Agenda - Council - 11/26/1996 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Also per Council's direction, City Staff has researched the status of the Ramsey Medical sign at the comer of 153rd Avenue and T.H. g47. As noted in the inventroy list above, it is considered illegal non-conforming, unless they can produce a sign permit from the City- approving the placement of the sign on that comer. According to City Code, the City could have forced removal of all of these i/legal off-premises signs by November 28, 1995. However, it was anticipated that eventually these signs would become an issue of discussion and perhaps a more pallatable solution could be arrived at than forced removal. The City has always tried to uphold a policy of working with the business community. Therefore, Staff has been treating them as lawful non-conforming and as such, other than change of copy or normal maintenance, a non-conforming or 'grand.fathered' sign will lose that designation if it is discontinued for a period of 60 days, expanded, relocated, replaced, altered, or damaged by more than 50% of its market value. In addition, if any property use or business changes ownership, all business signs on the property shall be brought into conformity with this code within i2 months of the date on which use or ownership changed. There are a couple of avenues that can be pursued with the Ramsey Medical sign at 153rd and T.H. 847. First of all, the business has changed ownership (Allina) and even though code states that alt signs on the .property_ then have 12 months to conform, Staff is of the opinion that requiring all of the signs, on the property or not, to conform to code is within the spirit of the ordinance. Therefore, the City can force removal of that sign on a date representative of 9 months from the date Allina took ownership of the medical facility. However, it is very likely that the property on which the sign is located will be developing in the near future. When it does, the business that locates there will most certainly want to erect its own flee-standing permanent sign and when it does, the Ramsey Medical or All~na sign will have to come down because code only allows one free standing sign per parcel. Recommendation: With respect to Superbowl's application, City Staff is recommending denial of the off- premises sign. Reviewing the application on its own merits, approval would set a precedent for approving signs that are not in compliance with City Code. jif the City approves this sign, are we ready to approve similar requests for non-code compliance sigange from any Highway 10 area business]. Staff has also observed that Superbowl's wall sign is fairly visible from Highway #10 and they are also entitled to erect a 25 foot high pylon sign on their property. In addition, the Dubats property where Superbowl's sign is proposed to be located already has an 84 square foot (100 square foot allowed) lawful conforming sign on Hwy #10 and a 24 square foot lawful non-conforming sign on Riverdale Drive N.W. Reviewing the application from a promotion of community and business aspect, it appears that the quality of sign desired is cost prohibitive to both the businesses and the City at this time, and on an on-going basis for the City. The Planning Commission recommended approval of Superbowl's request for an off- premises sign and their proposed findings of fact is enclosed. City Staff recommends that the findings be amended as follows: #14 should be deleted: the off-premises sign for Anoka Self Storage has been removed. #'s 16, 17, 19, and 20 should be deleted because they are not relevant to a sign. I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I