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2704 County Road 10 Variance Report March 18, 2015 Page 2 b. The variance is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan. While the Comprehensive Plan does not specify signage criteria for businesses, it does support improvements to, and the success of the City’s businesses. The installation of more signage is typically helpful to the success of a business. The Comprehensive Plan does focus on improvements to the County Road 10 corridor, and taller signs is not one of the things the City feels is visually appealing. c. The applicant proposes to use the property in a reasonable manner not permitted by this Title or the City Code. The applicant is asking for the additional ground signage in order for the business to be more visible to potential customers, and to help new customers find his location. d. Unique circumstances apply to the property which do not apply to other properties in the same zone or vicinity and result from lot size or shape, topography or other circumstances over which the owner of the property since the enactment of this Title has had no control. The unique circumstances do not result from the actions of the applicant. The somewhat unique circumstance of this building is that it looks like a residential property rather than a business, so the tenants rely on the ground sign to attract and direct customers to their location. The building was originally constructed and used by a home builder for their office. It was not built by the applicant. e. The variance does not alter the essential character of the neighborhood. A 4-foot height expansion may not alter the character of the neighborhood since it is entirely a commercial area along the County Road 10 corridor where every business has a ground sign of varying heights. The adjacent business has a 6 foot tall monument style sign and the other side of the subject property is a wooded area. f. The variance requested is the minimum variance which would alleviate the practical difficulties. Economic conditions alone do not constitute practical difficulties. The applicant feels that a 4.5-foot variance is the minimum variance needed to meet his business signage needs. There is another option to expand the sign square footage that doesn’t require a variance, but it’s much more expensive to make the sign wider rather than taller. g. The Planning Commission may impose such conditions upon the premises benefited by a variance as may be necessary to comply with the standards established by this Title or to reduce or minimize the effect of such variance upon other properties in the neighborhood, and to better carry out the intent of the variance. The condition must be directly related to and must bear a rough proportionality to the impact created by the variance. Staff does not have any suggested conditions.