Kennebunkport Growth Planning Committee reviews state density rules

[6:04] Paul Hogan: Good evening. My name is Paul Hogan. I'm chairing the growth planning meeting tonight. It's October 6th. We'll do introductions, starting with Tom on our far left. [6:15] Tom Smith: Tom Smith. [6:18] Tom Vandershop: Tom Vandershop. Paul Hogan again. [6:21] Anne-Marie Martin: Jane Evelyn. Anne-Marie Martin. [6:23] Mary Beth Gilbert: Mary Beth Gilbert, select board member. [6:26] Benny Ruhl: Benny Ruhl, support staff. [6:28] Nadia Crockett-Current: Nadia Crockett-Current, support staff. [6:30] Paul Hogan: Great. Thank you. Thanks all for coming. We do have five sets of minutes, which were forwarded to everybody. Hopefully, we've taken a look. Would anyone like to make a motion to approve? [6:50] Jane Evelyn: Jane, go ahead. Or any comments? I will move that we approve the minutes. I'll second. All in favor? That's everybody. [7:02] Paul Hogan: Next, we're going to have a quick summary from Ben, sort of to close out the discussion we were having on historic district. He went... A couple of things have happened since our last meeting, so he's just going to give us a quick overview before we go into the first agenda item. [7:23] Benny Ruhl: Thanks for that, Paul. All and yes, so when this committee had last met, you were finalizing the review of the historic district standards. Those standards have been very well publicized. They've been placed up on outside of just your committee's website. They've been placed on our planning department page. Thank you. They've been placed in other public locations on the website. We did have two different informational sessions with the select board during the month of September, one while you were still kind of in the middle of some of your review, and then one subsequently after you finalized review of the ordinance. It is still in draft form as you left it, but the select board did, especially at that second meeting, have some helpful concrete discussion on where they still had question marks or where things may want to go with that in the future. Part of the direction of the select board was the request that the planning board review the ordinance. So kind of the next steps in that ordinance process for at least that particular ordinance is to have the planning board take a look at the ordinance, have them draft any comments, and then those comments would go back to the select board, but also would those comments would come to you when they've formalized something as well. The planning board will start that review tomorrow night. I kind of suspect they will not have a chance to finalize that tomorrow night. I sort of have a feeling that their regular meeting agenda will end up taking more of their time than the ability to review that those ordinances, so I kind of suspect that they would bring that over to their other meeting in the month, but when that's finalized it will go back to the select board, and I will make sure that you receive those comments as well, and ideally we would have more information to share at one of your November meetings about where this goes, if there's any ask to make amendments, and then what the next steps in the process would be, Liz [9:48] Paul Hogan: is here, they keep rolling and we need another chair, I'll move this way, hi Liz, give us a brief intermission here folks, we just had a, and we're back, we've done a little seed rearrangement here, welcome Liz, I then you finished, We do need to, before we go to the density issues, we do need to discuss moving our November meeting, our first meeting in November, because of the election and the use of this room. So I guess that's the first. Did you have a, knowing the calendar, Ben, did you have a suggestion? Everybody pull out their calendars. [11:49] Benny Ruhl: so the following week on Tuesday would be November 10th, as of right now the I believe this room and our staff are available, there is a public meeting that is possibly I'm going to occur at some point during that week, but I don't believe that's been scheduled yet, so if we end up scheduling we can make sure that other meeting doesn't align with us, yeah Thursday will be the board [12:20] Paul Hogan: meeting, so how does the 10th look for folks, okay, all right, so let's go to the 10th, thank you, and one more administrative matter, do you have your quorum for Thursday night, you sent around an email, I think that we have Ann [12:52] Nadia Crockett-Current: Marie and Tom Smith, okay, is there a third person that responded that they could go, can anyone else make it on Thursday at 6, please say yes, can I make it by zoom, yeah I think zoom would be fine, I think you're still we you know allow zoom for other public meeting type things, we can verify that but it we [13:16] Benny Ruhl: We would take a verbal yes, you could be on Zoom for now if that worked for you. [13:23] Paul Hogan: Sure, if no one else can be here in person. I'm going to be out of town, but I can do it by Zoom. Great. [13:30] Tom Smith: I think. Before you go on, a question about moving the meeting in November. Yep. The second meeting of the month would be then the following. [13:39] Paul Hogan: Following, it would be two weeks in a row. [13:40] Tom Smith: Now, that's right before Thanksgiving. I'm going to be gone, for instance, at that time. [13:44] Speaker I (unidentified): so the 17th it would be the 10th and the 17th not the 24th do two Thursdays a [13:55] Mary Beth Gilbert: row okay everybody do Tuesdays yeah and the [14:00] Paul Hogan: Following week is Thanksgiving. Okay, good, all right, let's move along. Tonight's topic is the density changes in our ordinance that result from 2173, and we have some handouts, and we're gonna, I know some of them will be up on this screen if anybody's at home. Then you want to lead off? Certainly, and thanks for the overview two weeks ago. That was very helpful just to put it back in our minds. [14:40] Benny Ruhl: Certainly, and so this will, my kind of hope, at least the vision that Nadia and I have had as we've been thinking about how to go through this, is that we will kind of try to share the big picture and then start small and then work our way up. And so tonight's really the big kickoff of everything. But our hope would be that from prior knowledge that this committee has and then information that we've shared over the last couple of weeks, that you have the ability to kind of really start to dive into things tonight. What we are assuming, at least for tonight, will be helpful is kind of having a hybrid approach. So there are handouts on the table, and then we'll have a map up at different times for reference, and you'll have a little bit of a static map, but I think it might be helpful for people to turn around and look at the map when needed. Does anybody not have the handout? I know we had a couple of folks come in late. I tried to, we've got three sheets right there, should be three different pages of varying depths. Yep, three different packets of varying depths. Perfect, so I have one extra copy, so if our member of the public would like a copy, she's welcome to have one. Welcome. [Paul Hogan: Ms. Public.] So what you have before you hopefully isn't too information heavy, but we have several different things that I was hoping would be helpful for us to look at. So much of the printed information that's on the table is information that's from other agencies. The biggest packet has information that is from SMPDC, which is our regional council of governments, as well as information from the main office of community affairs. And those are things that are hopefully good resources to be able to reference as we're thinking about what the density provisions look like in 2173. And before we really get into those, what's the temperature of the committee? Committee, I know we've had several conversations about 2173. Do you feel like you have a relative overview of what it is, or would you like me to kind of give the elevator speech of why we're reviewing this and what these provisions are? [17:56] Anne-Marie Martin: I'd like the elevator speech. How [18:00] Paul Hogan: many floors are we going? [18:03] Benny Ruhl: Not very far down in the floor or up in the floor, okay, provision. So kind of stepping backwards, LD 1829 and 2173 were two pieces of legislation that were passed in the fall of 2025. In the spring of 2026, they kind of built upon LD 2003. And the chart that's on the top of the biggest packet that you have in front of you on the table really breaks down the whole package. And so that's the understanding, LD 1829 and LD 2173 provision. And so it's made up of a couple of different types of changes, and those were to already existing statutes. So it changed the affordable housing density bonus, it changed the way in which we look at accessory dwelling units, and it changed the way in which we look at density or multiple dwellings on a lot, which is what we're going to be talking about tonight and then probably at least one more subsequent meeting. The information that you have on that understanding, all the 1829 and 2173 provision, I think is going to be useful to keep going back to. And our hope is that we start here with the density provision, which is kind of the middle of the package, and then we'll kind of unfold into the rest of it. So we'll unfold into performance standards around that, as well as thinking about accessory dwelling units or accessory apartments and affordable housing. The rest of that packet has information related to tonight's exercise, which is the actual density provisions that are required under state statute. What the statutory requirements are asking of municipalities, including Kennebunkport, is that we do a couple of things. We have to try to review our use table and make sure that our uses match up with state requirements, and those requirements are effectively allowing the possibility of four units on specific lots in places across town. Additionally, it requires increased density depending on whether there is public water and public sewer or whether that lot is within a growth area, and we're going to get into what that means and what that actually looks like for us as we kind of go through tonight and most likely an additional meeting as we think about what this looks like. [21:16] Tom Smith: You used the word requires increased density. Isn't it better to say permits increased density? Yes. [21:23] Benny Ruhl: Yes, we would be permitting the increased density in these changes. You don't require it per se. Yeah. [21:34] Speaker I (unidentified): Quick question. This may be irrelevant, but I know some properties are not access to town water and sewer. It's one or the other. Where does that fit? [21:50] Benny Ruhl: it. So as it went through, as we're going through this, as we're thinking about, lots within Kennebunkport, and as this had gone through its process as a state, statute, it's the and that is important. So it would be, any of what we're talking about would be, a lot that [22:13] Mary Beth Gilbert: has public water and public sewer and our growth area by definition was a thousand feet away from sewer access so it wasn't is that correct that's correct so is that part of you