3.28.2024 Licensing Board

I will call the for of ele board meeting to order it's a special meeting to be held on Thursday March 28 2024 on pursuant to the open meeting L any person may make a an audio of video recording of this public hearing and may transmit the meeting to any media attendees are therefore advised that such recordings and Transmissions are being made whether perceived or UNP perceived by those present and deemed

acknowledge and permissible the city Charter section 9-18 mandates that all multiple member bodies develop and adopt rules or policy for public comment we have adopted such a policy which ensure provides for citizen input on licensing board specific matters at the end of the meeting actually it's at the very beginning of the meeting excuse me there is a signup sheet that is located in the

back of the room uh agenda item one is public input we have any Chris no okay we're going to take it out of order because I can't sit on um the uh number two so we're going to take agenda item number three lodging house uh raldi P operations LLC car of for property management Joseph raldi sorry we just need a a motion to take it out of order I'll make a motion to take

it out of order apiz uh I'll second that motion any questions on a motion hearing none all is in favor motion carries I'm sorry I'll start again uh item agenda number three lodging house Ral peace operations LLC care of for River Property Management Joseph Aldi Noah piece could you all identify yourselves by giving your name and address for the record please attorney Andrew Beach nor

for raldi p operations LLC 286 Union Street New bford Mass good morning uh Joseph raldi 254 French Street Boston Massachusetts noys uh 254 Street uh Boston Mass okay Jose pachon 2 251 South Main Street Fall River Mass okay well gentlemen we're here for the third time so uh hopefully third time's a CH a charm for you guys um um yes Mr chair um ronaldi Peace operations is before the board today

seeking a renewal of their their um lodging house license this is the third time we've been here um we appreciate the board's consideration allowing us to come back after having to reschedule um because of a minor miscommunication um my clients have worked um closely with the city the building inspection uh department and the fire department to make sure the properties are compliant safe and um

ready to be renewed in their license okay Mr chairman my name is Joseph Ral I just want to personally apologize to both members of the board for our failure to appear last Wednesday it was a fully my mistake it was an honest mistake when Jose called me after the first hearing I just wrote down the wrong date it was uh it was an error on my part I should have called the city to

verify I'm sorry that I did not and I'm I'm uh thankful that you're allowing us to be here today all right that's okay mral I mean the fact that you here today is fine I'm really kind of more concerned about um getting some input from the city as to what's going on I I am just very leery Mr Hato um and having these properties out there unlicensed I mean we you probably have heard that we

had a recent problem in one of the lodging houses that we shut down um I'm just very leery of having an unlicensed you know lodging house up there in case something should ever happened and putting the city in Jeopardy so I want to just make sure that this is right and we get this resolved for your sake and the city's sake quite frankly absolutely Glen if you want to touch on it you and uh Mr L

were here last and there were some problems so where are we at with all that good morning Mr chairman and board uh name is Glenn hathway Building Commissioner with the city of Fort River um after the first meeting that was held in front of this board uh we had a meeting at site we went through each and every building myself and the fire department included could could I just interrupt you for one quick second

I'm I apologize for doing that but we have three plans before us now what what are we dealing with we have a plan for 274 Street 197 Rodman Street and 240 4th Street okay allow me I'll I'll clarify okay so there is a total of four structures involved with this license uh I should say three to be more precise three structures the fourth one is in question okay uh the fourth one was a

apartment building SL off space that uh work was being done inside the building and brought us to this point with lack of Permitting and lack of responsibility uh for the proper permits to the building code to the fire code and that's why we initially brought this to the Forefront so with that said uh upon I asked the licensing board to notify me so that I could stop the process of the license or prolong it

until they complied and that brought us to uh what else of you done on the on the structures that's involved here that you did without permitting so that involved a inspection of the entire complex all buildings and that's how we got there so we have done I have walked through with the fire department on all the buildings um including including that fourth building including in the fourth building so we have three

buildings we have three buildings that was under the license initially as far as I'm concerned okay and the three build they did do some Renovations in those buildings without the proper permitting yes they did they are well aware after my inspection that they are not to do any more Ren now we'll go to the fourth building the fourth building is what's the address of that uh 254 2 254

