Planning board approves Gosselins’ site plan review

Sun, 05/22/2016 - 7:45am

A former Route 27 day care center is about to become a lodging house. Edgecomb residents John and Kristen Gosselin live on the second floor of the property. The couple received planning board approval May 19 for changing the property’s use from day care center to lodging house.

The Gosselins want to convert the day care center on the first floor into a three-room lodging house.

The new business will cater to short-term lodgers, according to John Gosselin.

He expects the renovations to begin later this summer.

“I’ve contacted a contractor and when he’s ready, the renovations will start soon I hope. Probably this summer,” he said.

Gosselin told the board he is limiting the number of guest rooms to three.

“Any more than four then you must register with the state. Also, I don’t think there is room for more than three rooms anyway.”

According to town records, the building has had many uses during the past four decades. It’s been a restaurant and a sandwich shop. A couple years ago, the Gosselins received approval for an ice cream shop, but never opened one.

The Gosselins researched various uses for the building’s bottom floor.

“We knew we had to do something with it so we started looking at different options and this seemed to fit our needs,” he said.

In other action, the board discussed the May 21 town meeting. The members are particularly interested in discussing the new municipal website. Chairman Jack French expected it to be up and running by Saturday.

Website Committee member Janet Blevins is expected to give a presentation about the new municipal website during the town meeting. This will be the planning board’s first viewing of the new website.

In previous months, the planning board debated whether to develop its own website to post ordinances and other pertinent information.

“I guess we need to play along and see how it goes. If it doesn’t meet our needs then maybe we should be doing something on our own,” said French.

The board doesn’t expect much discussion about the new land use ordinance revisions. The members described the changes as “making the ordinance simpler and easier to use.”

The planning board will meet next at 6:30 p.m., Thursday, June 8 in the municipal building.