Zoning Board of Adjustment - Regular Meeting

Now it is recording. Pick up. There he is. Can you guys hear me? Yeah. Well, I sure I sure apologize everybody. I'm completely spaced this off and I'm sitting at my house. So, I apologize. It's all right. Let's just get her done. Vinnie, can you see the screen, Cory? I can. I can. Yep. Okay. It's It's kind of up to you, Corey, since you're remote if you want to run the meeting or if you would like Jenny to run the meeting since she's here. I would say it's probably a good idea to have Jenny run it since I don't have any paperwork in front of me to rattle off the the application number or anything. Okay, I guess we will go ahead and get started. The Mills County Zoning Board of Adjustments meeting on April 15th at 6:33. We're going to start. Um, do we do roll call first? Collins here. Vula here. Like here. Gentlemen. Gentleman's absent. She is. Okay. And then we need to review and get approval of the current meeting agenda. I'll make a motion to approve. That approves. I need a second. I'll second it. But on other business, I have something I'd like to say.

Okay. Later. Later. Okay. You want to add it later then? Yeah. Make a motion to approve the previous meeting minutes. Oh, sorry. Okay. Motion to approve the previous by at second by Ted. So, new business is a discussion of the formal action on zoning variance permit application 25-02 for the proposed variance of the building front yard setbacks for the construction of a residential accessory structure at the property addressed at 31 331 MAR Avenue, Malvin in the White Cloud Township within the agricultural zone. zoning district. So, we can go ahead and do the applicants presentation. Basically the garage um where the garage would be um well if we followed the exact setback would put the building pretty close to even with the front end of that vehicle that's sitting there which is pretty much where the greatest amount slope is it would start there. Yeah, it would start there and go towards the house. And we're looking at a 30 foot by 48, which I've already heard is too small. But um what we are what we would like to do is kind of put it end up being about two foot south

from those pine trees starting it there and then going towards the house. Okay. So, is that power pole is at the end of the uh u end of the property? They get right away. I'm sorry. Right away. That's our power pole. Yeah. Yeah, that one is the county. That's the rightway right there. Are those in line? Yes. Okay. Okay. Sorry, I can't see. Essentially, we're looking for a garage. Yeah. And the reason why we had severe hail damage on three cars uh one was two years ago. Yeah. When we had the big hail storm, we had $50,000 worth of damage to two cars totaled out the third car. Every time it hails out there, we are petrified. So, it's 37 feet in from those two right away poles then. Yes. Correct. Yeah. Okay. So it' be on the other side of those two pine trees. Yep. That's where it would start. So the driveway is right there for the garage to pull in. Then you would essentially pull into the garage right on the other side of the pine trees. Be able to pull into the garage pretty much right off that gravel behind the car. Yeah, I see. Yeah, this technology is cool. That's what I said. [Music] So, we're looking at putting it right there because the driveway is there. The other there's someplace else you can drive on the property, but that's not really that's not a driveway. It's not a roof or not a driveway. It's not gravel or anything. It's grass. And how far are you going to put the garage? Anyone go the other way? That's pretty much as far as being accessible to the house for

garage. That's the flattest space we have on the property. And the closest to the house to utilize is a garage. Is that what you all you got for your not all you got? That's your what you've got for your presentation. Yeah, mainly I mean right now vehicles that are sitting out there getting loaded with dust from the crossroad construction. Okay. But that's minor inconvenience. Yeah, we don't have any place. We don't have a basement. We don't have I mean that's the only place for us to put storage or a garage. Okay, Corey, are you getting all this? Yes. Yep, I am. I'm getting it all. Yep, I understand. Y So, whoever's running the cursor around's doing a good job. Um, you got any neighbors close to you? Uh, no. Not. Well, let's see. The red line right there to the west of the bright yellow propane tank is uh that would be Frank Fay's property, but their house is No, it's across the field from me. There's a alpa field in between her house and mine and then everybody was notified. Okay. I had 60 letters that went out. Yeah. And I have no further questions. There's nobody really within Spit and distance for lack of a better term. Okay. More questions. So, are you ready to move on to staff report? So, um on and I meant to tell you about this. We should do public comment next year. So, if anybody wants to speak in favor of or against request, now would be the opportunity to come speak.

