good evening i'm charles clarke chair of the playing board and i welcome you to the tuesday july seventeenth two thousand and eighteen meeting of the playing board first of all let me introduce members of the playing toward this is carl had leaned on my right discussion from warren meyer that has to do with the bradford and she here at this point ok that's ok that's absolute fun and so we will have two new public hearings for thirty two thirty four wilson avenue and then four which is to raise a two family house twenty three inches then we will turn to forty five the forty seven changing road which wants to add two dormers to both in a general residence district will continue the public hearing for the fifty one fifty three baker street which is a propose to family home in the general residence district following that there will be a discussion and vote on the affordable housing documents for the bradford project which we have been working on for a while in conjunction with the housing trust that will be followed by updates on potential cases in plain board reports and committee reports we also make a temporary appointment to the community preservation committee will i don't believe we back and height number of stories under section four point two point two allowed set back allowed side set back ten feet existing in a proposed four feet allowed height two and a half stories existing and proposed three and a half stories in order to raise the existing home twenty four inches to allow for a living space in the basement at thirty two thirty four wilson avenue located in the general residence zoning district would you discuss would you like to describe your project and what you for sure  sure so it's an existing two family dwelling i'm not sure if the board is aware of which house it is exactly but it's terribly disheveled to family that i have purchased about a year ago on wilson i was pretty rundown and and so what we're planning on doing is so the basement currently is at six feet you know barely at six feet actually take five eleven something like that and we're proposing to raise the house to have it so it's usable square footage number one we were planning on possibly getting a bedroom down there mechanical room  a stairs on the left hand side if i'm facing the house on the left hand side a bonding the neighbor where the yeah there you go spencer which is right back there it's kind of hard to see but there is there is back there which  and and serving as a second means of egress and this way the existing stairs is not a budding the neighbor's lot with that also we want to fix up the landscaping clean it all up put in  you know obviously new driveway give some shrubberies in the back dogwoods emerald green arborvitae these and then we're going to screen the right side with emerald green arborvitae ease and some boxwoods in the front you know just to make it look you know bring up the value of the neighborhood we did go and speak with all the neighbors and and i would have to say about easily comfortable to say but what eighty percent is for it you know yeah so and we did have them we did inform them and we had them basically kind of sign a petition for it for the most part which which neighbors we were able to get in contact with nobody was against  then everyone obviously wants to see that house cleaned up for the neighborhood the surrounding homes typically there for three families four families some of them you know it's right behind the fire station wilson of that area  i think it's there's a bank in front of it so it's this is not you know bringing down the neighborhood at all it's most definitely you know cleaning it up and this is the a tall home it's a short home existing building height is that twenty six feet we will be you know twenty eight feet in just rounding them up and what is allowed there is this year thirty three feet that there are three hundred thirty three feet so we're still well below the maximum range height as well so it's a again it won't be a tall building the neighboring homes most of them are two to four feet higher than the existing home we are not adding any more we're not expanding the home in any way where it's going to take up more space on the lot it's literally just going up to make that basement usable and then we can get also a comfortable access into the basement as well i mean i'm i'm five seven and a few of those the two concerns are raising houses is one thing but you're really basically adding two bedroom suites one in the basement and that's got an independent entrance which looks a lot like a studio apartment in a way you're also adding significant square footage up in the attic you're building out the attic to put a bedroom up there so now you really creating a three story building occupation on three floors if it were just you were going from two and a half stories nominally because of the the basement you're going to now three and a half sort but you're putting an occupied unit up to see basically making that turning this into a three story building and in a sense four stories given the fact that you've got it almost a full apartment suite up there which which is fine it would be wonderful if we could allow three storey occupancy so i use the saying that don't do the i mean i can opt out of the adek i could just leave it on finished i have no problems the only thing i was just trying to do  reasonings to i'm not trying to rent out of it's not worth it for me to risk anything like that at all so i don't want the court to think that i'm just merely trying to make it a comfortable two or three bedroom apartment to make it usable i mean i'll be more than happy to opt out of the basement entry independent entrance into the basement i mean i'll be more than happy to take that out i have no problems i just figured that is just a means of the grass used when you begin to add something like that you've got three floors we're also very concerned about the bedroom in the basement there as well and we understand what you want to do in terms of this but those are things that are her i think we have a problem yeah i mean if i could have the water table so high there i mean i understand yes sump pump that's that's going all the time it would be going out twenty four hours a day and it's just even even for them you know i mean i'll be more than happy to sign anything saying that i won't put a bedroom but i just even make it you know walkable i should say because it literally you can't i mean you're talking like i mean i'm five six and i'm telling my you know my head you know as i told you earlier i live three houses down and you know i did that for eight years yeah i understand karl you know coming in this i reducing the or making the basement more accessible i don't know what the right solution to that is would like to try to help find a solution but we would have to get some kind of restrictions on you know the basements three floors three story building and an independent access you know basement apartment that is those things with that would make me feel better and and and again i'm sympathetic to trying to make the basement actually