[0:04] Do you need everyone and welcome to the Westland Planning Commission meeting. It is Wednesday's September 2nd,

[0:11] 2026, and it is 601 PM, like to call to order. And if Lynn, if you could please do roll call.

[0:21] Yes, chair. Okay. Commissioner Wallvotney.

[0:25] Here. Commissioner Salty.

[0:28] Here.

[0:29] Commissioner Cacherous.

[0:31] Here.

[0:32] Here.

[0:34] She'll see.

[0:36] Here.

[0:36] All right.

[0:37] We have five members in attendance.

[0:39] Thank you.

[0:41] Okay.

[0:42] Next on the agenda, we have public comment related to land use items, not on the agenda.

[0:49] So far, we have one person signed up to speak.

[0:52] So if Susan Collins is here and would like to speak, we'd love to hear from you.

[1:16] Remember to state your name right have it all written down. I just got to see it

[1:22] Hi, I'm Susan Collins and I'm a Westland resident in the Robinwood

[1:28] neighborhood

[1:29] Thank you for coming tonight. Thank you for letting me be here and to say my little two bits about

[1:37] my vision of the vision

[1:45] I

[1:46] Want to draw to your attention the upcoming legislative review of a project that's said

[1:51] is called Highway 43 Vision. The two most affected neighborhoods, associations, Robin Wood and

[2:01] Bolton have formally asked a multiple occasions

[2:08] that before the code language is associated

[2:11] with this proposal goes before the Planning Commission that it go to a physical open house where

[2:17] people may look at and comment on the proposed code and comprehensive plan changes. For whatever

[2:25] reason the city has not honored this request.

[2:30] Commissioner Deetz, her current tremendous credit

[2:33] has written a letter to the planning staff making a formal request. I would like to both as myself

[2:40] and also a member of the Robin Wood Neighborhood Association Community Development Committee.

[2:48] Again request before any such proposal as this is brought before the body that there be an actual

[2:55] physical open house for consideration on these proposals. Thank you so much.

[3:05] Thank you very much.

[3:10] Lynn was there anyone else signed up to make a public comment?

[3:16] No, we do not have any other people requesting to testify.

[3:20] Okay. Thank you. Next on the agenda is the tentative decision adoption of final decision decision

[3:27] decision, pardon me, and order DR-25004, LA-2502, proposal for a class to design review and

[3:35] property line adjustments, a mixed use development at 2410, 2422, 2444, Tamler Drive, an 1800

[3:43] blank and chip road.

[3:47] The hearing and record for this application was closed on August 10th, 2026, and no further

[3:52] public testimony will be accepted for this application.

[3:54] The Planning Commission deliberated to a tentative decision on August 26th, 2026 and will vote to adopt the final decision in order containing the denial findings this evening.

[4:07] So,

[4:09] to begin, good evening. Tonight we are here to vote to adopt a final decision in order for file number DR-25404, LLA-2502.

[4:19] The Commission made a tentative decision to deny the application on August 26th, 2026.

[4:26] The final decision and order contains findings to support that denial.

[4:31] This is a quasi-judicial decision, unlike in legislative hearings where personal opinion

[4:35] may come into play, quasi-judicial rulings must be grounded in the relevant code.

[4:40] I now ask the city attorney to cover the preliminary legal matters.

[4:45] Thank you chair. As the planning commission is sitting quasi-juditially, any decision

[4:52] it must be based on testimony, argument, or evidence in the record, and must address

[4:57] the applicable approval criteria.

[5:00] Do any members of the Commission wish to declare potential or actual conflict of interest or bias?

[5:11] Seeing mostly head shakings. Okay. Do any members of the Commission wish to report any say visits or expertate contacts?

[5:22] Commissioner Catraisky.

[5:25] Yes, I'd like to report an expertate contact. The day following last week's decision, there was a post about the decision on the Western community page on Facebook.

[5:34] I briefly engaged in two or three comments, strictly tempting to be helpful in correcting

[5:40] a few inaccuracies in the discussion.

