[Music] okay at seven o'clock hello everybody and welcome to the Planning Board meeting for Wednesday February 21st here in the Municipal Building Council Chambers first order of business is roll call we have John Beckett Dave Thompson Jeremy Chubbuck Michael Costello Christus Windsor and myself Lisa buck and I'd like to take a motion to make Mike a voting member so moved second all those in favor so be it acceptance of the agenda any questions comments additions I'll take just there was a revision to the agenda that was first given to you that went in the public notice there was just a small change to the total number of acres of the development it went from 98 acres to 62 point three and that's because in 2007 the applicant sold a portion of the retained land from the approved subdivision to Anna butter and so that reduced the number of acreage which is sixty two point three so that was corrected on you do I need a motion to accept this new agenda yes okay can I have a motion to accept this to agenda I make a motion that we accept the agenda second thank you all those in favor all right that passes I need a motion to approve the minutes of December 20th 2017 then we'll go for the corrections that might be there I move that we accept the minutes okay anybody got any other Corrections there's one that we had on page two one two three fourth paragraph second line should be chair Rock asked if there were hybrid options to meet the two pools plus seventy acres conservation target in the rural area that would be used to offset development of a vernal pool etc any other Corrections I'm looking at you okay okay all right all those in favor of accepting these so that passes thank you so we have a public hearing tonight on an amendment to a July 19th 2006 approved major subdivision plan titled forest hollow located at the intersection of Grant Road and forced Ave its tax map 17 lot 23 tax map 17 Lots 52 through 59 and tax map nine Lots 8 through 19 a total of sixty two point three acres in the low-density residential zoning district for John Donne Benson the proposed amendment is to reduce the number of Lots from a twenty-one single-family residential subdivision to a ten lot single-family residential subdivision so can we have mr. Benson come up and explain to us what this is about good evening my name is dawn Benson and in 2006 I did the forest Hollow subdivision on a new road Grant Road which is just off of Forest Avenue I'm here today to reduce the number of lots and it's strictly because the taxes are killing me the taxes are approximately $20,000 a year and every two years I lose a lot I basically caught up the perfect storm in 2006 and I've only sold three Lots in 12 years I had a deal with a builder that I had worked with very well in winter port and he was supposed to buy five lots and the money dried up so I financed him on one law and he went bankrupt so I ended up taking back lot one which is has a house on it I sold a second lot about two three years ago lot 15 and I sold a third law last summer in August a lot number two I'm getting ready to foreclose act as I had to sell it with owner finance and it hasn't seemed to work out I spoke with the tax assessor we try to reduce the taxes the assessed value is approximately 30 to $33,000 per lot which produces about a $900 a year tax I feel that the town hasn't recognized the recession properly I feel that the Lots were very valuable up until the recession I feel that the Lots are worth the zero until there's a house on I know that wouldn't fly with them with a tax appeal I spoke to the tax assessor about reducing the Lots I think a realistic price is about $20,000 per law in today's market I've communicated with a the biggest realtor in Maine who's in South Portland Maine real estate Network he thought that and he's very successful in South Portland Portland area he felt the loss of worth around twenty twenty-five thousand each so I decided if I could reduce the Lots there's seventeen unsold Lots on Grant Road I thought I would keep four which is my proposal and changed the other thirteen into two large parcels and in that way I would be able to reduce the taxes to about ten thousand dollars a year and then I thought when I sold the Lots I would come back and do another amended subdivision my big mistake was doing twenty back and it was six I should have done four or five as the Libby brothers did across the street on Maxfield Drive they did I think for six Lots subdivisions but basically my goal is to reduce the taxes by reducing the number of lots to continue to market the Lots until they're sold and then to bring back probably four at a time I'm not sure at this point everyone I speak to says how come they haven't sold and I go I don't know I've been in the real estate business my whole working career I've done several subdivisions or knows an upscale community I thought I had hit a home run when I bought the property I don't know why the taxes in Orono are high I can't think of anything else negative it's in a very nice area it's an upscale community I've worked in many upscale communities across the country of college towns I've worked in Columbus Ohio I worked in Ann Arbor I don't know every year I've been thinking maybe it's my year maybe it's my year I did a 12 lot subdivision in winter port and I was done in a year and a half so I just don't know I just can't afford to spend twenty thousand dollars a year while I'm waiting and that's the main reason why I'm applying you know to amend the subdivision it was going to be my retirement but that's hasn't worked out that well but that's my whole story okay it's it's a nice area it's a nice subdivision the Lots are quite nice I'm willing to compromise on price at this point my goal is to try to get most of my money back I have almost a million dollars invested in the situation and I do feel that the town isn't recognizing what the market value is today based on everything else and I really think that the market values about twenty thousand dollars I am applying with the tax department I'm going to do a an appeal on four Lots two of them are heavy ledge and three of them five lots and three of them are wetland Lots but that's a separate issue that's basically a thank you all right let me see if there's any questions members do I ask four questions for the public now open the public hearing or you can ask whatever can open the public hearing if you'd like you can also ask for the planners or whatever you don't we take the planners report and then we'll open for public hearing so as Don explained he's simply reducing the number of lots from 21 lots to attend lot subdivision the modification doesn't extend the subdivision outside of the bounds of what was approved in 2006 he in 2006 when he was approved he was approved with conditions and all those conditions were met the road was built to town standards and was accepted by the town