Town meeting requires extra seats for Shore

Development Review Committee meetings are usually held in a small antechamber room at a table that can seat approximately 20. But Planning, Zoning and Building Director Alaina Ray requested that a 2 p.m. Wednesday meeting be held in the Town Hall Commission Chambers.

That’s because the item on the agenda is an application review of a new Shore restaurant planned for the site of the former Moore’s Stone Crab Restaurant.

The application seeks an additional 114 seats and parking waivers. Residents of the Longbeach Village, where the site is located, are concerned about the increase in seats on the restaurant site, Ray said, which led her to consider a larger room for the meeting.

At the meeting, town staff will review plans with restaurant owners Mark Caragiulo and Tom Leonard. The meeting is open to the public, but the public is unable to provide comment at this time.

Ray said she expects the meeting “to be a lengthy one.”

“We’re concerned with parking and the number of seats being asked for,” Ray said.

The application, Ray said, also doesn’t provide “competent and substantial evidence” as required to justify why the restaurant needs additional seats, yet does not need to provide more parking.

The site currently has 49 parking spaces. Moore’s, which closed in July, had 185 seats.