Planning Board - Regular Meeting

Excellent. Thank you and good evening and welcome to the August 17th, 2026 regular meeting of the Township of Montclair Planning Board in accordance with the New Jersey Open Public Meetings Act, the Official Electronic Publication Act, and the amendments to the notice provisions of the municipal land use law. Adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by posting a copy of the notice on the first floor of the municipal building on the Township of Montclair's official internet website and on the statewide legal notices listings of the New Jersey Department of State. This meeting is being broadcast live on Channel 34 and is streaming live and will be available on demand on YouTube. This meeting is a quasi-judicial proceeding, meaning that the Board has powers and procedures resembling a court of law, and we are obligated to objectively determine facts and draw conclusions from them in order to provide the basis of an official action. Any questions or comments must be limited to the issues of what the Board may legally consider in reaching a decision, and the decorum appropriate to a judicial hearing must be maintained at all times. The fire exits are on my right, which is your left, and also in the back of the room. And next up is our roll call.

Mayor Baskerville.

Present.

Mr. Borschoff. Mr. Campbell. Counselor D'Amato.

Present.

Ms. Gaines. Present. Vice Chair Graham. Here. Mr. Ian Wally? Here. Ms. Willis? Here. Mr. Orbea is excused. Ms. Wallace? Here. And Chair Brodock?

I'm here.

Okay.

Next up, we have the swearing in of our board professionals.

I'm over here.

Oh, I'm sorry.

It's just me. I was just, I was feeling disoriented. I know, me too. Because I'm not in my chair. Do you solemnly swear or affirm the testimony you may give tonight will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? I do. Thank you very much.

All right, next up we have the minutes from August 3rd, 2026.

And I did not receive any comments or amendments to the August 3rd minutes.

I'd like to make a motion to accept the minutes.

Mr. Ian Wally, if your microphone.

You have something, I'm sorry.

Yeah, sorry about that. Yeah, not that I want to be added to the minutes, but Chair Brodock was absent, so he says Chair Brodock called the meeting to order. I think that was, was it the third? Oh. Yeah, that's probably not correct.

Yeah, no, it was Mr. Ian Wally. Okay, sorry about that.

And what a job he did.

I know, I listened to it. It was excellent.

Yeah, incredible job.

Thank you for filling in. That's not an easy application to jump into.

Are there any other changes to the minutes? OK. Motion to approve by Mayor Baskerville. Is there a second?

Second.

All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstention. Abstain. Abstain. Lots of abstentions.

We certainly do. All right, that takes us to our old business for application 2959116118 Walnut Street, Grafton Inns, LLC. We understand that the applicant has requested that this be carried to September 28th, I believe, because they couldn't make it tonight?

That their experts were not available tonight, so they want to carry it to September 28th.

Okay, so we'll move it to September 28th at 7 p.m. here in Municipal Chambers. with no further notice required?

That's correct.

Okay. That then brings us to our new business, starting with the council referral regarding the adoption of the municipal complex redevelopment plan.

So as you know, the township has been... The facilities and infrastructure subcommittee has been working on outreach and planning for... relocating either rebuilding the complex at the municipal complex here or relocating it at a different site there's been ongoing negotiations and in order to move these things along we've long talked about doing a redevelopment plan for this property as you know several years ago we did the area need of redevelopment evaluation the council recently adopted that so it is now officially an area in need of redevelopment and this is a redevelopment plan for these properties listing potential reuse options that really mimic the surrounding zone districts at least on three sides on the north it's the adjoining district is a two-family residential zone so what we tried to do is when in drafting the setback requirements we had a a larger setback requirement from residential uses on that side and then the front yard setbacks we have three front yards so we established specific front yard setbacks for uh claremont um north fullerton and park street uh and there's a variety of reuse options the township has not decided what direction that they want to go into this property on the on these properties but the options may include a municipal public use public utilities it could be residential because the surrounding use zoning and actually the underlining zone underlying zoning for the former bank site is a office residential zone and it mimics that with some slight modifications to adjust for the size and configuration of this of this property regarding setbacks and it also includes utilities as well so that's the structure of the redevelopment plan we've included in the redevelopment plan there was a couple changes that were made at the council meeting I sent it to you because the council met last Tuesday and I had to send the packets out on Monday so this plan does not include some changes that the council made upon introduction which are really minor and those changes are on page 11 if you look on page 11 we talked we have design standards for this use at this site and item B at the top of that page the language was changed to say that use of brick and cast stone is required to match the design of the larger multifamily and office buildings in the neighborhood but make it be consistent in the description of the area in B and C and in C it says horizontal rows of windows must be included in all buildings in a manner consistent with other larger multifamily and office buildings in the area because those are the uses that surround this property we also included because this is redevelopment certain requirements that i'd like to point out on page 14 because it does include cornerstone house any redevelopment of this property would require that the developer relocate cornerstone house at an appropriate location that maintains the same number of bedrooms that we currently have we also included a requirement that because this parking lot is used by the neighborhood it's not just used for the municipal building during the day it's used for overnight parking we included a statement that the developer is responsible for providing overnight parking for the neighborhood it may or may not be on this property but they need to incorporate that into their plan I think the language is the designator did the designated redeveloper shall as may be set forth in a negotiated redevelopment that's the new look yeah okay yeah okay

Can you read the full sentence? I don't have it.

Yes, it says the designated redeveloper shall also be responsible for providing 28 parking spaces for overnight parking, period. designated redevelop redeveloper shall as may be set forth in a negotiated redevelopment agreement assistant coordinating the phase relocation of the municipal building to another location and for repaying of grants received by the township for improvements to cornerstone house and the municipal building within five years of relocation i mean redevelopment this is basically the first step a lot of the details all of the details will be in the redevelopment agreement and that's the understanding so that's what this is in a nutshell i sent i received some comments which i sent to you today to your montclair township email address and if you didn't get the comments i need copies i think i i got them directly yep thank you so much I don't all I can say is no decision has been made.

This is regarding the relocating the police department to this property.

