Planning Board Agendas and Minutes

MINUTES OF THE MEETING OF THE COHOES PLANNING BOARD HELD VIRTUALLY March 14, 2022 at 6:30PM MEMBERS PRESENT: Mr. Mark DeFruscio, Chairperson Mr. Jack Carroll, Vice Chair Mr. Joe Nadeau Ms. Stephanie Couture Ms. Kizzy Williams ABSENT: Mr. Bob Bucher ALSO PRESENT: Joseph Seman-Graves, City Planner Sharon Butler, Administrative Assistant Chairperson DeFruscio called the meeting to order at 6:30 pm and asked for roll call. Roll Call; Member Bucher was absent CONSIDERATION OF MINUTES FROM THE FEBRUARY 14, 2022 MEETING Chairperson DeFruscio; first item on the agenda is consideration of the February 14, 2022 meeting minutes. Everyone was distributed the minutes, hopefully you had an opportunity to review them, they were a bit long. Member Nadeau; thank you Sharon Vice Chair Carroll; I have a revision I’d like to have made. It shows me as both present and absent, I would like it shown as present only. Sharon; ok Vice Chair Carroll; thank you Chairperson DeFruscio; any other changes, additions or comments? I see none so I’m looking for a motion to accept the minutes with the one revision that was submitted. Vice Chair Carroll; so moved Chairperson DeFruscio; anybody want to 2nd? Member Nadeau; I’ll 2nd motion carried YES NO Bob Bucher ABSENT Joseph Nadeau X Mark DeFruscio X Jack Carroll X Stephanie Couture X Kizzy Williams ABSTAIN CONSIDERATION OF A SITE PLAN APPROVAL FOR 426 COLUMBIA STREET Chairperson DeFruscio; next item on the agenda now that we’ve accepted the minutes, the next item on the agenda is 426 Columbia Street. Sean you had submitted a plan to try to enclose the parking lot and make it much better. Do you want to explain to us what you’re proposal is there? Sean Rivage; yea, so you can see that the light green highlighted area, that’s the existing tree line. I don’t know if it’s on his property or not, but anyway that extends down to about a little shy of where the front of the building is at Monroe Street there. So what I’m proposing is carrying that tree line across, wrapped around across the front of that property. And this will be built on top of a topsoil berm which is, call it about 6 or 7 feet wide and 3 feet tall at minimum to maintain the nutrients and stuff in the ground once the trees are installed, mulching that tree line. Now, the initial plant design would be 8-10 feet dark American arb trees and they would be planted 5 feet on center apart for each other. So the maturity rate of those trees when they’re initially planted, they’re already touching, so within a short time they are already kind of filling into each other along that hedge row. So if you’re coming from the Colonie side entering into Cohoes, with that initial wrap around coming off of that original tree line, it basically impedes, blocks all sighted views of the lot there. I figure that was the best approach instead of getting to close to the road. I like that idea better over any kind of fenced screening, it makes it look like a commercial feel than if you were to have an 8-10 foot tall fence with a privacy barrier on it. Basically to enter in towards the backside of the building all you need is a 25-30 foot opening at most to make it feasible for anything to access the property. That’s kind of what my thought was, I lease the space and Paul is open to do whatever needs to be done, he’s open to whatever I do improvement wise to the property. That’s basically the best scenario I came up with and I guess I’ll collect your thoughts and everybody’s input on that. Chairperson DeFruscio; thank you Sean. It’s definitely an improvement I can say that. We appreciate your taking the time looking into this for us. Does any of the committee members have any comments or questions? Member Couture; I just had a quick question. You said how you only lease the property, and Paul’s the owner, is he, he’s definitely agreeable to this, is there a timeline when this would be installed? Mr. Rivage; he’s agreed to this. I recently talked with him, a few months ago before this meeting ever arose. As far as a time frame goes to this, you’re talking anywhere from a few weeks from now to at the latest a month. You need the ground temperatures to get up a little bit. I mean as far as the berm and stuff, that can be down a week from now, as far as trees being available, you’re at that 2 to 4 week range as far as nursery’s getting tree stock in Member Couture; and then with the deer population that are probably going to feast on the arbor vides a little bit, is that going to take away some of the….. Mr. Rivage; no because we can actually, I deal with this all the time on the properties of home owners, so you would deer net. The deer netting sometimes they eat through it, but the best attack to that is just spraying a few times from November 15th until April 15th with some deer off or deer repellant. Rabbits and all that stuff are the same way as far as eating that stuff. There are a lot of deer around so if you spray them we won’t have any