okay we're ready good evening we're going to call the regular January meeting of the Verona Zoning Board of adjustment to order at 8:02 p.m. on January 11th 2024 happy New Year okay would you please stand and join me in the Pledge of [Music] Allegiance Al to FL United States of America and to the Republic it stands one nation indivisible Li and justice for [Music] all thank you Madame secretary would you please read the notice of this meeting and call the role the notice sorry the notice requirements for the open public meetings act have been satisfied with respect to this meeting of the township of Arona Zoning Board of adjustment which is the being held in person in the ballroom of the Verona Community Center located at 880 Bloomfield Avenue Verona time and date of this meeting were included in the annual meeting notice posted in the community center and sent to the official newspapers of the township the Verona CER Grove times and the Star Ledger at least 48 Hours preceding the start time of this meeting the agenda and instructions on how to comment will be provided at the appropriate time all meetings are recorded those wishing to speak during any public comment period should only provide their name and municipality street addresses are not required please be advised that should a member of the public choose to State their street address it will not be redacted from the recording Mr Russo Mr Ryan here Mrs Murphy Brad Mrs Deo here Mr Lundy here Vice chair Weston here Mr chairman McGinley here our board attorney tonight is M Diana govern uh the engineer is not joining us and uh to my right is Paula Mendelson and she is our acting zoning officer I'm here today too oh who I miss you put me on the other side of the room and look what happened you're not even on my list and Mr Matthew here it's that seat it's that seat I gotta that is the start next month nobody sits there okay uh we'll start with some general information for the public this board deals with the issuance of variances from the Verona zoning ordinance that ordinance is establishes specific Rec requirements for the land use in the township and regulates not only the uses permitted but the size of the Lots setbacks required parking signs conditional uses and numerous other such regulations an applicant is never entitled to a variance applicants must meet specific criteria contained in the state Municipal land use law by satisfying certain legal standards of proof the burden is on the applicants to show that they should be granted the specific relief requested depending on the type of variance requested applicants will need to prove special reasons undue hardship a balance of benefits and other criteria these are legal proceedings public meeting notices have been published neighbors have been notified applicants and their representatives will provide sworn testimony and be subject to cross-examination any action this board takes at this meeting will be memorialized in a resolution document prepared by our legal council that will be reviewed and adopted typically at our next regular meeting at that time any variances granted will become effective that said we are a board that conducts its business in a fairly informal manner applicants are sworn in tell us what they want to do with their property and what they are asking the board to do board members will question Witnesses and then members of the public May question those Witnesses at the conclusion of the testimony members of the public may make a statement regarding the application after closing the public portion of the application the board will deliberate and render a decision if you're following along on the agenda we are now up to item D approval of minutes these would be the minutes from our regular meeting held on December 14th 2023 everyone should have gotten a copy of those and read them if you didn't I'll give you eight seconds now and uh you can probably get through them and I guess we'll need someone other than Mr Lisa to tell us that they've read the minutes make a motion to approve the minutes from the December 14th meeting thank you I'll second again all those in favor please say I I I any opposed any extensions I Aban okay resolutions we have none there were no applications reviewed at the December meeting so we do not have any res resolutions at this time to work on which moves us into new business under new business item number one application are you both testified yes okay so each of you would you please the name and uh name on the record sure PA bie please raise your right hand you swear firm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing about the truth yes yes oh you can be seated please it once it stays right [Music] see okay we'll turn it over to you if you would be so kind as to tell us well if you wait one second okay okay here we go now your microphones work okay yep and we have a full board for the record M Murphy Brado is here okay if you would what we'd like you to do is tell us what your project is what you need us to do okay so I'm the contractor I'm trying to install a generator at uh at her home uh she doesn't well I don't know if it's um if you can't install them in the sidey yard in in Verona um or there's not enough side set I don't I don't remember uh but in order if we had to locate the generator in the rear of the house it's um it's a very long distance and uh it would be a financial hardship for her um to actually locate it back there it's substantially more and she'll she'll go over the financial hardship yeah good okay right okay um yeah I um live at 15 West Lincoln Street I um have a my father is very sick and I have a disabled son um that's where the financial hardship comes in um as it is uh my son is has autism and uncontrolled epilepsy he's you know the financial part of taking care of him is is just extraordinary um and we need this generator because both basically my father uh who was 81 and very sick and my son who's disabled uh if if the power goes out the how would we get I get him out of the house we have a lift that goes up and down the stairs because we have three flights of stairs and we have lifts but if the electricity goes out there is no lift to get them out of the house and neither one of them will get out from the second floor where they basically sleep you know so just for the record the zoning board typically does not deal with