December 22nd, 2025.

I am JD Bartell, Chair of the Historic Preservation Appeals Board, and I'm calling this meeting to order.

This board meeting is taking place at the City Hall Annex at 900 Bagby.

Although there is no longer a virtual participation option, Houston Television HTV offers viewing options via their social media and web page.

Board members, please unmute yourself and respond by repeating your name and saying present when I call your name.

I am JD Bartell, the Chair.

I am present.

Douglas Elliott.

Elliot present.

Truman Edminster.

Edminster present.

This is the first time for Stephen McNeil.

McNeil present.

And the first time for Brie Kellman.

Kelman present.

Present.

We have a quorum.

As chair would like to comment on how this meeting is to be conducted.

All speakers are asked to fill out a speaker request form, turn it into the front desk, and each speaker will be heard in person when I call on you.

Historic Preservation Office staff will open with a brief introduction to the appeal that is before the board.

The appellant or the representative will be next and will be given a reasonable time to make their presentation.

I will then call on any speakers who wish to comment.

Written comments will also be entered into the record by staff.

The appellant may have time for rebuttal if desired.

Finally, board members may have questions for speakers, which will not count against their time allotted for speaking.

May I call on a director's report.

Good morning, thank you, Chairman.

Uh very very brief report this morning.

I just want to welcome our two new commissioners, Commissioner McNeil and Commissioner Kelman.

Uh both have served the city with distinction at previous commissions and welcome.

Concludes my report.

Uh the prior meeting minutes were posted with the agenda.

May I have a motion and a second to accept these minutes.

Motion administer.

A second, Elliot.

All those in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Minutes are passed.

I'd like to act abstain since I wasn't present.

Neil abstains as well.

Okay.

Next item on the agenda.

My list.

Consideration of and particular possible action on oh, we did that.

Public hearing in consideration of possible action on the proposed 2026 HPAB meeting schedule.

Good morning, Chair.

There is no presentation.

It's just a simple vote.

Okay.

For the new members on the board, we do not meet this often.

This is just a they lock these in for us to in case there is a meeting.

Those are the potential dates for the meetings if she if we have them.

Does anybody have any conflicts or comments on the schedule?

I will likely be out of town for a large stretch of the first meetings, but I anticipate being back in Houston after that.

Okay.

Do we have a in a motion or a second to uh approve the schedule?

So moved.

Second.

All those in favor, please uh stay aye.

Aye.

Any opposed.

Any abstentions.

Motion passes.

Next item is consideration of and possible action on an appeal of the decision of the Houston Archaeological and Historical Commission on November 6, 2025, denying a certificate of appropriateness COA for a new construction of a garage at 2903 Houston Avenue in the German town Historic District.

And I will note as of this time we do not have the applicant or the representative here.

Good morning, Chair and members of the board.

This is Staff Person Samantha Delione.

I apologize for my voice in advance.

The 1,290 square foot two-story contributing bungalow style property was built circa 1905, situated on a 6,000 square foot interior lot.

Or corner lot, I'm sorry.

The applicant is proposing to construct a new two-story garage at the rear of his property, totaling six seven hundred and sixty square feet.

At the November 6, 2025 Houston Archaeological and Historical Commission meeting, staff recommended denial as the scope of work does not meet criteria two and four of Section 33-242A and did not meet the Germantown design guidelines.

Chairs and members of the board, I am here for questions.

The agent Alicio Pizza was supposed to be here but did not make it, unfortunately.

The owner, Keith Rice is not here, but asked me to read a letter on his behalf.

I believe that the letter can be found at the end of item three, I believe on starting on page 50.

Good morning, members of the appeals board.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

I sincerely apologize for not being able to attend in person.

The rescheduled date unfortunately conflicted with previously arranged holiday travel, making it impossible for me to return to Houston in time.

By way of introduction, my name is Keith Rise.

I'm a father of two girls, Eloise and Annie, who attend Travis Elementary and have been a resident of the Heights for more than 16 years.

During this time, I have owned six properties in the neighborhood, and in each case, I have been intentional about maintaining historical integrity and honoring the arc uh architectural character that makes this community special.

My straight my appeal is a straightforward request.

