Good evening, Rockville.

Today is Wednesday, March 12th, 2025.

This is meeting number 03 25 of the City of Rockville Planning Commission.

I am Jamie Espinosa, Chair of the Planning Commission.

I am joined by Commissioner Susan Pittman, Commissioners Eric Fulton, and Commissioner Meng Sun.

Tonight's meeting is being conducted in person and virtually by WebEx.

Tonight's agenda includes briefing on project plan amendment PJT 2020-00020.

One review and action item, which includes final record plat applications PLT 2025-00637, PLT 2025-00628, PLT 2025-00629, and PLT 2025-00630.

And that'll be followed by a recommendation to the mayor and council on zoning tax amendment TXT 2025-00269.

And we will conclude with our regularly scheduled commission items.

So to our first agenda item, which is briefing on project plan amendment PJT 2025-00020, an application to amend the plan development for Rockville Center Incorporated to permit a residential conversion of 13,011 square feet of previously approved street level commercial retail space into 13 dwelling units at 198 East Montgomery Avenue in the PD RCI Plan Development Rockville Center Incorporated Zone Comstock 30 33 Munro LC applicants.

Over to Mr.

Waselak for uh staff presentation.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair and members of the Commission.

This is a briefing uh as part of the PD amendment process that is currently required.

Uh this item will come back to you uh for a recommendation at a later date.

Um this is an opportunity for you to learn about the uh project plan amendment and ask questions as necessary.

And without further ado, I'm gonna turn it over to uh Christopher Davis uh to make the staff presentation.

And of course, the applicant is present here as well.

Thank you, Mr.

Rossleck.

Good evening, Mr.

Chair and members of the commission.

For the record, Christopher Davis with Community Planning and Development Services.

Uh as Mr.

Wasselak indicated, this is a briefing for Project Plan Amendment Application PJT 2025 00020.

And it's for the Boulevard Boulevard Loss at 198 East Montgomery Avenue.

So again, the purpose is for the introduction of the proposal to the Planning Commission and specifically for the applicant to provide you with information on the project and to allow you for preliminary feedback and comments on the proposal.

So here's the project site outlined in red on the screen.

It is 198 East Montgomery Avenue, located in uh Planning Area 1, corresponding with the town center.

Uh the site area is approximately 1.41 acres, and the land use designation for the site is commercial and residential mix.

Uh the zoning corresponds to the plan development for the Rockville Center Incorporated and has an equivalent zone of mixed use transit district zone.

As you can see, the the site is fully developed with a mixed-use building uh with both residential and commercial uses.

Uh the applicant proposes to modify uh previously approved commercial space into residential units as further detailed.

So as you can see, the proposed plan on the screen, uh 13,011 square feet of street level commercial space is currently vacant, and the applicant proposes to transform that space into 13 residential law units at the ground level.

As you can see, the units will be located on three sides of the building with several units uh along the west side facing Helen Hennigan Way, most of the units facing East Middle Lane to the north, and uh several other units to the east along Monroe Street.

6,500 square feet of existing commercial space will remain uh along East Montgomery Avenue to continue the commercial uh establishments along that side of the street.

And to move forward with this change in use and additional residential units, the applicant proposes an amendment to the plant development for the Rockville Center Incorporated Plant Development Zone.

So moving forward, the required application review processes have taken place and will continue, beginning with the pre-application area meeting or known as the PAM, which was filed back in November of 2021.

The corresponding area meeting was held on December 9th, 2021.

The applicant has then filed the project planned amendment application that's before you back in January of this year.

The DRC meeting is held for the applicant to receive initial steep initial staff feedback on the application, and we'll make uh future resubmittals to those comments provided.

Uh as well, the mayor and council will be briefed on this project at their meeting scheduled for April 7th, 2025.

So the following next steps shall occur before the application can be decided on.

Again, the mayor and council will be briefed on the project.

The applicant will then be able to receive that feedback and make any necessary modifications to the project.

The project will then come back to you as the planning commission for a public hearing and recommendation on the project plan application before proceeding back to mayor and council for both a public hearing discussion and instruction and possible adoption.

Following that process, the planning commission will also be able to consider a decision on a site plan application, which has also been filed for this project and is currently under review.

And with that, that concludes staff's presentation.

Staff would like to note the applicant does have a presentation for the commission, but happy to answer any questions you have.

Thank you.

Any of the commissioners have questions of staff at this time.

No.

Does the applicant have a presentation?

So while he's doing that, I'll introduce myself.

I'm Nancy Reglin.

I'm an attorney at the law firm of Shulman Rogers.

I'm land use counsel to the applicant.

With me tonight is the representative from the applicant, which is Rick Bierbauer, Vice President at Comstock.