Friends, family, and surrounding municipalities, we had the Kansas City, Missouri City Plan Commission meeting yesterday.

Here's what went down. Docket link below for reference. #kcmo https://www.dropbox.com/s/5t520gbj8e7gz4y/April%2020%202021%20-%20Docket%20With%20Staff%20Reports.pdf?dl=0

Docket #1.1 and 1.2 was a rezoning and area plan amendment from a R-6 (low density residential) to B1-1 (Neighborhood Business). It's at 2200 Minnie in Pendleton Heights.

It is the lot behind the building on the intersection at Brooklyn and Lexington.

The owners are the same people who own PH Coffee. They have been trying to get a restaurant tenant but COVID has forced restaurants (probably for the better) to have outdoor seating.

This rezoning and area plan amendment brings both parcels into the same category and allows for outdoor accommodations for a future restaurant. It had strong neighborhood support.

It was recommended to be approved 8-0.

There were a flurry of small vacations, which normally I am suspicious of.

Docket #4 was a vacation of E 52nd Street in the Vance Brothers facility off of Brighton.

They own both sides of the street and Quincy between 52nd and 53rd has already been vacated. Quincy to the north is a dead end. Denver is a paper street.

This will allow them to better secure the facility.

It didn't disrupt the grid or really affect the public in anyway.

It was recommended approval 8-0.

Docket #5 was another small vacation on the Westside. It was actually a street but ROW around Bi-State Dr.

This was recommended approval 8-0.

A 3rd vacation was Docket #6 was paper vacation, where it's on paper but not a street or alley. It's for a park and valet at KCI that the City owns but leases to the operator.

They vacated the long bar in the drawing to expand the parking lot.

Recommended approval 8-0.

The last and final vacation Docket #7 was a small vacation near 2nd and Delaware in River Market.

The new apartments reconnected 2nd Street and left this tiny piece of land floating. The property owner at the Chase Bag Building are going to use this space for their dumpsters.

This was recommended to be approved 8-0.

Docket #12.1 and 12.2 was an industrial park at N. Brighton Avenue and Missouri Highway 210.

The applicant wanted to put a distribution center at this location.

It's zoned to be residential and has residential on 3 sides and a parkway to its east.

The applicant had a lot of arguments for it like housing wasn't financially viable, Jobs!, etc. They also had requested a lot of variances to the standards.

The neighborhood, though loosely organized, strongly opposed it.

Staff recommended denial.

In my opinion, rarely do we get something this big that is very clearly an inappropriate land use change.

For me it was simple, I wouldn't want to live across the street from a distribution center so I wasn't going to do that to someone else.

It was recommended denial 8-0.

Council has ignored our denials in the past but this one is particularly egregious. I hope they listen to us, the neighborhoods, and commonsense.

Docket #15 was simply cleaning up a commercial property in West Plaza, which had its parking lot zoned residential. The rezoning would bring the both parcels into the same zoning category.

Recommended approval 7-0.

Docket #19.1 was a rezoning from Residential R-80 to B3-1 (Community Business) on NW Barry Road and N. Hickory Street.

This was for a development, which will be on the next docket, and brought it into similar zoning for the street.

Recommended approval 7-0.

Docket #21.1, 21.2, 21.3 was a rezoning, area amendment plan, and special use permit for a vehicle sales and service. This case has been ongoing for 2+ years with a bunch of issues and the applicant and his representative have not been responsive to staff.

It's on Swope Parkway and is an old surplus fire station. Based on documentation it was supposed to be a community business when it was sold.

We had heard this case several times before but the representative for the owner kept filibustering at every turn and wouldn't address the merits of the case. This meeting he said we didn't have jurisdiction because of state statute.

It was all very odd and confusing.

City process isn't perfect and staff is often overworked so sometimes there are errors, delays, etc. but they put a lot of work in and had multiple planners on this case for 2+ years. The applicant's rep didn't give us any real reason to not follow staff's recommendation.

We followed staff's recommendation for denial 7-0.

Housekeeping:

The cases of note that were continued were:

#16 - Location One (see: KCUR article on Black small business owners) was continued off-docket so they are looking to start over.
#18.1 and #18.2 - 45th and Troost was continuing to May 18th.

Docket #2, 3, 8.1, 8.2, 10, 11, 14, 17, 20 were continued to the date on the docket.

Docket #9 was heard but continued to May 18th

Docket #19.2 was continued but the date changed to May 4th.