001the order the regular meeting of the building board appeals for june 16 2022 roll call paul darling here robert hart here kevin cox here hugh fleck david armstar staff mike lemieux here john riser myself deborah williams and glenn dempsey and chris mcfarlane we have a quorum thank you any public commentary seeing none moved to uh approving the agenda move to approve a second who's in favor hi agenda passes uh the next item in the agenda is the approval of the minutes from the june 17th 2021 meeting so any of those those are attached to the packet is there any comment on those you have a memory from about a year ago's meeting any comments and no comments or there there are no minutes i mean it's it's the agenda but they're no anything attached to
002that yeah report so so jeffries are minutes from this meeting or is there with us are those been previously approved my apologies it looks like i did not attach those so we'll have to table that into the next meeting appeals and actions and she'll cause hearings the first item on the agenda is 81 a variance bba a 22 2000 variance requests for 322 east liberty unit 13 anniversary is there an applicant here for that you want to come up and say your name sign in and give us a five minute or so summary of your request okay my name is uh thank you mr chairman my name is rich kligman from superb custom homes we have patrick dyke who's our designer alan alcid who's the architect and jason bissonette from soils instructors our structural engineer
003patrick do you want to do a quick recap yes and i'm familiar with this particular process here so it seems like you've done some kind of a pre-hearing or gone through the documentation for the lack of being redundant when we started this project that was what we deemed to be a fairly unsafe spiral stair in that unit uh in some conversations with the city my understanding was that maybe under the rehab code we could develop a revised design a stair that would improve on the safety and welfare of the part occupants in that unit and given the structural condition of the unit being precast concrete and steel and the fact that we couldn't really do any major structural changes with a high-rise building and other tenants in the building and other units we couldn't get
004access to you know we did the best we could to make the opening as large as possible and designed a residential code compliant stair given the unit had fire suppression on both floors means of egress on both floors the the fact that the stair that we had designed we felt was a vast improvement on the safety for the occupant and given it's being used as a residential unit much like a single family custom home would be we felt that it was a more than acceptable solution that was what was designed and submitted for the permit set and it's my understanding until late in the construction process that we correct during the course of construction um there was a conversation with the building inspector and the project manager at that time that that that stair did
005not comply to building code for the commercial aspect of it which you know required wider runs and taller at that point however we once we'd received the permit uh for the stair that we ended up building we demoed out the spiral stair and at that point we couldn't go backwards and the stair that we have is maxed out and complies with residential we understand not on the building side but we were in a rock and a hard place and then we can't go backwards and until this meeting we weren't able to go forward so for the record myself as the designer allen is the architect we were never made known that the stair was not compliant until rich contacted me you know a couple months from completion of the project yeah after the stair the
006finish there was already built anything else you can have a staff report is there anything else uh any of the comments from the app again well we can go back and forth and question the comments out here after you present that report yeah um so just a little bit of we'll go over the background just um a little bit um i just wanted to point out um that the the violation was noted um in october of 21 again in november april of 22 and then again in april in each inspection report it was noted that the stairs were not compliant with the um with the building code staff recommends that this application be denied it doesn't meet the standards for approval the code has been that the code has the code has not been misinterpreted
007the provisions of the code do apply and the reduction in stair geometry is less safe than what is required by the 2015 michigan building code the applicant states that the stairway was constructed would meet the requirements of the 2015 michigan residential code that code is not applicable in our two occupancies the 2015 michigan residential code is a standalone code that only pertains to single family houses duplexes and townhouses and offers no provisions for r2 structures the introduction in the introduction of the 2015 michigan residential code it states this comprehensive stand-alone residential code establishes minimum regulations for one and two family dwellings and townhouses using prescriptive provisions 322 does not meet the definition of one or two family dwelling or a townhouse the nature of the r2 building has increased safety concerns that are not considered
008in the 2015 michigan residential code and this is why it's under the 2015 building code um the residential code is not intended to be used in commercial buildings it's a standalone as was stated before it's not meant to become a standard when the 2015 michigan building codes are not met [Music] the project it's because the 2015 michigan building code is a minimum standard uh in the in the code governing this project and is directly referenced by the 2015 michigan rehabilitation code for existing buildings this appeal does not meet the standards of approval the code has not been misinterpreted the provisions of the 2015 building code do apply and the increased riser height and decreased tread depth is neither equal to nor better than code requirements [Applause] okay thank you does the board have any questions
009for the attica um so the packet had a lot of cross-referencing of various codes which i have some questions about possibly to glenn but first of all the spiral stair that was in the dwelling unit originally it was a permitted as of right i mean permitted by code egress there the met code at the time it was put in the spirals there the high the right and the run i couldn't find at the time because i went back and did some code research to see when permit was issued i don't know what version of the code the city was using at the time because sometimes municipalities lag the current version of the code might not have been adopted i do know that it being a five foot diameter stair it was extremely small and the
010tread was the phantom stepping was like a real issue right and i understand that yeah but i guess what i want to establish first is that those spiral stairs are in every one of those units not just this one i think there's just two units there's only yes the michigan building code the 2015 version allows a spiral stair like that as an exception for an egress stair so i just want to make sure we're clear on that that what's driving this is not the fact that it was a non-compliant stair is that the owner doesn't like it because it's cumbersome and it's difficult to use he wanted to improve on this yeah my point is that this is a this is a preferential decision by the owner understood okay so and in early conversations with
