Vassalboro planning board members approved both site review applications on their June 6 agenda.
Kassandra Lopes has a permit to run a retail store in one of two existing buildings Raymond Breton owns on the east side of Main Street, in North Vassalboro; and the Oak Grove School Foundation has a permit for a new building behind the historic Oak Grove Chapel, on Oak Grove Road, near the Riverside Drive (Route 201) intersection.
Lopes said she is currently selling clothing and displaying art works, her own and those of other, mostly local, venders. She seldom has more than half a dozen people in the building at a time.
Board members have reviewed and approved new uses of the building frequently – five times, Breton said. Lopes said she plans no changes to the building or the landscape.
The Oak Grove Foundation’s building is to have two main purposes: it will provide a meeting room for the foundation’s board and a “caretaker’s cottage,” a home for someone who will be designated the Oak Grove Chapel caretaker.
Foundation spokesmen Jody Welch and Susan Briggs and contractor Lance Cloutier explained that the project includes a new leachfield and a new well.
They plan to use existing parking spaces. Welch said should they occasionally need more parking, they and the adjacent police academy have an informal agreement that each can use the other’s lot for overflow parking.
The new building will include a kitchen and bathrooms that can be used when there are functions in the chapel. Because the chapel is listed as a historic building, planners did not want to add modern facilities there, Welch explained.
The Oak Grove Chapel dates from 1786, Briggs said. It was renovated in 1895. Until recently it had been used intermittently in warm weather (there is no heat) for reunions, weddings and other functions.
Welch and Briggs said construction on the new building is scheduled to start immediately. They hope the chapel will see more use.
Planning board members scheduled their July meeting for the second Tuesday evening, July 11, instead of the usual first Tuesday, which is Independence Day this year.
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