A bill for an ordinance changing the zoning classification for 3429 W 3rd Avenue in Barnum, with a reasonable condition. Approves an official map amendment to rezone property from E-SU-D1x to E-MU-2.5 (urban edge, single-unit to urban edge, multi-unit) with a waiver, located at 3429 West 3rd Avenue in Council District 3. The Committee approved filing this item at its meeting on 4-29-19.
Please refrain from profane or obscene speech. Direct your comments to council as a whole and refrain from individual or personal attacks. Councilwoman, can you please vote council 247 on the floor? Yes, I move that council bill 19 dash 247 be placed upon final consideration and do pass. Has been moved and seconded. The required public hearing for Council Bill 247 is open. May we have the staff report? Q So Jeffrey, it was CPD, so I have a rezoning request for a property located at Third and Knox in the Barnum neighborhood. So the property is located in Council District three. Again in the barn and neighborhood. So the request area is at the northeast corner of Third and Knox Court and the request area is about 0.6 acres. The rezoning is to go from ESU, D1 Ex to EMU 2.5 with a waiver. And I'll of course explain what that means. The purpose of the request is to accommodate multi-unit residential development on the site. So the subject said again, easy d1x. So that's urban edge context, single unit. And the D1 one x denotes that an accessory dwelling unit is allowed and the surrounding properties are also ESU, D1 x. So again, ESU, D1 exits a single unit, residential zone district, which does allow for accessory dwelling units. And importantly, the maximum building height is calibrated by the front and rear of the lot. So the front, 65% of the lot can be up to 2.5 storeys and actually up to 35 feet depending on the lot with the slots big enough to qualify for the 35 feet and the rear, 35% is one story and 17 feet in height. And so the requested zone district is IMU 2.5 A Sense for Urban Edge Multi-unit 2.5 stories. And I'll get to the waiver request here in a second. But I mean, 2.5 is a zone district that allows single and two unit and multi-unit residential with multi-unit residential typically being embedded with other residential areas. And it does allow for a variety of residential building forms up to 2.5 storeys. The building height is actually similar to the existing zoned district. And the anomaly here that we'll get to in the waiver is the apartment building form and actually only allows up to two stories in height in the front 65%. And so looking at the minimum loss size, it's a bit smaller than the current zone district, but importantly also to note the half storey definition. So 2.5 storey is the maximum height in the front, 65%. And so a half storey is defined as essentially a third story. That's 75% of the floor area of the story below it. So there's a massing reduction. Additionally, within the zone district, there's standards depending on the building form for upper storeys setbacks and setbacks to further reduce that massing. And so I know this is a lot going on in this table, but it is important to kind of note this is the the basis for the waiver. So this table shows the allowed building forms and IMI 2.5 on the left hand side. And then looking at the heights, the building heights across these building forms and the front, 65%. So really uniform across most building forms with a 30 to 35 feet in the front, 65% and the 2.5 stories. And so this is the issue right here or the reason for the waiver request as the apartment building form has the same height allowance, 30 to 35 feet, but it only allows two stories and the rear 35% is similar to the other building forms. So this is just visually showing what the waiver request is on the screen. So it is a request for IMI 2.5 with the waiver. And the specific waiver is to the apartment building form to allow 2.5 storeys instead of being capped at two stories in the front, 65%. And so looking at existing land uses. So the subject site is currently it's actually vacant, it's shown a surface parking and the existing land use and has been vacant for some time. You see up and down the Knox Court corridor, while it does have that single unit, residential zoning, there's actually a mix of land uses. The read on this map is office and then the blue as a church. And we'll talk a little bit more about the Knox Court corridor here in the next slide. So the Knox quiet corridor is, I would say, a significant North-South connector in terms of connecting Barnham to the rest of Denver look in between federal and Sheridan . So it is a corridor that has some recent investment in terms of a new bicycle lane. And and then I also noted that there are several existing nonresidential uses along this corridor. Despite the residential zoning, most structures on this corridor are 1.5 storeys. There are some exceptions to that, even though the zoning allows buildings to go taller than that, going up to potentially 35 feet and two and a half stories in the front, 65%. And there's also a couple nonresidential commercial nodes within two blocks of the subject site on the Knox Court corridor at first and fifth. So you see it's a it's a mixed and mixed corridor in terms of land use and character, despite its its zoning. And so looking at the current site and on to some images here. So as I said, it is currently surface parking and actually has been vacant for several years and it's fenced off and has seen a fair amount of disrepair in recent years. Historically, it's always been a nonresidential use as far as we can tell in our records. Previously, before being a surface parking lot, it was a telephone service company garage with a small structure there. And so looking at images of the subject sites, those looking northeast at the site, you see it's fenced off and it was surface parking. You see the bicycle lane. I will note there's also a bus stop right in front of the site that connects this site along with the bicycle lanes pretty well to the overall mobility network . But you have to the north, the west light rail line, Knox Court Station, which is less than a mile away. Straight, north, north, straight. Shot from the site. And so this is looking kind of south, south, west say it is on the left hand