Zoning Board Pushes Back On Crowell Road Houses

CHATHAM – A plan to build three large homes on Crowell Road is on hold after zoning board of appeals members questioned the type of housing being proposed.

 Owner Ronald Rudnick of Chatham Max Holdings was seeking zoning board approval to build the homes on land at 104 Crowell Rd., land previously occupied by a commercial building housing Meservey Accounting and other businesses. Because the land is in a commercial district, special permits are required for each of the single-family homes.

 But some zoning board members suggested the site was more suitable for workforce or affordable housing, while others were concerned about losing more of the town’s dwindling commercial land.

 “This is the demise of more commercial space in our town,” said zoning board associate member Steve DeBoer at the June 25 hearing. “We’re trying to attract people to move here, but we’re losing places for them to work.”

 “I’m not convinced homes of this nature are what should go there,” said chair David Nixon. 
 Rudnick initially wanted to build workforce housing at the site, as he did at the former Stonehorse Inn in Harwich, said attorney William Riley. However, the town’s zoning bylaw imposes so many conditions on that type of development that it is not feasible, he said. The bylaw allows dormitories in the general business 3 district in which the land is located but requires 3,000 square feet per bedroom. That would not allow the scale required to make such a project feasible, Riley said.

 “We really want to build workforce housing,” said Rudnick, adding that “our phones ring all day long” with inquiries for housing for employees of local businesses. He met with Building Commissioner Jay Briggs but determined “you just can’t do it.”

 “This is the best we could do with it right now,” Rudnick said.

 Board member Paul Semple noted that 14 units of housing is planned for two acres of town-owned land on Stepping Stones Road; while the three 104 Crowell Rd. lots total about 1.5 acres, he suggested a similar development might be feasible, perhaps in partnership with the town.

 There is no land cost with the Stepping Stones Road project, Riley said. With the $1.3 million cost of the 104 Crowell Rd. land, that type of affordable or attainable housing would not make economic sense, he said.

 Changes need to be made to the town’s zoning bylaw to “help encourage and make workforce housing a greater possibility,” said board member David Veach. Riley noted that the bylaw hasn’t been comprehensively updated in decades. 

 “The society’s needs have changed, but the bylaw doesn’t change,” he said.

 Nixon worried that the homes, which range in size from 5,600 square feet to more than 6,000 square feet, would end up as multi-million dollar summer homes.

 “Not necessarily,” Riley said. Adding a fourth house and reducing the size of the others, as some board members suggested, would not be in keeping with the density of the neighborhood, he said.

 Board member Virginia Fenwick said she was concerned about the future of the Crowell Road commercial area, and while the board has allowed single-family homes there in the past, “times change, and I think that what we are seeing today, what everyone has expressed, is some concern for just more residential homes of a large size at a high price point.”

 “Our responsibility is to the town, the neighborhood, not to the profit of the developer,” said Nixon. “Is that type of home the right thing for the neighborhood? I don’t think so, I just don’t.”

 Semple asked for input from town housing officials about the type of housing that might be feasible on the lot, saying he was reluctant to make a decision without more information.

 After the board took a straw poll showing that a majority of members would not support the special permits, Riley agreed to postpone the hearing until Aug. 13.