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HomeMy WebLinkAboutLetter #123 Jill Meisenheimer & Dee Fox - fourth submission Shestak, Joe From:Dee Fox <dasfox2009@gmail.com> Sent:Friday, June 12, 2020 3:18 PM To:Shestak, Joe Cc:Jill Meisenheimer; Dee Fox Subject:Jackson's Grant Village PUD Rezone vote at full Plan Commission (6/16/20). **** This is an EXTERNAL email. Please exercise caution and Do Not open attachments or click links from unknown senders or unexpected email. **** Hi Joe, Please send this email on to all of the Plan Commissioners. Thanks! Jill H. Meisenheimer and Dee Fox Date: June 12, 2020 To: Plan Commissioners From: Jill Meisenheimer and Dee Fox Subject: Jackson’s Grant Village PUD Rezone, Docket No. 19120002 PUD: All in one place: List of Reasons to Vote Against Proposed Rezone for Commercial Uses. KEY: JG=Jackson’s Grant; JGV=Jackson’s Grant Village; SPMR=Spring Mill Road To Plan Commissioners, Your vote against this proposed rezone to allow insertion of unneeded, unwanted Commercial Uses into a residential neighborhood west of Spring Mill Road, has never mattered more. This is a watershed moment. At the 6/4/20 Committee meeting, Mike Hollibaugh referred to this JGV Commercial node as a test case for a neighborhood “corner store initiative” agenda. Most people who chose West Carmel’s zoning do not want that. West Carmel residents flatly rejected the City's push at the 2009 Comp Plan revision for significantly increasing density in West Carmel and allowing Commercial development up to every mile. Now it’s back on the table. Approval of this proposal would absolutely set a precedent, that could enable dismantling the beautiful, successful, unique area of West Carmel, and irreversibly “transitioning” it to be just another trendy urban area. All West Carmel residents deserve to be notified about the City’s ongoing redevelopment/rezoning agenda which is being carried out parcel-by-parcel, without widespread public awareness. A series of public meetings need to be held to allow an opportunity for direct public input, similar to the public meetings for the 2009 Comp Plan revision process. Until then, we ask you to not support this high-consequence rezone proposal that would again override West Carmel’s zoning and planning. Please give full consideration to the following list of 14 reasons to not support this proposed rezone to allow Commercial Uses. Thank you, Jill H. Meisenheimer (317) 292-5859 Dee Fox (317) 816-0565 1 GATHERED IN ONE LIST — 14 REASONS TO VOTE AGAINST THIS PROPOSED REZONE TO ALLOW AN UNNEEDED AND UNWANTED COMMERCIAL NODE (AND UP TO 70 TOWNHOUSES): 1. Violates the Public Trust: ~ In Carmel’s Zoning and Comprehensive Plan. ~ In City Officials' assurances to West Carmel residents over many years, that Commercial development would not be allowed to spread to the west side of Spring Mill Road. As recently as 2/6/20, a Chateaux de Moulin homeowner emailed Mayor Brainard, in opposition to the proposed JGV Commercial rezone and reminded him of their previous conversations, specifically that there would be no Commercial development on the west side of Spring Mill Road. The Mayor replied, “I agree with you.” ~ SPMR is now the only remaining “dividing line” between intense Commercial and mixed-uses to the east, and the lowest-density single-family homes area of West Carmel. 2. Violates the Zoning: No Commercial (or townhouse) use is permitted in this parcel’s current S-2 zoning, or even in R-1 through R-5 Residential districts. This proposal would jump 5 zoning districts, equivalent to "Urban Residential", in order to allow the Commercial and townhouse uses. Even the “Plan B” all-residential proposal at 4.29 u/a \[89u/20.77a\] would be the density equivalent of R-3 zoning, which does not permit townhouses at all, let alone 70 of them. JGV is not an urban site/location, and is zoned for single-family detached residential only, maximum density 2.4 u/a. 3. Violates the Comprehensive Plan: ~ Once again, the DOCS and developer did not mention the Policies and Objectives specific to West Carmel, intended to protect its large-lot residential areas for estate character housing, including Obj. 6.4: Require large setbacks and lot sizes, and only residential, institutional, and park uses along 116th St. from Spring Mill Road (SPMR) west to the Boone County Line (i.e., no commercial). Utilize the existing zoning ordinance Overlay to implement. (See number 4. below) ~ Once again, the DOCS is not choosing to support the “Best” Adjacent Fits that apply to this JGV "Estate Residential" land classification. Commercial Use and Attached Residential are not listed as a compatible Adjacent Fit at all, not even “Conditional”. ~ Once again, the DOCS supports rezoning property to increase the density and corresponding land classification, which then enables inserting