Boothbay Harbor board of appeals on Nov. 24 approved its notice of decision which denied appeal of a stop work order’s lifting at 14 Todd Ave. Appellants Tom Myette and Chandler Wright of 25 and 39 McKown Ave. submitted their appeal Oct. 22 on Code Enforcement Officer Geoff Smith’s Sept. 25 action which let abutter Dennis Hilton of 14 Todd Ave. resume construction. The appeal hearing was Nov. 19.

Board attorney Jim Katsiaficas of Perkins Thompson drafted the notice members changed in votes on typographical and grammatical errors and one substantive change.

Appellants’ counsel Kristin Collins of PretiFlaherty said she tried to show her clients were not challenging the issuance of the June 8 building permit. They were appealing the stop work order, and arguing that permission to continue with amended plans amounts to the issuance of an amended permit, which should require site plan review by the planning board, said Collins. She said she wanted the appeals board's decision to reflect that.

Member David Racicot said the argument of whether or not another building permit was required was central to the hearing, but was not the question before the board. “The question was 'Did the code enforcement officer do the correct thing in lifting the stop work order …?'”

Chair Merritt Blakeslee asked Racicot to consider that the appellants’ issue of a de facto permit was a central point of discussion and was not captured in the decision summary. While Racicot agreed, town attorney Mary Costigan asked the board to reconsider Collins’ request. The board voted in favor of Collins’ request to change hearing summary language: Katsiaficas read, “Collins argued they were not challenging the initial issuance of the June 8, 2020 building permit, but were challenging the CEO's lifting of the stop work order as a de facto issuance of an amended building permit without planning board site plan review.”

The board clarified that differences in the old and new buildings’ floor areas would not be grounds for a site plan review since the floor area did not expanded beyond that allowed in the June permit. Members also supported a change noting how unanticipated field conditions necessitated design changes which would not need planning board review as a new building.

Said member Richard Burt, “The other kind of changes that happened subsequent to the June 5 permit – rotating the roof and so forth – fell within what we consider to be normal variance of construction and also therefore did not constitute a new building … Had someone challenged the permit of June 5, at that point it's a new building … and that was the point at which to challenge this.”