 So it is 733 p.m. on Thursday, March 9th, 2023. Good evening, my name is Christian Klein and I am the chair of the Arlington Zoning Board of Appeals. I'm calling this meeting of the board to order. I ask all attendees who are not recognized to speak to please mute their connection until such time as they are recognized by the chair. I would like to confirm that all members and anticipated officials are present. Members of the Zoning Board of Appeals, Roger Dupont. Here. Patrick Hanlon. Here. Daniel Rucadelli. Here. Venkat Holi. Elaine Hoffman. Here. And Adam LeBlanc. Welcome to you all. Joining us on behalf of the town is our zoning assistant, Colleen Ralston. Colleen, good to have you with us. Good evening. And given that the business of the meeting tonight is mostly administrative, with the exception of just continuing the 40B hearing, we don't have anyone else from the town nor do the board have its usual consultants with us this evening. But appearing on behalf of the applicant, we have Paul Feldman. Good evening, everybody. Good evening. This open meeting of the Arlington Zoning Board of Appeals is being conducted remotely, consistent with an act relative to extending certain state of emergency accommodations signed into law on July 16th, 2022. This act includes an extension until March 31st, 2023 of the remote meeting provision of Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 executive order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law, which suspended the requirement to hold all meetings in a publicly accessible physical location. Public body may continue holding meetings remotely without a quorum of the public body physically present at a meeting location so long as they provide adequate alternative access to remote meeting. Public bodies may meet remotely so long as reasonable public access is afforded so the public can follow along with the deliberations of the meeting. An opportunity for public participation will be provided during the public comment period during each public hearing. For this meeting, the Arlington Zoning Board of Appeals has convened a video conference via the Zoom application with online and telephone access as listed on the agenda posted to the town's website identifying how the public may join. This meeting is being recorded and it will be broadcast by ACMI. Please be aware that attendees are participating by a variety of means. Some attendees are participating by video conference, others are participating by computer audio or by telephone. Accordingly, please be aware that other folks may be able to see you, your screen name or another identifier. Please take care to not share personal information. Anything you broadcast may be captured by the recording. We ask you to please maintain the quorum during the meeting, including displaying an appropriate background. All supporting materials that have been provided members of this body are available on this meeting's agenda or onto the town's website, unless otherwise noted. The public is encouraged to follow along using the posted agenda. And as chair, I reserve the rights to take items out of order in the interest of promoting an orderly meeting. So by the agenda posted to the town's website, we have four items tonight. We have just concluded item number one. I am going to defer items two and three, which are the other two administrative items to the end of the hearing. So we can move ahead with item number four, which is docket 3719-1021-1025 Massachusetts Avenue. Turning to the comprehensive permit hearing for the residents of the Millbrook. This evening, the board is continuing the comprehensive permit hearing for the residents of the Millbrook, the redevelopment of an existing site in the neighborhood office B1 district. The submitted documents are available on the board's website or as an attachment to the posted agenda. At the January hearings, the board heard testimony regarding what landed stormwater plans to the property, traffic and transportation issues and architectural considerations. At the February hearings, the board heard testimony regarding landscape plans, revisions to the civil plans, revisions to the architectural plans and the presentation of the construction management plan. Tonight Matthew Maggiore, president of the Maggiore companies and Christopher Mulherne principal at Harrison Mulherne Architects are unable to attend this meeting. They have notified the board that they will not be presenting any new testimony this evening, but will be requesting a continuance to our next scheduled meeting date for this project. And at this point, I recognize attorney Paul Feldman from Davis Mall in DeOxene. Good evening. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yeah, we had several of our consultants and Matt Maggiore himself that are both, that are able to turn out to be out of town tonight. We request that the board continue this public hearing until your next scheduled meeting for this matter, which I understand to be March 23rd. March 23rd at 7.30 PM. Are there any questions for the board? Being none. I'm sorry, Mr. Chairman. I couldn't get to my microphone in time. Mr. Chairman. You know, I realized that this applicant has been very responsive and cooperative. And so I understand that, you know, everyone would like to get this done as quickly as possible. And I think that we've been moving in that direction on all fronts. I would like though to be clear that I would like to see whatever this two week hiatus is that we're taking, I'd like to see that tacked on so that we have an agreement that we're extending our full complement of days for the additional two weeks that we're not having now. So, you know, it's understandable that the applicant wants to get this done as quickly as possible. And I'm all for that. But I do think that we should have the requisite number of days available to us. So I'd like to just ask that we have an agreement that we're extending for the additional two weeks that we're taking out now. Mr. Feldman, do you have an objection to that? Absolutely no objection. By March 23rd meeting, we will have had our first meeting with the Conservation Commission under the Weapons Protection Act which is currently scheduled for March 16th. We're gonna have an idea of their schedule. I've committed to this board and to the CONCOM that we would extend the Comprehensive Permit Proceedings so as to give the Conservation Commission adequate time to consider our application of the Weapons Protection Act so that before this matter is closed, there can be coordination between the issuance of an order of conditions under both the Comprehensive Permit Local By-law and the Weapons Protection Act. So I have a feeling we were gonna be tacking on some time anyway because of that process, but I'm perfectly happy to commit to the board tonight the two weeks that we've just been requested. My question is not a copy to me, but we would have. Thank you very much, Mr. Feldman. It's Johnny down on the motion. The two weeks from April 16th brings us to April 30th. So then I would move to extend the public hearing period for the hearings on 10, 21, 10, 25 Massachusetts Avenue to April 30th, 2023. The second? Second. Thank you, Mr. Hanlon. So basically what this does is this, the public comment period is the 180 day period from the opening of the hearing until when the hearing has to close. This is a vote to extend that by 14 days, which brings us to April 30th. So with that, a vote of the board, Mr. DuPont. Aye. Mr. Hanlon. Aye. Mr. Rickidelli. Aye. Ms. Hoffman. Aye. Mr. Holley. Aye. And the chair votes aye. We are extended on the public hearing. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I wonder if Mr. Lubanc has already sufficiently sworn in that he might be included in this? I've been debating this because unfortunately he can't join us on the voting on this matter. So I'm going to leave him off, but I will fully include him in any vote I can at the end of this meeting. Okay. I want to get his feet wet. This voting was the most fun part. So with that, I'll return to the other motion on this matter, which would be, I move to continue the public hearing for the residences at Millbrook until Thursday, March 23rd, 2023 at 7.30 p.m. Thank you, Mr. Hanlon. So this is a vote to continue this hearing two weeks from tonight on March 23rd. So vote of the board, Mr. DuPont. Aye. Mr. Hanlon. Aye. Mr. Riccadelli. Aye. Ms. Hoffman. Aye. Mr. Holley. Aye. The chair votes aye. We are continued on the residences at Millbrook until Thursday, March 23rd, 2023 at 7.30 p.m. Thank you all very much. Thank you so much for coming with us. See you in two weeks. Yep. Good night. Okay, so with that, I will return back to the administrative items. So these items relate to the operation of the board and as such are generally conducted without input from the general public. The board will not take up any new business on prior hearings nor will there be the introduction of any new information on matters previously brought before the board. So that brings us to item two on our agenda, which is members vote, the approval of the decision for 75 Dothan Street. So this was a hearing that we heard and decided on February 28th. A decision was written up by Mr. Hanlon, presented to the board for their questions and comments and then a final draft issued this afternoon. There was one additional change, which was just in the first line of the summary changing in to on in that first line. Are there any additional comments in regards to the draft decision for 75 Dothan Street? Seeing none, may I have a motion? Mr. Chairman. Mr. Hanlon. I move that the opinion that was presented to the board earlier in 75 Dothan Street with the amendment that the chair has just described be approved. Second. Thank Mr. DuPont. So this is a vote to approve the written decision for 75 Dothan Street with the single change. Mr. DuPont. I. Mr. Hanlon. I. Ms. Hoffman. I. Mr. Rickidelli. I. And the chair votes aye. That is approved. That brings us to item three on the agenda. Members vote approval of the decision for 20 Hobbs Court. So similarly, this was a case that we heard on the 28th of February. I wrote the decision, distributed it to the board, printed it in its final