finances taxes Financial hardships usually it's hardships of the property so in this case if you could tell us a little bit more about the property where you'd like to put the generator and maybe some sort of a description of your neighbors well the neighbor be the the bank at the corner because I'm on the corner and the uh the bank the um what is it the Citizens Bank is right next to me and that's the side of the house that we would be putting in so where the generator would go AB buts the parking lot of the bank on the leftand side of the house okay so the the noise coming from your generator would be going at best to the parking lot of the bank and right and that and there is a little bit of a there's a quite a bit of a strip between me and the bank so it's like not like I can walk out of my house and then I just step into the bank parking lot there's a n we're on a hill and there's a nice little break of woods and trees also the the uh her property then drops way down to where there's a wall and then that starts the bank's parking right so I like I in order to get to the parking lot of the bank I have to actually physically walk around the corner okay you know there's so it just doesn't seem that it's really impacting uh any of her neighbors as you could see uh I don't believe any of them are here we're pretty sure they're not outside we did unlock the doors yes and go how often is the test run to make sure that the generator is working well we could it normally uh it would run five minutes in an exercise mode once a week uh the new ones have a um a quiet mode so they'll run at 1,00 RPM so it's relatively relatively quiet or we could run it once a month for five minutes I mean we can adjust in the computer how uh how often it runs its exercise the decb are I think they're 65 at 10 ft so once you're back uh 20 or 30 feet yeah it's really not obnoxiously loud kind of like a back plaque blower is uh 85 DB so it's a big difference Mr chairman I I I did drive by your house just uh uh out of curiosity after I looked over the application am I correct in saying there's already an air conditioning a central air conditioning unit on in that area it would be on the same side right it would be on the same side yes so have you had any complaints about without noise or anything from the central air conditioning no never not not much I'm only say and that would probably operate more let's say if I'm the summer backup generator would ever would ever go on in terms of uh you know making a noise situation obviously unless there was an outage and uh but outside of that it's just going to run its exercise can you give us a little more information about why the back is so is is is so prohibitive I mean since it's supposed to be put there I'm just curious why you don't think you can do it um it's probably 80 90 ft away so uh and then there's a crawl space that would have to be gone through it's it's a much it's a very difficult installation and uh there's a a wooden deck there so it would kind of have to stay away from the deck the co the uh manufacturer specifications are uh 18 in from any well could be a combustible or any non-combustible but really two feet is what we would normally do to have some space to work behind it I never really have a high uh I I don't like uh putting them in certain situations I don't like putting them by you know decks the the wood dries out it's just for me it's a not a safe location and literally it adds 80 plus feet worth of uh conductors from the generator to the transfer switch and gas line so the further away you go the larger The Gas Pipe gets it just exponentially gets uh more difficult and serviceability it's you know in a snowstorm if something had to be done to it it would be you don't have to go through the whole side to get it back take a little uh slend back there okay you mentioned about the difficulty and I sympathize with your your situation uh with you need a a li the the essential reason for your backup necessity is you operate lifts to get your father and your son from the second floor down son exactly and um my son also um when he has a seizure he's on oxygen after that your father on oxygen my my father does well he also has a script for oxygen he's not on it 247 but he does have the oxygen tank and my son does and without electricity you can't you know there would we know and if so if he if we ever had a power outage there would have to be um he would have to go to somewhere El like a hospital or something because I couldn't be I couldn't get the oxygen to work okay thank you Mr chairman yeah so is is the application you notice everything is in order notice this correct on this one yes so the neighbors were served and have any neighbors uh at this meeting okay the board have any other questions for these applicants is that your vinyl fence uh yes well um no part of it I think is ours and some of it is the banks because the some of it did one time during the storm come down and the bank did replace it it and I don't think I mean we just had a discussion about it get into like legal aspects of it and they said don't replace it so I'm thinking that fence fence part of that fence is theirs and part of it is towards the back is ours is our head but I think the front part of the fence where the generators would be might be theirs but it's it's all on the same property line it's that's the property line I I don't know is the fence behind the uh the uh cement or is it on my side or their side I can't remember but it's very words walk in like inches yeah it's you point4 feet inside okay I'm just I'm getting at there's a retaining wall that's that's right it's on top of the retaining wall exactly retaining wall yes so if it's on the side of the bank of the retaining wall it's the banks and then if it's on obviously my side it's on my it's my fence but when I remember when the bank came in they um when the bank came in they um they put it up because they wanted it they wanted the fence there actually the bank was here and applied for a variance and part of the requirement was that they put a fence along the top of that retain oh okay they had to do it they had they didn't want to do it they had want to do it yeah they did though yeah they did am I correct in assuming and follow up on Mr L's point that the bank was notified that the generator NE so they would have got yeah I'm sure they got