HomeMy Public PortalAbout12-08-2008 Regular Meeting
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 1 of 51
MINUTES
HILLSBOROUGH TOWN BOARD
December 8, 2008
7:00 PM, Town Barn
PRESENT
: Mayor Tom Stevens, Commissioners Evelyn Lloyd, Frances Dancy, Brian Lowen,
L. Eric Hallman, and Mike Gering.
STAFF PRESENT
: Town Manager Eric Peterson, Assistant Town Manager Nicole Ard, Town
Clerk/Director of Administration and Human Resources, Town Engineer/Utilities Director
Kenny Keel, Planning Director Margaret Hauth, Finance Director Greg Siler, Lieutenant Brad
Whitted, and Town Attorney Bob Hornik.
Mayor Tom Stevens called the meeting to order at 7:01 p.m.
1. PUBLIC CHARGE
Mayor Stevens did not read the Public Charge but noted it would be followed.
ADDED ITEM ? RESOLUTION
7:01:27 PM Mayor Stevens read a resolution in memory of Lucille Dula who had recently
passed away, noting she was a resident of Hillsborough for 94 years, was a teacher, and had
authored ?The Pelican Guide to Hillsborough? and other works. After noting the many
accomplishments of Ms. Dula and her contributions to Hillsborough, Mayor Stevens presented a
copy of the resolution to the Dula Family.
2. PUBLIC HEARING
A. Public Hearing to gather public comment regarding an Ordinance to condemn the
dwelling at 226 Collins Avenue for Minimum Housing Code Violations
7:03:52 PM Planning Director Margaret Hauth said complaints had been filed under the
Minimum Housing Code regarding violations at 226 Collins Avenue, noting they had reports that
the dwelling was being occupied without electricity or water and sewer service. She said they
had gone through the required steps in their process, but the property owner had been difficult to
locate. Ms. Hauth said she had placed ads in the local newspaper and had conducted a hearing,
but no representative of the property owner or the owner had attended or expressed any interest
in doing anything with the property. She said it was her understanding that the home was now
unoccupied, and was not certain the occupants had had authorization to be in the home.
Ms. Hauth said no response had yet been received from the property owner and no physical
address had been identified. She said because of the complaints and the Town?s concerns, they
were recommending that the structure be condemned and the Town secure it so that it could not
be occupied in the interest of public safety.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 2 of 51
Mayor Stevens determined that there were no persons present who desired to speak on the issue.
Upon a motion by Commissioner Gering, seconded by Commissioner Dancy, the Board moved
to close the public hearing.
3. AUDIENCE COMMENTS REGARDING MATTERS NOT ON THE PRINTED
AGENDA
7:06:18 PM There were no members of the audience who offered comments at this time.
4. AGENDA CHANGES & AGENDA APPROVAL
7:06:26 PM Commissioner Gering removed Item 5.G from the Consent Agenda and added it
to the regular agenda as Item 10.K.
Town Manager Eric Peterson added a CATV Resolution as the first Item under Agenda #10. He
also added an Economic Development Issue to the Closed Session agenda.
Commissioner Gering added a second Economic Development Issue to the Closed Session
agenda.
Mr. Peterson added a second Personnel Matter to the Closed Session agenda.
7:09:04 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Hallman, seconded by Commissioner Lowen,
the Board moved to approve the Agenda as amended by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared
passed.
5. APPOINTMENTS
A.Consider appointment of Keith Coleman to the Tourism Board to fill the
Hillsborough/Orange County Chamber of Commerce Seat
7:09:21 PMCommissioner Gering stated that the Tourism Board was anxious to have Mr.
Coleman participate on the Board, noting he had attended several meetings in preparation for the
appointment and was an enthusiastic candidate.
Upon a motion by Commissioner Gering, seconded by Commissioner Lloyd, the Board moved to
approve the appointment of Keith Coleman to the Tourism Board by a vote of 5-0. The motion
was declared passed.
6. COMMITTEE REPORTS (Critical)
7:09:47 PM No committee reports were offered at this time.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 3 of 51
7. REPORT FROM THE TOWN MANAGER
7:10:00 PM Mr. Peterson announced that Budget Management Analyst Emily Bradford had
obtained her Certified Budget Officer Certification through the School of Government and would
be certified on January 4, 2009. Mayor Stevens offered Ms. Bradford the Board?s
congratulations on her achievement.
8. DEPARTMENTAL REPORTS
7:10:32 PM Ms. Hauth said in January there would be a series of public information meetings
on the next phase of the Strategic Growth Plan, noting she would be sending an email update to
the Board. She said those meetings were to be held in order to conclude them before the joint
meeting with the Board of County Commissioners in February, when a joint update would be
provided.
Ms. Hauth announced that Senior Planner Tom King completed training at the School of
Government to become a Certified Government Official. Mayor Stevens offered the Board?s
congratulations to Mr. King.
Commissioner Hallman asked what the status was on the temporary CO for the parking deck.
Ms. Hauth stated it was a temporary permit until the issues were resolved, but no specific
expiration had been added. She said they would be meeting on Wednesday to check the lighting
now that the leaves had fallen. Ms. Hauth stated a number of modifications had been added,
including shields and turning off specific lights at specific times. She said she did not believe all
issues would be resolved because some were technical issues with the Ordinance that remained
and she expected there would be some appeals to the Board of Adjustment.
9. ITEMS FOR DECISION ? CONSENT AGENDA
A.Consider Approval of the Minutes of the October 16, 2008 Joint Public Hearing; the
October 27, 2008 Monthly Workshop; the November 10, 2008 Regular Town Board
Meeting; and the November 10, 2008 Regular Town Board Meeting Closed Session
B.Consider Amendments to the 2009 Town Board Meeting Schedule
C.Consider acceptance of request from Waterstone NC Residential LLC to extend the time
to transfer ownership of Waterstone Park to the town until December 31, 2009
D.Consideration of an Ordinance to condemn the dwelling at 226 Collins Avenue for
Minimum Housing Code violations and direction to staff regarding enforcement
E.Consideration of a Consistency Statement and an Ordinance to amend Section 25 of the
Zoning Ordinance to remove the spacing limitation on family care homes
F.Consideration of a Consistency Statement and an Ordinance to amend the Zoning
Ordinance to create Special Use Permit process for recreation facilities in the
Neighborhood Business district
Removed
G. and added to the regular Agenda.
H.Consideration of a Consistency Statement and an Ordinance to amend the Zoning
Ordinance to add new section 21.6.4 to refer to the Historic District Design Guidelines
and indicate their role in project review
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 4 of 51
I.Consideration of various Budget Amendments
J.Consider approval of delegate confirmation and the current list of TJCOG board
members
7:11:25 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Dancy, seconded by Commissioner Lowen, the
Board moved to approve the Consent Agenda as amended to remove Item G for separate
consideration by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared passed.
10. ITEMS FOR DECISION ? REGULAR AGENDA
Mayor Stevens noted that this item had been added and would be heard prior to items listed on
the agenda.
Added Item: CATV Resolution
7:12:45 PM Catherine Rice, Action Audits, stated she was pleased to report that they had
reached agreement with Time Warner on the transfer of the system. She said in exchange for the
Town agreeing to transfer the franchise, Time Warner had agreed to do four things:
1)provide the Town with a government channel on the cable system; get the channel up and
running to serve the largest number of customers by March 31; and, the remainder of
customers would be served by June 1;
2)they would carry the channel on the basic service tier which was the least expensive tier
and the most watched;
3)they would provide a fiber optic cable connection between the origination point in the
Town Hall to their system; maintain it so that the signal was high quality; provide the
signal transport equipment at the Town?s end, and at Time Warner?s end they would
provide all other equipment necessary to redistribute the signal; and
4)they would hook up the two remaining sites at Dimmocks Mill Road at the motor pool
and at the water plant.
Ms. Rice stated they were happy with that agreement, and recommended the Board adopt the
proposed resolution.
7:15:17 PM Commissioner Lloyd asked did the agreement include the wastewater treatment
plant. Assistant Town Manager Nicole Ard said that the wastewater treatment plant was outside
the range of the equipment, although Bob Sepe had given them some alternatives to consider.
Jim Stanley, representing Time Warner, stated they had worked very well with Mr. Sepe and Ms.