Okay. What is the big picture? I mean, I know this may not be for this body, but I'm having trouble understanding I mean, there's a lot of things that are called for. This is not the biggest site. We already have a building here that could be repaired. Again, to the extent that it has been made public already, what's the plan? Is it to get capital from this site, use that capital to be, you know, sell this site, could be a residential development site, and then use that capital to relocate elsewhere? Is there an interim plan for... You know, while this building is being demolished, where will the town hall be while the next place is being done? What's the plan if this building is supposed to be renovated? What happens to the town hall? How much demand is there for a town hall? How much space do we use in this building? So I guess what goes through my head is, like okay there's a redevelopment plan is there a developer selected no no okay this is one we don't have a plan yet this is one option um so this is essentially it's almost like a placeholder but this has lots of this could be many things it could be an apartment building it could be whatever but what's the plan for the town hall what does the town want to do

we don't have a plan yet i'll let counselor it might be inappropriate it's a great it's a great question um and i've been working on this you know obviously for two years a lot and we'll be on a very uncharacteristically phlegmatic because we are in negotiations with different parties about different parts of this of the whole kahuna so we just do need and that's maybe unsatisfying right now but it is you know the the the objective here very clearly is to come up with a solution that fits all the pieces together that that is easiest on the taxpayer or positive and is and may preserve some of our historic facilities including 647 if it's bloomfield the police if it's possible So people should ask as many questions. Yes. So, but I think.

Well, just sort of like just a general plan, you know, that, you know, what, I mean, there's a demand for some space. It may include the police department, may include the town hall. So what's the space demand? How many, 50,000 square feet? It's roughly 50,000 square feet.

And then depending on, if you combine certain features you may gain a few thousand feet here or there but it's even combined the parking you might be able to yes and the municipal court is something like five thousand feet but that's not we want to make sure that that neighborhoods are not overburdened we want to make sure the council has been very good they they've they've got architects that are looking at the space needs trying to evaluate how to make this work

As you can imagine, there's a lot of pieces to this puzzle. And this is just one component that we've been talking about. It's an asset, a township asset. We own it. And rather than just – it's not going to – one option is it can perpetually be a municipal complex, but there's other options.

But this creates the value for the township. Yes. More fully take advantage of the value that's here already. That's right. The plan –

but by rezoning so that it's so that it is not only best and highest in terms of the potential value that the township and therefore the residents and the taxpayers have but also to make it the best thing that it can be you know aesthetically and in terms of the circulation so I'm not a great fan of redevelopment plans this is this is a time when it's when it is totally appropriate and and

What's the, I'm sorry if I missed it, the height and density, what's going to be allowed here, four stories or is it?

It's three stories. Three stories. Yeah, it really matches what's in the office residential zone right now. It mimics it, not line by line, not exactly, but it's close enough. It's three stories and 40 feet. tailored the front yard setback requirements to 25 feet from Claremont Avenue. Well, that's what the setback is right now for this building. It's a comfortable setback for a three-story building at this location. And then 15 feet on North Fullerton, which is the setback of the office building on Fullerton that would be maintained. Mm-hmm. We increased the setback on Park Street to 25 feet because that's more of a smaller scale environment over on Park Street than we have over on North Fullerton.

And it's no, it shouldn't be any secret that, as you'll see in here, that utilities is one of the functions mentioned. And so the great need to have better, more reliable electricity in town, as you know, this has been going on in terms of where a substation would be based, and this is one of of more than one potential locations. So that is why utilities are included. That's right. And so there's discussions about how that would work with all. So it's all these different things, preparation. And Janice, if I could ask you a question. There was a redevelopment plan that was sketched out earlier. I always get it backwards. The one for the police building was never passed. This one was passed, but a plan was never passed.

Right. There was never a redevelopment plan for this year, for the complex.

But how far in 2021 did we get at this site?

All we did was the planning board recommended to the council that it be designated an area in need of redevelopment. That's it. So... It went on pause after that.

Weren't there some drawings, though, that showed what that could look like? Yes. Yeah, there were. There were some drawings.

When we were negotiating with Lackawanna Plaza over the last four years, at some point we had talked about putting the municipal complex there. Yes. And then we had plans for what it would look like there, plans for what it would look like here.

And look like here, and combined with that one. That's the drawings that I remember seeing.

We've had a lot of concept plans. Yes, yes.

And if anybody's interested, there are, if you search on YouTube, there are two different full sessions that were conducted in January and February in which the renderings for some of those were displayed as slides, and if not, that those are available. They're interesting. This one was a big combined municipality and police, and we looked at that, and there are charts that show what the cost per square foot is, which is we determined was around $1,000, and we needed around 50,000 feet, so it's a lot of money. So this is all part of trying not to spend a lot of money and do something cool.

Did the committee consider taking it to four stories? There are four-story residential buildings very close, and that would, you know, one story is not much more. It would, you know... substantially increase the value that could be extracted from the site. So if you allowed four, it's an efficient same methods of construction to go four as three. So I'm just wondering if you had considered that.

We could have done that. But the existing zone, those are non-conforming buildings. So we went by matching what our zoning ordinance says, which is three stories for this.

But you can do what you wish in a redevelopment. We can.

Correct. And we may, you know, just because it's not there right now, just like what you're saying, because it's redeveloped, we can do what we wish.

We're near four stories, so it's not a problem. Correct.

Yeah, good point.

This site also does have prominence above the street of about eight feet or something like that. In any case, this plan will be amended almost, I mean, certainly at some point. Exactly.

As the council moves ahead in making decisions, it's almost guaranteed that this plan will be amended. And we get more details on what the anticipated use is.

And our job really is to, I think as Mr. Anise put in an email over the weekend, is to evaluate this for its consistency with the master plan. Correct? Okay. Within 45 days of

assume the council meeting last monday yes uh so thank you mr nice um which would take us essentially to our september

for basically the september 14th meeting planning board meeting yeah okay yeah and what do we have we don't what do we have on for that night because i'm i'm thinking in is that oh is that the yeah yeah i mean options i guess options as i see them here i mean we can continue our discussion now i mean i i just got this this morning so i haven't had a chance personally to look through it but i'm happy to help moderate a discussion if that's what everybody would like to do we can also have the master plan subcommittee look at it or we can you know and or push it to another meeting for a more robust discussion with the full board I'm just trying to figure out what folks will want to do at this point. Because it sounds like there's some ideas that some board members have that maybe we all want to consider. Because we've got consistency as the main objective, but then we're also able to submit to the town council whatever other recommendations we have regarding this plan.

