Good evening, welcome to the March workshop on the Simmer's property, annexation petition,
AXCP-2024-01. Located at 304 apples church road. Tonight we have our commission members,
staff, and the applicant present. This is the opportunity for us to kind of talk through
the project, interface directly with the applicant and staff, and ask pertinent questions
so that we can have a better understanding of the scope of the project.
So we'll kick it off to Kelly.
I know you have some new notes on, are we going to wait till the actual meeting for that?
It's all submitted, so I mean, we can workshop what we have.
Okay.
I mean, yeah, we can talk about that.
Okay.
I think that we should start there.
That's okay with everything else.
Absolutely. I wasn't sure, you know, where you want to start off that. So I'm
going to skip through some of my slides here and get us to.
So unless it was just advising that we're going to have to go through this information all over again for the public hearing portion.
Just prepare everybody.
I'm going to hear me talk a lot tonight.
So what we have before us is the petition for annexation.
It's an application.
It was complete and the fees were paid.
The application was provided to the Board of Commissioners at their December 2024 meeting
at which time they delegated it to you the planning commission, which is required by our code.
The applicant is here tonight.
A joining property owners have been notified by certified mail, advertisement in the Frederick
Newspost and the property was posted.
As previously stated, the petition for the
Simmer's property along Apple's Church Road is sitting at the corner where
Apple's Church Road and Roddy Road and Isla Road intersect. This is the same
property that was the subject of the 2022 annexation resolution and then went to
a referendum vote that was denied. Tonight planning and zoning commission wanted
to discuss proposal as well as here is from town residents.
The workshop portion allows the planning commission
to discuss the petition in an open format with staff
and the applicants.
They will not be accepting public comment
during the workshop portion of the meeting,
but we'll be accepting comments during the public hearing
and also at the end of the meeting,
public comment will be heard on any item
the plan or that you would like to address the planning commission.
So, there will be plenty of opportunities for public comment tonight, just not during
the workshop portion.
Anxations are regulated by the state of Maryland's local government article.
This article indicates that if a complete annexation petition application is submitted to
the town, the town commissioners, they must review it and they cannot outright just deny it.
The county code or the town's code, sorry, the town code regulates how annexations are processed,
and this is located in Section 3.3 of the zoning ordinance.
In the town code, the Board of Commissioners must delegate review of the petition to the Planning and Zoning Commission for their recommendation.
The Planning and Zoning Commission is charged with developing a written recommendation to the Board of Commissioners and they serve in an advisory capacity to the Board of Commissioners.
The Board of Commissioners holds a public hearing before making their decision.
So again, there'll be more opportunities for public comment.
They are the sole decision makers on annexation.
The Planning Commission, again, just makes a recommendation.
The Planning and Zoning Commission have several items they must report on to the Board of Commissioners.
They shall make findings of fact on the degree of conformance to the Thermalt Master Plan in
generally are generally and specifically in regards to the municipal growth element.
The availability of public facilities and services to meet the demands proposed development,
the viability and practicality of public improvement plans for utilities and services for the proposed
development.
They must also address if the annexation proposal should be approved or denied as any conditions
that should be placed upon any approval if applicable.
Review of the concept plan per the town code on concept plans which is located in 3.1.4
of the zoning ordinance as well as proposed zoning district.
How the annexation proposal impacts the planning and timing of infrastructure and what the zoning classification of the property should be upon annexation.
The concept plan will be held to the regulations of concept plans in town codes.
Thermal annexation process is unique in that it does require a detailed concept plan as you see here on the screen.
concept plans associated with any project go through multiple reviews where
recommendations are made applicant can address those review comments by
providing a revised concept plan which they have done. This can create multiple
versions of concept plans which is to be anticipated. However if an annexation
concept plan gets to the board of commissioners for approval it is part of the
annexation agreement. The concept plan is part of the binding agreement between the developer and
the town of Vermont. As a matter of fact, if an annexation is approved, the application must
or the applicant must still submit to the town to the Planning and Zoning Commission subdivision
plaques and site plans that would still have to be reviewed by you. Any plan submitted must be
in compliance with the approved annexation concept plans, so it can't just be willing
nearly something completely different. It has to be compliant with the concept plan that's
part of the annexation agreement.
The property currently has a portion within town limits and a
larger portion that is outside of town limits. The part within town limits is approximately 7.79 acres
and is currently zoned R5 residential which allows for a maximum density of
approximately 10 dwellings per acre. The larger part of the parcel is located
outside of town municipal boundary but is directly attached to the town. This
county portion of the parcel is over 16 acres in size and zoned agriculture. The
proposed zoning for the property is R5 which is the zoning category recommended in
the master plan which you can see up there on the map. It's underneath that blue star on the
screen.
Importantly regarding public adequate public facilities. A traffic impact study will be
required and the applicant has acknowledged this and they do intend to do that. Water capacity is
available. Certain upgrades will be needed and infrastructure obviously will be need to be extended
it into the site to supply the development, which would be funded by the developer.
Suer capacity is available.
There is an existing pump station in the neighborhood, but that would have to be upgraded.
And of course, infrastructure would have to be extended into the site by the developer.
According to Frederick County Public School Systems, their quarterly report, as well as reports
that they have provided there is adequate capacity in the school systems and they do anticipate
the school systems to be within the school rated capacity ratios for the next 10 years.
The electric services from the town are available and they will be served from Isla Road and required
electric system upgrades and lines extended into the site, which would also be funded by the developer.
Emergency services have provided comments, the planning commission has those, summary of those are
in the staff report, and some of the items that they were concerned with were roadway with,
no parking along the streets except where the parallel bump outs occur, full street width
connection to Luther Drive. The assisted living facility will produce additional stress
on the already stressed ambulance company.
And then as previously stated, the property
is within the growth area of the master plan and the proposed R5 zoning by the applicant
is compliant with the master plan. So that is all that I have.
Excuse me. Do we have any questions for staff at this time?
No.
Do we want to invite the applicant up so that we can interface with him?
Yes.
Okay.
Mr. Cross.
The workshop.
Hi, Mr. Cross.
Greetings.
Good evening.
Good to be back.
So I'll start off the question since we're a relatively new commission.
If you could walk us through the process of your intergenerational housing and where this
looks like elsewhere in the state that we could kind of look toward, you know, historical,
you know, were there any issues with that? Like, because you have competing age groups,
you know, collocated. So, has that been an issue in your other developments, or?
I would use the word complementary rather than competing. But in response to your question,
And my feeling is that neighborhoods that I was used to growing up that I've seen throughout
the state used to be intergenerational, multi-generational.
There was a time in America a grandmother could stick her nose out of the door and tell
the teenagers to behave at three o'clock in the afternoon and not get shot at.
There was a time when we didn't build age restricted age 55 communities candidly.
I believe that's a move by the developers who don't want to pay an adequate public facility's audience to fix the schools.
So if you do an age of 55 plus and you don't have kids, you don't have to make that contribution.
I don't agree with that.
I think if we're not fixing our schools, we're not gaining as a country.
So my attitude in the development, we have approved in Smithburg and
break ground on this summer is that you ought to have a mixture of housing in the same neighborhood,
particularly in towns where there is a large commuting population. If the middle generation
parents are down the road, and Joey and Sarah are going to get out of school at three,
is there not an advantage of Joey and Sarah's grandparents living in the same neighborhood?
and being that care provider until the bread-earning parents get back up the road near the end of the day.
That's the concept.
If you're in that middle-age group and you're looking over your shoulder-age parents,
if they live in the same neighborhood and can age out in that neighborhood,
I personally think that's a good idea.
So that's our idea as far as intergenerational is concerned.
Does that address your question, ma'am?
Certainly, Chris.
Sorry.
You know me.
I'm Bruce Dean.
I'm Mr. Crosses, Landy's attorney.
You would ask for a specific example that you could look at.
Now, we worked on one in Frederick County called Ballinger Run.
It's right across the street from Tuscware High School if you want to take a look at it.
And it was not intended to be anything other than an all-age project.
But then they, and I believe it was NVR Ryan Homes started building these villa products.
They're very popular with folks who want to live on the first floor, folks 55 and older as Daniel explained.
And we ended up actually changing a part of that project to be age restricted and not a large part of it.
But for the reasons Daniel just explained, there were people who were moving to that neighborhood because
is they wanted their kids to be able to walk
to Tuscware High School,
but then they also wanted their grandparents,
the kids' grandparents to live in the same neighborhood.
So it ended up being one of the fastest-selling projects
in Frederick County.
I mean, it went from starter construction to completion
in just a matter of years,
and it's significantly larger than Albert Metta's.
Do you remember John?
It's like, I wanna say it's like six or 700 houses,
So it completely dwarfed this one, but I think the point is to Mr. Cross's point is that it has been done in Frederick and it was done very successfully.
It is more typical that one single project will be all 55 and older and it might be next door to one that's up and everybody.
But we found that mixing the two in one project actually worked really well.
So he's not breaking brand new ground, but I would say he has a philosophy towards doing that that is not shared by all developers.
And what about apartments?
Because I don't know if you follow Frederick County and their housing assessments.
There's zero inventory for seniors to rent in the county right now, according to their study.
Why not? Look at that, you already have the assisted living facility there. Well, we had proposed
multi-family in the prior iteration of the annexation that was approved by the Board of Commissioners, but then
referendum to denial by the citizens of the town. For apartments? Oh yeah, there were apartments in our last
in the last concept plan that was approved by the Board. And it was deemed, I disagreed with it, but
the public spoke. They said it was too dense. There was too many units on that property,
and a significant amount of them. Do you remember what the percentage was? It was multi-family.
It was about 30%. But that was our argument. We were hoping to have a housing type for virtually
every price point in the town of Thurmond, but we were told that was too dense. So when we came back
in you don't see apartments anymore.
We were told that by your voters. Your prior contract
town planner very much encouraged us to proceed from kind of sort of what you're seeing now.
Our first 2018 submittal was a mixture of singles, towns, and the senior living facility,
and we were continually asked to increase our density in accordance with your plans.
And we ultimately went to a condominium-style apartment building
that had eight units per building.
Ground floor senior independent living zero threshold household units with apartments above.
That's what the voters made it very clear they didn't want in Thermite.
So that's to answer your question. That's why we don't have them. We would love to have them. But okay, that's fair.
Questions?
Can you talk about the park of why you're combining them?
You're improving the park that's already there, but you're not adding one, right?
I'm sorry. The park. The park. Yeah, the park. You're you're using the existing park.
that's on there no no it is not but it is the assisted living facility does
directly but the to the park yeah they're in the middle I thought I was
not in an previous plan where they were going to improve it correct in the
previous annexation the agreement that was developed between the board of
commissioners and the app it did include improvements to the Carroll Street
extended park. Okay.
So there's just a dog park and a small park for these
assisted living. There's a lot of air in the middle. No, there's more than that.
No. Yeah, yeah. Up here in the middle. It kind of looks like a couple.
Playground
and community gardens. Okay. I thought that was one that was already there.
That's
out in the middle. I was reminded that if I use a laser pointer on a TV screen,
no one can see what I'm shooting at. So I'll use the traditional one. This is the
primary playground area with parking and supporting it. This is the dog park exercise station
spread out throughout the running nature trails throughout the area, victory gardens, another
small playground. We've littered the community in opportunities to be outside and do exercise.
And what are the impacts to Easy Street and Luther drive with the parking that they have now?
Right now they obviously are they're both at a dead end.
Do we have an understanding of what that will do to that community with the parking there?
It's a public street so it currently allows parking.
One of the things that emergency services did recommend that within this development that
there would be no parking on the street except for within the areas that they have already
designed as bump outs within the curb line. So that would not impede any
emergency services accessing the site for emergencies.
But beyond that, I can't forecast whether or not people are going to park on, you know,
Luther Drive or Easy Street. I mean, I guess there's always that potential.
But most likely they're going to park within their neighborhood because that will be closer.
right but I'm saying like so for the existing neighborhood do those have the bomb
bouts already there where do they know they do not they just have regular
street sections that do allow for parking on the street so we wouldn't be
impacting the no parking there it would be no no any anything that we're
talking about or anything that we that you would recommend to the mayor's
missioners would directly apply to this development and not to anywhere else
within Fairmont.
Indeed.
Madam Chairman, may I make a comment?
Sure.
Because it fits with your question.
All right.
So when we appeared previously before you in January and before the commissioners prior to
that, this was concept two, version one.
What you're looking at in version two is we changed the road right away to 60 feet.
We had heard Board of Commissioners meetings, by which apparently citizens and hammock
rails feel their roads are too narrow.
You haven't made an official change in your ordinance yet, so I'm jumping the gun,
but anticipating that, the version two changes year to 60 foot right away.
What I've just passed out to you is that new road cross section showing 12 feet six for
for each of the traffic lanes and eight foot parallel parking on one side of the road and
still the required street tree box and sidewalk area.
And then on the side that doesn't have that parallel parking, that's a much larger
13, 17 foot six open space with the street tree box and the sidewalk between the curb line
in the end of the right away.
And to your question, therefore, as far as the parks, I'm hoping we can get better utilization.
If we're going to have that larger right away, picture, if you will, a serpentine sidewalk,
a meandering sidewalk instead of a straight shot that has some of the exercise stations
and more landscape planting as open space since it's going to be there.
Can
we talk about the intersections that interface with this development for a minute?
Because that's a big concern for me.
We have three roads that don't have markings on them, and one of the roads, I understand
we don't have easements to widen the road the whole way through.
So what is the recommendation and what is the plan to address that?
Well, the applicant would have to do a traffic impact study, and that traffic impact study
would make recommendations within that.
But beyond that, I can't provide any additional information until we get that traffic impact
study so that those engineers would figure out the logistics of all those things that need
happen to make the road official safe, they would make recommendations, but they wouldn't
engineer or design or anything like that. So typically, you know, they just wouldn't
analyze, or existing traffic conditions, and then apply this development anticipated traffic
counts, as well as existing approved plans that we have in the pipeline. So all of those
Those would be calculated as well in those traffic counts.
And then of course in that traffic impact study, they make recommendations as to what should be done to make the roads safer.
Out of chairman, what I've handed you, staff has had for several years, but as part of the last go around, two traffic studies were done.
We did one in 21 and one in 22.
The second one was because of this citizen request that we missed the Thurmont rush hour.
In fact, the Thermont Rush Hour is not the AM and PM rush hour, it's when NVR lets out.
So the second study was done for that time of day.
Further, the traffic engineer and staff, not me as developer, decided what intersections
get studied.
And I would point out that Marty Burns has, Commissioner Burns has repeated several times that there
There should be a firewall between the developer and the traffic studies.
Perfectly willing to support that idea, but they've been done twice, and there was public
criticism last time around, oh, but you did your traffic studies during COVID.
You obviously were low on your traffic counts.
But as you'll see in the professional engineering comments, they anticipated that, so they looked
at what the traffic counts were in the years prior to COVID, what your growth rates were,
and they implied those growth rates on top of the study.
So in essence, the second study was using what they estimated
to be able to have been 2024 traffic.
And you said which intersections were studied?
Wow.
A lot of them.
So intersection at Apple's Church Road East Main Street,
and these are the ones I remember off the top of my head,
but everything is indicated in those traffic impact studies.
Iowa Road, Roddy Road, Apple's Church Road intersection, Emmett'sburg Road,
Iowa Road, Emmett'sburg Road, North Church Street, Water Street, North
Church Street, East Main, West Main Street.
Beyond that, right now I can't recall,
but they're doing better than I could have done off the top of my head. I read the
reports. Those are the ones that I know for certain that we did look at.
Have
have you have you actually set out there and watched the traffic let out at
NBR yourself personally I have not okay well I would encourage you to do so so
you can acclimate yourself with that area so maybe you could have a better
understanding of what some of those concerns are from the citizens because it
does there's a lot of traffic on that road when it lets out you can always tell
when it's 230 because that's when the cars start rolling up and then you've got
school letting out and then the construction on church street so I wouldn't you
you know, dismiss some of those concerns that the citizens have.
I think they're a very real concern.
And we want to get away from being reactive with our intersections.
We, my opinion, we haven't done the greatest job at looking
at the intersections proactively, so we have a couple of problem areas
and we don't want to create another problem.
And these studies are done on average peak.
