Meeting transcript
Planning and Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting
July 18, 2023 · Watch on YouTube · All meetings
Thank you, Marina. And I will call the public hearing to order. The Tonight's public hearing, the Andover Planning and Zoning Commission will hold a public hearing on an application from Jacob Surdam to operate a home occupation landscaping business at the property known as 87 Merritt Valley Road, Andover, in accordance with Section 4.12 of the Andover zoning regulations. So that is the purpose of the public hearing. Hello, Scott. I knew that Anne Cremay was not going to be able to make it tonight, nor was Susan England. I didn't hear anything from Leanne Hutchinson, but we certainly got a quorum. So, we'll
go ahead and get started. I'm on here.
Okay. I didn't I guess okay, very good. Just now, yes. Yep. Okay, great. Thanks, Leanne. So, first up, Jacob, it's your opportunity to run through your application with the Commission here.
Okay. So I am applying for the special permit to continue operating the landscape, hardscape business that I run and own. So the basically, what we do is we store our equipment here in our trucks, and our main work is done off-site, you know, off of our property here on client sites. So what we do is we just store all of our equipment here So our three trucks stay here and our three trailers and there is obviously various hand tools and compactors and things like that that also stay here Most of that stays inside the garage here, so everything is inside except for the trucks and trailers. All of the
all of the trucks and trailers. When you say in the garage, is that in the garage? You know that's built into your home? Correct. Okay, yes,
yes, in the actual garage that is attached to the house. There is a storage shed on the top of the driveway, which I also use, and I'm hoping to use as a salt storage shed that is storing our snow equipment for the summer months. And then in the winter months, I'm hoping to be able to put salt in there. And that is Contains with mafia blocks that we built a mafia block area That's two blocks tall and it has a shelter on top of it and it also has Tarp on the bottom layer, so it doesn't mix salt with subsoil or anything like that and it keeps it dry in there So that is the plan with that, but it's also used for storage regardless of the fact of whether I have salt in there or not which it doesn't hold salt in the summertime because I need it for storage. So all of the vehicles stay parked at the top of the driveway there, with the exception of one of the vehicles that I also use for my own personal use that stays down the bottom and the rest of the parking at the bottom is for residential use. Or I also have a boat that occasionally is here, boat trailer. Other than that, our business operation usually goes from 07:30 to five, 05:30 in the afternoon, Monday through Saturday. That's usually our operating hours there. Wintertime, we do snow removal, so it's a little bit different in the wintertime. Obviously, when the snow falls, we have to go out. So other than that, that's kind of our standard operating procedure. We just load the trucks up here and we use this for obviously storage and getting everything going in the morning time. And then we're off to job sites. So most of the time I do have one employee that works for me. He most of the time will meet me at the job site with his own personal vehicle.
On occasion, he will have a vehicle here, but when his vehicle is here, one of my vehicles is gone. So he parks in that spot when one of my vehicles is gone. So I think that's all I got.
Okay. Agent Halsey, did you have any comments on the application?
Yes, I did meet with the applicant and went over the detail of the driveway apron. Right now, there was an existing residential driveway apron that was in place for probably at such time as the house was built. But the space that's being utilized for the business is a bit wider. And I spoke to Jay Tuttle, the public works foreman, because I anticipated that he'd have a concern about that equipment's moving from the applicant's property into the road. And he was looking for an apron, the extension of the existing apron. I did speak to the applicant about storage. I was concerned about salt. I suggested that he detail how he would contain that salt, and has just previously. Whether it's to the commission's liking, I don't know. I also did get a call from a gentleman across the street, Brian Lissier, who had some concerns. He just was concerned about on street parking, which I believe has been addressed. Led to believe it's no longer an issue. Brian didn't really have any concerns other than that. And just future growth should should the should the business grow. He's concerned how it might impact his property. There's also a letter from neighbor to further down the road, Robin DiGemis, who owns the the home next door to Jacob. And that letter is on the website. Posted with the application. That was a written written comment she had submitted. Brian's was a verbal that came into me. Just for information, I mean, this property is zoned industrial.
Why? I'm not really sure, but nonetheless, it's probably been industrial since the adoption of zoning. And there are specific provisions in the regulations to provide for home occupation on lots where a single family residential is in existence. This is the case here. The house was built Probably in the eighties. Does that sound right, Jacob? It was
late eighties, early nineties. I believe it was '91. '90 or '91.
Okay. It was built at that time. Been there ever since. Grew a little bit, added on to. And that's all I really have.
Okay. I know on your checklist, Jim, you had something about a waiver for.
Yes. Did ask the applicant It for a did submit one. I had sent it for Marina to post, if she is able to.
I did not see that posted in the online file today. Marina, did you get a chance to post that or did I just miss it?
I don't post anything on the website. I don't know if it got over to Kate, but Jim did email it to me so I can share it on the screen. Yep. If you could do that, that would be good. Jim, the waiver you said?
Actually, there's a waiver and there is also a narrative. And let me explain how this happened. We transitioned from, this is my fault, we transitioned from doing paper applications for special permits online, and when the applicant is uploading material, it's not automatically it has to then be moved. I mean, somebody has to direct it over, and that didn't happen. I didn't realize that until this evening, at which point I contacted the applicant and he resent these documents, at which point I sent them to Marina. So I never sent them to Kate for posting. I didn't have them for the reason just stated. We see the agenda Marina, not the waiver.
Let me see if I can reshare. This one, Jim, or the other one?
I don't see anything on my screen. Nope. There it is. Yep. There is something. There is the the waiver request. You want this one or the other one?
Well, both documents, but this this is the waiver here. Okay. This is merely requesting the waiver of VA two boundary survey required in section 23. And there there's an additional document that was provided by the background on the on the business. Which I believe Marina has as well. Yep. Okay, I understand that. Is it showing?
Yes. Yes, Griggered, yes. This seems to reiterate pretty much what Jake had done, offered earlier.
Okay, I got that. And I think everybody's probably had a chance to see that at this point. Thank you, Marina. And I guess while you're at it, I got so excited that I got the Zoom to work here that I didn't call up another search engine so that I can go to the website and put up the site plan. But if you could just show everybody the site plan that he's offering is a waiver. Is there anybody on the commission that did not see the site plan looking online? Okay, here in That's we're good to go, Marina. Everybody had a chance to take a look at what he is offering there. And I think for the purposes of what we're doing, it probably
fills the bill. So you can stop sharing now, Marina. Yeah, go back to the regular screen there. Thank you. At this point, do any of the commission members have any questions for the applicant? I just wanted to talk about the salt, Jed. Yep. Go ahead.
