CHARLOTTE PLANNING COMMISSION

1. General Business: Review of Minutes: In the review of Minutes for April 5, 2001, Dean made some corrections in the wording for the Ten Stones Final Plat approval letter that was discussed.

During the Tony Perry discussion, it was Tom Anderson and not Ed Stone who asked if there was a problem with making the two units of the duplex on Lot 1 (the agricultural lot) into one unit instead, for a person who wanted to have horses and only one house rather than keeping it a duplex and having only one of the units go with the agricultural designation.

The motion for the Tony Perry subdivision changes was not unanimous, as Jim Donovan voted against it.

Josie added clarification to a sentence about Lot 2's tree-clearing request on Lot #2 of the Charlotte Land Trust subdivision; she had said the 150', and an additional 100' of selective clearing request still seemed too much.

On page 4, Dean corrected the Sheehan description: The 10 acre lot is for the building lot and the 5 acre lot is the one that has the farmhouse on it.

Al Moraska moved to approve minutes of April 5, 2001 with corrections. Gordon Troy seconded and the motion was approved with 3 votes for, 1 abstention and 3 members absent.

Minutes for April 15^th were postponed until enough members would be present.

2. Gregg and Beth Beldock / Randall and Page Frantz, Subdivision Modification and Amendment to combine Lot 2 with Lot 3A and Lot 4 with Lot 3B, and clarify that the right-of-way serving Lots 3, 4 and 5 is centered on the existing road. Randall Frantz brought the new plans before the Planning Commission members and pointed out the changes agreed upon by the Beldocks and himself.

Randy explained how the subdivision was approved before he purchased land from Gregg Beldock, then showed how these changes look. He showed an overhead photograph of the area including Yvan Plouffe=s farm, Plouffe Lane where this subdivision is, Carpenter Road etc. Randy owns Lots 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Gregg owns all the land that is marked Aconserved.@ Randy=s lot is the one with horse barn, he said.

On the west side of Plouffe Lane are Lots 1 and 2, and what is called Lot 6. What they want to do is Lot 6 which is open land at this time. Lot 6 will now not exist as a building lot. One section will go with Lot 2, and the other section will go with Lot 4.

Al questioned Lot 3 which appeared to be land locked. But Randy said in the map that surveyor Bill Robenstein just drew, the old farm road goes right to the corner of Lot 3. Originally the access was in a different location in the middle of a rocky area. The pond is drawn in as an approximate location. Randy said if they develop Lot 4 they will have to put in a fire pond but he doesn=t plan on it yet.

The portion of Lot 3b when included with Lot 4 will become 18.5 acres. The portion of Lot 3a when added to Lot 2 will become 17.4 acres. There is no increase in the number of lots; actually there is one less lot. Randy said there is only a verbal agreement at this time about the conservation land. He will give the development rights to the Vermont Land Trust, he said. He cannot simply add some to what Gregg Beldock has designated, he has to do this himself.

Randy said the proposed pond is not in the ideal spot, as it is on high ground. If they develop Lot 4, he knows they will be required to locate a pond (accessible to the road) and would look for a spot that is preferably lower and wetter than the approximate proposed location that is on the map.

Gordon noted that Randy had said before, that Lots 3 and 5 would never be built on; and asked why. Randy said he just wants to keep it as open land.

Jeff read aloud, Dean=s recommendations for the approval motion, and after discussion among the members, the motion will be as follows:

Jeff McDonald moved to approve the application for Subdivision Modification for Gregg and Beth Beldock, and Randal and Page Frantz, and Amendment with the following conditions:

1) Lots 3A and 3B (so-called) shall be transferred to the owners of Lots 2 and 4, respectively and the deeds shall describe the merged lot, within 90 days.

2) A mylar of the survey map shall be submitted to the Planning Commission for review within 60 days, and the deeds shall describe Lot 4 as the merged lot, and recorded in the Town Land Records within 90 days.

3) Jeff McDonald moved that the new road right-of-way which will be a 60-foot easement centered on an existing farm road as described on the farm subdivision plan, and accesses Lot 3.