know kept going back to the to the to the letter of the law that let me let me think for it i don't mind coming back with a revised plan to the board if we're in the same direction but i have no problems you know i just don't want to spend anyone's we don't know anything that makes sense mean it's pretty barren as it is now it is yeah it's completely rundown charitable yeah yeah yeah be quite honest i mean sometimes it would have been better obviously if we knock it down we can rebuild playing i think for the if if if you're if you're going to be coming back any way we can the useful thing to do is to put dimensions plans before landscape you know i have no problems that was just like you know for discussion purposes but we're drawn one up right on the survey plan with the whole nine not a problem and we will write all the species and dimensions on there for the for the dogwoods we would have we would suggest four to five or spencer can get back to going up to the idea that whatever it is that the board feels is the right size is if we if we can know that you know we can kill two birds with one stone we can put the correct dimensions and diameters and whatever it may be and then carl will get that on a full plot plan for you not a problem by lighting it with spencer here it is going to be a fence around it or so the existing there is an existing chain link fence there we were just already condo off a number of the yeah over there like a couple of the triple deckers have been condos yeah with the use of that that's so i mean you know this is this will definitely clean up the neighborhood you know you know because this is i know i think the previous owners had some issues or i don't know whatever the back story is on that there were a lot of people in the neighborhood there who had been there like a long time  yeah and so i don't know what happened with the previous owners or however it happened but i can assure the board that a lot of our work is anyways we focus on high and high end residential construction will make it look like a million bucks ok and we have a debt to the you yes so we have a deck in the back because there's no deck no nothing it's because all the porches are enclosed right i actually yes it was at one time probably enclosed in there yes you are correct so what we're  trying to do is that you know there's a little square cut out there if you we look at it from a bird's eye view we were just that way it's a clean second means of eat grass it's not a that's nothing oversized small it's just a kind of get out get down and know all of those work and all those are still conforming the only the only side back issue that you have is on the left hand side we've only got one with wood but you're not putting any i'm not putting i'm actually making it a little bit more conforming because of that side stairs that i'm removing so it's actually making the lot a little bit more conforming and then you know i'm kind of looking at it just like from a bird's eye view i mean even it's pretty pointless to have that concrete there i mean i got to see the cost of removing that on the left hand side you know you know what you get really you know i'll saw i can take a look at that take a look at it depending on because i still would need someone just a little for that basement entrance and something for the door but but you know beyond that you know i'll be you know you know if everything works out i mean if we can raise it i want not i don't mind removing that actually one seventy nine belmont my dad was a builder i'm second generation so one seventy nine belmont street my dad jack this was like i remember i was young i was like ten years old that's when i actually started helping my dad out but we jacked that house up and it's like a pillow that it all puts it all up together we put the i beam through the middle and we just lift it all up cinder block it will have to watch oh yeah absolutely no problem oh yeah we've done some that this is nothing this is a piece of well i think you understand is this fence it will let me as this is a public hearing to have any comments from the audience about this but this proposed but sure would you would you come forward take the microphone down by yourself i mean carol harlow we're at thirty wilson yeah that's right next door right to the left we have the same concerns in terms of raising the high and then become like what has already been covered in terms of that and there definitely are three families in the neighborhood but if you write to the left which is us and then to the right we are just two families the other concern that we've had and it's been we would love to see it look wonderful because it doesn't at all but also this doesn't necessarily apply right now but we've actually had called the board of health multiple times because of the landscaping that it gets up to here and it's been so rundown even the past year  and we're on that left side when there's talking about that chain link fence it is to about here with five hundred holes of some species that has run through it so we're concerned about i love the other side that has all the box looks beautiful by our side in terms of saying that there's a visual barrier there is we just see overgrown landscaping currently i guess we would say response to those who would like to  yeah we actually try and guess what it is because what can make a hole that big an offense is terrifying but there's like holes in fences there's like who will make  they did and they did and it did get mowed but i was in this isn't necessarily even you but there was not this area hasn't been it was not shoveled a single time during the entire winter nor was it i mean the weeds got up to here and our daughter actually got rashes when she was neighborhood knows that but actually i never get later they never talk to me i never know they have implants so they probably talk to somebody else but we're just late but very close but i never get any i only know this like  few days ago so i think it's better if they want to have this project they can talk to us first so i just have feel that very skeptical what they're doing because it's like i'm getting ignored or somethin you know livin in the second floor of the current lee all the areas open and me enjoying the sunshine a lot in the in the dining room and also the living room i'm not sure if the high top of the next the microphone stand to the front and just  mike yes my name is jason harlow my wife karen spoke so i'm not going to speak any of those things but i did also just want to point out that you know as the next door neighbors neither of us were spoken to about this we also just found out about this through the mail the other day so we also have some skepticism having not spoken to anyone about this and just seeing the neglect of the property over the past nine months thank you thank you really think that might be is the seventeenth year so you're talking about me in the twenty four twenty thirty first thirty first thirty first gone twenty seven we'll need to make sure that we'll have to check to make sure that you can come here you have to watch it i