By By JOHN EBY / Dowagiac Daily News
Dowagiac Planning Commission decided Monday night that the Institute for International Cooperation and Development (IICD) Junior Department does not qualify under city zoning ordinances as a professional office for the granting of a conditional use permit.
The second issue City Attorney Mark Westrate placed before the advisory panel was whether converting the former privately-owned dormitory built on Dailey Road for Southwestern Michigan College students into a "small open institution" to rehabilitate court-adjudicated boys ages 12-17 belongs in a multiple-family zoning category, since that use is not specified in the ordinance.
The city has no agricultural zone, City Manager William H. Nelson Jr. said. "It's essentially commercial in nature, designed, I assume, to generate some revenues from its operation," Westrate said, "but I'm certainly not prepared to make a recommendation.
Planners recommended rejection of the IICD request Feb. 3.
City Council agreed, but the IICD appealed that denial to Cass County Circuit Court. Circuit Judge Michael E. Dodge determined he could not make a ruling without a more sufficient record of what factored into the decision.
Dodge remanded the matter back to Dowagiac for reconsideration from a new record made with both sides. That process began with a 2 1/2-hour public hearing July 7.
Written comments continued to be collected at City Hall until July 28. Planners accepted an inch-high stack of documents into the record.
Mayor Donald Lyons harbors "serious questions" about how such a facility might be operated and maintained by the IICD and whether it would be "harmonious with the existing or intended character of the general vicinity," one of five standards to meet in Section 94.405 of the zoning code for conditional uses.
Lyons said his viewpoint was shaped by "significant face-to-face conversations with the staff and I've visited other facilities. I made quite a study of this in the first instance and I came away from that feeling that this was not an appropriate use for that facility in that location. It has nothing to do with what was on the Internet."
Westrate concurred: "Nobody should be basing a decision on this proposed use based upon undocumented evidence" gathered from the Internet.
Rather, the mayor indicated, "We have had the consistent issue of utility payments in arrears. My concern is that if they're running so tight that they're consistently getting disconnect notices on their utilities, how do they hope to fund something that requires the kind of staffing and investment that they're proposing?"
Planner and City Councilman Leon Laylin brought up neighborhood gripes about door-to-door fund solicitation seeking contributions to support IICD operations. "We have had repeated complaints from people who live in the immediate area that they are not in agreement with this type of activity. I can't condone that as being harmonious with the operation."
Planner Sandra Hoger asked whether fundraising relates to existing operations "or is that going to be a continuing thing with the proposed operation?"
Director Line Henricksen responded that the IICD, like most non-profits, from Greenpeace to the Sierra Club, solicits donations.
In comments "that have been brought to me off the record, there was some concern about building a new (middle) school next to a program that we're unsure about," Chairman Dr. Charles Burling said.