##VIDEO ID:R## e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e good evening and welcome to the August 5th 2024 meeting of the city of summit Zoning Board of adjustment my name is Joe Steiner and I chair the uh zoning board this year please rise and join us in the Pledge of [Music] Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the of the United States of America and to the repblic for it stands one nation God indivisible liy and jusice for all thank you in accordance with New Jersey statute 10 colon 4-10 adequate notice of this meeting has been provided to a newspaper of record and has been posted here in City Hall this meeting is a Judicial proceeding any questions or comments must be limited to the issues that are relevant to what the board May legally consider in reaching a decision and decorum appropriate to a Judicial hearing must be maintained at all times for the benefit of the interested public this meeting is being live streamed on the city's YouTube page and is also broadcast on summit's governmental Channel which is Comcast channel 34 and Verizon channel 30 a transcript of this meeting is also being taken using the video and audio so we need to have all speakers go to Bo mail and turn the thing off um so we need all speakers to utilize one of the microphones and some of my cohorts who are watching some of the prior transcripts uh videos have told me that there are issues if you're more than three feet away from a microphone they may have trouble hearing what it is that you're saying and they do get their some of them get their certifications by watching the videos so please if you're planning to talk come to a microphone uh we also have a a hearing assistance device if you need that please see Miss zulos and then return it to the Das afterwards uh the exits in the room are a little changed tonight uh they are behind you um and also to my right your left but the one behind you is not directly behind you they're asking you to go through the what at one point used to be the judge's chamber and now is a conference room that allows you to go that way uh Miss zulos would you please call the role of the members sure chairman Steiner here Vice chairman lyit here Mr Yugo here Mr Nelson here miss Zan here Mr Kieran here Mr Malay here miss to is excused miss chfo here Mr feskin is excused Mr Chuli here you have a quarum you may proceed okay now for some other introduction uh Andy ball to my right is a zoning board's attorney uh if the applicant has an attorney they will work together to um on all the various legal issues and Mr ball will advise the board on any issues in the law that may apply to that case Miss suos who just called the role as a city employee and is the zoning board secretary she works with the applicants on preparing their applications planning our agendas and keeping our me meeting minutes also present uh at the table to um our right in front here or on your left is Marie rafy from colir engineering our board's engineering firm the um also seated at that table is a representative from Burgess Associates our board planner Ed snikes the these experts provide input to the board and also do not vote on the applications we have SE um we have seven regular members on this board and up to four alternates all members can participate in the hearings tonight but a maximum of seven can vote most applications require a simple majority to be approved before we enter into our executive session to vote on the application you will be advised how many votes are required each case will begin with the applicant or their attorney giving an overview of the application and the process that has taken place to date and the variances that are required we then hear from any additional expert witnesses that the applicant may have to help explain the application and why the variances are needed the board members May then ask questions of the applicant their attorney and the expert Witnesses once the board members and the board professionals have completed their questioning the public gets an opportunity to ask questions this is not the time to tell us what you think of the application that will come a little bit later uh please when you come up to ask a question again at the microphone give us your name and address once the board members and the board professionals have um missed a paragraph before you ask your questions uh make sure you spell your name and provide your address our court reporter again needs to be able to get all this information after all the witnesses have been heard members of the audience have their second opportunity to speak and at that time you may express your opinion positive or negative about the application uh and you will be sworn in for that uh testimony then the public hearing is closed and we enter what is called executive session where the board members up here discuss the case and vote you'll be able to listen to our executive session but normally you will not be able to participate in that discussion the City Zoning officer has asked that we remind all applicants that they must read carefully the resolution that documents the zoning board's decision and to pay particular ular attention to any of the conditions contained in the resolution if you have questions about any of those conditions please consult with your experts or with City staff through missio uh the resolutions that document the board's decision are normally going to be available one month after we decide your case um what we're going to do now is ask each of the applicants to come up and uh give us a quick answer to two question questions one how many witnesses uh will you have tonight and B how long will it take can you get it done in 30 minutes and we will begin with um Bristol Meers slip chairman good evening Kevin Moore with the firm of Stevenson Lee representing Bristol Meers squib I have three Witnesses and I think we can get done in 20 minutes okay we'll do our best to accommodate i' like that answer depends on how many questions you have well we make we'll see uh the second one is 61 Woodland Avenue uh Thanos and Pamela panopolis did I get close very CL evening to the board my name is Thanos Panagopoulos my wife panel is here with me um we have our architect Tom Conway with us here and I don't believe it will take more than 30 minutes to discuss our okay thank you and then um 25 Plymouth Road Christopher and Lisa barelli good evening I'm Lisa verelli this is my husband Chris um we have our architect stepen Jui here with us tonight and I don't think it would take more than 30 minutes to there okay thank you and 10 walren Avenue Peter and Kristen two this is Peter two and who else is with us number five Quinton two welcome for your first public appearance thank you okay thank you very much okay so has to be sworn I'm sorry he has to be sworn into we're going to swear everybody well swear we no no we're not going to do that we're not going to swear at them okay um let's begin with Bristol Meers squib Mr chairman uh members of the board good evening again for the record my name is Kevin Moore with the firm of Stevens and Lee and I represent the applicant this evening Bristol miners squib company uh if you recall uh the last hearing on this application was at your June 3rd 2024 meeting at that hearing we presented our application for a D2 use variance a C2 height variance and preliminary and final site plan approval for the addition of two 9,000 gon liquid nitrogen storage tanks uh and they are in the parking lot in of in the vicinity of building S12 on our camp Summit camp uh the liquid nitrogen is required uh for bms's commercial production and processing of c and biotherapeutic therapies at the Summit Campus at the conclusion of the June 3rd 2024 hearing uh you had requested that BMS explore the Alternatives of placing the liquid nitrogen storage tanks underground using multiple smaller liquid nitrogen storage tanks or using horizontally mounted uh liquid nitrogen storage tanks BMS has explored these Alternatives and as Mr Ahmed Osman uh who is the bulk systems engineer for the Eastern region of air gas which is bms's liquid nitrogen supplier will testify tonight 2 9,000 gallon vertically mounted liquid nitrogen storage tanks remain bms's preferred alternative um further as Mr Osman will testify tonight the two horizontally mounted 9,000 gallon liquid nitrogen storage tanks the only feasible alternative to the two vertically mounted 9,000 liqu uh storage tanks will cause BMS in approximately 40e delay because the tanks have to be custom manufactured however we are well aware of your concern about the visibility of these tanks to the neighboring properties uh therefore tonight uh we are proposing to install 38 8 to 10 ft tall green giant arbu v evergreen trees in strategic location on our property and to paint the tanks the same color as building as 12 as you'll see when our engineer testifies this makes the tanks virtually invisible from the neighbors's properties additionally at the June 3rd meeting uh you were concerned about the safety issues regarding the proximity of the diesel fuel fuel storage tank to the proposed liquid nitrogen storage tanks and Mr Osman will address this concern as well as i' alluded to earlier I have three Witnesses this evening Osman who's the system engineer for the east region of air gas bms's liquid nitrogen supplier and Peter McCade PE who's a senior project manager with L and engineering and environmental services in Mr Sera who testified at the last meeting is on vacation someplace on a beach so Mr mccab will be taking his place and finally Mr James Kyle who testified last time our professional planner with that I'd like to call Mr uh before you do that are there any questions for the attorney uh I do have one you supplied a new narrative yes can you explain the difference between the two because maybe some people have read one and not the other can we know what the differences were the only difference is that there were a series of questions answers to the questions you had had at the last meeting uh in the one that I had supplied after the last meeting those turned out to not to be accurate so this one just has those answers removed and corrected the uh number and size of the existing tanks per per Mr M's concerns at the last meeting and they will be testified to again tonight yes okay so we don't if somebody's using the wrong set of numbers they'll be well those numbers are right on all of them so on the two I submitted so you don't have to worry okay I also have a question because I don't think any of the witnesses will be addressing this um and it didn't come up in the last meeting but um with the addition of two 9,000 gallon uh liquid nitrogen tanks effectively uh Bristol Meers squib is uh creating 400% of their current storage so 100% of what you have now plus another 300% right you have 6,000 gallons you're adding 18,000 24,000 gallons total storage potential storage um well we're no we're adding 9,000 total or n each tank is 9,000,000 so right 18,000,000 correct plus 6,000 that you currently have is 24,000 right gallon capacity right of liquid nitrogen the testimony said that you're expecting production to increase by only 45% yes so you know 6,000 time 145% even 200 thou even 200% to give yourselves a buffer for extra use would not come anywhere close to 18,000 gallons even if you just doubled your volume you'd be at 12,000 total so I just didn't see anywhere an explanation for why this amount of storage was required and I I realize this is an expansion of already um non-permitted use but it seems to me that there must be perhaps plan there may be plans for other expansion that hasn't been discussed ory the only use that's not permitted is the tank use the man the the use that we're making of the facility is a permitted use I just want to clarify that correct but it's an expansion right that was in the testimony an expansion of a non-permitted use and I'm wondering well the tanks are the non-permitted right I'm wondering why we have to go up to 400% volume capacity there is no testimony to that anywhere the 45% expansion is what is Curr I mean that's happened and we have to meet that need but we anticipate further expansion so that's why we're seeking the approvals now will that all be testified to by some of some of the people are going to testify any of are any of them qualified to testify about that uh yes Mr gibber is here and he's testified we weren't planning maybe maybe we should hold that question and have it during his test well he I wasn't planning to have him testify CU we thought we'd established the need for the tanks yet last month and this month we were just going to address why they need to be vertical rather than horizontal and not underground and then show the Landscaping we're doing to medicate their view all of which we appreciate but I think if we have a a member that has a question and we have witness that can answer it we should probably let him test why don't we do that first because frankly that's might as well right I have no problem solving it right now no is that and we will need to swear him in because he has not uh yes not testified before Stan you want to come and hello good afternoon uh we're going to swear you in first please raise your right hand do you swear from the testimony you're about to give this matter the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth I do please state your name spell your last name it's uh Stan gerbick last name is gr Bic director of engineering for BMS El dery division okay is he testifying as a an expert witness well I'd like to answer the question we got to find out whether or not you qualify as an expert or not need to be qualified as an expert he's just T defying as uh the person who's in charge of this operation and why we need the inreased capity so that's not really expert thank you yeah not sure so on the engineering side we we managed the facility and utility needs for manufacturing for processing of the cell therapy process so we have two products in the building today both that are experiencing great growth um and servicing our patients so what our plan is now we may have a additional uh products come into the building so maybe a third and or fourth product that may come into the building so we want to have that L and2 capacity there and ultimately once the new tanks are online we'd like to take the older smaller tanks out of service down the road um which would which would um you know which would be the plan that we were looking for in in a couple years from now so we would necessarily have all that capacity online for future well so that conflicts with the prior testimony that said that you'd probably keep the tanks in service keep them in we would like Place obviously because we don't want to come back here not that we don't love meeting with you but well and to clarify in the updated narrative it says BMS is anticipating a 45% increase in production and processing it doesn't say that you're already 45% above like I I feel like it's saying two different something different than what that's what we're trying to clarify right on the paper it says you're going to see a 45% increase what you're saying is that you already have the 45% increase and that there's going to be additional products is that what's shortterm yeah shortterm we're seeing an increase for sure um longer term we're not we're not sure the capacity increase that we'll be