 Could you, am I already a co-host Aaron? I will designate you. Okay. Oh yeah, and there's a 413 attendee, which must be Alex. All right. Welcome to the June 14th 2023 Amherst mass conservation commission meeting. Comments from the chair. I don't really have many. We have, we're opening, we're supposedly kind of opening three and a half hearings tonight. And then we have a fair amount of emergency certs and kind of updates from Aaron, but nothing unexpected. I don't see Dave, so I don't think he's going to give any directors report. So Aaron, how do you want to use this three seven 30 time? Yeah. Just see I'm getting blown up on the text messages here. Dave, weird, but he can't seem to log in. Can you email me a new link? I will email him a new link, but I can't do that while I'm. Why don't we jump straight to some other business? Because I think some of this will be fairly easy for us to take care of. Maybe it will get a. Frontload some of the stuff that we have to take care of tonight. If it's okay, what I'd like to do is just do a quick run through of each of the emergency certifications. If anybody wants to see photos or has additional questions, we could do that. And then maybe we could just run through motions for each of them. If that sounds okay. Perfect. Okay. So 685 West street. This is a, an old barn that a tree fell on adjacent to wetlands and they applied for a demo permit. This is kind of over by the muddy brook farm area. On the same side of the street is Hampshire. Hampshire college. So it was a public health and safety issue because it was like a tree laying on the barn and the barn was clearly unsafe. So an emergency cert was issued for that one. And then the other one. And then the other one. The other one. The other one. The other one. This college street was a situation where a homeowner had three large pines in her backyard along the bank of a stream. One of the pines uprooted and fell on her. Garage. A short time ago. And she started to become concerned about the other two pines falling. So she breached out to me. And then the other one. The other one. The other one. The other one. The other one. The other one. So we removed them, but we figured let's just issue an emergency certification to cover it. Really visible site in town behind sort of the TD bank on triangle, triangle street. Right up against the parking lot in the back there. So we issued an emergency cert for that. Middle street. On plum springs. Conservation area, which. We have an ongoing situation with a beaver impoundment back there. And the. We have a flow control structure in the upper impoundment, but they started to build in a lower impoundment and then also started to build to block up the culvert. So we issued. So I applied for a grant through MSPCA for us to get a second flow control structure in the lower impoundment and also a. A second flow control structure in the lower impoundment. So we had a fence diversion, diversion fence around the culvert to keep the beavers from building material in front of it, which we were able to get in a really quick period of time. And we issued an emergency cert for those to be installed, which is nice because we don't have to remove the beavers. We can kind of coexist and the. It controls the water level. So it keeps it safe. It was. The water level was almost at middle street. So it was starting to get really bad. So we had to get a second flow control structure in the lower impoundment. So we had to get a second flow control structure in the lower impoundment and the culvert itself, the culvert head wall, which cracked and started to break away from the. The berm, which the road is on. And so there was one emergency cert issued for the installation of the. The flow control structures and the diversion fence and then a second for the repair of the culvert by DPW. And that's like some. Where the, where the. The, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the mortar work to repair that. And then the last one is 37 Bay Road. And this one is. You guys may recall about a year ago, we had an emergency cert to repair a failed culvert, which. Was that the outlet of the Epstein pond. Slash. Plumber upon dam. Under the Kestrel land trust driveway. That's the one on the top of the pipe. And the other one was. That was the one that was repaired and replaced properly. Unfortunately, when the installation was done, there was not enough cover put over the top of the pipe. So the pipe was. Specced out to have to have 14 or to have 12 inches of cover over the top of the pipe. And the. So there was not only the contractor, but also the engineer who was supposed to be overseeing this and making sure that the thing was built to specification. But clearly there was a decision made in the field without consulting the town orchestral to use less cover. And so we had a meeting last week and the contractor is going to be fixing it. Actually, not next week, but the following week. So he's going in taking out the asphalt putting additional cover over the top. The other like kind of minor detail is that he switched out a different manufacturer of the pipe. So instead of having 12 inches of cover it needs to have 18 inches of cover. So it actually increased the amount of fill that needs to go over the top of the pipe from a structural standpoint. So he's adding all it is is basically taking up the asphalt compacting additional fill on top of the existing driveway and then putting additional asphalt over the top. So it's not it's in the driveway. Right of way, and it's not, it's not extending into the wetland or into the stream or anything like that it's just on the footprint of the driveway. Who caught this. How'd you know that there was only four inches when they're supposed to be 12 or 18. Well, is there an issue. There's no issue but the issue, how it came to how we came to find out about it was that the structural designer the structural engineer who stamped the plan went to look at it he just stopped by and said I'll take a look at it and when he got out there he saw that there was not enough fill. And so he sent me or he contacted me he sent us a letter and outlined what the issue was so we immediately started to try to formulate a plan to to correct it and so we're we're pretty much there at this point but it's taken a little time. Probably has to do with like vehicle loads like you need some exactly yeah I mean it's, it's for the, I think it's age 20 loading which is for like a fire truck, an oil truck. It's like, I think it's the 40,000 pound I'm not. Yeah, I'm not great with the culverts could just collapse under that emergency vehicle and then you're really scared. So we had kind of a busy couple weeks for emergency certifications. And I. So can I mean, I guess commissioners any further questions or comments on this. Looks good. So can we just say move to ratify the emergency starts for and read that list Aaron. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, so I'm just looking for a motion. Yeah, I can make the motion. I'll make a motion ratify the emergency certification for 685 West Street, 36 Cottage Street, Middle Street culvert with a DPW the Middle Street culvert with the conservation department and 37 Bay Road. So again. Okay, voice vote. Fletcher. Hi, Michelle. Hi. Cameron. Hi. And I'm also an I unanimous Aaron, the emergency starts. Awesome. So I am good just going to really very quickly try to send Dave a link. Is Alex on the call. Yeah, he's on the phone so I'm not sure Alex if you can raise your hand if you're able to. How many raises hand on the phone. There's a button that you can push, but I'm not positive that. So I've permitted him to talk and asked him to unmute. Can you hear us. So Can you hear me. Yes. Do you want to vote on those emergency certifications did you hear that. Okay. I still unanimous. All right. Yeah, when I got, when I got on the phone, it said I would be muted all through the call. And I didn't quite know how to handle that. Oh, okay. It looks like. Thank you. No problem. I'm not really sure how this is going to go, but I think I can mute you if it becomes a problem. No, I can, I can mute myself. Oh, okay. Great. I've heard everything so far from the beginning. Okay. Great. All right. Great. All right. I recent Dave a link. It's seven 15. Let me just see. All right. So we, we had a, I'm just going to jump back to land use stuff. Yeah. Are those folks here, Aaron? I don't see her on the call. She may have forgotten about it or something. But I think it's a relatively straightforward application. So I can just present it to you guys and see what your thoughts are. And why is it not in the packet? Oh, that's weird. Maybe I dropped it. Oh, maybe because you know what it was in last week's meeting packet, I think, and we canceled last meeting. That's going to be what it was. Yes. Okay. So we got a land use application from. Elizabeth Creck, I think is her name. She had originally had permit reserved a space to hold her wedding. And for whatever reason, it was like at the very last minute canceled on her. And so she asked basically if it's kind of an emergency, because she's already got it planned to have it at Mount Pollux on June 24th. Six cars, 12 participants, they don't have anything coming. It's very like sort of low key. They expect it to take about 15 minutes. I explained to them kind of the rules that, you know, we, we encourage carpooling parking is first come first serve. And so she said, you know, I don't have any issues with that. I don't have any issues with that. I would just issue those sort of standard. Conditions that we typically. Well, maybe she's having trouble getting into the, um, she's emailing us right now. She must be having trouble getting into the meeting. Dave's having trouble getting into. So I don't know what's going on. This all sounds good to me as long as they know that it's always going to be open. No matter what. And they're aware of the parking issues. Those are usually the two hangups with Mount Pollux. I think otherwise I don't have any concerns. Commissioners. Okay. So, um, we're looking for a motion to approve. A wedding. Event at Mount Pollux on June 24th. I moved. Second. All right. Voice vote. Hi. Michelle. Hi. Cameron. Hi. Alex. Hi. And I'm also an eye unanimous by five of us. You're in. Great. Excellent. Moving right along. Okay. So, um, I will jump back into other business. And if anybody's on. In the waiting room. That like couldn't get into the meeting like Dave or somebody, please raise your hand and we'll pull you in. Um, Okay. So just a quick update, um, on the Holyoke range order of conditions that we issued last week or last meeting, uh, the last meeting that we had, which I think was May 14th. We had, um, had a condition for placing some stone along the trail edge. And the reason for that was because there was a lot of, um, uh, mountain bike traffic. And also, um, Andre had brought up the issue that there was the need for emergency vehicles to get through. And we were concerned about the stability of the trail. Um, But when natural heritage issued their comment, we approved it contingent on natural heritage approval. And when natural heritage approval came through, they basically said, We're only approving this exactly as it's been proposed in the plan. And no changes can be made basically without advanced approval. And I reached out to natural heritage and I spoke to them about the condition. And they said, yeah, if you include that condition, then the applicant's going to have to, um, we're going to have to basically reconsider the decision that was made. So when I issued the permit, I included that as a sort of recommended, condition and outlined the reasoning for it, but didn't make it required. And I wanted to just share that back with the commission because, you know, it was sort of just a recommendation. Um, and I didn't want to mess up. There was a grant that was funding this. It was a state, you know, on state land and stuff. And I didn't want to create additional administrative burden for the applicants. Um, because of the recommendation that the commission had made, but they all, they are looking into our recommendation for future trail stability issues. So it may come back that they, um, address that in the future. But for right now it's kind of, they're just going to be putting in the bog ridging. Yes, Michelle. I thought that, well, so there's a lot of out my use on those trails. I don't know about that one specifically, but that's pretty well used. And I thought that was pretty important to maintain that trail because that bikers aren't going to be using the bog bridging. So is it basically like. They're going to wait until the trails degraded and then apply for another permit to fix it from natural heritage. I mean, it's not going to get ripped up by mountain bikes if they put a bog bridge in there. Right. So, so here's the deal. So presently, like if you're looking at the trail, it's like say 15 feet wide in the wetland area, all rotted up with foot traffic and, and mountain bike ruts. The Kestrel land trust with the Appalachian mountain club applied for the grant to do the work. And, um, They got the funding for it. The work is taking place on state land. So DCR land. So the whole idea of, you know, doing the restoration work and putting in the bog bridging is to get people up off of this area that's being trampled. And I completely agree with you, Michelle. I did have a conversation with Paul Jenigie about it. Um, and his, he said that they would have just done stone if they had known that they could do that. And, um, as opposed to doing bog bridging, they would prefer to do stone just on the trail. And so we had a long conversation about that because as you guys may or may not know, it's been a little bit difficult sometimes with DEP permitting trail work. And they, um, particularly when trails go through wetlands. Um, You have to calculate every square foot of impact, including like just the footing under a bog bridge is, is counted as wetland fill. So there is a larger conversation that's going to be happening. About this because. There's many efforts to improve trail stability throughout the state. And there's, um, you know, these are the whole purpose of this is just, is to prevent erosion and sedimentation into wetlands as a result of trail use. Um, but there is a larger conversation that's going to be had, um, with DCR and DEP about. Um, you know, I