Oneida County zoning will review parking restrictions

Beset over the years with complaints of unequal treatment, the Oneida County zoning department will undertake a review of county parking restrictions, especially waivers from compliance, at the request of zoning committee chairman and county board chairman Scott Holewinski.

The problem is, Holewinski said at last week’s zoning meeting, the county pretty much goes along with town recommendations when it comes to specific projects, including waivers from parking requirements, but that has sometimes left the county in the middle when applicants complain that some people get special favors. 

Holewinski said the issue wasn’t really a priority, but he wanted to take the pulse of the committee.

“So right now we have parking restrictions, and then let’s just say the Minocqua town board will say, ‘Well give this guy an exception,’ and then on the next one they say, ‘Don’t give that guy an exception,’” Holewinski said. “We’ve been caught up that we gave some exemptions based on the Minocqua town board telling us what to do, and so I think we need to clear up the parking.”

Holewinski said he believes there are three ways the committee could go.

“I think we could put in there that there could be an exemption if sufficient public parking is within walking distance of the proposed business,” he said. “Or we just say, no parking requirements for business. That would not include apartment buildings, or hotels where they need the parking. Or a town could enact a parking restriction and give out an exemption.”

As it stands, Holewinski said, the county gives out the exemption and then gets caught in the crossfire.

A history of parking regulation

Oneida County zoning director Karl Jennrich said the county has had a parking ordinance all the many years he has been employed with the county.

“The earliest it was amended is 2003,” Jennrich said. “The last time it was amended was in 2022. In each zoning district there’s different types of uses — permitted, administrative, conditional use — so staff, when they review administrative review permits and conditional use permits, as part of that we are looking at parking and hours of operation. How many employees? How much retail do you have? Because, based on the square footage of retail, certain parking is required. How many employees do you have? Based on employees you need a certain amount of parking for the employees. How many seats or bar stools are you going to have in your restaurant? How many rooms for a tourist rooming house?”

Those are all spelled out in the ordinance, Jennrich said.

“The ordinance dictates the setback for the parking to roadways, setback to parking areas for side and rear yard setbacks, waterfront setbacks, and also what the dimensions are going to be,” he said.

Jennrich then rattled off other parking requirements, such as those for garages or for off-street parking, and he said the ordinance addressed a range of scenarios such as for residential multifamily developments, restaurants, hotels and bed and breakfasts, bowling, roadside stands, theaters, boat launching facilities, furniture and home appliance, retail stores, schools daycares, and nursing homes.

“And then, when questions arise, we usually get together to try to figure out what the parking should be,” he said. “We typically don’t talk to the committee, but what Scott’s talking about is, under [the ordinance] you have exemptions or potential increases/reductions for required parking spaces.”

With respect to that provision, Jennrich said, the towns of Lake Tomahawk, Three Lakes, Woodruff, and Minocqua in particular look at that because there are a lot of businesses built right up to the road. 

“I mean those areas that are built up on some of these old platted areas,” he said. “So there was an exemption, if you want to call it, in those areas of town that were developed into business districts prior to zoning.”

According to the ordinance, Jennrich related, if the buildings are built more or less up to the lot lines with no parking provided on the lots and no parking could be provided without relocating or tearing down buildings, parking would be determined after conferring with and receiving recommendations from the town board.

“So basically it still it is a committee decision,” he said. “The town can make recommendations but ultimately it’s the committee that makes the decision.”

Jennrich laid out other ordinance provisions providing for exemptions for specific situations, based on the committee’s assessments.

Holewinski said the list of those exceptions Jennrich laid out is where the committee runs into trouble.

“People say ‘Well, you favored that business but now you didn’t do it for this business,’ so [I wanted to see] if the ordinance could be more specific as to how we’re going to determine if we’re giving an exception,” he said.

Supervisor Bob Almekinder said he didn’t think parking restrictions could just be eliminated.

“You could get a big retail person in there who says, ‘Well I’m not going to spend the money on real estate and parking,’” Almekinder said. “We could just zero in on the language for downtown Minocqua, downtown Woodruff, downtown Lake Tomahawk, and downtown Three Lakes.”