So at 245, well, 1445, according to this study, you have 83 total cars
is going down Apple's church road. When normally it's, what does it say here? Normally about
30? It'll be very high peak time there. Yeah, I think that parking lot holds like 150
cars, doesn't it? Something. I'd have to look and count. I don't know. Is it using a zero
Yeah,
that's, I mean, Isla Road is a very, it's an era road, it's not, I mean, we're adding
a couple of developments that are going to be able to access that road in the next
couple of years.
You've got a regional park right there, you're encouraging park and open space, but there's
no connectivity to the regional park.
So that's, I think your proposed plan, it's going to, the sidewalks are going to go into town, but not that way, right?
It's going to go this way.
You mean with this concept that we have here, this way.
Right now, everything just aligns with their frontage on Apple's church road,
sidewalks on Apple's church road. Of course, they connect sidewalks to Easy Street and Luther Drive.
So, but beyond that, there are no additional sidewalks at this time, and that's something that, you know,
So in your recommendation to the Board of Commissioners,
those are recommendations that you would make
after you have all of your information.
So after we get the traffic and impact study back,
we look at that and review it.
And then you can take that information and say,
well, these are the things that we would like to see
the developer make concessions to in the annexation agreement.
The mayor commissioners may take those as their negotiating points in the annexation agreement.
So anything that the planning commission feels will be a benefit to the community, you
could make those recommendations in your report to the mayor and commissioners.
Okay.
So this pre-annexation agreement, that will be ultimately vetted through mayor and board.
Correct.
That is not under your purview, that is under the mayor commissioner's purview as the elected body they will negotiate with the applicant if they get to that point.
But we can certainly include that in our resolution to them of what we think would be best in your recommendation.
In your recommendation you can include any kind of concessions that you think would be a benefit to the community at large.
Okay.
Madam Chairman, if I understand your comment, one of Kelly's planters' comments in
her January 21st document did pertain to sidewalks.
And we now show in concept two, version two, aside-
We have a sidewalk from where our Alpha Road exits on to Apple's Church going northerly to the intersection because we control that. But we don't control the front of the houses on Apple's Church Road today, so we don't show that there. And then obviously we have the sidewalks throughout our own community. And as specified, we're making the connection of Luther and the connection to DZ with the sidewalks.
And then the design of the houses.
Do you have any brickfront homes that you're proposing?
Because I think when I look at the master plan and you talk about improving the roads
and making them connected and all that good stuff, it's a little puzzling to me when
you drive through one community that doesn't look anything like the next community that
you're driving to.
So I was just wondering from a developer standpoint, why wouldn't you want, you know, the houses
This is a kind of have similar features like having some of the brick front that you see in some of our townhouse communities throughout their mind.
So ordinarily, that decision happens later in the process.
We look at this from a land development standpoint.
Are we going to get through your process for an approved community?
Then we work with builders and I will tell you that the number of national builders that have been touched with me over the last two weeks after.
a couple of updates we posted is remarkable, given the appetite in the housing shortage.
But we would then work with them for what types and styles of houses.
In keeping with what recommendations you might make to us as you go through the process.
Price points are critical.
As I've said in my response, and Commissioner Burns said two months ago,
you have a hundred single family homes in your pipeline and other developments.
That's why I'm trying to do tan analysis, because I don't wish to compete with that other 100.
And I believe we should provide citizens with the opportunity to climb on the ladder of home ownership at a price point somewhere below with single family home.
I was mortified last June when we held our meeting at the library to have citizens say that if a person could not afford the $550,000 new DRB home in Hammaker Hills, they didn't want that person to move to thermo.
I didn't know how to react to that, but I will take in mind your consideration that you'd
like us to do some brick fronts and we'll try to work with the builders to see where those,
where the price points would be if we did.
550,000 dollar home, I couldn't even come closer to that.
The last section of hammocker hills is going in the 590s at this point.
It
must be some DC people moving up to 70.
So
do you do you share the same concerns about the intersections you've been out there you know what we're talking about with three of the four roads having no markings on them and you're proposing to put in you know a complete development on you know 26 acres.
I mean do you how do you feel about that and your culpability or I don't know.
James, could you get the zip disk for the previous PowerPoint 3 from the traffic study available for Kelly, please?
Okay, a couple of responses.
It's a growth area that the town has identified certainly to your 2008 master plan, and I actually think much earlier than that.
So I'm not the Johnny come lately, this has been what the town has said they want to grow as high density residential for years and years and years.
As Kelly has pointed out, it's somewhere around 9.8 to 10 depending on how you read the documents on the desired with a maximum density in an R5 neighborhood.
Got it roughly correct?
We're coming in at 4.6, so we're less than half, respecting what we heard from the
citizens last time around.
But there is a limit when you're only doing 100 units instead of 177 units of will-the-deal
pencil, if you tell me, I have to completely improve Apple Search Road or Carroll Street.
I would suggest you that there is some sharing there.
We're no longer bringing the majority of the houses to the area.
In the traffic studies, yes, that one, if you've got it, plays electronically.
I think the worst intersection it was identified previously was the even, and this was the
first study, so this was not the PM Rush out of Ryan.
The worst intersection was northbound on Apple's Church at the intersection with Carol.
And I believe we're going to find a slide that one of the slides said before we would
have done the 177 unit subdivision.
But with everything else in your pipeline, what's called background in traffic engineering
language, counted, that intersection was apparently an eight second delay on the evening rush.
and on the 2021 study we were going to grow to a nine-second delay.
So you'd have had an additional second.
Now when we first saw some of these slides up once we got into the 22 study,
I think those numbers began to grow.
But they weren't growing by a significant amount.
So two-year point, if working with the town,
working with the town engineers and the traffic engineers,
there's more that needs to be done at the intersections.
happy to look at it. I personally really like the red stop sign with the LED
squares around it on a solar panel. It gets your eyeballs and you stop at a
stop sign and you do the same thing on the slow and the caution on the sidewalk
ones. That's comparatively easy to do if the town is willing to have those in
their municipality.
What about exiting at Alfa Road? Do you have any, I mean you
We talked about the Carroll Street one, but the end of Alpha Road is going to be terrible
to try to make a left out of.
Which answer?
Wester East?
I guess.
Left side of this man.
Left side?
West?
Okay.
Yeah.
So, if you try to make a left at the end of Alpha, I mean, I have a feeling that's going to be
way more than a nine-sector right.
Especially at 2.45.
So, I mean, if they talked, I mean, would you put in stop signs there?
Is there traffic light in the idea?
Is there anything of that sort?
I know we certainly have a stop sign, but I don't think I may I may have more stop signs on that will search
Because I mean a stop sign there is obviously
Good
evening. My name is John Mazzell. I'm with Fox and associate Fox and associate the engineering record
there will be a stop sign on
the new leg
at that intersection and
the traffic study that's to be done would call out whether there is a warrant for a
three-way stop sign or a signal that would be addressed in the traffic
study and again the town can direct the traffic consultant in terms of what
capture they want if it is part of that study to capture the NBR traffic just as
was done in the 22 study.
So, do you see the comment from the fire chief
about having access to all sides of the assisted facility?
He made a comment, a recommendation
that he would ideally like to have access
to all four sides, correct?
Yeah, that is correct.
He did say in an ideal world,
access around four sides would be, you know, perfect.
But he also realizes that that's not always feasible.
So typically they like to have three or access around three sides.
And that is something that we would address in detail at the site plan review for the assisted living facility.
It's understood in the senior living industry that the residents typically cannot self evacuate.
So all of your stairwells get built with large landings in their vicinity because once they make it to the stairway door or the staff gets in the stairway door, they're then in a fire sanctuary.
This building is designed to tuck into the hillside.
Grayson is below it on page right as you are looking.
So we're trying to conceal the vertical mass of the building,
respecting the residents in Albert courts today.
So it presents on the uphill side as a one-story building.
We'll have to work that from the get-around.
It's going to be easy.
You end up doing compacted gravel with grass over them,
load bearing pathways for your fire apparatus to get around the side of the building without actually having full-scale roads.
That'll be comparatively easy to do, page right even though we're doing, we are showing that as partial green space.
And then you would be able to get in from the park side.
So the vulnerability you're pointing out is behind the townhouses on the UC Street.
But if we move north early, all we're doing is taking this larger building and
and making it more visible to more people.
So your traffic slides are up now.
I apologize, it took me a minute to.
Next slide, if you would, please.
Let me call the date on that on the bottom right hand corner.
This was a 30 August 2022 date.
There is your list of the intersections
that were studied as per the direction of planning and gym.
And call the bold node out on the bottom.
They did adjust to try to address
the COVID change in world. Can we go next slide? I'm looking for the color
graphic. So those are existing traffic volumes in May of 21 at North
Carolyn Apple and at Roddy Eiler and Apple for evening weights. Let's go next
slide.
This would have been with all new communities that were in your
pipeline at that time, add it in. That's your background
training on top of your existing. And you can see the
change there. And what I'm looking for is the next slide,
which should add us, this was trip generation evening and
morning rush for a 177 unit community. You're down at 100
now. So these numbers don't match what's going on.
you can see evening in and out and totals for both morning and evening and I'm still looking
for next slide because I'm looking for the one that counts us. There we go.
So,
before we played 8 to 11 seconds AM and PM when we played 20 and 12. So we're adding four seconds
in one case and in nine seconds and another at Carol and Apple's church.
But, Madam Chairman, I hear you. I don't think you're just talking about traffic volume.
I hear you talking about striping stop signs, go slows, cross walks.
Ordinarily, again, we would deal with that with you at quote, preliminary plan stage.
You approve the annexation, you approve the concept plan. We are back here to go through your full
process, and that's, I believe, when that level of detail would ordinarily happen, Kelly.
That is, John.
So that's all I needed on the traffic study.
So where was the nine seconds you were talking about?
That was a bit in the 2021 study, and it would have predated this by a year.
It was at the same intersection where we went from nine to eight.
But when we did it the following year, the numbers got worse.
So your AM went from 11 to a 20, you gained nine.
this the PM went from an 8 to a 12 you gained 4 to basically double to say again
basically doubled it yeah
177 units yeah so when we update this it's gonna come back down
we believe well when the traffic engineer updates it he'll come up with his own numbers
exactly correct and also I just want to reiterate the fact that planning staff and
And you all, as a planning commission, can make recommendations for intersection studies
and different anomalies you would like them to take into consideration.
So during this process, during this workshop, if there's something that you would like,
you know, the traffic engineer to take into consideration, that's something that we need to
start developing and making those list of items we want the traffic engineer to take into
consideration.
Madam
Chairman, I see we got 15 minutes left in the workshop, so we're welcome to any
other questions.
What I've just handed you was one of the complaints we had last time was about vertical
massing.
Mind you, at that time we were doing four-story condominium apartment buildings, and although
our height did not exceed the five condominium buildings in Albert courts today, I heard
the citizens clearly say they didn't want that level of vertical massing.
So this go around, part of what we did in Concept 2.
Kelly, can we go back to the other...
So it's hard copy with everyone for the benefit of anyone watching. Can we go back to the actual map, a concept two version two, please? One of the considerations we did this time was we moved the age 55 plus senior living villa townhouses, which is a really fancy word for a primary bedroom and primary bath on the ground floor. Build all the doorways as a three o'opening
zero threshold into the bath, put all the blocking and walls, and let a senior age out
in the home.
It still has two guest bedrooms upstairs for visiting family or grandchildren.
We put them up the hill because they are a two-story structure.
So we wanted to reduce the vertical mass for our neighbors in Albert Courts.
We put the three-story traditional townhouses at the bottom of the hill.
So the cross section I've just given you is a slice through the community, roughly there,
to show you how those roof lines, if you were looking at them from the side, starting
with the Albert Court condominium building and going through us, what the vertical
mass is.
I at least wanted to get that one out since we had criticism on last time.
But with 15 minutes to go, we're standing by.
We can race through whatever you want to cover.
And that is in our master plan of preserving the senior view in our communities.
Absolutely.
That is a good point to make.
What else do you guys got?
Questions?
It's probably premature at this stage, but vegetation that you're looking at putting in.
Will that grow up to be a block to the folks who are sitting at the top of it?
They don't basically.
I'm trying to interpret your question.
Do you want vegetation or don't you want vegetation?
That sounds like not super tall.
That was the question, basically.
You definitely want vegetation.
The question is from a height standpoint.
So your ordinance has a requirement for landscaping.
And landscaping is planned.
And John, I believe we are showing a minimum 10 foot buffer
all around the property.
Okay, okay, so we're possible we're running our nature running the nature trails are on the perimeter of the property also
What I hear you saying is maybe on the back of these senior villas notice we didn't put the pathway there
That's probably not where you want me putting Tuscan pines that grow 60 feet tall, right?
Your point is taken
Okay, yeah, again, back to what you were saying Craig that is something that we would work on during the site plan
really process what kind of vegetation what kind of plan of buffer that we would want to see
some and you know take into consideration public comment and that I remember that for previous discussions on other properties later in the game
But I thought I'd just go ahead and ask now in case you know we're thinking about I just want to clarify that
We're not taking public comment right now. We're just workshopping the Simmer's annexation petition.
No?
Questions from my engineer on stormwater or other issues.
If you want to touch on the stormwater management, that would be great.
Again, John Mazzell and the Fox and Associates.
Now generally our stormwater management has to meet the state of Maryland stormwater.
ordinance and the Fredrick County ordinance. They are the authority, the approval authority, and
inspection authority in Fredrick County. So, our stormwater will have to meet that criteria.
What is shown on this plan is a conceptual stormwater management plan. The small areas
that you see scattered out are called ESDs, environmentally sensitive design facilities that are with
they call bioreattention facilities, there's a whole gamut of things that will be utilized when
we do this design, what they call rooftop disconnects, non-root top disconnects, bioreattention
facilities, you name it, to meet our requirement.
It's the coin at ESD to the maximum extent practicable.
So, we are put under a microscope to provide stormwater management to meet that.
So, this is a concept those may ultimately when we get into the final design and get
into the weeds on this, those facilities may move around, they might amoeba in size.
A lot of things go into that, degrading of the site, how the water is going to move, how
we integrate it, but this just gives you a very high-level look at what stormwater management
is going to do. Generally, when we're done, the code says that if you provide ESD to the
maximum extent practical, this site will function as a wooded site in a post-developed condition
when it's all built.
That's kind of it in a nutshell,
but that's a pretty rigorous
review. I believe the town consultant reviews it as well. So there's a lot of eyes on it.
If I read it correctly, I know this is preliminary. At the base of the picture looks like it's your
upper level if you will water capture and it runs underground down to the big sort of
There's like shape down at the, at the time.
Where does it go after that, or is it just retained there?
Is it retained there?
Well, this is just, this will be what we call an engineered channel.
Okay.
That will convey water through the site.
Excuse me, John.
Can you take that mic with you so that everybody can hear, please?
The engineered channel will convey water safely through the site.
It will bypass this large facility, go around it to where it discharges.
So we describe this as an engineer channel, we will route it and design it based on the flow that's in it.
We will have to demonstrate that it's designed according to the flow that's in it and that it is stabilized.
In a post-developed, excuse me, condition, there will be culverts underneath of the proposed
roadways in these locations.
Where does it go once it leaves the property?
Currently, it comes down to Apple's Church.
There is a culvert that's here that really controls the entire site because we will likely have
to improve that culvert.
But the site will be controlled to the extent that we can put water through and over the road.
The county has a requirement that I think in a 100 year storm event, depending on the classification of the road,
you may be able to put as much as 8 inches of water over the roadway in a 100 year storm.
Again, we have to meet their criteria, they're going to review that, we have to meet their criteria.
Yeah.
Okay.
So, John, can you further clarify that larger storm water management facility, that is going
to control the water, the storm water runoff for the development, though, correct?
That's correct.
So, right now, what you were speaking to is existing storm water runoff that is running
to a facility and would not go to the larger facility for the development that the applicant
is planning.
That's correct, all of the proposed, the water that comes off of the proposed condition will be conveyed through storm drain systems to this larger facility.
So you're taking water from the impervious surfaces, rooftops, running them through these small ESDs that then get connected to a storm drain system that is conveyed down to the large overall facility to provide quantity management.
