[0:00] Welcome. The September 23rd, 2026 meeting of the South Portland Planning Board

[0:06] will come to order. This is a public proceeding, and unless the board votes to go

[0:10] into executive session, you have

[0:17] the right to hear everything that's being said and to view all the exhibits that

[0:21] are offered. This meeting is being conducted remotely and in person in accordance

[0:24] with 1 MRS Section 403B and the city's remote and hybrid meeting policy.

[0:29] The board works from a prepared agenda.

[0:32] It's been posted in City Hall, on the city's website, and on the city's online

[0:36] agenda portal, BoardDocs.

[0:39] The planning board members will disclose any potential conflicts of interest

[0:45] of which they are aware at the time that an item is being considered and before any

[0:49] testimony on the item. For each item, staff will provide an overview followed by

[0:54] applicant remarks for up to 10 minutes, then public comment will proceed.

[0:58] Any person wishing to testify may do so during the public comment.

[1:02] If you wish to speak remotely, use the hand-raising feature to be called on by the

[1:07] chair. If you're here in the chamber, simply raise your hand and be called on.

[1:12] When speaking, state your name and address and then proceed.

[1:15] Public testimony is limited to three minutes per speaker.

[1:19] Planning board decisions are based on whether an applicant has met their burden of

[1:22] proof to demonstrate that the project is in compliance with applicable laws.

[1:27] Any reconsiderations of board decisions must be made at the next regularly

[1:31] scheduled meeting,

[1:33] and any appeals of the board's decisions must be filed within 30 days to the Maine

[1:38] Superior Court.

[1:41] All right, with that said, we'll kick the meeting off with the Pledge of

[1:43] Allegiance. Please join me.

[1:46] I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic

[1:50] for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice

[1:55] for all.

[2:00] That brings us to roll call. Director Nemedi will call the roll.

[2:04] Yes. Mr. Bramble?

[2:07] I am here. All right. Chair Kelly?

[2:10] Here.

[2:10] Mr. Ladd?

[2:11] Here.

[2:12] Mr. McDonald?

[2:13] Here.

[2:13] And Mr. Taylor? Here.

[2:16] All right. We have five,

[2:20] and that is quorum, so we will proceed

[2:25] with approval of the minutes from our August 12th meeting.

[2:29] Questions, comments, clarifications on the minutes?

[2:34] Move to approve the minutes.

[2:36] Second.

[2:37] Motion by Mr. McDonald, seconded by Mr.

[2:41] Ladd. Any discussion?

[2:48] Great. Can we get a roll call vote?

[2:50] Mr. Bramble? Yes. Chair Kelly?

[2:52] Yes.

[2:53] Mr. Ladd?

[2:54] Yes.

[2:54] Mr. McDonald?

[2:55] Yes.

[2:56] And Mr. Taylor?

[2:58] Yes.

[2:59] All right. By a vote of five the motion passes, the minutes are approved.

[3:05] We will proceed.

[3:09] There are a whole bunch of communications and petitions.

[3:12] There are reports out of the minute exchange

[3:16] requests that were approved and performance guarantee releases,

[3:22] no actions required.

[3:25] And so that takes us to our consent calendar.

[3:27] There are three items on the consent calendar tonight.

[3:30] We have item 3A, minor amendment at 33 Ram, Inc., Cobblestone Coffee, 200 Gorham

[3:36] Road,

[3:38] concerning an occupancy increase, accessory structure, utility work, parking

[3:42] reduction, and relocation of dumpsters.

[3:45] We have item 3B, a minor amendment, Landry Circle Senior Housing 2 LLP,

[3:51] Landry Woods, 100 Adam Cork,

[3:55] formerly 51 Landry, tree modifications.

[3:59] And then we have item 3C, planning board regulations.

[4:03] This is an amendment to regulation number four, specifically application forms to

[4:08] modernize the forms.

[4:11] All right, before we proceed, does any member of the planning board have a conflict

[4:16] of interest to disclose?

[4:21] All right.

[4:23] Does any member of the planning board wish to take one of these items out of the

[4:27] consent calendar and treat it as a public hearing item?

[4:32] Mr. McDonald.

[4:33] I don't necessarily need to take it out of the consent calendar, but you mentioned

[4:36] that you would like to review some of this stuff.

[4:37] I would think that's a good use of time. We have a pretty light agenda.

[4:41] I'd like to see what's in there. If you would, Chair. That's your call, of course.

[4:47] Sure.

[4:50] Director Nemedi, would you like to give an overview of,

[4:54] I guess, the items on the consent calendar, and I think specifically Mr.

[4:58] McDonald's talking about item, the amendment to the regulation number four?

[5:04] Sure. Is that fair just to do the forms?

[5:06] Yeah.

[5:06] Okay. I appreciate that. I know the email came late in time for the packet

[5:11] deadlines, but still it came today, so just want to make sure everybody had a

[5:15] chance to put their eyes on it. The planning division uses forms to

[5:21] process applications that this planning board has to approve.

[5:24] You have regulation

[5:27] number four, which lists all of the official forms that have to be submitted when

[5:31] someone's applying for something.

[5:33] A little while back, you did an update to that list to adopt what we call the

[5:38] universal application form. And that has basically allowed us to centralize all

[5:43] the

[5:45] applicant information that we have just historically asked for repeatedly, things

[5:49] like application names and contact information and so on.

[5:53] The universal application is something everyone has to submit no matter what you

[5:57] ask for. What the next stage is, is to take individual requests and have updated

[6:03] application forms for those requests.

[6:05] So in this case tonight, we have the new modern version of the site plan, which is

[6:09] the most frequent thing you process and also the most complex thing that you

[6:14] process.

[6:15] And what we're doing here is a two-stage thing.

[6:19] First is the universal app, which gets core information about the applicant, and

[6:24] then we have what we're calling the site plan checklist.

[6:29] Our goal with this is that we can get these documents to be more readable, usable,

[6:35] and functional for applicants, so all the information is up there in front of them.

[6:40] That way, when they submit the information, they're more likely to be submitting a

[6:43] complete application, and they go through the process faster.

[6:47] So the checklist is a way of cataloging all the things we routinely ask for,

[6:51] including the things that our old forms never really asked for, but we always have

[6:55] to follow up and say, "Hey, you forgot this.

[6:57] Hey, you need to add more detail to that."

[7:00] So the checklist now is structured in two parts.

[7:02] Part one is everybody has to fill this out. These are the exhibits.

[7:06] This is things that you're all familiar with. We're not inventing new requirements.

[7:10] We're just reformatting. Third-party approvals. You have to have your DEP approval.

[7:14] You have to give us a traffic plan. You have to give us a landscaping plan.

[7:17] Everyone has to do that if they're submitting a site plan.

[7:20] Obviously, if the site plan scope is just interior retrofitting of a warehouse into

[7:25] residential, there's no landscaping work, we exempt the things that don't apply,

[7:30] but this is the sort of total list. And then certain unique projects may also have

[7:35] other additional standards, and these are as applicable.

