Trustees to Consider Change for Industrial Properties

If you’ve been around government a while, you’ve probably heard the term “business-friendly.” Tonight, members of the Village Board will get their first look at a proposal that, by all accounts, would live up to that phrase.

It’s been in the works for about a year, and it’s intended to solve a problem that has been keeping some industrial businesses from seriously considering locating in Montgomery, according to Charlene Coulombe-Fiore, executive director of the .

Under the current law, she said, virtually every business that has a freight dock on its property is required to get a special use permit. The current law requires a special use for motor freight terminals, meaning any building in which freight is stored for transport out of state, and for distribution uses, meaning any business that ships or receives goods more than five times a day over any given five-day period.

That complex definition would include just about every industrial operation in the village, Coulombe-Fiore said. She said she has spoken with owners of industrial businesses interested in moving to Montgomery, and the idea of having to obtain a special use permit to send and receive shipments has dissuaded them.

To understand what kind of an impact this law has, Brian Dolan, chair of the MEDC’s Business Climate Enhancement Committee (and a 34-year veteran of industrial real estate), visited every affected property in Montgomery. He said the law is “restrictive and impossible to enforce.”

“I was not even aware of how much industrial property we have here,” Dolan said, adding that he counted between 70 and 80 buildings. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to have an ordinance we can’t enforce.”

Dolan also said none of Montgomery’s neighbors have such a provision, and keeping it on the books would make the village “non-competitive in the market.”

The new proposal does away with both of those special use provisions. In its place, it defines distribution uses more simply: “A building, structure, parcel of land, or portion therefore in which: 1) freight is shipped by airplane, motor truck or railroad: or 2) freight is received, assembled, sorted and/or rerouted for local, intrastate, or interstate shipment.”

And the revision does away with the need for a special use permit in industrial-zoned areas, unless the property can be accessed through a residential area. 

The Plan Commission unanimously recommended the change last week, and the Committee of the Whole will get a look at it tonight at 7 p.m. Also on the agenda: an update on the progress of the village’s , a policy for traffic mitigation in neighborhoods with speeding complaints, and a discussion about how often trustees should meet, and when.

The meeting will take place at , 200 N. River St., and is free and open to the public.