wouldn't currently be served they would have to [22:35] Benny Ruhl: tie in that's correct and so the map that we have that's a static map for you is our growth area map which is our growth area in green the transition area in pink and the rural area in blue and then it's hard to read on this map but I did it I printed it out purposely just for reference as we move forward with this that is the sewer and water access within town and it's not the easiest to look at when you are this zoomed out it is much more clear if we zoom in and as we go through this process and part of why I was thinking you would want to have it be both high both things on printed out in front of you and behind you on the screen would be we are happy to zoom in and out of the actual GIS map to show you what that looks like so the way the [23:38] Mary Beth Gilbert: the law is though to go back to Liz's question and just for clarification it attaches itself to a town's growth area and their comprehensive plan but our growth area as we defined it was like I again I'll reiterate a thousand feet away so it's actually not connected so are we saying that it has to be is it a dual thing has to be in the growth area and currently connected so there are [24:08] Benny Ruhl: varying levels of the increased density the most dense locations according to state statute is areas that have access to public water and public sewer and are within the growth area and then the density lessons as you either lose public utility access or you move out of the growth area [24:35] Mary Beth Gilbert: Into a different zone. So if I said this way, in order to get into this game, I have to have public sewer and public water and be in the growth area. Correct. So I don't just say I'm in the growth area. I have to start at this level and build up. Correct. I never understood that. So that's a good clarification. That goes to Liz's question. You can say I'm in the growth area, and it's like, well, that started at C. We have to clear A and B hurdle first. So first you have to clear sewer. You're already in sewer. You're already in water. And you're in the growth area. So all three hurdles. [25:18] Paul Hogan: Or I assume you would, if a developer came along and was planning a subdivision, he would commit to having sewer and water. He's in the growth area, it abuts it, I assume that would qualify because he's going to provide sewer [25:33] Benny Ruhl: and water. So for our purposes, if you're thinking about hypotheticals, what we are effectively doing is amending the provisions of the land-use ordinance that relate to this particular state statute. And so it, you do need to think on a both district, zoning district wide basis and a parcel basis, but in terms of the exercise between the two, we need to think more about what exists today as it relates to the land use ordinance instead of what someone could build out, if that makes any sense, because the could build out is going to be much more challenging. I think if we, I don't want to discount that, but I think that it's a lot easier to think about where we are today in terms of what those provisions are, if that made any sense. So today we [26:36] Mary Beth Gilbert: use the three hurdles. Yes, today they would have to clear the three hurdles. [26:41] Jane Evelyn: Correct. So the question I have, I think about the 1,000 feet. So that's one of the could be questions. So we're just doing if people currently have water and sewer. [27:00] Mary Beth Gilbert: And live in the growth area. [27:02] Jane Evelyn: And live in the growth area. All three levels. Correct. Right. But the 1,000 feet doesn't matter. Not at this point. [27:09] Benny Ruhl: Not for your purposes of at least tonight. Night and you can put this on a tickler for the future, but that would be a question of subdivision in which our subdivision ordinance would be asking that person, would you commit to having that sewer extension as part of your [27:28] Mary Beth Gilbert: project and that could be something that like you know so as Ben put that sort of like off in a parking lot because it should go there because again you know as this goes forward this is the when we had air come in and go through the sewer build out plan right and so how many units do we get to before we hit the sewer so they always have to get permission for the sewer so I think that would tap into that whole discussion too like [27:56] Paul Hogan: if they're gonna hook up okay let's continue on [28:02] Benny Ruhl: So I think there are several different ways to kind of take a bite at thinking about what these provisions look like. In my hope with this particular packet was that it gave you a couple of different ways to visualize what these three choices are. These may or may not be helpful visualizations, but this packet that has the a lot of green on it is from the main office of Community Affairs, and that has a flow chart which is attempting to try to show how these changes would relate to the possible use typologies what a person could build on the lot according to this law, and then it tries to also show what those possible maximum densities would be according to the law, and then each subsequent very green page is a part of handout from the main office of community affairs which gives examples of how that would work on a lot-by-lot basis if you have those particular things. If you are in a Growth area and you have access to public water and sewer, what the maximum possible density buildup [29:25] Mary Beth Gilbert: So I think if we go back to what we were just saying. On this one that you have your you know, yes and no you're white with the green your very first paragraph of resident district area and a growth area or Served by but we would change that to an and yes so that would be an and because otherwise where are you Maribeth I'm right here at this very top one right here because they have an ore in there and so the ore because then if you go down it says the municipality must allow and so that goes back to our previous discussion about [30:02] Benny Ruhl: more tying into the into the wastewater plant and i actually will change my answer to i think that is actually correct as an or what this top provision is highlighting is that there are use typology requirements and then there are density requirements and those use typology requirements in the no section is stating that you only need to allow three units on the lot including an ad you and the green yes is saying four units on a lot and so what the statutory requirements are they would be asking us to increase the possible uses on some of our in some of our zoning districts to allow what would be considered a triplex or quad plex depending on if they have access to public water and public sewer or if they're in the designated growth area and I know we are quickly getting into jargon and dense weeds and everything else we do have Nadia and I have gone back and forth as to how to best share information with this committee and with the public as we move forward with this process we do have some visualizations outside of what we had shared with you last time that are a little bit more Kennebunkport specific if that's helpful. If you want to put that on the back burner we can certainly keep that on the back burner as well. We've been struggling with how to best relay this information to you so it's digestible and understandable. [31:55] Paul Hogan: So to this to the same flowchart page I'm still confused with the first or if it's in a growth area or survey public if yes to either then we allow for inclusive of one ADU I [32:18] Mary Beth Gilbert: actually think and then go [32:20] Paul Hogan: ahead if you go down below it says lot size and density it says if lots served by public water and public sewer and in growth area then the minimum lot size is $5,000, $1,250, et cetera. How does the top relate to the... [32:39] Nadia Crockett-Current: So I think it might be, maybe it would be helpful to consider our previous ordinances. So before LD 2003, which was a couple years ago, in Kennebunkport, most zones only allowed one single-family dwelling unit on a lot, no matter how big the lot was. Even if you had a five-acre lot, you could only have a single-family dwelling unit, or potentially, depending on the zone, a two-family. A duplex, right. That would require planning for approval and some other things. So this is basically saying if you are either on public water and sewer or in the growth area, you can have four units on the lot. But the lot size and density section is saying what the external requirements are. So if you're in the growth area but you have no sewer connection, which I think is one of the important piece here, state law requires that you have 20,000 square feet of lot area for a wastewater septic system. So if you created an 80,000 square foot lot, theoretically you could put four dwelling units on that lot because you could have four separate septic systems, or you know, work it out however you need to fit those septic systems. So it's saying that, you know, in some cases we can dictate what that density requires. We can say you have to have 20,000 square feet per dwelling unit, but we have to allow you, if you have an 80,000 square foot lot, to put four dwelling units on that lot. Does that make sense? Yes. [34:09] Benny Ruhl: And I find it, when I'm thinking about the difference between what is being granted as that allowance, that density allowance of the type of units and the number of units, versus the actual how big a lot is or how many units could be built on that lot, I think it's a lot easier to look at this first page that SMPDC had prepared, which lists effectively the separate chaptered parts of ordinance. [34:41] Mary Beth Gilbert: I think this is good, though, for the public. This is really good. This flowchart is really good. I think the only thing I would do or suggest, because I did get tripped up on the municipality must allow four units per lot, inclusive of one ADU. Maybe it should say per the lot size and density, which leads you then down below to the rules. Because otherwise, people stop there. Like, you don't stop there. You don't go to the next goal. [35:15] Speaker I (unidentified): or muscle out up to four yeah [35:21] Mary Beth Gilbert: per the lot size and density we have to get them to that next thing like connect the mind but I think this then you read through to you and then I think it's very I think this is very helpful I think this is nice this for communication I think is yeah or you know and as we move [35:44] Benny Ruhl: through this I suspect that not and I will be creating various handouts that are more specific to what is either helpful for you or helpful to our town as a whole again none of these are things that we had created but we wanted to share these resources with you as we started talking about this I think one [36:04] Tom Smith: Of the things that may be a bit confusing about this is you have to go through the weeds in order to get to the bottom line. Maybe it might make sense to start off by saying the more public infrastructure that exists, the more dense the lot can be. That's what you're getting at, I think. So the more water and more space and so forth and so on, the