 This is the Development Review Board for Burlington, August 6th. I will say that we take items up in the order they're on the agenda. Let's make some change at the beginning of the meeting. When we call an item, we ask that you come up to the table. And at that point, if you haven't signed in, it's helpful to sign in on the clipboard that's on that table there. And at the table, we ask that you use the microphones and keep them fairly close because it is hard to hear in here. And we take testimony on oaths so that people who are going to... The applicants and anybody else who testifies on a particular project, we swear everybody in per project. So then the first item is our agenda. We have one change on the agenda. Is that true, Scott? The 39 Westward Drive application was drew. Is anybody here for 39 Westward Drive? Other than that, we have no changes to the agenda, right? Communications, we have minutes in our packet, which we should look at. There's some supplemental... That's right, the supplemental communications on a couple of projects on our desk. On 1073 Pine Street, 186 Willard, and 426 South Windows. The first item on our consent agenda is one King Street. The King Street dock is the applicant here. So this is on our consent agenda, which means that if you've seen the staff report and they've recommended approval with a couple of conditions, and are you okay with those conditions? Yes. Does anybody on the board have any issues with treating this as a consent item? Is anybody in the public here for one King Street? I'd like to ask one question, if I may. On the site plan, you've got a nice curved rotary of sorts. Isn't there a stone retaining wall right there, too? A stone retaining wall makes up a portion of the outside radius that's on the northwest portion of what is shown as the circle. It wasn't showing on the site plan, so... Oh, I'm sorry. So we will treat this as consent. Can I have a motion from somebody for one King Street? Sure. 19-1010CA, one King Street. I move that we accept the application and adopt staff's findings and recommendations and conditions. Any discussion? All in favor? Opposed? Okay. Thank you. Thank you. The next item also on consent agenda is 426 South Manuski, which is a time extension for zoning permit to demolish an existing garage and construct a new garage accessory apartment. Brad, I think you skipped one. Appletree Point Road. Stop. We'll be out of order in our materials. Hang on, Scott. How's you going? Order. We're signed on C46, Appletree applicant here, so maybe you want to go with South Manuski. Your call. Here we go. 46 Appletree. That is the next one on our agenda going in the order of the agenda. Is the applicant here for 46 Appletree? He just walked in. 46 Appletree Point. James, you're up. You're up. Good timing. So this is on the consent agenda. Yes. Which means that the staff has recommended approval. Okay. Have you seen the staff report? Yes, I have. And you're okay with those conditions? Yes, I am. Thank you. Okay. Does anybody on the board object to treating this as consent? Brad, I would just note briefly, Conservation Board looked at this last night because of these quote unquote wetland. They recommend project approval as is. And noted that the pond is not a wetland. Okay. Really? Really. It's on the wetland map. Can we attach those to our findings? Yes. Yep. Is anybody in the public here for 46 Appletree Point Road? Looks like a nice addition to the project. Thank you. I have a motion on 46 Appletree. Sure. I'll do it again. On 19-1026CA 46 Appletree Point, I move that we approve the application and adopt staff finding recommendations and conditions. Second. Any discussion? All in favor? Opposed? Very efficient evening for you. Thanks. Okay. Now we're going to take 426 South Waduski Avenue. And requesting a time extension. And Brad, I'm going to recuse from this item. I will say I had a tour of the project from the applicant. I don't know if that's affecting my voting on the project or the other, but I want to say I didn't walk through with them. You've seen the staff's report and recommendation for approval. Yes. You're okay with that? Yes. Anybody on the board object to treating this as consent? Anybody in the public here for 426 South Waduski? Can I have a motion on this one? Yes. And 17-1117CAC at 426 South Waduski Street. I am moved that we approve, that we adopt staff findings and do consent approval condition to the conditions. Okay. Second? Second. AJ. Okay. Discussion? All in favor? Opposed? Thank you. Okay. Moving right along on our consent agenda. We have 1891, 1893 North Avenue is the applicant here for that. This is reapplying for something that was approved previously. Is that true Scott? Yes. This is the case wherein extensions have been granted but exhausted. The project is underway so they're seeking approval for it again. Okay. So this is again recommended as consent. You've seen the staff's report. Is that true? Yes. And you're okay with those conditions? Yes. Okay. So we're back to treating this as consent. Is anybody here in the public for 1891 North Avenue? Can I have a motion on this application? Sure. On, let's see, we're on 20-0025SD, 1891 through 1893 North Ave. I move that we approve the application and adopt staff findings and recommendations and conditions. Second on this one. Keenan. Any discussion? All in favor? Opposed? You're approved. Thank you. Thank you. I suspect things will slow down a little bit now. Next, as a public hearing item, the first item is 1073 Pine Street is the applicant here under the seat. And I'm going to square in the applicant and anybody else who intends to testify or speak on this project. Do you want to raise your right hand? And do you swear to tell the truth and hold truth under pain and penalty of perjury? Do you want to introduce yourselves? Sure. Again, you have to pull the microphones close. My name is Andrew Jope. I live at 1073 Pine Street. I'm his wife, Sylvia Jope. Do you want to go through anything on the project? Do you want to have us ask your questions? It seems pretty clear. I mean, as you have in front of you, we're applying for three-bedroom short-term rentals through Airbnb. We used to rent out as part of our duplex to long-term tenants and we're switching over to Airbnb. And you live on the property, correct? Correct. Just stay living on the property? Yes. So maybe we'll start with questions from the board. Anybody have questions for the applicant in this project? We do have one letter from a neighbor here. So is this already listed on Airbnb? Correct. Yes, it is. How long has it been listed on Airbnb? About a year and a half. We have a son who's in college and when he moved out, we looked at supplemental income. So we lived in the units and we had a tenant leave. They had a young baby. They looked for a larger place and that's when we decided the duplex that's right on top of us to convert that into Airbnb as we have now access to storage that we didn't have before and it just fits our lifestyle much better. And yeah, that's the project. And Scott, can I? Go ahead. This is yours, right? No, it's Ryan's. Thanks. Can you help me with the parking on the Airbnb? How do we calculate it? It's one space per room rented. One space. And then in this case it's