Planning Board - Regular Meeting

who made the motions. So may um we need to amend uh amend these so have them approved as amended. Does the maker of the motion agree to that? Yes. The seconder second. Okay. So the motion is to approve the minutes as amended. Is there any discussion? All those in favor say I. I.

Opposed? Nay. Votes. I. Motion passes. The next item is correspondence. A memorandum of the town planner dated November 18th, 2025 regarding an administrative subdivision application of 15 Aquidene Neck Avenue LLC involving properties located at 15 Aquideneck Avenue and further identified as lots 37A 38A on assessors plat 116 and W. May I have a motion to receive this correspondence? So moved. Second. Motion's made and seconded to receive this correspondence. Is there any discussion? All those in favor say I.

I.

Oppose. Nay. Chair votes. I. Motion passes. There are no changes to this evening's agenda. And there is no old business. So the next item on the agenda is item 5A, public hearing, application of Derek SAS for preliminary plan approval of a minor land development project for a proposed 2687 square foot commercial building to house an arcade, including requests for a special use permit per zoning ordinance section 602 and 902 to allow the arcade use in the limited business traffic sensor. Positive LBA zoning district waiverss from the design requirements of section 521 of the subdivision subdivision and land development regulations are requested including sections 521.1B.3 521.1.e.2 521.1. E.3 521.2B.1 2B.1 and 521.2 point C. Property is located at 40 Valley Road and further identified as tax assessors plat 402A. May I have a motion?

I'm I'm going to recuse on this. Okay. May I have a motion to open the public hearing? So moved. Second. Motion is made and seconded to open the public hearing. Is there any discussion? All those in favor say I. I. Oppos? Nay. Chair votes I. Motion passes. The public hearing is open.

Good evening, Mr. Chair. Me board Gerard Galvvin from Galvin Law in Newport, Rhode Island. Uh, as you are aware, uh, in 2022, my client was permitted to build a mini golf course on, uh, the premises that we're discussing tonight. At that time, the permitting process required that he travel through this board for development plan review and then obtain a special use permit from the zoning board, which he achieved. The course was built and it's been operated successfully since that time. He always anticipated a second familyfriendly use on that site uh and ultimately uh felt an arcade would be an appropriate use uh to complement the mini golf course. Interestingly, uh the indoor entertainment uh and arcade uh had been prohibited in the limited business district when we first began looking at this issue. So last year we filed for a change in the zoning law that would allow for indoor recreation such as arcades, bowling alleys, movie theaters uh in the limited business district. We presented that request to this board for comment. uh and this board voted in favor of that as a special use. Uh we then went to the town council and they changed the law uh to allow it with a special use permit. [clears throat] So once that change was made, Mr. Savis engaged professionals to design the proposed arcade. We uh uh completed and submitted the application for preliminary plan approval for the minor land development we're with tonight. that includes the special use permit and uh you did list uh five waiver requests since the time the application has been submitted. Uh [clears throat] some changes uh to the plans and and concessions on those waiver items have been made. So ultimately tonight we're only going to

be uh requesting a single waiver and we'll go through those as we uh uh move through the testimony. We met with the technical review committee on November 26th and received a recommendation in favor of the development. Uh certain conditions were attached to that approval. Uh we met with a number of you at the site on December 1st. Uh so you have that context uh before we begin testimony. And on December 1st, Mr. Wansky issued a memo to you outlining all of these approvals uh that we're seeking. Uh in addition to the notice that the town sends to Abutters for these public hearings, I also wrote to all of the abutters separately explaining the project and offering them an opportunity to reach out to me if they have any concerns. Nobody reached out to me. We [clears throat] were aware that uh one particular butter who had questions with the mini golf course um and is adjacent to the property, Mr. Savis reached out directly to him and Mr. Savis will explain to you that interaction uh when he testifies. But as far as we know, there are no objections to this from the abutters. So unless there's any other preliminary questions from me, I'll begin. I have four witnesses tonight. Um I expect all of them to be brief. U [clears throat] but we can jump in unless there are any questions for me.

What are the witnesses going to cover? Well, I have uh Mr. Savas, the property owner. He'll explain uh his goals with the project. I have a civil engineer, Seth Le Moy, who will explain the site plan, the storm water, any questions uh relating to those issues. Mr. Herkinrother is here, the architect, so he can explain the design of the building um and any questions you might have about materials and and things of that nature. And finally, Mr. will speak to a number of the criteria for the special use permit. Um and he also has a report that he'll submit uh as an exhibit. Okay. Does anyone have any questions before he brings his witnesses forward? Okay. No. See. Okay. Uh Mr. Savis.

Uh Derek Savis, 168 Cotton Hill Drive, Portsmith. Does Mr. Savis need to be sworn in or do you not? Okay. So, Derek, could you just describe uh your vision for the use? Speak to the microphone, please. if you could just describe your vision for uh the building, the structure on the property, and the use of the facility, how you'll operate uh the arcade if it's approved.

Sure. So, our plan uh is to kind of complement the existing businesses there already. Um we're seasonal as we stand with the mini golf. So, something that would be more year round would be beneficial to not only our operations there, but I think the community as well. Um, we plan to staff it similarly to how we staffed the mini golf. Two, possibly three employees depending on um the time of day and the demand. Um, we plan to just maintain compliance with building codes and hopefully move forward. Now, the mini golf has been operating for three seasons now. Is that right? Or is it two? Two. A little over two and a half.

Okay. And you've felt operations have been successful? They've been great. Yeah. All right. Have you had any complaints from neighbors or the town about operations, lighting, noise, anything like that? No, not all right. In in advance of this hearing, u I I explained to the board how I wrote to a Butters, but you also had a a direct conversation with one of Butter, Mr. Nevs, correct? Correct. And where's his property? He's directly behind the righthand portion of the property if you're looking from Valley Road. Okay. And how did that conversation go?

So, I met Joe here when we were proposing the miniature golf course. He's uh very active in in um keeping an eye on on what we do over there, which has actually been great. Uh Joe and I have developed a great relationship. We talk probably two or three times a year. Whenever we are going to propose anything new, we talk with Joe first. um and we're just pretty much on the same page. He gives feedback. We do our best to accommodate his requests and I feel like we've kind of garnered a great relationship and specific to this conversation, he indicated to you he didn't have any objection to this proposal. Correct. That's correct.

Uh do you have any sense of the proposed hours of operation? Um I know some board members might be interested in u what you envision in that regard. Sure. Um, right now during the summertime, we're open at the at the mini golf from 11 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. Uh, I would anticipate a similar hours of operation for the arcade. Um, being as though we'll be open year round there, I think during the school year when the demand for arcade during the day is probably minimal, we'll we'll draw back our opening times, but um, no later than than 9:00 p.m. A question came up at the site visit relating to signage and that hasn't been part of our plan uh in the application packet, but that's because you anticipate whatever signage you need you'll be able to uh complete within the confines of the town uh regulations.

That's correct. Okay. Uh one [clears throat] last thing I want to uh touch on and that u is going to jump to the one remaining waiver request. So there were five that were initially identified. Uh since that time, uh we've eliminated all waiver requests except for the pedestrian walkway. We can go through those as the you've eliminated all but which one?

The the first one listed which is the pedestrian walkway. What about the windows?

Yep. And we can address um how we've eliminated those waiver requests as we go through. And uh certainly, for instance, m Mr. Herkinrother will speak to the the window piece and um the siding piece. Um before I move on in testimony though uh to some of those other specific ones that we've eliminated, the one that we are still requesting is the pedestrian walkway. And so I I will ask a few of the witnesses about that. But I want to start with Derek to explain why uh from his perspective after observing a few years of operation on this site, why we're requesting that waiver to not have that walkway. So I'll have you explain that.

Yeah. So the they move in. All right. The destination is mainly a drivable destination. We don't have really any foot traffic coming from Valley Road. Um and that was something we kind of wanted to wait and see how it evolved uh before we went forward with the expense of that long sidewalk portion. Um and ultimately there really from what we've seen is the demand just isn't there for that. Uh, all get any foot traffic? Do we get any foot traffic? Only foot traffic I've seen, and I've been there a lot, is from the rear of the property. The rear from the the residential area. Yes. It's interesting.

But none from the street. Correct. Um, that's all [clears throat] I had on direct for Mr. Savis. And um, you know, we can get into more technical U. Yes, Miss Owen. Yeah. Uh my question is about the activities you think you you would have in the arcade.

Sure. So the arcade will be a very much open space inside with the ability to close off one section of the space for birthday parties or uh events. We're gearing this towards familyfriendly in kids. So anything that would kind of fall in line with that theme is what we'll be marketing to. Although we're not opposed to you'd like to have a party there, we'd love to have you. So, um uh do any uh uh do any of the kids come by bicycle? And if they do, do they ride in from uh Valley Road? They I've seen kids on bicycles. They all enter from the rear of the property.

Oh, really? Buck Road and then what's the road? No, it's the road and back. Crystal. Yes, those two. Those two rows are where I see um pedestrian. Speak into the microphone, please. Those are the two locations that I see bicycles and foot traffic. Most of the kids are either dropped off by parents or come with their parents or uh correct or walk in or something. Yeah. There really isn't much on Valley Road, as you know, that is really kid-friendly. So, there isn't a reason for kids to be walking around in the first place, which I think is why u we're mainly a driving destination. But there are some residents across the street and uh you get no traffic from there.

I have not seen anything. No, I haven't seen any foot traffic um from Valley Road up to where we where we are. Okay. Okay. Uh thank you. I'll call Seth Leo. introduce myself. Yeah, go ahead. [clears throat] Uh, good evening, C uh, council. Uh, Seth Leo from Princip Engineering. Uh, Seth, you're a licensed PE in Rhode Island, correct? Yes. And you've been a professional engineer for 17 years. Is that right? That's right.

And you've testified before planning boards and zoning boards throughout Rhode Island and have been recognized as an expert in the field of it. Yes, I have. I'd ask that the board recognize Mr. Le mo as an expert in the field of civil objections. So recognized. Thank you very much. Uh so Seth, before I ask you some specific questions, would you just take a moment to walk the board through um the site plan generally?

Yes, absolutely. Uh so we're calling this the phase two of the site and the uh arcade building is positioned in the open field area in the upland area beyond the existing parking lot. Uh the topography typically grades from the upper right towards the lower left which would be towards Valley Road. Um the building will be serviced by uh public water and public sewer supply. Um and then we're looking to have storm water controls um through some bio retention ponds which are similar to rain gardens uh which will control through the one through 100year storm events. Uh so that was showing a a slight decrease in runoff rates and volume for each one of those events. Um um the building will also be serviced by the uh existing parking lot which has sufficient parking in place to accommodate both businesses uh on the same lot. Uh we do provide some landscaping uh along the property perimeter against the residential neighborhood in the rear. Uh all those plants will be approximately six feet high. Uh the trees will be a little taller. Uh we provide also ADA compliant um access um walkway up to the building with some um dark sky compliant lighting low level.

Little dark sky compliant. That's correct. The the lights will all be 9 ft high or less. There'll be some building mounted ones and then some pedestal mounted ones for the walkway. Thank you. So, I do want to uh address two of the waiverss that had been requested and how that has been resolved here. Um on the plan set you have before you dated November 11th. Um [clears throat] there are trash receptacles uh reflected in a litter management plan um provided on that plan set. Is that correct? Yes, that's correct.

Um could you maybe just point out where that um crash receptacle and uh is Yeah. So looking at the plan and uh hand Mike there.

No m to that screen. So, we're proposing a single trash receptacle in the rear corner of the walkway on the exterior of the building. There's existing um receptacles throughout the property already to service the mini golf course. There'll be additional receptacles inside the building, which I have not identified on this plan. And we also provided some litter control notes regarding how the trash receptive is going to be emptied frequency, who's going to do it. Uh in addition with daily monitoring of trash and litter on the property. Also, Seth, the um original plans didn't identify how the HVAC system was going to be handled, and that was identified as a a waiver request. Could you please point out uh where the HVAC system is going to be and also speak to the screening that will be provided which is which is why we no longer feel we need to request the waiver.

