Public Hearing for Conditional Zoning/Site Plan
Submitted by G.G.P. Development (M. Cavey)
For
Chair Andrea Kacinari called the meeting to order at
Chair Kacinari opened the public hearing relative to the Application for Conditional Zoning Certificate/Site Plan Review submitted by G.G.P. Development (Mike Cavey) for Medina Country Club – North PUD Subdivision (NW corner of Ryan Road/Wedgewood Road, West to bike trail, relative to all or parts of Parcel Nos. 020-10B-32-002/003/004, 020-10B-31-009 and 021-10B-001 totaling approximately 76.95 acres.
The zoning secretary read into the record the Certificate of Mailing indicating that the letter notifying the adjacent property owners of tonight’s hearing was mailed on 7/11/08.
The Chair ascertained that the Board members had the
complete application and that it had been reviewed by each of them. The Staff Report of the Medina County
Planning Commission dated
Those persons sworn in for purposes of this public hearing included: David Lewis, Jason Brenner, Ted Lesiak, Ray Hanley, Mike Cavey (all on behalf of the applicant), Zoning Inspector Alliss Strogin, Zoning Commission Chair Karen Schoonover, Fire Chief James Sheppard, Roger Fowler and Bob Engel.
David Lewis – As you are aware we have been working on this plan for many months and we did secure zoning approval from the trustees to utilize the LTTD zoning requirement provisions. At that time we didn’t realize that we had to come before the BZA for a conditional use certificate and that’s why we are coming at this late date. The plan has been submitted to the Medina County Planning Commission (MCPC) and they reviewed and approved the subdivision plan. We have been working with the Zoning Commission on the south phase of this development and because the south area is not part of the LTTD zoning an overlay district zoning is being created for it so the Zoning Commission is very familiar with this development.
We are proposing 50 residential lots ranging an average size
of about 20,000 sq. ft., which is just under a ½ acre lot. The minimum lot area your zoning requires is
11,000 sq. ft. so we are larger than the minimum. Your zoning lot frontage minimum is 50’ and
our lot frontage ranges from 60’ to close to 90’ on some of the lots. Your zoning minimum subdivision acreage is 40
acres and our acreage is 76.95. Minimum
open space required by your zoning is 30% (23 acres) and we exceed that as we
have 37.86 acres of open space. All the
lots are serviced by central sanitary sewer and central water provided by the
Mike Cavey – You have seen the plan for the north and south side. The south side plan when it comes in will have cluster units – we call it a lifestyle community where we take care of the snowplowing and yard cutting. Tonight we are talking about the north side, which will be residential housing lots. Overall Granite Golf is going to put its corporate headquarters here and will probably employ 12-15 people. This could also allow the club and the restaurant operations to be open more year-round especially with all the homes around it. Instead of closing down and laying people off in the off season we could keep people employed year-round, which will enhance our employment in the township.
Some of the questions by the BZA members and audience were:
- Is the open space mostly the golf course?
- When you mention open space, is that not green space?
- How large will the homes be?
- What happens to the open space if the applicant sells the project?
- Are you putting up homes before they are sold or will they be built when sold?
- Is there going to be an island in your cul-de-sac because the trustees just discussed this?
- Is there only one entrance/exit off of Wedgewood and what is the deciding factor as to how many entrances/exits?
- Is the plan to connect the road to Dover Highlands?
- Who takes care of the open space?
- What about the homes that abut the wetlands?
- What is the plan for the wetlands?
- Isn’t there a law that governs the wetlands?
- What is the saturation zone?
- Can there be some restrictions on those lots by the wetlands so the landowners won’t interfere with them?
- Can the D & Cs also contain a notation about complying with the Chippewa Watershed Study?
- What about the golf cart access across the road?
- Are there two different school districts?
- Why did I get notice?
- Is there enough space to create a third lane if the traffic study required it?
- Are there sidewalks in the development?
- What plans are there for possibly errant golf balls being hit and toward the bike trail?
- What about the bike trail/path?
- Is there going to be a landscaping plan before this is approved?
- How long are the driveways?
- Are their wells on the property?
- What is the status of the Homeowners Association D & Cs?