Rice and acknowledged that they would honor all terms of the agreement and looked forward to
continuing to serve the Town.
7:16:14 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Lowen, seconded by Commissioner Lloyd, the
Board moved to approve the CATV resolution by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared
passed.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 5 of 51
A.Consideration of a Resolution to authorize a Special Use Permit for 2X2 Enterprises
to develop 2.22 acres at 610 Hampton Pointe Boulevard as a Sonic drive-in
restaurant with a drive thru window
7:16:44 PM Ms. Hauth stated that the applicant had not yet arrived but was expected shortly.
She stated this item had been heard at the October public hearing, noting if approved this would
be the final drive thru window to be allowed at Hampton Pointe and adding that this was a drive
up restaurant with no interior seating. She stated the Planning Board had spent significant time
reviewing the details of the plan and its recommendation was for approval of the Special Use
Permit with a number of conditions which had been included in the resolution under
consideration for adoption. Ms. Hauth said the applicant had requested a number of waivers, one
of which was regarding the landscaping between the building and the parking and was the only
one recommended for approval by the Planning Board. She said the Planning Board would like
to see the plans redrawn to show full compliance with Phase 2 stormwater requirements and did
not recommend granting either of the sign waivers requested.
Ms. Hauth said the issue regarding the lighted archway that had come up during the public
hearing was resolved assuming that some way other than tube lighting could be identified to light
the archway. She said since she had not had further contact with the applicant, she did not know
if they were looking at alternatives for lighting the archway.
7:19:07 PM Commissioner Gering said the issue of interior lit signage seemed to be a
violation of the Ordinance, and asked what alternatives could be used. Ms. Hauth responded that
the archway in itself was not considered a sign under the Ordinance; that there was an Ordinance
provision that said that roof and building outlines could not be outlined with linear tubing. She
said that if you outlined the roof or building with lighting, then it would make the entire building
a sign and that was why it was prohibited. Ms. Hauth said if the archway were internally
illuminated, and had translucent plastic for example, that because there was no message on it
then it was not treated as a sign and could possibly be allowed. She said if the applicant was
careful with how they installed their lights they could also light the archway from the exterior.
7:20:40 PM Commissioner Hallman asked Ms. Hauth to refresh their memory regarding the
staff recommendation concerning the driveway removal, and what the Planning Board had
determined. Ms. Hauth said the Planning Board had looked at that in detail and concluded that
particularly with the one driveway recommended by staff to be removed that was on the service
road and closest to the traffic circle, that everyone visiting the site would have to drive around
the building if going to the drive thru and then would have to circle the building a second time to
exit the site. She said the Planning Board had determined that would make the internal traffic
worse. Ms. Hauth said the only driveway that appeared to be even a possibility for removal was
the shared driveway with The Eagles, and since it had not been required the Planning Board had
decided to keep the three driveways.
Commissioner Hallman said regarding the Phase 2 stormwater requirements, did the Planning
Board?s discussion include what a compromise might be. Ms. Hauth said no, that the Planning
Board had not wanted to offer a compromise. She said they had understood that the options they
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 6 of 51
were likely to see would include that this was a small enough site that the applicant may buy
their way out of the requirement by making a payment to the State, but the likely solution was
that if the applicant did not use that option that they would remove some of the curbing, most
likely in the parking area between the shared driveway, so that that area could become a bio-
retention area where nitrogen could leach out through the grass or through some additional
landscaping. Ms. Hauth said they would have to wait and see what option the applicant chose.
Commissioner Hallman asked did she know what the magnitude of the buyout might be. Ms.
Hauth said she did not know, but Mr. Hackett may have some idea.
7:22:52 PM Terry Hackett stated he would guesstimate that the payment would be about
$8,000 to $9,000. Ms. Hauth stated that payment would go into a fund that the Town could
apply for to use for retrofitting or other projects.
Commissioner Hallman said then it would not be all that onerous for the applicant to make a
payment to the State in lieu of compliance with the Phase 2 stormwater requirements. Ms. Hauth
agreed it would not be.
7:23:36 PM Commissioner Gering said after having read the Planning Board minutes, he was
very impressed with their analysis and the quality of thought that had been put into each of the
conditions accepted and not accepted. He said he believed once again the Board had been very
well served by the Planning Board. Ms. Hauth stated the Planning Board worked hard and spent
a lot of time on the details, and she would pass that comment on to them.
Mayor Stevens suggested tabling the issue since the applicant had not yet arrived at the meeting.
Ms. Hauth indicated that the applicant had now arrived
George Wilson with 2X2 Enterprises said that Chad Abbot with Summit Consulting was not
present this evening, but he would be happy to answer any questions the Board might have.
7:25:04 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Gering, seconded by Commissioner Lowen, the
Board moved to approve the Resolution granting the Special Use Permit to 2X2 Enterprises for a
Sonic Drive-In Restaurant subject to the special conditions outlined in the resolution by a vote of
5-0. The motion was declared passed.
B.Presentation of Annexation Feasibility Study for Proposed W&W Partners
Development on 70A (formerly known as Ashton Hall)
7:26:17 PM Mr. Peterson said that one of the things that actually helped this proposal was that
it was infill development and was forecasted to result in surpluses each year, with an analysis
conducted at the end of five years. He said one thing that was different from Waterstone was
that no new personnel would be needed to serve it and it would have a more positive cash flow
benefit up front. Ms. Peterson said the big question mark was could the Town and the developer
some to an agreement that was satisfactory to the engineer and the Town Board in regards to
how they would connect to the system and what improvements were to be made.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 7 of 51
Mr. Peterson said if they could cross that hurdle and hold a public hearing, then they could begin
to work in more detail. He said he had looked at the water capacity study and saw not issues,
noting they should be able to service the development as well as additional infill development in
the future.
7:28:53 PM Commissioner Dancy asked if he had made a determination regarding the new
capital facilities fees that the Board had discussed, and was it included. Mr. Peterson stated it
was included, noting it was $2.5 million in capital facilities fees, and about $1.7 of that would be
sewer.
Commissioner Gering said if they wanted to pursue some increased density as that recently
discussed, such as a transit-oriented development on the Collins property, would going forward
with this project limit the Town in any way in being able to build a more compact or dense
development closer to Town like on the Collins property. Mr. Peterson replied possibly, but they
would have to run some more specific assumptions. He said the only things that had changed
regarding water capacity was they had used the same assumptions as for the Daniel Boone
project as well as for the Collins property, and had added 1,000 units on. So, he said, if the
Board?s desire was to add 3,000 more units then it would have an impact. Mr. Peterson said the
Board may need to look at the map and see what projects had currently been identified in the
water/sewer capacity study and prioritize them, then see if there was something that should be a
lower priority than Ashton Hall and to perhaps get rid of. He said if the Board were able to come
up with some assumptions as to where they wanted density and how much, then they could run
those scenarios and see what the impact on water would be.
Commissioner Gering said that did help, but he would need to go back and look at the
assumptions used for the Boone/Collins properties and try to assess whether or not that was at
the right level of density the Board may be targeting. Mr. Peterson said he believed they had
used 300 units on the Collins property, which he believed was 160 acres.
Commissioner Gering said he was not assuming that 20 acres would be all that would be
developed that would support high density development. Ms. Hauth said if it was 100 acres,
then that would be 3 units per acre, which was about what they were seeing now, and with no
allotment for recreation space or streets, which was usually between 10 and 30 percent taken off
the top for those types of things. She said that would make the density more intensive at 300
units, so she did not believe they were getting into a danger zone with that assumption.
7:33:34 PM Commissioner Hallman said they were looking at a March public hearing. Ms.
Hauth said the applicant?s intent was to be ready for the January hearing. Commissioner
Hallman said he had thought they were only going to try for January. Ms. Hauth said if the
Board said tonight that they were willing to schedule a special hearing, then that would be
accommodated. She said they did not yet have in hand a petition for annexation, and until they
got that they could not call the public hearing.
Commissioner Hallman said he did not believe the Board had had the chance to talk about
density and where they wanted to put it, and he would opt to wait on this. He said he believed it
was a great development and made sense in a lot of ways, but he wanted to make sure they did
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 8 of 51
not get ahead of themselves. Commissioner Hallman said he did not believe there was any great
rush, and did not want to push it for January. Ms. Hauth said the hurry was on the applicant?s
side, in that they wanted to move forward as quickly as possible.