Yes. Uh we're looking at putting a condenser unit to the rear of the building uh approximately [clears throat] this vicinity and we'll provide some landscape screening around that unit. Have you submitted a landscape plan? Yes. Commission doesn't reflect that change. It it does not reflect that change. No. Oh, that'll be a condition then.

Thanks. I think um that's all I needed you to be present by the map to show. But I I want to ask you, you mentioned um this being phase two and and the storm water uh systems being able to handle the 100red-year storm. A substantial amount of the engineering and storm water management occurred in that phase one. Correct. Yeah, that that's correct. And that was um designed to handle the existing conditions out there. We're not proposing to increase anything to that system. We when we performed our design and in essence, we ignored that system to make sure our earth could handle all the storm events adequately without relying on any use of that system.

Are you saying that the existing system is adequate for both facilities? No, the the existing system is adequate for the existing conditions today and what we've designed will um effectively manage the proposed conditions for phase two for the new building.

So to to put it another way, could you uh maybe again go over just point out where you're adding the rain gardens to handle the one additional structure that's being proposed to the lot? So, we're proposing two different areas uh for uh the rain gardens. One is located here, a slightly larger one uh and then a smaller one here. This smaller one will manage runoff from the walkways. The larger one's going to handle runoff from the building uh downspouts and the exterior walkways here and they'll be directed to the system here. Uh even through our modeling 100red-year storm, they're not overflowing. uh they their infiltration so promoting groundwater recharge

and and Seth so because uh we're disturbing such a small portion of the land here uh DEM doesn't have formal approval requirements here right but you're compliant with their uh standards yes that's correct the site limit of disturbance is less than one acre in fact it's uh less than one half acre and um our design conforms with the RIM uh storm water design manual. Thank you.

Uh and [clears throat] you also uh as part of your due diligence here received confirmation that we don't need a physical alteration permit from DOT that the existing ingress and egress are sufficient. Correct. Yes. Correct. Uh we've sent a request to the DM uh DOT for uh PAP applicates the uh PMP for this development is not required.

More than 25% of the site remains open green space. Yeah, correct. Uh actually it's uh closer to 50% remains open green space green space. Now uh from your perspective as a professional engineer is there anything in this plan that causes that you cause a nuisance in the neighbor? No. Anything in the proposal that would be detrimental to or substantially or permanently injure the surrounding? No. Nothing in the plans leads me to believe that. There anything in this proposal that would result in a hazardous condition condition in?

No. But you're not an acoustic or audio engineer. You're not a sound engineer or an acoustic engineer. Correct. Correct. I am not. But in in your experience as an engineer, is there anything that you see in this proposal that suggests uh any activities here would trigger municipal noise violations? Yeah, with respect to the arcade and it being cited indoors, um I don't believe there'll be any issue with noise. And you've testified about the storm water management. You don't see any negative impacts to the ground or surface water quality as a result of this project, correct?

No, I do not. And there are no significant negative environmental impacts from this plan. Correct. Correct. There are none. We're not seeking uh a subdivision here or to create a new lot. Correct. Correct. And we have permanent access to Valley Road. Correct. Yes. All the important direct questions that I had for uh Mr. Le Moy. Of course, we're open to any questions. He's going to address the windows. He was going to have the architect address the windows. Um, I think that'd be more

I'd like to ask about uh the noise. You said you didn't think it would be an issue. Uh, what do you base that on? Does this this building have openings? Will it be open during the summer or They'll have some door openings. The door openings will not be facing the neighborhood to the rear. It'll be facing towards the mini golf course in the front. And and is there anything inside that makes a lot of noise? It's an arcade, so I imagine there'll be some noise makers in there. Yeah, we could have Mr. Savis come back up and speak to that, but I wanted to ask Mr. Savas a question along those lines. Sure, if he could come back. Yeah. Anything else from Mr. Le Moine?

Were you going to bring him up to address the noise issue? Yes, I could do that. I I wasn't sure if he had any. And before [clears throat] We we'll call you back up. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Um I'll also before we get into the questions on the topic, we're all fully aware uh that property, this property and all properties are going to be governed and held and to the standards of the town in terms of noise ordinance. So, and there is a noise ordinance. That's right. We're all aware of that.

Yeah. We'll be hearing some additional testimony about what might be expected and how the solid walls of this building might help dampen any noise, but feel free to ask those questions. I wanted to put that out there initially. So, the the question is, do you anticipate any loud noises coming from the building?

I don't anticipate anything out of the ordinary for what we're proposing. Um, I know that the mini golf course that's outside has at any given time will have well more than the capacity that will be permitted inside on the course. Um, the nature of the games inside are um they're not intended to be super loud in the first place. You know, we will promote conversation. You want to be able to hear what kids are saying. So it's it's nothing more than maybe no five or six like loud TVs at one time. Nothing that will emanate outside by any means.

And and if I could uh ask a question, Seth spoke about where the uh ingress and egress to the building will be, which will be on the I guess the west front of the building. Correct. Dan's going to speak about the the bow windows, but the remainder of the building uh will be solid wall. Correct. Correct. Facing uh the Buck Road and the Bristol Road sides. That's correct. Okay. That will have a noise dampening impact.

Correct. In In addition, all these machines have volume adjustments on them. So, if one's too loud or if it tends to be that becomes a problem, you simply turn them down. It's not it's not, you know, one size fits all in terms of sound.

So, Mr. Savas, first of all, I commend you on the project. I think this recreation use and community space is something that's needed in Middletown. So, um I'm happy about that. Um but I think at heart what this committee does, what this board does is try to ensure that new development does not create some kind of a nuisance that diminishes the quality of life for neighbors. And this property does pretty much a butt a very residential um community. So it's a concern that uh that we have. Now I think it's also very impressive that in the two and a half years you've operated the miniature golf facility, there haven't been complaints from neighbors. And that suggests to me that it's being well managed. I think um it will go to a whole different level however with the arcade where you have the possibility of attracting groups of teenagers and other assembled groups that could be safety issues as well as noise issues and the like. So, I wanted to find out what your thoughts were on how you would be managing this property going forward and how you would ensure that there would not be problems of the kind that I just identified.

Well, thank you for your kind words. Um, I think it all comes down to staffing. In fact, I know it all comes down to staffing. Um, at one point in my career, I managed 140 employees. And the only way to ensure safe, fun, uh, operations and and for not only the business itself, but for the neighbors surrounding it is to properly staff it with rules and policies in place to ensure that things are done the way they need to be done. Um, we'll maintain compliance with all the codes, the noise ordinances, everything that's required by the town of Middletown. Not only because we have to, but because I want to. You know, we want to be good neighbors. We want to be in the community to welcome those kids that live behind us and their families. There are some of our, you know, customers at Mini Golf already. Um, and you know, it's not something where we're trying to promote outdoor live music or something to that extent. We're going to keep this inside um during the summer months, which we anticipate being our busiest times. The windows will be closed anyway with the HVAC running. So, I I I personally um know make sure that our staff will maintain compliance with with all that. you manage it yourself or you have a manager? How will you handle

a little bit of both? Um, anytime there are any issues, we have a a chain of command that's that's reached out to and no matter what level of that chain is is messaged, I'm I'm a part of it all the time. Um, so I'm very active in in everything that I do and and this will be no no different. Thank you. Yes, I do have a question about the uh entrances to the arcade and the exits. Could you point them out to us?

Well, why don't we bring you up and you can [clears throat] uh Dan Herkin here from Herks Architecture. Um, do you want to get into this or just go into the doors right now? You just bring up the architecturals if we're done with the site plan. This is probably a good image to start at. So, watch the question. Yes. Did you hear the question?

Doors. Yes. So, we have to have two doors by uh by code, two means of egress. So the two obvious places are going to be the front of the building which faces Valley Road which is the west and then the south building, the south facade which faces the commercial building to the south. But we felt that those would be the two locations for the doors. They can't be on the same wall. They have to be a certain distance apart by code. But we are not going to put any doors on the rear of the building which faces east and there's no doors on the north of the building which faces. So, the two faces of the building that face the neighborhoods, there'll be no doors on those. Thank you.

Why don't we uh jump into Dan? I had a question. I I was a little bit I was concerned. I was confused about this uh walkway approaching the building. There's sort of like a a pe section there, you know. So, what was the purpose for that? It looks like it goes over towards the rain garden. Back on the site plan. Yeah. Sorry, Ron. Yeah, correct. Uh, that's for ADA compliance because of the changing grade elevations. Oh, okay. So, that's a rampage. Yeah, that's the ramp that goes there's there'll be a direct route that goes um directly up the set of steps and then the uh the ramp that takes you in that Pshape back up to the building.

And there's a swale that crosses the uh the path on the way up. This looks like it says D, you know, it's I don't know. Correct. There's an existing grass swale there that we're crossing over the top of. Okay, I got it. Okay. Hey, thanks. Yeah, what I'll uh resume Mr. Urkin Rother if that's okay. And uh before I resume the questioning, I I just ask that uh Dan be recognized as an expert in the field of architecture. I know he's before you very frequently and has been recognized as such before. Any objections? feel recognized.

All right. So, Dan, you you've already um spoken about the doors. Could you just take a step back and kind of explain the um what was requested of you in the design and and how you made an effort to comply with the design standards?

Uh correct. Yes. So, uh what we're looking at here, this is the west face of the building. This is the front. This faces Valley Road. This is where our all of our windows, our transparent windows are going to be located uh for natural light and for the front of the building. The building size at the outermost corners is 40x76. It's about 2600 square ft of space. So, it's not a large building. So, codewise, building wise, this is a very small occupant load. And because it's a pretty small building, the pitched roof is not going to tower up that high. It's only 40 ft deep. It's got a single gable roof. Um, and one thing I wanted to note, if you want to go back to the first page, um, you can kind of see here, which, um, I think will go a long way with the help of the noise, the building is actually recess into the grade. So, you look at the back of the building, it's actually 2 feet farther into grade. Um, I think that's going to help minimize the visual impact to the neighbors. It's also going to help with sound. And even more important, you can't spill out on the space. There's a there's a 4ft walkway around the three back sides of the building. So, if you're worried about like people congregating outside the building, there is no way to do that because you have a walkway, which is for code, but there's no like gathering space. So, having the building recess and degrade actually will protect you from having anyone congregating around the back sides of the building. The only place people can can gather is the front which is on the valley road west side of the building

and uh no variances are required here. Correct. Uh correct. Yeah, we'll get into the um siding and windows later. Okay. And um you certainly uh at least for my eye uh seem to strive for the New England aesthetic here. Correct. Yeah, it's um somewhat similar to Gold's Next Door. It's got the same 912 roof pitch. Um, also like golds, there are no rooftop mechanicals, so we don't have to worry about how we're going to screen them. They're all located at grade, so much easier to to screen from view.

Now, originally when we uh applied, we made request for an alternative material and that is one of the waiver requests. Since that time and after further discussion with Derek, um he is any material. Correct.

Yeah. So, the two main Well, there'll be three main exterior materials. Uh, most of the building is going to be the cedar shingles. Uh, Derek also is fine with using wood trim. So, we can do painted wood trim. There'll be no PVC on the building. And then we do have a lower course of 2 feet and that'll be a wood collap board. We just felt that was a more a little more abuse resistant for the lower section of the wall. And so all those materials are compliant with with the code. Correct. Wood. No wood. No PVC. [clears throat] Ron. Does that have to be stated as a condition since it's different from the application?

Yeah, I was going to get to that, but I think all four of the requests that they're indicating they're going to by compliance will make those Um, the last one of those that I would like to address is need for windows or uh bow windows on the sides of the building east and north facing residential areas. Can you speak to that?