I hear in, you know, Hebron, they're having that huge problem with the public works facility over there. And, you know, the neighbors are all worried about the salt leaking out of salt shed. I've heard of that happening in different places. It's happened to the state, couple different places and salt leaches once there's water in it, you know. Just curious about that if if we have any kind of regs that they do what we can't do. Oh, salt. I
certainly was not able to find anything. I I shared your concern about storing the salt there. I heard that, I've heard a couple of different things about, you know, the Hebron Salt Shed and the problem with storing their salt isn't what's causing the salt in the environment. It's putting all the salt out, you know, around when they're spreading it. That doesn't mean I'm a fan of putting it in there, but I did go look for something that would do that. You know, we did get letter from Agent Wagner and our wetlands agent, and he saw no problem with the application in that it was outside of the 100 foot upland review area. So that's what I know about our regulations with respect to the salt, Scott. I guess the other the other question along that line that that I was thinking of was. Michael Jacob when you you said that. Michael You were putting a tarp down underneath it, you know, have visions of the equipment that you're using to load the salt would be fairly easy to tear through that. Do you have do you have measures that prevent you from ripping up the tarp or is the tarp, you know, waterproof so that salt can't leach through it? I know, know, a lot of tarps are water resistant, but they they don't stop the leaching through. Now you got to cover over the shed so that
that maybe prevents water from getting in there. But I share Scott's concern about the salt getting into the environment.
Right, so what we normally do when we load is I don't ever dig down to the very bottom of my pile. I will always leave a small layer of salt that we drive over to get to. We already did that.
Then Do you know who the iPhone is that was coming in? Was that you, Leanne? No. Okay.
And then what we would do is shovel that stuff that is on the actual tarp to the bigger pile once we're done with the storm so we can keep the pile contained in the same area. So we're not digging on to the actual tarp itself. I have thoughts of actually putting concrete in that area instead of using the tarps because it is more of a pain in the butt for me to to do that. If that would be more suffice of a solution than having a tarp down, I have no problem with prepping and pouring concrete inside that salt shed to make that more of a contained unit, if that will help with your guys' worries of it possibly leaching into the environment.
I think it is like three three or three or 400 feet away from the from your well, isn't it? Okay. Yes. Yes. It's on the apps complete opposite side of the property. Right. So, you know, I'm not worried about that, but I am I would feel better if if you did that. There's no regulations apparently for that, it could very well happen.
I I agree. In fact, might even be you put a tarp down on top of the cement because salt doesn't or cement doesn't like salt, then that would give us even better protection. That would be up to you. I do like the idea of putting, you know, the cement flooring in there, if you will, to kind of keep that from doing everything we can to protect the environment.
In the long run, Jake, it'd probably be easier for you anyways.
I I would agree. It's definitely something I've toyed with anyways with doing. So if that's something that will definitely, you know, keep a little bit everybody at ease, I have no problem doing that.
It definitely wouldn't have to be much. Only, like, a, you know, a few inch reveal coming up from the floor of the basin just enough to keep the, you know, whatever water does splash in there from storms. And, did you say if the the roof was tarp or was it, like,
permanent structure or roof? Yeah. It's like a a steel well, it is a a tarp cover. It's almost like one of those carport garages that you put up.
Okay. I know what you're talking about. Like, metal frame type deal? Correct. Yep. Okay.
Any other commission members have other questions for the applicants at this point?
Just for clarification in the application, thought it read that you were going to park all the commercial vehicles and the trailers on the existing driveway next to the shed. Is that correct?
Yes. Except for one vehicle Right. Which is my personal vehicle, which I usually park down the bottom. Right. Remaining funds will be at the top of the driveway. Yes.
Okay. I just wanted to make sure there was enough room there so you don't didn't need on street parking.
Yes. No. There once we got the complaint, we have not done any on street parking since then. So we've kept everything within the boundaries of the actual property. Very good. Thank you. Any other question members have?
Say again, Scott. We don't need any screening trees or anything. There's no complaints about that.
That'd no. And the any Neighbors are all good with it. The neighbor to the right, the gymnast, ordered the application. Yeah. And the gentleman across the road well, I I I can't say he supported it. He he wasn't looking for any sort of screening. His primary concern was was the on street parking, which is has largely been addressed. Part of it was the
Jim, on these applications, is the screening a requirement, is it only if there's a complaint? Well, it it is it's not complaint. Not It's not. Okay.
And when we get into the deliberation, you know, we'll go we'll go through the regulations. There's not many of them there. And I think it works out okay. Any other Commission Member comments? Yeah, I did have a couple for you. When I looked your company up online, you know, it says you're a Manchester company. I don't know, it looked to me like that was probably, you had a house in Manchester at the time. Is that how that came to be?
Yeah. I initially started the business in Manchester when I was still living at my mother's house. And then I moved, and I hadn't moved the business address, which is actually Probably moving here in the next few months or month to Andover Because that house that I have listed as the business address is no longer going to be owned by a family member or somebody in the business family so that address will be moving to Andover very, very shortly.
Okay. And so that's I know your application talked about Andover getting the benefit of the taxes from your business. That'll be the key to making that happen, I guess. Correct. It also said online there that you had five employees?
Yeah. I put that on there because a lot of people don't want to hire somebody with two people. They think that you're not capable of doing the job and honestly a lot of my commercial, clients Want to have a minimum of three to four people on your crew to be able to service their properties So that's why I put that on there, but I do only have one employee
Okay, the. I know looking looking at your trucks and that you know it's all great shape looking at your website looks like you do a great job, You know, Agent Halsey talked about the potential for growth. Do see yourself getting bigger and at what point would you no longer consider the home based business appropriate?
I I do see us growing a little bit. We've definitely grown for sure since I've started, no doubt. I want to say probably within the next two years, I will not be doing this out of my home anymore. If I had to put a number to it, I I wanna say two years. I do it at home now because I still have the capability and the room to do it without paying extra money for rent or owning my own building or owning something else down the line. But, yes, I I think one more truck or one more piece of equipment, and it's going to be too much for me to do at my home occupation. So I want to say probably about two years or so, and I most likely won't be having this business here.
