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■ The property in question cannot be put to a reasonable use under conditions permitted by the Zoning Code; ■ The plight of the landowner is due to circumstances unique to the property not created by the landowner; • 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. Findines of Fact Staff offers the following fifteen findings of fact for review: General Findings 1. The lot depth and width exceed the minimum R-1 requirements. The lot size of 13,939 square feet is nonconforming in the R-1 Zone. 2. The existing structure encroaches ten feet into the forty foot front yard setback along Skiles Lane. The structure meets all other R-1 setback requirements. 3. The proposed addition would encroach 24 feet into the front yard setback. Approximately 480 square feet of the proposed addition would encroach into the front yard setback, of this 96 square feet would be above grade and visible from Skiles Lane. City of Arden Hills Planning Commission Meeting for February 6, 2008 I UhdocsllahWHdatalPlanninglPlanning Cases12007W-029 Wessberg Variance (PC TABLED)1020608 -PC Report - Wessberg Variance.doc Page 5 of 8