By Kellen Olshefski
Correspondent
Many Sugar Creek Township residents present at the most recent Plan Commission meeting looked defeated following the Commission’s 6-1 vote in favor of rezoning a section along County Highway A from A-2 to B-2.
The rezone request calls for a rezone of part of a tax parcel to accommodate the construction of a 9,100 square-foot Dollar General retail store with additional parking and utilities. The property is part of the Jean A. Brummel Trust and located just east and on the opposite side of County Highway A from Tibbets Elementary School.
However, some residents are reminding their neighbors that the Commission’s decision Oct. 10 was a single step of a lengthy process and not to lose hope, as their support will be needed if the process continues to move forward.
A motion to approve the rezone from A-2 to B-2 – based on the grounds that the property in question is slated for commercial use in both the town and Walworth County’s comprehensive plan – does not determine what could or would be built on the parcel.
Numerous residents spoke out against the rezone at the meeting with the public comment section of the agenda lasting for about 45 minutes.
A variety of reasons for opposition were listed throughout that session, including previously noted concerns over increased traffic along that stretch, the lack of a need for Dollar General when Elkhorn already has a store, the potential for an empty business in a few years if it were to fail, especially if Highway 12 were to be finished and diver traffic around Sugar Creek, robberies that have already occurred at the nearby Mobile store and more.
A pair of petitions opposing the rezone were also presented to the Plan Commission at that meeting with about 490 signatures from township residents.
Sugar Creek Town Board Chairman Dale Wuttke said with the comprehensive plan for the township designating the property in question as land for future commercial land, the Plan Commission couldn’t just simply turn the rezone down without valid, legal reasons.
“There has to be reasons for turning it down, and Dollar General, for instance, they’re doing everything the right way,” Wuttke said in a phone interview late last week. “With the state, if they do everything the right way, you can’t just turn it down.”
He explained that the comprehensive plan has been in place since the early 1990s, and that the Town of Sugar Creek Plan Commission was actually born out of the creation of that process and has been following the plan since 1994.
While it might not have been the favored decision among many residents of the township, Wuttke said it was not only his responsibility an elected official, but also that of the commission to make the right decision from a legal standpoint.
“It makes it tough when everybody looking at you is against it,” he said. “From a legal standpoint, that’s where we were kind of tied up… say, for example, that they were to sue us, and they end up winning, it would be there anyways.”
As for the board initially choosing to send the rezone back to the Plan Commission, Wuttke said he felt it was important to give residents more of an opportunity to pull together a petition and voice their opinions on the topic.
Wuttke said the town was faced with a similar decision back in the 1990s when Mann Brothers wanted to open a gravel pit in the township and residents also showed up to voice their opinions at meetings then. In that case, however, Mann Brothers eventually withdrew the application and the Town was never required to vote on the topic.
Wuttke said he isn’t sure how Dollar General will react to facing similar backlash from residents.
He said that just because the commission voted in favor of the rezone, that does not mean that a Dollar General will be popping up on the site anytime soon, as there are many steps in the process. First, the rezone would have to be approved by the Town Board, at which time it would be sent to the County Zoning Agency for review. If approved there, it would continue onto the Walworth County Board. From there, Dollar General would still be required to seek approval for all the appropriate construction and planning permits as well.
Residents push back
Some residents are reminding their neighbors that the Oct. 10 Plan Commission meeting – and decision – was a single part of the process and not to lose hope, as their support is still needed in the steps to come.
According to one resident, who preferred to remain anonymous, while the Plan Commission is required to make their findings based on fact, it’s at the upcoming Town Board meeting that board members would be able to take the public opinion expressed at the Commission meeting into account when it comes time to vote.
“It’s been a very eye-opening experience for a lot of us and we’ve had to make quick work of it and figure out what exactly is going on and what we can do now within our rights to work against it,” the resident said. “I feel like a lot of people left that meeting feeling very deflated, and unfortunately, I think if you’re not heavily involved in those governments, which not everybody is, and that’s understandable, you may miss some of that understanding of how this pushes forward.
“People were angry, and of course they’re angry; it’s their backyards, it’s their front yards, it’s their kids’ school. There’s a lot of emotions.”
The resident said they are currently asking Town of Sugar Creek residents to write a letter to both the Town Board Supervisors and Walworth County Zoning Agency stating their opposition and reasoning to the two governmental bodies over the next week. Letters to the Town Board can be mailed to: Town of Sugar Creek Town Board, N6641 County Road H, Elkhorn, WI 53121. Letters to the Walworth County Zoning Agency can be mailed to: P.O. Box 1001, Elkhorn, WI 53121.
“It can be the same letter, but one to the Sugar Creek board and one to the zoning agency of Walworth County,” the resident explained.
While public comment will not be allowed at the upcoming Town Board meeting, the resident said they are asking residents to show up to the 6:30 p.m. meeting tomorrow, Monday, Oct. 21 as a visual display of opposition to the rezone.
“We’ve kind of coined the term ‘bodies in the building,’ because the more people we have there standing in unison is a show of force,” the resident said. “We do not want this; it’s our town, our families, our safety and our future. And if the board has been elected to represent us as citizens and the majority of the citizens say, no, we don’t want this, then that should be the vote.”
The resident reminds others that in showing up for tomorrow’s meeting, it will be a visual opposition, not a spoken one.
“There is no public comment at this Town Board meeting. It’s more of a showing up to just stand there in unison and let them know, hey, we’re still here, we’re not going anywhere and we’ll see this through to the end,” the resident said. “(The last Town Board meeting) was standing room only, and it’d be fantastic if we could get that and then some at this meeting, just so they know we have a good majority that’s opposed to it.”
