Planning Board Minutes

PB Minutes of 09.05.24

September 5th, 2024

Town of Carroll Planning Board
Meeting Minutes
September 5, 2024
5:00 PM

“These minutes of the Town of Carroll Planning Board have been recorded by its secretary. Though believed to be accurate and correct, they are subject to additions, deletions, and corrections by the Planning Board at its next meeting when the Board votes its final approval of the minutes. They are being made available at this time to conform to the requirements of New Hampshire RSA 91-A:2.”

Planning Board Members Present: Austin Alvarez, Jules Marquis, Paula Murphy, Rena Vecchio, Don Jones, Tom Godfrey, Ryan Peffer

Public Present: Carol Alvarez
Minutes Taken By: Steffanie Apostle

Item #1: The meeting was called to order by Austin Alvarez at 5:00pm

• Vice Chair Austin Alvarez ran the meeting in place of Chairperson Alex Foti who was not in attendance. Austin Alvarez introduced all of the Planning Board members

Item #2: Pledge of Allegiance

Item #3: Attendance taken; Quorum Met

Austin Alvarez introduced all of the Planning Board Members

Item #4: Approval of Minutes – August 15, 2024

Vice Chair Austin Alvarez had a few comments on the meeting minutes.
• Austin Alvarez was looking for Clarification on the bottom of page 4 is says “Cathy Conway agreed with that because each unit will be its own” and then it just drops off.
Steffanie Apostle said that Cathy Conway was referring to the number of units they would have because each unit would now be its own as opposed to a duplex so the number would be doubled
• Austin Alvarez made a comment about the pages of the minutes not being numbered and Steffanie Apostle said she would add page numbers to the meeting minutes
• Austin Alvarez also said on page 11 it says consolation and is should say consultation. Steffanie Apostle will fix the spelling error
Jules Marquis made a motion to approve minutes as amended; Rena Vecchio seconded the motion; All were in favor; None were opposed; 2 members (Ryan Peffer & Tom Godfrey) abstained as they were not at the meeting; Motion was passed

Item #5: Mike Spinelli – 348 Parker Road Concept Plan Consultation Map/Lot 203-072-000-000