don't want to interfere with this important grant because I do think that the work that is happening is going to be an improvement over existing conditions. And I don't want to, um, it's like, it's like interfering with progress for the sake of perfection. You know what I mean? Like. I think. It was, I just made it. I made a call and I did talk to Fletcher about it, like just to get his, his read on it to say, like, do you think that this is okay? Yeah. I think it's okay. I think it's okay. He thought it was a good judgment call to make. Um, but I do agree with you, Michelle. And I mean, um, I just didn't want to prevent them. They had to spend, start spending the grant before the end of the month. So it was a kind of a tough, um, decision to make. Yeah. Sort of unfortunate that sort of the bureaucracy and grants are getting in the way of maybe a better outcome for it. But maybe when we consider, um, you know, Um, Before it gets to this point taken to the count, my, uh, mountain bike use because I'm just curious what that's going to look like. Anyway. Yeah. I'm not going to. Yeah. I totally agree. And I, you know, oh, and the other, the other thing kind of related to this is that July 7th, we're having our first. Land use subcommittee meeting. And, and just by way of an update on the land use policy, I did go through and incorporate everybody's edits to the policy. There are some. Comments which were not easy to incorporate, um, because there's like judgment calls that are involved, like should we make this change? Should we not? So. Um, The status of the land use policy is going to be, and Dave and I are having a conversation about this. We're probably going to be bringing it to the commission, sort of section by section for approval. Um, and I think there are sections of it that we're going to want the land use subcommittee to look at and sort of tease apart a little bit more before we finalize those specific sections. Um, so that's kind of what we're thinking at this point, but I think that we're going to have a lot of discussions and discussions that need to happen as far as. The framework of the policy before I just sort of. I don't want to make a judgment call about how the policy should be. Um, Changed and then bring it to the board for approval without discussing it. So, um, That's kind of the thought process there. Dave and I did meet to talk about all those things. So we will circle back on it. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Sure. Um, the other thing I wanted to make you guys aware of is that I did do a sort of spot check on the. Um, Determination that was issued for Tuckerman. Um, Tuckerman Lane or Tuckerman road. Um, you may recall, we had an enforcement order out there quite a while ago. Um, That was, that was a really hard time for me. Um, I mean, I'm basically at the point where I'm going to issue a notice of non-compliance on that because, um, The erosion controls are in bad shape out there. It looks like what happened was that they. They got started on work. They, um, Cut down all the trees they grubbed. And then, um, They put in the erosion controls, obviously, Um, They put in the, The site is not really looking that great. Um, I can pull up pictures to show you. I'm just getting there bare with me. So I just have like a standard form that I use instead of enforcement order, it's a notice of non-compliance. Um, But this is like the site spilling onto the road and there's catch basins in the road. Um, Um, I'm just going to, um, You know, This shouldn't be happening on a public way where the site is spilling in. This is what the controls look like. Controls are failing. Um, Also, I have some concerns because like, So the, the erosion control boundary ends here, But there's a large stockpile immediately and next to it. And then there's this huge open area here that is not, Um, Um, Um, I'm just going to wash down the hill around these controls. And these stockpiles have been sitting here for probably six months at this point. Um, there's, They're not supposed to sit for more than, um, 14 days uncovered or without. Um, Some type of, um, Erosion control boundary around the, around the edge of them. So unless anybody has any objections, I just wanted to put on record that we're, So that's good. Thanks, Aaron. And I just, um, Exed out of my, um, Um, Back in. It's a night of technical issues. So sorry. No, no, I'm, I, I'm, I'm. Remoted into my. Oh yeah. Your work computer. Just taking a second. So that covers all kind of correspondence. And I think. Oh, there's a, we have to ratify our certificate of compliance. Do you want to do with our 56 Kesterling real quick? Yeah. Yep. I went out and did an inspection. The site is, is totally stable. It looks like it has not been touched in a very long time. So, um, I can pull up pictures if you want, but I have no, No issues with issuing a certificate of compliance out there. Okay. So we're just looking for a motion to. Issue a complete certificate of compliance for 56 Kesterling. Your mind. What was that? What was that one? Um, it's not a recent hearing. It's, um, A property that would have had some sort of order of conditions associated with any kind of permitted work in the past. And in order to close out the open permit, they wanted to issue a certificate of compliance. So Erin went out and inspected the site. I think it's. So like three years ago or something. No, no, this is, this is out on Kesterling. It's, it was probably constructed, um, In the mid nineties. Uh, sometimes they sit open for a really long time. Um, and then like a very, very, Yeah. Yeah. For like decades. And then when a property changes hands, they want to make sure that they like close it out. Yeah. Yeah. So this is what the site looks like. It's completely stable. Yeah. You shouldn't remember that one. Um, yeah. So I just needed a motion to issue a complete certificate of compliance for 56 Kesterling. So move. Second. Voice vote. Fletcher. Michelle. Cameron. Alex. Hi. And I'm an eye. You need a miss. Erin. Awesome. All right. Um, I think that is. Yeah. It's all the other business that required motions so we can move into hearings. Okay. Awesome. Um, so our first hearing amended. So I should open this formally. Erin. Yes. Okay. One second. Okay. This public hearing is now called to order. This hearing is being held as required by provisions of chapter 131 section 40 of the general laws of the Commonwealth. And act relative to the protection of wetlands as most recently amended and article 3.31 wetlands protection under the town of Amherst general bylaws. I guess, Erin. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for the partial demolition of existing barn. Um, and 2,646 square foot addition in the 100 foot buffer zone to BVW at 29 mill street. Um, do you know if. Yeah, I just pulled in, um, Steve. Okay. Okay. He should be coming in momentarily. Okay. So I'm going to come in. I'll just remind everyone that the way this goes is we a lot about 20 minutes, if less, that's great for each hearing. Um, and the idea is that we give about five minutes for a presentation by the applicant or the applicant's representative. Five minutes for any updates or comments from Erin. And then five minutes for public comment or two minutes per. And then we'll give your name address and any preferred pronouns. Um, and then we'll have five minutes for conservation commissioner questions. Um, Yeah. And that's kind of how we roll. And I will, before we take public comment, remind everyone of how that goes again. Um, So, yeah. Steve has Steve been able to come in. I'll try promoting him to panelists too and see what happens. Zoom is definitely acting very strangely tonight because there's multiple people who have not been able to get in. And, um, yeah. Just. I don't know what's up with that. Yeah, we see. Thank you. And for you. Hi, Steve. Um, Brian Frank, the builder too. Um, he was just, he's not in yet, but if you see Brian Frank, um, I'll show up and promote him to, um, I just sent him the agenda. Okay. So yeah, thank you everybody. Um, I'm Steve everybody senior scientist that Goddard consulting. Um, as, as you mentioned, we're here for 29 million, the, the Padar residents. Um, there's an existing order of conditions on the site now, um, for the tennis court that they built a few years ago. And it's an ongoing monitoring project. Um, I'm going to finish that out, but in the, in the end, they have, um, some more construction that they wanted to do on the site, mostly within developed areas. And been talking with Aaron, we decided to probably be the easiest because we have an open order of conditions to amend the order to include that work under the existing permit. Um, what they want to do now on the house is, you guys remember the site? There's the large house, there's the large barn. There's a little addition to the barn, which is, you know, I don't know if it's old, but it's kind of a smaller kind of extension to the barn. They want to take that extension off of the barn and construct a, essentially it's a home gym, but it's, it's, it'll, it'll look like it's connected to the structure, but it would be kind of like a free standing for building code. It wouldn't be directly attached, but it would be essentially adjacent. So from the outside, it would look attached. Um, all the work proposed for that will be with an area that's either the existing part of the structure of the barn. And some of it's going to extend into what is currently lawn. Um, there's a driveway gravel drive that comes off the paved drive that kind of swings around to the back of the property that, that's kind of like a double peered. Um, you know, the lower part of the barn, you have to drop in grade to get in the back. So there's a gravel drive that accesses the back of the barn. So they would have that gravel road swing around. Um, the proposed addition again with an area that's lawn. Um, all the works in buffer, the structure, um, you know, they wanted it a little bit bigger. We kind of had them scale everything back. Oh, perfect. We had them scale everything back to kind of keep the structure outside of the 50 foot, um, buffer, the gravel drive. And it's the way it's shown in this plan. It's a little bigger than what we stake down in the field. I think, I think there was some, some reductions they were able to do to kind of tighten things up even more. So, you know, the orange hatched area there is the proposed addition to the barn. Um, and then that the gravel driveway, you can kind of see it going through that hatched area where it exists now. They would kind of push that out to the East and have it wrap around the side of the building and then tie into the existing gravel on the, on the backside of the, the barn. And we staked it out in the field today. We measured it out that total area of, um, the gravel drive that would be in the 50 foot buffer is 110 square feet. And it's all one area currently. So it's not, you know, changing any, any, you know, taking down any trees or changing any, you know, natural vegetation type of area. Um, drainage is going to be pretty straightforward. They'll have, you know, gravel kind of trip edge around the building to catch any runoffs and perforated pipes and then they'll tie into, um, like a sump that's within the gravel drive. Now there's a little catch basin out there that's got, um, um, you know, you know, you know, four inch kind of pipes that just takes the site drainage and kind of connects it and infiltrates it somewhere. We don't really know where, but it, we don't know how many pipes that they, they like to the wetland or anything on the site. Um, so that's kind of the summation of it. Um, I don't know, I don't, Aaron, you've got some pictures and we can kind of, I think site pictures might tell, tell the story easier than the. Um, Steve sent me earlier today. If I am able to get it. Um, I think I uploaded it to the one drive. Um, but it's, um, Sorry, it's been a, it's been like a month since I've done. Since I've done this, I feel a little like I'm off my game. Um, All right. So let's, let's don't worry about it. I'm not worried. There was, I thought I uploaded. This image that, um, Huh. Well, Aaron looks for that. Just quickly Steve out of the gate. This is, is this like the use of this building for private use only? Just confirm it. It's not. And it, so did I get it right? 