NEW ULM — A series of zoning amendments impacting standards for auto/truck businesses were reviewed and recommended for approval by the New Ulm Planning Commission.

A public hearing was held Thursday by the planning commission to review revised standards for different auto /truck-related businesses.

New Ulm has worked for years on standards and policies to address blight. One of the struggles was how to classify inoperable vehicles. In residential areas, an inoperable vehicle could be considered blight, but in industrial or business districts an inoperable vehicle could be part of a business. Several repair and trucking businesses need to have inoperable vehicles on their property to conduct business. The city decided to address inoperable vehicles as storage and zoning issue rather than blight.

Recently staff developed new draft ordinances that exempt auto-repair shops from the blight ordinance. Instead, auto-related businesses would be regulated through zoning regulations.

There are five auto/truck-related businesses that are impacted by the proposed amendment. This includes auto repair–minor; auto repair–major; vehicle sales or rental; machinery/truck repair & sales and truck or freight terminal.

City Planner John Knisley said in reviewing zoning regulations for auto-related businesses, they found many businesses were not meeting the standards because the requirements were too onerous or did not apply in some situations. For this reason, the staff wanted to make adjustments.

Knisley said another consideration was the difference between auto/truck businesses that already exist in New Ulm versus new businesses. Some existing businesses have been functioning in New Ulm for years and this city did not want to increase their restriction. However, new businesses would be expected to follow the new restriction.

Existing auto-related businesses would effectively be grandfathers in will less strict regulations if the business started before Aug. 1, 2023.

Existing businesses would not need to screen exterior storage until the business expanded by more than 25%. New businesses would need to screen exterior storage.

Existing businesses and new businesses are allowed to store 10 inoperable/junked vehicles on the property, but existing businesses could store up to five inoperable vehicles in the front yard. New businesses cannot store any inoperable vehicles in the front yard area.

New businesses must conduct most repair work inside. Existing businesses could conduct some specified repairs outside if the business conducted these types of repairs outside before July 1, 2023.

All auto-related businesses, both existing and new, would be required to create a site plan approved by Community Development Department. This plan would be used to determine if something drastically changes on the property. Once a site plan is approved, the business would be held accountable for meeting that standard.

Before the meeting, Knisley said he received seven calls about the proposed amendments. The calls were from different types of auto businesses asking if the ordinance would impact them. Knisley said all seven businesses already met the provisions in the new ordinance, though each would still need to provide a site plan.

During the public hearing, Jeff Anderson of New Ulm Truck & Trailer raised concerns the new regulations would prevent him from performing repairs outside. He said since the business is landlocked, it cannot expand. In addition, the repair building does not have a high enough ceiling to work on some of the trucks coming in for repair.

“We’ve been there since Aug. 1988, I’ve never heard of a problem with anybody in the community being unhappy that we are working on something outside,” Anderson said.

Knisley was able to alleviate these concerns. He said if a business was conducting certain repairs outside before July 1 of this year, that business could continue doing those repairs outside.

Knisley said city staff’s only requirement was the existing businesses needed to list on the site plan which type of repairs was being conducted outdoors.

Following the public hearing, the commissioners voted to recommend making the recommended changes to the city code.

The recommendation will be taken before the New Ulm City Council. The council will conduct two considerations of the ordinance at separate meetings. Following the second consideration the council must approve the amendments by a four-fifths vote. If approved, the amendment would go into effect 30 days later.