ESCANABA — The Escanaba City Council took action on a number of recommendations from the city’s planning commission Thursday — but not all of the commission’s suggestions were heeded by the city’s governing board.

The primary issue the two boards disagreed on was the inclusion of a public hearing requirement in the city’s zoning ordinance. Historically, the planning commission has held public hearings for developments even when the planned use of a site was a use protected by right under that site’s zoning designation. However, a recommendation from the Michigan Department of Economic Development’s Redevelopment Ready Communities program put the practice under a microscope.

Escanaba is currently in the process of recertifying under the RRC, but to do so, the city must follow RRC best practices to ensure the city is developer-friendly. Because the projects protected by right cannot be denied based on the hearings, the RRC argued the hearings were unnecessary and created additional hoops for developers to jump through that could delay or add cost to projects.

“They made it explicitly clear they want two things, one is temporal efficiency and the other is predictability and having public hearings at the time that the site plan is ready defeats both of those,” said Council Member Ralph Blasier. “… If you’ve got a use that’s outside what’s permitted, of course you have a site plan, of course you have a hearing, but when you’ have uses that are permitted by right, it’s already their right. They should not have to defend it against anything, against any comment by anybody.”

The planning commission disagreed, arguing strongly at a joint meeting with the council and an RRC representative earlier this year that the hearings encouraged a dialogue with developers and increased public trust in projects. While public comment periods are held at all planning commission meetings, the public hearings differed in that neighboring property owners were notified of projects, something that may not happen if the hearings are discontinued.

In a split vote Thursday, with Council Member Tyler DuBord dissenting, the council voted to strike the requirement for the hearings from the zoning ordinance.

The council also had reservations about a planned sidewalk infill program that would put an additional 3.22 miles of sidewalks in the city over a period of five years from 2022 to 2026. Under the program, property owners that are required to have sidewalks and allowed the city to install the sidewalks — rather than hiring a contractor or doing the work themselves — would be placed on a five year repayment plan, where one-fifth of the project cost for their stretch of sidewalk, plus interest, would be collected annually on their tax bill.

The plan also includes changing the relevant ordinance to make notification of residents take place 135 days prior to the start of construction, which can only take place between April and December by statute. This significantly increases the notice time currently set at 22 days.

While only property owners without sidewalks would be affected by the plan, the added financial burden for residents already facing steep water and wastewater rate increase raised concerns for the council. In order to get input on the plan, a public hearing was scheduled for the April 2 city council meeting.

The council did unanimously approved one of the planning commission’s recommendations Thursday. Following a public hearing, the council approved a new zoning map for the city, which made changes to selected parcels in Northtown and along the North Lincoln Road corridor.