[5:43] There was also an aggressive ill-tempered commenter who was personally and directly

[5:47] commenting me by name, repeatedly denigrating my character across multiple comments, making

[5:53] me feel targeted and unsafe.

[5:56] I made one comment in response, defending myself against his assassination of my personal

[6:02] character and integrity. I didn't believe this was

[6:06] exparte because we had voted. I understood the

[6:09] decision to have been completed. As before, I remain

[6:12] impartial on biased and we'll be voting strictly

[6:15] according to the consideration of the code in effect.

[6:21] Thank you very much, commissioner. Anyone else?

[6:29] All right, moving on. Does any member of the audience

[6:33] wish to challenge the jurisdiction of the commission to

[6:35] hear this matter or their impartiality?

[6:40] I can't say the audience, so I'm going to defer to you all to tell me if anyone is raising their hands.

[6:46] Ms. Dughal, we don't have anyone in the audience.

[6:50] Great. Anyone on mine?

[6:53] No.

[6:54] Perfect.

[6:56] That concludes the legal matters.

[7:03] Okay.

[7:05] Moving on to deliberations.

[7:08] Does any commissioner wish to comment or make a motion?

[7:15] I think I probably should comment because I asked for there to be two versions of the motion.

[7:26] And I want to explain myself.

[7:28] It was my opinion at the end of the last meeting that things got a bit muddled.

[7:33] What is clear is that all five of us in attendance voted to deny the application.

[7:38] We provided a denial with kind of, in my opinion, two rationales, and if we're signing our

[7:44] names to this, we need to decide if we want both of these in the denial or only one.

[7:51] One of the denial basis, rooted in Section 38, was novel as far as I was concerned, and

[7:59] prior to Wednesday had not been brought up by anyone.

[8:03] And we discussed that code section as a group, I thought pretty extensively, and Dan explained

[8:09] his analysis.

[8:10] And the other was extremely multifaceted, mostly bringing up sections 21 of the code in sections

[8:17] 55.

[8:20] And in my opinion, the question, the veracity of things that had been addressed in staff reports,

[8:27] which was absolutely fine, but I felt like I personally did not have sufficient time

[8:32] to satisfactorily dissect and discuss these sections of the code and them as the basis for the

[8:39] denial.

[8:40] So for that reason, my inclination personally was to deny on the basis of section 38.

[8:46] But obviously, the way that we phrase this motion is the will of the majority, obviously

[8:52] not strictly my own.

[8:53] So I just wanted to present these options and discuss everything that we had brought up and come

[9:00] a conclusion as a group. I have minimal experience with editing motions and I would be very

[9:11] grateful to Darren or Gary or people with a little bit more experience in coming to the table

[9:19] and setting parameters for how we do this. So that's what I wanted to say at the outset.

[9:27] chair just really quickly you mentioned a couple of times chapter 38 did you

[9:32] inform you yes I did I'm sorry chapter no

[9:36] I'm sorry thank you

[9:44] would any of my co-commissioners like to speak yes

[9:51] Commissioner will want me

[9:56] thank you chair I can

[10:00] I understand the issues you brought up. I actually think that all of the findings apply. And so I support, I mean, I can support either one of them because they end up at the same place. But the order that includes all of the findings relative to chapter is 21,

[10:30] and 48 and 55 is my favorite of the two options.

[10:40] I do have one comment on it's actually one is editorial,

[10:44] and the other one is a little bit more.

[10:48] And this is on age one, and it's on both versions.

[10:53] So it's in the third paragraph, third full paragraph,

[10:56] the overview.

[10:58] And the second sentence says the residential component of this decision is subject to

[11:04] court, 197,400 for clear and objective standards.

[11:09] I'm okay with that.

[11:12] And then it goes on to say, and the mandatory procedure outlined in House Bill 413, which

[11:17] does that hold the curing prior to making it a sit.

[11:20] I disagree with that.

[11:22] And the reason that I did is that we have, we have, we have, we have, we have, we

[11:26] are goal-posed to the decision-making criteria, the requirements and the criteria for making the decision

[11:35] are established for SR-197.

