 for me to say. The Development Review Board is a quasi-judicial volunteer resident board that upholds standards and procedures as defined in the Winooski zoning ordinance. We review and make decisions on subdivisions, site plans, conditional uses, variances, and appeals of the zoning administrator's determinations. The DRB has authority through Vermont State statute and ensures due process, protects the rights of applicants and the rights of the public to participate in proposals for land development within the city. Appeals of decisions made by this board are heard by the Vermont Superior Court Environmental Division and the Vermont Supreme Court. My name is Matt Basowitz. I am the chair of the DRB. Harlan Miller is to my left. He's our vice chair. Elsie Goodrich is our secretary. Our current members are Erin Gayett, David Weisberger, Jordan Matz, and now Emily Morse. We'll just let everybody know at the start of last month's deliberative session, Erin voiced some concerns about being professionally tied to one of our parties tonight and has recused himself from further discussion and further deliberation. I'll remind you that we are your neighbors. And in a small city like Winooski, we are keenly aware and sympathetic to your concerns. While deciphering and upholding the rules of the Winooski zoning ordinance, please know that we each carry the burden of setting aside our own emotions and opinions to remain as impartial as possible when making any decision. Votes and recommendations are always cast in closed deliberative session that will take place as soon after the hearing takes place as possible. We will ask anyone participating in tonight's hearings to swear or affirm that all testimony is entirely the truth under the pains and penalties of perjury. We will ask you to say I affirm, raise the hand, right hand probably, before testifying. Knowing that there was a large response to the previous meeting and there may still be one tonight, we will be instituting a two minute time limit on all parties who wish to speak. And this reminder of this time limit does not apply to any applicant, a pellet or the representatives. We will also ask for applicants and or pellets to stay close as they may be asked to respond to individual questions or concerns that are raised throughout the hearing tonight. Please make an attempt to hold your response until the party has finished testimony. Please stay civil. Online Zoom participants will be asked to testify after all in-person testimony is complete. First item on our agenda is changes to our current agenda. If anybody has a proposal to make any changes to our current agenda, please speak now. Hearing nothing, seeing nothing. We'll move on to public item number two, which is public comments. Vermont's open meeting law grants an opportunity for public comments at every public meeting. If anyone would like to comment about anything that is not on our current agenda, this is your opportunity. Hearing no public comment, we will move on. Next item on our agenda is the approval of the previous meeting's minutes. Minutes were provided to you all via email and included on the city's website. So if there's any comments or corrections, I'll be happy to note those. Otherwise, happy to entertain a motion. I skimmed through, but did not have any changes. Anybody else? No changes for me. Okay, entertain a motion to approve the minutes. So moved. Harlow moves. Anybody seconds? Second. All those in favor of approving the minutes? Say aye, raise your hand. Carries unanimously. Next up, our agenda is the reopening of a public hearing on an appeal of the decision of the zoning administrator at 115 Barlow Street, which is the St. Stephen's Church. First up, we would like to try to keep all conversation on the topic of what we did not get answered last time, which primarily pertains to whether or not the building is on a historic registry. So please try to keep your conversation within that framework. We welcome the appellant to please come up and speak and present right now. Thank you. Matt, if appropriate, it may be, sorry, it may be appropriate to take a formal motion and vote to open the hearing as well. So we're on the record for that. Yes, we need to reopen the hearing, so we need to have a motion to reopen the hearing. I make a motion to reopen the hearing. All those in favor of reopening the meeting, please raise your hand. Sorry, who was the second? Jordan, thank you. All right, this hearing has been reopened. Okay. And once again, we ask you to affirm. Affirm. Well, thank you so much. I appreciate the opportunity to be able to offer more information on this matter because as you know, it's really important and this issue was left, I think, quite unresolved last time. And last time you heard primarily from me and Scott Newman, another seasoned historic preservation consultant about our professional opinion that the building is listed in the state register. And I will speak a little bit more to what the idea of this professional opinion means as a historic preservation consultant. And I wanna do that to just dispel any suspicion or myth that we are construing some sort of argument here or construing the issue at hand and fabricating an argument to push through an agenda. So that's absolutely what's not happening here. And I think you saw numerous, numerous parties weigh in consistent with what I had stated in the last meeting. And I think this is really important to get the clarity. So I'm really glad that we had a lot of voices, some of the most prominent members of the historic preservation community in Vermont. I mean, combined, they have hundreds of years of experience really doing this kind of work. And I will just say a little bit more about my background just to make it really clear that my opinion on this matter that I stated last time that the building is state register listed, the church. I actually serve on the advisory council on historic preservation. I was appointed by the governor to this position. I am the architectural historian member. I'm on the same body that approved the state register