more units can be there, which makes a lot of logical sense. You don't want to have too many people crowding an area with no resources, very limited resources. So it's basically the more that exists there to support the people, the more people you can put there. Is that what you're trying to say, basically? [36:41] Benny Ruhl: Yeah, that's good planning. Yes, but that's more or less what the intent of much of LD 2003 onward has been trying to encourage. [36:50] Jane Evelyn: Can I just ask a question about the map here, the green area, which is the growth area? I see that there's some pink within there. Are those transition areas within the growth area? [37:08] Benny Ruhl: If I, if I had to guess, those are related to the fire hydrants or the pump stations. I think if we take off that layer, which Nadia could do behind you, [37:22] Nadia Crockett-Current: you would see that there's like red circles, and if you zoom the map out far enough, they start to overlap and they create what looks like a pink zone, but is really just highlighting where the sewer is running. So the pink on the [37:43] Benny Ruhl: growth area is sewer. The, so the reason why I shared this map with you was to highlight that, to Tom's point about where there are utilities, that the intent of this law, if you really boil it down, is to encourage growth where there are utilities. Our growth area is the green or light green shade behind us, and the transition area, which is not our growth area, is that much larger pink shaded area above it. But our sewer line runs the length of the coastline pretty much to the northern extent of town on the coastline, all the way up to get to Goose Rocks. So, Goose Rocks, if you don't include the exemptions, which I will touch on in a minute, has access to public water and public sewer, and therefore may require the increased density of this statute, of the state law. [39:01] Mary Beth Gilbert: But it's not in growth? It is not in growth. [39:03] Benny Ruhl: But there are density provisions for areas where there is sewer and water access that aren't in the growth area, right? And if I had to guess, that was either forced main and a waste water treatment plant or a fire hydrant, if you were to really zoom in on the GIS that Nadia has up behind you. [39:40] Nadia Crockett-Current: Right now, after Lock Street going towards Route 1, there is no sewer, but there is public water. So what you're seeing, anything past Lock Street, what you're seeing is water, but not sewer. So for those lots, we'd be at about 20,000 square feet. [40:00] Jane Evelyn: And then there's this other little pink area that's probably just water as well. [40:05] Mary Beth Gilbert: There's no, yeah, so there's no growth, there's no transition. [40:09] Speaker I (unidentified): I think everything that appears pink [40:12] Nadia Crockett-Current: here is everything kind of around Dock Square and down into Cape Corpus all has sewer and public water. There's actually only a couple areas of town where there's only public water and no sewer, and it's mostly that section of North Street and River Road up past Lock Street and then over down School Street and a little bit up Old Cape Road. Everything else has both. If it has public utilities, it has both. So to [40:39] Mary Beth Gilbert: go, if I'm in, if I'm at Goose Rocks Beach, so I go down the flowchart, I'm on the flowchart thing, so I say is this resident district area and a growth area, no, or served by public water and public sewer, yes, and then I go to the dwelling units allowed, the municipality must allow four units, so we have to change that words, so we drop down to the lot size, and then I go down to the lot set size and density, I have to go over two blocks to find me if lot is served by public water and public sewer but not on a growth area, then you go to your green box and you can have less than 10,000 square foot minimum lot size, less than 20,000 square foot for a duplex ad you permitted without additional law. That's That's what you were talking about, Ben, for the Goose Rocks speech? Yes. Okay, which is covered by your flowchart. Follow the flowchart. [41:46] Benny Ruhl: For your kind of knowledge purposes, we've already sort of touched on this. Is it helpful to go through either those last boxes or the provisions of where, what those lot size requirements are? as we think about the density repeat [42:15] Paul Hogan: that question sorry so we've we've touched on [42:19] Benny Ruhl: at least mildly touched on where those where units are increased units themselves the number of units would need to be increased would it be helpful to kind of marry beth's question to go through these bottom boxes on this flowchart. [42:41] Mary Beth Gilbert: So that's these next pages, right? Yeah. That's these next pages. So it would go in detail about what you can do on each box. That would be good, right? Sure. Yeah. Yeah, let's do that. [42:53] Benny Ruhl: So feel free to stop me, ask questions, jump in. We can go at whatever pace makes sense. We can also pull things up as visualizations if that's helpful, but this is kind of the possibly more challenging part to wrap our heads around, and it will make sense as we kind of move through this. When you look at the use table or the dimensional standards table, and what I've at least highlighted as what, where we need to go with this, but ultimately what it means, what state requirements are asking us to do, is to have areas where there is access to public utilities have the most dense provisions within our code. So what that means is a lot that's within the growth area and has access to public water and public sewer would need to have two different things as it relates to density provisions. It would need to have a lot size that is no greater than 5,000 square feet, and it would need to have a density allowance, which would be the number of units that could be placed on that lot, of 1250 thousand, one thousand two hundred and fifty thousand square feet, fifty square feet, and that would mean that four units could be placed on that 5,000 square foot lot. And if you look at that chart, that's what that chart is trying to help folks visualize. Those four units can be inclusive of an accessory dwelling unit, and we'll talk about what an accessory dwelling unit, or we call it an accessory apartment, is in a different meeting. But I wanted to kind of go through what these density things are first so we have time to digest them. [45:00] Paul Hogan: I just have a question on the first one, the 5,000. So it does say it's subject to shoreland zoning, which has certain restrictions, its own restrictions, existing restrictions. It doesn't make mention of flood hazard zones. [45:24] Benny Ruhl: I'm glad you brought that up, so I had purposefully skipped it on the understanding all the 1829 and 2173 page, but all of these density things that we're talking about have the potential for us to choose to add something into our ordinance which exempts areas that are within a flood hazard zone, within a coastal dunes, coastal sand dunes system, or have other state mandated, state required flood hazard provisions. I do not have the full list of that for you today, but I will bring that for you in a Subsequent meeting, if it's helpful for you just to visualize what this looks like tentatively after we've gone on through and talked about what the full density scale could look like, we can pull up the flood hazard map on a map behind you. I had played around with trying to print it out for you and have a whole bunch of stuff for you and I was feeling like I was getting overwhelmed looking at it, so I didn't want to overwhelm you with static maps, but I think that's a good one to look at on a map where we can toggle layers on and off once we get through the actual toward density stuff and then move into what it looks like as we start [46:51] Mary Beth Gilbert: to adjust our table. Can I ask a few questions about this one? Sure. Okay, so if I have a lot that's 7,500 square feet, so am I allowed to then take that proportion and add on? I don't have to go to another 5,000. When I'm over 5,000, I can take that portion and put, say 7,500 would give me one more house. So I could put five on, is it so it's proportional to the [47:21] Benny Ruhl: The main office of Community Affairs is going through rulemaking right now. I suspect that'll be a question that was asked of them in rulemaking. Theoretically this provision is only looking at the four units or less. But we may have limited policy choice to talk about more than four units. So it might end up being that if we wanted to say that there was a provision for five units or more, that it ends up being an additional 5,000 square feet is what's required or something else like that. [48:00] Mary Beth Gilbert: So if I have a lot that's nonconforming right now in the village and I'm 10,000 square feet, can I do eight? Do I have to break it into two lots? [48:16] Benny Ruhl: This would not require anybody to subdivide. Okay, you may be able to do eight and is that still waiting for the same ruling? I don't think it would be waiting for the same ruling, but it was a conversation that Nadia and I were having before we left, which is something that I'll bring to you next week or next meeting, which is when we jump into the use table you'll see that I left some things for you to think about in red, which is on what happens if it's more than four units. Okay, we want to [48:52] Mary Beth Gilbert: Call that all right, so my next question goes down to the private state and local standards may apply. So it was my understanding, which could be wrong, that the town ordinances overshot Association regulations. So like if, and if association said you're only allowed one house on a lot, and the town ordinance says you can have this, the town or an ADU, you can build that still, even though the association law says no. [49:28] Benny Ruhl: I think it would depend on what the local ordinance says, in our case, what our ordinance says and what the homeowners association says. [49:39] Mary Beth Gilbert: Okay. And then the same thing went for private deeds, because I thought if there was a private deed, like if somebody handed a deed and Anne Marie bought a house from me and the deed said, thou shalt only have one house on this deed, this house, thou shalt buy this deed from me, this property, and you shall only have one house on this lot. My understanding that was a deed restriction from two private citizens and from a town's perspective the ordinances that allowed whatever to happen could happen and if they wanted to fight that out you know if the person that transferred that deed wanted to fight that out in court that was outside of What the town would get the town did not get involved in local deeds [50:27] Benny Ruhl: That's correct. And I'm glad you're bringing that up. So these all these pages are pages from the main office of Community Affairs. So they're made as guides for this process, but they are not us as the town nor as town staff saying [50:44] Mary Beth Gilbert: that those standards could supersede other things, so all those things, so these would have to be done in terms of things that are applicable to us mainly [50:55] Benny