hello everyone and welcome to the december twelve twenty seventeen planning commission meeting sorry for the late start and approval of minutes for the nov twenty one twenty seven team meeting so much support posed communications from the audience this is the time for anyone to come forward on items that are not on the agenda as a public hearing new business letter a  and it is master planned as e c to district the client is looked at the site and has started to develop site plans for storage facilities on the property and in order to do that  forward he needs to come in your request something where worth right thank you thank you this goes require a public hearing which i will open at this time and i will support to do all right i was in favor i suppose all right looks good thank you very much next item short term rental zoning ordinance text amend t we're we're looking at today is it is two different motions and votes the options are two for each of them are to recommend to city council the approval as proposed by staff the other one the next option is recommend approval with modifications to land use elements the next one is to recommend not approving the these resolutions text amendments to city council and there should be another one which is to table it to a future time based on  a certain issue all of this is contingent also on the adoption of chapter fourteen provisions by city council because they really work hand in hand what i'm going to propose and was ron vanderveen and i have discussed previously is that we do this and in two separate discussions and votes so the first one again are these are the two that we were discussing just now the two types of short term rentals that have already been approved by city council there the owner occupied that was approved back past november first twenty seven what i've done here is i've laid out in red for you are the proposed modifications to be discussed and voted on again under those those conditions that i just mentioned either recommending approval modifications or not recommending to send up to city council for for their approval so just a quick overview on that one more time owner occupied view it was put under thirty nine dash for five point one requiring a zoning board of appeals special exception there was also language in they had ordinance about needing a public lodging license per chapter twenty six there was a bit of a lack of clarity in terms of  that that is and spent like how it's inspected how it's and fours the need to have a certificate of compliance issue there wasn't really those details as to how you actually implement this type of of short term rental program so for owner occupied and in front of you in that first packet that i just provided to you the suggested text amendment is to delete from section thirty nine dash board or five point one so therefore not requiring a special exception for these types and the language is also alter her which would also then take out the public lodging license issue  and it would regulate regulate these details in chapter fourteen which is housing which is under the purview of the neighborhood improvement committee who has met this topic and is as being is still in the process of discussing it reading through the language the proposed text amendments whether or not they would do the same thing recommend recommend with modifications or not recommend to city council that language onto the non owner occupied in commercial p r d m p u d that was also approved again just this past november it was put into a section thirty nine dash for five point but considered an administrative special exception with they did change that provision from the initial approved ordinance that you all had had recommend to city council  and so what it does a fact and and and but the public lodging license requirement per chapter twenty six was still in it and again there was lack of clarity in terms of the implementation steps of the program so what we're proposing in terms of tax amendments again now we're just talking about non owner occupied commercial p r d m p zone districts deleting section thirty nine dash four five point too and an ad being it is not owner occupied short term rentals in all commercial zones except for c four which doesn't permit residential uses and the language of that would be short term rentals as allowed in chapter fourteen with the certificate of compliance and all of those provisions what a certificate of compliance is how you receive it what registration requirements you need is all proposed to be in chapter fourteen so chapter thirty nine is your chapter as the planning commission and so what we're asking for you to do is look specifically at that section thirty nine and two to allow these modifications to come in for again the two that have already been approved so if we could just start with a and have a discussion on that and then perhaps a vote motion  so it's very similar to the long term rental program and that's what we really want to follow this is been a program that's been implemented for many many years and staff really have mary thank you to have really has a very very good grasp on the program elements on how to administer it and how to implement it in all aspects and therefore we really think that it would be most beneficial in jan for fourteen again to provide that specific housing type language  discussion questions are does anyone want to make a motion hearing and i will close public hearings must mark or trish i want to say that there's nobody in the audience right may interrupt the motion of the staff recommendation was that it's contingent upon approval of chapter fourteen items i just want to make sure that your motion is contingent on the your motion to recommend those changes is contingent on counsel  it thank you so moving on the next part of this is the non owner occupied a short term rentals in a residential zone districts this has not yet been approved it's coming back to you for further look because from a city council charge they have heard from their constituents that that this is something that is very much wanted to lease test out in the city is and again you may recommend approval of the city council you