[This transcript was generated automatically from audio using AI and hasn't been reviewed by a person -- it can contain mistakes, including plausible-sounding sentences that were never actually said. Treat it as a starting point, not a verbatim record.]

[0:00] Comments are to be addressed to the chair or specific member of the commission. These hearings are recorded and broadcast on public access, television, audio tapes and other relevant public records are available in the city-playing office or on the cities web website at www.nola.gov.
[0:20] The first order of business is adoption of the minutes of the July 14th, 2026 meeting.
[0:39] I don't have a screen, let's go with hands,
[0:46] we have, okay, let's go short agenda and we can all raise our hands.
[0:52] So, a motion and a second for the minutes, all in favor?
[0:57] Hi.
[0:59] That's five, any opposed?
[1:02] None.
[1:02] The minutes pass.
[1:04] The next DACA item is DACA item 0, 7, 3, 26.
[1:11] Zoning DACA 0, 7, 3, 2, 6 is a request for a planned development to permit the
[1:17] former forensic skincare Claire's monastery into multi-family residential dwellings within the
[1:23] H2RD2 district and the CPC character preservation court or design overlay district. This
[1:29] request was referred at the July 14th meeting to allow additional time for review. The
[1:33] physician site is located as 720 Henrikley Avenue in occupies an entire city block
[1:38] bounded by magazine street, hemricley Avenue, constant street, and cow food street. The site
[1:44] This currently developed at the St. Clair Monastery Campus, which contains the Historic
[1:48] Monastery Building in Firmary, Accessory Structures, surface parking areas, landscape
[1:53] open space and masonry walls on the perimeter surrounding the entire property. The proposal
[1:59] with preserve and rehabilitate the Historic Monastery Building while constructing two new residential
[2:05] buildings. The demolition of Select Monastery Historic Accessory Structures, new internal
[2:10] circulation and parking areas and landscape open space to be accessible to the public and
[2:16] other associated site improvements. Together, the three buildings would provide 24 residential
[2:22] units, eight in each building, organized around a central landscape courtyard that is proposed to
[2:27] function as a publicly accessible park. The plans and ballot map process is intended to facilitate
[2:34] the adaptor reuse of historic institutional structures by allowing flexibility from certain
[2:39] zoning regulations where a appropriate staff finds that their proposal
[2:44] reserves the monastery as a defining architectural feature of the site while
[2:49] returning a long vacant institutional campus to productive residential use.
[2:55] The proposal includes residential buildings with an excellent height of approximately
[2:59] 49 feet, where the underlying zoning district permits a maximum height of 35 feet.
[3:06] staff finds that the additional height can be appropriate provided the new construction remains
[3:10] supported to the historic monastery. As discussed through the HDSC process, staff supports
[3:17] refinement of the building massings so that the taller questions of the new buildings
[3:21] and oriented toward the interior of the development and our further differentiated
[3:27] from the historic structure reinforcing the monastery as the primary architectural feature of the campus.
[3:32] This proposal also provides 61 parking spaces where 65 are required under the University area
[3:40] or Austrian parking overlay district. Staff supports these exceptions because requiring full
[3:46] compliance to reduce the site's planned green space in landscaping, which are essential
[3:50] to the design concept and public benefits of the planned development. The proposal for 720
[3:55] hammer clay is consistent with the master plan and preserves a designated local landmark and
[4:01] compatible with the surrounding neighborhood.
[4:05] Therefore, staff recommends approval.
[4:10] Were there any provisos or waivers included?
[4:14] Yes.
[4:15] With three exceptions in one provisos.
[4:17] Thank you.
[4:20] I have one card.
[4:22] Ron Lothel.
[4:24] Ron Lothel, one thousand self-dormancy Francis.
[4:28] Thank you commissioners for coming here today for all the work that you do.
[4:32] I'd like to give a little background on this project, if possible, first of all,
[4:36] acknowledgement to the sisters who have been guardians and great keepers of this property for so many years.
[4:45] I am sure this is an emotional day, but they have been working very hard to see that their legacy
[4:53] is kept in this property moving forward. I'd also like to acknowledge Tony Gellerman,
[4:58] who is our developer of this property.
[5:02] You know, we're here today on a very big project
[5:04] and you see what's behind us.
[5:07] You know, Tony met with the neighbors numerous times
[5:12] before the conditional use or the text amendment process
[5:17] became into play.
[5:19] So he had worked hard with the neighbors.
[5:22] Everyone that's been involved in this is CPC staff.
[5:27] numerous meetings, zoning staff, housing staff, safety and permits, council office,
[5:35] HDLC. We aren't just showing here coming up in front of you. Hey, here's what we're doing.