011the city before i started designing there was some conversation that the stair may you know i designed whatever i could get to work and it may uh upon their approval be accepted as an improvement in this health and safety welfare the part of the confusion was there's multiple codes that apply to this project but there wasn't a clear line in the sand and my rationale was okay i can draw an alternate shaped stair i told the client the best i can do is draw something else that will fit and see if the city will accept that and if they don't they will reject it and then we will just you know keep the stair that's there or we will if we're allowed to replace it as a replica we'll do that um and so when
012we submitted the plans and were issued for permit my understanding because i i wasn't really sure which elements of the unit would qualify under the rehab code the assumption was that okay the city must not find objection to this alternate design and then when we found out unfortunately the original spiral had been ripped out and we were told we couldn't go back to that now now that it had been demolished is that correct that's my understanding yes uh and mr dempsey can verify but when we had a zoom call and at that point he said because that was my question what's our worst case are we going back to what we have and he said no we can't and i don't disagree you know in the context of us not knowing what we started with
013relative to code but i would argue that i don't think anyone would disagree that the current stairs is safer if all things being equal this current starts safer well i see that's where that's that's a little bit of the problem that i'm having here is that the spiral stair as it as it went in it wasn't is it not it was a code acceptable staircase i'm assuming so well i guess i'm stating that also as a fact so what what the situation is is that the owner didn't like it because it wasn't a comfortable stair and was asking for something 100 a different configuration to suit the owner yeah a hundred percent yeah all right i just want to make sure that that was that's clear correct and then once we were approved that's when
014we took it out okay so understanding the difficulty and reconfiguring the new stair to meet the commercial building code the other thing that manifested itself in the packet is that the residential code has a particular standard for riser and tread which didn't match the narrative that that your code consultant offered so i guess this one is maybe directed to glenn it's the 2015 residential code that would apply in terms of an alternate design i'm not saying that that's the case i'm just asking the question because well what i'm getting at is i looked at the internet at the 2015 code version and it was a seven and three quarter rise and a ten inch tread your consultant has it as a eight and a quarter and nine inch tread and that's closer to what you
015guys designed you have a nine inch tread so i'm trying to understand which which one i don't know what code your consultant was looking at whether it was like a so mr green was uh i think he was one of the founding members of the international code council but that's not my question no no but my question is really to glenn there are two different standards in this packet that are listed for a residential staircase and i wanted i just wanted to know which one might be applicable here this would be an r2 type of construction so it's a it's a multi-family as opposed to a one and two family single dwelling family so the 2015 michigan building code would be the applicable code because it's a new staircase put in place and i'm not
016i'm not making myself clear the alternate stair that they're proposing which hues to the residential code which i understand is not really applicable in this case i just want it but it's cited a lot in the packet i just want to know what this what the riser and tread standard might be under the 2015 residential code because they're two different sets of numbers that are showing up as an impact of the building code which was permitted on the residential code supplies and reunders and the building code so can you can i can i speak to that for a second yeah um so there's the reason that there we have so many step configurations uh part of the reason is that the michigan building code gives an exception for stairways within residents so it doesn't need
017the need to meet the seven and 11 standard of the building code they can go down to the seven and three quarter by ten um within a dwelling unit that's that's exactly what i wanted to know thank you so let's just say for hypothetical reasons seven and three quarters and ten but you have but you don't have a ten inch tread you have a nine inch tread i believe there's an exception for where yeah and if you want to pull that up but the way that i interpreted mr green's languaging is there's an exception if you can't get to that number um um i'm sorry mrs william do you have an extra fight [Music] okay so i'm looking at um okay so i'm looking at pages 39 to 40 in the packet he's citing residential
018code three one one point seven point five point two tread depth minimum tread depth will be nine inches uh the greatest uh let's see um that's the residential goal though correct yes sir yeah that that's not the residential code it's 10 inches he's saying using the michigan residential code no r311.7.5 provides so you're saying when uh um using this saying the purpose of showing the requirements uh greatest uh so yeah i mean mr green is uh you know citing residential code for that nine-inch run yeah yeah though you're not one of your family no correct correct we knew that we were unable to conform under the building this was all about would that be being acceptable under the rehab code is an improvement on current safety condition right because there's in all reality everyone i'm
019sure everybody's been on a spiral stair before a co-compliant spiral stair especially when it's a five foot diameter when you've done i've done that before it's six foot six six six seven eight where you can walk around the outside of it on the outside rail and you don't have the concern about phantom steps this was so narrow by the time you took out the handrail areas and whatnot you were forced to walk really close and even though you could say that that stair was coming um the reality of it is it'd be very very easy to phantom step and fall not debating that yeah okay i i no you were clear mr hart okay right here so um just sorry mike like one more time the michigan residential code for a single family home or
020one and two unit dwelling is what for the riser and what for the tread i believe it to be eight and a quarter for the riser and nine for the tread oh it is not i believe i believe in residential code it is right that's what i wanted to get to thanks yes according to what they have in the pack and under 311.7.5.2 tread depth minimum tread depth shall be nine inches i'm on page 40 at the top and with spiral steer at 12 inches and it was seven and a half of what your packet said so you go from seven and a half to nine and i think on the on the walk line that stair was only like four inches i actually don't even think it meant we we measured this 25 meter
