City of Aurora Historic Preservation Commission met April 14.
Here are the minutes provided by the commission:
CALL TO ORDER
Chairman Miller called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m.
ROLL CALL
The following Preservation Commission members were present: Justyn Arnold, Fernando Castrejon, Amber Foster, Matt Hanson, Seth Hoffman, Kristin Ludwig, Dan Miller, Simon Munoz and Mike Walker. Al Signorelli arrived around 6:25 p.m.
OTHERS PRESENT
The following staff members were present: Mrs. Morgan and Mrs. Jackson.
Others Present: None.
APPROVAL OF MINUTES
22-0304 Approval of the Minutes of the Historic Preservation Commission meeting on March 10, 2022.
A motion was made by Mrs. Ludwig, seconded by Mr. Castrejon, that the minutes be approved and filed. The motion carried by voice vote.
COA REPORT
22-0303 March 2022 Historic Certificate of Appropriateness Report There were no questions on the COA report.
This COA Report was discussed and filed.
PUBLIC COMMENT
None.
AGENDA
22-0291 2022 Historic Preservation Grant Applications (City of Aurora - 22-0291 /KDWK-22.022-PZ/HP - JM).
Mrs. Morgan said the committee met last week. They ranked them with high, high/medium, medium, medium/low and low. I was going to go through them in the order the committee did them. We’ll just individually go through the committee’s recommendations, talk about them as we go and then at the end, if there are any others people want to talk about, that the ones that the committee ranked as low should be discussed in more detail and maybe be bumped up, we can discuss those and then see where we are money-wise. I would also recommend that we have 1 or 2 in line just in case someone decides they are not going to take the grant and then we can just bring one more right onto it. We actually ended up with a little more funding.
When I met with the committee, originally, we were allocated $100,000, but at the last minute, City Council ended up providing additional funds, so we’re at $157,000.
402 S. 4th Street – The project for this was porch restoration and siding repair and included replacing the columns, repair/replace the porch railing and floor and repair/replace siding. One caveat, a condition that the committee would like to make, is that the columns need to be restored first if possible. The cost estimate calls for just outright replacement. This project is coming in with a contingency of 10% around $24,370.
Chairman Miller said it does have substantial deterioration, even more than I thought what the picture showed. I noticed the contractor had written something about replacing some siding and I’m not sure what siding he is referring to, but I think that would need to be approved through a regular COA process. But the porch does have substantial deterioration.
Mrs. Ludwig said I have the total of this at $21,000, not $24,000 with the buffer.
Mrs. Morgan said the maximum amount we can grant is $21,000. The project is coming in over more than our maximum grant amount of $21,000. Just, I guess, to remind everyone how the grant funding works, the first $10,000 we will outright grant 100%. Anything over the $10,000 does require the owner to match it dollar for dollar. If you do use a local contractor for at least 50% of the work, you’ll get up to a $1,000 bonus to basically go toward your match. Obviously, it won’t be more than the project, so if you only have to match $500 and you use a local contractor then we’ll give you $500.
Mrs. Ludwig said the other reason, just for the rest of Commission, why this one ranked so high, we actually only had 3 applicants for the Near Eastside and only 4 for the east side in general, and of the Eastside, this was definitely the one that we thought could get the most bang for the buck for what they needed done.
Chairman Miller said does the porch have a gutter?
Mrs. Morgan said I’m not sure.
Chairman Miller said even if we don’t know right now, could we consider approving with the recommendation that the porch roof should have a gutter on it if it does not have one now. That could be a reason why there is so much decay in the floor and the bottoms of the columns and the railing on the steps.
Mr. Arnold said the current Google Maps picture has a gutter on it.
Chairman Miller said is everyone okay with this grant applicant? I’m not hearing any objections. Do you want to skip onto 427 W. New York Street?
427 W. New York Street – This one is for repair of rotted soffits, cornice, trim, porch and paint. It includes replacing the porch columns, repair roof leak, replace deteriorated handrails, floorboards, scrape, prime and paint wood. The condition on this is to investigate if there is a water issue causing the rot. This was also over-budget, so they get the maximum $21,000. They proposed $47,000.
Mr. Hoffman said did they only have 1 estimate?
Mrs. Morgan said they did only have 1 estimate.
Chairman Miller said I walked by this one also and it is substantial deterioration that seems to have happened fairly quickly. I read through the estimate from their contractor. It wasn’t exactly clear. It seemed that the contractor wrote in roof is leaking and gee that sure better get fixed, but it wasn’t clear that this contractor was actually fixing that. I really support this application. We may have to work with them because they may have a little more work to do. This has the boxed in gutters that I think might not be working.
Mrs. Ludwig said this was the one where we gave them the option either you could do this first or convert that money to do the gutters first. That’s what I have in my notes.
The gutters need to happen before this. We also thought this one was important because of the location being right across from that park that’s pretty new. It is very prominent.
Mr. Signorelli said it’s a prime example of its architecture and I think it is a premier contributing property in Tanner right now.
Chairman Miller said I don’t see any downspouts on the porches. This one I kind of want to volunteer more of Jill’s time to work with them and maybe some other kind people like Justyn and Seth if they are open to meeting with people who might want to help them understand how to maintain the house. The money could be redirected toward gutters and they may reach the $20,000 limit just on relining gutters. I’m afraid of replacing wood, but we haven’t addressed the water problem.
Mr. Hanson said it shouldn’t be either or, it should be contingent on making sure that all the leaking issues are repaired to. If the gutters and roof aren’t going to be done, then why are spending money below it?
Chairman Miller said I would have that same concern.
Mrs. Morgan said so I can have it that they need to reach out to a contractor that does gutters and have someone come in and take a look at their gutters to see if it needs work and then address that and then anything left could go to the rest.
Mr. Hanson said until the leak and whatever extent they are leaking is repaired, this conversation shouldn’t even be in consideration.
Mrs. Morgan said are you thinking that we should hold off, go back to them and say they need to have someone look at the gutters and roof first?
Mr. Hanson said they may have already had that done. They are not applying for our help with that, but it’s got be part of the bigger conversation.
Mrs. Ludwig said I think that’s why we wanted to say that if somebody comes and looks at the gutters and they decided that needs to happen first, then they could take that $21,000 and apply it there, so at least that work gets fixed. If they had come in originally and said that we need to do the gutters, we probably would have awarded it.
Mr. Hanson said that changes my mentality for that then because lots of people need roof repairs. They are applying for something else. I’m happy to support this repair if the other work is being done. I’m not giving them help for a roof right away because a lot of people need roof help.
Mrs. Morgan said you are thinking if they apply themselves for an HCOA for roof and gutters then we would grant this, but not necessarily give the money for roof and gutter repair.
Mr. Hanson said yes.