unique because they've got a two-tandem space driveway width. So two per unit. So they have a duplex. There's four, but they're taking the two bedrooms and the two unit. The two bedrooms and the two bedroom duplex unit, you rent those out short-term. So the parking is the same. So they basically have like a quad. They could go two and then two. But we view it as the two, their residents, they get the two spots in their tandem space. We don't generally allow or account for tandem spaces for short-term rentals like that because of the conflict that that would create. So hence they can get the one space to legally conform to the parking standards. And then the additional two spaces required. That's the waiver. So basically for the three bedrooms, Airbnb, they have one space. Correct. Then the waiver of two if they're seeking. So if we only went with one bedroom, there would be no waiver. That's correct. And question for the applicant. Do you have this listed on Airbnb as a proper kind of bed and breakfast with each room? Are you renting out the entire apartment with multiple bedrooms? So it's a little complicated. So the apartment that we use to rent out long-term tenants, we have both as a, the whole apartment, but also an option that individual rooms can be rented. So per room maximum two people. Such a small parking. It's such a small driveway. Yeah, it's actually not a small driveway. So I mean in the winter with parking bands, you know, we have comfortably four spaces and it would be one more car behind it. We're pretty much down to one car. Our son will take our second car. So and Pine Street is, you know, it's unrestricted parking in front. So when we have friends, they park in front. But if we have to go into the driveway, it's just going to be logistics, communicating the parking. So that, I wanted to ask that question. So that stretch of Pine Street I drive in all the time. I'm trying to remember, is that parking, can you park on that part of Pine Street? Correct. It's unrestricted the entire room. So we have a lot of people from the Howard Center or across the street. There's some meeting spaces. They are parking in front of our house a lot. And we also have Bear Park kind of diagonal from us. So when there's an event, people park. So it's a lot of parking. I have another question for Ryan. Do you remember Ryan who'd done this with a few Airbnbs before? There's obviously a concern with Airbnbs in general. We'll probably hear one here that, you know, guests show up at any given time with the headlights. Has it been that we restricted check-ins? Is that what we've done in the past, you know that? Yeah. We have, the way that the board has gone is to limit check-ins between 7 and 10 p.m. Can you remind me? 7 a.m. That is correct. 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., right? Just to follow up on that. The way it's drafted here is it's recommended that it be limited to that time. That's language reviews in the past where we've been more prescriptive. That's language reviews. I borrowed that from previous examples that the board has led to. Are we limited to changing it? So are we required to do the 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. or can we change the check-in time? We can change it. You can change it. Yeah, that's just a recommendation. But yeah, you're free to change the conditions. That's your role as the board. I don't know if you all have seen the comment letter that we received. Do you have a copy of that? Do we have other copies of this? I think one of the concerns that is expressed is just confusion about where to go. This looks like it's from one of your neighbors and they apparently have had some people show up at their house trying to check in for your Airbnb. Do you have any... We do. I think we have a really good system. Also on the listing, that's one of the comments. It's always very clear check-in. I can imagine that maybe in the early years when we were just kind of like in the early days that we were trying to figure out how people are finding us, we do have a lit up star in front and I always let people know if you come after dark, make it super clear because when you drive by, you see it but it's not so obnoxious that it's blinking or anything. So I think it might have happened in the past but I think it's pretty visible. Because we get it too. We don't want people to be creeping in other people's driveways at the end and we live there. This is our home too. We don't want any unexpected people at the wrong door. Okay. Thank you. This is a question for the applicant. What kind of house rules do you currently have in force and in particular if you could speak to what kind of rules you have regarding noise levels and the control of noise with your guests? Yeah. We do have both in our house rules which are printed out in each room. We say, you know, indoor noises between I think 10 and 7. We make people aware. People sleep here. We live here. And that's listed both on the listing. It's on the house rules which you can access electronically and because we live there we don't really get people who want to go into town for parties. They are very often parents of students, visiting family. Yeah. We have personally in our house never had any noise issues. And can you address their concern about there being four bedrooms for rent on Airbnb? We took one down after our discussions with our neighbor. But we were doing four in all honesty and then we took one down so it's now three. Ryan, it's a front yard parking issue here. No, they've got the depth to meet the first parking space behind the front wall of the house. Front yard parking. So that's the first space. Right. That's the first space. This is very confusing. So you can have parking in the front yard. Once the first space is met. And in this case the new space of the 80 new space would also follow that front yard setback as well. So once you satisfy one parking space outside of the front yard setback, the second car can be in the front yard setback. So what do we do like three hours of conversation for in the road? Does that seem pretty sinister? That'd be a fair one. That was my question. That was my question. I'm still very confused by it. I think that's where we ended up with parking. I can't say it makes sense, but I think that's consistent. On your parking management plan that you submitted, basically what you say is if you have extra cars, I'll park them on the street. That's basically what you say. I mean, you sort of talk about you know, you can near the bus and near other things, but basically you say if you have extra cars, you don't really say please don't bring cars, we don't have room for them, which to me might be a more accurate way to say it. You're asking for parking waiver. Part of that to me implies that you have fewer spaces than is recommended, so that you may need to say something to your guests about how many cars you allow on the property. That's not what's in your parking management plan. Are you saying we have to do that? I'm just questioning the parking plan as being a parking management plan for having fewer spaces than is recommended. It's your plan so you could say what you want, whether we get to vote on it. I think what I tried to make clear in the parking