particular kind of configuration. that being said, there's an obvious lack between the applicant and the surrounding neighbors talking to each other. they seem to be very -- not any fruitful conversation, nor can we require that, but it's mostly more opportune for us to hear the dialogue between the two parties. i did not understand the project until i heard the presentation, and i mentioned it in a phone conversation to mr. winslow on friday, that it's far away to follow commission requirements to the extent that it does provide us 3-d, which makes it almost impossible to understand particularly even in the existing propose does site plan. the site conditions with described in a manner that they are basically hardly readable,

so my suggestion would be that we continue this project. that one, we encourage the two parties to talk to each other and understand the constraints each of them has. it's not just one having constraints, but the other one does, too. and number two, i would like to ask that we get a better submittal by which we can study independently substantiate the proposal. there are things that i recognize represent the extraordinary constraints for an expansion. on the other hand, i do need to see the d.r. requesters concerns expressed in a manner that i can understand them, and i cannot. this is basically he says, he says, and nobody really talked to each other. so that would be my suggestion, that we continue this project for another four weeks or whatever it takes, and take a second crack on it. i'm open -- i'm completely open, not biased one way or the

other, but i need better information to judge this project properly. >> president hillis: commissioner richards? >> commissioner richards: so i think since i've been on the commission, i've always wondered why we didn't have 3-d drawings on project analysis, especially when sponsors have them them. when they put the 3-d drawings up, it made a lot more sense to me, so i'm open to a continuance. >> president hillis: i appreciate the 3-d drawings. i think they worked and it gave me a better understanding of the project. i think i better understand the project as my issue. this is part of our process to educate ourselves in here. i get your concern. no doubt you're going to be impacted about this. it's an odd configuration that exists there now, but i just -- i'm not compelled that what came up was extraordinary, you know, and we would take action

to reduce this project in order to ameliorate your concerns. it's not inconsistent with many situations that exist in the city. the information in the packet wasn't clear, but it's clear now. i think the 3-d models was the better that we've received. there is an impact to you. i don't think it rises to a d.r. level, and i'm prepared to approve the project today. commissioner koppel? >> commissioner koppel: i do think the project is well

designed. i feel sorry for you if you weren't involved in the conversation, but i like the project. i like where it sits already as is, and whether it's to staff, the department, as often as we can get that literally moving three-dimensional digital rendering, it answers a lot of questions, and it makes it more clear. i couldn't emphasize it enough that it's a highly useful tool for us up here, and i'd like to see more of it. >> president hillis: commissioner johnson. >> commissioner johnson: one, question for mr. winslow. i apologize if i missed this in the staff presentation earlier, but i know the d.r. requester brought up a couple of issues in the discrepancy of the height of their building and also whether or not the unique nature of this building potentially being boxed in by this addition was taken into consideration. i was just wondering if you could address that for the d.r.

requester. >> sure. i believe the discrepancy on the first item was not from staff, description of a two story or three story. the second regarding boxing in is, you know, the question of what's the extent of the existing condition in terms of its own predicament. is it boxed in now, and what's the impact or effect of this addition in exacerbating that. and through our analysis, from just looking at the boxing in part of it, which goes to sun light, shade, to some extent, privacy, but mainly, am i getting less air and light to my courtyard? the impacts were determined to be minimal because of the side set backs and the relatively minimal extension from the who are son -- from the existing rear wall. so the project sponsor demonstrated some shadow

studies. there is some additional shadow or shading into that courtyard, but that was not something that was completely boxing in the project to -- you know, that rises to a level of excess. >> commissioner johnson: thank you. i just think it's important in these cases that we're addressing people's concerns as we're making a ruling. in general, i would say i am approving of this project. i can't think of a reason to reduce the size. however, it does seem like you are close to maybe some sort of agreement the -- sorry, the project sponsor said you were interested in screening, so i am interested in continuing this just to give you time to work out an agreement between both parties because you have to live next to each other, and i think that is ultimately beneficial in these types of cases, but i'd love to hear

what other commissioners think. >> president hillis: commissioner richards? >> commissioner richards: we've continued quite a few projects reemcently. maybe it would be better to take d.r. and ask mr. winslow to work with the neighbor on privacy screening as you offered and put this thing to bed. >> clerk: is that a motion? >> commissioner richards: it's a motion. >> vice president melgar: second. >> president hillis: can we clarify, it's some kind of a new motion -- >> commissioner richards: mr. winslow, how should we word it? >> that's a great idea, but the criteria, how would we know when the parties have mutually arrived at an agreement? in other words, at what point do we decide to come back and say we're at an impasse, the project sponsor has decided not to change or modify things or the demands of the d.r.

