City Council - Regular Meeting

soon all right hello i'd like to call to order the july 21st meeting of the ross advisory design review group the first thing we always do here is we open up to public comment if anyone wants to speak for up to three minutes on any topic that is not on the agenda now is a time that you may do so okay no shame no one wanted to do that this time um the first order of business is we will approve the minutes from the june 16th adr meeting um i read those and they looked fine to me but if anyone has any suggestions for changes or to second the approval in their approval yep no changes great okay now we'll start the planning and projects City Council Chambers, For those of you that haven't been here or don't recall the way this works is for each project, the town gives a short introduction of the project. City Council Chambers, And then the owners and or their design team gives a longer presentation, during which the ADR members might or might not ask questions for clarifications. Mayor Mrakas, After that we open it up to the public, if anybody wants to comment about any project and then after that we bring it back to the ADR so we can make our recommendations to the town council and the first project is 92 Glenwood avenue.

Mayor Mrakas, yeah good evening ADR members tonight the applicant at 92 Glenwood avenue is requesting a recommendation to town council for design review and a demolition permit. This is the existing house here. And the project is proposing to replace the existing siding, I mean, stucco with western red cedar shingles throughout the entire house. And that's pretty much it. And staff request that the ADR group provide their recommendation to the town council. Thank you.

Is there anything you'd like to say about your desire to put shingles on the outside of your house? If so, please step up to the microphone. These meetings are recorded, so we need you to turn on the microphone. Yes. Actually, is it on? Actually, sorry, I can hear you fine, but I don't know. I'm not sure. How about that now?

Great. Thank you all for being here and for considering the project. We have a older home built in 1931 that had some deteriorating stucco and needed to be replaced to prevent water intrusion. And we also wanted to take the opportunity to improve the structure's wildfire risk and reduce it and make it more fire safe to protect the community. And then, Kim, I don't know if you want to add anything about the materials and the scope.

Hi, I'm Cami and we recently replaced all the windows because previous owners had put in new windows to the existing structure and they with the original stucco. it just we had water damage basically all around the house so replace them all with nice casement windows and in doing so we had to we saw how much water damage there was so we took off the stucco and we were about to then put up new white stucco and in the process we thought well now that it's off to be more in keeping with the town we thought that doing a natural wood shingle might just help elevate it even more and so that kind of opened up this process

Can you show us what the shingles look like?

So this is the company that we found. We talked to the fire department, and I kind of worked back and forth with Roberta and Alex to find an appropriate material that was still natural, but they come on eight-foot boards with fire backing, and it's one of the only ones approved on CAL FIRE for all WUI zones in California, kind of on its own. So it comes with like a plywood backing and then a fire returnant, and it... It meets all the requirements for fire zones.

Oh, that's great. You're able to find that. I didn't know that existed. Does anyone have any questions?

I saw that your plan is to give it a year and see how it kind of weathers and decide if you would keep it unfinished or sealed or whatever or add or paint it.

Right. So it took me a minute to decide what would be most in keeping with the house. And I really love the natural look. The company does offer to pre-stain, but my ideal is to have it age in patina really nicely and kind of have some browns and some grays and have the nice white trim. But if for some reason it didn't age well in our location, i believe that a light gray paint would look also look really nice on our house so um kind of giving the option not starting with paint starting with natural and then see how it ages over a couple of years and then take it from there if if it would look cleaner or nicer to be painted eventually thanks any other questions or comments all right thank you

Does anybody here or online have any comments about this project?

There's no one online.

I have a question. So, Alex, a demolition permit is required because if you remove more than 25% of the exterior surface, it's that constitutes demolition. Is that right? Correct. Yeah, we should change that, I think.

Yeah.

Would anyone like to go first?

I will. I think it's a great idea. It's going to be beautiful.

sorry you had to come before us to jiggle your house but i think it's great i'm pro um i'm also supportive of the change i think it fits well with the context of the houses on your street and the overall design aesthetic of ross so i agree with my colleagues and have nothing to add ditto same here good project

Okay, thank you.

Good luck.

Thank you so much. Thank you.

Okay, the next project is 98 Laurel Grove.

