The Lubbock City Council and the Planning and Zoning Commission on Wednesday heard hours of public testimony and considered more than a dozen amendments to the city’s new Unified Development Code, adopted in May and set to become effective Oct. 1.
The council and commission convened the joint public hearing Wednesday afternoon to consider staff-recommended amendments to the code, take public feedback on those amendments and entertain additional amendments proposed by citizens from the floor.
The UDC, which will replace Lubbock’s current planning and zoning regulations, took years to develop and was adopted with the understanding it still may need tweaks before and after it becomes effective, according to previous Avalanche-Journal reporting.
More:Unified Development Code approved on first reading with Oct. 1 effective date
The at least 20 changes suggested for the new rules range from simply cleaning up legal language, to doubling the notification zone for a zoning change request, to lowering the maximum allowable height of a mixed-use residential development, to adding an amortization clause for nonconforming land uses.
The height cap and amortization proposals — both brought by citizens — were two of the more vigorously discussed suggestions among public commenters.
Architect Stephen Faulk, law Professor Richard Murphy and Tech Terrace U.N.I.T. neighborhood association President Cyndi Pratas, all residents of the Tech Terrace neighborhood, supported suggestions to cap vertical mixed-use developments — mid-rise buildings with both commercial and residential space — in high-density residential zones to 45 feet in height and prohibit them from occupying the same block as a single-family home. The UDC as adopted allows those building to rise up to 75 feet.
Faulk said proposed buildings taller than 45 feet could be considered on a case-by-case basis by the Planning and Zoning Commission and City Council, much like two recent contentious zoning cases near Texas Tech.
“There has been immeasurable discussion in the last three, four, five months over two projects that are taller than 45 feet,” Faulk said, referring to two separate planned student housing developments in Tech Terrace and South Overton, respectively. “I am pro development, but it needs to be the right kind of development in a very specific placed tuned to that neighborhood.”
Councilmembers and P&Z commissioners did not offer their opinions on the proposed changes during the meeting.
George Hardberger, who owns property in the 2600 block of 19th Street and was recently denied a zone change to build a 600-bed student housing complex in Tech Terrace after a long, contentious fight with neighbors, said he feels Faulk’s proposed amendment was aimed directly at him and his property.
“This neighborhood is afraid we’re going to come back and try it again, and it’s likely that we will,” Hardberger said. “I just think it’s wrong to change something for a single property.”
Joshua Shankles of Lubbock Compact and Dora Cortez or the North and East Lubbock Coalition presented the amendment which would introduce an amortization clause to the UDC, a statute which would essentially allow an expiration date for grandfathered property uses that don’t conform to the new zoning codes.
Cortez and Shankles said amortization would allow the city to bring industrial areas in North and East Lubbock into conformance with suggested land uses in Plan Lubbock 2040, the city’s comprehensive plan. It would also ease historic disparities on Lubbock’s Black and Hispanic populations, they said.
More:North, East Lubbock residents file federal complaint alleging new zoning is discriminatory
“An amortization provision being allowed into the Unified Development Code very much is supported by evidence and had been repeatedly done throughout the state,” Shankles said.
“North and East Lubbock residents feel that broken promises is what we get instead of doing what you say,” Cortez told the council. “We need each one of you to champion our neighborhoods. Do the right thing.”
No action was taken by either the city council or P&Z Wednesday. The Planning and Zoning Commission will consider the amendments during their next meeting Sept. 7, and the city council on Sept. 12.
Because of legally required timelines for ordinance adoption, the earliest any approved amendments to the UDC would become effective is Oct. 16, more than two weeks after the UDC itself. Some P&Z commissioners suggested pushing back the UDC’s effective date to align with the amendments and prevent unintended outcomes.
