A Seymour couple had a dream of opening a commissary kitchen near their home to prepare and deliver Filipino food to a local industry.

From there, they hoped to expand to other industries and set up at local festivals and events.

If that was a success, they wanted to obtain a food truck. Then the long-term goal was to open a storefront.

Ridge and Leona Pearl had posted on Facebook about making food at their home at 730 W. Eighth St. to sell and deliver, and that was reported to Seymour City Hall and the Jackson County Health Department.

The Pearls were unaware a land use variance was needed, and they learned if they applied for that and received it, they could apply for a permit with the health department to legally operate out of a commissary kitchen in a shed near their home.

A business operating in a residentially zoned area sparked concern among neighbors in the Crestview neighborhood, and they shared those concerns during the Seymour Plan Commission meeting July 13 and the Seymour Board of Zoning Appeals meeting Tuesday.

The commission voted 8-1 to deny the land use variance with Angie Klakamp casting the only vote in favor of the request. Susie Bowman and Bernie Hauersperger were absent.

The BZA voted 4-0 to deny the request with Karen Munson absent.

Before the BZA voted, President Rob Kaufman asked board member Dave Eggers about the plan commission’s discussion that led to an unfavorable recommendation because Eggers serves on that board, too. Eggers said the general consensus revolved around concerns about a business being in a residential area and it’s hard to put limitations on a variance to hold it to a certain level.

“I’m the first one not to want to deny free enterprise,” said Eggers, who owns a small business in Seymour. “But with that being said, free enterprise has its free enterprise areas. I understand hesitance on opening a store or business.”

Similar concerns were discussed during the BZA meeting.

“I don’t feel as though that we can sit up here and look into the future and see how much traffic is going to be increased or decreased or anybody’s property values (impacted) by this. It’s obvious by the turnout this is not something that’s looked at favorably by neighbors and/or the city plan commission,” Kaufman said.

Skylar Earley then made a motion to deny the request, Eggers seconded and that passed.

During both meetings, Ridge opened by explaining how he and his wife planned to start their business small by delivering to Valeo, where he worked for 10 years and she has worked for 11 years.

“There’s a high concentration of Filipino people within Valeo, so we’ve had a lot of interest through various parties and stuff where a lot of neighbors local and far away have come and sampled the food, and it has always been highly received, so that inspired us to try to see what we could do to start a small catering business,” Ridge said, noting they have lived in Seymour since 2012 and in Crestview since 2019.

He emphasized this would be delivery only by one of them in a vehicle, so there would be no increased traffic in the neighborhood.

Still, neighbors expressed concerns about more traffic.

Tim Hardin, who lives three houses down, said in recent months, there have been cars parked in front of the Pearls’ home, which is at the entrance to Crestview, and that has caused traffic to be blocked. Ridge said no vehicles have parked on the street, and the ones that have been at the home are owned by family members coming there for birthdays and holiday gatherings and are parked in an organized manner.

Bob and Mary Lou Shollenberger, who live across the street, both expressed concern about a business being in a residential area.

“I do object strongly to a business being across the street,” Mary Lou said. “Our plat and deed says we are a single-family residence. I want it to stay that way.”

Hardin said allowing someone to sell food out of their home isn’t a good thing for the city.

“We have residential area zoning for a reason, and we have commercial for a reason, and it’s not to run businesses in all of the neighborhoods. Once we approve something like this, you all are going to get bombarded with more requests, and we’re going to have issues all over town,” he said.

“As a homeowner and a citizen of Seymour, I think that we should keep residential residential, and if they want to start these types of businesses and things, they need to go get a storefront or get a different property to operate out of and not continue infiltrating throughout our neighborhoods throughout town,” he said. “We need to keep them separated.”

Alan Winslow, who lives on nearby Holly Drive, said the Crestview area of Seymour made him and his wife “fall in love with this town” when they moved here 36 years ago. If the variance was approved, he said it would have a beginning impact on the character of the neighborhood.

“As far as I know, there are no businesses in Crestview. We are single-family homes, and I don’t want the character of that neighborhood changed from that,” he said. “You start with a small business like this, who knows what the next step would be? If you have one business, what’s next?”

Kelly Pifer, the city’s ordinance administrator, told the plan commission he and the health department were notified of what was going on at the Pearls’ home, and they were told to cease operations for food safety concerns and to apply for a land use variance. No citations were written, he said.

“I know they say ‘Ignorance is bliss,’ but in this instance, it wasn’t, so we were unaware of the regulations that surrounded that,” Ridge said. “After we were made aware, we made all efforts to try to go about it the right way.”

Ridge said he and his wife decided to start small because it would be a large financial investment to go straight to a storefront without knowing if it would be a success or not.

“If we don’t allow people of different cultures and just people in general to take these small steps toward being large business owners, I don’t think we would have any small business owners in Seymour,” he said. “It would all be major food (establishments). You would never have those smaller businesses. Everybody has got to start somewhere, but first step, I think, is a small commissary kitchen only doing some catering.”

Building Commissioner Jeremy Gray told the plan commission the Pearls followed proper protocol based on what the city and health department told them.

Still, Don Bruce made a motion to deny the land use variance, Eggers seconded and that passed.

Then it was up to the BZA to make the final decision Tuesday night.

Bob Shollenberger, Hardin and Dave Swaney all spoke against the request, and Gray noted the BZA had received a letter from Seymour City Council President Dave Earley stating he had four residents speak in opposition.

Then the BZA denied the request.