are here tonight are so all in this evening is to discuss proposed amendments to the demolition delay by law we have no other agenda items i'm going to give a very brief  overview of the by law and then really open the floor to any questions or concerns that you may have there were handouts out on the table out there i think one of them  we're now out of copies but all the information that was on the table is also available on the historic district commission website i'd also like to introduce spencer gober spencer wave her hand spencer is the new staff planner in the office of community development he's the contact for the historic district commission and if you have any further questions or concerns are anything you'd like to discuss about the  demolition delay byelaw you know his contact information is here and will also be included in the in the slide questions at the end of the  presentation so to start you may wonder why we have a demolition delay by law some of you may remember the tragic loss of the waverly congregational church built in eight seventy and designed in the gothic revival but we're going back yeah there are thank you in the gothic revival style by hammond billings when this important civic building in waverly square was destroyed along with several other important historic buildings elsewhere in residence came together to create a demolition delayed by law the original by i was co sponsored by the historic district commission and the planning board and these proposed amendments we're discussing today have been developed collaboratively with the planning board and with the vial our view committe the demolition delayed by law provides a tool to protect historically significant buildings that reflect the architectural cultural or social history of the town and was originally approved by town meeting in tw thirteen the twenty thirteen by law had a three year sunset provision and town meeting approved a one year extension so we now must renew the by law the experience with the bylaws over the past three and a half years plus our recently completed historic resources survey informed the proposed amendments the bylaw consists of two distinct parts which were going to discuss separately the first part is the by law itself the concept of a demolition by law is simply too pretty to provide time to consider alternatives to the destruction of a historic building with the goal of saving the building and retaining the character of our community the bylaw has several key elements first it does not prohibit demolition it simply pauses the process to provide time to consider alternative second it only applies to a list of historic buildings that are otherwise not protected through other means third it affords property owners the opportunity to appeal being a complete included on the list that appeal is made to the board of selectmen after the bye law is adopted by town meeting and approved by the attorney general all property owners will receive a certified notice from the office of community development and will have sixty days to appeal inclusion on the list to the board of s fourth and this may be the most important consideration for many of you it does not affect improvements you want to make on your property this is not an architectural review process it is not a historic district nor does it approach the review required for properties in a designated historic district fifth it includes provisions for emergency demolition when health and safety are risk and finally it allows the h d c to waive or shorten the delay period in some instances such as when an owner has demonstrated due diligence in exploring all avenues as alternatives to demolition the warrant for town meeting includes a few amendments to the by law some of which are less of stand to than others the non substantial changes relate to four areas first a byline now has standardize formatting to make this bylaw consistent with others in town that's basically copy editing it's ball it's capitalization it doesn't affect any content we have kept the sunset provision but increased it to five years to allow time to allow to see how this works we have added a definition of the word demolish to increase clarity and have deleted the severability clause consistent with other bylaws in town there are few amendments that represent changes to the bylaws and we wanted to bring those to your attention first we've added an exclusion section this is particularly important because it creates clarity related to the definition of demolition by identifying the types of actions that are not subject to the bylaw these include things like routine maintenance interior renovations painting additions or removals of architectural features in other words were that you might want to do to update or rehabilitate your historic property is not affected by another addition to the bylaws is a provision for buildings that go through the delay process but are not demolished within six months rather than being removed from the list of significant these properties would stay on the list and if demolition is desired in the future would have to go through the process again this is consistent with what happens when a building permit expires we have simplified the bar by standardizing the delay process to twelve months our experience over the last three and a half years let us to this change and we feel that the twelve months will provide the needed time to fully consider alternatives to the destruction of a historic building it also created a clearer process so that the length of delay is not governed by use and is consistent with what other towns in massachusetts do this chart looks complicated but it's relatively straightforward it illustrates how the delay process works over a twelve month period following the the filing of a demolition permit after the filing the building division notifies the historic district commission and the historic district commission will then hold a public hearing to determine if a building is preferably preserved this includes notifications to a potters and gives the community the opportunity