Culver Thoughts
I met some Culverites for dinner recently and they asked some questions that got me thinking. I thought I would share some of my thoughts here. I would credit them for some of this, but since I didn’t ask their permission, they get to remain anonymous. Probably safer for them anyway! Ha!
They wanted my thoughts on a new development in Culver. (One they wanted to pursue, not one of the current ones moving through the processes.) To be honest, I found myself struggling to stay positive. That was not the case 6 years ago when Culver was in the middle of their two Stellar applications. I was on those two committees and while there were some naysayers, as there always are, they were far outweighed by those with a sense of enthusiasm and camaraderie that pulled the community together.
To be clear, I don’t want to belittle what has been accomplished in the last few years. Culver’s Stellar designation has been parlayed into two grants awarded through the Regional Cities Initiative, at least five grants from the Marshall County Community Foundation and matching grants from OCRA, IHDCA and INDOT. So far this has resulted in a new Amphitheater in the Park, major renovations to the Beach Lodge, a new sports park with a playground on school property, new walking/biking trails as well as ancillary benefits not directly funded tied to Stellar, but resulting from Stellar.
When we first started down the path of toward Stellar designation, the scuttlebutt was that Stellar had the reputation of a “Mayor Killer”. In several communities that had attempted or received Stellar designations, the Mayor that promoted the effort was voted out in the next term. OCRA’s assessment of this was that this was mostly due to things not happening quickly enough, allowing opponents to point to the outlays involved with Stellar and profess there was no return on the investment.
Culver didn’t really have that issue as there were enough people involved in Stellar and enough of them understood the time lines in order to refute those claims. Ginny Munroe as our de facto Mayor didn’t let things languish and the town remained well informed about the progress. We’ve lost Ginny’s leadership at this point and there is a void with the Council.
Ginny began Culver Crossroads to chart the next steps for Culver, but I feel that it is losing it’s momentum. I initially served on two Culver Crossroads subcommittees which have fizzled out. One is gone and the second is really down to one person doing the work of the committee. The Culver Crossroads steering committee is also serving as the steering committee to revise the comprehensive plan and that feels like it is losing steam as well. It is odd, because I know there are people on that committee that are still motivated and excited about change, but my feeling is that this isn’t translating into much action between meetings.
On top of that, we have community members actively trying to sabotage input surveys with negativity. We have decent projects being opposed in public meetings and in some cases derailed by procedural attacks. We have seen project support pulled without discussion. All of these things are troubling.
To go back to the conversation I referenced above, I don’t feel like the town’s elected leaders and appointed boards have the same appetite for change that they did when Stellar started. They are still moving some things forward, but it feels like it’s being done with a more scatter-shot approach. We’re going back to dealing with individual things in lieu of pursuing our aspirations of bigger and better things. (Blue Zones is an aspirational project and the recent handling of that didn’t look good.) The three largest projects that are being worked on by the town are all projects brought to them by developers rather than projects they have specifically pursued to meet new goals. That’s a switch in mindset.
It’s not hopeless. It’s just harder than it was and harder than it needs to be. Culver Crossroads is working to create new aspirations for the town. Hopefully the town officials will embrace them and move them forward.
Co-Promotion for Culver
The downtown merchants are constantly hitting up the Culver Town Council and Culver Redevelopment Committee for advertising funds and other assistance. (I’m still flabbergasted that the Town is paying to have their sidewalks cleared. That’s an extremely selective benefit!) Meanwhile, I’ve noticed that CabinetWorks has put up several billboards looking to hire. (See Right) There maybe more, but this one was just south of Plymouth on 31 south and there’s another I saw just north of Rochester on 31 north. I also noticed that Lucrezia Trattoria has a billboard on 31 north headed to Plymouth. (Odd placement, but still gets the point across.)
A few thoughts here:
- In terms of return on investment, the Town should really be stepping up to help CabinetWorks. They are one of our top employers, a TIF contributor and probably one of the largest taxpayers. These billboards promote Culver and any & all promotion has to be good for the whole. Has the Town Council checked in on them recently? Are they having trouble and can the Town help?
- CabinetWorks’ position as a major employer also means every one of their employees that does not currently live in Culver is a potential Culver resident. Towns are growing or dying, so if want to continue to grow, we need to help our employers grow and try and capture those employees as residents.
