The City Council unanimously approved Monday night an ordinance amending the zoning for two sections of the St. Mark Church property behind Garden City to become Mixed Use Planned District (MPD) to allow for the development of 52 apartment units along Poplar Drive and Midway Road.

With approval, the easterly portion of the property along Poplar Drive, which was zoned residential A-8, intended primarily for single-family dwellings on a minimum lot size of 8,000 square feet, and the westerly portion along Midway Road, which was zoned C-3, primarily for use as general business, were both changed to MPD.

D+P Real Estate, together with Truth Box Inc., presented the redevelopment proposal. According to a letter from developer Jordan Durham of D+P Real Estate, the proposal includes renovation and adaptive reuse of the former Cranston Johnston Catholic Regional School (CJCR) building, which has sat vacant since 2009, for 20 residential units, in addition to the construction of 32 new apartment units on the Garden City side of the site along Midway Road.

Durham said Tuesday that the company has a purchase and sales agreement with the church for the school and that with council approval the company will move into the detailed planning of the development. If all goes according to plan, construction would start in the former school next spring. The total project is estimated to cost $9 million. Durham expects the first units would become available for rent in 2015.

“This is a sustainable development,” Durham said. He said particular attention will be paid to energy savings and that the apartments could become the first LED Certified multi-family housing development in the city.

Residents in the area were divided in their support of the project. Several showed up to Monday’s council meeting to voice their opposition or to speak in favor of the proposal.

Anthony Minutelli said he was concerned the space isn’t big enough for what’s being proposed. He said he feels parking would be an issue and wanted to see the proposal scaled down and the approval process slowed down.

“They would need to park 104 vehicles there, but they’re short [of space] on the site,” he said. “At the last meeting, they said vehicles could park at the Park and Ride, but that doesn’t belong to them.”

He said when church is in session on Saturday nights and three times Sunday morning, people park in the nearby Applebee’s parking lot, as well as on Poplar Drive, creating traffic congestion.

After talking with Planning Director Peter LaPolla, Minutelli said he learned of a planning meeting for the project that was scheduled for the week before Sept. 12.

“They’re supposed to send letters to property owners within 100 feet of the property line [about the meeting]. I spoke to my neighbors and no one received any letters,” he said.

Minutelli said he was not against the project, but rather would prefer to see it downsized.

“You’re trying to squeeze a football into a golf ball-sized hole,” he said. “This will cause chaos. It’s a nice neighborhood and we don’t want to see it go downhill.”

Minutelli said the planning stages for the project were presented in early September, a council meeting was held Sept. 12 and the final meeting was being held Monday.

“This is moving too fast,” he said. “We have a petition to make Poplar Drive one-way, and that’s a bigger issue than this project. The people that work hard have to live there and deal with the traffic.”

Carla Minutelli said she had concerns with people parking on Poplar Drive.

“Without Poplar Drive being one-way, if there’s snow on the ground, people park on both sides of the street when church is in session,” she said. “I had a 90-year-old man fall down in front of my house and the Rescue couldn’t get through because there wasn’t enough room. It’s a safety concern.”

Carla also said she felt residents were being sold on things that couldn’t necessarily be guaranteed.

“The proposal says the housing will be for elderly and there won’t be any kids, but there are a lot of single-parent families these days and people are grandparenting kids,” she said. “You can’t guarantee there will be no kids.”

Another resident said he was concerned about parking because there are a lot of kids in the neighborhood as well as people that like to walk their dog.

David Desjardins, who has lived on Poplar Drive for 60 years, requested a one-month moratorium be placed on any vote to allow residents to review all the information involved.

“Go back to the drawing board for other proposals because there’s only one to be considered and voted on by the council tonight,” he said. “The residents should have final say on what goes in the neighborhood.”

Desjardins said he would like to see additional proposals of what it would look like to divide the area into housing lots, break up the area into luxury condos or a downsized version of the current proposal.

“I live directly across the street of the present proposal,” he said. “This monster proposal needs to be taken seriously.”

Desjardins also requested a wall be built to prevent the entering and exiting of vehicles from Poplar Drive to the 20-unit building in order to alleviate traffic on Poplar Drive.

“I request that no vote be taken this evening until all further options can be studied and reviewed,” he said.

In addition to parking and traffic concerns, residents said the proposal is 1 acre short of needed land space and exceeds the building height limit.

Robert Murray of Taft McSally LLP, an attorney representing the developers, said that although 5 acres may be required and the proposal contains 4.2, the council has the power to waive that. He also said that while the C3 zone allows for a height of 35 feet, the average grade would be 37 feet.

