 Okay, we are recording great. So, I'm trying to think about note taking here. Dwayne did it last time. Darcy did it before that. Sarah's juggling childcare and everything so I don't think she's a good candidate for today. And Ashwin's also juggling so it looks like Steve or Andra I'm going to need to get one of you. To be a minute taker today if you don't mind. I can. Thanks Steve, appreciate that. It's not saying anything important until I can get set up for it. Well, while you're getting set up. Everybody can review the minutes from last time. Give me a minute and I'll get those going. Thank you. Laughing at my cat, Dwayne. I'll study on this cat in seven minutes. Actually, I have a cat that looks. It's a yellow cat like that or orange. I was on a call today with a colleague who I guess her desk is under. A lofted bed and there was a cat head like hanging. It's a cat that's like hanging. I'm just dealing. Stephanie. I want to warn you that my. I probably will have to log out. And come back in. So. If you see me disappear. That's what's happening and look for me. Coming back in. So I have my phone. Right here. So. I'll probably see that before I see you trying to get in. All right. Can you all read those? Okay. I'm a little small. I'm trying to, I've got it laid out on two pages. So let me see if I can get one page and then I'll. Yeah. And you can maybe. At the bottom right. It looks like you can. Make it a little bit bigger. Here we go. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. I wasn't in on that meeting with Lynn Grissomer. So you should probably take me out of there. Under number four. Oh, it's supposed to be Andra. I'll just change you to Andra. And on the last. Point in that section. It says regarding the health policy, but it should be the housing policy. Yeah. I got everything down. Sorry, where is that Laura? It's the last sentence of that number four. I move we accept the minutes. Second. Okay. Do a roll call vote. Drucker. Yes. Recker. Yes. Roof. Yes. Dumont. Yes. Rose. Yes. Yes. Yes. Ravi Kumar. I don't know if you're with us. Okay, good. Minutes are approved. Thank you. Oh, you're muted Laura. Sorry, thanks. So it does look like we have one. Public participant. I don't know. Annalise. You want to raise your hand if you want to. Make any comments or if you're just listening in, that's fine too. I think she's covering us for the indie. Okay. I will try to keep an eye on that in case she raises her hand. All right. So next up, I think is staff updates. So yeah, I just wanted to let you all know that the. Wetlands coverage is proving to be extraordinarily time consuming. So, um, Just, you know, bear with me. So, um, that's why I like Steve, I saw your message, but I couldn't even get to it. So, um, So I apologize, but I'll, I'm hoping, um, The next. The meeting tonight is not so bad. The meeting. For the 10th is not too bad either. So hopefully. I'll be able to sort of get a little bit caught up with some of that stuff. The meeting on the 24th is going to be a big one. So I said, I'm kind of going out with a bang for the wetlands work because that's my last meeting helping them out. So, um, But that'll be a big meeting which may or may not, I may or may not have to do follow up depending on where Erin is with her return. So. And I don't want to bombard her either. So, um, I'm just letting you all know that's kind of what's going on. Okay. Thanks, Stephanie. And do let us know if there's anything we can do. To make your life easier on our end. Thank you. I doubt there is, but. We're all doing a great job. Okay. Great. So, um, moving on to e-cac member updates. Quite a few things on the agenda. So maybe everything's covered there. So, um, I'm going to leave it up to you. When they in progress. Update. Stephanie, do you want to leave this discussion? Sure. Um, so, um, I had been in touch with, uh, Laura and. Jim. And they had requested that we actually move the. Um, draft review. From the 19th to March 5th. Because they have quite a bit. So, um, So, um, Laura has quite a, uh, Lauren has quite a bit that she's working on. And so it seems like she'd be able to have more substantial information to us. She doesn't want to give it to us in bits and pieces. So, um, that's the big update. And then, um, There's a revised timeline that goes along with that. And I'm sorry. I think. I had it. I had it open to share, but there is a revised timeline for everything. Um, You should know that that doesn't change our. End goal, which is to get something, you know, by, um, By mid-May to the. Town council, which we had changed originally we had said April, but we knew that that was not going to work. Um, even when we were talking about just having the drafts put together. So, uh, this, uh, thank you, Laura. So this is the result revised timeline. So. Um, everything has to be submitted to the MVP program. By June 30th. So essentially everything has to be done pretty much by mid-May. So if there's anything, you know, any comments from the town council for whatever reason. And not that I anticipate there's going to be changes, but if there's anything that needs to be addressed, it just gives that little bit of a window of time to get it done before everything. Um, and then that becomes finalized and submitted to the MVP program. So essentially it seems, you know, it seems like a little bit of a pushback, uh, in terms of the timeline, but it's really not, it doesn't throw us off a whole lot really. It's just a little bit. Darcy and then. The reason why we had initially. April was because the, the budget is presented on May 1st. Um, I don't know whether. It's meaningful for us to do that because I'm guessing the first thing the town council will do is refer it to committees. Um, I don't know whether it's still worth trying to get it done before May 1st. I don't think that's. So I think, I mean, I think that we. The report is the blueprint. And I think anything that's specific enough to be like, this is something we're asking for budget money for. It's something that we need to be working on right now. So I don't know. And I don't think those two things are. In conflict. Um, I think that. So I think that the report, kind of like how we were talking last time with our big ideas. You know, I think we should try to identify some specific action items. From that list. That we're going to take back to the council either through the budget reading process or through the committees. Um, to try to push them to be actions that this council can take in this year. Um, Those will all be complimentary to the report because the report is going to identify those as things we're doing, but those don't need to be written and finalized in the report in that level of detail. Um, So I don't think that it's an issue that the. That will be working sort of in. In parallel. On some very specific items, whether those are items we bring to the budget or not. I think it's a lot of different discussion. Or discussion we need to have. Um, You know, we've submitted some idea budget ideas. We also know the budget. Is super tight and that what we really need is like fundamental changes, which are probably not going to happen. Um, By May. And so we might just need to be priming for those. But I don't have it. I've not been following those discussions. Yeah, I would just add that, you know, one of our budget requests last year and this year was. For the resident to support the resident capital request. And I, I know that that has been. Actually, I haven't gotten the update on that from Andrew, who attended the JCPC. Right. Capital planning committee. Meeting last Thursday with the students. Do you have an update on that, Andrew? Um, there was no decision taken there. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I think we presented again. Um, and. They really had. You know, there was, um, not very much new to. To say. And they'd kind of forgotten what was before. So. I am. Yeah. I don't have anything. I don't have anything. I don't have anything. I don't have anything. I don't have anything. I don't have anything. And Andra and Ashwin. During the. Is it during the council meeting where one of the council suggested that that funding could come from somewhere else. Or was that a different meeting? Uh, well, last year. The JCPC meeting. Um, They're. They're. Um, Paul. Said. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if I could use the money that was for the CCA. Um, but that's. That's no. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We all. Has. Has worked with. Donno. And maybe there will be some money for part of it. Yeah. But we don't have to talk about that now. Yeah. Yeah. It was Kathy. I'm looking at your notes. Starzy. From that meeting. The residential capital. Oh yes, Kathy. Kathy. We had, at some point we had conversations about. Um, Getting donations for it. Trying to get matching funds. If, you know, if the town. Put in this much. We try to get matching funds for the other amount. Um, and Paul. Said not to go there because of the possibility for funding it. Um, so. Yeah, I think that there's some sympathy for funding it both in the JCPC and. I think with the town manager. That's the impression that I guess. I see a hand, Sarah. Um, All of these dates are. A Friday. Yeah. Yes. Um, so is the intent that we. Have comments by that upcoming Wednesday meeting or feel like there's some process in between these lines of like. We get it from Linnea and then what does it look like when we need to have review by and what does all of that. Um, I think it looks like there's kind of overlapping. Us reviewing slash them editing going on. Yes. You're, you're, yes, that is very, um, perceptive and astute. I just want to know when do I need to be ready to review and give feedback. Turned around and how quickly does that look. Yeah. So I would say it looks like you have a meeting on March 10th. So you get a draft on March 5th. I think the idea is to at least try to have some conversation on the 10th. Um, but it looks like, um, So I can actually have till the 26th, right? Um, So, so, so this is part of the conversation. We'll have a little bit later with the retreat. Um, But what, what I am in. Um, What I was envisioning is we get it on the fifth. Um, I think together with the report, I'll circulate out some kind of comment. Collating document or sheet or something. Um, And, you know, it'll be. Where come where everybody can add in their name and their name. You know, we're going to be focusing at, you know, task group or sector group. Co chairs should sort of start with that. Make sure they review their sector, but then also everybody's. Um, Welcome and encourage to review the whole document. I think this is, this is really our chance. I think to review the whole document, you know, we've talked a bit about. So far in sector groups, which has been. If efficient. Um, this is an opportunity to read, read through the whole thing. So. We are going to try to organize a. Um, Retreat hopefully for that, that weekend, the 13th and 14th. Of March. Um, I guess we could just have this conversation now seems easiest. Um, Um, To do. Stephanie, do you want to send out? I guess we could just ask right now if anybody has like. Definite. Conflicts with either of those days. And if not, we'll send out a doodle poll to kind of figure out whether morning or afternoon. Works better for folks. But what I'm envisioning is that we will all do our own review, submit comments. If there's anything that we need to discuss during the retreat, there's nothing conflicting, you know, discuss anything we need to discuss. We have our next e-cac meeting on the 17th. So that will be an opportunity to sort of. Finish up any of that comment, you know, any of that comment review that we don't get through during the retreat. Um, And we'll be ready to hopefully submit that. Well in advance of the 20. 26th. We have a meeting on the 10th. We have a meeting on the 10th. We have a meeting on the 10th. And the 10th is about availability and it looks like. The 13th and 14th. Between two to four for the regular scheduled, regularly scheduled meeting time. On the 10th, our preferences. Okay, great. Um, I think if people are free that weekend, I'd like to push it to the weekend just so that gives us more time between the fifth. And our retreat to do our, our review. Um, I think that would be a good idea. I think that would be a good idea for those days, but that, but that, that's the idea. Um, So hopefully we could get back our comments to Linnean. By, um, The 19th of March. That answer your question, Sarah. It does. Yeah. Great. Sorry, Andrea. I think you had raised your hand. And then. I might have skipped over you. She might have stepped away. Yes. Yeah, I just, I just want to sort of emphasize that getting that draft by March 5th is very important. And I would say to Linnean, even if it's not perfectly completed, they should get us what they've got by March 5th. And not ask for another extension. And, um, so we can at least start to read through it. If they have some revisions to present to us slightly after that, that would be okay, but we should get the bulk of. Um, by March 5th. Hopefully that'll work for them. But as a professor, I often know when you, when you give people an extension, they come back and seek another one. Yeah, I don't. I don't suspect that's going to happen this time. Okay. I think, um, I just think there were a few sections. Some of them are complete already, but again, they didn't want to piecemeal it. And so. The other ones will be ready by then. I think we've got to get started. Yeah. Yeah, I was, I was kind of inclined to ask if we could see some of those sections that are completed. So at least we can get a jump on reviewing it. But, um, that's fine if they want to wait and present the whole package on March 5th. Fine with me. Yeah, I felt the same way, Steve. Yeah, I think there's benefits to. Um, having it all together. So, but maybe if there's parts, you know, I don't know, see if there's stuff that we can get out earlier. With the commenting document. Um, so people can start reading earlier. Um, that might work too. So Stephanie and I can. Figure that out. But currently the plan is. By the fifth having it. Um, and. Um, Together with the report. Some kind of clear instructions on how to submit. Or to collect comments. Great. And then I think the other part of. That whole process. So between the fifth and. The 19th or the 26th. So when we get our feedback back to Linan. Is going to be, um, kind of community outreach. And task group member, you know, they're going to receive portions or they're going to receive it to review as well. And sort of what. I think it's always helpful when you're asking people to review a media document to. Kind of clarify the goals of their review. Like, what are we hoping that they're reviewing? Um, What, what we hope that they are looking for and providing feedback on not to say that they can't look and provide feedback on whatever they want to, but giving them some direction is usually. Um, Beneficial. So I'd like to talk through that with the group. Probably easier to do that once we get the draft. Um, but that'll be something we either incorporate into the retreat or into our meeting on the 17th. Um, Is it publicly available? No. Yes, exactly. Okay. So it's fairly limited audience. Although if it goes out in the meeting packet, would it be public? But maybe. I wouldn't necessarily post it to the meeting packet. I would have just sent it to all of you. Okay. That's good. I think. That's good. Okay. And then we have a more targeted group as we think about how we want to elicit and focus feedback from town staff. Now, is that what level of town staff is that going to include? Is it going to go. Out to department directors like DPW and. Chief of police and that. It'll go to department heads. But also there was a, uh, During the MVP process, there was a core team. That was, uh, included the communications manager. Who