 Uh, the time is now 6 31 and the October 19th, 2023 meeting of the development of your board for the city of Winooski has been called to order. The DRB is a quasi judicial volunteer resident board that upholds standards and procedures as defined in the Winooski zoning ordinance, we review and make decisions on subdivisions, site plans, conditional uses, variances and appeals of the zoning administrators determination. We have authority through Vermont state statute and insured due process protect the rights of applicants and the rights of the public to participate in proposals for land development within the city. Appeals of decisions made by this board are heard by the Vermont Superior Court Environmental Division and the Vermont Supreme Court. My name is Matt Basowitz. I'm the chair of the DRB. Harlan Miller is not present. He is our vice chair. LC Goodrich is our secretary and our current members are Aaron Guyette, David Weisberger, Jordan Matt and Emily Morse. Appeals and recommendations are always cast in closed deliberative session that will take place as soon after the hearing takes place as possible. We will ask anyone participating in tonight's hearings to swear or affirm that all testimony is entirely the truth under the pains and penalties of perjury. We will ask you to say I affirm and raise your right hand before testifying. Online Zoom participants will be asked to testify after all in person testimony is complete. If we have anybody online. First up on the agenda is an opportunity for public comment. Vermont State statute allows for public comment at every public meeting. If you have something that you'd like to discuss that is not already on our current agenda, this is your opportunity. Sorry, Matt. First there are changes to the agenda, if there's any. Ah, skip that part. That's okay. Well, we'll do public comment now and then we'll make a change to the agenda asking if there are changes to be made to the agenda. So hearing no public comment next up, we'll ask anybody that would like to make a change to the agenda as currently proposed. We will stick with the current agenda. Next up is to approve previous meetings minutes and we have to go all the way back to July for that one. And I will, I did flip through them. I believe I was here for that meeting. I didn't see anything that needed to be changed at anybody else. I will entertain a motion to approve the minutes. And a second? Second. Motioned and seconded. All those in favor of approving the minutes please say aye. Aye. And I believe that carried unanimously. Okay, I'll see abstains. So the first substantive item on our current agenda is a public hearing on a conditional use request for 67 Union streets. And we will ask the applicant to please step forward. Matt, I think procedurally, I don't know if we've done this consistently in the past, but we can have a motion to open the hearing that way we formally have the hearing open and then we can close it at the end of all of the hearings. So, so, okay, yeah. So we can, I think we should be able to open one hearing for all three collectively just a matter of having the formal action to open the hearing so we can take testimony on the record. Okay, perfect. So we will need a motion to open the hearings plural. I make a motion to open the hearings plural. I'll second. Motioned and seconded. All those in favor please say aye or raise your hand. Aye. Okay, we are in our hearing. Hello. Welcome. We ask that you do swear that you are speaking the truth under the panes and penalties of perjury. Thank you so much. Your name? Don Welch, I'm representing the original. So, Matt, I'd like to say a few words quick if I may before we take testimony from Mr. Welch. First of all, I believe Emily, you need to recuse yourself from this matter. So Emily will not be participating if I could ask you to leave the room. Sure. That would be that way there's no, no potential conflict or impropriety perceived or real in this matter. I'm a very expressive face. So while Emily's stepping out of the room, I will just give a few overview remarks on this application. This is coming before you tonight as a conditional use request. The reason this is coming before you as a conditional use request is because the existing building at 67 Union Street is a pre-existing, non-conforming structure. It exceeds the maximum number of units that we permit on any one lot in the city. But as such, it can undergo changes and modifications with approval from you all through this conditional use process. So the applicant tonight is seeking to convert existing space inside the building to residential space from office space. I believe it was previously residential at one time, was converted to office and now they're looking to convert it back. So that's a little bit of background on why this is before you tonight. There are no other changes that are being proposed to the exterior of the building or no other, no changes are being proposed to the exterior, just the interior modifications to that existing space. And I've got the plans on my computer to share for reference. So just for clarity, are we looking to grant a variance in this case? No, this would just be a conditional use approval to allow for the dwellings to be reestablished. Okay, great. So Don, if you can walk us through the project and the plans, that would be wonderful. So there's roughly 2,000 square feet right now of existing office space that the owners would like to convert that into two residential living units, two bedroom units. Really the only change of the building is modifying the windows on the exterior to the exterior of the building. There are no walls being proposed from the interior. Parking should actually improve traffic and that sort of thing. I think there were 10 employees there previously. And figuring 10 cars a day most likely will be fewer than that if the approval is granted. Okay. Yeah, there's not much change to the overall building. Is this all on the first floor? Yeah, it's all on the first floor. And would the units be rented or are they condos for sale or how does that work? They would be for sale. I'm pretty sure that I know that most of the units in the building are owner-occupied and I believe that there's a five or something like that that could be rented at any one time. But it could be rented not owner-occupied. So if the owners chose to not sell them then I think there's a way to do this if you want to rent the units. Okay. And this is more just out of my curiosity where the office is being used by staff for the facility or were they being rented to separate companies? The owners of the space had their offices there. Okay. The offices were relocated. Okay, great. Any other questions? The building was built when, do you know? It's not on the historic register, I think it's... It is, I think it is. I think I included that in here somewhere. I'll ask Eric to flip to the elevations in a second but I didn't notice whether that was the existing or proposed elevations because the windows don't look, on the top it would be the right most lower set. Right in the middle. In the middle. Right there, on the lower. Do you know the nest that runs in with the existing? Yes. So they have to see so it's one, two, two blank. So really in some ways it's returning back to probably more windows. So we're above is one, two blank, two and we're converting it into three in the middle and then one on each end pointing to the south side. 1938 is when this was constructed. I don't believe it is on the register. Well, let me rephrase. If it is, there's currently no local register so we have no mechanism to regulate if it was. I mean if it was, that's not really our purview. We'd have to go through someone else for the changes exterior. Sorry, I didn't realize that the windows were going to be that dramatic. I was just pulling up the Google Street View. What is currently there, or maybe I'm looking from the wrong angle, appears to match everything else. I'm curious to see what's actually changing with the windows. Where there are windows infilled, where we're putting windows in. Okay, maybe I'm on the wrong side of the building. If you go back to the elevation. So we're just to the left of the doors, right there. If you look up you can see what's right there. There's two windows to one side and then right in the middle, right there, those are window windows. Okay. And then right below it. Okay. So I don't think there's anything in the conditional use that would allow us to comment on the appearance. Is that right? I don't believe there is. No. Okay. I mean I would encourage you, I assume you're going to be using compatible. It's not going to be like some vinyl inserts. No. I think the condo board has, the condo board has already been changed. And I know that they have collectively been looking to upgrade their windows and they are looking at decent windows. So the windows you have to match, that all has to be approved by the condo board to use. Are there any other questions from the board? For Don. Sorry, what's the total number of units? 