WESTFIELD – The Planning Board voted to send a negative recommendation to the City Council for a zone change requested by Ward 5 City Councilor Richard E. Onofrey Jr., following a vigorous discussion of the benefits of changing the zoning for a convenience store.
The Council held its public hearing on the zone change at its June 20 session, then sent the request to the Zoning, Planning & Development Committee for further review and to await a recommendation from the Planning Board.
Onofrey appeared before the Planning Board at Tuesday’s public hearing on the zone change for the convenience store located at 397 Little River Road and formerly known as Carmel Farms. The current owner requested Onofrey to sponsor the request of the change because the property is currently a split zone parcel.
“The front is zoned Residence A and the rear of the parcel is zoned Rural Residential,” Onofrey said. “The store owner would like all of the property in a Commercial A zone. The property has been a convenience store for 40 to 45 years and 50 to 60 years ago it was a farm stand.”
Onofrey said the problem is that zoning regulation prohibits the equipment, cooler and refrigeration units in a RR zone, so all of that equipment has to be located in the RA section of the building.
“He can’t move that stuff to the rear of the building now and would like to reorganize because he wants to use the space more efficiently,” Onofrey said.
Planning Board Chairman Pro Tem William Onyski questioned Onofrey on the split zoning of the store.
“It doesn’t look like the store itself is split,” Onyski said, adding that the entire building is in the RA zone. “That may solve all of the problems.”
Onofrey said that he looked at the city GIS maps and to him it appeared that the line of demarcation between the two zones passed through the building but that the owner had approached him requesting the zone change prior to Onofrey looking at the zoning maps.
“The owner would be more comfortable to have it zoned Commercial A,” Onofrey said.
City Planner Jay Vinskey said the store is currently a non-conforming, pre-existing use in Residence A, but would also be non-conforming in the Commercial A Neighborhood Commercial District which limits the store area to 750-square feet. The store is currently 1,777-square feet in area.
“As a non-conforming use the owner is allowed to expand up to 10 percent,” Vinskey said, then described the uses allowed in Commercial A zones which include retail service stores, custom stores such as bakeries, food stores (except restaurants) 0r jewelry stores, radio, television or household appliance, and florist stores, branch banks, finance and realty offices, self-service laundries, medical and dental clinics, conversion up to 10 residential units with two off-street parking spaces per unit provided.
A number of uses are allowed through a special permit including self-storage facilities, conversion to residential use exceeding 10 units, funeral establishments, and shared elderly housing.
“Is there any need for a zone change if the building is not split?” board member Matthew VanHeynigen asked. “The applicant can already do what he’s planning to do.”
The other uses allowed in Commercial A zones raised other questions from board members.
“I’d like to hear from the owner to see the rationale for this request,” Jane Magarian said. “He’s had this property for 10 years, so why is he seeking this zone change now? We’re missing a piece of the puzzle.”
Onyski said the board had already voted to close the public hearing and could not request additional information from the property owner.
Board member Ramon Rivera made a motion to send a positive recommendation for the zone change to the City Council.
“He has property that he can’t use the way he’d like to use it,” Rivera said. “He’s been paying taxes on that property he can’t use and it’s not like he can make any changes without coming back to us (because of the non-conforming status).”
That motion failed to gain a second. VanHeynigen then made a motion to send a negative recommendation to the City Council, which was seconded by Magarian and approved by a 6-1 vote.