I just want to make sure, with all respect to our mayor and council member, who's on the master plan subcommittee?

Well, we have a redevelopment subcommittee. OK. It would be duplicative of Mayor Baskerville and Councillor D'Amato. Redevelopment subcommittee is Mr. Campbell, Mr. Borschaf, and Mayor Baskerville.

Made it possible if you all want to meet and go through it in detail, or if the board just wants to handle it at perhaps the next meeting so we don't run into the swim quest application.

The next meeting is the .

We have one witness and probably a lot of public questions and comments. And probably discussion amongst the board would be my guess, which if we want to handle this and that, we may have to bifurcate that hearing. finish our deliberations and whatnot a following night, just given what I would imagine for the length of time it'll take to get through all of that.

It might be helpful to have the public have a chance to comment on this also at the next meeting. I don't know if having the discussion now is necessarily in the best interest of the public.

The public will have an opportunity to make comment before the Township Council.

Oh, they won't have an opportunity to comment on our deliberations here because we're examining for the consistency.

It's been introduced by the council, and it gets referred to the planning board, and then the public hearings.

I always forget that procedural quirk.

So the 28th would be within the 45 days?

The 14th, not the 28th.

Not the 28th. Special meeting? Not that I'm...

Sorry. Sorry.

I mean, that's an option as well. Right? I mean, I think this is a, I feel like we're going to have, I'll speak for myself. I need more time with this document to really look through it and understand what, put together my own thoughts on it. I feel like we're going to have a reasonably healthy discussion among this board. So I would reserve an hour, hour and a half, somewhere in there for this kind of discussion. So whatever day that makes sense. And if it has to be the same day as the swim quest, then that's what it will have to be. We don't get a choice in these matters.

Right, right. We'll have to schedule the timing of that meeting.

Right.

OK.

So is that what we'll do? Yeah. We'll reconvene on this matter September 14th.

Yes. OK. Sounds good.

Before the swim club, I guess, right? Because we could limit the discussion and the swim club could go on for a while. Is that the thought?

Well, the thing is, you're going to have a room full of residents.

Correct. Well, suppose we don't. Let's say that the swim club goes on for a long time. And if we don't hear this, are we in violation of the 45 days? Or do we get an automatic extension because we tried? We don't get an extension.

I don't think there's an automatic. I mean, I could look at council, but I don't think there's an automatic extension. I mean, if we don't respond to the council within 45 days, they can do whatever they want.

Oh, so then we would have to hear it.

Right. We'd have to get it done. I mean, I think it makes sense to wait until that meeting, quite honestly, for this. But I think we're going to have to work with the applicant for the swim class school and just talk about timing. Because I think it does make sense to hear that application before we get into this, just so we don't have a room full of people waiting two hours to speak.

I suspect that the swim class application will take quite a few speakers.

yes the whole meeting

The one thought I had was perhaps upfront say, all we're going to tackle with the swim quest application on that night, if their counsel and the applicant agrees to it, but say, look, we have a hard stop. We're going to hear from your final witness. We're going to allow for questions and cross-examination of that witness. And then we're going to stop and move public comment and board deliberations to a future meeting.

Oh, that's what I was concerned about. I'm thinking that to tell the public that they've got to come back yet another time.

Would you prefer we hear only the swim quest that night and we have a special meeting for this?

I do think that if we could let them sum up and be done, rather than having the public not speak that night and have to come back and instead open a new hearing to talk about something different, it seems a little awkward.

But they're not ready for sum up, are they? Doesn't Mr. Steck have to come and speak for the first time? Yeah, so they're not ready yet for sum up. I feel like Mr. Tremblay will be ready.

I think that, yeah.

I think there's another... Well, I don't mean they're not ready. I just mean they have other witnesses that they're bringing.

There's another related issue, which is... uh having sat through uh several of the master plan re-examination meetings that there is a an interest in uh in this board uh having at least the opportunity to you know further discuss um in in september if it was possible just because i mean some people have thought that august you know people aren't around and maybe you know at the beach mentally so and we we do have to tie that up in november yeah i know that's related to all of this yes is we need to have it adopted by the board

by November 21st and what I would like to do is set aside time in September and October to discuss the master plan re-examination report at the second meeting of the month so that we give it due time and have it ready to be adopted by your second meeting in September.

So you're saying do that on the 21st, Janice? You're saying September? There's two meetings in September?

It would be November 28th. Oh, it's 28th, so we're not doing two weeks. It would be November 28th on October 19th, and we'd have to adopt it on November 16th. So that gives us September 28th and October 19th to talk about it. Okay? just as we're trying to schedule everything with two meetings a month i don't know if we will we'll take the entire second meeting but i just think we need to include it into in our uh agendas

If I could ask the chair, what areas of the plan do you think would be people would want to be discussing the most? In other words, like which plan? Of the redevelopment plan for where we're sitting. Like in other words, like what do we actually need to, what areas do we really, do you think we're going to be wanting to have a more robust discussion about?

I think height was one that came up. I think three versus four stories is going to be, you know, a reasonable discussion. But again, I haven't I haven't looked at the I only got it this morning, so I haven't thumbed through it. I don't know what's there, but I would imagine, you know, neighborhood character would be a big one. Heights, setbacks, step backs. Like if the board is ready to have this discussion right now, I have no problem, like I said, helping to moderate a discussion amongst everybody. If everyone's ready to go, then by all means, let's go. I don't want it to sound like I'm intentionally trying to push things off if everybody's ready.

Yeah, I would just say that that's either way is great. I will say that because in our discussions the expectation was so strong that we would be open to amending that it was Not a placeholder exactly, but it was something that we wanted to do in part just the sort of basic thing that would also involve, you know, appraisals. Like it's a starting point rather than a close one. I don't know if that's unusual or... Not kosher, but it was not, these were not super duper fixed, super duper fixed things. So, I don't know, Janice, help me out here.

