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Council delays action on church expansion plan
by Brian S. Orban
Mountain Home News
During its first meeting of the new year Monday evening, the Mountain Home City Council delayed final votes on conditional use permits involving the local Catholic community as well as Richard McKenna Charter High School.
The city council debated both issues for approximately two hours following the swearing in of council members Richard Urquidi and Alain Isaac, who ran uncontested in the November elections.
Earlier in the meeting, the four-person council unanimously approved recommendations from city hall to maintain Mountain Home's current department heads, including its chief of police and city fire chief. In addition, council members also made changes to which of the 15 different committees each of them serve on as liaisons to city leadership.
Meanwhile, the council unanimously voted to name Councilman Russ Anderson as its new president.
During the evening, the council began initial discussions on the city's parking ordinance. Urquidi said the law, approved in 1996, needed a review to address concerns with future growth in the core downtown area.
As written, the current parking ordinance requires new buildings to include a minimum number of parking spaces, Urquidi said. He used the former Kings building at the corner of American Legion Boulevard and North 2nd East Street to highlight problems with the current law. As written, he said, no one could tear down the building and build a new store there because the lot lacks the minimum number of required parking spaces, despite the fact the now-vacant store has a designated parking lot.
"If someone came in tomorrow and asked us if they could reopen that store, they couldn't because it doesn't meet the (parking) ordinance," said Mayor Tom Rist. "We want to encourage business growth downtown, so we should look at this ordinance."
"Parking is a sensitive topic," added Isaac, who owns an appliance store in the downtown area. "There's not enough parking downtown even with all the vacant store fronts."
Issues with downtown parking took center stage as the council debated a conditional use permit from the local Catholic community to build a new fellowship hall next to its existing church at the corner of East Jackson and North 4th East streets. The goal was to replace several existing buildings around town, including Good Counsel Hall, located a mile from the church. It also aimed to keep its fellowship area, administration offices and classrooms next to the existing church.
In a separate meeting Jan. 4, the city's planning and zoning commission recommended disapproving the church's conditional use permit, saying the plan falls well short of meeting the minimum number of parking spaces required by city ordinance. According to the law, the church needs approximately four times the needed parking spaces than the church's plan allows.
During its presentation to the city council on Monday, members from the architectural firm that developed the building plan emphasized the number of vacant parking spaces within a nine-block radius around the church. Representative Dave Davies pulled up several diagrams showing how many on-street parking spaces the church uses during the week and how many remain vacant despite having a middle school and courthouse within a block of the church.
According to surveys his company conducted last year, Davies said the church has a "plethora" of on-street parking with 50 percent of those spaces remaining vacant at any given time. Even during its busiest service Sunday mornings, the church only uses 65 percent of available on-street parking within a one-block radius around the church, he added.
James Murray, a senior company representative, also emphasized the church's total membership has remained steady over the past 20 years, and the church doesn't plan to increase the number of available seats in its worship area. In short, the building plan wouldn't compound the parking situation around the church, he said.
Battling prior arguments regarding parking around the church, Murray pointed to the nine temporary buildings added to Mountain Home High School this fall. The buildings were needed to accommodate hundreds of new students at the school. Despite the additional traffic around the school this year, city officials had no reservations about allowing the school district to proceed with that plan, he said.
Even if the church took up 134 parking spaces as required by law, "it still leaves many vacant spaces along with parking spaces for business as usual," Davies added.
"Living in the downtown core means parking on the street," Martin told the council.
"For years, everyone worked in harmony with no significant parking infractions."
It's not feasible for new business growth in the downtown area under the current parking ordinance, added Mark Slominski, a member of the church's building committee. As written, a company would need to demolish an entire city block to add just one new building, he said.
In her opening comments on this topic, Isaac aired her concerns regarding on-street parking problems, adding that people will park wherever they want -- even in reserved spaces -- to make it easier for them to get to the church. She also called the parking surveys a "snapshot" look and may not accurately reflect the number of parking spaces used in a given week. Isaac also raised concerns regarding the impact the church would have on people hoping to open businesses in places currently vacant. If these places reopen, it would cause new problems regarding downtown parking.
Supporters of the church's plans packed into city hall to hear the debate and lend their support, with two people coming forward to speak on the subject. Barry Peterson supported the church's plans while Frank Monasterio said debating the parking issue is "worthwhile" for the good of current and future downtown growth.
"Our downtown is key to the city, and right now the status of the downtown area is very fragile," Monasterio said.
After asking the church to look at its plans again in hopes of finding ways to ease the parking burden, the city council agreed unanimously to postpone its final vote on the conditional use permit. At the earliest, the council could make a final vote at its regularly scheduled meeting Jan. 25.