Good evening, India members. Tonight, the applicant at 98 Laurel Grove is requesting a recommendation to the Town Council for design review and a non-conformity permit. This is the existing guest house here. this is a site plan showing the guest house and the project is proposing to expand an existing non-conforming guest house by by 396 square feet increasing the total area from 385 to 781 square feet the addition will use materials that match the existing guest house and main residence The project also includes a new patio and a trellis and some retaining walls. Next slides are the north elevation here, the existing and proposed. The east elevation, the height is changing from 14 feet 11 inches to 20 feet 6 inches. The south elevation, existing and proposed. The west elevation, existing and proposed. And staff request that the ADR group discuss the merits of the project and provide a formal recommendation to the town council. Thank you.

Thank you. Would you like to come up and say anything about your project?

Hello i'm JESSICA Smith with polsky pristine architects Jared wasn't able to make it tonight, but sends his regards. i'm here to represent the guest house edition with owner Kelly when else and essentially the existing footprint stays the same we're expanding the guest house by adding a level underneath the existing finished floor. So the elevation of the upper finished floor now stays the same. The roof elevation stays the same. And the new addition will occupy what was crawl space and dig out part of the hillside so that the new finished floor lower level will be kind of at the same level as the main house. And we'll share a patio so that they kind of better connect and it's more usable. It meets all of the. zoning requirements is really well screened from the surrounding properties. The nonconformity is the existing structure is about eight inches over the side yard setback. Thankfully, that side has no neighbor next to it. It's really the building is on the other side of the next property. And the more prominent facade is on the east facade, and that faces the existing house. And so you really only experience it from the existing house and the existing carport. Our car court. I think that's about it. Can I ask a question? Absolutely. Is the trellis in the setback then? No, the trellis is actually kind of set in set from the... Okay. Okay. So it stays outside of it.

And then I know we reviewed this project years ago. We're just focusing on that one area. It's just this one area. Okay.

Can I ask a quick question on the impervious surfaces? There is a patio in front under the trellis, is that right? Correct. Okay. Just seeing the list of no change on impervious services on the page two of the application.

What's kind of confusing as part of the larger project happening on the site, the drive court is all becoming permeable paver. And so with that, it's offset this additional patio in front of the guest house. Okay, thank you.

I did miss that. Thank you.

Any more questions? Okay. Thank you.

Thank you.

Does anyone in the audience want to comment on this project? Or anyone at home?

There's no one online.

Okay. I'll go first. Seems great. They're not going into the side yard setback. They're not putting pool equipment in the side yard. They're not building a pool four feet from the side yard. They're actually building something more or less in the middle of their own lot. And they're not increasing the footprint of anything. So it seems like a great change to me.

Yeah, I mean, I like the volume going down into the earth. The roof line isn't. City Council Chambers, it's the building seconding taller so it's not increasing the mass thing and it. City Council Chambers, Possibly visible from across the hill, but none of your neighbors really are going to be impacted by any I mean besides construction by anything so. City Council Chambers, yeah I would be supportive of it.

City Council Chambers, i'm also supportive of it, I think it's a really nice design and the we always have a. issue with exacerbating a nonconformity, but because the nonconformity is only eight inches into the side yard setback and this is actually going down in the same footprint, I think that can be the findings why we would allow eight inches. I just think it's nicely designed and I support it.

Yeah, I can concur. I do have one quick question. The HVAC unit On the roof, is that existing or is that new? There's a mini split. Is that an existing one? OK. Yeah. I just was curious. I saw them in the drawings. I can fully support this as a drawing. It's a nice project.

I agree. I have nothing to add.

Now we will move on to the conceptual advisory design review for 8 Morrison Road.

Okay, thank you. Let me allow Shelly to... Oh, okay, okay. Yeah, let me pull up the plans. Thank you. Yeah.

Can you guys hear us okay?

Minutes.

Okay, perfect.

It's like I've seen your ideas. Two projects in 13 minutes?

It is.

Have you guys been by the residence, the house? Have you guys been by the house this morning, today?

Oh, OK. Yesterday. I did not go up the driveway, though. The driveway.

Yes.

There's no way that could be constructed today.

It must be at least 14%.

Just in case. Oh, nice. Thank you. Perfect. Oh, it's on me. Oh, nice.

Okay.

So can you go to the next slide, please?

