AGENDA #5

TO:                  Chapel Hill Town Council

                        UNC-CH Trustees/Chancellor

FROM:            David Owens

RE:                  Staff Drafts for Potential Development Agreement and Ordinance Amendment

DATE:            April 22, 2009

The Town and University Joint Staff Work Group (JSWG) has prepared on an updated draft of a potential development agreement (3.1 MB pdf) for the Carolina North project and an updated LUMO amendment (3 MB pdf) to create the U-1 zoning district. Those drafts are attached for your review and discussion.

These versions of the development agreement and LUMO amendment incorporate several changes to the drafts that were distributed on March 31. The Town Council met on April 8 to discuss the previous drafts. A number of suggested amendments and queries raised in that meeting have been incorporated in these updates. Several suggestions and questions that were raised in the public information sessions held on April 1 and April 16 have likewise been incorporated. Also, Town and University staff have continued to meet to discuss issues raised in prior Council-Trustee meeting and have further refined the documents to address those matters. All of the changes made to the March 31 are shown in the “Track Changes” mode (and the electronic versions documents can also be viewed or printed in a ‘Show Final” version if you prefer).

If the Council and Trustees conclude that these documents (as modified in your discussions on April 22) are ready for formal public review and comment, the next step in this process will be for the University to formally submit a rezoning petition and proposed development agreement by April 27. The Council would on that date accept the proposal and direct it be sent to public hearing on May 11. The notice of hearing would be published and mailed later in the week of April 27. The Council and Trustees are scheduled to have another work session on this topic on May 21. At that meeting the drafts can be further revised to incorporate information from the Transportation Impact Analysis (anticipated for delivery on May 1) and public comments and discussion from the initial hearing. The revised material can then be re-advertised for a second public hearing on June 15.

Also included in your packets for this meeting are two additional items of background information gathered in response to your previous discussions. First is a report summarizing the discussion between Town and University staff on the stormwater utility topic. Second is a letter from OWASA on water and sewer availability (169 KB pdf) for the Carolina North project.