Ruhl: I would say what's in this private state and local standards may apply as much as no one likes hearing these words would be on a case-by-case basis that there may on individual lots in any town across the state there may be covenants or deed restrictions or other things that would supersede what we're going to be talking about tonight and in the next couple of meetings but that in general the ordinances that we would be amending and as we go through this process would be our normal land use ordinances as they relate to land use regulations [51:32] Mary Beth Gilbert: across the town yes so I think if we go to the process part of it I hear what you're saying but at the same time in reality how we work it would go to the Planning Board and the Planning Board doesn't look at deed restrictions the Planning Board only looks at ordinances is that a correct statement they are [51:52] Benny Ruhl: Only able to make a determination off of our ordinances, but they may have a, they certainly could have a deed restriction that is brought up as a reason why they [52:01] Anne-Marie Martin: Could not make a determination. Okay, got it. I have a question on that. So easements, what if there's a, an easement to protect green space or wildlife habitat? How is that respected? [52:16] Benny Ruhl: So on a, on the individual basis, that would be something that would come up either as it goes through a planning process or as it is relating to the individualness of the permit process. As we're thinking about what we're trying to do with amending the land use ordinance that, we are really trying to do either townwide regulations or amendments to specific districts. So in that case, it's a lot harder to come down to the minutia level of a parcel or an individual's, possible, deed restrictions or other provisions. And this was just meant from the state to say these things could also come into play as you. As an individual parcel owner may be relating to these provisions [53:12] Tom Smith: Before you go on, I think you have to change the direction of this minimum lot size. What you're actually saying is the lot size here should be greater than 5,000 square feet. And let me give you an allergy. What's the minimum driving age in Maine? Is it 21? What is it? I don't know what it is. The minimum driving age in Maine is 12. What you're really saying is you have to be at least 12 years old to drive, correct? What you've written down here is the minimum lot size has to be less than 5,000 square feet. [53:48] Paul Hogan: No one here wrote any of this down. This is guidance from the state. Well, I know, but I'm just saying we're not editing the states. [53:55] Nadia Crockett-Current: For clarification, it does say less than or equal to, which is what the state is requiring. [54:00] Tom Smith: But I understand the words make sense. The symbol is incorrect. [54:06] Benny Ruhl: And Nadia and I are happy to, as we move through this process, because I suspect we would have an actual public engagement session with, not that we don't enjoy one member of the public, but with hopefully lots of members of the public, we can create our own Kennebunkport-specific documents that take things that you all share with us and take our version of where these could go. [54:31] Tom Smith: I don't understand the objection. If you're using the wrong symbol, you should change it. [54:38] Mary Beth Gilbert: Tom, that's what they're saying. They're saying that they're just giving us examples of what the state gave, and so this is what we have, and then they're listening to our feedback. So they'll take your feedback, and then when they come up with stuff for communication to our residents, these will reflect all the comments here now. So you're telling me that this [54:59] Tom Smith: symbol is going to change, it's going to reverse? [55:02] Benny Ruhl: It ain't right. We will make sure that it makes sense. It may or may not look in that capacity. [55:11] Tom Smith: Alright, I totally disagree. This is incorrect. [55:18] Paul Hogan: Correct? I don't disagree with you. I'm just saying this isn't our work product. We're not changing the state's mass produced documentation. But it's a word of caution in terms of sharing this with the public because it is confusing. [55:36] Benny Ruhl: It is inaccurate. Sure. And we don't want to make things even more confusing because it is already a very confusing topic that we're [55:44] Tom Smith: The concept makes sense, just the symbology. Yeah, it's backwards. It's backwards. [55:53] Paul Hogan: Okay, next one. [55:58] Mary Beth Gilbert: So. Now we're at the beach. [56:03] Benny Ruhl: So yes, so areas that are outside of the growth area but have access to public water and public sewer, which would be pretty much all of our transition area, which is in pink right along the shorefront that has a lot size requirement of 10,000 square feet or less, no, the pink doesn't have public water and public sewer, it's to get utility access to Goose Rocks Beach is. And so that density requirement is a minimum lot size of 10,000 square feet or less, and then a density provision which is kind of equal proportions to that. So one single-family home on that 10,000 square foot lot, and then a duplex, two units in one structure, for 20,000 square feet, and then we still need to allow up to four units in that location, up to three units in that location, and so if we have additional provisions and you'll see this as it relates to the actual table, that there is eventually going to be some choice that we can make as to what those units, what that actual density for those units above three could look like, so [58:01] Anne-Marie Martin: when we look at this little diagram of the two houses as a duplex and then something to the rear, there is that [58:09] Benny Ruhl: to imply an ADU? Correct. So in this diagram it's two, either presumably two units that are together as a duplex, as well as one ADU. And how big would, what [58:28] Anne-Marie Martin: is the maximum size of an ADU? 800. Under our ordinance would be 800 square feet. [58:37] Benny Ruhl: But and we'll talk on the performance standards of accessory apartments, is what we call that, at a subsequent meeting, most likely in November, but tentatively in the next couple of weeks. [58:51] Paul Hogan: And so above $20,000, say, if you had $60,000 on the lot, we have discretion as to above the first three, or we do not? [59:07] Benny Ruhl: Lot? We need to allow at least three units on that lot. Right, as long as it's one lot. If they wanted to subdivide it, they could. Correct, and what it ultimately means is the lot size will shrink. The land that someone would need within their lot will shrink, and Goose Rocks to me is actually the one of the best examples of where the provisions of state requirements actually may make sense, so we are happy to pull this up, but we certainly can let you do your own kind of research as you think about what density looks like in town, but Goose Rocks is already very dense. There are many locations that are many parcels that are much smaller than the actual minimum lot size, so they may already meet these requirements in which the lot size is reduced down to 10,000 square feet or down to a much smaller size than what our ordinance says they should have, and so Goose Rocks historically has been a location that is already this dense, as with other locations here in village center that have historically had the growth patterns that meet the requirements that the state is asking us to do. [1:00:32] Paul Hogan: So at Goose Rocks, if the lot size is smaller than 10,000, they're nonconforming and they don't have the right for three? [1:00:43] Benny Ruhl: So once we adopt those provisions, the minimum lot size would be 10,000 or less. So we could certainly do or less if we wanted to, but that's not what I was proposing, at least. But it would be a significant reduction from what's in our ordinance today, and we'll get into what those crossouts look like. I felt like we needed to get through what we're looking at right before we get into what town specific things we're looking at [1:01:13] Mary Beth Gilbert: so in square feet, forget me, I'm just, I'm just here looking at lots [1:01:28] Benny Ruhl: And then the last vision, and Nadia already kind of mentioned this, is outside of the growth area without public water and public sewer, or in the growth area without public water and public sewer. Both of those locations technically are falling for the density provisions within the subsurface wastewater rules, which means that the minimum lot size is 20,000 square feet or greater. The difference between the two would be that state statute would require us to have a minimum lot size of roughly that 20,000 square feet if it's a lot that's within the growth area and doesn't have access to public water and public sewer, versus if it's a lot in an area that is not in the growth area and also doesn't have public water and public sewer. Any minimum lot size that's greater than that 20,000 square feet is what is meeting the requirements. And so what that means when we look at the table, and we can go back over this when we're actually going through our table, is that the zoning districts that are within our rural area, which is areas that aren't in the growth area and do not have access to public water and public sewer, and some of the spillover of those same zoning districts that are within the transition area and don't have access to public water and public sewer, those lot sizes as they exist today may be appropriate to retain those lot sizes, but I think we should talk about whether those are the correct numbers, whether requiring that amount of square footage or that acreage is correct as it relates to the density in other parts of town, but I did not propose to amend those in what you're looking at tonight at least. [1:03:36] Paul Hogan: So in this example, one example two, it's variable in example 2 depending upon how many bedrooms you're putting in? [1:03:51] Benny Ruhl: Correct, it the calculation can be kind of challenging to go through as a math problem, but it effectively is based on the number of gallons that a particular structure would use, and that is a it's in state statute, that statutory requirement didn't change through any of these processes. Have I totally confused everyone already? That was the goal for tonight and [1:04:31] Paul Hogan: currently on our no public water, no public sewer, oh I'm sorry, I thought I was one sheet ahead, never mind, so [1:04:53] Benny Ruhl: That was a lot of information in about 45 minutes. Would you all like to look at, have us zoom in and out of the GIS map behind you so you can digest some of that a little bit? Would you like to jump into the actual proposed changes to the dimensional standards chart? What's best for the committee as you think about how to move forward with thinking about what we've [1:05:26] Mary Beth Gilbert: just talked about for 45 minutes? Can we go? So this one right here, the outside growth area but with public water and public sewer, it doesn't have to be too [1:05:37] Benny Ruhl: attached, right? That's correct. It can be a single-family home, it could be two different single-family homes, it