ZBA Hearing - April 18, 2023

Mr. Barth has been promoted.

Thank you.

Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the board.

Alexander Barth, on behalf of the applicant owner, Irina Gangadaz, 10206 Busselton Avenue.

Mr. Barth, could you state your name, please, and spell for the court reporter?

Alexander Barth, B as in boy, A-R, T as in Tom, H as in Harry.

Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

Yes.

Right. Our vice chair has just a few questions.

Good morning, counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to his

accuracy? I do. Have you emailed all the required documents that are needed to proceed with this

case five days in advance of this hearing? I have. Thank you. Please proceed and share the screen.

Thank you very much.

Good morning, members of the board. Just as a preliminary matters, the exhibits that were

submitted to the board. Exhibits E, G, J, and L are the deed, the tax clearance, the photographs,

proof or proof of zoning notice posting, as well as the documentation of the meeting and proofs of

mailing for the RCO meeting with Somerton Civic. We are here today on behalf of IRENA.

um this originated from a violation notice miss uh gangadiz was cited for um the elimination of

one off-street parking spot at this property this is a semi-detached property

um on busselton ave um and just for everybody's understanding i'm just going to go directly to

the photographs, which are listed as page 43 in the packet. Sorry, not 43. Exhibit K, page 44 of

your packet. These are photographs of the property 10206 Norris Busselton. These properties had

originally two rear garages at grade entrances. When Ms. Gongadies purchased this property in

August of 2014, her property had had those two internal garages. They had been retrofitted or

removed with walls put up, windows, and a doorway. A common conversion for homes in this neighborhood

and homes in this existing development.

The photographs show the conversion,

as you can see on the bottom of the page.

One garage opening has been filled in

with a window and an air conditioner

and another with a door.

There is adequate, and there is a parking pad

in front of these garage spaces,

spaces, but the internal space was previously removed at some point in time.

but the internal space was previously removed

at some point.

If you go further down the photographs, you can see other examples in this community,

in this exact development, where this same conversion has occurred. Specifically on the

screen, I'm showing you 10216, 10218, 10214. These properties even have parking bumpers

on the parking pad in front delineating exterior parking only. The original citation

was a violation of the zoning code for the failure to have one minimum of one off-street

parking space as required under RSA 2 and we are here to legalize this prior or pre-existing

non-conformity that was apparent when Ms. Goggins purchased the property, i.e. the elimination of that

interior parking space. Again, we have visited the Summerton Civic Association, presented this

case before them requesting this variance. They gave their letter of approval. The near neighbors

in Exhibit M around this property have also similarly supported Ms. Gangadiz's application

seeking to legalize this property to resolve this violation that was previously issued

for a pre-existing condition, and those are the immediate adjacent owners. So listed as Exhibit M

is the letter of support from Somerton Civic as well as the immediate neighbors Ben Thomas

and Sergio Santos. Is your client here a counsel? Yes. Why don't we have your testimony adopted?

All right. Irina, are you online?

Ms. Karina, can you unmute yourself if you're out there and raise your virtual hand?

she's not she's not in the audience i don't see her counsel you're an officer of the court

we will accept your testimony thank you questions from the board no chair no mr chairman

no chair questions or comments from the virtual audience

yes first I have Alice Udovich with a hand raised right

Ms. Udovich has been allowed to speak good morning Ms. Udovich could you state your name

please and spell for the court reporter sure good morning chairman members of the board

James Snell, my vote is yes.

Ismail Shaheed, my vote is yes.

Thank you, counsel.

Thank you very much, members of the board.

Number six, MI 2022-004-093-3712 Clarendon Avenue.

Donald Nogowski is the attorney for the owner.

There's a letter of support from the West Tarsdale Morrell Park Civic Association, and also applicant provided a petition of support signed by 31 neighbors.

Mr. Jogowski, can you raise your hand, please?

Excuse me. I don't see him in the audience.

Call his name one more time. Mr. Nagoski. Mr. I have a, no, that wasn't him. Mr. Nagoski,

can you raise your hand, please?

No one raising their hand by that nature.

All right.

Number six, MI 2022-004-093-3712 Claridin Avenue.

Cases continued.

Mark must be tried.

Number eight and number 11 will be heard together.

MI-2022-003-780-1916 West Burke Street, there was an RCO meeting, we do not have a letter.

And number 11, MI-2022-003-781-1920 West Burke Street.

Darlene Threat is the attorney for both matters.

There she is.

Ms. Darlene Threat has been promoted.

Good morning, counsel.

Ms. Treat? I did promote her. I don't know what happened to her.

Okay.

Good morning. Good morning. Can you hear me now? I can.

Thank you. I'm going to put my video on.

Okay, thank you.

Good morning. Could you state your name and spell please for the court reporter?

Darlene Threat, D-A-R-L-E-N-E, Greek T as in Thomas, H-R-E-A-T-T, 45 East City Avenue, number 496, Balak-Kenwood, P-A.

Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

Yes, I do.

Could you identify your client in relationship to the property?

My client, the owner of 1916 and 1912, Wetsburg, is on the line, Mr. Oda Menor.

Okay, our vice chair has just a few questions for you.

Good morning, counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to his accuracy?

Yes, I do.

Have you emailed in all the required documents that are needed to proceed with this case

five days in advance of this hearing?

They were all emailed in.

