From the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel:
Opponents of developer Bob Lang's proposed $200 million "lifestyle center" at I-94 and Highway C were shocked Monday night when Mayor Phil Schuman told them that the city had rejected the plans.
Schuman's comments at the Common Council meeting were the first time the word "rejected" was used when referring to Lang's proposal for an open-air shopping center, offices and upscale housing on 87 acres at the southeast corner of I-94 and Highway C.
"We were stunned," Gerry Holton said in an interview outside the meeting. Holton is the spokesman for the group Conserving a Rural Environment for Lake Country, or CARE, which is opposed to Lang's proposal.
The group presented a petition Monday night signed by 2,193 people who object to the Lang proposal. The group says the development would harm the quality of life and Delafield's rural atmosphere.
Schuman told those attending the council meeting that Lang and his partner, Lauth Property Group of Indianapolis, were told at the June Plan Commission meeting when the proposal was unveiled to the public for the first time that the "project was too large for existing" zoning.
"Basically, we rejected it," Schuman said.
People attending Monday night's meeting said that wasn't their impression of the Plan Commission meeting, which they also attended.
"I still remember the night the development was proposed to the Planning Commission. Why wasn't it rejected then?" resident Julie Duwe, who opposes the development, asked the council.
And, Rob Gerbitz, chief operating officer for Lang Investments, said in a phone interview later Monday night that it wasn't his impression that the Plan Commission rejected the development proposal in June. But he also said the June meeting was a conceptual presentation and that the Plan Commission also didn't "approve" the plans, either.
City officials said they now are waiting for Lang and Lauth to come back with a revised plan or to request a zoning change. The developers also have not yet submitted studies the city requested on the project's economic impact and how it would affect traffic and the environment.
A Plan Commission public hearing on the proposal will be scheduled when Lang and Lauth submit the required materials, city officials said.
The CARE petition, meanwhile, calls on the council and city Plan Commission to restrict development of the area at I-94 and Highway C to those uses allowed under current zoning classifications. The land is zoned B-5 Office and Research and A-1 Agricultural and Residential Holding District.
Delafield doesn't have a zoning category that would allow Lang's multiuse development, and without a zoning change his project can't proceed.
Lang and his partner, Lauth Property Group of Indianapolis, have proposed a complex that would include upscale stores, restaurants, offices, residential units, a 150-room hotel, a performing arts theater and a comedy club. The plan calls for 870,750 square feet of retail; 181,000 square feet of offices, including one office building of 99,000 square feet; and 385 residential units.
In its petition, the CARE group says it opposes "intense development that will adversely impact the environment, tax sewer and water infrastructure, increase traffic congestion and disturb the quality of life we currently enjoy."
The development would be near Lapham Peak State Park.
CARE, which calls itself a grassroots citizen group, said Monday it will not drop its request for a citywide non-binding referendum on the Lang-Lauth development proposal. The developers and Schuman oppose that.
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