 All right, good evening everyone and welcome to the November 21st 2022 meeting of the town of Arlington redevelopment board I'd like to call this meeting to order. My name is Rachel Zanbury. I'm the chair of the board and We could have the other members introduce themselves this evening I'm Steve Revolac Eugene Benson Kinlow and Unfortunately, Melissa Tentacalus will not be joining us this evening. So you'll have four members of the board We also have Claire Ricker the director of the Department of Planning and Community Development and Kelly line of the assistant director of the Department of Planning and Community Development joining us this evening So with that introduction We'd like to go ahead and open public hearing docket number 3724 for 37 Broadway what I'd like to do is to invite Claire Ricker to Provide any information that she would like to cover for us regarding the planning department's Memo on this signage application and then we'll turn it over to the applicant who will have up to 10 minutes for an introductory presentation We'll then move to the board members for Questions are any clarifications open it up for public comment and then back to the board for deliberation So with that I'd like to turn it over to Claire sure so This applicant is looking to update their signage Related to the Lehi health center Beth Esri al-Lehi health Most of these signs were granted permits at least at some point, but some have not been They're seeking to change out the signage Have a comprehensive special permit issued for the remainder of the signage to bring the package completely legal And up-to-date as well as you know obviously discussion of The new design the change in signage Thank you, and could you? Just remind us the of the signs that are existing which is the Unpermitted sign the one that we do not have a record of The directory sign is the only one okay great. Thank you very much And then the wall sign in the rear of the building is Great, thank you for the clarification right at this point. I'd like to turn it over to the applicant So if you could introduce yourself welcome to the board I think Claire summed it up fairly well You see it as fairly straightforward application about a year and a half ago they merged Lehi health What they're in the process of replacing all the locations they're starting with primary care locations We've got most of them done already One of the leader ones So we are Preface we had nothing to do with the free-standing sign that's there So I was a little bit surprised when I found out that they've never actually been permitted. They're Drought in the front so We try to keep the signs, you know, obviously they're in there We're going to try to keep them within the same sort of weight area as the existing signs The free-standing sign Thank you very much, I'll turn it over to members of the board for questions starting with kid essentially you're asking us for relief on the fact that the sign is Installed higher than what's what's allowed by zoning It's the Squirt footage, I'm sorry for not knowing exactly what the really requested was because We thought it was going to be a simple The total sign area is more than what is allowed for all signs What do you even add just the two large wall signs that are perpendicular to Broadway and then also seeking relief for the installation of the direct of the free-standing directory sign which is not allowed in the business sign district So I'm willing to give you what I'm saying. I'm going to extend the relief for The height of the sign because of the The building you can't lower it more convenient the windows And if you lower it below the windows then doesn't look right and you can't see it So I think for the betterment of the area Haven't given you relief for the height. I'm okay with that As far as the size of those two signs It's above the square footage. It's allowed, but you have a large building You guys are not the owner. She loved your ears. You guys are tenants, right? So that signed it's that a That pilaster sign order, what do you call it the director free-standing sign, right? I'm willing to give you a relief on everything but that I Would like that be torn down and just go away And Then I'll be I'm not speaking from the board right now, but I would be okay of just having Give me a relief on the size size of sign hide the sign On either side in the front Back sign we have no jerks this year on because it's the back of the building Have at it, okay. Thank you Ken move to Jean next First I was a little confused by the memo that we got because the memo says That in 1984 the ZBA allowed 136 square inch Square foot wall sign and it says nothing about a second sign So basically they own and do we know which wall sign was approved So they only had approval for one wall sign But through some mysterious process They put up a second wall sign without a permit and they put up the free-standing directory sign Without a permit there was a period in the tiny it was updated and there was a pool for updated signage And at that point two signs were Up updated. Mm-hmm. So it's it's just that we don't have So at some point we just don't have okay, the record of when that was and then when the signs were updated Walk before now and even before 2014 then the second time had already been added No I think it's one wall sign maximum for frontage So if they had two frontages Okay, thank you So I agree with Ken About the two wall signs, I agree with you too that the free-standing directory sign Needs to come down I Will I will tell you a couple of things the first time I drove someone to this building Which is the first time I was there about three years ago I didn't know it was there because the signs are actually too high if you're driving So, you know, I'm not going to tell you to move them down because you got approval in the past But I think it would the signs would be much better if they were closer to Street level if you're driving and you don't know where they are. So that's one thing I'll mention The second thing is there's no building number on the front of the building and you're allowed to have it I at least I didn't see one and you're allowed to have a building number on the front of the building So you might want to put 37 Broadway on the front of the building which I think would help people who are Driving by or even walking and aren't looking up like this that they might see the number of the building So but those are up to you if you want to do those or not But yeah, I agree with Ken. Okay for the two wall signs not okay for the free-standing directory sign Thank you Steve. Yeah, I One small quick question about sign a This is the wall sign on the silk Street side it look the rendering looks like it's not vertically centered in the band Yeah, it looks like a little bit low and I was wondering if that was You know if it was intentionally put there to limit the height to 28 or Okay So I would yes, I would just ask that it be centered I think that would look better Regarding the positions of the wall sign, I believe you are allowed one per street face So the one that faces a driveway doesn't Technically meet that but I understand why that's a better place Because you've got traffic going east on Broadway traffic going going West and you know the the westbound traffic would You know, it's more visible than something that's directly facing Broadway like So yeah, my thoughts regarding the The free-standing directory sign I Would have asked that it be Made to conform to the size limitations for directory signs, but I'm also okay with You know going along with mr. Lau and mr. Benson and you know You know seeing that one come out of the package Thank You Steve Steve I'll just address I think that the reason why the sign looks off-centered is because of the lock up with the with the folded Icon which is so much higher that it just it throws the whole Mm-hmm justification of the signage right, but I was looking at that too, but B doesn't seem to to You know present itself that way Or to me to me B. Just doesn't look doesn't look like it's too low Yeah, I think it's just that one's straight on and one's Yeah, okay fair enough Great, I don't have any further questions other than those for my colleagues Do you have any questions for us before we open that up for any public questions? Yes, okay, please That's I just as since I'm not the landlord I just don't feel like I can say yeah, let's get rid of it Let's cut it down and throw it away But you know, we would obviously let him know it's not hermit it for starters But we wouldn't make any changes at all to Sure Go ahead I'm Lucky to keep you relieved So I would ask you to I'm not gonna slow you down waste your time here, okay, but if you go ash and landlord same boat We're a pretty good size tent here You want to get these signs in They approve our signs But you have this illegal sign up front They're asking us to have you move it and if he's gonna remove it then just All the rest of stuff done Yeah, which which I understand and that's Yeah, so I think what I'd like to do is take public comment and then we'll discuss Amongst the board how how we'd like to handle that but that's a good question. I appreciate you bringing that up. Thank you So at this point what I'd like to do is open this docket up to public comment So any member of the public joining us this evening who'd like to speak on behalf of this Petition if you could please raise your hand Okay, seeing no one I will close public comment and turn it back to the board so Ken has weighed in on his thoughts with regard to Approval of these signs with the condition that the tenant worked together with the landlord for the removal of the directory sign Interested gene in your opinion Steve I'm in agreement with Minister Lau as well. Okay, great so Kelly Great, so that so long as the dimensions meet the requirements in the zoning by-law that may be something to consider as a suitable replacement For the freestanding directory sign. They actually have one By the door oh That's in the rear of the building I think they have opportunity to put it right there That looks at the front door. I mean you have to tell me everybody else that goes I think that's the other It's definitely not your entrance your entrance in the back. I know that Okay, well, we certainly could propose that to the landlord as well I Will just remind them that in there illegally Okay, thank you So is there a craft emotion here is there a motion to approve the signs The the building mounted signs as submitted With the provision that the applicant worked together with the building landlord for the removal of the Of the freestanding directory sign So motion can we say and that the new signs don't go up until the directory sign is removed? Yes, we can make that conditional on the successful negotiation of the Removal of the Motion as amended. Okay, right. I'll second that right. We'll take a roll call vote starting with Steve. Hi, Gene Yes, yes, and at me. Yes as well Really appreciate you coming in this evening Okay, thank you very much, thank you you too. So let's see here We get back to my agenda. So that closes agenda item number one docket number three seven two four We'll now move to agenda item number two, which is the preliminary discussion of zoning amendments and We are fortunate this evening to have with us several several residents in the town who have A Four proposed articles That they would like to speak with the board about regarding potential zoning warrant articles So welcome and thank you very much so what I'd like to do is devote up to 20-25 minutes, I think that that would keep us on schedule For for each one of the the articles for discussion that works for the board and Pull this up here. Give me one second What I'll do is I will go through what the four articles are and then we will invite You for each individual article to speak with the board. So this for the record is a discussion of Potential zoning warrant articles that will inform the process for the 2023 annual town meeting so the first proposed article is Related to open space requirements for multifamily and mixed use presented by Laura Laura Weiner James Fleming Pat Hanlon and Zavid press pretzer So You have two of you here this evening Would you like them to approach would that be the best way to pick up their voices great So if you could maybe come up to the seats here in the front we can turn one of these around Okay, thank you so much Great, thank you Please that would be great. Thank you I also wanted to mention that I'm on the board of the housing corporation of Arlington, but I'm not here representing them in any way we've been working with Pat Hanlon and David Pritzker and So we we became aware of the drastic impact that open space or open space requirement the way it's calculated has on the development of housing and how much housing can be built and We come from a belief that there's a housing shortage in Arlington and in the region and that we we should do what we can to address that Our proposal is is regarding only commercial zones. We're not talking about the R0 R1 or R2 zones at all What started me thinking about this was that I was looking at a potential mixed use project with the housing corporation of Arlington on a relatively small lot and as you know many of Arlington's lots are fairly small And any mixed use project that's going to be built is going to be in a commercial zone where open space is not likely to get a lot of But our bylaw paradoxically requires more open space be provided with each unit built and each additional floor that's built 5.3 point 21d says that open space requirement is 30% of not the lot but the residential floor area 30% is pretty high to begin with but In commercial zones and particularly with each floor added it actually grows. So it's not 30% of the lot For instance on a 20,000 square foot lot with a footprint of 10,000 square foot a one-story building requires 3,000 square