Waterloo Times

Cedar Falls officials recently were presented with an amendment to the town’s zoning ordinance process that would require the planning and zoning commission to approve all plans for new developments in the downtown character district.

There were no public comments or written comments from the community members, but the city council had a lot of discussion on the subject. If approved, the requirement would affect new and expanding developments in the Storefront, Urban General and Urban General 2 areas of the downtown character district. 

The suggestion dates to early 2022, and has gone back and forth between the planning and zoning commission and the city council since. The planners voted 5-4 against this requirement, as they felt it would delay smaller projects for unimportant reasons and also felt it went against the city’s recent goal of streamlining development review processes in the city as it would give the commission much more traffic.

“On June 8, after consideration of various options, the Planning and Zoning Commission recommended requiring new buildings in the urban general, urban general II, and the storefront areas in the downtown core to be reviewed by the Planning and Zoning Commission and approved by City Council,” Planning and Community Services Manager Karen Howard said during the March 20 council meeting.

“On July 18, the council did hold a public hearing… and they referred the ordinance back to the commission, as you recall, to also include some additional amendments that would require any plan for expanding the floor area of an existing building or any plan for one or more additional dwelling units in a project to also be reviewed through PNZ and Council on August 24,” Howard said. “The Commission did consider that referral and recommended disapproval of that petition to include those additional review items.”

The council worried that without passing this amendment, the site plans wouldn’t go through review at planning and zoning commission or city council, although city staff would still review it.

The mayor and council wanted as much transparency with the public as possible, which they would gain through the multiple meetings required by this new amendment. They want to ensure that big developers and businesses have to showcase their plans and designs in detail in very public spaces, to prevent them from building up and blocking views or building out and cannibalizing retail space or parking. While the council debated this topic due to the P&Z’s hesitation, they ultimately passed the ordinance to require the multiple reviews for developments.