could be a duplex, it could be attached or detached. Oh no, that's the ADU. It is, it's not necessarily related to, it is partially related to the duplex in the sense of how you're thinking about the unit density, but the overall picture of what will be changing is related to all use typologies in that in those [1:06:11] Mary Beth Gilbert: areas so if i'm in outside the growth area but within public water and public sewer so i'm down the beach I have a minimum lot side of 10,000 square feet I'm allowed I'm allowed I have to have a minimum lot size of 10 squash and I if I have 20,000 I can have a duplex and I can have an ad you on so I can only have one house on [1:06:41] Benny Ruhl: 10,000 square foot, that would be the minimum, the new minimum lot size. Do you [1:06:48] Paul Hogan: You get an ADU, too, on that 10,000? Yes. Right. If you wanted to put a duplex, if you wanted three units, then you have to have 20. [1:06:59] Benny Ruhl: If you wanted a duplex plus an ADU, you'd have to have 20. Right. Yes. And [1:07:07] Jane Evelyn: on the next one, in the growth area without public water and public sewer, example two says four bedrooms. So if you have – so this is saying two housing units with a total of four bedrooms. Is that the maximum number of bedrooms that you can have? [1:07:37] Benny Ruhl: So when you're thinking about areas that don't have particularly public sewer, it would be based on the subsurface wastewater septage calculation. So if you design it, if you design and build a big enough septic system, then you could have X number of bedrooms, is more or less what the calculation ends up being, and that the way that it relates to what will change is that either we would be reducing that lot size requirement to meet that, to come closer to that 20,000 square foot requirement, or we would be leaving our minimum lot size requirement alone as to whether it's in the growth area or not within the growth area, and that may make more sense as you go through the dimensional standards chart I [1:08:38] Paul Hogan: Think we should, well, this is in our brain, go to dimensional standards as opposed to looking at maps, because I'm going to forget everything we just learned. I don't even, I [1:08:57] Benny Ruhl: was just thinking about a public hearing. It actually might be easier in a public hearing setting because there would be just a lot of cross outs and add-ins. The one challenge of doing this piece by piece is that we aren't tackling the whole puzzle, we're just looking at a couple of pieces. But I was worried that if I dropped the whole puzzle in front of you with the pieces scattered, that we would never be able to put it together. [1:09:25] Paul Hogan: So is that okay with folks to go to the tables, the [1:09:35] Benny Ruhl: dimensional church? So this is a very basic possible proposed change to the [1:09:44] Paul Hogan: dimensional standards chart, which complies with state law, I assume, which [1:09:49] Benny Ruhl: is meeting minimum requirements of state law. And then I've highlighted areas where we might want to talk about, do we think that these are appropriate? That's the yellow, correct? Got it. And so when you're looking at this, sometimes my cross out button was not liking what I was doing, so there's a couple that are crossed out when they shouldn't necessarily be crossed out, but cross out in black meant it was a removal, red was an addition. If it's crossed out and red, it was meant to be fully red, it just wouldn't let me uncross it, and I want to share it with you, but I'll fix that as we move forward with things. And if I've highlighted primarily the actual title, the subheading, then that is something that I think as we get through, as we start to move through thinking about what this looks like, we may want to think about whether those numbers make sense. But I don't think we're ready to do the optional choices. I think we still want to stick with what we would need to do if we were meeting state requirements. And so if you haven't ever looked at the dimensional requirements. This exists in our ordinance. If you're looking on our e-code, it's actually a little tab that you can hit off of it. And as we will add both the existing dimensional standards chart and a proposed standards chart to your SharePoint. But if you were looking at it as the existing, it would be anything that's in black. And so anything that is in red is something that I've added, and probably something that we will can sort of continue to talk about and continue to think about as to are they the best definitions, names, numbers of those other types of things that we [1:12:02] Paul Hogan: need to make sure that this incorporates so if we're looking at minimum lots area for example and it says 5,000 in red we assume that's a growth area correct got [1:12:15] Benny Ruhl: it and if you go through it goes through each of our zoning districts as you flip through the pages you can see that there are most zoning districts that would require a lot area reduction of some kind and that five thousand or ten thousand number relates to whether it is within the growth area and whether it has access to public water and public sewer it [Anne-Marie Martin: is it] isn't within the federal historic district and the proposed historic overlay zoning district, but it is also its own zoning districts. And so each of these zones, as they're called out, the village residential zone, village residential zone East, dock square, so on and so forth, those are all zoning districts. We, at least for tonight's purposes, probably don't want to get into the weeds of what those districts entail, like what the uses are, but it may be helpful if, or if you feel like it would be helpful, we could pull up a map that shows the zoning districts as they exist within town. [1:13:48] Anne-Marie Martin: I think you gave us a map. [1:13:50] Benny Ruhl: Did I give you that map? I gave you a, I gave you the map of the growth areas. [1:13:57] Paul Hogan: The growth areas. The three, the overlay. [1:13:59] Benny Ruhl: But Nadia can pull up on the screen the actual zoning district's map, if it's helpful. [1:14:07] Paul Hogan: I assume the easiest way to think about this is go column by column as opposed to across a zone? [Benny Ruhl: I think probably.] Okay, so I'll ask a question on Goose Rock Zone. [1:14:23] Mary Beth Gilbert: You know, just also, too, when we're thinking through this for clarity, it might be good when we're having added Crossovers to like update the table and say, you know, village residential growth area, you know, growth zone or something for people. [1:14:42] Paul Hogan: Yeah, that wouldn't, but is that true for, or the overlays districts don't exactly match, do they? [1:14:53] Benny Ruhl: Which overlay districts? The transition, growth, and rural, they don't always match up with zoning districts. All right, there you go. So, and I don't think this is going to be something that comes before you in this process, but at some point in the future it may make sense for us as a committee and us as a town to think about these dimensional standards in terms of what we are looking for them to do, what the intent of the dimensional standards are. We intending it only for the uses that are listed, or are they intended for other use typologies? But that is not a conversation for you guys to have. [1:15:37] Paul Hogan: Tonight, okay, so my question on the only zone I know fairly well, Goose Rock zone, part of that has water and sewer and part of it does not have sewer. There's a lot of houses that Goose Rocks that do not have any sewer, and yet they're listed here as, you know, 1010 and [1:16:11] Benny Ruhl: I purposely did that because I wanted this committee to look at what the most dense choice would be if we were only building the code to have what the standards would look like for the whole district. If we want to have that policy choice, we can differentiate between sewered and non-sewered, if that makes any sense. I think you would have to. [1:16:43] Paul Hogan: What's the least confusing to a consumer who's going to look at a chart three years from now and say, oh, this is what I want to buy, or right, this is what I can do, they think [1:16:56] Mary Beth Gilbert: They'll think that they, if you, if we left it like this, then they think they potentially could do more than what they could, because if I'm just looking at this and I don't really, like, you have to say, you know, if you, if you're in this and you don't have sewer and water, and then you're over on this [1:17:15] Jane Evelyn: What I don't understand is you're talking about the Goose Rock zone. Right. There's nothing underneath there. [1:17:22] Paul Hogan: No, it's on the next page. It's on the next page. Oh, okay. Read on, as my law school professor would say. It's the read on rule. [1:17:31] Benny Ruhl: And I've had some basic conversations with a couple municipalities, so kind of stepping backwards. All towns across the state are trying to grapple with this conversation. Some are farther along than others. There were some communities that, up until the passage of 2173, thought that they had a earlier deadline than we do. So they had either fully gone through a process this spring or had started a process this spring. So I have had some communication with some of those towns that I don't want to call them early adopters, but that had already started the ball rolling for some of these conversations, and they've tackled that question that you asked Paul in a couple different ways. Some have differentiated between locations in a district that have access to public utilities and those that don't. They have said we will give the maximum density regardless, and then an individual who has a septage may only be able to access part of that density. They have also had, so in that, in Goose Rocks case, it would be the minimum lot area is 10,000 square feet if you're on a sewer system, but if you're honest, if you're on a septic, then you would need to go through what may be a variance with the state to be able to have that density, or you would be non-conforming. The other avenue, and that may not be the best choice, but I wanted to share what the highest density looks like first. The other avenue is creating a performance standard that allows for a density bonus within these, and I don't think we want to tackle that either, but I wanted to show what that number looks like for lots that have sewer first, and then hear your thoughts, and then bring it back to you next week, or next meeting. But I do think that it makes sense to break the two, to differentiate the two, whether it's sewered or not in this case. [1:19:54] Paul Hogan: Do the other zones have the same problem, the same issue, or is it just Goose Rocks that is so? [1:20:01] Benny Ruhl: So many of the zones too, not all, but many. [1:20:04] Mary Beth Gilbert: So Cape Porpoise will be the same because it's the water that has the sewer and water, but then any other side of the road. Yeah, so we're going to have that. Yeah, so that's a, yeah, it's almost like you need on your table, you need for each zone if you have that sewer and water, it's this. And if you don't, then the table gets bigger. [1:20:31] Benny Ruhl: Correct. The