feet, but a two-story building requires 6,000 square feet of open space Three-story building equals nine a four-story building requires 12,000 square feet of open space The bylaw allows four and five stories for mixed Structures and 3.0 FIR, but that cannot be built an FIR of three allows 60,000 square feet of building area on five stories That's 12,000 square feet before leaving 8,000 square feet on the lot for open space But the open split space requirement for that project is 18,000 square feet of a 20,000 square foot lot It just can't be built By comparison James and I looked at some neighboring communities first of all Medford and Arlington are the only ones that measure Open space as a Relation in its relation to the floor area as opposed to the lot area the other communities we've looked at all Measure it as part of the law So water town has no open space requirement in the central business district and 10% of lot area in other commercial zones Wall fam has no lot coverage or open space limits for businesses in commercial zones and 15% for residential Bellmont has no open space requirement in any business district and no lot coverage limit in the CBD Lexington has no open space requirement in any business zone and no lot coverage limit in the CBD We submitted our memo to start a discussion with you We know that you're aware of this problem and have your own thoughts about it and we want to hear your thoughts We want to work with one that we didn't come with a hard and fast proposal yet We're you know, there's many different ways to There's one other thing I just wanted to also throw in that that we think should be looked at which is roof decks which Have us very strange Requirement that they've even more than 10 feet above the lowest residential floor, which makes them pretty much And I think honestly that a roof deck is an open space that the residents Do use in many places and why not change it so that it is something, you know a resource for the residents and Provide some actual open space off the street. It's less exposed And if you do it one floor foot up and then you have more stories it's taking up Gary that could be residential So just at that I think we just want to open up to hear your thoughts We can discuss Thank you. Thank you not only for bringing this forward but for the research that you've done this was identified at one of our earlier meetings the Open space requirements in the business districts is something that the board wanted to tackle this year for town meetings So I think it's very timely. I Will turn it over to my fellow board members for any questions or discussions starting with Ken I'm very supportive of what you said here We recognize that the fact that open space has been a choke point or Makes use multifamily use in the business district and I think we agree that that's where we want to increase density and it gives us ability to Have taller buildings which would then include Elevators and so forth that which allows People to age in place. I think that's something we talked about other things we talked about is when we're not trying to ask we're trying to develop a diverse Housing network where it's it was just not all affordable and super rich So I think having Somewhere in the middle is also good too This would give that ability for that to also happen at the births program for housing I'm very supportive of this. The only thing I'm a little confused with is you give me these options and I think we just Those are some There's starting points because you don't come in say let's do this and they don't say anything else Fair enough and it's part of eliminating open space in the business districts. I Just think that some of the spaces we have right here are so small and I think this is the one of the only ways of unwrapping that The gridlock we have right now, that's why they explain it Because Yeah, the lot sizes I saw chunk Small broken up and what this does is it frees up the opportunity to have more commercial space on the ground floor which we want and we want lively streets and I think by Exchanging it only in the business district. So I'm not saying let's I'm not I'm not doing canyons of New York City down the street here Okay, but It's in the business districts where we have more lively streets and we have some more commercial space. That's and just not little small squares or bushes and trees Which is fine, too, but I'm I'm not nothing wrong with bushes and trees But having a lively edge along the urban street there is really critical and I think this is one way of doing that I'm not gonna keep on talking. I mean I Agree with everything. Mr. Lau said but come to a slightly different conclusion In spite of that I I think that for purely commercial buildings There's no need for any open space requirement at all When we're talking about residential or mixed use I'm not sure but what I'd like to see is something where We do some of what you say, which is 10% landscape based on the size of the lot rather than the square footage of the building and Give us the ability to reduce that in exchange for more affordable units Because I think one of the things that we need to do is to figure out how to incentivize Builders to put in more affordable units, so that's why I have a slightly different conclusion And kin does if it's just commercial I'm fine with that if it's not I'd go 10% landscape. I'd allow them to put it on Decks, but I'd also like us to have the ability to remove that in exchange for more affordable units So that I write this so you would also count decks at any height not at the specific But I'll point out that if our solar by-law is approved by the AG Those decks won't be on the roof because they'll have solar sure panels on the roof And you would I'm assuming I'm assuming Also eliminate the square Yes, yes, yes, great. That's at least that's my what my thinking is So of the of the two options that you provided I liked Or four options that you provided for there are four options. I happened to like two of them That's what I think I meant to say numbers two and number four So I would I think it's you know One of as my colleagues have said one of the challenges that we have with mixed-use buildings on these small parcels These small parcels were were built out before We had zoning before we had off-street parking regulations and before we had open space requirements And so any time you you build a mixed-use building while you you inevitably lose some of the first floor commercial space because of that I think this would be a reasonable way. I think this is a good way to to alleviate that problem You know going eliminating or Making a 10% requirement based on the lot size Not the GFA, but the lot size those those are the the options. I sort of like I Would make this use specific rather than district specific because one in two family homes are still allowed in the B districts and To the X if anyone Decides to build one there. I in that case I would like to see the you know the same rules for other that apply elsewhere for one in two family homes followed But mixed-use and multifamily residential would have the same risk requirement or restriction as Building a office for a retail. Yes. Yes. Okay. So it's just to eliminate the one in two families. Mm-hmm. Yep We do that looking at it right now. We do already do that. So single family to family Have a separate open space requirement and then mixed-use and other permanent uses have sectioned whatever Complicated the group decks and all those other things. So it kind of fits in They're already yes, nobody's going to build a one or two family It's only happened once that I know of So, you know, it's not that no one's going to do it the question is will someone do it again Yeah, but and yeah, I completely agree with the With loosening the Requirement for roof decks, you know, if you like if you're doing a Like I say a four or five story mixed use and you decide to put in a step back and have sort of a program programmed You know deck on top of the third floor. Yeah, I think that that counts as open space If it's approved by the AG's office So step backs that are required and so those are opportunities for roof decks where solar Typically is not the best option there. So I think that there are There are spaces which are currently not being counted which are ripe for For for being contributors to the 10% if that's A series of small spaces The solar panels are required if it's a certain size building all all new buildings all all new and significant Reconstructions that confirmed by no designer of you if it's approved by the AG's office There are there are several exceptions Okay, I thought it was it was below a certain size and we talked earlier about these sweet spots of Like 20 units, it's not above a certain size, but if it's shaded if it's But I but you know, so I was getting you know, I can see smaller Because there's so many it's such a cutoff space here Yes, they're there provisions built in where we can waive that for Situations like that because I just don't see us building mega blocks of you know block-to-block housing mixed-use buildings That's gonna be five stories. That's gonna be kind of More organic grown and it's gonna be the 20 units or 16 units that we talked about in our Our last meeting and I think that's where it's gonna really sort of generate over time and That's that's what it's trying. Well, it's I'm trying to think of opening up opportunities that encourage that and You know your jeans idea about holding 10% and maybe having a bill of the way that just so we can have one or two more units of Affordable housing or at least Mid-range housing, I think that's a good idea We could certainly build out what that What that reduction Whether it's just affordable housing or whether there are other incentive incentives whether it's presented to commercial or Yeah, we're all about trying to encourage and trade me off great I Think the other thing to think about if we're talking about the business districts is we don't have a solid business district Is you said we're not gonna get Sprinkled throughout mass-event and Broadway or a lot of residential districts, so we're not gonna get And if we retain the stepbacks that helps soften it a little bit too So So there's there's this interesting thing called biophilic Communities, which I don't know it would be interesting to think about if it's possible To incorporate that in exchange for giving up the open space because it's a way to Incorporate greenery into the building itself So biophilic community, you know that is more than I do Does this like make any sense it it does although that term can be interpreted a myriad of different ways It's basically the incorporation of three and other So it could be Like the screen like the like the screening that we Identified for the self-storage in the in the back technically is a strategy which you have the suggestion of Greetery although it doesn't necessarily have to be it's it but it's a wide term that covers quite a bit of different strategies So I think we'd need to be careful about incorporated something, but I hear where you're going about yep as a way to you know Soften what might otherwise be seen as too harsh So one item we should talk about I know that this is a topic that the board had identified an Interest in bringing forward to town meeting. Is this something that you are interested in pushing forward? Would you want to I? Think that the one of the things that the board would like to do is ensure that we have Articles which are taken up by by the board as as well So this this may be one and if it's something that you'd like to work with the board on We could certainly Do that, but I want to get the boards to take them whether or not you would like to see this Continue as a resident petition or something that you would like to be see sponsored by the board as we had previously discussed at one of our I would like to buy the board and maybe the board leaves it because it gives us the opportunity to have more outreach When because we're not gonna ask you to help public hearings and different schools and reach out all different So everybody has a chance to weigh in on it. I think if we just bring this up to my town meeting It's gonna be a sharper I think if we Do in a similar way how we did it the Confication and we had meetings of different precincts on the precinct levels and I think when the town or us Taking a lead on that gives us the opportunity to have those forms for more meetings Experienced with projects that have needed flexibility on this kind of thing So I think that does put you in a good position to be the sponsor We welcome it I Could do it either way. I just think that If what's presented back to us from the community group is not what we want exactly then it's a little more difficult Then if we have you know come to consensus on what we want so I think that's tries me a little more Doing it and hopefully getting your support Yeah, I agree with mr. Benson And I would agree with that too again. I think this is something that was We identified was very important to include on the development board's agenda this year and again We'd love to work with you to make sure that we identify an outreach plan and Work with you. I think that again the work that you've done already I know Kelly's been doing research on behalf of the board for for this as well as several other topics And we'd love to work together in terms of crafting an article Do you have any other questions? So what's next for the board so we have in one of our upcoming meetings I don't know whether it's the next meeting or the meeting after that where I know that you had mentioned you were working on a Draft of the different articles that we'd be Okay So what we'll do is we'll reach out to you and let you know the next time that this topic There will probably be at least one if not two more times that this will discuss this before Filing the war an article and then obviously there's the crafting of the main motion once the war an article is And I'd be interested in input back from you on what we're going. Yes, absolutely We'll be taking public comment after all of the the four items have been identified after we go through all four Thank you so much great. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thank you and you're up next Okay Okay, so the next item is a proposed article for parking minimum elimination in the v5 district through James Fleming So if you can introduce yourself and give us a James playing the Oxford Street This was something that felt like a natural Next step Lower parking Looking at the by-law it looks like there's already a lot of cases where commercial space doesn't need parking requirement like the first three thousand square feet of excuse building And all of others and so what I was thinking is well the parking that's there Did some of the may not actually you needed you've had cases on your docket before where? Had less than one space per unit proposed So that means someone has done the math and decided that's worth doing So that tells me that they may be verbatim further and I'm interested in it because parking as a as a Concept in the town doesn't contribute to vibrant streets. It doesn't pay taxes. It doesn't do any of those things It just provides storage for vehicles so If there was a place to do Reduction the most logical this seems like the v5 district because it has a bunch of overlapping bus routes it's the hub of town for Commercial uses you have multiple parking lots. You've got meter on-stream parking You got all these tools that reduce the demand for parking. So if there was a space to do a production v5 seems like the most logical place to do it The inspiration for this was actually a Salem zoning. So they have Coincidentally a v5 district, which is their core downtown as well and they've totally eliminated parking in that district as well for commercial uses And in their zoning by-law they say the community will accept the responsibility for that parking And what they did is a response is that they have Paid parking throughout their downtown and that's how they control the Parking they can raise the price if they need to and as a downtown it's a great downtown So My thought was let's try eliminating it in v5. It's a relatively small area We can see what the actual demand for parking is in that space because Someone puts a building forward whatever they propose will be what they think is worth doing in that space Thank you very much. I appreciate that Kim. Go to you first. I Looked in this and I did not apologize. It's not having Look at the zoning map. I was gonna see exactly where How many spots are to be fine I have it printed So it's just these two areas that are the b5 pretty pretty much. Yeah, there's nothing else down the mass out Parking lots in the bus route. So I was like and the like that I forgot about that. So I was like, that's the place If there's a place to try it. Well, there's a huge parking lot right here and there is We need sparking for commercial use you got the meter parking already Okay nice Here we need don't have much issues with this. I think this is another way of unlocking this downtown area We won't go into all the Same thing we talked about earlier, but I think this does do that It also would Encourages what we want to go is green and having less car pollution is the way to go So, you know, this is not a way of advocating for that by Having less ability to park cars, you know have less ability to drive it there and this that's the downtown It's worth the try this one small area and see where it's gross So What about residential in those buildings Where would they park If you went to some place like beating hell, you know, you're not going to have to get a parking Way against everything else well the folks I know who live on beacon hill who have cars can park them on the street But they can park them on the street overnight and there's Parking by zones or you know beacon hill. It's a beacon hill sticker back big It's a back base sticker, etc So they sometimes have to drive around like crazy people But they eventually find a place to park on the street if they have a car And they can walk to the red line and you can walk to the green line and A lot of them can walk to work We can't walk to the red line. We can't walk to the green line most people don't work in Arlington and The bus routes are not what they even were a few years ago So I have no problem in doing this for a Purely commercial building. I have real concerns about residences and Who we're saying can't live here? Because you know, I've known people who live here and work in Lowell and you know drive there work in Waltham Drive there where there's no easy public transportation. So I I'm with you on the commercial I'm not with you on But that could be somebody could put a mixed-use building before we go to Steve I actually feel the same way as as Jean on this one I think if we did not have our overnight parking ban, I would feel differently because then there's an opportunity for For residents to to park on the on the street. Should they not have parking available to them? I am supportive of that changing But until it does I I would feel the same way and I know that we do have the ability right now to Reduce the parking down to zero for commercial already. There's a vehicle for that So that would be my feeling of this Steve. Yeah, I'm I'm with the two of you At the moment there are there are 24 parcels in the V five district There are three of them that are residential. There's too little There's a two family and a three family on some place and there's a legacy who why my understanding has more parking than they know It to do it But you know, I think that we would like, you know, hope to see some of those parcels redeveloped and With the potential for mixed use and we do have, you know, the opportunity to reduce that You know reduce To do parking reductions in exchange for TDM one thing that You know, it's sort of tangentially related to this, but I think it's worth mentioning with a lot of the a lot of our business A lot of our business districts where there is they currently provide no parking at all We are allowed to reduce the parking to zero for the commercial uses as long as they have, you know, no opportunity to create additional off-street parking If they but if someone rebuilds a building, well, then they have the opportunity to create additional off-street parking So I'm, you know, I I think this is a good pilot, you know, a good test case You know, I know that Cambridge completely eliminated parking minimums through for the entire city all uses I don't know. I don't know that we're quite there yet But I like the idea of trying this for business uses in the B-5 district Also, the other thing to just mention is the bylaw also allows us to reduce Parking in exchange for more affordable units. I wouldn't necessarily want to give that up Either when it comes to the residential I'm with you on the commercial I have a question. I'm sorry. So there's no overnight parking allowed in the west a lot I think there's one can apply apply to the select board for an overnight parking permit, but Not readily granted. You know, I think it sounds like the board would be in support of this for the business uses if I had some of the feedback and I know that I believe that there is a group that was identified to study Elimination of overnight parking as a Part of this past town town meeting So I think it would be interesting to bring this full all of the uses in the district should that go go forward So I think the question to you, you know, you're more than welcome to go forward as as you proposed I think that the board it sounds like would be supportive Definitely of the business uses and reducing parking minimums But we need to see that in concert with something else for the residential Please of course. So this is just reducing the minimum. This doesn't mean someone wouldn't Understood they still have to sell the building correct And if you're building housing people tend to have parts in case they can afford new housing so Is it really good concerning about Not having enough parking when there's a there's an impetus to do it just because you can't sell your product without it This is if you have complete faith in the market, I don't have complete faith in the market. That's why we have a zoning That's where me Leave in the market Yeah, I said complete I Hear their points and their good points I think I Thought I didn't think there was any residential, but then I forgot all about the excuse That would be highly encouraged there. I think that's eliminating parking They'd be too far extreme right now And that's the fact that we can eliminate it through Us giving relief on that based off of all the trade backs. I think that gives us the ability to have To encourage To reduce not to eliminate for the residential I induce nobody by reducing To encourage other things Which is beneficial for the community Okay, please how would you feel about a reduction from one to a smaller number by non-zero? For residential in this yes, so so let's say none for commercial and some smaller number non-zero for residential Personally, I think you'd have to really have a compelling case for what that number would need to be I you know again, we have the ability with the TDM plan to reduce from what's from the one that's already been mandated and I Again, I you know, we've talked about this in some of the prior ones I think rather than just picking a number you'd have to have a really compelling use for this is why it would be half, you know Parties Yeah, we can reduce it by 75% in exchange for TDM and more For affordable units, so I don't see where we're getting anything extra Yeah, and the the fact that you know the reduction is in exchange for a transportation to manage and demand management plan It means we can negotiate for a transportation demand management plan So that's there there is I there is some benefit to having a Require to having the residential requirement, even if it's only for you know being able to negotiate What would the board feel about In the spirit of what James is trying to suggest In this district allowing the board to waive the residential requirement down to zero With a transportation demand management plan and more affordable units What we could we could put whatever Stipulation I would like to see that I would like to see that I think that would give the opportunity again for I think that would be more palatable to Residents as well in terms of just saying well, you don't have to do any and would again. I think address your concerns about what the market might put out without Discussion and would give us again some ability to ensure that there is a real plan in place for transportation I don't know if you're interested in that, but it's just something I wanted to throw out as a potential strategy to get to what you're I'm just you know one of the benefits and having a certain number of parking spaces is one of them has to be handicapped accessible and We need to think about what to do about that too Okay, so mass architectural access requires you to have So we need to build something in about that because you're not going to know whether your tenants need it Right away because you don't know who your tenants are when you're building And if there's no room to do it, right I'm sorry. Yeah, I you know in this discussion of affordability one of the things the city has Boston has done If you are building an affordable housing project and you're using light tech or others You do actually know who is going to move in your building units for those who make 30% AMI 50 60 Whatever your program is in your building and there could be an opportunity here to say you don't need to build a parking space for your 50% unit or your 30% unit or your business unit. However, we would want to talk about anything more Or excuse me less affordable if we're going to do 80% or higher That would be a way to sort of pre You know sort of pre know who is going to be least these these spaces and at the very least you would know Be the income distribution as a project comes in Listen because I don't know this When you make a reduction So does the applicant have to ask for the reduction or do you suggest the Typically the applicant requests it. However, if we feel that greater parking has been suggested for a For development and that we think the development could be improved by a reduction of parking we can also suggest That they explore that. So we've done that in a past where we said looking to reducing number of parking so you have more retail or Common space on the ground floor and I remember that project. I don't know what the address was but great 40 feet that's currently For question and you don't suggest it then it just goes out the door as it is it's I I don't know a Project that has come in front of us that parking has not been a discussion Would you say that's fair Everybody likes driving nobody likes cars Okay, great, thank you so much James appreciate it Okay, so the next item I believe James is also you Thank you so much for bringing these up. It really appreciate it The next proposed article is the elimination of usable open space requirements. Yeah, I don't put punches on this one This this this is a personal follow-up. So Laura and I were working on the other warranted article Completely unrelated. I'm work. We were filing for a special permit for Dormir in our attic And in that process we learned that the useful open space apply applies to Not that surprising But what we have learned is that a huge chunk of town is out of performance with these will open space on the lot Like either you have just barely enough or you don't have even any because of whatever the dimensions of your lot space you have aren't and so what the ZBA has been doing is Whenever someone