Augusta Planning Board approves solar project, advances childcare zoning changes

[6:28] Speaker A (unidentified): And 15 pm, welcome to tonight's Augusta Planning Board meeting. Thank you all for silencing your cell phones. A reminder for all who would be speaking this evening to speak directly into the microphone so everyone can hear your comments. Please address all questions and comments directly into the mic. Speak directly into the microphone so everyone can hear your comments. Please address all questions and comments directly to the board and we will attempt to have all your questions and concerns addressed. There are three items on our agenda this evening, two public hearings in one workshop. The procedure for the public hearing will be as usual. Betsy and Eva will present the application, the applicant or representative will speak next. We will then take public testimony. If you choose to speak please state your name and address and reminder to address your comments to the board. We will first hear from those in favor of the proposal, then against, then neither for nor against. Once all public testimony has been heard the applicant will have final say. The public hearing will then be closed or the Planning Board will deliberate. No further testimony will be heard unless specifically requested by a member of the [7:34] Eva Nielsen: board. Betsy and Eva we're ready to begin. Good evening everyone, my name is Eva Nielsen, I'm the assistant city planner. The first item on the agenda tonight is a public hearing for a major development and conditional use application of A H O S LLC to construct a 0.99 megawatt AC ground-mounted solar project. This is assessors map 9 lots 45, 49 and 49 C and it's located on Maple Brook Lane in the rural River District or our. The applicant established right title or interest in the form of a lease option agreement for lots 45 and 49 between the owner John Mulholland and the developer Ascent Renewables LLC as well as an assignment and assumption agreement between Ascent Renewables LLC the assigner and AHOS LLC the assignee and subsidiary of Ascent Renewables LLC. And I'll make note to the Planning Board too that the text has been updated in our staff documents since we delivered the packets so that's why you have this printout in front of you with the corrected right title and interest on That first page of the decision, draft decision letter. So also Central Maine Power provided a letter for project authorization over their lot 49. Seed the applicant submitted an application for a major development and conditional use review, supporting materials including narrative, sound and glare studies, letter authorization, decommissioning and operation and maintenance plans, stormwater modeling, site plans and details, and fees. For the application, the public notice and the abutter notification. Staff have also completed direct mailings to abutters within the required notification radius of 1,000 feet. We posted legal advertisements in the newspaper. We notified City Council and the Planning Board of Zoning Appeals and other interested parties and means installed signage on the property. So based on this review, we as the Augusta City Planning staff recommend that the Planning Board make a positive motion regarding the applicant standing to apply, the completeness of the application, and the sufficiency of public noticing to move on to the more substantive review. [9:55] Speaker C (unidentified): I move that we find the application is complete as the applicant has sufficient right title and interest to apply and has submitted all necessary materials. Staff has provided the abutter notifications as required by the ordinance. Thank you Kathy. All in favor. Thank you so. [10:16] Eva Nielsen: Planning staff have completed the staff review and a draft findings of fact and conclusions of law document and engineering staff have provided an engineering review which we've posted on online on our website and shared with the planning board members and the applicant. The applicant proposes to construct a sub 1.0 megawatt AC ground mounted solar tracking facility so it has panels that follow the sun throughout the day. Also included within the proposal is a gravel access driveway connecting to. Maple Brook Lane, agricultural fencing with a gap of eight inches to allow for wildlife egress and that's surrounding the solar array and then mdep approvals including stormwater and decommissioning permits are required. And just looking briefly over previous permitting, a subdivision for a mobile home park was approved in 1991 followed by a mineral extraction license for John Mulholland to operate the Bond Brook Road pit in 2007 and then there were two subsequent renewals for this license and in. 2013 and 2018 and along with the solar energy system on lot 49 one in two family dwellings is an existing and a proposed use as well as major municipal and public utilities on the lot owned by CMP lot 49 C and as operations on the bond pit our discontinued reclamation plan is required which the Planning Board will review at a future meeting and since we don't have this plan in hand right now staff added a finding to the draft decision letter which the board can grant or not grant and that would provide flexibility in the final alignment of the road subject to the city engineer Tyler Pease's approval. Looking at the presentation now first is a satellite image of the properties in that orange outline and other lots within the 1000 foot vicinity so I-95 kind of curves around the north and north to south on the western side of the properties and the access driveways off of Maple Maplebrook Lane which connects south of Bondbrook Road and Bondbrook Road kind of runs Northwest southeast intersecting with I-95. The airport is kind of south east over here and just quickly speaking about the airport. The glare study and your packets indicated there is no significant impact anticipated and the FAA or the Federal Aviation Administration confirmed the determination of no hazard to air navigation as a result of this project being built out. I have a couple other aerials. This shows the natural resource protection drinking water buffer. And we received confirmation from representatives at the Greater Augusta Utility District that staff didn't foresee significant impacts to this area and then shore land zoning so you can see the GD the general development district this kind of pink color and it just covers a portion of Maple Brook Lane which the access driveway would connect to though again there isn't anticipated to be a significant impact on this area or bond brook or some of the surrounding wetlands oh and just while we're still looking at an aerial I'll just mention that all of the lot standards are met except for the minimum road frontage for lot 49 see this really small lot and kind of sandwiched between the two larger ones owned by CMP although this lot is existing no changes that are related or proposed moving on to some site photos so here's an image of the entrance to Maple Brook Lane here I'm just standing on Bondbrook Road looking south into the entrance and then just for some context looking kind of Northwest in the direction of I-95 there's of residents across the street others in this area and also south of the project area other uses in the vicinity of a thousand feet include educational services rec areas and facilities government offices and services aka the airport warehousing uses others as well. This is just looking the opposite way so looking kind of east on Bondbrook Road from that Maple Brook Lane entrance so turning around here continuing into the site through the entrance of Maple Brook Lane you can see Bond Brook here in the frame and then a little bit farther down the lane you can see where the driveway to 11 Maple Brook Lane is located to the right here and then the continuation of Maple Brook Lane and I'm facing south here. This is the single family residence owned by John Mulholland who is the owner of this parcel and the other and you can see a distant portion