 I'm Josh Jerome. I'm the Community and Economic Development Specialist for the City of Montpelier. And thanks for coming today. It was a beautiful day, so hopefully you can enjoy some of it after. And this, I want to introduce you to Stephanie Clark from Weinberg, our consultant firm, who's going to run through the process for the master planning of this property. And then we'll take some questions and comments after, okay? Great. Yeah, thank you all for coming out. And yes, hopefully you've enjoyed it up to now and then we're going to get outside and be able to move around a good bit. But thanks for taking a minute. And so as Josh said, I'm Stephanie Clark from Weinberg. Our consultant team was selected over the summer. There was an RFP process and put out by the city. Our team consists of Weinberg plus DHB and Black River Design, BRD, that is helping to create this master plan. The ultimate goal is an actionable master plan, something that will have next steps, will have forward momentum to seeing a vision put into action. And so that's why our firm was hired. What we do is development consulting to municipalities. We've worked with Montpelier extensively before. We're really excited to be back. And the beginning of this process is really starting, it started before we got involved. So starting in spring of 2022, there was a vote of course, and there was a community conversation and input period that yielded a lot of comments and a lot of different ideas about uses and creative uses and opportunities with the property. We have a printout of that feedback on the table if you haven't gotten it, some of you have. And that is everything that was received up to September. So that brings us up to the fall. So the fall 2022 process is what we're doing right now. And there's two concurrent paths though. There's the conversation and the continued community input, which we'll get into more today. And we have a series of other meetings happening and other forms of outreach happening to gather that input. But also concurrently we're doing the site due diligence. And so the consultant team specifically DHB is running the site due diligence for what is happening with the property. What are the different features of the property? We have an archeological assessment being done, topography as you'd imagine, natural resources inventory. And all of that will come together in a memo and in a plan that shows us what the site actually has for characteristics. So we have this process, which again includes community meetings, stakeholder meetings. We've been doing a lot of communications thanks to Evelyn, who's who you all probably know but at the front desk there. She's been blasting out a lot of communication around this continued education and outreach, which we know is important to keep this top of mind and keep people informed. And that is going to continue while we on that concurrent path go on the due diligence. But the next phases, just to give you a sense of what to expect, is in the winter we expect to come back with an opportunities of these strengths plan. And that will show where the most likely areas for development might be, the easiest paths for development, and also the different challenges that come with it from the basic parts of the property and elements of the property. And at that time we intend to have public workshops to really assess then how do the visions for the uses dovetail with what the property can support and the best uses and the highest and best uses for those. But also the pros and cons for where infrastructure would be needed and how expensive that might be versus what would be the return on that investment. And then from that feedback and from the city council's direction, we intend to bring back a few concepts, two to three scenarios and development pathways that the city can then give input on and guide as the final actionable master plan. So there is a funnel really of what's happening in terms of collecting input and the guidance for how the master plan will come into being. I should say, you know, what we'll talk about more today when we're out on site though, is that it's a big piece of property and I just want to be, you know, full disclosure. We don't know what we don't know yet. So this today is not educating about what we've found yet, but that is coming. Once they've had a chance, we have to do a lot of this. We did this kind of, had to get going really quickly because the ground freezes, the conditions become such that you can't do any of the, some of the due diligence you need to do. And so once we have that data, that would be part of the presentation in the winter. So as I said, the input that we have gotten so far is detailed in the handout and there was a lot of consensus for certain uses. The vote had been intentionally for housing and recreational opportunities and so those obviously came to the forefront, but there were also suggestions around conservation, environmental conservation, natural resources conservation, agriculture, educational opportunities, some retail and what does that mix look like. And so, you know, as an example, there has been, there's quite a lot of range that we've seen so far and I expect we will continue to see because people, everybody has different priorities, but we're here to continue to hear that and to take that down and I keep saying this is my sponge phase where I really feel like I'm just absorbing a lot of this. We're taking notes, we're reporting this, we're bringing this back to the planning team and so all of that will get digested along with, you know, our expertise from development perspective with some, you know, highest and best use, best practices that will get applied as we kind of think about what some of these opportunities may be. And those, by the way, those comments are also on the website. So the web page, which is a sub-page of the website, is going to continue to keep up to date. There are documents on there that have our slide deck from when we presented to the City Council earlier this week, has the feedback from the public. So if any of your peers or your neighbors would like to know more about that, there's a lot on that website and that will continue to get updated. Where is that website? So if you go to the website, the main home page, there's actually a section as you scroll