 All right, we are opening the bylaw review wetlands bylaw review meeting at 1201 p.m. on April 29, 2022. And I am eating my lunch while I'm sorry but I'm otherwise I'm going to drop here. So, I guess I just wanted to check in overall, as far as the meeting, the upcoming hearing and how we sort of want to handle that. So there's a couple things that I think are relevant. The first is the documents that we are going to discuss at the hearing are what I would describe as final draft. I am still in the process like the version that I sent you guys yesterday I have to send to cobalt and page the town attorney have them give that last section a look over and there may be some other tweaks that cobalt and page recommends. I know it's coming down to the wire but this is like the only way I could do it. He's already looked over all the other sections so it's justice, the, the beast section which is the standards for inland wetlands. So that's kind of a disclaimer, and I'm not sure, like early next week there might be a couple tweaks to this section, based on town attorney's comments. One thing that is important for us to point out to the Commission at that hearing is the fact that a lot of administrative edits need to be made to this like Michelle pointed out last time like science some scientific names aren't in italics. So the references like so there are sections where there are references back to other sections. A lot of the section numbers have changed and I don't want to update all those section numbers and have us make more edits and then have those be wrong. So my plan would be to insert those final citations as like the last step, basically in the edits. One thing as far as how to handle the hearing is to go section by section starting with section one, and basically give provide general bulleted information on these are the changes that were made. And I don't know as far as viewing the document like I don't want to sift through every single edit that was made to these documents. So go to the conservation Commission page. In the left column all the way to the bottom, there's a link for the wetland bylaw regulation proposed amendments. And on there I did the existing bylaw regulations section by section those are the ones that were amended in 2014. Then there's the proposed bylaw regulation amendments and again those are still sort of final draft under construction there may be some other final edits that are made to those sections. And then there's the markups and the markups are what display all of the changes that were made between the 2014 amendment and the proposed amendment. So right now those are available for viewing. I haven't sent them to the entire commission yet because I kind of wanted to take a look at this particular section first with you guys before I sort of announce it and make it available to everybody on the commission and the public. But yeah, I don't know if you guys have a better idea as far as like how to review this with the overall committee. I was just thinking go through section by section and sort of broad brush these are the changes that we made. And these are the reasons that we made those changes, as opposed to going change by change edit by edit. In general, kind of like the approach I got two questions on timeline. First is you said there'll probably be some lawyer tweaks early next week. Is it possible for you to send Michelle and I just that section section for after the end but before the meeting so maybe even Tuesday night, Wednesday morning. Yep, and I'll, I'll send the standard section to KP law basically as soon as we get off the phone today because I just want to make sure if you guys have any final things you want to add we incorporate those now before I send them to KP. And once KP gets back to me with their comments, I'll send them to you. Just make sure if you reply don't reply. Okay, so KP law, okay. And I'll share the KP law markups, if there are any back with you guys. The other thing is, as far as this approach and I think a good way maybe to keep it moving long as if one of us Michelle if you have more interest but I'm happy to do it come up with essentially a series of slides for a PowerPoint, I actually have bullet point statements on them that reference to general changes per section. That keeps us away from going through anything in detail but keeps it open enough that if people have questions we will have time to drill down, you know what I mean. Absolutely and I think that's a fantastic idea Roy. And I want to make this really easy for you and Michelle so do you want me to put a framework for a PowerPoint together or is that something you guys want to do because I just want to support you as staff and do something to kind of help you get the ball rolling if I can. If not, I'm happy to take a backseat and let you guys do it. I mean, I greatly appreciate you leading that. Okay, I think that. Well I don't know like what kind of, you know, general overall handle that you have on creating that PowerPoint but me, I am maybe like a framework from Aaron just in word to them. I don't know are you ready to do that right now Laura or do you need. I'm ready to put some slides together and send them over to Aaron she can just put them together and a quick presentation I think. Okay. Great. Formatting backgrounds, the best in the town and probably presentation. Yeah so I do have a little time on Monday and Tuesday, and I can definitely help with that. So whatever direction makes sense like Leroy if you want to put some ideas together and send me what you have by like, if you can by Monday, and if I don't get anything from you or if I do I can start to just assemble stuff a little bit too. I'll get you something by Monday morning. I'll go section by section so at the very least you'll have a few sections to start with. Perfect. Wonderful Monday morning. Yeah, that's great. That's a great idea I like the PowerPoint idea that like that actually takes kind of a load off my shoulders a little bit because I was kind of, I mean it seems so simple but it's, you know, it's so overwhelming for me to think about it at this point, just because Yeah, that's a great idea. Thank you Leroy that way like sort of the changes are going to be visually presented and not just up to Aaron to recount it and everybody to remember what she said. Fantastic. Thank you. Yeah. Do you Michelle on those points or is that legal error? No, no, just copy me to send them to me and we can you and I can kind of sort out finalizing them and then once we have something sort of semi final I'll just send that out to everybody in advance of the meeting similar to what I do with our regular concom PowerPoint presentation so people can look at it a little bit beforehand. It might actually be a good idea to now that you're now that I'm sort of thinking about this to just include a slide that says on such and such date we started the bylaw review committee meeting we started meetings on this day and we held them every Friday noon you know and just kind of a little update and this is where the meetings are located. If you want to view them, you know, just to give some some of that background history of like how this all started and actually it might even be good to just explain that those these edits have been in the works for before I even arrived they are like 800 markups from others in town before I think like the contributors of the edits like a list of the contributors is good so that everybody knows that it wasn't just this one bylaw review committee. Yeah, yeah, probably you should put the list of reviewers right yeah titles. I'll put the I'll put the historic slide together with information on kind of what was handed to me and who made those edits before it came to me and then the process of setting up the review committee and then Leroy if you want to just focus on the changes section by section and then I can add and modify that if needed. Okay, that sounds like a good approach. Okay, I just clarify are we