Blaine City Council considers expanding restaurant zoning

Blaine City Council will consider approving a zoning change at its January 8 meeting that would allow restaurants along Peace Portal Drive south of the central business district.

The residential office zoning district roughly runs west of the Salishan neighborhood to Albert Street, extending a few blocks east of Peace Portal Drive. Lizzie’s Café and Ocean Bay Chinese Restaurant, which both closed in spring 2020, had grandfathered rights that allowed them to operate before zoning laws changed in the ’90s.

“Because restaurants are not a permitted use, once they close for 90 days, they are not allowed to reopen,” said Alex Wenger, director of the Community Development Services Department. “We have a number of buildings in this district with commercial kitchens in them that can no longer be used as restaurants.”

Mandeep Sran and Shamsher Sran applied for the zoning text amendment in August so they could open a restaurant at the location of Lizzie’s Café, at 1700 Peace Portal Drive. If council approves the zoning change, the restaurant would likely serve a new menu, Mandeep Sran said.

The city of Blaine’s comprehensive plan designates the residential office district as a commercial district and supports commercial land use along major roads.

The only operating businesses within the district are Anchor Inn Motel, Bayside Motor Inn and Foreign Auto Clinic.

Blaine Planning Commission unanimously approved recommending city council approve the zoning amendment during its November 9 meeting. Planning commission had wanted city staff to research whether the city could prohibit restaurant chains from the district, but ultimately decided to approve the recommendation without the clause, Wenger said.

Wenger told councilmembers it was unlikely someone would want to put a restaurant in a historic home because the process would be challenging and expensive. Councilmember Richard May said he wanted to exclude certain blocks with historic homes in the district, while councilmember Garth Baldwin said he wanted council to consider a caveat that would preserve historic homes.

“Sometimes developers will come in and bulldoze down a bunch of nice historic homes because it pencils out very well,” May said. 

After council unanimously decided to consider the text amendment during their upcoming January 8 meeting, city manager Mike Harmon said there may be procedural issues with the text amendment if council decides to exclude historic homes from the current district.