110 square feet inside the 50 foot. No disturb. Correct. Did you guys have any mitigation proposed for that? We didn't, but we can talk about that if you're going to require any. Okay. If you want something. Okay. So I'm going to pull up using that floated to the top, just listening. So if we want to think about that as we look through these pictures, that would be great. So this is in standing in the existing driveway. Looking at the barn. And this is looking at the barn from the, um, east side. Okay. Um, so this is turning to the easterly direction. This is the, um, Tennis court that was, um, permitted, um, on the other side of the lot. And then these are the stakes that show the, um, I believe the green is the structure, um, location. So the structure is actually proposed mostly within the footprint of the existing barn and the existing driveway, but you can see that it does extend slightly onto the existing lawn. And then the 100 foot buffer, I believe, are these yellow stakes that come down. And so that's the 50 foot buffer. I'm sorry, the 50 foot buffer. Excuse me. Thank you for the correction there. Um, And so you can see that they, the stakes kind of come together to a point down here. So when they. You know, wanting wanting to, they're wanting to put a driveway coming around because, um, as we saw on the aerial photo, there's like a garage basically on the other side of the barn. Um, and so they want to be able to connect from the existing driveway down to the other side of the driveway for that access to that location. And then this is, um, from the south side looking at the, at the barn. Um, my back is facing south. And then I came out in the field and this is looking, this is the, uh, looking at the driveway and this is just like overall site context. Um, And then this is also looking out toward, there's a wet swale that runs. And that's what the 100 foot buffer is off in this case or the, um, the stakes are off of that, the buffer for the swale, the swale runs down along the other side of this fence. And there's, we also permitted this little stream crossing to access the Tennis Court, um, in 2021. So this was an amendment to that permit. And the reason for that was because there was mitigation associated with the tennis courts, which needs to be monitored for three years. And so we didn't want to, I didn't want to, I was a little hesitant to close out the permit, um, when there's still monitoring going on from the previous mitigation project. And then this is looking down. There's an intermittent stream that also runs in the tree line. It's a larger intermittent stream and then this is you can see this is the garage on the other side or the driveway on the other side that they want to maintain access to obviously. And then there's a couple so they have they have some French drains already installed around the structures. This is a dry well that one of the outlets to the foundation drain goes to. And so this was a that went the builder and the homeowner and Steve we're out on site this morning for the site visit. So you can see the green steak in front of the builder is the corner of the building. The yellow steak is the. 50 foot 50 foot. So you can see it's like three feet into the 50 foot with the driveway at the point where it's closest to the 50 foot buffer. And Steve it's like it's like three feet in and about how long approximately to the driveway. It was 30 feet we measured it out so it's like a triangle that kind of comes into the 50 foot and it gets back out of the 50 foot. Okay, and it's on the plan it looks like it extends further in but on the ground when we actually took the measurement it's it's a little bit less impactful to the 50 foot buffer. And then this is the outlet to the current French drain that comes out in the in the existing lawn area. Okay, before we jump in with questions is that Aaron is that I'll just just a couple comments that I have the percentage of of total buffer zone alteration with with the addition was I believe 9.9% of the buffer zone for the entire lot. So it's under the 20% that that the commission allows the only encroachment on the. I mean the the only place that I really see a regulatory conflict on this is the 50 foot no disturb buffer. So I think that the commission is being encroached on by the driveway and I did talk with them in the field about that and let them know that you know the commission might have questions and that they may want to discuss alternatives and or they might want to come up with some possible mitigation opportunity there. So what was I guess, confusing to me was that I thought, initially when the building permit so I caught this on a building permit application. And when I initially spoke to the builder I thought I remembered the builder saying that this was for like a commercial business like a home train a personal trainer type situation where that was like operating the business out of the gym. That what makes that complicated is that commercial projects require stormwater review, but I did ask the builder is this for personal use or a business and I was told it was for personal use so you know, it, it's very large it's you know 20 it's it's like 2600 square feet so it's a it's a pretty substantial size structure. But again, they're saying it's for personal use so there's there's not a whole lot of like, you know, taking that at face value it is it is kind of what it is. The site visit was held today you guys just looked at the. I just looked at the photos so that's basically my general comments. If the commission does decide to act on this this evening my only recommendation would be that we only close a public hearing because I'd like to put together, you know a solid order of conditions and issue it at the next meeting. Aaron, before we jump in with commissioner comments I just want to take any public comment or questions on this. So again we'll try to limit that to two minutes and at the top of your question or comment if you could clearly state your name address and any preferred pronouns that would be great. Just go ahead and raise your hand if you have a question or comment. A lot of people 17 people in attendance but no, no hands up. Looking for access to the gym. I want access to the gym. That's nice. All right, last call. 29 million sounds like no public comment so commissioners questions or that's particularly on the main kind of regulatory kind of not even issue. I'm going to raise my hand at hand which is 110 square feet of that driveway coming into the 50 foot no disturb would be particularly interested in any questions clarifying this or thoughts on how to handle that. So can just that's going that you specifically said that's going to be a gravel driveway it's not going to be a paved driveway. Yeah just gravel gravel now they're just going to basically build this. We can start the same similar structure around the outside. What was the, did you have to change the dry well was that Aaron or just showing pictures of it that wasn't going to be where the driveway was that was there. They're doing a drip edge around the week, you know the reconstructed or the new structure that they're adding, and they're putting a drip edge as well as a French stream like a perforated pipe that will go to a French stream so I don't know where that will actually discharge either the dry well that I showed you a photo to or it might tie into that other outlet, which is in the middle of the, the lawn area and it's, it's very stable with grass. It wasn't soft, there was no unstable, you know, it wasn't destabilized in any way from the outlet. So, I don't really see any issue with the French train tying into that. Yeah. So it's in the 50 foot no disturb there's already been some impacts on this property. And I guess my concern is putting it in the 50 foot no disturb buffer. We discussed some mitigation but just to bring it back to the basics it's avoid and minimize and then mitigate and I think for you know it's not. There's a lot in the, in the 50 foot buffer and it's a very, very large structure and a lot of it's a gravel driveway, and I'd like to discuss alternatives for that getting into the 50 foot buffer. Is Brian on it all to let him in he knows more. I forgot his name but there's a Brian, I will allow I will bring him in as a panelist. Sorry. Hopefully he'll join there we go. Yeah, he's the, he's the builder for the, the applicants he can speak to their, their concerns and stuff more than, more than I can about some of the history. I know it's been reduced already what what they ultimately wanted, you know, to get things out of the structure at least out of the 50. Hi, can you hear me. The camera is on. I don't use this that often so. So, they had already had a larger structure planned, and there was other features in that structure, which they deleted to bring it down to minimize the impact, the only impact now is not the structure is just that gravel driveway. So, which is at most, I believe it's seven feet, and it tapers down over the course of 30 feet to nothing. So it's a total of 110 square feet of gravel which is not a structure. There's a desire for a given square footage for their space for multiple exercise activities. Being free weights, then you got yoga and cardio, and so that's their desire and the reason for the size of the structure, and they have already deleted some stuff to lessen the encroachment on the buffer. Brian, could you just state your full name for the record and who the company you work for and stuff. What would be Frank construction. Cameron or Alex. Any questions or Alex other. Alex, can you hear me. Yes. Okay. I don't think I heard Michelle's question. I don't think it got answered. So I think there is access to the back of the barn between the house and the barn. If I'm not mistaken, there are pavers between the house and the barn. And there could be access to the back of the barn without having to have the gravel driveway wrap around the new structure. Am I correct. I think that was an option and I did speak to the landscape company snow and suns and the homeowner. Unfortunately, since other renovations. They deleted the Once gravel driveway went there there is pavers, but now they stone patio interferes. It wouldn't even be nine feet wide to hit the patio so it wouldn't be adequate size also they ran their irrigation system through there. I think there would be more cost to that. Plus they've added planter beds and flower beds. I didn't. During the site visit, we didn't get down in there so I didn't realize, didn't realize there's a patio. Yeah, the pavers. Yeah, I thought I just asked. And I did exercise like talking to the homeowner and the landscape company to see if that was a practical option. And it really be tough for that to happen. Whereas the alternative being 110 square feet of gravel. Yeah, so gravel is still an impact within the 30, within the 50. So it doesn't have to be a strong trip to be an impact. Yeah. And that was my question. That was my question Jen is whether or not there's access between the house and the barn and I didn't get there. So I didn't see the patio. Unfortunately, it's not adequate. And there'd be other impacts to make that work. Like changing the irrigation system which is hooked up to a separate well as the other. So the only other alternative is the change the design of the new building so that there is not a rectangle that it allows for the road to wrap around without going across the 50. That would be the only other alternative I could see. Thanks Alex Michelle. Yeah, just so the driveway is wrapping around. I mean, does it, does it need to wrap around or can it access the building to a point to a parking area like why does it. Yeah, can you explain that. It's really for the service like the landscapers pull around to the other side so it's in the center of the property, and they can lower their gate for their mowers and such like that. They also have a lawn tractor, and they use the lower portion of the barn for storage. So it's a convenience it's not a regular driveway where they drive on it every day. So, if they had to drive across grass every now and then, it's not going to be the biggest inconvenience it's, but they have a lawn tractor and yard equipment they use personally, as well as the landscapers using that for access. You know, the, they have a pool, the pool equipment guy comes down, parks his vehicle there only services the pool. That's the reason I think that I think it was brought up in the field walk to today that if they if they didn't have the driveway they could go over the lawn, but this track tracks of vehicles over the lawn may destabilize the lawn as they give them a set place to drive that, you know, will rock the ground or tear up the grass or that type of thing. Because they do they do drive back there and you can you can see that they access the lower part of that barn and that's going to do that gravel gravel drive board is now is really the only way to access that lower area there's no other way around other parts of the property to get down to that lower that lower gravel area that's that already exists behind the barn. Yeah, so this is leading me to wonder if there's any other kind of like surface or like option that's not gravel into the 50 foot is just a compromise. We started talking about like porous tavers or something, something like that out in the field today. Yeah. Yeah, so Aaron, was that where you were going or do you have a separate well I just had a I just had a thought and this is this is nothing more than a it might be worth talking about and this is a question for the builder. Brian what is the, what are the dimensions of the, the structure. Sorry, because it looks like a like a rectangle as opposed to a square. Yeah, it's cool. I think it was like 54 by 49 or something. So I was just wondering if it would and this is just an idea like could you turn the design 90 degrees so that the longer end of the structure is north to south and the shorter end is east to west and that would push it over like by feet and then you could get your driveway around without I don't see that being like a structural issue or a square footage for their use. What it does do is it changes the aesthetic because of the buildings, the new building in the old building line up with one another. And it's actually set. So it sets back from the old barn whereas right now they're in line. And that was something the engineer structural engineer wanted to do. Though the buildings are separate. And he thought it would work better pushed back so they could gain. I think it's two feet. If they went towards the existing paved parking area, which is north and gain two feet there, and then push the building back. So when we did mark that out on site. Steve and I, I measured 12 feet off of the structure, knowing that the driveway is not going to be plumb tight to the building. So and it's nine feet wide right now. So I'm going to shorten that up to eight feet and go a little bit closer. And then the impact would be that much less probably down to about 80 square feet. I know I wasn't in the meeting, like as a being able to talk but I did speak to the homeowners and they are willing to plant a blueberry patch or throw up a couple birch trees in the wetland area. If that was kind of an offering because they don't mind doing so. So you just say you can probably shorten some of the building. Not necessarily the building. Sorry, yeah, driveway. You just said you went from 110 to 80 something square feet. Yeah, yeah, if we we push the driveway closer to the building, and then shortened it to eight feet because the majority of the vehicles traveling there would easily you know drive on that. Yeah, so I'm going to, so we've been a half an hour on this hearing and we have a full deck tonight. So in the, it seems like what I'm hearing. Brian and Steve is that half of the commission at least is not comfortable with disturbing inside the 50 foot. Could you guys go back and see if there's anything you can do to get that driveway out of the 50 foot. Different materials different footprints snugging it up making a little bit narrower, anything you can do to get the driveway out of the 50 foot. Continue this hearing. Yeah, with permeable pavers be acceptable. I do know that they would do that if that was a requirement or let me take a reading here Brian. How do you commissioners, how would you feel about permeable pavers as opposed to gravel driveway inside. I'd like to see it out of the 