side of the screen and this is looking from Third Avenue West. So you can see where the alley meets the subject's site. And so this is looking straight west of the subject's side. And you can see the the mix of land uses there and beliefs as an office mixed them with some of the single unit residential. And then this is looking south more broadly of the Knox Court corridor. Looking north. So you see again, the mix of land uses in this case, on the other side of Knox Court, we have the church, which is two and a half ish stories. And then these are strong properties that are directly east of the subject sites or across the alley, both fronting on Julien Street. You see the the one, one and a half storey character of that area as it jumps across the alley. So the process to date has been a normal rezoning process leading to the hearing tonight in terms of public outreach and public comment. There was extensive dialog between the applicant and the neighborhood organization, and I'll certainly let them talk about that if they'd like. But we did not ever receive a position letter from the Concerned Citizens for Burnham on the rezoning, but we did receive a total of three letters on the rezoning, two in support, and then one letter expressing concerns about the potential scale, inappropriate scale of buildings with the rezoning and some reference to the Barnum neighborhood plan, which we'll talk about, and policies there supporting continuance of the low density residential character and a stated preference in that letter for RH 2.5 instead of the requested zone district. So these are the criteria staff used to evaluate rezonings. I'll go through each one of these. And so we have the newly adopted citywide plans, comp plan and Blueprint. Denver And then we have the Barnham neighborhood plan. And we'll go through here briefly. So in terms of the conference plan, 2040 staff cites a number of policies in the staff report in support of the rezoning, mostly related to promoting infill development on a site where services and infrastructure already exist. And then also a number of policies in the comp plan supporting encouraging a diversity in a variety of housing types and each neighborhood. And this rezoning would do that. So staff finds the request consistent with those policies in terms of blueprint. Denver The newly adopted blueprint. Denver There's three topics that we look at, and I'll go through those briefly here. So in terms of future neighborhood context blueprint, Denver calls the site as urban edge. And so they are going to the urban edge zoning neighborhood context. It also does have language and blueprint in Denver within this context related to allowing some low scale multi-unit embedded with neighborhoods. In terms of the future places. The subject site is in the low, medium residential category, which is different than what it was under the previous blueprint. This particular category does have language that supports additional density at appropriate locations and multi-unit residential embedded in some neighborhood, some residential neighborhoods. And it does also look at vacant corner sites as potential opportunities for increased density. And I should note also that the Knox Court quarter is a residential collector. Third Avenue is a designated local. So in terms of the growth strategy, kind of the third tier blueprint, it is in the all other areas of the city. There is language in the, um, uh, within that category of supporting some rezonings and some investment at appropriate locations. So the barn and Barn West Neighborhood Plan is an adopted plan. The site is subject to for the rezoning. Her staff recognizes the plan is 30 plus years old and community conditions have changed a lot since then. However, it is important to look at that document and there are a number of policies that do support continuance and preservation of the existing low density residential character. There's also other policies in there that support reinvestment at strategic locations as well. And so looking at sort of the balance of adopted plans across the citywide and local plan, staff does find the request consistent with adopted plans because it would promote infill development in a place where services and infrastructure already exist, create a greater diversity of housing choices in this neighborhood, and be consistent with the context, the urban edge context called from Blueprint in Denver, and then also support a context sensitive scale of investment through the height and the transitions within the zone district. So criteria to the number is off your stuff to find the rezoning will result in uniform application of standards within this unique zone district related to the public health, safety and welfare staff does find the requests are consistent with that criteria, primarily through implementing adopted plan policies, as I said, related to encouraging a diversity of housing types and encouraging an investment that is context sensitive. And then looking at justifying circumstances. The fact that Blueprint Denver was adopted is in itself a justifying circumstance. And the the policies, the new policies that were assigned to this property. But we also staff also cited other factors, including some recent investment in bicycle infrastructure, better connecting the site to the nearby light rail station. And in terms of the consistency with the urban edge neighborhood context description, staff does find the request consistent with that criteria related to the description about block sizes and the overall grid pattern and access off of alleys, things like that. And the fact that the request is going to promote multi-unit residential embedded within a primarily residential area. So at that staff does recommend approval of the rezoning and I'm happy to answer any questions. Thank you very much. We have eight individuals signed up to speak on this item this evening. So first up, Jesse Paris. Jesse Paris represent for Denver, home of Salau, Black Starks and Movement for Self-defense and Positive Action Commitment for Social Change. And I'm on. Top of the ballot for at large. Make sure you vote by tomorrow. I was originally against this rezoning request because I thought it was just going to be more gentrification as usual. This neighborhood, this part of town, as all other parts of town, has been rapidly gentrified to no avail. Seeing that there's. Going to be allowed to use. I'm a supporter to use. So I'm in support of this rezoning. I had a few questions, though. I wanted to know exactly what the RMR level was. Going to be for this. This was going to be a rental. Or if this is going to be market. Is it going to be ownership? If you could please answer my questions, I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, Chairman Sekou. Yes. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Oh. My name is Chairman Sekou. I will be the. Next mayor of the city. And. This particular item. I support. Finally. You'll get this right. You got it right. And I expect a unanimous. Vote. On this thing. Well, because it satisfies all the criteria that exist. That's number one. And two, what's different about this one is that it finally begins to do the. Innovative process of creative thinking of how we can begin to. Address this housing issue. Now, I know we ain't supposed to be talking. Good about folks up here, and this is just generic. It doesn't apply to any one particular use class. But you know what? Congratulations. And you know what I'm talking about. And we go a long way back. Almost 15 years. This thing. For me. And those would probably be the last time that I show like this on this side of the podium. So. Happy birthday for. Congratulations on a successful. Year living my. I didn't know this is his birthday. Yeah. He's going to. Basketball. And I just want to say that and good luck. In the future. You're my hero. You did good. Thank you, ma'am. And keep on doing good. That's all I got. Thank you. Next up, Phil Workman. Thank you very much. Phil Workman. 130 Rampart Way. Denver, Colorado 80230. Found out when I was signing in on the iPad that I didn't have my readers. Which reminds me, I had a birthday not that long ago and and reminds me that I'm getting older as well. It also brings up that we started working on this project three years ago. Our first meeting with neighbors was in April of 2016 at the site, and I let the applicant describe what they do or what their vision for this. But I want to thank the neighbors that have worked with us over the last three years, as well as the city of Denver, to help get what our vision is, what what what the mission is of what the applicant would like to do, as well as what fits in within the plan and things that we heard from the neighbors as we went through this process. Basically, when we first met with the neighbors, the applicant came to us and and said, what, you know, what can we do? Let's meet with some neighbors here. And this has been vacant land for a long time. It's been commercial land. It was a parking lot used by a church. What's the vision? What, what what are the neighbors want? And we went through a process. We've met with the neighbors and small groups. We've met with neighbors one on one. We've met with the neighborhood organization. We've done a SurveyMonkey that was sponsored by the neighborhood, both in English and in Spanish with over 100 responses, which was gave us a lot of feedback of what we were looking to do and this or what what the neighbors were looking for at the site. And every one of our when we would announce our neighborhood meetings, we would go door to door with fliers, English on one side, Spanish on the other side. We didn't initially do that, and there was some came from the neighborhood and say, what about letting folks from the neighborhood also know what's going on in Spanish as well ? So that's when we put out the survey in both English and Spanish and also door to door. Initially, we we heard a lot and and just presentation, which I won't go through again, like the rationale or where we are with the particulars of the zoning. But we heard a lot from, you know, a lot has changed along this corridor. A lot of exciting things have happened in Branham birthday or a lot of exciting things have gone. A part of this is a corridor is the bike bicycle corridor, Parks Rec Center. I mean, this this neighborhood is is fantastic. And going to have some neighbors here speak to that in a second. So we wanted to take advantage of of that. And we wanted to provide a product that the neighbors can be proud of that would fit within the framework of what the neighborhood would be most interested in. Interestingly, there was a I'm. Sorry, but your time is up. Okay. All right. Next time around for any questions. Thank you. Next up, Greg Osborn. Good evening. My name is Greg Osborn. I am a partner in unlocking equity, the owner of the property. My address is 4021 Nassau Circle, West Inglewood, Colorado, 80113. Some of the initial questions that were thrown out were, what's the what's the mix here? What does this thing ultimately look like? And while we've done lots of iterations on what might work here, it all depends on what the ultimate density can be. I do want to commit to you all that we are attainable housing people and our vision for this site is and always will be attainable. Housing as informed by the neighborhood conversations we've had and the need in the market. I want to share one quick anecdote from an elderly gentleman who attended one of our earlier neighborhood meetings, and he said, Please build something here that my daughter who's entering the workforce in Denver can afford to live in while she starts her career in Denver. So that's something we won't forget in our quest. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, Charles Moore. Hi there. My name is Shayla moore. I live at four, six, eight Stewart Street in Burnham. West and I've lived there for ten years now. I've been a residential realtor for over seven years and I've been on the Barnum Arnaud's board KBE for over four years. I spoke on behalf of Matt and his team at the. Zoning meeting. In March. And over the last few years, Matt and his team have reached out to Barnum's community many times, surveying what Barnum neighbors would like to see built, as well as attending and engaging with residents at multiple neighborhood meetings. One thing I hear from the. Neighborhood in our meetings. Over and over again is that we need attainable. Housing that is. Compatible with Barnum. Not with our northern neighbors. I believe that Barnum needs density. In order to create this attainable housing. As you know, right now, the site is an overgrown parking lot. I'd like to see this development set a precedent for future developments in Burnham, one of attainable housing. Architectural facades in line with the neighborhood, and one that encourages more community and. Activity. Within Barnum. And I believe Matt and his team. Can do this for us. That's it. Thank you. Next up, Matthew Guarino. Good evening. My name is Matt Guarino. I live at seven 221 South Pontiac Way, Centennial, Colorado. And I'm a partner with Greg Osbornes who spoke just a minute ago and we received a call four plus years ago based on our mission from someone that owned, owned the church and this parking lot. This property was not on the market, but they heard our mission was and this is on the back of one of our cards. It's twofold. One is to provide housing for those that need it. And the second part is to create opportunity for those that want it. You know, we understand that nothing happens without a roof over your head. So that's why we put that as a focus for our work. But also, we're trying to create empowerment and that trying to encourage people that they can own their own home. So the sisters, not nuns, but the sisters that own the church. Where this was a part. They also owned this parking lot, called us because of our mission. And they said, we'd like you to buy this because we think that you can do something important not only for Barnum, but hopefully for the city. And one of the things during this three plus years. Talk about birthdays. Birthdays, three plus years that we've been on this journey is that I've been blown away by the folks at Barnum. Blown away. You know, there's so much divisiveness, divisiveness in the world today and people making the other side wrong to make their side right. We've had 30 town hall meetings, 30 to create this outcome. Opportunities for housing for those who need it and opportunities for those that want it. And we're really proud to be coming towards the end of this. And in this period that we've been working on this process. My oldest child, I have a 24, 22, 20 and 18 year old graduated college, worked for the U.S. government, doing a Fulbright scholarship in South America, came back and she can't afford to live in Denver. It gets really real when that starts happening. So we are more empowered and emboldened than ever to make this happen. And we appreciate very much the folks at Parnham and hopefully we have your support tonight. Thank you so much. Thank you. Next up, Sarah Brown. Hi. My name is Sarah Brown and I am a resident at. 114 Knox Court. Which is less than two blocks from the potential site here. And the reason that I am here tonight is my husband and I finally were able to afford this house in this beautiful, wonderful neighborhood. And we've taken a lot of pride in this home. It was built in 1915, and Helen Bartle originally did own this home at one time. We put a lot of effort into preserving this house and I've had to do a. Lot of research to learn about what's happening here. I am an education coach with early childhood. Teachers, so I knew nothing about this. So I have been reading and following along for over a year now. And the biggest thing that I, I like about this is that. This process is unique and that the neighbors and the. Neighborhood organization have the opportunity to work through the site development plan process, ensuring architectural dignity in Barnham. And I think that's really important for those of us that live there, especially being that close. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, John Coleman. Hello. My name is John Coleman. I'm a resident of Barnham. I live at 345 Irving Street, so actually just right around the corner from this proposed site here. I'm actually the president of the the Barnham R.A. Organization. I'm not actually speaking on behalf of our organization. Anything I say is just coming from me personally. But I've taken that role since January of this year. In addition to that, I'm also in residential real estate, and I've been in real estate for about four. This is my fourth year here, so I kind of know the. Some of the markets as well around. Our house as well. I guess one of the things I kind of want to bring up in the I guess my biggest. Point is that through through the last several years that we've been talking about. This with Phil and the Parker Company, is that I mean, a this is a developer that is actually looking at what the community wants and working with us and saying, hey, you know, what does the community want to see? Do you want it? What esthetically do you want to see? We can't work on that yet because we have to get through this process first. So I really appreciate that they're actually working with the community and not just saying, Hey, we're going to build this and we're going to, you know, not take anything and take into consideration . On top of that, I feel like there was three main areas that we could actually have this lot developed into because we know it's going to be developed. It's just how long it's going to take to to be developed. And so those three options were residential single family homes, which is zoned now for with the ADA use on there. One of them was a mixed use which would have retail on. The bottom and residential on top, which I believe was denied and taken out of the context here. And then the other option, which is what we're looking at here, is the affordable housing and the attainable housing that would be smaller units. I am all for that. As I know for a fact that single family homes with resident or ADA use in the back would be well over half a million dollars. I know that I'm closing on a property that is a 82 home with the single family home blocks from this, and it's over half a million dollars and it's built in 1950. So I know for a fact that this is not going to be affordable if you put single family homes with 80 use, if we can build something that's actually obtainable because that's the other thing, there's affordability and there's a attainability and they're kind of two separate issues. But I know for a fact that that's a lot of when my my first time homebuyers