Council approves special exception with stipulations

At Tuesday’s Perry City Council meeting, a vote was taken concerning a special exception application, asking for the business to be allowed to engage in window tinting, and automobile washing and detailing on the premises of 626 General Courtney Hodges Blvd. The business located at this address is H Town Detail Shop. Owner Dexter Davis said that the business to be conducted includes window tinting, auto detailing, and car washing. Davis also said that he offers a mobile service that will constitute most of the car washing. The application was tabled at the December 17 meeting until Tuesday.

During the pre-council meeting, which is open to the public, council raised concerns with the application regarding storm water

regulations. Bryan Wood, director of community planning, explained that there are regulations that any business has to adhere to regarding storm water. “In addition to storing a certain amount of water on your site, you essentially have to clean that water before it discharges.” said Wood, citing as well the chemicals used in detergents to wash the cars, and oils and liquids that leak from cars in parking lots. In the pre-council meeting, there was discussion of solutions to enforcing these regulations, which were provided via a memorandum from Chad McMurrian, engineering services manager. Wood explained that these include, washing the cars on an approved covered area with a drain connected to the sanitary sewer system, likely requiring a sedimentation trap. Also included in the memorandum was washing cars off site in an approved area, washing vehicle on a grassy area, or putting a filtering system on the storm water system. Wood said these options were also communicated to Davis through McMurrian.

During the public pre-council meeting, the proposed solutions and options were discussed to amend this issue, with the focus being the approved covered area with drain to sewer system. Wood stated that the planning commission recommendation was to approve the application, while the planning staff recommended denying it. City manager, Lee Gilmour said that the repercussions to not adhering to the regulations would be the loss of Davis’ business license, the water to the location would be shut off, and legal action would be taken against Davis.

Davis was in attendance for the regular council meeting. Wood briefed council on the application during the regular meeting and informed that there was the potential for environmental issues relating to storm water and further explained that there were four options to address the concerns, pointing to the memo McMurrian presented in the pre-council meeting outlining those solutions. “Chad McMurrian has met with Mr. Davis to address those and look at options of how to acquire that.” Wood said.

Councilwoman Phyllis Bynum-Grace motioned to approve the request as written. The application was approved by a vote of 4-2, with councilwoman Joy Peterson and councilman Robert Jones voting against it.

Davis explained that his understanding is that if he has an area with grass it should be okay because the water will soak into the soil, and that it was also alright to take the cars off site to wash them. “I really don’t know everything in detail,” Davis explained, “Because they didn’t just tell me everything, what I needed to do.” Davis informed he plans to follow through with this requirement.

Wood said that washing the cars on grass might be a short-term solution, “depending on the number of cars he is going to be washing on that site, it may not be adequate for the long term.” Wood further explained that the property already has a grease trap on site from what looks like previous restaurant used, which with modifications could be used to address the storm water issue. “We’ll be talking to him [Davis] further about, if that’s the option he would like to take, how that might be addressed to come into compliance.”