here of the access driveway as it climbs the hill in the background here is a closer image of the access driveway extending up the hill facing west and on the plan you'll see there are two turnarounds included on this driveway one near the connection to Maple Brook Lane and one closer to the gate and both the city engineer and the fire Chief we're okay With waiving the requirement to have another turnaround a turnaround every thousand feet due to the grading and they didn't feel that it was completely necessary and effective there so this is arriving at the top of the hill there the greater project area this is facing west toward I 95 similar view here but closer into the solar array area I 95 again is to the right or the West and where the land kind of slopes down in the background there that's where some of the wetlands are located here I Just zoomed in a little bit to that western boundary area you can see I-95 and along this property boundary you can see a little bit later on the site plans too the applicant proposes two rows of techniarborvitae which would provide screening in this area it isn't exactly what our buffer yard c requires fires and the ordinance the buffer yard see calls for a more natural screening with a mix of evergreen deciduous plantings understory trees and shrubs also deer and other some other animals like to eat the arborvitae, so that's something that the planning board can consider. And from that same spot, just kind of turning north a little bit, this is looking at that same western boundary into lot 49c, which is the smaller lot owned by cmp. So as staff, we would also recommend continuing the landscaping buffer curving around the corner here to kind of better screen the highway. And we'll just add a reminder that the planning board does have flexibility and buffer yards requirements and the applicant did point out, while we were visiting here, that the solar project is at a higher elevation than i-95, so the impact might be a little bit more limited, especially in this area, but something that can be discussed. So just turning a 180, this is looking east into the airport land, and then just going back down the hill on the gravel driveway, you can see the rear side of the single family home and kind of looking east here. Then we have the overall site plan and the next page, if it loads okay the closer into the solar array portion of the site plan, and so the trackers are running north to south rows. The wetlands are in the light gray colors, here's the one to the south kind of acting as a natural boundary of the project, and the agricultural fence is surrounding the project. The power is underground within the project, the solar area, and then just north of the gate is where it transitions to the overhead power and would connect a three-phase back to Bonnbrook Road and the Arborvitae buffer is here, so staff recommend the buffer yard, see plantings Irving the corner here to provide some additional screening, but the planning board, this is up to the planning board what they want to do with that. And this is the access road, the access driveway in more detail. Sorry, it's kind of taking a while to get the full frame there, full page, and sorry the left sides a little bit cut off too, but the pre-existing 20 foot wide logging road is modified to the 16 foot gravel driveway and this complies with the standards. You can see also the two turnarounds, I think one's about here and one is closer to the actual solar array area, and the grading is shown here as well on the bottom. And I do have a page of the details that includes like the panels themselves, the trackers and the fence, the agricultural style fence. I'll just scroll back up to the overall site plan. So just a couple of remaining details from the staff review, so the stormwater calculations indicated no net change over to 10 25 year increments the city engineer reviewed the modeling, sees no issues, and then planning staff, we recommend that the planning board maintain the city's standard for decommissioning requiring removal of solar equipment 18 months after operation has ceased rather than granting the applicant's request to delay decommissioning in extraordinary circumstances. Waivers were requested for the traffic report and the full stormwater report. The traffic report isn't needed and the engineering grows satisfied with the stormwater modeling submitted, so staff noted this in the additional findings, and then one last recommended finding is to grant a waiver for the boundary survey since the applicant stated this could be submitted with the building permit application. Now just looking at the draft conditions of approval, they include the following: number one, and access and utility easement located on lot 49c owned by cmp shall be formalized and recorded at the Kennebec County Registry of Deeds. Number two, issuance of a decommissioning bond in the amount of 183,600 consistent with a 13 cents per watt for other solar projects shall be issued with the City of Augusta named as an obligate. Updates to the estimate shall be provided every five years. Number three, issuance of a permit from the Main Department of Environmental Protection for stormwater shall be submitted to the Planning Bureau. Number four, the applicant shall provide documentation demonstrating project financing from the associated funding institution to city staff, and number five, several four-foot tall berms shall be installed within the project area to facilitate wildlife egress in accordance with a former letter we received from MDI FW, and then number six, we already covered this one, the applicant shall revise the landscaping plan to comply with the requirements of buffery artsy including additional evergreen and deciduous plantings, understory trees, and shrubs and shall extend the buffer around the northwest corner to better screen the highway. And so just to close these, the findings and conditions are draft recommendations from staff which the board can accept or modify as they see fit, and that's all from the staff. If there are any questions. [24:21] Speaker D (unidentified): It's true that we don't know exactly how many panels they plan to put up yet. [24:28] Eva Nielsen: I think so. It does say under project specifications number of modules, 2,420. [24:38] Speaker D (unidentified): There was some text that said they wanted flexibility to be able to adjust the number once they get on site and see how many it would hold. So you haven't had any further communication around the maximum number of panels? No, okay. And the other question had to do with the hydrant. Have you heard any other information from the city regarding whether or not they'll require another hydrant? [25:04] Speaker A (unidentified): I haven't. Okay, leave it to the applicant. Any other questions for Eva? Okay, the applicant can come on up. [25:18] Speaker D (unidentified): Good [25:26] Sean Murphy: evening, my name is Sean Murphy. I work with a consulting firm based in Yarmouth, [25:30] Teddy Epstein: Maine called Flycatcher, and I'll introduce the applicant. Yeah, my name is Teddy Epstein, and I'm the owner of Ascent Renewables and the subsidiary Ahos LLC, and plan to be the owner of [25:41] Sean Murphy: this solar facility. Once again, we, I personally appreciate coming to the city of Augusta. Your planning staff is thorough and has provided us with many questions that have only improved our application. So as I've done in the last two projects I brought before you, I am here for your questions. The staff has covered anything I would have discussed. [26:04] Speaker A (unidentified): Sure. Kathy, do you want to ask the question? [26:08] Speaker D (unidentified): Have you settled on the number of panels that you plan to install? No. [26:13] Sean Murphy: No. And the reason for that is that the market is fluid. We're not entirely sure which panels are there. What I can tell you is we're going to be a 0.99 megawatt AC project, and we're not going to be any bigger or any taller than what we have in front of you tonight. And have you heard