 All right, so I'm going to call the meeting to order of the select board at 6 31 p.m. On February 12th 2018 First thing we start with opening remarks announcements and agenda reviews or anything on the agenda that anyone needs to Comment on or change or add to it? Delete from it, etc If not, then I think we'll start with public comment is anyone here for public comment not related to a agenda item If so, please come forward We'll just while you're coming up. We'll Do what we usually do which is we'll listen to you carefully. We'll generally not react or offer any comment or or Commentary at that time, but we'll take what you have to say under advisement So please just identify yourself with the microphone and my name is Bill L. Sasser. I live in the Antwerl and I Am now a bit frightened walking further than Xana Toward the University on the main drag Archipelago statements not withstanding and I would like to propose a Bridge of flowers Analog down in that area which might mitigate the awfulness of it Arguably there is some awfulness there And I I don't know if I could afford to provide a solenoid for such a Community movement perhaps elderly retired people working together to implement some lush non S Some lush aesthetic as opposed to the grayness of the building That that's all I have to say Thank you No one else anyone else here for public comment related to some if you're wanting to speak to something is on the agenda We'll get to you when we get to that agenda item. So if you're Here for just a general public comment now would be the time But if not, we'll wait till we get to that point in the agenda and That's the case okay, so we'll move right into our our action discussion items first up is the second quarter budget update and we have Ms. Aldrich here, and we have a memo in our packet related to that so Like to come forward this is going to be really quick tonight I've had a few comments lately about oh you're not going to read that whole letter And I'm not going to read the whole letter This letter will be this some report will be posted on that Is posted on the accounting website so anybody that wants to go and read? We're rat at the second quarter It's there for anybody has any problems getting to it. They can call the accounting office So second on the second quarter. There's really nothing Different from any of the other second quarters. We've done over the last ten years So I'm not going to bother reading through the whole thing. I'm just going to point out a few of the highlights that stuck out for me I Wanted to mention that Jerry Hill is up 15% from last year at this time However, it does continue to be less than they were historically On the revenue side talking here the fines and for fits are higher than usual and that's due to Large zoning violation penalty that was penalty and interest that was paid recently Penalties and interest jumping that's the presidential payment. I didn't know if I should say that why ever not Penalties and interest are up a Bit they're up 55% this year from FY 16 I mean from FY 17 and they were up 55 percent from FY 16 And we're just watching this to see what the new trend is here on the expenditure side The salary we have a salary reserve in there for some of them you on contractual Agreements that aren't settled yet So that tends to skew the percentages and departmental budgets because this is all budgeted in the employee benefits section of the budget Until those are settled and then we move the funds it in at the annual town meeting the only other things that stick out or We'll probably going to the finance committee for reserve transfer For the fire department boiler the North Amherst fire department boiler that went down That was approximately 62,000. I don't have a total cost yet For that and then there's snow and ice. We don't know where we're going to end up with snow and ice this year It seems to be another year like last year where we have a lot of nuisance storms They still have to go out in the sand and stuff and the other big Section that is concerning is employee benefits. This is where we pay our all of our employee benefits including retirement This is also where the appropriations are for health insurance We had budgeted for the first increase at 10% to the PPOs, but we did not budget for the second and third increases and It's our hope that we can raise that we can Pay this deficit with savings in the operating budget. We're aggressively working with department heads to Stop any discretionary spending and trying to control it so that we can And that's it I told you I was quick any questions This is number. I guess I just had one and that was in the hotel motel tax Which is running at sixty one point nine percent? And a year-to-date basis and I was wondering if those come in evenly per month and or if there's some other explanation Or we actually running ahead this year They come in on Monthly they're not they're not in the same amount every month. It's whatever the usage is for that This is through November For hotel motel So if it's through November, that's five months So we actually are exceeding estimate on that one, right? You're talking a hotel motel Motel, okay. I got the UMass payment in lieu of in my head. Yes. It's only through November And does the UMass show in that line or does it show in? the Revenues for the UMass hotel. It's a payment in lieu It's not a pilot, but it's just a payment. That's under Non-recurring revenue, so it's in a different line item completely Thank you, it would be helpful in future if under miscellaneous non-recurring It's fine if it's just in the text if you could break out which part of that's the UMass part and which part of it's the Amherst College Part that would be great in terms of the non-recurring just because it shows a total But I don't know what that represents. Okay That can be done. Thanks Other questions or comments regarding? Thank you. I did actually have one other quick one You mentioned the boiler and we've certainly talked about the boiler before but where will that fit under? Where will that what category will that end up in when you end up writing this report in the future? It's in public safety. It's under. It's in the fire department budget under new equipment In building maintenance, so that's where it'll be Great. Thank you. Just to follow on that Would there be or have you considered using any ambulance funds? ambulance funds reserve for whatever I forget the name of the fund but any ambulance reserve funds for Mitigating or reducing that cost of it being out of the general fund. It's or I'm not sure that's possible because it really doesn't have to do with the medical side. I know it's heating the Building that holds the ambulances and stuff, but I'm not sure Checking to that all no more. Yeah a lot of little expense I just was thinking maybe some portion because you know, obviously it's a fire operation and but that's an integral part I didn't know whether not to yeah We normally use the ambulance funds just for the ambulance or medical equipment for the ambulances or in payroll We don't know So I do note in that line at a meeting I was had recently that the fire chief Nelson did make the comment that There is a heating requirement in order to Maintain medical supplies at the adequate temperature that is required Checking to it right fantastic any other questions or comments? Thank you very much so I'm going to Alter the agenda a little bit I was it was pointed out to me that we have a we have a chapter 61 a notice of intent to withdraw a Parcel from a from a section of chapter 61 a land and it's just relatively small item And we have someone here that is here for that purpose. So I think we'll skip ahead barring a any comment from my colleagues to just to Item for e which is chapter 61 a notice of intent to withdraw and I think in our circumstances Generally, we have a right of first refusal with mr. Zomek if you could kind of walk us through this particular Peace Excuse me. I'm just gonna get this much later. So it's not thank you very much Dave's on my assistant town manager I'm actually joined the owner of the property in question is here behind me tonight His Edelman is here. So if there are any specific questions that the board may have I'm sure she could answer Perhaps more specific questions than I can this is a somewhat unusual situation For us and I realized that we're asking the board to move a little more quickly than is is your practice In short before you on the screen and for those folks at home there is a the property in question is here and The sliver of land that we're talking about which is in chapter 61 a Is three tenths of an acre it is right here. It is a tiny sliver of land that Ms. Edelman needs because Her well for her house Was actually determined to be on that property so she needs to add that small sliver of land from property owned by coals to her property so that she can eventually sell her property and Although the planning board and the conservation commission typically weigh in on these I realized before they reach you I think given that there was a impending closing On the property we we were doing everything we could to try to move this process along fairly quickly I have been in direct contact with Christine Breastrup She is very confident that the Planning board Would not recommend to you that the town exercise our right of first refusal on point zero three acres of land Nor would I can say with with some certainty that we would not be interested in this parcel for conservation purposes so I did check in with town council Sharon Everett and there is nothing legally that prohibits you From doing one of two things either voting to not exercise your right of first refusal this evening or voting One option another option will be to vote to not exercise your right of first refusal pending Vote from the planning board in the conservation commission I Think given the circumstances I feel very confident that the planning board Nor the conservation commission would recommend to you to exercise The towns right of first refusal on this tiny sliver of land So I'm happy to give way to the owner of the property if you have more specific questions And I hope I covered that well Does this look we're having any questions Relative to this yeah, yeah, I'm you know, Mr. Zomick went with a third option be to Not that I'm Suggesting it but just to make sure we get all the options on the table to approve its subject to the approval of the planning board and conservation commission as opposed to negative I Might have said that wrong. I think that was what I was trying to say My only concern there is that and perhaps the owner could speak more to this than I can but I Know they have a closing date coming up the conservation commission will take this up Wednesday night the 14th But the planning board due to some scheduling challenges last week with the snowstorm and whatnot It may be a few weeks before they can get this on the agenda again. So I don't know if Microphone and just identify yourself the mic so that folks at home know who you are Deborah Edelman, thank you, and I'm I don't feel this famous except when the Patriots are playing My closing is February 20th and it was already extended it was supposed to be January 31st Yeah, any other questions or comments as Brewer So recognizing both that deadline and the fact that We need enough time to make these decisions That's why these come to us with a certain timeframe on them and we're trying to make it shorter already And so I'm a little frustrated that we're being told that It's not fast enough when we're actually trying to do it faster than normal And this is not the first property owner who has who has worked with us and been frustrated by the timeliness of the Process, but I can also appreciate that in this particular Circumstance the planning board had that weather issue and would have done it last week. It's still cutting it close For the 20th because our clothes your closing date is not our problem But in terms of us, you know doing our due diligence, etc. From what mr. Zomek has reported Not in the mood to fight about it There's not further comment I would entertain a motion Okay, I moved to Not exercise the town's first Right of first refusal the right of refusal option in accordance with mass general law chapter 61 a section 14 to purchase three tenths of an acre owned by WD Cole's Said land off of Shootsbury road butting the land town Is I'm gonna stop for a second. It's a Shootsbury or Pellum I know but with town line is it a budding No The motions of Pellum, but Pellum doesn't run up that way Shootsbury runs up that way This is your problem with knowing geography Yeah, I think I'm just gonna Maybe remove those words. I'm gonna pause for a moment and Ask if I may mr. Chair just ask mr. Zomek about this. Yes That's what we were wondering to because I'm not I think it's Shootsbury, but I'd rather than correct the difference. It's really not necessary So I'm gonna start the motion over again and I moved to not exercise the town's first right of refusal option in accordance with Massachusetts general law chapter 61 a section 14 To purchase approximately three tenths acres owned by WD Cole said land off of Shootsbury road Assessors map parcel 1d 9v-11 It's gonna motion in a second is there further comment Hearing none all those in favor, please say aye Post that's unanimous. No, I'm abstaining. Oh, you're abstaining. Okay one abstention. Thank you So that would be We're zero one. All right. Thank you very much That Thank you for coming in Put mr. Zomek on wheelchair. You should have wheelchair tonight because I'm gonna go back to our original order Which is the next on our agenda is the group health insurance update? So mr. Bach, would you want to bring that forward for a moment? Yes? Thank you, mr. Chair With a site if it miss Aldridge who's our comptroller and Patrick Brock whose chairs the town's employee health insurance advisory committee and I just want to give you some updates on where we are So as you know the town is insures its employees along with the town of Pelham in the Amherst regional school district through the Amherst Pelham Health Claims Trust It's a legal entity formed in 1986 By the by Amherst Pelham and in the district pay claims and administer the health insurance programs for its employees and retirees So this is we are not an insurance company We are a trust where the money from the town that contributes to employees Health insurance and from the employees that we deduct from the paychecks goes into the trust And then all the claims that the that the employees and retirees incur are paid out of the trust So that's why you have heard me talk before about the volatility of the trust When the experience of the trust is good meaning fewer claims than the money coming in we benefit from that But when the claims exceed our revenue we we that's a bad thing and that's what's been happening over the last period of time We have over the last year alone. We've increased on July 1. We increased the HMO rate by 10% on October 1 we increased both plans by 10 the HMO and the PPO by 10% and then on February 1 We increased the plans by 100 for individual 200 which is about a 14 or 16 percent increase The we So but we have a problem with it now And so we've engaged our employee group which is represented through the insurance advisory committee to talk about solutions to the problem The what's the problem? The problem is that we have a very large number of large claims And this has been going on for a while now and while we have reinsurance Which means we buy insurance to cover the large claims that doesn't kick in until that the claim hits $250,000 so the trust has to pay the first $250,000 of the claim we've had a number of those over the years and I've summarized those in the In the memo that you have in front of you the freak the frequently asked questions Additionally We have had we've benefited over the years by having the trust Have lower than you would expect premiums and when there are no increases to premiums That's benefits that the employees, but it also benefits the two towns and the district because we're not in Appropriating funds for the trust So while in the past years we have benefited It's the experience has deteriorated where we have had to make these insurance and these increases on Into the trust so the when you make an increase to the truck We do an increase to the trust it comes out of the town's coffers as in the school's coffers as well as the Employees pocket so it's both parties get hit by this To put it in perspective we are we are self-insured trust our neighboring communities like the city of North Hampton and The University of Massachusetts not a city, but major Employer are part of the group insurance commission the group insurance commission is the state-run health plan That that that's the city or the town could participate in if we so chose so When this problem began to Rear its head we engage the employee group through the insurance advisory committee which mr. Brock chairs and does a tremendous job of chairing it It's a large committee 14 members Every bargaining unit in the in the town and in the schools is represented at the table and has and can participate in the discussion And the three we've identified three things that we have to address First is do we want to stay self-insured as a trust or not or do we want to go out and buy insurance? And the key question on that is who who is going to bear the risk? The risk is if you are fully insured as you would imagine you pay a premium every month or you pay the premium for the year and The insurance company if the if the experience is bad they absorb it if the experience is good They get the benefit of it, but in either case they absorb the risk the The second one was we offer two carriers now one is Harvard Pilgrim Health and the other is Blue Cross Blue Shield and Having two our employees Split almost evenly between those two plans those two carriers makes it difficult For us to assemble ourselves and market ourselves out if we wanted to seek something a different type of coverage So one of the things that we would like to do is to eliminate one of the two plans when you look at the plan side-by-side There's 99 to 100 percent Overlap so if you are in Harvard Health There's a hundred percent chance based on your that your primary care physician is going to be Covered by Blue Cross if you're on Blue Cross and you and we want to switch to Harvard Health There's a 99 percent chance and if it's not if the if the Physician is not covered Blue Cross will go out to that person and offer them a contract to say Would you like to be able to take this the Blue Cross plan? So the first one was whether we want to stay self-insured or go fully insured the second one is to have just one Carrier that offers and we still offer two plans HMO and PPO HMO means that you're in the network PPO is a little more expensive, but it allows you to use the network of the HMO or go outside the network to the PPO with certain conditions The And then third item that we want that we have talked a lot about is plan design and Right now the town offers first dollar coverage, which is Unusual to say the least in health insurance industry now. We look at again the GIC communities We also look at the Hampshire County Trust which ensures about 70 small towns In the in Western, Massachusetts They have a plan through Blue Cross that mimics in a large measure the GIC Plan and then we look at private employers too in terms of what they are offering their employees because that's our competitive environment What we're trying to do is get to what I call intelligent plan design something where our employees Can migrate to that as we look at their experience and we we've determined whether they are Utilizing all the benefits that we're paying for sometimes they're not utilizing all the benefits that we're paying for and it might not be as hard a request The goals as we talk about this with the insurance advisory committee is With the three increases we had this year we don't want to live through that again next year We just don't want to be there and so we want stability We want to we want to be in a place that gives us options So consolidating the risk pool into one group gives us options The stability we'd like to see is you can't look very far ahead in the insurance Market especially health insurance, but we'd like stability and predictability for at least two years So it'd be FY 19 and FY 20 And then in terms of our plan design We'd like to bring start to beginning to bring our benefits in line with other Communities and with the University and everybody else is out there in terms of what we're offering It's a complex conversation to have at the insurance advisory level Mr. Brock does it it's it's a it's a large number of people there And then there's even you know probably three times that many people who are very concerned employees mostly Who are in the audience observing? And we've had very structured conversations about this. There's a small group that that that we gathered together to sort of dig deeper into some of these issues and then on Last Friday afternoon we brought these their their research back to the full group The timing of this is if we are to change on July 1 Which it means that we start making deductions from employee paychecks on June 1st, which means that We need to have the actual blue cross cards in people's hands by that time blue cross typically needs Two months, you know two months six to eight weeks to implement to get all the cards because that's the most important thing to our employees They don't it's not fair to the employees to have make a change in them Not and something happens on July 4th, and they're not they go to the hospital and their car doesn't work that has to work It has to be tested So we're on a very tight time frame and we've been at this for a few months now But our goal is to make a decision by end of February early March so that we can have a direction on where we need to go and then and during this process we have a major commitment to doing a lot of employee education on what the changes mean to them and giving them and most people when you have a group meeting their questions aren't Import they don't want to ask their question in public So there's a lot of one-on-one and we would have people from blue cross in here or represent us from the whoever we buy the insurance from Here to walk people through Who's a who's your provider? What does it look like? How does it look for you in terms of how this new design would look like? So that's where we are. It's a major financial challenge for the town our experience over the last year has not been great in sense that we can our claims continue to come in at a very high rate and One of the other challenges that happens when you switch to a fully insured program is like right now We will the claims that we incur in May and June They won't come in as bills until July and August so we are responsible for those bills So there's it's the tail run out whatever you want to call it Some people call it ibnr incurred but not reported we have to factor that into the price as well and We would want and that's so in essence. We will be paying 14 months of claims Over a 12 month period and so we have to raise those funds We can work on that to Extend that over a two-year payback period, but we still have to come up with the money So once we have the group consolidated if we get to fully insured and we see where we are with that after two years We can look at this again And if we say we'd like to go back to being self-insured We have that option if we feel like whatever insurance we go to is an adequate we can look at that There are a number of options But the key piece right