Well, that was the assumption. Look at what the underlying zoning is for the surrounding area. copy that for the most part onto this property which was again three stories I understand what you say a lot of those are four stories but I was a little hesitant because I know there's concern about character and you might have something that's too big for the site because this is a big property so I kept it as what the underlying zoning is for the bank property and what this property was previously zoned for which is three stories

so so let's assume we decided it was consistent with master plan and then eventually wanted to amend it to be four stories how do we do that right

then we just amended or does the council requested the council the council does it and would we review it again for consistency yeah that's how it would happen yeah it always gets introduced at the council it can be the planning board can recommend it to the council and then the council does the introduction and second reading or the council can introduce the change it comes to the planning board is always referred to the planning board and then the plant the council does have to

consider the planning board's recommendation and if they don't go according to the planning board they have to explain why so and one another reason the final reason to be to be very frank is about why it's contingent why all this felt contingent was the utility use is not that is a negotiated use within an envelope, how it's done.

They haven't. If they want to build a utility use here, we've not seen any plans.

Right.

So you can't craft appropriate standards in the redevelopment plan when you don't have a plan, you know, what their needs would be, how they would

make it work on the site so essentially it's it's the starting point is what this is what we do know is that if that were the use is that how it works these days is that there's a big perimeter around a facility that's what has changed so that they operate now on much tighter standards of noise and that there's no electronic field that's measurable at the lot line and stuff like that but it's not but there's no drawing there's no idea of what it would look like other than we discussed the setbacks and especially from park street and any kind of fencing and the fencing

way this was designed is there's no fencing requirements in here yes it it we um defers to our under the zoning ordinance and the zoning ordinance has a maximum height of four feet in the front yard or four and a half feet and only six feet uh or seven feet in the rear yard so that those kind of details would have to be worked out when we have if it was going to be a utility use i

information I get that it's like you're here everything you're saying I guess I'm uncomfortable just voting for something without really looking at it and as as I think we should be as a planning board you know I think if anything I heard from these public committees is the public doesn't understand half of what we do anyway and so i feel like it doesn't give them much comfort if then we go ahead and do things without even knowing what we're doing so i would i support you chair and taking the time i don't have a solution to the i also agree with miss willis carol that i think that's going to be really tight in the meeting on the 14th and sort of maybe going against expectations of having that play out over that meeting especially because we don't give notice i guess if do you want a special meeting i was going to say how about the 31st the 31st oh august 31st two weeks

Hold on just a second. Sure. I can do it.

Because it's two weeks from tonight. It's two weeks before the 14th. It's not Labor Day weekend. And school starts that week. Wait, is it Labor Day weekend?

No, it's not. And school starts that Thursday. So they're getting back into town.

Correct.

To get ready for school.

and the 31st i'm pretty sure that the council chambers is available because it's the fifth monday yeah but we have a joint meeting with the town council and the board of it um at six so i could probably get over here isn't that meeting september 1st no it's the 31st but it's not here oh yeah But it starts at 6, so I can probably just get over here by 7.30. Okay, okay. I was told that that joint meeting was September 1st, but anyway. No, I mean the last one that we all agreed on was the 31st for the joint meeting. Yeah, I had to schedule another meeting. Yeah, a committee. It's just a small committee of individuals. Okay. So...

that's two weeks from today yeah because we need ten days right with the new law, which is easy.

No, it's a lot easier.

We are good. That's great.

We have a master plan, just also a master plan discussion then?

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean, if we're going to be here for X amount of time, then. I think it would be terrific.

At least put it on the agenda. Yeah. See where we get, but I have a feeling we can do all of it.

August 31st. Probably the only planning board I've ever worked with that had three meetings in August. As opposed to... Yeah, okay, I'll set that up.

Okay, for 7 or 7.30, do we want to stick with the usual 7? 7, yeah. All right, we'll do that. 7 o'clock on the 31st.

yeah okay got it okay and that doesn't require a vote to hold that or that meeting or we can just do it i mean i don't know i don't think so i think everybody's on board yeah i feel like everybody's like yeah that sounds good so that's what we'll do

And we'll discuss the redevelopment plan, and we'll discuss the master plan reexamination.

Fantastic.

And anything else we come up with tonight? So next, I'll move on. Next up is the council referral regarding the ordinance to amend Chapter 202 land use procedures.

This is very simple. I don't like to have to chase money. So this is just updating the fee schedule for our escrow deposits, because costs have increased. And the proposed fees, I think, should be sufficient to pay the majority of the professional invoices that we receive. If we don't use up the entire escrow, we give it back to the applicant. So it's not like it's lost money. So essentially, it's just keeping up with the costs of the professional review of applications.

Well, I mean, I don't think the master plan really contemplates fees necessarily.

The master plan doesn't contemplate fees, but it does encourage us to have thorough reviews and professional reviews to ensure that all of our various design requirements are met.

I agree. So does that mean it's consistent or it's not inconsistent with?

I would say it's not inconsistent.

That's what I was leaning towards. Anybody have thoughts on that? No. Then I would make a motion that we find these changes to be not inconsistent with the master plan.

Second.

All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstentions? OK.

Next up is the master plan reexamination report discussion.

I don't know if you want to talk about that tonight, since we're going to talk about it on the 31st.

Yeah, I think that would be good to do it on the 31st.

All I can say is... we've got a lot of comments there's a lot of interest in this we had probably 90 people come to the various meetings four of the meetings were hosted by myself and my staff we had three or four meetings with the business districts that was the economic development coordinator working with members of council to get their input as well so you have notes from all those meetings in here the comments that i've received my response to everybody who submitted a a comment or an email i said i'm forwarding your comments to the planning board uh we had reports from the environmental commission was three years ago i don't think it really changed a lot we had input from the housing commission three years ago because we started working on this three years ago I had comments from some of the senior organizations and as well as the director of senior services. She put together lengthy comments because a lot of our recommendations had to do with the needs of senior citizens. I'm still waiting for comments from the parks recreation and open space Advisory Committee I have given them to August 15th their first July 15th and then August 15th they keep promising well it is done so I mean it's in the process we completed it

I guess put together and presented to you.

Yeah. I'm going to reach out to the chair and say the planning board is meeting August 31st. We need the comments from them and we need the comments from the Historic Preservation Commission.

You'll have the comments from the PRCA this week.

