Historic and Architectural Preservation Board - Regular Meeting

Alright. Seeing that it's 09:00, 09:03, we'll go ahead and open the meeting of the Historic and Architectural Preservation Board, 05/22/2025. Could we have a roll call? Attendant.

Chair Beebe.

Here.

Miss Trammell. Present. Miss Derryberry. Mister Steckety? Mister Watkins?

Yep.

And Mister Barrack? Here. Mister Bartanian has resigned from the board.

Okay. Just out of clarification, we have four board members present. I believe that's a quorum, if it counts.

Yes. We still met Okay.

Just wanna just verify that. We'll go ahead and look at the, approval of the minutes from 04/24/2025. You have those before you. If there's any revisions or adjustments to that, please note. Otherwise, I will accept.

Move to approve the minutes

of April 24.

There a second? All right. Gene moves to approve and John will second. All in favor?

Aye.

All opposed? None. All right. The minutes are approved. Any general audience participation today?

No, we do not.

No speaker cards? Thank you. All right. We'll go ahead and move into new business, review of the possible nominations for the 2025 Legacy Award. And we have a staff member, Harry Klinghammer, our historic resource manager.

Morning, Harry.

Good morning.

Thank you. Alright. Thank you. All right.

Good morning. For the record, Harry Klinkhammer, Historical Resources Manager. I just handed to you all two late nominations that came in for the Legacy Award after the agenda was posted. So I've handed out copies to all of you in the city clerk's office so that you all have a copy and we have a copy on file for the record. So last we met, the board here decided to open up for more nominations and also to request some possible candidates that would be looked into by the historical resources manager.

Since that time, I received as you've been handed out two additional nominations for the Legacy Award and I put together a list which primarily consists of names that were recommended to me although I had not received a nomination form, just merely a name recognition or recommendation. Several came from this board, one came from a citizen. So I used those to help compile that recommendation list that you also have before you. So at this point, staff is looking to the board to see what direction they want to move in with the new nominations that we have. And then also to addressing the revised nomination and comments from the original nominee.

So whether or not we want to move forward with any of those or if you want more information on any of the names on the list, we can definitely work on filling that out. But at this point, staff is just looking to see what direction this Board wants to go in or if the Board wants to go ahead and make a decision.

Okay. Thank you, Mr. Klinghammer. Well, I think if we ought to have a discussion about this, and during our last meeting, we chose to extend the nomination period, if you will. We didn't felt like we had enough coverage.

We certainly didn't have enough nominees to make a good selection, so we've now got two more. I guess I'd like to hear what the Board members think about continuing the extension through some time period or reviewing these we have before us. And which would be Ralph Twitchell?

The two new nominations that came in, one was for Ralph Twitchell and one was for Earl Bidlow.

Okay. And at this point, we have just received this packet also from Mr. Midlum?

Yes. The application for Mr. Midlam and for Mr. Twitchell were received late yesterday and early today. These were also based on recommendations that I had received from Board members. So I initially had received recommendations for those names and then later did actually receive the actual nominations.

Okay. I guess from our last meeting, it feels like these are both very good nominees. We have three now. We certainly have we also received a letter from Mr. Wright regarding his questions about the process, I think.

So at this point, I think, we intended in our last meeting to extend this so that we would get more nominees. I think we've got two more nominees. From my standpoint, I think we should extend it a bit further to have time to really look at the qualifications of what we have and also garner more. I think the award from my standpoint is more valuable if it's against a good competition, you know, of very good applicants, which we have. But I think having more would be better in my opinion.

Any other thoughts on that from board members? I think, I mean, year to year as we go through this, I don't you know, the number of applicants,

I wouldn't anticipate to be a great number year to year. Right. So I think if the bio of someone being nominated or a group is strong, I'm not so sure if they're if it seems well deserved that we should delay it further. My only reason thought to delay it further is just because we don't have a full board today.

Right.

And I would like more input potentially on on that. But other than that, I think what's been provided is pretty strong.