requester -- >> commissioner richards: sure. maybe a continuance is in order. obviously, we've had miss sciuto come up and say look at these buildings in the back. it's kind of a stage or theater with back lighting. maybe a continuance for a week while you guys sit down and talk and come back, and hopefully we have a consent in two weeks, and that's it, would work. >> president hillis: commissioner moore? >> commissioner moore: to continue it only meant for us to have a clearer understanding of what is really -- of what's going on here. i'm not saying where we will be not supporting the project. i have to do equal justice to both of them. however, when i examine it at home, i need to have information that allows me to -- to examine it to the extent of my own capabilities, and in this particular case, i

basically have to say hey, there's really some serious stuff missing. if i would have a full understanding, which i have a better one now, based on what i heard, i would have not said that. but what is being said here in this room rather than what we need to do at home are two different things. as you all know, i do not approve a project based on what i hear in the moment, and i cannot. professionally, i cannot do that. >> president hillis: commissioner johnson? >> commissioner johnson: so i completely respect and hear the concerns of my fellow commissioner, commissioner moore. actually, for me, the continuance is just about giving the neighbors time to come to some sort of privacy agreement, and i -- i'm not sure that we need to continue it. i wonder if we could condition our approval on -- on some sort

of screening privacy mitigation on the windows or something. >> president hillis: maybe we can ask -- 'cause i don't -- i think the -- the parties may be -- there's been a breakdown in communication or discuss -- you know, fruitful discussion between the parties. i don't -- you know, again, i don't see anything terribly extraordinary here, but maybe if mr. winslow is willing, we can approve the project, and they can have a session with him to look at kind of some ideas for the privacy mitigation, but it would be outside the scope of the d.r. if you're willing to do that. >> so in fairness, we did have a meeting tuesday, and the d.r. requester had two main requests -- maybe three. one was removal of the deck, setting back of the third story, and some kind of mitigation either through screening or glazing options.

you know, those are typical asks. they're specific asks. now whether or not they were reasonable or amenable is dependant upon decisions by either the commission and the project sponsor, so that's just a report back of where we were and where we left on tuesday two days ago. we could continue those discussions, i'd be happy to do so, but -- >> president hillis: i think the deck on the back is fairly typical. it's not big. to me, it's not extraordinary or exceptional. the third floor is in a place it should be. no doubt it's going to have impact on you, but it's not -- again, nothing, i think extraordinary. could there be some efforts to screen, yeah, but i think that's kind of up to you all to decide. i just don't feel like it rises to the level we need to continue this and figure it out. if mr. winslow is amenable to sit down with you and look at options, perhaps there's some less glazing on the front, on

the back, but i just have a hard time kind of figuring out what's that going to be and whether it rises to the level we need to -- to take it on. do you want to comment? >> yeah. >> we sat down on tuesday and tries to make some kind of progress, and at every stage, they've said they're unwilling to negotiate or modify in any way. i realize a deck is a normal thing in a back yard, but most decks aren't three yards from bedroom windows with views of the children rooms. >> president hillis: no doubt, there's decks by my house that are closer than that. >> the view is closer to you -- to him to you to our bedroom. >> president hillis: i just -- i'm with you. that's close, but is it extraordinary or exception or is that atypical, i don't think it is in a city environment, so i guess it. but -- but i get it. but to me, that deck doesn't