isn't specifically a department head, but was included. So it'll. It'll definitely be focused on the members of the core team. And then other department heads. Okay. Okay. Great. If there's no other. Discussions to be had on this. We can. Move on here. Okay. So we will have our meeting on the 10th. Yeah. And then. So we'll have two meetings between. Okay. I guess I was getting confused. Sorry. Meeting today. And then we have a meeting scheduled on the 10th and on the 24th. Right. Right. Yeah. So, um, if we have the retreat on the weekend of the 13th and 14th. Then. And we don't finalize our review then. We would finalize anything on the 24th. Will you start to have some discussion on the 10th or no. Yeah. That's a good question. I think. Um, potentially if folks are already. I guess I can see how folks can submit some comments. In advance. Um, and we could start that process and or we could use that opportunity to talk a bit about the community outreach. So, um, Think about that a little more. How to organize all that. Other option, I guess, is to. Move things around a little bit and do not have a meeting on the 10th, but then have a meeting on the 17th. If that worked for people's schedules. I just want to quickly tell Stephanie that Andrew is in the attendees and she wants to be led in. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Oh, because she shows up as a telephone number. That's why. Sorry. That's okay. I didn't. I didn't know that was her. I guess back to Laura's comment. My thought is to keep our meeting on the 10th is scheduled and hopefully we can at least have a. We should be able to have a big scale. Broad scale discussion of the draft. And maybe then divide up some of the more detailed review responsibilities at the March 10th meeting. Um, But at March 10th, we might just comment on if the, there's major sections missing or which sections initially look good, which sections need a lot more work. Um, the tone of the intro. Um, I think we can do some big picture stuff. And then maybe we can assign. Aspects of you. To, um, For the members to work on for a little bit later. Sorry, this is a housekeeping thing, but Andrew, I cannot, um, Promote you to a panelist for some reason. So. Can you hear me now? Yeah, we can hear you. Okay. I think you did. Okay. Anyhow. Good night. That's good. Okay. So. Yeah, let's plan on keeping our meeting on the 10th. And we'll, we'll go from there. I think we have. A couple of weeks to play with. And I think we should have ample time to. To provide comment. So I'm not too worried. And we'll send out a final time for. The retreat. Yeah. I think we should book two hours. If we don't need it all great. More than that's hard to stay on zoom for. For both days. No, just one day. Do we know which one. You all could. Decide now. I mean, you know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, Decide now, I mean, you know, You know, For the most part. Two to four was the timeframe that some people had a morning conflict. So. Two to four seemed to be the preferred time if people could do that on the 13th. Yeah. And we're in different. I'm in different too. I think. Sometimes on Sunday afternoons, I don't know. So why don't we say the 13th from two to four p.m. Sounds good. All right. Sundays also daylight savings time. We might be too tired. Or daylight, whatever. But they take away. We lose time. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know about that in my younger days. And now that I'm a parent, it's like my worst nightmare. I know. I feel for you, Sarah. Thank you. Sleep is precious. It is no pun intended, but there is a light. Yes. Sorry. My puppy is playing with my wire. Okay. I think you raised your hand to make a comment. And then I don't know if I ever gave you that opportunity. So I don't know if it's okay. It's okay. I, I. The time, the moment passed. All right. So that. Is great. So let's see. All right. So the next agenda item is housing policy goal. So I'll pull this up as well. So just to recap. The CRC is working on. A comprehensive housing policy. They've asked. They're sort of. Prepping ecac to provide input. Particularly on, I mean, we're welcome to write input on anything, but particularly on goal four, which is on page. 13, 13. Yeah. Start. Starts at the end of page 12. I can. Did they give a deadline for comments? So they are still in, as you can tell by this document here. They are still in drafting form. So they have not yet asked for kind of last and final comments on this. So in that sense, no, they have not given a deadline. They. But I believe their intention. Stephanie correct me if I'm messing this up, but I think their intention is to get a final version by June. So. Kind of given the shift in the report. It seems like probably us talking about this today. Where we have some room on the agenda makes sense. And then. Once we get a final version to comment on, we can send through any comments that we have now. I don't know. Get a more final version. We can also comment. Comment on that. I assume it will happen in April or something. Was this in the packet? Yes. I don't know. It's in there. It's in there, but you have to scroll through like the beginning is. Not this document. And then it gets to it. So. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know for CRC housing update to town committees. I have the. An earlier version of it that I was looking at. I don't, this isn't the latest draft. It was sent to myself and Laura. So even the comments that we made. Aren't reflected. Yeah. So this was the latest version that I had. So please add in to some of the comments we made. When we met with them a few weeks ago. Which, you know, were. Suggestions to, for example, for the strategies. It's not necessarily about. I mean, reducing carbine emissions is the goal, but for this policy, what we're actually talking about is making houses more energy. Efficient less of an energy sink. You know, not reliant on fossil fuel technology that. You know, may become more and more expensive and or. Stranded asset. As we move. Towards a low carbon economy. We talked about charge, you know, charging stations, which are in here. And we also talked about with this medium. Priority about resiliency and low impact development that that actually is not a medium priority. It's a high priority for. Making sure that. We are leveraging as many green infrastructure and low impact development. As much as much of that as we can. With any new. New buildings. I think that was the gist of it, Stephanie. Did I miss anything? No, I think you got it. I don't know if this is the right time. Got to get back on my computer, but. Stephanie and Steve. Did you see the. Graphs that. Core sent us. About the energy use. And. Amherst. And it looks like. It looks like. Low income residents. Pay. A much higher percentage than the Massachusetts average. Of their income on energy. So it's a very compelling. Data. Did you see that, Steve? I did. Yes. Yes. I'm trying to bring it up here. Is it here? So, um, Cora, who is our team leader for the Rocky mountain Institute. Um, present provided some information from. Uh, the so-called lead tool, L E A D tool. Energy. And it can provide hundreds of charts and comparisons on a fairly localized level. So she created some charts. That show the energy burden. Um, by owners versus renters. And also by income level. And you want to share your screen, Steve. Sure. Let me see. I can go here to the zoom webinar. Share screen. And, uh, there it is. And share. Okay. So we're going to start with the, the, uh, Andre and I. We'll be discussing with Cora on our meeting Friday. And I'm going to recommend that Oshlin might consider joining this group because we may be shifting more to look at energy and rental housing. Um, let's see if I could you zoom it in just a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. So this, this chart is showing average energy burden. Um, Um, Massachusetts versus Amherst. So Massachusetts are the