Board of Zoning Appeals

1 BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS MEETING 2 CITY COUNCIL CHAMBERS 3 Thursday, April 11, 2024 4 7:30 p.m. 5 6 1. CALL TO ORDER 7 MR. MISLEH: I'd like to call this meeting of the 8 Board of Zoning Appeals for Thursday, April 11th, to order. 9 Angel, if you'd please make the roll call. 10 11 2. ROLL CALL 12 RECORDING SECRETARY: Mr. Peter Kien. 13 Is absent. 14 RECORDING SECRETARY: Mr. John Misleh. 15 MR. MISLEH: Here. 16 RECORDING SECRETARY: Ms. Kristine Ward. 17 MS. WARD: Here. 18 RECORDING SECRETARY: Mr. Keith Bartlett. 19 Is absent. 20 RECORDING SECRETARY: Mr. Dale Eppler. 21 MR. EPPLER: Present. 22 RECORDING SECRETARY: Mr. Gene Gresko. 23 MR. GRESKO: Here. 24 RECORDING SECRETARY: We have a quorum. 25 26 3. PETITIONS 27 MR. MISLEH: Do we have any Petitions this evening? 28 RECORDING SECRETARY: We do not. 29 30 4. OLD BUSINESS 31 MR. MISLEH: Any Old Business? 32 RECORDING SECRETARY: We do not. 33 34 5. NEW BUSINESS 35 A. Robert Agarwal, owner and appellant, requests to 36 present "new evidence" regarding appeal application A1647-24 37 previously denied by the BZA on March 14, 2024, to determine a 38 rehearing based on said "new evidence" at 1014 Fowler Street, 39 RPC#52-110-006 of the Falls Church Real Property Records, zoned 40 R-1A, Low Density Residential District. 41 MR. MISLEH: We're on to the New Business. 42 I see we have an application from Robert Agarwal, 43 owner and appellant, requesting to present "new evidence" 44 regarding appeal application A1647-24 previously denied by the 45 BZA on March 14, 2024. 46 If staff would like to present the information. 47 MS. ROUZI: Sure. Thank you, Mr. Misleh. 48 Before the Board this evening is a request for a 49 rehearing of an appeal application the Board denied on March 50 14th. 51 For background, in February of 2024 the appellant 52 appealed the Zoning Administrator's interpretation of the 53 following two zoning Code sections: First was Section 54 48-931(4), the maximum width of a single family driveway 55 measured at the property line also known as the right-of-way 56 line. 57 And the second section, 48-2, the building height 58 limit in both story and feet is measured from the existing or 59 finished grade, whichever is lower. 60 On March 14th the Board denied the appeal concerning 61 the maximum driveway width issue and found the appeal concerning 62 the building height measurement invalid. 63 The appellant then withdrew his appeal on the height 64 issue after the Board's deliberation. 65 The appellant has since submitted the FCC 205, 66 standard apron detail, as new evidence and is requesting the 67 Board to schedule a rehearing to reconsider their denial of the 68 appeal application. 69 Staff recommends the Board deny the appellant's 70 request for a rehearing and to reject any apron standard detail 71 including but not limited to FCC 205 as new evidence for the 72 following reasons: 73 1, the 205 standard detail was presented and discussed 74 during the March 14th hearing and the Board agreed with staff 75 that apron standard details are irrelevant to the appeal. The  76 standards are used as guidelines for apron design and do not 77 establish the maximum driveway width which is administered 78 through the Zoning Ordinance; and 79 2, the 205 standard detail was drafted but never 80 approved or adopted by Public Works Director. Staff has 81 provided an email from public works engineers in the report to 82 that effect. The City currently uses VDOT CG-D9 (sic) for 83 residential apron design which was also discussed and found to 84 be irrelevant to the appeal case during the March 14th hearing. 85 As discussed during the hearing, the City applies the 86 CG-D9 (sic) VDOT standards for apron design in the right-of-way, 87 however as staff explained, the VDOT apron standards do not 88 govern the maximum driveway width in the front yard, the City's 89 Zoning Ordinance does. 90 This is the primary objective of the driveway width 91 regulation, to limit the area of pavement and allow more 92 on-street parking, both of which are good urban design and City 93 Planning principles. 94 Additionally, the zoning office does not review apron 95 design in the right-of-way or enforce VDOT standards which is 96 the function of the City's civil engineers. Zoning only 97 enforces the 14 foot maximum at the right-of-way line. Further, 98 CG-9D provides certain guidelines for apron design in the 99 right-of-way and offers a range for the desired width of the 100 apron, between 12 feet minimum and 16 feet desired. Our zoning 101 requirement of 14 feet limit at the right-of-way line fits 102 within that range and VDOT's guidelines. 103 In terms of procedure for this evening, the Board is 104 asked to review the appellant's request for a rehearing of the 105 appeal. After the public hearing and the Board's deliberation, 106 a member of the Board must make a motion to either approve or 107 deny the appellant's request for a rehearing. Pursuant to the 108 BZA Rules of Procedures, the motion must be made by one of the 109 members who has previously voted on the appeal application. 