It's a combination of all the different practices that get some slight attenuation and control in the small ESDs.
They're mainly designed for say the one-year storm event, your typical storm events.
That's where most of the pollutants are when they're washed off of the impervious areas.
But this is where all the quantity controlled will occur.
I
think for the sake of time, we should probably wrap up our workshop here, Mr. Cross.
My team's avoiding the 800 pound gorilla in the corner.
What John Stess described is what happens for Albert Meadows.
ESD, the MEP and the bioswales spread out around the community going to the pond at the bottom
of the hill which provides us the quantity we need and then feeds across the street. And
sir, there is a blue line stream buried in the woods on page top that that water eventually
goes to. Okay, the 800 pound gorilla is Albert courts. And what is shown on page bottom on the plans
you are looking at is a possibility, a proposal, for a stormwater facility that the county has
said they would allow to be built to 1996 standards, not ESD, the MEP, to accommodate the stormwater
coming off the nine acres that is an Albert courts today. And then that water would be conveyed through
our site down and around. That is an option for discussion by all the parties in the month's
set.
Yeah, and I think they'll be followed since we have a couple of minutes left. We might have some
follow-up questions to that during the public hearing before we take public comment on that.
I understood.
Okay with it.
Understood.
Okay.
Thank you.
Any last calls before I take a motion to close the workshop?
She's making those things with the wheelchair.
Don't fool her.
Yeah, she's having fun.
She's not having fun.
That's all right.
Sure.
Here's the motion to close the wheelchair.
So I have a second.
Second.
All those in favor, please raise your right hand.
Thank you.
Workshop is adjourned.
Let me try to use the little ghost bathroom real quick.
Quick recess.
Yes.
Good evening. Welcome to the March planning and zoning regular meeting today is Thursday, March 27th.
The first item on the agenda is the zoning inspectors report. Kelly?
Okay. So since our last meeting in February, we issued 19 zoning certificates, three work for
For new residential dwellings, 11 were for residential accessory uses, 4 were for commercial
accessory uses, and 1 was a no zoning required certificate.
So far this year we have issued 34 zoning certificates, and last year at this time it was
45.
Thank you Kelly.
Anybody have any questions for Kelly?
All right, the next two items, I'm going to go ahead before we get into the weeds and
And go ahead and swear anybody in that would like to give testimony tonight.
Please leave, raise your right hand and stand.
Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the response is given and statements made in this hearing before the planning and planning and zoning commission will be the whole truth and nothing but the truth if so answer I do.
I do.
Thank you.
Point of order.
We do have a couple of seats up here folks if you want to fill in.
When you do come to the podium, please state your name if you are a resident and if you've
been sworn in.
All right.
Next item on the agenda is discussion and action on the preliminary plan C1-PP-2025-01
Mountain Gate Business Park, Thermalt Business Park, Axis Road, situated east of Goodwill.
Alright, so tonight we have the preliminary plan which is the next step in the site plan
Review process. The applicant is here, adjoining our, adjoining property owners were notified by certified mail and the site was posted.
The
preliminary site plan before you tonight is for the property owned by Mountain Gate Business Park. The engineering firm for the applicant is be in our design group of Frederick.
The property consists of two parcels. One parcel is where Goodwill was constructed. And the other parcel is the over 18 acres and size.
and is outlined on the screen in yellow.
This large parcel consists of a platted road connection
to Thermont Boulevard.
Parcel includes a forest retention ordinance area
that is highlighted in green and consists of about seven acres.
The area in red is the area that parcel
that is vacant without forest easement
and has commercial zoning.
The area in orange has been before the Planning and Zoning
commission previously for a townhouse community in the R5
zoning district. The non-highlighted area is the electric line
easement for the for Thermont and Potomac Addison. There's
power lines running through there. The zoning designation of
the property in the area is general business. The property is
connected to Thermont Boulevard and sits directly adjacent to
the Goodwill site. The applicants intent with the access
road is to create a roadway to the property that is zone general business and is undeveloped
and it's located to the rear of the Sonoco gas station on Frederick Road.
The site area included in the access road is slightly more than an acre in size and it
is zone general business.
The preliminary plan for the access road proposes the development of a site, or the process
a site plan for the access road that will simultaneously amend the Goodwill site plan to create
direct connection to the Goodwill parking lot while creating access to the commercial zone
property that does not currently have road access. The proposed access road intentionally does not
follow the platted location for the road due to the impact of wetlands. As platted it would
disturb approximately 15,500 square feet, but as with the revised route, it would only
disturb about 1800 square feet. So that is a significant reduction in wetland impact.
The road location was shifted towards Goodwill or Northwest to, again, greatly reduce
those wetland impacts. The proposed roadway path will still impact wetlands, but again,
it is greatly reduced. And it is the path that was recommended or it was recommended by MDE to
reduce wetlands impact to the greatest degree possible, which again the applicant did follow their advice.
Here again is an aerial. I just, you know, I get a lot of questions where exactly this is located at.
So, again, here's the area of the site.
We can see approximately the access road location
in relation to things that we know.
Of course, this is just my sketch,
so it's not eloquent or to scale,
but it does give us the general idea
of the location of the access road,
which is the purple amoeba up there on the screen,
and it does connect to Thermot Boulevard.
Again, the area outlined in yellow
is owned by the applicants the area the area shaded in red is zone general
business which is why they're building this access road to gain access. The
green area is in a permanent force retention ordinance easements and the
area in orange is the R5 zoning district which has been before you previously. The
The town-owned passive park is the pie-shaped parcel, adjoining the green area, and some additional
landmarks you can see on the screen there, the Y's location, the Sonoco gas station, Fair
Oaks community, and the library, which is kind of cut off on the screen there, but that's
the location of the library as well.
Existing conditions, a portion of the proposed road is on the Goodwill site and the remainder
is on vacant unimproved land. Proposed site plan would amend the Goodwill site plan by adding
direct access to the southeast side of the construction, well no longer the constructed site, as well
as adjusting the storm water management facilities to accommodate the roadway. The access road is
proposed to be 30 foot wide paid roadway and is engineered or designed to accommodate tractor trailers
and other vehicles on the roadway.
The roadway appears to be able to accommodate truck traffic, but it would be good to have
the applicants, engineer provide us at least on one of the plan sheets or provide a new
plan sheet showing truck turning of movements just to ensure that indeed the 18 lillers can
navigate the proposed roadway.
Sidewalks are provided along the road, but they are not all shown in the same grades or the grade scale gradient on the plan.
There is also wording on the plan that states the future sidewalk, which staff is recommending that it be changed to remove the word future to ensure that sidewalks are constructed simultaneously with the road.
The proposed site plan is showing some grading on the town property.
So of course the applicant must obtain permission and a temporary construction easement from
the board of commissioners.
The applicant will not be installing any utilities with the access road.
They have an access easement already to the site that will allow them to take utilities
that way.
So we don't have to worry about utility installation with the construction of the road.
Maryland Department of Environment permits are required due to the presence of wetlands
and the property owner and staff met with MDE on site who indicated that reducing wetland
impacts to the greatest degree possible would be a preferred path while the town is also maintaining
the need to have a square road intersection at that point.
Stormwater and erosion and sediment control will need to be obtained, our approvals will
need to be obtained from Frederick County and they do all the review and approval of those
plans.
The access road will be private, but it will provide access to sites, the goodwill site
as well as this commercialized own portion of property.
So it is important that an access and maintenance agreement be submitted
to the town so that Leslie, our town attorney, can review it to make sure
that each property owner is fairly responsible for maintenance of that road.
And of course, the agreement does need to be recorded in land records
and that reporting information provided to town staff so we can ensure that
that does occur. So staff does recommend conditional approval of the
preliminary site plan and staff did make eight
plus recommended recommended
conditions of approval but most of them are standard items. The applicant must
obtain their MDE permit approval. The applicant must obtain Frederick County
approval for storm water management and for erosion and sediment control. That all sidewalks
should be shown on the site plan in the same gray scale, gradients, and future removed from any
sidewalk indication that the sidewalk must be constructed with the road construction. A temporary
construction easement must be obtained from the Board of Commissioners. An access and maintenance
This is an incident agreement should be provided to the town and the town attorney review it to make sure that each property owner's property owner is fairly responsible for their maintenance of that roadway.
Also asking the applicant to have their engineer provide on one of the plan sheets or separate plan sheet just indicating that those tractor trailer maneuvers can be made on that roadway safely.
And then, of course, we have three minor edits, which are the north arrow on the site plan,
having on sheet 7 and 8, the seal and signature of the engineers applied to the site plan on
page 7 and 8, and then also on sheet 2, we need the appropriate town signature blocks, which
is missing from that plan sheet, but it's on all the other ones.
So, I'll have.
Thanks, and the applicant is here.
Questions for Kelly?
Let us know, to be there.
I have one before we bring out the applicant, so I had asked somebody from MD to be able to
be here again, you kindly responded, you know, that they're on their own working schedule.
So I did contact MD to try to understand, like, you know, the meanings and the process
for what they're looking at.
So I just want to make sure when you guys met with MBE,
the gentleman that I spoke with said that the future development of the site would be of concern to MBE,
because the wetlands are being disturbed.
They would like to understand the scope of that.
And then also just to ensure that they're looking at all the options,
there was an option to come off of the main road.
and the applicant is choosing to come off of this particular site they direct they said that they would like to know that as well when they're getting their permit.
So I just want to make sure as I understand it that's actually what's happening behind the scenes to be as openly because I know people have been concerned about the wetlands.
And I know that it's just a minus fuel amount but I think that the gentleman told me that there's a 35 foot buffer.
So, you know, the concern is this area is right off the 15. There's a lot of run-off.
There's a lot of impervious surface already coming through there.
So those trees kind of act as a, you know, the first point of protection
and before it gets all the way back there into a very marshy area, subsequently feeding the,
I think it's hunting. Is it hunting creek that's back there?
Which, you know, people are like, oh, we have our, we already have a water issue here,
you know, just trying to do our diligence and making sure since it isn't our master plan to conserve the wetlands.
I was trying to figure out what actual, are we in the Blue Ridge or we in the Piedmont part of the wetlands map?
I still can't figure that out of exactly where we are, you know, with that.
I'm sure I have to research that.
The applicant's engineer might be able to answer that question.
Okay, just those those couple of questions. Um, and do we have like, is there a way for us to like actually look at
real time the actual disturbance of the the trees?
I know you say 1800 square feet, but like what does it actually look like?
I know we have the map, but like overlaying it on the actual Google Earth to see what that would look like with the with the buffer.
I don't have that capability.
The applicant might.
We'll invite the applicant up.
We're going to have the other questions for staff.
Good evening, Bill Brennan with being our design group
and Craig McLeath, the applicant is also here.
Basic, let's address the,
go through a little bit of the MDE permitting process.
Back in August, we met, we had a pre-application with MDE.
Town was invited to the site.
We had some discussions.
We have two alternates that was discussed.
One with MDE was basically bringing the road through eliminating this ESD and doing an
offset intersection at Thermont Boulevard, which MDE light because it really pushed us
out of all the wet, most of the wetlands.
Town had an issue with it because we had an offset intersection with a major entrance
at WICE, so we also had this alternate, which was a compromise in between, and MDE thought
that was a reasonable alternative at the pre-application meeting.
With the preliminary plan approval or preliminary site plan approval, we're going to move to the
step with MDE, which is what they call basically the wetland groups will do an actual jurisdictional
determination of where the wetland boundaries are.
And that gets flagged, MDE comes out, reviews it, agrees or moves the line depending upon
soil conditions, hydrology, vegetation,
or the three criteria that they look at.
At that time, we go out, survey it,
and then we actually determine what the impacts are.
Right now on this plan,
in blue, this blue boundary right here
is the edge of the wetlands.
but it hasn't been approved by MDE at this point.
The dashed blue line is the buffer area, 25 foot buffer area.
And this site is also in what we call a tier two area, so we'll also have additional reviews for gluten loading on that. So this site does have an extra step in it. Do you know what does tier two mean? Do you know? Do I know I'm not a wetland person, but a tier two is basically you have, I'm going to say class three, natural trout stream, hunting creek.
So therefore, you have your additional review and make sure that you have a reduction in pollutant loading on the stream
because they're trying to keep the natural streams and temperature loading down to the minimum.
The positive on this site is that we do on the, Kelly, you want to go to the overall with the forest easement?
Yeah, where the fro areas, the FRO, that's basically the majority of the wetlands on the rest of the site down in that area, the wet area.
So as we move on to develop the general commercial area, that is the higher side, the high side, and no wetlands in that area.
So we are staying away from the majority of wetlands down in the forest of the area.
So, when we get the preliminary site plan approval, we'll move to the next step, actually
delineating the wet landsline, getting MD out there, finishing up the report, processing
the final plans, such as the culvert crossings, and finishing up that engineering in the
Smith, M.D.E. and Frederick County in the town for their review.
And that's when we move into final construction documents.
And we're not going to, I know Kelly has on the preliminary plan, the first three items
permits, but those permits aren't going to be released until we have final engineering
documents and approval for that.
Item number four, we have the, do I go back to the preliminary site plan, Kelly, please.
item number four, we are proposing the sidewalk to be connected to the existing goodwill and up to this point, but we do show this area as future.
We really don't want to put that in until the site plan is approved on the back end.
We really don't want to take people and drop them to nowhere.
We would rather defer that sidewalk, the construction of this sidewalk, when we have a site for people to go to.
We just don't want to bring them somewhere and drop them off in the middle of the forested area.
We'd rather defer that until we have a site plan and have it constructed during site plan review if that's possible.
Well, that was our thought on that, that's why we haven't.
Otherwise, we recognize we have to have the temporary construction easement where at
the intersection, the roadway intersection is well above the town lot.
So in order to make the roadway 35 foot width and get everything in there, we're going
to have to get a temporary construction easement, which we will work with the town and process
just that through and go through the mayor and commissioners for that.
And we did some on this alignment, we already did some preliminary tractor trailer movements
and we'll just make that part of the plan.
We'll be glad to share that.
It was kind of a rough draft but we'll get that into final form for everybody for the final
site plan.
Are you anticipating a high volume of tractor trailer traffic on this road? No. No.
But you're going to have a commercial user in the back with deliveries. Yeah. Good will.
And granted, they're able to are loading docs on the other side. But when a larger road goes through,
instead of them maybe winding going back out through their driveway, which is a little bit
to the north of here, they might just make a circular route and come out to
Thermal Boulevard to the right. So, that's, yeah. And I think good wills, what one
are they, I think they mentioned they were only going to have like one or two per
week or something. I don't remember all the stuff in my head, but yeah. Yeah, we're not.
Yeah, Sanoco is going to have a lot more truck traffic than we have.
I mean, basically it's going to be deliveries for the commercial facility, whatever it is.
Will the future parking lot connect to the Sanoco parking lot?
Pardon me?
Will the future parking lot connect to the Sanoco parking lot?
No, not right now.
We have approached them and we haven't had a response back.
It is designed that they can make the connection in the future, but we're not going to provide
a connection for them at this point.
And with that, we would appreciate approval of the plenary site plan and maybe modify the
condition of the sidewalk because we would like to construct, we agree with constructing
in the sidewalk around the Goodwill area
but going into the future site
and like to have it affirm it
and have that constructed during the actual site plan.
Good construction
where the construction for the facility later.
I'll say the argument I make with that
is if you're doing the soil disturbance now,
why not just continue and make the sidewalks
in that soil disturbance?
You know, they're gonna be hand,
they're gonna be handicap accessible.
I, you know, it's just that
But why do you want to encourage somebody to go back to the middle of nowhere?
Typically it's been frowned upon.
I know in the old days it used to just do little bits and pieces, but the more and more
the thinking is, till you get a comprehensive plan, don't put people in areas where all of
They have a sidewalk and then they have to go into the street or this point into the woods they go into the woods
I mean, why do we want to encourage somebody?
Well, we are encouraging them to go into the woods because that's the access point to the trolley trail right there.
I mean to be honest, I mean I understand what the applicant is saying but again this site plan is showing the road to be
constructed all the way in to the point where they're showing it to end so and again
And then what if what if what if it does get sold with a property gets sold and then you know there's no guarantee that that future sidewalk work will occur.