dormers their attic they go Inspectional services will find that they are extending an on conformity you go before the ZBA they look at your thing and In 95% of cases they give you approval for that even though you technically need more they make the section 6 finding that this is not Going through this what I realized is for single two-family homes Leaving aside whether it's better for the neighborhood the person who is making the choice to change their home is making a conscious conscious choice to expand their home So the other thing is that it would expand the amount you need to expand to the size of the building so Personally, I don't see why that matters for a single two-family home But let's just say it does if that person is expanding their attic and they don't increase the size of their yard They're making a conscious choice that they don't need more yard with that space and There they should be empowered to do that if you are adding a ten foot addition on the back of your house and it's coming into your open space You've already made the choice that That living space is more valuable to you than the open space that you're giving up The stated purpose of usable open space is to be for the residents of the property So the best person to make that choice is the person The same person So it doesn't seem to make sense to me to require it For a single and two-family uses for sure and Medford's these both. He's actually doesn't apply to single two-family They only apply to three-family end up and I don't remember what they do for this juice It's in the research that we did The other proposal so what I was thinking was Make it not apply to single and two-family uses. So no no requirement for usable base leave landscape alone And then I guess the business part of it is we already talked about what that looks like in the previous one So if you want to talk about The whole thing or just single family Okay, thank you very much Okay, I was not expecting that but hey, that's okay. Um, yeah, I think you know, I kind of think we're due for a conversation about The purpose of our open space real life regulations and what they're trying to achieve We they were added to our by-law in the 70s and as mr. Fleming said there are a large number of properties that just do not comply with them a very a Significant portion of the ZBA's caseload is you know Half yeah You know the the dormer approval board sometimes it feels like that Because you know as if you do not if you lack the 25-foot dimension then you have zero usable open space and You know the way this will the way this typically plays out in the course of the ZBA hearing in my experience Has been the board will ask the applicant to show that there's no usable open space before the alteration Do is usable open space after the alteration and then that doesn't change the nonconformity So in other words if you have a nonconforming house the nonconforming Parcel the rule just doesn't apply to you at all You still have to go through the process but And the 20-day appeal period and where you have your fingers crossed Extremely Yes, so but going on to just like since you put the definition in your write-up You know we have our as we define it. It's a part of a lot designed for things like Swimming pools tennis courts drying clothes and gardening There's no requirement that open space be pervious that it be planted You know if you can do the if you can do the storm water management You could have hardscape and it that is perfectly good usable open space So yeah, this I Kind of have the sense that Back in the 70s. This was seen as a way to control massing in this in the sense that it's a quasi-fluor area ratio, but I I also think that Today there are different considerations like permeability and stormwater management and I would much rather see us regulate those sort of things You know then to make sure that you have that everybody has room to put in an in-ground pool Yeah, I'm I'm supportive of it, but I feel like we have to replace it with something You know it going back to like what are we trying? What are we actually trying to achieve? I don't quite know what that is yet So we already do have requirements for yard space and that is all set backs from the outside back We also have a lot coverage requirement of 35% So you by default will have 20 space 20 feet of space in the backboard You're gonna have 10 feet on the sides You do have a restriction on the amount of building coverage and there is No, there's nothing that says you can't in partscape like our neighbor completely pay with their backyard because they want the botchic work but those things seem Tricky to regulate because You don't go to the buildings that you put in partscape in your backyard Just it doesn't it just doesn't it can't come up something like parking maybe make sense as a Like you can't cover it with this much parking space as as like a just as a starting point Yeah, I think the replacement for it is just that you will have landscaping space you have setbacks which count as those things and The lot coverage takes care of the rest What are you next? I pretty much agree with what James Said and the reasoning Behind this. I'll just point out that it's not always the homeowner whose wants to put an addition on back it's You know builder who buys it and either Expands it or tears it down and put something else in its place but as James said, I think there are other dimensional pieces to this that limit the sizes I I think Steve raises a good point About Perniability, I also wonder about trees and whether there's something could be written That dealt with both of those things Agree, I think with my two colleagues here. I think Should you move this one forward? You're really going to need to focus on graphics Because this one's hard for people to understand So I just want again like everybody we try and give people advice for this is what will be Required this was like all the other But I think I think you can do it with graphics to be able to articulate how this will Yes, sir, and I think it would Be good for you if you haven't already spoken to the ZBA To speak to the ZBA Because to Steve's point, this is something that they see quite regularly and it would be great to have their support If you move forward with this as well No, I agree with you guys that I think Steve is a really good point Understand what this is trying to do and then maybe introducing once we understand what that point is introducing a minimum I Don't know what that is right now That's what gets me. You know, I think what's there now doesn't work But I don't know what will work so I propose elimination for a reason that's why I brought these graphics actually I So I was thinking So so I Started from what can we just like touch it and like we get a little bit and see if it's possible to make it better So we started well one of the problems is that it's based on the size of the lot parts are based on the floor area So let's try and let's change that so I found an example where this that is going to create additional problems So there's no problem here. This is good. This is a currently conforming house on the right or on the left That can put an addition on on the back and still be conforming with their useful open-space requirements If you next slide please This is what happens if we make it based in the lot area They lose the ability to do that addition because now they're in requirement for open spaces increased So on the left, they're still conforming although just barely but now on the right They have lost that ability so we've taken away a right they used to have them to the current zone and You could say maybe we just tweak the percentage, but then it's like there's still the question of there's thousands of blocks in town What is there a number that gets us low and if it's so low that to guarantee that you don't create problems It's essentially eliminating it so The other thought was well, there's the 25 foot minimum dimension So on the left, there's a non-conforming house or open space, so you have 20 feet by 15 in the back But you meet all of the other parts so like 30 percent of the gross flow area you're over the 30 percent whatever And as of right now this under special permit can go door with their attic without a problem So they would go up to They go their percentage of personal area we go Down below the minimum, but they're not conforming. They have zeros of Next slide please So if we make 20 feet for example the dimension then all of a sudden they have useful open space And now when they go to add their attic, they'll be creating a new non-conformity because their percentage will go below the minimum So that's taking away invested rights that they have under Whatever legal structure that is so and again you can pick a different number But again like a number and you may still create some problem for somebody So I look I looked at those two things. I was like well This is the only really the only two options you have for tweaking how this affects you And so I was like well, maybe it's just worth considering total over Because then you don't hear regular parcels we have etc. Exactly there's no worry about creating out before it is The justification in my mind is still they can decide for themselves what to do with their life and they know what's best for them and this just shows that there is no way to touch it without creating some sort of Or the possibility of creating a problem So someone who has a non-conformity Can go and get a variance special permit sorry special permit to Do an addition or dorm or whatever because it's a non-performing If we make that Form now Then all of a sudden they lose all those rights Doing that So inadvertently we may increase something here, but take something else away exactly. So this is the first place I went and I realized actually we fall into that category where we would become And Would you be thinking of do making any changes to? The way that landscape hoping space is treated just leave it as it is Now not it not it not yet I Agree Rachel. I don't know how you can explain this to everybody so that they understand it and Try to get at what you try to get at I Think I'm generally really reasonable understanding these things and I'm not I Get it, but it's it's You have to look at it like okay, but I don't know My suggestions We can get into how the how and I think that we'd be happy to work with you, but I think it's a combination of photos Diagrams, etc and showing you know what can be done and I think the compelling argument is one that Steve made and you made as well, which is you know just the Additional red tape that so many people are having to to go through and one of the things that we've identified as a goal In town is to take a lot of the unnecessary Complexity away from homeowners and business owners who are trying to you know, just right live and create really thoughtful projects In in town, so I think that this In the spirit of that this certainly aligns with many of the goals that that we and others other boards have said Layers and layers and layers of redundant restrictions. And so the challenge to you and this Is to prove or to demonstrate I think what you're doing with the setback That the spirit of the open space requirement Still be achieved. Yes through the setback requirements and it also Has the added benefit of making the bylaw easier to interpret And so just to know what Rachel said with the need for graphics and Examples or different cases to kind of explain that it's going to be very important But I think that's a challenge that this boredom is EBA comes across over and over again Just the layers And I think we'd want the ZBA to support this. Yes. Yeah We also talked about some sort of residential design standards or something Let's exist the residential design standards. So couldn't that somehow So the ZBA has been applying them for special purposes But those graphics are good No, you mean like have graphics that are like that good. Yes Because But when I looked those graphics I understood and I don't know. I just can't get you know, I think you need to show it And you know, it's just peeling back the onion and say, hey look you get all these different things You know, you're not going to lose it because we still have all these other Setbacks and regulations here and I'll put people at ease. I think when you say You get rid of this People look at you know, yeah, I get it I think I agree. I think that there's plenty of time to comb through that That approach in terms of what you need to you know, obviously to prove you did the work to to Look at alternatives may be important for this discussion, but they may not be important for the discussion To town any other comments or questions on this item? Thank you So the next item that we have and then we will open This agenda item up for any public comment So the last proposed article is affordable housing on non-conforming parcels through Barbara Thornton. So First time it's two and a half years that I've had to think about wearing pants and shoes My name is Unfortunately, this doesn't project this just this just goes to ACMI Yes, I will be like thank you for the feedback Does have trouble hearing us, please let us know and we'll make sure to project Okay My name is Barbara Thornton. I am a resident of Arlington at 223 Park Ave. You know in Arlington and I'm here to speak about the Non use of non-conforming parcels. This is something that I had proposed in and talked With our previous down manager about Maybe two and a half three years ago and then set it Aside to pursue the accessory dwelling units article and I'm coming back to it with with a new perspective And I first of all like there they're like three points that I want to make and I want And I wouldn't start by acknowledging that I did have a couple of questions with the initial Document that I would send to you and I want to answer those by saying that I I Do not see this