19. 19 and it will be 21? Yeah. And considering there had been housing there before, I'm assuming that the water and sewer and all of those pieces of infrastructure are in place and ready to go. Yeah. The orders, I guess, the orders requested and received sewer and water allocation, but I guess they asked so long ago that the allocation expired, so we'll have to re-ask them. But initially the city said no problem. Yeah. The city has plenty of reserve capacity in water and wastewater to serve the property. What we would do is look at, if we can, if we have the, depending on how the property is metered, we would look at the, what the office use was using for water and wastewater and then assign a credit for any future allocation based on the number of bedrooms and the design capacity. So it's possible they wouldn't need any additional allocation depending on what was being used previously. So it, but in any event, the city has plenty of reserve capacity to serve the water and wastewater needs for the additional units. Okay. And there's, there's a homeowner's association for this and these would become part of that. So those documents already exist. Those, those, that, that legal structure already exists. Yeah, there's a condo. I think it's a good project. Yeah, I agree. Thank you, Don. I appreciate it. I don't think we have any other questions, but we'll invite anybody else to come stay close. If anybody else would like to speak on this project, please do. And we will ask that you respond to that if you'd like to, if anybody wants to. Yeah. So thank you. We may call you back. Thank you. We'll be, the questions right now or later? Right now. Yeah. So we'd like to invite anybody here that would like to speak either for or against this modification, this project to please come forward now or. Hit the little raise hand button on the zoom. Yeah, there's actually two people online now. So, okay. Yeah, for the folks online, if you would like to speak on this matter, you can use the raise hand feature or the chat. Otherwise, you can stay tuned till the matter that you're here for. And hearing nothing and seeing nothing. I believe it's safe to move on. Thank you so much, Don. We will probably go break into the Liberty session. My guess is tonight and we'll be able to get a response. Sorry. Before Don leaves, I just want to, so I have the exhibit list for this matter. It includes exhibits A through J that will be included in the record. These will be listed as, these will be included in the decision as well and referenced in the decision. So I'm going to be providing a copy to Mr. Welch for his writers as well. So thank you very much. Thank you. Thanks for your time. Thank you. Take care. And Emily, you can come back in. Emily, you must not hotly conduct it. Yeah. We'll go late. Our second of three hearings tonight is a public hearing on a conditional use request for 133 Elm streets. And we'll invite the applicant to. And I believe LC is going to have to recuse yourself from this matter. While LC is coming out of the room, I'll just give a brief introduction here. So this is a conditional use request to establish a what we list as a commercial recreation and entertainment facility. That's what our, the city's land use table specifically considers what the use that is being proposed. Basically, it's a semi private gym training facility. I'll let the applicants provide more detail on what it actually is. They're looking at using existing space in the building at 133 Elm Street. It's the old river works. Carpet factory goes by many different names, about 100,000 square feet of space. They're looking at occupying about 1817, 100, 1800 square feet of that existing area. So no new construction. But our use table does list this as a conditional use. So that's why it's coming before you tonight. Okay. Welcome. We ask that you do raise your right hand and affirm that everything you are going to testify is the truth under the pains and penalties of perjury. Awesome. Thank you. And your names. So I'm Gina Buchanan. I actually, we, Corey and I rent the space. It's our lease with Redstone. I go to the kitchen and we'll partnership with G Corp. Okay. Corey Irish, I'm the owner of Rop Ready. I rent out part of the space that isn't necessarily political. He's doing, but I'll be the contractor that does the work inside to fit up the space. Okay. And I'm Antonio Federico-Copolo. I'm the one who is renting the space he needs to, looking to set up the facility that we proposed. Awesome. You said Antonio? Yep, Antonio. Okay. No, that's just, because I'm terrible with names, I need to write them down. Tony also works. Okay. Awesome. Well, can you please walk us through what your plans are? Absolutely. So my business is called True Warrior Fitness or True Warrior Training. We are a training facility that we're going to set up. We operate the Prisee Speed School in the state of Vermont. So we hold the only license in the state to operate the Prisee Speed School, which is a youth athletic development organization. It's been around for 32 years, coming up on 33 years. What we do is everything but the sports-specific side of things. So speed, strength, mobility for youth athletes, 5 and 25. But our main focus is 7 to 12. That's really where we like to take in a lot of athletes to do work. What we're looking to do is set up a semi-private facility. So this is not open to public. It's by appointment only. We'll have classes, and if my trainers and coaches will be able to take in private clients, but this is not going to be a huge cycle of think-planet fitness. Not a similar model to that. It would be an enclosed by-site appointment only. Okay. And what do you picture happening in the facility as far as fit up and what do you need done there? Yeah, absolutely. So I've got a few different things here. Obviously the main entrance, which is at that top there, that's going to be our main entrance to come into the room. The room directly to the right of that, which is those two office sections, that room directly to the right is going to be just a half-cut wall. So it's going to get cut to 44 inches, which is just going to turn into the front desk area. So when you walk in the room, you'll be able to turn directly to the left, which would be something sitting in the front desk to be able to take appointments. There is attached pictures as well, so you can see the exact measurements, how that cut would look. Additionally, the other thing we are looking to do is remove the ceilings in that space. So it is set up. There is another picture as well to see kind of what the before and after would look like for those ceilings, which it would just be removing the ceilings and then raising the lighting, raising the sprinklers, fixing the HVAC system so that everybody is set for