[0:00] 5:00 p.m. and we are at the Canyon
[0:02] Community Center for the July 15th
[0:04] meeting the Springdale Planning
[0:06] Commission. From the town we have
[0:08] Eugenie Ya Iikum, Nyall Connelly and
[0:13] April Radits and Tom Dansancy. On the
[0:17] dis we have Jorge Hernandez, Zion
[0:19] National Park representative, Rich
[0:22] Swanson, myself, Jennifer McCulla, Paul
[0:26] Zimmerman, Koshbati, and Melissa Labour.
[0:30] Terry Krushki is out tonight. Caution
[0:32] Melissa, I'd ask I'd like to ask you to
[0:35] vote in tonight's proceedings. Thank
[0:37] you. Is there agent a motion to approve
[0:41] tonight's agenda?
[0:42] >> I move we approve tonight's agenda.
[0:44] Second
[0:45] >> motion by Paul, second by Rich. All in
[0:48] favor?
[0:49] >> Rich I.
[0:50] >> Jennifer I.
[0:51] >> Paul I.
[0:51] >> Hash I.
[0:52] >> Melissa I.
[0:53] >> Motion passes. Are there any general
[0:56] announcements from the town?
[1:06] » I I think most of the planning
[1:08] commissioners are familiar with our two
[1:10] cent events and we are bringing uh The next in our installment of two cents
[1:16] events is the 2acre two cent where we
[1:20] will get your two cents about the 2acre
[1:24] property adjacent to the town hall that
[1:26] the town acquired several years ago. Um
[1:30] the town had been working towards
[1:31] developing a medical clinic on that site
[1:34] and the town council is reconsidering
[1:36] that and is looking for input on um what
[1:40] could be developed on those two acres.
[1:42] So that will be on Thursday, July 30th
[1:46] at 900 a.m. and that will be here. We'll
[1:49] start here in the community center and
[1:51] we'll do a little field trip of the
[1:53] site. So um we'd love to see you there
[1:57] Thursday, July 30th, 9:00 a.m. starting
[2:01] here at the community center.
[2:06] » Any other announcements?
[2:09] Are there any declarations of conflict
[2:12] of interest?
[2:15] There are none. For tonight's agenda, we
[2:18] have two non-action items. The first is
[2:22] a discussion about potential changes to
[2:24] the land use code that will be necessary
[2:26] following adoption of the wildland urban
[2:29] interface zone. Sta staff contact is
[2:32] Eugenia Ekam and Eugenia will be
[2:35] presenting.
[2:38] » Thank you. Uh this item is a
[2:41] continuation of the discussion the
[2:43] planning commission had on its May 1st,
[2:46] 2026 meeting regarding the wildland
[2:49] urban interface code. Uh the purpose of
[2:51] this report today is to highlight
[2:53] potential conflicts between the town's
[2:55] land use ordinance and the WOI code and
[2:58] to present draft ordinance language for
[3:00] the commission's consideration.
[3:03] Following the previous discussion, the
[3:05] staff reviewed the commission's comments
[3:08] and fed evaluated the relevant sections
[3:10] of the code and we prepared a draft
[3:13] ordinance language addressing the
[3:15] potential conflicts that were
[3:17] identified. The report primarily focuses
[3:21] on two discussion topics which is
[3:23] building construction materials and
[3:26] landscape requirements regarding
[3:28] defensible space. for the building
[3:30] materials. Staff uh prepared draft
[3:33] amendments that would prohibit wood roof
[3:36] shingles and roots uh the wood siding
[3:39] and continue to allow timber structural
[3:42] elements while we also uh agreed to add
[3:46] cement board siding as an approved
[3:48] building material for landscaping. Staff
[3:52] presented two options regarding the
[3:54] existing tree replacement requirement
[3:56] that is in the code. uh as well as we
[3:58] propose amendments to the minimum tree
[4:00] planting requirements within the town's
[4:02] adopted RUI zone. So overall, the staff
[4:06] is looking for direction from the
[4:07] commission through this discussion to
[4:09] receive feedback and to determine the
[4:12] preferred way to move forward with this
[4:14] uh in order to prepare a final ordinance
[4:17] amendment. And I'm happy to answer any
[4:19] question from the commission.
[4:22] >> Are there any questions for Eugenia?
[4:27] Okay, planning commission will move into
[4:30] discussion.
[4:44] Just a important discussion. One
[4:46] question on the um let's start with the
[4:49] wood roof. Although I'm not against
[4:51] saying it's not an approved material,
[4:54] but are we trying to limit that or we or
[4:57] should we be focused on requiring new
[5:00] buildings to have a certain ignition
[5:02] rating? Because I think the code doesn't
[5:05] say you can't have a wood roof. It just
[5:07] gives you really bad ignition rating if
[5:09] you do.
[5:17] » Yes, you are correct. The wooi code does
[5:20] give give you options right uh for
[5:24] parameters. Um in discussion with our
[5:27] building inspector
[5:29] um he recommended that wood shingles are
[5:34] particularly problematic in terms of
[5:37] wildfire and it it might be best to just
[5:41] get rid to prohibit them in this
[5:43] instance. But you are correct that the
[5:46] WO code it does give you options. Um but
[5:51] yeah in discussion with him we he
[5:54] recommended that would probably be a
[5:55] good move just to prohibit them. I I
[5:59] have no problem with that. I'm just
[6:00] curious. And then do we add anything
[6:03] ordinance that says we want to require a
[6:05] certain ignition resistance on new
[6:07] building because that would just cover a
[6:09] lot of things but probably a little more
[6:11] headache because it would have to be
[6:12] analyzed by someone.
[6:16] So, our building inspector uh reviews
[6:19] the plans for building code compliance,
[6:22] which is separate from our kind of
[6:25] zoning title 10 stuff that that the
[6:28] planners do and that the planning
[6:29] commission uh is is involved in. So, as
[6:33] far as the details of those ignition
[6:35] resistant materials [snorts]
[6:37] and structure in structures, that's captured by the building code
[6:43] review. And so, the the purpose of this
[6:46] is generally just to to identify
[6:49] situations where there may be a conflict
[6:51] between title 10 and um
[6:56] and the WOOI code.
[7:14] I would say in general I support
[7:19] the removing of the wood shingles,
[7:22] moving move wood sighting from the list.
[7:26] Um, also continuing with the heavy
[7:29] timber structural beams and elements and
[7:31] then actually adding the cement
[7:34] boarding, this cement board siding
[7:37] to the list.
[7:40] So, the only question I have on the wood
[7:41] siding is I know that house that was
[7:44] just built at the end of Kosava, I
[7:47] believe, is wood siding. It's reclaimed
[7:49] wood. Um,
[7:52] and I I look at that as like, okay,
[7:54] that's the I like the looks. It's nice
[7:57] as as long as you're willing to take on
[7:59] a new construction, the added ignition
[8:02] resistance and the added requirements.
[8:04] Do we want to prevent that kind of
[8:06] structure? Is it I I definitely see wood
[8:08] shingles are higher risk because of
[8:12] things falling on them? I'm not sure
[8:14] about wood siding.
[8:17] >> Yeah, sure. So, I think wood wood
[8:20] sighting um is is going to be more
[8:22] flammable than than other materials, of
[8:25] course. And I I think we could keep it
[8:29] in the code and then if if following a
[8:33] review under the building code, a
[8:36] building is not compliant with WOOI, we
[8:38] could, you know, it would stop right
[8:40] there. Um,
[8:44] but if you wanted to kind of go one step
[8:46] further and and remove wood siding from
[8:49] the approved materials, that's an
[8:51] option. So, um, I either way, it's going
[8:56] to get picked up in the building code
[8:57] review. Um, but this this could be a way
[9:01] of maybe nixing some more dangerous
[9:04] materials
[9:06] at at the outset.
[9:10] And I'm mixed on this one. That's why I
[9:11] wanted to bring it up because I the only
[9:14] reason I would like maybe getting rid of
[9:15] it, but I don't know if this would
[9:16] guarantee it is I like the idea of
[9:19] reducing the defensible space.
[9:22] You know, if you have an IR1, I think
[9:24] you can stick to 30 feet. If the wood
[9:27] siding, which IR2, I think that goes to
[9:29] 50 ft.
[9:31] So, by reducing the fencable space, we
[9:33] are probably preserving some more of our
[9:35] trees and greenery,
[9:38] which would be a plus for that. But
[9:40] again, I don't know if wood siding put
[9:42] you over that threshold or not.
[9:46] Yeah. And and I think it kind of it'll
[9:49] come down to sight specific assessments
[9:52] that we'll have to do on on each permit
[9:56] application that comes through. Um so
[10:01] you know you we we could leave it in the
[10:03] code that wood sighting is is approved
[10:06] and then kind of in that sight specific
[10:09] assessment during the building code uh
[10:11] we may determine that it's not going to
[10:13] be appropriate in that case. Um so it's
[10:18] you know either way is a viable route
[10:20] for you.
[10:22] I don't know if I'm giving a lot of
[10:24] input either except just asking
[10:25] questions. But this is why I would what
[10:28] bring it up again. You know, if we could
[10:31] add
[10:33] the idea is if we add an IR requirement
[10:37] to the building that would sort of
[10:39] minimize the defensible space,
[10:43] which I don't know, maybe people don't
[10:45] think that's a good idea, def minimizing
[10:47] defensible space. I'm just thinking that
[10:49] makes it easier. uh and less work will have to be done cleaning
[10:54] up trees in the 30 to 50 feet
[10:59] or 30 to 100 feet if you're really bad.
[11:03] >> I think it's just a good idea anyways to
[11:05] remove it
[11:07] considering the risk.
[11:12] I also want to in addition to that touch
[11:15] on one of Terry's notes which is um
[11:18] potentially removing wood from the list
[11:20] of ex acceptable fence or wall material
[11:32] which to me seems to make sense in the
[11:35] scope of all of this.
[12:01] I I would have to ask, you know,
[12:04] I don't know, a wood fence because
[12:06] they're pretty popular, I think, in some
[12:08] areas.
[12:10] What is the fire risk? Because it's not
[12:13] against your house.
[12:15] It is more fuel for a fire.
[12:20] But I don't understand the risk that
[12:22] would pose to a house.
[12:26] >> Yeah. So I think the Wooie assessment
[12:28] will is kind of based on your your
[12:31] property. Um so
[12:36] I suppose it's kind of similar to to
[12:38] wood siding. I guess the the risk of a
[12:41] wooden fence which is not right by your
[12:44] house is less than wood on your house.
[12:49] So it it's maybe less of a risk. Um but
[12:53] I I think
[12:55] um you know I think it could be a valid
[12:58] thing to to prohibit. I mean, wood is a
[13:02] very popular fencing material, so it may
[13:05] make it challenging for people to more
[13:08] limiting for people to
[13:11] get fencing for their homes. So, that
[13:13] may be something to think about before
[13:16] prohibiting wood as as a fence material.
[13:19] >> That's a good point because it's not
[13:20] only the wood fence, it's finding people
[13:22] to install. A metal fence takes
[13:25] some welding.
[13:28] You know, it's a different set of equip
[13:29] equipment needed
[13:31] acceptable
[13:32] >> or less accessible to customer or people
[13:36] >> which creates another fire hazard.
[13:38] >> What was that?
[13:39] >> Which would create another fire hazard
[13:40] if they're welding the fence.
[13:42] >> That's good point.
[13:44] >> Now, when I was researching this, I ran
[13:47] across something that um I think if I
[13:52] interpreted correctly said that vinyl
[13:53] fencing is not permitted. Is that
[13:55] correct?
[13:58] What kind?
[13:59] >> Vinyl.
[14:01] >> Yeah, that is correct. Yeah. And vinyl
[14:03] siding is is per is prohibited in the
[14:06] code.
[14:07] >> Siding, I understand, but it also
[14:08] extended it to fencing, I think. So, if
[14:12] uh if that's correct then and we take
[14:15] wood off of there, you know, there's not
[14:17] a whole lot of uh you know, it's going
[14:20] to be stone or metal. Um both of which
[14:23] are much more expensive than vinyl or
[14:24] wood. So, um,
[14:28] that'sation.
[14:30] >> Yeah. And actually, in thinking through
[14:31] the fence situation,
[14:33] uh, when we had the fire chief out,
[14:37] he talked a lot about space in between
[14:39] fuel.
[14:41] And so,
[14:45] a fence,
[14:47] you know, if it was if, you know, you
[14:50] wouldn't want brush right up against it.
[14:53] there would have to be it would just
[14:55] become part of the fuel but the fence
[14:58] itself is not actually
[15:01] um you know it's just a linear
[15:05] not a cluster of
[15:07] >> yeah I mean and that's [clears throat] I
[15:08] mean I think that's a good point because
[15:10] a fence typically you've got a single
[15:12] point of contact with the house
[15:13] >> right
[15:14] >> it's a linear extension that you know if
[15:16] it catches fire somewhere else
[15:18] eventually may be a burn but um in
[15:21] wildland fires. I think the the major
[15:25] and it appears to be in the in the WOOI
[15:28] ordinance. The the primary consideration
[15:31] is the the movement of the fire quickly
[15:34] across great expanses. Um and which is
[15:38] big trees and brush and you know large
[15:40] things that are and ching wood shingled
[15:43] roofs that sort of thing where they're
[15:45] large uh either
[15:48] generators of embers that fly or
[15:51] receivers of embers that fly fly that
[15:54] then you know catch fire. So a fence is
[15:57] probably doesn't normally fit into those
[16:00] categories. It will catch fire if
[16:01] there's fire up against it. Um, it may
[16:04] catch fire if an ember lands on it.
[16:07] Maybe not, depending upon the age of the wooden fence and the type of
[16:10] wooden fence. But [clears throat]
[16:12] anyway,
[16:21] so in summary,
[16:24] I'm thinking allow wooden fences.
