Planning Commission

September 24, 2020 – 6 p.m.

 

Present:         Libby Henderson, Chair

                        Marion Lasley, Vice-Chair

Charles Roberts, At Large

                        Jeff Diekman, District 1                   

                        John Youmans, District 2

                        Lorie Bouie, District 5

                        Tracey Stallworth, District 2

 

Absent:          Steve Scott, School Board Representative

                        Doug Nunamaker, District 3

                        William Chukes, District 1

 

Staff Present: Clayton Knowles, County Attorney

Diane Quigley, Growth Management Director

Jill Jeglie, Principal Planner

                        Beth Gjemse, Deputy Clerk

 

THIS MEETING WAS HAD VIA ZOOM. AUDIO ONLY.

 

Due to the restrictions on gatherings as a result of the COVID-19 virus, this meeting and public hearings may be viewed by accessing the Gadsden County Board of County Commissioners Facebook Page, www.facebook.com/GadsdenCountyBOCC. Those wishing to provide public testimony for the meeting and public hearings will be able to do so by accessing the Zoom platform, with virtual meeting access details that will be posted to the Gadsden County website, www.gadsdencountyfl.gov. Public comment for the meeting and public hearings should be submitted via email to CitizensToBeHeard@gadsdencountyfl.gov until noon on the day of the meeting in order to allow sufficient time for provision to the Planning Commission prior to the meeting and public hearings. Any comments submitted after this time will be accepted and included as part of the official record of the meeting.

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1.    Pledge of Allegiance

             At 6:08 p.m. Meeting called to order- Roll call was taken 

 

2.    Introduction of Members (Roll Call)

 

3.    Approval of the Agenda

  LASLEY/ YOUMANS

7-0 PASSED

 

4.    Approval of Minutes – June 4, 2020 and August 13, 2020

  June 4, 2020- DIEKMAN/ LASLEY -PASSED 7-0

 

Aug 13, 2020 Lasley made corrections- page 2, line 4 of the last paragraph, strike the words “did not”. Page 4, Second to last paragraph, line 4, the word portal should be “corridor”. Page 5, line 1 paragraph 3 the word partials should be “parcels”.

 

 DIEKMAN/ROBERTS 7-0

 

5.    Disclosures and Declarations of Conflict

  None were had

 

Public Hearings

 

6.    Scotland Road, Jett Large Scale Future Land Use Map Amendment (LSPA 2020- 01) (Legislative) - Consideration of transmittal to the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity of a Comprehensive Plan Large Scale Future Land Use Map (FLUM) Amendment to change the Future Land Use from Agriculture 2 to Agriculture 1 on a 62.13-acre parcel located at 1232 Scotland Road, Havana

             Jill Jeglie, Sr. Planner, introduced in full, the above item.

             

Jeglie stated larger signs were ordered per requested at the last Planning Meeting.

 

Elva Peppers, Florida Environmental and Land Services, In. (FELSI), appeared remotely- Amendment is requested by the long-term property owner of the parcel. The property was Agricultural for 46 years. Original property owner deceased and the children now owned the property. They have houses located on Scotland Road and want to divide the property for the 6 siblings. She submitted a map showing the difficulty in splitting the property into 6 parcels given all the homes were located along the road frontage. Properties were an odd shape and just not a good scenario. No objections from adjacent or nearby owners. No plans at this time to develop a subdivision. Current homes are on wells. If a home was built towards the back property, it would be over a half mile to get water to that home. Talquin had capacity but didn’t know if they could run a line that far.

 

Lasley- information sent the Commission did not have about how difficult it was to divide the 6 parcels.

 

Elva- Demonstrates visually in order to divide the parcels with a home being on each parcel, created an odd shaped property.

 

Lasley- would that still be the case?

 

Elva- No, Property would have to be 10 acres in size. Offered was a parcel with house could be 5 acres and someone would get a much larger parcel or maybe some of the other parcels would be 15 or 20-acres.  

 

Lasley- Are you saying it would not be divided equally?

 

Elva- Correct.

 

Lasley- 6 homes there already and they want another. Is that what triggered the lesser density.

 

Elva- No, the death of family and now it was time to divide property. Can do a family heir and give another lot.