Approved to construct a garage that can accommodate my vehicles, which currently must sit in my yard due to a lack of space and an accompanying garage apartment intended to be used by my extended family and children.

The proposed design is consistent with the style, proportions, and features of my craftman's home.

Following the denial of my initial submission, I spent a sat a Sunday in a late cold November walking the old Germantown Historic District to speak directly with neighbors about the proposal.

I shared the project renderings and asked for their feedback and signatures.

Of the residents I spoke with, 37 individuals in total, every single homeowner available and willing to engage, expressed support for the project.

The breakdown of my outreach follows, and he included a graph.

Not home slash did not answer the door was 27 people or 36%.

Does not trust the Historic Society, one one person.

Signed, 32 people or 43%.

Come back after eating dinner, two people.

Verbal approval, five.

Rental unit with no owner present, seven, and one underneath construction.

Importantly, 100% of the homeowners who were present and able to sign did so.

And those who did not sign simply were unavailable renters or in transition due to construction.

The universal neighbor support I received reinforces my belief that this project is appropriate for the district and aligns with the character of our community.

If there has been meaningful concern among residents, I would absolutely respect and accept that.

However, the opposite has been proven true.

It may be helpful to note that my property sits on one of the largest lots in old Germantown.

Within the district, only 24 properties have garages at all.

And due to small lot sizes, many of these structures are very modest.

Approximately seven include garage apartments.

Given this limited sample size, I believe comparisons directly regarding balconies do not fully reflect the diversity of structures and lot characteristics within the district.

For this reason, I respectfully ask the board to consider relevant examples in the adjacent Woodland Heights Historic District, including a garage slash garage apartment, just eight houses down from my property that features almost the same design elements present in my proposal.

Additionally, I would like to highlight the letter submitted by Wendy Parker, Chairman of the Old Germantown Historic District, who has expressed her support for the project.

I've included a photo of my current garage, which illustrates both its limitations and the opportunity to improve the appearance of my property.

My intention is to create a structure that enhances and respects the historic environment and not detracts from it.

For further context, I've also included a photo of my immediate neighbor's garage in Houston Avenue, which is within the same district.

The contrast reinforces my belief that my proposed project will contribute positively to the district's overall appearance and cohesion.

In closing, I respectfully ask the board to reconsider approval of my garage and garage apartment proposal.

I am fully committed to preserving the historic character of old Germantown and contributing to its beauty and long-term vitality.

Thank you again for your time and thoughtful review.

Sincerely, Keith Rice.

This concludes my presentation.

Are there any questions for staff?

Uh I have a question.

There was some uh discussion in the applicant's presentation and also at the HHC about whether or not the woodland heights was a more appropriate kind of context area or even design guidelines.

And I was just I mean, it's in it's not strictly speaking, but did the staff consider whether if you were applying woodland heights criteria, it would have met the criteria, it wouldn't met the design guidelines.

So there are no design guidelines in Woodland Heights.

There's currently only a draft and it has not been passed by city council, so it's not considered official.

The proposed garage design is more compatible with the Woodland Heights.

However, staff felt that in the ordinance it says that the block or the uh context area is the block face, which we counted as the German town block face.

So we did not consider the Woodland Heights to be an appropriate uh, I guess, reference to German town, even though it's they're directly adjacent to each other.

Okay.

And I was also a little bit unclear about what the uh major objection was.

Some of it seemed like it was the porch, then there was reference to the windows, and there was reference to the the narrowness and just kind of overall massing.

So if you could maybe kind of go through what in staff's view were the the main uh problems with this.

Yes, sir.

So if you were to go to page 21 of I the item three, or at the bottom it uh numbered it says page eight out of 32, which is on the original staff uh staff report of uh 2903 Houston Ave, which went in front of commission.

Uh staff went out and conducted, I guess, a mini survey of the entire German town area looking at contributing two-story structures as well as non-contributing garages.

For new construction, we do look at the criteria of making sure that it aligns with contributing structures.

That since there are no contributing garage structures in Germantown, I thought it would be helpful to at least include the reference of two-story structures as well as non-contributing garages.