yet [26:31] Speaker D (unidentified): whether or not you need to install another hydrant? Nobody has raised that issue, and I was [26:37] Sean Murphy: on site with the fire chief in February, and he didn't raise it either. Doesn't mean it won't [26:41] Speaker D (unidentified): happen but I no one said it to me third was probably more for the owner you indicate in your application that you're going to finance these by selling other projects by selling other projects that you've developed you've been the developer yeah you turn around capital for that 's that's correct [27:04] Teddy Epstein: but on this project, because of the size, fortunately I'll be able to be the owner. I already have the money ready. So maybe when the application was put in originally that was the plan, but I have already secured my own equity to put into the project. [27:21] Speaker D (unidentified): What's the total estimated cost for this project? I [27:28] Sean Murphy: Don't remember the number offhand, but we, the one of the conditions which we agree with, is to simply say as part of the building permit we need to provide it from either a financial instrument like a bond or something like that, or at least a letter from a financial entity saying yes they have this amount of money and have a signature at the bottom of a bank or something of the sort. [27:49] Speaker D (unidentified): We usually request some kind of confirmation on the financial capability, so we may want to consider that as a condition that we get a letter from the bank confirming that the money is there. [28:00] Sean Murphy: The staff has recommended that as a condition for tonight. Oh, okay. Sorry. Yeah. [28:06] Speaker D (unidentified): The other thing that it looks like there are a number of proposed or suggested possible transactions that might happen once this thing is built. You may keep it, you may sell it, you've got some, you're leasing the property. If you sell it, all the documents are going to make the conditions on this, including the decommissioning bond, transferable to new owners, and it'll become part of land [28:36] Teddy Epstein: covenants at my understanding. Yes, so the way that it would work is in a project like this is if I were to sell it, which is not the plan currently, we would have a buyer come in and they would buy the membership interest in AHOS LLC and all the covenants that go along with it. [29:02] Speaker D (unidentified): So they would become the sole managing partner in the LLC? Could be. [29:08] Teddy Epstein: Maybe I would stay as part owner as well. That's not out of the question. Okay. [29:16] Speaker C (unidentified): Any other questions? Yeah, I just have an easy question, I think. But the smallest solar field that we've seen was being designed to service a very particular development. What is your end game for this particular one and the power that it produces? [29:36] Teddy Epstein: It'll be a community solar project, and it will go to residents and possibly businesses. [29:42] Speaker C (unidentified): In the city of Augusta or where? [29:45] Teddy Epstein: That's possible. We subcontract that work out to a third party that solely does that work, and they find customers for us. [29:56] Speaker C (unidentified): So it's not designed necessarily to run Mr. Mulholland's house. [30:01] Teddy Epstein: No, that would be a lot of power that he's consuming for his mechanical garage. But yeah, so it'll, it'll go to, it'll go to give a discount on main, on cmp customers that are that obviously are folks that live in maine. Very good, thanks. Any other questions? [30:33] Speaker G (unidentified): I don't have [30:40] Sean Murphy: Them here tonight if that's what you're asking. But if that's a condition of the of the permit then we'll have to put it in. And I want to be clear that the reason why we had the line we had right there was as noted the site is above the highway some distance. These are only 12 feet or so in height. It'll have the agricultural fence around it which is eight feet in height. And we wanted to make sure that we provided space to allow not only for the current property owner to be able to move around There without having to make his road go through wetlands as well as allow the main D.O.T access down into that area as well. They actually came to the site flew a drone over it so they could look at where they have their buffer zone in there and to make sure that the end of the day that we didn't in any way impact their buffer zone. So that was the narrowness is mostly because we sort of looked and said these are cars moving not this evening because I get stuck in a parking lot that was 295 Today but in normal circumstances cars are moving relatively quick. It's far back off the road there's trees and such. But if the planning board says no we want you to do you know buffer zone C and we want you to bend it around that north northern corner there [32:00] Speaker A (unidentified): That's obviously your discretion. Thank you any other questions for the applicant. Okay you'll have the last word. We'll see if anyone's here to speak on behalf of the project. Is there anybody here tonight who would like to speak in favor of the project. Is there anybody here who would like to speak against the project. You can come right over here sir. My [32:45] Bruce Cummings: Name is Bruce Cummings and I live at [address] Augusta. My land crosses the other side on the interstate which would be up against that project on the it'd be his north side. What I was wondering is what does that do to my land that borders his and goes to Barn Brook. Oh is that a big depreciation because those panels are put in there. How does that affect that. And also is there going to be a retention pond because the water runs off that property now and it goes down through my property and Enters in Barn Brook and I was just wondering you know what their plans are. I know they're supposed to be putting one in on the other on the south side of that to go into the brook that goes that empties into Bondbrook just down below Dunn's pit area. But you know just I had these questions and I just wanted you know some answers there on what was going on there. Sure thank you [33:54] Speaker A (unidentified): For your questions, we'll have the applicant address those questions after folks are done here and see if it satisfies the answers for you. Yeah, there's one other thing I was going to ask [34:06] Bruce Cummings: you so that those panels are basically setting on the south side of CMP's power line going through there. Okay, we so there's a they've cut clear cut the land basically right up to my property which would be that you know that solid line that you see up there. So I was just wondering if so what are they putting in there just [34:37] Speaker A (unidentified): nothing and letting it grow back. Oh, it's a good question too, we'll have them address that. All right, thank you. Thank you. 