 This program is brought to you by Cable Franchise Vs and generous donations from viewers like you. All right, welcome to the Amherst Planning Board meeting of May 19th, 2021, based on Governor Baker's Executive Order suspending certain provisions that would be meeting law GL Chapter 30A, Section 20 and signed Thursday, March 12th, 2020. This planning board meeting is being held virtually using the Zoom platform. My name is Jack Jumpsack and as a Chair of the Amherst Planning Board, I'm calling this meeting to order at 7.35, I'd say. This meeting is being recorded and is available to you. Well, actually, that's what I have on my computer. It's 7.36, excuse me, 6.36, sorry. Okay. Did I say 7? You did, and so I see. Oh, okay, yeah, so 6.36. Oops. This meeting is being recorded and is available via Amherst Media Livestream. Minutes are being taken. Board members, I will take a roll call. When I call your name and meet yourself, answer, affirm Liddy, and then place yourselves back on mute. Ria, Chao? Here. Tom Long? Here. Andrew McDougal? Present. Doug Marshall? Present. Janet McGowan? Here. And Johanna Newman? Not on yet? Okay, and myself. Okay, I suspect that Johanna will be on shortly. Board members, if technical issues arise, please let Pam know. If technical difficulties occur, we may need to pause temporarily to fix the problem and then continue the meeting. Discussion may be suspended while the technical issues are addressed and the minutes will note if this happened. Please use a raise hand function to ask a question or make a comment. I will see your raised hand and call on you to speak. After speaking, remember to re-mute yourself. Opportunity for public comment will be provided during the general public comment period and reserved for comments regarding items that are not on tonight's agenda. Public comment may also be heard at other appropriate times during the meeting. Please be aware, the board will not respond to comments during general public comment period. If you wish to make a comment, join the meeting via the Zoom teleconferencing link, which is shown. And it's also available on the meeting agenda posted on the town website via the calendar listing for the meeting. You can also go to the planning board webpage and click on the most recent agenda, which lists the Zoom link at the top of the page. Please indicate you wish to make a comment by clicking the raise hand button when public comment is solicited. If you have joined the Zoom meeting using a telephone, please indicate you wish to make a comment by pressing star nine on your telephone. When called on, please identify yourself by stating your full name and address and put yourself back in your mute when finished. Speaking, so residents can express their views up to three minutes. And at the discretion of the planning board chair, if a speaker does not comply with these guidelines or exceeds their allotted time, their participation will be disconnected from the meeting. Okay, with that said, we can go to item one, which is the minutes and... We have minutes of April 21st. Correct, okay. And I am looking from other board members with regard to any comment or motions on these minutes. So move. Okay, so Andrew. Second. And any discussion on the minutes? I see no hands raised. I'll do roll call. Maria. Andrew. Aye. Doug. Aye. Tom. Aye. Janet. approve. Johanna, is she here yet? No, okay. And myself, so that's a six zero. All right, so, and we have a public comment period. And I'm looking at our attendees, see if any hands are raised. I see John, Brennan Bailey, Nino, I'm not sure how to pronounce the last name, but so we have three hands raised and we can start with John. Jack, may I just say, were you planning to address public comments for the inclusionary zoning and the moratorium at the time that the board is talking about those things? In other words, are you looking for public comments that are not about things on the agenda right now? Yeah, they should know that. So, you know, we will not accept comments on the topics that we will be discussing tonight, which are really focused on the inclusionary zoning, biological 15 and the temporary moratorium, building moratorium, article 16. So those two things are on our agenda. So folks that want to present, public comments should know that they don't want to present comment yet on that because they will have their opportunity later and those hands have gone down. Okay, so. John. Thank you. John Hornick, I have enabled you to speak. Did you have a comment that you wanted to make now or are you going to wait? No, I'm going to wait. Okay. I lowered my hand. Okay. Thank you. Thanks, John. Okay, so we have, we're meeting, we're going to start the inclusionary zoning meeting at seven jointly with the CRC. So we have about 15 minutes or so to go over the other items that are on our agenda. And do you, Chris, do you think we should just go to old business? Sure. Okay. Old business. We can talk about 462 Main Street. You mentioned that before the meeting began. Correct. Back, I think it was last year in 2020, early 2020 reviewed a proposal for 462 Main Street. Which is John Robleski's property along the railroad tracks along Main Street. And at that time, you were reviewing an amended site plan review application for 24 apartment units. And you approved it. That was amended from a previous application that was for 16 apartment units. But, and Mr. Robleski at that time was going to continue to use the house that's on that property. It's a White House with red shutters. He was going to continue to use that for office use as he'd been doing since he bought the property and the previous owner had also used that for office use. In any event, he is finding that he feels that it's going to be harder to fill that building for office use. The building has a number of, what should I say? It has a number of quirks being an old building. It's not handicapped accessible. It's a little bit, it's got some issues related to moisture and other things. So anyway, he is coming to the historical commission and asking for permission to demolish that building, that white building with the red shutters. So I don't know when that hearing is. I think it might be tonight actually. Mr. Morris nodding his head. So that the historical commission is meeting tonight and that is being considered. What he wants to do is use that space that would be there after the building comes down to have some additional parking. And I think he also wants to have a little utility building there of some sort. You know, and I think it's bicycles, equipment and different things like that. So anyway, he's proposing that to the historical commission tonight and we'll see what they say about that. And then if it transpires that he does take the building down and he wants to use that property for something else, he would have to come back to the planning board and file an application for an amended site plan review. So we approved a plan that had, that building was involved within the plan that we approved. I think that the trash, or I think a bicycle shed or trash receptacle or something, several things are, I mean, at what point will we see that if at all, Chris? Perhaps you would like to consult Mr. Mora who's here. He knows a little more about it than I do. I'm not as much up to speed as he is. Yes, please, Rob. Hi, yeah, so you're right. He originally had in his proposal to do an alteration to the, I think it was the North end of that building to create the trash and recycling storage and improve that area a little bit of the building. So if he receives a approval from the commission to demolish tonight and decides to move ahead with altering the site plan with a new building or altering the parking spaces and removing that building, then that would be submitted to the planning board. I would expect soon because I know just from talking with the applicant that, I think they found that moving forward on renovating the building wasn't the best option for him at the moment. And we would like to switch gears and go this other route. So I think if there wasn't a delay put on the project, then we would pretty quickly see plans developed and submitted for the planning board's review. All right, thank you, Rob. Pam, I think we know that Johanna is with us. 645-ish. I put 644. Oh, okay, good, good. Okay, thank you. Hi, Johanna. Other old business, Chris? I can't think of anything. Okay, and any new business items we want to talk about? Now we got like... Jack, Ms. McGowan raised her hand. Oh, sorry. During that conversation. So I just have a question about the Victorian house because that was the primary use of the lot. And I think that... So how many offices were in there? Because I remember that he said he didn't have problems renting the offices and he'd had a good clientele. There's also parking spaces allocated to that use. Does anyone know how many offices are there? Or I guess you could look that up if you don't know. Do you want me to answer that? Sure, thank you, Chris. So Tom Crossman, who is a property manager, had his office there and I think he still does, but he's planning to move into the new building. That space that's being created as part of the mixed-use building is where he's going to be operating. And I think that the other... I don't know about the other tenants of the White House, but there were probably three or four tenants of the White House, but I don't know if they're still in business. I think what Mr. Roboleski said to us was that as a result of COVID, the COVID situation and then also as a result of the building being in poor condition and also people just not looking for office space that he was envisioning, finding it hard to find tenants. And that's why he wasn't interested in investing a lot to fix up the building. That's my recollection of what he said. Thank you. And I'm just looking for other hands up. I don't see any. So move on to the next slide, new business, Russ. I can't think of any, trying to think. New business, nope, can't think of anything. Okay. Form A in our subdivision applications. You will be receiving a Form A next time at your June 2nd meeting. It's going to be property up along, let's see, I don't even know the name of the street, but it seems- 70 Blossom Lane. Thanks Pam. You're welcome. It's west of Southeast Street and at the very end of Blossom Lane and it's a rather large property and it has a fence that is actually located on its neighbor's property. So in order to correct that problem, the neighbor is selling a little strip of land to this property, 70 Blossom Lane. So you're going to see that. It's a very minor change for 70 Blossom Lane. It may actually affect the other property adjacent to it more since that property is a flag lot. That property is coming to the zoning board of appeals for a renewal of its flag lot special permit sometime in the next few weeks. So that will be one of the things that Pam would report on under ZBA applications. So you'll be seeing that, but you won't see it until June 2nd because we haven't heard back from the town engineer. Thank you. Upcoming ZBA applications. There are some. And I made a little slide. So let me just share that screen with you. Can everybody see that? Yes. So the CBA is going to review three new applications at their May 27th meeting. The first one is the one Chris was just talking to which is the renewal for a special permit for a flag lot. And that is property that's located off of Southeast Street. Another application is for property at 279 Amity Street. And that's a request for a special permit. They actually are proposing to put an addition onto the house such as pre-existing, non-conforming, one family detached dwelling that they're going to add an addition to. And then at 187 College Street, a request has been made for a special permit for a change of use. So the property there is currently a one family detached dwelling and they're proposing to change it to a non-owner occupied duplex dwelling. And they're proposing to add an addition onto it. So to make the property a duplex, there would actually be two. So existing, there is a building that has four bedrooms in it. And they are proposing to add onto that another, I guess you would call it a building that would also have four bedrooms in it. And Rob, I don't know if you have more to share about any of those or not, but that's what I know. Thank you. Question we usually ask the planning board are you interested in reviewing any of these? They seem to be smaller projects. Would that be your opinion, Chris? Yeah, so Doug. I think I would want to see the one on College Street since we're talking about multi-family conversions a fair amount. May I ask about the scheduling? Pam, when are these scheduled to go before the ZBA? They're going in front of the ZBA on May 27th. So that would be next Thursday. So unfortunately, there wouldn't be time to have a presentation to the planning board. But what we could do is tell the applicant that we want to have a presentation to the planning board and then tell the ZBA that, and then the ZBA could continue the public hearing on May 27th until it had heard back from the planning board. Would you would like me to do? Doug, does that sound good to you? Yeah, I hate to be the only one that causes a delay about all this. So it'd be helpful to know whether I'm a lone voice or whether anybody else on the planning board thinks that would be worthwhile. Yeah, I see a bunch of hands. Andrew, Tom, Janet, Andrew. I'm on board. Let's do it. Yeah, Tom. And Janet? I agree, because I'm just interested in if it's going to be student housing and just thinking about strong street and things like that. I think it'd be good to go through that. Yeah, and I agree as well. So Chris, loop them in to us when convenient. Okay, thank you. June 16th, because the June 2nd meeting is going to be all about Archipelago. So it would have to be June 16th. Okay, that's what I'll do then. Thank you. Great. All right, so is that it, Pam? Yes, it is. Okay, so upcoming SPP, SPR, SUB applications? Other than Archipelago and Emily Dickinson, we don't, as far as I know, have anything definitive at this time. Okay, going on to the Planning Board Committee and liaison reports. I, Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, we have a meeting, I believe, you know, is it this week or next week? But no, you know, no big news. Gonna say more, say more over there, but the CPA, Andrew? Nothing to report. Okay, and Ad Commission? Yeah, two quick things. We tried to have another meeting last night and again, failed to have a quorum. It's a commission of seven members and right now there are only four active members and we got three out of four, but not enough for the four-person quorum. And then I just noticed on the agenda for this evening, it says that I was nominated but have not, but I'm still awaiting appointment and that's no longer the case as of, I think it was January. Thank you. So sorry. Yeah, thanks Doug, sorry about that. Design Review Board, Tom. We have not had a meeting since our last meeting. So we had a meeting last Monday, but then we had a subsequent meeting where I think I updated you guys that I think we heard from Archipelago again or for the first time as DRB. And if we have time, another time, we can go through the comments. There's quite a few and I think they've been written up and I can make sure you guys have access to those. Yeah, it looks like we're approaching the seven minute or excuse me, seven o'clock hearing time. So yeah, so if he can just update us next time. I'll forward them on, yeah. Yeah. And zoning subcommittee, we're kind of like, well, we're gonna have a joint hearing tonight. So, but Chris, do you have anything else to add? That should really say community resources committee rather than zoning subcommittee. Oh, I'm sorry. Yes. That's our fault. I misread that. That's my fault. So we had a meeting of the CRC on May 11th and we tried to talk about a bunch of different things but I actually, my mind is blanking right now on what we talked about. I'm so sorry. Andrew Joe is here if you wanted to hear from her. Yeah, we, well, okay. Yeah, it's all fine. We have a lot on our plate tonight. And so at this point, we can invite the CRC to commence their part of the meeting. I'd be happy to, but I don't think there's a quorum yet. Okay. I keep checking attendees to see if they signed in as attendees. All right. We'll just keep us posted. I will take the opportunity to update you on May 11th discussion. We were hoping to discuss demo delay bylaw at the May 11th CRC meeting, but we did not have time for that. What we discussed was that we were going to have to have the apartment definition proposal which I think is coming to you guys. I'm not sure when Chris would know. There's so much in my head right now. I can't grab hold of that date. So sorry. But I have it written down. Good. Good. We're getting a report of the chair. I don't really have that and report of staff. And then, and then we actually, we can just. Report of staff would be that we're. Way too busy. With it all in our heads. Yep. Great. So the rest of the meeting, we're going to have these two hearings. And once Mandy has. The CRC quorum. She is going to chair that. And we'll conclude the meeting. We were thinking about a little bit different process for the planning board. Usually we. Will. You know, here, here. The, you know, project proposal. And then get public comment. And, and then we'll vote on it, but we're not going to vote on it. Until CRC. And then we're going to vote on it. And, and then we'll vote on it, but we're not going to vote on it. Until CRC. We're going to close the hearing. And then deliberate after. Both hearings have, have concluded. So. Just so the planning board members know that. Assuming it's not too late. I see Dorothy Pam and the attendees could. I'm just, I'm just, I'm just. Did you pull her in? I can. And I was wondering, Mandy, Joe, if I should be making you a co-host as well. If you want to, you may. Okay. I know Nate's going to help me manage stuff. So I appreciate that. And I'm going to focus on writing. So let's see. So once Dorothy, Dorothy is in now. She should be, or at least coming on over there. She is there. So I'm seeing a quorum of the community resources committee present. I'm going to call the special meeting of the community resources committee to order. At 7.02 PM. As has already been announced through the planning board. This is virtual by order of. The meeting of the community resources committee. So I'm going to check that Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law. So I'm going to just check to make sure everyone can be heard and can hear for those on my committee. Shalini. I'm here. Dorothy. Here. Steve. I'm here. And Evan. Here. Excellent. And Mandy is here. So we have all five members here. As Jack already announced. I will be chairing the public hearing and opening it and everything. So. I think we are ready to start, right, Jack? Correct. So at 7.03 PM. In accordance with mass general law chapter 40 a. The Amherst planning board and the community resources committee of the town council holds this joint public hearing. On Wednesday, May 19th to consider the following. Proposed amendments to the zoning by law. Please note in accordance with Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law. This meeting will be conducted virtually and will accommodate public comment to the extent practical. This hearing is on zoning by law article 15 inclusionary zoning to see if the town will vote to amend the zoning by law. By amending article 15 inclusionary zoning to expand the applicability of inclusionary zoning, including amending the language referring to local preference, expanding the categories of residential uses to which inclusionary to which in to which the inclusionary zoning requirement applies requiring a tiered level of affordability for projects. Requiring six or more affordable units adopting the definition for residential development and increasing the number of affordable units required to qualify for a special permit to allow offsite provision of affordable units or to allow a payment in lieu of provision for affordable units. So the hearing is open. Here is the plan on how the hearing will. Go forward. We will start with. I'm going to run through the process and then, and then we'll actually do it. And we will start with board and committee member disclosures and then we will have a presentation from the planning staff who is the sponsor. I do not believe there was any site visit because this is not a site plan review or special permit hearing. So it's on the list, but I don't think that happened and normally doesn't. And then it's going to be questions from the boards and committees from the members here, then questions from the public, then public speaking in favor of revision, public speaking in opposition of revision, the applicant's response or the sponsor's response, if any, and then continuing questions from the board or committee. Once those questions are done at the end of that, we will vote to close, we will take a motion and vote to close the hearing. Comment on the hearing other than the sponsor presentation will be limited to three minutes at a time. And I will be trying to time that accurately. But that is how we will do it. And so at that, this point, we will start with, are there any questions from the planning board or the CRC members? First of all, seeing none, we will start with any board and committee member disclosures. Are there any. Seeing none. We will move on to the planning staff presentation. I believe it's going to be Chris and Nate. Is that right? Nate will present the. The item. Okay. Thank you, Nate. You're on. It looks like there's a member in the audience who raised the hand. I don't know if we would want to. There's a question about the process or wait. So the member of the audience is Andrew block. Please lower your hand if it is unrelated to a question about the process. Keep, please keep it raised. If it is a question about the process. That we will be going through tonight. Okay. I will, since it is still raised, I will move on to the next slide. Okay. I will, since it is still raised, I will. You are using an older version of zoom. Andrew. So let me see if I can. Bring you in to ask a question about the process. You should be able to unmute yourself now, Andrew. Yep. Can you hear me? Yes. Thanks. So I guess I have a question about process, but also content. Was my understanding that perhaps this meeting would address a proposal for a six month postponement of any building? Is this the correct meeting? So that hearing is scheduled to start at 8pm tonight. So there are two public hearings on the schedule of seven o'clock one on amendments to inclusionary zoning and an 8pm hearing on a proposed moratorium. So we will address that one starting at 8 o'clock tonight. All right. Well, I'll come back for that then. Thank you. Thank you. You're welcome. Sure. Thanks. So I'm going to share my screen. I'm going to give a brief presentation and then also then share the bylaw, you know, showing the language as proposed. Yep. Is that visible to everyone? Yes. Great. And so yes. So my name is Nate Malloy. I'm a planner with the town and this is, uh, you know, a few slides. Okay. They update to the inclusionary zoning bylaw. And the, um, The purpose as inclusionary zoning bylaw is to maintain and increase the supply of affordable and accessible housing in the town ofーんburst. You know, I think accessible. Um, as it doesn't necessarily mean ADA accessible, but accessible as in, there are lower barriers to access to housing are the current The current issue being addressed by the proposed changes. Right now the inclusionary zoning applies to projects that produce 10 or more new dwelling units that require a special permit for the use. Or a special permit to modify certain dimensional standards, you know, building coverage, lock coverage, additional floors or increase in height greater than two feet. So, you know, projects that are by site plan review or by right. They don't, you know, they don't trigger inclusionary zoning. And so, as you know, the statement says mixed use building in the downtown or in certain zoning districts by site plan review doesn't provide any affordable units. There are a number of strategies that were used to update the inclusionary zoning bylaw and we'll see those in the text but you know one is elimination of the current threshold for a special permit for use or modifying the dimensional modification so that threshold is changed. Clearly state the bylaw applies to most residential projects, so it clearly states now that it applies to townhouses, apartments, mixed use buildings that result in 10 new dwelling units. There are exceptions. You know, a comprehensive permit project a 40 b project is exempt conventional and cluster subdivision is exempt. It's typically about the creation of a roadway and lots and not necessarily about the development of units, ironically, you know, because someone can propose a subdivision but they may not be the developer of the units projects in the fraternity zoning district and not necessarily limited land but and what's allowed in the fraternity zoning district. Institutional uses that contain residential units. So, you know, Amherst college produces, you know, a residence hall that isn't subject to this and then public housing. We're expanding the definition of local preference. And as Mandy read in the public notice we're defining what it means for new dwelling units and a new definition for residential development. That term residential development has been in the bylaw but