blue, um, columns and Amherst is the orange different shades. And this across the bottom is the, um, There's both renter occupied and owner occupied. So there's two sets of blue and orange bars. Set on the left is. Uh, renters and the pair on the right or owner. Um, Um, Um, which is a medium income. Um, And so this is showing that. Renter occupied. What is it showing here? Amherst is higher than most of Massachusetts. That's kind of the take-home message for this across both renter and owner occupied and across all income brackets. And then she broke it out. The next chart here is just, this is just an Amherst by fuel type. So the, again, there's across the bottom are the different income groups, 100% on the far right that's 100% of the median income, 100% and greater than median income. So the lower income are on the left side of the chart. And you can see the energy burden is a percent of income. So for the lowest income on the far left, you can see it's 20 to 24%, and there's a breakout of the different kinds of fuels there. But when you get closer to the median income on the right side of the chart, that energy burden is down into four to 5% range roughly. So that showing that renters have a higher energy burden, propane and fuel oil, as well as other work in that culture other views. And then was this one showing this one is showing energy burden again, again, a low income tends to have that higher energy burden, the energy cost is higher as a percentage of their total income. Oh, this is by the style of unit. So single unit on the left, one unit attached to units, three units all the way up to 50 or more units. So some of the highest energy burdens are associated with single units, but she doesn't know that's a very small percent of the total population has that very high rental or energy burden. Stop me if we want to move on. There's more details here. So yeah, so then there's some conversation that we're going to have about rental efficiency standards. And this is something that we've talked a little bit about an ECAC, but that would be related to potential energy disclosure laws, and even if standards. And there's great examples of other communities that have established this. Boulder, Colorado, Portland, Oregon, Portland, Maine that the Linnaean helped produce. And draw your attention. This site here rmi.org rental dash toolkit provides a nice sort of handbook on how to develop a an implement rental efficiency standards required rental efficiency standards, both benchmarking publicizing and then also mechanisms to achieve improvements in energy efficiency over time. I found that really interesting I spent a fair bit of time studying that. And some of the information I think that I sent you, which I think Laura sent out just a few minutes ago, was just a two page extract from this website that highlighted the aspects of creating rental efficiency standards. So I was pleased. I think this is a great strategy. I hope to learn more through rmi and maybe they might even set up a similar thing as they did for the electrification, where we might get a group of towns in amour in Massachusetts all trying to do the same thing. And with some rmi help, we can work together to develop something that can be implemented. I'll stop there if people have any questions. Thank you so much. This is this is awesome. I just real quick, I was opening and closing doors, switching to my computer right when you said something about a meeting that I want to join. And I totally missed what that was. Could you just repeat that real quick? Yeah, you're going to be leading this meeting on Friday. That now this is Andra and I have been participating in this Rocky Mountain Institute team that was focused on electrification and we sort of cleared the hurdle on that as that is now included in the statewide bill. And we're hoping for progress on that. But the our coach, whose name is Cora, is we're sort of shifting the discussion to explore these energy standards and rental sorry, energy efficiency standards for rental buildings and perhaps commercial buildings as well. And that meeting is scheduled for this Friday at what time. Getting there three o'clock, three o'clock, isn't it? Yeah, three o'clock. And in addition to Andra and I, it's also Chris Riddle and Felicia Mednick have been joining those conversations. So it's a fun group, it's a good group. And Cora has been really helpful as the coach of that group. So I will send Cora a note and have her at least send you an invitation, Ashwin. And then you can see about it fitting into your schedule. Brilliant. Thank you. It seems like some of these elements are worth adding to the list. You know, suggestions to the CRC. Yes. Yeah, they're really well. Yeah, I'm thinking we could even just share this document with with them. With that committee. Because it looks like there's some useful data in there. But I, but I also think that, you know, this, this came up. You know, Ash, both Ashwin and Andra brought this up or things around this issue up during the big idea discussion. The CRC is working on this policy. It feels like this is a really ripe area to focus in and identify some like specific actions that we can take both that the council can take. But also, I think Darcy, your earlier discussion, if there's anything around funding specific to this that we need, I don't know if we need funding per se, but I think this would be a good area to focus in on. Yeah, Ashwin. I sorry, I can't see every piece of it. So people. Yeah. OK, yeah. So I'm not sure if this would be helpful. And maybe the RMI people kind of know all about this and kind of have all the answers already. But if they don't, I would be interested in doing some research on the process that it took to get that ordinance passed in Burlington specifically and maybe some other municipalities. So if that would be helpful, I would be down to sign up for that task. Yeah, if you check out that toolkit that I was highlighting the RMI toolkit, they they present some case studies and they present also sort of a series of step by step actions to take and even a policy blueprint that you can download and fill out specific to your town. One of the things they do mention is that as you get into, you want to be able to do a housing study and kind of look at the bang for the buck and consider what level of efficiency standards you might try to implement. And they describe that as something like a $50,000 study. So that could come forward as a possible budget item. OK, so it sounds like Steve, you're going to connect Ashwin with the RMI group. And maybe you could share this document as well. Yes, why don't we I can share it now with the committee, but it might we might want to look at it and sort of focus it a little bit at our meeting on Friday and make it even better to share with the committee following that meeting. Yeah, if you could come up with, you know, a few items that you think we should add to the list for the CRC. Yeah, that would be that seems like it would be a good idea. And at the point that we're ready, it that the accelerator group is ready to share the document, I would also forward it on to Linnean. Yeah, OK. Oh, yeah, definitely. Oh, I'm thinking. Go ahead. Oh, sorry. Oh, I'm just thinking that it like the CRC has a lot of things that they deal with. You know, the housing isn't the only thing. So if we can, you know, provide it all, but but sort of do a cover letter of what we think is most relevant for us, that I think would be helpful. It makes sense. Things that works well for Amherst is we already have a rental licensing program and those those rentals have to be licensed every year. So that provides the perfect mechanism for adding on to for rental efficiency standards. And so I don't know exactly how that rental licensing program was developed a few years ago, but I can imagine we might do something similar to that process, which will take time, but we'll have to develop a group of people that might include the