Yes, correct. So, we originally, as the drawings show, we just had windows on the west facing. We didn't want to windows, as you know, is that's going to be the weakness for sound. So, if we had any real windows on the, uh, north and east side, that would just let the sound go right through the walls. So, um, a similar detail we did on Johnny Cake, uh, where we put a bunch of faux windows that face the neighbors. The idea, we're going to put on the north and east, we're going to locate the, uh, the windows that get to 40% glazing. And the way we do those windows is we install the windows, they're real windows, and then there's a wall on the inside of the window. And that means insulation's continuous because we were mostly concerned with sound control. We didn't want to have

So you're putting real windows in and then a wall in front of them. Correct. Yes. Yeah. Um that's the best way. That's what we did for the for the Johnny Cake project. That's what the neighbors wanted. So it it it's better because you can put a fake window in, but if you don't have like depth to it, it you can tell right away. So these are going to be real windows, but wall on the inside. And that's also great for the inside because that gives them wall space for putting gains and and whatnot. And and the number of windows will be uh compliant with the ordinances.

Yes. For percentage. Yes. For glazing. We're not showing any on the south side because that faces a commercial use. There's no residential to the south. And is there anything about your design proposal that uh your experience constitute neighborhoods? No. All right. I think that's all I had for Mr. Hurricane questions. Uh um the roof pitch, what is it? A 912,

but it was really cheap. It's nice looking. Thank you. questions. Thank you. I'll ask you Mr. W forward.

Thank you. He's going to testify on this. Yes.

Chair. Similarly, I I know Mr. Hoo testifies regularly here and is recognized as an expert in land use. Thank you. [clears throat] So Jim, you've uh you were retained and you prepared a report to analyze a number of things including consistency with the comp plan of this project, whether we meet the criteria for a special use permit and any impacts on the surrounding neighborhood. Correct. Yes. All right. Um I'd ask that uh Mr. Fool's report be accepted as a full exhibit and then we'll walk through that report. Um, if we do that, it should have been submitted a week before.

Maybe we should leave it just as a let him testify on it. Well, he can testify. I'll ultimately ask for it to be accepted as a full exhibit. Exhibits are offered during testimony, but but we'll come back to that. Uh, Jim, could you describe how you went about your investigation into those three questions?

Sure. I, you know, like any any of these type of matters that I'm involved, I study the petition. I go to the site, study the neighborhood to see uh how the uh proposal will interact with the surrounding area. Right. And um can you talk about any of the findings you've made?

Sure. I mean, we the primarily we're looking for the special use permit. It's a it's a use that is permitted with the special use permit. So, I began by looking at the standards um specific to the and section 902 of the um special use standards whether it would create a sign significant diminion of property values in the surrounding area. Um, I don't believe it would. It's a use that's very compatible with the um existing mini golf use. Uh, the building is harmonious with the other structure that's already on the property. Um, the building is built about 100 ft from the um back of the property line. Uh, the rear of the building is about 100 feet from the prop the back of the property line. There's a double row of arborite that are set four feet apart that are all along the back of the property line between um or are proposed to be that are between this use and the residential the nearest residential area. And up until now, as Mr. Savis has already testified there really hasn't been any issue with noise or any other light um odor disturbance from the use that's on site. And I see this as sort of a continuation of that same um that same use and same type of impact to the neighborhood. So this might uh be a bit of a followup to the test gave, but do you see the creation nuisance uh by virtue of this proposal?

No. No, I I don't at all. Again, it's the same. I mean, we're really looking at a very compatible use. One of the things that I had looked at, too, was the fact that this is contained within a building. So, a lot of the noise is already buffered. You know, the mini golf uh is wide open and has yet to create any kind of a problem. I realize there are machines here that will create a certain amount of noise and you're congregating a number of people inside a building which is also going to create maybe more volume. But because it's contained, uh my experience in uh looking at other similar types of uses, um that tends to really hold that noise within the building. So I don't see it creating a nuisance. And will this use uh be detrimental or injure uh the use corporate use of property elsewhere in the surrounding area?

No, not at all. This is, you know, the uses all along Valley Road are similar time type of commercial uses. Um they're, you know, they vary widely in in function, but they're all the same type. The lots are roughly the same size, buildings are similar in size. Um they they generate the same type of traffic. I really don't see that there would be any issue um created by this use. Okay. And uh what is your opinion regarding this proposal's consistency with the comprehensive plan?

Well, the comp plan calls at first it's again consistent just by the fact that it is a permitted use within the zoning code with the special use permit. Um so it's already accepted since the the zoning code is really the legislative arm of the comp plan. Um we're looking at a use that is sort of indirectly sanctioned by the comp plan, but the comprehensive land use plan calls for um use commercial uses to try to stay within commercial carters. This is an LBA zone. This is clearly a commercial carter. Um this is again it's very compatible to the existing use on site. So I I it's an infill it's an infill use. I see this as being very compatible with what the comprehensive land use plan calls for and similarly in compliance with the zoning code itself.

Yes. I mean when again because it is a permitted um permitted use within the zoning code. Um as long as the issues of the special use the standards of the special use permit being requested are met uh it certainly is harmonious with the zoning code.

Okay. Uh and could you speak to uh the one waiver request that we uh retain tonight which is that uh relating to way in in your in in your role as a a land use expert. Can you speak to the you know appropriateness u for requesting a waiver on that point knowing what you know about Valley Road, the existing conditions there and Derek's experience of how people access his site?

Sure. When I looked at the list of variances, I spoke to Mr. Galvin and he explained that really we were the only variance that ultimately would be requested was for the walkway. And when I so I understood that when I went out to look at the site and when you when you really look at the site, you realize that this is a very typical situation where you have housing, the dead ends to the back of a lot. um the street dead ends. You can see clearly um that if the people are trying to access um if they're walking or taking bicycles and they want to access um Valley Road down to the West Main Road or even over to the East Main Road that this would be a natural um sort of cut through. So I asked Mr. Savis that question early on and he said yes that in his experience he was seeing that exact pattern that because it was a single lot because it was a direct access that he was seeing a lot of that type of activity where there was walking path. So when you when you really look at the idea of improving the walkway, it it sort of almost runs contrary because you I think you would ultimately be actually encouraging greater cutthrough. I realize that sounds counterintuitive to the idea of having good walkway, but I think in this particular site, it makes sense that he's held off from improving that sidewalk because it would only actually, I think, encourage more of that type of activity. I don't think it's, you know, there is a sidewalk there. The sidewalk on Valley Road is older and not a very good shape, but there is already a sidewalk in

place. I didn't see it as a major a major detriment to the project at all. Okay. I don't have uh additional questions for Mr. Wool. Now that he's testified to a number of these criteria just for record, I'd ask that his report which uh speaks to a number of those similar issues be admitted as a full exhibit. Well, as I said, typically we require them uh documents to be submitted a week in advance. Does anyone have any objection in this case of accepting this report? If so, stay noted. Excuse me.

Uh unless there's other questions, any other questions for Mr. Who? Thank you. Let me I have a question. So, uh, are there any capacity limits on the building, you know, as far as the number of people that would be using it? Yeah. Danny, would you able to speak to that number? Usually around um, seven square feet per occupant. I mean, every occupant would be seven square feet. So, you could take not including bathrooms, mechanical, and and space. We don't know what our service area is yet, but that's what a standing room square foot occupant load is.

How do you determine how many parking spaces are required? That's well that comes from the uh the zoning code that determines um how many spaces you need based on what the use is. And when you add up the the mini golf, which is defined um with I think indoor recreation um which is defined in that code, I think you come up with 39 and I believe we have 41. And so that's been that's been looked at. But there's no chance that there would be overflow and you'd be parking on the the grass or anything like that.

Well, I don't know that I can answer the question of whether or not there's a chance of that. What I can tell you is we're compliant with the town code in terms of the parking provided. Um, and what I can also tell you is I think Mr. Savis has [clears throat] testified about how he manages his uh uh operations and how he staffs it. And if they get a sense that there's an issue, I'm quite sure they'll come up with a solution. But the proposal has uh been made in compliance with the town code. Okay. Thanks, questions. That's it.

That's all I have for witnesses. Yes. Any other comments or questions from members of the planning board? Um I have one question. Were the fire and police involved in the TRC review? They were not present at the TRC meeting, but plans were forwarded to them um for comment and and you received no comments from the

any other comments or questions? So, um, members of the public, Lawrence Frank O'Donnell Road, it's my understanding that the comprehensive plan has no bearing on this application. Is that correct? Well, I guess it depends on what you mean by no bearing.

Well, in talking with Mr. Crochi pre previously during the comprehensive plan committee meeting, he seemed to think that the reference to the comprehensive plan uh was really not suitable for these types of discussions. Well, maybe I'm incorrect in that. Well, the uh the comment had to do with uh we we could not use the comprehensive plan to uh reject anything in terms of the required findings. That's something that has changed recently in state law that for a special use permit. Um there's no longer a required finding for consistency with the comprehensive plan. So that has changed. Thank you. I go ahead.

Well, we still like to be uh consistent with the comprehensive plan. Okay. And I have question the HVAC system, where will that be located? Uh what is the distance from the nearest residential dwelling? Yeah. And what is the decibel unit the decibel reading at that nearest residential reading?

Can you would address that? Maybe on the site plan point out um I don't know if we have an exact distance. Maybe you could go up and point out where that's located. The unit's going to be located as close to the building as possible outside the walkway. Approximately in this location here from the edge of the building to the property line is approximately 100 ft. How many?

100 ft. So the residents are beyond that. Um these HVAC systems um typically don't have a high volume noise to them. That has not been specked out in um speaking with the architect. So I I can't confirm exactly what the decibel level of that unit will be. Uh additionally though, we have the vegetative screening there. Correct.

Correct. The unit will be uh surrounded by vegetation as well. Could I just ask uh I just for purposes of understanding uh if is Mr. Frank, are you uh an abuter? Okay. Wanted to know for purposes of it. Understood. Other members of the public?

Matthew Krosenski, 110 Wintergreen Drive. I'm also the secretary of the conservation committee on Middletown. Um recent appointee. Um I have a mechanical engineering background. So I was just actually curious about the HVAC system. Is that going to be an electric heat pump? Um, so the site is carbon neutral on paper.

Uh, yeah, the plan for this since it's one open space would be your traditional mini split system. So, we'll probably have like two condensers and then there'll be the cassette units on the inside. So, it'll be electrical. Yeah, that'll actually be great for promotion. Um, also my second ask was clarifying that path um that was mentioned earlier. Is that the path um going to the north? And well, if we use the top of the screen as north um is that the path that you guys are trying to get the variance for? Can someone clarify that please? Take the microphone. Well, [laughter] to get

my understanding is that the town requirement is for a pathway from Valley Road up to the at least the initial facility here. So, it is not the pathway coming from uh Buck Road.

Okay. The only reason I ask is um like I did notice I actually just looked it up the site on Google Mapath and there does seem to be some paths um semi-permanent paths there just people obviously using their bicycles. So um I don't know if it's a future consideration that if you do actually connect the gravel path northwards like I said that's north. um you might actually get more business opportunity for your mini golf course and for your arcade because you're going to have people on bicycles and walking from the top of your property coming down and instead of having to drive and have their parents come in, they may be able to say, "Hey, I can just walk to your arcade and spend some time there." So, um I don't know if that is something you want to consider in the future um or not, but if we're trying to promote Middletown as a walkable, multimodal communication place, you mentioned your own property is very car- centric, very car oriented. Um, I think you're in a good spot to slowly but surely enable people who may not be able to drive yet in that teenage age um range to pro um utilize your property more efficiently without having uh you know the soccer mom drive their kid to your property and um you know use your facility. So that's all I had though. Thank you.

Thank you. Um Mrs. Zas said he gets a lot of walking pedestrian traffic from that. Is there a path there? Now there is no formal path but there has been one created through habit traffic

and I will I will also add that all that traffic is not always beneficial traffic. um you know, we find shopping carts back there. There there are some issues with the amount of traffic um from that back area that we've we've tried to do our best to allow those that need to use that as a shortcut um but also be mindful of what's what's going on back there. Anyone else from the public who wishes to speak? Nobody online. Nobody online. So, may I have a motion to close the public hearing? So, moved.

