Committee: No to new bars

0 Comments | La Crosse Tribune, Jul 31, 2002 | by Kent, Joan

Two new bar proposals for the former Blue Tiger on Third Street got thumbs down from a La Crosse Common Council committee Tuesday.

"We need another bar downtown like we need a hole in the head," Police Chief Edward Kondracki told the council's Judiciary and Administration Committee.

"(The police department is) concerned that a heavily dense bar area in a college town on the banks of the Mississippi River has a predictable, outcome," he said.

The two separate applications, by Arnie May and Daniel McNickle, are the first to come to the council under a new ordinance requiring conditional-use permits for new downtown bars. Both applicants claim they will have leases from Carl Schneider who owns the building.

But committee members said the applicants had not shown why their proposed bars are needed downtown.

The committee gave the developers of a South Side Wal-Mart Supercenter another nod of approval, but with a caveat. The Judiciary and Administration Committee followed Monday's Plan Commission approval of a commercial rezoning for the store. But the committee asked the city attorney to prepare restrictions regarding landscaping, lighting ' , noise and other issues concerning the development proposed for Mormon Coulee Road.

"I have learned that if it is not in writing, it is not going to happen," Council member David Morrison said.

Wal-Mart understands that the commercial zoning will have a contingency that the store be developed as the plans indicate, said Julie Eveker, development director for Continental Properties. The store will not look like the Viroqua or Onalaska Wal-Marts, she said.

Rather than the standard gray with red and blue accents, she said it will be earth tones and green, similar to the Wal-Mart in Billings, Mont. Wal-Mart is willing to keep an open dialogue with the city during construction, Eveker said.

But she said delays could result from zoning as a planned development district, as suggested by city planning director Larry Kirch.

"If there are delays, it will have to go back to the real estate committee of Wal-Mart, and there is a possibility this may not happen," she said.

The developer also has agreed to stipulations regarding adherence to the city's noise ordinance and a light ordinance under consideration. There will be no light spill onto neighboring properties, she said. The site will be lower than Markle Road, which runs behind the proposed store, and separated from the road by berms and fencing, Eveker said. But several committee members and other council members said they want all the restrictions in writing.

The committee approved a rezoning that will allow the University of WisconsinLa Crosse to put a 32-space parking lot in the 500 block of Oakland Street and 509 14th St. N. Resident Tom Caponigro spoke against the rezoning, saying the university has had three years to save money to build a parking ramp connected to international housing.

The university has not built that housing and ramp due to finances and other more pressing housing needs, said UW-L campus planner Matt Lewis. But he said the university's physical development plan still includes a parking facility as part of a future residence hall.