 of the town. We are delighted to welcome into our studio our state representative, Sean Garberley, who is here for a legislative update. We love to get these as regularly as we can from our state legislators, so as always we appreciate your being here, Sean. Great to be here. Thanks James. Thanks for having me. So we we also got to speak recently to our state senator Cindy Friedman. We talked about the budget and you know it was interesting to me that she referred several times to it as being hey this is a good budget that we've got this year and my interpretation of that was a good budget means there's money to be spent on various programs. So let's talk about where we're at with with the budgetary process right now because we've been hearing about this money but we're not yet seeing it I don't think and then any particular wins in that budget for Arlington or implications for Arlington. Let's start there. James thank you so much for hosting this. Thank you to ACMI. I always love coming and speaking to my constituents in Arlington and in West Medford. So thanks so much for this opportunity. Senator Friedman and Representative Rogers when they have come to speak to you are absolutely correct in stating that this was a good budget. I serve on the Houseways and Means Committee so where we are the committee that crafts the budget every year we have hearings across the Commonwealth to really understand what people's priorities are really around Governor's House 1 which is the governor's budget and so we hear from experts in housing people with disabilities mental health economic development housing every aspect of the budget that's crafted and then we craft our own budget in April the Senate crafts their own budget and then we do a final budget and then the governor can decide to line item veto and then we override aspects of the budget the governor did not veto any monetary item in the budget this year which I assume is another sign that there's a certain kind of financial health here well there there is serious financial health in the Commonwealth our revenues have increased dramatically over the last six months we're cautiously optimistic and because of that we've been able to invest greatly in the Commonwealth we invested strongly in everything from unrestricted general government aid to chapter 70 education which we'll talk about soon to McKinney-Vento to special education circuit breaker because of the budget that the House in the Senate passed the governor signed into law we did a commitment to K through 12 education which was kind of the first payment of the foundation budget review Commission's recommendations on education in the Commonwealth that we're not adequately funding education and this has led to Arlington receiving two million dollars more than last year which is tremendous and I think that's very very significant you know I've been working I think we've had numerous legislative updates over my time in office and I've always appreciated your candor and and how informed you are on issues pertaining to Arlington and you have always raised to me the concern of the formula and local aid and so talked about it many times talked about it many times hardly ever have we gotten to celebrate right and so this has been my priority as a member of the Ways and Means Committee making sure that we invest in local aid and increase our local aid for Arlington because Arlington is in a difficult difficult situation right because we don't have a lot of commercial development like a Waltham like a Burlington we are highly a residential tax base community so our ability to raise revenue is very difficult and so the state needs to recognize that and I've always believed that when we do a formula it needs to take into account a community's inability to grow economically right or residentially or properties and so education is obviously our huge investment in the Commonwealth and so so important for the legislature to adequately fund that in the Commonwealth and we did a big step with this budget to be able to do that investing in all areas of education so that was a huge win for Arlington we also saw wins from you know funding for the Thompson Louisiana Louisiana field the Thompson Park everything from the children's room to AYCC to an increased amount of money in chapter 90 for our roads so when you mentioned sir sorry to interrupt when when you mentioned things like the children's room or AYCC etc. are you talking about earmarks that are going you know directly to fund those particular programs and organizations I am so they're their items that I and Senator Friedman and Representative Rogers filed as part of the budget that we were able to get passed people would call them earmarks I view them as local aid because this is money coming directly from the state that will go to pay for a new park at Thompson elementary school services at AYCC for people throughout Arlington right services at the children's room which obviously has a huge population people from Arlington who adequately use those services so I view those as local aid I also received because West Medford obviously is very important to me as well money for the West Medford Community Center which I know people in Medford and Arlington use quite quite frequently so you know some people would call these items pork I don't think anyone would say that going to the children's room is pork right so I try to correct people James by by making sure they're aware that this is local aid that this is money going directly to improving the quality of life for people in our community to me that is very important that's absolutely very good news I was wondering if you could dig down a little bit for us we know that we are getting this increase in education funding for Arlington as you mentioned and it's a significant one is it is it directed towards any particular aspects of the education that we're providing in town or is it going into kind of general education funding so that's a great question and so let me dive into what we just did and we did it through the budget process and we did it through the statutory process and right now it is in conference committee the education piece so you know as you know and we've talked about many times but just so your viewers are aware of it many many years ago a number of us myself included filed a commission to be created through legislation called the foundation budget review commission and what we wanted the commission to look at was what areas in education has the state walked away from its obligation we know that through our constitution the state has