[16:27] >> Yeah, I think I
[16:28] >> Yeah, after talking it through, I
[16:29] >> just want to make sure we're all on the
[16:30] same.
[16:30] >> Yeah. Yeah.
[16:33] the woodsiding. I'm not sure what to
[16:35] say. I would like to say it loud, but
[16:37] I'm I'm very open to that one.
[16:40] >> Well, having personal experience in a
[16:42] wildfire and
[16:46] 70 80% of my neighbors houses burning
[16:48] down, my house being constructed out of
[16:51] wood sighting and my house survived.
[16:54] Nothing else on the property survived,
[16:56] but the house was still standing when we
[16:58] got back. Um, it brought into my mind
[17:01] question about, gee, maybe this stuff
[17:03] isn't as bad as it's made out to be. Um,
[17:07] the wooden shingles, I feel pretty
[17:08] strongly that those are those are
[17:11] problematic. Um, the wooden siding, you
[17:15] know, my personal experience, I said, as
[17:17] I said, you know, it it um while
[17:20] mystifying it, it did a pretty darn good
[17:22] job of not burning the house down. That
[17:25] being said though, about a year later, I
[17:28] tore it all off and replaced it with
[17:29] Stuckco. So, [laughter]
[17:37] I kind of feel torn about the wood
[17:39] sighting, too, because
[17:42] also from personal experience, I know
[17:44] that the
[17:47] riskiest material was what was on the
[17:50] roof, not on the sides of the house.
[17:53] And I see a lot of the modern
[17:55] architecture where they like the wood
[17:57] just not the whole thing is wood, but
[17:59] they use it as an accent. So it it's not
[18:02] covering a lot of the house. So we're
[18:03] taking away that accent from residents
[18:06] and architects.
[18:08] >> I mean, I had potted plants up against
[18:10] the wood siding, contacting the wood
[18:12] siding that were turned to reduced to
[18:14] ash, and the wood siding didn't have a
[18:17] mark on it, which was mystifying. But,
[18:20] you know, a flaming 30ft palm tree about
[18:24] 6 ft away. Again, the wood siding wasn't
[18:27] the windows um cracked and broke from
[18:31] the heat, but the wood siding wasn't
[18:32] affected. So,
[18:33] >> well, that's a pretty strong statement.
[18:35] >> I don't know. It's kind of weird, but I
[18:37] did take it off later.
[18:44] I mean, in general, yeah, wood sighting
[18:47] seems riskier, but does it make sense to
[18:51] like how much more of it of a risk is
[18:53] it? I
[18:56] Yeah,
[19:01] » I mean, I think in general, it's better
[19:02] to make build houses out of
[19:05] non-combustible material, but that's
[19:07] >> right.
[19:07] >> That's either difficult or expensive to
[19:10] do depending on on what it is. there's
[19:12] there are there are better materials now
[19:15] because of the prevalence of these kinds
[19:16] of situations but um yeah I don't know
[19:26] with that said I I will give a thumbs up
[19:28] to the cement board siding so people
[19:30] have that as an option.
[19:32] >> Yeah.
[19:34] >> Say that again.
[19:35] >> I said with that said I still would want
[19:36] to give the cement board siding
[19:39] >> Yeah.
[19:39] >> a thumbs up to make that acceptable.
[19:41] >> Yeah. I think that's true.
[19:49] » Does the staff have um any idea like how
[19:53] much riskier would site like it
[19:58] if the risk outweighs
[20:01] allowing?
[20:05] » Yeah. So, um I I can't admit to being a
[20:10] great expert on this. Um, I would say if you're not comfortable about banning
[20:17] it outright,
[20:19] um, these properties when when we're
[20:23] reviewing the plans, the building
[20:24] inspector and and Eugenia and myself
[20:28] will be reviewing them for WI code
[20:30] compliance, which includes, you know,
[20:33] defensible space and all these other
[20:34] things that you're aware of. So,
[20:37] >> if um [clears throat]
[20:42] Yeah, there there may be circumstances
[20:44] where wood siding is is going to pass
[20:47] the WOOI code because other factors have
[20:49] been met. And so if you're if you're
[20:51] more comfortable with leaving that as an
[20:54] option, it's it's still going to be
[20:57] caught through the building code review
[20:59] if if there potentially would be a
[21:01] problem. So it's just a thought.
[21:03] >> I I'm comfortable with that.
[21:05] >> I'm I'm good with that.
[21:07] >> Um so then
[21:09] >> we we put on Niles. Now it's his
[21:11] problem.
[21:12] >> Yeah. [laughter]
[21:15] Um so with the building material then
[21:18] we're at moving wood roof shingles.
[21:22] Um continue to allow heavy timber
[21:25] structural beams and elements. Continue
[21:27] allowing wood siding and adding cement
[21:30] board siding to the list of approved
[21:32] materials.
[21:34] I should probably have a dumb question.
[21:38] like the 2x4 material that you see the lacked things that I see a lot in
[21:43] like the under ease
[21:46] what are they under the eaves in that is
[21:49] that considered thick
[21:53] not necessarily no um and
[21:57] we did like kind of trim and those sorts
[22:00] of features
[22:02] um yeah we we didn't include those in
[22:07] kind of our assessment of this. Um,
[22:12] so that that is something you could
[22:14] consider um
[22:17] if you wanted to to look at those kind
[22:19] of trim materials.
[22:22] >> I was just wondering what was considered
[22:25] >> the heavy beams kind of.
[22:27] >> Yeah.
[22:28] So th those are more kind of I
[22:31] think that's talking more about those um
[22:35] kind of bigger structural beams and
[22:37] ornamental
[22:39] um
[22:40] >> it's been a while but I thought those
[22:42] thick 2x4 thick
[22:44] >> elements in the the uh the code the
[22:47] woody code were uh considered okay
[22:52] but don't quote me on that. That's from
[22:54] my memory.
[22:56] So I I may need to plead ignorance on
[22:58] that.
[23:00] But uh I I know the bigger the bigger
[23:03] beams are are allowed under the WOI
[23:07] code.
[23:09] So
[23:12] » and what about um trim work around
[23:15] windows?
[23:21] » Yeah. So again, um I probably need to
[23:25] defer to our building inspector on that.
[23:28] Um I think all of these materials you
[23:31] can get fire rated materials and they
[23:34] can you know pass the assessment. Um
[23:39] so okay well we're allowed the siding.
[23:42] So those right now are probably
[23:44] sort of combined with that.
[23:46] >> That's how I was looking at it.
[23:48] >> Yeah. But I was just curious for future
[23:53] Okay, thank you.
[23:56] >> Question. If I have a tree on my
[23:58] property that I have to remove for wooi
[24:01] purpose, you know, guidance or whatever,
[24:04] do I need a
[24:06] permit or replant trees two to one
[24:09] somewhere else or do I just take it out?
[24:13] >> Do you want to talk about that, Eugenia?
[24:15] >> Yeah. So the options that we presented
[24:18] was to uh if it's within the town's
[24:23] boundary wooi boundary we uh had the
[24:26] option of either like you if you take it
[24:29] off you don't have to replace it as the
[24:32] as if you're making a development there
[24:34] and the other option was to um make a
[24:39] let me check the other option is to
[24:42] remove the existing tree requirement
[24:44] from the land ordinance alto together
[24:47] and not have uh
[24:50] not have yeah not have it there. I don't
[24:53] think
[24:54] >> but
[24:55] I read I read that to be though in new
[24:58] construction or remodeling uh purposes
[25:01] is that
[25:02] >> if I've just got a tree there next to my
[25:04] house and I got to take it out do I have
[25:05] a problem or not? So I whether we didn't
[25:08] ask uh the staff we didn't we looked at
[25:11] it just in any kind of a tree
[25:14] replacement in the Wii boundary doesn't
[25:16] have to be replaced. That's how we
[25:18] looked at it. We didn't look at it in
[25:20] terms of uh a renovation or a new
[25:23] development. So as far as it's in the
[25:26] bound within the boundary if it's
[25:27] removed it doesn't have to be replaced.
[25:29] That is one of the options that we
[25:31] presented as that.
[25:32] >> Yeah I realized that.
[25:33] >> Yeah. What what is the current code?
[25:35] Because I see trees disappearing
[25:37] already.
[25:38] >> So, it's right in front of you on this
[25:40] screen is uh is where this requirement
[25:43] is and the pink text here is the
[25:47] suggestion the suggested change that
[25:50] would remove that that requirement. But
[25:53] as the code is at the moment, native
[25:56] vegetation greater than 6 ft in height
[25:59] um
[26:01] if it's removed uh should be replaced
[26:05] 2:1 if it's native vegetation. And
[26:08] that's it doesn't specify in the code.
[26:12] Um well, it just says must be preserved
[26:14] during all grading and construction
[26:17] activities. you were asking about.
[26:19] >> So if I'm cut if I just go out and cut a
[26:20] tree down, that's is that a grading or a
[26:22] construction activity?
[26:29] » I wouldn't interpret as [laughter] maybe
[26:32] I'm confused.
[26:34] >> Yeah. I mean I I think in practical
[26:36] terms we're
[26:38] we don't have the capacity to check
[26:41] everybody's yards for every tree. Um, so
[26:45] th this is generally going to come up on
[26:48] redevelopment.
[26:49] >> Okay.
[26:49] >> Of sites.
[26:50] >> That's kind of what I thought. All
[26:51] right.
[26:51] >> Yeah.
[26:52] >> So I got confused by that. So I
[26:55] understand you can't enforce it,
[26:57] >> but technically according to our law,
[26:59] our ordinance, you should replace it.
[27:03] >> Well, that was my question. I didn't see
[27:06] anywhere in the existing code that said
[27:09] if I just go cut my tree down that I
[27:11] have to do anything about it other than
[27:13] take the trash away.
[27:17] >> So the the verbiage is um these natural
[27:21] features must be preserved during all
[27:22] grading and construction activities.
[27:24] >> Yeah. So cutting my tree down is I
[27:26] wouldn't that to be construction or
[27:28] grading because I'm not moving the dirt.
[27:30] I'm just now if I go um
[27:34] dig the stump up, maybe you could
[27:36] interpret that to be a grading activity.
[27:38] But if I just cut it off the ground,
[27:40] leave the stump there and let it, you
[27:42] know, go away over time.
[27:46] >> Yeah. I mean, I I think it probably
[27:48] envisage more significant
[27:51] kind of construction
[27:54] >> because this is just right now a
[27:56] proposal. This is not changing our code.
[27:58] And I think we're okay. But the reason
[27:59] this is an important question is people
[28:02] are meeting with the fire marshal chief
[28:04] or whatever and he's saying you should
[28:06] take down that tree and they're taking
[28:08] down the tree which is fine. I mean
[28:11] I want to make sure that was not in
[28:13] violation of some code. If so we'd have
[28:15] should change that ASAP but that does
[28:17] not seem to be the case.
[28:20] So
[28:21] yeah, I mean what what this is mostly
[28:23] envisaging is so our WOOI boundary um
[28:27] covers
[28:29] part of a lot of the Anastasia Plateau
[28:31] subdivision and Valley View Drive and
[28:33] that area. Um
[28:36] when new development comes forward in
[28:40] those areas and um Jennifer will know
[28:43] about this personally when she was
[28:45] building her house a few years ago. Um,
[28:47] if there are trees on your lot uh that
[28:50] you have to remove during construction,
[28:52] you have to plant two in replacement.
[28:55] >> And th those pads are are quite limited.
[28:58] Um, and so what often happens is that
[29:02] you to to meet that requirement, you
[29:05] have a lot of replacement trees kind of
[29:07] right around your house. And that's quite an obvious contradiction.
[29:12] And so the the proposed language here is
[29:14] that that that replacement requirement
[29:18] would not exist within the WOI boundary
[29:21] so that you're not kind of running into
[29:22] that conflict.
[29:25] >> I I'm I'm going to agree with that, but
[29:26] I do have a question.
[29:28] Just the red area is the boundaries or
[29:30] is that just a high risk boundary?
[29:34] So the town council adopted
[29:40] this as our WOOI boundary for the town.
[29:42] So this this is the area in this red
[29:45] shaded area is the area where we have to
[29:50] apply the WOOI code um in our plan
[29:53] reviews.
[29:54] >> I think we're going to have to add some
[29:56] verbiage to that. So my question is,
[29:59] what happens if my property is split in
[30:02] half?
[30:04] of it's in, half of it's out. What
[30:07] happens if my house is out, but my
[30:09] accessory building or another house that
[30:12] I'm building is in? How do we deal with
[30:15] those situations?
[30:17] >> Yeah, it might be good to to clarify
[30:19] that in in the language in some way.
[30:25] Yeah, we we can look at how We could
[30:28] tweak the language to make that clear.
[30:30] >> It was hard to tell on this picture. And
[30:31] to to be honest, I'm fully in it, so
[30:33] this does not apply to me, but I did see
[30:36] it, you know, at least one lot, maybe
[30:37] more, that it is split down the middle.
[30:41] Uh we approved the um workhouse overlay
[30:45] zone. I believe that new house would be
[30:49] in the the uh the red area, but the
[30:52] existing house is outside.
[30:54] So, I'm just highlighting this. I think
[30:56] we Yeah,
[30:57] >> you want to clarify some of that.
[30:59] >> I think that's a good a good point that
[31:01] we need to know how we would apply it in
[31:04] those circumstances.
[31:08] » I have a question. Um, remind me the
[31:10] origin of the code stating that it had
[31:14] to be two to one. Was it um an
[31:17] opportunity to enhance landscape or was
[31:20] it that because of the risk that the
[31:23] plant or tree may die?
[31:25] Yeah, my understanding is that when
[31:27] you're um [clears throat] it's kind of
[31:30] the latter. So that when you're
[31:31] replacing plants that the the chances of
[31:34] them establishing and being successful
[31:36] are less and so that the two
[31:39] replacements is to kind of account for
[31:41] that
[31:44] >> because I agree with removing the
[31:47] requirement in the WOI zone.
