in a new development would require a i could hold them to the end because i i think this is just an overview and people have questions will get them pointed to the right direction of the village residential north promotes residential development  adjacent to the village in order to conserve the town's real character for a world war two development encourages traditional residential neighborhoods built before in one nine hundred forty a lot coverage of seventy percent minimum lock sizes a quarter acre which is reduced homes face far apart on large acre lots in our village we're trying to encourage the characteristic type development that's typically been occurring look at the children ave baker street area this is the type of residential pattern in the village that we're encouraging village residential sile south has a lot size of half an acre other than lot size  similar to the village residential north cover fifty percent provides a compact a little community in the jonesville mix to district allows for mixed uses but the district continues to appear largely residential lot sizes again half an acre lot coverage of eighty percent is allowed in jonesville residential maintains the traditional pattern of single family homes lot size as one acre and lot coverage of thirty percent for the gateway district is similar to the gateway district now has residential density of one dwelling for thirty eight per watt sizes one acre lot coverage of fifty percent requires a larger set back along two than along other roads in the display in the general business district to similar to commercial and industrial commercial districts show you have now promotes economic development in the area served by existing infrastructure lot size of one acre lot coverage of seventy percent through the more important changes the rural three in the rural ten for the rural three it's a three acre minimum residential zone designed to maintain the town's working landscapes and open spaces while providing for opportunities for low density rural living and resource base small businesses you have a lot coverage of twenty percent maximum density of one wall and unit or three acres minimum lot size of one acre for residential or one half for a planned  again the rural ten is similar although with a larger lot size it promotes responsible management and conservation of natural resources while providing opportunities for low density rural living dispersed recreation and enjoyment if nature has a residential maximum of one drawing unit for ten acres a lot size minimum of one acre for residential lot size nonresidential is ten acres walk coverage of ten percent we also keep the mobile home park district similar to the current mobile home district now the boundaries followed sistering boundaries like coverage of forty percent and the park quarter acre per dwelling outside the mobile home park there have been some changes made to the flood hazard overlay district for properties within the special flood hazard area the regulations provide for a stream wide zoning permeating process for many repairs for example o needs is earning permit only and not a conditional use approval from the d r v and expands exemptions from the list for permitting requirements for low cost repairs lawns and gardens and building contents were currently everything requires  in light of the town's experience with tropical storm irene allowing repairs or replacement or structure up to a certain dollar cost can be either exempt from the dainty a permit or getting administered administrative permit only and not having to go through the d r v for a condition conditional use approval we've proposed a thousand dollar cost threshold for currently a permit is needed for any cost this also eliminates the current requirement that when an area for land development is with one hundred feet of his fimo special hazard area there jurisdictional term determination is needed to show that it is not inside the special flood hazard area currently under our regulations if you're on the map within one hundred feet of the special flood hazard area th regulations now we're keeping this provision in place and it's very important for saving thousands in taxpayer dollars later based on our experience with irene planning commission is convinced that we should continue the policy of not allowing new residential non residential construction in the flood sign restrictions the size and number of signs for businesses and organizations have been expanded the maximum signage area may consist of multiple types of signs of various regulations regarding signs vary by his own district the create greater signage and business related to its planned unit developments density bonuses are established for any plane or development which meet certain standards for land conservation for affordable accessible relatively hale housing these have to do with density bonuses where you can build more on a more dense level than current zoning allows the free qualifies with one of these c special development standards for the planned unit development and the various districts do apply accessory dwelling changes the maximum size of an accessory to walling or what you would commonly call in law part requirements they must be clearly subordinate to the single family dwelling mean they can overtake their primary residence on the property in size and exceeds the minimum state requirements may be up to seventy five percent of the total habitable space or eight hundred square feet which is levers loss was a unified bylaw combined zoning and subdivision regulations to create one unified document which clarified the standards and review process for  meds and d r p subdivision and other approvals were currently we have two separate documents and that concludes the brief overview i know everybody has come with a lot of questions and detail concerns and if you could take one at a them will open it up quickly to the rest of the audience and you will never be any thoughts questions or ok yeah well i have a comment initially i was unable to be at the second meeting with a select or move this forward i was under the impression when we were being given the information regarding the flood plane that the the restrictions that are in these new zone regulations are based upon qualifying for the national flood insurance program and i'm sure i heard that from more than one person and so my interpretation was that it is as strict as that is so that we qualify