listing for the property in 1993. So I routinely do this type of listing and approval of buildings to be listed and eligibility determinations of buildings to be listed. So I just wanna put that out there too. Because I think what's gonna be kind of important here is to speak a little bit to, as I said, what it means to be a qualified historic preservation consultant. And one thing I should say too that's interesting is if you look at the Winooski regs and the ones that were applied here, 4.4 and 4.1, I believe, they talk about the evidence that you would need if you had to do an evaluation for a building's eligibility for state or national register. And it says either the division for historic preservation or a qualified historic preservation consultant needs to make a determination. So it doesn't say anything that the zoning administrator is allowed to make this type of determination about a building's listings status. So I wanna put that out there. So what I'll do here is I, did you all get a chance to review everything in the packet? So you were able to see some of those secretary of the interior qualifications that I included. So I don't necessarily need to reiterate it all. But basically the gist is that in order to practice historic preservation and conduct activities related to historic preservation, you need to be qualified by the secretary of the interior to do so. And primarily that means you need to have a master's degree in historic preservation. So we go through really rigorous training. And the background in that is that it's actually the secretary of the interior and the National Park Service that administer a lot of the historic preservation programs nationally. And they have guidance not only for how you get qualified to practice historic preservation, but also for how you need to rehabilitate a building if you are doing a project that would require some sort of historic preservation. They give guidance for how you document historic buildings. So this is coming straight from the secretary of the interior. So all of the people who have provided testimony are secretary of the interior qualified to practice historic preservation. And the reason I think this is important is that we have a body of professionals to whom it is absolutely clear that this building is listed kind of against the opinion of the zoning administrator, no offense. No. You are who I don't believe has an education in historic preservation or as secretary of the interior qualified. So really to conduct a review, to be able to interpret this type of documentation and make a final determination as to whether or not this building is listed, you need to have the training and the background to do that. And I do think it was evident a little bit in the way that some of the initial correspondence for the division for historic preservation was interpreted. And I think yesterday or two days ago we received a follow-up memo from the division for historic preservation kind of explaining their process by which they arrived at this statement that the building is listed. So I'm not gonna reiterate what everyone said. I think the testimony speaks for itself, but I'll just say some of the people that weighed in were intimately connected and even there when this building was listed. So Glenn Andrews, decades of experience in historic preservation, he sat on the advisory council on historic preservation when the building was listed. So his body made a motion to list the entire historic survey for Winooski in the state register. And he talks about that there. Eric Gilbertson was the state historic preservation officer at the time it was listed. So he was involved in that process as well. Robert McCullough wrote a letter and he conducted a lot of these surveys back in the early 80s, but kind of same era, same sort of guidance that people were using. And he cited some of the guidance in a survey manual that was provided to surveyors, which kind of confirms the approach that the surveyor had for documenting the church saying that, yes, the rectory is the primary building probably because it's the oldest one and then the church is a related resource that is part of the property that's listed. We have some other voices. Emily Wadens was a historic preservation officer. She went on to become a nationally known advocate and policy expert for historic preservation. And cousins who wrote in, she has 30 years, she's one of our most experienced historic preservation consultants in the state who knows how to interpret these types of surveys. So I'm reiterating all of this just so it becomes really clear that those of us who are qualified to make these decisions say that it's listed. In contrast to someone who is not qualified to make these decisions interpreting that it's not listed. And then, of course, the Vermont Division for Historic Preservation weighed in and confirmed, yes, it is listed. And so I guess that's all I wanna say, but I'm happy to answer any questions that anyone might have about this. I have a question about this. David, just sorry, just make sure you're speaking loud enough so that that one mic can pick it up for the Zoom. Sorry about that. I'm not sure I understand what you're saying because to me it seems clear that the state administers this designation. The department has said it's on the register. That's good for me. Are you saying that any member of the public that's qualified with a degree can say, oh, well, this building is in a photograph in the survey so it's on the register and that has the weight of law. It's on the register. It's a professional opinion. And yes, ultimately the Division for Historic Preservation are the ones that have the final say. But as consultants, we do this all the time, we review projects, we review buildings, we make our professional opinion that will be verified by the Division for Historic Preservation. So it's kinda like if I was an engineer sitting up here and saying, wanging in on my professional opinion on the structural integrity of a bridge say, you would listen to that engineer and because they have the training