ED & Planning Committee
Meeting Summary for May 21, 2008
Page 1
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COMMITTEE AGENDA TOPICS
I.
Subject:
Action:
Belmont Retail
Update on Staff review of options for supporting retail in
Belmont
II.
Subject:
Action:
Residential Pedestrian Lighting Process
Receive information regarding pedestrian scale/decorative
lighting and make recommendation for moving forward
III.
Subject:
Action:
First Ward Park and Parking
Update on First Ward Park
COMMITTEE INFORMATION
Present:
Time:
Council members John Lassiter, Nancy Carter, Anthony Foxx,
Patsy Kinsey and James Mitchell
3:30 p.m. – 5:20 p.m.
ATTACHMENTS
1.
2.
PowerPoint Presentation Belmont Retail Development
PowerPoint Pedestrian Scale/Decorative Lighting in Residential Development.
DISCUSSION HIGHLIGHTS
I.
Subject: Belmont Retail
John Lassiter, Chair: We have gotten the return of the conversation on Belmont
Retail which the Committee dealt with last September. We took it to Council for
some feedback and they asked us to work on it some more so we are going to
get another chance to reflect on those issues in that neighborhood.
Tom Flynn: We want to provide some background and go over where we were,
talk to you about some opportunities that we have explored at the intersection of
Parkwood and Pegram and also some additional information on the Walker’s
Grocery, Fatback Queen and Stewart and Perina site. We have some preliminary
recommendations and we also have some more work to do, but we thought it
was the appropriate time, given where we were on some of these, to bring it
back to the Committee, get your thoughts and see whether this is ready to move
forward to Council or whether you want us to do some more work in it.
(Mr. Flynn used PowerPoint for his presentation to the Committee)
In September 2007, the Council directed us to pursue more work on developing a
mixed-use center to see what could happen at Parkwood and Pegram and also
explore potential reuse/redevelopment of willing C-store owners in the heart of
Belmont. We’ve done some more exploration of what land we could purchase
along Parkwood and Pegram. We’ve looked at a market study in that area, we’ve
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done some design work and also had some conversation with both the private
sector and the non-profit development sector in terms of the CharlotteMecklenburg Development Corporation in terms of their interest as well (pointed
out the location of Parkwood and Pegram and pointed out the parcels owned by
the City). We are looking at trying to get a retail project along those two blocks.
We have a willing seller at appraised value for those two parcels and have either
unwilling sellers or sellers at significantly above appraised value on the rest of
this.
Questions/Answers/Comments
Kinsey:
What is the significance of the different colors or is there a significance?
Drayton: It is based on the zoning classification.
Foxx:
Mr. Flynn, could you give us some idea of magnitude in terms of what
people are asking for on the property?
Flynn:
I’ll get to that.
Flynn:
Kinsey:
Flynn:
Flynn:
(Continued his presentation with Findings: Parkwood and Pegram Retail).
Josh’s Grocery – it says 18th and Seigle so that is not contiguous is it?
No it is not contiguous to this and we will show you what we’ve done and
what you could accomplish.
I’ll let A. C. Shull talk about this because he and Bob Drayton from our
Real Estate Division were more involved in the conversations around what
the adjacent property owners wanted, to answer your question, Mr. Foxx.
Shull:
Mr. Lunn’s property, you can buy it at appraised value of $412,000. The
adjacent property owner is Mr. Jenkins and he owns two lots there and up
here Carlos Espin owns two lots and Mr. DeVant. They are somewhat in
the real estate business in Belmont and we don’t know what plans they
have for that property, but they are not willing to sell at this time. If they
do sell, they were asking for about two times the appraised value which is
$550,000 per lot. That is so far beyond the appraisal that the City would
look at that we really didn’t consider it any further. Maybe they would
want a proposal to develop at some other time, but they are not
interested at this time or either they are driving a higher price.
Foxx:
Is that two times the appraised value true of both sets of properties? I
feel like I’m having a conversation about a small town in North Carolina.
We are talking about Joe’s Rib Shack and somebody’s fish store and what
I would like to see something that takes each parcel and tells us what the
appraisal value is and what the owner is asking. Is that too hard to get
done?
Flynn:
No, we can do that.
Lassiter: The three green parcels, is there currently buildings on those parcels?
Drayton: Yes.
Lassiter: What are they? Are they residences or what?
Drayton: The first two on the right are single family homes and the two buildings
you see in the middle, the first one in the green property and the second
one in the purple property are both commercial buildings. The commercial
building on the left currently does not have a roof, it just has walls and
there is a flea market operating out of the one on the right in the green
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Lassiter:
Drayton:
Lassiter:
Flynn:
Lassiter:
Drayton:
Lassiter:
Kinsey:
Drayton:
Lassiter:
Drayton:
Lassiter:
Flynn:
Lassiter:
Flynn:
Lassiter:
Drayton:
Foxx:
Flynn:
Foxx:
Carter:
Shull:
Flynn:
Kinsey:
Carter:
Flynn:
Flynn:
section.
Is it one building?
They are two separate buildings operating as one ownership.
There are three green parcels, do we own any of the green parcels?
No.
Then there are three purple parcels and one behind it. How many of
those do we own?
One, two and three.
We only own the ones to the right. And that is owned by the same guy
who owns the ones in the green.
Wait a minute, I didn’t see the light.
Pointed out the ones the City owns.
Everything to the right of that is owned by the same guy and he’s got
commercial zoning on one and residential on the other?
