Votes varied for four land use variances recently presented to the Seymour Plan Commission.

The board members voted 10-0 for Clayton Henderson to run a small detailing shop out of his garage at 207 N. Fourth Street Road, 9-1 for Kevin Burke to convert a home at 714 W. Fifth St. into an Airbnb and 6-4 for Gordon and Kathy Simler to run a kennel out of their home at 436 Persimmon Drive.

All three move on to the Seymour Board of Zoning Appeals with a favorable recommendation.

The only one to receive an unfavorable recommendation was Jigar Patel requesting to have two residential structures on one lot at 207 E. 13th St. That request was denied 10-0, but the BZA will have the final say on that one, too, during its meeting at 7 p.m. March 28 in the council chambers at Seymour City Hall.

Gary Colglazier was absent for Thursday’s plan commission meeting.

Following a discussion about the Simlers’ request, plan commission President Jeri Wells announced the vote tally as 5-5, which would move to the BZA with an unfavorable recommendation.

When the votes were reviewed the next day, however, it was determined there was a miscount. Six plan commission members had voted in favor of the petition, while four — Rick Schleibaum, Don Bruce, Bret Cunningham and Dave Eggers — voted against it.

The land use variance request came after the city’s animal control officer was called to the home on a complaint, and he told the Simlers they needed to apply for a kennel license because they had more than four animals. According to the city’s ordinance, a facility in which four or more dogs or other domesticated animals more than six months of age are housed, groomed, bred, boarded, trained or sold must have a kennel license.

When this was brought to the attention of the city’s planning and zoning department, it was determined they also would have to apply for a land use variance to board animals.

The variance and the license would put them in compliance, said Jeremy Gray, the city’s building commissioner.

During the recent meeting, the Simlers said they have 22 cats and four dogs in their home. Kathy said all of the cats have been spayed or neutered, are declawed and stay inside the home, and they have a 5-foot fence around their yard so the dogs can’t get out and the dogs wear bark collars.

For years, Gordon said they had a dog or two. Then they brought in a cat and then another one.

“Just little by little, we accumulated cats,” he said, noting most of them are rescues. “We decided that that’s their forever home. We just kept trying to find somewhere else for them to go, and the next thing you know, we had a number of them.”

When Wells asked if anyone was there to speak in favor of or against the request, neighbors Brandon Cole and T.J. Black spoke in favor. Both said the Simlers are great neighbors.

“I didn’t even know they had any cats,” Cole said. “We knew that they had some small dogs, never had an issue out of them ever. We were surprised that we heard about this.”

Cole said the only concern he has is if the land use variance would go with the property or the property owners, and Gray said it would go with the Simlers if it’s approved.

Cole said there are people in the neighborhood who have dogs outside that bark constantly and have an unkempt yard, but the Simlers have “one of the best yards in the area.”

Black said he didn’t know the Simlers had 22 cats until he received a letter from the city about the land use variance request. He said one person in the neighborhood doesn’t have a doghouse for their dog, and another dog jumps a fence and bites people, but he doesn’t have any problems with the Simlers’ pets.

“These guys are amazing neighbors,” Black said.

Plan commission member Susie Bowman asked if the board was approving a kennel license, could the Simlers expand the number of animals they have, but Kathy said they don’t want any more animals.

Gray said if the variance is approved, the Simlers’ home would be open to inspection by the animal control officer before a kennel license could be issued, and an inspection would occur once a year.

Kathy said their home is kept clean, to which Cunningham said it would have been nice to see the animal control officer’s report showing the findings of his inspection of the home.

“To be compliant with the city, this was the avenue that was suggested. We were just trying to find a remedy for their situation because it’s kind of unique,” Gray said.

“It is, and a lot of these situations turn out really bad, though, because pets live a long time, too,” Cunningham said. “That’s how you’ve ended up with many of your pets because people couldn’t take care of them anymore, so we always have to have that fear where what if we have to rehome 26 animals because something happens with you.”

Gordon said they have someone to take the animals if something was to happen to him and his wife.

“What our concern is, if we don’t get approved, we’re going to have to sell our house we’ve been in 39 years and have to find something out in the country,” Kathy said.

“They’ve obviously taken these cats in and they are now family. It would break my heart to see them have to move out in the country,” commission member Bernie Hauersperger said. “The only way I would vote for it, though, is if you said that they would not get any more cats and these would attrition down.”

He then made a motion to approve the request, which was seconded by Darren Richey and voted on. Then the next day, it was determined to advance 6-4 with a favorable recommendation.

With the Patel request, he said he wanted to turn an existing building on the property into an apartment. The nearly 1,000-square-foot space would have one bedroom and one bathroom, and he thought two cars could fit in the garage and the property could be accessed with the driveway and the alley in back.

Schleibaum said he had issues with two different units on one lot, in particular with access. Eggers agreed.

“That alley is very narrow, and it actually goes up and Ts. It splits two different ways versus normal alley access,” Eggers said. “I looked all over that garage. You’re going to get a couple mopeds in that thing. It’s not big enough for two full big cars. Little small ones maybe, I don’t know. You’ve got no room. There’s a lot of stuff happening in that area. This is notoriously something that we just don’t approve normally unless there are very special circumstances.”

Eggers said it would be “a mess” for emergency personnel to access the property, and an address would have to be established for the second location but would be hard to find.

“It causes lots of repercussion problems in the community is what I’m saying,” Eggers said. “I can’t endorse that myself because of those reasons, to be honest with you.”

Bruce made a motion to deny the request, Eggers seconded and the vote was 10-0 against the petition, and it moves to the BZA for the final say.