So basically the scope of work is just enclosing that cardboard. Sheet A1.1 please. Nice, okay. So top left is the existing condition and the lower right is the proposed design. so we are proposing to enclose existing carport into the garage and then giving a connection right here that's going to be a new hallway connecting the garage to the house so existing is open carport with a covered hallway, but it's exterior to the house. So we would like to enclose that space as well. That's the gray area right here. Yeah, that's pretty much the scope of work. And can we quickly go to the slide? elevation a 2.1 oh yeah this one is good too so as you can see the existing carport has like very low ceiling like seven feet for today modern standard we would like to raise it up higher so that create this box right here by still taking the shape and the footprint of the existing carport so we're not changing any lot coverage like if you look from the top view down you won't see the change at all because the roof is already there and only change will be the height of the garage

yeah and um we're going to need a variance for this project because it's already over the allowable so that's pretty much the scope of work for the project okay um they're really just requesting a variance to the far and it's going to be 118 square feet to enclose that walkway that way they can connect the garage to the house

So the walkway that's proposed that would increase the FAR, because it's pretty hard to get a variance in general for FAR. Usually they don't do that. And in this case, it's on the backside of the house. So literally no one else will ever be able to see it from anywhere. But is there any precedent in the town for letting someone increase FAR so they can have a walkway between the garage and the house? Because it seems like If the town council voted yes for this, then there are a lot of unattached garages or semi-attached garages in the town, including mine, where you could then say, well, should I be able to go over my F.A.R. to build a covered walkway or an enclosed walkway between the two structures?

Recently, there have been a couple two that I know of one on Allen. That was because their entrance was on the second story. So the ADR in the town did support them to go over their FAR so that they can basically have a first floor entrance to their home. Do you remember the address? Yes, 39 Allen. 39 Allen. Okay. And then the other one recently is the one on... 103 Bolinas. Yes, 103 Bolinas, all that was was a closet, it was like 103 square feet or something. And they really, you know, just needed some storage space. So we did let them pull out their rear, what was it three or four feet seemed reasonable, everything there in that area was already non conforming. So there was really no way for them to add without getting a variance. Let's see, what other? Any others?

We are looking for reasons to support this, findings to help you do it so it won't set a precedent for future applicants.

Not just okay.

So right now they can't go from the carport to the House, they have to go out and then walk down basically it's like an overhang of the roof that's really it so if it's raining or something.

So this is getting wet this increases fa are but not lock coverage.

which is kind of an interesting nuance here because it's all under the eve right so that's a pretty unique scenario where you're really and the bulk and mass is not affected in any way shape or form no well i think i i want to talk separately about the roof line of the garage that's a different story but i agree with that but i agree that the that it's already covered with a roof line makes it really benign i don't know how if that creates a findings route but

yeah speaking just of the hallway not not the not the garage right right some other means of egress out into that hallway right see there's two there's another door from that basically moving that entry door just moving the front door out yeah

It will maybe the ADR members could comment on, well, you can comment on anything, but specifically break up the project into two. One is whether or not you think there might be findings for increasing the FAR and another one about the enclosing the carport and making it a garage. It was like, like my house also, like we walk out a door from the garage covered walkway for 10 feet into our house. And we could enclose that and I don't think it would affect anybody negatively and it would also, actually it might get us over the FAR at that point and it would not increase the footprint whatsoever because there's already a covered walkway there. So there's probably other ones in the town like that too, I'm assuming.

Go ahead if you have some thoughts.

No, not exactly about findings. I just think that it's pretty benign in its position. It's benign volumetrically. It doesn't hurt anybody. The FAR is so stringent because it's hillside in this case. It's just got a lot of things going for it that are hard to meet literally with the code, but that are pretty fine under the kind of the general spirit of the code here. And so it's about, I think for the hallway, it's about trying to kind of help find the findings. Mayor Mrakas, But does it, but does that does the lot face a unique hardship that is not that is the others kind of don't face or that it literal interpretation would prohibit them from considered from normal enjoyment that other people enjoy I don't know did not really. Mayor Mrakas, yeah I struggle with the.

