The historic Albany house at 506 Ferry St. S.W., should not be converted as a commercial treatment center for people trying to overcome substance abuse, the city’s planning commission has decided.
The commission was closely divided on the issue. I caught up with the panel’s Monday meeting on YouTube and could not tell who voted which way. But JoAnn Miller, chair of the planning commission, called for a roll call vote and then declared that a motion to deny the request for a conditional use permit had passed.
Pretty much all the commission members agreed that treatment for drug and alcohol abuse was needed in Albany. But some of them said the development code does not allow the conversion of this house to provide a “community service” by a for-profit business…