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Land use app gets no recommendation from zoning board
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| By: Mark J. Crawford, Editor |
May 08, 2008 |
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A Bradford County Zoning Board meeting Monday night ended in some confusion after one member changed his vote following adjournment.
Ken Ryan, who is new to the board, said he did not intend to vote in favor of a motion recommending the county commission deny a land use change at the entrance of Deerwood Subdivision at the corner of U.S. 301 and Southeast 48th Avenue.
Those on both sides of the issue took their seats, and the zoning board voted again. This time, instead of a 3-1 vote recommending the county commission deny the application, the vote was 2-2.
The vote came after more than an hour and a half of comment for and against the application. Ryan joined Doyle White in supporting the applicants, while Colin Davis and James Jackson voted in favor of several Deerwood homeowners opposing the application.
As a result, the application will proceed to the county commission on May 15 without a recommendation from the zoning board.
The county commission denied a similar application last May that sought to amend the future land use map to allow for commercial uses on four parcels near the entrance of Deerwood Subdivision. The new application drops one of those four parcels to focus on the three situated at and near the northwest corner of 301 and Southeast 48th Avenue.
Darrell O'Neal spoke on behalf of his wife, Susan, and the other landowner, Elise NesSmith, who make up New River Land Development Inc. Together they wish to sell the land for commercial retail development but cannot unless the property is eventually rezoned. Amending the future land use would be the first step in that process.
O'Neal's tech-savvy presentation focused on the trio of parcels being the ideal spot for such a development. Much has changed since the construction of the Wal-Mart Supercenter and accompanying commercial uses across the highway, he said. The intersection is now the busiest commercial intersection in the county, and while all of this commercial buildup has been taking place, little further residential development has occurred in the subdivision.
The property directly to the north of the three parcels in question is commercial, and in fact, O'Neal presented a map that showed commercial uses on 301 north and south of the subdivision dwarfing the relatively small number of residential uses.
There is an existing home on one of the three parcels covered in the application, while the other two are vacant. The applicants solicited a letter from the individual presently renting the home from them to demonstrate the unsuitability of the property as a residence. That renter, Mark Williams, described the home as the worst location he had ever lived at.
"The house is great, but it's like the sun never goes down from the lights across the street," wrote Williams, also complaining about traffic noise from large trucks, squealing tires, horns and automobile accidents.
"At the end of my lease, I would not want to continue living here and I could not imagine anyone who would," he wrote.
O'Neal showed an artist's rendering of the type of multiple tenant retail development planned for the site. He included among potential tenants national shoe and clothing stores, sporting goods stores, dollar stores, cell phone retailers and salons.
"The developer said the anchor tenants for this are the type that wouldn't normally come to Starke. They go wherever Wal-Mart goes," O'Neal said, adding this particular developer has looked at other sites but is only interested in this location.
He said a buffer in the form of a fence and vegetation would be used to shield the neighborhood from the commercial development, and the development would more than meet the set back requirements of the land development code, perhaps even doubling or tripling them. Every home except for the one directly across the street would be shielded from the development, O'Neal said.
Because ingress and egress to the development would not be allowed from 301, customers, employees, delivery trucks and others would have to enter the subdivision via Southeast 48th Avenue then turn into one of the two proposed entrances for the development. One accesses the parking lot in front of the proposed building, and one accesses a lot for employees and deliveries at the back of the building.
O'Neal said they were proposing a combination of signage and speed bumps to allay traffic fears and let drivers know they were entering a dead-end street.
O'Neal demonstrated support for the application, producing several more letters, including correspondence from residents of other neighborhoods like Tim Thompson and Kay Waters, who wrote that their lives had not been adversely affected by the development of commercial uses in their neighborhoods.
Ron Lilly, president and CEO of the chamber of commerce and liaison to the Bradford County Economic Development Authority, said the development authority board members had voted to endorse the application because it would result in new commercial construction and activity. Virgil Berry, a chamber and development authority board member, concurred, saying existing commercial buildings remain vacant because of high rent. A development of this type is needed and the proposed location is the perfect place, Berry said.
"It's unfortunate that the lights are hitting out there," he said, referring to the impact of commercial activity on residents, "but change happens whether we like it or not."
O'Neal said the applicants own approximately 40 percent of the land in the subdivision, mostly undeveloped. Fifteen of the 32 lots in the 30-plus-year-old subdivision remain undeveloped, he said.
