Breaking: Property Owner Eyes Building 225 Apartments At Purecoat Site On Hittinger St.

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Photo: The Purecoat North site which the owner the Tosi family hopes to build 225 apartment units on the three acre site adjacent Hittinger Street and Brighton Avenue.

The property owner of the Purecoat North Plating manufacturing site on Hittinger Street and a dog daycare business facing Brighton Street in east Belmont has presented to the town a preliminary design to redevelop the 126,726 square foot parcel into a 225 unit apartment complex with four floors of residential units above street level retail stores.

“I think we have a bonifide offer to proceed with a very major investment in Purecoat by the owner of Purecoat,” said Select Board member Roy Epstein. Under this redevelopment “scheme”, the property tax on the site will increase “by a factor of 10.”

While details – revealed at Monday’s Select Board meeting – remain vague, the Tosi family from Belmont who own the property approached Town officials in June with its plans to transform the three acre location into the largest mixed use development in Belmont’s history. In comparison, the Bradford complex in Cushing Square that opened in 2019 has half the number of units as what being proposed on Hittinger and Brighton streets.

One detail that has emerged is for two thirds of the complex, or 150 units, to be two-bedroom suites with the remaining units single bedrooms and studios.

More details are expected when the Planning Board meets on Tuesday, July 23.

The sites, currently occupied by Purecoat and the dog daycare business Crate Escape, are located adjacent the driveway to Belmont Middle and High School and across Hittinger from a residential neighborhood. The site also fronts Brighton Street at the corner with Flanders Road and runs along the commuter rail tracks.

The Tosi’s have told Epstein the project is conditional on being a by-right development, which means that the town’s planning staff or the Planning Board cannot deny the project as long as the proposal meets the criteria of the the Zoning Bylaw. While a by-right project means the project will require no waivers, special permits, or any other approvals, it’s still required to go through the normal development processes including Site Plan Review and the regular building permitting approvals.

The parcels are zoned as “General Business” which allow developer much greater leeway to build the complex they envision, a proposition that promoted Select Board Chair Elizabeth Dionne to say that the Tosi family “has the town over a barrel.” Dionne criticised the proposal as a long-term money loser for the town as it will increase the cost of town services, a jump in traffic, and an unknown increase in student enrollment in the public school district.

“No, we make money, this is cash-flow positive,” said Epstein.

It took Town Administrator Patrice Garvin to end the verbal tit for tat by saying the town is currently working with the Tosi family “to run some numbers” on the project’s revenue and expenses.

“We want to get the information to the Planning Board to really see what this project means,” said Garvin.

If the town or the Planning Board pushes back on the Tosi demands, the family is said to have made an old chestnut of a threat. “If it [isn’t] by-right, he’s making money [as a plating manufactor] and they’ll just leave it and nothing will happen,” said Epstein.

The parcels possible development is a blow to a number of town officials and residents who sees the location as a hub for commercial development. In fact, during its recent review of maps during the MBTA Communities Act discussion to determine areas to change zoning requirements to permit greater opportunities to develop multiunit housing, the Planning Board removed the Purecoat site for consideration for residential projects, replacing it with an area along Belmont Street near the Cambridge city line.

That decision by the Planning Board is being seen as one reason the Select Board in a 2-1 decision not to reappoint Planning Board Chair Jeffrey Birenbaum, to his role leading the five-member group, a move that surprised many in town.

In the past decade and a half, the town had been interested in the property for various projects. The Tosi family rejected a $6 million offer in 2011 to allow the construction of a Belmont Light substation. The station would eventually end up on Flanders Road. In 2019, a 60-day negotiation period between the town and the Tosi family failed to secure the ownership of the property or create an easement to allow the community bike path to run along the south side of the tracks. The path is now proceeding along the northside of the commuter line.

The Running For The Dogs: Create Escape Seeks OK for 5K Road Race

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Photo: Racing with dogs.

Soon it will be the humans doing the chasing.

The general manager of Crate Escape came before the Belmont Board of Selectmen Monday, July 25, to seek a tentative OK for a proposed 5K road race in October that will be for the dogs.

General Manager Nikki Condon said the idea of the doggie daycare business at 30 Brighton St. sponsoring a fundraiser to assist in financing cures for canine cancers came to the facility’s owner, Bradley Hastings after he lost his dog to the disease two years ago. 