Second. Motion is made and seconded to close the public hearing. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. Oppose. Nay. Votes I. Public hearing is closed. Uh, may I have a motion? Do we have to take these in a particular order, Ron? So, typically when it's a unified review, you'll do the zoning first. So consideration of the um request for the special use permit should be addressed first. Yeah.

And then attached to that motion um you've got the four conditions that were recommended by the technical review committee. And then as we just talked about regarding the four waiverss that have been addressed or will be addressed that those be converted into conditions that would be satisfied by submitting revised plans prior to permitting. So all of this is under the special use permit. I would Yeah, you would apply those conditions to the special. Okay. So may I have a a vote to approve the request for a special use permit subject to the findings or conditions from the TRC and the additional four conditions that were applied for the waiverss. So moved.

Second. Second.

We have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Steve, I wanted to uh suggest an additional condition that addresses the concern regarding that this that the use could be a a nuisance and of course to succeed with us it has to not be a nuisance and that relates to the management and operations question that uh we've discussed and I know Mr. Savas has been very good about this, but I my condition is that um the owner develop and update as appropriate a management operations plan addressing noise and safety considerations and that senior management shall oversee and enforce the operations plan and that lesser staff shall be trained with respect to the rules. That's okay. All right. So, we will add that condition also. That okay with the maker of the motion?

Yes, it is. Second. Second. Okay. So, we have uh an amended motion with uh for the um approval of the special use permit. Is there any further discussion? No. All those in favor say I. I. Oppose. Nay. Chair votes I. Motion passes. Now a motion to approve the land development project. Okay. So may I have a motion to approve the land development project to uh develop this arcade building. So moved with the findings in the same conditions. Ah to the same conditions. Correct. Move it BJ. Correct.

Motion is made and seconded uh to approve the land development project subject to the same conditions. There any discussion? All those in favor say I. I. Oppose. Nay. Chair votes I. Motion passes. Good luck with it.

Oh, Ron. What about the one remaining waiver? We sold the public hearing. You didn't vote on that. Was that part of the approval? That was part that should have been part of the motion for the for the land development project. Did we modify that? Thank you. Oh, you should we do that as a separate motion?

Can we do that as a separate motion? Okay. May I have a motion um to approve the one remaining waiver? So moved. Second. Motion is made and seconded to approve the one remaining waiver regarding the uh sidewalk from the street to the facility. Is there any further discussion? All those in favor say I. I post nay. Chair votes I. Motion passes.

Next public hearing. Next item on the agenda is item 5B, a public hearing. Request of the town of Middletown for master plan approval for an affordable housing comprehensive permit application submitted pursuant to Middletown zoning ordinance article 17 low and moderate income housing comprehensive permit for develop uh for development of 36 units of affordable single family and multif family housing. Property is located at 351, 361, and 393 East Main Road, assesses plat 113, lots 22,23, and 23A. The application includes requests for adjustments from sections of the Middletown Zoning Ordinance, Town Code Chapter 152, as follows. Paragraph 602 to allow a multifamily development project. We are not permitted in the R20A zoning district. Paragraph 72 to allow more than one principal building on a single lot. Paragraph 1500 to allow multif family dwelling units without complying with every provision of article 15. Paragraph 1504 to allow a lot area of 271,218 square feet where a minimum of 360,000 square ft is required for the number and size of proposed dwelling units. Paragraph 1505 to allow less than the required amount of open space. Paragraph 1507 to allow parking within 25 ft of a dwelling structure and paragraph 1508 to allow less than the required separation between principal buildings on the property. Mr. Reagan,

good evening. I have to open the public hearing. May I have a motion to open the public hearing? So moved. Second. Motion's made and seconded to open the public hearing. Any discussion? All those in favor say I.

Oppos? Nay. Public hearing is open. Thank you. Uh Mr. Chair, members of the board, Peter Regan, town solicitor on behalf of the town of Middletown. Uh this is an exciting project to construct 36 affordable home ownership units right across the street on land that was acquired by the town over the past 2 and a half years with the assistance uh of Rhode Island Housing. Uh with me tonight uh our town administrator Shawn Brown, who will describe the uh history of this project and the town's efforts to increase affordable housing. Uh Jason Kroll of Horsely Whitten Group, which is a civil engineer for this project. Uh Frank Spanella, who's the town's affordable housing consultant, and Todd Braen of Brian Associates, our traffic engineer. As noted, this is a comprehensive permit application under the Rhode Island Low and Moderate Income Housing Act. And as most of you know, the purpose of that act is to ensure the availability of affordable, accessible, and safe housing for residents of low and moderate income. uh both individuals and families. And to make sure that each municipality is doing what they can to encourage the creation of affordable housing, the act establishes the goal that each city or town um have at least 10% of their year-round housing made up by affordable units. Uh Middletown is currently at 6.1%. So, while we're making progress, we're still short of that goal. And the project we're reviewing tonight is part of the town's efforts to get that number up to 10. Uh, in fact, speaking with Ron uh earlier today, the addition of the 63 units that are currently being built at Rosebrook Commons uh will get us to 7% and these 36 units would bring us up to 7.4%. So, this project is an important part of achieving that goal. Uh all 36 of these units would be restricted to

individuals or families whose income is at or below 80% of area median income or AMI. And in terms of the makeup of the units, there are 17 single family three-bedroom units, two duplex buildings with three-bedroom units, and five triplex units also with three-bedroom units. Uh we are here tonight for master plan review. Uh, as you're aware, that includes a review of the overall design concept, the number of units, the layout, features of the site and surrounding area, the public improvements, and potential neighborhood impacts. It is a somewhat conceptual review that does not include the full detailed engineering, a full traffic study, landscaping, or detailed architectural plans. And those items will take place uh at the preliminary plan phase. But even so, uh, master plan approval is an important step for this project because it will allow the town to seek further funding for the project from the state and also to put out an RFP for a development partner to work with the town to build these units. Uh, as the chair noted, we're seeking several adjustments from what the zoning code would require. Uh, the application noted six adjustments. I will note that there is one uh that we do not need which is number five which is the amount of open space. Uh at the time that we filed the application um it wasn't clear whether the vegetative buffers and the um storm retention areas would be included as open space. But if you look at the definition in article 15 of uh open space is defined as all land uncovered by buildings or vehicular traffic, maneuvering or parking including garages. Those areas would count as open space and that gives us enough open

space based on the requirement that we have at least three times the amount of the total floor air for the project. So that uh adjustment which is number five uh can be removed. Um and in considering those adjustments under the act u it requires the board to balance the need for affordable housing with what the zoning code would otherwise require. Uh lastly before we begin uh the project has been reviewed by the technical review committee as well as the roads and utilities committee and and I believe that you have their recommendations. Uh but they provide a positive recommendations with certain conditions all of which were fine with. Uh with that what I'd like to do is to call up Shawn Brown to just give you a brief uh background on how we got to this point. Mr. Chairman, Sean Brown, town administrator for the town of Middletown. Uh, Attorney Regan had asked me just to walk through the timeline and how we came about to purchasing and developing this property. So, I'm just going to quickly run through it. Uh, what I'm going to talk about is basically 351 East Main Road, 361 East Main Road, and 393 East Main Road. Those are the three properties that we're we've acquired. uh for the purposes of developing affordable housing. This process started in April of 2022, at which time we signed a purchase and sales agreement with the owners of 361 East Main Road and 393 East Main Road. In April of 2023, uh we secured uh through Rhode Island Housing and Mortgage Finance Corporation uh a sign a funding grant to pay for the property in the amount of $994,680 uh to fund the purchase of the property.

Uh, additionally, in April of 2023, the town uh entered into a land bank loan with Rhode Island Housing in the amount of $314,820 to complete the purchase price. Uh, in April of that year, also, the town administrator was approved uh to sign and execute the documents to purchase the property. And in October of 2023, the property to purch uh the paperwork necessary to purchase the property was executed. Um, also at that same time, um, we started to look at, um, 351 East Main Road, the property directly across the street, which has the the White House on it. Um, we at that time in October 23, basically uh, we we had been talking to the neighbor, Ron Marx. Uh, we signed a purchase and sales agreement with Ron. Uh in November of 2023, the town received an ARPA pre-development grant of $250,000 from Rhode Island Housing. Additionally, we were in June of 2024, we received a $345,000 state acquisition grant in the amount of $345,000 towards the purchase. And at that time, the council authorized again myself, the town administrator, to purchase the property. Um that purchase took place in June 28th of 2024. uh working with the affordable housing committee in May 1st of 2025, the affordable housing committee voted to approve the mixed development of that property, which is what is before you this evening. Um and on May 19th, 2025, the council basically ratified the affordable housing committee's recommendation for the development, which as Mr. Regan had said is 36 units of home ownership which is comprised of

17 single family homes, 19 multif family town houses all at or below the 80% area median income. Um all the units are being permitted as three-bedroom homes. Uh however, most of the town homes will likely be two-bedroom. And as the presentation goes on, the uh project manager, engineer, and architect will provide greater detail to the board. Question Mike. So, so uh the u the land is going to be owned by the town, but the uh the people will purchase the the homes. Is that the process?

Correct. the town will retain the property that will remain essentially uh uh it'll have a restriction on it so that it it's perpetually held for uh affordable housing. Um the homes themselves will be purchased by the individuals and that that's a model we have elsewhere in the town through church community. Uh there are a number of properties that are similar to this. The fact that the owners are buying homes but not the land is a key factor that makes it affordable. Correct. Correct. It is so and Mr. Spinella will will give you a little bit more indepth explanation on how this model

okay the um the designation of a low income that's um usually for a period of 30 years is that correct? Uh technically yes. What happens after that 30 years? Um yeah Frank will talk about that but essentially the idea is that will continue um unless you want to pay back the money from Rhode Island. We can wait till we'll wait.

Yes. Any other questions? Yeah. You know Leon and then Leon and BJ. Okay. Um just a question on why was this uh particular parcel um selected for this type of development? Why wouldn't we, you know, build this type of housing on parcels that are already owned by the town of Middletown? Uh the affordable housing committee had looked at actually parcels that are owned by the town and um through that process as well as review with the town council. None were identified for uh construction home ownership projects like this um this this parcel became available um I believe it was actually identified by our affordable housing consultant and uh we took advantage of the opportunity to purchase the property. Um again, originally we looked at 351 and 361 uh which is the parcel on the east side of the development. That that was the first parcel to become available. Uh and then we approached the neighboring property owner. Uh we we became somewhat aware that he was looking to relocate. Um and looking at the ability to join the two parcels u it gave us the ability to have a much larger development.

Okay. Um it is on the bus route which is you know desirable. Um, so that was that was another factor we looked at and the proximity to the high school which will eventually become the combined elementary school as well. Correct. Yes. Excuse me. I do have a question on the property management, the physical property management. If someone buys the house, who's going to maintain the outside grass or will trees be planted? How is that going to be man? I'll let Mr. Spanella talk about that when he describes the ownership model

but there will be to the point about trees there will be at preliminary plan phase a a excellent thank you have another question um with regard to um this is a fairly dense uh development for the size of the parcel um and there's a lot of relief being requested here in variances um would you say that if if the relief is not um provided and the variances are not provided that this development is possible. Um I'll let Mr. Spanella respond to that. But but I can say

as we've seen in the past on these projects, um

in order to get the necessary funding to make them viable and and to get them actually constructed, um there has to be a sufficient amount of density to make it worthwhile. Um and yes, we're asking for a density um bonus to a certain extent, but with a project that is 100% um affordable versus 10 or 25% here. So, um we understand that 36 units is a fair amount, but if you've been out, you've been out to the site, those of you at the site visit, it's a large site. Um, you know, it's it's surprising when you got and when I went back out there to look at it, it's surprising and how large it is. And, you know, the factors that Sean talked about in terms of being on the bus route, being adjacent to the school, those sorts of things made it, you know, sort of an ideal site for young families to to perhaps get their first homes here. So, so yeah, it's there there's always a balance between not being too dense but being dense enough that you can actually get funding in a very competitive environment.