Resulting in the creation of old-age districts. I think it's you know using existing zoning is just fine and And I'm I was going to say that I expect given that there are probably 1500 different Ways that this might be configured that it's not going to be something that I would expect to be an as-of-right use So therefore I assume it goes through a special permit process But listening to James talk about the the time delays in special permit process. I'm It's a lot to consider I coming away from listening to this so far this evening with the real appreciation of complexities of zoning Not a surprise to you But the I Want this this meeting I hope will be a discussion where I can hear from you some general feedback and I want to start by acknowledging that Kelly Linnema has been absolutely Terrific in in supporting me on this and answering questions in giving me lots of information And I have been negligent in not being able to to be Available at the times that she was available to kind of talk it through so she's way ahead of me on stuff Particularly the map and I will catch up And Because there's a lot there that I that I want to do and that she's shown me is available in the assessor's records and some data and Information by-zoned etc. So I'm excited about the kind of data that we can get and the kind of potential Which I think in our last conversation is the possibility of creating This is this is not very early. This is the lead potential of 1500 units of potentially affordable housing Based on the data on non-conforming parcels and you know, so I just need to dig a little bit more and talk about how to put those pieces together But I want to start Already started three times I want now to move to sort of a philosophical statement So you understand my point of view and and what I'm thinking about how I'm thinking about this and first of all I think that The permission to proceed on the course that I'm proposing Belongs to the municipality not to the private property owner, but the decision to proceed to Make the changes belongs to the private property owner not the municipality that's a balance that that I think in my estimation municipalities often Don't take full advantage of the opportunity to to achieve their public policy goals by Recognizing the the authority to create opportunities for private property owners And this is this is what I'm trying to do with this article To find a balance that private property owners with non-conforming parcels Can further monetize their own excess excess land by converting it to uses that form to the town's own public policy goals and this article just Sorry You've got to the right page. Okay, great. Yeah. Well, no, I'll be the right page. I'm looking at the points, but I'm just in the agenda. I'm happy to put it Yeah, that's that's fine. I'm not going to go into much detail here unless you guys There are The goals that The goals that I'm hoping to achieve kind of May seem like a little bit of a misfit being bundled into this one article But when you think about the philosophy of using the opportunity for non-conforming parcels To create incentives for private property owners to meet local town policy goals the two that I'm looking at most is the Additional units smaller units affordable units. I'm clumping it out all into housing and the The third is the work I've got me one two and three. So let me handle it that way Use extra land to build non-conforming parcels to meet a variety of Interests Like workforce housing middle middle Middle market middle income missing middle, sorry missing middle housing and affordable housing with a capital A the ACM The official federal regulations for affordable housing and the second is related to that and that's to build something that That I that's a Kelly helped me visualize a Cottage cluster because a lot of the non-conforming parcels have huge backyards that you can't get to But if you were creative you probably could and build kind of a cluster of housing back there You see a lot of that anyway Here and there around around Arlington. There's some up where I live off their mom There's some I think see down where you live in East Arlington, but I'd like to see that kind of cottage cluster maybe to find a little bit differently than than the standard Way of building housing on non-conforming parcels and the third which is the kind of the outlayer in this outlier in this is Convert the extra land on non-conforming Conforming parcels to permanent open space that is consistent with the town and state policies on Decarbonization and reforestation So I'm picking on housing and open space and saying why don't we just solve it all with this And now all I need is your suggestions. You've seen the the the rest of the What what lasts what two and a half years ago three years ago? looked like a standard proposal for zoning and We kind of mushed this together very quickly to show more information And I know that I'm going to have to come up with something that looks like What you want to propose to stick into the zoning law, but for tonight what I'd really like to hear from you Is What do you think what should I go? Thank You Barbara Let's start with Okay, I won't pass it on to Steve Barbara when you say non-conforming I'm thinking either There's not enough frontage Or It doesn't meet the minimum lot size for the district. Is there any other Peace I'm missing is I should probably start out by Having a work in this is something I was I was listening today I think this is gonna be my first agenda Called with Kelly is to come with a working definition for the purposes of this article on non-conforming courses because when this article was first developed It actually came from One of the realtors in town who brought it to Adam Tapilane's attention who brought it to my attention and I went back to the realtor And he said it's yours take it and what his proposal was a lot of people have lots that have extra land And that extra land is not quite big enough To to use but I think there are listening tonight To the conversation around Nonconforming parcels slipping in and out of reality as he's kind of mentioned I'm not prepared tonight to give you a hard rule, but what's in my mind is To wait to use And maybe I'm jumping ahead or to borrow off target, but to say Give people an opportunity to subdivide a parcel So they create a a little best part that park or public garden permanently and there's a trade-off With they they can use that they can sell it to a developer who wants to build Extra space, but this is available to him. He wants to build an extra apartment But he doesn't want to put in more open space. He can buy this open space and Sort of make his in lieu of requirements That's a little different than I'm not opposed to what you said and I'll say something about it But that sounds a little different than either there are existing Nonconforming parcels because either they're too small or they don't Have adequate frontage and we want to give somebody the opportunity to build something So that's one one Something that's already built there. No, no, nothing's there. It's a vacant parcel There are there are those I just kind of grease it and tell me that so you're really talking about this is the opportunity to purposefully Create nonconforming lots That's a different well That's what I heard you say that that's the second one right the first one is if you look at this memo There are currently 170 or 80 existing vacant nonconforming parcels Right, so those are the vacant and they're probably nonconforming because they're either too small under current zoning or they lack adequate front right so that's Bucket number one right bucket number two is the second one large parcels For potential subdivision, but if you divide that parcel in half One or both of them Become nonconforming either because they lack adequate frontage or they'll lack Enough area or both right so we have two different buckets That we're talking about if I am if I understand it then barbecues raised a third Which isn't in here at all, which I was actually thinking of when I read your thing the other day, which is some Interesting to see if we could do an Arlington transfer of development rights Where you would Allow somebody to build something in the and they do this by the way in King County, Washington Where they transfer development rights between like the ex herbs and the city of Seattle I think you know where you'll keep Your farm as a farm or your open space is an open space and Exchange you can build an extra story on your building or something like that But that doesn't seem to be nonconforming parcels, but you did raise it So I just want to say it's another interesting thing maybe to think about there where You could do a nonconforming parcel, but instead you Sell the development right so you have to keep it open in green and it goes to Massive Broadway and they can do something else with it But then you'd have someplace to put it No, that's that's Different that's different that's number two What we need is more time to kind of get this because I think what's missing if I'm if I'm right Kelly is that there's a whole category of of that is in the Assessors is listed as zero that is They're either not develop Not developable and open space where they are complete open space And not developable because they're currently too small. Well, and also some of them might not be developed because they're wetlands because they're Yeah on some crazy ledge edge or something like that. So we don't know The other is you said affordable housing later you said Workforce housing miss missing middle housing. So I'm sort of unclear whether your concept is it must be an affordable unit or it could be You know a starter home size unit or Are you clear about what that is yet? A little bit. I'll take the step further than that There's a big bureaucracy in making it Officially affordable cap and lay and I don't know today that that bureaucracy is in place but between the the housing trust fund and the HCA and the Arlington housing authority I can see the shadow the the the shadows of Somebody some organizational entity that could come in and and build on something that that Susie Smith says is a is a piece of a lot that she wants to build on What I'm also thinking about for workforce housing and missing middle is exactly that this Garter homes the smaller homes that because it's a smaller size It gets built it gets built with no requirements for permanent Reduced price. It's just as small and it replaces all the ones on my neighborhood. We're just wiped out in the last six months Yeah, you know, I guess I think I think These are some germs of really good ideas, but I think they need Co-lessing and some more definition You know, I think the general rule in zoning is don't create more Nonconformities. So in some ways this would be going against The general rule in zoning. However, if you look around town, there are non conforming lots all over the place With houses on them. So it's not as if you know, we're creating something that doesn't exist in Arlington already by figuring out how to Activate non conforming lots the the other thing I think is worth thinking about is How how non-conforming becomes too non-conforming and I don't know what the answer to that is But you know, is it In the R1 zone, is it 5,000 square feet? Is it 4,000 square feet? Is it 50 foot of frontage? Is it 40 foot of frontage? So I think it's worth thinking a little bit about that too because I think we need to have some understanding of what This would mean. So those are my general thoughts so far. When I look at this, I Thought this was a little too broad And I like to break it down into different sections that you did at the end of your summary Like you're number one thing You know, this is I'm assuming you're trying to make this zoning as upright So it's easier to build. So if someone had a lot and a half So let's say the area zone for 6,000 square feet He has a 10,000 square foot a lot There's no way you divide that in half and get two non-conforming lots, but you can divide it so that the 6,000 square feet now is Conforming but then this 4,000 square feet is non-conforming You can make it as a right for that 4,000 square feet to be buildable But has to follow all the setbacks and all the other requirements and it gets to the point where you want It's a ball. It's a much smaller house because of all the requirements and then that in turns makes it Sutter home or workforce home. I think that Is more of a very narrow focus, but it has one thing that has that one and a half lot size thing there and then That's something you can grab and understand and if you tell me how many of those are are in Allington That's one thing And then the second thing was I know there's a lot of these pie shape Lots where the frontage don't meet but the backyard goes on forever And the side yard goes on forever, right? So let's make it make some sort of zoning where you can do a road down a common road down there and then you go high-shape it out and Wave the front yard and and call those cluster like you said homes We're still you still have your five or six thousand square foot lots, but the front yet, but the Front the front lot doesn't meet that requirement and then you can build all the different homes there and they can be also smaller too or whatever but but Those are things I can grasp and understand and just say those are the two things I want to tap first and then go to the next one Because if you stay at this kind of up there you're not going to get nowhere Yeah, this is great. This is great I I'm happy to stay with those two, but I don't want to lose the The open space piece and you're saying I have to know one say anything I just know I know you would never tell me that Be a better idea if I brought into art. No, you I just don't have a A Something to say about the open space because I didn't know enough about that because when you because the other two