 Do you bring your dinner this time? No, I do not. I got home from here. I don't doubt that we had lost one of our characters. But I know that was not the way I wanted to end yesterday. That was two in one day. Literally, I'm still real. Absolutely real. Was that someone that was with you for a while? No, she's been in our store in North Hero. Good ten years. She and her husband. They're in our store tomorrow at least. Is that how they're doing that? Do you have people that actually earn your living doing that? These people do. She and her husband do. They both have, you know, serious medical issues. They can't do more than nine to five or anything like that. He's lost an eye to cancer, and she's had what she's been through, I don't know, three or four times with cancer and all kinds of stuff. This one got her. Yeah, we do have people who earn the better part of a living. I'm not one of them, but... It's hard to earn a living with the crafts. It is very, very hard. Unless you become a real commercial venture, you can't. I mean, certainly not if you have a family. I mean, there's no way. No way. This is my best year. I don't think I made a fist at my income. I did well, you know, and I thought I wouldn't do anything else. I love it. But if you have any sense at all, you don't do it for the money. Because that ain't going to happen. Well, it's nice to be paid for your hobby. Yeah, oh, absolutely. For a long distance, you don't have to pay money to get into the company. Yeah, I mean, it's gravy. It's stuff that's allowed me to go out to lunch with my friends when I want to go out to lunch with my friends. I certainly do that on social... $800 and on social security. Excuse me, I'm not going to cut it. Like, this doesn't work. City, you know, that... I can't stop working. There's no way, so... Yeah, that's one of the things that allows me to have a little quote-unquote fun on the side and just have you enjoy the things of life until I got my reverse mortgage. Even that was hard because that was funny. And things, you know, the non-necessities like food and fuel for the car. It wasn't one of the bills that came in the mail. So now that the reverse mortgage really is the best decision I have. So if you just live another 50 years, you'll still be on the... You'll still be on the... Oh, yeah, yeah. Unless I use it up and wind up in a nursing home or something like that. No, you couldn't do that. But, you know, I've been... And what they do is they... The unused portion earns interest so that it can keep growing if you don't use it that much. And this time of year, I don't need to get into it. So for three months or so, I'll get another $1,000 back on it, which I can then use in February and March from the beginning of your swim. I mean, we don't have too many craft shows in February and March. Actually, we do have one. And it worked very well for me this year. It's the one that St. Michael's has. It's the... You donate half of your profits to a non-profit. It's the have a heart show, whatever they call it, which I always give to the United Way. And then I got an email tonight which I cannot tell you about, really in a good way. This is not a... Well, in a strange way, but a good way. If this comes to pass... I am sworn to secrecy, but my head is spinning. It's been a crazy long time. Sounds like you're about to retire to Florida. No, no, no. Never, never, never. Do you want your table way over there? Not particularly, no. I don't want my name back down. I've got stairs. And those are the problems I have. It's not going to be comfortable in my stairs. And I forget who I am, and I don't even need them. So this is good? This is fine. Yeah, you can even come up to that other corner too. Yeah. Yeah, that's fine. Okay? That's ready. Distributed. Poor Mark doesn't get the cookies. This is the trouble with being here by telephone. Most of them don't get their breakfast, it's fine to me. My friends don't. I have a couple of friends from my family who like to barbeque. They've gotten packed. They've got 15 packages in a day off. Really? In the last week or two. Wow. Every day there's another one or two boxes. I saw a lot of friends. I've gotten them. I agree. They're like looking for the deck of cards. Anybody could send me a deck of cards. This was somebody I knew from college. He'd gotten back in touch with me. He was just beginning to have some issues. I did give her a gift from our store, or sell it in the shape of a cupcake, which is very cute, which I will get in the mail tomorrow, hopefully. The last time I played cards was when I moved to Los Angeles and they'd spend all the time with cards. They'd do research and find out what their cards are. But they didn't know what they were doing. They wouldn't tell me. I'd have to write them. There are lots of things I can't do. I can't write cards. You're very kind. Thank you. Well, good. Better. Oh! Yeah, we want to go. Keep it under four and a half. Six and a half. I keep saying that this was supposed to end in three. A couple of things I didn't expect. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, well, I'm going to be using... I'll probably tell him now to hear what's going on. Yeah. Yeah, come on home. What's that? What's that? What's the story? It's a story. Do you have some poems? I think that's the Friday morning. It's something... Who's one of those? I don't know. I don't know why. I don't know. Okay, you're on. Okay. Welcome to the South Florida Development Review Board for Tuesday, December 19th. It is about 7.04. First item on the agenda is directions on emergency evacuation procedures in the conference room. If there is an emergency, we'll meet right out here in the South parking lot. And you can exit either through these doors or the doors you came in. So there are several exits. And we'll meet over here just to be sure that everyone is there on safe. The other way to make sure everyone's there on safe is to sign the sign-in sheet. So please do that also for ensuring that if you want to be a party to an item on the agenda in the future, you have to sign in tonight to make sure that you are eligible for that. Second item is additions. Deletions or changes in the order of agenda items are there any additions from deletions? Any more comments and questions from the public? Not related to the agenda. Bring down announcements. I have two announcements. The January 16th meeting will be held at the police station. That is, we have a conflict with City Council they're meeting on the same night. They're taking the January 2nd at the police station so we're going to take January 16th. And then the open DRB position is being re-advertised to solicit more applicants. So everyone should leverage all of your friends to consider whether they would apply. Thank you very much. I guess we have one happening so far, right? 17. Yes. Okay. Good. Next item on agenda. Continue final application 17-28 SD 17-28 of J and golf to subdivide a 47.998 per parcel to develop for golf course into 11 lines ranging in size from .37 to 45.03 acres at Golf Course Road, who is here for the applicant. I am Dave Marshall from Civil Engineering Associates. Michael Lawrence from Michael Lawrence Associates. And we swore to you last time. So we don't have yours yet. Thank you very much. Still on the same obligation. And so yes, we had several items to be followed up on tonight. So if you could walk us through what things did you change? Very good. The staff report outlines the roadmap for moving forward with regards to the outstanding issues that were open from the last hearing before the board. Item one was to ask for the plans to be revised to identify the access points into the proposed pump stations. Clarity as well as easements were identified on plans and staff it appears to be acknowledged that that particular request has been completed. Item two, a revised and revised plan is to show the water main size amount of the curb at the entrance. In this particular case on the utility plans we did show the water main diameter in great detail. We did opt for a 25 foot radius entering the roadway primarily by the fact that we also proposed a narrow roadway. So as a balancing act between and that was one of the options offered by the fire department we opted in that direction rather than multiple curb. So at this point it appears that technical review by staff indicates that that particular item has been satisfied also. Item three, submit a plaque showing the entire subject by the person that was submitted and it's part of the application package. We'll go into that later if you want to take a look at it. Item four, provide a letter to the Planning Commission seeking authorization for the proposed road naming. In this particular case the Planning Commission asked that the road name be one name both for the public portion and for the private portion to avoid any issues. So that being the background the plans do need to be revised to reflect that the applicant will be utilizing the long drive name for the entire portion from Gulf Horse Road out to its terminus point at the far easterly nor the end. Item five, update landscaping plans. This is where we fell on our face a little bit. My fault, one of the challenges that we had was getting the applicant to provide us permission to make the changes to the road narrowing. Eventually that was received. We made those changes and shared the line work with Mike but not in time for him to be able to get his landscaping plans in the package to you. They were delivered to staff by email but unfortunately they are in your package. Mike's here to talk a little bit about the things that we did change on the plans to basically bring up that up to date and we can speak with Marla as far as anything else that she liked or didn't like about that particular plan set. So we'll come back to that one. No, let's just start there because we're going to roll into other discussions with regard to landscape preservation as part of the documents that are part of the application and ultimately we'll circle back to the road length issue of 20 feet versus 24 feet as part of the closing comments from staff with regard to this application. So Mike, I'll only talk a little bit about the efforts that you made in updating the landscaping plans for the project. Okay. We really rearranged the trees near where the new driveway enters between the two houses there. And those have been ash trees 10 years ago and now ash trees are probably the place familiar that ash trees are getting, but the ash borer is threatening the ash trees. So the nurseries aren't selling them so we changed a variety of those. Made simple notes. There are little clouds around. Everything has changed. Where David is pointing is a never-granted slit slightly because essentially, either things were utility lines that were moved slightly for, I think there were three trees down that we noted there. And then we made some revisions based on the hammerhead far end. So it was really just rearranging trees. That's pretty much it. And more remains to be done? More remains to be done. I thought that's what David was saying. I'm sorry. I think the next clinician was needed. I guess at this point in time you didn't know Marla or staff had any chance between Friday afternoon and today to look at that particular information to see if there's anything that jumped out at them with the understanding that you never had the benefit. So we took a look at this plan and it seems like it contains good information. It does not act to replace the other plans because the other plans show trees to be retained if you go to the title block. Matt. Which one? Title block. Bottom right. Bottom right. That page. Plant list. No. Far the right. Far the bottom. There you go. Proposed building areas, rows and drives, trees to be retained and removed. New trees, shrubs and plant list. So this didn't really substitute for the previous L2. It doesn't contain the same information. So staff was unsure if you intended to not replace L2 or if this was just a working drawing or where we were with this. Well, this was intended to replace L2. However, if the description on that title block which I probably cut and pasted I could certainly turn the