double check okay is there anyone from the public who has a question for these Witnesses okay without any further questions is there anyone from the public who would like to make a statement about this application hearing none I would close the public portion of the application and open it to board deliberation this is pretty straight forward from my perspective Mr chairman you know the the any offending noise um from this Machinery is going out into a parking lot um you know we we have review circumstances similar to this where the next door neighbor is in much closer proximity and we've branded variances particularly over the last six months I don't know how many cases we've had but more than one uh so I have no problem with with graning the variance I don't see that it it ta the the uh uh purpose of of the zoning uh in inter I would have to agree any kind of negative impacts are so minimal um that it it's not I would vote in in favor of this application you uh just a quick question now you said that you can schedule the how it runs like for its testing um and think what time during the day we want something like this Set uh I mean obviously probably like a early afternoon or something like that time frame so this way it doesn't impact like any type of dinner we could set the day in the time that uh that it runs its exercise like I said it only runs five minutes in an exercise mode the newest uh models are able to run in an exercise mode they normally run at 3600 RPM but they run at 18800 RPM when they run in exercise mode so you it's it's quieter than the air conditioner when it runs DB is not yeah it's even it's even less than that it's like 40 DB when it's running in exercise mon is this a condition and if it is what are what's the hour of time frame that you would like to make sure that it stays within I just don't want it to be like an early morning so let's just say you know to run between or test mode not between like 5 in the I'll start the evening hours 9:00 p.m. to like 10:00 a.m. so as long as it go between 10 a.m. yeah so normally uh as a default we normally set them up for uh Saturday at 10: a.m. as far as concern okay I just had the question just and this is just a very technical point and I have no problem with where they want to put the the general I asked about the notification only because since it is a business does the actual business location get notified or is owner of the property the owner of the property okay so the bus so somebody if they're renting the property just my own clarification if they're renting the property they really have no legal state or they don't have legal standing but if their landlord advises them that this is an application that might be of interest to them they could come and say something because they would they would be irrelevant OB but the landlord is under no obligation necessarily to notify that no okay all right just curious I say this not knowing what it says in their lease right otherwise otherwise okay thank you yeah I don't have any any problems with this either I mean the the noise from just the cars going down Bloomfield Avenue is going to significantly watch out anything that the generator would do plus just in terms of screening I know a lot of times we talk about screening as a condition of approval um doesn't seem to be necessary in this case it's so elevated there's a retaining wall there's ear fence up there and it's way in the back so I don't have any issues with it sound it sounds like the uh the direction of the conversation is going in One Direction I'll make a motion to approve application 20235 second thank you Larry all right we may have a roll call vote Mr Ryan I am voting tonight yes you're ulate you have to get the clarification here okay yes M Mrs Murphy Brado yes Mrs dartolo yes Mr Lund hi Mr Matthew yes Vice chair Le yes chair MC yes by my count the motion passed we will have a resolution drawn up and approved at our next meeting and uh good luck with your install in good weather yes thank you take care good we learned if you would just remain standing our Council will swear you in have we have your names sure uh full name is BOS b a r t o s z agus uh you can call me Bart Doo svar D go last name is Silverio silver iio you're both going to testify yeah yes please raise your right hand do I the um do you swear our firm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing about the truth I do I do please be seated okay thank you Council notice in order for this application yes it is Mr chairman thank you all right gentlemen if uh you'd like to tell us what uh what You' like to do as long as it's not something like putting in a deck so so it occurred to me yesterday especially had a few of you come by the property I I printed out a photo if it helps give you a visual I don't I didn't attach it to the packet I don't know if I could hand it out now if it's too late uh yes but give it to Kathleen to Market an exhibit sure and we will keep it that's fine think I have enough one that that would be a one I have one more here that somebody needs have one for each person okay thank you yeah so I yeah so I guess I'll just begin so um yeah so we're looking to put in a deck in our yard and I brought this visual here just to give you an idea of where it's going to go so where we were hoping to put the deck is kind of where you see the staircase uh here on the left hand side and it would extend to kind of right before the bushes right before the window there and then it would come out to sort of where the bottom of that picture is covering the most of that patio and the little grassy area to the left um so one of the variances I'm here to talk about is regarding the deck height so where so as you can see on the I don't know if it's visible from the picture but we do live on a hill Maple Terrace and there is a slope all over the property and uh on the left hand side it's about four foot four feet and change and then once it comes out towards a little further out to the yard it hits the six feet which is against against the 4 foot requirement so that one it's just a little hard to it's a little hard to justify given the slope of the land and living on a hill and where that first floor is kind of located to get to meet that requirement uh the other requirement is the uh I believe it's called the uh deck area relative to the existing glowing footprint