The next two lots are owned by one person and the two on the corner are
owned by separate individuals.
None of those folks want to sell?
That is correct.
Now, on the other side the first two are for sale, but the last three to the
left are not for sale.
That is correct.
What is on all of those properties?
The one in the middle is a vacant lot and that is like a commercial
business with an office on the corner and those two on the corner are
owned by one individual and he is asking about twice the appraised value.
I’m getting more confused. When you say that the owners on the left
hand side, the purple color, don’t want to sell, are you saying they don’t
want to sell or they are asking more than we want to pay?
They are asking twice the appraised value. I can’t recommend the City
purchase at twice the appraised value.
I’m not asking you for a recommendation like that. I just want to
understand the dynamics here and whether they are willing to sell, but
they are willing to sell for a higher price because there is a difference to
me.
I was wondering if you could go into the same analysis across the street.
A gentlemen named Bruce Wright owns both sides of the road there. He
works for the City of Charlotte and he is interested in developing his
property and would like to see a project, but he wants to do his own sole
ownership type deal.
He does not want to sell.
He owns the two on the corner?
Behind those two?
We didn’t go into those.
(Continued his presentation). We think is feasible is to purchase the
Parkwood Grocery, those are the two lots on the corner and we can
purchase those at the appraised value. They provide a key location for a
retail development. We’ve had conversations with CMDC and they are
interested in pursuing that. They think there are some other opportunities
there so we would like to move forward on that. We have a willing seller,
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Lassiter:
Flynn:
Lassiter:
Shull:
Lassiter:
Shull:
Flynn:
Kinsey:
Flynn:
Kinsey:
Shull:
we can put something better there, something that serves the community
better. It sets up potential redevelopment now or in the future if nothing
is able to happen there. It also allows us to purchase Josh’s which is a
closed convenience store in the middle of Belmont. That is why that is a
recommendation to move forward on Parkwood and Pegram.
Tell me about Josh’s property.
Josh’s property is located at 18th Street and Seigle Avenue, much more
into the neighborhood of Belmont. We have a willing seller at the
appraised value. The Plan calls for this to be residential and it actually is
zoned residential and is a non-conforming use. This would basically
remove blight, bring it back to a conforming use. It would require the City
to write down the land costs and we think the land cost for a single family
house, which is what could be developed on that lot, or a concept of one
single family home, probably can afford somewhere in the neighborhood
of $30,000 worth of land value. We would have to write down in order to
sell this. I think this promotes the plan, eliminates a non-conforming use
and we have a willing seller. It can bring back a nice single family dwelling
into the heart of the neighborhood.
What are the adjoining uses around that? More specifically what are the
price points in there, how much is new construction? We are talking
about reselling it, having somebody to build it?
Close to that area you find houses that are selling and rehabbing $300,000. I have seen quite a few of them $350,000 where somebody
purchases an older house and rehabs it. There is a lot of that going on
within two blocks of this area. Also within a couple blocks of this area is
the St. Paul Church which has a master plan to redevelop houses, which is
a rather large plan. That is what is near Josh’s.
If the properties are now being rehabbed and selling for $300,000 why
hasn’t the market come in and bought it?
I don’t think Mr. Lunn has been willing to sell up to this point. He has a
boarded up store and vines are growing on it. It is close to another
convenience store, which is Walker’s Grocery, which is part of this
proposal which makes it a fairly unattractive lot.
Also he is asking appraised value of $70,000 that puts you into basically a
half-million dollar house if you were going to land value and there to a
total development value. That is why we said if we did this we would have
to write down the cost because you can’t build a residential house in
Belmont and sell it for $71,000. That market doesn’t work today.
I know where this is and I wouldn’t want to live there right now. What is
the possibility of our buying it and knocking it down and just holding the
property until the surrounding property? I wouldn’t want to live near
Walker’s – that is not a good corner right now.
That is a possibility too. The City would not develop it. We would knock it
down and sell the land for residential.
Why not hold it until somebody really wants to come in there?
Another interest has been from the Housing Authority who is working with
the Belmont CDC. I think the plan is to build ten houses and I don’t think
they have built any yet. I have had some past conversations about the
Housing Authority essentially buying the lots we might come with here for
single family development. Those houses would be less than what I
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Lassiter:
Drayton:
Lassiter:
Drayton:
Lassiter:
Drayton:
Lassiter:
Drayton:
Flynn:
Lassiter:
Foxx:
Flynn:
mentioned, the $300,000 and would be more affordable, probably in the
$190,000 range.
This is not a conforming use, which means you could not reopen that
commercial property, which means you can’t live there, which means its
trade value is whatever the cost of land is less the cost of demolition. Is
that $71,000?
I’m sorry, what was your question?
This may be an incorrect assessment, but if it is not a conforming use, you
cannot reopen that as commercial property, cannot be used as a
residential property because it does not meet residential code, which
means its only value is as raw land less the cost of demolition of the
existing structure, and that is $71,000. So a lot now in the neighborhood,
they are all $71,000?
They are based on the square footage cost, roughly $10 per square foot
and that is what lots are selling for in Belmont, $50,000 to $70,000 range.
Is that discounted for the cost of demolition, so the property is worth
$80,000?
I don’t think demolition would be that much. I think they estimated
demolition to be about $5,000.
I am struggling with that math just because you’ve got the variables and
you’ve got location issues and this is not prime real estate in Belmont. If
some other things are resolved it may become closer to prime, but in its
current status, it is not that. Have we talked to the owner of this property
about what it is going to be worth or have we just talked about appraised
value?