a non-actual drop-set ceiling. The additional is adding in rubber flooring. So we've got two different options that we're looking at. Either three quarters of an inch or a quarter of an inch. That's just going to protect the concrete flooring. So when we are using strength, conditioning, equipment, anything like that, we have kind of that baseline flooring. So there's no change to any of the walls, other than cutting that one down? No, just that one cut for the front desk area. Okay. There's no change to any of the doors, the exiting doors. No, no exit doors change. Do you, I'm not sure how your programs operate. I don't know if you play music or if there's noise and whistling or anything like that. Yeah. Any consideration to, I'm not sure who your neighbors would be on either side. Us. Oh, okay. Okay. So you probably find them. Yep. With it being, like I said, semi-private, there isn't going to be a ton of background music and things like that. The noise in the space would be a coach one-on-one with their private clients. Our classes and such would have music in the background, but we don't want music blaring because of what we're doing. We want kids to be able to hear us as we're coaching, giving cues, giving tactile feedback and being able to work with them. Okay. Any modifications to any air handling? Do you need extra air conditioning or dehumidification or anything like that? Yep. The HVAC will just get moved since it is set into a drop, excuse me, not me to hit that, because it is set into the drop ceiling, so one of the things it's going to use is going to just get raised, like it was in the back picture there. So instead of the piping that is set into the drop ceiling, it's just going to get put back on into the hard set of all the vents. So the existing equipment will still be used as is? It's still going to be moved back. Yep. Okay. Most recently, we have a sprinkler's pipe tech combined because we're going to be switching out the sprinkler's system from being facing down to open cupboards. So again, everything is going to be still used in that facility. Okay. Actually, that was my next question. There you go. Thank you. I've done this once before. Okay. I think that, well, I'm sorry, right up in the report, we're talking about traffic impact on the neighborhood and things like that. You're only expecting to do what, four classes a day? Is that accurate? Yep, about four classes and not really a day, so it's usually after the four to 430 times period after. Yep. Because kids are going to go to school, we don't run any classes from the morning on. It's all going to be after school. And it's hour-long classes? Yep. So once an hour, you're going to have? A cycle in and out of it. A cycle of 12 cars. And we'll have a few crossovers because the classes we set up are strength, or speed, or mobility. So we may have a few kids here in that that will take a two hour. We'll stay for one and be able to stay for the next. With our models, since we do have a lot of youth athletes, a lot of them do carpool. There are parents that set up to make sure, hey, little Jimmy and little Tim, they're going to be in the class at the same time. One parent will bring a job. Yep. Are most of your students local to Winooski, or are they all over? So we are, since we are the only one in Vermont, we are from Charlotte to St. Albans. We are in the process right now of working with the Winooski school system to be able to take in a lot of Winooski school athletes, middle school and high school. Okay. And as you see this growth, what do you, if we're talking 12 kids, four classes a day right now, what do you see five years from now? So it depends. When we have the coaching structure, we would run simultaneous classes because we have the room in the facility to be able to do that. So we would run a speed session and a strength session at the same time. Same thing. So it would be up to eight classes. And that structure would just pretty much stay the same. We would just start to funnel kids in and out. With our structure, how it is set up, we work with athletes and they start to progress through the class structure. So a very baseline beginner, it's the best work for it structure. And then as we work the athlete year in, year out, they start to get to the elite level. And so that's where the class structure breakdown. So first two hours would probably be more beginner, later two hours would be more advanced and elite. And so those athletes would walk through those structures and eventually they work off into their own custom programming or private sessions. We also do work with schools where we'll go out and teach these classes at the school system so that we mitigate kind of the huge flux into the facility because we do have a lot of schools that we work with that aren't within a 30 to 25 minute drive. They're like a 40, 40. So we have to go work out then. So we'll do contracts and things like that to be able to mitigate some of that. Yeah. So five years from now, your picture maybe you'll possibly double the students that come in and out daily? Obviously, yeah. SafeBed is doubling kind of what we have set right now. But with the space that we have, it wouldn't be a triple or quadruple. Okay. And we know that the parking is, there's tons of it. There is a picture. There is ample parking over there. We can designate the parking spots. As far as traffic mitigation, the only thing that's next to us is cabin and for their storage facility, their tractor trailers come in during morning hours. So by three o'clock, they're done so they should know if you're in traffic. Okay. And all the other house spaces are pretty much shut down that time as well. Yeah. And Spirit is still down there? Spirit is still there. Their lease is up and through February for renewal. So we don't know what's going on beyond that. But again, Spirit doesn't come in and they have it. They don't have like a bunch of employees, right? No. No, not really. No. The only time that we've seen it was like two. Yeah. And then whatever's inside. Okay. I'm a little hazy about the division of the spaces between all of you. The red is what you'll be using other than the office beside the door. So you should be in the red? No. So the red area is the proposed for the gym. Over to the right of the screen is where the country kitchen is, which is my location. So that's where it is that whole entire space. And then to the left, Corey Irish, so property has that front office when you first come in and the warehouse space. Yep. And then the warehouse space. So the two offices to the left? Those two offices. They'll all go to the red area. Yep. So that will be your space. So the front one, that front more of the mouse is right now would be the reception area. And then the second office will be a private and closed office for Antonio and his staff. Okay. And both of your spaces require entry through the space. That's the same entry? Yeah. We have separate, we have separate entries. So my entry would be literally on the side right by the door. You can come down a little more. Right there is the door entry from my side. And then Corey's space is right in the front by the foyer in the top. There's a board right there. Yeah. It's outside. Yeah. It would be nice to have seen a larger site plan. This looks like it's at the end of the building or not. No, that is dangerous. It works in front of the building. That's the whole building. This is sweepy. That's sweepy. It's like the side. It's like a single level side. Right. But this is a huge building and what we're looking at is a little section of that. And that's all that I am. That's all that we are. That's the whole section. And the rest is warehouse. No, I get it. I get it. It's just something like this should be some sort of way like know where the parking is and how the roads relate to it. Will there be any signage? That would be up to Redstone. Redstone right now doesn't have any