[11:43] And because of that, because of the timing of that, which is subject

[11:48] to what the applicant was originally submitted or if it was complete,

[11:58] then it goes back to the date that it was submitted.

[12:02] Those were the decision criteria, because even if it had issues,

[12:07] then planning staff used those criteria at that time,

[12:12] make comments on the application.

[12:14] That is the line in the sand as far as I'm concerned and that House Bill 4037 did not go into effect in July 1, 2026, which is well after that date when the application was submitted.

[12:34] So, that's my biggest concern about the EASER app, the EASER app, the decision in order.

[12:48] I had one minor comment, and this is the first paragraph at the top of page 3,

[12:54] and it's during the discussion of the motion, Commissioner Salty made a motion to amend the motion,

[12:59] made by Commissioner Deeds, and then it goes into a book, and so it's that after

[13:05] Commissioner Deeds, there needs to be a comma, or a colon, or something, to link

[13:14] the following quote, addition to it. So it's it's minor, it's editorial. So

[13:19] however that gets resolved. And those are my thoughts on both decisions and

[13:29] Okay, so can I just, can I just restate that just to make sure that we over here, making the edits, got all of that straight?

[13:37] On the first page, third paragraph in section one, are you proposing that the language starting and the mandatory procedure be strict in?

[13:51] That's my, that's my thought based on the effective date of

[13:57] House Bill 4, Respeven and the goal post role that we have in place

[14:04] Your other statute.

[14:05] Would you like me to cop on that chair?

[14:08] Yes, please.

[14:10] Okay, and also I don't know about you counselor about me, but I'm getting a

[14:14] kind of a bad echo from them.

[14:15] Are you hearing that as well?

[14:17] I'm hearing it a little bit as well.

[14:19] Do you know if there's anything we can do about that on your

[14:24] doesn't?

[14:25] You're getting,

[14:27] or is that usually what happens when, if that's just how it is, that's okay.

[14:34] I'll answer basically what I can on the fiscal post rule.

[14:41] 227, what's 78, which is the fiscal post rule that applies to standards that are in effect

[14:47] when the application is first committed, which

[14:49] may say a applicable approval criteria,

[14:51] a procedure is not applicable for approval criteria.

[14:55] So unfortunately, that could be changed midstream.

[15:00] Whether we want it to or not. And so when they requested that we apply 4037, even though it was midway through

[15:11] the process, we were required to.

[15:20] Thank you for that explanation. However, I have one other concern, and that

[15:27] is a point that I brought up during the previous meetings that the applicant requested an extension

[15:39] within two weeks after the application was deemed complete. That's completely unheard of.

[15:47] I mean, there's a hundred and twenty-day clock, and for what reason they requested, I mean, the reason they requested is, is, is unknown, I mean, not explained the, the request that was provided to us, and so in my, in my estimation, I mean, we should have had, we should have had a hearing on this and ran it, it's all water into the bridge at this point. We should have had a hearing on,

[16:19] on in May or in June and well before HB437 actually went into effect and I'll if that's the requirement for a procedure

[16:37] I'll back down from that but I just want all of this in the record because at some point this stuff has to be ironed out

[16:46] Probably, as you've sent during our training on limited land use decisions, so.

[16:51] Yeah, so I mean, I completely agree with you, Council for Commissioner.

[16:58] Unfortunately, the way that the law works is we have to make a decision within 120 days of the application be deemed complete.

[17:05] It's up to the applicant if they want that period of time extended and they can extend it by up to 365 days.

[17:12] So I understand your position and I definitely can agree with you and empathize with you,

[17:23] but you know, to the extent that they wanted 4037 to apply,

[17:28] they were able to extend the 128 period and extend the timeline for a hearing and

[17:34] have it applied to them by moving that data.

[17:38] Okay. So I guess based on this discussion, I'll just vacate my request to remove that.

[17:46] That, or should but at least it's in the record.

[17:59] Okay. So, Commissioner Wolvani, the standing instruction or request is to add something on page three.

[18:09] A colon or a comma between Commissioner Deeds and the applicant. Is that correct?

[18:22] Yes, that's correct, or some additional, additional verbage.