Well, certainly, they're all good applicants. There's no doubt about that. So I would agree with you, John, about having a full board here. I don't know if we anticipate that. We have one more we have one board member who's rolled off as of this meeting. So that that's that. But it would be good to have a full board member to a full Board to vote on this. I think that the Board deserves that. So I would be in favor of waiting to the next Board meeting, next schedule one to do that.

Mr. Chair, if I may, I believe what we are intending on doing anyway procedural wise is that the board was each individually going to rank the applications and send them to the city clerk's office who would then provide the summary results of those rankings for the discussion on a final decision. Believe, Amanda, please correct me if I misspeak, but I believe the next steps would be that you would all receive ranking sheets from the city clerk's office where you would then and it would go to all the board members, so those who are absent today would get that in the material as well and then you would just respond back to the city clerk's office with your rankings and those would then be discussed at the next meeting.

Great. But I forgot that's what we decided with the rankings. I think that's a great way to do it. It also gives us a chance to get it to all the Board members.

Staff's here to make sure you dot the Is and cross the Ts.

Yes. We like that. All right. Thankfully, we have you, Harry, to keep us straight on this stuff. All right. Well, entertain I a motion to proceed with these applicants that we have before us, the three, and proceed with our procedure of ranking them. I suppose we would have that by the next meeting we could Yes. Think we do that by one meeting.

Yes. Will work with Amanda to make sure that the ranking sheets and then copies of the nominations to make sure everyone has those get sent out to all of you and then you can work with Amanda. I'm assuming I don't want to just make Amanda give Amanda work here, but assume then that you would reach out to Amanda with your rankings. Okay. And then that'll be compiled for the next meeting.

All right.

Yes, so the processes after this meeting, I'll get all the applications from Mr. Klinkhammer and then I'll email them to you with a ranking sheet and you'll either call in or provide a paper copy of your rankings. And then at the next meeting, I will provide

the

ranking totals, the results.

Okay. Fair enough. Do we need a motion to do that or just go ahead and

Yes, I would have motion if you guys want to close the application process for this year so that I can produce the ranking.

Okay. All right. Right. Chair will entertain a motion if we want to proceed in that way to close the nominations. Do we want to move make a motion?

Said a motion.

Well, do someone needs to make a motion to that effect.

I thought you made the motion.

I can't make a motion.

I'll make a motion to proceed with the applicants that have been received and allow city clerk to compile a list in order for the board to rank them accordingly.

All right. And we'll

close the twenty twenty four or twenty twenty five nominations.

I'll second that.

Alright. And Jean Trammell will second that. All in favor.

Aye.

Alright.

So we'll we have our nominations. We will hear from Amanda this coming week.

And, Chair, just for the record, were there any nays? No. Okay.

So There were no nays.

Okay. So unanimous. Yes.

Unanimous. Thank you. Alright. We'll go ahead and move on to the next order of business. Maybe we we're here to review the discussion the discussion on chapter 87, section seven, the changes to our guidelines. If we could have miss Trembley, Senior Planner, come and speak with us and staff.

There we go. Better?

Better. Thank you.

All right. So we talked about this at our last meeting and we went over the changes proposed by Mr. Barrick and kind of got consensus on what everyone wanted. So I've brought those back to you, made those changes in strike through underlying format. So we can just look at them, but if you have any questions, stop me as I go. Let's see. Okay. Yeah. Let's do that. Thank you.

Got it. Yep, this will be a little easier for you to see. Okay, so this change gives the Board the authority to make decisions on alterations, additions and renovations for properties that are in the local register. So, that's a change in authority. This is a change that allows the Board to seek other expertise for National Register nominations. That's I think straight from the CLG guidelines pretty much or If CLG

I remember right, that was unchanged from the last time or It's really similar.

