04/23/07 Council Meeting Minutes

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REGULAR MEETING APRIL 23, 2007 ordinance will be a major step in restoring pride in residential neighborhoods throughout the City. Catherine Toppel, Director, Code Enforcement, 13~` Floor County-City Building, 227 W. Jefferson Blvd., South Bend, Indiana, spoke in favor of this bill. She gave background information on the front setback regulation. In May, 2004, the Council passed a new zoning ordinance for the City of South Bend. Inadvertently, the provision regarding front setback regulations was not addressed within that zoning ordinance. That was discovered in June 2005 in the St. Joseph Circuit Court came down with that interpretation, so it was only during that time from May 2004 and July 2005 that the City has had an aggressive front-yard set back enforcement procedure in place with regard to ticketing through the zoning ordinance. She stated that she is in support of this bill, in that this does become a public safety issue, in addition to a quality of life issue. Front setback parking must be regulated to protect the quality of life that exists in neighborhoods. She stated that she receives numerous phone calls in her department, everyday; someone in her office receives a telephone call regarding parking in the front yard. While it is very unfortunate, the neighborhoods are driven by the perception of what is happen in those neighborhoods. Parking on the front yard gives off the perception to potential home buyers that there is an "I don't care attitude" in that neighborhood. The potential home buyer will go outside the City to purchase their home. The safety aspect is that we teach our children to ride their bikes on the sidewalk to watch out for cars backing out of driveways. With parking on front lawns, this makes it especially hard for these children or pedestrians or anyone utilizing the sidewalk to have to watch very closely the entire aspect of the front yard, not just driveways. She noted that there will always be some objection to this kind of ordinance, especially residents that live in the older neighborhoods within the City, that do not have a garage or driveway, and the streets are very narrow, and their only access to their property is off of an alleyway. Ms. Toppel submitted photographs and they are on file in the Office of the City Clerk for review. She noted that these photographs were taken in the fall of 2006 by Code Enforcement Inspector's. During the committee meeting this afternoon a comment was made that residents won't have a place to park on the street, therefore, they need to park on their properties. There are twenty-four (24) photographs, out of those twenty-four (24), fifteen (15), almost two-thirds (2/3), clearly show parking available in the driveway or on the street, but the vehicle is parked in the front yard. These pictures were taken just by chance; the inspectors were not out looking for these situations. There will be areas in the City that are clearly going be affected more by this ordinance, but those situations can be address, by the inclusion of pocket parking or amendments to the public safety ordinance. With regards to the rear yards the South Bend Zoning Ordinance has always required hard surface parking on property. Because of the grandfathering clause, if the resident has been doing that since prior to 1968, Code Enforcement has taken those complaints on a case by case basis. Ms. Toppel stated that they are not patrolling the area, because in more cases than not, we run into a grandfather situation. Code Enforcement does regulate rear yard parking and address that issue on a complaint basis. This ordinance will give the South Bend Police Department and the Department of Code Enforcement an additional tool, to address the quality of life issues in the neighborhoods, currently there is no ordinance in place. This in addition to the proposed zoning regulations and "Special Event" parking is something that the City of South Bend needs. This being the time heretofore set for the Public Hearing on the above bill, proponents and opponents were given an opportunity to be heard. Ms. Lucille Spaulding, 1124 N. Meade Street, South Bend, Indiana, spoke in favor of this bill. Ms. Spaulding stated that she lives in one of the older neighborhoods and parks on the street, only because it is a safety issue of parking her car on the garage. She stated that she also attends the Lincolnway West Neighborhood Steering Committee meetings and this has been a continuing problem that is brought up month after month. She is in favor of the parking ban in front yards; it makes the neighborhood look junky and brings property values down. This also does not make South Bend look attractive. Just on her way to work this morning, she passed seven (7) vehicles parked on lawns and that was just a ten (10) block area. Further down, there were four (4) vehicles parked on a back lawn and another vehicle was parked halfway on the lawn and driveway. This is a big