're welcome. Is there anybody else who'd like to speak against the project? Okay, is there anybody who'd like to speak neither for nor against the project? All right, and the applicant come back on up and I wrote down a couple of questions Bruce stated but I'm sure you just heard them too, so if you want to kind of start at the top [35:09] Sean Murphy: Could I just confirm that we're talking about the Bruce M Cummings irrevocable trust land? Could I can I confirm we're talking about Bruce M Cummings irrevocable trust land. He's just confirming then I want to I have a map of the boundaries and I would like to make sure I'm okay. Thank you, appreciate it. Yeah, that's just what's on the city tax thing, so yep. Do you want to do your questions first to you know they were So in terms of depreciation of land, there are multiple studies out there that have been done that show that while there may be an initial depreciation of the land value when solar facilities go in, if it happens, it happens over a short period of time, and then things adjust back up again. People don't like change is essentially what it boils down to, but there's multiple studies showing that. In this particular case as the speaker will tell you we're going up a long road which is why we actually asked for the turnaround to be a little bit lower so we're not doing a turnaround on a steep slope, it's going up and over and then down into the southern area. So the visibility from that property would be limited to the telephone pole that's our telephone good electric poles which would be against the side of the road and therefore sort of screened sort of naturally been that way anyway so I Don't see how there'll be any visual impacts on the property that would cause the, which typically is what's associated with the depreciation of land value. Do you want to have any follow-ups to that? What, before I move to the other topic, or do you? [36:55] Speaker A (unidentified): Sure, just does that satisfy, does that make sense, sir? [37:01] Sean Murphy: you know I've been doing solar for about eight or nine years you're the first person who's sort of offered that 's what they were concerned about is could they get their taxes lowered by this project that would be a conversation you need to have the city assessor's office I can tell you just based on studies it's probably not I CAN'T TELL IF YOU DON'T ROLL YOUR DICE, I GUESS. AND THEN THE SECOND QUESTION THAT YOU ASKED, SIR, WAS RELATED TO STORM WATER. ON YOUR SIDE OF THE PROPERTY, THERE'S AN EXISTING ROAD THERE RIGHT NOW THAT WAS USED FOR FORESTY OPERATIONS. IT'S ABOUT 20 FEET WIDE. WE'RE ACTUALLY CUTTING BACK THE WIDTH OF THE ROAD THERE. And we're doing that so that we stay under the one acre threshold for our road and the solar facility and therefore qualify for a stormwater permit by rule. So we'll actually be doing a decrease in the amount of runoff that you might expect from this roadway. I can't speak to what's happening from the formal gravel operations there. I did, I've been on site, it's, it's all vegetated over right now, but in terms of the part that's related to our project, there should be no increase and the water quality. Sorry, the watershed modeling that we did also showed that as well, the storm water modeling we did. [38:33] Bruce Cummings: Sure, yep, then we've, then. [38:40] Sean Murphy: The project will have produced an impact on you and you should be able to, and I'll defer to city planning here, but I assume that they would need to go to the code enforcement officer to talk about. [38:49] Speaker A (unidentified): That, yes, and the last question was related to observed clear-cutting and how much more or less was happening and why is that your question. [39:11] Bruce Cummings: I think. [39:21] Sean Murphy: That's just the forestry operation, I don't think it's connected with CMP's line. What I can tell you about CMP is that when we talked about the line being buried, it comes out of the facility, it goes through the CMP right away and it's buried through there because CMP doesn't want poles going crosswise with them, and it's then there where we start going on the downhill slope that we move into having above ground. I think that the tree cutting near the edge of your property is a, it's an issue of. Forest management and not related to this project. Again, I think if you had some issue with that, you'd need to speak to the Code Enforcement Officer. I'm not familiar enough with the city's standards on those things. I don't know if staff want to comment on it tonight or not. [40:16] Speaker I (unidentified): I mean, there was probably, I assume, a forestry management, I mean, a timber harvest permit that is through the state forest service for that. but i guess i 'm not i'm not aware yeah code enforcement would have that information but yeah okay i mean that was that it was done you're by the property owner really not that's correct but not by the solar company nothing [40:44] Teddy Epstein: We didn't ask for anything to be done, right, correct. Are you planning on putting anything [40:50] Speaker G (unidentified): in that area? Or I think that's kind of where he's getting into, is it going to be re-vegetated or [40:57] Sean Murphy: so that would be more tied to what the landowner was doing there, again, part of their forest plan. We, the lease that we have, and we show you in the, in the application, where no, we'd have a legal right, and we don't have any legal rights in that area. Okay, thank you, good [41:14] Speaker A (unidentified): question. Okay, thank you, thank you. All right, any other questions for the applicant? Okay, that'll close a public hearing portion of this, and we'll just deliberate as a board. Thank you, thank you. [41:32] Speaker G (unidentified): Nate, what do you think? Of course, start with me. I agree with city staff on the buff yard C and wrapping around that corner, and I think we should keep with the 18-month bond. What they determine as extraordinary circumstance could be anything. [42:06] Speaker D (unidentified): Other than that, I'm good with it. Okay, thank you, Nate. Kathy? I agree, it's pretty much premature to grant a waiver for 20 years out for how long it's going to take to decommission it. I would just, can I point out a typo in the final letter? I won't get to it in a minute. So on page seven, at the top of the page, under C, under glare, you just have two ways. Yeah, I can't help myself to [42:50] Speaker A (unidentified): lowercase A's before FAA. Oh, [Speaker G (unidentified): yeah, right.] beneath right on to see oh thank you I'll [43:04] Speaker D (unidentified): make that correction. Project, Kathy, I think all my questions have been answered. It is a little bit different, I think, where it's an individual that owns it under an LLC, and what would happen if it was sold, and you know what kind of commitment would be made by a new owner, but I think I've been satisfied with that. Otherwise, it's consistent with other projects that we've done. I can understand some neighbors concerned about all the clear cutting that was done, but that's outside of the leased area, so It's not really under our purview, but otherwise I support the project. [43:45] Speaker C (unidentified): I agree with Kathy, but I have also had a neighbor that's been talking about that clear-cut area for as long as it has been there, saying, what's going in there? And I kept saying, I have no idea, because you drive by it on 95 all the time. I have no idea. Now, at least, I have an idea. There. Kevin. [44:03] Speaker D (unidentified): Any of the concerns I did have about the application are addressed by the recommended conditions, [44:08] Eva Nielsen: so I'm good with going forward with it. [44:11] Speaker A (unidentified): Okay. Need a motion. My numbers do I need to speak or you need to vote? I need to vote, but I don't need to. Okay, very good. [44:24] Speaker D (unidentified): Yes. Excuse me. In the matter of Augusta House of Solar major development conditional use review findings of fact and conclusions of law on this July 28th of pursuant to the provisions of the City of Augusta Land Use Ordinance, the City of Augusta Planning Board has considered the application of a HOS LLC including supportive data, staff review comments, public hearing testimony and related materials contained in the record. The Planning Board makes the following findings of fact and conclusions of law. The applicant proposes to construct a sub 1.0 megawatt AC ground mounted solar tracking facility and gravel access driveway on and approximately 7.99 acres of vacant land. Access to the site is proposed from Maplebrook Lane. In addition to the solar panels and associated electrical equipment, agricultural fencing is proposed along the perimeter of the solar array, and DEP approval, including stormwater and decommissioning permits, are required. The applicant is AHOS LLC, which is a subsidiary of Ascent Renewables LLC. LLC. The lease option agreement between John Mulholland, the owner of the property, and Ascent Renewables has been assigned to AHOS, LLC for lots 45 and 49. Project authorization by Central Maine Power Company, Violetta, for lot 49C. Again, the owner is John Mulholland of lots 45 and 