are dealing with. So if we can build something that would actually be affordable and obtainable for people. I think that's the best use of this out of this lot. Thank you. Thank you. That concludes our speakers. Are there any questions from members of council on this? Councilman Espinosa. Yes, I think I. Actually Jeff and the owners as well. So. Is there is there any limitation prohibition on what can be built here, meaning that? I mean, there's a lot of talk about this affordability component, but, you know, in the study X, a townhouse is not an allowed form, but in the IMU it is. But in order to let it, which is a very different outcome than what is being seemingly discussed about the apartment form. So so you're you're wanting to know if I understand it. The resumption of developer agreement that compels this affordable project to go forward. Not as part of the rezoning. Is. So to the owners, is there some sort of agreement in place that compels an affordable project to go forward? There's not an agreement that I'm aware of. You know, we've like you've heard we've been in this thing for three and a half years and we have no idea what the numbers are for, depending on what the what the density outcome is. We've got several different concept plans, all in the attainable housing space, but nothing definitively ironed out yet. We've got job costing to do. We've got architectural to do. We've got all kinds of work to undertake. Once this, you know, hopefully we get we get your support, but there's no definitive agreement in place. I assume that that would be part of the development plan and permitting process once we submit. Actually, I'm asking a question that is recognizably extra extra outside of the two true criteria, but it is been a lot of the dialog, both from you, your representation and the community. And so therefore it's part of the public hearing and I'd like to elaborate. So attainable housing. What is your definition of attainable housing? So attainable housing to me is very simply something that an entry level worker could afford, whether it's market rate, whether it's rental in the apartment form, or whether it's if these things are rowhouses or townhouses, if that's the highest and best something that first time homebuyer could afford. That's what we do. That's our space. That's our definition. Okay, great. And I just wanted to elaborate. You asked a question about, am I right that that's typically something that's associated with low income tax credits, right? Public subsidies or public funding? We are completely private. Right. So we don't have those kinds of requirements. But, you know, we self-imposed those on our you know, on our work. What we're trying to do is create attainable housing. That's everything, you know. But for us, the speed and the the sometimes limitations that come with that are what we're trying to avoid. So our goal is to create, like said first time homebuyer. So I didn't actually say, am I? But I'm familiar with it. And so I appreciate you bringing it up. So in your attainable housing goals, what is your target? Am I for a representative household size of how big? We wouldn't. That's again, that's the criteria for it. But what we would say is that just like Greg indicated, for people that are, you know, first time homebuyers, that's what we're looking for. Right. So to say that that artificial income level is not how we look at it. Okay. So, Jeff, the real question I had to begin with is. You know, in first off, I want to appreciate the fact that CPD came forward with a 2.5 with waivers with the 60%, 6535 split, which is different than how we've been presented a similar waiver in the past. That said, this will allow an apartment for the apartment form still allows side by side dwelling units. Fortunately, there's a 50% maximum on the gross gross for the GFA of the structure. So we can't get a true slot home product. But you sort of could the. Is there anything. You know. Well, actually, it goes back to him now. And sorry, I'm realizing that this goes back to my original question about is there any commitment to use the apartment form for stacked units? But it's just one of the schemes, is that correct? It's it's they have that option and there's more flexibility with the apartment form than like the row house form, for example. But there's no mandate to do it stacked. It just allows more flexibility with the configuration of units. Okay. Then last question to you guys. Do you guys do condos? Because, I mean, is this would you this be a for sale product in a staff configuration or only a rental product in the stack? Once we get our density number, we can go back to the drawing board and run iterations on all of the product types allowed in the form that we're discussing, condos would absolutely be one of those performers that we would run, as well as for rent and row house. Okay. Thank you, guys. Thanks. Thank you. Councilman Espinosa, Councilman Lopez. Thank you, Mr. President. I was looking at the map. Mm hmm. How long is that parking lot? I mean, just. And I live not too far away. I live over on Sixth and Knox. All I remember, I mean, the little neighborhood of one of the neighborhoods I grew up in. All I remember is that just being a parking lot, I don't remember anything else on that. I'm trying to think and that's a good maybe 35 years of of of memory that I can tap into what was on the site before and when was on that and when was that? Yeah, we had trouble pinning down a specific date, but we were looking at historic aerials and at least since the mid-nineties we found it was it's been a surface parking lot. And before that and I don't know exactly when it got demolished, but before that, the only structure we found evidence of was a a small telephone company service garage structure. And so I don't know the exact square footage, but you could see from the footprint it's pretty small, relatively overall. So I wonder if we went into the records if or any library archives if that at one point was connected to the Westwood Telephone Company. That's where Westwood gets its name, by the way, a lot of people think, well, Westwood, you know, as we California, this is not Westwood L.A., but it's completely different. But it it derives his name from the Westwood Telephone