attempting to get through this entire. I mean there's one meeting to discuss the entire revision. Nope. So the intention is the hearing will be opened on May 4 and and on May 4. We would give that historical context I guess that sounds good. Then start with section one going through what our edits were and why and go section by section. There's five sections the last section there was no changes to so to really just be reviewing the four sections. That will be sort of an introduction and a general overview of changes and then from there we're going to continue that public hearing to May 11. There'll be a hearing on the May 11, General concom meeting. And that I think should be more for public input and will set aside like a 20 minute or half an hour block for public comment on the changes. And then the same goes for the May 25 meeting. So it gives three public hearings over the course of the month of May to give feedback and we can also tell people that they can submit written feedback as well they could, you know, send us an email with their comments or suggestions or whatever. Okay, so then our special meeting will be primarily to present this to the rest of commission and get their input and with the idea of getting through the whole thing and then leaving other sessions open for public comment on that. Yeah, and if we don't get through the whole thing then we can just handle it at a later meeting. There may be people we may want to set aside 20 minutes during that hour to for public comment because I'm sure there will be. Okay, thank you. I think generally on those meetings I think Jen asked the other day, so I would be open to leading them. I said I would be happy but then I was thinking about it. I'm a co-chair there but Michelle you're actually the chair here so I didn't mean to trample on your toes if you want to lead those meetings by all means. I think you're well suited to it as I mean, I can do it here. If you want me to Leroy I will but we can transition to the hierarchy for our normal meetings. Well you guys could also split it up you know what are you. I'm sure I'll have something to say. No I'm fine with that Leroy. I don't think you are if you're interested. Yeah, I don't think there will be much for you to worry about procedurally they should be pretty tight meetings the real concern will be the two that are aimed at public it's going to be mostly just keeping those people concise. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I know that there are going to be people who are probably not impressed with all the changes but I also, you know, sort of look at it from the standpoint of this is the job we're tasked with and it's our job to protect wetlands and that's the purpose of this. It's not there's no other purpose other than that so just to remind people of that. And that I'm Laura you will be leading it though that we just decided to confirm that. Okay. That actually I just as we were talking about as I was talking it might actually be a good idea to also include a slide that explains what the regulations are. We have a bylaw the town has a bylaw and the regulations are what administer the bylaw and just give people that information and explain. This is like the home rule authority this is the version of the basically the wetland Protection Act is state law and this is local law so it's clear to people kind of what we're doing and why. Yeah, just make a note of that. Probably do that at each of the sessions right. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good idea. Okay, well if do we is there anything else like sort of administrative that we want to talk about before we look at this last section. I guess I didn't have time to review the entire 40 pages but just to confirm the. Any sort of editorial errors and you know like spacing spelling and, but those are going to be handled like separately parallel to the content I mean, I just I didn't I was like getting a little caught up in it but I'm just kind of confirming that there'll be some review just for on that level, or do we need to discuss that today to. Yeah. So I could review it and send you some edits. If you want to send me markups that would be helpful. Are you the one that would have to do just like the editorial review. Okay. But the thing is I, oh and the other thing was I forgot to I forgot to mention this. I am also going to send this specific section to Emily Stockman, because she was the one who provided me the guidance, particularly on the guidelines, and, and the isolated land subject to flooding delineation guidelines. So I'm going to send this to her as well as KP law and get both of their feedback and incorporate any changes if I can early in the week but I'll send you the changes from both those folks. But so Michelle maybe hold off on the. Okay. Administrator stuff, but I think to your point, it needs to be made clear. This is still a working document. So, if anybody finds issues with any specific part of the document, it should be clear like a lot of the administrative things are going to be cleaned up this is really just looking at the content. Okay, so final in terms of content, not necessarily editorial review. Right and I'm hoping by the end of May, those versions will be cleaned up. Okay, great administratively. We can take a we can take a couple stabs that that once we get to the content portion. Okay, great. So we will focus on content and that sounds like a good plan. Okay. All right, so is it okay if I jump into let's do it. Okay. Okay. Can you guys see my screen. Yeah. Okay. Okay, so Jen. I had actually asked her to write the preamble for the bank section, similar to what Leroy did which by the way Leroy I took a look at your land underwater section and it looked great. So that was awesome. Thank you so much for doing that. I asked Jen if she could take a stab at this because Jen being a hydrologist I just thought oh gosh the bank section she would really she would really do a phenomenal job on. She was going to try to get me edits by today, but in the off chance that she doesn't have time. What I did was this. Sorry. This is from the wetlands Protection Act. And that's kind of a fallback just to use the wetland Protection Act preamble. And if we if Jen does provide updates, I'll plug those updates in here into this section, just basically outlining the interests that each section aims to protect. Okay. Can you just please turn to the species name scientific name for rainbow trout. This the gene the species should be in lower case. Sorry, I can't let that go. I know whatever. Yeah, just turn it. Let's all stop there. That was from Wetland Protection Act that was an error really act. Yeah. Pretty funny they should have gotten you an edit actually I found a bunch of edits in the Wetland Protection Act while I was doing this. Errors I mean I found a bunch of errors. Okay. Okay, so going down the line I'm just going to go through page by page. So there was no change from existing regulations with regard to the definition and critical characteristics. We may have talked about this before this edit here was basically just to clarify because it was not clear before that the previous iteration of the regulations didn't mention riverfront at all. In this section and so now it is clear that land within 100 feet of bank of an intermittent stream as well as land within 200 feet of the bank of a perennial stream I riverfront is likely to be significant so that change was incorporated. So previous in previous sessions when we reviewed this section, I've mentioned to you that several of the sections took some of the performance standards from the Wetlands Protection Act, but not all of them. So what I did here was I made this section consistent with the Wetland Protection Act. Here it also includes the additional performance standards that are applicable under the local bylaw. So it's not like, for whatever reason there was like certain ones from the Wetland Protection Act that were included but others were