I've been talking to all of you about that for a long time. I know those two other subjects really well good to know and The open space thing this is new to me, so I'm not as familiar with that So I don't have a quick example for that for you. Okay, but the other two I know there's lots of parcels like that That could easily be done Hey What the other one I just don't know enough to say anything about so I Jail with you and I'll shut So before I Hit it over to Steve. Do you have other before you hit it over to Steve? My my only question. I agree with the questions around clarity and some of the other things that Have already been voiced what what do you think the appetite is for this because it's not Uncomplicated what is there there are a lot of specific regulations and Additional there's an additional Sections of the zoning code that would need to be added in order to create something like this, which in some ways that's complexity, but it allows I you know, I see the very Creative projects that could result from this I think something that would be important to identify and understand is is What I think you did very well when you brought forth the adu article is identify what the appetite interest and potential Was and I'm not yet sure on this First it was brought to me I'm through this real estate guy who said There's so much opportunity. I see it every day when I'm out selling parcels and I'm talking to home buyers and home Sellers and things like that. So that's one But I tell you that when I put this out there and I got signatures and I talked to some people in in my neighborhood People were really interested. There's a woman. There's a woman two blocks away from me That says I've been waiting for years for something like this Great, this would be terrific. I think that's important as You develop this out to make sure it is is clear because I think that that's to me It's important to understand that there This is something that will be used and and useful because it is something I think that That was sort of my thinking when I when I emphasize the second part It's not something that that the town can change and wave of wand and it's going to happen It's going to take people deciding it's possible. I can monetize it. I could use the money I don't need the land as much as I need money And and then think about it and do it so it'll take time, but I think there's Yeah, I have a couple I'll repeat what I think my colleagues have said simplify Simplify and focus The worst I think the worst thing one of the worst things that you could do is to bring an article where It takes ever you have to explain it to several several times in order for the person to get it Pick one thing pick one thing and focus on that Next question Is it the intent and I've I thought I I thought I knew but now I'm not sure is the intent that Homes created under this proposal would be would meet the legal definition of affordable Only one of several options. Okay, so just you know in terms of You know I live on a non have a house on a non-conforming parcel It's 3,000 square feet with 30 feet of frontage The land is assessed at $327,000 which you know as a vehicle for creating affordable housing you know the limit of the purchasing power of someone that You know under 70 or 80 percent AMI, you know our by-law provisions their their price tags around 300 grand It's a little under 300 grand. So You know likely your land acquisition costs would be higher. So this would be a Something that you know there would need to be subsidies from somewhere Which is fine as long as you know, that's that's under sort of understood One thing I would just sort of a general Comment is try to be less prescriptive Like for example There is no place in our by-law where we regulate the floor area ratio of single and two family homes So we probably don't need to do it here. Oh good. Okay There are two sections of the by-law I'd suggest looking at specifically Which are five four two B two Five four two B two and Five four two The eight so one Handles a group of non-conforming Attached single-family homes around the Thompson school the other allows Buildings on non-conforming parcels to be reconstructed if they need certain energy efficiency standards But each of these provisions is like a paragraph or two and maybe a couple of bullet points I think it's possible for you to do get the effect that you're achieving With just a little bit of language and not a whole bunch of dimensional tables I think you could look to them as a structural as a structural guide That's that's all I have great any questions Decarbonization and reforestation separately, I think it would bring some clarity Okay These are a lot of parcels and even though Numbers are there. It doesn't mean that a lot of these non-conforming parcels are actually usable And it doesn't mean a lot of these large parcels for potential subdivision are really Able to be subdivided, you know, Ken was saying well if you have to meet the same Setbacks and things like that even if you don't have to meet the square footage Frontage a lot of them don't work. So my house is actually one of those 1,173 parcels and I've been thinking there's no way that I could do this Even if I split it, you know 6,000 and 4,000 so about 10,000 square feet Because of the way it's shaped and you know, there'd be So I think if there's any way to make these numbers Closer to reality I there may not be and I know this was like look these are all the possibilities But if there's any way to make this number closer to reality, so if somebody says how many parcels are we really talking about? You know that it's not this big number, but it's a more realistic number. I think that would be helpful also That's definitely the next stage added in a stage, but that's Other comments or questions for Barbara Great, thank you very much. Thank you. Thanks So at this time, we'd like to open agenda item number two Up for public comment So any member of the public wishing to address any of these four articles if you could please raise your hand so if you could Great, thank you, and you'll have up to three minutes And I actually before you Go any further could I ask you to actually come up a little bit closer so that the mic can pick you up? Thank you so much Various I don't I'm not sure it's incumbent upon the town to Find ways to further monetize property owners property We've heard some of that tonight That that is something that somebody should pursue It strikes me that the town is full of property owners people who own or people who rent live here And they do have a significant set of rights to go on and owning that property And The those rights, I don't believe Trump the rights of the community to to have a community that they desired and perhaps moved into for The community was around at that time When mr. Flunners made this presentation he set aside very quickly that desires of the community of the folks and around the properties that might wish to Have to be developed a certain way setting that aside. He said I believe the property owners of the best idea for how to develop their property And I don't think that's true I think there's a balance between the desires of property owners And what they want to do that's balanced against the desires of the community to do or maintain They also like in their community not necessarily that they own But that they are part of as a community And I know that you as a board are trying to balance these things in terms of redevelopment And the desire to fill up With more density or more housing or more affordable housing affordable housing is a need in town We know that but there are other needs in town that aren't just affordable housing There were needs for open space the needs for trees the needs for Non-development land to act as carbon sinks, etc. Etc. Fill them up. They're not doing that So I'm saying that we need to balance these things and I'm not sure some of what we're hearing is necessarily a balanced Thank you It's interesting Steve because I was actually thinking about that when I was reading this all the other day the tension between private property rights and Sort of what the community can expect that they don't own and I read this wonderful book about a decade ago I just looked it up and I got it right It's called trespassing an inquiry into the private ownership of land by John Hanson Mitchell and he looks at the Some wonderful private property that was open space that he loved and how it started getting developed over time and the tension between What we don't own but we feel like we have Some right to have because we like the Vista because we like the neighbor's yard Etc. Etc. With a person's right Up to a point to develop their property But also the community's need for housing affordable housing So, you know each one of these things is a tension and that's you know, that's why I said to James earlier I'm not I don't have blind faith in the free market because they don't don't always get That tension where it needs to go, but I think that's what you're raising and I think it's what all of us need to think about I appreciate your your perspective. Thank you. I'm sorry No, no, it was very well taken. So thank you I Trespassing John Hanson Mitchell John Hanson Mitchell If you well it has a few other words to it after I It's one of it's one of my more favorite books about nature and the sort of the relationship of people to built land I had trespassing an inquiry of the private ownership of land. Yeah, okay So it it did make me think about Was John Hanson Mitchell Okay, any other members of the public wishing to speak this evening on Agenda item number two that preliminary zoning amendments Okay, we'll close. Yes I'm sorry. I did want to respond to James's sorry. Yeah, so if you would like to yes, if you could Thank you forward to week so the mics and here you Pick this up Barbara Thornton two to three park at Arlington and James correct me if I'm wrong. I think it was You're I have parking initiative version two is what I called it and you're talking about the Renting that you're talking about the demand pricing for parking. Yes, okay. I Think there's a real opportunity here, and I know Jean you were concerned about people not having parking available if they were if this happened I Would love the opportunity to kind of play like Zip car that rents that rents for their own cars various driveway spaces around town I'd love to rent out of Driveway space. I'd make a driveway space available in my house And put it online and let people rent it out and I think that might be a way to address the Lack of overnight parking in town in the b-5 district somebody's gonna walk all the way to your house and park at But there is there is an app for that Barbara Somewhere If I don't know where that app is but there is some app or some program for that purpose Great, thank you. Any other public comments before we close public comment for agenda two Okay, so at this time we'll move on to our third agenda item, which is our hybrid meeting protocol so This item Will have for discussion amongst the board members As we discussed in new business in our last meeting And there is a pilot program that will be starting that has recently started in town for various boards and commissions of different sizes to pilot hybrid meeting technology for for future larger-scale deployment and to provide feedback on the use of both the hybrid technology as well as the ease of running and Participating in a in a hybrid meeting So you've all have received the memo What I put together as well was a response to that memo with regard to Should we decide to move forward and participate in the hybrid pilot program what I would recommend as the as the Ways that we would run a hybrid meeting there were several questions that the Remote participation study group put forward for each of the committees to identify Prior to joining the hybrid pilot such that it's clear to both the public joining as well as All of the members of the board or committee as to how the meeting will be run both from a technology as well as a Process standpoint, so I'd like to First see if Kelly you had anything to add. I know you've been speaking with a few folks in town about the Technology and It's readiness or not for us to participate So if you could fill us in there, and then I'd like to open it up to the board members for discussion I think So we've been working with Jim Feeney and He spoke with ACMI tonight just about some of the concerns overall about this room and the ability to hear from this screen and also the ability to For for anybody who's participating remotely to be able to speak from the screen during open Like the open meeting section of the Public comment section of Hearing or of any particular meeting. I know that Jim has been working with ACMI and the technology to make sure That you know, we're able to run things from two different laptops and I would just note that Running a hybrid meeting will take two staff and or One of the board members to volunteer to take on a role of facilitating The virtual We did a meeting with the elective by Arlington kickoff on November 1 I believe it was and it really could have taken three staff And so that's kind of what you see for the select board meetings as well Just that there's additional staff that or volunteers who need to be running that portion of the beating So I think just an acknowledgement that We can start this it's going to take staff or volunteers and Even so We would request some Courtesy and patience from those participating remotely because the audio is kind of a work in progress So it is going to it's going to take us time To be able to fine-tune this and make sure that it's working so that we can have Equitable participation in the room and those who are participating So you just brought up something that I I think is important whether or not there should be an expectation of equitable participation or whether visibility