 

Lasley- Handout said parcel will be divided into 3 parcels to split between the siblings and that could have been done now without the land use change.

 

Elva- no it can’t. there are homes and a couple mobile homes and the estate home so that was not equal. Did not know the details of who was getting what. Did know it was the emphasis on the Land Use Amendment. Was not to pave a road and make 12 lots.

 

Stallworth- Is there a document that could be shared to see what Elva is talking about.

 

Libby- asked Ms. Steele if it could be shared with everyone participating on the call and Ms. Steele said yes, she would share it on the screen.

  

Elva- don’t distract the request with the visual. Purpose is to change the property from Ag2 to Ag1. It appeared to fit very well in the community. Longtime resident of Gadsden County and multiple generations family on the property.

 

Lasley- The 4.46 acres. If not 5 acres it was a nonconforming lot.

 

Elva- That lot had not been created.

 

Lasley- There is a legal document in the packet that stated it had been.

 

Elva- It was a legal description until the process went through and was a description of the footprint.

 

Lasley- Wouldn’t they want to create a 5-acre lot instead of 4.46.

 

Elva- With the processes that Gadsden County had in place, 4.46 would be allowed if it met all the other requirements.  

 

Lasley- Only if it was a family homesteaded piece. That seems sloppy to me.

 

Elva- that is a different process and that had not been done and the only reason you see it is because the surveyor put it on there and it was the only survey to be had.

 

Jill- told Ms. Lasley since then, they gave a survey that removed the 4.46-acre parcel. It is a 62.13- acre outline.

 

The map was put on the screen for attendees to view.

 

Ms. Jeglie said it was an example of 10-acres that Ms. Peppers provided.

 

 Elva asked the map be moved up to view more of the property and she gave detail on what the lines represented separating the different lots. They want to change the Land use to then get a better type of layout.

 

Lasley- Currently it is 1 lot of 62 acres with 6 houses, and they want to plat it out and deed property to each other in unequal portions.

 

Elva- Not planned out but an example was; the estate home would get less acres than the others. Nothing planned yet until the change was made.

 

Lasley how many family members

 

Elva- not sure

 

Lasley- Worst case scenario is the County ends up with 12 houses and none would be on Talquin water and would be on a well that is existing or on a separate one. 

 

Elva- That could happen but she wanted to remind everyone the meeting was for an Agricultural Land use and an Agricultural parcel. Not posing a residential sub-division, it was Ag and they want to keep it Ag.

 

Lasley- 5- acre lots would not have an Ag exemption to her understanding and she asked Ms. Jeglie if that was a correct statement.

 

Jill- to apply for a family exception, they can apply with 3 acres if meet the requirements. Could deed off property to family.

 

Lasley- Even in addition to 5-acre lot?

 

Jill- they cannot exceed the density that they were approved for Even if they did a family exception parcel that was smaller than 5- acres, they still could not put more than 12 residential units on that property.

 

Diekman- Ag 2 to Ag1 is what was applied for, correct?

 

Jill- Correct.

 

Diekman the way he read the policy of the County on the urban service boundary, the sewer and water were not part of this application. Still Ag and until they went to something else, they did not have to connect to sewer and water.  

 

Lasley- Disagreed.   

 

Diekman- listing policy 1.1.3 on the urban service boundaries.

 

Lasley- Not an urban service area.

 

Diekman why would they be made to connect to water.

 

Lasley- listed in the printout, Policy 1.2.9.

 

Diekman- reading ahead of that policy in policy 1.1.3, which exempts Ag use.

 

           

Jill- there are no urban service boundaries yet. There no proposed development there is just a map amendment and what was indicated was in the future, if they cannot connect directly to water that was at the road, they may have to go through the process of development and bring them in, extending dry lines.

 

Diekman- they are not a proposed development and all of this followed policy 1.1.4.

 

Jill- Urban service boundaries should not include Ag.

 

Diekman- the County has not established urban service boundaries with the intention when they do, requirements are made for the parcels to connect urban services. It says Ag is exempt, and the land is exempt anyway because they were not trying to change to something else that would require them to connect.

 

Lasley- they are proposing to be denser and the water is there and the philosophy is that as you become denser you should be on central water and sewer id available.