Now I I have a question. Is is the um consolidation of the three lots is that part of our consideration this evening or how does that happen? Yeah, eventually there will be administrative subdivision that will have to be approved. So that'll go just to you. Well, it can be submitted as part of the preliminary plan. You can make it you can certainly make it a condition of any approval, but the plan is to combine all of those lots to one lot, but it'll come in with the preliminary plan review, you're saying? Yeah. Okay. Another question.

Yeah. Lean, is there any concern? So, so there is, and maybe I'm not sure if this is a question for you or Mr. Spanella or whoever. Um but there are a significant number of uh residential units or yeah residential units being constructed in this immediate vicinity. Um there's the KBH building with I believe 82 units. There is the Graange um project which I think has 18 and now there there is this project which has 36 is proposes 36 units which makes it 136 units literally within a half a mile. Is there any concern uh about the traffic impact on East Main Road with all of this additional uh residential housing?

That's something that I can have um Mr. Brighton address. I can tell you that when the full traffic study is done, one of the things that they will do is take a look at everything that's happening in that same general area. Um, not just looking at this site in a vacuum, but taking a look at the entire uh area. So, yeah, because we've raised that concern. There's this uh traffic creep that's happening with every single project we're we're um approving really. And eventually, none of these are online yet, so we're not going to know the impact until we actually live it. So, that's something that I think we all need to take into account. That's certainly something that uh Mr. Braen can address.

Okay. But that u of Mr. Spanella answer some of those more detailed questions. Chairman, members of the board, I' I'd like to first address the identify yourself, please. Frank Spanella, housing consultant to the town of Middletown.

Um the density question that Mr. Amaran asked. The state law that was passed last year, if it's 100% affordable, um you're allowed 12 units per acre. This is a 6.2 acre site, so if you do the math, it's 74 units that would fit by state law, by right on the site. And so 36 is a far cry from that. Um, and in terms of the the question of whether or not reducing the number of units would impact the ability for for funding and uh and having a viable project.

So we we've done a study in the town of what's really needed and we need housing at every level. We need we need home ownership. We need rental. I think some of the affordable rental developments that are being built right now are helping there, but we have never built an affordable home ownership development in the town of Middletown. So, this is an opportunity. Um, we we knew it would be somewhere. Initially, we only had half the site um which was on the market, which is why we we we purchased it and we were able to receive a grant for that. So, um, at the end of the day, the town will be out $0 for this this 6.2 acres piece of property. Um, to make it less dense would just would would help the problem a little, but not it. The more units we can build anywhere is better. Um, we think that this is a nice mix because we've we've gotten single families and town homes will have different affordability levels. Uh, which means that the that we can serve a whole lot more people. And we hear every day how people grew up here, can't afford to stay here, and their kids can't stay here. Um, and they just want to purchase a home. And we [clears throat] just This helps. It doesn't solve the problem, but it gets us helping.

Can you explain how the home ownership model works?

Sure. So, the because the town through probably a land trust would own the property, we would keep it affordable forever. Uh the minimum requirement to make the statute work is 30 years. However, uh because of the land trust model, it would be in perpetuity that it would remain affordable. So, what that means is is someone who qualifies when they when they purchase the house, um they're income eligible. If their if their income increases, they don't have to leave. It just means that when they sell, the purchase price is based on what 80% of median income at that time is. So, if it's five years from now, HUD comes out with a number every year. Um and we they would just have to sell to someone who is also income eligible at that time

and that ensures that the property remains affordable.

Correct. There's a deed restriction placed on the property forever. And I mean if if I can tell you what 80% of median for different family sizes means today. Obviously when we come to market it'll change a little bit but today a family of one um can earn up to 72,948. A family of two 83,400. A family of three 93,84 and a family of four 104,196. That's today. I'd looked that up today just to verify it because it changes um based on where we are and what the what the median

uh and can you take a moment to move in please Mike I'm I' I've got a cold I'm just trying to

can you please take a moment to describe the units that are and actually this will be good because maybe Ron can bring up the uh the elevations to describe the the types of units that are Sure. So, we have we have two types of homes. These are the single family homes. Um, and almost all of them would be threebedrooms. They um they'd all have classic New England looks with um hardy plank sustainable features. Um, Rhode Island housing is going to almost all ground source heat pumps or or just heat pumps. Uh so that because uh we're we're trying to make them as sustainable as they can be.

So so these houses are specifically designed to reduce the cost of ownership in those ways as well. Correct. Yeah. So long-term affordability is important not just getting someone in a cheap home. It's long-term affordability. So maintenance prices down and and u that would stay for a long time. So, you know, these homes have uh the single families all for the most part have three bedrooms uh all upstairs and um we built these homes throughout the state.

You have already built these homes throughout the state. We Yes. You do. You know, in fact, so I'm sorry. No, go ahead. Go ahead. So, we we actually built um some of them in Newport, right? Um on Hillside Avenue, uh for the Newport Housing Authority in their home ownership program, and they still look amazing right now with this same architect.

So, uh I have a question. So uh when people buy homes I guess they look at that as an investment you know so uh and as something that they can build equity in you know so uh if they're [clears throat] sort of constrained you know by this I want does that affect the motivation of a person to maintain their property and you know how does that impact the overall so the there is like any other I if you looked at the site plan again um there's an association

that the single family homes would have a leased area where they would they would maintain their own lots um and the multifamilies would all be maintained by the association. So the fact that there are so many people right now in need of a home um we don't expect any problem with with maintenance and we've seen that across the country that um the opportunity to own a home in Middletown for the prices that these will be at is unheard of. You can't get a home under $400,000. A new home, which these would be all um around $399 or lower for the town homes because they're serving the 80% of median folks and they are building equity. They're just not building equity at the market rate. So they they can sell at the time to someone who's at the same income level at the time. So if they're here 10 years, um conceivably the 80% of median number would rise. It won't rise as the market does like we've seen since COVID three times over, but it would rise and so that they won't lose money, but they won't make the equity that they could have made buying a market rate home, but they're also getting a very discounted home um to start. Leon,

I have Are you finished with your overall present? Okay. I have no idea. I have several questions. No, go ahead. No, please go ahead and All right. I I mean, I have several questions. I can wait. You have more, Peter. Um, I was just going to ask to explain the process of actually getting a project like this from where we are now to actually construction.

Sure. So, um, the way we're working it, um, I don't think it's anyone anyone's shocked by the fact that that municipalities are not great developers. Um, so we would be seeking a development partner to take it from this point on, apply for funding. Uh, there's a home ownership round coming out in the beginning of the spring. So, we would apply for funding to start that process. And there are probably six sources of funds that make this affordable but um that we would need subsidies. So the first one we've already gr gotten which is almost a million5 in acquisition pricing. So um we've received that million5. We also received the $250,000 grant that I think that Mr. Brown was discussing um for all the pre-development costs for all our engineering up to this point. Uh engineering architecture uh has all been paid out of that grant. So it's still it's cost the town zero. Um we would then the we're we're developing an RFP for a development partner who would come in actually take it from that point um finish the approvals with our help and then ultimately build it.

And Frank, how does one go about being in a position because there's 36 units. there's probably going to be more than 36 people who would love to buy one of these things. How does that process work?

In in other communities that I've I've done this model in, we've had lotteryies. And so we would have criteria um all following fair housing, but we would we would have a lottery because there are almost always overs subscribed. Uh we might have we might have three or four times as many people asking to purchase these homes that are qualified. So, we'd have criteria. We we'd love to be able to serve people who live and work in town. Um, uh, have grown up here, we'd have different points for for a whole bunch of things that we we've done before. So, um, the all taking into account fair housing, we can't violate fair housing.

So, so that was that was a question that I had. Could middle existing Middletown residents be prioritized for a project like this with regard to fair housing? We would mark it locally first. Okay. No. And who makes the ultimate is it a blind lottery at some point or is there for the most part it's a once once they're you've gotten people that are qualified because you've got to make sure that they can either buy it cash or support a mortgage um and are in the income level once they're qualified once we've gotten a final number then there'd be a a lottery and it would be a blind lottery.

Okay. Um, with regard to that process, so I think you answered it. Um, if the town doesn't hold a note or anything, this is private. They would all Rhode Island Housing is is probably the largest um, mortgage provider for uh, first-time home buyers. They have great programs. There are other many many lenders uh many on the island that also work with Rhode Island Housing Mortgages. Um so as long as they get their mortgage from someone else, we would not be part of that. And Rhode Island Housing does not have to be involved in in that mortgage. It's they don't have to be. No, but that's an that's an option. They are certainly one of the options,

right? Um I mean I can keep going if anyone else has um I totally believe in the home ownership model. So, I I love projects like this a lot more than I love the renting model. Um, there's a need for all of them. There is, but I think home ownership uh encourages um more vested, you know, interest in the town and a longer term, you know, um relationship with the town. We need to have coffee. Yeah. I I love that model. Um so, you mentioned a price point. Yeah,

I know you're very experienced in building these and even locally. Um, a concern I have is, you know, these projects do, uh, tend to, you know, sp they sometimes spiral with costs, unknowns, you know, you start you hit ledge or something like that. Um, how how would you guarantee a price point of 3.99 or lower? Well, they they have to be. It it's all income driven. It has nothing to do with the cost. Okay. It's a matter of how much subsidy the the ultimate developer gets.

Okay. And what happens if the if if I mean it has to be viable for the town? I'm assuming and you can maybe correct me if I'm wrong that this is a a nonprofit endeavor by the town. The town's not profiting from this from these sales. Correct. How do we ensure that the town does not lose? So So once we've designated a developer, the developer then takes all the risk. We just become the landlord for the for the dirt.

Okay. Um, and that developer goes to Rhode Island Housing. And I can tell you their their construction and development department at Rhode Island Housing requires in a in a development like this, they'll require borings at every road, at every foundation to to before they'll put any subsidy dollars into it so that they can we can know as much as we can about the site. Um, who bears that cost? Is that the town prep like

out of the construction budget? you know the the developer would with the subsidy. I mean I think so in the initial numbers that I presented um I show of a total development cost of roughly $19 million. Of that 19 million, we had one, two, three, um, at least half of that was subsidy by Rhode Island Housing, by HUD, by CDBG funds. Um, the Federal Home Loan Bank does a an affordable housing program for this very thing where they'll give you a um a grant of a million dollars. Um, we already received the million5 in in the the site acquisition money. Um, we'd ask the infrastructure bank. They provide uh grant funds for con uh constructing the roads um which I've done in other communities. Um other subsidies from Rhode Island housing of a million too. Community development block grant we can get up to a half a million. Um the pre-development funds we've already gotten. So there are several they call that the capital stack in these deals. And so there there are many sources of funds that buy down the purchase price and that's how we get to a number that makes sense um because we always have to go in any affordable housing development whether it's rental or or home ownership you have to back into your costs based on what you can either rent for or sell for and that's restricted by HUD and Rhode Island Housing. They come out with maximum numbers based on income and and that's the max you can sell for and then we back into on the cost side how we pay for that how we make up the difference.

Okay. And then just another question on that deed restriction. There's I did read through the uh um the legal document and it does mention the 30-year deed deed restriction. Yeah. In that um covenant or whatever in the current covenant. Okay. All the sources of funds that I mentioned will all have their own deed restrictions that we'll require. And once we put it in a trust, we will ensure just like when we buy open space as the town, any of that land is open space in per perpetuity. So similarly that this would be the same. Okay. And I didn't 30 is the minimum, not the max.