Do you have any other places that you're storing equipment now, or is everything stored at your house?
There was a couple things that I did keep in Manchester, small things, a couple lawnmowers and things like that, but nothing nothing major, no. Okay, yep.
So that was, that was all the questions that I had. I'll go back and at this point, are there any members of the public who would like to comment or ask questions of the applicant? Okay, I hear none. So was the person who made the, was concerned about on street parking, is that the person with the two trucks alongside the road? No, it is not. Okay, that's a different person, Okay, got it. So at this point, I guess my question for the Commission is, is there anything that we can think of that we might want to have answered, or are we in a position to close the public hearing?
One question. We talked about the concrete base for the shed. What is the existing subsurface there? Is it asphalt or is it crushed stone? What is it?
The existing subsurface is processed gravel. So process, and then we packed it in with our compactor, and then we put millings on top of that and packed that in to create a look alike a bass vault, basically. And then we would apply the tarp on top of that because it's a hard soil or a hard sub ground to to drive the machines on to load.
Okay. But it's basically a porous surface versus something like concrete.
Right. Right now, it is something that could possibly, yes, be porous. Yeah. It could leach. Correct. Okay. Thank you.
Once again, I'll ask if there are any members of the public present that want to comment on the application. Hearing none and hearing oh, I see a phone here. That looks like Leanne's number. Did you have a comment, Leanne? No.
Okay. If there are no objections, then I will close the public hearing at 07:29. And at 07:29, I will call the regular planning and zoning meeting to order. And first up is roll call and seating of alternates. And I see Steve Nelson's present. Scott Person is present. Leanne Hutchinson's present. I'm President, the only Member missing is in creme and we'll see Kevin artisan. In place of. Yeah. Not on the agenda, missed it somehow, additions or changes to the agenda. And so I had no additions or changes to the agenda. But if we need to change the agenda to add an item to change it, can certainly we can certainly entertain that thought. Does anybody have any additions or changes to the agenda that they would like to propose tonight? Hearing none, we'll leave the agenda as it is. Item four is public comment. Any members of the public that are here tonight that would like to comment on anything other than what is on the agenda.
Is Catherine Hutchinson, and I have comments about the gravel operation, which is under your old business tonight, and I respectfully request permission to be allowed to comment at that time.
Yeah. You will be allowed to comment at that time. You bet. Thank you. Okay, next up is new business. And the first item under new business is the application of Jacob Surdam 87 Merritt Valley Road. Applicant is seeking a special permit to operate landscaping businesses in accordance with section 4.12 of the Andover zoning regulations agent Halsey is there any. Any chance that you have a draft motion for us tonight?
I don't. I do have a number of conditions. I can put together one, Move to approve the application of Jake Serdam, 87 Merritt Valley Road for permit to operate a landscape business. So since you don't Yeah. Have One is that Jim,
what I'd like to do is I'll make the motion or we'll get a second and then we'll discuss it for for conditions of approval in we'll proceed. From there, so at this point, I will make a motion to approve the application of Jacob Sir Dam 87 Merritt Valley Road. For a special permit to operate landscaping business in accordance with section 4.12 the handover zoning regulations. I'll second that. Okay,
thank you, Scott. Now we'll have the discussion, Jim, if you can want to lead off with what you have for conditions of approval.
One would be the construction of an apron along the road in accordance with town ordinance, town regulations. As an aside, that will require permit on its own, really, the applicant. So the detail will be spelled out in that application. Second would be no storage of salt until salt containment is constructed in a manner consistent with what was represented or in a manner approved by staff.
Okay, and that would be the concrete floor? Yes, correct. Okay.
Or we could just I mean, you could say a impervious surface. But I think Just give staff sign off on it. It would cover it, I think. The third condition I would recommend would be no on street parking.
Okay. Any other conditions, Jim? No. Any other Commission members have any other conditions that they would like to discuss?
No, I would just comment that the applicant should be aware of the regulations regarding signage as well.
I did speak to the applicant. He indicated he was not looking to put an installed signage. He's not there's no drive by traffic. You know, that that word-of-mouth web based advertising. Great. Thank you, Jim. Thank you.
So we're in the discussion, in deliberation now. One of the things I did say was that we would go back and look at the regulations a little bit. And I do want to do that. One of the things I struggled with this application is there are quite a few landscape businesses around, and many of those operate out of a home. Most of those have a fairly big lot. In Jacob's lots, relatively small compared to the other landscaping businesses that are doing home based work. But Jacob's Lot, and again, I'm not exactly sure how we got there, was the, is in the industrial zone. And so, you know, when, if we looked at our regulations in Section four twelve, actually it's 412A, I think four twelve is the bed and breakfast thing. But it says, For in the industrial zone, scale business where the majority of work activity takes place off-site, but accounting vehicles and equipment is stored as a dwelling, that certainly sounded like exactly what the applicant has. So I thought, as much as I wish he had a little bit bigger lot that the equipment was a little bit less visible from the road, being that it's an industrial lot, That was consistent with what what our regulations allow there. So, any other questions or comments
at all on the application before we vote on it?
I know that the proposed salt shed is, what did you say, Jacob, two fifty or 300 feet from your well?
Yes. It is on the complete opposite side of the property line.
So How how close is it though to your neighbor's well?
To be a 100% honest, I'm not I'm not sure. I want to say it's a minimum of a 150 feet because they're quite a ways through the woods down the road.
So we might wanna check on that, Jed, because I was just doing some quick poking around online and the state of Connecticut has they're older. I mean, they're 01/25/2000, but they have road salt storage guidelines. And one of them is, you know, they want it to be X amount of distance from a flood area and then no closer than two fifty feet to a portable well. So just things to consider looking out for the current property owner and or future property owners.
Okay, no, that's a great point, Kevin. And I am thinking about that with what you saw there, Kevin, what kind of precautions was it taking? Was it just keep it more than that distance?
Yeah, they, I mean, they want it to be, they want us to be further than two fifty feet from a potable well, they want it to be outside of a one hundred year flood area, they want it to be non adjacent to water bodies, are supplying public water reservoirs. And then they noted that, you know, the facility should divert storm water with berms or swales or drains to prevent runoff from entering the salt. So basically the slab can't be poured flat or dead even with the subsoil. There can't be any risk that runoff is gonna come into the salt shed and then overflow and then just carry the saline out into the environment. And they're, you know, obviously suggesting that it needs to be covered with a waterproof barrier.
