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2009.05.27 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) QUEENSBURYZQNING BOARD OF APPEALS SECOND REGULAR MEETING MA Y27, 2009 INDEX Area Variance No. 11-2008 Debaron Associates by Debra Schiebel, Partner 1. Tax Map No. 239.18~1-47 Area Variance No. 22-2009 Stephen Mason 21. Tax Map No. 239.8-1-23 Area Variance No. 23-2009 Ronald O. Morehouse 26. Tax Map No. 309.9-3-24 Area Variance No. 24-2009 Michael Hill 29. Tax Map No. 295.6-1-6 Area Variance No. 25-2009 Sean Quillinan 31. Tax Map No. 289.09-1-30 Area Variance No. 26-2009 Peter Darrah 48. Tax Map No. 279.15-1-45 THESEARENOT OFFICIAllY ADOPTED MINUTES AND ARE SUBJECT TO BOARD AND STAFF REVISIONS. REVISIONS Will APPEAR ON THE FOllOWING MONTHS MINUTES (IF ANY) AND WILL STATE SUCH APPROVAL OF SAID MINUTES. o (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) QUEENSBURY ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS SECOND REGULAR MEETING MAY 27,2009 7:00 P.M. MEMBERS PRESENT JAMES UNDERWOOD, CHAIRMAN ROY URRICO, SECRETARY JOYCE HUNT RICHARD GARRAND JOAN JENKIN BRIAN CLEMENTS GEORGE DREllOS LAND USE PLANNER-KEITH OBORNE STENOGRAPHER-MARIA GAGLIARDI MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. I'm going to call the May 27, 2009 meeting of the Zoning Board of Appeals to order here, and first of all, let me do a quick review of our procedures in general. For each case, I'll call the application by name and numberpnd the secretary will read the pertinent parts of the application into the record, Staff Notes, as well as the Warren County Planning Board decision if applicable. The applicant then will be invited to the table and be asked to provide any information that they wish to a~d to the application. The Board, then, will ask questions of the applicant. Following that, we'll open the public hearing, and I'd caution that the public hearing is not a vote, but.it's a way to. gather information about concerns, real or perceived, and it's a way to gather information and insight in general about the issue at hand. It should function to help th~ Board members make a wise, informed decision, but it does not make the decision for the Board members. As always, we'll have a five minute limit on each speaker. So that basically tells us everything they want us to know in that five minutes. A speaker may speak again if, after listening to other speakers, they believe they have new information to present. Following that, we'll read correspondence into the record, and then the applicants will have an opportunity to react and respond to the public comment, and Board members then will discuss the variance with the applicant. Following that, the Board members will be polled to explain their positions on the application, and then we'll close the public hearing, unless there's a reason to leave it open, and that would be only if it looks like the application will be continued to another meeting. Finally we'll have a motion to approve, disapprove or table and then we'll vote on it. First off, tonight, I want to inform everybody that we did receive a letter at the last minute here. The last item on tonight's agenda, which was Peter Darrah, which is Area Variance No. 26-2009, and it's a letter from them. "To Whom It May Concern: This letter is to inform you that, due to a medical condition, my husband and I will not be able to attend tonight's Board meeting, requesting a variance to build a 24 by 24 foot garage. We would ask that the meeting be tabled and brought up again in June's meetings. Thank you and sorry for any inconvenience. So I think we'll table it later, but just in case anybody here came for that one, you won't have to sit around all night. OLD BUSINESS: AREA VARIANCE NO. 11-2008 SEQRA TYPE: II DEBARON ASSOCIATES BY DEBRA SCHIEBEL, PARTNER AGENT(S): HUTCHINS ENGINEERING/MC PHilLIPS, FITZGERALD, AND CUllUM OWNER(S): DEBARON ASSOCIATES ZONING: WR-3A lOCATION: DARK BAY lANE, OFF .ROUTE 9LAPPLlCANT PROPOSES CONSTRUCTION OF A 2,351 SINGLE-FAMilY RESIDENCE WITH ASSOCIATED WASTEWATER SYSTEM AND STORMWATER MANAGEMENT CONTROLS. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM SHORELINE AND REAR YARD SETBACK REQUIREMENTS. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM ROAD FRONTAGE REQUIREMENTS AND STORMWATER DEVICES FOR MAJOR PROJECTS. CROSS REF.: BOH 1-2009;SPR 14-2009 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING: MARCH 12,2008 (NO COUNTY IMPACT) ADIRONDACK PARK AGENCY: YES lOT SIZE: 0.45 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 239.18-1-47 SECTION: 179-4-030; 179-4-090; 147-9B.2(d) TOM HUTCHINS & DENNIS PHilLIPS, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT MR. UNDERWOOD-We had previously reviewed this numerous times. It's sort of bounced back and forth between the Planning Board and our Board, and we had asked for some information and some guidance from the Planning Board going forward here. 1 (Queens bury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) Just a short recap here as to what we're goihgtodo. I'm going to read the Staff Notes in, and then.1 think you guys had presented us with quite a bit.of new information. I think you probably want to go over that with the Board. The Planning Board, I think, did give us a note, and I will read that in, also, into the record. STAFF INPUT Notes from Area Variance No; 11-2008, Debaron Associates by Debra Schiebel, Partner, Meeting . Date: May 27, 2009 "Project Location: Dark Bay lane, off Route 9l Description of Proposed Project: Applicant proposes construction ora 2,351 square foot single family home, associated wastewater system and stormwater controls on the shore of lake George. The applicant requests 40 feetof relief from the 40 foot. road frontage requirement per 9179-4-090. Further, 24.47 feet of relief requested from the 75 foot shoreline setback and 18.27 feet of relief requested from the rear setback requirement for the WR-3A zone per 9179-4-030. Finally, 54.88 feet of relief requested from the tOo foot minimum setback requirement per 9.147-9 for infiltration devices on lake George. h; making a determination, the board shall consider: 1. Whether an undesirable change will be produced in the .character of the neighborhood or a detriment to nearby properties will be created by the granting of this.area variance. Moderate changes to nearby properties may be anticipated as a result of this proposal as the potential for visual impacts to neighboring parcels may be increased. 2. Whether the bene.fit sought by the applicant can. be achieved by some method, feasible for the applicant to pursue, other than an area variance. The applicant could reduce the size of the project in order to be more compliant. 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for 40 feet or 100% of relief from the 40. foot road. frontage relief per 9179-9-090 may be considered severe relative to the ordinance. The request for 24.27feet or 33 % of relief from the 75 foot shoreline setback requirement per. 9 179-4'-030 may be considered moderate relative to the ordinance. The. request for 18.27 feet or 73% of relief .from the 25 foot rear setback requirement maybe considered moderate to severe relative. to the ordinance. Finally,. the request for 54.88 feet or 55% relief from the 100 foot minimum setback requirement for infiltration devices per 9147-9. may be .considered moderate relative to the ordinance. 4. Whether the proposed variance will have.anadverse effect or impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood or district. Moderate impacts on the physical and environmental conditions of the neighborhood may be anticipated as the project proximity to. the shoreline and the. existing slopes may result in environmental degradation. However, the project is consistent with the nature of the subdivision. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was.self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. S.P. 14-2009 2,351 sq. ft. Single Family Dwelling Pending The Zoning Board of Appeals has requested a recommendationfrom the Planning Board concerning this project (see attached ZBA resolution and subsequent Planning Board recommendation). The cumulative requests for relief may be interpreted as severe when juxtaposed against the. both 9179, the Zoning Code and 9147, .Stormwater Management. However, the lack of road frontage may be mitigated as most homes within the area. do not meet this 2 (QueensburyZBA Meeting OS/27/09) requirement. This project has been classified a Major Stormwater Management proj~ct and as such requires Planning Board site plan review. Type II - No action necessary." MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. The Planning Board did make a motion, and I'll read that into the record. "MOTION THAT QUEENSBURY. PLANNING BOARD DOES NOT RECOMMEND A WAIVER FROM THE 100 FOOT INFilTRATION REQUIREMENTS UNDER 147-9B(d} TO DEBARON ASSOCIATES, Introduced by Thomas Seguljic who moved for its adoption, seconded by Donald Sipp: Due to the following reasons: The project will potentially have an adverse impact on the environmental characteristics that cause the establishment of the lake George Critical Environmental Area. Inability of the site to meetthe requirements of Chapter 147. The site consists of slopes ranging from 12.to 30%. The site soils are comprised of soils which have a potential for erosion, and adequate information has not peen provided to justify recommending a waiver from the infiltration distance requirements. Duly adopted this .19th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Sipp, Mr. Traver, Mr. Seguljic NOES: Mr. Ford, Mr. Krebs, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger" Two, MOTION REGARDING SITE PLAN NO. 14-2009 FOR DEBARON ASSOCIA rES. IN MARCH OF 2009. THE ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS HAS ASKED THE PLANNING BOARD FOR A RECOMMENDATION REGARDING THE . STORMWATER .. PROTECTION PLAN FOR >THIS APPLICATION. SPECIFICAllY THAT THE PLANNING BOARD RE-CONFIRM THAT THE STORMWATER MANAGEMENT PROJECT IS ADEQUATE AND. QUOTE. THEY'RE FINE WITH IT. MEANING THAT THE PLANNING BOARD IS FINE WITH IT. AFTER OUR MAY 19TH REVIEW. DISCUSSION. AND PRESENTATION BY THE APPLICANT'S ATTORNEY AND ENGINEER. WE RECOMMEND THAT THE APPLICANT CONSIDER DOWNSIZING THE FOOTPRINT OF THE HOME TO DECREASE THE IMPACT OF STORMWATER CONTROL MEASURES NECESSARY TO MITIGATE. STORMWATER SHORTFAllS FOR DEVELOPMENT OF THIS SITE PLAN. AS A RESULT OF THIS RECOMMENDATION TO THE APPLICANT. WE RECOMMEND TO THE ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS CAREFUL CONSIDERATION OF THE NUMBER OF VARIANCES REQUESTED IN THIS CRITICAL ENVIRONMENTAL AREA, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Ford: Duly adopted this 19th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Ford, Mr. Sipp, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Krebs, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: Mr..Seguljic, Mr. Traver" So that's it, and I think that what I'll doishaveyou guy come up, because there was a substantial amount of new information that we had in our packets, and I think we would like toreview that. . The question I would ask you, first of all is, is this the same stuff that you had presented to the Planning Board that evening, or is this something that's been revised since? MR. PHilLIPS-This is the same as we presented to the Plpnning Board. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. MR. HUTCHINS-They're identical applications. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Why don't you guys come on up. MR. PHilLIPS-For the record, my name is Dennis Phillips. I'ma lawyer with McPhillips, Fitzgerald & Cullum. I think you know Tom Hutchins who is next to me, and sitting in the front row is Debra Schiebel, who is the applicant in this situation, with her husband, tier son, and a friend, and so we're all present tonight. One comment I'd like to make on the resolutions that you just. read, and I raised this with Maria earlier today, because I 3 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) thought that the first resolution Was misleading, because it says that it was adopted, but when you count the votes, it was not adopted, so I thought that that was a little bit misleading that it would say that .it was adopted but it was a motion that failed, and so I thought that was important for me to make a comment on anyway, and I probably would have thought that that would have been denied instead of adopted. . So that seems to be p semantic. thing, but as we have this burden of establishing this variance, we have provided the Board with a. relatively complete submission, and I would just like to go through, again, some of the facts that are. in the. submission, and I think it's important to go back to the history of this subdivision where, in 1970, 1968, when Debra Schiebel's father bought this property, he bought it subject to a number of conditions that were imposed upon him by his seller, and what I've done, on that tax map, on the easel,l have outlined in yellow the original subdiviSion, and then I have highlighted in pink the lot that we're talking about, that's probably thesame lot that WpS shown on the projection before, but as you look at that tax map, there is a big .Iot down. in the, on the right hand side, lower right hand side, and that was. the property reserved by Mr. Mitchell, when he sold the property to Debbie's father and his partners, and I think Mr. Mitchell was concerned that, when he sold this property, .that Debbie.'s father and his partners may subdivide it more. than he wanted it to be subdivided. So what he did is that he imposed conditions on D~bbie's father, and basically said I will sell you this land if you do this, if you subdivide the shoreline into four lots, and if you subdivide the rest of the property into no more than 11 lots, and he then imposed some covenants and restrictions in that deed. You have them in your package as part of our most recent submission, and the Covenant A in that deed said that the subdivision of the shoreline lots, shoreline. into four lots, shall be required, and sothat produced lots One, Two, Three, and Four, and the lot that we have before you tonight is lot Four of those covenants and restrictions. Covenant B mandated the rest of the property to be subdivided into 10 to 11 building lots. Covenant D mandated that the premises would only be used for private, residential purposes. So, aside from the Zoning Ordinance in theTown of Queensbury, which has hunting and fishing cabins and Single Family Residential as permissible uses in this zone, we do have this private covenant and. restriction going back to 1968 that says it shall be used for private, residential purposes. So in effect the only use of this property now is for private, residential purposes. Covenant G in that deed mandated that no residence of less than 900 square feet be .erected on the lot. Our proposal to the Zoning Board is for a footprint of about 945 square feet, .and so we are also true. to that covenant when we have the.footprint of our house. Covenant E said. that no residence could be more than two and a half stories high in this area, and so we look at what is proposed here, where we have basically a basement that's open to the outside, we have a first floor, and we have then anotherfloor inside of the roofline which we look at as being in that two and a half story zone, but in any event, we're under 28 feet, which is the requirement for the Town of Queensbury..Wethinkthat 28 feet probably was intended, in Queensbury, to. be two and a half stories. So we think we're inside of that covenant. So, following those private covenants and restrictions, in 1969, Debbie's .father came to the Planning Board in the Town of Queensbury and asked for a subdivision approval, and it's the one that you see on the tax map, and he was granted that approval, after it was approved by the Department of Health, and then he filed that subdivision map in the County Clerk's Office, and then they began to sell off lots from that subdivision, and they built houses in that area. In 1971 , Debbie's father and his partners imposed some fLirther restrictions on lots. Five through Fifteen, not lot Four,. but lots Five through Fifteen. I have highlighted that on Page Five. of the most recent submission, and the reason I. did that is that, at the last meeting, Mr. Tobin, I believe, attempted to lead the Zoning Board to believe that there was a 35 foot setback from alotlinethat was required for any structure on lot. Four,. but that was not a. correct statement.. The 35 foot setback related to lot Numbers Five through Fifteen, but exempted lot Four. So that setback did not apply to lot Four. I thought that was importantforthis Board to know, to clarify that for the record. In 1974, Debbie's father actually conveyed the property, lot Four that we're talking about, to Debbie and her siblings, and probably at that time, he probably thought he was being a good father, granting . a building lot to his kids so that at some point they could do something with..it in the future. In 1976, the Adirondack Park Agency took a look at this subdivision, in its totality, and made the determination that it was a pre-existing subdivision under the Adirondack Park Agency Act, and blessed it as a pre- existing subdivision,. and indicated that single family dwellings could be built in this subdivision.. Then more time passed, and 1990 Debbie's father came before this Zoning Board and presented a building project that. entailed a 36 foot. setback from the lake. That actually was approved by a predecessor Zoning Board, but because of the fact that the concept of practical difficulty was not codified in ~67 of the Town law at that time, there was some confusion as to what findings the Zoning Board had to make, and so Judge Viscardi sent this back to a Zoning Board for further deliberations on findings, but I thinkat that time it just kind of went away. So here we are back in 2008, we began this Process, and so, 18years later, and now we're asking for a variance that actually is less 4 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) of a variance than was granted by your predecessor back in 1990. .The variance then was 36 feet. We're looking for morethan 50 feet, and the reason we're looking for the 50 feet is that we know that in your Zoning Ordinance, and also in the Adirondack Park Agency Act, that there is a 50 foot shoreline setback in a number of zones. So as a matter of policy, we thought that if a 50 foot setback is good enough for some of these other zones,. with this pre-existing lot, that's what we wanted to adopt here, becau~e we thought we could be consistent with the public policy. So, with that,.in my presentation to you, I have doubled up on the findings that need to be made by both this Board an~ t~e Adirondack Park Agency Act, because depending on what this Board does, thiS IS subject to the veto power or the approval power, of the Adirondack Park Agency. So on the first question of whether an undesirable change wiU be produced in the neighborhood, or whether there will be a substantial detriment to adjoining or nearby landowners, we have presented you, and I think you've probably all seen. it, with a neighborhood map that shows the immediate neighborhood, which. we look at .as being this historical subdivision, and in the immediate neighborhood, we've itemized L..ots One, Two, and Three are. already built out, and they have very, very high assessments attached to them. We have then jumped to lot Seven, which is the Folke lot, and Mr. Folke has been very supportive of this project, and he has submitted a couple of.letters to the Planning Board and the Zoning Board, I believe, maybe it's the Town Board. Those are part of your package so you have those, and then immediately adjoining us is the Association lot, and I have highlighted in the submission that the Association lot.is basically in a separate, not .for profit corporation, owned by a corporation. It does not have any individual ownership, and of course lot Four has rights to the Association lot, as do the other lots in the subdivision. I've also highlighted. lot 10, which is Mr. Tobin's lot, because he has been involved in this process. As I understand it, lot 1 o and the Tobin. house does not see this house from this location. So this house, as we would construct it, would not be visible from the Tobin lot, it would be visible from the common lot. I also have put the Tobin deed in the record, because in the Tobin deed, it does say that he is taking subject to the pre-existing subdivision, and subject to all of the covenants and restrictions that were in place before Mr. Tobin bought his lot in 1998. . So I look at this in the nature of a contract where, when Mr. Tobin bought into this subdivision, he bought into. a contract that already was in existence. As far as the extended neighborhood is concerned, in our mapping that we've shown you, we. have looked at all of the neighboring properties, and we have found that, in many cases, the neighboring. properties are built very close to the shoreline, and in fact they're much closer to the shoreline than what we are proposing. On Page Eight .of our submission, we show that the shoreline setbacks in the extended neighborhood run from 17 feet to 41 feet, averaging outto 29.33feet, and so, in terms of our project, we're going to be farther fromthe shoreline than any of these existing homes. We feel that, for that reason, we're not making things worse in this neighborhood, but we're actually going to be set back a little bit more. On the second question of whether we can achieve what we're looking for by any other method, or whether our difficulty can be obviated by something other than a variance, the way we look at it is that the, Debra Schiebel and Debaron do not own any adjoining or contiguous lands that could be utilized to make this property bigger. The Association owns the adjoining property, .and so that property's not for sale. Even if we bought it, we would not be able to improve our setback situation. If we attempted to purchase lot Number Seven from Mr. Folke, that doesn't help us, because he has some slopes on the property that would not be conducive to building, and we've indicated that Debra Schiebel and Debaron do not own any other lakefront lots that could be used, and in the. context of the tax assessments on this property, the only economic use. of this property would be for a single family dwelling purposes. It's being assessed. as .a building lot in Queensbury because of the work of the Planning Board back. in 1969, and what's interesting is that we had that discussion at the Planning Board level . of what constitutes a building lot, and I think that we pointed out here that we have lot Four which is assessed as a building lot .in Queensbury, and right next door to it is the lakefront lot, the home association lot that is a non building lot. That home .association lot has an assessment on it of $115,000. This lot has an assessment on it of $1.23 million, and so basically abuilding lot in Queensbury is assessed at 10 times,10.7times, I did the math on that,ofa .non buildabl~ lot. So we think that, economically, there's a huge difference.. So, the difficulty that we're dealing with here is that lot Four is lacking in depth from the shorelinefrom lake George, and as it sits now can't comply with the existing shoreline setback. So, the question is, Number Three, is the variance substantial, and what is the minimum relief that we need here? Well, we know that for any house on this lot, wewould need variances. For any house on this lot, whatever the size of the house, we. would need a setback variance from the lake, and that would then put us into a situation where we would need a setback variance from the rear. . We know that, because of the historical and existing nature of this property, that the highway setback. is something that everybody in this development has, because that basically, this development came into being before these requirements were required. So, in 5 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) terms of our setback that we're looking for from the lake, we. thought that itwas important that we get back 50 feet from the lake at least, because as a matter of public policy, there are other waterfront 50 foot setbacks. So we thought that was the most important thing. . So, as we look at whether or not this is substantial, at the time this lot was approved, there was no requirement for a lake setback, and that's evidenced by the other camps in this area. So, what has happened is that the change in the law has put us into a position where weare asking for these variances. We look at the change of law as. being something out of. our control,. but of course that's something that we have to deal with. As to whether or not we'll have an adverse effect or impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood, and whether we will affect the natural and . scenic resources of the shoreline and the adjoining body of water, I know that the first time we came to this Zoning Board, lucas Dobey, who is in the audience, presented a number of photographs showing.. what the visibility aspects were. Tom Hutchins might talk more about that today, but he'll also talkaboutthestormwater engineering he's done for this property, and I think that with thestormwater plan that he has presented, whereby we're dealing with erosion issues, surface runoff, we solved .the sewage disposal issue because we have the variance for the holding tank.. I don't think that we're going to have much of an impact on neighboring properties at all. Finally, the question is, is the alleged difficulty self-created? I know that the Staff thought that that may be the case, and maybe the Staff thought that because we're asking for a variance, but the manner in which this difficulty arose was the change in the law, and there's nothing that the owners of this property, whether it was Debbie's father, or whether Debbie did, created any self-difficulty. .So we look at the change of law, and that's why we're before you tonight, because the law has changed. We don'tlook at that as being difficulty that we have created. . The economic side, at the last. meeting of the Planning Board, someone said,well, why don't you use this as a lake access lot, and so our response to that was, well, we're paying over $14,000 almost $15,000 in taxes onthis property per year, . as a building lot. If we wanted to spend that kind of money accessing lake George, we could go to the Million Dollar. Beach or we could go to the campsites. We cold go to Bolton, where it's not going to cost us any money, or very littl.e money to utilize lake George, but it was approved. in Queensbury by the Planning Board a long time ago as a building lot. It's taxed by the Assessor as a building lot. It's assessed as a building . lot. In the last six years approximately, Debbie has paid $70,000 plus dollars to keep this as a building lot. So we think that the economics of this are such that she will be significantly injured, economically, by the tax structure, unless she can utilize this property as a building lot. So, ultimately, I. know that your job is to balance everything that's in the record, and that's why we've tried to give.you as complete a record as we possibly could, and that ultimately is goingto.be a balancing test where,you balance the variance against the health, safety and welfare of the neighborhood or community. We think, on the balancing, that certainly, based on what we presented, that the detriment to Debbie .is greater than the. public purpose thought to be served by the setback restrictions that you have, and I'd like for Tom to talk about the stormwater plan that he has proposed, and I can say that, based on the Planning Board treatment of this proposal, I don't think that the Planning Board ever said whether the stormwater system designed for this property would work or. not. We presented to the. Planning Board a stormwater plan that was very, . very extensive, engineered and re-engineered, and in doing so, we addressed concerns of the Planning Board. We addressed concerns of the lake George Water Keeper, but .1 guess I was looking for a recommendation from the Planning Board that would say something to the effect of, it will either work or it won't work, in orderto take care of stormwater on this site. I'm going to let Tom deal with that, as the engineer, because I think he's done a lot of hard work, and I think he's developed a good plan for the stormwater. So, with that, Tom, it's yours. MR. HUTCHINS-Good evening, Board. I thought I wouldbriefly review the changes to this plan from the last set of plans that you have received, and when I say plans, I mean, set of drawings that we prepared, not necessarily the documents that Dennis has discussed. The house is proposed as a 24 by 40 structure, and that is as was presented previously. It's as small as We could make thestructure and have it be.a useful structure to us. There is a, we have fine tuned the design details somewhat, and you'll note there's one curved wall instead of a complete rectangle, but other than that, the. footprint of the proposed house hasnot changed at all. The location of the proposed house has not changed. In construction of this, we've outlined a disturbance area of 5900 square feet, which is extremely tight. We have designed it in order to minimize any disturbance. We're showing a 35 foot area of natural vegetation between the shoreline and the lake side of the house to be undisturbed.. We are leaving all existing in that area, with a slight exception of what we'd need to do to get a water line through there, but in general, in front of the house will be natural vegetation as it exists. There are considerable large trees in that area, and any visibility of this from the lake wi 1.1 be well filtered, as will the view to the lake from this property. In permeability numbers for this lot, there's been a lot 6 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) of discussion that the house is oversized for the lot. Well, the, in terms of permeability, the Ordinance requires a minimum of 65%. We're at 80 and a half percent lot permeability, and that includes the house, the parking area, patio, and any existing hard areas on the site. So we're well in excess of the minimum in the Ordinance, and similarly with Floor Area Ratio, as you're aware, the Ordinance requires a maximum of 22%. We're at 15.4%, that counts all floors within the building. So we're in excess, or we're well beneath the maximum within the Ordinance, in terms of Floor Area Ratio. We've really, and this is both our. office and Debbie and her group have tried, throughout the process, to. keep the houses. small as we reasonably can and still have a functional structure that meets their needs when they're done. It's 24 by 40.. It's not very big, and we've done that purposely. As far as substantive changes since we were here last, the largest are with storm water controls, and we have modified the stormwater system.fairly significantly. We've done this in response to comments from the public, from the Water Keeper, from the Planning Board, and from the neighbors. Some of the things w~'ve done, we've moved the main infiltration trench that's located between the house and the lake, we've actually. moved that. five feet closer to the lake. That was done at the suggestion of the .WaterKeeper to attempt to minimize any construction damage in that area. In doing that, we have made it wider and shallower, and again, that was as a. result of our meetings with the Planning Board. It's, in my opinion, equally effective, if not more effective, than what we had, and it's probably more compliant, although it is.. five feet closer to the lake. We've improved stormwater area in the drive and parking area located north of it. We have improved controls there, additional infiltrative area. We have added provisions to deal with runoff from off our site, and this primarily has to do with. runoff that. comes down the drive, both from the south, flowing in a northerly direction, and from the west, flowing in an easterly direction. Both of those drives that yousee there slope towardsQur parcel. Instead of simply diverting that wateraround our project, we have incorporated some stormwater controls for that non site runoff, prior to it ultimately making its way across our parcel and to the lake. We've done three shallow retention areas which are great for sediment control. In this situation where you've got an asphalt road that a reasonable slope, the biggest concern is sediment, and we've got sediment controls both on the, to the south of our house and to the north of our house, we've installed, or we've shown a catch basin with an infiltration trench, and that, again, was an effort to do something instead of simply diverting it around our house. An issue has come up that, and that trench is actually located on the adjoining parcel that's with permission of the landowner, an issue has come up about whether or not that actually requires a separate variance, and we'd like to do it because it's better than simply diverting it, but if it's another variance on that site, then we may revise that as we go back to the Planning Board to simply divert it around. MR. CLEMENTS-Are you talking about the south end? MR. HUTCHINS-I'm talking, on that one, I'm talking about the north. MR. CLEMENTS-Okay. MR.HUTCHINS-There's a littleinfiltration trench, takes, there's a deep sump catch basin that'll catch a fair amount of sediment, and then that outlets to an infiltration trench. Obviously, .all of our stormwater controls are within 100 feet of lake George, the lot's 85 feet deep, and that portion of the Ordinance cannot be met on this lot, which is why we're here. We have been, as I said, we have been to the Planning Board on a couple of occasions, and discussed that we've done what we feel is a very good stormwater plan for this particular project. Again, we're disturbing 5800 square feet, and we're building a house with a footprint of just over 900 square feet. We've minimized, and I think we've done a decent system. here that's going to serve well, but, with that, I will turn it over, unless you have anything to add. MR. UNDERWOOD-Are your infiltration devices going to be maintenance free, or are they going to have to be maintained, pumped, you know, cleaned out occasionally to be effective? MR. HUTCHINS-It's in multiple years. Ten years or so there may be an issl,Je, and the surface has to be kept clean, but that's similar to any lawn area. MR. UNDERWOOD-Is the peat inside there, is that just to slow down the perc rate? MR.. HUTCHINS-The peat is an effort to provide some enhanced treatment, and some nutnent removal, because they are close to the shoreline, yes. MR. UNDERWOOD-Do Board members have any questions at this time? 7 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. CLEMENTS-I've got a couple. MR. UNDERWOOD-Sure. MR.ClEMENTS-One is I'd like to go back to Dennis, at the beginning here. You said in the original subdivision, there was a restriction that no more than four lakefront lots be created, and with the one that's owned by the Association, there, that's actually five. I assume maybe that you meant four buildable lakefront lots? That isn't what you said, but I'm wondering, could you clarify that a little bit? MR. PHilLIPS-Yes. As I read the restrictions, the restrictions called for four lakefront lots, and a common area, and in fact before the mapping was filed for the subdivision approval, Debbie's father hadacquired the property for the common area. So he was satisfying the requirements of, I think, his mandate contained in his deed, and so in my presentation to you on Page Four, I indicate that, in 1969, Debbie's father did an additional land purchase from Mr. Mitchell, .so as to satisfy the common area requirement that he had. MR. CLEMENTS-Thank you, and on the Site Development Data, in the setback requirements, this sheet.right here, I think the last time you were here I asked about the side yard setback to the north. The required was 25 feet, and then there was nothing for existing or proposed, and I assume, I don't know why there wasn't anything in there, but I assume that it's more than. MR. HUTCHINS-Well, there's, depending on how you look at it, there mayor may not be a side property line to the north, because there's the one parcel line that goes essentially all the way across the back. Yes, there's an angle point there, but it essentially is a continuation, it angle points about at the top of the stairs. MR. CLEMENTS-Right. MR. HUTCHINS-But we are, I guess I didn't indicate it. We're nowhere near him. MR. ClEMENTS~Well, that's what! thought. MR. HUTCHINS-We're nowhere near it. MR. CLEMENTS-I understand that. I was just looking for the information on the, and I don't know where you'd measure that from. I think you're right. Because the lines go. MR. HUTCHINS-We've treated it as a rear, at the advice of Staff, we've treated this parcel line asa rear property line.. Now, that could be interpreted a continuation of the rear line. I guess you could call it a side line, but if you offset a setback from this, it's going to be in this area, okay, and it's going to vertex right here, with this rear setback here. So it's not going to be in the area of our house. MR. CLEMENTS-And I think the last question that I had was, on the, could you explain a little bit about this storm tech chamber, what that does, how that works? MR. HUTCHINS-Yes. It's a polyethylene chamber, and in this case what it does is ptovide enhanced volume. Two of the things we have to provide to meet the Stormwater Ordinance are storage volume and. infiltration, in essence, assuming when you go onto a site, you're going to do something, you're going to create some impervious area that's not there, okay. The Ordinance says you..have.to have a volume reduction for a 10 year storm, and a rate reduction for a 25 year storm. In order to have a rate reduction for that . storm, you have to store it. What the chamber does is provide additional volume. When you've got a stone trench, you've only got 40% voids. When you have a chamber in it, you've got additional volume. So it allows you to take the same size trench, you put the chamber in it, you get more volume out of it. MR. CLEMENTS-It's just opening it up more? MR. HUTCHINS-It's just opening it up. MR. CLEMENTS-Okay. MR. UNDERWOOD-Does that give you more holding time, too, or doesn't reflect on holding time? 8 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. HUTCHINS-It would, well, if there's additional volume, the holding time fora given trench, the holding pond would be greater because. MR.UNDERWOOD-I mean, you're trying to infiltrate at a steady rate. MR. HUTCHINS-You're trying to infiltrate it at a steady rate. If you've got more volume that's got to infiltrate, yes. the time's going to be more, but really, the reason we did that isto get additional volume out of one trench. MR. CLEMENTS-Thank you. MR UNDERWOOD-Any. other questions? Okay. I think .1'11 open up the public part of the meeting. Anybody from the public wishing to speak on this matter? Would you come up, raise your hand. Okay. Do you want to come up, please. PUBLIC HEARING. OPEN CHRIS NA VITSKY MR NAVITSKY-Good evening. Chris Navitsky, lake George Water Keeper, We have a couple of comments and thoughts on the project, and we will keep them to the. variances listed and not divert into issues that may seem like Site Plan issues. Talking about alternatives. Now, the presentation talked about, that there are no otherlakefront lots that are aVpilable. It's our understanding, when the first proposal came through, there are other lots which are available within the same subdivision for a single family home. They may not be lakefront lots. So there are alternatives, it seems. If you carefully look at the Planning Board resolution, you talk about the reduction of the. building size, but if you take a look at that, that may also refer to the reduction of impervious coverage. Now, are there alternatives to .this project which may reduce the impervious coverage? And there could be. There are alternative site designs. Could there be 8green roof installed, which would reduce the impervious coverage? There are alternatives. So we think that those are items for consideration. The environmental impacts and impacts to the neighborhood. Obviously the lot was created, and it's been referenced back when there were not zoning regulations, and regulations have changed, stormwater regulations have changed. We know what happens to the lake. We know that water quality is impacted. So would this lot have been adopted or.created at that time that you could not meet these requirements? So the fact of the matter is we do need to protect the lake. So we do need these setbacks and they're set for reasons to protect water quality. Mr. Hutchins has worked and taken our comments and our thoughts, you know, regarding our infiltration trench, there's a trench between the house and the lake. .We had concerns that, when you're bringing construction vehicles in, when you're blasting, the potential blasting there, when you are driving concrete trucks there and you're impacting the soils, compacting them. you don't have a lot of soils there to begin with. So we feel, that's why we have concerns that that may not be a good tool for stormwater treatment, that trench five, six and a half feet from the house. Will that adequately address stormwater? The level of disturbance. We have, it's a .45 acre lot. Steep slopes,soils,which aren't eroding now, but when you disturb a third to half of this site, they're going to be exposed and they're going to be open to erosion. So you need that increased protection. We have rapid soils, very rapid percolation rates, but we're decreasing that time, that contact that the runoff will have with the soil, which is what removes the pollutants and nutrients and treats the water, but we're only providing a minimum 35 foot buffer, that's the minimum, and that's what you have to provide. So we're not getting anything more from this lot. So that's another consideration I think we have to put in. So we also talk, this was approved, again, as a building lot. The laws have changed, again, many times they've changed to address water quality and the impacts which disturbance and development has on the lake. We know now that just to the southwest, off of Plumb Point, not very far from here, every summer, we get a dead zone in the lake, and that's due to the increase nutrients, that's due to information that we did not have when a lot of disturbance and development happened on the lake, and we saw the impacts, and we see that late summers there's a dead zone, where the fish like to go, the cold water fish. So we have, will a single project create a great disturbance? Minimallywill, but we cumulatively are having this around the lake. So, we ask that you take a strong look at this, a strong balancing. We feel that there potentially are alternatives. We feel that there is going to be an environmental impact and that we need to get more protections along the shoreline. Thank you. MR. UNDERWOOD-Thank you. Anybody else, raise your hand. Come on up, please. 9 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) JOHN MATTHEWS MR. MATTHEWS-Good evening. John Matthews, year round resident. and neighbor directly across the Bay, .Dark Bay. Over the last several years, the Town has worked very hard to revise the regulations for construction projects in the Town, to make the use ofthe land better for everybody, for water quality and what not. Several years ago, the applicant of this project was denied .an application to construct a house on thi.s lot. Many years have past, and never did they grieve the assessment on the property. There was plenty of opportunity for them tolower the assessment, in lieu of the fact that they were just using it as a dock lot. Nowthey've spent a lot of time designing systems to hopefully solve the storm water management which I feel is inadequate, based on the slopes and what not, and there's one item that I'd like. to bring up is on the main map of this subdivision, as you look at the lot that is uphill from this lot, directly behind Mr. Folke's lot is a big, rectangular lot. Now just between now and two years ago, that was basically totally cleared of all vegetation. They blasted for weeks to build a house on that lot, which you have no idea is there because this aerial photograph hasn't been updated and they haven't taken a picture recently, but the runoff that comes from that lot, basically runs right down the road and out this outlet to the lake,and while they were building, I noticed, living right directly across the Bay, that when there was heavy rain, the Bay became cloudy out in our area and around the Point, which I'm concerned with, with the runoff. They tried to save many trees on the lot, but every time they touched the soil, because there was no soil, the big pine trees and what not had to come down. They fell over because they disturbed the roots and what not, and this is a fearthat I have of the, a little bit, the 35 feet of vegetation that they're going to leave on the shoreline. I find that it's probably going to be very impossible to keep it because of the disturbances that are going to have to be made by a water line and what not into the lake. Now, I spent a lot of time this winter, while this project was going on, walking on the ice, from any different angles, looking at the shoreline to . see what kind of impact this might have on the neighbors and the, what you see, and there's very little big vegetation right close to the lake that's going to. shade that, unless they do a lot of substantial planting and what not in that area. .1 know this is an old, grandfathered subdivision. So does this mean that other unbuilt lots will be built on also once this variance and what not are allowed for this lot. to be built on? That's a concern, because. I think the density, as per today's standards,is way overloaded, in an area which. has very little soil, septic systems for every single house except for this one, and many of which are probably not the best, because of the age and the rock that's associated with them. There's many other lots on the lake which have been. deemed unbuildable with the new rules in place. That's, this may be a precedent that's going to. be set. that's going to enable people to develop lots that are inadequate, just because they can do. As a year round resident, I trust the Boards of the Town will make the correct decisions regarding projects such as these in the future. Thank you. MR. UNDERWOOD-Thank you. Anybody else from the public wishing to speak? Come on up, please. JIM TOBIN MR. TOBIN-My name is Jim Tobin. Ilive.at 15 Dark Bay lane. I'm a member of the Dark Bay Association. There are three comments that I'd like to bring before this Board. As noted in the applicant's submission, there are a number of neighborhood lots that were said meet the, this building meets the conditions of the neighborhood. Well, that is slightly true. Buildings to the north of this site,. which were constructed pre-1978, and I believe 1978 is the correct date because that's when the zoning was enforced, or written for the Town of Queensbury.. Those building lots are shy of the. setback.. from. the lake, but they do meet all the setback requirements for. the side and for the rear lot lines. All buildings that were built after 1978, which are. basically south of this parcel, all meet or exceed the setback requirements of the lake. So I ask the Board to consider that, that this building does not really meet the neighborhood standards. Point Number Two, at the last meeting, which was the Planning Board meeting, the applicant stated that they couldn't think of any other lot in the entire Town of Queensbury that would have these restrictions imposed upon it. Well, within the Dark Bay Association, there are five additional lots thpt could meet, that.do not meet any zoning restrictions, the same as this lot. They all require variances. All the lots that are off the lake, have. rights on the lake through the Dark Bay Association and the beach lot. So an .alternative would be to build a house some place else. The property's owned by the applicant also. So I see no reason why. they couldn't do it some place else, not on the middle ofthe lake here. So I ask that you understand the. magnitude of your decision, if you grant this variance, is that there could be five additional applicants before you with the same variances in the near future. So you're actually setting a precedent, a neighborhood precedent, that you could 10 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) have other houses with the same restrictions that would need a variance, and Item Number Three, which I brought before this Board before. There are some deed restrictions that are associated with this parcel. One of the deed restrictions is that that applicant, at the last Planning Board meeting, agreed to abide by the deed restrictions, but I haven't seen any evidence of that to this date, and one oUhe conditions of the deed restrictions are that a two and a half story be built. I ask this Board, if they dO decide, I hope they do not, to grant the variances that are before the Board tonight, that you put a conditional approval into it that would limit the height of the building. It would be very important to me, and I think because this building is as big as it is now, it's a bad building for the wrong site, and it's rather ugly. I'd have to look at it for an eternity. If the Board would put a conditional approval of a two and a half story building, which the deeds says, you don't have to say two and a half stories but do whatever you want, it would be v~ry important. Thank you very much. MR. UNDERWOOD-AnYQody else wishing to speak on the matter? Come on up, please. ROBERT FOLKE MR. FOlKE-Before I speak, may I point out a few things on the map here? MR. UNDERWOOD-Certainly. MR. FOlKE-My name is Robert Folke. This is my house right here. Here's the lot that we're talking about. Here's the site of the house, right in this region of the lot. Here's the beach lot. Here's th~ lot next to me which was just discussed. This part, which is actually flat, has been seeded, at this point in time. The house itself, the new house that's not on this map, is right in this area here. Another house behind that has rights to these lots is right here. Mr. Tobin's house is right here. That's a visual presentation of where we are. I expressed my, my name, again, Robert Folke. I've spoken before, and I've written letters before. I expressed my basic position in letters to the Planning Board on March 16th, and the Zoning Board of Appeals on March 25th. They should be in your files. All questions raised in those letters have been resolved. I am one of the two longest residents in the Dark Bay Association, and the first year round resident, having occupied my house in December 1972. My property is the only one in the Dark Bay Association directly affected by the proposed house. The house will sit directly below my dining room and living room windows, between my house and Dark Bay. Apart from the existing Durante house, my house is the only one in the Dark Bay Association that will have a view of the proposed house, My original concerns about the height of the house were based on any change in grade level or roof height. After measurements with long poles, my wife and I determined that the sight lines over the planned roof would be satisfactory, but not with any higher roof or higher grade level. Wearing my other hat, as President of the Dark Bay Association, I was concerned about the practicality of the original water system of pumping waste water along the road to a settling field in an upper lot. This was a long line. It was going to be rip up the road. It was going to cross another spur of the road, and it was going to be a big uphill affair. When that plan was replaced by twin, linked holding tanks, the original concern disappeared. I'm not an engineer, but I understand that the proposed stormwater plan is likely to improve containment of runoff that flows into the empty lot from the two hills on the road that Mr. Hutchins was just talking about, and also John Matthews. That runoff has been therefor years. It's gone into an empty lot. I've been taking early morning swims along that shore for many years. So I have a direct interest in the water quality of the Bay and it's very immediate to me. I consider the size of the planned house appropriate for a lot that has nearly 200 feet of lakeshore. It would be one of the smallest houses along this stretch of shoreline, and all adjacent lakeshore houses in both directions are much larger. Of course, I have enjoyed looking atthe woods rather than houses for 35 out of 37 years, and I'm not happy to give that up, since my family and I have lived in the house, but we knew from the outset that we were surrounded by buildable lots, and we also knew the John Behrens and .John Durante had retained and paid taxes on lots adjoining ours for their children and grandchildren to build houses. That happened on the lot immediately west of us, starting two years ago, and it was no surprise. Similarly, this proposed lot was, expected, house was expected. We just didn't know when. No member of the Dark Bay Association, other than Jim Tobin, has expressed opposition to this house in hearings and. none to me. I understand his opinions, but do not share them. The plat told all who bought land or houses in the Association that the buildable lot adjoining our common beach and dock lot might some day have a house on it. Finally, it seems unconscionable to me that a family paying full taxes on a buildable, lakeshore lot for 40 years can now be denied the opportunity to use that lot for its intended purpose. If the rules changed along the way, so should the assessment have been changed, reduced. 11 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) It's currently, as we've already heard, one million two hundred and three thousand dollars. I'll be happy to answer any questions from members of the Board. MR. UNDERWOOD-Thank you. Anybody else from the public wishing to speak on the ~ matter? Any correspondence? MR. URRICO-Not since the last time. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Why don't you guys come back up, please. Any comments you want to make in response to the public's commentary? MR. HUTCHINS-Yes. I guess I'd touch a little bit on a few of the details of this lot, and where the building area is relative to the remainder of the lot. You'll see between, this double line shown across here isan existing stone retaining wall that's been there for, all I can say is many, many years. It shows on the original subdivision map from 1972. It's dry laid stone wall. It's in good condition. The site is terraced to some extent where the area where we're building is of relativelymodest slope until you get up in the area near the wall, and then it climbs up. There's another wall here that essentially supports the drive, which is not in good condition at all, and there's some failure evident in this area here, that this project would, among other things,address that, but I don't think it's unreasonable, and I've looked at this hard at the site, to keep our disturbance within the limits we've shown, and in particular with this wall here. The soils in this area are granular. They're good, and they're relatively deep, four, six, eight feet of granular material in this area that will work with the proposed system we're showing. As you get up toward the road, you get into. slope ledge. In fact, this area from, I believe it's Mr. . Folke's house, this area between his house and the drive is, there's a whole lot of exposed ledge, and it's a significantgrade change. This is elevation 370, at grade at the side .of his house. Down here, atour high point on site, we're at 345. . So this is a steep ledge. Everything we've looked at within here has revealed soils that I feel are workable. We're not on bare rock, as there were on the site up above that was discussed. There is an area that we're likely going to have to remove some rock in. order to. getthis basement in. .It will be for a short distance, and it will be along here and the exact extent of it, we can't detail until we dig it, but it's likely that there'll have .to be some rock removed there. It won't be a significant amount, but it's likely that there will be some, but my point, I don't think it's unreasonable, with careful construction techniques, to be able to build within this disturbed area. Obviously we don't have the luxury of a place to stock pile soil and put soils. Everything that comes off is going to have to go out in a truck, and then we're going to have to bring it back. . It's going to be a difficult site to build on, but I don't feel that it's unreasonable to accomplish it within the disturbancewe're showing. MR. UNDERWOOD-As you're proposing this, I mean, we're going to consider it a year round home, but, I mean, is it going to be used year round by the Debaron family, as far as you know, or is it going to be just a seasonal usage, three seasons, coming up at Christmas time, that type of deal? MR. HUTCHINS-Well, it's certainly going to be constructed, I mean, it's going to be constructed to year round standards. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, because one of the questions I had is this. Say somebody purchases the home in the. future, the first thing I would anticipate is someone is probably going to want a garage, some kind of covering for their vehicles out there. What's that going to do, at that point, to, I mean, we're not going to be near our 22% Floor Area Ratio .as far as build out or anything, even with something like that being constructed? I would imagine we're well below. MR. OBORNE-They're not proposing any car, or garages or anything. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. I know there's nothing proposed now, but I'm just saying down the road, you know, I mean, if someone comes in with a sob story about having to walk out and take the snow off the carin the wintertime. I mean, is that something that we would anticipate and be able to accommodate in the future? MR. OBORNE-I think, if they were to do that, it would be already over impervious surfaces, and all that impervious surface would have been accounted for. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. Okay. Board members, any questions you have? MR. URRICO-Yes. I want to re-confirm the height of the house as it is now, and when you start digging through that rock, will that change the height of the house? 12 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. HUTCHINS-No. We've set elevations for basement floor, first floor, and ridge, and the height of the house is 28 feet. We cannot raise the house, we can't raise the house and still meet the 28 feet, because it measures from existing grade and finished grade. So we can't just stack up fill and raise the house up in order to meet the height requirement, and we've agreed that the ridge height we've shown and t~e eleva~io~s we've shown we're going to hold to, and that may mean some rock excavation, but It will be minimal in quantity, as compared to a typical. MR. UNDERWOOD-George? MR. DREllOS-The stormwater trench, you moved it five feet closer to the lake. Is that because you're putting the trench in first, before the house is built, or after the house? MR. HUTCHINS-We moved it further away to mitigate a concern about construction damage of the soils in the arE~a of the trench. MR. DREllOS-Allright. So you want to be in undisturbed soils. MR. HUTCHINS-Yes. MR. UNDERWOOD-You don't want to be in a compacted area where you know you're not going to get anything. Any other questions? Okay.. I want to discuss with the Board members briefly here, because we're stuck between two things here. We had asked for a recommendation from the Planning Board, and we. sort of got one, that they would like to see something smaller. . Just to throw out the ideas for you guys to think about. I mean, you're at 945 square feet on your footprint of the house at the present time. I can't imagine going much smaller than that. I mean, it's 40 feet long, but it's only 24 feet wide, which isn't that wide for a home to be. I suppose that we could go even smaller, but in the context of the commentary that was made, if you look at the surroundiQg neighborhood and the size of the homes along the waterfront, north and south of here, pretty much everybody else is pretty much bigger than you are, like two to three times the size of what you're proposing on .the lot here, and again, that's not to say that this .is okay. I mean, you made some valid arguments hereabout the monetary angle, the assessment angle and things like that, but I think our main purview is that, you know, there probably is a right to put some kind of a structure up on this lot going forward, but we've got to decide in our own minds, is this reasonable, what you've proposed here, or is it unreasonable what you've proposed here. The Planning Board seems to feel like you could go smaller, and I.don't know what you guys think at the same time. DR. DREllOS-Well, isn't it in the deed, though, you have to build at least 900 square feet? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, but, you know, deeds are deeds. I mean, there's covenants, etc., blah, blah. We can argue that point, but in other words, there's a limiting factor, I mean, when you look at size, I mean, in a practical sense, if you're going to have a valuation of one and a half million dollars on your property, you're not going to build a 600 square foot hunting cabin and be happy, probably, with the result. MR OBORNE-I think you may want to get some clarification on that minimum size. .Is that footprint or house size? I believe it's house .size, not necessarily footprint. MR. PHilLIPS-It says 900 square feet, and it's interesting in terms of what that does mean. It's not clarified in the covenants. I mean, it's reasonable to me that the reason for that covenant is to have a certain quality and level of construction in that neighborhood. So that it benefits everybody else in the neighborhood. So it doesn't really answer that question. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. let's go down through here and look at whatwe're looking for. I think everybody pretty much understands the fact that where they're. siting the house, that they're going to need 40 feet of relief from the back line lot there and also the road frontage relief. It's not some main thoroughfare road that you're going to be stepping out into traffic on and getting mowed down when you go out to get the newspaper in the morning, but at the same time, in order to jockey this house on this small lot here, and keep in mind it's, what the size of it is. It's.45 acres, it's a hplfan acre lot. It's a long, thin lot is what it is. It's an oddball shape that they chose when they split it up and made it that way. What do you guys think about that setback? MRS. JENKIN-Which setback? 13 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting. OS/27/09) MR. DREllOS- The rear? MR. UNDERWOOD-The rear setback. MR. DREllOS-1 don't think you can get back any farther. They'll be on the road. MR. UNDERWOOD-Right. MR. DRELlOS-What are you, six feet away now, or four feet. MR. UNDERWOOD-And I think the commentary from the Board in the past has been such that, you know, you've got your choice. You go closer to the lake, you go closer to the road, which is, in a practical sense, it probably makes more sense to set it back as far as you possibly can, safety wise. MRS. JENKIN-I think when we spoke before about the six feet, 6., whatever it is. MR. DREllOS-73. MRS. JENKIN-73 feet, from the road, that we were also talking about snow in the wintertime. There's very little space. The retaining wall that is there now is the edge of the road. So there's no buffer at all from the driving lane to the house. So the house is essentially six feet from the road, 6.73 feet from the road, where people will be driving, and I think that it was a consideration, at one of the earlier meetings, that it was very, very close. Too close for comfort to the road. MR. HUTCHINS-And that 6.73 is actually from the parcel line, and the road. The asphalt area as outlined might be a foot behind that parcel line at that particular location. At the south corner it's, conversely it's 7.69 to the parcel line, but the parcel line's in the road. So, you're in the right, yes, it's six foot from where the snow gets pushed. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Tom, I'm going to have to cut you off, because I want to ask the Board members. If we need clarification, though, we will ask you that. MR. HUTCHINS-I'm sorry. MR. UNDERWOOD-Roy, you had something? MR. URRICO-Well, I just think that all of the variances are related to the size of the house. I mean, there's no way to separate them without coming back to the size of the house, that whether, if we consider this the minimum size that we're going to deal with, then we're dealing with three variances of substantial numbers. So I really think the issue is the size of the house, because that dictates all the other variances, the setback from the lake, the setback from the infiltration device, as well as the rear setback. So I really think there is really one issue that we're dealing with, not, that affect three variances, that impact, that create three variance needs. MR. UNDERWOOD-So the Planning Board's commentary about downsizing is pertinent t .? o. MR.URRICO-Well, they really didn't answer our question. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. Right. MR. URRICO-So I think we knew that. I don't know if that helped us at all. We asked them about direction on the stormwater, and they gave us what we already knew. So I really think we're back to where we were. MRS. JENKIN-I think one of our original requests was to reduce the size of the home. MR. URRICO-Right. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. let's, let me ask this question of you, Keith. When we began the whole project here, the first time .it was presented to us, we were kicked in because of Waterfront Residential Three acre lots, of which there don't appear to be any in existence in the area there. I assume the WR-3A zone designation was as a result of the steep slopes, etc., and that's usually been the case on any of the waterfront properties in Town here. 14 ~ (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. OBORNE-Yes. It certainly is geographically induced, absolutely. MR. UNDERWOOD-So it's topographic in that respect. Now, since that time, the Town Board has revised the Zoning Code. We're now in a situation going forward. We have to look at this in hindsight because we were at the 75, because now everything is two acre zoning with 50 foot setbacks. MR. OBORNE-Everything is two acre zoning with 50 foot setbacks. Not dealing with the infiltration trenches, that still stands. MR. UNDERWOOD-Sure. Hight. MR. 060RNE-And obviously you do have to look at it myopically through the WR~3A zone. MR. UNDERWOOD-Sure, and as far as the infiltration trenches and all that go, I mean, that's something that we have been using for the past year alone. . MR. OBORNE-Absolutely. MR. UNDERWOOD-I think when the project began, those rules and regs were not .in force at that time, but in the interim time, the plans are reflective of trying to build in what those planswere trying to achieve, and that is helping the lake, you know, maintain itself, and not exacerbate a problem where we know its already getting worse. MR. OBORNE-I would surmise that to be true, yes. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. If I look at the Planning Board commentary, you know, the decision of the Planning Board, as you said before, potentially have an adverse impact on the environmental characteristics that cause the establishment of the CEA of lake George. Due to the site constraints of topography being so steep there, and the steep slopes there, we realize that we're going to have an impact no matter what happens here. I mean, as it presently exists, there's probably an impacUrom the properties up above on the hill above there, too, that it seemed to, might have some mitigation as a result of these stormwater structures, if they're allowed to build them. MR. OBORNE-Well, I mean, there's obviously not any stormwater controls on that property. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. Other than the old retaining wall that's across the whole thing, in essence, yes. All right. What do you guys want to do? Do you want to make them go backand down size this, then, or do you want to go through this? MR. DREllOS-Well, .how small can you go before you get unreasonable? MR. UNDERWOOD-Well, exactly, and I think the discussion point, the point has been made that the 935 is a number, all right. Whether that refers to the actual footprint, or that it had to be a 935 square foot home completed, as the total square footage minimal size of the house that could be built there. MR. DREllOS-1 guess, what size would make everybody happy on the Board? MR. UNDERWOOD-Well, it's not a matter of that. It's, in other words, at the present time we're at a 935 square foot footprint for this home, all right. So in other words, if we told them that they had to come back with something that was smaller in footprint size, you know, the balancing test is going to be, what's a reasonable size for a year round home. 935 square feet's pretty small. MR. GARRAND-Not for an entire house. This house is going up. MRS. JENKIN-But that's not it. That's not the square footage of the home. MR. UNDERWOOD-But, I mean, if you use the square footage is totally as 935 is your minimum point, another words, what I'm saying is is that the footprint of the house is at 945 right now. So, I don't know if shrinking it down to 900's going to make a difference. Is the 45 hacked off going to make a difference? You're still going to end up with a two story house that's going to be 1400 square feet or 1800 square feet. Is that minimally, is 15 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) that minimal change going to alter the course of the lake, or is it going to make it better or worse, you know, by sticking to the size we have? MR. GARRAND-I don't think it could make. itany worse, but by the same token, it's not only been the recommendation of a Town Board member, but also the Planning Board to look at trimming down the size of . that house a little bit in order to mitigate the environmental damage we might be doing. MR. DRElLOS-The Town Board, or one Town Board member? MR. GAR RAND-One Town Board member. MRS. JENKIN-Could I make a commentjust generally? MR. UNDERWOOD-Absolutely. Sure. MRS. JENKIN-I had a couple of things, after listening to the response and the explanation, the original explanation. The laws have been changed, and unfortunately the owners do not have the same privilege because the laws have been changed, as they did when the covenant was first built, or first made out, because the covenant, at that time, didn't take into consideration environmental quality of the lake. They were not really talking about the protection of the lake. They were talking about subdividing the property to the benefit of the owners, rather than looking at the lake as a whole, and the reason that laws have. been put into place is because we r~alize the pristine beauty of the lake now, and it is very, very important to protect it, and the thing is, the house is 2351 square feet. It essentially is a three story home. The second story is smaller. The upstairs is a smaller footprint, smaller square footage than the main floor, but you also have the full basement, which is probably going to be developed, although there's nothing in the plans for development, but it is a walkout basement and has to be considered, and so that will be living space for the home, too. So you will have the full 2351 square feet of livable space. Taken that home, it's crowded in a very, very narrow lot, six feet from the road, it's going to be 16 and a half feet above the road. So anyone driving. past the road is going to look ata house, they'll. be able to look right in the windows. You'll have to close off the windows and put blinds or something in the windows so people can't look in. It's going to reduce the privacy for the people, for the owners. It's also going to be obtrusive to the other people in the neighborhood because the house is just going to be sitting there. .It's going to bea huge home on a very, very small parcel. All the engineering that's been done, and I think it's a wonderful job of the engineering that you've done and the planning, and trying to mitigate the problems of the runoff, because there will be runoff, but the whole point of it is to place a house that's larger than it should be on a small lot. That's the whole crux of the whole matter. You're trying to fit something in. It's a big block fitting in a small hole, and that's what you've been doing, and you can do itnow with engineering and everything. There is still a problem. of erosion and maintenance of these trenches. The three inches of peat that is supposed to protect the runoff and stop the runoff, that's going to have to be replaced every year because peat runs off, too. It's just one factor when you have mulch on top of something. I just, I understand why the owners want to build, but I really do feel that it is our responsibility to look at the balancing act here, and see if it is, if the benefit can be achieved by anyother means. Yes, it can. It's a big homeon a small lot. There is going to be an undesirable change in the neighborhood, because this home, if it was put on a larger lot, up on top of the hill, it would be perfectly fine. It would look lovely, and it would be appropriate, but putting it down there right near the lake, it's not appropriate. MR. UNDERWOOD-let me throw out another couple of comments here, if you're finished. MRS. JENKIN-No, I'll stop. MR. UNDERWOOD-The next item that we have up on the agenda is one of the homes over in Takundewide, and when we got into the Takundewide situation, we had a memorandum of understanding with their organization over there that a lot of these single story cottages, which were on these postage stamp sized lots, where everything else was communal property, we worked out a plan with the Planning Board, in consultation with them, that allowed them to change these homes into two story homes on the same footprints, all right, and if you're looking at the one that we have coming up next here, we were dealing with 768 square foot single story residences that we were going to allow to morph into double their size by adding a second story. It kept the cottage size. It kept the footprint small, and it accommodated the needs of the people in wanting to have an upper story on the home, and in that sense we accomplished 16 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) something that both their group, all the people in Takundewide agreed it was a good idea in retrospect, even though it wasn't a fun process to go through, but at the same time, looking at this lot here, it's almost the same situation. You can take the smallest lots that we have on the lake, and they are appropriate for development based. upon the valuations in your arguments that you made pretty sincerely to us, but I'm just saying, say we shrunk this down to a 768 square foot house, from a 945 square foot house, and kept it on that lot. I mean, we would be mitigating, we would be keeping it in a. practical sense, you know, the same thing that we tried to achieve further down no the lake. In other words, if we're looking towards gradually improving, gradually changing people's ideas about what they can and cannot do, that would be accomplishing the task. It would allow them to build the house, not quite as big as they wanted, bunhey would still get a house that's an improvement. MRS. JENKIN-But you're comparing apples to oranges here, because the Takundewide is a clustering type of thing. This is not a cluster. This isn't a cluster. MR. UNDERWOOD-Well, in effect it is, because when you did the original subdivision, you created all these nonconforming lots that ultimately were nonconforming. MRS. JENKIN-But they don't have a natural, a very large natural area as Takundewide does. They have preserved a very large natural area, and then have small lots, but there is no natural area on this one. MR. UNDERWOOD-I think that the direction that the Planning Board was looking at, that was looking towards going in that sort of a direction, where you would create something smaller, more compact, with less of an impact with runoff and things like that, and maybe that would be a means. of achieving it. I don't know if that's what you guys think is reasonable or not, but, I'll throw the idea out. MR. DREllOS-Well, they deserve something on this lot. The size, you know, is another issue, but, I mean. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. What do you guys want to do, then? Do youwantto make them come back with something smaller? I mean, in other words, everybody s.eems to . feel like what they've done, .as far as the stormwater runoff and. that is looking towards achieving is over and above what anybody else in the neighborhood has done previously. Anybody that's going to build a house on lake George on these steep slopes, in the future, is going to be subject to the same type of purview by the. Planning Board and the Zoning Board and the Town Engineer to make sure that we do minimize the impacts to the lake, but do you want to make them come back with something smaller? MR. URRICO-let me ask a question, just because Keith brought up the new regulations. If they were to withdraw this application entirely, and then re,.submit it in a different form, say next month, the 50 foot. setback wouldn't be required any longer. The variance for the setback from the waterfront wouldn't be required any longer. Is that what you were saying? MR. OBORNE-Well, that, I don't think you can do that, though. If this never existed in the past year and they came in and did it, obviously, yes, but it's an existing proposal. MR. URRICO-Okay, but under current regulations, that area would be a two acre waterfront? MR. OBORNE-Correct. MR. URRICO-And would require 50 foot setback. MR. OBORNE-That's my understanding. MR. URRICO-Okay. MR. OBORNE-But it would not, they would still have to deal with the 100 foot setback. MR. URRICO-Got that. MR. OBORNE-And their rear setbacks. 17 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. CLEMENTS-I think Roy's got a good point about that, and I have to say that I've looked aUhis as modest, particularly considering the sizes ofthe other homes that are nearby, and if you're looking at how it would change the neighborhood, it certainly wouldn't, I mean, you know, it's going to be smaller than the other houses there. So I don't see a huge change in the neighborhood that way. I think the current technology would most likely help the runoff, and I also think, and I'm sure that everybody agrees, that there's going to be an environmental impact on anything, if you're going to do constructions anywhere, there's going to be an environmental impact. There just has to be, and that's kind of where I'm coming from. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay, well, then I'm going to poll you guys and decide. This is what I want to know, do you want to do this tonight, or do you want to make them come back with something smaller? So, Brian, I'll ask you first. MR. CLEMENTS-As far as I can see, I would do this tonight. I see, I know there are a lot of concerns here. It's very difficult site, but I think they've done a good job on the engineering, and I think that probably, with the runoff that comes off of the road, that the, what they've done with the runoff is going to improve the area, so I'd be in favor. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Joan, what do you want to do? MRS. JENKIN-I would, actually I would recommend that the house be made smaller. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. George? MR. DREllOS-1 would be in favor of the project. I can't see making the house any smaller is going to make that much of an impact on what we have here. So, I mean, I don't see why we need to go another 100 square feet or 50 feet or whatever we're looking at. I think they've done a good job. I think the Planning Board also said it right in their minutes, that that's a good stormwater control. So I'd be in favor. MR. UNDERWOOD-Rich? MR. GARRAND-I think something should be built here. This homeowner's been paying for this lot for a long time, but I do think there is a little room to move on this, as far as total footprint on the house, and any increase in permeability in this area will help. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Joyce? MRS. HUNT-Yes. I have to go along with the Planning Board's recommendation that they consider downsizing the footprint of the home because of the stormwater control measures. MR. UNDERWOOD-Roy? MR. URRICO-Yes. I didn't want what I said earlier to be misconstrued. The point I was trying to get at was that the setback from the waterfront, the shoreline setback, I think is sort of mitigated by where the Town is heading right now with that area, but I still think there is room to reduce the size of this house. I think the rear setback is still, we're talking about 73% relief in that area, and 55% from the infiltration system, so I think there is room to maneuver there, whatever we can get out of it is going to be worth it. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay, and I, too, this is my take. on it. The road frontage requirement in the back, I don't think we have a problem with that. I think we realize that's the best way to go, setting your house back to where it is. The 75 foot shoreline setback, I think that we can understand where the Town Board has chosen to make it a 50 foot setback going forward here. Unfortunately, we would have to grant you relief for the difference with the 75 foot setback, and I don't think I would have a problem with that either because I think you're setback much further than every other property that exists along that shoreline there, with rare exception. I think that the stormwater that's been proposed, all the devices that Tom's spent a considerable length of time trying to develop here, in a sense that it's far and above. what we've ever requested on any other project. The only other one that I can think of that we came c1oseto on this was the one that we did down on Dunham's Bay last year, and they used peat infiltration trenches on that one. That was Tom Jarrett on that project. The setback requirements from the back, and the infiltration requirements, all this is new to us, and I think that we could just simply say that, based upon that, no, you can't build anything on this lot, but it would be pretty impractical given the argument that you've been paying taxes on a buildable lot and then it's a pre-existing subdivision that exists there, but I'm going to recommend the 18 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) same thing, that you come. back with a smaller footprint. look at what we do on Takundewide and some of these smaller lots and I think everybody has to realize, you can't always have exactly what you want. You're going to. have. to do something to accommodate the future. of the lake up there, and the Water Keeper's commentary, everybody's commentary is pertinent going forward here, but we've got to do things that are in everybody's best interest, and you've done, gone the extra yard as far as I'm concerned, as far as the infiltration structures as you've proposed them here. If we bring the size of that house down a couple of hundred square feet, and ignore the fact that the 950 is some magic number, I think that you're stiU going to end up with a 14, 1500 square foot house that's going to be a nice summer place to spend time in, no on~'s going to be complaining about it. So, based upon that, then, I think what we're going to do is table. MR. DREllOS-Well, what size, can you give them a, are you saying 200 square feet, is that what you're recommending? MR. UNDERWOOD-No. I'm just saying, let's come up with a number that's somewhere between, a number that is somewhere between 700 and, what, okay, we'll stay away from numbers, then. Do you want to table this, going forward, so you can discuss it with them? No? MR. OBORNE-Then I would suggest that Counsel recommend a withdrawal of the application. If you're not wishing to table it, are you withdrawing your application? MR. PHilLIPS-No, I want to vote. MR. OBORNE-You want to vote. MS. SCHIEBEL-Can I make a comment? MR. OBORNE-Of course you can, absolutely. MS. SCHIEBEL-I have four children. I have drastically downsized what I expected to build there. This is a two bedroom house. You get that footprint any smaller, Iwon't be able to tuck the bedroom. I have built three, four houses. We come from a family of builders. That's what my history is. If you make that first floor any smaller, we cannot tuck those bedrooms under that roofline. There won't be any height left to walk under. Any rooms in the basement, to me, are worthless. You talk to any real estate agent. They are worthless. I'm sorry, it's not considered living space. Maybe for kids to go down and play, but I'm not going to have a major portion of my living space in a basement. You're talking about a two million dollar investment for us, which is a big chunk of money. It's not what I have. It's all inherited. This was hard earned money. I'm not going to invest two million dollars in a property I can't even get my family in. I think we have gone beyond making compromises. This has taken me three years to get to this point. MR. PHilLIPS-Mr. Chairman, could I say one thing? MR. UNDERWOOD-Certainly. MR. PHilLIPS-I know it's a little bit out of order. I think that the first time we came to this Zoning Board, I remember that the comment by this Zoning Board was that it was happy to see an applicant who was fitting a house to the land, as opposed to the reverse of that, and as I remember that, we were well within all of the standards of the Ordinance,'in terms of permeability and floor space. The first time I heard about downsizing was when we went to the Town Board for the septic tank variance, and at that meeting, I heard Mr. Strough say that he thought there should be a downsizing of the project. I knew that Mr. Strough was a former member of the Planning Board, and so I understood his comment because that would not be unusual to hear something like that. When we went to the Planning. Board, I think.. last week, I think the discussion got very serious about downsizing, and our thoughts on downsizing was that, even though we downsize, as far as the stormwater is concerned, we still have to have stormwater variances because we are within 100 feet of lake George, and so I asked Tom, in the meantime, whether downsizing does anything, from a stormwater point of view, and I know that Tom thought that the storm water plan that we have designed basically solves the stormwater problem for this site, and enhances the neighborhood, because we wind up treating stormwater coming down the road in both directions. So Tom felt very, very good about that. So we asked the question of whether downsizing does anything for us, in the sense of the environmental impact on the lake. So what is the environmental impact on the lake? I 19 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) think that there is the visual. thing that people think about, that they might see something, but otherwise, in terms of the expert, Tom, who's next to me, I mean, he basically says that the storm water problem is solved, and so, on the downsizing issue, and I'm reflecting my client right now, you know, I think that I'm hearing from this Board for the first time tonight, the downsizing issue, but I've not heard this from this Board before, and I thought I heard something different, but I just wanted to make that comment for the record. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Then I guess that their wish is that we. vote on this tonight. So I guess I'll need to have somebody do a motion. Does somebody want to do it? MR. CLEMENTS-You probably want me to, right? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. That would be fine, and make sure that you include each one of the different sections, and I thinkwhat I'll do is, just to clarify, when you people vote,l think that you should vote on each one of the different sections because, just to let them have an idea of what we would approve, what we wouldn't approve, based upon your commentary that you're going to make. Okay. Brian. MRS. JENKIN-It's not three different votes, is it? MR. UNDERWOOD-No, we're just doing one vote. So, go ahead. MS. GAGLIARDI-Did you close the public hearing? MR. UNDERWOOD-I will close the public hearing. PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED MOTION TO APPROVE AREA VARIANCE NO. 11-2008 DEBARON ASSOCIATES BY DEBRA SCHEIBEL. PARTNER, Introduced by Brian Clements who moved for its adoption, seconded by George Drellos: Dark Bay lane, off Route 9L. The applicant proposes construction ora 2351 square foot single. family home, associated wastewater system and stormwater controls on the shores of lake George. The relief required. The applicant requests 40 feet of relief from the 40 foot road frontage requirement per 179-4-090. Further, 24.47 feet of relief requested from the 75 foot shoreline setback, and 18.27 feet of relief requested from the rear setback requirement for the WR..:1Azone, per 179-4-030. Finally, that 54.88 feet of relief is requested from the 100 foot minimum setback requirements per 147-9 for infiltration devices on lake George. In making the determination, the Board shall consider: One, whether an undesirable change will be produced in the character of the neighborhood or a detriment to nearby properties will be created by the granting of this Area Variance. Moderate changes to nearby properties may be anticipated. However, it doesn't look like an undesirable change will be produced. Number Two, whether the benefit sought by the applicant can be achieved by some method feasible for the applicant to pursue other than an Area Variance. The applicant could reduce the size of the project in order to be more compliant. However, in relation to the other houses in the area, it would be similar in character to the rest of the neighborhood or smaller. Number Three, whether the requested Area Variance is substantial? The request for 40 feet or 100% of relief from the 40 foot road frontage relief per 179-9-090 may be considered severe relative to the Ordinance. The request for 24.27 feet or 33% of relief from the 75 foot shoreline setback requirement per 179-4-030 may be considered moderate to the Ordinance. The request for 18.27 feet or 73% of. relief from the 25 foot rear setback requirement may be considered moderate to severe relative to the Ordinance. Finally, the request for 54.88 feet or 55% relief from the 1 00 foot minimum setback requirement for infiltration devices per 147~9 maybe considered moderate relative to the Ordinance. Number Four, whether the proposed variance will have an adverse effect or impact on the physical. or environmental conditions in the neighborhood or district. Moderate impact on the physical and environmental conditions may be anticipated. However, I feel that the impact would help,the water filtration system would help the runoff on the property. Number Five, whether the alleged difficulty was self-created. The difficulty may be considered self-created. However,it has been noted that because of laws since this site was developed that the difficulty may have been created by the laws, and I would make a motion that we approve Area Variance No. 11-2008. Duly adopted this 27th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Drellos, Mr. Clements 20 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) NOES: Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Underwood MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. MR. PHilLIPS-Thank you. Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 22-2009, Stephen Mason, Meeting Pate: May 27, 2009 "Project location: 2 Seneca Drive, Cleverdale Description of Proposed Project: . The applicant proposes the demolition of an existing 768 square foot single story residence and construct, in its place, a 1533 square foot two story residence. The applicant requests 7 feet of shoreline setback relief, 5.52 feet of north side setback relief, 5.09 feet of south side setback relief, and 8.8 feet of rear setback relief for the Waterfront Residential 1. acre zone per 9179-4-030. Further, the applicant requests 1030 square feet of Floor Area Ratio relief per 9179-4-030. In making a determination, the board shall consider: 1. Whether an undesirable change will be produced in the character of the neighborhood or a detriment to nearby properties will be created by the granting of this area variance. Minor changes to nearby properties are anticipated as a result of this proposal. 2. Whether the benefit sought by the applicant can be achieved by some method, feasible for the applicant to pursue, other than an area variance. Alternatives to an area variance appear to be limited due to the constraints of the lot. 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for 7 feet or 14% of relief from the 50 foot shoreline setback requirement may be considered minor relative to the ordinance. Further, the request for 5.5 feet or 36.7% of relief from the 15 foot north side setback requirement may be considered moderate relative to the ordinance and the request for 5.1 feet or 34% of relief from the 15 foot south side setback requirement. may be considered moderate relative to the ordinance. Additionally, the request for 8.8 feet or 58.7% of relief from the 15 foot rear setback requirement may be considered moderate to severe relative to the ordinance. Finally, the request for 1030 square feet or 204.7% of relief from the allowable floor area of 503 square feet may be considered severe relative to the ordinance. 4. Whether the proposed variance will have an adverse effect or impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood or district. Minor impacts on the physical and environmental conditions of the neighborhood may be anticipated. . 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. 21 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) Takundewide Resolution 9/23/2003 According to the Takundewide. Resolution, Memorandum of Understanding between the Planning Board and the Takundewide HOA dated September 23, 2003 any proposed cottage expansion would be limited to 1,536 square. feet (see attached). As this application calls for a 1533 square foot single family residence, it would be considered FAR compliant with regards to the above mentioned Memorandumof Understanding. Type II-No further action required." MR. O'CONNOR-Mr. Chairman, members of the Board, thank you. I'm Michael O'Connor from the law firm of Little & O'Connor. I represent the applicant. With me is Stephen Mason on the far side, who is the applicant, and between us is William Mason who is the builder for the project. This is the fourth time that we've been here on projects of this. nature. I think we began probably two years ago, and we went through a whole series of different presentations to the Planning Board, and the Town Board, and ended up with a community septic system that would serve this unit and the other units that have been renovated. That system has been constructed, and is operable at this point. Now, basically you've got another one of the units that came in that wants to follow what was set forth as a master plan for the development within this total development, if you will. There are 22 acres, and I get this a little bit confused, but I think 18 acres that are common. . The other four acres is taken up either by community buildings or the actual individual lots that are owned by different members of the Association. We basically have a very small footprint of exclusive ownership on the lots, and within that exclusive footprint is where they built the cabins, and basically they want to create, in this instance, a two story cabin instead of a one story cabin. They're not increasing the number of bedrooms.. It's the same number of bedrooms that are there presently. All the bedrooms that are there are accounted for within our .septic system.. So we don't think that we have any environmental impact. In fact, it was the prospect of being able to improve these lots that convinced the people to make the investment that they did make in the community septic system, which took the septic systems off lake, if you will, or. upstream away from the lake approximately eight, nine hundred feet away from the lake.. Where before there were leach pits, if you will, in front of these cabins, which probably are very suspect as to whether or not they were functional or not functional. That's basically it. I did note, when I was getting ready, and I looked at the Staff comments, and I'm not sure, Keith, the first variance you say that we're requesting is seven feet from the 50 foot shoreline setback. The existing cabin is 44.13 feet at the closest corner to what we call the shoreline, and actually that's conservative because it's the back side of the sidewalk that's at the shore, and our look at that existing cabin, if you go across the front, that front stoop, if you will, isn't any closer. So we're talking six feet, maybe. The new cabin, we actually had Van Dusen and Steves do it today. The front corner of the deck is 44.53 feet, and the corner of the cabin itself is 45 feet. So five and a half feet of relief would be sufficient. You don't need to give us the seven feet five anda half. MR. UNDERWOOD-I think last time we came in it was based upon the steps and the access to the home. Almost all the relief was predicated on that. MR. O'CONNOR-Those steps and those porches started a whole new lawyer relief program here. We've come back through on all three cabins, I think. MR. UNDERWOOD-No, the last two I know we did the exact same thing on those. MR. O'CONNOR-Yes. We'd be glad to answer any questions that you have. We've tried to make it simple. MR. UNDERWOOD-I think looking at this, based upon what we've done in the past here, we sort of substantiated in the past why the relief is necessary, and I don't think there's anything different on this one than the last two times you came in. So it's almost like we could wave the wand. MR. DREllOS~Well, they don't have to go in front of the. Planning Board. It's already been approved, right, for all of this? It's in your master plan or something? 22 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. O'CONNOR-Yes. This one here does not go in front of the Planning Board, because it's a tear down and new construction. Unfortunately, any of the others that come along, they are going to require Site Plan Review under the. new C~de.~he new Code says, the old Code says modification of existing nonconf?rmlng r~qUlr~s Site Plan. New construction didn't. The new Code says that all construction requires Site Plan, but this one here does not require us to go back to the Site Plan. So they save $500 probably. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Do Board members have any questions at all? MR. DREllOS-And this is on its own septic now, which will be. MR. O'CONNOR-This is on the community septic. MR. DREllOS-It's already on the community. MR. O'CONNOR-It's on the community septic, yes. MR. UNDERWOOD-Everybody pretty much familiar with what we've been doing here <:>n this one. I guess I'll open up the public hearing. Is there anybody here from the public wishing to speak? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED CHRIS NA VITSKY MR. NAVITSKY-Hello. Chris Navitsky, lake George Water Keeper. We've reviewed the submission and have the following comments or suggestions for the Board. If the variance.is approved, it should have a condition to provide stormwater management and install a shoreline buffer. The Zoning Board of Appeals, under 179-14-020, quote, may impose conditions similar to those provided for Site Plan review usage to protect the best interests of the surrounding property. The existing site, as well as others within the Takundewidedevelopment, lack stormwater management and shoreline buffers. This has resulted in impacts from runoff as well as contributing to the large algae problem off the shoreline of Takundewide, as documented in attached photographs taken last summer, and we have copies if the Board is interested. The Zoning Board of Appeals should require stormwater management for all impervious surfaces and the installation of a shoreline buffer to reduce the impacts of runoff and nutrients to the lake. The second one is regarding the Floor Area variance, which we feel is excessive and should not be minimized by averaging all units over the entire acreage ofthe property. The variance for the structure within the 50 foot setback on the lakefront. The applicant has justified the variance by minimizing the .actual variance requested through calculating the average FAR for all units at Takundewide over the entire parcel area, as documented in the 2006 letter to the homeowners detailing the 2003 MOU with the Town of Queensbury. This methodology fails to address development in Critical Environmental Area, hides the fact all development is concentrated close to the lake and none is on the eastern half of the property. Number Three was regarding the wastewater treatment upgrade, and obviously that comment will go away. We just wanted to know what the status was. So thank you for the comments, and we'll submit a copy for the record. MR. UNDERWOOD'-Thank you. MR. NA VITSKY-And we do have pictures of the algae blooms, that's similar to other comments. MR. UNDERWOOD-Anybody else from the public wishing to speak on the matter? Do you have any correspondence, Roy? MR. URRICO-No correspondence. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Why don't you guys come back up, please. Okay. Do you guys want to give any commentary in regards to the, what he was talking about, as far as some kind of a buffer on the front of there? I mean, looking at the aerial photograph up there. MR. O'CONNOR-With due respect, the ownership of what we have here some ten feet in front of the cabin. This a fairly well maintained frontage. As I understand it, they use only chemicals that are friendly to the lake, s for the grass that's in front of it, there's a retaining wall that actually stops the flow from going into the lake directly on the 23 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) community property, not from this property. The applicant will maintain stormwater controls, devices during construction. They put up the silt fences and, you know, to keep everything within the area of disturbance. The area of disturbance here is not very great. You're talking, what's the size bfthe building? MR. MASON-768 square feet for the building, and probably about double that for the area of disturbance, because we'll. be back behind it with. the staging, but not really towards the lake at all. MR. UNDERWOOD-Out on the waterfront, what you have now, I mean, you've got your dock complex there. You can point out to us, but the question I was going to ask you is this. Over the years, it's always kind of existed as a very open site over there. You do have a few trees around and.stuff like that, but I thought maybe some practical solutions like some flower beds down by the lake that would, you know, be raised to keep your sheet flow coming off there. MR. MASON-I understand what you're saying, I hear you. I do.. I just want to point out that this area right in here, this is all natural vegetation along the bank. It's a fairly steep bank, and as such, we do prune it down, because otherwise it would growwild and you wouldn't even be able to see through it. It's filled with all natural vegetation like honeysuckle and so on. It's invasive, but it's natural to us. It's been there forever, and ~ we don't do anything besides prune it down. We never, you know, remove all of the root masses and so on because we don't want all the. issues that are environmental are our issues as well.. It is, there is a lot of lawn in Takundewide, I know, but we plant trees every year. This year I planted 20 trees. So, it's not like, and when the elm trees went away, we lost all our trees. So this has been a constant thrust of the Association is re- planting all along there. We do have loads of flowers down in the center area, but that's, as Mike said, that's the Association, and we do try to do it as an Association, but my brother, on his 10 feet surrounding, he will landscape it and make it as pretty as it is today, with the amount of landscaping around it. MR. UNDERWOOD-I'm just thinking in a practical sense, you know, if you boated up the basin and you looked at the natural shoreline we've, you know, over the years, come to accept the fact that, you know, we have large swaths along there that have no trees at all, and, you know, no kind of bushes or anything like that, and, you know, to always presume that, you know, you have to have a complete, unobscured view of the lake, you know, I think is, you know, it's something maybe that you guys could factor in going forward here, that, you know, you possibly start to say, you know, hey, it's not bad to have a tree out in front, or a few bushes along the shoreline that would be substantial and would take up more of the nutrients and runoff that does flow off of all our properties on waterfront. I don't think it's impractical, and I don't think it's a burden, either, to do that, but it's something that maybe you want to consider. MR. O'CONNOR-The other comment I would make, with respect to the Water Keeper, Bill has met with the Town Engineer, and with Town Councilmen, to try to address some of the runoff, not from their site, not from Takundewide, but from Hillman Drive and the road that runs perpendicular to Hillman, Heron Hollow, and I think, I have seen the photos or the offer of photos that was made, that the bloom that they're talking about is down off of a drainage pipe that come directly out of some Town drainage that was established and has been complained about since the early. 1990's. That go directly from Hillman Drive, by piping, through the property that's at the end of Hillman Drive, between Hillman Drive and the lake, and I don't know if that's been, if anything other than meetings on the site and the discussions with the Town. MR. UNDERWOOD-No. I know the Town Engineer's been involved in that whole project up there, too, and trying to mitigate it, but I think in a sense that, you know, we all have to remember, I mean, even the last one that we just dealt with there, where you're trying to preserve the shoreline as it once existed down the. whole basin of lake George. We realize that Takundewide hasn't had, you know, a naturalized shoreline for many, many years, but at the same time, that's something that we should consider, in all aspects going forward. Even though it's not a requirement for us to do that, but the fact of the matter is, the more naturalization we do of the shoreline, the more we're going to lessen our impacts going forward, and, you know, just because we've always had it open, doesn't mean it's acceptable in the future. I mean, we should be thinking about what can we do, going forward, to make things better in all respects, but, you know, I'm not going to lay that burden on you totally, but consider it and come up with something. Anything else you want to comment on? MR. O'CONNOR-No. 24 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. UNDERWOOD-Otherwise we'll go to the Board then. MRS. JENKIN-Could I ask. Do you plan to put gutters on the house or drainage? STEPHEN MASON MR. S. MASON-Yes, I do. MRS. JENKIN-What kind of landscaping are you going to put around the house? What do you usually do? MR. S. MASON-Well, right now we're having a little bit of a problem with the cedar trees that we've got because of the deer that come down and are eating all of our cedar trees which I normally put those right around the property, but I love, I have a place in Houston, in Texas, and love, I've got a huge yard, huge landscaping all in my yard, beautiful trees, and so we're going to put in permanent landscaping around the house. We are still going to use it as, primarily a summer home for my wife and I. We have a second cottage there which will be used by my two daughters. They're upset we only have two bedrooms, but they have their own cottage when they come, and. we have a little bit of peace and quiet. So that's what we're planning to do. MRS. JENKIN-And the other thing is, talk about deer eating, don't plant yews either, because they ate my yews. They're very hungry. MR. S.. MASON-They got my yews, too. MR.MASON-For some reason, about 20 years ago, or 30 years ago, all we liked to plant was cedars and yews. That, apparently, was a big mistake. ~ MRS. JENKIN-That's why we have so many deer, I guess. MR.UNDERWOOD-Anybody else have any questions they want to ask, or are you guys all square with this? All right. MR. DREllOS-It's pretty straightforward. Isn't this the same as the last one. MR. UNDERWOOD-So I'm not going to poll the Board. I think I'll just have somebody make the motion on this one. Rich, go ahead. MR. GARRAND-AII right. MS. GAGLIARDI-Did you close the public hearing? MOTION TO APPROVE AREA VARIANCE NO. 22-2009 STEPHEN MASON, Introduced by Richard Garrand who moved for its adoption, seconded by Joyce Hunt: 2 Seneca Drive, Cleverdale. The applicant proposes the demolition of a 768 square foot single story residence and construct in its place a 1533 square foot two story residence. The applicant requests 5.5 feet of .shoreline setback relief, along with 5.52 feet of north side setback relief, 5.09 feet of south side setback relief, and 8.8 feet of rear setback relief in the Waterfront Residential One Acre zone, as per Section 179-4-030. Further, the applicant requests 1,030 square feet of Floor Area Ratio relief per Section 179-4- 030. In making this determination, we shall consider first off whether the benefits can be achieved by other means feasible to the applicant. The size of these parcels are very constrained. The means available to the applicant are somewhat limited. Will this produce .an undesirable change in the neighborhood or to the character of the nearby properties. The change is merely an upgrade to the existing homes to enhance their character and modernize. Is this request substantial? Since it's a vertical change, it will not be substantial. Will this request have adverse physical or environmental impacts in the neighborhood. Given the concessions made by the applicant with this community septic system, it will actually have positive environmental impacts, and whether this alleged difficulty is self-created. I would have to say, given the size of these lots, that the applicant was left with no other choice but to go vertical, and plus the fact that there's, basically the people only own the land that the house sits on. With respect to 179-14- 020, seeing the Zoning Board can impose, when we believe there are environmental issues, we have already imposed conditions, and the applicant has agreed to this community septic system, which should increase their capacity. So I move that we approve Area Variance No. 22-2009. 25 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) Duly adopted this 27th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Clements, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Drellos, Mr. Underwood NOES: NONE MR. UNDERWOOD-You're all set. MR. O'CONNOR-Thank you. MR. MASON-Thank you very much. AREA VARIANCE NO. 23-2009 SEQRA TYPE: II RONALD O. MOREHOUSE AGENT(S): GARFIELD RAYMOND OWNER(S): RONALD O. MOREHOUSE ZONING: MR-5 LOCATION: 46 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE APPLICANT PROPOSES PLACEMENT OF A 1,104 SQ. FT. MOBilE HOME ON THE PARCEL. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM MINIMUM REAR YARD SETBACK REQUIREMENTS. CROSS REF.: BP 92-535 PORCH; BP 95-634 ADDITION WARREN COUNTY PLANNING: N/A lOT SIZE: 0.14ACRES TAX MAP NO. 309.9-3-24 SECTION: 179-4-030 GARFIELD RAYMOND, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 23-2009, Ronald O. Morehouse, Meeting Date: May 27, 2009 "Project location: 46 Rhode Island Avenue Description of Proposed . Project: Applicant proposes placement of a 1,104 square foot mobile home on a 0.14 acre parcel. The applicant requests 4 feet of relief from the 10 foot rear setback requirement for the MR-5 zoning district per 9179-4~030. In making a determination, the board shall consider: 1. Whether an undesirable change will be produced in the character of the neighborhood or a detriment to nearby properties will be created by the granting of this area variance. Minor changes to nearby properties are anticipated as a result of this proposal. 2. Whether the benefit sought by the applicant can be achieved by some method, feasible for the applicant to pursue, other than an area variance. The applicant could place the home 10 feet from the rear property line and subsequently be compliant. 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for 4 feet or 40 percent relief from the 10 foot rear setback requirement per 179-4-030 may be considered moderate relative to the ordinance. 4. Whether the proposed variance will have an adverse effect or impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood or district. Minor impacts on the physical and environmental conditions of the neighborhood may be anticipated. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. None since 1962 There appears to be little to no limitation to placing the single family home in a compliant location. Has the applicant considered placing the home 10 feet from the rear property line to avoid a rear setback variance? 26 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) Type 11- No action necessary" MR. RAYMOND-My name is Garfield Raymond. I'm an attorney with offices on Bay Road. I'm here on behalf of Mr. Morehouse. I mean, it's pretty straightforward. I will make a comment, though, start off, concerning the ten feet, saying that we can move the property forward. I have a map here. Each of you have that. I kind of color coded where the trailer, it's a doublewide that would be located there. It would indicate that the doublewide has, in fact, been approved by Dave Hatin, been inspected, but the back, if you look at the rear setback line, we're talking, it's a ten foot area. We're asking for four feet. If they want us to move it forward, that would be great. When I met with them, with the Town, that's what I would like, I would like to do that, but then I have the same problem in the front. We have a 30 foot setback. So I would be shifting, and I'd have to be getting a variance in the front. So whether it comes off the back or whether it comes off the front is my. MR. DREllOS- That was going to be my question is why didn't we shift it to the front? Because I'd rather give a variance for the front, on Town property, which is the road, rather than someone else's yard in the back. MR. RAYMOND-And I would prefer to do that myself, and I'll give you the reasons why. I have pictures here, if you want to just pass them around. If you take a look at the map, . you'll see that there's a tree that's on there. It shows a 24 inch maple tree, and that dotted line that goes across there, that's the 30 foot setback requirement in the front, and so that tree is actually in the front, is in the setback area, and if you look at the houses in that area, you will see that they're right up, they're beyond that. They're all in that 30 foot area, and I would rather bring the house closer to the road, but this was what was talked about, but if you would want to approve it with moving it forward, again, I'd appreciate that. MR. UNDERWOOD-I mean, Keith, if we were to look at it that way, not knowing where exactly it's going to be, we would assume we're going to have to give some relief from the 30 foot setback from the road out there. MR. OBORNE-I think that's a fair. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, and we've done that before on these small lots down in that end of Town in many times previously that I recall. MR. OBORNE-Okay, and the crux of my concern was that you are, in fact, encroaching on a neighboring property, as opposed to a Town. MR. DREllOS-Well, that was my point. At least a Town road, it's not so bad as the back of someone else's. MR. UNDERWOOD-So would we just be granting this with whatever it is, or, I mean, not knowing what it is? I mean, we can assume that, how far forward would you want to bring it from where, you would be coming out four feet closer to the road, so then you'd need four feet from the road? . MR. RAYMOND-No, well, four feet from the, yes, so all we're doing is shifting the line, just four feet. MRS. HUNT-It's the same four feet. MR. UNDERWOOD-Right, it's the same four feet, one way or the other. MR. RAYMOND-And if you want to give us more, that's great. MR. PREllOS-Butas far as percentages, you gain a lot more, it's like a 50% one way, where the other way is whatever. MR. UNDERWOOD-Exactly. MR. RAYMOND-Right. It's 13% if we come forward. It's 40% if we're in the back. So . coming forward actually makes more sense. · 27 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MRS. JENKIN-Well, the other thing, too,is the six feet, you can't do anything with six feet. It would just be a barren area back there, but with 10 feet, you could do something. MR. RAYMOND-That's what I'm saying, if you want me to come forward even more, I'm happy with that, too. MR. DRELlOS-1 mean, you need room for your driveway. That would. give you 26 feet. You want to be off the road a little bit with a car and, you know, you've got to have something. MR. RAYMOND-Well, coming forward, then, four to eight feet would be, anywhere in there would be appropriate. MR. CLEMENTS-Four feet forward would be the least amount of relief, right? MR. RAYMOND-Right. Yes, we've got to come at least, because the smallest doublewide that they have is 24 feet wide, and that's the one that we have. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. MR. DRElLOS- That's my only concern. MR. UNDERWOOD-Why don't we open up the public hearing, make sure, anybody here from the public wishing to speak on the matter? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. UNDERWOOD-Do we have any correspondence, Roy? MR. URRICO-No correspondence. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. So what you're requesting, then, is four to eight feet of relief from the 30 foot road setback. That's the frontage requirement. That's, in essence, what you would be asking for in that range? MR. RAYMOND-Yes. MR. UNDERWOOD-So when you set the house, we would know the exact number, but if we set it at four to eight feet, that would give you enough of a range there? MR. OBORNE-You need to be specific. MR. UNDERWOOD-Why don't we say six, then. MR. RAYMOND-No, that's fine, because the more I can get onthe back. MR. UNDERWOOD-Give them six feet of relief from the thirty foot? MR. OBORNE-That's your call. My recommendation would be a 10 foot, for the rear, and keep it at 26 for the front. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. MR. OBORNE-Because that's the minimum amount of relief you can provide. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. Do you want to do it, then, with 26 in the front? MR. RAYMOND-I'll do it any way you want me to do it. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. Sure, and that'll give you a little bit of a yard out there, then you won't have to run the driveway right up to the side of the house, Okay. So does somebody want to do the motion or do you want me to do it, one way or the other. I guess I'll close the public hearing. PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED MRS. HUNT-I'll make a motion. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. 28 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MOTION TO APPROVE AREA VARIANCE NO. 23-2009 RONALD O. MOREHOUSE, Introduced by Joyce Hunt who moved for its adoption, seconded by George Drellos: 46 Rhode Island Avenue. The applicant proposes placement of a 1,104 square foot mobile home on a 0.14 acre parcel. The applicant requestsJour feet of relief from the 30 foot front setback requirement for the MR-5 zoning district, per Section 179-4-030. In making this determination, the Board shall consider whether the benefit could be achieved by other means feasible to the applicant, and he would need a variance, front or back, because of the size of the lot. Whether an undesirable change in the character of nearby properties would take place? I don't think so. It would be in keeping with the other properties. Whether the request is substantial? I would say it's moderate. Whether the request will have adverse physical or environmental effects on the neighborhood. I don't think so. As I say, it's in keeping with the rest of the neighborhood, and the alleged difficulty may be considered self-created because they wish .to put the mobile home on this property. So I would propose we approve Area Variance No. 23-2009. Duly adopted this 27th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Drellos, Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Clements, Mr. Underwood NOES: NONE MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. You're all set. MR. RAYMOND-Thank you. AREA VARIANCE NO. 24-2009 SEQRA TYPE: II MICHAEL Hill OWNER(S): MICHAEL Hill ZONING: SFR-1A; RR-5A lOCATION: 1 OLD WEST MOUNTAIN ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES CONSTRUCTION OF 480 SQ. FT. FREESTANDING GARAGE. RELIEF. REQUESTED FROM MINIMUM FRONT YARD SETBACK REQUIREMENTS. GROSS REF.: BP 93-729 SFD; BP 2002-331 SHED WARREN COUNTY PLANNING: MAY 13, 2009 ADIRONDACK PARK AGENCY: YES lOT SIZE: 5.22 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 295.6-1-6 SECTION: 179-4-030 MICHAEL Hill, PRESENT STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 24-2009, Michael Hill, Meeting Date: May 27,2009 "Project location: 1 Old West Mountain Road Description of Proposed Project: . Applicants propose construction. of a 480 square foot detached garage on a 5.22 acre parcel adjacent to West Mountain Road. The applicant requests 15 feet of relief from the 30 foot minimum front setback requirement for the SFR-1 A zone per 179-4-030. In making a determination, the board shall consider: 1. Whether an . undesirable change will be produced in the character of the neighborhood or a detriment to nearby properties will be created by the granting of this area variance. Minor impacts on the character of the neighborhood may be produced as a result of this project. . 2. Whether the benefit sought by the applicant can be achieved by some. method, feasible for the applicant to pursue, other than an area variance. It appears the applicant could build the garage west of the proposed area and be compliant. However, this would result in the loss of trees and it would appear to require grading and a change to the driveway configuration. Further, the limitations of the lot may be a contributing factor in the request for this variance. 29 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for 15 feet or 50% percent relief may be considered moderate to severe relative to the ordinance. 4. Whether the proposed variance will have an adverse. effect or impact on the physical or environmental conditions in. the neighborhood or district. Minor changes to the physical and environmental conditions in the neighborhood may be anticipated. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be interpreted as self created. Single Family Dwelling Approved 1994 P2002-331 Shed Approved 5/3/03 The location of the proposed garage appears to be the most logical given the limitations of the lot and the location of the driveway. Are gutters associated with this project? Where is the storm water directed during rain events? Please clarify. Type II-No action required." MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. It seems pretty straightforward to us, what you're proposing here. Anything you want to add? MR. HilL-No, as was stated, I would like to go west with it, but I'd have to remove trees, and would need quite a bit of grading. That's really the only place I could put it. I'm on a hill. MR. UNDERWOOD-Steep slope. MR. GARRAND-Staff brought up stormwater. What's your proposal for that? MR. Hill-Right now, my driveway, as you can see, goes, it's a circular driveway, and I have never had a problem with rainwater not absorbing or creating erosion of any kind, you know, as of yet. MR. GARRAND-It's pretty sparse up there. MR. HILL-Yes. I've been there almost 10 years, and I've never had a problem. I mean, I'm going to have, of course, some excavation going on for the footings. I can also, you know, have a trench to direct water, if that's necessary, right there. MR. UNDERWOOD-Board members have any concerns or questions? MR. DREllOS-lt seems like it's the best spot for it, obviously. It's not an oversized garage. MRS. JENKIN-Right. It's a fairly flat area, too. Isn'tit? MR. Hill-Yes. MRS. JENKIN-It's fairly flat. So you won't have a lot of excavation. MR. Hill-Right. I'm just going to have to dig footings. MR. CLEMENTS-It's going to be, like, right in the middle of that driveway. MR. Hill-Exactly. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. If nobody has any questions, I guess I'll open the public hearing. Anybody from the public wishing to speak on the matter? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED 30 (QueensburyZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. UNDERWOOD-Any correspondence at all? MR.URRICO-No correspondence. MR. DREllOS-Would the variance be, is that from the Town road? MR. OBORNE-It's from the front line. MR.UNDERWOOD-From the front line. MR. DREllOS-But the front line is after, is that Town property, because. it's a road. Right? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. That's an arterial road there. So you've got a wider setback on that. MR. OBORNE-And what you have is obvious. You see the old road going up there. It's got to be 40 feet to the edge of the pavement. MR. DREllOS-1 don't know, there's just that piece of woods in there that's owned by the Town. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. I don't think anybody on the Board really has a problem with this one. I mean, it seems pretty straightforward. It's based upon the sideline with the Town property there. I don't see that there would be any impact on anyone in regards to the project. I think Staff's identified that you've got to do something with your stormwater, and that's probably Just along the eaves, put a trench and put some gravel in there so it absorbs, and that should take care of that problem. It's a simple solution. So, do you want me to do this one, guys? All right. MS. GAGLIARDI-Did you close the public hearing? ~ MR. UNDERWOOD-I'll close the public hearing. Thank you. PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED MOTION TO APPROVE AREA VARIANCE NO. 24-2009 MICHAEL Hill, Introduced by James Underwood who moved for its adoption, seconded by Brian Clements: 1 Old West Mountain Road. He's proposing the construction of a 480 square foot detached garage on a 5.22 acre parcel adjacent to West Mountain Road. The project is requiring 15 feet of relief from the 30 foot minimum front setback, and again, that's from the Town property, which is, there's kind of a large chunk of land there with trees on it, from West Mountain Road and Old West Mountain Road, on the corner. We don't seem to feel any undesirable change will be produced by the creation of this garage on the property. Although it could be built somewhere else, just about any place else on that property would require major trees being taken down, and also. it would be on a steep slope that would require a lot of fill to accomplish it, so this is a flat area that would easily accommodate this building, and it seems to be the logical place to do it. The request is for 15 feet or 50% of relief, but again, we don't really see that there's any impact because of the substantial setback from the road. It's about 40 feet, and, as far as. any change in the neighborhood, it will allow the homeowner to put up a garage if he needs to utilize, and there won't be any noticeable change in the neighborhood that we can perceive. So I move that we approve it. Duly adopted this 2th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Clements, Mr. Garrand, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Drellos, Mr. Underwood NOES: NONE MR. HILL-Thank you. AREA VARIANCE NO. 25-2009 SEQRA TYPE: II SEAN QUllLlNAN OWNER(S): SEAN W. QUllLlNAN ZONING: WR-1A lOCATION: 4 SULLIVAN ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES CONSTRUCTION OF A SINGLE-FAMilY DWELLING WITH A 2-CAR GARAGE TOTALING 4,145 SQ. FT. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM MINIMUM FRONT YARD, SIDE YARD SETBACK, MAXIMUM HEIGHT AND MAXIMUM FAR 31 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) REQUIREMENTS. CROSS REF.: BP 2009-043 DEMO HOUSE WARREN COUNTY PLANNING: N/A lOT SIZE: 0.41 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 289.09-1-30 SECTION: 179-4-030 SEAN QUILLlNAN, PRESENT MR. URRICO-I'm going to start by reading in the letter that was submitted with the application. It says "Dear Zoning Board:. We, the Quillinan. family, are requesting variances for construction of a new home at 4 Sullivan Road, lake George, NY 12845 because of catastrophic fire on January 23,2009. The fire severely damaged the wood frame Ranch structure in short period of time. The failure of a dry hydrant system located within 300 feet of the house, on the shoreline of Glen lake, as well as the failure of the hydrant located on the East end of Glen lake (near Tee Hill Road approximately 1.5 miles away) contributed to the length of time it took to extinguish the fire. The extended time created a situation that allow~d the severity of the damage to be much greater and therefore require a much more costly reconstruction. The block foundation and masonry were lost to the fire as well, requiring a complete new home be built from the ground up. Our displacement and discomfort is of little consequence since our family (and dog Bruin) are safe. We.do mournthe loss of our cat Aurora. We are looking to replace the home on the same general footprint of the original house. We do intend to build a Cape-Style home, in order to provide more space (a partially finished half-story) for our two .kids (Ian 12 and Tara 10) and their friends. Since this is Upstate New York we also inten.d to add a tall 2-car garage to replace the 1 car garage that was lost. The new garage will be located in the rear of the house away form the main road (Glen lake Road), which will afford us more sunlight and a better view of the lake. The garage is . hidden from view of neighbors to the Northwest by a line of cedars (20' - 30' Tall) so visual impact is not an issue. The added height is based on the need for storage of kayaks, bikes, skis and snowboards, as well as other tools and equipment used for playing and coaching the various sports we all participate in. Our neighbor to the North will have the same general view as before the fire, so the added height of the building should not be an issue. We have actually increased her view and sun light by the removal of a very large pine tree and by the new home not having a two story porch system on the east end wall, which we did have. The original house did have a screened in porch along the East end, closest to Glen lake Park. It was used for entertaining and fund raising activities. We did have a walkout basement to that porch. Above the porch was a fully enclosed porch/den-like room my wife (Deb) used for reading and her schoolwork. We do wish to replace the screened in porch with a slightly larger porch. An open deck overlooking the Park and lake will replace the enclosed porch above. The new home should be a positive improvement when people see it from Glen lake Road. The original driveway is going to be removed and replaced with a lawn and landscaping. The short retaining walls will be removed and redone. We already have an awesome interlocking block wall system that tied into the original home, and it is iritended to be an integral part of the new one as well. Our intention is to follow the same general placement and appearance of the fire damaged home with a new and better home (more efficient, more functional). Our family has been part of this neighborhood for 5 generations. We want that to continue for another few at least. We appreciate your consideration in this process. Thank you. Sincerely, Sean W. Quillinan 4 Sullivan Road lake George, NY 12845" STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 25-2009, Sean Quillinan, Meeting Date: May 27, 2009 "Project location: 4 Sullivan Road Description of Proposed Project: Applicant proposes construction of a single family dwelling with. 2 car attached garage totaling 4,316 square feet on a 0.41 acre lot in the WR-1 A zone adjacent to Glen lake. 1:,~~li~~il~iYJt~g~;1 The applicant requests 25.9 feet of southwest front setback relief and 12.8 feet of west front setback relief from the 30 fooUront setback requirement for the WR-1 A zone per 9179-4-030. Additionally, the applicant requests 2.7 feet of east rear setback relief from the 20 foot requirement per 9179-4-030. Further, the applicant is requesting. 635 square feet of floor area ratio relief per 9179-4-030. Finally, the applicant is requesting 6 foot 11.25 inches of building height relief from the 28 foot maximum allowable height for a building per 9179-4-030. 32 (QueensburyZBA Meeting OS/27/09) 4. Whether the proposed variance will have an adverse effect or impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood or district.. Minor impacts on the physical and environmental conditions of the neighborhood may be anticipated as the house, ifapproved, would be re-built in the same general location with limited site clearing and grading. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. P2009-043 SFD Demolition 2/17/09 The applicant proposes to replace a 2,620 square foot single family residence with attached garage destroyed by fire with a new 4,564 square foot single family residence with attached garage in the same location. The lot is currently vacant. The Zoning Board may wish to verify if the proposed wastewater system is compliant. Type II - No action necessary" MR. UNDERWOOD-Go ahead. MR. QUllLlNAN-1 don't even know where I begin. The one area, as far as relocating it to a spot more central to the plot it~elf, based on my conversation with Dave Hatin, and relative to the 100 foot requirements from wells, will extremely limit the placement of the home relative to installing a new septic system, because the system that was there, because of the damage, will have to be replaced, and so we're currently working with Dickinson Engineering to have that finished,and from meeting with Dave and working on that now, where it's marked as reputed septic location is pretty much the only place it can go at .this point. The other. thing, too, would be if you. were to try and relocate the structure elsewhere on the property, it would require bringing in fill because of the hillside placement of the home, and at this. point, we wanted to tie in the existing stonewall that was, you know, it was damaged, but still exists, into the foundation of the new home when it's constructed. MR. UNDERWOOD-Keith, I had a question for you on the Floor Area Ratio, when that was calculated for the upstairs there, did they count, because the eaves of the roof come down there, and you've got the dormers up there. 33 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. OBORNE-It's still floor area. MR. UNDERWOOD-You count the total floor area? MR. OBORNE-Yes, sir. MR. UNDERWOOD-Not like where it's height compliant? Do we subtract that out of there or not? MR. OBORNE-It's from wall to wall. MR. UNDERWOOD-Even when you got a pitched roof coming down. MR. OBORNE-Isn't it a hip? Isn't there a? Basically. MR. UNDERWOOD-I'm looking at. It looks to me like you're not going to be able to utilize out to the edges of the walls of the house. Right? MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes. You will not be able to do that. It comes back at least five feet from the edges. MR. UNDERWOOD-You've got to be five foot in. So maybe that, on the second floor. MR. OBORNE-When I calculated it, I took it off the numbers that were provided in the floor plans. It's 884 on that second floor. MR. QUllLlNAN-lt actually, I think it winds up being actually now 764 on that half, what is a half story, but because of the 12/12 pitch, we'd be able to pick up an eight foot ceiling. I mean, it's still a half story, but you lose space. You definitely lose space. It definitely makes it sound a lot bigger. MR. GARRAND-What's the total height supposed to be? MR. QUllLlNAN-lt depends on where you measured from, because the problem is, if we're mepsuring it from what is basically the basement floor level to the top, it winds up being just under 35 feet. MR. GAR RAND-Because Code is 28. MR. UNDERWOOD-I don't know what you could do to accomplish that, unless you use knee walls, but that's going to give, I mean, essentially you're looking at three full stories here, you know, on that hillside. So that's where we get into the overhang. I wonder what the old house was, measuring up to the roofline on that. MR. OBORNE-Sean, can you talk to that? MR. QUllLlNAN-lt would be a standard roof. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, if you were measuring off your old patio up to the old roofline, the high point, that's probably about 28 feet there, wouldn't you say? MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes, it probably was. MR. UNDERWOOD-I mean, my house is on the other side of the lake, and when I did mine, I could only do it on the lakeside that height. MR. DREllOS-How many square feet was the old house? MR. QUllLlNAN-There's like a one square foot difference. MR. UNDERWOOD-I figured, the difference between the old house was the new one's 4,564, the old one was 2,620. So it's 1,944 bigger than the old one. MR. QUllLlNAN-Because of the, well, it's because of the addition of the garage, and then the space for the half story. MRS. JENKIN-What about the basement, because you don't have plans for the basement. It's a walkout basement. 34 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. QUllLlNAN-lt's a walkout basement. We don't knoW what we're going to do with it yet. So it is a walkout. So we have to include it as part of our overall living space. MRS. JENKIN-Right. MR. QUllLlNAN-At this point we'll have some area that'll be finished because we use the space, but how, we don't know, like entertainment area. MRS. JENKIN-Why don't you use that for the storage, rather than above the garage? MR. QUllLlNAN-Access. Going from the field side, it isn't quite as convenient, because you don't have access as easily down to that area, because you've got the hillside that you're on. MRS. JENKIN-Where do you have access, where is your access? MR. QUllLlNAN-lt would be a garage, it would be on the backside of the road. MR. CLEMENTS-You're going to change your driveway from. MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes, where the driveway is now would be completely gone, and the driveway would access from the rear of the house. So it would have a better look from the roadside as well. MRS. JENKIN-But the upper level of the garage, you said you wanted to store kayaks and things. MR. QUllLlNAN-No, the garage itself, like the garage itself, the main bay, is designed to be tall, have like a 12 foot ceiling. MR. UNDERWOOD-And you're going to have that as closed in space up above? MR. QUllLlNAN-We don't know what we're going to do with it. At this point it's going to be who knows what. MRS. JENKIN-It looked like, on the second floor, that there would be access to the garage from the unfinished storage. Is there? MR. QUllLlNAN-There really wouldn't. I don't think there'd be much access from there, because your roofline comes into it, so you wouldn't have, I don't think you'd have the height for it. MRS. JENKIN-Okay. So that would be a solid wall. MR. QUILLlNAN-Yes, it's going to be a little bit lower. MRS. JENKIN-It's not a solid wall in the plan, for some reason. MR. UNDERWOOD-How about, did Dave Hatin go over the septic with you guys and your leach field and all that stuff? MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes. What he said was, in order to pick up a bed system, I think we're going to require about 600 square feet of it. It would still fall, it would have to be placed within the 100 square feet from our own well to do it, but we have to keep it away from the 100 square feet from our neighbor to the north. MR. UNDERWOOD-Would you do that up on the roadside, then, where the driveway is? MR. QUllLlNAN-Right where it's marked reputed, it would be lower. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. Okay. It makes more sense to put it down there. MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes, because to the right of me is a park,l mean, it's deeded, there's . no construction. MR. CLEMENTS-It shows that on this map right here, right? MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes. 35 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. CLEMENTS-So, he's got a well. His neighbor's got a well up here. So he couldn't put his septic system in here. He'd have to put it over here. MRS. JENKIN-Okay. MR. DREllOS-1 guess my problem, Jim, is the height of it, the building. I think the other variances aren't that bad. I'm just looking at the height of the overall building and how much it really sticks out, especially with the park right there. MRS. JENKIN-Thesize of the house, too, in proportion to the other homes around you, it's going to be much, well, it is much larger. MR. QUllLlNAN- The primary rectangle is the same size. I mean, we're talking, it's two feet deeper. That's it. It's actually one foot shorter in length. Because the original house was 27 feet deep, or, I'm sorry, 28 feet deep by 47 feet long, and this one is actually 46 by 30. So it's two feet deeper. MRS. JENKIN-Then how.do you get the double the square footage, then? MR. QUllLlNAN-Because you add the basement, the garage, and the half story, it jumps the number dramatically. MRS. JENKIN-The basement wasn't included before. MR. QUllLlNAN-1 mean, it was there, but I mean, we're talking, when you add a two car garage and the half story, you're talking about a significant jump, and the requirement is, too, that we include both of our screened, you know, the screened porch as well as the front porch. Anything with a ceiling over ithas to be included. So, I mean, even though these are relatively open spaces,they're all part of that overall square foot number. My understanding is from the 22% ratio, I'm at like 24 to 25% of the area ratio, relative to the .41 acres. MRS. JENKIN-I guess, then, that the difference is, then, in the two pictures, then it is the h!3ight. MR. DREllOS-It's the height. MR. UNDERWOOD-It's because you've got to measure from way down, you know, on the low side there because you're on a hillside. MRS. JENKIN-That makes it look so much. MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes, because if you look at it from the road, all you're going to see one story and a roofline, and that is, I think that's the deceiving part of it, and then it doesn't help that, from the standpoint of the appearance of the field, you have a low field, then a rise, and then the house on top of that built into the hillside, so the physical, the appearance of the house looks tall. If you look at even one. of the. first, the first photo of the house, before the fire, I mean, even that is your standard one story house, but yet it still looks very big relative to its location next to the basketball court. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Keith, the side that actually faces towards Glen lake, you know, is, if you were going to measure thEfheight from the ground level at the top of the two retaining walls there, what would you get for a height on it, at that point, would you presume? It looks to me like you could lop off about six or seven feet there, right, about the height of that sliding door down cellar there? . MR. QUllLlNAN-lt would be the full height of the basement. You're talking about nine feet, actually. MR. OBORNE-I mean, you have to take it from natural grade. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, we do have to take it from natural grade. We've made that before. MR. OBORNE-And then it would be to the peak of the roof from natural grade, or to the highest point, regardless if you have retaining walls. MR. UNDERWOOD-Right. 36 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. QUllLlNAN-What if you took it from the west side, then? I mean, if you're talking natural grade on the hillside, it would be 20 feet. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, we've got to go from the low point, unfortunately on Waterfront Residential. So, I don't know what we could do to bring it down,. you know, I mean, seven feet's a long way to go. It's almost like you'd have to hack off the whole top floor up above that roof area where you've got all those bedrooms proposed and put the bedrooms down cellar. MR.QUllLlNAN-Then we'd end up with issues as far as egress with those, because you've got three sides. MR. UNDERWOOD-We would still be over height with the garage roof, though, too, right? MR. OBORNE-What do you have on the measurement on the garage? MR. QUllLlNAN-No, I don't think so. I think the garage is under 28. MR. OBORNE-It shouldn't be as high as that. If it's natural grade, it should be fine. MR. QUILLlNAN-Yes, the garage will be under it. Yes, because the garage, the floor of the garage is higher than the floor of the basement. MR. UNDERWOOD-What if you had, you know, if you had a lower pitched roof, got rid of the present, what you propose forthe upstairs bedrooms, and put two bedrooms up over the garage there. What would that do, Keith? MR. QUllLlNAN-Well, then you pick up 700 some odd feet over the garage. MR. OBORNE-Well, if you reduce that second floor. I'd have to see a plan. It sounds like you're directing him to reduce it. MR. UNDERWOOD-No, I'm just saying, you know, if you still want to get something upstairs there, it doesn't look like, if we're going to strictly interpret the rules, that taking seven feet would give you much for, other than for hobbits to live upstairs there, but over the garage, if that was still there, that didn't count for overall height,. if you kept it the same height? MR. OBORNE-That should be fine as far as the height, but as far as the Floor Area Ratio, it's going to add to it. MR. UNDERWOOD-Because, I mean, that's essentially what happened on my house. I've got my garage with living space over it, in the back, and I'm in the same situation on the other side of the lake, and I couldn't do anything up in the front, other than have like a short attic up there, nothing that would qualify as living space. MRS. JENKIN-So, Jim, are you suggesting that the garage be two story? MR. UNDERWOOD-You would have to, instead of having your roof pitch going up at 12/12 or whateveritis now, you would have to drop it down to like. a 7/12 or something like that, so it would be maybe crawl space, storage space, above there. MR. GARRAND-Similar to the original house. MR. UNDERWOOD-Similar to the original house, but then you'd have that higher pitched roof in the back where the garage was that would come up above. You could actually have a window with a view out at the lake there. That wouldn't count. MRS. JENKIN-But that's not the same square footage as, he wants a two bedroom. MR. UNDERWOOD-No, but I'm saying if you're looking at a garage that's 24 by 24, is that what it is, or 24 by 30. MR. QUllLlNAN-24 by 28. MR. UNDERWOOD-24by 28. MRS. JENKIN-How would you get up there? 37 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. UNDERWOOD-Well, you'd have to figure something out. MRS.. JENKIN-Your original house, all the bedrooms were on the main floor, were they not? MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes, they were. MRS. JENKIN-And why wouldn't you do that now? MR. QUllLlNAN-Space . They were small. The rooms averaged 10 foot by 11 foot. I've got a 10 and 11 year old who are extremely active. So it was just, we would like to increase some of this. I mean, obviously make the house more efficient. The way it was designed back in the 1950's, it didn't flow real well. It was not real efficient, as far as being able to entertain and to do things. MR. UNDERWOOD-What if you came out more towards Sullivan Road, you know, with the house that way, on the backside there, to create more bedrooms that way? We'd have to give you relief, but. MR. QUllLlNAN-East or north? The problem then becomes the hillside, and then you were talking about wash off coming from the road down there. It's already an issue as far as being able to hold back the bank. MRS. JENKIN-It's just that the other homes in the area are not that size, really, they're much smaller. MR. QUllLlNAN-You're also talking about homes that don't have families. You're talking, the house to the north is one woman living alone. The house, the A-frame behind me, is basically a two person house that's seasonal and currently For Sale. The house behind it is actually up on the hill is my grandmother's, and it's not that much smaller than what we're proposing. MRS. JENKIN-But we're. also looking at the. integrity of the neighborhood as it is, in proportion. MR. QUllLlNAN-1 would say that, comparable to the neighborhood, it's going to be comparable to the neighborhood. MRS. JENKIN-And the proportion of what it's going to look like, and. MR. QUILLlNAN-lf you go on Google Earth, you can drive the neighborhood, and you can take a look. I mean, it realistically is in line with the neighborhood. MRS. JENKIN-And it's a small lot, or it's a small space you're trying to put another big home on. MR. DREllOS-What if you got rid of the walk-out door on the basement, did something different, where it wouldn't look, just the looks of it. I know it's convenient, but. MRS. JENKIN-Where is your, is your property line, how close to the park is your property line? MR. QUllLlNAN-Seventeen feet. MRS. JENKIN-Seventeen feet. MR. CLEMENTS-Yes, it's right there. MRS. JENKIN-So that's where the hill comes down. MR. QUllLlNAN-Yes. It drops off. MR. CLEMENTS-It's interesting that if you took that house and you turn. it around 90 degrees, so that the peaks were at the other ends, you wouldn't have that height problem, because you'd be measuring from, I'm not saying that you ought to do that, but, I mean, the height problem comes in from the peak being over the, you know, over the deepest dip there. 38 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MRS. JENKIN-You'd still have to measure it from here. MR. CLEMENTS-Yes, but if you turn it around this way, you'd be measuring it up to here instead of out to here. MRS. JENKIN-No, it's the highest point. MR. UNDERWOOD-Does it affect it at all by not having a walk-out down on that lower story on the basement? MR. OBORNE-As far as it being living space? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. MR. OBORNE-I think if you have windows, it's considered living space. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. You've still go to measure from down, wherever the low point is anyhow. There's no getting around that. MR. OBORNE-I will say the new Code is if you have five feet in your basement, it's living space. MR. UNDERWOOD-Sure. r knew they tightened that up. Okay. let's do this. let's open up the public hearing. Anybody here from the pUblic wishing to speak on the matter? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED WALT QUllLlNAN MR. QUllLlNAN-Members of the Board, I'm Walt Quillinan. I'm the previous owner of the house. I'm also the President of Glen lake Park Incorporated, and I've lived in tbe house for 35 years. With regards to the height issue, which seems to be the major contention here, I'm just wondering, when you referred to the water district rules, I guess, on this height issue, in other words, is something to do with the height of the building facing the waterfront? MR. UNDERWOOD-No, it's just that it's 28 foot, and when we measure it, we. measure from the natural grade, the low point, wherever it happens to be, you know, and in this instance here, it's on the side of your house facing the house, obviously. So, I mean, if you were looking at the house from the lake, and, you know, it wouldn't be apparent, but it is the way we codify height. MR. QUllLlNAN-Even though the height issue faces an empty one acre lot, with only one house, with no view of it? MR. UNDERWOOD-Right. Yes, unfortunately. MR. OBORNE-Well, if I can, you're right, and that may make it easier for them to grant . that relief based on that, but it doesn't change the fact that it has to be 28 feet. MR. QUllLlNAN-Right, but I'm just thinking, this is something you have to take. into consideration is the view that you're contesting does not disturb or affect the neighborhood whatsoever. MR. UNDERWOOD-Right, and I think what we're going to do is, I mean, when the Board members make their decision in regards to that, I mean, in most instances, we're looking at camps that are looking right at the water, and they want to build an over height building, you know, and that's what we have to maintain the 28 foot. That's the requirement by the Town. So we didn't set the rules, that's what they are, and, you know, so we have to look at it with eyes wide open, as you're suggesting, you know, what are you going to see from the lake, you know, and that's the ke.y, really, in this instance here. MR. QUllLlNAN-And the view you get from the lake is very similar to the view you had originally. MR. UNDERWOOD-What you originally had, yes. 39 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. QUllLlNAN-Right. MR. UNDERWOOD-The other question, though, is FloorArea Ratio,and that is that, you kflow, in Waterfront Residential, the 22%, which is now shrinking to 20%, so they're downgrading it even more, you're up .above the. Floor Area Ratio, and I think that, you know, probably someone's going to make the comment that area over the garage, you know, even though it's not going to get finished off now, you know, if you sold the house next week, somebody else might come in and say, well, I'm going to put two more bedrooms up there, and then it kicks you way overboard as far as that goes. So we've always kind of got to look at it with eyes wide open. MRS. JENKIN-Well, the basement area, too, and it's an exposed basement. MR. UNDERWOOD-Sure. Right. MR. QUllLlNAN-But again, the difference in the percentage is what, three percent, in the Floor Area Ratio, in the Floor Area Ratio overall, three percent? MR. UNDERWOOD-You need 635 square feet. So 16.2% from, you know, what the requirement is. So that's minor. MR. QUllLlNAN-Okay. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. We don't have any kind of correspondence? MR. URRICO-Well, I just have a question. You don't know the height of the previous house? MR. S. QUILLlNAN-No, not offhand, not without. MR. URRICO-Judging from the pictures, it looks pretty similar, the one picture you have here of the house. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-Right. Basically the only change is going with a 12/12 pitch roof, picks up that extra. MR. URRICO-It looks like it's in the exact same spot, to me. MRS. JENKIN..So it's not two and a half stories. This is only a one story home. MR. UNDERWOOD-But you've got an extra floor compared to what you had before. You know what I mean? MR. S. QUllLlNAN-By changing the pitch. MR. UNDERWOOD-By changing the pitch from a 6/12 pitch to a 12/12 pitch. MR. URRICO-I do have one letter. It's from Walt Quil/inan. "In the event that we are not able to make it to the public hearing scheduled for Wednesday, May 27,2009 related to the above captioned variance, we would like it to be known that we have no objections to the variances that are requested. Additionally, Glen lake Park, Inc., the owner of the property immediately to the east of the property owned by Sean and Deborah Quillinan, has no objections to the variances. Sincerely, Walter K. Quil/inan (President - Glen lake Park, Inc.) Nancy S. Quillinan" MRS. JENKIN-Would it be possible, this is just another suggestion, and probably it would require a lot more. Would it be possible to excavate and lower the house and not have the basement exposed? MR. S. QUllLlNAN-At this point, with the sand and the rock that's there now, I wouldn't want to try and disturb the hillside. My biggest concern is movement of the hillside. I want to try and put it back. MRS. JENKIN-You'd have to move the hillside, and then you'd have to move your driveway and have it come down farther and everything. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-Yes. Yes, we're trying to disturb as little ground as possible, at this point. luckily, after the excavation was done, we've got a hole to work with. So we'd like to try and use the pre-existing hole. 40 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. UNDERWOOD-Well, what do you guys want to do? What do you think? I. guess we'll go down and poll through and see. I don't know, in a practical sense, what you could do, other than not having that upper story on there to bring you into height compliance, but, I mean, it's up to you guys what you think. Is it reasonable, as proposed, or do you think he should change the height and try and get it down? MR. DREllOS-lf you change the height, it just throws everything off. It's almost, you know, to a point that it's, again, to that point where it's not worth doing it. I mean, you're talking, you lost a whole floor. Basically what you want to do is take a whole floor off, and you're compliant with your FAR. MRS. JENKIN-You had a garage before. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-Aone car that faced the road. MR. DREllOS-lf they closed up that door in the basement, would that eliminate the basement space? MRS. JENKIN-No. . MR. UNDERWOOD-No. It's just because you've got the low point. You've got to go from the low point, when you measure (lost words). So no point in doing that. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-That's one of the considerations we did when we came up with this plan was to take out that second story enclosed porch area for our neighbor to the north of us, because she's the only one that has a view that looks southward, and what basically happened was that the fire was hot enough to boil the sap out of a large pine tree which was located just to the east of that porch, and so we wound up taking that out as well, and so we figured the logic, at that point, was to put in just the one story basement, or the one story screen porch, because thatwill match the hillside as she's looking to the south, and by removing that two story section of the enclosed porch it created, honestly for her, a better view. I think now she can actually see the lake. MR. DREllOS-And they include the deck in the Floor Area Ratio, too, that's all included? MR. OBORNE-Only an enclosed deck. MR. DREllOS-So that deck in the front isn't included. MR. OBORNE-It shouldn't be, no. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. Any suggestions from you guys as to what to do here? What do you want to do? MR. URRICO-Do you want my opinion? I'll go. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. MR. URRICO-I think special circumstances require special considerations. I think that our overall balancing test is to weigh the benefit to the applicant against the safety, welfare and health of the community. I think in this instance, and I've always been a strong advocate of height restrictions, but I think in this instance, I'd be willing to overlook those. I think this family deserves some breaks, and I'd be willing to pass on the variances with an approval motion. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Joyce? MRS. HUNT-Yes. I have to agree. I think the fact that the height variance is needed be~ause the b~i1ding faces east and agains~ land that's not developed and not really gOing to be an Impact on anyone. I would be In favor of the variances. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Rich? ~R. GARRAND-I personally think that with all the variances that we're being asked to give here, that the house is going to be overbearing, given the other. homes in this neighborhood. A lot of these are camps. This won't look like a camp at all. So I wouldn't be in favor of it. 41 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. UNDERWOOD-George? MR. DREllOS-Well, I don't like the height, but this is a special circumstance. I guess, I know Roy, he doesn't usually vote for these height variances. So this is, must be special, in this case, but I see the brown house to the right of it, and that kind of looks similar, and then the little blue house that, they do have that similar look to them, that height, this one is a little higher, obviously, butl would be in favor of this. MR. UNDERWOOD-Joan? MRS. JENKIN-looking at the balancing test, I just think, the main road, Glen lake Road, goes right past this, so the house is going to be very, very visible from the road, all three stories of it, because that's where you're going to see it from, because then the road turns around and goes up the hill, and coming down the hill you won't see it so much, but coming toward it you will. I think it will make an undesirable change in the neighborhood, because it will change the whole aspect of it, because it, right now, has been fairly small homes around a park where everyone can use, and it'll even change the aspect of the park. I think it's, the request is substantial because of all the variances and the height and the Floor Area Ratio. I think that it is extremely substantial. So I would be against it right now, without some changes. MR. UNDERWOOD-Brian? MR. CLEMENTS-I'm going to put you in the hot seat I think. This is very interesting. As a matter of fact, I'm surprised to hear people go the way they're going here. I think I feel that it is too high. I think that maybe it could be reconfigured so that it wouldn't, it could get rid of some of the height and also the Floor Area Ratio. So I would be againstthis also. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. . Before I vote, let me ask you a question, Keith, on this. All right. Everybody get their picture so they're looking at the one with the fire burning on it, and look at the old house as the roof existed on the old house. Okay. If we were, if we only allowed you to build the pitch of your roof on your house, this one here, as it existed on this side out towards the front where we were measuring our height from, but in the back, if we're looking at this picture, now, if we built the garage and we carried that roofline all the way through across the whole, all the way out to the front side towards Glen lake, parallel with Sullivan Road there, what would that do to our height? MR. OBORNE-I can only qualify it and say it sounds like it may reduce it. MR. UNDERWOOD-Because I'm thinking that would be height compliant, if we did it that way. It would still give you a full, in other words, Over the top of the garage, over the top of the house in the back along Sullivan Road, if the roof were pitched like this, and then you went to a lower pitch down on the front side there. MR. OBORNE-But it seems that where the deck is to the tip of the roof, that is where your natural grade is. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. Are you still going to have to measure to the grade way in the back on the garage, though? rvJR. OBORNE-Wherever it is to the highest point of the roof, yes, natural grade. MR. UNDERWOOD-Wherever it is. Okay. All right. Well, I think what I would like to do is this. I don't want to, you know, say you can't rebuild your house. I think obviously you need to rebuild your house, but I think that the Board is split, you know, and it's split for good reason, and that is because, even though it's not going to appear to be that high from the lakeside, you know, parallel with Glen lake Road and looking to the east, at the same time, we're still going to be way over height, and we're still going to be overindulging ourselves with Floor Area Ratio also. So think what you're going to need to do is to come back with some reconfigured here, and I don't know how we're going to do that, or if you can get together with Staff, if you could make some suggestions to them. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-1 would suggest that the person to call is Dave Hatin because he's the one who looks at my house, you know, and relative to the other houses in the neighborhood, it's not bigger, and it follows the same roofline as my neighbor's. 42 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. UNDERWOOD-But I think there's a substantial difference between what you had what you're proposing. I mean, it's pretty much different with that extra story up above, with those big dormer windows up there. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-At this point, that's kind of what we want is something different than what we saw burn. MR. UNDERWOOD-Right, and I would agree with you, it's not unpalatable. . Anywhere else in Town it would be appropriate, I think, but I think that we need to keep in mind with the 28 foot in height, that if you're seven feet over, you know, there's got to be some room for movement there, and I don't know how you would do that. Would, you know, making the dormers lower, you know, bring it down some? I don't know what you could do with the pitch of the roof or anything like that. You could fiddle around with it on, did you draw these yourself? MR. S. QUllLlNAN-What I did was I sent the sketches of the house to my brother in California, and said this is the general, I mean, they may not be completely, 100% to scale, but it was to give you some sort of reference of the house relative to the property around it and the other buildings around it, so that you had an idea of what we're talking about, not just looking at a set of drawings, in which case I leave imagination up to you.. MR. UNDERWOOD-What have you got for the height of the walls down on the first floor there? Are they just eight foot walls? MR. S. QUllLlNAN-Yes. MR. UNDERWOOD~They're as small as you can make them. MR.S. QUILLlNAN-We've got eight foot on the main floor. Maybe eight foot in the basement, and then you wind up with about eight foot in the center section of what would be the upper part. MR. UNDERWOOD-And then the other thing to consider is to build at grade and not have the basement on there, and get your storage space over the garage or something like that. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-There's no way you could fill that much. MR. UNDERWOOD-I don't know. Well, I'm going to make the suggestion, then, that we table this. and we try to come up with something different than what you've got, because it looks to me like you're a little over height. Even though I would like to side with you and say it's not going to matter, I think at least half the Board feels that it. does matter, and I think it's just important to make sure that we do things with a little bit of compromise. MR. OBORNE-If I may, you may want to direct the applicant to, and this is a suggestion, to give him something to work with, as far as what would you be palatable with height? MR. UNDERWOOD-We're looking at seven feet of height variance at this point in time. I don't know what we could do as far as the pitch of the roof, bringing it down. It's going to lower your living space upstairs somewhat if we start monkeying around with that 12/12 pitch. If we go to 8/12, I mean, I'm trying to think, on my house, that's that high, I don't have that extra exposure down below grade there. So, I mean, that's whpt really swings it. I don't know who you could talk to about it. Dave Hatin, or? MR. OBORNE-Well, I think Dave would be a start. I would be a start, but again, he does need direction. MR. UNDERWOOD-What do you guys want as far as relief, as far as the over height? I mean, he's at seven feet now. Do you want him to take three feet off it? Is it going to make that much difference? MR. S. QUllLlNAN-1 mean, you're looking at trees. I don't, I mean, what you're looking at is the same thing that was there before, to the south of me. The only house with any type of problem is the one to the north, and all that's above my roofline are trees. I mean, you're not looking at anything. We've already expanded here Site Plan by the removal of trees and a second story section of the house. 43 (Queensbury ZBAMeeting OS/27/09) MR. UNDERWOOD-Do we want to make any kind of an interpretation, based upon hardship, that it's really not On the waterfront? I mean, I don't know what you guys want to do. I mean, do you look at it with eyes wide open that way. MR. CLEMENTS-That's true. It's not on the waterfront. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. Do you guys want to reconsider what you were thinking? What do you want to do here? MRS. JENKIN-Well, it's still. MR. GARRAND-It's still overbearing. MRS. JENKIN-Yes. MR. GARRAND-At least the rendition is. MRS. JENKIN-If you could reconfigure the floor plan somehow. It's a very nice floor plan. It really is, but the thing is the location of the home and right by the park. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-1 take care of the park. I mean. MRS. JENKIN-Yes. MR. S. QUILLlNAN-1 mean, I think the benefit of what we do, relative to that park and the community, should, without question, be taken into account. MR. DREllOS~Do you actually maintain the park and take care of it? MR. S. QUllLlNAN-Yes. MR. DREllOS-You do? MR. S. QUllLlNAN-Yes. We've done it for 30,40 years. MR. DR Ell OS-I just was wondering. rvJR. QUllLlNAN-We provide access for Glen lake Park Association or Glen lake Association to do field days. We run fund raisers. We do. MRS. JENKIN-The problem is we're responsible for the variance. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-Look around the neighborhood. This house is not out of place, considering the neighborhood or the lake. These are not camps on Glen lake anymore. Okay. Glen lake is now year round residences. They're not camps. So this does not fit camp. I mean, it doesn't. MR. W. QUllLlNAN-lf you did a survey of the lake, a height survey of the houses on the lake, taking it from grade level to the peak, you would find that 50% of the houses within that water district exceed that height limit, I can guarantee that. MR. OBORNE-Sean, it's my understanding that you're probably going to need a septic variance. So that means you're going to the Town Board of Health, which is the Town Board, which means you're two months off regardless. Okay. You have to get your variance before, you don't necessarily have. to get your variance before you get a variance from here, but I think it would be a lot clearer as to where the location of that's going to be. You're going to want to know how large your house is for that. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-We understand that, and I've talked to Dave about it, and what the same concept is, it's on the same general footprint, three bedroom. It's the same. MR. OBORNE-What I'm leading to is that, regardless, you're going to need to go to the Town Board, and you're on a delay anyway. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-The delay is not the point. My problem is, you know, the design we have, yes, it is self-imposed because this is what we'd like to do. We want to make these changes, yes, we do. This would be one less delay. If I'm only dealing with the septic end of it, that's a delay I can deal with. 44 (Queensbury ZSA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. OBORNE-Absolutely, I understand. 1 do understand. I. do want to ask the Board, is the Board comfortable with the other variances? Is it the height is the only issue? MRS. JENKIN-Well, I'm concerned about the Floor Area Ratio, also. MR. GARRAND-If the height was cut down, that would probably take care of the Floor Area Ratio. Wouldn't it? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-1 would also loose square footage of usage. MR. GARRAND- Yes, but there's compromises here, too. MR. S. QUllLlNAN-The compromise is that if the hydrants had worked, I wouldn't be here. Okay. I mean, if they hydrant didn't fail, I don't lose my foundation, I don't have to re-do an entire new house, I can re-build with basically what's there...We're in a relatively unique situation here. let alone the fact I gave him the design of which to build the new hydrant system, and how to protect it and how to do it, and now they're talking to Warren County about building the system because they couldn't figure it out on their own because they're not familiar with lakes. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay, then, I guess what we'll do, then, is make a tabling motion, here, that we're going to table this for some changes and some practical suggestions and I'd like to have you meet with Dave Hatin as soon as possible, and then we'll put you on for the first meeting next month, so we're not going to, you'll be on before you go before the Town Board for sewer and all that stuff there. We're trying to iron this out. Dave, with his practical knowledge, is probably going to be able to come up with something for you that's going to work, that's going to bring you more. into compliance, and as long as you get close to the 28 foot, you know, there's got to be some practical means of accomplishing that, and I'm not going to suggest what to do, buta suggestion of using the garage or knee walls or something like to keep it down lower. So I'll make a tabling motion. Does somebody want to second that? MR. CLEMENTS-I'll second it. MOTION TO TABLE AREA VARIANCE NO. 25-2009 SEAN QUllLlNAN, Introduced by James Underwood who moved for its adoption, seconded by Brian Clements: 4 Sullivan Road. Tabled .for some changes and some practical suggestions and I'd like to have the applicant meet with Dave Hatin as soon as possible. .We'lI put you .on for the first meeting next month. Dave, with his practical knowledge,. is probably going to be able to come up with something for the applicant that's going to work, that's going to bring the applicant more into compliance, and as long as the applicant gets close to the 28 foot, you know, there's got to be some practical means of accomplishing that, and I'm not going to suggest what to do, but the suggestion of using the garage or knee walls or something like that to keep it down lower. Duly adopted this 27th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Clements, Mr. Garrand, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Drellos, Mr. Underwood NOES: NONE AREA VARIANCE NO. 11-2008 SEQRA TYPE: II DEBARON ASSOCIATES. BY DEBRA SCHIEBEL, PARTNER MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. We're going to have a momentary re-hearing, here, of the one that we did earlier this evening, and I'd like to have the Schiebel's come up, and that's Area Variance No. 11-2008. MR. DREllOS-Do we need all our paperwork? MR. UNDERWOOD-I would hold on to it. MR. GARRAND-Do we have to make a motion to re-hear? 45 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. UNDERWOOD-I think what we're going to do, at this point, is this. Because the public's going to need to make comment on this at some point, I think it would be improper for us to make any kind of a decision going forward as to whether we like or dislike or whatever going forward, and I think that, you know, as you spoke to Keith and I, they had made, we, in essence, denied an approval motion. We didn't deny the request for this project. In other words. MR. URRICO-It's always been my understanding, though, that when we vote negatively on, it is, in essence, a denial. MR. UNDERWOOD-It is a denial, but in other words, so we can either make a denial motion, we can make a tabling motion, with conditions. My concern is this. The public's not here. They deserve a right to public commentary in regards to the project. We can throw out some ideas. We can do a tabling motion. MR. URRICO-I think we voted on it. I don't think we have to discuss itagain. MRS. JENKIN-Yes. MR. UNDERWOOD-I would think we would have to, you know, make a motion to re- hear. MR. URRICO-No. I think the motion is dead. As far as, I want to hear counsel's recommendation, because we voted on it. It's a denial. I don't think we have to hear anything at this point. They have to re-submit an application. MR. OBORNE-I do want to say my concern is that your first resolution, or the only . resolution in this case, was for approval. MR. URRICQ-And in my understanding, my experience on this Board, has been a denial of an approval is the same as, a disapproval is the same as a denial. If you want to call counsel now and ask them if that's the case. MR. OBORNE-No, I can't call counsel now, but it sure would be a lot cleaner if you did a denial motion and you denied it. MR. URRICO-I refuse to do it. I think it's done. MRS. JENKIN-We denied the. MR. DREllOS-lt was a motion to approve that was denied. It wasn't a motion that was denied. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. Then my suggestion is this. MR. URRICO-We offered them that option beforehand. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, we did offer them a tabling motion. Okay. Then I guess we're just going to have to re-file with, not re-file all the information. I would suggest that the Board members hang on to the information in regards to Debaron, and I think what we should do is have them re-fiI~ with you, for some future meeting, and can we make a motion to re-hear next month? MR. DREllOS-Or you make a motion to deny. MR. UNDERWOOD-All right. Then I'll make a motion that we re-hear Area Variance No. 11~2008, and 1 think wewould dothat probably, when, next month, the first meeting, the first meeting of next month, and give them the opportunity to come back with a downsized building, because that seemed to be the primary sticking point that we had there. MR. OBORNE-If you're comfortable with that? MR. UNDERWOOD-Is the Board comfortable with that? MR. URRICO-I think, procedurally, we're out of our league here. MRS. HUNT-Yes, I think we need to get legal counsel. 46 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) MR. URRICO-We need some counsel to take a look atthis, and let us know. . MR. DREllOS-1 was in favor of the project. So you know where I stand. MRS. JENKIN-Jim, you offered to table it and they come back with changes, and they said, no, we want a vote. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Then I guess it's over and done with. You'll just have to re- submit. I mean, I'm going to have to agree with Roy. I think that, you know, the opportunity was there and it wasn't taken. So, you know, I don't see it as a chance that everything has to be, you know, the information's all there. Everything's been done, all the work has been done on the project, and we'll just have to re-submit it in a different form from what was proposed to us this time. MR. OBORNE-That's fine. MR. UNDERWOOD-So get the materials in. Get the changes in, and that's where we're going, I guess. MR. OBORNE-So the previous, the denial of the approval stands, and there will not be a re-hearing and there will not be a denial resolution. MR. URRICO-Unless Town Counsel says we need to be more clear on it, buUhat's always been my experience. MR. UNDERWOOD-Do we want them to get together with Town Counsel and see what they think, or argue it out? MR. OBORNE-I'II certainly, we have a debriefing meeting in the morning. I'll certainly bring that up. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. Sorry about that. All right. We have an approval of some minutes here. APPROVAL OF MINUTES March 18, 2009 MOTION TO APPROVE THE QUEENSBURY ZONING BOARD. OF APPEALS MEETING MINUTES OF MARCH 18. 2009, Introduced by James Underwood who moved for its adoption, seconded by Joan Jenkin: Duly adopted this 27th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Clements, Mr. Drellos, Mr. Underwood NOES: NONE March 25, 2009 MOTION TO APPROVE THE QUEENSBURY ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS MEETING MINUTES OF MARCH 25. 2009, Introduced by James Underwood who moved for its adoption, seconded by Joyce Hunt: Duly adopted this 2th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Clements, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Drellos, Mr. Underwood NOES: NONE April 15, 2009 MOTION TO APPROVE THE QUEENSBURY ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS MEETING MINUTES OF APRil 15. 2009, Introduced by James Underwood who moved for its adoption, seconded by Brian Clements: 47 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting OS/27/09) Duly adopted this 27th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Clements, Mr. Garrand, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Drellos, Mr. Underwood NOES: NONE AREA VARIANCE NO. 26-2009 SEQRA TYPE: II PETER DARRAH OWNER(S) PETER DARRAH ZONING: SR-1A lOCATION: 10 MUD POND ROAD APPLICANT . PROPOSES CONSTRUCTION OF A 26 FT. BY 34 FT. FREESTANDING GARAGE. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM MINIMUM FRONT YARD SETBACK REQUIREMENTS. CROSS REF.: BP 90-027 SFD; BP 91-206 DECK; BP 97-211 BARN WARREN COUNTY PLANNING: N/A lOT SIZE: 0.80 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 279.15-1-45 SECTION: 179-4-030 MR. OBORNE-You still need to table Peter Darrah, as a reminder. They asked for a June. MR. UNDERWOOD-So that would be for the first meeting in June. MOTION TO TABLE AREA VARIANCE NO. 26-2009 PETER DARRAH, Introduced by James Underwood who moved for its adoption, seconded by Joan Jenkin: 10 Mud Pond Road. Tabled until the first meeting in June. Duly adopted this 2th day of May, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mrs. Jenkin, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Clements, Mr. Drellos, Mr. Underwood NOES: NONE MR. ClEMENTS-Mr. Chairman, I would just like to say that I talked with those people, just to get it on the record, these people that we just, Peter Darrah, and she's the ?ne that told me that her husband had just had a heart attack, and so, I talked to them. I Just wanted to get that on the record. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. On motion meeting was adjourned. RESPECTFUllY SUBMITTED, James Underwood, Chairman 48