Housing
This section of the BDN aims to help readers understand Maine’s housing crisis, the volatile real estate market and the public policy behind them. Read more Housing coverage here.
Bangor historic homeowners say the changes city officials are considering that would allow them more flexibility to update their properties don’t go far enough.
Rick Violette, a general contractor who lives in Bangor’s Broadway Historic District, has been leading a small group of historic property owners pushing for changes to the city’s historic preservation rules for more than a year.
“At present, I would suggest that people ought not to buy such homes unless they have very deep pockets,” Violette said.
The proposed rule changes are intended to reduce how arduous, restrictive and costly it can be to maintain a historic property in accordance with the city’s rules. But some local residents believe the proposed changes still make owning and maintaining a historic building unnecessarily expensive and burdensome — even as the city grapples with an affordable housing crisis.
Bangor leaders are in the midst of reviewing and updating the city’s historic preservation ordinance, which outlines what changes owners can make to their historic buildings.
The laws apply to roughly 430 historic buildings and districts across the city, according to Anja Collette, Bangor’s planning officer. Owners of homes in the city’s nine historic districts need permission from the Bangor Historic Preservation Commission before performing work that could change their building’s appearance.
The current rules and proposed edits, Violette said, leave room for subjectivity for the commission to decide what maintenance should be allowed on a building based on a number of unique factors. This makes it difficult for applicants to know what proof they need in order to get a project approved, he said.
“I’m not looking for the rules to be loosened, I’m looking for them to be made more objective so anyone reading them knows what they mean,” Violette said. “You ought to be able to read the ordinance and know what’s expected of you to get a permit. It’s troubling to me that this ordinance doesn’t do that.”
The issue rose to prominence during a nearly year-long fight between Bangor resident Steven Farren and the city’s Historic Preservation Commission. Farren replaced the failing slate roof on his historic home with an asphalt lookalike after city officials denied his request to do so. Farren then sought — and eventually received — retroactive permission to keep the asphalt shingles.
Throughout the process, Violette said other historic buildings in Bangor have had their slate roofs replaced with asphalt. This created a precedent for Farren’s request to be allowed as well, but it was repeatedly rejected, Violette said.
Commission members initially argued Farren needed to install a new slate roof, as that would keep the home’s historically accurate appearance, regardless of how expensive and complicated it was to install due to the lack of local contractors who perform the work.
The proposed rule changes soften the importance of replacing an element on a home, such as the roof or windows, with the exact same materials to maintain its historical integrity. If replacing something with the same thing is unaffordable or impossible due to the lack of materials or contractors, the rules outline what documents an applicant can produce to prove that.
Violette said the change should go a step further and value the appearance of something over what it’s made of. For example, vinyl windows should be allowed to replace wood if the new windows look identical to the original, Violette said.
“To me, it’s more important what they look like, and I’d like them to keep looking historically accurate, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you have to use the same materials,” Violette said.
While Violette is underwhelmed by some of the proposed edits, others, he said, are welcome and long overdue. Those include expanded deadlines for homeowners to make approved changes to their properties.
Violette also appreciates the city reducing the number of affirmative votes an applicant needs to get their project approved. The current rules require four of the commission’s seven members to vote “yes,” but it’s common for only three or four members to attend a given meeting.
“This can result in delays in decisions if not enough members are in attendance,” Collette said. “Additionally, commissioners requested more clear guidance on hardship provisions and there were other issues that had come up over time, like needing full commission approval for small changes like heat pump additions.”
The Historic Preservation Commission is scheduled to review the proposed changes later this week, and city councilors may approve the updates later this month. Residents can offer comments on the proposed changes at the future meetings.
City staff plan to launch a second round of rule changes this fall that “focus on integrating more guidelines for things like new construction and more in-depth definitions of character-defining features for the various historic districts and sites,” Collette said.
The city broke the edits into two phases so more pressing changes could be made immediately before focusing on more complicated topics, Collette said. The next wave of edits are expected to involve themes such as a site’s “cultural significance.”