In response to the various questions, the applicant or its representatives (David Lewis, Jason Brenner, Ray Hanley, Mike Cavey and/or Ted Lesiak) responded as follows:
The golf course is in the open space and there is some buffer area between the golf course and the homes. It’s going to be natural woodland area or golf course areas. We are exceeding the minimum open space required by your zoning. There are also some wetlands on the property, which will remain as natural areas. The development is being proposed in two phases with Phase 1 having 26 homes and that is the street that comes off of Wedgewood and curves to the west to the cul-de-sac; Phase 2 goes north and has the other street cul-de-sac – the total is 50 units. The zoning actually allows for more than that and we have those calculations on the plan. Obviously, the golf course will be tied in with Medina Country Club. In addition to the 50 homes, 3 golf holes will be built over here and the driving range. Also proposed are a swimming pool and a pool house that the country club members can use as well as the residents within the subdivision.
The homes will probably be in the 2100 sq. ft. range and go up to 3,000-4,000 sq. ft. The homes will be sold the conventional way, fee-simple, with a deed whereby the lot and ground is owned. It is anticipated having four builders brought into this project and we will have some model homes to show and then sell off of those models. They will be custom homes not something like a Ryan home.
As per your zoning code and the MCPC the open space will be determined as permanent open space or green space and the open space cannot be sold away – it will be permanent. The Zoning Inspector clarified that the zoning and the county require what is called Declarations and Covenants (D & Cs), which are rules that govern over the Homeowners Association (HOA). It will be recorded and deeded and there will be provisions in the
D & Cs to make sure that is a given. Once it has been finally recorded, the open space will become open space for that development. The HOA will be taking care of the residential areas and the business entity will be taking care of the golf course area.
We would like to do cul-de-sac islands and we understand there is a regulation by the county commissioners that they don’t like it. There is a variance procedure that we would have to go through with the trustees and the county. The Fire Chief indicated that their preference is not to have islands because it interferes with the staging of vehicles as you are limited to make that radius and you might have to go through the landscaping if there is a fire and also people tend to park within the cul-de-sac area.
The deciding factor in whether you need one road or two
roads is outlined in the Medina County Subdivision Regulations and we have met
their approval. You are allowed to have
50 homes on a single access entrance and we have 50 lots. This one entrance/exit is off
The wetland is that crosshatched area on the plan and
basically the backyards of the homes on lots 37 through 47 would overlook the
wetlands. We do have a wetland permit to
fill a small portion of the wetland. The
law actually allows for creating a new wetland on your property or you can
purchase a wetland off of your property.
For our wetland permit we purchased wetland off of the property. We are allowed to fill up to ½ acre. There are some other small crosshatched areas
where the street crosses and those small areas will be filled in accordance
with our wetland permit but the main area that you see will remain
natural. As to the saturation zone, if
you study the contour lines the street will be roughly 15-20’ above that stream
area so the homes and basements will be elevated above that. Most of the homes on lots 37-47 will have
walkout basements with the basement level about 10’ above. We also set the basement floors on the
walkouts higher than
We intend to put into the D & Cs language in regard to the stream and wetlands that the wetlands are to remain as is and the landowners will have the responsibility to comply as well as a reference to the Chippewa Watershed Study. We will stake that property so it will be clearly defined as our property and the homeowners don’t have the right to go down and maintain it. We are also doing the retention ponds that are required. We are going to circulate that water and reuse that water by taking it from the retention ponds and put it in our irrigations lakes so we are going to be recycling much of the water that is on the property.
In response to a question of why the BZA was not on the
mailing list for this project earlier, the Zoning Inspector indicated she
didn’t know who was at fault.
The golf cart access is going underneath the road (
Lots 8, 9 and 10 actually show a split on the school
district. If you look at how the boxes
are positioned on the lots, the intent is to have the houses be completely in
the
You would have received notice of this public hearing if you were an adjacent property owner to any of the parcel numbers listed in the application. There were 5 parcels listed and this project is in all or only a part of those parcels but for legal notification we used the adjacent property owners around the whole area of those 5 parcels. Mrs. Cahill is in the process of selling a small portion of her property, which is east of the bike trail. We are only buying part of the bean field (a small sliver to the south side of the woods). We are not buying any of the wooded area.
The traffic study has been done in accordance with ODOT requirements and the report has been submitted to ODOT for their review and approval. The report did not indicate that a turn lane was needed for the north and south combined area. However if there were a third lane constructed there is adequate room. The third lane would be 12’ wide so basically the road would be widened both on the south side of the road and the north side so you would take 6’ from each side so I think we would be okay. In addition, the distance from the edge of pavement to the parking lot is approximately 40’.
