Columbus Regional Health is one step closer to having nearly 700 acres of westside property annexed into the city of Columbus.
The Columbus Plan Commission voted Wednesday to send a favorable recommendation to Columbus City Council regarding the proposed annexation of the 674-acre, hospital-owned site. Assistant Planning Director Melissa Begley said she believes the matter will go before the council in November for a first reading.
The site, also known as the Garden City Farms property, stretches east-to-west from Interstate 65 almost to State Road 11/Jonesville Road, and is south of the westside Walmart and north of the Bartholomew County 4-H Fairgrounds.
Columbus City Council voted in September to adopt a long-term concept plan for the area — known as the City View District Plan — as an element of the city’s Comprehensive Plan.
In addition to an approximately 100-acre CRH campus on the northeast side of the site, the City View District Plan includes a variety of residential neighborhoods, commercial centers and a research and development campus. These areas would be connected to each other and nature via “open spaces, green corridors, and amenities that extend throughout the property,” officials said.
“Columbus Regional Health has indicated their long-term intent to both identify the +/-100-acres of this property they wish to retain for a future medical facility and to offer the remaining property for development,” planning department staff stated in a report on the annexation request. “Annexation is the first step in the process for the development of this property which, over time, will be subject to numerous significant infrastructure decisions, rezoning, and subdivision. The applicant is not proposing any zoning changes or development of the property at this time.”
Begley said that in earlier discussions, the city and CRH had discussed whether all of the site would be rezoned at the same time.
“There’s just too many unknowns,” she said. “They would be coming back continually, asking for changes, and so that just didn’t seem the most prudent way to move forward.”
“And without knowing the zoning, we wouldn’t know what these departments’ cost implication is for any of this?” asked commission member Keerthi Alapati.
Begley confirmed that this is correct.
However, she also said that planning staff reached out to all department heads to find out if annexation would lead to additional capital, maintenance or infrastructure costs that are outside of what the city would typically expect.
The Columbus Fire Department expects that in the short term, CFD and its mutual aid partners should be sufficient to respond to any incidents at the site, according to the planning staff report. In the medium-term plan, assuming an agricultural use, department officials will want to ensure there is adequate water supply, proper hydrant location and a minimal number of dead-end streets.
In the long term, however, CFD expects it will need to purchase “Apparatus (1) Engine, (1) Truck, (1) Rescue Squad, and (1) Battalion Vehicle completely outfitted with all the required equipment and PPE.”
CFD officials also said that the city may want to consider an adding another firehouse and ambulance.
There will need to be 36 additional sworn firefighters to staff the new apparatus, and the department also estimates a need for nine medics/EMT’s to staff full time, 18 Medics/EMT’s to staff part time and one administrative personnel to manage the ambulance.
Columbus Police Department officials said that they do not see issues in the short or medium term, but there may be some potential concerns in the long term.
“It will depend on the number of residents and if those residents are new to our community or just transplanted from one area of the community to this area,” a department representative wrote. “I’m sure our call volume will increase in the long term for this area with the number of businesses and residences that will potentially be built. Traffic in this area will be affected as well which will increase our presence in this area. When we look at long term impact for CPD it will depend on the population of our community more than where that population resides or works.”
As with fire, parks and public works officials said that development of the property will likely result in additional staffing and equipment needs.
The parks department also said that it will need a new maintenance facility to accommodate the new equipment and supplies required to maintain new parks facilities on the site.
“Parks would be interested in looking into implementing a park impact fee for a project of this size and future developments,” department officials added. “We would look to implement the park impact fee prior to any development of this project.”
Commission members Zack Ellison and Julie Abedian recused themselves from the discussion and vote due to their respective connections with CRH. Ellison is a member of the hospital’s board of trustees, and Abedian is CRH’s executive vice president and chief community impact officer.
The plan commission’s vote to send the annexation request forward with a favorable recommendation was unanimous among the remaining members, including Dennis Baute, who previously voted against sending the City View District Plan forward to council.
At that time, he said he was not necessarily against the plan but would like to hear more public input on the concept and didn’t feel that it was ready for adoption, given questions around certain matters such as flood hazards.
During Wednesday’s meeting, Baute said that he was not against the annexation, though he still has questions about the proposal, such as the potential infrastructure costs, what will happen to CRH’s current campus and whether the residential areas are arranged appropriately.
“All of this is basically a plan,” replied CRH Vice President of Strategic Facilities Planning and Operations David Lenart. “Nothing is set in stone. … How it’s finalized is still further proposals that will come to this body. So I think at that time, that’s when the merits of those individual plans should be assessed, not at the time where we’re just talking about the concepts.”
Where to learn more
To access the City View District Plan, visit columbus.in.gov/planning/comprehensive-plans/.
An exterior view of Columbus Regional Hospital in Columbus, Ind., pictured, Tuesday, March 31, 2020. Mike Wolanin | The Republic