[18:31] Anything to better link into the, into the quotation.

[18:40] Concerties.

[18:41] Yeah, I just wanted to bring up one, one issue I had as far as when we go down to the findings.

[18:51] There's the revised staff supplemental findings and exhibit A, and I would argue that those

[19:00] findings are pretty contradictory to the motion that we made and are trying to adopt.

[19:07] And I would ask that those B removed because they are essentially directly contradictory.

[19:14] So if you go down to the staff findings in the supplemental, you'll see,

[19:30] the recommendation for the findings are in both motions.

[19:36] Are you referring to, I'm not sure if Darren's in person to you guys, but the findings that support the denial are in the actual document itself.

[19:45] and then I believe exhibit, the exhibit is the old findings that were originally recommended by staff.

[19:52] So those are the ones that are being adopted if that's what you're looking at.

[19:55] The findings that support the denial are in the actual body of the...

[20:00] Yeah, I'm talking about the appendix and then you scroll down to the tanners staff, supplemental findings from August 10th.

[20:11] So, the old findings would be the ones that supported the original decision, which recommendation, which was approval.

[20:19] The findings that support the denial are in the actual body of the document.

[20:38] Let me see if I can pull it up for you if Darren isn't a current person.

[20:50] Actually, I am here. You want us to pull something up on screen?

[20:58] I'm sorry.

[20:58] Do you want to simply put something up on the screen?

[21:01] I'm not to pull it up on screen, but just to confirm the commissioner's question.

[21:05] Yes, I believe commissioner Dietz is referring to, let's see here,

[21:15] section 3 of the section 3 of the

[21:22] I know decision order, where it says,

[21:24] Darren, I'm sorry to interrupt you.

[21:26] Can you speak a tiny bit louder, please?

[21:28] Thank you.

[21:29] Thank you.

[21:29] Microphones.

[21:31] Is

[21:36] this better?

[21:36] You've got my, you've got my, like, Darren.

[21:39] Yeah, that one, that one's not participating tonight.

[21:44] Yeah, so in a final decision orders under section three findings,

[21:49] it lists the commission,

[21:52] make denying it based on the findings of FAC contained

[21:54] and the identity to the staff report, the commercial identity to the staff report, residential,

[21:59] and the revised staff supplemental findings that were provided at the public hearing.

[22:06] And then including the following, which are the findings of the Nile that are embedded

[22:15] in the final decision in order itself.

[22:17] So I believe I'll state for Commissioner Deeds and she can agree with me, that Commissioner

[22:23] Dates is questioning whether the supplemental findings should be included in that attachment

[22:31] because they directly contradict the denial findings.

[22:37] So the supplemental findings basically supersede the denial findings.

[22:42] So it's instead of rewriting that entire document.

[22:46] It's essentially saying that original document continues to apply

[22:49] except where the supplemental fighting's control, if that makes sense.

[22:56] Okay, but where does it say that in the actual final decision in order?

[23:03] I'm not sure if it says that expressly, but that's typically how the supplemental

[23:07] findings will supplement the original final findings.

[23:10] Okay, but is there a rule against taking it out?

[23:14] The original findings?

[23:15] No, the revised staff supplemental findings specifically.

[23:21] Not if you would like to, but are the supplemental findings the ones that actually were

[23:26] provided most recently, or you mean the ones that were sent to us for today in Exhibit

[23:32] A. It's at the very, very bottom of a 200 page document and it's, you know, which I'm assuming

[23:39] those are the ones that were provided after the initial hearing. I think that those support other

[23:48] approval criteria beyond the ones that you've used to recommend denial. I'm talking

[23:52] about the ones from August 10. Are you talking? Yeah, okay. That's correct. So those

[23:58] I believe are speaking to approval criteria that you are not using to base your

[24:02] denial tonight. If to the extent that they are, they will be supplemented by the

[24:07] additional approval criteria or the additional findings to the extent that they are

[24:11] not, they're still important to the making the final decision.

[24:24] Commissioner Robotnis had his hand off for a minute.

[24:38] I think you can't hear you.