Okay. I didn't read it in detail, but can you explain? I mean, I'm I'm assuming someone can't buy this, buy one of these properties and then rent it. No, you need to be owner occupant. That's going to be one of the requirements of any of the funding sources. Okay. So, it has to be owner, right? Owner occupied. If someone is, you know, wants to buy a different house, move or whatever, they would be um they can't rent it. So, so who get so they they sell it, but who who manages that sale? Is that another selection process with the Rhode Island housing or So, they can sell to anyone who's income eligible at that point. Who man who

So, there are agencies throughout the state that um that are called monitoring agencies and those monitoring agencies have to certify that next buyer is income eligible. Right. in this area, church community does the monitoring or there's the housing network and and that does it statewide. So, those are two of the agencies and when we actually record the deed um once we're closed and and when we're building um we have to identify who that monitoring agent is and and

and then we have a def a de facto one if that monitoring agency goes out of business. So we would Rhode Island housing would ultimately be if one of the other agencies was gone. Okay. And then just to parlay on Mike's point, um there is a you said that there's going to be a um an HOA. Yes. Who who are the members of the HOA? So again, that the developer

the developer would would set that up with our assistance, but yes, the homeowners would be the members of the HOA. Um, and the land would be managed by the developer, um, who would be our agent as the town because they're leasing it from us, even if it's a dollar. Um, but then ultimately the homeowners would pay a fee, which is factored into their mortgage. Um, and so that further brings the purchase price down because there's be some home ownership fee, which would be for grounds maintenance and that sort of thing. The town would maintain the road. The town maintains the road.

Town would maintain the road. So that HOA fee, I'm going to get into fees now. Great, great segue. Um I is that something that is um um like restricted. I don't know what that question. So I mean, so you said there's there's an HOA. So, there's an HOA fee that covers the management of some, you know, common property. Yeah. Um, obviously those costs rise. You said that there's a developer that's going to be involved, I guess, in perpetuity. Yes. Right.

Um, does the developer say, "Okay, the HOA is going up this year." So, it would they would build a reserve account for like the multif family buildings would not maintain their structure. the single family homes would maintain their own structures

and then the association would maintain the grounds of the multif family buildings. So um they would have different portions of shares. It it it can get you know you can go down the line for a lot of things. So and the costs we would write in that they had to be the bare minimum to operate the facility. So it's not like somebody could make money on the HOA fees. That would that would defeat the purpose. Sure. And um you mentioned um the HOA fees would cover the grounds. Does it also cover like the roofs, the exterior like any

Yeah, that's to be determined by by the model like Church Community Housing. If they were the selected developer, they they know this model inside and out. And their model allows for they they do everything on the outside. Um, and then everything on the inside is by the homeowner.

That's certainly one model. We would we would work with them between Peter's office and Sean's office and mine and and we would make sure that the residents who are now residents of the town of Middletown would be protected in the best way. So, it wouldn't just be the developers go taking it and running with it. We would all be part of it still and that would be part of our our discussions at that point. Okay. Final question, I think. Um, how are these properties taxed? So, the because we're we're retaining ownership of the land. Tax day, by the way.

Yeah. And because we're we're um retaining ownership of the land, they're only being taxed on the building. And they're being taxed on the building based on the lower purchase price and what that [clears throat] value is, not the replacement cost. Um, in the rental world, it's 8 8% of effective gross income is the state law, but they can only be taxed at 8%. And, um, in the home ownership world, it's at the this the affordable sales price versus the market rate home. And that's another way that the affordability or the cost of ownership is is lowered.

It keeps it affordable because of that lower tax. So just just a philosophical question. Why wouldn't we have that? You said that last one was your last one. Yeah. Well, that that my real question. This is a philosophical one. You have a lot of experience developing properties affordability. Why wouldn't we why wouldn't everyone we would like to make Middletown affordable for everyone? Correct. So why wouldn't a model like that where the tax the taxes be kind of stabilized for everybody? Um, why wouldn't that be a a good idea for the rest of town? Our taxes, our taxes, I can't answer that question, but I can tell you

your opinion. I have you in front of me, so I'd like to ask the question. um the if someone were willing to deed restrict their property, I think that that should be you and and that is one of the models in other communities that if a resident is willing to put a deed restriction on their property, then it would be taxed at the lower level. whether they had an affordable rental apartment in their two family home or they were um wanted to stay in their home and couldn't afford to stay in their home. If they put that 30-year deed restriction on it, then it would be taxed accordingly. Interesting. That's maybe But you can't get the benefit of

you can't get the benefit of a low tax and then sell it at market rate. It just that I get it. But there's also the people that are aging out. they don't work anymore and you know they their houses keep getting assessed higher and higher and they get just taxed out of and that's that's a different problem but but in terms of the affordability because we know that in this area it's the land values that increase much more rapidly than the building values. So there is some stability for the people that buy these homes because they're somewhat insulated from some of those larger increases because they don't own the land. Sure. And I I admire that model and I love that it exists in this case. I would just like it to exist in other cases.

Yeah, it can. I talked short-term rentals. Sorry. And then Charlie. Oh, hey Ron. I have a question on design requirements. Can we are there any design requirements that we that are imposed on these? The one thing I can tell you is that there is no plan to request any waiverss from any of the design or material requirements under the town racks. Are we going to go for like a a New England style, you know, uh absolutely townhouse type of approach? Absolutely.

Well, all the homes are going to be limited to a certain square footage, no garages type of thing. Um, I think that there there'd be an ability on the single families to build a garage if if they chose to if at some point in the future. We're not planning garages now, but there there is that ability and the drainage and all the calculations are are taking that into account and and other options for different styles of homes that we can mix up, you know, would meet the requirements. So, it wouldn't be on all everything, right?

Yeah. And I apologize that the architects are not available to be here tonight. They're actually there's a deadline for rental housing funding requests middle of this month and they are working on a number of other pro affordable housing projects that need to meet that deadline. So who who are the architects Peter Union Studio uh Frank I want to commend you for the work you do. Thank you so much. Uh I probably built a hundred of these small single families that you're proposing back when I was a very young man and uh you don't see them anymore, right? Not on this island, right?

So it's very exciting project and thank you for your Thank you. BJ, was your question answered about maintenance of the yard area? I believe so. Yes, it was. That's why I haven't said anything more because I'm fascinated with how that's going to be coordinated. It's a great opportunity for the town. Yeah, Peter, there's uh one of the things that says um the project does not comply with certain sections of article 15. Could you elaborate on that?

Yeah, so that's sort of a catch-all provision. So the first section of article 15 says multif family development projects have to comply with all the provisions of article 15. There are several that were requesting adjustments for. One is the lot size or the density. Um the other were a couple of the dimensional requirements. Um let me pull that up. Um, so the lot size, um, the, um, the fact that some of the parking areas are located within 25 ft of some portions of the buildings, the fact that we've got more than one uh, principal dwelling unit on the lot.

So these are the things that So yeah, so those are the things. So, so anytime you need you you need an adjustment or variance from any of those sections of article 15, you need a variance from that one section that says you got to comply with every 15. So, that's that's that's sort of a catchall is there's nothing specific about that one. Any other questions for Mr. Spanella? Well, you did a great job, but I have other questions, but uh I I'm not sure Frank is the one. Uh you saw the comments from the roads and utilities committee.

Yes. Yes. And what I was going to do is have uh Jason Crawl come forward uh who's our civil engineer and walk you through the site plan, the circulation and can address and some of those comments.

Good evening, Mr. Chairman and members of the board. Jason Kroll, senior design engineer Whitten Group. Uh Jason, you've uh actually appeared before this board on other projects and been recognized as an expert in the area of civil engineering. Yes, I have. As as well as before other boards throughout the state. Yes. I'd ask that Mr. McCroll be recognized as an expert in civil engineering. Any objections? So recognized. Uh could you start by just reviewing the existing site conditions?

Sure. Could Ron, can you put it to the existing conditions plan, please? That that'll that'll pro that'll do. Um I'll just stick where you got it. Okay. Yeah. All right. So, here's this is actually the erosion control plan, but this shows the overall basically the lot as it is with the existing development. So, as Sean mentioned, the site is located on the south side of East Main Road, designated by the town as flat map 113, lots 223 and 23A. The total lot area is approximately 6.2 2 acres. The topography of the site slopes in a westerly direction with the high point of elevation 146 on the northern corner on the low point uh and a low point elevation of 106 along the westerly property line has about a 7% uh slope across the overall lot. Lots 22 and 23A are developed parcels each with a house and detached garage, both currently unoccupied. Lot 23 is primarily undeveloped with a singlestory structure located in the northeast corner and all of these structures and associated utilities will be raised with the proposed development. All the properties are located within an R20 zone as has been previously mentioned. Um they are located within Bailey Brooks wershed and they are also located in a traffic sensitive medium density residential district.

What utilities are available on site? Um, I will get into that, but currently the site has available municipal water, sewer, uh, electric, and there's also gas out on East Maine. I don't know if that we'll be connecting into that though. U, so, as I was saying, um, the site is also within a, uh, the site is not within a state designated natural heritage area or wildlife habitat area. The site is also not a historical site, an archaeological site or a scenic area. Uh the site is not located in any flood hazard overlay districts. Uh if you could move on to the proposed please. So here you can see the proposed site development consists of 36 units. We have 17 single family units on the outside of the perimeter. Two duplex units and five triplex units. The single family units will have a typical stacked parking like a driveway of a con conventional home each with two cars. Uh 36 parking spaces are provided for the duplex and triplex units which equals just under two spaces per unit. We have an additional 17 parking spaces on street um for the development and that brings a total number of parking spaces per unit to over 2.3. Access to the property will be with a singular 22- foot wide two-way entrance servicing a private looped road. The private looped road will have 12 foot wide travel lanes. An additional emergency access drive which is currently not shown in this plan. We are just showing a pedestrian access, but we will widen that for an emergency access uh to the property to the south.

Could you just show? Sure. So, right here is a pedestrian access. We will widen this and it will allow this will be allowed for emergency vehicle access. We'll probably lose an additional parking space here. Um, but this will just be for emergency access. And we'll limit this with some ballards um to keep people from traveling down that other than emergency use. And that uh pedestrian pathway leads to what will eventually be the new combined elementary school. Correct. Correct.

And and Mr. Crow, you um said there'll be 17 on street parking spaces. Do you mean on the loop road? So yeah. So scattered about again on the on the looped road you'll have some We have uh on street parking here, a space here, some kind of scattered about the site. There'll be some on street parking. So those again could be for visitor parking or for overflow parking for the for anybody who's in the community. Parking on East Main. Yeah, I I was going to say I don't know they'd fit on East Main, right? And you said that emergency path you intend to widen it to be an emergency access for vehicles.

Correct. We would we would widen that so that would be accessible by fire trucks and emergency vehicles and it would not be paved. It would be of a material that could be uh suitable for H20 loading, but it would be like a concrete paver type block. and and how would you um restrict it from every ordinary use but allow it for emergency use? I would envision it would either be gated or there would be a removable ballards so that people couldn't simply drive through there and we do have other neighborhoods in town where there are similar access points that are uh controlled by either police or fire and the details will come later I assume.

Absolutely. Um so again the property will be serviced by municipal water sewer underground electric. Uh trash and recycling will be handled by um individual enclosures. So you can see on the individual single family units there's just a small trash and recycling enclosure on the end of the driveways. On the uh on the duplex and triplex units again there'll be shared uh trash and recycling enclosures for those for those units. Um and then continuing on, storm water will be managed utilizing green storm water infrastructure which will include a combination of of water quality units and deep some catch basins as well as enhanced tree trenches for pre-treatment. Um that'll be followed by some subsurface storage which will provide um some infiltration um control and then it'll store it and then control it out of at a controlled release.

All right, the storm water. I know this is is preliminary so you haven't done the full engineering and at least through the preliminary phase. Have you seen anything that be an impediment to being able to

No, I have not. We have done some preliminary soil investigations which which turned out well. Um I think as you know the town of Middletown is not known for great infiltrating soils. However, this site is is better than some. So I am confident that I can create a a manageable storm water management plan. I I did want to ask a question on that. I didn't you you went quickly through your description of these storm water management areas. The term used in the materials is that there'll be swailes. That's a kind of awful sounding word to me. Uh we we've been getting um a lot of biodiversity ponds in terms of other applications we've had and rain gardens and the like. And I wonder Since this is townowned property, wouldn't we have a kind of leadership role in having low impact development?