inspections department and local real estate folks and property owners and kind of collectively come up with a plan that at some point in the future, could be a year or so away, would present a plan to town council for ratification. The rental program started in the inspections department with the current building commissioner. And I think to develop, Stephanie, it was probably, I would say, easily a full year. Yeah, but it was a lot of outreach to a lot of landlords. Right. So and that takes time getting response. You know, responses was it just took a lot of time. Yeah, and this may take even longer. It has the potential for putting a burden on property owners to complete surveys of their properties. And and they may be worried about what the costs of upgrading to an efficiency standard would be. And we want to make sure during this process that doesn't cause rents to increase above and beyond. What what energy savings tenants might see. And these are things that are all are discussed in the case studies that the RMI toolkit together. Yeah, and I think in terms of the CRC housing policy. I think it's it would be helpful if we wanted to get in, you know, they have this priority of reducing emissions. So maybe we edit one of these bullet points or suggest a new bullet point very specific to to this project. So I think it's not that necessarily CRC would do it. But I think if it's included in their policy and in our plan, you know, then we're sort of moving towards larger buy-in that this is the direction we need to go in. Yes, I think that's good. If CRC includes that, that could give an incentive to inspections department and perhaps us to work together to flesh out the details of. Does it make sense for our building group or the people that are focused on buildings to to take the take the request from the CRC and and and look at it further for edits and add whatever Stephen, Stephen, Andrew, who's on that committee? Steve and where the co-chairs of the building, Jesse and Steve. No, no, no. And Sarah. Well, anyway, it seems like we should have a little subgroup working on coming up with what our response is to the CRC. I, you know, I have comments about the the the list as it stands right now. I think that it's it's it's a little tricky because it's really intertwined with its zoning and planning recommendation that it put forward. So it to the extent that we could stay away from the politics of it, I think would be good. And so, yeah, I guess I just feel like it the the version that we have it needs needs a little bit more work and the opportunity for us to comment on it. And it makes sense for our building people to take it on, but maybe they don't have don't want to or don't have the capacity. I don't know. Yeah, so I think one. I think there's a good suggestion there, Darcy, which is that what what we don't want, I think what we want to accomplish is for the at a minimum rate, the CRC housing plan, not to contradict what's in the CARP plan and a maximum be really aligned and help push each, you know, sort of provide more kind of a backup for the work that we're we're putting in our plan related to building and housing. So I think we should review with me. So maybe and we have the time. So I think as we review our our report, somebody, whether it's Jesse or Sarah, or maybe somebody just will will volunteer their time to kind of cross check that with this plan. So what I'll put on my list to do is get an update from Mandy Joe. So we can do that cross check with the most up to date version when when the time is right, which will be at some point while we're reviewing the report or after we review the report. What what level of detail would be included in the CRC recommendations with regard to a plan like this? Would it be a basically a one sentence statement that a group will be developing a rental building efficiency standard and bringing it to town council or would it be more detailed in the CRC plan? Given the text that they currently have, I imagine it would be one sentence and pretty high level. So like right now it says for community choice aggregation, for example, utilize community choice aggregation to provide clean energy. So I imagine it would be just a sentence. I think yeah, I hope so, too. And I think then that could be very broad. And then we could assemble a group that includes some of us folks from inspections and who knows who else to really maybe working with the RMI coach to then develop it and go through the steps that the in the RMI toolkit to develop that plan over the next months. And I think Jesse would probably have some interest and expertise on this. They use either of the HERS building assessment or the HES building assessment, which I he has talked about as a way of assessing efficiency of buildings. Yeah, Dwayne. Yeah, I was just and I know we're not sort of commenting too in too much detail on the CRC strategies yet, but just throw out there and to to incorporate what Steve has been talking about in terms of these energy efficiency programs and and and regular rules or whatever it is. Is really important, but I would add because I'm reading this and it talks about net zero. And I think I think I'd like to see a little bit more explicit language about trying to encourage or regulate or somehow replace fossil fuel boilers in these buildings because that's that's going to be the big transition needed to get to the carbon reductions we need. They go hand in hand with energy efficiency because they're hard to do without energy efficiency. And if you're doing energy efficiency retrofit, that's a pretty good time to swap out to heat pumps or whatever. And I think that's more the goal than net zero, especially for retrofits. We don't want to discourage people from not doing it because they can't get to net zero because they can't put, you know, they might not have room for PV on the roof or something, but we still want them to swap out boil boilers, gas boilers for heat pumps and so forth. So I just just reading the list of the high priority list. I didn't see something that would a little bit more explicit about this transition to renewable thermal technologies. Yeah, that's a good point to in. And we did talk a bit about, you know, as we were looking through this together. There's just this one bullet point on retrofitting, but it was kind of recognized that maybe there's not enough focus on existing buildings. And so this would be a good addition to that. And I think point well taken. And we did talk about sort of focusing the language more on those tangible items of like reducing energy costs and reducing reliance on fossil fuels versus reducing carbon emissions, which is a little bit too like vague for for the doesn't explain as well what the goal is. The the programs that I have seen for rental building efficiency standards don't attempt to go to net zero for existing buildings. They shoot for improvements. And in some cases, there are caps on how much a property owner has to spend in order to make progress. So I think that was Burlington and I can't remember. But there are standards for how much improvement or what level of efficiency is required in order to maintain your rental license. And those are things that we can work out through discussions and analysis of existing buildings. And then those standards can also be ratcheted up every five or ten years. So buildings continue to grow more efficient. And that would provide a long enough time frame where building owners can then think about replacing some of those major things like like boilers. Not necessarily in the first year of the program, but they could think about doing it within ten years after the program that started up, for example. And I think that's there's an opportunity there to maybe bring in. Andra's idea from last time about the database and like the tracking, you know, could we build. An opportunity for landlords to provide information about the age and stuff of their equipment and then help them identify