Sixty residents living in southwest Austin organized a petition against the Primrose development project and presented it to the Planning Commission at their Tuesday meeting.

Saturday, February 17, 2001

Sixty residents living in southwest Austin organized a petition against the Primrose development project and presented it to the Planning Commission at their Tuesday meeting.

Primrose Inc., a private developer out of Aberdeen, S.D., has proposed to build a 72-unit multi-family housing structure on land southwest of Southgate Elementary School, currently owned by Richard Lickteig. A preliminary plat and rezoning of the acreage from an R-1 single-family residential district to an R-2 multi-family residential district was brought before the commission in a public hearing during the meeting, after having been tabled in January, due to growing opposition to the project.

The high turnout – approximately 20 residents – took the planning commission by surprise.

"More people are getting informed," said Commission Chairman Brian Johnson. "We have not had more than five people here on any one issue in the past."

Kim Jacobson, an Austin resident who lives near the site in question and is one of the 60 petitioners, said the three areas of concern are: noise and quality of life, the proposed project’s compliance with the city’s comprehensive plan and the effect such a rezoning and development would have on property values in the neighborhood.

Another area of concern raised during the meeting was storm drainage and the safety and water problems which may arise if retention ponds are dug near the site, said Johnson.

"The neighborhood is very quiet," said Jacobson, after the meeting. "We (her husband Paul and herself) bought our house here because we wanted to live in a quiet neighborhood."

Jacobson went on to stress the residents are not opposed to senior housing. The Primrose development proposal includes 32 assisted living and 40 senior independent living units.

What Jacobson is concerned about is the prospect of multi-family housing coming to the area. Earlier information indicated people in the neighborhood were worried about senior drivers so near Southgate, but Jacobson said the real worry involves the additional traffic which will be comprised of vehicles, including laundry and refuse trucks and buses, servicing the multi-family project.

Jacobson and other residents are concerned that with a change in the make-up of the neighborhood, increased traffic will come to streets near the conjunction of 16th Street SW and 22nd Avenue SW.

Using information from a traffic study conducted by Yaggy Colby Associates in Rochester, Johnson said he calculated the possible traffic the addition of R-2 properties would bring to the neighborhood and found there would be "less traffic with single-family homes than with Primrose."

After the meeting, Jacobson charged that the developer misrepresented some information. According to Jacobson, Primrose had stated the Austin facility was being developed in a comparable neighborhood to the site in Mankato. After visiting the site with her husband, Jacobson found the Primrose facility in Mankato is a "buffer" between a commercial district and a residential neighborhood.

"We did not mislead and lie," said Jim Thares of Primrose Inc. "We’ve always shared the facts."

The Mankato development "is located across the street from five-story low-income housing and two blocks from a strip mall," said Jacobson. The Austin location is removed from commercial businesses and on the edge of Austin, in a residential area.

"The Mankato site is surrounded on three sides by residential homes," said Thares. "There is vacant agricultural land on the fourth side, like there is at the Austin site."

Thares said "several accusations were made and assumptions were stated, which were not substantiated by the facts."

While Thares said the process for rezoning the properties in Mankato and Austin differed, their neighborhoods are very similar. The Mankato project was built in an R-1 neighborhood with the issuance of a conditional use permit, whereas a rezoning to R-2 is required before ground breaking can occur at the Austin site.

Thares went on to admit a shopping center is located three blocks from the Mankato site. Like Jacobson, the close proximity of this mall concerned City Administrator Pat McGarvey. "She (Jacobson) is partially correct," he said. "The mall is not on the boundary, but it is two to three blocks away."

"No, Austin isn’t exactly the same, but both are residential areas and residentially zoned properties," said Thares of the debate over the neighborhoods near the Mankato and Austin sites.

Jacobson was "disappointed" three city council members present at the meeting voiced their opinions on the project, prior to the vote by the commission. "This was a time for the public to speak," she said.

In addition, with the knowledge that this matter had been tabled last month, Jacobson was surprised only five of the commission members were available to vote on the proposal. "It was such a close vote," she said.

An issue raised during the meeting and reiterated by Jacobson is the project’s seeming contradiction to the city’s comprehensive plan, passed some six months ago.

"The city had enough foresight to say this area should remain an R-1, but the first development that comes along they throw the plan out the window?" questioned Jacobson. "How can they completely go against something they decided six months ago?"

Johnson made a motion to deny the rezoning, because it was contrary to the comprehensive plan. That motion was voted down 3-2 by the commissioners present.

As the meeting progressed, McGarvey informed the group that action was being proposed in the wrong order. Before a rezoning and preliminary plat can be passed, the comprehensive plan must be amended. Since this step was not included in the process, the issue was tabled until next month. March 13 is the next expected meeting date.

Thares was frustrated with this turn of events and afterward questioned why he was not made aware of the proper procedure order. "I’d like to ask Mr. McGarvey why the developers weren’t informed."

McGarvey said he had brought the matter of the proper order to Zoning Administrator Craig Hoium’s attention before the meeting. Councilman-at-Large Dick Chaffee and Councilwoman Gloria Nordin, both present at the meeting, said they began to realize over the course of the meeting that the proper order to rezone the property was not being followed.

Jacobson stressed she is not against the project, just where it is set to be placed. "It is a nice facility to have in Austin," Jacobson said. "It is not even that I don’t want it in my backyard. It’s that this neighborhood is just not the right place for it."

"I would hate to see a private developer walk down the road," said Chaffee. "It would be a tragedy. We don’t want to chase someone out of our community who is willing to spend millions of dollars here."

Chaffee said since the meeting several people have called to say they need a place such as Primrose for their parents to live in. Chaffee went on to say the aging of baby boomers and a population of people in need in Austin would benefit from the facility.

"It’s a positive thing for the community," he said. "We need to get the mayor and council to support this more forcefully," added Nordin, who also said the debate was a sign of Austin’s "growing pains."

If the comprehensive plan is amended and the rezoning and preliminary platting is approved, the project would then require the approval of the Austin City Council. Jacobson and the petitioning residents plan to continue the discussion of their concerns during next month’s planning commission meeting.