Great. That's great. NHPC has been working diligently on the comments. I understand. understand so that way the board has the benefit of all of the comments because it takes a long time to distill all this it take it took so long time to present the information and for all of you to distill it and and what we what I said at most of my meetings is There's a lot in our plans. There are tons of recommendations. Some that we accomplished, some that we didn't. And usually the ones that we accomplished were because they were our priority. So the frame, the mindset, looking through this, what are the township's priorities now and over the next 10 years? because i think a lot of it is already in there but we have to pull from our from our planning documents what's working what's not working what isn't there and what are the priorities so as you read through these recommendations keep that in mind we also have an updated report from jerry geosa too our parking expert were all those comments compiled comments distributed in hard copy or all it should be did you get your you didn't get a i didn't get a hard copy I told, I thought everybody was going to, I asked everybody to get a hard copy.

Okay, that must be why I'm behind you because I see these pink sheets and you're referencing all of these comments and I have no idea what we're talking about.

I assumed that you had received a hard copy because that was what I said had to be done.

I did not, no. And that's probably why my email sounded strange today.

Okay.

I never got some of these things. Sorry about that.

I will, you know what, I'm going to give it to you. Strangely enough... This was returned to our office, Santiago's.

Oh, okay.

I'll send him one tomorrow. Sounds good.

I'll be Santiago for tonight.

I don't know why we sent it to him and it came back to us.

Yeah, that seems odd.

It's very odd.

Okay. So then I can look through that and be prepared for August 31st.

I apologize. I had thought that you had received it.

unless it came today and I didn't see it today because I don't think I checked my mail today but wouldn't have done me any good for tonight anyways I know the Housing Commission is interested in working with us to develop recommendations and I don't know what that means and I've asked them to send a list of recommendations to you for consideration

That's probably the best way to handle it.

Yeah. And I've made myself available if they have questions on the process or however, you know, whatever it is. But I said, you know, really, you're the one that's collating all of these many distinct comments. And so it makes sense to have you be the point person on that.

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay.

Are there any other discussion on master plan reexamination? Okay. That'll be then on the 31st. Next up, we have the annual report from the Board of Adjustment.

So the Board of Adjustment Repairs reports every year with specific recommendations. And a lot of these recommendations were in last year's report.

Which we just received a few months ago, a couple of months ago. Yes. Yeah. Okay.

So the zoning subcommittee has been meeting. We've met once or twice so far. I we have another meeting scheduled for September 1st and I my suggestion is submit this to the zoning subcommittee because the last zoning subcommittee meeting we talked about trying to clean up our zoning ordinance the way we did in 2018 mm-hmm those of you who are on the board in 2018 we rewrote the entire zoning ordinance and the all of the land development ordinances in one new tabulated easy to read ordinance that never got adopted um for various reasons so just to put things in table form to make it easier to read is something that we're trying to do so all of these things could be incorporated into that effort we've done i think it was i don't know eric were you the one who suggested that we look at newark's oh it was tony we look at newark's ordinance which is an excellent example so um yeah so End of August, early September is going to be very busy. Monday we'll be meeting with the planning board, and Tuesday the zoning subcommittee will be focusing on some of these zoning changes. I don't know if you have any comments or questions about the specific recommendations.

No, personally I thought it would be good to have the zoning subcommittee take a look at it, but I know we've referred it to the zoning subcommittee in the past, and I don't know if it just – You know, I'm kind of wondering, should we have something more formal written up by the zoning subcommittee saying, hey, we reviewed these? Well, that's we agree with the following. We don't agree with the following. Just to kind of maybe even streamline the zoning board's annual report for next year, where they can even say, hey, we propose this. The planning board disagree.

Right.

And just because I feel like what I've heard in the past few years is the zoning board says we keep putting it in the annual report and nothing happens. And And I don't know if that's an us thing. I don't know if that's a township council thing. It's everybody.

I've brought the assistant planner into this process. She's doing the meeting notes and the meeting minutes. And since she wrote this report, she'll make sure that the zoning board gets that kind of response.

OK. Because I feel like we should just close the loop. And even if we disagree, great. Or if we, as a planning board, agree with some of these, say, well, let's send a letter to the township council for consideration.

think we have a really good group of people working on it's not just the planning board members on the zoning committee subcommittee we have council members and we have member a member of the zoning Board of Adjustment as well okay so that I don't want to run into the same situation that we ran into in 2018 where the council said well I don't feel comfortable with this so we all

But why, if I can suggest maybe, I know that the subcommittee's supposed to meet the following night, but many of these things are pretty big and kind of implicate the master plan as well. And some of them have nothing to do with zoning. so those why don't we just have this session in that in that meeting and try to everybody they can prepare you know hit all these topics and then some of these refer there's some of them some of them could then be referred to the subcommittee after that all right so what i can do is some of these could be incorporated into the master plan discussion others others are very minor and they could be part of the zoning discussion all right

some of them are pretty just technical changes would you want to annotate that report to just say this seems like a master plan issue this seems like a zoning subcommittee issue that way right maybe part of what we can do on the 31st is go through it and say yeah that sounds right let's have the master plan discussion now let's push the rest to zoning and then it's clear what we think we should be talking about yeah

it's I mean some of these are already in the master plan discussion when you talk about parking ratios we spent a lot of time in the mass talking about the master plan talking about parking ratios so from this perspective this is almost the recommendation from the zoning board regarding parking ratios so there is one point in here that I think it would be great if people wanted if we could hone in on one tonight number 14

And I had concerns with number 11. Is there something coming down the pike at these locations that the...

They've asked for that for many years.

This is over by... Who requested it?

11? Yes. The Board of Adjustment. Okay. Right now it's in the C1. They want it changed to NC.

And what prevented that happening years ago? I think the planning board decided no. For what?

I know we talked about it, and there was no enthusiasm for making that change. Probably because it was, at that point, part of a I really actually can't recall what the discussion was.

Yeah, if we can get information on number 11, that would be helpful for me.

Oh, it's OR4.

Yeah, to NC. So I didn't know if there was something coming down the pike that you wanted them to match in that specific area. And the Church Street Circle, what is that?

That's the circle.

You mean? The roundabout. Okay. All right.

22.

Yeah.

Okay. By the church. Okay.

Yeah. All right. Okay.

Then, Councillor D'Amato, you want to talk about item number 14?