Does the house same household count as favor? It does. We're the same household. But so since we don't have anybody here then the staff report on it is and on this request um you know we really really what I have to do is just look back to what the zoning board of adjustment can grant variances for and what the levels of you know difficulties have to be met where it's a hardship or not and really there's and I so I I put that in there for you on the front of it the zoning ordinances which there's a b c and eat as far as what it would take to meet. You know, the the first part of it is is that the variance cannot be cannot exceed 50% of the limitation in question. So, the front yard setback right now 75 ft. It cannot be 50 it cannot exceed 50% of what that is. I believe we just you have to hold off just a second. Okay. So B of it is the exception relates entirely to the use classified by the applicable district regulations as either principal or permitted use permitted accessory use permitted sign or off street parking unloading areas accessory to the permitted use. C is the exception is reasonably necessary practical difficulty related to the land in question. D. Such practical difficulties cannot be overcome by any feasible alternative means other than an exception. And E is that the exception is in harmony with the essential character of the neighborhood and the land in question. And so when when we look at the site, you know, I mean,

the the reason, you know, the reasoning behind kind of why they want to put it up here so close to the road, I it really does kind of come down to just a convenience factor and that they're that they would be able to potentially, you know, be further back here. I do that line, this red line that kind of comes across there. That would be right about where their 75 foot line goes for and coming across there. So, there's a potential of, you know, moving over here, putting a building over here. Um, you know, there's large large area in that place to put the building. So I don't see that any of the criteria have necessarily been met in order to be able to grant the variance request to them. And it doesn't I don't mean I'm not trying to discount any reasonings that you have behind that. It's just we have to meet a threshold in the request to be able to do it. Um, and I just don't see, you know, if there was there's trees over on even even the tree, you know, even a tree aspect of I mean, I look at trees, you know, look at topography wise, those kind of things and because it's got a it would be right on top of our house, huge slope right there that dips down and two very large maple trees. Yeah, we would be right on top of the house if we tried to build it there. I mean, it would it would just essentially leave us a walkway maybe if that. But that would be, you know, when you when you think of that though, it's like that's for the size of the building that you want. I mean, right here from this 75 foot line back to your house, you have enough room. There's enough room right there to put a twocar attached garage right onto your house that you could protect your vehicles from before that storm damage aspect of what you're talking about. And then you say, "Well, I need a place to put storage on there." Well, then you

could have you could have another you could have your other storage building kind of further back away from there. To put a large storage building so close to the road up here, it I mean, it just doesn't you'd be the only one. Well, there's another building, but that one over there is close to the road. It would be almost equal that if you look at the neighbors what size 30 by 48 and it would be behind the trees. You zoom out on that to see what the neighbors look like. Oh, there's a paved road. It is a paved road. Yeah, that's where the big dirt site is over there that we now anywhere else on the property would require it's not a garage. Substantial dirt work and removing. Yeah, see that very wellestablished trees because the the two maple trees that are there about two foot in diameter if you were to the west of the property there was a building that would be about equal to that. So the one that's right there, red roof there, it's a old barn. Yep. Picture this. Mal is this south of Mal. Yeah. South of G on that T the opposite direction from the by the quarry. How far is the quarry?

The the quarry is back further from me, but it's kind of back behind my field. Which way from you? South? Uh, it's south of me. Okay. I think I understand. So, do you want to move on to board discussion then? Are you ready? Because there wasn't any emails or letters for public comment either, was there? No, there was not. Forgot to ask. So, we'll move on to board discussion. Well, my thoughts are I mean there's no neighbors here to fight against it. I know there's only an official has to go by the regulations and I appreciate that, but we have the option of approving it. Right. How big is this bill? Says it's in 30 by 48. and then set back where they want to put it. If they were to go to the setback you're talking about, that would put it touching the house, wouldn't it? Essentially, yes. Can you draw? Yeah, it looks like there was from when I had that 75 foot line on there. It's about another 35 ft to the house. So about 35 ft in between the house and that 75 foot set. And you don't want to make it so it's attached to the home. No, it's a manufactured home. It's a manufactured home. So eventually it's gonna and the from essentially in front of those cars towards the house, it does one of these and then goes to a retaining wall that needs to be. It needs to be replaced. If we put tried putting a building that close to that retaining wall, the building would be in the house. So it wouldn't have to worry about being

attached. Unfortunately, our property is not flat. I wish it was. This is Iowa. None of it is. None of it is. Right. Well, they say Iowa's flat, right? And but it's never been to Iowa. So, but I'm thinking we got three options here. We can deny it. We can approve it. Or we could make it a little bit bigger setback, too. We could say it's 40 or 45 too. I'm just saying that those are options. Yeah. Cory, do you have anything for board discussion? No, I understand. But with the 50% rule and where Matt's going with it and and the county's idea behind it, it kind of floated cuz a lot of these um variances were being in a sense handed out at different rates. Some person really actually had a hardship and how do you constitute a hardship? Is it because you have to do a tremendous amount of grading? Is it because you have to bring in a lot of fill? It always had something different. So, it became too hard for somebody to say put a financial part on it. The other piece that's grandfathered in to the west, you know, I understand why that one's there. I know who the neighbor probably is. I'm assuming this is close to Mr. Starn's house, which would be to the east of you. Yep, he is. Okay. So, and I think they, you know, you know, are I'm assuming he must get along because he's not there um in opposition. So I I I kind of agree, but I I also know that for the last we started zoning in 2007 that we've never had a handle on this. Um and and and unfortunately it somewhere along the line we have to start saying, okay, what's that feasibility issue and what is the things