that's appropriate. So yes, so the Division is the final word but consultants can absolutely weigh in and create a professional opinion. And so we do that all the time and we wanted to have lots of people weigh in to confirm that yes indeed professional opinions coming together to state this one fact. Is that enough for you? No, I just don't get it. Like if I'm an architect and say I was an engineer, I can have a professional opinion about a project but I'm not gonna be the one to issue a building permit for it, the state does that. The state maintains this, the state's the one that should be saying what's on the list, right? Ultimately yes, and they did. But it's hopefully really helpful to also hear a broad range of opinions as well from highly seasoned historic preservation professionals who would look at this building and say, this is a listed building and depending on the context for what that's being said, it could then if it's part of a regulatory review, the state would ultimately get involved in some way and say yes, we agree with that. So yeah, it kinda depends on the situation for how and when the state weighs in but in this case they can absolutely confirm that it is listed because they are the keepers of the state register. That makes sense. And sorry to monopolize for a second but is this the way it works in every state? I'm just baffled that there's not, the survey is all there is and there's not then like a list of these buildings are on the state register. Well there is, yeah. So that is the way it's organized is that it's by town. You have all the buildings that are listed. So you have these inventory forms and then they have their stamp on them that says this was listed. Maybe it's not the most like technical and organized way to present it. It's what we have right now as we use some towns and cities have gone on to resurvey or add to their survey or reorganize their surveys over time because this program was started in the late 1970s. So it's a survey that has been done and listings have been done over time. So right now they're compiled in a database that is organized by community. And you can go like, you can, a member of the public, anyone can go and search this database and look and see what's listed or what's not. It's called the online resource center if you were. It just brings up the surveys. It brings up the surveys with a stamp that says that it was listed on the state register. And just to piggyback on that. So the meeting minutes that we found from 92, that is, how does that relate to the listing and the list, they approved the survey, basically? Yeah, so they, the advisory council on historic preservation is the body that lists any building in the state register. And then that state register is under the purview of the division for historic preservation. They kind of work together the two. So the Winooski survey was nominated. It was brought along with other town surveys to this meeting to say, we would like to list this. I'm not, don't remember who exactly did that. It was also just, there was an attempt to just do that at that time, to kind of recognize communities' buildings and to kind of show their significance by this honorary, partially honorary designation that now this is significant to be listed in the state register. So they were going through towns that were getting nominated to do that and listing them. And so the survey at first did not constitute a listing. It wasn't until 92 when they accepted it. Yeah, November 93 when it was formally listed. Yeah, the surveys were done just to kind of get a sense of what do we have in the state? What are historic buildings? Let's start to kind of organize and just start to create a list, basically. Well, now that we're seeing evidence from the state division for historic preservation that this structure does appear on the list, can you go into what sort of protections that means for the structure, for the property, things like that? Yeah, so that has several implications. One, a common implication is that when there is some sort of project that is involving one of these state register-listed buildings that has some sort of state permit or state funding behind it, it kicks in Act 250 or Section 248, which is the Public Utility Commission's review of projects. And then these buildings are considered historic sites in that process, which is definitely something a potential redevelopment of this property would be up against. So they are historic sites and they are protected and every effort must be made to protect them to the extent possible. There are ways to kind of deal with a building that it might not be ideal. It would have to, if a project like that was approved, it would have to undergo immense amount of mitigation and projects to kind of offset what we call an adverse effect on the property. So that's one way. And then commonly, a lot of municipalities use state register-listing as kind of an indication that this is a significant building that needs to be preserved and that's how we see it written in the ricks here. Trying to think of some other examples. State register-listed buildings, there can be some incentives to tax credits and stuff like that that could be involved. Also for national register-listed buildings, so. Would some sort of automatic higher-up review be required to take place? Yeah. If permits were sought for modification or demolition or things like that? So in Act 250 and Section 248, the Vermont Division for Historic Preservation does review the project. And so historic preservation consultant has to present a whole very technical process and list of items that they've reviewed in a report and then that's given to the Division for Historic Preservation to review. They'll concur typically, because we try to consult with them early on in the process or on the same page as we're planning a project. Thank you. Yep. Any other questions? Nope. Thank you so much. Thank you for your time. Hang close. Yes, I'll be here if you need to ask me anything else. Thank you. Yes, thank you. And we invite the original applicant to come up and