50 foot buffer. I don't I don't see the convenience of landscaping equipment as a very, you know reason like I'm willing to go into the hundred foot buffer for this but not I think we should not. I'd like to hear alternatives and I think I hear the point about driving over the grass but I'm not sure that that would be happening so often and to the extent that it would necessitated gravel driveway and I'm not sure about the permeable pavers but I'd just like to see it out of the 50 foot. Alex to do comment. Yeah, I'm Michelle speaks my mind. Okay. So, Cameron, did you say something sorry. Yeah, I said me as well. Okay. Yeah, so more than half of the commission present tonight Steve and Brian are really pushing back and would love to see alternatives to get that driveway out of the 50 foot. Right there are some options there. So if you guys would be willing to think about that and anything can get Aaron before our next meeting I think we have the rest of the information we need to move forward. So we'll try to move forward expediently if you couldn't give us some alternatives to get that driveway out of the buffer. I think we could probably be prepared. If you're able to do that I think we could be prepared to issue at the next meeting which we were, I was hoping we were going to do anyways so if you're able to get us something by the Friday prior to the Next to 28 so would be that would be Friday the 23rd. Yeah, yeah. And just to clarify that so we're not adding more to the timeline here because the most that we could do tonight is close the public hearing but we can't issue the order of conditions until the next meeting. So that's something we could be prepared to do at the next meeting so we're not adding time to the timeline if you guys can give us some alternatives with that driveway out of the 50 foot. And Steve and it could just stay one. And that's a very good possibility. Okay. All right. All right, we really appreciate your time. Thank you. Thank you for your talk to you. So Jen, we just need a motion to continue the hearing to June 28 at 740. And I will get this up on my screen if people need it. Motion to continue 29 million to June 28 at 740. So moved. Seconded. Second from Cameron voice vote. Okay. Hi. Cameron. Hi, Michelle. Hi, Alex. Hi. And I'm also an I. And the second on that was Cameron, right? Yes. Sorry, you guys were really fast. Okay, we're good. All right. Our 735. Oh yeah, go ahead, Alex. Okay. I'm in Bangor, Maine. And I've got about four miles to go before I get off the interstate. And then I've got. Some, some period of time before I'm on a road with very bad cell reception. Okay. If they're, I know we've, we've got a schedule, but I just thought I'd tell you that. I'm going to run out of cell reception sometime in the next half hour. Okay. Okay. Okay. So we've got four. Yes. Yeah, we've got four. It just, you know, in terms of a quorum, it kind of, you know, Alex will have to continue. Well, let's just keep going and. We'll take it as it comes. Okay. Thanks for letting me know Alex drive safe. Okay. Yeah, that's fine. And three. Okay. Good. All right. So 735 hearing. This public hearing is now called to order. This hearing is being held as required by the provisions of chapter 131 section 40 of the general laws of the Commonwealth and act relative to the protection of wetlands as most recently amended and article 3.31 well and protection under the time of Amherst general bylaws. Fletcher, do you remember how Brian used to have that memorized and could receive it from memory. Yes. I ran into her recently and I had that conversation with her. I still have not at that point. Okay. All right. So this is Goddard consulting for 52 fearing street LLC for construction of a single family house and garage with associated site work in preparation in the 100 foot. B buffer zone to BVW at 46 fearing straight. Wow. The tight. The day has come. I know it's been a long way to open this one. So if you could raise your hand if you're here. Okay. Okay. I'm moving in. Steve again. We should have just left Steven. Barry. So just just to be clear, the folks who are coming in right now are the project proponents who are proposing the project. There'll be a chance for a public comment. I just wanted to make sure I say that. Yeah, I'll go over that now. I feel like we have some public members here for this discussion. So we'll get it. We'll get it kind of introduction. An overview of the project from the project's representatives and then. A report from Aaron on the site visit and her review of the application so far. Then we will take public comment. So I will not forget. We will get there, but let's get all the info on the table first. Tom, Steve, Barry. Hello. Who is going to give us a project overview? I'm going to give the project overview probably with some help from Steve as it relates to the wetlands. Okay. Awesome. If it's okay, I'll share my screen. Please go ahead. You just have to enable it. Oh, I'll take care of that. Sorry. Okay. Thanks, Sarah. All right. Now I'm, I'm able to. Let me share. Okay. So if you can see my screen, let me, let me back up and Tom, ready to turn out bacon Wilson out of Amherst here on behalf of 52 fearing street LLC. And it's application for a notice of intent for the construction of that 46 fearing street here in Amherst with me, what when scientists and consultants, Steve Riberty, and Goddard consulting, and then the principal of 52 fearing street, Barry Roberts. So I guess I'll be brief. We're here. So this was something, a little bit of history. I probably don't have to recap it. I'm assuming that the 17 folks in the audience, they were there for this. So we had sought and received the resource area delineation. But so over a year ago, that was, we had appealed that the neighbors had intervened. I think they had two different groups. We had discussions with the EP. We had discussions with the town. We had discussions with the neighbor. You will get at some point in the near future a proposal for a different project on a different site that is going to stay outside of the 200 foot area as it relates to Tanbrook and so this was really all about Tanbrook. So because of that we couldn't go forward with this notice of intent. But this notice of intent is really simple. It's for a single family home in the buffer zone only. It's for this lot right here, which we've got an A&R in front of the planning board. It's a 14,500 square foot vacant lot. We understand that it used to have, it was almost used for farming, has some organic soils at the top. And I'll show you if you can see the site plan. North is to the bottom of the screen. South is the top of the screen. What we've got is a single family home. And the proposed garage, the structure of the home is outside of the 50 foot and I can zoom in a little bit here and I'll just move around on the screen if that's okay to see it better. So frontage, 100 foot wetland buffer. I'll talk about the rain garden in a moment. Towards the back of the site you've got wetlands. As delineated by God consulting and we picked those up, Randy Isra's office picked those up by survey. They do connect off property. So you see that the wetland flags continue there. That was for a single family home. You see the 50 foot buffer zone here the single family home was outside a deck would exist within that 50 foot buffer. We've got the 30 foot no disturb. I'll explain what these hatched areas are in a bit. You can see that we're proposing ultimately some wetland enhancement about 2000 square feet of wetland enhancement, and about 770 square feet of buffer zone restoration. Winterberry northern arrow would blueberry and then within the wetland fall bluegrass Canada rush hops edge and red maple. There's grass within that 30 foot no disturb, and then seated lawn within the 50 to 30 on the entire site decides 14,500 square feet. There is 3228 square feet of land disturbance within the 50 foot wetland buffer so that's like 22% of the entire site. So what really is, you know, this hatched out area is the limit of work, and you see here where the wetland buffer is so I'm going to just scroll down to the limit of work to show why they bump out so one of the things that that we heard from neighbors from Erin on behalf of the town was the water and in some concern about the hydro geology of putting a structure here and what that would do. And so, you know, we talked with our engineer Phil Henry of civil design who's done some other projects for Barry 70 University Drive you drive south and others. And what Phil looked to do was to capture the the roof drain, the rainwater the storm water that falls on the roof, and then to collect it and then convey it through a four inch perforated pipe with two feet of crushed stone trench that slopes from an elevation to 60 here to 60.5 down to 258 here. And that, you know, if you see where this natural wetland kind of swell is what we're trying to do with both the roof water from the single family home as well as the garage is to send it back towards the wetland to really, you know, get going the way that it wants to go which ultimately leads down to the handbrook. It's a relatively flat site, but one of the other things that we're looking to do is for the front yard in in the water that would fall in the front yard is we're proposing a rain garden here. And one of the unique things about this rain garden and we've used it on another project for a subsurface infiltration system but it's to remove any restrictive clay layer. And I think Steve can probably talk about what the soils are like here, but there would be a restrictive play layer, which would actually act kind of like a bathtub to hold the water up. And it would be to remove that and then the backfill with suitable materials so that it drains it, it percolates to the natural water table that that would be below grade so that's one of the features here and you'll see that you see the drainage arrows how you can capture that in the rain garden or sheet flow it off as it currently goes on the north, and then you'll see on the south where the drainage arrows, they also they drain towards the wetlands so no kind of high level, simple, family home buffer zone project keeping, you know everything but that DAC outside of the 50 foot, and then proposing some wetland enhancement here some pretty substantial with enhancement enhancement and also buffer zone restoration and then dealing with the storm water through those. Typing as it gets back to the wetland so that's the site in a snapshot I don't know if you have questions on that or if you want me to turn it over to Steve to talk about the wetlands lineation. You're muted Jen. Thank you. Steve if you wouldn't mind covering the wetlands lineation and then we'll get kind of a site visit report from Aaron before. Sure. Again, Steve Riverty senior wetland scientist gather consulting. So I came into this project fairly recently I wasn't involved any of the history on this. You know, so I came in kind of with a fresh set of eyes. And I and to be honest when I first went out there I don't like to really look at a lot of the political history I want to see the site and just do a, like a fair delineation like how I would how I would delineate it without knowing any of the context so I went out there probably last last fall to do the original delineation, which was kind of picking up from what a couple other consultants and peer reviewers had had done in the past and and essentially and I looked at only not only this wetland I looked at the larger delineation I had done on Tan Brook to what I flagged here was just a small part of the larger delineation I had done, but in most areas I made the wetlands slightly bigger than they were before and that was without even really looking at the previous context, just kind of how I flag things and then we laid it out and you know this wetland here is a little bit bigger than what was shown on previous delineations on the site. You know I had heard some concerns about the lawn areas here and are they wetland or are they not so I paid a little bit into here and I really you know tried to document what I was seeing out there and you know how I delineated and type of soils, but I did a lot of auger holes throughout the site not just not just in the wetland area but you know throughout the lawn areas between but the main wetland in the back here it's you know it's it's not a super high quality wetland it the well that we have here barely makes the parameters you know it does start getting some of the wetland vegetation showing up in this area the soils start getting closer to wetlands and there's drainage patterns out there that kind of connect this down to Tanbrook, I should say there's some unnatural patterns to you can tell somebody had tried to ditch it in the past, you know, I don't know how long ago but you know historically to try to get water to kind of move off the site and then kind of go down towards the Tanbrook area. So we have flags here this this wetland kind of extends into you know what is, what is the lawn. You know, in the back the southern portion of the wetland, you know there's some some naturalized vegetation there's lots of unnatural plants out there you just wasn't old garden there's like there's Japanese maples out there and ginkos and there's there's lots of kind of random garden species growing out there's probably relics of past use of the site. Within the lawn areas closer to fearing. It's, it's all pretty much just lawn grass, you know, and all the and all the vegetation out there is non hydrophytic, you know, for, for people that say I don't know what that means that's just just non wetland plants so. When you look at a wetland you're looking for all three parameters you're looking for the soils are looking for the hydrology looking for the plants. From my visits out there and I've been out there multiple times between last October and, you know, as, as late as probably late May was the last time I was on the site. You know, I haven't seen any, any evidence of wetland vegetation at all anywhere in the lawn area. I've done extensive auguring out here. Every time I've gone to the site I really wanted to see what the hydrology is out on the site so I've dug to water table each time and the highest water table I've seen out in these the lowest elevation of the lawn is 21 inches below grade for standing water. And the soils out there, you know, kind