4th okay go ahead I'm sorry so that building uh was the office slash apartment house not a boarding house not a lodging house but a but a um apartment that's the building in question that's been remodeled somewhat and changed somewhat my correct yes sir okay if I'm talking out of space you let me know absolutely okay so they did convert that building into some extensive work in there what I consider

extensive uh they have a order to get me a chapter 34 review from a professional design a design professional which is an architect or an engineer telling them uh what is telling us what has taken place and what they need to do in order to bring that building up to code in order to make it whatever they're going to classify it as okay but can I stop you one more time yep

so to to council are we entertaining A lodging license for 254 Forth Street Mr Mr chairman May if if if if I would well I just want to know if I want to know if an application is here not nothing to do you don't have an application on that property knows or we did not apply for one because they don't know if they need it yet that's why well then well then but

it's not properly before us then that's all I'm trying to I you can go on but I'm not so we're not going to act on 254 no matter what we have three applications one for 276 Fourth Street 254 Forth Street and 195 Rod I'm sorry Mr CH I think the confusion might just be that and none of those and none of those match what we just have right here

in terms of the plants I'm sorry I think the confusion might be that 2544 street is the tax parcel ID uh but the 274 Street um I'm sorry on the I filled out the application myself on the online application I I did list the correct address but it it would it had I had to select the tax parcel it's one lot that has two buildings I'm sorry 276 yes if we have a four plan for 274th

Street which we have before and 197 yes sir so we have those three so that's the three we we going to rule on we're going to make a decision on today yes sir I have the floor plan for 254 I provided it to Mr hathway I can give it to you now if you'd like it I'd like to see it yes sir so you walk correct Mr chairman the floor no this is that once I was

done uh clarifying what the process is that they have to follow in order to get then they need to if if the architect or the design professional classifies this under what I'm thinking he's going to classify it as as a lodging house/ boarding house then we will be back here for an additional license for that piece of property right now it is what I consider a lodging house or or a boarding house SL boarding

house the same as what they're running elsewhere but safety features in the building once that report is generated through the design professional then these gentlemen are going to have to come back and ask this board for a license for that structure 254 yes okay I but I just want from my standpoint you're you're correct no no no I I want to say something to me that then they're operating an unlicensed

lodging house correct okay I and I'm not I just want that to be put on the record something happens there they're not licensed and I'm not I'm not saying it's okay for them to do what they were doing whatever the city does in terms of whether they shut you down close it that's the enforcement authority to the to the billing inspector but I'm I'm not I just want it Crystal Clear something

should happen there that's unlicensed lodging house right now yes sir and so um we've had this convers we hope to have that as soon as possible I'm sure you I'm not even suggesting you're not doing that mral all I'm saying is for purposes of here because this is I've only come on the board the last two months yes sir but it really concerns me that you've been operating lodging houses since January

1st without a license something happens that's crazy we're going to go into the fourth month of the year so I just want to known that that that concerns me when we're when we have people doing things that should be licens and they don't have licenses so I'm just letting you know that in terms of 254 I would hope that that gets done sooner rather than later yes sir excuse me we'll go right

ahead um 254 how many I count it up I might have missed one but looks like there's 15 uh bedrooms there so the the current use of uh from and this is Jose uh clan on the owner of our property man his Property Management Company Fall River Property Management um the the current use is a six-unit multif family building um there's six units six leases in the property uh and so we as uh Mr

hathway mentioned it if the architect determines that it is actually being operated as or needs to be operated as ring we will do whatever we need to do to comply uh we're fully prepared to that but we we have six leases at that building six six units and it and Jose could speak more of that but and they have families that live in there or individuals like at a rooming house

families yeah it's not it's not a it's not operated there's not rooms there are Apartments okay and uh and they're all occupied there there four living there six uh all six units currently occupied yes sir let me clarify for everybody while we're here pleas do so there is the office area yes we've gone over this that was converted to an apartment individuals or five individuals it's a it's a different unit

but I know what you're speaking of the largest the the unit is not a family by right they're not a family there was so how many names was on the mailbox that's the one I brought there were so they're they're claiming to be a family and this is where the architect is going to make the determination to help me because it's complicated right the apartment and then I bring in