guess yes you could watch the movie you can watch it yeah yeah so so if it can come because i don't think we're going to get the next number of point announcement notices here by given that the belmont planning board will hold a public hearing on tuesday july seventeenth twenty thousand at seven pm on the board of selectmen meeting room town hall forty five talking to have to consider the application of craig cal galloway for a special permit under section four point two point two allowed height two and a half stories existing three stories posed i'm sorry allowed height two and a half stories the existing is three stories and the make the presentation thank you chairman members of the board my name is keith miller from your design i'm the architect representing craig galloway who's here with me he's going to just take a quick moment and talk about himself and his family and then i'll talk a little bit more about the project  i agree with him so well you know he used to be a selectman so he knows all the tricks got it got it that's how we got a sense it's all right well real quick i'm the owner of forty five forty seven  channing purchased about a year and a half ago i live in the second floor unit which is forty five channing and ran the first floor unit which is forty seven channing so when i bought the house  d you know some of the dated things that you find in these two family homes that had a really funky unique spiral staircase that took us up to on the second floor obviously that took us up to a finished a space so i had two rooms up there plus storage however the the the living it was considered part of the square footage i'm taxed on it it's all there and i have two boys twelve and  thirteen that live with me part time and so just trying to create comfortable living space so when we moved in they were a little bit littler it was good enough for room up there but you know they're there aging and reaching to the point where it's just not really comfortable that six and a half feet max at the peak and then it slopes down with the roof line so it's very difficult to call that actually usable living space so all i am really asking for with this is the ability to raise the ridge and create at a dorm or to create a head height and usable living space so that you know as they're getting bigger now we have two bedrooms they're sharing a room downstairs i have a room with my partner downstairs and it's a little tight so what we're trying to do is put what we had when we bought the house and just make it a little more comfortable up there so that it's actually usable living space because right now it's just it's just not i think the biggest thing is that it's my residence it's for my home the biggest problem is that my basement sits up a little bit too high so otherwise all of this would be completely conforming the fact that my basement is a little bit up makes it  three and a half story instead of a two and a half story by about eight inches i think is the the threshold that if my basement sit eight inches lower than i probably wouldn't even be here today so that's the the basics that's a little bit about me it's really just about making my my space look i live in a little bit more comfortable and gotten approval from all my neighbors have gotten to know them quite well because i do live there it's not a rental nothing like that just trying to see if project starting with the fact that it's actually an existing three and a half story house given that it has a basement and not a sour so we're just expanding the half story on the upper level to maximize the sixty percent were allowed to build by code for a half story in belmont so component of this project is kind of a life safety issue where the access to the third floor is a non compliant spiral stair metal spiral staircase in the center of the house removing that will not only allow us to build a new stair which is code compliant b also open up the existing main story of his house for usable living space for him and his family the second piece is by raising the the roof and getting the items there were going to be able to get windows on that the house the current windows the front of the house don't quite meet what's the worst code is right now today's code and then the last piece is we're moving branding another bathroom to that story currently the unit has three bedrooms and only one bathroom it doesn't even have a half bath so any gas have to use the bathroom that's used for the private living space of the family as well so raising that roof will allow us to add as you can see a bathroom on this floor for private living on this level this level already has a sitting area and a matter of how we're just expanding on both those spaces we're also using some of the  for equipment and storage that you can see there's a storage closet there the roof of the house is raising the existing roof is a twenty four point six right now we're proposing to raise it's twenty nine feet which is still four feet below what's allowable by zoning bylaw one of the reasons we're raising the roof that height is to allow us to use asphalt shingles on both the main primary roof and on the dormer that we're adding on the side so we don't have to use a membrane roof i think a statically for residential neighborhood i like the look of an asphalt shingle roof versus a flat membrane roof and i think the wife did a lot of people agree with that in terms of what the aesthetic of the neighborhood can support the new ceilings we're going to raise currently the house has a section as craig's hard to talk about that's two feet ten inches wide that has ceilings over six feet on that down that they're level the new space will the new ceiling height and light will allow us to have seven feet of at least seven feet of ceiling space for the majority of the bedroom bathroom is the sitting space with some eve off to the one side or locating the dormer on the driveway side of the house which is further from the property line than the other side of the house so we're kind of choosing the space that's further away craig has spoken with the two condominium orders that are on that side of the house and they both sign and support cracked and he spoke and he has not spoken with the owner of the other problem the house on the other the other side of his property but he hasn't spoken with the renters that are there hasn't been able to get hold  owner so we do have their senators along with some of the other neighbors you'll see in the package that we gave you that there's some pictures of both the spiral stair and i think craig posed in some of them so you can see exactly how low the ceilings are up and the third floor space there and then the last piece of the project that we're proposing to do is a balcony on the back of the house which will allow his family to have some piece that's coming off it doesn't post and has brackets going back to supported so the the back our neighbor is the train so really the only people that can see it even slay the are the other neighbors and they can see it when they're standing on the balconies that they already have on the just staring