please present. So I apologize. I had a printer failure this morning and Eric graciously offered to take digital copies and I wasn't able to communicate those. So I apologize for talking to you and explaining what the pictures would show. Essentially, if you asked the very easiest thing for the appellants to have done would to be to show you where St. Stephen's Church is on a list. Instead of coming here and hearing how very qualified the charming witnesses and how very qualified the people you heard from were, the easiest thing would have been to show you where it appears on a list. And they didn't do that because it doesn't appear on a list. It appears as a related building and that's not the same thing. So my first exhibit to show you was gonna be a list of the properties that were on the Winooski State Register nomination forms. And I could read that to you. It's three pages and you look at it and it has a case number 04181 and down through three pages, single spaced of lists. And... We'll save you from reading through the entire list. I'm not gonna read you. But I can tell you case number 41820 is St. Stephen's Rectory and you could study those three pages and not see St. Stephen's Church because it's not listed. But if you continued on the list onto the second page or the third page, you would see St. Francis Xavier Church and you would see St. Francis Xavier Rectory. So they're specifically named and identified. And the witness would have you believe that there was nothing to these surveys and in fact the surveys are detailed. So if you've looked at the St. Stephen's Rectory survey, which I'm sure you have the two or three pages, it's detailed and it includes photographs. There's no similar detail for the church. If you look at St. Francis Xavier Church and St. Francis Xavier Rectory, they're detailed. And the very charming witness and the many self-proclaimed experts would have you believe that if it's listed on as a related building, that's enough. It's a bootstrap argument to say it's listed. In fact, that's not accurate. It's not intellectually honest. Your zoning administrator gave an intellectually honest evaluation and summary of where things stood and said to the state, we don't see it. And do you remember the state's initial reaction sent your zoning administrator an email plus a form to apply? If it was already on the list, presumably he would have pointed that out, but he didn't point that out. He simply by default acknowledged it wasn't there. So then they do this backfill and say, well, look at the form and it's located, it's a related structure and related structures again, looking at that three page form that I didn't give you. There are three different properties that I'd like you to look at. One is 418-42, which is 7-9 West Canal Street. And that listed a related building, which was 29 Follett Street. And there were separate forms for each of those properties. That's the way it was done. It wasn't kind of this rough process. It was a serious process with forms that were filled out, giving details and pictures. And if you look at 418-44, it has a related structure, which is a garage. Do they really contend that anything that shows up on those forms makes it a related structure and worthy of historical preservation by just being in that position? Cause that's essentially what they're saying. They're saying because it was listed on that form as a related structure, that's enough to bring it within the protections of these regulations. That's not accurate. That's not intellectually honest. That's a result-driven testimony. They're different things. And if you saw the continued correspondence that the state had with your zoning administrator, you saw him change his positions. So then he said, well, it's enough. And the reason I sent the form earlier was just because we do that. When buildings have been out there for a long time, we see that whether they're worthy of being on the register, that's just BS. And that's a guy who wants a result. And he realized he made a mistake before, so he tries to cover his tracks. That's nonsense. And that's not what quasi-judicial bodies do. What you have before you is a hard decision, but that is to say, no, it's not on the list. We'd like it to be on the list. It's not on the list. It's very simple. And the notion that the placing it on the list is enough just to tease the state fellow I had prepared some exhibits where he was doing evaluations for structures and properties in Burlington. And he had listed like a shed. Well, surely a shed doesn't show up on a national historic site. Playhouses, that's not historic site stuff. It's not on a historic site. People would like it to be on a historic site. It's a beautiful building, but it's not on a historical site. Finally, the under 24 BSA, 44, 13, I think. It's, I think it's a, I think jurisdictionally, your hardworking board doesn't have authority here because I think it precludes review of religious buildings, among, among others. I, 24, 13. Yeah. And it says it includes state or community owned and operated institutions and facilities, public and private schools, churches and other places of worship, convents, parish houses, public and private hospitals, regional solid waste management facilities. So I think it's an over, jurisdictionally, it's an overreach. And even if it weren't, I think the honest, the intellectually honest decision here is, we're sorry, but no, this isn't on a historical register. So thank you. Any questions? Thank you. Sorry, before, sorry, if I may, I do have the documents that Mr. McCormick was referencing, the full list of the city's properties and also the section of statute. So if you want to see any of that, I can pull it up on the screen for you. I'd love to see the full list, if that's possible. I have a couple of questions. You were, were you able to read the letter from the state historian? Yes. It's in the, so at the end of that, he says based on the existing documentation, we consider both the rectory and church to be listed in the state register of historic places. I think I saw that. That's not