layer of the trees to be retained. I mean, there were a lot of symbols for trees to be retained and trees to be removed. That's what I didn't include. I just, there's so much information on these plans and they're so complicated to read. I was trying to create one fairly simple plan that people could look at and say, okay, that's what they're saving on the house lots. Those are the specific trees that they're saving on the house on each lot. So my goal was to make it clear. If you need the plan that shows them to be removed I can turn that layer on and show those trees as well. Are the trees to be retained with the little numbers in them? Yes. Okay. And is there, those numbers mean anything? Yes. Those numbers are all keyed into Warren Spinner's tree survey. So the intent is that you can go out in the field and see the tag on the tree, understand A, where you are in the face of the earth but more importantly, understand that that particular tree has a specific purpose either to be removed or to be retained. So it's a way to basically tie the plan into the site confirmation that conformance has been met. We did that for Ray's sake. Among other things, of course. So I guess it's up to the board whether we need a plan that shows the trees to be removed. We don't mean that they're being removed. Then they wouldn't show up on this plan, I guess. I understand what you're saying about it was confusing and trying to provide something that's clear. I'm just going to recommend a plan that at least has a legend identifying what the trees with the little numbers are. Can we keep the old plan and just have this as L2A? Yeah, L2, yeah, I was going to say L2.1, L2.2. One with the overlay. I understand what you're saying about adding it all in a tight space. Yeah, fix the tidal block. What's that? Fix the tidal block. John, you had someone say that? I think I heard what the changes were, but I can't see them. So unless we can blow them up enough, I'm not really prepared to understand how to think about this tonight. Do you want to open last week's packet, which had the old plans in it? I can do that. Mr. Wilking. If you look carefully at the plan, what I did was I put clouds. Yes, you can see that. Yeah, vaguely. I can see the clouds from, but I guess I would like either Matt to blow them up a lot so we can see them or wait until I can read the plans myself. Page it in his own hand. Like three or four. This one? Yep. So that's L1 and then L2 should be the next page. So it's really a different... Is this one right here? No, this is L3. Right, so the previous one was L2. This is L2, right. L3 looks like a blow-up of a portion of L2. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, in fact, there's several more that are blow-ups of... So the trees to be removed there are those the light green or the dark green? Yes. Light green? Light green. Okay. So these are the trees to be removed here? No, the trees that are to be removed are in those white spaces. Oh, so you can hear. You can see the lot numbers. I see. And those are the cleared areas. So those trees would all be in those... I got it. Very light green. And then the other question staff had was we had... Mike and I had drafted a condition together that referred to an area of basically tree preservation plan that referred to a specific line that was on the old version of L2. I don't believe the new version of L2 has that line anymore. So that condition that the next thing in the staff notes doesn't really work with the new version of L2. I don't think. I see what you mean when I'm looking at this plan. What I did was I unpasted the line of the existing trees. Can I stand up there and point to things? So on the new plan, I cut and pasted this line, which is where the existing woods are. And here's the outside of the lot. And I think what you're asking is that this is where we're planting new trees further out that this area now be considered as the tree preservation area. That's what I thought you and I had concluded. But now that we're talking about it in person, I want to make sure that you agreed that that's what we talked about. Okay. I guess in my mind I was thinking it's where the existing trees were. So I guess I really don't have any problem with that. I just didn't, I wasn't referring to this drawing when I was thinking about this. So it certainly had this on it. And it had this, I had almost everything else on it. I think this would be the only area. And this is all wetland in behind it. So I don't think there's any problem with including that. So I would recommend that there's no problem having this new L2 have, you know, additional sheets if it gets to be too busy. But we would want to show the outer boundary of the tree preservation area, whatever the board agrees that it should be clearly on a plan. I'm for that. Other comments? Yep. So it's easy to do. I can do it. I think that's what we're doing is showing the condition. Yeah, we should do it as a condition. We don't have to keep the hearing. No, great. Beautiful. But Matt, can I see the new L2 blown up so that I can actually see the areas that we're talking about? The most recent L2. Yes. Which is supplemental, which is right here. Which part would you like? Any of the clouds that... Why don't we start a golf course road and just kind of work down long drive? Can you blow that up a little bit? All right, I need to go up there and see it. This is just the change in the trees. Correct. From ash to... Oh, to locust? What did we end up with? I think they were a hybrid maple. Maple, yeah. Actually, it looks like that. And that cloud was... The cloud on... That's just coming up in the middle. Is a utility issue? Yes. Moved in evergreen tree. It was on a water line. Yeah. And same thing with the other one? The other one was also changing red maple on another project. Craig Lambert has suggested we don't use red maples. They're something subject to magnesium, something that's in South Burlington. And so, again, we change them to a hybrid... Still some kind of acer? Yeah. Yeah. And that's what... Is that what all the rest of the bubbles are? Around there, yes. That's what those bubbles are. There's one bubble that eliminated the stone wall because that tree number 17... Changes. They'll be making changes at the border. Not seen. We were putting the stone wall and that was one of the trees that blew over. So we said, okay, we don't have that tree, so we don't need the stone wall now. So the stone wall's gone? That stone wall's gone. And then this is a tree that was gone. Okay. And the one to the left? This was a tree that was down. It had blown down tree number 11 on block 8. Sorry, Matt. Go back down a little bit. No. Sorry. Go back the way you were coming. To the left of the stone wall, there's a bubble in the middle of the street right there. Yeah. That's another acer? Yeah. That's another utility line. Any other bubbles? Mike, I hate to do this to you because I don't know from trees. But our arborist tends to steer people away from specifically sugar maples. I don't know how much maple is in general because they're not particularly salt tolerant. Is that something that you feel pretty confident about? That's a street tree. I don't know if any of these other maples are just as problematic. Or other maples that you're proposing salt sensitive? I believe the Freeman is what I have replaced him with. I thought so. I'm trying to... This is the sheet, so... Is it the last part? I think I've got a note on there somewhere, maybe in the bubble or whatever. I think it's on the bubble. The red maples are the maples that the arborist has a problem with. So that's the first one. The Northwood red maple? Yeah. And the sugar maples are not near roads. And I replaced the red maple, which doesn't have a problem near roads, with the arborist, with a maple called the Freeman maple. There's four or five different varieties of it. And that's okay near roads. Just to interpolate what you're saying a little bit, you talked to the arborist about this plan? I did not talk to the arborist or about this plan. I got this information on another project in Okinawa. So the plant list is going to change from what we see here? Here it is, right here. Those are the ones that are being replaced. Okay. The Freemans, yeah. I misspelled freemeny. It's freemeny, it's freemeny. So this plant list that's up on the screen right now is correct? Yes. Okay. And that's based on guidance you've gotten from the city arborist on other projects. The plant selection. This is in response to the red maple that he said, don't plant red maples in this area. I might want to have a conversation with him about this for one last conversation because the project that he's talking about is the cyber mill, which is down on a much more flat area and may have different soils than this. I mean, how can you make that for the last conversation? On your street list, do you break out the street trees from site trees? No. I don't think they have to. Just shade trees. Could you move? Well, what I'm hearing Ray ask us is that as had a bare minimum, whether it be as a condition of approval or something that we provide to the board moving forward is that for pricing purposes and for bonding purposes, then we want to have the infrastructure and the trees located within the public rights way as part of the street tree planting separate from the other components of the project. Other things that we may want to think about moving forward is that we identify those particular trees on the plant list that are to be stricken from the project. Right now they're highlighted as being changed, but it's not clear to the layperson what that really means. So that would be little things that we can do to basically recognize how we're moving from the previously approved plan at the preliminary plant level to ultimately where we are today. I have a question about the oak trees that you showed. If you could please sit down and be close to the microphone. We're missing your audio. Okay, thank you. I noticed you had the diameters on the oak trees an inch smaller than the diameters on the maples that were listed above it. It seems kind of skimpy. Could you explain the reasoning for the smaller diameter on the oak trees on the maples that are listed above it? Well, actually, there's a hackberry there, so that's what I've got to say. Why is that? How long will it take those to mature? What do you consider mature? Well, to look like a tree. How's that for precision? Well, you know what? I honestly don't remember exactly why I did it that way. Have you heard the theory about trees and planting trees? As you plant bigger trees, the cost goes up exponentially because of the root ball, the weight of the roots. That's one thing. The second thing that happens is the failure rate goes up with larger trees. Why is that? The first part I understood, and the criticism of the chinsiness was implicit in my question. The second point I'm not familiar with. Explain that to me if you will. When you're moving a large tree, it just takes much bigger equipment. There is much greater chance of bumping things. Trees, when they're young, they somehow respond better. Like a little whip of a tree is the easiest to do. I think it has something to do with the fact that it's rooted, that it's set in its ways, if you will, and if you pick it up and move it, it just takes a lot more care. That may be. I noticed the ones that had one substantial experience with the planting of a lot of trees behind me some years ago, and the three-to-three-and-a-half inches held up real nice. That seems to be the max you're going for here. While I'm saying it's two-to-two-and-a-half inch, it's like a twig just about. I would disagree with that. A two-to-two-and-a-half is, again... Let me put it another way. At what rate do they add diameter? Probably about a half inch a year. But again, sometimes when you plant a large tree, it sits there for a while, and it doesn't do much. It just takes a couple years for it to just get acclimated before it starts growing, whereas a smaller tree takes off a little faster. It's a judgment call, a lot of it. Just out of curiosity, my general feeling about this project is that we shouldn't stick our