School zone: how it is designated and what happens to businesses already there

It is Chapter 7.4 of Joint Regulation No. 9473, inside the volume on processes before the Planning Board. It is adopted to comply with the mandate of Act No. 84 of 13 July 1988, as amended, which orders and provides for regulating school zones so as to foster a healthy and safe environment in public and private schools and their surroundings, located and to be located in Puerto Rico’s urban and rural zones. Its provisions apply to land use and to the construction and use of buildings and structures or properties within the school zones the Board designates, and to the siting and design of new schools. They are complemented by the Joint Regulation’s other applicable provisions and other planning regulations in force, and in case of conflict the provisions that best fulfil Act No. 84’s purposes prevail. The distances and the noxious businesses, as the Act itself defines them, are in our school-zones guide; this one is the procedure.

The need for a school-zone designation is identified case by case, on the basis of petitions from the school authorities, from the Parent-Teacher Council concerned, or on the Planning Board’s own initiative, by reason of the risk to students’ and teachers’ safety and the gravity of the noxious effects on the school environment caused by the activities carried on around the schools. Where it is not on its own initiative, the Board may consider applications accompanied by the documents Section 7.4.2.3 lists; it may demand other requirements and may waive some where it is shown to its satisfaction that they cannot be met, by a letter stating the grounds for the waiver request.

• Within a school zone’s limits: obtaining the Secretary of Education’s recommendations before any construction or use permit is authorised, or any action modifying the use of land, buildings, structures, properties or places.Verified against the official source
• To request the designation where it is not on the Board’s initiative: an explanatory memorial with the school area’s specific circumstances, the names and addresses of the businesses, activities and residents within a radius of two hundred metres, evidence of having notified the intention, and a map with the exact location of the school and of those lots.Verified against the official source
• Where private schools are concerned: a copy of the permanent Permiso Único granted by OGPe for each and every one of the school’s premises, as evidence that they are legally built.Verified against the official source
• Holding a public hearing following Act 38-2017’s procedure before any determination, with notice to the owners or operators of the businesses and to the residents within the two hundred radial metres, to the school authorities and to the educational districts and regions, with evidence of the notice.Verified against the official source
• For a noxious or incompatible business established before the designation: operating only outside school hours, two hours after the school closes and until two hours before it opens.Verified against the official source
• For the holder of a Legal Non-Conformity certificate: complying within one year with the conditions or orders OGPe imposes to bring the use into conformity with the school zone, and at the end of the permit’s term, discontinuing the use and devoting the property to a permitted use.Verified against the official source
• When a school’s operation in a school zone is discontinued: notifying the action and its reasons to the Planning Board no later than thirty days, with a letter from the Secretary of Education on the possible reuse of the facilities for another school.Verified against the official source

• An explanatory memorial reporting the specific circumstances of the school area that put students’, parents’ and teachers’ safety at risk and are noxious to the school environment.
• Names and addresses of the businesses and other activities, including residents, within a radius of two hundred metres of the school’s grounds, with the owners’ or operators’ names and addresses where available.
• Evidence of having notified the intention to request the designation and demarcation: a certification, the acknowledgement of receipt and copies of the letters of intent sent to the owners or operators of the businesses and to the residents within the two hundred radial metres.
• A map showing the exact location of the lot where the school sits and of the lots of the businesses named within the two hundred radial metres, using the qualification map in force or the corresponding cadastre maps.
• For a request to extend the one-year term in a non-conforming use: the eleven evidence items the chapter lists, including a copy of the permanent Permiso Único, of the latest income tax return and municipal patente, and of the alcoholic beverage licence and any other required permit.

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   Step 1: The Secretary of Education’s recommendation and its thirty days

   This is the rule touching anyone who wants to build, open or change a use inside a school zone. From this regulation’s effective date, no construction or use permit may be authorised, nor any action taken modifying the use of land, buildings, structures, properties or places, by private persons or government agencies, within a school zone’s limits without the Secretary of Education’s recommendations. And there is a clock in the applicant’s favour: if the Secretary states no objection within thirty days of the date the recommendations are requested, the Secretary of Education is deemed to have issued it. There is an express exception: to existing electrical facilities or infrastructure, the AEE may carry out modifications, rehabilitation and expansions without the Secretary’s recommendation.