an obligation to fund public education in all 351 cities and towns we wanted to know and we heard it from school committee members and select board members that more of the cost of education was being forced on homeowners through property tax and localities like here in Arlington and they wanted us and quite frankly myself included as a forum member of the school committee and a co-sponsor of the commission review legislation to look at what specific areas has the state not been meeting its obligation and how can we get the state to meet its obligation so the report came back this was done five years ago the commission's report came back and I looked at four specific areas from the cost of health care for municipal employees to special costs of special education the biggest ticket item one of those aspects was the cost of low income educating low income populations across our state and the cost of educating English language learner students across our state so those four areas came to a total of about $1.5 billion every year that the state was not adequately funding that's important so we created the implementation it's called the student opportunity act where we want the state to adequately fund public schools in Massachusetts or at least to what the commission's report stated I always believe that we need to do better but this legislation passed both in the Senate and by the House takes tremendous steps as a former school committee member to move us in that direction and what it calls for is an expenditure of $1.5 billion in new money in new investment over the next seven years so if you did you know the the bill is currently in conference committee so I don't have exact numbers of what Arlington will receive but if you look at you know the status quo meaning if we did nothing to the opportunity act Arlington between now and 2027 could see upwards to four to five million more dollars in in funding which is tremendous and and as you know Arlington is not low income we don't have a large ELL population so our portion of the student opportunity act will mainly come from health care reimbursement from the state and special education and part of the piece of special education James was we included out of district transportation costs to be included in the calculation for the special education circuit breaker and that's incredibly important because if you talk to Superintendent Bodie she here in Arlington she will tell you that one of the greatest costs is out of district costs special education I support those costs because obviously we want those students to get the best education possibly and most of the time that education can't be done in-house it has to be done you know out of town to make sure those students get the education they need but part of that education funding is the transportation cost and the state has been making the town pay for it for years now because of this bill if it comes out of conference included will take will invest a number of those costs yeah and I just wanted to clarify probably don't need to but just for my own sake that when you're talking about out of out of district transportation costs what you mean is that there are special education students who live in Arlington but need services that they that need that that are not available in town therefore they need to go somewhere else for those and therefore they need to be transported as a result and we've been shouldering that absolutely absolutely and you know we want these students go out of town quite frankly in my opinion because we don't have the programs that fit those students needs and we want to make sure that students in Arlington who need services out of district get the services they need you know that's really really important but the cost of that should be not burdened by the taxpayers here in Arlington or by the school committee but it should be done by the state and so that's something I've been working very long on so I'm really happy that it's in the bill I'm hoping that it also is included when it comes out of conference committee okay so what you're what we've just been talking about this this very issue this is something that you're hopeful we will be seeing change in a good way here in Arlington in terms of that funding increasing from the state oh between now and 2027 if this goes through that's what you're saying this is part of that 1.5 billion correct we hope well that yes the the the impact that we will feel a municipal budgets will be immediate but the the investment is between now and 2027 meaning we're going to implement the 1.5 billion dollar investment over a seven-year process but there is again the 2 million that you said we are getting an additional funding this year correct what is is that again is that going to be directed towards special education for instance or anything like that or is it really just general increased funding for our school budget it's general increase funding it was done through the chapter 70 formula we voted on it with the budget in April and and the Senate followed suit the same numbers with local aid numbers so it's a tremendous investment I know the school committee has strong they have strong standards for what they're going to use that money for so I know it's going to be used well mm-hmm so great good news on education what else coming out of of the budget do we have to point to and say yes well you saw a tremendous increase investments in nearly every area from mental health DDS it's people with disabilities more investment in in transportation so all issues that I know you have been very concerned with and active around for for a long time now so another area that I think is really important as we put a tremendous amount of money in the rainy day fund and so that's very important to me you know in areas of strong fiscal times where our investments can be huge we also need to remember that things are happening at the federal level that may create some concerns here and cause revenues from sales tax to capital gains tax I don't want to use the word plummet but to decrease over time mm-hmm and as you may know you know I was elected in 2008 and my first budget things were great you know I got a couple of the air marks for Arlington my priorities around people with disabilities and mental health were invested tremendously and then the Senate did the budget in in June or May rather in the middle of May and between April and May the bank in the market collapsed we lost four billion dollars in capital gains and sales tax revenue and it was almost a different budget when it went from the House to