management plan is when we're at full capacity, meaning that we have our two cars and then we have three cars for guests, then you're correct. That's one car that can't fit in the driveway. Technically you have one car for guests. You don't have three cars for guests. In terms of the parking layout, you can only have one car for guests. Now you may be able to squeeze more in there, but you really don't legally comply with the ordinance for more than one car. So once you have that one car on your site, you don't have any more appropriate parking for your guests. One guest car. Is that because of the tandem space issue? That's the whole thing with the parking waiver for two spaces. You can use them. You can park 20 cars in your driveway, you can squeeze them all in. But we have to do an approval based on some number of cars. And the number of cars we want to base our approval on is three cars. Two tandem, one other space. That's what we can approve. So how would you regard if we are a one car family? Does that freeze up one of the two spaces allocated to us? Is that transferable to the short term rental? Because a family residence has to have two spaces, and that's the problem. We've had that question raised because a lot of us have single car families. The problem is it's an apartment that runs with the land and zoning regulations and the residents two spaces. I'm a single car. I can't say that this house forever has a permit for the owners only having one car. Brian, I have a question for you. Sure. If the two bedroom unit was rented out as a single, like there's a two bedroom apartment that's being rented out as two bedrooms, two separate bedrooms. If that was rented out as one unit, would that change the parking calculation? No, it would still be two. Two spaces is better. One thing that I would not mention the stack port because it didn't seem too feasible but it's possible is the stacked parking possibility so they can count those two spaces so long as the owners are there to be the valet. That's right. That's part of your parking management plan. You can have a valet parking which means you have to move them. Like they have to leave the keys. This is a question for the applicant. It might be helpful for us to understand the volume of people that are using it and in particular, how often you're at full capacity versus what is your average capacity throughout the year? I did look at some of the numbers so it's summer is definitely busier so I think last I checked was 60% of capacity of the available times. It's definitely more the weekends. Friday, Saturdays, and the week it's hit or miss. Winters are less than that. May through August is probably the fullest. Again, I don't think it was ever over 60%. 60% meaning like 60% of days of the available days offered. That's full capacity. Yes. You have an open permit on the addition of the duplex. Is that correct? We're closing that. The inspector was just out of our house today. That was in 2000. 2001, correct. I don't know. The building permit on that is closed. We have that. Can either you or Ryan speak to there was a comment raised about whether a portion of the driveway was required to be removed and whether that was actually removed as part of that application? There was a bump out and that is removed. There's plantings there. A bump out. There was a bump out of the driveway. When we purchased the house it looked like it was for five cars or more and it just kind of fanned out to the side. It seems to me there's going to be a lot of cars driving in and out of that driveway all the time and probably at the most inconvenient times weekends nighttime How do you answer for that? What's the plan? With technology it's been really easy communicating with folks. I'm self employed so I would say 60% of the time I work from home so I'm very available and I think by communicating this and that's where technology is great. What do you mean you're available? I'm available at the house to move cars Cars are going to be moving a lot. I would dispute that characterization that there's cars moving a lot. A lot of people park the car and we've had so many people renting bikes or taking the bus because of people going to town or taking Uber so that's been a lot too that the car is just sitting and it depends on how you define moving a lot. Yes it's going to be people coming in and out when we had renters they had two cars a newborn baby they were in and out same thing and we had two cars at the time so there was a lot of in and out just the same I would say probably even more in and out less just parking. Question for the applicant I guess how many people that use your Airbnb actually come versus those that are taking say the bus or taxi from the airport or wherever they're coming from? I think it's a pretty high percentage Maybe 85 We get some who fly in and take an Uber or something like that but I would say a pretty high percentage are driving Out of curiosity You rented this as a duplex for a little while We bought it as a duplex 20 years Out of curiosity is it just that it's more profitable to do it as an airline? Yeah we had long term tenants it was great they had a baby they needed more space and we also gave them a lot of storage room which since we converted to a workstation for myself we have family it's been incredible to be able to say no we're not going to rent during these days it's been for our lifestyle and having a kid in college and I think we're really to our defense we're very comfortable hosts and we live there that's our home It is true that Airbnb or B&P but B&P is a conditional use which means we're supposed to evaluate the impact on the quality of the neighborhood and things like that and that's why I'll maybe take a break for any more questions because I think there's people from the public who want to say something maybe you can take a seat but other folks come up if you want to come up and introduce yourself and say what you want to say do use the microphone please My name is Dan Reagan this is my wife Allison Reagan we own the property at 1069 Pine Street next door This is our son Joshua Reagan who lives there My name is Dina Frankel and I own and reside in the house at 1061 Pine Street You wrote the letter I did This is Allison Reagan and I'd like to begin by describing the neighborhood for you The microphone closer to you The lower end of Pine Street is all single family homes and while there are some rentals on the street there is no other household that is doing Airbnb and there are a lot of children on the street The traffic from the Airbnb that has been operating next door has been significant it has deteriorated the quality of our life and the life of the occupant that lives in the household There is consistent traffic while I don't quite understand the metrics of 60% occupancy based on the number of days available it is significant where to the point that even this summer there were occupants for the Airbnb that thought our house was the Airbnb and parked in our driveway were working around the house the current listing is that folks can arrive up to 2 o'clock in the morning which again the car doors and the talking amongst how to enter the Airbnb is heard and noticeable other than that the rest of the street is quiet except