##VIDEO ID:s03mWekUV0s## that that has been busy they've been busy the meeting of the board of adjustment for the Bure of Summerville for July July September 18 will please come to order adequate notice of this meeting has required by the open public meeting act has been that on January 18 2024 a copy of the notice was copy of the meeting notice was posted in the burough Hall given to the clerk administrator mailed ta to email to The Courier News and post on the burough website if any member believes that this meeting is being held in violation of the open public meeting act please State your views at this time these proceedings are of a Judicial nature proper judicial decorum must and will be maintained only those items that uh are on the agenda will be addressed next item roll call chairman Adair here Mr allet here M carpinet here Mr mlin Mr O'Neal here Mr bimy here Mr Flores here Mr Alvarez here Mr Daniels here we have a quum would someone move that Morgan's absence be recorded as excused second all in favor okay next roll call I to flag of United States of America to the stands Nation God indivisible liy and justice for all we'll suspend with the reading of the minutes they're not on on the agenda for tonight uh resolution Mr chairman resolution I see you've been doing a lot of emailing on it left I was goingon to say we got it all we're all squared away um uh the resolution for 25 West High has to deal with the the establishment of a group home and a conversion of a uh commercial property essentially uh professional property to uh a uh four resident group home with two full-time uh staffers um as you know the resolution is fairly lengthy I trust that uh I trust that the board will understand that that's in keeping with the complexity of the application I did get some requested revisions kind of late from Mr uh salvaji I made those and uh every and and and from the uh and from the planner and everything is up to speed and ready to go certainly commended to the board for adoption I did send this over to you you know uh I I sent the revised copy over to you as well so okay so like to move the resolution I move second second any discussion yeah I I think we should put on the record at least anybody who's listening or two of them that this facility will pay taxes it's not tax exemp oh yeah it's right in the resolution yeah I just want that anybody to know that that this is not a free ride there is no tax exemption for either the applicant or the property owner so we got it on the record that'll make the 12 people who watch this meeting very happy that's that's 11 more than I thought I what I thought with uh some I think it was C at one point we were at 12 people does um roll call please chairman yes Mr allet yes Miss carpinet yes Mr O'Neal yes Mr vinsky yes Mr Flores yes Mr Alvarez yes okay next item on the agenda the hearing for East Main Street Mr chairman yeah good evening Mr chairman members for the record Larry C on behalf of the applicant sonoko LLC we're going to try to keep it as brief as we can this evening on Direct Mr chairman there's we like brief what's up I'm sorry we like brief we we do too but I've been getting text to my four kids are going crazy at home so I'm in no rush to go home so I may talk a little slower than normal but we'll try to keep it limited could be worse they could be teenagers yeah I'll find out yeah so very briefly Mr chair before I introduce our Witnesses tell you what we're here to do um the sooko station has been there for a number of years the applicant who is sooko uh is in charge as as far as ownership and maintenance and operations of various sooko stations obviously throughout the country and New Jersey has been undertaking branding improvements to the sokos this has been primarily limited to signage improvements um and upgrades and the like that's what brings us here tonight did we approve this about 10 years ago this was before the board previously Mr chairman that's right so this application is very limited it's primarily just signage improvements but the Delta is all downward adjustments the new signage is not garish it's not larger it's not more intense than what's there it's actually ends up being smaller it's updated branding but the numbers actually are coming down quantitatively on the overall square footage and the like so we've got a limited um compliment of witnesses here tonight we've got our project engineer John Anderson from Cornerstone engineering who prepared the plans that on record with the board John will testify shortly he'll walk you through the site what's there today The Limited changes tomorrow he'll identify the relief that we trigger uh and then we've got our project planner Paul Ricky because before the board of adjustment this use was a effectively a pre-existing non-conforming so we wanted to bring our planner uh for belt and suspenders to go over the relief with the board the changes and how they're warranted here under the uh under the code and the proofs so very limited uh testimonial hear from us Mr chairman tonight with those two witnesses we've got our documents digitally we can certainly present them if you like our engineer brought a flash drive or we have the you know sort of the old school uh board mounted whichever you prefer if you have a preference let go digital were these filed with the application or yeah everything you're showing tonight was part of the file John yes sir yeah okay these are identical what was filed then they don't have to be checked in they don't have to be admitted and our planner is probably going to just be live testimony no exhibits so we might be exhibit free this evening as well very good that's fine it's just one PDF at that time we had two applications for the for the signage the um the one on Main street2 talking with with the proprietor Eugene I don't know's about 10 years yeah yeah that's what I recall from I looked the prior resolutions from the Oprah um and we figured a few of