A call-your-bluff showdown about RV housing developed Thursday between Countryside Hills Mobile Home Park and city government.

Friday, August 13, 1999

A call-your-bluff showdown about RV housing developed Thursday between Countryside Hills Mobile Home Park and city government.

About 35 pipeline workers are expecting to park their RVs at the park when they arrive in Albert Lea Sunday. Countryside plans to allow them into the park, said Colleen Ardnt, Countryside manager.

&uot;They have to be in here Sunday and the city is dragging their feet,&uot; she said adding that four pipeline RVs are currently parked at the Albert Lea park.

Many will also bring their families and are among hundreds of pipeline workers who will spend the next several months in the area building a natural gas pipeline through Freeborn County.

But if the RVs are allowed into the park, Countryside could potentially violate a city ordinance that prohibits RV parking in a manufactured home park.

Countryside has asked the City Council to wave that ordinance, but it the council did wave enforcement and was challenged, it would would lose the suit, said City Manager Paul Sparks.

&uot;I don’t think there is anybody who doesn’t realize they need a place to stay,&uot; said Councilor Al Brooks. &uot;But we still have to meet the city ordinance. I feel bad for the people, but if they were asked to leave, they would have to leave.&uot;

The park is also considered nonconforming because it doesn’t provide a storm shelter, has commercial uses on site and doesn’t include required landscape buffers.

The city can’t allow the expansion of nonconforming zoning, said City Planner Bob Graham, adding that the purpose of nonconforming zoning is to bring it into compliance.

&uot;I’m sorry I don’t have a solution for the problem,&uot; Graham said. &uot;Certainly, I feel for these people like everyone else.&uot;

At the direction of the City Council, the planning commission was asked to research a possible amendment to the ordinance to allow RV parking at manufactured home parks.

But because of the zoning snafu, the planning commission recommended that the city’s board of appeals consider modifying the nonconforming clause to allow the RVs.

This process could take another six weeks, Graham said.

In the meantime, Ardnt said Countryside has applied to the state for a RV license. While Countryside is considered nonconforming by city ordinance, it’s currently licensed by the state as a manufactured home park.

But state licenses do not override city codes.

&uot;They (city government) are completely slamming Countryside and taking away all of our dignity,&uot; Arndt said of the situation.

Arndt questioned Sparks’ comments.

&uot;They think a mobile home owner owner will sue them?&uot; she asked.

Owned by Alliance Pipeline, the pipeline will extend from Canada to Illinois and cross seven Minnesota counties. Construction in Freeborn County is expected to take two seasons.