signage. Right now for us, it's the doors that have been signed and where that direction is. So we still have to get permission from the property management in order to put up signage. But that parking facility in front is strictly all out. I think that's all I had for questions. Are there any other questions from the board? No changes planned to the bathrooms? Nope. There are pictures of them attached. Both men and the women's. They are both set up for the proposed that we have for the influx for roughly 30 to 35. There's two in each one. And there would be no changes. There would be no changes. There would be no changes. There would be no changes. There would be no changes. There would be no changes. There would be no changes. And there would be no changes to these. Because they're already preset up. I just noticed that, I mean, obviously you have able bodied people as your students. They don't appear to be ADA accessible. What kind of building permit does this require? It'll go through the division of fire safety for the fit of that. Depending on what they need to do specifically with the electrical plumbing and the local building permit. It's not mechanical. Because it's considered a public building and all that need to go through the division of fire safety for permitting. And local building permits as well. But because it's a public building, we issue the local building permit based off of the review from the division. Okay. Great. Thank you. Any thoughts on the bathrooms just spurred adding a locker or shower facilities at all? It is a possibility in the future. Once we kind of know, once we get in and see the space where best it would fit, then we will definitely, it is something in about a year and a half. We do want to look into having a locker room or at least with the, there is kind of that hallway that's right in there. Kind of walk into the restrooms against that wall would be a set of coulis. Yeah, correct. And the reality is that they wouldn't change the wall structure. Okay. They're just like, they wouldn't create setups or metal lockers depending on the width. I don't think you're like a mother when you're a family. Yeah. It's so kind of the same stuff. Yeah. So with those lockers, are there plans for shower facilities as well? Because that... Possibly. We would, like I said, we'd have to look at, I haven't gone in and actually set up yet of what our kind of our layout would be. But it is a possibility that maybe in the future that room, which is, the two rooms that are outlined by red write some set from the bathrooms. Those two rooms there, one of them is the security room, which holds all the electrical panels and things like that. The room next to it does have a possibility to put a shower room in there. That would be a private lock. Yeah. It's like a mop sink in there, right? Yeah. Correct. So it's a possibility. We would have to get it. I'm grateful that she was actually in the space. I've worked in there for about 10 years. Oh, great. That's perfect. She's going to shower. Eric, would they need to come back and see us if they wanted to modify the building to add showers in the future? For adding showers, no. They would need to go through the building permitting process for the plumbing side, but they wouldn't, that wouldn't constitute a change of use. Okay. So they would not need to come back before us. Okay. Great. I think that officially is all I had for questions. Unless somebody else says something, I was like, oh, yeah. So the approval for the conditional use, conditional use on this one? Yes. Would be all that's required from us. That's correct. Unless they were looking to potentially expand into additional space or construct any type, any new building to accommodate any expansion in the future. But yeah, as long as they stay within the footprint that's included in this application, that would constitute the use. Okay. Great. I thank you. Stay close just in case anybody else has anything they'd like to say that we may ask you to respond to. That's correct. Unless they were looking to potentially expand into the future to respond to. I forgot to ask Aaron, did you have any questions? We don't see you on the screen. No, almost that. Okay. Thanks. There he is. Check it. Is there anybody else here that would like to speak on this project? Please come forward. I'm so sorry. Your name again? Dennis. Dennis. Okay. Do you want to bring up the satellite picture? Sure. Just for a little bit. Yep. I'm also here with Diane and my neighbor who's right next door. Okay. We have a different one because sometimes it crashes. So, overall this sounds not bad to me, but I do have some concerns about noise. Wow. Right now, our backyards look right over this property. It's a very nice back yard. There's a forest behind us between us and the property that we're talking about. A lot of playing and I smell a lot in the back yard a lot through this summer. The nice thing about here through my windows in the back yard, I'm a little concerned about stuff now going on in the evenings and here in a lot of traffic back there. It sounds like it might not be too bad, but I did want to have a discussion about it. Yep. Sorry. Just trying to make sure I got the right. So, yeah, this is the actual diagram. So, we are the properties right up at the top of the hill on the right side there. The user. Nope. Down towards the bottom there on Clifford Street right there on the west side of Clifford Street. It sounds like you guys are talking about being on the west side of the building, which seems like a fair amount of noise. Yep. And it sounds like people will come and go kind of as a group, like these will be scheduled to. They're technically come in as... They're not mic'd right now and for the purposes of the recording, it might be definitely cool, but sure. So, it sounds like people will be coming periodically in small groups, small amount of traffic. And the first sort of out is concerned that there might be some sort of alcohol and your music doesn't sound like that. And music could be relatively quiet. Yep. So, since the subset on that left-hand side there, like I stated, there wouldn't really be much music. It would all be in the building. It's not going to be outside of the building as well. With the user it wouldn't be if you've ever been to the edge or plan a fit or anything like that. You can probably tell it's kind of hard to talk over that music because it's in that kind of learning speaker. Think about four or five miles just now after that. I wouldn't be able to speak to the athletes in the room. When it comes to traffic, all of our classes end on 8 o'clock. You don't have anything that runs past 8. And we know two classes on Friday since Saturday is either. So, it's only Monday through Thursday and Sunday mornings. We use our Sunday mornings from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. just those couple of hours and nothing past. Additionally, most of our athletes that aren't specifically in Winooski or Essex Carpool are parents. So, it depends on the group of athletes anywhere from two to four. So, we don't have four parents always trying to draw on. I know these are going to be consistent. Yep, our age group is 5 to 18. And are you guys planning on any point that are you going to be moving outside in the summer for activities? It depends on the space. We may at times have some of our athletes in that front section there where we have the parking lot to a 40-yard dash. That takes about five minutes. We would have some do, and it's very specific. So, I think it's a good idea to get some of our football athletes. Are we talking shouting in the whistles? No. Overall, it doesn't sound too bad to me. I do have a pop here. It sounds to me like the noise won't be much of an issue. I also mentioned this to my neighbors and those that are concerned with noise. We had that we had cordy and cardboard. They're pretty much also subsets the noise on the other side. So, you guys really will not be you shouldn't be impacted as much with noise-wise because how much cardboard is coming through the other side. So, I spear it and belay is right behind us. It sounds reasonable. The concerns I get during the meeting sound, it doesn't sound really much of a problem. I appreciate it. Cool. Thank you so much, Dallas. I appreciate your testimony as well and just for the record, I can do a 40-yard dash in five minutes. Yeah. I thought that was good. Is there anybody else that would like to come speak on this project? Anybody online? We do have one hand raised online here. Okay. Steve Posner, you can Posner, you can go ahead and unmute yourself and speak. If he's speaking, we're not hearing him. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. It's hard. I'm not hearing him. No. I got you. I hit the wrong button. Okay. No. I believe Eric has a list. I couldn't be there in person tonight because I'm away. I do. I do agree that it is a pretty cool concept for down in that area for what they got planned. I guess my concern is living at the top of the hill at the end of Elm Street. It may fall on more of the developer list of our concerns and just more so with the gym being down there in the age group there is people going to walk there is people that are going to ride bicycles sounds like there's going to be a 16 year old driving a car down that street to come down there on his own plenty of 18 wheelers going up and down that hill how are you safely going to get them down there there's no ADA accessible from the top of that hill to the bottom of that hill there's no real liable street lighting along that area for the safety of anybody going down there if it's going to be in the winter months after hours etc etc I'm not trying to shoot this project down by no means I'm living at the end of that street we have 18 wheelers all night long years ago when that act 250 was approved it was from seven at night or seven in the morning to seven at night that's kind of fallen away from the loam of the town of one of the city of one of the one thing I'd like to see added to my list is the city of one of the city is making us a conditional use this conditional use for a gym is not in that conditional use it's under recreational and entertainment what's to stop a bar from going down there after this one is approved under entertainment and recreational then I'm concerned on parking there is some businesses down there that need parking there should be plenty of parking for them and that's just another thing on there but the developers should also have if it's gonna if it all goes through there should be a sign at the top of the street I'd say at least once a week an 18 wheeler pulls down to the project because they don't know whether to go left or right if it's a new driver and then they're backing up the street and all that so I'm just it's just safety concerns is more of the pedestrian than the people getting to that building the concept of the gym I'm all for it but it's just it's an ongoing changing down there that the city approves through conditional use as we all know the hunt factory down there flopped and that was a cluster I just don't want to see this happening I'm concerned about the anybody near my house and going up and down that hill but I do believe Eric does have a list I don't know if it was gonna be read in tonight or just in a file but I did want to try to jump online while I had a little bit of time where I am I think that's it all right thank you Steve so I will say yes I do have mr. closure's comments they will be entered into the record as well as an exhibit for this matter thank you anybody on the board have any questions in regard to Steve's testimony would you like to say anything yeah I would love if I could have a lot thrown I'd love to see just kind of that list so I can call back to it because I do agree with some of those statements it's nice to have the stop signs throughout that street to go down but it is something that we have talked about bringing to Redstone a sign at the top of that hill to talk about the 18-wheelers going down and possibly putting in a mirrored section so you can see because I don't know if we can pull up the satellite view it's got a very hard S shape going down we have talked about talking to Redstone I believe that is in the process as well of talking to them about putting up some more stuff up there so that we can sign into mirrors so that we can see whoever is going down 18-wheelers plus parents plus anybody who's up there can see and understand and look down look through a mirror and see okay I've got a clear passing to be able to go down this street I think with the street coming out like I said I believe there is three stop signs or four stop signs in that entire street before that S is hit when it comes to the sidewalks down and some of the things that within the city I would love to be able to once we are established go to the city and say hey we can prove that we have X Y and Z coming into the space could we start to talk about what can we do within the city that you guys could start to put in whether it's sidewalks whether it's sign inch whether it's more stop signs about that but I would like to as a business owner going in work with the city to be able to say hey you know we know that we have 15 kids that walk from Winooski down to our space because they live right up the street can we put in possibly you know a sidewalk cutting through because if you didn't mind they're just throwing up that sorry so part of that too it's not just where our space is the kids come down for the trails as well so again it's not so much just a concern with our facilities in fact they come down to go walk those trails when things that school buses we have not seen and they're all so long there has been no school buses that has been down that area the majority of the traffic trailers that come down come down on the backside the other side so more towards their side they would be the only traffic trails that come down on ours on the website is the cabin trucks and again we have guarantees from carrot that they are hours okay so they actually leave it so how would a child walk to the right now there's a sidewalk that yeah yeah so it comes from up here to here and then it's literally all road it's basically where the city stops plowing because we're the sidewalk if we were able like I said when we were in the space it is something that I have wanted to to pose the city of a safer route to come down that through that little cut with the s if it was possible to create a sidewalk that goes straight through kind of that grassy tree area instead of cutting along the entire s route it seems like a smart idea either a sidewalk or a pathing a clear pathing to be able to cut straight through down to that and create maybe safer pathing down to the trails not just to our space mention that is the trails there a lot of people go to do go down there so I think it's possibly already on the city's radar but with us going in there we may be able to push that forward more and be able to act as well that's not the city street yeah line yeah it is so it's all private property so the city would not be putting a sidewalk so this is the outline of the property basically that's showing there okay and then the city parking for the trails is all the way down the end of that wearing space perfect then yeah whoever obviously we would do our good deal doesn't find out who does control the leading hand on that but it is something that we have talked about putting into play as we kind of get into this base obviously it's something that we wanted anyway especially with me having a kitchen area regardless it is something that we have looked into and and you did state before that you expect the vast majority of your students to be arriving by car correct so you're not expecting a pedestrian impact we are