fingers in too far, because given the location and what's planned for this, these are people who can take care of themselves. That shouldn't need a lot of handholding, but I'm wondering whether these lots are going to be pre-sold or people are going to see what they're buying. You know? I'm asking. I don't know. I don't know what the status of the lot will be at the time of sale. Obviously, getting the trees planted sooner than later has a benefit as far as the maturity of the trees. If a lot doesn't sell for three or four or ten years. The other side of the coin is that depending on its location, it may be adverse in regards to challenges during construction phase of somebody trying to site a home right next to a tree that was just barely planted there. It would make more sense for it to be offset or delayed until the house is put into place to achieve ultimately the big-picture goal, which is a density, high-density forested area. So I think, Frank, the opportunity there is that trees not proximate to infrastructure installation or the building envelope could be planted sooner than later earlier in the process, and that thereafter, perhaps each lot, as far as the tree's proximate location to the building envelope could occur immediately after the house is constructed. So we've got to figure out just what makes sense there. Thank you for your explanation. I'll take enough time. As I said, this is not a hand-holding project for this particular project, I don't think. I do have one question for Ray to put him on the spot. In regards to the LDRs, there is a minimum diameter requirement for street trees. Two-and-a-half. There you go. So anything within the street rights of way should be a minimum of two-and-a-half inch. Okay. The risk of beating a dead horse, the two-and-a-half trees, inch trees are not changed from the 2000 for the preliminary plan, so not subject to our review. Helpful. Thank you. What size? So the last thing on this that I would like to cover is the wording for the tree preservation plan. So the notes say here that you would like to allow tree removal for the health of the surrounding golf turf. Is that accurate? Yeah, that is correct. We shared some conceptual words or a sentence to be inserted into this particular condition that would help balance the goals of tree retention in this particular area, not only in regards to what the condition calls for as far as the health of the forested area, but at the same time recognizing that the golf course itself needs to have air movement and access to sun in order for the turf to remain healthy. So we are always constantly struggling on the edges of forested areas and golf courses in regards to how to balance those two things. We heard some testimony earlier from neighbors in regards to the fact that there were some trees cut down that was done specifically to improve the air movement and sun access into that particular green area, the 13th green they call it. So that's what we want to make sure that you are aware of in regards to ultimately a condition that would carry with this particular portion of the project. I think it's important to have trees removed for the health of the turf. If it's going to be a viable golf course, you can't have scraggly looking turf. Comments from the board? I agree. Well, I think there's an issue of fairness to those of us who have to replace our trees every time we take them down. So I would be of the opinion that you take down a tree, you put up a tree. You may put it up in a different spot, but you take down a tree, you put up a tree. That's what the rest of the town has to do. I think that's what this should have to do. Jennifer Frank? I generally would agree with John on this point and this particular project, as I've said several times, it's all interior. As I understand it, it's interior stuff. You're not talking about, again, things that affect the public view or the public to any great extent here, are you? You're talking about interior? So right now, so the documents that were prepared for this focused on tree retention inside the lot, the landscaping plans obviously show a commitment to supplement those areas outside of the lots, but the language within the tree preservation plan only focused on the lots. So what the applicant and staff have been reviewing is how to make this more inclusive to not only protecting the trees inside the lots, but also the area immediately outside of the 10 lots and the rights of way. So that's what we are all working towards and we're close and as long as we can basically recognize that there's a golf course in the immediate vicinity and that there are certain maintenance obligations there or, yeah, I'll leave it at that, that I think there's going to be an appropriate balance. But that's kind of what I'm getting at. Maybe I'm not understanding correctly what this project is about. It's four people who want to live on a golf course. Is it not? Pardon? Four than four, but yeah, I get your point. The golf course is definitely going to be a sale four, are you? I mean, isn't that the idea, basically? Yes. So for this particular project as I was saying, this is the trees and everything else are a market matter to a greater extent than I would normally feel that way for this specialized category of people, which is how I see it. Not everybody wants to live on a golf course. And those who do presumably have some concern about the quality and the upkeep of the golf course or what it's like. And they too are balancing that against the desirability of one or more dozen trees. And therefore they should be treated differently than everybody else in the city is what you're saying. I'm saying they're in a better position to make a judgment. But we represent those people and we represent a series of rules that are supposed to be consistent. And you're saying, but in this case, let's change them. I disagree with that. I think I'm guessing that there's at least one person in this room that's not happy about the fact that the trees have been coming down around their house. And I think the fact that there's a golf course doesn't mean that the people there don't appreciate having the trees up and having their view modeled by trees. So I think you're just guessing, frankly. And I don't think the fact that they are more wealthy because they can live on a golf course has anything to do with anything. I think to put this in a class situation seems totally inappropriate. There we are. So some things we agree on. I think it has to do with understanding what the project is. Yes, I got that. So, John, to go back to your point, you are saying specifically in terms of trees to be removed for turf health, not for the other... I'm saying you remove a tree in a permitted location in this town. And it's grown from two inches to eight inches. You're going to have to replace that tree with four two-inch trees. That's the way it works. That's how the rest of the town works. You disagree with the language because the language just says trees exempt from this condition are trees of four inches or less listed as invasive, pose an immediate danger of structural integrity, potentially atomic home, trees that are dead, trees that are diseased... There's no problem with removing any of those. Replace them. So how do the rest of us feel about the language? Because that's not in here now. Can we impose that, Ray and Marla? I think you can impose that condition, yes. Replace whatever comes down. I think you have the authority to do that, yes. Okay. All right. In spite of the fact that this is rigidly, you know, confined by a constraint to whatever the... Look, if it's four against one that it's... But here's the thing. Here's... If they need to remove it to protect the turf, they should do that. Should they plant other trees in response to that? Sure. Yeah. That's all I'm asking. I'm not saying... I'm not saying you can't take a tree down. I'm saying... Yeah, not be able to take out a tree to take care of the turf, but if they have to respond with it by planting a similar tree, then fine. And I think just to bring closer to this, I think the one thing I have issue with John's recommendation of take down an eight-inch tree, or two-inch back, what really happens in the real world is if a tree dies or blows down the middle of the woods, four two-inch trees don't pop up on day two. Yes, I understand that. But the rest of the city has to deal with this. So I think, you know, as long as we can figure out an appropriate program for replacement, that's okay. But I mean, at this point in time, we're not looking to spend thousands of dollars to basically put trees back that naturally die. Small trees that can be placed in appropriate locations would be a good balance. Wait a minute. Well, I just plain disagree because that's the way the rest of the city has to work. I'm sorry to be ignorant on the point. Are you saying that pre-existing trees that die have to be replaced or trees you planted? No, a tree that is shown on a plant. You go and build a development. You show a tree on a plant. That tree is on the plant and it's one of the trees. It can be there from before. It can be planted the next day. It doesn't really matter. If the tree dies the next day, or if you chop it down because it's undermining your building, which is what happened to me last year, you take the circumference of the tree and you have to replace the circumference. That's the deal in this town. Okay. And a tree on a plant, forgive me, has to be two and a half inches. They're not putting anything under two and a half inches circumference on a plant, are they? I don't know if there's a minimum requirement, but I don't think anybody plants trees that are really... Yeah, I don't think there's a minimum. It's just basically a caliper per caliper replacement. So if you want to replace them with one inch, I guess you just plant a lot of trees. Yeah, you're going to be putting a lot more trees in. Well, actually, if you don't think it's less than two and a half, then you had a plant up here that showed two to two and a half for oak trees. So that would put it down to two. I don't have a problem with the size. I have an issue with... You take down a ten inch tree, you should be either replacing the ten inch tree with a ten inch tree or with, let's say, five, two inch trees. And my problem with it, as much as anything, is that I disagree with this rule for the city, but it's a rule that the city imposes on everybody else and I don't see why the golf course is not subject to the same rules. What I want to say is that when we propose a tree on a plan that's typically in response to a requirement that we meet certain landscaping requirements and that if we take down that tree, then it needs to be replaced with equal value. Ray's always been very consistent with that on any of the projects that we've worked on. This is a little bit different in the fact that we basically have not a program starting with an empty meadow and trying to create screening. We're basically maintaining and supplementing an existing forested area. So it's a little, it's not quite the same and right now the regulations don't talk about a specific standard as far as how many trees need to be provided on a subdivision. They used to, 20 years ago, we had to put two trees on each lot. We've exceeded that on this particular one, but just getting to the point that there's intent and there's also tied specifically to obligations in your land development regulations on landscaping minimum. And right now, the subdivision rules don't talk to that. Ray helped me out there, but it's not quite the same as putting up a commercial building and having to put X thousands of dollars of landscaping out there. That's cut and dry in your regulations. It's not quite the same. When the golf course was reviewed for approval, there was no requirement that it plant a certain number of trees. Different from if you plant a building, you construct a building, you do have to plant a certain number of trees. So the trees on the golf course were proposed by the golf designer. Many of those trees I think were existing trees or existing clumps of forest areas that were left. So it's different than a commercial building