Milton’s Planning Commission on Thursday will consider a pair of potential text amendments to City Code – one prohibiting auto rentals and sales anywhere, the other related to criteria for increasing building density in the Crabapple area.

The December 19 meeting will start at 6 p.m. in City Hall’s Council Chambers. People can attend in-person or by watching online at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajh8RVOJ8k4.

Made up of seven individuals appointed by Milton’s Mayor and Councilmembers, the Planning Commission evaluates and recommends changes to zoning ordinances, subdivision regulations, zoning maps and overall planning process. The advisory board also weighs in on variance requests and is part of the City’s public hearing process, meaning other committees also discuss and share views on some topics that it considers.

On Thursday, after voting on adopting the “minutes” – or official written record – from its August 28 meeting, the Planning Commission will take up the first proposed text amendment.

If approved, this amendment would prohibit “auto brokers” (to be defined as the use of any building or land as an office for selling or leasing vehicles) and the sales and leases of automobiles and light trucks anywhere in Milton. (Note: This text amendment wouldn’t prohibit the short-term renting of vehicles from storage facilities or retail stores like Home Depot.)

The other text amendment, applying only to area covered by the Crabapple Form Based Code, would specify that those wishing to increase building units for each parking space within a parking structure must meet one of several criteria – not all of them. This would be consistent with the City policy prior to last year’s adoption of the Unified Development Code (which, as is, says all stated criteria must be satisfied to allow for such increased density).

This will be followed by a presentation from City Arborist Sandra Dewitt, made four times a year to the Planning Commission, about recently granted “tree waivers.”  There were five such applicants in recent months. Then members will review this board’s proposed meeting schedule for 2025.

But before turning the page of 2024, they’ll tackle two more items that have become mainstays on Planning Commission agendas.

City staff will update the committee on the latest regarding progress made on “work programs” in Milton’s 2040 Comprehensive Plan. (You can dig more into that crucial guiding document, and all it entails, at www.miltonga.gov/ComprehensivePlan.)

Special Projects Director Bob Buscemi will close Thursday’s meeting by sharing information and inviting feedback related to the Deerfield Implementation Plan. This is an in-the-works efforts to chart a dynamic, community-driven, guiding vision for an area that includes properties off Highway 9, Windward Parkway, Webb Road, Deerfield Parkway, and Morris Road.

The Deerfield project team has collected extensive public input that is helping inform what’s in the Plan as well as Design Manual so developers have a better sense of the styles, uses, and general appearance that the City wants to see long-term in this area. For more about this initiative, go to www.miltonga.gov/Deerfield.