at the train but like it or he likes it like it as but that's the balcony piece again it's increasing the law coverage of the non conforming big there's an existing  conforming law coverage it's increasing it by about one a little over one percent it's a deck it's permeable we're not to be collecting water and running it off into one area so that's that small piece of the project  and then lastly i think you know our goal to the overall statical of the project was to have a blend in with a neighborhood get support of the neighbors so that we don't feel that we're creating any detrimental situations and we're actually improving the neighborhood and the quality of the space that craig's going to this you'll end up with more than three floors on this even if you don't even if you don't have the basement floor you're going up with three floors of space that's the concern that i have a car well i i think that before too long we ought to make a submissions include three d views i think those of us who have spent a lot of time with drawings are more comfortable than the average person who's a neighbor or and i i find that this particular plan is complex enough but i wish that there were three day view three d view of this so that we could actually see what it is going to look like to the neighbors these these flat elevations i think  sometimes misleading but in terms of the in terms of the size we're up against the there's only room again in terms of you creating a third floor but let me make a comment from there but this is a full third floor you're increasing the height of the building by five feet which in that neighborhood is a substantial increase most of the houses in the neighborhood are about thirty feet high even two story houses like this two family houses so you really really bulking up the size of this thing by a by a significant amount so so just from a static point of view would be kind of thing that the town meeting has been concerned about in past you know zoning by was against but just going back to the original by law you're really creating a third story here and i'm sympathetic with your interest in your needs the design plan it's interesting you know all that is very comfortable but you're you're you're basically bumping up against the specific letter of the law that says you can't build three story houses here and that's what's happening i mean i understand what the existing condition is i do understand and i'm very sympathetic but in my view of this this is a clear addition of a third story to a two story house and in the borders had i think there was a case that it would hit earlier this year on a range street which was exactly the same thing which he needed the extra space we understood that we understand this in this case  a number of other cases other people will come to us with the same thing and the people that have come to us before in creating a third floor we have the board has has not been in favor of that and with the the way it is now third floors we're not allowing third floors and there's no compelling reason for a public good for there to be a third floor so i mean that's my opinion i don't  sixty percent rule based on a floor below it all those three components so it's not it's not it's half story and then also there seems to be and i realize that you're a complete different body than the zoning board did before the zoning board dormers like this get approved all the time i've been for them numerous times and they're approving this so when one body is in one body isn't it seems like there's a there's a disconnect i think i think that's a little bit unfair to the study that the the that went into  zoning amendment that was passed by the town there are a whole lot of places where we could point out things that happened three years ago five years ago town meeting was not happy with the way things were going and we were directed to do a study and what we ended up with is the current bylaw right and in this case i mean the his he's basically here because his basement house was built his basement was built high and in the basement  we're not sticking up you're adding a substantial five foot higher ceiling to this thing and you're creating a full third storey up there you can if you can call it what you want to but you're creating in effect a full you're already three and a half and i understand the technicality of it but you're three and a half story building now and you're really you know effective you're three and already you're already non compliant and you're asking for for an extension for even even more if this is a problem is increasing the nonconformity by a substantial amount we could we can reduce the size of the ridge height i mean if that's if that's what the issue is the richest really predicated upon a steady be what we want to the house to look like and using shingles if if the five feet is too much we can bring it down i don't work i mean you know conforming as it is whatever you do is going to make it more non conforming pretty much yeah you just don't have the right house to do this to begin with that's the you know we can we can you know and the any issue always is anyhow so so i guess what i'm trying to understand that's coming from the board is any house that has a basement instead of a cellar by the boards will not be able to add dormers to the floor without that even without that you have to have it's two and a half even without that and you're going to make it three and a half you can already you know it's already there it's already three and a half because of the situation i wish i was trying to give you a break on that i was trying to give you a break on that saying  years you can you can ask for a continuance on this and come back to us to think about this and come back to us when you can withdraw your application i could ask jeffrey a question real quick i know je there were some recently changed some changes regarding i think dormers and whether they go to the zoning or the planning board can you can you yes just probably frenchman what that is to the thirty first and at least put a placeholder and give some time to think because you're now going to be having a knee jerk reaction and it may not be where you want to be so he's saying we can we get to the thirty first you guys can talk about this you can think what do you want to do maybe you decide to redraw and you do that but you know lose anything but i'm just saying it's sounding to me that the board is interested in seeing a dormer because it will be increasing the size of the house or so and he i mean that's what the whole project is so i'm not i we could give the board more time to think about what  we actually and at the suggestion of your architect we're actually trying to find a way for you to maybe make this work work i understand listen to what he has to say yeah i'm here i'm listening i just i want to understand more where you guys are coming from relative to someone who buys a property in the town has a family to raise i'm being taxed on the square footage that exists upstairs so the town clearly recognizes that is livable square footage so but it's