[31:51] Um, but I also wanted to talk about what
[31:56] if it everywhere else it was one to one
[32:01] and I don't know if you see or know like
[32:05] how many actually end up not surviving.
[32:08] I just know on our property
[32:10] we had to remove 11. So we planted 22
[32:13] trees which was a lot and not a single
[32:16] one that has died. they are all alive
[32:19] and and well and
[32:21] >> good job.
[32:22] >> Well, thank you. But at some point
[32:23] they're going to start running into each
[32:25] other and we're going to have to remove
[32:27] things because we are in the high-risisk
[32:29] zone. Um but I'm just wondering if in
[32:32] general
[32:34] um from my experience onetoone might
[32:38] make sense but maybe that's a unique
[32:40] situation that ours survived. I don't
[32:41] know.
[32:44] Yeah, I think um
[32:48] I think in my opinion I think it's um
[32:52] location dependent because in the area
[32:53] you're at where you're constrained in
[32:55] terms as N said earlier and constrained
[32:57] where you can plant those are all
[32:59] compressed into a smaller area it'd be
[33:01] really difficult to meet that as you as
[33:03] you learned. Um there's other places
[33:05] where you know they're large pieces of
[33:07] property where they're doing a small
[33:08] construction over here and they can
[33:10] easily plant trees somewhere else and help us retain a village atmosphere
[33:16] by doing so. Um but you know if you're
[33:20] in the wildland urban interface zone you
[33:23] know and the fire people say you need to
[33:25] take the trees out um it sort of
[33:29] nonsensical to say you got to plant more
[33:31] of them. Um
[33:33] because you know those people are you I
[33:36] mean you know my discussions with the
[33:38] wildland fire
[33:41] captain or whatever that was you know
[33:42] came out and did inspections was you
[33:44] know you don't have to necessarily take
[33:45] the tree out. They recommend you know
[33:47] they they'd like not to have trees there
[33:49] but they recognize the the value of
[33:51] having trees and so sometimes a better
[33:55] solution is to you know um trim the tree
[33:57] up from the ground and thin it at the
[34:00] top so that
[34:02] They they were seem more concerned about
[34:03] because the type of fire that comes here
[34:06] is not the big forest fire where you got
[34:08] high pine trees and that sort of thing,
[34:10] but it's a very fastmoving brush fire
[34:12] that comes through and they want the
[34:14] tree high enough from the ground so that
[34:15] the brush fire moves through. It doesn't
[34:17] catch the crown of the tree on fire and
[34:19] cause greater damages. So, um, yeah,
[34:24] >> I'm actually okay with it maintaining
[34:26] the 2 to one, um, just because of what
[34:30] you said, like it could just be an
[34:31] overall benefit to the community.
[34:33] >> Yeah.
[34:33] >> Because there are some houses in my
[34:34] neighborhood that removed one tree and they planted two and two is nice.
[34:39] >> Yeah. Now, and maybe we want to look
[34:42] further than this and say, "Hey, there's
[34:44] areas where uh we could we could make a
[34:47] change to existing code that says, hey,
[34:48] if you're in an area like Anastasia and
[34:50] you got to plant 22 trees and you only
[34:52] have space to plant 12, um why are we
[34:55] making you do that?"
[34:58] Or maybe we because I think the town is
[35:01] the um
[35:04] conservator on the on the uh greater
[35:08] area there. Maybe we u you know you go
[35:12] to the town and the town allows you to
[35:14] plant part of those 22 trees somewhere
[35:17] in the in the surrounding area. Um I
[35:20] don't know.
[35:22] >> Yeah, it can get complicated very fast.
[35:24] I thought about this a lot.
[35:29] Um so I myself would
[35:35] support just uh maintain the existing
[35:38] tree replacement except for
[35:41] the risk areas.
[35:43] >> Yeah. So option one I guess right?
[35:45] >> Yeah
[35:47] >> I I tend to agree. Now what that does is
[35:50] that basically
[35:54] exonerates Anastasi plateau which you
[35:57] know I think we're saying that's
[35:58] probably a reasonable thing to do maybe.
[36:00] I don't know.
[36:01] >> We have to be careful with that because
[36:03] not the whole plateau is in the zone.
[36:05] >> So we are right
[36:06] >> I mean this is
[36:08] >> this is where we're at but one neighbor
[36:10] might have to replace trees
[36:12] >> and the neighboring lot is exempt.
[36:16] >> Well but it's all in the WOOI. It's
[36:18] >> No, it's not.
[36:19] >> It's not.
[36:21] >> I looked at that last picture. Well,
[36:23] almost all of it, I guess. Maybe I'm
[36:25] missing.
[36:26] >> If you zoom in there, you can see
[36:27] there's structures outside of it in
[36:29] roads.
[36:30] >> Yeah. So, that that scenario that that
[36:33] Rich is talking about is is a
[36:35] possibility that you have somebody
[36:37] across the road that needs 22
[36:39] replacement trees.
[36:41] >> So, that that is true.
[36:45] So there's the whole area
[36:47] on the bottom part of that map.
[36:49] >> I see now.
[36:50] >> Yeah. Where there's a lot of houses. I
[36:52] don't understand it, but
[36:55] >> that's what it is.
[36:56] >> Whole thing doesn't make a lot of sense
[36:57] to me, but
[37:00] >> um
[37:03] yeah. So they would still have the 2 to1
[37:06] requirement.
[37:10] » I don't have enough knowledge. I mean,
[37:12] what you say makes sense to me. I don't
[37:15] know if the town has any other input on
[37:20] the success or
[37:22] heartache of doing 2:1 as a general
[37:25] rule.
[37:27] >> I I think the intention behind the 2:1
[37:31] is is good and I think on the whole it's
[37:33] probably served the town well. H I
[37:35] think, you know, having trees in our
[37:37] properties is has all sorts of benefits.
[37:40] Um but I think this is one instance
[37:43] where uh it's problematic with wildfire
[37:48] mitigation. So
[38:03] I'm not sure to go with that. Jennifer,
[38:05] I I I will say that the re in the the
[38:09] zone, I would definitely say it has to
[38:11] be taken out. Like we said, if if
[38:13] they're saying cut the tree down, you
[38:15] can't say put two more in
[38:19] » and then leaving the [clears throat]
[38:21] two to one for everything else
[38:26] » just because I don't have enough
[38:27] information to make a sound.
[38:29] >> I mean, I am a person like I just said
[38:31] that had to experience planting all of
[38:33] those yet. I still support the two to
[38:36] one because I I I don't believe that I
[38:39] think that that was kind of a unique
[38:41] situation for the most part
[38:47] and I I believe that uh most people in
[38:52] the community support that too
[38:56] from my what I
[39:07] Is everybody
[39:10] caution Melissa? Does that make sense?
[39:13] >> Yeah.
[39:15] >> I'm going on you guys experience. I live
[39:17] in a an apartment. So, um but
[39:23] two different scenarios. I mean,
[39:25] >> yeah.
[39:25] >> One is
[39:29] Yeah,
[39:34] » most of spring bill is unique.
[39:36] >> It's true. [laughter]
[39:39] >> Do you have enough to go on Eugenia with
[39:42] that discussion?
[39:44] >> Yes.
[39:45] >> Any questions of us that could help in
[39:48] moving forward or clarification?
[40:00] Do we hit all the points? That's
[40:02] >> so there's just one additional point you
[40:04] want might want to look at. So this is
[40:06] in the landscape chapter where um we
[40:10] propose some additional language. So um
[40:14] in the
[40:16] there's minimum amounts of trees that
[40:18] are required to be planted in certain
[40:20] zones. Um and so following on in a
[40:25] similar vein, um we've proposed some
[40:28] language here that says these minimum
[40:31] quantities do not apply to properties
[40:33] within the town's adopted wildland urban
[40:36] interface zone. So it's just um where
[40:40] you have um the requirement for one tree
[40:44] for every thousand square feet of
[40:46] landscape area. those requirements to
[40:50] remove those requirements from within
[40:52] the wubby zone kind of for the same
[40:54] reasons that we've discussed.
[40:57] >> I think so.
[40:59] >> I think we have to.
[41:00] >> Yeah.
[41:04] Okay.
[41:06] You guys good?
[41:08] Thank you. Now moving on to the second
[41:11] non-action item, a discussion about
[41:14] potential changes to section 1018 of the
[41:17] code to improve water efficiency and
[41:19] landscape.
[41:20] Staff contact is Nile Connelly. Nile
[41:22] will be presenting.
[41:24] >> Thank you.
[41:26] So this is a new but familiar discussion
[41:30] item. So um water conservation is a
[41:34] perennial issue for communities such as
[41:37] ours. um and it can be a very
[41:40] complicated and potentially overwhelming
[41:43] topic to address. So
[41:47] the intention behind kind of tonight's
[41:51] discussion and the staff report was
[41:53] rather than having a broad discussion
[41:55] about water conservation more generally
[41:58] was to
[42:01] kind of put it into some little
[42:04] bite-sized chunks that that we could
[42:06] maybe address one at a time. And so, um,
[42:11] this specific conversation is focusing
[42:14] on landscaping.
[42:17] Um,
[42:18] and so some potential change changes
[42:21] that we could incrementally make to
[42:23] improve water efficiency and water
[42:25] conservation in our town. Um, so there's
[42:29] a few ideas proposed. Um,
[42:32] not all of them may be practical, but
[42:34] it's it would be great to get your input
[42:36] on this. So, some of the ideas that um
[42:40] were suggested in the report are um
[42:44] removing the prohibition on artificial
[42:46] turf. Um artificial turf is not
[42:49] permitted in the town if it's visible
[42:51] from off the property. Um,
[42:55] so in in some instances, um,
[42:59] you know, a a homeowner or a business
[43:02] that would probably prefer to have
[43:04] artificial turf,
[43:07] um,
[43:08] needs to have real turf and then they're
[43:11] watering it and that kind of thing that
[43:13] it may be worth rethinking that policy.
[43:16] Um, another possibility could be uh
[43:20] limiting the amount of grass that can be
[43:22] used in commercial properties within
[43:24] their landscaping. Um, or even
[43:26] potentially some limitations on grass in
[43:29] residential zones, although there's um,
[43:32] you know, there's other factors to
[43:34] consider there. Uh, we've had some
[43:36] comments from Commissioner Zimmerman and
[43:39] Kushki. Um, and those have been printed.
[43:43] I think you've got copies of those that
[43:46] also raise some valid points. Um,
[43:49] so my recommendation to the commission
[43:53] would be to keep this discussion
[43:59] focused on some simple kind of bite-size
[44:02] adjustments rather than having a wider
[44:05] conversation about water conservation
[44:07] tonight. but just to think about maybe
[44:09] some of these changes to our landscape
[44:11] ordinance that could incrementally
[44:15] um push us in the right direction. Um
[44:18] but I'm happy to answer any questions or address any thoughts you have.
[44:37] We want to start off with what we have
[44:39] here or the other one I would
[44:43] here to discuss would be the um
[44:45] artificial turf.
[44:46] >> Yeah, that's um go ahead because I have
[44:48] some
[44:50] >> so um you know I actually have
[44:53] artificial turf um in my previous house
[44:57] and I haven't I mean honestly it is very
[45:02] nowadays they are very good-looking.
[45:05] Um, I don't see a problem with it for
[45:08] residents that want it is especially if
[45:10] you have animals, it's very durable.
[45:13] Probably a little hot,
[45:16] but I'm looking for a negative.
[45:20] >> Uh, I agree that they're they've come a
[45:23] very long way and there they look great.
[45:27] Um, I'm wondering though if still
[45:30] putting some limitations on it, like
[45:33] some areas have it allowable in the
[45:36] backyard but not the front yard or a
[45:39] certain square footage of it in back or
[45:42] front or just overall.
[45:45] Um,
[45:49] I just don't know that I've seen I've
[45:51] seen small backyards covered in it.
[45:54] Um, I haven't seen like large areas
[45:58] covered in it. And so in my mind, I just don't
[46:04] see a large area
[46:06] looking that great, but I don't I can't
[46:09] picture one.
[46:12] >> I hear what you're saying. That's why I
[46:13] want to bring this up.
[46:14] >> So,
[46:17] like, did you have a small yard that was
[46:20] >> Yeah, it's in San Jose. So, it's a
[46:21] smaller yard
[46:22] >> and I've seen it in small yards and
[46:27] integrated with landscaping and it seems
[46:29] fine.
[46:31] Um,
[46:35] my daughter happens to live in a
[46:36] neighborhood where they there's you can
[46:38] have it in your backyard
[46:40] and I have to say I don't love the yards
[46:43] that have it in the back, but you don't
[46:46] really have to look at it. Um,
[46:50] >> I There's a house that's up this road
[46:53] that has artificial grass and it it
[46:56] looks nice with the landscape. It's not
[46:58] big.
[46:59] >> Small.
[46:59] >> It's small, but it's there for their
[47:01] pets. So,
[47:02] >> yeah,
[47:03] >> I think it's better for them and it
[47:07] looks really nice. I thought it was real
[47:08] at first, but then I noticed that it was
[47:10] artificial.
[47:11] >> Yeah.
[47:12] >> I don't know how to make these rules.
[47:14] The one concern I have is I don't want
[47:16] people just to take it and roll it out
[47:17] and say, "Well, it's allowed. Here it
[47:20] is,
[47:21] >> right? Have a certain standard. And how
[47:23] do how do we state that
[47:25] >> because it can look really bad if not
[47:27] done well.
[47:27] >> Yeah.