more-intense “Conditional” Adjacent Fits (like townhouses and Commercial). Commercial with townhouses = density of 3.42 u/a \[71u/20.77a\] (over twice JG’s approved overall density limit of 1.5 u/a, and higher than the 3.25 u/a densest section of JG). Without the Commercial = 4.29 u/a \[89u/20.77a\], equivalent to the “Urban Residential” classification, and over quadruple the max. 1 u/a density of this entire "Estate Residential" classification area west of SPMR. *** Even the "Urban Residential” classification limits townhomes (THs) to up to 15%: *** (Proposed, with commercial: 52 THs is 73% of total 71 dwellings. A 15% Limit = 11 THs.) (Proposed, without commercial: 70 THs is 79% of total 89 dwellings. A 15% Limit = 13 THs.) 4. Violates the Purpose of the West 116th Street Overlay (“to protect the estate character of the area”): This proposed PUD Rezone to allow Commercial and higher-density development would nullify the Overlay’s application to the JGV property, without even any mention or discussion at the Plan Commission meetings. Apparently the message going forward is that this Overlay is just another piece of West Carmel’s zoning and planning to be easily overridden and replaced with unplanned and "non-permitted” more-intense development. 5. Mixed-use is meant for Urban areas: West Carmel is uniquely zoned, planned, established, and intended to be the exact opposite of Urban. West Carmel’s lowest-intensity, single-family, detached-homes zoning attracts homebuyers who seek low density and want to avoid having Commercial development near their homes. The understanding has been that any additional Commercial development in West Carmel would go in the areas already planned for it. This JGV property in West Carmel is NOT a 2 transition zone. When the City inserts incompatible development, then that causes a true need for transition where it was not needed before. 6. JG homebuyers were not told directly or in JG advertising that Republic would pursue “urban” Commercial uses (or attached townhomes) on this JGV parcel, so they expected that parcel to be developed with just homes similar to theirs. 7. 98 individuals have written letters (not counting multiple submissions from the same people): 73 in opposition, and 25 in favor, re: the proposed rezone for Commercial development (As of 6/9/20). Many JG homeowners and surrounding neighbors who would be most negatively impacted, detailed passionate objections in their letters, which are worth a second read. 8. Petition with 190 local signatures (176 JG residents plus 14 nearby neighbors) opposed to the Mixed-Use PUD Rezone, and in favor of upholding the existing S-2 zoning (as of 4/23/20). The petition was not even mentioned at the 4/23/20 Hearing or the two Committee meetings. 9. Downplaying the large documented remonstrance in the LaserFiche file, by ignoring it or by repeating vague/misleading claims of support for the Commercial: ~ The DOCS has avoided talking about the large remonstrance (number of emails and petition signatures), and the 5/7/20 Plan Commission Committee meeting proceeded as though there was no remonstrance. (At the end of the 6/4/20 Committee meeting, Alan Potasnik did ask how many people responded to this proposal by phone/email. The answer provided was the total number, but with no mention that the number of emails in opposition far outnumbered those in favor.) ~ No mention at Committees that several of the letters in favor were from home builders or others with conflicts of interest. ~ Republic’s repeated statement about a Focus Group meeting “vote” 2-1 in favor of the Commercial has been repeatedly discredited as very misleading by other JG attendees. Yet, incredulously, this statement still remains in the Executive Summary as though a fact (Commercial Committee’s JGV PUD 6/4/20 Packet). ~ Councilor Rider has said that the majority of people who sought him out were in favor, and Commissioner Kirsh repeated again at Committee that “for about every one person that I’ve heard that they don’t want Commercial here, I’ve also heard a person say they do want Commercial here.” However, neither provided any facts for comparison: Approximate number of those people, their names, was there any conflict of interest involved? ~ Councilor Rider stated, “People that want something tend to be very quiet. People that don’t want something tend to be very vocal", implying that there must somehow be a silent majority of people in favor. (6/4/20 Committee) \[This also implies that no amount of remonstrance against a development proposal is enough.