Historic District Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay, good evening. Welcome to the Historic District Commission for Tuesday, August 12. I'm gonna start with a roll call. Laura?

Present.

Josh? Present. Glen? Present. And the chair Brian is present. David, Nancy, and Don are not here this evening. I'd like to ask for an approval of the agenda. Are there any changes to the agenda for this evening? If there are none, commissioners, if you after I say do we approve the agenda, you would please say aye. Do you approve the agenda? Aye. Great. So the agenda is approved. Shanika and Anna Scott, there any announcements tonight?

Yes. We're going to remind the commission that we still need a commissioner to do training to fulfill our CLG, or Certified Local Government Training Requirement, by the September. We've shared a link to the state's website that has training opportunities. If you do a webinar, I think you have to watch three of them and then fill out the virtual training participation form, which we can share out again if you need a copy

of that. And it's one commissioner needs

to take care of that before

the September.

And we'll also remind you to speak into the microphones. Just get familiar with it.

Yep, green light on. No green light, it's not on. Thank you, Shanika. Any petitions this evening? No. Okay. I do think we need to read the public charge. So I actually think you all will read a section and then I'll read a section. Yep, I'll let you go ahead and take care of that, please.

I'll now read into the record the following. The commission operates under NC general statute one sixty d dash 940, which gives local governments historic preservation authority and the Chapel Hill Land Use Management Ordinance, including Article III, which established the local historic districts and sets forth regulations governing them, and the Chapel Hill Historic District's design principles and standards, which sets forth standards for changes in the historic districts, and the rules of procedure adopted by the Chapel Hill Historic District Commission, as well as the significance reports from all three historic districts and photos. I also call to your attention each of the applications and associated materials in your agenda packet. All of these items are hereby entered into the record. Thank you.

Thank you, Anna Scott. And I'll now read the public charge. The advisory body pledges its respect to the public. The body asks the public to conduct themselves in a respectful, courteous manner, both with the body and with the fellow members of the public. Should any member of the body or any member of the public fail to observe this charge at any time, the chair will ask the offending person to leave the meeting until that individual regains personal control.

Should decorum fail to be restored, the chair will reassess the meeting until a genuine commitment to this public charge is observed. Shanika distributed a copy of the agenda commissioners in advance of the meeting. Approval of the minutes from the June 10 meeting is the first item on the agenda for approval. Are there any comments on those minutes? If not, I'd ask for a motion to approve.

I move that we approve the minutes of the June 10 meeting.

Thank you, Josh. All in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye. The chair votes aye. So that passes unanimously. Thank you. The administrative certificates of appropriateness were really there for information purposes. Was there anything we needed to clarify on those? No? Okay, and just for Laura and for Glenn, those are items that staff approves because they're within their permission to approve them. Larger things come to the commission. So that's really what those notes are in the agenda. Okay, with that in mind, I'd like to start with new business and we're gonna start with 603 East Franklin Street. If you're here for that application, if you'd please join us at the podium.

Good evening. Hello.

Once Anna Scott's got you set up, there we go.

Brian, while they're getting set up,

do you

want to do conflicts of interest So amongst the

we ask about conflicts of interest which are ex parte communication with the applicants or any unauthorized site visits for 603 East Franklin Street. Does anybody need to disclose that? No. Thank you for the reminder Kevin.

And

we have a panel on the podium so we're not looking at your knees we're just looking at this podium even though it's projected here also Just that's a little disconcerting for you. So I'm going read a statement and if you would, if you agree with that statement, say I so affirm and state your name please. I affirm that the evidence I shall give to the historic district commission on the referenced application 603 East Franklin Street shall be the truth and nothing but the truth, I so affirm.

Yes, I so affirm.

And your name is? John Fuller. Sorry, the last

name? John Fuller. Fuller.

Thank you, Mr. Fuller. Please go ahead.

Sure. My name is John Fuller. I'm with Renewal by Andersen here in the Carolinas. Nice to see you all, committee members. I'm here for the historic district. So, I'm here on behalf of Mr. And Mrs. Rich at 403 East Franklin Street. They have a home here in the Rosemary Franklin Street Historic District that you're familiar with. They have the front facing side of their home has a few windows there that are showing signs of deterioration.

