City Council passes shipping container ordinance

The Olney City Council approved an ordinance that will allow residents in most areas inside the city limits to use shipping containers as storage sheds or workshops but barred people from running water or sewer lines to them.

The Council restricted homeowners in Residential Zone 1 - near the Olney Country Club - from parking the containers on their property, but all other zones will allow them under the new ordinance that passed unanimously on Aug. 28.

The Council wrestled with the idea of allowing residents to run plumbing to the structures to drain condensation from “minisplit” air conditioners but ultimately stripped it out of the final ordinance to prevent people from living in them.

“The plumbing [ban] was so we didn’t have people trying to reside in these things,” Councilmember Harrison Wellman said.

The Council decided that residents who want to run a drain for the air conditioners may apply to the City for a variance to add a drain when they apply for the permit for the shipping container.

“If someone comes in and says there’s going to be a mini split then we allow a drawing for it,” Mr. Wellman said.

Councilmember Tommy Kimbro, who said he plans to install a shipping container on his property, said he agreed with the idea of allowing variances.

The Council decided to bar residents from running water or sewer lines to shipping containers on their property after Mayor Pro Tem Tom Parker pointed out that people leasing property at Lake Olney could, in theory, place shipping containers on their lots and live in them under the draft ordinance.

The Council began last April to consider whether to ban or restrict the use of shipping containers as out-buildings or residences inside city limits after a resident complained at a public hearing about a container that had been installed at Oak Street and Avenue E.