down, dedicated to the elix that previously called the elix. We should talk about that. And there will be a link that goes to that site. So you're saying on the City of Montpelier website? City of Montpelier website, yes. Thank you for clarifying. We are calling this, as you might have seen on the signage and on this, that this is the Country Club Road site, which has been, was generally the consensus of the City Council at a meeting this week that really is a, it's a working title. We should just call it that. I think it's a way to recognize the place that it's at and everybody can recognize it as such. But that may not be its ultimate site name, but for now that's what we're calling it. And I think switching it from elix is going to be a little bit of a challenge I admit. So this, really, this is the question we're here for today. So what we'd like to do after this is open this up for input and to hear from everybody more ideas, anything that's troubling, anything that's exciting for you, relative to the site that we get to be here today is such a treat to be able to actually see the property. And we will go out after this once we've had time to have a comment and take a walk and there's a good number of folks, so we'll split up into some groups. Josh can explain more of that when we get to that phase, but there are different paths to take out. Luckily there are some nice walking paths here and you can explain more of that when we get to that point. So don't give us a chance to get out on the site and talk about it. Yeah, I was just looking at your timeframe, obviously based on the public forum feedback so you're going to have a preliminary input to the city in winter 2023 and one of the council meetings. And then your final written report, are you expecting that spring of next year? The timeframe is spring 2023 and I say it spring mostly because some of that will be dictated by the public process if for some reason we don't want to be too hard and fast on that and predict what we don't know because if we get to a point in the winter where more research might be needed, for example, we would want to go back and do some diligence and that could delay the timeframe. We don't want to rush this. This is not something to be really legacy opportunity. So I think by the spring we're hopeful that we'll have that concept planning phase so that we can have an actual master plan by late spring or early summer after that process. That's a great question. So, yeah, so this is a... Yes, we have another process question. Oh, just your slide calls this a legacy site. What does that mean? Legacy sites really is a matter of long-term opportunity. Long-term opportunity for the community once in a lifetime is another way of putting it. You know, having such an asset that the community owns and controls is something to be taken seriously. So that's typically what's meant for long-term planning. And so this is the question we want to get to. I'm more likely to leave up this slide just because it is a graphic of the site. You can see that we are here today and we will go out and take these trails and walk out on the site after this. But this gives us a good graphic representation of the 130-plus acres that we're talking about. And so I really want to stop there because I think you need to hear too much more or answer any more questions before we get to the input. Yeah. So the left end of that block is that the savings pasture property right there. Yeah. Correct. Yeah. Just one other question. I know that a lot of people come up here and use this for cross-country skiing and stuff like that very much. But is there still going to be a lot of cross-country skiing or recreational opportunities forward still planning all this stuff? In the interim. Yes. Yeah. My expectation. Yeah. Yeah. So are you saying that the due diligence of assessing the actual land, ledges and kind of stuff here, participating, getting that done, getting that all started in process before winter? Yes. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. We hope what's been a nicely conveniently actually not, I'd love to say I could be responsible for the timing, but it's going to go coincide well with the holiday season. We're not going to start the public process during the holiday season, but that's about when the research will finish up and give us time to go into our planning phase. And then by January, our hope is to come into that season when no one wants to be doing outside things anyway. And we can do some workshops around that. Here. Here. I know that City Council, some people came and asked about hunting and a decision was made. Can you show where the hunting might be taking place within that boundary? I would imagine that it's anywhere in the boundary in the forested areas. That would be to the far right and to the far left? Yes. Don't just stand in the forest. Well, the amount of people walking feels like any hunter might have given up on any deals on the opportunity. So the due diligence at this point, is that an environmental assessment of the property? Yes. Yes, it is. And everything from natural resources to wetland assessments and American endangered species to poverty, all of the environmental characteristics of the soils. Here. Yes. I look on this as we presented us a great big deserve with a hard crossing on top. We don't know what's underneath. And we all want to know, we all want to think what we know is underneath what we don't. And I guess as I can see, I'm a professional planner and I come ignorant of what's on this site and I don't know what questions to ask because I don't know what's underneath. And you have access to GIS information, I'm sure, and you've not presented it to us as a body. And I guess I don't think you're wasting my time and your time by not describing what's underneath this frost, this beautiful landscape we see. We don't know what's there, but we don't know its limitations. So why not spend some time and a little bit of your money for easy access to GIS and tell us what the state through the GIS system knows what's underneath. At least they think they know. And then we can start talking about what the potentials are and what the limitations are given that depth. While your procedure is described in this handout, we're going to get that information and certainly make the