VANDERBURGH COUNTY

REZONING BOARD

MARCH 18, 2008

The Vanderburgh County Rezoning Board met in session this 18^th day of March, 2008 at 5:50 p.m. in room 301 of the Civic Center Complex with President Jeff Korb presiding.

President Korb: Go ahead.

Janet Greenwell: Yes, I do. Are we ready?

President Korb: We are, let’s go.

Janet Greenwell: I’m Janet Greenwell with the Area Plan Commission. The first item on our agenda, we would ask you to approve the Rezoning minutes from the last meeting.

Commissioner Tornatta: So moved.

Commissioner Nix: Second.

Commissioner Tornatta: Jeff?

President Korb: I’m sorry. I’m having a vegetated state here. Discussion? All of those in favor say aye.

All Commissioners: Aye.

President Korb: Opposed same sign. Congratulations!

Janet Greenwell: Our minutes are approved.

Janet Greenwell: I would like to first do the first readings. We have four new rezonings filed for May. The first one is docket number VC-3-2008, petitioner, Gerald Reddick, who’s requesting to rezone a parcel on Green River Road from C-4 to R-1. That’s at 12615 North Green River Road. VC-4-2008, petitioner, Hirsch-Martin Development is petitioning to rezone acreage at 1501 North Burkhardt from agricultural and C-4 to a C-2 zone with a use and development commitment. VC-5-2008, petitioner, Ken Zint is requesting a rezoning for his property at 140 East Inglefield Road to be rezoned from agricultural to M2. These are first readings.

President Korb: Great, thanks.

Janet Greenwell: And, VC-6-2008, petitioner, Dauby Properties and Investments, LLC, requesting to rezone, a kind of tricky rezoning, a piece of land from R-3 to C-4, and a piece of land from C-4 to R-3 at 7445 North Green River Road. The explanation of that will be next month.

Commissioner Nix: Thank you. Move approval.

President Korb: Second?

Commissioner Tornatta: Second.

President Korb: Discussion? All of those in favor say aye.

All Commissioners: Aye.

President Korb: Opposed same sign. I need a roll call vote on this. Commissioner Nix?

Commissioner Nix: Yes.

President Korb: Commissioner Tornatta?

Commissioner Tornatta: Yes.

President Korb: Commissioner Korb votes yes.

Janet Greenwell: Okay, we have one petition on tonight’s agenda for final hearing. That’s the property, it’s docket number VC-1-2008, the property at 7900 East Morgan Avenue. Sterling Properties is requesting to rezone the property from agricultural to M2 with a use and development commitment. This is a 13 acre site located on the north side of Morgan Avenue between I-164 and the Warrick County line. It is to be joined with the site that was rezoned, about 17 acres rezoned by them in 2007 to M2. The overall site is planned to be about 30 acres for industrial development planned for Sterling Boiler and Mechanical. The petition includes a use and development commitment. It identifies uses to be prohibited; lighting, trash areas, landscaping, paving. All the commitments will run with the land for 30 years. We do need signatures of both the owners and the petitioners on the use and development commitment. The petition was heard at Plan Commission on March 14^th, and received nine affirmative votes. Any questions?

President Korb: No, I don’t have any, but I’m assuming we have an attorney here, and remonstrators here. Yes, Ma’am. Maria, please come up. If you would, just introduce yourself, and for the record.

