“The Met Council requires a certain amount of vacant land be zoned for high density. Does Blaine not have enough of that going on?” questioned Blaine resident Melissa Hurd.
Ultimately this apartment proposal was approved by council with additional conditions for more crosswalks and a traffic study.
Then the council addressed a second proposal – this one was for an apartment building to be built on the old Rainbow Food site near Northtown Mall. Residents also spoke against this.
“There has been a huge uptick in drug use in the area,” said Blaine resident Katie Joyce. “If we are looking up adding almost 200 new units right into that immediate area, what is the chance that people are going to follow residents into the building increasing drug use?”
The majority of the council was in favor of the project.
“With this development it will get better not worse because individuals are hiding and they can hide in vacant property they can hide in unlit spaces and they can be invisible where with developed land they will not be invisible anymore,” said Blaine City Council Member Julie Jeppson.
“We’ve worked really hard towards this, and unfortunately although it’s not popular, the residential component is part of the necessity of what we need to do,” said Blaine City Council member Jess Robertson.
“Nine years of zero commercial activity on that space. Nine years of nothing but decline,” said Blaine Mayor Time Sanders. “We have a landowner that purchased this property with a vision to turn things around. We have a developer that steps up to the table – not with a crappy apartment complex – but with a 50 million dollar investment into this city
Bue this apartment would have required a change to Blaine’s comprehensive plan to rezone the site from commercial to high density residential, and changing that plan requires five positive votes.
“If there was a commercial project that would have worked in that space it would have happened,” said Sanders. There isn’t the bodies. There isn’t the dollars.”
The change to the comp plan was rejected with just four council members voting yes and three voting no. Once the comp plan amendment was rejected, the council had to reject the apartment as well.
So for now, the Rainbow Food site will remain vacant and remain zoned for commercial development.