Kevin, is that a regulation or are that is that like a best management practice?
No, it was just a quick hit that I found that's on the, you know, ct.gov. It was like a .ct.gov website, and it's just titled Road Salt Storage. Yeah. Okay.
So I think, know, in one, I really appreciate you checking into that, Kevin, that, you know, we were concerned, we're especially concerned about the neighbors well and any salt there. Think there's maybe two ways that we can proceed, and I'm thinking out loud at this point. One is we can change the condition of approval to say that it needs to meet those requirements. And as long as we're two fifty feet from the neighbor's well, then all is good. The other thing is I could withdraw the motion and we can do a little more research between now and the next meeting, And we can actually vote on the application at that point. And I guess probably the cleanest is to withdraw the motion and
just figure out what the information is. And I guess Jim, you know, if we figure out the worst case scenario is he can't store salt there. And that would be, you know, his choice. I don't know where that would go. Hope that wouldn't be the case, but, you know, the salt was a concern.
Jacob, do you know where the well is on your neighbor's property? Yeah, he said he didn't.
I'm not 100% sure. I've never personally looked over there. I I if I had to guess. I wanna say it's on the closer to Route 6 side of her home, which would be well over 250 feet. I cannot be certain just because on the left side of her home, which is abutting my property line, there's a probably at least a 100 foot minimum of woods between us. And there's that's on a hillside, so I don't know if they dug the well there. I don't I'm not a 100% sure. I know she used to be on the spring that was fed from up on the hill, but I know she's no longer on that. So I'm assuming there's some sort of well. I just am not certain on where it is. But if any also too if any, I mean, not that it would happen, but let's say there was some sort of runoff. There's a a pretty large hill to be able to get to her location. You know, the runoff would go behind the salt shed and then down the, know, basically an embankment almost It would be very limited I would say to be able to reach where her well would be Just because of the severe slope on on the properties that we have down to the rail trail because of the topography. Yep. Just my thoughts there I'm obviously no engineer or anything, but you know, the runoff, I think if there was to be any would be
much more downhill from where her well would be, and it's definitely not down by the rail trail. I know that. So just a thought process there as far as something traveling uphill to where her well would possibly be, I I don't think would even be a possibility. But again, I I don't know where the well was done on the on the property there.
What about the neighbors across the street? Is are they up uphill from you?
They are uphill. Yes. From where it would run. Yes. So the only place Would have any sort of runoff at all would be down the backside of my property and then down towards the rail trail, which there's you know, a pretty big goalie between the rail trail and my property, which would also be an uphill battle to get to the rail trail. Mhmm.
Yeah. The topo slopes all back behind And the then it basically slopes straight back until you hit Route 6. And then eventually there's a swale that leads into, I guess, Cheney Brook that's down there. But that's a ways off to the west. Well, at this point So again, I just want to point that, you know, I'm not saying that it's a regulation or a law, but based on what I read, it's a suggestion.
Yeah, those are they're saying that it's best management practices kind of thing, so it's not they're not saying it's a regulation, Jed.
No, I understand, but again, you know, we have the opportunity to apply conditions of approval. And we did have a concern about, you know, salt contamination into the groundwater, which is a big issue, you know, lots of places now. And so, I'm probably going to do it wrong, but at this point, I would like to withdraw my motion so that we can do a little more investigating of what, you know, Kevin was discussing with us before we vote on it and lose the opportunity to make an informed decision one way or the other.
Jed, before you do that, in the original motion, it was to approve with the conditions. Yep. And the condition for salt containment would still hold. I would suggest we vote on the application so he could be in compliance doing his business there, and then he can't store salt there until the commission is satisfied with whatever the plan is. That's a good option too. I think that's a good option, Steve. Okay.
I withdraw my withdrawal and let the motion stand. I'm sure we've goofed up the process there a little bit. But that is what we have. We have the motion to approve the application with three conditions of approval. One is the modification of the apron extension to be in accordance with town ordinance. Two would be no salt storage unless it complies with the Connecticut best management practices for salt storage areas. And number three is no on street parking. Any other discussion?
The condition on the salt, can we add the concrete apron?
We can. So, I thought that would have been in the best management practices, but I don't know. I don't know. I did like the idea of the concrete apron. The second condition of approval would be salt storage consistent with best management practices of the state of Connecticut and a concrete floor under the storage area.
Yeah, would you be open to just simply deferring salt storage until such time as it comes back to the commission with some detail to give you the flexibility to apply the best management practices in any other detail that comes up as a result of Yep. Looking
And in fact, the applicant doesn't really need to attend the next meeting or anything else. He has to get with you and go through that. I would like as a commission to, you know, get a brief on what we've concluded the answer is on that because it's a good issue. Absolutely.
And one thing to note, Jake, you might just want to have some estimates when you get back to your gym for a tonnage that you plan on storing on-site.
Okay. The well, I can tell you initially it's the salt shed does not hold more than 23 tons. Okay. That is the maximum that that salt storage shed will be holding at any given point in time. Okay.
Jim, does that way ahead makes sense to you? Yes. Okay. In the Commission, well, I guess we'll vote and we'll find out whether the Commission thinks that is good, but I do think that's the smart thing to do and that does allow the applicant to do everything else he's been doing. We just need to hopefully have several months before we have to come through the issue with the SALT there. So with that in mind, I will call for a vote on the application. And I'll start with Steve. Aye. Scott? Aye.
Lian? Aye. We hear you, Lee Ann. Okay, that was I think I just heard you say aye when I was talking. Kevin? Aye.
And I vote aye as well. The motion passes five-zero-zero. So, you all the Commission members for the good questions there, and thank you, Jake, for submitting the application and I hope your business continues to grow so that even if we do figure out how to store the salt, it's only there for a short term basis. Thank you very much.
Okay, next item up is the November general elections for the Planning and Zoning Commission. And I think there's five of us that have our terms expiring this November. They originally were going to expire at the end of June. Jake, did you have any questions before you go on your way for us? I see your smiling face there, and I know you're not going be interested in any other any of this other stuff we're talking about.
No. Other than I think I'll just talk with you, Jim, about the driveway apron and starting a permit process for that, if that's through you so I can I can get that going to, to make sure that's taken care of first?
Well, it's through it's through the building office, but, yeah, you you can check with me. Sure. Okay. That's all. Alright. Alright. Okay. Yep.