now is that we have to take action I think the insurance advisory committee the employees who are participating that are really well educated on the on this on this Challenge that we face and have been pretty open to having a frank discussion It's not an easy one because they feel it's a degradation of benefits, which it is But it's one that they've come to understand and educate themselves about Those are the people in the room. There's a lot of people out there who are just working their regular jobs who This will hit them and though we have to talk to them about it as well So I just wanted to have this opportunity to talk to you. There's no action from the board and There's Aldridge mr. Brocker here if you have questions for them or comments from them I'm sure if you the one you want to say anything, but I I want to bring it to your attention because it's a big issue It's something you will hear a lot about as we focus on town meeting and Appropriations for this year and for next year and we the finance director just to side note The schools are the largest employee group the finance director from the schools is intimately involved in our all of our conversations Anything else you'd like to add either mr. Brocker miss Aldridge do you either one want to offer any? No, just do you have anything you wanted to offer as far as you know information for us as far as Process and what you've discovered discussed etc. Patrick Brocker and Amherst town employee retiree and retiree representative on the insurance advisory committee and and the chair that was a mistake The I'm really Pleased with what we've done in the last year as far as organization Our insurance advisory committee over the last 10 years out of the 14 members We'd get six or eight at each meeting when this started blowing up and in June and July Our attendance increase and we've had full attendance at every single meeting and we've been meeting a lot When it was first proposed That we needed an additional increase in Sometime in December or January after doing two increases There was a lot of pushback and there was a lot of education a lot of outside meetings outside communications and stuff I Was overwhelmed and pleased that we voted unanimously to authorize the increase February 1st What We're looking at now and hopefully that will take us to the end of the year But we've had some recent negative information that that's going to be difficult I think the town manager has put together a plan I constantly remind the town manager and the committee that it's the town It's the insurance administrators duties to set forth the program and it's the insurance advisory committee to give a Supported or oppose it He has asked for the committee's input. He's a good listener we've adjusted a few things And we've moved forward I'm not sure the that there are several Difficult subjects coming up That can derail our efforts And I'm not sure what the outcome is is we'll keep working on that And what I'm most pleased with is the communications between the town management staff and the committee members It is a significant financial event Working with the retirement board. I know what those are like And I I understand where the town is coming from although there's massive increases for the employees To come up with the balance that money from the town and the 75% contribution is is three times what we're suffering so Well, we are meeting the 20th Tuesday And we will try our best to go as fast as we can We're kind of pushing it along but what we're looking at is a is a As the town manager outlined to you is a plan starting July 1st Hopefully that plan would avoid any further premium increases for a year or so if we Do the actions that he's recommended? And we discussed all those actions and in fact the education for the last meeting was about deductibles and co-pays and how they're applied and I think that there was a lot of Recognition that they weren't what they presumed to be And we had representatives from blue cross blue shield helping us. We were getting the facts straight from the insurer so it was very very helpful and We just have to keep lobbying Tom manager can go into other issues that there will rise But I'm I'm hopeful that we'll have a vote and and the The issues that we have would be resolved But there are other issues collect the bargaining issues and other issues that are going to have to be addressed Thank you Questions for the manager of mr. Brock Mr. Sembert and First of all, thank you, mr. Brock for what you're doing and I'm not going to ask the question Of what part of your life plan whether was serving on the committee being retired or chairing the committee But you were thinking might be a mistake, but please don't answer that that's how what I was really I was my granddaughter's mistake. That is always a mistake the One question that struck me as I was reading the memo in advance is that it doesn't really set forth any information about How many claims in the total dollar value of claims that fall between 100,000 and 250,000 dollars Because the way the memo is structured it talks only about number of claims over a hundred thousand but that got me to wonder whether there was an option that was considered and rejected or not are not considered about Seeing if the stop-loss Insurance could be rewritten to trigger a lower amount So we when we went out to bid we looked at we only had one one company bid on our reinsurance last year And they bid at 250,000 and we would like to move that down to 125 or something like that But that's a we'd have to bid that out and negotiate with the reinsurer The There are some that exceed the 250,000 and then there are some claims that they what they the term is called laser out They say these three claims we know are going to be recurring So we're going to not address them until you hit to the 500,000 mark because they know that's a that's a known expense to the Insurance company So it's a pretty they're not in the business of losing money. They know our group. They know our claims So The idea of giving you the $100,000 threshold was to give you a sense of the number of large claims And that's really where the claims activity is and it's you know, if you have four claims at Up to 250,000 even if they don't exceed that. That's a million dollars right there And that's what we feel is driving our experience I think one of the the points in my time on the insurance advisory committee is that we used to work Six to eight claims over a hundred thousand dollars and now we're up to 12 to 14 claims And that makes all the difference in the world. It isn't one or two big eight hundred thousand dollar claims because we've got the reinsurance I think the committee has always followed the lead of Trusts administrator, which is the town manager We kind of got lulled into a good feeling with premium holidays and zero percent increases And when they said well, we've got problems Oh, how come how bad can it be and we probably waited too long before acting and they are this bad The other thing is I'm very well aware of benchmarking and and the relationship to that exists I don't think the people involved are that aware of benchmarking screw I just want to make a couple comments and I will I Think it's okay if I make comments, but I will disclose that I am I Benefit by being a retiree. So this affects me, but I'm trying to I'm really speaking from a bigger point of view In following this one I well I have a lot of faith in both both the manager and mr. Brock I've known you a long time, and I think that you did this with a lot of Skill and integrity so I Think people have approached this Trying to manage the situation and it kind of caught it kind of caught up with us because it was going so well It's kind of like you don't know how good you got it till it's gone in terms of having low premiums and Healthy trust one, but I agree with mr. Backelman that we can't face this year after year Or even if we had a good year in two years this up and down. It's It's not really acceptable because it makes it too hard to manage I I'm expecting that whatever changes we make and I do believe we have to make changes It's going to cost more money and it'll cost the Both the you know the town for their percentage share and the recipients more whether it's because We have a group insurance. We have an insurance provider that is going to go up and But I think we have to understand that that's what's going to happen and then I was Struck it's in the memo, but also we've talked about this before that if Amherst offers a better plan Maybe it's the you know the right level of benefit, but if it's better Then the employers around us we will attract people to choose that as their family plan provider And that's just the reality so It's a little bit like parking if you don't charge enough Then they're going to park here and not there So they're gonna and I've seen this other places. I've worked too. So it's just In people, you know, it's the rational thing to do if it's a better program you switch over So I think we we have to really be mindful of keeping the benefits pretty comparable to what else is Being done by whether it's the university or other large employers or even some of the smaller ones And I think that's just the new reality Going to that but it's going to be a hard transition It didn't help when the GIC made their changes and the pushback from those changes resulted them in changing their vote There are still members of the committee that believe We can do nothing. We can go ahead and stay self-insured and manage our way out of here I'm not sure that that's possible and I'm not sure that that's financially effective I Try not to vote to Unless there's a tie or something I have voted on on several emotions, but Most of the most of the members all we have representation from non-union members, most of them are bargaining members They are very involved in their own bargaining and and so this you know I got for my old days when we bargained health insurance in the contracts. Yeah, it was a total package When we've taken health insurance pretty much out of it it has an effect on the town's ability to give increases and stuff and We have to get people to understand that that's real and that you're getting a benefit in continued health insurance You know, so it's not an easy easy thing to do The questions or comments? Sure, so Starting in a random place might as well follow up on the GIC conversation My husband's employed by UMass and we're on that plan And yes, it was it was going to be a very different conversation of GIC went to only three plans And then we had employees who had the option of picking up the town of Amherst plan instead of the relatively crappy three Plans GIC was going to offer and relatively crappy is indeed the technical term for the health insurance I currently have which they were going to retain and then two other options Along those lines as you continue to figure out all these different puzzle pieces Which we you have done a great job of elaborating for us at several meetings now How all those different factors play into it and we appreciate that you brought up both? You know other municipalities and then also private employers and then of course UMass Which is a whole nother kettle of fish, but in terms of I'm assuming that it's true that it's still Standard today to offer both the HMO and PPO option from at least one provider as a just as opposed to just saying You get an HMO and that's all there is I'm assuming that's still like you know industry standard And that's why we would continue to do that. We're required to do that. We are required to do that by what? police state law or They're required so I can confirm that for you Just The end of 32 be yeah, okay just because I like this document has been and like others have been It's really helpful to be able to point people to these things and say this is why we're doing what we're doing This is how we got to this point. This is why and this for example is why we're doing that Is that we're offering both beyond the fact that I assume it's probably comparable to what other places are doing It's especially comparable if it's legal, so that would be worth pointing out I really appreciate the detail that you put on page 2 in terms of the years of premium increases and decreases for those of us Who sort of remembered some of that Again having that in front of us is helpful and so for example in FY 16 We had a premium decrease for those on the HMO But we actually didn't increase for those in the PPO and another year. We were able to just keep them at zero So we have done lots of adjustments and again That's something I think valuable information to show people that we've been doing these things But speaking of pages if we could have page numbers and a date on this document That would be super helpful because we've had variations of this document before and I don't have any way of knowing which ones which At this particular moment in time, so that would be great Just jump on that. So this is a document we shared with every employee in the community So they could they could see the information Can you jump on a couple other things while you're Sure, and then I was just gonna I was just gonna ask will I ask one other complete make some other complete separate comment That you've you've talked about in the past and I wanted you to remind us of which is that and as mr. Brock So helpfully gave us the segue for health insurance and Used to be part of collective bargaining agreements is not on the town side per town quote unquote Area now, but it is still in the schools, which of course is our largest group of employees. So Tell us about that again and how that's gonna work because they're in the middle of bargaining right now, too But that means not only instead of just taking it into account like we do for bargaining They're gonna actually have to potentially change something that's in the contract or not or well the school Department is in the middle of Negotiations with their with their bargaining unit. So I know they were having a meeting They may be meeting to right now So I can't really comment on it, but they're aware of this situation both parties are aware of it And I'm sure it's on the list of things that they're discussing But what I'm saying is it's in their contract. So they can't no matter what they say about At the insurance advisory committee stage, there's still that separate step for them. That's part of their contract Yes, it's there's something in their contract that they have to address But it's a complicated because of course I'm the trust administrator But the contract is not with me the contract is between the school committee and then in the bar and the bargaining unit the bargaining unit happens to Bargain for the regional school district and the local in the Amherst school committee who are town employees so all these things sort of weave together and We each have certain authorities to do I mean And But we don't want it we want to get to a agreed-upon place versus people saying you don't have a right to do this Or I I'm saying I'm going to do this whether you like it or not That's just not a good place for it was not the way we interact with our employees We really work hard and it's time-consuming in its education and it's us listening and them listening and so we work hard at Not getting into that kind of confrontational mode But both parties have certain rights and the employees clearly and they've art and if for the Teachers have clearly articulated that they know what their rights are. They're well represented as well Thank you because again that just follows up in the hall. There's so many complicated pieces to this that yeah It's not just one single decision. Thank you Screwed for what mr. Bachman you said this was circulated to all the Employee groups. Yeah, but it circulated to the retirees. I don't think it did actually just want to make a bitch that That was our bad. Yeah. Yeah, and just because clearly retirees have a huge interest in this as well and It's easy to forget because it's a different list So the other thing I would mention two things one is that like the screw-er Alvin not retired I am on insurance plan Wish I'm retired but not yet So it is again, you know sort of an interesting situation to be in but at the same time One of the things I wanted to point out just for people to recognize is on the second page of this mill Where you have fiscal year 13 through 18 your date and premium increases decrease if you go back when? High fifth fiscal year Six or seven there was a similar kind of spike in cost and It required premium increases a surcharge it was charged for a period of time And significant plan design was was altered at that point and we've kind of coasted on that for a while to be perfectly honest I mean, I think if you're an employee it's been employed during a whole period of time It's all sort of washed out and it's not too bad And and of course the other thing for folks is that you know Yeah, we could have just gone and put 2% of you know doing it done a 2 or 3 or 4 or 5% increase every year and all these things And that's you know half what it is nationwide But you didn't then are forgoing what you could do with that in your operating budget Because this means you're not paving roads or hiring staff or doing other wonderful things We want our communities to do it so so these things are You know pitted against that the other these choices are pitted against choices of you know Things we want our our town government to do our schools to do for for our citizens And so that's part of why we try to carry the the trust balances You know safely and small as it can be Because you know having a bunch of money sitting there not really doing much for anybody Doesn't do anybody any good, but it would at this point when we've had these high claims But we're gonna have that boom and bust cycle because we have such a small group quite frankly and so you know There are things we could do around sort of maintaining a larger level of balance or a steadier percentage increase every year, but I think You don't get down to brass tacks of conversations about planned design changes being comparable with neighbors Etc. Etc. In some ways until you get to these sort of harder points in time where you know The money's just not there and you have to make the choices, you know It's hard to have that discipline in the good years. It's hard to have the discipline and the foresight to sort of see You know how bad it can get you know, I think if you We're talking to us isn't fiscal 14. We'd have you know, no You know, no sense that it was gonna do anything like it's done I mean, we might think oh, it's gonna get more expensive at some point But not to this level and so it is a bit of the boom and bust cycle of a small small group Which speaks a little bit to some of the suggestions about being fully insured by somebody else or? You know other changes that are discussed there, you know help mitigate that small group thing a little bit Other questions or comments? None. Thank you Slaughter yes, I have one actual Question that before Ms. Aldrich leaves that is really budget and in how this Is going to be reflected into the budget as opposed to the health insurance policy issues or two issues We were addressing the Mr. Brock The reason I brought up the Whole question for a while during the budget discussion about that one line item the hotel motel tax that was coming in over I did some quick calculations and it seems like that's Approximately a hundred thousand dollars if you annualize it of additional revenue that we might be receiving that we didn't budget for and And so it made me realize that there are other variations that Are in there and I guess the question is Knowing that we have this large additional expense that we didn't budget for when the town meeting adopted the budget for the current year at the annual town meeting which is increasing the cost side because of the employer share of the health insurance costs Are is there a budget plan that goes with this that can and where where do we sit with that? So as as the claims mature right now, we have data from January 31 Which is seven months into the fiscal year and we're monitoring it on a Weekly monthly basis And once we know where we're headed Ms. Aldrich makes projections all the time and so we monitor those things the The you know the deficit the the Ibnr that the tail of the claims are both very large numbers that that the trust is responsible for paying and as a trust as a standalone entity and So the town and the employees would have to Pay into the trust to make sure the trust is whole so We have ideas we need to get a better handle on the scope and also what's going to happen in FY 19 and 20 and then and our idea is that part of the financing plan of the current Deficit would be incorporated into the FY 19 and 20 rates So it'd be spread over time for the employees So it's not one like the surcharge that we talked about earlier Chris, but I'm referring to is not the rates and not the trust but the fact that when you increase the rates and They're payable and part by the town and part by the employees part by the employees falls on the employees and retirees and Part that's attributable to the town falls in the town so that there's an effect on the Operating budget of the town That's a separate entity from the trust as you pointed out. So what I was really referring to is Where we stand with the the budget that was presented earlier and but Going for the rest of the year in comparison. So I think Ms. Aldrin alluded to the fact that we're we've Cracked down on all discretionary spending The idea is that we are trying to reserve as much as we can in our operating budgets to because we know this problem Is there we're gonna try and manage it to the best of our ability using Limitations on what people are purchasing basically just not spending as much and hoping that we'll have surplus and not hoping Expecting knowing that we will have some surpluses And I think that's You might want to add to my comment So I haven't tracked before you get too excited about the hotel Revenue being higher and maybe bearing that out. I've noticed that that business is very cyclical So the busy part is the fall and then later in the spring and we're going into the quarters where that Occupancy really falls and I don't know if we've tracked the up Cycle of hotel motel in the down but just because we're up after the busiest part of our accommodation season doesn't tell me that we're gonna stay there because People just don't come here December January February and March So I I don't know if Ms. Aldrin has seen that kind of a pattern. I I see it and some of the things I do I'm not sure if you were asking if that would help us for fiscal year 18 or 19 We're really talking about 18 and I appreciate the comment that was just offered by miss Krueger about Any single item including the one that she cited you know and I Referenced earlier may not in fact because of the cyclical nature of the funding be a be a factor, but at what point Are we going to look at? comprehensively The 18 budget to really see where we're at because we really are being hit with a more significant change I think in the line items and we're normally at and Might be helpful for us in the finance committee to know exactly where we are for the overall comprehensive Consolidated budget Now as compared to where we Expected to be when we adopted the budget as far as projections through the end of the year For 2018 we can't we can't go back and look at revenues and re-estimate our revenues because our tax rate is set for 2018 So our only option for the 2018 if we To cover the deficit in the health claims trust fund is to have a vote for free cash From reserves and that