issues, they won’t even touch them. As an extra precaution I put a deer netting around the trees tying them, and taking them off in early spring. Member Couture; sound great. This look wonderful thank you very much. Mr. Rivage; yea, just wanted to add some green space instead of you know a commercial looking feel. So people driving by, it just adds some extra screening and not just blocks and fencing stuff. Member Couture; absolutely, thank you Member Nadeau; Sean I would like to comment if I could. Sean and Paul if you’re listening, I’m very pleased with the concept. I also would be looking for a commitment that all materials and any construction stuff, plows, I’m assuming that was the intent to keep that behind the berm. Again as I stated at the last meeting I don’t have a problem with parking or vehicles of any type, I mean it’s a parking area. I’m very pleased with the concept, I hope it works for you and Paul. Thank you for working with us. Mr. Rivage; so I plan to implement this if everything is good and as far as snow equipment and stuff that is actually going off onto a different site once the winter commences. Basically what you would see driving by is vehicles and there wouldn’t be any kind of storage or anything of that nature in the front of it, just a couple of vehicles. I know at the last meeting it was brought up about a couple of RV’s out front, I don’t know what Paul’s plan is with that, I know he hasn’t chimed in here tonight, but I can talk to him about that too, just so it looks like a clean appearance driving by. Chairperson DeFruscio; thank you very much for your input in helping this. Jack did you have something you wanted to ask? Vice Chair Carroll; yeas on the existing tree line, how come you’re not carrying that type of tree right around the corner? Because the deer don’t seem to have every bothered them. Mr. Rivage; that whole row is a mixed line of trees, there are dark American in there and then there’s emerald greens, a whole mixed bag of trees in there. The overall appearance seems to be dark American, but they don’t really touch those, I don’t know, there’s always deer hanging out in the lot there so I don’t know why they don’t ever touch those. I don’t know if it’s because they’re so mature and they put off a different scent, every tree puts off a different scent I don’t know. Chairperson DeFruscio; ok if none of the committee members have any other questions, I’m going to open it up for public comments. Anybody from the public want to make any comments, ask questions or anything like that? Joe Seman-Graves; no one in the chat Chairperson DeFruscio; ok we’ll close the public comments at this point in time. Now we’re looking for a motion for final site plan approval for 426 Columbia Street or denial Member Nadeau; I’ll make that motion to approve. Member Couture; I’ll 2nd all in favor motion carried unanimously. YES NO Bob Bucher ABSENT Joseph Nadeau X Mark DeFruscio X Jack Carroll X Stephanie Couture X Kizzy Williams X Chairperson DeFruscio; thank you again Sean Mr. Rivage; if you want to put in your notes, you can put a dead line on the tree installation for April 15th. So if people are wondering, if you put that date on there we’ll make it happen Chairperson DeFruscio; we appreciate you putting a mark in the dirt but I don’t really think it’s necessary, we trust that you’re going take care of it before the end of April. Mr. Rivage; I just like to get stuff done and I’m all about aesthetics and appearance of things, so we’ll make it happen and I appreciate you guys coming through here. Member Nadeau; we appreciate your efforts Sean. Mr. Rivage; thank you. CONSIDERATION OF A CHANGE OF USE/NEW TENANT APPLICATION FOR 288 SARATOGA STREET Chairperson DeFruscio; next item on the agenda is consideration of a change of use/new tenant application for 288 Saratoga Street. We had discussed this project with Joe Johnson previously. He was to have 6 apartments there, it’s still limited to 18 occupants whether it’s 3 apartments or 6 apartments. Parking was an issue, we asked him to try to come up with additional vehicle infrastructure. His new proposal has one additional off street parking space and a bike rack. Joe do you want to fill us in on what you came up with? Joe Johnson; so at the last meeting we had discussed some parking for a couple of vehicles and that we were kind of short with converting this to a six unit so after some review with the architect, he found that we had enough room to put in a driveway there in the front and as mentioned in the last meeting we were more than willing to accommodate the bike rack for other means of transportation besides strictly vehicles. I think those are really the 2 key objects to offset parking that we needed. Chairperson DeFruscio; the only thing that I would add to this, is that we need to be careful that your tenants understand that they can’t try to put 2 cars in that driveway and block the sidewalk. That’s not acceptable because of the busyness of that street, we