"Plans call for three-stories and 45 rooms, with a first-floor footprint of approximately 9,400 square feet. For comparison, the average B&B in America is six rooms and totals 5,700 square feet, according to the Association of Lodging Professionals."
"Once you are set up to rent more than 8 beds, (16 people), then the occupancy changes from the B&B classification of Rooming & Lodging to Hotel. Hotel use has more stringent requirements than does Rooming & Lodging."
Often savvy, if unscrupulous, developers push the limits of the law. Bad projects spotlight the flaws and unintended consequences of bad regulations. As has happened here. The latest addition to Coston's - "local boy makes a few dollars" hardy har har - real estate holdings may result in a rewrite of Bar Harbor's regulations (which may not comply with state law, do not comply with B&B precedence, and which defy common sense and civic mindedness.)
The Cottage Street site could have been better used for an affordable multifamily dwelling.
If 8 rooms is the standard, here are some "hotels":
-Holbrook House
-White Columns Inn
-Atlantean Inn
-Thornhedge
-Primrose Inn
-Sand Bar Cottage
-Hearthside
-Bass Cottage Inn
-Ullikana
-Mira Monte
-Cleftstone Manor
I think we can all agree these are obviously bed & breakfasts.
Lodging definitions aren't as cut and dry as people would like them to be. Many, maybe even most, lodging facilities include multiple characteristics each primarily associated with different traditional lodging types. The Acadia Inn, a relatively new hotel with almost 100 rooms and a swimming pool, is called an Inn; so is the Hearthside Inn, an early 1900s home converted to a very traditional B&B with 9 rooms. Neither is incorrect; an "inn" can be most anything. The land use definitions are kind of like that--the defining language is relevant, but the titles in and of themselves are not.
It humors me that no one cares about any of this crap except some grumpy people who, for whatever reason, don't like my projects. There are other hotels in town categorized as B&Bs that were developed or expanded upon by other people and I've never heard anyone say a single word about them. Nobody will ever walk into 77 Cottage Street and say, "oh no, I don't want to stay or dine here, this is not what I expected of a B&BV use!" Nobody who will work there or live there will care, either.
Per the Town, Cottage Street is a B&BV. It could also be a hotel (allowed in downtown village), or a TA (same thing as hotel but not allowed in downtown village). Per the State Fire Marshall, it is a hotel. Per me, it is a hotel. That's all well and good. The State can call it a hotel for life safety purposes while the town calls it a B&B for land use purposes. Again, this doesn't matter to anyone other than some grumpy anti-business anti-tourism all-change-is-bad Bar-Harbor-was-better-in-the-1980s agitators with too many misinformed opinions and too little else to do than spew said opinions everywhere.
Why, then, didn't you buy it and turn it into an affordable multifamily dwelling? Why didn't anyone else? Prior to us buying it that property had been up for sale since about the time the dinosaurs went extinct; why did no one buy it and execute any of these brilliant alternatives? Or is it, for some inexplicable reason, my sole responsibility to do things that, clearly, no one else is willing or able to do?
In other news, those are some fun citations you have there. Very interesting. But "the average B&B in America is six rooms and totals 5,700 square feet, according to the Association of Lodging Professionals" is not what governs land use in the Town of Bar Harbor. The Town of Bar Harbor Land Use Ordinance does; and according to the Town of Bar Harbor Land Use Ordinance a B&BV use in the Downtown Village zone can be new construction, has no limit to its size or number of rooms, and can include a restaurant.
I appreciate that you apparently think I'm "savvy," but there's really nothing savvy about it. The plain language makes it clear in a couple of basic sentences that our building is an allowed use. I'm sorry you don't like it, but the fact you don't like it doesn’t make anything about it "unscrupulous."
All this crap was thoroughly litigated at the appeals board in 2017. It was determined that this sort of thing does meet the standard. Stop crying over spilled milk and move on. Stop calling me a crook because you don't like tourism or hotels or my project or my politics or whatever. Just say you don't like me. Or paint it on the sidewalk or write it on a stop sign. I don't care. But be honest and know what you're talking about before you engage is keyboard warriordom.
