REGULAR MEETING OF THE EATON PLANNING
ZONING AND BUILDING BOARD ON APRIL 12, 2005
AT 7:00 P.M., IN COUNCIL CHAMBERS
The Eaton Planning, Zoning and Building Board met in regular session in Council Chambers on Tuesday, April 12, 2005, at 7:00 p.m.
The roll was called and the following was found to be:
Present: Ron Coleman
Harold Geeting
Steve Deffner
Gary Wagner
Tom Jordan
Also in attendance were City Manager Dave Daily, acting City Engineer Joe Ferriell, and Law Director Donnette Fisher. The meeting was called to order at 7:00 p.m.
MINUTES:
The minutes of the March 8, 2005 meeting were read. A motion to approve the minutes was made by Gary Wagner and they were seconded by Ron Coleman. The motion passed as follows:
Ayes:
Coleman, Spencer, Lane, Geeting, Lane,
Nays: None
SWEARING IN:
All members of the audience anticipating to testify before the Board were asked to stand and be sworn in. The Secretary administered the oath or affirmation to the audience.
Who is representing this request tonight, if you would step to the front and give your name for the record?
Becht: My name is Jeffrey Becht and I am the owner and
president of Sign Dynamics and we are located in
Spencer: The one out in the front, the monument, is that a lighted sign?
Becht: Yes, it will be a lighted sign. I don’t know if it will be on 24 hours, I don’t think so, but it will be lighted.
Wagner: The wall sign on the north side of the
building that is going to face
Becht: Yes.
Wagner: It is not on
Becht: I don’t know which one is the front. This is where the monument is going, in the corner of the two.
Wagner: Your main entrance is on
Becht: Yes, I believe it is, I am not 100% sure but I believe it is. I have to go by it again.
Becht: A lot of times, on the front of the building, they might have an entrance, the walk in entrance might be on the side. I am not sure if that is like that or not.
Wagner: The point is that if you are going to put one on the front, that is not a variance.
Fisher: The way Bob measures the building he is
actually considering
Wagner: What is the address of the building?
Fisher:
Wagner: Then technically the front is
Fisher: Whichever way you look at it basically they need a variance to put a sign on each wall.
Wagner: The sign on each wall, would it be this sign?
Becht: Yes. It will be their logo and florescent bulbs and the actual name will be in channel letters and the monument sign will be florescent bulbs also.
Wagner: Donnette, on our new code, I know we are not suppose to be, but on the new code how does this fall?
Fisher: The issue isn’t allowable area but I think in the new code we allowed more than one structure type so they would be okay there. I don’t think in the new code we limited, in the new code we limited it by size. If you are within the allowable size you can have as many as you want.
Wagner: Under the new code does this fall under
Fisher: It would just fall under Business.
Wagner: We eliminated shopping centers out of the new code.
Fisher: It is not a shopping center, shopping center would be many different buildings and this is just a single standing building.
Wagner: Was that a variance?
Wagner: Did we approve that?
Fisher: Under the new one, and it even says, one per street front and they have two street fronts. I think they would be okay.
Ferriell: Planning Board makes a recommendation to the
Appeals Board on variances following Chapter 1133.07 and the Comprehensive
Development Plan. The Zoning district is ‘C-1’. The monument sign
is 30.5 sq. ft. and the one wall sign along Washington Jackson is 30.94 sq. ft.
and the one wall sign along
The applicant is requesting a variance to locate more than one structural sign, more than two signs and a sign on an elevation other than the front wall.
The Comp plan is “North Gateway” Planning Area (map 13) and is also in a “Special Planning Area”. No special recommendations pertain to this application.
Fisher: It does appear that this is another one of those variances that would be temporary in nature because it looks like it would be in compliance with the new zoning code.
Wagner: I move for the approval of AB-05-03 in that it meets the applicable standards as identified in Chapter 1133.07. Harold Geeting seconded the motion and it passed as follows:
Ayes:
Coleman, Spencer, Lane, Geeting,
Nays: None
Abstain: Deffner (1)
Spencer: You might want to add a finding of fact that in this particular case, being on a corner like that, this sign is not only an identity sign but also a directional sign. As they noted in the application they have four flows of traffic that come through that area and signage would be very important there to show people where the building is, the drive through and so forth. In addition to identity I think that as one finding of fact it would be helpful to state it as a directional sign.
AB-05-04 – Variance –
Angela Lyles – Angel’s
Lyles: I will and I am Mark Lyles.
