2325 COM Cover Letter re Zinnia Health Objection w Exs

10 b. The planning report claims that the use is compatible with the mixed land use character in the area and delivers a health care use on a site that has historically been associated with a health care use. The proposed use has never been on this site and is a potentially detrimental use for the existing stable uses around it. The prior use was more residential in character, whereas the proposed use is a treatment center with an expected steady flow of hundreds of transient occupants per year. Transient occupancy by troubled persons, especially of such magnitude as is proposed, may have an ongoing de-stabilizing effect on the surrounding neighborhood. 4. Prong 2 of the negative criteria – substantial impairment to the intent and purpose of the zone plan (Master Plan) and zoning ordinance. The Applicant’s planning report states that there would be no such impairment because the use is akin to many of the medical uses that are permitted in the OB-2 zone and the degree of departure is not substantial. These assertions are flawed for the following reasons: a. The proposed use is not addressed or even mentioned in the most recent re-examinations of the Master Plan. Nor is it specifically permitted in the Zoning Ordinance (Chapter 25), making it a prohibited use per section 25-3.2.d. b. The surrounding uses are office buildings, which are permitted uses. The proposed residential mental health and substance addiction treatment center is anything but an office building. c. As discussed above, there are significant differences in the nature of the proposed use that fail to align it with any of the permitted conditional uses in the OB-2 Zone.