by Dave DeMars
news@thenewsleaders.com
It looked as though the Rice City Council had a full slate of business at its June 20 meeting, but the business portion of the meeting was handled quickly and with little discussion – that is until the council took up a discussion on ordinances.
The issue under consideration was an attempt to deal with comments made in a previous meeting by council member Chris Scheel and dealing with the approval of a variance owned by Jerry Legatt at 225 First St. SW. The variance was needed because the property was out of compliance with present zoning regulations. It was grandfathered in because the building, while in good shape, is 60 years old.
Legatt requested the variance so he might add a 20-by-100-foot addition to the building for personal storage. In the other portion of the building, Legatt runs an antique snowmobile parts and repair operation.
“I know for a fact there are six businesses in here besides his that are out of compliance,” Scheel said at the June 6 meeting.
Scheel made the statement after council member Allen Voigt had cited the Land-Use-Development Code on zoning to Legatt and explained a parcel zoned for residential use cannot be used for any business. It can only be used for storage.
That statement led to a difficult discussion at this week’s council meeting about whether members of the council had an obligation to explore further which six businesses are out of compliance.
What concerned Voigt was the possibility that people would think the council did not care whether they complied with the city ordinances. He also expressed concern that other businesses might come before the council and request variances and claim the council had looked the other way when Legatt came before the council with his request or had in some way given favorable treatment to Legatt.
“If the council knows about it now, if Chris would have just thought maybe they are or maybe they aren’t . . . but once he said it to all of us, now the integrity of this council is in question as to whether we knew something about it or not,” Voigt said.
Scheel countered, saying when the properties were rezoned last year, they should have been grandfathered in. That would have made them compliant. If in the future one of those property owners would want to expand or improve the property for the business, then that owner would need to request a variance at that time.
Council member Paula Kampa agreed with Voigt, saying she thought he was on the right track but reasoned the issue needed to go back to the planning commission and the assessor. The issue needed to come back through them and they needed to check the zoning situation again. Then the council would have done its due diligence.
“It’s not our job to police it,” Kampa said.
But Voigt took issue with that contention, saying the council still should find out if the six businesses were in compliance. If Scheel knew the businesses were not in compliance, then he should share the names with the council and how those businesses are out of compliance.
Council member Brian Skroch said the variance allowed for Legatt was the result of poor wording and some recent changes in the law covering the ordinance.
“We used to have bullet points,” Skroch said. “You need to do this to get a variance. Now those are blurred, and it’s not written in stone as to what you need to have in order to have a variance. If you didn’t meet these bullet points, you didn’t get a variance.”
Voigt continued, saying the council will have to look to see if what is thought to be a violation really is a violation. Scheel thought the issue could be solved using the assessor and determining how it was assessed.
Voigt said that talk around town is some people receive special treatment from the council because of their name.
“It’s gossip,” Voigt said, “but it’s how stuff like this gets started.”
Kampa volunteered to check to see if the six were in compliance. If they are, there is no problem and Scheel was proven wrong. If there is non-compliance, then the council has some work to do.
Skroch suggested again the real problem lay with the poor language of the ordinance and the fact it was not as clear as it had been.
Finally, Scheel made a motion, seconded by Kampa, that they would do the leg work to determine if the six businesses were or are actually non-compliant, and the motion passed unaninomously.
The council also approved a garage encroachment agreement at 125 First Ave. NW and the sale by auction of forfeited vehicles in the police impound lot via online bid, and gave final approval of the updated bid to repair the men’s bathroom flooring in city hall with a spending limit of $3,054.
