The Berrien Township Planning Commission met on June 15, 2009 at the township hall for a regular meeting.Chairman Dale Sherwood called the meeting to order and opened the meeting with the pledge to the flag.
Roll call: Chairman Dale Sherwood, Vice-Chairman Ron Harner, Secretary Doug Shelton, Dave Riedlinger, Ross Rogien were present.Ed Kerlikowske Jr. and Robert Norris were absent.
There was a motion to approve the minutes from May 18, 2009 by Ron Harner and supported by Dave Riedlinger. All ayes, none opposed MOTION CARRIED.
Jim Hoover presented the building permit report.There were twelve permits issued.Permits totaled $125,575.00 in estimated costs and $510.00 in permit fees.
Mike Clark brought up the legalization of marijuana and discussed the pros and consto the thought of putting together any kind of ordinance on regulating “medical marijuana.”
We started looking once again at the draft of the zoning ordinance beginning on page
4-11, which is were we left off on the May 18, 2009 meeting.
The entire section in the zoning ordinance section 300.414, concerning private roads, will be eliminated from this draft and remain worded the same way as in the original ordinance.
Mike Clark will be working to improve and revise the wording on the entire zoning ordinance section 300.415.The new wording will hopefully make it easier to read and understand when being reviewed in the future.
The Berrien Township Board of Trustees were meeting at this time also.Present were Supervisor Paul Bixby, Clerk Mary Jane Dean, Treasure Paul Sprung, Trustees Julie Burke, Ross Rogien, and Harold Bishop.Kevin Klug was absent.
Mike Clark also will be working on zoning ordinance section 300.416, which deals with signs.Once, completed it will be up for additional review.
Zoning ordinance section 300.420 will be completed deleted from this draft due to the fact that the new “yard sale ordinance” is already in place.
While looking into the zoning ordinance article five-schedule of regulations, page 5-1, it was decided that: two family dwellings will be permitted, “special use land” be added to day care center or child care center, and to change antique, gift, art and handicraft shops back to “special use land.”
Zoning ordinance article five-schedule of regulations, page 5-3, will have portable sawmill once again be under “special use land”.Also under the same section on the same page we will be adding drive-thru to restaurants and change that also to “special use land”.
Zoning ordinance article five-schedule of regulations, page 5-2, hospital is being changed from “special use land”under R-1 to being ‘special use land” under A-R.
A motion to adjourn was made by Douglas Shelton and supported by Ron Harner.All ayes, none opposed, MOTION CARRIED.