[5:41] This has been highly vetted and has been worked on tremendously, including the council office.
[5:48] I don't want to exclude the council office. So this has been all hands working together to
[5:54] this project move forward. And in your last CPC meeting, you are the first key part of moving
[5:59] the legislation forward when you approve the tax amendment, which allowed this process to move
[6:05] forward. Of course, all goes through the city council, but again, it has been a collaborative effort.
[6:10] This is an excellent, excellent addition to the city of New Orleans. And we look forward to
[6:17] your approval on this. I would just like before I end that we make sure and clarify what the
[6:24] and the exceptions are before we vote, thank you.
[6:28] When we're done, I'll ask you to read them out loud.
[6:32] Are there any other speakers in support?
[6:37] I don't have any cards in opposition.
[6:38] I have one other card.
[6:40] Ms. Johnson said you didn't want to speak,
[6:43] and do you want me to read into the record?
[6:46] So I'll just enter your card into the record.
[6:49] Okay, great.
[6:50] So there's no opposition.
[6:51] Anybody else in opposition here or anybody in opposition because Ms. Johnson was for information
[6:57] So there's no need for a bottle because there's no
[7:01] opposition
[7:03] Can you read the the
[7:05] Provisors and the if on the waivers?
[7:08] Yes, the there are
[7:12] Two exceptions included in the report
[7:15] The first one speaks to the Austrian parking.
[7:19] It says the developer shall be granted an exception to Article 18, Section 18.30.E,
[7:25] Austrian parking requirements of the comprehensive zoning ordinance, which requires 65 parking spaces
[7:30] to require only 61 parking spaces to be provided.
[7:34] The second exception says the developer shall be granted an exception of Article 22, Section 22.7,
[7:40] required all-street loading spaces of the comprehensive setting ordinance, which requires one
[7:46] off-street loading space to require no loading spaces to be provided. The third exception that we
[7:53] spoke to in the presentation is regarding the height. The proposed height is 49 feet while the
[8:04] to Rd2 district only allows for 35 feet.
[8:09] And so we will be including the 30 session
[8:12] in the final report.
[8:15] And then the profile zone that is in the report
[8:18] is the Department of Safety and Permit Show
[8:22] issue no building permits or licenses
[8:24] for this project until final development plans are approved
[8:27] by the City Planning Commission
[8:28] and recorded with the Office of Commaices.
[8:31] Failure to complete the conditional use process by properly recording plans within one year time period or failure to request an administrative extension as provided for an article for section 4.3 each of the comprehensive zoning ordinance will avoid the conditional use approval.
[8:50] Great. Thank you.
[8:53] That closes the public hearing. So I'm looking for a motion.
[8:59] I'll make a motion to approve subject to the
[9:02] provide the exceptions in the provide.
[9:04] Thank you.
[9:05] Second, five commissioner A.B.
[9:07] Commissioner Keper made the motion.
[9:10] There's a motion on the floor.
[9:11] If there's no discussion, we'll call for the vote.
[9:14] All in favor?
[9:15] Aye.
[9:17] That's it.
[9:18] Any opposed?
[9:18] Any nays?
[9:20] Nine.
[9:21] Five to zero.
[9:22] The motion passes.
[9:23] Looks like a great development.
[9:24] So congratulations.
[9:26] And then let me just note that Susan Johnson submitted a card has a comment on the back and the comment will be entered into the record.
[9:39] Move on to the next DACA item.
[9:44] DACA item 03626.
[9:48] Zoning DACA 03626 is a request-specific council motion for a text amendment to the CZO to define data centers and any related uses to consider whether these should be permitted or conditional in any zoning district or overlay and to implement appropriate use and design standards for the use is not limited to density requirements, soundproofing and safety measures and other regulations necessary.
[10:14] Staff quickly concluded that the data center uses an atypical one from what usually goes through CPC and that there is a large variation in intensity based on the size and scale of the use and the impacts from data centers are not just hyperlocal land use impacts
[10:29] Like occupancy traffic, building design and lighting, but can be much broader impacting local supplies of energy or water and potentially creating major air quality, noise or water quality issues for nearby residents.
[10:43] And the greatest impacts come from the really large facilities with power generation on site and or liquid cooling facilities on site was the called hyper scale facilities.
[10:53] So, to inform the recommendations and reports, staff reviewed zoning and land use regulations
[10:58] across the country, either from county, state, or local government, staff found that
[11:02] regulations vary.
[11:03] Some cities or states or counties at more Tories on data centers, either entirely or beyond
[11:09] some kind of threshold, like 10,000 square feet or 50 megawatts of power.