to provide feedback if the building is determined preferably preserved the commission may continue the demolition delay process with the hope that the owner or developer will in gage in a discussion about alternatives if the property is not preferably preserved the historic district commission will notify the building division and the demolition permit may be issue so now i like to switch to the other part of the bylaw which is the list of significant buildings belmont demolition delay applies only to specific properties rather than broad categories which is what the town requested four years ago when the historic district commission submitted the by law to town meeting this makes it clear and unambiguous which properties are affected streamlined the process and helps to ensure that the by law applies to the properties that represent the most important examples of historically significant buildings the new list of of significant buildings is based on the recently completed historic research sources survey funded in two thousand and thirteen with community preservation act funds which follow the inventory methods of the massachusetts historical commission it was completed by lisa soft r preservation consultant and has been posted online on the h d c website the survey updated a previous inventory completed in one thousand nine hundred eighty two which formed the basis for the list of significant buildings in the two thousand and thirteen bylaw on the left you can see an image from the hundred eighty two inventory and a right and on the right an image from the current form the new survey included areas of belmont that were not previously inventoried as well as under represented building types such as mid century modern buildings we also work to identify significant buildings built before one thousand nine hundred that had not been previously documented the data collected through this survey was used to identify and analyze the most important historic buildings that are integral to the town's historic character and identity looked at over six hundred properties in belmont and ultimately prepared two hundred new inventory forms including revising some of the old farms and between one nine hundred seventy nine and one nine hundred eighty two since the goal of the survey was to fill in holes in the inventory some of the old inventory forms were determined to be adequate and were not updated and this is what the inventory forms look like they include an overview day to page and a written narrative also made recommendations about the significance of the properties and its potential eligibility for listing on the national register the original list that accompanied the two hundred to two thousand and thirteen by law had one hundred forty nine properties of these three were moved from the list due to fire demolition or physical change that triggered demolition delay once the consultant completed the survey project thirty five more properties were removed from the list because of lack of integrity or because they simply weren't as significant as others seventy one new properties were added from the new survey bringing our new total to one hundred eighty two and you can see from this park graph that the general make up of the original list versus the new list is largely the same in terms of time period for original construction with over eighty five hundred properties in belmont the list of significant buildings represents just two point one percent of the town there are some categories that are excluded from the list they include all municipal buildings and properties with preservation agreements in place they are the pleasant street common street and richardson farm historic districts the mclean national register district and the two former fire stations the breakdown of building types on the list of significant buildings is also shown those places that contribute to belmont character and to explore and provides time to explore all options before a piece of belmont's history is lost that's it on the presentation and we like to open the floor to you for questions twenty when me if the by law and memories are proved to town meeting they will go to the tourney general if they're adopted it to mean they'll go to the attorney general for review and when the as soon as that happens and the buy a lot goes into a fact the office of community development will send a certified letter to all property owners on the list and you have  then sixty days to appeal to the board of selectmen and they'll send out you know all the information about how you do that and that will happen you know if you know when the bio goes into effect  oh i'm sorry ben no it's no it's no it doesn't affect any any sort of renovation you know any changes you want to make it's just if you want to tear it down you want to tear it down  preserve important historic buildings so we have hired a preservation consultant to kind of to give us feedback on what that what those what those buildings are i can tell you that spencer can you just show the property values slide we did do a little retrospective research on the properties that were on the on the list the two twenty thirteen last to see if any had sold and generally you can see them sold you know over asked they sold over asking price and so there wasn't any indication that that had any effect on property value so i can just tell you that's what happened with this small sample of properties that were and the towns that have  demolition to lay by laws tend to have higher property values i understand so you so the good news is that you can you can make your case to the nothing nothing nothing it's not nothing it is not it is only if you want to bring up you know you want to bring a bulldozer and  nothing no you have no interaction with this sort district commission you only work with the building division on you know bill any building permit you might me ye ok and in fact important thing to know is this does not in the end in fact prohibit demolition it just pot it just ask for a pas to have a discussion about alternatives yes next  to there is no there is