when it's time to upgrade and things like that. Yes, yeah. Yeah, it's typically included in the energy surveys that are done for either the HES or HES assessments. In both cases, an inspector goes through the building and notes the levels of insulation, the types of windows, the size of the building, as well as the efficiency of the heating and the HVAC systems. They do not base the ratings on actual energy bills, so it's not based on what the tenants might be doing in the building. It's really based on the structure of the building. So that's why they liken it to or compare it to a miles per gallon ratings for vehicles guide that you can compare different buildings. But your mileage will vary depending on your your habits or your tenants habits. This is this report, the core of pull together. It's really amazing for how much data is already available. And yeah, you've got to thank her. Yeah, we'll thank her on Friday when we talk with her. Yeah, that's great. So I think I've heard a couple action items. One is that Steve will connect with Ashwin about the meeting. Ashwin has offered to do some more research on some of these other towns, you know, by looking through this information and anything else. And I think given the interest in this, the work of RMI, the work of the CRC on the policy, it seems like this is definitely floating up as one of the things that we want to focus on trying to move, move in some way. Um, am I mischaracterizing that there's a lot of synchronicity at the regional and state level, too, because this is an interest that, you know, the CCA group has talked about. And it's also something that is now, you know, a state goal for major climate organizations to pass legislation to help make this kind of thing happen. Is there this could be, of course, part of our report and then could feed into another MVP implementation grant? Sorry, something I'm getting the wrong words for the 50 K that Steve mentioned to do the because the housing stocks study, right? Is that what that was for, Steve? Yes, I'd have to double check exactly what that was for, as was described in the RMI toolkit. But it was yes, I think it was a housing study. Would there be any any other place we could we could get that money? Maybe Darcy looking to you now looks like maybe state programs. But I don't know. Yeah, that's some other research to be done to look at, you know, to start talking with. Do we are about things that are coming up? Stephanie, do you know the timeline? For MVP, so I know, like, we submit everything in the end of June. Is there some kind of like waiting period for when we can start to apply for additional grants? No, they have, in fact, they they're changing their format a little bit. And now you just have a letter of interest that you submit first. And I think they're trying to sort of narrow the the pool of. Funding that they're they're distributing to so. That's actually there's one actually coming up now and we could throw something in. And I wasn't saying anything earlier, but I have had in my mind about the. Solu solar resiliency that we had thought about applying to FEMA for submitting that. For at least a letter of interest regarding that. Which might touch on the. Resident capital request. We might be able to sort of wrap that in, especially if it's through the MVP program, I think. It feels to me like there might be a little more leeway in terms of. Where we could get the study that more sort of intense engineering study done. And possibly incorporate implementation as part of it too. I'm not sure. Okay. Okay. And then. I will reach out to Mandy Joe and just see when an updated version. Will be available of this so that we can. Provide more detailed comments. Consistent with our. Report. In the meantime. Is there somewhere that I can send comments. As, as like Darcy or as. My self to our whoever is. You know, our, our joy. Yeah. I mean too. I guess I'm confused by the question. To me. I just have some editing comments about that section. And. So just wondering what I should do with them. Yeah. So we can collect those. And if. Somebody, I think. We haven't. Yet had somebody from ecac. Volunteer to kind of take the lead on providing ecac specific comments, but I imagine the process would be that. Whoever does that, you know, we provide comments to them and they. Pull them off. Together and we review them as a committee. I mean, this is a public document on the CRC website. So if you wanted to provide comments. Just as Darcy, you're also, of course, anybody's welcome to do that. I don't know if it makes sense to submit a round of comments now and then submit a round of comments later or not. We could, if Darcy, if you want to send your comments, we can send them in with. Dwayne. Dwayne's note and just this. The. The mention that we're working on something related to renter. Efficiency standards and we'll be in touch with more information, but you know, it is still a work in progress. So I think. Comments are welcome. I just don't know if. When you, when you say send them in. Do you mean to Stephanie? Comments on this document. I would, I assume would go to the CRC. Right. Yeah. Are you talking about to Mandy Joe. Or Dave. Or whoever. Okay. I'm, I'm attempting to. Help. Shape the ECAC. The ECAC document. Whatever comments we're going to give to them eventually. So. I hear you saying that you would like us to wait until. We get a more final version. I think there's two things to wait on. One is getting our. Comments. So that we are kind of aligning. I think the more aligned these two documents are the better. So the more that the language we're using in our report is also reflected in the policy. The better. So I think. We want to provide comments that. So I think we need to wait to be able to provide those comments. So I want to reach out to them to me. I'll reach out to Mandy Joe and find out if they're going to have an updated version before mid-March. If they're not, then we should. Take your comments Darcy and any comments that come after we review our report and pull them all together and maybe. Our meeting on the 17th. Or the 24th. Am I getting those dates, right? Yeah. I'm hoping to focus on the. The 10th or the 24th, we can. Go through them. Probably the 24th. Okay. That sounds good. Yeah, I, I, you know, I, I was. I'm hoping to focus the, the, you know, incentivizing net zero, not just to new multifamily developments, but to new construction. Yeah. And I think that. That the discussion wherever it is talking about. Density. Encouraging. Or incentivizing density. And new development. I think we have to tread carefully there because. We obviously are, we obviously as ECAC. Would promote. Density in. Village centers or whatever. But it's sort of a question of. Whether we're promoting new development. Is that sustainable? Or whether we want to say we're needed. Because some of some of the language here. Is promoting. New development. And I'm not convinced that. That is. Sustainable unless it's shown that it's needed. So. And there's also just the issue of should we be, you know, like it's sort of like downtown versus. Promoting density at UMass. So that, that's the tricky political piece. Where, you know, we're going to run into half the town wanting one thing and half the town wanting another. So I guess I just feel. Like we need to think that piece through where we're talking about density. Yeah, Steve. Yeah, I agree. I think those can be potentially political landmines. But at least as the far as contributing to the CRC document. I think we have to, the ECAC should not come across as promoting density or development in particular areas. That could be done by others. We should, though, provide guidelines that when development occurs. It should be net zero. Yes, absolutely. The same development should be brought up to standards. So we avoid. Yes. So we can just add that language, you know, to make it conditional. Yeah, no, basically echoing that. I agree. I don't think we need to trigger