for an occasional car at that point in the day some of my concerns around granting this approving this request is the fact that it's a very transient population and maybe Josh can even describe some of the the Airbnb guests for you but I have significant concerns about young children living nearby I'm very concerned about the driveway that's next door the driveway I can't imagine how you would fit even a fifth car in that driveway it's squeezed with four cars and up until today to my knowledge not to my knowledge based on my observation the jokes have two cars and even if a child takes a car to college that child will be returning whether it's for holidays or weekends so as needed and that really does create an ongoing parking concern can I ask you a couple of questions do you live at the island of your house? no but we're the owners so I want to understand though you've just testified about observing a bunch of traffic conditions but you don't live there I visit on a very regular basis like when? and I drive by there yes I'm very attentive to what is going on where do you currently reside? I live in South Burlington but I did live on Pine Street prior to owning this house on Pine Street as well I lived on Pine Street from 1997 to 1988 to 1997 and I'm living in the area I go on that street and my recollection you can tell me if I'm wrong but I'm looking at the map this property is right across the street from I guess it's called Bear aren't those not single family homes? those are townhouses run by the Champlain Trust but it's on a different street no but it's like right across the street I just wanted to clarify this if I could just add something I do live there full time and for me it's been an increasing it's become increasingly commercial I just I feel that there's a difference between long-term rental and short-term rental where you have people coming and going daily they're different people they usually are here on vacation they're not holding a nine to five schedule they don't have they come and go when they please is also a concern with the biggest issue is the parking for me I feel constantly surrounded by all this external activity there's parking in front of my house walking across my yard there's there is a little issue on the parking driveway as it is currently pretty much right up to the property line so just to confirm looking at the map also your house looks like it's really abutting the driveway portion pretty much yeah they're right up against my house so there's no real separation there and it's just become kind of a nuisance situation where it's been done to the point now where it's being overdone it's just there's so much activity and it's being so commercialized it's turned into a business and I just as somebody who lives in a low density residential neighborhood I would like to keep it low density residential and not commercial and I also feel like we've done a lot of work on this property to fix it up and make it nice and in my opinion this is a detractor for future buyers this is my property value is going to be impacted by having this going on next door can you talk a little bit more you said that there were people walking across your yard so you're on the other side of the planting is that correct so is it people know now I think you might be looking at the house on the other side of them we are on the driveway we are on the driveway side so they park in front of our house and walk across to get to the do you know where the boundary line is it's about a foot and a half off their driveway is the property in my house there's the five foot buffer has not been followed were you living there while it was a two I was and I had no problem with the long-term rentals I knew them they were nice people they came and go at normal hours it was consistent I had no problems at all until the four bedroom B&B started and then it just became like just way too much activity for not enough property well according to the Airbnb listings online there's reviews dating back to early 2018 can you describe the frequency and turnover amongst the people checking in and out when that happens it happens at all hours definitely I notice it more later in the evening I'm home I'm having dinner there's people coming and going the weekends are very busy but for instance the other night I was at home and I witnessed four vehicles pull up two people in each vehicle and they all walked into the house next door so it was just a little disconcerting it's just too much activity for me to live unimpeded really so I'm not begrudging them for wanting to rent I just feel like it needs to be done in accordance with the regulations and also with the idea of let's keep it in moderation here the property's been overdeveloped they're into bonus credits on their coverage allotment they're asking for parking waivers so I you know they're at 37% coverage so I just feel like it's taking up a lot of space and it's impacting my ability to live unimpeded so it sounds like your primary concern is the change in the volume it's the volume but it's also the security so when there's that much volume you have people that number one I don't know any of these people they're all from out of town they're strangers and there has been instances recently this summer where people have parked in my driveway and walked around my property and it's just unsettling and I've tried to communicate with the neighbors I've tried to be neighborly not trying to have any conflicts but I just at the same time it feels like this is just they're continuing to push forward with this so I feel like I need to be heard just being a neighbor I'll give it off to Dean Hi thanks for taking our testimony I live on the other side I'm two houses away and I work in a home office so I'm there I'm in the house most of the time we have our windows open and so we hear but we don't have any air conditioning all the noise outside and I can tell you that just within the last couple of months you know I've been sitting out there and seen a guy pull up into their driveway next door on a motorcycle gone around tried all the doors knocked on the windows and you know we finally realize my husband and I that this was probably an Airbnb guest he didn't know where he was going and so we went out there and asked what's up and he had the wrong house this was in the middle of a Saturday afternoon and we have seen this happen a number of times the parking is also I think when people don't live in the house and they arrive and they're on vacation they just don't understand that when they get out of their cars and they're in a nightclub at midnight that the noise outside is disturbing the people who actually live in those houses next to the Airbnb that they've checked into so the noise is really it has been a significant problem over the time that the volume of Airbnb traffic has been as it is Yes, I have a question about the noise this is commonly in other areas but it's not the noise of the guests at the property it's the noise of them getting it out of the car slamming the door saying hey do you have the keys, that kind of stuff Correct, yes, really that most of them are parking on the street which actually has been an additional noise and safety issue because there have been a