no ability for these are you worried about this district commission doing more than what stated on the last we have no ability to make to to do anything more and in fact most of what this star district if we want to make a change most of what has to start district commission does has to go to town meeting and so we're doing this discussion today you know in advance of town meeting because you're the you know we wanted to let the property owners know first and have a chance to disserve discuss any concerns they might have before in fact we discuss it you know a town meeting oh  ratcheted up would have to go to town meeting again you know all the volunteer committees and commissions and they do change over time and certainly things are interested in change over time that's very fair there will be another review of this in five years and in five years we'll have the experience of seeing how it worked and i think if we need to tweak it then in one way or another we could but again we cannot do that without going to town meeting and asking for that for that change i think we have a pretty good byline now the biler review committee has you know had a lot of input in two thousand and thirteen and really worked on it you know this time as well to make sure the language was clear and oh i wanted to please her i want to add one mother other point because i know some people have voiced concern that is this analogous to a historic district and it is not and in fact the creation of historic districts are a voluntary undertaking so if a neighborhood wanted to get together and do a district they could but the historic district commission cannot impose that on you consideration you know that's a good that's a very good question i know that's has never come up in the discussions that i've been part of but as of it's a you know good good point yeah thank you we had two delays in the past three and a half three and a half years the first one was a property owner in prospect street who had a very significant radon problem in their house they were living in cambridge because the house was not habitable and they were on the twenty thirteen list they came to the historic district commission whining or they  filed a demolition permit with the town the town notified the historic district commission the historic district commission then held a public hearing there were no anyone who came and at the hearing the property owners brought all their scientific documentation about their rate on problem the historic district commission felt and voted to waive the delay period because we felt that it was a health and safety issue and the homeowners had really you know prior to coming to the to the meeting had really done their due diligence to look at all options know it's a fall and it is a voluntary process and what we do is we pop we ask you to pas the demolition we ask you to wait to demolish that's all it is just wait and discuss with us options the mouse historic commission does we don't have any examples in belmont it's why i really need to say i don't know about yeah the masses dark commission does have examples of times when you know the demolition delay did lead to the preservation of a historic building next  on the house as it goes into the real estate market you're raising the transaction transaction cost of the house for you the real estate market by having this edition from it so if it is going to be your an extension from six months which is which you say has been you well i think it's a very fair question and you know these kinds of things always have you know plus and minus and i can say that we had a  property that went through the delayed process there was a huge turnout in public hearing with neighborhood support for the building to be  saved but by the time the permit was filed the building division notify the historic district commission this dark district commission held a hearing you know we were halfway through the six month period and there was really no time left for the the for the developer to discuss options with the historic district commission most towns in fact can you advance the slide lisa we most towns have a longer delay period and also i think from a practical point of view it's a little backwards for next year ago so this shows you a little bit about what our neighboring towns do you know arlington brooklyn lexington new in watertown winchester all have twelve months or greater roof i think we did way that i mean there always are going to be opportunity costs with something like this but we feel that it is you know in the town's best interest to do this small effort to  other members of the historic district commission have houses on the list and we couple people are in there in historic districts where they were even bigger constraints you know i'm was pappi to be on the list you know obviously i care a lot about the historic character of belmont and i hope very much that the houses that you know contribute to the historic character are are retained i think that the reality is it really is going to affect very few and will really only affect the houses that you know want to that are for which a future owner may want to demolish in my case speak to my case my house could not be rebuilt because of their own restrictions so in the densely party parts of my many of the the historic buildings you know have smaller setbacks and larger law coverages than zoning allows and so i have a lot of incentive you know to keep keep my house irrespective of its character which i love very much so i think that this right well i think it's not an opt out it's it's it is an appeal and it's an appeal and that was part of the discussion with the original bot so this is the same as it's been and thirteen this is not a change and that was part of that was part of the you know a valving language that evolved in a you know collaborative effort with many you know groups in belmont and so i think that you could appeal they really need to make the decision based on the building being not significant and the criteria are laid out in the bylaw the preservation consultant making