City Council continues Cooperage appeal hearing to October 2nd

At the conclusion of an hours long appeal hearing, the Sonoma City Council elected to continue the matter to their meeting of October 2, 2024.

With Mayor John Gurney absent, the four council members in attendance struggled to come to terms with the appeal, hearing from both representatives of the appellants and neighbors of the property on 1^st Street West.

The appellant’s representatives, attorney Michael Woods, contractor Tom Thornley, and architect Michael Ross, spoke at length about the historical significance of the building, the philanthropic contributions of the McQuown family to community-serving institutions and organizations, and the potential financial benefit to the city of allowing commercial uses in the building. The requests for a wine tasting facility and vacation rental were denied by the current Planning Commission based upon its understanding of the Adaptive Reuse Ordinance, and previously determined conditions of approval when the matter came before the Planning Commission in 2018 before work on the building had begun.

The city’s Adaptive Reuse Ordinance allows a certain degree of flexibility of future use to facilitate the preservation or rehabilitation of historic structures. Under the terms of that ordinance, the Planning Commission granted the use of the ground floor for a “lifestyle store” in 2018, but did not allow the use of the second floor for vacation rental purposes.

Now that the building has been preserved and the work completed, the appellants argued that the Adaptive Reuse Ordinance allows for the approval of uses not included in the original application. If not currently allowed under the terms of the ordinance, the City Council asked the City Attorney about the legality and feasibility of adopting an amendment to allow it.

Neighbors of the project numbering a dozen and half objected to granting the commercial uses, arguing that such use will disrupt their residential neighborhood and violates the original conditions of approval. To make an exception based upon past philanthropy, one argued, is favoritism and implies that permission from the city can be bought.

In requesting these commercial uses, the appellant’s representative Tom Thornley noted that their intention is to increase the value of the building and recoup some of the expenses of its rehabilitation. Their plan to use the building as an additional residence has been abandoned and it is currently on the market for roughly $8 million.