and deeded to the town in 2011 along with the road came the stormwater drainage runoff buffers so the town maintains an easement to that to step on to the buffers in order to maintain them and improve them if necessary in order to make sure that the water is flowing off Grant Road properly mr. Benson did some due diligence he reached out to the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife to make sure that nothing had changed in the area since his approval in 2006 he reached out to the Department or the historic Commission at the state to make sure that there was no changes there either he had a updated letter from the soil scientist and site evaluator who did the both soil studies for the subdivision back in 2006 again it's been 12 years so we just wanted to make sure that nothing had changed in terms of the soils in the area and that came back satisfactory the one thing that is still pending so mr. Benson was required in 2006 to apply for a site law permit from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection any revision to a subdivision you have to reapply and show them the proposed revision to the subdivision mister Benson has done that but it has not been fully permitted and approved by the department yet so if you decide to forward with this tonight you could make it a condition to approval there are some notes on the proposed subdivision plan that have some errors in them that would also need to be modified tonight if you decide to move forward and one of those that I were suggesting is that they actually revised some of the recommendations from the planners report and you don't mind giving that to them one revision recommendations one revision that was made was to add a note on the plan acknowledging that any future division of the retain land that mr. Benson is proposing so he'd have the proposal shows three lots of retained land so one from the original approval and then two that he's creating by combining lots together so the note on the plan would just acknowledge that any future division of those Lots would need to come back again to the Planning Board for a subdivision approval and I believe that's all I have it are there any questions for me or any of the current there's two houses wanted I'm sorry only one is occupied though right oh no - raka - okay the lot one is a run off and not to the house on lot one is I own and I'm running it okay sometimes someone else's one packed them at all right it doesn't change their perspective out their value of homeownership so I actually got a phone call from one of the owners that lives down a lot 15 on the in the subdivision with that concern what I explained to him is that it doesn't affect the assessed value of his property and he was combining the other Lots together and does that mean that those would have a higher assessed value now because there's actually more land within the Lots and the answer to that is that it actually you know the reason that he's doing that is because it actually reduces the value of the taxes because he's only allowed one house lot on each lot and that house lot is valued at a higher rate and then the rest of the land remaining land is taxed at her assessed at a value that's lower so he's not going to be increasing the value of the Lots you'd actually be reducing it because he's going to now have less house Lots he could have had you know 13 house Lots and now they're only be counted as two so that's reducing the amount there so that's that's the only communication that I've had with any property owners within the subdivision because their dream of having neighbors is non-existent right now anyway I would plan to bring the Lots back in the same configuration when when I am able to and on the map that you guys have it shows where the old Lots were for so he is leaving four lots for sale so there is still potential for sale of some of the Lots there and if those succeed then as mr. Benson said he could see himself potentially coming back for further amendments to this to the subdivision that's all I had thank you any other questions I also just wanted to point out in the previous approval there were several open space areas one was a wildlife her on the west side of the subdivision the runoff buffers that I talked about before that's part of the stormwater drainage system to vegetated buffers that affect Lots one in lot two in the subdivision that are actually a lot one was is improved upon and lot two was sold so those are those are still part of the subdivision and then there was a recreational path easement that was deeded to the town all of that it remains unchanged within this new amended proposal so I just wanted to be clear on that as well okay I'm so opening up for public comment if you have a comment if you could please come up to the microphone and state your name and all that my name is Frank Ali and I live at 232 Forest Avenue right next to the subdivision is there a map that shows what the current proposal is because I don't see how was proposed lots are here okay so combining all of these top-tier together to create my parcel retaining land so all of these are still for sale so this one next to me is still for sale yes so this subdivision was proven into 2006 and it's almost twelve years old at what point do does the Planning Board consider dormancy on a project like this you know it hasn't it hasn't you know we have not had any movement and does the town have any clauses for dormancy on subdivisions actively for sale and being marketed so they're not considered dormant he hasn't pulled them off the market so he is still continuing to try after our subdivision is approved it gets registered at the recorded at the Registry of Deeds and runs with that land for forever until there's any amendment to all right and you know the only other thing is do we know about dollar value what the revenue implications to the town Orono would be for these reduced taxes I mean so what the new taxes will be yeah I mean he's approximately thousand cutting cutting in half by ten thousand for each law no that's total loss you know I'm gonna have to have you go up to the microphone so just so could be recorded that's fine the for loss would keep the same assessed value and the rest of the land would be too large Lots which would have a much lower assessed value I believe I can look it up I think the combined loss on the west side would be about 50,000 60,000 and assessed value and the larger parcel on the right which goes all the way around would be about eighty or ninety thousand but the total impact would bring the taxes down from about eighteen nineteen thousand to about ten and the for loss that I'm keeping or not changed at all they're they're identical keeping that lot on sold in these two and then one up here to give people choices I think that was more like six and then this is about ten or so one two three four five six when