so like I said we have this patio that we just wanted to cover and given where the door is where the patio is and kind of how it curves with the the pavers by the basement door we just wanted to cover that area and it just happens to exceed that 20% limit if that makes sense and uh just to also add uh a few of my neighbors especially two of which which are directly around me they also have the elevated deck um one they don't have the stair one of them doesn't have stairs we we have stairs in this plan and the other one it's not wooden it's kind of got blocks but uh so it is on par with what the neighbors have in the area least directly around me and that's I mean that's pretty much it if you have questions okay yeah just to make sure confirming my understanding um the height of the deck is going to be similar to where the I would say the landing the top Landing of the where the stairs are now near the it's going to be exactly that okay and just extend extend yeah so once it extends out especially as it comes sort of towards the bottom there it hits that oh it's about approximately six feet okay so it is a little difficult to tell the change of elevation from uh from this in the photo but if I'm looking at the back of the house now so it does slope from uh your property slopes from left to right from from from left to right yeah and it and it does uh at the end of The Patio there which I real probably should have captured in this photo it does slope down after that patio which is where that kind of bigger drop to six feet comes into play okay and uh can you describe any kind of uh Shrubbery or your you know along the um property lines to both sides as to if you know you have clear views into the neighbor's yards partial views blocked by trees bushes so on and so for sure so so on the left hand side uh where where you actually see the landing there are two big uh I don't know what you call them like bushes trees so that's actually um obviously in the spring and fall it would be essentially blocking the neighbor's yard and but those are the ones that have the elevated deck uh on the other side we also have shrubs they're not they're not that tall they're just kind of plants I don't know the term for them but they're just they're not they're not six feet tall we do have plants on that side but um if you look over here there are these taller bushes we have that do extend my my neighbors on that side have a patio and these bushes on the right hand side do cover the patio area where they have a barbecue and seating and such and then on oh one more and then on the the other side we have Evergreens for for the back side of the property uh that we planted to give some privacy but the neighbor also has two smaller smaller trees that fill in uh over the spring and summer months okay and uh what are your plans to do with the pavers that exist there currently are you keeping them are you doing anything different so I I did see the recommendation from the environmental board and I I do want to be helpful where I can it just my only concern is potential water in the basement I've been very fortunate not to have any issues with water in the basement but I some of my neighbors across the street have so I don't know I don't know what impact that would have to to that uh I can possibly consider moving some of them but I'd like to keep at least those closer to the house if possible because of that concern thank you follow on Mr West's point the the papers uh you know full disclosure I I did go and look at the propy personally and uh I I I guess the papers themselves right now they consider to be P perious or impervious impervious imper there's also question in the argumental report about the the d f all the way over on the right uh is it's appears that it's currently going into the directly into the storm drain I guess I suggested maybe uh you know just having a drain out onto the onto the property I don't know if that's not so I did have issues with that specific down spout um I think it was about a year or two ago and I tried to trace it goes to the front of uh roughly to the the front side of my house I don't know where it goes unfortunately but it doesn't go to the street or anything I think it just drains into the ground because uh I did have some water coming up about a year or two ago I ended up clearing what I could and it's cleared up ever since but I don't I don't know if it I mean I can't say for sure that it doesn't go into the storm drain but I I don't see a a line going out to the street or anything I believe it just drains into the ground if if that helps um there may be a line down the center between Maple and morning side morning side's on the other side the other side yeah which one's Maple Maran yeah there may be a line down the middle of those properties uh okay that takes it all the way down because we've had complaints from people on South Prospect yeah I mean we we've I mean this side of the lot I mean my neighbors have done some work uh to essentially help with drainage I possibly maybe to push it to the front rather than the back so people have can still use their yard a little bit down further down the hill um but I mean I I don't know where that information is outside digging up the whole lot we're not going to make you do that okay crossed our minds but we didn't okay so how does um are there any other questions about the height variance I just had one question if did finish with the height I had one question about the um you exceeded the 20% building requirement um yeah is the act is the figure that's in your denial letter 43.2% that exceeds 20 by a lot correct yeah um that's an accurate that's an accurate number yeah that's so when um the the previous acting uh sarine I don't know if I remember her name but she she asked me to include the stairs and that's kind of what kicked it over the the 40% but yeah so it does um yeah I mean it's just the way I mean I suppose we could sort of bring It a little closer to the house because it does extend I think like a little bit to the to to the green that you see here so I guess we could put it a little towards exactly where that patio ends because I really would like to to match what we have there with the with the way the papers are here on the side so that might bring it I don't know what the number is but I assume it bring it under 40 I don't know if there's a