of are indicative of the past use of the site as a as a garden, which you know I think this, you know, historically it's probably been kind of a place where compost and soil amendments have been added. We had a very, very thick and deep a horizon, you know, it's at the upper, the upper soil surface, you know, it goes down 16 to 18 inches in some areas. And it's dark, it's not, it's not black it's not like a, there's different criteria for, you know, wetland categories one of them is a dark a but this doesn't meet that criteria so brown enough to not be that. But there's a thick a horizon there's no evidence of redoxomorphic features within that that a horizon below that in that like 16 to 20 inch zone about a three to four inch layer of, you know, Tom referred to as clay, but it's just a very dense layer and the organic layer at the top is also dense it's organic so it's thick and heavy and it kind of it promotes water to stay at the surface maybe slightly longer than it normally would, but below all that is sand. So all those those that organic material is sitting over a sand layer, and that water table is into that sand layer, which is what Tom was saying if we can kind of get through that upper layer of a tight soil, you know water would percolate much easier to get through that site into the natural natural water table that's about two feet below grade. But in the in the lawn areas I didn't I didn't see the evidence of hydrology, I didn't see the evidence of vegetation I didn't see the and didn't see the evidence of the soils within the lawn area. And Erin and I were out there if we were we were arguing I've been out there multiple times, like I mentioned, kind of going through that area I know there's been some reports of water pooling out there and I wanted to see that myself so I've, I've been out there multiple times I've been out there after heavy rainstorms. Like I said I was looking at the water table to see if water table is coming up and expressing itself on the surface. And I couldn't see that. I didn't see some heavy rainstorms I hadn't seen any water pooling even even immediately like after during, you know, you know, two inch rain events that I was out there for. So, that's, that's kind of my wetland kind of narrative as to kind of how we have the delineation on the site and how we looked at it. Thanks for the thorough run through Steve. Okay, Barry did you have anything to add to the project overview or anything about the delineation. I don't think so I can answer questions about how we would construct a home. If that's pertinent, but I'm happy to answer any questions your folks have. Okay, thank you. Erin, I think we should, you might be losing. We'll just let that be. We have a commissioner driving in the far reaches of Maine right now so the audio might be him losing service, but I'll try to manage it as best I can. Erin, I'm here. Thanks. Thank you. And do you want to give us a run through like share some site visit photos and any questions you have based on your review of the application. Sure. Yes. So, and I apologize the site visit photos are not excellent. This, sorry, and I'm not sharing am I. I have a photo of Steve and I'm very flattering. I have my back to the road in this picture so this is my back is to the road and I'm facing into the lot. So there's a sort of a tree in the middle of the lot that's down. And towards the back of the lot you can see there's there's like a hedgerow of, of like evergreens there, and, and the, the flagged wetland I believe is like sort of right along that line or just starting right behind that line. Yeah, it's on the front of that line actually. This is me turning to the east. And I apologize for the unflattering photos I do this like to everybody so I'm so sorry, but this is just taking a picture of the lawn and you could see the neighbor's house. And then this is, you know, I took probably. They're twice to separate site walks and I probably took about 30 augers in the, in the grass and, you know, as just to sort of confirm what everybody said, you know, evidence I would say of hydric soils is probably between 12 and 16 inches on the site in various locations. And I would definitely also confirm taking multiple augers deep that my observation is a sand layer with like a four to six inch layer of more dense soils, sort of, that's where the hydric soils are showing up and then there's a very organic layer on top of that. So this is just photos of the soils that were taken. And this is not, this is information from the butters. So I mean, I think that there's multiple sort of this is a this is a complicated one and I want to leave time for public comment because we do have another pretty big hearing after this and we've already been on this for almost 25 minutes but just to sum up quickly. The commission always has the discretion to require a peer review if they so choose if they want to get additional information on the soil conditions on the site. I conducted personally multiple site visits on this site over the course of over a year. A lot of site investigation. I, I agree that because I've been shared photos of the standing water so here's a couple photos of the standing water that have been provided to me by a butter so we've we've got that documented. I've also tried to get out there during rainstorms I've like driven across town in the rain to get there to try to get this documented myself and I have never actually able been able to get there when they're standing water on the site. So my personal feeling on this with the history of the site, having gone through an appeal already with DEP on this, and also just my experience in general working on sites I think that this is an area that I would describe as a very marginal area. And it presents a major challenge to the commission and the reason for that is because it doesn't really meet the definition of anything under the regulations that I can find. Sort of, there's evidence of some standing water, but I'm not sure from a regulatory standpoint of sort of what to call it. I would say and you know I did talk to our peer reviewer about this just to kind of get a read based on my general site conditions and her. I don't know if you recall us dealing with a similar situation. It was for an anrad off of Montague road but there was similar situation whether there was some indicators, but it was a farm field and so there was a lot of discretion there as to whether or not the commission consider it to be a wetland or not. My personal feeling is that if we, you know, I, if the commission was going to go that route, I would definitely recommend a peer review, because we would need substantially more information in terms of a an alternate opinion on this. And to take it to the to the level of trying to argue that that is a wetland area. If we did, we would need some serious evidence to be found that there's there's more going on there than what we've been able to find as in Stephen myself. So I think the commission has discretion to as to how they want to consider this they have the ability to do a peer review if they so choose. I have worked with the applicant countless hours to develop a comprehensive mitigation package for the development of this site. And it's been a lot of back and forth a lot of sort of cooperation between town staff and the applicant. My ultimate goal, I'll be totally honest is preservation of the track along Tanbrook. That is my ultimate goal. I want, I would love to see that track preserved permanently preserved. But that's not part of this project. So just kind of keeping that in the back of our heads. I guess the only other thing that I would like to state on the record is that if the commission does consider approval of this I would recommend that we include a finding a fact that includes that we have received documentation from a butters that are providing water on the site, be it storm water or just rain water that will not infiltrate or percolate. And that if we do approve it that we're sort of approving it at the owner or developers own risk to develop this lot with the understanding that there is there is an issue there and maybe the development of the law and the mitigation that they've provided as far as the foundation drains and garden will address some of that drainage but we don't know if it will or not so it's a it's kind of a something that I would recommend if the commission does consider this approval of this project. And that's basically my comments. Okay, thanks Aaron and thank you, Aaron and applicants and applicants representative for all the work kind of behind the scenes to get to this point. So I think we should take public comment now. And then commissioners keep your questions and we'll come back to commissioner questions and concerns, figure out how to move forward. If you are here. Yes, go ahead Alex. I've been sitting in the car parked after driving for quite a long time. I need to take a personal moment which means I need to turn off the car. I think I can carry the phone with me and still be on the call. But if I get disconnected, I'll be back in probably five minutes. Okay. Thanks Alex. Hang in there. Yeah. So I think we're going to go ahead with public comment. As a reminder for members of the public with questions or comments kind of relative to our jurisdiction on this project. We'd ask that you limit your questionnaire comments to two minutes and because of the length of this hearing and our agenda tonight and the amount of people here I really need to try to stick to two minutes per person. And we ask that you also start with your name, your address, and any preferred pronouns when you speak. So with that, if you have a question or comment about the proposed project at 46 Fearing Street, please raise your hand. Paige Wilder, she her. All right, Paige. Hi Jen, thank you. Yes, go ahead. I'm at 73 Fearing Street just across the street. I have a question about the wetland enhancement Tom talked about plants that would be added does that include removal of invasives. So that's my first question. I also want to remind people that 2022 was a severe drought year. It was comical to say you didn't see any pooling in 2022. And I appreciate Aaron's comment that neighbors have seen pooling over the years as a common result of rainstorms. I have a question about the. So the, the main issue here is adding impermeable surface and increasing runoff because Tanbrook flash floods. We don't really know enough to know how much a rain garden and a perforated to will slow runoff. As opposed to something more like a cistern for a slower release, because downstream neighbors basements are going to be flooded the more people build and make more surfaces impermeable. So I'd be looking for more mitigation. Thank you. Yeah, thanks page. So, Tom, would you be the person to respond about invasives removal removal. Yeah, probably Steve and I, and I, I mean I think if it gets us across the finish line I'm sure invasive species removal would be fine mitigation. Okay. And then who so it sounds like there was a question a question in there about kind of the relative attenuation of runoff between a rain garden and perforated kind of French drain storm drain situation and then maybe other options. I know that there's a whole science around kind of runoff attenuation is Tom, would you feel comfortable speaking to kind of how the setup here is designed to up to kind of like mitigate runoff or Barry or who would kind of best field that question. Probably good as anybody. Besides our engineer. So we spent a lot of time with Phil Henry talking about it you know talking with Aaron zoom calls etc. We've got the system so it's a single family home you don't have to meet the storm water guidelines but what we're still trying to do is to take into consideration what we're hearing from the neighbors about kind of attenuating that that runoff and if you add in pervious surface, what you've got these roof drains proposed so obviously rain falls on the roofs goes into the gutters gutters down to the drains, and then you've got, you know, one's an 84 foot length the others 153 foot length of perforated pipe, you know I don't have calculations I don't even know that Phil would have calculations to say in a storm here's what it would be except you know conceptually the rain falls goes into those areas, and then ultimately gets back into the ground. And we're not adding any more rain to the area, if anything we're taking it and spreading it out over an area similar to the way that it would have been spread out before right so we're not taking it in and shooting it down because each of these are capped at the end. Right so you're not taking these like gutter systems into drains and the drains this charge so that you know think of scouring or whatever it is that they turn into some sort of lose system. That's not going to happen here right they're perforated so that they look to go back into the natural environment. Similarly to how they would act now. And that's for the backyard and Steve I'm going to ask you to hop in and just correct all my mistakes but explain it a little bit better than me so that's the backyard and then the front yard is that that rain garden. So within obviously the front yard is smaller than the backyard it's not collecting any of that roof runoff, you know the driveway is going to continue to do what it's going to send the water into fearing with catch basins in there and then that little bit of front yard area is being directed to that rain garden we're right now it's it's not directed anywhere so you know I think our thought is with those two steps I don't think we need to dry well. We don't need a subsurface infiltration system or anything like that I think between the rain garden here plus those pipes that lead back to the wetlands, which ultimately meander back to tan brook. We're covered and Steve I don't know if you've got anything to add. Yeah, no, that was a good summary Tom and again I'm not an engineer and I just work with them from time to time so I've been around it but in like Tom said the water is getting discharged from the surface. And anything that kind of comes to the surface it's going to like make its way to the wetland which we're going to increase vegetation on, you know, doing a lot of plantings in there right now it's mostly just grass we're putting a lot of shrubs which increases the evapotranspiration rate it's going to