Agenda - Planning Commission - 12/02/2010

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Update on Legacy Christian Academy. Final review of the site plan ,and subdivision related to the Legacy Christian Academy has been delayed to review development fees associated with the Plat. Staff will provide a more detailed update at the meeting. Update on River's Bend 5th Addition/Purchase Agreement. The City Council continues to discuss options with Mr. Rick Foster of River's Bend Holdings, LLC, regarding the purchase agreement for five (5) acres adjacent to River's Bend Park. Following resolution of this issue, Staff will finalize the analysis of acceptable uses and land use designation for this area. Land Use and Disprsifitir Alternatives for Former Municipal Center. Originally, the City had planned to set aside the former municipal center campus for a future middle school location within the community. Unfortunately, Anoka -Hennepin School District has no plans to construct a facility of this type in the foreseeable future. The City Council has reviewed different land use options for the campus. The current underlying land use is low density residential, At this time, the consensus of the City Council was to have this land use designation remain the same unless an acceptable proposal for a higher density is proposed. The City must retain the existing building until such time a facility is built to replace the existing Fire Station #2. Architectural Standards in Residential Districts. The City Council reviewed potential updates to the City's architectural standards in residential districts. The discussion was broken into three discussion points; 1) maintenance of existing residential structures, 2) architectural standards for new residential dwelling units; and 3) architectural standards for accessory structures. Consensus appeared to be to use the International Property Maintenance Code to address blighted and/or deteriorated exterior facades ranging from peeling paint to rotting wood products, etc. Consensus appeared to be to explore incentive based/form based codes to incentivize enhanced architectural standards. These standards would be intended to be simple and low cost, such as encouraging variation of color, use of multiple materials, and articulated facades and rooflines. This would give property owners the opportunity for flexibility in bulk standards such as structure size and setbacks in exchange for use of higher architectural standards. Finally, consensus was to amend City Code to increase the amount of square footage permitted without requiring a CUP in exchange for higher architectural standards. Green Building Standards. The City Council reviewed options for green building standards, a strategic goal of the City Council. Staff will continue to explore plausible options based on direction of City Council. `AgendaQuick'; New agenda software production software. The City has begun using a new web - based agenda production software package. The new software was used to produce the November 23rd' City Council Meeting agendas. The software is intended to streamline the production side of the agenda process. The software outputs high quality PDFs which will hopefully assist in better text searching and viewing. The software also produces a web -based htnil file that can be linked to the City's website for easy retrieval of agenda items. This software is anticipated to be used for all boards and commissions in the near future, including the Planning Commission and Board of Adjustment. PCi 12.02.2010 52