need to make sure that sidewalk remains available. The one parking spot is great, it’s just I know there’s a tendency if they can squeeze another vehicle in, they’ll try to as long as it’s not sticking out in the street, but we don’t want it blocking the sidewalk. Mr. Johnson; I agree with that as well. We own, run and operate our apartments so we’ll definitely designate that spot and then try to find the right fit for the vehicle that will, actually not interfere with that sidewalk. I don’t even know, like I said we’ll definitely be accommodating to that. If there’s any issues we’ll definitely address any and all of them as far as it goes with that driveway, a majority of the neighbors have this kind of similar setup so that’s kind of where the idea came from and it works and it help us out to take care of this parking issue that we have. Chairperson DeFruscio; any other committee members have questions, comments, observations? I see none so at this point in time we’ll open it up for public comments, see if there’s any public comments anywhere. I see none so I’ll close the public comments period at this point in time. We’re looking for an approval or disapproval, denial of a change of use for a new tenant application for 288 Saratoga Street. Looking for a motion. Vice Chair Carroll; so moved Member Nadeau; I’ll 2nd Chairperson DeFruscio; so we have a motion and a 2nd to approve the change of use/new tenant application is that correct Jack and Joe, I just want to make sure. Both members stated yes. Motion carried unanimously  YES NO Bob Bucher ABSENT Joseph Nadeau X Mark DeFruscio X Jack Carroll X Stephanie Couture X Kizzy Williams X Chairperson DeFruscio; ok Joe thank you for working with us to try to mediate some of the issues on this we appreciate it and we wish you good luck with the project. Mr. Johnson; thank you guys for all your help here, I really appreciate it. CONSIDERATION OF A CHANGE OF USE/NEW TENANT APPLICATION FOR 37-39 HARMONY STREET Chairperson DeFruscio; the next item on the agenda is consideration of a change of use new tenant application for 37-39 Harmony Street. We have the applicant here, he’s looking to change what was storage space into a studio apartment. Vitaliy Volpov; that is correct. Joe I didn’t know if you were going to speak or you wanted us to jump right in. Joe Seman-Graves; I try to stay quiet so feel free Mr. Volpov; ok, not a problem. Good evening my name is Vitality Volpov and my business partner here is Vinny Saviago. We are the owners of the LLC that owns this particular building that is called Harmony Mills Loft. We purchased the building in 2020 so about a year ago. It’s on a street, I’m not sure if everyone is familiar with the street, there are 4 multi-family buildings We have 3—4 units buildings on that street and we have an 8 unit building on that street, so it is entirely multi-family residential in the area. And with this particular building we have, there’s an existing 4 unit there, they are all rented and we have a storage area that is approximately 530 square feet. It’s already retrofitted with a kitchen that needs some appliances, it needs that little bit to make it a full living space. It has a full operational bathroom, it has egress windows throughout, it has 36inch entry doors and quite a spacious open floor plan. Essentially we are looking to change its current use, potentially change it to an apartment and go from a 4 unit apartment building to a 5 unit apartment building. It is currently zoned as a multi-family and apartment general as its current land use. In terms of parking, we have a large driveway parking area there that can fit up to 8 cars. So it’s one of the few buildings on the street that has off street parking. Obviously we are keeping that and that would go a long way to alleviate any parking concerns but overall it is essentially from our perspective a conforming use with the way all the other buildings on the street are being used and we’re hoping that is something that the board will find acceptable. Have any questions based on our presentation? Chairperson DeFruscio; when was the work that is done there, the addition of the kitchen, the addition of the bathroom, when was that work done? Mr. Saviago; so the bathroom was there, and the kitchen was not. So basically what was done, the electric was already there and all that was done was the walls were painted and cabinets were put into the kitchen. We original were going to use that as a work space and then we looked at how nice it looked inside of there and we have the off street parking. People were coming by that live in the building and said how nice the space was and that they wanted to rent the apartment, they had family members that would rent it. Chairperson DeFruscio; so Joe doe they need to get a building permit and provide a better diagram of exactly how the space is going to end up looking? Joe Seman-Graves; so I don’t need anything else necessarily right now other than saying this can be occupied