Category Archives: The Uplands

Redistricting, The Uplands

Uplands supports 10 council districts

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At the Uplands Residential Association meeting Thursday evening, residents voted to support establishing ten City Council districts to replace the current system of five district and five at-large representatives. Meeting attendees expressed several reasons smaller districts and the elimination of at-large representation would be better for the City. Smaller districts would:

  • Be more manageable for council representatives. Instead of 23,000+ residents per district, there would be less than 12,000 residents per district.
  • Provide more opportunity for minority representation. The current at-large/cumulative-voting system was established to increase minority representation, but has not accomplished that goal. Keeping the current system could end up reducing minority representation due to district expansion.
  • Provide more representation for the older neighborhoods. Under the current at-large system, a disproportionate number of council members have come from North Peoria.

The Uplands also voted to support eight districts with two at-large members if a ten-district solution is unachievable.

In other business, The Uplands expressed concern that the Pi Beta Phi Sorority (a.k.a. “Pi Phi House”), 1004 N. Institute Pl., which is for sale, is being listed as a multi-family residence for up to 29 people, or possible commercial location. In checking with the Planning and Growth Department of the City, the property is zoned R-4 (single-family residential), with a grandfathered sorority use. Thus, the property can only be used for a sorority or a single-family home. Any other use would require rezoning. It was decided to send a letter to the realtor explaining these facts so it can be listed accurately.

Bradley University, City of Peoria, The Uplands

Another “oops” in Bradley’s plan

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It’s enough to make a person paranoid. You may recall about a year ago, Bradley was rewriting its institutional zoning plan, and they wanted to include a part of the Uplands neighborhood in it. Specifically, they wanted to include the Pi Phi house, 1004 N. Institute Pl.:

The Uplands Residential Association said they’d rather not see precedent set for Bradley reaching across Main, especially after their track record with the Arbor District. At that time, Bradley stated they would abide by the wishes of the neighborhood association, and they did. They removed the Pi Phi House from their institutional plan.

But now, fast forward to this week’s council agenda. The institutional plan is being modified again at the request of Williams Brothers Construction because they built the new parking deck too close to the right-of-way on Main street. The only changes to the plan were supposed to be the revised setback requirement for the parking deck, a reduction in the number of parking spaces in the deck, and landscaping changes for better pedestrian access.

But guess what else was in there to be changed? On a whim, I decided to read the legal description of the institutional zone, and I’ll be darned if the Pi Phi House wasn’t added to the legal description! A suspicious person might even say it was snuck in. If this were to pass tonight as written, the Pi Phi House would be part of Bradley’s institutional plan, without any input from the neighbors, without anyone knowing about it.

I alerted my city council person and city staff of the issue, and they have taken action to remove the Pi Phi House from the legal description. Pat Landes, Director of Planning and Growth Management, said:

  1. Staff reviewed the proposed ordinance scheduled for Council consideration tomorrow night and the 1004 Institute property is included in the legal; it should not be. You may recall that at one point during the previous two Bradley cases [adding Maplewood properties and cleaning up boundaries] in 2007 there had been consideration of adding the Institute property to the Official Development Plan area. You directed the removal of the property based upon input from constituents.
  2. A revised ordinance will be on the Council’s desk for tomorrow night’s meeting and will be e-mailed to you as soon as drafted and reviewed.
  3. The intent of communications, proposed and 20078] was clear – the Institute address was not listed in the subject matter and application, and was not included on any maps. We will be checking through all of the past ordinances to determine if the Institute address or legal was included in the legal descriptions and make any necessary adjustments.
  4. I apologize on behalf of the department for not catching this error in the legal submitted.

So, the legal description was “submitted” — submitted by whom? Bradley. Ultimately Bradley. The contractor (Williams Brothers Construction) is listed as the petitioner, but Bradley would have to sign off on any requested changes to their institutional plan, and they would have had to have provided the legal description, either directly to the city or through Williams Brothers.

No doubt this will be attributed to another unintentional mistake. Just like the parking deck misplacement was just a mistake. After these two “oops” moments from Bradley, and the “mistake” by another developer on Fairoaks, the “mistake” excuse is starting to wear a little thin. It’s starting to sound like the little boy who cried wolf.

Bradley-Epworth UMC, The Uplands

Bradley-Epworth withdraws special use request

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Bradley-Epworth UMCNeighbors had steeled themselves for a vigorous debate on a church expansion proposal Thursday night, but the issue was defused when the church withdrew its special use request.

Bradley-Epworth United Methodist Church, 1314 W. Columbia Terrace, has been acquiring property for the past few years. They purchased 1215 N. University St., adjacent to the church, in September 2004, and in 2005 got a special use permit to house its student ministries there. Since then, the church has purchased two more homes on University (1205 and 1207) and the house at 1216 N. Elmwood, which is also adjacent to the church. They currently use the homes at 1205 and 1207 University as rental property. The Elmwood house is vacant.

The stated long-range plan was to acquire up to ten properties, leave the houses intact, but use them for ministry purposes, such as a 24-hour house of prayer, a coffee shop, etc. They would also pave the back yards of the properties to provide additional parking for the church.

Church officials recently requested a special use permit for the Elmwood property to use the house for church offices.

The church is located in the Uplands neighborhood. The Uplands Residential Association voted in favor of the church’s special use request in June 2007. However, several URA members — including several Elmwood Ave. residents — complained that they were not informed a vote was going to be taken on the special use request at that meeting. Only nine people attended the June 2007 meeting.

The issue was on the agenda again Thursday because the one of the intended uses of the property was to house guest speakers overnight in one of the bedrooms of the Elmwood house. That use was not approved at the June 2007 meeting because it wasn’t presented as part of the special use request. Church and URA officials mistakenly believed that overnight stays would not have to be specified in the special use request since the house is already zoned residential. When they found out that all uses had to be specified, URA officials brought it back to the Association for a vote.

But the vote never happened.

Jerry Jackson, Second VP of the Association and chairman of the Associations’ Zoning and Land Use Committee, read a short e-mail from Bradley-Epworth pastor Tom Eckhardt. Here’s the e-mail, reprinted in its entirety:

Jerry [Jackson] and Bernie [Goitein, URA President],

I wanted to let you know that Bradley Epworth Church is withdrawing its request to the city for special use zoning of the property at 1216 N. Elmwood. In addition, we no longer plan to use our properties currently zoned as residential for any purpose other than residential, specifically that there will be no effort on our part to put in parking for the church behind the University properties or anywhere else.

Tom Eckhardt
Pastor, Bradley Epworth Church

Jackson also stated that it was his understanding the church would be divesting themselves of the properties at 1205 and 1207 N. University, and that the church is looking for an alternative site to hold their largest worship service.

No reason for the change in plans was given.

Several Elmwood Ave. residents published an article in the neighborhood newsletter, The Uplander, outlining their concerns about the church’s recent acquisitions and expansion plans. It’s unknown whether the article’s publication prompted the church to reconsider its special use request.

After the e-mail was read, several members in attendance indicated they felt this was a positive development for the neighborhood. However, one couple that spoke at the meeting thought it was a negative, saying they were worried that the houses on University would fall into the hands of a slumlord. If that happened, they said it would negatively affect their property, since they live across the alley from those houses.