not livable for regular sized human beings so it's not compliant the stairs are absolutely a safety hazard getting up and down is a safety hazard their location in the house is a safety hazard if anyone had to egress from there in a hurry it's a danger so i'm just trying to understand the perspective of the basement sets a little higher than what your everything allows but everything else that keith put together is compliant with the half story edition so eight inches lower into the ground i'm not even here i'm just making sure that everything is compliant so i'm just trying to understand from your guys perspective how this is such an appreciably you know different thing is it just because a precedent that it might i say i think i think we've explained increases it has to do with the zoning bylaws we understand ok but what the zoning by little we're we're governed by the zoning bylaws the zoning bylaws were put in place by the planning board and there are a reaction and to town meetings so this is the will the town go in we understand what people buy when people buy property and they want to do additional kinds of things ok my house is the same way i could not put because part of my basement is above ground like yours is i couldn't put a dormer on on top of my couldn't put that i understand that and that's the regulations that are in place and i think you i think your architect understands this and i think he has a way forward for you ok because we're not allowed to expand and n conformity so i think that's where some of the dilemma comes it's already non conforming you want to make it bigger so it works for you but we're not allowed to cross you know you know we're kind of permit process that are coming up to us too so let's think about this let's think about this will put you so let me ask first before i continue public hearing does anybody anybody in public have any comment how do you wish to proceed i know that you submitted additional plans to us what were those submitted spencer if those are the plans that were submitted to  package because of when with these revised plans there are many submitted yesterday afternoon yesterday afternoon we saw them i got an e mail about this this afternoon when i was coming back from boston i have not reviewed these plans they fall out of the perimeter of what the board typically does to review plants we have not had a chance to look at these plants i don't feel we can go forward and discuss these that this time will have to continue it i'm of the sense that and we went through all these we were we were presented with this proposal for a two family house on what's a non conforming want for two family it's less than seven thousand square feet but not by much and it doesn't have sufficient frontage which is seventy feet of frontage for situations like this so it's not conforming in that sense for situations like this when the zoning was changed the allows for a single family to be built with a five thousand square foot lot with fifty feet frontage my opinion is that that is a more appropriate development then the initial plans that we've seen in for a two family the special permit is for involves two things the special permit is for use in the special permit involves a design and site plan review i see no compelling reason why we should go against the zoning and allow it to family on what is a very tight which is frankly a non conforming lot very tight in the front and some of the machinations that we have talked about last time about where you put this would be put that all pointed out to meet the reasons why the r s zoning was changed so that if you want to build two family house you got to have at least seven thousand square feet and you get to have seventy square feet the front edge so that's my opinion but i don't know what the rest of the board feels steve i've been wrestling with this too and we all i think at the first hearing we're trying to work around the into the fact that the the bible does give the planning board the option to to allow a two family house on non conforming lot if it means a number of conditions that are spelled out in section sixty which was i might say overwhelmingly  on that sunset clause on that was it was removed by town meeting by ninety four five percent vote and and in that it allows us to to consider  factors that have to do with conformity with the neighborhood and the problem with the current program that's what we were working on last night there was a kind of thoughtful process we were going to to through to try to figure out if there was a way to to as is chuck said we went through these mocking nations to try to make sure that see if there was a way that we could do that the building could be reconfigured to fit in some way and i haven't seen any indication that that's been changed i glanced at the plans that came in in my e mail just briefly there they're not very complete it doesn't look to me like there's been a substantial change in anything we still have the two driveway problem we still have the house being substantially larger than the average house two family in the neighborhood it's it's there are just so many factors about it that i'm having a hard time figuring out how we're going to grant a special permit under the clause that allows us to do weeks ago in the planning department responded to those plans and made some additional comments and sent them back the revised plans we put in weeks ago still remain as of yesterday the architect has to curl up shrunk the house another foot and gave you a basement plan and a couple of additional floor plans based on the feedback that we got from the planning we looked at the the total living area the t l a it's below the new plan is below the average t l a the by law allows for a special permit every plot up and down that street is fifty feet i'll give you the floor plan and and i took issue last time and i've since proved to myself and i have pictures that i can show you that there was concern with the board member that it was didn't want it to be the largest two family on the street and it is clearly not the largest two family on the street there are two for two two two two families on the street three lots away that are forty seven hundred square feet each there's another one in the neighborhood you've designated the neighborhood that's seven thousand square feet or on hamilton road with a f a r of ninety eight percent we have an f a are of less than fifty one percent which is the average and it's unfortunate that the information that the town gave us at our first time the information was erroneous the information that we were given and this board was given failed to take into account and failed to include to lodge forty seven hundred square foot to family houses three lots down to fifty nine sixty one bega and sixty three sixty five baker that that place as part of the criteria that the proposed structure ours has to be consistent with the existing neighborhood and the existing neighborhood has two enormous homes also has very many smaller average the reason why not i don't know but will take the average of something and we add them