021packet says seven and a half at the wall line that's 12 inches in at 12 inches yeah so maybe you know if it's right at that number or less i'm not really sure it's extremely tight probably all the residential code ones is all grandfathered it's really hard to change back to the building code i mean that's why there's such a difference that that inherently been built in there so long that eight and a quarter nine inch tread i think that and that's a that's a um a change in the michigan from the international yeah and i think it um is to accommodate um tighter spaces and i think that it's also considered that in a one and two family dwelling it's going to be one person who's in there using it for probably multiple years
022i don't know if this makes any difference to the board but the the tread is always measured nosing to nosing these treads actually had an inch and a quarter nosing so there is a little bit more surface area to get your foot on is it the nosing isn't it three quarters of an inch that's allowed you're about an inch and a quarter max is it unnosing yeah if you have no nosing at all it you have to make the treads deeper right but they're actually ten and a quarter on the surface and then it comes up and there's an inch and a quarter projection but notice in the packet there's a there's a drawing in here that has kind of a winder stairway on page 31 is that that was lunch i i drew that
023um because that was an attempt when i first started the project to try to get the michigan building code compliance there that winder shape was the most efficient shape to get it to work yeah and i still didn't have nearly the headroom and then we went to well what would it take to cut the opening and move the steel and that became not a feasible solution so again under my understanding was that this element may qualify under the rehab code as an exception under the article that was referenced to me by the city what is the head remember and that in that scenario what is the head room limited at that stage that's terrible six eight is required six eight is required but the in the wider it was far less what did you have
024in this one less than that i can't read it if i could remind the panelists to make sure you use them i apologize it's okay thank you i've been told i'm a loud talker but not that loud is there a handrail on the stair yes sir there will be no there is there is oh there is this was just a diagram i drew as a exploration of riser and run and shape configuration [Applause] yeah just a couple more um the building is sprinkling yes and it has a second means of egress to the carter both both floors have a door that goes to a fire rated corridor um so this serves as a supplemental means to be garage between the two floors i don't even think you could say it's a means of egress because
025each floor has an independent in case of a fire the first thing you would do is go for that fire rated corridor and then you've got the fire suppression so the the stair is merely for internal yeah supplemental yeah supplemental correct yeah yeah and it's probably why they approve the original spiral or the designer intended it that way to begin with i don't know again that stair that's the original spiral stair is permitted under the building code as a means of egress just the way it was configured but again not to belabor the point it nobody likes using it yeah yeah you get that right well and mr i'm not sure too on the code you know at what point it may have changed but the fact that we can't go back to that too
026is is part of our challenge of you know in other words if that was a coach implying stare and at the end of the day you decided hey we don't like what you have for whatever reason go back to what you had we're not we're told we should be able to do that i would think we were told we were not i think you're allowed to do that yeah yeah but again it doesn't it begs the begs the issue yeah the owner can't handle a spiral stare so um can you kind of complete the picture when you go out this the extra means of egr the the main means of egress to the corridor once you get out into the corridor do you have two ways to go two there two fire stairs two five
027to two and there's an elevator but the elevator can't be used in case you're right two or two to two opposed stairwells so if you didn't count or figure in the stair that's in question and you would and you relied upon the stair the door to the carter it would satisf things like a common path of travel would be okay yes this is a steel frame stairway to what it looks like no it's a woodworking you know the other provisions of the stairway the headroom that complies handrail lighting all that yes sir you said the head room was clear on here so narrative motion [Applause] okay okay i guess so so they don't see any photographs with the finished finish there there's kind of a progress shot there would you like to see what it
028looks like yeah andrew sure top-down view from the kitchen level looking down uh each stride is lit for safety uh would you like to see the problem as well so the hand rolls in the middle middle the handrail correct and there's railing on the garden yeah oh yeah no absolutely so one thing is that we have a board of five members as three are here today so all three of us will have a voting favor for it to pass i believe that's correct is that a minimum of three votes out of the five or four quarter of the people that are here yes i believe that you'd have to have the full quorum agree unless mr reiser sees differently so in the past we've had that we've given the applicant the option of tabling it
029until we have more board members if you think that you may not have complete consensus or we can go ahead and vote and if i may uh are we confirming with bylaws if it's and then if you can tell me mr chairman if you're all voting in favor then we'll take it now yeah we we understand this would be the point that we would table that before it goes to motion we know it's been uh seems been difficult to try to have a quorum for these meetings we're trying to be sensitive to the efficiency of the i think the advantage of tabling it would be is you don't pay the fee again you don't have to reapply and there's no guarantee that we'd have four members the next time right so we don't have the
030bylaws handy right now you might want to consider tabling if our legal staff agrees or maybe we could um we could take a break a five-minute break he's going to get his laptop okay we're taking a break can i just add something to the conversation that even when you look at rehab code in 403.1 it talks about alterations in any building or structure shall comply with the requirements of the international building code for new construction alterations shall be such that the existing building or structure is no less conforming to the provisions of the international code than the existing building or structure was prior to alteration gives you one exception an existing stairway shall not be required to comply with the requirements of section 111 of the international building code where the existing space and construction
031does not allow for the reduction in my staff report i stated that this isn't an existing stair so i don't feel like even that portion of the rehab code covers this alteration i would agree with that yep read a big motion yeah what did you decide to do you want to oh i don't think we can make the motion and it's just not vote on it yet i think if you want to develop a motion then we can decide we have tablet we have a motion for the next period or we're going to decide to vote on it or not so it's fresh in our minds as far as what the uh motion would could be okay thank you for that mr governor all right i moved that in case bba 22-2000 the appeal of