 

Diekman- the philosophy according to what he was reading in the policy was after you moved past Ag, and they were not asking to do that. When they make the next step, this would be something the Commission would discuss.

 

Lasley- Went to the property and they did have a well on-site. If the land use change is approved, can they continue to build houses on the property without planning the lots and putting a road in. Could they put 6-7 more homes on the 62- acres without going through any development process besides building permits?  

 

Jeglie- If they were under single ownership, they could build more houses on that property, it was highly unlikely, but for financing they would have to create lots

 

Lasley- it happened with 6 houses there already.

 

Jeglie- A lot of property is Ag if you look at the large farm and pasture property, there are houses for family members or people working on the property to have a place to live.

Lasley- Surprised you can put 6 houses on a piece of property and not have it platted out.

 

Diekman- the family wishes to give parcels of land to their family and are well within their rights to go from Ag 2 to Ag 1 upon what the land use plan allowed for. How they platted did not matter to this board. The bank will take care of that for a claim in case of foreclosure.

 

Lasley- Approving a Land Use change and it creates more lots and it is 12 lots and in any other application would be a sub-division the Commission would treat it as such. The Commission did have jurisdiction to make these decisions. She understood it was a family plot so the circumstances were different but in any situation 12 lots would be a major sub-division. It would require hooking up the water. Under the regular rules that would be what was requires of this piece of property.

 

Diekman- asked with a major sub-division, do we lose the lot size. A sub-division could have lot sizes a lot smaller than what they were asking for in this application.

 

Jeglie- The density in the lot size is dependent on what the future land use category is. When they come in to sub-divide, they have a series of options.

 

Diekman- the size really does not change. If this was a larger piece of property and they wanted to go from Ag 2 to Ag 1, it did not trigger the fact that they were going to build 30 houses.

 

Jeglie- Correct, they are just looking at the designation. Future plans as far as a sub-division would go through the appropriate sub-division process.

 

Diekman- Did not appear to have the footprint of someone putting in any type of sub-division.

 

DIEKMAN MADE A MOTION FOR OPTION 1 SECOND BY ROBERTS.

 

 LIBBY HENDERSON- YES

            CHARLES ROBERTS- YES

JEFF DIEKMAN- YES

MARION LASLEY- YES

JOHN YUMANS- YES

LORIE BOUIE- YES

TRACEY STALLWORTH- YES

 

 PASSED 7-0

 

7.       Section 5611.F, Driveways (LDR 2020-01) (Legislative) - Consideration of Amendments to Subsection 5611.F Driveways of the Gadsden County Land Development Code.

 

Chair introduced and welcomed Diane Quigley the Growth Management Director.  

 

Ms. Quigley introduced the above item.  Getting a lot of requests for circular driveways. Some were allowed and some were not due to current spacing requirements. Researched other LDC in other Counties. With that, the revising of LDC recommendations were to allow maximum of one additional access point per street frontage for circular driveways may be permitted for residential living facilities and day care centers and single family dwellings and duplexes if frontage is adequate to ensure proper driveway separation as set forth in Subsection 5611.F.10 and there is at least a 20 foot setback from the property line for each driveway.  Residential driveways shall be situated on a minimum of 50- feet apart along local roads with a 35mph speed limit or less, a minimum of 200- feet along collector roads with a 35-mph speed limit and a minimum of 400- feet apart along collector roads with 45 mph speed limit or greater, notwithstanding the provisions of Subsection 5611.F.9. Lots with less than 50- feet of road frontage may be permitted one driveway. Also added was the wording; Additional driveways may be approved by the Planning Commission Official based on a professional traffic study submitted by the applicant, meaning they could be reviewed on a case by case basis. When looking at some lots, they realized that some had a minimum frontage of 100-feet. When everything was measured out with 50-feet between the driveways, and the 12-feet from the driveway and the 20-foot setback, they realized this would put it a little over 100- feet. If it was okay, they would like to change the setback to 10-feet from the property line. 

 

Diekman- said his LDC book was dated September 19, 2019 and he would like a copy of the updated one.

 

Quigley- Yes.

 

Diekman- question about going from 20-feet to 10-feet was long time utility easements are set on the boundary lines on properties. Don’t want to impact utilities. Typically, an easement between 2 pieces of property was 20- feet. Maybe 15-feet as a compromise to give room for utility movement, drainage movement.

