Zoning Board of Appeals - Regular Meeting

Hey there. We are all set to go. Ready. Okay. I will call this meeting to order of the planning commission of the city of Bowling Green. Uh thank you for coming this evening. So close to the holiday here. We hope to not have any fireworks tonight. Uh, Chase, you want to call the role, please? Yes, sir. Mr. Body, yes. Miss Broadwell, here. Miss Enis, here. Mr. McComere here. Mr. Phillips here. Mr. Stalter here. And Mr. Wadd here. Thank you. Next is the approval of the minutes from our June 4th meeting. Those have been passed out to everybody ahead of time and had a chance to review them. Are there any corrections or additions or deletions to those minutes? Okay, sounds like everything's good there. So, the minutes are approved from the June 4th meeting as they were passed out to us. Move right along the lobby visitation. Chance for citizens to express their thoughts to us on any matter that's on the agenda or not on the agenda tonight. Does anybody want to uh come up and say anything? All right, as I thought. So, we will close lobby visitation. Moving right along to our annexation request. We have an annexation request for 67.692 692 acres located along the 1400 14,000 block of Bishop Road identified as parcel numbers R63-510-1203 400 0 R 663-510 dash 1203

two 0 0 0 R 63-510-12 0 024 0 0 and R 63-510-12 000000 yeah 2700 0 from plane township Robert W Mau agent Dougen Flo LLC, Robert W. Mau, and Mau Family Farms LLC petitioners. Heather, you want to tell us about this request? Um, sure. As you mentioned, this does consist of four parcels. Um, two parcels to the north of Bishop and two parcels to the south of Bishop, more directly on that um corner that um of Bishop and Brim. Uh, the agent is Robert Mau. on behalf of the petitioners Doug and Flo LLC and Robert W. Mau and Mau Family Farms LLC. The petitioners um this was approved by the Wood County Commissioners on May 15th of this year and the city received the um copies of the petition and related documents on May 27th to review. The property is contiguous to the city limits um where you'll see along Brim Road just south of Bishop. Um, annexation is required for utility services per our city ordinances. Um, as I understand it, they are interested in marketing the property for um, residential use or subdivision. However, I can't tell you specifically that they have anything in mind. I know they've requested the R2 medium density residential, which we'll talk about later. Um, but again, I'm not aware of any, you know, immediate development, just that they are interested in residential. Okay. So there's there's some property

on each side of Bishop Road, north and south. Correct. Um so that map that was in your map and I have on the screen basically it's contiguous there at the south um that would be the southwest corner of Brimman Bishop. And then um if you go to the north there, the other two parcels would be across um to the north of Bishop Road. Okay. But they're applying, you know, two different petitioners, but or three different petitioners, but um it would all be contiguous annexed together. Yeah. And it's all farmland right now. Correct. Okay. Uh anybody have any comments or questions for Heather? Heather, I'm sorry. Go ahead. Now, Avashek, you brought up a point. Uh yeah. Yeah. See if I say this correctly. it. The gist of it was that you had seen some research that indicated that annexation to municipal properties in situations like this isn't necessarily beneficial to the municipality. That the cost associated with servicing the property and it residents may outweigh the benefits of annexing that property. Correct. That is that that the gist of the the research? You got it right, Bob. Okay. Um yeah so in and I mean and in just more from an educational perspective uh and actually this came to my thought because I was like we looked at this request in April similar request of annexation this year we also request looked at the request and I was not present in that meeting in January so we have done this will be our third annction annexation request in this year um so as you mentioned Bob I mean you know and it's not I mean pretty common sense right there is cost to taking the solar utilities out there to any new property and then if the revenue is not increasing proportionately then it puts

a burden on the city and often time the lang revenue going to increase in 5 10 maybe 15 years and within that time when the utilities come to that property the owners may change their mind from R2 essentially resident amount the amount of people living is proportional to the revenue which will be generated is also proportional to the cost but silver line will go the same amount right it's 10 people taking it 15 people will not make a difference so um there is a decent amount of research there about that you know often time it leads to profit seeking and rent seeking from our two it may change their mind and we have to be a little bit more careful about what is the cost um so couple of things right I kind of got into this a little bit but not too much you know I've got wife and kids things to do at home too um So, um, it's I try to look at what is a criteria would county commissioners to accept a request and it seems to me that I and you got to educate me here and I couldn't find the meeting. It's like I own a property and I go to the commissioners and I say, well, I like to my city to be annexed and there's a master plan. They pretty much say sure, right? Is what's the process like? Yes. As far as I know, um it's actually part of the Ohio Revised Code how annexations are handled. Um there are four types of annexations. Um the most common tend to be the type two expedited annexations. And all of them require property owner um signatures. So, and to be the petitioner. And I think that's why pretty much when it gets to the county level, it's like, well, you know, the the owner desires to do that. It doesn't impact us as a county. Um I know uh for a lot of years we've had an agreement with the adjacent townships that they do have um you know they get uh financial reimbursement annually. I can't speak directly to what that looks like, but if