Phil Beaulieu from Headwater Consultation presented larger plans for the board to see.
Austin Alvarez confirmed with Phil Beaulieu that this was a concept consultation.
Phil Beaulieu said that his client Mike Spinelli had been in front of the board before for this property but to familiarize everyone with the location it is up off of Parker Road towards the 115 end.
Paula Murphy confirmed 302 is also nearby
Mr. Spinelli had asked Phil Beaulieu to do a conceptual plan for a potential subdivision of this property meeting the Town requirements for frontage, sizing and road standards. Mr. Spinelli had hired another consultant to do a wetland delineation on the property so the green areas on the plan are wetlands and generally undevelopable.
Phil Beaulieu explained that the existing parcel has a narrow section that comes down to connect to Parker Road and it was only about 50 feet wide down there, its not a right away it is actually part of the parcel. There is minimal width available there to do too much work but based on this plan here they believe they have met the road standards as long as there is no big issue with drainage or anything like that down there because there is nowhere to put in storm water treatment or a retention area in that little narrow strip. This layout shows the roadway accessing 7 separate lots each with 200 feet of frontage on the private road and 1 separate lot with access off of 115. The road per the standards would have to be 20 feet wide to access the 7 lots with 2-foot shoulders. The Town standards require pavement, so one thing we would like to request a waiver for would be the roadway as the cost associated with pavement is very high. Generally, the Towns Phil Beaulieu has dealt with are looking for pavement on the roads if they are steep like 8-12%. The Town of Carroll Road standards is 10% max grade and they would probably fit within that but due to costs they do not want to pave
Austin Alvarez asked Phil Beaulieu what they would propose for the roads
Phil Beaulieu said a gravel road, crushed stone, something that is easily maintainable and still hold up. They would use the New Hampshire DOT spec for this.
Austin Alvarez confirmed that they would be using the State standard for the road
Phil Beaulieu said that was correct
Phil Beaulieu said that the other thing with the roadway is that it is approximately 1,200 feet in length and the road standards are a 1,000-foot max so they would have to request a waiver in order to build the road at 1,200 feet. The reason that the turn around (cul-de-sac) is where it is was the grading associated with it, if they pulled it back to the 1,000 feet they would be in the wetlands and they are trying to avoid the wetlands as much as possible, in addition it reduced the amount of lot frontage that’s available. This would maximize what they need for lot frontage and avoid the wetlands. There is one property that would require crossing the wetlands, which is actually pretty good with the amount of wetlands that is on this plan. That is kind of in a nutshell the proposed plan and what they are looking for is a little bit of guidance and thoughts on what they see and if they think the waivers are acceptable the way they are
Austin Alvarez asked the board what their thoughts were
Paula murphy had a couple concerns such as controlling water and drainage because that area seems to be hilly. Another concern Paula Murphy had was if the legend is correct and approximately 2 inches equals 200 feet, she had a real concern about lot #1 and the proximity of the house to the abutter. It didn’t appear to be 200 feet away, why is it so close?
Phil Beaulieu said that the layout which he should have made a note on is not exactly where the buildings are definitely going to go, the driveways are fairly close to where they will go based on grades and trying to maneuver around the wetlands but the building locations are arbitrary, basically just a graphical representation of where they thought a building site could be and still meet a location for a proposed setback.
Paula Murphy said she had a big issue with that particular lot
Phil Beaulieu said there was more area on that property as Paula Murphy had pointed out and there is actually a decent spot up here where it is higher elevation and it could be further up here and that is probably the better building spot, further up on the hillside.
Paula Murphy asked if they had gotten any feedback from New Hampshire DOT about a driveway
Phil Beaulieu said they had not yet but there is a portion of 115 that is controlled access right of way which means the State owns the right of way and they decide how many driveways you get when you purchase the lot and Mr. Spinelli’s parcel was granted 1 point of access for the frontage off of 115. They would need to go through the permitting for that access but they are granted 1 point of access.
Tom Godfrey asked if there was an existing driveway
Mr. Spinelli said yes and showed him where it was
Paula Murphy suggested a possible retention pond by Lot #8 to absorb some of the excess water off of the hill
Rena Vecchio asked about access from Parker Road and would it be a driveway or would it be a private road
Phil Beaulieu said there were 2 parcels that were under 5 acres and would require State sub-division approval. That would be lots #2 & #3
Rena Vecchio said she would not consider giving them a waiver until they see the final plan that tells everything. She would hate to say yes or no at this point because just sitting here now she would say no
Austin Alvarez asked if they had spoken to the Fire Chief
Mike Spinelli said he did and that was one of the reasons that prompted this redesign was because the fire chief said the driveway had to be wider so they thought they should just put a road
Paula Murphy said they were kind of puzzled over something that was on the original map but isn’t on the new one anymore
Mike Spinelli said that was on their first map and that everyone was shocked with the amount of wetlands that was there
Paula Murphy referred to the drawing and asked if that was for access
Mike Spinelli said technically that would have been a road and it allows frontage for the lots. That was one way to do it but what they are presenting now is a much cleaner way of doing it
Phil Beaulieu said Mr. Spinelli is also investigating the potential for feasibility for extending the municipal water to service the subdivision. The way the lots are laid out they could be serviced by individual wells but that was an option they were thinking about. They have talked to Scott Sonia about this but he has not seen the newest plan
Rena Vecchio said that was important because they need a letter from Scott Sonia saying if they have enough water to service them
Austin Alvarez said that the current use had come up right before the meeting and there was a part of this property was affected
Mr. Spinelli was aware of that
Rena Vecchio said that when they take that portion out, they will have to pay
Phil Beaulieu said that this plan didn’t actually include the entire property, the property goes way back and abuts the National Forest and Mr. Spinelli is still considering options for that remaining portion of his land
Mike Spinelli asked if he could put a sign up that says “to come next spring”
Austin Alvarez said they would need approval for that but that yes, they could and there would be a sign standard of 100 sq. feet max
Steffanie Apostle said that information is on the Town website also
Austin Alvarez said if it was going to be put on 115, they would need DOT approval for that
Austin Alvarez asked them what their plan was and when they would be submitting an application
Mr. Spinelli said if they thought the waivers were something that could be thought about with the right information then road building would start in the spring
Austin Alvarez told them the next meeting is in October and in order to get the application in it has to be submitted 21 days beforehand and the Board would have 65 days to approve or deny it
Mr. Spinelli asked if the waivers looked palatable, are there any particular concerns they need to investigate
Austin Alvarez said he was surprised they said it was required to be paved
Paula Murphy said that was in the regulations for a subdivision. Mr. Spinelli said they could pave the tongue area of the road and that they would look more into the run off of water
Tom Godfrey confirmed they said they had talked to the fire chief and asked if he had said anything about the paving
Mr. Spinelli said he did not say anything about the paving
Austin Alvarez said it would be better in some ways that it wasn’t paved like with the water run off
There was a brief discussion about what the length of the road could be and possibly it has something to do with fires and hose lengths and maybe for a hydrant
Mike Spinelli said he would talk to the Fire Chief about that
Austin Alvarez said they would need to get their application in by September 12th for the October meeting
Mike Spinelli asked if they could submit it with 2/3 of the information
Austin Alvarez said they could do that
Paula Murphy said she was wondering about the application and if they submit it should it be complete
Austin Alvarez said it would need to be completed before it made it to them but it would give them the opportunity to put it in and if anyone had any comments, they could address those rather than wait another month
Phil Beaulieu said water runoff, road design and drainage are their biggest things to address