decisions given whatever limited input and they may be not what we want. So I guess I'm criticizing your process. And that's fair. What? So that's your title to that. So I will tell you, I do not have any of that data. So I personally, our firm does not do that work, so we partnered with VHB and they are busy doing that work. And that takes time. VHB, they're the firm out of self-reliance and they are doing that work. And it takes time. They started, our contract technically was to start on October 1st. I got started a little early because we wanted to get the public back engaged because it had been a while. So the spring process had taken a little while. So we wanted to get back to while there was conditions where we could come out and see the site to get a chance to continue the conversation as the public. So I don't know that data yet. And when we do know that data, we will be bringing that back along with an opportunity for a lot more conversation. This is just not the only time for conversation. I guess I didn't see that on that first diagram represented as to the timeframe when there would be tough feedback. Yeah. I guess that's what, if this wasn't as clear as it could have been. This is really the opportunity. When we have the data, that's what the opportunities and constraints plan is. It will present what the features are, the questions you guys asked about the environmental features, as well as barriers and challenges that we know regulatory and such and anything permit related, as well as then that's the opportunity to have a conversation around the uses and how that will go, how that will fit in. And then there's even further opportunity for more public input. I'm, if I may, Mr. But part of that community input and prioritization is like each of us is thinking our finger through that frosting on the cake and saying, oh, I don't like what's underneath here. But you have a mixture underneath. What's in that cake? We don't know what is available given the suit. I don't disagree. I don't disagree. It is a bit hard to paint on a canvas when you don't know necessarily, but I think that there's a balance here of trying to still retain feedback. Let me ask for example. I think we have to take a few. If I may, Bill Fraser, city manager, I'd like to respond to that. To be honest, the process that you're saying is what they initially proposed, which was to get all the data first. And it was actually the city who had heard from its residents and from others that people wanted to be really involved and have multiple chances. So we actually asked them to start this early. And the point of this is to find out what potential uses people have for the highest priority. We don't know exactly where they're going to go yet, but is it housing? Is it recreation? Is it open space? So when we get that data, we can begin to think about where those things might go and then come back and show that to the public and get reactions. So if you have criticism of the process, please direct it to me and the city and not folks who are doing what we asked them to do. Well, you know, I worked a while in public assistance participation. And the model you're suggesting is method how to limit input for citizen participation. This model is just that. The less the people think they have a lot of input, they take a session like this, then they go away for a while and then they gel something what they want, the administration wants. And then they come back and say, this is it, this is what you asked us to do. Well, maybe if the administration or the city knew what it wanted, that would be happening, but we don't really just do it here and what our folks want. Well, Mulligan models and it shows certain things come out at the end. And I guess what I'm asking is, why not make available online the data base that is available and have a constant website starting out with GIS for the site, the respectable relays to constraint to come out of it and let the people be up to date as you develop this due diligence. We're not going to disperse information with every study we do. There's lots and lots of pieces of due diligence and so it would not be responsible to put out information in such a different, small segregated way. It's a comprehensive picture. We want to make sure we're doing all of the thorough due diligence. I want to be sensitive to time. We do need to make sure everybody gets a chance to be heard and she's been waiting a while and then we'll go to this gentleman here in the gray. I'm happy to go ahead and move back to the slide where we're talking about, you know, we can, I can still feel a question about process too but if you want to also on the input. So will the GIS and other work that the other party is doing address questions about veg and rock and clay and all of that? Yeah, soils and as much as, without doing borings, they're not going into borings yet. That's a little advanced at this stage but to get a sense from, especially the mapping that is available to look at the geotechnical aspects to it because I agree, I think that here is a particular concern. It absolutely would be kind of a bit of a deal killer for, you know, exactly what we want to get to for the opportunities and constraints plan. We don't want to talk about doing, you know, multi-use, multi-family housing with subterranean parking, for example. If you did townhouses, for example, with parking underneath to minimize surface, you know, you can't do that when you have a lot of ledge. So we don't want to have that. That's exactly why we want to bring those two things together. And so we'll go to Greg and then we are going to ask the people, keep their questions and comments to a few minutes and then we'll have a chance to speak and we'll make sure everyone has spoken first before we get to people speaking multiple times if you can appreciate that. Yeah. Yeah, one question now. I believe that the TIC district ended its savings cashier, so this is not included as part of the fair. And do you know what the zoning needs are? I don't know what the, you can ask that question whether it would be a question for the audience. It's the rural zone. It's the rural zone. It's the rural zone. Okay. And I guess the other question would be, depending on what you find, would it be possible to rezone it to allow for greater density in housing or