• the proposed goals, policies, and implementation strategies,
• the rationale for their consideration, and
• any options that staff should prepare in advance of the final draft’s presentation.

The City of Flagstaff’s Comprehensive Planning Program has been working with members of the public, other City departments and government agencies, and Northern Arizona University for the past year to develop a High Occupancy Housing Plan. The draft of this document has been released and is now available to review at www.flagstaff.az.gov/hohplan. The community has 60 days to review this draft. A hard copy of the draft plan was transmitted to the Planning and Zoning Commission and City Council in early August. Comments are due to the project manager, Sara Dechter, on September 27, 2017.

Background
High Occupancy Housing (HOH) is generally buildings that house more than 75 persons per acre or have more than 30 units per acre in dormitory or apartment-style units. Due to a combination of pent up demand, constrained supply and the 2011 changes to the Zoning Code to promote mixed use development, interest in large multi-family housing projects has grown. Many specific plans focus on a defined geographic area of the City. This Specific Plan differs in that it will focus on a specific development type, HOH that is not necessarily geographically defined within the City of Flagstaff. Therefore some of the goals, policies, and strategies apply more broadly than just HOH, even though the changes are designed to address HOH issues.

Public Involvement
Up to this point, there have been 25 public meeting to inform, develop, and refine the content of the draft HOH Plan. In addition, there have been 8 online topics posted on the Flagstaff Community Forum. See Attachment A for more details.

Content of the HOH Draft Specific Plan
The HOH Plan is a package of Regional Plan amendments, a specific plan and eventually a set of City Code updates intended to provide clearer direction and more consistent implementation of HOH projects in the City of Flagstaff. The overall vision of the Flagstaff Regional Plan 2030 (Regional Plan), feedback from the Flagstaff community, and research on practices to achieve desired outcomes were used to inform the proposed goals, policies and implementation strategies. The HOH Draft Specific Plan under public review includes the following:

• Introduction - provides a basic background of HOH and its development as a community concern as well as a history of density standards in the City of Flagstaff.
• Site and Area Analysis - goes into detail on each major component of development that relates to HOH.  Each section starts with what Flagstaff already does, and then is followed by an exploration of these component’s potential best practices based on peer reviewed research and an examination of peer cities and their practices. Potential practices for moving forward are a combination of concepts that have proven successful elsewhere, or situations or constraints that are unique to Flagstaff. The purpose of this chapter is to illuminate potential ideas, solutions, and/or issues.
• Concept Plan - The Concept Plan is an illustration of the land use and transportation concepts in the document with accompanying descriptive text. The Concept Plan does not encumber private land or limit the ability of a private landowner to develop in accordance with their current zoning or City standards. It is intended to help with the interpretation of the Plan’s goals and policies.
• Goals, Policies, and Implementation Strategies - Goals and policies in the HOH Plan are topic specific ways of advancing the goals and policies of the Regional Plan. Goals and policies in this chapter are written broadly because they are intended to be viable for a 10- to 20-year planning horizon. Implementation strategies identify specific actions or changes that could be made to implement the HOH Plan goals and policies. The goals, policies, and implementation strategies in this chapter are preliminary and subject to change based on public comments, direction from the City Council, changes in conditions, and further review by staff and partner agencies. Goals, policies, and implementation strategies are organized based on what they would like to achieve under the following headings:
  • Promote HOH buildings that connect and enhance urban patterns
  • Promote HOH primarily as a part of complete Activity Centers
  • Leverage HOH to create more efficient and equitable transportation
  • Enhance public spaces where HOH is located
  • Stormwater policies to support public safety and place-making
  • Reduce waste and increase energy efficiency of HOH developments
  • Improving NAU-City coordination
  • Promote affordability and sustainability incentives
  • Promote economic resiliency through building design in HOH developments
  • Set legislative priorities for new tools to address HOH

Proposed Regional Plan Amendments
Any specific plan adopted by the City must be in conformance with the Flagstaff Regional Plan 2030.  Because the impetus for the High Occupancy Housing Plan included issues that lack clarity or have conflicting information in the Regional Plan, Regional Plan amendments are needed to adopt the Specific Plan. Chapter 3 of the Flagstaff Regional Plan allows for amendments to the Regional Plan that accompany a specific plan to be processed without a separate amendment process.  Therefore, the 60-day review and other relevant process steps can be used for the purpose of meeting the regulatory requirements of both the plan amendments and specific plan adoption process.
 
The proposed plan amendments can be found in Appendix B of the Specific Plan. They are intended to clarify and assist in accurate cross-referencing between the Regional Plan, the HOH Specific Plan, the Zoning Code, and the Engineering Design Standards and Specifications.  The proposed plan amendments include changes to both Chapter IX: Growth and Land Use and Chapter X: Transportation.

• Chapter IX: Growth and Land Use changes: Clarification of area and place types language and definitions constitute the majority of the changes proposed in Chapter IX.  One policy is proposed to be deleted (LU.1.8), two policies are proposed to be added (LU.10.10 and LU.18.17), and two policies are proposed to be modified (LU.10.3 and LU 10.7). Major topics addressed in these changes are:
  • The interpretation of the Plan concerning rezonings and development Downtown
  • Clarification of density ranges and connectivity requirements for area-place types
  • Further definition and revision of Neighborhood and Regional –scale activity centers, including reassigning some activity centers from Neighborhood to Regional, and disfavoring rezonings in historic Districts and Neighborhoods (Regional Plan Map 14)
  • Better definition of the commercial core and commercial corridors in urban and suburban settings
• Chapter X: Transportation changes: During the process of understanding how the City can achieve better outcomes for High Occupancy Housing projects, Staff reviewed what types of decisions were not being made consistently or for which the plan provided unclear direction for decision-makers. The table in Chapter X that described area-level “Levels of Service” was not providing all the information needed to inform updates to the Engineering Design Standards and Specifications, and ultimately, the adoption of a Master Streets Plan for the City. The information on the updated tables is intended to inform decisions about changes to standards and does not directly change any City policies or ordinances without further action by the City.

If you have questions, or require clarification on the contents of this memorandum, please contact Sara Dechter, AICP, Comprehensive Planning Manager at sdechter@flagstaffaz.gov or (928) 213-2631.