you have any further questions um I know our administrator is here. Um so they've worked out that agreement several decades ago that there would be compensation and um our actual ordinances require annexation for city utility services. And you've probably heard that before. or it's the same thing in a in a lot of communities to you know try to enhance that growth and look at um you know how do we get the income tax base here it's often driven by the need for utilities so I don't know if that kind of helps I mean it's but it's basically done by the OC the Ohio revised code is how it's dictated and then we only mention it when it comes to again our requirements for annexation for utility services and then again in our zoning code when it comes to the planning commission involvement and reviewing it and then city council. Sure. So it seems to me that the commission would essentially look at every party involved is in agreement. They look at the titles and pretty much they are not doing any costbenefit analysis, right? They're not thinking about how much revenue will this property bring to the city. They're essentially passing that to us as planning commission and eventually to the city council to make that judgment whether this will positive thing or maybe drain on the resources there. Okay. So that makes and I will add that we do send every petition to our administrative staff, all the departments to review. Um so we do request comments. If there are any red flags or concerns, um we do ask that they let us know. Um we've talked internally about having a more robust process. Um it's just very complicated. It's very hard to measure the pros and cons of annexation because some of them aren't measurable. So do you want to grow your population? um do you want the next little league coach, you know, to be part of our community or the next, you know, um workforce? It's hard to measure those types of um pros and put a number to them. Um it's hard to know what development's coming because like I said they are interested in residential but you know we don't know what kind

besides their um request for the R2 zoning which would mean you could have town homes you know or um basically you could share a share a wall or have one unit dwellings um so that's really as much measurement as we can get when it comes to the zoning but you could also have an adult daycare facility you know that it's pretty broad some of those uses so it's very hard to measure annexation um for many reasons. Sure. And I can just make few points and then then I'll open up for discussion. Actually, this kind of has been on my mind for a bit because there has been a lot of discussion about having more affordable housing. And if you look at the new housing in Biji is over $400,000. I mean 350 is considered to be cheap now. Uh and a lot of families including my would not have been able to afford a house. We live in a great house. It's old house if it was 350, right? So there was this I think it happened last year that we approved a housing which was set for $225,000. I think Trifecta was the construction company from Cleveland. We actually had someone in the in u in our audience who actually said don't do this. This is expensive. And I thought $225,000 will be an affordable price to have a house. There was an article about it in Bijendu uh news. After several years actually the price of the construction became 375 and I kind of felt a little betrayed there because they did 225 it seems feasible and then of course the price increases by $150,000 and becomes $375,000. To me that is not an affordable house. So if we connect these joints points together so nobody's denying that the city has to grow and these things look good and there's an attraction on the families. I think we can put the cost to what will it be to have an R3 versus R2 versus R1 and what it will take to take the utilities and services there and also drain on the resources. There's a long-term cost to it because the you know the services have to get spared more right fire and

police and other things is not just about one-time investment. So to me I think we need to have some robust discussion about this and what are the process moving forward and then the other question is what are about other properties around it right so we have already seen two requests right and it's essentially from the same practitioner uh practitioner is there a master plan in place like can't can we do two or three of them together which might actually may lead to economies of scale and maybe reduce the cost of doing that kind of work rather than every two or three months you see one coming. So to me there are some of the thoughts for us to think about um and you know have a discussion about these uh because it's certainly tied to affordability and also drain on the resources of the city. Anybody else have any comments? The only the only question I had was Heather, those properties, if I'm reading this right, the properties north of Bishop and east of the annex annexation request, that strip of properties, is have they been have they spoken with the city at all? Has there been any interest whatsoever to annex the that strip as well? and what are the, you know, thinking about the continuation of how things tie together? Uh, does it make any sense to to go forward with looking to do that if, you know, does the city think about doing that versus having to wait for a request? I mean, how does that all tie together? I guess bottom line, there's a lot to that. Um, so the city does require annexation agreements. So, several of those properties signed annexation agreements several years ago um when they signed on to our electric um Okay. I believe I'm not sure there's a water line there though, but I do know there's electric.