[11:13] But there are different approaches across the country as the demand for data centers has significantly
[11:18] increased in the past few years.
[11:22] So recommendation, staff recommends setting a scale for data center based by establishing
[11:27] four main categories based on square footage and energy consumption.
[11:32] Staff looked at data center regulations from other places to inform the thresholds along
[11:37] with research on existing data center providers.
[11:40] So the categories would be accessory, small, medium, or large, or hyper scale.
[11:47] Accessory data centers would serve a primary use at a site and would be no larger than
[11:52] 2,000 square feet and would take up no more than 25% of the gross floor area of the primary use.
[11:59] Small data centers would be allowed up to 20,000 square feet with no greater than 5 megawatts of power.
[12:07] Medium data centers would be allowed up to 100,000 square feet and no greater than 20 megawatts of power consumption.
[12:15] large or hyperscale is anything beyond the medium threshold which would be prohibitive
[12:25] citywide use permissions overall small or medium data centers would be conditionally
[12:34] allowed across districts in articles 15, 16 and 17 in the commercial center areas and
[12:41] institutional campus district small would be conditionally loud in C1, C2, C3, EC, MC, MS, or LS.
[12:55] In Article 16 centers for industry small and medium data centers would be conditionally allowed in LI, light industrial, HI, heavy industrial, MI, maritime industrial and BIP business industrial park district.
[13:13] In Article 17, the central business district small would be conditionally allowed in CBD 1, CBD 2, CBD 3, CBD 4, and CBD 7, and medium would be conditionally permitted in CBD 7.
[13:30] We can take a look at the map on the next slide.
[13:35] Here you can see in red and blue, the commercial center areas that would conditionally allow small data centers.
[13:42] The purple color includes L-I-H-I-I-M-I and B-I-P districts that would support small or medium conditionally and the gray area on the map shows the areas within and around the CBD that would permit small as conditionally use.
[14:00] This gray area also includes the CBD-7 area, which would allow medium sized data centers conditionally.
[14:09] standards. As we were looking at the data center use type, we realized there are a series
[14:14] of procedural considerations for the use that are atypical. A new data center would require
[14:20] a review in consideration from energy, potentially sewage and water board, certainly the
[14:26] building permits division and so we decided to stipulate these initial considerations as part
[14:30] of the use standards. So first, all data center applications for conditional use must be pre-reviewed
[14:37] by Kuro, and to introduce Swishin Waterboard and a statement of review by those agencies must be provided to CPC before an application can be made to us.
[14:48] Second, each application would be required to include a general impact assessment to provide information on electrical load, water usage,
[14:57] expected noise levels and it is
[15:00] The description of the mitigation efforts to be undertaken. The building and site design is largely
[15:05] similar to other industrial permitted use types, which are required to comply with the underlying
[15:11] zoning districts regulations for bulk, yard design and landscaping. Staff includes density and
[15:18] distance restrictions. First, all data centers must be 500 feet, which is roughly three
[15:25] blocks from all residentially zoned properties.
[15:29] In industrial districts, LI, HIV, MI, and VIP, data centers must also be 500 feet from
[15:36] one another to limit any proliferation in a certain district.
[15:41] And in the CBD, only one data center is permitted per building to limit the potential for
[15:46] entire buildings becoming into data centers.
[15:49] There are some examples of university campuses seeking to construct data centers nationwide,
[15:54] Staff includes an allowance for universities in medical facilities, subject to the institutional master plan requirements in Article 15 to seek data centers as a use allowance within their master planning process.
[16:08] Lastly, on-site power generation is prohibited except for backup purposes.
[16:12] So staff recommends approval of the proposed language.
[16:17] However, this morning, we realized a noticing issue,
[16:21] whereby the description of the zoning docket described the
[16:25] interim zoning district that was previously considered.
[16:28] Instead of this text amendment to create a definition
[16:31] around data centers.
[16:32] And because of this, I think we will recommend deferral.
[16:38] Can you repeat that last part again?
[16:40] Right.
[16:41] So, what we found this morning is that while the the zoning
[16:46] docked case number was listed on our public notice documents, the
[16:50] description actually referenced the interim zoning district that you
[16:54] all reviewed previously instead of this text amendment.
[16:58] And so for that purpose, I think we would recommend deferral.
[17:03] So, just to follow up on that, something we've done in the past when we've
[17:07] had a noticing issue and it's really kind of a felt since it's
[17:11] We want to make sure that there's no possibility that somebody is going to challenge an ultimate decision based on a procedural mistake.
[17:25] So again, I think what we are going to suggest in a lower commute is to refresh on the timing.
