I was a little surprised when I opened up the video of the 04/19/2021 Board of Zoning Appeals meeting and saw that it was almost an hour long. They only had one zoning appeal on the docket. Appleton Music Academy and Emmanuel United Methodist Church were seeking a variance in order to put up a second ground sign on their property advertising the presence of Appleton Music Academy in the building.
Back in November 2020 the Board had heard 3 variance requests and that meeting had only been 55 minutes long, so I was expecting this to only be 20-30 minutes long. To be fair, by the 20 minute mark they had basically decided how they were going to vote, but there were some surprising twists and turns after that.
If you want to learn more than you ever expected to know about Appleton’s ordinances regarding sign placement and size then, please, read on.
The meeting started out with participation from a member of the public. As with the public participation in November, this person was simply at the meeting to learn more information about the proposed plan. She had thought that they were going to be placing the sign on the Washington Street side of the property. However, they wanted to place it on the College Avenue side next to their current sign. She saw no problem with that proposal.
After she left, they moved into the fact-finding portion of the meeting.
Board Chairman McCann explained that a determination on the variance request would be made that evening, and that it would take 4 affirmative votes for a variance to be granted.
There were essentially two problems that Emmanuel United Methodist Church and Appleton Music Academy were facing in their quest to erect a second ground sign. (1) Section 23-522(b)(1) of the Zoning Ordinance only allows a second ground sign if both street frontages are 200 feet long. Their lot has 3 frontages but only one of those frontages is over 200 feet long. (2) They were proposing placing the new sign next to the current sign, but section 23-522(b)(4) of the City Zoning Ordinance prohibits two ground signs on the same street frontage.
Ryan Korb who both runs Appleton Music Academy and is the Music Director at EUMC appeared to argue his case. He was somewhat difficult to hear because he didn’t have a microphone.
He gave some background on AMA’s use of the church facility. They’ve been there since 2010. The space had been largely unused prior to that due to declining church numbers. So this was a win-win; AMA has a space, the church receives the rent money, and they both work together to keep the building afloat. AMA sees themselves as part of Downtown Appleton as well. They have about 80 or so people coming downtown for lessons there.
When he talked to the church about getting a sign he didn’t discuss placement with them. The church board made all the decisions about size and placement, and they had wanted to keep the new sign within the current landscaping.
Regarding the lack of at least two frontages that were over 200 feet long, Ryan pointed out that EUMC’s property was actually composed of two parcels. Due to the lack of a microphone, it was hard for me to hear the history of why this one property was composed of two parcels; however, the bottom line was that if that parcel was added into the calculations they would have 227.6 feet along Washington and 325.29 feet along Meade street. Later in the meeting, however, City Inspections Supervisor Kurt Craanen said that because they were different parcels they couldn’t count those additional feet.
Chairman McCann asked Ryan if it was only College Avenue he wanted visibility on–not Meade or Washington Streets. Ryan said that was correct. Most of the traffic going in and out of downtown Appleton is on College Avenue so that is where they wanted the sign to be.
Chairman McCann said it sounded like the sign was more intended as advertising than to help people locate the building because there is no entrance to the building on the College Avenue side.
Ryan answered that, although parking was in the back or on the side, the building has a College Avenue address and people have told him that they have driven right past and didn’t know where AMA was. He said there was also sometimes confusion because Memorial Presbyterian church is kitty-corner to them on the south-east side of the College/Meade intersection. A sign would help people know which location was the correct one.
The Board members discussed whether the ordinance had any instruction regarding a property that had 3 (as opposed to 2) street frontages and reached the conclusion that it did not mention that situation and, although the intention of the the ordinance was probably to allow a large corner lot to have signs placed on each of their sides, there was no requirement that, on a 3 frontage lot, the second sign be placed on a side that was at least 200 feet long.
There was also discussion of the portion in the ordinance that states “In no case will two ground signs be allowed on the same street frontage for the same business or parcel”.
Ryan pointed out that the signs would be for two separate businesses. They are different organizations using that same property. The Board members, however, thought that since the ordinance specifically mentioned “or parcel” instead of just “same business” that that restriction still applied even in situations where there were multiple businesses on the same property.
There was some concern over whether the lot met the requirement that ‘Double frontage lots must have at least 300 feet of lot depth” but it was eventually determined that it does.
So, at that point, the Board narrowed down that Ryan essentially needed two variances if he wanted to place the sign where he wanted–one for the 200 foot frontage rule and one for the rule stating two signs cannot be placed on the same frontage. The Board seemed amenable to granting the variance for the first issue but much less so for the second issue.
