After a couple of years of needling and lobbying council by an aggrieved neighbour, in the end it was the Eastern Regional Appeal Board who overturned a decision by the Town of Bay Bulls to allow a garage to operate out of a premises on Northside Road.
Mayor Patrick O’Driscoll noted the town has let the 10 day period it had to challenge the Appeal Board ruling expire, meaning council will not fight the decision. He noted council has also overturned its approval of the tire changing business.
Council had initially approved the business owner’s application to operate on Northside Road back in February. At the time, it attached conditions that allowed the business owner to store tires outside his property, but in the side and rear yards only.
However the appellant in the case before the Regional Appeal Board, Doug Chafe, who lives next door to where the garage was located, maintained the business had been operating for a couple of years prior to that without having any permit. On a couple of occasions at council, Chafe complained the garage changed the longstanding nature of the street and reduced the values of neighbouring homes. Chafe further claimed some members of council were using the business for their own tire repairs and maintenance knowing full well the business did not have a permit to operate.
“I never observed it (operating),” Mayor O’Driscoll said this week when asked if the business had been operating for two years without a permit. He pointed out most of the tire changing was done by a mobile unit taken to where the customers were located or needed help.
In its decision, the Appeal Board said that while council did have discretionary authority to approve a business on the street, the conditions attached to the permit were contrary to the town’s municipal plan. It also ruled that “the town did not correctly classify the tire repair service as a light industrial use.” As a consequence, the commissioners, found, “the town did not use its discretionary authority appropriately.”
The board vacated council’s approval of the business and instructed the town to reconsider the application in accordance with its municipal plan and development regulations. Council did so, O’Driscoll explained, when it voted this past spring to rescind the permit it had issued for the business.
However, the owner of the business has reapplied to operate at 135 Northside Road. The public has until Wednesday to submit a written comment to council.
