Tempers flared Tuesday night after the Madison Board of Ealdormen rejected an appeal from Austin O'Kelly, owner of The Ranch daycare center, on a failed fire inspection. WAPT reported:
Kathy O'Kelly opened the daycare center in 1980. The Ranch became quite popular as children are able to interact with farm animals and spend much of their time outdoors. However, Ms. O'Kelly was operating the day care center out of her home as she lived on the premises. Since The Ranch was home-based daycare, the rules are more relaxed than those for a commercial business. As Madison grew, building and fire codes changed but Ms. O'Kelly's home was grandfathered.
The long-time owner sold the business to her son in 2023. This is where the problems start. Since Austin O'Kelly did not live on the premises, the city considers the day care center to be a commercial operation and thus subject to commercial fire codes.
Inspection reports state the fire department advised Mr. O'Kelly to install a fire-sprinkler system, fire alarm linked to sprinklers, and a fire hydrant (which would require the installation of a quarter-mile water line). Mr. O'Kelly said bringing the facility up to the fire code would cost nearly $300,000.
Thus, The Ranch did not pass the city's fire inspection. The Health Department in turn revoked its license. Mr. O'Kelly appealed the fire inspection decision to the Board Tuesday night. The Board unanimously rejected his appeal.
Kingfish note: The closure of The Ranch generated a storm of outrage on where else but TikTok as numerous supporters accused Madison of government overreach or trying to force Mr. O'Kelly to sell the property to developers.
7 comments:
Papa MS guy is one serious weirdo.
Change zoning from residential to commercial which as more stringent codes. Shut it down. Steal the land through forcing them out of business. Sounds like a wholesome goal for Mayor Mary.
I hope The Ranch can get up to the new codes that weren't required until rezoning and sit on that land until after Marys tenure and destroy her wet dream.
Before all of you "Mary haters" jump on here, get your facts straight. Austin is a jerk and refused to cooperate from day one.
FWIW, they were offered free legal services from an extremely heavy hitter from the legal world, and they didn't so much as send a text, so didn't seem too serious.
I understand the frustration, but if you want to go all in on the logic in those videos, quit buckling your children; anybody my age made it just fine without seatbelts in the 1960’s and before. It’s a tough call, but modern safety standards have to be followed at some point. There’s no ulterior motive and no land grab, it’s simply officials making a tough call with the safety of children in mind.
Yep. His mom is at fault too. She should have been doing updates slowly over time so it was such a massive rush and bill to do what was required by law.
If there were ever a situation and a child died, everyone would say "should have shut that place down years ago"...
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