intellectually honest. I mean, that's why I trace his history of saying, I'm sending you the form. The reason I sent you the form was because periodically we look at them. And he also said, we don't get involved in local determinations. And here he is weighing in, you know, eight days ago. I mean, he's, and also he's on the board of preservation, Burlington, which is now involved in litigation in Burlington. So that guy's got conflict of interest all over the place. So I just want to confirm with Eric that you weren't communicating with this person in your previous, in your earliest communications, right? That was with a staffer of his or something? With Devin Coleman? Yeah. I was communicating with Devin. Yes. So there's an accurate to say that he- Yes. My email exchange, the emails that I've included with the exhibits are with Devin. Are with him? Yes. I mean, my problem is, you talk about jurisdiction and I tend to agree with the first witness that, this is so infuriating for me. Like, I feel like we called this hearing on the simple question of whether or not it is on the register. We have here the person who administers the register for the state saying it is on the register. But before he did say that, he wouldn't say that before. That is infuriating to me too. Right. It's the reason we're here a second time. Yeah. If we had this information the first time we would have been able to make a decision. Maybe, but I feel like people are saying it's not our responsibility to make this decision, but it is, you know what I mean? Like, is no one's willing to, it's not clear who has the authority to make this determination, apparently. Well, the decision we're making is not necessarily as, the decision we're talking about right now is purely the appeal of the zoning administrative determination. It's not- And this is for deliberation. Okay, so my other question is related to the statute that you just brought up at the end. You have that one up there? Sorry. I can bring that up on the screen as well. The first paragraph, the sort of the scoping of it, lists the ways that these uses can be regulated by zoning boards. And it says they can only be regulated to the extent that the regulations do not have the effect of interfering with the intended functional use. So I think a question we have is whether this building is still being used as a church, whether it was being used as a church when this permit for demolition was put in, and whether these restrictions still apply if the building is no longer being used as a church. That's a good question. I honestly didn't chase down what the meaning of that statute is. So I can tell you, Noah was not being used as a church when the application was filed. The parish closed two years ago. But it's been under tax rules. To me, again, I'm not a lawyer, but the reading of that bylaw, it says intended functional use. It doesn't have any sort of time reference to it. If it was a church and now it's not a church, but it's, I don't know, that's tricky, right? Intended functional use. It's also tied into... It's certainly intended to be a church, right? It was intended to be a church. I know it's not a church, not a functioning as a church. It seems like the intent of it, we're getting far afield here, is to keep municipalities from regulating religious institutions in their religious functions. I agree with that. So since the church has stated that there's not a uniform regulation as to what happens to churches when they're done, it doesn't seem like it's a religious requirement that can demolish this building, right? It was delegated, you know, it's within the... The individual parish gets to decide, yeah. I'll put parish. Any other questions here? We thank you. Please stay close. Did you have anything else you'd like to share? No, thank you. I'll be heard to see. Yeah. We now invite members of the public who are interested in speaking to please come up. If you wish to offer your opinion, again, please try to keep it within the framework of the topic of the conversation today, which is the church listening. Yes. Oh, certainly. Yeah, if you'd like to come up and respond. Yeah, please do now. Yeah. Okay. I just want to make a few things clear. It's tough to sit there and listen to someone say that I am self-proclaimed as a professional and that my opinion is fabricated and that the opinion of all these other people as well as the division for historic preservation is a fabricated opinion to push forward an agenda. That is absolutely not the case here. I am an expert and okay, I am a self-proclaimed expert but I'm also qualified at making these decisions. This is my role on the advisory council on historic preservation. This is serious and I'm uncomfortable with people kind of assuming that we are not serious professionals that know what we're doing. So I just want to say that I can address everything that was said. Basically, it's not on this list that is three pages long because that list is literally just the buildings that are in those forms. So that's the reason why it doesn't appear on the list that doesn't mean it's not listed. It just means that the parish house is the building that was the primary building. If you saw Robert McCulloch's letter, he was the one who was referencing the survey manual at the time that was being used. He was saying that when there was a property that had just two buildings on it, so less than three, one form was fine to document the two buildings. You just had to select one of the buildings to have. And this is something we do hundreds of times is we document properties. And I said this all in my last testimony last month. We document a property. It's got several buildings on the property. The property gets listed. So the fact that it's somehow diminished in its importance because it's a related resource that is absolutely not the case. The reason he put the rectory first is because it's substantially prior in time. And it just speaks, as he said, to the survey format has no bearing on whether the church was or is historically significant. So someone who has not trained in