seeing but it's proposed to be or it's anticipated to be more than 45% so we want the extra capacity there with the two new bulk tanks that we're looking to install can facility that creates the product um make enough product to use the full capacity future capacity of the tanks without physical expansion of the plant we talked about addressing the other concern with the more frequent deliveries so as we increase our manufacturing we would need to if we have this just the smaller tanks in place we would need need to have more frequent deliveries I think we talked about that last time I think stand what uh the question is actually we need to expand building S2 for our expanded product line no we're not looking to expand the actual building no I understand so we can stay within our existing S Building say you you increase production right with the increase with the max capacity of S12 ever require the full capacity future capacity of the tank that you're proposing today I don't think so based on what we know today I don't think we would exceed the capacity required or provided by the 29,000 gallon tanks but he's asking the 6,000g tanks plus the oh plus the 29,000 would we come up to the point where we use that capacity unless you expand your current manufacturing plan it's difficult to say if we wouldn't necess I don't think we would exceed the capacity that we're asking for today based on the um ability of the building to manufacture within the four Suites that we have because it would take to your point it would take an additional building expansion building new Suites to have to use more capacity okay and I don't want something get missed that I heard the witness say just now and that I heard in the in the audio the video from prior meeting that is this add of Capac G also helps reduce your frequency of deliveries which has major benefits for for the surrounding neighborhoods in terms of trucks coming in and off is that is that correct that's part of the reasoning for putting these tanks in so we don't want to limit ourselves with um being C short on deliveries right we're delivering on on average once a week now with the additional increase in manufacturing we wouldn't want to go down to 2 3 days we have more flexibility with the larger tanks and I think we're talking about delivering between 14 in 21 days if we have the larger tanks in place um and I think there's also testimony about possible supply chain problems that in case in case of production delays getting the product to you you'll have it on site in case there are delays detriment to our process and serving our patients if we get caught short not having the proper El and to in place we don't want to get down to the day or two level like we want that a capacity in place for at least a week out to ensure we have no issues manufacturing thank you go ahead M just want to make sure I'm understanding so if you were to put two of the 15ot tanks in right I don't know if those are 4500 each or what the capacity is on the 15 but it sounds like that would exceed your current forecast of the 45% still give you excess capacity not have to put 30 foot tanks in and even if you went to the the 30 foot tanks then there's a building expansion that would probably be required if you were to fully utilize all that capacity Plus the existing capacity you have just to clarify I don't think that's I guess we're not being clear and I apologize we need the amount of capacity the 18,000 gallons plus our existing capacity to accommodate our future manufacturing I guess what I've heard is right now you're anticipating 5% which you're saying that it's already there he's saying it's future future need right either way if you even double that you still with with the 15ot um High tanks you would still have more than enough storage in capacity right that would still solve for the frequency of deliveries right you're saying if we just added two 15 foot1 vers I don't know 15 I don't know three existing 3,000 gon tanks each that's what's existing tanks 3,000 G yeah I just want to say there's a lot of uncertainty in the manufacturing process um we do have very successful products that we're trying to you know we do have um uh we were able to bring on more patients into our to treat more patients with the two processes that we have and based on uh latest news with our competitors like our product has an advantage so more patients will be swaying our way with this cell therapy process so it's it's just it's very uncertain on exactly the percent growth and exactly the amount of el and to that we need but we feel that with the two 9,000 gon tanks that we'd have enough capacity and then based on how the forecasts go over the next few years there's ability to maybe not continue using the 3,000g tanks because they're older they're exceeding their end of their useful life as well so we're know putting new in place with the ability to take the older tanks out of service down the road and but I think when those come out of service we would be we would have enough capacity with what's left the 2009 two 29,000 gallon tanks if if you understand when they come out of service did they have an alternate use they may not be good for this chemical but are they good for something else we would not pursue them for anything else in our facility they would be removed they would be removed if they get use somewhere else a different site different vent different company that's that's that' be um not in our area of responsibility or wouldn't follow the okay so could that be a condition that once they're out of those are out of service they're removed from the premises would that make sense yeah the smaller tanks would be removed once we no longer have that as a that does that makes sense to the folks bringing this up yeah okay can we put that one in there for now any other questions for this witness I have I have a question are you going to address like the possibility of you know right now you have two 29 foot tanks instead you know instead of two 29 just you know four smaller ones is that going to be addressed tonight yes that's my next witness okay yeah that question came up in the last meeting that today okay any other questions for this witness yeah it's just maybe I'm being very simple with mathematics but you're only getting two 6,000 gallon deliveries a month that's 12,000 gallons right that's what you're saying two trip two two deliveries a month 6,000 gallons today in the future if you get the new tanks you're going to limit your deliveries will drop down to two a month initi 6,000 initi initially so beyond that initial Point how many deliveries do you anticipate do you to increase is it going to be three a month four a month five a month if you're increasing 45% now then you double it to 9 the delivery's got to increase too it would double think the way um we're planning you know we wouldn't jump into the increased capacity right away so it could be delivery instead of once a once a week maybe once every three weeks but as we ramp up then it might go down to two weeks but I don't see it being back to once a week at least short to midterm longer term no two years out we may have we don't know what the capacity is going to be so my but my point is you're not filling the tanks the capacity with only 12,000 gallons and so how does that work using normal gallons I think the could maybe speak to that the truck comes in certain sizes so one one truck load it is what it is I don't know forgot the exact amount that's delivered at each time but they can speak to that yeah they have detailed testimony on that perfect okay any other questions questions from our professionals I did have I just wanted to clarify and I maybe this isn't question for you but um which was what was the date on that new narrative that you submitted that would have been that's that's not St so I can answer that the letter accompanying it is August 2nd a August 2 yeah received August 5th if you want my copy I'll get I have an extra one CU I printed one and it was one thing on my Des okay any other questions in the professionals yep if not any question from the public for this witness only I see none okay thank you Mr chair can we let's move on to the i' like to call Mr Ahmed Osman and if you could please raise your right hand do you swear from the testimony you're about to give in this matters the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes sir please state your name spell your last name I'm Matt ausman it's o m n thank you and uh uh can you briefly describe your background experience and qualifications if you're being qualified as an expert I'm a mechanical engineer aeronautical designs moved to AAS like six years ago I worked on the design part now I'm theal engineer for Aras East okay and licensed in state of New Jersey as an engineer mechanical engineering is not we don't they don't do the licenses like the site civils okay any questions okay U Mr Osman there was a if you could just uh tell us the issues with um the problems with using a number of a multiple number of smaller tanks rather than the two uh tanks that are proposed so heat loss more piping to the internals of the tank now we introducing more heat more V to the cryogenic liquid cenic liquid is like 320 when it's come to nitrogen so the vacuum and the insulation around the two vessels is just heat like fighting the the weather outside yes even if it's like 10 outside and the worst day ever we will see and in the fall still it it just that's a lot of heat we are trying to eliminate the pathway to the internals of the tank more piping more pipes that SM more heat to go to that liid nitrogen and more heat to the liquid nitrogen it will turn it to gas and when it turn it to gas we are losing that gas to the atmosphere so you're taking the tank from maybe 75% efficiency to 45% efficiency just by adding extra tank extra tank extra tank more loss the tank is not not not a and are the tanks uh viable to be placed underground no by by code is we are not allowed and it's not even designed to be that way now with respect to the horizontally mounted tanks as opposed to the vertically mounted tanks what are the disadvantages from uh an operational perspective of the horizontal tanks so uh the manufacturers they have on their documents you will see something called natural evation rate that is the rate of the gas actually the cenic liquid turning to gas inside the vessel so that is a glass I'm sorry that is alcohol it will stay alcohol for a year maybe it will shrink but for uh for the liquid nitrogen you give it one day you will be losing a percentage to the gas so for example we're starting with 100 gallons we going to lose 0.24% every day for of that liquid to the atmosphere so horizontal tanks are not efficient as the vertical tanks the vertical tanks I now I will State the numbers it's called ner the natural evaporation rate for the short tanks it's one of the best tanks we're using right now uh horizontal tax is 0.24% and vertical tanks is 0.16% of course when you put that on like across the board after for a whole year it numbers make difference okay that's just a lot of waste of money since that it's not a code requirement with a and uh also uh how long would it take if we have to go with the horizontal tank since we hadn't planned to since we had the vertical tanks for us for BMS to be able to get them at least four weeks okay thank you that's 4 Z weeks um and then lastly our last meeting the board had a concern about the diesel tank which is located approximately 39 ft from the low prose location of liquid and nitrogen tanks are there any safety issues respect to that uh no and there is nothing in NBA 55 version 2020 anything regarding nitrogen and diesel tanks and what is NFPA 55 for the board uh that is the National Fire uh protection protection agen that concludes um Mr uh osman's direct testimony I know the board had some questions and he is here to answer them all right let's start with our professionals anything from either of you Nothing questions okay then for the board members yes uh if you would maybe we can elaborate a bit about fire protection uh from lightning okay liting F okay there is a lighting calculator I have to use as a design Authority like bending uh to make sure that there is no lighting uh problem uh lightning lightning like thunder the Thunder yes yes and if if if there is uh might be possibility we I will require uh grounding to the next for the 30 foot to all tanks yes the tank would be grounded to the just the grounding so the body of the tank will act as a uh yes a lightning drop yes the tank itself can handle and the the legs has like a copper Tock to be connected to the gra thank you yes um I had a question did you say that the loss per tank was if they're vertical was 0.16% per per day vertical uh yes okay so over the course of a year if you have 18,000 gallons of storage you'll lose 10,500 gallons of liquid nitrogen over the course of a year from basically 0.16% a day out 18,000 gallons yes I I didn't do the calculation thatw but I trust the yes yeah I have a couple questions which maybe the two one or both of you answer if not maybe another winess can I just I think I know the answers from listening to the video and hearing testimony but so the vertical tanks they are shorter than the building they next to correct correct how how many feet um 29 29 versus 35 so 6et and you're going to paint them in the same color as the building yes that'll be in our next witness okay and I heard you also say it's going to be plantings right that's Mr mcc's going to address all of the screening and hyp cuz the tank when I went there the tanks I I can't imagine it would be easy to see the tanks even without that just from walking the the backyards there but I you're correct just want to make sure that I understood everything else correctly any other questions for thisness um the diesel tank is that above ground or under above is there a dyke around it yes yeah so it's not going to impinge on these tanks if it's fills it will be very hard for it to go underneath and I mean diesel is very hard to ignite anyway but it's not going to impinge on these tanks if the tank ruptures or something like that any other questions for Mr Aus what I'm asking um we not if it were not a 40 we delay to get the horizontal and to stick within the 15ot variance would would you consider that to be a better option without having asked for a bearance talking about vertical versus horizontal which would if if all things were equal right if all things were equal which is that I I would pick uh vertical still right what I'm saying is but how high is a vertical horal yeah it's maybe if same size most likely it's 8' 6 in maybe plus or minus two foot 2 feet depend on it would require variance it would not right okay well it still would require the use VAR they all require the use Vari it just wouldn't require the height VAR any other questions from the board any questions from the public I don't see any okay thank you sir can we go to your my next witness Mr Peter McCabe whatever you're going to need to take this m with no he can he can use the one right there that works that will not carry okay but first Mr MCC can give your let me if you could please raise your right hand do you swear from the testimony you're about to give in this matter is the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth I do please state your name spell