Buda City Council hears historic guidelines

BUDA — Buda City Council listened to a presentation of the Buda historic guidelines and their impact on staff recommendations for development in the historic district on May 21.

According to the presentation by Historic Preservation officer Will Parrish, the purpose and intent of the historic district is the “matter of public policy, the protection, enhancement and perpetuation of landmarks and districts of historical and cultural importance and significance is necessary to promote the economic, cultural, education and general welfare of the public.”

Parrish noted that the following is applicable to all property within the historic district and any designated landmarks:

• No person shall carry out any construction, reconstruction, alteration, restoration, rehabilitation or relocation of any landmark or any property within a district

• No person shall make any material change in the light fixtures, signs, sidewalks, fences, steps, paving or other exterior elements visible from a public right-of-way which affect the appearance and cohesiveness of any landmark or any property within a district without a Certificate of Appropriateness application

• Exterior temporary items obscuring the facade from the right-of-way shall not exempt a person from this provision

• The application must be reviewed and approved by the historic preservation officer or the Historic Preservation Commission prior to the issuance of any building permit involving any landmark or party located within a district

For non-historic buildings — buildings less than 50 years old or which have been substantially altered — the commission can apply the guidelines with more flexibility.

Parrish stated that the application, whether by the city or individual property owners, should be reviewed by the United States Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for Rehabilitation and any applicable adopted design guidelines previously ratified by the city council.

“They kind of set the orientation of how you look at a proposed application. Is it a rehabilitation of an existing building or are you remodeling the building that's different from its existing purpose? Are you reconstructing it to be in its original form? Are you making it work with a new development,” he said. “So, they kind of set the standard of what to do.”

If the application fails to have any motion to approve or deny within 90 days of its submission, it is automatically approved. If denied, the applicant can appeal.

There are 15 architectural styles: Tudor revival, craftsman/bungalow, vernacular - homestead, folk Victorian, Queen Anne, stick style Queen Anne, colonial revival, classical revival, prairie school, Spanish colonial revival, mission revival, gothic revival, Italiante, Main Street commercial - 1 part and Main Street commercial - 2 part.

“We were really looking at architectural styles from 1942 and before,” said Parrish. “So, you won’t see any ranch styles in our guidelines.”

Guidelines include specifications on shape, scale, orientation to the street, placement on the lot, roof shape, location and proportion of porches, entrances, windows and divisional bays, foundation height, porch height, material and color, details and texture and contemporary design.

“There are conflicts, there are sentences that don’t finish in our adopted [historic] guidelines. They just kind of fall off, so the commission has been identifying some of those issues, going through and making recommendations for those updates,” confirmed Parrish.

Following the presentation, council member Evan Ture questioned how a landmark is determined, to which Parrish stated that staff would make a recommendation and then it would be voted upon by council, but the Planning and Zoning Commission would be involved if the district is to be expanded.

Council member Paul Daugereau added that he would like “to see [the city] working toward fire suppression systems in those buildings, whether it's on their own or working with someone like the [Buda Economic Development Corporation] to move forward and start working on a plan to do that. I just think it’s so important to start to talk about [it].”

No action was taken as this was a presentation only.

Buda City Council will meet again on June 4.