pump a lot more water in theory out of the ground than you know then what what that wetland is currently doing. So that wetland would be able in theory to handle more water. You know, and then this water would be you know help support hydraulically that well into. But that wetland could handle more water and then before it you know surcharges that water out that channel area towards tan brook. But like Tom said that this is where the water is naturally going anyway that the ground right now it's generally pushed there there's some you know, pits and mounds and areas where you know water could pool. During a heavy rainstorm, but you know it's not, you know, it's not really changing how much waters I think leaving the site but again you know it's not an engineer I don't really, I really can't quantify that. Okay, thanks Steve. Page, I just left you and do you feel like we answered the questions you had in there, you should still be able to talk a few unmute. I thought it was inadequate one because the plantings are going to absorb some water but they're not going to be a fraction of the amount of water that was absorbed by the 25 trees that Barry cut down on that site. We had that remains to be seen how much of the transpiration and absorption of water by those trees will be exacerbated by this whole project. And the head one other. It's not about how much water is there and where it goes it's about how fast it goes. And the pooling on that lot has kept it out of tan brook. And what you're doing is getting it to be tan brook putting it to the road to get to the drainage system that leads into tan brook and causes severe flooding, and it's flash flooding. Okay, thanks page. All right. We're going to keep moving here, Michelle Haas. Hi Jen. Hi. Yes, Michelle has but 60 fearing street. I want to, again, thank you guys for all this hard work and for the applicant for being here. So I just want to share that I'm, you know, right next to this property and I am one of the people that have supplied photos of that lot being completely underwater. And so I want to echo again pages comment of no surprise you haven't seen it this year because it hasn't been wet. That lot has been completely underwater. And the other comment that was made that we know that lot has been trenched by the previous owner because it was so wet in that spot. Like we have a lot of information about what this spot has been like, what it continues to be like, and no surprise it has not been built on because it's not an appropriate lot to build on. And honestly, I'm super concerned about the runoff because I already get flooded in flash floods. And this is really severely going to impact me. And I'm a neighbor to this property, and I'm going to be probably the most affected by additional runoff going into the brook or down the road that goes right into my property as well. So I have great concerns about this. I don't think it's appropriate. I really encourage you guys to step back and gather more information and really assess whether this is an appropriate lot to put a building on and the impact environmental impact it's going to have. Thank you Michelle thank you for being here. All right, keep moving. I'm going to ask a question from Halder. We can see you if you unmute. We should be able to hear you. It's actually not had your computer. Be telling you that I should have changed. Carl's trim. So 73 faring across the street and downstream of the, of the project. I am, we are severely impacted by flashing on my property. So the water comes very quickly when the storm water comes up. And so we're having some major erosion that's going right into my garage and I've been trying to mitigate that. But it just comes up so fast and so hard that the loss of this, having more impermeable surfaces really does concern me. Again, a lot of trees have been taken away already and I think it's been a bad flashing year already. I don't know if this has an impact but it's been dry but at the same time when the water comes it comes up fast and it does major erosion. So I was surprised to hear that no storm water survey or analysis needs to be done for a single family. That was the first I'd heard of that. I'd like to verify that because I think storm water is actually critical for this spot. So those are my comments, my questions on that that I'm surprised by your soil analysis. I've dug a lot down as I put in a foundation for a garage and what I found was the old prehistoric lake Hitchcock set bottom play layer, not too far down. Maybe it's a little farther than you went, I don't know. And it's rock hard and impermeable. So there's not gonna be any percolation. If that layer goes across the street which I can't imagine it doesn't, that is a prehistoric, the Lake Hitchcock bottom was sitting there for billions of years and collecting silt and sediment. I found it very close to cement. So I think that the storm water runoff and some sort of mitigation that would allow more trees, more absorption of the water, as opposed to just channeling that water back to Tambrook as quickly as possible would make more sense and probably have a less severe impact on me as a downstream resident. So I'll stop there, thanks. Okay, thanks, Ralph. Before I let you go, so Erin, can you speak to whether or not stormwater planning is required for single family homes? Right, so under the Wetland Protection Act, the stormwater management is only required for commercial development. So single family house lots do not require stormwater. I mean, I completely understand where everybody's coming from. I really do, because we've been going through this for so long and I've had many conversations with the applicant or with the butters. I think that there's valid points on both sides of this. I think that the applicant has made efforts to try to provide storage and try to provide infiltration capacity with their plan. And I also think that they're... I hear the concerns of what the butters are saying and there is a legitimate issue here, a legitimate issue with the flooding of Tambrook. So... Okay, thanks, Erin. So, Ralph, I'm gonna let you go. Thank you for those questions and comments. I just wanna say too that... So with the perforated pipes that are proposed that are heading from near where the home is collecting, runoff from gutters, et cetera, and to the back of the lot, I just wanna emphasize that the way those work is that the pipes are capped. So it's not acting as a conveyance. It's acting as essentially storage with usually there's perforated... It's perforated on the side. Sometimes they're perforated on the top, bottom and the sides. So what it does is that the water backs up, it slows the water and kind of access storage and then simultaneously kind of dissipates and disperses the water. So I just wanna be clear because I know it's tricky when you're looking at those plans, it can look like it's gonna be like a super highway, a flow to the back. It is having a storage function. So I just wanna make that clear for anyone members of the public here. Okay, Freddie. Manning, we should be able to hear you if you unmute Freddie. Hi, yes. My name is Winifred Manning, Freddie Manning. I'm one of the three properties right there by Fearing Street that are beside this brook. I'm very surprised. I mean, you just said that stormwater requirement, storage is not required for personal properties. And that must be a very old regulation or a very new regulation. I mean, it seems to me that that doesn't make any sense for people who are living beside a body of water or a stream. So that's just the thing that really just caught my attention right now. And the applicants have done a lot of due diligence. I'm sure. It's just that it's all done here in the present time. And I think you have, I've lived there for 50 years going on 51. I have seen it in every state that you can imagine. And I just, I cannot imagine the having a, you know, the little bit of mitigation that you are planning like a little rain garden or in those kinds of things doing anything. When this property, when the water falls on this property and the water builds up there, it is a raging, raging torrent. And you really have to be there and see it because it's short-lived, but it's dangerous and it is not a trivial thing. I hope to take this seriously because we've all, the three of us have lived there for many years. And there's others too have seen it. It comes over Fearing Street. It took down the bridge once, you know, and the banks get eroded. I just can't imagine doing anything to prevent water slowing down before it continues downstream. So I guess that's, I think, you know, sending more water downstream is not the purpose of this actually. That's, I made a note of that phrase that you were working on sending more water downstream. I don't think that's a very good idea. Okay, thank you, Freddie. Thank you for being here. So I wanna just also say that this isn't changing the amount of water going to Tanbrook. What we, the opportunity we have is to change or the impact of the single family home is potentially hypothetically changing the pace, the speed, the rate at which really the rate at which the water reaches Tanbrook. So that's the point of the mitigation that is proposed here, is to literally make it move more slowly and therefore contribute less to flash flooding than it would otherwise. And I think that's maybe, I'm hearing, that is like a technical pivot point here that might be a way to like move forward with this. So I'm just flagging that and clarifying that. All right, so I don't have any new hands up. Freddie, I see your hand is still up. Michelle, I'm not sure if your hand came back up. If you guys still have questions, keep your hands up. Or if anyone new has any comments or questions. Again, we're at about 17 attendees here. Michelle, I see your hand is still up. So I'll bring you in for, if you can keep it down, keep it to a minute. We still have another hearing, we're at a really big hearing tonight on our agenda. Thank you, Jen. Yeah, so my, and I appreciate you summarizing that, but isn't also the point of this is to come to some type of decision on the suitability of building on this lot? Yeah, so one issue is the delineation, if we think a third party review could reveal something that Steve and Aaron have not to move this from a gray area to a change in the delineation, right? So that could swing buildable area on the site. But with all these questions about the stormwater, I just wanted to clarify that it's not adding any more water. There's not more rain coming into the system because of this. It's more about like how we attenuate and slow the rate of water being delivered to Tanbrook. That's all. So yeah, there are kind of two things that we're talking about here, but I just wanted to clarify that on the stormwater. No, thank you. I appreciate it. I still think the suitability of the lot is I think what is really raising a lot of red flags for me. So thank you. Okay, thanks, Michelle. Thank you for being here. Okay. Seeing one more new hand and then I think we're gonna cut it off. Jen Larson. Jen, we can see you. Yeah, go ahead. Hi, I'm Jen Larson. I'm the abutting neighbor to this empty lot. Nice to be here. My other Zoom call just ended. So thank you for including me. I agree with Michelle about the suitability of this lot. It's very, very wet. And I think that there's a reason that it has not been developed in 100 years. As for bringing in third parties, maybe I don't have all the information, but I thought we already did this a couple of times. So are we talking about the whole intermittent versus perennial story or is this something else now? Sorry, but point being it's a very, very, very wet property. I don't think it's gonna be less wet. There won't be more rain, but if you take roots away, there won't be trees to soak up the water. It's just really squishy. I live next door and I'm really concerned. I don't know where the water is gonna go if you build a house there. Like I said, I think there's a reason there's not been a house there and I don't think there should be a house there. So thank you very much. Okay, thanks for being here, Jen. Okay. We have some repeat hands. What do you think, Erin? Keep it moving. Keep it moving. Yeah, so this would be my recommendation. I think we should go around, do like a round robin on the commissioners. I think we should, we're looking at a continuation at this point, but I think that the commission kinda needs to come to some sort of consensus of where they stand with what the information that they've heard thus far and then we should just plan to continue and maybe give it like another five, 10 minutes. Yeah, okay. So members of the public, I think everyone has had a chance to at least make one comment. This hearing is not gonna be closed tonight. So we will continue until our next meeting on June 28th. Not sure the time, somewhere in the 7.45 range-ish, but check the agenda. There'll be another opportunity for public comment. If you wanna put your comments in writing. Jen, you just froze comments and questions. Okay. Oops. So we missed your comment, Jen. Oh, sorry. Am I okay now? Just about writing a comment down. Yeah. You just started to say write your comments. Okay. You can also email your comments to Erin. Comments and questions can go to Erin and she includes them in our board packet, which is in part of the public record. So if you have more questions and comments, contact Erin or attend the next hearing on this application, which will be on June 28th. Sorry about that. I don't know what's going on on the internet. So yeah, to Erin's point, I kind of wanna spend maybe eight more minutes on this because we have another big hearing after this. Commissioners, what I'd like to go around and hear from you. One, any like actual factual questions about the information presented? Like if something wasn't clear and you need like a clarifying question. Two, thoughts on the delineation. Do you feel like a third party review would actually reveal anything more than the numerous times that Erin and the thorough review that Steve has done? And if so, should we move in that direction for a third party review of the wetland delineation on the site? And then three, stormwater attenuation. It feels like a soft spot. It feels like more facts around the functionality of a rain garden and the proposed kind of, I forget the technical term, but it's like