Maria Worthington: Good evening, Commissioners. I’m Maria Worthington, and I’m an attorney with Kahn Dees Donovan and Kahn at 501 Main Street, and we represent Sterling Boiler and Mechanical, Inc., and Sterling Properties, LLC. Fortunately, Dan Felker was able to attend with me tonight. His schedule changed again. I’m glad he’s here with me. He’s the president of Sterling. What we plan to do this evening is quickly reintroduce you to what we think is a very exciting development for Vanderburgh County. I believe all of you have heard about this project before. Mr. Korb was present at our Plan Commission meeting last week, and the other Commissioners heard of this project last summer when we rezoned 7800 Morgan Avenue, that is the property immediately to the west of this parcel. It’s a little bit bigger tract than this one. I want to just remention some of the professionals that have been associated with this project. Mike Shoulders is responsible for a beautiful concept design of what the new facilities will look like, and Jim Farney is the engineer who has been working diligently on this project. I am going to hand out for you just a couple of things that I’ll refer to in my presentation. The property that we are going to be seeking final approval on tonight is 7900 Morgan Avenue, above, on the overhead where it says proposed M2, and then the existing M2, as I mentioned before, we rezoned last summer. This is almost to the Warrick County line in eastern Vanderburgh County. You might be familiar with it as the site of the Tee Time Golf Range. The purpose of the request is to pave the way for new facilities for Sterling Boiler and Mechanicals main operations. Sterling would like to break ground on these facilities within, around the next year. Last summer we were saying about a year and a half. So, it would be about the same timeline, about a year from now, maybe a year and a half. One thing I would like to note is that this zoning request includes a use and development commitment, which provides our neighbors with certain assurances that they have requested. The first thing that you’ll see in your handout, just to backtrack a little bit, I think most of you are familiar with Sterling Boiler and Mechanical and what they do, but I’ve given you a short history of the company, just so you can get an idea of what they do. Then, I would like to say a few words about the company too. Dan Felker began Sterling Boiler and Mechanical about 25 years ago with very modest operations on 7^th Avenue in Evansville. Today, Sterling Boiler and Mechanical is one of the top 100 construction companies in the U.S., serving mainly the growing power and energy industry. Sterling generates an annual payroll of over $62 million, and employs, on average, 750 employees, over jobs sites in Indiana, Pennsylvania, Ohio and other states. These employees include skilled craftsman, all the way to management and office personnel. Dan will be available to answer any questions that you have, and, hopefully, we’ll be able to cover all of those, but, if you have any remaining concerns this evening after we finish our presentation, we would like for you to let us know about those, and see what else we may need to do to satisfy any questions or concerns. When we filed this rezoning petition originally on 7800 Morgan Avenue last, it was November of ‘06, and we finished it up in July of ‘07, we had quite a few meetings with our neighbors to address and resolve their concerns. We think we’ve crafted a project that will not only meet Sterling’s needs, but one, a project that would be both acceptable to our neighbors, and a very handsome addition to the far east side of Vanderburgh County. When I first met with Dan Felker about this project a couple of years ago, I listened to him talking about what he dreamed for these new facilities, and how far he had come from his days on 7^th Avenue. What we started out with was a campus that included five different buildings. Over a series of many meetings with our neighbors, what we came up with was a single, basically, a single facility campus. If you look in your packet you’ll see what we expect that to look like. It’s holding up the drawing that it is. What the neighbors really wanted to see was as little activity as possible on the site. So, Mike Shoulders took the five buildings and condensed them into one building. So, it’s more the case that everything’s under one roof, and the neighbors won’t have to see a lot of activities at the site. The next thing that happened was the neighbors, across Telephone Road there are some residences, and the neighbors felt that they would be happier if we would flip flop the operations inside the buildings to keep, to put the office functions closest to Telephone Road. So, we did that as well, and they were very pleased with that. Finally, one of the major changes that the neighbors requested on the 7800 Morgan Avenue zoning, which we’ve also accommodated on this project, if you look at the drawing that’s on the overhead now, at the northern most tip it says Ag. There’s a little, right there, that, they wanted that to stay Ag, that’s the closest to their residences on Telephone Road. Then we buffered, you can see the tree line buffer, the pine tree buffer, they wanted that buffer, and then they wanted that northern most tip to remain Ag. So, we amended our rezoning, and our legal description to keep that Ag for the neighbors. Then, we did the exact same thing when we did 7900 Morgan Avenue. We cut out the northern most tip of the property. So, now, all that provides an Ag buffer to the neighbors to our north. Many of the neighbors expressed that they really would like to have sewer services. They requested that to help them reach that goal, they wanted Sterling to extend its sewer line to a location that they selected. We have accommodated that request. Sterling, as I mentioned, is working with Bernardin Lochmueller and Associates, and engaged its engineers to study, each neighbor who is interested, we did a study of their individual accommodations and what they would need to tap into the line, and provided each one of them with data and cost information, and we’ve agreed to bring the line to a couple of certain points that they had requested, so that they can easily tap in. Whenever we did the 7900 Morgan Avenue, there were additional folks interested, one in particular that wanted the same kind of treatment. So, we did that for that neighbor as well. The use and development commitment that we filed talks about limitations on the building materials that we can use. It stretches out for 30 years, rather than the 25 we originally proposed. It speaks to access from Telephone Road being just very limited, emergency only type of gated entry, and will have a frontage road on the highway. It speaks to quite a number of benefits to our neighbors, and we believe all of our neighbors are happy with that. I did mention at the Plan Commission meeting that we did have an inquiry from one neighbor at Sticks and Stones down the way, just generally inquiring about drainage questions. They did not attend the neighbor meeting that we held on this property, but they did attend some of the last ones. I believe they’re here with a couple of comments on the drainage. So, I’m going to reserve my comments on that subject until after they go, if that’s alright with you? Any questions of me?