[47:30] I mean, and over time it can
[47:31] degrade and and if it's not maintained
[47:34] or replaced, then it can look badly. But
[47:36] my bigger concern with artificial turf,
[47:38] it's been this way for I've felt this
[47:40] way for considerable amount of time and
[47:42] you're seeing more um more about it in
[47:46] the press is that you know especially in
[47:48] an area like this it um taking natural
[47:53] spaces and converting them to artificial
[47:56] turf and I include grasses in natural
[47:59] spaces. Um the grass is is cooling to
[48:02] the environment. artificial turf and
[48:04] cement and hardcapes is not cooling to
[48:07] the environment. And um you know we
[48:09] we've there's been a movement and this
[48:12] movement is about trying to preserve or
[48:14] conserve water. Um I I don't think we've
[48:17] adequately
[48:19] in general addressed the impact of the
[48:23] environmental heating uh as a water
[48:28] um user as much as we probably should be
[48:31] because you know are we really in the in
[48:34] the big bigger picture are we conserving
[48:36] water by uh making things generate more
[48:40] heat around us because we may find that
[48:42] we're not because you we use the water
[48:44] in a different way evaporates or you
[48:46] know not a different consideration. So
[48:49] >> that's a good point. I I think there are
[48:52] artificial turfs out there now that
[48:54] address that. I don't know exactly what
[48:57] that looks like.
[48:59] Um
[49:01] and
[49:03] I would say maybe it's hotter if they
[49:06] put concrete there as opposed I you know
[49:09] I
[49:10] >> um some of the artificial turf I mean
[49:12] you don't want to walk on it barefoot.
[49:14] Yeah,
[49:14] >> especially when it's 100° outside. You
[49:16] don't walk on concrete barefoot. Some of
[49:18] the some of the cool coat uh materials
[49:24] that goes on top of concrete can
[49:26] actually
[49:28] help with that and you where you can
[49:30] walk on it in when it's hot out. But um
[49:33] none of those are as good as having just
[49:35] plain old grass ground because
[49:37] >> um you know plain old grass is is pretty
[49:41] cool especially if it's in the shade.
[49:43] Um, so I'm I'm generally not in favor of
[49:47] moving from grasses to artificial
[49:49] substances whether they
[49:51] >> Well, and also in general it's not
[49:52] really fitting
[49:54] >> in the desert like it's not a natural
[49:58] landscape,
[49:59] >> but then you know um you know you can
[50:02] make the same argument if you're going
[50:04] to take the the um cool grass out and
[50:07] put a bunch of gravel down or something
[50:09] of that nature, you're going to end up
[50:11] with the same kind of problem.
[50:13] I would lean towards allowing
[50:17] a certain amount.
[50:20] I don't know exactly what that amount
[50:22] would be. Just some some
[50:26] small area that would be beneficial for
[50:28] pets or
[50:31] like I said integrated with other
[50:32] landscaping.
[50:37] And
[50:41] I don't know how turf, [clears throat]
[50:43] artificial turf is rated. If we could
[50:45] somehow put some kind of standard
[50:46] attached to it.
[50:49] >> Yeah. So, there's definitely some
[50:51] research we can do. Um I've I've done
[50:53] some preliminary research on artificial
[50:57] turf and it's true. Um it's not all
[51:00] created equally. There is kind of
[51:02] different grades. Um, it has improved a
[51:06] lot over the years. Um, but yeah, it's
[51:10] certainly not a silver bullet. It's not
[51:12] hoay for artificial turf. Everywhere
[51:14] should be artificial turf. It's maybe an
[51:17] option for uh someone um who wants a
[51:23] kind of a zeroscaped landscaped area but
[51:26] wants a little bit of green to
[51:29] lighten it up a little bit. So
[51:33] perhaps um one option could be to for us
[51:37] to go away and [snorts] explore how
[51:41] um yeah we how it could be included in a landscape area but not kind of
[51:48] unlimited sades of it. and and we could
[51:52] also potentially look at if there's
[51:55] different types of gradings of
[51:57] artificial turf or different qualities
[51:59] and see if we could explore how that
[52:03] could address the concerns.
[52:04] >> That would be great.
[52:06] >> Yeah. I'd be curious too on if you look
[52:07] at areas that have a lawn, what kind of
[52:11] shape are they in? Do they look decent?
[52:14] Would it be an improvement for
[52:15] artificial turf or are they all in
[52:19] pretty good shape? and we're not really
[52:21] changing anything besides getting rid of
[52:23] some nice green grass and replacing it
[52:25] with plastic.
[52:26] >> I I think the only advantage really is
[52:29] on water conservation. I think a a real
[52:31] lawn is always going to be nicer for
[52:34] many reasons. It's going to like I I
[52:36] have artificial turf in my in my
[52:38] backyard and it it's fine, but a real
[52:42] lawn would probably be nicer. Um but yeah, if we're kind of looking at
[52:50] this from the perspective of water
[52:51] conservation and maybe giving some
[52:54] options um to reduce water usage, it it
[52:59] could be kind of an option that we could
[53:03] offer to people.
[53:15] um
[53:19] the memo that I sent out um that you've
[53:21] all received, you know, in that I
[53:23] recommended that the planning commission
[53:24] consider combining landscape and water
[53:27] conservation with a review of open space
[53:29] code because they're I think they're
[53:31] very much linked together. you know, the
[53:33] town general plan
[53:36] and open space plan, you know, have have
[53:40] uh stated, you know, basically that it
[53:44] the town wants to retain and promote
[53:46] open spaces and anything we do with
[53:49] regard to conservation, water
[53:50] conservation,
[53:52] um that limits that going to you could
[53:55] be very detrimental to the retention of
[53:56] open spaces over time. So, we have to be
[53:58] very careful in that regard. So to to to
[54:01] look at one independently of the other I
[54:04] think probably might not be the best way
[54:06] of going about it. So anything we do
[54:08] with regard to uh water landscape and
[54:11] water conservation should take all of
[54:13] that into effect because um or
[54:15] consideration because they are
[54:18] >> fall outside of landscaping or is it
[54:21] included in that?
[54:22] >> Well um in you know there's open spaces
[54:26] in the valley residential zone that are
[54:29] um based on um strict interpretation of
[54:34] the way the code's written, you know,
[54:36] it's it's called landscaping. It's not
[54:38] called open space, it's called
[54:39] landscaping. So, if we change, you know,
[54:42] water conservation in landscaped areas,
[54:44] we're indirectly affecting the ability
[54:47] to to maintain or create open spaces
[54:50] over time.
[54:54] And you know I cited some some uh
[54:57] examples of that in my diet tribe but
[55:00] you know
[55:04] » does it make sense just to exclude
[55:08] open space
[55:10] >> in in the scenario that you're talking
[55:12] about does it would you say it would
[55:13] make sense to exclude open space? Well,
[55:16] I I mean that's one way to do it, but I
[55:20] think I think um realistically at some
[55:23] point we're going to have to look at the
[55:24] two together and in in the bigger
[55:26] picture and rather than just do it
[55:28] independently and say, "Okay, we're just
[55:30] going to do this one thing right now."
[55:32] Um because you know I think I you know
[55:35] when I read through um some of this you
[55:39] know I I immediately started to look at
[55:42] things and say well if we do that then
[55:44] um it's going to create this problem
[55:46] over in the open space area and so we we
[55:48] don't want to necessarily do that
[55:50] without doing something about the you
[55:51] know preservation open spaces because
[55:54] and you know I mean even in the even in
[55:56] the intro it says um the overwhelming
[55:59] majority of water usage in Springdale is
[56:00] for irrigation and So, we should review
[56:02] our landscaping standards, see if they
[56:04] can be more effectively promote water
[56:05] conservation. Well, I I would venture to
[56:10] guess that most of that irrigation or a
[56:13] very large part of that irrigation goes
[56:15] to open space properties, properties
[56:18] that are either an agricultural
[56:20] uh whether they be in agricult zoning or
[56:23] their residential zoning under
[56:24] agricultural purposes, which is
[56:26] something we need to think about as
[56:27] well. But um you know there's you know
[56:30] the the um
[56:34] water shares users um predominant usage
[56:37] for them is is in is irrigation of
[56:41] pastures or that sort of thing. And so
[56:44] um if we're you know while it's true the
[56:47] over I think the the ratio of um town
[56:53] user irrigation and
[56:57] um
[57:00] water shares users is about twothirds
[57:02] water shares to one third town. Um and
[57:05] so if twothirds of the of the water goes
[57:08] to watershed users, obviously the
[57:11] overwhelming majority is used for that
[57:13] purpose. Um and then within I think even
[57:17] within the town uh
[57:20] you know what we would think may might
[57:21] be town users are probably some of the
[57:24] large um hotels or that sort of thing.
[57:28] And they've got large expanses of grass or or other landscaped areas
[57:33] there. but they're they're watering
[57:36] those with irrigation water shares as
[57:38] opposed to purchasing water from the
[57:40] town, which is why they can probably do
[57:42] as much as they can in that regard. So
[57:45] again, you know, we have to take all of
[57:47] that in consideration. So
[57:53] I I'm just going to say good job putting
[57:55] all that together and I I totally agree.
[57:57] After I read this, I was very concerned
[57:59] of losing the open space.
[58:00] >> Yeah. But like you said, if if we say,
[58:04] "Well, they're exempt."
[58:06] The next biggest user is probably
[58:08] businesses and hotels.
[58:11] And what are we going to do with them?
[58:12] Because they're probably using most of
[58:13] their waters in
[58:15] >> Well, the the water that the hotels are
[58:18] using that aren't for irrigation
[58:21] is cooler water, which is not what this
[58:24] is about. So, they're that's being
[58:27] that's controlled in a different set of the code. So we can we can look
[58:31] at just the irrigation part of it
[58:33] without impacting their ability to you
[58:36] know feed and and shower and bathe and
[58:40] you know clean the properties but
[58:43] because most of them well I shouldn't
[58:45] say most many of them are using uh well
[58:49] irrigation water for the outside and
[58:52] water shares for most of that
[58:53] >> but I look at as water is water so I
[58:56] guess where I was going is if you take
[58:58] those things away the people we're
[59:00] hurting are the residents that really
[59:01] aren't using that much water anyways.
[59:04] >> You I'm sorry. You think there's not
[59:05] >> So if we say we want open space, which I
[59:07] agree with.
[59:08] >> Yeah.
[59:08] >> So go ahead, water that. We're not going
[59:11] to be able to um restrict internal usage
[59:14] of water.
[59:16] >> So how much water is really left
[59:19] and who are we really
[59:21] >> my understanding is the town did a a
[59:22] study on that in the last number of
[59:24] years and they've determined that
[59:25] there's a lot of water for the next 20
[59:28] years. No, that doesn't
[59:29] >> No, no. I meant how much water usage,
[59:32] meaning that the residents that, you
[59:35] know, live in the town of Springdale.
[59:38] >> I don't see them watering a lot,
[59:40] >> right?
[59:41] >> So, how much water are we saving and all
[59:44] we're doing is inconveniencing a lot of
[59:46] our residents and I don't think we're
[59:47] going to get that far as far as the
[59:49] savings. I think I'm agreeing with you.
[59:52] >> Yeah.
[59:53] So what of the conservation
[59:59] items listed? I mean the one that I see
[1:00:04] would be a benefit for everybody
[1:00:06] including open space irrigation systems
[1:00:09] being designed to water um efficiently
[1:00:11] and avoid overspray and overflow. That's
[1:00:14] not limiting their water. It's probably
[1:00:17] actually helping their watering
[1:00:20] situation.
[1:00:22] Um
[1:00:24] I don't see anything though that really
[1:00:26] is actually limiting the volume.
[1:00:33] » Well, there's a number of things on on
[1:00:35] you know this the staff's uh notes here
[1:00:37] that you know 80% of plants in landscape
[1:00:39] are required to be water conserving
[1:00:41] species. Um
[1:00:44] that's that's a good thing. Um we should
[1:00:47] be doing that. But if you're in if you
[1:00:48] look at it agricultural areas um
[1:00:53] the and if the next bullet says before I
[1:00:56] continue on that the next bullet says
[1:00:58] the town holds a list of approved plants
[1:01:00] approved plant species which are native
[1:01:02] and drought tolerant.
[1:01:03] >> Um and
[1:01:07] that's also true. But if you look at
[1:01:09] some of the pasture areas that are out
[1:01:11] there, you know, there's there's large
[1:01:13] pastures where um
[1:01:18] grasses that are used for forage or food
[1:01:21] for for livestock are, you know, being
[1:01:24] cultivated there. And some of those are
[1:01:26] alalfa. Alfa is not on the list. There's
[1:01:29] other fescues and buffalo grasses that
[1:01:32] are on the list and some of some of the
[1:01:34] pastures use that. But um to try to take
[1:01:38] uh the alalfa, which is a arguably a
[1:01:42] better food source for most of the
[1:01:45] depending on the type of animal you
[1:01:46] have, to try take that away from them,
[1:01:48] it'd be very difficult.
[1:01:50] >> So would there be a way of listing
[1:01:52] exceptions for those types of things you
[1:01:54] just mentioned? Well, it could be and
[1:01:56] that's maybe that's why and that's kind
[1:01:58] of why I'm saying we got to look at them
[1:01:59] together is because one way to do this
[1:02:01] is say, hey, if you know if we're
[1:02:03] looking at um land that's being uh
[1:02:06] that's somehow defined as open space
[1:02:09] within the residential zones, which we
[1:02:12] we'd have to do. there's some some way
[1:02:14] we'd have to figure out how to do that
[1:02:15] and say, okay, they get some certain
[1:02:17] exceptions if they're, you know, if
[1:02:19] they're using those as open spaces uh in
[1:02:23] somehow in an agricultural uh manner,
[1:02:28] you know, it's okay to plant alpha alpha
[1:02:30] or we add alphaalfpha to the list of
[1:02:32] approved plants in in those particular
[1:02:34] types of areas. I'm not saying I don't
[1:02:36] think you'd want to do that everywhere,
[1:02:38] but you could say it in certain areas
[1:02:40] and make it open it up so that they've
[1:02:42] got a a little more leeway there that
[1:02:44] doesn't discourage them from from, you
[1:02:47] know,
[1:02:47] >> I I personally I don't want to limit
[1:02:49] what you can plant on those open areas.