like Matt said about A through C or however it was phrased. Um I like Pat's idea of maybe moving it back a little bit more. Um, I don't know if that gets us to where we what we what we want to be at. I understand that there's more money involved in removing trees, grading the ground, doing stuff like that, but I do think, and this is my opinion, that you'd like it closer to your house and it would be more aesthetically pleasing. It wouldn't be blocking the vision from your house to the road and stuff. That's just my opinion. So, I don't know if a purse can really look at this and say, "Okay, can we can we do a little bit of grading?" You can do a lot of stuff. You can do a lot of grading and tree removal for $2,500. I'm just giving you a number. That's that's the type of business I'm in. You can do a lot of stuff for $2,500. So, if that isn't a a detriment, then maybe it could follow right into the guidelines of what this building should be. If it was too close to the house, it would only give us five feet. We don't want it really attached to the house because it is a manufactured home. Could you move it? Yeah, but moving moving it east. So, I can't draw on your map, but let's say where it says 3594 right now. If that building started at the four and moved to the east another five feet, let's call that probably put you about 15 feet away from that building. I don't know what that other is that is that an old foundation or something that's sitting there? No, that's uh currently ducks livestock. And we're adding livestock. See, I'm say I'm thinking for the future if if that's my place and keeping it or selling it, the $2,500 of earth work, tree removals. I know trees are mature and they take a while to grow. I understand that. I think it's a better looking piece of property when it's closer to that

building 15 feet away kind of sits in there all you know contingent or continuously versus that far away because in the winter time that that's my opinion also but as a real somebody in real estate also to an extent I think it would look better closer to your house than it would be way up by the by the road. Yeah, we're going by what we think we we would like and we don't want close to the house and you're going to bury me at that house. I'm not leaving. Nope. I understand. I And Yep. And I I can that's why I said it's just my opinion, but I do understand that with the last zoning change that we had here in 2023, meaning kind of revamped stuff back up, this was a very big sticking point to the county and some of the county officials that we've got to be very cautious on how we hand these out. So, is it because we're residential? Because if we were agricultural, wouldn't there be separate uh setbacks? There's no setbacks for farmers. So if we were an agent, we're residential and well, you'd have to you'd have to have a schedule F and I think there's a certain amount of more paperwork than just classifying it as a farmer, unfortunately. Right. Matt, you showed you did that line before from the uh right away going back 37 feet. Can you show that again on that starting and coming down? It's right at the edge of those trees. That's what we were looking at. About 40 feet from the road. 3840t is where we were thinking. Well, this is board discussion and I I think we should

approve this for like 40 ft. I'm willing to make a motion to that. I I understand what Corey's saying about aesthetics and that. Then at the same time, I understand that these people want this garage setting there and he's talked about some slope and some grading. he's not necessarily really wanting to do. Um, and I I guess I have to agree with that. I think if we came back 40 ft, I can see us proving that. You have anything else, Corey? Nope. Nope. Nope. Um, do you want to go ahead and make a motion? I'll make a motion that we approve this conditional use for me for the variance of 40 40T setback 40T made the motion second Russell. Yeah. Collins. Yes. Golka. Yes. Like, yes. Warren, yes. Good luck. Thank you. Um, so other business, correct? Other business. Uh, I brought this up with Ever since we uh approved that. Thank

you for your time. Thank you so much. Initially used permit for Clay Lincoln on the uh Thank you. on the camping down there on 34. And at that time, I think we were kind of I was a little misunderstanding or misled. I thought this the uh would be the south side of that property line had a house that could see in there when I drove there and actually look at the property and this was a while ago and I've been out of town. Thank you. But there's nothing across that south border but a cornfield. And I don't see why we need to make him spend $20,000 or whatever to put a burm across there. I would like to change my I would like to take that condition off of that conditional use permit that he does need to put a burm on the south side. And it was because I think we really didn't know the layout of that property and we were going by what some homeowners had said that I thought was I I think it's inaccurate what I was told at that meeting. I thought it was just on the west west side, but if it's on the south Yeah, I would agree 100% with you, Pat. the gravel roads there. I'm pretty sure when we we passed it for the bur on both sides, right? Okay. Which I think is and the west side burm needs to be there because of the house. Yes, the house that that's the Rodmin's uh family's house, I think, if I remember right. And we they were going to put a five to six foot burm and trees on that which uh Clay called me on maybe two weeks ago and asked me you know how to go about it to a certain extent and how what he thought the board would want. So I gave him my insight but yeah I don't remember it ever being on the south unless we just had our directions wrong because yeah that's there's nothing there. I know there was a ditch there they were worried about getting water into and I think that's when the south side of it came up because I know Audrey and I we w we went back and and rewatched it because at one point in time we were talking about it being on the north side. We were talking