it was never defined require that larger rental projects provide tiered affordability. So to income levels, and then increase the payment in lieu of There's many elements that are retained from the current bylaw. So, the idea that 10 or more units is the the threshold in terms of project size that remains the same. The percentage requirements for providing affordable units remains the same. So, if you produce, you know, nine units or less, you know, this that project doesn't need to provide affordable units through inclusionary zoning. A developer can always voluntarily though provide for the units. So 10 to 14 new units it's one affordable dwelling 15 to 20 new units it's two affordable dwelling units and then if it's 21 or over in terms of new units is 12% of the total unit count. And then you know it's rounded up if it's in between. And then there is this provision in the bylaw that was adopted more recently but it's a special permit can be issued to modify the percentage of offsite units and originally right now in the violence for more affordable units we're changing that to six but the bylaw does allow for a provision of offsite units or a payment in lieu of and so there is minor changes to these provisions but those are currently in the bylaw and we're proposing to, you know, change those a bit to make it a little bit more challenging in terms of project size or payment in lieu. In terms of the actual language. Is this visible for members, the bylaw. So in the intent and purpose and 15.03 what's shown in bold italics is is new language and what's in read and strike through is being removed and so you're saying to the extent allowed by law, ensuring that the permit granting authority or the special permit granting authority consider offering local preference for new affordable housing as a condition of the permit or special permit. And so there's a number of categories for local preference and as you can see in red originally was it said to persons who live or work in Amherst but there are more categories in that for local preference so the thought is that this new language allows the permit granting authority to expand who you know, who can, who can, who can be part of local preference so it's not just liver work in Amherst it's also if you have school age children in Amherst. So there's other you know and it's also regulated by the state so we can request it as a permit we can't require it we have the town that has to request it through the state. So in 15.10. Again, we're including this new language will apply to residential development, including but not limited to townhouses apartments mixed use building planned unit residential developments or perds, or open space conservation developments, or CDs that provide new dwelling units, and then new dwelling units is a is a new. We're redefining it, meaning a combination of units that have received or will receive a certificate of occupancy in any five year period, and are located in new buildings or additions to existing buildings. And any net increase in units resulting from reconstruction of existing buildings, except for units resulting from, and then there's a list of clear exceptions and so you know, you know staff feels that this definition. The five year period in this particular occupancy helps capture projects that may be phased so you know sometimes developers may phase a project to avoid inclusionary zoning and so you know with this new definition. The idea is that it would capture it. The exceptions are what we've listed previously. You know companies that permit a 40 B project, a conventional subdivision or cluster development. There are uses in the fraternity residents the RF district institutional uses housing constructed by a public agency. And then replacement of units that after damage by fire water natural disaster. The changes here is what's taken out in red is the threshold for the special permit so now it's reading that any all residential development resulting in new units above the number already existing in the development shall provide affordable units at the following rates. And so, you know instead of requiring a special permit now it's just they have to, you know, new to any development that has new units. And the bylaw already said in in the asterisks, see sections 4.33 and 4.55 and those are cluster development and open space community development and so we just include a language as a more direct reference so in those sections, there can be affordable units provided, not through inclusionary zoning. We've eliminated the special permit modifications for the building coverage lock coverage and height. And then with the double asterisks this is the tiered affordability when six or more affordable rental units are required. 20% of the affordable units shall be affordable to households earning 60% of the area meaning income or less as calculated by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. And so six or four six or more rental units that is a project of 46 or more units so it's a pretty sizable project that would then have to provide this tiered affordability. 13.12 is a new definition for residential development. It means new dwelling units on one or more adjacent properties developed at the same time or in phases, you know, within the, you know, the five years, and that share aspects of the property such as but not limited to shared utilities a common driveway shared parking, or the use of the combined properties for a lot or building coverage calculations. And staff included this because oftentimes there are adjacent properties where someone will have maybe a common driveway and develop it at the same time and and really for the context of this bylaw this is, you know, one residential development. And so, you know, we're defining it as that. And then the the enumeration for the rest of, you know, the subsequent sections is different. That's not shown in bold but you know with the new sections the numbers change. 15.17. This is the provision allowing the permit granting board or special permit granting authority to grant a special permit for modifications. And we're increasing it except that when it's now six affordable units are required, rather than four, it says a minimum of 50% of the units must be provided on site. However, there is a provision for offsite affordable units, which isn't changing. And there's the BVC, so general business, Village Center business, their neighborhood business, and the BL districts of budding BG so in those owning districts, half the units could be provided offsite through a special permit, or within 500 feet. And there's also a payment in lieu of, and Can't hear you. You can't hear me. Strange because I could. I'm not having the problem crisis. I know I couldn't hear anybody I'm sorry and me it's okay. All right. So then we have the offsite affordable units and then the payment in lieu. Again that's currently in the bylaw and the recommendation is to increase the payment from three times the median income to four times the median income. To five thousand so four times that is what we see as a relevant amount to to offset the cost of not providing a unit so that amount of funding, going to the housing trust could help actually build the unit. So, so the recommendation is to increase, increase it to four times. And those are the changes to the bylaw. Thank you Nate Chris would you like to add anything. I wanted me to explain why we're asking to have 20% of the units be 20% of the affordable units be reserved for those making 60% or less of area median income. It has to do with the way affordable units are sized. It has to do with section eight vouchers and he can explain that. Yeah, sure. Thanks Chris yeah I guess I should say that, you know in our bylaw we define affordability as 80% of the area median income, and we're in the spring field metropolitan statistical area so the msa springfield msa. So, 80% of the area median income is a standard definition used by the state in the town. Because Amherst has such a high demand for housing and the rental amounts are high at 80% am I a voucher holder, and actually, you know, a number of other lower modern income tenants can't afford to live in Amherst so 80% is actually above the rental amounts that a voucher program even allow someone to live in the unit so they're not even eligible to apply to those units if it's at 80% am I. So it's closer to 70%. 60% was used also it's the, the area median income amount, often used by the loan come housing tax credit and other subsidy program so it's a it's a standard amount that's calculated it's something that Amherst as a town won't be calculating on our own it's already calculated by by harder other agencies so we're not trying to figure out what is 60%. It's calculated on an annual basis for us, and we can use that. I think that concludes the sponsor presentation is that correct. There as far as I know, there was no site visit, so we don't have to report on that. That means we're on to questions from the planning board in the Community Resources Committee, if people have questions could raise their hands I will try to recognize them in the order that they are raised. Dorothy. I think there's something I rarely do. I think you've done a fabulous job of putting all these details. I've been to so many meetings where these items were discussed, and you've really arranged them in a way that's comprehensible and clear. So, I just want to say thank you very much for all your great work. Thank you Dorothy. Any other questions from the boards or committees. Jack, I can't raise my hand. Thank you for that reminder. Jack and then Andrew. I was just wondering about the magic number of 10. And, and, you know, where's the backup and history for, you know, other towns in the Commonwealth or, or elsewhere, where 10 is the number. I don't know if, you know, Nate, you can speak to that or Chris. Yeah, I think the, you know, there's a balancing act with inclusionary zoning, you know, you need a strong enough housing market so that, you know, your requirement for affordable housing doesn't deter development or, you know, have the price passed on to market rate and so, for instance, in communities closer to Boston, they start at six units. And they even have a higher percentage, you know, say 15% of the units instead of a graduated, you know, up to 12%. So, you know, when we had our comprehensive housing market study, the consultants thought 10 in 2013 and 15 thought 10 was the right number but they actually recommended a 15% affordability calculation and we haven't increased that. So, you know, they thought 10 was appropriate for, you know, the types of development, the size and the demand for housing. So, you know, there's a number of factors that would, you know, weigh on that, on that number. You know, there's an economies of scale too. So usually they say under a certain number, it's just not economical to require affordable units. So, you know, we're saying 10 is the right number. In actuality, we probably haven't seen that many proposals that are 10, most of the proposals that we've seen for the development are greater than 20 in the last few years anyway. I think that, you know, in the last, you know, say 10 years has probably been, I have a number, I have a chart, but it's probably been about 15 developments that, you know, have 10 or more units. And that really depends on, you know, we also permit a lot of single family homes, you know, so there's other duplexes. So there is a range of, you know, number of units permitted. Okay, I'm just thinking of the projects we've seen in the last five years from the planning board. I think all of them have been greater than, say, 20 units versus the 10 but just wanted to get your input on that. Thank you very much, Nate. Thank you. Andrew. Thank you. Nate, great presentation. Andrew, we can't hear you. We just lost you. Can anybody hear me now? Yeah. Okay. I will try and if not, I'll come back later. So you've identified some loopholes like phase developments, which is great. Are there any other areas that you have concerns that might present potential loopholes down the road? And one that popped in my mind was just the offsite units, like one of the nice things about this proposal is that you've got sort of the income levels living together. You know, is it possible that that offsite units could be used to essentially like, I don't dump some of these units in a different part of BG, BVC, you know, some of those planning districts where we may be missing some of that spirit of the principle. Yeah, that's a good question. The housing trust really discussed this and, you know, they felt that because you already have to provide half the units on site that providing half offsite and with the geographic proximity. So with the 500 feet or the same zoning district, they felt that, you know, it wasn't an issue of fair housing. So one of the housing trust members who works for mass housing said that other communities are using this provision. You know, it would be an issue if we didn't limit it. Say, for instance, they had a product downtown and then you could put it in, you know, on the border of North Amherst or something. But because we have a geographic kind of proximity to the project site, the trust felt that that was actually okay. And they actually preferred the provision of offsite units rather than the payment of Lua because they'd rather see units get built. And so, you know, stats talked about this and I think, you know, it's a special permit. So it's not as if it's by right. So I think the applicant would really have to prove why they would need offsite units. And then, you know, staff would likely recommend a condition that there be, you know, that the applicant show they have site control and they probably receive certificate of occupancies at the same time so that there'd be some conditions, you know, having both the projects happen at the same time. So, you know, it wouldn't be like a five year lag before the offsite units are occupied but, you know, we could have some provisions and conditions of permits that would make sure they are actually developed and an occupiable. Love it. Thanks, Nate. Thanks, Joe. Andrew Doug. Yeah, speaking about loopholes. 15.12. You have, you have a pair of independent phrases linked by and Don't hear him. He's saying that 15.12 has independent phrases linked by and me to share my screen again. Yeah, yeah, you say residential development means new development on one or more properties developed at the same time or in phases. And that share aspects of the properties. I'm wondering whether you might want to make that a but or or rather, and or just because I could see somebody maybe taking a large parcel and splitting it in half and developing to nine unit projects on the two parcels and and not having them share you know, aspects. And, you know, then they've then they've then they've gotten around your requirement. All right. Thank you, Doug, Janet. Thank you for this presentation and for doing this work on this. The IZ article, I feel like we're sort of coming to the end of the road of a long period of trying time of getting it right, although we can always make adjustments later. I think it's really uniform. It's very simple. It applies to everybody. There's no kind of dimensional requirements that trigger so someone can go up to the inch and not over it. And really, I really appreciate this, this draft or this, this own proposal, but I have, I have a question that I think Carol Lewis from the housing trust had sent us an email asking why there was an exemption for cluster developments. And so I was kind of wondering why because and then I looked the cluster developments, the bylaw sections have always sort of daunted me. And so I was looking at it quickly, and it seems like under section 4.33, if the developer provides to at least 10% affordable units, they can get quite a huge increase in the number of building lots. And so I was wondering what the rationale was there, like, if, if somebody had a cluster development of like 25 units. Or do I mean, like, how do these two play off of each other, why, why is cluster development, not automatically required to do 10%. And then it seems like in this case the cluster development under 433 would get a kind of a bonus of extra lots that nobody else is getting. Chris, you raised your hands. Do you want to answer that. So, I think that possibly in the future we might want to include standard subdivisions and cluster subdivisions in inclusionary zoning but for now I think it's too complicated. Someone can come along and subdivide a piece of property. And with that really means is to create a road, put in infrastructure sewer water electricity, whatever, and divide the property into lots, and then he might just sell off the lots. And there's no guarantee that the same developer is going to be developing all of the lots and it mean it seemed to me that it really made more sense for this round of inclusionary zoning amendment to focus on developments where the whole development was being done by one developer and you could capture the 10% right at that time or the 12% or whatever percentage it is that you wouldn't have to go on into the future and I'm going to use Amherst Hills as an example of a subdivision that's taken a very long time to develop. So it was originally developed by Doug Cole or originally no it actually was started, I think it was started by Jeffrey flower, back in the late 80s, and then Doug Cole bought it, and then he passed away and it's been being developed by Tafino associates. Since, you know, late 80s until now, and it's still nowhere near done. It's got 42 houses out of potential 70 and Amherst. If you had to track keep track of which lots were going to be affordable which lots weren't kind of, you know, require the developer to build the affordable in sort of at the same time as he was developing the non affordable market rate units. It would just be too complicated so in my mind I felt like it was better to leave subdivisions out for now. And then, once we get our feet under ourselves and really understand how this inclusionary bylaw is going to operate. Now that we're encompassing so many different kinds of development, then perhaps in the future we might want to consider subdivisions but it's just too complicated for now. So, in terms of the cluster developments, it is like the whole 4.33 do you feel like it's too complicated to deal with that right now that maybe in the future. It would have the 10% would apply to clusters and maybe they get their bonuses if they provide like 20% affordable or something. So I think there have been a few cluster subdivisions that have taken advantage of the density bonuses and provide affordable units but then it becomes something where it's worked out during the permitting land use permitting. And so, you know, usually then it's the applicant who's a developer who's willing to designate lots and really, you know, help organize that upfront as opposed to, you know, not, you know, not knowing what's happening with those with those properties. So it's something that, you know, is then, you know, like I said, dealt with upfront because they're they're actually voluntarily doing it. Thank you. We're going to move on to Shalini. Yes, I wanted to again thank the staff for streamlining the process and removing the, I think what developers also look forward to is what's predictable and clear for them and so that's really well done. I also want to highlight again the potential of increasing the rents by not offering any incentives because I'm looking at research on this one paper for example which I had sent earlier. It's in one of a series is the economics of inclusionary development and just having a business background. My understanding is that when we are asking the developers to offer affordable housing units and they're receiving half the rent or whatever it is, that means they're going to recover the loss from the rest of the units, which means the rents go up in the other units and overall does that create affordable units but does not but also increases the rents in town and the way to offset that. So according to this report it says in most cases jurisdictions will need to provide development incentives to ensure the feasibility of development projects. The principal incentives could be direct subsidies density bonuses tax abatements, reducing parking parking requirements. And so that's just something either we look at what is the impact of inclusionary zoning in other towns did the effects of that on yeah we're creating affordable units but is it also increasing the the rents in town. And when we say there's high profits we also have to keep in mind the high rents are also because the property taxes in our town are pretty high. So my other concern is that it will affect actually the smaller builders because the big units I think have enough profits perhaps I don't know, but it's the smaller builders who might be more impacted by the inclusionary zoning when they're not given an incentive. Thank you Chris. So I wanted to remind everybody that we do have a tax incentive for developments that provide 10 units or more affordable housing, we have a tax incentive that provides demand or I'm not exactly sure how to say it but it provides a tax relief over a period of 10 years starting with a large tax relief in the beginning of the project and the smaller and smaller tax relief as you get towards the 10th year. And so far the only developer in town has taken advantage of that has been beacon communities with the North Square project but we're hoping that other developers take advantage of that tax incentive as well. Thank you Chris Steve and then Maria. Hi. So actually a lot of you have covered my comments but I actually want to follow up a thread that Janet McGowan had brought up. I think that laws and bylaws are fairest when there are no exemptions. So I'm looking at the list of exemptions and they need them out. So, like the affordable housing exemption that doesn't seem like that should be an exemption because by definition, this will meet the, in other words you can't have an affordable housing requirement. They're going to be meeting it, because it's all affordable housing. So I don't see a reason for that. The conventional subdivision. I'm not convinced that that's an insurmountable issue. So in other words, there was in the case of what Chris was describing the developer would be compelled to put a deed restriction on, you know, there's 40 parcels there'd be a deed restriction on what I can't do the math, five parcels. And then that bridge gets crossed when those parcels go for sale, I guess. And then cluster development I think there's been a good description of that. Then even RF, I don't understand fully why that would be exempt because so RF we know that what's developed there is student housing that's for student offsite student housing is permitted. But I don't understand why we'd be given an exemption for that. Oh well, I'm going to answer my own question because I think that students don't typically qualify for for affordable housing so I'm going to answer my own, I just answered my own question. But anyway, those three, the top three. I would prefer to remove those from the exempt list and then we can cross the bridge how to enforce it at some other date but the last thing we want to do is to be incentivizing conventional subdivision development. I mean that's the worst possible kind of exclusionary development so why don't we figure out a way to make that part of this package now. Thank you Steve Maria. Yeah, I was going to say with the comprehensive permit project. They may not actually meet the inclusionary zoning by a lot. So when 132 Northampton Road came they actually asked for a waiver from it, just because sometimes the subsidizing agencies don't want to see that it's that it's subject to other local regulations. And so, whether or not we put it in here, most often a comprehensive permit developer is going to ask to waive this anyways because they can't be subject to two local regulations and so you know we're just we're exempting it because in the last two months of permits they asked for this provision be waived, because they see it as like a as a legal problem that they'd be subject to both. I understand you I understand right like if the list of exemptions grows too long. It's like well what are we recapturing. Thank you Nate Maria. Thanks Nate. So, I, I've always had the same beef with this and I'm shining kind of touched on it it's just. I'm interested to about the incentives and how we mediate sort of. Yes, we want more affordable housing, but how do we do it so that we're not reducing the amount of development because of this being possibly really stringent and I've kind of come around to that with the idea that you know I really trust the planning staff and the planners and the building department staff that they have worked enough in town over the years, talk with the developers had a lot of anecdotal sort of examples of what was able to be built what was proposed and not able to be built to really stand behind this and that's the only reason why I'm not as apprehensive. Because I, you know I read all these studies about, yeah what are the incentives are their bonuses and I don't see any and, and the one that Chris you mentioned, you'd have to build almost 100 units to get back right because if it's, you have to build 10 affordable units, that's, I said it wrong, I said it wrong Nate can say it correctly. I think it's 10 units with some affordable units whatever the requirement. Oh, not 10 affordable. That makes more sense. So I