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. The variance, if granted, will not alter the essential character of the locality; and, . Economic considerations alone shall not constitute an undue hardship if reasonable use for the property exists under the terms of the Code. B. Additional Review Information: Although State Statutes include guidelines for evaluating variances, the interpretation and meaning of those Statutes have been impacted by various court decisions. A somewhat common, though apparently incorrect, interpretation of the written Statutes is that a property owner must show that they do not have reasonable use of their property without an approved variance. The difficulty with this standard is what counts as "reasonable use" of the property? Since most properties could be construed to have "reasonable use" without a variance, this standard was declared virtually insurmountable by the Court of Appeals. A revised interpretation of the "reasonable use" evaluation criteria has emerged from the Minnesota Court of Appeals. According to the City Attorney, a property owner does not need to show that reasonable use for a property only exists with an approved variance. Instead, the landowner must only demonstrate that the proposed variation is reasonable for a particular property in a given zone. For example, the property owner must only demonstrate that an addition that encroaches into a particular setback is reasonable as opposed to showing that the property would only have reasonable use with the addition. While this is a much softer interpretation of reasonable use, the applicant must still address all four variance criteria listed above. Findinl!s of Fact Staff offers the following twenty-four fmdings of fact for review: General Findings 1. The lot size of 15,761 square feet and the lot dimensions are conforming m the underlying R-2 Zone. 2. The existing dwelling meetings all property line setbacks. 3. The proposed dwelling would be as close as 13 feet to the western property line, which encroaches either 17 or 27 feet into the western property line setback depending on the designation of the western property line. A variance is required to encroach into the western property line setback. 4. The proposed dwelling does not encroach on any other required setbacks. 5. The existing detached accessory structure is nonconforming because it encroaches into the southern side yard and western property line setbacks. The existing accessory City of Arden Hills Planning Commission Meetingfor Julyll, 2007 IlMetro-inet.uslardenhi/lslPlanninglPlanning Cases\2007\07-016 Gonzalez Variance (COMPLETE)\071107 - PC Report - Gonzalez Variance.docy Page 8 of 13