[7:38] So are you doing a farmer's market? Well, you've got to address those components.

[7:42] Are you doing coastal resilience overlay zoning?

[7:45] You've got to address those components. So some things have specific standards.

[7:49] They're all itemized here, and this all matches our

[7:52] ordinance. The way the checklist works is just like a checklist.

[7:57] The applicant's supposed to be able to go through here and say, "Yep, I've got all

[8:00] this stuff in hand. I've done the universal application. I've paid my fees.

[8:04] I've submitted a project data sheet that explains my project." You'll see that in a

[8:07] second.

[8:09] With each of these exhibits, we used to just say, "Provide an introduction and

[8:12] overview cover letter and describe the extent of your project." Well, what are we

[8:16] actually looking for? We now have a little bit more definition.

[8:18] What's the intent and the scope? Site conditions, natural resource impacted.

[8:23] What's your financial capacity? We've updated what we accept as reasonable

[8:27] demonstration of financial capacity.

[8:29] Again, all these things are what you've always had and what you always see once

[8:34] staff has vetted a project, but now we're trying to put it up front so staff

[8:38] doesn't have to chase it and applicants are more aware, and they have a more

[8:42] functional list to work from. So it just goes down the line.

[8:45] Your plans, it talks about the format of the plans, the scaling of the plans, the

[8:49] details we expect to see in the plans, that all of it's corroborated.

[8:52] When you say you're 10 feet from the setback, do your plans actually show that?

[8:57] Do you put a date on the revision of those plans so we know the plans coming to the

[9:01] board are accurate and up to date?

[9:05] It gives specifics on what we expect to see in those site plans so that applicants

[9:09] don't miss anything, and these are all the necessary components so that we can

[9:12] evaluate the project. And it goes down thematically.

[9:16] So there's your site plan, there's utility sheets, stormwater sheets,

[9:20] access and parking circulation plans, landscape plans.

[9:23] Again, the goal is these are checkboxes.

[9:25] Applicants can go through, verify they've met all this, or confirm that it's not

[9:29] applicable to their project, and they can move forward more rapidly.

[9:34] This is supported by the data sheet, which is just the quick numbers that are

[9:40] critical for us to evaluate a project.

[9:44] Again, this is all stuff that's asked for in the form.

[9:47] It's just organized better, and it's more comprehensive.

[9:50] So we've always asked for how much floor area.

[9:53] Now you get to put it in neat numbers, and we don't have to scan through a jumbled

[9:56] page to find it. How many structures are you doing?

[9:59] It gives you an opportunity to respond to more than just one.

[10:03] Give us the specific metrics for your setback so we can see it plain as day.

[10:07] And then with this, again, all this should be really familiar if you compare it to

[10:12] our current application form. But what's missing in the current form, since it was

[10:17] back from the early 2000s, is updated information.

[10:20] Like now we have a new EV ordinance, and we have specific different categories.

[10:25] Is it EV-ready?

[10:27] And there's links. Like in this case, what does EV-ready mean?

[10:29] And it takes you to the ordinance, and you can go ahead and dig right into it.

[10:33] One thing I will just add,

[10:37] we will be hyperlinking more of

[10:41] the text in this document so that people can jump to the specific section of the

[10:46] ordinance, which doesn't really appear in this form.

[10:48] It's just going to be, I've given you a few examples, like what is dual frontage?

[10:52] You'll be able to jump to this specific section, read about it immediately, that

[10:55] way you can answer it faster.

[10:58] So any of this kind of blue text, plus anything else that makes sense for us to

[11:02] reference, we will do that so people can get the information they need.

[11:05] So parking reserve, not many people are familiar with that.

[11:08] We gave a specific citation. You'll be able to read it directly in the ordinance.

[11:12] So this will be hopefully a better tool, a more easily readable tool, a form

[11:16] fillable tool that just gets applicants more comprehensive, more complete, and

[11:22] faster through the process. We have, again, as I mentioned before the meeting, so

[11:27] the protected trees is a relatively new thing. We're just itemizing.

[11:31] Again, if it's not relevant to the project, they ignore it.

[11:35] Wetlands, explaining what you're doing with wetlands in just numerical fashion, so

[11:39] we can quickly compare and contrast and evaluate the project.

[11:43] So not really anything new of substance.

[11:46] We're not asking people to do anything we haven't asked normally.

[11:49] It's just how we're representing it.

[11:51] And I can show you,

[11:56] I know the board sees this regularly,

[12:01] but members of the public might not,

[12:04] what our current application form looks like.

[12:08] And you'll maybe get a sense of why we're doing this.

[12:12] So here's the current site plan app.

[12:16] It's got stale information about costs for things that don't match up with our

[12:20] current fee schedule.

[12:23] It's sort of jumbled up and disorganized.

[12:25] The facts that it asks for is like you're looking at property information, then

[12:31] you're looking at zoning. Suddenly you're into floor area, then you're back to land

[12:35] uses, then you're getting back into numbers, and then you've got this long list of

[12:39] exhibits with stale information we don't use. We don't ask for some of this data.

[12:44] This is an older reference map. It's doing a lot of this cleanup to get it out of

[12:48] there. Right, title, and interest information doesn't really clarify what we know

[12:52] constitutes right, title, interest, so we give them more information about it.

[12:57] Some of the financial capacity thing, it takes up an entire page when really it's

[13:00] just a quick... The four of these things on this list are actually functional and

[13:04] what we continue to use today,

[13:07] and so on. So it's really just condensing, in this case, what's a 14-page document

[13:12] into a couple of quick, punchy forms.

[13:14] This gives us all the facts in two pages, and the actual

[13:20] exhibit listing gives applicants more information, again, in eight pages.

[13:25] So a lot of trimming down, cleaning up, making it easier.

[13:29] So

[13:31] that's what's in your packet for

[13:35] this consent item. And again, happy to dive into any of them if you want.

[13:39] We would have to have motion to take it off the consent.

[13:43] Great. Thank you.

[13:48] Okay, we'll go back to the planning board.

[13:50] Does any member of the planning board wish to take any of these items off the

[13:53] consent calendar and treat them as a public hearing item?

[13:57] No.

[13:57] All right. Did we get a motion on the consent calendar?

[14:02] Move to approve the consent calendar as presented.

[14:06] I'll second.

[14:08] All right. Motion by Mr. McDonald, seconded by Mr. Ladd. Discussion?

[14:15] We get a roll call vote.

[14:16] Mr. Bramble?

[14:19] Yes.

[14:19] Mr. Kelly?

[14:20] Yes.

[14:21] Mr. Ladd?

[14:21] Yes.

[14:22] Mr. McDonald?

[14:22] Yes.

[14:23] And Mr. Taylor?

[14:24] Yes.

[14:26] All right. By a vote of 5-0, the motion passes.

