Friendswood City Council approved recommendations from the Planning & Zoning Commission related to temporary event signage, screening requirements and staggered terms of service, Commission liaison Trish Shanks told the Planning & Zoning Commission on May 22.

The council "did approve the recommendations that you all made, we approved them without any changes," Council member Trish Shanks said during the commission meeting. She specified that one recommendation concerned temporary signage for events, another adjusted screening rules to give the commission more latitude, and a third changed terms of service to stagger appointments.

The council-approved changes to screening give the Planning & Zoning Commission additional discretion to apply what the commission considers "best practices or good sense" when reviewing screening and related variances, Shanks said. She added that commissioners can recommend deviations from screening standards when appropriate.

Shanks also noted the council approved a policy change to stagger terms of service among commissioners to avoid many vacancies occurring at once. "We did go ahead and stagger position so that we could have, just better representation and not have so many of you leave at 1 year and, have that void," she said.

Shanks's remarks were delivered as the council liaison update during the Planning & Zoning Commission meeting; no formal council motion text or vote tally was included in the commission transcript provided.

The council approval implements recommendations the commission previously forwarded. Commission members did not debate those council actions at length during the May 22 meeting; the comments were delivered as an update from the council liaison.