Ames City Council made a final ruling on Breckenridge’s housing development proposal, discussed the new task force between Government of the Student Body and the council and approved ISU Homecoming events.

The council denied Breckenridge’s request to make the south parcel of State Avenue the position for a new low-density zone housing complex.

Breckinridge, LLC. representative Brian Torresi spoke to the council again on Tuesday about the changes made to the master plan since the August meeting when the council proposed the company make changes.

The council decided that Breckenridge would not be allowed to make the same request for development for another 12 months. The council will look at the city zoning map to make zoning in the area more specific to the geographic features of the land. 

Since the beginning of this hearing, the only party to make concessions is Breckenridge, Torresi said. The amount of bedrooms decreased from 450 to 420, at the request of the council during the prior meeting.

Many Ames residents spoke about the increase of traffic that would be a result of allowing the requested amount of dwellings to be built on State Avenue.

Sarah Cady, Ames resident, said that parking in the area is already over the maximum amount with spaces on the street at full capacity during the week and illegal parking happening on the weekends already. The company is proposing the maximum amount of dwellings and the minimum amount of parking spaces.

Hillary Kletscher, Government of the Student Body president, and Lissandra Villa, ex-officio Ames City Council liaison, talked about the creation of a task force between the council and the student body. The task force would be comprised of students appointed by Kletscher and community members appointed by Mayor Ann Campbell.

This task force would be on a trial basis for 12 months. At the end of the 12 months, the council would vote on the success of the task force and decide whether to continue with the Student Affairs Commission, which is currently in place as a communication tool between the council and GSB.

The new task force would differ from the commission by making a separate task force for different concerns, such as the bike share program.

Currently, the commission requires 15 members and has only held quorum once in the past two years. The task force would hope to make it easier to appoint to individuals and discuss issues that arise separately.

The council voted to continue moving forward with the task force, while also keeping the commission in place to be improved upon in the next 12 months.

The Student Alumni Leadership Council also came to the council to look for approval of events set for Homecoming weekend. The City Council met its proposal with concern about the fireworks permit set for midnight of Oct. 10 during mass campaniling.

Gloria Betcher, councilwoman for the first ward, stated concerns over the time of the firework show. She asked if the show could be moved to 10 p.m. due to potential noise complaints.

“We thought about doing it at a different time, but nothing would be as climactic as [mass campaniling],” said Kurt Beyer, faculty adviser for the council.

The resolution was passed with the promise that the council would look at potentially altering the event schedule for next year.