We have talked to him about what he wants and he is asking more than
appraised value. We are still negotiating with the property owner. We’ve
had an appraisal done and a new appraisal so we actually have two
appraisals.
I think what I’m hearing is the Committee would like some more
information about the appraisal and the … used to come up with that
appraisal.
I think what I’m trying to get to is more comprehensive information. I’m
having to imagine in my head where things are, how they connect and
how all of this kind of rolls up. Maybe you had it in your slides, but I’m
not going to ask you to figure that out until I understand the whole
business deal and I’m kind of picking at pieces of the business deal as it
comes in front of us.
I’m having a similar struggle. I don’t know if it is 100% the same, but on
this page, for example, what is the public policy purpose for acquiring this
property? That is what I’m struggling to understand. Is it to remove
blight, is it to remove a crime magnet, is it to place a use that is going to
have a catalytic impact on that block?
One, it is a package deal for this and the two lots at the corner of
Parkwood and Pegram. Our understanding from the owner is that if you
buy one you have to buy the others so it is a package deal. We think
there is something we can accomplish up at Parkwood and Pegram.
Secondly, clearly this was identified as a blighted influence. It is a closed
non-conforming use so there is policy there to do that, as well as not that
one single family house will bring back this entire block here, but it begins
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to bring you back to what your plan is, which is to have residential in this
area. You have a number of different policy initiatives or policy issues this
will accomplish.
Flynn:
We have some additional opportunities, however, we don’t really have
recommendations on these except for the Stewart & Perina one which
does not involve any purchase. We also looked at Walker’s Grocery at the
corner of Belmont Avenue and Pegram Street. We talked to the Historic
Landmark Commission about this and it turns out that this is one of the
very few surviving mercantile buildings of this type in Charlotte. They do
have an interest in pursuing a purchase of this store. We did have it
appraised and it appraises at $73,000. The owner is asking more and we
don’t know how much more, but we think that it is worthwhile to continue
the conversations with the Historic Landmark Commission to see if there is
something that could be done here. Once again, we are sort of asking if
that is okay for us to continue or is that something you want us to keep
working on. Certainly, we have had conversations with Dan Morrill and he
would like to continue the conversation in that regard. It does remove
blight and it supports historic renovation which are things that might look
pretty interesting there. The fact that Fatback Queens sits directly behind
this structure so this too, you can’t really do one without doing the other.
We would also want to be talking to Historic Properties Commission about
the possible purchase of Fatback Queen by them or in some collaborative
partnership with them. We look at that store and see something and the
Historic Properties people look at it and say, well if you take that façade
off, there might be something really interesting. There could be some old
bones of the neighborhood which would be pretty nice to have. The
benefits would be to support historic preservation, remove a nonconforming use, but once again we would like to continue the
conversations with Historic Landmarks Commission and bring that back to
the Committee if that is okay. On Stewart and Perina on Belmont Avenue,
it is a convenience store under single ownership with three adjacent
parcels. They have the desire to close the convenience store and
redevelop it into a residential retail use by combining that with the other
three parcels. We’ve had Planning look at that in terms of how that would
fit with the Plan, however, there are lot size issues with that. We have to
look at consistency with the Belmont Plan and a site plan, but it would
require a rezoning.
It would require a Council action in order to
accomplish that. I’ll let Debra speak to that if there any questions about
that. Planning staff has worked with the owners and are beginning to look
at that and they have determined it would take a rezoning, which I think
Planning staff would say yes to but there are some restrictions around site
plan and parking issues I think.
Campbell: I don’t know if we have a location map that we could give them or a
contact … The reason I would like to have a contact is some of you know
this is really in the heart of Belmont and that most all of the other uses,
other than the fact that if this were to be redeveloped, it is more density
single family, a little bit of multifamily, but for the most part it is all single
family. Small parcels abutting adjacent to single family zoned land, we
really want to manage parking, that transition and again, it is really right
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in the heart of the neighborhood. Obviously, it is not zoned appropriately,
it is a non-conforming use and that the zoning possibly something with a
conditional plan and probably would have to be like an urban residential,
urban commercial district. It would take something for us to relax if they
truly wanted to go to a mixture of uses.
Lassiter: Let me make sure I understand these adjacent parcels. The Walker’s
Grocery is no longer in use?
Drayton: No, it is boarded up.
Lassiter: Fatback Queen is in use?
Drayton: Yes, operating part of the time at night as Advanced Food and …
Lassiter: The Stewart and Perina Convenience Store is operational?
Drayton: Yes, it is open and sits on B-1 land.
Lassiter: It is really not non-conforming other than it’s got parking issues.
Campbell:Actually it is non-conforming. It is zoned R-5.
Lassiter: We got into this issue, as I recall, from problems of open convenience
stores that were drawing other kinds of activity to them. Now we are
talking about open land, buying closed stores and working with one
operating facility and one partially operating facility that goes back to
Anthony’s question, from a policy standpoint where are we here. I would
think that we could make a comparable assessment of a dozen other
neighborhoods within a two-mile radius of Trade and Tryon Street that
have similar kinds of boarded up non-conforming facilities in them that
could not be reopened and short of vagrancy and perhaps some criminal
transactions, we are not isolating them for acquisition for redevelopment.
Is that accurate?
