WESTLOCK – Town of Westlock councillors will debate a change to the municipality’s land-use bylaw next month that could see a pizza restaurant opened in a shuttered downtown-area church.
At their April 12 meeting, councillors voted 4-2 (councillors Curtis Snell and Clem Fagnan were against, while Coun. Murtaza Jamaly was absent) to first reading of Consolidated Land Use Bylaw 2015-02, Amendment Bylaw 2021-10 and set a public hearing for May 10. Specifically, council will debate whether to rezone Lot 11, Block 25, Plan 7191ET from R1 low-density residential to commercial multi-purpose (CMP).
In her briefing to council, director of development services Krystle Fedoretz said the applicant wants to rezone the lot to allow for the renovation of what was the original Westlock Gospel Chapel into a pizza restaurant that would not only provide take-out service, but offer a seniors hot lunch/dinner menu and student hot-lunch program. The church, which stands at the corner of 104th Street and 102nd Avenue, has R.F. Staples School located at one end of the block and the Pembina Lodge half a block in the other direction.
“It would be an anomaly I guess, an island amongst itself if we did go down this road,” commented Snell.
Fagnan asked whether they needed to go to first reading, noting a change to zoning could open the site up to a variety of businesses.
“If we change the zoning, this land use, we could end up with someone applying for a local bar and if it’s a permitted use we wouldn’t be able to stop it,” he said.
Added Snell: “If we do go this route we can’t decide what goes in there, once we change it.”
The town’s land-use bylaw says a commercial multi-purpose zone is defined as a district that can “provide for a wide range of commercial and retail businesses and services at a medium intensity and which serve areas within and beyond the surrounding community and which are not suitable for downtown as well as highway corridor areas.” Permitted uses within CMP include eating and drinking establishments, funeral homes and hotels, while a liquor store, service station or a shopping centre would be a discretionary use and be decided upon by the Municipal Planning Commission — the full list is on Page 89 of the town’s land-use bylaw. And while places of worship are included as a usage under CMP, CAO Simone Wiley said the property in question has always been zoned residential — over time the municipality has tweaked its land-use bylaw and moved places of worship under CMP.
“Technically that is correct, you don’t have to actually give it first reading,” replied Wiley to Fagnan’s question of not going to first reading. “However, do you want to hear what the public potentially surrounding that parcel of land has to say?”