49. Central Maine Power Company has ownership of lot 49C. The zoning is, we don't have a number yet for Maple Brook Lane as far as an address goes, but it's a rural river zoning, map 9, lots 45, 49, and 49C. Existing land use for lot 45 is vacant land. 49 is mineral extraction activities, which were conditional use, and one and two family dwellings, which were permitted in that zone. Lot 49C is major municipal or public utilities slash communications facilities, which is a conditional use. The proposed land use, Lot 45, 49, and 49C will be solar energy system, ground-mounted, large-scale conditional use. Lot 49, one and two family dwellings, as is, permitted. Permitted. Lot 49C, major municipal or public utilities slash communications facilities, conditional use performance zoning. The acreage is 74.53 total acres per the assessor's records. Previous permitting, in 1991, the planning board approved a subdivision for Mobile Home Park, Brookdale Park. 2007, the planning board approved a mineral extraction license for John Mulholland to operate the Bonbrook Road pit on Lot 49. In 2013, the Planning Board approved license renewal of John Mulholland's Bonbrook Road pit on Lot 49, and it was again approved for him in 2018. So I move that we accept the findings as drafted by the staff and would move to therefore the Planning Board recommends approval of the application of Augusta this is Augusta community solar HOS LLC as described in the findings of fact and conclusions of law above with the following additional findings waiver has been requested from submission of a boundary survey with surveyors name address signature and seal as the applicant has stated this will be submitted with the building permit application staff supports granting the waiver the Planning Board grants the waiver Planning Board does not grant the applicants request that in extraordinary circumstances the Planning Board may allow commissioning to be delayed beyond the 18 months allowed out under the ordinance. The planning board grants the flexibility from the requirement for truck turnarounds every 1,000 feet due to the steep terrain and based on the recommendations of the city engineer and fire chief. The planning board grants flexibility in the final alignment of the access driveway to accommodate potential minor modifications resulting from the future gravel pit reclamation plan subject to final review and approval by the city engineer. The following conditions shall be met prior to issuance of a permit from the Code Enforcement Bureau in order to satisfy land use ordinance criteria and planning board requirements. One, an access and utility easement located on Lot 49C shall be formalized and recorded at the Kennebec County Registry of Deeds pursuant to Section 300-601D, Sub 3E. Issuance of a decommissioning bond in the amount of $183,600, consistent with the 13 cents per watt for other solar projects, shall be issued with the City of Augusta named as an obligee. Updates of the estimate shall be provided every five years, and this is pursuant to Section 300-527.1. Number 3. Issuance of a permit from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection for stormwater shall be submitted to the Planning Bureau pursuant to Section 300-404B, Sub-19. Subsection 4, the applicant shall provide documentation demonstrating project financing from the Associated Funding Institution to the City staff per Section 300-603E, Sub-7B. 5, several 4-foot-tall berms shall be installed within the project area to facilitate wildlife egress per section 300-404.B sub 9. The applicant shall revise the landscape plan to comply with the requirements of Buffer Yard C, including additional evergreen and deciduous plantings, understory tree and shrubs, and shall extend the buffer around the northwest corner to better screen the highway way, Section 300-603E-6 and Section 300-527.1-D. I can't remember if we said this before, but those revised plans are subject to staff approval. Should that be part of the condition? Okay. The project shall commence within two years of this approval and shall be substantially completed within five years of the date of the Planning Board decision unless a permit extension has been granted by the board deviation from this approval is subject to code enforcement action and potential legal proceedings per section 300-6 or one of the land use ordinance there a second Thank You Nate all in [51:50] Sean Murphy: favor oh yeah sorry 14 and 15 have italicized text that automatically get filled in at some [52:00] Speaker A (unidentified): later point there's 14 i think she read that section no she just verbalized that we're agreeing to we accepted that we accepted well it has a number of individuals attended [52:15] Speaker D (unidentified): What page are you on? [52:16] Speaker A (unidentified): So he's looking at page 3 of 8. Yeah, so here when there's like an option to not overlook. [52:28] Speaker D (unidentified): We found the application complete. Yeah. But he's talking about 15th Plainwood. [52:37] Speaker A (unidentified): Yeah, so we went through that section. [52:48] Speaker D (unidentified): Usually staff fill that in after we have the public hearing, because then we know how many people attended the hearing and spoke. [52:55] Speaker A (unidentified): Do you guys do that? Okay. So the first part, okay, thank you. So applicant satisfied, I think we can carry on. Is there any further discussion before we vote? We had a motion for, we had a second. Any further conversation? The only question was, did you want to [53:16] Speaker C (unidentified): put those extra words in officially on that of having it approved by staff? The, let's say he said yes, we're all set. We don't need to state it again. No, okay, I mean she added it [53:31] Speaker A (unidentified): yeah she said it and she agreed yep all in favor thank you congrats thank you 're welcome [53:48] Speaker C (unidentified): Good luck getting home. This is three days away. I don't need them anymore. I'm not working any longer. [54:17] Speaker I (unidentified): All right. So the next item on the agenda is a public hearing. It's a text amendments to the land use ordinance regarding daycare and childcare per state law. This is an item that was tabled from the last meeting with some questions about definitions between the city's definitions and the state's definitions and how they work together. So I provided the board with a memo that gives an outline of how everything sort of works, I guess, for licensing and regulation for child care facilities or daycares. So as the Planning Board, all we're looking at is what the city of Augusta's land use ordinance is regulating and where, you know, these uses are occurring. So I would say state law said they'll have to be allowed everywhere residential is allowed. In the city of Augusta, residential isn't allowed in government services, in the industrial districts. So the change to the land use ordinance would just be to add as a permitted use in all, the other districts, all 22 districts. So, this, I mean, I could go through this, but obviously you all have it. This has been posted on the website, you know, just to see what the city of Augusta's land use ordinances. The Code Enforcement Bureau looks at the land use and they also look at the structure, and then in some instances the Department of Public Safety, the office of State Fire Marshal is looking at specifically like the building construction for larger daycare facilities like the kids count one that we just looked at fairly recently, so the State Fire Marshal looks at that specifically, and in each of these entities have different definitions and they kind of very confusing, but in any case all the planning board needs to do is look at where the use is located, change the chart to comply with state law, so I have the edits are basically the same red lines as I provided with you at the last meeting to maintain the daycare center definition as it is, and as we say this is a little different than it also includes adult daycare as well, which is a little different