So I think it's very important that we ensure that if we're building that road section and the site plan is showing us building that road section that sidewalks are constructed at the same time that road is constructed.
But I remind you, this is not a public road, this is a private road, and you also have
site plan approval in order to, is your hammer in order to build the, I mean we'll be glad
to put the, the pressure in for the handicap ramps, but I need some to the planning commission,
you know typically I would rather wait till we
have a user and know where the site
walks supposed to go but what's the benefit of it being a private road?
Well we
can't make it a public because if we do it right away goodwill becomes an
on-conforming structure to the setbacks where the property line is so we do have
issue. And I don't think we really want to all of a sudden make a brand new building and not
to conform the structure right off the bat. So you pinched between goodwill and the wetlands.
Yeah, I don't know whether it sound really wants to maintain a road. I don't know whether the
public works department really wants to maintain a 35 foot road to one user in the back.
back.
How wide is Thermont Boulevard? Do we know? I don't know off the top of my head.
I have to measure it. It is a 50 foot right of way, at least. It might be even 60 foot
there.
Right now people are parking on that road to get to good well. So if you have tracked
trailers, Thermont Boulevard 40 feet wide.
My issue is, you know, we do a great job of bringing
the tractor trailers into town but then leaving that intersection it's it's not so great so and there's
really no way to improve that there's nowhere for that other lane to go other than
taking parking away from McDonald's or Goodwill or KFC which I don't think we want to do
do you know you know you guys that I'm talking about that's why I asked about the tractor trailer
there. People are parking on Thermal of Art. I don't know why. Let me discuss that later.
That's a big topic. I mean, we need to discuss it now because it's part of it's going to impact
this project. If you've tracked a trailer's trying to turn out and you've got cars parked there,
that's a competing interest. It's not safe. And then who will enforce people parking and
constructing like what if people park they want to they want to go to trolley trail and they park
in your road are you going to have no towing like you know no parking no towing if that happens
probably that's a question for the applicant but I would if it becomes a problem I would think
the no parking signs as mentioned the staff report would be an appropriate solution for that and
can
Can I ask a silly question?
I think we kind of talked about during the concept, but why the road here and not off
of the main road, where you already have the tractor trailer traffic?
We don't have access.
Here comes this ricklee.
He has something to say.
Good evening, Craig McLean from Mountain Gate.
So, you got a couple of questions.
one is the town really doesn't want truck traffic on Frederick Road and their goal
is to get the truck traffic to come out this entrance. The owner of the
snooker is got his property for sale that could be a possibility but he's not
going to spend a month but you're worried about the parking not that I want to go
all the way back but I want to turn goodwill around the other way and have the
parking and then you wouldn't have that parking along the street because the
in front of the store had been facing north.
But now it's facing that way, so you park along the street
and use that sidewalk that you guys want.
You want a sidewalk, so hey, there's a sidewalk there.
It looks like you're supposed to park from there.
But really, you're right.
There's another entrance off of Frederick Road.
The idea of this is to get traffic off of Frederick Road
and get them to use this and to kind of slow down
the traffic on Frederick Road.
That's the idea of the boulevard.
that's the idea, everything trying to get less traffic on the Frederick Road, which for
me is a double-edged sword because I've got a lot of commercial businesses up that way.
So, I really don't want traffic off of Frederick Road, but I can see why the tab would want
traffic off of Frederick Road. So, that's the idea.
Okay.
You've been in your questions from Mr. McLean.
And
you can't share future use, like what, what were that?
Well, the original user kind of went dark and I wasn't, I signed a confidential
agreement with them and they, they, so I can't repeat that.
We have another user looking at it for doing, you know, like a family center, you know,
get a car track maybe or something and we have another user that's probably just
using for parking so it's nothing nothing extreme but again it's like Bill
says that'll come to planning and zoning and you guys will be able to you know
have your comments there and say yeah or an air but you'd like to see with the
future sidewalk I understand what Kelly's saying and understand it needs to be on
the plan but you know you could have a user back there in six months you could have a user back
there in six years six years that sidewalk is not going to be any it's going to be all busted up
and you're really going to not serve the purpose so you know at the end of the day you know we're
trying to do something nice and bills right it's just a sidewalk going to nowhere so really we're
We're only going to black top here, and then we're going to barricade this off.
So we're barricading the road off, so you can't go back there.
You can't really barricade a sidewalk off.
But, you know, I understand Kelly's concern.
Is that something that could be incorporated in an agreement that at the time of development for the second phase of that, that the sidewalk would be expanded?
unless you're going to record something like that in land records I don't
recommend it because finding these things again in the future is fraught with
peril.
But again when the site when the site playing comes you can make that a
condition but they can't they can't develop that without finishing
You guys have all the teeth. But you're selling that so you might not be the same applicant for one that comes up, right? That's true.
I think that's that's the issue. If we know you were sticking around, it doesn't seem that way.
I just think about as long as I can, and Madam Chair, remember, whoever owns the property
doesn't make any difference.
They have to come before you for site plan, no matter what, you are the final authority.
We can build a sidewalk to know where, you know, that's fine, but whoever owns that property
for wherever use is going back there has to come before you for site plan.
And at that time, you know, pull the plan out, hey, it shows this future, I don't even
call it base two if you don't like the word future, you know, to be constructed with the
use on the remainder of the property.
Maybe that's the compromise, you know, to be specific.
That is not beyond the future of the site plan, but it has to be constructed with the site
to play on use, you know, or whoever the user is.
And I'll be glad to put that on the plane.
If that makes it more, more powderable.
So you're going to barricade this part
until the development for whomever occurs,
so that there's no other loophole around
from the other adjacent property to get back in there
at this time.
No, it's blocked off as well.
OK.
I don't hang out back there, so it wasn't quite sure.
How do you guys, what do you guys feel about the sidewalk?
Those signs are good on me.
I mean this over here carries this point.
So we're willing to put in ADA curbing as they lay it up.
Sidewalks, square counts.
The curbings are just stays.
You're not, what's happening?
The roadway in the curbing.
It actually has an ADA, you know, like the space.
Here and, I assume that's at both points of contact.
Well, those are already there, but this is the good one.
I understand.
Yeah.
This is a giant there.
We've put the depressed curves.
I see over here.
I'm never mind.
I'm a good little guy.
That is already over there.
Yeah.
That's already existing.
So they'll be turning into things.
Oh, okay.
So this is what I'm talking about.
No, this is here.
Man enough.
This is something.
That's a question. Kelly, can you put the purple blob slide up?
It's a great one. There you go.
There's a red blob.
See, it goes right up.
That's right.
Greg,
what do you think about the sidewalk?
The
reason for it is right. We can force the new tenant when they come in to put something in place.
if it's going to be a bunch of years, that sidewalks is going to get beat.
What is legal's recommendation to articulate that for the recreation of that easement
or of the property to ensure that that does happen?
Well, you would have to have future sidewalk required for subsequent development on the
flat.
So we can add that as a condition of approval for this. Correct. Correct.
24 can be updated.
The
applicant, you don't have any, you don't foresee any issues with
the tractor trailers turning out and having a clear path onto the Thermal of Art. When
you have traffic coming out of Weiss as well, you don't, and you've got people coming in to
the good will there. So you've got three different access points right there and then you also have
the pedestrian crossing from the trail. It is I'll be honest with you it is tight going out
making the right hand turn and the reason it's tight is the radius is only 25 foot and we can't
enlarge that because the town has a storm drain structure right at the fillet of the curb return.
So that's why we have the 35 foot roadway and the center line that
tractor trailer is going to be right on that center line in order to make that
turn.
But he's able to do it. Stay on the right and stay on the center line of
Thermon Boulevard.
He's going to go straight out and make one of those hard hard
but it's doable. It's not the best situation.
I mean, the remountable of our roll, the curb radius
should have been at least 30, 35 feet
for a road of that classification.
Because this is a private road,
you can't put a stop sign
when you're coming off this private road
and making a right on the the remountable of our,
is that correct?
You can make a condition of your approval.
Absolutely.
I know legally you can put a stop sign where it's a private access room.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
There's a public safety issue for sure.
Okay.
Yeah.
We have a stop sign.
And they do have it on the other side.
It's kind of hard to see on the little ones here.
Yeah.
It's on there.
Okay.
And then the pedestrian crossing from the trolley trail coming out with the tractor trailer
or in just vehicular access,
how are we directing them through this intersection?
Good, we're not a truck stop.
We're gonna have...
If you're a family fund center,
that could, that could attract a lot of traffic
on that intersection.
But not tractor trailers.
Yeah, you could, you could ask the applicant
to put a crosswalk across that intersection.
If you would like to have them do that, you know, the trail does come up and end there
at the Roadstub and lead you to the existing sidewalk that is currently there.
So, I mean, you could potentially ask the applicant to put a crosswalk across there to
protect pedestrians.
Sorry, I haven't asked a liaison.
Do you have the temporary liaison, do you have anything, any questions at this time for
of the applicant or staff or us?
Not really.
My only thought was, and I believe it was pretty much answered why this wasn't accessed
on the area where the trucks go in and out of the Sonoco property.
That's tractor trailers all the time in and out of there, and I don't understand why we
had to put an additional roadway in, but it makes a little more sense, Mr. McLeif explained
a little better and, you know, to try to keep track traffic all front will further
grow, I guess, is the answer. But I still think that would have been a better fit for
that property than what the plan is. Just my opinion.
But we don't have access to that property. We don't have legal access through there.
And that wasn't at your fault. You did try to work it out with that property owner,
correct?
Well, I let Mr. McCleef speak about that so that's not true. I have legal access. I can get legal access, but again, we're trying to get traffic off of Frederick Road and on the Thermal Boulevard to the light because all the traffic would come out there. There's no light and then they'd have to come out the intersection of cars, trucks, whatever you come down here, you come on the Thermal Boulevard and you come out to the light.
So the whole idea was to get traffic off of the program.
Yeah, no, I understand what you're saying.
All right.
Gentlemen, what's your pleasure?
If you have any other questions for the applicant.
Staff.
All right.
If there's no additional comments or questions,
I'll open the floor.
Do we want to make a motion? Do we have a motion?
Public comment?
Oh, sorry.
Did you get the sign-on sheet for that?
I did not.
Yeah.
Yep.
Oh.
Early A's on is going to bring it to you.
They're not here for that.
Okay.
Hold it.
Thank you.
I should really just ask, is there anyone here on the sign-in sheet that's here to speak about
this particular project?
Is there anybody that would like to give comment on this project going
once, twice?
Okay, seeing that there is no public comment, I will open the floor to accept a motion.
Did we agree on the sidewalk before we make that motion?
It's going to change the wording.
Right, I think so.
As long as it can be reported.
Recorded from that.
It has to be part of the future site plan.
Right, and is there specific language other than just on the plat?
on the plaque.
There's nowhere else to put it at the stage of the game.
But any specific wording that should be on there?
Just a future sidewalk connection required, combined with laws and effects at the time.
Basically, it's what it's going to say. I mean, keeping in mind, you know,
the requirements of your master plan as well, which actually says that will
have sidewalks everywhere you can put them and this is your opportunity to
require it because what we don't want to have happen is for somebody else to
buy parcel number two and say well we're going to come in off of a public
street and that's not our problem keep that in mind.
And did you decide whether you
wanted a crosswalk across the access room from the trolley trail the other side? I
we should add that requirement.
So there'll be nine conditions of approval.
Good you're going to modify number four. Yes. Okay.
Bless you.
Oh, you want motion? Okay. Yeah. Okay.
It's been a while since I did this. I forget what I was supposed to say. Make a motion to
recommend conditional approval of the
Mountain Gate Business Park Access Road
CP1-PP-205-01 as listed.
Do I need to read through all the items?
Yes.
Yes, you do.
Okay.
As follows.
One, Maryland Department of Environment,
Permit Approval.
two, Frederick County Stormwater Management Plan approval,
three, Frederick County Erosion and Sediment Control Plan approval,
four, all sidewalks should be shown in the same gray gradient
and the words, future sidewalk, I'm
already.
You had a word for it, ma'am.
Future sidewalk required, thank you.
Yeah, I think that the other thing,
Yeah,
I'm just concerned about the whole coming in from another direction on the second
parcel to be developed in the future.
And imposing a requirement on a road that they don't need.
That concerns me.
Can we overrule our own recommendation from this?
You can start over.
Right.
That's right.
We just started over at that point.
That way it's on there and we can erase it later if we need to.
No, I think you're suggesting doing it now?
Yeah, I'm just that the issue the the concern that I have is
If you want the sidewalk in the future, but it's not a this is a private road
owned by two other
property owners
How are you going to impose that requirement on somebody new to the table?
That doesn't have a right of access to that public road
That is my concern
But this will be so worth a plus because it's this word is being built to access both of those
sides.
Right.
I was going to say is it being re-plated to this
All of it. Correct. Correct. So the deed is not there to do a subdivision plat at this point. It is just for the access road construction. When they get to the development of that site, then yes, we would recommend that subdivision be occurred. Subdivision plat would occur. Simul
simultaneously with the site plan for the development of that site.
Well, then maybe that's the thing to do to say that it's a requirement of subdivision approval on part two.
Yeah, I think that we can hope we have legal grounds with that because I mean, currently, if there's a transfer of ownership,
who would maintain who would end up with this road is the question.
So, because the which is another reason we need the easement right because you don't want to wind up with
a recorded flat and no easement document.
So you said it should say a future sidewalk required as part of some division approval period or you had some
additional language earlier complying with future laws of effect. I would add that to. Okay, but it's quite by definition it will have to.
But it doesn't hurt to put it in but you know when the whatever somebody develops property
you have an obligation to comply with hitting upon the face you know current requirements.
So an ADA sidewalk things change over time as we all know and they get bigger typically
they don't get smaller so I think that that doesn't hurt to add.
okay but one one second for point of clarity so that particular item doesn't say
anything about an easement though it just talks about the sidewalks no that's
one of your other conditions okay yeah just point of order just making sure there
were I think we have got that one okay proceed do I start all the way at the beginning
I think I picked up a number four.
Yes.
Well, let's start over.
It's up to you.
Does the motion have to die before we restart it?
Well, we technically took discussion out of order.
Typically, the motion is made and then there's discussion.
And then the motion can die.
So we didn't quite exactly do this,
according to Robert's rules.
Okay, start over.
Okay, make a motion for conditional approval of the preliminary site plan for C1-PP-2025-01.
Mountain Gate Business Park, Thermal Business Park Access Road, situated east of Goodwill.
The items are one, Maryland Department of Environmental Permit Approval, two, Frederick County Stormwater
management plan approval, three, Frederick County erosion and sediment control plan approval,
four, all sidewalks should be shown on the same gray gradient and the words futures sidewalk
required as part of subdivision approval, complying with future laws in effect.
Okay, five, temporary construction easement must be obtained from the town of Thurmont,
6, access management agreement established between Goodwill Property and the applicant's property which shall be reviewed by the town attorney to ensure that each property owner is responsible for their fair share of road maintenance.
7, a separate plan sheet or in addition to an existing plan sheet to show the tractor trailers can easily maneuver the access road.
8, minor plan edits, a, add north arrow to the site plan, b, the seal and signature
of a registered Maryland land surveyor, and or the seal and signature of licensed engineer
or landscape architect must be added to the site plan, only on sheets 7 and 8, item
c, appropriate signature blocks should be provided on all sheets of the site plan, 4 of the
Administrative sign for the town, missing on sheet two.
And the new item nine, add crosswalk from trolley trail across access road.
Okay, I have a motion on the floor for conditional approval for preliminary site plan C1-PP-2025-01-mountain gate business park with nine conditions.
Do I have a second?
I'll second the motion.
Any discussion?
All those in favor? Please raise your right hand.
Thank you. Motion carries.
Thank you.
All right. Next item on the agenda is the public hearing. Annication petition AX-CP-2024-01,
one, Simmer's property, 304 apples church road.
As Kelly stated earlier, we will be starting over.
Kelly will be reading us for a lovely note yet again.
Kelly?
Let's
see the right slides here.
Bless you.
Okay, I'm just gonna read the exact same thing.
I read previously for the purpose
of our public hearings tonight.