I don't believe that they were five days in advance, sir.

Okay, our council will let us know if we received everything, but please proceed and share your

screen right now.

Thank you.

Sorry about that.

You

can you see my screen commissioners we can we can thank you um i represent a 1916 west birch street

i submitted an exhibit package which contains 11 exhibits refusal appeal property information

form, deed, tax information, more property information, plans, pictures, petition, community

flyer, proof of mailing. I would like to say we did meet with St. Elizabeth's RCO. We were given

their full support, but I had not seen or had not been able to ascertain a copy of the letter. I'm

not really sure. They wrote one. I did speak with them as early as yesterday again, and they told

me they would send a letter, but I haven't gotten it. We applied to the zoning board of adjustment

to create a two-family dwelling in this property, which my client bought in 2015 from Sheriff's

sale. We filed for an appeal with the zoning board of adjustment indicating that this property

was an existing duplex. Basically, it was fitted out when we bought it, and we'd like to finish

renovating and make it legal for a duplex i prepared the property information form

uh we have the deed here uh you can see on the bottom of it it was tendered by

jewel williams it was a sheriff sale property

the taxes are clear on this property

just some general property information i gave you and here we have the uh plan so let me just

move this out of the way

so i can reduce it a little bit

I'm not seeing my reduce button here.

uh miss three it's in the top top center you see where it says 100 about the image right up top

you want to come down a little bit right you want to make the image uh smaller so you can fit the

yeah I'm really not seeing it doesn't say 100 next week

next year I apologize I have it here okay okay here we go

so basically we what we have is a three-story dwelling um in the

lower level here we have a living room excuse me in the uh

On the lower level, we have a utility room, living room, kitchen, bathroom, and a bedroom.

We walk up the stairs to the second floor, and basically we have a bi-level three-unit dwelling

here. The second apartment is basically a mirror image of the first.

On the first floor level, we have the living room, a bathroom, and a bedroom.

On the upper level, we have two bedrooms.

They're both three-family dwellings, approximately 1,400 square feet apiece, and they both have

two bedrooms and two bathrooms in each unit.

I took some pictures.

But it's a two-family dwelling, right?

Two-family dwelling.

Darlene, it's a two-family dwelling?

Yes, it's a two-family dwelling.

Right, okay.

Here we have a picture of the posting.

We actually posted this two times.

That's the second picture.

It's just a block in general.

I took a picture looking west down Burke Street.

As you can see, right across the street to the left is a new multifamily dwelling with two and three unit apartments in those.

new multi-family dwelling with with two and three unit apartments in those

down the block to the right we have several multi-family dwellings with two and three units

apartments in each of them this is the corner this is actually 1920 the second property that

we have in front of the board today it's a corner property you can see the posting there too

The apartment is basically the same design and same layout as 1916.

This is another picture of the block across the street, looking east down Burke Street to just show you a general character of the area.

And generally, almost all of these properties are either duplexes or triplexes.

I just took some other pictures of properties on the block to show you that they're existing.

and here's a two-family another existing property with a two-family

just an additional picture of the front of 1916 West Burke Street here's a picture of 1916

West Burke Street looking east you can see also across the street on the corner to the left there's

another apartment development complex we did circulate a petition on the block we got quite

a few of the neighbors that lived on the block to actually sign the petition. We did schedule a

meeting. Actually, we scheduled two meetings with St. Elizabeth RCO. We did actually conduct that

meeting and had a live meeting with the community. Here's the second letter and here's the proof of

mailing. I would like to indicate that we did go back and forth with the community and in the end

everybody supported the project. And with that, I'm happy to answer any questions anyone has about

either 1916 or 1920. Or if you'd like me to pull up the plans for 1920, I can at this time,

Commissioner. Pull up the plans for 1920. And then how, do you believe both were zoned at one point,

multiple family dwellings? Well, they were both fitted out, Commissioner. I do not think they

were ever legal. Okay. All right. Good. Thank you. Just show us the plans for 20. Okay.

Okay.

Commissioner, these are the plans for 1920 Burke Street.

Okay.

It's pretty much the same layout as 1916 Burke Street.

They're both three-bedroom, two-bedroom,

bathroom, bi-level apartments.

Is your client here?

Mr. Munnar, are you on the line?

Could you raise your hand, please?

Mr. Munnar is on the line, and I'm allowing him to speak now.

Hi, sir. Could you state your name, please, and spell for the court reporter?

Mr. Munnar, can you unmute, please?

He's there. He's just muted.

Mr. Munnar, can you unmute yourself?

all right all right my name is muneer order m-u-n-i-r order o-d-e-h right do you swear

or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth yes i do proceed council

mr muneer are you the owner of 19 of 1916 are you the owner of 1916 and 1920 westbrook street

Yes, I am.

Have you heard my testimony as presented to the board this morning?

Yes, I did.

Planning Commission recommends that the Zoning Board deny the vets.

For both of these locations, I'm going to close the record and wait for a letter from the RCO.

We'll vote on this next Wednesday at 930.

So MI 2022-003-780-1916 West Burke Street.

and MI-2022-003-781-1920 West Burke Street.

Both cases are closed except for a letter from the RCO.

We will vote on this next Wednesday at 9.30.

Okay, counsel?

Thank you, Commissioner.

All right, thank you.

I'm told that number six is now available.

Let's go back and see if we can get them on.