Absolutely. And the I think it may that may have been a misunderstood um statement about a swells primarily. So, uh tree trenches are basically our green storm water infrastructure implementation. So, you're you're utilizing street trees in in that would be on the street. We have you would have a catch basin. So, the catch basin captures that water. It's capturing sediment and then that allows some of that water to go in the tree trench. So now the tree trench is taking up nutrients and providing pre-treatment. That water would then be conveyed to subsurface systems. Those subsurface systems would be scattered about the property. So there's where you would get your storage and retention to m so to basically maintain pre-development rates and runoff and and volumes. [snorts] So the so the site would have absolutely would would implement and green storm water infra infrastructure throughout the site. Is that the same thing as low impact?

Correct. Yes, it is. Thank you very much. The utility plan shows the gas lines coming in as well, right? We did show that and I think we just as as an option, but I don't know if if you know I think as we further develop this, you know, with with passive energy and they may not want the fossil fuels in in the site. Well, we did show the gas then because we had the gas available on East Main Road. Right. Okay. Thanks. And that's something that would be determined at the preliminary plan whether uh service was going to be. That's correct.

So, some of the funding sources from Rhode Island Housing would say no gas. So, right now, they don't allow gas on any of the um apartment complexes that we're building throughout the state. So, similarly, depending upon their funding source, we would we would um determine at that point. We're showing it just so that we in case we do need it depending upon where we end up um we have it. What is the reason for not not allowing gas as an option? Natural gas uh scarcity and it's not as green as as electric. Um

what if it's cheaper than electric? Isn't this whole thing about affordability? So the the new high efficiency systems um where Energy Star and with the heat pumps they're super efficient. Uh so it may not be more efficient or cheaper to run um gas. It's bizarre that if it's an option that's available, readily available at the curb, that it wouldn't at least be run in for a just in case electricity rates spike like they have been. Yeah.

Um, so I know that's probably a a restriction or regulation, but I would I would hope that if that's an opportunity to do it while it's being developed that the infrastructure is put in place.

Yeah, we're that's why we're showing it in case so we have options. So the so the project will require a UIC permit with Rhode Island DEM. So the stormwater design will follow the the Rhode Island DEM stormwater regulations manual. Um which will obviously ensure that there's no net increase in rate of volume of storm water runoff from the proposed development. Um because East Main Road is a state highway u we will also need to apply to to DOT for a physical alteration permit for the uh for the proposed entrance. And so talking about the proposed entrance, the the the town regulations, this section 501D street arrangement provide whenever possible, all development shall be provided with at least two means of access. Did you at least at this preliminary plan phase explore the option of having a second access point on uh East Main Road in addition to the emergency access on the rear of the site?

We did. We'd looked at alternate layouts and and one of those layouts um had an entrance way I guess on the northern corner of the property, but due to the the existing grades there, it's a really steep slope that comes off down onto East Main and that on that portion of the road, it just was not just didn't make sense. And in addition to that, and I think the traffic engineer can speak probably more of this than I can, I think you have some issues with sight distances there because you're you're kind of on the on the hump of the hill at that point. But that being said, whether it is possible to add a second entrance and comply with that requirement will be something that is addressed in the I know you're not doing but in the at the preliminary phase when the full traffic study is done.

Yes, that's correct. So before we even went to the TRC, we met with the police and fire departments and public works and [clears throat] this configuration with the one way in and out plus the emergency access to the school property was the preferred for them as well. So they've approved this design just so that everyone's aware.

Could I go? Let me ask a question. Did I want to go back um to the uh comments from the roads and utilities committee. You said you saw those. Yes, I did. Did you see the one about um the overflow onto Abaso properties in extreme storms? I did see that. Um let me walk over there.

So, so I did see that comment. Um, and we will obviously with our storm water design, we are not permitted or allowed to to increase any flows leaving our site. You do have the the low point on the property is in this general area and it's about 3 ft lower than here. So, I don't know if it's feasible for us to to swell or or to convey the water out to the to East Main Road. And typically, the DOT is not going to allow us to increase the same as we can't increase the rate of runoff to the neighbors here. DOT is not going to allow us to sit in any additional water or water that's not going there now. They're not going to they're not going to let us take water that's normally going here and direct to here. So, we're going to have to manage our storm water on site. But I can tell you with confidence that that'll be handled where there's not going to be an increase to those neighbors.

And to the extent that we can, we will try to see if there's any way to mitigate um the flow going to Wobbaso during large storm events. Yes. So during our site visit, you know, we we noticed that there was a considerable grade difference between the from north to south and uh I guess the plan is to regrade the property uh and kind of level that off. Yeah. So we would be proposing to to do a cut on the eastern portion or the uphill side of the property and basically pushing that material to the to the right if you're looking at the plane. But the eastern part is the top part of that drawing, right?

Yes. East would be the left side of the plan. So, so just to be clear, the property is not going to be flat at that. You're just going to The property will not be flat. It's just going to We're just softening that slope. Yes. Will that require retaining walls? You know, it will require some retaining walls. Yes. question. One other thing that we we touched on at the site visit was um if uh people in this complex wanted to uh walk to the library or to town hall or to the bus stop across the street. Could you address how they would do that?

I know that well we re we have pedestrian access from our site to to East Main Road and I know um there's sidewalks on East Main Road. So, the pedestrians would then either have to walk up East Main Road or down East Main Road to the to the light intersections where there'd be crosswalks there. And again, I can't speak into depth about the crosswalks, but I can tell you typically um DOT and others do not like what they call uh midblock crosswalks because that can cause problems with traffic. But there are crosswalks um at at the traffic lights, I believe. Yes, I believe there are in both directions.

Yes. So, if you're going to the library, you can come out and take a left, go down to that signal. Well, if you're going to Frosty Freeze, you come out and take a right and head up to that signal. You envision another traffic light being installed here with all this development happening? I would let the traffic engineer speak with that, but I would I would my opinion is no. I do not anticipate I I to the to the few times that I've been to the site, I've been surprised and then the ease that I've been able to pull out, it seems to time well with with the existing lights. Not to say that that happens all time, but the few times that I've been there, but that's certainly something that Mr. Great. We can address it. Any other questions for Mr. Cole? Other questions, comments? Thank you.

Thank you. Explained.

Good evening. Todd Brighten, Bryant Associates. Mr. Brighton, you are a professional engineer specializing in traffic. Is that correct? That is correct. In fact, you've been recognized by this board in the past as an expert with regard to the new middle high school project. Yes, I have. As well as many other boards throughout the state. That's correct. Ask that traffic engineering. Any objections? So recognized. So once again acknowledging that we're at the master plan phase rather than the preliminary plan. You did uh a preliminary study and report for this project. Is that correct? That's correct.

And if thisary plan phase, you would be conducting a full traffic stud. Is that correct? Yes. Would you just take a moment and walk the board through uh the steps that you took to conduct your analysis as well as your findings?

Yes. Um so, so we started off um reviewing the plans um seeing where the proposed driveway was. Um we did a field review of the area um primarily uh to look at site distance at the driveway but also to look at posted speed limits. Uh see what what's out there, sidewalks, that sort of thing. Um so uh the next thing we did is we estimated how much traffic the site would generate. So we used um it trip generation manual for that. Um and the the two land use codes um are single family detached housing which is for the 17 single family homes and then for the uh 19 uh duplex and triplex or the 19 units that comprised of duplexes and triplexes um single family attached housing is the use in um in the IT trip generation manual. Uh based on that uh those those two uses and the number of units um the the total new trips generated by the total 36 units would be um eight entering vehicles in the morning peak hour and 15 exiting vehicles. And the PM peak hour there would be 16 entering vehicles and 11 exiting vehicles. And throughout the course of an entire day there would be 149 vehicles entering, 149 vehicles exiting. Um so so in summary there's there's between 21 and 27 new trips entering and exiting in the peak hours. Um and then for the in terms of the the percentage of traffic to 298 new trips during the course of the entire day is uh approximately 1.6% um of the traffic on East Main Road. Um, so as was mentioned um by Jason, there are signalized intersections to the east and to the west um at Forest

Avenue and the Pel Plaza driveway to the east and uh Marshall's Plaza driveway and the Toyota dealership driveway to the west. And this this driveway is actually almost exactly centered between those two. Um so we we don't anticipate there being issues from those signals on the driveway. Um and also that as was also kind of mentioned is that there's gaps provided from the signals the way they operate. Um that does make it easier to to enter and exit the driveway. So in terms of the site distance um we use a 45 m mile per hour design speed which is 10 over the posted speed limit. Uh and and that requires um a site distance of 360 ft which is exceeded in both directions at the proposed driveway. Um in terms of site site circulation, this is also mentioned, but traffic will enter and exit the site from the proposed drive in East Main Road. Um parking will be located um in the driveways for the single family units and the parking spaces on the access roadways as well as the the loop road on site. There is proposed sidewalk within the site that will connect all of the units to East Main Road. Um, and there's also pedestrian path which as been mentioned is going to be um expanded also into an emergency access into the uh the back of the property towards the current high school which will be in the elementary school in the future.

Based on your preliminary view project have any adverse impact on the traffic in the area? Yeah, based on on the numbers we're looking at, we don't anticipate a significant impact to traffic in the area. And there was a question about whether or not the scale and size of this project would require any signaling. Uh not only would it not require, it would not meet any warrants. The traffic volumes are way too low to meet any warrants for signalization. Um and then with regard to the single access versus two access points, um that is something that will be as we'll do a deep dive on during the full traffic study. Is that correct?

Right. There there's other things to consider. Um the more access points you have, the more conflict points you have. So sometimes you want to reduce that for safety. The sight distance, as I was mentioned, sight distance as you go to the to the east up the hill does get worse. So you don't want to have a driveway too close to that to that hill because that would that would be substandard. Um and and also the most important thing probably is that it's a state road and DOT has to approve any any driveways questions questions I have a question. Um what one of the problems um that we have with uh all traffic studies is they take this incremental approach and so the conclusion is typically well it's not a big deal and that's we what we see in this study as well 1.6%. But how how is it affecting the capacity of the road? Can you comment on that?

As this study we have not looked at that yet. I think um as Mr. and said that we would look at that in more depth in the full traffic study and I think you mentioned earlier we also look at other in the area that haven't been approved. We can work with Ron on that uh to determine exactly what's out there in the area and then we can we can use that as as um as part of the background growth for the area uh to see what the impacts would be based on not only this development but other

others. Good. Very good. And in terms of just just to touch on those other developments where we've got some former commercial or office buildings that are being converted to residential, you can also see whether those changes result in an increase or decrease of traffic from those particular sites once again based on the use. Correct. the comments, questions also. BJ,

I would like to say I'd like I thoroughly appreciated all the information that has been uh given us and uh I think that I'm in the process right now of absorbing a lot of it. So, I want to thank you all so much for all the work that everyone has done on this project. That's all the witnesses that we have at this point. Le has any other questions?

Yes. Um I do have a couple questions more on the fees. Um with every development that happens in Middletown, every project, uh there's a development impact fee and permit fees. Um, will the town be collecting those fees on this project or is this a special uh situation? We're requesting because the town is retaining ownership that they would be waved. Okay. Why does the town get special treatment when the town builds projects? Well, this one it's costing the town zero. So, we've gotten grants for virtually everything so far. In terms of development impact fees, affordable housing units are exempt from a from the development impact fees. Yes,

there's that, too. And the permit fees. Permit fees are a different story. Yeah. And we'll we'll have a discussion with regard to those. So, I don't I don't know if that's been fully socialized. So, we'll Yeah. Well, in almost every instance, we pay building permit fees. Okay. There is a cost to the town. Resource cost for sure. So we almost I've never seen those waved. Okay. And we wouldn't request that either. And then Ron, just general question. What are what are if if this gets approved tonight, what what are the next what's the timeline look like for um the planning board and additional?

Well, that's a better question for the applicant. I think they would have to they would have to come back for preliminary and then final approval, but I don't know what their timing is.

