Increasing revenue to Mt. Lebanon with zoning changes

Hi Everyone,

I meant to post this a couple weeks ago; however, I got delayed in doing so.

The 2009 budget is going to be challenging. There have been significant increases in costs for some areas (like garbage collection, insurance premiums, etc). We are still faced with the uncertainty of tax income due to the current economic environment. While we need to look at costs and efficiencies for immediate impact, we need to focus on increasing revenue in the long term. I want to share with you a large revenue impact issue I believe we need to address.

Mt. Lebanon’s Economic Development Council (EDC) Task Force that I initiated about a year ago has been focusing on brainstorming and acting on different approaches/initiatives to improve the economy of the business districts. One item that surfaced from these brainstorming/discussion sessions is the issue of zoning that, if addressed properly, could bring significant revenue to the Municipality.

A building like the Washington Park Condos could generate about $500K annually to the Municipality in terms of real estate taxes (both annual and one time transfer fees) and earned income taxes. It seems to me that if we had 10 such buildings in our business districts then Mt. Lebanon would have $5M in additional revenues annually.

I understand that our current zoning ordinances have restrictions that are not conducive for (re) development. To illustrate, the current zoning requires any new building to have a setback in front and/or back of the property. I do not understand why it is alright for the Municipal building to abut the sidewalk while any new construction is not permitted to do so. In addition there are zoning restrictions with lot coverage and parking that may be too restrictive. I know that Mt. Lebanon is a residential neighborhood; however, we are talking just about the business districts.

I am told that the current zoning is to prevent “big box” type of development; however, we can not have our zoning restrictions preclude development of office and residential buildings in our business districts. At the last Commission meeting the Commission directed the Planning Board to look into the same and make recommendations on changes to proactively attract (re)development of large office and residential buildings in our business districts. I am looking forward to the recommendations of the Planning Board in this regard since the impact of this can be very significant.

As always, your feedback is much appreciated. Thanks.

Raja