So the petition for annexation, application,
it has but it was submitted completely
and all the feeds were paid. The application was provided to the Board of Commissioners
at their December or 2024 meeting at which time they delegated it to you the Planning and
Zoning Commission for the Code. The applicant is here tonight, adjoining properties have been
notified via certified mail, advertised in the Frederick News Post and the property was posted.
As
previously stated, the petition for the Simmer's property along Appleschurch Road is located
at the corner where Appleschurch Road intersects with Roddy Road and Isler Road. This is the
same property that was the subject of the 2022 annexation resolution that went to a
referendum vote and was denied. Tonight's Planning and Zoning Commission wanted to discuss
the proposal after workshop, which they already have, as well as here from town residents.
During this public hearing, the Planning Commission can also act with the applicants,
ask questions of staff, ask questions of the applicant, as well as here public comment.
The town's code regulates how annexations are processed.
This is located in section 3.3 in the zoning ordinance.
Anxations are regulated by the state of Maryland's local government article as well as the
town's code.
The article indicates that if a complete annexation petition application is submitted
to the town commissioners, they must review it.
They cannot just outright deny it.
In the town's code, it specifically indicates that the board of commissioners must delegate
a review of the petition to the Planning and Zoning Commission.
The Planning and Zoning Commission is charged with developing a written recommendation to the Board of Commissioners,
and they serve in an advisory capacity on annexations.
They don't make the decision.
The Board of Commissioners holds a public hearing before making their decisions.
They are the sole decision makers on annexations.
The planning and zoning commission has several items they must report on to the board of commissioners.
The degree of conformance with the Thermot master plan in general and specifically in regards
to the Thermot municipal growth element in the master plan.
They must report on the availability of public facilities and services to meet the demands
of the proposed development.
They must report on the viability and practicality of public improvement plans for utilities
and services for the post-development.
They must also address if the annexation proposal should be approved or denied as well
as any conditions of approval if they so choose to make that recommendation.
Review of the concept plan per the town code on concept plans which is located in 3.1.4
of the zone ordinance, as well as the proposed zoning district.
They must also report on how the annexation proposal impacts the planning and timing
of infrastructure, and they must report on what the zoning classification of the property
should be upon annexation.
The concept plan will be held to the regulations of concept plans in the town code.
Thermaltz annexation process is unique from other municipalities, and that it requires
an detailed concept plan, as you can see here.
A lot of other municipalities just have a very amoeba-like concept that processes with
an annexation plan.
So we really get into the NITS with planning here.
So the concept plan associated with any project tends to go through multiple
reiterations where recommendations are made and the applicant addresses those by
amending their concept plan. And they have done that here tonight so you have a
different rendering than what we saw in January. This can create multiple
versions of the plan so that it should be expected at this point and through the
review process. And it can even change after you all make your recommendation. It can
change with the mayor and commissioners during their review process and negotiation process.
The concept plan is a binding agreement between the developer and the town. As a matter of
fact, if an annexation is approved, the applicant must still submit to the town to you the planning
and zoning commission and a subdivision plaque and a site plans review. So you'll get even
more into the details of those plans in the future if everything aligns.
And any plan submitted must be in compliance with the approved annexation concept plan.
The property currently has a portion within town limits and a larger portion that is located
outside of town limits.
The cart within town is approximately 7.79 acres that is currently zoned to our five high
density residential.
It allows for a maximum density of approximately 10 dwellings per acre.
The larger part of the parcel was located outside of the town, municipal boundary and
is directly attached to the town.
The county portion of the parcel is over 16 acres in size and is zone agriculture in the
county.
The proposed zoning for the property is R5, which is the zoning category recommended in the
master plan and you can see that on the map there in front of you are
zoning map as well as the growth area map.
One of the key elements is adequate
public facilities and that you must address in your review process and comments to
the mayor commissioners. One, an impact or traffic impact study must be done
and of course the applicant has acknowledged that and is intending to allow that
to occur. Water capacity is available there will be a need for some system upgrades and obviously
infrastructure will have to be extended into the site at the developer's expense. The sewer
capacity is available but there will also need to be certain upgrades to the existing pump station
and obviously the infrastructure will have to be extended into the site again at the developer's
costs and the developer also have to install sanitary sewer grinder pumps for the assisted
living facility that's proposed. According to Frederick County Public Schools quarterly
report schools are operating below capacity and it is expected to remain below capacity
for the next ten years. Electric service from the town is available to serve the community
And it would be served via Isla Road, and require electric system upgrades and lines would also have to be extended
extended into the site at the developer's cost.
Emergency services have provided comments, which you all have, and the items of concern were roadwayed with.
No parking along the streets except for where parallel bump-outs are provided.
full street connection to Luther Drive, rather than just an emergency access, only connection.
And the assisted living facility will also produce additional stress on the already stressed ambulance company.
As previously stated, the property is in the town's growth area of the master plan.
And the applicant is proposing an R5 zoning, which, again, is compliant with the master plan.
That's it.
Any questions for Kelly?
Okay.
We'll invite the applicant up.
Madam Chairman, I'm Daniel Cross, Cross and Company and Frederick Merrill on the contract
purchase or the parcel.
I would like to do a quick summation, but I'm actually much more interested in hearing the
public comments. This is
Good evening, and being able to respond to them, then giving you the same briefing I've given on a couple of occasions. What I would point out is we believe we are responding to the citizens overturning the last annexation request that the then planning commission approved and that the then board of commissioners approved. What we believe we heard was that we had too high a density, even though we followed instruction to that level of density. And our building style of
the condominium apartment buildings
was not considered appropriate for Thermite.
What we've come back with is 11 single family homes
on the west side of the site,
abutting the single family homes
that are on Apple's church road
or that are in pleasant acres
so that if you're in a single family home
out there today and you look at your window,
you see a similar house type to what you have.
We placed the senior living primary bedroom
on the ground floor senior living villa townhouses on the uphill section of budding Albert
Courts age 55 next to intended senior living and we placed the family townhouses, I have
to be careful as a broker, I can't say family, the open market townhouses on the downhill
site and I provided during our work session part of our rationale as far as reducing the
vertical size.
As said during the work session, the concept 2 version 2 that you have up is because we've
gone to 60 foot road right-of-ways, not yet a requirement of the town, but anticipating
that that might happen.
And we are providing for storm order for our community at the bottom of the hill, frankly
where it has always been shown in all the concept plans that go back to Albert courts in the
early 90s and we are providing a possible solution for Albert Court's current storm
motor management issues at the top of the hill. I stand ready for questions.
I've got one about the you keep saying about the 55 plus are you going to
designate homes to only be 55 plus in this community? No, they're just going to
be designed that way. They're designed to that accord but you know there may be
younger people who want a bedroom on the ground floor with a primary bathroom
and 36-inch stores and a no-zero threshold shower.
I looked at your May-a-states a few times.
Would you do you think it's appropriate
that we've finished a conversation about this
from one of my management?
That would be the workshop.
We didn't really ask questions of it.
Do you want to do that first?
I don't.
Personally, I have any questions.
Do that after the comments.
I do.
You do comments.
Okay.
But the folks have waited a long time.
Okay.
Yeah, exactly.
All right.
Okay.
So we're going to go into public comment.
We're going to go right down the list, so when I call your name, please come to the podium.
Bernadette Wright,
Mary Crutchley,
Daniel Cross, David Fogel,
please state your name
if you live in town, and if you've been sworn in, please.
David Fogel, I have a 121 mortistry.
I asked the question about back up after this one, two or three years from now.
If the bill is going to dry out there because that house development, are you guys coming
back to replacing the bills?
A point-of-order, sir, make sure that you please address all of your questions and concerns
directly to the commission.
The applicant, he will come back and answer, but just make sure that you're posing the
questions to the commission and to staff, please.
I just asked about the wells, if the wells go straight out there because of the development,
they're going to come back and drill us a new well, or as a town people might have paid
for a new well and so, and another thing, who's going to take care of all the streets and
stuff out there once they move out, is that going to be up to the town, or is that going
to be up to the development out there, have some like repaced black tops and the sidewalks
and stuff that they get?
Are you talking about the existing development that's already there?
But for Albert's court, is that what's called the currently?
No.
I mean, the townhouses under the condos.
Yeah, that's all part of Albert's court.
Okay, so your concern is the existing Albert courts?
I'm talking about the development you're putting in here.
So you're talking about the new development.
Those are going to be public streets.
So the town would be maintaining those the town can't handle what they got now. How they got a handle note of element
That's a lot of people out there
You come up right right now sometimes in the evening. It's back back the clean down past town
Fork you're talking about not a two hundred quarters in the town limits
That's all I thank you, sir.
Renee Freely
Rocky Freely
a question about the lawsuit.
You're suing the residents for something.
Sir, a point of order.
Yeah.
You please address all of your questions
to concerns to the commission and staff.
OK, this is a question too, Daniel, though.
He is sued the residents of Thermont for $75,000 a piece
for something they didn't do.
They can't control.
And they couldn't even fix it if they tried.
What is the goal with that?
Thank you, sir.
He's not going to answer that.
No, he's not going to.
This isn't a Q&A.
This is public comment.
I do want to make another comment and he's one of these people is my daughter and basically
your holder hostage so my patients with you is just about expired.
Okay.
Alicia Kuchinski.
Oh, my name is Alicia Kuchinski.
I'm a resident, and I have been sworn in.
I'm part of that 800 pound gorilla that was mentioned earlier in the workshop.
And the 800 pound gorilla isn't the rainwater, it's what Mr. Freely talked about.
It is the lawsuit and I so appreciate your time and your attention to detail but at this
point in time it's null and void.
How can you give a recommendation when so many people are being sued including the town
and including the county?
I spoke about this before about it being biased so if there's a movement that you need to
make. I have two dates for you that should be when you can make that. So next week, April
3rd, we have a mediation. If that is not settled during our mediation with everything,
our next date is June of 2026, and that is our trial. That's the point, if it goes to
that, that maybe then you can look to making a recommendation. Because the first thing
and this is on a broader context.
I'm looking at precedent here.
It is anyone's legal right to bring a lawsuit.
It just, it is.
And you know what, summer justifiable and summer legitimate
and summer frivolous and a tool of manipulation.
And that is not up to you to decide.
That is up to the legal courts to decide.
And until that's decided, you can't make a decision
because it is bias and it is inherently everything is clouded and that's not fair
to you for what you have to do. So I think at this point it needs to be clear to
any developer that comes along that filing maybe a frivolous lawsuit will not
get them what they want because if you still allow a recommendation to be
We made when things are not fully settled, it is open season on anyone, including the town again, including the county and including individual members of this community, who, as Mr. Frailey just said, have no control over the situation.
Personally, the second reason is, it's funny that Mr. Frailey said the term hostage, because that's exactly what I have written down.
I am stuck in this until 2026 and I'm already looking at that point because I cannot guarantee
that I can be out of this by next month.
I am a hostage here and I do not think it is fair and it is definitely not just that
crossing company and patricious simmers can in the meantime while I'm being held hostage
benefit from a situation that they created. It is neither fair and it is neither
just.
So with that, I don't know if I can refer to what was said earlier during
the workshop, am I allowed to address that, or is that all?
No, you can make a public comment. Okay. So one of the things that I just thought was
interesting. We keep talking about assistant living and wider areas because most people
in assistant living may need help getting out and that's great. And I love the idea
of a multi-generational, but the idea that a grandparent who is also an assistant living
can take care of younger kids doesn't really, it's not, it doesn't balance out.
The other thing is I understand a lot about Frederick County.
I've been a teacher at Frederick County for 28 years now.
And I was at Thermont Middle School as an eighth grade language arts teacher for 20 of those
years.
And there were times we were below capacity, and I still had 120 kids because just because
you have just because the space is there, it doesn't mean the educators are.
And I know that, and there are some of you on this board that know that as well.
So I just think that even though we're saying, oh there's the space, there's the, it's,
the numbers aren't practical for what actually happens.
So thank you again.
I appreciate your time, and I appreciate your effort.
But I will reiterate that it needs to be delayed until everybody is off.
Or this total legal situation is completed and finished.
And if that's 2026, that's 2026.
If I'm in it, they will be two.
Thank you.
I'm
Earl Maine resident off of Cody Drive and I've been sworn in.
Z-Wiz, I haven't got much to say now.
I'm going to dress up and it's a little minor compared to what just was said.
And mainly it's the, I can't speak too much for easy street, but it might be the same.
But Luther Drive, you currently cannot get two cars to pass.
on Luther Drive because there's parking on both sides of the street. If this is
extended through as a non, you know, as an actual street and not in emergency
access, there's going to be issues that you're going to have to deal with on the
town side going in. You're going to have to make it parking on only one side in
in order to get two guards to pass,
especially if you have parking on both sides,
and you do have emergency vehicles
that need to through that access,
you're not gonna get them through.
So it becomes a safety issue.
That's about all I got.
Thanks a lot.
Thank you.
Dan Twig.
Hello, my name's Dan Twig.
I am not a resident, but I'm a property owner
of the Albrecht Court II Condo Development,
and I have been sworn in. I have a couple of things I just want to just hit on it. I've already
been talked about in the preliminary traffic. I think Mr. Maine just he indicated very well that this
access to the development of a Luther is definitely not wide enough for traffic flow with cars
park on either side. He's absolutely right. Compounded that is Easy Street is
worse. It is not as wide as Luther. So Easy Street is even tighter and you're
only getting one car with cars parked on either side of Easy Street, which
there is, along the townhouses here and street parking here, you can only pass
one car. Now my concern is with this proposed development concept, if you
If you look at a broader picture, easy street of a North Carol extended would become a main
access point into the development.
Because people aren't going to want to go down Apple's Church to that entrance or most
traffic is not going to come off the Gracie and Apple's Church access road to access it there.
The North Carroll Street extension becomes the main access point because it's
closer to the assisted living facility. It's the best access the
So, you're accessing most points off of the easy street extension which becomes the main access in and out of that development which is the worst entrance to access the development. That's the main point. The second point is nobody's really addressing. We've talked about all of the intersections on Carroll Street and Apple's Church and Main Street all those intersections and the traffic impact of those intersections.
But what nobody is looking at is if that is true and traffic is truly impacted in all those intersections,
people are going to start looking for another access point or another easy and easy out.
My fear is that people start to go down here and they want to access the Apple's Church Graceham road,
which runs from there to Graceham intersection, which is a horrible intersection,
section you cannot see when you get to that great state of
intersection you cannot see going east. It's a blind
intersection but what people are going to want to do is they're
going to want to find an easier way to get to Walker'sville
Woodsburg Frederick. That becomes a very easy access point to
points south and east without with avoiding all the traffic
congestion that may be created in town. They're going to look
for an easier route. Grey's hand road is not. It's not. Basically designed for that
kind of traffic. I don't even think it's straight. I don't know. I don't even think it's
straight. Definitely not. It's very dangerous. So traffic is definitely still a main concern
for the approval of this concept plan. I don't think we've even touched on some of the
line areas of traffic we haven't even looked at or what could potentially become a problem.
But the other thing that Mr. Cross and his team have not even really talked about is
this is not a short-term project.
So they're talking about the impact of traffic and the traffic studies of traffic now.
But we've addressed this before, nobody's talking about the impact of the construction workers,
the construction vehicles, the equipment, the hauling in and out of materials that's going
to add to the construction to the traffic problems during the whole project.
This is not a one year or two year.
We're talking about a long term project, so the construction impact to traffic is going
to be huge.
You're talking about tractor trailers, big equipment, a lot of workers, a lot of just workers that
they're going to be also added to that traffic study.
They never even put that into the traffic study.
It was never mentioned, the impact of construction.
Now, and I'm chairman, so you hear question earlier.
I don't think you ever really got an answer.
I don't think Mr. Cross didn't understand the question.
He was just trying to avoid the question.
When you said, where can we go to see this type of development?
And he really didn't answer that.
Now as lawyer came up and said, there's
development of Frederick that has 600 and some units houses, whatever. But again, he
kind of avoided that question because it really isn't comparable to this. So where can
we go to see this? They really never answered that. I don't know. Where can you go to see
a site plan like this? They didn't really give us an answer to that. I will have to admit,
It, you know, Mr. Cross says he addressed this area right here along the county line
to the town line and that they eliminated the apartment complex that were built, that
were proposed in concept one to be put on top of this hill.