One window in particular we're going to address tonight has significant deterioration to the point to where it does need to be fully replaced. I have been out to the home a few times, fully inspected. Our team and our company has been out to the home a few times and fully inspected. And I'll get into those details as far as far as why it needs to be replaced and that a simple repair or just something just fixing it won't suffice. And then our proposed plan for mister and missus Rich for you to approve, hopefully.

This is the home here at 603 East Franklin Street. You can see it's it's a very nice value home, value property. We want to put a good high quality window back in the unit. We don't want them to go with something that's just going to take away value from your community and more importantly, you know, themselves as the homeowners there. You can't see the unit too well, but I'll zoom in here in a second.

This is just the plot map for your information, in case you need it. As far as going back with the unit we're proposing, the unit that we're proposing to go back with is a premium high quality window replacement. It's a wood composite material. So it's made out of wood. It's not 100% wood so that it won't rot in the future.

That way, they don't have problems. But the idea with Renewal by Andersen is we wanted to create a window that's as beautiful as a wood window for these types of applications, but doesn't have the problems that they could potentially face in the future by putting something else back in there that would rot. It's going to have the same distinctive look as their current window. We have something called FDL grills that's going to be on the window. So, it's going to have the same distinct beauty of the existing windows, just a modern unit.

This is the specific window unit. We have it numbered there as 101. It's just to the right of their stoop there. And you can't see it yet, but I'll zoom in in a minute and you'll be able to see the specific damage on that unit. So, the proposed window is going back with an exact match, a double what we call a double hung window with a reverse cottage sash ratio.

And then, all of our windows are joined using mortise and tenon joints like a high quality piece of wood furniture, something you'd see that this home probably has throughout the entire home, is those type of joints for the construction. The interior and exterior finish is going to be our Anderson white, which will perfectly match. The grill pattern is going to match the existing units. And then we're going to our craftsman, carpenter craftsman, they can replicate all of the wood trim on the exterior so that everything perfectly matches. This is a rendering of the two windows, a side profile and and then also the front profile with all the specifics.

The grill pattern is going to match as well. We're using a Fibrex exterior grill pattern that will never rot, interior wood grill pattern to keep the historic value and to keep the look of the window just as beautiful as it is today. But something that's going to provide value for the homeowner to last much longer. Of course, we've reviewed all the applicable code enforcement and design enforcement for this project. And these are kind of included here.

We did confirm that the water infiltration in their home is not only destroying the exterior of the wood trim, but it's also getting into the wall of the property. That's why just a simple fix on the outside or a simple repair won't suffice in this case. Again, going back to the same unit, I'm going to zoom in with some close ups here. On this close-up, you can kind of see at the top and the bottom some beginning stages, what it looks like beginning stages from this distance of the exterior right. But again, that water infiltration is going down into that opening.

This is an interior picture of the same window. And zooming in, we're going to zoom in here. This is the interior where you can actually see that water infiltration is going into the home. And that's why it's so critical of an issue. There you can see the lower sash, technically called sash two of the window also showing that rot.

So, going into the type of material that we're proposing to replace us with. This is our Renewal by Andersen Fibrex material. It's a 100% solid composite material made out of reclaimed wood that we reclaim from our own wood windows that we build. It's a premium quality material that's going to last the homeowner much longer than any type of wood replacement. Modern wood is mostly soft growth pine.

That type of material rots very quickly, even after it's painted and things. It will still fail very quickly. This is the material that we're proposing to use for this project. We've been approved to work with we've had approvals all throughout Chapel Hill, Hillsborough, Beaufort, all over North Carolina, the Wilmington Historic District. So, we have had approvals all over in the historic districts throughout the state.

And, that's pretty much what we're seeking approval for, for Mr. And Mrs. Zurch. I'm open to questions. I know this is not probably a very common request. But I'm open to questions to see if I can help you guys in any way.

Thank you for the thoroughness of that. Very helpful. I'm going to ask the commissioners if they have any clarifying questions. I'll then ask you to take a seat. We'll have a brief discussion and Absolutely. We'll make a

Thank

you. Any commissioners have clarifying questions for Mr. Fuller?

