Planning Board - Regular Meeting

All right, what about you, Paige?

Okay.

All right, so we're going to call tonight's planning board meeting to order. It is, what time is it, 6 or 7 p.m. Before we get to our agenda, I would like to first say thank you to Shadi. Today is her last day with us, and we really appreciate all your contributions to the board. Thank you. I'm so sad to leave. Yeah, same. We're going to miss you, but we want to wish you luck. Thank you. So, for the last time, we have Chatty Kadibi and Paige Barnum here tonight, and I'm Glynis Geller, chair of the board. We do have only a couple of items on our agenda this evening. Aha, there we go. So the first on the agenda, we have one, two, three items on the agenda tonight. We're first going to start with project number DPR-2026-4, which is a development plan review for the address of 549 and 523 South Pearl Street, which is the historic Cherry Hill, which is the applicant. So it looks like they're represented by Mr. Churchburg. And who do you have with you today, Mr. Churchburg?

I have James Campbell, who's a member of Historic Churchill in some capacity. I know exactly what he is. I'm President of the Board. President of the Board of Trustees. Awesome.

Happy to be here tonight. Okay, so I'm gonna give it to you. You have six minutes to, what is it? Okay, thank you very much. 10 minutes for that.

The plan develops the building. They are making improvements to the building. It's zoned properly for the use that it is in now. The historic Cherry Hill has been there since 18... 1797. 1797. I knew it was, by the way, it was before I was born. Slightly before I was born, not very much. But again, They've been there for quite a while. It's a wonderful building. If you want to go on to the next slide, this one shows the existing plan. The building occupies the lower right-hand corner over the northeast end of the site. The building serves a need they have now. They're making improvements to the aesthetics of it, But what they do need is handicap accessibility. So if we go on to the next slide, that shows how we're gonna do that. The plan on the right shows the handicap accessibility being developed at the rear of the building. You see that switchback and the ramp going to the rear of the building. That's gonna be handicap access. And that requires some change in the plan, In order to do that, we had to relocate some parking. So the parking is relocated to the south end of the site. And that's what the other plan shows. That's additional spaces we'll be placing on the launch. The need isn't necessarily for more parking. It's to maintain the parking they have there. Of course, they're taking up a portion of it with the NAF assets. Next one, this actually shows a landscape plan. We are adding some trees and shrubs. The shrubs are putting at the back of the building, at the back of the parking area. They're putting a lot of shrubs there and putting some street trees. We think it's a good plan. It does some landscaping for the site. You know, Working with the groups like this, my problem always is keeping the budget as affordable as we can, because when I tell them they have to spend more money, they have to figure out where to get it. Consequently, the landscape plan is good, but if they gave me another $20,000, I'd maybe want more, but I can't ask them for it. So I did a landscape plan that keeps the cost in a reasonable range.

The next plan is a stormwater plan.

But stormwater control is one of the concerns here all the time.

Whenever you have pavement area, you have to put in stormwater controls, and that's what we've done here. And it discharges through what's called the hydrodynamic separator, which means that any of the material gets picked up in the drainage, gets turned out. Actually, if you think of it as a swirl concentrate, water swirls in it. When it swirls, the dirt, was out to the side. If you've ever seen a floor concentrate work, that's how it works. So that's what's being done there to keep the storm away. Next is the pictures. This is the photo of the north end of the site, entering into the site. It's well landscape now.

There's a front-on look at historic cherry hill from South Pearl Street. And the next, I think I have a couple more sites.

On the south end of the site, that's a driveway that's adding some parking back there. And you can see Cherryville in the background. So that's pretty much the site as I see it. And if there are any questions, the members of the ward, I can try to answer them. Any questions?

I don't have any questions.

I'll hand it over to John. So from looking at it a little closer, it does look like there's two properties where the proposed retaining wall and new parking would be, is it a smaller property also owned by Cherry Hill? We see those lines on there. Yeah, yeah. So that would just need to be consolidated. And I know either you or somebody, I think the architect maybe has been speaking with Chris Loman, our preservation planner. Obviously, the certificate of appropriateness is required for the exterior part, you know, the ramp and the porch work that's going on, so we know they're reviewing that.