So, there are some annexation agreements already on file for that um street or block. Um the city's not been aggressive with annexation. We've really let property owners lead that and that's what's happening in these cases for the most part. Um, and um, I don't know if that really helps answer your question, but the city definitely has people sign annexation agreements and they can be triggered at any time they become contiguous, such in this case. And and and I take it you don't need to be aggressive if you're already supplying the utilities and you already have those agreements in place. So, okay. Correct. I get it. All right. That's helpful. Thank you. Mhm. Well, although Abashek raises some, you know, some interesting points that had not come up before, I I think for purposes of this property, we we don't have much choice except to follow the rules and proceed the ordinances that are in place at this point in time. Uh we we certainly can discuss these things further, but we do have a set of of laws basically that uh govern the situation uh for this piece of property. And I'll remind you, you are making a recommendation to council. So um you're not making any final decisions. If that helps, maybe give some more thought to it. Any other comments or questions? Could we um sorry could we um like have an suggest different zoning maybe like R3 zoning and because again like if we are more if there are more houses in a property and that is in coordinance to what the city is trying to do with like you reducing the having more construction like you know lot sizes and stuff. Um so to me having more people in place will certainly be beneficial because more people will get houses it will increase the supply of the houses essentially

become affordable but also increase the revenue and more people live in the city is good for the city right so to me kind of there is no dis I totally get right like essentially there's no not much to it to annexation but I think what is to it is how many people live there so I think you're talking about interimm zoning next unless you want to combine ine that with this conversation I would, you know, reference the memo that I had wrote for the packet that references our land use plan and um that's where I take my guidance to give to you and how you want to make that decision. I keep them separate. Okay. Well, I would think I I'll make a motion that we recommend to city council that we annex these four pieces of property. I'll second it. M. Broadwell. Yes. Miss Andis. Yes. Mr. Pomber. Yes. Mr. Phillips. Yes. Mr. Stalter. Yes. Mr. Wadd. Yes. Mr. Body. Yes. Okay, motion passes 70. Next, we move to the interim zoning, which was already been brought up a little bit. Um, I'm not going to read off the parcel numbers again with all the zones. But you do that so well. I'm counting real quick as I do that, Judy. I can tell. Um the property is has an agricultural use currently as Heather explained has explained to us before and again uh that she's uh required to recommend the zoning that is most closely associated with the current use. uh but we don't necessarily have to go

that route and we have on several occasions uh followed the request of a property owner as to what zoning they would prefer to have for their property. Not unusual that in a case like this that the the mowers uh want the R2 medium density zoning. Uh it's kind of consistent with some other parcels that have come up in the last couple of years. Uh so any comments about the interim zoning from other members of the commission? Yes. So so I think our difference between R2 and R3 is R3 will be more number of houses and R2 will be lesser number of houses, right? Um in R3 you can have multi-unit dwellings. So it could be an apartment complex or it could be a one-unit dwelling. There's there's more allowable residential uses in R3. And then I would make sure to point out too in the memo I gave you that future land use map has this as that yellowish greenish color um which is suburban single family residential with retail permissions. So um I would always defer to our land use map to use that for guidance um and if you you know in the future do decide to amend that map that we could do that or make that recommendation to council. So the map suggests that this should be R2. I would say either R1 or R2 because it says more suburban residential. So that is not a high density to me. That's to me a a lower um or medium density. Can I ask a followup? And was there a cost benefit done to this kind of map? like was there a thought behind like how much it will take to drive the utilities and public service versus how much revenue we'll be getting from them? No, it did not go that deep. However, um our future land use plan that was passed in

2014 does have um a dedicated page about annexation and Julie and Judy probably remember being being on that committee to um review that plan and be very involved. We talked a lot about annexation and how complicated it is and that we do need to be careful. So, it's definitely the city does recognize that that's really important to evaluate each request. Let me just go back to something that you said earlier. So, you think if it's a R3 that there would be more units so the cost would come down for people because is that did I get that correctly? So, you're cons Yeah. No, I mean that you're concerned about bringing the cost down so these homes don't turn out to be 400. Exactly. I mean and again like it it's a benefit on all respects, right? I think like we need to be little bit creative with how we doing things, right? So if there is already an R2 and there are multiple R2s, why don't we have some new R3s? Also, it's a simple I mean I'm not a builder or a construction person far from it though I do DIYs at home and I develop taste for it. It's simple like more houses means there will be more more just supply more demand lesser and I mean or demand same so the cost of construction will go down if you because their houses are smaller it's also you know sits well with how things are people don't want to live in giant houses anymore and there's cheaper to heat them cheaper to cool them um so yes to me that's a win-win for all more people living here more house availability and more affordable affordable houses and we have a 67 acre of land which we can play with. I mean I not play with in that way but you know maybe to some look for some collective collab collaborative collective ideas. Well I mean I'm all in favor of finding more affordable although I think there's a new phrase for that. It's not

affordable. It's something I can't remember. somebody said where's there do seem to be some smaller houses being built in the two Staint Springs right now and you know the the people the buyers can decide what size house they want I think people are wanting bigger homes 2,2400 square ft that's a lot of the reason the costs are so high because people expect more today than maybe us old people did when we were young so um so it's it's just a and they don't seem to mind these huge mortgages and rents and things like these Redwood apartments that are around. They're $2,000 a month for for rentals and some of them. So, it's it's maybe a different expectation now and people don't want to start small and work their way up. I don't know how you legislate that but or if you should. So the question is whether we recommend R2 or R3 zoning essentially. So it sounds like to me. Okay. Am I correct, Heather, in thinking that anything that could be built in under R2 could also be built under R3? Not necessarily. Um, for example, one difference would be you're allowed to have an accessory dwelling unit in R2, but not in R3. Uh, you could have a bed and breakfast in in R2, but not in R3. Um, R3 allows a multiple unit dwelling and a nursing home, which is not allowed in R2. You could have a parking lot in R3 and a parking structure, but not in R2.