Yes. This is pretty much exactly what Mr. Barrack proposed. We talked about that. This is following up on that change in authority. HRM will be responsible for reviewing all properties on the local register but not approving. HAPB will be responsible for approving those changes. And so, we also removed the part about appealing the HRM's decisions because there won't be a decision by the HRM. The HAPB's decisions are always appealed to counsel, so that would remain the same for this. And then, this was in addition just to more broadly define what might be on the register. This is pretty much the same wording we talked about last time.

Right.

Here again changing the decision authority from HRM to HAPB for the certificate of appropriateness. So, that's the properties on the local register. I think that's pretty much it. These are all just changing the decision authority at this point. To the HAPB. And then there was one more change that Mr. Barrack and I just talked about. Wanting to make sure that you all aren't seeing buildings of a style that you're not interested in, something that's not historically significant, not VHP and not another substantial style. Is that kind of what you're looking for with your last change?

Yes. So within our districts, we're going to see a lot of changes. And as changes come through, a commercial building, no not you know, close to the Venice historic style at all, and they wanna change out their out something. So based on our regulations now, they would have to meet our guidelines. If and the exception, you know, to get a CAC, we require a front facade to have three or four items to bring the overall facade into compliance for a CAC if they're doing a renovation.

But only one offs do we need to see those? Do they have to comply if they're doing just one offs? And that's in regards to why we're seeing little things and not more major projects when the original style isn't indicative. It was built in another decades after the 1926 error in our historic district. Do we need are we interested in making that comply if they're only doing one offs?

Well, okay. So a couple of things. If you're doing remember we talked about the minor definition, like what's a minor change? And if it's fewer than three items, you don't need to bring your whole building up into compliance. So, that part is already in there. But we did kind of read over it and think we might have found a solution that doesn't require a code change, but just an interpretation based on what we know you guys want. I'll show you on the document camera, if I could please.

While you're looking that up, just a quick question. This this is not, we're not talking about structures that are not on the historic register. Is

that This would just be something in the district.

Something in the district. So it's really not part of our original discussion.

Right.

This is another

Right. This is a different concept.

This is different than what we've just gone through. Okay. Yes. Not on the historic.

So if you look at items h and I. Right. So we need to change that, I'm sorry, to HAPB instead of historic resources manager. But those kind of talk about the styles that are exempt. So I says structures in either district not in the VHP style but historically significant or substantially constructed in a different style would be exempt.

So the part that says substantially constructed in a different style could be interpreted to be something that's not historically significant or not of interest to the board. In that case we could possibly consult with the chairman or with the historic resources manager before making a decision on whether or not to refer them for a hearing and say okay is this a style that you would want to see or you think the So board needs to I think that could be just refining our process and how we use this code instead of changing it if you all think that that would kind of get at your intent.

I think that would get to our intent. We have a number of times it's gotten through the board Mhmm. Insignificant. Stylistically, it doesn't even describe. It's very eclectic.

And then we have to go through the process and then say, it's not required. We don't need to be doing that, and I think that was why that was put in there. That as well as recognizing other styles, some very significant within our districts that are of clearly of another style. But I I would agree with the interpretation question, Nicole, that we could do that with the chair and just have a general understanding of whether that should go before the board would save the board's time.

And I agree. I think that's why it was put in there. But you know, there are some examples, like you you mentioned the Florida Cancer Care Center, that one maybe didn't need to come to you guys. And I see why, you know? Yeah. It's just matter of kind of refining how how good we are at Yeah. Still So we'll keep working on that.

All right.

Do you have any changes? Or are you would you be ready to let Planning Commission decide on this?

I think at this point, you have adjusted everything that we had concern about. We had a good conversation with Mr. Klinghammer last time about this being something that we would work on together. And his input is very valuable to this board as we make a decision, and then we make it because essentially he's at every meeting that we have any discussion about this. So he would come to us as a really valuable resource to make a decision, but then the Board would make it.

Right.

So I think that's, I mean, we don't have that many properties on the register at this point, but someday we will. So I'll entertain a motion, if there's no more further discussion on this, to approve the strike through underlying version to be sent to City Council.