I have a quick one. This is Don Tice. Sorry I was late. So I wasn't clear, are you going to be replacing the head jam and seal materials?

Yes. Let me go back. That is And

when you replace those, are you going to replace it sounded like you were going to replace them in kind. You're going to match the profiles and moldings.

That's exactly correct. That's correct.

Just clear for everyone here, it's SDL. So that means you have a bar in the middle as well as a frame in the outside and the inside.

Yes.

The frame you showed a picture of was kind of what I would call a putty shaped frame. Is that what the actual profile of that mullion is going to be?

Talking about this picture?

Keep backing up there. Sorry, I've been further along.

It's okay.

There you go.

That one.

One. One. Okay. Go one more. One more. Okay. Two more. There we go.

Yes.

That's what is that what the profile is actually going to look like?

Pretty much. This is a side cut, mister T. So it's it's a side cut. So you're not really gonna see into the side like that. Yeah. But that profile shape, yes, that is that is about what it looks like.

A nice shape for older windows to have that putty profile.

Yes. These full divided light grills, they're the high end premium. It adds a lot of depth. It adds a lot of character. It's something that we would use in this particular application.

Okay. Thank you. You're welcome.

So the one you're using, I can't read that exactly. But the mountain is that three eighths of an inch high? Tell me.

Yeah. On the ex it's it's a three quarter. Yeah. On the exterior, it's about three quarters of an inch.

Okay. So it'll have a good shadow line.

Yes. Okay. Yes.

Yep. That's what I want

to know.

Yes, sir.

Yep. And from the exterior, it's going to look just like the other windows that exist.

Yes, ma'am. So anytime we replace one unit of anything, right, it's going to look slightly different. But it's not going to look like taking an old window and just moving it over. It's going to look slightly different. But we're doing our absolute best to match it like for like, all the exact exterior trim, like we talked about, and color and shape and style. But the overall shape and style will look exactly like that. Thank you. You're welcome.

Any other questions? Okay. Give us a few minutes. Thank you.

Yes, sir. Thank you.

Anyone from the public here to comment on this application? Okay. We'll now entertain a discussion with the commissioners. Is there anything we feel

like we need to discuss? Anybody have anything they want to talk about before we go to a bid?

I appreciate how thorough that application is.

Quick question, I'm new to the HTC, have we reviewed and approved window replacements before, I'm just curious.

Yes. Okay.

A lot, actually.

I will say that I do like the seven eighths, the depth of the mountain on the outside because I think that's gonna come closest to replicating at least what most traditional mountains are like in windows. I haven't looked at this house specifically, but I'm familiar with many historic true divided light windows. And the mountains are pretty deep. And this one, many times, replacement windows have shallow mountains, almost flat bars. And this case, this looks deep and it looks like it's gonna come closest to replication.

Which gives you dimension on the window.

It gives you dimension and shadow.

Any other clarification? Josh, I see you reaching for the

Yeah, I can

If you would.

I would move that the application is not incongruous with the special character of the historic district according to the application of the relevant provisions of Lumo and the HDC's design standards based on the facts that are presented in the record.

Can I get a second for for Josh?

I second.

Thank you. So Josh, put a motion forward. Laura put a second. I'm gonna take a vote if you would either say a yay or nay. Laura? Yea. Josh? Yea. Glenn?

Yea.

Don? Yea. And the chair votes yay. Passes unanimously. Thank you very much.

Thank you committee members and thank you on behalf of Mr. And Mrs. Rich and Renewal by Andersen. Thank you.

Thanks very much.

You can go ahead and sign your name here and print it and then fill out your email address.

While we're taking care of that does anybody have any ex parte communication or unauthorized site visits to disclose? Thank you.

Okay perfect. Hello. Hello. I'm going

read a brief statement. And if you agree with that statement, if you would say I so affirm and state your name after please. I affirm that the evidence I shall give to the historic district commission on the referenced application for February shall be the truth and nothing but the truth. I so affirm.

I so affirm. Jody Brown.

Thank you, Mr. Brown.

