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Planning Board Meeting 10/13/2011
Members Present: Maggie Leonard; Chair, Bridget Krans
Meeting to order: 7:15
Special permit granting authority: The board discussed who should be the main permit granting authority in the town of Monterey. Currently the board only grants sign permits. The board agreed that since we do sign permits we should be the granting authority for sign special permits also. The board wondered who was in charge of parking permits. There is a section in the bylaw on parking spot regulations. The board would review that if someone was starting a business that they had enough spots. If they wanted more or something different Maggie felt that it made sense to go to the ZBA. The board discussed if anyone cared and if it would make it easier for the people. After discussion the board felt that it was a good idea to have the Planning Board be the permit granting authority in terms of parking permits. Barry and
Stephen brought up the point that applicants should be going to the ZBA if they were denied and need their permit needs to be appealed. Who makes the decision prior to that step? Should it be the planning board? If the board gets into site plan reviews then the board would be named the special permit granting authority. Site plan review is for common driveways, multifamily, commercial and non-commercial structures. Mr. Bobrowski stated that we already call for it in our bylaw so we should solidify that fact and start requiring it. Mr. Bobrowski also stated that you cannot turn anything down with site plan review you can only make recommendations. Bridget wondered what the objective of a site plan review was. If we can only recommend changes then what is the point if there is no enforcement of the Planning Boards recommendations. The board needs a more definite explanation of what site plan review means before they decide to put it in the bylaw. The board felt that the example
of a site plan review that was given by Mr. Bobrowski needed to be simplified. The board also wondered if any of the neighboring towns had site plan review and wondered what their major and minor square footage requirements were. This led to a discussion about what the purpose of the planning board was. In the current bylaw the planning board has no authority. Again the point was made as to if we were just reorganizing or if we could change things. Further investigation on site plan review brought the board to look at various towns’ bylaw. The sentence that the board felt that was the most important was: Protection of adjoining premises against serious detriments or offensive
use of the site.
- Bed and Breakfasts: Mr. Bobrowski supplied the board with the bylaw for bed and breakfasts from the town of Lenox. It stated that the establishment was limited to not more than three guests. The board felt that this was too small of a number. If the parking, septic, water and rooms are there then why can there not be more guests? Stephen felt that he would like to not limit anything. If they are able to do it and they are not a bother to neighbors then we should encourage it. What is the definition of a bed and breakfast? If it is larger does it have to be an inn?
- Wind Bylaw: Barry brought up the point that what if something is passed such as the telecommunications bylaw for windmills? The Maggie and Stephen felt that houses should be allowed to have windmills as long as they complied with the structure bylaws. Bridget wondered why you would need a permit at all to put up a windmill at or on your house.
- Solar energy bylaw: Is it by right or does it need a special permit?
- Automobile businesses: Maggie did not feel that we needed special rules or regulations for them. We currently have some in place. There are three businesses in town currently.
- Camp kitchens: Stephen suggested that we re-visit our restriction on one kitchen per site. Currently we only allow camps to have one kitchen area. This means that if there are residents living and/or renting at the camp they cannot have kitchenettes in their cabins. KSA would like to rent out cabins to skiers and they would like them to be able to have basic kitchen amenities in their cabin. The board agreed that it should be allowed as long as it was to code. The board would like to get it on this year’s warrant. Stephen volunteered to work on that.
- Submitted by Bridget Krans
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