just, I, I know that a lot of people said we could try it see if it works. If it doesn't we'll come back to it and I'm kind of coming around to that just because I would like to see if it works. I don't know how we know that but I'm sure the planning staff will know because they'll see the projects, or developers come and say, you know, this is unworkable or okay, we'll do this but we might ask for a little more height or something to make it work for them financially so. I still stand behind that I do have a worry about the lack of incentives but that I want to bring more affordable housing to I mean like a broken record always saying that's that's sort of one of the biggest issues that we have. We're trying to work towards so I'm coming around to like let's just try it. And trust that the staff will really monitor it and see that we're not losing opportunities. And that will come back to it if it seems like property owners and particularly the smaller ones are saying you know this is just too onerous or or they're asking a lot for a lot of other waivers or bonuses because it is our so. So yeah I, I still have that concern but I'm willing to just stand behind the staff that's worked really hard on this over the years and see how it goes. Thank you. Chris, did you want to respond. I just wanted to mention one more thing I think that when this was first put on the books in 2005. We talked about if a project requires a special permit, then inclusionary zoning is required. And at that time, there was a decision made to interpret the special permit to only be a special permit for use, but conceivably it could have been, it could have gone the other direction. It turns out that most projects that come before us these days require special permits for something, either a dimensional setback or height requirements or a lot of different things require special permits. So if we had been interpreting the bylaw to to involve all special permits from the beginning we would have a lot more affordable units right now. So I feel like we're, you know, it's it's going to be okay and the only and the other thing I wanted to say was that in the BG zoning district there's very little opportunity for making to do any incentives for dimensional incentives you can't really make the building any taller unless you go to a sixth floor and I think that's going to be something that people aren't going to want. You can't really give a lot coverage deviations to any extent because you're already allowed 95% lot coverage might be able to do a little bit more with building coverage but there really isn't much of an incentive to do to give developers in the BG zoning district, there may be some incentives and other districts but it's the last time we brought a very complicated inclusionary zoning bylaw to town meeting it was, you know, rejected and we just felt it was important to make this a bylaw that could be understood by people and could be worked with and just not to make it to him to impossibly complicated. Thank you Chris, I am noticing the time and cognizant that I'm sure there are people in the audience that would like to ask their questions so I'm going to ask Shalini and Doug whether they can wait on theirs until we've recognized the public and I'm seeing yeses for that. So we're going to move on to questions from the public so at this point, if you are in the attendees and you have joined up and you have a question. We're guarding the bylaw, not that you want to speak in favor of it or in opposition to it but actually have a question please raise your hand using the raise hand button. We are going to start with, and I want to remind people that they will have up to three minutes questions in theory should take less than three minutes so we're going to start with Ted Parker. And you should be able to unmute yourself Ted. Thank you. Very simple question. The 80% and 50% numbers what do those translate into real dollar amounts? What's the current income? Nate do you have those numbers handy for say a four member family? I don't have them right off the bat. The way the income translates into how much 30% of your income prorated every month is what the rent should be plus allowances for utilities. So you can make under that and then the rent is set. I understand all of that part. I just want to know what the real numbers are because one of the options if there's a if there's a payment in lieu you're going to you're requiring this bylaw require four times the 8% of the of that income right so that's a real number. So it changes because it's frequently recalculated but you have no idea what that number is now. So I what I what I was going to do is look base base it on the income or the rent that can be charged at Aspen Heights not say for instance like Aspen Heights I'm looking at their website it's not what the income is so for instance like a one bedroom. You can charge almost $1200 for an affordable one bedroom. And it goes up from there so you know whether what you know that's at 80% area median income. So that's you know that's that's the you know that's what the that's what they can charge for rent. Right but but but you're at the bylaw says that a payment in lieu right which is which you are offering that option would be four times the the the that the the reference income. Yeah, so four times right so the area median income is not based on 80 or 6% the area median income for Amherst is say $75,000. So you're saying it's a Amherst or of the catchment area the greater Springfield metropolitan catchment area. I'm confused about what you're. So the income for the rental amounts is based on the area median income that Springfield metropolitan statistical area, but the payment in lieu of is just the median income for Amherst calculated by whom. I think the bylaw said that. I had an answer so 80% of area median income for a family of four, I believe is about $68,000. So you multiply 68,000 times X times four. So the Amherst the Amherst median 80% of the Amherst median income is. It's a Springfield area median income. And we're part of this area. So I think the question has been answered. And we are going to move on to the next person. So the next is Brendan Bailey for a question. Oh, I have to sorry Brendan, I forgot to allow you to talk. Thank you very much. Yeah, I was trying to figure that out myself I said, this is going to be tough. It's not necessarily a question specifically the comment that I have doesn't speak directly in opposition or in favor of the amendment, but it's more input from my association and we've actually touched on a little bit tonight. I didn't know what the appropriate time would be for me to bring that forward. You can do that now if it's not in favor or against. Okay, super. Well, thank you all very much for allowing me to be here and do we need to state name and where you're from. Yeah, sorry, I forgot to say that just just state if you know your district what district you're from if you live in Amherst and not just identify what town you do live in and if you're representing someone identify. Sure. So, again, my name is Brendan Bailey on the CEO for the realtor Association of Pioneer Valley. And I live in Long Meadow, right next to Alex's bagels actually if you know where that is. Anyway, so the comments that I want to bring forward are really about its input not speaking for or against. And there have already been some comments directly on what I'm talking about. And that really involves the costs the current proposal does not contain costs offsets for affordable unit requirement, and we really urge you guys to include an appropriate offset in any final language. Most common what we've seen nationally is a density bonus which again has been talked about a little bit which works to defray costs of the affordable units over a larger base. When this isn't present developers may not have the ability to finance projects or pass along and they, you know, these costs can get passed on to the end user. One thing that we really recommend if I don't believe this has been done financial feasibility analysis can provide a basis for that appropriate offset and you know we would be happy to talk about that. But I'm not sure if this body is familiar with our organization. My predecessor was the gentleman by the name of Ben Scranton. He retired previously and I took his place now as CEO. We're making a big effort for our association to be involved with our 68 municipalities because our association does represent all the realtors throughout Hamden Hampshire and Franklin County so it's a lot of area to cover, but a lot of good work to do so. I just wanted to put that forward to you guys and specifically the feasibility study that is something that we can help with actually because we are a local association but then we do have our state association and the National Association as well. So whenever you're going through policies such as this I know we're a little late to the game in this instance, but we can perform a lot of these studies for you and also through grant processes that we have with our National Association and things like that so we're simply here to be a resource and I appreciate the time. Thank you Brendan. Next, actually, are there any other questions. Nina, while please unmute yourself and state where you live and then ask your question. Nina while I live in Amherst in District four, and I've been aware of Center East Commons, because it's sprouted up in in my neighborhood very close to me. And my understanding is it has no affordable units. Is that true. And second, would these if they were in place when they were applying for their permit would they have had affordable housing units. So I lost you for a second so I just want to confirm your questions the first one is whether Center East Amherst has any affordable units and the second is if this bylaw were in place at the time they were granted their permit, would they have been required for Okay, Chris. It does not have any affordable units and if this bylaw were in place when it was being permitted, it would have been required to have some affordable units. Thank you. Any other questions from the public. We're going to recognize Mac user please state your name and where you live and then ask your question. After you unmute. I don't know the district but it's Steven and Evans. District four. Yeah, they switched districts and the numbers and all that I haven't kept up with it in the 20 or 30 years I've lived here. I'd say a lot of it half of it I've been following the affordable housing issue in town. I remember in the old day what I call the old days. We had a different figure. Same as the first question, first citizens question about the percentages. I've noticed that we've gone from 30%. Most of the language now is in the 60 and 80. Not even in 50% of the AMI. Since we have such a severe issue here with our anchor institution. Really creating, you know, in the last 510 years, declining population in BIPOC people who work in town commuting in from chickpea and so forth, we really need to, since there's a radical problem. There's a radical solution. So I'm wondering why that 30% was, you don't see it anymore. It's 60 and 80. Thank you. Thank you, Chad. Chris, did you want to answer that or Nate? 30% of the area median income. That's the correct. Yeah, I think that, you know, to have that low of a, you know, to have an income of that nature and the rent of that nature, usually it's a developer who can apply for subsidies. It's not typically a market rate or, you know, most developers aren't specialized to know how to do that. There is a lot, you know, there is does take a lot of, you know, expertise to apply for subsidies and manage that. You know, so for comprehensive permits or other projects, they can go to 30%. And we're actually saying that the 60 and 80 are maximums. So developer, if they're willing, they could voluntarily have a lower MI. We're just not requiring it because it is, you know, it would take a lot. I think at that level. Whoops, you cut out. I think Nate just froze. You cut out at the end then. Yeah, you cut out at around at that level. Oh, yeah, I was just saying, I think at that level, we need more subsidy or more offsets because it is, you know, there is then a greater differential between market rate and the 30% you know rental amounts at 30% am I and I just think that there's not. You know, I think that would be a really restrictive requirement. I think I said that developers can voluntarily go that low. It's just not a requirement, you know, the 60 and 80 are maximums. Thank you, Nate and thank you Chad. Seeing no other questions we're going to move to public speaking in favor of revision at this point. If you are in favor of the revisions proposed for article 15 please raise and you would like to speak to them please please raise your hand for recognition you will have up to three minutes to speak. We are going to I'm going to recognize. John Hornick at this time. Okay, I believe I'm here. Everyone can get me. We can. Okay, I appreciate the opportunity to talk. And I also appreciate the work that the planning department particularly Nate Malloy has done on this as other people have mentioned. I think this is the time to do this. I understand that there are costs as well as administrative requirements that developers have to pick up in order to be able to do affordable housing. I don't think that's an insurmountable barrier. We already have developers who are doing this in town. Nate mentioned Aspen Heights there are other developments that Barry Roberts has on University Drive has completed another one he's now building. So developers can figure a way to do this from the little bit of experience that I've had learning about affordable development one thing that I understand is that there are always problems that come up. Costs that are not anticipated and developers just figure out how to how to deal with it. These are not an insurmountable or they don't present insurmountable obstacles. On the other hand, would they prefer to have to do these things to add costs to add administrative requirements will of course they wouldn't. I mean anybody else in any business wants to minimize their costs and minimize their administrative requirements and that's absolutely going to be true of any developer in Amherst or anywhere else. One of the former members of the housing trust approached the developer in town about voluntarily adding inclusionary units or affordable units to a development that was in the planning stage and he was kind of interested. And then he got back to my colleague and said well you know I've talked to my banker I talked to a realtor and I talked to somebody else and they all said you don't want to get involved in that it's extra costs and extra work. So I think that people are not going to do this voluntarily. Because indeed it does involve extra costs and extra work. But again, it's not so much in the way of extra costs or extra work that it's not impossible, particularly when you're renting a new one or one bedroom apartment for 1800 to $2,000 a month or three bedroom two bedroom apartment for $3,000 a month. The rental market in Amherst is very, very strong. Developers can't move somewhere else you can't go to those rents in Sunderland or Hadley or Northampton or Eastampton. If they want to play and get involved in projects of that nature Amherst is the place that they need to be. So, to me, this is a question of values. Yes, on the one hand we know that it will make development a little bit more difficult for people who go into that business. On the other hand, we also know absolutely that if we don't see new affordable housing through any number of roots and inclusionary zoning is an important one, then people who need that housing are not going to be able to get it. You know, I don't, people in this group don't attend meetings of the Pioneer Valley Network to end homelessness or you may have not seen the way fine. Sorry, wrapping up. Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Mandy, Joe. Okay, there's all kinds of evidence that we have a huge need and inclusionary zoning is a way to do this we don't need more debate, we don't need more study. We just need to get it done. Thank you. Thank you, John. Next up is Janet Keller. Please unmute yourself identify yourself and you can speak them. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. And thanks to the staff for a terrific, very clear and convincing presentation. I would like to add to John's list of groups that of developers that did find a way to add the affordable units presidential apartments did so they added six out of 54 at that development. I'd like to speak to the need. North Square was able to with the comprehensive permit to offer 26 affordable units to households with very low income. About 1% of area median income. And out of the 130 units total, and almost immediately, they told us that those 26 were snapped up. And we have some terrific new neighbors as a result. And 300 people went on their waiting list. The need is really great. And I am so hoping that we get this this change because it's a huge need. Thank you. Thank you, Janet. Seeing no other hands in ready to speak in favor we will be moving on to public speaking in opposition of revision. And before I recognize anyone on that if anyone raises their hand for that I just want to state for those that are joining us for the 8pm hearing we are getting close to wrapping up the 7pm inclusionary hearing so just be patient with us as we move through finishing the 7pm hearing. And so we are looking for anyone to raise their hand if they're going to speak in opposition to the revision of the bylaw. So at this point, I'm going to recognize kitty axelson berry. Please unmute yourself and identify where you live and your name, and you may have three minutes. Okay, I'll try to be faster kitty axelson berry 89 stony hill road. So I just don't think it goes quite far enough. I agree with Andrew McDonald when he was giving a cautionary statement about what, well, I forget which one he was wait a minute. I think it's to pro developer in that 500 square feet is actually a football and a half football field and a half away. So, like this other place for you know this kind of ghetto where the affordable housing could be put is it yes it's not as far as North Amherst from the downtown Amherst but it is a football field and a half away that's I think that's really too far and that that should be modified. I also feel that there should be 20% affordable housing not 10%. And I'm, and I agree with Doug Marshall that it should be or not and in terms of those two clauses of who what what people what developers have to do, or how they qualified. And, and I hope that these regulations would pass on from owner to owner. And I don't know whether it has to say that or not. But yeah, I just wanted to mention it. That's all. Thank you very much kitty. We are next going to recognize Richard Bentley. You should be able to unmute yourself right now please identify yourself and where you live. You have three minutes. Am I unmuted. You are. Well, I, I'm hoping that a lot of this zoning stuff is very confusing and very difficult. And there are all sorts of little squiggles and things that people can do that other people don't notice and they like it that way. I'm told that the planning board is going to provide some sort of direct of kind of. I don't know what it is, but it's a direct way of communicating with the public. So we can know exactly what's going on because there there's so much this zoning stuff is a nightmare to most people. And so I'd like to urge them to get busy with that I'm told that something they're going to do I haven't been told when they're going to do it but let's get busy with that, making all of this known to the public in simple, easy ways. So Richard, Chris, would you like to identify the website that you have created to identify all the zoning that is being worked on. Thank you Mandy. Yes, on the planning department web page, because not all of these things come from the planning board on the planning department web page is a section that has all of the zoning amendments that are currently being published. It also has all the documents that we've shared with the planning board or with CRC documents that have been submitted from others. It's got comments from everybody on it. And we could send Mr Bentley a link to that page tomorrow. Thank you Chris. We are still looking for hands for people speaking in opposition to the revision. I just raised her hand again. I will allow you to talk to you on it, even though I'm confused by you may unmute yourself. I raised my hand again because I was confused and this technically probably fits into this category. I fail to support Steve Schreiber's suggestion that this be amended to reduce the subdivision exceptions. Thank you. Thank you Janet. Seeing no more hands seeking to speak in opposition. Hold on. Seeing no more hands seeking to speak in opposition we will move on to the planning staff. Do you have any final words to say. Yeah, I think the, you know, I think maybe I misunderstood Ted Parker's question and so I just. You know, the, I can, I was going to share my screen just to show what I pulled from HUD just to, you know, if this is visible to everyone. It is meeting family income for Amherst. It is calculated based on the Springfield MSA but it's 81,700 for fiscal year 21 and the 80% income limit so for a family of four it's 67,300. And, you know, and it's, you know, it's based on family size and the rents, you know, are calculated by, you know, affordable housing developer will have a marketing agent and you work with the state to come up with rents and so for Aspen Heights actually, which is a new, you know, the Amherst motel site, you know, the affordable bedrooms are actually more expensive than I thought so one bedroom is 1366 a month. A two bedroom is 1537 and a three bedroom is 1700 a month. So, you know, the, you know, the mercury events at 80% 80% am I can still be quite high, you know, there's wiggle room there in terms of utilities and other things this these include utilities. So you can back out a number of utilities but I do think that. So, you know, the, if someone were to apply, we'd say this is what 80% is, and then that's what the meeting family income is so we would you know we would go through a process of using a HUD data set to determine those those numbers. Thank you, Nate. Anything else from the planning staff. Any other questions from the planning board or the community resources committee. I am seeing none. Ted, I encourage you to email the CRC and the planning board and the planning staff if you have continuing questions about the numbers within the next day or so, seeing that there are no more questions from anyone. If you take a motion. We're going to do a joint motion so that one motion gets made but all committee members of all committees vote at the same time so is there a motion to close the public hearing on article 15 inclusionary zoning. Johanna. So moved. Is there a second. I second. And so we will take a roll call vote seeing that there's doesn't seem to be discussion on this. I'm going to try and grow down the list. If I miss any planning board members I apologize and just speak up as I do after I finish the whole list. So Jack. Sorry about that. I was muted. Yes. Okay. And then Janet. Yes. Tom. Yes. Andrew. Hi, Doug. Hi, Johanna. Hi, Maria. And did I get Tom. Yes. Is that the whole planning board. Yes. Okay. And then my committee is Shawnee. Yes. Mandy is a yes. Dorothy. Yes. Evan. Hi, Steve. Yes. That is a unanimous vote of both committees to close the hearing at 813 PM. The planning board, I believe Jack will try to take this up for discussion and recommendation at the conclusion of the next hearing. But that will be up to Jack and you guys when we conclude that hearing the CRC is intending to discuss it and vote on a recommendation at its May 25th regular meeting. If the planning board has made its own recommendation by that time. At this time, we are going to move on to the next scheduled public hearing. This is the one that was scheduled for 8pm. It is now 813pm. I am going to read the statements again. And that is in accordance with MGL chapter 40 a the Amherst planning board and the community resources committee of the town council holds this joint public hearing on Wednesday, May 19th, 2021 to consider the following proposed amendments to the zoning bylaw. In accordance with Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order, suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law, we are conducting this virtually and will accommodate public comment to the extent practical. Before I read, I will read the zoning bylaw that we are here for while I'm doing that Pam, can you try to bring in Kathy Shane and Darcy Dumont from the attendees list as presenters. So this is a public hearing on zoning bylaw article 16 temporary moratorium for 180 days on building permits for construction of residential buildings with three or more dwelling units by voter petition article pursuant to MGL chapter 40 a section five. It is to see if the town will vote to add article 16 temporary moratorium for 180 days on building permits for construction of residential buildings with three or more dwelling units to the zoning bylaw which would temporarily halt the issuance of building permits for the proposed construction of any residential buildings including three or more dwelling units in the business general BG business limited BL or general residents RG zoning districts in the town for a period of 180 days. The 180 day delay will provide time for town