032the building officials decision that the work to be performed at 322 east liberty unit 13 is granted relief from section 1011.5.2 the building report of appeals reverses the building officials decision for the reasons as follows the applicant has a probe has proposed an equivalent alternative on the following basis that the circumstances of this construction concern the owner's inability to use the original approved spiral stair that the proposed replacement stair is a supplemental communicating stair and not a primary egress there that the proposed stair meets safety provisions of the 2015 michigan residential code for a single dwelling unit that with further consideration that the building is sprinklered and has a direct path to a primary second means of egress and that this appeal approval is not to be used as a precedent for future similar conditions
033or appeals do you have a second on the motion i suck at that discussion on the motion do you want to put in there with the rise and one are as it was built i mean uh it has a minimum a nine inch tread so it has a minimum nine inch tread now or is it bigger than a nine inch tread it's a tread built nine at nine inches for what you would deem is usable tread yes it does it does the actual chart is deeper but with the nose yeah by the definition of code and the rise is uh why is his equipment to what the spiral shared was it's the same number of steps as the spiral stair was so the rise is the same i can't say that to be true i
034just uh you have the plans my goal was to be under eight and a quarter you know when you're dividing it by an equal amount yeah there's there's some big ranges sometimes uh and being able to meet the head clearance if i win another riser i would not have met the head clearance so it was like the maximum i could go is that did i was that clear in that saying that because it's okay right now it has to comply with the minimum requirements of the residential codes and hopefully what they're but they've built there is that eight not more than eight and a quarter inch rise so does it fall within minimum yeah okay so we'll wait until we get an answer about the motion thing before we vote mix three so yeah yeah
035is it possible i could hear the motion again is it possible that i could hear the motion again right um you get the motion debra now he would have to repeat that [Music] i missed part of it when you read it the first time i was just wondering if you could reread it back because you guys killed me um this is a voluntary position right mr heart that's all i can do not like you're paying for this so can i paraphrase oh yeah paraphrasing [Music] the motion was that if they built a conforming replacement stair if they built a replacement stair that conforms to the michigan residential code for within a dwelling unit um and that the stair itself is in effect a supplemental communicating stair not a primary egress stair that and that because
036the building is sprinklered has a direct means of egress to a corridor with with the um twin uh fire stairs um and the fact that the owner is challenged or was challenged by the original stair that was in spiral stair that was installed that they were making a reasonable accommodation but perhaps the most important thing of all of that is that i don't want to see this being used as a president for future situations i mean if if something like this happens again i would expect that the construction be shut down period and we're also not boxed into a situation where we're trying to rationalize i some kind of equivalency to the code because on the face value of what you said what was presented by the building department you're right i mean bottom bottom
037line you're right so the motion is basically trying to make an accommodation to the situation that was presented but that's that's the gist of it okay thank you yeah we're thinking that uh we're feeling that uh it has to be a majority of the quorum so the two two out of three are are there bylaws i couldn't find them on the city website does this board have bylaws like other boards do no we're a maverick organization you haven't been established for very long here right because bylaws can set forth what the quorum is yeah but if i don't think this board has any different bylaws you could follow it if they're biased i want to whatever those are in case you know these feel people feel aggrieved then they can pursue an action that we
038didn't follow our rules yes so there is this still derosa uh hail single state construction code which says that the construction board of appeals or like building board of appeals mcl 125 point 15 14 shall be created consisting of not less than three nor more than seven and we have six on ours three of whom aren't here so we have three and that's quorum so uh absent something in our bylaws that roberts generally a majority prevails so the majority of those present and voting would determine what you do today if you want to be if you want to table it to be extra careful or to get more input that's your prerogative but i think that you two out of three have the uh ability to rule the day today that's good news good year
039okay thank you for that mr riser clearly so any of that further discussion on the board the only thing i the only question i have is can can they can in the future this happen again they come back and we're held viable and saying well you did it here you accepted it here's what he's trying to do as long as i'm trying yeah really hard to make make it clear that this is an exception not a rule and right nobody comes back and says but uses this as a precedent yeah correct so the other 12 units in the building or whatever well you did it in this unit you're going to hear us that's a lot there yeah yeah and again mr chairman darling i think there's only one other unit that does have a
040stereo totally i can't understand what you're saying so the coming back is it one more time right yeah in point of fact there are a lot of other buildings growing up in ann arbor the kind of mirror sure you know this this kind of arrangement so you know um yeah so we have a motion we have a second on the motion right there we have mushrooms right i'm gonna take a boat those in favor of the motion say aye any denials no denial so it passes uh three or nothing thank you very much for all your time and energy thank you thank you so the next item on the agenda is item number 22 108.2 dba 22 [Music] variance request from 1299 harp street ann arbor michigan is there a applicant here step up sign
041in and tell us a little about your appeal i'll get you after okay um hi my name is jim skrivens i'm with root associates architects and representing the uh the owner of the property at this at the location um quick background on the on the house the um our house was built in 1940. our client his parents purchased the house in 1994 he he inherited the property from his parents and uh in january of this year he wanted to rent the parcel so he had the housing commission come out and perform an inspection and found some violations in the home mainly well they were in the home but the basement was considered not to have a be permitted um it was at some point about 40 years ago the basement might was finished at some