and the opportunity to Participate as opposed to setting up the expectation of equitable Participation is something that we would like to commit to it's something that there's been a lot of discussion about In the study group and how challenging that can be One of the things that I identified for example was that I would recommend to our board that anyone Presenting to us be here in person as opposed to trying to modulate between Somebody in person and somebody who's joining remotely and I think In that vein there are several recommendations that set up clear expectations for what somebody What the requirements of applicants and participants in the meeting will be in terms of their physical presence versus what? The expectation of somebody who is a resident who is joining to Listen in and perhaps join during the public comment period might be able to participate in So with that I'd like to open it up to a discussion as to number one thoughts on participating in this pilot and if so thoughts on the initial memo of the way that we would Run that type of meeting would be and I'll start with Ken I'm gonna answer that backwards sure I Totally 100% agree of you whoever is presenting in front of us should be presenting in front of us not on a Hybrid process the whole team should be here and presenting materials. I always like Having boards up having feeling the materials what they do for the sides Actually seeing colors and everything else makes it for instance one to us That said I understand it it takes more people or more volunteers to run this I think that's an undue burden on on the board because I I Generally like to listen to everybody and I do listen to everybody when they speak and try to Think about it in a really fast manner and understand what they're trying to say where they're coming from and if I have to jigger around with The laptop and doing this and answering all these I'm not gonna be 100% focused on listening to the opponent or listen to all the board members in their comments and So I'm not sure we have enough people To do that Then my third one is Who else is doing this besides us? So The I can I can pull that list of participants I will say that it has waned from the original list as people have had these discussions and Identified some of the challenges that they believe they're going to face. I know that the ZBA is planning on Testing this they've committed to one one test which I think is coming up at their next meeting Okay, so that it must be the meeting after that they School board I believe is already piloting this but again, they have a special room that has been built for this as does the Select board although I don't believe the select board currently has Participants in person staff only it's only staff and the board person is a little different than what we would do and then there are a few smaller boards and commissions that have Said they're interested although I think we there are only one or two that have committed It's gonna be really difficult to do any of that in this room Just the way it's set up. I'm not even sure these speakers No offense, sorry Microphones here Will work and how it comes how clear it is and how we speak it is The whole thing to me right now will distract what we're doing anything in spring We have a lot of things coming up. That's really important and I rather not get distracted and move off the side I'd rather get these warrant articles And get this sort of get a handle of this and move forward So I guess my boat is to To delay this and wait and see but that's my Before I comment I had a question the memo said something like Lieutenant governor Polito signed something that allowed this through March 2023 what happens in March 2023 Unknown so the the lieutenant governor passed the provision to allow remote meetings and thereby Hybrid meetings to continue should should that be chosen? but The that has not what happens next has not been so so we could do this in December January February and then March couldn't do it anymore if if the legislation doesn't get Re-passed or something so my understanding so my understanding and again, I would need to double-check this with Doug Hine is that By holding a meeting in person even if remote meetings are not permitted That a hybrid meeting where there is a quorum of the board Your meeting in person our applicants are in person, but we are inviting members of the public remotely to participate is not prohibited by Current provisions of open law again. I would need to check that but that is my understanding March is March is not the deadline for hybrid meetings it is The deadline for something either needs to be passed to allow remote There are many committees that are still fully meeting remotely, and so I think that's where It is unclear as to what will be passed going forward related to those but hybrid in the way that this board is looking at engaging with hybrid is something that my understanding is would be allowed under current But again, I would want to defer that's that's my understanding So I have the same concerns that can raise Plus, I don't really understand if we're having Materials here and things on the screen Are people at home going to be able to see the things that are here in the room and The things that are here on the screen or just the things on the screen and when they're on the screen Do we lose the ability to see whatever? Diagrams and things like that are on the screen So that's a great question and something that will have to work with so the meeting technology The technology would be and called a neat bar. That's one that they would use first correct So that would allow both us to keep items projected as well as Also, it basically follows the voice of who is speaking So again, we would have to figure out how to configure the room such that the applicant Who's speaking is in the line of the camera view and then it would? it would Basically refocus on a member of the board my understanding is that we would need to then project up here and then I Would need to also project We do all on my screen for anybody who's participating remotely because This is going to be hard to see from that So we would need two screens So this would have this My understanding is that this would have to be dedicated toward those participating remotely And we would have to project Any presentations or application materials to the screen for this board and anyone participating And then I would need to site it simultaneously do that over zoom and these microphones would get routed through see through a CMI via zoom So that it's a little complicated we need to test it out a couple of times and would a CMI continue to do a live feed of our It's currently not live. It's not recorded and then okay, and then uploaded and that would remain that would remain the Yes, okay Yeah, I Think a lot of the thing for some of the reasons that kin said about You know all of the warrant articles that are coming but also the people who come before us who need to have decisions made and Our attention on them. I don't feel like we should be the ones experimenting Really, you know for this where we have Specific legal obligations and responsibilities and what we do has a real impact on People coming before us, you know, I think like And I don't want to like call them out as the people who should do the experimenting but the parts of the town boards and commissions that don't have that like Electrify Arlington or Clean Energy Future Committee things like that Where they don't have all of these obligations and whether people come before us don't have real legal Expectations that we have to meet. I think they might be the ones to do more of the piloting And then we would learn from them and figure out whether and how we could fit that into what we do I guess that's sort of what I'm thinking to sort of add on to what kin had to say Great Steve So with regard to Your recommendations madam chair with respect to remote participate with respect to who's in the room in the Requirements for a form. I think these are well thought out Set of standards and I agree with them I Was very enthusiastic about this and but until This line of them mentioned well, yeah, and we need another set person which makes complete sense This is this is where it starts to get into. Yeah, and a video production crew Because that's what you're doing essentially if We could have I Feel more comfortable if we were Assured of having me the resources necessary the human resources necessary I agree with kin where trying to You know if you're trying to Participate in the discussion Having to let people into a room or you know raise hands that sort of thing it could be a distract distraction Yeah, I agree with all of the points here. I think that I'm I'm concerned about the number of Staff members who are going to be required. I'm personally concerned about running the meeting and trying to stay present and also modulate or moderate rather the the attendees and I'm very interested again mostly in the feedback of Claire and Kelly who have already Participated in some of these and it sounds like it's been challenging I don't want to put words in your mouth. Yeah, I think you know, it's this is a really interesting question It's been very challenging. I think too There's a I I appreciate in this memo that we said we would not be Monitoring the chat a lot of times that takes one whole staff person I Do think that it could get you know And while Kelly and I can certainly be here. I'm not sure I have a third staff person who can help us I certainly don't right now We'll see what happens maybe by next summer, but sure but it is it's it's very intensive I that said I like the idea of you know, obviously as many people being able to participate as can But I do I you know to Jean's point. I think because of the business of this board It it may not be I think that you know the most feasible And certainly where we to do it I I mean to be really frank I just don't have it right now right to do it so to me I think that's our answer right there if we don't have them I mean people to be able to we could do it with two people so long as one board member would admit people from the Because That would just because for Claire to run presentations. Yeah, they're and then for me to handle the The the whole zoom aspect of it audio, etc. It's it's also hard to monitor a waiting room when you would have people entering Any time during working and so that would be my concern would be that somebody would not be able to get in I mean, I think that the other thing we we also when we were fully remote we had some challenging behavior from some of the Participants yes that we had to moderate as it came up During deliberations and to that required that at the time Jenny and I be fully Aware of what was happening with the remote attendees at all at all time and she was fully really dedicated to to that and that That takes a lot of a bandwidth to I mean it sounds like just letting somebody In from the waiting room is not a Lot it's not that it's moderating. I mean we were having people. I remember yes But being up slogans and other things Right, right. There are people like Right putting things on right somebody will have to monitor that and then somebody's gonna have to monitor when people raise their hands Because we wouldn't have the chat Right because this is because it wouldn't function like a public meeting. It would function like You have a comment and so You would allow people to raise their hands and speak one at a time during public comment Just like you would for people who are in the room And so I would just need to Make sure that people remain muted and Until there's a public comment period and that screens are being shared Well, we did the zone of reconfiguration and The public involvement was very very intense and Well, we had people come up here and you know, you would have them sign up the sheet Talk, you know the name and yeah, sometimes they're like two or three sheets that we'd have to go through for a meeting And that's fine. But when you Integrate it all that with this hybrid stuff. I think it's going to require Another person or one I think I don't think you can ask a board member to be doing that Because we're going to be I rather not do that and listen to what people have to say and not be so conscious on Did I miss somebody here or or someone's gonna get upset with me because they've had their hand up all the time or something or Or if they did not know how to use the system and they yelling and screaming in the in their mic say I Can't get in I can't get into what's out on it, you know, just Disruptive yes, so I I mean I Think it's good. But can we have tried out somebody else and let us I think it's going to be really challenging The spring for what we want to do and I've gone through this before and it's just gonna You know, jean, it's not so let's talk about what When what what we would want to see For us to feel that it was it is something that we would want to try So obviously we know their acoustical issues with the room and we know that the town still needs to figure out with the interface with ACMI and the recording and The running of of the meeting I mean that's it just untested at this point and we know that we have several full dockets ahead of us and it doesn't seem like there is a Let's call it a light meeting like perhaps we have had one or two in the past coming up as we're leading up to The Warren article submissions MBTA communities That's going to be hearings and everything else. It seems like we would want some some comfort level that those things have been tested and Vetted before the board I do not that's how I mean it because I surely do not want someone to say hey You insinuate this hybrid meeting and I did not get a chance to speak or Hear things or do things when we're doing the MBT community because that's a stop it involves so many people And if they feel like it's slighted, I