Go ahead and rewrite the ordinance. I've already been quoted in the Islander stating that the present set of 19 definitions don't make sense and that many of them are confusing. I have been saying for years now, "if you think the rules are broken, change them." I don't care. Whatever the rules are, I will follow them.
I know what a traditional Bed & Breakfast is--I own a half dozen of them. I know they don't have 45 rooms. But the authors of the 2010 definitions didn't write it up as such. That's all there is to it. Your whole mischaracterization and overcomplication of the situation is just slander.
My apologies to Mr. Paradis for associating him with the Cottage Street 45 room B&B boondoggle. Of course it should have been Stephen Coston, along with Brian Shaw and Tom St. Germain.
The 45 room Coston Paradis Hotel, which cronyism designated a B&B, stands as a monument to Bar Harbor Town Council corruption. And not satisfied with how much they can personally profiteer from the town, the hoteliers now want to appropriate to their own use, high value Cottage Street space designated for metered parking. Because ... why not? Doesn't government exist to shovel public resources into the private nosebags and corporate troughs of the unconscionably greedy? It has in Bar Harbor. Can the preposterous B&B designation be declared null and void? Is there some other way for the town to claw back what it's corrupt elected officials have given away? We need a new Town Council to even give it a thought.
These folks don't deal in facts, bud. They exist in a more subjective, narrative sort of domain. Basically, they invent their own "facts" to suit their narrative.
Here are a couple of real facts:
1) In June 2010 voters overwhelmingly adopted new so-called B&B uses that did not limit new construction or room count and in certain districts did not require planning board approval.
2) I was 21 at the time and had no interest in business nor town affairs. I did not even vote in the election in which the new uses were adopted.
3) My business partner Tom Saint Germain wasn't on Planning Board until 2012. Again, this stuff was generated in 2010. The year 2012 came after the year 2010.
This Town has lost its collective mind and created a false narrative of businesspeople as villains in support of their ideological perspective. Simple as that.
Gosh darn those dastardly public officials for "giving away" that private property, a collapsed barn and condemned garage. It was a real urban paradise, that site. You only had a decade or two to buy it yourself and do whatever the heck you wanted with it. So terribly corrupt and unfair! How dare we propose a Bed & Breakfast V use very clearly allowed by the 2010 Land Use Ordinance changes overwhelmingly adopted by the voters? How dare we plainly, legally obtain a building permit for this allowed use? And how dare we pitch a public loading zone in what had already been our own curb cuts? Disgusting.
The most humorous part is you have no clue whatsoever how completely ridiculous you are. LoL.
The town regulations were conveniently changed to accommodate your plans for a hotel on the site. And you want more changes (to parking on Cottage Street) - for your profit at the town's expense.
The town regulations changed *eleven years* before the inception of this project. That is a matter of indisputable fact.
Dense much? Wrong much? Platitudinous much?
You ought to quit banging your keyboard before you make a bigger fool of yourself and go draw some graffitti on the sidewalk or put barbeque sauce on my car or whatever the heck you Marxists do in all your free time these days.
You have an extremely loose and theatrical definition of facts, sir or ma'am. I'm sorry you're so bitter that a local kid made a couple dollars. You must lead a miserible existence.
Of all the baseless claims, this one is far and away the goofiest.
I have an ownership interest in something like 20 properties. My dad is a minority investor in two of them. He has given me $0 to buy properties. He has loaned me $0 to buy properties. On the atypical occasion he invests he retains his own ownership interest and enjoys the same terms as everyone else.
When I need money I get it from my own accounts, find someone to partner with, and/or hit up the bank like everyone else.
If you think my dad is out here buying me Ferraris, you clearly have never met the man. The thought of that to anyone who knows him is downright comical.