your last name is this on should show Green I can engineers and attorneys get along or if you feel more comfortable you can say this is dead guys again yeah can you just spell your last name for the record mcabe mccab thank you and can you briefly describe your background experience and qualifications for the yes I have a degree in civil engineering from Ruckers University I've been practicing civil engineering for over 30 years um and I'm a licensed engineer in the state of New Jersey in good standing I'd like to offer Mr M is an expert in the field of civil engineering any questions from the board or would you like to accept his credentials we will accept your credentials and turn you over to your your attorney Mr McCain could you just uh re I guess we reorient and remind the board some members I'm gathering just listen to tapes where the proposed tanks are uh and then we'll go through the various views certainly and uh what I'd like to do is Mark my first exhibit as A9 A9 right and that is called um BMS Summit n expansion landscape plan she LP 101 prepared by Michael C szur dated 0805 2024 so what this exhibit uh shows is a it's a partial plan of the site um on the left is the the dark line that you see is the property line of BMS and the residences are beyond that to the uh to the left of the page um I'm going to get I'm going to try and get closer with that microphone so I can point to a couple yeah just drag that microphone over to the edge you can use that one we can use all kinds of mics You Name It We got them okay so I hate to put my back to part of the audience including Quinton in the back row but um this is the location of the the tanks that have been discussed uh testimony was provided by Mr Mr Sara in terms of the site improvements but that's where the two 29 ft tall nitrogen tanks are proposed this is the existing building um in in the background so to speak uh when we consider uh the perspective from uh the property line um what I would like to point out here is that there's two islands uh this larger triangular shape and then a kind of a peninsula um at the top of the page and in both of those locations there's existing um vegetation you'll see that in the the photo that I'm going to present but we we determined that there was an ability to excuse me put 12 large arbide on this peninsula and then another uh 26 large arbide in this peninsula and what we're doing what we're proposing is to install them 8 to 10 ft tall um roughly six to 7 feet on Center um and 8 to feet to foot tall at planting so I think what I'm going to do next is introduce the uh the next exhibit which is an existing photograph and that will be exhibit A10 which is called BMS BMS Summit uh N2 expansion view2 existing conditions prepared by langen engineering and Environmental Services LLC dated 05 August 2024 [Music] this microphone so but this I'm standing right in front of it so what I wanted to do for the board real quick was to just point out on this plan exhibit A9 where this next photograph is taken from so there's a red X which I'm going to point to um and the location of this is roughly 180 ft from the proposed tanks behind where the perspective of this photo is taken there's close to 150 fot of buffer um tree growth and a fence and a row of aravi that's been recently planted by BMS here's the property line the distance from the property line to the to the tanks is 350 ft give or take so that's that's the perspective of of where this photograph is taken from so it look far more it'll be far uh less of a view of the tanks from the actual neighbors property lines correct Mr MC right so exhibit A10 is taken from the parking lot with 150 ft of woods you know generally deciduous wood some some Evergreen but there has been a row of arbori along the fence that's been planted um so photos that we took from those properties in the spring when there was leaves um you couldn't see anything so we didn't do a perspective from there we did a perspective from the parking lot so what you're seeing here is the building and the existing tanks um so the next exhibit and that is exhibit um A1 and that is um the uh view of the addition the it's called Uh BMS Summit N2 expansion view2 after installation also prepared by Langan engineering and Environmental Services LLC and also dated 05 August 2024 correct so the all that was done to this photograph is a rendering of the proposed tanks painted um and from this perspective you're only going to see roughly the outline of one of the tanks because they're one behind the other from from this area but you can see at the center of this Photograph what's shown is a dashed white line giving the outline of the tank and you can see the color matching again it's it's software so it's not it's it's not entirely precise but you can see that the silhouette of the of the tank is is pretty difficult to see um but again I mentioned that we're proposing a significant amount from from this perspective you're going to see in this next exhibit what the 8 to 10t Arbor V are going to to do to this viewshed or to this perspective so this will be exhibit 812 right and that is entitled BMS Summit N2 expansion V2 after installation with Evergreens also prepared by Lang in engineering and Environmental Services LLC and also dated August uh 05 August 2024 correct so exhibit a12 like I I described has the Arbor superimposed um as a rendering uh at planting so these are 8 to 10t um arbid and again it's a perspective so this is the building's 35 ft in the distance um the tanks the outline of it from this perspective although it's 29 ft looks taller than the than the building but again the arbor being in front um at 8 to 10 foot you're not going to see you're not going to see the tanks okay and now can you show The Bard what it look like after 5 years of growth uh sure and this would be exhibit a12 uh a13 a13 I apologize and it's entitled BMS Summit and2 expansion vi2 5 years uh installation with evergreen trees prepared by Lang and engineering and environmental services LLC also dated 05 August 2024 so again this is the the planted ARB provides uh 5 years after after install um and you can see the impact of five years of growth they're fast growing uh trees uh this again is the the outlet of the or the outline of the um the nitrogen tax and that concludes uh Mr mcca's direct testimony he's obviously here to answer questions our professionals first I do not have any questions I have a few questions uh what type of uh software was used to do the simulation in order for that's a good question I'm going to turn to my assistant uh staff member do you know what what our landscape Department uses photosh Photoshop so it's Photoshop reference uh items for you to then take the the proper measurements yes and simulate those yes it was uh what date was that photograph the photograph was uh April 15th April 15th so the trees taken by Ashley buringer who's in the office so the trees were just coming into leaf or those are if you can excuse me can't see but trees or the trees that you're seeing in the background yes they're coming okay correct um is there irrigation where the Landscaping do we know I I don't know that that answer we can we can easily make sure it's installed I don't know if it exists today but we can all right he needs a microphone one way or the other can't he him okay Stan and he's pre he's already right so based on the question if we can provide irrigation if required I guess to ensure the trees grow well over the years and that St for water okay thank you no fur question anything else you okay I'm sorry any board members I just have a quick one so this grow trees is that the first group on that island before the driveway or is it the second group you follow what I'm saying if you go back to the first page yeah I can yeah 12 or that's a good question yeah this is not the full extent what you're looking at is not the full extent of the armoring yeah so you're looking at this this this grouping here that's right I'm sorry forg about the red yeah very good they you don't see the Stagger that well but there is there's some staggering that's that's shown that's that exists questions from the board none okay uh questions from the public none all right I will now call my Final witness Mr James Kyle who is pre he's our professional planner and he was previously sworn and qualified at the last meeting okay good evening everyone um so I just want to kind of sum up where we're at relative to the variance criteria so we heard the concerns uh we went back did the re search I think what we learned tonight is the difference between the horizontal and the vertical uh there is an efficiency loss that is significant enough that for for BMS they would prefer to go with the vertical design so when we got to that point uh we spent a significant amount of time trying to come up with a solution to address the visual concerns that were presented at the at the meeting in June so I think what we've come up with um here is that the painting of the tank and this was a point that I made in my testimony in June the building is really the backdrop to these tanks as viewed from the west side of the property uh we have about as Mr mccab noted 350 ft from the property line um to the tanks that's the property line of the residential uses to the West along pic so the painting of that tank will effectively increase or rather decrease visibility even further as a backdrop so we can color match to that lower portion of the building it will essentially help that tank blend in with the building behind it which is taller the secondary step of adding the arbori um we have enough room in those landscape beds that we can put those trees in I'm sure you've all seen these trees they grow incredibly quickly um it's not uncommon after the first year they're installed that you get two or more feet of growth per year if they're irrigated it'll probably be even more um what's not reflected here as well is the width um at 6 to 7 ft on Center in a stagger configuration that will be a solid Evergreen wall probably within 3 years so we'll essentially have two levels of protection to the views from the West painting of the tank to match the building as a backdrop and then the Evergreens that will effectively eliminate all view from the west and you know there is a little driveway opening that is there it's not significant enough that it's going to open up that view shed dramatically so we think this really addresses the visual concerns uh that we heard it does make the vertical tanks a viable option as we've heard tonight that's a better option from an efficiency perspective and thinking back to the variance criteria particularly on the height um because I don't think the use was necessarily the issue it was really the visual of the increased height that we were requesting here we feel strongly that this kind of underscores the fact that the benefits of the vertical tank outweigh the potential detriments here which would be the visual impact because we've essentially proposed mitigation that will effectively eliminate that concern almost entirely so I think here the benefits do outweigh the detriments on the C2 analysis uh that would Prevail I think that's all I had to say so I'm happy to answer any questions that the board may have or if Mr has no you covered it okay professionals questions no questions board members just a real quick one are there any alarms required on these tanks in case there's a leak so that if there's any oh Osman on that so we have a Telemetry unit installed in the tanks uh we forecast the usage that's one one that's the first defense and second thing will be a Telemetry unit wired to the inside of the facility they will be monitoring the level and the pressure of T is there a proximity alarm to the tanks to the the people parking in the parking lot if there's a leak they're not overcome by the it's open it's not so there's no risk of affixation it is not it's not confined space it's not a courtyard uh if it's open to the atmosphere you can just walk through the cloud no problem any other questions from the board members any questions from the public when do I get my application heard that's the questions from the I see nothing from the public so I uh would say it's up to you for any closing um I have uh we that concludes our direct testimony I think we have met the uh requisite uh variance criteria and I would urge the board uh to vote for these variances and site plan approval okay um just reminder we should open it to comments from the public as well that's where I was going public for comments we will swear you in if you wish to make any comment uh positive or negative about this case I don't see anyone jumping towards the microphone so we will now hear from our attorney the conditions uh as well as the number of votes required yep so since this is D variances involved it will require five votes to approve I have two condition that were noted first is our usual compliance with the conditions noted in the board Engineers memorandum with the exceptions noted from Council in his introduction uh and second is that upon the decommissioning of the existing and and correct me if I'm wrong on the figure here but 6,000 gallons of capacity existing okay uh yes that's correct those tanks will be removed from the site and it takes five votes yes Okay who wants to K can you I'm sorry can you clarify that last condition upon the decommissioning of the existing 6,000 capacity 6,000 gallons of capacity of storage those tanks will be removed from the site so just won't be repurposed won't be used elsewhere but decommissioning is is is open because they could be left empty for any amount of time so just want to okay is there a better better I'm just thinking not they're not going to be decommissioned with the tanks that are being installed like typically you would decommission a tank when you're putting in a new tank but right this is not so well what's the right language for what we're talking about which means if they're not using them anymore they're taking them away well I think that's that's the part that's sort of an unknown in this decommissioning statement is that there's a basically an unknown no expiration for when when they are decommissioned meaning not used anymore we will take them away I think you also have to have those tanks tested every so often I would assume to to hold the pressure you have to meet certain requirements right isn't there a lifespan for these things you said that lifespan sure t requ uh you need a microphone sorry sorry to do this you're not supposed to talk but we need a microphone go ahead okay go ahead can you please repeat the question repeat the question please the question repeat question there's a lifespan for the for these tanks you Cinders right 20 years 30 years TS small small 3,000,000 G okay so there is no lifespan we have tanks since 1960 in the field okay it need to be maintained it has to follow all of national board the American national board the asme and n PA requirements the second the tank is out of compliance it has to be scrapped uh if the if even if the documents for the tank is lost the data plate on it if it's lost that's a scrap tank it has to be retested by ASM and the that's where was going so yes and that that that information should be like with the with the birth certificate of the of the tank from whatever old how old it is doesn't the intent is to have