not in the neighborhood with kind of what I've spoken with with the town of Winooski a lot of this area doesn't have financial backing as we all know there is there are a lot of kids there that end up having to be the parent to their siblings their parents are not home they're working double triple shifts I've spoken with a lot of people within this area about how to work with that and the biggest thing we do is go to the schools so a lot of the athletes in Winooski would probably be coming to us in house we would be going to middle school the high school be able to do clinics pop-ups the pro of being right down the street of that is it's not something that we would have to charge for it's something that we can work with the town trying to create scholarship programs as well so that we wouldn't really have a huge impact of pedestrians walking down would try to keep that with where there are comfortable which is the high school okay great so I'm sorry good I was going to say Mr. Pleasure has his hand up again so but I will wait for you to recognize me we can bring him back okay yeah then Steven go ahead and unmute yourself again okay no I like I said I don't want to harp on it if this is going to become a public building I believe per all codes of state of Vermont Winooski there needs to be 88 accessible building to that building whether it's private or public property and there was a comment made that school buses don't go down to school buses stop in front of my house every afternoon at 2.30 and 3.30 and drop off almost full buses and then they head towards Forestry so I mean I'm not like I said I'm not trying to really be on I think a lot of this all falls on the developer and I believe this needs to be some kind of conditional use for this conditional use and a better site plan showing how the public will be able to access this building and I mean there's I believe the young lady on that talking has a catering business down there you know not just looking at the future could that expand into a restaurant and then also no I know you're saying no now but I do development for a living we just we just did that yeah we we just did that a few months ago right with you okay yeah there there is no possibility of a restaurant there right and I wasn't included in that meeting we were never warned of that meeting nevertheless it's just part of this deal being on that end is true so we're just my comments and we'll let it go from there okay well thank you so much Steve for for joining in yep all right take care is that these school buses go down and don't move down the S if I am incorrect I would love for him to speak back up but I'm believing that those school buses do not travel down to our actual building they stop at the top of the road which is still a city road and then continue on to forestry as mr. Poser instead okay are any of the entrances to the building ramped could someone get to this space not through the kitchen if this is a right here is okay by approach yes so we have looked at the possibility onto the side but the right here this set here possibly putting in a ramp we would need for here and to look at construction see if it's something we get set in or it is something we have looked at because I know that there isn't super easily accessible one the set right here is easy enough to build in just a very small ramp we are looking at possibly putting that in right here what runs along the building right now it looks like an overhang what runs from the foundation it's just it's actually just the roof the part of the roof of where they keep the condenser where oh no I mean it's underground concrete is it concrete or gravel okay grass right up to the foundation okay Eric is that a is that an issue ADA compliance and accessibility in this case that's a good question that would be something that the state would address though with their when they do their building permitting okay they would address any accessibility or make sure that the doors are appropriately designed with panic hardware with activation if necessary depending on because it will be a public space that would be covered by the state through the building permit process okay and I'm assuming that the responsive and this is just me speaking not I don't have my big book here but I'm assuming that the responsibility of ADA compliance would fall on the shoulders of redstone and not individual businesses is that it would be the property owner yeah okay correct yeah so that's something to to consider absolutely yeah any other questions or comments about this project no hearing none seeing none Aaron are you okay yep so good okay we thank you so much for being here and again we hope to be in deliberative session tonight to have an answer hopefully next 14 days right thanks so much real quick before they leave I have the exhibit list for this property for sorry for this project exhibits a through K these will be included in the record in as well as mr. closers comments will be added to this list also I have handwritten that in they will be formally added to the to the record that is that is recorded in the city's land records along with all the rest of the information take care and next on our agenda the final substantive item on our agenda is a public hearing on final plans for a PUD at 205 West Allen Street as we bring back in and so I'll just do a quick intro here this is a this is a project that you've seen several times before this is a plan unit development for 205 West Allen Street it came before you back in November 2022 as a sketch plan then back in June of this year as a preliminary plan and now it's before each night as a final plan I will note that in addition to the comments that were provided in the findings and decision from that June meeting the applicant is requesting a is requesting an additional waiver to the side yard setback for the Western property this is based on some comments from the fire department for the access driveway to make sure they have enough room to enter the property as necessary so the applicant has pushed the the Western building closer or is proposing to push it closer to the property boundary which would necessitate the need for an additional waiver to that side yard setback so Greg Dixon representing the applicant here tonight so great I'll let you take it from there oh yes you need me to raise my hand so yes please affirm that okay thank you Greg so I was not here for the June meeting so I only had to read put on the read minutes and then read yeah comments based on on this plan so I'm going to defer to the board who was mostly here back in June I hope I can give a little more synopsis yes kind of what has changed so yeah we reached out to the fire department originally we had about I think it was 12 12 foot road in between the buildings along with maybe about two foot shoulder on each side side was about 14 to 15 feet between the buildings this is the existing building 205 and a new proposed one to the West after conversations with fire department they decided that they needed 20 foot free space in between the building so that they could drive the new fire truck back in here we had a lot of back and forth on this I did not think it was necessary but in the safety we worked with fire department to do this the only other option was to sprinkle each one of these residential homes which is an idea but there's a lot of upkeep with that for residential person to take on and the intent of these buildings is to sell them as condo residential homes so having a full industrial sprinkler system in a residential home is not ideal so the reason I am asking for the additional waiver you can see that Western building has moved about four and a half feet to the West in order to make up the additional space we will not be paving that whole space originally the fire department did want that but I pointed out to them that if you pay the 20 foot space you're just inviting