Uh you can have um a similar thing would be you could have a two-unit dwelling in both R2 or R3 and that's basically it. It be so we only recommend to the city council and city council will finally decide the zoning. Correct. I mean, another option is you just leave it agricultural and recommend that and then the owner can come back later to change the zoning. Uh those of you who have not expressed an opinion yet, do you have a do you have one? Which what what should we vote on here? The the R2, R3, A the A1. I mean, I think if the owner wants the R2 and they're going through the process, I don't see why they have that or putting it, you know, giving them what they're requesting, I don't see a reason against it because they're the ones that I mean, ideally you're going to be investing in this and as much as I, you know, I see a lot of Abashek's points on this stuff, it's pretty market driven. And in the end, even if we if it goes through, we recommend it. council passes it and two years they're gonna come back and change to get what they want anyways. I would recommend that the R2. I agree with Joe. I think the R2 makes the most sense. Okay. Well, let's go about it this way. I will um make a motion to recommend to city council that the interim zoning uh be the R2. And we'll see how the vote comes out here. And I will second that. Miss Andis,

we voting Judy. Oh, I'm sorry. Yes. Mr. McComere, yes. Mr. Phillips, yes. Mr. Stalter, yes. Mr. Waddle, yes. Mr. Body, no. Miss Broadwell, let's say yes. All right. Motion passes 6 to one. Now we move on to uh a topic that we started last month uh talking about vape shops. Uh Heather, you want to say a few things about changes you've made and so forth? Yes. So, I really just took your feedback from last month and made a few minor changes. I don't know if I'm on the right track. Obviously, you can tell me if I am or not or what changes you want. Um, but I did add tobacco or vape store as a conditional use in the central business zoning and that is under section 150.4 to the comprehensive use table. Um, then I added um a prohibition of walk up and drive-through wind windows under 150.69C. I know we talked a little bit about that, not in depth. I thought I saw another couple of their codes. I thought maybe that's a good thing to at least run through and and see if you like that. Um, and then added requirement to post regulatory signage at public entry doors under 150.69E, which I know Julia had brought up um, a couple times at the last meeting. I made it very general because I thought um I don't think we need to people's signs for them that they could at least you know incorporate the language as long as they're incorporating what we say that that we want in the code. Um and then we worked with our GIS department to come up with a few maps and we put those in your packet.

So, the first map and let me get my bearings here because it's too small to see on the screen. So, I got to get my map out here. So, we titled that exhibit A. And what we did was we took the existing vape shops and um drew a onemile buffer around those. So, you can see by looking at that that that would essentially leave um maybe a few spots to the the east, maybe one to the north and one to the west where additional vape shops could go. That would be new. So, the one mile is not necessarily prohibiting anymore. Uh the second map labeled exhibit B is um basically imagining a blank slate. So no existing vape shops and using all of those community oriented facilities that are mentioned in the proposal which you know daycarees, uh schools, libraries, um and churches. And we may have missed a couple here and there, but we came up with about 56 spots that um we thought would apply to that 1,000 ft proposed buffer. And that's what that map looks like for that buffer. I don't know if that really captures what you wanted us to do, but we did our best to try to translate that. Okay, let's talk about the maps a little bit more here. Yeah, I think Mr. Wadd, you were really the one that pushed for that the last meeting. Um, but as I look at exhibit A, just want to make sure I'm interpreting this perfectly, Heather, the the blue dotted line around the

exterior of the map is the city limits. Right. Correct. Okay. As I'm looking at it, and correct me if I'm wrong, the only substantial area that is not prohibited is to the west side of the city. There's It looks to me like there's a fair amount of space in in that area. Well, I we did pull up the or mark the four zoning classifications where we're proposing that they be allowed. So, commercial, central business, interstate commerce, innovation, employment. And so, the white space really doesn't mean anything for this purpose. I see. The white space is the it's not zoned properly. It wouldn't be zoned properly. Okay. So, yes. So, the colors basically mean this is where Okay. a vape shop could potentially go or tobacco shop. So really like I mentioned, you know, very small edge on edges on the north side of town in the east side of town and a couple on the west. East. Yeah. Okay. And then exhibit B. I mean, really, bottom line in looking at this, if if you you could put one that might fit in the one square to the west like uh I don't know, is that at Reis or something? I think probably. Okay. So, that would be essentially the only one that could be added beyond what's presently in place. Correct. I mean, am I reading that right? Is that a fair assessment? Not necessarily. No. You could have more um you know closer to Newton, you know, where you see the the zoning there that the orangish color and that likely is well over a mile apart between to the north and um uh the pinkish colored commercial zoning that