staff and a consultant to provide outreach to residents to assist in drafting design standards, and to amend the zoning requirements regarding streetscape sidewalk widths and greenspace for new multi unit tenants, building heights and setbacks required in the zoning bylaw dimensional table, inclusionary zoning requirements, the definition of mixed use buildings, municipal parking overlay in the BG district that allows for no parking spaces for new residential buildings, and allows removal of existing parking spaces without contribution to a public parking fund, yet allows tenants to secure town parking permits for town parking spaces, irrespective of the number of residential units. Climate action resilience criteria for new construction recommended in the town climate action adaptation and resilience plan. If the town is not able to implement amended zoning bylaws addressing all of these areas listed in this section before 180 days, then there shall be a 90 day extension of the temporary moratorium. So that is what this hearing is on. Let's move through the process for this hearing again because a number of people have joined us since the last one. We are going to start with board and committee member disclosures, and then there will be an applicant presentation. The petitioner presentation and it is being done by counselors Darcy Dumont, Dorothy Pam and Kathy Shane. There will be questions then then there will be questions from the boards and committees planning board and the community resources committee. Then we will move on to questions from the public. Then we will move on to public speaking in favor of this revision of the zoning bylaw. Then we will move on to public speaking in opposition to the revision of the bylaw. Then we will receive any response from the petitioner sponsors. Then we will conclude with additional questions from the board or committee. And only after that will we take motions to close the hearing if it's appropriate at that time. So are there any questions regarding the process. Seeing none, I will hand. Well, I will first ask for board and committee member disclosures at this time. Darcy, do you have a, you're not on the board or committee but do you have a disclosure to make. Because you raised your hand. And you're muted. Okay. I do not see any board or committee member disclosures so we will move on to the applicant presentation. I just want to confirm that we can hear counselor Shane and Dumont so can you each just say you're present. We've already done it for counselor Pam so we don't have to do that again. Yeah. Okay, I heard you both simultaneously. I believe counselor Shane you are starting and yes. I think you can share your own screen. I can share my own screen. Okay, I believe so. If you can't let me know. Okay. Is this showing. It is now showing yes. I'm going to start out we were a team of three counselors and just so people know the origin of this there is a provision in the mass general law that allows 10 or more residents to bring a proposed bylaw, and that triggered this hearing. And my, my role, and before I turn it over to Dorothy and Darcy is to say why we think they need there's an urgent need for temporary moratorium on and again if this is on as Mandy read this is on multi unit residential projects in the downtown areas. One thing you should all know is that when we first came up with the concept and drafted a bylaw on the word got out. We were inundated with requests where people said can I drive to your house can you come to your, my home so I can sign it and we had over 200 people sign and deliver a registered voter petitions that were certified to get to the council to make sure that we had enough we only needed 10, but we, we overexcited because of the enthusiasm. And I think that's a real reflection on what people's perception us on where we're going and the needs to take a pause, a six month pause this is a temporary moratorium. We have a real opportunity in Amherst for change. We're already as we just heard with the discussion of the inclusionary zoning bylaw. This is triggered a new energy engagement at the planning board the planning staff has been leading us in the community creatively with new ideas that are plugging the holes and gaps we have in our current bylaws and thinking about what we want in the future what designs we want. What is our vision for Amherst. And I think this is motivated a want why there's a sense of urgency is people's of experience of what is happening what has been happening to our downtown. And people see large looming residential units downtown with shadows with lack of walkable sidewalks or any public space to greet and convene or even just sit outside the building. We're seeing small businesses be displaced well known businesses. And even though they're supposed to be mixed use the there's been a lack of creativity on what is that mixed use what's in that downstairs empty corridor often we aren't seeing drawn in subsidized or creation. There's been no parking provided by the new buildings because of the zoning overlay, but we're losing parking places some of the new buildings have been built where there used to be parking places. So people's experience of coming downtown is they can't find a place to park, and there's no provision to pay into a fund to build us a parking garage. And as we already heard in the first hour, the new units and there been well over 200, and there's another 58 online to come on aren't coming with affordable units so there aren't units that people who are residents low or monitoring come residents of Amherst can move into. So it's time to rethink our current zoning provisions look at where their gaps where their holes, we desperately need design standards, the plan, the master plan itself calls for them, and says we should take pause periodically to look at where we're going to. And we've got an amazing planning staff that is already started working energetically on this with a proposal to hire a consultant to start working with a consultant to give us design guidelines and streetscape. We had a meeting with Chris breaststroke when she was talking about why she felt we need a consultant to work with us. And it's in and what she expressed it as a time for a public discussion to examine what we like about downtown and what steps we need to make it more suitable to our future need, and I think that's the sentiment it's not a sentiment of stopping development but saying how we develop really matters. And this is a time out of a crisis of a pandemic. We have an opportunity to make a real difference. And I'm going to turn to Dorothy, where this is the motivation of doing it now to give us time to put these on the books so they are effective for any new building that comes in to downtown and adjacent areas. So we can see something different going forward. And Dorothy I'm going to turn it over to you to talk about what we can gain by this in by taking this pause by hitting the pause button. Thank you Kathy. So what does Amherst gain with a temporary moratorium. We want to create housing units homes for individuals and families diverse in age, race, ethnicity and income. We want to require inclusionary zoning affordable housing unit in multifamily buildings. The one of the things we need to do is we want to respect and build on Amherst's historical, cultural, artistic, intellectual and educational resources, because we really are and should be a year round town. We want to preserve and adapt historic and iconic buildings that help define the town that let you know you're in Amherst not in some other big place. We'd give it get time to establish and enforce design standards, building heights, no sunless canyons that despite being told that new buildings will barely cast a shadow. No pay no attention to the man behind the curtain just believe your own eyes. One reason people are so excited about this is that zoning is very complicated. Often we don't know what the rules mean. But if you go downtown, you can see it. We see it so everyone has an opinion, everyone has a thought, and they're saying, wait a minute, we need to pause. We need to pause because our town is changing in ways that we don't really like. We need to have setbacks from the steep street for safe pedestrian friendly wide sidewalks so that people can meet and greet each other, as you would expect to do in a small town. We need the public and private green space on both sides both north and east pleasant streets. The planning department has been working on this and discussing it for quite a while. And I want to add that the town did not rebuild Kendrick Park so that developers would not have to include outdoor social green space for its tenants. New playground equipment the informal sitting areas and the performing spaces, they were made for all of us. The park is there for all of us in the heart of downtown. And what do we get if we do this and reassess our parking situation, we would then support and stimulate retail businesses, services and cultural and artistic activities that would draw residents and visitors downtown for a lively interesting project that one that has been and is meant to be so I totally support this moratorium so that we can get a chance to get this thing right and get the design correct. And now Darcy, it's your turn. Thank you so what was the temporary moratorium by law actually do. I hit the pot with a six month moratorium on new permits for buildings with three or four more more units and in three, three zoning districts the BG, which is downtown the BL, which is the limited business district and the arch. So it would allow time to act develop and implement provisions regarding mixed use building the mixed use building definition and inclusionary zoning which we see has already both of them have already gotten a great start and a deep thanks goes out to the planning department for getting started with those. But we have so much more to do we need to the design standards for streetscapes. We need to revisit the parking overlay district provisions downtown. And I'm just going to take a couple minutes to talk about potential climate action criteria for new construction. The buildings have some green features we want to make sure new construction is following the most updated recommendations for green buildings. We want to prepare the town for the possibility of opting into the state zero energy stretch code that was just passed into law once it's completed. Town staff will be presenting a climate action adaptation and resilience plan within the next few weeks. We will include a number of recommendations regarding the building sector, some of which are recommended to be implemented in the near term, since we have an emissions reduction goal of 25% by 2025. It'll be important for the planning board and CRC to take those recommendations under consideration for zoning amendments during this temporary pause. Also the moratorium on permits would not apply to new businesses homes. Due plexus or accessory dwelling units specifically, and the temporary delay could be extended for 90 days. Just final note, since our first meeting on this matter at the town council, the resident petitioners easily obtained over 880 signatures supporting a temporary moratorium from all over town. And just to clarify, there are two petitions in the packet today. One was gathered via an online petition, and one is a folks who signed a paper petition but not the online petition. So the total was around 880 signatures. Many signers took time to voluntarily add their comments, as you can see, people were eager to add their voices. The comments cover the full gamut of issues and are passionately felt. As I've said before, this is an issue that I discovered on the campaign trail, and then campaigned on because it appeared to be an issue that the vast majority of my constituents reported, having a downtime where residents want to spend their time. So we officially urge the planning board and the CRC to affirmatively recommend the adoption of article 16, the temporary moratorium for 180 days on building permits for construction of residential buildings with three or more dwelling units. And that is the three of us, Mandy, with in record time, I think, so I will stop sharing my screen. Thank you, Kathy, and thank you for making it short and sweet. I do want to note for those watching that if people have been counting there are I believe seven counselors currently in the panelist side because we have added two presentations. The CRC will not be deliberating or debating the merits of the bylaw proposal tonight that will happen at the May 25th meeting of the CRC. And that is why this did not need to be noticed as a full council meeting because the deliberation won't happen. There will be questions asked and answered, but that is not deliberation. I would like to make that clarify that for people who might be questioning or wondering. And so with that presentation, thank you, counselors. We will move on to questions from the board, the planning board or the CRC. Please raise your hand if you have a question to ask the petitioners at this time and I will recognize you as the questions come and the hands get raised. We will start with Andrew. Thanks for the presentation. We've been getting so many emails. It's been great to actually hear the story. So I appreciate that. I had a couple of questions from seeing that. I think Dorothy, you had mentioned build on our educational resources and when I first heard that I was thinking like, well, wouldn't student housing be a way of helping to build on that? I'm sure that's not what you meant. So I was wondering if you might be able to clarify what that means to you, building on those educational resources. Well, I said intellectual and educational as well as artistic and cultural. I mean bookstores. I mean tea houses. I'm performing spaces. We're a town of people who read, think, like to do things, like to create things. And some of that should be downtown. I mean, to go downtown, it shouldn't just be a place you go if you want to drink or you want a piece of pizza. It should be a place where we can go to mix and mingle, which we don't do enough. I remember back before COVID, we would have street fairs and it would be a whole different feeling. It would be, oh my God, here's the people and I know a lot of them and we're all walking up and down. And then maybe there was the aerial dancers or things displaying going on. You realize this is an interesting town with interesting people. But right now, you don't really get that feeling when you go to that part of the downtown. So I'm just saying let's bring back the liveliness that is part of Amherst. Okay, I do miss those days. And then I guess one other just quick follow would be how much how much is the archipelago new proposal driving the timing of this is this like a response to them in particular, or is this something that I guess I'm just trying to understand like is this is this almost singling out that particular developer and understand them, you know the concerns people have about their development but is that is that really the primary driver for this. This has been on the books since we ran for office, the changing of the downtown the closing of the small shops. The one day we woke up and the Gazette had a picture of five identical buildings filling that whole space. That hasn't happened yet. So people have been coming and writing and calling and complaining about this and saying what's happening for two or three years now so it's not singling out the latest development that this is responding to very deep. Express in other words we didn't create the issue people have come to us out of their concern and upset. Thank you. Thank you. Did you have anything to add to that. Yeah, I wanted to. Andrew, clearly, yet another building on the scene does make a difference but as the reason there aren't buildings in that whole corridor is some people managed to get Bertucci's the old Bertucci's declared historical and there was a delay because we did see a wall. So I think their perception is we have a lot to lose right now. We can lose where the new buildings coming in. You talked about the building design you didn't talk about how many parking spaces we're going to lose that they're not public, but people parked there. And the fact that we don't, I had one person say oh but they all pay into a parking fund I said oh no. Some towns have that we don't have a parking fund. The sense that the sidewalk at that pinch point will never get wider unless we start talking about setbacks and put it in our code that there's a moment where you can maybe have momentum for change and if you don't act, you'll lose it. And we don't have a very big downtown. It could all be lost pretty quickly. What, if we don't think of this so there is this sense of urgency, because each one that has happened makes means that's that much less we can do. I just want to say one more thing about education. This notion of a year round economy that if you look at the UMass schedule there, they're here about seven months a year. So if you're thinking about a running a business downtown and entertainment business. If we don't develop something that visitors want to come to Amherst during those other months or we want to come. It's really hard for small businesses to make it. I mean, what do they do the other five months. So there's an interest of in the affordable units but also what brings people to downtown year round. And so the composition of who is in that building, and who would want to move into the building is also important. Thank you, Kathy. You're done for now. I guess maybe could I could I just propose just one other final thing would be. I've lived in town for a long time and you know this, some of these areas have been parking lots forever. Right. Like, would we would we rather some of these areas continue to be parking lots for the next 30 years. If we can't, you know, if we can't get developers to build it. No, I'll just respond. I think it's not that as much. I've seen some towns do a linkage or a linkage fee or an impact fee is saying if you're not going to provide parking then contribute toward a parking garage. So we've also for 20 years been waiting for the parking garage so that notion that you build a public utility that will serve your own interest and it's a direct link to your own the benefits of people who are going to living in that building. That is the alternative. We don't have to keep a parking lot. I agree. Thank you. Andrew. Thank you Kathy Tom. Hi, thank you guys for the presentation. And thank you for sharing your thoughts. I think one of the big questions I have is about the correlation between a moratorium and the results that you're asking for. The end right and so if we go through a process with a consultant and they come back and say we want a hard streetscape with five story buildings and that's the result is this project then not done because we have to go back to the table six months and we have another 90 days where we try to refine that to get what certain people want or is this like what are the criteria for this being a quality productive session. And I think my internet's a little bad. Sorry. And then the second part is sort of correlating that to your results in regard to things like businesses and bookstores. How is a moratorium going to produce a bookstore downtown and change the dynamic of that culture when some of the developers are having a hard time finding those people to even occupy those spaces now. So I guess I'm curious about where these correlations come from and how this moratorium is going to produce these results that you're talking about. And I appreciate your results. Like I agree that many of those things should be addressed and I do think we need design guidelines and I do think we need to a more robust business downtown and I do think that we want to make a concert concerted effort for a more inclusionary experience and living space downtown but I'm not quite sure that what you're proposing is going to get us there in six months and I guess that's what I'm asking how do these quarterly. Kathy or Dorothy Kathy. I'll be willing to jump in you know I think you're right Tom it's ambitious. So what what we're we've been observing in a very positive way is how intensely you all have been working and the planning staff has been working the town's been talking about hiring a planning director but I think there's an opportunity to start to figure some of this out if we're not racing against time if there's a cause I heard the discussion on the amount of retail space in the new building that's being proposed and how small it was. I'm watching other places say you could design a commercial space to have pop up spaces and flexible use inside so it can be season multi seasonal. We could get we could think of a large space if if we would say a mixed use building should really not just be an apartment building with a tiny square that we called retail so it gets out from under. We could think those are zoning then say that like do we have to say in our zoning that there has to be X kind of space. No I guess that's the difference in. I think the hardest thing is your question about the retail and commercial I think we could certainly get street setbacks redefined how far away from the road, what the the feeling and look at the building is some climate action. The hardest is how do we. This is what every small town is grappling with right how do we bring back downtown and Main Street first we were losing it to the malls now we're using losing it to the Internet so that is a challenge, but I think there's a creative thought and up here in the North Square where there's really big retail space it's empty right now. I think there's an opportunity for some creative thinking to get ever smaller with no retail space in large apartment buildings will lose it forever. We won't have it downtown. Thank you Kathy Dorothy did you have something to add. I just wanted to say that I understand those are really good questions, and we can't we are not saying that we have all the answers but we do know that if we go the way we're going. We'll be stuck with our downtown permanently change these buildings will be there for a long time, and then you'll have a kind of a dead corridor in the center of town. So, in hopes that with the consultant and more work such as you have been putting in the planning department is putting in in hopes that we can come up with something better. We're proposing moratorium. I mean if we talk about a mixed use building did we really think that having parking in the side on the first floor of the building. Is that what we had in mind when we talked about mixed use. I don't think so. There are a lot of problems and so we're saying, we don't know if we can solve all of them, but we want to at least give a chance to try in a short pause. This is not against building. It is not against development, but it's a chance to try to look at it again, and perhaps with a more creativity. There's some new ideas that we've heard may happen at Amherst works that will be really exciting. There's maybe a new energy in town for doing things differently. We'd like a chance to see if we could apply that to that part of the downtown to I think the second part of my question is a little bit more logistical one which is, how do we know when this is done. And then how do we know when we need another three months and then after three months, how do we know when we need another three months so I guess I'm curious like what who and what qualifies completion of all of these items. Kathy Darcy. I think that's a great question Tom and clearly we drafted a bylaw and we got it here to the public hearing so the same way I've been watching what's been going on with inclusionary zoning is getting refined. I think those questions could be answered you could make a trigger point you could say, you know, what would condition taking it off. They aren't answered in the current bylaw. So I would think that Chris might have something to offer here. You're putting her on the spot but I would, I would really prefer not to comment at this time. Thanks very much. Okay, so we have a question. We know that we would be done after that is consultant has presented design guidelines and you, the planning board planning department have really gone through it and decided what you think is the right way to go. And then I think that we would, you would or, you know, or the staff would come up with a new bylaw and then we would be done because but I do think that's a good question. We certainly have no interest in a process that keeps continuing and continuing and hanging things up. We do not want that we're talking about a pause, not a series of delaying tactics, because we just love the way it is downtown right now. That is not the aim. Thank you, Steve. I have a comment question than a comment. So my comment is we've actually had to de facto moratoria in building in the central business district. The first one was from about 1880 to about 2010. So during that period of, I can't even do the math, very long period, nothing substantial. No substantial private buildings were built in downtown, larger than three stories the Tucker Taff building is the only private building that was built in downtown. And that entire period between both would place and the probably the billions worth the Hastings block is, we need some reflection on why that happened. During that more than 100 year period, Hadley was eating our lunch, the, you know, basically the route nine was being developed. So nothing was happening in an hour's. So the next period 2010 till, I