Mayor Mrakas, Because I would like to support this, but I struggle with the findings, given that it is you're almost by adding this you're almost double the hillside lot fa. than you're supposed to allow, which is really restrictive. As Stephen said, it's 600 and some odd square feet. I understand it's really restrictive, but you're almost doubling it, right? With this extra 180 square feet, it's like, you know, 1300 square foot home or lot coverage, or I'm sorry, FAR over the allowable. So it's hard to understand how we think through that. Maybe let's talk, maybe let's move to just some of the design of the carport itself.

Yeah, let's talk about that first and then we'll do the covered walkway.

Maybe, Alex, if you could show one of the elevations.

Yeah, thank you. And you slide to the right of that or just back out.

City Council Chambers, I struggle a little bit with the height, I understand the height of the current carport is restrictive and you would like to raise that up makes total sense. City Council Chambers, Unfortunately, the home is such a low slung home overall raising the the the carport now now garage to the to the height that it you're proposing becomes the dominant physical feature of the project which. You know, from a design standpoint, I would prefer not to see. So I would love to see maybe an exploration of, you have some, you know, I call it, you know, have a totally flat roof home. Is there a way to minimize that garage roof so it's not so tall, maybe with a different roof form? I think following the slope of the main house. The main home.

Literally. Or if that's too short at the left-hand side of the diagram, then doing an offset where it's exactly parallel, but offset by one foot vertically. There you go.

would make it look like it was designed in concert with rather than as an addition i think that's what i was thinking the same thing like there's a way to to infuse this a little bit better into the into what the roof structure is with the home without being so tall it does look even on the on the facade looks a little extra tall um you know that's it's possible

Like yeah we looked into those ideas like have it lower and have it like matching the slope or work together with the existing home, but this game came out just because. waterproofing is easier for this scheme, if you build it up, so it gives you like the curb. height to work with yeah over the existing existing yeah yeah um so that's just the construction method is it's easier this way but um yeah we we can compromise and bring it down and make it work with existing house as well does this garage i'm sorry conform to setbacks i think so um do you have a site plan do we the setbacks are not notated on the site plan is that right

setbacks are here oh they're noted 24 feet 23 feet and 70 foot 11. i don't know where the sides and rear are and stuff like this it just notes yeah and i don't know whether those are just current dimensions versus the frontage is along the street which should be 25 and then the rear should be 70 and it's 24 foot four it will not conform well rear should be 40. the rear should be 40 40 the sides should be 25 size to be 25. is the rear

The larger setback, the 70, or is the rear the 20?

The rear would be the 24-4.

I think the hardship is a very odd-shaped lot in the hillside ordinance, giving them 600 and something square feet to work with.

And the topography. For the hallway, you're saying?

Yeah, and for enclosing a garage or not enclosing a garage, like doing any development there, that there's a hardship that I think we could work with them.

I agree with that. I think that though the form should be complementary of the roof, and especially because it doesn't conform to setbacks. Yes.

it shouldn't be something that is dominantly so from the aesthetic side the garage is dominating the house in the current you want that balance to be reversed ideally being actually a little lower yeah i don't know if you could get the garage like stephen was suggesting the garage being maybe a little bit taller than the home i don't know if you could do what you're suggesting which is have the garage just a slight like a foot lower than the home plate height and then rise at the same

slope that would be a question just from a geometry perspective i don't know if it has a filling foot yeah that's too low it would be too low if you match the garage to the slope of the house does it even lower the street like side at all much um yeah like because the the street side is The taller end right, and so you have to allow the appropriate space for the garage doors i'm just wondering does it even bring it down.

Much. Pretty much like a flat roof like their main house yeah.

I think what Laura's saying is on that bottom right image, which is the proposed, if you did a slope that was parallel to the main roof, it wouldn't lower the right-hand side of that diagram. So from the street, it would appear the same.

Yeah. That's what I'm trying to point out.

Right. But it would look cooler from space.

yeah from when they pull their car into the garage but it wouldn't really like have impact on I mean that's a fair point I was busy focusing on the driveway so I didn't really look at it from the bottom but um

But so, Joey, you're saying that just because the literal enforcement of the hillside in this case is so darn stringent that that's kind of the hardship, right? Because it's an irregular shaped lot that's super small.