Mr. Chair, so just for process, if we are if this is the version that the Board wants to take forward, You'll need to do a motion to request the staff initiate the LDR text amendment process and present with the changes to Chapter 88, Section seven as presented. I didn't hear that there were any amendments here today. So it's that you're initiating staff you're having staff initiate the LDR text amendment process.

Okay. So we would need a motion to initiate the LDR text amendment. So, anyone would like to make a motion to do that or any further discussion before we do that? Miss Trammell, you look like you

I'll move what he said. Does that cover it?

Do you is that good enough? Do you want me

to repeat it, Amanda?

Yes, please. Thank you.

Please. Yeah. So it's a motion to request staff to initiate the LDR text amendment petition for the changes to Chapter 88, Section seven as presented.

All right. Do we have a second for that motion? Greg seconds it. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

And Nicole, thank you for all the work to adjust this. It is well appreciated.

Are here to support you guys.

Thank Thank you for that. All Alright. There any other items before the Board today? Any discussions the Board would like to make?

What I've noticed since we've had the recent cycle of hurricanes coming very close or coming across Venice

Oh, yeah.

We have a lot of buildings replacing their windows in our district.

Right.

And many of these windows, because the way our code is written, we're not seeing those changes before they happen. So what I think I'm proposing is that we make some amendments to window and door and how we identify what's required versus not. Currently, if a impact window is installed, historic windows were divided lights, meaning individual glass panes were separated by muttons, then you had the sashes and the head and the stiles to each side boxing the glazing in. So with modern day windows by almost all manufacturers that I'm aware of, you know, you have one solid sheet of glass Yes. For impact resistance.

One is a glass layer, and then you have the laminated glass with a spacer in between. So as most manufacturers our guidelines don't provide any requirements or guidance toward this toward this design or the selection of the mutton itself, nor where that should be placed to simulate what a historic window should look like. So what I'm seeing, and this is going back quite a few years actually, as these windows are being replaced, most of the most of the selections are between the glass layer and the muttons are flat. Meaning they by dimensionally represent historic window by because we give them guidance on the spacing, but the appearance, depending if it's a black frame window or a white frame window, is visually incomprehensible to what a historic window was. So what I think the board should consider is providing a bit more guidance so that when those decisions are made by a homeowner and a contractor that they're more historically accurate as far as where the muttons are placed and the style of the muttons that are are selected.

So they're more historically accurate.

Yeah. I'll just comment on that. I agree with you that our guidelines do not get into enough detail to actually require a historic appearance window with the with the muntins. They they're not required to be on the exterior of the outside glass, which is what gives the shadow lines and really makes it appear to be a historic window. So we would have to make an alteration to, our code to adjust that, or give more guidance.

Probably would require some study to see what what manufacturers actually can produce that and that we aren't requiring something that is proprietary or not readily available. Not to put undue hardship on the applicant, but when we're trying to do historic looking windows, you can't purchase. You can't. You can get something custom made with individual panes, but that is just exorbitantly expensive. So, that would be up to the owner.

But that's not the typical case. Typical case is putting in a vinyl or aluminum window that meets hurricane impact, which we should be doing, and also in the historic district be something that has the appearance of historic windows. So and we've approved many windows over the years that had divided lights that really didn't look historic or, you know, almost imperceptible that they're divided. So I think it's worth discussing further. I agree.

How we go about that, I'm not sure. I could potentially look into a window manufacturer to providing information about that, what's available. There's probably 10 or 12 window manufacturers that are used in this area, so we could see what we could do. As it would only apply to those trying to really do the entire facade. It's not your first comment, John, about people doing impact windows where their window broke out or baseball went through it or whatever, replacing one off or Yeah.

Mean a few, you know. We're getting wholesale change outs. We're getting big changes

out. And that we're not seeing that because if they stay within the size

Right.

You know, and they put muttons in, well, you know, a homeowner is gonna see a drawing and they're gonna see it and they're gonna say it looks fine. You know, they're not gonna realize that that doesn't have any depth to it that would have, as you said, the shadow the shadows needed to perceive what was originally there.