Item #6: Other Business

Austin Alvarez asked about the Master Plan
Rena Vecchio told Austin Alvarez we met on Wednesday September 4th at 2:00pm. The Open House for the Community Engagement is on September 25th from 4:00pm – 7:00pm. There will be different tables available for the Chamber of Commerce, the historical Society and some other businesses, kind of like a meet and greet to get people walking around and asking questions and give ideas.
Steffanie Apostle said she did receive the new survey and flyers from Angela Cleveland from North Country Council. The info was posted on the Town Website under News & Announcements so if someone wanted to, they could scan the QR code and do the survey that way. Steffanie Apostle said she would also put the flyers and surveys out at the Town Hall and they could hand out flyers at the transfer station.
Austin Alvarez asked if the survey was already out there and Steffanie Apostle said that if you went to the Town website you could access it
Rena Vecchio asked if Steffanie Apostle was handling the food donations and Steffanie Apostle said yes
Rena Vecchio said one of the complaints that was brought up at the Master Planning meeting was that the Planning Board was not doing its job, they didn’t go into detail they just said the Planning Board is not going by the zoning ordinances and Rena Vecchio said it was not her who said it
Austin Alvarez stated that Rena Vecchio and Paula Murphy were there and they are both Planning Board members
Steffanie Apostle said they had more planning board members than zoning board members on the master planning committee
Rena Vecchio said she wanted to put it out there so they all could hear it because it was said and is in their minutes
Paula Murphy said that it could come back in the survey also
Austin Alvarez asked the board for anyone who was able to make the community engagement to please go. He will be at the community engagement and committed to being part of it and Omni will also be there
Austin Alvarez had also given some other names to invite to the engagement but due to lack of space and tables they had to make decisions about who could come and who was not going to be invited.
Rena Vecchio also said per North Country Council we needed to be careful about inviting businesses to the engagement because then we could be playing favoritism because every business was not invited and we wanted to be careful about the perception we put out.
Austin Alvarez said one of his complaints from the last Master Planning was they gave a short thing to Bretton Woods and when you think about it from the Town standpoint the majority of the tax income is from Bretton Woods / Omni
Rena Vecchio said Omni has their own plan they are supposed to hand in every 5 years and she thinks it’s been years since they have done it.
Austin Alvarez said they were here last year
Don Jones said they had come to discuss the renewal of the temporary structure of Bretton Woods Club. They asked for 5 years and we told them they needed a better plan and we gave them 2 or 3. This was with Chris Ellms and before Steve Janicek was there. Chris Ellms said he would come every year if we wanted him to. Steve Janicek was at their Association meeting talking very specific things but Don Jones agrees it is time for Omni to put together a vision document. Steve Janicek was talking things from adding a minute clinic to take care of injuries that happen to a liquor store, he is a man with a million ideas
Austin Alvarez was talking to Steve Janicek and Steve Janicek said he wanted to give the Planning Board a heads up that they (Omni) are planning to have multiple new charging stations at the hotel and the ski area. Austin Alvarez was asked by Steve Janicek what he thought about that and Austin Alvarez said he thought it was a great idea people are going to all electric vehicles
Rena Vecchio said the people that are buying them will need places for them to charge
Austin Alvarez said Omni wasn’t sure if we had regulations for charging stations but they would like to have them installed in 2025