this landmine even, even if we are pro growth, you know, I'm always imagining and thinking about the fact that there's going to be several hundred million climate refugees in the next couple of decades. And I do think that we need to house them, but I think that we need to do that. I think that we need to do that. I think that we need to do that. Maybe other people in Amherst don't want to house climate refugees for some sort of reason that I can't possibly have them. Yeah. And I would agree too. And I think. Darcy, I think this is where you're kind of straddling your counselor hat and your ECAC hat. I mean, I don't think ECAC needs to take on this political. Landmine, this is not our policy. It's not our policy. I think we should be, we should focus in on making sure whatever development has or does or doesn't happen or retrofits do or don't happen are done. Right. And line for that. Okay. Great. So I think we've sort of combined. And I think that we should be able to do that. I think that's at least part of that in terms of. Identifying this one item that we want to want to work on. Which is great. I think this will really. Be. Could be an impactful place to focus in some of our efforts and activities. I don't know if folks wanted to have a chance. I don't know if folks wanted to have a chance to have a chance to have a chance to reflect on our discussions last time or looking at the notes from the discussions. If there's anything else that's popping out. As something that. We really should. Bring to the forefront of our. Our work over the next several months. I'll note that, you know, I think that we should be able to do that. So. Additional rebates for electric vehicles. At the heavy duty or medium duty. Sort of range. So that could be something that we've. That ties into my big idea around. Maybe trying to help smaller businesses that have fleets. I don't know if there's anything else. Maybe Andra. That you think is, is. Bubbling up on the state level. That would be good for us to. Also. Focus in on. And I don't know if you'll raise from before, or if you have another comment. Nope. Sorry. I'm. That was from before. Okay. Yeah. Andra and then Darcy. Well, so. This isn't what you just asked. But I did want to. Bring up. The transportation issue that. We may want to weigh in on. The school budget. Capital budget includes. Capital budget includes. The school budget. Capital budget included a line item. For another bus. I mean, we've got like nine buses and they last about. Nine or 10 years. Pretty much every year that got it in there. Every other anyhow. It's. And it's for diesel bus. And it's for. The next bus. To be. Five thousand, whatever. And so. That issue is going to come back. Like, can't we plan for. How we're going to move ahead and maybe the next bus can't be electric, but could we try. And. And have a plan in place for. The next bus. After that, if not, you know, just like this, this is going to just keep happening. And it's got to be a way to put a little bookmark in here. And as far as what's happening at the state level, it's just all, you know, beginning. The. Legislation was just filed. And so. The administration on their. Clean energy. And. CECP climate plan. This next in the next month. I could forward more information about that if people are interested. I personally haven't really. Done the dive into that. I'm sorry. I was just going to add. That, you know, I, and I know you've brought this up before Laura, that if in any way we could focus on. Different means of fundraising and or maybe finding out what other towns do. Seeing how, what is a green bond and how does it work? You know, all the different forms of, you know, major fundraising that other towns have done in order to fund climate initiatives. It seems like that is key. Because grants only go so far. And then they run out. You know, we need, we need some continuous fundraising. And I think it's important to, to Laura that the, the reparations group in Amherst. Actually they, they, the reparations group in Evanston, Illinois. Has. Is funded through. The revenue that that Evanston gets from their marijuana sales. So, you know, ideas, ideas about revenue streams. Where we could get money to do some of this stuff because. You know, we can ask the taxpayers to pay for it. But it would be nicer if we could. Figure something in addition to that, you know. Out. So that's a whole area of. And, you know, And work for someone. Yeah. Oh, go ahead. I just had a curiosity. Because it's something I've been thinking about as well, but in that reparations. Agreement in Evan, Evanston. That's the revenue source, but do you, do you, do you know what the form of the reparations are then that is provided to the. I think the black population. I think that it's, it, it, it isn't like cash to individuals. It's, it's divided into different sectors of housing, education and social services and so on goes into different, different categories. Yeah, it's extremely well organized. I just being inclined to maybe I shouldn't start, but buy them all a PV system. And in that way we solve our problem and then they have. They have perpetual low, lower costs. Yes, yes, it could definitely be combined. Yeah. I mean, not to say that they don't need some reparations on education, other services, but. I think that's something that we could think about. Yeah, I am. I have a. There's, I just Googled paying for electric buses and this document came up. That I can share with the group. From 2018. Yeah, I don't know who, like, who. How do we push that conversation forward. In a way that's productive. Like, is there some, like, And who, who's the response? Who's responsible for that? I guess is, is kind of my question. Like. Would it be the finance committee? Would it be like a different group? Would it be like a subcommittee of. Like, I don't know. I'm just trying to figure out, like, how can we. Cause I like toss this idea out like. As much as I can, but. In ecac could. You know. Come up with something, but I feel like it needs to be a larger effort. Stephanie, do you know anything about the DEP. VW. Grant offering, whether that. Second round is. Has happened or is projected to. I haven't seen anything from it. I'm still. Wrapping up our first purchase. In fact, I just submitted our final. Report to them. Final invoice information. So. I, you know, I can, now that I've, that's wrapped up, I can sort of look into it. But usually I get notification and I don't think I've seen anything about it. Cause I've been trying to pay attention because I do feel like that's something we would try to pursue again. I do think though. I have a recollection that somehow it was going to be a little more restrictive this time. But I think it's going to be a little more restrictive. In a good way. In a way that we would prefer. So. Got a DPW got a roll off. Vehicle approved last time. I don't know that they would. Get to do that this time. It might be only for electric. This next round. Yes, Steve. A funding idea that I would favor is to take. Some of the money that's coming to the town. We're going to get some of that. We're going to get some of the payments in lieu of taxes from some of the solar developments. And I have to college pays some of that. And see if we might get some of that dedicated. The specific projects that you see AC is implementing. As well as seeing if we can. Maybe in a little while get some of the. That. I know some of those have already been earmarked and it's sort of a blood bath to try to fight for. Portions of that. And what they've been earmarked for is also important. But maybe we could request that in X number of years, maybe a slice of that could be shared with the AC. And probably best to ask for it to be shared for specific projects as opposed to a budget for DC AC to do things. So the more specific these proposal requests are, I think the more likely they'll be honored or granted. Yeah, I had hopes for the solar landfill. Funds given how much time