Planning Board Minutes
Planning Board
October 15, 2019
Approved November 19, 2019
Members Present: Bruce Healey, Chair; Michael Beaton, Vice Chair; Regina Cockerill, Howard Maurer, Bill Weiler, Richard Wright, Members; Deane Geddes, Alternate; and Ken McWilliams, Consultant.
Mr. Healey called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m.
Minutes:
The Board reviewed the minutes of September 17, 2019. Corrections were made.
Mr. Wright made a motion to accept the minutes as corrected. Mr. Weiler seconded the motion. All were in favor.
7:15 p.m. – Case 2019-009 – Final Site Plan Review for Cottage Industry – Danielle M. Jallah (owner) – for property located at 356 Chalk Pond Road, Newbury, NH, Tax Map 039-637-409 – Operation of a family-based daycare.
Mr. Healey checked the application for completeness. Mr. Healey stated that the applicant received approval of a special exception for the cottage industry from the Newbury Zoning Board of Adjustment on Monday, September 9, 2019. Mr. Healey made a motion to accept the application as complete. Ms. Cockerill seconded the motion. All were in favor.
Mr. Healey opened the hearing and invited Ms. Jallah to the table. Ms. Jallah approached the Board to give a background as to why she was there. Ms. Jallah explained that she has been doing an in-house daycare in her home for two years. She explained that an anonymous tip to the state pointed out that she was unlicensed and that she had too many kids in her care. The state licensing office visited her and explained to her that if she had more than three kids in her care, she would need to be licensed by the state. She was unaware that she had to go through the town as well. She explained that she was licensed in Colorado, which is very different. She has five kids in her care, as long as four of her own kids. She is solely financial responsible for her four kids and shutting down her business would be a hardship. She has letters from some of her parents in support of her and her business, and they would have a hardshipas well if Ms. Jallah had to close her business. She went to school for childcare and this is her passion. Ms. Jallah hopes she is able to get approval from the town and continue doing what she loves to do. Mr. McWilliams asked if there is an outside areafor the kids. Ms. Jallah said she has a small area outside for the kids in the front yard. Ms. Cockerill asked if she is licensed and Ms. Jallah said she can’t get licensed until she receives approval from the Planning Board. She has put in a waiver until she gets approval from the town. Mr. Geddes asked how many of her own kids are in her care, and she responded that all of her own kids are at school and not in the numbers of who she is caring for during the day. Mr. McWilliams asked what the limit of kids she could have is and she replied the maximum would be six kids, and she currently has five. Mr. Healey explained that if her application gets approved this evening, that they would need to put it in writing that it is conditional on her receiving her license through the state.
She explained that the five kids in her care are preschool aged kids. Mr. Healey asked Ms. Jallah if she could send the copy of the State for Family Childcare Application to the land use coordinator so they can have the proper application title.
Mr. Healey opened the hearing for public input. There being none, he closed the public input. Mr. Wright made a motion to accept the application that has been submitted for cottage industry. Mr. Beaton seconded the motion. Mr. Healey explained that it is subject to a condition precedent and that he will need to write that and it will say the applicant will deliver to the Newbury land use coordinator a copy of the required approved NH State Application of Family Care to be filed with Case 2019-009 within. Mr. Healey asked Ms. Jallah how many days/months she wants to put down for her timeframe to being approved for her license because a timeframe needs to be met for the condition. Ms. Jallah explained that she is unsure how long this process normally takes. Mr. Healey said they could set it for six months, and he explained that she can ask for an extension and Mr. McWilliams explained she can also submit it early. Ms. Jallah agreed that she thinks six months would be adequate. All were in favor of the motion.
7:30 p.m. – Case 2019-012 – Conceptual Site Plan Review – Sarah D. Christie (agent), for Allen Revocable Trust (owner), for property located at 885 Route 103, Newbury, NH, Tax Map 020-041-134 – General practice law office.
Mr. Healey invited Ms. Christie to the table and read to her the definition of a conceptual consultation. Ms. Christie explained that she is looking to operate a general law practice out of the small house next to Marzelli’s Deli. Mr. Healey explained that it is a green ranch on the left after the deli going toward Bradford. She explained that it would be her and one assistant with a maximum of about four people at a time. She explained there would not be a lot of people coming and going. She wants to know if she needs to do a site plan review by an actual surveyor.
