Planners sidestep business move issue

Grand Coulee’s planning commission kicked the can down the road to the city council on the Mike Horne proposal to move his MPH mechanic shop down the street to a new location.

One planner after another moved away from trying to find a way that Horne could move his business to another location on Midway Avenue, where it is currently grandfathered into a zone that changed in 2011 and no longer allows that type of business.

It appeared to spell doom for the move since two city council members sit on the planning group — Councilmember Tammara Byers, who chairs the group, and Councilmember David Tylor.

Any hope that the planning group would look at a re-zone or a conditional use permit evaporated after a parade of people last Wednesday night spoke against the issue.

The planners just didn’t have the stomach to go through a long and tedious process that was so widely opposed.

Carlene Worsham, owner of Pepper Jack’s Bar & Grille, said that her parking area would prevent Horne from being able to use big bay doors on the side of the building next door at 19 Midway, and he wouldn’t be able to move cars, trucks and boats in and out. Worsham showed a photo of her parking lot, with a line illustrating the boundary to close the building.

“I won’t grant him an easement to get into his building,” she stated. “He hasn’t been a good neighbor and parks junk vehicles and boats behind my restaurant.” Kicking the issue upstairs to the full council may kill the proposal.

“The public would like an answer now, but that isn’t going to happen,” stated Byers, chairing the meeting.

The public came to play hardball. Debbie Starkey, who owns the professional building next door to the property in question, brought a petition signed by a number of people.

“Allowing the move seems to be in conflict with a sensible, aesthetically pleasing, accessible district that contributes to a sound economic base for the community,” she said, reading from a prepared statement.

Speakers took issue with the idea that Horne and a few friends were going to do the work of raising the roof and knocking the side out of the building to put in large bay doors. And they pointed to the messy conditions of his business on the other side of the Pepper Jack’s location.

Tylor, who has become more active on the city council recently, stated, “I am not in favor of making a change in the zoning process for just one person.”

The city’s hired planner, Jerry Litt, from SCJ Alliance, stated that the city will need to review its comprehensive plan by the year 2017.

That prompted Byers to say members of the planning commission should study the existing plan and start marking up changes they would like to make.

A more immediate change now seems unlikely.