as an apartment. Mr. Saviago; Joe do they have access to everything that we submitted, like the diagrams and everything? Joe Seman-Graves; yes Chairperson DeFruscio; yeah, he’s putting them up on the screen Mr. Saviago; ok Joe Seman-Graves; and I’m not sure what else, is there any other work to be done in the apartment? Mr. Saviago; the only other thing to be done is appliances need to be ordered. Joe Seman-Graves; ok so I, our purpose is, I’m ok with the submission just saying that this is going to a studio apartment from a work space. Building might require some additional information but not necessary for this review in my opinion. Vice Chair Carroll; what’s going to be used for heating? Mr. Saviago; there’s electric baseboard and there’s a gas space heater. We pay for the gas and electric for the apartment. Chairperson DeFruscio; any other questions from the members of the board? Member Nadeau; just to follow up on Mark’s question, was it permitted to install the windows and door, was that a building permit situation for the front entrance area? Mr. Saviago; are you asking us if it was? Member Nadeau; yes Mr. Saviago; I’m not sure if you needed a permit to do that or not Member Nadeau; well was it a garage door initially? Mr. Saviago; it was a garage door that was falling apart when we bought the building in 2020. Member Nadeau; anything structural by way of entrances or windows I would expected some kind of permit requirement. Mr. Saviago; I mean we would definitely be willing to have Code come out and check anything they want in there. I wouldn’t necessarily say its structural issue it’s all solid brick building with a steel lentil beam that goes across so if the garage door was open or closed obviously there’s not structure to that. Chairperson DeFruscio; well we’ll just wait and see what building says you need to do regarding changes that were already done. What were here to do is approve or deny a permit for it to go from storage space to living space. But I wanted to give Joe Graves an opportunity to tell you what you might need to do with the building department. Mr. Saviago; we agree 100% that we’ll do anything that the building department says that needs to be done or not done to make it a livable space, structure and dwelling apartment in the City of Cohoes. Chairperson DeFruscio; I would anticipate that you are going to have to buy a building permit and probably provide a diagram just to state how the garage door was replaced and something like that, nothing….. Mr. Saviago; absolutely we have no problem doing that Member Nadeau; and in addition there is electrical work that will require underwriters inspection and that type of thing. But I think Mark is right, need code enforcement to get a C/O for that, I’m sure you’ll know enough to go through the proper procedure. Mr. Saviago; absolutely and we have a great working relationship with the MDIA that does all the electrical inspections in Cohoes, so that’s not an issue either. We can have them come out and check or stamp anything that needs to be done. Member Nadeau; ok Chairperson DeFruscio; any other questions or comments from the planning board? I see none so at this point in time I’d like to open it up for public comments, see if there’s anybody in the public that have any comments on this proposition. What’s the end square feet, I didn’t notice. Mr. Saviago; 532 square feet sir Chairperson DeFruscio; ok thank you. See anybody raising their hand Joe? Joe Seman-Graves; no, it’s a quiet meeting. Chairperson DeFruscio; ok I’d like to close the public comment period now. So we’re looking for a proposal to either accept or deny a change of use for 37-39 Harmony Street from storage area to a studio apartment. Member Couture; I’ll make a motion to approve Member Williams; I 2nd it all in favor motion carried unanimously. YES NO Bob Bucher ABSENT Joseph Nadeau X Mark DeFruscio X Jack Carroll X Stephanie Couture X Kizzy Williams X Chairperson DeFruscio; ok you got the approval to change it from a storage area to a studio apartment so now please just work with the building department to get the rest of those things ironed out. Mr. Saviago; thank you very much we appreciate it and have a great night. CONSIDERATION OF A CHANGE OF USE/NEW TENANT APPLICATION FOR 202 ONTARIO STREET Chairperson DeFruscio; ok next on the agenda is consideration of a change of use/new tenant application for 202 Ontario Street. This was the barber shop on Ontario Street right across from Cap Com. And the main issue with that was knowing how many chairs there was going to be as well as any ways they could resolve parking issues because of the busyness of Ontario Street and the limited parking right there. I know that just a couple of houses up is a hairdresser that has limited hours as well, but I think this proposal was looking for hours from 9AM until sometime in the evening. Is the applicant on the line? Joe Seman-Graves; there’s a couple of people who muted themselves Chairperson DeFruscio; yea, the