Yeah, it's just this larger question that we're going to be wrestling with at the council meeting. I'm not sure when the pending tree ordinance will be introduced, but in some versions thereof, there is the planning and zoning boards are implicated in terms of you know, carrying some of the weight of that ordinance. And it's, I would just say it's kind of over my head. Like, I don't really understand what the implications, what the full implications are. That's why I think it'd be good to talk about it. So number 14, you know, in other words, like if, if a tree, well, just like read it and,

Number 14 says, except for tree removal permits for the removal of dead, dying, or diseased trees, no application for development shall be filed with the Planning Board or Zoning Board of Adjustment for a property within two years of a tree removal permit being issued for that property. I don't understand.

Do they mean a no application for an additional tree or no application for anything?

no application an application for development is actually to put an addition on a house okay so if you remove a tree for two years you can't you can't you can't apply for a conditional use permit or an addition to your house or whatever that's what an application for development is broad

So maybe that would be, that seems like something for, does that subcommittee have members of this? Yes. So they could explain the why behind it?

Well, this is, I'm sure this came from either Bill Harrison or Jerry Simons also on this own board. We can ask why they, how they think that this would be implemented. If somebody filed for a tree removal permit for something, for some reason they had And then a year later, they wanted to put an addition on their house? Right. I don't understand. I don't get why not.

I have to imagine the, I would imagine the purpose of this is so that somebody doesn't buy a property, clear cut it, and then say, well, now I'd like to develop it. And it's not, you know, the tree removal is not evaluated as part of the land use application. It's already done.

Would be my guess as to why that was in there. Can we just make sure that it is evaluated?

as part of the application is there a way to adjust instead I think it's scale if somebody comes in and they want to remove 50 trees from the site that's huge right right As opposed to somebody who removes one tree for various reasons and then the next year wants to put an addition on their house or has a, who knows, they want to change their use. They need a conditional use permit for whatever.

I guess it's segmentation. Maybe that's what they're worried about, right? I think so.

That would be my guess.

Well, yeah, but it's a pretty straightforward thing, though. If you wanted to build an ADU and there was a tree there, if you wanted to remove any healthy tree that qualifies under the ordinance, which is the DBH of, I don't know, whatever it is, 4, 6, or something like that, it would mean you could not build an ADU By removing a tree, you'd have to wait two years.

So couldn't we exempt certain types of applications? I mean, that's not even an application to the Board of Adjustment. That's just a building permit for them. That's right.

I'm just curious what, it seems to me they wouldn't have wrote that if they hadn't had something that made them suspect that someone was trying to game the system. There's some bad facts there. Yeah, so I'd be just curious what's the what behind it.

I will tell you that I had a brief conversation with the township attorney and she and I discussed whether or not this proposed ordinance should be a zoning ordinance or located in a different part of the township's ordinances. She and I, I think both were of the opinion this kind of ordinance should not be in the zoning ordinance.

You're talking about the new tree removal ordinance? Yes. Yeah, I agree.

why aren't tree removals how can they be bifurcated uh if you have a tree removal permit you remove all the trees and then it's not considered with a um you know application for development how come how are they bifurcated how are they bifurcated now because an application we review tree removal permits as part of it i mean we you know we do that we remove tree move as part of an application for development if somebody's coming in just for a tree removal permit

and they need permission to remove that tree, the issue is I don't understand the trigger for sending an application to just remove a tree to the Planning Board or the Board of Adjustment. There's no development. You're just removing a tree.

Okay, but I think then the point is if somebody submits an application for tree removal and removes those trees, shouldn't that be considered in a subsequent process? application for development well if if it it would be if they're developing the property if they're just reviewing what i heard what i heard was is there is a potential to remove those trees with a permit right right correct then come back submit an application for development those tree removals are not considered in your application for development that could be problematic

that's see that's what you get that shouldn't happen right right so isn't that we're trying to solve for maybe maybe I'm incorrect I think that this is the draft or the tree removal ordinance already results I don't know solve that because it's so rigorous and turn in terms of the cost to remove trees it that you would there are many different amendments that are being kicked around right now and and I very like support a very you know tough one and I've seen

properties where there's been clear cutting, so I get it. But the question that I had was, it wasn't about this actually, it was more like there's sections where it just involves the land use boards in a way that they're not involved. And I apologize, I'm blanking on exactly the mechanism.

I think the issue that we talked about is The land use boards should not be involved in approving just a tree removal permit.

Right. I would agree. I agree.

But we do get involved, obviously, in a tree removal permit that's associated with the development application. That was the disconnect, right?

Yes.

Where one draft of it said if somebody wanted to get a tree removal permit and there was I don't remember. Was it denied? There was some role that the planning board, the zoning board had in that. And absent any development application, it just doesn't fit.

But assuming there's a subsequent development application proceeding a tree removal application, then it should be incorporated.

Unless the trees are already gone.

But that's the point, right? If the tree's gone, then we should be able to.

That's what the ordinance is trying to address.

Who's the adjudicator in the ordinance, like staff of the township? So can it just, can that, whatever, do they, I know you're still working on the language, but are the way that they are being instructed to review it kind of parallel to how the planning board review it? Like, does it matter if you're going to remove a tree, shouldn't you hit the same threshold whether you're doing development or not? Or no? That's what I don't know.

That's a good question.

I don't think that this was necessarily part of the discussion. Other than that, so there are mechanisms that are like an unpermitted removal mechanism would mean that you couldn't get a certificate of occupancy.

I think that makes more sense.

But this one would necessarily involve every application for development would first have to be cleared by going to whatever department is keeping the tree removal permits. So the first step, the Department of Planning and Community Development, before you got it, you go to the zoning office or whatever, you would have to go see if there was a permit within the two years that didn't involve a diseased tree. And then there would be a question of whether or not that could be appealed. yeah and like would the planning board be the appellate body or no the zoning board

I know from other towns the concern is that, like, sometimes the rigor of the staff or the rules on the staff level, the township staff, the authority that they have aren't rigorous enough or the rigor. And so then you end up with, you know, every time a beautiful tree goes down, it gets into the news. So I guess, you know, it really falls on whatever language you're working on now to make sure that, you know, they're – You know, the staff is empowered to be rigorous about tree removal.

It has to be specific. Trees of a certain age, trees of a certain type, trees of a certain DBH cannot be removed unless it's a health or safety hazard.

Right. And not a lot of discretion and not a lot of.

Exactly.