left off. They're all included now with the additional two sections from our local local rigs. And then the preamble for boarding vegetated wetlands I wrote based and this was based on some of the, I believe the tiner article the tiner paper that I read I fashioned this so this subsection was completely rewritten. It's completely open to any changes to this is more or less just to have a little bit more comprehensive preamble and also because we have additional interests under our local bylaw that the Wetland Protection Act doesn't have. And so that's why I wanted to adjust our preamble to address those additional interests. The definition here made consistent with the Wetland Protection Act. I don't like the fact that we had a different definition under our local bylaw than under the Wetland Protection Act, and also a more loose definition under our local bylaw than under the Wetland Protection Act that's not how it's supposed to be. They should be consistent. This the same delineation criteria should be being completed for resource areas that are the same under both our bylaw and the Wetland Protection Act so that's exactly what what was done here. This is a cut and paste from the Wetland Protection Act, with the exception of these ones at the bottom that are additional and these address previously altered areas, previously altered wetlands, similar to like that site out on Montague Road, where that was like agricultural use had altered it. No change from existing regulations for the presumption section. Okay, general performance standards for BVW. This is again made consistent with the Wetland Protection Act, with the exception of where underlined so in the town of Amherst and this is not a change from the previous bylaws. So under Wetland Protection Act, it's one to one replication so if they're filling one square foot of wetland they have to replicate one square foot. In the town of Amherst if you fill one square foot you have to replicate two square feet. So that's what that double that underlined takes into account. I just have a question there about maybe consistency and tower denoting differences between the Wetland Protection Act and the bylaw. Maybe a sort of discussed asterisk, which I don't think is appropriate anymore because there's so much integration into the section so that's one thing I think we should remove the asterisk it's just sort of confusing but is Shelby double that are you underlying it for emphasis or that call out the one difference and then otherwise. Okay, I because we don't do that everywhere so I'm just bringing up the why is this the only underlined text and the whole thing at this point. So the general format of this section is cut and paste from the Wetland Protection Act at the top, and then the bylaw specific sub, you know, subsections are below that. The reason I underlined that was because that's actually an edit to the text that I copied and paste from the Wetlands Protection Act and I wanted to just call that out in the version that we're reviewing so that's clear. I'm open to keeping that in the permanent version just to highlight it for people. And I totally hear your point with regard to calling out the bylaw specific performance standards for example. I guess I'm just not sure how to do that consistently without it being sort of like disruptive to the overall document. Because like for example with an asterisk. It's, it's difficult because it might just be a really small change just a couple words like in this case just that those four words are the only difference and so putting an asterisk there gives the indication that there might be a more substantive change. And it's literally just a short word so. Yeah, I agree that it could be disruptive I'm just so I guess is the first time that I'm thinking we've underlined something so I'm just wondering should we keep that in mind for other specific and significant exceptions to state, we can keep going I'm sort of acknowledging that we've used up formatting for like to signify something that we haven't really been doing throughout the rest of the document. That's all, but we can keep going. Yeah, I'll keep that in mind and I might ask Emily what her thoughts are on that. This is the only condition or the only performance standard that was specific to our regulations and this came from the previous iteration of the regs so just to point that out. Actually this one down here. And this is, this is one is pretty important because it refers to stormwater structures. Okay, so isolated wetlands and vernal pools. I'm sorry I've been just thinking about at the risk of lengthening it by a line. Could we not change that underlined portion to keep it the original wetlands protection act, and then add a second line at the end of that section that says in the town of Amherst that square footage just doubled, or something on that line. So that makes it pretty clear. No, I mean, it would be a maybe one a or maybe number eight to put that line in. Where can we just add in the town of Amherst number one, or something that could work or under the town. Something like that. I think that would work better than putting it lower down I'm just concerned that it won't be clear that it's tied back to that particular number one, if we totally agree. Okay, so that would allow us to on underline to take away underline. It seems I don't know it seems maybe menial but it's just. It's just the convention that we haven't used throughout so it. So is it okay would you guys mind if I just keep it underlined and we get to our final. I mean until we present it to the overall board it's just that the reason is so that for me to keep it clear in my own mind. The section that's up on the website I'm not sure if it's even underlined but I'll double check that and the version that we use the clean version that's on the website I won't underline it I just want to make sure that when folks are reviewing it that that's called out specifically. Like KP and and Emily and myself. But I will have quite too much. I said, I'll take remove the underline in the final draft version. It's your part Michelle it is menial but when you're if you're just a lay person reading this and it is the only underlying thing the nature of the line almost makes it feel punitive. Yeah, yeah, maybe that's what I was. Yeah, yeah, I agree. I agree. I like, I like the Roy's. Yeah, at it. Okay. Okay. So, just to point this out this change. The previous version of the standards. Bordering vegetated wetlands and isolated vegetated wetlands were in one section together. I removed isolated vegetated wetlands from the bordering section and put it in its own section along with vernal pools. For me that made it much clearer and more more distinctive that there was a lot of problems with bordering and isolated being combined together in one section. This section, this preamble section was rewritten to account for for that and these resource areas are not resource areas listed in the wetlands Protection Act. Per se, there, there are references to these are these, but they're not considered to be resource areas, unless they're not subject to protection unless they're located in a different resource area. So for example, a vernal pool would only be regulated if it was in riverfront, or if it was within isolated land subject or isolated land subject to flooding, that's the only way that the vernal pool would be regulated under the wetlands protection Act because it's still ACOE. Exactly. Okay. So, my preamble for this one's a little long, and my protections on this section are a little more sort of assertive I guess I would say. Based on the advice and I know we touched on this quickly with the last meeting, based on the advice of Emily Stockman, the definition of isolated, or I shouldn't say that so it under definition it's basically the same isolated vegetated wetlands versus bordering vegetated wetlands. The difference being bordering vegetated wetlands border on something isolated ones do not but the