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MINUTES OF THE <br />ORONO PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING <br />Monday, November 18, 2019 <br />6:30 o’clock p.m. <br />_____________________________________________________________________________________ <br /> <br />Page 31 of 46 <br /> <br />8. LA19-000093 ALEXANDER DESIGN GROUP, 1971 FAGERNESS POINT ROAD, <br />VARIANCES <br /> <br />Item Number 8 was removed from the Agenda. <br /> <br />9. LA19-000094 DAVID BURDA, 1966 SHADYWOOD ROAD, VARIANCES, <br />9:26 P.M. - 9:45 P.M. <br /> <br />The applicants, David and Cindy Burda, were present. <br /> <br />Oakden presented a summary of packet memorandum. <br /> <br />Mr. David Burda and Ms. Cindy Burda, 1966 Shadywood Road, stated they bought the home in <br />September 2019. This house sits inside the 75-foot setback and they know this house would never be <br />approved to be built today. The distance between his house and his neighbor's house is roughly 2 feet. <br />They are requesting two improvements. One is for safety; the other is for more privacy. The first request <br />is for a breezeway. It's 6 feet between the garage and the house and it is a pretty narrow space, and in that <br />narrow space you're traversing three steps and two doors, which can be challenging. Also, the main <br />service power lines run right across the corner of the garage over the roof of the entrance to the back of <br />the house. He referenced pictures he created with PowerPoint to show what the roof line would look like. <br />His second request would be to take out the bay window, put in a door, opening it up with sliders and <br />windows, and adding a couple of steps going down to a patio that would be both flagstone and grass. This <br />would give them direct access to their boat docks. The only other access is through the side of the house <br />where they basically step out the door and they're pretty much 10 feet from the channel. Adding the new <br />access point would give them a little more privacy in moving from house to the dock area as well as just <br />sitting in an area that would remove themselves somewhat from the channel traffic. They are planning to <br />remove a good amount of hardcover to offset any hardcover impact from the proposed patio, including <br />reducing the size of the deck and a few other things. <br /> <br />In response to questions by Libby about the breezeway being under roof and cover and whether it would <br />also have footings, Mr. Burda said he wanted to make sure that it was not built yet. It would be a 3- <br />season, so there would not be any heating out there. The garage is slab-on-grade, so they'll dig footings <br />right off the garage, it will be built, connected permanently to the house. There is something called a slip <br />joint that allows for the breezeway to remain stable while the garage can move up and down with the <br />frost. As he looks at the cracked concrete which sits between the house and garage, you know there's <br />movement going on. He understands from an engineering standpoint there's a way to construct it to allow <br />for that movement without permanently attaching the breezeway to the garage. Mr. Burda said the main <br />house was built in the 1940s, there was an add-on in the 1980s, the garage was part of a variance granted <br />in the early 2000s, and in that amount of time you can see the amount of movement that's taken place over <br />the winters. <br /> <br />McCutcheon said he understands the practical difficulties. In Minnesota a garage being connected to the <br />house is a big deal. He also agrees with the privacy concern.