the board members might be the same from 10 years ago and it's nice to see but the last two applications I had with you folks it was still Zoom um there were you know multif family conversions so it's nice to be back in person while we're waiting for Jenna to do stuff which I can't do I still 78 records at home but can we talk a little bit about the site in general sure we could start testimony yes so we can certainly swear in and qualify our engineer we can start we can start talking let please raise your right hand you saw s the testimony you're about to give in this matter will be the truth so help you gu I do please state your name and spell your last name for the record certainly my name is John Anderson a and d r s o n I'm a licensed professional engineer in state of New Jersey I work for and a part owner in Cornerstone Consulting Engineers and Design Services and we are the project Engineers that uh prepared the plans this evening thank you very much Mr uh Council your witness please John your license is current in good standing in the state of New Jersey yes it is okay any more questions about any more question about qualifications Mr chairman are we are we okay have you appeared before us before uh I think I was yes I think probably for the application previously for the same location right we do most of the work yeah so John if you would we're going to use the the paper and we've confirmed that these are identical to what's on file with the board so we're not going to mark them if you show anything that's disparate from what's on file we'll identify it we'll date it today and we'll mark it as an exhibit but for now if you could walk the board through existing conditions so we can go with the proposed changes certainly the only thing that's different from the submission is we put some color to the plan that's it it's the same it's the same site plan except it's got color to it you want to mark it then Cliff please please mark it yes so we'll mark that as A1 John if you could just identify it the title block and put your put put the date on it please that's our local well it's not just our local rule most boards do the same thing absolutely so exhibit A1 dated today 9182 24 what is it identified as John the plan that's before you is an existing uh it's it's a plan of the existing Soko facility uh located at East Main Street and North Gaston Avenue uh it's a site and signage scoping plan set consisting of three pages the site plan which is the first page P1 uh it's also got two other Pages sinage DET sales one and sinage detale number two which would be SP 2.0 and SP 3.0 and that's the same plan set that was submitted as part of the application um it's it's rev one or revised uh one time and submitted and it's before you the only difference in A1 is that we put some color to it to make it easier to for the board to distinguish the site improvements okay understood uh the site is located on the northeast corner of East m Main Street and North Gaston Avenue it is a Soko gas station consists of a single building on site that building is roughly 1,320 Square ft uh it has a small office component and vending component inside and it's got two service Bays on the right hand side of the building uh there are four multi- uh product dispensers on site there are two along East Main Street under an existing canopy there are two also parallel to North Gaston Avenue and they are not under a canopy there's no canopy on those that location uh there are um entrance drives onto East Main Street and also entrances on North Gaston Avenue and the site is primarily all the improvements are located towards the intersection uh and then on the front of the building the right hand side of the page are uh parallel parking spaces and then behind the building and also along North Gaston Avenue are additional parking spaces consisting of six six spaces and as shown on the the board or the easel uh the darker tan color are the buildings and canopy the lighter tan or concrete uh the darker uh gray areas or shaded are can you speak into the microphone the darker shaded areas of gray are the uh parking um associated with site and obviously the green is the grass or pervious areas behind the building and parking so do you want to go into now John what brings us here for the application tonight the modifications proposed yes primarily the modifications are all signage related um you may you may know that the pylon sign or the sign located at the corner or of the intersection has been hit and is down right now it is going to be replaced however the proposal this evening is not to change the size of that sign but to modernize it so on SP 2.0 which was part of the set you can see in the uh lower right hand corner there's a small photo of the existing pylon sign and then there's a rendering to the right of that of the proposed sign basically it's the same size they're just changing um the manual numerals that get replaced manually or changed manually with a modern LED sign uh and then that size is I mean the the pricing component will just be advertising the regular price component in lie of all three U products that are uh available for sale and then the sonoko emblem or the diamond sign is at the top of the pylon sign but basically it's the same size except modernizing and changing the manual numerals to LED uh the next the next change that is proposed uh on SP 2.0 is the change in the canopy signage uh the canopy sign they're doing away with what we used to call the Horizon Graphics uh and the uh sometimes it would also have official fuels of NASCAR on there they're modernizing the the image to just be a blue fascia band along the canopy and then simple sonoko letter on either end of it uh to basically bring it to its its modern image uh the canopy signage um uh the canopy signage is actually staying the same actually I'm sorry there's a reduction there's a small reduction there's they're they're taking off a couple of signs