you mentioned. Okay. So, you probably could do two. That's what the That's the numeric one mile. Yeah. Yes. And to the east, you could probably maybe do two or three because that's quite a distance there to the north. Mhm. And then basically our business park there is to the east where there would be uh um that type of shop allowed. And then you probably could have one more at the southeast corner of the city where it's zone commercial. Okay. So on uh in this exhibit A on the east side of the city is it uh number two cosmic haze. That's the one that's closest to that side of the city. Correct. Right. So if you sort of go further east or a little northeast or southoutheast the the limit there that's one mile from Cosmic Haze. Correct. Okay. Okay. You might you might be able to get one or you can get one possibly two into the I see I see into the innovation and employment zone on the east side of the city. Okay. So Heather, I probably missed this because I was not present in the say there is already existing business. They decide to have w it's primarily a different business and they decide to keep waves with them. Will this apply to them as well? No, only to shops that we're considering this is their primary sellable product. Um and we wrote that in the definition, right? if you saw that or we tried to be comprehensive. So we just said a retail establishment dedicated to the display, sale,

distribution, delivery, offering, furnishing or marketing of tobacco, tobacco products, etc. Okay. So, so like a gas station can keep it correct as alone. So Okay. So to me the issue is more about the visible nuisance of a shop than the product itself. Because if we do apply this in this ordinance then there could be other creative ways to sell the product which will bypass this but probably not create the visual nuisance of a web shop because I already know one shop which has it which is not primarily what they do. And I was thinking about this and thinking about this ordinance. The other issue is and I'm you know I'm just going to be a little clever here. Um you know in our previous argument we are arguing against market like we should not interfere with the market free market and I get that and in this one we are and I do know that market will always beat us in regulations like in the sense they will find creative ways to to figure out how to right and we might become so like for me we we tried to simplify the zoning laws and all this stuff and now we're again back to complicating it Okay. And we complicate it more and in that process they will still find some loophole. Then we will have another rule for it and they'll still find some loophole, you know. And it's like an unending uh quest. I'm all for it. I don't want kids to smoke vapes. I don't smoke it. I hate it. Uh actually I'm allergic to it. But I also think that we have to kind of take a step back which was I was trying to say if we are interfering with the market at least we have to think about what will lead to the greatest good or the greater numbers right so can we find ways to increase the cost of operations on someone who's running a wave shop which will deincentivize them rather than having more regulations could we also find to

provide incentives to other businesses which may help the community and I think of a bakery for that example high cost of running low profits but certainly everybody loves fresh bread. So I I you know again like I I I'm with you right I'm with everyone to have ordinance but I also think that this is defeating the purpose of simplifying regulations and there will be loopholes which I we just figure out one right now I can just have vape and I'm selling beer. The other issue is obviously the bars. There are bars here, right? So then we start regulating bars. Well, we regulate a lot of things in the zoning code. I know. I know. And this is our daily job in playing department is people trying to get around things. I hate to say that, but that's just, you know, when you try to enforce rules, you know, it it's always upsetting someone. Um, so we do regulate adult oriented businesses, and it doesn't seem like much people really have concerns with how specific that legislation is. I mean, that's four pages of regulations that um I mean, I don't know if that's much different in my mind, but we can regulate um certain uses and we're able to do that to make our community, you know, what what we want it to look like. It is a bit bothersome to me that if we even if we regulate the vape shops that you've got all these ancel stores for which it is an ancillary product and they are not they're not contained within those within those regulations. Uh so you you got 30ome what 30 some uh stores that fall into that uh category. Also, I was noticing in looking at the municipalities that you looked at the ordinances and other municipalities, it's um makes this subject somewhat

difficult because there's a lot of variation from place to place. Uh and I don't think anything as I as I look through it, I didn't see a a definite pattern where you can say, well, everybody does this, this, and this. It varied a lot from place to place. One of the uh places, one of the issues where it varied quite a bit was the the thousand foot uh buffer between hospitals and libraries and youth oriented activities. Seemed like about as many municipalities went with 500 ft instead of a thousand. It was pretty evenly split between those two numbers. I wondered what the map would look like if we if we did the GIS thing for 500 ft. Well, we thought that might come up. So, we do have that also. Great. She's good, Heather. While that's being passed out, um, some of the other municipalities had discussed how many vape shops per number of people in population. Um, I don't see that here and I can't really remember what we came up with last time. It does seem like, and I apologize because when I saw the map, I didn't really understand it either, seems like with these buffers, we're we can still have quite a few more shops come in, which I thought the purpose was to keep the numbers where they are and then if someone closes up shop that another one wouldn't come in. But maybe I'm not still looking at the maps, right? But what did we discuss? Does everyone anyone here else remember we talked about vape shops per population because other cities did that. I I remember it Julie is I don't think we came to any real conclusion. We did bring it up and talk about it a bit and there's another area where there's quite

