This petition encourages the Berryville Town Council to deny the changes proposed concerning text amendments requested by House of Lords Inc. in order to modify Article 6 Section 610 Berryville Zoning Ordinance.

This text amendment would delete Section 610.2(u) of the Berryville Zoning Ordinance as

that allows retail stores and shops as an accessory use in the Business Commercial Zoning District. Basically small businesses.

610.201) Retail stores and shops as an accessory use to the primary permitted use on the parcel, provided:

• the retail store or shop is directly related, ancillary, subordinate, and incidental to the primary permitted use;
• the gross floor area of the retail store or shop (excluding storage) does not exceed ten (10) percent of the gross *floor area of the primary permitted use;
• the gross floor area of the retail store or shop (excluding storage) does not occupy more than 1,500 square feet; and
• the gross floor area for storage related to the retail store or shop does not exceed 500 square feet. (8/01)

Mr Echols, Agent for the application, is requesting that the following language be established under 610.2(x) of the Berryville Zoning Ordinance as follows:

610.2 (x) Personal service establishments, retail stores and shops not to exceed 10,000 feet for each free-standing business or for each business in a shopping center or strip mall center, (00/16)

To understand the scale, Shop and Save building is approximately 25,000 square feet.

The intent of this Business Commercial District is to provide locations for highway commercial uses (such as retail uses dependent on automobile access, restaurants, motels), office and employment-related businesses within the precincts of the Berryville Area. Further, Section 610 of the Berryville Zoning Ordinance states that "adequate transportation and site planning of' all land uses shall have the goal of minimizing traffic conflicts with all other activities within the Berryville Area”.

By increasing the size and types of businesses in this location, the traffic would also be increase in an already busy area. This would include large supply trucks.

By allowing a developer to dictate changes to the zoning in that area – which also includes property that is not his, the town goes against all the good practices it had established and developed since the start of the Comprehensive Plan, which is a document required by law in the state of Virginia. The Comprehensive Plan has recently been updated and none of these issues were brought to the attention prior to its approval. Protocol calls for changes of this type to be made to the Master Plan before any type of zoning issues can be made. The current Mayor has ignored this fact on another recent zoning change for the same developer.

By allowing this type of zoning to the north of the town, we change the dynamics of the town from the quaint rural town that many of us moved here to enjoy and be a part of. Mr. Echols will site various tax revenues to be brought in, but, those can only be speculative in nature as our current economy and rural status are factors for the types of businesses he is looking to attract. We then run the risk of seeing an empty strip mall area as part of the entrance to our town.