that had the minimum landscaping requirement that had to plant X dollars. And then one or two of those or some of those trees are removed or die. The regulations are very specific that those trees must be replaced. I'm not sure on a golf course because they weren't required to be there to begin with. And there usually were trees that were existing there before the golf course was there. So it is a little different, but I think if the board wanted to impose this condition, they may be able to. Well, what we're talking about right now isn't the golf course. We're talking about a housing development that happens to be on the golf course. So I would argue that this is different. This is typical development. I could throw another wrinkle into it. Oh, good. Well, you've got the trees that are on the lots and now we're talking about trees that are outside the lots that are on the golf course property. And as a, for instance, October of this year, this windstorm came through and there were, I don't know, four or five fairly big pine trees that went down. What do you do in that case? Because I think in some, I'm guessing if you talk to Warren Spinner, he would say that's a natural event. That's going to actually allow other things to spring up in a natural area like that. So I guess I've started this whole discussion and conversation with the idea that I think the golf course has got a real vested interest in keeping those trees and they make those golf holes. Those gorgeous trees make playing that golf course wonderful. And so they've got really a very vested interest in maintaining that and keeping that. But if I may, there are two interests here. There's the golf course and there's the houses. Yes. The people in the houses may get used to a view out there rear that has trees in it and those trees may arbitrarily, as far as they're concerned, disappear at times because you need more airflow for the turf. Is that fair? I don't know, but I'm saying two things are happening here. If you're talking about the golf course, I will agree with you all day long that there probably are all sorts of good reasons for thinning out trees and so forth. We're not talking about a golf course. We're talking about a housing development. That's my argument. Okay. So let's find some wording. So it sounds like there's two basics to proceed with either value or caliper. The standard in the city is caliper. So replacement of tenet. I'm sorry, Bill. But, you know, gee, you read this thing, you learn stuff, you know. I'm looking at supplemental regulations, landscaping requirements. And I see John's point about landscape maintenance. All planning is shown in an approved site plan. I'm looking at section 13.06B for C, which says trees shall have a caliber equal to or greater than two and one half inches when measured on the tree stem, six inches above the root ball. So a plan that says two, two and a half inches does not comply. Right. We made that point a little bit earlier where we asked Ray for clarification on anything that is required within the public rights of way. It has to be a minimum of two and a half inch. So that would be a corrective item. What do you mean within the public rights? It says anywhere, right? Landscaping requirements. I'll defer to Ray on that one. I'm looking at 13.06B for C unequivocally and unconditionally and without limitation to location, trees shall have a caliber equal to or greater than two and a half inches. I think one thing you need to keep in mind is that the court dictated what set of regulations that this board is to review this development under and it's regulations back in 1999, 2001 era when this application was submitted for preliminary plan was vested back that far those many years ago. So those are the regulations that we have to review this application under some and that provision was not in those regulations. Well, was the provision for landscape maintenance in those regulations? No, there wasn't. This is a new, this is a new provision that we've added. So, are you sure? That's right. Because I was, I succeeded in getting Everett Farrell to replace about 60 trees that died. When was that? 2000 and 2000, early 2000, 2000, 2002. The applicable standards are in the staff comments from the previous meeting. Skimming through them now talks about soil erosion or reduction in the capacity of land to hold water and that's really the only thing about landscaping. Undue adverse effect on the scenic or natural beauty of the area, which was the one that brought us to court in the first place. So that condition means we'll not have an undue adverse effect on the scenic or natural beauty of the area is aesthetically compatible with surrounding developed properties and site characteristics and will protect rare and irreplaceable natural areas and historic sites. I'll say again, that's the condition we all went to court over. So we all remember. Okay. So that's the standard that applies to landscaping. Period. And then the one about ability of the soil and infiltrate water. Everything else is about utilities and stuff. Okay. Thank you. All right. I'm going to go for saying that that in my belief that settles it. I agree. Yeah. So, so we are saying that we want to replace by caliper or not at all. Is the board, but again, the court decision doesn't seem to include any conditions. Review things that have changed since the preliminary approval. And then there are some very specific provisions in the old regulations that the court says that we're sending back to the board for review under final. Right. So we really have no basis to say. Can't enforce the LDRs as they are today. Correct. Right. Right. So we really can't enforce it. Well, the only reason we can do anything is because they're asking for something. They're asking for the ability to clear trees for the health of the turf. Right. And that's the only reason we have an opportunity to do anything. Honestly, I think if, if we're abiding by those terms, I, I retract my position. Because Ray can't enforce it. Right. Yeah. Well, I mean, I guess he could enforce it if we, if we made it a requirement, but, but it seems. I'm sure. Go ahead. Yeah. It doesn't, it doesn't make sense to me if they're asking for a change. Right. Then it's the current standard that ought to apply. It's a pretty insignificant change. But I think the, I, I think the current standard should apply. Period. But that's a, that's a, that's the Supreme Court issue. Under normal principles, and I'm familiar with you. Come in, you ask for something new. You go with a new standard. I think the thing that we need to recognize is that the tree preservation plan is very clear about what its limits are. It's for those trees within the lots. Right now, what we're trying to come to agreement on is how to expand that beyond just the lots. Right now, if you're going to say, oh, by the way, Dave, if a eight inch tree happens to fall down because it gets blown down and you have to put another eight inch tree up, and that's not going anywhere here. So what we need to do is recognize it. What has already been previously approved is being something that just protects the lots, but something beyond the lots. And I think we need to also recognize that there's some balance in regards to the benefits that are afforded the city, or perhaps any of the neighbors, by an expanded tree protection plan versus what the exposures are to the applicant in regards to the plan that's approved by the court right now, which is just on the lots. So if you want to basically expand a little bit further, I think we just need to all recognize that it needs to be balanced in regards to the benefits of the city beyond what it has today, which is nothing. Well, but I assume the developer has its own reasons for wanting to expand it. The applicant can do whatever they want on the golf course. That's not what I said. I assume you wouldn't be here asking to expand it unless the We're not asking for to expand it. Staff is asking to expand it. The approval from 2010 from the court order says that the condition that the board shall record a condition applicant annually shall with the final plan approval, which is what we're reviewing now applicant annually shall provide the city with certification from a qualified consulting arborist as to compliance with the tree preservation and landscape planning plan on each law as well as on the retained project property beyond the lot, specifically listing areas of noncompliance. The reason staff has asked for this additional condition is to clarify what the tree preservation plan is on the retained project property beyond the lots because in reading through the existing tree preservation handbook it's not very specific as to what has to be done. So our suggested condition was intended to make it easier to enforce this condition that the court requires us to put on this application. Sorry. So it sounds like unless I misheard it that you are required to expand your plan beyond the Yes, I apologize Frank. Yes, that is correct. Okay, and therefore as far as I'm concerned you're required to comply with current standards. Not to me. Rest of the board. Well, I mean honestly Dave's last comments to me made me feel the same way. You completely changed my mind again to say you're pushing back hard on me and as far as I'm concerned you need to do what the city does, what the city requires. So this will be probably a vote amongst us. Okay. We've heard enough at this point. We're happy to hold on. Did we want to finalize the discussion of whether to add to the sentence about trees exempt from this condition include trees with a diameter of four inches or less as invasive species, trees that pose immediate danger due to structural integrity or potential impacts of the home, trees that are dead, trees that are diseased and trees that need to be removed for turf health. To me, yes. Or is that something we want to do in deliberation or do we want to make a decision? I think we need to talk about this. Yeah. Thank you everyone. So no decision here. I'd say we've got a good split. Yep. Okay. Next topic. So item six, have we talked about this one as as clarification needed on the trees within the tree preservation area that have been cut down? Looks like staff considers that will be part of our deliberation. Very good. Item seven, determine whether the applicant is interested in narrowing the roadway to 20 feet to reduce costs and if so provide a proposal. If the applicant decides to pursue this, let me know and I will work it through the system. So we did provide plans that then identified for that section of long drive starting at golf course road and proceeding between the two single family lots that the roadway would be reduced from 24 feet to 20 feet. We also brought the sidewalk in closer to the road basically provided a standard eight foot wide green space to basically provide a little bit more buffering to the existing house on the north side. This particular 20 foot width is basically was two feet wider on either side of the centerline and that basically extends again from golf course road right up to the horizontal curve here where we use that horizontal curve to blend the road in from 20 feet to 20 back to the previously approved 24 feet just to basically so it doesn't look like an hourglass or the opposite side of the hourglass visually. Go ahead. One of these parties has shifted to 24 moving from 24 to 20 or? One of them. Mr. Provost is here tonight. He lives on the house on the south side of the roadway. If I understand the comment I'm sorry. They're only one. Pardon me? Only one. Maybe we'll hear from you in the public comment. How many parties were there to the judgment? There were. There were. Bear with me Frank and I can answer that question. So there was Marie Ambusk William and Elizabeth Rosich John Kane and Michael and Heather Provost were the listed interested parties in the document included in your SAF report. So you have about half of that number here? It's just Mr. Provost is here. Otherwise everybody else listed here lives out of town now. They don't live in South Burlington anymore. But they're still the owners? No. They've sold their property. Or whatever interest