There will be sidewalks on the streets within the development. The sidewalks are shown but because of the size of the drawing they are not clearly depicted. If you look close the right-of-way lines are thicker since those are the sidewalks up and down both sides of the street.
We have the bike path paralleling the golf course now for almost a mile and golf balls go into the bike path. The driving range is angled away from the road. There shouldn’t be a problem with the way this is designed but you can have errant shots that go into the bike path or possibly hit a house. They are teeing off to the northwest. Mounding will be in place and like we did at Shale Creek we mounded, put trees up and put some netting up so it just depends on what is needed. We are going to sink the tee down and then take that dirt and raise the sides. Also anybody living in the development will sign that they know living on a golf course could be hazardous to the siding of the house or a window.
We are proposing to run the path coming east to where our
tunnel will be and then going under our tunnel.
We’re going to the State first to try and get the bike path in the
right-of-way. The reason we are doing
that is for the township comprehensive plan.
We are going to ask for any new developments to put in bike paths and
it’s easier when you are doing a development if you only have to work with one
person, the State, instead of a bunch of homeowners to extend the bike path
because it would only take one person to stop it. We plan to ask the trustees and the Park
Department to help us with the presentation to the State. We also would like to negotiate with the
County so bike trails could go in the right-of-way, like along
We did not submit a landscaping plan at this time. Our thinking was when we do the swimming pool and parking lot development that site plan will have to be submitted to the township for further review and we planned to submit a detailed site plan for that and the landscaping plan. Anything that has to do with the golf course will be landscaped as golf course very similar to what we have right now on the south side of SR162. The Zoning Inspector indicated a landscaping plan should be submitted now showing landscaping around the perimeters. It would be to everyone’s benefit to submit a site plan for the initial landscaping on the course itself and then when you actually come in for a permit and approval for the pool, then you would show additional landscaping for that piece of the project. Zoning Commission Chair Schoonover inquired if the BZA would consider wording to the effect that the swimming pool architecture needs to be consistent with the area so as to prevent perhaps an unsightly bubble thing if the pool was to be covered.
The Zoning Inspector mentioned that on the preliminary site plan it showed “future use –11 units” and there is really no 11 units carry-over or future. If this gets approved for 50 units that’s it, the rest is open space. The fact that by area density you could have 61 units does not mean that you can bank these 11 units because you can’t so I don’t think that belongs on there.
Attorney Lesiak indicated for the purpose of the record, it
should be noted that Jason Brenner (Lewis Land Professionals) wrote a letter
dated
In further commenting on the boulevard and cul-de-sacs, in all due respect for the fire chief, they do already exist in the Demond development to the north. The boulevard entrance we are trying to make on SR162 is all about creating a beautiful landscape entrance into the development and the same thing with the turnarounds as to landscaping. We were all at the planning meeting with the county where the cul-de-sacs were discussed and we had to have something from the township saying in certain circumstances they might approve but they also said they would not approve any parking in the center. The cul-de-sac will be posted no parking. The Zoning Inspector indicated that at the trustees meeting Monday night they made a resolution and chose not to have landscaped cul-de-sacs but they further indicated that in special set of circumstances there was a variance process that a developer could go through if they desired to have them. She further stated that the fire chief had a valid concern but for the most part landscaped islands are very attractive if done right and she suggested two guest parking spots in the landscaped circle.
As to the length of the driveways the minimum building setback is 40’ from the right-of-way so you can have two 20’ vehicles parked end to end and not hang over the sidewalk. These are just regular homes with full size lots and you can get four vehicles in there. In a condominium project or with cluster homes usually the driveways are closer and shorter.
There were wells on the property sometime in the past but they have been formally plugged so that is not an issue. As to the Homeowners Association Declarations and Covenants, they have been started but we were trying to get tonight’s matter through before we finish them.
There being no further questions, Chair Kacinari closed the public participation portion of this public hearing.
There was discussion among the Board members whether to go
ahead and make a decision tonight or possibly set up a joint meeting with the
Zoning Commission. Zoning Commission
Chair Schoonover indicated that the Zoning Commission met on
The applicant indicated that they are trying to build the golf course holes during construction season and have been meeting with everybody to get this project started. It was suggested that the Board consider a conditional approval tonight based on a landscaping plan being presented for approval. This would allow us to keep moving forward on this project as every day it is delayed has an economic impact. Attorney Lesiak indicated the approval could be subject to a landscape plan that meets the zoning code and that approval must be on the final plan.