President Korb: Questions for Ms. Worthington? Seeing none, remonstrators? People who are not real excited about this?

Mark Miller: I’m sorry, Mr. Korb. I shouldn’t stand up, because my clients are excited about the project and are not asking that the zoning be denied.

President Korb: Great, but?

Mark Miller: But, the issue is, as Ms. Worthington referenced, is an issue about the drainage.

President Korb: Okay.

Mark Miller: They just asked me to, called me today, which explains my very casual attire.

President Korb: You look great, but you need to tell the record who you are.

Mark Miller: Okay, I’m sorry, Mark Miller. They just asked me to come in and express their concerns on the record.--

President Korb: Okay.

Mark Miller: –of this proceeding. I had them take some pictures. As all of us know, it’s raining quite heavily today.

President Korb: No? Did you take those pictures today, Mr. Miller?

Mark Miller: Yes, sir.

President Korb: Did you?

Mark Miller: Yes.

President Korb: Okay.

Commissioner Nix: Good timing.

Commissioner Tornatta: Thank you.

Mark Miller: I might give Mr. Jeffers a copy.

President Korb: Thanks.

Mark Miller: (Inaudible) Ms. Worthington (Inaudible).

President Korb: And, the people you’re representing, Mr. Miller, are?

Mark Miller: Sticks and Stones, the owners of the company are here. Basically, what the photographs show, the first photograph on the first page, if I may walk over to the screen?

Commissioner Nix: There’s a pointer, Mr. Miller.

Mark Miller: Do you have a pointer?

President Korb: We couldn’t find it earlier.

Unidentified: Bill’s got it.

President Korb: Mr. Jeffers?

Mark Miller: The first picture is this area right here.

President Korb: Yep.

Madelyn Grayson: Mr. Miller, can you stand closer to the microphone, because we type these verbatim.

Mark Miller: Yes, I’m sorry. Is right here, and the lower, it would be the southwest corner of the first parcel that’s already been rezoned. The picture below that, you really can’t see it on this photograph, but if you extend down the access road, it would be approximately in this area here. There is a little bit of a high spot, as you can see in those two photographs, between those two low points. There is some green space there in the midst of the water today.

President Korb: That’s just west of the, what appears to be a clubhouse?

Mark Miller: That would be west of our office building? Southwest of the office building.

President Korb: Yeah, okay.