So you can see here I included a photo of the street view, which has all of the addresses listed, and kind of showing that there is not really one that matches what Mr.

Rise was asking for in terms of a two-story balcony.

So I take it from that the balcony was the major issue about incompatibility.

Correct.

Uh it did not seem to match anything else that we could find in the historic district in terms of contributing structures.

Uh and there was one uh structure that was not this narrow.

Okay, so that also the narrowness would be.

I would say probably the balcony was the main thing that got staff.

Okay.

I'd like to make a comment on that.

So when reading the guidelines uh when you look up page one of the introduction, um it talks about um the the things that the qualities that uh make the district desirable, such as mature trees, front porches that foster connections between residents, um, and a variety of architecturally compatible well well-maintained buildings.

Right now, there's clearly a not well-maintained building.

I drove by it on my way here.

Um the the garage, excuse me.

Um and then there, like he said in his his written notes to us, there's he doesn't have room for his truck.

Right now, the truck is physically sitting outside with the uh he's doing work on it clearly.

It's a really cool old Ford truck, but it's you know sitting there with the roof up and it doesn't look very nice.

Um directly next behind him, which is outside of the Germantown uh district, because he's in one of three houses on that side of Houston Avenue in the district, which is if you look at a map is important to me as well.

Um is a two-story garage apartment with a porch balcony um on the second story.

Um so I I don't know.

When I look at all the different factors for this and what the applicant, I'm very empathetic to his situation.

Um I'm sorry he couldn't be here today.

That's really unfortunate.

Um, but I think he clearly pounded the pavement and demonstrated that uh there is tremendous neighborhood support for his project.

Um also being on I I said it but more specifically and elaborately, being on Houston Avenue in a bungalow is is quite difficult.

Um so the fact that and he wants to do something to enable him and his family supporting the local schools to uh continue to live there.

I um I am sympathetic to the applicant and uh would be supportive of his project.

I have a question on the windows.

Um it seems like in being my first meeting, I'm not exactly sure because he was denied based on vinyl windows and the meeting minutes from the HHAC referred specifically to uh the commissioners not wanting to approve this because of the vinyl windows, but now I see he still has vinyl windows, but he's attached the traditional um historic window standard as part of his package.

So the has the package changed from the submittal to the HHAC to today?

I will say that the one thing that has changed is that's uh the Office of Historic Preservation has uh created and signed an internal window policy which allows vinyl windows on accessory structures.

So that is no longer an issue for staff.

Okay.

And and so they still have to be recessed and set or correct, yes, sir.

Okay.

And then I also see that in this submittal that the frame color is black.

And is it do we have any purview over color of windows being compatible in the neighborhood?

No, sir.

We do not regulate window color.

Okay.

Thank you.

I want to piggyback on what Commissioner Elliott was referring to about the context area.

One of the things that I was troubled about had to do that this is a 1905 building.

And at least according to HCAD, which is not the all-to-beat all, of course, but this saying that essentially all the structures around it were 1920 and more recent.

So this is one of the this is kind of the unicorn that's out there in the neighborhood.

And I understand that it's probably is more compatible with what is over in Woodland Heights since it kind of preceded Woodland Heights, if you will.

Uh, and that trying to more mimic what's going on in that area.

I was having the struggle with on the staff write up between contacts area versus, well, it wasn't in the doesn't match Germantown.

And it's the well, from the information that was provided to us, it was kind of the exception to the rule.

They didn't have a place to go on the west side of Houston Avenue because Woodland Heights wouldn't take them at the time, and so they joined Germantown just to be protected, which I certainly applaud what they did.

So I'm I'm wanting to see if we could really more evaluate this more in the context area as opposed to strictly adhering to the German town regulations because of the intent, history and what have you.

And we have someone coming up to the only thing that really troubled me about the application, you know, has really nothing to do with our purview.

I was more troubled with the balcony not having any type of columns on it as opposed to and the garage door as opposed to what the you know balcony versus no balcony.

Um what we have purview over, it seems at the context area that you know we have some latitude as far as the value of what constitutes context area, and I would encourage us to go ahead and look at the broader uh area of context as opposed to strict interpretation of German town design guidelines.