ideal number we're looking for not looking for necessarily an ideal number but the relative it's 40% relative to the size of your house right well 20% is the the law right 20% is what you're permitted um so would you be telling me that your house is undersized would would I be telling you that my house is under well I mean it is two stories uh so the footprint the foot I mean I don't know if I would say it's undersized but I mean we do would like the deck for a sort of an outdoor space but yeah I mean at two degrees it is under side yes yes they are very small houses in this section we make the best of what we can meaning under siiz in relation to the overall size of a lot right I gota not even just that just everything is like undersized everything yeah yeah not just the the size of the lot but just even in general from um the square footage from from one floor that it's not that the the size of the deck is that outrageously large it's just in comparison a lot of it doesn't espe the older your house uh 1939 coming up on its 100y old birthday sort a lot of changes since I do have uh let's see one thing that I might think might be an error um okay I looked at the rear yard setback okay your existing rear yard setback according to the application is 45.5 ft and the proposed is 30 so that Delta would be 15t right uh okay yes so that suggests that the depth of the deck off of the exterior back facade is 15 fet according to the plan it says that it's 20 feet oh so yeah so this is this is part of the I guess it's a little bit of a confusion so I thought it was to the base of the because the the stairs kind of threw me off with this entire application so it is if you look at my uh drawing on the one sec yeah so if you look at the drawing the the the setback is to the kind kind of excluding the stairs if if it makes sense [Music] the proposed deck and forgive me coming out now Beyond where the current pages are exclusive of the staircase but forget about the staircase a little bit yeah I don't I don't know the exact it does come out a little onto the grph correct so so chrisy I see your point but it still would not require another Varian so if would include the stairs it would still be up 25 ft or so uh no the rear yard set back there is 30 so that would trigger another variants I thought it's 20 ft is the briard setback we have the book Cy I'm pretty sure it's 30 so it's 30 in almost every zone for for the yeah for the for R50 I'm just going by did not help it says 30 right yeah it should be I'm sorry it says 20 with a proposed setback of 30 okay um yeah on the denial list it says a rear line setback of 20 fet y 30 ft according to R okay I'm trying to understand that um because I'm looking at the uh survey that they marked and it's showing 35 feet to the indented part of the deck um I'm I'm not I'm trying to understand like to make sure there's not a variance what the actual setac number is for the res solution it's a little hard to say without kind of a fully scale drawing but if if this description is direct at 45.5 ft as exting from the exterior wall to the back property line and the required setb is 30t that leads 15t for the to play with this proposed de is 20 where are you seeing the 45 number just my oh gotcha a little hard to say survey but it's noted on this all right so it would be my suggestion if the board is going to tweak this that you say a number that can be enforced so and a way to measure it either from the back property line or from the home however you're going to to figure that out so that it's clear so I believe I think I I think I understand what happened um and I believe the application should be 50 instead of 45 because I when I measured it I I think there might have been a timing issue from when I submitted the application to when I when I when I submitted uh I guess sort of this drawing here so if I'm remembering correctly the 35 was was correct and then it 35 Plus the 15 and a half to bring it up to about 50 so the actual uh setback is about 50 from the existing house to from the existing house to the end of the property is 50 feet and then the drawing would be 15 feet for the deck and then 35 for the property or for the for the uh remaining of the from the setback from the sort of the base of the deck to the end of the property in general I see that the the stairs are included as part of the as part of the de so the stairs are estimated about 4 feet right generally the stairs at least when I do these stairs that's the main part of yeah I mean so I mean the stairs are 4T so it would be 31 instead of 35 so just apology IES for the I'm what I'm guess I'm driving at is I I think the the the number I have here on the application is incorrect and just for the record the deck is considered an accessory structure in this case it's not because attached to the house according to according to our book a permitted accessory use B5 is a deck either attached or unattached all right I just sort of did some rough math the only reason is if that's if that's the case then the accessory only has to be 10 ft from the rear property line which would negate the need for another variance yeah so I just did the rough calculations and you're at 31.3 8 with the 20t deck would be the rear set back with existing yes yeah so I I added all the numbers from the survey so we're at with the 20ft deck the setback would be at 31 ft 38 in 38 so there's no additional variance just that's the just under 400 feet yeah there's been a lot of math during this whole process just for the record um it says here that you you prepared the drawings of the deck correct y um well I mean so this is this is my contractor he G he did give input in terms of uh you know some of the input here but yes okay I I was just interested in determining the level of professionalism that went into preparing the deck description because it looks pretty good thank you okay are there any other questions for our applicants concerning their deck or the two variances they require um did you speak with your Neighbors on either side to discuss the deck with them yeah I spoke with uh all the Neighbors on my street and then the rear kind of the opposite side on morning side yeah no I mean like I said two of them have decks uh the other one I think is might recruit me for my services if I get disapproved uh so but um no yeah everybody seems to be on board I think a lot