Chairman Miller said I agree with at least part of that in that we need to address the gutters first. In this case, in the homes with the boxed in gutters, I am willing to support that as a historic preservation grant. It is part of the home that needs to be maintained. All these boxed in gutters, they are 100 years old now and plus they’ve all outlived their usefulness. It is an unusually expensive repair and it’s an integral part of the house that most people don’t have. Although I agree if they are just saying I want a new set of K-type gutters, then I would not support that as a historic preservation grant. So I think of it as a, like the roof on Wilder we did support and it is very unusual that we provide grants for roofs, but that was a historically significant roof as opposed to what most of just have, like an asphalt shingled roof, which I would not support a grant for my roof, which is not a historic preservation project. It is asphalt shingles.
For this house, I could support relining boxed gutters.
Mr. Signorelli said that’s a historic feature in itself.
Chairman Miller said I don’t know if that addresses your concern Matt. I’m separating the historic gutter. It is an architectural feature the house has as opposed to just reroofing their house. I’m thinking it is the water in the built-in gutter that might be leaking through those soffits and causing them to rot out.
Mr. Hoffman said I would agree that it is rotted out around one of those outlets that’s missing a downspout. I don’t have a lot of confidence of that single estimate that they have. Their estimate is not very well written either, which isn’t an indication of their craftsmanship, but…
Chairman Miller said in this case, it is more work for Jill, but we are proposing we support them. This house is important, but we are basically changing what they applied for. I’m saying they really have to look at the boxed in gutters. I think this estimate is for woodwork and I thought the contractor wrote something, gee the roof is leaking, and someone needs to fix that. It wasn’t clear to me that this contractor was offering to do that. They need to get contractors in that do gutters if they are willing to work with us on that.
Mrs. Morgan said I can make sure that they have to first provide an estimate from a gutter expert and then we can go from there.
502 Oak – This is for window and door restoration. Restore 25 windows, including glass, cords, balances, etc. Replace aluminum storm windows with wood storm
windows. Restore 3 exterior doors and paint to match existing color. This one will be a max of $21,000.
Mrs. Ludwig said Linda has suggested that this one be contingent on removal of those 4 shutters. I kind of debate that because what’s underneath those shutters? Like how much more work are we putting on them? We don’t know what is under there.
Mr. Hoffman said they are going to repaint this soon anyway because the flipper’s paint is flaking.
Chairman Miller said I think the project overall is very ambitious restoring all these windows and creating new wooden storm windows. Do you recall, did this include replacing like the window in the attic? One of them has been replaced with a vent or a screen or something.
Mrs. Ludwig said what bumped this up so high for us is that they are going from a non-historic storm window and going to wood.
Mrs. Morgan said I can’t find for certain if they included replacing the vent or not. They have a photo of it. I would think it would, but I can’t guarantee that. Do we want to condition that that vent needs to be replaced with a window?
Mr. Hoffman said the restoration work estimate, that specifically itemizes single light fixed window attic 2, so that’s there. Historic Homeworks, they itemize 4 fixed windows. They highlight the picture of it. They are clearly aware of it. It certainly appears that they intended to do that.
515 Oak – This one is a chimney repair to rebuild 30 courses and concrete cap.
There were 2 cost estimates, $6,900 and $1,900, so the committee went with the lower amount with a grant of about $2,100.
Chairman Miller said this is a smaller grant request. It could be a bit of a safety concern in that she was concerned that the chimney might actually fall down.
Mrs. Morgan said she is concerned with stability of the chimney.
Mr. Hoffman said I think there is some value in having some diversity in the type of project too.
Mrs. Morgan said does anyone have any thought on the difference in the cost estimates being so dramatic? Anyone seem like the lower one seems too low?
Chairman Miller said I didn’t think so. I was wondering why a chimney would cost $6,000.
Mr. Hoffman said the E. G. Masonry for $1,900 does seem very low. It might be something to clarify.
Mrs. Morgan said do we still want to go with the lower one or the higher one or give a larger than 10% contingency? We’ve done that before if we think the lower one is too low.
Mrs. Ludwig said I think it might be a good idea to raise that one up a little bit, like we bring it up to $4,000.
Mrs. Morgan said if we say $4,000 and they come back lower, then that’s all you get.
535 W. Downer Place – This is for gutter, downspout and siding repair. Reline the box gutters with copper, repair ornate scupper boxes, downspouts, brackets, porch and siding repair. This one also came in over our grant amount and would be a maximum of $21,000.
Mrs. Ludwig said this is a former Mayor’s home. It’s on a prominent corner at Downer Place and May. It is a local landmark, so not in a historic district, but we’ve been trying to encourage more people in this area to maybe be in a historic district someday. This is a very, very big project that she’s taking in part, so she’s been a successful grant recipient before and did the whole side porch, which is very nice.
She’s got to redo the carriage house. She’s got the front porch things leaning and whatever, so she’s actually doing what we’re asking the other people to and that is to fix the water stuff first before going for the aesthetics, so that’s exactly what she’s doing. She is going to be putting in a lot of her own money on this, so this would obviously be a big help toward maintaining the home. She is very much into trying to do it right, so she is going copper as you can see.
Mr. Hoffman said I like that the emphasis of this application is the gutters and downspouts.
Mrs. Ludwig said you can’t see it in the photo, but she is getting significant water damage.
Chairman Miller said I like this proposal because there is a structural issue and she is proposing to address that. It is endangering the structural integrity of the home.
Mr. Hoffman said it appears she has estimates from competent contractors.
Mr. Signorelli said this one is very deserving.
327 W. New York Street – This is to repair siding and soffits and painting. Fix areas on soffit that have holes, repair wood siding and paint entire house.
Chairman Miller said I thought it was more like the other paint jobs. I kind of wanted to move it down and look at it with some of the other people’s jobs. I didn’t see a lot of structural work that needed to be done here. When we looked at it in committee, I was understanding it needed more structural work or more wood replacement.
Rereading that entire application, I didn’t really see a lot.
Mrs. Ludwig said the last batch that we looked at were all the highs. This starts the medium highs. I can move it down.
Mr. Signorelli said I think that painting only should be moved down to, frankly, with how much money we might have left over at the end. I’m very conflicted, again, with paint jobs only. I don’t feel like we should necessarily award a grant for painting only.
Although having said that, sometimes painting only means scraping, priming, so there’s more work involved. But the ideal situation for us, I think, is to award someone for not only painting, but historically appropriate repairs.
Chairman Miller said I agree. That’s why I wanted to move that one down and talk about it in conjunction with some other people that basically submitted for paint jobs.
Mr. Signorelli said but my conflict is we have a couple here where the paint job may be on a property that’s on a prominent corner, for example. There’s one here that we are giving a Mayor’s award to that’s in a prominent place and the paint job looks wonderful and it makes the view look nice, so there’s that to be said too about painting.
Mr. Castrejon said you’re right. What we did we when we went through round 1, those in those categories of paint jobs, we kind of put them at the bottom more as maintenance versus any restoration.
Chairman Miller said and what I was saying with 327 W. New York Street is originally in the committee, we looked at it as if it needed a lot more work done to it. When I reread the whole application, I changed my mind. It looked more like just a point job.