They did eliminate that and I appreciate him putting that thought into it.
It does eliminate those four story buildings, but the whole thought process behind that was
that's affordable housing. You addressed it. Where do we have affordable housing coming
into this development?
I understand that apartment buildings, you're not a property owner,
you're renting, so it doesn't offer some kind of affordable housing, yes, it does. But our
complaint was aesthetically from my house or from my condo, aesthetically, what would you see
from behind that, looking into that apartment building,
because that would be right in our next line of view
coming out, my window, the condo.
Aesthetically, that would not be pleasing at all.
Neither would it have been very aesthetically,
when you're looking from 15 or even out
to see that line of apartment buildings on top of that hill,
it's not what Thurman's about, if you ask me.
It's not what we represent, it's not what we want to represent.
That's what we want to look like.
This in its entirety is still a massive, massive,
dense development.
As he scaled it down from the original,
whatever it was, 170 some units to 100.
But is it now?
100?
Sure.
It is.
But you're still looking at a primary townhouse,
three-story home development.
now it has added the what he called the 11 single family homes again I
appreciate him doing that I did understand the concern of the people living
along Appleshurst Road we didn't want to see townhouses and three story
buildings right out our backyard now they're gonna see single family homes
there that wasn't compromised I appreciate him doing that but in the overall
concept of the whole plan it doesn't solve the issue of the mass development that
we're talking about putting in.
Now, going back to, as Mr. Cross eloquently put it,
the 800 pound gorilla in the room, my question is,
what he's telling us right now is this dorm water management
area for the Albert courts to and the Gateway community,
if he's allowed to put this in, then all of a sudden,
that becomes a non-issue problem solved.
It's taking care of. No more worries. If you allow me to do it. My question is, is if we say no right now,
what happens to that? Does that continue to go on into litigation from the town to the county, to the residents?
I mean, where does that end right now? He's kind of using that over our heads saying, oh no, you'll prove this and that goes away.
Hey, will they care that?
Will they care that?
That will become Albert Courts, too,
in the Gateway Community Store and Water Management
answer.
I'll agree with Ms. Consensi.
Don't hold that over my head.
Let's fix that first.
Let's resolve that first so that no matter what happens,
that isn't an issue with the town, with the county,
or the residents.
I mean, I don't understand.
I really don't understand how we could, like,
Ms. Consensi, how can we move forward
with that looming over our heads.
I don't understand.
The other issue is as far as we're concerned
that Mr. Crossbreed to my attention that the last meeting
that in a clause when this was originally,
when the easement was originally approved
and that stormwater management facility was agreed upon
with Miss Simmers, well, with Doc Simmers at the time, Kenneth
and the town and the county.
that that would be a complete stormwater management pond and upon completion that the maintenance
and care of that stormwater management facility would have been turned over to the Albert
Courts 2 community, Gateway Community and Albert Courts 2 condo association to maintain it.
Well as far as I know, that was never completed and it's entirely.
So, how can you hold that over the residents, the condo association, the gateway community?
How can you hold it over their heads to say, well, that has never been maintained?
The county hasn't been inspecting it.
How can we maintain something that was never completed?
It was never completed.
It was supposed to be an alternative plan.
Okay, this was a three year agreement.
we had a three-year agreement, you can use it, but there's going to either have to be
a provision that that becomes the permanent facility or another facility is developed
and completed and then turned over to the Albert Courts too in the community.
That was never done.
So once again, how can we hold the residents, the property owners, how can we hold them responsible,
How can we sue somebody that has no say in the maintenance or the care or the ongoing process of that stored modern management?
My recommendation to the committee is just like Ms. Cousinsi's head, we don't move forward with this until this whole 800 pound gorilla is resolved.
That would be my recommendations to you guys as the planning and zoning commission.
I'm sorry until we know the answer to this, not only now, but moving forward, if this
is or is not approved, where do we go with that storm water management?
I do want to make one other exception, he said about the hammock or hills development
and the price of housing up there and this is going to be much more affordable.
So I have yet to see a home on Handmaker Hills come anywhere close to $550,000.
I watch the real estate listings all the time.
They're here between $490,000, $50,000.
That's a lot of money, but I haven't seen anything come close to $550 up there.
And where he got the number that they're going to go to $590,000?
I have no idea.
Unless he knows a realtor that I don't know.
I know a lot of realtors in areas, nobody's told me they're going to shoot up to $600,000.
and also when he talks about the three-story townhomes I know my son has a
three-story townhome on Lake and Leckler there. Those three-story townhomes are
now 350, 360,000 that's realistic so that's the kind of prices that you're
talking about for this development with all these three-story townhomes that's
That's the price of houses, like it or not, that's a reality.
But I mean, I think you're attracting the right kind of people, I don't want to say
the wrong kind of people on the other end, but people that are responsible enough to purchase
a $360,000 home,
I think they're responsible enough to maintain and take care of a community.
So anyway, that's all I have to say.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you.
Matt, toll.
Keeney?
Sorry if I said your name wrong.
That's okay.
Happens all the time.
Good evening, everybody.
My name is Ruth Haney.
Yes, I'm a resident.
And yes, I did get sworn in.
I listened to your comments from 6 o'clock on, then scurried up here.
So what I have to say is also going to be given some feedback to what you all just said.
So it might be a big of a patchwork quilt and I'll try to make it come all together so that you'll understand it a little bit better.
I'm going to start out with something new. I'm giving an approach from a different angle.
I'm going to say thank you to someone.
I'm going to say thank you to each of you for the time that you've given.
I'm going to thank the staff over there, Kelly Doody.
I asked her if it was long time ago, Kelly.
I sent her an email and she immediately got back to me.
I appreciate that.
And I think that her purple blob slide is absolutely wonderful.
So keep it up.
I would request that if somehow you could make that be turned a little bit, because
I sat there and have not been able to see exactly where the people were pointing to.
I see the exit sign, which is over here, and if somehow you could get it so that everybody
could see it, that would be helpful.
Okay, now I said I would start with the good things.
I'm going to give a shout out to a commissioner, and he's not here tonight, but I want to do it.
And this commissioner said something in the March 4th meeting that he needs to be applauded for.
And I'm going to give you what he said, this was said in public, and I'm saying this is a resident.
This is what he said. Mr. Cross asked to meet with me privately. I have no intention
of meeting with the developer ever privately. It can be in a public meeting and that is
where business is done.
I want him to know how much I appreciate that. He did the right
Right thing for agreeing not to meet with Mr. Cross in a private setting concerning any
comments dealings with Zimmer's property because development and thermont requires transparency.
And this is what we're doing tonight and it is great.
So thank you.
I want to thank the chairperson for her insistence to continue to get the goodwill, so
local issue solved instead of waiting for another night. I thought that was
well done. Thank you. Now back to Zimmer's property. On the the Miss Meredith
with ask if what we have now would be interfered with some develop.
Yes, easy street, as other people are saying, cannot have two cars going out at the same time.
You've got to have one car going up. The same thing with Lucer. There is not space enough for two cars to be in that the same time. There is parking on the side.
And that goes to the comment made by someone, I don't know who it was, that there is the
ambulances, they are stretched enough as it is.
So if we try to get ambulances in those narrow streets, it might be a little dicey, and
I'm concerned with that.
I'm also concerned if we start to get those streets being used as another way to get around to the development,
that that alley that is behind the 117 building will become a racetrack.
We already have people who come there and do not pay any attention to,
This is private property. Please do not come. They come anyhow and that I think will increase.
I also wanted to add to the traffic study and the town planner was great with what you remembered.
There is, you do need to put in that traffic study at the easy street intersection of North
Carroll Street at the truck entrance to NVR.
You go down to that truck entrance and there is constant traffic.
That is why North Carroll Street is a pothole and if we have more construction that will get
worse.
So please think about that when you're doing that.
Let's see. I did that, did
that.
Now the questions that I had and looking at this were answered semi. I would
like for that 800 pound gorilla could get done to get cleared by 2026. I don't
think any of us won't go into litigation. That's not what we want. We want it to be
solved so that those people who are responsible get held responsible. We are
not responsible for that whole. We didn't dig it and we're not responsible for
taking care of it. So I don't want to go to litigation and I'm thinking it
else does. So please think about what Mr. Twig was saying and about what I've just said
and I appreciate what Alicia said but most of all I appreciate what you've done
and I hope that in a couple of months or maybe before 2026 this can be done with
and those people who want to sell, and by the way, there have been people who
have bought units there. They're not afraid of that lawsuit because they can
pay cash. You can still buy if you pay cash, but if you have to go through a
broker, then that's a different issue. Okay? So I hope that before 2026, that this
can be done with to everyone's willing to cooperate, but that means that you've got
to be transparent and you take responsibility for what you did.
Thank you.
James Clark.
I had Stanfield.
I've got a cold.
So I'm pretty croaky.
Probably contaminate the bike.
Ed Standfield, I'm not a resident, I'm from Middletown, I am a realtor, I'm a sort sworn
in.
I represent Miss Simmers as a listing agent, and so I feel very protective of her.
And her request is that if people could be a little more civil to her, whenever she goes
out. She really appreciated it. She said people don't try to shun her front yard. She said
people run across her lawn with cars and it may be kids. I don't know. She gets harassing phone
calls. She's not, she always checks to see who's calling now. When she goes out grocery shopping,
and she only states somebody with her
because of very uneasy on what somebody may say to her.
So her request, if he could be more considerate,
she's just trying to sell her ground
like she feels she should be able to.
That's one point.
The other point, from a realtor's point of view,
is you all know the prices of housing
is partly because of being scarce and it's a country we're a wide phenomena and we've
seen it in this area for many years now. It has not led up. Scaresty of housing causes
pricing to go up as you know, supply and demand.
Home based in Frederick, so I think people
coming out of Montgomery County can't afford that if you can't afford Frederick, I end up
in Thurmont, Myersville, Washington County, Pennsylvania,
and if you can't afford that, I'm over in West Virginia,
so I'm stepping around Bartonsburg.
I've sold a lot of houses here in Thurmont
over the years, and people love Thurmont.
It loved to settle here, comes down to affordability,
and subdivision like this would just help considerably
considerably on supply. The other thing I've seen change is first-time home buyers who
used to always be in their 20s now seem to be in their 30s because of affordability.
After wait longer, try to save longer. Meanwhile, save like a maniac. Meanwhile, the prices
keep going up. So I'm all for a subdivision like this. I understand concerns because I work
those sides by our Zant sellers affordable
or whatever you label to pick it on at least
it's not the really jacked up high price. The large percentage of people can't afford. The other
The point is youth make any community.
If you don't have youth coming up, whether it be housing,
churches, schools, or always a site of good things coming.
The comparative issue you always use is Cumberland.
I guess you all heard six months ago where they were given away $10,000
just to get people to move up there to go towards their closing cost.
And that's what happens to any of this, not growing, it's shrinking, it's not good.
Wild growth is one thing, but modern growth is much better, I think, you know, some
divisions like this, I think, will help along that.
And rather than trying to call them as simmers, if you want to call me out, I'll listen, as
I have in all these meetings, she's afraid to come to these meetings for
afraid that whatever.
You know, it's psychological.
Like the world's against you.
And I don't think that's true.
Thank you.
Craig is gone.
That is all who has signed up.
Is there anybody that is not on the sheet that would like to speak?
sort of start with the lady up here in the green and black shirt view with the ponytail
Please state your name if you're a resident and if you've been sworn in or not. I'm Christine Johnson
I am a resident. I live in abort courts. I am actually the homeowner's association vice president and I have not been sworn in
Please raise your right hand
Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the response is given in statements made in this hearing before the planning commission?
and will be the whole truth and nothing but the truth,
if so answer I do.
I do, thank you.
Hello.
OK, so I haven't, I was sick last morning,
so I couldn't come in.
Basically, first, I'm a single mom.
And it's very easy for people nowadays, most people
are divorced, or they don't stay married long.
And I mean, seriously, you can look it up.
But affording a house on my house,
I was I've been here four years only four years and I am hostage. I can't sell my house. I can't do
anything. I have to stay here because of this man because it's something that I have no control
over or didn't have any control over years ago.
Traffic. That's a huge issue for me. I've actually even
contacted the police station about how fast the truck drivers and people drive
through there and they can't even get down on my carol, down where NBR is where
I am. You can't get through. If a truck is coming through and they have all
of their construction stuff on there including, you know, to go down, one
car gets through. Even though that road is wide, they took out our mailbox and it
We took them, how many months?
Oh, it's just six months maybe, maybe even longer
to get it in.
It is ridiculous.
The amount of traffic we have on that already
because of the trucks.
There's got to be a different access point
if this is even to be considered.
You can't get down where are the people of the residents that
are in our townhouse is going to park down easy street
or Luther street.
There's room for one parking spot at our townhouses in our driveway.
If you are married or you do have people living with you, which a lot of us do, including
family or your kids, you know, my kids are 25 and 22 now, and you know, they have to
park on the street.
There's not enough parking for us alone for a four person family.
As your kids grow, you're going to have four cars.
Where are they going to park?
We're going to do it.
Are we going to, we can't widen it because we own that property.
You pull, I mean, unless you take out the sidewalks, which you can't do, you can't take
them out.
Secondly, I actually have contacted Maryland State about the traffic light here in town.
I don't know how many other people have, but I have been one of them.
They could not do anything about the traffic in the morning.
Okay, how many cars do we have down at that intersection?
It takes me 15 to 20 minutes to get out of town to get to 15, which is an exception.
The one down, the light over the square at the square, at the square.
So you have all these schools coming in, we barely, the truck drivers can't go down that
road as it is because they can't turn.
So you're going to add all this traffic to a, they won't, the state won't even change the lights.
They won't change. I was like, make it one direction, you know, out of time because people cannot turn.
You've got so many people going one way. People cannot turn another direction.
So you get stuck. I get stuck for like 15 minutes just to get to 15.
I don't want to have to go down all the way through town. I moved up here from Walker's Boat because I loved the area.
the one thing I hate is the traffic. I absolutely cannot stand it and that's why I
called. But they said that it would actually the timing of it or something it
would make it a lot worse, which to me I don't see how that's possible at this
point. But do you go adding a whole bunch of people to this town, you know, and then
the realtor that was here was just talking about modern growth. Okay, well what
about all these houses where people were not going to be in anymore because they're
leaving because they're old. They need to be renovated. We don't need modern
growth. We need to renovate the town. You guys are putting in what? How many
apartments are going on the square? Yeah, I mean, and not alone. That is
renovating. We need to make the town better. We need to renovate what's already
here and not add. My house is over $300,000 on a single income and mind you, I've
worked for the federal government in the National Cancer Institute. My
jobs on the line. How am I going to forward my house as one person? You know, it doesn't
make sense to me to put in something that is going to actually be more detrimental per
person, per this town. It might bring us money, but at the same time, you're going to lose
residents. As soon as this crap is over with, and we finally, hopefully, I mean, I can barely
afford what I have to pay my lawyer to get me out of this. I mean I'm paying two college bills
plus everything else. You've got people who, you know, are first-time home buyers in our association
who are struggling as it is. And that's on a $300,000 house with two incomes coming in. How are
We're going to put this many people in here and say, oh, it's growth. No, we need to fix what we already have. You go down the street, you see the houses, you see how they're, you know, they're not up kept as well as they could be. They're beautiful. Why not put that money towards something that is there? What are you going to do when this house is fall down? Is it going to be you go down the street? And we're going to just look at, you know, houses that are on the ground? I mean, it doesn't make sense to me. There was something else that I care.
I'm sorry but yeah I per me per whatever everything Alicia said you know we're
getting sued like four times you know I have the homeowners association that's
being sued that I have to put money out just for that I have to put money out
for me myself and I've only been here four years what are the heck am I being
held accountable for something I wasn't even I wasn't even alive probably but
this was built honestly I don't even know it's like to me and like Alicia said if we don't come
to some agreement or whatever come April 3rd we're stuck paying more to our lawyers we can lose
our houses our houses can be foreclosed because some of us might not have jobs our economy is screwed
right now this is not gonna help when people can't afford anything at the moment you go to the grocery
grocery store. You've got $200 worth of groceries. What you used to cost is a hundred. You know, I can't, I can't
reiterate enough that until this is over. And I mean, 2026 is a long ways away. That's over a year. It's like June. It's over a year and a
half away to have to keep paying our lawyer to deal with this company. Why? Why are we being held accountable and you guys are
being held accountable to and you're going to let this person come in and make
millions. Where's it going in your pockets because you guys have to put out
just as much as we do to fight him. Thank you.
