And then this is Germantown to the right of the property, till left of the property.
And then our plans and drawings.
The commercial space is going to be the first floor and the lower level, and that's approximately 1,900 square feet.
Unit number one will be in the rear on the first floor and the lower level.
Excuse me, the commercial unit is 1,068.
Unit number one is 900 square feet, a two-bedroom, one-bath.
That's also a bi-level on the first floor.
in the lower level, and then we'll go through the plans and drawings of the floor plans,
but units two and three are both on the second and third floors as bi-levels, and those are
two bedrooms, two baths, both over a thousand square feet.
Unit number three is a little bigger, it's almost eleven hundred square feet.
And then this is just, again, the restaurant, the floor plans, again, based on what's actually
being built there. It's 32 seat capacity here. And then if you look at this, this is the first
floor plan. The restaurant, you would get in through the front, and then that's here. And
then you go into a lower level where the kitchen would be. And then, you know, we have a side
entrance for the units themselves. So you come in here on the left, and then this is unit number
one, which is a bi-level, which is already built out, approved. You can see these plans were
approved by L&I, and that's a bi-level of, and it's a two-bedroom, one-bath. Instead of the first
floor and lower level, you go up to the second and third floors. You see here, you get into a
common staircase, and if you go left, this is unit number two, which is a bi-level, which is a two-bedroom,
two-bath, 1,017. If you make a right coming out of here, this is unit number three, which is a
two-bedroom, two-bath, bi-level, 1,084 square feet.
So our RCO meeting notice,
we met with the community on January 8th at 7 p.m.
Proof of emailing that notice,
along with proof of the actual mailing of that notice,
was sent to the coordinating RCO and other groups.
36 addresses received that notice.
Those are the addresses, proof of mailing to those addresses.
Our application for appeal that we filed with the ZBA,
along with the Notice of Refusal and the Project Information Form,
and then the deed to the property showing that 6206 Germantown Avenue LLC is the owner,
and then the Certificate of Tax Clearance showing that a slight amount is due,
but the payment that was due for 2024 was just paid, and proof of payment in 2025 is not due.
So with that being said, I would ask that Mr. Hardiman be sworn in.
Mr. Hardiman, could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Yes, Darren Hardiman, D-A-R-E-N.
Last name is H-A-R-D-I-M-O-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
Yes, Mr. Hardiman, you heard everything I had to say today about your zoning matter.
Is it true and correct?
And do you adopt it as your own testimony?
yes um in particular you know i i wanted to highlight and i want you to talk a little bit
about your your thought process of it being more of a hotel boutique hotel rather than a hodgepodge
of visitor accommodation use so the reason for well first i own a few properties on the block
First, I own a few properties on the block, and I'm very well invested in the area.
I'm very
But for this space specifically, because we're trying to do a cocktail bar, I thought that it would be better used as visitor accommodation.
Even though we soundproofed the building, we put gypsum down, we were making sure that there's going to be no disturbance for the units above.
We thought that it would be better for the Airbnb or the visitor accommodation use just based on what's going on in the area.
There's a lot of change.
There's a lot of people coming.
But when my family alone and neighbors that I speak to, when people are in town, there's nowhere else to stay other than coming into Cedar City or going into Chestnut Hill.
So that's what drove the reasoning for the visitor accommodation coming into this space.
And it's not uncommon to have visitor accommodation uses in this area of town.
Correct.
I actually had my team kind of supplement, kind of do it old school with paper.
So I'm going to take one copy.
if you don't mind i'll approach or i don't know how that works now if someone takes it just get
okay get it here somewhere okay i didn't want to be rude
and alan to be clear the only refusal you have is your accommodation everything else has been
approved that's right and and and built honestly but i asked my team when i was looking at the
presentation before i left the office i'm like are there any other airbnbs nearby they're like
yeah there are i was like well why didn't we put in the presentation so i was like so i couldn't
update the presentation that quickly but i said print something out give me a map and tell me
where they are and there's a number of visitor accommodations nearby in germantown we think
that would be better to actually be on germantown that's more appropriate than being in the
neighborhood especially as more of a boutique hotel and again as mr hartemann stated he has a
lot of assets on Germantown Avenue and you know there are people who there's a need for this type
of visitor accommodation use but more uh like formal in nature than what's going on in the
Germantown area all right questions from the board can I see the basement uh plans I just want to see
the delineation between the commercial use on the basement and the apartments for the visitor
accommodations just want to make sure i have the right screen up first
so to be clear it's the the visitor accommodations is for
of the all of the apartments correct uh that that's correct okay
and uh get my screen
Chair, sorry for the interruption. Just for the record, we are in receipt of an additional exhibit titled 6206 Germantown Avenue, nearby Airbnb listings. That'll be scanned and added to the record. Thank you.
Thank you, Ian.
So, board member Graham, here we are, right here.
So, if you look, this is the front entry to the commercial space, which comes out of Germantown, and there's an internal staircase for the commercial space that goes down, and essentially, this is the restaurant area for the public, and this will be the kitchen area for the restaurant.
And then if you look along the side of the building, there's an entryway that goes along the right side of the building here, where this is unit number one, which is the first floor and lower level.
And in order to get to units two and three, you would go up this flight of steps.
All right, I have a few questions.
One, have you operated any other Airbnbs?
I have not operated any other Airbnbs, but I have a property manager who has operated
Airbnbs, actually operates an Airbnb in the building that I own adjacent to this one at
620204, but it's for long-term use only, not visitor accommodation, which would allow
us to do short-term stay.
A single Airbnb or multiple Airbnbs?
She operates about 15 different Airbnbs.
In the building next to her?
No, no, no.
There's a single Airbnb in the building next to me, and then she operates multiple Airbnbs
throughout the city.