may recommend approval with modifications to specifically the land use element elements which i'll discuss in one moment you can recommend not approving it or you can table it if you don't feel that you have enough information to make a decision or recommendation i should say so this is being proposed as a two year pilot program these are not c n n s staff recommendations these are proposals  are actually directives from the city council they would like to see a two year pilot program to test this type of short term rental staff is saying though that we think that it would be best suited to be and that and through that spelled out would be aspects such as registration certificate of compliance process these inspections specific safety requirements change of uses from back really of property use and that that was something and so i just want to address that real quickly is that were we're thinking in terms of taking precautions to someone who doesn't know the area doesn't really know where they're they're living where they're staying at that if they're playing in the pool for instance and they don't and they need to call nine one one and in order to quickly provide that that address to them  and that that some extra provisions that were proposing to put into the pilot this pilot program and a lot of it is is from working in south haven and working with  the short term rentals there and things that i directly saw and kind of learning from that and trying to bring those good best practices into into holland and ask a question certainly would you want me to wait  with the sign on it with the address how does that work no just having it available and certainly we pointed out a pool area but having something just a valuable in the backyard would be sufficient for us so  aware that it is back there so land use elements this is really this is the second packet that i handed out to you just before the meeting the first page is really what's pertinent here staff is proposing to add it to section thirty nine dash one ninety four which is currently bed and breakfast tones and put it as a point one which would be called occupied short term rental pilot program this would be the only aspect of the pilot program again the nonresidential owner occupied in residential zone districts that would be located  again all of the regulations the provisions are very similar to the first two short term rental types and there's just a little bit of additions in terms of again these specific provisions for instance this address in the backyard etc so only before you tonight and again you may recommend and this is kind of highlighted  here but you may recommend changes modifications to any of this language even if it's in chapter fourteen if you had looked through if you looked through chapter fourteen you may do so however in terms of the official vote that would only be on these aspects these land use specific aspects of this program so getting right into those those are all highlighted here and her in red section thirty nine dash one ninety four point one establishes the section so that would be your first  aspect of this this motion so get and then the land use elements is and this was proposed by the city manager maximum of forty nine owner occupied short term rental units in residential zone district citywide you know the roof over forty one or twenty there was not a significant rationale had proposed twenty five initially city managers said that perhaps we should up it to forty these are specifically what you are very much able to recommend and vote on and to change with with to change as a recommendation to city council so the forty maximum you can change it to twenty five you can change it into and you can again these are recommendations to city council but this are roughly thirty five on earth there's currently thirty five of of kind rental units short term rental units that the staff is aware of now that was so in part that number came from that kind of thought that we would want to be able to capture all of those and are we able to capture enough funding then to maintain that so that the city staff will be compensated to maintain that forty number is there through licensing or whatever we're going to require for whatever fourteen says but that's a really  of questions or debates i've been attending counsel sessions for about six months now so i'm not new to this question or this and this issue but the question was the methodology for determining that number was asked several times how did we derive that methodology was the methodology to drive that number and the real concern was the legal aspect of number forty one applying and denying so i mean what was the methodology and have can you guys explain that to me a little bit probably not a good scientific response you know in grand rapids they have a number of something like it's either two hundred or two hundred fifty f or which numbers in their ordinance i we're obviously a lot smaller than grand rapids  it's reasonable there than this would tend to be reasonable for our size of city i think also the question about and force that meant the enforceability and being able to keep up with the the inspections and  is a concern and you know again how do you distinguish between forty and forty wine on the other hand how do you distinguish where the line is between our wine and the r t r end zone district to some degree but but in any event and a lot of ordinances it's just sort of it's a judgment call legislative judgment call and authority we feel that it's big enough at this point to say that we we can justify that it might be an issue later on we don't know  going into this because it's a brand new situation for us to deal with but also you get to more of these and then it becomes an issue of how do you staff the department of community and neighborhood services to be able to handle this and we just don't know at this point so i think that that's part of the rationale i don't think i really answered your question but that's best answer we can we can give yes martin after two years  risk that that's always a risk there now you know there are a lot of things in here that in the chapter fourteen if this is passed that that