the tanks empty on site with the use in and in place of that use the 9,000 gallon tanks but empty doesn't mean just cuz they're empty doesn't mean they're going to be decommissioned I guess that's just the so I just don't know what the decommissioning criteria how that helps it sounds like decommissioned and removed right that's what you're agreeing to upon installation of the 9,000 gon tanks no IM if they're not using these what I was trying to get to is when these tanks are no longer used that you're now only using the bigger tanks they go away but within and I don't know how to express that then they should then they should be decommissioned upon installation of the 9,000 y tanks right right well the testimony was that they're not going to be they've indicated that they do they do have a reason to to be using both at a time at some time but there may sometime that they decide they're not going to do that and then when they do that they go byebye can we can we put a station in is is when they stop being used within six three months six months they must be decommissioned and removed so that there's actually a time um frame on that that's great so it's just not sitting two we would agree to decommission and remove them within two years of installation of the new tanks okay more that's clear you're happy I just say I think it's more clear that would work okay okay can you add that as a condition absolutely okay back to the uh plants and the height and paint any other comments that anybody wants to make about the uh the application does does the conditions say the plants does it say also the irrigation yeah irrigation is the condition and then it would be planting is provided it exhibits a uh [Music] a be a12 okay and also exhibit A9 which is the actual plan for planting so we've added the U yeah and so another condition a third condition will be that plantings will be provided in accordance with the testimony and with A9 and a12 and that irrigation will be provided as necessary [Music] any other comments that people would like to discuss is this executive session or is this we're an ex we're totally in executive session but we've blown the we've blown all the all the things out of the water here so uh yes sir Mr Vice chair bring bring us back to order will you uh I want to thank this applicant for hearing the board the last time and clearly doing a a thorough investigation to storage alternates I have to say I don't really find results of that convincing but what I do find very convincing are these renderings of the landscape kind of wish you had come here in the first place with that probably would saved us all some time um but this is clearly going to be very well screened and uh that was my major concern is the visibility for the Neighbors uh or anyone passing by and so uh with this change your landscape design uh I can support this application someone from this side go ahead um again appreciate the work that was done and going back and looking at Alternatives I'm I'm and I think it addresses the the visibility concerns I had the other is asking for a variance when there's perfectly reasonable alternative to not need a variance I kind of get stuck on that a little bit and know it's a 40e delay I know there's some things there um you're investing a bunch of money to to mitigate that so you know I don't think there's necessarily support for vars um so I'm still a little torn on this because I I do think you know had you just come in and put it horizontal um we would be have this conversation to answer your question there's a lot long delay here this application was put in in February well think of how many but if you'd ordered the tanks how close would they be well that's I don't have the answer to that but I do U I'm going to say what I think right now I think there's I I always seem to be on the side of Medical Arts and getting people what they need when they need it and this e even the loss of 1% of the ability to treat a patient somewhere who needs it um goes very far far on the positive side for me you add to that the uh fact that the um potential for one of these trucks to spring a leak on River Road uh or do whatever you know have a driver who doesn't know what he's doing on Route 24 and 78 where they flip over all the time and Don you've done a number of those as luckily there's never been an air gas vehicle so you know okay but it's it's still I I I I put that on the side of Public Safety uh taking care of our community taking care of our First Responders um and just going ahead and making sure that they all of these people are protected and are taken care of and uh so therefore I'm very I'm I I would entertain a motion to approve this experience I have I I just have anybody else want to say something please I think go ahead you're no I I I I can very easily support this application I think I had no visibility concerns before you added the screening and the plantings or should had limited concerns because I I had a hard time seeing it from the backyards I one of the property owners I would go back there and look and I had a hard time seeing it now without the screening but the added screening it's going to be virtually invisible um I think you made a convincing argument why the vertical is better than horizontal it may not be 100% convincing but I think you've made a good enough case combined with the fact of of hiding the tanks and it's lower than the building I got get supp TI variance too I'm very very strongly convinced of the positive impacts of Having excess capacity maybe in some sense in order to reduce deliveries for some of the reasons that Mr serer just mentioned um and I I see no sub substantial detriment to the public good in improving this this variants and I see a lot of uh public benefit as Joe alluded to with the increasing their capacity to make Cancer drugs I'm not sure that how that applies to Zone ring zon variances but it's certainly a positive factor for uh for helping them do their work so I I I can strongly support this application um I I obviously I'm we're all here hoping you know every somebody finds cure for all cancers so it's not about that um I think that one thing that needs to be said is that while the number of deliveries might be reduced more trucks will be coming right to fill 9 thou to 9,000 gallon tanks if the TU trucks are 6,000 gallons capacity each you're going to have more trucks so it's not less truck traffic it's just maybe twice a month you have two trucks or three trucks instead of one truck every 7 to 10 10 days now and then maybe if you didn't have these tanks I I I think that just needs to be said because I'm I'm not convinced about the benefit from the reduced traffic I that one just doesn't resonate with me um the other thing that I do find a little bit challenging is that the capacity is so much greater than what is you know what has been testified to the need for and even you know doubling the potential need um it's now now if you decommission the other tanks instead of having 400% of present capacity including the current tanks it'll be 300% in two years um that's one that I'm sort of struggling with I have to admit because I think that that case almost if that happens if right now you're anticipating 100 you know an increased 45% production and you want to increase your storage by 100% to give yourselves a buffer I understand that but increasing the storage by another 200% that's more than I almost feel like that need you just need to come in for another tank at that point when you need it when you think oh we're we're developing a new drug we're going to need more nitrogen I'm that that's the one that's something I'm struggling with it's um just the capacity of it because we don't allow above ground storage tank so if you're going to have an above ground storage tank I feel like your use really needs to be justified the complete use the size of the tank needs to be justified so for me I would prefer to see those tanks be smaller maybe not 29 ft maybe 20 fet you know something that is more in line with giving yourself 100% room for 100% increase in production as opposed to 45% but not another 200% I'm ready to a second I um move to approve with the conditions stated earlier any other comments before I do this again and not is anybody on this end um so I my concerns um are similar to Miss's the it's more I the the I could not see the tanks at all from the the road so the screening was not an issue with me it's just a size of a 29 two 29 ft tanks um and I don't think I mean unless I miss something I never heard any explanation on why we couldn't do four smallet tanks I mean it's never oh we did if we if you need us to reiterate that but s I'm sorry we're in executive session we're going to stay in it please go ahead so if anyone I mean I don't know if I if I missed that you know why there there couldn't been smaller tank heat loss heat loss it's more piping oh yes oh yes okay yes but that was that wasn't just the that wasn't just the um horizontal tanks that was the same thing for each individual one also okay any other comments from them is there a motion so move to approve with conditions as stated I'll second it okay may we have a roll call vote sure and it requires five affirmative votes yes Vice chairman lit yes Mr Yugo yes Mr Nelson yes Miss Don yes Mr Kieran no Mr Malay no chairman Steiner yes the motion carries thank you very much uh we're going to take about a five minute break and we will be back here at a quarter of with the uh next case up being 61 Woodland Avenue yes please yes e e e e e e e e e e my name is Pam P thank you okay can you uh Begin by telling us uh What uh what what your application is about what you're hoping to accomplish and then I'm assuming you'll turn it over to your uh architect who will carry the the water for you absolutely uh we move to 61 Avenue in April of last year um and since we've lived there we noticed that the deck in the rear of our home is in somewhat disrepair in fact recently some of the boards have broken on the deck and the Finish clearly um is deteriorating and so we've decided it's time to replace the deck to keep okay any questions from Marie for the no okay any questions and the board members uh oh and I should uh should uh note for the record that uh misson is uh recused yourself from this particular case any questions for the applicants from this side no okay and I'm assuming you wish to turn it over to to Mr Conway okay all right we going to square you in uh do you SAR that test you're about to give in this matters the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth I do please state your name spell your last name Thomas Conway c n w a y thank you and I know you've appeared before us a number of times any changes to your credentials since the last time you were here no I'm just older that's fair enough I imagine the board would like to accept you once again yeah we'll bring them back um just to start this off just uh to avoid too much confusion we um they mentioned this we had been in for this project uh previously for the previous owners which were Steve and Melissa spur and we had designed an addition off the back to go is that what hang on one second it's fine it's okay okay is that okay or was that too much it's good okay have the same conflict okay so um a previous owner that um decided not to do their project so we gotten approvals for that work and then they moved next door because the um woman that was living there um sold their house and they decided that they want to renovate that one and then they could keep their own house and then they sold to the current owner so it's a little confusing because we have a previous uh approved variance on but not on this project so we're doing u a proposed much smaller scope of work on this on this house um and uh we're just suggesting to replace uh the deck in the back and also to upgrade some of the Hardscape front walkway and the back walk adding a little bit of a back walkway as well while we're doing that work we're also doing a little bit of work along the side the house uh to prep for connection to the basement which they're also eventually going to be renovating but that's all inside that doesn't require any variances so um the excuse me before you go too far so there's already a prevence variance approved on this it was but it's expired so it's expired okay yes just sorry got you I just didn't want to confuse anybody I don't know how many people were here then I don't know whether any of you were um so the property um along Woodland um my stor reservation background always kind of looks towards you know the context and the pattern of development these sites along this stretch and also up on shitty side are unders scaled for the zone and a number of them in that neighborhood um so that was um that's really the the uh issue we're mostly having on this um so that the property is Zed for r10 and uh they only only have a 7,234 ft on their current property uh the variances we're requesting are um a uh proposed the well the existing lock it's for both lock coverage and building coverage the existing lot coverage is 52.83 per where the maximum allowed is 35% we're proposing a 52.6 4% which is a slight de decrease and we're also um uh for building coverage uh we are also requesting for a proposal of 28.9 5% where there's a maximum allowed of 18% and the existing is 29.03% increasing and making them more um making them also compliant um just to bring them uh closer to um what's desirable um the uh I'll just like point it out so uh um the existing um U the existing deck uh currently connects from the house and actually down to the drive and it's actually very very tight the way it's developed there along the edge of the property uh along the edge of the uh garage and the house uh so what we proposed is to kind of open that up a little bit more reconfigure the deck so the deck actually rather con connecting from the house to the driveway it connects from the house to the Garden of the backyard um and this reconfiguration is more contextual it opens up the light and air into the uh lower level as well and it just makes the layout a lot more desirable So currently there it feels very awkward the way it's laid out and this makes it a lot nicer where you have a more central element there and it more aligns with the architecture of the house and gives more of a a symmetry of the house with the rhythm of the front of the house um we are also looking to renovate this doesn't require varant but we're just going to be renovating the existing porch up front and we're also going to be doing um some siding upgrades as well the uh stucco has has deteriorated it's very it's been changed over time so it's very coarse so we're looking to go to match that with wood siding along the lower um band of the house um and then we're also looking at the new design for the deck we would be doing a lver plan on both the front and the back um rather than umce which is is harder to maintain and keep looking sharp and um we think this is an attractive uh upgrade it doesn't have any negative determent to the neighborhood and it's in keeping with the neighborhood and uh the storic Integrity of the house and and the properties around it okay questions so it doesn't appear that they're imp increasing the impervious coverage or changing the grading in any appreciable way um so I I don't feel that there's any engineering comments we