Zoning Ordinance Fiasco

Over $70,000 spent so far

The Hayes Township Zoning Ordinance is one of the best and most protective in Northern Michigan.  It has been developed by our former Planning Commissions with the help of professional planning consultants over the course of over 40 years.  It was last revised and approved by a very good Township Board in 2009. It took about one year to revise it since the last amendment in 2008. The current Board and Planning Commission have been trying to radically change the standards of our zoning ordinance so that it is much less protective of our residents, our lakes, our land and our water.  Here are some examples:

1.  In the shoreland protection strip of our lakes and streams they want to allow dredging, more tree cutting, more development and reduce the isolation distance from the lake for structures from 50 to 25 feet.  They want to make some mandatory rules voluntary and make some clear restrictions vague.

2.  They want to combine some zones, such as agricultural and residential, and allow for smaller lot sizes, including on lakes.

3. They want to allow gravel mining near residential zones.

FOR THE PAST FOUR YEARS, THE PLANNING COMMISSION HAS BEEN SPINNING ITS WHEELS . . . And that has cost taxpayers a lot of money. Rather than review the existing Zoning Ordinance, the Commission thought they should throw the whole thing out and start from scratch.

The first year, they obtained and then rejected professional planning consulting. For the past three years, the Commissioners actually have been revising the Bay Township Zoning Ordinance–not ours–with no explanation given to the public. And wasting time in confusing meeting after confusing meeting.

The Planning Commission began the process in 2020 right after updating the Master Plan that January. The Township contracted with Beckett & Raeder, a planning consulting firm, for $20,000 to rewrite the ordinance with Commissioners’ input. The $20,000 draft ordinance was ready in early 2021. This draft was never shared with all commissioners or the public. Instead, an edited draft was given to Commissioners, who reviewed it at their April, May and June 2021 meetings. Ron Van Zee and Roy Griffitts, who were Supervisor and Deputy Supervisor, respectively, while also wearing the incompatible positions of Zoning Administrator and Planning Commissioner Chair, made the edits. 

Then the Commissioners discarded the $20,000 report. The public was none the wiser. Only one resident had attended a early 2021 meeting.

That summer, some lakefront owners on Lake Charlevoix discovered the Planning Commission’s approval and Zoning Administrator Van Zee’s approval of the excavation of the shoreland for a proposed Commercial Resort boathouse/event center, boat basin and channel, in the middle of a residential zone. The Township approvals, however, had occurred more than 12 months prior.

After public outcry in August, the Township pushed the contradictory narratives that permit and site plan approvals never expire, automatically renew, and/or were not activated yet. All of that was not true, as the Zoning Ordinance is clear that zoning permits expire in 12 months from date of issue (ZO § 9.02(5)), and Planning Commission site plan approvals also expire in 12 months (ZO § 5.03(9)).

The Bay Township Version Appears — In September 2021 the Planning Commission trotted out a new draft it said it was continuing to revise. It turns out it was not the $20,000 draft by Beckett & Raeder, as the public was led to believe, but a copied version of the Bay Township Zoning Ordinance.

Not realizing the switcheroo at first, residents thought the draft being reviewed was the Beckett & Raeder draft.

Review of the modified Bay Township ordinance continues today, going on four years now since the Planning Commission first attempted revision. The Planning Commission does not look at our current ordinance, nor explains what parts of it are in need of revision.

Revising Away without Any Professional Planning Help — Faced with a petition by 475 residents demanding a revision of the Master Plan (upon which a Zoning Ordinance is based) and elimination of future industrial land use plotted for Bay Shore, and the Planning Commission’s plans to combine residential zones into one, and combine agricultural and rural residential zones into one, the Township arranged for Beckett & Raeder to work with an appointed Advisory Focus Group to look at the issue of industrial zoning and the future land use map. In the process, residents learned that never once has the Planning Commission let Beckett & Raeder know it has been revising the Bay Township zoning ordinance, or that it threw out the planning firm’s $20,000 draft. Planning Commission Chair Roy Griffitts often says, when they are stumped about something, that they’ll ask Beckett & Raeder. But this never happens. The Township spent another approximately $13,000 on Beckett & Raeder for the Advisory Focus Group meetings. (See May 2023 Board of Trustees packet). The Focus Group’s documents and process were on a Beckett & Raeder website which no longer exists, but not the Township’s. Thus, Township residents do not have good access to documents produced by the process.

The costs of this fiasco so far:

Beckett & Raeder for the 2021 draft, $20,000

Planning Commission meetings for 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 add up to about 48 meetings at a cost of $560/meeting for 7 commissioners = $26,880

Planning Commission meetings so far for 2024: 2 @560 = $1120

Zoning Administrator attending 48 PC meetings at an estimated $200 per meeting $9,600

Beckett & Raeder advisory focus meetings in 2022, $13,000

Money spent on training of planning commissioners: Unknown.

Extra secretarial support by Clerk: Unknown.

TOTAL Estimated: $70,600 and counting

Hayes Township’s current Zoning Ordinance Bay Township’s Zoning Ordinance The discarded $20,000 Draft