Lyles: On the front of the building, the front actually faces Somers, for two reasons we were wanting to catch the traffic flow off of Barron and we can’t do that with a sign on the front because of the way the front structure of the building and because of the signage that was there. We were wanting to put one above the side entrance that goes into Linda’s and also to Dave Biggs.
Lyles: The wind blew it off.
Lyles: Yes. Dave said that they will put it back as it was.
How large of a sign are you actually wanting to place?
Lyles: It is a 3x7 and it is actually an oval shape.
Lyles: Yes.
Lyles: Non-lighted.
Wagner: This sign was located at another business out of our community before this?
Lyles: Yes.
Wagner: So, you want to move the sign to the new location in our town?
Lyles: Yes.
Wagner: I went down there today and just walked around the building and noticed there were no signs in the front and now I know why. When I walked around there, I know the corner lot is a parking lot, therefore if there was a building there you wouldn’t have a sign on the side of the building. I look at it like it is a corner lot on an alley so I would have no problem with the variance the way he has applied for based on those kind of facts. It does meet the requirements as far as size. There is no size issue here.
Deffner: What is the picture?
Lyles: That was a picture of a previous business
that was in
Deffner: But you are going to have an oval?
Lyles: It will be that sign right there.
Deffner: With the same measurements?
Lyles: Yes.
Deffner: I thought you said 3x7.
Lyles: That was roughly the size. What does it show on there?
Deffner: 42x90 inches.
Lyles: That is the sign there. At the other we also had two 4x8’s but they were on a sign post out by the road which we don’t have at this location.
Geeting: I don’t really see any problem with it either. It seems like it meets all six of the standards.
Ferriell: The Planning Board makes a recommendation to the Appeals Board on variances following Chapter 1133.07. It is in the ‘C-4’ zoning district. Section 1169.07 (a) allows wall signs; however, Section 1169.07 (b) (1) requires the sign to be along the building and to face parallel to the street. This applicant is requesting a variance to locate the sign on the East side of the building. The Comp Plan is “Downtown” Planning Area, with a future land use of Downtown and no special recommendations pertain to this application.
Fisher: I think Bob’s letter in your packets explained it pretty well.
Wagner: I think since there is not room on the front and we are trying to attract business in our community, I think we would be well served if we would approve this attractive business sign. Even though it is a variance for signage, with the location of the building and the sign facing the east and the parking lot next to it, it doesn’t do any harm to our property or the property around it.
Spencer: It should be noted that the owner of the building is in full support of this. I think it would be a good addition to the building.
Deffner: I make a motion to approve case AB-05-04 as presented. The motion was seconded by Ron Coleman and passed as follows:
Ayes: Coleman, Spencer, Lane, Geeting, Deffner,
Nays: None
Old Business:
Fisher: Dave, do you think we should hold off for a week?
Dave: You have these chapters?
Fisher: This is one through five. I have re numbered them and re formatted the entire thing. The one that I made the biggest changes to was what was previously five and is now 1109. As you recall we talked about 6, it was such a mess and we just threw things in there. In five all you had was Planned Unit Development, the Planned Residential Conservation Development and the Historic Development, all of those are overlay districts. I pulled the telecommunicaiton, the flood plain and the well field out of six and you now have all of your Overlay Districts in one Chapter. I thought that would be a little easier and it narrows down Chapter 6. You didn’t really have a lot of changes in seven.
Daily: Will we be getting six and seven by Friday?
Fisher: If we can get you six and seven by this weekend.
Fisher: I don’t know how many changes you are going to want to make.
Daily: What is your feeling? Are you going to take more than one meeting, do you think?
Daily: Yes.
Daily: We were talking about that today and I didn’t think we would.
Wagner: There are some questions about this Historic District that I think we need to talk about, but we could do that at the meeting.
Fisher: Their next meeting is the 10th.
Daily: Is it something you can talk about now?
Wagner: Having thought
about it a little further and what we talked about at the last work
session. Dave you had made a comment about structure age and thinking
about that, if we designate the square that we are talking about and we go from
Somers to
Daily: Like the Village Pantry?
Wagner: Yes. I read in the Register Herald this week, there is an article that Fanny Kiesling writes in there and I noticed that when the town was first laid out that the first plots that were laid out went from Decatur Street to Israel and then from Maple Street to Walnut Street. I don’t know if you want to read and review that and use that as a Historical. People are going to ask up why did you select these streets, why did you select these blocks? We can say there is a Historical History there that shows that that was the first lots set out in our community back whenever they did it.
We left out one Historical block there that was part of the original plotting of Eaton at the time.