a bit of variation from one city to another. You know, one one city says one vape shop per 1500 people, another says one vape shop per 10,000 people. I do see with this map with the 500 ft buffer that it does open up quite a few spaces compared to the thousand foot buffer. It does unless these other businesses stay in business. Well, what do you mean, Bob? Well, with the with the mile uh buffer between shots. Oh, okay. Mile, you're thinking that Okay, I I see what you're saying, but the mile buffer, right? We could have showed that on here, but we were just so fearful of getting these maps so complicated. It's hard, you know, just to send you a packet and then not be able to explain it. So, so what is what is the requirement since so many of those shops are already in place? Um, if the ownership changes, does that essentially set them back to zero and they're not able to operate as that type of shop or is it as long as that type of business is continuous, then they can switch owners every week if they want. Is that essentially that's how I would translate it. I mean, if it's here now, it's a legal non-conforming use and it could change hands just like, you know, um a legal non-conforming house can change hands and it still remains. Okay. If if it further if it closes for year

and then tries to reopen, is that how would we handle that? Yeah. Um I think we say six months. So, if they're not actively trying to repair it or rehab it or you know what I and get it ready for the next um owner or business, we would definitely say it's voluntarily being discontinued. And it's really hard with nonforming uses because Ohio law is really heavy on private property rights and they want voluntary voluntary discontinuence, not you know the city coming in and saying, "Okay, you lost it." That leads to lawsuits. So we would definitely heir on the side of the higher revised code and um follow that voluntary discontinuence. There's just so much variation between the options in a number of different areas that for me it's hard to focus in on something and say, "Okay, this is the way we ought to do it. Well, as a reminder, you are making a recommendation to council and they'll have the final say. Yeah. I I I I guess my feeling, Bob, is that after looking at these essentially what you've put together is meeting what your what your goal was. And you know, there's still some opportunity in place, but yet it's restrictive enough that it's stopping the every every corner. So, I'm I'm essentially comfortable with where you're headed and what you've done to this point. I thought one way to approach this and as to how what we would recommend to city council would be to go through your proposed legislation item by item and

say is there a majority of us that are in favor of keeping this restriction in the in the recommendation. I think that's a great idea. Yes. Of course, we still need to have a public hearing, right? Correct. Yes. That would be in August. Well, I would plan on having the public hearing our next meeting. Hash this over meeting after meeting, right? Right. Spin our wheels. Yeah, I I would go for the public hearing so that we can make some decisions. So, I can just dictate that we'll have a public hearing at the August meeting. Okay. Yeah, that'd be August 6th, I believe. Yeah. But thank you for all the information you did provide us with Heather and for taking into consideration some of the comments we made the last time. I'm I'd be open to ideas. Uh but I uh like I say the thing that crosses my mind as a way to go about it is after the public hearing is to go through your proposed zoning code amendments one by one and see if there's a majority of us in favor of each amendment or if there are any that need to be change altered. I mean you could we could alter for example maybe maybe six of us would want us would want to say instead of a thousand foot buffer we have a 500 foot buffer or some other such thing but take it item by item and see what a majority are in favor of and then make that our recommendation to council. Well, do you want to do you want to go through that quickly now? So that that's essentially what we would be taking to the uh public hearing. Um, I mean, I just I I I guess my feeling is

I I I'd like to see something that goes goes to the public hearing that's that we all feel pretty comfortable with. We may not all agree with every every piece, but at least it's something there that the public's going to come in and and see versus boy, they could throw out a a million different ideas to Heather and to us, and we'd be starting at square one. And and I just I just again I I personally feel comfortable with what you guys put together and showed us. I think it matches the parts and pieces that you wanted to deal with. and um and if we want to tweak those some but but just have something in place to to show the public. Uh that's my feeling. Again, I don't know how the rest of you guys feel. Oh, it's pretty short. I mean, it's not I think overly complicated was our goal. Uh the rest of you okay with doing that? Can we sort of vote without really officially voting, Heather, or not? Or not? This is not our recommendation to city council, right? But we're trying to see where uh what what our tendency is at this point prior to the public hearing. Sure. And I can make any changes that Yeah. majority would like to see changed. Okay. Okay. Well, let's let's see if we can go about that. Uh for what what I suggest then first of all, we've got uh section 150.69A. Uh that's basically the one mile uh buffer. Uh is uh is everybody in favor of that or would you be more interested in a different number? Like I suppose if it was something different it'd be smaller. I mean it pretty much excludes