of people in the area have gone through it so they're very supportive of The Proposal I had one other question I'm sorry and I'm sorry if I missed this before um um are you anticipating putting in more Pavers at the bottom of your new stairs to connect to the driveway nope no no uh no and at the back of your property um there used to be at least according to Google Maps there was like the street views there was a bunch of trees very tall trees at the back and I don't are they there are they still there I still have the one giant tree that scares me every time the wind blows uh and my neighbor has the two trees and we also planted uh six or seven Evergreens a couple years ago that are going to grow okay no we didn't remove any trees okay I guess I don't have to ask is there anyone from the public who has a question of these Witnesses um and I'm going to go out on a Lin and say there's no one from the public who'd like to make a statement about these applications so we will close the public portion of the application and go to deliberation what's the general consensus on the variance for the height of the deck at this point you're a victim to the the property that you're on um I don't see the need to have to create steps coming down from that first floor to meet the height requirements so Ian personally I'm okay with the height yeah I I certainly don't see a problem with d okay all right the height is a hardship of the land how about the 43.2% um variance required for the permitted deck area yeah I mean I I don't have any issues with the the size I mean I know the percentage seems large but I believe that's because the the house is on a smaller side from the um kind of square footage I mean it's a 382 square foot deck so it doesn't seem um out of proportion actually seems quite functional usable um anything smaller kind of limits what you could do with the deck and and again it kind of fits into the let's say landscape of the of the yard given the the uh um the percentage of improved lot coverage I think is more critical than than uh the whole comparison of the deck to the footprint of the building particularly in the circumstance where you have a u substandard lot you've got a 5258 square foot lot um you know we've we've certainly granted enough variances with lots that are substandard substandard being just DET term that it's it's smaller than than the Zone not any inference about your property sir um so that being the case I would have no problem I think that the the the comparison of the um uh the deck to the footprint of the building is superseded by by the the U positive aspects uh of the improved lot coverage where it's still on to 40% are there any other thoughts on the uh lot coverage well I guess I'll get started um so South Prospect um floods horribly horribly horribly horribly um a point completely taken about the size and scale and the proportions and everything else and I wholeheartedly agree with that um but I think that we really have to take into account what's happening at the other end of the street here um I know those neighbors aren't here maybe they don't quite you know understand that this is like death 5,000 Cuts kind of thing if we keep granting these kind of little variances then all of a sudden they're going to have you know massive flooding and they already do um am I allowed to chime in in this part or no no [Laughter] um anyway so I'm I'm I'm certainly sympathetic and and I know that everybody does it and just because everybody doesn't doesn't make it right makes it common um which isn't always right chrisy can I ask you are you saying this would exacerbate what would anything more than what's currently there well no I mean it it it would probably be kind of a wash but that wash doesn't make wash right I I understand that but you know and once again I'm one of the newer members here but uh uh you know points are made I guess basically I know that other variances have been granted in similar situations and uh I guess you know is it we're still supposed to treat these as individual uh Standalone kind of yeah we're always making reference to that uh so my question to you would be would there be any uh mitigation or condition if you to get your vote to approve it that they could do to alleviate some of your concerns um just outright denying the application no I mean honestly I mean even if you left everything as it is today it's still a problem you know um it's well for example if they pulled the papers up that still wouldn't uh it still still wouldn't make it better that would help but then they would you know that would prevent them from living the life that they want to live right right well well I mean pulling the paper is up with the deck but you're saying it would make no difference in other words one of the recommendations from the environmental commission was that basically the way I read it was if you allow it the deck to go up to pull the papers out underneath the applicant had expressed concerns then about the effect it would have on on possibly water getting into his basement okay but I don't think he was totally opposed osed to considering that that's that was my understanding of it if it might alleviate some of your uh it could make things better basically if you had a deck and just just dirt underneath wouldn't that still absorb more than what the papers still I well I mean if water's getting in there water's getting in there oftentimes it has to do with the the conditions of the drainage system on the outside not the pavers not the decking okay it's going to penetrate it's going to penetrate um and from personal experience I have a raised deck and I pulled all the paper this is one before all this storm water matter stuff but I purposely took papers out from under the deck to alleviate some of the concerns on my own property that the water wouldn't pool and that seems to have been successful I don't have I have a deck there are holes between the you know the boards on the deck so the water does eventually get into the ground but it doesn't sit on the top of a paper it goes into the soil and it does drain better than to me than when I had Lally just papers down there where would pull on the papers and sit there for a while so I know you have bigger engineering background than I have but I'm just going by my own anecdotal experience with having a raised deck and and no papers