So the all the terms were extended from June to November when we shifted our town elections from May to November. But the people that I see having their term expiring is Anne Creme. My term is coming up, Scott Persson, Anne Blanchard, and Kevin Arneson. And so I am going to. Run for reelection and I hope each of the other ones, if you do as well. If you choose not to, I'd appreciate you let me know so I can figure out how to go forward. It's been very nice having a full commission with the flexibility that a number of alternates bring to bear there. I think the alternates are all doing a great job. The only thing that's keeping you from being on the commission is we got a full house there. But I want to keep all of you. So that's any questions on what you need to do there? I know the reason that we're all meeting Zoom tonight is the Republicans are caucusing in the Community Center Room right now and. Due to a scheduling conflict on that I looked at the town's website calendar, I said we were the only thing on it, I didn't worry about it. And
obviously, that wasn't the best answer. Please run again. And that's that. Next item up is land use training requirements. That's probably a hard issue to bring up right after I'm asking you all to run for reelection because here's a given amount of work there. I show several folks you'll need to get the training done. I won't go through and name the names tonight unless somebody asked me whether or not I've got a record of their completion. But I sent out a link to the Yukon CLEAR land use website. And it even says on that now, they weren't sure back at the time, but there's three one and a half hour sessions, and they all look pretty good. I watched the affordable housing presentation that was by Mark Brandt's, and I thought that was good. I looked at the titles. I haven't looked at, haven't watched the other two yet, because I attended the Connecticut Bar Association training, which I also thought was very good. But looking at the information there, I think that it's very doable when I look for ways to try to make getting the training done more palatable. I would offer up that, you know, we've got five months left to the end of the year. If the folks that need to do the training were to watch, you know, one or two in place of attending a meeting, that might be as much time compensation that I can give you. I don't know what happens at the end of the year If you haven't done the training, I know I'm required to report to the Board of Selectmen that we've done it. And
I don't know what, if anything, they have to do with that information. Know, on the public act 21 dash 29 that came out, it just says Commission must report compliance annually to the legislative body or Board of Selectmen in town meeting towns. So we're, that's a selectman for us. I will report our compliance as best as I know. If you watch the videos, I don't think there's any way for you to get written diplomas or anything like that. So I'm just looking for you to tell me that you watched the three and that would be that.
So, Jed, that would satisfy the requirement if we watched the three videos?
It would. And so, if you look through on there, I don't know who wrote up the website, but he says it should meet the requirements. And is the letter I sent out to talk, you know, everybody had to get four hours of training. So you watch the three videos, and that's about four and a half hours. Yeah. You get to the point where there's questions at the end of the presentation. I don't care whether you watch that or not, but you watch those three. It's suggested in that link that that would meet the training requirements. Very good. And I think it will. And I think it truly is worth your time to watch those. Is
Yeah, agreed. And I think that makes it a lot easier for us, you know, a time challenge. So I appreciate that. Well, know everybody's, you know, busy and
I hate to throw more requirements on there, you know, when we're doing a good job of keeping the Commission full. I'm also on the Inland Wetlands Commission and, you know, we struggle every month just to get a quorum and I don't want you guys going over to Inland Wetlands either. So you stay right here. But that's that's the pitch on that. I haven't heard anything lately about the sexual harassment training. I'm more concerned about getting through the land use training. I think that's, you know, more beneficial, although I do think that, you know, it's probably important for the town that we all are aware of what would constitute sexual harassment and that kind of thing. Did participate in that. I don't consider myself an expert on that, but I didn't learn as much by watching that program as I did by
attending the land use training. So we'll try to get compliant there first, and I'll see how much we hear about the sexual harassment stuff. We got to the end of the year to get that done, but I would ask for your help on getting us in good shape on that. Any other questions or comments on the training? Thanks. Here we go. Next step, page new business. We're going to go to old business. And Jim, you're up on the gravel pit operation.
Rubble pit operation is there's been very little activity. I did indicate at the last meeting I would attempt to facilitate a meeting with the applicant's engineer, Chris Bell, and town engineer, Joe Dillon. And I did. And that was unsuccessful. The applicant, Bill Genovese, indicated he thought everything was fine. He didn't want to engage his engineer anymore. He shared numerous opinions with me. But he did agree to meet me on the site, and I'm hoping to to meet with him this week. If I get nowhere, I'm basically, you know, with that that meeting, I am going to be in contact with Grant, see what our next move is, as far as pulling a bond, getting the work done. As you probably know, there's a couple of issues. One is, primarily, there's my opinion, anyway there's no the site is not stabilized. It's not stabilized because there's very little seed, little grass, little vegetation on the property. There's very little vegetation because there's very little absolute. I think it got blended in with the material on-site. The second is the runoff. Direction of the runoff is not compliant with the approved plan of April 2020. There is correspondence from Chris Bell on the website, which misleading, refers to an approved plan that was not approved.
And that's about all I have. I'm hoping to meet with Genovese in the next few days. Is the bond, still good, Jim? Yes.
I did have a conversation with the, insurance company that provided the bond, and they they gave me an updated copy and said that as bondholder or whatever the term was, that we would be notified if it's canceled.
What would be the I mean, where's where's the red line on this, Jim? I mean, how how far does this go before we call the bond? I mean, since the beginning, it's hasn't it hasn't done they haven't done what they were supposed to right from the beginning, and now it's,
you know I think when I meet with Grenavitz, either he's gonna take some action to correct the issues, or he's not. And at that point, I will defer to Mark Brantz's
recommendation. So are we gonna give him a set amount of time to finalize this, or we're gonna call it bond? Or does the board have to do that, or you do that, or who does that? I believe it's my call. I mean, right now, I'm told too that nothing's gonna
grow right now at this point in time. So if it takes a month or two, I'm Okay with that. I realized it's taking a lot longer than that, and I realize where it is. To answer your question, don't think I'm to give them much longer. I want to see him walk the site and him feel how that sand you know, I mean, he wants to argue about various things. Bottom line is he's not in compliance with the plan. He wants to do that. Some modification of how to stabilize that. He has every right to as far as I'm concerned. But he's has not indicated that he's willing to do that. So it's not like I'm working with him. I'm meeting with him to fill it out in person. Did I answer your question? What is it? I'm
just I'm I think I think that we should have given him a time schedule to start with, and and I'm just wondering if we're we're being negligent by not giving him a time schedule right now. We're at this meeting and we're talking about what's going on. I mean, Jed, do you have an opinion about that?