7:35:14 PM Mayor Stevens said the next available public hearing date would be in April. Ms.
Hauth said that was correct.
Commissioner Lloyd agreed that January was too soon, and noted that there were still issues that
had to be addressed and she did not want to rush that.
Mayor Stevens said he recalled that the Manager had wanted to get the facts and figures to the
Board tonight so that they would have an opportunity to study it, but also so that it could be
gotten out of the way so that time would be devoted to the budget. Mr. Peterson agreed that was
the case. He said however the Board wanted to proceed was fine with staff.
Mr. Peterson said looking at the budget and considering what they were facing, one issue was
that there was not a lot of development going on in the country and they were talking to a group
of developers who claimed to have the wherewithal to make this project go forward, and so
perhaps they should not put them off until April. Mr. Peterson said since the development
offered a lot of potential and if the developers could produce something that the Board was
satisfied with and felt was a high quality development, that to put that off for four-plus months
and knowing how things did not happen quickly was an issue. He said they were facing serious
financial challenges, and even without the financial crisis they were looking at a nine cent
property tax increase for the upcoming year without adding any new personnel, and from a
financial standpoint he wondered if they should go forward with the hearing in January. Mr.
Peterson said that would still allow the Board the flexibility to take the additional time to study
such issues as density and water capacity and to take additional time to study the effects of that
development before any decision was made.
Commissioner Lloyd said she did not want the developer to think that just because they went
forward with the public hearing that she would necessarily vote in favor of the project.
7:38:42 PM Mayor Stevens said there seemed to be some consensus forming around taking the
Manager?s advice.
Commissioner Gering agreed, starting they did not have to throw up a hurdle and could make
decisions at their leisure to make sure the development met expectations as best they could.
Town Attorney Bob Hornik stated this was a Conditional Use rezoning process so there may be a
reason why you may be in a position after January to need more information, and the process
provided that flexibility.
Ms. Hauth stated the Board would need to make a motion to accept the petition for annexation so
that the public hearing could go forward in January.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 9 of 51
7:39:40 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Lowen, seconded by Commissioner Hallman,
the Board moved to accept the petition for annexation from W&W Partners by a vote of 5-0.
The motion was declared passed.
Mr. Peterson commented that while the financial forecast was projected at nine cents, that they
would work for a no tax rate increase.
C.NPDES Phase II Stormwater Permit Annual Report for Permit Year 3 ? Terry
Hackett, Orange County Water Resource Officer
7:40:24 PM Terry Hackett provided an update as to where the Town stood with its stormwater
program. He said he would provide highlights tonight, but if more detail was needed that could
be found in the report he had provided to the Board.
Review and Background
?
NPDES (National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System) was a federal law and part of
the Clean Water Act. In this State the Division of Water Quality administered the
program and issued permits.
?
Phase 1 referred to larger communities; Phase 2 referred to smaller communities.
?
The Town?s permit was issued in October 2005; the permit authorized stormwater
discharges from the MS4 (Municipal Separate storm sewer system), all of which went
into the Eno River.
?
Year 3 recently completed of the five-year permit.
?
Program required implementation of six minimum measures; all measures except for
?illicit discharge and detection elimination? had been fully implemented; they were in the
process of finalizing some protocols to complete implementation of that measure in
Permit Year 4.
What Had Been Learned Thus Far
?
They now knew exactly where stormwater traveled.
Highlights/Accomplishments
?
Education and outreach successful through combining programs with the Orange County
Stormwater Conservation Office who had existing programs.
?
They had participated in local festivals and attended homeowner association meetings to
provide more outreach. Existing schools programs were expanded to provide stormwater
education.
?
Big Sweep in 2007 during Permit Year 3 had resulted in the collection of 1,300 lbs. of
debris, and in 2008 which was technically Permit Year 4 they had topped that collection
which was due primarily to Gold Park where the contractors had located an old dump site
that was cleaned up.
?
The Town had four projects that were required to meet the post-construction stormwater
requirements last year. One question that had been discussed several times was the
requirement that any project disturbing more than one acre would have to comply with
the stormwater rules.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 10 of 51
?
CWEP (Clean Water Education Partnership) was an organization that the Town belonged
to that provided education and outreach for clean water; the State recognized that what
CWEP provided helped to meet many of the education requirements under the Phase 2
rules. CWEP pooled membership dues from its members to do such things as purchase
television and radio ad time and to contact property owners via postcards who had creeks
on their property to educate them about riparian buffers.
?
Good housekeeping inspections have proven successful; that program included inspecting
such things as whether or not Town employees were doing a good job with managing
trash and keeping it from going down into the storm drains, if the Town was storing
chemicals appropriately, and whether or not there were erosion issues. For the most part,
any issues identified were very minor and easily solved. The biggest issue was at the
motor pool partly due to its age and its location, which would soon be corrected.
?
Training was conducted as a part of that good housekeeping program.
?
They had developed a rain garden program this past year as an education and outreach
opportunity, although not required by the permit. One requirement of the permit that was
not very feasible was the storm drain stenciling, mainly due to the storm sewer system
being made up of a lot of different components. Rather than trying to spend time and
effort on something that seemed not very feasible, they had come up with something new,
which was the rain garden program. A description was offered regarding such a program
taking place behind the Market House.
Action Items
?
They would be continuing the programs already began. They would be highlighting the
things done at Stillhouse Creek with a workshop hopefully early this spring, which would
be a collaborative effort to bring as many local agencies involved in water quality and
water quantity issues together. That would allow those agencies to take that information
back and do similar things with their properties.
?
They would be finalizing protocols for the illicit discharge and detection elimination
program. That would involve traveling throughout the Town to make sure people were
not dumping into the storm system or into ditches, or were not connected to the storm
system in any way.
?
They were planning on doing some stream sampling; proposals had been received and
were being reviewed. They wanted to identify not only if there was something wrong
with stream flow, they wanted to get a baseline of what was out there so they could
determine if there was anything that would indicate any water quality problems. They
also wanted to get a handle on what the current nutrient loading was; that is, how much
nitrogen and phosphorus was flowing through the Eno.
?
Assistant Town Manager Nicole Ard had suggested expanding their training to all Town
employees, not just to those who were responsible for maintaining and running facilities,
which they believed to be a very good idea. That training would allow employees to take
those ideas home and try to make a positive impact on water quality.
Things to Think About
?
Permit renewal ? current permit expires in 2010, so they would begin talking with the
State next year to see what types of information would be needed to renew the permit.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 11 of 51
The State would be moving from the more qualitative approach to a quantitative
approach to determine what had been done to improve stormwater pollution or reduced
water quality impact, so stream monitoring would be important.
?
Phase 2 rules required that any development that disturbed one acre or more had post-
construction stormwater requirements. The Board should consider dropping that down to
one-half acre, at least for commercial development, so that they were getting some
additional stormwater treatment.
?
Knowing that there would be a permit renewal and knowing that they needed to keep
moving with the programs and making sure they were actually doing something to
improve the water quality, the Board may want to think about and discuss long-term
funding mechanisms. The State did have statutes that allowed municipalities to do
certain funding options for stormwater programs.
?
Think about conducting stormwater retrofits by going into existing developments where
they knew they had some stormwater quality issues and installing some sort of
stormwater best management practice, such as a rain garden, a small-scale bio-retention
or something similar. For example, several areas at Millstone Commons had some
erosion and runoff issues. Also, Cornwallis Hills, Beckett?s Ridge, and Hampton Pointe
were all fairly high impervious areas that did not have to meet the more stringent
requirements and they needed to be looked at. There was grant money available and it
was possible the Town would be asked to consider applying for such grants.
?
Another thing coming was the Falls Lake rule process which had already begun. That
dealt with point source and the water plant, as well as non-point source, or stormwater.
One thing to remember was that those rules would likely mimic the Jordan Lake rules,
one of which had been very contentious which was that the process required nutrient
reduction of 30%. That would likely be required in Falls Lake, as well. Another
contentious rule was the existing development rule, which put the responsibility back on
the local governments to find a way in existing development to reduce those loadings by
30%. They were now trying to figure out a way to pay for that, noting it could be very
costly and they would need to take some innovative approaches.
