LAMBERTVILLE: Zoners to look again at music hall plan tonight

The Bridge Street Foundation is the same organization that saved and revitalized the Bucks County Playhouse. It now hopes to create a nonprofit music hall in Lambertville

By John Tredrea, Special Writer
   LAMBERTVILLE — The Zoning Board of Adjustment is scheduled to hold a public hearing on a controversial proposal to create a music hall in the Old Baptist Church on Bridge Street at 7:30 p.m. today (Thursday) at the Justice Center
   The board would have to grant use variances to the Bridge Street Foundation in order for the music hall project to move forward.
   The Bridge Street Foundation is the same organization that saved and revitalized the Bucks County Playhouse. It now hopes to create a nonprofit music hall in Lambertville.
   Under state land-use law, a two-thirds majority of the full Zoning Board is required for obtaining a use variance. A use variance entitles a property owner to use his or her property in a way contrary to the local zoning code.
   ”This is an application (for variances and other relief), which is pending before our Zoning Board,” Mayor David Del Vecchio said at the June 18 City Council meeting.
   ”They (the zoners) have had a number of hearings so far. The hearing is before the Zoning Board because a portion of the church property is in our R-2 residential zone, so the owners have to obtain use variances to allow the uses they want to put in that building (theater, restaurant, tavern). Those uses are not permitted in the R-2 zone,” the mayor noted/
   At the June 18 council meeting, which was attended by many city residents concerned about the music hall proposal, the mayor explained that the City Council has no say in the matter.
   ”We appreciate that this project has created a lot of interest and concern, both for and against it,” the mayor said June 18, but “this council has no jurisdiction over the zoning parts of the application and there is nothing we will be doing as a mayor and council at this time. We cannot pass any law concerning it, or otherwise interfere. The law requires the Zoning Board to apply the ordinance in place at the time the application was deemed complete. Any ordinance changes we would make would not apply to the project unless the owners withdraw their application and start over.”
   The mayor said that anyone wishing to address the Zoning Board on the music hall application must do so in person in order for his/her testimony to have legal clout.
   ”We have heard concerns that not everyone who has wanted to be heard has gotten a chance to speak yet to the Zoning Board,” he said.
   ”You can be sure that the public will get to be heard, but you will have to be patient, and you will have to be present at the hearings to speak in order for your statements to be considered by the board.
   ”Neither the Zoning Board, nor we as a council, can accept petitions, email chains or letters for or against the project, because the law does not permit those to be considered as evidence or testimony,” the mayor concluded.
   IN JULY 2012, a Bridge Street Foundation spokesman said: “The group funded the purchase of the First Baptist Church late in 2011 with the hopes that they would be able to create a community music facility with the mission to become an active, vital arts center for the enrichment of the community and surrounding area . . . This facility is intended to complement the activities of the Bucks County Playhouse. However, the entities would have distinct identities, management and would not compete with one another.”