Well, do. I was trying to so you know as we were talking here, the big concern was when Jim said that Bill Genovese's comment was, it's fine. Well, it's not fine, we have been going on forever. But given that you probably can't get anything done now, you know, we need to have, we would need to have him do something and there's smarter guys than me to pick the date, but it's got to be done sometime in August because if he doesn't do it, we need to have time to get it topsoiled and seeded and germinated this fall.
Right. So how about a date of the end of August?
If we think we can get somebody out there and we probably got a landscaper that would be willing to help us out, or do. But yeah, as long as you know, we're convinced that we can get it done, you know, I would think that you want to have grass planted by mid September. Yep. So if we go to the end of August, I was thinking maybe mid August, that gives us a month to get done if he doesn't do it.
Yeah. But I'd like to hear from the rest of the Commission to get their opinion as to.
I mean, you absolutely need a timeline to incentivize the work to get done. If you don't put anything out there, then it's just going to keep
And it's not like we haven't had a timeline. His timeline was it had to be done the most recent one was the end of May. But there hasn't been any true consequence.
That is absolutely correct. And it's certainly clear at this point. And I am convinced that we're going to have to proceed legally. So we'll know soon if we need to invite Mark Branch to the next meeting where we head down that path. But I think Jim's assessment of the situation out there is right on. And I think that Genevieve is frustrated that you know Chris Bell didn't do a better job of managing this thing for him if he was supposed to be doing that. We know how frustrated we are with with Chris Bell. So imagine what Genovese is coming through at this point when when we tell him all that he paid Chris to do was for nothing.
I mean, so I'll say that I agree with Scott that I think given till the end of August, and then that take that gives the town time to come in and take action in September to get things straightened out and stabilized for the winter season. But
Ted suggested, Kevin, to to have it at mid August, and we we need time to probably find a contractor.
Yeah. I mean, I don't know how long the town bid process takes to settle on a contractor.
I mean, it could take a month just to get the bond money once we decide to go that route. I don't know how long that takes, but Oh yeah, that happen So yeah, maybe reel it into mid August.
I'm almost thinking we ought to just go the bond route now, now that we've kicked that around and we look at, you know, I don't know if there's harm in putting grass seed down now. I've seen people, you know, put seed down in November, and it didn't germinate until the following spring and it came up okay. I guess it can sit there in in doing
doing that. I guess that you need to put you need to put the topsoil, you know, he probably needs hundreds and hundreds of yards of topsoil over there. That has to be spread, and then if we had the amount of rain we had lately, we it would have germinated.
I was gonna say it would germinate in days because the soil temperature would be so high, and then the Right. Moisture would all be there.
Has anyone checked to see if we're having any erosion from all the rain that we've gotten since there's no growth there? Very limited amount of erosion.
Yeah. I'm sure the water hits the ground, it goes right out through the site. It's so the sand that drains so well over there. Mean. I don't think it holds any water.
There is a little erosion on the the the hill adjacent to the to to the Haul Road. Mhmm. But it there's fair amount of property. We need the adjacent property owner there. Oh, so when when It's traveling far.
So, Jim, when did you when was your meeting gonna be with, Bell and Genovese?
I'm not meeting with Bell. Genovese made it clear that, he was not gonna engage in any further meetings. Spoke to him last Thursday, spoke to Bill Ganovich on Thursday, and he indicated well, he indicated that his mother-in-law had died, he was pregnant. And he couldn't do it last week, but that he would make an effort to do it this week. And so I will give him a call tomorrow, or shoot him an email. As far as setting a time frame, I always wanted to hear what he said. If he said, I'm not going to do anything, then that's information that I would use to move forward. Whereas if he agrees that something needs to be done, I'd like to evaluate that. If he just says no, then why should I give him any time?
I agree with that. And I think that he is likely to say that. Yeah. Just just yeah. Go ahead, Leanne.
Speaking of the runoff, Chris Bell submitted a plan in May that showed water flowing to the right. I think he called it the south, or to the right onto Catherine Hutchinson's property, which was supposed to be remedied as part of this all along. And I believe he said that this agrees with the plan that we approved in August 2022, but it really doesn't. And I think Jed brought up the fact last month that Chris talked about there being 15% runoff. It's in the minutes language in the minutes somewhere than there was before. But then there was some discussion, I think. Again, I think Jed was the one who brought it up about if there wasn't supposed to be any runoff, then why is there 15% less than nothing? If you see what I mean. So that's hopefully what Jim's gonna be able to discuss with Mr. Genovese.
Yeah. I mean, I understand where Chris is coming from. He's making an argument that there's less runoff. And that may or may not be true, but it's of a moot point. There's an approved plan in place. He's not in compliance with it. That's that. And and you're right. An improved plan or an approved I'm I'm saying that.
An approved plan that he's not in a compliance with.
Gas bill. The existing flow, water flow, not in compliance with the approved plan. But basically, the approved plan, talking about the plan that was approved by the commission. That's the plan that was submitted with Chris Bell's letter of May '1 thing or other, that he alluded, he referenced as an approved plan. It wasn't. Kind of a non issue in my mind. Think we may be saying the same thing. Yeah.
Yeah, I agree with you. It's a moot point what the runoff is. If it's not, if there's runoff and it's not in compliance with the approved plan, the actual number, the percentage, or how it compares with predevelopment runoff is kind of not the point here. Okay.
And having said all that, I did you go out to look at the property on Sunday. After we had the good rain and it was certainly for the most part soaking into the ground. Did not see a lot of evidence of runoff on either side. But the fact remains that it is not graded in accordance with the approved plan in every plan that was discussed with us talked about two to four inches of topsoil and seeded with grass seed and that sort of thing. So there definitely is not a lot of topsoil out there.
It's only Tom's oil in one small area, isn't there?
I think sometimes soil points in front of the property, but it's very low quality. It's it was mixed in with with material that was on-site. Not loan. I saw very little organics,
Jim. Yep. Yeah, I agree. I'm not going disagree with that. I mean, you can basically, if you walk the site and hear, hear what it's the sound tells you what it is. Towards the rear of the site, it's like walking on a beach, the sound.