042point and so we had been working with the building department to come up with a we looked at the things that were in violation of the housing code and brought those up to compliance but we are still have three items that we're asking for today they've one of the issues is the hallway that's in the space is two and a quarter inches short at one end of the corridor or the hallway area the two doors leading to the sleeping rooms are roughly an inch short below the code and then of course the egress windows that are leading out of the sleeping rooms are also short only in height the width is acceptable by building code and the area is 5.2 square feet so the area free area is also in compliance there our proposal was
043to if we see our drawings our proposal was to correct the staircase which was an existing stair and it was installed at the time the house was built in 1940 and so we decided to bring that up because that was in violation of the housing code and we also decided to correct the window wells on the exterior of the house because the window wells were only 20 inches deep and you couldn't climb out through the window well through the egress windows so the three items that we're looking to appeal today are the width of the one end of the corridor the hallway the head height on the door openings and the egress from the windows themselves going out they're all existing as far as we know they they're um they've been there as long as
044we can tell but the issue goes back that the building department can't find any permitted building permit for the finishing of the basement itself the building at one point in 1982 the basement was fixed up as a part of a community development block grant so the wall was replaced in one one side of the basement work was done down there we don't know to what extent that work was so um i think that's basically the situation that we've got going right now so thank you staff report uh staff recommends this application be denied uh no permits were issued at the time of construction um in uh so now the area needs to meet the requirements of the 2015 michigan residential code and it's in its current configuration it does not meet these requirements if the
045renovation did take place 40 years ago it would not have met code of the time i'm referencing the 1981 boca code and that's at the end of the report which is pretty similar to what the requirements of the 2015 michigan residential code are and it's correct it was the the issues were realized during a rental inspection that happened january 11th of 22. thank you oh yeah um so how much how much of what we're looking at in the plants or in the plan was existing or everything was existing on that plant except for the staircase that would we are we are proposing that the staircase was a really tight wedge-shaped tread and it was built in 1940 we proposed to come in there and put a new winder stair that's fully compliant with the 2015
046building code so we were doing that and the owners pulled a permit and is now proceeding with that work we saw that as as an you know means of egress and so we wanted to make sure that that was acceptable so and you said the exterior wall with the windows to those bedrooms well the exterior wall on the on one side was the car part of the community block grant program was that the exterior wall on the west side of the house was replaced a part of the community block plant program also had those basement windows on the east side of the house as damaged and broken and they were to be repaired or replaced so we don't know what exactly happened at that time period so those windows were they look existing or from
047the 1980s when the work was done in 1982 so that's all we can tell at this time so so the window weld the window wells were existing the window the wall with the window wells is what would it what actually is that is it a concrete wall a block wall it's a eight-inch cmu wall they didn't see okay reconstructed window miles doesn't matter what uh the window wells currently the existing ones were pressure treated to timber and i believe the owner is going to go back with a pressure treated timber but currently it's 20 inches deep from the face of the building and we're going a full 36 inches out into the yard can you describe the section at the egress windows what is the sale height the egress sill height is uh it's meets
048code it's 44 inches to the top of the cell for the clear opening with the windows are a vinyl double hung window they have a upper and lower sash the bottom sash raises up the clear opening width is 39.5 inches and the total clear opening height from if you push raise the sash up from the sill the window is 19 and a half inches um code requires that it'd be 24 inches tall that's where we come into problems with climbing we've got the the width because the width is 39.5 inches hot long so you can easily climb through it it's just not tall enough yeah is there an obstruction that you can't go up well so the window is at the top of the joist so it starts from the floor line and goes down
049and the basement itself it's 44 inches off the floor so we could go down further but we'd have to dig out and and cut concrete wall and all that other stuff so concrete water cmu cmu wall so the easy fix is a casement window well so casement window we looked at that casement window will work it's a 36 inch wide it's it's um we'd have to reduce the size of the opening um it'd still be a vinyl window it comes close to not applying to the 303 code where it's is for the front bedroom because of the area we need eight percent square feet of light opening and so a 36 by 40 window that fits in that opening is borderline for the light requirement as far as natural lighting so as far as clear
050glazing area so that we kind of wanted to keep the amount of glazing that we had in there and then we also cited that section appendix j if we would have put a window in there appendix j says that we're allowed to put the same style and use in that window opening so technically we're allowed to buy code to put in the double hung and that's where we thought well if we're going to replace the window we're entitled to the same type of style why can't we just keep the style that's there are these winners are 1980 these are your windows as far as we know they're they're from the 80s they're solving near the end of their useful life probably are they vinyl are they it's a vinyl window yes you're not replacing them
051the point was just to keep them everything's existing and not to not to take them out not to touch them we have the same issue upstairs but you know we have vinyl windows up there and they're we're not looking at those issues they don't meet the code as well but because the basement wasn't permitted and the house dates from 1940 upstairs there were they're allowing the upstairs windows but not the basement windows but they're trying to rent this base as a different unit which they didn't before that's what's triggering this yes because he's trying to rent it yeah that was sighted up in the housing report and it currently meets the housing group the window the way it sits meets the housing code so and the door is due and the hallway does so we
052looked at the item the only thing that didn't meet the housing report was the staircase and we're correcting that and then as far as the building code we thought that the window well if we correct that would make it easier use out of that window to climb out of so that we're trying to correct that as well here's a real test to see if the owner can get out the window can i can i come on on that um that emergency escape and rescue openings are not only for somebody to get out of they're also for a fully equipped firefighter to get into so probably but i'm saying that the the intent of the code in there is not only direction yeah yeah so the outside window helps in that provision deep is the window