Holewinski wanted to know if the county could eliminate the parking restrictions for those downtowns. Jennrich said yes, with caveats.

“The only thing is, I would try to do it within a geographical area,” he said. “For example, maybe Three Lakes in those areas that are on sewer and water and zoned business. Possibly the same thing with Lake Tomahawk.”

For Minocqua, Almekinder said, the county could exempt the island, with the caveat that if there is land available for parking, it has to be utilized. 

“So they don’t just sit there and say, ‘I have a vacant lot and I’m going to build lot line to lot line and not allow any parking,’” he said. 

While the problem in Minocqua is mainly the island, Almekinder said there is still land available there. 

“And do we sit there and say everything on the island is exempt from parking or do you sit there and say, ‘Well this piece of property still has land available for parking. You could limit this building size and still have parking,’” he said.

Almekinder said there was a vacant lot just north of the old Dairy Queen in Minocqua. 

“So, technically, if you were to exempt the island, that piece of property could be built lot line to lot line,” he said.

Jennrich said that would put pressure on the island.

“There is land available on that lot for parking,” Almekinder said. “So to me it would have to be, the exemption would have to be on existing properties that are built lot line to lot line, not properties that already have space available or vacant lots.”

Supervisor Billy Fried, who is also a Minocqua town supervisor, said he did not know if he personally wanted to keep the parking restrictions in Minocqua as is, but in his role as a town supervisor it was a different matter.

“I don’t know if I personally wanted to keep them,” Fried said. “Looking at the chart that your staff did, it looks like we’re more restrictive than a lot of the other counties. So I’m in favor of reducing them. But I represent Minocqua on the town board and also here at the county and whatever direction we’re thinking, it would be nice to go back to the town for input because I think there’s going to be some resistance, which may differ from my personal opinion.”

Fried said he sometimes felt squeezed in the middle.

“That aside, there’s good reasons to have it and I think the county has gotten frustrated over the years because sometimes projects from Minocqua or other townships might come forward and say this one we want to exempt them from it and others we don’t,” he said. “So if there’s a measurable way to have some consistency I think it would be of benefit for the county or specifically the committee.”

Almekinder said he had other concerns.

“Let’s say I’m on the island and I want to redo my business, and I want to just blow it up and screw the parking,” he said. “To me, that’s not right. The parking on the island is a real big problem during several times of the year. So if you were to just sit there and eliminate parking restrictions on the island, people could just sit there and blow their buildings up and then all of a sudden we have no parking on the island.”

But if you have a lot that’s got parking available, that should be preserved, Almekinder said.

Holewinski said he wanted to point out that there have been times when the town of Minocqua has recommended an exemption even when there has been available parking. Though he could not think of the name of the business, Holewinski said he remembered one business that had plenty of property and an exemption was given anyway.

“We gave them the exemption, and that’s where we get caught,” he said. “Whatever we do has to be detailed out and we have to follow what that exemption is. But I think if we took the downtown area, and we said, if there’s public parking within walking distance, which is from one end of Minocqua to the other, is that feasible? Because I think the other three towns are pretty easy.”

Jennrich did offer some examples of parking issues from those three towns — the zoning director said some huge projects in Three Lakes wanted exemptions and Jennrich said he directed them to the town first because, while there is on-street parking, there is no municipal parking lot in town. 

Holewinski wrapped up the discussion by saying more input is needed from the town of Minocqua because that’s where the real problem is.

“It’s not a crisis,” he said. “I would hope that at this point that we concentrate on getting the ordinance amendments done and we get the comprehensive plan and then we can move on to some of these other things.”

Fried said he thought the county should also reach out to Woodruff and Lake Tomahawk and Three Lakes to get their input, too.

“And then what are your thoughts to just, when you look at a CUP [conditional use permit], would we still have a standard where we looked to decide if they have adequate parking available?” Fried asked.

Holewinski said that would still be looked at but the exemption provision was the most important one to clarify.

“So everybody’s treated equally,” he said.

Jennrich will send a letter to the affected towns to get input from each one of the towns about what they think.

Richard Moore is the author of “Dark State” and may be reached at richardd3d.substack.com.