functionary, perforated, right, French drain situation going out the sides of the property. Is that a spot where maybe we could tighten this up and have more information that might help make a better decision on this project? So those are kind of the three areas. And let's keep this moving. I wanna make sure that we're giving our applicant actual guidance for more information that we need in order to change what we have on the table in order to make a decision about how to move forward at this project site. So it needs to be like clear guidance to these applicants. Who wants to start? Fletcher. Great, yeah. It sounds like a third party review. I don't know if it's gonna do anything more, but clearly there's some hints on that where we'd like to see that in delineation. Stormwater, the water, I don't know if we can do anything better with the driveway or something. I don't know, like are there other systems available? I'm thinking the one in the corner by behind the Florence Bank across the street from Auto Express in South Amherst there, they had to elevate everything like the whole parking lot. That was a massive parking lot though for the, yeah, okay. I'm just trying to think. I'm just trying to think of other options for the water to function. Riffing off of that, even Tom, if you could give us calcs, because my guess is that your engineer has just like expected attenuation of X inches per hour rainfall. Like usually that's a spec you can pull from a rain garden design, like standard drawing and similarly for the pipes, like anything to talk about what rain falling on a mowed lot, like a grassy lot versus what happens when rain falls on X square footage of rain garden and X square footage of designed perforated pipe drainage to kind of give us some more numbers behind kind of attenuation of water. That would be really helpful. I especially, I think the rain garden with the removal of any kind of impermeable clay layer is it seems like it's particularly relevant with the Lake Hitchcock plays on neighboring properties, ways to have soil types that would encourage infiltration, things like that was another thing I was hearing. Sorry to riff off of you a little bit there, Fletcher. Thanks. I'm good. All right, Michelle. I like what you just said. I'm kind of curious about the lower soil horizons with the rain garden plan given the Hitchcock comment. I don't have any further questions. I am comfortable with the delineation. I was out there to decide visit in early May with Steve and Alex. I saw the soil horizons. They were past 12 inches. I walked the whole grassy site, I didn't see a single hydrophilic plant and I would have expected to at that time the plants were up. There wasn't even a sensitive burn. So I don't need a third party review. I am concerned about the stormwater and I'm interested in Aaron's suggestion about the comprehensive mitigation plan. It seems like the flash flooding of the river is an additional problem among the, like in addition to the impervious surface. So maintaining that river's ability to do its thing through conservation of that bank seems like something maybe we should talk more about. Okay, thanks, Michelle. Alex, are you still there? All right, we'll see if Alex comes online. Cameron, did you have anything to add or any questions? Yeah, I didn't have any further questions. I was wondering about how much that rainwater garden would bring in and having that information would be useful. I as well went and did a site visit, saw the soil horizons and also hearing Aaron's comments. I don't think that having another third party reviewer in would give much more pertinent information. And yeah. Okay, all right. So unless Alex chimes in the next couple of minutes, Tom, it feels like more information comparing kind of typical stormwater runoff on a grassy lot versus the attenuation proposed or alternative stormwater attenuation proposed would be really helpful to kind of address public concerns about contributions to flash flooding on Tanbrook. Yeah, and the issue of flash flooding on Tanbrook is like both Aaron and Michelle have said is like kind of separate from this application, but any thinking we can do about how to mitigate that on the larger scale, including conservation of land in that back part of the lot is sounds like it's really important to the neighborhood. So I'll just respond to that one is like a preview of coming attractions. We're going to be submitting an NOI maybe tomorrow, Aaron, for 336 346 North Pleasant Street, which is the land that this is kind of connected to keeping the development at least 200 feet away from Tanbrook, whatever we're calling it, which was part of the reason why we were able to withdraw. So not even to have to deal with it, which would have full, I mean, we've got a stormwater report, we've got a detention basin, we've got a subsurface stormwater infiltration system. And I think part of that larger discussion may be what Aaron's talking about with some sort of comprehensive management non-development of the back. If we're able to get that project in the front, I think we're able to conserve in the back is kind of as simple as I could put it, but so we'll get there. I just don't, I want to separate them a little bit because this is a single family home on a lot that, we can talk about why it hasn't been developed for the years, it's been not going to develop, but hearing what I'm hearing, if, and I agree, I think Aaron and Steven, it sounds like you have some really intelligent commissioners, they've been out there to see what's there. And I don't know that somebody new is gonna dig a different hole that hasn't been dug before. You see what's out there. So I don't know that a peer review is necessary, assuming not, we can certainly take a real hard look at this stormwater and think creatively about, okay, yeah, we don't have to meet, but like what would that look like? Are we talking some sort of dry well? Are we talking some sort of, you know, what can we do? So, because I'm hearing slow it down, right? You're not gonna change the amount that's falling, but when it falls, make sure it's not going off the site, really any faster than it is, like just meet the storm instead of having it not leave the site any faster than it's leaving currently. You can't change the quantity, but as long as it's not going any faster. So we can take a hard look at that. That's great. Thank you. Can you hear me? Can you hear me? Yes. Yeah, Alex. Hi. Do you have some input to share? Yeah, I have a technical clarification question and then a comment. And I'm sorry, I was talking to you and I couldn't figure out what was muting me. I'm dealing with the car and my own phone. So sorry about that. I thought this is a technical clarification question. In the conversation by the consultants, I thought I heard them talking about removing the clay layer and putting down the loan. Did I misunderstand that? That was in the rain garden specifically, Tom, correct me if I'm wrong. Yeah. It was specifically in the rain garden to encourage infiltration in the rain garden. So they weren't talking about the entire site that would not be built on? No. Okay. And is that a, this is a real question. Is that a practical idea to stimulate? It's pretty common. It's pretty common that rain gardens in order to encourage infiltration, you would kind of remove native or not native depending on the history. Yeah. I understand rain gardens. I'm talking about whether or not, if this clay layer is what's keeping the water on the surface and stopping it from infiltrating, is it a practical idea to think about scraping the lot, to remove the clay and putting down loan? A practical idea. I wanna clarify the clay issue. It's really not clay. It's really loam. Like most of that, the loam layer is so thick on the surface. It's just slowing down infiltration. Okay. The clay layers would be a glacial thing, which are deep. Yeah. It's not like a cap where there's like this, this like impermeable, like very distinct thing at a typical depth around. It would be very heterogeneity, like very scattered and spotty. And it would impact the whole lot to kind of do something like that. It would be a huge disturbance. But I hear, thank you. Yeah, I got it. I got it. So the idea of dry wells is tantalizing and whether or not they could slow down the rate beyond what it is now and hold the water longer in the soil and have it go. That's a tantalizing idea to me. I don't, that seems to go beyond the, just the small rain garden. And I don't know if that's something that the applicant can bring forward. I'm not asking for it, but I don't know if that's how practical it is to have dry wells enough to retard the water longer than it is now. So, the place that... Steve, hello. Go ahead, Alex. Okay, so I think like that fits in the overall message to the applicant, which is please help us understand the attenuation that's happening with this multifaceted kind of suite of stormwater BMPs and some sort of alternatives, consideration of alternatives, including like beefed up storage. I do wanna say that things like dry wells, which are infrastructure, literally storage, they don't have any vegetation and associated with them. So there's not that added evapotranspiration function that you're getting with additional vegetation like you would have on a wooded lot. So it's not necessarily better to store more water longer. It has to do with, there's a lot of trade-offs. So some understanding of that logic in this or other alternatives, I think Tom would be really helpful here. So, Jen, you're talking as a hydrologist. I am. Okay, yeah, okay, good. Yeah. Moving on, thank you for the words, much better than mine. And as to additional surveys, part of me wants to give some credence to the fact that you brought it up. I don't know if I'm reading between the lines, but part of me says, Aaron brought it up. That causes me to wanna respect her bringing it up. I was on the site visit with Michelle and Aaron and the consultants, and I don't know whether additional work would bring anything forward. But the fact that Aaron brought it up, I would give deference to Aaron on that and ask the quest clarifying question, how long would it take? And would it come forward quickly? So not usually very quickly. It definitely wouldn't be available before our next meeting. Okay. And I think Alex, I 100% hear what you're saying. And I think I'm the first to pay very close attention to everything that Aaron says. I think she also is just channeling both her technical expertise on the site and the kind of evidence that she's collected from the neighbors. And so she's just trying to make sure that both of those voices are heard. Aaron, correct me if I'm wrong on that reading you're not sure it didn't sound like more soil borings would reveal more information, but you're trying to say that there is historic evidence of ponding at the site. Yeah, I mean, I think we could go around in circles about the delineation for months. And I don't think it would get us, it wouldn't get us really anywhere. I think that the better question is how do we handle the water on the site? Yeah, okay, and that's where we've landed. So Tom, do you need any more information from us or Barry or Steve? Do you feel like you guys have clear guidance on the additional information we need to move forward with this? Yeah, and if it's okay, we can reach out to Aaron and say, hey, what do you think about this? And I'll text him with Phil right now. And so he knows what's coming. So we'll certainly take care of it. Okay, great. And thank you to the members of the public who are here for this hearing. I know it's late. Trust me, we still have another hearing. And again, we will continue this hearing until our next meeting, which is on Wednesday, June 28th. So keep an eye on the agenda. And if you have questions or comments in the meantime, you can reach out to Aaron, who will get us any information. So commissioner, yes, please. I'll make a motion and continue this public hearing to June 28th at 745. Second. The second for Michelle. Voice vote, Michelle. Aye. Fletcher. Aye. Cameron. Aye. Alex, are you still here? Yeah, I'm here. Aye. And I'm an, I'm an aye. All right. Thank you, Tom and Steve and Barry for your time. We'll see you in a couple of weeks. Thank you guys. See you. Bye-bye. Bye. Hey, Jen, I got a question. Yeah. Yeah, go ahead, Alex. Next hearing, on this next hearing, you said several times it's going to be involved. Can you give me an idea time wise, what we're talking about? I'm sitting in a parking lot before I get on or another 100 miles where there's intermittent cell reception. And if I need to continue to sit here to be in that meeting, I will do so. Alex, I appreciate it. I think my own concern for your personal safety, I just, I want you to get wherever you're going. We have a quorum without you here. This is UMass addressing an enforcement order. And I think we're going to be, I mean, obviously we'd prefer to have you, but given the circumstances, I think you should, you should carry on. And we will be okay. Alex, you can miss one hearing and you can watch it on YouTube and still participate at the next meeting for this hearing. So just putting that out there. Yeah. So, so, so I returned home on the 21st, our next meeting's the 28th. So I have plenty of time to do that. Perfect. And so I have about 110 miles before I get the international border in inner Canada. And I need to come up early in the morning for work. So I'm going to probably sign off now, if that's okay. That sounds good, buddy. Thank you, Alex. Travel safe, Alex. Thanks, Alex. Thanks for the week today for that. Thank you. Bye-bye. Bye. All right, we just have to continue this next hearing, right, Erin? Yes. So I think we didn't have what we needed in order to go over the time bond, ever source energy upgrades within 70 K sub station, 246 college, butters weren't notified in time. So we're just looking for a motion to continue public hearing for 246 college street, NOI to 628-2023 at 735. So moved. Second. Oh, I got Cameron on the second. Voice vote, Michelle. Aye. Fletcher. Aye. Cameron. Aye. I'm also an aye. All right. So last but not least, Erin, do you want to bring in? Yes. Erin and crew. So this is a new NOI, so I'm going to open this even though it's open. So Tony, are you, I think Tony Summers is with SWCA. If you are Tony and you want to join in, just raise your hand and