rise to the level of extraordinary. >> okay. i'm just letting you know, we tried to -- we only were able to come to some -- >> president hillis: but what were some of the privacy or screening issues that you wanted? maybe we get a concrete? >> we don't know because the only screening there is a deciduous tree that loses its leaves every year, and a nonopaque trellis. so again, we were excluded from this process. we don't want to block this, we just would like to have a conversation with them and try to work this out which is why we're asking for the continuance. >> president hillis: i'm just a bit skeptical. you've had the discussion with mr. winslow. if i thought this would be productive -- i just don't know where it goes, you know? the screening options are i think some of the more reasonable requests, but i

don't know what they are. yeah, do you want to offer? >> this is an idea that we had, and so i feel like the deck -- in most cases, you know, we screened it from the lower yard, but this was kind of a thought of something we could do to create a trellis that could screen the view to the upper window, which is here, so this is their bedroom window. so i think this is something that we would be willing to offer, which could solve the problem. >> president hillis: okay. >> and i think -- you know,

another talking point, i don't know that it would be worth it or not, but i know there's talk about this sort of being a party deck and there being a lot of parties and noise there. the homeowners are here, and they can talk about how they plan to use the deck, but i feel pretty strongly that that's not an issue. they're not -- i don't believe they're going to be out there partying all the time. i think those concerns are something that we can try and work past. that's my concern. >> president hillis: and that's true. it's hard for us to decide how somebody's going to use their deck. it's physical aspects leading to more parties or less parties, but who knows? >> yeah. >> president hillis: commissioner richards? >> commissioner richards: why don't we condition it on approval of a screening condition on that deck and a green wall. you know, figure it out.

>> president hillis: come up to the mic. >> if you'd like, you can see, there's no screening. could you also add a condition on screening from the third floor glass window that is staring directly into our children's window for which there's no tree? the drawing in the architectural drawings that's not there. >> commissioner richards: right. my issue is there's already wind buildings there with windows facing roughly the same number of feet away. there's a lot of glazing this one. actually, it should be the project sponsor worried about you looking into their place. >> president hillis: what is the room in the back? it's the bedroom in the back? >> it's a room that wasn't shown in any of the drawings from the project sponsor's third floor has -- if you -- i don't know if -- if someone could bring up a -- yeah. actually, i can show you.

the window that you see at the top of the stairs are our children's bedroom window, who is age two and five, and the sight line you see on the right hand drawing is directly from their proposed third floor into our children's bedroom, and there's currently no privacy screening for that, and that's what i'm asking that you could add. >> president hillis: what would that be -- let me just asking, what would that privacy screen? >> we actually asked turn the glass window into a wall or put frosting on that window. >> president hillis: yeah. >> otherwise, you can use curtains or other shading devices. >> president hillis: our problem is that's a bedroom for

them, too, right? it's just -- you know, it's a tough -- i get it, you know, but how far away that? >> that building, i think i heard in your presentation, sticks out 6'10" from the other buildings that are in front of us. >> president hillis: but that view from that window to their window, how far is that? >> 34 feet to our children's bedroom window. >> president hillis: all right. it doesn't help us, you all talking, but it's 34 feet. >> so based on his drawings, i found it to be 20 feet. >> president hillis: okay. all right. commissioner richards? >> commissioner richards: i think i'm with mr. winslow on this, a shade that pulls from the bottom up halfway to allow light to permeate but still allow youngsters to be in their bedroom without anybody peering

in would probably be the easiest thing to do, so i move to take d.r. and require a green wall-type privacy screen on the deck facing -- >> president hillis: what was the height of that screen wall? >> commissioner richards: all the way up. >> president hillis: well, it didn't go all the way up. >> commissioner richards: 6 feet, a minimum 6 feet. it's on the edge of the deck on the west side. [inaudible] >> commissioner richards: can you speak in the mic? >> president hillis: what was the height? >> for the trellis, would be 9'9" could be able to really -- to be able to really block the line of site. >> president hillis: 9'9"? >> commissioner richards: yeah.

all right. let's do that. >> clerk: there was a previous motion. i assume you're rescinding that in. >> commissioner richards: yes. >> clerk: very good, commissioners. there's been a new motion that's been seconded to take d.r. and approve the project as proposed with the condition that the -- that there be a green privacy wall at the property line that measures 9'9" above the deck. >> commissioner richards: on the west side of the deck. >> clerk: on that motion -- [roll call] >> clerk: so moved, commissioners, that motion passes, with commissioner moore voting against. commissioners, that'll place us on item 21, this item is at 1267 rhode island. >> president hillis: groundhog day. we're back to rhode island.