six friends or five friends okay uh and we all share this apartment they're not related by blood of marriage or anything else they're all separate individuals uh renting or part of an agency or part of something that is sleeping in this building or this area clarify that do we have an ordinance that says you can only have certain non-related people well that would then you're then by the building code

standards you you're operating a lodging SL boarding house okay which that sounds to me that that meets meets the criteria correct that that one that one apartment as an office I guess is and shared uh bathroom and kitchen facilities like there is right then you could you could call this more of a boarding house you're right in what you're saying and that's again it's a little confusing to what's going on

because I can make it in my observation it's a lodging house okay yes they're not sharing a common bathroom and a common kitchen area with the entire complex but they're sharing a common area and a kitchen with four or five individuals based on the number of bedrooms and they're not all family yeah so the and and absolutely and that's my understanding of it well and I'm sure that you're more well versed in in the

ordinance and and the uh statute that I am that but that's the point that I just want to make is that second unit that we're talking about does have its own kitchen bom but can I just stop you because 254 is not before us yes I'm not going to even deal with it that's stage of the game 270 197 and 276 I'm sorry 197 driving street they're all in order Mr haway yes sir and you have

no problems with us issuing this permit I do not all right are all applications in order Mr chairman thing um so we did get police reports and you know I I really I mean I haven't done like a study of them but it's a lot of uh um alarms unwanted parties domestics you know basically um Quality of Life type things and you know obviously very very domestic violence is very very serious and uh there's there's

a number of other um a lot of medical calls different things and which that's fine medical calls but there were lot lyes citizens reports break at residents a lot of calls for the police department do you have any plans probably you I can speak to that when they bought the property um there were drug there was a drug dealer dealing drugs out of the window um we actually saw when we first walked the property

when they first purchased it there were prostitutes taking people into the rooms um all those people have been gone uh there were a lot of drug users in the building particularly 197 Rodman a lot of the I'm not saying that no one uses drugs there but a lot of the known drug users and known drug dealers have been evicted or their leases have been terminated they're not there anymore uh

the number of incidents at that property have gone down dramatically since they made the adjustments that they made to the property they upgraded the property and we have done as much as we can to vet every you know every resident that comes to rent either a room or an apartment in the you have surveillance cameras there yeah they actually purchased a really comprehensive um system

that um you know they also upgraded the lighting and the park just to piggyback on on Mr PR I just just be well aware that obviously lodging houses are you know come to the Forefront so just pay attention to it CU next time you come in for your for your renewals you know will probably be a little you're new we'll give you the opportunity looks like trying to do the right thing you know

when it comes back in I'm sure Mr pra from his affiliation with the police department is going to you know be on top of that and we'll be always talking to Mr haway to make sure everything's in order so um hearing that I'll entertain a motion to approve the lodging house licenses am I say 270 Forth Street 197 Rodman Street and 276 Forth Street correct motion I'll second that motion anybody uh in favor

of the motion anybody opposed hearing none all those in favor I motion carries thank all set thank you very much gent's not coming dma just told him she's not showing up is there any other ones we can do nope that's the other uh items four and five need to be tabled the applicant oh they were going to be tabled anyways anyway yeah so you want to do that yeah uh I can't anyhow I'll I'll make

you can't even act those two those two no I own the people that own the buildings in both so we have no just table them I mean we just going to put them on to the next meeting but what are we I mean what are we going to do this he's he needs to he's been he's had his stuffing for over a month I know I'm willing to do whatever we can I know no

I know you are whatever we what do you figure on yeah so we can't do anything when's on when's Melanie going to be able to do this do you have any idea I'm not sure I mean I know not tomorrow reached out to her text me so I'm available tomorrow Greg but she's going to be I'm available tomorrow bet I think it's the whole place closed Good Friday yeah oh that's only reason I

said it's good Friday that's why I said no tomorrow can we try to maybe do something for Monday yeah I'll work on it when I come Ser I'm available Monday let's have a motion to ad Jour so you can cut it off I apologize motion motion to adjourn um all those in favor all those opposed