preservation can't sit here and say, this church is not as important. It's a related resource. Related resources don't count. Like that's not the case. Related resources count. The fact that the parish house or the rectory for St. Francis Xavier has its own form and the church has its own form, who knows why they did it that way. But that doesn't at all, that's not the point that has nothing to do with the St. Stephen's property. You know, it's just- I do wonder about that one because it's the same guy, the same year, almost the same month. Yeah. Same week. Like why would he go- I don't know. Why would he have the church and the rectory and then he comes over across town and he only does the rectory. Who knows? And we can't- It was the end of the week. And maybe he was tired. I didn't know, but it just- We can't know. I mean, that's the thing. That's not evidence upon which we should base the credibility of this statement that it's listed because we don't know why he chose it to do it that way. It doesn't mean that the church is not listed. So another point is when there are related resources and it might be a garage, like a 1920s garage is part of the property. The garage gets listed too as part of the property because it's an integral part of the property. And that's what we have with the church and the parish house, or excuse me, the rectory that has, you know, the church is an integral part. The rectory would not hold the significance that it does without a church with it. So to follow up on Harlan's point there, if you had a survey form that just listed the name of the building, you wouldn't be able to probably make a determination about the historic value of that building. If it just had a name and no documentation. Yeah, this rectory was built in 1920. Yeah, we'd want information about it and some sort of description about its history kind of showing why it's significant, which is what this form does for the church and the rectory. But why is there, isn't it important for the historic preservationists to have like all this detailed description about the buildings and there's not all that about the church? Like, why wouldn't we do that? You know, like what's the point of listing it there and not listing all its historic features? I mean, maybe it's just so obvious. I don't know, that's 1979. The standards for documentation were very different than they are today. It doesn't mean the intent wasn't there. It's just the methodology. We've come a long way in what, 44 years now. You know, these forms are way more robust now than they were. And that's partially because I was saying the National Park Service constantly updates its guidance for how these buildings, you know, the best practice for documenting a building. So I think that really just speaks to the era in which it was documented. You know, it doesn't mean that it's less significant. It just means that he just, who knows. We can't get into his head. Oh, just going on the same logic. I'm assuming that the senior center was built prior to 1979 and there's a garage or a shed behind the rectory. Yeah, I think that's okay. I'm assuming they were built prior to 79. Would they fall under that same related umbrella or? I think the community center was 80s. I don't think it was 1979. And that shed, if I remember quickly, is more of like a temporary kind of, or more of like a prefab type of shed, am I correct? The one next to the senior center? Are you talking behind the church? There's one behind the rectory. Yes, yeah. But the building itself had to be more than 50 years or whatever it is old, right? Yeah, so when they were looking at this, right, exactly. Buildings, that's sort of the criteria for the potential for something to be. Evaluate these properties. I'm just confused as to where the authority lies to accept and make a judgment. It just, again, it just confuses me that we have to ask somebody whether something is on the register. Yeah, and I don't know. I mean, that's the thing. A historic preservation professional, if they were presented with this form in the first place and with this property, and we were not, no one was brought in early on in the process who is qualified to do this. And again, I'll remind you that the regulations in Winooski do reference qualified historic preservation professionals, making these kind of determinations. We're not talking about the evaluation. I'm talking about who has the authority. It's the Vermont Division for historic preservation. They are the ones who say if it is on. They have the final word. Right. And, you know, they did not say, I should say early on, that the building was not listed. It's sort of a, I do this all the time. We are presented with a survey that's older, and if there is a really big question here, especially if it's pertaining to a local matter, they would like to see the building just a more formal way of verifying that it's listed. And the problem with that is that you need the approval of the property owner to do that. And obviously, we're not gonna get that here. So our hands were tied already, just to take that approach, which is one of the approaches. You know, Devin mentions here, he is a trustworthy person. Okay, I don't, you know, there's nothing devious or anything behind his decision here or an agenda. He is just weighing in when the question narrowed to is this building state register listed? And it was very neutral question that they could answer. Yes, is what they said. Ideally, the building would be redocumented and get the kind of, you know, the discussion that it deserves, you know, and we would love to be able to do that. We can't. So it is a division for historic preservation. They keep the state register and they said it's listed. So that's where we're at. Okay, thank you. Thank you for listening to me again. I have another question. Oh, sorry. Do you have an, I should let you go first, I'll talk a lot. So I know that you said that you don't believe it's relevant and you don't think you can weigh in on it, but is there any idea why St. Francis was allowed to list two different forms? Because