Court Opinion

ID: 9724852
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 11:17:40.399863+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:07.329791
License: Public Domain

RATLIFFE, Judge,
concurring.
The majority opinion in its very first paragraph states that Glenwood Terminal applied for a variance in order to alter the zoning status of its property from agricultural to commercial so that it could build a grain drying facility. This it could not do. Rush County bas an area plan commission and board of zoning appeals. Area boards of zoning appeals are prohibited from granting a variance from a use district or classification by the express terms of the applicable statute. Indiana Code section 36-7-4-918(d).
The majority later states that this matter has been treated as an application for a special exception and that we shall treat it as such. Slip Opinion at 8. If the action of the Board of Zoning Appeals is to be upheld, it must be on the basis that it was dealing with a request for a special exception. The area involved had been rezoned from agricultural to commercial. The use sought by Glenwood Terminal, that of a multigrain handling facility appears to be an allowable special exception in a commercial district under Code No. 515, Category: Wholesale Farm Products (raw materials) under the Rush County Zoning Ordinance. See Ordinance, p. 86. The parties appear to agree that the matter before the Board was the petition for a special exception. Such was within the Board's power to grant upon the meeting of the conditions prescribed by the ordinance. (See Ordinance, pp. 67-69). I concur with the majority that the Board's findings and the evidence are sufficient to sustain the granting of the special exception.