Council's strategic inaction stymies business plan Mechanic shop owner may file suit

 

Last updated 10/2/2014 at 1:18pm



Doing nothing can change everything if you couch the resulting message just right.

Official city inaction Monday night dashed Mike Horne’s hopes of moving his auto repair business down the street and had him threatening a lawsuit.

The city council declined to appeal a building permit issued Aug. 18 to Horne by city staff, who were under the assumption the permit was for his current business address — 123 Midway Ave., next door to Pepper Jack’s Bar and Grille.

But the address Horne gave the clerk to put on the permit is for 19 Midway, a currently empty commercial building on the other side of the restaurant’s parking lot.

Horne planned to buy the building, raise its roof and install big bay doors for accepting tall rigs in his MPH Auto & Marine repair shop, a type of business not allowed there under the city’s zoning code. Horne’s current shop, about 200 feet south on the same street, is allowed in the same zone because it’s grandfathered in under the zoning ordinance passed in 201l. The same type of business is allowed on the other side of the street.

Once a building permit is issued, it can’t be rescinded except through an independent appeal process. After discovering the clerical error, the city was considering taking the matter to court, the subject of Monday night’s special council meeting.

After a closed 20-minute meeting with the city’s attorney to consider possible litigation, the council decided not to appeal the building permit.

Mayor Chris Christopherson explained that means Horne is free to make the building changes he wants, but not necessarily to operate his business there. That question could be addressed at a later time, presumably when his business license is considered – a license that would be requested to allow him to practice his trade in an area not zoned for it.

“Basically what you’re saying is I took out a loan for $80,000 and went through all this process, and then you have the option of not giving me a business license,” Horne said. “I think it’s pretty special that you guys allow me to drop $195,000 on a building and another $25,000 on materials, and then, ‘Eh, you don’t get to put your business there, but you can change the building.’”

Debbie Starkey, who owns the Starkey Professional Building at 17 Midway, next door to the building for which Horne got the building permit, challenged his assertion he’d spent any money.

“You know, Mike, I was sitting right beside you immediately following your meeting with Chris when you confessed you had not spent that money, and that you knew when the clerk was filling out the permit she thought it was for your existing business.”

“Yeah,” Horne answered, “that’s what she thought, but it wasn’t. There’s an address on my papers that has 19 Midway on it. And though I didn’t spend the money, I have committed to it.”

Starkey had brought a prepared statement and argued that the council should take public input on the matter. Christopherson said the meeting was adjourned, but waited for the clerk to look up in Robert’s Rules of Order whether it could be reopened. It couldn’t, the clerk found, but accepted Starkey’s written statement to be made part of the city’s public record on the matter.

Horne walked out stating he had $60,000 left to buy the services of an attorney.

 

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