[17:37] We have to notice it three consecutive weeks.
[17:39] So we're not going to be able to make the August 11th meeting.
[17:42] Is that correct?
[17:43] Sabine, you.
[17:46] Yes, the notice for that meeting actually just went out at the end of last week.
[17:51] Right, so we would suggest the August 25th.
[17:54] I think it would be the earliest that we could defer it to.
[17:59] And do we hold up public hearing, so to speak, if there's anybody here, or do we defer it
[18:07] vote on a deferral before that?
[18:11] I mean, I'm comfortable with having, if people are here to testify to have them testify?
[18:17] Yeah, that's usually what we do with the deferral.
[18:19] Okay. And then when we hear it again, does the report get, we pick up where we left off,
[18:26] or do we read the staff report again and go through this whole process again?
[18:32] I think what we've done. We want to hear lower again. We've read it again.
[18:38] And there's just a handful of people here, so.
[18:42] We'll probably do it again. Okay. I mean, there will be more people in the audience.
[18:48] Is there anybody in the audience who wants to speak on this issue?
[18:54] Yeah.
[18:55] Great.
[18:56] Coming up.
[18:56] Did you fill out a card?
[18:58] Terrific.
[18:59] And then while we're getting your card.
[19:02] I have a card from Susan Johnson, but again, you don't want to speak.
[19:06] So we have one speaker.
[19:09] And that is Jesse George.
[19:12] Yes, and I'll be very brief.
[19:14] Thank you, Jesse Jordan.
[19:15] I have the Alliance for Affordable Energy.
[19:17] Just wanted to say thank you for to the commission staff
[19:20] for their work on these recommendations,
[19:22] also for including the recommendations
[19:25] that the Alliance provided in their report to the commission.
[19:29] And we are in full support of a prohibition
[19:32] on hyperscaled data centers in New Orleans.
[19:35] They represent a major threat to communities
[19:38] around the country and around the rest of this state.
[19:40] So this is an important step to protect the ratepayers and the citizens of New Orleans. Thank you
[19:46] And then Mr. George, I'm just going to your address is 4519 South Claybarn and you're with the Alliance for Affordable Energy.
[19:54] That's correct. Great. Thank you.
[19:57] If there's nobody else in the audience who wants to speak, we had a couple of comments from the commission.
[20:04] Commissioner, any mayor? Yes, thank you. On page 4 could you pull that up?
[20:22] It was a one with the map of the, you hear the red shading and like two different colors.
[20:39] Before that you had mentioned the three types of data centers that would be allowed. So that's the one.
[20:45] So the red, what type of data center, what that be in the zoning for those areas, is that
[20:54] industrial or the red area on this commercial center, it's the C1, C2, C3, and then some
[21:04] medical education areas, and that would allow conditionally small data centers and they would
[21:15] I'll be conditional use because I just want to I want to ask that question because a community is kind of confused, you know, with the term data center, you know, we have the different categories, so that needs to be actually explained, so they're the public one to stand, you know, what will be allowed if it's going to be allowed. Okay, okay. Thank you.
[21:42] I had a question. So hyper size is not allowed anywhere?
[21:51] Yes. Yes. It's prohibited. Larger hyper scale. So anything greater than 100,000 square feet
[21:58] for greater than 20 megawatts would be prohibited. And that's really based on our
[22:04] conversations with a lot of the different people that we spoke with, from a lot of different entities.
[22:11] 20 megawatts is considered a pretty high power draw.
[22:18] As we understand, it's a very high industrial type of use.
[22:24] So beyond that is you're getting into a realm of something I think that didn't seem appropriate for us,
[22:32] even to conditionally, you consider.
[22:35] And I have one more question, but so hypersize
[22:38] brings to mind hyperdrive from Star Wars, which
[22:42] is an alternative dimension to cross the galaxy.
[22:46] It millions and times the speed of light.
[22:48] And we probably don't need that in order to perish.
[22:52] Why did you allow conditional uses in the CBD?
[22:58] You see, it just strikes me to be inappropriate to have a data center in the midst of, yeah.
[23:08] So, what we found is, you know, there are existing data centers in the CBD that are taking up small office spaces.
[23:17] We really tried to find out exactly how much office space they were taking up.
[23:22] We were unsuccessful in that endeavor, but we do know that there are data centers that exist downtown that offer different services to different types of clients
[23:31] Maybe they're hosting their data. They're
[23:35] Doing other things and
[23:38] We felt like that could be an appropriate use for some empty
[23:43] Office faces a minute to wait to use some office existing vacant office face and we talked with other
[23:51] use and saw use case examples where they did sort of entire building rehabs and they were putting
[23:57] data centers in and we didn't feel like that was necessarily appropriate for New Orleans,
[24:02] who really wanted to keep those office buildings as office buildings and to be utilized that way,
[24:09] but this seemed like potentially an appropriate sort of inter-emuse for vacant space.
