The Aspen Planning and Zoning Commission has recommended that the Aspen City Council deny a request from Councilman Bill Guth and his wife Lisa Guth to expand the available living area in their home by 1,000 square feet.
The request would not change the home’s overall footprint, but it would convert an existing crawl space into an additional living space. The additional space would bring Guth’s net livable area — the actual interior living space — in his 150 N. 8th Street home to 4,471 square feet, nearly 2,500 square feet more than is typically allowed in the city’s residential/multifamily zone district, within which the home sits.
The Guths sought the amendment to their property to allow their family to stay in their same home as their family grows. The new living space would be in the home’s basement, and would not create any new visual impacts.
“The kids grow up and it becomes very tight, so they have this available space to which to expand, and they would like to use it,” said Patrick Rawley, a principal at Rawley Design Planning, on behalf of the Guths. “It’s very important for them to stay in the core, they like the ability to be able to hop on a bus, for instance, and go to ski areas, they are very valued members of the community … so you have people that are living and working inside the core and they would like to stay here.”
Rawley spoke during a public hearing on the matter at Wednesday’s P&Z meeting.
Homes in the R/MF zone are allowed up to 2,000 square feet of net livable area. The policy was established in 2007 to allow for smaller, denser development in that zone district.
Guth’s home currently has 2,952 square feet of net livable area because of an ordinance passed by city council in 2012 for the home’s previous owner.
In 2012, the property owner at the time wanted to add an affordable housing unit on the 9,000-square-foot site where the duplex sat. It reduced the size of one unit from 3,157 square feet of net livable area to 2,952 square feet, expanded the second unit from 657 square feet to 741 and added an additional 401-square-foot affordable housing unit.
Staff at the time recommended denial of the project because the largest unit had nearly 1,000 square feet of net livable area more than is allowed in the R/MF zone.
But P&Z and city council ultimately approved the project because it would result in the creation of an affordable housing unit. The unit is considered a legally established nonconformity, meaning it does not meet certain code requirements, but was allowed to break from those requirements legally with permission of the city. According to the city’s land-use code, the city agrees to “permit nonconformities to continue, but not to allow nonconformities to be enlarged or expanded.”
Guth’s current request is “in direct conflict with these standards,” a memo sent to P&Z states. To receive a variance, such as the one Guth is seeking, a property owner must demonstrate that the use of the property has been withheld by the city and can only be achieved by granting a variance.
“The property owner must demonstrate that their rights, as compared with owners of similar properties, have been deprived,” the memo states.
But staff strongly recommended denial of the project, writing to P&Z, “There is absolutely no hardship on the applicant that requires this variance. The property owner already enjoys rights that are not commonly enjoyed by other property owners in the same zone district,” because of the additional 952 square feet of net livable area granted to the property in 2012.
If they had to move from their current home instead of creating more livable space, the Guths “would be driving, they would be also likely taking another resident-occupied housing unit out of the North 40 or elsewhere from someone else,” Rawley said. He also argued the Guths’ current home would become someone else’s second vacation home.
“We want to stay here. We’ve been here, worked here, lived here, met here, had our three kids here for 20 years, we love this community, we don’t want to move,” Lisa Guth said during the P&Z meeting.
But city staff also said granting the variance would grant special privilege to the property.
Granting approval for the project would require a change in the city’s land-use code, Aspen Community Development Director Ben Anderson told the Aspen Daily News in an interview Thursday.
“I have a lot of respect for the Guths, they’re a great family. I certainly understand their intentions to expand their unit to accommodate their family needs, that’s not an unusual desire,” Anderson said. “But I will say what they're proposing, from staff’s perspective, would require a land-use code change … I think it was a very intentional policy when it was created, but it could be that the community isn’t interested in that policy any longer, and so if there is a desire for a code change that could give a path forward.”
It is unusual for the city to receive requests from residents to expand units that are nonconformities, Anderson said. It also is not typical for the city to receive requests to expand units beyond the allowed net livable area.
The Lift One Lodge development will have some residential units that will have a net livable area larger than what is currently allowed in the city’s code, Anderson said, but the units were part of the project’s original approvals before the net livable area cap was established for that zone district.
P&Z voted unanimously to recommend denial of the project. The proposal requires city council review, which would likely take place early next year, Anderson said.
In the memo to the commission, city staff said it would “set a very problematic precedent” and “raise serious questions about the city’s ability to consistently regulate our built environment in application of the land-use code and enforce previously established site-specific approvals.”
The city also argued expansion of the unit’s livable area would require additional community resources and contribute to extreme property values in Aspen.
Guth declined to comment because the process is still ongoing and the issue has yet to go before city council.
“It’s difficult when it’s a city council member and that added sort of a degree of care and concern to our review, but at the end of the day, staff is bound by the land-use code and prior land-use approvals,” Anderson said. “There’s a perspective for sure that what they’re asking for is a fully reasonable thing, and we should be supporting local families and their desire to stay in Aspen … but unfortunately the code doesn’t provide a lot of flexibility on the topic.”