don't know, three years ago was there were several new buildings built in downtown. And so the second moratoria is the last three years so nothing has been built in downtown since when he's pleasant. Spring Street has started and was stopped because of the pandemic. But basically we've had three years of this council, Councilor Dumont, I'm sorry, Count candidate Dumont brought up this idea three years ago. And what's happened, nothing has happened until you know there's a newspaper article about new buildings being proposed. So, I myself am very skeptical about, you know, our ability to, you know, to meet these deadlines. So that wasn't my question my question was, how many new units have been built in the downtown area you guys have that in your, your package and I cannot find it. Dorothy or Darcy or Dorothy, do you have a quick answer to that. I'm not your numbers person but I think it was like 220 230. It's 100. All of my information comes from Chris's staff but it's 170 units are already up if we do can. And the other there's another 58 coming on with spring street. So let's say 200. Yes, say that 200 units have been built downtown in the last 10 years. If those exact same units were built in our end as houses that would be half acre lots. So that would be 100 acres. So to use somebody else's analogy earlier, that would be 100 football fields. So we've already learned earlier that a football field is a very long distance right five. So 500 100 football fields would be used for those exact units that have been built in a very compact area of downtown. And I'm curious as to why there is a sense in the in your message that that is not somehow sustainable or meeting climate action goals. Darcy, do you want to respond to that. You're. Yeah, I guess the, the density arguments around creating units downtown is, you know, it's, it's valid. It's very particular when you have elements of life that people can know if they have food and hardware and clothing and all the other things that people need. You can have a dense, no car walkable bikeable situation. But if we're creating buildings that are admittedly designed for students and all those students have cars that that isn't a climate friendly situation. There are a lot of things that we can do to make it climate friendly but density only is a thing if you have the amenities. To accommodate people living there. Thank you Darcy. Shalini. Yeah, I think I'm also following up on what Tom had said earlier that, you know, these are goals we all share the, whether it's the planning board, the planning department, CRC, the council. And how is what you're proposing going to lead to that specifically when we talk about affordable housing is one of the goals. We're already working on inclusionary zoning how is pausing building building more building affordable building. And so we're already doing the inclusionary zoning so let's remove that from your list, perhaps. Could there be other ways have you looked at other ways of increasing affordable housing like engaging the developers to use PURD and other ways of building small starter homes I know Dorothy has mentioned that should love to see communities with starter homes and and that is possible. Has any of you spoken to any of the developers locally to consider those alternatives. Instead of, but and I'm just asking as a question is a moratorium going to result in engaging the developers to provide these alternatives or with a dialogue with them, provide us more possibilities. So that's one question and then I'll have. Yeah. I would like to answer that very quickly. We don't have inclusionary zoning yet. We had a hearing today. We're going to be discussing and voting it because we're in a moratorium now. There's a chance that we will have be able to pass the inclusionary zoning bylaw before the next building is built. So that in itself that in itself is worth this at the attempt of putting this moratorium up so that not there wouldn't be another because we've we've lost so many affordable apartments recently. When I asked one person, I said I see you have two accessible apartments. Why can't you have some affordable ones? And he said because I'm required to have accessible apartments. So I have my two, but I'm not required to do the other. If I'm required to do it, I'll do it. So one of our little aims is to get inclusionary zoning on the books before anything else is built. And yes, I have started discussions with some builders. There's many, many more to go. But yes, I have definitely done that because the idea of starter homes in some way, which is not land hungry, as Steve described, you know, we're not going to go there. The master plan says we're not going to do taking up huge swaths of land for single family homes. So I know that. So you've already answered in a way one of the questions the moratorium hopefully will allow exclusionary zoning to get on the books and to be applied for the future buildings. But I agree with you much much more needs to be done. I totally agree with you, Sharon. And we're already doing that though. So I'm not sure I understand how the moratorium passed the bylaw. We're going to be discussing it on doesn't apply to the building that is being under permit now. It cannot be any ways not included. Don't argue over each other. Okay. Anyway, moving on the next question is a question and then we'll go to Johanna. Yes. Okay. And the other question is about again, the businesses, how does improving the design guidelines and sidewalks bring in more businesses. We already have blue marble lying empty. We we know that it's the Internet. So when I spoke with Mercantile store before closing, this are the only people who buy from their other UMass students and they don't have enough business. So it's not. So how is that going to improve rather than having the bid working with them and they want to put the performance shell or do public market something like thorns market. And so it rather than alienating our developing community through moratoriums is that more impactful in reaching the goals you've highlighted. And I don't see anything that you've mentioned because I don't see how design guidelines is going to lead to more businesses when we could be engaging the building I mean the developing community in business community. If anyone wants to answer that. Do any of the petitioners have a response? I would answer it in that right now, if you want to go shopping, do you want to go on sidewalks that are so narrow that you feel that you're in the street. These storefronts are not inviting. When you go to the top part of town across from the common, we see big buildings. We see the small shops are demarked. They look smaller friendly. They kind of invite you to come in. And it's just a whole different feeling. So architecture does influence how people feel, think and interact and design guidelines could help create that. And is that the reason mercantile score store loose goose all of those. I mean, I just feel like we're confounding the things to create an argument for the sake of it. And is that really what happened? I mean, of course design guidelines are important, but independently to the goals that you've set out here. I'll be short. You know, Shalini, you're not wrong that that is the challenge. There's nothing and just remember the motor moratoriums. That's been proposed just downtown you can do starter homes all over Amherst if you can find developers who want to do them. They're great ideas and so that. But if we want performance shells, we've got to have space for them. So I think even the pause button on thinking what are some of their buildings where could it be that's important. And as you start to think of who is living in the buildings if we had long term residents the number of people who told me they were ready to move down to spring street. The original proposal was some parking and two and three bedrooms aiming at permanent residents. They were ready to sell their homes, move downtown until it became studios and one bedrooms and really small studios. That person would be there all the time. That person who would be more likely to be there in August in June, you know, in all those months. And that's the kind of thing that we have got to be have time and what Dorothy just said inclusionary zoning is not on the books. If it had been on the books we would have had 30 more units downtown with people living downtown year round, if all the big buildings downtown had had to face that. Chris said earlier for rarer reasons they could be big buildings but not have it. So that alone is a good reason to at least think a little bit and wait. So, but bringing businesses back blue goose. This, this is the big, big challenge that we all have to work on in a cooperative way, I agree. Really last, last question about parking has anyone spoken with bid because the developers are ready to build a parking garage without any taxpayers money. But we are and so are they more likely to offer that once we stop them from building or what has anyone spoken to them at this point or engaged with them. And what is more likely to get as a parking garage when we have going to dialogue with them or when we put moratoriums against them. Mandy, would you like me, I'll just do it. We have not seen that proposal yet what I'm worried about and I'll tell you just because the one thing I heard is developers could build it and then tenants could buy long term leases for spots in it and we wouldn't have a public parking garage we would have a garage for leases that are already been purchased. So I think we do need a public parking garage so if the terms were favorable and we could actually, it would be great but I have to tell you how, how many years, we have been waiting for that. So if there's money on the table, and the parking would be caught with a meter, I would love to see it because I haven't seen money on the table yet. Thank you, we're going to move on to Johanna. Thank you. I've been standing board since last summer and I see how long it takes us to deliberate about issues and do iterative processes and lots of opportunities for public comment. And I'm concerned that 180 days or even 270 days isn't enough time to do all the work that you've laid out in your proposal and so I'd love to hear from you about that timeline and potentially the planning department about that timeline. And then secondarily, 180 days or 270 days to have downtown, especially the north end in the condition that it is right now seems like, I don't know, I mean, like they're condemned buildings and cracked parking lots and it's like, it's an eyesore. And I worry that that in and of itself is repellent rather than creating momentum. So would be curious to hear reactions to that as well. Thank you. Kathy or Dorothy or Darcy. I think that we, we can't take all the time. Okay, had we but world enough in time, all right, we don't. So we would just have to do the best we can within that time, and hopefully get those design guidelines. And I have talent, you know, watching what the planning department has put together this year. It's an incredible amount of work and they would bring it in and then you guys would kind of knock it down. I mean, I believe it can be done. But we do things look bad, but we've just lived through a whole year with the spring street looking like a ghost ship. Sometimes change is awkward. And, you know, going back to the thing with the loose goose, I had thought that some of those places went out of business because the people who own the land said, I'm going to be, you know, we're going to build on this. And so people chose to leave it. I don't I don't know the details on that. I do agree that we want it to look better. We want it to look like Amherst though, we don't want to have everything that that looks like Amherst to disappear and to find that we've walked into this canyon of of like dorms we don't even know who the people are. And they're all the same age we if we want diversity that means age, it means families and singles. It means racial it means ethnic, it means income. And I think that, you know, we are a town that it really talks about our values a lot. And I think it would be good that we lived our values. Garcia did you have something to add. Yeah, I just want to point out that the three of us are not the only petitioners, you know, we're actually the petitioners because we're residents who signed the petition. You know, I almost feel like we should be inviting some other petitioners into the room so that they can also answer questions I don't know how you feel about that but you know, I feel like we, we were asked by a group of the petitioners to make a presentation today, but we are not the petitioners. So the petitioners are the people who signed the petition that was certified but I'm going to ask my question and I will say I reached out to the three counselors because I knew they were sponsors of a similar amendment and I asked them to put me in touch with who would be doing the presentation and they came back with they would be. So, I'm going to take leave to ask my question, and then I think there are no more committee or board member hands so then we're going to move to the public after that. And my question is going to be similar to follow up on the other ones I'm reading the strict language here. I have a couple of questions that says if the town is not able to implement amended zoning bylaws addressing all of the areas listed in this section before 180 days, then there shall be a 90 day extension of a temporary moratorium so I have a couple of questions. What happens if, by some miracle, because there's a lot here. The council is able to vote on six proposals to match the six bullet points, but shoots one of them down so that it is not implemented. Does the moratorium continue on. What happens if at the end of 90 days, six proposals have not made it to a vote at the council. Does the moratorium stop or not. What is the intention of the petitioners in that in those two cases. I'm going to, I'm going to just jump in and answer you, Mandy with words I've heard you. We brought forth this concept. If it can get positively move friendly amendments to fix things like this, where three out of five or top priorities. But yes, I don't think in my years when I was trying to bargain health change in the United States, I didn't start at my lowest common denominator I tried to start where I could move. So yes, this could be improved. So what you're asking is absolutely right, you know, does it have to be everything on the list, or before that shall those kinds of things I think can be amended and can be fixed. Thank you Kathy. I was just reminded that Jack might have a hand up but he can actually raise his hand sorry for not seeing Jack I have a small screen don't get too many people on it. Thank you Jack and then we will move on to the next part of the hearing. Yeah so my understanding of the moratorium is that it's, you know, we're going to proceed with the development proposals that are presented to the planning board within the next, you know, assuming this moratorium was approved. So here the proposals that are presented to us. And in fact I think if your bylaws are presented. And again I need some some feedback here from Chris or Nate, but if some of the bylaws like inclusionary zoning are proposed that the developer will need to incorporate within their design prior to, you know, our approval and and there's a number of, you know, zoning, you know, bylaw priorities that are that are in the mix right now that they could be come into play. And then in the end when we're talking about building permits, building permits are going to affect, you know, I guess very close to construction which would be for any of the current proposals will be next spring summer so this moratorium seems like to kind of like I'm just wondering about the timing of it. I mean I understand there's a lot of concern. But I'm, I'm trying to understand if this is really going to get the job done that that Kathy Dorothy and Darcy have are proposing, because it seems like, perhaps it should be a one year moratorium, and then that's just like a non starter for any sort of like, you know, business vitality for for Amherst that's just a bad look. But in effect, I don't really think that this is going to do anything with the six month moratorium. Any response from the petitioners presenters. I'm just saying that Jack because you think it would take longer than that to get through the issues. My understanding is that the projects that are in the in the wings are not going to get building permits until way beyond six months. And so this more this proposal is, I just wondering what the point is, it's not stopping anything. I think we had a discussion that at a planning board meeting, and it's actually in some of one of the, I think, this right here. Okay. What projects would be subject to the moratorium. Okay, and what projects would and projects that are not subject to article 16 moratorium, because current applications or applications expected soon, they're not subject to it. None. So it sounded like everything that you were working on now would be subject to this moratorium. And the projects that are not subject are ones that are already in Spring Street already under construction. And a number of these are half built or built and or North Hampton Road, which already had a comprehensive permit. Are ones that already have affordable housing. This is, it seemed to me that it would actually have some effect on not allowing some projects to go to to completion. Until we get this thing done and I agree with you we've got it's got to be it cannot be something that that just lingers on and gets expanded and extended because that would be very bad. And that is not our intent. So I'm going to clear up the question I know Chris raised her hand but I'm going to think ask sort of what Jack was trying to which is can a project that has applied for a special permit, if this moratorium is adopted, or even right now while it's in public hearing, can a project that has applied for either a site plan review or special permit receive that site plan review permit or special permit from the planning board or ZBA right now. Chris is, are you willing to answer a question like that. A project that is being reviewed by the planning board can receive a special permit for a site plan review right now. Projects are more affected by zoning amendments that are in the pipeline than they are by this moratorium in my opinion. Thank you for that. Did you have anything else you wanted to say, say Chris because I know you raised your hand. Projects. It's, it's rather complicated projects that are that are going along and being reviewed. And Rob can help me out with this but once a legal ad for a zoning amendment is published and the legal ad for the inclusionary zoning amendment was published now we had our public hearing tonight. And that means that if that zoning amendment is adopted, that zoning amendment will apply to whatever projects haven't yet received their permits so the simplest way to look at this is this inclusionary zoning amendment would apply to the projects that are being proposed for East Pleasant Street. On the other hand, there are mechanisms that developers can use to circumvent the application of a zoning bylaw and I'm not going to go into the details about that but it's, it's possible that developer will choose to take one of these routes to East Pleasant so it's all a very complicated kind of thing and what I think we should do is, I'm not going to comment on the moratorium but I think we should put our energy, all of our energy into moving forward with the zoning amendments that we're working on and hoping to work on in the future that's what I would like to focus on. Thank you. Chris, Steve last one and then we're moving to the public. So the 40 are the very recent 40 are study take, did it include a lot of the components that are actually mentioned in these bullets and didn't result in a positive town council vote. Chris. How long the study took the 40 are study took 40 our study well we started it in 2018. And I would say we're not completely finished with it yet. So it takes a long time, and it never got as far as the town council. I was just going to jump in quickly, I think that if you could, you know the same I say a 40 are takes like you know a year right if you really focus on it and you have a consultant and staff and you really put effort into it you know it's it's a months long process to have stakeholder interviews, you know, public forums meetings back and forth so it is a you know there is a kind of an average length of time and it's many months. Yeah, at this point we are going to move on to questions from the public part of our public hearing for anyone from the public who has questions about the proposed article 16 temporary moratorium please raise your hands using the raise time button when the questions are finished we will move on to public speaking in favor of the revision and then moving on to public speaking and opposition so this time really is just for questions. And we will I will first recognize when I recognize you please when you unmute state your name and what part of Amherst you live in if you know your district. I'm going to now recognize Nina while you should be able to unmute yourself Nina. Yes Nina while I live on high street and Amherst, and I did prepare a three minute written statement that I was going to read, but listening to the discussion for the last hour. I do have a question for all of you. And what I'm hearing is that you feel that the moratorium is not the solution to the problem. But what I'm not hearing is, do you agree there is a problem that one East Pleasant Street one East Pleasant and Kendrick Park are a blight on our town. They don't work. The only tenant in Kendrick place is Mass Mutual. That's an international Fortune 500 company. Nobody goes in and out that brings no vitality, nothing to our town. We have a private parking lot at East Pleasant. What does that do for the public of the people in our town a private parking lot $200 a month people pay to park their car there. What I want to hear is, there's a problem. What is the solution if the moratorium is not the solution. What is the solution. I think we have a problem. Thank you for that Nina. And I will say that you can say your statement when we get to public in favor or an opposition I'm not sure which side you're on so just just when we get there feel free to raise your hand again to make that prepared statement. Is there anyone who would like to attempt to answer Nina's questions. Chris, and then Steve. I would just say reiterate what I said a moment ago which is that we should work on the zoning amendments that we're currently working on and we should hire our consultant and get on with our business. That's what I think. Thank you, Steve. I think I answered the question from my next door neighbor and fellow architect Nina, but the answer is no I don't think there was a problem to the extent that you have presented it in fact I think that we've done a great job and and encouraging builders to build on what seemed to be unbuildable sites where Kendrick places that was an empty vacant lot with many failed proposals on it. And now it's an attractive. I find very attractive home for many new residents in district four. I feel the same way about boltwood place built on the loading basically the service yard of Judy's restaurant, who would have thought that that could become a place for new residents of Amherst. The debate old one are the aesthetics of what for me or one East pleasant. So I wish that it were more different than Kendrick place. I wish that the storefronts had opened so one of them restaurant open the other one didn't. I think we'd have a very different discussion if those restaurants had open. I have an opinion on the, what they charge for parking, or, you know whether or not that parking is is accessible to me because I believe in the downtown parking district which is probably one of the most sustainable overlays that we have it's basically a way of encouraging people to build on build up a core of downtown. Do I think we can do better. Absolutely. I think that we have a very strong planning board now, which has a zoning bylaw that they can enforce. And so there's a lot of interpretation in the zoning bylaw we have very skilled people, a wide range of opinions on the planning board. So I think any new projects that come before the planning board is will I think I'm fully confident that this group can, you know, help interpret the current bylaw and help us get even better buildings, but no I do not feel the same way you do. I don't agree with any of that about monstrosity or blight or any of that I don't agree with, you know, any of that actually. Thank you Steve, Jack. I've said this several times, but that mass mutual business just gets no respect. I mean, again, I have a neighbor that moved to Amherst because they got employment through the mass mutual business that is in that can replace building period, and they have a son that's going to be going to Crocker Farm School in a couple years. I mean he's probably three years old. I mean I think that's the whole point of what development is supposed to be in Amherst is to bring people and businesses and families to Amherst. I'm just like very confused when people, you know, disrespect the businesses that are within the mixed use buildings in Amherst. Thank you, Shalini and then Johanna and then we're going to move on to the next question. Yeah, I would answer it in a slightly different way, which is that before pandemic