PUD zoning for hoteliers will dominate PZB meeting

Historic City News will be following several applications of interest coming before the City of St. Augustine Planning and Zoning Board during their upcoming meeting on Tuesday, April 7, 2015 at 2:00 p.m. in the Alcazar Room of City Hall.

• Returning for approval of a use, by exception, is an application from Josh Parks and his mother, Donna Parks, for Local Hero’s Bar & Grill. The board will consider whether or not the controversial bar, located at 11 Spanish Street, is operating in compliance with its conditional approval; and whether approval should be allowed, revoked, or modified. This application was continued from the March 3rd meeting.
• Kanti Patel’s Vista Hotel IV, Inc., owner of the former Bozard Ford location at 1700 North Ponce de Leon Boulevard, will be asking for approval to allow the sale and service of larger farm equipment, trucks, and tractors, as a use by exception to accommodate the current tenant. Old Town Trolley Tours recently closed the St Augustine Welcome Center operated on the site.
• Hank Williams, the owner of the Monk’s Vineyard on St George Street, will ask approval for expansion of the decades-old restaurant and tavern, with a new owner, as a use by exception.

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Of particular interest will be rezoning requests, some of which are high profile, controversial requests, for approval of Planned Unit Development zoning; sometimes referred to as “spot zoning”.

An application for Old Island Hotels, Inc. by its owner, David Barton Corneal, will come before the Board to ask for relief from restricted Historic Preservation zoning for the Dow Museum of Historic Homes. Corneal is represented by local law firm, McClure Bloodworth, P.L. His request for a complex of inns, with ancillary resort uses, requires rezoning from HP-1 to a planned unit development. The hearing was continued by the Board on March 3rd.

Corneal’s attorney, Susan Bloodworth, will also be representing Ponce Hotel, Inc., another Patel property. The lots, along North Ponce de Leon Boulevard, between Matanzas and Garnett, are adjacent to Patel’s Vista Hotel IV, Inc. property at 1700 North Ponce de Leon Boulevard. The application Tuesday will be to rezone those lots from Commercial Medium two to a Planned Unit Development to allow a hotel with ancillary uses.

Bloodworth will also ask the Board to approve a land use change and rezoning at 1111 North Ponce de Leon Boulevard for client Farid Ashdji. The Quality Inn property (QI Historic, LLC) is asking the Board to change from Commercial Medium to Residential Medium Density, Mixed Use, and to rezone the property from Commercial Medium to a Planned Unit Development to allow a hotel with ancillary uses.

Later, there will be a discussion and summary presentation by staff of recent “Town Hall” meetings, related to the proposed special event venue ordinance and potential revisions of Division 8 planned unit development of the land development code.

Planning and Zoning Board Members