lot of side swipes on the street in fact it's happened to us twice we never park on the street because people come by over the course of the night and it's a relatively frequent occurrence to lose a mirror and last year, early in this process one of the cars was out there and was really severely damaged and so there's this whole thing of you're out there in the middle of the night with a police car Pardon me I will reserve comment so it has been a significant impact in terms of noise, in terms of strangers walking around on the property and the practice has not matched up to the requirements that may be listed in the rules and regulations Just one piece of information they market the rental ads no on-site parking plenty of off-street parking and perhaps that's one of the reasons why it's so noticeable but I just that's in their listing I've got to print it out so I just thought I would add that and I would add this as well that although technically I guess by the rules they have enough for four cars it really does not fit four cars in order to fit four cars there you really can't open doors and get out properly obviously the whole thing about being able to come and go it really is problematic so that's why they ask people to park on the street because it's not practical to really park in there and in fact because there are driveways just about on the property line originally it was on the property line it's hard to know exactly where your property line is it was supposed to be two and a half feet removed so theoretically it should be two and a half feet back from our property line I'm not sure it is that's what the plan showed two and a half feet and the plan showed a 17 and a half foot drive which truthfully a parking space is usually nine feet so they have a nine and eight and a half foot which isn't which is pretty much two spaces right but when you have on one side you have your house you can't really get out of the car on the other side you kind of have to squeeze it over maybe under the grass a little bit so I'm just simply saying that the parking is an issue it doesn't really comfortably fit four cars so hence you know kind of park on the street so parking is quite an issue actually in this situation the contrast between the long term tenants and the short term tenants yeah absolutely so with the long term tenants they were in the local community they had day jobs, they were gone nine to five they would come home at normal hours it was a young couple they were not noisy they kept themselves they had two vehicles but it was it was not noticeable it was only noticeable when to contrast you started getting a lot of different people coming and going at all hours of the day more traffic, more cars more rooms being rented as they set up to four bedrooms so that could be aid guests for vehicles it just became more like a commercial motel less like a residential home that was just renting out some space not that this is necessarily relevant but I would add that it's a very expensive area to live and it'd be nice to see I'd almost prefer if there was long term tenants because it drives the housing costs up when you get all these short term rentals coming in and then the people that live and work in Burlington can't afford to live in Burlington anymore they have to go to outside neighboring places because there's such a in demand rental market that's being driven by outside investors and Airbnb's so I it's a stark contrast and I just would like to see it be a little bit more consistent and more in line with my lifestyle, my day to day and just to clarify I mean it sounds like the applicant had a very very long term rental that had sustained you know if this weren't an Airbnb the long term rental doesn't necessarily have to be very long term and it could be people have a very different lifestyle so maybe are working at a bar and come home at two in the morning every day and there's no guarantee I agree with that and I understand that and I'm not trying to say that these people are going to be the same as other future long term rentals but I do feel that the Airbnb culture as short term vacation rentals is a lot different culture than somebody that's a long term tenant in a community okay anything else you want to add I think we've got a pretty good picture right now okay thank you appreciate it was anybody else in the public that wanted to speak on this project does the applicant want to come back up yeah you can come back up I just want to suggest that I would not take this personally as much as these are the issues we hear in neighborhoods like this with B&Bs this is a pretty universal issue yeah and Josh isn't telling us anything he hasn't told us to our face well Dean hasn't said anything to us so I guess a couple of things the driveway as you just heard it fits four cars when it was a long term rent it fit four cars in house so I just want to clarify that characterization I want to make sure that it's noted that no one who's stayed with us has clipped mirrors or sideswiped cars on Pine Street so that's not I think it was characterized like that might be a byproduct of this and I just want to make sure that it's noted that's not I would say too Josh has come and talked to me twice about this and we want to be good neighbors we realize this does particularly with the parking and people getting in and out of cars you know and so after we talked to him we tried to make sure the house was more clearly delineated right and we I hear I don't want people like going out and knocking on the door walking around this property so I feel like we're I think fundamentally we have a disagreement about whether or not we should be operating and be there but I would also like to add that we have heard him and we have tried to be responsive to some of his concerns and also just with regards to the neighborhood you know it is a very busy street it is not like a street where kids are playing in the street because it is Pine Street they go over to Bear Park we do have Bear Park I think since the summer has like big sporting events which makes the entire Pine Street used for parking which just goes all the way to Queen City we do have neighbors who have post-meetings we had for years issues getting out of our driveway because their parking really close so it is not just us adding to the parking and when we listed it with on-site park off-street parking on-street parking I'm sorry A it was before zoning and to our defense we've tried to look into what is Burlington's regulation with regards to Airbnb a year and a half ago and I googled I didn't I found B&B you may rent it as Airbnb but it is a B&B and the importance is clear about parking for B&Bs but it is confusing admittedly and in the end I did have to call actually first code enforcement because we always complied with code enforcement when it was rented it was a certificate of compliance so and they said no actually now you have to go through zoning so it does sound like Airbnb is it's still it's still new we're all trying to figure this out you know what's fair what's the right approach I definitely I feel bad that somebody parked in their driveway I hadn't heard about that and like with anything I think it is also a little bit of a learning curve of how clear