Zoning board legalizes gazebo and sunroom built without permits; garage plan held for a site visit

The Croton-on-Hudson Zoning Board of Appeals granted variances on Sept. 15 legalizing two structures that went up years ago without permits: a gazebo that was the only thing left standing after a house fire on Newton Court, and a sunroom and attached storage shed at a Cleveland Drive house bought out of a reverse mortgage. A third application, for a garage on Hastings Avenue, drew the evening's longest discussion and no vote. Matthew Robinson came first, asking the board to legalize a gazebo that stands closer to the street than the house at 8 Newton Court, in an RA-25 residence district. The application sought a front yard variance under Village Zoning Code § 230-33A and a second variance under § 230-40(B) to allow an accessory structure nearer to the street than the principal building. "We're looking at two variances here," Read 2:58▶ the chair said, putting the front yard relief at 11.8 feet. Robinson said the gazebo had stood for more than 13 years and that the need for a permit had not been apparent at the time. A fire that Robinson dated to May 7 of last year took down the rest of the house. "The only remaining structure from that fire is the gazebo," Read 1:15▶ Robinson said. "So, obviously, it means a lot to my wife that that remains." Read 1:15▶ Robinson said everything else in the rebuild had been permitted. "So I've learned a lot through the rebuild," Read 2:20▶ Robinson said. Assistant Village Engineer Ron Wegner said the house is being rebuilt essentially within its old footprint, with a minor expansion of the garage, and that the 28.17-foot dimension on the survey runs to the property line, with a strip of grass and village right-of-way beyond it. The chair said the gazebo therefore sits farther from the pavement than that figure suggests. "So it's essentially more than 28 feet from the street," Read 4:37▶ the chair said. "So the effective variance is less." Read 4:37▶

Board member Bill Goldsmith asked whether the letter Robinson sent to neighbors covered everyone on the street. "Is that all the neighbors in on the street?" Read 5:02▶ Goldsmith asked. Robinson said the letter went to everyone with a view of the gazebo: "I tried to get everybody who had view of the gazebo." Read 5:22▶ In discussion, Goldsmith said the application raised a question of precedent. "I'm not sure whether this is something that would get approved if it was coming to the zoning board before it was constructed because it's not conformant," Read 6:14▶ Goldsmith said. Goldsmith also warned of the risk in treating work already built without a permit as a reason to grant relief, but said the neighbors' support settled it: "I'm somewhat, you know, pushed over the edge toward approving this by the fact that we have all the neighbors." Read 6:31▶ A board member moved to grant both variances, with the front yard relief set at 11.8 feet, and the board approved them on a voice vote. Working through the five factors later in the evening, members called the Newton Court difficulty self-created but not substantial, and found no detriment to the neighborhood. Eric Berger, who bought 215 Cleveland Drive four months ago, asked for front yard, side yard and total side yard variances under § 230-33A to legalize a sunroom and an attached storage shed that appear on no village plan. Berger said the most recent plan for the property dates to about 1990 and shows neither structure. Berger said the purchase was a bank-owned reverse mortgage sale taken as is: "I had to take the property as is because it was a reverse mortgage bank owned property." Read 10:06▶ The chair called the situation strange. "Surprised the title company didn't pick it up," Read 10:04▶ the chair said, and later: "This seems to be a ripe situation, particularly when a bank is involved." Read 10:56▶ Asked whether the village had any record of the structures, Wegner said it did not, and that the property "had been, I guess, abandoned for some time." Read 14:32▶ Wegner said the rest of the house is being renovated but that the unpermitted sections cannot be reached until the variances are granted, and that checking the foundation will mean digging. "I'm probably gonna be looking to dig something up and and see what we got," Read 15:51▶ Wegner said. Goldsmith asked whether the house alone would have satisfied the 20-foot side yard requirement had the shed never been built. Wegner said the house by itself would likely have met it. "I believe it it would be 20," Read 20:24▶ Wegner said. One member called the side yard relief significant but the total side yard variance less so, and the front yard variance not significant. The chair pointed to the low profile of the one-story house as a point in its favor: "sometimes we do these variances where it's a two story, two and a half stories and it really looms over the adjacent property and I don't think that's the case with this one." Read 22:35▶ A member then moved to approve a 12-foot side yard variance, a 4.4-foot total side yard variance and a 6.2-foot front yard variance to legalize the sunroom and attached storage shed, and the board approved on a voice vote. Working through the five factors afterward, members split over whether the difficulty was self-created. One member said it was, arguing that a buyer should run a title report — "That's me as a real estate lender," Read 30:33▶ the member said. Goldsmith said the nonconforming portion of the structure was not the applicant's doing. "The nonconforming portion of the structure was not self created," Read 31:08▶ Goldsmith said. The chair said the difficulty was not self-created, and the board recorded it that way. The final application, from Thor Snilsberg at 98 Hastings Avenue in an RA-5 district, produced no vote. Snilsberg did not attend, and the presentation fell to the owner's architect, John Power (sp). "I'm surprised Thor, the owner, is not here. I expected communication from him," Read 32:47▶ Power said. Asked to clarify the scope, Wegner said the application arrived as two separate requests that the village combined into one, with "the garage part one and the porch part two." Read 34:29▶ Part two is a renewal. The board approved side yard and total side yard variances for an extension of the front porch years ago, but the project never began and the approval lapsed; the file asks for up to two years to commence work under § 230-164E. The chair read the porch figures off the application: eight feet deep and 19 feet wide, with a one-foot side yard variance and 2.2 feet of total side yard relief. Power said that was the recollection, and that the owner had not been able to take on the porch project and had let the variance lapse. The new request concerns the detached garage. Power said the garage stands about three feet from both the rear and side lot lines, where five feet is required, and that raising the roof to the 15-foot height limit adds a little encroachment. Power put the existing ridge at 141 inches, just under 12 feet. The garage "in essence is nonconforming, but it has existed who knows how long," Read 36:02▶ Power said, "but the fact that we're modifying the roof creates some a little extra encroachment." Read 36:02▶ Goldsmith noted that the 1981 survey on file shows narrow setbacks all along the block. "I'm looking at that same survey from 1981 and I'm noticing the neighbor to the left has a garage. It's got like a 2.4 setback," Read 40:06▶ Goldsmith said, asking whether the block's narrow setbacks predate the zoning or reflect "an earlier zoning code with a smaller setback." Read 41:17▶ Asked about the proposed bathroom, Wegner said one is allowed in an accessory structure: "You can put a bathroom in an accessory structure." Read 44:12▶ One member worried about what a shower in a garage might lead to: "Could open the door to some shenanigans." Read 51:33▶ For Goldsmith, the bathroom was beside the point, because a bathroom allowed as of right would never come back to the board. "And if and if he gets the bathroom as of right at some point, it's never gonna be before us," Read 53:39▶ Goldsmith said. The chair said the height is what it comes down to, with the garage "already too close to the property line, and it's gonna be, you know, more of a more visible to the neighbors." Read 54:00▶ Rather than vote, the board decided to walk the property and to seek letters from the neighbors, especially the one behind the garage. Wegner said it would be cleaner to handle both halves of the application at once. The chair said the board would set a site visit when members could all make it, with the owner present; a Saturday morning was floated. Power said that "if the construction and the building permit process doesn't start within two years, I will I will personally remind him to renew." Read 59:24▶ The board also adopted a confirmatory resolution memorializing its June 16 interpretation of Village Zoning Code § 230-9.1(A)(10)(f), on keeping domestic animals. The Hastings Avenue file stays open until the site visit, when the porch renewal and the garage roof will be taken up together.