The architect of the Berkshire Design Group, Carlos Nieto, put on the plans for the friends of the sheriff office of the Franklin County Regional Dog Shelter on Plain Road East in Deerfield in February. The public hearing of the Zoning Board of Appeals on the project will continue on May 15th.
Personal File Foto/Chris Larabee
Deerfield-E-a group of residents who have laid out against the proposed new location of the Franklin County Sheriff's Office Regional Dog Shelter from Plain Road Ost and who have expressed concerns about the traffic and the location of the facility on a quiet, dead street have hired the lawyer John McLaughlin for their interests.
The inhabitants of the residents of Cliad Road East and Millage Road Kamala Bouche, Nicole Duprey and Linda Shea are listed in a letter to the Zoning Board of Appeals as McLaughin customers who decided on Thursday, but to continue the public hearing on the project by May 15th. The ZBA derives the application for a special permit, while the planning authority focuses on checking the location plan.
McLaughhlin's letter said that the planned location of the animal shelter was an “extremely bad choice” due to the size of the simple road to the east and the lack of a separate application for a liberation of zoning zones gray 3710, which prohibits the cause of noise “perceptible without instruments”, which are more than 200 feet from the limits of the origin rooms in a non-residents.
“The applicant's project is most importantly violating the project [Section] 3710 ”, wrote McLaughlin, who successfully defeated the North Main Street Park project.“ This is an unusual amount [that] borders on a residential area, with only a small street leading into it. Especially with this special use that create the sounds that emerge from the property, this is simply the wrong capacity for this proposed use in [sic] The application should be rejected. ”
The friends of the regional dog underground of the sheriff office of the Franklin County-Die non-profit organization to collect money for the service of the shelter-suggests the construction of a new building, since it has grown up the deteriorating 1,570 square meter facility on Sandy Lane in Turner Falls. The non -profit organization bought the Plain Road East package for $ 135,000 in March 2024.
The group suggests a 7,000 square meter building with kennels indoors and outdoors, larger dog runs and parking for employees, volunteers and visitors in front of the dead end at the end of Plain Road East. If the project progresses, the shelter can also absorb cats.
While the residents were concerned about noise, traffic safety and the changing nature of the neighborhood at every public hearing, the Peer review of the engineering office Tighe & Bond did not find any “fatal errors” with the planning authority, but some details had to be further addressed.
“There is nothing that points out that this website cannot support this type of development,” said Tim Grace, Senior Engineer of Tighe & Bond, at the listening of the planning authority on April 7. “We have not seen anything with the layout or as I said, fatal mistakes that have a risk of general health and security to the public.”
In a follow-up letter on April 15, Grace and colleague, Senior Engineer Christopher Rokos, said, the designer of the project, “provided additional materials for our review, which illustrated how the design was revised to answer most of the review comments in our original letter.”
Other details that are not affected by construction revisions could be addressed by the engineers by providing the Berkshire Design Group before construction.
“Our comments have been directed to our satisfaction and we recommend that the board demands the additional materials as the consent of the consent,” says the letter from Grace and Rokos. “We understand that the Berkshire Design Group will provide the board of directors a summary of the outstanding information before the next hearing.”
The shelter will come to the planning authority on May 12th. The ZBA will be associated again on May 15th. Documents in connection with the project, including McLaughlin's letter, can be found at bit.ly/42o3h9m.
Chris Larabee can be reached at Clarabee@recorder.com.