Sandpoint considering ban on drive-throughs

SANDPOINT — The city is eyeing zoning changes that could make drive-through businesses a thing of the past.

The proposal, which recently passed through the Planning and Zoning Commission and will come before full council in May, would amend the city’s current commercial zoning laws to prohibit all businesses with drive-through services.

The law would relegate drive-through restaurants, pharmacies, banks, coffee shops, convenience stores, dry cleaners and other businesses featuring a drive-through to areas zoned for industrial use, according to city documents.

Existing businesses with drive-through services would be defined as legally nonconforming and would be allowed to continue operation, but would not be allowed to rebuild if the facility was damaged or destroyed, said City Planner Jeremy Grimm.

“Conceivably, as these existing drive-throughs degrade — if they’re not maintained — this could lead to a Sandpoint of the future with no drive-throughs,” Grimm said.

Grimm said the proposed changes might only be temporary, as the council will soon be changing all of the city’s zones to reflect the newly-completed comprehensive plan.

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He said it is unknown if the permanent zone change will feature a drive-through prohibition.

Despite the restrictions, Grimm said the changes would not hamper business growth.

“We’re not preventing them from developing their property or building or investing in this community, we’re just setting some constraints on it and I think this is very far from depriving someone of the reasonable use of their property,” Grimm said.

Dick Hutter, who until last week sat on the Planning Commission, said the proposed changes are just one of the many new growth strategies being implemented that will hurt the city.

“I don’t agree with the direction that Sandpoint is going,” he said. “I don’t like the lack of parking downtown, I don’t like the interference with stores and I don’t like the anti-corporate nature of what’s been happening.”

Hutter resigned from the commission last week. He said his time on the commission had run its course and he did not want to be thought of as a “cranky old man.”

“If I was young and full of spit and vinegar yet, I might go toe-to-toe with them and fight like hell, but I’m 70-years old and I’d like to enjoy my life,” Hutter said.

Councilman John Reuter introduced the drive-through amendment, but said the proposed changes would not necessarily carry over into the permanent zoning changes, which the council hopes to have finished within a year.

“I think it makes sense for a temporary, stop-gap zone to be fairly restrictive,” Reuter said. “I think we need to have a serious conversation about where drive-throughs are appropriate and where they are not. At the end of that discussion maybe we’ll decide that drive-throughs are never appropriate, but I don’t think we’re at that stage yet.”

In addition to the drive-through prohibition, the changes would also require a conditional use permit for new or expanding businesses with a building footprint larger than 20,000-square feet. During the conditional use processes, those businesses would also be required to submit to nine new site and contextual planning standards, which include surface parking requirements, pedestrian circulation amenities and a number of aesthetic requirements.

Among the aesthetic requirements, the structures would be required to have “exterior building materials and colors that are aesthetically pleasing … ,” including “the use of high-quality materials and colors that are low reflective, subtle, neutral, or earth tone,” according to a Planning Commission staff report.

The amendment would also disallow the use of florescent or metallic colors, “although brighter colors in limited quantities as building trims or accents may be considered at the discretion of the Planning Commission,” according to the report.

Local real-estate agent Kitty Eyestone said none of the proposed restrictions would serve a legitimate purpose and would only stunt business growth and hurt the local economy.

“Business owners are shaking their heads and asking, ‘What’s next?” she said.

She also said the changes would give prospective businesses owners the impression that Sandpoint is an anti-growth community — something she wholeheartedly disagrees with.

“I really believe that growth can be a good thing if it’s done right,” she said.