than the state, so it has a wider a broader land use i guess, but this is the definition the city's had for a long time for daycare centers. For a daycare home, I was proposing to change it to daycare small. So it would be in either a facility or a residence. I would know more than 12 persons for the care. So that would be treated in the same way as a single family residence. So there's no extra parking requirement basically, which is reflected further down here on the chart for parking requirements, there's a modification recommended for home occupation because daycare home land uses did require a home occupation permit, but now that the land use has to be treated the same as a single family home, you can't require the home occupation permit because that's extra, so that would be taking that out of the ordinance, and also that changing the section in the land use ordinance the 30521 for daycare modifying that a little bit to have to add the daycare small in there as well, i provided you all with the just the licensing requirement that code signs off on just so you can kind of see what that looks like, and also a handout from one of the previous meetings about the definitions for child care, for the state definitions for child care facility, family child care provider, nursery school, small child care facility, just so you could have that at easy reference so one thing i will note with these recommendations as i said the daycare center also includes adult so it's not just child. So these recommendations would, allow like the adult, daycare center in all those zoning districts as well. So it would be, which a lot of the zoning districts already allow it. so it'd be added, in the RB2, which is a medium density residential added in the Kennebec business district too, which is a sort of, across the river near memorial circle that area of the city and on west side professional so that's kind of up winthrop street but those are really the only other places that will be added as a use so that's all i have i'm hoping this clarifies did it was for me it was okay for me to figure out where we were going with it that was perfect it took me a while to untangle it. Yes, so I'm not [59:54] Speaker D (unidentified): sure I've digested it all well, but the smaller facilities that are would be allowed in residential neighborhoods that don't have home occupation licenses, is there any concern about vehicle [1:00:04] Speaker I (unidentified): queuing? We can't, you can't do anything with that. State says you cannot look at that. You know, I'm [1:00:10] Speaker D (unidentified): thinking if in the morning with, you know, 12 different cars showing up to drop people off or drop kids off. I think it could be an issue in some neighborhoods. [1:00:20] Speaker C (unidentified): It already is. [1:00:21] Speaker I (unidentified): I guess that's something to talk to the state about. [1:00:24] Speaker G (unidentified): I mean, I have one on my road currently. It's not horrible. I mean, you might get a little bit of queuing from maybe 10, 15 minutes, but it's not bad. It's pretty come and go. [1:00:40] Speaker I (unidentified): I mean, I'm sure, you know, the police department, if there was some issue that's restricting traffic, you know, causing years, yeah, some causing some sort of a concern, you know, maybe they would, they could be called about it, but it's all in the public way. Any [1:00:59] Speaker A (unidentified): other questions for Betsy? I [1:01:11] Speaker C (unidentified): think we're ready to say we're gonna send this on to council, right? Yes. [1:01:15] Speaker A (unidentified): And because this is a public hearing, do I need to ask the audience or at least identify to the focus or to the TV that nobody is in the room to speak on behalf of this at all? So we'll close that piece, and now we're ready for a motion. [1:01:33] Speaker C (unidentified): Yeah, I'm happy to make a motion to send the language as proposed by the city planner on to council with our approval. [1:01:43] Speaker A (unidentified): Second. All in favor. So [1:01:50] Speaker I (unidentified): the next item is a workshop. It's land use ordinance amendments for housing to meet state law requirements. I would like to say this was very complicated. That's not all of it, so I decided to cut it off at this point because there's more. Stop doing that anytime. So the interesting thing is this, there's, I'll shortly be putting out requests for proposals to modify the land use ordinance to help kind of mesh it in with the comprehensive plan, to try to simplify things. So all of this housing stuff it This is all sort of jumbling together at the same time, so I decided it was probably best to move some of these changes forward that so that we could at least be thinking a little bit of the way about, you know, starting the process, because this is sort of a the start of a global overhaul basically. So yeah, so there's this, there's a lot there. I have a question for you. [1:03:13] Speaker D (unidentified): On page five, we're talking about dwelling units, and we're excluding, we're redlining the language it has to do with manufactured housing, being defined as a dwelling unit. Is that what I'm seeing? [1:03:31] Speaker C (unidentified): Page five of this one with the red and the blue on it? Yep. [1:03:41] Speaker G (unidentified): We, under the definition. Yeah, no, I see it. [1:03:48] Speaker I (unidentified): Previously, we had a definition for manufactured housing, and we had it called out on the land use chart. So putting that definition in, adding that into the one family and two family was sort of helping to bridge the gap between those two. [1:04:06] Speaker D (unidentified): So it's not excluding it, still comes under the definition of a dwelling unit? It's [1:04:16] Speaker C (unidentified): included but not pointed out maybe singled out if it if it's if it meets [1:04:20] Speaker I (unidentified): the definite if a dwelling unit if whatever you're looking at fits the definition of a dwelling unit we don't care how it's constructed. Okay, I just want to be sure it wasn't being excluded as no. So yeah, so in this memo I tried to take some of these LDs that have come through the new law when they become effective, which section it was changing, and then break down. I had given the board a memo months ago that I highlighted in color saying we have to worry about this, we don't have to worry about this, but this is going through it a little more specifically to see what changes are required where, what things we've done, you know, we've moved through a few. City council just last week had an informational meeting about the subdivision definition and the adu changes, so those are going through. The child care, that's that's moving along. Did they [1:05:16] Speaker D (unidentified): have people testify about the subdivision change? I don't know, I wasn't at the meeting. [1:05:23] Speaker I (unidentified): I know I let some people know that it was going because they really were interested in it, but it so it would go to the next, the business meeting would be not this week because this is the fifth Thursday, but next week, and then and again in two weeks. So it's possible if everything goes through on the typical schedule to August 20th, they could vote on it maybe, and then 30 days later that would be in effect, so which would help some of the smaller housing projects not need to go through planning. Board which just eliminates a little cost and time, obviously, even though we're very friendly to visit. Yeah, so anyway, so this outline kind of goes through what changes we've done, which ones we haven't done. I've some things in this memo which seemed easier maybe to move forward that we could focus on at this point were some of the affordable housing changes. One of those changes would be changing the name of the affordable housing bonus density district overlay to just housing district overlay. And then that would, the rules for affordable housing would still relate to that overlay, but also it would allow it to, the name being