this letter from Robert McCullough says that for multiple structures, you had to choose one and surveyors were forced to pick one. Can you speak to why St. Francis has to pick? I don't think we can. I mean, it could be that the surveyor was just really impressed and loved both of those buildings so much and wanted to, you know, give each one its own form. I don't think we can say why he took that approach. And why it wasn't consistent. It doesn't weigh upon the significance of St. Stephens and whether it's listed. It just, for whatever reason, he decided to do that. And maybe it's just, these were his two favorite buildings in Winooski, I don't know. You know, it didn't have to be done that way. He could have just listed St. Francis and then if the rectory was a related resource or related structure, it would have been listed also. So I'm confused if it doesn't have to be that way. What does it have to be this way for St. Stephens that it had to be one primary building in St. Francis he was allowed to pick two? I, you know, I don't know. Again, who knows his rationale for it? I mean, he would have been allowed to do that. He would have had the liberty of documenting whatever he wanted. He didn't have to. You know, he could have just listed a property as a related resource and had that part of the property that's listed and it's listed with the main primary building on the property. Why he chose a different, yeah, I wish he was here to answer that question. So yeah, I don't know, but he had flexibility obviously. I mean, no one's gonna say, oh no, you can't, you know, the more documentation, the better. So if he was able to offer this extra documentation that was, you know, wasn't any harm in that. So, yeah. Thank you. Are you familiar with the statute that was brought up at the end? I am, yes, I am. To have an opinion on its applicability? Yeah, I mean, that's one that, that's an issue that starts to become a little more contentious because there are different ways of interpreting that statute and there's different ways of figuring out whether a building is, you know, in this case a church is functioning as its intended use. You know, you could look at tax records and the church is currently paying taxes on the property. So they are no longer exempting themselves using this religious exemption. The applicant for the demolition permit was brothers and sisters, not the church. So that's already kind of ceding the sort of control of what's happening on the property and that religious use to the applicant who will benefit from the demolition of the church. So there are a few things at play there. I think that's all, that could become a really, really big discussion in itself that, you know, I don't know that we can get into everything and all the nuances tonight because there's a lot there behind that sort of issue. So, that's what I know about. Thank you again. Thanks for allowing me the chance to respond. Thank you. Thank you. The whole discussion about, well, he could have done it differently is exactly the point. It's not on the list. So now there's backfill going on saying, well, if he had done it differently, it would be on a list. It's not on a list. And with regard to the statute, I agree it's a complicated area, but I believe that in the Burlington church case, the court has ruled that, that or the Burlington zoning board ruled that it didn't have authority based on that. So I come back to this and say that intellectual dishonesty extends also to the professor at UVM as a McDonough or McCullough, whatever his name is. And he says, well, he makes stuff up. And how do you know he's made it up? Because the evidence and the Winooski records, he said they only had one choice. If you have two facilities on a single property and you're using a single form, that's the only choice. That wasn't true. You look at St. Francis, two facilities on the same property, two forms. You look at the facilities that I referred to on Center Street and Follett Street, where they're indicated to be related, two forms. He just didn't do it. It's not on a list. If he had put it on the list, it would be a different discussion here tonight. But again, intellectual honesty on your part demands that you consider the evidence and say, it's not on a list. Devin Coleman saying it's on a list doesn't make it be on a list. It just means Devin Coleman says it's on a list. And he has an interest in this. He wasn't straightforward and you could see his tone and points change. It's not on the list. What I think I heard from the previous witness is that, or how I understand this to be, is that these registers are not lists. They're collections of surveys that need to be interpreted by somebody. I think that's why I'm so upset because a register sounds like it should be a list, right? It sounds like there should be a book that you open up and say, here's a list of buildings on the register. But what I think I'm hearing people say to me on the other side is that the survey constitutes the register and therefore whether something's on it has to be interpreted and my question is who gets to do that? And I don't think it's a qualified historic preservationist. I think it's the State Department of Historic Preservation is where, is what I'm hearing, I think. Does that make any sense? I guarantee you if they had wanted to assert the demolition permit should not be granted because it's on a list. They would have shown you because it's on a list. And this State has a access and something like AACD services, dot for month, dot gov, something like that. And you go on that and you plug in a town and a county and it will tell you which properties are listed. I guarantee you if you put in the church, St. Stephen's Church, it would not kick up. If you did the rectory, it would. I mean, there's gamesmanship being played because there is a desired result. And that's not the way law works. You don't make it up as you go along. And this whole thing that it's perhaps listed, you know, does that mean that sheds and playhouses that show up on historic sites suddenly require review by your