"It's kind of a stretch to say this is a thriving subdivision," O'Neal said. Except for the homes NesSmith has built in the last few years, there has not been any new home construction there, he added. To the contrary, the trend of land development in the area is commercial, and tax revenue generated from the property by commercial development would increase by 80 percent.
O'Neal said the applicants are heavily invested in the subdivision land and intend to market their remaining acreage based on the convenience of the lots to shopping and other commercial services.
Michael Grimes, one of the homeowners present to oppose the land use amendment application, said the applicants may own half the land, but they do not own half of the homes. He and many of the other homeowners in Deerwood asked the board to vote against recommending the application because they said it would negatively impact safety, property values and their quality of life.
"Urban development planning directs that towns be developed to promote strong urban cores in which communities are protected from intrusions of adverse effect," said Holly Grimes. "Approving this request for a change in land use, in my opinion and the other professionals with which I sought counsel, would be a contribution to the condition of urban sprawl, a concept looked on very negatively by the general public. This creates precedent for continued movement away from the city's center and provides for continued degradation of the town core."
In a place this size, diverse land uses already exist in close proximity, making it important that the existing dividing lines are enforced, she added.
The requested land use change was made, not because of a lack of appropriate locations for such developments, but because a corporation found that it could buy land in a residential area for rates far less than commercial, then seek to change the land use before selling it for greater profit, Grimes said.
Cheryl Spanswick opposes the application because her front yard faces the proposed development.
"Right now I'm already putting up with the noise, pollution, congestion at the corner from Wal-Mart. Now I will also have this in my front yard," Spanswick said.
Not only could she sit in her front yard at night and read a book thanks to the lights in the parking lot across the highway, she said he can also hear the audio advertisements from the pumps at the gas station.
"Now putting it on a second side of me is something that is going to be really tough," Spanswick said.
Lorie Jones claimed the land use change was being sought out of greed and selfishness. She said she was personally approached by one of the applicants to sign a document releasing the lots in question from the deed restrictions prohibiting commercial use and said she was further told that the sale of the properties was needed to keep the applicant's business afloat.
"I do not feel that I or my 5-year-old daughter or my neighbors should have to suffer or should have to lose our peacefulness, safety or integrity in our neighborhood because of someone's poor business decision," Jones said.
Gary Knowles, speaking of his experience as a law enforcement officer, said the proposed development would not only increase lighting and traffic but bring crime to the neighborhood as well. He said he does not want the crimes taking place at Wal-Mart brought into the subdivision.
Knowles said there are seven commercially zoned acres just north of the existing automotive repair shop with two entrances on 301 and an existing median break in the highway that could better support a commercial development like the one proposed.
"It fronts 301, it doesn't affect a residential area, there's ample room for construction, for parking, and it would not have and adverse effect on myself or the other residents in the Deerwood Subdivision," Knowles said.
Lamar Waters expressed concern for the safety of his family, particularly his 3-year-old son. He said the issue is not about 100 feet along 301 but about money, and the applicants do not have enough money to make up for anything that might happen to his little boy because of increased traffic into the subdivision.
Others spoke and letters were also submitted by some who could not be present, including Mary Milton, whose letter pointed out that land development regulations limit permitted uses in residential districts, including uses that would encourage a larger number of visitors than would normally be expected in residential neighborhoods. Furthermore, she wrote that no land in a residential district can be used for a driveway or other access to land in a commercial or industrial district or used for any purpose not permitted in a residential district other than ingress and egress to an existing use that does not abut on a street.
Because access would not be allowed by the state to the lots in question from 301, the residential road would have to be used to access the proposed development, and she wrote that does not conform to the land development regulations.
"The quality of life for Deerwood Subdivision residents has already been negatively impacted by the development of Wal-Mart from traffic, noise, light and garbage pollution," Milton wrote, also pointing to the overabundance of vacant commercial and office space in the city of Starke. Even the new building next to Florida Credit Union remains empty, she pointed out.
Not all of the homeowners in the subdivision commented against the application. Al Mate, and his wife, Joan, wrote to the zoning board, saying they sold one of the three lots in question to New River Development knowing what the buyers intended to do with it and the neighboring land. Their home is located directly behind the proposed commercial development and they said they do not oppose it.
A second application will go before the county commission on May 15. Twenty acres of Keystone Heights Airpark property where the future land use was recently amended for commercial development is now up for commercial intensive rezoning.
That application received the full support of the zoning board, although attorney Michael Woodward again spoke on behalf of Crystal Lake residents Eric and Esther Piper, who oppose the change in part because of the impact they fear it will have on the lake and drinking water.
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©Bradford County Telegraph 2009
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