Ryan said he wanted to respect the church board’s decision on sign appearance and placement.
Chairman McCann said he respected why they were asking to place it where they were, but he thought it looked a little busy, and, in fact, looked exactly the way the framers of the framers of the code didn’t want things to look. He thought they didn’t want all the noise of signs on the same frontage in the same area.
Ryan wanted to know whether he thought it was busy because of the design of the sign or the fact that there were two signs next to each other.
Chairman McCann said it was both the fact that they were next to each other and that they had two entirely different designs. There might be some situations where two signs complement each other, but these ones are trying to catch the attention of two different audiences. His basic concern was that this situation is probably exactly what the code was written to prevent and he didn’t really understand what the hardship was that they could take into consideration.
Chairman McCann then pointed out that they’ve been there 10 years and then asked if Ryan could talk a little about what hardship might result from not being granted the variance.
Ryan said the hardship was that they were supporting the church and downtown businesses in addition to providing education for students.
Chairman McCann asked, “So your business isn’t sustainable without this sign?”
Ryan answered, no. They’ve been there for 10 years, but as the numbers keep decreasing in the church he thinks they’re helping the EUMC remain sustainable. The pastor’s letter to the Board outlined some of that.
Chairman McCann had no question that they were a benefit to the church, but the Board’s responsibility is to find some sort of hardship that would allow them to override the intent of the code, and I hadn’t heard a hardship other that “it would be nice”, which didn’t get across the threshold for him. He went on to explain some issues they consider such as if there’s a terrain issue or an odd shaped lott or some kind of physical impossibility caused by the building placement that would not allow them to place a sign where the code would allow. He asked if the church would consider replacing their sign so it included AMA on it.
Ryan strongly doubted it and also said they didn’t have the funds to redo the sign. They just started going back to in-person services so their numbers are down quite a bit.
They discussed the possibility of putting a sign on the building or taking a new sign and sandwiching in on either side of the existing sign. Or the Board could grant a variance for the rule requiring two frontages be at least 200 feet long and then AMA and the church could put a sign on the Meade Street side.
That was where things started meandering a bit because they realized they didn’t know what section of the lot would be considered part of the College Avenue frontage vs part of the Mead Street frontage. They looked up the Zoning Code definition of frontage which states, “Frontage means that boundary of a lot that abuts a dedicated public street. The public right-of-way may include frontage road,” but that didn’t seem to help them.
At first they just thought the section that potentially had overlapping frontages was a rectangle on the southeast corner of the property if one drew a straight line from the sides of the building out to the street, but as they thought about it more they wondered if the frontage extended all the way back to the other end of the property such that if they granted a variance so that a sign could be placed on the Meade Street frontage would that allow AMA and EUMC to put the signs next to each other anyway and claim that one was on the College Avenue Frontage and one was on the Meade Street frontage.
As one of the committee members asked what is the frontage? The first 10 feet? The first 15 feet? Is it equal to the building setback?
But the Municipal Code seems to offer no definition that would help one delineate the frontage of one street from the frontage of another on a corner lot for purposes of sign placement.
In looking at the code, Inspections Supervisor Craanen confirmed that, on corner lots, they would struggle with trying to define exactly how far away two signs needed to be.
At some point during all of this pondering, they realized that the sign AMA and EUMC were wanting to place broke the municipal code in a third way hitherto unnoticed. Per Section 23-525(c) a ground sign that is over 3 feet tall cannot be closer than 15 feet to a public right-of-way. The church’s current sign is exactly 15 feet away from College Avenue. The sign they are wanting to install would be between the current sign and College Avenue so it would be closer than 15 feet. The proposed new sign is also 4 feet high.
All of that means, even if they were granted both of the variances they were requesting, they would still not be able to install the sign where they wanted to unless they reduced its height to 3 feet or were granted a third variance.
Eventually, Chairman McCann articulated the hardship in front of the Board which was that there are two businesses on the property but they are not well represented by the existing sign and the parcel is also large with a confusing layout. In light of this hardship, they granted AMA and EUMC a variance for the 200 foot frontage requirement. However, the Board also voted to deny a variance for the two signs on the same frontage requirement.
That has left Ryan with the option to place a second sign on the property, but he will not be able to put it where it was originally proposed. He will need to work out with the city what exactly “frontage” and he will have to work out with the church board where on their property they would be willing to have another sign placed.
Rest assured, I will keep you updated when/if a new sign goes up on the Emmanuel United Methodist Church property.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=856512&GUID=017BBA1F-7194-4EFA-9E86-987163858544&Options=info|&Search=
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