By Scott Sullivan
Editor
David Barker’s proposed 90-unit Forest Gate Condominiums on 16 acres at 485 Ferry St. north of Northern Lights Condominiums will be up for a Douglas Planning Commission public hearing Thursday, Feb. 9, starting in city hall at 7 p.m.
Williams & Works planner/zoning administrator Tricia Anderson advised city manager Rich LaBombard that Barker’s plan, first discussed by the commission Sept. 21, 2022, had been revised to 45 duplexes, not 5-unit family townhomes, but remained incomplete.
Notably lacking, she said, were a site plan showing property dimensions, legal descriptions, revised master deed, detailed easements; lighting, sewer and utility line locations, written project narrative and more.
Though Anderson noted the site plan review committee might be a more fitting venue at this point in the project’s progress than the planning commission, “to expedite the process,” she wrote Jan. 26, “I opted to simply allow the applicant to resubmit.
Her memo noted reviewing Dec. 28 and Jan. 26 revised and re-revised applications and offered comments synopsized above plus more.
“The commission should take the opportunity to hold the public hearing and listen carefully to the public’s, fellow planning commissioners’ and applicant’s comments,” Anderson went advising, advising no further P.C. action Thursday.
“The public hearing can be adjourned, if needed, to re-open it at a future meeting,” she.said.
Barker controls 50.34 acres west of the now-demolished former Haworth plant on long-ago MiRo Golf Course land and said last fall he hoped to start building as soon as spring 2023.
As proposed it would be by rights in the city’s R-5 Multiple Residential zone with sidewalks and two roads connecting to Ferry plus another south to Wiley Road.
Baker appeared at planners’ equinox session amid news he’d been charged in Allegan County District Court on one charge of false pretenses-$100,000 or more and two separate charges of larceny-$20,000 or more.
Both stemmed from a March 28 incident involving complainants Leland Curtis and Philip Palley, records show. Barker was released on a $5,000 cash bond and said afterwards allegations resulted from a Pier Cove contract matter involving his coastal-armoring Argent Management “based on incorrect information.
“The correct information is another contractor blocked access to that project,” Barker said. The case has since then been dropped.
Barker in early 2019 signed a memorandum of understanding with then-city manager Bill LeFevere to explore developing the now-leveled former Haworth 7.1l-acre site at 200 Blue Star Hwy., land he controls north and west of it, plus 16.84 city-owned acres southwest of and contiguous to the other two lots fronting Wiley Road. That total 75-acre mixed-use proposal remains at this point conceptual.
He was also an agent in Douglas’s Summer Grove Condominiums development, plus in Saugatuck brokering the $10-million sale in 2014 of the former Presbyterian Camps’ 130 acres south of Saugatuck’s Oval Beach to Dune Ridge, LLC.