 and I see recording Pam. Beautiful. So I think we're all set. I think I can call the meeting to order. So welcome to the Amherst Planning Board meeting for July 1st 2020 based on Governor Baker's executive order suspending certain provisions in the open meeting law GL chapter 30a section 20 and signed Thursday March 12th 2020 this planning board meeting is being held virtually using the Zoom platform. My name is Christine Graham Mullen and as chair of the Amherst Planning Board I am calling this meeting to order at 6 34. This meeting is being recorded and is available live stream via Amherst Media. Minutes are being taken as normal. I will now now take a roll. I'm doing it already. Roll call board members as you hear your name called unmute yourself and answer affirmatively and then please place yourself back on mute. Michael Burt whistle. Present. Maria Chow. Maria are you there? I am sorry. No problem. Hello. Jack Jemsik. Present. David Levenstein. Here. Doug Marshall. Present. Janet McGowan. Here. Okay. Board members if technical difficulties arise we may need to pause temporarily to rectify the problem and then continue the meeting. If you do have technical issues please let Sean or Pam know discussion may be suspended while the technical issues are addressed and the minutes will know if a disconnection has occurred. Please use the raise hand function to ask a question or make a comment and I will see you raised hand and call upon you to speak. After speaking remember to re-mute yourself. Opportunity for public comment will be provided during the general public comment period and other appropriate times throughout the meeting. Please be aware the board will not respond to comments during the general public comment period. If you wish to make a comment during any of the public comment periods you must join the meeting via the zoom teleconferencing link. This link is shown on the slide and can be entered into a search engine by typing https colon backslash backslash amorce mass dot zoom dot us backslash j backslash nine seven five three six four four five seven five one. The link can also be found on the meeting agenda which is located on the town website in two different places. One is through the calendar listing for this meeting from the home page and find the link within the event details. A second way is to go through the planning board webpage and click on the most recent agenda link. On the agenda there will be a link towards the top of the page where it states virtual meeting. You please indicate you wish to make a comment by clicking the raised hand button when public comment is solicited. If you have joined the zoom meeting using a telephone please indicate you wish to make a comment by pressing star nine on your phone. When called upon please identify yourself using your full name and address and put yourself back into mute when finished speaking. Residents are welcome to express their views for up to three minutes or at the discretion of the planning board chair. If these guidelines are not complied with or the speaker exceeds their allotted time their participation will be disconnected from the meeting. Included on tonight's agenda item three is the site plan review public hearings. Scheduled to continue from June third board meeting will be the common school paving application followed by Amherst Media's SPR application to construct a new home office building. Moving forward this slide will now show the agenda. Again note the virtual meeting zoom link. Thank you. So at this time we're going to move to item one which is minutes and we received through our email the minutes from March fourth. They're the second time coming to us and at this point I assume everybody has them. Yes can you hear me? Barely you're quiet. Yeah I I don't know where I went. I seem to have. You're here Pam. Nope I can't see anything. Look at the bottom and there's a little like zoom square or wherever and you can bring it back alive. You probably just all I see is the little thing at the top that says your screen sharing is paused. Okay got it. We're good. Good job. Okay so we're gonna have the agenda come up eventually and board members we are evaluating the March fourth minutes so I see David Levinstein's hand is up but I also see Chris's so I'm gonna call on Chris first and then David. Chris you have something to say? I just wanted to say that the minutes that you have before you are have actually been seen twice already. I forget what the first time was but anyway it was a good month ago. Yeah it was several months ago so what happened was Janet McGowan submitted edits and then those were circulated and then other people submitted edits and I took all of the edits and combined them into the document that had Janet McGowan's edits in it so the things that I added are shown by track changes and it should be pretty clear where those are. I just wanted to make that statement. Thank you Chris. David? I'd like to say something about the minutes but I moved to approve the minutes and then for a brief comment. Second. Great thank you. So I think a lot. I'm sorry if you seconded. Michael. I'm sorry David. Michael I think. Thank you. So if I may. Yes David please. A lot of effort has been gone into writing and reviewing and revising and reviewing again these minutes and I think that it seems like some of that's been misdirected effort in my opinion. I think that the following kind of guidelines should guide the planning board in the discussions about these minutes is that we really should review the minutes for it to correct inaccuracies, to remove statements of opinion and to edit your own comments not to put words into somebody else's mouth. I think that that's really crossing a bright line at that point. And I don't think we need to discuss this much further so I'd like to move to approve these minutes and get on to the business at hand. Thank you. Okay thanks. I see one other hand and if there are any other comments we're in the discussion on the minutes raise your hand. I acknowledge Janet McGowan. Hi. Thank you. Thank you Christine for these corrections. I support all the corrections. The only two ones I'd like to leave in are the ones the deletion on page 13 and 15 and they both involve priorities and for the consultants like issues that Mr. Moore felt that the consultants would be need for and on page 13 I put down parking downtown signage 