would be housing code type related ok and the idea of the permit is a housing code related item and sell but there always is a risk there because you know that if if a court were to interpret it as is as a disguised as owning ordinance which is seldom done but it has happened on occasion  then the court would say that there would be legal non conforming use rights that might attach on the other hand if we were to put all this in the zoning ordinance and then change it it's guaranteed to have legal non conforming use rights that continue non conforming use rights argument then then if it's in chapter thirty nine there is one other factor too and i never talk to jenna about this because the direction it's going is is positive in this way but the two bills that are pending in this in lansing now the senate bill and the house bill all both say that for zoning purposes short term rental is a single family residence but the key is there both say for zoning purposes and they leave open the option to do regulations outside the zoning ordinance and so when i've looked at the chapter fourteen regulations one of the thoughts i've had and terms of evaluating that is you know will lot of this survive the adoption of these bills it's a mistake for anybody to say that that these two bills in lansing would do away with any local regulation of short term rental that if they don't do that they just change the classification for sure for zoning purposes and putting the regulations in chapter fourteen had the best chance of surviving to give local control over short term rental issues thanks ron so the other a provision here a land use provision is a five hundred foot separation distance between each man or occupied short term rental unit in a residential zone distracts  discussion i have actually i have these two maps this is showing with the black parcel in the middle this is showing a buffer the black line is filling the buffer of five hundred feet so that would mean that if this center center parcel was a non owner occupied short term rental in a residential zone which r t r and is then there would not be permitted another short term rental non owner occupied short term rental within this five hundred foot buffer he picked my house john and really pretty much while not going to be a short term rental  yeah right and then the blue line is showing us thousand foot buffer so again we can adjust we can go you know we can recommend you can recommend seven hundred fifty feet if  you so desired if you thought that that was more appropriate the reasoning behind a buffer came an initially from council and it was in reaction to the thought that that perhaps in the winter months and a lot of the housing stock a lots of kids that would be going to the school districts it has happened in other areas close by and it was something that we would want to avoid again this is a two year pilot program it's a good way to kind of dip sample leaves that it's a good way to depart toes into it and to easily be able to get out if it if it doesn't work so this is the r t r and then i've also provided a buffer area in holland high and so they you can see a example of our one with the larger lots and what that buffer would look like again five hundred feet in the black a thousand feet in the blue so you're welcome to discuss that number as well if you would like or propose modifications to either or the forty cab or the five hundred  separation and then you have and then the other aspects of this modification in chapter thirty nine would just be things such as compliance with chapter fourteen housing only allowed with certificate of compliance that's in the fact that owner short term rental units shall not continue if not incorporated into the ordinance or if the pilot program is not renewed and those again are the only aspects of the pilot program that staff and are churning run vanderveen are proposing are suggesting to be in the zoning ordinance and i again all of the provisions the regulations the details would be in chapter fourteen which neighborhood improvement committee is currently looking at and will vote to make a recommendation recommend with modifications or not recommend approval after meeting in january that is something that's that's going to be in chapter fourteen there will be an evaluation process any specific modifications to that the staff it laid because so in front of you this is from the additions that are proposed to chapter fourteen housing and here we have a pilot program evaluation measurements throughout the two year program staff will track information regarding each property that's registered under this pilot program information will include but not be limited to property complaints from neighbors new song nuisance complaints police visit police tickets certainly it cetera provisions in terms of how you m not be not be able to renewed your certificate of compliance which will be valid for one year is also in chapter fourteen  instance if you get three tickets police citations you automatically will not be able to renew your your certificate of compliance at the end of that year therefore you would not be legally able to resume your your short term rental and then there's other provisions as well they'll be an assessment by staff and a determination as to whether or not they believe that a certificate of compliance renewed for a criminal we're proposing that staff would collect all of that information and then if so then the other aspect that we have so that's again evaluating and so then we'll also share all of those results with city council and for city council to determine whether or not they believe that that it is working or that it's not working i guess and we don't make any recommendations relative to determine whether or not based on the information that we provide and for reports as to whether or not it's working or not working however i know that the neighborhood improvement committee is interested in that language as well and is going to work on that and that's in chapter fourteen specifically as certainly you as planning commission can recommend and can the whole legislative things that were on or off if you were starting from ground zero with this i