Post #784751 by Prettyman's Atoll on Tue, Mar 6, 2018 4:43 PM

All right--good news! While the Planning Manager noted that the existing tiki room was almost certainly built without a permit and is disconforming to city code and zoning regulations (and not necessarily legally so), he dug deep into the code regulating allowed encroachments for single family residences and discovered a little-used provision that would allow me to permanently set aside a non-encroachment portion of our land to never be built upon, and in return I could legally build in an area that would otherwise be off limits because it's in an encroachment. Since the entire tiki bar is currently in an encroachment zone, this will allow me to finally make it all legal and conforming. And it would all become inhabitable square footage, so a plus for our home value.

The Planning Manager had no problem with me wanting to go down 16 inches, and saw no problem with the bar sink draining as graywater (watering our mint bush to keep the Mai Tais flowing). And most surprisingly, he had no problem with calling the complete tear-down and rebuild a "partial remodel" since one of the walls (the wall of the house) will remain standing.

He did hint that I should get hopping on this right away, as Planning Managers are given a lot of latitude in their decisions, and the next Planning Manager may not be as accommodating. But if I can get design approval soon, and if I apply for a permit for at least part of the work within a year of design approval, the design approval for the entire project will never expire.

So he recommended putting together plans for all work I need to do (new development--I now also need to build an addition somehow, somewhere for elderly parents to eventually live in), and get those plans approved. He suggested a second-floor addition above the tiki bar (or the garage) as one possibility to get extra space in the house, and I'm now thinking I may end up with not just a tiki room, but also something like the Captain's Quarters above Milwaukee's Foundation Bar (https://www.critiki.com/location/foundation-captains-quarters-milwaukee-1078/). Obviously, we wouldn't be sticking the elderly folk up the stairs above the bar, but we could move up there to free up a ground-floor room.

All very exciting stuff, and I can't wait to get to designing it all!