So sta uh I'm sorry, I was just gonna go ahead and say something.

So staff could not go ahead and make that, I guess, decision to go ahead and consider another historic district with a con uh as the context area.

Usually in rare circumstances, staff will go ahead and look at the entirety of a of a historic district.

So for example, if this was located in Houston Heights East, we could go ahead and broaden that uh that context area to not just include a block face, but to possibly go throughout further in that particular district.

But uh so staff just did what we have always done, which is to go ahead and look at the context area in terms of the historic district that the property is located in.

However, uh the commission as well as the board here has every right to go ahead and consider a different uh context area, which may not apply in to staff.

Then Samantha, as a follow-up to my comments, here's the question I'm looking at.

Was there any discussion amongst staff that you know at least had discussion about the context area of Woodland Heights, even though for the reasons that you just stated that you that staff chose not to evaluate that.

Is there any other let's say color that you could add to the discussion here?

Hello, staff member Terrence Jackson here.

Um staff staff typically does not broaden the context area.

We st we strictly stick with the block face.

But again, like Samantha said, um, so there was no conversation about broaden that because we were only going our broaden broadening of the review uh was basically just to broaden it and look at Germantown.

Okay.

Um Germantown is a very small district, so when we broaden that it doesn't it didn't do it any justice by broadening that.

However, like she said, if you guys would like to broaden it and include Woodland Heights, you're very you're you're you can very much do so.

Staff, however, cannot based on the ordinance, but it does state that you guys can and you can broaden the um broaden the block face if you wish.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

I was I was gonna say that I was like you're bound by the co by the code.

We are not as bound by the code.

Correct.

Um I have now I'm trying to remember my questions in regards to this.

Usually um applicants have some ideas of how to that are things that they're willing to do to address what the HHC has.

Has he made any concessions to make any alterations based on the comments of the HHC?

Yes, sir.

So I did speak with the architect, which was Mr.

PETA, which is the representative who is not here today.

He uh made uh it clear to me after the November 6 commission date that they were willing to change the vinyl windows to wood.

However, uh Mr.

Rise, the homeowner would have uh stated that he would like to go ahead and take his chances with the current design in front of the appeals board.

I did communicate with Mr.

Rise the concerns we did have whenever we uh staff initially went over his application back in October, because he did defer this uh for the month of October.

So staff did uh look over this application and I did relay the issues that we had, and he uh did not want to change them at the time.

And the new document says that vinyl windows are acceptable.

Correct.

Yes.

So this has nothing to do with the windows, just in terms of the balcony.

And and as currently submitted with the vinyl windows, those are I can't tell if they're in set correctly or something.

But because that was an issue too.

But that that part, if we were to approve the pending application, would the windows be in set as they're supposed to be in the historic district?

Yes, sir.

So if you were to go that that's fine, I just but it's in uh we have a window diagram that's included in every single COA that goes in front of commission, which states that windows do need to be insette and recessed.

Yes, sir.

I just didn't know what the if that had been redrafted into the current application or not.

That is what is potentially uh subject to approval.

So thank you for clarifying that.

Uh Chair.

Um I'm sorry if I could uh or unless you said something.

Okay.

Um I'm kind of following up on uh Chairman Bartell.

I'm uh a little confused that they only you all only talked about windows with them when it appears that the main problem is the is the porch.

So um was that addressed, or is that just something that's uh not possible?

Because to me, that's sort of the issue, and uh I don't understand uh what the status of that is.

Right.

So at commission, it seemed that the commissioners had more questions about the windows, as usually that is the case, you know, you with most applications that go in front of the commission.

But the main thing to staff was that we could not find a two-story balcony which was similar in design to what Mr.

Rise was proposing, uh which is why I went out and I did that mini survey and included all of those structures.

Um was that made clear to the applicant and give them any opportunity to modify that or he did not want to, no sir.

Okay, thank you.

Um this one final thing, because the the there aren't a lot of uh uh detached garages, there aren't a lot of reference things.

The idea that this is uh not going to be possible to to build anything there because you're always gonna think it's too narrow or it's always gonna be incompatible.

I just didn't know if that had been discussed with them too, if there's some other proportions that that you all felt was uh more in incompatible with the district.