So the reason we refer to the certificate of appropriateness is to make some change to the site? Because it's a historic, yeah. Okay.

Okay.

It's another step we have to go through.

Excuse me, you're raising your hand. Are you here for public comment? Yes. Okay, give me one moment. I want you to go finish your review and then we'll go back.

We sent the application to Albany County Planning Board. It needs 250 feet, so they'll send something back end of August for their review. The project was referred out for departmental review. Engineering signed off, and so did DGS. That includes the forestry and landscaping. Fire didn't provide comments, but I doubt that they would have any. Parking, you know, once you're moving a hydrant, they don't really provide comments. And water provided comments a couple weeks ago, so I'm sure they have things about that.

There were comments we just received a couple weeks ago, so we haven't heard from them.

A lot of things don't apply because there's just parking, there's no change to the use, there's no expansion of the building, so all of those kind of dimensional standards don't apply in this case. I think we'll just confirm, you know, DGS did sign off, so they must be happy with the sidewalk, that should be fine as is. We may just need to clear up some of the requirements, you know, with either partial or whole waiver, because there are obviously mature trees on the property, they're just not in the public right of way, so. we could probably kind of switch in for out. We just need to track that for planning board review and approval. It looks like there's three curb cuts along South Pearl.

There's the two for the driveway, and then one additional, if you're looking at the property, an additional one to the left. So if all three are open, we just want to confirm that, or if one would be closed, then that would just need to meet city standards. The number of parking spaces,

because there's no change to the building, the minimum required doesn't kick in. So you're providing nine, or providing 11 is how we counted it, but I think he said 10. So we'll just need to confirm that. But 11 spaces provided with the one ADA.

And then I think just clarification too, or a few things on the plan set. There's a chain link fence kind of running

around the property, but some of it may be interrupted with the retaining walls and the parking. So if there's any changes to that, obviously chain link, new chain link is not permitted in the front yard. So we preference to remove the existing, but I also understand there's some security concerns that have been addressed or been conveyed. As far as I know, there wasn't any after lighting proposed. I don't know if there's any, kind of directional signage or lighting connecting the kind of lower parking area up to the building itself. But any kind of, you know, additional signage we need to go through the . Obviously it is under the department review still and it will still be the COA, so we would just defer action. We hadn't received any public comment prior to the meeting, but, you know, honestly.

Ma'am, are you here regarding the, to comment on the Cherry Hill matter? Okay. Yeah, we can accept her. If we can do a quick public comment. So we want to take your desk so she can come up, if that's okay.

Okay.

So, ma'am, if you can come up, state your name and address, and you have 30 minutes to

Put forth your comment.

My name is and I have property in that area. So my question is, will the Jerry Hill building, Rensselaer residence, will it be somehow affected?

Are you talking about the one in Alby? I heard Rensselaer. Am I right in saying that?

No, that was Rensselaer's residence. Oh, okay. And now this is a museum, so will it be somehow affected?

So we're adding a ramp. They're just making ADA access, so people with disabilities can access.

Oh, okay. We'll be able to go there. So is it, will it be public parking lot?

For visitors, yeah.

For visitors of museum?

Right.

And how secure it will be?

Well, I think, so this is outside of our purview. Our purview is really about whether or not the plans that they're putting forth today meets with what we call the United States, USDO, which we're governed by. And so what criteria goes into that regarding you know, how it affects how they're going to operate there, the questions you have about whether or not it's open to the public or not, that's really a question for them. That's not under our purview. So I would, Board of Directors, he's right there, like after we're done, definitely, if he's willing, put him to the side and ask those questions. They seem very straightforward from what I'm hearing, and they're the best people to provide you with those answers.

Okay, and the last question. Who is the builder? Is it private, private company, or this is the state, or?

Again, that's for them.