don't think this is the way you would do it if you really want to test it ok first up no offense but i have little faith that counsel is going to come up with a rationale that this didn't work ok as does not happen it's never happened before it's not going to happen now so if that's the premises that it's going to continue is this the way you would want to regulate these things ok and especially if you want to limit it initially all right so other communities have done an overlay district where they say this area go crazy have your short term rentals and do the separation all your stuff in chapter fourteen applies it stuck in the zoning ordinance where it's defensible u k all the stuff is still in fourteen if that goes away right so  tests in south shore it's has it really gives a do service to test it with an overlay would be a very constrained area and generally would just be in generally in i would say two or three in holland  maybe about seven or eight in the arts here and it's really interesting and with the owner occupied two that have already been approved with they're a little bit scattered most of them are they're on the edges they're not in the core downtown and we're getting calls from people that want to buy property throughout the entire city we're approaching them like a lead to back in july and he was just this past july when we were having a study session and really kind of diving into the meat of this staff came to the planning commission with a proposal that basically said hey let's look at these just passably being in the to rent district because they're probably going to want to be close to whole college and close to downtown etc that went nowhere with you as a group and shut it down and it basically saying we want these to be able to be city wide why should we not be allowing these to be owed in maplewood are owed him in the west stander whatever it may be so so part of the rationale for this too is a direct response to a direction from the commission from this past summer that you didn't want any part of it just being in one area so that was not owner arctic as we shut down  owner occupied just out of general principle that it would get anything i don't know if it was just applied to owner occupied thing you think from what i recollect it was a part of the whole broader discussion about where do we want to with short term just thinking about all the testimony her very public hearings where people were saying we're here what are your customers here for and they're here for retail whole entertainment  more towards that area and i'm just i'm just trying to have a problem micro with your criteria is that sorry that none of that is anything they're planning commission really talked about that was all that stuff that was brought up by the short term rental people are made for this was what does this do to the affordability not affordable housing the affordability of houses in the area in the community in the community ok geographically and then at the end of two years or because that was cool then let's expand the overlay disparate so you have the same ability you do wind up with  with the with saying you're going to do it but that's what we're really saying here i mean i don't care about your criteria i don't care about something a judgment at the end the way this is planned out the way the money's being thrown at this thing is at the end of this there's going to be very difficult to have a rationale that says it works and so if that's the case let's just do it in a manner that we have some more control over at the beginning and i agree with you mark that maybe not was the idea back then ok i think it just applied to the owner occupied at that point in time but the main concern that this commissions have from day one was not nuisance not cops not one grass not anything it's the impact this has  neighborhoods and the impact it has on removing product out of the marketplace that's affordable in that one twenty one eighty range and how do we minimize that impact and from my perspective if you're going to do this we can do the that's the area that we're going to trade in first because we know we're going to do it and if it works then we could expand elsewhere i am wondering though if we want to evaluate the true impact of a neighborhood and to be able to do a pilot program all rationale can you explain to me from the point commission perspective of how that was followed up or if that was followed up with regard to  the most recent that i've heard is to look at the five hundred foot separation distance with the forty maximum capacity residentially so that may have been in previous conversations but the conversations that i've been involved in since i've been here in the end of july and did not include that in there far as staff was staff did look into an overlay option but quickly fell that that it would be able to test better than three c why i guess i would definitely agree with gen i mean there was discussion about overlays for specific things to work on so it was discussed i mean i know we discussed it here the planning commission level also but it didn't really work its way into the final language and i know that there are there is one city council member or two who probably would be very much to against you know having kind of a smaller area i remember a council member live and speaking quite vehemently that he thinks that he's going to have folks out on the sole shore neighborhood that are going to want to take advantage of this and he very much wants to be able to neighbors over there to be able to take advantage of it so he probably i can't speak for him but he just based on what he said he right so i can if you would like to to modify staffs proposal in any way or make any recommendations that are not outlined here you are able to do so and those those recommendations will go to city council and the city council will have the authority to accept it bring it back make whatever decisions they they want to there but they are asking for your recommendations  because they they do want to consider them so any changes that we want to make to this the number of units or the foot separation we can do that missions now definitely  recommendation