Groundfloor Apartment Conversions OK’d

City Plan Commissioners signed off on converting two empty downtown commercial spaces into apartments, in the latest instance of a citywide trend towards ground-floor residential.

Commissioners took those votes during the most recent monthly virtual City Plan Commission meeting, held online via Zoom.

In a 4 – 1 vote, the commissioners voted to allow for a first-floor residential use at a row house at 265 Orange St. That ground-floor space currently consists of an empty former law office.

The only ​“nay” vote came from Commission Chair Leslie Radcliffe, who cautioned against the landlord’s apparent plans to convert the building’s current six upper-story single room occupancy (SRO) units into a more traditional two-family home. (See more on that debate below.)

In a separate, unanimous 5 – 0 vote, the commissioners also voted to allow for a first-floor residential use in an adjacent row house at 267 Orange St.

That garden-level space is currently vacant, local attorney Ben Trachten said during Wednesday’s special permit public hearing. It was presumably once used for commercial purposes based on the building’s zoning records, he said, but he was unable to find out exactly what occupied the space before its current vacant state.

Both 265 Orange St. and 267 Orange St. are owned through separate holding companies by Stamford-based investor Avraham Lipsker, whose LLCs bought the adjacent four-story buildings for a combined sum of over $1.2 million in early March.

Trachten, Westville Alder and City Plan Commissioner Adam Marchand, and East Rock resident Kevin McCarthy (the latter speaking up during the public hearing portion of the meeting) all put this groundfloor commercial-to-residential conversion in a larger context of persistently empty commercial space and a citywide need for more housing.

Click here, here, and here for previous articles on similar groundfloor conversions.

“I think that the antiquated commercial use on the first floor that’s just going to sit there and be unoccupied and vacant serves no purpose whatsoever,” Trachten said.

McCarthy agreed.

“I live a few blocks away and go past these properties regularly. Residential is an entirely appropriate use for the ground floor,” he said.

He said that the Board of Alders should consider amending the city’s zoning ordinance to allow for such groundfloor residential use as of right, given the number of recent applications for such uses.

“We all read Jane Jacobs. We all value eyes on the street. But having vacant ground level properties is really not benefitting anyone.”

Marchand commented on how the city’s retail landscape has been profoundly changed by the pandemic and, well before Covid hit, by the Internet.

“Given our current retail environment, and not to mention the possible impact of remote working upon the office space market at this time, I think it makes sense to grant a special permit to allow a residential use on the first floor,” he said.

What About The SROs?

While the commissioners ultimately overwhelmingly approved both groundfloor residential use special permits, some did push back on the requst for 265 Orange St. when they found out that that row house’s upper three floors are currently classified as single room occupancy units, or SROs.

Trachten said that, while the 6 bedrooms spread across the upper three levels of that four-story building are technically SROs, they have long been used as a more typical ​“roommate setup.”

That is, while they technically can be rented by the bedroom to unrelated single individuals, they have in fact been rented like most multi-bedroom apartments to groups of people looking to live together.

“I don’t believe that the SROs have been used for their intended purpose for many, many years,” Trachten said. Nevertheless, the planned conversion of the whole property to a two-family unit would result in the loss of those six individually-rentable bedrooms, to be replaced by two rentable multi-bedroom apartments.

He also pointed out that more than 100 units of new market-rate housing are slated to be built atop a surface parking lot right next door.

“I think it’s important to keep a smaller scale residential component with some history to the neighborhood in place immediately adjacent to this colossal new structure that’s going to be built that will also see a historic structure relocated.”

For Commission Vice-Chair Ed Mattison, these dwellings appeared to be SROs in name only. ​“Even though I am very opposed to reducing our supply of single room occupancy housing, because many individuals need a place to live” at the more affordable rents offered by single-bedroom rentals, ​“I’m not sure there’s any way in this particular area with these buildings to turn them back into SROs.”

Marchand ultimately agreed. While this groundfloor residential conversion will ultimately facilitate a larger project that results in the loss of six SROs, the empty groundfloor commercial space isn’t serving any purpose at this time. ​“Do we really need a bunch of empty commercial spaces when they could be used for housing?”

Radcliffe, however, disagreed, and was the only commissioner to vote against the 265 Orange St. special permit for groundfloor residential use. She did vote to approve the parallel application for 267 Orange St.

What swayed her vote against the first application, she said, was the fact that allowing such a commercial-to-residential groundfloor conversion at 265 Orange St. would facilitate the landlord’s larger apparent objective to get rid of six single room occupancy units in favor of a two-family home.

“I see this as converting a commercial property so that you can create an apartment which is going to reduce the availability of housing for individuals who can use single unit occupancy housing,” she said.

Given the city’s dearth of SROs, and the need for such affordable rental options, that trade did not seem worth making at this time.