There's very little building to be done here.

The applicant's going to handle it all themselves and probably hire people who actually do the changes, but the building itself is going to be, things are going to be done to it, like painting and things like that, and we're putting a handicap access We don't need a builder to really do that.

We have a subcontractor going in and taking care of it as she can. So CT will hire the subcontractor?

No, the owner of the store, Sherry Hills, is the owner of the building. They'll hire whoever they need to do the paving or to do the handicap ramp, things like that. But there's not going to be a major builder going in to do these projects.

Thank you very much.

All right, thank you.

All right. So since we're recommending deferral, there's no vote for us to have on this this evening. So once we get the reports in, we'll be back.

I knew it was being deferred. But it said no action on the agenda. I knew no action. Yeah. We do have a number of comments.

All right, thank you. Thank you. So it looks like you're on for this next one too. Yeah. All right, we're looking at DPR 2026-4. No, this is the same. I'm looking at something different, my apologies. DPR 2026-10, 142 Green Street. This sounds like we saw this before. upstate general construction, a conversion of an existing non-residential structure, which is St. Judd's Church, no, we haven't seen this before, to a dwelling multi-unit residential dwelling with a total of about 17 dwelling units. So it's just you here today, Mr.?

Yeah, I'm not here. Pat's not here, but that's okay. Okay. People are probably familiar with looking at that building. It's been like that for, a number of years, I think in the course of the years, you may not have seen projects, the three other people were proposing to rehab it and do things with it. Financially, it's a very hard project to put together because the facade needs some work to restore and you can't really change it. You gotta restore it and start building, which is expensive. So I think the goal here is that The fact that Chu believes that if he gets the project already, he may be able to get a grant to cover the cost of the facade improvement. That's his goal here. So again, you're seeing the church, and I've actually worked on, like I said, three different applications over the years to do this stuff. It turned out they didn't have the money to do it. One of them was a much more aggressive one. It had like 40 beds in it, but they were more like a dormitory It wasn't a particularly good use for the building. So that's the building there. This is the site plan. Church in the middle, all surrounded by forest streets.

What we do add to it is we add a dumpster location at the back because now that we have 17 units there, we need a dumpster.

So that comes through a curve cut at the rear. And we also have a stormwater map

facility down there because right now the storm drainage runs down, goes out into the street and goes into our combined sewer. So we're putting through the solar management system to reduce the drainage from the site below where it is now. That's what that gallery has done here. We do have some landscaping on the site. And we think it'll be an improvement view-wise and the goal here is to get it all cleaned up, get the lines off it, get it so it looks More like the church it was at the beginning. The next one has, that's the view from the rear. And there is a curb cut down here at the rear. And that tree on the left will stay.

But other than that, it's just gonna have a dumpster with shrubs around the dumpster.

These are the first and second floor plan, main level and second floor plans. They're actually, there's a main level, a second floor, and a third floor. And we originally had, we listed as nine and eight as 17 units, but there was two nine-bedroom, so it's actually 26 units. Not 17?

No.

We missed counting the third floor with the nine units. It was eight on the first floor, nine on the second floor, and nine on the third floor. It's 26 units. The next picture is, I think the next one is the third or fourth one. This is repeatedly the second floor. They're primarily one bedroom and studio.

So this is the third floor right here?

Yeah, yeah. Okay. It looks pretty much like the second floor. And then I have a few photos of the site to show the building. And those buildings are actually the renters you're gonna use to go through Road Start Resource Commission. The goal is to restore it. Some of these features have deteriorated over the years, but They plan on restoring it. There's going to be a lot of detail there of windows, et cetera, that the Historic Resource Commission likes to review.

The architect is Dan Sanders, a Paris-Sanders architect. He did a number of historic buildings in the city and rehabs in those. So he's familiar with the project.

So again, we hope to turn this into a real project. All right, there's no comments written or public, so we're going to hand it over. Well, do you have any questions? Does this have to be reviewed further with the 26 related versus 17? I would assume so.