Mr. Hackett stated they would begin thinking about all of these things during the upcoming year
so that they did not get blindsided, noting they could begin doing some things now that would
put them ahead of their baseline. He said those were the types of things on the horizon that
would impact the Town, and that the Board should feel free to contact him personally whenever
they had questions.
8:07:59 PM Mayor Stevens thanked Mr. Hackett for his thorough and informative
presentation. He stated the project Mr. Hackett had described behind the Market House was very
interesting. Mr. Hackett stated they would continue to monitor that over the spring and believed
it would work well.
D.Project update from Stratford Development on Waterstone
8:08:50 PM Dave Dennison with Stratford Development said that he did not have any
particular update to offer, but did want the Board to know they were doing what everyone else
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 12 of 51
was doing which was to wait for the real estate market and the lending market to recover
somewhat. He said at this point everything was pretty much at a standstill.
Mr. Dennison said he had visited Waterstone today and everything appeared to be in good shape,
except for the ?donuts? someone had driven into the soccer field but that could be repaired.
8:10:11 PM Commissioner Hallman stated that an update had been provided to the Economic
Development Commission about a month ago, and that there may be something happening soon.
Mr. Dennison said they had two prospects, one which was commercial and one at a different part
of the mixed-use. He said one was H. H. Hunt Homebuilders who wanted to build in the
residential area and take all of the lots, but they were not ready to build anything at the present
time. Mr. Dennison said that Centex wanted all of the townhouse area, and had shown them a
very good product they wanted to build but they were not ready to build anything, either. He
said even though nothing was happening at the present time at Waterstone they would keep the
area cleaned up and maintained.
8:11:24 PM Commissioner Hallman stated that the County had a new Economic Development
Director and he was ready to help in any way possible. He said if there was anything the
Economic Development Office could do to help, to please make contact.
Mr. Dennison introduced O. C. Vest, a professional engineer who had been with Stratford for
about a year and a half. He stated that because he was now semi-retired that Mr. Vest was
working to take up the slack, and stated he was available should the Board have need to contact
him. Mr. Dennison stated he had heard that Hillsborough was the last capital of the
Confederacy, and asked was that true.
Mayor Stevens stated that Bennett Place, between Hillsborough and Durham, was the last
surrender of the largest Confederate army.
Commissioner Lloyd stated that Hillsborough had been the capital for a very short time.
E.Review and consider approval of increases to the Water & Sewer Capital Facilities
Fees
8:14:13 PM Town Engineer/Utilities Director Kenny Keel said that the Water Sewer Advisory
Committee had met last week to review the Water and Sewer Capital Facilities Fees, and had
wanted to have an additional month to continue their review. He reviewed his recommendation
to implement the five-year average, which was recommended from an administrative standpoint
because it was simpler not to make changes annually. Mr. Keel said it would be equally okay to
implement each annual change when required.
Mr. Keel said Mr. Peterson had suggested doing the implementation annually to make it easier
for developments that happened in the next year to bear the cost during these tight economic
times, especially because fees would somewhat discourage development due to the higher
upfront costs related to water and sewer.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 13 of 51
Mr. Keel said he would recommend that the Board at least wait until next month to take action to
allow the Water Sewer Advisory Board to complete its review. He pointed out that the Town
had been considering moderately increasing the rates for water and sewer, and after they began
design of the wastewater treatment plant there would be a significant increase in sewer fees. Mr.
Keel said at the earliest the Board would consider at its March meeting a contract for the design
and raising the Capital Facilities Fees to likely take effect in April.
8:17:16 PM Commissioner Gering said to clarify, when Mr. Keel had said he was thinking
about a five-year average did that imply that the rates would be fixed for five years. Mr. Keel
stated yes, that they had calculated what the Capital Facilities Fees should be for each of those
years and averaged them. Commissioner Gering stated could they just recalculate for the next
five years what the fee should be each year. Mr. Keel said if they did the five year average he
would recommend the rate stay the same for the full five years; otherwise it would be less
accurate.
Commissioner Gering said when Mr. Keel came back in January, a question he would ask was
why he thought five years was a reasonable period, because they had already spent six years
without re-evaluating it and it was so outdated now why would they want to wait another five
years before re-computing the Capital Facilities Fees. Mr. Peterson said that actually it was
outdated. He said on the water side they were at $1,650 and the average was up to $2,000, so it
had actually gone up due to inflation. Mr. Peterson said they were about where they had
expected to be on the water side.
Mr. Peterson said on the sewer side, they had also done a calculation on the Capital Facilities
Fees if they did not do expansion, which had been over $800, so what threw that out of balance
was the upgrade.
Mr. Keel stated the current calculation for the water fee was only $100 more than what was
currently being charged, which was $1,754, and the five-year average put it a little over $2,000.
He said for the wastewater it went from $634 to $773 if they did not use the five-year average.
Mr. Keel said it was slightly out of adjustment but by a small amount.
8:20:13 PM Mr. Peterson said another reason to consider the year by year average was that
once it was implemented it went up year by year for inflation adjustments, and they would likely
not see a lot of development over the next two and one half years or so, which was important
because that was used for the average. He said given the economy, they were likely to see a lot
more development after that two and one half year period, so financially it was to the Town?s
advantage to take advantage of the higher fee for those who did choose to go forward with
development.
Mayor Stevens said it appeared the Board needed to table the issue until the January meeting.
Mr. Peterson said that he and Mr. Keel had talked in preparation for the Water Sewer Advisory
Board meeting, and he wanted to let the Board know they were planning on proceeding with
design for the wastewater plant. He said that would be between $26 and $30 million, and he was
not anxious to have to raise the rates. Mr. Peterson said they had had some improvements as far
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 14 of 51
as the way they treated nitrogen at the plant, and Mr. Keel and his staff would look at that more
closely. He said they would move forward with getting the design ready to go so that if any
grant funding was available to help mitigate the cost, they would be ready to move forward with
that. Mr. Peterson said as well, because there was not much development going on it would
allow them to defer the plant for a longer period, providing the Town with a larger window of
time to defer the plant. He said the new administration in Washington may be providing
funding, and they hoped that funding would include wastewater and other infrastructure
improvements.
8:23:19 PM Commissioner Hallman stated he had read an article today where Governor-elect
Bev Purdue had mentioned that wastewater could be included.
Mr. Peterson stated one thing they may be able to do would be to develop a one-page description
that could be provided to their legislators which would say these are the reasons why
Hillsborough was in desperate need of help. He said they could perhaps market it in that way
once they got a more accurate cost estimate once the design phase was started, then they could
begin that marketing.
Mayor Stevens stated he had talked with their Congressman about that, and believed a one-page
information sheet would be very helpful.
Commissioner Hallman said he believed what had resonated with the legislators was that the
Town did not need help to expand; they needed help to meet the discharge requirements.
Mayor Stevens agreed, noting he believed that had been a real eye-opener for the legislators that
they were not trying to increase capacity but to provide safe drinking water.
F.Consideration of Penalty for Construction Error at Corbinton Commons - Bridge
Street
8:25:02 PM Ms. Ard said a draft resolution had been provided for the Board?s consideration,
noting this issue had been continued from November. She said the resolution had a blank left for
the Board to fill in the appropriate amount of financial penalty. Ms. Ard said that at the
th
November 24 meeting Commissioner Gering had proposed a $20,000 penalty to be designated
for use for parks. She said she had included a suggestion of possibly extending the warranty for
an additional year.
8:26:10 PM Commissioner Hallman asked had any additional feedback been received. Ms.
Ard said no, and no one had appeared this evening to speak. She said the ?outside the door?
feedback was some concern about the $20,000 penalty. Ms. Ard said there was a willingness to
put up the signs as the Board had discussed, but the developer would prefer curbing paint.
Mayor Stevens said he believed they should wait and see what was on the ground before making
a decision, but they should not have to enter into a long-term discussion.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 15 of 51
Commissioner Lloyd asked would there be parking on either side or on one side. Ms. Ard said
th
the way it was left on November 24 was the Board was asking the developer to put up signs for
no parking. Commissioner Lloyd stated she had checked with the Fire Department, and they
would prefer no parking on that street. Ms. Ard stated that had been noted in the materials.