IPhone? Joe Seman-Graves; no one is currently unmuting themselves. So the board knows this was last reviewed at the September 13th meeting so it’s been 6 months. As Mark stated, there was a question on the chairs, the count of chairs as well as parking. Parking was not addressed in this site plan, but I think the original statement was somewhere between 4 and 6 chairs. Looks like there’s 3 identified in the plan. I will say if you have the proposal in front of you, you’ll notice it has an architect stamp on it, which I was a little taken back by. I wasn’t expecting that, but still it doesn’t address the parking, so without the applicant here that’s all I can say about it. Vice Chair Carroll; should we table it? Chairperson DeFruscio; well that is an option. I was going to see if you guys had any comments or questions or anything on this before we discuss the options. And I was also going to see if there was anybody in the public that had a comment, but I don’t see anybody there either. So the options are; we can approve the plan, we can deny the plan or we can table the plan until we can get the person proposing this in to discuss it in better detail. Anybody want to make a motion? Member Couture; Joe, you had mentioned a time line of 6 months. Is there any specific time frame that they have that they have to get the application looked at before they have to start from the beginning? Joe Seman-Graves; no, I don’t think so. I mean it’s, are we talking in the sense of starting the review process over or is there a time frame that the applicant has to adhere to in order to get this up and running? Member Couture; I guess for the application to get submitted and the review packet, because the application goes back to August. Joe Seman-Graves; I’ve never been asked that question, I have to be honest. I will do my best to get you an answer next time but usually they don’t go on this long with review. Chairperson DeFruscio; if we approve it, they’ve got one year to make a move on it otherwise then it has be reviewed again but they can be stuck in the review process for quite some time. Joe Seman-Graves; it is my understanding unless it’s approved or denied that what kicks in the time frame. If it’s just tabled then I’m not sure. I personally wouldn’t think that would start the clock over or anything. Member Couture; ok Chairperson DeFruscio; if we approved it they have a certain time frame in order to start it, if we deny it then they have to wait a year to come back. If we table it then they can just come back next month and answer questions. So I’m looking for a motion from somebody to either table it….. Member Nadeau; I’d be interested in hearing what they want to do about parking, so I’m going to make a motion that we table it. Vice Chair Carroll; 2nd motion carried to TABLE this application YES NO Bob Bucher ABSENT Joseph Nadeau X Mark DeFruscio X Jack Carroll X Stephanie Couture X Kizzy Williams X CONSIDERATION OF A PRELIMINARY SITE PLAN REVIEW FOR 45 JOHNSTON AVENUE Chairperson DeFruscio; next item on the agenda is consideration of a Site Plan application for 45 Johnston Avenue. They are converting it into a multi-family residential building with 14 apartments? Joe Seman-Graves; 16 is proposed Chairperson DeFruscio; 16 apartments, 2—2bedroom and 14—1bedroom. Gentlemen would you like to go over it with us? Peter Tyron; hello my name is Peter Tyron and this is my business partner Ron Stein. Ron and I are developers locally, we’ve done new ground up projects in Albany and some historic renovations and we’re looking to convert the old St. Agnes School to 16 residential dwelling units. We have a proposal for 2—2bedroom and 14—1bedroom apartments. We also made a proposal for exterior parking, 16 parking spaces around the outside of the building. After discussing it with the city, they also recommended that we include a plan that does not have the parking but rather enhancing the street scape to match how Remsen Street looks and add some foliage and enhance the curbs. We’re also looking to historically remodel the building. That would be using historically approved windows back to the original sizing, refurbishing the doors, brick and just enhance it from what it looks like today. Chairperson DeFruscio; are you closing any doors up or moving doors? Mr. Stein; we notified and applied for historic but the one opening that you can see in this picture on the right hand side where the garage was, because it’s not going to be a garage and it’s completely, I’d say 90% or more falling apart, we would try to remodel that door which would be a door for the access for handicap as well for ADA. A couple of things on here, over the front door on the right hand side in this picture (on screen) we would have the historic statue, the historic any kind of numbers, placards and fix that exactly the way it looks right now. It’s hard to show in the renderings but that’s a little fine tuning that doesn’t show in the picture of that, but we would keep that as