However, I think there are some things we can do with it and move it down a little bit.
We might still want to consider partially funding that. There are some things we can do there.
551 W. Downer Place – Storm window repair and painting.
Mrs. Ludwig said they have lot of problems going on with this house. They’ve been doing a lot on the back. There is a lot of water coming in. There is a lot of roof deterioration to the point of animals like living in the house. But they are doing all that work on their own dime on the back. But they are getting wood rot, so it is more than just paint here. There is going to be quite a bit of work that needs to happen up high.
It is a historic landmark. This is the Hannah Lancaster home, so 2 very prominent
Aurora families, sister-in-law to the Lake family, so the 3 homes that you see side, by side, by side, those are all considered the Lake homes. They were all built for the
Lake family. This one, I think, we agreed on it because this house is all windows. We felt that it was such a prominent feature for this home that that was why we…
Chairman Miller said the windows are the primary significance of this house. The proposal is restoration and re-glazing of the storms that are protecting those windows.
They are having some deterioration.
Mr. Hoffman said so all the window quotes here are for storm windows and not the primary windows?
Chairman Miller said for the storms. It has like the original wooden storms on it.
Mr. Signorelli said this is more than painting. This is a very worthwhile place to put the money.
Mrs. Ludwig said and it is a project they can’t do without this help, so it wouldn’t happen.
Chairman Miller said it sounds like everyone is okay with this one.
325 Clark – Window Restoration.
Mrs. Ludwig said this is on the Near East side. This drops into our medium category, but right now we still have the money to fully fund everything above and keep going.
Chairman Miller said so here the windows are substantially deteriorated. The downside of this to me why it doesn’t rate as high is it is still a home with artificial siding on it, so it won’t make a huge difference for street view, but on the other hand we’re preventing having someone coming to us in another couple of years and saying I want a variance for vinyl windows because my windows can no longer be repaired and wooden windows are too expensive and I need to put in vinyl.
Mrs. Ludwig said once again, this is one of the only ones on the Near Eastside to apply at all.
Mr. Hoffman said I think this could rank higher than a repainting. This is a more long lasting restoration, more so than a maintenance bubble painting.
Mr. Signorelli said the windows make it a good candidate.
Mrs. Ludwig said and we still have the money to fund it in full.
Chairman Miller said I was looking for storm windows and that will protect them once they are repaired. If they are repaired properly and have storm windows fixed over them, they could last another 100 years.
730 Grand Avenue – Replace shutters. Replace 14 pairs of shutters with custom wood shutters.
Chairman Miller said this one we have looked at before. It didn’t come to the top. I think when we looked at it originally, maybe a year or two ago, we thought maybe the shutters were not original features, which as we know in our old historic homes often shutters are not. However, this a Colonial, where sometimes shutters were installed originally.
Mr. Hoffman said it looks like you can see the hinges.
Chairman Miller said they are mounted properly on hinges. So those are original shutters. They are substantially deteriorated. I believe the grant application is to replace them with new wooden shutters saying that they probably can’t be repaired.
From some of the pictures, I might be inclined to agree that they are kind of falling apart. I could see most carpenters would say don’t repair that. What do you think Seth?
Mr. Hoffman said by the time you actually pulled it apart, most of that joinery is probably pretty rotted. They look like a relatively standard style.
Mr. Signorelli said I would think repairs would be so labor intensive that that would be hugely expensive.
Chairman Miller said so this is a homeowner who has applied before. We didn’t grant them.
Mr. Hoffman said is this still within our budget cutoff?
Chairman Miller said it is.
Mr. Hoffman said it is clear these are original shutters and not later additions. I have
yet to see later sort of updated shutters that actually have the hardware that actually are connected and are just screwed on.
Chairman Miller said we have verified that they are original shutters. Are we good with including this one? If we include all the way down through 730 Grand, we could fully fund all that we’ve asked for.
Mrs. Ludwig said what we can do is keep going down the list.
Mr. Signorelli said so did we decide that this one is a viable project then?
Chairman Miller said I think that’s what I’m hearing. I was considering this one we would include. I would give them the full funding. Below this, I’m inclined toward partial funding for the other ones. That might help us to spread the money around more.
Essentially some of them are paint jobs, which I don’t have a great measuring stick to say why we should pay for one person’s paint jot and not another person’s, although they need to be done. Maybe with incentives they get done faster, but we all need to paint our house. It is a basic maintenance item. Some of them I think we can add in a few things so that we get some additional preservation out of it.
Mr. Hoffman said I think ones that have either some restoration of features, something beyond just scrape and paint, I think those we could extend out. The only one that hasn’t’ really done it for me on the list so far is the painting job so far that looked like pretty routine, 327 W. New York.
Mrs. Ludwig said that one we are moving down to talk about.
Chairman Miller said I was on the committee, so it is my fault. I thought maybe we rated it a little high.
548 Garfield Avenue – Porch, window, gutter and roof repair. Replace part of porch floor, replace porch trim, repair 2 windows, replace 2 windowsills with vinyl, remove shutters, paint west side second floor, replace some gutters, roof repair.
Mrs. Ludwig said this one we ranked medium low. This is another westside local landmark and they were looking for $7,308. This was one that…
Chairman Miller said this was a list of multiple things to repair. I didn’t rate it higher because I thought it was kind of a honey do list, although the house is very worthwhile.
They were talking about replacing something with vinyl. I don’t remember now what they meant.
Mr. Signorelli said vinyl trim on porch and windowsill.
Chairman Miller said I’m not sure if that would be approved. We’d have to look at that.
Mr. Hanson said philosophically, I guess, if we are beyond the highest rated or the highest scored categories, the remaining funds should go to properties that are in the historical districts. I’m good with granting some of the other grants to landmarks that are outside of the historical districts, but the rest of the money should go to places that are committed to being part of the district. That’s my opinion.
Mr. Signorelli said now this is not landmarked, correct?
Ludwig said that is a local landmark.
Chairman Miller said it is a local landmark. It is not in a local district.
Mrs. Ludwig said which means the owner has taken on extra work and expense to be part of it when the rest of the neighborhood has not, so there’s that to consider, at least.
Mr. Signorelli said I think it is worthwhile.
Mrs. Ludwig said and historically, we’ve kind of ignored the local landmarks and everything has gone to the historic districts. Not everything can go to Tanner. I think that’s where we try to create a little more balance.
Chairman Miller said in the past we have granted a house on S. View Street. That one still has work going on, and also S. May, a porch project. Both of them we made them local landmarks so that we could fund them. There was an earlier round of funding where we had a little bit more money. There were numerous local landmarks that applied and maybe we didn’t fund any of them. I wondered if maybe that was a bias that I had, which is why I asked Kristin to serve.
Mr. Signorelli said I do think though that we need to discuss the vinyl trim on the porch and windows.