to communicate things and we are aware of that and trying trying our best and we do live there you know this is it's a predictable issue with B&Bs that people will go to the wrong house and we just hear it time and time again about how clear you are it just does happen well I do have a question about have there been any noticeable increase in like break-ins or other crimes as a result of this so you know that we heard some testing the new demographic is tourists so I don't view them as like a high crime rate so it's a lot of you know I haven't heard of any and I think because we make it so clear we live there we've never had anybody that we felt uncomfortable with never because we're so clear it's a family of three that lives there that I think when people look at our profile they understand it's moms bringing their kids and saying this is great I felt like home we need to be comfortable I don't want to live in a house where I have potentially some strange people walking through so it is we have not felt up to this point uncomfortable with anybody because I think the people that would come here to party or have whatever business we can be in with us what is your check-in process so we do have key like hidden key lock boxes that upon confirmed booking we disclose to them and they're out of out of sight so they're behind a screen door or they're behind a wall bend that only people who have that information would know about you saw the recommendation for the check-in between 7 a.m. yeah yeah we just saw that in the what's your response to that it's probably a matter of communication I would ask too does that mean like the first check-in because people go out to town people go to concerts, people go to dinner so when you say check-in does that mean does that mean first check-in that's how we've interpreted it yeah yeah and we can I'd be happy to change our listing and saying no we can't accommodate late night arrivals you would agree if it wasn't a recommendation a requirement check-in by 10 p.m. if we had to do that it just weeds out certain people I wouldn't like it but if that is part of yeah right now you had a four bedroom but you stopped doing that so you had three bedrooms one bedroom in your house two bedrooms in the apartment and I have no idea how but if you were approved for two bedrooms and not three would you stick with that if you were approved for two bedrooms and not three bedrooms would you honor that given that you've been advertising we were going to do the right thing we wouldn't be happy about it and honestly I think really because our son moved out it's a big property I think it's unreasonable but if that was a recommendation any other questions from them I'm going to close public hearing we may deliberate at the end of the meeting tonight on this we won't know until we get to the end of the meeting and you're welcome to stay we don't take any testimony when we deliberate but you could listen if you wanted to and it's the one that's in the deliberation it's public yes yes public but you can't participate we'll decide at the end of the meeting what we're going to do that okay thank you thank you everybody for participating so the next item on our agenda is 186 south willard street it is the applicant here I'm going to recuse myself from this okay this is a change of use from single family home to three units with existing footprint is anybody else besides the applicant going to testify on this project can I ask everybody to raise your right hand Jeff are you going to testify I'm going to raise your right hand I'm swearing you with so you have to raise your right hand do you swear to tell the truth I hold truth on the pain of penalty of perjury okay so Brad just briefly if I may one of your supplemental communications tonight is an amended driveway and parking plan for the property parking by parking in a widened driveway and a potential division in a shared driveway thank you do you want to introduce yourselves yes my name is Ilya Porolev I'm representing Paul Cotton who's here with me we're seeking approval for conversion of single family into three family there's no change to the footprint of the building there's no change to the number of the bedrooms or bathrooms of this property there's an existing three car parking that's been approved in 1995 currently the curb cut is shared with the neighbor so we propose enlargement of the curb cut to isolate entrance to the property on our side of the property only and we're adding some additional parking long-term and short-term as well if you widen the that's what this is showing changing it to rough cars there's a big tree at the beginning of the driveway is that tree taken out with this change there's no there's existing telephone pole which we had asked utility company to relocate and we got confirmation that it's possible that's the pole shift so I was looking at Google Earth maybe it's an old photograph was there a tree there at one point actually there was a tree there at one point many years ago so this plan has to get redone to show retainage for the parking is that very nice retaining wall along the thing right now it's going to have to be redone can you clarify why are you asking what I mean well if you look at your drawing the cars are hanging out over the top of the wall so the wall is going to have to be redone to conform to where the cars are shown oh so the car you're saying the tires of the cars can't hang over they're about three feet or four feet up in the air I think the cars were are the cars are placed are placed further forward in this drawing than they have been for the last 25 years okay good does the board have any questions for the applicant I have one question for Scott how did you come up with the plot coverage calculation you change in the staff report so I pulled it from the permit record okay with this proposed revision to the driveway coverage will seemingly increase a bit but at least eyeballing it there appears to be room under the 40% ceiling to do so so you pulled it from previous permits it does look like they're swapping some paved space for green space there may be no net change now that you mentioned it you're saying 63 square foot of walk to be returned to green space with a new 63 does the intent there to maintain the same level of coverage correct intent to maintain the same same level of coverage by reclaiming it from some paved areas it would be good to resubmit this plan for record to have the cars not hanging out over the walls if you can do that that would be a conversion of 65 any other questions? it looks pretty straightforward does somebody from the public want to comment on this? do you want to come up? do you want to take a seat? yeah, my name is David Bork and I'm the direct neighbor with the cottons right here my address is 190 Jackson Cork it's not a southward street but we share the access to our properties so I just want the board to be clarified I got the report today that there's no alterations the only alterations are limited to the new AC compressors and pads but as Scott noted later on this afternoon he said that he sent this revision for the access to a lot as it's drawn I just wanted the board to know that currently our property line is basically 70% of that access