Pittsfield — A sign hangs on the front of EMS Automotive, located at 51 Center Street, that reads, “This small business is closing thanks to Mayor [Peter] Marchetti and the city of Pittsfield. Pittsfield IS NOT for small business.” The sign is the latest in the battle between EMS Automotive owner Evan Skubel and the city over multiple zoning code issues.
Skubel opened EMS Automotive in May 2021.
According to documents provided by Mayor Marchetti’s office, a petition to enforce the zoning codes was filed by City Solicitor Devon Grierson on April 2 with the state’s Western Division Housing Court. The petition lists that the complaints were filed against Sandri Realty of Greenfield, which owns the 51 Center Street property.
According to the petition, on April 11, 2024, city building inspectors responded to complaints concerning snowplows and snow removal equipment on the property blocking the lines of sight at the intersections of Center and Church streets and Center and South streets.
The company was fined $50 for violating Pittsfield Zoning Ordinance Article 23-4 4.308: Visibility at intersections. According to the document, however, the company ignored the initial fine and did not correct the violation.
For the same reasons, the company was also fined for violating Sign Ordinance Article 25-4: General regulations and prohibitions for signs; the company has been fined a total of $19,650 for both violations as of April 2025.
On April 29, 2024, building inspectors inspected the property in response to a separate complaint about “feather style” free-standing signs that were located within the public area in the grass along the sidewalk located on Center Street. The building inspectors subsequently fined the company $50 for violating Sign Ordinance 25-4. According to the document, however, the company ignored the initial fine, leading to additional fines totaling $10,650.
On June 21, 2024, the company was fined for violating Sign Ordinance Article 23-8 when building inspectors “observed snowplows and snow removal equipment stacked and stored throughout the entirety of the property and marked for sale in violation of the [zoning ordinance] as an expansion of a non-conforming use.” According the petition, the company once again ignored the fines, which led to a total fine of $5,250.
In its petition with the state’s Western Division Housing Court, the city asked for an injunction in order to force the company to pay the total fines of $35,550 and to correct all zoning violations, along with assessing additional fines, attorney’s fees, and penalties to be determined by the court.
Months before the petition was filed in court, the city’s development board met during a public hearing on November 19, 2024, to review an application for a special permit on behalf of EMS Automotive. The special permit application was filed under Section 23-8 Non-Conformities of the city’s zoning ordinances.
Through the application, made by attorney Darren Lee representing EMS Automotive owner Skubel, the company requested the expansion of the “existing non-conforming gas/automotive service station to include the ancillary retail sale of snowplows and related snow removal equipment in the Downtown Creative District.”
According to the meeting minutes, however, Development Board Chair Sheila Irvin said the special permit application was incomplete:
[The committee does] not have information on screening, parking, and generally what the applicant wants to be done. The application says you will do things, but they are not spelled out. The application says a parking analysis and site plan will be done, but neither are included.
The public hearing was subsequently scheduled to continue on December 17, 2024.
At the December meeting, Skubel spoke to the committee on his own behalf.
According to meeting minutes:
[Skubel] did not submit any additional information to the board. He does not feel he needs to produce any further information that was requested. He feels the city has been bullying him and his business. He reviewed the history of the business. There has never been a complaint in the past three years. He has been working with the city for the past few years as a contractor. He doesn’t need additional parking. He doesn’t need to specify where the snowplows will be located. If needed, he will buy the property across the street and demolish the carousel. He is not going to screen his inventory. He is not going to spend money to get a site plan.
Irvin told Skubel that the information requested by the committee is required by the city.
According to the meeting minutes, Skubel agreed to reach out to the city’s building department in order to supply the information needed for the permit.
The public hearing was continued for the January 14 Community Development Board meeting, but members of the committee determined that Skubel’s updated plans were insufficient, and the hearing was again scheduled to continue at the February 18 meeting.
According to the February 18 meeting minutes:
Chair Irvin noted, frankly, that the board is about finished discussing the application. They have asked multiple times for more information and what was submitted is less than acceptable. They’ve been very clear on what they need to make a decision.
At the meeting, the special permit application was denied, with all of the board members present at the meeting voting to deny the permit, except for board member Ben O’Shaughnessy, who abstained from the vote.
Skubel was not present at the February 18 meeting.
Several months later on June 12, over a month after the city filed a petition with the court, Skubel posted on various social media pages blaming the city and Mayor Marchetti for his problems:
When contacted by The Berkshire Edge, Skubel declined a chance to be interviewed. Instead, his employee Kelly Mytinger, who said she “answers phone calls, makes appointments and stuff like that,” said she would answer questions. “It started with the flags, and [Skubel] paid the fines for those, and [he] kept them up because every other business in Pittsfield has them up,” Mytinger said. “We told the inspector ‘if everyone takes their flag down, we have no problem taking them down.’ It’s just that he didn’t want to feel like he was the only one getting singled out.”
As for the snowplows on the property, Mytinger said the business “sold them for years and they were just on the lot.” “We have a ton of snow plows, I would say 20 to 30 of them,” she said. “They told him he needed a special permit to sell the plows. He went to all of the meetings that he needed to.”
Mytinger said Skubel could not attend the February Community Development Board meeting because “he was plowing for the city. He also has a snow plow contract with them, so he was plowing the streets.”
In response to Skubel’s accusations, Mayor Marchetti sent The Berkshire Edge an agreement signed by Skubel and a representative for the city on May 22. In the agreement, Skubel agrees to come into compliance with city zoning and sign ordinances; that snowplows and snow removal equipment would not be stored, stacked, or sold on the property; and that free-standing signs would conform to city ordinances. In return, the city reduced its fine to $7,500.
“We have been dealing with him for over a year,” Mayor Marchetti said. “Since [Skubel] leases the property, the person accountable for the fines is the owner of the property [Sandri Realty]. When the property owner realized that this was a large number of fines, it is my understanding that he is being evicted from the property.”
“At one point in time we entered into this agreement that I thought he would follow through on, but he has not,” Marchetti added. “He wants to do whatever he wants to do, whatever the city’s codes says. If Skubel would comply with the original agreement, I would even advocate for him with his landlord to keep his business open. But I can’t. I can’t ask a landlord to keep a tenant where the landlord’s going to pay $35,000 worth of fines because of the activity of the tenant.”
Following the interview with Marchetti, The Berkshire Edge asked Skubel via email about the May 22 agreement with the city.
Skubel’s responded, via email:
Per that agreement we did everything on our end. [Building] inspector came and did a site inspection. He said everything looked good and reached out to the mayor to say I’m in compliance. A week later that same inspector fined me for two storage containers that were on the property, and have been on that property for three years. The inspector parked directly in front of these containers at his visit and never mentioned a word about them. But a week later we received fines, per the agreement a fine would void our contract. This is nothing but pure harassment.
Skubel also operates Countywide Snow Plows Sales & Service Inc. at the same address as EMS Automotive:
View the agreement signed between the city and Skubel here.
View the petition filed by the city in Western Division Housing Court made against Sandri Reality here.