happened, we saw a lot of concerted effort with the chambers and the bid to create more vitality and with the town also the council and the town staff working to revitalize and redesign on our commons with the Kendrick Park and there's talks about, you know, things like the block party or the performance shell, the farmers market and the bid going actively trying to create now public market spaces. They're trying to be creative and we don't want to distract and put more obstacles rather we want to create spaces and when we really talk so I did reach out to Barry Roberts today and to understand what are his plans and he talked about the designs that he created, which I don't know where the building is because there's so many obstacles at this point, but he hired Cune Riddle, which is a local architect to create a design which he thinks people will really like and appreciate and appreciate his aesthetics. We look at Amherst works what he's done with that taken an old building and change that or we look at Amherst cinema and his work with that or we look at what Cindy Jones has done with the beacon like she had many community engagement planning sessions to get as much feedback. So it's, we want to encourage these local developers so we are punishing everyone we're painting everyone with a whether we agree or not but what we're doing is we're saying we don't like those buildings whether they're good but it's a personal perspective. Nina does not like it and Steve thinks it's okay so but the point is we are punishing all the other local developers who are so invested in our community and they live here they've lived here for generations, and they want to do what's right, but we have to create a space for them to be able to come and share. I don't think any of them will talk today because there is there's no sense of invitation and cooperation and collaboration here when we talk about moratoriums. So I would just answer in that way that yeah Nina we are working really hard in trying to engage the different stakeholders including students. I spoke to, okay last thing, I spoke to a student in one East Building, East Street Building because we met on Instagram and he's a graduate student he's 40 years old he loves living there and he said I'm different but there is no policing I asked him what is your experience are there more So we need to be speaking to people and finding out who lives there who wants to live there we keep saying we want diversity and we want families do families want to live downtown we don't know that and so we are working on a community engagement plan right now at Tom and and yeah and that's all okay. Yeah we're thinking about it. I want to remind people to stick to the question that was asked. So, really the question is, do I think there's a problem and do I think the new buildings are a blight on downtown. I think five stories is a very accessible height. So from that, I'm okay with the height levels I think density makes a ton of sense. So those buildings are creating about a million dollars in revenue for our town that help pay for our schools and our sidewalks and our road maintenance and, you know, the kind of high standards for services that we want. And then, you know with regard to mass mutual. I only know this because my husband does data science work at UMass and you know he says that in that facility. Mass Mutual has really created a world class data science training program for young people, and it's the kind of thing that he didn't really think was possible in a place like Amherst like Boston maybe you can have an incubator for that kind of thing but it's happening right now in Amherst and it's pulling young professionals who are really up and coming in the data science field. A lot of them have connections to the university and you know there are 15 people who are employed there and doing interesting important work. And sure it's a you know it's mass mutual it's a large company but that doesn't mean that the contribution isn't important and adds to the vitality of downtown. So, you know, do I wish that one corner was set back further from the road. Absolutely. You know I was just going by the over design building and looking at the overhang that's there and imagining how 11 East pleasant might have an overhang similar to that and thinking how much more appealing I like that streetscape. But, you know, to me really, we're moving in the right direction we're learning from our experiences and I, you know, I don't think it's the, I don't think it's a blight by any stretch of the imagination. Thank you I'm going to move on to the next question. Ted Parker please identify yourself and state where you live and ask your question. You should be able to unmute now. I'm Ted Parker and I live in District five I live in in Amherst Woods. So my question for the sponsors is, you know, I manage some commercial property in the area and finding tenants is always a challenge. Did you, while you while you were formulating some of the site, these ideas. Did you ask the folks at archipelago about whether or not they were having success at getting commercial tenants to fill the spaces or why they decided to reduce the amount of space that they were going to devote to commercial. Do you have any, do you have any feedback from any developer about the success in in in filling the commercial spaces that they include in their developments. And the second question is, did you consult like lead for neighborhoods are any like objective standard about what makes good development good infill development because lead lead for neighborhoods encourages dense building on existing infrastructure, reducing parking. I mean, these are all like well established industry standards for responsible dense development. And, and this moratorium seems to fly in the face of them so I'm wondering about, did you consult developers and did you consult lead for neighborhoods or anything like that. Do any of the petitioners have a response. I can answer very briefly I certainly attended planning board meetings in which our Capela goes asked about retail, and he certainly mentioned this for the spokesperson mentioned difficulty at this time, but you know one of the things we're talking about is rents, talking about rents for apartments who can afford them. It's also rents commercial rents. And if the rents are too high for the kind of places we've mentioned, they're not going to go in there, but also in the middle of coven okay we're just getting out. We've been into two stores today for the first time ever. So what we've had in terms of the past year in terms of commercial may not be indicative of what's coming. Yes, we have no one we've read about what are standards we know the argument for density, but one of the arguments for density assumes local neighborhood services, and we don't have those we don't have a food store. We have many things that are that are needed in a discussion with Barry Roberts, a long time ago. He mentioned somebody said we need the shoe repair man. So, so glad he's still here. And he said yeah I haven't raised his rent since like the 1980s. In other words, sometimes to have the services that people want the people who own the buildings, don't charge the market rate, because it's a service we needed, but they don't make that much money. So there's people, you know, builders who have a certain kind of roots in the neighborhood, really are are are great, and think about the needs and some of those we've, you know, Shawnee mentioned some very forward looking developers. So, but we're not going to talk about one group versus another we're saying some of these arguments were developed holistically. And when you miss certain essential parts, such as stores for needed things, then the whole concept of the dense neighborhood that's walkable where people don't need cars doesn't it's a fallacy. So, that's it. Thank you Dorothy. Next question is going to be from Susan. Please identify yourself with your name and where you live. You should be able to unmute. My name is Susan Sheldon, and I live Mill Lane. And my question is, has there been any post occupancy occupancy evaluation done on any of the archipelago buildings. Thank you for that question. Does anyone if you have an answer to that please raise your hand Chris. There hasn't been any post occupancy evaluation done by the town. Does it follow up. Yeah, I'm just wondering why do we not require post occupancy evaluations. Correct, we don't require post occupancy evaluation. Thank you for that. We're going to move on at this point to the next question, which is Nina, do you have another question in a while. No, I'm sorry but you know what I'd like to just say for a minute. I'm really happy that your friends found a home at Mass Mutual. I don't mind Mass Mutual, I just think it's the wrong place for it. That's all. I thought we were hoping for, you know, some smaller shops, businesses, interaction, that's all. I just wanted to say that. Thank you for lowering my hand. At this point. We are going to, we don't have any more questions. So we're going to move on to public speaking in favor of the, the zoning by law proposal revision. And so please, if you'd like to speak in favor of it, please raise your hand and I will recognize you in turn you will have up to three minutes to speak in favor of it. And I will do my best to keep time and let you know when it expires. When I recognize you please state your name after, after unmuting please state your name and where you live. We are going to start with Richard Bentley. First I have to unmute. I just often wonder whether wasn't this all discussed a long time ago, and the planning department decided that there will be no additional parking in the downtown hasn't this already been done. I mean, there's no parking, you can't park there. And so why would people go there and, and if maybe they put in some parking somewhere. Fine but where. I mean, this, this whole issue was solved. Eight to 1020 years ago. There's no parking. Thank you for that comment Richard. I'm going to recognize Pam Rooney now you'd need to unmute yourself and state your name and where you live. Hi, thank you Pam Rooney 42 cottage streets so I am in district four. I do support a temporary moratorium. Our master plan acknowledges desired increase housing density in the town centers. And it's very clear about that but it also says that new infill and redevelopment of existing historic downtowns and village centers will have to abide by rigorous and sensitive design and density controls intended to preserve and enhance existing buildings. So I want to say thank you to the counselors who sponsored this. I guess I'm one of 880 people that signed the sign the petition. I do support denser housing construction. I sadly feel different than some of you, because I do not like to see negative outcomes for the heart of Amherst. I want some design controls in place to ensure what's built is has wide pedestrian friendly sidewalks it adequate parking for the business visitors and also that creates affordable dwelling units as part of anything built in the town. I think the moratorium gives us just sort of a time to build a measuring stick first and evaluate the many many disparate zoning elements that are that are under consideration. It's a huge ball of many facets, many interrelated elements that are being handled, you know, one by one over a year ago we had the 40 our proposal showed us, you know, initially showed us five story blocks smashed up against the existing neighborhoods and lining North Pleasant Street. Four months ago the Council directed the 11 different zoning articles to the town department the planning department and the planning board. This is a lot to to think about holistically. These are now unfortunately being discussed one by one. Yet they have significant overlap and definitely some cumulative effects. We still have no guidelines by which to gauge and consider the outcomes of those zoning amendments. So I would I, we also unfortunately have no standards or zoning that actually supports adaptive reuse of historic structures. And those are the buildings that in fact give character to a once and former number one college town. I'd like to get to number one again. So I would say please do vote to pause the perm permitting and I mean, all permitting not just specifically building permits but also to include site plans special permits. And let's get some design guidelines in place. I think we can then we're we're we're earned to give developers a clearer direction and we're also able to give them better direction on walkable and engaging sidewalks and storefronts will look in the field that's been mentioned before, and also some adequate parking that supports the small businesses and the new residents. And very importantly, we do want the affordable unit as an outcome of the densification of the town center. So I hear lots of comments and questions but it just, it feels like we really do need to just pause. Put our eggs into the one basket and deal with them holistically. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you Pam. Next up is Sandy must prep. Please unmute yourself and identify your name and where you live. I'm John North prospect Street, and I greatly appreciate this motion and support it and particularly well expressed by Kathy. I find it hard to understand the resistance to a moratorium a pause. It seems to fail to recognize that there is a new event in town. We've actually seen buildings built under the current codes, and many people at least 800 are dismayed. Apparently not Steve Shriver who would have, I would prefer to have had the Hadley malls built in Amherst. I understand his comment. I think it is and thoroughly sensible to pause and think how we might do a bit better. This is not against development. It's not against diversity in all those wonderful things we wish could be reconciled. It's extremely difficult to do that. But we have had events which we find dismayed and many people do you should pause. Please support motion. Thank you Sandy. Next up is Susan. Please identify yourself after unmuting and state. Thank you Susan Sheldon again. I'm a landscape architect. I have a master's in landscape architecture and a BA and an art history. I've had my own design build business for over 20 years. So I'm mainly concerned with aesthetics and creating spaces that are human scale inviting. I've been in the Kendrick park committee for over two years from the community outrage getting feedback from different different parts of our community to vetting the design firms. I'm very excited when a major building was going up on the north end of town as a gateway to our downtown and I was really dismayed at what was built. I felt like it took didn't miss so many design opportunities to engage with the park. And both of those buildings just present a flat face to the park. One East pleasant has door that has sliding doors that open with these kind of dog like gates that are supposed to be balconies I guess I just I just makes me really sad of all the missed design opportunities. And I went down there today and I walked around the park and I actually stopped several people and asked them what they thought of the buildings. And I didn't hear anything positive. It was several comments about how they were out of character with the rest of the town. And they missed the little shops that were there where so much community action took place. I think basically that's what I just wanted to say is I do believe that we need a moratorium and to develop some stronger design guidelines that would ensure that future buildings have some kind of nod to our history and the vernacular architecture in our town. Yeah, so I do support a moratorium. Thank you. Thank you Susan. Next up is Fanny Rothschild please unmute yourself and state your name and where you live. My name is Fanny Rothschild and I now live at 25 Map Pollux Drive District five. I wholeheartedly urge you to vote for a temporary moratorium. I would like to step back to systematically study what our town needs to bring new energy to its center, like others like Susan who just spoke, and, and the petitioners. I think I know we're having a consultant but I still feel like there needs to be systematic way to reach out to our residents as to what we want to see built right now to. And I don't think that we're going to find that the answer is more student housing smack in the center. And apartments that unapologetically are designed as student dormitories. I don't feel like anybody's totally addressed that today. And I'm not sure why our town planners are feeling that that's what only needs to be built and that's what I feel like is happening. I don't think that we need more students living in the center of the town. You mask and handle that other areas can handle that. And I don't think that more students living in town equals more business revitalization. I believe it's other age groups like young working people, families and retirees. They'll support the businesses in the bottom of these buildings and other downtown locations. And in turn, I think these businesses will attract the 30,000 non student residents who live outside the center. I'm talking business like retail restaurants as well as art and music venues and something like thorns marketplace which I hear is being considered, which I'm thrilled to hear. We need a study to identify what other types of buildings are viable. We need to identify these student buildings, and then work with developers who will design for non students. This plan encourages the town to thrive all year round, not only when the colleges are in session. Thank you. Thank you, Fanny. Next up is Elizabeth fearling. Please unmute yourself. Thank you. Yes. Okay. Yes, Elizabeth fearling at 36 cottage street district four. And I just wanted to say that I think that the issues that the moratorium asks for review. Prior to issuance of further building permits I view as the most critical issues in determining the future of Amherst development for equity and inclusion. And for ensuring our town is a destination for residents and visitors. I think unfortunately the issues raised by the moratorium, we're either not on the list of council development zoning priorities, or we're down very low on the list of council priorities. And I think this was a major factor, catalyzing the initiation of this petition. Hopefully since the moratorium was first put forward, inclusionary zoning has made it to the table, as was apparent tonight. And mixed use building is under discussion, though I think the latter is far from suitable in its current form. I think the other issues of critical importance, the design guidelines setbacks public space parking and further consideration of affordable housing are woefully in need of serious consideration before further development proceeds. I also believe a moratorium is warranted as we consider if the town's vision for the north end of town center is really a plan for a mini satellite UMass campus of student dormitories. And statements made that the buildings that are built and that are planned have the possibility of taking the burden of student housing out of neighborhoods. I would question the data to support this, given that the students I work with on a daily basis are looking for housing well under $1,000 a month, not starting at 1200 a bedroom. I would just like to say that the idea of building this student housing that that's going to suddenly make affordable housing pop up somewhere else is simply the worst form of trickle down economics applied to housing. Thank you. Thank you, Elizabeth. Next up is Ira brick, please unmute yourself and identify where you live in your name. I'm Ira brick. I live at 255 Strong Street District four. I sent a letter to you all with some excerpts from Amherst annual report from 1986 and 88 about the two year moratorium that happened then that pause was enacted to create the opportunity for improvement. Public input and more strategic study aimed at solving problems of over development, lack of affordable housing, whether we could provide essential services including clean water, as well as public open space to that growing population. Amherst annual report after the two year moratorium was done, reported on the creation of a phase growth by law that address the rate and type of growth that could happen, but also attracted national attention from other towns and cities, and even a feature and planning magazine. Unfortunately, that by law rewarded or penalized proposed projects by how well it met criteria. It was reported that there wasn't, quote, increased sensitivity by some developers to the protection of open space and provision of affordable housing unquote. The annual report also said that Amherst had quote, greater control over development proposals allowed for imposition of conditions by the board to ensure the site is developed without harm to the surrounding areas unquote. The journal also mentioned that in the 1988 report at the end of the moratorium it said quote, the growth of the town continue to pace and subcommittees of the planning board focused on growth management issues locations for a parking garage as well as cluster housing, affordable housing incentives and research parks. In our town's master plan it's strongly recommended to include the public's perspective in the planning process. We take great pride in Amherst that learning is baked into our town's economy and culture. I'd hope a moratorium a pause for thinking would be a time where we can benefit from the magic of representative government and recognizing that old adage, all of us are smarter than any of us. Thank you. Thank you Ira. Next up is Meg Gage, please unmute yourself identify yourself and where you live. Hi everyone. Thank you Mandy and thank you everyone. I'm Meg Gage I live in District one on Montague Road. It's really, I'm going to put on my little timer so I don't go over the time. It's really tempting to try to respond to what I've heard because there's so many. Mandy you'll have to keep time. So many things to respond to, but I'm going to stick to what I had thought I would say. I wanted to respond to three of Congress counselors Ross's points in opposition to the moratorium, but particularly the first. The three are the three that he raised in opposing the moratorium or the potential to jeopardize future and economic investment. The potential to jeopardize future state funding and the potential to exacerbate inequalities in our town point out these are all potentials which means they're neither true nor false or just like potentials. The potential to jeopardize our future economic investment and Amherst is the one that interests me the most. The argument that developers will develop will abandon Amherst if we pause to consider all options puts all power in the hands of developers and prioritize prioritizes what is most profitable for individuals, rather than what is in the best interest and the common good of Amherst Amherst is a treasure and one of the very, very few downtowns in Western Mass, where there is an opportunity for development. There are many and varied economic opportunities for revitalizing our downtown as well as our village centers. We have a great hand to play and we should be in charge of what happens, not cowtowing to what developers say they need us to do for them to be profitable. We are not supplicants. We need to take charge of exploring opportunities that will enliven our downtown, for example, services that people can't buy online, as well as more arts and cultural resources. If we flutter downtown with students, students, I feel the opportunities for serious arts facilities, for example, will diminish a few words about Amherst Cinema that I know a fair amount about. Amherst Cinema is not kept afloat by students. Amherst Cinema was not created because it would be profitable. It was created because Amherst residents wanted an independent film house. We raised 3.5 million and worked in partnership with a very creative and generous developer. We created the vision, the strategic partnership, and made it happen. I feel we need to pause and take time to envision how we can be in charge. A couple of examples. Maybe we want to create a little committee of creative people to come up with ideas. For example, let's learn more about the Thorns Market Business Plan. It's very profitable and lots of small businesses are making. Let's explore how we might develop RFPs to create the kind of businesses that we want. Let's explore creative ways of building downtown arts and cultural facilities in partnership with developers. I don't know how I'm doing with my time, Mandy, because I didn't put on my thing. You have about 30 seconds left. I'm just going to point out how to jeopardize the future state funding. Councilor Ross should specify how the six months moratorium makes us ineligible for grants after that period. Seems like they're always state grants. There really is third point potential to exacerbate inequalities in our town. This is a scare tactic and an unfortunate and really sad attempt to gaslight moratorium supporters as reactionaries with implications of racism and prejudice against low income families. People supporting this moratorium are not trying to build more upper middle class homes. They're not opposed to affordable housing. This is a really unfair and false and extremely unfortunate line of thinking. Zoning regulations are for the long haul for the buildings they govern. We need to say that 180 days is nothing. 