 

Quigley said that was doable.

  

Lasley- Page 3, in F, #3, should say replace provided with however. In A of that section, a 10-ffot setback is being requested instead of 20. Ms. Quigley agreed. Lasley said that meant driveways could be 20-feet apart from each other. Ms. Quigley said correct in some cases. Lasley said on page 4, #6, did not understand the alignment of the driveways and asked if they wanted them opposite of each other separated by 20-feet.

 

Ms. Quigley said it was offsetting driveways. Driveways should be directly across from each other or separated by a minimum distance of 20-feet so cars in the driveways could see each other. 

 

Lasley- had problems with the wording in #10. Remove or less in line 3. Asked if notwithstanding meant “as long as they comply with” and Ms. Quigley answered yes. Lasley said the last sentence in #10 on page 4 should be its own item so it stood out. Same page letter G, the type of development box was residential with less than 25 units. She asked what did Residential/Collector mean. Quigley said residential neighborhood with less than 25 residential development *inaudible* community with less than 25 units along a residential/collector road.  Lasley stated maybe the slash needed to be removed.

Page 5, Additional driveways may be approved by the Planning Commission, did that mean additional driveway in addition to the 2 points of access for the corner.

 

Ms. Quigley said that was just a general statement. Leaving it open for a special situation where they may need more than 2. Lasley said she would pull it out of the paragraph and have it stand alone because it was referencing the corner lot application.

Page 5, #2 Lasley said she did not understand how it worked and the numbers that were listed did not match. Is there a table that was created to outline this so it was consistent and said what the County wanted?

 

Ms. Quigley said she would clean the language of that one up Lasley said it related to page 4, #10. Page 5, 3a, first line the or at the end of the sentence should be on. Line 3, roads design should be road designs. Line 5 all the way to the right, or should be of. Asked if Ms. Quigley wanted to bring it back with the corrections or vote on it with the corrections that were made.

 

Libby- Many changes, should it come back or is there a motion.

 

Diekman- On lots less than 50-feet, can the language change to give people 10-foot setback of the property line, only on lots under 50 foot. Would like it 12-feet.

 

Quigley can have this at the Oct. meeting to go over the changes or adopt with the changes made in the meeting.  

 

BOUIE MADE A MOTION TO ADOPT WITH THE CHANGES. SECOND FROM DIEKMAN

 

LIBBY HENDERSON- YES

CHARLES ROBERTS- YES

                        JEFF DIEKMAN- YES

                        MARION LASLEY- YES

                        JOHN YUMANS- YES

                        LORIE BOUIE- NO

                        TRACEY STALLWORTH- YES

 

PASSED 6-1

 

 

 

8.    Capital Improvements Schedule (LSPA 2020-03) (Legislative) - Consideration of the Amendment/Update of the Capital Improvement Schedule for 2020/21- 2024/25 of the Capital Improvements Element of the Gadsden County Comprehensive Plan.

 

Ms. Jeglie introduced the above item.

 

MS. LASLEY MADE A MOTION FOR OPTION 1 WITH A SECOND BY MR. /DIEKMAN

 

LIBBY HENDERSON- YES

CHARLES ROBERTS- YES

                        JEFF DIEKMAN- YES

                        MARION LASLEY- YES

                        JOHN YOUMANS- YES

                        LORIE BOUIE- YES 

                        TRACEY STALLWORTH- YES

 

PASSED 7-0

 

General Business

 

9.    Planning Commission Question and Comments

Diekman wants an updated LDC.

 

Quigley- Will sent to all. Wait until changes are approved and send revised?

 

Diekman as long as it was before the next meeting.

 

Nothing for October meeting.

 

 

10.  Director/Planner Comments

 

11.  Adjournment of Meeting

7:35 adjourned Bouie/ Lasley.

 

THE NEXT REGULARLY SCHEDULED MEETING IS OCTOBER 15, 2020 AT 6:00 PM.

 

 

                                                                        GADSDEN COUNTY, FLORIDA

 

 

 

                                                                        _________________________________

                                                                        LIBBY HENDERSON, Chair

 

 

 

ATTEST:

 

______________________________

NICHOLAS THOMAS, Clerk