053well um as far as off from gray down to the cell it's roughly i think 20 inches okay what's the lighting in these spaces you said that if you were changing the window out you'd be worried about the lighting but i know those mechanical makeups for that you can make up for the artificial lighting yeah so i mean the lighting's pretty good right now with the windows but the coat says you know in section 303 that's eight percent we currently have about um uh it's uh 10.5 percent right now with the existing window and if i were to put a smaller window in there there would be a casement i would be right at that borderline with the glazing area so that's kind of what we didn't want to reduce the lighting the natural lighting
054in the space at least the front bedroom the back bedroom if you look at the plan there's the back bedroom it's got two windows and that has a substantial amount of lighting in there so you have a section where the doors are and it looks like there's space underneath there for the two doors you have an 85 inch ceiling height and then you got six foot five door but it looks to me like you got four by four well there's a floor beam in that right below above the door and so i have what i measured on site it looks like to be about an inch at the most from the floor beam to the top of the head of the door there don't know exactly but we didn't want to have to tear the
055doors out and try and we weren't sure whether we were going to be able to raise those doors just an inch to get that clearance to meet the building code when it meets the housing code currently and so the the floor beam goes up from front to back of the house and it's the wall is right below that floor beam and that's for bedroom one and bedroom four uh yeah both both the basement bedrooms in a bedroom is there a reason why this isn't going in front of the housing board of appeals because it was unpermitted work i see so that falls under the building department's jurisdiction not housing okay it seems like a lot of it they're addressing the housing code issues so they're waiting to variants um well it's all because this isn't
056permitted and if you look yeah so housing code is for you know dwellings that haven't been altered so that they can be used in a different manner this dwelling was altered and then is trying to be used in a different manner so i think that that's where the difference is and here again it wasn't part of our the owner purchased the property after this what work was done this is pre you know it was done prior to the owner ever purchasing the house the owner the original owners were his parents the original owner was his parents they purchased the house in 94. he inherited the property after they passed away so the work seems to be done that was done in the 80s from what we can tell so it was prior to them owning
057their house so if you reframed the door the head of the door so that it was right up to the underside of that joist would you get your six six um up to the beam yeah it's questionable whether we could do it or not we might be able to pull them out and reframe them um there's a section in appendix j that says that um doors being replaced too i think it's what is it um [Applause] good i'm looking at 10xj401.2 where it says that if you replace the door with a material that's slightly different you're allowed that discrepancy as far as what is considerable minor reducing in width and so if we take this door out you know we're allowed we're entitled to our appendix j to maybe reduce that width or height just
058slightly so we thought well if we have to do this anyways then why can't we exercise appendix j in this case uh what's the fire what's the smoke detection fire alarms uh there's interconnected smoke detectors in every sleeping room and on every floor that we can tell they're there um they're working is this space currently occupied uh it's not occupied currently because the work's being done right now what work is being done right now the replacement of the staircase okay and this um one unit in this house or they're running the basement something in the rest of the house or so it's 740 square feet the first floor has got a living dining and one sleeping room in the rear um bathroom in the kitchen upstairs the downstairs has got two sleeping rooms a bat
059a bath downstairs and a kitchenette in the basement as well so so this will be a regular okay it would be a regular single family rental it's my understanding renting the whole house that's my understanding but it's not being set up that way um i don't you know it's it's set up as a single family rental i think that's what the my owner the owner is planning on doing i think that's what it's always there's no there's no division between the upstairs and the downstairs so there's no two forms of entry way or anything like there's a there's a side entry and a front entry and uh you could um there's a door at the top of the stairs but it's not lockable or anything so it's not like it's for the handle being switched
060out well yeah i don't know right now it's not lockable it's not it's they're connected together the spaces what is the hardware on the bedroom doors the hardware that's this knob right currently i mean is it a are they lockable no that's a passage it's a piece of attention this is just a quick question that is not so much code based in a case like this where you have an egress windows right that you're really relying on and it's a double hung situation and it's a day like today what's the likelihood that someone's going to stick an air conditioning unit in there so that that window doesn't become functional as an egress window if it's a say if it's a casement is that what you're asking for oh if it's a double hung i mean
061it could happen so ahead of making a motion i don't see any reason why any of these things couldn't be rectified i mean there it's not a voluminous amount of work in relation to what's already been done it it all looks eminently doable um the wall itself would be problematic in the hallway um with the tile cart tile in the bathroom in the floor yeah the tile in the bathroom and moving that hallway to move that wall two and a quarter inches is seems a little um difficult as far as turning into the space and having them move that's that wall over the hallway itself is 20 feet long and it's shorter at one end um and it makes it uh what's this you is it land ceiling or is that a diploid ceiling it's
062a drywall ceiling in the whole space but it's not it's only not to code in front of the bathroom yeah that's what i i stated that though you know that hallway area there leads to not have little spaces um and then the space where the exit is for the bedrooms is actually got a wider corridor there of four foot three so so your only problem is from that bedroom door back to the laundry room so that is the kitchen oh it gets kitchenette down there yeah there's a kitchenette yeah and you're not able to move that small part of wall well over it to help here again it's existing and it meets the housing code and we're trying to avoid tearing into the tile and and having to replace the whole bathroom floor and all
063that why would you live towards the bathroom i'm talking about the bedroom oh the bedroom can't go into the bedroom which would rectify the door and the hallway issue all at once um well i had to move it substantially into the bedroom area as far as you know so there's a lot of it's a lot of work there to tear that wall down in four inches isn't it 36 minimum it's 36 minutes 36 minimum yeah yeah we're two and a quarter inches short it's uh if if i may it's a section r 311.6 always the width of a hallway shall be not less than three feet three feet i i almost tend to agree with almost the comet which sounds like they just don't want to do the work well they're saying that this was
