Audio recordings from the February 21st Meeting of the Zoning Board of Appeals have been posted to the Village website. To access the main menu of recordings edited by agenda topic, click here.
The meeting began with a public hearing for a special use permit for expansion of an existing artificial lake at 153 Algonquin Road. Several neighbors expressed concerns about potential impacts to their properties. The hearing was followed by a unanimous vote to recommend the special use permit to the Board of Trustees. The hearing can be heard here.
The next agenda item had been scheduled to be a vote on the special use permit for a proposed boathouse for a residence on Hawley Lake, which had been the subject of a public hearing in January. Chairman Dan Wolfgram informed the ZBA that the petitioner’s request had been withdrawn.
Discussion then turned to a number of topics that the ZBA had begun to consider at last month’s meeting and had determined merited future deliberation. Village Administrator Bob Kosin began with a description of the process by which a zoning complaint may be registered with the village, and then reviewed the staff procedures to review the complaint and determine if a violation had occurred. True to form, Kosin’s explanation was difficult to follow at times due to his “unique” style. Kosin’s narrative can be heard here.
Next, the board considered the matter of who can submit an application for a text amendment to the village’s zoning code. In recent years, a somewhat vague part of our code has been interpreted to allow any resident potentially affected, directly or indirectly by a zoning matter, to be able to propose a text amendment change. In the case of commercial horse boarding, this lead to numerous dueling proposals which took up an inordinate amount of the ZBA’s time, not to mention taxpayer money. Members seemed to be in agreement that a better process might be for residents first to bring up their suggested amendment changes with either a Board of Trustees member or a ZBA member. The topic was referred to the ZBA’s trustee liaison Colleen Konicek-Hannigan who will present the idea for discussion at an upcoming BOT meeting. That section of the discussion can be heard here.
The ZBA also mulled over the need for either a special use permit or special event permit for residences which play host to numerous and/or large private charitable events. Members felt that charity events are a hallmark of the generosity of the community, and any efforts to create a more formal permitting process should not be done with the idea to curtail or discourage such events. As is the case with many issues debated by the ZBA, a balance between the individual property rights of one resident must be balanced with the neighbors’ rights to peaceful enjoyment of their homes. Members decided that they should begin attempting to draft language for review at a future meeting. That portion of the dialogue can be accessed directly by clicking this link.
Finally, Zoning Board members considered the pros and cons of regulating the length of time that contractors’ advertising signs might be allowed to be displayed at a home, and whether or not there needs to be a limit placed on the height of building structures. Those topics may be found beginning here.
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