Mr. Hoffman said well being a designated landmark, they would have to go through the same COA process, but it might be something to note so they don’t come to the COA application with, well for grant consideration it would be an indicator of how committed they are to the standards, but in terms of what ultimately is approved…
Chairman Miller said this estimate is for like some repairs and painting. There are a number of people that applied for painting. Would it be okay if considering like partially funding them so the painting, considering that we see some historic preservation value we are getting back? Either essential things are getting repaired or we are having something restored back to the way it should be.
Mrs. Ludwig said I do agree with you, even though I think it is appropriate to hit some local landmarks as well. I think when it is basic paint and maintenance and it’s not structural in nature and things like that, since they’ve broken it out so much, I think if we would want to give them anything, I would think partial makes more sense then.
Mr. Hoffman said that’s a good point, so it’s not just partial credit for a painting project, but we are recognizing the more serious restoration work part of it. They are proposing to rebuild the window. That’s going to be a fair bit of sash construction. Now they say removing the shutters. Are they removing them to stay? These are tacked on. They are on the side.
Chairman Miller said I didn’t realize the home had shutters.
Mr. Hoffman said these are the only ones on the house. Maybe that’s something for Jill to note on there for notes for Jill that those shutters would be removed. In one of their estimates here, they do note about addressing water issues. Some of these are design defects from when the house was built.
Mrs. Ludwig said I think the reason why it made it to the medium low as well, and maybe Amber or Seth you could comment as well, about the uniqueness of the architecture.
Mr. Hoffman said this is one that I had on my wish list in Aurora. It reminds me a little bit of like a Civil War era gun/battleship. It’s a unique home. It’s shingle style with a curved shingled turret and the little battlement windows and that’s what makes it look odd.
Mr. Signorelli said that’s important to me because that’s one of a kind. There is no other house that comes close to the style of this and it is really unique. To me, in my mind, that’s always a consideration.
Mrs. Ludwig said and that’s the tricky thing in that particular neighborhood is you can’t get enough neighbors to come in to be a historic district, so you have all these individuals that are trying to do it anyway and follow rules that they don’t even have to follow. I think sometimes it is good to reward them for doing that.
Mr. Signorelli said to be a district, there has to be continuity. It this only going to end up being painting and roofing?
Chairman Miller said no, there are additional repairs. It is mix of paint and various repairs. It is kind of hard to summarize it. It is little bit like a to do list.
Mr. Hoffman said I’m looking at the very last page here. Is this the homeowner’s summary here? Yes, this must be their summary. So they have porch floor replacement, porch trim, window repairs, they have it separate for painting and they have roof repair and then they have gutter and then they sort of bound all this stuff from $6,600 to $11,000.
Mr. Signorelli said and since the grant amount is only a little over $7,000, I think we should go ahead with this one.
Mr. Hoffman said they itemize out painting. It just ranges from $900 to $1,700. It must just be spot painting. It is not the whole house painting. This is mostly repairs.
Chairman Miller said are we leaning toward fully funding? With the buffer, we only come to $7,308.
The consensus was to support fully funding this one.
Chairman Miller said let’s look at 327 W. New York Street.
Mrs. Ludwig said now we are in the painting projects and lows.
Chairman Miller said it is a very attractive home on W. New York. When I looked at the proposal again, I thought it is largely painting. There’s mention of wood repair. That may be referring to some steps that are on the back of the home that go up to the second unit. I believe both units are like family occupied. In my visual inspection, on the west side of the house, there are windows that have plastic over them. In the proposal, it does say something like well there’s a window that’s leaking, maybe we’ll fix that too. So I don’t know if he is referring to the same window. We have extra money and we do have a number of people asking for painting. What I was thinking we could do is offer some partial grants and say to get the grant you do need to paint your house, which you need to do anyway, but we are also going to ask that you repair those windows on the west side of the house and remove the plastic. This is way too nice to have plastic. This is a nice looking house. It should not have plastic covered windows, so to repair those windows so they don’t need to have plastic on them, or you put storm windows on them or something.
Mr. Signorelli said well they are also suggesting wood siding repair.
Chairman Miller said I looked at the pictures of the house. I didn’t see it needed a lot.
Mr. Hoffman said there’s going to be a little. That would be standard with a painting.
There’s going to be a few splinter cracked boards or ones that the squirrels have nibbled at in the corner.
Mrs. Ludwig said so you are thinking of partial?
Chairman Miller said yes, like a partial grant and say you do need to do this project and we’ll fund part of it with the catch that you need to repair those windows and remove the plastic.
Mrs. Ludwig said so when you say partial, are you thinking like half or what are you thinking?
Chairman Miller said should we say like $5,000 and say that will cover anything you do to your windows and cover some of your paint?
Mrs. Ludwig said I’ll put in $5,000.
Chairman Miller said there was at 116 N. View Street that we originally said low. I read their application again and I’d like to look at that again. I think there is something we can do for them similar to W. New York Street. They want a paint job. These owners purchased some years ago. They have already replaced the roof and they put on a whole new set of gutters. They want to do a paint job and some re-glazing on windows. I don’t know how extensive that is. I didn’t notice the first time, but she put in her proposal removing that fence structure on the roof of the porch. The homeowners actually wrote that in the proposal and we had missed that. That moves it up to where you are restoring something to its historical appearance. That fence thing with the “x’s” is like a 50’s. I don’t know her that well. I was under the impression she didn’t really care for it. It’s like a country look and this is not a country house. It is a very prominent, large city house.
Mr. Signorelli said they are also anticipating repairing and/or replacing the wood soffits, which is important.
Mrs. Ludwig said the original total is $15,325, which if we did it in full, we’d have about $3,400 left, unless you wanted to something else.
Chairman Miller said I was thinking more we give her a partial grant. It is largely painting the house. We can make it contingent on you do have to remove that fence, which she said she wanted to and that makes it more historic preservation and we get some historic preservation out of the project. Does a $5,000 grant seem like enough to incent people to get it done?
Mr. Signorelli said no.
Chairman Miller said that leaves us with $13,000 left and we can keep doing some partial grants.
532 Oak Avenue – Wood repair and painting. Repair siding, repair soffits, fascia, crown molding, repair window, paint one wall.
Mr. Hanson said it is more than a paint job. There are repairs that need to be made there.
Mrs. Ludwig said would we want to do a quick skim and group the absolutely no, or just a paint job and move up some of these like the 532 that are not just a paint job?
Mr. Hoffman said that might help to kind of filter down.
Chairman Miller said I’ll suggest some:
311 Sunset – He’s replacing his aluminum storm windows. I say no.
347 Lawndale – That’s aluminum siding that he wants to paint, which he can, but I don’t see why we would give him a grant for it.
Mrs. Ludwig said I would also move to remove 434 W. Downer Place.
Chairman Miller said the Copley Mansion. We were going to wait on that.