up and divide by two the way but so to finish my comment the information the town erroneous the town i have learned has now corrected it i've been in touch with people from the planning department and i was told that this board was going to be supplied with updated information and updated report in time for this meeting and i wonder if that occurred you are free not to everybody's busy i get it i understand it but when the town supplies us with information and this did you know makes determinations based on false information it needs to be pointed out just because i'm sorry to interrupt but this updated information that i have since the proposed deal is thirty six hundred fifty eight square feet and the average in the neighborhood is twenty eight hundred three square feet which is substantially smaller than this home is proposed on you are looking for something that basically blends in fits in with the neighborhood meeting between the working what was going to be a working meeting and the first planning board meeting the applicant sent revised plans i then provide a comment and sent back in and to sufficient of the working meeting given the decision with the open meeting law we decided to not have the working meeting until the board decided how they wanted to move forward in consideration of the meeting long after we decided not to hold that meeting i emailed the applicant and said unfortunately we will not be able to have the opening of the working meeting and explain the reason why they requested that they there's some it revised plans or new plans before close of business business the wednesday prior i did not receive any indication that they wanted to move forward  calculations bring them down to thirty two hundred fifty five square feet our issue our first issue is on this and we we will make this clearer for other applicants you have a develop will pull a lot there for a single family house that works just fine you have to go through a special permit for for that and design safe plan review which you have to do for all new construction in the general residence district you're asking us to sort of do something extra here and i'm not inclined to go with two family on this but i have not seen the plans that you submitted to us so i cannot comment on those they've told me the size i have no comment on those at this point and it's probably unfair for the applicant or you for me to make any comment on that until i review those presentation based on correct information by law allows for this to be brought before this board and i wonder if anybody i'll take on a walking tour of baker street but if you allow me to put up the if spencer will put up  two things was the chairman i like to introduce one is and these were what i basically put up going to put up on the screen and i have one for everybody aerial picture of the site which is currently a junk yard something that everybody wants to get rid of that's the other thing that needs to be underscored here that we have we have some more a sense and support signatures here previous reasoning behind it is that the applicant missed a sack as live there for seventy years on baker street families been our biggest read for one hundred years and he wants to move into a two family doesn't have a pension quite i'm not in a woman marries him he needs the income from the second unit so he can pay the ever increasing taxes and the carrying costs for where he wants to live out his rest of his days on a street where he's lived for basically is entirely i think a good but one trowbridge and move the fifty yards over to the next block and that's where we been and he operates a junkyard and he'd like to take a legal non conforming longstanding use they would like to convert it and increase everybody's property value everybody in the neighborhood that has come here and there's not been one bit of opposition to what we took all of the when you look at the revised plans and i appreciate that you will if there was a miscommunication i made with the planning department for that and then i'll apologize for that miscommunications happen but that was our intent that those go for would like you to take to review them and we can you know bring this up another day but but that's sort of the reasoning by for it we're taking a a use that nobody likes yet is legal everybody wants to get rid of and i suppose you know yes we could do a single family but that doesn't help mistress miss de sac so there's a window of opportunity in the bylaw i suggest that's why the window of opportunity or what i will call that exists in the first place and if you look at the list this isn't a this isn't a small lot compared to everything else they're all cookie cutters and every one of them has a fifty foot frontage i know because i did the two big ones years ago and they have fifty feet of frontage so i'm going to submit to pictures here one i've labeled with my own handwriting there t l a proposal not the biggest two family in the neighborhood and i've laid out the square footage on the three that i've sort of picked out here and the second one goes to the issue of curb cuts to curb cuts which we have for that the spy law allows for one curb cut you don't get to unless two are consistent with in the neighborhood i think that's the language that's in the by law and again i've gone through and i have marked on the second exhibit using the neighborhood that this is the lines of demarcation that this board has identified being baker street hamilton road and i guess half of trowbridge street is being quote the neighborhood for analysis purposes and i've gone through and marked all of the homes that have more than one curb cut to curb cuts that will probably become an issue i don't know before who but i understand that the town is getting ready to and i brought this up last time to repave and put on curbing and put on sidewalks which if you walked up and down baker street in the gas department is gas companies in there tearing it up and putting stuff in but even if you walk up and down baker street you'll see what i'm talking about and when they start coming down given my past experience as a selectman i'll be twenty years ago curb cuts and parking are going to be i don't know where it's going to lead on your desk is going to lyndon so maybe the other people that are sitting in that chair on monday nights but but there's going to be i would suspect some type of reaction put it like that so i'll give i give you these a member of this board last time i paid for you ok so that's how that's i'm just that stuff so i figured ok that's the boundary so and what we're proposing we'll take a look at the t l a i think we can probably come up with the t l a because there's many calculations my calculation on a twenty is thirty two hundred fifty five square feet total living area that we've reduced it from the thirty seven of the thirty eight hundred feet there may be some a way go wro ok so at this point i think i think the most productive thing to do at this point you've certainly advocated for your client well is for us to review the plans that had been submitted to us the revised one