Geeting: I did that because I thought that was pretty much the original layout. I was thinking that, not particularly now, but as a second step or a next step would be to go in like you were saying was to go in and identify certain buildings. You didn’t have to take exactly the whole thing, it would be the Historic District, but then you would identify certain buildings that might not fit in.
Wagner: That is why I think by putting the designation of being constructed prior to a certain date and they would fall in under the criteria and those that didn’t would fall under the eye of the Historic District Board and have them make the determination of whether it is a Historic building or not and then they could waive those requirements.
Fisher: That was the original plat for the City when it was incorporated?
Geeting: When it was first laid out, how it was originally laid out.
Fisher: You want to add to where?
Wagner: It would take in
the block from
Fisher: What was that again?
Wagner: You go from
There numerous structures in there that wouldn’t fall under Historical, in my mind.
Fisher: Would you want any kind of requirements if you limited that to buildings built before a certain time, would you want anything that if a home burns down or is destroyed, that a new home be built in general conformity with the character of the area?
Geeting: I think you would.
Fisher: That way you are not getting a prefab home in the middle of two big brick houses.
Wagner: Yes, my mind hadn’t gone that far yet.
Deffner: The thing that I think, in talking about dates, how are you going to determine the construction date on these homes?
Wagner: I would imagine that the Court House has that information.
Fisher: I bet you can get it right off of the auditor’s site.
Daily: Probably the earliest. A lot of times that is what they did, the husband and wife would put the foundation in and as the family grew they would do the additions. It was that main foundation.
Wagner: I don’t know what date, what year you would select. When I look at the video that you gave me last week, that was taken in 1936 and a lot of those buildings are still standing. I don’t know if you can say that all of those buildings have Historical significance as far as when they were founded to a certain point.
Coleman: What date are you going to start with? Are you going to start when Eaton became a City?
Wagner: What you do is put a date on prior to, whatever prior to 1936, anything built prior to 1936 falls into Historical building.
Coleman: I think you could go back into the 1800.
Wagner: You could, if we have structures built in the 1800 you would want to preserve it.
Coleman: That one down by Renner’s is that one of the first structures?
Wagner: That was William Bruce’s house, he plotted Eaton. He was the one that laid out what we just talked about. I wanted to throw that out to you so while you are reviewing you can think about that. I think you need to give the Historic Board some flexibility to say, this house doesn’t fall under the criteria and no it isn’t a Historical building. If you make it too strict with no flexibility, then you are going to be sitting up here arguing with property owners all the time.
Coleman: I don’t understand the goal.
Wagner: The goal is to preserve the Historic downtown area, the buildings.
Coleman: I can see the downtown but now you are spreading it out. I am thinking these houses, like the one that burned down there, what are we going to do with that?
Wagner: It is going to be a parking lot.
Coleman: I thought when this started it was going to clean those up but I can’t see any way they are going to get those cleaned up in this Historical District. I thought that was the whole thing about this Historical District that we were going to force people to clean these old houses up.
Wagner: No, the Property Maintenance Code does that. The Historic District is supposed to preserve the integrity of the Historic downtown.
Jordan: So we won’t have a big building in the middle of the downtown.
Wagner: My thought is that, every building in that area that Harold or I described, all those homes or structures are not Historical structures. So the Board will have flexibility to say that they don’t have to comply with these rules because your house was built after 19 whatever.
Spencer: If you don’t do it that way then they would have to comply or they would be out of code.
Fisher: You can set a date like we are talking about, everything before 1925 has to comply and everything after that doesn’t. You can leave them in place but you could put something in the code that, upon review by the Historical District Review Board that these regulations do not apply based on the age or character of the home. You could include something in there that, the Review Board can determine that the rules and regulations do not apply based upon the age of the house, but they could still have some say in, I want to tear off the siding and put on bright pink siding. They could still have some say in that any major modifications to a house fit the general character of the neighborhood. It is not, you have to comply with every single thing, this is a newer home, but we want you to maintain it and keep it in a way that preserves the character of the area.
Wagner: I guess the bottom line for me was to give, whoever those people are on the Board, the flexibility of saying no, because of what you just said, you do not have to comply with these rules and regulations.
Daily: You could also put it on like a perpetual program where any building that is 100 years old, obviously every year the scale moves up, then you will capture those homes as they age and they will start falling in over time.
Wagner: What that does, that makes everything after 1955, falls in that group. A lot of things built in 1955 have Historical value.
Daily: If you use 100 years it would be 1905, then 1906, and 1907.