40R transition zone in IZ. Mr. Moore didn't say that it was on a slide so I omitted that and and then I also would leave the deletion from page 15 where Mr. Marshall is talking about the need to have discussions with the community about downtown if we want to extend the town time this you know five-story buildings and all the stuff and the reason I think that's really important is you know our discussion about the zoning by-law update was really rich and so there's a lot of good stuff in there but I know that these issues are really important issues to many members of the community and I think that it shouldn't be lost that we see the need for a discussion about downtown we need that need for consultants to help us we need consultants for the 40R for inclusionary zoning transition zones with the BL those are long-standing issues and it looks like in the zoning by-law update we're going to address those and so it's not my opinion it's not putting words in people's map but I do think the richness of our discussion and those are super important issues to many members of our community so I thought those were important to put in and so that would be I agree with the minutes and the corrections and just to leave those two deletions in perhaps pointing out that it wasn't Mr. Mara's statement but it was his slide that's it thank you I David is your hand up yeah okay yeah I move to approve the minutes as revised by Chris and distributed by Chris Brestrup earlier this week thank you okay I don't see any other hands raised so at this time we can take a vote I have to do a roll call it's in one second that second one second okay that was done is there more discussion Shannon is your hand up or you just it's not lower or oh can't hear you your volume's off okay I don't see any other hands so I think we're ready to move forward with this motion okay so I still don't see hands okay so uh Michael Burt whistle Maria Jack David approve Doug Janet approve and I also approve Christine so um that's unanimous we've approved the March 4th minutes for the planning board thank you um at this time I will move to item two public comment period uh ham do we see anyone at this time who wants to raise their hand and so I I do see uh I see one I see one and I just want to make clear again that this is only to speak on things that are not on our agenda tonight because we will have other public comment then so if you'd like to speak on something that's not being addressed tonight on our agenda feel free to have your time so Pam is there okay I just see that hand is now disappeared I see no other hands and the phone call I don't know who that is um if they star nine are we good I'm not seeing a star nine okay total one phone call listener so I'm not sure who that is um well if they didn't start nine then I assume they're not wanting to speak now here's Michael Lou okay because we're going to need Michael Lou next okay yes we do okay I still don't see any hands okay I do not either so at this time I will move on from item two public comment period we'll move to item three which we have one it was set for 632 and I have 645 now so I think we can move right to that um and I will read okay in accordance with the provisions of ngl chapter 40a this public hearing continued from june 3rd 2020 has been duly advertised and notice thereof has been posted and is being held for the purpose of providing the opportunity for interested citizens to be heard regarding SPR 2020-10 the common school 521 south pleasant street request site plan approval to repay the existing driveway and pave and reconfigure the existing gravel parking and turnaround drop-off area including the emergency drive walkways and other site improvements map 17a-78 rn zoning district um I'll just look for a show of hands from the board members are there any disclosures um any board meter numbers need to I'm not seeing any hands I'll keep watching um and the next we'll move to um we have Michael Lu who has come back uh again welcome I see you're there can we hear hi can you hear me yes we can welcome hi do you have anything you want to show I do I have um I'm hoping this will be can be short and sweet I have one graphic to show okay um and are you Pam do you have him as a co-host he is a he is a panelist so he should be able to share his screen great okay um okay first of all yeah this I'm Michael Lu with the Berkshire design group um back for the common school project to uh repave the driveway and pave the turnaround area um hopefully y'all remember what we had proposed before what the issue that came up last time was the um we discovered that there was is a deed restriction on the main parcel of the common school um that up for um basically for a maximum of 25 coverage on the lot um it seems like in I think it was 2002 or three or somewhere back in there um the school engaged with the town uh or I should say the town approved of a change in the deed restriction from 25 to 30 percent and they had initiated the process uh to change the the restriction in the deed um and paperwork was filled out but for some reason this was was dropped or never followed through it had to go to the state the state has not yet um endorsed the plan so this process has to um continue now um and basically on on a longer parallel track if you will to this project but we have come up with a plan which I'll show you shortly that uh complies with the 25 percent lot coverage um because that's technically what we need to um you know to have to comply with current um legal documents um so if you will let me share let's see um okay I've I've put up a plan graphic um can you all see that yes so basically a black and white plan with the property highlighted in red um and I'm gonna start this so this plan brings the lot coverage to 24.9 percent on this sort of I have yeah I have a um we had submitted an entire set of revised plans you know with the with the permeable paving basically and that's the purple areas are shown um where the permeable paving would be proposed um we had come to an agreement with the town that the uh for the permeable paving that 50 percent of this area could be counted as green space and the rest would be this is the concrete um open block system so the rest of it would be basically imper impervious with the with the concrete um so with these areas and in the green you'll see here the the elimination of these uh