[24:41] Mr. Robotnis, I think your mic is not working.

[24:44] Sorry.

[24:45] Thank you, Chair.

[24:47] I'm actually looking at the supplemental findings right now.

[24:50] But I am trying to recall it on a decision in order where this has been done previously

[24:56] And I'm coming up with...

[25:01] With nothing. But I'll take a look at this and just see what I think. Thanks.

[25:15] Commissioner Cajorisky.

[25:19] I'm a little bit just thinking out loud.

[25:25] The motion that you wrote was quite

[25:28] dense. That was like a lawyer. I'm impressed as an English major. That was pretty good. It's so dense.

[25:38] I feel like we didn't, we didn't really have an opportunity to go through that carefully.

[25:49] It was already prepared and written, it seemed like from the beginning, I just struggle

[25:55] with that a little bit, it just fills uncomfortable.

[26:05] I do agree with what Commissioner Salty pointed out about the, it not being in compliance with

[26:14] blocks and the access loop in the streets, but I do have some discomfort with that first

[26:22] motion. I just need to say that because it, yeah, I just need to say that.

[26:31] Can you go by me? Yeah, sorry. Mr. Deeds go ahead. Yeah, can you tell me what your own

[26:36] comfortable with?

[26:47] The way that it arrived fully formed, that we hadn't had any discussion

[26:52] about the pieces of it during any of the meetings.

[27:02] Yeah, it's difficult for me to articulate beyond that.

[27:05] There's just something about it that I'm having a hard time supporting.

[27:11] I do support the motion that Commissioner Salty put forth.

[27:17] And I just have concerned it's important to me that the work that we're doing here is not undone

[27:23] and this,

[27:26] yeah, I think that's all I want to say.

[27:37] Mr. Wavati, it's your hand up.

[27:47] I chair, sorry. I meant to take it down before, but I will comment.

[27:51] Some of the things that strikes me about the supplemental findings is that

[27:55] it's providing basically support to the applicant for the denial that we're doing.

[28:02] So it's providing supporting language in areas that we're not considering as being

[28:12] the problem areas that we think it should be denied.

[28:20] Finding that little odd and that we don't usually do that.

[28:25] I'm trying to figure out the precedent for this in the decisions and orders that we typically provide.

[28:33] So, typically when staff rights findings, we provide evidence and we, I guess, we consolidate

[28:42] the evidence into arguments and then produce recommendations based on each applicable

[28:47] approval criterion and the supplemental findings were based upon additional evidence and arguments

[28:54] that we received prior to the deadline, but after we'd already provided the initial staff report,

[29:04] and so those supplemental findings were to supplement the original staff or embuttings

[29:11] that your planning mission had received when staff was still recommending approval.

[29:18] So that was produced prior to your decision to deny.

[29:25] Thank you. I just saw that it's dated August 10th. But that being the case, that's prior to our deliberations last week and our continuation of those deliberations on the final decision in order.

[29:43] correct. I'm just trying to figure out what to understand why any of the stock

[29:49] in the 200 plus pages would be included as a pivot A. So basically because we have to

[30:23] So, we have approved applications where we have denied applications and denying applications has been based on what we've done in the past.

[30:31] on Pacific items and not going through every single,

[30:39] every single finding that was presented

[30:42] in the Staff Report.

[30:44] So, I'm sure that you all made emotions based on just one or two applicable approval criteria

[30:52] that you thought were not meant to be, but I can almost guarantee staff behind the scenes

[30:56] we're reviewing every applicable approval criteria and check whether it was not or not.

[31:01] whether that made it into the final decision, I can't say one or the other, but I think as a best practice

[31:07] it's good to show your work and show why each applicable approval criteria is never not met.

[31:14] That can be adopted into the final decision if you want to, or it can just be part of a staff report, it's really up to you.