underneath it does seem to dra to me in in my situation it drains better but that's why I suggested you know maybe mitigating some of the concerns about water you know running off and right not having the papers other thing just to point out is the the the negative space that's generated by this is you know 30 feet 31 feet or whatever it is that's roughly the size of the ceiling Coffer so that is the extent of your of your grass then right just to kind of give everyone a frame of preference of you know um how much grass would be available keep in mind you can still put more Pap that would still be within our no I I again I I understand I I I totally get the math there's just something about this that's I appreciate the concerns but I I I think I'd go back to the fact that neighbors have been notified the application uh is in order if there are flooding concerns that the neighbors have they had the opportunity to present those concerns in an open form and they're not here and we've just gone through a substantial rain event we have another substantial rain event uh facing us so I mean for my money if it's a if it's a problem on South Prospect enough for Neighbors to be concerned they ought to be here I think the application needs to be uh viewed based on the information we have and based on the fact that none of the neighbors and the applicant has testified that he has spoken directly with neighbors on either side and across the street and in the rear of his property um so he's done the legal point of notifying the neighbors as part of the application he's gone out and he's spoken directly in terms of his testimony that he has spoken to neighbors that are in close proximity to his property I don't think that it's it's uh um appropriate that that we assume that that uh this is going to either be detrimental U to any flood conditions that it's going to exacerbate that that's circumstance because I think that you know the fact that the neighbors who may be affected by this haven't shown up so to me the application has to to stand on what's presented not on on uh you know other circumstances that may or may not um be affected by by this variance if I can follow up to you for on Larry's Point with putting this deck just putting the deck up would it be any worse than the current conditions on the property I mean in your opinion no okay one thing that we we do have to take into consideration that okay the neighbors may not be here but we have to be able to advise on storm water whether neighbors are here or not because most neighbors will not understand right because I actually do think that this was brought to the council several years years ago with some residents on South Prospect I'm 100% sure it was you know the whole the whole issue look we all just had to sit down and watch a whole presentation on storm water management so it should all be fresh no I mean it should it's certainly fresh in our minds we had to get in TR and after the David that we were you know brought up to speed on the state's requirement uh and uh so I I think the discussion certainly is valid I I'm not you know uh questioning your your desire to maybe see the situation if not mitigated but we have a conundrum and as Larry has said though you know we're now applying a standard that was not apply to other variances that uh that this board granted I I don't think we're Bound by precedent but you know I think we certainly have to consider you know the uh well you know the effect the other thing is on the second page of the denial letter is the the sentence strong wag is exempts since increase impervious is under 400 square ft so then it's not an issue so no it's not not an issue there's just extra mitigation procedures that you need to take if you're disturbing more than 400 square F feet it's not that they don't apply no I understand that but we don't have any kind of measurable parameters and we have no dialogue with any neighbors that have have expressed a concern on this so I don't know how you would would manage what mitigation needs to to happen given those circumstances you're operating in the dark as far as as I can [Music] tell it's somewhat similar to the November meeting where we had the application for the pool and the gentleman came in with all of it is data in detail explaining why the flooding was occurring um it's I guess our job is is very localized however a lot of little localized makes the flooding on an Street and the flooding on South Prospect um in this case I think the applicant has managed to move around the requirements the deck is smaller than would include storm water management efforts um I'm not going to assume that the applicant would put in storm water management facilities um on your property uh if they're not required so it it's not something we can make a condition it's unenforcable well which is why I just asked chrisy the question is this going to make the situation in my mind if it's not going to make it any worse I I'm essentially agreeing with you and that that you know uh putting the deck up is not going to exacerbate was already there in terms of storm water runoff so I'd be inclined to say which I think you're seem to be moving towards I don't want to you know put words in your mouth but it seems to be you're moving towards you know granting the uh uh the various and you know I mean you know I'm not I I would be accepting of it yeah although my friend did move from South Prospect of Forest Avenue so he could make the water as opposed to being I mean quite frankly I I would I'm more concerned with it's not Pur of this board I'd be more concerned about where that Downs spout is emptying out in terms of your problem with you know water rain down to South Prospect who knows but that's not us that's not for us to decide but if we had a down spout that we didn't know where it went we'd be interested in knowing where it goes yeah well that's what especially if you're getting a little water in the basement yeah I can tell you from having dug up several it's amazing where they go yeah I haven't had issues that I'm aware of so put them back before you you the neighbor notices you're in his his Bight line okay folks um it sounds as though we may be moving beyond uh the need to discuss any more the the maximum permitted deck area can I ask one other thing I'm sorry of the applicants uh the the size of this deck it's um 