110 And that's all I have to say for this evening. 111 Thank you for your time. 112 MR. MISLEH: Thank you, Ms. Rouzi. 113 A question for you on that report. 114 One of the members that was present has to make the 115 motion. How about, did you have to be present to vote? 116 MS. ROUZI: No, you can vote. 117 MR. MISLEH: Thank you. 118 With that said, do we have someone from the public 119 presenting or the applicant presenting? 120 MS. ROUZI: The appellant has not informed us whether 121 he is coming or not coming tonight so we do not know if he's 122 going to be here to present his own application. 123 MR. MISLEH: Understood. Thank you. 124 Is this meeting open to public comment? 125 MS. ROUZI: Yes, sir, it is. 126 MR. MISLEH: And do we have anyone from the public who 127 claims to speak tonight? 128 MR. GALETZKA: Sure. 129 MR. MISLEH: Do we have to have this gentleman sign 130 in? 131 MS. ROUZI: Yes. If you could just write your name 132 and address here on this roster, and then you can speak either 133 at the podium or at the conference table. 134 Thank you. 135 MR. MISLEH: Come on up. 136 Good evening. Welcome. 137 MR. GALETZKA: Good evening. My name is John Galetzka 138 at 1013 Fowler Street, so across the street from Mr. Agarwal. 139 Yeah, just some comments in support of City staff 140 trying to uphold the standards and I know a few other neighbors 141 and we don't agree in bullying of City staff and thanks for 142 upholding the standards. And I do want to say we do have other 143 neighbors on our other side, that as Mr. Agarwal, you know, 144 rightly pointed out, they have large driveways and somehow it 145 slipped through the cracks somehow but, yeah, what's done is 146 done and but, yeah, upholding the standards going forward. 147 And maybe a few other comments regarding maybe the 148 need to uphold those standards in terms of maybe runoff, 149 rainfall runoff. So large driveways contribute to excessive 150 runoff and so, yes, there is a need to minimize large driveways, 151 I believe. 152 I would also like to mention, you know, in our 153 neighborhood just in -- even today we have across the street 154 from us the old farmhouse there at Fowler and Crane and there 155 was discussion about whether to keep, preserve the barn there at 156 the old farmhouse. That was demolished in the last few days 157 with the approval of City Council. 158 But what surprised me was some large trees were taken 159 down today and I also want to note on Mr. Agarwal's property, a 160 few months ago two large -- those poplar trees, gigantic trees, 161 and those trees do soak up a lot of rainfall and aid in 162 preventing, you know, downstream flooding. 163 So, yeah, I'm also hoping to preserve large trees in 164 the future in the City. 165 Yeah, I think I'll keep my comments at that. 166 MR. MISLEH: Thank you very much. 167 So I guess that concludes the appellant and public 168 comment segment for this evening. 169 I'd like to open it up for the Board's deliberation 170 and questions of staff. 171 MR. EPPLER: Let me start then please. 172 One question. I read your submission and it does 173 appear that the 205 Rule was never approved. I'm just curious. 174 Why is it up on the website? 175 MS. ROUZI: It has other standards like street-cut 176 section. I looked through it. And I did forward it to the 177 public works director, if it's outdated, it should be removed. 178 It's just another thing. Small jurisdiction, we never go around 179 to updating. But that's a question I have posed. 180 MR. EPPLER: Okay. Thank you. 181 MR. GRESKO: In the start of your, everything's hinged 182 on his FCC 205, "new news". This says that somewhere in here, 183 that Item 1 I think, that 205 was presented and discussed, thus 184 indicating this is not new news. 185 So I'm looking through the minutes of where that was 186 discussed. 187 MS. ROUZI: 205 was an attachment to my original staff 188 report. I brought it up and presented it as an apron detail but 189 not specifically 205. I just generally spoke of apron design 190 details and how they are irrelevant to the appeal case. 191 205 was attached to my staff report though. 192 MR. GRESKO: Okay. So it was attached but again, this 193 is saying -- okay. The detail was presented and discussed so I 194 think we're now saying it was presented, not necessarily 195 discussed. 196 MS. ROUZI: You're right. That should be corrected 197 then. 198 MR. GRESKO: Okay. I got it. 199 MR. MISLEH: Ms. Ward, questions? 200 MS. WARD: I don't know that I have any questions 201 right now. I don't know if we want to start discussions or if 202 there's more questions I guess. 203 MR. MISLEH: If there are no more questions, let's go 204 ahead and open it up for discussion. 