something like that? That would absolutely be a, that could be a recommendation that the master plan. I think that exactly, that question gets at what could the actionable master plan include would be some recommendations for next phases. You know, this is going to be the highest interest use can we rezone it and then that would be a step or is it getting a different state designation for this area? Is it those kinds of steps that would be needed before you can put a shovel on the ground, for example? Yeah. And so we'll go here and then to the gentleman with the great hat. I did not want to criticize your process. I think it sounds like an appropriate way to proceed in order to do, you know, what your objective is which is to find out the best use for this parcel. However, I do think that the city's public interest, more broadly, is that this become, you're using the legacy concept, that this become something which is tightly integrated with the city as possible. And I do not see that objective as part of what your planning process will address. And I've just got a couple of things in that regard that I want to mention. As some may know, I raised this point with Mario who I had on the front that suggested that Satan's pasture really should be the planning for it and the planning for this to the extent possible. Really should be coordinated. I understand full well the difficulties of that, the history of it, et cetera. But it is in a key location between here and the city. And particularly with regard to access, which from my point of view is what you have decided that I wanted to bring. So the current vehicular access is the worst feature of this parcel. And with the possibility obviously of accessing onto the old county a country club road, which then in turn would have other street rebuilding matters and so forth. But in my view, the most long-term advantageous access would be an extension of East State Street right across Satan's pasture. One to here. Probably cutting in half the distance that people would have to go were the existing access to maintain the primary way to get on here. And in terms of the Satan's pasture question, I would say that I've talked with one of the owners at some length last summer about their interests. And it strikes me that were that that kind of access to be created, it would add value in a similar way to the Satan's property and could be one kind of leverage to gain certain corporations in that sense. And I've got other thoughts, but that's the main thing that I wanted to... Can I ask clarity on tightly integrated with the city? When you say that, what does that mean for you? I'm not sure if I understand. What that means is that physically, that the access back and forth from the villa part of town is simply the easiest that you can have. I thought at the beginning you were saying tightly integrated with the city relative more to the process than actually about access, so I just didn't know if I understood that comment. I suppose one way to phrase it would be that the means of accomplishing what I'm suggesting should be a goal is more than analyzing the site. Yes, I hear what you're saying. That it's more comprehensive, not site-specific, that it needs to look at the context and the different opportunities. But I think the point is, were there efforts made to do what I'm suggesting, that would clearly have an impact on how the site itself was designed. And I've walked the entire property here as a disaster again. I've had some professional experience in land use and so forth. And it strikes me that there are several ways, which I'm not going to belabor the time to outline, that both properties can be developed more efficiently and effectively than separately. I don't think anyone would describe me. I think there's best practices to have integrated properties and access between properties. That's best practice in planning and in development. As a developer, there's efficiencies there. Of course, if it's possible. So I think what you're getting to, and I absolutely agree, is part of our job is to integrate the ideas that come out and the site opportunities and constraints. But absolutely look at the picture. As we mentioned about, maybe it needs to be re-zoned, there needs to be designations with some of the surrounding properties in order to make it what we want. It's not going to stay within the boundaries. Right. And I'm just alluding to a bit of difference on areas such as the area of Terra Street, which was developed in the 50s. And if you look at that and just think of what went on there, there's a whole street system and so forth. That was never designed as a single person. And in a way, we've really gotten away from conceiving a community as something that is rationally integrated in the past few decades in my own observation. And I think this would be an opportunity to perhaps reverse that. No. Thank you. In the back, with the greens for Manhattan . Stepney, as we look at the site plan, would you be kind enough to point out where the late 1800s early 1900s golf course house was located on that site plan? Getting out of my expertise. We have not gotten into the history of the site yet. I'm not quite sure where the golf house was in the early 1900s. I've not seen any documentation showing that. I would encourage you to do some research. That's part of the new diligence is the historic use of the site as well as the permits that have been issued for the site before. Any archaeological sensitivity, historic sensitivity. Good. Okay. We can go to any kind of comment. Any input or processed questions or input. Happy to hear more. I want to make a comment. I don't see this in any other statements that other people made, but you can see a dog out there walking. We walk our dog here, three to five dogs three to five times a week. And we're not alone. We're dogs. We're all being walked. I would hope there's some way we can take that into consideration. I think we're about the only town of any size around here without a dog park. I'd like to add, have you had that to the wish list? Just to add to the wish list on behalf of my grandchildren to consider a skate park. I know we've been in some conversations about doing one at the current rec center, but this would seem to be actually a much better location than that just because that's already