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Mercy seeking to expand Edgerton medical center

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EDGERTON — Mercy Health System will ask the Edgerton Zoning Board of Appeals at a public hearing Wednesday to OK several zoning variances in a plan that would more than double the Mercy Edgerton Medical Center.

The hearing is the first step toward Mercy clearing a plan with the city to increase the size of its health clinic at 217 N. Main St., Edgerton, from 4,100 square feet to 8,300 square feet.

The company seeks approval for a building addition on the west side of the existing clinic, facing Main Street.

The expansion plan requires variances because it would make the clinic nearly twice the size allowable under city zoning. Plus, the clinic expansion would encroach on setbacks along streets in several places and partially obstruct a line of sight at the corner of Main and Broadway streets, officials said.

City Administrator Ramona Flanigan said some walls at the existing clinic already are close enough to the street that they fail to conform to city setback requirements. Mercy is asking the city to allow the building addition to match up to those old, nonconforming walls.

"Otherwise, walls would have to have jogs in them," Flanigan said.

Under proposed site plans, Mercy also could opt to move parking from along Main Street to the southeast side of the clinic lot, creating a paved parking area that would border on a residential property.

Flanigan said Mercy doesn't need a variance to put a parking lot next to a residence. She said the neighborhood is zoned for commercial use.

Tony Prestil, chairman of the city's zoning board of appeals, said that in recent years the city has gotten a spate of zoning variance requests from owners whose plans for building improvements tangle with setback requirements and other zoning rules.

Most of the properties, Prestil said, have been in the city's historic districts, where many buildings already fail to comply with zoning laws or are situated on lots in ways that make expansions or additions difficult.

"You can only do so much with a certain building or lot," Prestil said.

Flanigan described the lot where Mercy plans its clinic expansion as having a "bizarre," unwieldy shape.

If the zoning board approves Mercy's requests, site plans for the clinic still would face approval by the city's planning commission and the city council.

Flanigan and Prestil said the city has yet to receive public feedback on Mercy's plans for expansion.

Prestil said the zoning board likely would vote on Mercy's variance requests on Wednesday. He said it's possible the board would attach conditions on some of the requests.

"We'll ask questions and clarifications from Mercy and make sure everyone there gets a chance to talk first. It's not going to be a rubber stamp," he said.