the Senate because we lost 200 earmark line items God zeroed out so we need to prepare because when we there's an economic downturn we may not receive notice so that's why we need to make sure that we put enough money in our stabilization accounts to make sure that we're still able to invest in the Commonwealth I have to say you know we did discuss this with with your co legislators as well and I agree with you and them a hundred percent that this is this is prudent and very important to remember even as your you know you've been working for years around you know establishing different programs all of which depend on money now there's money I'm sure there's a big temptation to say let's all right let's get this done and this done and this done really important to remember let's put some aside because things are not always going to be right very simple but very important right and when times are good you have to pick specific areas to invest and education is one of those areas transportation needs to be one of those areas you still have to make difficult choices of where you invest even during good fiscal times as you just mentioned James mm-hmm and you just mentioned Sean transportation yes that's something you know before we came on camera we were discussing the fact that you know it is not possible for us to have a conversation but be it legislative update or be it you know if I see you on the street somewhere without this coming up it seems right because it's so prevalent in our lives it's so clearly a problem here in the Boston area throughout the state on and on we talk about it on and on it seems like things are not happening right so at the risk of repeating a cycle let me ask you anything going on in in that sphere that you know that is is worth sharing with our audience so I think it's important to remember that Massachusetts runs on transportation right when there is a derailment as we saw twice this past season between the red line and the orange line and some technical different difficulties with the green line families feel that you know we talk about transportation in terms of the economy and how important it is to the economy that's true but what I hear every day and what I see every day is someone who works on these issues is how it impacts individuals how it impacts families right people being late to work people getting home from work at 7 o'clock 8 o'clock at night because the trains were delayed they didn't run depending on the seasons you could have a situation many times where the air conditioning doesn't work where there is power outages because we have a transportation system that needs to be invested in and we have a transportation system that literally is just moving at a very very slow pace it's not the way we can run a 21st century economy so what can we do about it and as you know I've proposed many ideas of how to deal with it and for me the first there's several things that we can do the question is will we have the political will to do it at the State House and that's the answer I don't have but the proposal that I've been proposing for for many years now is around debt relief and I know we've talked a lot about this you're probably sick and tired of hearing me talk about it James but you know it needs to be said we have a five point three billion dollar debt on the on MBTA from the big dig yeah which was when I was a child right and the reason why it's so important is every dollar that goes in through revenue to the MBTA 35 cents to 40 cents of that goes right away to pay for debt service debt that isn't even the teas the tea wasn't responsible to it I was around the big dig but yet the tea has to pay for it and that has certainly caused huge problems in our public transportation system and the reason we need to deal with it is because of we're paying 35 to 40 cents in every dollar but also I told you it was done when I was a kid that whole period it's been ignored you know through you know very small revenues to pay down the debt but not any big it hasn't paid it down nearly as much as we should right it's been out of sight out of mind unless we deal with this first or with any adequate bill it will continue to be out of sight out of mind for the next 50 years and if we want to invest I was talking to Sarah a little bit off camera if we want to invest in transportation improvements across the Commonwealth we talked about you know West to East rail the North South rail link things that will revitalize our economy in Massachusetts and make people's lives better because that's what transportation is supposed to do we can't do that unless we deal with this essential problem and that is the debt we need to pay down the debt so we can take that money and put it to where it should be investing in families by investing in public transportation in Massachusetts so that's one thing we need to do the second thing that we need to do or look at certainly is around more direct revenue for the MBTA for the RTAs for public transportation across the Commonwealth though I represent Arlington and Medford I look at transportation not just as silos of how we can benefit here in the Boston area but how important it is to invest in transportation across the Commonwealth across our state because that makes our economy better that makes our people's lives better so I'm under the impression and believe that the legislature will be taking up a revenue bill of directly targeted to public transportation probably after our recess around the holidays so I would expect that we will take it up in the month of January so what form might that take when you say a revenue bill that means more money is going to come in somehow what what what should people or could people expect are going to be the sources for that additional revenue so right now I don't know I've been meeting with Speaker de Leo and my colleagues and certainly arguing that I believe any revenue increase needs to be progressive it needs to be adequate I've been arguing my support for closing some corporate tax loopholes looking at the expenditure budget trying to find ways to make sure if we do revenue that it's adequate meaning that if we do this it's going to meet the needs of the problems that we are facing but to make sure it's not going to hurt working families that we do it in a progressive way meaning that we're increasing taxes if you will on those who can afford it not working families here in Massachusetts so there that's what I've been arguing I can't give you an exact answer because the bill is not public and that I haven't seen it yet either the Joint Committee