MINUTES OF ZONING AND PLANNING COMMISSION CITY OF WEST LAKE HILLS, TEXAS 6:30 P.M. PRESENT: ZAPCO Chairman Robert Meisel, Vice-Chairman Les Gage, Commissioners Eric Erickson, Brian Plunkett and Bob Belanger ABSENT: ZAPCO Commissioners Kevin Leahy and Bill Vandersteel 1. Call to Order. Chairman Robert Meisel. Chairman Meisel calls the meeting to Order at 6:31 p.m. Chairman Meisel welcomes new Commissioner Brian Plunkett to the meeting. 2. Consent Agenda: The following items are considered to be self-explanatory by the Commission and will be enacted with one motion. There will be no separate discussion of these item/s unless a Commission Member or citizen so requests. a. Approval of the March 18, 2015 Regular Meeting Minutes. VICE-CHAIRMAN GAGE MOVES TO APPROVE. ERICKSON SECONDS. UNANIMOUS (3-0) APPROVAL. COMMISSIONER 3. Land Use : After the fact variance for a front yard fence encroachment at 1401 Redbud Trail. (Section 22.03.173 of the West Lake Hills Code.) Applicant Carrie Saxbe. b. c. Presentation by applicant. Public Hearing: All persons wishing to speak for or against shall be heard. Chairman Meisel: As I understand it, there was a notice sign put up when originally requested. Our ordinance is clear that it has to be posted. Whatever may have happened, we re not going to hear your item tonight. It will be on May 20 th. Please get the sign posted tomorrow. We need to meet all our legal requirements. 4. Land Use : Multiple variances (impervious cover, building setback) for a residential addition at 605 Laurel Valley Road. (Section 22.03.281 of the West Lake Hills Code.) City Planner Grundman: They are asking for 4 variances. 3 are setbacks, rear setback, retaining walls and side for the patio and the patio would be 3 tall and the fourth is impervious cover.
Page 2 David and Maggie Bettner are the homeowners. We moved to 605 Laurel Valley last summer. We have a 15 month old and we are so excited to have him grow up in West Lake Hills. There are a few things to make it more family friendly. We want to blend in to the neighborhood with screening. We did want to add a pool and a lawn for our growing family. Shane is the Architect: There were a few things we had looked at initially. An overhead presentation is done. This is actually the green that comes down right here. The slope is separated from the creek and a large driveway. We want to use the area that is the most private to keep the pool and the deck in a private area. We also decided we would like a lawn adjacent to that. Our problems are the setbacks and shape of the lots. Even a corner lot doesn t have this problem. The double fork comes back on itself; the setbacks, even the house are beyond the setbacks. There is a tiny portion that they have legally in the setbacks. This is the site plan that we are proposing. This provides a private area and reduces visibility to the area. They would like to add a carport and show how we minimized that look. John Hogg lives 1404 Wildcat Hollow. You remember Mr. Atal had the same problem with the same screening. I love landscaping. I went down and designed the property on Skyline and Westlake. The yard looks great. These are my friends and I loved the challenge of the lot. You have all this pavement here and we want to get a lot more green. A lawn should do very well. Bringing in natives and give some privacy enhancing along Laurel Valley. I think it will look spectacular and blend with the neighborhood. Shane: These are ideas of how the view looking across the creek and the property. We are hoping to bring in native landscape and Westlake view from the road. This is another idea. All Double Fork it is very visible. Privacy would be nice. It is a beautiful area but it is very open to the road. We want to bring in taller vegetation. This is a proposed pool. Nothing grows in the area. We want to level it out and add a pool and add vegetation and make a protected and private area; nothing super drastic. This is a rendering of a carport. We are removing the arbor and slope down the driveway. Four to six posts at a slope to match the roofing on the house which would be minimal. That is all we have for the presentation. Chairman Meisel closes the Public Hearing and reconvenes the meeting. ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 2
Page 3 Commissioner Plunkett: Just a question, your before and after are pretty dramatic and awesome. It is very exposed. How will you achieve that level of screening? How quickly will that look like that? John Hogg : I invite you to go to Skyline. You only see green. It takes some work to do it. You have to bring in top soil. I PH match it to the area. You have to bring in a lot of soil. We would buy full mature plants. It takes weeks and months to do it. It will be instantan eous by the size. Their range of visibility will help the neighborhood. 