So I guess the bottom line is, at our next meeting, Jim's either here so convinced that Bill Genovese is going to fix it that we let him have a chance. But the more likely approach is we'll have Mark Branch here in in be discussing and we don't have to wait till then to have that discussion. At a minimum, if we haven't started that discussion, you know, before the next meeting, we will add that meeting on I would say, Jed, setting
a time schedule tonight that you want the place seated by the beginning of September.
Right? I'm still happy. I still think mid August is good because it's going to take a while, you know, once we decide to go to get it all done right.
You know, year ago we were saying we should have put a time schedule on him. Yep.
Well, there's always, you know, reluctance. Once we start legal proceedings, that'll be a fairly consuming event. So I know Jim's been trying to work hard to not do that. And we all know that Chris Bell's been a, you know, it's been a little frustrating trying to work with him to get this done. I think we're pretty close to that red line you were asking for, Scott.
And so Jim is supposed to tell Genevieve tomorrow whenever he sees them that the board wants seating to be done by mid August. That's the date.
In addition to, you know, making the lot in compliance with the approved plan. Right, right. In addition to that, correct. So we just need it to be in accordance with the approved plan, like Jim said, which it currently is not. And in his usage to seating done by mid August August 15, which is I don't know that he can get there. August 15 is gonna come up fast. So I guess hear what you hear, Jim, and if you're not dazzled, we need to start heading down that path. Yeah, right away. Yep, because August 15 will be here before you know it. He'd have to start spreading topsoil in there next week. Yeah, he would.
Any other Commission members have any comments here? Well, I see my screen has gone from yellow to green now. I don't know if I've got camera failure imminent here or what, but it doesn't look like that in my room. Kathryn Hutchinson, we promised you some time to make comments on this item?
I agree, Mr. Holloway. Yeah, I'm sorry. Allicy, that the plan that was submitted as built is not in conformance with the plan that was approved under the 08/15/2022 approval of plan of that map. Just for the commission's explanation of this, the as built plan that he submitted in May has a new added to the the map, what he calls the high point. Everything to the right of the high point that is toward the what he calls the right hand side, the southeastern part, I. E. My land. All of the water from that high point is directed toward my land in complete contradiction to what the commission has consistently indicated shouldn't happen. And more important is not in conformance with the map that was a plan that was approved.
Okay, yep, understand. And I'm not sure, I'm just looking at it out there, that it's actually graded in accordance with that as built. I didn't see, I'm not sure I see a high point where he's got it there. I was out looking for it, but that's why we've got surveyors and engineers to go out and check that out. But I certainly, we all, I think, agree that Woody submitted as an as built was not what he briefed us on and we agreed to.
I agree that it has to be in accordance with a plan that was approved. Yep, you bet.
I can see where this is going, Jed. Genevieve is gonna get out there, you're gonna tell him that you want this thing regraded, which this has to be, and he's gonna have to get a new surveyor. It's very expensive. Yep. He's going have to get a new surveyor. He's going to have to get a new dozer in there.
Yep. I'm sure he is not wanting to pay that bill, but he doesn't want to lose his bond either. So, we'll see where we go. But, you know, we have to get that properly graded and seeded this fall. Any other discussion on that? Okay? Oh, I thought we were close to the end. Item seven, approval of minutes. Let's start. I'll make a motion to approve the minutes from May 22. I'll second that. Thank you. That was Kevin. That was Scott. Scott. Okay.
Any comments on the May 22 meeting minutes? And I had none. So, hearing none, I'll call for a vote. Steve? Aye. Kevin? Abstain. Scott? Aye. Leanne? Aye.
And I vote aye as well. The minutes are approved, five-zero-zero. Make a motion to approve the public hearing and special meeting minutes from Wednesday, June 7. I'll second that.
Thank you, Steve. Any comments on those minutes? Normally, I would vote on the special meeting separately from the public hearing. But since it says the special meeting was canceled that night, I figured we could wrap it all into one. So any comments on the June 7 minutes? Hearing none, I'll call for a vote. Steve? Aye. Kevin? Abstain. Scott? Aye. Leigh Ann? Aye.
And I vote aye as well. The minutes are approved, four zero one with Kevin Absteen. Next up, for the public hearing minutes from June 20. Can I make a motion to approve the minutes from the public hearing on June 20? Second that. Thank you, Scott. Any comments on those minutes?
Jed, you've got I wasn't there, but you've got six members listed. It's not clear who was seated.
That, that is because those were the members present at the public hearing and we didn't see anybody at that point. Okay. Thank you. The only comments I had are down at the bottom of page one, there's a question mark after Errol. I do think that you have his name spelled correctly, if that's why the question mark was there, Marina. Yes,
and then the page numbering the it says page one of four where I think it should have been one of three and page two two of three and page three three of three because there is no page for there. Okay, I'll fix those.
Any other comments on the public hearing minutes? Hearing none, I'll call for a vote. Steve? I abstain. Okay. Kevin? Abstain. Scott? Aye. Leanne? Aye.
And I vote aye as well. The motion passes three zero two with Steve and Kevin abstaining. Last up is the special meeting minutes immediately following the close of the public hearing. And I make a motion to approve the special meeting minutes. Second. Thank you, Scott.
My only comments on that were. There was some you know, the middle of the one page. It talks about page three or four I don't know if that because you split it out from the preceding one, but I think there's only a one of one page. Okay, I'll take a look.
And then in the last paragraph under new business there, you talk about with the following conditions, see attached listing. And I did not see anything attached there. Do see the motion with the conditions of approval listed, you know, they're in the file. But I. And you can make you can either attach it or you can. Say see see conditions of approval in the application file.
Yeah I think I sent them to Kate to post with the minutes because I can't combine them with the Adobe that I have. Okay, then yeah,
if you were or Jim could follow-up with Kate to make sure that we get the conditions posted there, That would make that correct, so the only the only changes to remove the line about page three or four in the Center input page one of one on the bottom. Any other comments on those meeting minutes? Hearing none, I'll call for a vote. Steve? Abstain. Kevin? Abstain.
Scott? Aye. Aye. And I vote aye as well. Motion passes three zero two with Steve and Kevin abstaining. Lost my agenda. Correspondence.
There we go. Okay. Correspondence, Jim. Item A. Administrative reports, zoning agent.
Ongoing violation 664 Route 6, unresolved, working with county attorney on both the occupancy of a trailer behind the residence, as well as ongoing blight violation. Sent out a letter today, 85 Lake Road, work done without a permit. Hopefully, that will be resolved. I think we've got a few more. 157 Wales Road and monitoring along with some other folks from post violations. Have few others that I'd like to schedule an inspection. That's all I have.