[24:14] And so that's why I may be limited to one per building.
[24:17] That's why we said a limitation of one per building.
[24:20] So 20,000 square feet is roughly oftentimes
[24:23] like the square foot into the tire floor.
[24:26] So we found that to be sort of a high end.
[24:29] And then it was the sense that you would only have one per building.
[24:36] You would limit that.
[24:37] To add to that, there's one category,
[24:41] which is the CBG7 district, which is the biomedical district.
[24:44] So we just thought that a larger size may be more appropriate in that setting given types of uses that are likely to locate.
[24:57] And then the electric, I'm just envisioning that data center that sucks a lot of electricity and some big office building goes dark, which is, you know, admittedly.
[25:08] So that would be up that would be part of the energy review process before it's even submitted to CPC.
[25:15] So the idea and that's why we had that first use standard is that all these applications would sort of be pre-reviewed and pre-approved.
[25:23] And so energy would be able to say, yes, we can support this type of energy draw or this new facility.
[25:32] And so we would have proof of that throughout the conditional use process so that would come first.
[25:40] Any other?
[25:41] Oh, Mr. Potcha.
[25:42] I just have a comment.
[25:43] Thank you to you and the team that put together this report.
[25:47] You're tackling a very complex issue.
[25:51] And I'm happy to know that we're actually deferring this because I'd hope there'd be a lot more public participation
[25:57] in this particular bucket item, you've done a great job of thorough analysis of a very complex
[26:05] issue and presented it very plainly, clearly with rationale and justification that is
[26:11] very simple to comprehend. I'm saying that because for the record I encourage anyone who
[26:17] has an interest in this case to thoroughly read this report because it clearly defines what we're
[26:22] with and what we're not. And answers a lot of questions that were in my mind prior to being here
[26:29] today. So great job with this. This is the kind of work that I know is hard to tackle and you've
[26:37] set us up for success, the public, and the commission in terms of having an honest dialogue and debate
[26:42] debate about moving forward with this. I also know that this is an emerging industry. It existed
[26:48] on some micro-scopic level for a long time, which is what we identify here in the report.
[26:53] And you all have worked well with some comparable cities to learn from their mistakes and
[27:00] devise a set of recommendations that hopefully can be trailblazing as additional cities begin
[27:08] to develop their regulatory environment around this.
[27:11] So thank you for the work that you all put in this.
[27:13] And I again really encourage everyone to read this report very thoroughly.
[27:17] Yeah, and I echo that as you were speaking, it was easy to follow your rationale going from zoning district to use as it was clear that you thought about all that.
[27:31] Any other comments from the commission?
[27:32] And then we would need a motion to defer.
[27:36] I'd like to move to defer to the August 25th CPC meeting.
[27:42] We are second.
[27:43] A second.
[27:44] Commissioner A, Bayer's second.
[27:46] If there's no discussion, I'll call for the vote.
[27:49] All in favor.
[27:51] Aye.
[27:51] Five eyes.
[27:53] No nays.
[27:54] Motion passes.
[27:55] We'll be back on the 25th.
[28:05] And Mr. George, you're welcome to come back on the 25th.
[28:08] But if not, your comments are in the record.
[28:13] Subdivision ratification.
[28:15] Do we have any?
[28:17] Yes.
[28:18] It is in your package.
[28:19] It is up there.
[28:20] It is a list of minus of division that we are in the process of approving and misredeveling,
[28:26] or rectifying, or decision that those sub-division can be reviewed and approved at a misredevel.
[28:34] We get a motion to approve the sub-division ratification.
[28:38] So moved.
[28:38] Mr. Poche.
[28:42] A second.
[28:42] Commissioner A. Bear seconds. All in favor.
[28:47] I.
[28:48] Five eyes.
[28:49] Any nays. None.
[28:51] That passes.
[28:53] And.
[28:53] Do I need a motion for adjournment? Or.
[28:56] Can I just declare it adjourn?
[28:58] Always wondered about that.
[28:59] Can I get a motion for adjourn?
[29:01] Yeah.
[29:01] Hello to adjourn meeting.
[29:03] Mr. A. Bear.
[29:05] Mr. Jackson seconds.
[29:07] All in favor?
[29:08] Aye.
[29:08] Five eyes.
[29:09] Motion passes.
[29:11] being a judge.