1994-10-24 Public Hearing and Regular Meeting

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e SHADY RIVER CIVIC ASSOCIATION P.o. BOX 662 LA PORTE, TEXAS 77572-0662 e O::tober 6, 1994 Dear fellow Shady River resident, By now you are probably aware that on September 29, the Planning and Zoning cpm- mission (P&Z) recorcrnended that a proposal for a nearly 12 acre comnercial developnent, a training facility' for rmmicipal and industrial emergency response teams, on McCabe Road be sutmitted to the City Cbnncil for approval. '!his area is behind and adjacent to the property of the first 12 homes on Hackberry, starting at the park and going . west. This property is Shady River's "side yard" and is ideal for residential devel- opment. In my judgement, this rorcrnercial development would serve only to affect our property valus adversely, and La Porte would be best served by leaving this land for residential use. The land comprises about 50% of all the land on McCabe adjacent to Shady River. This land is zoned POD (Planned Unit Development) with an underlying R1 (laY density, single family dwellings) land use designation. If this canmercial developnent is ap- proved, it would mean fonner BayMUD residents were misled, maybe inadvertently, but nonetheless misled during the zoning proceedings that took place after BayMUD was annexed by La Porte on December 31, 1988. '!he history of these proceedings is relevant to this issue and is as follaYs: -Following annexation, a top priority of the City was to zone the fonner BayMUD. They issued a preliminary proposal, with which we had two primary' concerns -- the area to the west was proposed to be PUD with an underlying R1, and the area to the north was proposed to be R2, medium density, single and multi-family dwellings. , As President of the Civic Association, I wrote a letter to the Mayor and City Coun- cil members with a ropy to P&Z expressing: these concerns. See Exhibit A. - Subsequently, the concern I had with the west area was allayed when I understocd the then O1airperson of P&Z explain that a PUn with an nnderlying R1 was effective- ly an R1 designation. The only difference being that the POD gave a developer the lati tude to include, for example, a few neighborhood oriented conmercial faciili ties, as long as the developnent was a an integrated, residential "planned tmit" devel- opnent whose architecture blended in a way that the "unit" was aesthetically pleasing. -NaY came the public hearing at which several members of Shady River spoke. See Exhibit B which is a copy of the notes I used for my talk before the P&Z. tbte I started by saying the PUD designation for the west area was no longer a concern as it had been explained a POD with an underlying Rl was in effect an Rl desig- nation. If this statement was t::.L.Lot~, no ale <Xl City. staff. or P&Z nade any effort to correct IDe. -In any event, 'we still requested an R1 for the north area. After deliberation, P&Z reccmnended a PUD with an underlying R1. We had no objections for the r.eas.ons noted above. '!'he tenor of the discussion supported that a PUD with an underlying R1 was in effect an R1 to the extent that the Bayshore SUn reported: "Several Shady River residents asked for an R1 zaung ........ and the P&Z ay.L~ unani- DDUSl.y". See EXhibit C.