delineation guidelines are the same as far as vegetation soils hydrology. Okay, so there's a section a, which described how to delineate isolated vegetated wetlands. And then there's section B that talks about how to delineate a vernal pool, and the vernal pool delineation criteria came from the certification criteria from the mass division of fisheries and wildlife. So I took their form and basically put it into this format. And Michelle, this is one section, I would really like for you that just this section be for you to take a really hard to look at in terms of like, if you were going out to delineate this would this make sense to you. And is there anything loophole that I like missed in here as far as delineating it. Okay, just quickly then you basically copy this from the criteria for vernal pool certification from mass wildlife right like, I'm like slightly familiar with how to certify a vernal pool so this is the criteria that they use so Yes, but the formatting is different, like, they have it in a, it's like a more of a landscape view sort of. It's got. I'm going to describe this like a, almost like a table, it's in like a tabular format and actually I did put it in the research folder which I haven't uploaded to the one drive but it's a, it's like in a tabular format of how it's done so the format of it is like I had to format it a little differently to get it into this regulatory format. Okay, happy to take a look at that. Okay. And that continues down here to the second page I just didn't when I put in the comment it didn't highlight that. I just also wanted to express that I think it is reasonable that this is longer than the other sections because it's specific to Amherst it probably deserves. I just support that you've been thorough with it, because we are deviating a bit. I think it deserves a lot of clear explanation. In the previous section of the regs it was not clear. And yeah, and also the guidance was confusing to people. And so I feel like, like for example people thought that vernal pool was a subsection of an isolated wetland. So that if it didn't meet the definition of isolated it wasn't a vernal pool. And so this way it breaks it out to two separate sections to make that clear. So it's not a subsection of isolated it actually has its own definition and its own, you know guidelines for delineation. Presumptions this section was completely rewritten. And this was based on that paper in based in part on that paper you sent me Michelle. Excuse me. These general performance standards were taken from the vernal pool performance standards on the last version of the regulations, but I did edit them. So for example, I included shall not to be clear from regulatory standpoint. I also included, or the setback determined to be appropriate by the Conservation Commission to protect said wetland. So, if for example the commission was reviewing a given project and said 100 feet is not enough to protect this isolated wetland or this vernal pool that is in there. It also go the other way. That's true. That's true. If, if it's like, you know, highly degraded or something and the commission and it was like in the middle of town, the commission, you know, could determine that it should have a smaller. And that's an important distinction, especially when people bring up a complaint about that important thing to point out. Okay. Here we go. This is Leroy's section. Thank you Leroy. This looked great and I don't. Oh yeah, I kept the headers. Okay. So, definition here is the same as well and protection and the bylaw regulations that didn't change, I don't believe kept the presumption from wetland protection and added the additional because under our regulations, isolated land subject to flooding also has 100 foot buffer, which it doesn't have, or I'm sorry, isolated, agitated wetlands have 100 foot buffer, which does not have under bylaw protection. Okay, so land under water bodies and waterways. This is one of the sections is really bizarre. There was only a, there was only like three or four performance standards. All of the rest of the performance standards in the wetland protection act were left off of it. And I don't know why that was, but at this, that's this juncture they're added back in. So all of the performance standards under one protection are there. Okay, so this is another. I'm not suggesting this right in the previous iteration of the bylaw regulations land bordering land subject to flooding and isolated land subject to flooding were two separate sections. I incorporated them together. And the reason I did that is because that's how it's how they are in the wetlands protection act, and I'm trying to make our bylaw as consistent with the wetland protection act as possible. So this is a standpoint of definitions and resource area sections. And it was just confusing to me that they were separated, and also sort of duplicative in a way because they're like the same resource areas just once boarding and once isolated. And they're both referenced in the wetland protection act. So it just made sense for them to be grouped together here in my mind anyway. So this is another section where I took the preamble from the wetland protection act and part of it was a symptom of the time that I had available, and also because it's broken out into two separate preambles in the wetland protection act and it's, so I felt safe doing that. Again, it's not as crafted for the town of Amherst specific interests, and if I had a little more time I would have liked to have done each of them individually but I just didn't have that time so there these are basically placeholders if we end up having more time to do that with Amherst specific preamble we can do that but if we don't, the wetland protection act preambles there. I just saw something about isolated wetlands, subject to flooding, including, okay so the distinction with that and vernal pools. And because if a vernal pool. Okay, so this is really important. And, and this is something that you know I'm always learning in this job but this is something that's extremely important. Anytime we have a vernal pool, it should also be referenced as isolated land subject to flooding. So, so a vernal pool is isolated land subject to flooding, but isolated land subject to flooding isn't also a vernal pool. That's confusing. Well, I guess I, yeah, I mean the bottom line is protection, right because you don't want it to be filled because it's holding front floodwaters that could be displaced and end up somewhere else. So hold that thought Michelle, because there is a section of this that may have been a little bit of an overreach on my part and I just want to have you guys give me your opinion on it. This section previously only contained a portion of the wetland protection act definition. I edited it to include the entire wetland protection act definition, and I edited it where underlined. So, these are the sections that I wanted you to read here in particular, the conservation commission shall consider and regulate all vernal pools is certified under these regulations. That's the first thing. The second is the boundary of vernal pool habitat. The third is as defined by these regulations. Okay, so I just wanted to make sure that that was, that was. Yeah, so, um, KAP law will read that, especially the underlying. I don't know if that's the wording because we, we can't certify them but I guess the point is that we consider them and evaluate them as if they were certified right so as long as they are criteria for delineation are the same as certification so that holds a higher standard to identifying them. Yeah, I guess as long as they review that and it's clear that we're not. I'm, it's just seems could be sticky, like that that we consider them as certified. Not that we're. Anyway, I think it's fine. Right, we will regulate them under the some like, based on the criteria of being a certified burn pool. I don't know, I think it could just use review by the law. Okay. I'm sure they'll