don't have any problems with this application okay questions from board members wish I could say had some I don't this side questions from the public seeing none um does anybody wish to tell us in the public what they think of this application this is going quick any okay is there anything that you would like as the applicants to say to the board and close [Laughter] it just that we just want to say we appreciate your time and for allowing us to come uh before you to give us our plans thank you very much okay who wants the uh conditions and number of votes yep so just our usual condition of compliance with those oh wait was there a engineering memo no so then no conditions uh the number of votes required are four uh since only C variances are involved it's a simple majority vote Okay who wants to start executive session Mr Vice chairman uh I think uh Mr Conway explained it perfectly uh undersized lot this is completely concealed from public view uh positive criteria obviously improving the safety and usability of the deck uh they improving the the layout this is very straightforward for me and I can support this application and the only thing I add is the variances they're asking for they're actually making them lesser variances so that's great Point yeah and the I guess the one thing I maybe wanted to ask I'll just comment about the Foresters notes the lack of screening but also says he doesn't really see any room for screening and I'm no expert on screening I'm I'm going to assume he's right I took a quick look I kind of see what he means but you know I'm just I'm not I'm not asking for a condition but if the applicant has any imaginative ideas for screening feel free to try to do that well we are think by pulling as I mentioned the left hand side of the deck back a bit we plan on having a planted area there which we don't have now so that that would kind of give us softer I'm trying to keep executive session I apologize without going back to the applicants if we can okay anybody else okay it looks like we have a very Sim Le application here that uh um not even sure we'd be here If This Were A regularized laot but uh anyway uh the answer is uh that I can't see anything that would prevent us from moving ahead on this it's uh an easy one to support uh is there a motion to approve motion to may we have a roll call vote sure Vice chairman lits yes Mr Yuko yes Mr Nelson yes Mr Kieran yes Mr Malay yes Miss Cho yes chairman Steiner yes the motion carried thank you good luck again look at your resolution I well with with them I'm not worried make sure that when you get the resolution you follow what's in there or ask questions as needed did we time that what is that some sort of record uh we're getting close uh they said they could do it in 15 minutes and they did uh Miss Z's going to join us back thank you um for the record do that and um we're ready to go to 25 Plymouth Road Christopher and Lisa verelli okay Here Comes Your Art Expert and we will Begin by swearing the two of you in good follow the same mode can do your both do you swear from the testimony you're about to give in this matter is the truth the whole church nothing but the truth yes yes and please one at a time state your name spell your last name Lisa verelli and last name is v i r e l l i b is Victor i r e l l thank you okay could you uh give us an idea of what your project entails and what the variances are and then I'm assuming you will be uh relying on your expert witness to uh give us all the details um we've lived at the house for um 7even years now and we have two children that are in the middle of school and um our house is um older like around 1940 there's no closet at all on the first floor um I I don't know what happened to it or I don't know if there ever was one I assume there was but there isn't now so we have nowhere to hang coats or really put any of the children's sporting equipment and gear we also have dog um and we've noticed as the years go on and the more things they get involved with it just explodes through the kitchen and all over the house um so we've sort of had a makeshift mud room in the garage and we spent um we called Steve a couple of years ago to see like what we could do and we wanted to think about it some more make sure it's what we really needed and wanted and then we came up with a plan to bump the garage back I think it's 12 ft I'll leave the exact measurements to Steve um and put the make an official mud room inside the house and then add a pantry and sort of just rejigger um that first floor so it's more functional for us and we thought for resale in the future it would also be good for future owners that they would like it um so it seemed to make sense and then while we were doing the bump back our master bedroom is pretty small and sort of has an odd layout so we wanted to improve that and take the 12 ft that we're going to sort of make the room uh bigger more functional and separate the sleeping area from the bathroom area um and we came by Steve uusi by way of a couple of friends who have used him in the past and really liked his work and've enjoyed working with him so I will turn over the um or I guess can that and you get a chance to add a word if you want me yes she did a wonderful job uh I could only screw it up know she said everything that we wanted to say thank you okay any questions for the uh for the applicants uh no I do not okay any questions from the board the public okay I GA you're going to turn it over to your expert and we'll move from there yes this is St you if you can please raise your right hand do you swear affirm the testimony you're about to give in this matters the truth the whole nothing but the truth I do please state your name spell your last name my name is Steven mjusi with a pH mausi m a j e w SK I thank you and I believe you appeared before us relatively recently yes uh three times in 2021 in April 2022 and I was accepted as an expert witness at that time any changes to your credential my license current state of New Jersey all right any questions from the board or would you like to accept him once again I don't see any questions please accept we accept your credentials and ask you to move forward thank you uh as uh Lisa verley stated they came to me and gave me the program that she outlined pretty good and I may uh look at the present conditions and give a few little extra explanations on them uh as always when I come before uh um well I wasn't planning to come to the board but as always when I get a program initially I review the zoning compliance so they gave me the survey and I discovered three things immediately the lot is undersized that's only about 70% it's 12 uh 10,500 versus 15,000 in the R15 Zone it's also under width by 15 ft it's only 75 ft versus 90 and uh also it's an unusual through lot where it's on two streets Plymouth and ashin so I was already uh presented with uh conditions that would make it a little bit difficult to uh design a project and uh that might be in compliance that I had to be more sensitive to Land Development ordinances when I approach design the project so uh I'd like to talk a little bit about the present conditions I'm a little lopsided here I'm sorry so uh you have these sheets as part of your packet on the first sheet of present conditions which is your U fourth sheet in the uh packet I show the uh elevations that are uh significant uh the two side elevations and the elevation that uh faces ashin road which is where the garage doors face on the present conditions I put a a little outline of the uh proposed so it could be understood now uh Mrs verley addressed the interior designed uh and she listed some of the challenges which I also agreed with and uh there is a dimension missing on your present conditions that one of the sides of the depth of the existing garage is only 16 ft and many SUVs and family type cars are only a full 16 ft at this point or larger so that side of the garage is very deficient they do use the back of the garage as a mud area as was stated there is no mud room for this house you could come in the side and enter direct to the kitchen and there's also no hall closet if you look at your present conditions you can see that so one of the challenges with to try to give the family a mud room uh with children especially children that have a lot of sports these days compared to other times and that was one of our challenges to uh make the garage uh deeper and also to a pride a mud room space if you look at the second floor you'll see that the master bedroom primary bedroom has a little funny kick in it it's a little difficult to arrange Furniture the bath B door essentially is right on the bedroom and it's hard to arrange furniture around looking direct into the bathroom the bathroom is also not ideal the toilet is across from the sinks it restricts use of the sinks and so that was part of the challenge that I was presented with in order to move forward with a design for this project so when I designed the project I try to keep the architecture in keeping with the existing architecture that's there I use the same materials the wood shingles I essentially only made a small section taller than it was in order to achieve proper ceiling height in the bedroom the bedroom's only 7 1/2 ft tall now so we went to basic 8 ft No taller than that at the end walls and that was a little bit taller than that existing Wing which you could see in the proposed PL you have but yet the existing house is actually a tiny bit taller than that but the exist house is only 26 1/2 ft tall far below the 35 ft allowed in the zone so it's not a tall house by any means but it's a beautiful house it's contributing in the neighborhoods a standard Colonial 1947 it's a very nice house for the neighborhood when I could see why they would want to add to this house in a reasonable way to bring it up to new standards because the rooms aren't really huge uh they're not very big so I designed an addition that was about the right size that could give them the functions they needed on the inside if you look at the street facade it essentially looks the same as faces Ashlin now the through lot side of of the street but I added uh at the garage door a little small pent roof it was an architectural detail that's nice it keeps the same shape that was uh existing now but it just comes forward uh backward towards the street which I consider the rear yard uh if you look at the side that faces the closer neighbor all we're doing that we're asking for one of the Varian is is to extend a small entrance porch uh to get into the kitchen that's there and also to make the mud room function at the proper height related to the ground cuz right now it's basically on the ground CU it's at the back of the garage uh the addition itself meets the sidey yard requirements the minimum on that side required is 15 ft the actual addition of the second floor is 15 ft 7 so that complies the the variance for side yard is only for the little entrance porch to get into the kitchen and the other variances I'll talk about in a little while so when we design the inside if you study the plants I have a a a a reasonable size mud room at the back of the garage that's attached to the house we've enlarged the entrance porch so you can come up the side rout opening the garage doors and get into the mud room direct or into the kitchen so that's going to make it a more useful mud room and and allow the space in the garage to function for the cars cuz it'll be a good distance and also place for bicycles and other things that we lawnmowers things like that we need on on our property the uh lav Powder Room in the existing was very small we moved it back so it's not facing into the kitchen it's off the mud room and we're able to uh make the plan uh nice on the inside gives us place for coat hanging uh shoes you know everything that we need to come in basically this this house functions from the backyard most of the time and guests can also then have a place to hang their uh things in in the in the uh mud area in the master uh what we did was we improved the bathroom by moving it closer to the middle of the existing house we're able to compartmentalize the toilet improve the sinks in the shower area and we're able to get good closet space uh for the improving uh this property especially as related to other homes so that's essentially the architectural project uh and uh we added some detail the shutters the the pent roof in order to improve on the property this drawing you have this the it's the plot plant the first sheet it illustrates the property you can see that it's a through lot with Ash at the top and Plymouth Road the address of the house at the bottom of the page you see in Hatch the uh addition we've added it's over existing Paving we don't really need to adjust the paving there uh we are going to adjust the patio in order to make the existing patio that's not compliant on the western side of the loot uh it was pointed out by the zoning official that the uh to who helped me uh understand this project that uh the patio was non-compliant and we were able to rearrange it eliminate the non-compliant part and now it complies with the 15t setback uh we are also by doing that and building over existing Paving we were able to actually reduce the lock coverage on this property so uh we're improving that situation I think we've reduced it about a full 2% I'll go over those numbers in a little while uh this does not affect any trees on the site all the larger trees are near the perimeter uh the Pro it does not affect any other vegetation on the site essentially the view from the off site especially on ason road will essentially remain the same as far as the tree cover and the planting it actually remains uh as it is uh and in the past the fence and the entrance Gates were changed to bring them compliant which they weren't they were closer to Road they've actually been brought level with the other properties and the gates uh meet the requirement that was pointed out to me that had to be at least 20 ft from the edge of the road and they're a little bit over that as existing so we're not touching any of the great Gates or the fencing it all is compliant at this point um one of the things I did investigate when I first started this project because I was curious if there was any and needed to know if there was any previous variances and the zoning officer at that time Chris Anderson confirmed there were no variances of record um because the existing house is only about 11 and A2 fet but all our addition from the side copy line but all our addition complies well with the uh combined setback and also with the minimums so we basically came up with a design that we felt could uh uh be considered reasonable and in response to zoning uh requirements and uh we feel that it contributes architecturally to the existing home so I'm going and going through the uh design uh in reviewing the uh variances uh that were required to accomplish this uh important one would be building coverage and we increased from 15.8% to 18.4 18.4 is just a little bit over uh the allowed for Total Building coverage it's about 38 Square ft I believe only too much that's how it's been calculated so very di Minimus uh amount for building coverage and lock coverage by moving and adjusting the patios and by building over existing coverage we're actually reducing lot impervious from U 38.9 to 36.9 uh impervious coverage