January 31, 2009

What has the city council been up to?

January 7: Regular Meeting followed by Committee of the Whole

Legislation for First Reading

Ordinance 09-01: To amend the 2009 salary ordinance to reflect staff classification changes and new staff additions.

Ordinance 09-02: To designate 38 acres being transferred into the city’s planning jurisdiction (2865 E. Rhorer Rd.) as a Planned Unit Development (PUD).

Committee of the Whole Discussion

Ordinance 09-01: Daniel Grundmann, director of employee services, described why he is requesting an amendment to the salary ordinance, and listed each position affected. The position classification changes are first considered by a job evaluation committee comprised of staff from various departments before they are approved.

Resolution 09-01: Planning director Tom Micuda introduced this resolution to change the interlocal agreement between Bloomington and Monroe County regarding the planning jurisdiction of each, to incorporate 38 acres on Rhorer Rd. into the city’s planning jurisdiction. This would be necessary before Ord. 09-02 could be approved.

Ordinance 09-02: If we decide to allow the 38 acres to change from the county’s to the city’s planning jurisdiction, we need to put some sort of land use designation on it. Mr. Micuda proposed a PUD because:

1)    The 38 acres is currently zoned for 1 unit per acre in the county. The city has no equivalent zoning, nothing between “Residential Single-Family” (4 units/acre) and “Residential Estate” (2.5 acre lots). So for the developer to get the same value for his property that he has in the county, he is asking for a PUD which allows 1 unit/acre.

2)      The developer who owns the land, Sherman Rogers’s company YFD, also owns 114 other contiguous acres, and they plan to put all these parcels together and propose one big Planned Unit Development in the future.

I was concerned that the future development be subject to strict environmental regulations, and I thought that this could be best achieved in the city’s planning jurisdiction. In addition, a PUD has to go through a rigorous approval process in which the Environmental Commission makes recommendations to the Plan Commission, and the Plan Commission makes a recommendation to the City Council. The City Council has the final vote whether to approve a PUD or not. So it made sense for the 38 acre parcel to enter into the city’s jurisdiction as a PUD. Further, Mr. Micuda told us that if we did not grant at least the same development density as the parcel has in the county, the developer would just leave it in the county.

January 14: Executive Session

We met in private to discuss security during Council meetings. 

January 21: Regular Session

Legislation for Second Reading

Ordinance 09-01 and Resolution 09-01 were passed.

Ordinance 09-02: I proposed an amendment which would require the 38 acre parcel on Rhorer Road to be developed following the Conservation Subdivision model described in our Unified Development Ordinance. In this model, houses are clustered on the portion of the site where there are the least environmental constraints, and the portion with the most environmentally sensitive area is left undeveloped and protected. On the Rhorer Road site, the stream and sinkholes would be protected from development and less natural land would be disturbed. Both the amendment and the ordinance as a whole passed.

Legislation for First Reading: None

January 28: No Meeting due to lack of legislation