[14:30] Consent calendar is approved.

[14:33] All right. That brings us to our first

[14:36] public hearing item on the agenda.

[14:38] That's item 4A, zoning text amendment, Elvett Sciences, amend building coverage

[14:44] allowance in the light industrial zoning district, properties at 200 John Roberts

[14:49] Road, specifically.

[14:53] Before we kick it off, does any member of the planning board have a conflict to

[14:55] disclose?

[14:58] No.

[14:58] No. All right. Marin?

[15:02] Thank you. Marin Stevens, community planner.

[15:05] Is there something I need to do to get it on this one?

[15:07] You just push and hold, and then it'll take over.

[15:10] Okay.

[15:12] There we go. Great. Again, Marin Stevens, community planner.

[15:18] Today we have a zoning text amendment from Elvett Sciences.

[15:23] They're seeking to amend Section 27-904 for the light industrial, which we refer

[15:29] to as the IL zoning district, to change the building coverage from 30% to 40%.

[15:35] You will see on the left-hand side, the subject property is circled, and

[15:41] the purple on the map are the light industrial zoning districts for the city,

[15:48] which all exist on the west end of town.

[15:52] So, just as a refresher for zoning text amendments, first they come before the

[15:57] planning board, which is tonight.

[15:59] If approved, or you guys can recommend approval, then it goes to

[16:05] city council, and they'll hold two public hearings, a first read and a second read.

[16:09] If it's eventually approved by city council, the ordinance takes effect after 20

[16:13] days for an appeal period.

[16:17] So the proposed amendment is to add an accessory structure to an

[16:22] existing property at 200 John Roberts

[16:28] Road, again, which exists within the IL zoning district.

[16:33] The existing building is 27,040 square feet.

[16:40] So the building was constructed in 1984, as far as we can see, and there's been no

[16:44] expansions to date. The building coverage currently is

[16:51] over the building coverage allowance for the zoning district by 1%, so it's at 31%.

[16:57] So the applicant is seeking to add this storage structure for their business, which

[17:03] basically is going to hold ethanol

[17:08] that they use to process hemp into CBD.

[17:11] But that storage unit would exasperate the existing coverage

[17:17] nonconformity. Again, it's already at 31%.

[17:23] So to rectify this, they are seeking to expand the coverage limit in the entirety

[17:28] of the light industrial zoning district to 40% to allow that storage unit to be

[17:34] possible.

[17:36] So, staff analyzed the request. So as you can see, this is what

[17:42] the proposed amendment will look like in the ordinance that is attached to the

[17:47] agenda. It's basically a simple cross out of 30% to make it 40%.

[17:56] So,

[17:57] we, as the planning staff, have to look at master plan consistency for all zoning

[18:02] text amendments to see if it aligns with our new comprehensive plan.

[18:08] So again, there's three zoning districts that are light industrial.

[18:13] I've highlighted them in purple.

[18:17] All of these

[18:23] light industrial zoning districts either exist in our future land use areas of

[18:27] unique growth or growth area.

[18:31] And within our future land use map, we have key land use

[18:36] priority areas or KLUPOs. So the

[18:44] KLUPOs that exist for the light industrial are KLUPO one, which is our West End

[18:49] Business Park. And really the priority from the comp plan wants to prioritize the

[18:54] economic development of that area and investment in office and other

[18:58] non-residential development. The existing property, why it's highlighted in blue,

[19:03] is within the Maine Mall mixed use KLUPO.

[19:07] And this is really a vision of that area is to support the Maine Mall,

[19:13] and the shopping centers around that, and also try to put major investment in the

[19:19] area by repurposing older buildings, repurposing

[19:24] extra surface parking, or making that more efficient for uses, and really

[19:31] trying to bring in a diversification of uses in that area.

[19:35] The other KLUPO

[19:37] that exists for light industrial is the airport industrial area, KLUPO number four.

[19:43] And really, we want to see that remain industrial in character, and we're looking

[19:48] to support warehousing, logistics, light industrial, and lodging businesses there.

[19:55] So the amendment, we feel supports the master

[20:01] plan because it is really asking to increase the building coverage to

[20:06] do some infill growth and really to support development investment in the

[20:13] light industrial areas. The comprehensive plan really supports this through a

[20:18] couple strategies in the economic development section and in the state

[20:24] strategies. Really, again, specific call-outs to really

[20:30] see that infill growth happening in the light industrial area.

[20:35] So when we're looking at it from just a zoning district analysis, we wanted to

[20:39] compare it to other zoning districts that are also industrial and see

[20:44] what was happening in comparison.

[20:48] Why are we at 30% for light industrial and the other,

[20:53] the shipyard,

[20:55] industrial, residential and non-residential, and non-residential industrial areas,

[21:01] why are their building coverages maybe more, or are we out of date here in the

[21:06] light industrial? So the first thing we looked at is that across the board, the

[21:12] maximum lot coverage is not applicable.

[21:14] So that means that for any of these industrial zoning districts, you could cover

[21:20] the lot with pavement. There's

[21:24] no

[21:26] parking lot restrictions or say you needed an area for

[21:32] utilities. So there's no restrictions across the board, and that is really to

[21:36] support the industrial development within the city.

[21:40] However, we have a larger range of building coverage permissions

[21:46] between the shipyard, the industrial, residential and non-residential, and the

[21:52] I&R, the non-residential industrial districts.

[21:55] So, we have a disparity in the light industrial, although we're encouraging more

[22:01] building coverage and utilization

[22:04] for infill development in these other areas.

[22:11] So that basically is highlighting the other areas, showing them at a larger

[22:17] amount.

[22:19] So we actually dove in a little bit deeper and did a desktop analysis of the

[22:26] developed properties within the light industrial zoning district, just seeing what

[22:30] their existing building coverage is.

[22:32] And we looked at 38 properties

[22:35] that had structures on their parcels within the light industrial zoning district.

[22:41] Two of the 38 were non-conforming already with the 30% building coverage, including

[22:47] our applicant today and their neighbor at 170 John Roberts, which is at

[22:53] 36%. So that specific area of town is

[22:57] really

[23:03] restricted from any future building expansions because of that non-conformity.

[23:09] We looked at

[23:12] those that are getting close to the building coverage allowance, which we found

[23:16] seven of the 38 properties are at or above 25%.

[23:21] So they're not exceeding that 30%, but they're pretty darn close.

[23:24] We had some at 28%, 29%, so if they were like our applicant to come back, it would

[23:30] be

[23:32] pretty hard to allow them to do any extra development on their own properties

[23:37] today.

[23:39] So in general, we found that amending the building coverage allowance would be in

[23:43] parity with the other zoning districts, as we showed you, at 40%.

[23:48] It's not a large increase. We find it a modest request to get up in parity

[23:54] with the other zoning districts.

[23:57] And really it's supported in our comprehensive plan to allow

[24:03] these properties, these owners, these small businesses often,

[24:09] or even large businesses, to continue to make investments and expand their

[24:12] buildings to support development in our non-residential tax base.

