Mitchell looking at regulating shipping containers after storage lease questions

Sam Fosness, The Daily Republic, Mitchell, S.D.
·2 min read

Apr. 22—MITCHELL — Discussion over the use of shipping containers on residential properties was a hot topic during Monday's Mitchell Planning and Zoning Commission meeting.

The discussion came after a local property owner inquired with the city about placing shipping containers on residential properties for homeowners or tenants to rent the shipping containers for storage space.

As of now, shipping containers are not defined in any of the city's ordinances. City Planner Mark Jenniges brough the discussion forward to seek suggestions and ideas from commission members on how to regulate the use of shipping containers.

"We had an individual bring up that they would like to use shipping containers and renting them as storage units on properties where self storage would be a conditional use or permitted use," Jenniges said.

City officials have discussed whether shipping containers should be defined as self storage, which is a term the city's ordinance defines as "groups of buildings consisting of storage." However, Jenniges said city officials don't believe shipping containers should be classified as "self storage" because the type of use for the shipping containers does not serve as a building.

"These would not be considered buildings themselves. As you know, there are many different sizes of shipping containers, and the ones this gentleman was talking about would be 80 feet wide and 40 feet long," Jenniges said, which amounts to roughly 320 square feet.

Jenniges posed the question of whether the type of shipping containers that are roughly 320 square feet warrants the city creating a new definition properly matching the shipping containers.

A few ideas Jenniges pitched were defining a shipping container as equipment or outside storage, which would each have a different set of regulations.

"These could be considered equipment, and you're leasing out that equipment to have someone store their stuff in that equipment," Jenniges said. "Outside storage is keeping in an unroofed area any goods, junk, material or merchandise in the same place for more than one month. That one though, it's supposed to be your own stuff."

Commission member Kevin Genzlinger was in favor of creating a separate definition for shipping containers to allow the city to better "regulate" the use of them.

Genzlinger was concerned about the aesthetics of multiple shipping containers placed on residential properties.

Commission Chairman Jay Larson questioned whether drainage requirements should also be included for a property that paces multiple shipping containers on it.

Larson noted there are examples of people turning shipping containers into living quarters. As long as shipping containers turned into a dwelling meet the city's building codes, Jenniges said it could pass as a dwelling.