would go into the trust fund so that we would not have a deficit because it's legal to have an appropriation deficit According to the dr so we'll have to have make the trust fund whole and That's where we would have to look at what the Surcharge would be Like mr. Slaughter alluded to back in 2006 and we had this Happened before we did institute a surcharge to pay back the general fund for those appropriations in the town The town Contributed to 75 or 80 percent and the employees contributed their 25 or 30 percent or 25 or 20 percent But we can't go back and look at those revenues and increase them and say we're going to use this to pay Because it would have to be an appropriation at town meaning But you can't use that anyways because of the tax rate and we do watch the trends on all of these if we have huge spreadsheets to show the trend of Thing if we think it's going to stay a study upward trend then we'll adjust our budget estimates for that in normal years Well, thank you, that's very helpful, and I'll just conclude it because I don't want to drag this on longer But I think it would if we are going to have to use Any significant amount of free cash in order to make the budget balance at the end of the year If we can offer some sort of projection to town meeting Before it starts. I think that it's very helpful to remind town meeting that We put in free cash as part of the reason for Building free cash was because unforeseen things can happen and to remind town meeting that free cash isn't a just a piggy bank to go to for Whatever but that there are purposes of free cash, and this is one of them. That's I think why I've driven it a little bit Thank you for that Thank you, Mr. Brock for coming Um at this time we'll move on to our next item on the agenda, which is rental appeals board charge In sketch I might be the right word In in your packet you have a draft rental appeals board charge as you recall the bylaw Anticipates the creation of a rental appeals board Which has not been need necessary to date Previously you established the membership of the rental appeals board as being the whoever's the current chair of this of the select board Whoever's the current chair of the planning board whoever's the current chair of the zoning board of appeals And then they would be called into action if there were an appeal of of the building commissioners decision and You know, I think the board pointed out well, we should have a charge and so we Put one together, but so it's very a first look at it for you comments and feedback. We'd appreciate it So on your desk tonight, you can see my incredibly clear edits I know that they are just so so very clear, but basically they're that It's a couple of issues one is that this is not based on one of our more recent and At accurate Formats of a charge. So that's why a bunch of stuff is missing from the top for example SME status special municipal employee status is missing That's a separate topic and something we should plan to either vote on tonight or vote on at a future meeting because Obviously all three of these It needs special municipal employee status because these people represent other bodies because that's their job is to represent Other bodies so just to put the icing on the cake. It seems like we need the SME status But of course that's supposed to be at the top of the charge also It's also supposed to indicate and Honestly, it's been a while since I looked at the more recent one that I worked on which is Time limited or ongoing and in this case it would be ongoing Whereas we've had a number of things that have been task forces lately that are time limited You know do a certain project like dog park that we'll talk about later and then be done rather than an ongoing committee and Another area is associated with enabled under town by-law is not the terminology we use But it should say town by-law and it should say yes And it should say the actual town by-law which is written there And I believe maybe member appointments was trying to get it term length and I think in this case We're just in the unusual case of because we picked chairs when we had this last conversation informally It's completely different than anything else. We normally do unless we looked back at what the JCPC charge says for example Where they appoint their own so that's not as important But just in terms of trying to get that mask Accurate in terms of the frame Then in terms of the rewrite that I did there at the bottom, which I know my handwriting is atrocious What I was trying to get at is that it's my understanding that this board only has one purpose It's not a primary function. It's an only function and its only function is to cut be called into action if An appeal is filed within 14 days of the code officials decision to suspend the residential rental permit now in order to do that job I wrote this I'm totally made this section up so you guys can rip it as ever you want But it said the RAB will develop and from time to time review and revise the following the criteria for evaluating appeals the procedures rules and or regulations for Advertising duly notice public hearings conduct of the duly notice public hearing as some of you recall we have not had a lot of experience with some kinds of public hearings we do unlike say the planning board historical commissioner conservation commission and Documentation of their written decision. So that's not like an ongoing thing It is and it isn't and in that their job is to do the appeal But at some point they're gonna need to get together and do those things to support them being able to do the appeal So that's what I was trying to get at when I rewrote that rather than making it seem like all those things are equal Because those things are not all equal. There's really only one thing that's critical for them to do Let's just but hopefully we've set them up for success by giving them time To make those previous arrangements and you know, we've waited since 2013 to put this into effect And so we may continue to get lucky and not need to have that planning meeting because we all have a bazillion other things on Our plates, but at least it is listed here And I thank you for the structure that you gave us in terms of it being listed here What things you would want to go ahead and address before you had to deal with that first appeal Thank you After that rewrite my thing is really minor so In my universe that by law is not it's never hyphenated so kill that Because it's inconsistent everyone does it differently, but you've basically changed that anyway But when we do a rewrite in the next version up in the upper right corner and enabled under town by law take it Please remove the hyphen cuz it was My only other thing that's that's kind of different When Miss Brew when you say Documentation of the written decision would that be a written decision that's then filed with a town clerk How would somebody find that written decision? It's an excellent question that I don't believe the by-law actually covers and I don't know if we have Practice of other communities to look to because this is a fairly interesting thing that Amherst does that others perhaps do not So yes, unlike say conservation Commission historical Commission. What would that we could potentially add that to this because I think that's You know instead of trying to find it in someone's files ten years from now. That's the place to file the written decision So it says documentation of the written decision But if you want to mandate rather than letting the three people develop where it's going to be then that would be Why I decided you know and filed with the town clerk so if you give us Lee way to take this back and make the changes I don't think there's any urgency to it But we'll have the building commissioner look at this and review it with the town clerk as well and bring it back to you It's great And when you bring it back to us if you would just make sure there's also a motion about SME status So we don't forget enough to make it up You know the further comment on on the And what about a date on the charge so we know what version and it would show voted at the bottom We're done in the theory when we vote it would show it We voted and it also show a separate date for the SME status But you're right that should be part of the word template is the one I've been looking for. Thank you So if there's not further Comment offered for that, then I think we'll move on to our next Agenda in which the municipal property uses and disposition process policy Mr. Zomek if you'd like to take us through that well again In short what you have before you really is very similar essentially what I did is I took out all the Old boilerplate if you will out of an earlier document that we discussed back in November We've had two discussions on this To date and this would be our third Conversation and what I did was try to take out all of the references of course to other cities other towns with municipal real property policies and try to boil it down to really what could amount to a draft policy and I'm happy to work with you tonight to get some more feedback on it I did just want to tell you what I have been doing in the meantime since last we met on this We've met as I said twice on this topic had headed on the select board agenda I've met with all the department heads at least one some of them two or three times for feedback on this We've begun gathering data on Municipally owned property in our database I've met with the conservation commission to get feedback from them They are very supportive of a process and a policy coming forth I have also met multiple times with I've not met with the entire Affordable housing trust, but I've met multiple times with John Hornick the chair And at least twice with Rita Farrell their staff consultant on this topic And gotten some feedback from the through the chair from the trust and they appear to be very supportive of moving this process forward There's probably a little asterisk on that in that they are considering as the chair knows The East Street School and and a possible alternative to that property going through this policy But we'll save that for another night, and then I know Chris Breastrup the planning director Has also discussed this with the planning board. I did not go to that meeting myself but I know the planning board is aware of this and Christine did not receive any significant negative feedback on getting started with the process as I look at this I think of this as something we To some degree need to start and we will have some test Cases if you will come through the process, and I think we're gonna learn we've never did my understanding is we've never had a Policy or process like this at least I've been with the town for 13 14 years. We've not done it I think we're gonna learn as we go and I suspect that I and the town manager will be back before you as we learn how to do this and there will be some policy adjustments my goal would be to start and Begin the process and and start to do some of the research get the database Going and and again as I said before to earlier meeting we expect there's fewer than a dozen properties That we think will come through this process and we might start with four or five So I'll stop there What's to go first if I could just say briefly thank you so much for all you did to get us to this point because we really Appreciate it the way that you've outlined it for us up to this point You know this is how this town's doing it This is how this place is doing it and then we knew that eventually we would need a thing that was an actual policy So thank you for bringing us to this to this stretch without just jumping into this in the first place And I appreciate the ordering at the end associated with I had felt like even though we all knew what it meant It was confusing in terms of tracking You know whether or not it had to it was up to the select board to take it to town meeting And then if the select board said no it wasn't going to go to town meeting that that The only way it could actually finally be done is if it went through town meeting the part that the select board could wave Wasn't the taking it to town meeting part. They can only wave some other aspects of it So we just want to be super clear to people that it would have to go to town meeting if it was gonna actually be acted upon and The I would hope Without getting into the conversation you alluded to that the trust would understand that they could fit Anything conversation about the East Street school potentially under number 10 because if we don't put East Street school through this process as a Test case. I'm not sure why we're bothering to do this at all I mean East Street school is the main reason we needed this policy after all these years of discussing different variations, so I would think that item 10 about waving and varying would accommodate any Creative things they want to do associated with that, but I don't I don't know why we would exempt Give them any impression that we were exempting any discussion of East Street school From this policy I would hope that they would be if it if anything the first test case I can already hear people talking about a performing arts center at the fire station that's still occupied as being Another test case still occupied being the critical point But thank you So I will paint a little bit of the picture about East Street school later when I give my member report, but anyway Okay, if you could bear with me I had a couple of questions and comments and I'm pleased to see it. It's it's been coming a little this process has been coming along I don't I think the East Street school Conversation has underscored the need to do this. I don't think it's the reason we're doing it I think it's been long-awaited and important It's particularly interested in the word this clarifies in the second paragraph at the beginning of the document about the authorization to dispose surplus real property and it also And I did have some questions about how this would relate to our municipal affordable housing trust but partway So all town-owned property. I kind of underlined all the first sentence of that paragraph and then Town meeting partway down town meeting must also change the use of the property and or transfer the custody of The property and then it gives the citation master in a law chapter 40 15 a So one question I had and I'm going to I'll go through all of mine, but if you could just kind of follow If we're looking at For example the East Street school and the trust wanted to have the custody transferred to them It sounds like that would require a town meeting action some question about that and then the next Sentence it goes on if the property is being transferred and then it says And the board needs to make a determination before or after town meeting and I was just confused before or after town meeting Looks like it's kind of hanging out there, maybe it's it's just grammatical That it does not need the property for the purposes which was held So I'm glad we clarified about the value Could be by the assessor, but his best practice is by an appraiser. That's in here. I thought that was good Page two under the section policy and process for disposing of surplus real Property I was thinking because of that issue about the transfer of the care and custody Or transfer of the custody Maybe we want to also add a number in here about a policy to determine when and how What the criteria would be to transfer the custody because it doesn't it doesn't really talk about that. It just talks about Dispositions, but sometime there's a there's often a first step where one Department or board has it and it's going to another. How do we decide when it's ripe to be transferred? I'm almost done Under five advisory groups recommendation to the town manager shall include be the assessed and Appraised value. I think it's supposed to be and or the appraised value 5b This is 6g you have about the restrictions can be placed making recommendations about the restrictions and I Had a question mark if g Might best be under five or both in five and six which is where the advisory group Makes recommendations about what restrictions might be placed on the property before it Gets used for whatever or goes into this surplus process. So I don't have an answer it may be in both and then 6d Assessing making recommendations on the impact of sale and proposed use of the property on the abutting landowners and surrounding neighborhood my how are you going to do that that to me is a Little bit of a land mine unless you know what that means The only last one I have is under next steps a final comment the third bullet Develop a corresponding policy that would establish the priorities For determining a property as surplus Question mark. I don't get corresponding policy develop a corresponding policy Separate from this as part of this I just just you know, this is a draft So that's that's just as a reader. I struggled with some of that. Yeah, I thought that last bullet might come up And we might soften that a little bit But my understanding and talking to staff about that was that and town council was that we As a town we should it reminds me a little bit of of the CPAC developing Kind of some priorities in other words We would gather from CPAC from the Municipal Affordable Housing Trust from concom Not new information, but we would pull together a short Policy might be too strong, but a guiding document to say, you know in 2018 The town of Amherst has established Strong and clear goals on the need for affordable housing as referenced in the Municipal Affordable Housing Trust's Plan X the master plan speaks to this so that we would have something that we're not every property is not We're not looking at it simply in a oh well, this might be good for conservation This might be good for no these are the guiding principles if you will that we're using to say and and a good example Would be the need for affordable affordable housing whereas we've been Redefining if you will and and refocusing our goals for open space in the last five to ten years Those are different than they were in the 1980s. So I think that document needs to be Living a living document that isn't it's it's appropriate for 2018-19 maybe a five-year period Yeah, so that that's what I was trying to get at I could just fuck and that helps I just would suggest just in terms of word crafting that you might spend some more time Just refining and it's not as long as maybe your answer to me verbally, but trying to get that into that That section we can do that Comments I was just going to recommend something more along the lines of criteria for that last concept Because in some ways it's also an alias to the community development strategy that block grant uses right every year They look and they say based on all the different policy documents we have in town These are our priorities for this year. So it's a strategy It's a set of criteria, but so as not to confuse it with being a different policy than this policy, right? And if I could just to address one other Question that Ms. Gruber brought up the the issue of care custody and control what we're learning from counsel is that Absolutely, there are different ways that a town can work with a municipal affordable housing trust And there are many examples in Massachusetts and in fact Through town meeting The entire property does not need to be transferred all at once Through deed in other words There are ways that the trust could have certain rights to explore development for a b or c While not taking full custody of the property the town may still take care of the building You know keep it secure, etc. Etc. And then eventually if a viable option is determined for housing then A transfer could could take place. Just a quick follow-up on that. So my understanding Think reinforced by this document is for example, if the East Street School were to go To the municipal trust For their exploration period for their custody that would require A vote of town meeting for the transfer of custody and then later or maybe simultaneous a vote of town meeting to authorize the disposition for Sale or lease for affordable housing. That's that's my understanding as well that it could take place in two votes Or one vote depending on what the trust wanted and what they Asked the town to do the other would have to address those two Yes, those both would have to be spelled out in the vote custody and eventual Disposition yes, there's gonna need to be a vote even before that because in our research We don't appear to have a vote from the school committee, so we're gonna need a vote from the school committee essentially Giving back the school to the town to make clear that it is under the town's control That's a town meeting vote. So that's three That's just a school committee. The school committee vote on record and then the two correct or simultaneous to correct Again, I think we're gonna learn as we go here a little bit. I think this provides a framework. I'm happy to Make a few Edits here and then I mean I need to come back before you but certainly through the town manager We could get this approved at a future date whatever you'd like Mr. I was just gonna mention that when when you're editing so page four I think is when we ended up talking more about the corresponding policy and the potential words criteria and strategy and the way You had explained that That is of course also then talked about on page two under item three So just so that you know, it's in both Recognize that it's in both places that we're trying to avoid that particular use of policy In that section because this is the policy. That's something else Excellent, thank you other comments or question for Mr. Zomek on this item. Thank you for this I will I Do have one question. Have you mentioned to mr. Hornig about the school committee needing to take action? He's very very aware of that. So that's good I won't steal my own thunder from a later conversation about things that happened at the trust meeting last week. But anyway So if there's not further questions or comments on this Thank you for that and why don't we move into 4f which is project updates on a variety of things I wonder if I could ask the chair. Would it be possible since miss. Ciccarello is here To do the sustainability committee first with that. Absolutely if that's all right with the rest of the body I presume it is so yes, that's That's fine with me. So we'll go to the recommendation for creation of stability committee. Do you want to start this? Thank you. Yes. Okay. Thank you. So thank you for many well since I've been here and It's not very long But you've had it on my goal list from the very beginning that you wanted to town to continue its focus on sustainable issues and stability initiatives and as we've thought about this we've I Want to first recognize the amount of work that we've already done And I've tried to document some of these things and miss chicarello came up with a list That's a page long of all the things that we have done over the over the years What this doesn't include is all the work that we've done at waste water treatment plant the water treatment plant a number of other Departments these are sort of things that have happened In general for the town. So we've done a lot and that's the message here But I think we can do more and I think that The expectation that you have said is that you expect us to do more and so we're prepared to do that And I think we're set to set up to do that So as we conceptualize this One of the things was there are you can do a hundred things. There's a thousand things It's so big sustainable stuff goes from you know the way you build a building the way you source the materials to electric vehicles to lights to how