got so much going on there. And I'll just say that one of the things about a skate park is it's classless. The cost of doing it is very low. And we want to make sure that there's a lot of space in the park. And we want to make sure that there's going to be recreation here that would be available to the entire community. Speaking as a Burlington resident, I completely agree with you, and I will say one issue I'll just point out is that there is an issue of access, though, given the proximity to downtown. So some might argue that downtown skate park has more access opportunities. So just to point out there's pros and cons, you know, with all of these things, and that's going to be in this process is really kind of trying to weigh out how the different benefits of doing something versus the opportunities versus the challenges and then versus, you know, something that might take a lot longer versus, you know, we're in a housing crisis. So what needs to happen sooner than later? And so maybe there's phases to this, multi-phases, multi-year phases and reserved areas for future uses, you know, things like that. So I think we should all keep an open mind in terms of thinking what the timeline might be for the development to I see here, and then we'll actually Yes. Why don't we go here first? So I want to suggest something you just said. I think at this stage when you're looking at legacy kind of issues, what Ben said is the worst thing would be that this is a satellite and there's no sort of relationship. And the best thing you said is classless. So I think it's not dog park and skate park and that kind of thing. It's more on a legacy scale. It's the things we want to make sure we didn't leave out or miss the opportunity for. My background is in landscape architecture and so I've done the kind of work you're doing and knowing what's going on around the edges, you know, the context in which any site sits is important. So all the things that you just said are really, I think, legacy issues. And I was at one of the earlier meetings where a lot of the specific kinds of activities showed up. I think what we don't want to miss is that we've done something that's very future orientative opportunities to maybe be a model for kind of building it everybody needs to be looking at. So I don't want to make sure you don't close doors to things that are the big picture issues around it rather than, because we all have a favor we want a pool or a tennis court or whatever and I have my own but I don't think that's what this meeting is about. The workshop you're going to kind of feel like a charrette of some kind. I don't know if that's what you would do. But you would have the data, the site data and the constraints and the content and the context. But I like one of your points being some of the themes to keep in mind during the process. For example, don't close the door and that's kind of where I was going with we may not plan all of it in 2023. Maybe we want to reserve it. We don't know what his grandchildren might want for the site and that is really important to keep in mind. The property of this site, you have that. That's an opportunity. I saw your hand and then that's okay. And then, do you have your hand raised? Yeah. We haven't heard from him, so if you don't mind. I'm going to go to who we have. Nothing against the room here but I just want to make sure that you might have to actively engage younger people in this because the people who are willing to come out and spend their time doing this are a different age bracket than a lot of people who might really be interested in what's going on here and just can't get to it. And that's going to require actually reaching out to them rather than like, come on in and just join us. On a Saturday afternoon. Yeah, or any time. The town needs more things for younger people that can book. We agree and there is this current outreach phase includes things like being at a farmer's market and having tables for education and outreach. And that I think will even heighten more when we're getting into the opportunities of constraints planning part and the phase in the spring which could look more like what you've seen that Montpilers done before, a lot of communities have done before and events where there are families, where there are young folks who are trying to get to people that aren't receiving their communications to the traditional channels to be able to weigh in on options and really respond to options which I think is another type of input that this group can visualize some people can't they want to be able to respond to something. So there's different ways people learn and try to tap into that. Okay, I'm going to go I'm again going to skip around. You've had your hand up for a while so I'm going to go to you and then you're in the back and we're going to get to these folks I just wanted to give you're looking for feedback again today so I'm of the mind that I'm hoping for more and more housing as opposed to more and more recreation but we have Hubbard Park etc but if we end up finding that a lot of places, people have talked a lot about fields and soccer fields and all this but my priority is 75% housing because young people cannot afford to get a home people coming in from the state are flashing lots of, come out of state are flashing lots of money and putting prices up and moderate priced homes and then some some lower income homes up here well planned, beautiful and but you know so if it's a lot of ledge out with the rest then we need this field area for homes, right yeah I'm doing it absolutely and we'll go back there and we'll come to this front there's a couple things I'm assuming since you voted for housing and recreation and we're going to be some of each of those I would ask you in terms of literacy and maybe please join with me in the past year that there'd be thought put into a trail system that might surround that or be incorporated into that and then also um there was at one point after the intervention today use potential use of this building or some part in terms of a direct department but I would encourage the examination if it hasn't already been done I know you guys are also involved in potential uses of the college there's a big gym there already is that a viable option for the city which would be a more central location than