Mr. Signorelli said now 347 Lawndale, it seems to me that there was also a chimney repair involved. I tried to talk him into removing the vinyl siding, but I’m still working on that part. Could we help him possibly with the chimney repair?
Chairman Miller said I can’t really see it, so I was at no on that.
406 Grant Place – Again, that’s painting aluminum. I’m a no.
435 Iowa – They want to replace a door to a rental unit. They are welcome to, but I’m at no for funding it.
Chairman Miller said among the paint jobs, there’s quite a few here. I’m at lowest rate,
737 Pennsylvania. It is all brick and the windows aren’t that bad. I don’t think I could tell the difference from the street. I just don’t know that we can fund all the paint jobs, even at partial. I am suggesting this as a no.
452 Pennsylvania – We can consider that one. That is the one with a violation for vinyl siding. I think just the vinyl siding is the only violation she has. The windows are grandfathered in. She needs to remove the siding anyway. She says she doesn’t have any money to do that.
Mrs. Ludwig said I was anti this one because she is the one that put up the siding in the first place.
Chairman Miller said normally removing vinyl siding would rate really high with me and this one just doesn’t.
Mrs. Ludwig said originally this was like the top of my list until I found out that she had put up the siding in the first place and now looking for us to pay to take it off. I didn’t think that was fair.
Chairman Miller said what are we thinking on this one?
The consensus for this one was no.
Mrs. Ludwig said now we have a mere 8 properties left. Do we want to try to do something for any of these? Do you have any others that are a no? We have left almost $14,000 and we have, out of the ones that aren’t a no, $88,000 in requests. Now out of those that are left, 1 of them is an Eastside landmark, 985 Sheffer, that I think when we met last week, everyone felt really should be a no because they just bought the place and it is in really great condition. It was sort of like maybe a little down the road when it needs a little more. It is not anywhere near any other historic properties and it’s in really great shape. That one I would propose could also be a no. Out of what’s left, pretty much everybody on Oak Street, we’ve got 4 houses all right in a row, the entire 500 block of Oak Avenue has asked for something. Those are all in the Tanner District. Everybody that’s left is in the Tanner District. Do we want to go through those 7 and see if there are any in there that people would say cut them down more? Chairman Miller said why don’t we glance at them. What’s the lowest for paint?
Mrs. Ludwig said 215 Grand.
Chairman Miller said this house wants to paint and to put on new gutters. I might consider like a partial grant if they would upgrade the front gutter to maybe a half round. That’s not what they are proposing, so they may not agree, but that way it would look a little bit more historic.
217 Chestnut – Mr. Signorelli said I’d like to help them with paint.
Chairman Miller said needs paint and there are some minor carpentry repairs on the porch. It’s not a real high estimate. We could give them like a partial incentive just to get stuff done a little faster. Without the grant, maybe they won’t do it this year.
Mrs. Ludwig said he’d be not a bad candidate for that because it looks like he is only looking for about $7,000, or a partial grant might get him something.
353 West Park – Chairman Miller said this is a big house that is apparently owner occupied. I’m just brainstorming ideas how to make the projects worthwhile and why should I pay for one neighbor’s paint job and not the others. Underneath the porch, it looks like a chicken wire or something.
Mr. Signorelli said I’m seeing a lot of things inappropriate with the façade. I see a lot of problems there. The railings are all wrong and this door is wrong.
Mrs. Ludwig said they want $12,000. Do you remember what they wanted to do?
Chairman Miller said I think it is just painting.
Mrs. Ludwig said painting, power wash, scrape, caulk, spot prime.
Mr. Signorelli said any freshly painted house is going to look better, but there are so many things that are inappropriate about this house that a fresh paint job isn’t going to help.
Mrs. Ludwig said do you feel like it is a no?
Mr. Signorelli said I do personally.
Chairman Miller said okay we can just say no. That’s an easier answer.
Mrs. Ludwig said do you want to look at all the Oak Avenue’s?
411 Oak Avenue – Chairman Miller said this one does include some window repair.
Just a few windows, pretty minor. Painting and window repair. I thought this might be another candidate for like a partial grant and say it is contingent that you do need to repair the windows. You can’t just drop that off the project.
Mr. Signorelli said well first of all, my opinion is, again, the architecture here is wonderful. It is a wonderful little house. A lot of work over the years. I’ve known a few people who have lived in that home and over the years a lot of work and maintenance has been done and my other thought is, if I’m not mistaken, this is next door to the
Garfield Goose House and then there are a couple of other houses all in a row all around that corner and I just think it is wonderful and, again, great examples of the architecture. It is kind of a growing thing there. To make a long story longer, I’m feeling yes for at least partial.
Mrs. Ludwig said right now we have 3 candidates for a partial. We need to figure out how to divvy it up between them.
Chairman Miller said I’m punching in $5,000 for now. We can change it if we want.
523 Oak Avenue – Mr. Hanson said in the past, has there been a leftover fund for applicants that have come back realizing that oh my gosh it costs a lot more than I thought and I can’t do it unless I have more? I’m just looking for the will of the Commission here.
Mrs. Ludwig said that’s why we do the buffer.
Chairman Miller said the ones we are fully funding do have a 10% buffer put in. Then these others for the paint and some repairs, I’m proposing just cut the flat grant.
There wouldn’t be a buffer. They would be spending a lot of their own money in addition.
Mr. Hanson said so all the ones we’ve already award have a 10% contingency build in there?
Chairman Miller said yes. So 523 Oak, this is paint and they want to do some repairs to, I think, that are on the back of the house.
Mr. Signorelli said my feeling is I would like to say yes to this, except compared to some other properties, this looks like it is pretty well maintained and from the picture it looks pretty darn good as opposed to some of the properties that could use some of our money. That’s my feeling.
Chairman Miller said there are some pictures in the packet, like on the back of that,
the back steps, which you can’t see and usually don’t agree to fund. These people submitted for work on the back of the house before and I’m usually saying this is public money and the public can’t see it.
Mr. Signorelli said and we want to get the most bang for the buck that we can get here, especially with such a limited budget.
Mr. Hoffman said the whole back porch and landing is just treated deck. Not particularly well built.
Mr. Signorelli said I’m sure we would all like to say yes to each one of these projects, but we just can’t.
Mr. Hanson said there’s more soffit damage there than meets the eye. There are detailed pictures that I’m not going to fight hard one way or the other, but it’s not just a paint job.
Mrs. Ludwig said siding repair, new steps, new gutters. Repair/replace wood siding and soffits. Replace gutters. It is quite a bit more. It is not just the back stuff.
Mr. Hanson said and the soffit and the gutters probably go hand in hand.
Chairman Miller said it could be a gutter failure that’s caused some issue.
Mrs. Ludwig said should we hold this one as a maybe then and then look at the last 2?
I’ll hold it for now.
532 Oak Avenue – Needs paint and some carpentry repair.
Mr. Arnold said on this one, one of the proposals just says paint repaired areas. So it almost looks like there are repairs and they are painting.