So staff does uh does not design for applicants, but of uh of course.

But I also went in, I included uh the context area in Germantown of two-story garages that were detached.

And as you can see, it's starting on page 24 of that item three packet or page 11 out of 32 at the bottom.

Um it uh starts with the garages that I was able to find just purely off of the block um driving past on the block face.

And there are two-story garages, but none that I could see with a long two-story balcony uh w for what the applicant is proposing.

So staff was not necessarily opposed to him having a new garage, especially one, you know, to include or to have a two st uh to have a garage apartment on the second floor.

But we just felt that looking at the two-story structures that were already contributing in German town, there was not one that matched with the with the balcony.

And then also looking at garages, we were not able to find one that matched with that balcony as well.

Thank you.

And I think that I guess the fact that it's narrow, I don't mind that it's narrow because then that enables him to have a yard, right?

Correct.

And usually you want i narrow is better than wider.

So um I in a follow-up, uh I drove by it this morning and took a picture on my iPhone.

This is the um this is the garage that he has now with the cool old truck uh Ford truck right there.

And then directly behind him is a two-story garage with a porch and a balcony.

So in terms of context area, you can't get more close to than the one right here.

So it just doesn't have to be a I think uh Mr.

Williamson had wanted to.

Yes, I just wanted to make the point that the applicant did um modify his original design when submitted to staff.

So I think you had it on the rendering up there, Terrence.

We he uh he was open to adjusting the roof line and some other subtle changes.

So it wasn't like the applicant said no.

Correct.

So uh he went out and spoke to Wendy Parker, who is head of the old Germantown Historic District, their civic association.

She was the original applicant for Durban Town, and she did give some valuable feedback on you know things such that could help the design.

Uh staff to clarify, staff also made this point.

But after speaking with uh Ms.

Parker, the applicant uh felt comfortable enough to make those changes.

So he did adjust the roof line as you can see on page 22 of 32 of the original staff report or page 35.

Uh it was slightly off-center, which staff felt of course did not match anything.

Um but we felt that it was a bit of a an accumulation of a of a lot of little things, right?

Uh we usually always work with the applicants to try to see if we can find a middle ground, but we felt that uh I guess their main concern was not addressed.

Um but as you can see, he did uh adjust the roof line, um, which honestly looks a lot better.

Do you think he would be open to having um uh posts along the balcony?

Um the roof stops short of the entire balcony.

Now you'd have to lengthen the roof on that side in order to put in columns, which then throws off the balance again.

So if you want balance, then he can't go any further on the other side because of the firewall.

Thank you.

And which time was the roof adjusted?

Was that before it went to the HAHC?

Uh so that was after it went to commission, or I'm sorry, it was after I'm sorry.

So applicant submitted this application in in uh September and it was supposed to go to uh H H C in October.

Uh the applicant decided to defer because he wanted time to go ahead and make those changes that Ms.

Parker had suggested.

So for the November commission, we did went ahead and included those revised drawings as uh Mr.

Williamson stated.

Okay.

So the uh the commission in November was able to look at those two differences in the revised drawings.

I have I have one, the example that was provided that does show a balcony does show columns and that's at uh the one that says 3102 Morrison Garage garage apartment.

Right.

Two, I don't I also don't have a problem with the narrowness because it's really determined by the size of the garage door and the garage itself.

Right.

Um and most garage apartments are not facing the street wide.

So that doesn't that doesn't impact me.

But it was the problem with the balcony, the presence of the balcony or the location of the balcony, because a lot of the the ones that were shown show it on the narrow side, not on the long side with that.

So the issue with staff was the length.

It was not the location nor the presence of the balcony, it was just the length.

We did not find a single structure in Germantown that was contributing, nor on a non-contributing garage that had a balcony that long on the second floor.

There's like the photograph that our new member showed has the garage apartment next door, but the balcony is on the short side facing the street as opposed to facing the house and all the way down the long side.

Right.

Right.

I think the fact that it's on that side makes it even less visible for the public right away too, actually.

Like you won't be able to tell how long it is or not.

It's just that it's there and oh, someone might be sitting outside and maybe I can talk to them is how I view it.