But I think some of these are just replacing windows that don't have that and aren't required to have that. So there's that as well for just replacing window for window for opening. So I don't know.

I think

I think

I've got a decent handle on this. I will, as I did before, I'll propose the change and then we can Okay.

Discuss it. I think

I just think this is really important because we're getting a large number of folks replacing windows right now. And my perception of what I'm seeing go in is not

historically If it's on a historic in the district within

It could be a lot better, put it that way.

Could be better, yes. Alright. Well, if you wouldn't mind doing that, that would be great. I've got another question maybe for staff, regarding storm damage. We have throughout the city, and I've brought a couple of these to your attention or to Roger's attention, where we have, broken tiles, damaged roof tiles that are not being repaired.

And we're pretty far into it now. I know there's insurance issues, dealing with them, with companies like that. However, we just have, we have a number of structures that are just having tiles that are precarious. They're just sitting on the roof broken, in the district and not being repaired. So just don't know if that's a code enforcement thing at some point or if that is something that the board just pays attention to because most citizens don't look at it.

But we do. So are there any anything that staff is doing with regard to tile roofs that are not being repaired?

I'm not sure exactly what the maintenance code says off the top of my head. I kinda have to look into it, but it may be possible for that to be a code enforcement thing if it's required for them to repair it or keep it up to date. But I would have to research that a little bit.

Okay. Yes, it was just a question.

It depends. There are roof standard there are roof maintenance requirements the city code in regards to property maintenance. And it's usually about being whether it's weather tight and whatnot and whether or not if there's a tarp up and timing and whatnot and how long that tarp has been up and whether or not there's been permits issued. And so that would and that would be a code enforcement issue and not here.

Our code has maintenance of historic resources and it's if it's subject to a CAC or a COA, then enforcement violations are subject to the city code enforcement as our legal representative mentioned identifying chapter two of city ordinances, and also that city staff and h a HAPB may work with property owner to encourage maintenance to stabilize the historic resource?

Well, code enforcement is under a separate one. It's under it's we have separate property maintenance requirements. And that's as opposed to issues and historical representation of it's about again more of is this property meet the standards of is water coming in, is it secured, is it structured as opposed to whether or not it meets historical standards.

Right.

Yeah. But I mean, this just gives us a little teeth in the know, allows us to work with staff and the homeowner to try and move things so it's the historical resource is going to be repaired in a time sensitive manner, not to cause further damage.

I recognize that, you know, we're we're still seven months out from Milton. So that's a good amount of time, but I'm sure there's people still working with insurance companies. But if you take a tile roof, whether it's a concrete or a clay tile roof, the actual water barrier for that roof is not the tile. The tile's only purpose is aesthetic and to keep ultraviolet rays from hitting the actual peel and stick or underlayment that is the watertight roof. So you can have damaged roof tiles that are unsightly from a from an appearance standpoint and still have a functional roof, for some months.

Typically, it's like a hundred and eighty days with with direct sunlight on peel and stick. So it becomes both. I mean, it's an aesthetic issue for the city, and it's also a functional issue if that starts damaging the the actual underlayment.

So the code that mister Barrack just read about maintenance of historic resources, it does say that all roofing materials must be kept in good repair and maintained and that the enforcement would be through the code enforcement process in chapter So it's something that we can look into. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. It's just something we probably noticed. And like I said, we look at and other people don't, but it should be should be on the radar. Alright. Anything else for the board today? Looks like, Mr. Clark might be having an idea.

So we have to keep in mind that the state has prohibited municipalities from making more restrictive regulations until I believe 2026. Some of So the changes we're talking about are more restrictive. So they may have to be kind of approved by Planning Commission and then put on hold until we're allowed to actually adopt that. But that is something that we hadn't really talked about before and we should be thinking about.

Okay. Yes, I appreciate that. I didn't

recognize All

right.

Is there any other discussions? Any comments? Well, lastly, we had

the forum, local register forum.

