Ordinance committee reviews expansion of courthouse-proximate/Upper Main Street zone, discusses nonconforming residences and owner notification

Ordinance committee members on April 2 reviewed a proposed amendment to the downtown Central Business District that would expand the area designated as the courthouse-proximate and Upper Main Street zone one block to the south. Staff said the change would map the overlay rather than rely on a lengthy definition in the ordinance and would continue to prohibit most first‑floor residences in the expanded area, with specific historic purpose‑built residential properties exempted.

"With the 1998 adoption of the zoning ordinance, there was an area put in there as, called courthouse proximate and Upper Main Street area," a staff presenter said, explaining that the overlay has traditionally prohibited first‑floor residences except in limited circumstances and that the proposed amendment would clarify the area by creating a map.…