Does she operate anywhere they're in the same building?
in the same building yeah i'm not certain so i just i i travel a lot traveled a lot last year
i stayed in many airbnbs like this i would say one of the biggest issues when buildings convert
like this is property maintenance um i think like over time when you've got multiple people
staying on top of each other sometimes these end up being denser than your typical like
than your typical like apartment building would have been at any given time have you thought
apartment building would have been at any given time have you thought
All right.
through um what are going to be the max uh number of people that could be in any of the individual
units at one time so right now in the building next door we have a two bed one bath um very
similar makeup uh the building next door a little bit bigger it's a six units of five apartments
plus commercial so in the unit that is being running as an airbnb is two bed one bath and
the maximum amount of people that have been there thus far is four and it was a family so there was
two adults two children they were in the same room um at this point they've been there for about five
months and that's pretty much what we've seen so that unit she's been renting it from me for three
years and it's been vacant for at max 30 days so about that as what's going to be there i imagine
that it would be the same in these um two to four people um can't see that much more we're putting
full-size beds into the units except for one of which is going to have a queen just based on the
overall size of the bedrooms so i don't see that there's going to be any much more and then in
terms of overall maintenance that i mean it's what i do so in terms of like generally when you've got
this many bedrooms in the units it accommodates families and typically families need things like
children's bed roller beds cribs and typically the airbnbs have space in the airbnb where they
can kind of store this stuff so they can swap it out are you thinking at all about where like
materials to support the boutique hotel or airbnb short-term rental usage so there's might be able
to be provided on site sure so there's ample closet space and all of the units we also are
putting in lockers for things that need to be refilled in each unit um we additionally we put
in my cube safes so no different than when you go away or go to a hotel there's cube safes and
the master bedroom only um just not in the guest room so everything in in terms of like the overall
planning perspective we're looking forward to be boutique hotel so we made sure that we rolled out
the red carpet for everything that's going to be there including welcome packages so all of that's
going to change we do not have uh cribs or things like that we're not going to provide them either
for the overall liability aspect of it so they won't be in our units right and then my last
question is with the bar next or the adjacent bar in the space is this a full commercial kitchen or
are you going to have like full food options on site it's full commercial kitchen we're going
for the type r liquor license which requires food to be sold anytime the bars open and then
so pursuant to that where are you exhausting the kitchen uh 10 foot above the building okay thank
you sure and by the way mr hartman is going to be owner occupied in terms of it's gonna it's
restaurant. Operating in the business.
Other questions from the board?
there any regulation
around the number of
individuals that can be in an
Airbnb by
bedroom size?
That I do not know, but what I can say is
aside from
us monitoring, we are putting on a
notice, we did let everyone know
there are going to be cameras in the hallways. There's no cameras
going into the units, but there are cameras in the hallways.
We also have decibel
meters that are going in they look like smoke detectors so if there's a party going on which
we do not allow nor does airbnb we'll be coming with the police to shut the party down um it's
happened at other units across the city but for us we don't want to be a nuisance i own on the
avenue i'm here i live work play in this area so we have no intention on doing anything outside of
the right thing so um with respect to the cocktail bar which i understand we're not um
So we're not approving in that sense, but what kind of operations are we talking about hour wise? Are you going to have live music? Are you going to have a liquor license so that the hours would be, you know, late? And how is that going to affect the habitability, if you will, of these Airbnb units?
so that's something that we took into consideration when we put down a quarter inch gypsum and then
we put down quarter inch sound mat and then we put down uh inch one inch gypsum so that there's
no sound transfer between units from the first to the second floor so that's been done across
the entire building so there won't be any sound transfer at all we are going to have music won't
be live music um and we won't have a dj we won't have a jukebox so people are going to listen to
what we play. And then the hours of operation? Oh, hours of operation
are Sunday through Thursday, 11 to 11, and
then Friday, Saturday, 11 to 12. We're looking to pick up the lunch crowd.
Okay. So you're not going to
operate till 2 o'clock in the morning? Absolutely not.
Okay. All right. Thank you. Other questions from the board?
Questions from our attorney, Ryan McSherry?
no chair questions or comments from the audience
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
questions or comments from the virtual audience yes chair
Yes, Chair. I have a hand up by the name of Charles Richardson.
I have a hand up by the
They have been promoted to penalist.
Hi, Mr. Richardson. You've already been sworn, sir. Just state your name.
Sorry about that. I'm being promoted to penalist and that takes us longer to get in.
No, no. You've already been sworn. Just state your name, sir.
Charles Richardson, Office of Councilwoman Cindy Bass.
The councilwoman, based on the results of the RCO meeting, has no opposition to granting the variance.
Thank you very much for taking the time to call us. We appreciate it.
Is there anyone else in the virtual audience?
There are no more hands up at this time.
Planning Commission.
Thank you, Chairman, and good afternoon.
David Vecto with the City Planning Commission.
Chairman and board members, the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the CMX2 commercial
mixed-use zoning at this location.
There is no unique physical condition or circumstance of this property that would prevent it from
being used in strict conformity with the zoning code.
A 2020 zoning ordinance passed by City Council, which regulated short-term rentals, did not
change the basic rule prohibiting full-time use of a dwelling unit as a short-term rental.
This type of absentee management, where the owner does not live in the unit, has been illegal since the first short-term rental zoning regulations became effective in 2015.
What's changed since the passage of the 2020 ordinance is that there is now a licensing and enforcement mechanism.
The City Planning Commission recommends the Board deny the proposed use variance for visitor accommodations.
Thank you.
Mr. Chair, can I just respond quickly?
So, given the location of where it's next to a self-storage facility, and more likely we're going to have a medical facility across the street, I think that this is an appropriate use of the property for visitor accommodation under the circumstances.