[MassHistPres] Fwd: Demo delay applicability

[Dennis De Witt]

Alison

If your bylaw is like most, if the Commission doesn't act within a  
given time period you forfeit your right to impose a delay.

While after some discussion we could get our Town Counsel to agree  
that LHD design review is not transferable to a new owner, we did not  
explicitly address that re demo delay.  Our draft Rules & Regs and  
our practice has been to assume that the ability to demolish is good  
for three years after the stay has been lifted or has timed out,  
without respect to whether there has been a transfer of title.  It  
would be interesting to know if anyone does require reapplication by  
a new owner, even if there has been a recent application.  I think  
the argument against such a practice would be that building permits  
are routinely transferable.

In the case of LHD certificates the prevailing argument in our  
discussion with town counsel seemed to be that while building (and  
demo) regulations are universal throughout the state, and thus a  
change of ownership shouldn't matter, LHD design review is very case- 
specific and locality specific, and thus there is a much greater  
chance that a new owner wouldn't understand all of the constraints  
and might not conform to the Commission's expectations.  Furthermore,  
unlike demo cases, wherein permission to act has been denied, in the  
analogous LHD case permission will have been granted to the old owner  
and the presumption is that it will be granted again to the new owner.

Dennis De Witt
Brookline


On Jun 5, 2008, at 11:39 AM, James Hadley wrote:

> Almost all town by-laws are different, based on home-rule, so you  
> should
> review Topsfield's. It seems clear to me from our modus operandi  
> here in
> Orleans that the application for demolition is particular to the  
> applicant,
> and has no transferrability. Since the individual application  for
> demolition permit is what triggers the hearing on demolition delay, it
> should be the case that the new application will result in a new  
> hearing and
> either a delay, or an agreement to demolish (remote, but possible -  
> and this
> possibility seems to me to validate the new hearing and potential  
> new 6
> month delay.)
>
> But consider this for a moment: a thorough review of the issue  
> might take a
> number of months. Perhaps this additional time should be invested  
> in order
> to BE SURE. Then comes the 6 month delay. Hmmmmmmmmm.
>
> Jim Hadley, Chair, Orleans Historical Commission
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Alison Hardy, Window Woman" <ahardy at window-woman-ne.com>
> To: <masshistpres at cs.umb.edu>
> Sent: Wednesday, June 04, 2008 10:50 AM
> Subject: [MassHistPres] Fwd: Demo delay applicability
>
>
>>
>>
>> "Alison Hardy, Window Woman" <ahardy at window-woman-ne.com> wrote:  
>> Date:
>> Mon, 2 Jun 2008 14:20:45 -0700 (PDT)
>> From: "Alison Hardy, Window Woman" <ahardy at window-woman-ne.com>
>> Subject: Demo delay applicability
>> To: masshistpres at cs.umb.edu
>>
>> Here in Topsfield new owners of a property want to tear down their
>> beautiful 1830's English Tie Beam barn and put up an office  
>> structure. The
>> previous owner had applied to do same citing bad condition of barn  
>> (it has
>> been looked at by timber frame specialist and deemed quite  
>> salvagable).
>> The HC issued a six month demo delay on the barn. The property was  
>> then
>> sold to new people. They now also want to tear down the barn. My
>> interpretation of the demo delay bylaw is that it is tied to a  
>> request for
>> a building/demo permit and since the new owners would be  
>> requesting a demo
>> permit they have to come before the HC again for review and  
>> possible demo
>> delay. Even our building inspector isn't clear on if this process is
>> correct. Any of you had similar occurances? Right now our town
>> administrator has legal counsel reviewing so I'd like to see if  
>> there are
>> any similar cases out there.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Alison Hardy
>> Topsfield Historic Commission
>>
>>
>> Alison Hardy
>> Window Woman  of New England
>> www.window-woman-ne.com
>> 978-561-1062
>>
>>
>> Alison Hardy
>> Window Woman of New England
>> www.window-woman-ne.com
>> 978-561-1062
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