ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS
MONDAY, MARCH 28, 2011
Members Present: Ms. Marteney, Mr. Baroody, Mr. Darrow, Mr. Kilmer, Mr. Tamburrino and Mr. Westlake
Member Absent: Ms. Calarco
Staff Present: Mr. Fusco and Mr. Hicks
APPLICATION APPROVED: 86 Lansing Street
APPLICATION DISAPPROVED: 24 Alden Avenue
Mr. Westlake: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, this is the Zoning Board of Appeals. Tonight we have the following items: 86 Lansing Street, 24 Alden Avenue
If there are no errors, omissions or additions to last month’s minutes of the meeting, the minutes will stand as written.
Thank you.
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86 Lansing Street. R1A zoning district. Area variance for breezeway between house and garage. Michael Quill, applicant.
Mr. Westlake: Would 86 Lansing Street please come to the podium, state your name and explain what you would like to do.
Mr. Quill: My name is Mike Quill and my wife Joan we live at 86 Lansing Street. When we built our garage approximately 18 or 19 years a 2-car garage it was always our intent to connect it to the house by a breezeway just for the convenience staying out of the weather things along that nature. We have finally seen our way clear to afford to connect the breezeway to the house. I understand that there is a restriction we have to have a certain amount of space on each of your neighbors’ sides. I believe that we are 5 feet short that is what our variance is for to connect our house to the garage.
Mr. Westlake: Thank you. Any questions from the board? Is there anyone here wishing to speak for or against the application? Seeing none we will discuss amongst ourselves and make a decision.
Ms. Marteney: Nicely done packet fully explained.
Mr. Westlake: Do I hear a motion?
Mr. Baroody: I would like to make a motion that we grant Michael and Joan Quill of 86 Lansing Street a 3 foot variance on the east side of the house and a 2 foot variance of the required 17 feet as submitted on the plan.
Mr. Darrow: I second that motion.
VOTING IN FAVOR: Ms. Marteney, Mr. Baroody, Mr. Darrow, Mr. Kilmer, Mr. Tamburrino, Mr. Westlake
Mr. Westlake: Your application has been approved. Good luck with your project.
Mr. Quill: Thank you very much.
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24 Alden Avenue. R1 zoning district. Area variance for addition to front of carport. Raymond Wisniewski, applicant.
Mr. Westlake: 24 Alden Avenue please come to the podium, state your name and explain what you would like to do.
Mr. Wisniewski: Ray Wisniewski, 24 Alden Avenue. We had Code Enforcement up to our house last year there is no problem what so ever there is adequate room on both of the house, one side of the house is an empty lot, we have 7 ½ feet on one side of the house. All I want to do is extend my carport and just put a roof on I don’t want to enclose it I just want to keep the snow off of the cars in the winter time. I am not going to put any sides on the carport it is going to be an extensive just to have a roof up there that is what I want to do. Codes was up here last year as far as a variance there was no problem.
Mr. Westlake: Thank you. Any questions from the board?
Mr. Darrow: I didn’t have a chance to view the property so it is my understanding that this is currently your house here (points to sketch) and you want to extend your carport out to here?
Mr. Wisniewski: Carport comes out this way towards the road. We have already measured from the street comes out to 12 feet.
Mr. Darrow: It doesn’t give you the 25 feet required.
Mr. Wisniewski: Right.
Ms. Marteney: It says 14 feet.
Mr. Wisniewski: We have plenty of distance from the property line that was measured from the street, which was 25 feet I believe. They told us 25 feet.
Mr. Baroody: Can you go back in the rear?
Mr. Wisniewski: I could go back but I have to knock a wall down and have to break the foundation on the house we don’t want to get into that. I figure putting this roof up would be probably half the price of doing what you suggested there. Money wise doing something like that would cost $10,000 to $12,000 what I am going to have done now I am not sure because I wanted to see if this was going to be approved then I will get a contractor to do it. I want it to look good I don’t want to take away from the house.
Mr. Tamburrino: Basically a carport with a couple of posts maybe?
Mr. Wisniewski: Probably 4 posts and the roof on top of it to match our house.
Mr. Kilmer: Can you show me on this sketch? This will be 14 feet?
Mr. Wisniewski: Yes.
Mr. Kilmer: This is not to scale?
Mr. Wisniewski: No.
Mr. Baroody: Twenty-six feet wide in the front.
Mr. Wisniewski: We will be coming out this way (points to sketch).
Mr. Kilmer: It is 12 feet wide now and you are going to make it 14.
Mr. Wisniewski: Yes. This part is enclosed already.
Ms. Marteney: He doesn’t have enough front yard left once you do that you don’t have enough front yard you have to have 25 feet from the property line to the center of the road.
Mr. Hicks: You have to have a 25 foot set back from your property line the front of the structure. You make sure where your property line is by measuring the road’s width for the area. We come back normally 24.75 feet from the center of the road to the front property line 25 foot back to the front of the house.
Mr. Westlake: So what you actually need is a 10-foot variance.
Ms. Marteney: The furthest out edge of your house towards the road has to be 25 feet from the property line and once you put that in you only have 10 feet. So what you are asking for is 15 feet to build the carport in that area where you are not supposed to build something.
Mr. Wisniewski: Will that make our taxes go up?
Mr. Westlake: We can’t answer that.
Mr. Wisniewski: I understand I need to get a permit.
Mr. Hicks: You will need a permit for that and because you are increasing the footprint you will be assessed for that.
Mr. Wisniewski: Ok.
Mr. Westlake: Is there anyone here wishing to speak for or against this application? Seeing none we will discuss amongst ourselves and made a decision.
Mr. Tamburrino: The only issue I really have with this is really if you drive down that street nice street all the houses line up now and I can understand what this gentleman wants to do and I sympathize but he wants to bring it out and my personal opinion is that it will detract the visual aesthetics of the neighborhood.
Mr. Darrow: I agree it would change the character of the neighborhood.
Ms. Marteney: I wish there had been letters from the neighbors.
Mr. Wisniewski: All of our neighbors didn’t know what to do with these letters. They put them back in our mailbox. They read them and put them in our mailbox.
Mrs. Wisniewski: We asked them if they would write letters.
Mr. Wisniewski: Whatever you decide we will go along with it. Those were the only 2 neighbors that got letters, I called the others to see if they got any letters and they said no.
Mr. Westlake: Do I hear a motion? Any more questions?
Mr. Baroody: I would like to make a motion that we grant Raymond Wisniewski of 24 Alden Avenue a 10 foot of the required 25 foot front yard as required as submitted.
Mr. Darrow: I second that motion.
VOTING IN FAVOR: Ms. Marteney
VOTING AGAINST: Mr. Baroody, Mr. Darrow – I feel the protrusion of the carport will change the character of the neighborhood, Mr. Kilmer, Mr. Tamburrino, Mr. Westlake – because of the change of the character of the neighborhood.
Mr. Westlake: Your application was not approved.
Mr. Wisniewski: Thank you.
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