they had they no longer live in town. That's an interesting question. Are they still an interested party? Well you know, truthfully I don't know the answer. I mean a successor developer would be bound by the order if it was sold to somebody else it would be bound by the order. Does an interested is this buyer from an interested party benefited by the order? I don't know the answer. But it looks like City Council has expressed itself. If I look again unless I misread that if we could go back to that paragraph on the staff or on the report it says our City Legal Counsel advises that since the judgment order represents a contract between the interested parties does not have an associated expiration if the interested parties do not agree to the change that the road should not be narrowed then the road should well it's obvious what it means. In other words the City Council would be in unanimity but truthfully would you go back to City to Council again and say how about if they moved? Yeah can you say again who has not moved? There's only two houses there were more than two people interested originally it was about six so I don't know where those people lived originally if they were maybe across the street or you know across the way. Is that right if I just put something out here? Should we go out of turn? We haven't really finished we're almost finished let's close any more staff any more board comments and let's open up no more board comments okay comments from the public please identify yourself. So Tom Leary and other than the other house there Oh thank you everyone who is going to comment tonight would you please raise your right hand and tell the truth and nothing about the truth on the penalty of perjury. Okay and then please identify yourself. So I'm Tom Leary I live in EXDOT house To the right or to the left? Yeah that one and I think probably what's happening there is Dave this gentleman here I moved into that house and it was and so it could be that those are some of the people who no longer live in the area about two years into leasing that house we were called up and told that if we didn't buy it we were going to be evicted and so we bought the house and at closing we were informed of this Longway easement which we had no prior knowledge of we decided to go forward with the purchase because we didn't have an alternative option line though. Now as far as this goes I think the question at hand was whether it's amenable to have a 20 foot road as opposed to a 24 foot road that's a pretty easy one to answer right 20 foot is much more it's much better I do have some other questions you know in order you know so I'm now a single parent and I left four children in that house tonight to come here I didn't have my work schedule I haven't had the opportunity to engage in any of these like the easement was a complete surprise to me at closing again I've talked to Ray and another fellow about this in the past but to come to these meetings is a burden so I do have some other questions about this I don't know if now is a good time to address them or what the right format is that's my answer to the 20 foot versus 24 foot which is yes on 20 yeah yes it's 20 is much better okay assuming you have a position at all since you're a successor to the interested party and not the interested party that's right so do we want to stay on this topic and ask other people if they have comments on that or yeah I would like to hear from Mr. Provost yes, Mike Provost my wife and I have our own 170 golf course road and we are agreeable to drink the road down to 20 or even smaller is that all you're asking now or do you want to dig into more that would be enough for now and then we'll come back and open it up for more broad questions in just a second anyone else on the road okay so it sounds like both people on both sides of the road are in favor of it I don't know if that satisfies the interested party question as you raised Frank that's a good point so anyway it sounds like people that are right there are in favor of it you know I'm starting to I don't think it's a clear cut it's real clear cut but what has happened here is this hearing has been noticed several times once in the newspaper and a placard and a budding letters to a budding owners here's the law as to what we would do we render a decision all interested parties have 30 days to appeal it I think I don't know anybody including me who doesn't who really objects to the narrowing on its merits and the people most affected are concur in the narrowing on its merits at some point it's no harm no foul legal counsel's opinion which Matt had up on the board was that the judgment order represents a contract between the interested parties and does not have an associated expiration the color commentary that went with that was that means that those interested parties could sue the city at any point once we've taken over the road to widen it 24 feet because it's not what was on the contract that they approved I agree with you that there's very little risk and I specifically disagree with that I guess those parties could sue the other parties if it's a contract but as far as I mean the city we're not parties to that contract yes we are it says on the we're interested party the city city of south barllington is the appellee on the judgment order I suppose that's the same as interested party right or only more so even more so well technically yes technically you're not in frank but frank's point is we've got the most forget the interested the legal term we have the interested parties we understand what their sentiment is now we just need someone who used to own the home a certain point sign a piece of paper that said yeah that's fine or I no longer am interested yes I guess the other thing I'd like to add which was subject to the 2010 litigation is that this particular order from the court does have a limitation it required that the applicant come in with a final application within 12 months so there is a termination similar to your own preliminary platypus there's a certain period of time in which you need to come into the next step otherwise you're done so just getting back to what seems practical today and in relationship to what the city attorney out of respect has said what the public notice process is our attorney says the court was acting as the DRV at the preliminary plat level they came out with this particular decision with conditions and said go to final plat within 12 months just like you would have said perhaps slightly different as far as the LDR expectations so his feelings are that as long as everything was publicly noticed that people had the opportunity to sound in if they didn't like it that this is the process so you were supposed to go to final plat within 12 months of the decision yes and you didn't we tried to it's a long story we also went to court about that would you like to hear the long story well are they is their current position valid where's Mark he could tell us about it according to the court okay so we had other questions that people wanted to raise in any particular order sure you raise your hand first so I'm Rawlin Brown president of the Highlands Community Association so I represent the homeowners as a collective group and one of the things that we've noticed recently is a lot of water fluctuation for the homes that run golf course road and I was trying to understand and I couldn't understand from these plans how the sizing for the water has to be provided to these homes has been accounted for in the current system civil engineering question so as far as pressure variations that could only be associated with perhaps something occurring with pumps we had the pumps checked out for two weeks on hourly basis no fluctuation and concern is that these homes are on higher elevation and is there really sufficient water supply available and I didn't see any sizing to back that up to at least answer the question as far as distribution it's an 8 inch main that's designed to basically extend into this particular site and there is an agreement of the applicant in conjunction with the water department within this line in the future to basically improve the looping and the redundancy of the system and certainly reduce issues with high demands on flow and what that means as far as pressure losses and subsequent experiences of people within this particular area other things that can affect the pressure is not only the water booster pump station that services the Vermont National Country Club but more importantly water supply that's feeding these pumps because each pump adds a certain amount of energy and if this energy starts out low then the amount of energy that can be added is only so much so that if the water department or CWD happens to be fluctuating or creating different operating conditions within the gravity storage tanks then you will also see just like everybody in town that there are different levels within the system so that's the best answer I can give you right now there so I guess I'll leave it for that for now as CWD can confirm that there's capacity to add I happen to live on the system too I've noticed to do well so there is current capacity to add these eight homes nine homes we have the permission we have the allocation letter from the city we had a booster pump because there wasn't enough pressure so we had the same problem but we didn't have enough pressure when we put an irrigation system in we had that booster pump I'm not sure you exactly answered John's question would you ask your question the current capacity you talked about capacity I'm not sure they're identical I'm not sure he can answer for CWD either for that matter but if he's got permission he's got permission CWD then has to provide I agree he didn't answer my question but I don't think he probably has the ability to well I think well but that's the concern of these folks here right the reality not the official imprimatur would be a greater concern do you have any evidence you folks who are concerned to the contrary in other words I think we're probably burdened by the presumption of the allocation that it's quote good enough and I think now probably the burden would fall on you to come up with an engineer who says you know I've looked at this I mean to get us to move on it we don't have any basis except the allocation that exists but you would certainly be free to bring your own witnesses as I recall at the last meeting Dave Marla had read something from the city engineer that said you need to have at least two inches and your response was we got eight so so I think that talks to if it doesn't solve the engineering issue actually to bring clarity to the comment from public works or at least the water firm was that for any new water main to be owned by the city it has to have an eight inch diameter and it's intended primarily to be able to provide fire flow so normal domestic flows there's usually not a pressure issue as far as adding people to the system it is when you have a fire flow event that you're pulling a lot of water out of the system that you can get extremely high friction losses energy losses and it will affect different parts of the city in different ways if you have small lines just like a small straw and you try to suck through it it's pretty hard larger straw it's much easier the second part of the comment was that on the private roadway it was the minimum diameter was two inch at which point that's where our statement said it's yeah well we're actually providing eight inch it's part of the global bigger picture issue of how to ultimately complete the looping components within the Vermont National that eastern portion of the Vermont National Country Club project so that's at least the background and the character of the response I believe and how far away is the Highland Association from this all the homes on the golf course so all the homes on the golf course are served by a water booster pump station that is owned and maintained by the Association so that's where we are in regards to what the existing infrastructure is in the meantime the city has raised the water tank to basically provide higher pressure levels I'm not going to try to describe or now