Thank you.
Here's next sir. Please
state your name if you're a resident and if you've been sworn in or not.
Hello
Tyler Romero and resident of upper courts as well. I'm also not going to be
just to go on more information that we did not have last time.
Sorry, sorry, were you sworn in?
Sorry, yes.
Thank you.
More information than we had on January was mentioned
the medical services or the ambulances that we have available.
And so how they're really stressed out now already.
So I live because it numbers courts
and I have a direct view of Luther.
And I'm fortunate to work at home.
So I do see frequently ambulances go in
and out about the, like, over here, the, I guess,
elderly condominiums, and it's not in frequent.
It's probably, like, maybe once a week, maybe twice a week.
I mean, it's not, you know, emergencies where they're,
like, splaring, but they're picking up people
or moving people with the town's ambulances.
And so I can only imagine that's going to get, you know,
as more people that are involved with being
getting the ambulance services with, you know,
obviously way more houses.
But more importantly, with the assisted living,
It's going to be a lot of stress, not just like, you know, we talk about having, oh, there's
more communities being built around Thermont, you know, your average person doesn't need
the ambulance at all.
But as this is living, we'll need the ambulance quite often.
So I can only imagine that, you know, basically, I just wanted to make sure to reiterate that
they are very stressed, and it will be a lot more impact on our emergency services that, you
know, we already don't have the capacity for it.
Louise?
Okay.
So I'm Louise Schaefer.
I'm from Thermont, but I haven't been sworn in.
All right.
Raise your right hand.
Do you solemnly swear or firm that the response is given and statements made in the hearing before the planning commission will be the whole truth?
And nothing but the truth if so answer I do.
Thank you.
Okay.
I also am going to talk about the Easy Street and Luther Drive.
The density of the business traffic, employees, tractor trailers, delivery trucks, and
the single lane of traffic on Easy Street and Luther Drive.
Our community has traffic from 152 homes along with this commercial business traffic.
We don't need cohesiveness and connectivity.
We don't need interconnecting streets with another community.
and we don't want an emergency access gate only through drive.
These opening these streets is not essential to this development, so please understand
that we don't need more traffic in our community.
Also we currently have 116 homes in the pipeline.
This development would immediately add 100 homes, making a total of 216 new homes.
4 of the developments haven't broken ground, 3 of these developments are on the northern
side of town and may use some of the same roads as this development.
Luther Drive, Carroll Street, Woodside, Apple Search Road, and Euler Road are all the
streets and roads that support our courts and its new development.
This is a mixture of secondary roads, roads and streets that lack sidewalks and streets that
need major repairs such as carol street, which is our main artery into this community.
Emergency electric and water repairs are getting more frequent.
We have a major issue with PFAS in our water, and we are still in a drought situation that
may not get better.
A well that would serve this development has been taken offline because of PFAS contamination.
Planning is only, only looks at the development at one at a time and not the totality of
the developments. We have not had this amount of development in years so we truly don't know the
impact that this amount of growth will have on this community, our town, our services, and our
infrastructure. We are in uncharted times and now it's not the time for major growth,
let's take care of this town and the people who love it.
Planning and zoning checks off the basic
requirements for a development, but there are other boxes just as important. Our growth plan states
that the growth must look like it belongs in thermont.
It's supposed to support and advance
the character of the town.
And it's supposed to fit competitively
with its surroundings.
And provides a lasting benefit to the community,
including conservation of scenic views.
The growth plan also says that build out
of the growth area like the Simmer's annexation
would only occur in the distant future
beyond this master plan surrising of 2040.
We have a hundred homes.
A hundred homes is still an R5 dance community development.
This development would be three times the size of Hammaker Hills 1.
The majority of the Simmer's property is surrounded on two sides by rural land,
country roads, forest, Carol Street Park, and the historic apples church.
and another side has the modest one-story homes.
This large development of townhouses
is not compatible with the majority of this rounding area.
The residents of this town have already shown
that they care about what happens to this property.
This is not the time for growth
and I'm against the annexation and this development.
Thank you.
Is there anybody else that hasn't spoken
that would like to speak?
Ma'am, please state your name if you're a resident
and if you've been sworn in.
I'm Judy Miller, resident of Thurmond,
and I have been sworn in.
And I gave you all a whole speech last time,
so I won't go into it.
But I do not feel that the town of Thurmond
or you guys as planning and zoning
should be able to make a decision until after this court case.
This court case is holding us hostages.
He wants to talk about family communities, buildings.
He's holding families' hostages that they cannot take care of their elderly family members because we cannot sell our houses.
So until he decides that he's going to drop the case or the case goes before the courts, you all cannot make a decision.
And if that is January 13th of 2026, that's what it is.
Thank you.
Anybody else for public comment do you state your name if you're a resident if you're sworn in
James Miller. Yes, I've been sworn in. I am a resident
We owned a house over there for
15 years and the house is close enough for for us to be sued
But it's not close enough for us to get a letter saying about tonight
And that kind of crazy
So what I'm here, we are, my wife and I are 30 and 31, we're being sued separately, okay?
It's not like the conduits.
Yes, the conduits can sell because they're, he's suing the association, he's not
suing the individual person, he's suing my wife and I individually.
So we have to be representative two times.
The house was originally sold in September.
We talked to J. Day in April. The house had a five-month lease on it. It was supposed to be sold in September.
We were served in July. So we are stuck until this is straight down.
We can't solve the problem. I mean he's even saying that the pond is not moving.
And he don't say he's going to fix the pond with the development.
He said, possibility it could be worked into a solution, right?
So what he said, a solution.
He didn't say he's going to fix it.
I put him in.
And the ponds are not moving.
The ponds stay in and the same spot it is now.
I can't get it.
I can't prove this, but I was told, okay, that when the pond was put in,
there was a house built for Mrs. Simmons along that street.
That's why I was told.
If that's true or not, I don't know.
But that's what I was told years ago.
If you are going to prove something,
it needs to be there should not be a lawsuit tied into it.
That's all I'm saying.
We're being sued four times, our association,
the county, the state, and then my wife and I are individual.
So, you know, that's basically what I have to say.
Thank you.
Anybody else for public comment?
Last call.
Anybody for public comment?
On the summer's annexation.
Go ahead and close public comment.
Excuse me.
Do you want me to read the two that we received?
Yes.
Okay.
They're not anonymous, right?
No, neither one is anonymous.
So we received earlier this week a letter to the Planning and Zoning Commission and I'm
going to read it.
It comes from 117 Easy Street, deer planning and zoning folks, RE cross and company application
for annexation of Simmer's property.
This is to express our opposition to the annexation of said property.
The reasons are many, but no need to state them here.
Respectfully submitted, Larry and Donna Ebby.
And then via email, receive the Planning and Zoning Commission,
receive this email.
Dear Planning and Zoning Commissioners,
the town has already voted down a proposed annexation
of the part of the Simmer's Farm that lies in Frederick County
and outside Thermal Town Limits by huge majority.
The bid of the Simmer's property in Thermont upgraded to R5 in 2022 master plan is itself
a travesty that should be reversed.
It was incorporated during COVID against the wishes of the residents it affects.
Under the present system, the master plan designations are Sankersinked.
They get included into revised plans after supposed public input, but the public that counts
never suggests these changes.
Apparently, the developers have the ear of the county planner assigned to Thermont or
someone else in the town with an agenda that is out of sync with the desires of the residents,
but is able to get the desired zoning designation inserted in the master plan.
The master plan needs real input from effective residents so that we can stop this endless loop
of developer proposals being rammed through despite almost universal resident opposition.
He references Mechanics Town LLC development on MSburg Road for a prior case of this nature.
We would hope that after the previous vote on the Simmers annexation
motion, the planning and zoning board would be 100% on the resident side. Thomas Cromwell.
And I wrote their written comments on the sign and she just as a point of reference. Okay.
Okay. So public comment is closed. So we were talking with the applicant. I would invite him back to the podium.
Let
me just say,
I need a Pepsi and we'll get onto that file soon, uh-huh.
Okay, so, okay,
what would it be, our intern around, so you don't have to walk behind.
I'm chairman. Thank you for the change in the order. I am my team. Find it valuable to hear this. Some of it. It's a little rough, but it's valuable for us to hear it. I think I'd like to try to explain a little bit history here for a moment.
So, with your permission, I'm going to work my way through this slide deck somewhat quickly.
It'll be in the public record.
We're also happy to go over it with anybody.
This brief was given, and I'm also going to try to respect the request we heard earlier,
and I'm going to brief off of that screen.
Okay.
This brief was given in August of 2023, next slide.
It was given to these people, so it's already on the public record with the Albert Court
Condominium Association, Gateway Enterprise arrived, Town of Thermite was present.
Lastly, I'm not here to litigate our issues this evening.
I'm just trying to provide the background material for everybody.
Next slide.
When we did the briefing, we asked the participants to identify their tax map parcels, so we knew
who we were speaking to. Next slide. These were our goals coming out of that meeting.
We had already issued the notice terminating the easements on Mrs. Simmer's property
and we were explaining that and we were doing what we're doing right now, which is the
history of the Albert's Court's development. We raised the question of the MS-4 permits.
we don't need to do that this evening. Next slide please.
John already covered
ESD to the MEP. The Albert Courts neighborhood is approximately 9.34 acres that
not all of it's impervious but none of it is treated and that's the argument.
Next slide. Okay, so that's a 1988 aerial image before anything happened. The
The NVR facility is still here, North Carol Streets Inn, look down Apple's Church Road,
some of the houses are there, Pleasant Acres is not built yet.
None of what you know today is Albert Courts was there.
Next slide.
That's the same, or, excuse me, roughly the same image today, so you can understand the
change that has happened between those two images.
This was a 2015 image date, so it's ten years old.
Next slide. This was done by John's firm a couple years ago with professional
surveyors to actually stake out the property line, stake out where everything
is on our side, and where the easement area is. Next slide. Here's the other
call out. So the temporary stormwater management facility, as built, is outside
side of the easement area. It's not all inside of where it's supposed to be. Next slide.
That's the topography. Notice the steepness of the hill. Those of you that live in Albert
Court Section 5, you know the steepness of the hill going down to Mrs. Simmer's property,
the same on the far side of Cody Drive. Next slide. An observation. Go back one slide for
me. I'll go back to slides for me. My discussion this evening and what is the point of
contention is the easement area that's on Mrs. Simmer's property. But there is a second
easement area on what is still owned by Gateway. Okay, so next slide. Let's catch up next.
anything that dumps from these Albert courts going condos, going towards
Cody, including that which comes off of the town property around your water
treatment plant gets to hear the slope then takes it to us. So any storm
water from this area still moves easterly to the other facility. Next slide, that's
another zoom in, next slide.
All right, this is out of date.
John, we've revised this since this brief was given in 2023.
This was what we thought at the time
was the drainage area on to Mrs. Simmers.
I've got another slide that covers it.
Next slide.
OK, we're going to go through some time sequence here.
1991. Notice this document is signed by soil conservation service. It had not the record
copy we got hadn't gotten signed by the other departments. Next slide. This is
Sprangler Court, the first townhouses that went up. The call out here is the storm drain lines.
It starts on the south side of Carroll. So it's actually picking up storm water presumably
out of the Ryan development or maybe just the drainage ditch along Carroll.
It's crossing, it's picking up the other side and in that era, it took it
northeredly and it just dumped it because nothing else was developed north
of Sprangler Court.
Excuse me.
Point of order.
There is no public comment from the floor at this time.
Thank you, ma'am.
Next slide.
Okay. And again, some of the documents seemed to indicate that a silk pond went at that
dump location in 91. Next slide. Again, commenting on how much comes from the town in pervious
surface of their public roads. Next slide. I'm sorry. I'll record section two. This is only in here.
Sorry. Sorry. Can we go back to the spangler? Sure. I missed that part. Can you go back? Let's back up.
Back up all the way back to the spang. Which one? You were talking about the the culvert and the pick up from
Okay, so that's shown in greater detail on the next two slides. This is the over view showing the whole thing. Let's go one slide forward for me.
Okay, the same thing. Here's that pickup from the south side of Carol crossing. It's also got to pick up from the other side of Luther. It's coming this way and it's draining northward.
Next slide. Same image again with those drains. 15-inch storm drain running
underneath Luther from the South Side of Cure. Next slide. Okay. This is in the
brief only to provide continuity of the sections. Section two, but this one's
all the way over by the back entrance to Ryan. It's not part of the drainage to
the summer's parcel. So it's not pertinent to this discussion. Next slide. Okay. 1992, and now it's
time for construction of the first two of what we know is the Albert courts condominium buildings,
the western two buildings. Call out for signatures, Frederick County Public Works in 93, the town in March
of 93. Next slide.
93. This is where they're going to go. That land still owns by Gateway.
Next slide.
Two 12 unit condominium buildings and it ties to the easement. You're dumping water
here at the end of Cody and you're dumping water onto the Simmers parcel. Next slide.
That's the
condition of those two drains when this image was taken probably back in
2018. Next slide. Okay. This is what I wanted to make sure people saw tonight. This
is not a recorded document but it was found in the records. This is a 1992 print
date, and the handwriting on it, I think I've got it zoomed in, is a 1996 note ad storm
water area all the way at the bottom, in handwriting, storm water here. Two things to call
out as you look at this. Albrecht Court Section 5, the three condo buildings, aren't on this
plan. Under the original thinking, Easy Street was going to turn, have a bunch of duplex units
and connect to Luther. When this was written in 92, next slide.
Okay, thing to point out,
if you go to the pre, go back one for me, Kelly, sorry, please note the civil engineer.
This is Harris, Amigo, associates, working for Mr. Clayball. Go to the next slide.
You got a changing engineer, now your Fox and Associates, before John Stein, who was
brought in to do section 4, and Mr. Clayball didn't do section 4, a different developer
did.
Next slide,
and they put in that developer, under guidance from Fox, put in their own
stormwater management pond that drains those townhouses does not drain Albert
Court's two condo buildings, approvals by all the county and state the county
and town governments. Next slide. Okay now we're on to Albert Court section 5, the
three condominium buildings that are to the east. And date time, these signatures are
in the summer of 96. Next slide. There are the three of them. The storm drain that
was previously coming out of Sprangler and just dumping is now connected. It goes on down
Luther and goes into something on Mrs. Simmer's parcel. I want to call out, you can't read
it at this scale, but see the note at the very top. Go to the next slide, please. This
shows, again, the stormwater coming into not only the Eastman area, but outside the Eastman
area, next slide. And let's go to the note. We're signed off by Frederick
County in July 96 were signed off for stormwater in July 96. The note says the temporary SWM facility
will be maintained by gateway enterprises until the site is stabilized and 90% of the units have
been sold. At that time the homeowners association will assume the maintenance responsibility of the
All
right. So, earlier we saw a 1992 possible concept plan for the development of a whole parcel.
This is a later concept plan. Notice the three condominium buildings in Section 5 are built.
Notice Luther Drive continues all the way down and connects at what at the time was still called
Grayson. Notice that Easy Street didn't connect, because they did a series of singles,
towns, singles on Apple's Church and a mixture in here. Again, not a recorded document never
actually agreed to, but showed the concept plan. This is the big call out. Temporary Storm
motor management for Section 5 here, permanent stormwater at the bottom of the hill.
Next slide, temporary, permanent at the bottom of the hill, the HOA has the responsibility
for the maintenance of the temporary.
Next slide. This one's also out of date. You can skip it. And you can skip that one. Okay, so folks, this is why we're in the mess we're in. The original developer didn't do storm order for their section. And it's on Mrs. Simmer's parcel, and we need to have it removed. Your anger is at me, very respectfully. Your anger needs to be at the sovereigns who sign the thing off.
many years ago. We will find a solution. Water has to flow downhill, but we've got to clear
the title and make it possible for Mrs. Simmers to sell her property, for you guys to have
permanent storm water, and for the partially developed in accordance with the growth plans
of the town that go back certainly the 2008 comp plan, not a mayor, Chairman, and probably,
Yeah, you got promoted. Sorry about that, John.