there's one large lot it's more than a little lot but it's not a lot more this this would have a value of about three Lots the other consideration to make is that mr. Benson created a road which is because the road is there it's an improvement to the land and those lots are then assessed at a higher value because there is a road there that's a town owned Road so that's why he's seeing a higher rate I guess that's my point so I'm and just I'm sorry but we're just recording this is public eating so that's I guess that's why I asked that question because we have a road in there that the towns maintaining we have to maintain the berms and the stormwater runoff and that cost the town money so to reduce those taxes I just and then you know probably if the real estate market turns around he gets to turn around and redevelop these into what they originally were and reaped the benefits and the town doesn't get the those all those years of that ten thousand dollars it's the taxes on the entire hook 96 acres was $1500 mm-hmm that's right because it was probably in tree growth and no but that actually isn't isn't something that we would take up here right you know we're just gonna that's a tax assessor question and I'm sure there's laws and all the rest of it up about that on it's not part of our business tonight any chance you can do [Laughter] it's all yeah do you have any other questions sir no I that's that's it I just yeah dormancy as long as for sale then it's not doing it yeah okay thank you any other questions I'm gonna close the public hearing so do we want to move forward on on this proposal sure I make a motion that we accept proposal as proposed with the following restaurant conditions number one that all findings of the Planning Board with respect to this development at its meeting on July 19 2006 and all the conditions of approval and requirements pertaining thereto are unchanged and remain in place to that a note be added to the plan acknowledging that any future division of the retained land if any if such future division constitutes the creation of a subdivision law will be subject to the land use ordinance standards in effect at the time of the subdivision 3 that the net and usable acreage in the acreage table on the plan be corrected for that note number 17 on the plan should be corrected to read quote approved by or no Planning Board on July 19 2006 and recorded on August 25 2006 5 that the applicant be granted an approved site location in development law land use permit for the amended plan by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection and finally number 6 that the signed amended subdivision plan be included not to include conditions of approval that run with the property be recorded within 90 days of approval of the amended plan second any discussion I actually have a question the number 5 that takes care of the it's pending approval of that Maine DEP so that takes care of that yes okay thank you all right all those in favor looks unanimous do I need to read some thing into the record some finding of fact so just as a matter of procedure here I'm gonna read this and then we vote on this too or no okay so we'll go ahead with this and then we'll vote on this too okay thank you I was finding a fact forest house subdivision mr. Donald Benson amendment number one subdivision review february 21st 2018 pursuant to article 7 section 18 - 210 subdivision review of the or no code of ordinances the or no Planning Board has considered the application of mr. Donald Benson to amend the forest hollow subdivision originally approved in July of 2006 by reducing the number of Lots from a 21 lot single-family residential subdivision to attend lot single-family residential subdivision the property is located in the low density residential district on Grant Road and based on all evidence presented by the applicant reviewing agencies and town departments and the public the Planning Board found the following number one Lots that the proposed amendment includes reducing the number of Lots from twenty one to ten achieved by combining Lots 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 19 22 four-man 18.4 and by also combining lots 7 9 11 and 13 to form a ten point six three eight acre lot of retained land on line two three lots of retain land a total of approximately 37 acres and seven subdivision Lots further that all Lots continue to meet the minimum dimensional standards for the low-density residential district and comply with state standards for Lots relying on subsurface wastewater disposal systems further that the proposed amendment properly acknowledges that future divisions of the retain land if any if such fugitive ition constitutes the creation of subdivision Lots will be subject to land use ordinance standards in effect at the time of the subdivision - drainage improvements that the amended subdivision plan does not alter the previously designated and approved protected runoff drainage buffers that are part of the approved stormwater management plan three open space wildlife habitat wetlands and recreation land that the amended subdivision does not alter the previously designated and approved significant wildlife habitat buffer vegetative buffers on Lots one and two and the recreational pad off the easement for overall findings as to the other elements of the forest house so division they're reducing the number of Lots from twenty one to ten will not affect any previous findings leading to the original approval of the forests Hollow subdivision and will not adversely affect any element of the original approval including standards for sewer and water utilities pollution controls stormwater management and drainage improvements the roadway and traffic circulation or financial and technical capacity further that all other findings of the planning board with respect to this development at its meeting of January 19th 2006 and all conditions of approval and requirements pertaining thereto are unchanged and remain in place do I have a motion move do we accept the findings in fifth the fine of fact I have a second seconded any discussion all those in favor that's unanimous thank you is there any other business nothing on the agenda no I just wanted to let you know that the March meeting which is scheduled for March 21st we will have two items as of right now on the agenda one would be an amendment to the edge they need to come back because there was a taking by the main d-o-t as part of the roundabout project that moves their property line which then affects the setback for the cluster development that they were approved for so they have re-engineered small modification so they'll be coming back and then there is a single family home to a two family home on the agenda as well thank you do I have a motion to adjourn so moved second thank you any discussion all right all those in favor thank you you you you you you you you you