8:27:43 PM Commissioner Gering said he had made the suggestion for the $20,000 and was
still supportive of it. He said he wished he knew how much money was saved by the developer
building the road the way they did instead of the way it should have been; and, how much it
would cost them to redo it. Commissioner Gering said he believed a fair amount would be
somewhere between those two figures. He said because they did not have those figures, he
believed $20,000 was appropriate.
Mayor Stevens asked if they had any ballpark estimate from past experience about paving and
construction of roads. Ms. Ard stated there was an estimate but knew it was inaccurate, noting it
had been $70,000. She said Mr. Hines had agreed that estimate was too high, but the developer
had indicated that $20,000 was more than it would have cost them to go back and correct the
errors.
Mr. Peterson said he believed there was about 1,000 to 1,100 linear feet that would have to be
repaved. He asked what it would have cost to repave a street mile. Ms. Ard said she believed it
would be about $30,000.
Mr. Hornik stated he would feel much more comfortable in arriving at a penalty if the Board
could articulate some basis for how they had arrived at that figure. He said the Board could of
course impose some kind of penalty because they could force the developer to rip it up and do it
the right way. Mr. Hornik said as long as the penalty they might impose was not outrageous an
amount in relation to the cost of repair, then that penalty could be imposed. He said right now he
had no frame of reference to say that $20,000 was an outrageous number or a fair number.
8:30:41 PM Commissioner Gering said he could say that $200 per linear foot was a reasonable
penalty, which would amount of $22,000.
Commissioner Lowen said he agreed, but asked what you would base that on. And, he said, did
they give the developer the option of ripping it up and doing it correctly if they thought that
would be cheaper.
Commissioner Gering responded he believed they would have to offer that option.
Commissioner Lowen said he believed that ultimately they would all like to see the street
constructed correctly. Mr. Hornik said if the street could be fixed for the same $20,000 or
whatever the figure was, then the street should probably be fixed. He said the Town could really
not require any more than that, because if the developer should repair the street and meet the
specifications for less, then even though the Town might like to have the $20,000 the developer
should have the option to spend less and fix the errors.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 16 of 51
8:31:49 PM Mayor Stevens said that was true, but the Town had allowed the developer to
continue in good faith that the penalty assessed would be less than the cost of ripping up the
street and redoing it.
Commissioner Gering stated the developers had been warned about the $20,000. Mr. Hornik
stated he had no problem with the $20,000 as long as it was not disproportionate to what the cost
of repair to correct the errors would be.
Commissioner Lowen the question was how to determine what that cost would be without
paying an engineer to do that. He said he did not want the Town to have to spend money unless
they could in turn give that back in the developer as a penalty.
8:32:38 PM Commissioner Gering asked could they deal with this by just allowing the
developer the explicit option to fix the street to specifications or to pay the $20,000, and let them
choose which option.
Commissioner Dancy remarked she did not think that would be fair to the developer since they
had already received permission from the Town to continue the project.
Commissioner Gering responded that was true, but they had also been warned that the Town
would impose a penalty.
Commissioner Dancy said in good faith she could not do that, because they had told them to go
ahead and the Town would impose a penalty. Now, she said, it was up to the Board to determine
what that penalty might be. She suggested asking the developer to provide an estimated cost of
repair and then see if they could determine a penalty that would be feasible.
8:33:40 PM Commissioner Lowen said what he was hearing was to ask the developer for
something that would detail for the Town what it would cost to fix the street to specifications.
Mr. Hornik stated the Town routinely asked developers for their engineer?s estimate of the cost
to create roads in a subdivision, for example, and then setting the amount of the bonds at that
estimated cost. So, he said, engineers could come up with that number relatively easy.
Commissioner Hallman asked using the Town?s estimate for paving, what would be that cost.
Mr. Peterson replied they had been attempting to figure the cost to do the road to specifications,
and Ms. Ard had stated she would estimate that to be about $30,000 for repaving a mile
including compacting and everything else that went along with repaving. Mr. Peterson said if
you assumed the street would be about one-fifth mile long and it was $50,000 to do a linear mile
of road, then 20% of that would be $10,000. He said the developer had shorted the Town out of
about a foot out of 22 feet of width, so that was another 5% of $10,000, so he would guesstimate
that the developer had saved about $5,000 to $10,000 maximum by not building the road to
specifications.
Commissioner Gering said it was irrelevant what the developer had saved. Mr. Peterson said
that one option would be to calculate all the time the Town had spent trying to solve the problem,
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 17 of 51
then make some assumptions and come up with a dollar figure. Then, said he, you could figure
that the developer had created a road hazard, and even though it may be acceptable it did not
meet the Town standards and that dollar figure could be applied. Mr. Peterson said then the
amount the Town received from the developer could be used to address some other road hazard
in Town, whether it was a repaving issue, adding curbing, or some other traffic issue.
8:36:29 PM Commissioner Lowen suggested that those funds could be put towards the Nash
Street sidewalk project. Mr. Peterson said the penalty could serve multiple purposes, in that a
small hazard had been created that may be acceptable, but a penalty would be imposed and that
amount applied elsewhere. He said that would send a message to contractors that if things were
not done properly then a penalty would be forthcoming.
Ms. Hauth said whether using the GASB 34 or not, the developer was required to provide the
Town with a schedule of values as part of accepting the roads, so at some point the Town would
be getting that number from them on what the value of that curbing was. Or, she said, they could
pull the value provided for Waterstone or Gold Park or some other project, noting they could
determine a number using the costs associated with those projects.
Ms. Ard said it may be easier to use the GASB 34 because at the bottom of the resolution it
noted that the penalty had to be paid before the Town would accept the roads.
8:37:33 PM Mayor Stevens asked would there be a principle that whether it was 50% or 10%
of whatever the value was, that they pick an ?X? percent as the penalty. Ms. Hauth said that
would work, particularly since Commissioner Gering had mentioned striking a midpoint between
what had been saved and what would have been spent. She said the Town could use, for
instance, 75% of the value of the installing the curb, so it would not be quite to the point of what
would have been spent to replace it but it would be more than what the developer had saved.
Ms. Hauth said it would be beyond the midpoint of the replacement cost, so it would be painful
for the developer to pay but it was not more than 100% of the cost.
Commissioner Gering said the replacement cost, based on those figures, did not include
demolishing and redoing it, which would be a considerable expense. Ms. Hauth said then they
could say the penalty would be 100% of the cost of what it would have been to install it
correctly, and then the developer would be saving the demolition costs. Commissioner Gering
said that sounded reasonable to him. Ms. Hauth said the number would be what the developer
provided to them with an engineer?s seal on it.
8:38:51 PM Commissioner Gering said then the Board could adopt the resolution tonight with
that language. Mr. Hornik said that would be acceptable as long as they described how they
arrived at the number. Commissioner Gering said they could then use that same calculation as a
formula for future transgressions.
Commissioner Lowen said then they would not be tabling the issue tonight, they would be
deciding the actual amount at a later time. Ms. Hauth said they would be directing staff on how
to calculate the amount, so that when the information was received the Town and the developer
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 18 of 51
would know what that amount would be. She said it was not an unknown number, they just
could not calculate it now.
Commissioner Gering said then they would need to craft some language for the last paragraph of
the resolution.
Mr. Hornik suggested ?a penalty in an amount equal to 100% of the cost to construct to Town
specifications Ridge Street, as certified by a licensed engineer, to be paid to the Town.?
8:41:20 PM Ms. Hauth said what she was hearing was 100% of the value of constructing the
entire street, and it was only one section of the street that was an issue.
Mr. Peterson said that Mr. Hines? calculation was 1500 feet, noting he had taken measurements
at 150 feet intervals.
Commissioner Gering said he did not believe that was a figure the developer would provide.
Ms. Hauth said she believed they would deliver the value of the level part of the road, the value
of the curb and gutter, and so on. She said she had thought what the Town would be asking them
to do to repair it would be to pull out the edge of the curbing and replacing it, so that was the
item they were trying to determine the value of.
8:42:55 PM Mayor Stevens said the developer was already paying the value of the road, so
anything at one point above was a punishment, so a percentage of the value of the road may be
more arbitrary but would at least be a figure that made sense.