>> let me catch my breath. sorry. >> president hillis: do you need a couple minute break or are we good? >> good evening again commissioners, president hillis, commissioners, david winslow, staff architect. the item before you is a public initiated request for discretionary review of a permit application 20150928.8194 to construct a two-story vertical addition and the who are son addition at the rear of an existing two story two family home on a 20 food wide by 100 up sloping lot. this block of rhode island street consists of two and three story wood class homes set back from the street with a fairly open midspace pattern.

the first and second stories would extend 17.5 feet from the existing rear wall and are partially below grade. the third story would extend 11 feet from the existing rear wall, and the fourth story would set back 4 feet from the existing wall. the reason for the d.r., the d.r. requester of 1261 rhode island is that the -- who is the adjacent neighbor to the north concerns five primary issues. first, the building scale at the rear is out of scale with the neighborhood context. second, the height and depth of the addition lgs impacts the midblock open space. third, light and air, and fourth, privacy of the adjacent neighbor is impacted due to the massing, and lastly, the addition poses an impact on the historical resource. public comment to date, the department has received no

letters in opposition nor any letters in support. the department's recommendation is in light of the d.r. requester's concern, the department has reviewed the project with respect to the scale and massing of the context and recommended shifting the upper floor five to 8 feet forward to ruse the rear massing and that involved a little bit of negotiating with historical staff because they had ascertained a limit line to discern the site line from the addition, eliminating the upper floor roof deck and the associated railing, reducing the fourth floor ceiling height by approximately 1 foot and minimizing and orienting the north side facing windows to reduce privacy requests to the d.r. requester's back yard. with this, staff finds that the pronl meets the department's standards and guidelines, and the department recommends the commission not take d.r. as as

the project has been -- this concludes my presentation, and i'm happy to take questions. thank you. >> president hillis >> president hillis: all right. project -- no, sorry. d.r. requester. >> good evening, commissioners, good evening, david winslow. i'm here on behalf of the eight neighbors who i represent who also filed a d.r. with myself, and we have two neighbors here, ana brook, and jake, that are also present in the neighborhood. when i saw this project, i was pretty much in shock.

when i heard someone was actually going to rebuild this house, this abandoned house on rhode island, i got pretty excited. for reference, the owner has had the house for over six years and has done nothing to it. it's been abandoned, but i quickly came back to reality when i saw the project. pretty much a developer has decided to make financial gains to the detriment of the neighborhood and the city, and they know it, by simply looking at how much respect they've paid us over -- over time over the last couple months. there has been no neighborhood meeting -- or there has been one, but it was in 2015, when none of us was around. there was ae no respect for deadlines. i had a meeting with john, the architect, only 24 hours before to file a d.r. they appropriate hoped that we would not file at all, and no respect for the midblock space.

they cut down a larger tree two months ago. the primary concerns is the extraordinary heights and the entire out of context size relative to the surrounding neighborhood. the proposed building is filling up the entire back yard with a four story modern building simply set back from the general facade yet all the additional houses are two stories and have open space. if you look at specifically the building size and construction, we're looking at a 4,000 square foot, two unit building. the bottom unit is 80% average larger than all the other units on the block. we are 25% larger than any unit on the block. it's 40% larger than any unit on potrero hill, and it's 35% larger than any existing unit in the entire city. i looked at four unit

buildings, and compared to that, it's roughly 10% larger than a four unit building on potrero hill. we're really looking at something that's out of scale. if you look at the residential guidelines, special, page 23 and 24 of those guidelines, it says, design the height and depth of the building to be compatible with the existing scale at the midblock open space. the rear yard is really uncharacteristically deep and tall, additionally completely out of context with the other houses on the block. it removes 700 square feet of midblock space into the garden, pretty much two thirds of where the garden is. this rear yard two story expansion also encroaches. it does not leave much room for others, and cuts off light and

trees from the midblock space. it contradicts with the residential guidelines to leave the center of the midblock space open for air and yards and open space. i'll just add three points that i also found in the residential guidelines. it has impact on the neighborhood character. that's page 7, chapter 2 of the residential guidelines. it has impact on the architectural features while the real facade is not compatible at all with the surrounding buildings. it is a modern bulk. the front appears to be intact, and the impact on the potential historic, that's paragraph six, page 49 of the residential guidelines, the observations of the proposed building are important to overall historic forms. a lot of the buildings around here are over 100 years old.

