Zoning board issues supplemental decision, reaffirms carriage‑house approval after Superior Court remand

The Newport Zoning Board of Review on May 18 issued a supplemental decision that reaffirms the board’s earlier January 2024 approval of a carriage‑house and attached garage at 275 Harrison Ave after a Superior Court remand asked the board to make explicit findings about whether the proposal represented the "least relief necessary."

The case was remanded by the Rhode Island Superior Court specifically to require the board to address three issues the judge identified: whether the Historic District Commission (HDC) formally rejected alternative locations, whether the applicants created their own hardship by converting the existing garage into a kitchen, and whether the design requested the least relief necessary. Attorney Joshua Parks, representing the homeowners, asked the board to incorporate the solicitor’s memorandum and existing hearing record rather than reopen wide-ranging testimony. "This application was certified finished almost 3 years ago," Parks told the board, noting the project had been vetted by experts and the HDC and that the requested location is the only practical site on the property.

Objector counsel Jay Lynch urged the board to confine its decision to the record, noting that no formal HDC vote rejecting other locations appears in the file. "There is nothing in the record of any HDC vote where they rejected other applications," Lynch said, and asked members to make explicit findings to satisfy the court.

Board members spent the meeting addressing the three discrete questions. Several members said their prior hearing and questioning had in practice considered the HDC’s deliberations and the alternatives on the property even if the HDC did not have a separate formal recorded vote on every rejected location. Members also relied on prior expert testimony — including engineering evidence about wetlands and site constraints — that, they said, demonstrated no suitable alternative location existed. On the question of self‑created hardship, the board cited expert testimony that the former garage door openings were too narrow for modern vehicles and that repurposing the preexisting space into a kitchen was an understandable adaptation, not a self‑imposed disqualifying hardship.

After discussion of the three remand issues, Vice Chair Dave Riley moved "to adopt the Board's finding of fact information in the staff report, application supporting documents, testimony of witnesses ... and adopt the Board's conclusion of law that the petition has met their burden of proof" under the ordinance as it applied on the original application date and to issue a supplemental decision incorporating the prior decision and the additional findings the court requested. The motion carried on a 5–0 vote.

The board conditioned its reaffirmation on the standard drafting language it applies to dimensional variances: the project must be started and substantially completed within 12 months or an extension requested; outstanding public‑notice invoices must be paid; and the board directed the solicitor to issue a supplement to the January 2024 decision that formally records the explicit findings addressing the judge’s remand.

What happens next: the board asked applicant counsel to prepare the supplemental decision for the board’s record. The remand was narrow; the board limited new testimony and relied on the prior record and solicitor guidance to resolve the court’s instructions.

Provenance: The board opened the remand discussion when staff read the petition and explained the Superior Court remand (SEG 903–919). The board debated scope, allowed brief closing arguments, and then deliberated on the three judicially‑identified questions before moving and voting to adopt the supplemental decision (discussion and vote took place across SEG 955–2360).