[24:19] So in total, we're recommending that you recommend to the city council to approve

[24:23] the zoning text amendment contained at ordinance 7-26-27 to expand the building

[24:28] coverage allowance from 30% to 40% in the light industrial zoning district.

[24:33] I'm here if you have any more questions, and the applicant is here as well to

[24:37] answer questions. Thank you.

[24:39] Thank you.

[24:41] If the applicant would like to supplement the presentation, they're welcome to do

[24:45] so.

[24:47] Thank you.

[25:04] Good evening, Chair and members of the planning board.

[25:07] My name is Stacy Evans, and I'm representing Elevate Sciences Incorporated today

[25:11] before you in support of the proposed amendment to increase the maximum building

[25:16] coverage from 30% to 40% in South Portland's light industrial district.

[25:22] We believe the amendment is consistent with, as Maren mentioned, the South

[25:27] Portland's comprehensive plan. It aligns with existing development patterns within

[25:32] the light industrial district and supports continued investment and economic

[25:36] development in areas already designated for industrial activity.

[25:41] We also appreciate the South Portland's collaborative approach throughout this

[25:45] whole process and respectfully support planning staff's recommendation that the

[25:51] board approve the proposed amendment.

[25:53] Thank you so much for your time and consideration.

[25:55] Thank you.

[25:56] I'm available to answer any questions you have.

[25:58] Great.

[26:00] All right. This is a public hearing item, so I'll open it up to the public.

[26:04] If any member of the public is with us remotely, feel free to raise your virtual

[26:10] hand and be recognized if you'd like to speak on this item.

[26:14] I see no hands online.

[26:15] All right. There's no hands in the room.

[26:20] Turn to the board. Mr. Ladd?

[26:21] I've got a couple of questions for the applicant.

[26:26] So if I understand correctly, you folks own a unit of a building?

[26:32] We lease it.

[26:32] You lease it. Okay. But it's part of a larger building, but there's different

[26:36] units.

[26:37] Yes.

[26:37] Okay. Is the storage facility going to be attached to your unit?

[26:42] No. It's away from the units.

[26:46] Okay.

[26:46] It's on the property, but it's not attached to the building.

[26:50] Okay. So you're going to be storing chemicals, bulk chemicals?

[26:54] Yeah, just a few. I think it's

[26:59] up to 600 gallons of ethanol, and that's it.

[27:02] Okay. For the planning director, does that involve the city fire department being

[27:07] involved? Does that-

[27:08] Yes. This is to change the zoning to allow the coverage-

[27:14] Okay

[27:14] ... for the building, for any building.

[27:16] In this case, they're using it for the storage, ethanol storage.

[27:19] But then when they actually submit that request, it goes through full staff review

[27:22] for that.

[27:23] Thank you.

[27:23] And in fact, one of the reasons why this building in particular ...

[27:28] triggers

[27:30] the coverage, which is a building-based metric.

[27:33] So the thing that they're building has to be a building.

[27:36] If it was just a storage unit, that's a structure, it's not a building.

[27:39] I know these

[27:41] sound like synonymous terms, but our ordinance actually sees them differently, a

[27:44] shed and a structure that's meant for occupancy.

[27:49] And under the building code, fire and our code staff reviewed it because it's

[27:53] conditioned and because it's meant to contain specific kinds of material that need

[27:57] extra care and attention. We have to classify it as a building coverage, not a

[28:01] structural coverage thing. So that's why they're here in part, is because these

[28:06] other departments have been looking at it and are familiar with it.

[28:10] Okay.

[28:13] Mr. McDonald?

[28:15] Were you finished, Ms. White?

[28:16] Yes.

[28:17] A couple questions. You answered one by saying that you're renting.

[28:22] Another question I have is, how are you going to capture or prevent the smell of

[28:26] the CBD-producing material from escaping?

[28:31] So currently, we produce CBD animal health supplements in the existing building.

[28:37] So that's where they're manufactured currently.

[28:41] So it's not going to be in a storage enclosure.

[28:43] So it's already in operation right now?

[28:45] Yeah. And it's been in operation since 2018.

[28:48] Oh, okay.

[28:49] Yeah. So you can't smell it.

[28:50] We haven't heard about it yet. We're not going to hear about it.

[28:52] We're just wondering about the smell.

[28:56] Yeah.

[28:57] This facility processes hemp, which is an agricultural product.

[29:02] Right.

[29:03] And it's not actually regulated under our marijuana ordinances.

[29:07] Okay.

[29:07] So where we do have things like HVAC equipment controls, or it would've had to come

[29:12] to you as a site plan for marijuana approval.

[29:14] Right.

[29:15] This is not a marijuana manufacturing facility. It's a hemp processing.

[29:19] Now, that agricultural product still has some of that same odor component, but to

[29:25] your point, and we're hearing since 2018, and we haven't had any complaints.

[29:28] Okay. We haven't had any complaints and all that.

[29:31] With that, and

[29:35] this may be for Marin or Milan, where do other communities in our area sit in this

[29:41] particular guideline? We're looking to move it up to 40%, which I'm assuming would

[29:46] then be cross-applied to everything in the IL.

[29:49] If we're going to give an exception to this applicant, every other applicant going

[29:53] forward is going to have to accept it as well.

[29:55] Where are the other communities in our neighbor, Portland, Scarborough, Gorham,

[30:02] Westbrook, where are they in percentage-wise?

[30:07] So our industrial districts, every town is going to apply and look at their zones

[30:12] differently. I

[30:15] don't know that it's going to be a fair comparison to look at the two differently.

[30:19] I will say though, and I think Marin tried to cover this, the comprehensive plan

[30:22] wants this area to be significantly more invested in.

[30:25] Absolutely.

[30:26] The IL zone most likely will be removed from this area when the overall zoning for

[30:32] the two-year process to implement the comprehensive plan will not have this area as

[30:38] industrial zoning. But it will have a proposal, at least, for a higher

[30:43] amount of building coverage, because the goal for the mall area is infill

[30:47] development.

[30:48] Right.

[30:49] So this applicant happens to need to work within the IL because that's the law

[30:54] today.

[30:57] And so that's why they're amending what they're amending.

[30:58] They're not trying to propose to implement our comprehensive plan.

[31:02] They're proposing to work on their property in alignment with our comp plan.

[31:06] They're only dealing with the thing that they really need to deal with.

[31:10] So I can tell you that the policy direction we have is that this area has a

[31:14] relatively high building coverage percentage.

[31:17] And industrial zoning is not prescribed in this area.

[31:20] It will be moving more towards mixed use, housing, business park, and complementary

[31:26] type uses. That's the future comprehensive plan vision.

[31:30] The comprehensive plan also will not remove existing businesses.

[31:35] So all those offices that are in here or the light industrial type activity that

[31:39] has been happening in here, those are all allowed to continue.

