Appeal Set For Recycling Site

USA Metal Proposal To Be Heard By Elected County Officials

Thursday, January 31, 2013

— Benton County’s justices of the peace will be asked to sit in judgment of a decision by the county’s Planning Board to block a metal recycling business from operating near Gentry.

Tom Smith, owner of USA Metal Recycling, sent the county a notice of appeal of the board’s rejection of his application for approval of a large-scale development plan. The board voted 7-0 to deny the application at its Dec. 19 meeting and filed its findings and decision letter Jan. 4 with the Benton County Clerk’s Office.

Smith declined to comment on the appeal, referring questions to his attorney, Jason Wales of the Everett, Wales & Comstock law firm in Fayetteville. Wales would not comment in the specifics of the appeal.

“There’ll be an appeal before the county judge and two or three of the JPs,” Wales said. “We’ll do that, and if that doesn’t work we’ll go to circuit court for a jury trial. He just feels like he ought to be able to conduct his business on this piece of property he owns.”

The Planning Board rejected Smith’s application for the business at 13670 Old Highway 59 after a public hearing at which 15 people spoke in opposition to the business’ plans. Planning Department staff noted the proposal would establish a heavy industrial use in an area where no other heavy industrial uses are in proximity; there is an established residential and agricultural pattern of land use; the transportation infrastructure does not currently support a heavy industrial use; and allowing such disparate land use will change the character of the area.

At A Glance

Planning Appeal

County Judge Bob Clinard will appoint a panel of three justices of the peace to hear the USA Metal Recycling appeal of the Planning Board’s decision to reject the business’ plans to operate on a site near Gentry. The appeal hearing is tentatively set for Feb. 25 with a site visit scheduled for 2 p.m. and a hearing in the Quorum Courtroom set to begin at 4 p.m.

Source: Staff Report

Mark Curtis, Planning Board chairman, said the staff findings and recommendations, public comments from neighbors and from Gentry city officials, and the board’s own observations from a visit to the company’s operation in Fayetteville led him to vote against the application. Curtis said he’s still convinced the decision is correct.

“I would have to say that we are not surprised that Mr. Smith has appealed the board’s decision,” Curtis said. “But I think the information we were given pretty much led to our decision and I still believe in that decision.”

Chris Ryan, county planning and environmental director, said the office has received a copy of the notice of appeal and a Freedom of Information Act request from Wales for information about the USA Metal case and the Planning Board hearings on the application. The request asks the county to make available “all letters, emails, faxes, photographs, videos, applications, studies, reports, notes, files and other documents which refer or relate in any way” to the Gentry property.

Ryan said the planning office is gathering the information and hopes to place it all on a single webpage, which would make the material available for Wales or anyone else who might want to review it.

Benton County Judge Bob Clinard said past practice has been to select justices of the peace from areas other than the district where a property is located to sit on the appeals panel. Justice of the Peace Patrick Carr represents District 12, which includes the property near Gentry. Clinard sent an email to the justices of the peace asking if any wanted to volunteer to sit of the appeals panel. By Wednesday afternoon, Carr of Gentry and Joel Jones of Bella Vista said they were willing to serve. Justice of the Peace Tom Allen of Bentonville indicated he would prefer not to serve.

This will be the third appeal of a Planning Board decision from 2012. The two appeals heard last year stemmed from decisions made by the Planning Board at its June 6 meeting. The board rejected a proposed large-scale development for Nighthawk Custom Training Academy, characterized in the appeal as “a private shooting range,” on a site at 2016 W. Centerton Blvd. near Centerton. Another plan for Downtown Towing, which planned a “temporary holding lot for wrecked and impounded vehicles” for property at 21819 Meadow Wood Drive near Siloam Springs, also was rejected. Both businesses were operating at those locations without permits from the county and were asked to submit plans after complaints were made to the Planning Department, according to information presented at the June meeting. Both decisions were appealed. The denial of the application for the gun range was overturned. The towing lot decision was upheld.