therefore, i conclude by saying that we have an extraordinary out of scale, out of context construction in a residential neighborhood. it's completely disfiguring. the reason rear motion denied block space with significant safety concerns on both sides. so we have a situation. we have tried to mediate, and we have not found any potential solution. >> president hillis: okay. thank you very much. is there any public comment in support of the d.r.? welcome. >> good evening, commissioners. my name is ana brook temple, and i live at 1236 tajaro. our block is a block of old small houses with very deep lots and a lot of green open space. what i understand, it's called a midblock space. i, too, am concerned about the

size of this proposed remodel and appreciate your time in hearing our concerns. the house right next to mine on tajaro street doubled in size with a similar remodel. at the time, the neighbors didn't really pay attention, and we didn't really push back, and it went through as planned and permitted, and it has a big negative impact on the neighbors houses, on the -- neighboring houses, on the sun and views, and it jets way back into this midblock open green space. thus far it's the only such house on our block, but it's my concern that this proposed house remodel on rhode island is going to start a domino effect that could quickly lead to a big change to the nature of our block. i support more housing units and obviously everybody in the neighborhood is very excited about this house being finally occupied. it has been a blight and a n nuisance in the neighborhood

for 15 years. it's in terrible shape, however we really hope this remodel can take place in a fashion that is much more in keeping with the neighborhood. thank you. >> president hillis: thank you. additional public comment? >> hi there. my name is jake stengel. i live to the south of the unit that we're talking about, and i represent a four-unit h.o.a. everyone's still working right now. as hugo and brook said, this project will not only change the character of the street and the neighborhood that we live in. as a brief background, as you guys mentioned, just the property's been a blight. it's been totally abandoned. while weeds sprung up everywhere, there's pretty much been no care or attention put on the property and it's already been just indicative of how they're just not doing much in terms of respecting the neighborhood.

even on my way here, i just rode by, and there's weeds growing everywhere. the yard is just kind of a mess as well. these are actions that are not good signs of neighbors or respectful individuals that care about the neighborhood as we do. these are our homes, our communities, our neighborhood. we care so much about potrero hill, the fact that they've tried to ram this project through with minimal communication late in the game, it's kind of indicative of a party that wants to put the least in and get the most out at the expense of us. it goes without saying, that's why we're here to protect the community, the fabric cht neighborhood, our -- fabric of the neighborhood, and finally just our open space and feeling of potrero hill. our neighborhood has specific kind of objections to the way the project will significantly

impede the amount of light the interiors of our home received as well as the shared court yas yard. lastly, the last point is there's a massive issue that we have with in particular or h.o.a. with structural engineering. i'm not sure if you guys know that we're on one of the steepest hills in the city. we have a lot of drainage issues. all three of us are dealing with it. our homes were almost a century old. they weren't expected to around quite this long. -- to be around quite this long. i'm currently going through two sides of my foundation are being replaced, and there'll be a two story acquisition below ground, so in particular our h.o.a. is very worried about the structural implications

about when two stories will get removed adjacent to our home and we don't have the support for the century that our home has been around. that hasn't been discussed, but that is a major concern because it's structural, and just very important to the safety of the neighbor. >> president hillis: thank you. any additional public comment? seeing none, project sponsor. welcome. >> the overhead, please. >> president hillis: there it is. >> very good. okay. i'm john goldman, goldman architects. commissioners, david. lower units, 2300 square feet. upper units, 1450 square feet. entirely restoring the front

