Serving Gogebic, Iron and Ontonagon Counties
Serving Gogebic, Iron and Ontonagon Counties
By TOM LAVENTURE
Ironwood — The Ironwood Planning Commission continued its site plan review and conditional permit application process at its regular meeting on Thursday.
The information was to ensure the members understand the process and scheduling for what could be around eight public hearings over the next two months to consider marijuana establishment licensing applications, said Tom Bergman, director of community development for the city of Ironwood. There are eight applicants with a total of 16 total applications that will likely require two public hearings a month for two months.
“We will probably want to have the meetings spread out more than one a month or we will have long meetings with several applicants on one agenda,” Bergman said.
The board approved the hearings to be held on March 4 and 18, and April 8 and 22. It may also entail the first meeting of May. Details of the meeting times and virtual links will be forthcoming.
The March meetings will be held virtually, Bergman said. The April meetings will likely be held virtually unless state pandemic orders change.
The commissioners expressed concern for holding an effective public hearing virtually. Bergman said he would research alternatives or at least outline the most efficient way to conduct it virtually.
“We may be able to seek public comment during a section of the Zoom meeting where people could just write their comments and we can read them in the virtual forum,” he said, noting that legal questions will need to be researched to see if that is allowed. “Otherwise, we’ll just go down the list of attendees and make sure that everyone has an opportunity to speak.”
Tim Dean, city attorney, reviewed the planning committee process for considering zoning compliance with ordinances, along with the criteria to grant a conditional use permit. To avoid potential legal ramifications from the process it is important to base decisions on the language of the ordinances and not on sentiment based on support or opposition to an application, he said.
Expect that public hearing will present a difficult decision that requires balancing the competing interests with zoning ordinances, he said. There may be proponents who believe in the design and purpose of the project but not for a specific location, while others will oppose the project anywhere in the community, he said.
The planning commission should also consider laws that recognize the rights of property owners to expect a reasonable return on their investment, he said. That is also part of the conditional use permit applications.
“All zoning decisions should be based upon the standards set forth in the zoning ordinance,” he said. “The standards that you use should be written in the ordinance and if all standards are met the application must be approved.”
There are two applicants for the micro-business licenses that allow for cultivation, processing and packaging of up to 150 plants for sale or transfer to another marijuana safety compliance facility. There are six applicants for two available marijuana retailer licenses, and two more applicants for two available class B grower licenses that allow for up to 500 plants, he said.
There are four applicants for two available class C grower licenses that allow for up to 2,000 plants, he said. There are two applicants for two marijuana processing licenses.
The planning commission will consider information from the applications, site visits and public hearings when applying screening or other specific conditions on conditional use during this process. The next step in the process would be to score the applications on a merit based scoring system during a joint meeting of the planning commission and the city commission.