[1:02:51] If they're feeding animals livestock,
[1:02:55] put what works for them because I think
[1:02:58] if the town character likes the
[1:03:00] livestock.
[1:03:01] >> Well, that's true. But the other thing
[1:03:03] you have to be aware of too is you know
[1:03:05] um the uh the there's significant amount
[1:03:10] of water that is that is needed to
[1:03:14] farm or undertake agriculture or
[1:03:17] whatever. So, if you've got a large
[1:03:19] pasture, say a 5 acre pasture, you need
[1:03:21] about 800,000 gallons a month at a
[1:03:24] minimum to water that um to keep it uh
[1:03:28] the grass, you know, whatever kind of
[1:03:30] grass is.
[1:03:30] >> I'm confused of where you're going with
[1:03:32] this.
[1:03:33] I'm just saying we need to be un we need
[1:03:35] to look at them together and be
[1:03:38] understanding of what some of those
[1:03:40] constraints are as opposed to just
[1:03:41] saying hey we're going to make some
[1:03:43] changes and and then without considering
[1:03:45] that it's going to have a could have a
[1:03:47] significant impact on this other
[1:03:48] >> yeah and I'm agreeing with that that's
[1:03:51] >> but I'm saying you take out the big
[1:03:52] users and I don't want to go through and
[1:03:55] put all kinds of restrictions in for
[1:03:56] someone that's really not using that
[1:03:58] much water like for example the uh spray
[1:04:01] overflow from sprinkler systems. Well,
[1:04:04] that probably occurs with people
[1:04:05] watering lawns. How much of that is
[1:04:08] there? How much are we really how much
[1:04:10] is there to get? You know, I'm not going
[1:04:12] to stop someone, you know, has a field
[1:04:16] that has a big sprint uh sprayer.
[1:04:18] They're going to have overshoot. I know
[1:04:20] it happens. I see it.
[1:04:22] >> Well, there are but you know, at the
[1:04:24] same time, there are things that those
[1:04:25] users can do to to mitigate some of
[1:04:27] that, you know,
[1:04:28] >> but that that's going to be a cost to
[1:04:30] them. It is a cost but it's but it
[1:04:32] >> and I really don't want to burden them
[1:04:34] more.
[1:04:35] >> No, but I I think um you know there's some reasonable things to do. I
[1:04:40] mean you know in you know you know my
[1:04:43] community the community owns a 5 acre 5
[1:04:46] and a half acre parcel that's planted as
[1:04:48] a pasture and one of the things we found
[1:04:50] out was that um we were consuming much
[1:04:53] more water than we really needed to
[1:04:55] because we were manually turning the
[1:04:57] valves on and off and we were relying on
[1:04:59] people to do that. sometimes other
[1:05:00] things got in the way and they didn't
[1:05:02] weren't able to do that. And so we spent
[1:05:04] a you know a significant amount of money
[1:05:07] converting over to an automated system.
[1:05:09] So now it's all you know on timers and
[1:05:12] whatnot. And so the timers want can you
[1:05:15] know control when the water goes on and
[1:05:16] off and we're well within the the uh you
[1:05:21] know requirements for lack of a better
[1:05:22] term of you know what we should be
[1:05:24] doing. we're we're actually using less
[1:05:26] than uh what some of the agricultural
[1:05:30] people are suggesting. I think that's
[1:05:32] part of that's because the the area is
[1:05:35] smaller than what we thought it was.
[1:05:37] But, you know, um we're using probably
[1:05:40] half as much as we used to use 5 years
[1:05:43] ago. And then significant, but now
[1:05:45] you're going to go to the the farmer or
[1:05:46] the person that has, you know, a pasture
[1:05:49] with cattle
[1:05:50] >> and required them to make an investment
[1:05:52] to upgrade their system, which is
[1:05:54] probably going to cost more than yours
[1:05:56] because it's much bigger.
[1:05:57] >> It may it may or it may not. Um, it
[1:06:00] depends. And and some of those, you
[1:06:01] know, I mean, those people are not
[1:06:04] necessarily unwilling to to do that. I
[1:06:06] mean, you know, we all live in this
[1:06:07] earth together and there many of them
[1:06:09] that are willing to conserve and, you
[1:06:10] know, there's benefits to that. some
[1:06:12] farmers are some of the most
[1:06:13] conservation ob you know aware people
[1:06:16] that that I've known. Um so if there are
[1:06:19] you know good
[1:06:21] uh methods or habits that we can
[1:06:23] encourage them to do I think generally
[1:06:25] they'll be willing to adopt that. But so we shouldn't just write it off and
[1:06:30] say hey you got a big user so we're going to you know um
[1:06:36] you know leave you outside the fence and
[1:06:37] you can do whatever you want. I don't
[1:06:39] think that's the right choice either. I
[1:06:40] think we need to do consider both sides.
[1:06:42] So,
[1:06:44] >> could I offer a few suggestions?
[1:06:45] >> Sure.
[1:06:46] >> So, um I I think this is a really good
[1:06:50] conversation because um
[1:06:54] you know those those pastures and those
[1:06:56] kind of semi-aggricultural parts of town
[1:06:58] are a really treasured part of a
[1:07:01] community, right? They're really part of
[1:07:04] the landscape that we all love. Um and
[1:07:08] um those are all with the exception of
[1:07:12] Trees Ranch, those are all zoned valley
[1:07:14] residential.
[1:07:15] >> Yeah. So to Paul's point, if we do
[1:07:19] introduce uh restrictions on turf for
[1:07:23] natural grass in valley residential
[1:07:26] zones, you could you're essentially
[1:07:29] applying them to those areas and that
[1:07:33] could potentially mean that you know
[1:07:35] their ability to stay in that kind of
[1:07:38] semi-aggricultural state may be may be
[1:07:41] difficult. Um, one one thought is
[1:07:46] um you could put the valley residential
[1:07:50] zone to one side for the time being and
[1:07:54] look purely at the commercial
[1:07:57] landscaping
[1:07:58] um requirements. So, um, and introduce
[1:08:04] some greater restrictions on grass
[1:08:07] within the commercial zones, within
[1:08:09] those commercial properties, h
[1:08:11] potentially limit grass to functional
[1:08:14] areas. And there's some ways you could
[1:08:16] define that to recreation or that kind
[1:08:19] of thing. Um
[1:08:22] and
[1:08:23] the benefit of doing something that is
[1:08:25] that when when we do get a um a
[1:08:30] commercial redevelopment of a property
[1:08:32] where the landscape is being redeveloped
[1:08:36] um we can you know get some gains as far
[1:08:39] as water efficiency there. We've had a
[1:08:41] few redevelopments of commercial
[1:08:44] properties in the last few years that um
[1:08:47] they the finished product looks great.
[1:08:49] They're really beautiful projects, but
[1:08:51] there's a lot of there's a lot of grass
[1:08:54] that's just there to look at. Um and
[1:08:59] perhaps they could still look great with
[1:09:03] water-wise landscaping.
[1:09:05] They could look just as nice with water
[1:09:07] wise landscaping as they do with grass.
[1:09:09] and we'd be saving a lot of water. So
[1:09:12] that that could be one area that you
[1:09:14] could focus on that might be a little
[1:09:15] bit easier than
[1:09:18] kind of imposing restrictions in the
[1:09:20] residential zones for the discuss for
[1:09:24] the reasons you've outlined.
[1:09:28] » Do we have an idea of how much water
[1:09:30] that would save?
[1:09:32] >> I don't have any figures to hand.
[1:09:38] So, I mean, we we could look a little
[1:09:40] bit, but I mean, I think if you drive
[1:09:42] through the commercial areas of town,
[1:09:44] you'll see lots of lawns that need
[1:09:47] regular watering. And so, I think
[1:09:50] incrementally as those properties
[1:09:52] redevelop and adjust, um, over time, you
[1:09:56] could make some real savings on water. I
[1:09:58] think
[1:10:05] » is the town is the town on a schedule
[1:10:08] for a water to water the grass?
[1:10:10] >> Yes.
[1:10:12] Well, the the users are on the schedule.
[1:10:15] >> I don't Yeah,
[1:10:16] >> I'm not sure I'm not sure if the
[1:10:19] watershed users are on the same schedule
[1:10:21] or not. Um, my my empirical observation
[1:10:26] is that they kind of water when they
[1:10:27] feel like they can, they want to,
[1:10:29] >> because I I I drive to work every
[1:10:32] morning at 6:00 a.m. and I see the same
[1:10:36] >> grass being watered almost every day.
[1:10:39] So, I'm like,
[1:10:41] is it on a schedule or are they should
[1:10:43] be on a schedule or
[1:10:49] » And the other the other Go ahead, Tom.
[1:10:51] Are you Melissa, are you referring to
[1:10:53] When you say town, are you referring to
[1:10:54] just like town- owned properties or just
[1:10:57] general properties within the town of
[1:10:58] Springdale?
[1:10:59] >> Just general properties. I see them. I
[1:11:01] see the water just every morning, same
[1:11:04] time,
[1:11:06] >> and I'm like I'm not sure if it's on a
[1:11:08] schedule because we're talking about
[1:11:09] this and then I'm a little confused
[1:11:10] because I don't know anything about the
[1:11:13] water schedule or anything because
[1:11:16] again, I live in the apartment and we
[1:11:18] have a drip line. So
[1:11:20] >> yeah, that's a good question and and
[1:11:22] it's a little complex. I think as Paul
[1:11:23] was about to answer that, you know,
[1:11:24] there are some properties that are um
[1:11:26] irrigate with water through the
[1:11:30] irrigation company. They have set
[1:11:32] watering times when they are supposed to
[1:11:34] water. There are other um properties
[1:11:37] that water with um water that they
[1:11:40] purchase through the town. Um and and so
[1:11:43] it just it kind of depends on which
[1:11:45] where you're getting your water and what
[1:11:46] the schedule is. I think the point of
[1:11:48] what Nile is trying to to say is you
[1:11:50] shouldn't be watering your grass every
[1:11:53] day at 6:00 am in the morning. And if
[1:11:55] there's a way that we can encourage
[1:11:57] people not to do that, that's that's the
[1:12:01] goal, right? So that that's that's what
[1:12:04] we're trying to do here.
[1:12:05] >> That clarifies a little bit for me. So
[1:12:08] because I was a little confused,
[1:12:11] >> do you know the does the town what
[1:12:14] schedule does the town adhere to? their
[1:12:16] own schedule or do they have are they
[1:12:19] have they selected one of the others?
[1:12:23] » I should know the answer to that
[1:12:25] question, but I don't.
[1:12:26] >> That's okay.
[1:12:27] >> Um, so I I will find that out for you.
[1:12:29] >> Okay, good.
[1:12:31] >> I'm going to go back to the idea. I
[1:12:33] mean, the the best one of the great way
[1:12:35] to conserve water is to get rid of the
[1:12:37] lawn and just plant native plants,
[1:12:40] but I don't know how we'd want to
[1:12:43] enforce that. you know, we can show
[1:12:46] pictures, examples.
[1:12:48] I mean, it's actually beautiful and it encourages wildlife and everything
[1:12:52] else.
[1:12:54] >> So, we want to go want to like mandate
[1:12:56] that type of landscaping.
[1:12:59] >> So, so I think the way that it work
[1:13:00] would work is if if the town were to
[1:13:04] make amendments to our landscaping
[1:13:05] ordinance to to restrict grass and and
[1:13:10] that kind of thing. Um
[1:13:13] all ordinances are are futurefacing,
[1:13:16] right? So they would only apply as
[1:13:19] people start redeveloping pro
[1:13:22] properties. So it by changing this
[1:13:24] ordinance, it wouldn't mean that all of
[1:13:27] the commercial properties suddenly need
[1:13:29] to get rid of their grass. It would just
[1:13:32] mean that over time as redevelopment
[1:13:34] happens um
[1:13:37] there would be
[1:13:39] you know the landscaping the commercial
[1:13:41] properties would over time become more
[1:13:42] and more
[1:13:44] um
[1:13:45] >> so that's really limiting space you have
[1:13:47] for grass
[1:13:53] » um Rich that's a great question about
[1:13:56] hey if we if we pass all these
[1:13:58] ordinances what really is the impact
[1:14:00] right because we can say no more grass,
[1:14:02] but then we have to wait for all these
[1:14:03] properties to redevelop. And how long is
[1:14:05] that going to take? Well, one of the
[1:14:07] things that that is available to the
[1:14:09] town if you pass an ordinance that has
[1:14:13] certain water conservation elements to
[1:14:15] it, many of which you're discussing
[1:14:17] tonight through the water Washington
[1:14:20] County water conservation district,
[1:14:22] property owners can get a rebate for
[1:14:24] removing their grass. And so then there
[1:14:26] becomes a financial incentive for them
[1:14:28] to get that that or to remove the grass.
[1:14:32] That incentive is only available
[1:14:35] if the town adopts an ordinance that has
[1:14:38] some of these water conservation
[1:14:40] elements to it. So, I think that's
[1:14:41] another reason why um Nile and Eugene,
[1:14:44] you're reading this to you tonight, is
[1:14:46] to perhaps um qualify property owners in
[1:14:50] the town of Springdale to receive that
[1:14:52] incentive from the Washington County
[1:14:54] Water Conservancy District to remove the
[1:14:56] grass. That way, we don't have to wait
[1:14:58] until properties are redeveloped. We can
[1:14:59] get faster action on it.