on Revenue is working with the chair the Joint Committee on Transportation and the Speaker and the Senate president are working to craft a bill hopefully that will adequately increase our revenues to be directly for transportation so we can do a serious upgrades and improvements in our public transportation system across the Commonwealth let me let me ask you something Sean you mentioned at the beginning of this conversation about transportation or the beginning of the part of our conversation about that you said you know if there's the political will and that really is the 64,000 the 64 million the 64 billion I don't know dollar question right and so I'm confused a little bit I have to say looks to me like we have a legislature in the State House Democrat don't you know democratically dominated or dominated by the Democratic Party the legislators that I get to talk to there's only three of them but then I also interact with others hear about others views on this etc it looks like there's plenty of consensus who who is standing standing in the way of the establishment of political will what are the interests that are that are there present in the State House that are that are countering this you know your clear conviction about what's needed as well as Cindy Friedman's as well as Dave Rogers as well as many others right so what what is it what what makes it so hard to find that political will that you're talking about when it looks like there's you know broad consensus about around this several years ago we did another transportation bill and the proposal came up with around 500 million dollars certainly inadequate and it was certainly done in a regressive way and this increased the the gas tax three cents increased the taxes on some tobacco products and it just got us to 500 million okay there were a number of legislators who were strongly opposed to it because it was an increase in taxes and I remember being in the Speaker's office arguing for a more progressive form of revenue having colleagues in different parts of the state saying absolutely not I will lose my re-election I can't vote for that and I said well then we're lying to the people of Massachusetts because if we're gonna do a 500 million dollar revenue plan which is in fact regressive and inadequate the problem isn't gonna get fixed and so five years from now when we're in the same situation your constituents are gonna come to you and say we just did this what happened it's because not even the political will you didn't tell your constituents the truth of what the magnitude of the problem is and how we need to fix it and so you know I don't want to blame my colleagues but I can tell you that there's a lot of people on Beacon Hill who hear the word revenue or taxes and get concerned and maybe it's easy for me to say because I represent constituents that understand that we need revenue to deliver a product to our constituents that we can be proud of that improves the quality of life for the people here in Arlington and Medford and across the Commonwealth but you know I voted no on the revenue bill a number of years ago because it was inadequate because it was regressive and I hope I don't have to do that again we need revenue and I'd like to make sure it's done in a progressive way but also make sure it's adequate but a lot of that is about finding the political will and a lot of that is convincing my colleagues that the time is right to do it okay well I appreciate the fact that you you know of course you can't bash your colleagues but it's you know I think that our audience is hungry for as am I frankly you know some straight talk about why this is not getting done right and so appreciate your your addressing that let me ask you let's let's keep moving forward what are because that we are here for a legislative update give us an update on some of the legislation that you're either sponsoring particularly interested etc you know that folks should know about great so this session I filed around 65 pieces of legislation I'm not going to talk about all 65 James I promise yes you can talk about one 30th of those okay but they're they're in the areas everything from people with disabilities kids with mental health renewable energy there are a whole host of issues that I believe really strengthen the core of my mission as your state representative and that is investing in the people of Massachusetts that you know I wake up every day and try to file and work on pieces of legislation that I believe make us stronger that I believe support the most vulnerable people in the commonwealth so to give you an example of two of the bills or three of those bills that I think are really close to the finish line meaning that we're doing the work the legislative work with my colleagues with advocacy groups and really trying to perfect these pieces of legislation to be able to kind of get them through one is I call the inclusive concurrent enrollment bill so that I've talked about this bill before and this is a piece of legislation that allows students with autism and Down syndrome to be able to go to college even if they can't pass the MCAS test so we remove the barrier of the MCAS test and the reason we want to do this any study that has been conducted shows that students with autism and Down syndrome and other IDD's they are 35% more likely to be successful in terms of you know independence employment if they're able to go on to college to me this is a true mission you know people battled for generations of inclusion making sure these students were included in K through 12 classroom now no one even blinks an eye because it's the way it is but it hasn't always been that way we are at the forefront of this battle in public higher education and I'm really confident that this session we're able we're going to be able to get it done the second bill that is really really close is around people who have multiple sclerosis there are thousands and thousands of people who live I don't want to use the word suffer but they live with this disease every single day and they were able to deal with it through prescription drugs many times health insurance companies will drop a drug that is working for people and when that happens it causes flare ups it causes very much discomfort that may even lead that individual as they're trying to find other medication that will work for their to address their flare ups to go into the emergency room this bill would mandate insurance companies cover that prescription drug and I bring that up because it's very very close of being able to get past and the third bill it