Good evening. I'm here. I'm the architect on the project. I'm representing the homeowners, Fred McLaren and Avery Russell. Avery is here if we have any questions for her. This is a project on 208 Hillsborough. Here's an overview of the house. It's a colonial revival home. We think it dates to about 1910. It shows up on the 1915 Sanborn maps.

It's part of the historic district, obviously. It has a covered porch in the front. It has a screen porch on the right hand side, which has been converted into a sunroom. And it has an addition on the back, which we think was originally a porch that has been enclosed. Here's a view of the back of the home.

What we're proposing is to do a primary suite addition. There's currently not a bedroom on the 1st Floor. So we want to do a primary suite addition in the back of the home, which would include a bedroom, a bathroom, a walk in closet and a small laundry area. Here's a site plan of the property. The gray area is the existing footprint.

And you can see the small area that adding on to in the back. The only change in the pavings and the stone walls are there's a stone path that currently goes through where our addition is proposed and we're relocating that stone path around the new addition. This is the existing plan. You can see the front porch, the screen porch which has been enclosed and the addition off the back which we think used to be a porch. And here's the proposed new construction.

All the red walls are the new walls. You can see the new construction in the upper right hand corner to contain a bedroom, closet, bathroom and a small laundry. There's an existing bedroom that'll remain. This is a aerial view of the back of the house as it currently exists. And then this is the proposed new addition.

You can see the primary suite addition here. And there's also a small porch between the former screen porch and the new addition which needs to get rebuilt partly because of the geometries of the new addition and partly because it's starting to rot and need repair. This is another view aerial slightly from the side of the existing. And this is the new proposed addition. One more existing view and there's a proposed of the addition.

One more existing view and then the proposed addition. This is an elevation from the front. The main takeaway here is you can't see the addition from the front of the house at all. It is in the back and it's towards the right. So you can't see it from the street.

From the side, this is the prominent side that you can see as you're walking down the street. The only thing we're doing here is these two windows are currently aluminum sliders. And we're replacing those with eight light divided light windows instead. The opposite side, you can see the addition off the back of the house to the right and the little porch addition in between. The main design approach to keep it compatible with the historic character of the home was we treated it like an addition in that it's secondary to the main house.

It's a one story instead of two story. It has a lower slope roof than the main house. And it has slightly simplified detailing. It doesn't have shutters for example. And the eave returns, it doesn't have those. The materials used are all basically matching the existing home. The roofing is asphalt shingle to match the existing house. Siding is a wood lap siding with a profile to match the existing house. The trim and corner boards and fascia all match the existing house. Windows are a sixone wood double hung window.

We're using Marvin Ultimate with a simulated divided light with a shadow bar. There is one door out of the primary bedroom, which will be a wood patio door, single light to match the existing door that you can see in this photograph. The port railings are matching this rail, which also matches the port rail on the front of the house. And the foundations are brick to match the existing. The stone walk, this is the existing stone walk that will get rebuilt in a slightly different configuration.

So it'll match the existing. That's basically what we're planning to do. I'm happy to answer any questions.

Great. I'll ask commissioners if they have any clarifying questions,

and then we'll move into another

discussion. Clarifying questions from commissioners.

I do have one question. Are you matching the roof slopes for the other 1st Floor ground floor roofs?

Yes. Yeah, it's basically a three and twelve slope for the existing 1st Floor additions, we're matching that.

So the upper roof is a steeper roof and then all the ground floor roofs are similar

Exactly the screen right.

Can you help me understand where you have shutters and where you don't and what the philosophy is on that?

So the new edition does not have shutters on any of the windows. The sunroom addition on the side is similar. It doesn't have shutters. It has shutters on the front, but not on the back. So the idea is as you get towards the back of the house, we don't use shutters. And in the new addition, we're not using shutters. Partly that's because we have a triple window, which would look ridiculous with shutters. We made that decision to simplify the detailing as we got towards the back. Any

other clarifying questions? Okay. Thank you.

Thank you.

Any member of the public here to comment on this application? Yes, sir.

Hello. My name is

Is this you?

That's me. My name is Tim Carey. I'm the owner and resident at 206 Hillsborough, which is facing 208 where the people on the right. We've lived there for fifteen years and just wanted to say, reviewed the packet completely consistent with the neighborhood. We have no objections at all. And hope this goes well.

Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else wants to comment? Okay, thank you very much Commissioners. Let's discuss.

Is there anything to discuss?

This is a sympathetic addition. I think it is sufficiently delineated as different from the main house. It has enough separation. The three windows on the bottom actually, the triple window, do reflect the triple windows above it existing in the house. So I feel that does something to tie them together as well as having the siding match in terms of exposure and material.

So I feel this is a pretty sympathetic addition.

I think this is a really good example of the amount of detail and the matching with the guidelines and principles of the historic district which make it easier for us to make a decision about this because it's Not long, but complete, if you know what I'm saying. It's well done. If there is no more discussion, I'd love to entertain a motion. And there's a script right there. Done.

Okay, so this one right here. I move that the application is not incongruous with the special character of the historic district according to the application of the relevant provisions of the LUMO and the HTC's design standards based upon the facts presented in the record.

Could I get a second for Don's motion?

Second.

Thank you Josh. Okay I'm gonna take a vote. Laura.

I vote to approve.

Just say aye. Yep, thank you. Josh? Aye. Glenn? Aye. Don? Aye. And the chair votes aye. That passes unanimously. Thank you very much. Good luck with your project. Okay, so I think our last item on the agenda this evening is a discussion about officer elections. Anna, Scott or Shanika, would you like to remind us about that? Maybe the one thing I'll say is context is that the council did approve some changes to the historic district commission, a few other boards over the summer, which took our commission size from nine to seven, which helps us with quorum, which is good news.

And with Laura and Glenn now joining us, we're actually at a full commission, which is great. We don't have David and Nancy with us tonight, but that kind of rounds out our group of seven. And we need to have officer elections, I believe, next month. You all will maybe take it from there, please.

Yeah, I think HTC usually has officer elections in September. So next month's meeting, you'll vote for a chair and vice chair. I think we'll just do the two officer roles since our board size was reduced to seven, so we don't have the I don't think there's a need for the deputy vice chair. But we'll look into updating the rules and procedures to correct that.

And so I have served two years as chair. So I believe based on the principles, cannot serve another term as chair. So just to clarify that. Nancy has served as an officer I think for three years and has expressed an interest in continuing to support if needed, but would prefer not to. So just ask everybody to think about that and we'll have a discussion about it when we're together in September. And I'll make sure that both Nancy and David know that also.

I'll also say since we are going to have to amend the rules of procedure to eliminate the vice chair position anyway, We may also want to consider eliminating the rules regarding the number of terms that a member may serve as an officer. Now that we've removed two seats from the commission, we've got a smaller pool of applicants to draw from for these two roles. So it may be worthwhile considering whether the board is interested in amending or modifying those rules to allow more consecutive terms or to make that more flexible in some form or fashion.

Okay. And would that be something that, so how, what would be the appropriate way for us to consider that? Would it be a discussion we'd have here next month? Or would we want to do that?

I think that would be fine. If you all want to think about that and bring whatever comments you all might have back to us next month, then we can work on whatever we need to do to get the rules of procedure amended and back to you. Then I think also to the town council, but I may be wrong, for final approval. Yeah.

So we can look at what the process is for updating the rules and procedures. I think we'd also want to check council's overall board membership policy because I think that addresses the officer roles too.

And I think there's benefit in us being consistent. So I don't think we want to do a one off just for the district commission. We probably should follow the policy's been set. And I think there were three others that were also rescaled, I guess you would say, with that change. I think it's probably to their benefit if we just all follow the same rules.

Yeah. Guess

the only other note on that is we do normally have a counsel liaison has been Camille Barry. I think she's anticipating that she's going get reassigned, she's been our for two years, but I suspect the mayor will take that up sometime in the new council year. So maybe the next time we're all together we'll have some news on that. In the meantime, if there's anything we need advice on, I'd still go to Camille. And I think that is it. Kevin, Shanika, Anna Scott did you have anything else for us tonight?

No.

Other than welcoming Laura and Glenn and saying thank you for showing up. We'll try to keep them all. Just keeping it interesting Don, that's all. Okay, I think we're adjourned. Thank you.