"Plans call for three-stories and 45 rooms, with a first-floor footprint of approximately 9,400 square feet. For comparison, the average B&B in America is six rooms and totals 5,700 square feet, according to the Association of Lodging Professionals."
https://www.mdislander.com/news/residents-question-b-b-regulations/article_01675190-a198-11ed-9bce-f32216925ba3.html
"Once you are set up to rent more than 8 beds, (16 people), then the occupancy changes from the B&B classification of Rooming & Lodging to Hotel. Hotel use has more stringent requirements than does Rooming & Lodging."
http://www.maine.gov/dps/fmo/plans-review/bbrequirements
Often savvy, if unscrupulous, developers push the limits of the law. Bad projects spotlight the flaws and unintended consequences of bad regulations. As has happened here. The latest addition to Coston's - "local boy makes a few dollars" hardy har har - real estate holdings may result in a rewrite of Bar Harbor's regulations (which may not comply with state law, do not comply with B&B precedence, and which defy common sense and civic mindedness.)
The Cottage Street site could have been better used for an affordable multifamily dwelling.
There's only about 3 bed and Breakfasts in town under 8 rooms. By that definition Does that mean every other one is a hotel?
If 8 rooms is the standard, here are some "hotels":
-Holbrook House
-White Columns Inn
-Atlantean Inn
-Thornhedge
-Primrose Inn
-Sand Bar Cottage
-Hearthside
-Bass Cottage Inn
-Ullikana
-Mira Monte
-Cleftstone Manor
I think we can all agree these are obviously bed & breakfasts.
Lodging definitions aren't as cut and dry as people would like them to be. Many, maybe even most, lodging facilities include multiple characteristics each primarily associated with different traditional lodging types. The Acadia Inn, a relatively new hotel with almost 100 rooms and a swimming pool, is called an Inn; so is the Hearthside Inn, an early 1900s home converted to a very traditional B&B with 9 rooms. Neither is incorrect; an "inn" can be most anything. The land use definitions are kind of like that--the defining language is relevant, but the titles in and of themselves are not.
It humors me that no one cares about any of this crap except some grumpy people who, for whatever reason, don't like my projects. There are other hotels in town categorized as B&Bs that were developed or expanded upon by other people and I've never heard anyone say a single word about them. Nobody will ever walk into 77 Cottage Street and say, "oh no, I don't want to stay or dine here, this is not what I expected of a B&BV use!" Nobody who will work there or live there will care, either.
Per the Town, Cottage Street is a B&BV. It could also be a hotel (allowed in downtown village), or a TA (same thing as hotel but not allowed in downtown village). Per the State Fire Marshall, it is a hotel. Per me, it is a hotel. That's all well and good. The State can call it a hotel for life safety purposes while the town calls it a B&B for land use purposes. Again, this doesn't matter to anyone other than some grumpy anti-business anti-tourism all-change-is-bad Bar-Harbor-was-better-in-the-1980s agitators with too many misinformed opinions and too little else to do than spew said opinions everywhere.
Why, then, didn't you buy it and turn it into an affordable multifamily dwelling? Why didn't anyone else? Prior to us buying it that property had been up for sale since about the time the dinosaurs went extinct; why did no one buy it and execute any of these brilliant alternatives? Or is it, for some inexplicable reason, my sole responsibility to do things that, clearly, no one else is willing or able to do?
In other news, those are some fun citations you have there. Very interesting. But "the average B&B in America is six rooms and totals 5,700 square feet, according to the Association of Lodging Professionals" is not what governs land use in the Town of Bar Harbor. The Town of Bar Harbor Land Use Ordinance does; and according to the Town of Bar Harbor Land Use Ordinance a B&BV use in the Downtown Village zone can be new construction, has no limit to its size or number of rooms, and can include a restaurant.
I appreciate that you apparently think I'm "savvy," but there's really nothing savvy about it. The plain language makes it clear in a couple of basic sentences that our building is an allowed use. I'm sorry you don't like it, but the fact you don't like it doesn’t make anything about it "unscrupulous."
All this crap was thoroughly litigated at the appeals board in 2017. It was determined that this sort of thing does meet the standard. Stop crying over spilled milk and move on. Stop calling me a crook because you don't like tourism or hotels or my project or my politics or whatever. Just say you don't like me. Or paint it on the sidewalk or write it on a stop sign. I don't care. But be honest and know what you're talking about before you engage is keyboard warriordom.