Austin Alvarez then went on to Echo Lake coming back
Steffanie Apostle said they had not submitted their application yet
Austin Alvarez said they had until the 12th of September to do so and that Echo Lake had a lot to get done for the conversion to condos and all that goes with it such as the Site Plan. Austin Alvarez said they did respond to Echo Lake that they do need a site plan and they do need to put in another application with a narrative that allows the board to understand what’s the same and what is different. They have Phases I & II and what are they doing now
Tom Godfrey asked if that affects the regulations we have in place because he remembers when they put in the original site plan, they were trying to follow all the requirements for our subdivisions
Austin Alvarez said he went back and read the regulations and it said if you are doing a conversion to condominiums, you need a sub-division plan and it was talked about at the last meeting. They are going to have twice as many units now, they were going to have one unit as duplexes and now we are up to 52. Austin Alvarez said he told them they have to define what’s common property and what’s not common property
Steffanie Apostle said she had talked to Kevin Leonard because he had called after he got a lot of updates from Cathy Conway so he wanted clarification of what they were doing. Steffanie Apostle said she gave him a run down and sent him a copy of the minutes to review from the last meeting and Kevin Leonard was going to read some of Cathy’s responses and the minutes and then get back to her
Austin Alvarez said by that time they will know if Echo Lake has submitted their application. Austin Alvarez said Echo Lake’s attorney said it was going to take them 3 months to get through the State regulations. The owner Syed wants to move as fast as possible
Rena Vecchio brought up a few concerns she had and one of them was they were scaring her and she can’t figure out why they are going from duplexes to condos. She feels they think that once they get there, they won’t have to do anything we say. Phases in a subdivision still apply right?
Austin Alvarez said phases in a condominium also apply
Rena Vecchio said they are talking about selling the 3 houses already because they can and then they will do the rest of it later. Them needing the money is not our problem, we have not been a problem they have been. The fact that they have come here this time after all these years they have been coming now they changed their mind, there is something going on
Austin Alvarez said it’s probably financial
Rena Vecchio said that our concern is the Town not them. They go along by the regulations and ordinances and everybody is fine
Jules Marquis said the way they were talking was everything will remain as is but what they want to be able to do is sell them as they go.
Rena Vecchio said but they can’t if the phases are not done. Phase I needs to be completed in order for them to sell any of the units.
Jules Marquis asked if that meant all the buildings had to be put in
Austin Alvarez said they could still have a phased development but it will all depend on how the condominium phases are written and also how the offering statements are written.
Jules Marquis said that what he thinks they are looking to do is sell some without having to put in all of them. Putting in a section of condos to sell those because they have tied up too much money
Rena Vecchio said Phase I has to be completed before they can sell anything, that is stated in our regulations Page 33 section 15.03. Its important that we watch what these sub-divisions are doing. They still have to have the roads finished, the water, the grass has to be in
Steffanie Apostle asked if that included the fire ponds because when she talked to Kevin Leonard Cathy had implied that they did not and Steffanie Apostle told him that was incorrect
Rena Vecchio said they had to be completed per Chief Jeff Duncan’s request at the last meeting
Paula Murphy said there was another issue with common space and when it changed from duplexes to condominiums there was some discussion about the common open space needing to be redefined.
Austin Alvarez said they will need to show that on their new plan
Paula Murphy said another thing she wanted clarification on was major vs. minor subdivision. Echo Lake was approved as a minor subdivision and she was reading something that says a minor subdivision that changes within 5 years is considered a major subdivision and she wasn’t sure what the ramifications were
Rena Vecchio said she would love to have either Austin Alvarez or Alex Foti contact our lawyers saying this is what they had, this is what they are doing now and they want us to push this through.
Paula Murphy seconded the request to speak to legal on this
Austin Alvarez said he would contact Alex Foti about that
Rena Vecchio said her last concern was when Bonnie Moroney from Selectboard came to a meeting she brought up a waterline that wasn’t deep enough
Steffanie Apostle said she spoke to Kevin Leonard about that and that made it to his list of things that needed to be done. Steffanie Apostle said she had also talked to Scott Sonia from the water department about it and he had talked to Kevin Leonard about it also
Rena Vecchio said we are not being a pain; we are trying to protect the people buying the condos because if we don’t watch out for them and something happens
Paula Murphy said that she agreed. We work for the town not the developer
Austin Alvarez said we do work for the town but on the other hand we need housing
Paula Murphy said they had started as 2-bedroom housing and now they are up to 4-bedroom housing who is going to buy them?
Austin Alvarez said we do need more low-income housing but we need controls on who can buy them
Paula Murphy said we can’t attract young professionals if we do not have housing for them

Meeting Adjourned at 7:15pm