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   Step 2: Who may ask for a zone to be designated

   The need for a designation is identified case by case, on the basis of petitions from the school authorities, from the Parent-Teacher Council concerned, or on the Planning Board’s initiative, by reason of the risk to students’ and teachers’ safety and the gravity of the noxious effects on the school environment caused by the activities carried on around the schools. Every designation or amendment to an already designated zone is made by a resolution issued by the Board and a map demarcating the zone’s extent; and once made, the zone becomes part of the corresponding qualification map.

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   Step 3: What must accompany the application

   Where it is not on its own initiative, the Board may consider applications accompanied by four things, plus a fifth for private schools. An explanatory memorial reporting the specific circumstances of the school area that put students’, parents’ and teachers’ safety at risk and are noxious to the school environment. The names and addresses of the businesses and other activities, including residents, within a radius of two hundred metres of the school’s grounds, with the owners’ or operators’ names and addresses where available. Evidence of having notified the intention to request the designation: a certification, the acknowledgement of receipt and copies of the letters of intent sent to those owners or operators and to the residents. And a map showing the exact location of the school’s lot and of those businesses’ lots, using the qualification map in force or the cadastre maps. For private schools, a copy of the permanent Permiso Único granted by OGPe for each and every premises is also submitted, as evidence that they are legally built. The Board may demand other requirements and may waive some where it is shown, to its satisfaction, that they cannot be met; in that case the petitioner must request the waiver by a letter stating its grounds. Where the designation is on the Board’s own initiative, it may dispense with the notice requirement above, but notices of intent must be sent to the school authorities, to the corresponding educational districts and regions and to the Department of Education.

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   Step 4: How it is demarcated: a hundred linear or two hundred radial metres

   Once the need is identified, the Board conducts the necessary study within a limit of two hundred radial metres to determine the zone’s extent and prepares the corresponding map, using the qualification maps in force as the base for a demarcation overlaid on the different qualification districts. A school zone’s limits cover a distance of one hundred linear metres, computed from the school’s usable accesses in all directions of the public way, including transverse or lateral streets; or two hundred radial metres from the limits of the school’s grounds for uses that may adversely affect the development of school activity or the health, welfare and safety of the school’s users.

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   Step 5: The School Committee and the public hearing

   A School Committee may be created for each school zone whose designation is requested, to advise the Board in the identification process or on any related problem once designated. Committees may be created on the Board’s initiative, at the municipality’s request, or on the initiative of the school authorities, the parent, teacher and student councils and the community’s civic leaders. They comprise an official of the Department of Education — the school’s principal or their authorised representative; the President of the Parent, Teacher and Student Council or a parents’ representative where there is none; the President of the Student Council or a student representing the student body where there is none; a municipality representative; and the Police District Commander or their representative. After identifying the needs and demarcating the zone, following Act 38-2017’s procedure, the recommendation goes to a public hearing before any determination. Notice of the hearing is sent to the owners or operators of the businesses and to the residents within the two hundred radial metres, including the school authorities and the educational districts and regions, and evidence of that notice is required, consisting of a certification and the acknowledgement of receipt. On approving the designation, the Board issues a resolution and a map, and the zone becomes part of the qualification map as a zone overlaid on the existing districts.

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   Step 6: What is and is not permitted inside the zone

   In designated school zones, the uses and activities established by Chapter 6.1 of Volume VI for the particular area are permitted, plus those approved by consulta de ubicación where required, provided there is no conflict with the qualification districts in force or with the sector’s character. The chapter names as most compatible with the educational endeavour: activities directly related to education, such as institutional, civic and cultural uses; and services, low-client-volume offices, retail commerce, dotational uses and technological service centres whose operation poses no risk to students’ and teachers’ safety, health and welfare and does not interrupt or alter the school environment, provided they hold the corresponding permits, may stimulate students’ vocational interest and constitute potential sources of employment or training for young people. Not permitted: the operation of businesses, heavy industries, commerce, trade workshops or technological service centres producing smoke, gases, noise, vibrations and other analogous situations that may adversely affect health and the environment; nor those businesses selling alcoholic beverages as an accessory or incidental part of their operations — such as restaurants and cafeterias — where OGPe determines that sale is contrary to the school zone’s purposes.

