Neosho City Councilmembers heard more feedback from their constituents Tuesday night during a public hearing on proposed zoning changes to be written in Chapter 405 of city code.

Planning and Zoning Board chairman Jay Holweger kicked the hearing off by outlining changes his group would like to see before the ordinance is voted on by the council. That vote, on first reading, will likely take place in two weeks on Dec. 2.

If the new rules were passed, only one home occupation would be allowed. One of things Holweger suggested was that a registration system be implemented, wherein primary home-based businesses would still require a permit while income-generating “hobbies” would only need to be registered as such at city hall.

Mayor Howard Birdsong said it was important to differentiate between the two, though both may generate income.

“A home occupation is a primary source of income, a hobby is something that would go to craft shows or sold to the neighbors like woodwork, or quilts, or scrapbooks or things like that,”
Birdsong said. “Hobbies are more recreational in nature although there may be some income.”

Holweger said he would define a home occupation as something that should be declared to the IRS.

City planner Kim Messer said people would be required to fill out a questionnaire to determine if their “home occupation” would need a special use permit or just simply be registered.

Holweger noted that if an activity is something people may complain about, such as if it generates more traffic, it would require a permit.

“Registration would be for a business that doesn’t modify the neighborhood at all,” he said.

The question popped up of why someone should register their “hobby” at all, even though it may make money here and there. Birdsong said it was just a matter of trusting people to do so, though he admitted he didn’t like the feel of government intrusiveness. He later agreed that not registering a “hobby” isn’t something that would probably be a big issue anyway, unless there were complaints.

Resident James Smallwood said he makes scrollsaw cut-outs of which he maybe sells eight a year. He asked if that’s something he would have to register.

Birdsong said no.

“We don’t want to be in the business of regulating that kind of recreational activity any more than we do scrap-booking or Tupperware,” he said. “We’ve got more important things to do…whenever we do enforcement, there has got to be a good measure of common sense and compassion and not to intrude on people’s lives any more than is necessary.” 

Doug Skaggs, a resident who said he liked Neosho just the way it is, asked about people who have been doing business for “30 or 40 years” out of their home. He said he knows someone who has been doing car repairs for that long at his residence and wondered if he would have to stop now, since auto repair would be prohibited as a home-based business under the new rules.

“I can’t go up to anybody who has been doing something for 30 or 40 years and tell them all the sudden that what they’re doing is wrong,” Birdsong said. “Whatever we put on paper needs to be enforceable. And if it’s on paper it needs to be well-considered and have some reasonableness to it. It doesn’t make any sense to put words on a paper in black and white and then just go out and do whatever it says. There has to be some thought and common sense behind it.”

Citizen Linda Shields wanted to know why if she held more than one garage sale a month it would be designated a home-occupation, as written in the new rules being considered. 

Councilman Jeff Werneke said it’s because some people, not necessarily in Neosho, have “30-day garage sales” wherein they’re constantly bringing in items to sell on a more or less daily basis.

City Manager Jan Blase said exceptions would be made, such as if a person had to continue a garage sale the next weekend due to rain, and that the rule was for people who actually hold sales as an extra source of income.

Werneke later suggested changing the wording where not more than 12 garage sales could be held in an entire year.

“If you get beyond that, you’re essentially setting up shop in a garage or a yard where you’re going to have increased traffic that comes in and out all the time — it’s a business at a home location,” he said.

Richard Davidson, who owns Marco Group Inc., questioned the clause about the bottom strand of barbed or razor wire fencing in commercial areas not being lower than seven feet from the ground. He said he measured fencing around several industries intown and found that not one of them would be in compliance. Though current fencing would be grandfathered in anyway, Davidson wondered if that would still apply should he have to rebuild a section of his present fence.

Don Gambill, of La-Z-Boy Midwest, wanted to know the same thing as he said the company planned to add about 150 feet of new fence.

Birdsong suggested that he speak with city staff for more clarification and direction.

Messer, city planner, said the seven foot off the ground provision was simply a safety issue.
Gambill said that anyone who gets hurt near La-Z-Boy’s fence either must have a reason for being there, in which case La-Z-Boy is liable if it’s an employee or contractor, or they’re somewhere they don’t belong anyway.

“Call me old-fashioned, but if they’re somewhere they don’t belong and they get hurt, that’s their problem,” Gambill said.

Gary Miller, a trustee at Fellowship Baptist Church in Neosho, took issue with a provision in the proposed zoning changes wherein churches could only have one ground sign up to 50 square feet in size, of which only 16 square foot could be used as changeable copy (letters). He said his church, which overlooks U.S. Highway 60, needed more space for big letters so drivers could read it.

“I think the council should think long and hard about the sign changes — it almost intrudes upon freedom of speech,” Miller said. “When you limit a church to 16 square feet (for its letters) and you can drive down the boulevard and there’s a huge billboard for the gambling casinos, it seems to me like we’re getting the short end of the stick…

“We’re not a big city. We’re not Branson, we’re not Joplin, we’re not Springfield. We’re Neosho.
We’re a hometown people.”

Janet Penn, who also serves on the planning and zoning board, said the city should lead by example and not exempt itself of the new zoning regulations, as stated in the ordinance.

“As my grandmother would have said, ‘what’s good for the gander is good for the goose,’” Penn stated.

Blase explained that the city would be exempt because it incorporates a varied amount of land and property uses all over town that don’t necessarily fit into one zoning district or another.

Birdsong said that should the new zoning regulations be passed, as the case with any ordinance, city employees would have to use discretion when enforcing them.

“They have to exercise their authority with reasonableness and compassion, not with a hammer and not with a shotgun,” he said.

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To view the proposed changes to Chapter 405, go to the city’s website, www.neoshomo.org. Click on the PDF document that states it was last modified Nov. 4.