Winchester planning committee pauses Side Hill rezoning after local industrial businesses raise finance and expansion concerns

The Planning and Economic Development Committee continued a city-sponsored rezoning of roughly 97 acres in the Side Hill area — the Side Hill Neighborhood Design District (NDD) rezoning — after business owners and city staff discussed how the NDD could affect existing light-industrial operations.

The committee did not vote to send the rezoning forward and agreed to revisit the item at its August meeting, asking staff to meet with affected property owners beforehand.

City planning staff told the committee the NDD is intended to "allow a flexible mix of commercial, residential, other uses and create a focal point" for future redevelopment in Side Hill while implementing recently approved plan changes. Staff described several accommodation options for existing M1 (light industrial) uses now mapped into the NDD, including limited by-right expansion of nonconforming uses (staff cited example expansion thresholds such as 10%), a conditional-use path for larger expansions and the option of making M1 uses permitted in specific mixed areas. Mike Ruddy said the city could revise the NDD text to apply such accommodations across all NDDs or tailor them to Side Hill.

Business representatives argued that labeling long-established industrial operations as "nonconforming" creates a financing and marketability problem. Tom Willis, general counsel for National Fruit (also referred to as White House Apple/National Fruit), told the committee: "I don't really wanna use your your property as collateral because to me, it looks like maybe the city's, you know, got plans for your property that's inconsistent with what you're doing now." Willis said his client had asked the city to exclude its property from the NDD or, alternatively, to allow M1 uses to remain permitted and expandable "by right and not limited." He described lenders' likely response to a nonconforming designation as a risk to borrowing and to corporate deals, including acquisitions.

Representatives of Winchester Cold Storage also said they want to continue operating on their current site and retain the ability to expand. John Scully said, "we would like to be left alone and be able to do what we've been doing for a hundred years on this site." Peter Yates, also with Winchester Cold Storage, added that the term "nonconforming" carries a damaging perception: "It's a word. It's also a perception."

Committee members and staff discussed compromise options. Suggestions included a targeted text amendment to the NDD that would either: (1) allow existing industrial uses to expand by a modest percentage (staff used 10% as an illustrative figure during the discussion), (2) create a conditional-use mechanism for more substantial expansions, or (3) explicitly allow existing M1 uses to remain permitted only for businesses in place as of a specified cutoff date while limiting new industrial uses.

Staff flagged implementation concerns: a change that broadly re-permits M1 uses inside every NDD could undercut the NDD's redevelopment goals in other neighborhoods. That led several committee members to favor a tailored carve-out for Side Hill rather than a citywide change. Committee members asked staff to draft language that protects existing businesses’ operational and financing needs while preserving core NDD objectives and to meet with affected property owners before returning to committee.

The committee moved to continue the rezoning item to the August meeting so staff could work with property owners and bring a draft amendment or alternative that the committee could consider.

If the committee and property owners reach agreement, staff said options include (a) rezoning the parcels now and bringing a text amendment back to define expansion allowances, or (b) holding the property rezoning until a text amendment is finalized so rezoning and the ordinance change proceed together. The committee and business representatives left the item open for further negotiations and scheduled the item to return in August.