and the cottons they've been in our neighbors for 25 years great neighbors and they drive over our property line to get in and out not a problem it's a change of use from a single family home to now a tenant house I'm sure that we do have the proper access for both properties can you just clarify where your property is I don't know that we have a map that would show us there was a diagram we have that's the one that you have now there was a revision sent on Thursday from the architect you guys don't have that I think this is what we have what are you asking for, Nate? oh no he's asking for clarification we have the original plan and then we have what was submitted I think it was yesterday maybe provided to you in the board your property is east of the 1E6 your are the east side of the driveway yes okay and their change was to get full access without encroaching on your property that's all I want to do that's what they want to do that's exactly what is drawn wide and 16 foot curb cut off your drive that's the best way to do it and that's the way it's drawn I think I just want to make sure that that's what the zoning board is looking at and will approve that condition you do have to move the utility board okay I guess that's it any other questions for the neighbor? thank you Dave you can come back up if you want you don't have to anything you want to add if I may based on this new plan again because it was provided after the staff report if the board does approve it there should be an additional condition basically saying the utility company for this board cannot approve so with that we are closing the public hearing and as I go to medical we may deliberate at the end of the meeting okay next item on our agenda is 2026 church street parking waiver request for changing 14 commercial units to 12 to 13 residential units is the applicant here yes oh I think they've got the sheet you can introduce yourself if you want to get started on absolutely and I guess I'll ask is anybody else going to testify in this project 2026 church street besides the applicant do you want to raise your right hand to tell the truth and hold truth on the pain and penalty of perjury okay you'll get the clipboard back if you want to introduce yourself my name is Greg Chaffee and I'm the owner of 2026 church street with my wife and you're converting it to residential units on the upper floors on the upper two second and third floor second and third floor what's there now commercial units right it's a mixed use of office beauty salon upstairs and so the people from the office they theoretically would have to park somewhere and they sort of figure it out yes same as the retail store they come down down we have no we have no exterior elevations we have no exterior photographs those are lacking are there any exterior changes planned as part of this no other than maybe you know paint and clean up the board if they have questions for the applicant on this project can you just speak a little bit to how you're planning on what you're planning to say to potential residents about parking what do I plan to say to potential residents hopefully they don't have vehicles that's going to be our our primary goal is to since they're within a block of the public transportation several different there's parking that the architect did a plan for what our goal is is to have people possibly live work either in their units or work downtown and their occupancy will not add to the traffic downtown we can't guarantee that but that's that's our goal you're not obviously not providing any parking for a number of these units so if someone has a car it's their responsibility to find parking for that that's not unusual in the central business district parking spaces to my knowledge not entirely but I don't have the history to recall past projects how does one enter how do they enter the apartment building from where from church street number 22 has a door to the staircase and one ascends the staircase to the second floor and then there's a spiral staircase going to the third floor winding staircase winding code wise it's different can I ask a question about church street traffic I notice trucks and stuff from moving you know is that commercial vehicles only or if someone wants to move units can they bring their U-Haul to the front how does this work one can move in church street between the hours of 730 and 1030 or any other reasonable time as determined by the church street marketplace but every day other than Sunday 730 to 1030 the street is open from the top block to the bottom block to the left that would be communicated to tenants oh yes this is a beautiful building I guess it's actually one of the oldest ones 1874 and so I just want to stress that there are no exterior changes as part of this application the only possible exterior change would be in the rear we're going through public works as far as egress we removed one means of egress from the rear and you may have to replace it with a different but it wouldn't be visible from the front of the building that's that rear steerway that would exit into the parking area behind the building yes and would that have to come back for us Ryan or sounds like that would be administrative for them even with the historic element correct any other questions for the applicant here I think it's exciting to have more residents on church street I think the upper floors are tough to rent out commercially aren't they it's just 20 over the years when we first renovated the building in the mid 80's there was a good demand for small office use etc but over time those tenants have migrated to places where strip centers and places where they can drive in and drive out are you next door to Halverson I am yes the upper floors there are still vacant right they've been vacant since the fire well they were burned out in a fire and the building owner Dr. Eastman had rented these spaces to the brothers from Boston they controlled the rebuild of that building they just left the facade and put a slant roof on the back of it and it's condemned upstairs and there's probably not room enough upstairs to build anything anyway now let's say change the roof any other questions can I ask Ryan a question and this is nothing to do with the application this is just for my own understanding with this being a permitted use to more than a 10 resident unit does it still require an affordable like 2 units does it still require any affordable housing or is that that's a good question we're as high as Zariah for conversion I'm sure it's higher it's not the standard 5 I don't feel like I'm asking a dumb question anymore does the elevator go to the third floor the the foot elevator goes to the third floor the stairs left right there is no left in the building and you're not required it's 10 Zariah good thing someone's paying attention 10 requires it requires an exclusionary 10% of 12 is that but here's a question if that's not a condition to what's before us does that address it we would add it to as a condition an approval but we won't we wouldn't prove that because it's a downtown corner it's a permanent use so we're not reviewing the parking waiver so would staff have to administratively make that requirement no you would wrap it all into this we would