we provide Water to at events and it can be a million things and sometimes There are so many things that we get we struggle with inaction so I think what we sort of need is a overarching group that's going to first establish goals for us on what we're trying to achieve and then from that group there will Emerge smaller groups that would not be necessarily part of the larger group But would be part of the overall strategy to focus specifically on so zero energy buildings or you know aggregation aggregating electricity in the town or Working on solid waste issues and I guess tonight what I was gave you a brief memo to sort of Get you start thinking about it and how you want to conceptualize it. This is One person's basically concept, you know idea on one way to go. It may not be the best and And so it's just a way to sort of open up the dialogue a little bit We have this chickarello here has been working in the field for a long long time And she's able to contribute or weigh in as well. I'm not sure if you want anything to add but she's Drafted much of this and So in my mind what's really needed is for us to Establish a set of goals that we as a community want to achieve There are many models out there other communities that have done a really good job on this city of Cambridge Obviously, but a number of communities are out in front on this issue And I think we expect ourselves to be one of the leaders in this area at least leaders in Western, Massachusetts And I think that we're not far off from being that way, but we need an organized and Set of goals that we want to to reach for and then a strategy for reach for meeting those goals Otherwise what I fear is that there will be Initiative overload people individuals will come with individual projects safe in every individual project will have merit We'll think and it'll be unrealistic or Unreasonable for us to say no to any particular thing Unless we have a criteria and what's really important for us and especially for our staff is to say What can I say no to what can I say yes to does it fit in with an overall policy and where we want to put our best efforts and So I think that's why we need some a Group of people volunteers from the community who are going to help us conceptualize this and the great thing about this is we've got some really really talented people in the community who are already thinking along these lines and We have our institutional partners who are active in addressing these issues on their own campuses Hampshire and Amherst and UMass and we can learn from the efforts that they have made and in fact Fold them into our efforts because I think we should be looking at this as a community-wide initiative not just Town buildings or things we may want to start with a few things that are town oriented But ultimately we're looking at ourselves as a whole community that includes these three institutions And I think there's a lot of cross-fertilization that can happen So that's the sort of concept of this and be really eager to hear I don't know if either of you want to add into anything, but you'd hear some thoughts on this and what what we should do next Thank You Stephanie Cicarello sustainability coordinator for the town and I would say that Amherst has been in this role and doing this work for quite some time as noted by mr. Balkaman and We are actually in many other communities Noticed and recognized as a community that's doing quite a bit in the field of sustainability and energy efficiency and dealing with the issue of Climate change because we have been doing this for so long But we are at a point where a lot of our focus has been really at the municipal building level and just on what the town operations are doing to address this issue and We're at a point where we really do need to sort of make it a broader more holistic townwide effort And that is really what other communities that we have been working very closely with for instance north the city of Northampton The city of Greenfield some other communities in the area are now looking really more more holistically at their entire and broader community So that's really the point that we're at And why we need input from not just The town government portion of you know What's happening with the town buildings and town operations? But we need to look at what's happening within our broader community And so we need representation from the community as well and we need a lens We need to sort of look at sustainability and all the work that we do in the community from that lens of how it impacts the long-range Vision and sustainability of our community as a whole so that's really what this committee would really be charged with Strings or comments for the Mr. Simer well, I Do note that we had a very successful enterprise to Reach out to make a difference for homes within our community with Solaris Amherst and That was an extraordinary success So I think that we Really have done quite a bit and I'm pleased that we're going to continue to look to doing more the question that I was pondering was How much of the various projects that we've been working on? Have been driven by staff and how much have been driven by volunteers and are we looking to the committee? To be the core of the volunteers to do the work or are we looking for the committee as Mr. Malcolm and said to set the goals and The recruitment of volunteers is a separate enterprise and the reason I bring that up is that the recycling and refuse management committee very much is not just establishing goals but actually Organizing itself to do the grunt work to achieve the goals and I guess I Just look for clarity as we move forward so that we are Sure that we are charging the committee appropriately for the role and if we are not going to have the committee moving forward Taking the violent citizen volunteer component of implementation that we know how that's organized in place So if it's okay, Mr. Chair, I think there's a dialogue because I don't I don't have answers and in Stephanie yet But it's we have opinions and so that's the type of thing our response My sense is that we do need volunteers to do the work and that's where the core of the work will begin I think we do need a volunteer group that is educated on this area or on these areas already to help us Work out in an overall plan, but I think there will be subgroups You know I think of the dog park task force for instance that they have an overall group But they have small groups that go off and work on their own on location and rules and things like that We you know it'd be that type of thing that we would have subgroups That would be going out and working on say energy aggregation or whatever it is that we really want transportation might be one Yeah, I would just add that It's really going to vary there will be moments and projects and times when There will be a requirement for staff to sort of make a commitment to maybe maybe Either move us towards a campaign or project for instance with Solaris I had a very large role in the beginning in terms of the application process But when it came time to actually then implement the program We had a group of community volunteers who were our Solaris team And they were the ones who actually went out and did the hard work of the marketing. They were you know They were at events. They were going door to door They they had a lot of different projects and campaigns that they created to Advertise the the opportunity for folks to install solar on their homes during that time frame So it was a very specific targeted campaign. It was a very specific and targeted time frame as well So I think it you know, it depends. There's again, there's a lot of opportunity here, but And again, it's not it's not something I could answer today either because we really that's kind of what we need the committee for Is to help us frame what the priorities would be moving forward as well So I'm gonna jump in at this moment. I think for me when I think about this. I think about We may want to consider In regard to you know sort of developing a group like this is in some aspects of what we do, there are certain Of our committees and boards that have certain professional expertise required the board of health has, you know certain requirements This is on review. You have to have like an architect There that might be a wise thing to put in here and the reason why I say that is because I think the most Maybe not the most but one of the critical things That when you're setting the goals or things that have highest leverage and it depends on the area of Sustainability you're looking at as to what might be a high-leveraged thing as you said, you know Any idea that people bring forward is noble and and and and worthwhile But is it the best at this point? Is it the kind of thing that moves us the most in whatever directions we choose? And so I think we need to you know identify what those areas are that we think are most important to us or Define what the the broad categories are and then within those categories one of the highest leverage sort of things and I think people that have expertise in In in those areas will be valuable in sort of framing the conversation because You can get into things that are You know very good and noble and have an impact, but their impact for the effort is small Relative to other things we could do and we want to probably take on those things that have the largest impact first I think There may be varying opinions about that and and obviously you know a lot of it is opinion-based as far as what is important Or what has the highest leverage or that sort of thing? But I think that's something that I would offer as suggestions We move forward and this is to think about what expertise do we want to bring on we have some in-house obviously, you know yourself included in that but but I think there's plenty in our community We have the you know fortunate nature of having you know the university and and two colleges in this in city limits to think about these things You know professionally all day long. So, you know, we should tap into that as best we can and and help that to help People with good intentions and lots of energy to keep them focused on things that have the highest leverage be my suggestion a Couple things that just to reinforce what my colleagues have been saying I'm mr. Steinberg's question and then mr. Buckman's answer about Policy versus implementation. I think it's the most a broader conversation because it comes up often with other committees in the work Like when is the committee there for policy and where do they expect it to roll up their sleeves and do the work? So There's different ways to look at that I think your point about the professional looking at some professional Skill set not for every everything what I worry about I mean, I think we're going to move ahead and create this Entity right now. We're just kind of you know fleshing out some ideas and different thoughts we've had so this I'm assuming we're going forward But some of the I Worry that from I worry that Sometimes depending on the composition of the group or maybe the charge You get people are advocating for their interest area or the thing they're most passionate about I think we do have to be able to prioritize because we're not going to resources and time are finite and so we have to make choices all the time and I wouldn't want to see well these two people want to do building stuff and these two people want to do trash and these and then you sort of cancel each other out but people who can Were excited about the overview, you know in the set of compromises that have to be made in order to Move the the town as a whole forward You know the picking and choosing kind of thing that you were talking about But that problem interests them and not just you know, whatever the I mean Advocacy is great and being passion is great, but I I don't want this to splinter out into one of these in one of those kind of kind of things because I Want this to really help us have a clear vision of where we're where we're going I'm not sure if it's exactly along those lines, but I like to hope so and so One of the things I would like that I really like about this is all the things we've talked about But also the idea of bringing all these different groups who have been working on things individually and in set little Areas before like as it has is mentioned on Mr.. Karela's list We had the energy conservation task force in 2000 for some number of years and then it just kind of dwindled away Because we have other things to do and other priorities But the work that group did would be entirely appropriate under this umbrella and looking at this umbrella So how you structure at what you call it certainly you tack that you know I've been part of likes to argue about what's an executive committee and what's a subcommittee and what's a steering committee No offense to mr. So much who's doing a fantastic job over there It's just you know the way people structure things in their minds and what that means But you know we previous had work on climate action by Vince Chikarello with also some volunteers and involved But it wasn't really a formal town committee in some respects and some things were and some things weren't and I would definitely Like to see recycling and refuse management be considered for moving under this umbrella So again, you'd have so that you don't just have you know one of these and one of these one of these It's kind of like you have this overall group and then when it's decided to move on with certain things Then a whole nother committee can get Dispicked that may have one or two people with expertise and then a whole bunch of just really dedicated people who want to do it So that you have all those branches off the committee But so that they all know what each other is working on and whether it's you know Bringing us another thing about how we have to buy recycled paper towels or whatever it is It's not just Tell procurement to do that but that everybody knows that that's all part of the bigger picture So, you know not setting it up in parallel with recycling and refuse But with the idea that recycling refuse would fit nicely within this because the work. They're already doing It makes a lot of sense to me to look at this as a sustainability effort and figure out what all goes in that So that as you say you can make the hard decisions about what to pursue quickly and what to maybe put off for a little while Long the same lines elected with the town manager presented because it reminds me a little bit of the master plan You know when you've got something you can say is it in conformity with this overall instead of goals And then it's much easier for the employees because there's a lot of pressure on staff to do things and we have very active Citizens with lots of ideas. So I think that's a good way to frame it. Let me The other thing I would mention if I could I'm just talking about this is as we move ahead and depending on the circumstances situation I think we I'm not sure how to sort of articulate this without being sort of overly dictating the direction but but the idea of impacts when we want to broaden to the larger community now you're starting to impose things upon the citizenry whether it be our business community our homeowners What's the impact of that and how to evaluate that well as we move ahead because you know you can create You know zoning that forces certain kinds of things to happen you can have unintended consequences Along with the intended consequences that price people out of our you know it could run counter to you know other efforts We're trying to make an affordable housing perhaps or we might squeeze businesses out because these kinds of changes are onerous and You know it's just not something that people have a way to you know May or may not be able to evaluate be able to evaluate well And so that's you know again gets back to some of the expertise questions that I raised earlier But also just I think that's a that's a piece of the puzzle as well as as we make these you know Movements in these different areas that we keep and we try to broaden it out You know what constraints are we imposing upon other people? What is the impact of those of those things as we move ahead? So does it change the timelines we work under or does it change the degree to which we do things? And do we put then you know? reevaluation points in in those sort of actions and activities So I just wanted to address a few things that were said. I guess first of all I just want to say in terms of the the Energy task force that when they came together they really had a specific goal which was to create a climate action plan Which was done and and it was actually Disbanded after the climate action plan was completed and we were getting into the phase of implementation And what happened was once we sort of got into that phase of implementation The sort of necessity of having that organized group wasn't Necessary quite as much anymore and also we were moving towards the direction of Become a green community at that point green communities became available and there was a really a shift in the focus of looking at this issue I think because You know there's been a movement at the federal level to move away from being involved in for instance the Paris Accord that I think we're Looking more now at specifically addressing climate change again That's kind of a it seems to be a renewed focus and not just talking about energy efficient efficiency But really looking at climate change once again So I think having a having a group focused on this effort absolutely at the more the broader community level is important and I hear your concerns and I Share them that we don't want to be imposing things on the citizenry in town in a way that would feel Onerous to them. I mean this is something that hopefully there will be broader support within the community and something the community will will want and Want to work towards and be part of in doing that I think What we really need is to have some kind of a plan and my hope would be that when we gather a Committee together that we create some kind of a plan and a framework to move forward with this work Because you really can be over the map and as miss Kruger pointed you have people with their specific interests So in order to make that sort of a more equitable playing field I think we need to have some kind of a plan or strategy that we create as a committee To move forward and so that will sort of keep that in check to some degree And it will also identify what those priorities are and by all means absolutely We have an incredible pool of talent within this community and absolutely We should tap into them and there are several people I think that would be very eager to participate in this effort already to further comment or questions for the Manager of staff on this I can't resist a Small edit on the first line when it says re regarding and It says an emmerced that is resilient and sustainable. I thought The title for what we're doing is a resilient and sustainable amourst We get rid of that isn't I'm offering that you can keep it the way you have it or it's interesting because it's definitely pointed out sustainable Amherst is Already is that's that is labeled the Amherst College initiatives Sustaining Amherst is our the town though. So there there's these words are so we want something that sort of recognizes that Who we are so sustaining the Amherst was the one that we've used as a town But if you they don't say college after there, no, well, then let's just take theirs They have the they have that Twitter account So thank you both very much miss Brewer When when you write the charge that I'm sure we're going to suggest you please go ahead and do is There is surely some reference you can make to the master plan But the charge itself should reference the master plan maybe that was a disposition of property That's right, so thank you all very much but So next steps Would be we will work on this a charge Sort of steps going forward to sort of lay out a map on where this might go and bring that back to you for further conversation Just the less I was glad to see that the point your concept Includes folding in the recycling and refuse because I was looking at this saying we really need this but I have a sort of my No net gain of committees, so this would actually accomplish the no net game Thank you. Thank you Bob So now we'll go back to 4f which involves project updates on a variety of topics Great, thank you. And again, I will respect your time and the time this evening. I know you have many more agenda items but the town manager asked me to Give you and the the the public out there a very quick Overview of some of the exciting projects that we have on the on the front burner And it is going to be a pretty exciting winter and spring and summer construction season We hope I wanted to talk very briefly and I'm going to go pretty quickly I'm happy to maybe go back at the end and if you have any questions Just note them and we can we can zip back through But I have five projects and then one minor update that I think the manager may want to give on Sweetser Park I have a slide on Sweetser But let me start with Where we're headed on community field as you know the rec working group is Currently focused on creating a master plan for the area you see before you on the screen Community field the high school and the middle school These areas have been identified really as our core recreational field facilities in town and We are looking we have hired using CPA funds Weston and Samson an engineering and design firm out of Boston with extensive experience in master planning for Recreational facilities were very excited to be working with them They came out in December and January to do before its note actually and then after as well to do some recon and some baseline Research out here in town. They met with the rec working group. They met with the ad they met with Facilities staff and and my staff and they are beginning to put together This master plan for this core area that you this see that you see before you on the on the screen We are planning a public meeting on this topic for February 28th at 7 p.m That will an announcement of that will be going out very soon In the next day or two It'll be at 7 p.m. In the town room hosted by the rec working group and the idea there is for us to gather input from coaches from parents from athletes About the current conditions the configuration ideas concepts hopes dreams about what These fields and facilities could be We you'll note that community field not only includes the football field It's really a complex of football softball Baseball and the War Memorial pool So they will be looking at that facility as well You know that there is a very old playground associated with War Memorial pool that clearly needs work They'll be looking of course at the track and the soccer field We know through our communication with school personnel that the track is in in dire need of some improvement so we have Town and school staff as well as committee and board members on the rec working group We're going to be pulling in mr. McPherson our new facilities director as well And I'm slated to meet with him in the next week or so to kind of update him on this So I think I'll keep moving and then we can come back as need be This was referenced earlier in the evening another very exciting project and that is being put forth by the dog park task force after some Many months of exploring both public and private land in town The committee with a recommendation from me. We have landed on trying to utilize exploring the utilization of a small piece of the South landfill Identified up in the right-hand corner there Off of old Belcher Town Road We