City Council Chambers, I would go for irregular shape lot, but I strongly say that if it's the hillside lot of the hillside lot ordinance right just because it's strict and they don't have a tiny amount of square footage that doesn't that's not a hardship, no.

City Council Chambers, I agree with you, but, but. City Council Chambers, lot size and the fact that now we're back to talking about the enclosing of the the hallway the fact that that's on the backside with a big.

makes it benign but does it make it uh what's the yeah I think we all but is it a smaller lot than most in this if you look at the map is it one of the smallest in the zone or I mean a similar project is the Wellington project that got a bunch of extra far so there I don't go there I mean yeah I think there I feel like there has to be some sort of mechanism

City Council Chambers, For us to be able to decide things that that increase the quality of life so materially for such a small architectural gesture that does not affect one person, other than making this House so much better So what is the mechanism for as for us as a group.

City Council Chambers, I think your your point of the. City Council Chambers, I would say the lot shape and it's restriction for growth, but I would say this doesn't I would say the difference here is that it does not increase lock coverage in any way. City Council Chambers, increases fa are but not lock coverage, so it doesn't increase the bulk and mass it doesn't increase fa are i'm sorry lock coverage, which I think is a unique scenario. City Council Chambers, But mark's point is right like your House would be the same thing yeah right, but I guess we could be no reason, like if the town ever.

If it ever came up, someone wanted to enclose my walkway.

Yeah.

I'd say, well, look at this house.

And I would, I would, I guess, ask to maybe to all of us, would that be terrible? Would that be terrible if they did that?

It wouldn't hurt anybody, but just like this, you know, first thing I said is it's not going to, no one's ever going to see it. Yeah.

What about the egress angle? Does it help at all?

It already has it. I mean, it doesn't make it safer.

It's the same egress. You're already directly to the outside. Get out of that other bedroom. And it's already covered egress. It's just whether or not it has a wall next to it.

I thought that was a good one. If it says sprinklers, maybe it's safer.

I can support, I could say I could support this, the extra 181 square feet, based on the fact that it does not increase block coverage. But I don't know what the finding is for it.

But then every overhang every covered anything you could yes, people are going to start because I remember how you used to not be able to enclose front porches actually my rear porch is probably 20 by 15, and I couldn't close that and it wouldn't increase the coverage.

Remember the one on Hilgert that came back to us many times where they were saying it wasn't a they were saying it was covered. There's been a lot of things.

Yeah. All right.

It's still dilapidated.

Yeah, yeah.

It's not going to be my issue. But you guys, if you start voting for covering stuff that's got overhangs, anything that has an overhang in the town is essentially getting closed up when someone wants. Yeah, covered porch, which might be fine.

No, it's a fair point. A covered porch is a much larger problem. The proportions of this and we all I think, agree, it does not impact anybody or anything. But the precedent it could set is fairly.

Well, and there's us, you know, making these arguments, which we all think it's fine because no one's going to see it. But we don't know that town council would want to vote for it either, because then they'd be setting themselves up for every month going forward. Someone with a covered area wants to enclose it and increase their F.A.R.

When it doesn't increase lot coverage. So we're on the, we're in a conceptual design review. We could, we don't, we need to give some guidance, but.

Yeah, we're giving guidance, not a recommendation to Council. Not a recommendation to Council. So I guess my guidance would be on the FAR it's usually not granted. Like usually they just don't grant FAR overages, especially when you're already over. But even if you were under, sorry, even if you were on the line, They normally would not do that unless there was some hardship that was unique. So I think that's going to be pretty difficult to do. Of course, you could always submit the project like this and see what the ADR says at that time and see what the town council says at that time. And then if people don't like it, you could do the same project, but without enclosing the walkway. And then you've got your covered walkway as you would have your worst case is a covered walkway.

Or create a JADU.

or create an ADU.

Because then you could do a cover walkway.

Oh, yeah. I mean, you get that square footage.

But it has to be. But then you're putting like a kitchen in there. And you have to have like all the things. Well, not in the hallway. Downstairs or something. Change the project. Yeah, change the project so you could get more square footage. You could swap square footage. But the square footage would have to be in the JD. Oh, I see.

