9 19 24 West Orange BOA ZB 24 06 PSEG Full size

Page 101 1 CHAIRMAN NEUER: And just one point I would 2 like to make to you Ms. Merainer, respectfully. Public 3 service standards are not binding on this Board, which 4 is why I'm glad you gave a more factual explanation 5 with regard to what it is that you were trying to 6 accomplish. I didn't want it to drift into the area of 7 a net opinion, because when somebody tells me that 8 that's my company policy it's not necessarily this 9 Board's policy. So you might want to refrain from 10 doing that in the future. 11 And just so the record is clear, is the 12 height of the entire fence 9 feet or is it just the 13 pillars? 14 THE WITNESS: It is just the pillars. The 15 reason we're asking for more than 8 feet is the fence 16 will be 8 feet but the pillar has a cap on it, and 17 that's what I'm trying to include. 18 CHAIRMAN NEUER: So it is clear that the 19 black slats going up and down without that hook at the 20 top that you showed us from Jersey City which will not 21 be there, that's 8 feet. And the supporting pillars in 22 between the brick with the cap on top is what goes up 23 to 9 feet? 24 THE WITNESS: I don't even think it will go 25 up to 9 feet.

Page 102 1 CHAIRMAN NEUER: But that's what you're 2 asking for? 3 THE WITNESS: That's what we're asking for. 4 CHAIRMAN NEUER: But it the pillars, not 5 the -- 6 THE WITNESS: Exactly. 7 CHAIRMAN NEUER: Slats? 8 THE WITNESS: It is the pillars and the 9 little decorative cap. 10 CHAIRMAN NEUER: Those are my only 11 questions. Mr. Williams, questions for the witness? 12 MR. WILLIAMS: Yes. Thank you, Mr. 13 Chairman. Good evening, Ms. Merainer. How are you 14 this evening? 15 THE WITNESS: Very well. Your question? 16 MR. WILLIAMS: I will also thank you for a 17 thorough testimony. I have mostly points of 18 clarification. Let me get back to my notes. Bear with 19 me one second. So you mentioned the purposes of zoning 20 that would be advanced, but could you just give us the 21 sections, please? 22 CHAIRMAN NEUER: You mean the sections from 23 the statute? 24 MR. WILLIAMS: That's correct. Thank you, 25 Mr. Chairman.

Page 103 1 THE WITNESS: The sections from the 2 Municipal Land Use Ordinance or the West Orange 3 Ordinance? 4 MR. WILLIAMS: Correct. 5 CHAIRMAN NEUER: The Municipal Land Use 6 Statute? 7 THE WITNESS: Okay. Yes. I do have those 8 written down if you'll just bear with me for a second. 9 MR. WILLIAMS: Certainly. And this is just 10 for the record. 11 THE WITNESS: N.J.S.A.40:55D-2(a), 2(b), 12 and D-2. 13 MR. WILLIAMS: Wait. I'm sorry. So 14 purpose of zoning (a) is the very generic first purpose 15 of zoning. 16 THE WITNESS: It is. 17 MR. WILLIAMS: And purpose (b) is? 18 THE WITNESS: This is -- we're seeing an 19 advance in safety. 20 MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you. And then the 21 last one was? 22 THE WITNESS: Promoting energy resources, 23 D-2. I have my Cox book here, which I'm sure is also 24 on your desk. 25 MR. WILLIAMS: Yes.

Page 104 1 CHAIRMAN NEUER: We call it the drill book. 2 THE WITNESS: And Mr. Miller's as well, Mr. 3 Warner's desk. So I'm sure you have all of this. 4 MR. WILLIAMS: We do. Thank you. I'm just 5 clarifying that for the record. You mentioned that you 6 included the at least one of the past Resolutions for 7 an application for this site. In your opinion are the 8 proofs today similar to the proofs in the past for the 9 D-2 Variance? 10 THE WITNESS: They are. And D-6. 11 MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you. Member Scott 12 asked about the chain-link fence. And I think we were 13 hoping you could respond to that question about not the 14 new fences being proposed but the chain-link fence. 15 THE WITNESS: The chain-link fence is 16 located on the western-most entrance by -- along Mount 17 Pleasant Avenue. That is the entrance to our 230kV 18 yard. And 8-foot high fencing was put up to protect 19 those assets. 20 Actually, what we are proposing is to 21 replace that chain-link and barbed wire with decorative 22 fencing. That is shown on our plans. 23 MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you. Bear with me. 24 You and Ms. Porter mentioned that there are at least 25 one other pre-existing nonconformity. Does the

Page 105 1 proposed development exacerbate that or any other 2 pre-existing nonconformity in your opinion? 3 THE WITNESS: No, it does not. 4 MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you. 5 THE WITNESS: Actually, specifically we are 6 getting rid of a brick shed. So if that is considered 7 a building, and if that is considered the 8 nonconformity, that shed will be removed. It is brick. 9 MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you. 10 THE WITNESS: And that is on the site plan 11 that is presented. 12 MR. WILLIAMS: Okay. Thank you. 13 THE WITNESS: Two meetings ago. 14 MR. WILLIAMS: Okay. I'm fairly 15 comfortable that I heard and noted correctly the proofs 16 for the D-2, which is the expansion of a nonconforming 17 use, and you spoke about the use being inherently 18 beneficial. You went through the first and second 19 prong of the negative criteria. Of course, you 20 mentioned the purposes of zoning. 21 For the D-6 Variance could you just provide 22 a bit of context about the standards for this Board's 23 review of a D-6 Variance? 24 THE WITNESS: I believe it would be 25 essentially equivalent to what I already testified