a little more broad would help when we're trying to figure out the density standards and where those apply in the city for the number of units that can be on a lot, minimum lot size, that sort of thing. So when we get to that section of the density calcs, we could reference that same chart because it's basically like up here on the screen, Eva created this lovely GIS map, but the orange outline is the growth area in the city of Augusta. And then all that blue is, you know, areas that have water and sewer. So a lot of it is, it's, the water and sewer areas are within that growth area. So if we were saying the growth area is the boundary for the density standards, then, you know, it would just be following that growth area line. But anyway, that's sort of how those two relate. I do have another map, which I didn't provide you. I think I have at one time but this is our zoning map in the red is the that same growth areas so you can see where it like it covers up a lot of those urban you know more commercial higher density zones in the city you know the only one that's fully outside of it is on the east side or the right side of the map is that green is the rural ponds district in some of the rural residential district, but... [1:08:31] Speaker C (unidentified): Yeah, West River Road, that's that white line. [1:08:33] Speaker I (unidentified): Yeah, so, yep. So that was one thing that, moving forward, just basically changing the name of the map, that's a simple one. In the memo here, we have the definition of affordable housing development. So to change that definition, it's basically nothing substantive. It's just referring it to the section in the ordinance where it talks about affordable housing, and then just shifting some of the, right now the affordable housing development standards are in the zoning section, but really they should be in performance in the general zoning standards instead of the zoning standards. So shifting it, keeping the substance the same, and then adding that standard to allow extra height for affordable housing if it was desired, I guess, by the developer. Another easy change would be to change the parking requirements for community living arrangements, because those need to be treated the same way as a single family house is, so fair housing act, so they can only have one space per community living arrangement. That was a change that we missed before, I guess, somehow. So those, I think of these changes that it gave you all this stuff, like those ones are, I think, ones that could move forward that are kind of easy, and I'm not sure, I mean, nobody's really been banging down the door for, I think we've got maybe one project to use the bonus, the density bonus. I think the one on Oxford Street might have to get the 25 units, but I can't remember exactly, but you know, it's not one that's used a lot, but it is something that we could change to help match state law, so that would be something that, moving forward, other changes that we're looking at in here, we're changing the clustered residential development performance zoning to just change it to clustered residential development. There's not a lot of projects that use this type of development. Coney Village, which was now over 20 years ago, oh my gosh, really, it was that long, I think so, yeah, wow, don't think about it. Else maybe a little under 20 years, it's it's it's around there, but I think it, so that was one that, you know, used some of those standards in the ordinance to change their lot sizes and setbacks and everything, and the planning board could approve it because it would still meet some standard in the ordinance for density, but I think with the changes in density that are coming, there's going to be so many units that are going to be allowed on a lot of these lots that really there's no need to have specific standards calculated out for that anymore. It just seems like it's something that's sort of outdated. I [1:11:59] Speaker D (unidentified): Guess Kathy has a question. Can I go back a page? I had a note to myself on the changes in affordable housing. I'm looking at the middle of the page where it talks about, for purposes of this definition, housing costs include. Is there a reason why they're not the same for owned versus rented? Ask the state. Those are just, I just took that verbatim from the state. Yeah, I mean, it doesn't even allow for renters insurance to be allowed as a cost, but it does if you own it. I just, I'm just surprised. Yeah. [1:12:36] Speaker I (unidentified): I don't, I don't know. I think a lot, I'm assuming a lot of the people who are using this as a program probably, you know, have other standards through Main Housing or whatever the funding mechanism is that are pretty similar to those standards, but I don't know for sure. Yeah, do you have another one, Kathy? Or I was just trying to see if I did. Okay, for affordable housing, I have [1:13:13] Speaker D (unidentified): a stupid question. After each type of owner, each type of project, there's a BP2, BP3, and I haven't been able to think what those stand for. Which type of, like, mobile home, manufactured housing parks in brackets, it's BP3. Condominiums was BP2. What are those referred to? So this document [1:13:38] Speaker A (unidentified): and then example could just be on the back side of page one. [1:13:49] Speaker I (unidentified): If you look at the end, oh, Betsy Poolins' comment one. Oh, it's just your track changes, apparently. It's tracking my changes. I didn't, I didn't, didn't even [1:14:06] Speaker A (unidentified): Okay, so just, all right, there you go. [1:14:13] Speaker I (unidentified): That's good. I like it. Questions I can answer. You guys are usually trying to trip me up. Yeah, so the cluster development, so that was, this is something that I mean, I'm putting out here, this is, as I said, these are a lot of things to think about, just kind of throwing it out there as an option. And then the last, the kind of the big, the big thing, as I said, would be the density standards. So I think some comprehensive plan edits may be needed so that the our land use ordinance is in compliance with the comprehensive plan. But some of our comprehensive plan standards maybe wanted less density in parts of the city, so we got to figure out how that works. I don't know, we'll deal with that later. And then of course, I've been here, I've redlined all the zoning districts and eliminated anything that had to do with housing except in the rural ponds, because that's its own situation, but removed like the lot area per dwelling unit, minimum frontage for conversion to two or more dwellings, all of that because What we'd be doing is putting those standards in a new residential density section, which would be 300 524 D. So I asked a question about [1:15:55] Speaker D (unidentified): your edit number four that's on page, that's the last page, for accessory. I think there's a word that is not needed and a word that is missing. One accessory dwelling unit shall be allowed on all parcels where, should it be there is, instead of where A. I think the A reflected one and two family dwelling. [1:16:22] Speaker C (unidentified): How should that read, in other words? Because I couldn't figure it out either. I tried to write it in. [1:16:27] Speaker D (unidentified): I think if you take out the A before what's crossed out, and add the word there, where there is the only residential use is. [1:16:40] Speaker C (unidentified): So we've got a double is that way. [1:16:42] Speaker D (unidentified): Well, you can take out the A and the is, yeah. [1:16:45] Teddy Epstein: So it's where the only residential use is. [1:16:50] Speaker I (unidentified): Oh, whoops. Actually, the red line one we sent to council did have is the only also crossed out. Sorry, I missed that. Okay. So what you have already submitted is all right. Yeah, this is, this was okay, so it, yeah, it says parcels where a residential use is on the lot. Yes, sorry about that. I think my brain was getting scrambled, so yeah, I don't know what this is, just a