people to park along the side of it which kind of defeats the purpose of getting a fire truck through there so we will be strengthening that five foot shoulder but it will be covered in four to six inches of topsoil seated and will be grass the 15 foot road was a compromise that the fire department was willing to take on besides that change really nothing's changed on this project besides adding additional detail even from the sketch plan that we originally came into you with it's still a three unit PUD all the units will be condoized and be sold the intent is to sell them separately and they would sort of own the property as an association I think there there were quite a few comment or maybe about six or seven comments that the board had we have to address those all together but I also wrote a five page document which I don't know if you read but it's a little bit piggybacks on what I originally wrote for preliminary and then also answer some of those questions so maybe I can just answer additional questions that the board has we always read everything I do produce a lot of paper very good so that is the request for additional waiver it was sort of a last second thing I think I did it about an hour and a half before I had to beat my vacations so I think it's all there Eric has told me it is so besides that nothing much else has changed from preliminary the owners did speak to the neighbor about fence we did put a detail of a fence in there believe there do just do a wooden privacy fence about six feet tall it's very similar to what we did and that would surround the entire all three sides yet you can see it on the site plan okay it won't go out in front like the current one does if you ever walk down there on West Allen Street right now actually the the fence is actually on the city property and so we will be looking that but as you can see it will tie in to the existing building at 205 on the east side it's actually more of like a screening porch right there and then it will tie into the west southwest corner of the property on the west side so kind of enclosing that whole area for them use very similar to all the other properties just for clarity Eric the two variances that are very other two variances for two setback to waivers rather so there was a waiver sorry variance it waiver there was a waiver granted to the front yard setback to allow the existing building to remain okay there was a waiver requested and granted to the rear yard setback to be able to push the northerly building closer to the property boundary so this would be a third waiver being requested for the Western property boundary now I would also point out that that waiver request to the to the West is a PUD setback waiver we still need the waiver of this zoning the zoning for this property is 10 feet we're still leaving 10 and a half feet so I know it's because it's a PUD it has the additional 5 feet all around you kind of pick the the biggest one and make it consistent so I just want to point that out as well it is consistent with the neighborhood just not consistent and as soon as you push the driveway close to the existing so you had enough room to turn into the western most building are you having a concern about I see you put bollards any concern about the closeness of that way to the existing building I mean that's why we put the bollards that close there is if you were to go out there today that's about a 18 inch concrete sort of sill that runs along that existing building that will stay in place it is a 15 foot wide road which for residential driveway is quite substantial I think 90% of the cars that come back in here are gonna be fine might have some issues with larger vans or if like a delivery driver decides they want to be real lazy and drive into this place I also put it there for if the fire truck ever does come but I do think regular cars sands trucks as you be smaller as you need to be fine again I'd push I'd push the idea that these properties will be sold as separate units and the people who are buying them will kind of see the closeness of the site and understand the site and I think that will also push sort of I just wonder if it would be possible to center it between those two buildings and strengthen both sides yeah I don't see why that would be a problem like I said I think I did this about an hour and a half so I was trying to keep the curb around the same spot that I showed it originally so it was less of a change brought before you all but yeah we can definitely put that in the middle and then up to a half feet on the other side and what is the strengthening is it it would be the same like geobark it would be the same sub-base as the road just instead of having the four three and a half inches of pavement it would have four or five inches so the truck won't sink when it drives on that how wide is the truck so it's when you see these new truck that they bought for using for the car I had a discussion with the fire department and I thought that was an unlikely truck to use on this property but that's not here nor there so the truck is not that wide because obviously 20 foot wide vehicle could not drive down so the truck itself I think it's about a half feet what is the stabilizers for the truck so the truck drives in they shoot out their stabilizers to put up the giant ladder to get to the top of this so these are two story structures right okay so I don't want to speak for the fire department but when the new truck arrives we will be disposing of the of the existing ladder truck so that'll be our only ladder yeah I'm not dismissing the fire department's comments at all yeah I was no I'm just just providing some additional context is so that if they were to need to get on to the site to get above the structure is the only it's the only vehicle will have so they'll need to be able to cite it appropriately to make sure that it doesn't get damaged in the process yeah and clearly we didn't we're not dismissing it I pushed back just trying to understand the actual procedure they would use to fight a fire on this but at the end of the day we're happy to keep safety in mind we are requesting the additional waiver for that exact point but I will bring up one other thing because I was upset I didn't say it last time I know you had mentioned that we can just reduce the size of the buildings and maybe get less waivers the buildings are the size so that that consistent we thought consistency was crucial in a co-ownership environment if you have two buildings that are about 2,000 square feet actually I think these are close to about 1,500 square feet and then you have one building that's a thousand square feet the ownership conversation comes a little bit more onerous and so our attempt to keep all the buildings consistently about the same size was was part of that I was kind of kicking myself I didn't mention that last time it is in my long list of information here are they mirror images of each other I think we asked this last time I did the same yep they are the same building the same footprint yeah that's it only one set really high foundation so it's a step up to that porch and then a step into the building yeah and then obviously the driveways we also had discussion about front door entrance we took a look at it it was kind of difficult to put a front door the space on the back building the board had asked us to look into putting a door facing the the street that door would be blocked by the existing building anyways but we did look into it I had a lot of concerns because we can't really put an overhang over it keep water off of it I was worried you sort of just have a door that would take on a lot of rain and possibly go into the building I think there's another list of about five other items that just were concerning to us not to mention that I mean I have a garage that's pretty much 95% of how I enter and exit my house is through my garage these buildings