Commissioner Gering said he was hearing Ms. Hauth say that they already itemized the cost of
the curb versus other costs. Ms. Ard said even if they provided a lump sum, there had to be a
method to get to that lump sum so they should be able to break the figure down.
Ms. Hauth said she did not believe it would be hard to separate out the cost of a concrete curb
and gutter from the cost of the asphalt paving.
8:44:12 PM Commissioner Gering said at least in this case he was sure those figures could be
produced, because they would be required to. Ms. Hauth said it was to their advantage to
provide those figures, because if they could not produce them then the fee would be on the entire
length of the roadway, which was a dramatic difference.
Mr. Hornik said then the resolution should indicate the cost to bring Bridge Street into
compliance with Town specifications as certified by the Town and an engineer. Ms. Hauth
stated that would be a higher price that just the replacement of curbing.
Commissioner Gering commented that actually made him feel better about it.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 19 of 51
8:45:46 PM Mayor Stevens said then that fee could actually be almost like a payment-in-lieu
as opposed to bringing the street into compliance or the equivalent monetary value, which was
somewhat of a different principle.
Mr. Hornik provided the suggested new wording to be included in Section 2 of the resolution:
?The Town Board does not condone this error and assesses a penalty in an amount equal to the
cost to bring Bridge Street into compliance with Town specifications as certified to the Town by
a civil engineer licensed by the State of North Carolina.?
8:46:37 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Gering, seconded by Commissioner Lowen, the
Board moved to approve the resolution as amended by changing Bridge Road to Bridge Street
were appropriate, and as amended by inserting the language provided by the Town Attorney in
the last paragraph by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared passed.
G.Consideration and Comments on 2035 Long Range Transportation Plan (LRTP) to
be provided to the MPO Meeting on December 10
8:47:08 PM Ms. Hauth stated in the packet were tables that had also been included at the
Board?s workshop, as well as the priority list and a draft letter to Commissioner Gordon who
served as the Chair of the Transportation Advisory Committee (TAC) that would provide the
Town?s comments on the LRTP prior to the next TAC meeting. She said the draft letter
indicated that the Town?s preference would relate to delaying the construction on I-40 and I-85
with the exception of interchange improvements, supporting the bike and pedestrian plans, and a
preference for rail service.
Commissioner Hallman said one question for Ellen Beckman, the Transportation Planner in the
City of Durham for the Durham-Chapel Hill Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO), was
whether or not the rail station should be included in the LRTP in order to get funding for it. Ms.
Hauth indicated that Ms. Beckman had not replied to that or other questions. Commissioner
Hallman asked did that also mean Ms. Beckman had not provided any information on what the
formula was between the different divisions. Ms. Hauth replied that was correct.
Commissioner Gering asked what fraction of vote the Town had. Commissioner Hallman
replied one-sixteenth of one vote.
Ms. Hauth asked was that with the weighted vote. Commissioner Hallman replied yes. Ms.
Hauth replied when the weighted vote was not used, Hillsborough had one vote.
8:49:39 PM Mayor Stevens said it sounded as if the information they had asked from Ms.
Beckman was critical information.
Commissioner Hallman said the other issue was where the Town would weigh in on the
alternatives for the rail component. Ms. Hauth stated she had included language at the end of the
second paragraph of the draft letter that said ?We support the commuter rail transit option as it is
the only one that provides service to Hillsborough within the plan horizon. We understand that
this may not be the larger region?s preferred option. We are willing to support a different
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 20 of 51
alternative if it does not preclude or endanger our efforts underway with Amtrak to secure stops
in the existing Piedmont and Carolinian routes.? Ms. Hauth stated Ms. Beckman had alluded to
that in her comments, and she had tried to capture that concept in the draft letter.
8:50:32 PM Commissioner Hallman asked had something come out more recently that with
the light rail service they were still considering a commuter rail service into Chapel Hill to hook
up to it. Ms. Hauth said she did not believe so, that it would be more likely they would run
something else up the spur to intersect with the commuter rail.
Commissioner Lloyd asked then how would the light rail run. Ms. Hauth said the light rail
would not come to Hillsborough, and the Town was asking for commuter rail that would come
from Burlington, on to Durham, and through Hillsborough.
Regarding language in the draft letter, Commissioner Gering asked what did ?shared
proportionally across jurisdictions? actually mean; that is, by what measure. Ms. Hauth said she
was trying to articulate what both this Board and the Planning Board had said, which was not to
just cut Hillsborough?s projects but to share the cuts equally among all the jurisdictions on some
basis such as population or some other method so that the cuts did not disproportionately impact
anyone. She said in other words, cut something from another jurisdiction rather than cutting all
of Hillsborough?s.
8:52:43 PM Commissioner Hallman said along those lines, the Town had agreed to cut two
projects which were probably two of the most expensive in the TIP. He said he was reluctant to
remove the I-85 widening because of the prediction in the LRTP of how congested that section
of I-85 would be, even though they would be revisiting the plan again in three years.
Commissioner Gering asked if suggesting taking I-85 off but making the bridge improvements
improved the possibility that the bridges would be improved.
Commissioner Hallman said they had brought up the phasing of that and asked if the bridge
improvements could be made outside of the widening project, and they were told they could not.
He said he had gotten the impression from that response that the widening and the interchange
improvements were tied together. Ms. Hauth agreed that NCDOT?s preferred method would be
not to do one separate from the other because it would be less efficient.
8:54:46 PM Commissioner Hallman stated they had actually had that discussion during one-
on-one meetings with their division board member, and they had also worked to get the bridge
improvements done earlier on the schedule but had been told separating the two was not feasible.
Commissioner Lloyd asked was Commissioner Hallman suggesting leaving the I-85 project on
the LRTP. Commissioner Hallman replied yes, he believed they should leave it in, because
otherwise the overpasses may be impacted.
Commissioner Lloyd said regarding the widening of I-40, she believed that widening the
roadway would only allow for increased speeds, adding that speeding was already an enormous
problem on that roadway and the more you widened the road the more traffic it would attract.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 21 of 51
8:56:13 PM Commissioner Lowen said the reality was that they were stuck in the situation
that with both the east and the west ends of the corridor having already been widened, the Town
could say yes or no but when the State got the funding they would do it no matter what the Town
said.
Commissioner Hallman said but for this draft letter, it appeared that the Town was playing along
by giving up the I-40 widening.
Ms. Hauth said then the letter should be revised by taking out the sentence regarding removing I-
85 from the LRTP. There was general agreement from the Board.
Mayor Stevens said other than that, he believed the draft letter was appropriate. Ms. Hauth
asked would the next paragraph read better if it simply said ?shared across jurisdictions? rather
than ?shared proportionately across jurisdictions.?
There was general agreement from the Board.
8:58:16 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Hallman, seconded by Commissioner Lloyd, the
Board moved to approve the draft letter with the removal of the sentence regarding removing the
I-85 project from the LRTP, and that the next to the last paragraph be revised to say ?shared
across jurisdictions? rather than ?shared proportionately across jurisdictions?, and that the letter
be finalized and sent by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared passed.
H.Discussion of right-of-way and sidewalk concerns in front of the Colonial Inn
8:58:45 PM Ms. Hauth said basically they had a right-of-way issue with the former Colonial
Inn building in that the porch hung out over the top of the public right-of-way. She said because
it predated the creation of the NC Department of Transportation they were not willing to say they
owned the right-of-way. Ms. Hauth said NCDOT did admit to having maintenance responsibility
but were not claiming it for ownership purposes. So, she said, the likelihood of getting any kind
of encroachment agreement for the porch was more problematic than they wanted to pursue, and
there was an issue of who really had liability and maintenance responsibility. Ms. Hauth said
that the property owner was also very concerned about it but was willing to accept responsibility
for it, and if it was his responsibility and he then had the ability to keep the public out from under
that porch overhang and away from the front windows, he would like to have that possibility.