064existing and it wasn't there yeah i mean this wouldn't have come up unless they were trying to get get it approved through the housing and it it comes up not necessarily it passes the housing code and it's it's now we're they're being forced to say that this is not wasn't permitted and we don't know whether this was actually what the state of this was done under and um to have to go through and get this all permitted understood but there isn't anything here that's an insurmountable or technically infeasible thing to do yeah that's i mean i think that's the point you know and and i mean it's i think it's it's obviously it's admirable that you're rebuilding the staircase but equally good or better than the code is just a minimum yeah right so we
065looked at all these issues as a as a kind of a whole and we tried to pick out the things that you know the major violations and try and improve that to make everything equally or better but it sounds to me like you chose the stairs well that was the main that was the major violation that we saw but the firemen going into a unit is not a major violation uh well there again we most firemen will destroy the window if they get into the house um within but it's still short right it's it's 19 and a quarter inches high or 19.5 inches high yeah so you got four and a half inches there you got two and a half inches then you got one inch that's i just don't i me personally i just
066don't see the there's not an inept ability to change out some things to say yeah you're right you can't do it okay you know there again it's just that we thought it meant the housing code the client meant to help you know and he would like to not have to go back and fix something that wasn't his responsibility and um saying that it wasn't um you know he seemed to think that this work was existing prior and didn't require a permit that you know it was already permitted or done by someone else he he took you know he inherited the house and now he's being burdened to have to fix things that he hasn't had a renter who's been living there hasn't been rented he's been living there uh his parents were living there i
067don't know if um he was renting it out after that point period after you inherited the house from his parents so inherited the house now he wants to try to make it a rental i just it just to me it just doesn't seem like get a couple doors try to move a couple walls it's not like there's a a beam right there that he can't break through where there's a solid beam underneath top bottom it's masonry wall okay well there is a beam underneath the doors currently but you can move that wall two inches in well the beam is like seven or eight inches wide so if i move that wall i'm still underneath the beam um but if you move the wall six inches you would clear the beam it would be more than
068that probably have to be at least a foot just to get but you're talking in it for that for the door part of it it sounds like we're talking fractions of an inch i mean if the door went directly to the underside of the beam would you have the six foot six i don't know for sure we didn't we didn't tear into it and i don't then you have the issue if you get that door to work the hallway's not wide enough right outside that door well i think i know what you're talking about i think actually moving the the door is one thing but the wall is something else and however the moving of the wall and the door and that particular bedroom might work out right it would solve two things two things
069i agree with you all right so here again we're like i said we're talking about fractions of an inch for these things and it meets the housing code and the owner felt you know if it's better than most of the houses in the city that um you know it comes down to that i'm sorry yeah i'm really sorry that that's not relevant i understand okay a lot of the other houses in the city are super questionable how they ever got passed for for what is being presented here again i don't see that it's such a tremendous burden out of what they're going to get for this to do this work as a matter of construction feasibility costs what you know and improved safety i mean i'm very well familiar with the limitations on a double
070hung window in terms of egress because i have the same existing situation from 50 years ago in my house i can believe it or not i can get out of a one foot nine inch window opening but it's not easy and it doesn't have to be that way and they have the wherewithal to fix that by just changing out the window um yeah but there again that section j allows us to keep the same style it was compliant the time it was built but it may not be compliant on time it was built because it didn't get a permit yeah and we don't know if i mean those windows were there from the time it was built in 1940 so they were replaced at some point in time so yeah um you know if they
071were replaced with lifestyle back then why isn't it acceptable now today there's never been 19 inches clear opening though i know but you know j the section j is there for replacement i don't know what style what window was there when it was replaced in the in the 1980s so there again it's just we go back in there we're allowed to replace this window keep the same style and function of the window under section j so technically we could put that back that window back in there again and it would still be code compliant its existing window i may not have been in bedroom before i don't know well so i got documentation from that that people were living there back in the 80s based on the permits that were done through the community development
072block program program so we know the people were living down there so it's all in the city archives so those windows were there prior to probably when the house was built now they were replaced at one time and so those you know it's the same it's the same situation that happened back then they put new windows in there you know that would have been the same issue that if it happened back then they'd be looking at the same issue we have today so i just don't see it as that much work yeah and i know everyone has a different you know yeah we just see the windows as a new point if i'm if i'm entitled to put that function back in there um why can't the you know why can't i take the exception
073j and just use those windows that are currently in there as a as the window itself so is there a period of time that if it hasn't been ready for a period of time that's a concern i mean something that hasn't been rendered prepared now they want to re-rent it into some of those things you know what they're going to bring back up the phone because he hasn't rented it for i don't know how long it's been vacant there's a rental in that dominant level i don't know for sure he you know multiple years possibly i don't know for sure how long he's he's had the property i mean his parents had the property in 94 and he inherited it was his last rental inspection i guess that would be a trigger this was effective