I'll pull you in. Okay, this public hearing is now called to order. This hearing is being held as required by the provisions of chapter 131, section 40 of the general laws of the commonwealth and act relative to the protection of wetlands as most recently amended in article 3.31, wetlands protection under the town of Amherst, general bylaws. So this is a notice of intent filed by SWCA for UMass, for after the fact of approval of installation of underground utility conduit that it, oh, it's as in a response to the enforcement order for replacement of two 18-inch culverts with arch culverts, et cetera, et cetera. So hi, Kristen, sorry that it's so late. It's okay. Can I share my screen while I introduce myself and just give like a overview of the project area? Perfect, yeah. Been a while, so we'll need a reminder. No problem at all. Let me pull this up. Sorry, PDFs are running really slowly. Can you see my screen? Yeah. Okay. With, so this is the site locus. This gray line right here is the town line and this red line is the project footprint. Hi everyone, my name is Kristen McDonough. I'm with SWCA, I'm a certified wildlife biologist and professional wetland scientist and I'm here representing the University of Massachusetts. Here to present an after the fact notice of intent filing the DEP wetlands file number is 089 sorry, 0717 and this is related to the installation of new conduit within an existing gravel utility roadway to bring power to the North Village Apartments and Amherst which is right up in here from the university power facility which is down here. And so this right here, this red line is an existing gravel utility road and also the in-kind replacement of a double barrel 18 inch diameter clay culvert with double barrel concrete culverts. And that was right over the Amherst town line right here in this wetland system. You can see this kind of persistent emergent marsh on this ortho photo right here and you can kind of see this dark line right there. That's where that was. UMass has an existing order of conditions related to ongoing campus operation and maintenance and that wetland file is 0890647. And there are special conditions attached to that existing order including the requirement for the university to provide the Amherst commission with written notification prior to upgrading underground utilities occurring within jurisdiction and also requiring prior notification and potentially a new permit application related to an in-kind culvert replacement. Those activities may have been permissible with prior project review. However, failing to provide that notice was an oversight and the commission was not provided an opportunity to review the project prior to implementation. This resulted in an enforcement order issued by the commission for the unpermitted culvert replacement and also for inadequate erosion controls implemented during the culvert replacement work conducted by the contractor. As a result, the Amherst wetland agent and UMass and SWCA walked the site on September 12th, 2022 and on November 2nd, 2022, the Amherst wetland agent, MastEP, UMass and SWCA walked the site to review recommended next steps. During those site visits, the agent and DEP requested an after-the-fact notice of intent be filed and the in-kind culvert replacement be replaced with a culvert that meets the current Massachusetts stream crossing standards. We also discussed other mitigation options including improving the aquatic connectivity within the stream, including an in-stream restoration approach. Additional stream bank restoration including there's a 60-inch culvert just south of the Hadley-Amherstown line right here. So there's, we'll get into this in a second, but just for kind of site locus reference, there was an additional mitigation approach that we discussed including stream bank restoration at that 60-inch culvert outfall. And we presented early concept plans to the commission in a meeting on April 12th in 2023. I think, Erin, the purpose of this after-the-fact notice of intent is to present the mitigation discussed in the September and November 2022 sidewalks and presented in the April 2023 meeting to improve the existing conditions as previously discussed between the issuing authorities and UMass. And this proposal includes the in-kind replacement of the 18-inch double barrel concrete culverts to meet mass stream crossing standards with an eight-foot span open bottom arch culvert as well as other resource area restoration including improving the aquatic connectivity at the crossing, stabilizing areas of bank erosion, removal of riprap from BVW and restoration of those areas, improving the floodplain connectivity, improving wildlife habitat by incorporating more wildlife food-producing plants into the design and increasing plant diversity over existing conditions, reduce thermal loading by increasing shade with native woody plantings and reducing soil movement from bank slumping at the bank erosion from that 60-inch culvert stream outfall which is just moving sediment down gradient into the Mill River, which is right here which is a cold water fisheries habitat. That's pretty much the summation of where we landed today. And I'm happy to dig into this NOI. I know that it's late and everyone's tired. So I just wanted to kind of give like a very brief setup to how we landed where we are today. You're muted, Jen. Sorry, thank you, Kristin. Erin, do you wanna run quickly through kind of your feedback on the NOI at this point? Yeah, absolutely. And I do have site visit photos, but it might not, I'll just go through my comments and we can talk about that later. So my comments were, I took a look at the plans and I did have a chance to talk briefly with Kristin about my comments, but the plans, I don't know what percentage of completion these plans are at as we're reviewing them, but like there was some basic information or I said like information I would be looking for on the plans that I couldn't find. So for example, on the culvert cross-section, the minimum amount of cover over the culvert pipe wasn't included. There was no data or no notes or information on the plans that noted like the amount of compaction detail, the materials that would be used for placement over the pipe and those I would look for on engineered drawings. So the fact that they weren't included made me sort of question where the design is at. In talking with Kristin, she was gonna get some feedback on that so we can circle back to those answers. But I do think it would be, and also Kristin did provide me with some contact culvert specifications just today. So there is still information forthcoming on the application. I did note, because there was two sets of plans provided to us, one from the engineer, which is right Pierce, and then one from SWCA and there were what I would describe as like inconsistencies between the two sets of plans. And also some, a lack of clarity with regard to some of the proposed work. Like for example, on the head walls, like the upstream head wall, there were some notes that were somewhat conflicting and some symbology that was somewhat unclear with regard to what exactly the symbology represented. There was a note that stated all of the BVW that was currently installed at the inlet was gonna be removed, but then replaced back in, which I was like, why is that? And then the plan from SWCA for the restoration showed like more of a natural sort of configuration at the inlet. And then there was also a note a leader line pointing to the whole bank area around the head wall that said riprap. And then there was another leader line pointing to it that said like natural slope stabilization. And so it's unclear where the extent of riprap begins and the natural slope stabilization ends. And so it would be helpful to clarify the extent of what is proposed where I guess on those plans. That's, sorry, Erin, let me just float something here. So we're not gonna be in a position to issue an order of conditions and like issue a permit tonight. Like the most that we could do is close the public hearing and then in the 628 meeting issue of order conditions. I guess what I wanna hear from the commission is given kind of the, we're not talking about a reworking of what's proposed. It sounds like there's just some details that need to be synced up on these plans. Would you guys be comfortable if Kristen and Erin worked to get these concerns sorted out on the plan set? Get it to as close to 100% plan set as possible and have a proposed order of conditions to talk about at the next meeting. I guess is what I'm asking. In that case, we would take public comment, close the public hearing and trust Kristen and Erin to kind of sync up on these important but not like big picture altering details. For the design. Erin, Kristen, do you feel? Yeah, I was gonna say. Is that appropriate? I was gonna say that generally speaking, I am ecstatic about the plan. I am so happy to see the crossing getting the attention that it needs and the stream getting the attention that it needs, the stabilization measures. I am very happy with the overall concept that's been put forth. I am too. And so that's why I'm kind of thinking let's, let's keep this moving and rather than make Kristen dive into these specific details and like where the arrows point right now at 9 24 p.m. We trust Kristen and Erin to sync this up and review in order of conditions in the next meeting. There's a lot of work that's gone into this. I mean, this is a remarkable improvement over existing conditions. So anyone else, any concerns? It feels like fletcher's on board. Am I right, fletcher? Yep. Okay. Sounds good. I got a thumbs up for Michelle. Okay, so let's take public comment quickly. Members of the public, if you're here to comment on this culvert replacement proposed by SWC and behalf of UMass, please raise your hand. No takers. Man. Okay. So yeah, arch culverts, man. Big culverts. Fish passage, they're like, whole nine yards. That's gonna walk underneath. Yeah, I mean, while you guys are just hashing this out, I'm just gonna share pictures because just to see the improvement over what is there now, that's at the inlet point. You can see this is the inlet point. Oh yeah. Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm stopping my sharing. Okay, we got ya. So the inlet point, the culvert is down here. It's two 18-inch culverts. This is the wetland up above, the road looking down at the outlet. And also one thing that Kristen didn't say because she's being very diplomatic here is that the contractor, when I showed up on site during this violation, there was no supervisor on site. There was no engineer on site. There was no survey equipment on site. There was no plan on site. These guys were installing this with nothing, just a machine. And there was no little or no erosion controls. There was a pump around system that had no erosion protection, no turbidity curtain. There was, I'll show you a photo in just a moment. This is the stream at the outlet point but they added in these massive granite slabs at the outlet, which this was not part of the plan. So while UMass was, it was an oversight on the part of UMass to contact us, there was also a bunch of work that was done by the contractor which exasperated the situation pretty dramatically. And this is the outlet of the 60-inch. You can see these are the erosion controls that the contractor put in place that are hanging in the stream. This is a scour pool at the outlet of the 60-inch culvert which is gonna all be restored. So this is gonna be- Also, if you go back, Erin, there's a bank flag in the stream on that last flag because that bank slumped. Yeah, it collapsed. So I don't think you can see that blue flag. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, this whole area collapsed and this is a very deep scour pool at the outlet of this culvert. So this is a tremendous improvement and there's enough blame to go around. Let's put it that way. But this is an improvement for the resource which is the end goal. And so I think Erin and Kristen, if you're comfortable just sorting through some of the discrepancies on the plan set and making sure we're looking at 100% plan set that an engineer will be looking at in the field and then we can discuss order of conditions which I don't anticipate being super specific. And then at the June 28th meeting, I think that makes a lot of sense. Is that okay? That sounds great. Yes. Tony, I see you're in the meeting, but if you have anything to add, let us know at any time. Nope, I like the approach. Okay, great. Less is more at 9.30 at night. Yeah, and I just, yeah, I think we'll probably go in circles on where arrows are pointing and it's important to get it right and we should get it right but let's not do it at 9.30 on Zoom. Yeah, and I've already started to address some of the comments that Erin has provided and we'll continue to work with her. Great, thank you. Thank you, Erin, for always catching all these really important details on these plans. You're awesome. Okay, we're looking for a motion to close the public hearing. I'll keep, I'm going for it. I'll make another motion to close the public hearing for 9.50 North Pleasant Street. Second. The second for Michelle. Voice vote, Michelle. Aye. Lutcher. Aye. Cameron. Aye. I am also an aye. All right. 9.29, good work, guys. Thank you very much, everyone. Thank you too, Erin. We'll be in touch. Okay, thank you, Kristin. Thank you, Tony. We'll see you soon. Okay. Have a good night. Okay. I think I'm done, Erin. Yeah, that's completely fine. The only thing that I asked for was comments back on the MOU for DPW. I did get comments back from Alex. I didn't get comments from anyone else, but I feel pretty comfortable with it. And I'd really like to take it to Dave and Guilford at this point and just move with it if that's okay. Yeah, I've read it, it's fine. Okay. Yeah. Awesome, thank you. All right. That's a wrap. Motion to adjourn. Second. Yes. Voice vote, Cameron. Aye. Michelle. Aye. Lutcher. Aye. Also an aye. Good job, guys. You guys, really awesome work. And I'm so sad that this is our second to last meeting with you guys. But it all, it's all good. It looks sad. I think so, but some fresh energy will. There you go. There's all the improvement. Yeah, no, I agree. And I'm, you know, it's all good. It's all good. But thank you guys so much. I really appreciate it. Okay. Thank you guys. Bye. See you next time. Bye.