it's basically a flat lot uh there's no change to U uh runoff at this point it's been uh mentioned that there was no change uh it appears to be no change and I should address that uh from the engineers report and U it basically stays as is and we're not pushing more water towards uh any other property of course it comes under scrutiny if past the variants that would be reviewed in the future if there was any issues and that would have to be considered but at this point we don't believe that there's any issues that now the true lot uh requires us to do a 40% uh essentially a front yard calculation of 40% as opposed to the minimum 35% the 40% forces us to calculate out that 5 uh 6 ft is required now a standard if that's essentially functioning as the rear yard a standard rear yard is 45 ft for the Zone our request is to be 42.8 so we're a little bit more than a standard rear it's a little deficient from a standard rear yard by 2.2 feet or so so we're trying in this design to try to be compliant as if we were a rear yard even though it meets the definition of a through line and as I mentioned the sidey setback it's only the little small porch uh that gets into the kitchen the addition itself uh complies with side combined and side minimum that leaves us with floor area ratio um the garage area is 445 ft so it didn't actually use up quite all the amount that would be allowed for a garage so that pushes more into the living space because it's not considered garage now the floor area ratio is a a a planning U uh design tool to try to reduce the bulk of the building and to keep it uh down now one of the uh interesting things about this house that I discovered when I measured it was that the house is so low compared to zoning and only about I think I said 26 and 1/2 ft it's about 10 ft less than the Zone requirements so the even though the 4 a ratio is higher we're essentially working with the bulk and mass of the building and by the building being as low as it is and essentially not going any higher uh and we're well on compliance so I feel that the uh floor aor ratio is addressed U to to be uh not a severe condition in this this specific property in this specific house uh also the house is a contributing structure in the neighborhood uh doing this is helping preserve a a structure which is part of the uh land use uh goal of uh approving a variant such as a uh F variant so what we're doing is we're adding not a significant amount of space but we're improving things like the garage and and the interior without making huge rooms and we're preserving an existing structure that contributes in the neighborhood there will be no changes from the at the front of the house at all and if you come on Plymouth and you look at the front if you're looking from the southwest side you can barely see where this Edition would be and from coming from the uh right side down the street you really can't see it at all and also in and looking at uh this proposal I observed other houses and it's in the packet with the with the photos uh I have another photo over here that I could talk to in the application package this photo microphone Google Maps just make sure you use a microphone sorry we just we got roasted on that have to make sure we do it I prepared an additional photo board one because the photos that I had present in the application were all during rainy dreary days that I was having a hard time finding a good day to take pictures in the spring so I took new pictures uh with better lighting the photo in the middle is in your uh on the upper in the middle is in your packet it's the same photo which I put a line across it you can see that uh the property Direct to the Southwest or the left of the front is uh further back than our existing house is now and the next two properties beyond that also go back with garage extensions and a second floor on on uh uh them also if you look at my photo board on the upper left is a picture of the subject property the facade that we're going to uh push back towards ashin and I believe we've improved the architectural uh context of that facade if you look below that on the left and in the middle I was trying to illustrate uh that you could see the remainder of the house that is untouched and also the patio portion that's going to be removed which is a eating area we're readjusting it and reducing the impervious coverage the last photo on the bottom right is intended to show uh that you could see the extensions of the other homes that go back further than this one does now and we're either going to be uh similar or actually less than one of the properties that are to the Southwest we won't extend back as much so I was trying to illustrate that with these photos and um that's where that [Music] is so I did get the U uh report and I think I had uh it looks like the um Consulting zoning officer Lindsay Knight agreed with the variances as I presented them outlined and advertised and it meets uh what I wrote uh they asked me and she asked me in that report to give testimony on the size of the lot and the area which I did the lot is under sized it's under width and it has the challenge of being uh two front yards essentially um the uh engineering consultant asked me to say that there's no new uh grading proposed and I have have said that I believe uh it talks about soil erosion and sediment control when I plan if this is approved and I turn in for permit my plot plan will usually show the silt fence and have the commentary about uh soil on the site and that'll go in uh not as a formal grading plan but as a plop plan because a formal graining plan I believe is not required if it is required we would of course provide it but we're not adding uh any new impervious surface and I believe at this time we're aren't required to rep provide that but if we are we will um the the city Forester agree that the existing screening is adequate and that and uh no trees are being or significant changes to any landscape it's really affecting hard hard surfaces or lawn just's go back to forer one second he he said with only minor modifications have any idea what he might have meant or is applicant have any idea what he might have meant by saying it be adequate with minor modifications that was the Forester yeah minor modifications he's usually not that vague appears to be adequate only minor modifications you might be referring to changing the lawn area by moving moving the patio around there's no other really landscape materials that were touching our trees I'm not sure I want a condition based on that but I'm just wondering if if there was any thought what he me I thought you were flu L I thought I was by now but that's uh yeah I don't think he means that it would be adequate with minor modifications I think he's saying it is adequate and they are proposing only minor modifications okay I I'll go with that that that's my reading of it I'll go with that okay okay uh the historic historic HPC commented um that it was matching the existing architecture I've pointed that out the turn Gable they were in agreement and I I believe that they were favorable it appeared to me when I read the comments we will of course meet all building codes uh for expansion of a house that it's part of the building permit process and that will uh be turned in at the time it involves smoke detectors fire detection Electrical Plumbing all those things will be addressed of course if approved uh for this so in summary I believe uh We've uh presented a a a reasonable addition and have addressed uh trying to stay within the ordinance uh obviously we couldn't but I did note that uh everything except the through lock condition we would be able to meet if it was a full-size lot by a significant amount the true lot in even though we're in violation of number of feet if it was a rear yard we'd only be in violation two and a half and that's the reason I felt that that was a reasonable request uh that it would not be considered a significant uh intrusion and U I believe that's it for me I think okay I've address what's this questions from our professionals so um could you could you talk about any screening that you're proposing to change around the air conditioning units I know you're changing something about the patio does that affect anything with the landscaping or screening around that little bit little bit hard to see the photos but the air conditioning systems are tucked in behind a a fence that's near the on story existing section and I believe there's no proposals to change that we would be able to put any adjustment inside there uh there is a discussion if it actually goes to permits of how we're going to uh change uh heating and cooling systems and I believe we would be eliminating one in the basement and putting it in the attic to address the heating and cooling better uh for the extension and upstairs cuz it goes all the way from the basement up across the garage seat ceiling and then into the second flooor which doesn't make a lot of sense especially with an extension so the HVAC will still remain screened the way it is now it's not moving locations okay and um so they they already testified that they're reducing the um impervious coverage on the lot so that doesn't affect any of the storm water um they don't they're not required to mitigate for any of that um so I don't have any further questions on this just to make sure you we're we're on the same page whatever you do with the air conditioning will comply with Municipal statute that's correct we will comply with zoning and building I'm talking about the air conditioners because we we do run into that every once in a while when people say well this is what we can do out no you got to do it this way okay questions from the board yes sir just building off the if you walk me through the tradeoff of understanding the through lot the C and thinking about it from a rear lot perspective I'm sorry not hearing so thinking through maybe walk me through how you evaluated the extra kind of 2 half ft or 2.2 feet on for the what the rear yard even though it's front yard yes through lot yes as you thought about designing the the home like what was the tradeoff there of the through lot setback from Air instead of complying within what the 45 ft which would have been if it were not a through L and coming in that 40 2.8 yeah if it were not a through lot U if it was a standard rear yard we would have to ask for a variance to go from 45 ft to the 42.8 that's requested so it's a it would be a little deficient the other Varian is I said if it was a full-size lot would likely be eliminated completely but that variance for the depth of the lot of at 130 ft with a 45t rear yard yard requirement we would still that is one variance that would not disappear we would still need a variance for rear yard for 2.2 ft although the variance we require for a through lot is significantly more it's required to be 56 we got 42.8 got it I was just wondering what the benefit to the home of the additional 2.2 feet were for this property and the garage it adds the proper space in the garage to be able to park the cars and still have space in the cars and also achieve the mud room that we're trying to put inside the house that the house does not have now so uh it also helps uh the design of the master uh bedroom suite upstairs uh to keep that two feet uh in the Pro in the uh in the design and it visually it would not change anything significantly to eliminate that two feet and it would make it uh deficient on the inside uh for the space thank you Mr chairman Yeah couple questions um we've had a couple applications on this uh street over the years one not too long ago it's very unusual the th is a very unusual circumstance um entering in night of Ashland I'm sure has its own Nightmare Horror Stories whatever um but I have a I have a couple questions so actually let's talk about that that uh the front the second front yard setback the the rear yard front yard setback I I get you're trying to make the argument that if it were a normal rear yard it would be 45 ft so it's really in a 2.2t 2.2t variance but the fact is there is a separate rule for this kind of second front yard so you're actually asking for variance from 56 feet and I think you make good maybe make a good argument but I mean you think that is there any special thing you want to add to that argument because you're really asking for a variance from 42.8 to from 56 and I get what you're trying to say about the 45 but it's do your cents use that space as a backyard yeah yes okay yeah separated it's yeah there grass and I if I could also just add that it's unusual the way our property is set up and also that our neighbors there's a busy road between us yes so we usually we don't actually even know a lot of the neighbors because it's so separated um I just wanted to add that also if it was a standard front yard would only be 35 ft requirement so it's kind of peniz the homeowners for and it's an unusual lot it's an unusual condition that's why we're here that's why it's put in there so that a board could evaluate its benefits outweighing the detriments I feel that the benefits do outweigh the detriment in this case similar to some other about five if about six houses on the Block have similar uh situations and there are actually a couple that are a little bit closer I don't know the exact number but visually you can see that they're closer closer to ashy than this yeah I'm glad I wanted to hear hear some kind of testimony like that um f variance so it's undersized lot I'm sure at least part of the variance is driven by that what would If This Were a normal siiz lot for the Zone what would the FB do do you know or could you calculate it was theb for 15,000 requ I think it's 20 uh 21.2% so you'd be' be under if signicant the FL ratio would be 3750 allowed and we're 3178 proposed okay so we wouldn't even be near the 25% requirement okay that's all I have thank you sign um I just have one question so this this lot is sized more like an r10 lot basically right and that also has an F of 25% permitted so I'm just kind of trying to compare like if you took you know if this lot were somewhere else you know I know it's not um what would what would the requirements be and I think the f is one that would stick but some of the other setbacks the like the minimum sidey setback of 13 fet versus 12 ft that would probably be a non-issue um I guess it's sort of proportionally for this lot um and your experience you feel like this is appropriate exactly right we feel it's appropriate that's that's why the requir is there so that a board could evaluate whether it's appropriate request uh for this lot for the architecture for for for what it's achieving and how it doesn't disrupt anything U other aspects of the zoning orance uh land use I I think it meets that criteria that that's responsive to the neighborhood uh it's responsive to Land Development requirements the height being significantly lower also U will control bulk like if this was a full height house asking for that floor error ratio I don't know if I would uh approach that uh but because it's so low uh the house almost 10t lower I this part's even a little more than 10 low I think it's a reasonable request sorry and this house was built prior to zoning right and it it's already over what's over it's you listed at 26% right the existing uh the existing yes right so it's not like you're under and you're