Working with RaceWire, a Braintree-based consulting firm, the business is looking at the weekend of Oct. 22 with a hope of having 250 people and for many, their dogs, attend and donate. Condon said Belmont Police had given a tentative OK so she could show her plans to the Selectmen. 

While the board was favorable deposed to the race, the members were concerned the proposed route layout – which would start at the facility and travel north of the commuter rail tracks – included some heavy residential streets such as Broad and Chilton streets in Precinct 8.

“These are busy, populous roads” that would be impacted on a Sunday run, noted Mark Paolillo, the board’s chair.

Condon, who has been the manager for eight years, said she would return to the police for further consultation and work with Town Hall to develop a 3.1-mile course that would not severely impact the surrounding neighborhoods. 

Established in 2004, Crate Escape provides daycare, overnight boarding, van service, grooming, and training in Belmont as well as Cambridge and Charlestown.

Belmont Planning, Health Boards to Make Changes to Kennel Rules

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The Belmont Planning Board and the Board of Health will be working together to make changes to a pair of Town Meeting articles that, if passed, would force Crate Escape, the doggie day care center located on Brighton Street, to close its doors, leaving 300 customers and 150 dogs – 75 percent from Belmont – without a home of the day.

“The intent [of the articles] were not to effect day care, only overnight kennels,” said the Planning Board’s Elizabeth Allison, who said she will be sitting down with the Health Board’s Vice Chair Dr. David Alper and the town’s Health Director Stefan Russakow to replace the current static number of dogs that can stay in a “kennel.”

“Is this a backdoor way to eliminate doggy day care in town? No,” said Allison at a Planning Board meeting on Tuesday, April 15, at Town Hall.

The two Town Meeting articles, number 8 and 9, updates Belmont’s decade-old animal bylaw to meet state standards and the zoning code on the definition of what is a “kennel”; the current regulations specify a kennel as being an outdoor shelter. Under the existing code, that facility could only hold up to 25 dogs at one time.

Under the new proposed code, the definition of kennel is expanded to include commercial entities such as overnight and extended-stay as well as day care businesses. But the Town Meeting article that would amend the Health Code did not change the maximum number of 25 dogs that could be kept in a licensed location.

According to Crate Escape’s owner Bradley Hastings, he would be forced to close his Belmont site if the articles passed Town Meeting early in May.

In response to Hastings’ concern, the Allison group is considering replacing the 25 dog limit with a formula establishing a square-footage percentage of dogs that can be safely held in an interior site such as Crate Escape.

“We will come up with something to keep [Hastings] here,” said Allison, who said she will be seeking the help of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in creating the formula.

Town Meeting Articles Could Force Dog Kennel to ‘Take a Walk’

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Sadie, a blue-nose bull dog, isn’t shy to say “hello” to anyone after spending a day at Crate Escape, Belmont’s “doggy day care” center at the corner of Brighton and Hittinger streets.

Her owner, Chris of Acton, said he has been taking his pet to the facility located hard by the commuter rail tracks for the past three years which is convenient as he works in neighboring Arlington.

“It’s awesome. She loves it here,” said Chris who has owned Sadie for the past five years.

“She runs around all day and comes home tired. He usually naps on the trip home,” he said, calling himself a “very satisfied” Crate Escape customer.

But Chris and Sadie along with approximately 300 customers and nearly 150 dogs on an average day will need to look for a new canine provider if next month Belmont’s Town Meeting passes a pair of articles forcing the six-year-old facility to shut down for exceeding the maximum amount of dogs a kennel can house under the new regulations.

“This will bankrupt me if this passes,” said Crate Escape’s owner Bradley Hastings, who opened his current Belmont facility last year after moving from his original location across Brighton Street on Flanders Road (which opened in 2008) that will be used for the new Belmont Light substation.IMG_3798

Chris was more succinct.

“It would [stink],” he said.

Hastings attended an informational meeting by the Board of Health Thursday, April 10 at Town Hall on the changes to the town’s health codes in Article 8 to amend the general bylaws effecting animals.

Hastings, who has 55 employees and a $1.2 million payroll at stake, said first heard about the meeting and the warrant articles that morning when clients spoke to him advising him to attend. What he heard was sobering for the Belmont resident.

