18 January 2011 | Approved: 15 February 2011
Present: Bob Booher, Mimi Styles, David Stopak and David Neumann. Councilor Joli McCathran was present as Town Council Liaison. The meeting began at 7:30 p.m. David Neumann took minutes.
Approval of Agenda and Adoption of Minutes
The proposed agenda was modified and then adopted unanimously. Minutes for the December 21, 2010 regular HPC meeting were approved subject to a few changes. They will be filed in the Town office and submitted to Bill Saar to be added to the Town Web Site.
Project Reviews
There were no permits to be reviewed.
Council Report
Joli McCathran reported that the Town Council has discussed the formation of a "Meadow Committee." It has also been involved with budget considerations. The timing of the Town Council meetings has changed. Instead of meeting regularly twice a month, they will meet once a month on the second Monday of the month. In March they will meet for a second meeting due to the time needed to discuss the Town Budget. The Council liaison reminded members that the HPC needs to prepare its budget.
Amend Historic District
The members discussed amending the historic district to include the newly acquired meadow. We decided that the County needed to be contacted to determine the process. Members agreed that it would be helpful if David Stopak were on the “Meadow Committee” so that he could be involved in the effort to make the meadow part of the Town of Washington Grove Historic District. David Neumann suggested that when the Meadow Committee begins its work that they contact Clare L. Kelly and Scott Whipple at the Montgomery County Historic Preservation Commission for some initial advice and help.
Budget
Bob Booher presented a draft budget that he had received from Joli McCathran. This consisted of the following items:
| 2D-3.0 | Historic Preservation | |
| 2D-3.1 | Commission Secretary | $650 |
| 2D-3.2 | Commission Secretary | $600 |
| 2D-3.3 | Preservation Award | $200 |
| 2D-3.4 | Archives Worker | $6317 |
| 2D-3.5 | Archival Equipment and Supplies | $500 |
| Total | $8267 | |
Members decided that it was important to keep the Town Archivist as we are still at the beginning of getting the Archives organized with a searchable data base. Joli McCathran suggested that we consider an archivist that she has used and highly recommends. Members also agreed that the archivist we had until recently might come back and that we should not exclusively give the work to an expert due to the cost and desirablility of having a Town person involved. Members decided to drop the cost of a secretary from the budget, but to leave a placeholder of $50 for that item. The total budget would then be $7,667.
We discussed asking both the last Town Archivist and the individual recommended by Joli McCathran to see if they are interested in working for the Town and possibly asking them to send us resumes. The recommended individual was David Burgevin.
Coordination of Seminars or Talks with the Woman’s Club
Margot Bohan had presented the idea of the Woman’s Club sponsoring seminars or talks on Historic Preservation. There seemed to be some misunderstanding. Joli McCathran explained that the Woman’s Club had thought they would be responsible for paying the costs of such talks or seminars. Members explained to Joli that there was no cost to the Woman’s Club. After some discussion it was decided to ask for a half-day workshop on Window repair and maintenance. Not, in the Woman’s Club, but in the Town Hall. The date was decided to be in March or April. Some or all of the cost approx. $750 could be covered by the Town. There would still be a $35 fee to Town residents. Mimi Styles said she would coordinate with the Town Clerk regarding possible dates. There was also a discussion of contacting the HPC in Gaithersburg and Rockville to see if they would like to co-sponsor the program, i.e. allow their residents to attend. Mimi volunteered to contact the two HPC’s. Mimi also said she would ask the Town Clerk to place a reminder about the Workshop in the next Town Bulletin.
Welcoming New Residents
Joli explained the Woman’s Club welcoming procedure for new residents. Mimi explained that we have recently been doing our welcoming separately. We discussed giving the two volume history of the Town to new residents as a good will gesture. This has begun to done by the HPC when individuals move nto a contributing residence. We provide the new residents in contributing structures with some history of their new home as well as the two volumes. The question discussed was whether we should do this separately from the Woman’s Club or in conjunction with them. HPC decided it would do it separately.
HPC Rules of Procedure
David Neumann had sent out to members copies of Draft 22 of the HPC Rules of Procedure. HPC members reviewed the draft. Some changes were suggested. Procedures were added for demolition. David Neumann will make the changes and re-circulate it as “HPC – Rules of Procedure Draft 23” before the next meeting.
PC/HPC work sessions on Mansionization
Members reviewed the current status of the PC/HPC efforts to draft an ordinance that would offer some protection from mansionization, i.e. the construction of out-scale structures, in the Town. The next meeting of the joint PC and HPC is scheduled for Wednesday, January 26, 2011. Members discussed their understanding of the PC/HPC proposals. David Neumann presented some graphs of the current proposals, especially the smooth graduated FAR concept. It was discussed at length.
Adjournment
The next meeting will be Tuesday, February 15, 2010 at 7:30pm in the McCathran Hall meeting room.
The meeting was adjourned at 10 p.m.