Company. A lot of the folks that were workers of the 20th century and turn of the century, but, uh, for those thirties were employees. I wonder if there anything. I mean, I can't do anything about it now because it's demolished. And I wonder if there's anything. That's why I'm curious as to what was there before and if that was the connection. Can you talk to me a little bit about if we're driving? If you're walking excuse me for riding bikes because there is a bike lane there. If you're commuting down Knox, you have a lot of single family homes. Some of them are in. You have some multi-unit. You have to go to a few to unit multi-unit uses. There you have commercial. You have front yards. How far is the setback from the property line. To the door? So it will be under the new zoning and the current zoning is subject to a context sensitive senator from Knox. So the baseline is 20 feet, which is, I think, pretty consistent with what's out there now. There would be an analysis done to make sure it essentially lines up with what's there, anything that gets built and good. Now, looking at the the corner. So that would be the. Looking at the intersection, the northeast corner, which is as you go up in that property, what does that corner look like? Is there a community space? Is there bike rack? Is somebody's front yard? I mean, I want to get a kind of a just a visual in terms of what that what that footprint would look like and if there's any kind of entryway into the units at that point or are they all just facing the court? Is there any kind of diagonal corner there? Yeah, that unfortunately can't answer. That's more of a design question. I don't know if the applicant's a be more of a question of the applicants in terms of the I mean, there's certainly bike parking that's required and things like that, but it doesn't get into architectural standards in terms of the zoning. And I understand that as part of zoning, I'm just trying to kind of visualize when you guys see context and context sensitive, you know? Barnum Our neighborhoods context is very the context is that it really has no one unique context that's a little different. You kind of have a hodgepodge, everything. You have a bungalow, next thing you know, you have a prefab, next thing you know, you have a stucco. Who knows what? Right. And then then sometimes you have adobe look in all the units as well, too. So I'm just trying to figure that out. All right. And I saw that there was some opposition with that opposition. I mean, there was some letters that came in the readdress those issues. Yeah. The there's one letter that didn't explicitly state opposition to the rezoning or just express concerns. And that's what I wanted to be clear. The concerns yeah, the concerns were and I could pull it up and it's certainly in your packet but one the scale of buildings potentially here relative to the surrounding area. And so going through each one I guess for example. So in that case, the scale in terms of how tall a building could be is, you know, something that is actually similar to what's allowed today. So the height is actually consistent today with what is going to be allowed under this new zoning, which is a different you could do multi-unit instead of single unit. The second concern is related to, I think, addressing the Burnham Neighborhood Plan. And so I think there were citation of some policies in there about preserving the low density residential character. And so that is certainly an adopted plan and we have to look at it. But I think on balance, in terms of the age and the change of conditions and the other citywide policies, staff's opinion was, you know, looking on balance of all the policies that the request are still consistent with adopted plan policies. The third issue raised in the letter was a preference for another zoned district and that being Area 2.5. And so that was a zone district that was part of the suite of options we looked at with the applicant team and ultimately it wasn't going to work for them. Okay. One more question, Mr. President, if I may. And I just I had it in they give me another year on my life here. So I'm starting to really feel that now. I'm 41, just July 18th, for the record. I am wondering about the neighborhood plan. How old were you in 1986? I'll take the fifth on that one. I was. Archive of my life, so I was. Probably watching Top Gun the day that it was adopted. Yeah. No, man Top Gun came out a little earlier than that. So is this being addressed? So is there any kind of update? My my worry is, is some of these older plans. Villa Park is 1991. Before we before we touched Westwood, that was 1978 and 79. Barnum is from 1986. It's a very different neighborhood is I think there's something coming up. Where is this being scheduled for review? And I'm I'm asking this in the context of this rezoning, because this is not the first time that we're probably going to see a rezoning in this neighborhood in the future, especially with this old, old neighborhood plan. Gosh, I apologize. I'm not sure when it's scheduled. And I know that given the date of the plan, I don't want to misspeak. But I believe it's it's up in the priority list. Okay. That's why I wanted to thank you so much. Thank you. Guzman-Lopez Councilman Flynn. Thank you, Mr. President. Councilman Lopez and Jeff actually got to the core of what my question was. It was about the single letter expressing concern, and I have read that email from Mr. Krueger about it. And I do note I guess the only thing I'd be interested in clarifying is does CPD have a threshold for the age of plans when when it because the direction in the Barnum Barnum West neighborhood plan would argue against this rezoning. But that was 1986. And Councilman when I was alive and I was probably sitting at that table covering the council, passing that plan for the newspaper. But I don't have a specific memory of it. But how when do we cut them off and no longer rely on them, particularly when it has direction that argues against the rezoning ? Yeah. I wish I had a specific metric for you. I don't. I think it's it's a case by case determination made. But I think in this case, you know, when you consider the breadth of plans and the average age of a plan, it's really in the in the very lower tier in terms of age. And so more. Important, I guess I'm sorry to cut you off, but more important than would be, how much change has there been in that neighborhood since the plan in Barnum? There's been a significant change since 1986, maybe. Yeah, that's certainly true. We've seen a lot of of new investments. The park, for example, nearby the West light rail line coming through there. I think that, you know, 30 plus years has been a lot of change. So it's a big factor in looking at the age of the plan relative current. Thank you. And well, certainly if if if a 3032 year old plan supported a rezoning 32 years later, we'd certainly be relying more on it. And we wouldn't be dismissing it, would we? Probably not. I think we'd still look at the plan with skepticism, regardless of the change conditions. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilman Flynn. Councilwoman Ortega. Thank you, Jeff. Can you tell me what kind of parking requirements would be included as part of this development? And and have you have you all jointly calculated just roughly how many total units can be on this site? Yeah, the first into the first question is one space per unit would be the parking requirement and there's bicycle parking requirement to figure out exactly what that is. But the second question, we haven't because we just don't know at this point. Unfortunately, it could in terms of the number of units. And so it really depends on the type of units and the configuration of units. And so, for example, we could be looking at really small micro units or we could be looking at 1500 square feet, you know, two and three bedroom units. So not knowing what the unit configuration is makes it really difficult to get at a unit count. But there certainly would be vehicle parking one per unit, regardless of the size of the unit. Okay. So let me ask either Matthew or Greg, if you wouldn't mind addressing the same question, just trying to get an idea of how many units you're proposing to have on the site. And I know it's not something you have to tell us, but I would assume you haven't spent all this time going through the process with the neighborhood without some idea of, you know, generally what you could build on the site. So so that's true. We've we've been running scenarios for three and a half years, you know, pondering what might happen here. A reminder that currently four units could exist used by right on the site, which clearly is not the highest and best use. Regarding parking, I would I would say that the remember the back 35% is restricted to single storey. So that's an ideal use for the parking required on the site. But, you know, we've run scenarios from, you know, from the from the four units when we first bought this thing up to, you know, 30 or 40 units in the micro sense, 15. I mean, so much of this is is hard to even address because it's not only the unit count, it's the cost to build it. And as Matt said, we're private people. We're not asking for public money to help get this thing done. It's all our money. So we want to we had all these costs and risk analyzes to do to run the numbers and make them work. So that's only just really begun with with the with the density in question. But I think in keeping with our mission of attainable housing, more units is our is our extreme bias. I mean, more people need housing in the city and more is better in our sense. So that's what we'll try to do as long as the affordability numbers are there from a market perspective. So if you do micro units, does the parking requirements change significantly? And Jeff, you may be better to answer this question. So if. Yeah. And I apologize. I don't. And Jeff, before you answer that question, we're having a little bit of trouble, the interpreter hearing you. So if you could speak a little bit louder in the microphone, that'd be appreciated. Thanks. Yeah. Gosh, I don't I should know this. I believe there is some flexibility. I could look into it for micro units and some parking reductions. I know there's flexibility for proximity to transit. This is not going to be subject to that. But I'd have to look into that if the lower square footage brings you lower parking requirements. And I could do that. Okay. That that would be helpful to know. And so while you're doing that, the the last question that I had was related to whether there has been any exploration on where a curb cut would go, assuming there has to be parking on site, would that be off a court or would that be on the avenue? Yeah. So we asked that question of the folks that we review the site plan and what they told us was no access would would be allowed off of Knox Court. It would come off the alley more than likely. Okay. I'm sorry. I do have one last question. And it is about the the difference between the IMU 2.5 and the assumed DCS. One is the half story. The the main difference between the two in terms of of I know the the height is the same, but yet the IMU is being requested because it allows the 2.5 for the apartment concept. Yeah, the height is the same actually in terms of of how it's measured in feet and number of stories actually between the current zone district and the proposed district. It's just the ability to use the apartment form that allows a little more flexibility with the unit configuration within that sort of building envelope. Okay. All right. If you I don't know if anybody else has questions, but if you could just check on the. Yes. Amount of parking for the micro units, that would be really helpful to know, I think. Yes. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Ortega. That concludes the questions. The public hearing for Connersville two for seven is closed. Are there comments by members of Council Councilman Lopez? Thank you, Mr. President. I wanted to thank folks for for doing such a good job of making sure that there is a lengthy community process, a robust community process. Y'all have been working this for quite a while and making sure that you're taking into account the current context in the neighborhood is good. I think there's been different iterations with different zone districts. I really appreciate you me coming to that meeting mean to that middle. There is no letter of opposition there. Council chambers are not packed with a bunch of folks who are who are opposed to it. And that's a good sign. And sometimes you will get a lot of folks in here upset about something like this and on its on its on its merits. And based off of the criteria that we have, it does meet it. And the important thing is it's a parking lot. It is a parking lot. And it's always been a parking lot since I can remember I was eight years old in 1986 and running around that neighborhood. And the fact that that parking lot will not be home to weeds, but be home to potentially families and folks that actually can afford to live there. And that's that's what matters. And, you know, taking that context and, you know, context and design is nothing. It's not something that we can consider legally based on that criteria. But you're going that extra mile and kind of helping. Describe to us what that looks like based off of the input that you've had in the communities is a good thing, given that I think, you know, you have an opportunity to actually create something that could be a landmark in this area. Burnhams For a little landmarks. Some of them are very disappointing forever. I thought, you know, Barnum had the zoo and all the zoo animals and all that stuff. And I come to find out that even the Barnum home, P.T. Barnum ever even laid foot in it. But it's good to have something that's not disappointing in terms of history like that. I think this is an opportunity for for you all to demonstrate to everybody else in the city that something like this can be done, giving a good community process, making sure you're taking those those strategies and those that that input into account. I think that matters, right? As residents, we drive by it every day. We live by it every day. We want to be part of the solution. But at the end of the day, it's still our neighborhood and it's a good, happy meeting. So and thank you for coming. And that traffic must have been crazy coming. Yeah. There are no more shortcuts to the neighborhood. And anyway, that's another conversation. Thank you. Thank you. Guzman-Lopez Councilman Espinosa. Phil, Phil Workman, Speedy Jeff Hurt, Kyle Dalton. You guys did it. You painted me into a very, very difficult corner. And that one is you've painted this rezoning in just the right ways, big in. What I mean by that is this is a significant increase in entitlement and over any sort of adopted plan and it's loosely affiliated to the blueprint Denver but in it hits those recommendations but it is you know one of the things I've already articulated since we've adopted that and even before we adopted the new plan was the need to customize zoning so that we don't just take the recommendations verbatim and start mapping them into existing zone districts and hope for the best that you build in to those zone districts. The, the other things that those plans articulated. Now, I'd love to see the equity components that have been discussed here hardcoded somehow, but at least the form the transitional pieces are there with that 6535 split, the one story limitation on the rear. This is dramatically different than the holly situation that we had, which allowed that two and a half stories all the way to the rear setback line in a similar context. And so you've done it formally, but the thing that gives me pause but it's not enough pause is that we're now allowing both the apartment form and the townhouse form to enter into this into this parcel, into this loan line. And that's an easy exit in this market, right? Is if these guys realize that they can't make the numbers work on these affordable units, but they can capture equity that helps them complete their mission elsewhere. It's an easy turn and flip to another developer who can build townhouse product. Now, historically, that would have been a slot home. And that what bothers me about that is then we are jumping, we're going from Jefferson Park in the Sloan's Lake into West Colfax and then jumping Lakewood Gulch and Sixth Avenue into this neighborhood with a slot home. The good news is we did the slide home text amendment. So the combination of the form restrictions that are brought by the waivers and the slot home text amendment would sort of at least compel a different outcome from the public realm side. But it doesn't. There's nothing in here that precludes this from being market rate product scaled at a size that hits the maximum top dollar. And but unfortunately, that's not justification for denying an application. But I've seen all of this mostly for staff. Which is that you've painted a very narrow box that satisfies essentially all the all the things that I would push back on. But it doesn't hit a lot of those vision elements just by hitting the base entitlement and the upper storey step back requirements. There are other things in that plan that should be driving. There's no access to high frequency transit. This is just a couple blocks, three blocks from the fire station. You know, it's a dangerous place for kids necessarily to be at if there's high speed vehicles going up and down knocks. And so but it is access to park. So there's a lot of other things in those vision elements that I think we still need to be grappling with as we go, as we do land use map amendments and text amendments going forward. But this one will check all the boxes. And so you'll see me sort of begrudgingly supporting it, because until this project comes to fruition with those with that affordability lens, I worry that it may not. And that is that has ramifications for this community going forward. Thanks. Thank you, Councilman Espinosa. Seeing no other comments, Madam Secretary, roll call. Excuse me. So I just wanted to see if we can get the final question, the final answer to the question about the parking on the micro units. Thank you. It's a quick answer. No, they're not. They wouldn't be allowed to have the parking reduction for a micro unit on this zoning. Thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Secretary. Black eye. Brooks. I. Espinosa. Flynn. I. Gilmore. I learned in. High. Cashmere. I can eat. Lopez. All right. Ortega. SUSSMAN Mr. President. Madam Secretary, please close the voting, announce the results. 12 hours 12 hours counts Bill 247 has passed council minutes. Will you please put council bill 127 on the floor?