001like schweijhoffer present for staff we have mike lemieux john riser and myself brandi lewis can i just make one point uh made to me by ctn that with our masks please make sure that you speak directly into the microphones thank you for that reminder all right roll call is completed uh on our agenda next is the approval of the agenda we have an agenda uh before us could i have a motion to approve the agenda all right we have a motion second second all in favor please signify by saying aye hi opposed all right our agenda is approved up now we have public commentary so this is an opportunity for persons to speak for up to three minutes about any issue on this agenda we will first call on individuals present to address the commission
002then remote participants to speak during this time remotely press star 9 if listening by phone or use the raise hand feature if viewing through the web link for phone access call 877-853-5247 and enter meeting id city staff will select callers that have their hand raised and use the last three digits of your phone number or by name if available for those accessing through the web link you will hear an automated announcement that the host is allowing you to speak when speaking please move to a quiet area and mute any television or background sounds so that we may hear you clearly for either method of participation please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments is there anyone present that would like to speak at this time okay i don't see anyone in
003the room is there anyone that would like to address the commission remotely we have no one in the waiting room all right i will close public comment moving on the next item on our agenda is approval of minutes before us we have the housing board of appeals meeting minutes of september 14 2021. i'd like to make entertain a motion to approve the minutes all right we have a motion second thank you all in favor of the um approval of the minutes say aye aye opposed all right the minutes are approved next item on our agenda is unfinished business does anyone on the board have unfinished business that they wish to discuss not hearing any we will move on to new business new business before us is the hba 21-004 variance application for 906 5th street
004ann arbor 48103 all right and um can we first have the staff report please sure um staff recommends that this variance not be granted as it jeopardizes public health and safety the permit referenced from 1997 by the petitioner states that it's a second story edition that was pardon me 10 by 24. the space being rented does not meet the code requirements of um of the time both in 1987 and 1999 boca codes were researched and they both have requirements that the space does not meet it appears this space would be acceptable as storage but is now being used as habitable space and it doesn't meet the minimum standards of the ann arbor rental code or any applicable building codes and was rented out prior to a rental inspection this uh this property came to the
005staff's attention as an unregistered rental through a complaint i would like to add that if this if this area was intended or wanted to be used as habitable space it would require a building permit and it would also require that it meet the minimum code requirements of the current code all right thanks mike are there any questions for staff at this time go ahead just to be clear there's a reference to uh the permanent for a second story edition but this is the third floor over here today so that's correct and is the the room in question considered occupiable as a bedroom you'll be able to go buy it by code i'm assuming it's just square footage yeah it's a ceiling height square footage and a door height issue so i have a quick question
006the whole house is the rental not just this bedroom right um i believe bedrooms are rentals are they rentals separately like you rent them out by lease to separate people yes gotcha all right are there other questions for staff all right not seeing any at this time and it looks like we have the appellant in the room did you want to uh address the board or make a presentation yes i did great please approach the podium thank you i am barbara h stewart and i've been a resident at 906 5th street since so about 30 years i'm a widow i have two grown children one living in detroit one in chicago and i have a host of health issues that have made this whole thing very difficult they include spinal stenosis peripheral artery disease and
007copd and adhd the space was always intended as a bedroom space we installed baseboard heat in it for the bedroom not the storage my son used it as a bedroom from 2003 to 2011. he is six foot and lived happily with his baseboard heat and since then various people have stayed there for rent or not usually family or friends of family now and it was 2018 or 2019 my son and i came up with the idea that we would use the room on the third floor for airbnb to help pay for our mortgage which at the time my son was paying all of it we've enlarged that to three rental units and have been very popular with no small sacrifice of time or money the first inspection that we had resulted in a whole book
008of non-compliance in september we spent over ten thousand dollars to getting compliance and i saw that the addition to the triangle room as we call it would be 35 000 for the ceiling modification um this is certainly beyond our means the way that we came to your attention was through a guest in in my house who is a long-term guest at the beginning of the pandemic she became psycho she barricaded herself in the room came down and screamed at me if i had anybody in the house and you couldn't go within any space of her or she would just flip out so i'm not surprised that it was she who complained we hadn't registered before because we didn't realize we were supposed to i know innocence is no excuse for the law but that's the
009truth now if i didn't have that room and the third floor wasn't available i'd lose my most popular and very unique rental and those rentals continue to pay my mortgage the alternative is to move the bedroom into the big room which would ruin the flow of the rooms but moreover knock out a 90 year old window to meet egress standards so i just want to finish my brief comments with the idea that we are a family not a corporation and i feel like we've been judged harshly in all respects of inspection questions thank you other questions from the board for the large room and i realize the city is not evaluating my current condition but is the egress window if you understand it the size of the window a major issue yeah it would have
010to be knocked out i don't know i have a question follow-up question similar to jerry's um the context of opening the entire floor so it's like a studio space and adding a window and removing the the header issue over the door the height so you'd knock out that wall yes huh and making it a single large yeah but it would still have the sloped wall the sloped ceiling right when i was wondering some did you explore that as an option as potential no okay no i hadn't money is an object yes um but that that sounds feasible too and changing out the window was a question yeah as well because you know the health and safety of somebody up there is paramount well all they have to do is turn around and 10 feet down