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   Step 7: The business already there: two hours before and two after

   Activities or businesses established before the school zone’s designation, classified as noxious or incompatible, may operate only outside school hours: two hours after the school closes and until two hours before it opens. Nonetheless, businesses such as restaurants and cafeterias that do not sell alcoholic beverages may operate with no limit on hours.

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   Step 8: Legal Non-Conformity and the year that runs

   From the effective date of the resolution designating a school zone, OGPe is obliged to issue Legal Non-Conformity certificates for uses, buildings and structures not in harmony with Act No. 84’s provisions but legally existing before it was promulgated and that turn out to be noxious or incompatible. These certificates shall clearly state the nature and extent of the non-conformity. Whoever obtains a certification may request and obtain a permit to operate that use for a term of one year from the date the resolution demarcating the zone is approved, and shall comply within that year with the conditions or orders OGPe imposes to bring the use into conformity. A permit may also be sought for a change or modification in the operation turning the use into a conforming one, showing that through changes in hours, accesses, processes, equipment and structure the noxiousness will be eliminated. If the year does not seem reasonable, the interested party may ask OGPe, during the year following the non-conformity notice, for an extension, submitting eleven evidence items — from a graphic and written description of the structure and the separate value of the land, structure and movable improvements, to the relocation cost, information from the Police, Fire Corps and Health, and copies of the permanent Permiso Único, of the latest return and patente and of the alcoholic beverage licence. OGPe evaluates weighing the public interest and the individual prejudice, and a hearing is required before the authorisation. At the end of the granted non-conformity permit’s term, the use must be discontinued and the property devoted to a use permitted in school zones.

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   Step 9: If the school closes

   Where a school’s operation in a school zone is discontinued, the school authorities, public or private, shall notify the Planning Board of that action and its reasons no later than thirty days after it is discontinued. With the notice, a letter from the Secretary of Education must be submitted with comments on the possible future reuse of the existing facilities for another school. Where the school use has been discontinued for more than two years, and the establishment of another school in the same place or within the same zone is not being processed at the Board or OGPe, any interested party may ask the Board to eliminate the zone; that request is processed as an amendment to the corresponding qualification map. And OGPe must notify the Board of its agreements on every change of use of schools in school zones processed at that agency.

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    Step 10: Where a new school may go

    Schools must be sited in existing school zones or in places where the sector’s character, and the activities, businesses, land use, traffic conditions or other characteristics of the area where a teaching facility is proposed, are compatible with a school zone’s characteristics and with the environment the educational endeavour needs. New schools may not be sited in places where uses considered noxious or incompatible with school work exist or are authorised. And strict compliance is given to the provisions for pre-school, primary, secondary and higher-level teaching institutions in residential qualification districts.

The school zone’s designation is made by the Planning Board, by resolution and map, after the public hearing held following Act 38-2017’s procedure. The recommendation prior to permits inside the zone comes from the Secretary of Education. Legal Non-Conformity certificates, the one-year permit to operate the non-conforming use and the evaluation of the extension request fall to OGPe, which must also notify the Board of its agreements on every change of use of schools in school zones. Eliminating a school zone is processed before the Board as an amendment to the corresponding qualification map.

• Filing the designation application without the list of businesses, activities and residents within the two hundred radial metres.
• Notifying the intention without keeping the certification, the acknowledgement of receipt and copies of the letters sent.
• Processing a permit inside a school zone without requesting the Secretary of Education’s recommendation.
• Believing the Secretary’s silence stalls the process: at thirty days the recommendation is deemed issued.
• Confusing the hundred linear metres from the usable accesses with the two hundred radial metres from the grounds.
• Assuming a restaurant that sells alcohol may operate with no limit on hours: that exception is for those that do not.
• Letting the non-conformity permit’s year pass without bringing the use into conformity or requesting the extension.
• Not notifying the Board of the school’s closure within the following thirty days.

These are the government pages this guide is based on.

• Junta de Planificación de Puerto Rico (JP)

  Junta de Planificación

  docs.pr.gov

• Planning Board

  jp

  jp.pr.gov

• Department of Education

  educacion

  de.pr.gov