[1:15:01] >> Yeah. The the unfortunate aspect of that
[1:15:04] is well if it's something that somebody
[1:15:07] wants to do and is budging to do that
[1:15:09] anyway, it's a good uh little extra for
[1:15:13] them. But the cost to replace well to to
[1:15:17] naturalize the land is it's almost
[1:15:20] impossible to take the gr remove the
[1:15:22] grass and replant it to look like the
[1:15:24] natural spaces around us. Um those
[1:15:27] spaces have developed over hundreds of
[1:15:30] years and they're basically because uh
[1:15:34] there's no neighboring properties
[1:15:36] blowing you know outside seeds in the park fights with this all the time.
[1:15:42] They're they're out there trying to kill
[1:15:44] the invasive species and the town is
[1:15:46] doing the same thing. If you try and
[1:15:48] just
[1:15:50] cut take the grass out, you basically
[1:15:52] have to uh sterilize the land almost and
[1:15:54] then come in and and plant new plants
[1:15:57] and it's extremely cost prohibitive to
[1:15:59] do that. Um
[1:16:01] >> I I don't know if I fully agree with
[1:16:02] that. You you rip the grass out, you
[1:16:04] till it, you put in new plants.
[1:16:07] >> Yeah. And then
[1:16:08] >> I can say that that's what I've done.
[1:16:09] the old weeds and the old roots and
[1:16:11] stuff start coming back up and you end
[1:16:13] up with lots of weeds and and it doesn't
[1:16:15] look like the natural spaces around us.
[1:16:18] It can be especially if you're on a if
[1:16:20] you're in a small garden area, you can
[1:16:22] it's it's doable if you're on a large uh
[1:16:24] piece of property. It's very very
[1:16:26] difficult to do that. So
[1:16:27] >> So can that happen anyways without any
[1:16:31] ordinanced
[1:16:33] >> ordinances? Like if they do it, can they
[1:16:35] get
[1:16:35] >> the rebates?
[1:16:36] >> Yeah.
[1:16:37] >> So not at the moment. No, because the
[1:16:39] town would first need to adopt that
[1:16:41] model ordinance from the water
[1:16:43] conservancy district for our town to
[1:16:45] qualify for that.
[1:16:47] >> And um I guess maybe it'd be helpful to
[1:16:51] see the that ordinance, right?
[1:16:55] >> Yeah, we can I I can bring details of
[1:16:57] that
[1:16:58] >> the next time. The the commission
[1:17:00] discussed it a couple of years ago.
[1:17:03] >> Okay. Uh there's so there there's some
[1:17:05] of these standards that we've talked
[1:17:08] about this evening and then there's
[1:17:09] other things like recirculating hot
[1:17:12] water systems for your shower and that
[1:17:14] kind of thing that are are part of it as
[1:17:17] well.
[1:17:22] » I think that would be worthwhile to look
[1:17:23] out and see if it's Yeah.
[1:17:26] The the other question I had is about
[1:17:28] this. Um I feel like there's a conflict
[1:17:32] going on here. So we'd like water
[1:17:36] conserving species, but we also want
[1:17:39] fire resistant species. They typically
[1:17:42] are not the same thing. To be fire
[1:17:43] resistant needs a lot of water contact
[1:17:46] content in the plant, which means you
[1:17:48] have to give it water. If you want low
[1:17:52] drought tolerant, that's going to be a
[1:17:54] drier plant. it's going to be more prone
[1:17:55] to fires. I don't know how to balance
[1:17:58] that.
[1:18:00] >> That's the joy of planning. Lots of
[1:18:02] competing priorities.
[1:18:06] Um,
[1:18:08] so yeah, I don't
[1:18:09] >> right now I'm I'm leaning toward fire
[1:18:11] resistant,
[1:18:13] but that is not going to be good for
[1:18:16] >> I mean there's things you can do to be
[1:18:17] better with water, you know, drip system
[1:18:19] and things like that. I think there are
[1:18:22] a number of options when it comes to
[1:18:24] choosing plants like cactuses or
[1:18:29] um
[1:18:30] >> okay I need a screen because I want to
[1:18:33] get rid of some plants some what are
[1:18:35] they tumeric turmeric or whatever they
[1:18:37] are but I need to replace them with a
[1:18:39] screen so that's not going to be a
[1:18:41] cactus
[1:18:43] >> I don't know all the plant names but I
[1:18:45] know that there there are some that are
[1:18:47] drought
[1:18:48] >> drought tolerant And
[1:18:51] um I know we mostly what we planted
[1:18:53] around our house are drought tolerant.
[1:18:58] Um but they're not like black brush.
[1:19:02] They're not flammable like that. They
[1:19:04] have green leaves and flowers and um but
[1:19:07] they take very little water. So I I
[1:19:10] don't know if there's a lot, but I know
[1:19:12] that there are a number of choices when
[1:19:16] it comes to landscaping like that.
[1:19:18] succulents and those sorts of plants.
[1:19:20] >> Yeah. And even some of the grasses
[1:19:23] um they don't take a lot of water and
[1:19:25] they stay green like the taller grasses
[1:19:28] and they're not again not flammable like
[1:19:31] brush would be
[1:19:34] >> or or junipers.
[1:19:37] >> Rich in in for your specific instance a
[1:19:39] desert willow would be a fantastic
[1:19:41] choice because it has the similar
[1:19:44] screening that your tamarisk do
[1:19:46] currently. It uses much less water and
[1:19:48] it is um not it's it's fire resistant.
[1:19:52] It's not a it's not a combustible
[1:19:53] species. So for your specific location,
[1:19:56] you could you could investigate the
[1:19:57] desert willow.
[1:19:59] Um okay. See, there's always trade-offs.
[1:20:03] So the desert willow may work, it may
[1:20:05] not. There may be things, but the my
[1:20:07] point is is there seem to be this
[1:20:09] conflict. You know, you can't find the
[1:20:12] perfect you might not be able to find
[1:20:13] the perfect plant to do what you need to
[1:20:15] do.
[1:20:18] So when it says you know some things
[1:20:20] were what does it mean to say required
[1:20:24] to be water conserving what does that
[1:20:26] really mean?
[1:20:30] So that this these this these bullet
[1:20:34] points are already actually in our code.
[1:20:37] Um, and so we we have a list of plants
[1:20:42] um that are that are water conserving.
[1:20:46] Um, if people want to use other plants
[1:20:49] um, you know, from a staff perspective,
[1:20:52] we do a little bit of research. You
[1:20:54] know, we're not botists, but we do a
[1:20:56] little bit of research to make sure that
[1:20:57] they're water conserving. And that's kind of you know we do our best
[1:21:02] to to make sure that that we apply that.
[1:21:10] Yeah. So water conserving usually more
[1:21:12] fire
[1:21:14] prone unless you have very limited
[1:21:17] selection the overlap of firerone and
[1:21:22] water conserving the list.
[1:21:24] >> I don't know if that list really exists.
[1:21:30] Sorry. The the approved plant list,
[1:21:33] there's a concern that they're all
[1:21:35] flammable. Is that your
[1:21:37] >> Yeah. Are they all
[1:21:39] >> I I don't know that there's necessarily
[1:21:41] as big of a
[1:21:44] either or. I I think there are plants
[1:21:47] that are drought tolerant that aren't
[1:21:49] necessarily super flammable. Um, that's
[1:21:53] that would be my [snorts] understanding that it it
[1:21:57] doesn't necessarily have to be a black
[1:22:00] or white tradeoff.
[1:22:03] I know when the fire chief came to our
[1:22:04] house, we have a lot of variety of
[1:22:06] plants and he flat out told us that the
[1:22:09] main concern was clearing out the brush
[1:22:13] and and
[1:22:15] um limiting or cutting up the junipers.
[1:22:18] >> Yeah. Beyond that, he was pointing to
[1:22:20] other lots of plants saying, "Not
[1:22:22] worried about that. Not worried about
[1:22:24] that." And it it was quite a few plants,
[1:22:27] different species.
[1:22:31] But I hear you too. There is definitely
[1:22:33] a conflict going on too with some plants
[1:22:35] that do take a lot of water and
[1:22:39] um or not and they're flammable.
[1:22:44] I'm wondering at this point if we should
[1:22:48] like so we have asked for more
[1:22:51] information on the turf
[1:22:53] um and some information
[1:22:56] about um the model of the regulations
[1:23:01] for watering.
[1:23:03] Um, if we want to talk about just some
[1:23:06] of these other potential
[1:23:10] um ideas, limiting grass and lawn areas,
[1:23:14] uh, restricting water features
[1:23:17] and time of day. Does anybody have any
[1:23:20] thoughts on
[1:23:22] those specifically? Any of them? Well,
[1:23:24] the I think I like um
[1:23:27] Nile's idea that we maybe focus on for now we focus on the commercial areas
[1:23:33] because it probably bigger payoff and less complexity in terms of the open
[1:23:38] spaces.
[1:23:39] >> Yeah. No, I agree. I'm just as far as
[1:23:41] >> because if you like grass areas for
[1:23:43] commercial
[1:23:44] >> Well, if you look at if you look at the
[1:23:46] open spaces, those are grass areas.
[1:23:49] >> They're also regulated in terms of time
[1:23:51] of day.
[1:23:52] >> But I'm just saying like if we What
[1:23:54] about for commercial
[1:23:56] limiting grass and lawn areas? What
[1:23:58] would that look like?
[1:23:59] >> Well, there's going to be uh for for new
[1:24:03] com I mean and you know I think one of
[1:24:06] the things that have to be careful of is
[1:24:09] you know this is talking about what's
[1:24:11] going to happen in the future as opposed
[1:24:12] to what's now. So people that have large
[1:24:14] grass areas now are probably not going
[1:24:17] to be necessarily subject to this but
[1:24:19] people that are going to make changes
[1:24:21] for the future would be. So um we want
[1:24:24] we don't want to dissuade desirable
[1:24:27] looking properties. So we have to be
[1:24:29] careful in that regard. But we've got a
[1:24:31] more we have more flexibility in in uh
[1:24:34] looking at that. So for commercial
[1:24:35] properties is probably uh you know if we
[1:24:38] focus on that and try and figure out a
[1:24:40] way to make sense out of that that might
[1:24:41] be real helpful and we and we probably
[1:24:44] will learn some things in that process.
[1:24:46] So because what what I think in doing
[1:24:49] that what what we should do is look at
[1:24:50] what the existing commercial property
[1:24:53] in in some you know examples are and try
[1:24:56] and evaluate are we is that something we
[1:24:59] want to see in the town and if it is
[1:25:00] something we want to see then how are we
[1:25:02] going to craft the code to make that
[1:25:04] happen again in the future as opposed to
[1:25:07] you know if it's something we don't want
[1:25:09] we can dissuade that so we're not going
[1:25:10] to get that but we want to encourage
[1:25:12] something that's going to be more that
[1:25:13] is going to be beneficial and meet the
[1:25:16] requirements. So,
[1:25:16] >> so I guess what I'm wondering at this
[1:25:18] point is what is what is it that we need
[1:25:20] to be considering and what do we need
[1:25:22] what information do we need for the to
[1:25:26] talk about those considerations?
[1:25:30] I think it I think it's a difficult
[1:25:32] question because if you look at um you
[1:25:36] know I don't remember where it says it
[1:25:38] but you know when I look at um
[1:25:41] you know that list uh well for back up
[1:25:45] above the first list says irrigation
[1:25:48] systems must be designed to water
[1:25:50] efficiently and over avoid overspray and
[1:25:53] overflow. um
[1:25:57] how how do we define what's watering
[1:25:59] efficiently? Because the code doesn't
[1:26:01] tell you what watering efficiently
[1:26:03] means. Um you know, somebody could
[1:26:05] interpret that to say, "Well, I dumped a
[1:26:07] lot of water on my grass and it's
[1:26:08] growing really good." So that's pretty
[1:26:09] efficient. You know,
[1:26:11] >> other people are probably going to
[1:26:12] interpret that and the town probably
[1:26:13] interprets that to say, "Well, use less
[1:26:15] water doing that and see if you can get
[1:26:16] it to look just as well." Um
[1:26:18] >> sir, do you think that needs to be
[1:26:19] changed? Well, I you know, I I think um
[1:26:24] the way it's written right now probably
[1:26:27] isn't sufficient for us to regulate very
[1:26:29] well. Uh maybe maybe you've been doing
[1:26:32] that uh or trying to do that, but when I
[1:26:36] look at it, you know, that's the
[1:26:37] statement down the last bullet on the
[1:26:39] screen up there. Um that's pretty much
[1:26:43] straight out of 1089
[1:26:47] and that's so that's the code. So, how
[1:26:50] do you how do you interpret that when
[1:26:52] somebody comes and says, "This is what
[1:26:53] my system's going to look like."
[1:26:56] >> Yeah, it's a good point. It's it's maybe
[1:26:59] not super clear and it's something that
[1:27:00] we could look at. Um,
[1:27:04] >> and maybe that's part of what we do if
[1:27:06] we're looking at at the commercial
[1:27:08] things and say, "Okay, let's let's take
[1:27:10] a look at what that means, you know,
[1:27:12] because it's it is open to some
[1:27:14] interpretation. So if we can look at a
[1:27:16] you know what examples of efficient
[1:27:18] watering systems are and say okay this
[1:27:20] is a good way to do this and we want to
[1:27:23] encourage that much like you know uh
[1:27:26] recirculating water systems where you
[1:27:28] you're reusing this the hot water um is
[1:27:31] beneficial. So there's probably ways to
[1:27:34] do that.
[1:27:37] If you if you talk to
[1:27:39] um
[1:27:42] agricultural people, farmers in
[1:27:45] particular, you know, they have
[1:27:47] developed ways to water very efficiently
[1:27:51] because it's economically beneficial to
[1:27:54] >> Yeah.
