Board of Zoning Appeals - Regular Meeting

P. Say the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance 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.

All right, we'll do roll call. Um, Miles Fettinger present. Vicky Grosski present. Drew Buchanan present. Julie West absent. Pete Sounders. Yeah. Jerry Jackson present. Okay, we've got quorum. Uh, did everyone have a chance to review the minutes of September 9th? Are there any corrections? Any comments? Make a motion to approve the uh minutes as presented. else. You're good. My old

got a a motion to approve and a second to a motion to approve in a second for approval of the minutes. Uh all in favor? I I opposed. All right, that brings us to item five, preliminary plat 25-02, petitioners Rural King Realy LLC at 1340 West State Road 2. Uh, do we have anyone from the petitioner to

Yes, this is Clayton Walden. Uh, I'm with Royal King Realy. I'm our in-house counsel and then we also have Sher Aldrich on here who is our transa uh transaction manager. Hello everybody. All right. Would you go ahead and describe what's proposed and Yeah. So what we're doing here is I mean this relates to 1340 West State Road 2 there in the port Indiana. We are requesting to subdivide off the rule king box from the remainder of the shopping center. Um and I think we've presented both preliminary final plot which will reflect that. So,

so it would Are you Are you complete finished or? Yep. Like I said, I I won't make it too hard there. It's pretty simple. Um just requesting that the one existing lot be split into two um lots. one being the current real uh real rule king building and then the the second lot will be the remaining of the shopping center there when it's all said and done. Okay. So in one part if I'm understanding it right one parcel is solely Rural King the other parcel is the other businesses and of course the associated parking lots.

Yes you are you are correct. Um would it be the intent that this this pro that this parcel split then could be sold independently? Yes. Okay. Are there other questions from the plan commission members? Are there separate utilities for the uh this parcel currently? Like does each tenant have utilities? Do we know? And that may not have an effect on this at all.

I I could um I I don't know that I can answer that definitively. However, I will say it will be subject to an existing or REA that provides for all those easements uh and and addresses most of those sorts of things, utility easements, cross access, cross parking, and and the like as part of any proposed disposition. I and Clayton, if if I could add, it is my understanding that each tenant has separately metered utilities there.

I I called the water department. They said the utilities crossing the part the parcel are public utilities. The water is. The sewer is not. The sewer is a private sewer that runs through the alley the whole length of the building. So, that's an issue I think you have to deal with. If the uh sewer breaks down by Andrew Avenue, um somebody's got to fix it. And yeah, and there Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. I didn't mean to interrupt. Sorry if you need to keep going.

And and it's a private sewer. It's 100% on private property. Uh, in fact, I've been along around a long time and I recall when we tried to uh take over ownership of in order to serve on the other side of 39 and Rural King wasn't the owner then. Whoever the owner was wasn't interested in that idea. So, they retained ownership of that sewer. Yep. And as I mentioned, those underlying uh REA or ECRS that would be put in place would would grant easements uh to each of the owners. And then there will also be those self-help sort of remedies to to allow for those repairs that you're discussing.

Explain how that would work because if uh if one owner has a if the sewer breaks and it it affects one owner, how does he get the other owner to pony up, so to speak? Well, either he he gives them notice or like I said, that's a self-help remedy where you can go over uh fix it yourself and then usually those REAs or ECRs gives you the private right of action to go seek um you know if I pay $10,000 to go fix it and it's your problem um I can seek that $10,000 and usually reasonable or your reasonable attorney's fees as well as part of that underlying private ECR REA. So attorneys get involved usually.

That's been my experience. Go ahead. So real quick, the util the the sewer utilities run off of Andrew Avenue West. Is that what you're Is that That is correct. Yeah. The sewer starts at the uh west end of Rural King and flows all the way to Andrew Avenue. Got it. So this new parcel if if the sewer, you know, there was an issue there, Rural K, the tenant of Rural King would have to go after them then. Correct. Yeah. for example, it could it could break closer to uh Andrew Avenue and Rural King wouldn't have sewer service and Rural King wouldn't have it'd be on someone else's private property where they needed to fix it.

