PORT ST. LUCIE \u2013 A Planning & Zoning Board majority rejection of a May 5 variance request for a proposed retail building at the northwest corner of Southwest Bougainvillea Avenue and Southwest Gatlin Boulevard could mean the Dollar Tree Corporation will rescind its application and look for a different site altogether along that busy commercial corridor.<\/p>\n
Planner Sofia Trail introduced the request from property owners John and Joan Ghanie that evening, which was the first of three related agenda items including both a rezoning and conditional use permit request.<\/p>\n
The couple owns two of the lots, while a realty company owns the others that are all being joined via a unified control agreement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a request to grant a variance to the rear setback and landscaping requirements for a proposed retail development,\u201d she said. \u201cThe applicant and agent is Edward McDonald with Thomas Engineering Group on behalf of John Mohamed Ghanie and Joan Davis Ghanie Living Trust for Lot 6 and Haredo Realty Advisors Inc. for Lots 7-10.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo the north is a drainage canal and right of way [and] additionally some single-family homes. To the south is Gatlin Boulevard, to the west it is currently undeveloped and to the east are some offices.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trail then dove deeper into the requests and the requirements of city code.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne request is a variance of 14.6 feet from the building setback,\u201d she explained. \u201cThe second is a variance of two trees and 154 shrubs of perimeter landscaping required along the outside of the architectural wall along the northern boundary. Our code requires a minimum rear building setback of 25 feet, landscaping may encroach a maximum 10 feet into a 20-foot drainage easement and each landscape buffer strip shall have one tree planted every 30 feet and one shrub planted every two feet.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although she also described the companion items, the Board never actually got to them that night.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are two concurrent applications, a rezoning to limited mixed density [and] a request for a special exception use to allow retail that exceeds 50 percent of the building\u2019s gross floor area and exceeds 5,000 square feet,\u201d Trail said. \u201cThe property owners have entered into a unified control agreement. Recently we changed our conversion manual to allow for unity of control in addition to unity of title.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chairwoman Jim Norton was the first P&Z Board member to pose a series of clarification questions, zeroing in on that new agreement between the lot owners.<\/p>\n
\u201cBefore you go on, just explain that unity of control,\u201d he requested.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur conversion manual previously required a unity of title for all the lots within a development project for the conversion area,\u201d Trail responded. \u201cUnified control allows various property owners to enter into a development agreement in which they agree to develop the project as one project for all of the parcels. For this example, the trust owns Lots 5 and 6, Haredo Realty owns Lots 7-10 and they\u2019ve entered into an agreement to develop all of those parcels as one project, so they can\u2019t be separated.\u201d<\/p>\n
The city planner then pointed to a conceptual plan on the monitor that depicted the northwest corner of the proposed store jutting into the 25-foot setback.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have highlighted the corner of the building, which is approximately 10.4 feet from the rear property line,\u201d she said. \u201cIt also shows the 10-foot landscape buffer along with the proposed wall at 10 feet. The northern property line is 307 linear feet. Because of their design of the site, they are only to provide eight trees and 26 shrubs. If the Board does find the variance applications consistent with the criteria in the city code, the Board may motion to approve the variance with the condition that the variance expire one year from approval if 10 feet of the 20-foot drainage easement is not abandoned by the City Council.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chairman Norton subsequently hinted at a potential denial and asked Trail if there was a different way to design the site. The latter recommended he hear the applicant\u2019s presentation first, and Dollar Tree representative Edward McDonald came to the podium. He began by describing a year of staff negotiations.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have worked with staff to figure how to make it work and meet the standards of the city and the requirements of the code,\u201d he said. \u201cWe came up with the bare minimum request that we\u2019re presenting to you. Dollar Tree stores are plus or minus 10,000 square feet. We\u2019re seeking a variance for the corner that\u2019s touching the very northwest tip, from 20 foot to 14.6 feet and to take the 10-foot buffer, putting the landscape material on the south side of the wall.\u201d<\/p>\n
McDonald insisted there was no other way to fit the proposed store on those parcels.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a very difficult to work with staff on how to make the layout work,\u201d he explained. \u201cWe have the parking met, we have the other landscape onsite met, stormwater\u2019s going to be met, we\u2019re extending the sidewalk on Bougainvillea, so we\u2019re checking all the boxes. If we don\u2019t have the variance request approved, there\u2019s no other site plan [and] nothing else we can do to make this work.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Board\u2019s subsequent debate ended with Board Member Peter Previte insisting Dollar Tree had a solution.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf Dollar Tree wanted this badly, they could just alter the building and be within the setback,\u201d he said. \u201cIf their requirement is to have a square building, they don\u2019t care and they\u2019re not going to develop there, that\u2019s fine. But there\u2019s certainly a remedy.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat does not work for Dollar Tree and this client,\u201d McDonald replied. \u201cThey will walk away from this deal \u2013 they were very specific in that fact.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another Dollar Tree representative, Duane Bushey, addressed the Board during public comment.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo cut a corner off of a building, you drastically change the structural elements,\u201d he said. \u201cThat one corner is actually where our delivery door is, so it would make it very difficult to deliver. Getting the truck in and off that site was quite the chore. I didn\u2019t want anybody to think Dollar Tree was being stubborn about the building shape and size. Really, the only way we could come up with developing it was what we showed you today.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even though Board Member Eric Reikenis almost immediately made a motion for approval that was seconded by Vice-Chairman Greg Pettibon, they got no cooperation from their colleagues except for Rose Mocerino. The vote failed 3-4, with Chairman Norton and Board Members Previte, Joe Rosen and Peter Spatara dissenting. The P&Z Board then tabled the other two related items indefinitely so the applicant would work with staff or appeal the decision to the Board of Appeals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PORT ST. LUCIE \u2013 A Planning & Zoning Board majority rejection of a May 5 variance request for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":265421,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[171,173,172,563],"class_list":["post-265420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","tag-port-st-lucie-news","tag-st_lucie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=265420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265420\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/265421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=265420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=265420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=265420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}