was I I believe is one of my most ambitious pieces of legislation we just had the hearing for it about a month ago and this would move Massachusetts to a hundred percent renewable energy by 2045 in all sectors but also move us by 2035 and a hundred percent renewable energy in the area of utilities and to me this is all about political will we talked about as well I had 40 around 35 40 of my colleagues including rep Rogers standing behind me as I testified with my co-filers Marjorie Decker in the House and Senator Jamie Eldridge in the Senate that we need to pass this bill that climate change we have a moral climate change obviously is real despite what we hear from Washington but we have a moral obligation to address it and this bill is going through the legislative process and I'm confident California has done it New Mexico has done it Hawaii has done it New York has done a version of it and we're hopeful that Massachusetts will become the next state to pledge to move to a hundred percent renewable energy by 2045 so you just mentioned Washington and I wanted to ask you right now on the national level we're seeing within the Democratic Party in the field of candidates that is going to be winnowed down to one in over the coming months a certain kind of tension a tension between activism often favored by younger voters and you know activism and change let's let's get something done versus others who would counsel that you know you need to take a more moderate approach in order to appeal the electric electric etc. I know you're very familiar as our this is our audience with all these arguments I'm wondering though how does that how does that tension how do you deal with the that kind of tension between let's get something done let's make big change and you know not let's stay the course but let's do things more incrementally and and more in the middle of the road so you're you're a Democrat you're serving in the state legislature how do you deal with that right well it's a great question you know I'm guided by my work everything I do by certain principles and part of those principles of making sure we invest in the most vulnerable in the commonwealth the most vulnerable in our community and that is the poor people who suffer with mental illness live with mental illness sort of as well and people with disabilities and everything we do I look through that lens okay I believe in bold change I believe that everything I work on needs to be bold it needs to be inventive and we need to keep pushing for the things we care about and that's things like single payer hundred percent renewable energy the cherish actors the bill I filed around investing five hundred million dollars in education public higher education because it's going to get back and support the students who are able to invest in the commonwealth after that so I believe in bold progressive change that's why I'm supporting Elizabeth Warren for president that's why I'm really pushing forward on a lot of these agenda items however I have never opposed the idea of working as hard as I can to get pulled bold change but then being able to get something done that I can push forward and a couple examples of that is I support single payer I support moving in that direction however I worked really hard to get hearing aids for children covered and some people would push back and say that's not bold enough that's just one piece of health care and I don't disagree with that but for those kids they've been living for seven years without having to face over ten thousand dollars out of pocket and cost for those kids hearing aids to me that's really really important I believe in eliminating mandatory sentencing because to me that's really important criminal justice reform but last session I was able to get past restorative justice becoming the law of the land across the state and that's really really important because that one responsible party's life could be changed not having a permanent record because they go through restorative justice their life may be better now because of that and some people might call that incremental change so I believe in bold change but I also believe in the small change to improve people's lives and I will work at both because I think it's really really important and I think that's incumbent on in government Republicans and Democrats unenrolled green party you name the party that we work to invest in our commonwealth with bold change but we're also not going to be opposed to supporting people by getting small things done to that will make a big difference in family's lives and that's how I look at that yep appreciate that answer before we dig down into a couple of local Arlington issues to conclude I wanted just to ask you to make sure that we are not leaving something unmentioned on the on the state level in terms of your work in the state house etc anything that we haven't covered that you wanted to that you wanted to remind people I mentioned it a little bit in your your last question as an example of bold change but I didn't mention it in the legislation I filed this session and so I just want to talk about it a little bit and that is the cherish act so the mass teachers association really worked on two pieces of legislation one being the promise act with which morphed into the student opportunity act which is that one point five billion dollar investment I mentioned they also filed the cherish act which is the other portion of their platform which is around investing in the twenty nine public higher education campuses from Cape Cod middle sex all the way out to Berkshire community college in all sectors community colleges state universities and all of our U masses and that is a bill that I have filed in the house along with Paul mark and it was another rep from Peru massachusetts and senator cummerford who represents the amherst area and it's around investing about five hundred million dollars in public higher education in students and holding fees and tuition flat for the next few years to me that is bold change it's change that we need to see happen and now that this first year of the legislative session we did k through twelve I'm really hoping and I have every reason to suspect that the last session you know we go until July thirty first will be about public higher education and trying to get my the bill I filed the cherish act passed mm-hmm great thank you mm-hmm that so in to conclude kind of bringing the scale back down to Arlington one of the we have lots of concerns in town as always but you know was a 2019 has been a year of some major decisions coming