Campbell:Yes, in terms of could we find other in town communities that have
comparable challenges and conditions, absolutely, we could. When we did
the Belmont Area Plan, we talked about the future of Belmont and the
ability to try to stabilize it. If you recall the history of Belmont, we have
been in Belmont with the map and almost every Federal program you can
name and when we try to skirt around the edges of truly stabilizing the
community and I think the Belmont Plan really pushes us toward a
stabilization strategy. It is probably asking for some, I would say not neat
things, because if we take the Westover Shopping Center for example, I
think this strategy looks similar. We had a shopping center that was
going down and when we went through the process and we literally asked
the community – we had to prioritize implementation because we never
go out and promise a community that we are going to deliver everything
that a plan says. It is almost impossible, but if the public had the
opportunity from the public sector’s perspective, they said help us with
these convenience stores. That was just the consistent message. The
reason being 60% to 70% of all the crime problems, the destabilization
elements were within even the closed buildings because people would
gravitate to those buildings and do whatever it is they need to do. We
weren’t trying to paint a negative brush as it relates to the convenience
stores, it was just the reality of the information that we got back from the
neighborhood. I think the strategy is how do we strategically identify
areas within the community that are in two of these cases, not on the
fringe of the neighborhood, but in the middle of the neighborhood and try
to stabilize those and maybe even encourage a reuse. The Economic
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Development strategy said, we don’t want to penalize this business
operator who may own a convenience store. Maybe we can partner and
recreate so that you have the people that are there also benefiting from a
revitalization effort. That is generally what this strategy is, I don’t want to
say buy-out, but I would say partnership with the convenience stores that
are property owners for which they are about.
Foxx:
With that content, a couple of concerns that I have, that I need to request
and get a reaction from you on. I have seen some reports and studies
that were not as … where the very points that you related can be raised
by the community …. I need some way of understanding the extent to
which the market is going to take care of some of this stuff for us versus
what needs public addressing to change. That is one issue. The second
issue is, after we do this what are the outcomes.
Campbell: The first one, in terms of will the market take care of this, maybe. It
depends on how patient we are. It depends on how patient residents are.
This has been a neighborhood venture. They were on a downward cycle
for 30 or 40 years and I don’t know if there is a whole lot of patience. It
almost a chicken or an egg. Will we be able to continue to maintain the
revitalization process when you have these type of elements in the
community? We can do it on the edges and that is where we’ve seen a lot
of redevelopment occur.
On the edges.
If you can get close to
Plaza/Midwood, if you can get close to Optimist Park and Davidson, that
will happen. This is in the interior of Belmont so if our goal is truly to help
the people who truly live in Belmont today, I think these types of
strategies really reach that population. I believe on the edges and fringes
of Belmont it will be taken care of by the private sector. That is my
opinion and Tom may have something different.
Flynn:
Well, looking at Parkwood and Pegram intersection, we showed you a
concept plan. We proforma out what we might expect and talked to Lat
Purser about it, talked to Bob Sweeney about it and the concept we
showed you that had all the retail there in today’s market was still going
to require significant land write down and at a subsidy by the City, a
second loan and a very reduced interest rate in a second position in order
to make it happen. Probably about a million or million and a half dollars
worth of City subsidy in today’s market. I think that once again gets to
where Debra is, in today’s market establishing better retail even on the
fringes is going to take the City to be a gap financer. Is that going to
change in 5 to 10 years, probably. I think those are the choices you have
and to get to your second question, what we have then, at least on Park
and Pegram is the hope to have a catalyst project in that area to sort of
move the market in that direction. On these interior ones, if we were able
to work with this and have a historic renovation here, I think there could
be some very neat old bones of this community. Will this be too massive
redevelopment in here, no, but is another little piece of the puzzle that
helps this community move forward.
Campbell: Would our goal really be to present massive redevelopment because we
do have a neighborhood with generally affordable now. I hope a personal
commitment to Belmont from the perspective of being out there for
someone, and hearing those citizens and those residents say do
something to help us because we have been here and have been through
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Flynn:
Lassiter:
Carter:
Kinsey:
Foxx:
Flynn:
Foxx:
Flynn:
Lassiter:
all the changes, all of your programs and we are still here and we want to
be here. We want to be close to uptown. We want to have the
conveniences, yes we want change, but we want to be able to afford to
live here.
If we were to go forward with this in terms of acquiring Parkwood and
Pegram and acquiring Josh’s, doing all of that, we took out Stewart and
Perina, that is actually no costs, Walker’s we don’t know whether that will
happen or not, but you are looking at a total project of around half-million
which leaves you a little bit more than $560,000 left out of this $1.1
million. If we are able to work anything out with the Historic Landmark
Commission, that would come out as well. I hear from the Committee
that you need some more information. You clearly want to have a better
understanding of all of the price points and appraisal points around
Parkwood and Pegram. I think you want to have a better understanding
of the appraised value and how the appraiser got to the appraised value of
that.
I think what I want to try to do is give you a little bit of direction if we can
come up with that of what we would like you to do or not do. I’m not sure
we’ve been exceptionally clear about what we think is the right thing to
do. Parkwood/Pegram and Josh’s is kind of tied together. Currently, you
cannot get control of that one intersection without buying the remaining
property. We have seen what that costs to do that and there may be
some other finer point on it, but what is the sense of the Committee, non
binding, but direction to staff to continue to work on that issue? Do we
want to continue to work on it or do we think it is not worth the effort.
I think Ms. Campbell’s statement was absolutely on target. Preserve a
very important community approximate to uptown.