Gordon Troy seconded the motion. (Item 3 was added as a friendly amendment.) The motion was approved, 4-2 with three members absent.

3. Town of Charlotte, Shirley Allen and Brenda Whalley: Sketch Plan Review for a Boundary Adjustment to add approximately 5 acres to the Town Forest known as AWhalley=s West Woods@: Wendy Schroeder described what was being considered. Shirley said this land was donated to the Town of Charlotte in 1970 by the Whalley family.

Wendy showed the members the piece that Shirley describes as Athe wrap-around@ and said the Town has agreed to buy this out of the Conservation fund. The land is in the process of being surveyed, and they think it may be approximately 52 acres. The other piece is 6.7 acres.

Gordon Troy verified the land in relation to the barn, and a trailer where Shirley=s daughter lives, and Shirley=s home.

Al verified that the total parcel is 11.25 acres. Shirley called attention to the plaque that identifies it as AWhalley=s West Woods@ and that is on the deed. There is an easement but no parking and no road. Shirley describes the 10' right-of-way and the gate directly at the end of it.

Shirley said there has been 2 different solutions offered; widen the road in that area to allow a small amount of parking, but this has not happened yet. Sometimes people have driven in Shirley=s driveway and then have gone into the woods, but as long as the traffic isn=t much heavier than the couple of people who have done that she didn=t mind. But the conditions are, that there be no vehicular traffic and it remains a semi-wilderness area.

The new section is also wooded, but it is not quite as thickly wooded. Shirley said there are some trees in there that are of a very wide diameter.

Jeff McDonald moved to classify this as a Boundary Adjustment. Al Moraska seconded the motion. Wendy Schroeder said they would make sure the land would be correctly identified as AWhalley=s West Woods.@ Shirley gave members a copy of a short history of this piece. The approval vote was unanimous.

4. Other Business: Josie Leavitt reported that Linda Hamilton had dropped off some brochures of some upcoming seminars that some members might be interested in.

Town Plan discussion: Jeff talked about the joint meeting that would happen next Monday: Things to discus are, AWhat does it take to get another 600 votes to get a Town Plan to pass, what things may need to be changed, and also to commit to a schedule so that we don=t have hearings in December when the Selectboard is also dealing with budget.@ Members agreed.

Jeff added, AI feel that this will be a joint effort and we don=t want to feel like we are >playing ping-pong= with this.@ Especially, he said, if there are only a very few things that need to be changed.

Gordon Troy said he watched this whole thing in amazement, since he has just been through this process in the Town of Warren, VT. We had re-written the ordinance.

Gordon asked, ASince the old Town Plan was re-adopted in March of last year, is there any urgency that this re-written Town Plan has to be adopted right away? Isn=t the one we have still in effect for another four years?@

Dean said the only urgency he can see, is that there was an extensive public participation process that took place last year. It had a lot of momentum behind it, and even though the new proposed plan doesn=t have a lot of radical departure from the current plan, there is a significant amount of input, and some changes, that, if it was totally put away, then there could be feelings on the part of the public that their participation was totally disregarded.

Jeff agreed; to be respectful of the process, and we don=t have to have anything done by this summer, but we are probably talking about next Town Meeting. ABut do we have to do anything at all? Should we just sit with this plan and wait, or stop the whole process over so that we have a five year process? Or should we do it in a year so that the Plan is okay for the next five years?@

Gordon asked, which plan are you talking about? Are you talking about the plan that you finished with and then passed on to the Selectboard? Or are you talking about the one that the Selectboard modified and then sent on to the general public? Dean said it is probably the draft that the Planning Commission sent to the Selectboard. Gordon asked for a copy of the one that the Planning Commission gave to the Selectboard. Gordon also asked if the Town Attorney reviewed the Town Plan as proposed by the Planning Commission.

Al and Jeff agreed that the attorney had not reviewed it until after the Selectboard had gotten done with it.

Gordon said that Steve Stitzel had given them a phenomenal amount of input (in Warren) after they had finished, and he valued Steve=s input. It appears that Steve didn=t have any specific suggestions, but only about warning it, etc.

APPROVED BY THE CHARLOTTE PLANNING COMMISSION ON

Chairman Date

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