Austintown panel recommends zone change near racino

AUSTINTOWN

Austintown Zoning Commission has sent a recommendation to the Austintown trustees for final approval to rezone four parcels of land from residential to business-professional services.

Township officials met Thursday night and deliberated the decision after hearing from the applicants for the zoning change and neighbors who were against it. The Mahoning County Planning Commission had recommended against the change Aug. 26 because it would be inconsistent with the county’s land-use plan from 2006.

The four applicants own seven parcels of land totaling 4.7 acres located north of Norquest Boulevard and state Route 46. That also means they are within six-tenths of a mile from Hollywood Gaming at Mahoning Valley Race Course. The casino section of the new business opens Sept. 17; the racetrack is set to open Nov. 24.

All four applications made the same arguments for the zone change, and all four paid the $300 zoning request fee. Their applications read, “The state upgraded [state] Route 46 to a four-lane highway causing increased traffic and noise. Thus we are looking at the property as a speculative investment for future business growth.”

The property owners and neighbors opposing the original zoning request — a change from single-family residential to general-business classification, a B-2 designation — spoke before the zoning commission deliberated. The panel briefly interrupted its talk to ask if the owners would be opposed to a recommendation of business-professional services specification, a B-1 designation for office-use and not retail, instead of general-business, B-2.

Speaking for the group, Manfred Michalski of 166 N. Canfield-Niles Road, said, “We do not have a problem, collectively, making it B-1.”

Read more of the discussion and the outcome in Friday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.