Fisher: You could put something in there that these regulations shall apply to all buildings 100 years old or older. In the case of buildings that are under that, then you could give the review committee, and then it would depend if you would want the review committee to have the power or if you want it, to say that these regulations don’t apply to you or these regulations don’t apply but you are doing a major modification here and we want to make sure you are not using bright pink and green.
Wagner: The way the administrative process is on that committee right now, they have the authority to require this property owner to comply but the property owner has the right to appeal to Council only.
Fisher: The other thing we could do is, we could change that and set it up more like a Conditional Use, where they review it and make a recommendation to you, as Planning Board, and make you as Planning Board decide.
Jordan: I would rather see it in the Historic District Committee hands and let them make the decision because they are going to be more versed in the Historical aspect than we are and then if the property owner has a problem they can still appeal to Council.
Fisher: The only reason I recommended that is when the other overlay district, the Well Field Protection, the Telecommunications, the Flood Plain they all come to you to issue the permit. The PUD’s, you make recommendations on them, Council ultimately decides those so that is why I suggested that you might want to funnel them through the same way. It is up to you whether you want to see them or not.
Coleman: That way if you get a radical Board you have something to do with the Board.
Spencer: That’s the fear that you might get a small number of people on that Board and if their eggs aren’t cooked just right that morning somebody is going to pay.
Fisher: If you have them make a recommendation to you and have you review it is a lot easier than trying to do that during a Council meeting.
Mayor Stonecash-From the audience: I think Gary is right and the Committee should make the decision and if they want to appeal it they appeal to Council. The way you are going now you are going to too many different Boards and it is going to end up with Council anyway so why burden three different Boards with a problem like that. When we originally talked about it,
Fisher: I am just throwing out options Bob.
Stonecash: that Committee was responsible directly to Council. The reason for that was to keep that Committee in line. We have had situations in the past where a certain group wanted to tell everybody downtown how to paint their buildings, using strong arm and I don’t think we want a strong arm. We want people with common sense.
Spencer: I think what Bob is saying is that the important thing is that at least there is that appeal process in there.
Wagner: I didn’t mean to open a bag of worms but it has been on my mind for a week and I needed to get it out.
Fisher: Bob, the only reason I suggested that was the Well Field, Telecommunication, the Flood Plain they get reviewed and then they go to Planning Board for approval, because they are like a permit process. The only thing that you guys see from all of the Overlay District at Council is PUD’s. You normally wouldn’t see Historic District because it is a Building Review, it is not a Zoning Review, it is not legislative, and it is administrative. That is why I suggested.
Mayor Stonecash: I think at least three of us agree on that situation.
Fisher: sending it here instead of Council. Even if you guys decided it is still administrative appealable, to the Courts because it is administrative action, you guys deciding it won’t make it legislative.
Stonecash: That’s okay.
Fisher: Okay.
Stonecash: We will let Dave Abruzzo decide it then. Do you agree with that Gary?
Wagner: Yes, I don’t have any problem with that.
Daily: Are you looking at this 100-year then?
Jordan: I would say look at the 100 year and then let aggress as time moves on.
Geeting: That would work.
Wagner: I don’t want the Historic deal to become a burden on anybody to the point where you see a lot of it in Council and if you do then it is not working, in my opinion. I talked to my brother-in-law who is on the City Council in Miamisburg and they went through the Historic District deal that they had over there in the downtown area and they had a lot of issues with that and it was just dropped, not enforced and now there is a contingent of people over there who want to re establish that. They have lost a lot of buildings because of fire and other things happen with the restaurants and things. It could be something good and I want it to be good I don’t want it to be a burden on anybody.
Daily: We will have to see how the first couple of cases go and we may have to tweak it.
Wagner: Most people that live in Historic structures or in that area will be happy with it. Most of them are going to do it anyway even without the Overlay District being there.
Jordan: That is the purpose of this whole code review, we want to make it so that it is more streamlined and we don’t have to have all of these variances and all this kind of stuff. We need the Historic District, but I have mixed emotions about doing it. We need to have it so it does have a process where people aren’t forced to do what they don’t want to do with their own property. If the Historical District makes a decision and they appeal it to Council, that’s fine, as long as they have a right and a way to appeal the decision of that Board.
Daily: Like I said we will see how the first couple go and then make any adjustments that need be and we might have it right the first time.
Jordan: So, we are on for the 19th at 6:30 p.m.
New Business:
Jordan: Any new business?
Tim Lane makes a motion to adjourn and Ron Coleman seconds. All ayes.
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Secretary Chairman