facade. the issues we're bringing up will be addressed through the project, preservation of this beautiful building. we're putting it exactly back to original. when i met with mr. ray, met with him twice now, the main issue that was expressed, and incompetence to spoke us on that -- and i want to focus on that, is the fourth floor. this wall here that you see lined up with the third floor. the reason for that is historic preservation department said we had to have a 28 foot set back to the fourth floor, kind of force that towards the rear yard, which was not our preference. so i set to mr. bray, hey, we can maybe convince the historic planners to let us move this to the west and that'll have less impact, and they let us move it to the west, so we've done so. now if you look at this, we're

splitting the difference between the 1275 and the 1261 building with our fourth floor. you see the set backs, it's about 6 foot. we're splitting the difference, we're averaging our fourth floor now. we also lowered the fourth floor. we also have high windows on the fourth floor to address the privacy issues and we eliminated what used to be a deck on top of fourth floor. that's gone. so we did everything the planning department asked us to do. we think it's a better scheme. we like -- you know, we think it's actually improved now because of actually having the flexibility to move the fourth floor towards the street. so what i want to do here is focus little bit on the sections. >> okay. so there's a stepping going on here in the back. this dotted line here shows that the entire lower level and

half of the middle level is actually below grade. we're trying to minimum the impact of this building on the midblock open space. if you're in the rear yard, it looks like a 1.5-story building. this dotted line, that's the height limit. we're way below it, way below it. in fact, we are not higher than the 1275 building to the south, and i'm going to show you that in the perspective. so i believe we're respecting the midblock open space and the heights. you can see the stepping effect here. the section, you can see the stepgs, and the dash line is the height limit. very narrow fourth floor, very tiny, 360 square foot net. this was a small fourth floor, but that was the major issue brought up by mr. bray, which i think we've greatly improved this issue. okay. i want to focus on these

perspectives. okay. so you can see here, we've worked very hard so you can't see the fourth floor from the street. from most views, you can't see it at all. it's still over 20 foot set back from the front facade, and you can't even see it from most angles. there, you can. if you're far enough back, you can see a little bit of the fourth floor addition, but it's pretty minor. okay. here's 1275 rhode island. we are lower than that building. also, not mentioned, there's a big building in the back of that yard. we are lower, quite a bit lower, than this building right here, and we are not higher than the main building.

okay. see if i can get this to work better. all right. so here, you can see how much lower we are compared to the rear yard of the adjacent neighbor, which is here, and we're not higher than their roof, you can see here how it sort of fits within the neighborhood and the surrounding homes, so we are not impeding the midblock open space in any way. the purpose of the continuois stepping back on each floor is to open up the midblock open space and to average between the rear walls of the adjacent neighbors, which we do. we're following all the residential guidelines. working with david winslow and other planners -- >> president hillis: all right. thank you. >> clerk: your time is up. >> okay. any way, it's better now. open for questions. >> president hillis: any public comment in support of the project? seeing none, d.r. requester, you have a two-minute rebuttal.

just pull that mic over towards you, the microphone, so we can hear you. >> okay. if we can zoom here, what john was showing was essentially the north part of the midblock space, he's completely missing the rest of the block, the southern part. all the houses -- actually, this is a view looking to the south. you can see here, this is their -- the yards, and you can see the open space here. all the houses loog like this one, or mine that's on the side here. what they're trying to build is this thing here, which encroaches significantly onto it. it is more like the house to the south of it. this house is very abnormal in

light of all the others. here's what it looks like today. as you can see here, this is more like what the rest of the houses look like on the block here to the rest of the north, and this is what it looks like today. finally, and please excuse the low tech nature of these papers, this is what the midblock space looks like here. as you can see, there's a lot of midblock space. this is the proposed units. if we are automobill to do sim things, it would look like this, so the midblock space would disappear. >> president hillis: thank you. project sponsor. >> let me put this here again. i forgot to mention something important, if you take a look at our rear wall, we don't go past this courtyard. on the building to the south, there's a front and rear

building, so we don't extend past that gap, and that was at the request of the residential design team, which we totally agree with. we took great pains to not impact that open space between their existing buildings. and then, we took great pains to do the averaging between the rear walls which both the code -- planning code and residential design guidelines asked for. so i think this is greatly improved, you know, since -- since it was first submitted and actually in response to the d.r., and we like it better. and i really think it fits -- fits well. the other thing is -- it's not modern, our addition. it's woodsiding, it's wood trim. it's actually meant to look kind of traishditional. it's wood trim, woodsiding. so any questions, please feel free to ask. >> president hillis: okay.