Mr. Healey thinks she can work with the land use coordinator on the application. She said they were originally going to open on January 6, but now it looks like they will try to open by December 2 and she needs to know what the Board is looking for as far as a site plan review. Mr. Weiler asked if there is already a site plan review and she said she did not believe that there is. Mr. McWilliams asked if they are making any changes to the building and she replied ‘no’. She said the only thing will change is the sign. There will be no additions or changes to the parking area. Mr. Maurer asked if parking will take place in the driveway and she said ‘yes’. Mr. Healey said that in this type of case, he does not think it is necessary to have a professionally drawn site plan review. He felt that if Ms. Christie submitted pictures and a hand-drawn map that should be acceptable. Mr. Weiler read the application requirements under Article 7.7. It says, “A site plan should be prepared by a NH licensed land surveyor and/or NH licensed engineer.” Mr. Weiler explained that this was put in due to the advice of town counsel. Mr. Beaton asked what we would be doing with the site plan and Mr. Weiler said it is for the purpose of recording. Ms. Cockerill said she thinks Newbury really struggles with economy and when they look at small businesses coming in, she feels that it is not in the benefit of our town when they put an unfair financial burden on the small businesses. She feels they need to take that into consideration. Mr. Maurer said he doesn’t understand how the Board would accept two entirely different things from different applicants. Mr. Maurer wants to know why the rules are different. Ms. Christie said she will submit whatever the Board wants. Mr. Wright said he thinks they should make it as simple as possible and doesn’t know what the Board would be gaining to make her submit a full site plan. Mr. Weiler said what they would be gaining is creating a baseline for any future expansion of use down the road. Mr. Healey said he does not believe they need a licensed engineer site plan, and that Ms. Christie can easily draw up a site plan for this application. Mr. Healey said that if Ms. Christie wants a hearing in November, she will need to submit the completed application by noon on October 29th.
Other Business:
Discussion ensued about the Board’s following of regulations. Mr. Healey said maybe the regulations need to be rewritten or modified. Mr. Weiler explained that they were just rewritten. Mr. Weiler said this Board has gone over this several times and he said the Board needs to start following the regulations. Mr. Beaton agreed with Mr. Weiler and brought up the past Fells case. Mr. Weiler said that any business that wants to start in town should have enough capital to meet regulations. Mr. Wright feels that the town is drawing lines in the sand that make things difficult for people. He feels the Board should be following the regulations if there is a need or a concern but if there is a situation in which there is going to be no change and there is no room to do anything, it does not make sense to make these people jump through the hoops. Mr. Healey said the Board has the right to waive any of their regulations if they feel necessary.
CIP- Status –Regina Cockerill – Mr. Healey distributed the most recent CIP and asked Ms. Cockerill to update the Board on where we are with the CIP. Ms. Cockerill stated that she intended to just go in and modify the library debt. service, but in order to do that she went into the table and to find calculations. She found that in the original table, there were no calculations for the bond, just numbers stuck in there. She tried to figure out how the fire station had been calculated and figure out what percentage of interest was used and do the same for the library. However, there were no calculation so she believes the calculations were wrong. She explained that they redid the calculations for the fire department. And they used a 3 ½ % interest rate. She explained that the bonding for the fire station and the library have changed. They are both coming in the year 2021. Those were the two changes on the tables. Mr. Healey asked Ms. Cockerill what transpired between the emails between her, Ivor Freeman, Mr. Maurer and Mr. Healey. Mr. Healey suggested Ms. Cockerill delay and use another 30 days so the committee could discuss in person, rather than try to solve via email. Mr. Healey said he is disappointed because with the CIP and the oversight, there appeared to be issues with the subcommittee regarding bond percentages and the amounts. He said because there were issues, he feels that the subcommittee should have taken a month to work out the issues. He said he is not happy what transpired because there were issues with the numbers and his reply was that the subcommittee should correct the numbers and then present to the Board. Ms. Cockerill said that the chair of the subcommittee (Ivor Freeman) said that it is done. Mr. Weiler asked if the CIP that is in front of them tonight is something they can vote on. Ms. Cockerill said yes, Mr. Healey said no. Ms. Cockerill said that if they meet together as the CIP subcommittee, they will come back with the same CIP next month. Mr. Healey said no and that he is requesting a change. Mr. Beaton said thank you to Ms. Cockerill for finding the mistake. Mr. Maurer said maybe the subcommittee does need to meet again and bring a new plan forth. Mr. Wright asked where the numbers came from and Mr. Maurer replied that all of the department heads came forward with these numbers. Ms. Cockerill said she doesn’t know enough about fire equipment or highway equipment to know whether or not these department heads really need it or not. Mr. Maurer said that everyone had really good reasoning to what they needed. He said he wants to know why the fire station is in there since it keeps getting rejected at the town office. Mr. Healey said there can’t be a CIP without a master plan. The items in the CIP has to mirror the goals and objectives of the master plan and in Newbury’s master plan, it is identified that there is a need for a new fire station. Mr. Wright said he thinks department heads should show quotes and justification for this equipment so no padding can be included. Mr. Healey said he would like to request one change. He requested to add capital funding amount that is being requested by the library to be included in the document. Ms. Cockerill said she will make that change. Ms. Cockerill made a motion to adopt the CIP plan with the amended change on page 4 for the library addition to include the bond value of $1.5 million. Mr. Weiler seconded. All were in favor.
