Business owners question council regarding parking spaces

By James Grob, jgrob@charlescitypress.com

Charles City Council members found themselves on the defensive during Wednesday evening’s planning session, as some downtown business owners expressed disappointment at the council’s recent decision to approve an agreement with Hoover Properties to lease seven public parking spaces to a federal government entity.

“We, along with several other business owners, would like for you to respectfully decline this request, and keep the parking in the downtown area to a first-come, first-served basis for all of our community business and staff to use,” said Jay Jung, owner of SNAP Fitness, The McCoy Smoothies and Farm Bureau Financial Services. “We’re disappointed that this didn’t get shot down.”

Hoover Properties is interested in purchasing and acquiring a commercial building located in the 300 block of North Main Street in Charles City, with the intent of leasing the property to a federal government agency for commercial use. The building does not have on-site parking available, but is located adjacent to one of several large public parking lots.

The council initially denied requests for reserving public parking spaces in November, but at the last meeting, the members unanimously approved the lease of seven seldom-used parking stalls in the parking lot in the 700 block of Blunt Parkway, in the northeasterly corner of that parking lot. Under the agreement the stalls will be limited to the parking and storage of government vehicles, and can’t be used for any other purpose.

“When we purchased our building at 220 North Main in 2017, we understood that it would be first-come, first-served parking, and there was nothing we could do about that,” Jung said.

Jung addressed the council Wednesday, along with Bryan Elsbury, owner of Aroma’s, and Lanie Sanvig, co-owner of St. Charles Brewery. They said there were other downtown business owners who agreed with them.

“When we heard about this, we were upset, because we have limited parking,” Sanvig said. “We depend on public parking.”

Sanvig said she was worried about the parking by the courthouse, across the street from her business.

“If that became private parking, where would that leave us?” Sanvig asked. “We bring a lot to this town, and it’s kind of a slap in the face, for lack of a better word. It’s very frustrating on our end.”

Jung listed off his main concerns, and wondered if existing businesses would now be granted private spaces in and around buildings. He said he was concerned that the decision would set a precedent, and that if future investors requested reserved private parking spots the council wouldn’t be able to deny them.

Jung made it clear that he had no issue with new tenants looking into occupying the building, and understands and welcomes the need to fill vacant buildings in the city. He noted, however, that private parking spaces that come with a building could artificially inflate the value of the building.

He also wondered if future councils would follow the lead of this council.

“Council members have given me assurances, but I seriously doubt you’re going to be on the council forever, and I don’t look forward to the possible fights to come over parking spots,” Jung said.

Council member DeLaine Freeseman said that as long as he was on the council, leasing public parking spots to just anyone wasn’t going to happen. Council member Phoebe Pittman agreed, and said that this was not something that the council will continue to do.

“Initially, we said no to this — where they wanted the spots was going to impact your customers, and that was a no-go,” Pittman said. “They came back to us multiple times until we finally found these spots where nobody ever parks. It was a compromise that we thought was the best we could make at the time.”

Mayor Dean Andrews said that it was an issue-by-issue decision, and the decision did not set a precedent.

“The precedent was set 20 years ago when we gave Hy-Vee spaces for their shopping carts,” Andrews said, referring to space in the city-owned public lot in front of Hy-Vee. “We’ve always done this on a case-by-case basis.”

Andrews said the council didn’t take this decision lightly, and all the council members agreed.

“I personally don’t think this is precedent-setting,” said council member Jerry Joerger. “This is a special circumstance, and they need the 24-7 spots for overnight parking.”

He said the parking spots in question were specifically chosen because they wouldn’t interfere with operations of other downtown businesses.

“The spaces we’re talking about are very seldom used,” Joerger said. “They’ve agreed to put the signage up, they’ve agreed to snow removal when necessary, they’ve agreed to take care of it.”

Council member Keith Starr said the reserved spots actually improve the parking situation because the vehicles in the reserved spaces won’t be competing for the public spaces closer to the businesses.

“This decision is very narrow,” Starr said. “It’s not customer parking. It actually clears out more spaces in that lot for customer parking for everyone in that area.”

Council member Philip Knighten said all the parking issues had been discussed at previous meetings.

“We hashed this decision over for at least three months, and it’s been on a public level, and we did not take this decision lightly,” Knighten said. “I wish we would have had more feedback as this went along. It might have shaped our decision a little differently.”

In other business, the council discussed the Grove Street improvement project and design agreement with SEH Engineers. Paul Rottinghaus, the new owner of the former Bailey Nursery site, has discussed the needed street improvements for access to his facility at Grove and Illinois Streets. SEH Engineers had previously been retained by Bailey Nursery to review the bridges spanning Sherman Creek and determine improvements to the structures for vehicular access.

Drainage from Grove Street has been an issue at this intersection. There is inadequate storm sewer in this area, and the storm water has flowed over the curb and eroded the street embankment above Sherman Creek. The plan is to reconstruct Grove Street, add storm sewer to discharge gutter flow directly into Sherman Creek, rebuild the street embankment, and place new guardrail. SEH has prepared a conceptual plan of the improvements required to correct the deficiencies. The cost opinion of the street improvements is $135,000.

In other business Wednesday, the council:

—Discussed a proposed agreement for Tony Lessin’s request for sanitary sewer service to a new home he is constructing in rural Floyd County east of the city’s corporate limits. The proposed agreement requires the Lessins to cooperate with voluntary annexation of the property into city limits upon the request of the city, and also would designate the city as their power of attorney to sign voluntary annexation documents in the event they (or their successors) declined to voluntarily annex upon request of the city. Lessin and the council were not yet able to come to an agreement.

— Discussed the purchase of a new mower for the Parks and Recreation department for Wildwood Golf Course. Parks and Recreation Director Jerry Mitchell told the council that the existing mower has more than 4,000 hours on it and little value or life left in it, and replacement parts are difficult to find. He received quotes and is recommending the council approve purchase of a used John Deere 9009A from Van-Wall Equipment Inc. for $33,000, using capital equipment reserve funds.

— Discussed garage door replacement at the fire station with Charles City Fire Chief Eric Whipple. Whipple has acquired updated quotes and is recommending accepting of quote from Double Z Construction for $31,511. This price would include nine doors to be replaced. Whipple said all the quotes received were well within the budget. The item will be on agenda at the next council meeting.

— Discussed adding lighting to the Corporate Drive water tower, as the painting project was finalized last month. MUSCO Lighting has provided a quote for the design and equipment portion of the project. There are funds in FY21 budget for this project.