table is going to expand probably regardless of what we end up doing. [1:20:37] Paul Hogan: Yeah, I think it has to be listed both ways for transparency's sake. [1:20:40] Mary Beth Gilbert: Yeah, because you won't know if you're buying a lot someplace and if you just go by a table, it's not clear at all. [1:20:49] Paul Hogan: Yeah, and even if you have a lawyer who's not really familiar with all of this, he's going to say it looks good. [1:20:57] Anne-Marie Martin: I have a question with regards to we're talking about sewage and those properties that have access to the sewage. My concern is that if you're able to build more units, is there an addition, can we charge the cost of the town and the impact of the extra use on the sewage plant, which is really sort of at its limit in many ways. [1:21:35] Mary Beth Gilbert: Well, the way, like when we had Eric come into our meeting, so he took us through that report that was done in 2019 about the build-out. So we have a number, right, that will trip us into that we have to build a bigger plant. But we have the capacity and theory. Where we get in trouble is in the high season, so and so where we get into, so when did we get into, I'm not talking about the issue with the plant and that July, I'm talking about I think a July before that. It was a July 4th and we had a lot of rain and we had everybody here in town and we were, we were at maximum capacity at the wastewater plant. So I think that's the problem is that we're not a steady state area and we're not like we include increase a little bit, you know, we go 4x. So I think it's very hard to, you know, so then when you go 4x, are people building to be residents or are they building to come during the height of that season? So I think we'll get some on some, but the propensity might be seasonal people again. [1:22:53] Paul Hogan: But now if I have a property and I add an accessory dwelling unit with its own sewer line or maybe it's connected in or I add a second unit, I get charged a separate connection charge, right? As if it was a new house, there's an upfront charge and then you pay your regular. So you'd have two sewer bills or three sewer bills on the lot. [1:23:24] Anne-Marie Martin: I guess I'm anticipating [1:23:27] Mary Beth Gilbert: At some point, we're going to trip into it. At some point with the town growth, if this is an accelerator then we'll get to that build out of the plant sooner. Or if this is just us on our normal path, you know, so I think it's, it's hard to make the call. It's this, it's like the note I sent to that one resident, you know, is it a catalyst, is it not a catalyst, right? It appears it could be a catalyst but we have to let it play out to see how fast or, you know, what will become of this. So we have a number and everybody has to get a permit to build. And if you're hooking into the sewer, you have to get that. So it's all, it's a transparent system that we're feeding into. So of some of these lots, [1:24:16] Anne-Marie Martin: perhaps there's five. There's four buildings and then an ADU. So would that be five billing that would be going to support our development [1:24:28] Paul Hogan: of a... It's five dwelling units at that point. It would be five dwelling units, and I assume five sewer bills. Each dwelling unit gets its own... Yeah, how does that work? [1:24:40] Benny Ruhl: I'm not sure, but I can ask and bring that- That'd be great. [1:24:44] Mary Beth Gilbert:... to your next meeting. Yeah, I think that's a really good point, because I think we crossed the bridge on the ADU theoretically, but yeah, that's a good question, because that trips the system to start. [1:24:58] Paul Hogan: I mean, they know you can't get a building permit without the permission to say, yes, there's capacity. And I assume there's a charge at that point. [1:25:08] Anne-Marie Martin: Well, I'm just wanting to... [1:25:10] Mary Beth Gilbert: Is it four charges or is it one charge? It's just one charge. Right. So it should be four. [1:25:15] Anne-Marie Martin: Should be four. Absolutely. So we want to have that in writing ahead of time, right? Clarity. Clarity. Double. [1:25:25] Tom Vandershop: Notarized. And if we're done with the sewage for now, can you help me understand, how does this work? The maximum lot coverage seems very difficult in the densest areas for multiple, like how is that going to work? I mean, I assume the 20% limit gets superseded by the state law or something, but I don't [1:25:53] Paul Hogan: know. Can we stick with the first column and make sure we all okay all the way down we all we all understand the first column [1:25:59] Mary Beth Gilbert: so the first column will have to change depending on if your transition and Right access. So there's in general if you have everything in That area and that transition This is the minimum lot coverage to give you the maximum density. [1:26:25] Benny Ruhl: Yes. Those words almost make sense, right? Yes. And so especially because you have asked to have us highlight what it would look like if you're on septage, when we bring this next meeting, when you look at this, we will have a breakout that probably talks about areas without sewer or some other we'll find a better way to write that on the chart but it would probably be just relating to the subsurface wastewater rules where appropriate and that's how some communities have done that i just didn't want to have that be something that i was proposing without you all talking about it first can you [1:27:14] Speaker I (unidentified): Can you just clarify your red line on minimum lot area for Cape Porpoise, both zones? Is it 20 and then there's a red line and then there's more zeros? [1:27:34] Benny Ruhl: So in all three of the Cape Porpoise zones, so it's east, west, and square, where the existing lot dimensions would be reduced to 5,000 square feet. [1:27:55] Speaker I (unidentified): Oh, okay. So ignore the red line. [1:27:58] Benny Ruhl: Yes, I think that was just a red line that I couldn't get to come off of the thing. But if you were looking on the growth area chart, so Cape Porpoise is generally within our growth area I think there's a couple of outlying parts of Cape Porpoise West that might be in the transition zone but much of those three zoning districts are within the growth area so [1:28:37] Speaker I (unidentified): that first column is basically if all three criteria are yes water sewer growth the [1:28:49] Benny Ruhl: First column is the minimum lot area for the listed use types in every zoning district across town, but it would relate to 5,000 square feet if it is an area that's in the growth area and has access to public water and sewer, or would relate to the 10,000 square feet if it's an area that is not within the growth area but has access to public water and public sewer. If we chose to, we could certainly, as we mentioned, highlight areas that only have a septic requirement as meeting the subsurface wastewater rules. Also in waiting in the wings is the exclusion of the flood hazard zone and other provisions, which is not something that would be in this chart, but it'd be a performance standard that we would add to a different part of the code. And if at any point it's helpful to see a map of either the zoning districts or the flood hazard area, we can pull that up on the screen, instead of the chart. [Paul Hogan: And] I kind of glossed over this in terms of how it's how you use this chart, but this chart is relating to the uses and the dimensional standards within those zoning districts, so if a project is proposed before the Planning Board or someone is proposing something to go through the building permit process with our code enforcement officers, this is how you would build and not fully answering Tom's question but getting into Tom's question, all of these standards would be how a structure or other things Could be placed or constructed on a lot fully they know, but there is mapping that would assist with that for your purposes, but we will make sure that you have looked at as we think about what [1:31:15] Mary Beth Gilbert: This how this relates to density, they would have to look at them, they'd have to do due diligence and look at the person buying should we [1:31:32] Paul Hogan: Go to net residential area column, the minimum net, I will do my best to walk you through [1:31:39] Benny Ruhl: That what where would be a better place to go, I think that residential makes make sense because it is the next part of the required provisions that would have to change, but i will do my best to make it so that we understand what net residential [1:31:55] Paul Hogan: Is actually talking, is everyone okay with the first column for the moment, we understand it, okay [1:32:03] Benny Ruhl: so for tonight's purposes it probably doesn't make sense to get into the actual definition of what this what a net residential area is but if you are interested in that it is in the definitions part of our line use ordinance or not you and i are happy to talk about what that includes or excludes but effectively this is how many dwellings what the density is on each of the lots in any zoning district across town and so these numbers previously we did not have a dwelling unit allowance so previously what you could build on a lot was based on how much land area you had. In the zones that were almost an acre of land, that was required 40,000 square feet. If you had two acres of land, you could build two dwelling units. Now this will be different, especially in areas where we're in the growth lots, in the growth area, or lots that have public water and public sewer. So that net residential unit, dwelling unit calculation will actually be a dwelling unit calculation, as in planning speak, as you think about how many dwellings could be placed to [1:33:28] Mary Beth Gilbert: the law. So it's not a lot area coverage anymore, correct? So it's not the minimum [1:33:34] Benny Ruhl: lot requirement that's dictating how many dwellings could be placed on the [1:33:38] Mary Beth Gilbert: law. And at some point you're gonna take us through what it really means, right? We [1:33:43] Benny Ruhl: can, I will share what the minimum net residential definition is. I wouldn't recommend that we really get too far in the weeds of changing it, but I think will be helpful as you think about performance standards for us to talk about that. But for today's purposes, I was trying to keep us small and then built. And so all of these numbers in many of the zones currently relate to that maximum density as it would be for an area that has access to public water and public sewer. When this chart shows the area or a lot in a zoning district that has access to only a septic requirement, that density requirement will change, and I'll have a new calculation for those particular types of lots. I [1:34:50] Mary Beth Gilbert: don't know what the [1:34:54] Benny Ruhl: words mean. The easiest way that I think about this is going back to what the state had included, which is one of the reasons why I had included it with your information tonight. But we've talked about minimum lot size, which I think for us, for everybody, we all are, many of us live on a particular lot of a particular size in town, so we know what that looks