The Board of Zoning Appeals met 01/17/2022 and took up two variance requests from St. Bernadette Parish related to erecting a sign on their property. They wanted to erect a third ground sign while city code only allows 2 signs per property, and they also wanted to have the third sign they erected be 5 feet tall and only 6 feet back from the property line even though city code requires signs that are over 3 feet to be at least 15 feet back from the property line.
Normally, a meeting would start out with a time for public appearances during which neighbors or community members could express concerns and ask questions about a variance. In this case, outside of the individuals requesting the variance, there were no members of the public at the meeting so they skipped over that section of the agenda.
They took up the first variance request in which “the applicant proposes to erect a third (3) ground sign on a corner lot. Section 23-522(b) of the Zoning Ordinance limits the number of ground signs on corner lots to two (2) signs.”
Board Chairman Paul McCann asked the applicants to introduce themselves and fill the board in on whatever information they wanted the board to understand about this situation.
Jody Lueck was the business administrator at St. Bernadette Parish.
Dan Fourness was the day school director at The Richardson School in Appleton. He told the board, “I think from our perspective, this creates a hardship just based on some of the feedback we’ve gotten from families, districts, potential camper to our program not knowing where our location is, having trouble finding it, confusing our building for the church building.” The Richardson School was a brand-new school and people are not aware of its location. Being able to put up a sign would help give the school a little bit more exposure and help people know where it is located. He said they did have a sign in front of the school, but it was not visible from the road.
Chairman McCann explained that one of the requirements for the board to find in favor of a request would be to establish some sort of hardship associated with the shape, size, or terrain of the property. He asked what types of circumstances did they believe were particular to that property that made it a hardship to comply with the code.
Jody answered that the St. Bernadette center houses both The Richardson School and the Thompson Center on Lourdes. There was no signage along Lourdes, and the buildings were tucked back and couldn’t be seen clearly. From a safety standpoint, they were dealing with senior citizens who were not necessarily overly aware of their surroundings, and they were also dealing with the Richardson School which didn’t only serve local people who knew the neighborhood and where the school was located.
She asked Dan to give some background on The Richardson School, so the board could understand what it was.
He explained that they were a private school that contracts with school districts to serve students that have disabilities, primarily behavioral needs. When a student outstrips a district’s ability to meet a student’s needs, whether because their facilities and resources are too limited or they cannot handle the amount of actual hands-on physical intervention that a student requires, they will hire The Richardson School to administer the student’s educational plan. They have students from local districts including Appleton, Menasha, and Kaukauna, but they also have a lot of students that come from smaller districts that don’t have necessarily the resources a district the size of Appleton might have. He mentioned Berlin, Fond Du Lac, and New London. People come from significant distances, far outside the neighborhood, and don’t necessarily know precisely where the school is located. Transportation companies may also not know exactly where the school is.
Board member Scott Engstrom asked if there were buses or other larger vehicles bringing students from outside of the area or if it was mostly smaller vehicles like van.
Dan said it was a combination of both and depended on what made most sense for the district. There were some buses that transported students but there were also minivans as well as some personal vehicles dropping students off.
Chairman McCann wanted to confirmed that there were currently two signs and a decorative cross on the property.
Inspections Supervisor Kurt Craanen stated, “We feel there’s two sign that are currently on the property.”
[Honestly, that struck me as a funny statement to make. Either there are two signs on the property or there aren’t regardless of what one may “feel” about it, but it was actually a little less clear than one might expect.]
The application in the agenda packet was somewhat confusing because they had included a picture of a red directional sign that did not actually have anything to do with the variance request. The Google Street View was also misleading because the images had been taken a number of years earlier and included a sign that no longer existed and that made it look as if there were already three signs on the property.
The conversation was a little difficult to follow when listening to the audio because I could not see the visual materials they were referencing and also because they were referencing not only signs along the street but also signs on the building as they tried to clarify which signs counted toward the two-sign maximum set out by code and which signs did not. It was confusing to the point that I actually drove past the property this morning to clarify for myself what was going on. I confirmed that there was a St. Bernadette Catholic Church sign on Lourdes Avenue, an IRIS Place sign on Matthias Street, and a cross on the corner of Matthias and Lourdes that had, at one point, been the location of a sign that was still visible on Google Street View.
Board member Kelly Sperl remarked that this was an unusual sized lot with only minimal street access to it.
Jody told him that they had around 15 acres. When the parish had started back in the early 1960s, they had actually bought even more land because they had planned to build a Catholic high school on the south side of Appleton. That didn’t come to fruition, and the parish sold off some of the land which was then developed into residential homes.
Now NAMI runs a peer run respite center called Iris House in what had once been the convent. The convent had been intended to house enough nuns and priests to teach at the planned high school which is why it was the size it is. “But we’re making good use of it—I should say the community is making good use of it. We’re very happy to have NAMI there. We’re very happy to have the senior center there. And now the Richardson School.”
Chairman McCann tried to estimate how much frontage the property had along both Matthias and Lourdes.
Inspections Supervisor Craanen thought it was probably around 1,000 feet on both sides.
It was confirmed that the only access to the site was off of Lourdes Avenue.
Board member Engstrom thought it was probably one of the more unique lots in the city in terms of the sheer size and depth from certain areas.
Chairman McCann also pointed out that it had been purpose built for one thing and they are now trying to repurpose it for a number of different agencies and organizations which was difficult to manage with a two-sign restriction.
With that discussion having been had, Chairman McCann told the board he would entertain a motion on the variance.
Board member Engstrom made a motion to approve the variance saying, “I think that the variance—actually both variances requested—are in the public interest. I think that when we’re looking at the standards that apply here–and even if you go into the purpose of the code at the section 23-67(a), I mean, there are clearly special characteristics to the property. Those are well documented and well established. I think the literal enforcement of the ordinance in this case would be an unnecessary hardship and would create practical difficulty not just for the property owner but for the community at large. I do think that there are concerns as to public safety when it comes to people from out of the area coming to find a building that is, you know, set back so deep and such a big lot when there are multiple organizations on that same lot. I think it is in the public interest to grant the variance, again noting the special characteristics of the property and the fact that it’s in the interest of public welfare.”
There was no further discussion and the board voted 4-0 to approve the variance.
Vote. Approved 4-0
McCann: Move on to the second item.
They then moved on to the second variance request in which the “applicant proposes to erect a sign that is five (5) feet high and six (6) feet from the front property line. Section 23-525(c) of the Zoning Ordinance requires signs that are over three (3) feet tall to be setback fifteen (15) from the front property line.”
Board member Sperl started the discussion off right away by saying, “I don’t know that there’s a whole lot to discuss on this scenario. I think I’d like to go ahead right away and make a motion to approve this because, for the same exact reasons Scott pointed out with the third sign as far as quantity goes, there’s a lot going on with this site and to hide that and to put it too far back I think is gonna be detrimental and I think it serves a good purpose in that location. I’d like to make a motion to approve that.”
Board member Engstrom said, “I’ll second it. I think that we’ve established a sufficient record to support votes on both variances, and I’ll incorporate as if set forth herein the same analysis that I provided previously.”
Chairman McCann wanted to confirm for the record that this sign was in no way a visual hinderance for traffic safety or any other issues related to line of sight.
Inspections Supervisor Craanen confirmed that was the case. If the applicants were to situate the sign elsewhere than the spot indicated on their application, then they could find themselves in violation of some other code, so he cautioned them to make sure they kept in the middle between the two driveways.
There was no further discussion and the board voted 4-0 to approve the second variance.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=920442&GUID=8A492C09-2836-4675-A147-8B81438BA8E8
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