Council debates expanding mixed-use housing and Booth Kelly zoning changes in broad housing-code update

Springfield — City planners and outside consultants presented a comprehensive set of proposed zoning updates intended to increase housing options and implement the city’s Climate Friendly Areas (CFA) overlay, prompting extended council debate over the trade-offs between housing capacity and industrial land protection.

Jamon Kimall of Cascadia Partners said the work aims to ‘‘allow housing in a mixed use development in more locations’’ and listed four objectives including greater mixed‑use allowances in existing commercial districts, more flexibility for commercial space in mixed‑use projects, and incentives for higher‑density housing.

A central proposal would permit mixed‑use housing in community commercial corridors such as Main Street / South A Street on parcels under one acre while reserving larger sites for employment uses. Council members asked for more careful standards where new housing would abut industrial parcels; Hailey (staff) directed attention to mapping in the packet that identified about 23 properties in the corridor segment that are designated industrial or ‘a budding industrial’ area and said additional adjacency standards are being proposed.

Staff also proposed minimum density requirements in the mixed‑use residential district (20 units per net acre), which would effectively limit large single‑family lots in those districts. Council members had mixed views: some favored maximizing developer flexibility, others worried minimum density language might mislead or be difficult to achieve on small infill parcels.

On Booth Kelly and related districts, staff recommended creating a Mixed Use Employment District that would allow residential above commercial/industrial on second stories but would continue to require that a majority of ground-floor area remain commercial/industrial (proposal cited 60%). The draft also flags heavy manufacturing and production as potentially subject to discretionary use review in some zones. Several councilors warned that adding discretionary permits for industrial uses could deter economic investment in one of the city’s few rail‑served sites; staff said that discretionary review was intended to allow tailored conditions for high‑impact uses (noise, truck traffic, emissions) near residences.

Chelsea Hartman presented details of the Climate Friendly Areas overlay for downtown and Mohawk, and staff asked whether the council wanted to prohibit or limit new auto‑oriented and auto‑dependent uses within the CFA overlay; councilors suggested a more surgical approach (targeting specific high-impact uses) rather than a broad categorical ban given Main Street’s mixed roles (hospital, clinics, bus routes).

What’s next: staff will refine draft code language and return with additional mapping, adjacency standards, and proposed review processes. Council asked for more detail on whether and how conceptual development plan requirements for Booth Kelly could be replaced or moved into a master-plan or site-plan process while preserving millrace and stormwater protections.