MANCHESTER – Overdevelopment remains a concern among public officials and residents; that’s why an ordinance brought up for first reading sparked some further discussion on the subject during a recent council meeting.
Ordinance 25-02 authorized the sale of 1223 Englemere Boulevard for $60,000 to Julian Wilschanski. Councilman Craig Wallis remarked “what we are doing lately is creating 75×100 lots. Over the years the township would never sell or trade a lot to make a non-conforming lot. It had to be sold or traded to become a conforming lot.”
A town will create zoning rules for every piece of property in town. For example, in some areas, a property owner needs 100×100 before they are allowed to build. If they have less than that, they can ask for something called a variance from the Planning Board.
“This one here is two 25 x 100-foot properties, (with) one in the middle. We are selling this inner one to give this builder the opportunity to build a 75 x 100. We told him ‘go get a variance’ so honestly for me either we get rid of our 100×100 zoning out there (in Pine Lake Park section of the township) or we say no and we don’t contribute to the problem,” Wallis added.
He noted that the person with 75 x 100 could go to the Planning Board. “They will sit there and tell them the court has said you can build on the 75 x 100. The thing is, before, the township has not created these 75 x 100s. We didn’t tell the property owner to trade it so that somebody can have a 75 x 100. That kind of stuff is contributing to overbuilding in the township.”
Wallis said, “if you look at it, if you have a 400-foot lot, that is four houses. If you have a 75×100 that is five houses. That is my problem with it. I just don’t want us to contribute to the problem.”
Council President Roxy Conniff brought a different perspective while also acknowledging that the Council was looking at the issue of overdevelopment in the community.
“This property is not located in a drainage area and I have been advised by our department heads that if we didn’t sell, we would end up probably being sued by the property owner and would not be able to win based upon the property being useless if it was not sold to him,” she said.
She added “It can’t be used for drainage or for open space so there really is no reason we can’t sell it to him. I don’t want the undersized lots to be built on out there but I also don’t want the township to be sued and face legal fees.”
“It is hard because when you see a property like this and you go through for a variance, you have to try to make it as much of a conforming lot as you can. The property owner next to him is 125×100. There are things we can do to put into effect deed restrict properties as well,” the council president said.
She stressed to The Manchester Times after the meeting that “we can’t do anything with this property. We will be looking at all these undersized lots.”
A resident asked how many properties there were that were non-conforming and that would be potentially sold. Business Administrator Carl Block answered “we could put a list of how many we did last year and many of the sales are of people who buy the 25×100 who live there and consolidate it into their existing lot. There are others where it is a 50 adding to a 25 which does in fact take the nonconforming 75 but that is less nonconforming than the 50.”
Block added, “we’ll be putting together a report of how many and for what reasons for the last calendar year – and how much.”
Columbus Boulevard resident Gail Apgar agreed with Councilman Wallis “that perhaps we build the least number of houses over there.” Nothing can be done if someone has already built on a nonconforming lot. She asked if there was a way to put a cap on it in the future. “In the future, it can’t be bought by anybody except the people who have a house and a small lot, offer it to them first instead of having everybody in creation coming out of the woodwork to buy that land.”
“Say if there is a corner lot and nobody knows what to do with it, can a person like me for instance can make a garden out of it so nobody could buy it and give it more or less to Manchester,” Apgar added.
She said, “these are all ideas that maybe we can talk about because we got to stop this someplace.”
“Are we taking into consideration the fact that that we aren’t having driveways or garages and the accumulation of all the vehicles that are being parked on the street?” resident Alice DeVito asked.
She said, “in the evening we can’t even get through some of our roads because of the double sized parking.”
Block responded “you aren’t legally allowed to limit the number of vehicles of a household. You can regulate parking on a street based on its characteristics. It isn’t the ownership of the cars you can regulate but rather how they do park on the street. That requires a study by the police department to implement a parking ordinance.”
Wallis voted against the ordinance. The rest of the council voted in the affirmative for it. Another ordinance was introduced unanimously passed to sell a Fourth Avenue property to Clifford Munn and Lori Gray for $10,000.