180 days is a trivial length of time compared to the long term. And we need to think about the long term. These buildings that we're talking about building are going to be there for decades. I didn't go over my time. Thank you, Meg. A whole bunch I didn't get to, but I'll send you a letter. Send both the planning board and the CRC email or email to me and I'll make sure it can get to bodies. The house I grew up in on North 220 North Pleasant Street, for example, is a historic house and you could build a beautiful four story building behind it and keep the front. Anyway, I'll send you a letter. Thank you, Meg. Okay. I realized as Meg was talking that there are people that would probably be wondering how many attendees we have had for this. And right now we're around 44 or so I think I wasn't paying attention to see how high we got but I think it was in the 44 to 50 range for this hearing 51. Thank you. And for the IZ hearing it was somewhere around 30 at the high I think before we started getting people in for the next hearing. So I'm going to recognize Janet Keller now. Please unmute. Thank you, Janet Keller district one pulpit Hill Road. I hope that you hear that 880 people spontaneously are asking you to consider this moratorium and that they are asking you to support them in providing and ensuring that there's room for them in a more welcoming downtown. And then we have now, and to explore that with the consultant and and to enable the consultant to do whole holistic and systematic examination of what it is that makes 880 people uncomfortable in the downtown. We're glad that Mass Mutual has done well and is training young people in new skills. We still want buildings that make us feel welcome that have inviting exteriors with plenty of glass and doors opening onto the street. And in buildings that are set back on sidewalks that allow us enough room to walk with friends and family and and have enough room for trees and benches and tables for outdoor dining. We do want to ensure that we get the affordable units. And that's one way to increase the diversity, not only of the economic qualities of the people but also BIPOC I've been working with affordable housing with Amherst Community Land Trust. And we have brought several families of color in into our housing and and we need that if we need the affordability if we want to get the diversity. And finally we need to protect our public parking. The recent downtown buildings were built or permitted with very few I believe only 34 spaces for a total of 229 units, either built or permitted. And residents of these buildings are parking in the Boltwood parking garage and on Pre Street and driving demand for another parking garage which, you know, then would be paid for with public money that does not compute. And we also need to look at during that period, updating the green building standards to the ones that the town is adopting with zero energy and the new stretch code. So, um, I hope you will hear the voices that are asking you to consider their concerns. And I thank you for the opportunity to comment. Thank you, Janet. Next is Matthew and Judy, please unmute and identify yourself and where you live. I'm Matthew Mattingly. I'm in South Amherst. I'm the Matthew part of Matthew and Judy. I would like to advocate for the moratorium very strongly and for having a concerted effort to look at our design practices, and especially I would like to advocate for physical accessibility. This is something I've looked in the town on master plan and so on and the documentation I see that there is plenty of references to accessibility, which I think is really important and I like that. But I also know that it's possible for a building to be, you know, accessible on paper and in the eyes of the law and not really be accessible. It has to be accessible. And the weather is bad. It has to be accessible when it's crowded. There's more to it than just having the right number of parking places and so on. And accessibility should really be addressed holistically that the town services, the town sidewalks, the parking places, the cutouts, all those things and the way that the buildings are designed all have to work so that somebody can get off the bus or get out of their car and get into the building. And I know that accessibility is something that's in the law, and it's something that you will be looking at. But I also know that historically it's easy for it to get swept under the rug or pushed aside by things that are more, more sexy at the time, like, you know, if we want to have green buildings, that's great. We want to have buildings that look good. That's great. We want to buildings that are appealing to many different people. That's all great. But those things have to be all done in a way that's accessible. And in general, accessible design, if it's good accessible design, is just plain good design. It's beneficial to everybody that uses the buildings or the facilities. So I just want to advocate for that being kind of top of mind, as we deliberate about the design criteria for these buildings. Thank you. Thank you, Matthew. Next up is Robert greeny please unmute yourself and identify yourself and where you live. Hi. I'm Bob greeny. I'm on the column street in district three. And I think the points that I would want to make have all been made. So I just want to speak briefly saying that I really support the moratorium this very meeting is a good example of what the moratorium can do. It gives me a greater sense of connection to what's going on. I can hear people I disagree with stating their case, the trend that trajectory downtown is this disliked by a lot of people. That's obvious. The moratorium is a way of saying, we hear you. We're going to listen to you. We're going to make an effort to do things better. We're going to make it effort to have the bylaws, the standards that we use to guide our building more reflective of all of us. We're not so further scenes of division. We all live here we see each other we know each other. We want to get along with each other we don't want to be bad about being each other. We need to try harder to respect each other's position and find a compromise that works and builds greater consensus in our community. I really hope I think the moratorium would be an opportunity to do that. Thank you. Thank you Robert. At this time we're going to move on to seeing no other hands we're going to move on to public speaking in opposition to revision again if you would like to speak in opposition please raise your hand. If you recognize everyone in turn you will have up to three minutes to speak in opposition to the revision and proposed revision. And when you do get recognized please state your name and where you live before you start speaking. We're going to start with Sarah Marshall. Hello everyone can you hear me. Yes, great. Hello to all the visitors who have spoken I care what our new apartment buildings look like, but I care more about adequately funding our local schools. I care how wide our sidewalks are, but more about adequately funding repairs towards our existing sidewalks and roads. I care about the height of new buildings, but more about preserving subsidies that allow kids a financially stressed families to participate in our recreation and after school programs. In some I care more about strengthening our town's finances so that we can address people's needs, then I do about the aesthetics. I care most about creating an environment that welcomes and supports local businesses by welcoming people of any age who want to live in our village centers. I urge you to vote against the proposed moratorium, which could cost us more than we realize. Thank you. Brendan Bailey, please identify yourself on mute identify yourself and identify who you represent to everyone. Thank you for me speak again. Again, my name is Brendan Bailey. I live in Long Meadow. However, I am the CEO for the realtor Association of Pioneer Valley and our association represents the realtors in Hamden Hampshire and Franklin County. Speaking against the moratorium, it's been our experience and when I say our experience, I mean, with our partners at the state level, the Massachusetts Association of realtors as well as the National Association of realtors. It's been our experience at housing development moratorium does not help communities meet diverse needs and they can negatively affect local economies. We respectfully urge you to continue to import your important work without freezing the housing landscape. The big thing that really stood up to us is that Amherst can already decide which proposed housing developments are good for the community without imposing the moratorium. None of the housing development subject to the proposed moratorium are allowed by right. The board can determine whether proposed project adds value to the community or if it should not proceed. So our objection is pretty, pretty short and sweet. There is a process of site plan review and the board can ensure that development aligns with the character of the neighborhoods and the town's long range vision. So there are mechanisms in place and we speak in against against the moratorium and thank you again for the opportunity to speak. Thank you, Brendan. Thank you. I'm Ted Parker and I live in District 5. I have to call this effort disingenuous. I think that it is clearly an attempt to sort archipelago's development, the timing of its fact that nobody at archipelago was consulted. I mean, I agree with Mr. Brick that we're smarter together and I'm a little appalled that this is being proposed without consulting the developers themselves. I think it's irresponsible and I think it's lazy actually. And it clearly is an attempt to stop development for a while while other strategies are developed. A thousand people who don't like the way downtown is being developed, no matter how loud they are, are not a majority of people in town. And I think there's plenty of people in town who just aren't motivated to come and argue about it, who see nothing wrong with the development downtown, or see not enough wrong to want to stop it cold. And it surprises me that this such a hastily and ill thought out proposal is actually being considered. And it just seems like the same kind of obstructionism that that doomed town meeting, to be perfectly honest. Thank you. Thank you Ted. Erica Zickos. Hi, thanks, Erica Zickos. I'm also in District 5. And I will also speak against a moratorium. I worry that any moratorium will harm our relationship with our local developers and their willingness to invest. I worry that any time in moratorium is too long and that six to nine months is not actually long enough for the selection of a consultant, a legitimate study work by our staff to propose changes, public outreach and to change. I worry that zoning here is being asked to carry the burden for decisions about the public way and decisions about the type of business tenants that a developer would choose. I think that more regardless of the outcomes that there will still they'll still meet with a variety of opinions, and that we have really good changes to the zoning code in the works already. We've had parking study that recommends a garage and have developers interested in the project. I love some of the ideas that have been shared tonight and share a desire for affordable housing and for the arts in our downtown and I don't see any reason why those ideas can't move ahead within the zoning. And the amendments that we have and have already been proposed. Thank you. Thank you. Nicola usher. Hello, can you hear me. Yes, we can. Hi Nicola usher district one. I encourage you not to vote for this moratorium I think it's short sighted and regressive. There's a lot of talk about working people. I have to say as a working person with a young kid. All of us are able to attend a hearing that goes until 10pm to say our piece. I also would be curious how many working people signed the petition for the moratorium. Also hearing a lot about people of color wondering how many people of color signed that as opposed to how many people signed the sort of the counter statement. I'm not an economist but I wonder how we could even be considering doing this coming out of a global pandemic. We should be so lucky if anyone wants to invest in building anything downtown right now. You know there's there's all this it's stopping and porting development with all of this talk about small businesses but no constructive information or reasoning on how this would actually result in their being an influx of shops. And one of the counselors I believe counselor Shane mentioned something about now being the time or being stuck with it or actually I'm sorry I think this was counselor Pam. Stuck with a downtown changed for good. I want downtown to change I want more things to do I want more reasons to go downtown why is change bad what are we protecting. So counselor DuMont said density is only a thing if you have amenities to support the people living there. How is a moratorium going to create these amenities. And what's so bad about students living downtown we don't want them in single family homes as our neighbors but we don't also but they also can't be downtown. It would be comical if it wasn't so insulting and discriminatory. If they're living downtown they're going to spend money downtown but also we don't get to socially engineer downtown. You know I think that proponents want a moratorium because they want nothing to happen. And nothing to change and we need to confront that reality because six months isn't going to make that go away. Thank you. Well, Nicole. With that, we are ending the public speaking portion I appreciate everyone sticking with us through 10pm at night. We are now moving on to the next item which is the petitioner applicant response to counselors, Pam Shane, or do not have anything they would like to respond to or say at this point. Well just, well first of all I want to thank everybody for their time. It is really late at night and I can't tell you how thrilled we were to be preceded by inclusionary zoning because I think one of the words moratorium sped a lot of things up so it had an impact just by saying let's what Chris was saying what we really want are some changes in the zoning law and some positive changes so that's important. I would really encourage people to look Darcy uploaded the comments we got of people who signed. There are a huge number of people that are very pro development they want growth, they want change. So it is not a keep things the way they've always been I realize there are people who would like to keep them. It is a sense of taking hold. So I just leave you with that thought and whether mature moratorium is the only way to do that as opposed to a package with Pam talked about of holistic changes where we think about them all together and how they interact. And that's in the planning boards hands as well as staff. I do, I do think this is a moment I watched. I had two main towns that I looked at sea coast. One decided to take hold, and the other didn't have where they wanted to go and one is prosperous and the other is not so there are moments Dartmouth some other towns have taken hold. So I think we could do this, whether we can do it in six months. I don't know. Dorothy, would you like to say anything at this point, just a few brief things. I don't really like having a defeatist attitude that says whatever comes our way we have to take because we'll never have another chance. And I don't believe any of us have ever said we're against change, but we said we didn't want to have the town change so much that we didn't know that it was still Amherst. The thought of Amherst being a special town is very strong. And there's no reason that it can't continue to be so, but some of the changes that have been happening are not ones that we think are going in the right direction. So it's time to have a pause to time to think time to give the planning department planning board CRC time to deal with this. We have about four or five zoning bylaws, which are deeply in process to get through at least some of those. We solve all the problems. No, but some of the arguments against the moratorium were just reaching and creating strong and which they disposed of. And I ask you to think a little bit deeper and understand that we are not saying nothing should change. It's great the way it is. We hate everything that's happening. We don't want a new building or we don't like students. That's not what we said. It's not what we have been working towards, which is a town, which is, you know, I hate to quote this because but it's really, you know, a town where it's for everybody and a place where all of us want to be. I think we're moving in a direction which is making that challenging. So I'd like the rest of the town around Kendrick Park to be the kind of place that looks like it has a park has children has families and wants to get outside and do something artistic and creative together. Thank you. Thank you Dorothy. Darcy, do you have anything to add. I'm going to assume the lack of unmuting means not at this time. Okay. Yes, I just wanted to thank everyone again for coming and I especially want to thank the planning department that has worked hard on this for a long time they they had some very good plans in the making way back in September of 2018 and I think that I have a lot of comments that that we're going in the right direction, and I hope that the planning board and the CRC will really spend time learning and looking at the comments that people have made. I guess I just really feel like the parties are not that far apart that that that it won't be that much of a reach to to come to agreement and solve some of these problems and probably sooner than what we think the time would take so anyway I want to thank you again and I hope that you will strongly consider the moratorium. Thank you Darcy. Are there any further or final questions from the planning board or the CRC. Please raise your hand if there are. I'm going to try and make sure Jack's on my screen so I can see him too. Steve. Are we taking comments or just questions. Questions no comments. Okay. I'll pass. Chris, did you have anything. I have a question about the process afterwards so what I'm going to ask you is, when you close the public hearing, don't all scatter and let's talk a little about process and dates and procedure. Thank you. Thank you for that. Any other further questions from the planning board or CRC members. I'm done at this point I will take a motion. We're going to do this motion again fully jointly. I'm so emotion to close the public hearing on proposed zoning article 16 temporary moratorium. Is there a motion Doug move. Is there a second is that Andrew for a second. I will second. Okay, we have a motion and a second any comments. We're going to do a vote I will try to make it through the planning board again without missing anyone. Jack. Yes, please. Andrew. Hi. Tom. Hi. Who's next you Hannah. Hi. Maria. Yes. Janet. Did we lose Janet. We lost Janet at some point. So Janet. Yeah. Janet had told me prior to the meeting that she was not feeling her best and that she might exit. So. Okay. Yep. Nope. That's totally understandable. Did I get Doug. Hi. And I think that's all for the planning board. And so CRC is Mandy is an eye and Dorothy. Hi. Evan. Hi. Hi. Melanie. Hi. Did I miss anyone at all. Okay. So that is unanimous with one absent, which is Janet. And so the public hearing is closed at 1017. At this time, I know it's really late. I will say that CRC will discuss and vote on a recommendation on this on its May 25th regular meeting. If the planning board has already voted and made its own recommendation. CRC's policy is to wait until it has a recommendation from the planning board before it makes its discussion and recommendation. Okay. With that, I know Chris wants to talk about going forward with timings and plans and all. So before I adjourned the CRC meeting. And hand this back to Jack to determine whether the planning board's going to discuss anything tonight at 1018 or not. Chris, did you want to mention anything about timing or anything? No, I don't want to. I don't want to talk about it tonight because I think it's very late and we wouldn't have a very rich discussion. And so I hope that Jack will consider that. But with the idea that the CRC would like to vote on. May 25th. I wonder if there's flexibility there. And I was going to ask Mandy, Joe, how. What is our deadline? Do we have. Any time now. Any questions? I don't know. I think we'll go to the public hearing closes in which the town council can take a vote. What is, what is the rule about that? So the council has up to 90 days from the close of the public hearing to vote. If it does not vote within 90 days of the closure of the public hearings, a new public hearing needs held. So it doesn't require. It's not like the bylaw fails under state law. And so the referral to both bodies was that after the public hearing was held, we needed to get. CRC needs to get to the governance organization and legislation committee. It's vote and recommendation and language on the bylaw by. 60 days within 60 days. So, you know, I think we're going to have a meeting on June 9th. So our tentative plan is to discuss this for CRC on May 25th, but if the planning board has not had its discussion yet, it will wait until whatever the first meeting after the planning board's discussion is until it does its discussion. Yes. So I was going to make a recommendation to Jack that he consider holding a planning board meeting on June 9th. And that whole night is going to be filled with the new building that's being proposed for downtown. And then they're meeting on the 16th, which seems a little far out into the future. So I wondered if the planning board could muster itself to meet on June 9th to discuss inclusionary zoning and the moratorium and come to a vote and then pass that vote along to the CRC and then the CRC could meet after that. I know Evan raised his hand, but Jack first and then Evan. Me. Yes, Jack. Oh yeah. For whatever reason, I know I'm good with, you know, powering through this. I mean, we've heard everything. And I think that I think we could collect the votes on these two articles. But I will, you know, we'll do a straw poll. We'll do a straw poll for the planning board members. And if we want to adjourn after, you know, the hearing joint hearing with CRC is concluded, then that's, that's fine. But I'm willing to throw that out there. Chris with regard to just having some discussions and then a vote on each because I did, I, but. Let's, let's do a straw poll, you know, with the board for tonight on these, on these issues. So before that happens, I want to recognize Evan and then determine whether CRC can adjourn. Evan. In response to Chris's suggestion and remind me if I'm getting the dates around me, but I believe June 9th is when CRC had scheduled interviews for planning board appointments. And there are members of the planning board currently serving for, for reappointment. So I'm not sure a June 9th meeting for the planning board would work. Thank you for that reminder, Evan. Yes, there are potentially two members of the planning board that, that would need to attend those hearings. The interviews, the interviews are currently scheduled for 7pm to start. So are there any other questions? Chris for CRC before I adjourn CRC. So I will just make the statement that CRC will modify its schedule. On when to discuss these recommendations based on what the planning board decides. I think you've given me good information, Mandy, that it's not. There's, there's not a lot of urgency in the next couple of weeks to get this done, but maybe we can get it done tonight. I just wanted to know what the, what the deadlines were. So thank you. Thank you for that. Unless there's anything else from the CRC committee. There's nothing else on CRC's agenda. So CRC is going to be adjourned at 10. 22pm. I passed the gavel back to Jack to take his straw poll and everything. I would ask. Pam. To move anyone. I'm going to, I don't think me leaving as co-host will affect me. I'm going to ask Pam. To move me as co-host and then move. Anyone that is not on the planning board. So the seven counselors into the attendees. If they have not left. Is what I will ask. Pam. And I am just going to leave and say, thank you to everyone. I love the idea that you are willing to power on Jack. Thank you all very much. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to remove your co-host. I don't want to hit leave until I know I'm not going to kill the meeting. Hi, everyone. My planning board standards. Put me in the attendees, please. And same with me, Pam. Okay. Talk to you. So Andrew and Marie, you have your hands up. I'm going to take a five minute break or. We can do a straw poll, whether we just want to. You know, take this up at a later date or. For whatever reason, I have some energy. At this late hour. So. Andrew. Yeah, I would say we don't Janet here. And then also I. I don't feel as compelled to rush through this either. I think that. I don't have a lot of information tonight that I'd like. Like to process. So I would, if it wants to straw poll, I would say to not. Okay. Tonight. And Maria. I'm ready to vote. You're ready to vote. Okay. Doug. I am also ready to vote, but it does occur to me that we could have, we could meet next week. You know, and just postpone the CRC. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if I can vote by a week or two. I don't know when they would meet. As far as I know, we don't have a meeting scheduled for next Wednesday evening. And I could make a meeting then. Thank you. Chris. So if we were going to meet next week, we would have to have a very minimal. Amount of paperwork. We could post an agenda that would just include voting on these meetings. I'm going to be out of town. Friday, Monday and Tuesday. And I think Pam is going to be out of the office on part of Friday. And so there's not going to be a lot of. What should I say? Manpower, woman power behind putting a meeting together. So if all we have to do is have an agenda, post the agenda, have a meeting on Wednesday, the 26th. I think we could do that. I was just going to say that I think I'm ready to vote too. Okay. I am as well. So that's four of the seven that are, that are ready to vote. I think that Janet was going to provide. An email or something. Chris, did you receive anything. Of that nature. I don't believe I received anything from Janet. And I stopped looking at my email around 430, 445 tonight. But Janet probably wouldn't be able to vote on the. Moratorium because you're for the public hearing. I see. So. Yeah. You know, I think we're looking pretty good just to, to, to. You know. Do our deliberation to have, do our additional comments and, and. You know, tally up our votes. So. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's looking that way. So. I mean, I can go, do I need to do a. A roll call for, for, for us continuing. Chris, do you think? Or just. We get into it. Can I interrupt really quickly. Tom's missing Tom long. No, where is he? Must have left. He's in a 10 days. I'm going to bring it back. Okay. Yeah. My goodness. How could one of our board members. I'm still here. Do you want to. Thank you. Around here, but. You move. I must have put Tom over there and not. And what about. I just, I sent you an email and I was flicking my raised hand. You have to know my text. Oh my goodness. Darcy, she's going to go to attendees also. Isn't she? Um, double take. Go ahead and put me in attendees. Yeah. Okay. Everybody's hands are down. Okay. So at this point, Chris, do you recommend that we take a vote to continue? Or, or. Because it was a straw poll looks like we have the numbers to continue tonight, but. With your, on your path to voting. Okay. I think you probably do have that. Okay. So let's, let's discuss zoning by law. Again, we've had the hearing, the hearing is closed. We're going to deliberate and then. So this is on the zoning by law, article 15 inclusionary zoning. You see if the town will vote to amend article 15 of the zoning bylaw inclusionary zoning by expanding the scope of local preference, extending the applicability to more residential developments and adding new definitions and tiered affordability. So, um, People want to, you know, discuss beyond what. I know we have, uh, That's far. Um, Jack, this is Nate. I think, you know, he had a comment about changing the or. I was going to share my screen again. Um, In 1512. So. On one or more adjacent properties developed at the same time or in phases or that share aspects of the properties. I think that was something that was brought up. Um, You know, a pretty specific comment. And the other one was just, You know, eliminating some of these exact exemptions here. So I, you know, those are. From my notes, I mean, there are other, there are other comments, but those are kind of specific. To the bylaw has written and then there are a few others. Um, But I just wanted to, you know, to me, You know, Very helpful, Nate. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, because yet again, we, it's been an hour, hour and a half since we talked about this, but, um, Good reminder. So, uh, Do you see any. Issue with, with Doug's suggestion for changing it to and or. Nate. No, I, I, you know, um, You know, let me just go back to it. I actually think the, um, When he said it, and then I think someone, I don't know if someone else reiterated it. I, it does make me think that, um, you know, that would be, I think that not, I don't want to say it's a loophole, but I think they're, you know, The way that's phrased now, I think you would have to have both, you know, both parts that would have to be true. And so I'm not sure that's necessarily what, what we want. So, um, I think changing it is, is for the better. So, um, Changing it to end or. Uh, just saying or. So, or that chair aspects of the properties. Remove and. So yeah, right. So this would just be, um, Oh, my text. Okay. So we have that modification to the 1512. Uh, With regard to a future. Um, I would, I would propose and then with regard to your, you know, going down to the exemptions. I think that, I mean, I don't know, Rob, what if you're reading the bylaw now, sorry, Jack, I just want to. Rob had his hand raised and he's. Okay. Yeah. Then we got, we got Rob and we got Doug and Chris. Okay. So Rob. Uh, yeah, thanks, Nate. I just wanted to remind you that we actually had that language as, uh, as we were talking about. Um, It's being suggested now prior and our, our question at the time was about, um, what would it mean to develop adjacent parcels and phases? Um, and we, we were really, um, Trying to capture the situation where they shared, you know, common entrance ways, utility connections. Uh, where, where a project was developed more as a, um, a set of units or buildings on multiple properties and not so much, you know, one lot being developed and then two years later or the next year, even another lot next door being developed. We weren't trying to capture that, at least in our discussions, uh, with staff. So Rob, what would your recommendation be? Well, I, I don't, I don't have a problem with Doug's recommendation. I just wanted to remind Nate that we chose specifically not to do that. Uh, and, and, uh, have that be, you know, have that be a, um, uh, a less of an incentive for a developer to purchase multiple properties that are adjacent to each other. Uh, that may in fact develop them over time, one lot or a structure or building at a time and try to close a loophole on combining properties and benefiting from sharing those common, uh, parts of infrastructure or, uh, whatever it might be for the part of the development. And that's what, that's what this language does is it, it, it really goes after that, that proposal to develop multiple properties together, uh, not individually. And that was done intentionally. Doug. Yeah, I, I mean, I, I basically made that observation and I wouldn't even call it a recommendation. Um, it was just an observation that having the and means, you know, both sides of that and have to be, uh, have to be in place in order for the, the restriction to take place. So I'm fine with just leaving it as and, um, I think, you know, it's my understanding that town council can adjust the language, you know, in a couple of weeks when they, whenever they get it, uh, assuming we've, uh, you know, I mean, so this isn't quite, it doesn't have to be perfect tonight, but and, and I'm not even sure that I really care one way or the other. I just saw it as something that if I'm trying to wiggle my way out of this, uh, having that and look like it would be an opportunity that you wouldn't have if you had the or, but I, Rob, I hear what you're saying and, you know, you've got a little more experiences with this than I do. So I'm fine with leaving it as and if I do think Doug, to your point, though, is, you know, so what if someone, a developer is like, well, rather than, you know, yeah, it would be better to have a common driveway, but you know what, I don't want to do inclusionary zoning. So I'm just going to have two separate driveways on adjacent properties just because it saves me from doing, you know, a few affordable units. I mean, I think that's, that's the reality of having this and there that we might get some action, maybe some undesired, you know, some, some, someone would find a way to not do it. So, so we would get less pavement as is Nate. I'm thinking if we say to and, yeah, and that share aspects, I think no, I think we'd get more pavement. So for instance, if you have two adjacent properties and someone's thinking, oh, you know, I'm going to put, I'm going to develop these both at the same time. Oh, but wait a minute, you know, if, you know, you know, I'm going to have two separate driveways. So I don't trigger that and right rather than maybe I'd only have one driveway and have a better parking layout. I don't want to trigger inclusionary zoning. So I'm going to do two separate driveways and two separate parking lots, even though a better site plan might be to have one driveway and one parking lot between the two properties. So as this will result in less pavement. Yeah. I mean, this is one example. I don't. Okay. Um, Chris, is your hand up? Okay. Yeah, my hand is up. I wanted to say, um, that I don't think we should remove standard subdivisions and convince conventional standard subdivisions or cluster subdivisions from the list of exemptions. Um, first of all, there's not that much land left in, in Amherst where anybody is going to develop a subdivision, a new subdivision. So I don't think it's really going to be an issue. And it really does complicate Chris. Wait a minute. Can we scroll to that portion? The list of exemptions, except for units resulting from exemptions. Um, and Steve Schreiber, um, encouraged you to consider, um, not exempting conventional residential subdivisions or cluster developments. And I think you should exempt them for now. And if you decide later on that you don't want to exempt them, you can always make that change. And it would be fairly simple, but we don't have that many opportunities for, um, either type of, um, development rate at this time, there's not that much land left. So I don't think this is going to be a big, um, a big source of affordable units and it really complicates things. And I think it makes makes, it would make it harder to administer these things for the planning department. And so for right now, I think to simplify things, leave it in. Um, you can decide later to, uh, decide differently. That would be my advice. Chris, the RF district again, I, the RF district is all about students. So what's allowed there is primarily, um, dormitories and buildings related to, um, student life. And so, um, you're not really going to get affordable units there. We had a long discussion with various attorneys at the state level when archipelago was developing the, um, building a drive Olympia place. Yeah. And it ended up that, you know, we really couldn't, um, require affordably. Well, it turned out that we decided not to require affordable units, but there was a lot of argument in favor of not requiring. So again, again, it would just complicate things. So I would leave that the way it is here, leave that alone. Okay. Um, Rob, is your hand up? No. Okay. Um, So any other discussion amongst, uh, the board on, uh, this article as proposed. Okay. And, and we're not doing public comment because we already did have the hearing. Chris. Yep. Okay. So, um, with that, I guess we could take a motion. Maria. I'm going to approve the article is written with no edits. Very good. Is there a second? Second. All right. Doug. Uh, any discussion? I see none. All right. Let's do a roll call here. Maria. And Andrew. Hi. Uh, Doug. Hi. Tom. Hi. And Janet is not with us. Uh, your honor. Hi. And myself would be an eye. Very good. Okay. So let's, uh, move to the next item. Then we're going to deliberate post the hearing, which is the, uh, zoning bylaw article 16 temporary moratorium for 180 days on building permits for construction of residential buildings with three or more dwelling units to see the town will vote to add article 16 temporary moratorium for 100 days on building permits for construction of residential buildings with three or more dwelling units to the zoning bylaw. Uh, I'm not going to read the rest because we just, uh, had this presented. So, uh, Chris. Yeah, you have your hand up. I just wanted to go back and reword the motion for the previous. Um, article, which really I think should have been. I think we should have moved to recommend to town council, the town council adopt the inclusionary zoning article as written. Can I change my, my previous move or do I have to resay it? I'm moved that the flame board recommends the town council. To a judge that we said already. I think that's what we understood. Okay. But I think we're only recommending. Um, And Doug seconds. Three wording. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Thanks. And we're okay with not taking a vote again on that, right? I mean, I think we understood that was here. Yeah. Yeah. Anybody, any, anyone object to that? Okay. I see none. All right. So, um, on to article 16, uh, the building moratorium. Um, any, any board members. Want to discuss this further, uh, Doug. I was just going to move that we hold a vote to, on whether to recommend this. Proposal or this petition. For adoption by town council. Uh, is there a second? Not sure. I didn't understand the motion. I don't know. I don't know. You say the motion. My motion, my motion was that we. Uh, hold a vote. On whether to recommend to town council or not. So the vote is. I guess you could say I was calling the question without. Uh, wording it in such a way as to indicate whether I supported or opposed the measure. So then you're going to have two votes. And then you're going to have the next vote to actually vote. Sound right. Okay. Um, Johanna, do you want to, uh, we'll, we'll still have. An opportunity to discuss here before we vote, but Johanna. I was going to second Doug's motion. Okay. So now we can discuss. Um, and personally I had, I had some items there that I just want to get into. Um, um, Um, personally, I think the, the, the thing for me is, is, is parking. And, uh, the moratorium. You know, would put, you know, Provide maybe an opportunity for. For reevaluating, you know, where we are with parking, but I don't see it changing. Um, You know, anything else. I don't think like parking has been. On our agenda much with regard to the zoning priorities and. You know, maybe it should be. Um, But I mean, I'm not, I'm not really moved by the, the arguments of shadows and, and narrow sidewalks and open space. Um, because I, um, Again, I think when he's pleasant street. Um, you know, needs a fixed, but otherwise our sidewalks are fine. Uh, shadows. There are shadows. Um, up on main street that nobody complains about. I'm not sure why, but there definitely are shadows, uh, from a five story building, uh, in that area, but nobody complains about it. Um, and When it comes to open space in downtown, I don't really, I mean, I don't go downtown to get open space. I mean, Amherst has the most highest percentage of open space, recreational space of any town in the pioneer valley. And, um, I understand it has value, but. You know, I would couch that somewhat. You know, Given, you know, where the particular, you know, development may be. And, um, that's, I just had it. I just wanted to say that from, from the prior discussion. So, um, Maria. Oh, yeah, I, there are a lot of subjective things said tonight. You know, very emotional things, but the bottom line is, um, Amherst has a very, very comprehensive review process in place. So many, uh, departments and eyes on each project, more so than a lot of other surrounding cities. And then the other sort of non-subjective aspect is that this moratorium is basically, uh, I think one of the people wrote the best was that. It's basically a moratorium on the downtown recovery and of businesses and of people working. And, um, it just didn't make any sense at all to me, honestly. I just, yeah, I, um, I'm, I'm ready. I mean, I'd like to hear if everyone else wants to make any comments, but I'm ready to make a motion to not recommend it to town council for consideration. If that's the right wording, but, um, but I also didn't want to like put the kibosh on a fitting once in the board wanted to say anything. Yeah. Can I motion slow out there while, while more people say things. Yeah. So we can wait on a second there. If other folks want to, um, I think we can move to the next one. I'm gonna move to the next one. Yes. Only if I said it correctly for us and move to. Andrew's got his hand up Andrew and Tom. Andrew, please. Yeah, thanks. Um, you know, I tend to agree, Maria. I, um, and I'm, I'm just like a little tired right now, but the, the, the area that I have, uh, just some concern around is just, you know, What other mechanisms do we have in place with the proposal in front of us, for example, to be able to get some fair market or low modern income housing in place into those new developments? You know, Andrew, I'm wondering, and again, that didn't really get addressed, does providing more housing alleviate and encourage affordable housing by taking pressure off, you know, we're talking about downtown right now, but I think that's something that hasn't been addressed adequately, but to me, my gut tells me that more housing is going to help the overall situation in the town of Amherst. Tom? Sure, thanks, Jack. I mean, I think, you know, one of my questions is pretty clear to them in terms of not seeing correlation between the goals of the moratorium and the deliverables that they're saying are going to come out the other end. And, you know, so I have a problem because I do see ways in which we can enhance the business downtown with, you know, with financing and all kinds of other things, but zoning's not going to do that per se. And I don't think the design standards you're going to get are going to fix the problem. So, I mean, because I still think they're going to allow for buildings like that roughly to show up. So I don't know if it's going to solve the problem. And I also have sometimes take issue with the idea that we live in a town with a massive industry. And if that industry were some factory and we were talking about housing factory workers, we wouldn't be having a conversation about not wanting them to live downtown. And because our industry just happens to be education, we say that those people can't live downtown. And that's where I find the problem in terms of the way we think about who's living where, because it's our industry and we have to support our industry. And so, you know, I'm not in favor of, for a few reasons, but one, primarily, I don't think it's going to solve the problems that we want, that they're trying to address. And I think the ones that we are already trying to address and as Chris said, the amendments are going to get us to a place where we can address at least some of them on the short term. Very good. Thanks, Yoana. I grieve at the amount of time that our staff have spent working on this as opposed to advancing solutions. And so, yeah, that's all I have to say. Thank you, Doug. Yeah, I guess, you know, I have felt like this was, on the one hand, it was unnecessary because if you look at the six bullets of what they want to accomplish, we're well into, we're well down the road of accomplishing an evaluation of four of them. The fifth one has to do with the municipal parking overlay, which feels like a conversation that is really complicated and could take years. And then the last one is this climate action resilience plan, which hasn't even been released yet. I asked town staff earlier this week to give me a copy of it and it's not available. So, you know, who knows what that's gonna have and whether anybody wants to adopt what's in that. So, I feel like this is an unnecessary motion. And then because of the timelines involved in some of these conversations and getting things through the process, I think it's inadequate to accomplish its purpose. So, I intend to vote against it. Thank you. Thank you, Doug. Johanna? I'm lowering my hand. It's a vestigial tail. Oh, okay. Andrew? I would just say, this is actually, I've really enjoyed this. I went into the meeting today, thinking that I was going to be like a dissenting vote and hearing folks talk has actually been very useful to me and I appreciate hearing from everybody on this. Thank you. So, you know, in my mind, I'm wondering if we can, all right. So, we need to move to vote in favor, or not in favor of this now. I guess, Chris, you got to help me out because we kind of got down a road here. I think Doug could withdraw his motion and the person who seconded would be Johanna, could withdraw her second and then someone could make a motion to vote to recommend against, vote to recommend to town council that they not adopt article 16 on the temporary moratorium. Okay, Doug? Yeah, I was on the same wavelength. I withdraw my motion. Okay, and Johanna, good. So, I'm wondering in terms of an adder, if the town can put the parking aspect of things, because I don't see that in the zoning, you know, Chris, let me know. I mean, maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see the downtown parking as one of the zoning priorities and it just seems to be a driver. And can we recommend to the CRC that that becomes one of the main zoning priority, you know, efforts within the coming months? I think you could do that under a separate motion. And I wanted to say that Nate and I just had a conversation today with two members of town staff about parking and they're really involved in it. And we recognize the fact that we have to take another look at the municipal parking district that was developed in the 60s, revised in the 2000s. And now we've got a lot of development downtown. So we really need to take another look at that. So that's on our radar screen. And if you wanted to make a motion to ask the CRC to put it on a priority list, I think that would be well received. Okay. All right, so at this point, we have a motion with regard to not approving the proposed zoning by law, you know, article 16 for the temporary moratorium, 480 days on building permits for construction of residential buildings with three or more dwelling units. Is there a motion? Maria made that motion about- Oh, Maria. Okay. And then a second. Nobody seconded. Seconded. Okay. Doug. And so any discussion for the discussion? I see none. Okay. Let's do roll call. Maria. And Andrew. Sorry, this is to not set, sub-send it for correct? This is to recommend that town council not adopt article 16. Aye. Doug. Aye. Tom. Aye. Johanna. Aye. And I am an aye as well. So that's six zero. And I guess I would like to make a motion that there is a priority set for, you know, resolution of downtown parking concerns within our zoning priority bylaws. Cause to me that seems like a crux of, you know, a lot of the issues associated with what was behind the building moratorium. A second. Doug. Doug second. Okay. No, I did not second. Who seconded? It was Tom. Tom, Tom. Okay. So any discussion on that or? Yes. Yes, okay. Doug. Yeah, I'd like to talk about this at our next meeting or I don't want to talk about it tonight. Okay. So can you put this on the agenda, Chris? Next meeting. The next meeting is going to be all about archipelago. How about if we put it on the agenda for the 16th? Sounds good. Okay. I ran out of paper in my tag here. I found my last sheet. Are you talking about just parking general, the discussion of parking as a zoning priority, is that? I think you're talking about looking at the municipal parking district. Is that right? Correct. The only municipal parking district, not about article seven or any other parking or is it just really the municipal parking district? Let's focus on one thing at a time, municipal parking district. Okay. And that's why I want to talk about this at another time. Yeah. And Chris, one of the things is how the town is offering cheaper parking permits than UMass. That was another thing we discussed today. Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of stuff going on there with parking that I think would address a lot of these two hearings that we had today. Well, not two, but the moratorium anyway. So I think we're going to have to rope Nate into coming to the meeting on the 16th because he's our resident parking expert. I don't have that, but yeah, I agree. I also think that there's things outside of zoning and whether even in the general bylaws there's other regulations that could apply too. So I mean, I think there's a number of factors. So why don't I put on the agenda kind of a parking umbrella with some focus on the municipal parking district? Okay. Thank you. And okay, so I think we hit all the other items and it's 11 o'clock on the dot. I think we can adjourn. Where's Andrew? I think Andrew's hand is still up. Mr. McDougal. Who's hand? Oh, Andrew. Yeah, not to kill. I wanted to make sure we got all the way to 11 just so I could. But no, actually like a really simple new business question I forgot earlier is like, are we, what's the town policy like on having these meetings in person with some of the latest news announcements? Is that in our foreseeable future or are we still zoomed for a long time? That is unclear. It's, we know that the governor is ending the state of emergency as of June 15. What we're not sure of is, is he going to take away the ability for groups such as the planning boards to have meetings in remote format. And we haven't heard anything about that yet. Usually we get some kind of announcement from the state in a written form. We get something from the town manager in a written form and then we get something from KP law and we haven't gotten anything like that. And previously a couple of weeks ago, the town manager has said that he thought we would be having zoom meetings through the end of the summer. So it's all to be worked out. Okay, thanks. Good question. Thanks Andrew. So at this point, I think we're good. Correct? You're going to move to adjourn? Just say we're adjourned. Yeah, we're adjourned, we're adjourned. Thank you all. That it was a long night, but I think it was very productive. We did it.