Ms. Hauth said in order to do that, because the sidewalk existed, the Town would need to take
action to make some improvements to the existing sidewalk to maintain the pedestrian access
already there. She said they would also need to bring it to current standards to get the handicap
accessibility that was not currently present. Ms. Hauth said she would like to have some clear
direction from the Board as to whether or not the Town should pursue making corrections to the
sidewalk, adding doing so would mean loosing some parking spaces on King Street and require
some type of traffic calming mechanism in that area. She said staff and the owner had spent a
significant amount of time trying to untangle this problem, and what she had described appeared
to be the best option that would most likely resolve the issue.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 22 of 51
9:02:03 PM Mayor Stevens said then essentially without claiming ownership the Town would
abandon any claim to right-of-way. Ms. Hauth said that was correct, noting that NCDOT would
need a letter from the Town requesting that they quit maintaining that right-of-way and stating
that the Town had abandoned the right-of-way. She said that would mean that the owner was
then responsible for everything that happened under that overhang of the porch.
Mayor Stevens said one consequence of that would be the Town?s cost of expanding what was
already there and loosing the parking spaces, and the other consequence may be that the owner
would have full control to enclose that porch unless there was some kind of easement granted.
Ms. Hauth said the porch could be enclosed only to the extent allowed by the Historic District
Commission so that it looked more like a porch of a building rather than a pedestrian access.
She said abandoning the right-of-way would put that area under the overhang from the columns
back to the building under the control of the owner and no longer a public right-of-way that the
Town controlled. Ms. Hauth said the letter to NCDOT did not need to specify a time when the
sidewalk would be corrected, although she knew they would want it to be done in a timely
manner.
9:04:07 PM Commissioner Hallman asked could they possibly get some spot safety funding.
Ms. Hauth said they could certainly ask.
Commissioner Lloyd said doing that would give the owner responsibility for the porch, but the
sidewalk at the bottom would remain the Town?s. Ms. Hauth said that was correct.
Commissioner Lloyd said she believed the owner would likely want to block the porch to keep
the public off of it. Ms. Hauth said any barrier would have to be approved by the Historic
District Commission, and if something was erected without approval the Town would force the
owner to remove it. She said railings on both sides of the porch would be enough to be a clue to
the public that the porch was no longer a pedestrian path, and they would need to walk around.
Commissioner Gering asked why it was essential that they addressed the issue now. Ms. Hauth
said the property owner had made a specific request, and had been asking that the issue be
resolved for about two years. She said the owner had stated it was an issue for him when he
began any renovation of the building because he wanted to enclose the site properly with
construction fencing to keep the public out. Ms. Hauth said the owner was very concerned about
liability and someone getting hurt on his property.
Commissioner Gering said he did not believe the owner would do anything. Commissioner
Lloyd agreed.
9:06:41 PM Mayor Stevens said perhaps the Attorney could provide some insight into that.
Mr. Hornik said the owner?s concern about liability was a legitimate concern.
Commissioner Hallman said he was concerned about the Town?s liability as well, and they
should not allow personalities or personal feelings to play a part in an issue where the Town had
some liability exposure.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 23 of 51
Commissioner Lowen said he understood what Commissioner Hallman was saying, because if
someone was to be walking across the porch and it collapsed there would be some liability. Ms.
Hauth responded no, not technically, because the owner did not have a permit to encroach into
the right-of-way.
Mr. Hornik said in such an instance everyone would get sued, and he was not sure who exactly
would be liable.
9:08:05 PM Ms. Hauth said at the present time, if someone were to be hurt it would be the
Town and the State who would be held liable.
Mr. Peterson stated that for a perspective buyer, having this issue taken care of would make it
easier to facilitate the purchase of the property.
Mr. Hornik said there was no question it posed some sort of title issue or would pose such an
issue at some point, and anyone considering investing money in the property would want the
issue of the porch settled.
9:09:32 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Dancy, seconded by Commissioner Hallman,
the Board moved to proceed with calling a public hearing to close a portion of the right-of-way,
and to direct staff to write a letter to NCDOT to accompany the owner?s request to end
maintenance of a portion of the right-of-way by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared passed.
Mr. Hornik said the exact area closed would be portion of the right-of-way on which the porch
was situated. Ms. Hauth said it was the 839 square feet shown in the photograph attached to the
materials. She said if it was convenient to place this issue on the January public hearing
schedule she would do so, and if not she be schedule it for the most suitable time.
9:10:41 PM Mayor Stevens said he believed they should treat this issue without involving
personalities and move forward as they would with any such request and try to facilitate a
solution with reasonable diligence.
Item G. Removed from Consent Agenda: Consideration of a Consistency Statement
and an Ordinance to amend the Zoning Ordinance to create Special Use Permit process
for event centers within the Central Commercial Zoning district
9:11:08 PM Ms. Hauth stated this item referred to the text amendment to create the Special
Use Permit process for event centers within the Central Commercial zoning district. She
reminded the Board that there was a two-step process and they could be ruled on together or
separately, and those two steps were the Section 383 Statement and the actual ordinance.
9:12:21 PM Commissioner Gering stated he had wanted to pull this from the Consent Agenda
and discuss it because he did not believe this was the appropriate time to consider the text
amendment.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 24 of 51
Commissioner Dancy asked why. Commissioner Gering responded that they had crafted the
proposed text amendment for a very specific purpose about a year ago when they were
approached with the possibility of an event center option by the owner of the Colonial Inn. He
said his belief that any of the options listed would ever be exercised was about zero, that the
Town should take the opportunity to entertain other possibilities for a site such as that one, and
that he felt no sense of urgency to put such an ordinance on the books particularly in advance of
the ordinance rewrite.
Commissioner Gering said he believed the Town Board had acted in good faith by taking the
suggestions that had been provided, but in the meantime he had seen no expression of good faith
on anyone?s part to deal with the concerns expressed by the Board a year ago. He said since the
Colonial Inn was currently undergoing a prevention of Demolition by Neglect action, it was
premature to consider what might happen next with the property. Commissioner Gering said the
Board could always reconsider the text amendment at some later time.
9:14:27 PM Commissioner Hallman said since they had already held the public hearing, how
long could it sit on the shelf without having to recall a public hearing. Mr. Hornik responded
that if it sat for more than a few months the Board should likely conduct another public hearing
before considering adoption or denial. He said once it was stale it faded from memory.
Commissioner Hallman said he appreciated Commissioner Gering?s concerns, agreeing that the
text amendment was somewhat of a ?surgical? text amendment crafted specifically for the
Colonial Inn.
9:15:27 PM Mayor Stevens asked would there be any value in tabling the issue for perhaps
two to three months, and putting it back on the agenda later, or, was Commissioner Gering
suggesting that they just deny the text amendment.
Commissioner Gering said he was not certain what his preferred option would be, but just knew
at this point in time such a text amendment did not seem to be a reasonable proposition.
Commissioner Lloyd agreed it was a bad time because they were waiting for the Demolition by
Neglect issue to be resolved.
9:16:30 PM Mayor Stevens said this issue had not real association with the Demolition by
Neglect.
Commissioner Lloyd said she did not see the point when what was allowed by the text
amendment could not be done anytime soon at the Colonial Inn.
Mayor Stevens said the only value he could see was that if the property went on the market then
it would likely be a useful tool to a potential purchaser.
Commissioner Gering said even in that scenario, a perspective buyer could possibly have very
different ideas about the use of the property that would not resemble the text amendment and
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 25 of 51
would ask for a modification to allow some other use. He said it diminished the value of this
particular ordinance to consider that a new owner might want to do something different.
9:18:19 PM Commissioner Lowen said he would be fine with tabling the issue for three
months and then revisiting it. Mr. Hornik said he believed that would be a decent rule of thumb,
but at that point he would suggest holding another public hearing if the Board truly wanted to
take up the issue and seriously consider it. Commissioner Lowen said or, they could simply say
they were not interested and deny the text amendment. Mr. Hornik said that was correct.
Mayor Stevens said the easiest thing would be to table it and take it back up again in February
and decide if they wanted to look at it again, if anything had changed, and then either deny it or
go forward.
Commissioner Gering said they had a sense of urgency a year ago, but that sense of urgency had
evaporated.
9:19:30 PM By consensus, the Board tabled this item until February or March 2009.
Ms. Hauth commented that February would be better, noting that March would put them past the
advertising deadline.