Yeah, I mean, this is a uh after looking at all the kind of objections, I think we're we're boiled down to how long the balcony is.

And and obviously you don't have a lot of things to go by, but in a case like this, normally what I would be happy to do is to defer to you all looking around and what the HHC did, because I don't think that's obviously wrong as far as I can tell.

And I know we're allowed to kind of look at it fresh, but I prefer not to, because I think the expertise is is is lower down in in that particular area of evaluating those sorts of things.

Um I I also want to comment about the fact that the the person that authored the German town district and all the neighbors seem to have no problem with that.

And while, you know, it's not a series of referendum of your neighbors on whether or not you can build the ordinance is uh the ordinance and is interpreted the way it is and enforced.

Um I think you know, for for you all, any time it seems to be uh a decision or interpretation, it doesn't seem to be serving the purposes the neighbors thought it would.

I think that's you know kind of a cause for maybe a little reflection, see where that disconnect is.

Um but uh to me that's not a reason to uh uh reverse a decision either.

So is there any other discussion on this matter?

I I have one last question.

Uh is it an option for us to really remand this back to HAHC to work with the applicant?

Yes, sir.

Rather than him going through a whole new application.

Yes, sir.

I believe that that has been done once before earlier this year, actually.

It was sent back down to H C.

Uh so that definitely is an option.

And I believe that it would be included on the January agenda.

Is that right?

Regardless, it would be going either in January or February.

December 8th was the limit for this month for January.

Correct, yes, sir.

Okay.

I do I do have some sympathy for the applicant.

They put their initial submission August 19th.

Um what what would what would happen if we referred it back down to the historic commission?

What what are you thinking of?

What I'm thinking about is that they were more focused on the windows at the time.

And that it and it's all boiled down in our discussion.

It's all about the balcony.

Well, they didn't really vet balcony at HAHC.

Did they not?

Is that correct?

They it was I'm sorry, you know.

Even if they discussed the windows more than the balcony, was the balcony I mean, it was still included and I think just not as much.

It was it was in the application, but I didn't see in the testimony that uh much discussion was really focused toward that balcony being, and that's really what's at issue here.

And I don't believe us as an appeals board that we need to get into really design issues.

That's something for the HAHC to do.

And I'm wanting to help this guy, but what's the right thing to do?

And you know, we can approve it, we can deny it, or we can remand it back to me, or those those are the three options.

But I would think that the lack of conversation about the balcony on the HHEC gives you a testimony to what they were thinking of.

Like there were not concerns about the balcony shown.

I think if you staff has done a great job of of looking at the German town historic district, because that is what they are responsible to do, and yes, it does not fit quite in the German town.

But if you consider Woodland Heights, which we are allowed to do, and you look at their next door neighbor who has a pretty identical building, you would I uh I don't see the opposition to really what he's done.

He's made a lot of changes, and I would vote, I would vote to approve the as as as submitted to us today, rather than kicking it back to the HHAC.

Um in the motion that was given at the HHC, you know, here at the I always make the members on this board qualify their motion so that is there a qualified motion in the rejection at the HHC.

Did they qualify why they def denied the can you put it in the record?

Um I guess really um McNeil is correct in the sense that there was a lot of discussion on the windows.

I do believe that that kind of would be resolved right with the internal window policy stating that we're fine with vinyl windows on accessory structures and with our commission, they are very much aware that usually, you know, applications that are submitted with vinyl windows usually kind of warrant a second look, right?

Um but I do believe that um well I get I just did want to state that if you guys did decide to kick this back down, I would be willing to have this go on the January agenda so the applicant could get an answer quicker.

I just wanted just to state that as staff.

Um if that was something that you guys wanted to do.

I don't know strictly speaking what that means to kick it back down.

I think you know, I'd like to kind of cleanly either approve.

That is no problem.

But no, no, but but the fact that you are able to kind of expedite a reconsideration, I think is very helpful.

And that's basically what kind of a remand would be, I guess.

It's like you don't have to start all over again.

We'll we'll still treat this as an amendable ongoing application.

So that that seems the result, but we would uh essentially be uh uh upholding what the HHC did, and then you all would continue it as always or a live application.

