St. Cloud Board to Weigh Solar Panels at Youth Shelter, New Special Education School

(KNSI) – A St. Cloud youth homeless shelter wants to add solar panels, and a regional special education district wants to turn a former medical building into a school.

Both requests go before the St. Cloud Zoning Board of Appeals for public hearings at 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday at St. Cloud City Hall.

Minneapolis-based 180 Degrees Inc. is asking for permission to install a ground-mounted solar array at its youth shelter at 1101 and 1111 Washington Memorial Drive, along the Mississippi River Trail.

The catch is a city rule limiting properties like this one to two detached accessory structures. The site already has two detached garages, and under city code, the solar array counts as a third.

In its application, 180 Degrees argues the array isn’t really a building and shouldn’t be treated like one. The organization also says tearing down one of the garages to make room would cost too much to make sense.

The 2.83-acre lot is much larger than the roughly 6,000-square-foot home lots nearby, and city staff point to its size and triangle shape as making it unique. Even with the solar panels, the garages and array would cover less than 3% of the property.

City staff recommends approval, with one key condition. The trees and shrubs along the east and west edges of the property must stay in place to block the view of the panels. If they’re removed, the owner would have to put up a six-foot fence.

The second hearing is about a new home for special education programs. The Benton-Stearns Education District wants to move into the former medical office building at 1520 Northway Drive, which is owned by CentraCare and first opened in 1978 as the Woman and Children’s Medical Clinic. Calvin Ryan Comstock of Inventure Capital filed the request on the district’s behalf.

The education district provides special education services for the Foley, Holdingford, Kimball, ROCORI, Sartell and Sauk Rapids-Rice school districts. The new school would house its most intensive programs, serving students with autism, emotional and behavioral disorders, and developmental cognitive disabilities who need more support than their home school can provide. Students go back to their home schools once they’re ready.

Right now, those programs are spread across several buildings that the district says no longer meet its needs. The application says the search for a single, central location has gone on for about two years.

The district currently serves 58 students in those programs, and the school could hold up to about 100 at a time. City staff recommends a cap of 110 students. About 40 teachers, therapists and support staff would work there.

Six to eight buses would drop off and pick up students during the busiest times. The buses would pull right up to the west side of the building, so students wouldn’t have to cross the parking lot. Plans also call for fenced outdoor play areas on the east side of the building, including a playground for younger kids and a basketball area for older students.

The school would run from 7:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on weekdays.

Because the education district can’t own property, an ownership group would buy and renovate the building and lease it to the district. City staff recommends approval, saying the building has more than enough parking and Northway Drive can handle the added traffic. The state would still have to sign off on the building plans.

Both hearings are open to the public, and residents can share their two cents with the board before it votes.

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