205 MS. WARD: And maybe there will be more questions, I 206 don't know. 207 So I guess from what I recall of the meeting, we did 208 talk about the apron details, the drawing, and I would have to 209 go back and look if we talked about that one specifically but I 210 think we all came to the determination that we're following City 211 Code and not guidance documents. Because there's guidance 212 documents in the State of Virginia, there's guidance documents 213 that apparently that were loaded but we're ultimately abiding by 214 City Code which states the 14 feet. 215 Now when it comes to new evidence, I do think it was 216 available and we did look at the VDOT standard. I remember 217 discussing that one which I think had a larger maximum, if I'm 218 recalling of, was it 20 feet? I'd have to go back and look, 219 which we again discussed in detail. 220 So, yeah, I'm not sure that I would consider this new 221 evidence but open to more discussions obviously. 222 MR. EPPLER: I can't -- I'd have to go back through 223 the transcript as well to determine what exactly was discussed 224 but it seems to me that 205, unfortunately is up on the website 225 but, a, it's not even approved by the Department of Public 226 Works. The Department of Public Works doesn't set the standard. 227 The right-of-way standard is set by the Zoning Ordinance. 228 There are standards and there are maximums set in the 229 standards but the enforceable rule, it seems to me, is what's in 230 the Zoning Ordinance. That's what staff has to enforce and so 231 it's not a question of appellant's problem is not with the 232 staff's discretion. It's what the Ordinance says. 233 He hasn't requested, hasn't tried I guess to make a 234 hardship presentation but I don't see a basis here for a 235 hardship. He would just like to have the same exception that 236 other people unfortunately in the neighborhood got but that's 237 not what the Zoning Ordinance says, in my opinion. 238 MR. GRESKO: Well, again, I think the subject at hand 239 is should another review of this happen given this new data, 240 okay? And from everything I see, this new data of the whole FCC 241 205 is in the same realm of GDD9, (sic) both of which we 242 concluded that those were irrelevant to the issue of his 243 property. Because what happens in the right-of-way is not of 244 the zoning issue. 245 So the whole item before us is is this new news or is 246 this new news relevant to warrant another comeback. That is 247 what's at issue here. We're not talking now of issues of 248 hardship or anything else. Namely, new news, is it warranted, 249 is it relevant to even go forward. 250 And I contend it isn't. 251 MR. MISLEH: Thank you. 252 Do we feel like we're at a point where someone would 253 like to make a motion? 254 MR. GRESKO: Sure. This is new news to me in terms of 255 this, do we warrant a new review. 256 I make a motion that this is not new evidence subject 257 to a re-review and that we deny this request to have another 258 review of this applicant's driveway. 259 A lot of rambling words there but the best I could do. 260 MS. WARD: I'll second. 261 Do we need to read it out in a different -- like the 262 actual entire clause or is that sufficient? 263 MS. ROUZI: If you feel that's more appropriate, 264 maybe. Sorry. The description. 265 MR. GRESKO: I'll get it yet. 266 I make a motion that the request by Robert Agarwal, 267 owner/applicant for new evidence regarding the appeal 268 application A1647-24, previously denied by the BZA on March 14, 269 2024, to determine a rehearing based on said new evidence at 270 1014 Fowler Street, RPC#52-110-006, of the Low Density 271 Residential District, that this be denied. 272 MS. WARD: Second. 273 RECORDING SECRETARY: Mr. Eppler. 274 MR. EPPLER: Yes. 275 RECORDING SECRETARY: Mr. Gresko. 276 MR. GRESKO: Yes. 277 RECORDING SECRETARY: Ms. Ward. 278 MS. WARD: Yes. 279 RECORDING SECRETARY: Mr. Misleh. 280 MR. MISLEH: I'd like to abstain. 281 RECORDING SECRETARY: Motion passes. 282 MR. MISLEH: Thank you, everyone. 283 284 6. APPROVAL OF MINUTES 285 MR. MISLEH: So on to the Approval of Minutes. 286 Do we have minutes to approve this meeting? 287 RECORDING SECRETARY: We do not. They were completed 288 too late to be actually put on the Agenda so they are just for 289 review. 290 MR. MISLEH: Great. Thank you. 291 292 7. OTHER BUSINESS 293 MR. MISLEH: So do we have any Other Business? 294 RECORDING SECRETARY: No Other Business. 295 MS. WARD: There was one discussion for Rules of 296 Procedure that we wanted to wait for our Chair to be present 297 for. That was something that you wanted to discuss. 298 RECORDING SECRETARY: Yes, but I did need someone to 299 actually let me know to put it on the Agenda to have that 300 discussion, Rules of Procedure Discussion. 301 MS. WARD: So we have to wait until next month then 302 maybe. 303 RECORDING SECRETARY: If you'd like it for May's 304 agenda, I can now put it on the agenda. 305 MR. MISLEH: Yeah, let's please do that. 306 Is the calendar set for this year? 307 RECORDING SECRETARY: The calendar is set. 308 MR. MISLEH: Great. Thank you. 309 310 8. ADJOURNMENT 311 MR. MISLEH: So with all of that said, we move to 312 adjourn. 313 MR. EPPLER: Adjourn. 314 MR. MISLEH: Second. 315 RECORDING SECRETARY: All in favor? 316 (A chorus of "ayes") 317 MR. MISLEH: Thank you for coming this evening. 318 319