City considers commercial use for Jeffco Health campus

County wants to rezone parcel at Kipling Boulevard and W. Alameda Avenue.

LAKEWOOD – The Planning Commission late Wednesday gave the nod to a request by the County to rezone the Department of Health site at West Alameda Avenue and South Kipling Street so it can sell off the 17-acre parcel for commercial development.

But some neighbors and two members of the planning board of the site are concerned that the proposal is like buying a pig in a poke because the request comes without a development plan that would tie down the details of questions that could go unanswered for years if council decides to accept the planning board’s 3-2 vote to recommend approval.

County commissioners, seeking an infusion of cash to relieve a tight budget forecast, believe selling the property could bring as much as $8 a square foot, depending on its potential for development, Commissioner Kevin McCasky said before Wednesday night’s meeting unfolded.

The county wants to rezone the property at 260 S. Kipling, changing the existing 1-R large lot residential designation to Planned Unit Development (PUD). The Jeffco health agency has operated at the site under special-use permits approved by the city in 1974 and 1988, but has occupied the site since the mid-60s, before Lakewood was incorporated. The current zoning carried over from a similar large-lot residential zoning category bestowed by Jeffco.

The requested change would allow the county to sell the property for commercial and retail development including supermarkets and other single-tenant retail stores up to under a maximum of 150,000 square feet of buildings. Other specified uses include gas stations, banks and financial institutions, fast food outlets, office buildings, convenience stores, and low-power telecommunications facilities.

The requested change also would allow any uses allowed in 1-C (Convenience Commercial) zoned districts except adult-oriented businesses.

That broad commercial category also accommodates college and university uses, medical clinics and labs, assisted living facilities, group homes for the elderly, mortuaries and crematoriums, day-care facilities and “garment work.”

Commissioner Kevin McCasky said the county intends to find developers with potential tenants that would maximize the sales- and property-tax income potential of the high profile site at one of the city’s busiest intersections.

Maximum sale price also is less important than the continued economic benefits – jobs and tax revenue – that could help bolster income for several taxing authorities, including the city, the county, Jeffco Schools and West Metro Fire Rescue District, McCasky said.

And Jeffco is willing to wait two years or more to find the right combination for the site, according to McCasky.

“We want to find what works best for the long term,” McCasky said. “Whoever we sell it to and whenever we sell it, we want to see it put into production right away.”

The site is the only county-owned property on the sale block, but the county is looking at the increasing cost to maintain a number of properties with an eye toward consolidating some of the facilities. Money from the sale of the Kipling Street acreage will go into the county’s General Fund and could be used to meet much of that maintenance burden, McCasky said.

But Jennifer Merriman, who lives near the site, said the development is unlikely to attract new businesses, but instead would attract existing businesses from elsewhere in the city, leaving vacant storefronts in their wake.

“This is just a replacement of tax revenue from one area to another,” she said.

About four-dozen neighbors of the site raised concerns about the projects, largely focusing on traffic issues, the impact on surrounding neighborhoods and the potential increased risk for school kids crossing Alameda Avenue or Kipling Street.

Judy Smerey, who lives south of the site, said she is concerned the increased traffic generated by a commercial development at the site could make it more difficult and more dangerous for pedestrians trying to cross Alameda, especially the neighborhood youngsters who walk to nearby Creighton Middle School or Lakewood High School, both which are north of the Jeffco Health site.

Other residents voiced concern over what could be a lengthy detour to reach their homes if the proposed partial closure of West Cedar Avenue becomes reality.

When Planning Commissioner George Brown asked where in his packet he could find the traffic study compiled for the case, a brief but testy exchange with the city’s principal traffic engineer, John Padon, ensued.

“’We do not post the traffic study in our information packet,” Padon responded, holding up his copy. “You can ask. I am expecting you to believe me as a city employee, that I would tell you what the traffic study analysis” says, Padon said.

“So we have to base our decision on what you say, without any questions,” Brown asked.

“Yes, I expect the Planning Commission, as me being a city employee, to trust what I referred to and what I approved to be a good projection upfront,” Padon said.

Brown let then the issue drop for the moment, but as he prepared to cast his vote against the rezoning, Brown said he opposes the rezoning, partly because he is “not happy with the traffic numbers, or the lack of them.”

Other nearby residents expressed concern over the uncertainty of the eventual development plans, a point picked up by Planning Commission Chairman John Plotkin.

“Too many issues are unresolved,” Plotkin said. “It (the rezoning) may work, but not with the blank template we have before us.”

Plotkin and Brown cast the two dissenting votes.