like. This density provision is intended to make it so that those new four units can be built on the most dense areas. So it's 1,250 square feet for each four units, which if you times that by four is 5,000 square feet. [1:35:49] Mary Beth Gilbert: Oh okay, and so what the, okay, that's my little, yeah, okay, so okay, all righty and [1:35:59] Benny Ruhl: and I'm very much simplifying this because well I didn't the 12 the 12,000 [1:36:05] Mary Beth Gilbert: the 1250 was sort of out in space for me, yeah, but now I got it, okay. [1:36:19] Jane Evelyn: You might only have one house there, but what's changing is that now because it's 5,000 you have 8 units that could be built. [1:36:38] Nadia Crockett-Current: Theoretically if you had the world's most perfect lot with no wetlands, it was on public water and sewer, it was in the growth area, you could you may be able to split a 40,000 square foot lot into to eight 5,000 square foot lots and build four units on each one, so in you know at the maximum density you could theoretically put 32 units on a 40,000 [1:37:02] Mary Beth Gilbert: square foot lot, but for the purposes of this table all this table is trying to point out to us is that the minimum lot size now goes from four thousand forty thousand to five thousand, and then my minimum net residential area because I potentially could get four dwellings in there. My minimum net dwelling per unit goes down to one-fourth of the $5,000, which is $1,250. So that's all this is trying to say is here's your new density outlook. Correct. [1:37:34] Benny Ruhl: And there are different ways to show this and to be able to meet the state requirement. some ways and I had played around with trying to pitch this to you tonight put some ways effectively lumping all of these types of uses that we've talked about the single family the duplex all into one so that when you are thinking about this density multiplication if you will that it all adds up in the end, but i wanted to kind of show what a baseline look of our use table as it stands today with the required state provisions would look like and you could [1:38:24] Jane Evelyn: just clarify so you could have on this one acre you could have 32 dwelling units Plus an ADU. [1:38:37] Mary Beth Gilbert: No. Theoretically include the ADU and the 32. And the four. [1:38:42] Nadia Crockett-Current: You would have to split the 40,000 square foot lot up into eight individual parcels before you got your four units. Judging by how we can read the language of LD 2173 without having the rulemaking completed yet. [1:39:01] Mary Beth Gilbert: Yeah, we still need the rulemaking test. [1:39:02] Nadia Crockett-Current: So more things will become clear to us later on, but right now, that would be, you could, in theory, in that 40,000 square foot area, if it was split into eight lots, in theory, you could see eight ADUs in that 40,000 square feet, but because it would have to be in 5,000 square foot individual lots. [1:39:26] Mary Beth Gilbert: Eight of the 30, the 32 would have to include the eight, Jane. [1:39:31] Jane Evelyn: The 32 would have [1:39:35] Mary Beth Gilbert: the 8 ADUs. Yes. Well, if you split the lot up, and what Nadia just said is if you split it up to 8 5,000 units, each 5,000 unit per the current understanding, like Nadia said, before the rules all come out, you could have an ADU on each 5,000 square foot. So you could have 8 ADUs theoretically, but they'd have to be, to your general question, they'd have to be part of the 32. So the answer to your general question is the ADUs have to be counted into the four or whatever the split is. [1:40:10] Benny Ruhl: And I would say as you think about what the total unit maximum provision could be as we move through this, I think that number will be much more clearer as we move through and think about the rest of the use table and the policy choices that we have, that the town has, but also as we think about other provisions because just because the math of the maximum density provision under state requirements says a particular number doesn't necessarily mean that our local requirements will allow someone to do that. Right. And so the actual buildable number might be fewer units. [1:41:01] Mary Beth Gilbert: So we don't have any requirement to change front, setback, side, or rear. There's no requirements. [1:41:08] Benny Ruhl: So the statutory requirements allow our local ordinance to have front, rear, and side setbacks, to have minimum lot width requirements. To have maximum lot coverage requirements, and to also have building height and open space requirements. [1:41:34] Paul Hogan: What was the one after lot width that you just said? Lot coverage. [1:41:40] Benny Ruhl: Lot coverage. Okay. Sorry, I was, I think, jumping around in that, too. All of those other dimensional standards are to kind of where Tom's question, I think was going 15 or 20 minutes ago that is how you would actually construct something on a lot and so those are all choices that we have made in the past that are on this table that we can still make as a town and that it may to possibly where you were going Tom it may make sense as we think about where this goes to determine are those numbers correct those different dimensional standards have different impacts as to how something is constructed on a lot how a structure is constructed on a lot so the I think the biggest barrier to constructing something on a lot within our individual code is the lot coverage requirement. And I'm not proposing to change that, but I do think that kind of dictates how you construct, and that there's a lot of space within a lot that is purposefully kept open and doesn't have development on it. So the minimum [1:43:02] Mary Beth Gilbert: setbacks, front, side, and rear, that's for a lot. So now this lot can have four structures on it. So then how do I look at each structure within? So are my four, do my fours have set, does this, is two of my four that sit next to each other on this face have setbacks from each other? [1:43:29] Benny Ruhl: We do have a provision, and I don't know what offhand, that has a distance between two units that are part of a duplex. That would be a performance standard that I think we would want to think about as it relates to additional units that are not part of a duplex, because we've historically, if you look at what's in black, we've really only ever fully defined single family and two family, right? We also have a multiplex definition that exists, and that's really intended to be a particular type, and it's not as useful as we think about a [1:44:09] Mary Beth Gilbert: post 2173 ordinance. So if I come in to the planning board, say this goes on our, and so this goes, it's on our ordinances, I come in, I've got a 5,000 square foot lot, and I want to put four units up, and I come in with my front, side, and rear for each face of the house, houses facing those sides. So for example, this house in this corner will have a setback from the front and from this side, but what does the planning board do for, if they're, if they're not multiplexes, they're four separate units, they're four separate owners. So [1:44:54] Benny Ruhl: I have a couple different thoughts on how to answer that, and I will start with one and see if you guys will hear me with another one, but a, when we're thinking about the most dense, if it's a 5,000 square foot lot, there may, just by the way that our, the rest of these dimensional standards work, there may be very limited ability to construct other structures on the lot. And the humor me part was, do you all know what size lot you have, roughly? I know I don't know like fully in general, and I don't live in town. But I do have a roughly quarter acre lot. And in the town I live in, with the setback requirements and the dimensional standards that exist and the way in which my house is existing on the lot, I have an existing garage. And I probably would not be able to build an additional accessory structure or primary structure on my lot because of those setback requirements. So I'm stating that to state that a 5,000 square foot lot that already exists in town probably is going to exist the way that it exists today, or would have very limited new structures built upon it. [1:46:23] Mary Beth Gilbert: Okay, now if I am, okay, so now I'm gonna go down the path of non-conformance. So if I'm a non-conforming structure in the port right now, and then I come in and I want to make use of the 5,000, but to your point, Ben, if I can't get four in because of the setbacks, but I'm non-conforming. [1:46:51] Paul Hogan: Meaning you're less than 5,000? You're talking a year from now? Yes. You have a 3,500-square-foot lot. What could you do? [1:46:59] Mary Beth Gilbert: Yeah. And I'm, and I'm not gonna, you'd have to, no, I want to say it the other way. I want to say I'm 5,000 square foot, but I'm non-conforming on my setbacks right now. Oh, I'm sorry. So am I granted because I'm non-conforming on my setbacks right now, when I try to build for new, can I claim my current setbacks because I'm not conforming, and that one goes down, and then I used the setbacks that I had. [1:47:31] Benny Ruhl: There are non-conforming provisions within the code, and there are very specific standards that either the planning board or the ZBA would be looking at. Generally, that would be for an existing structure. And so, actually, at tomorrow night's planning board meeting, the planning board is reviewing something similar with an accessory apartment. And so yes, an existing structure may be able to have this additional density added to it, but it may be very challenging to have new structures placed if it's a lot that is 5,000 square feet and has all of these other dimensional standards within it as well. And so generally, if we're thinking about how all of these parts of this use of the dimensional standards table interact with each other, it would be a 5,000 square foot lot that might have changes within the structure, so it's a larger home. That already exists, and instead of just being a single-family home, it becomes a duplex. [1:48:36] Anne-Marie Martin: Or a triplex. So our height limitations, part of the requirements that might impact what you can, for example, building vertically, you would be able to add an ADU or maybe even make it a duplex. So. [1:49:01] Benny Ruhl: All of our, all of our zoning districts have maximum height standards. I didn't propose to change any of them, but they would restrict how structure was constructed within, like how tall a structure could be constructed within those zoning districts, so that would be one of the limitations. [1:49:21] Mary Beth Gilbert: To what would be developed there, so we actually could come up with the lot size, right, with our setbacks, to answer Tom's question. We would take the 5,000 square feet minimum and then we would just add on this square footage for the 25 foot front, 50 rear and 250 sides. You mean subtracted. [1:49:44] Paul Hogan: From the 5,000 to show you what you're building? [1:49:46] Mary Beth Gilbert: No, because then you would add it on and then that essentially would be your minimum lot size for you to achieve the setbacks and then get four dwellings. So that's like we keep saying