[31:44] If they choose to shut those down, they may need to move into a different

[31:48] direction. That'll come with our comprehensive plan zoning.

[31:52] Right.

[31:52] So I think that 40% probably could go higher than what they're requesting, but they

[31:57] don't need it for what it is that they want to do there.

[32:01] I'm just wondering if we should recommend a higher number, if that's what we're

[32:03] trying to get to anyway, and that way we could nip that in the bud, so we're not

[32:07] facing it again in the future. That's just my thoughts as the chair.

[32:12] That's a recommendation you can make to the council.

[32:15] Yeah. I

[32:17] think

[32:18] it's likely to come up in the context of implementing the changes

[32:24] associated with the comprehensive plan.

[32:27] Like Milan mentioned, the light industrial zone could go away

[32:34] as we move through that process, and I think that would be better

[32:40] vetted in that context. But

[32:45] I'm supportive of

[32:47] the proposed recommendation. I think the analysis makes sense to me.

[32:54] The fact that we have other

[32:56] industrial zones that it aligns with,

[33:02] and

[33:04] it meets the applicant's needs.

[33:07] And I think we'll take a more comprehensive look as

[33:12] we move through. Yeah, sorry.

[33:15] Marin Stevens, community planner. So I did the analysis.

[33:18] So the areas that I think that we would want to remain light industrial, again, I

[33:23] showed you that graphic of that there is no restrictions on lot

[33:29] coverage. Some of those areas have significant trees.

[33:33] They're near stream protection in the West End Business Park.

[33:37] So we were actually looking at let's go big, let's go large, but then when we

[33:42] looked at the developed areas in the West End Business Park,

[33:49] we recognized that you could

[33:55] extend into some significant tree coverage and stream areas in that area.

[34:00] So we found the 40% a modest increase,

[34:05] looking at the three different IL districts.

[34:09] So that's where we landed today, but again, those districts might change from light

[34:14] industrial to something else more industrial in the future.

[34:17] But in the current analysis that we looked at,

[34:21] the other light industrial areas aren't as developed as the main mall area.

[34:27] So that's where the modest 40% came to, just to give you a little bit of background

[34:33] on our analysis.

[34:39] Mr. Bramble and Mr. Taylor, anything from you?

[34:45] Nothing from me.

[34:48] I'm good.

[34:50] Great.

[34:53] I guess I'll close public comment and turn to the board for any further

[34:59] comments, questions, motion.

[35:04] I'll make a motion.

[35:06] Make a motion to recommend that the city council approve the zoning tax amendment

[35:10] contained in Ordinance 7-2627 to expand the building

[35:16] coverage allowance from 30% to 40% in the light industrial zoning district.

[35:23] All right. Motion by Mr. Ladd. Do we have a second?

[35:26] Second.

[35:27] Seconded by Mr. McDonald. Discussion?

[35:33] All right. Now can we get a roll call vote?

[35:35] Mr. Bramble? Yes. Chair Kelly?

[35:37] Yes.

[35:38] Mr. Ladd?

[35:38] Yes.

[35:39] Mr. McDonald?

[35:39] Yes.

[35:40] And Mr. Taylor?

[35:41] Yes.

[35:43] All right. By a vote of five to motion, it passes, and the recommendation will be

[35:46] made. Thank you to applicant and staff for presentation of the work on this.

[35:53] And that brings us to public comment on items not on the agenda.

[35:58] If any member of the public has a comment on an item that is not on the agenda,

[36:03] now is the time to raise your hand.

[36:06] I see no hands online.

[36:08] All right.

[36:11] And then,

[36:15] Milan, I don't know if you wanted to-- You mentioned you might want to talk about

[36:21] the process you're going through with the

[36:24] forms.

[36:26] We do that on number seven.

[36:27] Okay.

[36:27] That's not part of the workshop.

[36:28] Okay.

[36:29] Yeah.

[36:31] Then items

[36:34] six and eight. We have no workshops on the agenda tonight.

[36:38] Item seven, comments from the planning board and director of planning.

[36:42] All right.

[36:43] Just a couple of brief ones, and then I'll show you a little visual just as a

[36:47] teaser of some of the things we're working on.

[36:51] Comprehensive Plan

[36:56] Committee is meeting next week, Wednesday.

[37:00] And that'll be where we discuss for the first time the schedule for the

[37:03] implementation of the comprehensive plan.

[37:06] So you'll get a sense of,

[37:09] well, through your representative and certainly if any of you attend or listen to

[37:13] the meeting, what the pacing is and what parts of town we'll be tackling for

[37:18] implementing the core zoning reforms that we have to do.

[37:21] This isn't implementing the entire comprehensive plan, it's just doing the core

[37:24] zoning alignment. So, as I mentioned, this area that was here tonight is moving to

[37:30] a mixed-use district, so the industrial zoning will have to get cleared out of

[37:33] there. And to keep the things that make sense within that new vision.

[37:37] So we're going to show you the schedule for that. It's roughly in six-month chunks.

[37:42] So around spring 2027 would be the first package of ordinance

[37:48] amendments to implement the comprehensive plan that comes to the board.

[37:52] And the Comprehensive Plan Committee likely will see it in advance of that.

[37:56] So just as a heads up on that, whatever the CBCs guidance is on that schedule,

[38:02] I'll report that out at your next meeting.

[38:03] Or Jeff, if you want to report that out, just so this board has some knowledge of

[38:08] when that heavier package is going to come forward, and those ordinances are going

[38:13] to be available for review.

[38:17] Second thing is the council schedule is

[38:22] off in the next couple of months due to a variety of things, holidays, elections.

[38:26] They're out for a convention, MMA convention, a conference.

[38:32] And so their schedule is adjusted.

[38:36] And I want to just cover that so you're aware, because there's also a conversation

[38:41] that we need to have about the planning board schedule.

[38:44] So just for your information, October 13th and 27th are the only city

[38:50] council dates. So that's when on November 27th, they'll see the first

[38:56] read

[38:58] of a couple of zoning amendments that are council directed.

[39:02] You'll have

[39:05] those come to you on October 14th at your meeting on October 14th.

[39:09] And then November

[39:12] 5th. November 12th is a workshop, and November 17th is their November meeting

[39:18] dates. For the board,

[39:23] we have

[39:26] November 11th as your normally scheduled meeting, which is obviously Veterans Day

[39:32] and city offices are closed, so we would not be meeting on that day.

[39:37] And then November 25th, we talked about this at the beginning of the year.

[39:41] But we also, I think, Don, you were not part of the board at that point.

[39:45] November 25th is the day before Thanksgiving.

[39:49] So I kind of wanted to do a quorum check to see if we're not able to meet on our

[39:55] normal schedule of the 11th. Our next normal schedule would be the 25th, which is

[39:59] the day before a holiday. If that's dicey for people, then what would be good is if

[40:05] we can pin down the alternative dates for November.

