The highlight of Tuesday night’s Culver Town Council meeting was a public hearing that was held to review a Planned Unit Development application for Culver Meadows.
Town Manager Jonathan Leist explained that this week’s hearing consisted of a review of the primary plan and rezoning request. According to Leist, the town has a zoning district that is strictly for PUDs, which allows for the development to have both commercial and residential structures.
The Culver Meadows development will consist of approximately 25 single family and townhomes that will be installed south of a proposed gas station on State Road 10 and State Road 17. Property owner Thomas Beste was there serving as a representative for the project.
According to the Town Manager, the consistent complaint from citizens continues to be about the commercial aspect of the project, the gas station. He said most of the residents who voiced their concerns prefaced it by saying they approve of the residential portion but they don’t want to see the gas station go in.
He said, “That’s been the biggest debate throughout it, people want to know, is there a way to do the residential component without the gas station component?”
Leist explained, “The applicant, he didn’t present that option so it was “take it or leave it all together as one” which is kind of how our Planned Unit Development application goes, once it’s presented you either approve the entire plan or reject the entire plan.”
Leist added that if Beste was to scrap the commercial aspect of the project, he would need to go through the entire application process all over again.
Leist said the council members approved the primary plan and rezoning request on first reading. The second and third readings will be scheduled for the next town council meeting. If it passes those readings, the next step would be a secondary review.
The Town Manager explained that if the primary plan passes the other readings, the developer will have a maximum of 18 months to conduct engineering and site work to draw up a more detailed site plan to present during the secondary review.
Leist said Tuesday’s decision did move the project forward a little there are still several more procedural steps that Beste has to take before a building permit can be issued and the construction phase can commence.