Yeah. So they did already include laundry.

The only difference would be the indoor, outdoor or medical. the plan there for the outdoor too.

Any other questions?

Aren't they bringing the mobile trail across the connector? Yeah, that would be the good idea to tie into it.

So, if there's no other comments or questions, I'm going to hand it over to them to go through their notes.

Well, when it was under 20 units, it wouldn't have required a major DVR, except that it's an NUMDE, so it's a change of use from religious institution to dwelling multi-unit.

So that was how it was given a major DVR before, but it still does with the 26 units as well. Obviously, the certificate of appropriateness is required. I know, again, that Chris has been working with Danny Sanders on that.

And those are the elevations we've seen most recently that show the ramp on the rear. So there's kind of a new access next to the dumpster enclosure. The project was referred for comment. So far, just fire provided and we may have responded to that also. They're just checking on sprinkler, how it would be addressed. Next one. We sent it to the Albany County Planning Board and they have three recommendations and three advisory notes. They look familiar. I'll just say it for the record now, and then at the next meeting, I won't have to read it through. So their recommendation is to modify local approval to include review by New York State Office of Parks, Rec, and Historic Reservation. The potential impacts on archaeological and historic resources should be required at the final approval The city should ensure the project complies with all applicable building, fire, accessibility, and residential code requirements associated with the conversion of the historic institutional building into multi-family housing. And applicable flood damage prevention regulations, including ensuring that utilities, building systems, and any improvements comply with local floodplain management requirements should be considered during evaluation. And then on the next page, they have the advisory one. So as per the short environmental assessment form, the project site contains federally enlisted endangered species, such as Atlantic sturgeon, short-nosed sturgeon, and peregrine falcon. Reviewed by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, Division of Environmental Permits should be required to determine if permits or additional needs are required due to wildlife species identified. The city should evaluate the adequacy of pedestrian access, bicycle accommodations, or refuse collection emergency vehicle access and loading areas. And then last, although no off-street parking is proposed, the city should determine whether the anticipated parking demand can be accommodated through existing off-street parking, without creating adverse impacts on adjacent residential properties, public features, etc. So all of the first set are kind of baked into, go back one more, sorry. Those recommendations are all baked into the process.

This is usually the case, so obviously they are working with SHPO.

I think they've already provided you the actual building code. It's only really assessed when the building permit is submitted and that plan is available. And then flood damage, it is in the floodplain overlay, but it's not new construction and most of it applies to new construction.

So you're obviously not going to elevate the existing building.

So those are all baked into the process. And then the three advisory comments, we don't think any surgeon are on the site. This came up with the other downtown project as well. It's just within the buffer of the Hudson River. So it gets dinged, but we don't believe that they're required for this project. You guys mentioned the bike-ped connections. partially addressed through USDO anyways, as far as access, sidewalk access, and bike parking. And then Dan mentioned they're adding a dumpster enclosure to the rear, and fire has reviewed for emergency access. The parking, I think it's in the staff notes, we do mention it, it's part of the requirement because of, I can go through that part of the code. Those are the Albany County Planning Board, which we'll have to get to when there's action on the project. So we can reverse all the knots in the first bullet point. The project is greater than 20 million units, therefore we'll identify the 10%. And laundry was already shown on the floor plan, so that's already been addressed. No changes to the building itself, so the dimensional standards. are finite bids, there is generally a sidewalk along the property on all four sides. If anything needs to change, your engineering will convey that. The quality of the sidewalk, if it needs to be replaced at any points, they will convey that with their comments. There's a lot of frontage because it's all four sides, so the requirements for amenities and street trees are quite high. You know, if a partial, if not all of those requirements can be met, we can apply for a partial waiver as well. You mentioned the kerfka along the rear dongan ave. It seems like maybe one will be kept for the dumpster and then will others be filled in? Okay. Yep. So we'll just point that out on the plan set.

Move to the next page.