[40:09] November 18th seems like a good candidate because it splits the difference between

[40:13] those two.

[40:16] So

[40:17] number one, is November 25th

[40:22] not ideal? And since we have to cancel the 11th anyway, and that makes it a kind of

[40:28] a long wait for applicants,

[40:31] do you prefer just to make it the 18th and just give people the 25th so they don't

[40:35] have to worry about it and scramble the day before family arrives and whatnot.

[40:40] So I think that's what we're asking is do you want to cancel your November 25th

[40:44] date, move it to the 18th, or keep the 25th?

[40:48] And while we're at it, if there's any other scheduling that we want to change

[40:53] before the end of the year.

[40:54] I think the 18th sounds good because it gives the applicants, they don't have to

[40:59] wait till the 25th.

[41:01] Mm-hmm.

[41:02] So I think the 18th is more user-friendly.

[41:06] Okay.

[41:07] Yeah, I agree. I would not be able to make the 25th.

[41:12] The 18th does work for me.

[41:17] Anyone else?

[41:18] As I said last year, I don't mind working on Veterans Day.

[41:23] You guys do for some reason, so I fought for you guys to take the day off.

[41:28] But I'm okay with the 18th.

[41:30] Okay.

[41:32] Any issues, Cooper or Mike? 18th works for me.

[41:38] Let's do it for the 18th.

[41:40] All right. That sounds good.

[41:42] All right, so November 25th is out. We're moving to the 18th.

[41:46] The second thing I want to just-

[41:47] That's correct.

[41:48] Mm-hmm.

[41:51] Was that?

[41:52] I think he just said that's right.

[41:53] No, I'm just saying that's good. Yeah, I propose that. Yeah, that's great.

[41:57] Okay. And-

[41:58] What did you say, Mike?

[42:01] The second thing is, just based on our current scheduling, we will definitely have

[42:05] an item for you on the October 14th hearing date.

[42:08] And actually, there'll be two council-directed items.

[42:12] So I'm hoping we can confirm a quorum. We can do that offline.

[42:15] We don't have to do it right now. I can text you or whatever to just confirm for

[42:18] the 14th. But right now, we're not having anything tracking for October 28th,

[42:24] except there's some discussion about an ordinance, again, that may stem from

[42:29] council. So if needed,

[42:33] October 28th, if you guys can just hold that as likely happening.

[42:37] I know we're trying to do once a month, but this is a particular month where

[42:41] because of the adjustments to the other schedules and everything else, we may need

[42:45] to hold the two meetings. So I can follow up with you on that, but this October

[42:49] month, just plan on the second and the fourth until I let you know otherwise, if we

[42:54] can.

[42:56] Okay?

[42:57] Yep.

[42:59] Mr. McDonald.

[43:00] I asked James when I went over to pick up our sweatshirts, which looks really nice,

[43:05] by the way.

[43:06] Thank you.

[43:06] Can we get an updated list of what the calendar looks like?

[43:09] Because I still have things that are on my calendar that don't get taken off when

[43:13] we change things. So I just want to make sure I can go through and take everything

[43:17] off that's off.

[43:18] Yep.

[43:18] For the foreseeable future, what we have available.

[43:21] Yep. I'll have Jim update your meeting invites and then give you also just a

[43:26] sheet that you can fill this off.

[43:28] Okay.

[43:30] Okay?

[43:31] All right. Very quickly, I don't want to spend a ton of time on it, and we can

[43:33] enjoy an earlier night.

[43:36] But I did want to mention, just because I'm excited about where we could go with

[43:40] this.

[43:42] We're trying to implement

[43:45] some AI-driven tools to help us with application intake.

[43:49] And we've been working with a couple of guys who are

[43:55] working coding or IT in government, in particular.

[44:00] And they've been helping us develop this tool.

[44:02] I just happened to be working on it earlier that takes the universal planning board

[44:07] application materials and moves it more into a digital realm.

[44:12] So this looks like a conventional form, but what it sort of hides behind the scenes

[44:17] is that it's interconnected with our ordinances, our planning board regulations,

[44:22] our application history,

[44:25] and helps applicants along as they're working.

[44:28] The model that we're trying to use for this, if you're familiar with it, is like

[44:32] TurboTax, where you're able to just, it prompts you with the questions, and based

[44:36] on your answers, it can also prompt follow-up questions.

[44:38] So if you say, "I'm in the shoreline area, yes," then it kicks in a variety of

[44:44] questions. So if you say no, you'll never see that portion of the application.

[44:48] So it keeps things simple for you if your project is simple.

[44:51] But if your project, if you feed in more information and disclose, and we're asking

[44:55] the key questions we need to ask, then applicants using the AI tool will be able to

[45:00] build out an application as if they're talking with a staff member to get there.

[45:05] There's a sort of self-directed version of this. There's also a version where...

[45:11] Let me see where I have it in here.

[45:21] You can enter in your

[45:25] location.

[45:28] It's tied to our GIS and can identify information about your property immediately.

[45:33] Yes, this is the location I want to go with. I want to talk it through.

[45:38] I'm interested in marijuana

[45:43] ... retail store here.

[45:46] And then it will mine our ordinance and try to dig into what it is that you need to

[45:52] know in order to get prepared so that maybe you can have more intelligent

[45:57] follow-up questions with staff, make good use of your time, and it'll sort of focus

[46:01] you in. The benefit to this versus just a generic AI tool, like you can go to

[46:07] ChatGPT at home and ask, "Tell me what South Portland needs in order for me to open

[46:12] a marijuana retail store." What we're trying to build, and we're not done yet, so

[46:16] these answers aren't exactly tailored.

[46:18] What we're trying to build is a closed environment, so it's not hallucinating, it's

[46:23] not pulling City of Portland ordinances, it's not getting other information.

[46:28] So we're fact-checking behind the scenes and interested in releasing this when we

[46:33] know that it's actually giving people helpful information, or if it can't get to

[46:36] that information because it's too complex and too many iterative tasks, that it

[46:41] knows when to kick it out to staff.

[46:43] But so far, we're in the early days of testing this out and building it out.

[46:47] The ideal is that we eventually get to this talk it through chatbot will basically

[46:53] identify all the component parts that you need, that it will then kick you into

[46:57] your actual digital application form.

[46:59] You can start it, save it, come back to it later, eventually fill it out, and then

[47:04] you're submitting something

[47:06] that is more ready. The other thing we've been working on is this plan review tool,

[47:11] and we've been testing it out with various examples.

[47:15] This tool is very cool. It mines the site plan application, the digital document

[47:21] that's submitted, and scans it for all the things that we're looking for when we

[47:25] review it as staff. So it'll find things.

[47:28] For instance, if you're providing a site plan set and you give a metric for height

[47:33] in that site plan that is some number, and then you're showing an elevation drawing

[47:38] a little bit later on, if your scale is off and if the elevation drawing says it's

[47:43] 40 feet, but your number in your table says it's 38 feet, it'll tell you in advance

[47:48] with this sort of audit of your submission. Is it consistent?