format today. And Mr. Hanlon caught that I had referred to the applicant as my Haynes in one location as opposed to Mr. Haynes. So we will make that a change. Are there any other questions or comments as they relate to the decision for 20 Hobbs Court? Seeing none, may I have a motion? Mr. Chairman. Mr. Hanlon. I move that the application for 20 Hobbs Court be approved. Excuse me, the opinion for the application be approved with the amendments that the chair has just indicated. Second. Thank you, Mr. Hanlon and DuPont. So the vote on the decision for 20 Hobbs Court with a single edit. Mr. DuPont. I. Mr. Hanlon. I. Ms. Hoffman. I. Mr. Riccadelli. I. Chair votes, aye. That is approved. So that is the end of our regular business for this evening. We do have, I wanted to, I'd introduce him briefly, but we have with us, Adam LeBlanc, who is the new associate member of the zoning board of appeals as of Monday. And so he is working with the town clerk, getting sworn in and doing all the fun things we need to do when we go on a board in town and we'll be with us going forward. So we're very glad to have him with us. And we'll give you the full introduction at our next hearing. So we have coming up on our calendar. So the next hearing date is March 23rd, which is again a comprehensive permit hearing for 1021, 1025 Mass Ave. Then Tuesday, March 28th at 730, we have our regular, the regularly scheduled hearing. There are five items on that agenda. One of them is the continuance of 212 Pleasant Street. One of them is the continuance of 178 Forest, is my understanding at this time that the applicant has decided against pursuing a special permit and has filed a building permit for as-right development. And so I have asked them to appear at the hearing to specifically request that they withdraw their application so that there's no question among the public as to what exactly is going on in regards to that case. So we'll be doing that. Then after that Thursday, April 6th at 730 would be the comprehensive permit hearing continuation for 1021, 1025 Mass Ave. Obviously that is after March 31st. So all bets are off as to what format we're in. The law allowing us to continue remotely will have expired. So unless the state acts to extend it, we will be either in-person or hybrid and we can discuss that offline as to which format we should take up. We can certainly hopefully by March 28th we have an idea as to what the state is gonna do. But I think the last two times they voted on it the day after it expired. So I'm not holding my breath on that. Then after that, April 11th, Tuesday, April 11th we do have a regular rescheduled meeting and we have hearings that evening. And then beyond that we go forward. I did see today that the Housing Corporation of Arlington is pulling together their final paperwork on applying for a comprehensive permit for 10 Sunnyside in East Arlington. So I anticipate that will be filed before too long. And then the only other piece is once we have closed the public hearing on 1021, 1025 Mass Ave we do need to schedule meetings to discuss the decision because those involve a quorum of the board. They do have to be public meetings but we cannot take any testimony. They will be closed meetings but the public may join and observe but they cannot participate. And hopefully those will not go on for too long. We have 40 days from the time we close the hearing so we can schedule those as we need. Mr. Chairman. Mr. Hanlon. In the previous times, our advisor Mr. Hoverty has drafted a decision for us to consider and for the public consider before we actually close the hearing. And I wonder if he's planning to do that again. It's helpful of course because it allows us to focus on the conditions at least the ones that we can focus on. We can't really focus on the model at a point when we still have the ability to hear from the public and from the applicant about their acceptability. I did request that from him a couple of hearings ago and I appreciate the reminder because I haven't seen anything yet. So I will follow back up with Mr. Hoverty on that one and try to get that moving. And then I need to, I just need to pull together some other information on the conditions that had been mentioned as we had gone through the hearing process. But since the hearings close, I don't want to get too deep into that. Mr. Chairman. Mr. Hanlon. Just to say again, one of the issues that has been sort of lurking in this case since the very beginning has to do with the historical status of one of the two houses, I think it's 1025. And the question I have is, it seems to me at this point, we got to at least once we figure out what the situation is, we got to at least hear it in the public hearing so that public can understand what the situation is and we can get clear on what I gather is a somewhat uncertain background. So I think that that part of, I have no idea where that's going or what to say about it is, but it shouldn't be, it should be ultimately dealt with in the public hearing before we go into deliberations. Okay, to that end, I'll speak with Town Council and see if he can appear at the next