Life Of Jason

I received this e-mail today from Tamara with Pythian Castle and it is posted here with her permission.  I thought for those interested in the situation it might provide some more information.

In response to all the people that think I have been willfully operating
unlawfully, I would like to remind them I asked for my business license in
August of 2004 long before I planned to open. My request to operate a
business here should have been a simple request handled by low level
employee. To use an existing occupiable building for uses allowed in the
current zoning in a structure designed for its use, is a decision that
should have taken no more than a week to approve.

Instead of granting us a license, they forced us to rezone to the most
expensive and complicated re zoning that exist saying our zoning did not
include all our uses. Rather than inspect the building, they converted us
to a never developed piece of land and a brand new never been occupied
structure. This required us to pay an architect to redraw an existing
building with no changes than color in the areas being used and by the
public and noting existing egresses, something they could have done in a
20 minute walk thru.

This change then required these plans to be reviewed by the director of
building and development, the highest ranking employee in building
department. Our renovations requests which entails  upgrades to the road
and parking and no structural changes to the building could have easily
been handled by lower level staff. Permits could have been authorized by
the appropriate specialist. Now, after three years of attempting to get a
license (the same time it took to build this entire building in the first
place) we are dealing with the second in command of the city's legal
department.

To waste our tax dollars on planning and zoning staff, the time of the
director of building and development and top legal staff to oversee minor
projects is an egregious waste of tax payers money. It could be equated to
having the chief of police issue parking violations.

If the people of Springfield thinks three to four years and is appropriate
time for businesses to wait for such licenses and the use of this many
city employees is acceptable to them, I have no argument. But, they should
know, businesses are not going to choose to invest their money here if it
requires four year of carrying cost with only the possibility of getting
permission. Unfortunately, since my property is not portable, I can't
simply move it to a more friendlier place. As a consequence of their
actions the city won't only lose a business it is going to lose a
historical site.

This is from a second e-mail today where we were talking about the fire codes and hydrant placement:

Just in case you did not get another response I gave on a blog regarding
our fire hydrants and accusations of us not meeting minimum fire safety
standard, I have included it below for your information.

We the owners of Pythian Castle did our first flow test on our hydrant in
June 2005. City refused to acknowledge it or the hydrant. They demanded we
put a new one in with an 8" line. We dug up the dirt to show them we have
an 8" line feeding from a 10" shutoff located on our property. All of this
could have been avoided if City of Springfield followed international fire
code which recognizes the use of private fire hydrants along as they are
flow tested annually. They city has finally adopted this standard this
year. Three years after our request for a business license.

Claims have been made we haven't met minimum fire standards. We are one of
the only buildings listed in the assessors book as fireproof construction.
Egresses from the rooms can evacuate over 500 people in less than three
minutes from doors 2' bigger than modern code. Most of our doors and
openings are 5' wide, code requires 3'. From the inception of this
building, we exceed the standards of modern codes which simply require 1
hour fire ratings. While modern code requires you have enough time to get
out of a burning building, ours was built not to burn in the first place.
Very few buildings in this city can claim the same above code standards.
This does not mean we do not have exit signs or emergency lighting. We
still live and work in a place where power goes out and people need to
exit safely. In the rare case of a fire, we have extinguishers every 75
feet (twice code) and four internal fire hoses (no longer recognized in
modern code, but they exist and work all the same).

I’m not going to comment on her letter or anything else in the situation until I see the response from the city that was promised at the City Council Meeting Monday night.  Well, other than to say this…there is a clear disconnect somewhere in this whole situation and now that it’s out in the open we need to find a way to get it resolved for everyone.   The city hasn’t shown me how having the Castle closed is good for Springfield and until I do I’m going to be on the side of finding a way to get it open.  (Now, that’s not necessarily endorsing Tamara.  I want to see what the city’s response says first.)