don't want to be a part of that Because of this technology. Let's just just have it the old school way and this you know if there's issues Let's talk about it. We're a group here and Madam chair. Yes, I was wondering if Was there a lot of any discussion on the Like recommend or recommendations regarding the various formats that you can use as a meeting I'm thinking specifically of you know the typical Brady Bunch way that we normally do Verse and where you have a waiting room and allow people and versus more of the webinar forum that the select board uses where anyone can come in but then You know whoever's operating You know running acting a zoom controller has to sort of elevate people to co-host so they can speak and then So the town does not the town only owns I believe two webinar one webinar account that basic webinar the webinar option is not available to us So it's either the traditional zoom format that we've been using or nothing. Yeah, so I'm It's if the webinar option were If it would make easy management and if it could be if that would If we need needed one fewer person to manage meetings then maybe we It would be nice if we could consider getting another webinar license. I can give that feedback back to the committee Would you agree that that would be The webinar format I think just as it works with the select board, I think it would be appropriate for this board Kelly is there any concern this is the thing that keeps coming up for me on this That because we are in a hybrid situation and let's just say for example, you're running. I imagine this would be the zoom Stop and then let's say I'm doing a presentation for over there if we're not Marrying each other exactly. Are we really delivering the same presentation to those at home versus the ones in the room? I mean It would just have to be as close as good as it can be because the other thing is that we have all of these materials on With the agenda, so they actually are available to anyone But I think this was good feedback I will take this back to the remote participation study group and Give them the feedback about the webinar option would actually make this a lot more attractive to this particular board the concerns about the the technology the number of staff that will Be required to run this and let them know that we'd like to defer to a future date Okay, thank you very much. Let's see I Like to Actually just move to meeting minutes and then to open for him Because I think where we're pretty close to that there I mean I mentioned before we started that this was going to be a discussion with them with the board Okay, so let's move to agenda item number four meeting minutes and And we will see if there are any additions or corrections to the meeting minutes from October 3rd 2022 I submitted all mine for yours for the third or for the 17 Mine was for the third for the third can you just quickly run through what those were? Yeah, so the changes on it would be on page 3 the third paragraph from the bottom The last sentence of that paragraph ends Mr. Revolak was asked to participate in creating Winchester's ADU manual That should read Mr. Revolak was asked to participate in Winchester's ADU panel. I participated in a panel discussion I did not write a book Do you have any other corrections, okay? Is there a motion to approve the October 3rd? 2022 meeting minutes as amended some motion Second start with we'll take a vote starting with Steve. Hi Gene. Yes. Yes, I'm a yes as well meeting minutes for October 3rd have been Approved I will now move to the October 17th 2022 meeting minutes And We'll run through to see if there any additions or corrections starting with kin. No gene. No Steve. No, and I have none either. Is there a motion to approve the October 17th? Meeting minutes as submitted some motion We'll take a vote starting with Steve. Yes, Gene. Yes, Ken. Yes, and I'm a yes as well Those have been approved. Thank you very much for the excellent meeting minutes And we will close agenda item number four and move to agenda item number five, which is open forum So any members of the public wish you to speak, please raise your hand starting with Barbara Just a question regarding the change in the meeting format have you Looked at how the participation in your readings in general changes from zoom to to this format exclusively because it seems to me that during COVID I saw a much greater percentage of younger people and Attending that can't get away at this time to Because they have children It's an excellent question I have to say I I did keep an eye on that and I don't know that I had that same observation. I did not keep Statistics on it. That was one of the things that actually would be part of the pilot program is keeping track of who's attending in person And who's attending remotely, which again also is a requirement of the board and the staff to do that So again, that's one more thing. We'd have to be doing is keeping an eye on that. I I think that they're There We've had meetings since we've been back where there's been a good amount of present a good amount of participation But we also haven't been in or an article mode. So it's it's tough to tell. That's when that's when people really come out Regularly, we also haven't had too many large Hearings since we've been back in in person to me I That's actually not true We had the one we were in the select board chambers and we actually had a really great turnout That was one so I would say that I haven't really noticed a Significant Difference yet, but I think again once we start getting into the warrant articles. It'll be interesting to see but thank you for that comment Any other I think if people are Interested in what are concerned about what we're talking about they do come That mean it I was quietly heavily attended so if You know if you or if that topic is something that I really just did they didn't come You know, there's not that me who would come and sit and say nothing. You just watch And I'll just add on to that I think that the fact that those people came and were in the room Allowed us to at that particular hearing have a really productive and Meaningful exchange with the residents in in the area and and led to I Think a more creative solution than they felt involved Yeah, I mean I Didn't look at the numbers But I think what Rachel said is the one thing that struck me when we've had these in person meetings The people who have come have been like the next door neighbors and people like that and a few other people And they seem to be much more involved than they ever were when we had the zoom meetings And there was sort of a better interaction. I thought you know Then with then when we had the zoom meetings with all the little boxes up on the screen So it was interesting. It feels more empathetic. Yeah. Yeah, it was it was real interesting to see that difference Any other members of the public wishing to speak during open forum? Please I'm so sorry may I ask you to please come forward Hybrid I'm a co-chair of a town committee and we've done two of the hybrid meetings and they've done very very well And I I guess I would say I hear a lot of scaredness from you the technology and It's not scary Injection quite it's I was quite amazed And scary we were we've met in the annex not in this room and I would maybe ask you to get a little familiar with the technology Meeting but outside of a meeting so you can see Because I think I don't know if this is an example of the kind of In-person participation. It's difficult to make it here and these warrants as you said they're really really important and And then thirdly this room Yes, I agree. Yeah, and that's that's honestly part of the issue with us moving forward It's this room, but I just wanted to say it's not scary and it's been really successful This is our room though For better or worse, I think you raise an important point which is we need to see what's working with other with other committees What it's taken for us to figure out how to do it and I'll and I'll also just add that I think that again, we didn't have the number of Presentations that we typically do from large groups here tonight, but it's it. This is a little different of a Board structure in terms of the types of cases that we hear Thank you, though. I appreciate that that feedback. That's very helpful great. Any other comments Great. So at this point, we will close open forum and open new business. Is there any new business from the department I Can just share that we had our first public meeting on MBTA communities Otherwise, which I'm starting to refer to as zoning for multi-family because that makes more sense to somebody who isn't familiar with the legislation So we did have a kickoff meeting on Thursday night. That went very well We had 78 registrants and we probably have about 40 to 45 people there We all of the information regarding that meeting is now posted to the town website And so if you wanted to see the recording of that meeting or if you wanted to download the slides or participate in the survey That's our first opportunity to do that before we get the working group officially started So I think overall the meeting was very successful And I think you know Claire and I both offered to do this meeting again because just to make sure that more people are aware of What's happening? So just when you have a moment to feel free to I know Jean was there and Steve was there, but if you have a moment to check out the slides check out the presentation I think it was a very good way of getting the facts I think it was a very successful meeting very well presented lots of good comments During the open comment period of the meeting, I think it was a really excellent kickoff For for the process Yeah, we also asked for expressions of interest in the working group and I've received several expressions of interest in the working group, which is which is great And I think we're gonna have a really good Diverse one pretty diverse. Yeah, we're gonna have a pretty good group of people Moving this forward. So yeah, it was a success. I think It's great. Thank you for the update. Sure. I appreciate it Any other I just want to follow up on that and then mention one other thing I think it would be good once the working group is up and running if we got like a report back Once a month or once every meeting if things are happening just so we can stay those of us not on the Working group can stay in the loop. Oh for sure. Give our comments in along the way But the other thing I wanted to mention I'd mentioned a few Meetings ago that the T is in the process of altering the bus routes They are in Arlington and they've now Finalized the new bus routes and much to my surprise. They didn't take any comments When they came out with the revision So I think Arlington's a little better than it would have been otherwise but we have lost some bus routes and some bus routes have Decreased service and they had before and The bus that I took which went to L life no longer exists so that If I was working I would have a much harder time Getting into into Boston than I would otherwise and I Think it's just unfortunate I Think we lost out Sharing that everybody knows What the outcome was because I know you brought that up So the quick details is the 79 bus is gone completely The 67 bus was restored But instead of going the way it did go down down Pleasant Street and route 2 to L wife It now goes on mess out of to L wife Brooke Parkway So partially replaces the 79 bus The 84 bus is gone. It no longer exists and the 78 bus has Fewer runs Then before and the new the new Bus route which goes from Arlington Center through Belmont to somewhere in Waltham was Shortened so it goes from Arlington Center basically to nowhere Nowhere meaning right nowhere meaning not a medical place not a big employment center Not the type of places where people usually get on the tee didn't go out to 128 didn't go to Brandeis so I just find it a little I'll find it interesting to see how many people end up taking that bus which will only run once an hour anyhow, and then 67 ends at 7 p.m. Where the 79 used to run until 9 30 p.m. So like me you tended to miss a lot of buses because you were working in the evening You could still catch a bus at like 9 30 at night But can't do that anymore in our life to get to Arlington. So Do you cancel the one to go into Hanscom? They they changed the route and I can't remember what the route is now They changed They they made some route changes to the 62 the 76 I can't remember what they are and they made some route changes to the 350 the one that went to Burlington Mall Either in the 80 in the 84 Slightly different Thank You Steve two quick things one regarding the multi-family zoning presentation I Think it was very successful and You know I staffed at a great job. I Really appreciated the the conversation starter maps because I think there's been You know out in the public There's been sort of a feeling like this has to go near ill life or this has to be in a business district and I think you Broke out of that mold quite successfully So the other the other piece is You know hey a couple of weeks ago. I went to Winchester to participate in an ADU panel They had a special town meeting and they have adopted an ADU bylaw Thanks So my friend who lives in Winchester told me you have either the ADU or the owner of the house has to be at least 62 Years of age so they're not as they're not as good as we are folks were or handicapped Yes, they are different. They were more restrictive than we are And only 500 square feet. I think they told me I don't remember the size We're better Barbara Third meeting to discuss the better bus that we're that one's that one's just our equity. Oh, is that the equity ones? I'm interested to what here what they say about that because some of the buses that got cut out go through EJ neighborhoods right Any other new business? All right seeing none. Is there a motion to adjourn? So motion Yes