- The Lucrezia Trattoria billboard hits a similar, but different set of eyes. One thing is certain… everyone that comes to eat there is a potential shopper in the surrounding businesses. How those businesses capitalize on that traffic makes a huge difference to our downtown. With a billboard like this, Lucrezia Trattoria is specifically targeting diners from outside Culver and not just the ones with lake homes that already know about Culver.
I have often promoted the idea that downtowns should work like malls to be thrive. To be successful, they need to work together, keep the same hours, run sales on the same days, etc. Culver does this selectively, i.e. sidewalk sale days, but not consistently. On busy restaurant evenings, shops should be open to promote something to do while waiting for a reservation or an option to walk off dinner before heading home. There has been a successful Cupid’s Crawl for Valentine’s Day. How about a St. Patrick’s Day Stumble? We have two Marina’s in Town. How about shutting the street down for an outdoor boat show? The Chamber is no longer doing the Taste of Culver, but I think that’s due to lack of organizers, not because it wasn’t successful. Can the Library be better utilized to have downtown events?
CabinetWorks and Lucrezia Trattoria are going it alone in promoting their businesses, but all of Culver benefits from this exposure. I can’t help but wonder if they know the Town has been using funds for promotions? Can Culver offer to help? Can some co-promotion with other Culver business benefit everyone?
Thoughts on Zoning Hierarchy
So, in the past few months, the Culver Plan Commission has rezoned several properties in what they would have considered spot zoning in the past. Two of these were on the main commercial corridors of Main Street and Lake Shore Drive. The first was at 303 North Main Street. This as the former Easterday Dental Office. The Plan Commission rezoned the property from C-2 to R-1 allowing the former residence turned dental office addition returned to residence to receive a permit for remodeling. The second was at 114 Lake Shore Drive. This was a older house used as a triplex. The Plan Commission rezoned the property from R-1 to R-2 allowing the current use to be legal. (They also rezoned 217 South Ohio Street and 810 South Main Street from R-1 to R-2.) I don’t particularly have an issue with any of these uses, but I think they could have been handled better.
The property on North Main Street is probably the most problematic to me. The Main Street corridor from the current Main Street business district north to Lake Shore Drive has been designated “Commercial” in the last two Comprehensive Plans. This has been followed up with a zoning district designation of C-2 in the Culver Zoning Ordinance. This has allowed the existing homes to remain, “grandfathered” in their current use; thus allowing the house at 303 North Main Street to be used as a dentist office, the house at 307 North Main Street to be used as a residence & art gallery, the house at 313 North Main Street to be used as a beauty parlor with second floor apartments, and the house at 212 North Main Street to be used as a law office with second floor apartment. This also allowed the expansion of Good-To-Go into the adjacent lot to the north without issue a few years ago.
In the case of 307 North Main Street, there was no issue when the owners of the art gallery sold the property and the new owners returned the use to residential only. The problem occurred with 303 North Main Street when the new owners wanted to use the property as a home (allowed), but also wanted to remodel. Remodeling required a building permit and residential use is not allowed in a C-2 district. The solution proposed by the then Building Commissioner and accepted by the Plan Commission was to rezone the property as R-1. When it was brought up that this violated the direction of the Comp Plan, the Comp Plan’s recommendations for this area were questioned. I felt the rezoning was a mistake and that considering rezoning that corridor would just compound that mistake. For one quick example, the Rezoning of 303 North Main Street to R-1 placed a buffer restriction that will be imposed if anything is done with 307 North Main Street: “Any property line abutting said residential district shall be required to be effectively screened in one of the following ways, or a combination thereof: buffering by a dense strip of natural plantings or by a solid of opaque fence.” – Culver Zoning Ordinance, Chapter 3, page 32. This buffer requirement doesn’t exist between commercial properties.
I have paraphrased something Jim Dicke II told me several times in this blog: “Communities are growing or dying. The Status quo cannot remain.” I think this is salient because I know of only two commercial properties that are currently for sale, i.e. 107 & 109 South Main Street and I would not say they are priced to sell. If we want Culver to grow and grow in a controlled manner, we need to provide areas for this to happen. It makes sense to expand our commercial corridor and move towards tying the two commercial districts together. The first step is the corridor from downtown Main Street to Lake Shore Drive.
