Public hearings on the rezoning of a residential area in the downtown business district will be held at 7 p.m. Feb. 27 during the Municipal Planning Commission’s monthly meeting and again at 7 p.m. March 6 during the monthly City Council meeting. The purpose is to hear input from those opposed to or in favor of rezoning a half block of housing in the 300 block of North Bickford Avenue; housing situated in the 200 block and 300 block between North Rock Island Avenue and North Barker Avenue; a half block of multi-family dwellings in the 300 block of South Barker Avenue; and housing in the 200 block of South Admire. Decades ago, the city placed a commercial overlay zoning on about 28 square blocks of downtown El Reno, calling it the central business district, or CBD zoning. A couple dozen houses plus an apartment building are on the perimeter of the CBD and are included in that zoning. In the last five years, four separate requests have come from homeowners wanting to rezone single-family residences from a CBD to a residential district. The zoning creates a headache for homeowners who want to sell or refinance their homes, city officials say, because the documentation needed to individually rezone are lengthy and burdensome for the property owner.