New owner of East Boston eyesore fixes it up, asks board to approve unauthorized changes made by original owner, but board says no

The Zoning Board of Appeal this week rejected a request by an Arizona real-estate investor to approve unapproved changes made by an earlier owner of an eight-unit condo building at 160 Webster St. in East Boston.

Board members unanimously agreed with the Boston Planning Department that even if investor Patrick Cardon was not to blame for the unpermitted changes, and even if Cardon managed to repairs years of neglect that included copper pipes being ripped out by scavengers and damage by squatters, they were not about to set a precedent that would let somebody can just ignore board approvals and Planning Department sign offs on building plans.

The Tuesday vote means Cardon cannot re-apply for the final OK he needs to get a certificate of occupancy for a year, which means potential issues for both him and the Florida couple who purchased a unit in the building - and took out a mortgage - just last week, according to Suffolk County Registry of Deeds records.

The changes made by the original developer, who lost the once nearly completed building to foreclosure last year, were not drastic and are related to an elevator entrance to the roof deck and the deck itself. The roof elevator entrance was built with a larger and taller than approved enclosure, which increased the building's overall "floor-to-area ratio," and the elevator got a two-foot taller than approved "overrun" area for the case where the elevator doesn't fully stop exactly at the roof exit. The deck was changed from a private one to a common deck open to all residents, and added a restroom and a wet bar for the use of just residents of the top floor.

The building's overall height was also slightly shorter than originally approved by the zoning board eight years ago - and then approved through the then BRA's "design review" process.

Cardon's local representative, James Christopher of 686 Architects of Braintree, pleaded with the board for leniency. He said it was his firm that first noticed the "as built" discrepancies - ironically in a building the firm had helped design for the original owner - and immediately contacted city planners to seek their OK, and that he ran into months of delay just finding the original plans - all done on paper, many missing - before filing with ISD.

"This project was largely inherited and we tried to correct it," he said. "We didn't try to pull the wool over anyone's eyes."

And then, he said, a planner at the Planning Department even signed off on the plans.

Christopher said he quickly agreed with requests from the mayor's Office of Neighborhood Services and district City Councilor Gabriela Coletta Zapata just the night before to explain the changes to neighbors, but said that the project really couldn't wait a year, or much time at all.

The building is now "complete, fully inspected and ready for sale," he said. "A deferral at this point would result in the loss of those sales, significant financial hardship to my client and to the owners and would eliminate all the work that we've done to eliminate this problem property."

Conor Newman, of the Office of Neighborhood Services, said his office, as is its practice, would neither recommend nor oppose the project, but said that "after many years of it lying vacant, I think many community members would like to see it built out."

But officials said they're not going to start granting variances for buildings that were approved, then the developer changed.

"They had approved plans to build something and now they're back asking for variances from a proviso from design review and also variances for building height and a restricted roof structure," Planning Department planner Jeff Hampton told the board. "I think it's very important that everybody realizes that when you go through a regulatory review process that you are bound by those plans that we've already stamped."

Hampton said that if somebody from his department did agree to sign off on the plans, that goes against department policy, which calls for its employees to stay out of the approval process for smaller buildings such as this one until after the zoning board approves any required variances.

ZBA Chairwoman Sherry Dong said there is precedent for the board to reject changes in building plans after the board had already approved them. The board then did just that.

Watch the hearing: