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09-26-2012 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) QUEENSBURY ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS SECOND REGULAR MEETING SEPTEMBER 26, 2012 INDEX Area Variance No. 49-2012 Curtis & Tamara Carstensen 1. Tax Map No. 239.12-2-60 Area Variance No. 50-2012 Ronald Miller 5. Tax Map No. 227.9-1-5 Area Variance No. 47-2012 Frey & Anita Frejborg 9. Tax Map No. 289.17-1-47 Area Variance No. 43-2012 Legacy Land Holdings, LLC 12. Daniel Valente Tax Map No. 296.15-1-2 Sign Variance No. 51-2012 McDonald's USA, LLC 32. Tax Map No. 309.13-1-74 THESE ARE NOT 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. (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) QUEENSBURY ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS SECOND REGULAR MEETING SEPTEMBER 26, 2012 7:00 P.M. MEMBERS PRESENT STEVEN JACKOSKI, CHAIRMAN ROY URRICO, SECRETARY JOYCE HUNT JAMES UNDERWOOD RONALD KUHL RICHARD GARRAND BRIAN CLEMENTS LAND USE PLANNER-KEITH OBORNE STENOGRAPHER-SUE HEMINGWAY MR. JACKOSKI-For those of you who haven't been here before, welcome. There usually is an information sheet on the back table, but I see that we're pretty much out of them already this evening. So I'll generally describe how this all works. Tonight's agendas have been established and for those applications that have public comment we will be calling the public to the small table to make comment if they so choose. We will call each application to the table, and the application will be read into the record. The applicant may add any additional information they so choose. The Board will generally ask the applicant questions. We'll open up the public hearing and we'll decide whether or not to close the public hearing. We'll poll the Board. We'll ask for additional information from the applicant, and then possibly we'll go into motions or votes. So, fortunately tonight we have no Old Business to attend to, which is kind of nice. So there's no housekeeping. So I'd like to call to order tonight's meeting, Wednesday, September 26th, here at the Queensbury Center at seven o'clock. The first application tonight that we're going to discuss is Curtis & Tamara Carstensen. We're going to go a bit out of order. The next application we're going to hear is Ronald Miller. The next application will be Frey and Anita Frejborg, and then we will get into the Legacy Land Holdings and the McDonald's USA applications. NEW BUSINESS: AREA VARIANCE NO. 49-2012 SEQRA TYPE 11 CURTIS & TAMARA CARSTENSEN AGENT(S) JARRETT ENGINEERS, PLLC OWNER(S) CURTIS & TAMARA CARSTENSEN ZONING WR LOCATION 18 HOLLY LANE - ASSEMBLY POINT APPLICANT PROPOSES TO REMOVE EXISTING CONCRETE WALK AND STAIRS AND REPLACE WITH NEW PATIO, STAIRS, AND DRY LAID STONEWALL RESULTING IN +/- 564 SQ. FT. OF NEW IMPERVIOUS SURFACE. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM SHORELINE SETBACK AND PERMEABILITY REQUIREMENTS OF THE WR ZONE. CROSS REF SPR 58-2012 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING YES ADIRONDACK PARK AGENCY YES LOT SIZE 0.17 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 239.12-2-60 SECTION 179-13-010; 179-3-040A BOB HOLMES, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 49-2012, Curtis & Tamara Carstensen, Meeting Date: September 26, 2012 "Project Location: 18 Holly Lane - Assembly Point Description of Proposed Project: Applicant proposes to remove existing concrete walk and stairs and replace with new patio, stairs, and dry laid stone wall resulting in +/-564 sq. ft. of total impervious surface. Request for shoreline setback and permeability relief. Relief Required: Nature of Area Variance: Parcel will require area variances as follows: 1. Shoreline Setback - Request for 38 feet of shoreline setback relief from the 50 requirement for the WR zone as per§179-3-040. 2. Permeability -Request for an 564 square feet of impermeable surfacing for an overall impermeability of 2,327 square feet or total site permeability of 68%; Minimum per code is 75% in the WR Zone. Note: Existing site permeability is 75.8°/x. (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) Criteria for considering an Area Variance according to Chapter 267 of Town Law: 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 to the neighborhood may be anticipated. 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. Feasible alternatives concerning setback relief appear limited due to lot constraints and the proposal offered, however, a feasible method by which to potentially avoid any variance for permeability would be to offer permeable surfacing in lieu of impermeable flagstone pavers. 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for 38 feet or 76% relief from the 50 foot shoreline setback requirement for the WR zone as per §179-3-040 may be considered severe relative to the ordinance. The request for a decrease in permeability from 75.8% down to 68% 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. Any increase of impermeable surfacing adjacent to the shoreline of Lake George should be discouraged as an impact on the environmental conditions may be realized. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. Parcel History (construction/site plan/variance, SP 58-2012 Hard surfacing w/in 50 feet of shoreline Pending Staff comments: • As the existing conditions are compliant with regards to permeability yet proposed are not, consideration should be given to installing permeable pavers instead of impervious fieldstone for proposed patio. • The potential to avoid an area variance may be realized if permeable surfacing is used in lieu of impermeable surfacing. At the very least calculations should be accomplished in order to ascertain any benefit that could be considered. SEAR Status: Type II" MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you. Just for a little bit of housekeeping, if there are any students in the audience from Queensbury, if they want to come up here I can sign the agenda so that they can prove attendance. Welcome. MR. HOLMES-Good evening. My name is Bob Holmes. I work with Jarrett Engineering, here this evening representing Curtis & Tamara Carstensen. Just briefly, Mr. Urrico, obviously your summary pretty well sums up the project. It is the preference or the desirability on the part of my client to proceed with the plans as we have before you, but certainly I would imagine we're going to have a lively discussion, I would anticipate. It is a relatively small site, obviously, to begin with, and we're just trying to allow the, my clients some improved usage of their property. We do have, as part of that, I didn't quite hear it in the summary there, that we are providing stormwater controls for all of the new patio surface that is there, plus we're going to be applying and providing additional stormwater controls for much of the lakeside drainage from the existing house that, pardon me, the, sure, my, I'm sorry, I get tongue tied here a little bit. The basins and infiltrator units that are proposed are directly underneath there, then we do have an edge drain directly along the landscaping wall that's down the lakeside. That's going to contain and trap much of that water and it'll be infiltrated back on site. So, that's just a little bit of additional summary there for you. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Thank you. Are there any Board members who'd like to ask the applicant questions at this time? (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. Staff posed the question whether you could use permeable pavers instead of fieldstone. Is that something you guys would consider doing? MR. HOLMES-I think that would come down to it, yes. Obviously the proposed impervious cover we have there is more of a desirable solution for my client. That's why it's been proposed and that's why we took the additional step of providing the additional stormwater controls. MR. UNDERWOOD-So you're going to have drains to capture and then distribute that underground? MR. HOLMES-That is correct. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. MR. HOLMES-And if you could follow on the plans you've got in front of you, we've got this landscape wall that's right here. We've got what we refer to as an edge drain, collects any of the runoff that's coming from the roof, any of the adjacent remaining sidewalks and the patio itself, it comes there, distributes it into the infiltrator units that are subsurface below the patio, and from there it will infiltrate into the ground. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. MR. JACKOSKI-Are there any additional questions? MR. KUHL-Would the same system by there if you had permeable pavers? MR. HOLMES-One small discrepancy that we did have with Staff is it would still be our opinion under the current configuration or the way I currently understand and read the Zoning Code, that it would still be considered 50% impermeable. We still would have to provide stormwater controls anyway, and it's our belief it still would be a variance request. So we're just, the way we view it is we would be here before you this evening asking for relief anyway. It's the case that the chosen direction for my client was to go for the impermeable, but at the same time, provide the additional stormwater capacity to compensate for that increase in impervious cover. MR. URRICO-I guess my question, next, is for Staff. What would be the difference if they used impermeable versus permeable? MR. OBORNE-Well, the 50% comes from a determination by the Town designated engineer on the San Souci project, specifically had to do with parking lot pavers, of which there particularly is not much benefit to that, but he did get 50% for that, I believe, with these type of pavers, which are patio pavers. He may consider that 100%. I don't know, and until we get it to him, I really cannot answer that question. MR. JACKOSKI-Any additional questions at this time? There is a public hearing scheduled this evening. Is there anyone here in the audience who would like to address the Board concerning this application? The Water Keeper, Mr. Navitsky. PUBLIC HEARING OPENED CHRIS NAVITSKY MR. NAVITSKY-Good evening. Chris Navitsky, Lake George Water Keeper. We support the applicant's initiative to install stormwater management and the landscaping plan which was proposed which will provide water quality benefits. However, we cannot support the requested variance for the decrease in permeability for this lakefront parcel. The requested variance is not the minimum necessary for the applicant to achieve their intended use. We would recommend a zero decrease in permeability, at a minimum for the project. This could be achieved by decreasing the proposed patio size and basically are getting two patios proposed for 564 square feet, or again, as the Board discussed, construct with permeable surface. We also had a question regarding the structure and the height of the proposed retaining wall, and that was not included on the plan, and those are our comments. Thank you. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you, sir. Is there anyone here in the audience who'd like to additionally address the Board? Seeing no one else, is there any written comment? MR. URRICO-There is, but it was by the eloquent gentleman that just spoke. MR. JACKOSKI-By the Water Keeper. Okay. So at this time, does the applicant want to address any of the concerns raised by the public comment? (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. HOLMES-1 guess I certainly understand the perspective of the Water Keeper. It's not entirely in the desirability of my client at the moment, however, but if there's common ground or medium ground that could be achieved, I think we could come to that. I don't know. What's the overall position of the Board? MR. JACKOSKI-We'll poll the Board now so that you can get a flavor for where the Board is headed on this. I'd like to start with Roy. MR. URRICO-Well, as you know, our charge is to provide minimum relief. MR. HOLM ES-Understood. MR. URRICO-And there are two possibilities to decrease the permeability that's needed. One is decreasing the size of the patio, and two is to use permeable pavers. So I think you have two options there that could help reduce the request. So that would be my position. MR. HOLMES-Okay. MR. JACKOSKI-Rick? MR. GARRAND-I think Staff made a wonderful comment with the proposal to use permeable pavers. I think that should definitely be done here. I would be in favor of the variance, provided they use permeable pavers. MR. JACKOSKI-Joyce? MRS. HUNT-Yes. I'm kind of torn. I agree with both my Board members, but I do think we should be using permeable pavers in this case, and I would go along with the size if the permeable pavers were used. MR. JACKOSKI-Jim? MR. UNDERWOOD-I'm going to have to go along with Roy in this case, here. I think that we can reduce the size of this patio. I mean, that's a large patio, and the fact that you do have dock space that's utilized also. We have to keep in mind that this is only a .17 acre lot and it's over built if we allow this to go through as currently proposed. So I'd like to see it reduced in size, and the permeable pavers I think is a good idea, too. I mean, anything we can do to improve the situation makes sense to me. MR. JACKOSKI-Ron? MR. KUHL-Yes. I'll agree with Jim on the permeable pavers. I mean, that's, I think you have the option to do that and that would be better for the parcel for the whole. MR. JACKOSKI-Brian? MR. CLEMENTS-1 also, I don't have a problem with the size. I also would like to see permeable pavers there, and I assume the stormwater management plan is going to stay in effect. MR. HOLMES-That would be realistic, yes. MR. JACKOSKI-I think it's fairly unanimous. MR. HOLMES-Yes. I guess I would make the offer if we would concede the permeable pavers, I think that would be appropriate. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. So the applicant has modified the request to include permeable pavers. MR. OBORNE-No, we can't quantify the amount of permeability, that relief you're going to be given, until we get a revised plan. MR. JACKOSKI-So the only thing we can do at this point is I suspect the applicant is going to request a tabling. MR. HOLM ES-Obviously that's the position we're pointing. I guess, Mr. Chairman, the one question I do have for Staff is, Keith, do you believe that there is room for, where this is not under a parking lot or a driving surface, that the percentage of permeability or impervious cover could be addressed? (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. OBORNE-It could be. I have to lean on the engineer for that. MR. HOLMES-So at this point the position still would be is we would treat it as a 50/50 split, utilizing permeable pavers? MR. OBORNE-That would be the minimum at this point, with the potential of 100%, with no guarantee on that. MR. HOLMES-Okay. I mean, just along that line, my reason for asking that question is you had mentioned that you had talked about providing the stormwater. Yes, we would still do that. The numbers, changing that from impermeable to permeable pavers, will jumble those numbers around, but my intention would be not to drastically alter what the design is we have currently, other than what the surface itself would be. MR. JACKOSKI-In knowing the feelings of the Board, if we could go ahead and grant this, but because we don't have the math behind it, unfortunately, we just can't. MR. HOLMES-Okay. All right. Then I'm going to say we have to ask for a tabling. MR. JACKOSKI-I accept that. MR. HOLM ES-Understood. MR. JACKOSKI-So I think we're going to leave the public hearing open, and can I get a motion from Rick? MOTION TO TABLE AREA VARIANCE NO. 49-2012 CURTIS & TAMARA CARSTENSEN, Introduced by Richard Garrand who moved for its adoption, seconded by Joyce Hunt: Tabled until the November 28tH meeting with a final submission date of October 15tH Duly adopted this 26th day of September, 2012, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Clements, Mr. Kuhl, Mr. Underwood, Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Jackoski NOES: NONE AREA VARIANCE NO. 50-2012 SEQRA TYPE 11 RONALD MILLER AGENT(S) H. THOMAS JARRETT, P.E. OWNER(S) RONALD MILLER ZONING WR LOCATION 107 ROCKHURST ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES TO ELIMINATE A PORTION OF LAWN AND INSTALL TERRACED LANDSCAPING THAT INCLUDES DRY LAID STONE WALLS, CONSTRUCTION OF A +/- 250 SQ. FT. FLAGSTONE PATIO, AND VEGETATED RETENTION AREAS TO TREAT STORMWATER. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM MINIMUM PERMEABILITY AND SHORELINE SETBACK REQUIREMENTS FOR THE WR ZONING DISTRICT. CROSS REF SPR 57-2012 WARREN CO. PLANNING YES ADIRONDACK PARK AGENCY YES LOT SIZE 0.19 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 227.9-1-5 SECTION 179-3-040A; 179-6-050 BOB HOLMES, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 50-2012, Ronald Miller, Meeting Date: September 26, 2012 "Project Location: 107 Rockhurst Road Description of Proposed Project: Applicant proposes to eliminate a portion of lawn and install terraced landscaping that includes dry laid stone walls, construction of a +/- 250 sq. ft.. flagstone patio, and vegetated retention areas to treat stormwater. Relief requested from minimum permeability and shoreline setback requirements for the WR zoning district. Relief Required: Nature of Area Variance: Parcel will require area variances as follows: 1. Permeability- Request for an additional 288 square feet of impermeable surfacing for an overall impermeability of 3,186 square feet or total site permeability of 64.8%; Minimum per code is 75% in the WR Zone. Note: Existing site permeability is 68%. (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) Criteria for considering an Area Variance according to Chapter 267 of Town Law: 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 to the neighborhood may be anticipated. 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. Feasible alternatives would be to consider permeable materials to either eliminate or reduce the amount of permeability relief requested. 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for a reduction of permeability of 288 square feet resulting in site permeability at 65% may be considered minor 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. Any decrease in permeability on Rockhurst should be strongly discouraged. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. Parcel History (construction/site plan/variance, SP 57-2012 Hard surfacing w/in 50 feet of shoreline Pending Staff comments: • As the existing conditions are not compliant with regards to permeability, consideration should be given to installing permeable pavers instead of impervious fieldstone for proposed patio. • The parking area to be removed and resurfaced with impermeable surfacing. Consideration should be given to installing permeable pavement or pavers to promote permeability. • The potential to avoid an area variance may be realized if permeable surfacing is used in lieu of impermeable surfacing. At the very least calculations should be accomplished in order to ascertain any benefit that could be considered. SEAR Status: Type II" MR. JACKOSKI-Welcome. If you could identify yourself for the record, and don't say ditto. MR. HOLMES-Good evening. I am still Bob Holmes with Jarrett Engineers, and a little bit of de ja vu apparently here. Again, obviously very similar to our prior application that we just went through. This one slightly different lot, obviously. We are proposing some reduction in size, just a clarification, some reduction in size to the parking area, but please understand that this time it was not the intention to completely remove that parking area and reconstruct. It was a matter of reduction in the size, and then in the future times, once that area is reconstructed, that we would alter and correct drainage to flow towards our stormwater basins that we have there. This one a little bit different from our prior application where we are having, we're going to have some vegetated basins for infiltration of stormwater. Again, we will be accounting for additional runoff from existing impervious surfaces to the basin, also including runoff from the new proposed patio. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Thank you. Are there any questions from Board members at this time? MR. CLEMENTS-I just had a question. This is compliant with the setback from the lake, though, right? There's nothing in here that says anything about setback. Maybe I ought to ask that of Keith. MR. OBORNE-It does need shoreline setback relief. MR. JACKOSKI-Any additional questions from Board members? (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. KUHL-The proposed dry laid landscaped wall, how tall is that going to be? MR. HOLMES-1 believe it's going to be about two feet. Please bear in mind, unfortunately I'm pinch hitting this evening. So some of the details I may not fully know for you, but I can certainly get the information if I can, but I believe it's in the neighborhood of 24 inches of relief that would be on the face of that wall. MR. KUHL-Both of them? MR. HOLMES-Correct. Question. Keith, did I understand you saying we are looking for shoreline relief as well? MR. OBORNE-Yes, that's what I'm quantifying right now. Because I obviously didn't qualify it in my notes. MR. JACKOSKI-It is on the agenda. MR. OBORNE-It is on the agenda. Yes. So I'll get back to you on that. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. MR. KUHL-I have another question. What size are you going to cut that parking area down to? MR. HOLMES-1 believe I can tell you that. We're reducing the size down, basically, to, the depth would be about 18 feet of depth, very similar to parking lots for cars, we're reducing it down to parking for cars, basically each parking spot would be a nine by eighteen area. MR. KU H L-Okay. MR. JACKOSKI-We do have a public hearing scheduled this evening. Is there anyone here in the audience who'd like to address this Board concerning this particular application? Mr. Navitsky. PUBLIC HEARING OPENED CHRIS NAVITSKY MR. NAVITSKY-1 guess I won't say ditto. Chris Navitsky, Lake George Water Keeper. Again, we commend the applicant for the initiative of the ground cover installation and stormwater management controls, but again, we cannot support a decrease in permeability. We feel that it is not the minimum necessary for the applicant. We recommend a zero decrease, and that could be accomplished by reducing the parking area more, the impervious surfaces, or decrease the patio size, and again, as noted on the last application, there already is a patio or an outdoor area on the site. We did also have a question, as a Board member had, about the shoreline setback and if that was required for this also. Thank you. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you, sir. Anyone else here in the audience who would like to address the Board on this application? Seeing no one, is there any written comment? MR. URRICO-No, there is not. MR. JACKOSKI-No written comment, and Staff has a question. MR. OBORNE-No, it's some clarification on the shoreline setback relief required, and you're disturbing within, you're removing within 35 feet of a shoreline and disturbing within 50 feet of a shoreline gets you in front of the Planning Board at this point in time. I don't believe we're here for shoreline setback relief at this point in time, but it is advertised as such, and there's no structures going up. If relief was to be granted, it would be 21 feet from 50. It should be 29 feet for hard surfacing within 50 feet of a shoreline, but again, that's a site plan issue. That's not an area variance issue, in my estimation, and I do hope I'm not wrong on that. MR. JACKOSKI-But tell us the Craig Brown, Zoning Administrator, his opinion was? MR. OBORNE-1 don't have his denial. It would be in with Roy's documents, I believe. MR. JACKOSKI-Just for clarity, Roy, you probably should just check that. Do you have it? (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. URRICO-Yes. "I'm writing to you in response to my review of your proposed plans depicting the proposed improvements to the property referenced above....and upon review of the plans submitted to this office, I find that an Area Variance and Site Plan Review will be necessary in order for you construct the desired improvements in the location you have shown. Specifically, the proposed construction offers the creation of a deck that does not meet the minimum shoreline setback requirement of the Waterfront Residential (WR) district, which presents the need for an Area Variance." MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. So we do have clarification that a shoreline setback variance is required. MR. OBORNE-So that's been qualified. The quantification is 29 feet. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you. So at this time I suspect the applicant doesn't want to add anymore, and we probably should, we'll leave the public comment period open, and we'll poll the Board. This time we'll start with Ron. MR. KUHL-Well, I think that if you would use permeable pavers, we'd be better off with this. I have no problem with anything else, other than decreasing the permeability. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Brian? MR. CLEMENTS-I have to agree with my fellow Board members here. Permeability with pavers would be my request also. MR. JACKOSKI-Jim? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. I think we can look at the similarities here and the differences. The previous application was .17 acres. This is .19 acres, and you're only requesting a 250 square foot patio, which was what I was looking for on the first one. So I think, in this instance here, I think the 250 square feet is more reasonable. I'd like to see the permeable pavers also, and I would commend you on the design of this one. I like the landscaping a lot better than either one. I think it actually is going to enhance the waterfront and not, you know, continue to chip away at it. MR. JACKOSKI-Joyce? MRS. HUNT-1 have to agree with my fellow Board members. I would be in favor if there was an increase in the permeability. MR. JACKOSKI-Rick? MR. GARRAND-I also have to agree with the other Board members. I'd also like to say I think the form goes along with the lake. It's a wonderful design. So commend whoever did it. MR. JACKOSKI-Roy? MR. URRICO-Yes. I agree with everybody else. I think this is a nice plan, and I just think that we have to investigate whether the pavers are something that can be pursued. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Similar situation. MR. HOLMES-The question I do have, I mean, going along with the permeable pavers, and I probably should have asked this on the prior application. Is there a way, I mean, proceeding forward, opposed to tabling it for a future review again, can, the implementation of using permeable pavers, can that be done as a condition of approval? MR. OBORNE-Yes, I mean, you could do that, but, you know, you would still want to know if we do still require permeability relief, though. It still has to be quantified. That would be at the Board's discretion, and I probably would advise against it, to be honest with you. MR. JACKOSKI-Yes, and I believe this Board has suggested to me in the past that if we can't do the math and have the specifics behind the math, then we are going to request a tabling. MR. GARRAND-Yes, exactly. MR. JACKOSKI-Unfortunately. MR. HOLMES-Okay. I understand that. I mean, just for example, I mean this is already, as far as permeability goes, as you've noted, it already is pre-existing, nonconforming. So even if we were 100%, well, if TDU is to allow 100% permeability, we would have no change at that point, but if it was any other variation split 50/50 or an 80/20, something of that nature, there would be numbers that would change. 8 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. OBORNE-To a positive. MR. HOLMES-Yes. MR. OBORNE-Okay. I agree. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Public hearing is still open. Could I get a motion? I assume the applicant is requesting to table? MR. HOLMES-I guess we are, yes. MOTION TO TABLE AREA VARIANCE NO. 50-2012 RON MILLER, Introduced by Richard Garrand who moved for its adoption, seconded by Joyce Hunt: Tabled until the November 28th meeting with a submission deadline of October 15tH Duly adopted this 16th day of September, 2012, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Urrico, Mr. Clements, Mr. Kuhl, Mr. Underwood, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Jackoski NOES: NONE MR. HOLMES-Mr. Chairman, quick question on that, again, for Staff. Keith, I guess as soon as we can, if we can facilitate a conversation with Sean or whomever, the TDE, come up with a number, I think we can get this turned around very quickly. MR. OBORNE-Yes, I agree. I think that if you could call Sean tomorrow he'll let me know the results of that conversation, and we can move forward from there. MR. HOLMES-Okay. MR. JACKOSKI-And just a note for Staff. I think that there are some other agents for other applications that it would probably be a good idea, going forward, based on some of the comments tonight at this Board, that when there's a review of the application, maybe that is brought up about the permeable. MR. OBORNE-Yes, it was brought up at the pre-submission meeting, and it was elected not to be pursued. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. That's great. Thank you. MR. HOLMES-Okay. AREA VARIANCE NO. 47-2012 SEQRA TYPE II FREY & ANITA FREJBORG AGENT(S) VAN DUSEN & STEVES OWNER(S) FREY&ANITA FREJBORG ZONING WR LOCATION 153 BIRDSALL ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES A 550 SQ. FT. (0.01 ACRE) LOT LINE ADJUSTMENT WITH ADJOINING PROPERTY TO THE SOUTH. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM LOT SIZE, LOT WIDTH, SHORELINE FRONTAGE AND PERMEABILITY REQUIREMENTS OF THE WR ZONE. CROSS REF NONE FOUND WARREN COUNTY PLANNING N/A LOT SIZE 0.56 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 289.17-1-47 SECTION 179-3-040 MATT STEVES, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 47-2012, Frey & Anita Frejborg, Meeting Date: September 25, 2012 "Project Location: 153 Birdsall Road Description of Proposed Project: Applicant proposes a 550 sq. ft. (0.01 acre) lot line adjustment with adjoining property to the south. Relief requested from lot size, lot width, water frontage and permeability requirements of the WR zone. Relief Required: Parcel will require area variances as follows: 1. Lot size - Request for 1.45 acres of relief from the 2 acre minimum requirement for the WR zone as per§179-3-040. 2. Lot Width - Request for 47 feet of relief from the 150 foot lot width requirement for the WR zone as per§179-3-040. 3. Water frontage - Request for 74 feet of relief from the 200 foot minimum requirement for the WR zone as per§179-3-040. (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) 4. Permeability - Request for site permeability of 70.1% when minimum requirements for the WR zone is 75% as per§179-3-040. Criteria for considering an Area Variance according to Chapter 267 of Town Law: 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 to the neighborhood may be anticipated. 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. Feasible alternatives would be for both landowners to "swap" exact square footage amounts to avoid the lot size, lot width and permeability relief requests. Concerning the shoreline frontage request, this could potentially be avoided by not entertaining any Water Frontage changes whatsoever. 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for 1.45 acres or 72% relief from the 2.0 acre minimum may be considered severe relative to the ordinance. Further, the request for 47 feet or 31% relief from the 150 foot lot width requirement may be considered moderate relative to the ordinance. Additionally, the request for 74 feet or 37% relief from the 200 foot shoreline frontage requirement of the WR zone may be considered moderate relative to the code. Finally, the request for a permeability percentage of 70.1% or 6.5% relief from the 75% minimum may be considered minor relative to the code. 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 or environmental condition in the neighborhood may be anticipated. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. Parcel History (construction/site plan/variance, None Found Staff comments: As stated above, it would appear that most if not all of the requested variances could be avoided. SEAR Status: Type II" MR. JACKOSKI-Just for the record, so that there is full disclosure here, my wife owns property within the neighborhood here, but I don't feel I need to recuse myself because of a conflict of interest. Welcome. If you could identify yourself for the record. MR. STEVES-Good evening. Matt Steves with Van Dusen and Steves representing the Frejborgs on this application. Real quickly, to go through, I'll make it real brief. Staff basically had everything on there. This is two existing parcels of .65, or excuse me, .63 and .56, and the request is to adjust a lot line down near the shore. There's not going to be any physical change. There's no additions, no building or anything that's going to be happening. This is to accommodate improvements that were on the southerly parcel, or the Dineen parcel, that were discovered after we did the survey in February, and then discussions came along with the neighbors of how to facilitate, to place the usage that they've historically had on their own property, and was to adjust it with the 500 feet along the shore. As far as the permeability is concerned, because of the two acre zoning now, currently the Frejborg's parcel is currently at 70.7, and by adjusting the six feet of shoreline and the 550, it drops to 70.1, but again, there is no physical change being made to either property. As far as the comment of making a swap in the back, we can do that but we don't really see any benefit to either applicant to do that in the back. It's real easy to know what the property is like in the back. It goes over the hill toward the pond. It doesn't really affect either property or improve either property to adjust that, and as far as the last comment from Staff, as far as the shoreline variance, yes, we could swing back to the original point on the shore, but then it makes an awful acute angle or skew angle coming back to the shore for any future setbacks going down the road, and the existing stone wall that is along the shoreline was built by the Dineens. So trying to accommodate and leave as much of that (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) wall on that property as possible. So we looked at this in about six different ways and we figured that this was the best scenario to accommodate both properties, owners, but yet be the least amount of land to be transferred. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Thank you for those clarifications. Are there any questions from Board members at this time? MR. KUHL-Yes. I guess I was snoozing when you started. Was it that they, Dineen just built on it and built over the line because the lines were not clear back then? MR. STEVES-I would assume. I really don't know. I got involved this year. I don't know when the actual construction took place, but that's what they've historically been using for quite a few years. MR. UNDERWOOD-1 think they did the walls probably five years ago now. So it's been a while. MR. STEVES-So then we discovered the, you know, when we did our boundary survey, it showed all the improvements, and that's when it was discovered where the stone wall and that, it's kind of like a circular staircase going down with a circular wall on the top. MR. KUHL-Keith, if they swap property in the back, they'd still have to come because it's two acre zoning? MR. OBORNE-No, if you don't change the nonconformity, you're fine. If you do it per square foot per square foot swap, it's a wash. MR. KUHL-Okay. MR. STEVES-And we did understand that going in. We knew that we could do a little swap in the back and then come back to the existing point on the shore, but it made that,just got it really too tight down there to accommodate the actual usage and the ownership intent for this property. Both parties are agreeable to this, and so that's what they wanted to do. MR. GARRAND-The Frejborgs don't have a problem with the fact that it's going to potentially limit the improvements they can make on the property? MR. STEVES-No. MR. JACKOSKI-Any other questions? There is a public hearing scheduled this evening. Is there anyone in the audience who'd like to address this Board concerning this particular application? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. JACKOSKI-Seeing no one, is there any written comment? MR. URRICO-1 do not see any. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. At this time I will poll the Board. I'll start with Jim. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. I don't see there's going to be any change created here. It's a little swap of a little slice of land here, and I think for future purposes, if the properties have to go up for sale, they would have had to do it anyway to make it saleable. Both properties have been pretty much improved to the maximum extent that they could be improved anyway. They're relatively new, both buildings, and all the improvements that have been made. So I'd be in favor of it. MR. JACKOSKI-Joyce? MRS. HUNT-I agree. There's nothing being changed on the property except the lot line, and I would have no problem with it. MR. JACKOSKI-Ron? MR. KUHL-Yes. No, I have no problem. It's a good way to clean it up and be good neighbors. MR. JACKOSKI-Rick? (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. GARRAND-I would be in favor of it. I can't foresee any adverse impacts on this neighborhood. MR. JACKOSKI-Roy? MR. URRICO-1 agree. I think this certainly satisfies the criteria and also this is a pretty minimal adjustment, in my estimation. MR. JACKOSKI-Brian? MR. CLEMENTS-Yes. I think it's a very minor change. I don't see anything that can be done on either property, and they both agree with it. So I'd be in favor. MR. JACKOSKI-So I am going to close the public comment period. Can I get a motion? MOTION TO APPROVE AREA VARIANCE NO. 47-2012 FREY & ANITA FREJBORG, Introduced by James Underwood who moved for its adoption, seconded by Ronald Kuhl: 153 Birdsall Road. The applicant is proposing a 550 square foot .01 acre lot line adjustment with adjoining property to the south. Relief is requested from the lot size, lot width, water frontage and permeability requirements of the Waterfront Residential zone. As far as the relief required, it's 1.45 acres of relief from the two acre minimum requirement for the Waterfront Residential zone. Lot width is request for 47 feet of relief from the 150 foot lot width requirements for the Waterfront Residential zone. Third is the water frontage, and that is request for 74 feet of relief from the 200 foot minimum requirement for the Waterfront Residential zone, and last is the permeability request for site permeability of 70.1%, where minimum requirements for the Waterfront Residential zone is 75%, as per the Code. We do not anticipate any undesirable changes in the neighborhood. Nothing really will change other than a line that's there for the purposes of survey will be slightly moved to the northeast, and at that point both properties will become more compliant with the Dineen's property not encroaching on the Frejborg's property. Duly adopted this 26th day of September, 2012, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Urrico, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Clements, Mr. Kuhl, Mr. Underwood, Mr. Jackoski NOES: NONE MR. JACKOSKI-Congratulations. AREA VARIANCE NO. 43-2012 SEQRA TYPE 11 LEGACY LAND HOLDINGS, LLC DANIEL VALENTE AGENT(S) H. THOMAS JARRETT OWNER(S) LEGACY LAND HOLDINGS, LLC - DANIEL VALENTE ZONING OFFICE LOCATION GENTRY LANE EXTENSION APPLICANT PROPOSES CONSTRUCTION OF 176 APARTMENT UNITS IN 29 BUILDINGS. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM MINIMUM SHORELINE SETBACK REQUIREMENTS. CROSS REF. SPR 59-2012 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING YES LOT SIZE 28.1 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 296.15-1-2 SECTION 179-3-040 MICHAEL BORGOS & BOB HOLMES, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Area Variance No. 43-2012, Legacy Land Holdings, LLC, Meeting Date: September 26, 2012 "Project Location: Gentry Lane Extension Description of Proposed Project: Applicant proposes construction of 176 apartment units in 29 buildings. Relief requested from minimum shoreline setback requirements. Relief Required: Parcel will require shoreline relief as follows: 1. Building #1 - Request for 58 feet of shoreline relief 2. Building #2 - Request for 48 feet of shoreline relief 3. Building #3 - Request for 48 feet of shoreline relief 4. Building #4 - Request for 51 feet of shoreline relief 5. Building #5 - Request for 28 feet of shoreline relief 6. Building #7 - Request for 49 feet of shoreline relief 7. Building #10 - Request for 28 feet of shoreline relief 8. Pump Station - Request for 67 feet of shoreline relief (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) Note: All variances listed above are for shoreline relief from the 75 foot requirement as per §179-3-040. Please see page 2 of 6 submitted by Jarrett Engineering for additional information. Criteria for considering an Area Variance according to Chapter 267 of Town Law: 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 to the neighborhood may be anticipated. 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. Feasible alternatives would be to site structures 75 feet from the wetland shoreline in order to avoid area variances. Note: This would most likely require a reduction in dwelling units. 3. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for 8 shoreline setback requests between 67 feet and 28 feet as noted above from the 75 foot shoreline setback requirement as per§179-3-040 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 to moderate impacts on the environmental conditions in the neighborhood may be anticipated as residential development of this magnitude adjacent to wetlands should be closely monitored. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. Parcel History (construction/site plan/variance, SP 59-2012 29 multi-family apartments Pending FW 4-2012 Disturbance within 100 feet of a ACOE wetland Pending Staff comments: Clarification on the front setback with regards to the pump house should be forth-coming. The setback should be extended 75 feet into the property adjacent to the end of Gentry Lane; if pump house is within then setback relief is required. SEAR Status: Type II" MRS. HUNT-Mr. Chairman, I'd like to make a statement. MR. JACKOSKI-If you could, but speak loudly into your microphone. MRS. HUNT-In the interest of full disclosure, I'd like to state for the record that I reside in Baybridge. After listening to the information presented, I will make an informed decision. Thank you. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay, Joyce, and I guess I also should make a notation here for full interest. I did not realize that the applicant's attorney, this evening, was married to my wife's cousin. So I don't believe I'm going to be biased in any way, but certainly if the audience suggests that I not continue, I'll recuse myself, but, welcome, Mr. Borgos. MR. BORGOS-Thank you. It's a small town, isn't it? For the record, my name is Michael Borgos. I am the attorney for the applicant, Legacy Land Holdings. With me here tonight are the project engineer, Bob Holmes, from Jarrett Engineers, Dan Valente, from Legacy Land Holdings, and Deb Roberts who is our consultant PhD in biology who did our wetlands delineation. Since we're not here for site plan tonight, I'm not going to guide the Board through the entire project. I'm not going to take your time with that. We'll be happy to address any specific questions you have about the site and project, but we're here for really one variance with eight different locations. It's the same concept. So I think that'll help speed the review. So we're just going to focus on the variance that we're seeking, which is a dimensional area (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) variance from the 75 foot setback from a wetland and the shoreline. In this case, the summary is that we believe these wetlands that are in proximity to the buildings and to the pump station are what we would refer to in a scientific sense as a low quality wetland. Certainly still needing protection, but I need to emphasize that these wetlands are not going to be disturbed. We're going to be back from them. No buildings are going to be constructed on any wetlands. These are not DEC wetlands. They're Army Corps of Engineer wetlands, and these are, it's also important to understand that the total disturbance of wetlands is going to be limited to 500 square feet for the road crossing, and that's a permit that's required from the Army Corps. We'll get into that in a little bit more discussion later on, but it's important to understand what 500 square feet is. It's not a very large area, but when I go through the review that this Board is charged with making, as Mr. Urrico just read through the criteria, the fifth one's always the interesting one, was the alleged difficulty self-created. We're not going to contest that it was self-created in this regard. It's self-created from the diligent planning that's been done, and the diligent planning that was undertaken by the engineers has a little bit of history to it, and I want to share that with you because I think it's significant. This project was originally before the Town Planning Board back in January for Sketch Plan, and at that time we heard from the neighborhood, Baybridge Homeowners Association. We looked at the site carefully. We did some further delineation. We met with the neighbors in June, and had a special meeting, sharing with them a new proposal and a new plan, had some more feedback, and then we were back with the Planning Board last evening for a recommendation, which you have received, which is that the Planning Board does not see any adverse impact from the granting of these variances that we're here for tonight. That's an important history to understand because we think we've been very careful about designing this project in a way that is as sensitive as possible, and still achieves the developer's goal of utilizing this land for a productive purpose. He's been carrying it for at least 10 years, and it's time that he moves forward with the project. So he's proposing this as a plan that he thinks is responsible and not going to harm the environment. The other items to be considered are whether an undesirable change will be produced in the character of the neighborhood as a result of granting of this variance. We feel strongly that there's not going to be a substantial change in the character of the neighborhood. Certainly any time you develop an area that is an open field and the history of this parcel was a farm field. It was a dairy farm historically. That's going to affect the view shed of neighbors who have built there, but by the same token there was an obvious and well known intent to develop this property. It should come as no surprise that this was being developed. Can the benefit sought by the applicant be achieved by any other method that's feasible? Well, as I had mentioned, the careful design process has taken all this into consideration and we don't believe that there's a proposal that's any different that can still achieve these purposes. Deb Roberts, as I mentioned, did our wetland delineation, and I want to give her an opportunity to speak a little bit about the wetlands that she found there. There were some photographs that were taken. We distributed those to the Planning Board last night, and I believe we still have those. I don't know how many of you had the opportunity to get out there and see the site firsthand, but certainly through this process, I've been educated as to how wetland delineation is done, and I want to give Deb a brief opportunity to explain the work that she did, and to describe this wetland area. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you, and, Deb, if you could distinguish between wetlands and wetland buffer. DEB ROBERTS MS. ROBERTS-There are two different types of wetland on this property. The wetland along the western edge of the property was delineated and confirmed by DEC to be a DEC wetland, and the remainder of the wetlands on the property were not determined to be jurisdictional by DEC. DEC came out to the parcel and confirmed the delineation that was done previously, and then when I was involved, became involved in the project, and asked to confirm if there were any other wetlands on the property, there were wetlands in the center of the parcel that's basically at the base of the hill. So, if I can make my red dot work here, these are the DEC wetlands up here, running along the stream. The GF-23 that this is part of continues down and actually drains eventually under Bay Road and out to Halfway Brook. So this is connected to a larger wetland that's south of the parcel. So this is a DEC wetland out here. That was formally delineated and confirmed by DEC. When I came out to the parcel and was asked to confirm if there are any other wetlands, this is the area of note, as well as this corner of the parcel, is wet. This area was originally part of the farm field. It is a wet meadow, and there is area of forested wetland that connects to the DEC wetland, and that's in this area of the property, and this is of note in that this area was logged and in, when was that, Dan, around 2005, maybe, yes. So although this shows within the forested canopy, most of this, the canopy is not very dense anymore and it's somewhat disturbed from a vegetation point of view because a lot of the large trees were removed at that time, and this area where the road, this is the dot here where it's shaking a little bit is where the road crossing is, and this feature that looks linear, draining from the center of the wetland to the south, appeared to me in the field to be part of a poorly drained (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) area where logging trucks had gone through and changed the hydrology such that water sits in here and now the criteria of having vegetation, wetland soils and enough water in it in the springtime create that into a wetland. That's the area which was most probably created by the logging is the area where we're crossing, and in fact the area right near where we're crossing, a lot of it didn't have a lot of wetland vegetation in it because there were logs in it that was part of the slash that was left behind during the logging activity. So the process we went through was first to confirm the DEC wetlands, have the Army Corps come back out after I flagged the additional wetlands on the property. Kevin Bruce confirmed those boundaries. We supplied the material required by the Army Corps to apply for a permit to cross the wetlands at this location and showed them the site plan and although we haven't received the final permit from the Army Corps, the application was waiting for our letter from OHPRP for the historic review, and that has been received and sent to the Army Corps. So we have a permit pending from the Army Corps under Nationwide 39 and will work with DEC for the areas that are within the DEC 100 foot buffer that would, so a permit would be required along this area for the structures that are within the 100 foot buffer. So, both of those permits are pending, and we anticipate positive outcome for both of them. So I guess in summary there are two types of wetlands out here. Both of them are regulated, one by DEC and the Army Corps. We will be obtaining permits from both of them, both agencies, for the activities out here, and the Nationwide permit for the Army Corps is intended for projects that have minor impacts on wetlands. So this is considered a very minor Army Corps permit, and the wetlands that are of concern for the variance today are all related to the Army Corps wetlands and none of them have to do with the DEC wetland. DEC did not determine that this wetland is of a quality or a location that required regulation from DEC, and my professional opinion is the location of this in the watershed, where this is at the base of a hill, it's a poorly drained wet meadow, and at the border of a forest that part of this wetland was created by logging activity is not a high quality wetland, and the impacts, from a wetlands perspective, in that there will only be a permanent loss of 500 square feet, is a very minor impact on this scale. Now, the relevance to the variance is the setback and whether there is a significant environmental impact for the wetlands by not having the structures located farther than 75 feet from the wetlands. I think that has to be discussed in terms of what are the functions and the values of these wetlands. I mean, for observations in the field, they're not a high quality habitat that probably the highest functions of the wetlands are for hydrologic purposes, that if we leave these wetlands undisturbed, if there's no grading, filling or draining of the wetlands by building completely around them and only crossing them in one place, the hydrologic function of the wetlands will also stay intact. So because there's not any really strong habitat value to them, surrounding them with buildings is probably not a significant environmental impact on this site, and I think that is pretty much what I can tell you about that without dwelling more on the distinction between the regulations between the Army Corps and the DEC. MR. KUHL-Deb, I have one question. What do you expect from the Army Corps of Engineers? MS. ROBERTS-We expect that they will issue a permit under Nationwide 39, probably within 45 days because our application is complete with them. MR. KUHL-Which will say what, that you can build within a distance? MS. ROBERTS-They don't have a setback requirement for wetlands from the Army Corps. Their only regulation is for dredging or filling, direct disturbance of the wetland. MR. OBORNE-To clarify, that is a Town setback. MS. ROBERTS-Right. MR. OBORNE-For the Army Corps wetlands. DEC has a setback, but. MR. KUHL-Well, we use the DEC as a subject matter expert on water issues on wetlands. So do we not use the Army Corps of Engineers for the same thing? MR. OBORNE-No, not typically. MR. UNDERWOOD-We treat all wetlands equally. MR. OBORNE-We do as a Town, yes. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. MR. KUHL-Okay. (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. OBORNE-All right. We have an adjacent area. DEC has an adjacent area. The Army Corps does not have an adjacent area. MR. KU H L-Okay. MR. OBORN E-Quantified. MR. UNDERWOOD-The Chairman asked you to comment on the buffers around wetlands and the importance of those, and one of the questions I would raise would be, you know, you're going from basically a field situation to what I would consider to be kind of urban density here, in the way that the units are laid out. They're pretty tightly packed. There's a lot of them there. It's a pretty significant change from what we currently have on site, and I think that one of the concerns we should have is that when we try to meet the setbacks there's a reason for that, and that's to allow for infiltration, things like that. I don't know what your subsurface is like on the site. I know Surrey Fields was very clay up that way and they ran into all kinds of difficulties. You guys are going to be on the sewer. Luckily you don't have to deal with that issue, but at the same time, I think when you consider the homes along Country Club Road there in the background, the density over there is nil compared to what you're proposing here, and I know that you're probably within the confines of what's allowed by what your numbers are. Nonetheless, I'm just wondering why, this seems to be pretty different from what else you've done in Baybridge, too, you know, I mean things are kind of spread out and now we're getting into this last bit here and it's really packed in like, as much as you can possibly pack in to the area, and I'm thinking that possibly, you know, with a little less intense density, that it would spread things out, it would minimize, but, you know, it's up to you. I mean, I know you're going to go for the big number. MS. ROBERTS-While we're talking about wetlands still, I just want to keep the two issues of stormwater within the project area and the stormwater treatment separate from the impact on the wetlands. Those are two different issues. The variance that we're talking about today is a variance from setback from a wetland, and although I agree that one of the functions of the wetlands is groundwater recharge/discharge, but the stormwater plan addresses capturing, treating and discharging the stormwater from the property, just like any other project does, and we aren't asking for relief from that. So the function, that function of the wetland should be protected in two ways. One way is that we're not impacting the physical area of the wetland, except for that 500 square feet, and secondly, there is a stormwater management plan that will capture like, you know, any required project, and taking into consideration the features of the project and the engineering aspect that Bob Holmes will have to discuss with you, but those are two different issues. There is a hydrology function of the wetlands, but the stormwater is a separate issue. MR. BORGOS-Just a couple of comments. A few questions brought out these issues. Mr. Underwood's question regarding the density. We are below the allowed density. We have reduced it from what it was originally proposed as, and we're cognizant of the appearance as drawn on the schematics of what this will do, compared to the open field, but when we look at the neighborhood, we see that it is developed. These are not five acre parcels, for example, by comparison. The rationale for the location of some of these buildings in proximity and the need for these specific variances really comes from a good planning process, and that is the connectivity to provide two points of access here. If you look at the current situation, you have a stub road there at the end, and by continuing all the way around provides for better emergency services and for better traffic flow. So there's very good planning reasons for having that road there, and when you build the road at $120 a foot, you have to have a return on that kind of investment. So that necessitates and helps drive the developer's decision making. MR. UNDERWOOD-Is all of Baybridge on private roads, or you're currently on Town roads within what you've done so far? DAN VALENTE MR. VALENTE-Yes. MR. UNDERWOOD-But this is not going to be on a Town road? MR. BORGOS-Correct. This road will privately maintained by the developer. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. MR. BORGOS-And I'd like to have Bob Holmes address some of the stormwater details, and specifically some of the things that they have designed to add further protection for this 75 foot (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) setback area that if these variances are granted will be diminished and what they're doing from a stormwater protection evaluation standpoint. MR. HOLMES-For the overall development, we are providing, as Deb correctly pointed out, providing stormwater controls that are running off from our impervious surfaces or the changing of characteristics, where the development does occur. We are providing impoundments, via rain gardens. Our primary objective as far as stormwater is we can infiltrate what we can. Under the more extreme storm events, there will be some overflows that will flow over the surface just the same as you will see under most current development you see around the area. With regards to the wetland buffer we've proposed, we are providing a protection that is in addition to all of our stormwater controls that are proposed for the project. We are, instead of there being a direct discharge or a runoff across the surface of a lawn area adjacent to one of these buildings that falls within the 75 foot buffer, we do have a small berm that will capture and retain water there and would slowly release at that point, keeping our hydrologic characteristics predominantly the same, with no significant change. Would you agree with that, Deb? Yes, okay. Real quickly, as far as the wetland crossing, we do, as far as, that is a small area. We've concentrated that, specifically in that area because there has been some prior disturbance there, and we can keep that small and compact without creating any adverse effects going beyond what is currently proposed, and I fully agree with Mr. Borgos that routing and location of the proposed access roads here is an element of sound planning that we can provide secondary access, and ease of flow of traffic and things of that nature. Additionally, as Mr. Valente points out, it also allows us to loop other utilities such as the water as well, that if there ever was a point of a breakage or something of that nature, that there would not be a large prolonged outage, that one fix couldn't repair, that you have access to back feed and provide water service. Again, it's an element of sound planning. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Thank you. Are there any other questions from Board members at this time? There is a public hearing scheduled this evening. I suspect there are some in the audience who'd like to address this Board concerning this particular application, and in order to try to keep as much public comment available as possible, I would request that you, as you listen to public comment, if you could avoid repeating repetitive comments. Certainly we want to hear your comments, but in the interest of time for everyone to speak, we'd like to just try to avoid duplication if possible. So, I think what I'll do is I'm going to try to start from the left, my left, to the right. So, for those of you who'd like to address the Board, if you could raise your hand and I'll try to call on you as we go, and, again, I'll work from my left to the right. So, sir, in the front row, if you could address the Board. PUBLIC HEARING OPENED KARLA BITNER MS. BITNER-Mr. Chairman, I actually I represent quite a few of them that are here. So I think it might be better for the Board if I go speak for these people. It's the Board's discretion. MR. JACKOSKI-He's yielding his time to you at the moment, so feel free to address the Board. MS. BITNER-I just think it might be easier, more flow for you. MR. JACKOSKI-No problem. Welcome. MS. BITNER-Thank you. Good evening. I'm Karla Bitner. I'm an attorney at Bartlett Pontiff Stewart and Rhodes. I'm here and I representing the Queensbury Baybridge Homeowners Association, most of whom are behind me here, literally, figuratively, however the Board would like it. I sent over to planning today a packet which contains letters and a petition and an engineering report, some other things. I believe, Mr. Urrico, you have them. I do have hard copies for all the Board members if you want it. I'm not going to inundate you with paper if you don't want it. It's your call. So, I can give them at the end. MR. JACKOSKI-I think if you give them to us at the end, that would be fine. MS. BITNER-Sure. I would like to make it clear to the Board that notwithstanding the number of people here today, the Queensbury Baybridge HOA is not against developing this property. As the applicant's counsel did say, this was a property that was going to be developed, and I think you'll hear every homeowner here say they knew it was to be developed. So, first and foremost, they're not against the developing of this property. In fact they believe Mr. Valente to be an excellent builder, and in fact his family built their homes and had their land first. So I wanted that out in the open. My job basically is to do all the lawyerly stuff tonight and leave the emotion to everybody else. So I just want to go through what you have to do as a Board and address a little bit of the Staff comments that we did say. The five areas that you have to look at obviously (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) you're well versed in, and mainly we would take exception with basically all of them. We agree that it's self-created, and I'm glad to hear that that was agreed to by the applicant. This is a meadow. This is 29 acres. There are a variety of feasible alternatives for him to take, including reduction of the dwellings, single family, smaller multi-family. There are a variety of things that he could look at that wouldn't involve shoreline variances. Will this have an undesirable change in the neighborhood? I think it's not disingenuous, but I think it's a little obscure to think that this is not going to be an undesirable change in the neighborhood. As was pointed out, this is a meadow, and while good planning is good planning, it needs to take into effect the entire area around it, Country Club Road, Brown's Path and Queensbury Baybridge, not an urban development right there. So I am, having the variance, it does go into a lot of other issues, and I know that the applicant didn't present to you the entire project tonight, but without this variance, the project doesn't happen, at least not in the example that it's in now. At least seven of the buildings would not be there, or at least would be moved someplace else on the property. So there is an undesirable change in the neighborhood. One of the things that we have included in our submission to the Board tonight is an engineering report from Curby VanVleet from Hansen and VanVleet. He couldn't be here tonight. He had a death in the family, but his report is there, and I would encourage the Board to look at the report. One of the things he is very concerned about, he's a hydrogeologist, is that there was no groundwater mounding analysis performed here. Given the fact that it is very clay surface, and you'll have to excuse my complete ignorance in engineering and rely more on his report, there was no analysis done to see what happens to the groundwater if it mounds, if it hits the high water table that's there, and we would encourage the Board to at least explore with the applicant to perform such an analysis to see what happens with that groundwater. It just wasn't done here, and so we don't know what the detriment will be to the condominiums, to the HOA. The variance is substantial, and I would respectfully take issue with the Staff comments that say it's minor. It is a substantial variance. They're asking for eight variances, seven buildings plus a pump house. Yes, it's the same variance, but it's on eight different areas of the property. You're looking at anywhere from a 17 foot setback to an 8 foot setback when it's supposed to be 75 feet. That is a substantial variance. MR. OBORNE-Karla, not to cut you off, but I said moderate. MS. BITNER-I stand corrected. I still take issue with moderate. MR. OBORNE-1 take it you would. MS. BITNER-Because we do believe it is a substantial variance here. One of the things that is not discussed is that, let me back up. There's two access points here, and Mr. Valente and his attorney and his engineer said that's very important for us to have two access points and we need to get this Army Corps permit because we have an access point going to Gentry Lane on the left side of the screen there. Well, and I'm sure it was a mistake, but in the packet before the Board submitted by the applicant, he doesn't designate that he, Legacy actually owns property beyond, which, adjacent to it and connects to Country Club Road, and I would ask the Board to discuss that with the applicant perhaps to see if that's a feasible alternative to dual access, to go out onto Country Club Road through property already owned, at least to have them look at that as an alternative, which may obviate the need for the shoreline variances, because it would obviate the need for that road over there, and it would obviate the need for the Army Corps permit. I would just ask that the Board discuss that with the applicant. There are quite a few people that want to speak behind me, and I'm going to let them, and I just wanted to advise the Board that we do think that this variance, while they tried to say it's not substantial, that this really isn't the big part of the project, will still have a site plan review, without this variance, their project as it exists now with 177 units, doesn't go forward. So this really is a very important variance to them, and I would like the Board to listen to the comments of everyone here and just take it into consideration and hopefully it'll raise some questions in your mind. Thank you. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you, Ms. Bitner. Sir? ERIC MULLER MR. MULLER-My name is Eric Moeller. I'm from Annapolis, Maryland. I'm here representing my mom, Virginia Moeller, who owns this parcel right here. This is where my folks have lived for years, and there's a renter in there now. So it's this chunk right there. It used to be 30 acres. Now it's 25, and as far as we're concerned, this is not a low quality wetlands. This is our property. My name is Eric Moeller. I live in Annapolis, Maryland. I will try to calm down. I am representing Virginia Moeller's interest in the 445 Bay Road property. As you know, this property is a 25 acre parcel immediately to the south, if the orientation is correct there, of the property being discussed here tonight. Virginia Moeller is my mom. My mom is the owner of the property. Virginia is 88 years old and can no longer travel but has a very real interest in the outcome of this matter. I am her son. I have power of attorney, I can speak on her behalf. In 18 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) my statement tonight, I shall attempt to develop a brief and relevant chronology of my mom's land, and I shall attempt to persuade the Board to uphold the minimum shoreline setback in its entirety without compromise. Please bear with me as I've had a scant four days to arrange travel and for my employer to do some research and prepare this statement. I learned about this hearing on Friday about four o'clock. It is my understanding that Mr. Valente is seeking relief from a clearly stated regulation in his effort to proceed with construction. We, the Moellers, cannot oppose the construction of the 176 apartment units and 29 additional buildings, but we absolutely do oppose his request to build outside the bounds of existing rules and regulations. Mr. Valente, a land developer, must be held accountable to the same rules and regulations as are stipulated for individual landowners. So I'm going to go through a brief history of this property. The 445 Bay Road property exists now as a two story farmhouse and a garage/workshop in the back. The house was originally built on 30 acres in about the late 1800's. In 1937, the house, garage, workshop and several barns were transferred through the Harris family to William Harris. This property served as a working farm for years. In July of 1965, the property came into the possession of my grandfather's second wife Florence. Florence was William Harris' sister. During the summer of 1975, Warren County successfully approached Florence with a proposal to improve Bay Road. Money changed hands and two deeds resulted as indicated in public records. Of direct significance to Florence and Hiram was the fact that fresh water could no longer flow along the natural grade of the terrain. In addition, the property contains a natural spring that sources water, regardless of storm drainage. Consequently, as the years have passed, Florence and Hiram have watched their property slowly but surely turn into a swamp, which we now call wetlands. To add insult to injury, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation notified Hiram and Florence of a public hearing to be held in June of 1984. What resulted was the GF-23 wetlands designation covering well over two thirds of that property. The consequence of the Bay Road improvement has rendered my grandparent's, and now my mom's property, legally unusable, and vastly undervalued. Multiple attempts on the part of my grandparents and my parents resulted in frustration. Ultimately our family had to quietly resign ourselves to the fact that this land is now a truly, it is truly a wetlands. That does not mean that this is land to be taken advantage of by adjacent developers seeking to maximize development. The land is now undevelopable and henceforth must remain pristine and unencroached upon. That is, after all, the point of a wetlands. Now Mr. Valente is proposing to do just that. He's proposing to encroach deeper into a property that should now remain untouched. Water flow has been blocked on the east by Bay Road for 37 years now. Mr. Valente's development continues to encroach on the property from the north, and now he wants relief so he can further encroach on the north, effectively boxing the property in on two sides. Fast forward to November 2002. Florence and Hiram are now both deceased. My mom and dad sold their home in Saratoga and took up residence at this property on Bay Road. My dad's health was deteriorating. I came to visit from Maryland for a few days, partly to help my mom cope with the inevitable. I had come to take, I talked to my mom about someday approaching Mr. Valente about possibly making a deal. On a whim, on Sunday I called and spoke to Mr. Valente on the phone, just before I had to head back home. He did not seem optimistic, but indicated that they might consider something in the future. Two days later, Mr. Valente approached my mom's back porch and presented her with a very loosely written contract at her kitchen table. He seemed like a nice man. He even presented her with a pre- printed $2000 check as down payment on a total purchase of 15 acres for $10,000. Had I not been paying attention, my mom would have unwittingly effectively given Mr. Valente fully one half of her land holdings. I believe Mr. Valente knew exactly what he was doing. Upon inquiry, my mom told me that she had already cashed the check, so the deal was sealed. Friends helped to identify Jon Lapper as a possible ally. Mr. Lapper generously agreed to take on our case, which lasted well over two years. To my great chagrin, we agreed to sell five acres, which is that nip out of the land there, for $24,000, simply to close the matter. This land aided Mr. Valente greatly in his present design under discussion today. This is how the 30 acre Moeller lot came to be a 25 acre Moeller lot. I believe, in December 2002, Mr. Valente knew what he was after. He wanted and got shoreline relief through the purchase of my mom's five acres. Now he's looking for the Board to look the other way as he seeks additional relief to build on the south side of this development, i.e. the Gentry Lane Extension. I ask the members of the Board to inject appropriate moderating judgment into Mr. Valente's plan, tell Mr. Valente, no, he cannot have his 58 feet of shoreline relief from Building Number One, 48 feet of shoreline relief from Building Number Two, 48 on Three, 51 on Four, 28 on Five, 29 on Seven, 28 on Ten, and 67 feet of shoreline relief on the pump station. Tell him he has to play by the same rules as two generations of my family have had to play since 1975. Tell him to go back to the drawing board and execute a re-design and sincere consideration of the environment he has chosen to develop. One more thing. The Jarrett developer's drawing indicates a six inch berm, berm of excavated soil at the boundary of everyone's backyards. That's less than that height right there. Per the Army Corps of Engineers standard, there's supposed to be a 10 foot natural buffer between these backyards and the actual wetland zone. So that's less than the distance between these tables, and there's supposed to be a sign put up to keep people from cutting down that 10 foot buffer. In Glens Falls where snow comes in feet and remains for four to five months, are you kidding me? Is this seriously supposed to isolate the effect of developed land (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) runoff and protect the balance of the natural land? Bottom line, we, the Moellers, absolutely oppose the high probability that Mr. Valente's development drain off will run into the 445 Bay Road property, thus further exacerbating the wetlands issue we have already had to deal with. We further oppose this request for relief to existing rules and regulations. If he can't fit his development into his clearly designated property, then he can darn well modify his design. Finally, we believe it is the responsibility, and indeed the purpose of the Board, to uphold these principles as a precedent to future activities. Our property has been encroached upon enough already. Enough is enough. Thanks for your thoughtful consideration in this matter. MR. JACKOSKI-Is there anyone else who'd like to address this Board on this particular matter? Sir in the front row. BURR LECHEVET MR. LECHEVET-My name is Burr Lechevet, and I'm a resident of Dorlon Drive. First of all I'd like to say that heartbreaking story, it causes me to lose my train of thought, and I just can't believe that that occurred, and if that did occur, I don't even think we should be here. I have three questions. One addresses the wetlands. The other addresses the traffic, and the other addresses the character of the area. If we're going to build this density and going to have that amount of runoff coming off of all these impermeable surfaces, going indirectly into the wetlands, losing all of that, I just was amazed at Lake George looking at putting in a permeable solution when they had a storm runoff and you denying that access by just installing permeable blocks. Permeability doesn't mean that the water doesn't runoff. If you put a hard surface or a soft surface, when you have runoff, it runs off, but each of you looked at that statement and said, look, we're concerned. This makes Lake George look like a flea on a dog. When this is built, you're going to have a lot of that runoff go off into this wetlands. No berm of six inches is going to do anything to effect that. The plot of land that we're dealing with is not going to be a wetland anymore. It's going to be a swamp. Now, when I was an engineer, we used to do environmental reviews. I don't know what it is that you do here, but if an environmental review is done in this area, in my job, this would be denied immediately because of the impact. The second question I have, or the second statement I have, and I don't know if I can question the Staff on that, so I'll just make a statement. When I take a look at this area, and I'm new to it. I'm a Saratoga resident. I'm coming up for the quality of life up here. I wouldn't have purchased the home if I had any idea that this was going to happen, that this kind of density was going to happen. The traffic in this area on Bay Road is horrendous. Nothing in Saratoga equals what Bay Road is at some times. It's unbelievable. So what we're proposing is taking about 600 cars, having them all go out onto Bay Road. That doesn't make sense to me. Exacerbating the problem you already have. I'd like to know what the traffic study is. Now when I was in the Town of Wilton, when somebody built something like this, there'd be another lane built on Bay Road to handle the flow. Six hundred cars is a lot of cars. Why wouldn't this be diverted to Country Club Road, especially if some of the land is owned by the builder? Last concern that I have is the character. Coming from Wilton and Saratoga, we respect what has happened in the past, our past history, and we deny this type of construction in high densities like this. An example of this was off of Jones Road. When a developer said I'd like to build this exact same kind of property, put the density in with the rentals or units, and it was a farmland and then there was a community involved close by, the MacGregor golf links, all of the other ones, we had a two acre minimum and half acre. It went from a half acre to the two acre because the density became so great. Now I understand the Bay Road density because it's professional buildings, but there's a buffer. This is all on the other side. So this character is going to change the character of the entire community. So you've got three things, runoff, and I don't believe all of the reviews have been done. Secondly traffic, and I don't believe all of the reviews have been done, and third, I can only talk about what the history of other towns are and how they react to this type of a change in the community. Thank you very much. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you, sir. Working left to right, is there anyone else, center, in purple, if you could. Again, just to remind everyone. We are here this evening for the wetlands shoreline setback, and of course this project will go in front of the Planning Board again for more details regarding traffic, etc. Welcome. SHARON HENDRICKS MS. HENDRICKS-Good evening. I'm Sharon Hendricks, and I live at 46 Dorlon Drive. I'm sorry I'm emotional because of what I just heard as well. Excuse me. I represent the Queensbury Baybridge Homeowners Association. Residents purchased homes at Baybridge with the understanding that the adjoining property would be developed with a quality, privately owned townhomes or individual homes. In 2002 the Association turned over to Valente Builders a connecting 300 foot parcel of land at the end of Gentry Lane, with the understanding that the property would be developed with single family homes. I believe in your packet you have a letter that states that. The adjacent property is now owned by Daniel Valente and the company 20 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) renamed Legacy Land Holdings LLC. We consider Dan Valente to be a quality builder. We accept that the zoning laws were changed in 2005 to include rentals. There is, however, a moral obligation to the residents of 86 units who bought from Valente in good faith that their investment would be honored. In addition, we believe there should be a moral obligation by the Zoning and Planning Board to consider the losses of Baybridge community and what they would suffer due to the proximity of additional rental units, regardless of who the developer is. We have a PowerPoint with slides. It's a disk with eight pictures on it, a CD. You don't have it there? I have one with me if you want me to give it to you. MR. OBORNE-That may be a good idea. MS. HENDRICK-Okay. Number One slide, traffic safety is a main concern. The streets are narrow, with no sidewalks. Pedestrians walk on the road when traveling to and from mailboxes on Baybridge Drive, or walking for pleasure with dogs during day or evening. Number Two, people visiting park with two wheels on the road and two on the grass. Driveways hold two to three vehicles. This causes narrowing of the road for vehicles and pedestrians when traveling. Has the Board considered the Code of 24 feet required for a Town road because of safety issues such as fire trucks? Baybridge Drive is 21 feet wide when entering Baybridge community. With the proposal and density Baybridge Drive being the main ingress to access the site plan, it could cause a traffic problem and hamper safety. Number Three, lawn care and garbage pickup is once a week each. Lawn care vehicles and mowing equipment dominate the roads, as do disposal and recycling trucks. You pass with caution and at a low speed. Number Four, rentals with the existing plan will likely bring children. The present school bus pickup is at the end of Walker Lane for Baybrook Apartments. Parents park on both sides of the road waiting for school bus. While waiting it can cause a problem for cars entering Walker Lane from Baybridge, and limit the flow of traffic. There are three pickup times for the bus, in the morning and in late afternoon. A designated point for school bus pickup will have to be established for Cottage Hill. This could create a traffic problem, especially at peak times of day. Number Five, at present there are two dental practices in Fairfield Professional Park. At least six cars are parked in each lot, coming at peak times of the day. The potential is for 14 more offices, which could easily bring 96 cars, as this development progresses. Number Six, the entry road at Baybridge is winding. Number Seven, the turn onto Gentry Lane is narrow, particularly if cars are parked in front of residences. The road is in need of repair. This will continue to deteriorate with winter plowing and large equipment used by developer. Number Eight, the buffer between Baybridge Development and Cottage Hill Development should be the responsibility of the builder. At present a field of goldenrod, ragweed, etc. exists. In the Fall all vegetation will die off and the field will be barren. A berm should exist between property lines and tree plantings, more than six inches, to give privacy and distinction of property lines. Residents of Baybridge are not against development, provided it is compatible with the existing Baybridge community. We know of no other apartment rentals that do not have their own ingress and egress. Instead of driving through an existing established residential community of 25 plus years. If Cottage Hill would create their own ingress and egress, this would eliminate traffic issues. The Valente family builds a beautiful residential community at Baybridge with townhomes and private residences offering complimentary green areas. Queensbury Baybridge Homeowners Association has endeavored to maintain its beauty through proper maintenance of buildings, driveways and landscaping. We are an asset to any development. We thank the Zoning Board for their time and interest in addressing our concerns. Thank you for bearing with me. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you. TERRY DE ANGELO MRS. DE ANGELO-Hi. My name's Terry DeAngelo. I live at 32 Gentry Lane in Baybridge. In my letter to the Board, which should be in the package that you all received tonight, I included some concerns about the project, and I offer my views on it based on being a realtor of 21 years and being a homeowner in Baybridge as well, and again, I want to make the same point, that Mr. Valente is a quality builder, and I'm really pleased that he'll be the one to develop it. That being said, I do have concerns with the fact that the project is apartments. Not the family homes, single family homes, townhomes, as was the original Valente Builders plan. Mr. Valente indicated that he was building the complex with the idea of possibly townhome sales in the future, and I can tell you that typically two story townhomes with no garages are probably the most undesirable style for the townhome purchaser. More than 90% are empty nesters, seniors, and they all prefer, most, I should say, prefer single level homes and having a garage is an absolute necessity. I have documents in my package as well that kind of gives a background from, you know, the realtor side brought up from the MLS to support that. By design alone, this leads me to believe that this complex is going to remain apartments indefinitely. We've already experienced lower values due to the Schermerhorn apartments on Walker. They sell the slowest, and the values, when sale prices do happen, tend to be a little bit lower. Cottage Hill being there is just definitely going to have a direct detrimental impact on the value of Baybridge (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) homes overall. You'll find supporting documentation in my package as well for that. With the Schermerhorn apartments on Walker, the addition of Cottage Hill in the back, I mean, our Baybridge community is going to be entirely encompassed by apartments. I don't know what possible positive result there can be by sacrificing our neighborhood for the sake of an apartment complex, and I don't know about tax consequences, but I know that if our values go down, I would assume that our taxes would go down as well. I just would think that building apartments rather than a volume of single family homes would bring about maybe a lesser potential revenue for property taxes. I don't know those things personally, but my guess would be as such. I've researched and I have yet to find any example, anywhere, whereby an access to an apartment complex is directly existing through a residential neighborhood. I can't imagine their being one. Especially when the apartment complex is of such density, and with the majority of our neighborhood residents being in their senior years. Since the residents of Cottage Hill apartments are young, more than likely we'll draw young. Speed is going to be a problem in our interior streets. Baybridge Drive, where we get our mail, where all of us step out of our cars to get our mail, is a straightaway, and there's going to be some that are going to want to put the pedal to the metal, so to speak. So it's going to be an issue for people getting out of their cars, and Mr. Valente, if he goes forward with this project as apartments, I want to point out that he mentioned that a price range for rentals were going to be about $800 to $1200 a month, and my experience shows that an $800 rental will likely draw a younger tenant, maybe the college students, definitely more transient type of tenant, and I have seen very few quality rentals out there for less than $1,000 per month. He's a builder of reputation, and I'd ask if he was going to implement rules and regulations for his tenants, as far as maintenance and use of his property along with our community as well, because there will be, you know, a crossing over, you know, and lastly I want to mention most, if not all, and it's already been mentioned, I'm sorry, that the homeowners in there never would have purchased in there if not for the reassurance that the plan was to continue townhomes or cottage style homes. I know my husband and I absolutely would not have. It's our nest eggs. It's our security. Having the Cottage Hill there is going to rob us of that. It's going to rob us of our home values. It's going to rob us of our peace of mind and the safety and comfort that we have in our community and we have taken such great pride in maintaining. Thanks so much for listening to me. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you, Terry, and working left to right, if you could, please. Again, folks, again, we are here this evening for the wetlands variance. We understand the Planning Board aspects. We understand, you know, the concerns of the entire communities and neighborhoods, but this Board is here tonight just concerning the wetlands matter. AUDIENCE MEMBER-Can I ask a question? The other matters, have they been covered and blessed, or are they going to be covered in the future? MR. JACKOSKI-From what I understand, this project will be going in front of the Planning Board of the Town of Queensbury and they will address many of the issues, I believe they will address, many of the issues that are being raised here tonight concerning the development. We here this evening are here because they're asking us to grant relief as it relates to the closeness to the wetlands. Welcome. PATRICIA DECKER MS. DECKER-Hello. My name is Patricia Decker. I have been at Baybridge townhouses since 1991. It is my opinion that you, the Zoning Board of Appeals, should abide by this 75 foot setback requirement for buildings. I know how important wetlands are, and I'm sure many of you do, too. There's a specific flora and fauna, and New York is one of the States that is, as I read today on line, one of the States that is one of the faster eliminators of wetlands. We're just paving over them. They are vastly important. There's a flora and fauna, and I see this every day because it's in back of my house. The frogs and the turtles and the deer and the fox, and they are important to us. Wetlands are like sponges. They clean the water and they hold the water, and they hold the water, and we do have a very, very, many of us, problems with the low water level. 1, for instance, have not a total cellar, and if those wetlands are built on, I see problems with more water in my cellar, and the people on Dorlon Drive, you know, in the six-plex that I live in. So I would ask you, please, in Queensbury is seems that development always trumps the environment, and you have the power to stop that in this one small area, and I hope you'll consider doing that. Don't allow this. Build, fine, but let's keep the 75 feet. Thank you very much. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you. WAYNE WOODCOCK MR. WOODCOCK-Mr. Chairman, Board members. I have good news. I want to talk about wetlands. (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. JACKOSKI-If you could identify yourself for the record. MR. WOODCOCK-My name is Wayne Woodcock. I live at 40 Dorlon Drive in the Baybridge community. There's no need for me to re-visit all the reasons why the Cottage Hill proposal is such a misfit. Not only for our neighborhood, but for Queensbury as a whole. They've all been pretty well covered tonight. In reviewing the Town's Comprehensive Land Use Plan, adopted in 2007, which addresses shaping success for and a vision for Queensbury, it's clear that the Cottage Hill project flies in the face of progressive development. I wish to address specifically the applicant's request for eight variances due to the presence of Army Corps of Engineer wetlands on this property. I'd like to read to you from Page 23 of Queensbury's Comprehensive Plan, and I quote, the Town of Queensbury hosts an extensive water and wetland network. These play important environmental roles (e.g. drinking water, flood control or wildlife habitat) as well as important economic and social roles (e.g. tourism or recreation). Some areas, such as wetlands and stream corridors, may be protected by building restrictions. While seeming like a limiting factor, such rules force a community to think about economic, environmental and social values over the long term." This is from our own Comprehensive Plan. This paragraph from our own Comprehensive Plan pretty much describes why we're here tonight and what we're facing with the Legacy Land's request to deface long established wetlands, and for this very important reason, I plead with you not to grant the requested variances. Thank you for your time and consideration. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you. Is there anyone else? Ma'am, please. JOYCE SMITH MRS. SMITH-My name is Joyce Smith, and my husband and I have lived at 30 Gentry Lane in a single family house there for 11 years, which was built by Dan Valente. We're very pleased with the house, and we've been very happy to live in the Baybridge development, but I know that one of the things you're considering is undesirable changes which might be produced or be a detriment to nearby properties, and I'd like to say a few things about that. While getting to know Dan, while our house was under construction, he indicated to us that someday his plans were for our street to be extended so that he could build additional single family homes that would be more spacious than ours. We naturally pictured privately owned single family homes with garages and a nice amount of green space around each. Had the current plans for the Cottage Hill development been made known to us at that time, we would not have purchased a house where we did, and I would like to call to your attention that the SEAR form for the proposed Cottage Hill development does not mention, in Item Seven on Page 21, the 22 single family homes on Gentry Lane which are a part of that community, and when you look at the diagram there, almost all of Gentry Lane is single family homes and those are not mentioned in that SEAR form. Now the thought of squeezing in all of those buildings and parking spaces is distressing to us because of many reasons, but the one I really want to focus on most of all is traffic and safety. I'm one of the persons, among a number, who live in Baybridge who go for a lengthy walk every day. Many others walk to get their mail at our gazebo on Baybridge Drive and walk their dogs, some with physical disabilities ride an adult tricycle or walk with four wheeled walkers to get their exercise. We have a home in Baybridge owned by Warren/Washington ARC where four developmentally disabled women live. Several of them at a time go for a walk with a caregiver on our already fairly narrow roads. We know the amount of vehicle traffic of all sorts would increase dramatically on Gentry Lane and Baybridge Drive, and it had already been mentioned that getting on and off of Bay Road would be even more difficult than it is now at times with the Cottage Hill development as now proposed, and the traffic for 14 potential additional business related buildings in the Fairfield Professional Park. My husband and I and many others are not against all development in the area under discussion, but we would like to see nicely spaced, privately own residences rather than impose this huge project of crowded rental residences. Thank you. MR. JACKOSKI-Seeing no other hands in the audience, I will call the applicant back to the table. ROBERT WILLIAMS MR. WILLIAMS-I'd like to speak. MR. JACKOSKI-Sure. Go ahead. Welcome. MR. WILLIAMS-My name's Robert Williams. I reside on Country Club Road. I bought an older home. It's probably 50 years old, and I have two neighbors with houses as old, and this was before Queensbury did all the building. So I just wanted to say they put three new houses next to me and nobody puts their basements in the ground anymore, but mine's in the ground. Every spring the sump pump runs constantly, not only in my house, but both my neighbor's. We all 23 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) have water problems already, and we're just as high as that ridge out there. I'm a little nervous. During that hurricane when we had all that rain, what was it, last year I believe. The water was just, I have gardens out there, in my backyard, and the water wasn't going anywhere. It just sat there and holes in the ground. It practically perked. It was just a lot of water, and I don't think the drainage is as great as everybody claims it to be. I mean, we've been really dry. We had a real mild winter. I've lived there for 15 years. So I've seen a lot of water in my basement. I just wanted to add that. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Thank you, sir. One more. JOHN DAVIS MR. DAVIS-Good evening. My name's John Davis. I'm a former member of the Queensbury Environmental Committee back when the Town of Queensbury felt that an Environmental Committee was necessary. I was on the Committee with Deb Roberts and with Tom Jarrett and a few other people that I highly respect. I spent probably about 35 minutes researching this project this afternoon. That's all the time I've had, but I'd like to just emphasize a couple of quotes that I found. This is in the impact statement. Several buildings are proposed within 75 feet of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers jurisdictional wetlands. In as much as the shape of the wetland boundaries makes a 75 foot setback impractical in those areas, and I'd like to emphasize the word impractical, compliance would dictate the loss of a number of residential units in the project. Well, maybe from what has been said here tonight, that wouldn't be such a bad idea. I know Jim Underwood was alluding to that, and I think that the density certainly could be decreased. Just as an overall statement relative to wetlands, you know, developmental pressure has emerged as the largest cause of wetland loss in the United States. As Ms. Decker said earlier, we've lost a tremendous number of acres of wetland in New York State. EPA estimates that between 17, 1 think it was 1780 and 1980, 60% of the wetland in New York State disappeared, and they're continuing to disappear maybe on not quite such a great rate because regulations have been put in place to try to prevent that, but nevertheless, it's still a tremendous loss that we can't ever regain. I'd also like to note that in this proposal roads and buildings and other paved surfaces will increase from 0.4 acres to six and a half acres. That's 15 times as large an area, and I realize that the surface water runoff plan and the groundwater considerations don't take into consideration this fact, and hopefully won't result in exacerbation of the problem, but I think it's just we're gradually paving over the Town of Queensbury with impermeable surfaces, whether they be roads, roofs or whatever, and I think that the, with this in mind, I'd like to compliment Ms. Bitner, the attorney for the HOA, who spoke to groundwater mounding. I think that that's a very important consideration that the applicant should pursue further because this area is relatively low. The groundwater is about anywhere from 12 inches, I think the report says 12 inches to six feet below the surface, but I think in this particular area it's pretty shallow groundwater level, and this groundwater mounding could result in exacerbating the problem and creating additional flooding. So thank you very much. MR. JACKOSKI-Thank you. Now the applicant can re-join the table. Would you like to address any of the comments made by the public during the public comment period? MR. BORGOS-Yes, I would. Thank you. I'm not going to belabor the point. We heard from a lot of very passionate, emotional people who are very concerned about their neighborhood and their community, and I respect that and I like that we have that process available to us, but I do want to correct some of the things that I think really come from maybe a base misunderstanding. Going back and looking at this, it would have been wonderful to do single family residential. However, the zoning changed, and zoning changes result of this Comprehensive Land Use Plan. These are things that have happened. The developer has had to respond to the changed Zoning Ordinance. So he can't go building single family residential there. It's not allowed. So it's got to be multi-family or office, and if it was office, those traffic concerns would be exacerbated. You'd have higher traffic counts. I heard complaints about traffic. I heard issues with stormwater. I heard issues that relate to the site plan review, and as Mr. Chairman was mentioning between comments, those are things that'll be addressed by the Planning Board during site plan review, and I do think that this issue here tonight in front of the Zoning Board is simple. It's a setback from a wetland that DEC doesn't think is a wetland, and that's why we called it a low quality wetland. We're not diminishing the importance of it. We're just saying it's not a bog or a marsh or a classic wetland where you have standing water, and that's an important determination. Mr. Moeller's comments were that these were important wetlands to him, and we appreciate that. However, this is a wet field during certain times of the year where groundwater might be within an inch of the surface during certain times of the year. Other times of the years you could walk across it and not know the difference. We're not going into those, other than those 500 square feet for the road crossing for which a permit from the Army Corps must be obtained. These are significant differences from paving over paradise and those other passionate comments about diminishing the quality of life here in Queensbury. We do have 75% of this parcel green space under the plan, 75%. That's a significant amount. The density is 24 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) less than what is allowed under the Zoning Ordinance. So this Comprehensive Land Use Plan that resulted in the Zoning Ordinance allows greater density than what's being proposed here. We're not asking for a variance on density. We're asking for a simple variance from the dimensional setback requirement from a wetland, and I haven't heard any comments or opinions about 75 feet being a magic number to be a setback. I see the 75 foot rule as a good general requirement that's Town wide to pay attention to the setback from wetlands and where you do have a deviation from that proposed in an application, you take a hard look at it, you enlist professionals. In this case we have a professional engineering firm that is licensed by the State of New York to prepare a stormwater management plan, to prepare an opinion based upon their expertise as to what is an appropriate way to do that. They've submitted that. This is being reviewed by DEC and Army Corps. Everybody else is okay. This is the Town of Queensbury's setback rule that we're seeking a variance from. We're here emphasizing that we've done our due diligence here. This is a site that will be developed one way or the other, and all these other site plan issues need to be addressed during site plan review, but not by this Board here tonight. We want the Board here tonight to ask whatever questions relate to those particular issues with the setback of 75 feet, and I have not heard anything that says there's a problem, other than Ms. Bitner has mentioned that there was a packet that was presented. We haven't seen that. We're not aware of any of the submission, so I can't really respond to that, but I think that there were a few comments made that perhaps Mr. Holmes can respond to with regard to the groundwater issue. MR. HOLMES-Thank you, Michael. With regards to the development and the concern of runoff or adversely affecting the hydrology or changing downstream characteristics, part of the implications and requirements that we're bound to meet not only be the Town Zoning law but also by DEC standards for stormwater runoff is we are required to mimic, with development, pre- existing conditions. As this being an open meadow field with some forested area, going through and doing our calculations, that the stormwater runoff post development for what we're proposing will not be adversely effected once construction is completed. It will ultimately, it will look, how do I want to state this. The stormwater runoff will look very closely to what it is currently, post development. We aren't looking to, we aren't adversely changing downstream flow characteristics, hydrology, running off the property. We are controlling and maintaining stormwater on the property, while still maintaining separations and differentiating the difference between the hydrology of the wetlands that we are not disturbing with the exception of the one small crossing for the new proposed road. Did you want to elaborate on that, Deb? MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Are there any additional questions from Board members before I poll the Board? MR. GARRAND-I've got a question. The applicant spoke earlier about responsibility. Would the applicant be willing to accept like financial responsibility for any potential flooding that might happen on Dorlon Drive, Gentry Lane or any of the other properties within say 500 feet? MR. VALENTE-I don't know how you could even go down, that's a slippery slope. MR. BORGOS-That may be something to discuss in the future. I don't think it's a parameter that's appropriate for the review here tonight. MR. GARRAND-There are a lot of setbacks, it's directly related. One way or another it's going to affect the groundwater in the area. MR. BORGOS-No, I don't think so. I think the engineer has stated that the law requires that they control all the stormwater on site, and there's no evidence before you that says there's going to be any effect on groundwater because of a different setback from the low quality wetlands that we've identified with Army Corps. The DEC is not concerned with these wetlands. They're not classified as DEC wetlands. There's an assumption, there's a lot of non-expert belief that's been voiced here, and I respect those opinions, but I think that it needs to be backed up with some type of a showing that there's going to be a different effect than what's presented. The planning process relies on experts to prepare plans and submit them, and thus far we have received those other necessary approvals. MR. GARRAND-Yes. Part of what I'm referring to is in the application it says the current groundwater is between 12 inches and 6 feet. Groundwater moves. I know 12 inches is pretty shallow. You expect that to, where's the 12 inches going to go during any kind of storm event in the spring. I mean, it appears to me, given the topography of this property, that most of this is going to run probably to the south, southeast. MR. HOLMES-That is correct, and that's exactly the direction that most of that water runs off currently, and it is our, the effort and the design effort that we've put into this mimics existing conditions. We are not proposing to change or alter the groundwater conditions in those areas. 25 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) That's why our stormwater plans that we put together are, the areas where we have increased runoff from a building or a roof area, the stormwater basin, retention area basins that we're proposing, is to retain/detain much of that stormwater to allow it to drain over a longer period of time to mimic existing conditions on the property. So alter, significant alterations or alterations to the groundwater is not anticipated. MR. URRICO-So you're saying that the problems that occurred on Meadowbrook Road, north and south, would not occur there? Can you guarantee that? MR. BORGOS-Every site is fact specific, and that's too broadly stated a question. It's impossible to respond to that. MR. URRICO-Okay. Let me be more specific, then. Your issue seems to be with the 75 foot setback, which is what Town law is right now. MR. BORGOS-Correct. MR. URRICO-The Town law does not distinguish between what's an Army Corps of wetland or a DEC wetland. It just calls it a wetland. So you're asking for significant relief from what the Town is asking for. You seem to be diminishing that part of it and drawing us to what your definition of a wetland is. MR. BORGOS-Well, your question assumes an underlying belief, or an assumption that the 75 foot distance as a setback is a necessary distance to be, in order to avoid any type of impact. MR. URRICO-But it's what the Town requires. MR. BORGOS-But your question goes further to say are you going to be able to guarantee that there won't be an effect. There's no way to guarantee that. MR. URRICO-But you're asking for relief from what the Town is requiring, and that's the line. It's not something that we're going to be able to eliminate because you're arguing that. It's something that exists. MR. BORGOS-Of course. So if we take it away from this site, certainly you've probably had this application before for relief from this particular item in the Code. Do any of you recall one of those? I haven't checked, but I'm sure you have, and I'm sure you've granted them, to varying degrees. MR. URRICO-And we've denied them as well. MR. BORGOS-I'm sure you have. It depends on the facts specific to the case. MR. URRICO-Right. Here, the facts we've presented show that all the stormwater can be maintained on site. There's no evidence that groundwater is going to be anything different than existing. We can't, then, forecast what might happen in the future. We don't know what the rainfall rates are going to be. We don't know if we're going to have more storms per season. Those are all big questions we don't have the crystal ball for. Nobody could ever guarantee any of those things. MR. GARRAND-Test pits over several years would help. I mean test pits, you do test pits every year for say five, ten years and you get a good cross section of what the groundwater's going to be. I mean, do we have that kind of data available? MR. BORGOS-1 don't believe that we have 10 years' worth of test pits. MR. HOLMES-In the process of completing a subsurface investigation, we're looking for evidence of where the maximum seasonal high groundwater is, and that can be done a couple of different ways. Number One, part of it is in the springtime of the year where theoretically we have a maximum seasonal high groundwater, your Code actually encourages that to be investigated at that time, where you can actually dig down and you can either find standing water or you find evidence via mottling, which is a staining of the soil in the test pits, to indicate where the maximum recent extent of that groundwater rises towards the surface, and that's what we did as part of that. MR. VALENTE-I guess I'll say my piece. First of all, I know there's been a lot of attacks on my character this evening, and anybody that knows me will know that I would not bring a proposal before any of these Town Boards if I didn't believe that it was the right thing to do. If I felt it was going to be a detriment to the community or the environment, I wouldn't be sitting here. A lot of 26 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) people that are in the audience are obviously clients of either mine or my parents. I'm a second generation builder in this Town. We have nothing but an impeccable reputation. We've done nothing but support Baybridge whenever it had issues, and anybody that knows the full history of that community knows what they've been through with some of the people that have been there to help them or hurt them, and we have always been there to support them when they needed us. With that said, a lot of the clients that I have are very good friends of mine and are here, too, and they know that I would never bring a project before the Board that isn't to my standards, in my opinion. I hire a lot of professionals here. I have my engineer. Deb, obviously is very qualified, very well respected in the community as a delineator. The Town's engineer oversees the entire project. They will not, nothing goes in the ground unless they sign off on it. We have already received comments back from them. We were out there today doing additional test pits on site. So all these professionals, to protect the Town, protect the community, protect myself. I don't want to be a detriment to anybody. They're all here to look out for everybody's best interests, not mine. Okay. We all have to do everything right. I've always tried to do things right. I believe everybody that I've built homes for in this community can attest to that. So I just, as a part of my character, there were some things said tonight that were obviously upsetting to me, as upsetting to some of these other people out there. There's two sides to every fence. So people need to know the full history of what's gone on on this parcel. Not all of it was with me. A lot of it was with my father, but he is an outstanding individual himself in his own right, but I just want to protect our character as developers in this community, and I feel that this is a quality project. It's not a detriment to the community at all. As was stated before, with 75% green space, I'm required to have only 35% green space. I think the plan looks a little intimidating. It is spread out over 28 plus acres. It does look a little intimidating, but, you know, it does fit the community. It does. It's a multi-family community. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Any additional comments from Board members before I poll the Board? MR. KUHL-I'd just like to ask you one question. Somebody mentioned that you had property off Country Club Road. Do you? MR. VALENTE-I have one residential lot off Country Club Road. It's not feasible to get a road across there. It's not feasible. We've looked at it. It's just not realistic, and I don't think some of the people in Maple Row would appreciate that either. MR. KUHL-How come when you designed this you didn't come in off of Walker Lane instead of, you know, Baybridge? MR. VALENTE-It was never intended. The master plan that was set out there in I believe it was the mid to late 80's, my father had, this road has always been intended to loop exactly where we have it. So, you know, we're not, we had to change the path of it due to these Army Corps wetlands that were never there, and now, you know, obviously with the changes in the rules and regulations, we now have these wetlands to avoid. So that loop has still always been there. It was there, you know, it was always intended to be that way. This development always flowed back through that subdivision. Always did. MR. KUHL-I have a question for you, Keith. To me it looks like Building 22 is 63 feet off the wetlands. MR. OBORNE-Well, these are numbers that the applicant provided. Twenty-two feet? MR. KUHL-No, Building 22. MR. OBORNE-I'm sorry, Building 22, and you've got a measurement of 63 going to the wetlands. MR. HOLMES-1 believe that's their prior structure. Is that what I'm looking at? MR. VALENTE-Yes, that's correct. There's an old abandoned garage back there that will be demolished. MR. HOLMES-The 63 foot setback is to that existing building. MR. KUHL-Is that what that SIB is? MR. VALENTE-Yes. MR. KUHL-Okay. MR. HOLMES-The SIB is the 75 foot setback line. (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. KUHL-Well, to me the 75 foot line does brush right on that building. MR. VALENTE-It's pretty close, yes. MR. HOLMES-It's right at the 75 foot mark, but not within the buffer. MR. KUHL-Okay. MR. VALENTE-And again, you have to take in the whole scale. We've got this, you know, I don't know what the overall length of the property is, but you're 28, 29 acres, and, you know, you're looking on this at an 11 by 17 paper. So, obviously it looks condensed, but, I mean, the reality is it's not really that condensed. It's a big parcel and it's spread out nicely. In my eyes, I believe when you have a good parcel, you need to utilize it wisely and it minimizes sprawl with outside areas of the community. MR. UNDERWOOD-Can I ask a question, Keith, of you. We sort of two different standards. If this were Town roads through here, obviously none of these buildings would probably meet the setbacks because they'd have to be 30 feet back off from the edge of the right of way anyway, and in this case here, you know, we basically have these buildings parked as close to the road as possible, just enough space for a car, like maybe 15, 16 feet at the most, that I see on the plots here. Is there some reason that we have a double standard, you know, that we have one standard for the community, one standard for a private? MR. OBORNE-As far as the width of the roads go? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, width of the roads and that, you know, because I think it does bear on the end result that we achieve, you know. MR. OBORNE-1 wouldn't disagree with you on that. I really can't answer to why there is a difference. I will say that the applicant has taken and presented a private road. The minimum width that a private road can have for emergency services is 20 feet. MR. UNDERWOOD-In looking at the parking, you know, I'm looking at the density you have back here in those photographs that the lady had on the disk there, too, you know, when people come to visit, you know, it's the same situation we've had in a lot of the apartment complexes in Town. There was a question when, I know when Richie was putting his in over on Meadowbrook and things like that, we had to decide if we were going to make him build the maximum parking necessary for it. MR. OBORNE-Right. MR. UNDERWOOD-And this, obviously this is dialed in with the parking that's necessary for the units proposed. MR. OBORNE-It is. They're a shade above. It's 1.5 per unit. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. MR. OBORNE-It is a shade above. During my review, and this is a planning issue, I will ask the applicant to potentially show some banked parking. It does not have to be developed right now, but show an area where banked parking can be installed, if there's not enough parking on the site. MR. UNDERWOOD-And obviously the school buses, if indeed that's, you end up with families in there, they're going to have to truck their kids out to the corner of Bay Road and let them stand, waiting for the bus to pick them up, as is now done? MR. BORGOS-That's a determination made by the district. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, the school. MR. BORGOS-It's beyond the control of the developer. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, I didn't know if they would come in on such narrow roads. MR. VALENTE-Well, the road is, with the shoulder, is 24 feet. So, I mean, we have the width. It's actually, I believe, a new DEC recommendation to narrow the road down some to try to minimize impervious area. So, you know, we're trying to, you know, everybody's very green 28 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) friendly, and we're trying to, you know, work with that also, so, you know, it puts us in a catch- 22. MR. UNDERWOOD-You don't want too much or too little. MR. VALENTE-Right. You don't want a superhighway either. MR. BORGOS-The other advantage of a narrow road is it does tend to slow the traffic. If you have a wide open road, people tend to go faster. That's a hazard as well. MR. OBORNE-If I could make a clarification on a comment, and I'm pretty sure I heard it right. Mike, you stated that single family dwellings were not allowed in the O zone? MR. BORGOS-Single family residential. MR. OBORNE-Right. MR. BORGOS-Attached dwellings. MR. OBORNE-Detached dwellings or single family dwellings. They are allowed in the O zone as long as you're 300 feet from an arterial. MR. VALENTE-Since when? MR. OBORNE-Per the Zoning Code. MR. VALENTE-Since when? MR. OBORNE-I just want to make sure that. Now that's not a determination I can make. That's obviously Craig's bailiwick, but I can read the chart here, and it does say it's an allowable use. MR. VALENTE-I think this goes back to the history of this parcel. It's been re-zoned three times in the history that we've owned it, and, you know, at the end of Gentry Lane we were doing single family townhouses, and I had multiple contracts to finish, to build the homes there, and I would issue for a permit and they stopped issuing the permits because the zoning had changed and didn't allow that anymore. I was in the middle of building. So they allowed us to finish up to the end of that paved road, and that's where it stopped, because actually that phase was supposed to be another 300 feet out, and, you know, it (lost words). MR. UNDERWOOD-Just hypothetically, I know where you're at with this project at the present time, but if the option were available to continue doing what you'd previously done within Baybridge, would you continue doing that or would you prefer to do what you're proposing here, I mean if you had the option? MR. VALENTE-In the current market, I would have to say I would have to lean multi-family. It's just, you know, eventually someday I'd like to retire, too. You see how the front of Fairfield's moving, you know. I have, obviously, a sizeable investment out there. So, you know, I don't want to be back here, again, you know. I'd like to build out eventually and move on. So, you know, I've owned the parcel for about 10 years. I purchased it from my parents, but, you know, I've carried it for 10 years and it's something, you know, it's time to move forward. That's it. To be honest with you, the subdivision, if I didn't have the issue with the Town at the end of Gentry Lane that I had at the time, I probably would have already been built out there. We probably could have continued at that time. The market was strong. We were selling those well, and I would have gone for the next phase approval. Unfortunately, you know, I had the rug pulled out from under me. So, you know, this goes back to a lot of the history that people don't understand and don't know, and it's been a lot of battles, too. So I wouldn't do anything that's not good for this Town. I can assure you that, and that's my perspective honestly, but. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. To remind everyone, the public hearing is still open. I'm going to poll the Board at this time to get some feedback so the public can hear that from the Board as well. I'll start with Brian. MR. CLEMENTS-Thank you. I have a number of comments here. First of all, as a Planning Board member, I would have a lot of questions, as we're not a Planning Board member, but many of these issues are not under our jurisdiction. So, that having been said, first I think that everybody has to understand that this type of development is permissible, which is not under our control, and it's something that's not under our control, but I would say quite simply that a new project could be developed that's compliant and we, as Board members, have said consistently, not necessarily all of us, but from my point of view, that a new project could be developed to be (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) compliant and should be. So I guess my point of view would be if it could be built compliant, than that's what we should do. MR. JACKOSKI-Roy? MR. URRICO-I'm going to agree with Brian. I think if I go down the criteria, I'm a pretty practical person when it comes to this. I mean, we have regulations and we have a Zoning Board of Appeals. The appeal allows you, as an applicant, to ask for a variance, variation, of the law, and it's up to us to decide what is permissible or what can be deemed excessive. That's what the minimum requirement comes in where we're asked to do that. I think as far as a change in the neighborhood, I think I agree that there might be a change in the neighborhood regarding this relief, but I'm not sure it's going to affect a lot of the other houses in here, but granting this type of relief and this type of a project could, down the road. A feasible alternative would be to shrink it, to make it, as Brian said, compliant without need of variances or with minimal variances. Some of them are quite extensive. They're talking 68 feet and more, or thereabouts, 67, 51 feet, 58 feet. That seems to be a lot. I mean, I know it was a line that was drawn in the sand by the Town, but it was drawn for a reason. They did a lot of research at that time as well. As a person that was on the Comprehensive Land Use Committee back then, I know we did some work on that and why we came up with these numbers, and I think eight shoreline setbacks is a bit much. As far as environmentally, I think we don't know what the effects could be. It could be detrimental. It could be greatly detrimental. It could be minimal. I don't know. I do know there will be some impact, and I think this is self-created. So I think there is room to maneuver on this. I think a compliant or more compliant application could be made. I would be not in favor of this one at this time. MR. JACKOSKI-Rick? MR. GARRAND-First of all, I'd like to just say that I think it's kind of unnecessary to denigrate the character of a man that's just trying to make a living here. Our sole task here tonight is with the wetland setbacks. A lot of what was presented wasn't relevant to what we're here for. With that said, I do think some of the relief is excessive. The request definitely is substantial. Can benefits be achieved by other means feasible? Well, yes, it's a brand new project. Nothing's been built yet. This is starting from scratch. There's no reason why it couldn't be more or less more compliant. Are we going to have adverse physical effects on the environment? Quite possibly yes. I'm not convinced that the water table's not going to be affected in other areas. I would like to see some sort of guarantee for neighboring property owners with respect to, you know, if they have water damage down the road. I wouldn't want to see these people left high and dry or whatever you, but with that said, I can't be in favor of this right now in its current form. MR. JACKOSKI-Ron? MR. KUHL-Yes. I agree with everybody. I think you're asking for too much. You came and said that you're just asking for these items, these eight items, and I think you're asking for too much. I'm not in favor. MR. JACKOSKI-Jim? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. In the context of any Critical Environmental Area in Town, I think we need to be concerned, and, you know, in the Bay Road corridor and the Meadowbrook Corridor, as you've suggested to us, we have given you variances from the wetland setbacks previously, and I would not be in favor of all the wetland setbacks that you're asking for here this evening for several different reasons, and that is as follows. Most all the time that we have granted those variances previously from the wetlands, it's usually one corner of a building, a very slight intrusion into it, like maybe five or six feet into the boundaries, but I think as Roy said, and as everybody else on the Board has said so far, you know, these are significant amounts of relief that you're asking for, and I think that, in this instance here, based upon, not only the wetland setbacks, I think that you could re-design at a smaller scale with less density and probably be able to still fit in quite a few units in there, and, you know, I'm a little bit taken aback. Personally, if I were going to look at the project as a whole, I would say it's probably been well thought out, well designed by your engineer and you spent significant time and effort in trying to polish it, but at the same time, it still looks to me like a lot of the relief that you're requesting, a lot of these things are right up to the 75 foot setback, like right sitting on the very edge of the line, and I don't think that that's really something that we're looking towards either. I think that, you know, in the instance of where we can make things fit with the area that it's being proposed for, I think you can do a better job. You're trying to fit too much in there, and I think that's why you're seeking this great relief, and I think that you can go back to the Board and come back with something a little less dense. MR. BORGOS-Just a point of clarification. This is not a Critical Environmental Area. 30 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. UNDERWOOD-Well, a wetland is a Critical Environmental Area. MR. OBORNE-But it hasn't been designated by the Town as a Critical Environmental Area. MR. UNDERWOOD-Right. MR. BORGOS-But you're using it as a term of art, in that. MR. OBORNE-Yes, it's not. MR. BORGOS-It's not. MR. UNDERWOOD-Well, it is a wetland, and again, we don't discriminate whether it's a DEC wetland or an Army Corps wetland. I think that we can treat them all equally, and I think in this instance here, as I said, I think you can go back and scale back a little bit, and you'll be able to fit plenty of units in there still. MR. JACKOSKI-Joyce? MRS. HUNT-Yes, I agree with my fellow Board members. MR. JACKOSKI-So I guess on this application also I suspect the applicant's going to request a tabling. MR. BORGOS-No. I guess we would ask you for a vote. MR. UNDERWOOD-Do you want me to do it? MR. VALENTE-Folks, can I make a quick comment? MR. UNDERWOOD-Sure. MR. VALENTE-Just so you know, obviously I know how this is going. I just want you to know that, Number One, the quality of the Army Corps wetland, to me, is ludicrous, in this day and age, and, Number Two, I think because Army Corps doesn't require any setback, that's really my point of view saying if that agency was really concerned about that wetlands, that they would have initiated some kind of a setback to us and dictated that, whether now or any other time. So that's kind of my mindset when I was going into this, okay, just so you know, and, you know, we have the buffers, but I understand where we're heading, but I wanted to at least let you know my point of view of why I came in with this. Okay. MR. UNDERWOOD-Okay. I'll make a motion. MOTION TO DENY AREA VARIANCE NO. 43-2012 LEGACY LAND HOLDINGS, LLC DANIEL VALENTE, Introduced by James Underwood who moved for its adoption, seconded by Richard Garrand: Gentry Lane Extension. The applicant proposes construction of 176 apartment units and 29 buildings and relief is requested from the minimum shoreline setback requirements. As far as the relief required, Building Number One is 58 feet of shoreline relief. Building Number Two, 48 feet of shoreline relief. Building Number Three, 48 feet of shoreline relief. Building Number Four, 51 feet of shoreline relief. Building Number Five, 28 feet of shoreline relief. Building Number Seven, 49 feet of shoreline relief. Building Number Ten, 28 feet of shoreline relief, and the Pump Station request for 67 feet of shoreline relief, and all those variances that are listed above are shoreline relief from the 75 foot requirement per Section 179-3-040 of the Town Code which treats all wetlands, whether DEC or Army Corps, equally. Having considered the request, the Board does feel that an undesirable change will be produced in the character of the neighborhood by the creation of the granting of those variances. We do feel that the benefit sought by the applicant can be achieved by some method feasible for the applicant to pursue, and that is possibly less density or locating outside of the 75 foot requirement. Whether the requested area variance is substantial. The request for eight shoreline setback requests between 67 and 28 feet as noted above from the 75 foot shoreline setback requirement per Section 179-3-040 may be considered moderate relative to the Ordinance. Whether the proposed variance will have an adverse effect or impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood. We do feel that there are possible impacts on the wetlands because of the location of those buildings being within the 75 foot setback, and the difficulty is considered to be self-created by the applicant. (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) Duly adopted this 26th day of September, 2012, by the following vote: MR. JACKOSKI-For the record, I am going to abstain from the vote because in light of the information brought forward, I didn't realize how significantly close my parents own property was to this parcel, so I definitely better abstain. AYES: Mr. Urrico, Mr. Clements, Mr. Kuhl, Mr. Underwood, Mr. Garrand NOES: NONE ABSTAINED: Mr. Jackoski, Mrs. Hunt MR. VALENTE-Thank you for your time. We appreciate it. SIGN VARIANCE NO. 51-2012 SEQRA TYPE UNLISTED MC DONALD'S USA, LLC AGENT(S) BOHLER ENGINEERING OWNER(S) MC DONALD'S USA, LLC ZONING CI LOCATION 192 CORINTH ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES 4 ADDITIONAL WALL SIGNS ON PROPOSED RESTAURANT. RELIEF REQUESTED FROM MAXIMUM ALLOWABLE NUMBER OF SIGNS PER THE SIGN CODE. CROSS REF SIGNAGE HISTORY: BP 7772 YEAR 1983 WALL SIGN; BP 7772(A) YEAR 1983 FS; BP 7772(B) YEAR 1983 FS; BP 2008- 668; BP 2008-405; BP 2005-532; BP 2004-250; BP 93-363 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING YES LOT SIZE 3.14 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 309.13-1-74 SECTION 140-6 CHRIS BOYEA, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT STAFF INPUT Notes from Staff, Sign Variance No. 51-2012, McDonald's, USA, LLC, Meeting Date: September 26, 2012 "Project Location: 192 Corinth Road Description of Proposed: Applicant proposes 4 additional walls signs on proposed restaurant. Relief requested from maximum allowable number of signs per the Sign Code. Relief Required: Parcel will require sign variances as follows: Number of wall signs- Request for 4 additional 30 square foot wall signs. Note: As per§140-6, the following applies -A business located on a,parcel shall be granted a ,permit for two signs; one freestanding double faced sign and one sign attached to a building or two signs attached to a building. Criteria for considering a Sign Variance according to Chapter 267 of Town Law: 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 sign variance. Minor impacts to the neighborhood may be anticipated. 2. Whether the benefit sought by the applicant can be achieved by some method, feasible for the applicant to pursue, other than a sign variance. Feasible alternatives would be to reduce the number of signs to a compliant amount. 3. Whether the requested sign variance is substantial. The request for four (4) additional walls signs or 4 times the amount allowed per Chapter 140 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 or environmental conditions in the district may be anticipated. 5. Whether the alleged difficulty was self created. The difficulty may be considered self created. Parcel History (construction/site plan/variance, (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) SP 64-2012 Demo and replace 5,420 sq. ft. restaurant with 5,200 sq. ft. restaurant Pending SP 15-93 4/29/93 Indoor play area Approved 4/29/93 SP 4388 5,420 sq. ft. restaurant Approved 10/26/88 Staff comments: None SEAR Status: Type- Unlisted, Short Form attached." MR. JACKOSKI-It's a pretty straightforward application. Do you have anything to add at this time, or would you like comments from the Board? MR. BOYEA-No. I'd like to give a brief presentation if I could, very brief, and it looks like most of the audience is gone. My name is Chris Boyea. I'm with Bohler Engineering, and here with me tonight is the local owner and operator of the facility, Renee Reardon, as well as Francis Esion, who is with McDonald's Corporation. He came in from Boston tonight and we read a couple of Reader's Digests in the back area. The proposal in front of you tonight includes the redevelopment. Renee is going to reinvest into the community here. There's an existing McDonald's at the Exit 18. I hope everybody's very familiar with it. It's been there. She's operated it for many years. The reinvestment option is not just a small reinvestment. Instead of just remodeling this facility, she's chosen to make a very large impact, put a dozer right through that whole site, and build a brand new 5,200 square foot restaurant there, which is similar in size to this. The new facility is going to be ADA compliant landscaping. It looks phenomenal. This is the plan that is being presented to the Planning Board. You can see we're getting rid of a lot of green, or a lot of asphalt. We're increasing green space. A lot more vegetated area. As far as what we're here for tonight is a Sign Variance. This is what the building looks like today. It should look very familiar. Existing pole sign that's out front is to remain, no changes. We're here for wall signs on buildings, and this is one of the easier applications that I've happened to come across recently because as you can see we have over 250 square foot of wall signs on this facility today. So, our application's coming in with half of that. That's not to even include the lighted roof beams and the red mansard roof that's synonymous with McDonald's across the country. That's just these signs that encompass and surround the building. The new facility is not quite as loud. It's not the red, white and yellow that's been seen before. This is a more modern facility that you may have seen similar to something like in Clifton Park, if you've been down in that area. We've rebuilt that one down there. It's a similar look. Straight walls. No more of the double mansard roof, and instead of six M's that are around the existing facility, we've only got one, two, and a third M on the drive thru side. So overall our numbers of signs are going down and the square footages of signs are coming down from existing. However, we are still more than the Code would allow. So that's why we're here tonight to ask for relief from those variances from that side so we can get more in conformance with the Code, but we're still not going to meet it completely. So we are here tonight to answer any questions. I could talk a long time about this, but I know that it's been a long night for everybody, and in a nutshell that's what we're doing. We're going from 250 some square feet of signs down to the 120 that's been asked for. The pole sign would remain just as it is today. MR. UNDERWOOD-So the M's are considered signs? MR. OBORNE-That's branding. MR. UNDERWOOD-It's branded. I'm trying to think, what did we do with Taco Bell because we just did that one. MR. OBORNE-The bell was granted. MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes. Applebee's with their awnings. MR. JACKOSKI-So there's six total signs on the site? MR. BOYEA-Today. MR. JAC KOSKI-Actually there's be seven if you count both sides of the poles. MR. BOYEA-There would be seven signs counting the pole sign today. MR. URRICO-I'm counting five signs on the building. I see two on the side, two on the front, and one on the other side. 33 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MR. JACKOSKI-Right, six total as we look at it. MR. KUHL-Yes, five on the building and then the big sign in front. MR. BOYEA-That's what's proposed, yes, and today there's seven total. MR. URRICO-What about on the rear side where the drive thru is the menu board? MR. BOYEA-The menu boards are included in the sign package. I believe that those are, believe that's just part of the drive thru use. MR. URRICO-Okay. MR. OBORNE-Yes, we don't consider those signs. MR. URRICO-They're the most important signs on the property. MR. OBORNE-They do explain the gastronomical treats that await. That is correct. MR. JACKOSKI-All right. So why don't we go ahead and get comments from the Board members before I open the public hearing. Seeing no comment, I'll open the public hearing. Is there anyone here in the audience who'd like to address the Board on this matter? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. JACKOSKI-Seeing no one, is there any written comment? MR. URRICO-No. MR. JACKOSKI-Having none, I'm going to poll the Board. Start with Rick. MR. GARRAND-Thank you. I'm looking for an undesirable change in the neighborhood. I still haven't found it. I can't see how. Is the request substantial? From a percentage point of view, yes, it is substantial. Any adverse physical or environmental effects? I can see none. This is, a lot of this is branding. Signs I tend to see as an advertisement out on the side of a building or out on the street somewhere that's obtrusive. I don't see this as obtrusive at all. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. Thank you. Ron? MR. KUHL-Yes. I have no issues with this. Going from seven to six is fine. Reducing the square footage is fine, and I realize that everybody wants to look the same. MR. JACKOSKI-Brian? MR. CLEMENTS-Yes. I'd agree, too. We did a thing with Applebee's. I think that this is very nice looking. I'd be in favor of it. MR. JACKOSKI-Roy? MR. URRICO-This is a great design. I think it's definitely an upgrade to the neighborhood. I'd be in favor of it. MR. JACKOSKI-Joyce? MRS. HUNT-Yes, I agree with my fellow Board members. I have no problems. MR. JACKOSKI-Jim? MR. UNDERWOOD-Yes, it's nice to see it toned down in the advertising world, you know, and not having like having how many you served because you lost count so long ago you can't remember how many it was, but, no, I think it's an improvement over the, you know, any time the branding changes like this, I think that, you know, it's tending, now, to be less than more, as it used to be in the past, and it's not that gaudy look anymore. It's much more subtle. So I'd be in favor of it. MR. JACKOSKI-And isn't the South Glens Falls facility similar to this? RENEE REARDON 34 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) MS. REARDON-Yes. MR. OBORNE-Yes, they have more stone on that one. MR. KU H L-They refaced that. MR. BOYEA-That's right. That was a remodel. MR. KU H L-Yes. MR. JACKOSKI-Okay. So I am going to close the public hearing. PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED MOTION THAT BASED UPON THE INFORMATION PRESENTED AND THE ANALYSIS OF THE ABOVE SUPPORTING INFORMATION, THIS BOARD HAS DETERMINED THAT THIS PROPOSAL WILL NOT RESULT IN ANY SIGNIFICANT ADVERSE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS AND WE WOULD GIVE IT A NEGATIVE DECLARATION REGARDING SIGN VARIANCE NO. 51-2012 MC DONALD'S USA, LLC, Introduced by Richard Garrand who moved for its adoption, seconded by Ronald Kuhl: Duly adopted this 26th day of September, 2012, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Clements, Mr. Underwood, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Urrico, Mr. Kuhl, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Jackoski NOES: NONE MR. JACKOSKI-Having a Negative Dec, is there anyone who would like to put forth a motion to approve this Sign Variance? MOTION TO APPROVE SIGN VARIANCE NO. 51-2012 MC DONALD'S USA, LLC, Introduced by Joyce Hunt who moved for its adoption, seconded by Brian Clements: 192 Corinth Road. The applicant proposes four additional wall signs on the proposed restaurant. Relief requested from maximum allowable number of signs per the Sign Code. In making this determination, there will be minor impacts to the neighborhood. Feasible alternatives would be to reduce the number of signs to a compliant amount, but the signs are really very tasteful and not at all obtrusive. The request for four additional signs, four times the amount allowed per Chapter 140 may be considered severe relative to the Ordinance, but as I said before, these are small unobtrusive signs. There will be minor impacts on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood, and the alleged difficulty is self-created because they wish to upgrade the building. I move that we approve Sign Variance No. 51-2012. Duly adopted this 26th day of September, 2012, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Urrico, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Underwood, Mr. Kuhl, Mr. Clements, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Jackoski NOES: NONE MR. JACKOSKI-Congratulations. Good luck. MR. BOYEA-Thank you so much. MR. JACKOSKI-Is there any other business to be brought before the Board? I'll take a motion to adjourn. MOTION TO ADJOURN THE QUEENSBURY ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS MEETING OF SEPTEMBER 26, 2012, Introduced by Brian Clements who moved for its adoption, seconded by Joyce Hunt: Duly adopted this 26th day of September, 2012, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Urrico, Mr. Garrand, Mr. Kuhl, Mr. Clements, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. Underwood, Mr. Jackoski NOES: NONE 35 (Queensbury ZBA Meeting 09/26/2012) On motion meeting was adjourned. RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED, Steven Jackoski, Chairman 36