Church conversion rejected; St. John’s got some ‘splainin to do | Opinion

When Mike Rosseau and Dorothy Tobe came to St. John 10 months ago, the first thing the city did was take them to court.

They’re about to return the favor. And I don’t think it’s going to go well for the city.

On Monday night, for the second time, the City Council rejected the couple’s application for a special use permit to allow them to move into an abandoned church building that they bought to live in after they got pushed out of Denver and Colorado by skyrocketing housing prices.

The first time around, last July, the city punctuated its rejection of their zoning application with unprecedented criminal charges because they slept in the building the first few nights they were in town — an alleged violation of the city’s zoning code that’s never been enforced against anybody. Those charges were dropped five months later, without explanation.

St. John City Hall is not really into explaining itself. More about that later.

Case on its way to court

After Monday’s vote to reject their permit, Rosseau and Tobe said they’ll be filing an appeal to the District Court.

“I expected this,” Tobe said after the meeting. “We’re prepared to file the appeal and this will get interesting.”

Tobe filed an appeal of the previous rejection on her own, because the couple didn’t have money for a lawyer after spending most of their life savings to buy the church property.

That appeal was rejected because she didn’t understand the rules and filed a day late. That mistake won’t be repeated because supportive townspeople raised money for the couple’s legal defense and they now have an attorney to represent them.

Monday’s meeting was a textbook example of how not to do a zoning case.

Three neighboring property owners filed a protest petition against the permit — former city councilmen Kevin Davis and Ryan Christie, who are partners in an electrical contracting firm down the block, and Jeni Jones, a member of the planning and zoning board who owns two properties on the street, a beauty shop and the former practice space for a local garage band.

The council allowed public comment before the vote. None of the opponents spoke, but four local residents pleaded with the council to let Rosseau and Tobe stay.

Mitch Minnis, the town mortician, mocked the protest petitioners’ letter that claims that they’re not interested in acquiring the property themselves. He pointed out that under a special use permit, it would revert to commercial zoning if Rosseau and Tobe ever sold it.

“The people that don’t want that property can then buy it,” he said.

He also suggested the city should investigate the petitioners.

“There are multiple code violations of the people that signed that,” he said. “I can go around St. John and fill up a Big Chief tablet clear full of code violations. How far do you want to go with it?”

No explanation given

Because Davis, Christie and Jones control more than 20% of the property within 200 feet of the former church, Rosseau and Tobe needed a four-fifths majority of the council to win.

In the event, the vote was three against the permit, two for it. No explanations were given.

That’s going to be a problem in court for the city, which I suspect is about to get a crash course in the “Golden Rules.”

I’m not talking about “do unto others as you’d have them do unto you” (although St. John would be a better place if the council followed that).

I’m talking about the rules established in Golden v. Overland Park, a landmark 1978 decision by the Kansas Supreme Court that prevents cities from using zoning codes to render someone’s property unusable.

One of the major findings in the Golden decision is that while setting zoning rules is a legislative function, ruling on individual requests is “quasi-judicial,” meaning the City Council has to act more like a court, evaluating actual evidence against six criteria:

▪ The character of the neighborhood.

▪ The zoning and uses of properties nearby.

▪ The suitability of the subject property for the uses to which it has been restricted.

▪ The extent to which removal of the restrictions will detrimentally affect nearby property.

▪ The length of time the subject property has remained vacant as zoned.

▪ The relative gain to the public health, safety, and welfare by the destruction of the value of plaintiff’s property as compared to the hardship imposed upon the individual landowner.

The St. John City Council failed to take any of that into account. The three council members voting against the special use permit said nothing but “Nay.”

So there’s no public record explaining how the decision would meet the legal standard that people be allowed to make reasonable use of their property.

In Rosseau and Tobe’s case, the church they bought was deconsecrated and sold at least 20 years ago.

The family that bought it used it for personal storage, which is a residential, not commercial use. That’s why it was listed in Stafford County tax records as residential property when the couple bought it.

The permit opponents didn’t show up to address the council meeting (probably knew they didn’t need to), so the only evidence on the City Council record to justify the decision is what was in the protest letter.

The only part of that letter even touching Golden standards was this: “Commercial spaces are already scarce in a town of our size, making it challenging for existing businesses to expand or new businesses to establish. The role of businesses in our community’s economy cannot be overstated. In this case, granting the special use permit could set a dangerous precedent, suggesting that the commercial zone can be used for residential purposes, further diminishing the already limited space for businesses.”

Dennis Veatch, a retired Dodge City planning director and chairman of St. John’s planning and zoning board, punctured that argument in his report to the council before Monday’s vote.

He counted down 14 commercial buildings and storefronts in and around the town’s central square that are being used for personal storage or just sitting vacant.

Veatch also pointed out there are already at least 10 occupied dwellings in the downtown commercial zone, nine houses that predated the zoning code and at least one apartment above a downtown business (which the zoning code allows).

In court, the council members will have to justify their decision.

I doubt they can. About all they’ve done is extend the time that Rosseau and Tobe will be essentially homeless from the current 10 months to more than a year.

The couple will have to go on running their modest eBay business from the church building by day and sleeping in their real estate agent’s guest room by night.

The protest letter by Davis, Christie and Jones laments that “this case . . . has brought negative attention to our town.”

To that, I’d say, no, you did.

The negativity doesn’t come from a couple trying to move to your town, but from the manipulation of process to benefit a few favored insiders and a lack of basic fairness in government.

There are 1,200 people living in St. John and I feel sorry for most of them — especially the ones pleading with City Hall to quit punishing Rosseau and Tobe for the crime of trying to move there.

The way that town is run, I wouldn’t want to live there. And I don’t recommend it to friends.