I'll just not going to try to describe to you how the water department manages the water levels in the tanks with regard to the existing pressure issues that would be obviously a concern for everybody in the association and if this project just went away it would still be the same issue only because the amount of users on this particular system is such a small percentage in increase or actual demand on the system at that particular location so the fact that we have a this is obviously speaking without a lot of background is that if we have pressure issue I don't have enough information to answer the question so I'm just going to leave it at that for now there's a couple of pieces of information that the long-range plan is to extend an 8 inch pipe for distribution for a much larger area than this is the start of that so that's the intent is to provide better service more questions? I talked to Justin about that he's the one who talked about the circular pressure issue that's where I was talking to him about the fluctuation and pressure that's being observed for the homes that are on a golf course today golf course road we're not seeing the same fluctuation actually it's a different piping system on the other side of the golf course where I live so part of the issue is frankly my home is lower than the homes that are up on the golf course road the company station provides sufficient pressure I've actually monitored mine and my next door neighbor for some time we don't see the issues I get calls from people on the golf course road and it varies I mean it's good for a while then it's not does it drop below 35? I asked for numbers they just say well that fluctuates that's the big question that's the minimum pressure you can have right so you might want to check that yeah other comments? okay where do I start? sure the biggest thing I have and I think you guys might have missed the whole appointment the tree preservation plan I thought was court ordered so this is not something that the developers committed and said oh we're going to hold all these trees the whole gist of this litigation was that the wooded area provided the wildlife corridor and it's my understanding that yeah this went all the way to the spring corridor but they put the restrictions on this area because they wanted to preserve that wildlife corridor somewhat and I may be wrong, but that was my impression so when he says he wants to remove trees around the golf course to protect the golf course and help the soils and things, I get that but you got to decide whether you're building houses and you're a developer at home lots or you're a golf course developer and I just don't I see the talk of this tree preservation plan but I just don't get how it's going to be managed and handled and he's selling these lots to someone else it's going to build the homes in it so how does this all get passed on to the builder and then how does the builder pass it on to the homeowner and where are we at in ten years, is Ray out there every month with a fine what is the fine, what happens to these trees as they get removed or destroyed I just don't see logistically how this all lays out I think it's very specific in the handbook it does require an annual report to me by an arborist about the compliance with the approved plan so every year an arborist is going to go out to each lot and see if anything's changed and if there is they have to report it to me and it's either in compliance or not if they remove a tree that's over two inches without approval then that would be a violation of the handbook limits I don't know enough about the handbook details to know about enforcement it's just a reporting requirement I think the applicant did as part of the court process Ray these lots once these lots are sold the duty to comply with the plan will fall lot by lot on the individual owners so that will be part of essentially they'll be bound by a covenant to maintain the trees in their lot and a violation if they were to cut a tree down that they're not supposed to they're in violation and so there's some enforcement ability there to either require them to replace it or do something that we're not sure yet so the recourse of the neighbors would be to bring what's called a mandamus action against the city to compel compliance with the plan that's the the private recourse available in that circumstance if the city does not act on its own but it's one of those things that's the permission so they're in there you know we have three houses the fourth one comes in the guy wants to site the house little differently and the bulldozer knocks over the three four trees opens up his views if you look at these lots they're on a golf course which you should expect to see views and you know man's field and camels hunk but these trees restrict all that so it takes a pretty unique buyer that's going to buy something like this and I just worry that these aren't all going to sell overnight three years from now someone comes in and all this doesn't get relayed to that guy that's built in the house all of a sudden he clear cuts the whole lot and he pays a fine and he's got a beautiful view but I've given you this body can't improve upon that situation I've I think I've given you a pretty good and succinct response as to what your remedy is there is a private remedy that is happening you complain to the zoning administrator the zoning administrator has a duty to enforce if he's not acting then the private interested party has standing to go seek a mandamus that's what it's called to get the court to compel the zoning administrator to do his duty that's the ultimate recourse and that's if you don't want to wait for the annual report the annual report will be done by a qualified arborist who will notice that the trees are gone and Ray as an enforcement action will simply say plant so you took down to use John's example took down 20 trees of 10 inches that's 200 inches is that right 20 trees 10 inches 200 inches so you've got to plant 102 inch trees on your property maybe maybe not is there an association related to these will these be a member of the association of these new 10 there will be a member of the association regarding storm water and water system discussion of the trees that's outside of the homeowner well so this makes clear that the supreme court decision which is in last week's packet last week's agenda makes it clear that new homeowners shall be bound by this supreme court decision and so yeah Bill that's you know one by one is a lot harder to handle than eight homeowners as a group if we could get an understanding with the developer that they would create an association of these for the control of this of this forestry issue then you then the city has one person to go to they've got an association that's there to plan the purpose you know rather than having eight arborists come out there and come up with eight different reports on eight different lots that makes very little sense and you can just see some guy saying oh I'm going to get the arborist who doesn't care that I cut down three trees so if I can just jump in I never got a chance to answer the question I think an association would be a prudent approach in regards to the common infrastructure that is associated with this particular project the answer is yes there are no documents before you right now as far as that there are multiple associations within the Vermont National Country Club regime a master association sub areas I believe so this would be a natural inclusion of a sub association to manage the specific needs of that geographical area of the project site so would you agree to do to create an association or as a condition of approval yes okay we are not part of that association we would not be I think that's correct your lots are not included in the supreme court decision you could be an interested party yes I am you can join sure they would turn out your views right so I saw when I saw the plan our address gets changed can we hold our no sorry you can come yell at me later we front golf course isn't that I made your case to the state already they shot me down I'm sorry Mike and the setbacks is the is the driveway side now is that a different setback requirement than the front and obviously I'm assuming this is all within that setback yeah your house would be on a corner lot so it would have the frontage requirement for both long drive and golf course road that road is how far from my property line setback requirement is 20 feet but it's from the property line not from the property line I don't get how wide the road is my question is what is the distance from the property line to the face of this home now so that's 20 feet so it's approximately 30 feet so what's the distance from the property line to the pavement in the north lead direction here to here just by eye if that's 20 feet then I would call that 18 feet, 17 feet it is very close to that thank you I guess that's it ok thank you ok so I'll just kind of throw out some random thoughts here as this is the first time I've commented publicly like I said the notice of the easement was a surprise to me the fact that I'm just wondering maybe it's a follow up rather than taking too much of the board's time here but one particular concern I have is that I lose footprint on my lock which it makes it difficult for me to expand on my house which I had a plan to do and I don't know if there's some way in zoning that that can be addressed whether well by any means by way of some exception to the footprint ruler how can that be addressed I asked the developer or I asked the owner Jim McDonald about that I told him in a perfect world we'd look at the lots and figure out how to not shrink my lot in order to have this development I'm not one to it's your land I'm not one to object to somebody developing land that they own I've been sort of raising a stink on that grounds but I guess in a perfect world I'd like to see my ability to add an addition to my home not be constricted because this subdivision is going in so that's the first part the second part was I hadn't really I don't remember seeing this and it seems like the whole I know you're in a whole legal process I appreciate the pain of everything you've probably been through of all parties trying to work something out but it seemed to me that the board and the staff is serving the interests of the people including the existing owners of homes and when I look at the way that number one building footprint is situated it doesn't either serve the interests of preservation of trees because that's one of the most wooded sections of that entire area and I can assure you I've spent more time in that area than all human beings combined over the past eight years that's where I go to chill out I just walk around the woods back there and that's the most wooded section there's whole areas of that woods that are cleared essentially that they're 30, 40 feet in any direction there are no trees but that section right there is full of trees number one, number two for reference it's a lot higher than my house so if you're so the ground level at my house which is the back door there if you're looking out towards that building footprint number one it's about as high as that green buffer behind staff's heads there so that wooden bar there so imagine that being how much higher that is than my house now imagine that you're going to have about 18 inches to two feet of like basement level so right about where it says Vermont that's that's where that house that's where the first floor is going to start so it's really like putting you know you're basically going to what that plan says to me and I don't know how this is a developer or the mandate of the city or what have you but what that plan says to me is that you've chosen to situate a house in a highly densely wooded area where you're trying to protect trees on the highest point of the land as close to my property line as you can basically get it with no buffer there when it could have been situated like frontage to the road there which is what was done on Golf Course Road most recently the houses that have gone in on Golf Course Road recently have been very much sort of like