10 to 12 foot range maximum. Vice-Chairman Gage: hardship? For us to grant a variance, you need to show John: Because the house is 3 sides, the sides that face the street have greater side yard encroachments. Vice-Chairman Gage: That could be remedied by making it smaller. Shane: This block is existing house and patios. This is all in the creek and then a triangle here which is the only other location we have. Vice-Chairman Gage: The other thing we could do is for you to show that you minimized your request. I m concerned about the corner of the pool and carport? How big is the carport? The dimensions are lacking. Shane: The carport is a two-car; 20 x 20. Commissioner Erickson: In order for variances to be granted. Chairman Meisel: 27 wide and 22 deep. Vice-Chairman Gage: It would be nice to have the dimensions. Chairman Meisel: What I m seeing, no offense, we re trying to get you prepared for Board of Adjustment. The property has had se veral variances before. The pro blem is we are kind of going from what s mine is mine and yours is negotiable. This doesn t play well i n front of Board of Adjustment. One suggestion; taking out some of the driveway and putting in green, excellent. That is 700+ square feet. If you can find a way to take that garage down as further mitigation would help you. The other is the encroachments. The pool is 5 from the property line. It is our job we have these standards and we are supposed to enforce them; we shouldn t wait for neighbors to object. You do have a hardship with the creek. I grant that im mediately. I would suggest for your consideration, just looking at the plan you could take down the garage, tear down t he patio and more or less put the pool in front of the house, where you ve put the lawn in now and put the lawn where the garage is. What we don t see where the pool equipment is located. This is just discussion. ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 3
Page 4 Commissioner Erickson: Something else, the pre-existing is not showing the heights of the retaining walls. Because of the creek it creates more of an impervious cover. A drainage study would be good from a landscape architect. I m not sure where the floodplain is. It is lacking in information. The three sides could be the hardship the effort in mitigation with it. You took away the access the garage and does that trigger something else? Chairman Meisel: This has nothing to do with your application. You can get your address changed to Double Bend. Please see to that. Commissioner Erickson: As chair stated, we re here to assist you in this process. Commissioner Plunkett: One other comment, when I drove by a couple of times, I was sympathetic to the pool. I n looking at the neighbor s house, indicate the distance from the neighbor s house. If you can get the neighbor input. Vice-Chairman Gage: Those setbacks I m very sensitive to. Shane: Does the commission and Board of Adjustment more sensitive to neighbors setbacks or street setbacks? Chairman Meisel: All setbacks are created equal. Commissioner Erickson: Every property is unique. There was mention of what is going on with the neighbors around you. Reach out to them and getting support. Chairman Meisel: What is your hardship? A lot of the usea ble area of your lot is the creek and the setbacks are tougher than others. Your building envelope is just so big. You knew of should have known about the size of the patio and how far it goes into the s etback. You need to give careful thought about the sizing of those two improvements. If you have a new place to park your car, what happened to the garage? That s just being realistic. Vice-Chairman Gage: I would suggest getting dimensions so it will be easier to read. Commissioner Erickson: Elevations would be helpful on all sides that are affected. A drainage study would be needed as well. Grade and how it s affected by the a rchitecture; t he retaining wall and where the pool is. We have ordinances dealing with those. It is extremely difficult to get that through as it is. Chairman Meisel: You have two o ptions at this point. I think you might get a vote to deny. We recommend and Board of Adjustment gets that says yes or no. You have the option of letting us vote which will give you 3 weeks to revise before Board of Adjustment. The alternative is to postpone ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 4
Page 5 and come back next month. The sign needs to stay up at that time and then we ll have another go at it at that time. Those are your two options. Commissioner Erickson: If you chose to go ahead and move forward and they you re denied there, you have to wait a year before you can come back. Chairman Meisel: You can also postpone at Board of Adjustment. Shane: I would recommend to postpone and come back? The applicant requests to Postpone. Commissioner Erickson: Look at alternatives to work within the hardships. That s always good, too. VICE-CHAIRMAN GAGE MOVES TO ACCEPT POSTPONEMENT. COMMISSIONER ERICKSON SECONDS. UNANIMOUS (3-0) POSTPONEMENT. COMMISSIONER BELANGER ARRIVES AT 7:05 P.M. 5. Land Use : Site Plan Amendment and Building Permit for the Hills Fitness Center at 4615 Bee Cave Road. Applicant John Barzizza. (Section 28.03.098 of the West Lake Hills Code.) City Planner Grundman: They are applying for a building permit that was part of an annexation agreement; applying for parking and a building in the back. It had an expiration of April 2016. John Barzizza brought Russ Bragg who is the Engineer with respect to the tree mitigation. One, the building permit for the parking lot which is 99% the same as the site plan that was approved in 2016 in the agreement. We want to address the trees and we want to ask for an extension of the two variances that were granted back in 2006 for the redevelopment of the Sportsplex building in the back. Large plans were shown to the commission. Smaller versions are passed at the dais. The fourth element is the phasing we would like to see granted for the development of the parking lot. You see three. The complicating feature is the strip of land here is phase three. I can t touch until this building goes on sewer. Dr. Edwards developed this and granted this 30 foot strip for a septic easement for his development. What you see in the development plan that are in the 2006 negotiations and final agreement is a trail being moved and that is the only use we would make of that. One of the problems as it occurs to me those four items, one of the issues relative to landscape and tree mitigation is this was heavily used. We ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 5