Mark Miller: Yes, Mr. Korb. Then, oh, great, then the picture on the top of the second page is their retention area, which has overflowed its design today, as a result of the rain. It’s in, you know, in the center area, excuse me, in the center area of their parcel, approximately there. The third picture is just showing that there is a drainage area, that they understood would be on their property, and it’s just really showing the back end of their property, okay? So, the only issue that they would like to express on the record, and is something that they have communicated, is my understanding anyway, I’ve not had a chance to speak to Ms. Worthington, since I did just find out about this today.

President Korb: Okay.

Mark Miller: But, they have had discussions with her, expressed these concerns that the development of their project take into consideration the issues that are in place today. It is noted in the Area Plan Commission staff report that most of the subject site is in a flood zone, and that is going to push this water somewhere. We understand, and my clients understand that that is not a matter that is perhaps properly before you today, that that is a Drainage Board matter, that that would be addressed and should be addressed. They are simply asking that I make you aware of the concerns and the problems in this area, and ask that Sterling Boiler be sensitive to that.

President Korb: Sure. Did, Mr. Felker, do you have these pictures?

Mark Miller: He does now.

President Korb: Okay, great. Would you mind, Mr. Felker, coming to the microphone? Mr. Miller, if you don’t mind just standing there. Maria, please don’t freak out, we’re not going to ask any legal questions.

Maria Worthington: Can I come with him?

President Korb: Yeah, come on. This is a dorky question, but–

Mark Miller: He can handle it.

President Korb: Yeah, I figured he can, but, here’s what I’m thinking, I mean, you’ve been gracious enough to extend sewer lines, which are not cheap to the neighbors, which is pretty cool. I’ve got to believe that when you see pictures like this, doing the business that you do, that you’re going to help address that. Am I imagining that? Or is that, I don’t expect you to fix it totally, but, give me some feedback on that.

Dan Felker: When we started to put this together, we will have our own on-site drainage system that we’re putting in.

President Korb: Okay.

Dan Felker: There is a retention pond already planned.

President Korb: Okay.

Dan Felker: We’re going to have a retention pond that will then feed into the city storm sewers.

President Korb: Okay.

Dan Felker: I thought, and I still think that we have, we’ve accounted for that.

President Korb: For this, what we’re looking at here?

Dan Felker: Yes, sir.

President Korb: Okay.

Dan Felker: I mean, we can’t fix problems that are off of our property–

President Korb: Absolutely.

Dan Felker: – that was already there, but we’re certainly not going to add to them. We’re, what we’re going to build is an in-house drainage system.

President Korb: Because, I think what Mr. Miller’s concerned about is exactly that, dumping onto your client’s property.

Mark Miller: That’s their concern.

President Korb: Sure. It’s a valid one. Absolutely. Guys?

Commissioner Nix: Well, I just want to emphasize the fact that every time we approve these drainage plans for a development, we’re comfortable that within the development itself we’ve helped the situation, not hurt it. The only concern I want to raise is that seeing this and seeing the area out there before, Mr. Felker can do everything in the world on his 27 or 37 acres, 20, and is that right?

Dan Felker: Somewhere around 30.

Commissioner Nix: 30 acres? I think you’re still going to see some of this down the road. Correct me if I’m wrong, Mr. Jeffers. So, I just want to make sure that you think because he’s doing this development it’s going to solve all these problems out there. I don’t know that that’s necessarily true.

Mark Miller: Mr. Nix, I have explained to my clients, and they have also spoken to Mr. Jeffers, that the objective of the drainage ordinance, as Mr. Felker just graciously said, is to not make the situation worse.

President Korb: Right.

Mark Miller: It is not–

President Korb: To fix it.

Mark Miller: –(inaudible) obligation, nor are we asking it be, of Mr. Felker to solve a much bigger problem.

Commissioner Nix: As long as that’s clear, because I think we’ve seen that before, a developer comes in and does all the things they are asked to do, by law and by the things that we ask them to do, and people still have water problems. They say, we made this development and now we still have this water problem. Why didn’t it go away? That’s the concern I have.