I.Discussion Regarding Future Development Density Planning
9:20:18 PM Ms. Hauth stated she had wanted to make sure that everyone understood where
they were and what the current picture was in terms of what the current zoning allowed, what the
Land Use Plan talked about, and what was their potential for infill. She said right now their
zoning districts did not get smaller than 10,000 square feet unless you did a cluster, and no one
had ever taken full advantage of a cluster development and pushed it to the 50% lot size
reduction. Ms. Hauth said multi-family was 9 units per acre, but they had allowed up to 12 units
an acre with a Special Use Permit, although none were yet on the ground.
Ms. Hauth said language in the Future Land Use Plan spoke to Historic Residential zoning which
was the designation called for in the historic district, and specifically called out a density of .5 to
one unit per acre which was what the zoning currently allowed. She said she had talked about at
the workshop the average lot size was somewhat smaller than that. Ms. Hauth said the last
sentence in that same paragraph could possibly provide some wiggle room, but the Board could
also read it to not allow wiggle room. She said since that sentence spoke to infill but not to
density, it was somewhat vague.
Ms. Hauth said staff had done some quick math on the existing stock of vacant land, and she had
used the term ?vacant or underdeveloped? to indicate that. She said they had used the rule of
thumb that if a property had a taxable structure value of less than $10,000 then it was considered
to be underdeveloped. Ms. Hauth said that would pick up a lot of properties that had only
storage buildings or just garages, or buildings that might not have been occupied for some time
where the value of the structure was dropping. She said there was also the unique taxing
structure that came with mobile homes, noting that if they were on permanent foundations they
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 26 of 51
were taxed as real property, but if not they were taxed as personal property. Ms. Hauth said in
round rough numbers leaving no allocation for open space, new roads or the like, there was
perhaps 500 acres of redevelopment potential with some of that being commercial.
9:24:44 PM Commissioner Hallman said even with two units per acre that would mean an
additional 2,000 people. Ms. Hauth said that would be 2,000 dwelling units which would be
4,000 people. She said her rough numbers did not go outside the ETJ except for just a few
places where they had smoothed out the boundary and picked up a little bit of extra land. Ms.
Hauth said by and large they had not gone south of the interstate, and it did not include the
Addison property and it did not include Ashton Hall.
Mayor Stevens asked did it leave area for designated recreation area. Ms. Hauth replied no, she
had made no allotment for open space, road construction, slopes, recreation area or anything else,
noting that was sometimes as much as 30%.
9:26:37 PM Mayor Stevens said then they could perhaps subtract out a little of that total. Ms.
Hauth said yes, adding that for instance in recalculating land in west Hillsborough there were not
big areas of land that needed roads constructed. She said but when you got down on Oakdale
Drive, some of the area between the railroad and I-85 had much larger tracts and would have an
open space requirement, a recreation area requirement, and road needs. Ms. Hauth said for the
Collins property, she had used the flat acreage number with nothing removed except for the
parcel owned by the Town. She said if she had added up all land that was vacant she likely
would have gotten twice that number.
9:27:51 PM Commissioner Hallman asked what the next steps would be, for instance would
they want to go back and look at the Future Land Use Plan and say where they wanted to
increase density such as around a potential rail site. Ms. Hauth said yes, adding that the Board
could ask her to provide more examples of what different density could look like. She said she
would ask that they not change or attempt to change the break points between the different
categories listed in the Land Use Plan since those were the breakpoints that the entire region
used. So, she said, medium density residential meant 3 to 8 dwelling units an acre here, in
Raleigh, in Cary, and in Chapel Hill. Ms. Hauth said because Hillsborough did not have much
medium density residential, their 3 to 8 was probably closer to a 3 to 5.
Ms. Hauth said her question now was what the Board?s next round of questions were and what
information could she bring to them to help them get where they wanted to go.
Commissioner Gering said an immediate thing they could do would be to adopt the district
descriptions as a starting point for a policy document. Ms. Hauth stated the Board had adopted
those descriptions when they adopted the map last December.
9:30:12 PM Mayor Stevens said he wondered if a next step would be some education or self
study by the Board, noting he would value a list of sites he could go visit that could give him a
visual of what certain types of development looked like. He said perhaps a tour could be
arranged at some point for the Board. Mayor Stevens said the information was still somewhat
abstract and it was late in the evening, so providing an opportunity to get some education would
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 27 of 51
be helpful. He said this issue came up in almost everything they did so they needed to keep
conversations about it going. Mayor Stevens said it would impact the ordinance rewrite so that
education should be sooner rather than later, perhaps in the next quarter, and they could then
schedule some more discussion time.
9:31:32 PM Commissioner Hallman said one of the more immediate issues to discuss was the
cluster subdivision ordinance and what were good examples and what were bad examples.
Commissioner Gering said they would be considering annexation opportunities as well which
may change some of the picture. Ms. Hauth said obviously they would have to agree with
Orange County as to what designations would go in those fringe areas, noting some of the
ghosted areas on the map meant nothing at this point and had no bearing, that it was simply an
idea. Ms. Hauth said she would schedule the next discussion during a workshop rather than a
regular meeting.
Mayor Stevens agreed that would be the most appropriate.
J.Discuss and consider approval for Proposed Agenda for the FY10 Budgetary
th
Planning Retreat on January 24
9:34:00 PMMr.Peterson said the Board could make any suggestions or changes to the
proposed agenda they wanted. He said he had added a time in for the Orange Rural Fire
Department to provide an update, but before he called to offer a specific invitation he wanted to
get the okay from the Board to do that. Mr. Peterson said also built into the schedule was a time
for each department to give presentations on redesigns or ideas, and during that time he wanted
the department heads to be able to bring in other members of their team to sit in on the
discussions, noting he believed that time spent would be valuable to them particularly with the
difficult year they were facing.
Mr. Peterson said the retreat would be held in Room 212 at the Durham Tech Hillsborough
campus, which was the large room upstairs where the Community Policing Summit was held.
He said that room would afford plenty of room to add perhaps twelve more people.
9:35:22 PM Commissioner Gering said he believed that was a good idea.
Mayor Stevens agreed, on both counts. He said this process was to review their top-level
strategy map and how that translated into what they wanted to accomplish, and some of those
key goals were about community safety and the Fire Department was certainly a key element of
emergency services and safety. He said he would support including the Fire Department on the
agenda. There was general agreement from the Board.
9:35:51 PM Mr. Peterson said he believed it would be helpful to the Fire Department as well
to hear about the efforts the Town was making as far as cost containment and other issues.
Mayor Stevens agreed.
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 28 of 51
K.Announcement of Hillsborough being awarded the Government Finance Officer?s
Association Distinguished Budget Presentation Award
9:36:16 PM Mr. Peterson said they had been fortunate enough to receive the Government
Finance Officer?s Association Distinguished Budget Presentation Award many times in the past,
and this year they were pleased to again received the GFOA award. He said they had used an
entirely new format and on the report card they had received from the reviewers their comments
had been outstanding. Mr. Petersons said that was a compliment to the Board, the staff who had
worked with them on making the new format change, and to Emily Bradford who had worked
many hours and had been innovative in the way she had formatted the material. He said they had
also received the special recognition for the performance measurement which was fairly hard to
get. Mr. Peterson said they had come very close to receiving it for the capital section, but the
comments provided by the reviewers would be very helpful in making next year?s document
even better.
Commissioner Lowen suggested placing that information on the Town?s Web site on the front
page, noting they should let citizens know the Town was doing a good job. There was general
agreement from the Board.
11. CLOSED SESSION
9:38:00 PM Upon a motion by Commissioner Lowen, seconded by Commissioner Dancy, the
Board moved to go into Closed Session by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared passed.
Upon returning to Open Session, and upon a motion by Commissioner Gering, seconded by
Commissioner Hallman, the Board moved to adjust the Manager?s salary by 4.25% to $116,000
by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared passed.
12. ADJOURN
Upon a motion by Commissioner Dancy, seconded by Commissioner Gering, the Board moved
to adjourn the meeting at 10:45 p.m. by a vote of 5-0. The motion was declared passed.
Respectfully submitted,
Donna F. Armbrister, MMC
Town Clerk
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 29 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 30 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 31 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 32 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 33 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 34 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 35 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 36 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 37 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 38 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 39 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 40 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 41 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 42 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 43 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 44 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 45 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 46 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 47 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 48 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 49 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 50 of 51
December 8, 2008 Regular Meeting
Approved: January 12, 2009
Page 51 of 51