frontage oriented right as opposed to set back into the block and no buffer between and I asked Jim that today I said you know I'm not going to go to a zoning a planning meeting and pitch a fit about somebody building property on land that they own but can we work together to like could I go on to your at my expense could I go on to your land and plant some trees there because I thought the whole idea of this like tree preservation thing was to preserve trees and preserve some buffer whatever and you know I'm not going to quibble with him but his response was well no you can't plant trees on land that's not yours I'm like well that's not really what I'm asking what I'm asking is would you approve of me planting some trees and so I don't know I mean if I were him and I had to go to the supreme court to develop land that I owned I probably wouldn't be in the best mood to make concessions either but I guess that's just my objection is I look at this and I'm like why is that doesn't make a lot of sense to me it doesn't seem like it was well thought out and considering and normally that would be much to quibble about but considering we went all the way to the supreme court I'd like to think that some stuff would be well thought out is that too much to ask open question so we run into this a lot in the O'Brien development we run into this all the time and we are typically able to find ways to mitigate aesthetic concerns aesthetic and neighbor watching kind of concerns so I don't know if we can on this one or not because it is a little bit high bound Ray Marla no I think you can't go there on this one that's not being changed it's been approved by the court that specific location has been approved by the court you're saying that footprint can you speak to the thanks for the flat no do you think maybe you should elaborate on that Ray what does that mean to the person who's being impacted and keep in mind as you do just answered with the flat no that I'm not in my backyard person this is literally in my backyard what you see here was proposed as part of the preliminary plat application and that was approved by the court at a very lengthy court hearing so that the plan that we're seeing tonight is not changed from what the court approved this board does not have the authority to change and alter that portion of the plan and that's just the envelope not necessarily the footprint they can build within that but it doesn't necessarily mean that the house is going to be that square it's more of a building envelope can you explain why the court constrains the board to building uncertain envelopes as opposed to envelopes that have square footage within a certain law I can't really explain why the court did what it did this is the plan that the applicant proposed in court the judge said okay that's the plan that they approved and now this board is having to live with that plan is the developer able to change the footprint or is the owner able to change the footprint or does that reopen it to go back to is there any leeway here for human beings to come to an agreement that makes sense for other human beings in the mix or are we all just because of this court process we're just stuck where we are are you going to object if they come back to you can I just get a human response here if Jim comes back to you and says hey we have no objection to moving that footprint because I don't even know if there's rocks under there so there is an opportunity similar to what was done with narrowing the road from 24 to 20 feet if there's a mutual agreement a revised plan could be submitted that showed this house a little bit farther from the point of land looking at this plan right now it's not quite on the point of land it's a little bit down but I do see your point about it being elevated from your house if the applicant wanted to move it closer to the road so that it's a little bit lower they could do that and it would be pretty straightforward for the board to say yes that seems fine and approve that change it seems to me you have several I think this is exactly like by the way narrowing the road same issues a lot of involved parties potentially argue them but I get I get it that you don't want to look at the concrete of his foundation from next door aren't there some other options here for example first of all what's the distance from your house to that sideline you're not exactly butting up against your sideline you've got a lot of space there is there any reason that a buffer either in cooperation with the developer maybe if you go along with it or you if it bothers you enough how much shrub does it take to provide screening from that house given the relief that's there right so it's there's a rock wall it's like it's elevated right but I'm not sure for example I'm not sure exactly where that property line goes if you go back to the previous thing is the is that the existing tree line there or those those dark marks are existing trees that are existing and some of those are on your property okay okay alright well that's news to me because I was in the impression that the property line was based on the way that Jim's team or whatever has taped off that you know so there's pink tape markers from time to time and they've been put on the wall there and I think you've seen those right Mike it's sort of like I think they're on the wall so according to that it's actually about looks like about 10 feet deeper in than the wall itself which means that I own some property on the elevation where I can plant so what I was asking Jim today can I plant some trees up there it looks from this survey that that is actually my land so that would help for sure but I think it makes sense for and if what you're saying is it's open and it's the same issue as the way that the road is then that's very encouraging it allows you know potentially to revisit that but if he doesn't want it he doesn't have to no totally get it you know people can entrench that makes sense but I think a developer is going to find I have not done a poor sample myself but I think a developer is going to find that that footprint is going to require blasting and a lower foot plant print is not because there's exposed like if you look at the top corner of that lot that's like rock someone said that's the highest point in south Brooklyn and it's basically it's exposed rock in my backyard so yeah you can see it on google earth you can see the exposed rock so I would imagine that the higher the more pushed up that footprint is going to be the more likely it is that there's going to be blasting and obviously again it's not I don't have an objection to a building on land that he owns but obviously I have a preference for not taking out trees that don't need to be taken out and not building where you need to be blasting I don't know if it's a normal thing that they would do for example anyway but I think it's pretty pretty basic that whole thing is just a ledge I don't know if that's what those that sort of stipple line is in the plan there if that's it has a connotation of being rock ledge but that's basically the rock ledge anyway that's it's it's a thing right and I think we all know that where you blast you create dust and blah blah blah okay so that was encouraging that was a good human response I can I have the ability to go back and talk to an owner slash potential developer about coming to an agreement about footprints thank you very much you're welcome I wrote comments from the public comments questions from the board so are we closing this and we continue again okay sorry what's the construction process that they need to follow is it is there any timing or is it self-promoting restrictions that they can only operate certain hours any of that I don't know construction noise is limited to I believe from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. 7 days a week 7 days a week almost and they have to start construction within 12 months or they have to get no this is a subdivision the subdivision approval does not expire so it's not a PUD so there's no requirement that they have to build the first house within 6 months which would be the case if this was planning a development okay so these lots can sit there as long as the developer wishes them to be undeveloped the road and the infrastructure does that have to go in first or does it have to development I would think practically they would have to build a road in order to get the equipment in to build the homes sure I do have one more question which is I brought up with Jim today it seems like he's going to be amenable but I wanted to ask y'all and maybe it's just again a follow-up item the 24 feet to 20 feet is going to help significantly but I think you can see from the plan that there's a significant grade on my driveway and so my concern is that this road cut is going to render it necessary for me to regrade my driveway all the way to the garage door because we've got about an 8 foot you're aware of this it's about an 8 foot descent across maybe 30 feet like it's pretty steep I think that's just another concern I have and I don't know if that was ever addressed in a plan but I'd imagine that making that road cut right there is going to make an already steep driveway grade steeper and hard to sort of blend like Provost about that same issue and the fact that the applicant is committed to making sure that we can make those driveways as functional as possible with their permission to work on their land to do that so the applicant is willing to have that as a condition of approval if that's legal but that being the background we want to make sure that access is safe from the existing homes that their viability and usability as far as turning movements and the like is not unduly and adversely impacted by this project thank you have our comments questions from the public from the board close, continue I don't really know what to do this is an unusual subdivision an unusual process we want to deliberate we need to deliberate you may want to deliberate before you close an event if you want more information possibly I think we've got a sheet 2L or L2 sorry maybe we've got L2 and L2A are we looking for anything more in there as are we we're keeping L2 and just adding L2A so the information we're looking for is a clear limit of the area that was subject to the tree preservation condition and I think we all agreed that we're okay with not showing the trees to be removed because they'll be removed and we won't care about them anymore is that true and there does exist a plan that shows the trees to be removed so that's what satisfies whether it's one with all the overlays or two different ones the tree the plan that exists that shows the trees to be removed has some trees on there that no longer exist the blow down but we don't care that that is slightly inaccuracy in that plan because that's not the point of that plan as long as the tree preservation handbooks accurately reflect the current conditions so nobody is responsible for maintaining a tree that has been blown down so I guess the only thing the only revision we're looking for from L2 or separately on L2A if he feels too cluttered is to show clearly the limits of the area subject to the tree yeah so however you want to do it I don't think it matters as long as it's clear use your engineering judgment Dave a couple of pieces of information which we typically obtain in a subdivision such as this is the budget for the street trees so that we can require as a condition that the landscaping bond for that amount be provided prior to the issuance of the permit to build the street the other piece of information is the estimated cost to construct the street and have that number reviewed and approved by the public works director and that number included in the decision so I don't know if we have the authority to require that information the court certainly did not include that as a list of things that we can so I don't know if this is continued I can we can try and find out the answer if we do have the authority to continue so I think that are we meeting on the second we are meeting on the second well I move we continue final plot application SD 1728 at Jamgolf to January second 