Commissioners decline request to build car wash

On paper, Willard Hogan's request seemed very bureaucratic: He wanted to rezone property located at Southeast Corner of Fury's Ferry Road and Blackstone Camp Road from C-1 use to CC use.

But his description was much simpler than that: "We want to build a car wash."

If only it could have stayed that simple.

Commissioners deliberated the request for nearly an hour last week before denying it - saying the Community Commercial, or CC, zoning would open the property to too many uses that would not fit in the area.

"Once you've rezoned that land, you've opened it to whatever," said Commission Chairman Jim Whitehead.

"That's a big goldfish bowl there," said Commissioner Frank Spears.

The questions came because of a switch in Hogan's request. Following a planning commission meeting earlier this month - where planners supported the car wash as a condition use in the C-1 zoning, instead of the less-restrictive CC zoning.

But County Attorney Doug Batchelor said multi-bay car washes are not allowed in the C-1 zones, so commissioners couldn't follow the planning commission's recommendation.

So that left Mr. Hogan with a request for CC and car wash owner Gary Richardson with questions about the county's zoning rules. He said the rules allow a convenience store to have single-bay car wash in the C-1 zones, but multi-bay washes aren't allowed.

"It looks like I'm going to have to be in the convenience store business to be in the car wash business," he said. "It's just not right."