hearing. And hopefully by then, we'll have a little bit better sense as to what the current status of that property is. Are there any further questions on our upcoming schedule? Seeing none. Hi, thank you all for your participation in tonight's meeting of the Arlington Zoning Board of Appeals. I appreciate everyone's patience throughout the meeting. I would especially like to thank Colleen Ralston, Vincent Lee and Marissa Lau for all their assistance in preparing for and hosting this online meeting. Please note the purpose of the board's recording, the meeting is to ensure the creation of an accurate record of its proceedings. It is our understanding that recording made by ACMI will be available on demand at ACMI.tv within the coming days. If anyone has comments or recommendations, please send them via email to zbaatown.arlington.ma.us. That email address is also listed on the Zoning Board of Appeals website. And to conclude tonight's meeting, I would ask for a motion to adjourn. Mr. Mohr had something he wanted to say. Indeed, if I could just get a second to Mr. DuPont. Thank you. Mr. Mohr. I'm sorry, I appreciate you very much for the closing. One quick question. What, I'm wondering what you believe the way ahead is for the Thorndike Place project at this point? Ah, so Thorndike Place, as my, as I understand it, there is a one, the applicant appeal is still before the state. I believe it's in Superior Court. I can't remember if it goes to Superior Court or Land Court, but it's in one of those two, and that is proceeding. But the applicant is seeking a buyer for, so it's Oak Tree Development, we believe is seeking a buyer for their share of the property. And I have not heard anything other than that. So the, if the property was to be sold, my understanding is that the decision stays with the property, so it would be in effect. But at this point, without speaking further to council or having any sort of definitive bill of sale, I have no idea what's going on over there. Thank you, Mr. Chair, does that, does that basically mean from your perspective, and I know you're not, that the decision rendered by the court would go with the property, and if the court decides to uphold whatever the appeal is, and I'm not ready for any of that. No. That it could undo all of the agreements that the Oak Mount, whatever you said, what Oak have made with this board and the town so far? So the decision that the board reached the applicant, the neighbors who filed the abutter appeal, they had very specific objections to it. And though, so depending on what superior court does to amend the decision that the board makes or upholds the decision the board makes, that should remain in effect is my understanding. The issue would be if the property is sold and the new owners want to do something different, that they would either file to reopen the hearing or they would file a new comprehensive permit application and we would start all over. But I have no idea what, who it would be or what their intent would be. Mr. Hanlon. I think that there are lots of legal ways of kind of going at this. I would expect that if there was a desire on the part of the applicant, whether it's the current owners of the property or somebody who succeeds to them, if they want to change anything, at this point they've already dismissed their appeal before the housing and appeals committee. And so they would probably come to us to seek to amend the comprehensive permit. That would be sort of the usual path for doing a thing like that. That would open up a whole new proceeding. Although as far as I know, we have no reason to believe that that would be the case. If the court were to uphold the butters appeal, it would send a, it would give a mandate and it would have some grounds for doing that. It would be anyone or a multitude of the specific objections that were made. At that point, typically what would happen is that they would send the matter back to the board to revise its opinion in the light of the court's opinion. At that point, I think we'd have to discuss what council was to what the exact procedure is for us to do that, but that's probably what would happen. And that part hasn't changed because of any prospective sale if it takes place. That's what would have happened anyway if the court agreed with the butters. Okay, that's very helpful, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate that. I just, I know that the approach that the owners took to what they wanted to build changed at least three separate times that I remember and ended up with a kind of specific use, kind of a, yeah, a specific use. And I just would hate to have all that somehow undone by this last minute change. But that's an inexpert opinion on my part. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Moore. With that, I think we are ready to adjourn. So we have the motion before us to do so. Vote of the board, Mr. Dupont. Aye. Mr. Hanlon. Aye. Ms. Hoppen. Aye. Mr. Holley. Aye. Mr. LeBlanc. Aye. Mr. Riccadelli. Aye. And the chair votes aye. We are adjourned. Good night, everybody. Good night. Good night, everybody. Gleam the week.