GUILDERLAND — Over a year after first presenting his proposal to the town, Christopher Beckmann was recently before the Guilderland Zoning Board of Appeals seeking permission to open up a new special-occasion facility next door to his family’s Appel Inn.

At the July 19 meeting, Beckman requested that the board grant a variance from the town code requiring him to install a fire sprinkler system in his proposed business and for a public hearing on his special-use application.

The system is required as part of town code; New York state doesn’t have the same rule. 

The zoning board took no action on the application, keeping the public hearing open until its Sept. 6 meeting. 

Beckmann is proposing to use his barn, which he relocated onto his parents’ property at 580 Route 146 in 2017, to host functions such as wedding-rehearsal dinners and showers of up to 100 guests. The 2,200-square-foot facility, to be known as the Barn at Black Creek, would begin as a three-season space with the possibility of expanding to a year-round business.

The zoning board in 2016 granted Beckmann an area variance so the barn could be built within 75 feet of the Black Creek; town code requires a minimum setback of 100 feet from watercourses. 

The project was before the town’s planning board in March of last year for a site-plan review. At the time, Beckmann requested that the board waive the requirement for his site plan to be stamped by a licensed architect. 

The planning board ultimately signed off on the site plan in a 4-to-3 vote, and included as part of its recommendation that he submit certified plans to the zoning board with his application, which he did on July 19.

Beckmann was asked by Elizabeth Lott, the zoning board’s chairwoman, if he were to receive approval for his permit, when did he anticipate opening his business. He responded that, after complete plans had been drawn up and after he obtained a loan to complete construction,  “2025 would be a good year to kind of open up for events.”

Beckmann told the board that getting his proposed facility up and running has been a seven-and-a-half-year process. 

He said his parents had been hosting larger wedding ceremonies at their Appel Inn for the past 40 years, but his plan was “to host smaller events, under 100 people, in similar context to my parents’ venue but at a smaller capacity, more intimate rehearsal dinners, wedding ceremonies, birthday parties, bridal showers.” It was said during the July 19 meeting that the Appel Inn hosts events of up to 150 attendees.

Beckmann also told the board he planned to close off a portion of the Barn at Black Creek and turn it into his permanent residence. 

In making his case for a sprinkler variance, Beckmann said, to supply the system, he’d have to run over 1,000 feet of a six-inch main under Hurst Road and Route 146, “which is a very, you know, large expense.”

Board member Nichole Ventresca-Cohen asked Beckmann if he had an estimate for what it would cost to install a commercial sprinkler system in his proposed facility. 

He did not have an estimate but pointed to the “most relevant one to me,” an estimate for Clover Pond Vineyard to install a system at a cost of $75,000; the vineyard received a variance from having to have a sprinkler system in 2019.

Beckmann then said his cost would be “in the ballpark of somewhere around $100,000 just to run the line close to 1,000 feet long.” He also couldn’t provide the board with an estimate to install a “New York state code-compliant pull-down alarm system” that would be used in place of a sprinkler system.

Board alternate Steve Albert said the sprinkler-system rules had been in place for decades, pointing to Boston’s Cocoanut Grove fire, where, in November 1942, nearly 500 people died inside the popular nightclub in fewer than 15 minutes, as to why the rules were put in place. Albert said he’d “have a hard time voting on anything that didn’t at least go in front of the fire department in reference to the actual sprinkler system not being there.”

Beckmann responded that he’d reached out to the Guilderland Center fire chief and he was “hoping to just get something prior to this meeting,” but that hadn’t happened. 

Lott said, “Anytime we approve something, always the burden falls on our enforcement officers to make sure that people are doing what they told us they were going to do.” She then asked Beckmann, “So I was just curious how you would make sure that every event was under 99 people.”

He responded, “I mean, there’s a guest list and I’m the one running” the event. Beckmann added, “Relating back to Clover Pond Vineyard, you know, they’re posted at 99 occupancy …  There’s obviously something that regulates that.”

Lott retorted, “Is there?”

She then said she knew there was a regulation, but added she had concerns similar to those expressed by Albert, and wanted the town’s engineer to “visit the site specifically to determine the whole situation with the fire sprinkler.”

Lott also said she “would like the fire chief of Guilderland Center Fire Department to tell us his opinion on the sprinkler system versus what you're calling the ADA-compliant enunciation and manual pull station.”