the far reach of town which this would be gotcha and I meant to say that before thank you for reminding me that part of the evaluation is going to be looking at this building and what this building can support what kind of condition it's in generally understanding the feasibility of retrofit renovation here versus starting from scratch you know it's always best practice to try to reuse what you can and in some cases it's using pieces and in some it's using the whole thing I'd like to go here and then we saw I saw two more comments but red shirt first and then is there a way for the tree board to work with is that the right initials BHP on the resource analysis regarding older trees that may be not as property of course older trees in Vermont could be anything over 50 or 60 years they may actually have older trees here but it would be nice to have the tree board be consulting with BHP in order to establish or we may want to do some protection of these trees I've noted that let me talk with them and we'll circle that because I think the tree board has been on a list of stakeholders we need to be talking with and at what point for example if the area of the most growth is already considered not available for other reasons then it makes sense that those won't be the nodes for development so we can just figure out the phase but thank you for bringing that up I have that written down now this property has been in current use so there are some portions of it that have trees that are quite long particularly on the the right-hand side let's go to the person right behind you on the subject of paths and trails there's already a really nice network of paths for the single golf course and so to the extent possible it takes place to leave those in time and they're lovely like that right-hand pedestrian paths there's a process of copy obviously someone can throw it out but they're already there yeah wherever reuse is possible for sure you know some have seen you know some impact already just from wear and tear and frosties and things like that but I totally get that and I think one of the goals for the site that came out of the early work done or the early comments and will be one of our recommendations is to do smart development energy efficiency uses wherever that includes from construction through from development impact to the actual construction if you have any buildings and so that would be one of the most important features is reuse did you have your hand up yeah I just have like a general comment to the room not directly to you but I'm bouncing out from what you're saying about getting young people I think it's obvious that I'm the youngest one here except for the little one represent but I'm gonna say we as in my age group we don't feel welcome here we don't feel like we can afford to live here that we can buy here we want to raise our families here just like all the rest of you have but we can't afford it so that's why we have to work with something like this we don't care about tennis courts we want to save good community to raise our kids in and there's just too many people that are stopping that for some ridiculous reason or not just because people don't like change but we have to think about all the people that changed so you guys could buy houses here and the rest of us wouldn't be able to buy houses in response to that I have to say that I've been in town for 10 years and bought a house when it was much more expensive than it would be now if I had to sell my house I would not be able to afford to stay in my neighborhood so it's not just young people who want to come to town I would like to stay here I'd like this community there's a critical affordability piece at every step so small very small, very energy efficient was there anyone on this side of the room that I missed that had their hand up? I want to get to those folks who haven't spoken yet and then we'll come back on this side I'm just curious because what's the status of the home disposal to take this building and renovate it so there that's all being considered as part of this master plan so there's no commitments made and regular communication with us about their goals in this group and they'll be actively participating in the process but the community owns the property so it's got to be what works for them I'm just curious whether that was a source of revenue that could come in the city do you know how much money quickly and how much money we have now we have been in lease negotiations with them and so far we haven't reached any agreement about that and then I guess a comment at this point VHB is one of the most comprehensive group in the country and in the world to do the work of Stephanie Syrom to the way in which Syrom and doing this analysis completely from the beginning is the way to go for all of us to possibly get the plan on what's to happen unless you understand on this site completely you can't come up with any of the ideas that everybody has here which are all great but what we are taking is the direction we go to work on something that resonated with me earlier was the term classless I would like to see classless homes be built here so many homes that we can offer a space for young families or older folks or anybody who really wants to live here but not like these these ones were built these are the low income ones and these are the upper income ones just classless building and I'd also like us to be thinking about using green building materials and also thinking about how we can make green living as much as possible maybe it's rooftop gardens I don't know maybe it's solar maybe it's a lot of windows so that the sun can heat the homes just making use of what we have here and also paying attention to this idea of legacy we don't want to leave a footprint here that made a mess of stuff we want it to be done correctly so that we can keep our environment into the future and people will want to continue the classroom I had not wanted to speak more than once but the idea that she brought up about the cost of homes I wanted to comment on just a tiny bit of an experience one of my sons who was born here went away to college started his career has had really hard time moving back a year ago and are paying through the notes perhaps with problems of their attempting to pull this off but it's clearly going