it has to be 5,000 square feet. It's like 0.23 acres or whatever. So now we can just add on that square footage of the setbacks and that gives us our, to Tom's point of how can you actually achieve this, well, then you would, whatever that math works out to be, that makes sense, doesn't it? [1:50:25] Benny Ruhl: You might have lost me, but that doesn't mean it doesn't make sense. [1:50:27] Mary Beth Gilbert: Well, no, you have a minimum, you say, the whole, we always have these theoretical discussions about will this happen or won't this happen. Well, the answer to that is we have the math. We have 5,000 square foot, which allows us to drop down to four units, and then we have our setbacks, so then we just add our setbacks onto the five thousand square foot and that's your minimum lot size that you would have to walk in to achieve four houses because. [1:50:55] Nadia Crockett-Current: You would achieve the setback. I see your, I think I drew a building envelope is what we would call that area. I expended it with little dotted lines here, so you have the lot size is kind of those outside lines and then the building envelope is what you're talking about inside the setbacks, like yes, okay, yes, question, it's quite a small building envelope on. [1:51:19] Paul Hogan: Yeah, I've thousands for sure multiplexes, you've added them on the first page for every, are we required to have to allow multiplexes and then you, then they're not in, so these are in growth areas with theoretically with. [1:51:40] Benny Ruhl: Sewer water? We are not required to have multiplexes in the sense that the LD 2173 is really only looking at four units or less. We do currently define multiplex and it was a kind of a catch-all for something that would go through subdivision, so currently three units or more, if you humor me with where things were before we started talking about these changes. And so I do think it probably makes sense to continue to allow those units that are more than four to exist in the places that we had already said that those bigger density units could exist. And I'll share I purposely didn't include the multiplex definition with you tonight but we can talk about that at your next meeting and we can all have the definition and we can talk about whether what it relates how it is being defined and how it relates to this chart and if that is the correct usage for [1:52:53] Paul Hogan: Those unit types so I don't are you saying we allow multiplexes currently we do so but multiplex [1:53:05] Benny Ruhl: As it exists in today's non-LD2173 world is three units to eight units and it is only allowed in specific zoning districts but it's it's viewed as a subdivision it would trigger subdivision because of the number of units that are involved with it. [1:53:27] Paul Hogan: It triggers subdivision or site plan review? Both. [1:53:33] Benny Ruhl: But subdivision standards are higher, sometimes higher than site plan standards. And because of the number of units within an individual structure, it would trigger subdivision review. And when we last reviewed that definition, that was purposefully done. Done. So I will bring that definition to you at your next meeting, and we can talk about where it, when it was last reviewed, which was actually not too long ago, and what the intent was, and how we want to catalog that intent as we move through this process, because it should most likely change because we are adding part of that density into every zoning [1:54:19] Paul Hogan: Districts so in the old world if I wanted to put a five unit in one of these it in an old house or whatever or build a new building with you say it triggers subdivision are there five separate tax bills and five separate corporate deeds then that are a natural consequence of that? Or is it just a fiction? I mean, I want to build an apartment building. I want to own it. I want to rent five units out. [1:55:01] Benny Ruhl: It's more the latter. You certainly could condo something, which I think is a little bit different, but it was intended to be someone wanted to build a six-unit apartment building. And I had asked Nadia if she could remember anybody using that provision, and as far as we're aware, no one has utilized that provision in our code. But there are certainly good policy reasons why we want to have the possible density of four units and greater. And we can kind of dive into what that looks like and if there should be a maximum number next time. And I purposely didn't give that to you tonight because I didn't want heads to explode. [1:55:47] Paul Hogan: Okay, so long as we come back to it next week, we're already, the density is mind-boggling already, and to suggest allowing more density voluntarily seems, it's not logical to me at the moment. [1:56:03] Benny Ruhl: I'll share what's in code. Yeah, great. And then we can talk about what that is next time. I don't want to lose Tom's thought. Right earlier in the hour because I do think it relates to kind of what we talked about since then but so I had highlighted the minimum lot with and the maximum lot coverage as two of the parts of this chart that to me stood out as the most evident that we may want to talk about them those numbers are what exists today so if it says 100 or 150 or 20% for those two different columns those numbers are how they exist in today's non 2173 worlds so that hundreds where the hundred linear foot lot Width would relate to a lot that is 40,000 square feet it may be very challenging for someone to create a lot that is 5 000 square feet with a square footage and 100 linear feet and there are different ways to think about whether that what that number should be I have a chart that I'm going to have for you next time I'm going to propose a number next time but I'll have an actual chart that says here is some good planning guidelines for whether it should be 100 linear feet or another number but Tom you were on the right avenue of ideally when we're thinking about all these other dimensional standards that we are pigeonholing someone into needing to have a small lot size but then never being able to actually legally do anything with it because the other dimensional standards preclude you from creating something new on the law I [1:58:06] Tom Vandershop: Mean the math like if it's 150 it's 33 [1:58:08] Benny Ruhl: Foot depth like it's right, yeah, there's no, and so those two highlighted ones to me were the ones that stuck out that we may want to adjust, and I will have some proposals and some additional guidance for your next meeting, but I kind of figured we would be at about 8 o'clock when we got to that point anyway, so I didn't want to overload you tonight. We also could certainly talk about whether the setback requirements are correct, but those generally are pretty standard with what a good thought process, a good planning thought process would be for a [1:58:44] Mary Beth Gilbert: smaller, denser law. I would like to understand if we would be allowed to do setbacks in between buildings to separate buildings, especially on a street-facing view, you know, because you showed us the pictures the other day of what density could look like, and I actually, there's nothing wrong with old Orchard Beach, I just want to say that publicly, but we went out to dinner there and after you showed me the pictures I was paying attention up some of the areas that I was driving down and I'm like people think our streets are dense, our streets are not dense yet, so that is dense out there, so if so to me if we could have a street facing view with a setback and if somebody chooses to put four units or three or whatever, if we could have a street facing setback between those two units that might be helpful, I don't know, I'm just don't [1:59:44] Benny Ruhl: know if we're allowed to do that or just so I can noodle on it and probably chat with our code officers as well. For street facing, do you mean public right of way facing? Yes, I am hopeful that you aren't entirely confused. My intent was to kind of build upon things each time, and I think that now is a good time to share, I don't have this anywhere but on my computer, but I will make sure it's in your drive, that my thought process was during the month of October we would go through all these density provisions, which to me is the hardest, we will get through the hardest part of it. In November we would talk about performance standards which relate to all of that, so that would be performance standards around accessory dwelling units, which we call an accessory apartment, around those residential units, so having that distance separation between individual units, as well as talk about some of the performance standards that our state required as part of this LD 2173 provision as it relates to Residential uses in commercial areas, and then we would move into parking, which may be its own bear and may have provisions that we as a community don't feel comfortable with. But we should talk about as we think about what is part of the requirements that the state is asking, and we have already talked about it, but I do think that we would be remiss if we didn't discuss where 2173 is asking those parking provisions to go. And then ideally, somewhere towards the end of the calendar year or at the latest in early January, we would have wrapped up everything. So it will be a very, for lack of a better word, dense couple of months. But I do think we can get through it. But it will kind of require us to kind of keep moving things forward, and at some point in that process I suspect that we would have a more clear indication of where the historic standards may or may not be going as [2:02:22] Anne-Marie Martin: Well thank you, I was going to ask about parking, so that's gonna be the, that's [2:02:30] Mary Beth Gilbert: gonna be like one of the biggest rubs, because we had the, we said no, the select board said no, we didn't put it out to ordinance vote because we looked at our streets, if I can't, so we would be doing a disservice to the town, to our residents, to our safety, if we did that. So I think that's something that, you know, we are going to have to force parking on these lots. Yeah, you know, we cannot, we cannot allow, we do, we have no area to build a garage, we have no public transportation to get people to cars, we have no, people are going to have cars [2:03:08] Benny Ruhl: here. So and I would suspect when we go through the parking conversation that we would share where that conversation went in the very recent past, and it would, I presume, be something that I would have conversations with the select board before we get into this process with the GPC. But I would be, I feel like in order to either decide that we are not moving forward with it or decide that we are going to make some amendments, that I would want to include it at least on the schedule of things that you all are looking at. Very good, I think that's great, thank you, thank you. Hopefully everybody's head isn't ready [2:03:56] Paul Hogan: to explode. Thank you. Anything else for the good of the order? If not, I'll take a motion to adjourn. We have a second. Thank you, Jane. All in favor, aye. Everybody in favor, thank you, thanks a lot, thank you Nadia, that was great.