really need about an acre and a half maybe two acres of the old or we're trying to call it the south Landfill because old and new confuses folks We have working with the chair and the various members we have made Presentations to a number of boards and committees in town and we recently as recently as last week Got a recommendation from CPAC for $90,000 to recommend to town meeting to spend to explore the the full feasibility of putting the dog park on the South landfill that would include surveying permitting work Engineering work as you can imagine This is not the easiest piece of property, but it is town owned There are very few encumbrances on it but we do have to explore and work with DEP on Assessing its Appropriateness and some of the potential impacts of course to the cap the cap is the most important thing If you will in keeping that landfill secure for generations to come. So we'll be working with DEP Berkshire design group has volunteered to do a In-kind a concept for the dog park Peter Wells who lives in Amherst and has his firm has designed a number of dog parks in the region and our hope is to put that Design with a grant application to the Stanton Foundation The Stanton Foundation has offices in New York and Boston, and they are the lead funder of dog parks in Massachusetts And I believe we can secure a grant up to $225,000 for the construction of a dog park. So we're in the feasibility stage We'll be working with DEP. This will have to Dovetail if you will I'll be talking about solar in a minute, but we will have to work very closely With our team of mr. Moring I've been consulting with mr. Moring miss chickarello on this But we'll have to be working very closely with our solar team on this Because we know we need the majority of the Southland feel which is up on the screen As mitigation for our solar project on the Northland feel so again We're creating excuse me the dog park task force has much of their information already up on the town website And we'll be adding to that as we go So the next step would be a concept design done by Berkshire design and then the Stanton Foundation grant So very exciting to be moving that forward The next project is What we call the North Common Main Street parking a come now a combined project as the select board knows We do have funds available through town meeting CPAC funds to Design improvements to the North Common The area between Spring Street and what we call the Main Street parking lot in consultation with mr. Buckleman With mr. Moring We decided that it made A lot of sense to do if if we knew we were going to redo the Main Street parking lot We had already had funds for the North Common It really made sense to treat this entire area as one and design the improvements both for parking for pedestrian ADA plazas lighting Erosion control all of that as one So at this at this time our plan is to utilize Mr. Buckleman may help me out here, but a transportation fund money as well as the CPAC allocation of $540,000 we are currently negotiating with Weston and Samson on this project And we hope to have them under contract very soon This will be a project that is Overseen if you will the public forums by the LSSE Commission the historical Commission With staff support, of course from the various departments, of course DPW mr. Moring and his engineering team will be right there every step of the way We're planning public meetings on this in late February. I don't have exact dates yet But I will have those soon. We will also be Creating a web page its own web page for this project so that the public can keep up on it as we move forward You may recall As we were assembling the money for the North Common We had a number of public meetings. So we feel as though we're not really starting back at zero here This conceptual design was done by DPW engineering staff And we feel as though we're gonna build on that concept design But we really don't want to go back to square one on this we've spent a considerable amount of time and energy I've gotten a lot of public comment so we can build on that So that's the North Common our goal would be under to be under construction ideally Early this summer and that is a that is a optimistic and aggressive goal Moving forward more excitement down south the graph park Spray park and the graph spray park and playground again. The select board is very familiar with this project we again were successful at Gaining the confidence of the CPAC and town meeting to assemble a funding package Just orient folks at home. This is the parking lot at Graph Park the existing comfort station and in this area This is the area where there was an old playground and the old Waiting pool which has now been removed The goal here would be to create a spray park feature a significant spray park feature and a playground And a pavilion both at the upper level and although it doesn't show it in this figure a new pavilion on the lower level Which is down at the Fort River and these are just some concept designs and and ideas That we are bringing to the table This is a project that is going to be designed by Berkshire design as it as it turns out they have extensive experience in in spray park and playground development Again, we are planning public meetings both in town But also down in South Amherst in February and March Our goal is to be meeting with folks. We'll probably have one at Crocker farm We hope to have one at one of the one or more of the apartment complexes off of East Adley Road As you know also we've asked through the CDBG process for funding to do a Multi-purpose path on East Adley Road We have half of that package assembled and we've put forth the the remaining funding request that will go to the state In the coming weeks So the idea is to really reach out to many of the residents neighbors people who are within walking biking distance of Crocker farm Crocker farm parents, etc to gain Insight as to what they would like to see at that park now LSSC has done some of that already, but we are going to redouble of our efforts to Gather more more input This project will be overseen by the LSSC Commission, of course But with input from appropriate staff from planning from DPW and from LSSC Again, we will have a unique web page up with this project in the coming days So that people can follow the progress of the of the project Our hope here and and this is another aggressive timeline But we're pretty confident in this one. Our hope is to have this under construction Late August or at least by September 1st. The goal is to be able to use Gough Park the entire summer and then We would have to fence of course the construction area But there would be construction equipment and and some modest disruption of use there But if we can get the entire spring and summer That we that would be our goal so Gough Park and Then finally This is an image that we used at a recent Solar forum that we had in this room. Some of the select board was there. We had about 40 people Attend. I thought it was a very productive discussion We had brief presentations that I did one miss Chickarello did one and mr. Moring mr. Bachmann was there to answer questions as well We feel as though we have a strong and and and growing partnership with Lee energy group our partner on this For those folks at home who have not participated in this forum This is a picture of the North landfill with the transfer station which is right off of belcher town road And this is simply a conceptual design showing this cross hatching represents a Concept of where? Panels for solar would go. This is about about a four megawatt Array and again that is currently under Development and design mr. Moring miss chickarello have been meeting with our our partners at Lee energy to talk about how this Would would move forward. There's a number of permitting pathways that need to Be completed by Lee energy and in the town will support Lee energy as they move forward as I alluded to earlier this North landfill is all Habitat for a very rare species of bird called the grassland Sparrow the grasshopper sparrow and in order to develop solar here. We need to put land From the south landfill in what's called a conservation restriction So we'll be working with DEP and the folks at natural heritage program in Boston on how to do that We've had a number of conversations with them. And so we have a framework for how that will How that will happen so we're quite confident in moving forward with that strategy Again this project Already has a web presence, but we'll be beefing up that web presence off of the town website in the coming days The permitting pathways, there'll be many opportunities for the public to get involved. There'll be conservation commission permits They'll be DEP process natural heritage process MEPA process and then Finally, there'll be a local ZBA permit that will need to be Achieved by the applicant so there'll be plenty of time for the public to hear more about that And then maybe I'll stop there I know mr. Backelman wanted to have one slide up about sweets or park and I'm not sure if you wanted to update the board Briefly on that. Sure is thing. Mr. Chair. So as you may have seen in the paper and Senator Rosenberg has put a funding request in for a bond authorization bill at the state house and One of the goals would be to for a his request would be to put in $100,000 for making improvements to Sweets or Park. We already know that When you will hear in a couple weeks when we talk about our paving plan that Main Street is scheduled to be repaved the sidewalk from along Sweets or Park and As far up towards Emily Dickinson house as we can do as we can achieve. That's a it's a design challenge is is very bad repair and needs to be addressed and Whether we get this grant or not that it's a top priority one of the top priorities for the town But we appreciate the efforts of the senator and if that money comes through there are Enormous needs throughout the town that we need to address and this is one of them So we utilize his the funds from the state to take the take on this project if I could could just add on this we do have some money set aside through CPAC to assess the condition and possible Repairs for the fountain in Sweets or Park, which is a historic feature of the park It is a unique. I don't have all the details myself But I know that mr. Tucker before he retired schooled me extensively on on the need to look very very closely at that That beautiful historic fountain, so we do have funds set aside for that We plan to contract with an expert to come in and assess Both the condition the and the inner workings of that fountain to see how we can repair that as part of the capital needs in the future Well, that's very exciting to see possibilities for sweet sir. I just looking at this and Wanted to underscore that we have the Clark House and then in Whalen right in this area, which are two senior housing developments in town and Whatever we do to have an eye towards the sort of age-friendly community Mr. Bachman's talked to us about before and maybe make sure that those people also have a voice because in a way This is their front yard or their backyard if you will I mean, this is a highly used area families play here at Lake to see you know a play area more Develop, but I think anything we do around the sidewalks on either side of sweet sir And benches whatever that make it even more accessible and friendly For the seniors who this is their yard Are there any questions? I know I went through those quickly, but other and you've heard some of that before But are there any questions on any of the other projects that I might answer for you tonight? Yes, bro. It's it's not a question. It's more part of a future presentation So when you're talking more about gruff park Although the neighbors who use it right now are pretty well aware of how old that equipment is Just in terms of context of there is the upper and lower playground of course I mean, I know you all know all this I'm talking about the general public So the upper and lower playgrounds obviously the lower playground is substantially older than the upper playground And when you referred to the upper playground is old. I was like well, let me think okay I worked on mill rivers most recent playground. Oh wow almost 20 years ago So yeah, it is older because that was done before mill rivers current iteration Which is showing its age and needing some refreshing But I think it's important for people to recognize that because people don't particularly people who don't have young kids playing right now They just remember, you know, the old stuff at mill river that you remember from when you were a child and Your family's involvement there and then the lower part of graph part where many of that much of that equipment just stayed the same for generations of children and That it was good enough for us Burn your hands on that slide. It's okay. It's not that high. It'll be fine and Just just show that, you know, just like splash parks are not something we We experienced as children that they're they have become the way to go associated with water features and safety and supervision that playground equipment has also changed a lot over the years and so even though It doesn't feel like it's that old It does need refreshing much more memorial again being new her but not new by any stretch of the imagination Because I think it's sometimes hard for people who don't have kids who play there right now to realize It's just not what we would want it to be for the community values that we hold It's not that we're trying to build the most amazing play structure ever But we need safe and fun and developmentally appropriate equipment for kids And that just takes ongoing refreshing and so thank you for including that as part of you know We don't just doing the splash markets that we're realizing that the whole thing and having two pavilions will be an interesting Addition to the space that has always been available there in terms of the lower because it's such a popular place to have To use of the pavilion in the lower section to have an additional pavilion sounds fantastic People will like so one subtle but important point about graph that a lot of people don't realize and and it factors into Where our focus is is that? On the lower level we get into many more resource areas because we're very close to the Fort River Which is a very special river with regard to the unique Species that occur there So we are going to redo the pavilion on the lower level in pretty much the exact same footprint than it is And that's a way that we can work with the conservation commission and and they will be very appreciative of us not you know Increasing impervious surface, etc. There um, but on the upper level our goal And we can't we can't do all things for all people up there But our goal is to do a playground and a spray park that has features that are Appropriate for children of different ages. So the goal is to design it. That's why it's it's really We need an expert to do that because if we we can all pick out of catalogs But Dave Zomek doesn't know what the best features are for three to five year olds and then from six to nine year olds And so this is why I'm a Berkshire design and they bring in People from the companies that make these and then they come up with with the right mix of Features, I do note. Yes, we do have very very old Play structures on the lower level of grove and that's something we're gonna have to really look at Do we need them? Do we want them? Are they still safe? Many people have said oh, don't touch them. We kind of like them But definitely on the upper level closest to the to the restrooms that all needs to be Redone and that's our goal. So the other thing I would just add regarding play structures is, you know One of the things that's becoming more To the forefront in design of those play structures is Accessibility so that kids of all different kinds of it and levels of accessibility whether it be age-based or just physical based You know is factored in as you do that There are some playgrounds in the area that that have that in their design and and people will drive Ways to go to a park that has those kinds of facilities. We absolutely must have that as a key Criteria in our in our design We have recent experience with that because of course the planning staff work very closely with the folks at Crocker farm to design that wonderful CPA funded primarily CPA funded a new play structure at the Crocker farm preschool and kindergarten Just a couple of things and it's just our first bite at the apple because I know we'll see more as it is evolving But when you think about how you're going to use the upper and the lower Play areas It's also challenging when one is supervising young children and the four-year-old dashes to the lower and The two-year-old is at the upper so it may be differentiating or thinking about because I I think some of the parks I've gone to some really super-duper ones fall short where they don't make space for the people who are actually Supervising the children and that's shade Not, you know, we need shade being out there in July when there's no school and you're you know You're the grandparent and you're managing and it's just brutally hot for everybody So enough shade and enough seating in areas so that you're Appropriately watching but giving independence and then that thing of like one runs that way So there's a lot to think about and of course the accessibility I'm sure will be integrated and just to be clear We're really other than the pavilion. We're not really doing anything on the lower level in this phase It's gonna all be on the upper level absolutely shade ADA seating Multipurpose pavilion. How can it be used, you know, nine months a year? Etc. So and we're gonna tie in the the comfort station as well You can tell what things we find exciting Playground equipment. I loved I didn't just pick it out of a catalog last time But I want to talk about accessibility again I want to emphasize a little bit more what mr. Slaughter said back when we designed Mill River almost 20 years ago We looked at places that were we went on many field trips and we looked at places that were specifically designed to be Really accessible as opposed to ADA required accessible. We made Mill River ADA required accessible We did not make it the kind of magnet that there's a name of a child's playgrounds that's like a whole series of playgrounds that Really fully integrates Kids with different abilities and that science has changed a lot in the last 20 years But then we chose not to do that We just did what we had to do and I encourage us to look and see if there's a way that we can do at least a portion of it in the more forward-thinking ways with the more even more recent ways of looking at accessibility because We know that in Amherst we have a number of people who come here specifically because of our school programs that are available to us And so to be go beyond what's required because of course we're going to do what's required We have the little ramp. We have the engineered wood fiber blah blah blah But if we can look at it really carefully I'm sure Berkshire design or whoever can help us with that but to consider it as More than just what's required But perhaps looking at being a little closer to the cutting edge because we did made that decision not to do that 20 years ago And it is a draw. I was gonna say cutting edge, but then I thought I'm not being good for playground Yes, no cutting edges. I really appreciate the emphasis on the accessibility And I will bring that forth to and through Berkshire design I will say that mr. Backelman and I with mr. Moreing Ms. Bills have had fairly recent conversations about you know as we as we don't want to get ahead of ourselves here But as we as we launch Improvements to growth. We have a master plan going for community field. We want to make sure that In time we come back around the mill river because we do know that that playground there You know there are cycles and that cycle was 15 20 years ago We have not gotten a park grant from the state in quite a while You may recall that we applied for multiple park grants for North Common and for a variety of reasons the state didn't love that proposal so our hope is to circle back around and The goal being having an updated current ADA accessible exciting Park North Central and South Amherst and you know, that's our goal over the next five years So thank you. So I have a couple of questions Not related to play grants, but So at the North Common memory serves the Sidewalk on the north side of the Main Street parking lot is going to hold the bike share rack which given that we've gone with the Bell wagon or whatever that group is that the motorized will require power. So I presume as we redo the surface of that lot and we Will need to you know run conduit to that space I presume is the case The other thing I would suggest is just a thing to keep in mind not that it has to happen anytime soon that PBTA has the ability to take basically a panel out of the bus shelter and turn it into a electronic signage and so if there's You know sort of standard power available to them. They can do that They can also put solar on the roof if if necessary It's a fairly heavily used bus bus stop. There are others that are used more but just May not be something but if we're going to sort of tear up the sidewalk to do the parking lot And we're going to run power in that neighborhood It might be worthwhile to run the conduit whether it happens soon or not But just to put that in your mind is something to to keep in mind But the one one question about that though is is that sidewalk on Main Street actually going to end up any wider I know that the lot itself is a little bigger Than is sort of strictly necessary for a parking As it's currently designed so there's more space between cars Than is absolutely necessary as we're back in turn rent So are they is there some thought of widening that sidewalk make more of a little plaza up on the Corner near the lights or not or can you there have been Discussions about that, but it's a little bit early right now Because we're just getting our designer on board But certainly that's come through as we've talked about that island that includes where the bike share will go And where the current bus stop is that we all recognize that that is a very it's a hodgepodge of Generations of bituminous pavement and concrete and and and whatnot. So we definitely want that to be a More welcoming space a more accessible space We do have some room to to move out in in the right-of-way And we also have a little room So it's something that mr. Moring and his staff will weigh in with with our designers on I don't want to get it. I don't know the specifics, but it's certainly been talked about So it's on our radar screen. So the other thing I want to ask about is on the solar landfill You talked about being a four megawatt and again, this may be premature At some of the meetings way back when you know, there was some discussion about whether it would all be Would all the power be essentially sort of credited to the town or would you know Some communities will build one of those and homeowners can buy essentially a certain section of of power from it So for example, my house is not a great even though it's immediately adjacent to that property It's not a great doesn't a great solar resource by virtue of the way the house sets and that sort of thing But if there was a publicly available, you know ability to buy my section To get myself credit for having solar even though it's not physically there There are those kind of things that been part of the discussion at all or is it mostly all gonna be a an agreement between Lee and and the town only a We haven't got there a community