The Parkwood/Pegram parcel really does benefit. It just shows here
Belmont, but it backs up to Optimist Park so it really does benefit a larger
geographical section than just Belmont because of where it is located.
I support staff continuing to work through this. I would like to see parcel
by parcel, what the appraisal is and what is being asked by the owners. I
would also like to know whether you all have done an analysis of the value
of that block you were showing if it were unified in ownership.
We can show you that.
The last question is what kind of detail or other issues you see happening
on that block? How does the City propose to dispose of that property?
What process would be used to actually get that into the hands of a
private sector developer to make a higher and better use of that property?
To answer a couple of those questions, when we come back, we will make
sure that Bob Sweeney from CMDC can be here to talk about that.
I think we ought to be really careful how we go about that process and
Josh’s is an issue, but if in fact there is going to be some redevelopment
effort and an attempt to use public funds to stimulate that and then flit it
back out or some joint venture with other parcels that are adjacent to it
who may want to be a participant, I would like to hear whether CMDC is
interested in playing the lead role as opposed to us playing the lead role.
That is a pure redevelopment question and is way away from how this
came to us. We can talk about it, but more appropriately, it is a CMDC
issue and not a City of Charlotte real estate issue or City of Charlotte
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Planning issue. Somebody has got to be a lead agency in trying to do that
and I would like for them to step in if they are interested in doing that,
support them and if they are not, I think we need to rethink our decision
about it.
Foxx:
I just want to respond to that. I do think it has been unfortunate that this
issue has gotten as negative as it has gotten because I think what that is
doing sounds like what the neighborhood has wanted.
Lassiter: Dose that help you all?
Flynn:
Yes it does.
Lassiter: What is the Community’s sense about Walker’s Grocery?
Kinsey:
I like that parcel and I’ve driven by it every Sunday for years going to
Allen Street Baptist Church, but the Landmarks Committee has money and
I’m not real excited about funding something for this. They have money
that they can sink into it.
Flynn:
Exactly, and they are willing to do that if they can get it at the right price.
Kinsey:
I don’t think we should subsidize …
Shull:
They plan to purchase it out of their revolving money.
Flynn:
Okay to continue to work with them and bring that back.
Kinsey:
Tell me again where we have that zero.
Lassiter: Zero is the redevelopment plan that the idea is that it primarily works
from a planning standpoint to come up with a way to assemble adjoining
parcels and come up with a residential/commercial plan that could be
live/work mixed-use something that would take into account all of that
and we would work on the planning side to help them come up with a
favorable plan to come forward.
Carter:
I sense an underlying complete plan and it follows from what we have
done before in prior action as I understand it. I am wondering if there is
anything we need to do with regards to planning to look to the future of
this entire area.
One of my points of concern is justification and
maintaining affordable housing in the area approximate to our Center
City. If you can look forward ….
Campbell: One of the things that Neighborhood Development is doing … as part of
the analysis we are doing…we are tracking…
Woodcock:
The Housing Authority is also … 191 units … to preserve affordable
housing in Belmont. Hopefully the housing value will go up, but there will
be affordable housing in Belmont.
Campbell: I will say we are tracking it and trying to add in new units.
Kinsey:
Belmont has had so much low income housing for so many years that I
think if the benefit for the more affordable the higher come in. I want a
mix there because if we have too many low income housing we are going
right back to where we’ve been for years and years. I think you have to
be very careful there.
Lassiter: I think what we have technically done is we have walked away from the
issue of purchasing operating convenience stores and trying to remedy the
community of whatever good or bad they provide and now have given
staff direction to be more surgical in terms of a planning and
neighborhood development strategy that we then tool and partner,
focused on particular points and redevelopment points and away from
what has been a pool of funds available to take out operating businesses
and replace them with something … Is that accurate?
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Flynn:
Lassiter:
Yes.
It will maybe make the Council happy, but they are also going to have to
buy into the fact that we taken a different direction.
Flynn:
Just to clarify one thing on the Walker’s Grocery – that should read
Walker’s Grocery/Fatback Queen, so we would wrap those two together.
Lassiter: There are lots more places like this and what I would like to think we are
doing is we are piloting some techniques that are going to need to come
into play as we look at other kinds of issues in other neighborhoods where
you did not have restrictions about particular kinds of development as the
neighborhood developed and those have created similar issues for those
neighborhoods. In some cases, they have been issues of preventing
quality development. Other cases have been issues of criminal activity,
loitering and whatever else. I think it is a good exercise to kind of go
through this and see what we have learned so that as we look at future
small area plans we try to identify some of these locations to see if there
is similar ways to address them, based upon what we have learned.
Foxx:
I want to make sure that I am clear on my own personal perspective on
this. I don’t know that we are moving away from what was proposed last
time. I think we are refining it, but what I view happened was that we
had this perception that the City was going in and forcing people to sell
stores, opened stores or close stores. We are now saying we are going to
buy the stores which people are willing to sell which I thought was the
whole plan anyway. I just think maybe it will sound better in the
newspaper, but I feel like this is a variation of what you all were thinking.
Kimble:
It is really the third evolution, not just the second, and I think we are
getting to where everybody’s comfort level is starting to take shape, but
we have more work to do.
Campbell: I think what you all did for us and our thinking was to help us be a lot
more technical, a lot more strategic about this issue of would we have
something that is creating a blight in the community and how do we
manage that. How do we respond to that?