Mark Miller: I think one of the purposes of being here today was not only to express the concerns that the situation not be worse, but get everybody familiar with each other, and an understanding that we’re all going to try to accomplish that, but there’s no magic solution when you’re in a flood zone.

Commissioner Nix: Good. Okay.

President Korb: Super.

Mark Miller: Thank you.

President Korb: As long as your client understands it, that’s great. Great. Good. Gentlemen, any other questions of Mr. Miller? We see none. Maria, if you want to rebutt, you can, but I think you’d be smart just to stop where you are and ask for a vote. Just guessing off the top of my head.

Maria Worthington: Yeah, I think that sounds like a good idea. Although, I did want to ask for verification.

President Korb: Absolutely.

Maria Worthington: One of the comments that Dan made was that working with Bernardin Lochmueller and, you know, the process that we’ll need to go through with this development to have an appropriate drainage plan, we’ll do what we’re asked to do, and maybe over and above that, but the retention pond on our property isn’t going to do anything to help what’s down here in these pictures. I don’t believe. I think one of the comments that he made, just maybe if you take it literally how he said it, may have sounded like there is something we can do on this site to fix that site, and I don’t think that there is.

President Korb: No, as I understand the comments from Mr. Felker, that was, that’s what Commissioner Nix was talking about.

Maria Worthington: Yeah, I appreciate that.

President Korb: It’s like, hey, we’re not going to make this problem worse. I mean, today, it’s obviously a pretty unusual event, not unusual anymore, according to Mr. Gore it would be unusual, but what we’ve got going on is a situation where this is not going to fix the total problem. I understand that, Mr. Jeffers agrees with that. That was a dig. Global warming. But, anyway, no, I think I understand–

Maria Worthington: Okay.

President Korb: –and I just want to be sure you all understand that him doing his work is not going to totally fix the Sticks and Stones thing.

Maria Worthington: It’s probably not going to fix it at all.

President Korb: Okay.

Maria Worthington: I’m just being frank about it.

Commissioner Tornatta: But, the deal is, you’re going to go through the process of Drainage Board–

Maria Worthington: Yes.

Commissioner Tornatta: –and all those facets. This is not what we talk about at this function. He brings that up, but, really it’s just for note. We’re not holding you on the spot for anything that you say in this meeting with that capacity, because it goes through Drainage Board.

Maria Worthington: Great.

President Korb: Right.

Maria Worthington: I just want to make sure that–

President Korb: Okay. Any other comments?

Maria Worthington: No, thank you very much.

President Korb: Oh, you’re welcome. Last chance, Mr. Miller. I’m sorry, Commissioner Nix?

Commissioner Tornatta: Motion to approve.

President Korb: Okay.

Commissioner Nix: Second.

President Korb: All those in favor say aye. Opposed same sign. The motion passes.

Commissioner Tornatta: Roll call vote.

President Korb: Roll call vote, okay. Sorry. Commissioner Nix?

Commissioner Nix: I vote yes.

President Korb: Commissioner Tornatta?

Commissioner Tornatta: Yes.

President Korb: Commissioner Korb votes yes. Congratulations, Mr. Felker.

Maria Worthington: Thank you very much.

President Korb: Thank you, Mr. Miller, and Sticks and Stones for coming. I need a motion for adjournment.

Commissioner Tornatta: So moved.

Commissioner Nix: Second.

President Korb: All those in favor say aye.

All Commissioners: Aye.

President Korb: We’re out of here.

(The meeting was adjourned at 6:10 p.m.)

Those in Attendance:

Jeff Korb                                             Bill Nix                            Troy Tornatta

Clay Havill                                          Janet Greenwell             Madelyn Grayson

Maria Worthington                              Mark Miller                      Dan Felker

Others Unidentified                             Members of Media

VANDERBURGH COUNTY

REZONING BOARD

Jeff Korb, President

Bill Nix, Vice President

Troy Tornatta, Member

(Recorded and transcribed by Madelyn Grayson.)