Between and betwixt: Rezoning vs. historical preservation

The debate over rezoning a leafy 23-acre oasis near Interstate 70, the Business Loop and the city Municipal Power Plant demonstrates how the values of landowners and historical preservationists can conflict.
Last summer, the landowners asked the city to rezone the land from residential to industrial zoning. They asked for a postponement in January, and the City Council now is scheduled to consider the request on May 3.
At issue is land owned by the trust of Juliet Bowling Rollins, the wife of the grandson of the University of Missouri’s founder, James S. Rollins, and two descendents of Juliet Bowling Rollins.
When the matter first came before the City Council, city staff raised no objections. However, in September the Council’s Historic Preservation Commission stepped forward and noted the historical significance of the site. Since then the commission has developed a 21-page report outlining the importance of the land.
Brian Treece, head of the Historic Preservation Commission, hopes to present the report to City Council to explain the multitude of reasons why the land should not be rezoned and should be preserved. The rezoning designation requested would have no restrictions and thus would allow anything from auto salvage yards to strip clubs.
Treece is a pragmatist, however, and the report includes more than sentimental reasons for preserving the land. Noting the possible future construction of an I-70 interchange in the area, the report says that preserving the land as a green space could create a “gateway,” to the city’s historic and arts district.
The commission’s report also includes a lengthy outline of the land and the two homes’ connection to some of the leading names in the history of Columbia: “There are no surviving properties that represent the unique history, culture and remaining vestiges of the McAlester-Bowling-Rollins families and their successors.” The report also points out that the land itself has been undisturbed for more than 180 years, which makes it an “archeological treasure.”
As for the owners and their interests, a spokesperson for Landmark Bank, a trustee of the Juliet Bowling Rollins Trust, has been quoted in the Columbia Daily Tribune as saying the rezoning was requested to protect the landowners financially if the city or state were to take the land by eminent domain.
For now, like the land, the matter awaits spring.