Yes.

And that was last week, attended by Harry and Nicole and Sarasota Historic Alliance. We had Joy Builders there and made a short presentation to the general audience, which is about 40 people, I guess. Yeah. You know, pretty late in the season, so it's a pretty good crowd Pretty good given that it's pretty late in the season. I think a lot of folks had some questions that were so it was productive in that sense that, you know, you don't have to meet with Harry.

You could feel more comfortable coming up to a bunch of people rather than one having to make an appointment with one individual. So I think it was well received and I think the information was beneficial for the public in general and that maybe we should consider having that again sometime in the future.

Yeah. I did talk to Harry about it, said that he thought it was successful and it was good to have contractors and other folks there to just ask questions. You know, I think citizens wanna know what's the benefit of being on the register and what are the ramifications. And, it's an education process, but someone who's interested certainly would have a chance to meet with people who really do that work. So that's good.

Also, we had proclamation last week, a national preservation month, so from the city of Venice. So if you guys wanna look at our proclamation or see it, it's here. Went well, and everyone's very much in favor of what we do. So we appreciate your efforts as well. All right. If there's nothing else today, then we are adjourned.

Harry, did you add something? Wait.

Open again. Was just briefly going to update the Board. We are still waiting on the state to finalize next fiscal year's budget to see if we get the funding to do the historic resources survey for Seaboard and Edgewood. We were ranked 32 out of 76 projects. And the way the budget is kind of falling, it looks like there's a good chance we will get the funding.

But until the budget gets finalized in Tallahassee, we are just sitting and waiting. At least regarding that part, we are working now FY twenty seven's grant application because it's due next week. And the application is going to be for an historical resources survey of Golden Beach and Gulf Shores. So basically, from Aldi Amar down to the airport and from Harbor Drive to The Gulf is what we're gonna be applying for a grant to, survey those areas.

Okay. Great. That would be wonderful.

Great. Actually, I came up with one other discussion item. So I saw that the city had leased the Lord Heigl House to a business owner.

I heard about that.

And I think having it used as a alternative for, you know, to support business and the economy locally is important. The historic interior standards, you know, it's pretty specific that it wants adaptive reuse and there's many examples of that's been done successfully within the city already, downtown businesses, you know, and such. I would just say that, moving forward, if they need to do renovations, you know, that those need to be perceived very carefully that you're not changing the streetscape of the of the building from public view. I am not sure how that's all gonna work.

So, yes, indeed, the historical resources empire here in the city of Venice is expanding. I was actually going to note as well that the ribbon cutting for starters, the ribbon cutting for the old Betsy Museum building is going to be June 5, if you would like to at nine a. M. If you'd like to come and attend that. I will also add that John Watson, my collections manager and curator and I actually met with the lessees or as I guess they're being called now the Laura Heigl House manager according to the RFP.

And we had a very productive meeting with them yesterday about balancing out their business plan and model with historical interpretation in the building. And I have to say, I walked away very excited about that meeting and the possibilities and potential. I will also add commenting on what Mr. Rarek had to say that I did inform the owners because I know they are looking to do some work alterations in the building so that it functions as a proper business for them. That I let them know that the building is in our local register so any, you know, exterior changes, renovations, rehabilitations would need to go well, technically right now to me and with these code changes get approved, then it would go to all of you.

So they are aware of that. They don't really have any intentions of doing anything like that. Just minor things like signage which wouldn't go before this board anyway. But they are strong historic preservationists. They actually own a couple of historic properties in Saint Augustine. So they are very excited about this opportunity. They are very excited about telling that Venice history story at their place of business. So if there are gonna be any exterior changes happening, they will be coming before this ward or to myself.

Great. I think that's gonna be wonderful. So sounds like a great opportunity for for a new business and and, like you said, adaptive reuse of an existing structure that's on the historic register. We don't have many of those, so that's great. So wonderful. Alright. Anything else to discuss today? Alright. Officially. Now we're adjourned. Sorry about that, guys.