Okay.

I will say since you we have two new we are technically uh the board is supposed to review what came for what went through the HHC with the documentation that was provided to the HHC to determine whether they followed the ordinance and the code.

That's our main focus.

So we're we're not allowed to really review new information per se.

And if the person comes with a whole bunch of information, and I think that's why that deferral happened.

There was a bunch of new information, which we just said, you know, okay, the HHC didn't have this information, and we put we punted it back to the HHC saying, you know, they need to review this information, not us, because it's out of out of order.

Um when we review this uh item, we're we need to be looking at do we feel that the HHC and the staff followed the intent of the ordinance within the code and not review per se new information per se.

And so a question on that is the letter from Wendy.

Whatever her last name is, Parker, new information?

No, sir.

That was included in the and the uh November uh action or November staff report.

And uh all the signatures on his uh petition, or is that new information?

That is new information, yes, sir.

That's new information, but it's not really related to any changes or detailing of the building itself.

It's just showing support of the project.

Correct, yes, sir.

Which to me is quite material to have that many people in such a small area and uh wendy as well, is quite material in my uh evaluation of what the applicant wants to do.

Um for the reasons I stated, I mean I am sympathetic uh to the applicant.

I think there's probably a a good solution that he he will be happy with and get something at the staff and HHC would approve, but I I don't think this is it.

And and I'm not gonna kind of substitute my judgment about whether or not a a long uh balcony is compatible with the district or not.

So uh I would make a motion to approve the HHC's um decision.

We have a motion.

Do we have a second?

Okay.

Uh motion fails.

Do we have a new motion?

I'll make a motion to approve the um applicant's uh request um as written here.

With your with your motion um because it's different than the HHCI would specify like we were talking about before uh to actually qualify, why, so that we have a we keep a record of because we have appeals and all the time.

So we have a record so people have a predictability in the system of why this particular item is going against or for the commission.

Sure.

I'll qualify it that I think the applicant has made um concessions already as after them starting the process in August.

Um I think they've demonstrated significant neighborhood support um in support of their project.

I think they have a um I I think that uh porches and balconies in general are encouraged and the intent of what um makes uh neighborhoods in the the German town district and surrounding um Woodland Heights and Heights area very um material.

I think the balcony is on the part of the how the garage that is um less visible from the street, so if it's long or short, you can't even tell from the the street um on a corner on the corner lot.

And I think next directly next door to it is uh two-story garage apartment that has um has a second floor balcony as well.

Okay, we have a motion.

Do we have a second to the motion?

McNeil seconds.

All those in favor, please state your discussion.

Discussion.

Commissioner Edminster, I would like to weigh in insomuch that the HAHC was more focused on the windows and really did not discuss the balcony.

It's been my experience, at least on this body, that when they're concerned about something, they discuss it.

And they discuss it quite fervently.

And so therefore it would seem that by the omission of that discussion, that they weren't particularly troubled by it.

I agree.

So as a consequence, I have to say that I, you know I am more amenable to uh what the applicant has presented as a consequence of that there being no testimony or no discussion uh that was adverse to this balcony.

So that's all I have to say.

And how do you vote on the matter?

Well you call the vote now.

Yeah.

Call for a vote.

Aye.

I like motion.

Oh, Kelman, I.

Sorry, thank you.

McNeil I.

All those opposed?

Elliott, no.

And Bartel, no.

Motion passes.

Thank you.

Um I see no one in the audience, so there's probably no public comments.

Uh HPAB member comments.

Does anyone I would welcome the two new members?

Um but uh any other comments.

I will just join you in welcoming our two new members and I hope we have a nice productive uh year ahead.

Thank you so much.

Happy to be here.

Thank you for welcoming us on the commission.

Committee.

Board.

I know.

It's hard from the H C being commissioned to a board.

I messed it up a lot too.

Same and I'm a lot removed.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I did just want to say that uh Marbet Alonso did ask me to state this that uh Ms.

Kelman, if you are able to go ahead and submit that photo that you showed to the rest of the commissioners on the record.

Or uh just whenever if you can email it, I just have to state it.

Thank you so much.

Uh meeting is adjourned.