Okay. And I've got nothing to report from the Inland Wetlands Water Course Commission. Item 11 next regularly scheduled meeting is really August 15. Instead of August 22. We think the first day of the month was a Tuesday, so we thought we were going to meet on the twenty first. Shifted to the third Tuesday. That backs it up a week to August 15. And that's consistent with all the calendars that I can find. So we run all the right calendars to have that meeting then. The And that will be that will be back, you know, the hybrid in the community room. Next item up 12 miscellaneous anybody have any miscellaneous topics to discuss and I do have one myself but we'll let other folks go first.
Not really a miscellaneous topic yet, but I did post in the chat for everyone's reference the article that I was looking at by the Connecticut DEP. Okay. So just can grab the link and look at it, look it over for next meeting. Excellent.
The original one was from 2000. That one is a more recent one that was cited by Yukon.
And I hope that link doesn't go away. Any chance you could email that to everybody? I don't know once we sign off tonight if we can get back to getting into the link or not.
Yeah, I can just send it back to the zoning agenda. Appreciate Thank you.
Any other miscellaneous? I just wanted to share with the Commission on what I thought was a very positive note. You know, I met this morning with John Grzowski, our town planner, and Eric, and we spent the morning together talking about getting him started. I expect him to show up at our next planning and zoning meeting, and he will be in attendance at hopefully all meetings going forward from there. The we talked about, you know, a couple of things. There's a couple of grants that he can start, you know, working on. His big project is obviously the plan of conservation and development, but he'll be able to do some more of that. Marina, if you can allow me to share my screen, I just wanted to see if I can get the schedule that we initially looked at.
Okay, let me know if you can share. Yep, I think I can.
And so this I think most of you, many of you here tonight were at the interview session where we listened to the different people who were making their proposal. And this is the one from Tai Chi, which John represents. And the key thing here was, you know, it's about a fifteen month plan. So I didn't want to get started on it until at least after July, because I want to make sure that we don't finish it up until 2025 so that we get our full ten years out of the old one and a full ten years out of the new one. But there are some things that he can do that you'll make a positive impact on the town by getting grants and that sort of thing that you hopefully next budget season make his working with us for us a positive story, good news story. But what I'm working on, and we started out the first couple months baseline review of existing plans, data update and assessment. Right down here is where it talks about staff advisory committee meeting. And I initially thought that, with the exception of a couple of people that was going to be the planning and zoning Commission. And it still can be, and that would be great. I don't know that. How much involvement that's going to take as we work our way through there. My concern is a little bit on overloading the planning and zoning folks. I've got you, you know, working on trying to get some training done for by the end of the year, that sort of thing. And so next time, john's going to walk us through the process and I expect that to take place at the next meeting. And I'm wanting to get
other commissions, the opportunity to participate discussion about the Community service, what are the questions we're going to ask and that sort of thing. And I was thinking, you know, certainly the Conservation Commission wants to participate in that the Economic Development Commission wants to participate in that. But there might be others that I'm not aware of. So my question is, are you know what, what do the planning and zoning commission members feel about signing up for this many extra meetings. Some of those can be done at our regular planning and zoning meeting, but some of them might have to be done outside of that. Because there's a lot to do there on top of what we normally have is not the shortest of meetings there. Is that too big to ask for the Planning and Zoning Commission? I know I will make my very best attempt to attend every one of those advisory committee meetings, I expect to be the guy that's kind of. Leading leading the charge here. I'm looking for a little input on other folks. Is that doable? Do you want to hear what he has to say a month from now before we make that decision because we had these advisory committee meetings that we had public presentations. And I'm not sure who should public would be the public, but the different commission members would all be part of this as much as they can take. So anyhow, that was is I started working with John on how do we get started on this? I soon recognized that the first question was, who is this advisory committee? And John said, well, it could be whoever you want it to be.
And I said, great. So I'll go out, try to put out some feelers, but I need to, he said sometimes it's a subset of the Planning and Zoning Commission. Sometimes it's the whole Planning and Zoning Commission, and they're kind of leading leading the charge there. So that's where I'm at. I'm looking for any feedback on nope, I can't do that. My schedule just won't let me. Or yeah, I can probably do that and I might miss one or two, but I'll do my best to attend everything that comes down the pipe. We don't need to get that tonight just think about that a little bit, but it's that is going to be a significant project that's coming up soon, I do expect that we will spread it out a little bit I told them today that
I didn't care. I would be happy with it finishing up the end of June, that gives us six months of. Fudge time in case you know something we get behind on don't think we will, if we can get it done in fifteen months I don't want it to be one of those cases where the job expands to fill up the time allowed. We don't need that but. But I do think for us getting started figuring out what do we want to ask in the Community service survey and that kind of thing, You know how do we want to do the survey, a lot of it can be done electronically, do we want pay the postage cost to do it there's there's a lot of stuff that we will have to go through. I'll be working with john on that, so that we're ready for the next meeting. That's the schedule that he presented to us back when he thought he was just applying to do the POCD.
Shifted gears I think everybody's aware that you know, we brought him on as a down planter with this being his primary responsibility, and he'll get that done. But we did spend a lot of time talking about some things that he needs to do to get off on the right foot. And then we spent a couple hours driving around town. We went over, looked at the ball fields, looked at where we want to put some pickleball courts, playscape. We looked at the old firehouse, the garage putting in there, talked about the continuity project on Route 316 and what he can do to help us there. Just drove all around the town, showing the different things there. I thought that was a very positive morning and gonna be good news for the town. Questions on that? Okay. Stop sharing. There we go. Any other miscellaneous topics before we call it a night? I think we've, I certainly talked it up then, and I'll make a motion that we adjourn. Second. Thank you, Steve. All in favor, aye. Aye. Any
opposed? Any abstaining? Motion passes 500. Thank you very much for attending tonight. Thank you for the involvement, the engagement, bringing up good topics. And just being active members. It certainly helps me out and I really appreciate that. While it, you you would seem like you're throwing a wrench in the works that kept us from heading on down the road smoothly with the home based business, Kevin, I thought your quick research was right on and that was great. I appreciate when all you guys do that. I like the active involvement of the whole commission. It works to the benefit of everybody. So having said that, we're adjourned. Good night all, and we'll see you on August 15. Thanks.