The Iowa City citizens who oppose the building of the 20-story mixed use building at the intersection of College and Gilbert Street are trying a new tactic to block the city and developer Marc Moen from going forward with the building: they're taking legal action.
Opponents of high-rise proposed for downtown Iowa City go to court (The Gazette)
Iowa Coalition Against the Shadow, a citizen group formed during the debate over the project, filed a petition in Johnson County District Court Monday appealing the City Council’s denial of the group’s request to rezone the land where the building is to be located.
The rezoning application was an attempt to stop Marc Moen and the city from moving forward with a building up to 20 stories tall on city-owned land at the intersection of College and Gilbert streets.
The primary argument laid out in the court papers is the same one the group made at city meetings: The project would violate the city’s comprehensive plan.
The Coalition Against the Name was developed as the name for the group as they express their concern about how the building will be a poor fit for the neighborhood it is be constructed in, including a dread that it will cast a long shadow on nearby buildings.Despite the lawsuit's claims, city attorney Eleanor Dilkes said it is unlikely that a city council zoning decision will be overturned by legal means.
Anti-Chauncey group files lawsuit (Press-Citizen)
The lawsuit also states that the city’s comprehensive plan shows the parcels at the college and Gilbert site as part of a transitional area between downtown and the College Green neighborhood. The group argues that the tower would be “radically taller and more dense than the surrounding buildings,” and to rezone to the CB-10 designation necessary to accommodate The Chauncey would be “spot zoning” — creating a small island of properties with usage restrictions different from surrounding properties.
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City Attorney Eleanor Dilkes, who said she had yet to read the lawsuit, said she is “fairly confident the decision by the City Council was a reasonable one that will be upheld by the courts.”
“I can tell you generally that zoning decisions made by a city council are given a strong presumption of validity by the courts,” Dilkes said. “And if reasonable minds can differ, the zoning action will be upheld.”
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Meanwhile the city and Moen's development group remain in negotiations about the building plan. There is the possibility that the building could come in at a smaller size after these negotiations are completed, especially with outside pressure, both political and legal, hanging in the air outside the project.
As it was originally pitched, the Chauncey is a 20-story building that Moen says would cost approximately $54 million to build. Moen has asked the city for more than $13 million in tax increment financing assistance to help finance the building.Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.