Within the Culver Zoning Ordinance there is some existing hierarchy of uses. While not a 100% applicable rule, for the most part The I-2 district acceptable uses are allowed in the more restrictive I-1 district. The C-2 district acceptable uses are allowed in the more restrictive C-1 district. The R-1 district uses are allowed in the R-2 district. I think this would be worth considering across zoning districts as well. If this were the case, it would not have been necessary to rezone 303 North Main Street since the residential, R-1, use would have been a lesser use than the C-2 District allows. My rational is that this would have allowed the existing house to continue to be used and remodeled without losing the Town’s long-term goal of expanding the commercial corridor. It would have also kept it abundantly obvious to the land owners that the goal is commercial and not leave them thinking that their future neighbors will automatically be residential. That said, when a cross use is made, it would be easy enough to require any of the more restrictive requirements to be followed, whether it’s the lower use or the higher use, i.e. if a property owner wants to put a house in a C-1 district, this would be allowed, but the R-1 setbacks, impervious surface requirements, etc. of the R-1 district would apply as the more restrictive land use. This idea would require further examination and consideration, but it might be a good first step into some of the more mixed uses being considered in the upcoming Comprehensive Plan.
Personally, I would not only keep this corridor commercial, but would expand the Main Street Commercial Corridor on down to Davis Street and expand the Lake Shore Drive Commercial Corridor west to Main Street. On the south end, there is already commercial property at the corner of Main & Davis. There is already commercial property on both sides of the street on all corners of the Main and Lake Shore Drive intersection. Linking these together makes planning sense. It opens the opportunity for more mixed use little shops and businesses such as the former art gallery at 307 North Main Street and the law office at 212 North Main Street. This would promote more foot traffic between the two commercial areas of town. I am not sure I would find fault in making this C-1 while we’re at it…
Sometimes the desire to be helpful overcomes the mission of long term planning and the vision that involves. It was helpful to the new owners of 303 North Main Street to rezone the property, but there were other options. Sending them to the BZA for a “Variance of Use” would have made more sense. Rezoning is the more radical choice.
This also applies to the other three rezonings that were completed, changing R-1 zoned properties to R-2. This is undoubtedly spot zoning creating a future problem where a problem didn’t exist. All of these properties were grandfathered in their current non-conforming use, but now they are allowed to remodel, upgrade or even tear down and build something that solidifies the use, that doesn’t fit the long range plan, for the foreseeable future. While these property owners believe this “fixed” their problem, in reality, all of these properties would require variance for any changes they want to make as they don’t meet the R-2 requirements either!
Before this escalates from commentary to rant, I’ll leave it at here. It will be interesting to bring these things up as the Comprehensive Plan proceeds.
Follow up on Tamarack Road Annexation
This is a follow up on my previous post, Musings on Tamarack Road, regarding the Beachview Properties project. Just to reiterate, I’m basically indifferent to this project, other than I believe that in general, growth is positive for Culver.
There was a public hearing on the annexation for this project at the Town Council meeting, Tuesday, January 24th. I brought up my question about how Tamarack Road will be handled. Ginny Munroe, Culver Town Manager, answered this question saying that there were no plans for Culver to take in any of the Tamarack Road Right-of-Way. Ownership and maintenance would remain with Marshall County. She further explained that Culver would maintain the frontage on West Shore Drive.
This means that no maintenance or improvements to Tamarack Road will be included in the Financial Management Plan for this annexation. It’s a little dated, but this document provides some explanation of what’s involved with the Financial Management Plan on pages III & IV: https://iacir.ppi.iupui.edu/documents/Fullreport_fromWeb_wCover.pdf
Later in the discussion, in response to questions from the Culver Fire Chief, Terry Wakefield, the owner’s representative, Burke Richeson, indicated that the property will be gated and due to the size of the expected vehicles to be stored, there will be one entrance on West Shore Drive and one on Tamarack Road so they can pull through. This means this development will have an impact on Tamarack Road. I am unclear on whether the County has to consent to the annexation, but I would assume they would have concerns about increased traffic loads caused by the proposed project.
