Trying to find a parking spot will become a thing of the past at the Greater Niles Senior Center.

On Monday, the Niles Township Board of Trustees approved a request by the senior center to rezone property at 1838 S. 12th St. from residential to general business.

Kathy Ender, director of the senior center, said the plan is to install a parking lot on the site. It will create an additional 20 parking spaces. The senior center currently has approximately 25 spaces now.

“We’ve been thinking about it (expanding parking) for quite a few years now,” Ender said. “We’ve been getting busier and busier with more and more activities. We are excited about it.”

The senior center averages between 80 and 100 visitors a day. Enders said the senior center gets even more visitors when it offers popular activities, like cash bingo, which attracts 80 to 90 people just for the event itself.

When the parking lot is full, many people park across the street in the Big Lots parking lot, forcing visitors to walk down a hill and cross Bell Road to reach the senior center.

“We don’t like people having to cross the street,” Ender said.

Terry Eull, Niles Township Clerk, said he is confident in the senior center’s plan.

“I have known a lot of people that work there and they are very dedicated people and they will do a good job,” he said. “I have no doubt about that. It will be a parking lot, but it will look good.”

The rezoned property is located directly to the east of the senior center, which is located at 1109 Bell Road, in Niles.

Peg Hartman, the township’s zoning administrator, said the senior center would need to submit a parking lot site plan for review by the township planning commission before the project can move forward.

Ender said she hopes to have the parking lot finished by the fall of this year.

Also Monday, the board of trustees approved the rezone of 310 Fulkerson Road from residential to general business. Mike Kachur, owner of Kachur Tree Service, purchased the property, which is located immediately to the west of the business. Kachur said he plans to use the property as a place to park equipment and possibly to store mulch or similar products for retail sale.

One resident complained that the tree service causes too much noise and asked the trustees to deny the rezone.

Hartman said the planning commission would need to consider a site plan for the rezoned property and, possibly, a special land use permit depending on what Kachur plans to do on the property.