about that word about then have a public hearing and then there's a council but can i'm very uncomfortable voting on anything here like everybody's in a bum rush to do this let's have a conversation with the current conditions about doing an overlay district and what that might look like understand the ramifications for all of that from rand runs point of view understand where that might go what that might look like maybe you know really district the separations two hundred fifty i don't know all of these numbers are just out of the air so let's have another conversation about if you're going to do this and if you're going to controlled and be able to expand it because we're going to wind up with short term rentals in this town one way or another one way by the state legislature saying go after it and the other way by the by council saying hey we don't really have any problems because we didn't find what a problem was trisha did you have something i have a question for the city attorney ron can you tell us what the impact it would be if we create an overlay zone district specifically for short term rentals and then council decides they don't want to do the pilot program can you speak about non conforming uses specifically related to an overlay district well they're what they were you know is that you're going to wind up with council adopting short term rental income that the way i would see that working out would be would be that instead of the section thirty nine dash one ninety four point one saying that they're allowed in any residential district it would say that be allowed the short not owner occupied short term rentals would be allowed in the whatever we want to call the overlay district and then we would have a section that sets the areas the parameters of that overlay district and and within that peretti those parameters within that overlay would be the only place you could have short term rental i would also see as adapting chapter fourteen regulations that would regulate those and  that would all be the same is what we're talking about here that the overlay district and the the impact is to narrow down the area you could potentially have non conforming uses because if it's not legal outside the overlay district you can acquire non conforming use privileges and so you know that the whatever that overlay district is is the area of risk understand my premises  this long enough and how this works we're going to wind up with the council approving for a terminal program and my point is is is this the program you want to have them cruel or do you want us to think about it a little bit more in what in the light of day of what's going on now and that would be my premise on the table emotion that allows us to have that conversation we get to the end of it we only say this is really good or may something say something different but i'm not prepared to vote on this as it stands of this point in time because i think as a premise for doing something and not doing something in the same breath that a real good one so there's a motion right well i would make a table in motion if i may ask staff needs to have very specific things that you want us to do over the next month i'm i don't know that our staff to do anything at this point in time i want to have a conversation before you guys jump in i'm not got a lot of time tonight we could we could continue to talk about this mar i mean i guess what i'm saying is i mean i don't i don't think it's in anybody's best interest to just fritter away another month to come back from this a month from now didn't sit around and go ok what do out as an overlay just or you know do all history things where he comes both sides of the street let's look at what a five hundred foot separation what the potential number is in there ok and and everything else stays the same because fundamentally the question here is not one of my new show that the question here is what do we want this to look like and while i understand the desire to quote test it quote unquote all over the city the testing from my perspective is a farce all right i may be dealing with the things that but at the end you're going to wind up with a short term run program and if that's the case let's start with a short term model program from the get go right and let's minimize its impact on neighborhoods and places like initially constructing a geographic aspect of it and at the end of the year six months everything's all cool groovy move the boundaries ok my only other suggestion is that we have clear cut ways to determine whether or not the program fails or is a success they would be allowed regardless regardless once those program gets started those enforcements and those illegal short term rentals will be will be  made and they will be directed to follow a process of i mean so we've been waiting to know what that process is and by that enforcement efforts will be kicked up her city council in here you also don't have lino how you would handle it the certificates correct yes so the the regulations those specific types of regulations would be would be offered in a brochure we do have a text in the ordinance that states something to the effect of rules and regulations from cns would be adhered to  so that those would be would be spelled out specifically in terms of we would do it by who comes first first come first serve and as we're proposing here  that would pretty much you know x marks the spot of where we begin we would draw the buffer and then and start through the process inspection process and make sure that all the registration materials are there and then to try and go from there so basically with complete applications started that process as if someone else say anywhere were to come at the same time obviously they're not you know five hundred feet apart as a as a number as you say is a lottery possible is that something that we can do it is an option so if you say there's a deadline for your application on this day and we will be drawing trisha's coming up again you know some of the concerns we have with the lottery are some property owners will move through the process faster than others we don't want people place holding to say oh i got my application