2018 it's been moved in second we continue this to January second all in favor say aye opposed thank you very much happy holidays take care next on the agenda request for reconsideration of findings in fact in decision pertaining to preliminary and final plot approval SD 17-18 of south village communities LLC we'll see if they have again good evening pardon just identify yourself please I couldn't hear you oh Robin Jeffers with SD Ireland south village communities very much do we need to like this separate swearing I don't think so not at this point okay it doesn't hurt to swear more but you can to you promise tell the truth the whole chosen penalty approach I do thank you so yes if you'll describe to us what would you what you would like we submitted a letter and we are asking for a request for the consideration of condition number 25 of the most recent approval and specifically to change a shall to a if then comment regarding affordable housing and we had agreed with staff to an if then and when the final decision was made the text is different and so we are requesting the language be changed to say if the applicant builds more than 269 units then there shall be at least 6 affordable housing units in phase 3b with no more than 4 units in the buildings with greater than 3 units this condition does not alleviate the overall responsibility of the applicant to meet the affordability mix of section 18.02 of the land development regulations either within phase 3b or within south village PUD as a whole thank you very much and so in opening it up to the board let me open by saying that I don't see how we can do other than what the applicant is requesting because to say that we require affordable housing units before they reach the number of units that push them into requiring that doesn't seem to me to be legal but so we have a lawyer on the board for comments I think it's problematic for this reason it seems to me the developer and I don't think it's clear cut it seems to me the developer wants to have it both ways they don't want to be constrained to build affordable housing in the in the diverse locations that we're concerned about here but they don't want to give up the right to take advantage of the bonus now I don't see how to separate the two frankly if you want to give up the if the motion for consideration was to withdraw the request for a density bonus then I'm fine but as long as they want to preserve that option I'm against changing the condition and if they want to appeal it we can talk in the supreme court about the symbiotic relationship between our condition and their reserved option to increase the density why in other words why would you object to this condition unless you plan to violate it current I believe the way that's currently written that we're saying that there shall be six affordable housing units in 3B is that correct and they don't they've never had to do that unless they exceeded 269 they have no we have no right to force them unless they exceed 269 they have not exceeded 269 and our ability to force them to build six let's say before 269 is nonexistent I understand the point and so adding the language that if I understand the argument whether we have the it's difficult to separate one from the other if they get to I understand exactly where you're coming from how do you go negative if you get to 269 get to 270 and you've built non affordable housing in the areas where we want affordable housing and this is their problem then what is and you you figure that's their problem I figure the way the city of south growing enforcement works it's our problem and at that point since Robin has been here a lot and we you know you've talked about situations where where the board should be punitive I would happen to agree with you if that to us and Ray came to us and said we're at 270 and they don't have six units I think I think that's for six units at 270 they're at 270 don't they have to have all six units no I think it's a one to one so if they can do 271 275 so they have one market rate and then one affordable I see okay so somewhere around 272 I don't know 281 they have to have all six units so they could they could build them at that point they've got to build them backwards too which is kind of interesting they have to get right don't they have to be spread throughout the well that's the whole point so how do you get there unless you've already built the affordable units but they can make they have the affordable units for instance and they can set aside units that are now cheaper they can make that happen so I guess I would simply say this is theirs to do they have to make it happen they have to make it happen essentially retroactively into the other pieces of the project and if they want that density bonus they'll figure it out if they don't figure it out they can assume that we'll be a little bit punitive if they've overbuilt at least you and I will we may not be here well come on I wonder if the developer would accept a condition that said a rewrite that said something like that the developer shall not exercise its density bonus unless it can demonstrate at the time it seeks to exercise it that it has built it has met the following plan for diverse distribution of affordable units would the developer go along with something like that I would say that the existing condition already warrants that I'm sorry I didn't do it the existing condition already warrants that we may not pull more than 269 units worth of building permits without going over that without doing the one for one there's a pre-existing condition we can't get a 270th building permit without a plan I think Robin you're agreeing that's the current condition that is the current condition Frank's saying so Frank's your condition we're already there so the nuance in this condition compared to the existing condition addresses the distribution element of the affordable bonus the geographic distribution the nuance of this condition is it forces six units before or even if you get to 269 that wasn't it I'm sorry but the one that you included in your letter no the existing condition so the condition as written is the same as the condition Patrick proposes without the first clause so after the comma it's exactly the same which I think is Robin's right if you simply read it after the comma it says there shall be six affordable housing units in phase 3B now there shall be we don't want to say that I don't want to say that after they build there shall be at least six in phase 3B well and but I see where Marla's coming from she's saying there will be six in 3B in 3B not necessarily spread out I thought 3B accomplished the spreading out in other words by limiting the idea was to limit 3B to six wasn't that it because otherwise that was the place where it looked like they were all going to be condensed wasn't that the issue yes you're right if you if you kept going it was the concern was to that was the concern that everything will be crowded into 3B right well except the condition reason at least six so I thought the condition I thought the concern just reading this was that there were going to be more than six in 3B less than six in 3B no well the condition says there shall be at least six so there could be more than six in 3B I don't have the there was one section of the plan where we were concerned everything was going to be all the affordable units would be crowded into there if we didn't do something about requiring dispersal the board wanted some proportion of the affordable units to be in phase 3 since phase 3 was what they were reviewing at that time so they were only reviewing phase 3 so they could only address the proportion of the number of units in relation to the total number of units in the project it came out to six affordable units would be an appropriate ratio or percentage in phase in phase 3 but Frank's point is valid if we say at least six and if the approved condition is at least six and what we really meant was exactly six or no more than six yeah I'm hazy unfortunately I need to see the plan again to remember what we were talking about so I think the bottom line is do you want to reopen or not I think that's instead of getting you're kind of getting into the merits of the thing now we're just you're just being asked to open it or not opening so we consider for later on we make it we can make a motion I would make a motion that we reopen consideration of ST1718 for January 2nd 2018 we can't do it for January 2nd because the noticing requirements those hearings have already been January 17 16 16 and then Robin had an additional request that she sent me by email today I suppose we should discuss the merits of that request as well yes we had asked that all of the waivers that have been granted for phase one and phase two we applied to phase three and there's quite a shopping list of them and somehow one of them got left out and that is a side yard set back to five feet for single family duplex and triplex buildings we've we've talked that through a lot I think we can reopen for that as well yeah so I hope make a motion that we reopen where I meant my motion that we reopen preliminary final plot approval of ST1718 the South Village Communities LLC on January 16th, 2018 second the move in second we reopen this agenda item for January 16th all of the waivers say hi hi no okay thank you very much take care see you January 16th happy holidays everyone thank you yes we've got minutes and we've got two extension requests too is that correct that's correct okay so minutes everyone had a chance to read the minutes just one type of page which page page five page five okay that instead of tap top page five I like I like that I like such tat very top of page five it's perfect it's it for tat it says the top of page five says uses uses in the south section of the building such tat eleven thousand four hundred square feet are medical offices yeah should be that yes thank you thank you attention to that I would make a motion that we approve the minutes from December 5th 2017 subject to tat second the move in second we approve the minutes from December 5th all in favor say hi opposed okay and two extensions one extension is Harbor Freight do we have a SD or SP or some kind of number like that to refer to this too SP 1734 SP 1734 so we want to do a one year extension of SD 17-34 is that correct it's for three months they have requested three month extension did they we talked to them about that they said that they would be ready within the week they're close to they just needed a few more weeks to pull everything together why wouldn't you ask for it so their e-mail said they'd like one year just to be safe we don't care about that did I put the wrong agenda item did I put the agenda item in the wrong order this is this is 1775 Shelburne Road Harbor Freight it says one year just to be safe no you're right I'm sorry I have them backwards which one is three months three months is Hannaford sorry this is the new warehouse on the north side of Shelburne Road west side excuse me the west side of Shelburne Road going south it's on your left south of Shearer and it's at a little below street level right big signs tractor mechanics place yeah tools so that one is asking for a one year extension do we have a SP1734 yes SP1734 great what are we doing we're extending the permit for SP1734 Redstone by one year by one year thank you second okay it's been moved in second we extend this for one year opposed and next so who says they just need a week is it Harbor Freight or is it Hannaford Hannaford says they only need a week okay well they said a few days and now they have three months they're going to take a few weeks okay so this is SP17-22 and CU17-05 Lake Champlain Marketplace is that correct requesting a three month extension called Lake Champlain Marketplace that's what the subject is yeah as I mentioned to Jennifer they changed their name a lot okay I moved that we granted a three month extension to the permit for SP17-22 and CU17-05 second it's been moved in second we granted a three month extension say aye opposed and that's the end of the meeting thank you very much take care and happy holidays not yet not yet not gonna last