Trib: Mt. Lebanon planners recommend approving high school

The Mt. Lebanon Planning Board recommended final approvals for the school district’s $113.3 million high school renovation proposal, leaving the controversial project’s final go-ahead up to the municipal commissioners.

The board Tuesday night recommended that the commissioners give final approval to the school district’s land development plan; grant the district a “conditional use” to keep the school in an area zoned for residential development; and move forward with a shared-parking agreement for 40 spaces in a municipal lot that gives the school enough spaces to meet the zoning code’s parking requirement.

Read the full article:

• www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_713886.html (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)

Trib: Mt. Lebanon High School project moves forward

The Mt. Lebanon High School project is back on track after getting preliminary approval Tuesday night from the municipal planning board.

It was the second time the planning board, which reviews development proposals to ensure they meet Mt. Lebanon's zoning codes and regulations, voted on the controversial $113.3 million renovation project.

Read the full article:

• www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_710772.html (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)

Why Didn’t the School Board Pursue the Shared-Parking Option Earlier? (Updated)

Updated 2010-10-16 15:55 with details from school-board director Jo Posti’s blog post about the school district’s zoning appeal being denied.

Over on his blog, Commissioner Dan Miller writes about being inundated with questions about the school district losing its zoning appeal. He guesses that the school board is likely to respond by resurrecting an idea the municipal planner had suggested a couple of years back – a shared-parking agreement between the school district and municipality for the Commissioners’ Lot. This agreement would provide the school district with the additional parking needed to meet zoning requirements.

To give residents an idea of how long it takes for the gears of government to turn, Commissioner Miller offers a potential timeline for the school district’s detour through the municipal government, first to obtain the parking agreement and, following that, re-approval of its plans.

The timeline begins with this Monday’s school board meeting, where the board could vote to pursue a shared-parking agreement. The proposed agreement would then go to the commissioners. If they approve the agreement, the school district could then submit parking-enhanced plans to the planning board. The planning board could then meet in December or January to grant preliminary approval of the plans and to recommend to the commissioners that the plans receive final approval. Finally, the commissioners could vote on the planning board’s recommendation – in late February or, more likely, in early March 2011.

I gather that the school district would be able to continue with the high-school project after receiving preliminary approval from the planning board in December or January. Still, that’s quite a detour.

Which raises the question: Why didn’t the school district pursue the shared-parking option earlier?

The option was recommended to the school district two years ago. The school district knew it lacked adequate parking back in March, when the zoning hearing board told it so. So why pursue a time-consuming court appeal to an uncertain conclusion without securing other options? Court cases are always a gamble. If the school district had such an obvious way to hedge its bet, why didn’t it?

The only reason I can fathom is that the school district didn’t think it needed other options; it thought the zoning appeal was a sure thing. If that’s the case, what made it so confident? On its merits, the case didn’t look strong to me, so the sure-thing explanation seems hard to believe.

In the end, it’s a mystery to me. If anybody can explain why the shared-parking option wasn’t pursued earlier, let’s hear it.

Update

On her blog, school-board director Jo Posti implies that a shared-parking agreement was, in fact, pursued but has just taken a long, long time:

[T]he parking agreement concept isn’t new but one that has required ongoing discussions regarding language and terms... It’s an agreement unique to the community that’s been given thoughtful consideration since there isn’t local precedent to model.

But Commissioner Miller’s account is somewhat different: “Some may also be aware that there were some discussions on [the shared-parking agreement] in April and May of this year – but until recently the issue was dead.”

So what really happened? Did the school district earnestly pursue a shared-parking agreement during its zoning appeal or didn’t it?

School District Loses Zoning Appeal (Updated 5)

Updated 2010-10-14 10:01 with details from the court’s opinion and order.
Updated 2010-10-14 10:20 with with minor changes for clarity.
Updated 2010-10-14 11:22 with with minor changes for perspective.
Updated 2010-10-14 18:14 with links to media coverage.
Updated 2010-10-15 09:20 with link to P-G’s extended coverage.

Yesterday in the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County, the Honorable Joseph M. James affirmed the Mt. Lebanon Zoning Hearing Board’s earlier decision that the Mt. Lebanon School District was not entitled to a variance for the currently planned high-school renovation.

The official opinion and order of the court is only nine pages long, so it’s worth a read. The opening paragraphs are particularly helpful, summarizing the school district’s attempt to comply with zoning code and, failing at that, its appeal to the court.

The opening also puts the appeal into perspective: “When the trial court takes no additional evidence, the scope of its review is limited to determining whether the [Zoning Hearing] Board committed an error of law, abused its discretion, or made findings not supported by substantial evidence.” So, for those plan-supporters who think the Zoning Hearing Board was shortsighted or somehow acted improperly, here’s the reality check.

Moving into the appeal, the school district had argued that it did not require the disputed zoning variance: the high school is currently nonconforming and, therefore, the school district had the right to change it, provided it did not become more nonconforming. No so, wrote the judge: “[T]he law does not relieve the School District from requiring a variance just because a nonconforming building currently exists on the property. Both the Ordinance and case law support this finding.” Although existing nonconforming buildings could “be continued” under the Ordinance, the judge noted, the school district’s plans call for a new building on previously vacant ground and do not qualify for this special consideration.

The school district had also argued that the challenges of high-school project were so great that complying with the disputed zoning requirements would be unreasonably burdensome. But the Zoning Hearing Board had found otherwise, and the judge affirmed that finding on the grounds that the school district had failed to support its claims: “The School District did not prove that the irregularities of the property caused the lot coverage nonconformities or limited the number of parking spaces. Secondly, the School District failed to prove that the property could not be developed without the requested variances.”