board to take down the playhouse? You know, if you look at the related uses for St. Francis rectory, one of them was a new carport. Did that new carport that was listed and written up in 1979, does that then become something that requires action when it's taken down? That's not the way it works. But you're limited here. I mean, I can't cross-examine the witness. That's not the way it works in this kind of hearing. So we go back and forth. But I ask you to look at it. I mean, your people of common sense, your honest, just bring your intellectual honesty to it and affirm the zoning board, the zoning administrator. So thank you. Thank you. Any other questions? I don't know, would assume probably not. At this time, we will invite members of the public if they wish to please come up. We will be instituting a two-minute time limit for anybody that wishes to speak at this time. Nobody's jumping. Oh, okay. But please again, give us your name and mention that you do it for them. Yes, hopefully I won't be as emotional as the last time. I'm not here on either side. I'm originally from Winnowsky. My family has been here since the beginning of the 1900s. And I just love this town here. I was a member of St. Francis growing up. I guess I'm not here for either side. I'm not here for St. Francis Church. I'm not here for the historical society. I'm just here to say that I don't believe that canon law, which is the church law, demands that churches need to come down when they're no longer used as churches. And we have a lot of examples in Vermont of churches that have become other entities. I just had hope. It just doesn't seem to be like a Vermont thing to actually tear nice buildings down. But more than just the structure, there are still many, many people here who are associated with that church. And their families will always be probably for the next 50 years. So I wish I had just hoped that St. Francis would have chosen a different path to maybe find somebody who could develop it while keeping that building intact at least for the next 50 years. If it gets sold and it becomes a bar in 50 years, those people aren't gonna be here anymore. But for right now, it's a hardship for them. And that's just my feeling. And I believe what St. Louis Valley said at the last meeting, he didn't care if it was historical or not, he would still want the demolition permit to go through. So I'm just saying, I don't think the church has to tear it down. I just wish that they had found another developer who would have kept the building as part of the project. Thank you. Your name again, I'm so sorry. Louise Rushlow. Louise Rushlow, thank you. Anybody else not hearing anybody? Does anybody have any other questions for our accountable applicants? Oh, that's right, we have people on Zoom. We do have one person with their hand raised here. Jess, you can unmute yourself and speak. Hi, I spoke at the last meeting and I don't have a lot to add, but I do have a master's in historic preservation from UBM and listening to the lawyer for St. Stephen's speak. I just wanted to point out that Bob McCullough was, I think, unfairly maligned by him. He has a PhD in city and regional planning, a master's in historic preservation planning, a master's in public policy law and a jurist doctorate. So I just wanna say he does know what he's talking about and that's all I have at the moment. Thank you. Anybody else online? There are no other hands up. Okay, at this time, I believe we can move on to our next agenda item and close this session. Yeah, I was gonna say, if you want to, well, no, I was just gonna say, if you want to make a motion to close the hearing formally, we can do that or if you're ready to do that. Can we ensure that all documents will be submitted, all documents that he sent you will be submitted to us so that they can be included? Yes, I will confer with Tom afterwards to make sure I have the correct documents, but we will add those in as the exhibits. So to that point, I do have two copies of the exhibit lists for this hearing. These will be exhibits A through V that will be entered into the record. I have a copy for each, the appellant and the applicant that I will provide now. And we will add Mr. McCormick's documents as exhibit W. Thank you. We'll entertain a motion to close this hearing. Close this hearing? LC motions. Who secures? Jordan's second. So those in favor of closing this hearing please say aye, raise your hand. Aye, aye, aye, motion carries unanimously. This hearing is closed. Next up on our agenda. I have a question. Do you have, does the 45 days start again or what, when the decision? 45 days, the hearing is now officially closed, so it'll be 45 days from now. More than the like, a lot of times we do try to meet in deliberative session the night of while everything's still fresh. So that is city updates. Are there any updates from the city, Eric? I don't have anything specific unless there's anything from you all. Town meeting day just happened. So we have a new council that's been seated, officially reorganized last Monday. So I was not able to attend, but, or sorry, this past Monday they reorganized. So moving forward with the new council. Okay. Is there any other business we should be discussing today or? The only other thing I had is that our next meeting is scheduled for April 20th. I believe we will have a hearing for that night for a conditional, sorry, a waiver request for a setbacks for a development project. So fairly basic request, but I'm anticipating getting the application materials later this week, the application, sorry, either today or tomorrow or early next week. The application deadline for that meeting is next Friday. So if I don't have anything by then, I will let you all know, but as of right now, I'm anticipating getting materials to have a meeting April 20th. Great. And the last item on our agenda is to adjourn. I will entertain a motion to adjourn. I'll move that we adjourn. Harlan moves. Any seconds? I'll second. I'll see seconds. All those in favor of adjourning, please say aye, raise your hand. Aye. Aye. We are adjourned. Great.