Board of adjustment members voted unanimously on March 11 to approve the application from developer George F. Mesiha's GFM Development. The meeting was the second time the application had appeared before the board.

The 7,258 square foot lot is currently vacant, though it used to hold a non-conforming two-family house. It's zoned B-3 for commercial use, though additional residential units are listed as an acceptable accessory use. David Crook, the lawyer representing GFM, said at a previous meeting that the only reason a use variance was required for the project was because the first floor of the project is taken up solely by parking, rather than by office space.

The three-floor, 40-foot development will have one office and two two-bedroom condos on the second and third floors. A 15-space covered parking lot is provided on the first floor with a front façade designed to disguise it.

In between the board's Dec. 11 meeting, at which it approved the use variance but voted down the bulk variances, and the March 11 meeting, the applicants shrunk the size the development somewhat, reducing the building's total size by about 10 percent, according to architect Robert Zampolin of Zampolin & Associates. The building's lot coverage shrunk from 74.5 to 69.5 percent.

This change in the project responded to the board's primary objection in December when several members argued the development was simply too big for the lot.

"I think you found a great fit for what you're trying to do," said board member Kim Birdsall in December. "If what you were proposing were a little bit smaller you'd be able to make better use [of the property.]"

"It's been downsized, it has ample parking," said board member Richard Rovito last week. "It's office space, which is great. We need office space in this town… I don't see this project as anything but fitting in [with this area.]"

The revised application eliminated one of the original application's four bulk variance requests by meeting the requirement for a 25 foot landscaped buffer in between commercial and abutting residential properties. Crook said the developers planned to plant white pine trees in the area and would work with the Shade Tree Committee to determine what would be most appropriate.

The three remaining bulk variances were for a 95.76-foot lot depth instead of the 100-foot minimum, a 24.75-foot two-way driveway aisle width instead of the required 25 feet and for 9 by 18-foot parking stalls instead of the 9 by 19 feet required. Crook noted the lot depth variance was for a pre-existing condition of the property.

Zampolin stated that the aisle width, which the developers expanded in part by eliminating an extra uncovered parking space that the board had taken issue with in December, was within only a few inches of meeting the requirement.

Several balconies that board members had pointed out would have looked out onto the roof of the nearby Forest Dairy convenience store were eliminated as well.

The development will pay $50,000 to the borough to meet its Council on Affordable Housing (COAH) obligation.

Diane Conrad of the The Terrace, whose property would border the edge of the development, objected to what she considers to be a fire hazard created by the building's close proximity to the neighboring properties. She argued that in the case of a fire in between the buildings, firefighters wouldn't be able to reach the area.

Crook noted that Fire Marshal Paul Dansbach addressed the board regarding the project's safety at the Dec. 11 meeting, though his comments weren't specifically directed at Conrad's concern.

"I think this is a great example of the Board of Adjustment working with a developer to come to as close to a win-win as possible," said board member Cathy Botti.