forth in town and we know that we're going to be funding and getting a new high school and and the override past as well etc big big changes in a lot of ways and and and in broad acceptance of the reality that we need that we need to cough coughing you know cough up some more money in our through our property taxes etc however housing itself is a perpetual issue in town whether it is the burden on homeowners and the and the rise in their property taxes or whether it is the lack relative lack or at least the the the fact that the level of the the supply of affordable housing in town is lower than many many people are comfortable with or wanting what how do you see that playing out in town and specifically you know again the the Mugar development is one that has been on everybody's radar for multiple years it may be moving forward it seems there isn't if there are there's affordable housing that's going to be part of that development yet most of the town seems opposed and virtually all of the local officials we've spoken to are opposed to that development isn't it a good idea to get a little bit more affordable housing in here well I think it would be how you would define affordable I certainly wouldn't define affordable that is used under general law as affordable I certainly couldn't afford it many of my peers couldn't afford it and that's the problem right when we hear affordable housing we think oh this is great this means that the average middle-class family will be able to afford this unit but that's not true it could be anywhere from twenty five hundred to three thousand dollars a month for one bedroom unit to me that is not the definition so that's under the state's definition of what housing is it does and so that's certainly something that I think that we have to look strongly at and whether or not that's affordable but that's also a state issue and I think when we do zoning reform and we'll be taking that up we'll be looking at items like rent control I'm not saying that that's going to be part of the bill or part of the solution but that does need to be part of the process of investigating what we can do to support communities because it's not just isolated to Arlington it's impacting the whole Boston area in terms of housing market and I you know I do support zoning reform you know depending what the details are to help grow more housing opportunities in Arlington but I also think it's important that we have a conversation in terms of what is affordable and what what the definition of affordable should be for a lot of these markets in terms of the MuGar property the decision recently looks like the project is moving forward I have been categorically opposed to this project it's not that I'm opposed to affordable housing obviously I'm for affordable housing I've been working closely with the Arlington Housing Corporation the economic development here in Arlington and Arlington Housing Authority itself to try to come up with more units of housing to make it affordable to make Arlington affordable place to live but if you look at that region of where Mr. MuGar where they want to place that over 100 unit development I think it's over 200 yeah it's a it's a tremendous it's a huge build that unit from or that that development area where what used to be the silver maple forest right what used to be the say the faces property we used to be lanes and games has just built about 800 units of housing that has an environmental impact because that is was conservation land and that means you know flooding that means more traffic that means a whole crunch area to that region that I don't believe is sustainable and so to me there it raises a lot of questions in terms of the viability of that area with the increase of sewerage traffic over you know it just it raises a lot of concerns that's why I have been opposed to that I think it's clear now so I don't want to speak at a turn because it's not my legislative district that area is supported by Representative Rogers and Senator Friedman so I will support them in any way they want my support but I myself have always been opposed to developing that area you know with that said with the project seeming to move forward I think the town has you know a difficult choice to enter conversations with the developer on what what are the proposals but I've always been opposed to it right yeah and like you said the town is in a tough situation would you do do you see that we that we as a town do have some potential leverage with the developer to try and like you said begin to talk about how this is all going to play out and whether we can extract let's say some concessions or some some you know something that works for the town in your eyes and in the eyes of others is this do we still have that option do you think I hope so I hope so because it really really is important not just for this region of Arlington but for the whole community we want to make sure that whatever gets built if anything is going to support the mission of Arlington not hinder it but that's probably a question for for our town attorney our town manager our select board who will have to start answering these these questions you know this has been a project that has been proposed obviously not this iteration but there's been several iterations and decades apart you know the MuGar family has owned this property for decades and so I'm really hopeful that we're going to be able to reach a consensus that is not going to damage the neighborhoods in East Arlington or our environment all right well thank you Sean thank you James really on behalf of our audience really do appreciate you're always taking the time to come by and share with us and today I found to be a particularly kind of its usual broad range in terms of our conversation but also some some real straight talk you know in terms of me asking questions but also in terms of your responses in a way that again given the fact that we're dealing with some seemingly intractable problems that we continue to talk about all the time it is helpful I think for all of us out here your constituents to hear you know again some straight talk from you about hey this is what we're up against this is what we can expect this is what we can hope for and so again we appreciate that well I appreciate your questions and I appreciate ACMI always inviting me back here and we thank you need to do so thanks so much thank you for our state representative Sean Garbley who let's remind everybody yes represents Arlington but also West Medford I'm James Milan this is talk of the town we appreciate your being here