submit us some comments. Okay, so this is another one here, a couple underlined here. Okay, there's the solid statement I was asking about yet. And then isolated land subject to flooding shall be presumed to be vernal pool habitat. The conservation commission may use its discretion in determining an area is not vernal pool habitat with a clear showing of evidence from the applicant that the area does not have to be flooded. There is not vernal pool habitat with a clear showing of evidence from the applicant that the area does not meet the definition of a vernal pool. Does that come at this clarify some of your question a little bit. I just think for a second. I'm going to eat while you think. I mean so essentially is being the burden of proof on the applicant to show that it's in no way of vernal pool so I just assume unless proven otherwise that a, you know, depression subject to flooding could serve at some yearly interval as vernal pool habitat. Unless there's clear evidence to show otherwise. Yeah, I mean I think that's a good conservative statement. It should be pretty easy to prove it's not a vernal pool like if it has an outlet, you know, or if it has fish in it. Well, I mean, soil hydrology. I mean this is something that we've talked about before like proving something is a vernal pool requires like some tie in with the biological component which makes the room so that can be hard, you know, in year three of a drought when the pool hasn't been active for a while. Right. Well and the other thing is I mean, and I spent a lot of time thinking about this section. It's like, they're the criteria for vernal pool is pretty specific and pretty comprehensive. And so is it fair to then assume that it's a vernal pool by default. To me, the criteria would be, you know, it's a credible credible person was to submit information and I mean maybe we want to add some time of year requirement for that information, like it has to be evaluated in the spring to confirm that it's not or something like that. I mostly don't want to create a situation where something is comes in as in a in a delineation is isolated land subject to flooding. And then we find out later it was a vernal pool, but we didn't know it was we so in this case we would assume it is until information is presented to us that it's not. I'm kind of that one's a little, you know, I, yeah, I think that is safe. This because just the way information is presented to us know, you know, speed at which we're need to consider it. I think I prefer to err on giving the burden of proof to the applicant, but as far as like, you know, timing. I have to read about like certification whether mass fish and wildlife do they have a time of your certification. Like is it, is it reasonable to know biological indicators aren't going to be in there. And I mean unless you come across. Like you said like exoskeletons or something. So is it reasonable to make an applicant wait like the course of the year to prove that that is not a vernal pool. We have in the past. Okay, we have in the past I mean we had a two year hearing at one point for trying to capture that window. Well, determining it was a vernal pool at the end of the day. That's good context. I think it's pretty hard to show outside of the season, you know, but I have, I don't, I don't know, maybe you could just confirm that with your vernal pool expert if she thinks that it's possible like this, you know, under conditions where maybe it doesn't fill every year but every other year 50% of the time. In an off year, can you still determine like the biological indicators or is it important to wait until spring. LaRoy, I'm curious to hear take on that on this. I guess I'm just listening. I can offer any good solutions but I have the same feeling as Michelle which is that it seems like undue burden. And I also have a question about undue cost to applicants. But so far, I don't really see that as a concern. Because, like you said, it seems like if you were easy to prove any common person could come in and say, hey, there's an outlet here. If it was as difficult to increase as you would need a more credentialed person and that's been costing crisis but again that's with difficulty permits so I'm all right with that. The year though, it's just tough to get around. I mean you're absolutely right Michelle. So season to prove it, but we don't want to wait. I mean, yeah, it seems unfortunate that you know if it was happened to be a dry year that we'd have to say you have to wait an entire year but if there's precedent for that. I also don't think it's, you know, reasonable to just because it's the fall and there doesn't seem to be any biological indicators. So we're going to allow complete filling or modification of it, whereas it could be a rental pool and we just didn't know because of the season. I just feel like we need a little expert opinion on that one if it's, you know, is it possible to delineate a vernal pool outside of the wet season. I mean, as an Instagram, we have a permanent comment. I want to do whatever with a certain space. Whether or not we come to find out it actually is burnable pool shouldn't matter that much right I mean it's going to be isolated land subject to flooding. It has its own protections. Yeah, a setback would be different right. This setback would be different, but I guess my point is, it would only change applicants who are really particular or trying to really work right up into that limit. Most of our permits are people wanting to know where things are, or they already know where they are and they're issuing work plans that aren't even approaching. I mean, so functionally it only affects a very few cases. And those are the cases we actually do want to keep an eye on what you're people approaching right up to the limits of things. Right. So I did that way I do kind of agree with the, you know, time of year and we can make people what that's a good point. I mean, honestly, as an ecology background, I'm support time of year to be certain I mean our mandate is to protect the wetland and how can we be sure it is or not a vernal pool. necessarily but again like I would, you know, if, if you have another towns that have other towns done that and also I guess just confirming with some that does these if it's determining that vernal pools are certified in wet seasons because that's when the biology is happening. So if that's the criteria for surveying a vernal pool I think there should probably be a time of seasonality on evaluating. It's, it's status is one. Double done that to for trying to keep as much in line with the status box where we should probably hear with a special one I have to say about. Okay, so I did add a little bit of wordsmithing here while you guys were talking it out I said, if isolated land subject to flooding has observed physical criteria and characteristics of a vernal pool. It shall be presumed to be vernal pool habitat. Like if there's no outlet so physical criteria and being mostly no outlet or connectivity with like a fish bearing water body. Yeah, I mean I'm fine with that but I do think we should make sure we revisit the seasonality here, especially in here with where the burden of proof is stated that. The Commission may use its discretion in determining an area is not vernal pool habitat with a clear showing of evidence in the form of. I don't know if we want to add that Aaron lack of biological criteria. I think I think it'd be too easy just to show like a dried up basin with no biological criteria in it. Can we just refer to our wetland or vernal pool standards, because it's all sort of laid out what we consider to be vernal pool there can we do like in parentheses section blah blah blah. I just want to go back to because we were just talking about the seasonal requirement for checking it, and I was going to add that in here. But if you want to just refer to the section we can do that but I was going to say if we're going to add in the time of year I think we need to say