[47:52] Are you missing pieces? Do you have the north arrow?

[47:54] Is this digitally signed by a surveyor? Do you have the updated date stamp?

[48:00] Do you have the zoning table that tells you if it's compliant with setbacks?

[48:04] Have you measured distances to FEMA because this property's in a FEMA zone?

[48:08] It'll kind of give you this rubric so it's elective.

[48:11] Applicants can just sort of choose to feed their application through this initial

[48:16] screen test, and hopefully it'll ferret out the things that staff will eventually

[48:21] come back to you with. Just you don't have to wait 30 days for staff to compile

[48:24] those edits. You can get it right away, and that way your application's more

[48:27] complete. If the AI is hallucinating, it'll tell you, "Hey, you didn't provide a

[48:31] written statement on whatever." And it's like, "Actually, I did. It's here.

[48:34] You just missed it or something went wrong or whatever." You can just ignore it.

[48:38] Your application's still fine. But if it flags something that you actually know you

[48:43] need to address, you did not put the zoning district in there. Oh, shoot. Okay.

[48:46] Let me do that because I know staff's going to ask for it later, and this saves me

[48:49] the time, and I can hit the ground running.

[48:52] So those are two tools where they can-- we'll be using AI to screen applicants and

[48:58] give this to applicants so that they can give better submissions and then make

[49:02] those submissions through the portal, so that we can process them faster and we

[49:06] know where the answers are.

[49:08] So I think we're hopeful we can get to a December rollout.

[49:12] We'll do a little bit of beta testing with some applications and whatnot through

[49:16] November and early December, and then try to start testing it out with applicants

[49:21] and do a little bit of coaching along the way.

[49:23] We might be sitting with applicants and actually having Mr.

[49:26] Shadowing as they go through it just to make sure it's working.

[49:31] But so far, it's looking promising.

[49:33] It's just we do have to really take a lot of care.

[49:36] Designing those systems is super easy.

[49:39] You can launch these within hours this tool is available.

[49:43] It's all the controlling for all the hallucinations behind the scenes that is

[49:47] really, really tedious. But if we can get it right, it'll replicate a lot of what

[49:52] staff do, at least for the easy stuff, and let us focus on the big, important

[49:57] questions.

[49:58] Are there other communities in Maine using this tool?

[50:01] As far as we know, we're the only ones.

[50:02] This company-

[50:03] All right

[50:04] ... has two others, and they're actively in development.

[50:06] But no one has launched anything like this yet.

[50:09] I think it's a bit of a new frontier. So I'm here to see if it'll be useful.

[50:15] It's exciting to work on, but definitely requires some input.

[50:21] So more on this later, but I just wanted to kind of give you a window into that.

[50:26] Thank you for sharing.

[50:29] Anything else?

[50:30] That's it for me.

[50:31] Jeff?

[50:32] I do have something.

[50:35] I was reviewing,

[50:38] getting ready for the

[50:41] upcoming meetings regarding implementation, and I found that we have a discordant

[50:46] fire code as compared to the federal standards that were implemented in 2021.

[50:53] So I can send you all the discordance that I would hope to be able

[50:59] to resolve, because in the same vein as you have all this stuff to speed things up,

[51:04] this is holding up, and it's costing builders exceptionally more money to build

[51:09] something because our standards are lower than what the federal fire protection

[51:14] standards ask for, and we're the only city in the entire state that has that.

[51:20] So in our new comp plan, with our new comp plan goals of speeding things up and

[51:25] making things more affordable, this is going to be a pretty big initiative to try

[51:28] to-

[51:29] Can you give an example?

[51:31] Sure. The difference between high-rise versus a mid-rise building.

[51:35] Our high-rise, the national standard says 75 feet and above is a high-rise.

[51:40] High-rises have completely different building products that are required.

[51:44] Ours is 25 feet lower.

[51:46] Wow.

[51:47] So anything that we build at 50 feet, we have to build it using high-rise

[51:53] materials, even though it's not necessary, or at least the federal fire protection

[51:58] says it's not. And this is a barrier to building in our city that I don't know if

[52:03] it's intentional or if it just got stuck somewhere that people didn't realize

[52:07] about, but it is something that I learned, and

[52:11] I wanted to bring it to everyone here's attention so that now that that is one of

[52:15] the things that I think that we should really consider going forward to make the

[52:19] recommendation to make our fire codes

[52:25] align with what the federal fire codes are, whether it's the International Building

[52:31] Commission or the Federal Fire Protection Commission.

[52:37] This is something I'm quite familiar with, and we raised with the fire department

[52:42] a while back. And actually just yesterday, reached out to the fire chief and others

[52:47] so we can set up a meeting to get into this because the

[52:51] comprehensive plan implementation does ask for some increased height allowance in

[52:56] certain areas like the Mall and downtown.

[52:59] So specifically, what Jeff is referring to is Section 8-4.2 in Chapter 8 of our

[53:04] ordinance, which is the fire protection section.

[53:06] We generally adopt NFPA and other codes as the codes that affect are here, except

[53:12] there are certain instances where we say we are actually going to set a new

[53:17] standard different from NFPA, and there's a few cases of this.

[53:22] One of them is this high-rise designation.

[53:24] So in South Portland, the high-rise building is 50 feet, where nationally it's

[53:30] 75 feet.

[53:32] But yeah, I'm very aware of the cost of construction implications of making that

[53:38] designation is something that we are working on with the fire department.

[53:40] Right.

[53:40] So we hope we'll be bringing the ordinance package that will have an update on

[53:45] this.

[53:47] Again, not sure exactly where we'll land and what the fire department will advocate

[53:50] on this, but it's certainly going to be part of the discussion.

[53:53] And again, the cost difference is significant to the point where it's prohibitive

[53:58] to actually build some of the stuff that we're trying to push through.

[54:02] So

[54:04] I just wanted to make everybody aware of that.

[54:09] Thanks. Does most of that live in the

[54:13] Chapter 8 or Article 8?

[54:16] This is it.

[54:17] Yeah.

[54:18] So where we amend other standards, yes, in the fire world, lives in

[54:24] Chapter 8.

[54:24] Mm-hmm.

[54:26] Specifically, all it would take would be deleting this one if it was-- I think what

[54:31] Jeff is advocating is that we just get an alignment.

[54:33] Mm-hmm.

[54:34] But we need to first understand why this was adopted, if there's any reasons why we

[54:38] are different, and what's the justification.

[54:41] Mm-hmm. We're not different. We're unique. We're the only one that has this.

[54:46] So it

[54:49] creates a significant problem with competitiveness in our city compared to

[54:55] everybody else in the state.

[54:58] Yeah. What I was getting at was, as a matter of course, the amendments of this

[55:04] section of the ordinance don't necessarily come before us, right?

[55:07] The planning board.