074no he hasn't had a rental inspection uh january 11th was the first time he's had a rental inspection because he was looking at renting the parks the property okay so people living down there with all housing inspections that's what it sounded like yeah people are living down there prior to that it seems i think all those things adding up together that that hasn't been inspected for housing stuff the things that are to be applied on the housing the housing code dates to like the 70s i mean it just hasn't kept up with the building code for life safety issues doesn't address the same level of egress concerns and i mean those those windows are probably near the end of the useful life probably gonna have a seal failure and they're gonna put a same window
075back in and versus the window that would be you know uh well so i don't the windows seem to be functioning fine you know the way they are i don't know if they're at the end of their life but um like i said if if we go and put back in the same window we're entitled to that under under section j yeah why can't we just it'd be nice just to keep those windows the way they are right now they're functioning and um permitted at least those windows if we we could possibly you know try and see if we can investigate raising the doors and an inch that can accommodate the six foot six clearance or which is what's required in basements but if the owner inhabited the house and does remodel he wouldn't in
076this clarification he wouldn't have to update the window because of section section j if if the building department was in and saw that the basement had been finished without permits we'd be in the same place it just so happens that it was a rental inspection that triggered the um observation of something that was done unpermitted so so you sort of end in the same place is that does that answer your question it does it just no matter what something would have had been fixed at some point but now he just wants to rent it out and that's what yeah he doesn't want to spend the money to update yeah i mean ultimately i think we'd like to just keep the windows i mean that's the crux of it is what um and avoid having to
077tear into the space but we're going through the with the city right now on permitting making the we're trying to make everything permeable we pull the building permit we're going through there inspecting all the electrical and everything else and so we're we're trying to do you know our due diligence on our end to do that um we just didn't want this window fail that inspection which inspection the you know trying to get a new permit and they would have would they have to update the windows um there's so the windows were put in without a permit so i think that that section in appendix j is for an existing home where somebody just wants to put in replacement windows where they didn't have the same requirements of the time if we look back and if
078we accept that this remodel happened in the 80s i have the boca codes as the appendix right they are pretty much the same requirements as they are now so if it was done improperly then yeah it doesn't make it okay to keep going with it doesn't make it okay now right had it been you know had the requirements been different it had been permitted in the 80s and remodeled then they would be able to replace that window but because of the way that it happened in the situation it doesn't i don't think that um emanuel j or not manuel j appendix j right is is um can be used in this situation if they were to go four inches lower is there a maximum height for egress out of a window to make this a
079new window work is that florida um cell height is 44 inches they would go below that so they couldn't give it a caller they want to keep a double home yeah so but i mean again i don't know the exact measurements but putting a casement in there might yeah resolve the issue and we don't know if a casement window would actually work uh i mean 36 inch casement would work it would work it would be 6.3 square square feet yes a 36 inch casement it just reduces the currently the it would it would fit inside the opening but it would reduce the amount of you'd have to build it build it in we'd have to build it down he's going to rebuild the window well just make them four inches deeper know what the sales
080warrant is well we got i don't want to have to cut the concrete wall out that's the cme though yeah cmu but yeah and you got one more course and put a sale in there and yeah yeah so i mean uh i guess the easiest solution would be to change the function but if we're allowed like i'm saying is if we're allowed to replace the window that was it's an existing window um with like use i i was my impression that we could claim appendix j for the new window but you can't right because it wasn't compliant when it was built well i mean this window the opening was there since the 1940s since the house was permitted originally so but you don't know what the use was this is uh there's probably a change
081of use involved here as well it's a single family residence it's always but now it's gonna be rental it'll be a rental yeah but it's always been a single family residence up to this point you have a moving forward yeah you're changing the use from a residential to a rental it's the same use but it's just it's same news right residential can rent it triggers other stuff well i mean there's bedrooms upstairs too right there there's a bedroom and a kitchen i mean the basement could have been unfinished in 1940 small basement windows down there that he made bigger than her put the windows in the 80s well so the basement according to the documentation that i see from the city from the community block grant program when it came in inspected that that basement
082was subdivided so that there were people living down there so the information that i found out says that it was being used it wasn't it wasn't unfinished but it was being used because they replaced the electrical down there and they wired those rooms with new switches and stuff so it shows in the community block program that they fixed up those rooms down there that was in the 80s that was in the 80s so um it's it says that in the work description of that work so i know that those rooms were being used down there um there was a letter to this city um from the owner at the time saying that her family was living there at the point so i've got that documentation that the the resident that was living there was um
083using that space as well so whether it was in the same state i don't know it was it was being used as a living space down there emotion or answer all your questions i move in the case of bba 22-2001 the appeal of the building officials decision that the work to be performed at 1299 herpst is denied and the building board of appeals affirms the building officials decision for the following reasons number one the true intent of the 2015 measure residential code in sections 310.1 311 r311.2.1 and r311.6 governing the construction 1299 herbs have been correctly interpreted by the building official two the provisions of 2015 michigan residential code section r3 10.1 r311.2.1 and r311.6 applies to the construction at 1299 herbst and three the applicant has not proposed an equal or better form of
084construction the second on the motion the second that any other discussion on the motion you take a vote those in favor say aye aye aye those opposed i was just a denial so it's yeah so it's i'm gonna vote in favor so it's three a's zero nays so the denial motion passes okay [Applause] next item on the event agenda is old business nothing listed there next item is new business any new business discussion we have a new person on board welcome welcome thank you and uh do you have a motion for a german leave to adjourn german passes we are adjourned at 303