look at those and come back and discuss that so at this point we should probably q is there anybody in the public who'd like to make it before we continue the public hearing seeing nine jeffrey what we want to continue this to the fifth or when you july thirty first going of september fourth continue the public hearing this july thirty first where you just feel like i mean i'm looking right now so i think it was june for letting me sort of figure this out if so you're looking for a set of what we consider with the revised plans will put them all together you know will give you pardon that full set for their particular size you time oh i shouldn't introduce this there has been heated discussions with the toll brothers regarding the affordable housing component of the the bradford and steve think it in along with the belmont housing trust has been working with toll brothers who want to get the affordable housing component in a clear in a clear way is easily understood reflects the agreement that was reached is part of the special permit for the bradford and it's been a couple of interation in terms of things  on behalf of the belmont housing trust we have reviewed all the revised affordable housing documents presented by s e b the affordable housing lottery and marketing agent for the bradford and by toll brothers although we are requesting furthe modifications on the requirements and procedures for proof of local residency and on affordable housing lease on the affordable housing we said then we offer our conditional approval of the affordable housing documents listed below and subject to final approval by plan number two affirmative marketing plan for affordable housing three a sample of advertisement a flyer for the lottery information packet five the actual lottery application six affordable housing thoughtful and i must say that the responses we've gotten from toll brothers and if he had been also thoughtful and very responsive i was looking at it from the from from my point of expertise which was looking at the building plan identifying the correct number of studio single family into family story single bed room and two bedroom units making sure that the square footage was with the same and then advocating for appropriate minimum sizes that we came up with were five hundred square feet for a studio six hundred sixty square feet for a single bedroom and nine hundred sixty square feet for a two bedroom which seems quite appropriate for the  six to better me units that's consistent with the ratio of units in the building so part of this exercise was making sure that we had the right bedroom counts going on because there was some confusion and consternation about that   and we were able to work off that following following on to that and read reading the revised plans that came in since since rafi's work just to make sure that everything was consistent which which it was so i think we're well on our way to to take a look at any if they have any final comments or is this pretty much they are these divisions ok which are verification certification of residency their suggestion that town council take a look at this is reasonable before this goes into the effect they should do that and so i'm fine with with going forward on this this point to give our case to give our approval sub to i think it's a make a motion that we that we prove that the affordable housing documents for the bradford  the requirements and procedures for proof of local residency in the done them so those conditions being set i make a motion that we approve this at this point will be easier but i think i think with that that's in fact what everybody had him in mind and going through this through really carefully setting a good president with this it's a small relatively speaking small smallish project terrific i mean they have worked in affordable housing each of them their whole careers are in affordable housing and the points of the wealth of talent that there is in belmont and tapping into this terrific and we can all learn things from from them that i've been dealing i've been the representative off and on for the past five years with the housing trust and i think they do a terrific job so in any case let's move forward to to do not date of the bradford would you like to i know we have neighborhood representatives the breath of would you like to come forward and sit at the table come on line up you can introduce yourselves we'll run down the information that we have we don't have everything but we have some things and robert scheer turn your microphone on what you sex and also the crushing square neighborhood association and so i'm ruth small and also in precinct six i live in london avenue and i can see that development from my office on out precinct five corn road resident right behind the development jughead had asked a number of questions about what's going on the on the breath you've just seen the affordable association had of us let's walk through these these questions in the interest that we have and this is the best information we have at this point as you realize community development in the planning what does not control all of this so what we have is this jeffrey would you like to go forward with this so do you want to go with this or the thing this once a particular oh what's the best thing oh which or do you want to do this oh these are the questions that then why don't you answer the date for the entire project is fall of twenty nineteen the starbucks is going to be done by christmas right that's the importance right that's right that's important all in all though be one hundred twelve residential units nine itself the first light is the winslow building which will be the first to be completed and spring started in spring of twenty eighteen and will be completed in the fall of this year will be twenty residential units no studios six one bedrooms and fourteen two bedrooms three of which will be affordable will be two one bedrooms and one two bedroom with a little over ten thousand square feet of retail space which is currently broken down  light is for that from own a building which was also started in spring of twenty eighteen and will be the last to be completed in the fall of twenty nineteen there will be fifty four units which makes this the largest building in the we did not save the facade and then it's a last is the third building which is the highland it sits up on the corner of common street and belmont street it was also started also how's the the amenities for the residents on the roof will be a roof rack and then there will be a fitness facility all in all the b thirty eight units zero studios fifteen one bedrooms and twenty three two bedrooms affordable units will be five in total zero studios one with bedroom for two bedrooms with eight thousand square feet of course a space and then the last page she gives a timeline of milestones to date and then as well as next steps you'll see that there are three items the planning board will review and approved before installation and those are the exterior on the exterior materials signs ng's street furniture implanters prior to the