solar is something that's becoming more and more popular The biggest Challenge oftentimes for a solar developers having someone willing to take off take the power and they like to have one customer I eat the town to say we will buy everything There are a lot of solar developers out there who are marketing their power to different people or and they look at the big customers and I think the easiest path to success is to have one Entity buy it, but they're doing a community solar option is certainly not out of the realm of reason Do we know what our general year-over-year sort of total use is I think this was a quarter of the use Yeah, we were not surplusing no That's what I'm thinking like we could use all of it and then a little bit of place into we've been approached by three different Entities saying buy our solar places in Western Massachusetts, right? We're sort of holding out because we want to be we want this project to go Right, and we want them not to have the ability the fact that they haven't sold their solar To stop this project from moving forward, right? So we want to be their customer, right? Other questions comments I just want to note, you know There's a there's a lot of product there a lot of projects in play right now and you know, Mr. Zomek is sort of really leading the charge on most of them and It's it's very ambitious, and we've set some very ambitious time frames, especially for the North Common that one is probably Gonna be a hard one to once people start to get their teeth into it and start to understand it and start asking questions I think we and think the public process is gonna be more involved But we have our goal and we're gonna try and work towards that But I just you know credit him and the department the various departments in the town for taking on all these projects And we're gonna be very busy over the next year Thank you Mr. Slater, we have a five-minute break. Absolutely. Absolutely. So we'll take a little recess again. This is a quick look I'll be back. We'll do updates. We'll keep the board very informed. Absolutely. Thank you very much We'll take a little recess so people can stretch your legs and get a drink of water or whatever Then we'll be back in a moment physical Because there's so much We have one other action and discussion item Which is medical marijuana procedures for letters of support and non-opposition. So last time we met we We were discussing a couple different things We may potentially have another request for a letter of support non-opposition, but we also thought it would be wise to take a few minutes and think about Since we haven't dealt with this in a while and we've got a little perspective on it and the circumstances around Medical and recreational or adult use marijuana has changed So I think we can take up a little bit of time to think about how we would approach this What would be our criteria? how In hindsight we would think about it what we would have or should have asked our previous Applicants for these letters and what we might be thinking about for any new applicants that come along To what kind of Rational we might apply to giving a letter of support or non-opposition which still is a Or pair of terms I should say so We have a few things in our packet just To sort of you know, lay out Where we are with applicants Cation of some of the currently approved letters and then the letters themselves I didn't know if our as an experts Wanted to offer some initial comment or thoughts about How they think about this or what their thoughts or Ideas are what they've heard from other communities because you know Let me blow it out and then you'll smooth it over. Okay. That sounds like a good plan Because I mean you've interacted with a lot of other communities who you know grapple with some of these sort of You know points of conflict. There's a very different, you know to my mind Let me just frame it this way is that I think that are we you know medical marijuana is a very different Thing than the adult use and I certainly think of them as very different things And so I think that my approach to a letter of support on opposition is is We're not required to for the other but for this There's certain things I want to kind of press them about relative to the medical aspects of this and so that's that's kind of Where I've been sort of thinking about this a little bit, but I'm curious as to what other communities When you see medical just think adult use because essentially With the new statute the new legislation There's no Prohibition to the conversion, so we may still be at the tail end of the medical Licensing phase and there there are legitimate medical Components that still might happen and they'll be separated in different tax structure and there's different reasons but When you see a request for medical or when I see a request for medical I'm seeing adult use So you can smooth that one out. No, it's only gonna get worse from here. So So one of the things I asked the town manager just to check in with KP law and make sure I hadn't missed something and all the pieces of Paper we saw at MMA and all the other articles we read by the reams every week about Marijuana of various sorts and affiliations from week to week and One we can't rescind at some communities talked about rescinding their letters of Non-opposition and support even if we wanted to which I'm not saying we wanted to but just in terms of knowing our options We actually can't do that because they already got their provisional certificates of registration. So that's a non starter anymore One of the things that's so interesting, of course though is that we have To provide in order for them to get that provisional certificate a letter of support or non-opposition However, as things currently stand with let's just say non-medical Marijuana we don't have to provide anything Except they just say that meets the zoning good enough for us Which is one of the things we've been working on at all the hearings because it makes No sense to me based on the conversations We've had over the years here that we who clearly our community supported medical marijuana. We Forth rightly and quickly did zoning in 2013 to make it happen We gave all these people letters and none of them opened and I'm really mad Jealous even that East Hampton is saying our community was so forward-thinking in allowing medical marijuana It's like so were we we can't help it. They didn't open and so we did all the things we needed to do And so I'm feeling frustrated that We went through this when we didn't have any idea when we wrote when we did those original letters of support Non-opposition that there was gonna be a provision that allowed them to automatically transition into non-medical use and Yet we asked them all these hard questions about who are you really are you really? Non-profit are you really medical? Are you just you know saying this or do you seem to have professional staff associated with this? I mean we were really trying to do our due diligence and now it doesn't really seem to matter because they're all gonna be allowed to flip to record to non-medical use and Without us Giving that letter of support or non-opposition the only saving grace is that they will have to have signed host community Agreements at some point in the process which they did not have to have technically It was a little unclear with just the medical and we only got to that point with one of the organizations but those will be a necessary component of Everything that happens after July 1st under the new regulations So in terms of how well the reason I want to talk about this is one I wanted to I guess vent about that and I'm really unhappy that we don't already have medical and one of the reasons I wanted to have medical was because I wanted to have medical because our community made it very clear That's one of our values and we wanted to offer people pain relief in our community and we're really disappointed it hasn't opened Even though we've given out four letters Two is that we're really just I'm really disappointed that we haven't done it because then we haven't seen any of the Grammifications and so people being worried about things that have or have not come to fruition Because none of them have opened although one of them is making substantial progress So we still don't have much to go on beyond theoretical stuff at this point I believe mr. Bachman can speak to what town council did say in terms of If someone comes forward to us as we've heard may be happening with one of the organizations That's already received a letter, but is potentially looking at new ownership that there's a Suggestion from town council as to how we might handle that rather than that idea of like resending or withdrawing a letter per se so that those That there would be clear Transfer of one to the other as opposed to there being five instead of four because one of the reasons We chose that number eight which was not highly scientific, but was based to a degree on We've assumed that at some point these four would move forward because again, even though July 1st Regulations, I have no doubt will be in place given how fast the canvas control commission is moving that doesn't mean anybody's gonna open and so some of these may just Wander off and and decide to open someplace else or put their interests elsewhere And others may open as both medical and recreation Non-medical or they may just oh they may just transfer completely to the other I mean, we just don't know at this point So that's why I'm having a hard time understanding if at this point our attitude needs to be kind of whatever because there's Like really not much more to say about medical at this point Or are we trying to get at some other types of information that we hear from people before we issue another letter? Because to some extent we've learned stuff over time We've learned that in hindsight it might have been smart to issue an RFP rather than just accepting whoever showed up in whatever order They showed up in but that's what we did too late now So is there any point in belaboring this more than I already just have and we're just saying sure that that sounds good to Whoever comes in knowing that they're gonna be under whatever regulations come into place July 1st, or do we have? Something concrete we can really ask them that we feel will make a difference to our community beyond what town council suggests in terms of making clear That we've got four or not five The thing I think about is that and this is to some extent you know building off what Ms. Krueger said is that I Think at this point the intention of getting This is to get a leg up on the competition to go into non-medical use and so I think that Changes my lens relative to whether we want to do that or not in other words We have four that currently have that leg up, which is half of the eight that we've decided as a town to allow Do we want to tip the scales? More or less and the thing is is the process to go through the medical is fairly extensive You know it's it's a fairly extensive and expensive process And so we talked you know some of the conversation when we were talking about zoning is do we create a level playing field for all people who want to You know that so more people can access this business opportunity and So I have some real reservations about issuing anymore just from the standpoint of I think we've given half of the Eight kind of a head start on everybody else At the same time I'm not sure it makes that big a difference given that the amount of time between now and July 1 But anyway, so my question is how far can we go in talking about? How many legs we want up? When you know, I don't want to wander into the specifics of a request because it's not on our agenda, but I Think I'm feeling similar to what I think you said I would be just as happy to have three strictly medical Coming along and then evaluate what the other up to you know five more Looked like under the new rules of the game, which we you know We probably know about 90% of what it's gonna look like and not the rest. I don't I don't see any I think we've got ahead of ourselves, you know in some ways in trying to Have an open humanitarian view and then The rules of the game changed I'm looking at the map with the three Locations and I I have different ideas about whether that's Good or bad just like from a planning perspective of density and location and I go back and forth about it's good that they're all together It's not good Gee this corner line has all kinds of redevelopment potential that you know isn't You know wasn't realized in the application that We already had maybe it would and some other so you know Just how I feel about how I want to see this corner lot redeveloped have anything to do with whether that should be adult use marijuana by itself standalone so I You know, I don't I Don't know That can be brief. Thanks. I think you've already stated the issues all the three of you very nicely You know that the problems with the process that got us to this point and the fact I don't feel any particular urgency in granting yet another one under uncertain circumstances, so Believe it that Yeah, I'm not sure that I have much I could say that would contribute to anything that we can do tonight In questions that would come along if we did receive another request that we were acting upon is whether if we have reached the eight point by the for adult use marijuana sales facilities and then get another one that comes in for medical whether Medical that medical marijuana has any rights attached to it to expand beyond just medical and That's a hypothetical question I'd care about under those circumstances, but doesn't need to answer now and The other thing that I wonder about however is It's my understanding and this is maybe just educational question not entirely related. It's my understanding that with the medical marijuana Establishments that they're required to grow within Massachusetts under in facilities that are also licensed by the Department of Public Health Are there any similar? restrictions for other adult use marijuana production well the grow facilities are all under regulations and I Believe some of the DPH stuff is going to switch over to the CCC right, I mean it well it would have to be in Massachusetts because they can't transport across state lines and But it's not required to be vertically integrated So that's one of the things that for example GTI, which you read about in the newspaper. I'm not speaking out of school here GTI is the furthest along they're up on Meadow Street and they're building a facility in Holyoke to grow and so They have to grow it themselves under some part of GTI in order to sell it here or at any other dispensary medical once it becomes Available to the world of Massachusetts on July 1 Then recreational places will be able like a different recreational place We're not non-medical place would be able to buy from GTI If GTI wanted to sell to them as opposed to it having to all be vertically integrated within the same company So there will be a lot more choices although again You know you have to start planting stuff in order to sell it and that hasn't happened a lot of places yet That's still and we're still under 20 in terms of active Medical dispensaries in the entire Commonwealth of Massachusetts Which I think is a lot slower than a lot of people expected given the county restrictions that got lifted years ago So that's part of it in terms of the eight you bring up an excellent point that we've been discussing in the That we talked about associated with the eight But also that we've been trying to clarify in our internal working group Which is that we want to make sure in terms of like retailers versus Establishments like what counts is that eight and we have never counted and we would not intend to count and we want to make Sure our definitions don't count Every medical non-medical site as to they would only count as four So if every one of the four that is currently licensed to do medical and also did non-medical It would still only count as four it would not count as eight is my understanding because otherwise Then eight wouldn't have been enough because they might have all done that and that wouldn't have solved our all the other issues Of why we said we wanted a larger number than the number that currently exists But you are exactly right that that's one of the definitions that the zoning subcommittee is looking at bringing to Town meeting it annual town meeting to make sure it's clear because mr. Also realized that after the fact that he wanted to have the differentiation between retailers establishments whatever that means to be totally clear on that so in theory if all of these places if we hadn't heard anything about anybody considering doing anything else all these places could Establish a separate non-medical arm and it would still only count as four because it would still be on the same site now If they said we want to have another location And that's the one that's going to be the non-medical and we're only going to do medical at this site Then that would count then there's still that definition question We have to be clear on to make sure Does that count as five or does that count as numerous outlets of one place? And so we want to make sure that What we thought was eight at least we all agree on what eight means in terms of how it counts Well marijuana is on the floor it might just give you a little update We've been struggling and it's come up at a couple of hearings and workshops we've been to the the cafe or social consumption aspect and Not being opposed or Non-opposed it's unclear how would work for a bunch of reasons. It's complicated and also juggling that with no smoking laws and Workplace smoke fee workplace stuff And you may have heard that the governor actually weighed in and asked the cannabis control Commission to delay that part of the regulations because Again not opposed Or not opposed It's just way more complicated, but be thinking once that gets worked out. We might have the eight licensees Plus we could have other locations for social consumption I don't know if that would how that fits with the aid or not so a whole other layer that I Mean I I think waiting probably makes sense just because we it's it's complicated And we've a lot of unanswered questions and their rollout of this is a Lot as it is the adult use part Right and just to make that a little more specifically complicated is that East Hampton is already has Somebody who's already planning to open a social consumption place Their zoning allows for it But again, how smoking gonna work because you're not supposed to be able to smoke and so then there's place in Worcester That's opened. That's a private club where you can smoke anything you want according to their website and Not clear how that works because cannabis Control Commission said that that's not ours. We didn't write any regs for that. Mm-hmm. You got you got a problem with your Smoking regulations then at that point. That's not our problem But then it's the matter of you know, we're trying to be proactive so that we don't have a place open And then we have to fight with them about whether or not they're doing What's entirely appropriate and so or in the spirit of the law versus a lawsuit So one of the things we tried to get across certainly when the hearing I was at as I said, we know people are gonna get sued We just rather not get sued first So could you please? With some more details so we don't get sued first as to how this works because Exactly because we want to try and do Things that support what our community values But we also wanted to do it with eyes wide open as to what we're allowing and not what we're and what we're not allowing And like you say social consumption would not count to the best of any of our assumptions as eight But again when we came up with that number eight We weren't really planning that social consumption was gonna be a thing right off that so we didn't have the draft We're continually I said the other thing I said is we're predicting the future as fast as we can It's been a little tricky as as to how to do that because we don't know what they're actually gonna end and they had the Cannabis control Commission has been getting immense pressure from all the quote sticks in the mud about not doing social consumption right out of the eight but So they're hearing some positives and some negatives at the hearings because we tend to two different hearings And so we know they heard both Associated with that because one of the issues is it's being treated as a social justice issue that that could potentially be a place Where people who have in the past don't have the big money to buy into creating a storefront? But social consumption is a different level of investment You don't have to have X number of dollars to back you up to get a certain kind of license so Then it seems so the reason I want to talk about this tonight was to see if there was anything we needed To think about in terms of if we do have someone come forward to us from one of these four groups Or even just a completely different group and say They want something. It's like how do we say how do we decide? I mean, I'm not saying we're deciding on the merits of that because we don't have it But what I'm saying is what questions will we even ask? Knowing what we know now versus what we knew that I don't know I mean we can ask just random questions, but that doesn't help us like necessarily Decide what that means. I mean as there are some form we talked about criteria earlier tonight associated with different kinds of things Criteria to help us decide if property surplus criteria to help us decide various things How do we even? Frame the conversation. Well, I certainly think for me anyway I think at a minimum because it is a letter relative to medical marijuana that they should have the sort of Whether they fully intend to go right, you know non medical use or not They should have their you know proverbial ducks in a row relative to medical because if you know It's it's disingenuous at a minimum to come in and say That they want to do medical but not have you know the sort of pieces in place It's like what you're you know medical plan. Do you have a medical director? Do you have you know? When we saw some relatively sophisticated plans from from our previous Requestors relative to you know delivering Marijuana in a medical environment in a in a serious way And so I'm I'm definitely going to hold them to that if that comes before us because I think if you want a letter of Non-opposition or support relative to a medical facility. You've got to be a medical facility. So I'm going to do that personally. Anyway, I Think you know at this point given that we know what we know about Non-medical use then I think we're going to ask those questions to about Do you have plans to? transition or additionally Open recreational because I think that Starts to change how you think about the location a little bit but Still evolving on what I'm thinking about these things. Mr. Simmer Very difficult because I'm not even convinced that any of these places that have gotten to The point that they're at in the process level three or whatever it's called provisional licensing Actually have to open as medical facilities in order to get their adult use license and so All of the presentation all of the good questions we asked in hindsight What do they mean Could we ask for a more intricate business plan than we did? Possibly but and would we think about that in the future possibly? Those are the kinds of things that we might think about If a criteria that we have Is that we want no more than four of the eight to be also medical In order to bring a variety a larger variety of providers into the community Then