Kinsey:
When this is brought back to us could we have these maps on boards or
something so we could read them better? I can’t read this.
Flynn:
We will have a big board with the maps that are highlighted.
II.
Subject:
Residential Pedestrian Lighting Process
John Lassiter, Chair: This initiative has been in front of us and we need to come
back with some thoughts from Council and we have talked about the idea and had
some preliminary information, but we need to have an update on where this is.
(Barry Mosley used a PowerPoint for his presentation to the Committee)
This item has been before the Committee a couple times and we are asked to make
some additional research happen so we will go through the slides and try to jog your
memory on why we are here regarding this issue and some of the things we have
come across. The purpose of the project was to take at a look at the information on
the possibility of requiring pedestrian scale and decorative lighting in single family
residential development. Also, we wanted to take a look at the possibility of
discontinuing the use of wood poles in single family residential areas for street
lighting. In July 2006, City Council recommended staff take a look into this
particular issue and evaluate our existing ordinances and policies to see what we
ED & Planning Committee
Meeting Summary for May 21, 2008
Page 12
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have in relation to the corporate quadrants in those ordinances. In February, City
Council recommended that this particular project get further study and sent it to this
particular body. In April 2007, staff presented the finding of the report to this group
and in September 2007 ,we received some additional direction and scope of work
from this body to proceed and move on to conduct some additional research for this
information. In February 2008, we presented the information to you and there was
some additional questions that arose in that meeting, one of which was which part of
Raleigh’s code addresses street and pedestrian lighting? Who pays for pedestrian
scale lighting and what are the costs?
Questions/Answers/Comments
Carter:
If you replace a wooden pole, do you have to replace the others along
that block? If there is a storm water improvement crosses at a point
and there are three poles in the block, do you replace one with
aluminum and the other two are wood?
Mosley:
We are looking at existing neighborhoods and I had a conversation
with a staff person in Davidson and what was stated was that in
addition to requiring new residential developments to have pedestrian
scale lighting, there is also underground utilities. In those existing
communities, most of them do not have underground utilities so if you
go in and develop one parcel within the community, then no, you are
not required to do that you just go with the existing. I think in
situations where the community wants it that is a different situation
and they can probably request it and pay for certain things to happen
that way.
Mitchell:
In Davidson and Rock Hill what are the new standards for new
residential development – no to wooden poles, but what are the
standards?
Mosley:
That is something I didn’t further explain in Davidson. With this
procedure in Davidson through their new subdivision or residential
development, developers have been willing to do this, but they do not
have anything in their ordinances that require them to put those poles
in. Right now it is just the willingness of the developer to say okay we
are going to put in pedestrian scale lighting, but there is no teeth for
the City to back it where you have to do that.
Mitchell:
What about Rockhill?
Mosley:
I am not certain about Rock Hill and will have to give them a call back
to see what that is.
Mitchell:
I would be interested to find out the new standards for those two
cities.
Kinsey:
I know what the wooden poles look like, but if we were to require this
would these poles be fiberglass and would they be in residential
character, would they be decorative or be just plain old utilitarian
poles? I had a wooden pole as one of those old metal poles that you
see on the field.
Mosley:
I think in most cases where we talked to the various cities and towns
is that some of them are using the fiberglass poles. Whether they are
decorative or not probably would be left up to the decision of the City
Council because there is a cost associated with that and I think the
fiberglass, for example, with Raleigh they have two options that they
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Meeting Summary for May 21, 2008
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Kinsey:
Mosley:
Mosley:
Carter:
Mosley:
Carter:
Mosley:
Carter:
Lassiter:
Kimble:
Mosley:
Mitchell:
Mosley:
Mitchell:
Mosley:
Mosley:
Carter:
Mosley:
Carter:
Mosley:
can use, but the poles themselves they have a fiberglass that is just a
regular gray pole - $250. If you want a black pole it is $1,690, so that
is the difference in costs.
But they are both fiberglass?
Yes.
(Continued his presentation with slides on Page 4)
Your $600,000 monthly costs – is that electricity or is that installing
the street lights?
That is for the electricity costs that we currently pay per month to light
the city.
It is neighborhood streets, but not our roadways run by the State?
I want to say yes to that but I think that is probably a much larger
number. I can double check on that. I got that information from
CDOT and I think the way the question was phrased to them is what
are we paying for pedestrian scale residential lighting and that was the
number they gave us. I can also see if that includes other items of the
streets.
It would be interesting to see the comparison.
I would guess that our lighting bill for all of the City streets and any
State roads that we maintain. It would be Randolph, Providence,
Monroe and all the neighborhood streets. I probably would not include
I-77 or I-277. They don’t work anyway so there is no electricity used.
It is the historical costs.
(Continued his presentation with slides on Page 5)
The fiberglass poles, we don’t pedscape the Rozzelles Ferry Road, is
that example the fiberglass decorative pole?
I wish I knew, but I’m not familiar with that pole.
I think it would be helpful for the Committee if next time we have
some pictures of what type of pole we are talking about. I see the
Rozzelles Ferry and I don’t know if it is fiberglass, so if we could have
some pictures that would help me get an understanding of what is the
fiberglass pole and the gray pole.
Versus maybe a metal and I think sometimes they use concrete or
something like that.
(Continued the presentation)
Have we looked into green lighting and the costs in the sense of the
light bulbs that are conforming to the green?
No.
