Opponents plan lawsuit to block bus barn

Those Blue Springs residents opposed to a proposed bus transportation center plan to file a lawsuit seeking an injunction.
Terry Reed, a spokesman for Citizens for Responsible Government, said Tuesday the group plans to file the request for an injunction soon after the necessary paperwork is finished. The defendant will be listed as the city of Blue Springs, specifically the Community Development Department, according to Reed.
Proposed as an 18,600-square-foot transportation center for the school district’s fleet of buses, the facility would be on U.S. 40, southeast of Hy-Vee on 18.6 acres. It would have parking for buses and employee vehicles, as well as a facility where buses would be repaired and fueled.
The project received unanimous approval from the city’s Planning Commission, but that decision was appealed by Reed and several others. City Council then heard the appeal last week and, after a brief public statement period, the council voted to uphold the commission’s approval.
“Our beef isn’t so much with the school district, who are just trying to get a project finished,” Reed said, “but rather the city. They’re the gate keepers for projects like this.”
Reed and others plan to argue the city violated its zoning codes by allowing the district to build on land zoned general business/commercial parking lot rather than light industrial.
Scott Allen, director of Community Development, said last week the project does indeed fall under parking lot/commercial parking because the buses are not being stored on the property and that no bus storage yard and or equipment yard is part of the project. As on a commercial parking lot, Allen said, the vehicles are stored on a temporary basis.
Reed also said the city failed to examine traffic study reports and other related information until after the zoning was approved.
“Whether it’s zoned commercial parking lot or light industrial, we just don’t approve of the project,” Reed said. “It’s not the place for it.”
Other concerns include noise, pollution, traffic safety, and impact to property values, according to Reed.
Also part of the injunction attempt will be a due process complaint, which Reed said stems from the fact that Mayor Carson Ross limited public statements to five minutes for two speakers – or two and a half minutes each.
“We appreciate that the mayor allowed us to speak when he didn’t have to,” Reed said, “but there were six appeals. Only two got to speak and not for long enough for get our points across.”
David Handy, who serves as chairman for the group, agreed.
“Nine months of taxpayer-subsidized bad planning and irresponsible decision making cannot be logically rebutted in the five minutes to which you limited us,” Handy wrote in a letter to Ross.
The letter was an invitation to Ross for a debate, which is scheduled to air on 1140 AM and 1160 AM from 1-2 p.m. today.
Ross declined the group’s invitation, but he replied to The Examiner when asked about the pending lawsuit.
“The decision regarding the approval of the (project) was made by the Blue Springs Planning Commission and affirmed by the City Council,” he wrote. “Due process as outlined by the city’s planning and zoning requirements and the (city) charter was followed during the consideration of this project.
“There is no need for further debate of this issue.”
A spokesman for Hollis and Miller Architects informed by the commission and the City Council what the school district plans to do: install heating blocks in the buses, which will prevent drivers from idling the buses by heating the engines prior to starting them; install a traffic light just west of Sunnyside School Road along U.S. 40, which is the main entrance for buses.
As for odor and underground gasoline storage, the spokesman said the district is in compliance with EPA standards on fuel emissions at its center off U.S. 40 near Lake Tapawingo.