\] 10. Commercial Use is NOT Needed on the JGV Parcel: ~ According to Rick Arnos (Republic), the only retail envisioned for this Commercial area is a coffee/ice cream shop, if possible, with the rest intended to be office space. However, plentiful retail and office space already exist, with more planned, very closeby on the east side of SPMR. ~ During the Focus Group meetings, Republic tried to calm upset JG homeowners by saying that Republic doesn’t need to put commercial uses there, and won’t build what people don’t want, and already had an all-residential, no- commercial “Plan B”. They repeated these statements several times after that to Plan Commissioners. ~ In 2011, this proposed Commercial parcel was withdrawn in order to get the rest of the proposed Silvara/JG PUD rezone approved. ~ With generous setbacks, and effective visual and noise buffering along SPMR and 116th St., single-family homes would sell just fine on the JGV parcel. There are examples of high-value homes along busy roads and roundabouts all over Carmel. ~ We have seen a pattern that the City routinely uses any nearby Commercial development to justify more Commercial, but does not accept surroundings of low-density homes as a reason to uphold the zoning for more low- density homes. 11. Commercial Area Would Likely Struggle to Survive: 3 ~ Lessons learned from The Bridges and The Village of WestClay commercial areas: Both struggle, and neither turned out to be what was presented in order to get approved. The meaningless “hook lines” repeated for virtually every commercial area proposed for insertion into a residential area, including this one, are: “Mom and Pop shops” and/or "walk to a coffee/ice cream shop.” Developers cannot guarantee any particular use, initially or longterm. ~ Republic apparently recognizes that the Commercial area could be denied or fail, since the PUD is already written with the option of adding more townhouses there instead. (We don’t recall any Plan Commissioners even questioning the large number of townhomes being proposed.) ~ Republic admitted that rather than being centrally located for the neighborhood, the “Neighborhood” Commercial needed to be visible from the road in order to attract customers from outside the neighborhood. ~ Due to the pandemic, and competition from chain stores and online shopping that offer larger selection and lower prices, small brick-and-mortar businesses are likely to struggle or fail for years to come. A Commissioner said, "Commercial and tenants are rethinking everything now”, with people working from home and meeting electronically, rather than in a physical space. 12. Commercial Area Would Offer Little Benefit to most JG and Surrounding Residents: ~ Abundant Commercial retail and office space, existing and planned, is just across Spring Mill Road. ~ Some JG homebuyers have stated that they don’t mind nearby Commercial, but don't need or want it within JG’s borders. ~ The Commercial area would not be an “amenity", and would not take any pressure off of the already overcrowded JG true amenities (e.g., swimming pool, clubhouse, sports courts, trails, etc.). ~ The Commercial area’s location off to the far edge of the JGV property would not be very convenient for many in JG. ~ JG already has many places to walk, bike, gather, and socialize. Republic can’t promise a coffee/ice cream shop, or any specific use. Neighbors don’t typically go to offices to socialize, and office space is not likely to be of widespread interest or benefit to the average JG homeowner. ~ After a PUD rezone is approved, development there commonly shifts and changes, especially in commercial areas. 13. The DOCS is Driving the Inclusion of Commercial Use in JGV: ~ Working together for months, Republic said the DOCS encouraged them to keep the Commercial node in their plan. This, in spite of the high level of citizen opposition, and Republic’s statements about not needing to have the Commercial node. Republic said, "If they \[DOCS\] had said to us early-on that they didn’t think this was appropriate, you would not see this in the plan." ~ The Department Reports are slanted in favor of Republic’s proposed (and currently not permitted) Commercial and townhouse uses on the JGV property. Important information, unfavorable to the proposal, was not included. ~ The DOCS has ignored the subject of the City’s longtime assurances about no Commercial spread to along the west side of SPMR. The DOCS routinely favors intensifying development, and inserting urban mixed-use development, even in and near areas zoned all low-density, single-family residential. 14. Ramifications to the Surrounding Areas: ~ The IU Health PUD contains an already planned transition to the single-family home developments west of Spring Mill Road. If more-intense commercial use is approved in JGV, then the IU PUD transition area would likely be amended to allow the same. ~ If this commercial spread to the west side of SPMR is approved, the precedent is set to continue spreading commercial development further west throughout West Carmel, forever changing its unique character and quality-of- life. 4