What the City will not tell you on the outcome of the "Save the Integrity of Carson City's Historic District" initiative

We wish to thank the public and the property owners of Carson City’s Historic District for their efforts and support in our cause to save the Integrity of the District.

At last night’s Board of Supervisors Hearing the Developer’s appeal of the decision by the Historic Resources Commission was granted. Despite the fact that a number of procedural errors were made by the Planning Division the development of two 4-Plex apartment buildings within the Historic District is now allowed to proceed. The decision came down to a technicality. The word “density”, had it not been used by the motion to deny the project during the 12/11/14 HRC hearing, would have had a much different and surely the desired as well as the appropriate outcome, which should have started the process anew by first presenting it to the HRC and then, upon approval to the Planning Division. This was not the case and the Board of Supervisors in my opinion did not acknowledge that the appropriate process was followed. A Carson City Historic Resources Commission brochure prepared and published in 2005 states the following:

“Design and Permit Requirements
In addition to meeting the usual city building codes and zoning requirements, construction within the Carson City Historic District is further affected by Chapter 18.07 of the Carson City Municipal Code. In brief, these ordinances require that certain exterior modifications to properties within the District pass through a review process for appropriateness. The Historic Resources Commission is the reviewing body.”
“Exterior modifications covered by Carson City’s historic district ordinances and, therefore subject to review, include…

- Fences and walls visible from public rights-of way
- Additions
- Renovations
- New structures
- Removal of existing structures
- Application of siding and roofing
- Erection of signs
- Other miscellaneous site improvements”

… It further states:

"All applications for building permits covered by the Historic District Ordinances are directed to the Review Commission for their approval prior to the issuance of a permit."

Sadly, Carson City’s District Attorney did not find any violation with the process of this particular Permit Application and so the Board of Supervisors went along with his finding. The Historic Resources Commission was referred to as strictly a “Recommendation Committee” without any jurisdiction over density issues.

The proposed development of this project is therefore a done deal and the damage done will have grossly negative affect not only for Carson City’s Historic District but for the City as whole. The HRC was stripped of their authority leaving property owners in the Historic District with two options. One option is to sue the City with a Class Action Suit and the other would be to ignore any HRC recommendation. There has been no evidence to enforce any City Ordinance or of applicable penalties throughout the course of our opposition. Why should we as citizens of this community, who have made this District what it is today make ourselves subject to any future scrutiny by the HRC? Existence of this “Recommendation Committee” is left meaningless. It is much easier to do as one wish without any approval, as long as building codes have been met and to pay a minimal fine or restitution if and when a so called violation could be noticed.

Although mistakes have been made by all Committees, including the Board of Supervisors none were ever acknowledged in the process. This is particularly disappointing when the Community has to live with the consequences for rest of their lives.

By Alexander Kirsch

We fought the good fight last night and lost (strictly on a technicality in my view). I went back and looked at the HRC video/audio from 12/11/14. Although there was very little discussion during the meeting of "the density and historic uses within the historic district", for the final motion Mike Drews cited those two items as specific reasons that the Bauer Project did not meet the purposes of Chapter 18.06.015. If his motion had just stated that the project did not meet the purposes of the Chapter 18.060.015 and should be denied, The Developer’s appeal would not have been upheld by the BOS.

It is unfortunate that the City Attorney's representative requested that additional clarification for any denial "would be helpful" to the BOS for any future appeal of the HRC and that HRC Vice Chairman Drews inappropriately used the word "density" in his motion to meet that request. Just the absence of the word density would likely have caused a completely different outcome. That's a sad commentary on the process that we just went through. Still, because of the flawed process between the HRC and the Planning Dept, alleged code violations, and missing details for the HRC decision, the correct BOS decision should have been to return the item to the HRC and the Planning Dept for a "do-over".

If I were on the HRC, I would resign in protest, because the basic principles of the Historic District and the authority of the HRC were absolutely trampled upon just by some poor wording in a quickly put together motion last December. In the discussion by various HRC members on 12/11/14, it was clear that the Developer had never provided the HRC with required details on windows and that there were unanswered concerns about the conflicting arborist reports as well as the landscaping and mass and scale of the buildings, particularly with regard to the increased parking area and the decreased building setbacks from the street not being appropriate for the Historic District. In reviewing the video/audio, it was also clear that the HRC members were mystified as to why the normal process of submitting an application to HRC first and the Planning Dept. second was not followed. In my view, the Planning Department made a major mistake in this regard and it cost the city a good deal of money and wasted time in dealing with unnecessary protests.

By the way, there is a May 2005 Planning Dept brochure (see the attachment to this email) for the Historic District that describes the new project process and states:

"If a property owner's project is approved [by the HRC] the paperwork is then forwarded to the Carson City Building Division for issuance of the proper permit, provided that the project otherwise meets the city's requirements".

That sounds pretty clear to me and perhaps the Planning Dept should follow its own brochure in the future and not issue special use permits for projects in the Historic District that have not been previously formally approved by the HRC… The City Attorney's Office may also want to familiarize itself with the attached brochure, which describes the basic process/flow for new construction in the Historic District. It might just help to re-define what the meaning of "shall not be started" is for that office.

Thanks for all of your support on this; it just had an unfortunate outcome due to too much wordsmithing on the final motion to deny the project.

By Steve Brenneman