will have doors into the garage into the building so those will also act as kind of front doors so are there so is the only other door to that back building off of the porch to the right yeah okay and the only other one is off the porch to the left of the left building or to the bottom of the one two buildings have front doors that face okay the existing one there just that back faces West Allen Street does face to the east and is it a new fence on the east side as well yeah we're still in coordination with that neighbor the fence that is there right now is so nobody really knows who owns it it's on her property but they've been interested working with us to just have sort of one fence that would be on our property yeah so that proposed fence is taking into consideration her concerns about her landscaping in the back yeah I think her concerns were actually mitigated because she was worried about her tiger lilies which I think are kind of right in front of her garage Aaron did you have any questions I don't think so you don't think so only at the beginning I'm sorry yeah that's what it's okay yeah okay all right any other questions or comments from the board well I just want to say thanks to Greg like you put a lot of work in yeah responding to the comments I appreciate it yeah let's spend a year now right almost remember we came in for sketch and then we took six months off to actually do a lot of this stuff the balance that they took a while and then we had a combination of me on the vacation and other stuff that I couldn't sit in September so yeah back here in October okay well thank you stay close we'll invite anybody else who wants to speak to please come up did you want to speak on this no okay is there anybody online we do have Nathaniel Eisen online Mr. Eisen if you want to say anything please use the raise hand feature or the chat or otherwise you can just stay put not seeing either no response okay I thank you Greg and unless there's anything else you wanted to follow up with I think we're okay we'll go into deliberative session later on tonight so so for the for this matter I'll be providing mr. Dixon with the exhibit list this will include exhibits a through n these will also be included in the written record for this matter and included in with the other information on the decision so great there's the exhibits for you and keeping with procedure from earlier I will entertain a motion to close the hearings for tonight's meeting moved and seconded all those in favor of closing the hearings for tonight please raise your hands or say I I'm assuming Aaron agrees as well yep okay that's right we couldn't see your video there okay so that carries unanimously the hearings for tonight are closed up next on our agenda if Eric is ready city updates I don't have any specific updates for you all unless there's anything you have questions about that I can update you on St. Stephen's Church appeals still in court so nothing nothing new to report on that matter Dunkin Donuts in front of the high school so actually that did go through the environment for the court did rule that so you all the city denied that application due to traffic concerns that was appealed to you all you also denied that application due to similar concerns that was appealed to the environmental court the environmental court rejected the applicants traffic impact study based on some some data that they basically said was not accurate they were showing a condition where Norman Street would be two ways rather than the current one-way situation and there is not an expectation that it would go to two ways so the basically the court said we are we're not accepting your argument and denied their appeal as well and it has with that was not appealed any further so that project is not moving forward they would have to reapply and start the whole thing over again okay I think that's any updates on any of the hotel projects yeah so lot 7d behind CCV there has been some activity going on there they did receive a zoning permit to remove there's some soils that it's some contaminated soils they did receive a zoning permit to remove the soils and also to do some sheet piling basically taking down the existing wall that's there the retaining wall and putting in some more permanent sheet piles so that work is in progress now they've also done some utility relocation the City Council did review updated design documents for that project that were approved and so next steps are to at least from the from my perspective I'm not involved in the day-to-day discussions with the design teams but they would need to apply to receive a zoning permit which would also require an amendment to the Act 250 permit for downtown so that is I believe their next steps so it's it is still moving forward on that particular hotel the hotel on lot 9 we are still in court with the owner of that property on so nothing new to report there and the hotel on East Allen Street has there's no movement actually really hasn't been any movement since you all saw that project three and a half four years ago now so I have to look at our regulations to see if there is an expiration on that based on the decision that you all issued but I'm not sure that they're formally is so it's kind of hanging out in limbo at this point is not nine the one right next to the Champlain mill yes that's correct yep yeah that isn't in the form base code that is in the downtown core zoning as well so that would be reviewed by City Council for designs including amendment to the Act 250 permit the challenge with that project is parking there's the city's existing garage technically the we we don't have any available parking to provide it's all either under current contracts or basically it's all contracted so on paper we have no available parking so problem with the other one right yeah well ish they're building a parking garage to go with it oh that's the one I'm talking about so that in the downtown core 70 v1 the CC v1 is in the downtown core yes so that is including a new parking garage to go with it to address the part that's not solving their problem correct correct is that the outer limit of the downtown it is yes yes yep the basically the properties on the east side of abnackie way up to ccv are the downtown core to the rotary the mansion street projects or mansion projects yes so there is no there is no current application for that project so if they want to do anything there they need to resubmit under our existing regulations okay all right thank you Eric and bring it back to you for the next agenda item which is other business so yeah so for other business the only thing I would add is our next meeting if we do need one would be november 16th the third thursday in november tomorrow is the deadline for applications for that meeting I have not had any conversations about anybody needing to get on that agenda so potentially we will not need a november meeting unless you all have something you want to meet about otherwise I would intend to to cancel that meeting looking ahead the december meeting we may need to postpone depending on people's schedules that meeting would be held on december 21st so I don't know if folks will be traveling taking time off but just something to keep in mind that is currently the the date that's the third thursday for that meeting so if you don't anticipate that you'll be available then please let me know so I can plan accordingly for anybody that is potentially submitting an application okay I don't need to know that right now you can tell me when you have a chance and I'll I'll send out an email to remind folks of that as well very good uh so our last agenda item is uh to adjourn so anybody want to make a motion to adjourn for the evening I will make a motion to adjourn all second and it's been moved and seconded so we will vote now to adjourn all those in favor please say aye or raise your hand aye that carries unanimously