Because I get it. For the staff, it's also a judgment call and they're not. So I guess, right, I would say the language seems to fall on this ordinance like, and empowering the staff of the town, whoever's that decision maker, to be able to say no and have a set of facts that allow them to say no, as opposed to this, which I feel like you would just get, this sounds like a lawsuit. I'm like, what if someone new bought the property and they're not the ones that got the permit two years ago to remove the tree?

And would that be part of title search?

Right, exactly.

I mean, I could see there's a, I would almost see we could add something to our checklist that says you have to, as part of your development application, present any tree removal permits that have been granted in the last two years. That would be the easiest way to put the burden on them.

Correct, put the burden on them.

And then there's got to be a check in the background, right, when it comes into your office and you're checking to make sure everything's complete or incomplete. Right. you lean over to whoever has those, hey, anything for this lot and block? No? Great. That's how I would see kind of almost a check to perhaps get at some of the segmentation concerns.

The good news is that the permitting process that will be done for the new tougher tree ordinance is being moved online in a way that will be much more professional so it's not like you're going to have to go through filing cabinets to figure out it's only two years yes you're going back 20 years right but and presumably if this something like this were to pass When you try to pull a permit for removal that does not involve the dead or diseased tree, there would be a notification on it, a big box or something that would say, if you go ahead and execute a permit to execute a tree that is not already dying, you will not be able to

do anything to your property. Under these new rules, if someone applies to remove a tree, what rationale do they have to have? I'm just saying, hopefully the system that you're setting up, where the staff reviews tree removals, would just prevent willy-nilly tree removals. But if someone wants to remove a small tree, they can, because that's not... affected by the ordinance, let's say, but if it's a big tree, don't they have to hit a level of criteria?

It's called tiered... Well, if a tree also comes down... it's tiered replacement so it's not and the focus which I agree on is first of all the first focus is you can't plant like an ornamental tree or a screen that is one that people advocates are I think on the right track about because it's about protecting shade trees so and we weren't always looking at it like we were thinking like a tree is a tree of the tree and it's not true You know, like a lovely little dogwood is not the same thing as planting an oak tree. So that's the first thing. But it is the question of if somebody wants or needs to remove a tree to build something, then what happens?

Oh, you mean build something that doesn't come to the level of a board review?

I think this discussion is denoting that the building and construction doesn't have policy and procedures in place to safeguard shade trees right now. They do have the mechanism to protect those trees. If anyone's walking into their office looking for a permit for removal, there is a laundry list that that resident and that tree have to go through. before the permits are even issued. But more importantly, there's also code enforcement that would also go out and inspect before any removal. So there are measures in place. I think the current legislation is probably going to enhance those procedures, but we do have measures in place at the township.

think I would say the Environmental Commission has a different understanding of what's in place and it's just I'm not on the tree committee subcommittee of the Environmental Commission but I just hear chatter in the meetings I'll say that at least from certain members of the Commission perhaps the tree subcommittee they they don't feel there are appropriate checks and that you know from their perspective Folks are pulling the permit and then not replanting. And that was a concern.

I think that that may be because I don't think the building department, they don't review trees. They review buildings and they're inspecting the buildings. Code enforcement goes out when there's a complaint. They don't state that the building, the tree removal permits don't go to code enforcement. They go to the Department of Community Services.

OK, but there are measures in place and I can tell you I could tell you firsthand that one of those residents came into the office today. So there are, I think they are being well advised on the process and the do's and don'ts of removal of a tree.

Okay.

Right. But clearly our ordinance needs to be vastly improved.

That's what I've heard. It's been a topic of discussion.

Yeah.

Does that give you what you need for question number 14? I don't know if we're going to get too much further tonight, but.

I guess it's very complicated.

It is very complicated, absolutely. And I don't know if this board is the one to solve it.

And again, I apologize for not remembering the parts where it mentions the land use boards.

Well, something on the 31st we can reconnect on.

I just looked at it real quickly.

We don't have to resolve this here, but I'm just confused as to why someone would be able to get a legal permit to remove a tree like that. And if they have a legal permit to remove that tree, why then later they wouldn't be able to apply for it? Put in an application for development.

Well, right now, as it works, you pay to remove a healthy tree. And I guess it's tiered. Like you pay $450, I think.

I don't know.

Something like that. My understanding, like there's a permit fee, and then you either have to replant on your property one for one or pay $250 to a tree fund per tree.

But I'm assuming this was drafted to prevent bad actors from just removing trees. I get that. I give some tea. But I still don't understand the particulars.

I think the one question I just have here is it's like, if you want to build an ADU, that's just sticking in my head because I've seen this, and you need to remove a tree to build the ADU, you can't really build the ADU for two years. That's what this is saying.

No, if you would apply one time to, no, it's saying if you remove the tree and never even brought up the ADU.

But if you brought up the ADU and said, I have to remove this treaty, do it. Yes, and it's a bigger discussion.

But also for an ADU, you're really not going to a board for approval. You're just going for a building permit, unless they need a variance.

Right.

But I think it's awkward.

Just write the perfect language.

All right, do we have any committee reports?

We've got the zoning committee, which is the focus right now. I'll reach out to the redevelopment committee, let them know if they want to meet before the August 31st. And the DRC, the Development Review Committee, has been very slow because we haven't had a lot of site plans coming in. I have a nine-unit subdivision plan that was filed last week. Talk about tree removals. There's quite a few trees to be removed on that. That's over on Pleasant Avenue. Pleasant Avenue and Cedar Avenue. But he's no longer involved. There's a different attorney. But yeah, so that will be coming before the board sometime this fall.

I can say the communications subcommittee met last week to start talking through how do we help educate the public on the procedures that we have. I think, Ms. Wallace, you said it, a lot of people don't even know what we do, and I agree. So to try to get to some of that, Mr. Borschoff and I met to try and just start thinking through, like, what's our highest priority? And the first thing that we came up with really was, hey you're here to comment on an application here's what you need to know and having that be the first focus and we had some ideas really mr borschoff about let's put up a qr code people can snap it people can use their phone to you know understand what's how a how a hearing goes and where will the public actually have an opportunity to comment so and then we've got a few other things that he's he took all the notes so i don't have it in front of me but I will get a download to you, Ms. Talley, and then we're going to keep moving forward on that.

