WAUSAU, WI (WSAU) — A heavily discussed city-owned property has been rezoned.
Tuesday evening the Wausau City Council took up the proposed rezoning of the city-owned property at 1300 Cleveland Avenue. The proposed rezoning is to take the property from a Medium Industrial Zoning District to a Multi-Family Residential-12 Zoning District. A public hearing was held on the rezoning when it passed the City’s Plan Commission on a 5-2 vote.
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During the public comment portion of the meeting, several Wausau residents spoke about the rezoning of the property. The majority of residents were in favor of rezoning the property to a residential district to correct a zoning map from 2019 and to keep industrial expansion by companies like 3M and Kolbe & Kolbe Millwork out of the mostly residential neighborhood.
With the property residing in District 3, Alder Tom Killian explained he knew his district wanted the government error from 2019 to be correct. “This really was a zoning map error. The public understands that everyone can make mistakes, honest mistakes. Whether that’s a person or a government unit. But the public also fully expects that those mistakes and errors are corrected,”.
Along with correcting the zoning map mistake from 2019, District 4 Alder Tom Neal noted that the rezoning could also help with the environmental cleanup of the site. “One is to rectify an error, as simple as that. But two, when you achieve this level of zoning, we are now paving the way for the optimum effectiveness of cleaning up that property. So I think that is also in full respect to the neighbors,”.
Soil samples were taken on the property in October of 2020 to identify any environmental concerns with the area. In February the Council held the first of what will be several meetings to go over the results of the soil samples as presented by GEI and the DNR.
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While the council was mostly in favor of rezoning the property Tuesday night, some were wondering if it might be a better idea to table the rezoning to a later date. District 7 Alder Lisa Rasmussen said she wasn’t sure the property would be a good location for a residential site with the current levels of contamination found on the property.
“I believe that we can make deliberate movements for cleanup without going to a residential zoning class. I’m in fact interested in what zoning class it could be that perhaps doesn’t necessarily further industry but would also keep people from living on it. It’s going to be a tough sell for me to ever allow anyone to live there,”.
Ultimately the Council unanimously approved the rezoning of the property to a residential district. Killian and District 1 Alder Pat Peckham pointed out that zoning is a dynamic process, meaning the property can be rezoned at any time if the potential owner of the property so chooses to pursue the rezoning process.