That might be something we should look at. Remember when solar
power was not appropriate for I-277 because it was not as strong as it
needed to be. That would also be important …
In some of our research we did find that certain cities do have their
lighting policies and there was concern about lights just being emitted
in the air and the pollution so they have various standards and
regulations to take care of that. Some of those are dealing with those
various types of light bulbs and the space that they cover. I guess
when you get into a more detailed study the Engineering Department
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Carter:
Lassiter:
Carter:
Foxx:
Mosley:
Foxx:
Campbell:
Mosley:
Foxx:
Lassiter:
Kimble:
Lassiter:
or the Utility Department takes a look and considers that. In most
City stuff they put policies together so they can develop a real deal.
That might be an issue that the Environment Committee could
consider. There might be energy between these two Committees to
look at the impact of environmental impact from the aspect of light
pollution.
Bear in mind, we are not doing this because it is necessary to see what
we are going to do, we are doing it to see if it is affordable and it has
been cost prohibited to date and my expectation is if you then shift to
a more energy friendly lighting you can put another couple zeros on
your costs.
The initial investment perhaps … the long-term costs might help.
This is sort of on the other end of the green spectrum, on the
electricity use side, do we have a policy or a practice when it comes to
Duke Energy or any of the various power lines to go back and look at
the lighting structure that we have?
From what I understand is that Duke Energy currently supplies the
City with wood poles at no cost and I think if the City requests Duke
Energy to do those things that they will look at it and do make the
necessary changes. At this point in time, I don’t think there is a policy
or anything in place to say that we need to replace a pole here or
there when you go out to put in utility lines.
I think that would be an opportunity to partner with Duke Energy and
perhaps the style of the lighting as well as whatever is going as well as
maybe some green options.
We would have to pay for that.
Yes, from my conversation we would have to pay for that because they
now install the wood poles at no costs. The only time that there may
be some costs associated with it is when there are some extenuating
circumstances when they are digging and some other things happen
and then that costs is passed on to the City. If it is just a standard
installation there is no costs and we pay for the power.
I really would like to know about their policy because as I go around
the City, you can almost tell the economic status of an area based on
whether they have power lines running above ground versus below
ground. I don’t know if Duke has some retrofit policy that they are
pursuing or whatever, but I do think there may be some ways for us to
work with them, even if they are willing to spend what they are
spending on up fits and if we were looking at paying an increment
above that for some perhaps higher up fits, but it is as least worth
talking to them.
Back when I was on the Planning Commission, I raised this very issue
relative to how do you get more underground and be engaged with the
operations people at Duke Energy and they are more than willing to
put stuff underground if you are willing to pay for it. The cost then was
staggering.
After your 2002 ice storm, the Council took that issue up again and we
reaffirmed even higher costs the next time.
What has happened is newer neighborhoods at certain price points
that development pays the costs of getting utilities underground and
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Foxx:
Lassiter:
Kimble:
Lassiter:
Mitchell:
Mosley:
Kimble:
Mitchell:
Lassiter:
Mitchell:
Lassiter:
Mitchell:
Mosley:
there may be some older neighborhoods that have done that and paid
the cost because it is pretty punishing to take all the pieces coming off
the back of the house just to figure out how to cut through trees and
gardens and everything so it really becomes problematic. My suspicion
is that we will see a similar answer and it is a cost no matter where
you are, in most cases it is prohibited.
Just to be clear on what the question is, what I was trying to frame the
question around was whether they have some retrofit policy to take
lines above ground or below ground.
Their plan is to get your trees out of the way and let us clear-cut
through them so we can get to those things that we’ve got to get
power to.
There is a long standing policy and practice between the City and Duke
because they have the franchise going back to like 1908 and now
when we go into redevelopment and retrofit, the City pays 60% of
burying and they pay 40% of burying so there is a practice and a
policy in redevelopment and retrofit areas where we’re both wanting to
go in and make changes in that area. The point you’re making is what
about in neighborhoods, and that is the difficulty. Not a lot of that
gets done in neighborhoods, it is more in redevelopment corridors.
What has happened is now that … it is cheaper for Duke to do it from
the front and go right down the Right-of-Way and increasingly as
areas redevelop or property develops the access point is the back side
so it does not work from the street side.
Who set the standard for the wooden pole? Duke Energy told us this
is the free pole we are going to give you or the City said we want
wooden poles. Who set the standard? Have we ever revisited the
standard wooden pole?
I think it comes down to economics again. You are getting something
for free and then you get the service.
My suspicion is the wood pole standard is designated by Duke Energy,
not by the City of Charlotte.
My issue is why would we accept the standard, times have changed in
communities and I can understand we wouldn’t have metal and
fiberglass back in the early 60’s, but we had an abundance of woods,
we cut down trees. Now the communities have changed and the City
has changed so why has the standard not changed? Some of my
frustration is we are accepting the wooden pole and Duke keeps giving
us the wooden poles. We need to say why the pole can’t be metal.
It is not free – they bought the poles and the poles are loaded into
yours and my energy rates.
So why can’t they give us a fiberglass pole?
Then they will tell you your power rate is going X amount to recover
the costs so it is not free. We could say it has to be decorative poles in
uptown and Duke will provide it, but they will adjust the power rates to
reflect that.
I would love to have some discussion of this.