well. It was just that side door to the garage that we would kind of terminate in a way that looks and feels like the building was, but not with an extra garage on the side. Chairperson DeFruscio; at this point in time we are not looking to approve or deny anything at this point in time. It’s giving us time to explore what they’re proposing with this building and talk about the different things. I think you’ve also provided the space where the trash is going to be and things of that nature in your plan. Mr. Stein; yea, there is a street in the back, the common alley where the garbage trucks go by. We have a spot in the back you can see on the upper left and we also have green space all along the back, which was never utilized that well. We will be utilizing that and putting bike racks and access from the front street as well. So there will be some bikes and probably a space for dog walking so it’s not in the neighborhood. And we’ve done that on our other buildings and it seems to be a nice amenity. Member Nadeau; is your property line currently defined on that back yard area at the stockade fence, is that the property line? Mr. Stein; yes, way in the back. And again on the parking side and as Joe had mentioned, first we were asked to do 16 then this, we’re ok with whatever works for everyone. We’re also ok with a hybrid if you want a couple of spots maybe around the corner but not, I totally agree with Joe and having done other projects we don’t want to effect the DEC, that’s a big thing. I’ve done it on a project now and it’s a lot of work but I think there’s a balance here but there could be a couple of spots available somewhere or at least maybe even a handicap spot that could be available for visitors that would add to the street especially around that corner but not effecting DEC. We’re really open, we want to help it’s really a great building and I love historic projects. It’s just, I think it’s been empty way to long. Member Nadeau; I’ve got a question on, I don’t have the drawings in front of me, based on the plan that handicap ramp, is that actually handicap sanctioned, it doesn’t look like it’s…. Mr. Stein; we’re doing work both inside and out, so we put a ramp on the outside at the right angle and then inside it’s kind of cool because there’s a ramp down where the garage was. We, that ramp will remain it’s going down in the middle to a center welcome desk and then each side will have stairs. Member Nadeau; alright and I guess that’s the question the drawing doesn’t show a dimension, but it doesn’t appear there’s enough distance there for a 30 foot ramp. Mr. Stein; it was measured, it’s pretty big that basement as it currently stands. And we will make sure it’s to code Member Nadeau; ok Mr. Stein; the architect went through it and we’ve done a couple of these before inside. Member Nadeau; and I’m confident that you have done this before Mr. Stein; it’s all going to be to code, and it’s all going to be to length. It was pretty interesting design when we saw it too, it kind of took us by surprise, a ramp down stairs, that’s pretty cool. It will make that whole level really accessible for handicap Member Nadeau; just one small error, I think you have one of the rooms, again I don’t have the plans in front of me, at 1800 square feet Mr. Stein; yea that was wrong good catch Member Nadeau; if it was 1800 I’d be renting it Chairperson DeFruscio; any more questions or comments? Member Couture; I was just wondering are you also the property managers, once it’s completed and occupied? Mr. Tyron; yes, my company is Member Couture; ok, excellent Mr. Stein; and Peter manages not only our project but others, many, many units, but he also manages all project we do together and some that I’ve done on my own in Albany. Member Couture; excellent. I think it’s a great use and I’m glad you guys are going to keep the name on that one entry and the numbers as well. I went to that school so I’m glad to see it being re-purposed in a great way. Mr. Stein; our architect, one of our architects, her mom went to that school, the grandma, it’s a school that many people have gone to and everybody that we’re working with says oh I remember that school I went there. Mr. Tyron; one of my leasing agents actually went to school there, she is thrilled about this project. Member Couture; that’s awesome, thank you very much. Chairperson DeFruscio; at one point in time we had 6 catholic schools in the city of Cohoes, now there’s none Mr. Stein; well the other nice thing is, we are really trying to keep the walls inside as much as possible but still give space, so it’s still going to have a nice look and feel even inside. Member Nadeau; actually I’m glad you just said that, I’m intimate with the building, I was the care taker many, many years ago and I went to school there. Structurally it looks like that you’re actually going to do some structural wall removal between the corridor and the classrooms Mr. Stein; we’ll have some, I would rephrase that a little to