So this is the parking requirement. I just wanted to include the actual language to demonstrate that it's not applicable. So the off-street parking requirement is generally for either new construction or these other circumstances. So if the building is expanded by more than 25% or if the change of use results in an increase of 50%. So neither of those apply. The previous use was religious. institution, which would have required 35 spaces, and the proposed not 17, it would be 26, which is still less than the 35.

So it's not increasing from the previous to the proposed. So off-street parking is required. Again, there are four frontages.

I'm not sure that the more alley-side one is off-street parking, but there is off-street parking in the area.

Next one.

As I mentioned, same with the amenities, street trees.

There are some existing street trees, especially on the Dawngate Avenue side.

So whatever is being preserved should be noted. If anything needs to be removed due to quality, if DGS points that out, then we'll just include that in the landscape plan. There's currently a temporary chain link fence, because obviously it's been vacant and unoccupied for a long time, and it's noted to be removed. That's a thumbs up. I don't know if there's any changes proposed to the wrought iron in the front. If there are, I'd just include that. I think there's an existing transformer in the southeast corner, so on the Donkhanav side. If there's any changes to that, sizing-wise or location, that would just need to be noted. And there's not currently a buffer around it, so I assume if there are changes you might need to add. those bollards. Any exterior lighting needs to be included in the elevations, and just note that as well. This is another long one to say for the record, and it's something new, so this is the first time this has come before planning board, where the new seeker exemptions will apply to a project. It was just revised in May, or was it May? So the planning board, we would recommend the planning board assume there's a role of responsible agency, which we're kind of taking a lead agency equivalent. And you would make a determination of exemption for the record. So the next slide does include the official language, just so you can demonstrate that it would be exempt. We have the part one of the short EAF. So this, Language below is what's actually from the text itself. Supplies for this project as well as the next project. So construction of housing in cities is fewer than one million, anywhere that's not New York City. So that applies to us. And then connected to existing community that applies to basically all projects here. Located at a previously disturbed site. that it's an existing building, no more than 20% commercial retail, community facility or other non-industrial, non-residential. It's purely residential. So it checks that box as well. Not exceed 100 dwelling units. It's far under that. And it makes the specification if there's no zoning. Obviously we do have zoning. So it checks that box as well.

And it's dwelling multi-unit. It's not a single family on a personal one or more acres.

So it does meet that exemption. So when actions take on the project itself, we can fold that in as we normally would. At this time, we just defer until all comments have been addressed.

Well, we're deferring. Any other questions before we move on?

I just wanted to point out that the building is raised enough that the 40 building is above the floodplain elevation the site is below the floodplain because you know the entire area is within an under your floodplain right but meanwhile the building they thought well enough to make it make it high enough that was above the floor nice because a lot of buildings were built back then where they didn't actually consider them at all right we know that i understand all right for the last one it is

DPR 2026-18, which is a development plan review for 650 Warren Street. And again, the applicant is Patrick Chu of Upstate General Construction with Hershberg & Hershberg, the representing agent. And we're joined by Mr. Hershberg. All three of them were yours. And this is a new construction of a three-story wing to an existing two-story vacant building, with an additional third story to be added and used as a dwelling multi-unit. for a total of 44 dwelling units.

Okay, that's the existing project view from Warren Street.

The building actually appears to be on Mercer Street, even though it has a 650 Warren Street. The front view from Mercer Street looks a lot more like a front of the building than it would be from Warren Street.

That's the building we're looking at for Mercer Street. But whatever, it's 650 Warren Street is the address. That's where we're going. That's the survey of the existing site. And when you look at the proposed site, which should be the next plan, we cut down the total of the parking area and we added a wing three-story wing on the left-hand side of the project. So the bulk of the work is done on the left-hand side of the project. We do cut down the parking lot. We do add a stormwater management system on the site, which has done now. We do some landscaping.

We do have funnage on two different streets.

Warren Street is sort of, it sort of ends before it gets to us, even though the right-of-way continues in front of us. These are the floor plans. That's both the existing building and the proposed building.