workshop, so I just wanted to give you all some information. I mean, we don't, you could either decide you want to move forward anything, or if you have any comments about how I'm trying to organize this, I think it's a great [1:17:47] Speaker C (unidentified): it, I think, I think you really worked hard at this and it shows. It is a lot of material though, I'm impressed, yeah, with you trying to put it into some sort of semblance of order for, yeah. [1:18:01] Speaker I (unidentified): I'm trying to, the next things I was trying to work on was there's a lot of zoning districts that have minimum frontage, minimum lot depth, minimum lot size. Obviously all of those standards would still apply for anything other than residential, but the residential ones, I'm not sure if there would be some minimum lot standards that the planning board would maybe want in some zoning districts just to maintain the character of certain areas. So I think it's one of the next meetings I'm going to provide some kind of examples of what, like a lot, if it was, if it maintained the 100 feet of frontage, but then maybe it's only 50 feet deep, so it keeps the frontage that's consistent in the RA district, say, you know, would that be a good idea? Or is that really going to be limiting housing? I don't know. I mean, I think it would give you all a few scenarios because a lot of the zoning districts, the minimum lot size is way different than what, you know, the state's putting forward. But I think the character of the zoning districts, like a lot of thought's gone into where that is in the city. And if we want to, yeah, have any minimums, yes, for that. So we can talk about that a little bit at about a future meeting. And as I said, there's this RFP going to kind of shift a lot of this. So we're in this weird transition. I mean, we have till July 1st of next year to get this done. But as we know, time kind of flies. [1:19:47] Speaker A (unidentified): Yeah flies, yeah. So and are there pressing items like this memo, you know, seems pretty straightforward. Are there pressing items that you have people knocking on your door for? [1:20:00] Speaker I (unidentified): Anything at this that we should prioritize? No, not really. Yeah, so I mean, and I said, like, I think I think in here the easy things that could kind of go forward were the affordable housing items that changing for the parking for community living arrangement. The other ones are sort of tied together with changing everything else. Maybe pause on those ones. Yeah, I feel like they're part of more of a bigger discussion. [1:20:32] Speaker D (unidentified): I have a question, and I think that came up with the redefinition of subdivision. But in the document, zoning district requirements, under rural res we talk about which do not involve construction of a road. What's the difference between a road and a long driveway? Do we have a road definition that would, yeah, okay, so if they said it was a road with a driveway [1:21:01] Speaker I (unidentified): can access two or less dwelling units and a road would be three or more okay thank you i think that would that 's all gonna go away okay i mean we modified it for to bridge the gap with this whole subdivision discussion but i think it's it'll like i'm not really sure how we want to look at we have a lot of zoning districts that require open space and open space is really important to the character of rural residential zoning District say so how are we gonna move forward some of these changes with keeping the comprehensive plan like what the vision is for the city for some of these things like so agree to pause [1:21:50] Speaker A (unidentified): on some of those. Oh yeah, I think so. Yeah, so does it to move forward for tonight on what has been proposed are there certain things people feel comfortable with at this point? I still have [1:22:01] Speaker D (unidentified): Have a question. Oh, go ahead. Sorry. In that same document, when it talks about conventional zoning, the village district talks about group care uses. Do we have a definition elsewhere of what group care is? [1:22:19] Speaker I (unidentified): That's something that I think we'd like to clean up in the rewrite. This is the only zoning district that has those vague... Is that because there's a few [1:22:30] Speaker D (unidentified): group homes around? No, I mean, [1:22:32] Speaker I (unidentified): well, because right now it says single group care and two family uses. It's just, I don't know what group care is supposed to mean either, but I didn't... [1:22:44] Speaker D (unidentified): This whole section now only relates to group care. Yeah. So it would be nice to have a definition. I think we should have a definition. [1:22:52] Speaker I (unidentified): We could keep chasing this ball of yarn, whatever you want to call it. [Speaker C (unidentified): No, I understand.] Yeah, it's kind of hard because, like, some of these things, like, you're like, okay, so what is a self-storage unit in here? Not professional use. Retail, I guess? Like, I don't like the way that 's organized. Like, I think the whole lot sizes should really be reworked for that section. [1:23:22] Speaker D (unidentified): What would happen if you cross out that whole A to? Group care out if we don't know what it is right good you start with B that becomes A yes [1:23:41] Speaker A (unidentified): we need more information before we make those decisions anyway tonight yeah we should probably [1:23:47] Speaker C (unidentified): hold on to all these yeah pieces of paper because this is really a lot and it's very well delineated [1:23:57] Speaker A (unidentified): Forward, I mean, I would support the affordable housing pieces as discussed earlier. I feel like that's pretty clean. If those changes folks wanted to continue to move forward, if everyone wants to hold on everything here, then we can just wait till the person who's going to be tasked with this project is identified, then we can just review those edits at that time too. Whatever's more meaningful to the city too for us to prioritize. I think we had good discussion, but it seems like there's so many questions. Yeah, I mean, I think I think when we have [1:24:32] Speaker I (unidentified): people coming to develop projects in Augusta, generally the density requirements are not the problem. Like it, that's not the barrier that they're hitting to redevelop, right? So I don't, I feel like other communities maybe some of these changes would be more impactful than in Augusta. So I don't think it's a huge rest. The subdivision change definitely, I could see that was a big change. The ADU one, yep, it's a big change. I mean, even some of the ADUs, it might be called an ADU today, but when the density Changes like that lot could be split, it might be in compliance with zoning, so it might be too soon, yeah. [1:25:21] Speaker C (unidentified): Can I, all right, random questions, Betsy, have you heard anything about the development off of Union Street that was over by the Y? Is anything happening, the old station, what's [1:25:36] Speaker I (unidentified): that, yeah, the old police station? I know they're applying for another round of financing. Do you [1:25:43] Speaker C (unidentified): know when that round is? It's September, okay. I keep waiting for something to happen, yeah. [1:25:51] Speaker A (unidentified): So wait on this, it seems at this point, okay, all right, so this is just a workshop anyway, right [1:25:59] Speaker I (unidentified): now, oh yeah, this is a workshop, so we won't move to move forward on anything yet, okay. [1:26:05] Speaker A (unidentified): All right, and then we can move on to minutes. I heard you say that earlier. What was that? Minutes were okay from Kathy's review. Did anybody find any other edits? Or any edits, I should say. Okay. Is there a motion for the minutes? [1:26:34] Speaker C (unidentified): I move that we accept the minutes as written. I'll second. All in favor? Okay. Great. And? Motion to adjourn. Second. All in favor? Very good. Do you want those? I'll give them to my granddaughter.