Page 6 came before the City and submitted a building permit in 2008 in the fall and everybody knows what happened in 2008 and we pulled the permit because of the market. This building has always been proposed that once it was finished, we needed parking. We were moving the health club parking down here. All the members would park in the back. This is an easement to these guys here. The property will function very well once it is in and once we get a center turn lane. We could have leased this building 100% when it was done. What we have is Fusion Academy. They are outstanding. They have 10,000 of the first floor. Austin Plastic Surgery is coming before the city for their space. The parking for medical use is 1 to 200. In order to maintain this has always been planned to be rolled out when this was. My plan is to not choke this driveway with this development until that center turn lane is in. The worst thing in the world to me is not having enough parking. We are going to watch and play this card when it is close to delivery and the completion of the turn lane. We need parking to satisfy the use of this building. One of the four elements of phases, I would like to hold back and not develop these few parking spaces down at the bottom; I d like to have a lay down area for the construction of that building. We will do it all in concrete. It costs more but it stays there. Construction would damage that. We are asking for the phasing of that. The tree issue is one that, the phasing plan is in the information provided. You also see in the information Mr. Erickson asked at the last meeting, you wanted to see what is around the Hills. You have a color photo with Bee Cave Road and the Hills development down here. Parking will go below the Hills Office Park. You can see there is a tremendous amount of green space. As you know, sits down below Bee Cave. The council in 2006 approved two variances for the same footprint but let me go 3 stories. That was approved. The council allowed us to go three stories. What we got was a height variance to get that. Our plan was to put 18 clear height on the first floor to replicate what is commercially. That is the plan; two 13 foot clear heights on floors two and three. It is a really nice sense of space and again, we re trying to key off of what worked here. We are asking to extend. The one thing that didn t run with the land, the council at the time, we ll give you ten years on this. I could deliver a permit by 2016. I would like to not have to force a product on the market when the center turn lane hasn t been done yet. I don t want to get to a place where something happens. Extending that is what we re looking for. The final issue is the trees. You have a version in your packet. This is the larger version of what you have in your packet. This had to be done to comply with the mitigation requirements that this property is complying. The landscape ordinance that was in place at the time in 2006, turn to Page Hills Parking Facility and tree plan, the numbers were required in 2008 when we submitted our last building permit but then pulled it because of the recession. They were required by ordinance. The council said that was not rational. They went through the same exercise. Russ has been carrying this back and forth with me. What was approved was 74% of the 1297 which is 954 inches. Something you can visualize in your mind, the plan says we need to put 318 3 trees on the site. The current plan 8 years forward, we need 1374. Trees have died. We have more inches. ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 6
Page 7 The approved inches would be 1011 or 337 trees. If you take the current ordinance, 1237, the approved with same percentage were 312 trees. Let me ask Russ to describe what we have here. It was 93 trees in this area. Russ: We had to absorb all these trees into this plan just to come up with total. Chairman Meisel closes the Public Hearing and reconvenes the meeting. John: Councilmember O Con nor recommended that we get an ar borist to opine this plan. He will be at the council meeting. Commissioner Erickson: What about that floodplain, if there was an update for the number of years? John: We are not in the floodplain. We see being able to satisfy their comments which is being worked on now. We re out of the floodplain. Commissioner Belanger: What do care to recommend on the shortage? John: My proposal is to start that can be supported, visual presentation, and safety. We have a running trail and it is a safety issue. I f this traffic can t see the running trail, the trail