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.