wrap it all in just like any of the other administrative conditions no your action should you approve it would be to approve the conversion to 12 units and the parking waiver and by the way you need to find inclusionary but we're not approved we're not asked to review the conversion well if we want to tie ourselves up in bureaucracy and have the applicant come back and reapply separately and come back in September in addition we should do it now do you have any concern with us applying a condition that requires two of the units to meet the inclusionary housing standards yes do you have a problem with that well we start let me give you a brief history of this we started this and our architect went down and had a sit down meeting with the former public works I don't know if he's the head or the chair person but Ned so we got everything in line for Ned the way he wanted it got ready to do our our plan talked to some people in the state and then I put in for the zoning variance for the parking based on the architect's designs and what she received for information from Ned well recently she went down for a sit down with Ned's replacements since he has retired and Brad has given her an entirely different set of parameters as to now he says that we have to have handicapped accessible units in adaptive use of in historic building for the second and third floor which realizes an impossibility but yet if we go over three units we have to have that additional conditions and additional conditions so if that is a requirement there will be then more and then more if you want to approve the parking lever I would appreciate it along with the conditions that were listed already before this hearing and if you don't want to that's alright also because you'll be piling more upon us and we simply want to do a simple thing and provide housing and if we can then we can so this wouldn't require a change in design oh it's already required a change in design from Ned to Brad we're not going to be able to probably do what we want to anyway I'm trying to follow how many units you have now we have eight units on the third floor and six units on the second floor for a total of fourteen that's what exists now I'm looking at the plans we have I see one, two, three, four four units on the third floor you say eight units on the third floor you may be looking at plans that the architect did for reconstruction plans as is now we have an existing plan here if you have a plan that shows four units on the third floor then what you have is inaccurate it's been eight units up there since 1984 so what's the net increase in dwelling units net increase in what what is the net increase in dwelling units it's a net decrease it's a net decrease in dwelling units the dwelling units will be two less than the existing units there now we're going from fourteen existing units to twelve units there are residential apartments he's talking about units regardless of views twelve residential units is what you're looking for currently you have how many residential units no residential units twelve residential units my head is also off yeah when you say net increase I don't know what you're referring to it is confusing for us I will say I have a level two plan here that just shows how many residential units and it's got two, three, four, five residential units proposed on the second floor I don't know I don't know what you have what I'm seeing nine units on the plan that's what I see too nine residential units if you have nine residential units you don't have to do affordable I've asked the applicant to present a more accurate site floor plan to clarify the units and I'm still kind of waiting for that for the purposes of tonight it was the parking waiver but it's still so we is the hope to have twelve residential units but the plan only has nine residential units this is an old plan that I had that I gave to Ryan but it's not accurate as of today this plan was done I can't read the writing on this because it shrunk down 2017 this plan is two plus years old and again this plan was done when Ned was there and everything was okay and now Ned is no longer there and there's very little that's okay so I don't know exactly what will be approved for so the request that's in front of us is just for the parking waiver if he has other obligations under the zoning ordinance those are not currently in front of us correct the parking waiver is necessarily tied to a use we cannot grant a parking waiver based on criteria related to an undefined use it's connected by now it's connected to 12 units which we don't have a plan that shows 12 units we have a plan that shows 9 units my thinking is should we continue this until we get a plan I think that what we should do is continue this so that we know what we're approving and if it's 9 units then we don't have to worry about the affordable condition especially if you're saying public works is still reviewing aspects of this and that there may be other plan changes at 9 units at 9 units adapting the current use to the new use we don't need a waiver we're allowed 9 units and that's fine my concern is if I give you I don't have a plan that shows what's actually the core basis of our approval and that gives me I don't want to do 12 parking waiver for a plan that shows 9 units and it may be an old plan you may have new ones but I think the way I'm feeling is we should continue this until we actually get whatever plan you want before us I will know that you've heard no objections to the parking waiver but we have other issues we got to do this appropriately do we need a motion on that? I would only note that the next bill meeting is September 3rd so 4 weeks out as opposed to 2 the 20th is totally fine is that enough time for you to come back September 3rd if between the architect and public works they can come up with a plan that's acceptable to her and to Brad we can continue it further out again I don't know I thought 2 years ago we were set with a plan we can continue it and then you can come in and apply for when you want to get back on the agenda why don't we continue it and then I'll make a motion on B19-0655CA I move that we continue the public hearing until the September or no 17th 17th meeting and if the applicant needs additional time to finalize his plan he can just come in and he can write to the staff and let us know that and we can continue further on discussion I guess just I'm not convinced that we need a site plan of the interior of the building to approve the request in front of us we need to know how many units he's presenting that there will be 12 units and he's asking for a waiver based on 12 units I do agree given the circumstances and thank you Zariah for raising it there seems to be a lack of clarity about what exactly is happening I think we have a pending motion discussion I'm just saying I'm not sure we need an interior site plan I tend to agree that we should continue it to resolve the issue I think that the site plan is a surrogate for a certain team so we have a motion we have a second all in favor opposed so it's continue to the 17th unless you need more time we should talk to the staff about that thank you so that is this meeting we will close the meeting for adjourn and how do people feel about