Go ahead and rewrite the ordinance. I've already been quoted in the Islander stating that the present set of 19 definitions don't make sense and that many of them are confusing. I have been saying for years now, "if you think the rules are broken, change them." I don't care. Whatever the rules are, I will follow them.
I know what a traditional Bed & Breakfast is--I own a half dozen of them. I know they don't have 45 rooms. But the authors of the 2010 definitions didn't write it up as such. That's all there is to it. Your whole mischaracterization and overcomplication of the situation is just slander.
Hardy har har.
My apologies to Mr. Paradis for associating him with the Cottage Street 45 room B&B boondoggle. Of course it should have been Stephen Coston, along with Brian Shaw and Tom St. Germain.
The 45 room Coston Paradis Hotel, which cronyism designated a B&B, stands as a monument to Bar Harbor Town Council corruption. And not satisfied with how much they can personally profiteer from the town, the hoteliers now want to appropriate to their own use, high value Cottage Street space designated for metered parking. Because ... why not? Doesn't government exist to shovel public resources into the private nosebags and corporate troughs of the unconscionably greedy? It has in Bar Harbor. Can the preposterous B&B designation be declared null and void? Is there some other way for the town to claw back what it's corrupt elected officials have given away? We need a new Town Council to even give it a thought.
What even is cronyism. What actual facts of that is there.
These folks don't deal in facts, bud. They exist in a more subjective, narrative sort of domain. Basically, they invent their own "facts" to suit their narrative.
Here are a couple of real facts:
1) In June 2010 voters overwhelmingly adopted new so-called B&B uses that did not limit new construction or room count and in certain districts did not require planning board approval.
2) I was 21 at the time and had no interest in business nor town affairs. I did not even vote in the election in which the new uses were adopted.
3) My business partner Tom Saint Germain wasn't on Planning Board until 2012. Again, this stuff was generated in 2010. The year 2012 came after the year 2010.
This Town has lost its collective mind and created a false narrative of businesspeople as villains in support of their ideological perspective. Simple as that.
Gosh darn those dastardly public officials for "giving away" that private property, a collapsed barn and condemned garage. It was a real urban paradise, that site. You only had a decade or two to buy it yourself and do whatever the heck you wanted with it. So terribly corrupt and unfair! How dare we propose a Bed & Breakfast V use very clearly allowed by the 2010 Land Use Ordinance changes overwhelmingly adopted by the voters? How dare we plainly, legally obtain a building permit for this allowed use? And how dare we pitch a public loading zone in what had already been our own curb cuts? Disgusting.
The most humorous part is you have no clue whatsoever how completely ridiculous you are. LoL.
Defensive much?
But not refuting the facts.
The town regulations were conveniently changed to accommodate your plans for a hotel on the site. And you want more changes (to parking on Cottage Street) - for your profit at the town's expense.
Privilege much?
The town regulations changed *eleven years* before the inception of this project. That is a matter of indisputable fact.
Dense much? Wrong much? Platitudinous much?
You ought to quit banging your keyboard before you make a bigger fool of yourself and go draw some graffitti on the sidewalk or put barbeque sauce on my car or whatever the heck you Marxists do in all your free time these days.
Holy melodrama, Batman 😂😂😂🤦♂️
Just the facts, m'am.
You have an extremely loose and theatrical definition of facts, sir or ma'am. I'm sorry you're so bitter that a local kid made a couple dollars. You must lead a miserible existence.
Childish insults from a kid who has lived his whole life on daddies dime! Lol , maybe bring in your sockpuppet Brandon to agree with you.
Slinging insults anonymously shows true Character.
Of all the baseless claims, this one is far and away the goofiest.
I have an ownership interest in something like 20 properties. My dad is a minority investor in two of them. He has given me $0 to buy properties. He has loaned me $0 to buy properties. On the atypical occasion he invests he retains his own ownership interest and enjoys the same terms as everyone else.
When I need money I get it from my own accounts, find someone to partner with, and/or hit up the bank like everyone else.
If you think my dad is out here buying me Ferraris, you clearly have never met the man. The thought of that to anyone who knows him is downright comical.
Next.