After nearly three and a half hours, the Covington City Commission upheld the city's urban design review board's decision to deny the Baker Hunt Art & Cultural Center's desire to construct a contemporary garden pavilion and a new entryway through the south lawn wall.

It was the fourth time the plans were presented at City Hall and the third time they were put to a vote.

In June, after a 4-hour meeting, the urban design review board expressed concern about the design and asked GBBN Architects and Baker Hunt to come back with altered plans.

The following month, the plans were outright rejected.

On Thursday, the Baker Hunt proposal became the fourth appeal to the city commission of an urban design review board decision this year, an unusually high number. The city commission upheld the UDRB's denial of plans to tear down the Bavarian Brewery Building and a resident's request to install vinyl windows in his Mainstrasse property. The commission overturned the UDRB's denial of a local attorney's plan to construct a modern townhouse in the same neighborhood where they deemed Baker Hunt's proposal to be unfit.

It should be noted, the city commission does not necessarily inject subjective analysis into the proceedings when a UDRB decision is appealed. The parameters within which they must rule are whether the UDRB overreached in its power or whether the decision by the board was made arbitraily. Commissioners expressed some sympathy with Baker Hunt, an important institution in the city, but ultimately voted 4-1 to uphold the denial of the new wall entry. Baker Hunt wants to create a 15-ft. wide opening that would be handicap accessible and create a more visible entry from the street. The UDRB suggested that it should be only 5-ft. City Commissioner Steve Frank found that decision to be arbitray and dissented.

The commission also voted 4-1 to uphold the denial of the sleek garden pavilion and its metal, glass design that would offer it the opportunity to be used as classroom space with a wall that could open to the outside. Commissioner Jordan Huizenga dissented on this vote.

At appeal hearings, only people who spoke at the UDRB meeting are permitted to speak again and they are only allowed to reiterate their original points. Much of the same arguments, therefor, were presented in an encore of July's meeting.

The next step for Baker Hunt, as it embarks upon an approximately $3 million campus renovation project, would be to appeal to Kenton Circuit Court, or to submit altered plans.

-Michael Monks, editor & publisher