going over you're already you weren't under to to start yeah right uh but the garage was deficient so if we just made the garage bigger that wouldn't have increased garage would exclude 575 ft but our garage is only 445 ft I believe so there's still like an extra 100t of leeway if it was garage it would come off that Flor ratio so it's kind of a balancing act playing uh with a reasonable design reasonable size um and and asking for it that way any other questions any questions from the public we only have one public left okay um okay um no more questions from the public no more questions from us uh is there anything anybody in the public want to tell us what they think about it no uh because there's nobody here um so we'll go to well maybe the little guy wants to say something uh I don't know but it does I believe you're all for the next case if I'm not mistaken um do you have anything to give us as a wrap up I think she said it obviously kids who play a lot of sports we' love to have this mud room and really help the house and thank you for your time apprciate okay the last I would have put in is that this is not just benefiting these homeowners this is benefiting anybody else that will purchase this house in the future and the things that we are addressing and trying to uh fix in this condition uh situation okay um number of votes and conditions D variances well One D Varian is required so five votes are required to approve it and we just have our one usual condition which is compliance with the conditions noted in the board Engineers memorandum okay who would like to kick it off I'm going to start on this side who wants to start it on this side go ahead you've got it um yes so I think you know considering it's an undersized lot um being thoughtful about lot coverage and reducing that trade off with the space between the garage and usable space within the house things thoughtful use of the space um i' certainly support this okay anybody else want to Don yeah I I support this uh proposal U one of the things that troubles me with with um Lots like this is and I shouldn't say lots like this but sometimes we we get ourselves into things where we we buy properties and the conditions exist when we buy it then we try to change it all um I'm a little concerned about the bulk of the house even though it's smaller I I think this is I support it I'm just you know I'm kind of I looked at the other houses in the neighborhood some of the additions were one story some of them were two I'm we got to get to a point where like hey okay this is the house exists that's the way it is let's not make it worse than it already is and you you are improving it a little bit by reducing some of the coverages um but like I said I do support this project uh I just think uh moving forward we all need to keep an eye on things like this that's all so I do support this project okay Mr Vice chairman you looked like you were ready to go oh I didn't realize I was giving off that Vibe um I always appreciate projects that show restraint and I think this Falls squarely into that category um they're clearly improving uh the usage of the house um you know uh they're keeping the architectural style consistent with the existing house which is very attractive to begin with um and I think what they're asking for is entirely reasonable um and they're they're getting major improvements um with sort of minimal impositions onto the variances so with that I can whole hardly uh support this application I know these three these through streets but part of our report to the planning board try and straighten out some of the issues most of some of which have been brought up here so uh I think we're kind of handling it this way the way we actually recommended to the planning board to change it but we'll see what happens if they uh get around to doing that um no I anyone else have any comments to make if not I would accept a motion to approve it so moved is there a second I'll second it almost almost got to that point roll call please sure than five votes Vice chairman lyit yes Mr Yuko yes Mr Nelson yes Miss Don yes Mr Kieran yes Mr Malay yes chairman Steiner yes the motion carries good thank you so much and the last case of the night but not the end of our business we will be doing business after we're done at 10 walren we have a recusal Mr chairman pardon we have a recusal oh he's just leaving yeah okay are you leaving no oh we're just consolidating here okay hopefully hope be by then okay as we move on we're going to swear in three people is he going to be answer fin we'll worry about the two if you could raise your right hand do you swear from the testimony you're about to give in this matters the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes and one at a time please state your name spell your last name oh Kristen tohill k r i s t i n to Hill t o u h i l l at 10 walren Avenue thank you and S all yep um Peter pet to Hill Peter p e t e r t as in Tom o u h i l l okay can you uh whomever it is that's going to be telling us uh what it is you're looking for what the variances are and then I'm assuming you're going to uh let your expert take over correct so Kristen and I have been in Summit since 2009 when we were married we rented on Summit AB we bought our house um we had the opportunity in 2009 when we were uh well sorry we bought it in 2010 when we were 25 years old so we were pretty young for our block I would say at the time um we did a bunch of work at the time the house had been been occupied for over 50 years was an niore in the neighborhood um you know we spent every penny that we had doing the work that we could um you know but we left our third floor which had two bedrooms and a bathroom but is partially gutted um not sure why um we left that there cuz we didn't have any kids at the time um fast forward to today or last summer really um my wife was pregnant with our fifth child um and we also just our roof um was leaking so and also like the original um Cedar Shakes had started to leak on occasion when there was like horizontal storms um and so she went trying to get quotes to get it fixed just had no luck kind of in the summer into the fall um and just trying to get quotes really to get this um redone and then in October one of the guys came it was like on a Monday one of the roofers and was like we start on Friday I can get this done um like in the next week and so we just wanted to get done before the winter and we said yes um I don't think that needed a permit but we also had a framer frame out three Dormers um we had wanted the Dormers just for additional light egress windows and also just makes the house look a lot better from the street um we thought we might needed a framing permit and but we were planning to you know subsequently do plans to refinish the third floor and just thought we could add that to like the framing permit when we did it um we hadn't considered like a zoning variance would be needed or hadn't even like occurred to us um you know and also just appreciate everyone's patience I know um you know that was you know November of last year we've had a lot of personal stuff going on um and then um we've also in the last couple last number of months um after talking um with our architect you know decided maybe we want to expand the house a little bit um and so we're in the process of working on plans to do a very small expansion we have an engineer and a planner engaged they couldn't their plans aren't done yet the engineer and the planner or their stuff and the they the engineer couldn't make it tonight um so but I know the board wanted us to uh come talk about the Dormers tonight so here we are and we have Doug Miller our our esteemed architect okay questions for the applicants okay um Mar okay then I assume I'm not even going to ask about the public the record there is no public remaining um so I'm not going to bring that up again um you're going to turn it over to your okay so let's do that hi good evening if you could raise your right hand do you swear from the testimony you're about to give in this matters the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth I do please state your name spell your last name Douglas Miller from ahm Architects located at 281 Main Street Milburn New Jersey Miller is m l r thank you and I believe you've appeared before us recently as well any changes to your credentials since the last time you were here no my license is still in good standing um I've made numerous presentations to boards in the surrounding communities as well and accepted as an expert any questions from the board or would you like to accept his credentials I think we can accept his credentials and going to ask you a question up front we we're talking about Dormers that have been done already Yes okay so we're and we're only talking about that we're not talking about any other work to be done in the future which will require a return visit exactly yes we're focusing solely on to make sure we all got on the same page because there have been a lot of discussion back and forth in cers now we we all know where we are yes okay so we're talking about gee I did this how do we legalize yeah unfortunately yes this is the situation we find ourselves in um I noticed everybody had the board over there their presentation boards but with the microphone situation and considering there's no Public's view to be blocked would it be okay if I kept the board close to me here sure do whatever you want perfect it's fine as long as we can all see it I'm sure he's going to be very happy to see be closer to them for once yeah yes exactly so as uh Pete had just mentioned their goal is really to improve the functionality of their attic with a such a large family they need additional bedroom space um and you know they wanted to improve the carb appeal of their house the house is an existing 1920s you know nondescript Dutch style Colonial and they wanted to see you know how they could really enliven it and bring it more in line with the other houses in that community so let me briefly describe the project um lot is approximately 52x 144 or 8,788 ft smaller than the required of 10,000 ft in the r10 zone uh 75 ft is the width requirement so much narrower than required the existing lot width the right side setback the percentage side yard setback lock coverage building coverage and floor area ratio are all existing non-conforming so when we looked at what to do or I guess when they you know we've realized what the situation is there would be no other way to expand this house without variance relief so what we are asking for is a variance relief a Dev variance relief for the construction of these three dra these are the same drawings that you have before you um the we're increasing the uh floor area ratio from the existing non-conforming 2,00 I'm sorry 2325 or 20 6.45% up to 27.0 7% which is 2379 so we're increasing it by a modest 54 square ft or 62% uh the site has a a very long driveway that goes along the uh right side through a detach garage which you know just a note has existing non-conforming rear yard setback as well uh I'll go through the plans a little bit uh Dre the whole house just so you could kind of see the arrangement the first floor uh consists of basically five rooms uh with a foyer living room kitchen family room dining room sun room those changes are proposed on this floor on the second floor there's four bedrooms uh three children's bedroom and a primary with the bath and there's also a hall bath the bedrooms are extremely small at least two of them one is uh 10 8 by 9' 9 and the other is 92 by 7' 7 so extremely small bedrooms the second bedroom is smaller than what would be required in a modern house to meet code um the third is more reasonable at 12 uh by 12 um but there's no changes to this floor either the only real change is on the attic level is the addition of these three Dormers here this the existing attic consisting of a study SL bedroom uh a hall bathroom a hallway and some storage space and what we're proposing to do are these three Dormers uh I'd like to note that the additional area of these Dormers does not make the attic an attic story it's still a a conforming house it's less than 30% of the floor area below so it's not adding to the attic story rule so that is in conformance uh the next uh drawings are the existing elevations uh you can see it's a just a typical Dutch Colonial and this is the proposed you can see that the the three Dormers kind of really enliven the house and really bump up the curb appeal I have a rendering I put together just uh a before and after I found a picture from 2022 that showed what the house looked before I don't know if any of the board members you know remember the house before the Dormers were added but I could hand that out thanks was this included in the packet okay so this will be A1 these are both photographs they're both photographs yes the the lower photo there was grills added to the upper window in Photoshop but otherwise it's uh the way the house looks present uh the lower photo was taken by myself the upper uh photo was taken from a Google Street View uh from 2022 so you can see that the changes to the house with that that the two hills have done have really bumped up the carb peel really enlivened it made it a much more attractive house uh so as I stated previously it's just for the increase of floor area for the uh attic space so a few reasons why I believe that the variant should be approved is all the hardships of all the existing non-conforming conditions on the three Dormers are going to be all constructed within conforming setbacks um it's going to be over existing building space so there'll be no change to the building footprint uh no changes to the site the grading uh and if our lot was conforming at 10,000 square ft we would be uh conforming for f so we would be permitted to have 2500 fet of floor area ratio so would be below that at 2,300 I'm sorry 2379 um and the property is unique in the fact that it's forwarded by a a large Church uh to the left so along the side it's not on drawing but on this side there's a a large church with a completely paved parking lot and along their back property line there's a it's the B Zone and there's a commercial dance facility so they're surrounded on the the left side and the rear by commercial structures so there's significant bulk on those lots and I think our house by being the first in the residential Zone and if you drive down the street there's kind of a eclectic mix of houses and housing sizes uh so I think our house can easily accommodate it uh and I think that the improvements definitely outweigh the detriment uh we also looked at the comments from the uh different departments in the town and the only departments that had any comments were zoning and uh HPC and the HPC thought you know the Dormers might be a little bit too large and they didn't want uh they wanted to see some grills on the upper windows so that's why it's shown in the rendering that I have given you uh the two hills are going to add those grills to the attic Windows to make those windows match all the existing windows on the house and I also have a photo board I'd like to submit was not part of the package and we can maybe mark this A2 so uh these are all photos taken uh by me uh and December of 23 and uh those are the ones without any foliage on the trees and the others are from July of this year U the house the