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Minutes, Zoning Board of Appeals, September 12, 2006
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2 STATE OF NEW YORK COUNTY OF WESTCHESTER 3 TOWN OF EASTCHESTER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . X 4
5 MINUTES OF THE 6 EASTCHESTER ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS
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8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . X
9 HELD AT: Eastchester Town Hall 40 Mill Road 10 Eastchester, New York 10709 September 12, 2006 7:30 p.m. 11
12 B E F O R E:
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14 LOUIS SATRIALE, Chairman PAUL CUBITA, Member 15 FRED SALANITRO, Member PETER BORDUCCI, Member 16
17 P R E S E N T:
18 LOUIS REDA, Deputy Town Attorney 19 MARGARET UHLE, Director of Planning JAY KING, Building Inspector 20
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24 DINA M. MORGAN 43 CENTRAL DRIVE 25 BRONXVILLE, New York 10708 914-469-6353
DINA M. MORGAN, REPORTER
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1 EASTCHESTER ZBA - 9/12/06
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3 THE CHAIRMAN: I would like to
4 welcome everybody to the September 12th
5 meeting of the Zoning Board of Appeals.
6 Would everybody please stand for the
7 Pledge of Allegiance.
8 (Whereupon the Pledge of Allegiance
9 was said.)
10 THE CHAIRMAN: I'll get right to
11 the agenda items tonight. We only have
12 an agenda of three tonight. I'll run
13 through the three that are going to be
14 heard tonight and then I'll run through
15 the adjourned items for those either here
16 or watching at home so you'll know what's
17 on and what's not.
18 You'll also see that we continue
19 with a four person board. So, as we
20 discussed when we last met in June, in
21 these circumstances each applicant will
22 be given an opportunity to adjourn if
23 they would like. We were hopeful that we
24 would have a full board tonight. That
25 unfortunately hasn't worked out. But we
DINA M. MORGAN, REPORTER
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1 EASTCHESTER ZBA - 9/12/06
2 believe we'll have a full board by the
3 next meeting in October. So, of the
4 three that are proceeding tonight if you
5 would like an adjournment just let me
6 know when I call the application and it
7 will be moved to the second Tuesday in
8 October.
9 If you decide to proceed tonight,
10 just be aware that if there is a two/two
11 vote of the board, that is a denial. In
12 order to have your application passed,
13 you need three affirmative votes. So,
14 you would need a three/one vote of a
15 board of four. Two/two is a denial.
16 I'll go right to the agenda. We
17 have one item under old business and
18 that's Family and Community Services. Ms
19 Cioci is here. Are you ready to proceed?
20 MS. CIOCI: Yes.
21 THE CHAIRMAN: First item under new
22 business is 196 Oakland Avenue. Is
23 somebody here for that application? The
24 architect is here. And you're ready to
25 proceed on that one?
DINA M. MORGAN, REPORTER
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1 EASTCHESTER ZBA - 9/12/06
2 MS. RIVERA: Yes.
3 THE CHAIRMAN: The final one
4 tonight is 203 Park Drive. Is somebody
5 here on that? You're here. And you're
6 ready to proceed?
7 MS. MARONE: Yes.
8 THE CHAIRMAN: So, the three
9 applications are willing to proceed with
10 a four person board.
11 Final thing before we get to the
12 agenda would be an approval of the
13 minutes from our June 13th meeting. Is
14 there a motion to approve the minutes?
15 MR. BORDUCCI: So moved.
16 THE CHAIRMAN: Moved by Mr.
17 Borducci. Is there a second?
18 MR. SALANITRO: Second.
19 THE CHAIRMAN: Second by Mr.
20 Salanitro. All in favor.
21 (All aye.)
22 THE CHAIRMAN: The minutes are
23 approved. We'll get right into the
24 agenda.
25 First item is the only item under
DINA M. MORGAN, REPORTER
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1 EASTCHESTER ZBA - 9/12/06
2 old business, Application 06-20, Family
3 and Community Services at 551 White
4 Plains Road.
5 MS. CIOCI: Good evening, Chairman,
6 members of the board. My name is Lucia
7 Cioci with Cuddy & Feder. We represent
8 Family and Community Services. When we
9 were here back in June, we had adjourned
10 to market the premises exclusively as a
11 residence and to provide that information
12 to the board at this meeting.
13 Before I go into those details and
14 our submissions, I just wanted to review
15 for the board a little bit about the case
16 law regarding the criteria for the lack
17 of a reasonable return to justify the use
18 variance. The case law provide what I
19 think are four important holdings.
20 The first is that the applicant
21 must provide dollars and cents proof
22 regarding this criteria.
23 The second is that it's entirely up
24 to the discretion of the Zoning Board of
25 Appeals to determine what is reasonable.
DINA M. MORGAN, REPORTER
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1 EASTCHESTER ZBA - 9/12/06
2 There is no formula, there is no range of
3 values.
4 The third item is that a court will
5 not substitute its judgment to that of
6 the Zoning Board of Appeals so there's
7 some judicial deference for any decision
8 that a ZBA makes.
9 Finally, that any evidence
10 regarding the inability to sell the
11 premises for the uses that are permitted
12 under the zoning district is very
13 relevant to this criteria.
14 Before I go into some of the
15 information that we developed marketing
16 the property as a residence, I wanted to
17 first touch on our last submission dated
18 September 1st.
19 We looked at FCS's situation and
20 tried to look at the zoning law and
21 looked at the holdings of these cases to
22 determine what are the particular facts
23 for this application that make it so
24 unique and support this criteria, and
25 unlike most applications for variances
DINA M. MORGAN, REPORTER
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1 EASTCHESTER ZBA - 9/12/06
2 FCS is very different. Most people look
3 for a use variance because they want to
4 expand or change an existing
5 non-conforming use. In this situation
6 FCS has a permitted use. They've been
7 using the premises since 1958 as
8 basically a professional office, they
9 just happen to be a not for profit, and
10 they were using it pursuant to a special
11 permit granted by the town. So, it's
12 really not a non-conforming use that's
13 been in use it's really a permitted use
14 under the zoning code.
15 So, when you look at a reasonable
16 return, it's not what was the purchase
17 price in 1958 versus what's a sale price
18 in 2006, because Family and Community
19 Services over time had to make
20 significant renovations and changes to
21 this property in order to use it as a
22 professional office.
23 Some of the renovations that they
24 had done were detailed in our February
25 application materials, but they involved
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