[55:08] No, they wouldn't.

[55:11] When was that last changed? 2021.

[55:14] 2021 is the

[55:18] last edit to chapter eight, but it's not when this section was-

[55:22] Oh, okay

[55:23] ... amended. So this goes back much further than that.

[55:26] That far.

[55:26] I don't know the exactly.

[55:29] But yeah, it's

[55:32] older. I think it's more than 20 years old.

[55:34] That's what I was thinking, too. When I saw the 2021, I was like, "This doesn't..."

[55:37] So I looked back at the 2020.

[55:39] 2021 is when we did the sprinkler update.

[55:41] Yes, and that's all I could find. I couldn't find anything in this, so I was

[55:44] wondering how did this end in there, because all there was the sprinkler codes.

[55:47] I assume it's older than that, too.

[55:49] I was here in '21, and that would've been a much bigger discussion with me, so I

[55:53] would've remembered that for sure.

[55:55] I'm glad to hear that, Milan, because I was really wondering how that got through.

[55:58] I was like, "Wait a second. We're trying to streamline everything.

[56:00] How did that get through?"

[56:01] Yeah. But right. Planning board doesn't have a role with zoning to advocate,

[56:07] to make a recommendation. It doesn't mean that you all can't-

[56:12] Yeah

[56:12] ... communicate something to council-

[56:13] It's good to know, yeah

[56:14] ... in a workshop or whatever.

[56:16] That's why I wanted to bring to everyone's attention, because I don't know what our

[56:19] role is in-

[56:19] Yeah

[56:20] ... doing this, but if we could even have a workshop and then submit a

[56:23] recommendation to the city council to get us aligned with everybody else in the

[56:26] state, because we're trying to do this in the new comp plan.

[56:29] If we can get this thing... Because this is significant.

[56:33] Think about this. All of the buildings we have are four feet or significantly

[56:36] higher, but you can't build a five-story building in our town because it's just too

[56:39] expensive. You'll build it down in Scarborough instead,

[56:44] where they don't have to deal with this.

[56:46] So there's significant structural issues?

[56:50] Yes. There's an entirely different structural standard that applies.

[56:55] There's standpipes and other fire suppression equipment that kicks in, higher

[56:59] technologies that are used.

[57:03] All of it contributes significantly more to cost in comparison to the non-high

[57:09] rise class of structure. And nationally,

[57:13] NFPA says those things are all important, effective fire suppression

[57:19] techniques and tools,

[57:22] and we only will require them at scale of a 75-foot building.

[57:26] Mm-hmm.

[57:26] And we require them at the scale of a 50-foot building. So that's the big thing.

[57:30] It's not necessarily that those component parts are wrong.

[57:33] This is a question, from understanding Jeff's point of view, is that we're

[57:40] sort of overkill for the size of the building that we're talking about.

[57:43] But our code says 50 feet is

[57:47] when we want to apply these additive protections.

[57:51] It'd be like requiring a sprinkler system in a garden shed.

[57:54] Right.

[57:54] Nobody's going to build a garden shed after that.

[57:56] Well, this is the part that we're getting into, and I can't speak to all of the

[58:01] benefits and trade-offs of making this designation.

[58:06] These things all make the building safer, no question about it, right?

[58:09] Because the question is, is it justified to put it at that scale, and what does it

[58:14] mean for some of our other goals, and is there a challenge in there?

[58:18] And I think we need to hear more from the fire department about this, because this

[58:21] was all adopted before certainly any of us were engaged on it.

[58:27] But yeah.

[58:28] I'm thinking about the coastal resilience and sort of

[58:35] the need in certain areas to build up

[58:39] and how that aligns with... Because there's going to be a cost associated with

[58:45] making improvements and

[58:49] layering on additional cost if you... Yeah.

[58:53] I'm picturing those areas. They're not necessarily the ones where we're going to

[58:59] see this, but

[59:02] yeah. Just-

[59:03] Yeah

[59:04] ... be interesting. I think it definitely comes up in the context of the

[59:07] implementation work that the Comp Plan Committee's doing.

[59:10] The problem with the implementation, as Milan talked about, we don't know what the

[59:15] structure is going to look like, or how long it's going to take, and when we'll

[59:18] actually address that. I'd want to address that pretty quickly.

[59:21] Are we going to be approving the implementations all at once, or are we going to be

[59:26] doing them step at a time?

[59:29] It's too much to do all at once.

[59:31] That's what I thought.

[59:33] We could do it all at once, but it would mean waiting two years and then doing it

[59:36] all at once. So hearing from you all and others, I think we're just going to try

[59:41] and take it in more digestible chunks.

[59:42] So we're going to be coming in six-month spurts.

[59:47] The first one is proposed for spring of 2027.

[59:53] And I'll try to make sure it's on that and the least, but I was wondering if we can

[59:55] get ahead of it now that we know.

[59:57] So I will share that the fire department has been collecting a variety of chapter

[1:00:01] eight edits, because this isn't the only thing that our fire chief has been looking

[1:00:05] at and needs updating and refinement.

[1:00:07] Like many of our chapters, it's so old and needs to be refreshed.

[1:00:12] So I know they're working on a bunch of other stuff, and this has been something

[1:00:16] that I've identified that needs to be discussed when they amend chapter eight.

[1:00:20] This goes back more than a year or two.

[1:00:24] I think what's part of this is that the fire department is looking at all these

[1:00:27] other edits and this is one of the things, and they're not yet ready for all of

[1:00:30] those edits. But to your point, Jeff, maybe this one needs to be taken out of turn

[1:00:35] or just sort of take it, like we've been doing with miscellaneous amendments, take

[1:00:38] a few at a time. Get progress incrementally rather than wait for the whole big

[1:00:43] perfect thing.

[1:00:44] Does anybody here agree with me on that one?

[1:00:47] No?

[1:00:47] I think it's the sort of thing we're leaning on your city council person is going

[1:00:52] to maybe move it in a direction.

[1:00:56] Has this issue been brought up by developers in the past?

[1:01:02] Yes.

[1:01:04] Which is, again, why I brought it up previously.

[1:01:10] I think they should know the better, you know?

[1:01:14] So, as I said, I think we're meeting a week from now or so

[1:01:20] to get into it and see the status. My main question is to see if we can pull this

[1:01:24] out and have it be its own thing and schedule some time with council on it, whether

[1:01:29] that's within the spring session or even earlier than that.

[1:01:33] Again, and this is the fire department's ordinance,

[1:01:38] or at least the one that they administer most closely.

[1:01:40] So it's the council's ordinance, obviously.

[1:01:43] We need to have those meetings to figure out where they're at.

[1:01:49] Thanks for bringing it up, Jeff. Anything else?

[1:01:57] All right. Should we take up adjournment?

[1:02:01] Move to adjourn.

[1:02:02] Second. All right. We're adjourned. Thank you. Thanks.

[1:02:30] You came in really good.

South Portland Planning Board

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