Sep 16, 2011 By Steve Ferrisheraldstandard.Com 3 min read

Healthy Start can finally move into a building it bought in Uniontown seven years ago

The city zoning hearing board (ZHB) on Thursday approved Healthy Start’s application for a special exception under a recently adopted zoning ordinance amendment that allows the agency to relocate to a home at 54 Wilson Ave., which it plans to remodel into offices.

The city planning commission recommended approval of the special exception earlier in the day.

Healthy Start, a national program that receives federal funding to provide prenatal and early childhood support to Fayette County parents, purchased the home in 2004, but hasn’t been able to open there because the city’s zoning ordinance contained no provisions for social service agencies.

In August, Uniontown city council adopted an ordinance amendment that creates two classifications of social service agencies.

Healthy Start’s special exception is for a Type A agency, which does not see clients in its office. The agency’s property on Wilson Avenue is in a medium density residential (R2) zoning district. The ordinance amendment permits Type A agencies in R2 districts with a special exception.

The agency has been operating in the county for 10 years. Its existing office is on Pittsburgh Street in North Union Township.

Healthy Start has 10 employees and the zoning ordinance requires one parking space for each employee, but the Wilson Avenue property has only five parking spaces.

Attorney Ricardo Cicconi, who represented Healthy Start, said the agency has arrangements with the New Beginning Church, Stephen E. Kezmarsky Funeral Home and St. John The Evangelist Church to allow employees to park in their lots.

Only three employees are there throughout the day, said Doug Arnold, the agency’s building and facilities manager.

All 10 start at the same time on Fridays and start at different times the rest of the week, he said.

The office will be open from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday, said Healthy Start Executive Director Cheryl Squire Flint.

State Rep. Tim Mahoney, D-South Union, and Vincent Zapotosky, chairman of the Fayette County board of commissioners, spoke in support of the special exception at the ZHB hearing.

Arnold said renovation work will start after the agency obtains an occupancy permit and the offices should be finished in about four months.

Type A agencies are permitted in local business and institutional districts without a special exception. Type B agencies, which see clients in their offices, are permitted in business-professional, local business, central business and institutional districts with a special exception.