Both. The existing building has offices, so that's gonna be ordered from offices to residential, and the new wing adds additional residential.

They're primarily one-bedroom and studios. Third floor is a lot like the family. So I think the things that look the most for you, this shows you what has to be demolished what the buildings will look like down below. And you're looking at the end of the wing there, on the left-hand portion, that's the end of the wing. And the balance of the building will read. Rehab is part of our work, but you could recognize the shape of it there, and a third story's added to it. It's currently a two-story building. Third story's added to it.

So this is the demolition of the other one, shows the shorter building there. And this is what gets replaced with it. So even though the building is serving as a base for one and two stories of a portion of the building, the third story of that building and the whole new three-story addition is brand new construction. So this will look like brand new construction.

It'll take the existing building and make sure it points in with the old one. That's what those elevations show.

Any questions? We don't have any public comments. Are there any questions from the board?

Project obviously requires a major DPR. It's an increase in the total gross for area. We did have some on the total number of mill units.

In some spots it says 41, some it says 45, some it says 44.

So if we could just confirm the final number so we can make sure our documentation is correct. It was 41. I might have counted wrong.

Okay.

Because it seemed like 41 of a certain size unit and then three more of another, four more of another, so. Okay. Okay. It's different in a couple spots. It was not sent to the Albany County Planning Board because it's not in 500 feet of any of the things that ping that requirement. It was sent for departmental review. Comments have been provided by engineering and fire and water. Hasn't provided comments yet. They just recently got the slip. It's greater than 20 dwelling units, so those use specific standards apply for laundry and indoor outdoor active paths of recreation. The dimensional standards are a little funny because it's both an existing building and a proposed addition and it has frontage on Mercer but the access on Warren. Inclusionary housing requirements applies and the form was provided, that was revised and provided so that addresses the requirement there. The sidewalk again is a little bit funny because there's no existing sidewalk on either side of Mercer Street. But the new development on Warren Street, the rise that Prince on Ontario was required to install a new sidewalk on their side. So there's sidewalk on one side, not on the other. So it is a requirement. We'll just have to kind of talk through, obviously, if there's no plans for the city to put sidewalk on any other part of Mercer, then it doesn't make sense to have 50 feet of sidewalk or whatever it would be. So we can talk through that requirement. The existing curb cut, there's just the one on Warren Street, and there's a new kind of proposed little pad for the dumpster enclosure.

It's just the same curb cut, though, right? It's just... Yeah, we have to change it.

I know we put some comment from engineering that it showed the need to back up the truck after pickup.

They don't want that, so we have to change the angle of that. Got it.

But obviously there's not a new curve cut proposed for the MPO the other way, it's still just the one side.

We can go to the next page. There, as Dan mentioned, there's a rearrangement of the existing parking, but it generally counts out to the same because you're paving a park that was previously green and it meets the requirements for one per unit. Street trees, there are a number of trees along some of the side frontages, or just side yard, but along Warren and Mercer. Again, Warren only has a small portion where it's abutting right away as far as the street. But if the landscape plan could address either what's maintaining and existing, because there are again shrubs and other trees kind of in the middle, so whatever is being proposed stay during construction. should be identified and then anything new to meet those requirements. I didn't notice the location of the existing transformer, but again, if anything's changing with the utilities, if they would still be on the ground versus roof, we just need to make sure that's confirmed in the plan set. And then any new exterior lighting, I think there are existing lighting holes in the parking area, so if any changes to that or any additions obviously to the exterior of the building. This meets the same exemption under Seeker. Again, it's under 100 units, and it has all those other components. We're under a million. It's a previously disturbed site. There's no non-residential host. So that this, again, would meet that same requirement to act as the responsible agency and declare it not.

Is that it? Yes.

Or until all comments have been addressed.

So we will be deferring it.

All right. Thank you. Thank you.

And we have a motion to adjourn.

Second.

All right. Unanimous. We shall adjourn. Pretty good. Thank you. Thank you. Take care. You ran the show tonight.