is less secure. We may end up putting a fence and securing the trail all together. Russ: Adding all these trees doesn t do anything right now. To plant this many trees will require taking out understory. It doesn t make a whole lot of sense. You have to plant under a lot of larger trees. When you cram that many trees together they won t survive. Chairman Meisel: We ve blessed this up to now? The one factor is the septic easement and the lack of a left turn lane? John: This is a detention pond today. With these comments, we need to keep what we ve got here. I don t want to say something that is ridiculous. I would like to start with what the city s ordinance today. They don t want this property in the old code. They want to bring every property in the same standards. We want to start 374 trees. You ve got the arborist opinion, maybe we can do a range that is justified and they could say put some money back in the city s hands toward what they will lose on Bee Cave Road? We need a plan that makes sense. Commissioner Belanger: The ordinance has plus and minus. When you have a density of trees, they will choke over time. The approach to it is let the professionals make. ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 7
Page 8 COMMISSIONER BELANGER MOVES TO RECOMMEND APPROVAL. VICE-CHAIRMAN GAGE SECONDS. UNANIMOUS (4-0) APPROVAL. 6. Land Use : Site Plan Amendment and Building Permit for new parking for BBVA Compass Bank at 3633 Bee Cave Road. Applicant Joe Grasso. (Section 28.03.098 of the West Lake Hills Code.) City Planner Grundman: Items 6 and 7 are for the same address. They are losing a parking space due to the right of way taking and reconfiguring their parking and move their sign. There is a hydrant that needs to be moved. The most recent is on the dais tonight which is in color. Joe Grasso is the engineer and is representing the bank. A large picture display is presented showing the relocation of the signs and parking spaces. The area where they are relocating is shown. We ve looked at it back in August. We re trying to minimize the impact on the site. There is a little strip of land that is affected by the row taking. Areas shown where paving is being added is also shown. Minimization of impact by moving the sign doesn t affect the drive through flow. That s fairly simply what we re asking for. Chairman Meisel closes the Public Hearing and reconvenes the meeting. VICE-CHAIRMAN GAGE MOVES TO RECOMMEND APPROVAL FOR BOTH ITEMS 6 AND 7. COMMISSIONER ERICKSON SECONDS. UNANIMOUS (4-0) APPROVAL ON BOTH ITEMS. Chairman Meisel: I have concerns about the light at Beaver Trail. What needs to be done for pedestrian signals? Joe: They prepare the plans and make it work somehow. 7. Land Use : Proposed relocation of signage for BBVA Compass Bank at 3633 Bee Cave Road. Applicant Joe Grasso. (Section 32.03.007 of the West Lake Hills Code.) THIS ITEM WAS APPROVED WITH THE PREVIOUS ITEM. ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 8
Page 9 8. Land Use : Site Plan Amendment for a new store frontage for Silver Papery at 3300 Bee Cave Road, Suite 240. Applicant Representative David Helmer of River City Builders. (Section 28.03.098 of the West Lake Hills Code.) City Planner Grundman: They are changing out the store front. The first photo with the wood is what they are proposing. David Helmer is the representative. The smaller window is what exists. It is being changed back to make the other store fronts. When they moved in they wanted smaller windows. Chairman Meisel closes the Public Hearing and reconvenes the meeting. Commissioner Belanger: Are there any plans to reuse these tiles on the building? David: No. Commissioner Belanger: Good. COMMISSIONER BELANGER MOVES TO RECOMMEND APPROVAL. COMMISSIONER ERICKSON SECONDS. UNANIMOUS (4-0) APPROVAL. 9. Land Use : Commercial Building Permit for a Columbarium and Prayer Garden for St. John Neumann Church at 5455 Bee Cave Road. Applicant Bob Galloway. (Section 28.03.098 of the West Lake Hills Code.) City Planner Grundman: They came through with a variance to remove the trees and they are coming through for the building permit. Bob Galloway is present. We are applying for a building permit. This is an outdoor project. This is at the base of the church. We ve added the floodplain that was requested by Building Design Committee and we addressed the issues that were brought up. We will be replacing the trees elsewhere in the area. There was concern about the runoff. We are adding 4,500 sq. ft. of impervious and added storm inlets to absorb a twoinch rain. The last issue we were in the process of talking with TCEQ ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 9
Page 10 about the water quality, you should have a letter. We re-examined the calculations is within the existing requirements right now. It will be a week or so before we get the final letter. The niches are in the foundation wall itself. There are small foundations in the area and pathway lighting to get down to it. Chairman Meisel closes the Public Hearing and reconvenes the meeting. Commissioner Erickson: My last comment at BDC was, are we there yet? And we are. COMMISSIONER ERICKSON MOVES TO RECOMMEND APPROVAL. COMMISSIONER BELANGER SECONDS. UNANIMOUS (4-0) APPROVAL. 10. Adjournment by Chairman Meisel. Meeting is adjourned at 7:50 p.m. ZAPCO MEETING MINUTES Page 10