a clear show that there's a lack of biological criteria during the spring vernal pool season or something to that effect. Do we have a seasonality component to a rental pool section that section be. Yeah. We probably should there if we're going to go with this. In which case, can we just refer back to that section and not like sort of. Like mission me is this discretion determining areas not a rental habitat. If, like definitions of vernal pool as like, however you say it, definition or something like that. And yeah I would put the site to like this section. Yeah, I'll do enter. Yeah, I mean in general I think like being really detailed spelling out our definitions and criteria and then referring back to that is probably better than trying to restate it in a different place. So because we just talked about the seasonality thing I want to go back up to. Yeah, for sure. I'm not going to go into that because this is super important right now. I feel like this would be the place to enter this something and Michelle or Leroy if you have recommendation for how to word this something to the effect of biological criteria. Criteria must be observed during the wet season. Like, I don't know, I can look up for language like the inundation period or like. Yeah the wet season and an inundation, I mean spring is important. I know vernal pool, vernal pool, let me just mess. I know that timing I look to you Michelle, it shouldn't really be all wet seasons just whenever it's wet right really should be spring specifically. Yeah, I guess so like Aaron you were looking for a month like a. Yeah, I mean I know Emily Stockman could advise on that like she's told me in the past I believe it's between like May 1 and June 30. It's definitely earlier than May 1 because I was looking at vernal pools and like maybe April 15. Yeah, we can I think we can find that but if you have a placeholder and also I don't want to say April 15 but maybe more like April, like just to make us have some longevity with, you know, climate changes and green patterns, everything. So maybe I'll say, like March 30 to June 30 or something. Yeah, June 15 because they're usually dried up by then I'll put this in here and I'll ask. Great, thank you. I'll ask. Okay, I'm, I feel good, I'm much better about this. Me too if it does end up being a window I mean it does reduce burden to applicants definitely it's a corner of the year. Yeah. Okay but here's the thought. On June 15. You're not going to see necessarily, will you see egg masses in mid June. If we, I would really like to refer to an expert on this one, like when the window is to certified vernal pool because too early and they won't be active to and you know that gives. It's going to be like, you know, you can a pool can become active on a single night, and that single night is corresponding to like a rain fall in temperatures over 50. So that might not happen until April 7. So if the certification is done, or the survey is done April 1 and those conditions haven't happened yet. There should be no indicators in the pool. So I'm almost thinking there should be clarification about, like, we do know specific conditions where amphibians become active, and it's not necessarily a date. It's actually like rainfall and temperature. So if we can be. I feel like our window then could be more specific to the biological activity of a vernal pool and less about people's scheduling a consultant to go out there on a certain day. What I'm going to do is I'm going to ask Emily, I'm going to call her when we're done here and ask her for recommendation on that. I'm going to ask her for a recommendation on language and then, and then once I make that edit I'll send it out to them because I think that's a really important, really important. Okay, thank you. Yeah. I'm excited to see what she says because when I used to be a spare Michelle and Massachusetts anyway a lot of the reds do reference growing degree days GDD instead of. Yeah, probably a system for this. I'm excited. But right and then we don't have to make our window move around with climate change or just it's the conditions are right then we can assume the biology will move along with it. All right, I think that that's good. I'm going to keep moving is that okay. Okay. All right, so I just want to. Where we were a second ago. The reserve physical criteria and characteristics. Take out in characteristics of a rental pool. It shall be presumed to have it that efficient may use its discretion and determining if an area is not a rental pool with clear showing of evidence from the applicant that the area does not meet the definition of a rental pool see definition and enter citation. Okay, so I think that I think that covers it if we have the time your requirement in the definition. For the temperature and rainfall criteria presumptions from wetland protection act general performance standards. Mostly from what when protection act with the exception of these couple at the bottom which were taken from our existing by law. And then these ones were taken from the well and protection act okay. So now we get to the now we get to the really fun part. You guys aren't sharing my my excitement. Okay, so riverfront was specifically is specifically called out in our bylaw as being a protected resource area. It's never listed in our standards as a resource area, which makes no sense to me at all. There was literally no riverfront in here and it has been an issue. Time and time again for applicants claiming there's no riverfront requirement under our bylaw. So at the advice of town council town attorney, excuse me, not town council town attorney, I've added in the entire wetlands protection act preamble definition characteristics. Okay. I'm just going to stop right here because this is definitions. You will see, please note under section three that if the commission is presented with evidence from a credible source that a watershed size of a stream is greater than a half square mile it shall determine the stream to be perennial. We're dealing with an appeal right now. Where these issues are at question. And so this gives the commission the ability to deem the stream perennial locally if it's a half square mile size of watershed period. So I added that in. So that's one change from the state to us in the riverfront section. Very long section. This is why this section is so long, almost 40 pages, because this huge section got added in. It's also very, very important section. So it's very long, lots of lots and lots and lots of performance standards are within this section. And other than my only big question, was there any reasoning behind why it wasn't in there before did they believe it was caption under another standard. My suspicion is that it was an oversight and or whomever was drafting it, it was strategic. But I think it was more strategic, in my opinion, but okay. So that's, that's that and I, I did read through here trying to take out some of the statewide references. There was a couple references to other river basins and you know, that is another section that would benefit from a more critical read through. I mean, I know this stuff is like thrilling to read you guys, but it would really benefit from like a solid set of eyes looking at it and saying, Oh wait, you forgot there's like the ocean here or something. I did try to read it I literally spent like multiple hours yesterday skimming through this and reading it and taking sections out but taking references to other parts of the state out taking references to coastal out coastal waterways and stuff like that. But again, are you asking us to look at it. Can I just write so it's the riverfront standard section. Yeah, the entire riverfront section really benefit from a very critical read through. And then we get back to buffer zones, which brings us back to some of the changes. We've reviewed these previously. But just to make sure this is the direction we want to go. To add in this section from Northampton, which I feel like is a