Alder Furlow: This wasn’t about affordable housing.
Concerned about drugs, traffic, and violence, Upper Westville neighbors convinced city zoners to stop a two-family home from becoming a rooming house.
That decision took place Tuesday night during the latest monthly meeting of the Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA). The four-hour virtual meeting was held online via Zoom.
The zoning commissioners unanimously turned down landlord Nicotra Redd’s application for a use variance to allow for a rooming house at 101 Davis St.
City zoning law does not permit rooming, boarding or lodging houses — defined as residential buildings occupied by four or more unrelated roomers — in RM‑1 Low-Middle Density Districts, such as the one that includes 101 Davis.
Zoom
Tuesday night’s BZA virtual meeting.
“I believe that many may find that a rooming house which is overseen can bring more harmony due to the fact that rules are enforced” than a potentially unruly single-family or two-family residence on the block, Redd said. She said she is a nursing home administrator with experience overseeing patients and employees, and that she would “uphold the rules as far as state and federal and city regulations” are concerned.
In her written submitted application to the zoning board, Redd stressed the financial hardship she has experienced as a landlord during the Covid-19 pandemic.
“I am looking to obtain a room house license for the purpose of renting out rooms,” she wrote. “In short, I am hoping to be able to survive the strain this pandemic has set upon our economic system, in lieu of succumbing to these pandemic restraints.”
Ultimately, BZA commissioners denied the application because, as Chair Mildred Melendez put it, the hardship a variance applicant needs to prove is “a hardship of the land, not a financial hardship. Tonight, I feel like the applications has lacked to provide that to us.”
Before the commissioners took their final vote, they heard a raft of public testimony from immediate neighbors to the property.
Their concerns, however, were not with whether or not Redd had a so-called hardship of the land. Rather, their opposition zeroed in on the safety and quality of life of the neighborhood — and how they believe adding a rooming house to the block would be a burden rather than a boon.
The neighborhood message represented quite a different perspective from one often offered at public meetings around housing — during which advocates and city officials stress time and again the need for more affordable housing citywide.
Instead, it echoed the “neighborhood character” argument voiced by a host of Lawrence Street homeowners when a local landlord sought to convert an East Rock two-family house into five separate apartments.
City assessor photo
101 Davis St., a rooming house denied.
That dilemma — between supporting more affordable housing, while critiquing housing that some residents believe may negatively impact a neighborhood — was perhaps best encapsulated by Westville/Amity Alder Richard Furlow (pictured), who spoke up on Tuesday in opposition to the rooming house plan.
“It’s very difficult for me to oppose housing, because we have a housing need in our city,” he said. “But in this application, I don’t see anything that would line up with the city’s agenda to provide affordable housing.” He said the city should be very careful when “rezoning areas,” and he agreed that the application did not appear to meet the strict legal standards for a variance.
“I’m asking you to hear the voice of the community,” he said, “and deny this application.”
Later in the evening, Furlow spoke out in support of another zoning relief application in his ward — a proposed suite of lot area, side yard, gross floor area, and building wall height variances designed to legalize an existing fourth apartment built above a garage at a three-family house at 9 Pardee Pl. “This is exactly the type of thing that we should be developing throughout our city,” Furlow said about the accessory dwelling unit.
Opponents: “Fundamental Fabric” Threatened
Local attorney and Westville resident Ben Trachten kicked off the public testimony on the rooming-house matter by stating that, contrary to his usual speaking up in support of zoning relief applications before the BZA, he would be urging the board to turn down this matter.
Rooming houses are a particularly challenging use and are limited to only the highest-density residential zone, he said. Without comprehensive zoning regulatory changes, he said, this type of use simply is not allowed in this type of zone.
“This beautiful house can be used in a myriad of legal ways,” he said. “This is a financial difficulty personal to the applicant which also threatens the fundamental fabric of the neighborhood.”
Clockwise from top left: Jenine Wilson, Lakiya Nichols, Valencia Cullbreath and Jeanne Fuqua.
Neighbor after neighbor who spoke up after Trachten agreed.
Jenine Wilson said she has lived on nearby Earl Street, and that both Earl and Davis are already filled with vehicular and pedestrian traffic.
“I don’t want any more traffic from people who are transient, who are in and out of the neighborhood, who don’t have anything invested,” she said. “I don’t want to live near a rooming house.”
Democratic Town Committee Ward 27 Co-Chair Andrea Downer also warned about the traffic and transient implications of a rooming house. “That is not in harmony with the neighborhood,” she said. “I don’t think I would welcome a rooming house. It’s in and out, like a revolving door. There’s no investment.”
“Those of us who own in the neighborhood are wanting it to feel like a neighborhood, and safe,” said Davis Street resident Jeanne Fuqua. She said she would have safety concerns about living right across the street from a rooming house.
Fellow Davis Street resident Lakiya Nichols said the same.
“I’m concerned with what kind of tenants this would attract,” she said. “I’m concerned with high turnover. There is a difference when people stay long term. They’re more invested in the neighborhood.”
She also said that a rooming house might have a negative impact on nearby property values because it might make the block a less “desirable place for potential homeowners, for people wanting to invest in the community.”
And Valencia Cullbreath said that, when she bought her home on Davis Street 28 years ago, it was a “quiet neighborhood” and safe for her son to play outside and for her to walk her dog after dark.
Then a strip mall was built around the corner, which “commercialized” the area and “brought a tremendous amount of traffic in our neighborhood. We do not feel safe.” She said the mall also brought with it drug dealers.
“I do not think that a rooming house will make our situation any better.”
Redd tried to counter the public outpouring against her application by stating that neighbors had voiced “a lot of stereotypes that are basically being put upon a rooming house.” She said that short-term renters are not necessarily more prone to violence than anyone else, especially if a rooming house is carefully monitored and maintained.
“I think there can be a lot of stereotypes,” she repeated.
The commissioners ultimately voted down her proposal.
“It does not seem to be a hardship,” BZA Commissioner Alexandra Daum said. “This could be very easy to rent out under the current, existing zoning. I just don’t see the hardship to convert it into something that is much more burdensome on the neighborhood.”
Affordable housing: denied.
We hear the cry "why is there no affordable housing." Answer: we made it illegal.