to become more pronounced with climate refugees and those who are well off being the first people to come here making the prices even higher and it occurs to me that one approach could be to model something on habitat where that particular program requires a certain level of income to be eligible for but it allows people to contribute their own sweat to building a house and to make it affordable for them and something like that is one of the two things that occurs to me it could in fact make it more reasonable for people to be able to build here it would obviously require additional funding from other sources to prevent that but I really think something like that needs to be seriously developed can I ask I'm a newbie in this are there any members of the housing committee present here today so that is something for example that we want to bring back if and when we get to housing is going to be a part of it no matter what so when we get to the point of figuring out the different options of where housing can be the question is what kind of housing and the question is what is most in demand but what is also what is financially feasible which of course in this current construction climate is impossible there is a lot of housing conferences going on right now talking about the cost of construction and ways to leverage different resources staffing capital all the different sources to be able to make this possible but I do think one of the conversations needs to be around the different types of housing the mix and also I'll just say it I think the crisis is now and for the past year or two it's not getting better right now so while we want to do a really diligent job of planning and making sure we have the best foundation we also want to put into place the steps that can happen sooner rather than later because the story you're telling about your family member or the story she shared that's happening everywhere so the sooner the better in some way to be able to get something under construction to satisfy help start stemming the flow of what we're having experiencing here so there is a balance here that I think the city council especially is going to end up being kind of the ultimate guide for what that vision is and that's going to be the balance that needs to be discussed so I think you had your hand back up first and then I'll try to agree in terms of the housing if there is also attention to non-cisors who might move out of bigger houses and found that we are facing maybe pricing for a new agreement who's going to say that when she mentioned that it's like downsizing isn't even possible across the state it's not unique and not regular so yes you're going to agree yeah I don't care a lot there is a downsizing group of about 100 plus members and for all of us who are going to age out of our houses at some point trying to maintain and just maneuver a big Victorian which once the housing stock came in not who there is we're looking for alternatives as far as something that will accommodate us at the age so it can age in place I don't pretend to be an expert in this but yesterday in fact the Vermont town manager was briefed by Josh Hamford and I think it's important to understand the struggle I think we all agree with the goals that have been articulated we were told but right now in multi-family housing the average cost per unit in Vermont right now is $400,000 per unit to construct a unit so when you're talking about you know projects that to Stephanie's were penciled out financially the reason more expensive homes being built is those are the ones you can sell and make profit so as we consider these options I think we as a community need to think about what are we going to invest in the project to make the results that we want to see and so there will be debates and future votes and we've purchased this land we control our own destiny which is actually unusual we're going to consider giving these lots away we're going to consider construction infrastructure and not asking a developer to continue in order to get the price that we want I'm not saying we'll do any of that but as a community we need to have that the state right now is a wash and money from the federal programs and a lot of it is going to housing one of their number one programs is actually to provide grants to developers to reduce the cost and to the homeowners to reduce their price so that they can actually meet the gap which by the way they're talking about between $250,000 and $350,000 is sort of what the average person can afford so that's the state of housing in Vermont right now it's not just one it's everywhere so as we think about this those are the realities we will be dealing with when we talk about how do we create classless housing how do we create a range of housing how do you make this all work financially and what if anything because certainly a fair comment to say hey this is private housing we don't need money let the market drive that's one fair outcome as is the city should put it a lot to get these outcomes so do you think about that for the next year it's a really good point and I had wanted to circle back to something similar akin to that which is that in our work and the work of our peers in the economic development consulting space we are working with many municipalities who are taking a vested interest they are actually being proactive in the driver's seat to actually make housing possible in their communities and it's somewhere on the really small scale we are doing some work in Manchester right now they have a property and they put it out to bid to see who might come forward and then they can guide how that development happens but you know at least it puts them in a position of being able to put some scan in the game and really I mean using the tools that municipality, the public sector has available to it and the private sector does not and I mean you can say what you want and you have different experiences with different developers but there are a lot of good developers out there that are just really not trying to make an outrageous you know a profit here but they have to, they are running a business they have to see the ROI and the numbers just don't work that's why we are in this situation this didn't happen by magic we are here because of the construction environment it costs as much to build here in Montpelier as it does in Burlington it doesn't say J but you can only get certain rent in St. J you can only get certain rent in Montpelier and there's a limit in Burlington I know so many people who are saying I can just get a place in Burlington I want to move to Burlington that's not feasible either it's just because the costs are just really out of whack municipalities are taking a more active approach not to say that may happen here but it's the way that you can leverage different resources to be able to get to the kind of product you want the kind of resources you want to provide to your citizens so there are lots of different pathways that part of our work is going to be making those recommendations looking at funding sources if you were to put in the infrastructure if you were to connect to some roads how do you leverage municipal dollars that you can get access to that private property yes we can go here I'm curious whether there's obstacles in the way because it seems like it's potentially quicker with all the big old homes in town that couldn't be turned into two or three units that could be unless it's not allowed and I don't know the answer to that it seems like there's a lot of creative people that can take it well and make it work for three or four families I can't totally speak to that necessarily today but yeah I mean a lot of that is right now retrofitting and renovating and new construction it's so expensive no matter what because there's no contractors there's not available labor so it's just very expensive so even that is becoming more of a challenge but that's historically been done a lot I mean there's a lot of multi-family here and elsewhere but we started a single family and so we'll go to yes one quick one is maybe a little bit it's a good discussion about all the interactive uses that everybody dreams might happen here earlier I asked about zoning I have no idea what this is about but it made sense in consideration for you to charge the Planning Commission the State Planning Commission to start and now in establishing a PUD that would provide maximum flexibility for all these future ideas because this is just the world of zoning that has a two acre minimum plot size or whatever none of this can happen so I think that the Planning Commission is allowing the zoning to allow maximum flexibility here but then when the plans come together rather than oh we can't do that the zoning restrictions are too strict we have to rely on zoning starting today go through the process which as you know takes a while you get there to think about what can you create here from the zoning standpoint that allows maximum flexibility for us to move forward when you're ready to go that works being done Josh is part of the Planning Department Planning Director has been actively involved in this process so we really are very much in touch with that thank you the limitation on this piece of land is the access to it from through to and I guess any ideas we want to have on the land is going to have a traffic pattern and the traffic pattern is going to depend on who goes when and where and the access is so bad that it's dangerous and my opinion is it's going to actually go back to the traffic circle and whatever else is on the land so when you think about uses on the land it's going to go back into costing more period some additional funds for traffic regulation for traffic control so I think that should be part of your analysis and it's not just the average daily traffic flow it's when that traffic flow will occur if this is all housing and that is the solution that's going to be a great outpouring on to that traffic system it's going to be costing a lot of money and it's going to cause a lot of headaches so I think pattern and use or just no use at all that attracts traffic a certain time of year may be the optimum because of the cost that are going to have to be born from the rest of the city traffic what you raise is actually a good example of what I was saying that in the winter phase we may want to have some sessions and workshop some ideas and then we may want more research like we may want more traffic assessment for various scenarios and then have another interim step before we come back with some 2-3 scenarios because for example it could be a deal killer if you have it could be a full stop if there's a big traffic impact with one particular having all your housing clustered on one end of the site for example so I think that's a good example and definitely something to be considered and it's another example of this may cost more to do the infrastructure upgrade but it's going to get us this and is that what the city wants those are going to be the choices being mindful of time for the walk but does anyone have any further comments because we do have about 10 more minutes if we want to talk more here otherwise we're going to break into some groups and we'll kind of leave that a little bit but any further comments I've written all this down we've got it recorded again we're going to be having another one of these sessions next Wednesday night at city hall and another on via zoom so again trying to give people some people feel more comfortable the virtual right now still with pandemic conditions and it'll be during the daytime some people can make that very much so different ways for people to have this exact same opportunity minus the walk and then additional education and outreach which I think the education piece will definitely ramp up more when we have more known about the site and more things to respond to and so as always emailing josh is a great conduit for getting that into the funnel and if you take photos today we welcome you to send those to him as well if you're out on site taking photos of things that are particularly higher assets that you want to see retained things that you hate go ahead take pictures of that too send them to him with captions and make it clear but those kinds of that kind of visual data can be really helpful for the planning team but as well as bringing that back to the public I think Maureen will say about the walk yeah can I get maybe a show of hands who participates going for a walk so that's an idea great thank you we're just going to meet out here right outside the building here and kind of break up thank you