be cut outs, not removals. Because the walls are going to be whole, we’re just going to make a little bit of a cut out, it’s almost doors if you will Member Nadeau; ok Mr. Stein; we want to utilize as much as possible because of the wide hallways there. Member Nadeau; it looked like where you bumped out….. Mr. Stein; we’ll have space for some storage outside the units which will allow us to give amenities inside like washers and dryers. Member Nadeau; it just looked like where you bumped out for utilities and stuff, it was kind of connected and I was wondering how you were going to do that. Mr. Stein; yea, they’re going to use, I don’t know the proper name for it, but basically going to be able to cut out some steel beams throughout but not touch the walls. The integrity of the walls will still be there just sort of be an extra steel beam above it and not wood. Member Nadeau; I’m overwhelmed, I’m thrilled to see someone saving the building and I want an invitation to the ribbon cutting. Mr. Stein; it’s a public even. We’ve done a couple of buildings in Albany that we’re starting renovations on. We’ve been working on the old Ralph’s (Red’s), people know that tavern on the corner of New Scotland. We’ve done the outside now we’re working on the inside. It’s another place people say they got wings or beer there. Chairperson DeFruscio; I know somebody who was a longtime resident on the 2nd floor there Mr. Stein; and I live on the 3rd. I love this part of this, we do ground ups, we do big gut renos, this kind of thing is fun for us, it’s like we’re giving back a little bit and the community appreciates it. Member Nadeau; I’m a little concerned with the parking but that is something you will have to deal with, with your tenants, I’m sure you will do what you need to, to satisfy them. Mr. Stein; we talked about it quite a bit and we can, we’ve made it work where we had no parking, we made it work where we had 1 for 1 parking. Obviously for us we prefer more parking, not less because if we can offer it to the tenants it is easier to maintain. But we’ve also seen it where there’s some things we can do to try to help where there’s limited parking, in both marketing to people who either work close or take public transportation. The other thing is the, we’re also open to hybrid where maybe we get a couple of, especially on Johnston Street side, maybe a couple of ones to the corner and you go around the other corner you take a few of the other ones that don’t affect the DEC and make them angled because it’s a 2 way street, away from the other side of parking maybe it won’t affect, we’d actually add instead of subtract from that one and keep maybe 5 spots, 6 spots or 7 and only lose maybe 2 and then there’s a plus 5 this time not really affecting the other sides. We’re open to brainstorming, we’re excited to move forward. Chairperson DeFrusio; and I would ask that you work with Joe Seman-Graves and our city engineers to come up with something that works for all of us. Mr. Stein; again this is our first project in, and this is not, believe it or not, but in the last 2 weeks we had, we’re looking at 3 more in Cohoes. So we’re looking to do more projects here and I don’t know how it works in Albany or rather how it works here, but in Albany sometimes you can do conditional so, conditional parking based upon approval of Joe and the parking authority or parking department. We’re really open to that too because that helps us get started on some of the internal stuff and we know we can’t get approval until we have that condition met and everybody’s happy. Chairperson DeFruscio; I think we’re ok with saying that it’s a good plan, we like that you’re doing it, the only thing that we pointed out that I think that is an issue is your parking. I think if you work on that a little more where the plan is going to come together and I know that you have 8 zoning variances you need to get. And there was, Joe there was one, I was going to open it up for public comment just so you can read that one comment to them because I’m not sure they heard it. Joe Seman-Graves; read the one comment that was sent in. I will also say to the planning board there’s 2 things that I think we’re looking for at this meeting. It seems everyone is happy with the proposal so I think if there’s any comments regarding the amount of parking, now is the time to really share that. And then 2, we would be looking for a recommendation to the zoning board of appeals. There are a good number of variances, but I’d say only one of them has to do with the applicants current proposal, the rest are based on the existing condition of the building and it being non- conforming for uses of the district now. So those are the 2 things that I think would be very helpful in this meeting to come away with. Chairperson DeFruscio; so let’s close the public comment period at this point in time Member Couture; in regards to parking, they did mention the bike racks, so that would offset at least a couple of the