And I suspect, based off of all these documents, it's been in the growth area since the early
90s when the whole neighborhood was being planted.
I wouldn't ask a question about the farmland itself, because that was one of my questions
from earlier.
Was there something wrong with the soil, with the farmland that made it not usable or
There was just a discussion that just for strictly growth that this is where the town
decided that they wanted to go or was there like an actual issue with the farmland itself?
Does that mean that's important to not aware of any issues with the farmland, with crops?
There's no way.
The commentary I would make is this parcel of those still zoned agricultural in the county
is not in the county planning documents as an agricultural area that needs to be kept.
If you look at the Thurma, if you look at the county chart, it's not there.
Mrs. Simmers is not able to make money farming that ground, so it's gone to follow.
But you could sell it to a farmer.
Yeah, sometimes there's like, I'm sure you're following the NPR discussion with putting things that don't have any other use on the land.
because it's not feasible to use it for the designated use.
That's a historical question to figure out.
Was the soil bad or that was just, it was a growth,
we were planning on moving here.
I got to come back to you, the municipality,
have designated it as being in your growth area,
since at least your 2008 comp plan,
and I strongly suspect since your mid 90s.
So I'm simply following the written guidance
that you've been telling the county and the Maryland Office of Planning for
25 years or more. This is what you want to done with the ground.
Can
we talk about the assisted living facility and what that might look like?
Are you are you planning on leasing that or are you going to sell that out right when
this gets done? So when we saw each other at the Maryland Office of Planning
planning, slash Maryland planners association meeting at Ellicott City. I then shared with
all of you via Kelly, a copy of the Health Dimensions group at a Minneapolis, Minnesota's
senior living study for the overall thermon area. I'm also reacting to the Thermon Economic
Development Director's survey, now getting some long teeth on it, that said there was
a demand for assisted living in thermo. I'm a real estate developer. I'm a broker. I'm not an
operator of senior living facility. We will go to companies like HDG or other competitive
regionally based operators who do this for their living and they will either lease the facility
from us or ground lease it from us once it's built. But no, crossing companies not can operate it. That's
It's not what I deal.
I was just making sure the plan hasn't changed on that one,
because I know that was a big question.
I'm sorry, couldn't hear you.
I was making sure that I was still the plan.
Yeah.
We're working on the architectural side.
We work with Nolkren Hall Architects out of Chambersburg.
They are specialists in senior living.
And to your question earlier on the fire,
remember, all of these buildings are every resonance
in Maryland today has to be sprinklered,
but a senior living facility gets sprinklered
to an incredible extent.
But no, what I will seek to do is identify an operator.
We will work with that operator on building design.
We've already done sun comp set designs,
and we would ultimately engage in a lease with them.
Questions for the applicant?
Have you got anything else?
No.
Actually, I have to move.
Does anybody have a follow-up question to staff?
Point of clarity, I've wrote down about the well.
that's going to be utilized for the subdivision,
is that currently offline due to PFAS?
Yes, we do have one of our wells that are offline due to PFAS.
And for this, would that be applicable to this development?
I'd have to defer to the Water Department.
Sure, that's not.
Well, you've offline, well, seven of you have to be sure.
Okay, well, Jim is saying no.
So, well eight is offline and well seven would be servicing this development.
All
right.
Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Madam Mayor.
I
might have a question for legal.
Just relaying a public comment to legal, is it possible for us to proceed with this annexation
application while pending lawsuit is happening?
That was a question that was proposed by the public.
the answer to that question is yes it is and I think it's important to clarify
that what you're tasked with doing is addressing the points in the code
that is what your job is it's not anything else and that
that is the focus
of what this commission does.
Yeah, my follow-up to that was,
do we have any legal path to deny anything
in this commission if they meet the criteria?
OK, so what your job here is with respect
to the annexation plan is not an approval.
What this is is a review of the plan that's been submitted
to you.
That is all that this is.
that review gets submitted to the Board of Commissioners and it is the Board of
Commissioners homework that reviews and passes on the proposed annexation.
The purpose of this exercise is to determine if it needs the criteria set
fourth in your code. It's not a for vote, it's not a naivot. It is just simply your observations
that are being presented to the Board of Commissioners.
Thank you for that clarification.
Sure.
And for the traffic study and recommendations for a pre-annexation agreement, that is just
included in the resolution itself. That's nothing. That's which resolution are you talking about the resolution that we would be making if it if it does me the criteria or if it doesn't because it says you know whether the annexation should be approved or denied and what if any conditions.
The planning commission believes the mayor and commissioners to place all the approval on the annexation to ensure that it conforms the recommendations of the comprehensive plan.
Okay, so we have to be careful about terminology, and I know that people get irritated with
lawyers for being sort of dancing on the head of a pen, and I get that.
But you're not passing a resolution.
That is not what you're doing.
What you're doing is a review of the application to determine whether or not, in your opinion,
it meets the criteria set forth in the code.
It is only the Board of Commissioners that can make the resolution, and as part of that
program, it's not just the annexation plan that's being submitted, but another important
component is an annexation agreement.
And in the annexation agreement, that is where certain concessions are offered, if you will,
by a proponent, someone who's seeking an annexation.
So, for example, if you say, well, you know, if this is going to proceed, it would be a really good idea for you to, you know, look at the parks over here and improvements to adjacent parks or something like that.
That's certainly something that can be within the scope of your recommendation and that would become part of an agreement.
month. Okay.
If it were adopted by the board commissioners. Right. Just to be abundantly clear.
I think that's very important to note that we we are an apolitical body. We are volunteers.
We are we are actually not paid. We have a stipend of $25 for full transparency per meeting
that we attend, not about $450,000, so we don't, as Leslie was saying, we are completely
separate from whatever we have. There's three components of the requirements in the
zoning code. That's it. It's nothing more than that. I do, Kelly, you wrote it in your
sacriport about the discrepancy, the wording of the master plan with the R5 density.
So that's an issue for me, because it's not crystal clear.
And for the sake of clarity for us, how do we, we can do up to the 10 per acre, right?
That's what the actual R5 is, but the way that it's written kind of contradicts that in
the master plan.
So it's creating some confusion and I don't know legally how the best way to make sure that we are
I don't know we were protected, but doing our due diligence when we're we're reading something and and it doesn't say the same as what this says over here
Well, I'll make a comment to that. I know with reading the
Master Plan it's it's in there as suggestions and guidance and that the R5 is the suggested
density for the annexation. So not necessarily the controlling density.
Right, and that's something we touched on of what that, if the annexation does occur,
what the density would be for that parcel of land.
The way your code has been read is up to. That's the way the code has been read.
All right. I don't think we're going to be making any decisions tonight.
I mean, I think we were just trying to interface and understand the project more, but I mean I did a full transparency.
I did send an email to staff today because some of the feedback that I did here was that some people told me that they could not speak because of the pending litigation.
They were they were counseled to not come and speak. So I feel like that's counterproductive to the discussion for not hearing from people that can't come here and speak.
So there is some merit to some of the comments made it's, you know, I know at the end of the day if it meets these three criteria, then, then so be it.
But for one of our goals is supposed to be community outreach and transparency and we don't have that if we can't have the full participation from people that can't be here.
So I just wanted to point that out.
Yeah, I don't know to what extent anybody has received such legal advice is obviously not our purview to invade attorney client privilege.
And I think that if somebody, I mean, if somebody stood up and said, I can't talk about
this because it's imprudent to do so, then you have somebody saying that to you directly.
But that didn't happen.
So you know, it's, I understand what you're saying.
It makes perfect sense that you want to have a full and fair discussion of the issues involved
and I know that this is caused an incredible amount of turmoil and disruption and hardship
to the citizens of, you know, and the residents of this area.
And so I get it.
But again, this is in your discretion as to how it affects your formulation.
I mean, it's not like there's a writer or a wrong answer.
I had another question, but I honestly have no idea what it was.
So do we want to defer to, because we have a new plan that we're going to be discussing
next month on the same part of the property.
Correct.
If you're for your April agenda, we have received a
And then we have the annual report. Correct. And then you also have some other items that the board of commissioners have given you for some discussion and making a recommendation, which would be discussion on street withs, and of course, your.
for accessory dwelling unit discussion as well.
Yeah, so.
Yeah, how long are we going to keep delaying this?
That's what we have.
I mean, we have two options, approve or not approve,
based upon these three criteria.
So is that something that you guys want to talk about that tonight?
Or do you want, I mean, what, this is our commission.
We're, we're in this together.
No. No. Not about this particular item. We will have public comment at the end. And we are required to have that rate.
I don't even know. I'm so tired. I'm sorry.
That's why I think it's 9.30. I don't think you're going to get a lot of intelligent discussion.
Yeah. Amongst us tonight.
Right. So we're putting this on the docket then for May.
I mean April so we have like five things on there I think it will be very confusing to
combine this with the concept.
I think you would be better off doing this in May.
Okay so before just before we go back into public comment for April we're going to start
at 7.
We're going to we're going to talk about the annual report, the concept plan for
the Simmer's property that's located in town for 38 townhomes,
80 use.
And then point
of clarity, have we gotten the survey results from that survey that Vicki did? Because I
think part of it was like based upon the revitalization of the economic.
I just received in the day, so I will disseminate that way we can kind of circle back because we may want to break down our revitalization topics because it's like that's a whole thing in itself of like a whole other review on what that's going to look like.
So I think maybe addressing what we need to fix now would probably be prudent versus doing all of that.
So,
and what else you said the street, yeah, the street was correct.
So, annual report, concept plan of in town, summer property, ADUs, revitalization survey recap.
Yeah, I'd like to, when you discuss, I'd like to have the upcoming development major
here as well for tanger questions, so I'll see if she'll bail more or not.
Okay, and then street woods,
does that cover everything that you have?
Do we have anything else that's coming down?
No, I haven't gotten anything, and the deadline for making the April meeting was this past
Friday, so we can't accept anything else.
Okay, so the nay it'll be the annexation of
the 18-point whatever acres, right?
Simmer's property.
Well, I mean, I don't know if you want to have anything in May because logically we would
want to do or have the applicant do a traffic impact study.
So is there a direction from the planning commission at this point that we would like
to add into the existing traffic impact study to, because you're going to need that information
to help formulate your response and make your findings, make your recommendation to the
mayor and commissioners.
So that is important information for you to have to facilitate in your deliberation and
make formulating your recommendation.
All right.
And I can we also add about the existing parking situation with the two streets that they're they're trying to also widen and go through because
That's that's a big concern for me. I know it's not part of it, but it's impacting a
traffic study is not going to look at parking
They but it will look at traffic. So you know take into consideration the existing conditions and formulate the added
anticipated growth as well as what the development will produce, but they won't, doesn't look
at, you know, the parking conditions. But that is definitely something that you can state
in your recommendation to the mayor and commissioners that that's something that is a concern to
you.
Okay. And then what about the stormwater management? Can we also address that preliminary with
traffic study to figure out if this will alleviate all of the issues. I know it's hard
to say because there's litigation happening, but whatever is being proposed is that actually
going to be ratified and amicable to the county because they're the ones that approve
it.
So, so you're you're asking if if that like the storm water can be something that you can look at now.
Yeah, in conjunction with the development is that what you're saying?
Yeah, and and informulating your your recommendation to the mayor commissioners.
I mean, yeah, you can absolutely put any of that information into your recommendation.
Yeah, just keeping in mind that the ultimate stormwater facility approval rests with the county
Not with them on right. That's what I'm saying and not for us, but for them the the bodies that be
bless or not
The the point was also made that this traffic study should be done while school is still in session
Yeah, okay
That makes sense.
That just keeps that in mind in terms of how you're going.
And then the peak times will be adjusted to reflect NVR's traffic.
Right.
Yeah.
I mean, when the traffic study was originally done, it was not or did not take into consideration
NVR shift changes.
The amendment to that traffic impact study did take that into account.
So they read it their counts and took that into consideration.
So again, we can rely on those time frames
that were previously used in the amendment
to the traffic impact study and apply those
to have them update that.
So it would include peak hours, which is our standard morning
peak hour and your evening peak hour,
as well as the NBR shift changes.
Yes.
Okay.
Anything else last time that the previous commission asked for that helped them make their
decision?
No.
I mean, I don't have anything else to add.
I've provided with all the information minus the traffic impact study.
Is that sound fair?
Good.
All right.
I guess one question you may want to post to the applicant is a timing on the traffic impact
study.
If it can be done before the May meeting.
I don't know, I don't know the answer to that.
They said they don't know the answer.
Because the guidance we have had is that we're supposed to be hands off.
So my expectation is that I was talking to Kelly and Jim and we're coming a couple of
days and arranging for me to be hands off and for them to go.
But I didn't obviously want to proceed with that until we had tonight's meeting.
Yeah.
I mean, absolutely, Jim and I can work with their traffic engineer to formulate the
intersections to look at and to study.
My question to you is, is beyond these standard ones that have been looked at previously,
is there any other intersections that you would like to add to that update?
I think one of the citizens raised good point of coming off of Grace Ham.
Yeah, great salmon. I was church. Definitely needs to be and I guess the traffic study does it include the proposed
Intersections like the new ones that technically don't exist yet like so
since that does them
Obviously no one's turning left or right in which rate that doesn't exist. Correct. Yes. Yeah
There's a thought there
Stop are you guys good?
All right, I think so. Yep. We're ready to work with the with the applicant too
make sure that traffic impacts study gets squared away.
And then if it can't happen before our main meeting,
I'll update you in April.
OK.
A liaison, a temporary liaison.
Yes, sir.
A liaison.
I got one thought here.
And I don't know how it would be possible to do,
but with the developments that are proposed
to go in on Emmett's word road with access on the hour road,
Is there any way you can get a ballpark figure on traffic while you're doing this traffic
study to add to that because that's going to affect this whole deal in time?
Yes, absolutely.
All of those developments are taken into consideration.
So when the original traffic impact studies were done, it took into consideration Highmaker
Hills, Mountain Brook, Mechanics Town, the addition will be the leal, the six leal.
single family homes, but all the other developments that were in the pipeline at
that time are still in the pipeline now with the addition of that one family, our
six single family homes subdivision. So that'll all have to be included.
Yep.
All right, last call up here before I go into public comment.
If you have a public comment, please come to the podium, state your name and whether or
not you're a resident.
about the traffic study of Christine Johnson. I'm sorry. I am a resident. Yes. And I have been
sworn in. About the traffic study. So I do, you know, I live in Albuquerque and I'm always
in the community park. I love taking my dogs for walks, everything else. Grace Hambrook is extremely
They have another property across the street there that they use.
People like.
They go around.
They come down like if we have to make, and there's no room on that road for two cars to literally pass through safely.
If you come around the one corner where the park is and somebody else is flying, I'm surprised there hasn't been more accidents there.
If you add more traffic, especially if you add all these people, it is going to end up
happening.
Someone's going to end up dying around that corner.
There's the, I think it's a con cast hour or something there, I'm not sure where it is.
But to put that amount of traffic to go down through because people may want to try to avoid
the traffic going through that our townhouse developments or whatever, you're adding stress that is
going to be deadly.
I'm serious. That's all. Have a good night. Thank you.
Thank you. Mr. Twig.
Yes, our dance wig. I'm not a resident. Homeowner and Codian. Yes, I've been sworn in.
Just one thing. I know it's your job. I understand what council is saying.
Town Planner saying it's not your job to resolve litigation.
It's just to present your findings from this commission to the commissioners of whether they meet all the criteria put forth to them by training and zoning and the ordinances of thermont for the development.
But I don't know how we can say yes all the criteria has been met if the storm water management is still a issue even as part of this development.
How can we say yes all criteria has been met because that storm water management is still there.
It's there.
So has all criteria been met?
Technically no.
No, because that's still an issue, that does not resolve.
So has all the criteria been met?
No, it hasn't been met, because in the constant play and
that storm water management is there, but isn't even legal.
That's all I got, thank you.
Thank you.
Anybody else have public comment?
Last call, public comment?
Last call on the floor before we entertain a motion for adjournment.
I'll make the motion for adjournment, do I have a second?
Thank you.
All those in favor, please raise your right hand. Thank you.