Only three council members voted in favor of the zoning commission’s recommendation to require a supermajority of the council to expand the boundaries of an institutional district. The general consensus was that the system isn’t broken, so they didn’t want to “fix” it.

One of the council members trotted out the popular notion that there’s no harm being done by Bradley because they’re buying out their neighbors at above-market prices — in some cases, five times the property value. It sounds like they’re a really good neighbor, doesn’t it? Wouldn’t you just love to get a cool half-million for your $100,000 house?

The problem with this reasoning is that it doesn’t take into account the whole neighborhood. Take the example of Bradley University buying the houses along Maplewood across from the Fieldhouse. Yes, the people on Maplewood are getting a great deal, but what about the rest of the Arbor District? What about the properties on Cooper or Rebecca?

The answer is that the neighborhood as a whole is destabilized.

Why? Because who wants to buy in a neighborhood when the university is expanding west and that beautiful historical house on Cooper may be the next to be acquired within a few years? It’s not the family who wants to put down roots in the neighborhood and raise their kids there. It’s someone looking to buy a property for $100,000 and hopefully get $500,000 for it when the university decides it wants it.

And for those neighbors who are already there, how many of them want to put new landscaping around their house? Or put in new windows? Or new siding? Or even a new paint job? If the residents reasonably expect the university to keep moving west, it would be silly to put a lot of capital improvements into their houses.

Speculative purchases. Deferred maintenance. This is what happens when institutions disregard the boundaries of their institutional district.

But the council, judging by the rhetoric of the “nay” voters, thinks everything is hunky-dory with Bradley’s property acquisitions. They’re not interested in taking any action against Bradley’s encroachment into the Arbor District, let alone enacting the modest proposal that came before the council tonight. As far as they’re concerned, Bradley’s doing the neighborhood a favor by disobeying the city’s own ordinance.

The City Council will decide Tuesday night whether to require a supermajority — a 2/3 vote — to change the boundaries of an institutional zoning district.

Institutions such as colleges, hospitals, and universities have a special zoning designation in Peoria. It’s known as “N1,” or “institutional,” and it has advantages for the institutions and the city.

For the institution, it gives them a self-contained campus area within which they are free to do almost anything (there are some limits, of course). They can set up restaurants, libraries, book stores, parking, athletic fields, etc., without having to go to the city for permission.

The city, on the other hand, benefits from, first of all, not having to deal with every little change or request that these institutions want to do within their campus area. But more importantly, this arrangement provides stability to the neighborhoods surrounding the institutional district. People can purchase homes in abutting neighborhoods with a reasonable expectation the institution won’t be encroaching into their subdivision.

Currently, to change the boundary of an N1-zoned district requires a simple majority of the council. But the zoning commission is recommending the council change that to a supermajority for institutional boundaries that have been in effect less than 10 years.

The zoning commission’s rationale for this change is to promote even greater stability:

Requiring a super majority vote of the Council will promote stability in the Institutional District and abutting neighborhoods. An inter-reliance between the Institution and the adjacent neighborhood exists: a stable institution suggests a more predictable market place in the adjacent neighborhood, which promotes stability; a stable adjacent neighborhood likewise encourages stability for the Institution. An example of an unstable, unpredictable market place is one of speculative purchases, and deferred maintenance.

Even though this change affects several institutions (Bradley University, Illinois Central College, Methodist Medical Center of Illinois, OSF St. Francis Medical Center, Proctor Hospital, and Midstate College), I have a suspicion that the reason for this change is because of Bradley University’s not-so-subtle acquisition of houses in the Arbor District and plans to expand their campus west.

The text of the proposed ordinance states (emphasis mine):

12.3.1 An amendment which adds territory to an existing institutional district, which territory is contiguous to a boundary which previously has been changed less then ten (10) years prior to the date of the amendment, shall require the affirmative vote of two-thirds (2/3) of Council Members actually voting, but in no case shall an amendment be passed by less than the affirmative votes of six (6) Council Members.

Just two months ago, Bradley’s institutional boundary changed slightly to allow them space to put in a transformer as part of an electrical upgrade to their Global Communications building. Given the wording of this ordinance, it appears the ten-year provision will be counted from May 2006 when that last boundary change was put into effect.

In any case, when Bradley comes to the council asking for their institutional boundary to be extended to the west, it would take a 2/3 vote of the council (that’s 8 votes, assuming everyone is present) to approve it, if this ordinance passes Tuesday.

Nevertheless, neither Bradley nor the other affected institutions appear to be worried about it. They didn’t even respond to the zoning commission’s request for input.