(Continued his presentation with Summary of Key Findings and Next
Steps)
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Mitchell:
Kinsey:
Lassiter:
Foxx:
Campbell:
Let me go to possible Option #2 because I have had several
conversations with developers and those developers have been
inclined to sit down with staff and talk about pedestrian lighting. You
know Cambridge, a lot of their properties do provide decorative
lighting for their neighborhoods because it sells and it is more
aesthetic so I am not ready to throw this baby out with the water
because personally I’m not a wooden pole fan. I think we are talking
about our neighborhoods as the new Charlotte and I think we’ve got to
be creative if we are going to provide other ways of bringing quality to
our neighborhoods. I’m looking at another option or at least to
explore having some of our developers at the table with us. It seems
like there is some interest on their part to participate.
Developers can do what they want to can’t they?
Yes, and if you will recall, when we drove through Peachtree and
Windy Ridge they all had decorative lights. The housing community
has been putting in decorative poles at their costs so I’m not sure who
we are pointing fingers at. If we are talking about is where we are
putting them in as part of our road construction, maybe that is the
issue, but I’m not sure there is a lot of wood poles going in
neighborhood developments because it is a selling feature that they
have loaded into the costs. The flip of that if it is neighborhood that
the developer don’t pay for it, that costs is going to get passed
somewhere and it is going to arguably make the house worth less
because it will come with the expense of profit margin on what the
developer has built in. Again, none of this is free. I’m not convinced
that we’ve got a problem big enough to make any changes.
I see three issues, one is green field type development where it seems
to be happening already and these things are being addressed in one
way or the other. The second is redevelopment like the interior
neighborhood redevelopment kind of stuff and even looking at our
Neighborhood Improvement Program which does get out to interior
aspect, I still wonder whether we are missing an opportunity, since we
are often times cutting sidewalks and cutting curb and gutter on those
public Right-of-Ways whether there are opportunities to partner to get
some of those utility lines buried and perhaps get decorative poles up
as a way of improving neighborhood quality. The third one is the
corridor stuff where we’ve got a business corridor that is a gateway to
the community. The same issue as we are looking at infrastructure
opportunities in those corridors, are there ways where we can maybe
partner to improve the lighting. I don’t disagree with you John, that
on the scale of issues, I don’t know that this one would bump up to …
three, but it might be at this point in the conversation, we may find
that there is a developer …
Would it be possible for us to make one more stab at this and maybe
some research for, number one, the business corridor project, because
I personally know that every time we do a business corridor project we
want it to … and we do all of that as a way to try to clean up as a way
to attract a future developer. If we could bring you back some
information about that. If you want us to talk to you a little bit about
how utilities are being handled now through the subdivision process,
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Carter:
Lassiter:
Campbell:
Lassiter:
Kimble:
Lassiter:
Campbell:
then we can do that for the commercial, non-residential or residential.
I think the third thing, if you were to have some of stakeholders
meeting or something like that. I’m trying to think if there is a
process underway currently just to get you some…. If you want us to
convene a few of these people, but I think that when John mentioned
that we are getting it, but we may not be getting it everywhere. For
the most part, I think the challenge becomes is it still something that
you do voluntarily or do we require it everywhere. Even though these
costs may not look big, that margin makes or breaks. We hear if from
the developers all the time so it is just one additional expense and
costs. I hope we think this more in terms of are there other things in
a subdivision, for example, when we went through those foreclosure
neighborhoods, rather than decorative street lights, I wish that we
could have given them trees, grass seed, a lawn mower. They were all
dirt yards so I guess it is in the context of if we want to require
something that will truly make a difference in the stability and livability
of that community, and that is how we have been approaching this. It
is not that we don’t want to do this, it is, is it going to be that margin
that really stabilizes or retains the community as a competitive
neighborhood long-term. Will decorative lights do that? I don’t know.
I thoroughly echo what you are saying, but I think there is one more
basic level that I encourage us and that is the grading of these lots. I
saw significant erosion that is not controlled when we out to see the
last neighborhood. That was totally … and I was absolutely furious.
What I would like you to do is broaden this just a little bit, if you want
to … folks let’s have that broad discussion that gets to this point of
what makes a neighborhood more viable and attractive and gets some
comparative thought about that. We all struggle with the starter home
neighborhood and depending on where that is in town, it has a very
different look.
It may be questions of how the sidewalks are
constructed, it may be questions about what is required in terms of
interest, the kinds of things that you might not see based upon where
it is built because the price went $10,000 more or the … attracted a
different purchaser. I think that is a reasonable question. It puts all
sorts of pressure on home builders, but people are still going to build
homes and people will buy homes, and the degree to which we do
things in our subdivision ordinance or do things within our zoning code
that creates some decision point that we can make policy wise and
they reflect the economics of the transaction, I think is a good
discussion.
We can do that.
Is there a consensus that she proceed with those? I did not get a
second to your comment relative to an Option 2.
I think you have cited an Option 4.
I think we need to look at those issues and determine where they fit
within our priority line and some of the reality of what is going on so
we may have some suggestions that would provide some integration
back into varying codes that would control neighborhood development
and redevelopment.
We will have an emphasis on a statewide …
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Meeting Summary for May 21, 2008
Page 18
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Lassiter:
Kimble:
Lassiter:
Kimble:
Lassiter:
II.
We are not doing the third item on our agenda.
Can we talk about June 4th which is Town Hall Day. We need to
reschedule that meeting. We can postpone one week but it is up to
you.
If we were to move it up that is a conflict for me and it also conflicts
with the HAND Committee meeting.
Shall we poll you?
If you would, poll and see if you can find a date.
Subject:
Next Meeting
The next meeting date is to be determined .
The meeting adjourned at 5:20 p.m.