Hanning Subdivision Possibilities

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Co. Rd. 6 Acquisition: Hanning October 21, 1999 Page 2 Berg has requested that Council consider whether such a permanent credit might be granted by the City. This option might be reasonable, given that the Hanning's had approximately 11.2 acres dry buildable before the taking and about 10.8 dry acres after. This still leaves enough acreage to create two conforming 5-acre lots; however, the dividing line the Hanning's would prefer does not yield 2 regularly shaped lots because of the location of the existing house in the center of the property. The Hanning's preferred scenario would result in a new 4+acre lot and the house remaining on a 6+acre lot. However, in order to have the required 5 acres in each lot, the line would have to be 'gerrymandered' to pick up more land behind the house for the new vacant lot. With credit granted for the newly acquired right-of-way, a lesser degree of gerrymandering would be needed, while still resulting in just two lots on 11 acres. Council in 1998 expressed support for the Hanning's position, but the City Attorney advised that it would be inappropriate to grant a variance absent the public process (see minutes of June 22, 1998; Moorse letter of July 1, 1998 and Gaffron letter of July 7, 1999). Council is asked to weigh the $125,000 financial risk (City responsibility is half of this amount) against any precedent-setting aspects of such an agreement. In this 5-acre zone, staff believes the overall density is not at risk, and the precedential aspects are reduced because this would be a settlement of a condemnation case rather than an arbitrary zoning action. The City might be better positioned by considering this as the granting of a variance to credit the area of road easement taken, as opposed to granting a lot area variance for creation of a new lot. The amount of area that would be credited to a new easterly lot would be about 30' x 400' or about 1/4 acre. This is only about 5% of the 5-acre lot area requirement, and as a percentage of the required lot area, is relatively minor. In the 2-acre zone, a 5% variance would be 0.1 acre, still having little impact on actual buildability. It can certainly be argued that if only 5% of required lot area is in right-of-way,there is relatively little actual development impact. whether it's a 5 acre zone or a 1/2 acre zone. But, taking the same 1/4 acre of right-of-way out of a 1/2 acre lot would be disastrous. Any findings in support of the credit should therefore relate to the percentage of lot area in r-o-w, not the acreage. Accordingly, staff has drafted conceptual language committing to allowing the area credit. This would potentially be incorporated into a resolution and a settlement agreement that would be binding on future Councils. FINDINGS 1. The Hannings are owners of real property described in Exhibit A, which property is located in the RR-1A Single Family Rural Residential Zoning District requiring 5 dry buildable acres in each building site.