a recommendation about the significance of your property i would say that if the consultant identified it as potentially eligible the national register that's a pretty high level of significance you know that's a good question i think that there are a few properties where the an ancillary structure is mentioned and that that is one of them i remember that one yeah i think you could appeal th those kind of you know sort of landscape structures would not be subject to the bylaw and there's a specific language in the bylaw that says removal of non historic additions are not covered so even if you had a very very large addition that was not historic and you wanted to take that down that would not be subject to the demolition delay you welcome asking when it goes into a fact yeah i think that it's hard to predict but my sense is that town meeting is you know it'll be in around may one for when it will go to town meeting there will be a up or down vote at town meeting after town meeting i think the town council looks at it there's a little bit that happens and then the town clerk sends and me bylaws approved at town meeting to the attorney general for review that takes you know could take you know three months so i would predict that it's not going to be until it least fall of twenty seventeen preservation act funds to support a historic resources serve as a survey and part of that discussion was updating the inventory that had been done hundred eighty two which informed the demolition delay list so that's one thing the second thing is some task approach the what properties are affected very differently some towns require that all buildings built before a certain period you know be considered for demolition delay we were instructed by various groups in not to approach demolition delay in that way we were instructed to have a list and so we tried to do that with the best information we that came about the last question you raised i think is a very good one about what if our consultant missed something in the review and in fact a property has been altered significantly from you know the time in which it was built now it's fair to say that most old buildings in belmont have been altered in some way the question is does that alteration change or reduce their historic significance if you felt that your property had been altered significantly and so it had lost its historic significance it is my view that that would be a very valid reason to appeal and that is the kind of thing i think that the peel process is intended to capture so you know we're no one's perfect and our consultant did the best she could based on readily available information we have heard you know a few corrections from folks that you know we will attend to on the inventory farms but if you felt that your building was significantly altered so that it had lost its significance that would be a very valid reason to appeal is that did i answer your questions  yes no additional fees that i know of there should be a section on the farm that talks about historic significance yes yes it's possible in a few cases that  if if your farm wasn't updated and it's still that as the one thousand nine hundred two form that there is less the new forms are better in other words but you could we could post on line links to the national register criteria for example that would be helpful so you'd have access to some some documents are prepared by the national park service that describe the criteria and what it means we can do that yeah we'll do that we'll put those on the h d c website and then you can read those on your own and and you know present a case for the appeal if you'd like  as a result of this the thing i think it's important to realize is you know this is just a tool it doesn't prohibit demolition and the more restrictive things that exist in town that apply to historic districts local historic districts which is different than a national register district by the way local historic districts that is done voluntarily and  commission would be delighted to work with anyone who'd be interested in doing that but we are under no circumstance is going to impose that kind of you know structure on a on a property owner very valid point and you know that speaks to you know it's actually had a goal which is community which is neighborhood character is really what you're talking about there are ways that communities do th cambridge you know i know we're not cambridge but cambridge has a something they call a conservation district so that is not a historic district you know you don't doesn't have all of the you know really minuit architectural review that happens in a historic district but that allows you know the it is i think the historic commission that does the review allows them to really work with these neighborhoods to protect their character and in fact i will say that the historic district commission is interested in pursuing that as an option in belmont it would have to be voluntary house still built whether you like your way two years whatever yeah completely change but i think that's a great speech at a great con man and if we could have you know a little neighborhood conservation districts to protect these really distinctive neighborhoods and then that would that would eliminate the need really for demolition july perhaps for most of the properties on the west absolutes yeah that's yeah we just don't have that tool yet yeah i think you for everybody to look at some of these other places that have this process that we seem to be catching up to and find out are there any stats around their list and wh know sometimes things you know your gut reaction is wait a second this is my little piece of life you know you're not going to do it this is america but is that really what is the out of pocket costs ok we worked on that with the bio review committee i will i think that's very fair and i think one of the it was a concern actually with the original bylaw because the original biologist said substantial demolition made no you know and so one can interpret that in a lot of different ways it becomes limited one