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HomeMy WebLinkAboutPH 2022-04-11 - Petition 2003-08-SN-08 - Aver Sign CoCITY OF LIVONIA PUBLIC HEARING Minutes of Meeting Held on Monday, April 11, 2022 ___________________________________________________________________ A Public Hearing of the Council of the City of Livonia was held at the Livonia City Hall Auditorium on Monday, April 11, 2022. MEMBERS PRESENT: Jim Jolly, President Scott Bahr Rob Donovic Brandon McCullough Kathleen McIntyre Scott Morgan MEMBERS ABSENT: Laura Toy, Vice President OTHERS PRESENT: Paul Bernier, Assistant City Attorney Scott Miller, Planner Sara Kasprowicz, Recording Secretary The Public Hearing was called to order at 7:00 p.m. with President Jim Jolly presiding. This item is regarding Petition 2003-08-SN-08 submitted by Aver Sign Company requesting to amend Council Resolution #549-03, adopted by the Livonia City Council on October 22, 2003, to allow the illumination of tubing around the pump island canopy of the BP gas station at 27428 Schoolcraft Road, located on the northwest corner of Schoolcraft and Inkster Roads in the southeast ¼ of Section 24. This item will move to the Regular Meeting of May 2, 2022. The Public Hearing is now open. There were 3 persons in the audience. Jolly: We will start with Mr. Miller. Would you like to give us a brief presentation about what this is in regards to? Miller: Yes, back in 2003, in 2002, they came in to rebuild the gas station at the northwest corner Schoolcraft, and part of the conditions of approval for the gas station was that signage comes back before the Planning Commission and City Council. Signage came back in 2003. They got approved for signage, but one of the conditions was that no LED light band or exposed neon should be permitted on the site, including limited to building pump island canopy or the windows. That's what they're trying to appeal today. Back in February of this year, the Planning Commission denied this request based on a couple of conditions. One of them was that it is not supported by the new zoning ordinance that prohibits outlining tubing signs and there's been a long policy by the city to not allow these types of signs. Jolly: Thank you, Mr. Miller. Petitioner would you like to give us your perspective quickly. Grysko: Hello, Council, Brandon Grysko, from the law firm, Fausone Bohn, 417006 Mile Road Northville Township. I'm here representing the owner of the gas station, Mr. Salem, and Aver Sign is here as well, represented by Jennifer. I like to start out by thanking the Council of course, if there's any questions I can answer before I go into a brief recitation on some things, and I'd be happy to answer the questions that the Council has on this. Jolly: Please go into the recitation. Grysko: Sure. So, first of all, did the Council all receive the email that I sent? I see that it's not in. Okay. So, without going through every single point that I already made in the email, we are going to hit on some of the highlights there. I would like to correct on a couple of things real quick. In my email, I attach a PDF document that showed a variety of gas stations from around town and how those canopies are illuminated. I think I indicated that the first two pages of that PDF document were Mr. Salem's gas station, and also the sort of proposal that we're going to model off of, in terms of what our illumination would look like. Actually, it was supposed to be the last few pages. So, if you were looking at that document, and that was confusing, I apologize. The proposal site was the second to last page, which was the Schoolcraft and Inkster BP gas station. Then the last page is a picture of the Farmington and Schoolcraft recently developed BP gas station. As you can see there, what we think is a pretty clean-cut look to it. So, as Mr. Miller indicated in 2003, the Planning Commission, as a condition of approval, said that Mr. Salem was unable to use any LED lighting. I certainly think that, perhaps at the time, that condition was implemented, it may have made sense. I think that based on the packet of information that we submitted and based on the look of similar projects around town, I think that condition does not necessarily make sense any longer. I think the LED lighting that exists today, as far as the technology that existed at the time, that the condition was initially implemented. I think that the intent was really to prohibit the kind of gaudy look of some of the say, liquor store windows, for example, where you see that all four sides of the window are outlined in lighting, or where there's actual neon tube lighting being used, which of course in this case, we don't really have tube lighting, so to speak, so much as it is an LED strip of lights. I just want to touch on a couple of things from the ordinance as well. So, Section 2.02 of the zoning ordinance defines outlined tubing signs as an arrangement of tubes or bands of light that outline and call attention to a window or other building feature or certain features of an advertising device. So, the lighting that's being proposed here, as the Council can see from the packet that was submitted, that it could certainly be such an accent the canopy and it certainly illuminates the canopy. I think the Council will consider that it's not really outline in the way that you would typically think of where see an outline, right? Go back, for example, if you will, to a liquor store, for example, where they may be trying to draw your attention to the display window. So, they have all four sides of the window being outlined in light. What we have here, as you can see from the packet that we submitted, is that it doesn't outline the four sides of the canopy, but rather appears in the middle of the canopy, more as a state of the branding, that is true outline of the canopy. Council President, did you want to ask me something? In addition to that, 11.05 of the zoning ordinance does indicate the following tubing signs are prohibited. However, such tubing is permitted