PB Agenda Packet - June 4 2025 - Laserfiche WebLink

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6 1 MEETING MINUTES 2 ORANGE COUNTY PLANNING BOARD 3 MAY 7,2025 4 REGULAR MEETING 5 6 MEMBERS PRESENT: Lamar Proctor(Chair) Cheeks Township, Chris Johnston (Vice-Chair) Hillsborough Township, 7 Meg Millard, Little River Township Representative; Statler Gilfillen, Eno Township Representative; 8 Beth Bronson,At-Large Representative; Charity Kirk,At-Large Representative;Whitney Watson, 9 At-Large Representative; Delores Bailey,At-Large Representative; Venkat Yendapalli, Cedar 10 Grove Township Representative; Jonah Garson,At-Large Representative. 11 12 MEMBERS ABSENT: Steve Kaufmann, Bingham Township Representative; Liz Kalies, Chapel Hill Township 13 Representative. 14 15 STAFF PRESENT: Cy Stober, Planning & Inspections Director; Perdita Holtz, Deputy Director—Long Range Planning 16 &Administration;Tom Altieri, Senior Planner- Long Range Planning &Administrative Division; 17 Patrick Mallett, Deputy Director—Development Services; Jack Moran, Planner 1 18 19 OTHERS PRESENT: Albert Benshoff, Lydia Lavelle, Liz Hill 20 21 AGENDA ITEM 1: CALL TO ORDER AND ROLL CALL 22 23 The meeting began at 7:02 PM 24 25 AGENDA ITEM 2: INFORMATION ITEMS 26 27 Lamar Proctor reviewed the upcoming Planning Board and Board of County Commissioners meeting calendars. 28 29 Emergency Services Director Kirby Saunders gave a special presentation on the County's Hazard Mitigation Plan 30 31 Kirby Saunders: I appreciate the opportunity to present to you and certainly will take any questions that you have. 32 33 Lamar Proctor: Statler? 34 35 Statler Gilfillen: Starting about 1810 with the Boston Building Code to after the Chicago Worlds, or Chicago Fire in 36 the 19th century,the building codes moved to require masonry or fireproof construction in the 37 urban areas. Moderately successful in this century. If I'm hearing what you're talking about, the 38 forests now have the same danger that Boston had when it was all wood framed back in 1810, 39 and it's burning them down. Are we at a time whereas a society we should look at making the 40 building codes now for construction be masonry or concrete and not wood frame anymore? 41 42 Kirby Saunders: That's a really good question. I'm not the expert on that but I would, my gut instincts would be no. 43 The reason for that is in comparison to the risk that is posed by wildfire,for specifically an 44 example, I think it would outweigh the consequences of requiring a resistant building construction 45 in our community. I can't say that for every community, but in our community, requiring resistant 46 building materials, like concrete or masonry for all residential structures would, I think, prohibit 47 development, and prohibit affordability,for example. We feel pretty comfortable that the materials 48 that are constructed today in our community meet our risk by the North Carolina Building code. 49 We do not see examples in occurrences of increased risk when people adhere to the building 50 code when they're properly followed, and I think that's the caveat is,that's why the building code 51 exists. So, my initial reaction,again is, I think that would be prohibitive and it would reduce the 52 availability of affordable housing by doing so which would be an indirect consequence. 53 Chris Johnston: This is just a point of clarity, in regard to the subdivision recommendations, is that not already on 54 the books that we have a requirement for minimum widths for emergency services and that sort of 55 thing in subdivisions?