Mr. Hoffman said in his summary he did say that there was some work done by one of these community organizations that they didn’t complete.
Chairman Miller said this is a fairly inexpensive one.
Mrs. Ludwig said $5,400. Do you want to compare it to the last one? I don’t know how the committee feels about it, but do 4 houses in a row on the same block, is that….
Mr. Munoz said kind of no good.
Mrs. Ludwig said right. That’s the only thing I’m wondering about.
Mr. Hanson said if they apply, they are eligible. If they continue to make the block look better, that’s something to be proud of. Regarding 532, when I vouched for that, part of that is the owner, I think, got short changed when the people volunteered to do work for him before. We did put it under consideration, but it is more than just a paint job. That’s a laundry list of things that need to be done that was not done properly from the last time around. No fault of this Commission.
Mr. Signorelli said after having said what I said, what Matt showed me, that house needs a lot of repair.
Mrs. Ludwig said I’m not for or against any of these. I’m just making a note that we’ve been trying to be balanced a little bit and spread it out.
545 Oak Avenue – Painting – paint trim, doors, gutters, downspouts, siding, porches and shed, which I think we agreed shed would not be part of it.
Chairman Miller said there’s that deck on the back, which isn’t really a historic addition.
Mr. Signorelli said it’s vinyl clad.
Chairman Miller said I was going to ask what type of siding is on this house. Does anyone know? Is it vinyl? Aluminum. I’ve been saying no to the other painting on aluminum. They are free to paint the aluminum. Sometimes it comes out looking pretty good, but I don’t give grants for it.
Mr. Castrejon said it is just a paint job.
Mr. Hanson said I’d rather see the stairs and the railing addressed, or the gravel driveway addressed. I can think of 10 other things as I walk past every day.
Mr. Signorelli said the railings are clearly inappropriate.
Mrs. Ludwig said so that’s a no?
Chairman Miller said that’s a no.
Mrs. Ludwig said so that leaves us 5 properties asking for $51,000 and we have $14,000 to spend. Do we want to back to through those last 5 and figure out how to divvy up $14,000? The first one out of those is 215 Grand. They asked for almost $13,000.
Chairman Miller said it was for painting and like new K-type gutters.
Mrs. Ludwig said Fernando says no.
Mr. Signorelli said no.
Mrs. Ludwig said the next one was 217 Chestnut. They asked for almost $7,000.
Chairman Miller said any strong feelings on this one?
Mr. Signorelli said well I think we should give them something.
Mr. Hanson said if our list of 5 is now down to a list of 4, can we kind of scan through the 4 and then base on ask and balance?
Mrs. Ludwig said this is the first one. The next one is 411 Oak, but we are going to say they have to repair the windows as part of it.
Chairman Miller said they include carpentry repair in their estimate too, so there is some additional work being done.
Mrs. Ludwig said they want almost $16,000.
The second to the last one is 523 Oak. This red one that Matt says has a bunch of stuff needed.
Mr. Signorelli said the picture is deceiving. It looks like it is in really good shape.
Mr. Hanson said in the application pack, all the pictures indicated there is more to it than just a round of paint.
Mrs. Ludwig said and then the last of that batch is this white one, 532 Oak. So we are down to $38,000 worth of ask and about $14,000 to spend.
Mr. Signorelli said something’s gone there. It just looks artificial.
Mrs. Ludwig said it does like something’s stripped away from it. Do we know out of those 4 if we have 1 of those 4 that we feel strongly about?
Mr. Castrejon said the one with the turret.
Mrs. Ludwig said the turret is 411 Oak.
Mr. Signorelli said it is a unique little Victorian. I would say some partial money would be good here.
Mrs. Ludwig said so they’ve asked for almost $16,000. Do you have a dollar amount you want to test in the system?
Chairman Miller said as a placeholder for these, like the 327 W. New York, paint with repair windows; 116 N. View Street, paint with removing that fence structure; and 411 Oak, paint and repairing windows and some carpentry. I’m just putting in $5,000 as a placeholder. We can decide on what we want. We can go higher and award fewer people. We could make it lower and try to spread it out even more.
Mr. Hanson said I heard 116 in there. So we did not award them anything? They were still under consideration?
Mrs. Ludwig said no, 116 we did award $5,000.
Mr. Hanson said so we have $14,000ish left for the last 4 houses we just viewed?
Mrs. Ludwig said correct. So if we take another $5,000 out, then…
Chairman Miller said for 411 Oak, then it would be $8,000. I’m at $8.706 remaining.
Then we have 217 N. Chestnut, 523 Oak or 532 Oak.
Mr. Hanson said I’d suggest, and I’m just going by the house number, $3,000 for 217, $5,000 for 411 and $3,000 apiece for 523 and 532.
Mrs. Ludwig said we can’t. We’ve got to cut somebody. We are short. If we take 411 Oak, if we took that one and gave them $4,500, we’d be fine.
Mr. Signorelli said could you flash back to the pictures to the amounts we’ve just decided?
Mrs. Ludwig said do you want to start from the top and see everything that’s being funded, or do you want to just go with the partial ones? Or just this last set that we just did?
Mr. Signorelli said yes.
Mrs. Ludwig said so starting with 116 N. View, this would be $5,000 toward the $15,000 that they asked for.
Chairman Miller said this is contingent on them removing that fence structure. They would not be able to drop that from the project and still get funding.
Mrs. Ludwig said then 411 Oak, this would be $4,500 toward the almost $16,000 that they asked for and they have to repair the windows.
Chairman Miller said could we just go up to 327 W. New York? That was a partial too.
Mrs. Ludwig said $5,000. 327 W. New York would be $5,000.
Chairman Miller said they would need to repair those west side windows in the bay so they don’t have any plastic over them.
Mrs. Ludwig said 217 Chestnut, $3,000 partial grant and they had asked for $7,000.
For 523 Oak, this would be $3,000, again towards the almost $10,000 that they asked for.
Then the next Oak, that’s also $3,000 towards the $5,400 that he asked for. That gives a total of 14 separate homes. It is a nice balance. I can do a pie chart for everybody to see how many are in each district. At a glance here, there’s at least one in every district and it feels a little more balanced.
Chairman Miller said I’ll just review here, we did agree to partially fund some painting and repair projects that Kirstin just reviewed with us. We earlier talked about fully funding 402 S. 4th Street. It has a lot of carpentry repairs on the front porch.
427 W. New York Street, there we’ll need to work with the homeowners some. They really submitted for carpentry repairs. We are going to ask them to look up to the gutters, the boxed in gutters that probably need relining, which will be an expensive project and will consume the whole $20,000 grant.
502 Oak Avenue, which is an ambitious project, reconstructing wooden storm windows, and door repair. We also made it contingent on they would remove the shutters.
515 Oak, this is a smaller project that involves rebuilding that chimney. We even increased their buffer a bit to make sure she’d have enough money. There was some concern expressed by the homeowner and members of the Commission that the chimney might be a safety hazard, as it might actually topple over.