Pending –
- NEHSA – Mr. Healey explained that the New England Handicap Sports Association came in with a site plan review in 2015 to build a new facility to replace the one at the mountain. This site plan application was approved by the Planning Board. This plan included new drainage, building access, and this year they applied for a building permit. They never did anything and in 2017 they came back with a new set of plans. This plan included new drainage and finally this year they applied for a building permit. The code enforcement officer looked at the file on their plans and looked at what they were doing and he found that the NEHSA had a new director and a new architect on site. The CEO said the building going in is not what was approved. The original approval was a pre-fabricated custom home and garage from LaValley’s. The new architect has designed a totally new building. The CEO said they need to go to the Planning Board to get a new approval. They are on notice that they need to come in before the Planning Board. Mr. Healey told them that as long as they were diligently pursuing approval of our regulations, they could continue without delay with their building as long as they came before the Board in November for a complete site plan review. Mr. Healey believes that it should just be a minor site plan review is necessary, but wanted to check with the rest of the Board. The Board determined a standard site plan review was required. Mr. McWilliams said the CEO should have gone sooner to check the building process. He said he waited too long to check.
- Nordic Skaters – Mr. Healey reminded that Board that they had decided that the selling of power boats on this property was an expansion of use and it was supported by town counsel. Nordic Skaters will need a site plan review if they want to continue to sell these boats. The owner was notified and Mr. Healey asked the CEO to remind the owner that he has been issued a letter and if he is going to have power boats over there, he needs to do a site plan review with the Planning Board. Mr. Healey said if the boats stay there and they continue to ignore the Planning Board, he will contact town counselto get his advice.
Zoning Ordinance Amendments - Mr. Healey said the Planning Board has agreed to be behind changes to the Personal Wireless Service Facilities and the Shoreland Restoration. He explained that the Shoreland Restoration was sent to town counsel and came back with one change. Mr. Healey said that a month ago he received an email from Conservation Commission Chair Katherine Holmes as well as Selectman Russ Smith. The email had to do with issues with shoreland owners who were doing things in the waterfront buffer that was not authorized. They proposed that the issue could be dealt with in two sections of the shoreland buffer zoning article. This primarily had to do with property owners in the first 50’ being allowed to trim limbs and trees to keep their views open. A number of these owners are taking advantage of this and doing more trimming than obtaining their original view, so they would like to propose an amendment to be able to enforce the amount of trimming. Mr. Healey took two sections with identical wording and rewrote a change that will address the concerns that Mr. Smith and Ms. Holmes have. Mr. Beaton said he thinks this should wait. Mr. Healey explained the proposed change of wording that he would like to make. Ms. Cockerill would like to hear from Mr. Smith and Ms. Holmes. It was decided to table the topic to another meeting.
Ken McWilliams – Mr. McWilliams announced that he has decided to relocate to Alaska. He said that he will continue with the Board until March of 2020. Mr. Healey said the Board will need to find a new resource. Mr. McWilliams suggested putting out an ad to look for his replacement. He suggested posting this with the Office of Strategic Planning as well as NH Municipal Association.
Mr. Geddes made a motion to adjourn. Mr. Maurer seconded the motion. All in favor.
The meeting adjourned at 9:31 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Donna S. Long
Recording Secretary
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