Laserfiche WebLink
<br />2. Zoning Code amendment to allow institutional housing as an interim use in the B-2 Zone. <br />3. The property owner would need to obtain an approved interim use permit to legally permit <br />institutional housing on a temporary basis on the former Holiday Inn property. <br /> <br />While the College has stated that the student housing use would be temporary, the City currently <br />does not have a legal tool to place an expiration date on any particular use if the use is categorized as <br />a permitted use or conditional use. Within State Statutes, however, there is a tool called the inlerim <br />use permit. This permit is similar to a conditional use permit except that a city can place an <br />expiration date on the use. In order to use this tool, this process would need to be added to the <br />Zoning Code along with a set of requirements that must be met in order to grant the interim use <br />permit. In the case of institutional housing, the City could require each room to have a bathroom, <br />limit the number of people in the building, require mass transportation to and from campus, etc. <br />Adding this process to the Zoning Code requires a public hearing with the Planning Commission and <br />Council approval. The interim use process could be useful in other situations in the future. <br /> <br />As noted above, institutional housing is currently not allowed in the B-2 Zone. Since it is against <br />State Statutes to grant a variance for a use, the B-2 zoning regulations would need to be amended to <br />add institutional housing as an interim use. This Zoning Code addition would require a public <br />hearing with the Planning Commission and Council approval. <br /> <br />Once the interim use permit process is added to the Zoning Code and institutional housing is added <br />as an interim use to the B-2 Zone, the College would then need to obtain the actual interim use <br />permit. Granting an interim use permit requires a public hearing with the Planning Commission and <br />Council approval. <br /> <br />While this may seem like a complicated process, all three steps could conceivably be done on the <br />same agenda with the Planning Commission. The City Attorney has reviewed the above process and <br />agrees that it is possible to do. Please note that the current moratorium only refers to new <br />construction and reconstruction. The moratorium does not stop the City from considering changes to <br />the Zoning Code. <br /> <br />Preliminarv Analvsis <br /> <br />While the Council meeting is not the appropriate forum to debate the concept or to give an official <br />answer to the concept, the College and Staff is requesting preliminary feedback on the concept <br />proposaL Northwestern College has indicated that they are on a very constrained schedule, and the <br />time to prepare and process the series of applications would be time-consuming. To help facilitate <br />the discussion, Staff has prepared a brieflisting of some of the pros and cons associated with this <br />concept (this is not intended to be an all-inclusive list): <br /> <br />Pros <br />. The property would have a user and maintenance issues associated with a vacant property <br />would likely be reduced (i.e. graffiti, lawn maintenance, general appearance of the building <br />and property); <br /> <br />\\Metro-inet.us1ardenhills\Plalll1ing\Deve!opmeJJf Projecfs\Norlhwestem College\021108 -NWC-Holiday Inn COl1cepl Proposal.doc <br /> <br />Page 2 of3 <br />