15 six 15 and a half ft deep have you considered shrinking it at all would you would you consider shrinking it um so I mean we are open to you know to being supportive any way we can I I I don't have the number but I would be open to bringing it in towards where the patio is because like I said it does extend a little to the deck I I think it might be like a foot or so I I I can measure and get back to you all um but I am open to doing [Music] that where is it about a foot now more over where the end of the patio is the proposed deck well they may have to pull some papers up to put the footage in which I don't think is a major difficulty you wouldn't have to take all the papers out each just have to pull pull the ones out where they're going to put the footings so would the applican agree then that the the deck would not uh extend out beyond the existing line of of the patio yeah sure I think I can do that I mean if ideally I like to keep it as is um IDE I'd like to win the lottery I don't I don't I don't I don't want to cause any trouble so yeah no no but I mean we want to be reasonable if we're going to cond you know if we're going to Grant a variance and there's going to be conditions um but the conditions have to make some sense to you otherwise you know we we're uh we're not really fully doing our job which is dictating right want to ask your contractor that's going to present any more problems to be quite honest with I want to ask my wife but she's not give me one second I mean it I mean if I have to make a request so I mean the way we the patio as you see here is you know we have a chair we have a table and chairs and a barbecue and it does seem a little tight so if I have to choose that I'd like to keep it as is if possible good silence is good think everybody's thinking all right I just for the record I I don't have a problem with the size of the deck as as proposed okay pretty sure I don't have a problem with the size of the deck as proposed either because there's nothing worse than a deck that's not usable my parents have a deck that is completely not usable because it's too small and it's just silly so I'll make a motion to approve application 2023 d 16 as presented in the in application I'll second we have a roll call vote Mr Ryan Yes Mrs Murphy Brado yes Mrs DeBartolo no Mr Lundy hi Mr matthewson yes Vice chair West yes chairman McGinley hi by my count the motion passed and we will have a resolution drawn up and vote on that at our next meeting now it's probably not the greatest time to start but good luck with your construction um so just just for my understanding so now you can't get a permit until we do the resolution yeah so it goes to I think after it goes to the build uh building inspector right so it just gets automatically moved on to the next phase right no no right once once the resolution is um drawn up it will come back to the board to be memorialized once that is done you will take the resolution you'll use that you don't need a zoning permit because the resolution will be your zoning permit and then you'll need to submit to the building departments for all all the plans and fill out all the jack and permits for them okay thank you appreciate your time luck okay all the best all right folks that moves us for the record anybody who's here for the third application well I don't think so it's not necessary to hang around and wait we have moved that it may be in the febru meeting okay so please nobody throw away your plans that you received for that um application because it is looking to move to February 8th hold on to your paperwork is there any reason for us to go into executive session this evening hearing none um has everyone had a chance to meet our new office office hello everybody you free to caller with question I don't have uh the all the license yeah yeah I am an architect in Brazil I'm a licensed architect too and uh trying to switch cers would there be situations Mr chairman where if the application was very complicated we still have to call in an engineering firm in yeah yes and how would that be determined I'm just curious on my own I mean if somebody looked at the you know if Kathleen looked at this thing and there was like I don't know five or six different variances required to do something who would determine what kind of experts I guess I'm asking would we need to to conduct the hearing with I I send the application out to different people to review the environmental and it goes to the engineer so if the engineer Mr tenkate did not feel he needed to be here tonight for these these applications but if it is one that will require more of an engineering review so he would he will actually do a report and then he would attend the meeting okay and then the chairman will look at the report and asum and no no well you know I know we've had situations where we felt we needed more expertise here than we've had and hopefully that situation has you know been addressed and uh you know hopefully no fingers crossed which is why I'm raising that uh that point for my own benefit that's what we're hoping hoping that we're coming out of that tail no and and I don't mean to apply none of these applications tonight fall into that category I just saying that as a as a general question and also when packets are sent to you when you do your review if you have a concern that you feel we need to bring the engineer in we can make the request to bring the engineer in even if he didn't say he needed to be here based on what the board would like and Kathleen I'd like to compliment you on the the way you put these applications together and the fact that you got them to us is very far in advance of when the actual uh you know meeting was so so thanks a lot I appreciate it and I hope I speak for the members of the board want to say because you weren here last week I got it and thought I had Thursday so if anybody has any complaints about the way we're changing the Varity registration or whatever it was here I'll take bre so I okay CH motion toour the meeting Mr chair love to hear a motion to I'll make that motion our next meeting is February 8th and we have at least two hour appliations yeah and I'm going to hold it hold it at two because duing okay good way to start the new year did we get a motion and anour second yeah a second don't require a second unanimous noever no one's ever voted okay thank you