Page 106 1 about. Again, it's a height variance and it's height 2 of structures that are exactly the same as to what we 3 already have, specifically, the lightning masts. 4 It could even be argued that the lightning 5 mast is not the principal structure but is an accessory 6 structure, but then we are getting into the weeds of 7 planning law. 8 MR. WILLIAMS: Let me ask it a different 9 way. In your opinion is the standard for the Board's 10 review of the D-6 different than that of a D-2? And if 11 so, how, in your opinion? 12 THE WITNESS: In my opinion in this 13 particular case the D-2 and the D-6 go together, and I 14 have addressed the proofs needed for that. 15 MR. WILLIAMS: And in your opinion can the 16 site accommodate the extra height that's being 17 requested? 18 THE WITNESS: Yes. We are mostly asking 19 for lightning mast. It was discussed last week by John 20 Copa, our electric engineer, what the lightning masts 21 are for. 22 MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you, and I'm almost 23 done. I think I have one more question and that is, 24 you provided the recitation of the bulk and area 25 deviations, and I think I heard you address them but I

Page 107 1 wasn't sure if you gave context for those. In other 2 words, was it a C-1 standard you were applying or a 3 C-2? 4 THE WITNESS: For the bulk variance for 5 setback that would be a C-1, but I'm essentially 6 arguing a C-2. 7 MR. WILLIAMS: And your argument is that 8 the tradeoffs, the benefits outweigh the detriments? 9 THE WITNESS: Yes. 10 MR. WILLIAMS: Did I hear that -- 11 THE WITNESS: Yes. 12 MR. WILLIAMS: And then lot coverage, the 13 proof there was -- 14 THE WITNESS: Was also the benefits 15 outweigh the detriments. 16 MR. WILLIAMS: And that's based on in part 17 the civil engineering testimony? 18 THE WITNESS: Yes, it is. 19 MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I 20 think that concludes my questions for now. 21 CHAIRMAN NEUER: Thank you so much, Mr. 22 Williams, for being so well prepared. Mr. Hess? 23 MR. HESS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have 24 no questions of this witness. 25 CHAIRMAN NEUER: Thank you so very much.

Page 108 1 Now is the time for members of the public 2 to pose questions to the witness based upon the 3 testimony that she has presented this evening. Mr. 4 Fagan, do we have any hands up? 5 MR. FAGAN: Yes, Mr. Chairperson. Before I 6 go to members of the public we have Kevin Malanga with 7 his hand raised. 8 CHAIRMAN NEUER: Welcome back, Mr. Malanga. 9 MR. MALANGA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ms. 10 Merainer, good evening. 11 THE WITNESS: Good evening, Mr. Malanga. 12 MR. MALANGA: You refer to the fence as a 13 decorative fence. 14 THE WITNESS: Yes. 15 MR. MALANGA: So it is not a security 16 fence? 17 THE WITNESS: It is. That is the 18 decorative version of what we use. 19 MR. MALANGA: It was indicated at the very 20 beginning of this hearing that the piers or the 21 columns, the brick piers or the columns were going to 22 have a distance of 30 feet between them as proposed by 23 PSE&G. Is that your understanding? 24 THE WITNESS: Yes. We are proposing that 25 because this station is rather unique among our 300

Page 109 1 plus substations. This one has landscaping that exists 2 and that will be replaced. Most of the photos I showed 3 you are actually of city areas where we have used the 4 decorative fence with 20-foot brick spacing to provide 5 something decorative to look at. 6 In this case we believe that with the trees 7 and the new fence which is 8-feet high we think 30 feet 8 between pillars will be sufficient. We have tried 9 10-foot spacing, we find that to be too busy, too 10 distracting. 11 MR. MALANGA: What is the present distance 12 between the brick piers? 13 THE WITNESS: Twenty. 14 MR. MALANGA: And why would you not use 15 20 feet for this site? 16 THE WITNESS: Because of the existence of 17 copious trees and even more trees that we will be 18 replacing. 19 One concern we have is that installing the 20 brick pillars may cause additional trees to be removed. 21 We do not want that. In fact, we propose that we work 22 out the engineering details with the Board 23 professionals. What we do not want is during 24 construction we attempt to install a pier and find out 25 -- or a pillar and find out that there is something

Page 110 1 that prevents it. 2 MR. MALANGA: Is there any reason why you 3 could not use the existing footings for the piers? 4 THE WITNESS: Yes, there is. 5 MR. MALANGA: What is that? 6 THE WITNESS: I have had extensive 7 conversations with our engineering department, this is 8 PSE&G Engineering. We believe that this fence dates 9 back to 1928. I apologize that we have no one in the 10 company who has first-hand knowledge of this anymore; 11 nor do we have retirees with first-hand knowledge, but 12 the drawings we have found shows this fence from 1928 13 and the piers which we checked in the field do conform 14 to the drawing from 1928. 15 We cannot validate the suitability of the 16 existing piers; nor can we validate the foundations for 17 the existing wrought-iron fence. 18 MR. MALANGA: Did you visit the site? 19 THE WITNESS: Absolutely. 20 MR. MALANGA: Did you see any piers that 21 were not plumb; that is, straight up and down, 22 vertical? 23 THE WITNESS: I apologize that I am not an 24 engineer and cannot tell you if they are plumb or not. 25 We believe it is better not to rely on construction