degree yeah so i think so i think for town meeting what we'll that's a very very great comment and i think you could make it ok for someone you know rather the barn by law they express or rebuilding by law is intended for individually significant accessory buildings of which there are some in belmont not all are on the list of accessory buildings but i think you know it's hard to say without knowing the exact building we're talking about but if for other folks yeah it would depend on the structure but you know if it was on the inventory form was it done a fight is significant then perhaps it you know perhaps one could make a case that it would be eligible for the excess rebuilding yeah you know i think that it does it all it doesn't restrict you from demolishing whereas a local historic district does impose you know more rigid restrictions so that's the best i can i can just i'm going i'm looking over at spencer  included it's for it's one hundred percent voluntary and one hundred percent voluntary and that includes there are two different kinds of historic districts there are historic districts that are listed on the national register of historic places that's a designation that comes from the secretary of interior the pleasant street historic district is on the national register then there are local historic districts and that's a something that commute of a town in massachusetts creates and based on historic importance and local historic districts are then subject to the kind of architectural review that folks have been asking about tonight mainly are only physical changes that are visible from a public way that's a lo completely voluntary yes both are both being on the national register and being a local historic district being on the national register of historic places which is what  that on your list yes it was on the list as an example of the loss of a history of historic buildings before the demolition delay went into effect nobody we didn't after that economically the best bet for building is a tear down build something and so what i'm saying is it's just a huge burden to have a historical property and there's not really any incentive when i do it and so i guess what i'm saying is i think rather than having i mean preservation work i think promoting new priorities that one hundred years from now will say our work to keep as well i mean you see a lot of new construction is more just to you know depending on the scope of work that someone wants to do on their property they might have to go to the planning board you might have to go to zoning board of appeals depending on what's proposed the only thing that comes to historically just before say it's hard to answer that without really knowing the details the answer could be yes or no depending on the particulars but there's no reason why you couldn't construct something else on your property even if you had a pending demolition you know with the historic district commission that we have no involvement in anything you want to add yes yes that's correct yeah that is correct yeah there were earlier versions of the bylaws that were actually more restrictive in that way but that's one of the reasons why the exclusions are in there to be very clear that it's not really meant to require that you come to the historic district commission if you want to make you know if you want to rehabilitate your property or our future owner wants to do that it's not architectural review yeah it's it most it mainly you know well it says removal replacement renovation or construction of the buildings porches entryways entry platforms roof deck stormers or other architectural elements so if you're right it does not say x carrier but that is what that means it's not a lake yeah yeah no i twine we do this  and that's a fair comment yes could you come to the mike for the thank you there's no there is no you are correct in that that we we do not force the owner or if there is a developer involved to come we will hold a hearing i think the owners representative is is asked to come to the the hearing they will invite the you know the neighbors will be notified the hope is this if the owner or developer wants  past that delay period faster that they will you know come to the historic district commission and add a minimum you know discuss and discuss some options and it's possible that you know something might come of that discussion that would have a different outcome that it then had been considered it does happen it hasn't happened yet in belmont but that's the purpose well you know i think here's what i think is going to happen and this is based on our experience it's possible that the owner and or developer and or real estate you know broker would come to the commission meeting and say we are not interested in entertaining any alternatives that is a possible scenario and in that case then we will say ok we're going to now we're going to you we're go decide if this building is part will vote on whether or not we think it's preferably preserved if it is preferably preserve them will vote on whether or not we're going to continue the delay period for the full twelve months so that's one scenario that could happen and other scenarios that could happen is that the arc is the owner you know a developer a real estate person or some combination of the above might come to the historic district commission  and the community member maybe some neighbors commented we love this building we really want to see it preserved and the developer said ok i'm interested in talking to you about other options and in that case we would spend a couple months looking at other options with them and so that's another scenario so those are what i would imagine the two scenario were able to renovate that building to save you know part of the historic structure had two so far one yeah the the other other one that came off the list burned and that was outside of everyone's control that the historic district commission come back to town meeting if we we want to do that spencer with any further questions we'll try to make sure that those questions get get answer