that's a principle that we ought to Test to see whether we can in fact implement it and then that should be the discussion I agree with the two preceding comments. I think it's just a lot of makes a good point I mean if we don't know what's going to happen and we obviously well maybe we do and that's going to happen But I think for the very for the sake of consistency alone It's so it's proper to ask for all the information we did for the rest I mean, otherwise we're not doing our due diligence I think and again, we did basically said we did a very detailed plans about the medical expertise the delivery the security We got down to building plans and and that's the least we can do and then as mr. Steinberg said To inquire into further prospects and to keep that number four in mind I've just been thinking I mean usually we're kind of at the front end of a process and then we see well You know, it's going to go to the ZBA or their planning board or both They're going to look at plans and what it looks like and maybe design review board It might be that before we give anything we want to really know what? Particular site is going to look like how it's going to benefit the community You know if it is that corner site for example, how does how does that work? Is that the best you know way to use that site? I mean we we can actually Use our position to maybe be be a lot more proactive about what we're going to get Just a thought Just again talking about process not any particular cases as you recall when we did have that conversation we were We made sure to raise the issues of past ownership and uses versus the potential future ownership and use without you know without saying we want to pick winners and losers or Decide what business should go where that was part of the conversation at least as a general consideration So I think we're entirely within our rights to to keep doing that You get into you get into some strange places if you want to you know So for example some of what they talked about was how they would interact with police and our police department to provide you know Security footage and the interaction with you know Care and control product and you know all that sort of stuff And so there was a certain public outreach component that they had some of them had well if I remember correctly About how they were going to you know essentially interact within the community You know it's like to what extent can we ask those questions or and perhaps that's more appropriate for a host community agreement about you know Compelling them to do certain kinds of things within our community Because we have a lot you know we've talked about this too is that you know we have a large number of relatively vulnerable You know people as far as you know that aren't quite of age or even are of age, but may not be well suited to make great decisions because you know They're still you know young And we you know we've talked about you know having a certain responsibility to to to those members our community in that regard and not to overly Parent them, but at the same time to to create circumstances where they you know make the best choices. They can I guess in some respects I don't know how much of that kind of series of questions we could impose or ask about And again, it may be a part and parcel of like a host community agreement structure that we you know sort of press them on certain you know sort of community building and Community outreach kind of things, you know in much the same way when you you know If you look at every lottery ticket, there's a thing about getting gambling help, you know There's sort of certain hooks on on some of these kinds of things So I don't know, you know, maybe again perhaps, you know a host community agreement kind of captures that or has the ability to capture some of that sort of stuff, but Anyway, yes, so so you there are a couple hypothetical suppose a new company comes in and says we want to Open a new place. So the question is is that something the board would like to entertain or Suppose a company comes in and says we want to Transfer our license to company a company was did company be is that something you want to? entertain as a board or are you Saying we're gonna wait until July 1 to see what comes out because we're it's it's we're not ready to talk about this anymore There's no I don't think there's anything that compels you to talk to people if they come in But if you get that request hypothetically What should our response be on your behalf? Thank you, I really appreciate that question and so Back to the host community for just a moment the host community agreement is Negotiated by the town manager and although of course he is gonna listen to us and all our infinite wisdom when he debates that it isn't like it gets Debated here or that it gets debated in executive session or anything like that. It's just like once it's at that point It's it's off our plate So we know he'll represent us well and get us a really good deal, but that's There's only so much we can influence for that I appreciate you saying that nothing compels us to do this because you know We're always trying to think of you know on the one hand Amherst is open for business and then another and you know We support medical happening absolutely and we even support non-medical We're just a little concerned about how the details are gonna play out But we support both and with all the things that we always talk about although I said the last time I'm not gonna tell you again all the statistics about how young our population is but that's huge for us absolutely I Think the other thing that you know becomes problematic is as we as we talked about associated with a release from 61 a earlier And I when I quite harshly said well, you know your closing deadline is not our problem But the reality is it's not and so on the one hand we want to do the right thing for people absolutely And I'm really glad that that's gonna work out for them but it's not our problem and so There is no medical place given the current situation of the four that exist That can actually start offering product as I am medical establishment prior to July 1st I would be really shocked if GTI has anything available based on their growing and so Literally no one's gonna be selling anyway as of July 1st. So then Maybe that to some extent changes the conversation to then if this was happening a year ago if a year ago So right after the regs came out when we didn't know what the timelines were For sure and there was theoretical possibility But at this point there's no longer a theoretical possibility That any of these medical places are gonna open in time as far as I can tell based on where they are in their plan And their own vertical integration because of the fact they have to grow their own so I Feel less worried that somehow economic development wise We're saying We're putting we don't want to feel like we're being unfair or that we're putting on the brakes on anyone from that standpoint And I don't that's what I'm saying is I don't think we are but I would also Be interested to hear with the rest of the board things if we would want to hear and as mr. Bachman indicated do we want to even hear from anybody associated with these things? But Make it clear that if we do want to hear from them that it's not necessarily a slam dunk When we don't want to mislead anyone But do are we willing to hear from them at all or is there a point to hearing from them at all given how we So that he knows the answer to that question Because if somebody asks you theoretically today since we haven't really sorted this out Should they bother coming before us or should they not and if they do Do we just say sure you can try? We don't know where we're going with that We don't have like this nice little checklist that you can see if you meet that and therefore you will say yes I'm inclined to let people come in and talk to us and It doesn't in being clear that that doesn't mean because they're on the agenda that you know Any we know what action we might take them just you know Looking at a lot of different alternatives, but I think to not even allow somebody to come in and talk to us Does say like we're not open for business in a certain way And I think it also makes mr. Kravitz's job very awkward where he's trying to It's gonna say cultivate But I think he's you know I And then we have the conversation recently, you know, maybe the maybe the conversation is yes, but And I hear your thing about the timeline and no one is going to be able to meet that but in general for the industry and as People come in and have something we're interested in and it's part of the eight They have certain, you know business benchmarks they need to make or they're going to walk away So maybe it's somebody you want to say yeah, hey Great come back in July or this is where we're stuck or we really like you you're offering us something Nobody else talked about before so I meant to listening I meant to going that far without creating too much expectation. I would I would suggest I would I'm in the same camp as that you know, I'm certainly Fine with with hearing people out, but making no promises about whether we'll make any decision that evening or or any other evening You know We might we might not I just don't know, you know But I think that's the clear thing we can't say is like you can come down and talk to us We may do nothing. We may do we may say no immediately. We may say yes immediately or we may Wait two weeks and say yes two weeks later or no two weeks later or whatever. I think all of those things are within the realm I think But I agree with you I think hearing them at least they like you said they may offer some They may tell us something. We haven't heard before that really strikes us in a way. That's very different than anybody else So I think that's You know worth Being open to the possibilities This is time or juice. I mean, I think the law. It's fair to say listening is we encapsulate this conversation that if there's a request for a transfer of a current medical marijuana to a new provider or a new request that We will be asking a full set of questions Going into all of the criteria that have been discussed tonight including which is mostly the criteria from before but I think that Miss Kruger is certainly articulated an additional one which is this the best and highest use of the location and the second is that We are at least at the moment disinclined to Have more than four That are selling both medical and adult use though. That's not a concrete policy. It's just Was I think we're The conversation was going before But Other than that, I agree that if somebody wants to come in the It should be entitled to Appear and for them, I don't think that that's a major expense in comparison to all the other expenses. They anticipate taking on We do want to be dazzled though I'm kidding. Is there anything else anyone wants to add on this? I wanted to just add about the questions that we ask and so we each made up those questions based on what and because you know We have to everything an open meeting that we thought were good questions to ask There is no set. I mean there might be free to us individually But there is no set questions to the vast and that's one of the things I was referencing when I said there's no checklist They can look at and say oh, well, I've I meet seven of these ten criteria I know what exactly what they're gonna they should look at our old tapes Then they'd know what we were gonna ask them, but we don't have a document We don't have a criteria document that says these are the things we're looking for and partly It's because things continue to unfold and so we're not gonna make one it doesn't sound like Before any of that happens, but but because we don't have that we also we ourselves are depending on our own knowledge Gained over the last couple years of doing this of asking those questions rather than it being Something we hand out and say These are the questions so I think it's been for me it's been productive to hear each of you and Certainly if anyone's still watching If they have comment or suggestion for us certainly write us an email because I certainly you know Don't have a monopoly on good ideas. So send those things in to us But I think we're trying to you know wrap our heads around this and and I found this productive So moving on in our agenda or sort of Proform a sort of stuff next up is committee and board appointments three appointments We have an appointment there Someone would like to offer a motion I'll make a motion and then if This crew wants to add to it because she was probably involved with the interview and knows the criteria For this committee and the various people to serve she can add to it I moved to a point Sharon Povanole to the downtown parking working group through June 30 2018 and there's a second So Seguing perfectly off what mr. Steinberg said we don't have a copy of the charge in here We should always have a copy of the charge except maybe when we're doing a whole bunch of appointments in June Maybe that's not a good time But for something like this where we did ask for specific sorts of skills and experiences in particular I think it's valuable and for us to be able to look at the balance of the committee etc We should always have the charge in here and I realize that you know staff Gets other priorities go on to but that should just be on a checklist somewhere that the charge goes in with the CAF So that we're all reminded. Oh, right. That's who's on that already and these are why and Also the date because the date I believe is because much to mr. Bags disappointment back when he was still with us I said I wanted to have this be a time-limited committee So is is that the is that the date everybody's up by 6 30? Yeah? And that's why it's got that date, which is very soon in comparison to many of our other appointments Let me just let me just add that Miss Pove and Ellie Many of you might know is one of the owners of a downtown business Hastings not a secret and Would be replacing Matt ye who was a downtown business manager, so she's sort of manager owner We have somewhat stuck with the original slots, but as we've lost people we've tried to fill in with Appropriate members rather than necessarily the letter of that if you might recall that miss Anderson was on there as a sort of parking facility You know person that's unlikely. We're going to find that so we've we've been flexible We want someone who sort of knows the issues who can who in miss Pove and Ellie's come to a number of meetings participated And has participated with the parking garage subcommittee of the downtown parking working group So she was enough up to speed that it was good because we may be finishing our two years July or may come back here and say hey give us another six months or something I still see it as a shorter turn not a standing ongoing committee But whether July one is the absolute right time to fold we're going to have that conversation in the spring so We did interview her mr. Malaya and myself and I Actually, I don't know exactly how the ball that dropped But I thought we had done this appointment a couple weeks ago And we hadn't and because we had said yep go ahead But whether I didn't put it in writing or I just didn't thought so I actually thought She'd been appointed and hadn't gotten her letter when she asked me so in a way This is a little bit of a makeup, but I I think she would be appropriate. I'm sorry You didn't have the charge, but we did look at that Yeah, I Never meant to imply that miss Pove and Ellie wasn't incredibly well qualified I know it's simply as a matter of the charge. Sure. That's what we should be doing I'm perfectly pleased you've been able to fill the slots after we belabored how to Thank you None all those in favor, please say aye She'll be very happy to get her All right, so next up on our agenda is Section seven which is licensed public way meter parking information. We have consent calendar Are there any yes edits to those please there is one of it and then I can make a motion To match to make the motion match the requests Yeah The first one which is the all alcohol beverages at a reception in the life sciences lab 320 Is what is in the application form? It's not s3 30 And with that It's I did pair it all out. I'm perfectly prepared to make a motion to approve those items listed on the consent calendar for the February Posing here 12 2018 agenda as amended Second right emotion in a second is it for the discussion? Hearing none all those I Just don't look around and then you don't have any discussion. It works out super well You're just grumbling under my breath so it's a little weird That UMass is having an alcohol reception in one of the dining commons It's a little weird given all the talk we have about alcohol use on campus But it appears and I had meant to double-check this earlier, but it appears that that's the night before spring recess starts so it's on the 10th and The 11th is one spring recess starts so Sure, I guess I mean we obviously have the chief of police look at this But it's a little strange one think the one would think they would be serving food hot sandwiches soup List of common visuals that we often request or ask for but Any other Any further discussion Hearing none all those in favor. Please say aye. All right. I oppose. All right, that's unanimous All right, so now we're in down all those Voting what not we're on to the town managers report. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So first off A couple things I want to mention one is Our cup of Joe will be Friday at share coffee and I'll be with building commissioner Rob Mora from 7 30 to 9 a.m. That's share coffee. That's this Friday Secondly I wanted to mention that I want to thank LSSE For a great winterfest. They they expanded this year from a one-day affair to a one-week affair And if you look at the number of events that they had Organized or had sort of put under their umbrella over the course of a week. It was pretty impressive and I think that Everybody other than mr. Wald's dog enjoyed enjoyed the event But it was they they really Took a chance they had a lot of energy From volunteers who want to make this happen. They received a lot of support from fraternities and sororities so Congratulations to Barb bills and her staff for being ambitious trying to get do a little bit more and good for them The Just as a follow-up if you recall a couple meetings ago You had approved the Alcoholic beverages licensed hours change for Amherst cinema subject to the police chief's Review and he has approved it. So that has been issued There is a we we talked at one point about I think last time about Safety measures that can the town can implement at voting places and at the same that same evening The police chief was meeting with the school committee about Suggested changes that to both physically for some of the spaces, but in particular one For the cracker farm school to have a police officer on duty. So today we received a letter which we will put in your packet For information. I don't think you need to take action on it necessarily It's something that we would accommodate Based on if the police chief says it's a necessity for us to have an officer and the school committee is requesting it It's something we would look at our budget to make sure that just happens Unless anybody says that's a really dumb idea, but I think that's There's a Resident who came in spoke to you as well at that at some point The went to note that Last week last meeting we gave you a litigation status update. There was a mistake on it I sent you a replacement just so everybody's aware that there is a replacement that's been Uploaded on that Next meeting Will be focused on which is in two weeks Tonight was sort of the David Zomac Sondra Aldridge showed next time will be all about a lot of DPW things and that will include the Second meter for agricultural use regulations that will be presenting to you it will include a presentation on Pavement management, which is very timely because I think if you drive around the town We I don't think it's called management anymore. I think it's just survival But you know, we have a very detailed Presentation on that so I think it'll be really interesting. We have a number of other things that involve DPW just updates as much as Sort of where we're headed on a lot of these major projects for DPW But the big one will be the second meter for agricultural use that will will have the information to you in advance and The Yes, so we're we had got as I told you we had gone out to bid for ambulance billing to as our Contracted service and we have Received numerous bids on that We are going to go into contracting out our ambulance billing we have worked through the staffing issues internally which includes some collective bargaining issues and and that will all work that will begin on March 1st and So we're in the fire department and Treasurer's collector's office are both prepared and ready to launch into this initiative We think that it will provide Take take a very important task and give it to a company that specializes it in it because there's a lot of nuances to ambulance and billing for medical services that It's really hard for our staff to stay up to speed on it because the Things change all the time and these companies are out there and they almost every very few cities and towns do their own Ambulance billing anymore. It's all contracted out So it's a good thing to do and I think we're we're pretty in pretty good space staff wise That's it's a combination the staff will have to make It'll be some there's some negative impacts for some employees But I think we've been communicating that with folks and they're okay And then I have to request if the we right before coming down here We received the final wording on the charter quest summary of the charter question from town council who Charter Commission met last week Had come up with language town council had comments on it. They were going back and forth but and I neglected to ask the chair to put this on the agenda for tonight, so I have to ask if you're willing to have a special meeting To vote to place the question the charter question on the ballot The reason it would have to be this week is that it has to be done 30 to 5 days prior to the election, which is February 20th There is an opportunity to meet at 10 30 on Friday on Thursday because two members of the board will be here for JCPC until 10 ish and then or until 10 or 10 30 and then two members from the board will be for the merit here for the marijuana working group at 11 so there's an opportunity at least three of you. I know we're gonna be in the building in that time frame And I'm not sure if the chair was going to be able to make it or not again The world's schedule, so that was It would have been nice to have had the language finished and ready for you to review tonight But really it's a according to town council. You have to take the action But it's really a ministerial action of saying yes, we want to put this on the ballot Mr.. So to click to beat that to a little more detail So we are only as a select board all we do is agree that and we in fact already agreed to this a long time ago We just didn't vote to put the question on the ballot because you were required to do that after the charter commission says We finished our work, so we have to put the question on that normally reads under MGL shall this town and Just to make things interesting the charter commission wants it to say shall Amherst as opposed to shall this town But the rest of the words are just what they say at MGL It and that's the question and then that's the thing that we say yes and then by putting that on the Charter Commission is entitled to put