This in no way suggests that Culver is doing anything covertly. I have to assume the County is fully aware of this project and the upcoming annexation. After all, the Town Board and County Commissioners share the same attorney and it’s been in the press. It’s just a question of how this benefits Marshall County if it means they take on additional costs.
Shared ownership of streets and roads is always an issue. The coordination of services ranges from the minor, i.e. who plows the snow, to the major, i.e. when one entity decides it needs paved, how is the bill divided? In the case of paving, so much is tied to State funds, it becomes complicated when grant applications are made. Culver just recently has been through this with the west end of Jefferson Street…
Until about 10years ago, the west end of Jefferson Street was still County Right-of-Way. This was a hassle for the County as it was one short section of road to plow that connected to Town streets on one end and the State highway on the other. An agreement was made to transfer this Right-of-Way to the Town and as incentive for the Town to take it, the County paved it one last time before the transfer. Last year, when Culver decided to improve Jefferson Street as part of gateway improvements and pedestrian trail expansions, they found that the transfer had not been completed and MACOG did not have this section as a Culver Street, thus they could not include it in their application.
The Council decided there were enough changes yet to be made to the plan that they tabled it. First of three reads are scheduled for the next meeting. I expect it will go through and the Tamarack “Can” will get kicked down the Road…
Our Customers Say…
MacKenzie Ledley - Executive Director, Pulaski County Public Library
Robotics Challenge
February 20, 2023
Kevin Berger
Commentary, Plymouth
Community, Tips, Trends
We attended the Vex Robotics Competition at the Plymouth High School Gym on Saturday. We have attended a few times in the past and it is always interesting.
I’m no expert, but here’s what I have gleaned from a few competitions I’ve observed.
The competition on Saturday was multitasked and was called “Spin Up”. Two teams of two robots competed – a red team and a blue team. The field of play is approximately 10′ x 10′. In two opposing corners there were two goals – a high goal and a low goal. In the alternate corners there were spinners with blue and red sides. scattered around the playing field were yellow disks that were collected to score points in the high and low goals.
Robots were sent to the spinner corners and they attempted to turn the spinner to show their color. Then they also had to defend the spinner so the other team couldn’t turn it back. Meanwhile they were also collecting disks and for lack of a better term, were spitting them into the high goals. To make that more interesting, the red high goal was over the blue low goal and vice versa. This meant that a missed shot scored for the other team. A score in the high goal was worth more and was safe from removal, but there was also the ability to remove disks from your opponents low goal, reducing their score. There was also a skill demonstrated where the robots shot out a string with a ring on the end, which appeared to be a strategy to tangle up your opponent, but that wasn’t clear and not all of the robots did this.
For those of you familiar with Battle Bots, this is a much less aggressive competition, i.e. no flame throwers, chain saws or axes, but there was still some mixing it up between the robots as they jockeyed for position and attempted to get the better of the opposing team.
There was obviously a lot of strategy, variation of design and some teamwork that made differences. Most of the robots spit the disks from fairly close and one at a time. One robot we watched tossed three disks at a time and didn’t miss until the upper goal was so full that disks were falling out, while another shot from across the field with pretty decent accuracy. Some had no trouble climbing over the small curbs defining the low goal, while others used that curb as a stop to set up their shots. The decisions between offense and defense were interesting as well. They were not allowed to “pin” their opponent, so a strategy of pushing and blocking was generally employed. We observed one team that would time a bump of the shooting robot just in time to throw off its shot, with every miss being a point for them in the low goal.
My understanding is that while most teams are school sponsored, that’s not a requirement. There were some teams that were quite obviously wearing school colors and were adorned with school mascots, while others were more creative in their team attire. Whether school affiliated or not, there was obviously a lot of non-traditional learning going on. Aside from the obvious STEM connections, the teamwork and strategy demonstrated were impressive. After qualifying, teams must form teams with other competitors in order to move forward in the competition. This is a process of evaluating their opponents and assessing skills that could add to their own. Negotiating and selling skills were employed!
There were several hundred spectators there. Most assuredly, the majority were family members of the competitors, but I would recommend taking the time to watch a competition, if you get the chance. We had no horse in the race, but enjoyed the competition just the same. These kids are future engineers and programmers, and seeing those skills put to work at the high school level is impressive. Well worth the time and price of admission (free)!
0 comments