011there is a aggressible window with no door in between them it's like the one big room extends with an aggressible window at one end and one that doesn't egress properly on the other end did that answer your question yes i got a question i don't see where the stairs are do you have interior stairs yes where are they i don't see them in the picture or the map here the blueprints yeah i think this is the attic stairs yeah but you're right i didn't outside of the house i hope not looks like it is i don't think the drawings are to scale well sure but well what the the drawing tries to show and doesn't very well you go down the stairs and make a right angle turn and then go down another short flight
012of stairs okay so they i guess they sort of wrap around the wall going down we did a um a short modification that dropped the stairs so that there was more headroom [Applause] so you're taking this photo from the stairs yes gotcha thank you ready no question for the inspector sure mike we have a question when you get a chance that's mike what's this height from from here down to the floor the ceiling down to the floor um i don't know that i have an exact measurement on that um but less than seven feet yeah i think that the door is five foot seven six what is it five point six oh so the door is five feet six inches so that's another six so they're probably at six feet so if you're six feet
013tall you're hitting your head on the ceiling okay well i'm six feet tall you'd like my room you think yeah i've had some tall people stay in there and they enjoy the kind of grotto like atmosphere of the a-frame it's very good for sleeping i hear do you have other questions all right and at this time i don't have any questions either from staff or uh from our applicant i am um i will let you know where i'm at just in my own thoughts before we take a vote because i think it's helpful to talk through some of these things it sounds like there are some alternatives that might be less expensive including changing the flow or addressing the 90 year old window which i know are not maybe preferable but it does meet your
014overall interest in having that room be a rental room there may be alternatives to explore as well making it more of a studio space and again that would be something the city could evaluate and maybe work with you i don't i don't have the ability to say whether that would meet code right now or not and i don't know if those are alternatives that would be acceptable but for some of those reasons i am not going to i'm not in favor of granting the variance today but i'm certainly happy to entertain emotion or i'm happy to make a motion discussion so our three criteria are practical doesn't violate the perception of the code which is done doesn't jeopardize public health and the code is now in the codes at the time are in order to
015reflect the minimum required for public safety yeah i don't think there's enough data there may be other options that are less of a hardship and i certainly appreciate your concerns so that space would be okay as non-habitable space i believe that was what the city included in their report for storage or other something not considered non-habitable space as as it is now i mean does that mean that people can't use it at all going to defer to the city on further discussions of how the space can be used okay um it could be used as you would an attic space you can store things up there the the intent of that would be that there's not somebody up there long term there's somebody up there you know putting something in taking something out and that
016ultimately the space is just used to store um you know whatever household items might not happen right now would further modifications allow that space to be used differently so if they change that space from storage to habitable they have to meet the current code requirements and i believe that there would also be stair issues um that would come into play with that i believe that the variances that that were requested here excluded some of the other issues which were stair head room clearance and things like that okay i only addressed the the two items that were asked for variants on there's plenty of headroom in the staircase what you need is handrails according to my report and and so if if you choose to go forward with changing this to habitable space you'll have to
017provide us you know a building permit application with a plan we'll do a code evaluation at that point to make sure that all of the elements meet the requirements for habitable space that's the modification of the small room the entire space because the stairway would need to be addressed for the entire space airway would have to be addressed but the ceiling wouldn't have to be so if you're if you're changing it from storage which is acceptable now to habitable it would need to meet all of the requirements of the current code so i don't i i don't know off of the top of my head what that ex what that means exactly for this space but it's something that um would need to be evaluated to make sure that it meets meets the current requirements
018and that's going through the rehabilitation code which gives once you change uh change the the use of a space then you have to meet the current code requirements okay i guess what what i'm confused about is if i hang a curtain over that 5.6 door does that mean that the large room is going to be habitable with the modification on the window you know because i believe um i believe that you still have the square foot issue and headroom issue in that room as well don't that room is fine again um if you if you choose to change it to habitable space we would need to see a plan to do a full evaluation on it to make sure that it was meeting the codes can i get an assessment before the work is done
019that would be the plan review process when you apply for the permit okay all right so it looks like i better start planning for change unfortunately okay am i done all right well yeah if unless you have any questions we do need to make a motion an official determination so i'm going to go ahead and i'll make that motion that the case hba21-004 the appeal of the building officials decision that the rental unit 906 is denied and the housing board of appeals affirms the building officials decision for the reasons stated below which include the variants would jeopardize public health and safety can i have a second thank you all in favor aye aye opposed all right motion carries so i guess i'm done here yes thank you thank you all right i don't have anything
020else on our agenda for today under new business so the next item is adjournment someone like to make a motion to adjourn it's always the most popular motion to make in a meeting all in favor aye opposed thank you meeting is adjourned