Their explanation and we've seen a draft of that as the entire board I'd seen a previous draft it has been changed again numerous times since then because it went back through the Charter Commission itself And then went back to town council again as you've described And so we don't get to have any say per se on what they write for their part It's kind of the equivalent of when the Galvin puts out the red book on the on the questions We might have an opinion as to how long it on You know it's already a long ballot. They're gonna have to flip over the page Hopefully I'd suggest that we talk with Ms. Burgess about making sure it starts on the front page So nobody gets confused and forgets that they have to turn it over But beyond that it really has nothing to do with us except based on our amazing wisdom over the years I had suggested to the Charter Commission that we if any of us Individually have input based on the drafts We've seen so far even though knowing they've changed if there was something that you saw that just was like wow Sure, you wanted to mention this or you didn't want to mention that you could Individually tell the chair of the Charter Commission that but as a group We don't need we don't vote on that because that's not our part our parts only the part out of MGL And they get to do the other part and we don't have to accept what they say It's just they just turn it into the town clerk and it's got nothing to do with us I mean, we're not doing it tonight, but it's not Well as I said wouldn't be a great time Just as I said before we came downtown council had made recommendations and the the chair of the Charter Commission has been granted some some leeway from his Commission to make some changes and But if anything major he would reconvene the commission and go back to them Reconvene before our deadline to vote unless it's like you see it to a comma or no We know no they don't have to reconvene before our meeting our meeting is only for our part because their summary could change Their summary they can keep changing up until the minute that Ms. Burgess says they have to turn Exactly and and the so the question was Who's authorized to tell the town clerk to put a question on the ballot and it's really just you Who has the authority to do that? We would post it tomorrow morning if we could get a quorum for that You're in both places right and so and so yes, we could do that But what I'm saying is I know that you saw a draft a previous draft It's been changed since then but if you really had a strong opinion about don't wordsmith it But if you had a really strong opinion about a concept that was or was not included Then that would be worth sharing with the chair of the Charter Commission, but it doesn't come to us We're saying 10 30 that's thinking 10 30 and 45 whatever you find easiest Turn those questions for the mantra Yes, so will we have a quorum at that point? I'll be there It's just the Charter to say yes the question goes I'll be here for JCPC I was hoping not to hang around for very long afterwards because I'm actually leaving town that night Do you want to make it 10? He doesn't want to wait till 10 30 is what I'm saying. I could come earlier It's hard to just drop everything and rush out Also, whatever's convenient when you're agenda for JCPC. Oh, I don't know, but it's like sometimes people want it So we're gonna be in the same place, right? We're gonna be in the same meeting room either this room or downstairs I'm not sure and so because I think marijuana internal working groups down there then too So if you want to make it 10 15 mr. Steinberg or even 10 o'clock and then we just We just come to water It starts late it's fine, but that way 10 o'clock quorum. It doesn't start. Yeah, that's right But that way if you Ten o'clock and then I did want to talk to you about the what it what the ballot will look like so when Ms. Burgess does the ballot she takes the ballot that has the most races on it so Precinct nine may have 16 people running for town meeting and then she Sets that up and places the question wherever it winds up underneath the Races and then for other precincts if they may only have four names She doesn't move the question the question stays where it is So you might have four four races and then a lot of white space But it's to make sure that's presented to all the voters in the same way And if it's that to say at the bottom and it might Leak over to the back the idea is to cave the question on the front so people know there's a question her fear is that People won't remember she will instruct her election workers to make sure you turn it over But people forget they forget you know they get flustered or something So her goal is to try to make sure it gets on the front at least the question itself Maybe not the summary as much of it as can be on the front, but it's going to be defined by the most contested Race up there so that's how she doesn't but we will see I will see a draft of it before it goes She's willing to show that to me It goes to the printer the printer looks at it does up a mock-up sent it back And then we can look at it and it's helpful to know why it why it's like that Yeah, so people will say why do you have all this space so you're doing you know It's because it's to treat every every precinct the same versus someone saying oh you're trying to gain the system Might have it way up at the top and then one would it would be right not right for others Place that the same in each one Next up is member reports does anyone have something I do a little bit Mr. Sandberg would you like start I'll just be really quick on three things because I know it's getting late One is on the appointment process since we just through that I wanted to sort of acknowledge that we're continuing to work along at this point with our Endless transition, but this Kruger and I have been working very effectively together really is a two-person team on it and So I really appreciate all that I've learned about the process from her one of the things that has come up and is that We've sort of begun to realize that a well-intentioned system of interviews has begun to Way down the process a lot. We've done a lot of good work with it, but We have been giving some thought and we'll come back to you with a more concrete recommendation on how we might modify the system to have it Work effectively for the greatest number of the committees and work effectively for all of the staff and volunteers Including members of this board who are involved secondly As far as sister cities is concerned I've had discussions with the chair of the kind of gisaki committee. They are just Engaging in a process Actually starting this meeting tomorrow evening About really thinking about what is some of the future goals for their committees and an issue that I had raised in the letter That I had sent to miss Johnson on behalf of the board that one has to be really thoughtful about what is the goals of the sister city process and received a Email today, which I have not had a chance to respond to ironically from the La Paz Centro committee chair Essentially saying that she wanted to talk to somebody from the select board and it sounded like it was the same kind of an issue so this is actually a good time to Sort of see where the existing sister city committees are so that I would suggest that if we Have our chair and vice chair Receive a request to add a third sister city that we wait until Probably April after the town election before we actually Take that up both to know what the form of government is going to be going forward and To make sure that we get adequate feedback From the two existing sister city committees about their status and challenges before we start taking on a third and the last thing just to report on is that I think I reported previously that I've been working with Ms. Krueger and mr. Bachman and and as is the chair of the Fire station GPW study committee when Christmas with Four people who were From mothers out front and associated groups who were involved in drafting the original net zero energy by-law about Whether we Whether we can collaboratively create some modifications to the by-law to make it more workable But with the thought that it's something that of course We've always felt was it needed to be done and that it's still work in progress and but I really wanted to Thank all of the people who were involved for coming forward and some in the actual Few additional community volunteers who've offered expertise And what it's very good process, but there's really not anything to report additional tonight Thank you other reports Sure Just to add About the looking at some ways to possibly streamline some of the committee interviews We had I had drafted and mr. Stenberg had reviewed a memo that would be essentially to mr. Bachman, but also to the select board, so We've kind of done that, but it wasn't on tonight's agenda Yeah, and I asked mr. Slaughter to consider that and decide when it would be appropriate. So I think the whole board probably has some interest in in a short discussion about how we Might change what's really a practice. It's not a rule or regulation I might become something that we add to the slipboard guidebook because that section Predates when we started doing these interviews and just in in terms of the work to revise or rewrite the Zero net energy by luck At least within our little group felt It really needed to that means the four not The collaborative discussion really felt that that by line needed to be Rewritten and that meant that would mean bringing it to town meeting Probably for the annual meeting and I just wanted to add What mr. Steinberg was talking about because we might feel that way, but it's really going to be this Board that decides that we would be sponsoring a Yet a different version of a of a zero net or called similarly by law And we would have until I think the April 2nd signing of the warrant to work on that would be sponsored by the select board So I just wanted a little chance without getting into the nuts and bolts of what we're doing It was just starting out in this collaborative process But just I wanted to know that we're thinking that and would want To know if the full board kind of agrees that we would go ahead And work on that Go we're going in that direction of drafting a new by-law and bring it to the annual town meeting Personally I'd say that's that would be all right. I think that we should if we can get it crafted in time and you know Articulate the sort of pieces that need to be there and I would say yes We should try to do that because I think that as it currently stands. It's unintentionally obstructive to certain things and and that is not that wasn't I don't think that the folks intention when they put it forward But I think it is in that in that way now. So if we can find some things that we can Find tune about it to make it more functional than that I think it's beneficial regardless of what happens in the March election and all that sort of stuff, but Strategy-wise it's hard to sit there in a in a discussion and say We think we want to do this but the week is really this body and so we that's a deliberation So along those lines just to be clear about the deadlines So yeah, we don't sign the warrant till the second, but we're supposed to look at it on March 19th and the internal warrant review where Hopefully usually legal counsel looks at it before they show up on a Friday morning and look at it for the first time with the whole Group of people because I don't consider that to be very efficient Is March 16th in terms of language? So there is some some pressure there in terms of a fast track But um push it up as we go with different versions But we know that associated with all of the kinds of articles that are coming up boiling up through things But it seems so far away, but it's really not as it turns out. It's only about a month Any other sort of member report things I can't think of anything okay, that's fine I'm not gonna talk about parking bit It's it's hard we had we were trying to sort of plow through a bunch of stuff on the day of that snowstorm and town hall was closing and we were meeting and it it felt a little disjointed and My idea for our next meeting which was looking for the date and can't find because my calendars won't synchronize To Kind of pull back and look at the six months six month goal Program the work plan and really get the group talking with each other about where they want to go because we just You know being sort of so task-focused and trying to get this done and that done and what about the street and that so I think we're just and we will have it our new member officially on and To just sort of have it be more of a working session to kind of see if we can Jail around where we're going because we are getting near Any closure on another set of recommendations and there has been Commentary from a number of people and you'll probably see this in the paper. I got a letter From mr. Vickery attorney Vickery who's the now chair of the president of the chamber board saying He had a real issue with the six to eight enforcement hours others have had that issue and Then mr. Merzbeck from the gizek called me so I think because Mr. Vickery sent it to the paper as well So there'll be something about that and that's the issue that I think the downtown parking working group But I have to get them all to agree to this we'll probably take up first to evaluate or reevaluate so you did a number of changes and the Thinking is it takes Four to six months of a change before people really learn it and are used to it So that's the general idea about we did a bunch of changes. Let's give it some time to see how it works I think we're going to front load a conversation about the six to eight enforcement hours because that seems to be The biggest area of concern and contention But we're not going to do it at our next meeting because I want that to be some space to kind of figure out and get Them to say how do you want to talk about that? maybe Two meetings out so that's just a little you know news from the front And I notice we're into puns tonight since you're talking about plowing through issues on the meeting So I'm gonna ask about parking Something that came to our tent. I know you're gonna love this but One of the things I hope that When the downtown parking working group reports back to the select board on the status of those conversations that It's we're reminded of why we did that eight o'clock to begin with because I didn't like it And I wasn't the only one that didn't like it And I really don't like it now that I'm at parking ticket to wave around Seven p.m. Is a peak seven p.m. Is a peak seven p.m. Is why right but At this point the people who are giving me feedback. I'll act like none of them wanted like no one in town wanted I'm like hmm because somebody wanted it because that's why we agreed to do it So it would be useful to remind us where that original idea originated and to make sure that They've rethought their position whoever that was so that would be helpful And the other issue is that I'm concerned about the fact that the senior center is still issuing parking stickers And in fact is advertising it on the front page of their newsletter That they're advertising parking stickers that not only are for use at the senior center Which is something we've talked about for years and there was an informal program started to make sure that both volunteers and Participants and programs had relatively easy parking. It's now being advertised as parking for use at the cinema for shopping Etc. This is like so not part of the system and we talked about this several times This is part of our conversation and and so what I'm saying is how else am I gonna get this on somebody's agenda? It's down our agenda because on our agenda. We need to hear back about that because we're getting because this is just working in Isolation you're worried about It's being excellent. I'm sure it's on your agenda list somewhere just like we have Google doc in theory of what our agenda. It's more than that. Don't worry about parking in that way I just got concerned about people being sold parking stickers. I know you're yes So thank you. I appreciate that and I you know, there's probably other things that need to be dealt with as well So thank you. I appreciate that and hearing the timing on that because obviously we're going into town meeting and everything else Going on Associated with that in terms of member reports That was I really just wanted to mention that as we knew last time because Ms. Krueger had already testified that morning I testified the next day Ms. Vetterman went with me She chose she chose not to speak the meeting that you were at the hearing You were at was much bigger than the one in Greenfield partly the size of the room kind of I think influenced that we didn't have a bunch of legislators that ours like had been at the first one We didn't end up in the newspaper. There was like zero coverage of that one So it was lucky that we hit both hearings because you never know which one's going to be the popular one And so we'll be very curious to see what comes out of the CCC from that because as we mentioned earlier in the conversation They're getting a ton of feedback from the Baker administration various assets agency saying Speaker of the house everybody saying wait, wait, wait, wait So it'll be very interesting to see what they actually take into account and what they change for their deadline I think they're planning to have it done by March 9th for March 15th And that will be more or less what the regs are so If you have any additional input on that then Ms. Krueger and I could take that into account We have another meeting on Thursday so see with that And we're also talking about tweaks to town meeting associated at town at annual town meeting to that word establishments or retailers for example That kind of thing again not getting too far ahead of ourselves because we don't know what some of the regulations We're actually gonna look like and black history month was Saturday morning And it was not horribly freezing cold like it often has been so that was really nice and it was a little and So we appreciate that flag went up previously and then was raised again at that event and for those out in the viewing public We're always looking for more people to help organize that event, but it went off without hitch So thank you for making sure. Yeah, it actually it was it was nice and one of and one of the as you all know One of the members of our Human Rights Commission so happens to be in an a cappella group So we even got to have additional entertainment that we don't normally have so that was very helpful Mr. Wolfe I feel I should talk a lot because I'm not even a 10 30 yet and not as young but Talked about black history month, so she's still half my report Another thing is that on Sunday I attended the annual meeting of the historical society which had a very interesting lecture about fashion And textile collections, but also as a presentation of the conch award for service to Amherst history to Jonathan Tucker Our former planning director and historical commission liaison. So that was a nice event I ring someone who's done a lot to support town committees and generally encourage the study of the towns past So Anything else from anyone? I just have a couple of quick things First and foremost is the ad comm is going to meet tomorrow evening Where it will take up and I will help sort of paint the picture of the second meter for agricultural use So I'll try to report back their their feedback in case they don't get an opportunity to send us a little note Or memo on that for meeting on the 26th They are still looking for members so Well, they had run into the chair Rebecca for Kay and this issue of Membership and it's a nine-member board It's you know, maybe you could also talk to them that they had an interest in and a warrant article to reduce the size of Their commission because it really has to come from them She said she just you know needed to think about it or talk about it But because we have these deadlines and you know what the deadlines are talking about them earlier I think if you could bring that information To them about what they would need to do by when and if they wanted to because There just aren't that many active farmers. That's part of the problem. That's one of the reasons and it's been very hard for them right, and I have mentioned to them in other meetings Previously about that I would check to make sure that state law didn't prohibit the fewer than nine and it does not I look Yeah, okay good So ad commissions don't have to be nine we happen to pick nine so it can be less than nine Following up on that since you did check MGL. Thank you Is that the other alternative we could do which we haven't done often but has been done for Human Rights Commission is we could lower the quorum number Without going back to do well They were created by they were created by town meeting then the most assumption is majority other than but that would be another Alternative if they thought they would suddenly have enough farmers to do it But they really only need x amount of people. That's another alternative, but it would still have to go to town meeting Right not a field That's trending although with marijuana cultivation that could change and that is actually a new pool of people But we're just not there quite there yet, right and that may be one of the topics I haven't looked at the agenda yet for for tomorrow night, so they may have that on their agenda They may not but I'm sure it will be one that they do take up before too terribly long the other thing I'll report on is the formal housing trust met We're still in process. I'm working on a policy that again as I mentioned before we're gonna the trust is going to adopt and seek adoption from Planning board select board, etc. But again, it's probably Well into March before we'll have that in a form that will come to us that then we can offer our feedback on and and that's worth thing the other thing just to East Street school as Mr. Zomek hinted at you know the Trust has been interested in that piece of property. We're we're actually we we voted authorize a small bit of spending to do a little Do diligence work on the property It's potentially very wet. It's obviously frozen right now, so we can't do the work until it gets warm out But it's Unless something really extraordinary happens. It's likely that we will have come to us an article from them for You know custody of the property with probably with both parts The disposition with the disposition but authority dispose right authority to look at it for you know for specific purposes But and also a time horizon And again, it may be one of those things where I indicated it's like let's not do this as a petition article Let's do this through the committee process and we'll work with you on that and and but the deadlines are coming up But I also said, you know if we get to a place we do the small do diligence work We realize it's not going to work. We can just dismiss it when we get to town meeting and there's no So I thought it'd be better for it to come through the formal process And so that that will come to us sooner than later because it will be something that Well, like you're saying March 19th is going to be our review of that We may so before that will we'll probably start to see hints about we had rough language at the meeting the other night It's still got a few more things to do So And those are the things I wanted to mention to you folks and So I believe unless someone has anything else we've exhausted Ourselves and the meeting agenda, so I would take a motion to adjourn it. I move to adjourn a second All in favor say aye