for the national flood insurance program but then i read the national the federal guidelines and that's not the case we are much more restrictive so i'm concerned with the fact that we were given information that either i misinterpreted or and if i misinterpreted other people did as well that maybe where we are being a little bit more restrict we need to be that said i do think that we probably want to strict building in the floodplain but if you have land that's not buildable when you're looking at your density  calculations it seems to me that if you've got fifty acres of land that's developed a bill and i understand that this is currently you don't want to put this in the calculation so you avoid clusters but if you've got fifty acres of land that's develop a bowl you can still put five houses on five acres if you have fifty acres of land but only twenty years as developer you can only put two houses there to me that seems like an inequity it seems like you should be able to calculate not necessarily build on undeveloped land but at least calculate it in your when you're looking to to develop that area so i just want to put that you say to somebody from really important to protect in the town things they wanted us to focus on and they really emphasize done natural protection property density on steep slopes building views caves there's an awful lot of things that people threw out there the said this is really important to the character of richmond and we don't want to change the town and we're nish we discussed have enough percentages for these different characters features and we ended up taking them all out of me the only thing left was look so i think up as a bare minimum hope of what we grr that's not in flood plain we batted around a lot of those percentages of different areas and it got very good use in that we were one hundred percent comfortable with the the natural resources component agriculture and so i think we wanted to not go too far with this clown and try to be a little conservative and learn a little bit more about some of the other factors the farming and the natural excellent point and something that i want to make is that it's not reasonable in a in a town and have it in your run by human beings to expect earning regulations to be without without errors and without need to be revised so it's important to have a vision procedure you know kathleen is that something that you can or or or or some leaflets playing machine talk about how that happens in the future if and then and then maybe along those lines or film maker maybe not on a property that becomes non conforming from you know the current zoning to the decided i was going to come off of it and i don't think we should be in this meeting right now we should have this before because i think in february we had a meeting with technically we would not allow be able to allow a new business to set up and install a new tank until every vision came out but i'm pretty confident that area vision will address that pretty quickly well but pretty quickly with two public hearings of this like we're going to pretty quickly it's like six weeks maybe i don't think we're ready for that i don't think revenue standpoint right we can generate revenue on two basis right homeowners have taxes and businesses pay into the taxes so my question is my first question is this this is a man a machine is which currently located as you can see here on the map and birds google maps with a map hearings and what one has been the public process it seems like we've been discussing this for quite some time and my understanding is that we're not talking about  you need to have awfully and skating in between the property and have setbacks there so there's a number of different things if you read the current regula was not like it would be you know brought up immediately or chopped up and you know in a number of weeks or months the estimate i got was something like six months before brought up again also we don't want to do it outside of the sequence of normal voting process because of the cost so i think that's and so i think a i think if there was think that it depends on how it happened and if there is if there appears to be i don't i don't think it does me if we have a healthy vibrant business community they're paying taxes be on what their their needs are require the business itself is creat for school children to go to school that's a major part of our taxes so it's really the residences that create the tax make make to tax the home did that notion of being consistent with neighboring towns so being i think overall we want to be in the same general ballpark rate down basically  you know big developer comes in plopped a couple hundred houses down and i think that is probably the biggest thing that this document my progress when we had that consult on one of the lots because of water and sewer restrictions we'd need a bigger lot to do it but it took a big developer comes in they built community systems and i think that would really change a town so to me keeping one of  you know if you think we don't have enough don't just look at the just strip on the map that have business because goodness there's a lot of a lot of other places ok we are getting close to nine so there were now little over a year since irene when the entire town came together in a way that was really impressive to help our neighbors and we're dealing with a very complex documents here the to amend already very complex zoning regulations and there it's to be expected that people will not like some parts of it that people will will organize against or vote no organized for it that's all perfectly fine that's the democratic process but i have a problem with is when i have to call it ministration a front porch form and complain that there are personal attacks that have made it into front porch form and are being used against members of the planning commission when their personal tax being made in public forums that's in appropriate if you believe that that is that it's evil intent on the part of volunteers in the commission or or committees in town i invite you to step up and volunteer for those committees and play that role yourselves we have a standing problem with finding filling the slots in committe members is to provide a way for everybody in town to have a voice i'm going to go vote on the six and vote your heart and how you feel about this that's the way it's supposed to work but if we demon