No, you could create an ADU downstairs that is partly under the house, partly an addition. You know, you could just... And then... Yeah, I guess you'd have to take a part of the existing square footage as part of the at you so that you could push.

yeah so essentially recommending you spend about a million dollars to get this hundred.

yeah that's right.

yeah if you did a jd you'd have more square footage and you could do work around but then you're spending hundreds of thousands of dollars. City Council Chambers, In order to cover the walkway essentially right so that might be something you want, if you want a slightly bigger house, but it might not be you could essentially turn the garage into an at an at you.

City Council Chambers, Right, I mean there are there are ways to work in the at you kind of world to make this work, but it is definitely not as simple as what you're proposing yeah. City Council Chambers, recommending that.

Yeah, so I think that, does anyone have different recommendations or comments on the covered walkway other than it's a risk and it's probably not going to be, you know, my point was you can try it, but it's probably not going to be approved because certainly far less than 50% of people asking for extra FAR get approved in this town. It might be less than 10%. Yeah. That's a precedent. And egress doesn't really mean anything because there's so many, like, everyone wants extra square footage near a door, right?

Yeah. I would think maybe the highly irregular sized lot could be.

But isn't that almost, like, how many hillside lots are square?

I know. Drew? I think it's hard to get extra. It's hard to get extra square footage. If you don't really have a hardship. That's sort of how it works here. And then there's this huge bonus. If you do an ADU or a J do that, where you can get a lot of square footage, and it doesn't have to come, it does, you know, there's the setbacks are much more lenient. But that's another project.

That's a whole, you can talk to Alex and

City Council Chambers, The town about but yeah I do support in closing the garage and making a closed garage and I, I would say let's give guidance it's too high, the way it's designed it's too tall. City Council Chambers, i'm actually very curious about is there any plan to try to make that driveway more navigable is that required of you. City Council Chambers, You know, to make it.

actually where you can drive up it more easily is would the town require that for fire in no getting a fire engine up there or when they don't meet the require there's a requirement for that the driveway be a certain slope for fire trucks and stuff but when it doesn't meet code in its current condition they don't make you change it if it's impossible if you're doing a larger project it might ask for a greater density of fire sprinklers or other things like that to try to make it safer for the occupants longer so that the

time that it takes the fire people to go up the driveway on foot is accounted for kind of i was just curious that's right so if unless it's uh 50 percent of the area it's not gonna require fire Right right um the hallway could do that it's possible that would be fires determination, I guess, I just wanted to add when game and shelly Ryan who's the property owner came really the concern was the driveway and the way they're accessing the House now, and I do believe. it's not something that needs design review, but you're going to try to reconfigure that driveway, right? So maybe you can describe that in the plan.

So it's not just... Yeah, we don't have the actual design settled down already, but yeah, we'd like to improve that condition.

By cutting higher up on the hill?

moving it i'm making a gradient radius i believe yeah swinging it kind of longer yeah i don't think we have a say in that but we'd support it you'll like it more yeah we do we do have someone online that would like to oh speak yes yeah hold on well we what's conceptual uh yeah go for it yeah yeah it's the homeowner uh david can you can you hear us

Hi, I can. Can you hear me? Yeah, we can hear you. All right. Well, thank you for all the suggestions, and I'm glad everyone did survive that driveway. It is challenging. We are in the process of working with some engineers to kind of come up with a a driveway that isn't so challenging, where even the engineer was saying the left side of the driveway to the right side of the driveway is such a slope. He's never seen that before. Um, so it is work in progress. It's not, nothing is confirmed at this point, but we do, you know, we do agree. We have a four year old daughter as well. So it's somewhat of a concern if she wants to go out and go down the driveway, it, uh, obviously in the current state, it's not ideal.

And this is Shelly. Thank you guys so much for all your feedback. We know that it's definitely an interesting driveway and property in general, but just really appreciate your time in the considerations and feedback. So I guess we can work with game to rethink the enclosed garage and then based off your feedback to decide if you want to move forward with also the enclosed hallway. But it sounds like that could be potentially unlikely from this conversation, but just appreciate the feedback. There's anything else? All open ears.

Thank you. So why don't we do this? How about who here thinks the drive the garage? Not let's not talk about the height right now, just in general. It's okay if it's enclosed. Does everyone agree that?

Yes.

Okay, so everyone agrees the garage, the carport can be enclosed. Who believes the design for the enclosed carport should be slightly lower?