very important section. I tried this section I tried to look at other towns in our region that are similar to Amherst. And my observation is that Amherst or that other towns have more stringent buffer zone standards than we do. And I wanted to make our buffer zone a little stronger. That's why I incorporated these changes to only allow up to 20% of the area between 50 and 100 feet. It was it was 50% before. What was it. No, there was no percentage requirement before this is a completely new section this was taken from the Northampton regs. And part of the reason why it's 50 to 100 feet is because I created a 50 foot no touch, which again, other people might not agree with. But that is a new section here. And then I did add because we had had some discussion about like, well that's a little strict and what about if it's in like a downtown area where it's like heavily developed and so I did add in this sentence. I think that the exceptions can be made on a case by case basis in redevelopment projects urban locations or areas where resource area that values are documented severely degraded. Yeah. I think that's pretty solid I just want to make sure that the exceptions are tied to those items and I think that they are, but I feel like that the exceptions are in cases specifically when it's redevelopment urban degraded, so that it is not just case by case basis it's like contingent on those criteria. And the same concern came to the same conclusion I think it's good the way it is. The word is and instead of or so it keeps it to those three cases. Okay. Again, if you guys have any ideas of how I can tighten that up. I mean, it's been a couple years to suggestions. This. I'm a little nervous about this and the reception that this is going to see. But, I think I love it. Yeah, it's consistent with what I've seen in other communities. I mean, so badly has a 50 foot no touch. I think a point is that we're overdue for a review and revision, and we're coming up to speed with what other towns have probably more recently determined so as far as was different, we're modernizing and based on better understandings of impacts and etc. Like I think that I don't know for sure, but they perhaps have reviewed there's more recently. So in a sense, you know how we were talking about a PowerPoint, sort of at that for at the, at the starting gate before we even delve into going through section by section to point out exactly what you just said, Michelle, like, there are some changes here which expand our are sort of strengthen our jurisdictions a little bit and that there are reasonings and logic behind that. And this is what those reasonings are just to sort of prepare people for this. So, just tonight. So, you know, whatever that changes were made on the, you know, like on the basis of, like, greater understanding experience but also consultation with other town bylaws. The in similar like maybe, maybe say which towns they are because it's not like their anti development towns or anything their towns with similar population sizes similar recall, you know, well and conditions, etc. So, yeah, that we have like a basis for this. I don't think we want to like come off the bat and a defensive standpoint, I think, you know, really carefully considered all of this and just to relay how we did it but not necessarily in a defensive point of view. Yeah, and I, I think, to your point earlier Michelle, the setbacks on a case by case basis, if they're if the applicant is requesting relief from some issue for some specific reason. I think that the commission can take that into consideration, and the same way that the commission can expand its jurisdiction if it's concerned about impacts. The commission could also reduce its jurisdiction if it thinks that a given area is degraded and that, you know, a greater setback wouldn't be of benefit or wouldn't alter the resource area to have it smaller. So, are you planning to, is that going to be like a PowerPoint bullet or are you going to compose that. Anyway, I would put that in the introductory slides. Great. Thank you. Okay. So these some of the there may have been some changes here from the previous wetlands administrator who had submitted some suggested revisions. I didn't go through these ones to distinguish every every single edit that was made, but we do have various. I mean, I have the version of the regs that she edited, and that were edited by multiple folks in, in the town hall before I arrived. If, if folks had questions about that. But there, I didn't make any edits to these sections down below here. And that takes me to the end of this section. Great. It's significantly longer. Let me just see, I just want to just prepare you guys for the difference. So the existing is 11 pages. But a lot of that is clarification through the additions of what lands protection act. Like just making it more complete. And adding in the entire riverfront section, which is huge. So we're still running shorter significantly concerned how much we had. Yeah, I mean, I think we shortened some sections and expanded this section and to me this is the most important section of the document. So I spent this is like where I spent the bulk of my time. So that is that. So you guys want to, I, we've reviewed every section at this point and we've reviewed some sections multiple times. So I wasn't, I wasn't thinking that we were going to revisit the other edited sections. Again, I put clean versions up on our website showing existing regs, changes made, and then the current sections. I've been reviewed by the town attorney at this point with the exception of this one. So this is like our last section. But if you guys feel compelled and have time and you want to look over those final revised sections and you have additional comments, please let me know. Again, we're coming up kind of close to the hearing so I'd like to finalize those as much as possible. There was one which was the fee for emergency certifications, which I left in the $75 fee. Because I don't really want to press that issue or matter but you guys know my feelings on that other than that. So this is like we had talked about where those funds go and how they're allocated and if $75 is representative of like the administrative cost of the permit and the site visit. I think that it probably is if you have to do a site visit, but 75 does seem like a lot. There's been a certificate of compliance and there's really no difference between a certificate of compliance, other than the fact that emergency cert is like high priority, you know, like if you get it you have to respond within 24 hours. I see. Yeah, I don't know I mean I'd welcome other commissioners input on that one just. I don't really have anything more to say except that you have a concern that hasn't really been addressed so yeah. I haven't really to be totally honest I haven't looked at what other towns charge for that permit. But I just have a question about the sections that there were no edits to like specifically limited projects. So what's the reason for not revisiting this you just didn't see any need to or just so I'm clear on the sections that we haven't revised and why. So, limited projects. Are you familiar with limited projects Michelle or should I give a little overview on that. I mean I think I've only had a very marginal experience with them. Okay, so limited projects are reserved under state law for very specific situations. I'll give you some examples. So, like town water and sewer utilities. And the reason is because a lot of those projects because of the way that they're cited. They can't comply with the performance standards. So for example, Like ever source doing right away stuff. So, essentially, we just don't even have jurisdiction if it's a limited project it's an exception. No, no. It's just that there's a very clear process for it. So I'll give you an example. If an applicant is claiming a limited project status, they would note that on their application. They would say, We are a