thank you. so we'll close this portion of the hearing. commissioner clokoppel? >> it's definitely under the height limit, and i don't have a problem with it. depending on what everyone else says, i'm ready to approve this. >> president hillis: commissioner richards? >> commissioner richards: preservation staff, actually -- i'm sorry. could you walk us through how you determined this building was a historic resource? >> so i was not the preservation planner on this project, but i'm happy to talk you through this process to the best of my ability. >> commissioner richards: please, and thank you for staying. >> you're welcome.

so when this project was submitted, it did not come with an h.r.e., which was a consultant prepared report. it was a supplemental jogs report which was a variety of information about the property, architect, if we know it, architectural style, and the surrounding neighborhood. department staff prepared what we call a historic preservation evaluation response, which is similar to the team response form that was filled out in the previous project. both of those are done by staff. it's how staff basically records and puts into the record their determination if a building is a historic. this building is an 1823 stick tile. we would argue this is an exceptional example or a distinguished example of this particular style. that would be due to the

variety of detailing is what we would say is a character defining feature of this building, and that this building basically represents that style very well. so it sort of has more details in the building in particular to that particular style, so the stick style is a style of victorian, so that's how that determination was made. we would argue in this case that that was an exceptional example. >> commissioner richards: okay. thank you so much. i'm just looking at the picture, trying to go maybe it's the detailing under the windows. >> yeah, so there's the false front, there's the more detailing on the windows. it's part of the style that it was a balloon frame style, so the way that the style is constructed is expressed on the exterior, and that's done well here, and so all of those are sort of the character defining features. >> commissioner richards: wonderful. it's that stuff when i drive

by, i go it looks like every other victorian. appreciate it. thanks for staying. i agree with commissioner koppel. >> president hillis: could i ask the d.r. requester a question. could you mind coming up, sir? so i look at this, and i get your concern. they're putting a lot into this building. there's a lot of program going into what was a smaller footprint building to get two units, so especially in the back, there tends to be some more mass and activity, but a lot of it's underground or under kind of what is your or the neighbor's ground level. but what -- what are you asking for, i guess, is my question? i mean, i guess it's -- i mean, when i looked at it somewhat, it's a little jarring, you don't expect that much from this building, and it kind of steps into the bill the way it

does, but whatever you call -- into the hill the way it does, but whatever you call -- what are you asking about change sng. >> well, it's basically in the d. -- what are you asking about changing? >> well, it's basically in the d.r., the rear be pulled back a couple feet. >> president hillis: but on the upper floors? >> no, on the bottom. the bulk of the building is really the bottom. essentially, there's one floor where it's not really visible, but the three floors are quite visible. it's on a hill, so it's even more. >> president hillis: yeah. okay. thank you. yeah, i mean, i agree -- i mean, i agree with some of the comments that the d.r. requester made. there's kind of a lot going on, but there kind of has to be to get two units into it. i'm not sure what that would get us, some of those -- some of the changes you're asking for. the top floor is pretty small,

it's pretty set back. it is higher than the adjacent building or what we typically see, but i don't know what we'd get at from kind of taking that off or minimizing it, so i think i would agree with commissioner koppel. commissioner moore? >> commissioner moore: i've looked at this really carefully, and i could not find anything i question. it holds defining lines, at least to its neighbor, and the fact that the rest of the block does not do that is not a reason we would hold it back to the stepping line of the others. i personally think we should not take d.r. and approve the project and it's a motion. >> president hillis: all right, jonas.

>> clerk: seeing nothing further, there's a motion that's been to not take d.r. and approve the project as proposed. on that motion [roll call] >> clerk: so moved, commissioners, that motion passes unanimously, 5-0. >> president hillis: lrpall right. the meeting's adjourned. thank you.

>> all right. this meeting will come to order. welcome to the, september 12, '13