whole neighborhood or the street is made up of mostly historic appearing houses um a variety of styles some Colonials some Dutch Colonials some Craftsman you know victorians all different styles there's even a odd by level and a Cape Cod that don't really fit into the context of the neighborhood um I think if you look at the house I think these Dormers that they added really go a long way to fitting into the context of the neighborhood you know a lot of the houses have Dormers and when you think about Dormer size you have to think about you know what's appropriate you know it's I think design is something that's very subjective uh you know some people may look at a house and say oh look those Dormers look too small or those Dormers look too big or or those look proportionately correct and if you go down the street you know some houses have Dormers that appear to be too small like the house next door or or Dormers across the street uh that at seven that to be proportionally right you know and so by having a variety of Dormer scales you know I think adds to the texture and fabric of the community and really makes the houses look unique you don't want every house to have the same size dorm or the same configuration of Dormers because then it starts to look like a track development and I think what uh we've done here is create something that's attractive makes the attic uh much more functional to give them that much needed bedroom space um that they need and so overall I I think the uh benefits outweigh the detriment it makes the house safer by creating a more practical bedroom increasing the the daylight in that space uh making it more H habitable um so uh I'd like to you know end my present there and open up to the board for any any comments or questions do you have to mark that one I we Mark that okay I know your office is getting crowded uh questions start with you um so there's there's no changes to the site being proposed um and it's only a flary ratio so there's no engineering comments on this um did I miss it or did you not talk about the driveway I did not talk about the driveway okay the driveway is also in Christa's he note that it was built not the way it was supposed to uh does the applicant have anything to tell us about that or you it can be they answer that question yeah I'll jump in um yeah I think it was over 10 years ago it's hard to remember honestly I think my wife kind of remembers going into the office but it's just uh I we didn't get a permit and it's a little bit expanded from she got the permit she didn't get the second permit oh so anyway yeah I mean that I mean that was going to be kind of covered in our next presentation we just the engineer I mean ultimately like the part that was expanded we actually going to look to remove anyway so you're going to leave you're you're going to try and leave here tonight without dealing with the driveway non-conformant yeah I mean well I think the board wanted us to come tonight we were trying to just do it on one presentation but we weren't ready and the engineer could make it t dragging on and this yeah no I get it I get it I totally appreciate and we need to get it done agreed uh or take it off or whatever so I want to make sure I heard right what what are you say you going to do with the driveway and then I mean ultimately I think it just got expanded by a little bit I mean were what they were the permit um application you reads Chris's memo there tells you that the permit application wound up being deleted because they didn't send in the grading permit so she had to hunt it down so but this was in 2012 they they got a permit application for Paving the driveway but that's not the way it was paved the permit application was they said they had get a grading permit that is required they never filed that and because they never filed the Zone um construction just took it out of the file wait a second the permit was granted to pav the driveway they paved the driveway but then how did we discover that it was not paved to the permit yeah I there's more there's more there then that's permitted right a lot here yeah yeah so I there's a lot of violation yeah is what we've got is that the storm is there storm water retention required for this driveway is that what they're is that what we're talking about the grading permit well because it's over lot coverage by lot well I mean just for Paving a driveway was there does anyone know if there was a requirement for storm water like dry Wells and all that I don't is that is that what she's talking about there there would be at the figures they're at now 44% 3 is permitted would have triggered a and it's over 300 ft of impervious coverage Beyond what's permitted so it would trigger storm water management and that's the issue but is the applicant proposing to leave there what's there or we don't have like the engineer with the to topographical survey and all that to like I think fully address the yeah yeah to fully address those non-conformities so I don't know how we can speak to this without expert testifying yeah well that's what Ian I mean I'm happy to if we want to because what they were directed to bring yeah so you asking us to vote on the F but we're going to hear more from you later on the lot coverage saying at a subsequent hearing yes okay is that that does everyone understand that's what they're asking us to do do yes okay do we want it's not what I thought we were doing but okay that's what they're asking us to do I'm listening if we want to entertain that do we want to impose a condition that the subsequent application be submitted within a certain amount of time so that everything is addressed timely I think we would almost have to because otherwise the zoning officer is going to act a zoning officer acts to you're going to court so I think what we would need to hear from you is when do you anticipate having those plans finalized and being able to submit that application since the go ahead I I know the engineer just came out to to do the topographic survey uh so they'll be starting on their engineering work I don't think we would be able to make it to the next month's meeting but I would say that our goal would be to make the following month that way it would give the engineer time to put together all of their uh required documents submitted to the town uh give the town engineer time to review them give us feedback and make any appropriate adjustments give comments to the board and then when we come to the to that meeting we should be able to address all those concerns at one time and at that time our engineer you'd have storm water recommendations at that at that time I I would you know comparing what was previously done to what was done without permits right okay and I don't just to clarify I don't think it's actually the um the amount of impervious coverage over what's allowed I think it was the amount of increase I think that's the way your ordinance is written right so it would be 300 Square F feet if they increased their impervious coverage by 300 sare F feet over what was previously there then that's what would trigger the storm water but if if I'm not mistaken a a significant portion of the driveway walkways and all that stuff was added without a permit and contributes to that figure beyond what was permitted before so I I think you know chime in if we're wrong but I think they we well over 300 ft beyond what was prev previously permitted right yeah you know I have really no knowledge of what was there before it was all a surprise to me when we got the the review from uh Christa Anderson uh she has in the review comments a survey that shows I guess the state of the house uh when uh when they came in to request the permit so the vast majority of the driveway was there uh I think the areas in question are this little kickout on the driveway here in the center of the backyard in this patio space so I think those are the areas that differed from uh what was on the site when they purchased the property so it's over 300 ft yes Stephanie what do we have available in October so we either have the 7th or the 21st and you have space on enough space on either one which is your choice I mean I prefer it's whatever you think I mean the engineer has been very busy so that's part of been the I don't really know I and and and this will be with no additional adjournments we will hear it or dismiss it and if we dismiss it the zoning officer goes to work agree is that something that the rest of the board can go along with I know I feel like I'm dictator pushing I think we kind discussion before some of this yeah I think you're right all right um is it very saying the 21st which gives you as far far out as we can and I would um accept a motion without further notice which means you don't have to go through all that uh to Mr adjourn this are we bundling are we ders the the whole thing good yes you're going to present everything in one shot make it a break it but we don't need to Reen notice correct they okay they don't need to Ren notice that's what Joe was you want to re notice I think if you're doing an addition to your house I think you need to re notice I mean there's there's other stuff that that you're going to be bringing in correct now that you mention it I do believe the notice only specifically stated the three Dormers and it would silent about any additional coverage so because that would need to include the other variances that we're seeking that additional notice would be prompted unfortunately okay we can we can is that acceptable I'm seeing two different two different two different answers one from the professional and different from the applicant sounds like it's legally required so leg I don't think there's a choice right I strongly recommend that you have your civil engineer uh do a thorough accounting of all the work that's been done since you've taken possession of this house so we have a good understanding of before and after like like the got renovation from 201 11 and stuff walkways driveway size all the site the civil engineering and you will need to notice for anything that is new that was not prior approved yes that is that what would fit yep all all the new variances so yep October 21st correct here motion I would take a motion if possible so moved second okay I think I'd like to do this one by roll call Vice chair lit yes Mr Yuko yes Mr Nelson yes Miss Don yes Mr Malay Miss Chapo yes chairman Steiner yes the motion carries okay we'll see you then and please contact Stephanie contact you know the appropriate experts here at uh at Town Hall so that you come because the one thing we don't want to do is refer something back to the zoning officer for for court court court action we don't want to do that all thank you very much thank you all for your time okay we have a number of things to do still and I lost my place go ahead Stephanie I think you're up okay so we have a resolution for memorialization sorry uh it's uh 190 Kent Place Boulevard that's Jordan glassberg that's Block 14 2 lot 7 zb- 242242 the eligible voting members are chairman Steiner Mr Yugo Mr Nelson Miss Don Mr Kieran Mr Malay and Miss toad do we have someone uh would someone like to move that I'll move it okay and okay chairman Steiner yes Mr Yugo yes Mr Nelson yes Miss Don yes Mr Malay yes Miss to I mean whoops she's not here not here never mind Miss to yes okay the motion carries okay um the next one is little interesting it's um this one is not I don't know if we're going to vote on it or not tonight but it'sot not voting tonight it's just on for discussion it's on for discussion for a 4year extension so you want to explain it yeah so what happened was um this is 38 Ascot by the way so 38 Ascot way zb- 23- 2211 lock 4401 lot 40 it's Joe and Megan Del prit so what happened was they were approved for their variance they came here um they plan to put an addition on their home and then they noticed they had some mold in their bathroom so they had a mold infestation um and these renovation plans for the bathroom kind of uh now made them need to push everything back so they're asking for a 4 four-year uh extension variance request no no I mean Andy what do you think of I mean what could change between now and then what I mean and that that's the concern with extension going on that long is if the zoning changes then that's that's the point of limiting the approvals is to guard against those zoning changes that may occur within the time period so if you think it's more reasonable to cut down the extension that we're granting at this point to maybe half that maybe something less whatever the board is thinking um you know of course we now just recently bumped up our uh permit time frame to 2 years for all ongoing applications I don't believe this one fell within that recent change so it's um you know something to keep in mind on what we want to Grant here but yes the potential for a zoning changes what you want to guard against with delaying it out too long and why it's only for discussion tonight or so we could figure out where because they were requesting for and before I yeah when does there expire the they were just granted earlier this year I believe it was January so they they still have until January of 25 to pull the building permit so it could be a f it could be like five years really they would have five total and where that's right what yeah with two two okay would you suggest to them that that might be the appropriate request okay so wait two meaning two more they get two years from the expiration in January of so up to January 27 so that would give them three total but the same two-year extension were the same two-year period were given to every new application but they already have one I get that so they would have total of three before they'd have to come back no wait so everybody else is only getting two total everybody else is getting two but then they can go back for an extension okay and I think anybody who comes back for an extension on a two we're probably going to say one so it's three either way so in this case she's getting three they are getting three I'm good with two okay then we're just letting them know that and then their request will come back in writing right and we'll uh be able to see what their reasoning for it is which we now already know anyway oh so they have to formally ask it they're just trying to get our our thoughts I'm sorry trying to get our flance right now they formally asking right right because they're not at the deadline and because it's a significant can request that we thought it was best to discuss it in general and see where it was going before having a formal resolution on for adoption without knowing the time frames thanks and we offered them the opportunity to come to hear our discussion maybe they're watching on television but uh uh and they did decline to to uh to do that we have one more item of business okay so minutes yep so that's the minutes um these are from July 15th um I would ask for a Voice vote um and we would exclude the members who were not here that evening who aren't here now anyway it was Mr feskin and Mr Kieran um would anyone like to move the minutes so moved okay and second second all those in favor I any opposed okay the motion carries and the last item of business is to say you're done for the month of August our next meeting is September the 4th is there a motion to turn thank you all thank you Mr chairman