The East Hampton Village Zoning Board of Appeals voted unanimously on Friday to reopen, for a second time, a hearing that had resulted in a determination granting multiple area variances and a wetlands permit for a Jones Road property, despite the impassioned objections of one member. It also closed another hearing, allowing an applicant on Middle Lane to convert an accessory building to an accessory dwelling unit and to make alterations and additions to it.
In April, Joseph Rose rebuked his colleagues on the board for their votes to approve the application of Doug and Kristin Douglass of 15 Jones Road, having been critical of it from the first meeting at which it was heard, in February. The application included additions to the principal residence, a new swimming pool and patio, a new septic system, and conversion of an accessory building into a dwelling unit, as well as phragmites removal.
Mr. Rose, a former chairman of the New York City Planning Commission and director of the Department of City Planning, was critical of a proposed two-car garage with a peak of 23 feet from natural grade, to which a neighbor had objected, calling the setback variance sought “extremely substantial.” The house and garage would form a “144-foot-wide continuous structure” across the Jones Road frontage, he said, also asking pointed questions about a proposed vegetation plan that called for a native species buffer between the majority of the wetlands area and the yard area of the property.
After the hearing was closed but before the determination was read in April, the hearing was reopened at Mr. Rose’s request, and he read a lengthy critique of the determination about to be announced. Following the vote to grant the application, he told his colleagues and the audience at the meeting that in 45 years of government service in land use, “this is the first time I’ve ever been embarrassed to sit on an action. It’s not because of where a swimming pool is going, or a 30-foot side-yard variance, even though as I stated, it’s problematic. . . . It’s because I think in this case we’re not adhering to the standards and treating like applications alike.”
The board did not say why the hearing was reopened and Mr. Rose declined to comment on it on Monday.
Friday’s meeting also saw the conclusion of another hearing, this one concerning 35 Middle Lane, where the applicant Amphitrite Properties, a limited liability company, plans to make alterations and construct additions to a pre-existing nonconforming accessory building located within the required side-yard setbacks and to convert it to an A.D.U. Variances of 47.5 feet and 8.8 feet were required as the structure is 2.5 feet from the side-yard lot line and the proposed additions would fall 41.2 feet from the side-yard lot line, where the required side-yard setbacks are 50 feet.
Initially heard in April, Amphitrite Properties requested a one-month adjournment to confer with a neighbor about the proposed work. Last month, Jonathan Tarbet, an attorney representing the applicant, said that “the village already requires a covenant be recorded to protect against some of his concerns. But in addition to those concerns, he was worried that the structure itself might get enlarged further than what we’re proposing now . . . or that the roof line could change.” The neighbor, he said, was concerned that the A.D.U. might also be rented to a third party.
The village code pertaining to A.D.U.s stipulates that they are limited to the family or guests of the occupants of the primary residence, or employees working on the premises or in the primary dwelling unit. It may not be rented separately from the primary residence, and must meet the setback requirements of the principal structure.
At more than two acres, the property is large enough for an A.D.U. to be constructed under the village code, “but it just makes more sense to use the existing structure,” which has legally existing bedrooms, “and to expand it,” Mr. Tarbet said. “We’re expanding away from the property line, so nothing will be any closer to the existing property line.” The accessory building “will become a conforming structure in the sense that it’s going to become an A.D.U., and it’ll meet all the A.D.U. requirements.”
When the hearing was continued on Friday, Mr. Tarbet told the board that “there’s already a covenant the village requires, and we’ve just amended that” to add that the structure will not grow taller or closer to the property line.
The hearing was closed, and the determination granting the application was read.