“People don’t like services taken from them and this is what will happen. But it will also do such damage to a business that is successful and wants to do what’s right for everyone,” said Hastings to the Belmontonian.

Located in a 15,000 square foot single-floor commercial building, Crate Escape is a big open play space for your pooch. On a visit, some dogs were running around, others playing with plastic toys, a few napping and several extremely curious of a 35mm camera.IMG_3778

Dogs are segregated by temperament and social “skills” in one of the seven pens with a handler on hand so everyone “plays safe,” said Nikkilee Condon, Crate Escape’s general manager, who said there is also grooming and boarding at the facilities.

“There’s a lot of running around and mental stimulation for the dogs. They have to figure their way through a new hierarchy each day,” said Condon, who said their are 30 dogs in each enclosed area.

Calling the business’ clients “very loyal,” Condon said more most dogs, a half-hour walk “is not enough” activity and leaving them alone is troublesome for both pet and owner.

“We have the right balance here,” said Condon.

Yet for Hastings, the services he provides the community is just two votes away from being banned in Belmont.

On Thursday, the Board of Health’s vice-chair Dr. David Alper told the sparsely-attended meeting the language change to the existing bylaw was effectively mandated by the state’s Board of Health which issued language in 2012 in an effort to bring uniformity to the hodgepodge of hundreds of regulations existing in each of the Commonwealth’s approximately 350 municipalities.

Changing regulations, static numbers

Under the “tweaking” of the regulations, the town’s Health Department will only have the power to enforce the safety and welfare of the animals by inspection and licensing facilities; it is unable to determine where a facility can be located which is left up to the zoning bylaws, said Stefan Russakow, director of the town’s Health Department.

Yet in the proposed new bylaw, the town’s terminology for what is a “kennel” has been expanded and specified  to the determent of doggy day care facilities.

In addition to requirements on licensing pets and dealing with “dangerous” dogs, Article 8 states that “[n]0 Kennel may keep more than 25 dogs on the premises at any time.”

And under the language in Article 9, a kennel in Belmont will include “[a]n establishment used for boarding, holding, day care, overnight stays or training of animals.”IMG_3795

This regulatory double play would force Hastings’ facility to close down as he could not meet the drastically-altered licensing requirements.

“There is just no way we could do business here,” said Hastings.

Yet the new amendments were not being proposed to drive kennels out of Belmont, according to town officials, but rather an oversight when transforming existing bylaws and zoning regulations.

According to Jeffrey Wheeler, the town’s Planning Coordinator, the history of the current animal regulations goes back to 2003 when residents along Pleasant Street complained of noise coming from an animal clinic’s outdoor kennel and petitioned the town to regulate those facilities by limiting the number of dogs to 25 in any kennel.

Under the bylaw that has been in existence for the past decade, a “kennel” did not included a section for canine care facilities such as Hastings’ but will under the amendments.

“And the Board of Health did not change the number of animals in their regulations when the zoning changes were made,” said Wheeler.

If in the first week of May Town Meeting votes to amend the bylaw (Article 8) and the zoning code (Article 9 ), Create Escape will be forced to close.

Yet the articles are far from being death sentences to Hastings’ business, according to both the Board of Health and Wheeler. Crate Escape will need a little help to revise the articles with the stroke of the copy editor’s blue pencil.

One of two measures would need to take place to save Sadie’s daytime home: the submission of a so-called “amendment to the amendment” (the articles are, in fact, amendments; they do not create new bylaws or codes) doing one of two things: either excluding the terms “day care”; or change the number of dogs a specific facility can handle.

Those who hope to change the articles are required to submit an amendment to the amendment.

Town Clerk Ellen Cushman told the Belmontonian that one Town Meeting member can file the proposed amendment in writing with the Town Clerk by the close of the business three days prior to the session of Town Meeting the article is expected to be voted.

“Related to animals, [that is] expected to be heard and voted on May 5; amendments are due by 4 p.m. April 30. No additional signatures are required,” she said.

“It behoves you to go to the zoning, planning to discuss this,” said Alper to Hastings.

But for Hastings, the last-minute way and how he was informed of the two Town Meeting articles he said could do severe damage to a decade-old service with 4,000 current customers in three locations was deplorable.

“There has been this anti-business feel since I’ve been here. No one could think of calling me? I’m disappointed,” said Hastings.