Patton Township’s Board of Supervisors on Wednesday gave final approval to a rezoning request that will allow the planning process for a proposed affordable senior housing apartment complex to move forward.
Supervisors unanimously approved the rezoning of 160 W. Clearview Ave. from R-2 low density residential to R-3 medium density residential. Developer HFL Corporation of State College next will need to submit a land development plan for approval before the project can commence.
The board previously voted in September to advance the request to the Centre Regional Planning Commission for review, which authorized then-Centre Regional Planning Agency Director Jim May to provide comment. May found the request to be “in conformance with the Centre Region Comprehensive Plan, good planning practices and the proposed project meets affordable housing goals in the region and in Patton Township,” according to the agenda for Wednesday night’s supervisors meeting.
HFL submitted the rezoning request in May 2023 to accommodate plans to build a 31-unit apartment building for income-qualified individuals ages 55 and older on the property at the corner of Waddle Road and West Clearview Avenue. The 2.5-acre parcel, which HFL purchased in July for $625,000, according to county records, was previously home to a Seven Mountains Media and had been a radio station dating back to the 1960s.
The request raised concerns from neighboring residents about an apartment building’s impact on traffic at the already busy Waddle-Clearview intersection, stormwater management and the character of the neighborhood.
The land development process will offer an opportunity to address some of those concerns, township Manager Amy Farkas said in September, including a stormwater management plan and a traffic impact study that will identify any warranted mitigation measures.
Those measures may become even more important because, former Supervisor Dan Trevino noted, traffic on Waddle Road will likely become heavier regardless of the apartment building, with the construction of a Penn Highlands hospital behind Cracker Barrel nearing completion, the future development of Patton Crossing on North Atherton Street and more drivers using Waddle Road to and from I-99.
“There is an opportunity there, once a land development plan is received by the township, to work on making sure we’re not making the situation worse and hopefully doing something to make the situation better for the residents out there,” Farkas said.
The request also led to discussions about the property’s future use as the Waddle Road corridor continues to develop as a more commercial and higher density residential area. It sits next to a neighborhood of single-family homes on Clearview Avenue, but also a student apartment complex and many nearby commercial and office properties.
As it stood, the property was not consistent with adjacent land-use, township senior planner Leslie Warriner said in September. Rezoning it to R-3 is consistent with The Bryn student apartment complex, which borders it to the southeast.
R-2 zoning is defined as a buffer zone between rural and higher density residential sections, while R-3 zoning is suitable in areas near major highways, commercial areas and centers of employment.
One of the determinations for rezoning is whether it would be consistent with the comprehensive plan for the area. For this request, that’s “a little bit complicated,” Warriner said, because the proposal meets the goals of the 2013 comprehensive plan, but the future land use map anticipates the property will be commercial.
Neither the evolution of the Waddle Road corridor over the past two decades nor the long-range planning, however, indicated that the property would be low-density residential in the future.
The board and planning commission have discussed conducting a small area plan for the corridor, and some residents asked that the rezoning request be tabled until after that is completed.
Farkas said in September that a small area plan, which the township may still pursue, could take up to a year. In that time HFL could have decided to back out and another developer could come in with a commercial rezoning request. That would be difficult to deny, given the existing comprehensive plan and future land use map.
“In a perfect world, we would have done a small area plan first before something like this happened, but we have the rezoning request in front of us,” Farkas said at the time.
“Delaying it possibly invites in other rezonings. We don’t want to lose the opportunity to direct where we want this to go, but also to not lose the opportunity of having something that’s residential and not having someone come in and say ‘I’m going to put in the new Wawa or the new Sheetz right there’ and rezone it commercial to fit that corridor.’”
