The Rush Township Zoning Hearing Board decided to continue its consideration of a local business's request for a variance at a meeting Tuesday night.

The hearing ies scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Dec 17.Seitz Brothers, a pest control and mold remediation business headquartered on Route 309 in the township, recently purchased a property on Hunter Avenue, also within the township. That property, consisting of a garage and combination office building/second floor apartment, was formerly used by a plumbing company for warehousing and service.Seitz was seeking a variance which would allow it to use the Hunter Avenue building for the fermentation, aging, bottling and selling of wine. Seitz would also like to continue its present use of the garage building as a place for parking trucks and storing supplies for the pest control business.During the meeting, Zoning Hearing Board members referred to the part of the township's zoning ordinance which addresses lot size for a business located in an R-4 district. According to that ordinance, a business located in an R-4 district is required to have one acre of land.The Hunter Avenue property owned by Seitz is a half-acre in size, but since it had already been home to a business Draper & Yost Plumbing for many years, the Rush Township Zoning Hearing Board had allowed Seitz to grandfather its use of the property as a warehouse and office for its service business.Adding another business to the property would require a variance, the board said. Officials asked Seitz to amend their application for a variance to include a request to operate more than one business at the property, as well as request a variance which would allow the manufacture of wine. The retail sale of alcoholic beverages is already permitted according to the existing zoning ordinance.Seitz will also amend their application to reflect the actual square footage delineated in the drawn plans for the building. The sizes for the sections of the building, such as office, retail area, fermentation and bottling, were smaller on the original application. When Carbon Engineering, the firm Seitz engaged for the property, drew up the plans, the company discovered that the first measurements of the building had not been accurate.The vineyard, owned by Brian Seitz, president of Seitz Brothers, is located in West Penn Township and called Blue Lizard. During the hearing, Seitz said that the vines are as yet immature and won't be producing a viable crop for several years.