when it's protected from weather and breakage. So of course, in this case, we are proposing lighting that will be protected from the weather from breakage. I think I already discussed how, again, that's not really a true outline in the sense of some of these lights were used in the past. Jolly: Are you all set? Grysko: Not quite yet. So, in addition to the other locations that we've identified, to our knowledge, we haven't seen or heard of any citizen complaints surrounding these other locations. So, we don't want to sort of feel that the citizens would be upset by this. We don't necessarily think that it's harmful or hazardous to public health, safety or welfare. We also believe that it's aesthetically pleasing. Frankly, just take the Farmington and Schoolcraft location, for example, that has quite a nice look to it. It's a relatively new location. So, Mr. Salem, he's looking to invest upwards of $50,000 into his small business, a single location, a business owner, true small business owner, good corporate citizen. He's looking to make a pretty significant investment, to make the look of his business, to bring him into the 21st century, and to make it look nice for Livonia. So, if the Council has any questions, I'm happy to answer those. Jolly: Thank you, sir. Council. Donovic: Mr. President? Jolly: Mr. Donovic. Donovic: Thank you, Mr. President. I thank Mr. Grysco for being here and to your client for being here as well and wanting to invest in this business. I do enjoy that we used the word recitation three times this evening, which would make four, so I enjoy that. Thank you for sending the package. Initially, I was a little worried when I want to hear the tube lighting, but the neon lighting that was what I had originally envisioned, was some sort of that, gaudy kind of tube laying around your windows, that strip lighting, and this isn't that. I drove by the locations you sent me. Really thorough work, sending multiple locations and the Council multiple locations throughout the city. So, I have no issue with it. I think it is aesthetically pleasing. It's an accent, as opposed to that gaudy kind of LED neon bulb that you see at, kind of around the perimeter of buildings and whatnot in the communities, and I don't like that look. I think the city has done a good job avoiding that sort of look, and I don't think that's this. So, my only question is, looking at the different BP-specific gas stations, the BP-specific gas stations, one at Middlebelt Road 17151 and the Schoolcraft and Farmington Road one, is your client proposing the same kind of LED lighting around his canopy? Grysko: The location that was specifically identified as what we will be kind of modeling after was the Farmington and Schoolcraft Rd. location. Donovic: Okay, so that's what you're asking for. I see your client nodding his head. If that's the case, I have no problem offering and approving, because I think it looks good. And it's not that kind of neon bulb lighting that we've seen. To your point, in your package, about every gas station in town has that kind of accent lighting on the canopies, but if your lighting is what I see at the Schoolcraft location, with that nice lighting feature. I'm okay with that and offer and approving. Thank you. Jolly: Anybody else from Council? Mr. Bahr. Bahr: Is either Paul or Scott, do you know, is this stipulation in the zoning ordinance for this application? Is this new to the Vision 21 ordinance or was this in place before that? Miller: It was in placed before. Bahr: So before, okay, so every one of these other gas stations that we're seeing examples of here are going to have come in, since it was in that ordinance, and we have not really been enforcing that. Miller: Like I said, he could be a good neighbor, and we could send out enforcement to these people. We could enforce it. Grysko: I don't think that's our preference. Bahr: What Scott, do you know, and I was just now seeing the Planning Commission minutes and I can go into more detail later, if necessary, but what was the primary reason for the Planning Commission denial, just what the ordinance says? Are you familiar with what the drive of their decision was? Miller: I think it was just past practice. I think it was that they didn't want the lights on there. Bahr: Okay, I have a lot of respect for our Planning Commission, but I, I struggle with referring to past practice, when we have so many examples of this, including some that without research in history, some of these examples we have are very recent. Six and Haggerty, for example, is very recent. So, I would agree with Councilman Donovic, I don't see an issue with this. Thanks. Jolly: Anybody else in the Council? Mr. Grysko, all I was going to say earlier, did not intend to throw you off, but I think if you took the plane of the canopy and turned it vertically, it would be very much like a window outlining the same features, correct? I don't really care. I'm in support of this. Grysko: I appreciate your support and so I'm tempted to agree with you because of that but... Jolly: One is a box like this, and the other is a box that is like this. Grysko: Again, to me, when I read that, Council President, the first thing I thought of was that an outline should cover not necessarily the entire surface area, but all the edges. That's what I think of, perhaps, and I think the perspective of somebody looking at a gas station canopy tends to be looking at it straight on. Jolly: Mr. Donovic flies over the Livonia in a helicopter. Anyway, you have an approving. Thank you very much. You did a good job presenting, but your most impressive trick was using the word recitation that got Mr. Donovic there. Donovic: So that's five, for the record. Jolly: There's nobody else here who want to speak about this or no? So, you're all set. You have approving. This will be on the agenda Monday, May 2nd, the Regular meeting at 7PM. Grysko: Thank you, Council. As there were no further questions or comments, the Public Hearing was declared closed at 7:12 p.m.