[1:27:56] [snorts] So, not to say that those, you
[1:27:59] know, those methods apply necessarily in
[1:28:02] some of the, you know, the places in the
[1:28:05] commercial districts, but maybe they do.
[1:28:08] >> Yeah, I agree. It would be useful for
[1:28:10] there to be more definition to water
[1:28:13] efficiently and avoid overspray and
[1:28:15] overflow. Is that something staff can
[1:28:18] look at some language for?
[1:28:21] I mean, as I stated before, one of the
[1:28:23] >> one of the things that was most helpful
[1:28:26] when, you know, on the the plot we've
[1:28:28] got down there is, you know, looking at
[1:28:31] and saying, "Hey, you know,
[1:28:32] >> the biggest uh waste of water is because
[1:28:36] the gentleman that we, you know, had
[1:28:39] tasked with turning the water on and
[1:28:41] off, uh, he'd turn it on and then he'd
[1:28:44] go to work in the park and then thinking
[1:28:47] he was going to be back three hours
[1:28:49] later and he could turn it off and he'd
[1:28:51] get caught doing something else in the
[1:28:52] park and then he'd uh forget about it
[1:28:55] and on the way home he'd go, "Oh, the
[1:28:56] water's still running down the street."
[1:28:58] And he'd turn the water off after eight
[1:29:00] or nine or 10 hours possibly. And so
[1:29:04] tremendous amount of water was being
[1:29:06] wasted um
[1:29:10] wasted in
[1:29:12] well
[1:29:15] curious how many use cases are like that
[1:29:17] though.
[1:29:17] >> What's that? Most people have cuz most
[1:29:19] of you drive at 6:00 in the morning. You
[1:29:21] see how the sprinklers on, you know
[1:29:22] they're all on timers.
[1:29:23] >> Not necessarily. You'd be surprised.
[1:29:25] Yeah.
[1:29:31] » Is
[1:29:32] >> I I would say many of them are. I'm
[1:29:34] sure.
[1:29:34] >> Is timing something that's we should
[1:29:37] talk about the regulations as time
[1:29:43] or
[1:29:44] >> Yes. But it again that's complicated
[1:29:47] because um and it and the question uh
[1:29:50] that I would ask there is you know the
[1:29:53] commercial users what type of commercial
[1:29:55] user are they are they a irrigation
[1:29:57] waterhares user are they a town
[1:30:00] secondary irrigation user because the large users based on the size of
[1:30:04] your the pipe that you're using um are
[1:30:07] restricted
[1:30:09] >> uh the big it's called big water users
[1:30:11] if you look at the town schedule um
[1:30:13] they're restricted to only water between
[1:30:16] 10:00 a.m. and 6 pm on Thursday and
[1:30:19] Sunday from 10:00 a.m. to Monday at
[1:30:21] 10:00 a.m. So, if you took the and I
[1:30:24] kind of pointed that out in the thing,
[1:30:26] if you took the the recommendation on uh
[1:30:30] on this list to say we're going to
[1:30:31] restrict it so you can't water between
[1:30:33] 10:00 a.m. and 8:00 pm, um that means
[1:30:37] they can't water on Thursday at all.
[1:30:38] They can only water on part of Sunday
[1:30:41] and early Monday. uh and it reduces
[1:30:44] their their watering schedule down to 14
[1:30:47] hours per week. Um that they're able to
[1:30:50] water on only one day and that's not
[1:30:54] going to be sufficient to maintain a
[1:30:56] pasture of any kind. The grass will die
[1:30:58] after two maybe three days. Even even
[1:31:00] the current schedule where it's
[1:31:02] Thursdays and Sundays, you know, the
[1:31:05] grass is getting pretty scorched looking
[1:31:07] >> out for commercial.
[1:31:10] same same thing because if but again
[1:31:13] that's that goes to the question you
[1:31:16] know the first question you have to ask
[1:31:17] for that is what kind of schedule are
[1:31:19] they on are they subject to those same
[1:31:21] restrictions um and and frankly I don't
[1:31:24] know if that schedule's codified or not
[1:31:27] or if it's just a
[1:31:30] suggestion but
[1:31:32] >> I I think it's a really valid point that
[1:31:34] if we are introducing time of day
[1:31:37] limitations that we need to make sure
[1:31:39] that it lines up properly with the
[1:31:41] irrigation schedules and recognizing
[1:31:44] that that's um there's some complexity
[1:31:48] with that because there's different
[1:31:50] water sources. So um yeah, I think if if you think this is a good idea to
[1:31:59] restrict it by day, we can we can kind
[1:32:02] of dive into that detail and see if
[1:32:04] there's any conclusions
[1:32:06] >> or if not then we won't.
[1:32:10] >> I to me it sounds like
[1:32:13] given what both of you were talking
[1:32:15] about like it may not make sense to put
[1:32:19] to have those restrictions on
[1:32:21] To some extent it does. I mean you'll find that you know generally most
[1:32:26] water conser agencies are trying to get
[1:32:29] you to limit or do your watering hours
[1:32:32] or your watering during hours where it's
[1:32:34] not the middle or the heat of the day
[1:32:36] because a lot of water is at lost to
[1:32:38] evaporation.
[1:32:39] >> But are they already doing that?
[1:32:41] >> They may be or may not. You know that's
[1:32:43] why you're you know your observation
[1:32:44] that said 6 in the morning there
[1:32:46] everybody's watering. There's a reason
[1:32:48] for that is because the water is going
[1:32:49] into the ground as opposed to going into
[1:32:51] the air.
[1:32:51] >> So, I guess that would be good
[1:32:53] information for us to have.
[1:32:55] >> Okay. Well, yeah, we can investigate
[1:32:56] whether there's anything that would make
[1:32:58] sense.
[1:32:59] >> Yeah.
[1:33:00] >> With all of those constraints.
[1:33:02] >> Perfect.
[1:33:09] It would be interesting to know where
[1:33:10] our big water usage is to know what to
[1:33:13] target.
[1:33:14] I'm
[1:33:14] >> sort of lost you on like
[1:33:17] Yeah, we can nickel and dime a lot of
[1:33:19] things, but where where where are we
[1:33:21] really using all our water?
[1:33:29] » Yeah.
[1:33:31] So
[1:33:33] in in as Nile mentioned, this this
[1:33:36] topic's been before the commission a
[1:33:39] year or two ago and and we brought some
[1:33:42] data to the commission about where the
[1:33:44] water was using was being consumed and
[1:33:47] which types of users were consuming the
[1:33:49] most amount of water. We can certainly
[1:33:51] bring that again to you. Um I as Nile
[1:33:56] mentioned at the beginning at the outset
[1:33:58] that's all you know good information to
[1:34:00] have as as Nile mentioned at the outset
[1:34:02] what what we're trying to do here is say
[1:34:06] within the context of the land use arena
[1:34:10] which is what the the planning
[1:34:11] commission does with within the context
[1:34:13] of regulating land use are there things
[1:34:16] that can be done to encourage better use
[1:34:19] of water overall so I'm I'm not sure
[1:34:22] that the commission needs needs to
[1:34:24] really get down into the into the
[1:34:26] nitty-gritty of of looking at this
[1:34:29] particular
[1:34:31] use scenario versus this other
[1:34:33] particular use scenario or this this
[1:34:35] type of user versus this type of user.
[1:34:37] Rather, in general, when we're
[1:34:39] regulating land use, what can we do to
[1:34:44] um encourage better water conservation?
[1:34:47] So, yes, we can get you that that that
[1:34:50] figures, those figures, and I'd
[1:34:53] encourage you to kind of think in
[1:34:55] general terms,
[1:34:57] how how can we do a better job of of
[1:35:01] managing and using our water,
[1:35:03] >> okay? And and I get that and I
[1:35:04] appreciate that and I'm not trying to be
[1:35:05] difficult, but like there's a question
[1:35:07] on fountains
[1:35:09] and I'm sitting here going, geez, how
[1:35:10] many people really have fountains? But
[1:35:12] we can go through a bunch of effort to
[1:35:14] try to figure out how to limit
[1:35:15] fountains. What am I gaining for that?
[1:35:18] Is that is that a big use? And then I
[1:35:20] have to look at well where do I see
[1:35:22] fountains? I see it at a an Airbnb.
[1:35:25] Well, do I want to say that they can't
[1:35:27] have that anymore or new Airbnbs can't
[1:35:30] have a feature like that? New
[1:35:31] businesses. And it's hard to answer that
[1:35:34] question without knowing,
[1:35:37] you know, is that really something
[1:35:38] that's using a lot of water?
[1:35:42] Yeah. So, we are definitely not going to
[1:35:44] be able to get you data on how on on
[1:35:47] water use for fountains in the tank.
[1:35:49] Yeah. We we we do not have that granular
[1:35:51] that that level of of granular data. We
[1:35:53] can get you data on in general what a
[1:35:56] residential connection uses, what a
[1:35:58] commercial connection uses, we we can
[1:36:00] provide you that level of data. If
[1:36:02] you're looking for how much do we lose
[1:36:04] from evaporation from pools, how much
[1:36:06] does a a fountain use, we don't have
[1:36:10] that data and and we can't get it.
[1:36:14] >> Some of some of that stuff is in a
[1:36:16] general sense is available for for
[1:36:18] example evaporation of pool pools. you can that's dependent upon the surface area
[1:36:24] of the pool, the heat or the and the uh
[1:36:27] climate, you know, if it's a drought
[1:36:29] area or humid area, that sort of thing.
[1:36:32] Um, and you know, you can you can figure
[1:36:34] make those calculations and so we can
[1:36:36] the difficulty there would be trying to
[1:36:38] figure out how big are the pools around
[1:36:39] town, you know,
[1:36:41] >> this is a pool, this is a fountain.
[1:36:43] >> That's one of my complaints is we allow
[1:36:45] pools,
[1:36:46] >> but we're going to say you can't have a
[1:36:47] fountain. a pool is going to be a lot
[1:36:49] worse than a fountain.
[1:36:50] >> Yeah. And and and again, I think the in
[1:36:52] general, these are the kinds of
[1:36:54] questions to have for the commission,
[1:36:56] right? Is hey, could we save some water
[1:36:58] if we don't allow fountains? Sure, we
[1:37:01] could. is from from your um uh position
[1:37:06] as as the planners for the town of
[1:37:08] Springdale, is that a is this is the
[1:37:11] potential water savings from not having
[1:37:13] a few fountains
[1:37:16] worth the uh community character impacts
[1:37:20] of not having fountains? Those are the
[1:37:22] kind of decisions that you need to make,
[1:37:24] right? and understanding that that
[1:37:29] the the total impact of of removing all
[1:37:32] fountains in Springdale in the grand
[1:37:33] scheme of things is going to be pretty
[1:37:34] minimal in terms of water conservation
[1:37:36] and also every drop saved is is
[1:37:39] important. Right? So those are the kind
[1:37:40] of questions you that I think are
[1:37:42] important to have and I think you can
[1:37:43] have those questions without real hard
[1:37:46] data on the water use because it's
[1:37:49] either going to be estimates as as Paul
[1:37:51] mentioned um you know using some
[1:37:54] algorithm to to come up with them um and
[1:37:57] we're just not going to get really good
[1:37:58] hard data for you on that.
[1:37:59] >> Yeah. Well, and also maybe we don't it
[1:38:02] doesn't I don't think always have to be
[1:38:04] something that's already a problem but
[1:38:06] avoiding
[1:38:08] >> sure
[1:38:09] >> to happen in like so when it comes to
[1:38:10] the water feature thing maybe it's some
[1:38:13] I don't know what the number is but a
[1:38:15] large amount of water you know many
[1:38:17] gallons that you know a property decides
[1:38:21] to wants to put in like a waterfall with
[1:38:25] a river going down to another waterfall
[1:38:27] that goes into a little fish pond or
[1:38:30] something and that's a a lot of water
[1:38:32] and while we're putting um this added
[1:38:36] language in maybe it makes sense just
[1:38:39] you know for future like that that is
[1:38:41] something that's doesn't make sense and
[1:38:45] you know where we're trying to conserve
[1:38:46] where we can
[1:38:47] >> I mean I think lo Las Vegas is a great
[1:38:50] example of that I mean you've got
[1:38:52] properties there that are
[1:38:54] >> huge users of fountains um in a very
[1:38:58] drought out. Uh, [snorts]
[1:39:01] >> so it could just be simple
[1:39:02] >> area,
[1:39:03] >> no water features
[1:39:05] over 100, I don't know, whatever number.
[1:39:08] >> My problem with that is I'm going to say
[1:39:11] you can't have that, but you're going to
[1:39:12] have that big pool.
[1:39:14] >> Well, I I I think we just put in what
[1:39:17] makes sense to to me. It doesn't make
[1:39:19] sense to tell people they can't have
[1:39:21] pools in this area, but one way we could
[1:39:25] save water is limiting water features.
[1:39:29] Yeah, but they're also limiting their
[1:39:31] rights to have a a water feature.
[1:39:34] If it's really beneficial, I could get
[1:39:36] behind it, but I can't say it's really
[1:39:38] beneficial.
[1:39:39] >> Well, I would say it's everything's a
[1:39:40] balance because that's kind of what the
[1:39:43] code is all about is coming up with the
[1:39:45] best balance of what serves the people
[1:39:48] of the community
[1:39:50] best. And
[1:39:53] >> so, because the fountain looks like it's
[1:39:55] using a lot of water, we're going to
[1:39:56] take it out. Well, I don't know if it is
[1:39:59] using a lot of water. My guess is
[1:40:00] >> we can't we can't find that out easily.
[1:40:05] >> I'm to me it's an an area that you could
[1:40:08] save water that I don't think there
[1:40:10] would be a lot of heartache in the town
[1:40:11] about. I mean, maybe somebody would be
[1:40:14] disappointed that was building
[1:40:15] something. I I just think it's something
[1:40:17] to look at when we're putting water. It
[1:40:20] would be interesting to see. I my
[1:40:22] opinion is that's probably a pretty
[1:40:24] common thing that you see is limited
[1:40:27] water features
[1:40:29] or the amount of water in water features
[1:40:34] in areas that are putting together
[1:40:36] ordinances for conserving water.
