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MRC Oct. 2, 2000, 11:58PM Houston Heights Association presents deed restriction proposal By MARTIN HAJOVSKY Home in the Heights After more than a year of work, the Houston Heights Association's board of directors last month accepted a set of proposed revisions to the Heights' deed restrictions. The revisions are intended to severely curtail prospective townhome and other new construction considered by the association to be inappropriate to the historic nature and character of the area. Just over 20 percent of Houston Heights properties are currently protected by the deed restriction documents, first drafted by the association more than 20 years ago. The updates are necessary in order to keep pace with current threats to the neighborhood, according to association President Allan Tiller. "When the restriction documents were first drafted, the perceived threat was from commercial intrusion, having a business set up next to your home," he said. "Now with the rise in property values, that's not as much of a threat. What is a threat is the possibility that townhomes with their canyons of garage doors up and down the street will replace the essential character of the neighborhood with a level of density that is inappropriate." Tiller is not dismayed by the fact that after two decades of work, only a minority of area homeowners have signed on. "Certainly we want this to extend to everyone in the neighborhood and we're working to do that," he said. "But just the fact that you have it and it's publicized means that it becomes kind of a guideline for the neighborhood, and builders and developers are still reluctant to go in and change that or build anything contrary to that. That's been my experience." The proposed revisions deal with eight major areas in new construction dealing with design, density and placement, but not use, of properties. ? Setbacks -- A house or structure would have to leave at least three feet, increased from the current two, on the sides, three feet from the back and 15 feet from the front. Corner lots would have the 15-foot setback apply on both sides facing a street (similar to the city's 10-foot front setback rule). ? Front-facing construction -- Any new house will have to face the street rather than a common private driveway to prevent multiple-unit "compound"-type construction. ? Common wall construction -- Although the association board feels that the setback rules should generally prevent common-wall construction (two units sharing a common exterior wall), this provision was put in to help ensure that the prohibition is not circumvented by multiple-unit construction on a single lot, such as apartments. ? Garage setback -- The new restrictions would require that any garage facing the street be set back at least halfway to the back lot line, and in any event be no closer to the street than the front of the house itself. This is the case throughout the Heights currently, where garages are generally unseen from the street, as opposed to the newer townhome styles found throughout the Montrose area and the West End near Memorial Park. ? Garage-dominated front -- A new provision would mandate that a front-facing garage door could not take up more than a half of the first-floor front of the house, a direct blow at the most common townhome styles. ? Raised foundations -- Preserving another dominant characteristic of home construction in the Heights, the new restrictions would require either pier-and-beam construction, or other foundation construction that would raise the bottom floor of the house at least 2 feet from the ground. There are currently no townhome styles in Montrose or the West End that have raised construction of any kind. ? Height restrictions -- The revisions would retain the current height restriction of 40 feet, except that for lots of width greater than 50 feet, the limit would go up an additional foot for every 2 feet of additional setback from the nearest lot line. The point of this is to maintain the general Heights practice of no more than two stories in a single family dwelling. ? Density and lot width -- The minimum lot size would be increased from one residence per every 2,500 square feet to one per every 5,000 square feet, and there would be a minimum frontage of 50 feet for each lot. This would essentially establish a minimum lot size of 50 feet by 100 feet. This would represent a major break from the past. When the Heights was originally laid out in the 1890s, lots were considered to be generally no wider than 25 feet and houses occupied two or more of these lots. However, throughout the area, examples abound of homes constructed on 25-foot-wide lots only. Recognizing that situation, there would be two important exceptions to the new density and lot width requirements. First, garage apartments would not be treated as "residences" for this purpose. Second, lots of smaller frontage or size with existing houses as of the date of adoption of the revisions or other fixed date (to be determined) would be "grandfathered." That is, their size would be treated as conforming to the deed restrictions. A bracketed bill enacted by the Texas Legislature in 1999, applying only to the Heights, created a means by which the deed restrictions could be changed, setting the stage for these revisions. However, the alteration process is something that in itself could take many months, according to Tiller. There are three methods by which the restrictions can be changed, according to the bracketed law. First, a ballot could be mailed or delivered to each qualified property owner, that is, those who have already signed the deed restriction documents. Adoption of the revisions would require an affirmative vote of 75 percent of those submitting a ballot. Second, a petition could be mailed or otherwise sent out to all signed-on owners. Adoption would require the signature of 75 percent of the owners. The third, and as Tiller pointed out by far the easiest, method would be to call a meeting of signed-on property owners. Adoption would require the affirmative vote of 75 percent of those attending the meeting. "Obviously what we would prefer to do is to hold the meeting because it's the easiest thing to do," he said. "We would send out the notice to everyone, see who shows up and pretty much do it all in one fell swoop. Also, the group that would be most excited about the issue would be those attending the meeting." However, Tiller said that no one on the board or the association's Land Use Committee, which originally drafted the proposed revisions, wants to enact any change to any document without ensuring that the entire community supports such a move. "The number one priority is to build a consensus of support for the proposals," he said. "We are in the public education phase of the campaign. Before there's any kind of vote taken there's going to be a mailer to everyone that we have on our list who own deed restricted properties. That's going to be a hassle trying to track all those people down, but we need to do that. "The statute requires that notice be sent to all restricted property owners. What steps do you need to take in order to satisfy that? We'll take every practical step we can, and we'll record we did that. But that's another technical issue we have to deal with. "First and foremost, our goal is finding out whether or not we have the consensus to do this." Tiller did acknowledge the difficulty inherent in building that consensus with the association's all-volunteer work force. "With the petition it's my understanding you'd need 75 percent of everyone," he said. "That appeals to me because that means we've got as broad a consensus as possible. But that's a lot of work. With an all-volunteer process that might be too much. "In any event we'll be sending out a notice to everyone probably more than once. The technical issues of presenting the proposals to the neighborhood have to be worked out." Protecting the historic quality of the neighborhood, Tiller said, is the main goal of the restriction documents. As such, it coincides with a similar effort to seek historic district status from the city of Houston, an effort that still hasn't yet gotten off the ground in the Houston Heights despite the awarding of the status to the neighboring community of Norhill to the east. Tiller acknowledged the similarities in goals, but noted that the deed restrictions have a much tighter focus. "The deed restrictions really apply to new construction rather than preserving what's already on the ground," he said. "We could have extended it to preserving issues as well, but we did not want to overload this particular issue of stopping townhouse construction with the preservation issue as well. It will be a similar process, building a consensus and going to the homeowners to do that. Here initially we have a much more limited group we have to address though, which is the qualified property owners." The Houston Heights Association board of directors will focus on this issue at its next meeting, to be held at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 16, at the Fire Station at the corner of West 12th and Yale. For additional comment or more information about the deed restrictions, check out a copy of the current document online at the Heights Association's Web site at www.houstonheights.org/deedrestrictions.htm <http://www.houstonheights.org/deedrestrictions.htm<;. Also on the site is a list of all deed restricted properties in the Heights. For more information through non-computer means, call the Houston Heights Association's main telephone number at 713-861-4002. ______________________________________________________________ Gordon Hagendorf Kvaerner E&C gordon.hagendorf@kvaerner.com 713 270-2450 Phone 713 270-2990 Fax
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