The judge concluded, “Based on the foregoing, the decision of the Zoning Hearing Board of Mt. Lebanon is affirmed and the appeal is dismissed.”

What now?

As reported earlier on Blog-Lebo, the Mt. Lebanon Planning Board recently granted the school district preliminary approval of the renovation plans. This approval, however, was conditional on the school district receiving a favorable ruling in its zoning appeal. Having just lost that appeal, the school district now finds its plans on the wrong side of both municipal zoning and municipal planning codes.

So now the question for the school district is this: What’s Plan B?

Read these articles:

• Judge upholds rejection of Mt. Lebanon High School plan
  (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
• Judge denies Mt. Lebanon's zoning appeal for high school
  (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)
• Judge denies Mt. Lebanon renovation request
  (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; extended coverage)

P-G: Mt. Lebanon school renovation gets conditional OK

Mt. Lebanon's five-member municipal planning board unanimously passed a motion Tuesday to give the Mt. Lebanon School District conditional preliminary land development approval for its $113.2 million high school renovation project.

Among the conditions of the approval is that the school district obtain a favorable resolution from Allegheny Common Pleas Court, which is reviewing the district's appeal of a zoning hearing board decision.

Read the full article:

• www.post-gazette.com/pg/10273/1091350-55.stm (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)

Planning Board Conditionally Approves High School Plans (Updated)

Updated 2010-09-28 23:54 with more details, thanks to the audio recording of the meeting provided by LeboCitizens.com.

Tonight, the Mt. Lebanon Planning Board voted unanimously to approve (preliminarily) the school district’s plans for the high school project. The approval, however, was subject to the following conditions:

1. The school district must obtain a favorable resolution about parking spaces in its zoning appeal (the plans have only 505 of the required 528 spaces).
2. The school district must comply with the municipal engineer’s review comments.
3. The school district must comply with the traffic engineer’s review comments.
4. The school district must obtain from the Mt. Lebanon Commission approval of a conditional-use application for the high school being on a property zoned R-1.
5. The school district must obtain a modification or waiver from the Mt. Lebanon Commission to allow the use of plants not on the land-development code’s required plant list.
6. The school district must properly treat and test its permeable pavement and report annually to Mt. Lebanon about the same.

Most of the conditions seem easy enough for the school district to satisfy. That first condition, though, is something the school district has less control over. Who knows how the court case will be decided?

But one thing is certain: if the school district’s zoning appeal fails in the Court of Common Pleas, the plans for the high school are going to need some rethinking.

Trib: Mt. Lebanon High School renovation project waits on answers

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports that the planning board withheld approval of the proposed high-school project again:

Mt. Lebanon planners again postponed approval of the $113.3 million high school renovation Tuesday night, adding another month to refine the project.

Not yet satisfied with all the details of traffic studies, crosswalks and parking, the municipal planning board gave school officials more time to go over their plans for the final product, which would involve two years of renovations, demolitions and additions to the high school.

For the details, see the article:

• Mt. Lebanon High School renovation project waits on answers (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)

High School Project Delayed by Traffic and Safety Concerns

According to the Tribune-Review, the high-school project has been detained at another municipal checkpoint, this time by the Planning Board:

Until the Mt. Lebanon School District can address concerns brought up by municipal traffic engineers, formal approval of the $113.3 million high school renovation will have to wait... While the [school] district contends the design is best from an educational standpoint, municipal officials expressed concerns based on zoning, parking and, now, traffic and safety considerations.

The Post-Gazette's coverage of the Planning Board meeting, where the school district's plans failed to meet approval on Tuesday, suggests that such problems are not unusual when complicated projects are first submitted to the planning board:

For a project of the size and scope of the planned high school renovation, it would have been unusual for the high school to receive preliminary land development approval at its first meeting with the planning board, municipal planner Keith McGill said.

The school district's outlook is predictably upbeat, with superintendent Dr. Timothy Steinhauer being "very confident with where we are going from here," reports the Post-Gazette.

One wrinkle, which the Tribune-Review did not overlook, is parking spaces. The planning board, citing visibility and maneuverability concerns, suggested that some half-dozen spaces be eliminated. But earlier this year, if you will recall, the school district's plans were found in violation of municipal zoning code because they didn't include adequate parking, a finding that the school district has appealed to the Court of Common Pleas.

The district's appeal rests, in part, on the notion that the planned renovation would make the high school conform to zoning code more than it does today: the new design adds 3 parking spaces, increasing the total from 502 to 505 (of the required 528). But if the district removes 6 of those spaces to improve visibility and maneuverability, it can no longer claim that its new design is more conforming to zoning code; it will be even less conforming than it is today. Thus, to meet traffic and safety requirements, the school district may have to undermine the foundation of its zoning appeal.

Read more:

• Traffic, safety issues stall approval for Mt. Lebanon high school (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)
• Mt. Lebanon board tables step in project (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)

Updated 2010-06-24 16:59 to clarify the parking concerns.

Mt. Lebanon Zoning Board May Be Approached About Project

The Mt. Lebanon School District intends to open a second front in its battle over zoning deficiencies associated with the proposed $113.3 million high school renovation.

On June 22, the district could make its case before Mt. Lebanon's Planning Board and give a formal presentation regarding the construction project.

Read more: www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/s_683087.html