One of the recommendations that came up at one of the community meetings was that the planning board should have public comment, in general public comment, on the agenda. So I just thought I would.

I'm not personally a fan of that.

I would forward that recommendation to the full board.

HPC does do that, but yeah.

I feel like we get a lot of comment as it is.

I know. I do think there was also the meeting. They came up a lot at the Ward 1 meeting, I thought. Yes, they did. I thought more of a one-off where it was, I don't know how you do it, but just sort of almost like the meetings you did about the master plan. It's just almost taking a part of our meeting, and of course then no one will show up. So people could ask questions about how the planning works. And that could be a one-off, not necessarily every week.

Or you could do it quarterly. Right, right. Do a quarterly, just put it on your agenda on a quarterly basis, public comment.

Right, or a public question. You know, people just, I think they're, you know, and I think of that building on Park Street, which I missed the hearing for, but I feel like, you know, that created this whole, you know, I don't know. It was an unfortunate situation, it seems like, and a bad map, and I don't think they were bad actors, but then all of a sudden it just created this air of distrust. And I don't know. You're not going to convince everybody, but if you could just try to explain what the parameters we work under. And it's not just how we feel in our hearts that we vote.

That was part of our discussion last week was exactly that and how to convey that.

Right. chairman I think it might be a good idea if we do planning board meetings in some of the wards outside of town hall Roadshow yeah why not interesting one we've I am generally you know favor of doing community meetings but I'm trying to figure out the benefits for like a planning board meeting versus having you know plenty of room here well it gives the community more and better access to experience a planning board meeting we're going into winter months so it is going to be dark late earlier, so I don't think winter would be a good time to go on the road, but just a suggestion if you really wanted to educate the residents on what we actually do here.

Is there a way that we could find out if there was any interest in that and if the reason people weren't, you know, more people weren't coming here consistently was because of, you know, that and they didn't feel like that the live, the televised meetings was sufficient or something. You know, is there a way that maybe we could find out if there were people that were desiring something like that before we just jumped out there?

You know, I think what might help is rather than just having general public comment on the agenda on a quarterly basis, maybe coming up with topics so that the word gets out. Oh, the planning board is going to have a public discussion on the master plan.

Yeah, I like topics.

Or the planning board is going to have a public discussion on open space. We're working on a plan this year.

I think, though, Janice... I get where you're going with that, and it does make sense to focus the conversation. But every now and then, HPC will get a comment about a random topic that actually is very helpful to us to learn about. So I think leaving it more open-ended, if we're going to do it, we should let people come to us with things. Because it will be about things that we're not even thinking about sometimes, and I think that's helpful.

think that's useful and do they want to they want want more you've heard that they want us to go to the wards because I know people always in some words are very very excited about having more more more and then some I'm just trying to find out the need to do planning board you know in there because if there is I'd be the first person to say well yeah we need more that you know I mean maybe if there was Maybe we should do council meetings there. I'm just trying to figure out how we figure out if that's going to be something that large numbers of people feel they would benefit by.

Just one, I think it would be if we did have a public sort of Q&A. I mean, almost as simple as like on the screen, like this is a zoning map. Type your address here. Look at the zoning of your house. Look at the zoning of your neighborhood. You know, here's the code 360. Here's what that zoning means. I mean, I think like a simple thing like that, like people don't know. how their house is zoned and what's that mean.

That could be helpful if we did a road show for something like that.

I felt like that came up. How do we know there are not other things that aren't anticipated on the zoning map? I think Zoe was like, oh, look up your house. Look up your neighborhood. People might not know how to do that.

That would be a good example.

I would be more in favor of like I mean, I like the idea of moving around, and certainly the First Ward place that we always go to the library is like a block from my house.

And it's not large enough to hold us all. Yeah, well, it's pretty big.

And it's going to be bigger. Yeah, eventually. It's going to be bigger. Maybe during the next council. Although we're going to have to remove a tree. But I would be in favor of... Those permits. I love the idea of the special meeting. I would be in favor of some kind of public training on stuff like you're talking about. And when we had that meeting, we were talking about it with people, like, just learn your zoning. Just learn what's down. Get ahead of the curve. Because people... I mean, you know, everybody's so shocked when an application gets pulled and, like, they...

realize oh we can't change anything now so i think it'd be great to do that what you're talking about that doesn't necessarily have to be at a planning board meeting yeah that's what i'm the whole plan you know how to do that and that's something that staff can do Not that I want to charge my staff with doing more publicly, but I don't think we'd want to have that take up an official planning board meeting. That would be more of like planning outreach.

Right, or what's the next number? Like three members of the planning board go. Yeah, exactly. So it's not an official meeting.

So I think that's a great idea.

Yeah, I like that idea.

That's good. So the planning board is invested, but it's not the full board. Great idea.

Right.

And then we would, ideally be trying to encourage public comment, which is what this group just pretty much said that they weren't interested in adding to the agenda. Because if you're going to ward to ward to ward and you're going to do that, I think that in an ideal world you would be trying to encourage participation with the questions and with those types of things, right? So that would have to be a comment, like the example that you gave, which I thought was excellent in terms of helping people to read and understand. So with a smaller group like the three or, you know, people from here, I think that that would be a really wonderful addition to not instead of that we could have these where know we're here and people are always welcome to come here and sit and listen and participate at the appropriate time and then have those you know on the road show maybe we should create an outreach committee outreach is good I'll resign from one of the others and go to outreach. I love outreach.

I'll join you. Okay, we've got two people so far.

I'll put my adjunct professor hat back on.

There you go.

Communications, yeah. There we go. That's excellent.

We'll expand the communications committee. And how many people do we have? Two.

Just myself and Mr. Borshaw.

We need a third person. I don't think I'm on any active committees. Or if I am, they haven't activated me.

It seems to me that we already have something that Mayor Raskin, right when you were before it started, the local ward meeting. And I think that having that structure already in place, that perhaps local ward meeting might choose to have on its agenda at some time. Brilliant. Absolutely. That's it right there. Brilliant.

We just knitted it all together.

Thank you for remembering. Wonderful.

Oh, yes, it is.

All right. That is a good point. I think we've got a good path forward on that.

I think that's it. Okay.

Do we have any bills? No bills. No bills. I would move to adjourn.

Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed?

Have a good night, everyone.

Have a great night.