most of the city. It does exclude most of the city and you know if you're doing one of the it looks like we've got so you've got one mile exclusion of other vape stores and then you've got this exclusion of 1,000 ft against um you know civic uses right as it were. I mean it's pretty much blads out the entire thing. Yeah. If you put those two together there's not much left there's nothing left. And in my mind, if to me, I mean, I would strike a and go with the 500 ft to start. Mhm. See where that goes. It leaves it open. I I'm kind of of the mind that we've already saturated and that they're just going to start going away before too long anyways. But would you stick with the one mile buffer between? Well, I think I think it's a one or to me it's one or the other. Like you're if you're going to exclude based on proximity to each other, then let's do that and pick that distance. Or if you want to exclude based on proximity to civic uses, then let's pick that. I it seems redundant to do both. Okay. I think we do need to do both. You think we do need to do both? Mhm. When we looked at other municipalities, I do think most of them did tended to do both. All right. Uh well, let's you know, just count noses. Abashek, start at your end and come to this end. Are you in favor of the one mile buffer? Sure. Yes. Okay. Tom, what do you think? No. No. You don't like it? No. I think it's too too exclusive. Too restrictive. Yeah. Mr. Waddle, I'm okay. You're okay with it, Judy? I'm okay with

it. Joe, not not couple. Yes, Julie. Yes. So, that's uh four to two. Uh, and still be still be a majority no matter which way I voted. I must admit it's I'm very close to being on the fence about that. It bothers me that it that that it's so restrictive, but it one mile did seem to be the uh distance of choice in most municipalities. So, okay, we we'll leave that alone for now. Not hearing an an outcry to the contrary. Now, the thousand foot buffer, I'll start at the other end this time. I I also like that. You like the thousand? I would be more inclined for a 500. Okay. I I really agree with a th00and foot. Okay, Tom. Same here. Okay, Tom. I think 500 would be better. Okay, Abashek, thousand is fine. Okay, well, we'll stick with the we'll stick with the thousand then because again, it's the same breakdown as before. Uh, is everybody okay with the not allowing the walk up windows and the drive-through windows? Yes. I suspect that nobody objects to that, right? Okay. Not serving uh in-person customers between 10 p.m. and 8 a.m. Again, I suspect everybody's probably okay with that. Yes. Yes. Feel free to tell me if I'm wrong. I mean, just from a business standpoint, most your business is going to be at night. I think you could move that up between probably noon and midnight. I I just have a question here. when it talks about a tobacco or vape store if you're going into the gas station. Not even part of it. You know, that's not even

part of it. So, you can go to the gas station and buy it, but you can't buy it if you're going into a the store, right? Is that my understanding? I think your understanding is correct. Okay. C can I So, why is it in person? like like they would just not serve anyone is like they could order online and they can deliver to their house probably. Yeah. Okay. So, if you're ready to spend more money, you can get it. But if you don't have the money, then you just wait till next morning. That's how life works. I hope the product you want is at the corner convenience store. Yeah, but there still people still get it, but they're just paying more to it. It's little um you know against the poor. True. Okay. How about party? uh the the the uh signage that's required state the legal age of purchase and the minors may not enter the premises unless accompanied by a parent or legal guardian. Anybody not in agreement with that or want to change that? All right. Again, the signage and the lighting in part F, is that acceptable to everyone? Yes. Okay. Part G, the nonconforming legal non-conforming use. Yes. And then the definition of a tobacco or vape store.

Heather, I think you, you know, you hit it on the head pretty closely. No human and outcry about any of the sections that you've included here. So, I think that makes it easy. I think we start with that for our August 6th meeting. Okay. Okay. I'll end our discussion for tonight then on this topic. Uh, and what we have left, uh, is, uh, Julie, do you have a report from the zoning board of appeals? Yes, I do. There were three variance requests. Nicholas Bolus of 929 Sand Ridge Road requested a variance to allow the construction of a 25 foot by 35- ft parking pad in the front yard, which would be a location that does not conform to section 150.72 off- streetet parking. A parking pad is allowed in the sideyard or rear yard. There was a lot of discussion regarding this. Uh the vote ended up to be three three for that and two against. So that did pass on a 3 to2 vote. The second one was Laura Trenler of McBride Dale Clarion on behalf of 7-Eleven Speedway had requested the following variances to allow new construction at 1650 East Worcester Street. The first thing the first was to exceed the 60% maximum total lot coverage allowed in the IC interstate commerce commerce district by 16% in parentheses 76% of the parcels would be covered by impervious services and two to exceed the maximum outdoor