532 W. Downer Place, this is a home looking at some structural damage from water because the original boxed in gutters that would be over 100 years old, are leaking and is causing some wood rot in the soffits and she is addressing the issue by relining the gutters and repairing downspouts and the water system and wood repair in the soffits.
551 W. Downer Place, they want to re-glaze and restore the wooden storm windows that are covering these highly historically appropriate and unique windows and character defining windows on this house, which is a local landmark. We believe that project helps to preserve the historical nature of the home and want to fund that project.
325 Clark Street, this gets us back to the Near Eastside District. Although the home does have artificial siding on it, which they are not proposing removing, they are addressing the windows that show substantial deterioration. They are an original feature of the house. They are character defining. It seems like they are addressing something that is worthwhile.
730 Grand, this is replacement of original shutters that have outlived their useful lifetime, but we did verify that they are original to the home and this gets a nice project in Riddle Highlands.
548 Garfield, this is a very unique home and a local landmark. It has a number of repairs that need to be done. They will need to confer with Jill. They mentioned something with vinyl and that would need to get a COA. We would need to consider that. The other repairs seem very well thought out on a home that’s very unique. I think we made it contingent on removing the shutters also, which the homeowners brought up themselves.
Chairman Miller said so those are the fully funded and we just reviewed the partially funded. Kirstin and I have spreadsheets to send to Jill to make sure that everything is straightened out. Do we have a motion to approve the grant awards as presented, both fully funded and partially funded?
MOTION OF APPROVAL WAS MADE BY: Al Signorelli
MOTION SECONDED BY: Kristin Ludwig
AYES: Justyn Arnold, Fernando Castrejon, Amber Foster, Matt Hanson, Seth Hoffman, Kristin Ludwig, Dan Miller, Simon Munoz, Al Signorelli, Mike Walker
NAYS: None
A motion was made by Mr. Signorelli, seconded by Mrs. Ludwig, that this agenda item be approved. The motion carried.
22-0294 2022 Annual Mayor’s Awards for Historic Preservation, honoring property owners who have made improvements to their properties while maintaining the historic character (22-0294- KDWK-22.071-PZ/HP-JM)
Mrs. Morgan said the Public Awareness Committee met last week. We did a call for applications. We didn’t receive any from the public. We did pull a few that were submitted by the public and reviewed those. Two of them they are recommending for an award. The rest of the applications were selected by the committee looking at what’s been done in the neighborhoods, like small HCOA’s. This is what the committee is proposing for awards. We have 11 at this time. They are all not, obviously, this past year. They come from the past 3 years. A couple of them are even a little older that haven’t ever been recognized, but the property owners have also maintained them through the more recent years, so those are being included. The first one is 20 S. Chestnut. This is for the restoration of the front stairs, which was done in 2007, but more recently in 2013 they did the roof and gutters and they have maintained the building and updated landscaping through the years. Maybe I’ll just run through them all and then if there are any individual ones you want to discuss in more detail, we can do that or if there are any that you think we’ve missed that we should consider as well.
Mr. Hanson said this is my first go around. Do we vote on them in mass after reviewing all of them or individually, or how is this process held?
Mrs. Morgan said I think we will vote on them in mass. We’ll go through all of them, discuss any that need to be discussed and if there are any that need to be removed.
28 S. Stolp - Known as the Keystone Building. The iconic downtown building was restored and redeveloped into 33 luxury apartments. Restoration included rehabbing the interior office spaces into apartments, adhering to the Secretary of Interior standards, as well as exterior restoration. They have removed the air conditioners, which you can see in the one photo. They restored some of the front windows and they installed some new windows on the rear. I don’t have a great after picture, but I will get a better one for the actual, if it is nominated for the actual award ceremony.
106 Le Grande - A very sensitive addition was added to the historic garage in the rear.
The chimney was rebuilt along with a new roof. The homeowners have maintained it beautifully through the years, including painting. As you can see, some of the landscaping that has been updated. Not a great picture, but I can get a little better picture when I go back out of that garage addition. This is one that was nominated in prior years when we ended up not having it by a member of the public.
112 S. 4th Street – This is in the Near Eastside. New half-round gutters were installed restoring an original historic feature in a brown color that compliments the brick and soffit and fascia that were meticulously restored. Chairman Miller said I think if I remember right, this was a grant applicant. Didn’t we kind of revise, or make suggestions to them, that they had damage and we thought maybe we should invest in the gutters because they had wood rot and we thought they might have water problems. Is that correct?
Mrs. Morgan said yes. We ended up doing some additional funding for the gutters.
They also did a new roof a few years back.
324 West Park – They’ve given the house historically appropriate light grey with a gable end accent in a darker grey and the trim accented by white. The previous owners had de-sided the home and restored the original siding and porch. They never received a Preservation grant for it.
Chairman Miller so lifetime achievement over more than one owner.
325 Sunset Avenue – Beautifully restored the open front porch, including installing custom wood arch door and adding new cedar shingles while retaining the original slate floor and light fixture. This was also another grant applicant. It is in Riddle Highlands.
420 W. New York Street – The owners took the time to scrape, prime and paint the entire house in a beautiful green with tan trim and darker accents. It is in Tanner.
424 W. New York Street – Extensive stucco restoration was conducted prior to painting the entire house in an appropriate two part color scheme. Custom half-round gutters were installed restoring the original historic fabric. They also put on new stairs.
I think they have updated landscaping as well.
Chairman Miller said I think in that case maybe someone had done some front steps along the line that were probably a violation and he just went ahead and took them off and put new ones on. It may have been a violation that hadn’t been cited, but once he said he was going to do everything we didn’t really bother. It was the previous owner’s violation probably.
435 W. New York – Built-in gutters were repaired and soffits were then restored. The owner scraped and then painted in a color scheme original to the house. Massive overgrown shrubs were removed providing a better curb appeal. This was a grant project, but the owner did a lot of other work himself to the porch and the bushes too.
517 S. 4th Street – The lining of the historic boxed gutters were repaired and then the soffit, fascia, eaves and trim were beautifully restored preserving the wide overhanging eaves that are an architecturally significant element. Previously, a historically sensitive garage was installed that compliments the house as well. This was one of the grant ones where we wanted to make sure they had someone actually look at the gutters to make sure the gutters were properly lined before just doing the soffit and fascia restoration. This is in the Near East.
741 Wilder Street – This is in Riddle. One of the few remaining homes with a wood shingle roof received a new wood shingle roof preserving a significant character defining feature of the 1925 Tudor Revival home. This was a grant recipient, but they were the end of the grant recipients, so they just got like $5,000, so the majority of the work was on the homeowners.
Mr. Hoffman said I think this is one of the few houses were a roof is a significant restoration feature. One of the few where a reroofing would be worthy of an award because it is prominent.
Chairman Miller said it is extremely prominent when I walked up Wilder Street the first time after they did it. It is very striking and they are maintaining an original material.