Yeah. If possible.

OK, so majority on that as well. And then does everyone believe that the extra FAR for the proposed sorry, the enclosing the hallway, which would get them further over the FAR would be problematic with the town council and precedent setting? Or do people support that, even though we might all agree that it's not going to affect anybody else negatively?

but do most people think that's probably it's something they can try but it's probably not likely to get approved yeah I mean I I agree with Joey like I wish that for these small amounts in situations where it doesn't like do anything to the neighbors it doesn't impact the neighbors that you could make kind of small exceptions um but it in my experience with my own project for um it was moved forward to the town council because we were trying to increase by like 62 square feet and town council wouldn't would not allow it so um I thought they had a hard line except for if you're increasing the garage space basically but um so I would like there for there to be a way for this house to get a small increase but I I don't know it's tricky so the majority thinks that

it probably wouldn't be approved based on what's happened in the past with the town council and requests for extra far and this is just conceptual so that's sort of our advice yeah thank you thank you thank you thank you have a nice evening okay now uh information discussion and new agenda items

um information so we have on the Ross review and the town's front page a recruitment for the ADR since this is Mark Kruschnitz last ADR meeting I think we've gotten two applications so far and um the council decided that the process for that would be once we get the applications which are due on August 17th We put it out for about a month. The governance subcommittee, which is Mayor Pro Tem Robbins and Council Member Dowling, they're going to conduct interviews and then make a recommendation to the Council of whoever the applicants that we get. At the last meeting, you all decided to move forward with the pool exception landscape features exception. So we're working on that, but it has to go through legal review and all that. And we have to get it consistent with all the other portions of the zoning. And anything else to add, Alex? I think those are the updates.

Okay, well, and I would like to add that it's been a pleasure these last 10 plus years, I think I've been on the ADR with you and others and with your predecessors and working with you has been a pleasure. And so thank you.

Thank you for your chairmanship. We do need to for the next meeting or we have to pick a new chair.

Yes, we do need to pick a new chair. Mark, when were you? When did you start on ADR? Is it 2017?

I'm not sure, but it's been a long time. It's almost 10 years. At one point there were like 10 of us on ADR and we were rotating through and it didn't really work that well because people would come and the second time they'd have four new people and they'd have different ideas. And then finally we got it. So there were only five of us and then it works much, much better. And that's probably been a good eight years just like with a smaller group right at least six it had to be pre it was pre-covered so it had to be 18 or 19 if not earlier yeah we all did it through covet yeah yeah those meetings all the zoo meetings well thank you mark for your service to the town it's been a pleasure to work with you

And then I just, if you don't mind, have a little something to read as a thank you. So I just want to take a moment to recognize and thank Mark Kruschnitz for his outstanding service to the ADR since joining the Advisory Design Review Group in 2017. That's what we had in the records. Mark has generously volunteered his time, expertise, and thoughtful perspective in the service of the town of Ross. Over the past nine years, he has participated in countless discussions and project reviews, helping applicants navigate complex questions while upholding the values that make Ross such a special community. The ADR was created to provide guidance on design, architecture, landscape design, site planning, building massing, privacy, neighborhood compatibility, and many other design-related issues. And throughout his tenure, Mark has exemplified the collaborative spirit of the ADR process. He has consistently offered constructive advice, encouraged meaningful dialogue, and helped applicants and neighbors find practical and creative solutions to challenging issues. As we know, volunteer service of this nature often takes place behind the scenes and requires a significant commitment of time and energy. So for nearly a decade, Mark has devoted countless evenings to carefully reviewing plans, attending meetings, and sharing his knowledge to the benefit of the community. His professionalism, collegiality, and dedication has strengthened both the ADR and the quality of development in Ross. And while we will certainly miss his expertise and thoughtful contributions, we are even more grateful for the lasting impact he has made through his years of service. So on behalf of all of us, thank you for your commitment, your wisdom, your nearly nine years plus of distinguished volunteer service we wish you all the very best in the years ahead and hope you'll always know how much your contributions have been valued and appreciated please join me in thanking mark for his service to the town of us thank you and on that i will suggest we adjourn the meeting turn second second

the longest standing chairman we've ever had.