Attorney Lesiak indicated that on the drawing there is a block for future development. It is not necessarily a banking of lots but just an area that can be developed in the future so it meets your current code. What would be approved is the green/open space.
The Zoning Inspector indicated that the Board was talking
about the future use of other units and those 11 units cannot be banked and
that needs to come off. Another thing,
Block A shows reserved for future development but that
happens to be your driving range. If
this is approved as a driving range, it is no longer a future block for
development. The items the Board would
approve are the use of the green/open space.
It’s a golf course development and part of that is the open/green space,
which would be approved as a driving range and 3 holes. The
The Board discussed what components of this plan might be missing or need modified and/or what conditions could be placed on the conditional if approved, to-wit:
- take out those 11 lots for future use on the preliminary plan
- need a landscaping plan showing the entire perimeter
- swimming pool enclosure (if any) needs to be architecturally compatible with the surroundings
- approval would be for 50 units, 3 holes and a driving range
- reference to Block A reserved for future development to be removed
It was noted by the applicant there were some notes on the top of the preliminary plan that say pool, pool building and surrounding improvements shall have a detailed site plan and landscaping plan approved by the township prior to construction. We thought we would get this basic plan approved and then before we can build anything with the swimming pool we’ve got to come back with that detailed plan with landscaping.
As to the landscaping plan for the entire north side, the Zoning Inspector indicated it should show some buffering on the front here by 162, some buffering against the other subdivision - a basic overall general plan indicating where landscaping is going to be and the type of landscaping. It would be mounding, natural buffering or wooded areas, etc. just so there is a landscaping plan right now on how it would look with or without the swimming pool and then when the pool goes in there will be additional landscaping around the parking lot, the pool house, etc. and that would be shown at the time of the site plan for the pool. It is understood that it could be a fluid thing and some mounding or tree buffering might shift a bit once it is determined what is actually there but at this time a general landscaping plan for the perimeter is needed.
The applicant further noted on the top of the plan the statement saying variance required for cul-de-sac islands and boulevard entrance islands to be fully landscaped and maintained by subdivision homeowners association. The applicant still elects to pursue those variances.
As to the notation on the plan saying underground gas lines exist on both parcels and have not been fully located, the applicant indicated those have been located through what markers are available. They are gathering lines and will have to be relocated as the construction and development occurs.
There was a question whether there was going to be any lighting on the streets in this development. It was mentioned that in some developments the homeowner was required to have a yard light. The applicant indicated they have looked at two options as to lighting – yard lights or street lights because some type of lighting is needed. The Zoning Inspector commented that when street lights are put up the township pays for them so if street lights go in they usually make the provision that the HOA reimburses the township.
The street lighting the township normally pays is at a major intersection but as far as subdivisions, the township would have to request it and they would have to make arrangements with the HOA to pay back the township.
Zoning Commission Chair Schoonover suggested that the Board add to the list of provisions that the D & Cs need language regarding the wetlands are not to be disturbed and to comply with the Chippewa Watershed Study.
A motion was made by Nanci Shanley as follows:
Application for Conditional Zoning Certificate/Site Plan approved for
Conditions:
1) Receipt of a landscape plan for the entire subdivision and approval by the Board of Zoning Appeals;
2) Receipt of a revised Preliminary Plan with the reference to “Future Use – 11 units” removed and reference to “Block A Reserved for Future Development” removed;
3) Swimming pool enclosure, if any, needs to be architecturally compatible with surrounding property;
4) Use is for fifty (50) homes, three (3) golf holes, and a driving range;
5) Deeds and Covenants (D & Cs) shall include language reflecting that the wetlands shall not be disturbed by the homeowners and also to comply with the Chippewa Watershed Study.
Jack Blank seconded the motion.
Vote: Dave Parker - yes
Andrea Kacinari - yes
Jack Blank - yes
Mark Riffle - yes
Nanci Shanley - yes
The motion passed.
Chair Kacinari closed the public hearing.
The meeting to sign minutes is scheduled for
Upon motion by Mark Riffle, seconded by Dave Parker, it was
unanimously approved that the meeting be adjourned. Meeting adjourned at
Marlene L. Oiler, Certified PP, PLS
(Note: Minutes
approved