limited project where requesting the commission to consider this as a limited project. And then the commission would say, like, let's give this the straight face test is this really a limited project and and and also is this a situation where the applicant can't comply with the performance standards like can something change with the plan designed to help them to comply. And so the commission has to determine it to be a limited project and it has to be determined that they can't comply with the performance standards in order for it to go forward. So there's sort of like a multi step decision making process that occurs with those projects and that's spelled out by the state now. So my understanding from talking with KP law on that and also on like the minor activities provisions is that we really shouldn't adjust those to be different from state law and the reason for that is because they are specifically set up for entities who can't comply and also to give people relief in very minor situations and so it just opens us up for like litigation situations that we're overreaching our authority. So like those particular cases, I don't, I don't usually, I mean, I, we look at them critically and I do look at limited projects critically, but at the same time, if they genuinely can't comply, you know, there's not a whole lot that you can do. So that's why those sections aren't edited. Thank you for that explanation. And so there may be, you know, not in the case of utility user rail or something is there some nexus with like creating undo. What is it called when you create your own hardship. Just so. Yeah, self imposed hardship. Like there, when somebody comes the limited projects, I don't know if this is would be like a homeowner or, you know, a developer or something but is that under consideration. No, I mean the only time that that that I could really think that that might be is. So for example, like the only thing that spring to mind right now is a solar project. And because solar projects are so new that if, if somebody came before us and they said, we want to build us, you know, solar field, and they constructed their solar field and then after the fact they said, Oh, but we want to put in these huge batteries right next to the river. That the projects constructed and everything's completed. But then three years later, after getting their certificate of compliance, they say we want to put these big batteries right by this river here. That would be the only situation where it would be like a little bit of creating one's own hardship because they've recently developed the site, and it would then qualify because it's a utility. And then their citing is limited because of how they've developed. Does that make sense. Like, they may have used every square foot of developable area to put in a solar farm. And then that's restricted where they can put a battery three or 10 years later, because there's no more upland area on the site to put it, but then they may say it's a limited project. The commission still has the authority to say, no, this is not a limited project or no, we're not granting you limited project, or we want you to comply with the performance standards. You guys still have the ability to do that on the regs. However, they could appeal that. So then, in such a case, that would be up to commission to make sure that the plans approved account for such things and foreseen things. I mean that's sticky I don't know to think about that one. Yeah, but I just I guess I'm just curious about how the interaction between a situation like that and I mean, and that's completely hypothetical. That's like, I'm trying to say an example that speaks to what you're describing. Because like, ever source has their utilities, like mass highway has their highways. The railroad has their rail lines like this. It's not like they're saying like oh we want to put in a new utility corridor, you know it's completely different situation. It's kind of difficult to pick an example out of agriculture would be an example, new agriculture. If somebody wanted to buy a property and create new agriculture, they might say that's a limited project. There are very specific sections of the regs that apply to that which are the exemptions and new agriculture is not exempt, but it has different setback requirements. So for example, like in riverfront you can alter up to the first 100 feet of the riverfront with new agriculture versus single family home. You can only alter up to 10% or 5000 square feet whichever is greater on a lot created prior to August 6 1996 or only 10% on a lot created after August 6 1996. You can see what I'm saying like there's a less strict standard because it's agriculture. Okay, well I, I mean, lots of, I guess, case by case consideration are just curious as to our reasoning not to revisit it. Well and the other thing to think about here is and this is something that we haven't really talked about as a board but situations like that, like the one I described with solar. It's a good place to put in a condition on the order of conditions that states something to the effect of no more alteration is permitted on this site period. Good to know good to, you know, have that foresight and yeah. Okay, well thank you for that. Thank you for my recent example to make you feel better Michelle but I cannot remember for the life of me the property, but someone did come before us probably two months ago. That was looking to make something a limited project and it clearly was not and we just denied it so it is possible. Okay. I was just, yeah, wondering. We did not deny the entire project we denied the fact that it was a limited project and we made them go through a normal permanent process. Yeah, and I think I'm not positive or that may have been the bike path down on Mill Lane. The limited project status, and we did end up approving that and not requiring restoration. There was a little bit of wiggle room that was, you know, allowed but we did require a bunch of plantings as I recall, native plantings around the proposed look off. So it's kind of like a balance I think. But that's a good example bike paths are limited projects. I don't want to take any more of your time because, you know, I think we, this committee has been awesome like as far as our time management is concerned and I am, by the way, I'm like totally shocked that I was able to get this section done by today. I was like freaking out that I wasn't going to get it done. But I do want to get it over to KP law and I want to call Emily as soon as I can. And I don't want to hold you guys up any longer than we have to because I think we've, I think we have really exercised this thing really well. Yeah, this is our final meeting. So here I bit of do then my homework is section B what and you are setting this to KP law what is your requested timeline for my input is that contingent on anything. Okay, I'll just try and get it. If you try to get a meeting Monday. Okay, Monday close a business, then at least Tuesday I have time to adjust if you do. I don't think that it has to be I don't think KP law and Emily have to look at it after you look at it I think you guys can all look at it. And I just incorporate all the edits on Tuesday. Great. Well, and read over riverfront section. That's the big ones, riverfront section just to make sure I didn't miss anything I'm going to try to read through it again too. That was very rushed yesterday afternoon to get that done. Well, thank you everybody it's been really productive and educational and pleasure to work with you both. I'm excited to see how it's received. And excited for its implementation. Which would be fairly quickly I mean once it's approved and right into effect. Okay, once once it's voted to approve it, presumably on May 25, it'll be, it'll be official. Oh, it doesn't even have to be read by the time console. Just in time for this season. Absolutely. All right, guys. Thank you so much. And I will look out for markups. Okay. Bye guys.