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Want Accessory Apartment

By
T.E. McMorrow

The need for affordable housing raised a problem for the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals on Tuesday when it considered an application that would require a variance to allow a homeowner to create an accessory apartment. The night also heard the board announce decisions on several controversial applications.

Represented by Zach Cohen, a two-time unsuccessful Democratic candidate for town supervisor, Anita Baskind sought permission to convert a 372-square-foot room in her house at 81 Hog Creek Road in Springs into an accessory apartment. The problem is that the property, which measures only 9,375 square feet, is well under the 15,000-square-foot minimum required to create such an apartment.

Mr. Cohen told the board that under the town code, his client, a retired teacher, could rent the room without invoking the town’s new rental registration law because she lives in the house full time. He said an affordable apartment would be far more desirable.

Tyler Borsack, a town planner, noting that this was the first application for an area variance to allow an accessory apartment, cautioned that “it may set a precedent.” He asked the board how it would be “possible to single out individual applications from one another, even though they are very rare.” However, each school district is allowed to have up to 20 accessory apartments, while Springs now has only seven.

The precedent setting nature of the request clearly concerned board members. Cate Rogers warned that, once granted for Ms. Baskind, the variance allowing the apartment would remain with the property in perpetuity.

Ms. Baskind spoke on her own behalf, saying young people born here are being driven from East Hampton by the high cost of housing. “Living in daddy’s basement is not always something they want to do,” she said.  Allowing an affordable apartment would also make it possible for elderly East Hampton residents to “die in their own homes,” she said.

A graduate of East Hampton High School, Juan Gouache, also spoke. “I live with my parents, because I cannot afford to live here,” he said. Mr. Cohen explained that Mr. Gouache has a degree in architecture, but as an apprentice, does not make enough money to afford East Hampton rentals.

“This might provide an option for me as well,” said Diana Walker. “I would like to die in my house, too. I would be thrilled to have Juan in my affordable accessory apartment.”

Chuck Hitchcock, a former East Hampton Democratic Committee chairman, also spoke in support of the application, as did Mr. Cohen’s wife, Pamela Becket, an architect.

“This will set the bar for possible future applications,” Mr. Borsack said.

The board has 62 days to make a decision.

In decisions announced that night, the board rejected variances requested by Andrew Tatiana of Springs and by a trust that owns a Bull Path, East Hampton, house. Mr. Tatiana wanted to retain an illegal 10-foot-tall gate and fence in front of his property on Parsons Close. The town limit is six feet. “It changes the character of the neighborhood,” Ms. Rogers said, as they voted the application down.

The 40 Bull Path request, from the Abraham Feldman Trust, was to retain an artist’s studio over a garage. The garage itself is perfectly legal, at 600 square feet, the maximum allowed for an accessory structure under the code. However, the 360-square-foot second floor studio was an issue. It would have to go, the board decided, either by decreasing the height of the ceiling so that the space can only be used for storage or eliminating the space entirely.

The board split on an application from Barbara Hair of 265 Three Mile Harbor-Hog Creek Highway, voting 3-2 to allow her to demolish the house there and replace it with a 3,015-square-foot house farther away from Three Mile Harbor.

David Lys saw the proposal as a tradeoff, one that benefits the town. “This property is going to be environmentally better than what it is now,” he said. Mr. Dalene agreed, calling what is on the site now, including an aging cesspool and an asphalt driveway that drains toward the harbor, “the worst possible scenario.”

John Whelan, the board’s chairman, also agreed and called for requiring mitigation to prevent leakage from a planned swimming pool into the harbor. Ms. Rogers and Lee White disagreed.

 

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