Nine months after saying he planned to live in a metal storage building located on U.S. 411 in Tennessee, developer Kenneth Hodson is seeking to have the property rezoned for commercial use.

Hodson is asking the 1.79-acre commercial steel building be rezoned from R-1, Rural District, to Rural Arterial Commercial (RAC).

"That's the request," Building Commissioner Roger Fields said.

"It meets the requirements for what RAC is designed for, but whether it gets positive feedback is up to the Planning Commission."

Planning Commission Chairman Jim Scully did not comment other than by saying he wants to know more about the request regarding the steel building.

"I want to see all the facts on it brought out at the meeting before I vote on it," he said. "I don't like how it got skirted around the regulations to get approved."

Scully will be looking for specific information about where the steel building lies.

"I need a clarification of where the (Maryville) Urban Growth Boundary ends exactly instead of hearsay," he said.

In 2006, Hodson applied for a building permit for the structure with the understanding that it would used for residential purposes.

"The building permit was notated for residential use," Fields said.

"It's got an apartment in it so it definitely meets the requirements for a residential dwelling. [The metal building] has got separate living quarters, kitchen and bathroom."

What the metal building doesn't have is a tenant. Apparently, no one has been living there.

"It doesn't appear that way," Fields said.

According to officials, the purpose of the rezoning the prefabricated metal building is not known at this time.

"To get a rezoning, you don't have to specify a use," Fields said. "That comes during the site planning process.

"If it's rezoned, then we use that zone to determine if the site plan meets the criteria. They may be rezoning it to sell it. It's common for folks to do that."

The Planning Commission will consider the matter during its Thursday meeting. The rezoning request is one of three before the Planning Commission on Thursday.

"It seems like the floodgates have opened on the rezoning requests," Fields said. "There's been a pretty constant flow of them."

County regulations limit the RAC zone to property adjacent to U.S. 411, and along U.S. 321, outside the Maryville Urban Growth Boundary, to its intersection with Foothills Parkway.