Mrs. Morgan said are there any individual ones that anyone would like to go back and discuss in more detail?
Chairman Miller said I would just comment the commercial building on Stolp, I know they did a lot of interior work, but the interior work did result in them being able to remove these giant window air conditioner units that had always been hanging out the front windows, which to me is a huge change to the streetscape on Stolp.
Mrs. Morgan said from exterior-wise, that is probably the biggest. They did other work.
They did tuckpointing. The exterior was already in pretty decent condition, so you don’t see as much of a rehab as you would like in the Terminal Building or the Hobbs.
Mr. Castrejon said so are the officially done?
Mrs. Morgan said I’m not sure if people are in it.
Mr. Castrejon said there are some units rented. I walk on that side every single day and don’t pay attention, so some of the windows, a month and a half ago, in front, I don’t know if they were waiting for the actual windows, but what they did it was like a standard size window and the sides were kind of nicely boarded up, so it was not the actual window.
Mrs. Morgan said okay. I had thought they were done. They had their grand opening, but I’ll go back out and take a look before we actually present it to make sure that they are completely done.
Mr. Hanson said have commercial units be awarded these awards before?
Mrs. Morgan said yes. We’ve had a couple of them.
Mr. Hoffman said did the committee consider any other commercial buildings that stood out?
Mrs. Morgan said we couldn’t think of any other ones that were done. There are a lot of them that are kind of in process, but there weren’t any other ones that we thought that were completely complete.
Mrs. Ludwig said what’s the story on 324 West Park? That just seems like a huge overhaul, but you said that was across multiple owners.
Mrs. Morgan said it was across multiple owners.
Mrs. Ludwig said that’s a lot putting that porch back on and everything. Not from that picture, but the all the way back pictures. It is a huge difference. They took off the siding too.
Chairman Miller said on the committee, I favored recognizing this one just because of the change in the house, the caveat being I believe we understood that the current owners mostly did the painting, while the structural work was done by a previous owner.
For me I just like to promote historic preservation in the city. I just like that dramatic change from before and after, even if the current owners did not do a lot of the work themselves. This is a huge change where the house is taken back to something much more appropriate for its style.
Chairman Miller said does anyone have any comments on these nominations?
Mrs. Morgan said are there any you think should be removed?
Mr. Signorelli said I have questions about 20 S. Chestnut. The reason being, even though I defended it in the past, the more I thought about it, although I think the architecture is great and the interior is wonderful, the more I look at it, I really kind of have a problem with the stairs that appear to me to be completely inappropriate. I would go along with whatever feelings the rest of the Commission had on that.
Mrs. Ludwig said are we narrowing this down to a single candidate?
Mrs. Morgan said no. We don’t have really a limit. I usually try to keep it under 10, usually around 7 or 8, but since we haven’t had it in several years, I think it is fine to take more. As far as I know, I don’t think there is anything else like awards on the agenda that night. We are at 11, so if we want to just take it down to 10, that’s fine.
Mr. Hoffman said this was not an owner public nomination, right? This was one selected by the committee?
Mrs. Morgan said no, Scott Pettit was the one who originally recommended this one.
He is on the committee, but was not present this year, so I guess it is a committee nomination, just not a member of the Commission.
Mr. Signorelli said the next piece of business would be just to vote on everything we have before us then?
Mrs. Morgan said yes, I just basically just ran through the pictures, the scope and so right now if there are any that people want to discuss further, or any we want to remove, we can do that and we can vote on them as a whole.
Mrs. Ludwig said I guess the only that I didn’t, I was having a hard time telling, it didn’t seem as dramatic a difference was on 112 S. 4th Street, but I did not visit this one in person.
Mrs. Morgan said it is not the most dramatic of changes. The committee wanted to make sure we had diversity and some Near Eastside representatives. I went through some of the old COA’s to see if there was anything else. Most of the paintings haven’t seem completed. This was one of the ones that was kind of in the Near East.
Mr. Hanson said the work at 20 Chestnut that may be in question for its historical correctness, was that part of a grant that was awarded to him?
Mrs. Morgan said I don’t think so. Do you know Al?
Mr. Signorelli said I don’t think so.
Mrs. Morgan said no, he is not locally regulated.
Mr. Signorelli said I think he applied for a grant, but I think that we didn’t give him anything.
Mrs. Ludwig said but I agree with Al’s point that the award is for historic preservation, not just preservation of a home with whatever you do to it. I agree the stairs aren’t historically accurate.
Mr. Signorelli said I’m really conflicted by it.
Mr. Hoffman said and part of this is kind of highlighting best examples of what the Commission and ordinances intended to promote and this is a little conflicting.
Mrs. Foster said it is promoting the best of historic preservation, not just aesthetics, so I would agree that the stairs are a problem to the process.
Chairman Miller said so I hear some reluctance on 20 S. Chestnut because of the structure of the steps.
Mrs. Morgan said do you want a motion to remove it?
MOTION TO REMOVE 20 S. CHESTNUT FROM THE LIST WAS MADE BY: Al Signorelli
MOTION SECONDED BY: Simon Munoz
AYES: Justyn Arnold, Fernando Castrejon, Amber Foster, Matt Hanson, Seth Hoffman, Kristin Ludwig, Dan Miller, Simon Munoz, Al Signorelli, Mike Walker
Chairman Miller said I guess we can strike that. Are we okay with the remainder of the list to go ahead and nominate them? I think the next step is these will go to City
Mrs. Morgan said no, they don’t have to. These are the Mayor’s Awards, so the Mayor signs off on them and then they get presented at City Council.
Chairman Miller said are we okay with the remainder of the list with 20 S. Chestnut taken off? Are we okay with nominating the remainder of the list?
Mr. Castrejon said I’m okay with it once you confirm the windows on the Keystone.
MOTION OF APPROVAL WAS MADE BY: Fernando Castrejon
MOTION SECONDED BY: Al Signorelli
AYES: Justyn Arnold, Fernando Castrejon, Amber Foster, Matt Hanson, Seth Hoffman, Kristin Ludwig, Dan Miller, Simon Munoz, Al Signorelli, Mike Walker
NAYS: None
A motion was made by Mr. Castrejon, seconded by Mr. Signorelli, that this agenda item be approved and filed. The motion carried.
PENDING
COMMITTEE REPORTS
A) Grants
No Report.
B) Near Eastside Historic District
No Report.
C) Riddle Highlands Historic District
No Report.
D) Public Awareness
No Report.
E) Landmarks
No Report.
F) FoxWalk Design Review
No Report.
G) Tanner/Palace Historic District Committee
ANNOUNCEMENTS
None.
ADJOURNMENT
A motion was made by Mr. Castrejon, seconded by Mr. Munoz, that the meeting be adjourned. The motion carried by voice vote. Chairman Miller adjourned the meeting at 8:30 p.m.
https://www.aurora-il.org/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Minutes/_04142022-2880
Alerts Sign-up