Board of Zoning Appeals - Regular Meeting

I'll call this May 12th uh 2026 board of zone appeals meeting to order. Uh first uh pledge of allegiance. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

David, do you want to do roll call? Brian Cer, present. Mark Danielson. Vicky Gushowski, here. Nate LS here. Pete Saunders, three present. Approval of minutes from April 14th. Make a motion to approve. I'll second. Motion has second. All in favor? I I. Item number five, variance of development standards 2606. Will petitioner step forward, please. I bet you didn't know there'd be such an audience for you. I sort of expected it. Uh, name and address, please.

Um, my name is Amy Ficus and u my address is 11:05 West 10th Street, Leaport and I am the property manager of Rosean Apartments. Welcome. Maybe you give us a brief summary. Okay. Um, so I am here today to get a variance to put up a to actually replace an existing pole barn that I have on the property. Um, I want to make it a little bit larger and I want to move it to the back of the property. So I want to put it back to the property line and because of the size it exceeds the 16 foot. So I need a variance for that as well.

What are you storing in this by the way?

Um this is for the apartments. We have equipment that we keep in there. Um it could be anywhere from extra air handlers, but mainly trucks and um that kind of stuff. We're just reconfiguring the existing one um that we built back. Well, we've always had a barn there um since the day the building was built. It's just that we've replaced it in the past few years and we want to make it so it's a little bit more easier for us to get things in and out. Uh we went from back in the day it used to be four garage doors. We went down to one. We want to go back to the four garage doors and and on the side instead of on the short end.

Okay, Becky. Any question? Yep. Um, thank you. So, at this point, I'll open it for public comment for the board of zoning appeals meeting. Is there any public comment? Hearing none, I'll close this portion of public comment. David, you give us staff.

So, yeah. So, item number five, if you want to go back to the first slide there, I wanted to mention something about the title there. Item number five, variance of development standards. A petition 25 26-06 is 06 to exceed accessory building area requesting 4,800 square ft. Um, and insert in there also to allow the 27 foot building height, the increase from the maximum allowed building height of 18 feet as was not uh put out in the petitioner's notice. Um and the last part of that is to reduce the minimum side and rear yard building setbacks for from 10 feet to 5T for a detached accessory building. Um this property as you can see on the map on the next slide there is currently consists of um apartment complex there as well as existing um maintenance building on the site. The petitioner proposes to build a 60 foot by 80 foot detached accessory building with a 27 foot height on the property. Um the uh and as well kind of in that northeast corner of the property you see there's kind of a little point there. Um towards the right upper right of the screen.

Um and so the property itself is about 5.65 65 acres is currently zoned R1B single family residential district of which the current use is currently allowed um with the use. So the petitioner is requesting the variance to allow the additional size for an accessory building and that is located within the zoning ordinance for accessory buildings um for the permanent use which is the continued use of the property for the apartment complex there. So, um this is accessory to that property is what they're requesting. Um the size specifically um just going through briefly uh the decision criteria. The approval will not be interest to the public health, safety, morals, and general welfare of the community. Um this proposed building accessory building size will not be interest to the public health, safety, morals, and general welfare of the community because the existing use of the subject property is for multif family apartments. and the proposed accessory building will be compatible with the surrounding commercial properties to the north of which they are zoned in the B2 general commercial district um in compatible with the um those buildings on those lots. um the five- foot setback from the side and the north is is pretty similar also to those existing commercial properties to the north um because the um the scale of the property and the existing use and continued use of the property um and what they're requesting for the proposed to have storage for maintenance equipment and things like that. Um and then the last part of that the increase in the size um from 18 ft to 27 feet um right next door to the building basically is three to four stories of apartment building. So um there will be no impact there. Two, the use and value of the area adjacent to the property will not be affected in a substantially adverse manner. Um the use and value of the uh property adjacent to the site

will not be affected in a subst sub substantially versed manner with the construction of the proposed accessory building for storage of maintenance equipment um because of the existing multif family apartments have been existence there um on site. The reduction in the building setbacks for the accessory building will not negatively impact the use and value of adjacent properties because there are other similar building setbacks on surrounding commercial and residential properties in this uh surrounding area. The increased accessory building height will not negatively impact surrounding properties because there are existing uh multif family buildings on site that are above that height. and three that the strict application of the terms of the zoning ordinance will result in practical difficulties in the use of the property. Um the strict application to limit the size of the accessory buildings to the 721 square ft on a 5.65 acre will constitute um use of the property to store maintenance equipment for the existing multif family apartment complex. Um the proposed size um of the accessory building is comparable to the uh adjacent commercial properties to the north. Um, and then the strict application of the terms of the zoning ordinance to limit the proposed accessory building to 10 feet from the side and rear property lines um would not allow reasonable use of the existing site um because of how it's already built up there um on the property. And the strict application to limit the accessory building height to 18 ft will result in practical difficulties in the use of the property because there are the buildings of a higher um higher height. So staff finds that the proposed accessory building size, building height, and building setbacks are comparable to the existing buildings on commercial properties to the north of subject properties. So staff recommends approval of variance of development standards petition 26-06. And I'll answer any questions if you have them.

So there's still going to be a five foot buffer between the property line. Correct. Correct. All right. I think she said up to the property line, but yeah, I just want to make sure. I'll make a motion to approve the variance for the development standards for 2606. I'll second that motion. Motion second. All in favor? I. Congratulations. Um, old business, new business. Just nice to see so many people at the BCA meeting tonight. Motion to adjourn. I'll make that motion.

I'll second. Motion second. All in favor?