[1:40:48] So I think you know
[1:40:51] we can look at that kind those kinds of
[1:40:53] things if it's not something that makes
[1:40:55] sense or there's not a problem so we
[1:40:58] don't feel like we need to address it.
[1:41:03] >> Yeah. I mean I think that's a
[1:41:06] I think that's going to be a hard area
[1:41:08] be for a number of reasons. one, it's
[1:41:10] going to be hard to quantify, but you
[1:41:11] know, but it's also gonna generate a lot
[1:41:15] of
[1:41:17] um emotion,
[1:41:21] >> right? Well, and it could get
[1:41:23] complicated, too.
[1:41:26] >> My pool has a water feature, but it's a
[1:41:29] part of my pool, so
[1:41:30] >> Yeah. So, you got to dig up your pool,
[1:41:33] >> turn it off, you know. I mean, there's
[1:41:35] communities in California that have done
[1:41:37] that sort of thing where basically
[1:41:39] legislate you can't have that anymore.
[1:41:41] It doesn't go over real well, I don't
[1:41:43] think. But, you know, I mean, the parks
[1:41:46] got a whole bunch of water wasting
[1:41:48] features. They had some, you know,
[1:41:49] earlier yesterday or, you know, those
[1:41:51] things called waterfalls. You know, they waste a whole lot of water because
[1:41:55] it all evaporates before it hits the
[1:41:56] ground, you know. So, I don't think
[1:41:59] anybody would want to legislate that,
[1:42:01] though. No.
[1:42:04] What I was looking for is, you know, I
[1:42:06] don't see a big bang for the buck there.
[1:42:08] I do see a bang for the buck, but I
[1:42:10] don't know what to do with it
[1:42:11] >> of trying to maybe change the ordinances
[1:42:14] to
[1:42:16] reduce the amount of um grass to have
[1:42:19] more water resistant
[1:42:22] um landscaping.
[1:42:24] I do see that being a big benefit that's
[1:42:27] worth going after.
[1:42:30] And that's what we're looking for. Which
[1:42:31] one of these have the big which one of
[1:42:33] these should we put time into which
[1:42:35] gives us the biggest benefit?
[1:42:36] >> That's I think that's what we need to
[1:42:38] do, right?
[1:42:39] >> Yeah, I agree.
[1:42:40] >> I mean, figure out a way to get the, you
[1:42:42] know, the people that, you know, turn
[1:42:45] their water on in the morning and don't
[1:42:47] turn off until nighttime because they
[1:42:49] forgot. Figure out a way to help them,
[1:42:52] you know, make do conservation. I don't
[1:42:54] think anybody's going to disagree.
[1:42:56] turn telling somebody that you got to
[1:42:57] turn your fountain off because it use 50
[1:42:59] gallons extra a month is probably not
[1:43:02] worth our time to do it if if we find
[1:43:03] that to be the case. So, and sort the
[1:43:06] hard part is going to be sort of sorting
[1:43:08] through and figuring out what are those,
[1:43:10] you know, low hanging fruit that we can
[1:43:12] attack.
[1:43:13] >> And is there any information that would
[1:43:15] help as in determining
[1:43:18] what that would be? we could follow
[1:43:22] um whatever the 8% of the total lot size
[1:43:26] was. I guess maybe that was St. George.
[1:43:29] >> Uh but it's not is it lot size or the
[1:43:32] required
[1:43:34] um
[1:43:35] landscaping area.
[1:43:37] >> Well, that's a St. George requirement,
[1:43:39] not a spring.
[1:43:40] >> That was an example. So, how how do we
[1:43:42] come up with a number that makes sense?
[1:43:45] >> But, you know, Yeah.
[1:43:51] So I agree that seems like
[1:43:55] an important water conserving effort
[1:43:58] limiting grass and lawn areas.
[1:44:02] >> So yeah, I mean if you've got a 5,000
[1:44:05] square foot lot you building a house on
[1:44:09] you and you can only have 8% of it with
[1:44:12] grass, that's a pretty small lawn.
[1:44:17] We got to be careful those sort of and if you've got a large open space
[1:44:21] that is all grass, how does that factor
[1:44:23] in? If we say, okay, now you can only
[1:44:26] have 8% of that large open space be
[1:44:28] grass. Um I'm not sure what that means
[1:44:31] because I don't know how they're going
[1:44:32] to they're going to stop watering it and
[1:44:34] it's going to turn into weeds. Nobody's
[1:44:36] going to like that. So,
[1:44:38] >> do you know of any information that
[1:44:39] could help us?
[1:44:42] So,
[1:44:44] as far as um
[1:44:46] >> how much grass So, if I could just
[1:44:51] summarize where I I think we're at.
[1:44:53] >> Yes, please. We've been all over the
[1:44:54] map.
[1:44:54] >> No, it's been it's actually been a
[1:44:56] really great conversation. So, um we
[1:44:59] started off talking about artificial
[1:45:01] turf. The general consensus is that we
[1:45:06] should allow it, but we want some
[1:45:09] limitations on that. So, we're going to
[1:45:12] do a little bit of digging into that.
[1:45:15] Um,
[1:45:19] we've decided that for now, as far as
[1:45:23] limiting grass, we're going to focus on
[1:45:25] commercial properties rather than
[1:45:27] residential for now because there's kind
[1:45:31] of bigger problems that could
[1:45:33] potentially arise there.
[1:45:35] Um,
[1:45:38] we're going to look at the WA Washington
[1:45:41] County Water Conservancy District rebate
[1:45:44] program again to to see if that's
[1:45:47] something we want to explore again.
[1:45:50] Um,
[1:45:52] uh, we're going to look at the text
[1:45:55] where it talks about
[1:45:58] irrigation systems being efficient to
[1:46:00] figure out if there's a if that could be
[1:46:02] tightened up in some way.
[1:46:05] Uh we're going to investigate irrigation
[1:46:07] schedules and see if the time of day
[1:46:10] watering restrictions would be feasible
[1:46:13] or worth doing.
[1:46:16] Um
[1:46:18] water features seemed like that was
[1:46:22] maybe something we're not going to look
[1:46:24] at right now. Um and then Okay. And then
[1:46:28] so your your question there about
[1:46:31] the city of St. George uh 8%.
[1:46:36] Um I I would suggest that if we're only
[1:46:40] looking at commercial properties that
[1:46:44] we [snorts]
[1:46:46] the sensible thing might be to only
[1:46:49] allow grass in functional areas and we
[1:46:53] have a definition for that that we can
[1:46:55] work at. So that's you know recreational
[1:46:57] type areas and then we I think the 8% in
[1:47:01] St. George is focused on residential properties in
[1:47:06] recognition that you know it people do
[1:47:10] want a bit of grass. Um I I feel like if we're focusing on commercial
[1:47:14] properties then maybe maybe that
[1:47:16] percentage is not is not actually
[1:47:20] relevant for us. I I could also for the
[1:47:23] next meeting um you know provide some
[1:47:27] examples of water efficient landscaping
[1:47:30] around town just to provide some visuals
[1:47:32] of what things can look like and kind of
[1:47:34] good solutions that if if that would be
[1:47:37] helpful at all.
[1:47:39] >> Yes.
[1:47:40] >> Yeah.
[1:47:42] >> And I agree with the
[1:47:44] functional grass
[1:47:47] and whatever that definition is.
[1:47:51] I'm we don't have any regulations or
[1:47:53] ordinances on watering right now, do we?
[1:47:58] >> On when you can
[1:48:01] or how you can if it's an automated
[1:48:03] system versus a nonuto.
[1:48:06] >> I think there's just the general it
[1:48:09] should be efficient. I I don't know that
[1:48:11] there's anything more than that yet.
[1:48:19] Yeah, I didn't see anything that says it
[1:48:20] needs to be automated either.
[1:48:23] >> That might be something we want to look
[1:48:24] at. You know, if you're going to an
[1:48:26] efficient system would have some sort
[1:48:28] of, you know,
[1:48:29] >> automation,
[1:48:31] >> artificial intelligence for lack of a
[1:48:33] better term associated with it. You
[1:48:34] know, a little timer.
[1:48:41] We do that with lighting, but you know,
[1:48:44] and even that's difficult, but I think
[1:48:46] having in the code would be beneficial
[1:48:48] potentially.
[1:48:52] » Yeah, we can look into that.
[1:48:54] >> And is there any
[1:48:57] So, I'll just give an example. I can go
[1:48:59] by some houses and they have big stakes
[1:49:00] that spray water over the hoses or over
[1:49:03] their plants. Well, I know everyone
[1:49:06] pretty I think anyways that a drip
[1:49:08] system would be more effective.
[1:49:11] But it's hard to make an ordinance
[1:49:12] that's going to require someone to rip
[1:49:14] out what they have and put in a drip
[1:49:15] system. Is there any type of other than
[1:49:18] rebate from Washington County? Is there
[1:49:20] anything else that we can do to promote
[1:49:25] use of, hey, if you go have a drip
[1:49:27] system,
[1:49:28] you get this benefit? But I don't know
[1:49:30] what that is. But I'm trying to figure
[1:49:31] out how to encourage people to do this
[1:49:34] without putting a financial burden on
[1:49:36] them that hey, you have to rip out what
[1:49:37] you have and change it. I'm into I guess
[1:49:40] residential so I apologize but
[1:49:42] >> yeah sure so incentivizing those sorts
[1:49:44] of things. Yeah I think maybe we could uh ponder on some ideas for
[1:49:51] that. I think um
[1:49:54] when we're looking at the details of
[1:49:56] irrigation systems I'm in the back of my
[1:49:59] mind I'm thinking kind of at plan review
[1:50:02] stage that level of detail
[1:50:06] may be quite challenging. Um, so that
[1:50:09] just the practicality of of that may be
[1:50:12] a little bit challenging, but I yeah, I
[1:50:15] think that's I like the idea of trying
[1:50:17] to incentivize
[1:50:19] drip systems and those sorts of things
[1:50:21] that are going to be more efficient. And
[1:50:23] >> I don't know for businesses if because I
[1:50:26] always think residential I have a hard
[1:50:27] time switching to business. Maybe for
[1:50:30] businesses that are remodeling,
[1:50:32] can we put requirements like that in?
[1:50:36] Well, the other the other consideration
[1:50:38] too is that um
[1:50:40] different plants have different
[1:50:42] requirement or different methods of
[1:50:44] taking the water in. So in some in some
[1:50:46] cases the drip systems are very
[1:50:48] efficient and effective. Other types of
[1:50:50] plants you need to spray over a larger
[1:50:52] area because the root extends out. You
[1:50:54] need to get you can't just drip in one
[1:50:56] spot and have the plant absorb the water
[1:50:58] as efficiently. So
[1:51:00] >> well like grass for instance. Well,
[1:51:02] grass is one example, but there's, you
[1:51:03] know, like citrus trees, for example,
[1:51:05] typically they'll have emitters that are
[1:51:07] near the trunk of the tree that spray
[1:51:08] outwards to a larger area because that's
[1:51:10] where
[1:51:11] >> they have rings and that, but again, all
[1:51:13] this costs money, too. And
[1:51:14] >> what's that?
[1:51:15] >> I said there are solutions because they
[1:51:17] have like drip holes that you can put in
[1:51:19] a ring around. But you but you can't
[1:51:21] what you what you don't want to do is
[1:51:22] write something that says you can only
[1:51:23] have a drip system because the strict
[1:51:26] interpretation of that says oh I can't
[1:51:27] have a citrus tree because it's not
[1:51:29] going to it's not going to survive very
[1:51:31] well especially in this climate. So not
[1:51:34] that there's well there are some around
[1:51:36] there's apple trees too. I don't know
[1:51:38] how the apple trees are watered. It'd be
[1:51:40] interesting to find out.
[1:51:44] They're probably on some sort of area
[1:51:47] spray, but in the root area,
[1:51:51] but that can be defined as a as a low
[1:51:54] pressure
[1:51:56] uh system that you know like that uses
[1:52:00] drip type emitter, small small heads,
[1:52:03] small emitters as opposed to ones that
[1:52:05] spray over large vast areas.
[1:52:10] Maybe to the point we can start thinking
[1:52:12] of some of these for the commercial,
[1:52:15] see how they go over before we start
[1:52:17] thinking we're going to put this to the
[1:52:19] residential areas.
[1:52:20] >> I think that was probably took me a
[1:52:22] while to get that.
[1:52:24] >> Yeah, I think we can look at the at how
[1:52:27] we can if there's ways we can require
[1:52:30] irrigation systems to be more water-wise
[1:52:35] and can see how practical that might be.
[1:52:48] thoughts.
[1:52:55] Do you feel like you have enough to go
[1:52:57] on to bring back to us?
[1:52:59] >> Yeah, thank you. That was really
[1:53:01] helpful.
[1:53:02] >> Yeah, thank you.
[1:53:02] >> That's good because I thought we were
[1:53:04] just more confusing than else.
[1:53:07] >> [laughter]
[1:53:09] » It's all good. It's good to hear all the
[1:53:12] different ideas.
[1:53:15] » No more discussion. Is there a motion to
[1:53:18] adjourn?
[1:53:20] >> Motion to adjourn. Let me
[1:53:22] >> second.
[1:53:23] >> Motion by Paul, second I motion by Rich,
[1:53:26] second by Paul. All in favor?
[1:53:29] >> Rich I.
[1:53:29] >> Jennifer I.
[1:53:30] >> All I k I.
[1:53:33] >> Meeting is adjourned.
[1:53:38] Um, hey, just a PSA
[1:53:40] for you all.