[31:36] Christian, I'll take. Did you want to weigh in? Yeah. So when I was going through the findings,

[31:43] most findings specifically just at applicant response and there wasn't actually a city response

[31:52] to them and I know that specifically for 74 because I ran it. So I would just be careful how

[31:59] we kind of say that we've reviewed everything when most of it I think has been pushed through before

[32:05] actually find it from the city, it leads to that's why understanding. And I think what the

[32:09] supplemental response that was done on August 10th, that was completed was kind of the

[32:15] help resolve some of those issues. But I don't, I think you went a little far, and also

[32:20] saying that it's all been reviewed when there's not a city response, it's literally titled

[32:26] applicant response.

[32:29] That's fair. I think what I mean when I say it was reviewed by city is they took all applicable

[32:35] documentation, they weighed the evidence presented to them, and then they adopted the findings

[32:41] that they agreed with. So when there is evidence in the record that they agree with the applicant,

[32:48] they will adopt that information. If there's evidence in the record that opponents agree with or that

[32:54] they agree with opponents, they will adopt that information.

[32:59] Yeah, is that stated somewhere? It's stated by saying

[33:03] that that's the applicant's response.

[33:05] And it's been provided there to the findings.

[33:13] Commissioner Wavotney and then Commissioner Dates.

[33:15] It's okay.

[33:23] Sorry chair.

[33:24] I thought I'd roll over to my hand.

[33:26] So, Commissioner Dates.

[33:29] Yeah, I mean, I think from what I'm hearing is that

[33:33] maybe we should just go ahead and remove the staff findings

[33:38] from August 10th just because it seems a little bit

[33:43] I don't know, contradictory,

[33:47] is anyone else on board with that or no?

[33:52] My recommendation would be if you move, if you remove August 10, Spindings, I recommend

[33:55] you removing the other ones as well, and then only adopting them in the way that your commissioners

[34:01] had talked about adopting them in the past, which is simply based on approval criteria that

[34:08] feel have not been met. So essentially striking the entire previous findings document.

[34:16] Rather than just talking to someone than not others.

[35:07] Would

[35:13] anybody else benefit from about a 10-minute recess just to think this through? I would. Okay. I would like to recess for 10 minutes, and we will return

[35:28] at 647, please. Thank you. Commissioner Wavotney, are you there? Yes. Hi. Okay.

[35:38] If anyone else has anything they would like to say, or, I'm sorry,

[35:49] you did you hear all that?

[35:55] Yes, I did.

[35:56] Thank you.

[35:57] All right, just making sure that everything was going.

[35:59] Thank you, sorry.

[36:00] Okay, welcome back to the meeting.

[36:02] If anybody has anything that they would like to say or if anyone would like to make a motion.

[36:06] And I'm happy to share the notes I've made if you can read my handwriting.

[36:16] So can I try to read?

[36:18] You may.

[36:53] Yeah.

[36:54] Commissioner Salty.

[36:55] So I'd like to make a motion for option one.

[36:58] Motion doubled out findings for CDC chapter 2148 and 55.

[37:03] I moved to adopt the final decision in order to now findings based on less than

[37:07] Community Development Code 21, 48 and 55 as presented in the 90R-2504, LL-82502 with the removal

[37:14] of exhibit with A and its entirety from,

[37:32] and the additional added verbiage from Commissioner

[37:35] Mulvaney regarding, specifically, I think it was like, I'm sorry, well, I don't

[37:47] know if I need

[37:48] to go into it, do I?

[37:49] No, I think that's that should work, I think I need to repeat what he said, right?

[37:55] Okay,

[37:58] can we have a vote, please?

[38:04] Thank you.

[38:07] Commissioner Deetz.

[38:11] Commissioner Cacherisky.

[38:13] Commissioner Wallotney.

[38:16] Yes.

[38:17] Commissioner Salty.

[38:18] Yes, I'm sorry for pushing your name.

[38:22] Chair Schulteen.

[38:24] Yes.

[38:25] All right.

[38:25] the motion passes five to zero.

[38:29] Thank you.

[38:31] OK.

[38:32] And I believe that is all we have on the agenda.

[38:36] I'd like to thank all of you.

[38:38] And meeting will adjourn.

[38:39] It is 650 p.m.

[38:42] Thank you.

Planning Commission Meeting

Agenda

Transcript