and first and maybe i'm not really going to do a short term rental but i don't want any of my neighbors to do it either so i'm going to get my application in first and hold my place to kick out everybody else around me was first  the completed we have a set of regulations in chap fourteen about having a complete application giving preference to someone that has already had a property inspection and we know their property is already in compliance with chapter fourteen they already have their local agent in place and several other items like that because again in working through the process to give a fair chance to our property owners we it would  be challenging to work with a property owner who's never done an inspection before and this is their first show versus somebody the are already has a property that's been around toll for many years and maybe now they just want to start using it as a short p lot of how that's going to work we know that there are several people that are ready to go that have already had their inspection it's been inspected as a long term rental for many years they'd like to use it as a short term rental staff wise process wise procedure wise they're going to be more prepared than an owner that's never done an inspection of those that are apparently ready to go within five hundred feet of each other yes so what happens now it's black friday  first come first serve we will require brand new inspection for anybody that wants to use their property as a non owner occupied short term rental because of some additional regulations we put in chapter fourteen that addresses fire extinguishers parking requirements so we both do that we'll do we'll take in the applications will get people scheduled like we normally do when they come in and we're going to have to evaluate i think we're going to have another that's wh i could be hardened up the steps i'm pretty sure we're going to have the same problem i think whether we do a lottery or a first come first serve because the same thing could happen in a lottery we pick the first one our trip to the pick out the first application and i somebody that's never had an inspection never gone through the process it could take them three months do we really want to hold up everybody else but this is the kind of conversation that we need to flush out because i guarantee  well i think just the point i was trying to make earlier was to have the methodology and to be able to articulate back to people why we decided what we did decide regarding overlays or the number of these applications i think we have to understand that not only is accountable to the planning commission as well i will apologize to you if the city council hasn't given you enough communication what their desires are and what they would like to see happen that's that's the fault of the council and i apologized for them at the council but we still need to find a better way or better approach to be able to articulate back to the people in those neighborhoods when someone purchases a house and they don't occupy it and they begin to rent it out we better have an answer to them why we're doing what we're doing and so i commend all the work the planning commission has done this is a incredible amount of work in a short amount of time i really do commend all of you for this and i've been watching this from outside and now i'm on the inside so now i can speak to the fact of what i think should happen but i think we need to we need to work on this one on my first meeting playing point commission  and in the work session you know we you know paul will apologize in advance for saying this but when we talk about three foot fences her nine hundred ninety percent of the meeting was about a three foot fence and whether we're going to do that but this is the hottest topic that's reached the city of holland in some time i want to comes to playing commission issues i think they should have been on the agenda first for discussion or we need to have a special meeting and have fun you know kind of answer these questions that all of you are bringing up because like maybe not in depth with the commission the loma city council i know both sides people have been parking about this but maybe we haven't heard each other and made sure we've addressed some of these questions that are out there so that's that's it's one where my wife yells at me not to yell at the t v but when we did what we did six to four and then you grandfather them in that night at the council i was yelling par fixed that ok but i agree we generally don't have a lot of conversation about really important stuff staff sets the agenda based on what council tells them to do and quite frankly it was some of our frustration we looked at this we provided we came up with three ordinances that allowed it not owner occupied we elected to send the first two up to council they voted them in and then a couple months later they  and we did that that was resume and then i got some today and then i came back here saying well since you can't tell us we're going to find it for you these are professional people that sit here on this board if you're even if i desperately disagree with what you want to do but  that's exactly what we're going to do i'm going to try to come up with the best darn way of doing it this ain't it guy in my opinion and i've done this for walk a long time  yes i will ask it for you to do i hope in the public hearing on this topic ok i can at this time i open a public hearing on this item and i will close the public hearing table this until we've had opportunity to discuss the next study section if this is the right way to go is there support for that support that all those in favor i oppose i need a motion and then support somo i was in favor i opposed to you any more than that jenna that was the only one right yeah unless you want to do a study session a hand short term rentals and welcome to our new commission member yes block representative from council scott corben thank you know we're all friends here this has any way of communicating very communications from staff happy holidays to everybody and thank you very much for all of your patience with us you know yes to friends and professionals