issuance of the certificate of occupancy they put in work will have to approve and reviews sound analysis landscaping and site review and ensure that the developer is in full compliance with all conditions and then lastly it will be a sort of an ongoing review is the accuracy of landscaping and screening when you're after before the housing compliance leasing of the commercial spaces and sure it's that it's in full compliance with all conditions ask a question obviously the certificate of occupancy it's going to be done building by building up some or opening soon ourselves a landscaping  that time will be that will be done but i don't expect it to be a separate phase right until the promoter comes on line in which point that's when the real final will be done and then there also is  review board can not force them to submit anything they understand that they need to get approval before i'm sorry the builder understands that they he needs they need to get approval of those before they can be installed and so i mean i suspect that the board will want to do both a site visit and have materials brought into the meeting obviously means that seventy seven o'clock at night so had talked a bit about what was going to happen with the samples and i believe you said that they're basically going planning to build them on the back of the building  and so i live right around the corner and for the past you know ten days or so i've noticed that there is some sort of fake wall exactly up in the back of the winslow leaning or i'm sure it's more than leaning it supported against the fry the former kathy fried and it's now her son's property and it seems to be a sample wall of windows and because they're different colors to different finishes this black the silver there's something else you know it's kind of a different finishes in the building in the different buildings and i think that there are different finishes per building is that the i think yes so which leads me to the question of the exterior materials is the is a window considered exterior finish material my understanding is that they're going to be building sample walls around those windows so that we don't get what the yeah exactly you'll get because the windows have been delivered today i got a little clogged up at the end to send out a little rain on the building for some time to see any signs of progress on that and i'm glad that you're reporting they are actually starting to do it so that's that's the the the large sample but to look at it closely you can't get in there  see those up close you know that's so another option would be to play some of those materials at town hall so that the public can can have touch and feel and have a look at these things and i so i understand that's great that they're doing that i shows the window how all the materials are hitting the windows what the reply to the glasses with whatever's on the wall and how all the details are put together and i think  and it seemed to me that when the toll came in they started talking about substitution for materials as equal and i don't know if boyd never made a decision as in the subject materials and i'm glad to hear that there's progress on that because there's so much progress so that i want to go back to the delivery of the henderson windows there was a i couldn't get into my street because it was an eighteen wheeler eighteen wheeler of andersen windows backing in so my assumption and maybe other people who would be looking at that would be that all the windows are being delivered if it's an eighteen wheeler full of windows  have input to ensure that we have a building that last fifty years as opposed to ten and the miss the various steps granted on different topics haven't indicated that toll has generally been proactive in giving people a lot of lead time so when i see spencer a summary here that says that you know they're expecting the winds well to be completed in fall two thousand and eighteen i start having an alarm bells go off and fear that what we saw happen with the enderson windows which is kind of a surprise to me i thought that was something that you guys were going to evaluate will start happening with some of the other finishes as well so there were  but i'd like to see a whole mockup placed in a public place rather than behind the building behind the security fence and so i think one one related point to this is that we're going to see a small is a very small wall that you know belts and and the way it's going to but a lot of places it really doesn't look good and i'm hoping that your expertise in particular will help ensure that we get something that looks very very nice and the brick veneers they actually they seem to have class action suits going on and poor quality stuff and their other properties which is also something that obviously we want to try and avoid right yeah i was very relieved to hear mr clarke say that a decision was not made because i was at that meeting and it was a very strange meeting it was a slightly different board and and there was a lot of public concern voiced about the switching of materials after this board had put in so much time betting the mint the original materials with chris starr on the original group i would be interested in seeing other buildings locally that and that are in place that are that use the materials they want to use there's a building i drive by frequently that  yeah but it's peter quiet but it is peter quinn and it looks very familiar and i'm waiting to see what the exterior of that looks like it's just it's on it's the massey hardware site and  it's a different situation because the building is scaled to fit in with the neighborhood perfectly terms of size and mass and the size of the lot kind of dictated that but they didn't you know they didn't allow them to go higher crazy yes that's true but you know when i looked at this timeline i realize that i've been coming to planning board meetings for this about ten years and i wasn't even living in on cushing square at the time but i was getting ready to so it's been quite a process but this is such an important thing i mean you know every time i look out my office window at that eyesore from the sixty's when that other lay out for them sort of your expectations on what your review process would like would be like if maybe that would get them to come forward more quickly because they may have a different set of assumptions on how quickly they're going to jam it through yeah i'm a did they didn't really understand the process and and they know all the steps that they need to go through where we have to assume that they do i mean from from the conversations that we've had it sounds like i mean  meetings but it is it is a little not a little it is more than a little disconcerting but as you say it's july is ticking away and we haven't representative temporarily so they can have a forum at certain points i suggest i make a motion that we nominate steve pinkerton to for a temporary appointment as a plain board representative to the community preservation committee to hear second all in favor go get on favorite thank you very much everybody