spaces correct? Joe Seman-Graves; yea and I think when we’re looking at this, I mean they have proposed one for one, so they, this is their proposal and it’s feasible. I think there’s something to be said that the city has asked them to go away from this proposal and then that would be up to the planning board on the determination on the number of suitable spots, if there’s any waiver requirements. They are able to carry this proposal out, we just had a couple of reasons to ask for it to be changed, ultimately the traffic engineer and I asked them to just go back to the existing curb line and propose it as is. If the planning board sees a need for more spots we can definitely work with that and try to incorporate more, but now would be the time to say something and not next month Member Nadeau; for clarification if I understood you, so are we, is it this plan you’re showing here that we’re going to be approving or is it the other plan? Joe Seman-Graves; this is what myself, Garry Nathan and Paul Johnson had asked them to provide after this one was already submitted (shown on screen). Chairperson DeFruscio; so the plan that they submitted provided for 16 parking spaces, the city is asking them to change that to or reduce it to make sure to handle other traffic issue so in, from my perspective I would be favorable with giving them a waiver on the parking based on use doing these for safety issue and environmental conservation issues. Joe Seman-Graves; and if the board wants to give a few extra spots, we can certainly work with the applicants to put some additional ones in, as Mr. Stein was saying possibly a hybrid of the 2 plans, however this was what we had asked them to propose to the board as compared to this, which would have met the requirements Member Nadeau; ok Joe Seman-Graves; does that make sense Joe? Member Nadeau; yes and I’d be more in favor as to what the city has requested than the diagonal parking. Chairperson DeFruscio; right, so to summarize and anybody can correct me, the planning board is favorable to the parking proposed per the city’s request but if you would spend a little more time with the city looking at other options to see if you can come up with one or two more parking spots that would be helpful. But if it comes down to approving this proposal we would be, as far as I’m concerned I believe the planning board would be in favor of that Member Nadeau; yes I would, I agree with what you said Joe Seman-Graves; and with that I can work with the applicants in the next couple of weeks here to see if we can squeeze a couple of more in Chairperson DeFruscio; and then get the zoning board approvals and then come back and since we’ve already reviewed it and we looked at the plans and we discussed the plans, we’re happy with everything as is, if you can come up with another parking spot or two that would be even more helpful Joe Seman-Graves; and I would ask that planning waits on making a determination just in case there are any changes that has to come out of historic or zoning. But could I take this as a recommendation for zoning to approve the variances from the planning board? Chairperson DeFruscio; from my perspective yes Member Nadeau; yes Member Couture; I would agree as well Chairperson DeFruscio; Ms. Kizzy? Member Williams; yes I agree as well Chairperson DeFruscio; ok Joe Seman-Graves; alright I’ll pass that information along to zoning. And would there be any comments for the historic board? Chairperson DeFruscio; not unless they change the entrance way or come up with some parking downstairs. I don’t see anything I think they’ve done their due diligence to provide windows, entrance way and maintain the historic value of the building. Member Nadeau; just one final comment the, that highest point of the picture we’re looking at, just above the statue, that particular part of the parapet is curling in. I’m sure your structural guy will address that. Mr. Stein; we we’re up there and took core samples and we we’re up there with our stone and brick guy and he was not to happy because it had to be negative 5 that day, we had to hold on to each other to make sur we didn’t fall off the roof. But there are blocks there that don’t look that big from below, we’re going to need a crane to reset those blocks because 10 guys couldn’t lift that. Member Nadeau; the coping is pretty extreme on that. Mr. Stein; but we have complete confidence in that we would be stabilizing that on the roof. Member Nadeau; so you know what you’re in for ok Mr. Stein; no, we made sure, we had everybody look at this, we even gave the details of the exact windows that we’ll be using to historic Member Nadeau; beautiful thank you Chairperson DeFruscio; thank you, we wish you luck and we’ll see you next month hopefully to get you rolling Mr. Stein; thank you, appreciate everybody’s comments. Chairperson DeFruscio; ok its 7:26, I’m looking for a motion to adjourn Member Couture; I’ll make that motion, 2nd by Member Nadeau meeting adjourned at 7:26PM