lighting level of 5-ft candles under the proposed auto fuel canopy which would allow the use of 43 ft candles maximum which would be with an average of 35.86 ft candles to be used. The third request was to allow the construction of four wall signs. Signs would be one sign at 45.86 86 square ft. Two signs at 49.1 square ft. One sign at 61 square ft. And then so those are four wall signs. And then one canopy sign which would be 24.55 square ft which would exceed the maximum number of three s signs allowed per business which um it would exceed it by four signs because there'd be there's a proposing seven total signs. The existing legal non-conforming pylon signs are approximately 120 square ft and 200 square ft in size. And then the last request was to allow the total sum of all signs to exceed the 336 square f foot maximum in the IC interstate commerce district by 214 square ft which meant proposing 515 total square ft of all signs. So again, we spent a lot of time looking at this. Part of it is that they um because it's 7-Eleven, they're going to be putting in a restaurant and so requesting signs that would be visible no matter which way someone was coming to the building. Um and that was unanimously approved all of those at 5 to zero vote. And then the last one was Ali Burkis on behalf of Quick Trip requested the following variances to allow new

construction at 120 Freeway Court which is over by the Holiday Inn. I think that's what that's called over there. to allow the construction of a 58 foot 8 in x 124t 2 in accessory structure which is an auto fuel canopy and a 31 ft 6 in x 114 ft 8 in accessory structure which is diesel for the diesel truck so diesel canopy which would both exceed the 18 ft maximum height by 7'6 in it would be 25 ft 6 in tall. That was our first request. And then the second one from Quick Trip was to allow the construction of a 79 ftx 113 ft travel center which would exceed the 60 ft maximum front yard setback by 105 ft from the front property long line along East Worcester Street and by 88 ft from the front property long line along gez along South Dunbridge Road which is a corner lot and that was approved 5 to zero. Okay. Thank you, Julie. You're welcome. Heather, do you have anything else for us tonight? Yes. Okay, fairly brief. Um, but so far our total permits are at 208 compared to 215 at this time last year. Um however we've had 37 single unit so basically housing starts compared to 19 at this time last year. So that's more than double for the number of housing permits. Um we've had one multi-unit permit which is within the R3. None at this time last year,

zero commercial as far as this year compared to last year and then one building in the innovation and employment zoning and also one at the same time last year of the same. And then we've had two institutional zoning permits compared to zero at this time last year. Um, as far as permits issued since our last meeting, we did just issue a permit for new construction town and country animal healthcare to be located at 811 South Enbridge Road. We actually signed that this morning. And then we issued St. Alawishas Church. They're doing a small addition and alteration at 150 South Enterprise Street. Um, as Julie mentioned earlier, we are working with Quick Trip still. We are close to issuing that permit since they received their variances. We are just waiting on their financial guarantee for the work they're doing in the right of way to get filed with the city. Um we're waiting for revised plans from Tin Man to do an addition in a warehouse there at 1358 Bellard. Um working with Pioneer Packing on an addition at 510 Napoleon. Waiting for resubmitt plans for that. Um Bowling Green High School new construction. We're close to issuing that permit. They do have their permit for, you know, they start some site work there. Um, but we're close to issuing their permit for the actual new high school. And then we're waiting for revised plans for Bowling Green Senior Living, which is new construction of uh 66 dwelling units on South Main Street, which would be um near Aldi or behind Aldi. Uh we do not currently have any subdivisions under review. Uh access management policies and guidelines, the work continues on that document. Subdivision regulations, we are updating those. As I mentioned, we put a request for proposals out on June 16th and we had the proposals due on July 17th. We received one so far that I'm aware of. So, we hope to get more of those to review. And at um a near point in the future, we'll be asking for a volunteer from planning commission to likely serve on a steering committee that helps us review those

subdivision regulations and make recommendations on the final draft. Um, I also wanted to include in your um, little packet here an update on the South Main Improvement Project, which you probably have encountered that um, continuous construction work, but I thought this was a nice um, handout to give you that really shows the progress there. I think um, it really does meet our recent community action plan and our future land use plan as far as adding over 80 trees to that corridor and a shared use path and two additional crossings with pedestrian hybrid beacons. So, I think it's really important that plan commission is aware of those improvements in the public, of course, and that we're really trying to implement the plans that we've had in place. It takes time, it takes resources, and of course, money. Um, but we are, you know, seeing those improvements be implemented. So, I think we'll all be excited when South Main Street's done and improved and and we see a lot of people using it and different users, you know, whether it be a bicyclist or a pedestrian or a vehicle. Um, city council, they have public hearings scheduled for the placement of 416 West Wooster Street on the local historic register, which includes historic overlay zoning on July 7th at 6:30. Um, they'll also be reviewing interimm zoning of um, two properties on San Ridge that you reviewed a month ago or so. So, um, that's it as far as my report unless you have any questions. Okay. A lot of lot going on. No questions for Heather. Anything else for the good of the order tonight? All right, then. Uh, I move that we adjourn. Judy second. Seconded. And the vote was seven to nothing.