“My client plans to put an underground garage below the [32 new] units, so [measuring] from bottom to top will be 47 or 48 feet, but it won’t be noticed because it will be below grade,” he said.

Murray also addressed concerns regarding how quickly the proposal came together and moved through the approval process.

“My client started this process in the spring by going door to door and speaking with the neighbors, conceptual plans were presented at a meeting at the library in May, numerous meetings have been held with the Planning Department, a public hearing was held on the second Tuesday in September and we notified people within 400 feet of the property,” he said. “This is an opportunity to take a vacant school building and put it on the tax rolls, and also increase shopping at Garden City.”

Matthew Coppa, a resident who said he worked with Jordan Durham for several years, said he was in favor of the project.

“This is a well-thought out plan. The new building works well, it’s a good transition piece between the Garden City residential neighborhood and the commercial shopping center,” he said. “This is a very good project for the city. This is a local developer wanting to invest in our city; I believe you have a fiduciary duty to take these projects seriously and vote in favor of it.”

Another resident, who identified himself as a parishioner at St. Mark’s Church, said he was also in favor of the project.

“Over the past years, there have been five or six other offers to purchase the property, all of which were heavier density than this 52-unit proposal,” he said. “If this doesn’t go through, they will entertain other offers that could be commercial. This proposal is thoughtful, sensitive and low-density.”

A St. Mark’s Trustee member, who said he’s been a Garden City resident since 1967, said many meetings were held relative to the project.

“The school has been vacant sine 2009. We turned down many offers, some that were very appealing, due to consideration for the neighbors and the neighborhood,” he said. “We looked at this offer closely and had six meetings on it. The last thing we want to do is offend anyone, especially the neighbors ... We need this project.”

The consensus among the council was that if the 52-unit proposal were denied, it would provide an opportunity for other offers, including commercial ones that could create even bigger issues.

“It’s a danger to consider other proposals for the land, which is already zoned for commercial,” said Councilman Don Botts. “It could be anything commercial as long as there’s no drive-thru. I think that would create more traffic than a 52-unit complex.”

Botts said because the area is already zoned commercial, a business would not need council approval for a commercial proposal.

“The traffic element from 52 units will be minimal, we’re promoting the use of Garden City, this is a Green project, and it will add to the area as opposed to what’s there now, which is a vacant building with weeds growing out of the cracks,” he said.

Responding to Desjardin’s suggestion of looking at other proposals for the area, Council Vice President Michael Farina said, “I wish we could put forward different projects to vote on, but this is what’s before us.”

Expanding on Botts’ comment about businesses with commercial interests making offers, Farina said that could include anything from a spa or salon to a drug store or convenience store, which he said gets approximately 3,000 cars a day.

“That would be much worse than a 52-unit project,” he said. “This makes sense for the area.”

Councilman Paul Archetto commended constituents for showing up and speaking out about the proposal.

“Father [Anthony] Verdelotti had a difficult decision to choose an offer, as there were many to consider. We know what we’re getting here, the project was discussed at the meetings and was voted on unanimously,” he said. “This is not that large of a complex and it will fit well in Garden City. It will generate revenue for the city, a half-million dollars per year.”

Councilman Michael Favicchio said regardless of what happens with the proposal, he would introduce an ordinance to create a one-way street on Poplar Drive, as well as to plant evergreens or some other type of landscape buffer between Poplar Drive and St. Mark’s.

“I understand the concerns of constituents and neighbors,” he said. “We’ve been faced with looking at commercial proposals, like CVS, and I’m fearful of 2,500 or more cars coming in five minutes a day versus people parking and staying in for eight hours or so.”

Favicchio said some of the parking spaces currently along Midway Road are “dangerously close” to the street, and part of the redevelopment proposal would move those spaces five feet back, making them safer.

“I have 1,000 units around the corner from me and we’ve had no traffic problems,” he added.

According to the proposal, the existing school would be converted to 20 units: 16 one-bedroom units and four two-bedroom units, for a total of 24,000 square feet of residential space. Average size of the one-bedroom units would be 850 square feet, and 1,250 square feet for the two-bedroom units. New construction would consist of 32 units, 11 one-bedrooms and 21 two-bedrooms, for 40,000 square feet of multi-family residential space. Average one-bedroom units would be 750 square feet, and 1,175 square feet for two-bedrooms. Parking will consist of 34 garage parking spaces under the new 32-unit building, and 59 surface parking spaces, for a total of 93 parking spaces, or 1.73 per unit. Rent will be between $1,200 for one-bedroom units and $1,800 for two-bedroom units.