about it being on the west side, south side. I mean it was just kind of all around. But we ended during the motion of it to where it was on the south and the west was that be a burm there which you know with that drive being there the entrance of it kind of being right there. I mean, it really does not make sense for that southside because I mean, it's going to be you're going to have a big driveway going right through it at some point in there. So, but we can't we can't vote on that now then. Correct. Right. We'd have to put it on the agenda to take formal action. Yeah. Public needs to be notified again. Okay. Can what do I make a motion to put that on the next agenda meeting? I mean, uh, if we don't have a meeting for next month, I would I would rather just wait. I don't think I think when it comes down to it, and this didn't originate with Clay. It originated with me. But, uh, it doesn't have to be a next month meeting if we don't have anything else scheduled is what I'm saying. Maybe put it on the next scheduled meeting when there's something else going on. Yeah. Because I mean, as as the board of adjustment, you guys can revisit any conditional use permit that you want anytime. you just give us the notice to say, "Hey, we want to see," you know, one of you say, "Hey, we want to see this back on the agenda." We can put it back on the agenda for you to revisit. Great. Thank you. Well, we you know what do we have if we go back to the verbiage and that was it did we put restrictions on how high the BMS had to be bes besides just talk besides just recommendations not actual direction? We did not put any height requirements on the burm at all. Six feet. So you you know if you're standing Well, that was what that was our that was what I recommended on the southside because I said because at first they said 15 feet and I said, "Well, how about you put six feet and we'll put in some trees and by then you'll have something that's more

aesthetically pleasing." But if we don't have a restriction on that side, it might be better not to even bring it back up and have and talk to Clay about his grading plan and if it's a foot higher over there because of the way the water flow is going to work. That way you don't give those people down there something to get riled up about. That was a little bit of concern I had about having. So, um, here I'll just I got Audrey handed me the paperwork. So, it just says on it was number 10 and it all it states is that a landscape burm will be constructed on the west and south sides of the property in accordance with the landscaping requirements of the Mills County zoning ordinance. So, we did not put an established height on it. Okay. Yeah, I would in my in my opinion two two things. One, if a person sees something gets brought back up, maybe 10 other people decide they want to get something brought back up or it leads into additional work in the future for us. And two, I don't think all those people coming back into whack at them again would be uh much fun for him. I don't I don't know if we said a burm with no height, just a water burm, something that would work would would satisfy what we said because there's no height to it, right? We could we could call and come in and have him run over his grading plan. and he sent me his grading plan and we I talked to him about it and it I don't know who's doing the work, but it I mean he he's doing it much better than anybody else has done things in this county as far as actually getting stuff. I don't know if he got his hand slapped or something, but it's like he's he's

he's out there trying to do it correctly. Would you be okay with that, Pat? I don't know. I think it I don't think it'd be that hard to just take that condition off there. Leave the same but just for the west side. Yeah. If we have to Cory saying if we have to post that for the public a public hear or so that the public is aware of it and how many other people are going to come in here and say hey we want to have this brought up and changed or we just make it for a burn for defer deferring water flow. Okay. If you can change work with the verbiage like that. Yeah, I just think it's unfair to make a guy spend 20k or whatever for a big sixoot berm if he doesn't need one. It may be easier on clay just with how many neighbors came in kind of riled up over it the first go around rather than to go through that go around again. Just work it through the grading planks. There's not an established height on it. I mean, it could be a six inch per Okay. All right. I'm fine with that. Did you accomplish your mission? No established height on the BMS. Okay. Anything else for other business? We do not have a meeting next month. Nothing came in. So, and I apologize again. I mean, I was doing nothing. It was weird, too, because I was like, I'm not doing anything tonight. On your attendance report, you're only going to get a half star for tonight since you didn't show up. Well, I thought for sure you were going to say yes. I was already in my vehicle. They said no. Go by Zoom. I'm like, okay. All right. No. A lot of weight on you. Well, no, that's good. Yeah, because it Yeah. Retired lifestyle. Somebody's living out there, I guess. Huh. Yeah. Yeah. That's

what it is. That's what it is. Somebody want to make a motion to make a motion to adjurnn. I'll I'll second it. All right. Is there much lag? Is there much lag in between these me talking and you talking or does is it pretty fast? Really is fast. Yeah. This is a great layout now the way you got it now. I wasn't here last meeting. They wore they wore the carpet out. [Laughter] Didn't want to be blinded by the camp. Oh yeah, I got a migraine that one day. So, okay. Well, thank you guys. Sorry again. All right. Thanks.