I've spent on that. Over all these years. And I was told and I'm assuming this is true. And I haven't heard anything contrary. That it was dedicated to the solid waste fund. Because it's on the landfill. So. You know, nothing for. Nothing for us. Well, that's, I mean, it is, but it's. In gentrally. No, I agree. I, I don't, I don't disagree at all. Like I said, I was. Rather deflated. When I heard that. I don't agree with that. I don't agree with that. I don't agree with that. Half of that is as a peer bonus. Get a little something for us. But I don't disagree. You know, I just think you have to sort of be very specific about what you're asking for. Yeah. Yeah. And not, and not pan the things that it is also going for, because those, as you said, are important. Right. But, but if we can put something in line for a year or two out. You know, I don't agree with that. I don't agree with that. If you have an extended timeframe. And if it's, if it's something specific, like electric school buses, that makes it even a bit more. I think attractive and doable. Maybe the solid waste fund could be dedicated to. Zero waste initiatives. I don't know that it would be specifically dedicated to that. I mean, they don't even. I don't know. I don't know. So. I would hope that maybe. This means we might get somebody again. I don't, I don't know. That would be nice. Yeah, but I don't, I don't know for sure. What the intentions are. I just. How do we find out? Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I can, I can start asking. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Because now that it's coming to more of a reality of being. Installed, I can sort of reach out to find out what happens to those funds. Okay. And so the. Is this for the new landfill project or were. Not Hickory Ridge for the new, yeah, the new, the quote unquote new landfill. Belcher town road. Right. Okay. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if it comes time to negotiate that pilot. I think this group. King. Might have some. Things to offer. For whoever doesn't. Negotiating. For the Hickory Ridge project you're talking about. For any of the solar projects that the, you know, the town is sort of. Leading and is on third. They expect to get a pilot. And for future. There's a lot more that can be. Drawn out from the solar developers and equity. Financers and they leave pitons to the towns. And it's worth. Pushing back and making a strong argument for, for more, maybe it's not, you know, A front because they're, that amount over time, it would be worthwhile to try to develop strong negotiating stances on that and to push the developers on that. Because that's real revenue for the town that could be used, you know, not just for like a position, but even to, you know, start funding other projects, meaningful projects. Yeah, I'm liking this idea even more. And I think if the town citizens knew that some of these solar projects were supporting popular things like electric school buses, they might might more than might be favorable to future solar development projects. So I think exploring that is something that maybe ECAC wants to figure out how to do and not leave it to Stephanie on her own to try to work out if she can fair it out some information that would be useful but maybe we come up with a particular proposal. And the school bus one seems like one that's concrete and fairly immediate. And could be tried out as and see how it how it works. Yeah, Stephanie and I can share some of the stuff I've been doing with the NREL grant as well on the on the financial options in terms of ownership and flip models and agreements and so forth. Sure. Are there any other solar projects sort of in the pipe Stephanie? The Hickory Ridge is the big one. And that's the only one that I'm aware of right now. And that's not the landfill. No, the landfill is something different. And that's I mean that negotiations long gone that's ready to be developed. We've been saying this for a while but it really is I swear. We're just sort of waiting on every source at this point but you know all the permitting has been done. It's actually I think it had gone out to bid and their potential developers now bidding on the project so. But they haven't accepted a bid yet. They're receiving bids. This is the con so this is Cypress Creek who we've been dealing with our subcontracting for the development of the actual structure. Construction. Okay. Construction. So yeah. So that's who they're bidding out to right now. So it is moving forward. You know if ever sources settled on the interconnection agreement and costs. No, I don't. That's something that almost tripped up the development at Hampshire College because ever source came back and said oh geez you're going to have to pay two million bucks to differ studies and interconnection connection costs. Yeah. Had had to pony up that money and we got most of it back because most of it wasn't needed but it was a big delaying problem. Yeah. I don't think I mean actually I shouldn't say that. I think again because Cypress Creek is working with them. You know I don't I don't know every little detail at every turn but I'm I'm pretty sure actually that they already did actually agree on that but I don't know the exact details. Some of it they don't share so. Yeah that's kind of deep in the weeds. Yeah. But yeah don't I don't trust ever source with these things. I don't think you're alone. Lisa it's not as bad as you read about Maine. Central Maine Power Authority started backcharging solar development projects. Hundreds of thousands of dollars for interconnection costs. Backcharging. Yeah. And once the newspapers broke it then the executive said oh gee it was the mid-level engineers. It was their fault. Yeah. All right so it sounds like there is I mean I think there's this larger conversation about funding what different funding sources are out there whether we're exploring all the different ways of not using taxpayer funding or redistributing taxpayer funding or doing debt service or whatever. A lot of those are larger than e-tech but important to our work for sure. And but then specifically these pilot payments and low taxes for solar projects if that's something we can work on for upcoming projects. I would just add to that I mean in addition to pilots I mean this very much goes into the realm of the CCA as well with regard to you know the vision of you know trying to bring in some of these solar projects as supply for the CCA and some financial opportunity for more local ownership of those assets through through an organization like the CCA. So I wouldn't limit it to just negotiating a better pilot. All right I think we're near the end of our time and agenda so we have a couple action items to follow up on and you know we'll be looking forward to getting the report at the end of next week. I want to give Stephanie a little time before her next meeting. So is there any other last minute thoughts or questions? I don't see anything so so we'll follow up with I think Steve and Ashwin are going to connect on the rental efficiency program ideas. Darcy if you want to send any lane any any comments you already have about the CRC thing because you have them ready just send them but we'll plan on addressing that as we go through the report and next week we'll send around the report and sort of the the way that we're going to do comments which we'll dig into a little bit more on the 10th as well. So that's all good to everybody and the retreat is going to be scheduled for the 13th from two to four and we'll get a reminder from Stephanie about that probably right. Yeah I'll send up a Zoom meeting and send that all and I'll have to post it. Great all right if there's nothing else I think we can call it a call it a meeting. Any public comment? Oh public comment I don't know. No I think our public left so. Well great meeting thanks. Thanks everybody. Have a good night. Thank you all. All right thanks Laura. Take care. Bye all. Bye. Bye.