Yeah. And that we we are intentional when we go through and build these ECRs, RAS to give us those rights for those exact scenarios that you're bringing up. We want to be able to have the ability to go fix it if we need to. How do we have some asurances that that language covers it? the I'm trying to I've had many of these cases where neighbors come to blows. Um not literally, but um trying to avoid that situation here. I I guess we could provide you with a copy of the proposed ECREA for your uh your team to review to make sure that it does meet um your approval.

Yeah. Yep. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Approve it pending review by legal. Yeah. Review by legal VCR. Yep. Okay. If you could provide those two two things then I think the recommendation would be approve it pending appropriate legal review. Any other questions? I did I did have a question. If the if the lot is subdivided, what happens to the businesses buildings in uh the lot B? They will be whoever buys the property will uh buy subject to those leases. So they'll become the new landlord for those businesses.

Thank you. Other questions, comments?

Republican. Um I believe we do. Yeah. Yeah. I would just ask for public. I'll open up the meeting for any public comment on this subject. Any public comment? It's not a It's the existing May. Yeah, you need to come up to the if you Sorry. Sorry. Where is this being built at? If you would name and address and then ask your question. Oh, I'm sorry. My name is Rebecca Patz. I live at 2022 Welnuts Road in Michigan City. Was he saying Andrews Avenue?

The the mall, the m the old Maple Lane Mall. Nothing's being built. They're just subdividing the parcel. Oh, cuz my son lives on Andrew Zev by the mall. Yeah. The the only thing that could change is ownership at some point. So, Okay. Yep. Thank you. Any other comments? Okay, seeing no further public comment, I'll close the the comment period. David, would they get those documents to you? Is that Yeah, just send them to us and then we'll make sure to review them before the next meeting before the board of public works. Yep. Perfect. All right. So, we basically need a

All right. Thank you. Are are we approving the pre preliminary and the final together? Yes. Yeah, you can do that with the provision they provide the documents. Correct. Okay. I'll make that motion. I'll second. Okay. We have a motion to approve the preliminary plat and final plat subject to the submitt of the ERC's. Can you please repeat the two documents real quick that you're going to share with us? It's REA ECR. They're uh they're used kind of interchangeably, but it's basically just uh the easements, the underlying easements that are going to govern this document or this uh development

after the subdivision. But yes, I I'll provide the ECRS andor what's the what's ECR stand for? It's easements, covenants, restrictions. It's usually built into one. Perfect. Okay. subject to submission of easements, covenants, and restrictions and restrictions and legal report. Legal report. Perfect. Like I said, it's different attorneys will call it different things. The REA is a reciprocal easement agreement. It'll be one document. I don't know. I have a a attorney working on this and I don't know which one he used, ECR, REA, but it'll be one of those. Effectively, it's the same thing. Don't mean to confuse you. Sorry.

Yeah. Yeah, I think we we just want to make sure that that uh you know that both parcels are are served correctly by you by sewer. So, thank you. Yep. All right, we've got a motion. Do we have a second? I don't have Yeah, I do. We have motion and second. All those in favor? I opposed. Okay, pass both the preliminary and final plat 25-03. Is there any old business? David, you got anything? one any new business? I think wasn't there a comprehensive plan update on the agenda or I see it on there. Do you have anything for that or Craig?

Uh yeah, I can just update you that the work progresses on the plan. Um we uh have encountered some issues with the traffic modeling aspect of the plan um in terms of the usability of the existing modeling. that's available at a regional level. So, we're trying to um find solutions for what we need to do with regard to the traffic modeling aspect of that. Um currently and um so that's slowed us down a bit. Um but we hope to have answers on that soon as far as understand a timeline going forward once we get that um part of the scope figured out. So, we've had our public input sessions. Um we had an open house originally earlier on in the process and then um we also had public input opportunities at both the sunflower fair and the um farmers market on that same weekend or the farmed and forged that same weekend. So we've kind of concluded the public input uh in the earlier stages of the plan. Um, so now we're focused on um drawing up u the recommendations and then uh maps and uh eventually we'll come back and have an open house for public to be able to see those before we go through the adoption process. But again, what's holding us up is basically the transportation element is kind of hampered by the um the issues related to the transportation modeling that's available to us. So like I said, we should know more about that soon.

Thank you. Thank you. All right. Is there any other business for the board tonight? If not, I'd take a motion to adjurnn. So moved. Second. We're adjourned. Thank you. Thanks.