and just keeping just two signs uh so there's a there's a slight reduction in signage for the canopy um and then the next uh on SP 2.0 the the other major change in signage the fascia band around the building in the upper right hand corner of the page uh there's a photo of the existing building band signage band along the top fascia of the building that also has the Horizon graphics on it and it also has a uh advertising sign on the left on the right hand side that is for the detailing business that's in there that sign's going away the horizon and colored Graphics are also going away and it's being replaced with a just a simple blue signage band with no signage on there so that building signage is actually reducing from 76 square feet to zero so that's one of the major reductions in signage for the site and this page is a little complicated uh but it's basically just the signage associated with the fuel pumps themselves those fuel pumps as shown onp 3.0 uh the signage I don't we don't really have a a picture of the existing signage but the veilance is associated with the dispensers also have Horizon graphics on it and different signage it's being simplified and um the fuel dispensors are coming down in square footage from 144 to 120 the total existing signage is [Music] 353.tv discussion items uh that the uh the board may want to talk about it was alluded that they wanted to talk about some of the site uh conditions out there and we're we're happy to discuss all those items yes so at this time Mr chair we'd make Mr Anderson available to any questions folks might have the illumination will would be brighter than the previous side or less bright it would actually be um so the manual letters are not they're only internally aluminated so the LED letters are illuminated it helps for uh visibility legibility and so forth as passer uh people in cars are passing by uh so that would increase the illumination however uh from an overall perspective the signage would be decreasing in illumination I don't want to mislead the board to say that the the freestanding sign's not going to increase we are adding LED letters that have illumination to them okay anybody else from the board any questions yeah I'm not sure if you're the right guy to ask but that station always kind of looks like that um I hate to embarrass any state but it looks like something out of like way down deep south all forgotten about you know there's stuff parked around there's there's things that I'm not sure if there being worked on I gather that probably the bays are rented to somebody else and they're doing work but it it's a prominent corner and it sometimes look like it's working on being a junkyard we were actually speaking about that Mr O'Neal leading up tonight when we were all doing our own site inspections and and sooko understands that as well and cleaning up the site thematically is part of what they want to do here the signage is is obviously corporate it's branding it's an upgrade across the board but I'm glad you said that because sonoko heard it um they will be cleaning up the site and our project plan maybe we'll speak to that a little more in a little more detail uh we can certainly well we're certainly amendable to to baking into any resolution of approval of condition that requires us to maintain the site in good keeping and working order without any dilapidated conditions you know cliff and I can figure out we can word that but um we're glad to be held to that standard I kind of thought you would be I just thought I'd bring it up no no I appreciate yeah yeah um I appreciate that I think you said the same thing about 10 years ago yeah we did at times it's on when they're closed or it always seems to be on when it's closed that you've noticed I guess the request is if it can reduce the illumination to security lighting when it's not being operated right steuart I think that's what steuart's getting at yeah no I understand I'm asking my client if if they can do that I imagine they can but we can make that be dimmed overnight down to security lighting you know at a minimum requirement to meet those code standards for security lighting yeah because stre gas St sure so with within an hour of closing perhaps okay anyone else have any questions of Mr anyone from the audience have any question of the testimony just given by Mr Anderson thank you John so we'll call our second and Final witness Mr chairman our project planner Paul Ricky welcome back Mr Ricky good evening Mr Ricky you saw me S the testimony you're about to give in this matter will be the truth so help you God I do please state your name and spell your last name for the record it's Paul Ricky R ICI very good welcome back thank you Paul I know the board recogniz you as a licensed professional planner can you confirm it that license is still current and in good standing in the state of New Jersey it is okay thank you Mr chairman Paul if you would you've heard my profit to the board you heard John Anderson's test testimony and the few stipulations we made so far regarding keeping the site clean and making sure the lighting goes off after hours uh we've got some relief here it's limited but we have some relief if you can walk the board through that and the justifications Paul uh sure maybe I'll just uh spell out the variances to begin uh number one is associated with the the rebuilding of the the existing freestanding sign 64.3 square feet um variance was granted for that in the past the applicants looking just to rebuild that in it in its same form it's the same location same height and same size you heard from the site engineer the only difference is that the lettering would be illuminated rather than the the changeable copy where someone would have to go up on a ladder and pull the letters down um to permit the second variance is to permit 2 2326 squ foot canopy signs where three canopy signs exist today comprising 45.8 Square fet the reduction again uh spoken to by the SL engineer and to permit signage on the fuel dispensers where 120 square feet is proposed where U 144 feet is existing those are the the excuse me the uh sign variances we're we're seeking the the variance relief under the the flexible C2 criteria we can de demonstrated Advance purpose of the Mis melanous law and that the variances can be granted without a substantial to the public good in in zone plan and here uh I think it's pretty clear that that this is really an application of a betterment an improvement it's a it's Soko reinvesting back into its property modernizing its facility and that investment will not only will result in a a greater uh visual betterment to the property um but it would also bring your signage back closer to your Zone plan which promotes uh several purposes of zoning um I found that you know I think I've testified for a few snow codes over the years and some of the boards don't like the old Raceway I call it the Raceway Graphics I believe Mr Anderson called it the Horizon Graphics so the the the new plan is for some nice clean Graphics just all blue uh the science itself it's all clear and it's there's no real so in my opinion there's a reduction in visual clutter um the reduction in in signage it's it's substantial it's a 42% reduction which is significant uh and again uh that promotes the general welfare of facility I think it's also important to recognize that U having adequate signage to the traveling public is an important aspect of of of this site too for safety reasons uh onto the onto the property um and it's ALS Alo again important to recognize while we are seeking these variances all these signs exist uh on the site in in some form here we are reducing the building mounted signage so uh there there's no increase in any portion of the signage uh that exists today again the canopy signage is being reduced um 40 from 45.8 square feet to 23.3 square feet is proposed um so I think it's clear that the benefits of this application uh clearly outweigh the detriments and the fact that there's such a substantial reduction in overall site sign is that that this results in improved Zoning for for this property for these reasons I think it promotes the general welfare of the community purpose a um having adequate signage uh promotes purpose H the location of design of Transportation routes will promote the free flow of traffic and clearly the reduction of signage and visual clut will promote uh purpose I to promote a desirable visual environment um regarding the negative criteria again this is a very limited application because we're just reducing and beautifying the site U as a planner I see no new uh negative impacts lighting is being reduced here um so if anything impacts or will be existing impacts will be reduced as part of this application uh these signs aren't the attracting to the motoring public uh they're not overbearing create unfair advantage in this area uh again results that improved Aesthetics um the facade improvements again are are attractive uh and and for all these reasons uh I think it's clear that there will be no substantial uh detriment to the surrounding Property Owners the public good uh or your Zone plan uh I think a key goal in sign regulation isote a desirable visual environment through the mitigation of a visual clutter and that's what's really occurring here so my testimon is rather limited tonight if the board would like me to discuss any other aspects of the application I'd be happy to do so thank you Paul anybody have any questions of Mr Ricky just kind of curiosity did Soko like end its relationship with Nascar or CU that was a big deal for a while huge yeah yeah I don't know I'm a big NASCAR guy I don't know um they may have come to a conclusion I'm not sure I've I've had this you know other other stations have been doing the same thing in in similar municipalities I just wondered all of a sudden it occurred to me I wondered if that had changed I think it's more tasteful I have to admit you know as a not I'm not a member of the board as far as decision making is concerned but I you know get getting rid of that I think is a step in the right direction anyone from the board have any questions uh I just have one what's the timeline and when it's going to be done 10 years so 10 years thought because any idea they still have them down on on 22 in Gaston Avenue and now that's going to be marijuana cannabis dispenser AKA weed store Mr chairman the estimate is is about three or four months post resolution compliance once they can pull permits few months okay anybody from the audience have any questions thank you Mr Ricky thank you thank you Paul that's the entirety of our case tonight Mr chairman m is relatively simple and straightforward it's always nice when we get to propos signage that's less than what's there today we think it sort of is uh you know naturally positive application and Land Development so um we thank you again for your time and thank you for getting us on the agenda in September I know that we originally were looking at November but we were able to sneak in September so we very much thank you for your time sooko is to your question what's the implementation time on Mr chairman they want to get this done fast too so we thank you for your time tonight as always the 88 spot is the applicant going to comply with the we just say yes for the record yeah we will our Engineers not the John Anderson again for sonoko yes uh we have an idea how to comply with that there will need to be a curb not curb I'm sorry sidewalk modification for a ramp as well we'll apply for permits for that but yes we're able to comply with that and the guard rail and the housekeeping that's absolutely we'll agree to that and painting of the rear of the building um guard rail we were talking about that either repairing it or actually re uh removing it I don't from a engineering standpoint or site accessibility from V vles I don't know if it's really necessary I don't know why it was installed originally but it may be better just to remove it from aesthetically because it's in my opinion it's not attractive councelor does the applicant have any objection to uh Making Mr compliance with Mr Cole's report a condition of approval no we don't comply everything in there no everything there is fine and on the issue of the guard rail if we can leave that open to maybe a postapproval discussion because I think the applicant would rather remove it if it's not necessary but you may need to look at that closer Mike since we're bringing that up tonight um but maybe there could be discussion that you have with John Anderson Post approval sure removal on we're all aligned to clean up the the site and uh with the board members that is it's a public Corner that's gets a lot of visibility and U I would like to see I'm sure the board would like to see it cleaned up to the extent absolutely yes agreed I can't remember it being anything but a gas station you rich yeah it was a flying G before it was a Soko yeah was flowers at 10 o' that light went out okay um that's it um anybody from the audience have any comments on the application soone like to move uh close the public portion I move second Mo the second all in favor I W which po well I'll start I think it's it's an improvement took 10 years to get here but we're here again you know but the site I think this this whole project makes a lot of sense it's good to see and we do still need a gas station in town there used to be like a dozen LS two least so I I think it's a good we want to maintain it but the site that needs to be cleaned up and they've consented to clean it up so I'm not sure we can actually do anything about that but take take it the word I know for the last 15 years I've been given Eugene the flags that he has on in the kiosk so he's been flying them proudly for the last 15 years that I've been get any any other comments yeah I I I just so happen the light just goes right into my bedom is that right I I got um yeah I I would just like to see that the light is dim at the hour you know if not off you know understand that's going to be a condition of approval because you know not only me but I mean there nothing but residential apartment if you ever go to the site like 10:30 11:00 at night nothing you know there's no business to be had probably the reason why they're not 2 hours you knowly I'm happy that it's to be an improvement I think that's a really good thing but um you know just keep the consideration for the understood in our younger days we would use the P gun on that anybody else no I I agree it's a it seems to be a very logical and easy uh approval for me um just just as long as they do keep the uh the lights down I would like to uh you can go further maybe they can have some plantings you know like on the corner of Gaston Avenue main like the on the drawing it just has gravel I was wondering maybe like you know like I said people stop at that light put anything there St St yeah nothing above 30 in in height mess with the site triangle it's just that you stop at that light like at the State Highway looking at it State Highway in the county county road as I said I think it's an improvement and if they're going to clean up the site that's a big Improvement so go all the way around good yeah I'm good I mean the the the word of the night is visual clutter right so cleaning up the signs is nice but also cleaning up the other things is going to be nice I'm I go there often to talk to Eugene about uh cycling so it'll be good to see the new sign we'll make the clean up a condition of approval as well yeah yeah last week I flag the Kos for the last 15 years a whole okay someone like to move for approval with the uh I'll move the conditions okay mooving the second any more discussion roll call please chairman D yes Mr allet yes Miss carpinet yes Mr O'Neal yes Mr vsky yes Mr Flores yes Mr Al yes Carri thank you very much folks I'll coordinate the preparation of the resolution with your office sounds good good seeing you my pleasure good to see you again we an executive session I have a resolution to that effect that's why I was wondering oh yes the and I had a couple couple things but we can still be on of record um as you know on January 1 the mayor gave a planning board his marching orders to uh address is this an executive session we no this is this is okay I just want to make sure that Chairman's comments that the U the planning board got their marching orders to address the master plan the zoning ordinance and the affordable housing in which you had talked about FAO and what I'd like to do is just schedule the night on so that everybody's on the same page as far F we have Mike and Cliff give us a little class like when Mike gave the class on the difference between two and a half and three stories so if we'd like to just sit and I would like us to have a big say in the uh master plan and the U zoning plan because we're the ones that have to interpret we're the ones that have to work with it and make the things that are illegal legal so get together on that and if there's anything else that anybody wants to talk about as far as moving forward with the uh master plan I know they wanted to start doing it this year but it's been pushed off to next year start next year my question is is this going to be a meeting of just us or with be I like to get together as we did with the pone but I like us to discuss it first okay and then get together with the uh the planning board because they're going to make the ultimate decision so yeah yeah just to get our input as to how they can incorporate it in in the master plan okay that's it go to Executive session someone like to move that we adjourn this meeting so move second all in favor so like the move that we go into executive session second move second all in favor and Michael this is uh we had discussed this last last monek oh let's can we just okay yeah what we just did