So I can speak to the timing. So the we're here for master plan because in um I've been told in January there will be another there'll be a funding round at Rhode Island Housing for the first trunch of um affordable housing homeownership funds. Um Rhode Island Housing and the Department of Housing between the two of those agencies. So that's why we are here tonight. Um in that same time period, we'll be um soliciting proposals from developers and hopefully have a partner. If not, we'll apply for those funds and then supply those funds to that developer, to that ultimate developer. Um and then we'd be back for preliminary once we've selected someone. We would work with that that team um in conjunction with them to get it across the finish line. And then hopefully, you know, over the next, I would say 10 months assemble all the rest of the funds and then a year from this spring start construction

probably. Yeah, I mean that I think that's realistic. Oh, one more question. Sorry. Um, as far as you mentioned the selection process for um deciding who was going to be able to um purchase these films. Sure. Are there any I mean as far as the Rhode Island housing um criteria or the fair housing criteria is this are are there any restrictions? Is this restricted by age by just by income? Is does income level does that include retirees that are on a fixed income? Just income. Just income. It's only income.

Okay. Steve, just a quick question on the ground lease. Is the is the ground leased to all of it to the developer or is it leased to each homeowner? So, it would be we we as the town would lease the entire site to the developer and there I'm guessing there'd be subleas leases of areas for the single family homes and the multif family homes. And is there ground rent payable to the town? Probably not. A nominal dollar or something. Yeah, it would. Right.

So, uh, so the home buyer pays the purchase price. He has his mortgage. He pays real estate taxes. Those in the multif family units pay homeowner association. Everyone pays homeowner association. Everyone pays the homeowner association dues. And that's it. There's no ground rent that the individual Okay. Any other comments or questions? Do you have any other witnesses? No other witnesses. Thank you for your time and thank you for your consideration.

Is there anyone from the public who would like to speak? Matthew Kzenski, 110 Wintergreen Drive, Middletown. I just want to say um you guys did a great job honestly um going into this project. I was looking over the documents. There is a lot so I didn't have time to get through all of them. Um I think it's a step in the right direction because the more housing you add, it does lower costs because supply and demand, a lot of math. Um, but just for your knowledge, I was doing some research yesterday and I came across some startling numbers of the median home price in Middletown is now up to $850,000 and the selling prices are sometimes lower, but we're still close to 700,000. So, to enable first-time home buyers, which I'm hoping to be in the future, not when I'm 40, which is the medium firsttime home buyer age now, which is astonishing. Um, it's amazing to think that the repeat home buyer age is now up to 59. So it means my parents are now buying the homes that they bought when they were in their 30s. So clearly we have a home um affordability crisis and I think as um you know everyone here mentioned that it's a we need all types of housing and this is a great start whether it's um you know smaller whether it's the multimodal having everything mixed together tends to promote that lower price walkability and in terms of traffic um it's not necessarily this project is going to solve that and but I I think the board in general should start considering how we can tie um a lot of requirements to mixed use zoning because to reduce number of trips by car you have to promote other meth methods of transportation. So if I have a supermarket within walking distance of my house I can do that instead of driving. Just a thought there's a lot of things um that are coming out of the town that I'm very excited about including the transportation and the

bike studies that have been done in the future things like that. But I think overall um the town is doing a good job and this is a good use of land for um people making first time home buyer decisions. So good job guys. Thank you. Lawrence Frank Adonald Road first. Mr. Spanella has done an extraordinary job and you are we are fortunate to have him with the town. Absolutely fortunate. Yeah.

This public hearing regards the property owned by Middletown for the development of 36 units of affordable single family and multif family housing. Property located at 351, 361, and 393 East Main Road. The Middletown Affordable Housing Committee, of which I am the chair, evaluated several proposals presented us by the town. The affordable housing committee committee approval was required for this proposal to advance. The AHC voted in favor of the proposal that is is being addressed before you this evening. There is a housing crisis in this country. The town of Middletown has failed to address this issue in a comprehensive way and in fact has just done the opposite. Except for this project, which accommodates those with significant incomes, the town has stood in the way of other projects that would have made truly truly affordable housing available to those most most in need. In a review of the book entitled There Is No Place for Us There Is No Place for Us Working and Homeless in America, we are presented with the following. According to HUD's annual homelessness assessment report, approximately 7,700, excuse me, 770,000 people in the United States were homeless in 2024, an increase of 18% since 2023. The number of families that were homeless increased by 39% and the largest in group increase by group age group was 33% was among children under 18. Recent research reveals that the actual number of those experiencing homeless homelessness in the United States is at least six times larger than the official

figure. The new face of homelessness in the United States are people whose paychecks are not enough to keep a roof over their heads. Currently, 11.4 million low-income households are classified as severely severely costburdened, spending on average an astounding 78% of their earnings on rent alone. They are identified as the working homeless. In America today, there are just 34 affordable and available rental homes for every 100 100 low-income households who need them. This amounts to a shortage of 7.3 million low rent apartments. And the single greatest reason the single greatest reason why so many people are continue to be homeless is their lack of income. The fastest growing segment of the nation's homeless population. fastest growing segment of the nation's homeless population are children under the age of six. The biggest challenge, however, is housing supply because the market on its own the market on its own will never never be incentivized to build and maintain truly affordable housing. Now, why is it why is it that the most vulnerable, the most vulnerable among us have become political pawns, denied the most basic needs of every at every lab level of government. Weaponization of the hungry has become a Trump sport. In Middletown, truly affordable housing is denied over building height, while at the same time, multi-story multi-story hotels get the green light as town officials blindly accommodate real estate investors. The West Main Road Town Center project originally called for workforce and affordable housing. Now it has none. Of the 11,000 workers in Middletown, 5,500,

more than half earn less than $50,000 a year. The average two bender rent in Middletown is $30,000. The government of Middletown has displayed a callousness towards those workers who the town depends on to provide our most basic services. Why is it so hard? What is so hard about us doing the right thing? Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you for your comments. And um I want to echo his commendation for you, Mrs. Stanella. Great job. Uh any other comments from the public? Nobody on live would end. Further comments from us, Mr. Chair. Okay. So, uh, with that, uh, may I have a motion to close the public hearing? Motion.

Motion is made and seconded to close the public hearing. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. Oppose. Nay. Chair votes I. Motion passes. Uh I assume we should uh deal with the request for zoning relief first.

So this this is a bit of a different animal as a comprehensive affordable housing permit application. Um you'll be I believe making just one motion to approve master plan. Included in that motion would be adjustments to the zoning requirements. They're not considered variances in the statute. They're they're called adjustments. in that I think I can be corrected if I'm wrong, but it essentially means that you do not have to uh apply the um findings for a variance. Um what you're simply doing is looking at the findings to approve the comprehensive af comprehensive affordable housing application as listed in the memo again without having to get into the typical variance um findings. So, so we are just taking one motion to approve uh for master plan approval including now six of these adjustments. Is that correct?

I believe it's five. Well, there there are seven total and you eliminated one.

So, the six adjustments. Yep. And the and the findings. And the findings. Okay. So may I have that motion please? So moved. Second. Motion is made and seconded uh for master plan approval of this project uh including the findings and the six requested adjustments. That correct? I think so. Yes. Is there any further discussion? Zoning post speaking to the mic please. Along with the well those are the six requested adjustments. Okay. Any other comments?

Yeah, I want to thank Mr. Spanella. This was very educational. He answered a lot of questions. Um, and again, I do believe in this type of affordable housing because it is home ownership. I would love it if the town were to u make this type of development a lot more viable for other investors or other developers. uh so that it is possible that we don't have to always um uh the town doesn't always have to build the afford the affordable uh housing that's necessary. Um I've been pushing for this for a long time. uh you know re we we are we are we are allowing the town to um do this by kind of giving a lot of uh relief on a lot of these regulations which tells me that a private uh developer would not be able to do this type of development without that type of relief which tells me that some of that some of those reg regulations are impacting the ability for things to be affordable. Um, and that's an obvious thing and I think we need to always keep that in mind with every single regulation, every single ordinance that's passed. And I I I don't think we as a town as as as a planning board or a town council do a good job of that, particularly with the um with the impact fees and the permit fees. I mean, the fees and the fees and the fees just make housing and all everything more unaffordable. So, um, I am a fan of this development. I would love it if the town were to look at other parcels of land that we own so we don't have to go out and buy and do similar developments like this. Um, so thank you. Other comments? All those in favor say I.

I. I. Oppos? Nay. Chairman votes I. Motion passes. Congratulations. Good luck.

The uh next item on the agenda is a review of the proposed fiscal year 27 to fiscal year 31 Middletown capital improvement program to determine consistency with the Middletown comprehensive community plan. I uh assume all of you read through these items

at least for consistency with the comprehensive plan. Did any did anyone find anything that is inconsistent? We all look through them. Nobody finds anything inconsistent. So, may I have a motion to u uh pass this along to the town council with the planning board's assessment that it is consistent with the comprehensive plan? Have that motion, please? So moved. Second. Motion is made and seconded. Is there any further discussion?

I will have one question. [laughter] Go ahead. There is a lot of uh we don't believe you when you say one question be one long question. [laughter] Um there's a lot of capital money in this uh in this I don't know 50page document. I'm assuming that not every single one of these uh projects gets what's the timeline on these projects? What it's it's a basically a six-year plan. Each year the town council in the budgeting process will determine how much money to put forward for capital projects. So, and these are all of them that are on the table.

Yes. But they're not they're not all necessarily being funded in FY27. They be they may be out um in out years. So, the council goes through these and makes a during budgeting and determines which ones will be funded. Correct. Is that correct? That's right. Okay. So this is just consistency with the plan, correct? Y. So we have a motion to forward this to the town council uh saying that it is consistent with the comprehensive plan. Is there any further discussion? All those in favor say I. I. I. Oppos? Nay.

Chairman votes I. Motion passes. Next item on the agenda is the status report. Does anyone have any comments on the status report? I have no comments this this this morning. Next item are committee reports, comprehensive plan update committee.

Our next and I think final meeting is tomorrow night. We hope. Um the the goal for tomorrow night is to have the consultants just uh talk a little bit about how they address comments they received since the last meeting in the draft and then the action by the committee tomorrow night will be to forward the draft comp plan to you all to the planning board to begin the formal um adoption process. Yeah, good job by you and the consultant. Really good job. Very good. um tree commission.

Uh we have our meeting tomorrow before the comprehensive plan update committee meeting and uh there's no new no additional news from the last time. We haven't had too many meetings. Okay. Open space and fields. So there's there's a meeting next Wednesday. um wasn't able to make the last one, you know, on uh in November. So, I don't have anything to report on that conservation commission. Uh no update since last meeting other than this gentleman is a is the new member. Don't you have a new chairman?

Oh, yes, we have a new chairman. Uh a chairperson um Melissa Welch has been elected chair. So, the next meeting I think is in January. Yeah, I think the next meeting is January. I was sworn in as secretary as well. So, we have a new um chair, Melissa Wells. The vice chair is Peter, right? Is who who was the other person name? Um and we are looking for new members because um well, I forget his name. Somebody had to step down. Brian. Brian, I believe.

Yeah. Yeah. One of our he's time constraints with family. Um, but other than that, we're meeting January and we have I have a 230 page um, watershed plan to read over. So, I would highly suggest doing what I'm going to do before reading through it hopefully, send it to Chat GPT and give it a summary, um, I would highly suggest you all with these massive documents that take in a ridiculous amount of time to read through. Put it in chat GPT, say summarize, and then it will line up the points for you. And if you're curious about a section, you dive into that section. Um, that's what I do for a lot of my work. It saves so much time. So,

thank you. Well, we look forward to hearing from the conservation commission. [laughter] Um, the citizens advisory committee is on hold, right?

Yes. Nothing yet. And you see the upcoming meetings that we have planned. I just want to point out that we've got our joint meeting with the town council is now scheduled for February 17th. And um just for your information, I updated the memo that we're going to send to them since we changed the date. Some things have changed. For example, the comp plan is now complete where it would have been incomplete before. Anyway, that'll be included in next month's package. So, you'll get a chance to see it. So, anything else to come before the board? You have a motion to adjurnn. So, move.

Motion's made and seconded to adjourn the meeting. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. Oppos? Nay. Board says I. Meeting is adjourned.