six parking spaces along the driveway and returning that to green space brings the the lot coverage down to 24.9 percent um and and then so that that's the plan and this the proposal that the school would like the town to entertain is that the the school is willing to do the the the 18 parking spaces here at the turnaround as permeable paving the fire and emergency access drive here as permeable paving and they would like to have a three-year window to do this permeable paving if it's necessary meaning that if they can execute the paperwork for the change in the deed restriction then they won't have to do this drive this really elongated driveway apron which is in excess of 100 feet from the property line to the to the basically that first parking lot to the right um. Did you repeat that time? Three a three a three-year window or a condition that if the basically if the deed restriction cannot be executed within three years then they will have to construct the re or basically I should say reconstruct this as permeable paving. The proposal is to do that um with with the condition of approval from the planning board that this be allowed to be repaved as you know asphalt but they would have to go back in and put permeable paving if they could not execute the paperwork in three years and the reason that we're asking for three years is because I understand I've been told that the um by Kevin Campbell the school's consultant that there is going to be a change in leadership at the school so there's just going to be a transition period for the the administration and board there and that this would just give them a little extra time so that this you know didn't wouldn't fall through the cracks and that if they had to do it in a shorter period or um what David Zomac had suggested in an email with communication today is that a that be a two-year window to get it done. The school's asking for a little bit more leeway in upping that one more year to three years they had initially through a five-year time period to Dave Zomac and Dave came back with a two-year so I guess we're trying to negotiate for you know the three-year. I don't know I don't think Kevin is on the meeting tonight um I don't I didn't see him shown there but I expected that he would be joining the meeting I don't know if he's- Kevin Campbell is there I think can you move him over Pam? You might be able to provide more information on that um transition period if you're interested um but basically this plan satisfies the current legal requirements for the lot at less than 25 percent we're at 24.9 um but you know if they can execute the paperwork then obviously this the the coverage will go up a little bit with the driveway being asphalt but the school's still willing to do the permeable paving up around the at the parking spaces and the fire lane um the fire lane or the emergency access is something that's going to be hopefully rarely used um so it makes sense to do that as permeable and keep it in in a green if you will a quote-unquote green condition and the parking spaces um I think that the school realizes that that's a that's a further you know method of having some green infrastructure there which is an advantageous and a positive thing for the site in terms of drainage green space you know open space etc um does mr. Campbell want to add anything to this about the time period being requested I'm not seeing his hand go up he is there but can you hear me there you go yes thank you sorry like Kevin hey Mike um I only wanted to to share a little bit of the just a teeny bit more about the logic for why three years actually matters versus versus two years which first of all we really appreciate that the town will even consider an extension at all um but real quickly I had responded very late in the day today to say the common school has been in an interim leadership position for the last two years and it has just set up a transitional leadership team that will carry it through the next two years while they eventually move to a more permanent leadership situation again so that just two years puts us on the cusp from my perspective of them them at that right at that moment shifting into this rather again transitional I don't want to say unstable but but uncertain moment and one more year would put it on the plate of a new head of school new leadership and something that that that would guarantee its its success if necessary the second thing and maybe more near and dear to my heart is we're undergoing a million dollar or so renovation right now of the school's classrooms and the school's been raising this money over many many years and we are spending every single penny of it and the apron at the front is roughly going to cost us somewhere in the neighborhood of six thousand dollars or so and deferring it deferring it is significant and what I'm just looking for is a chance for the school to sort of recover from the renovation project to stabilize and to have enough time to start raising funds again should it have to you know we not get the amendment and it have to do the apron so I know none of those are are good reasons from a zoning perspective or a planning perspective but from an operational perspective they would go a long way an extra year for the school thank you thank you um michael do you have anything else to add or can I open it up to um first miss bestreff and then the planning board members I think that's um if we talked about other aspects of the project last time the rain garden being added and so forth and improved ADA access safety with the fire access lane that the fire department has always wanted um so yeah I think at this you know I think we're ready to open it up and listen to any comments uh questions from the board okay thank you I'm going to recognize Chris Bester first and then I see Jack and David uh Chris are you there I'm not here I am here and I wanted to say that the plan um even um with even without this request from tonight yeah meets the zoning requirements because the zoning requirements allow up to 30% um of the lot to be covered uh within pervious material so it's really the deed restriction that we're talking about tonight I just wanted to clarify that thank you that helps um jack yes I was just wondering the the project is uh originally accommodating a repaving effort uh is that correct Mike yes yep so what are you repaving the entire drive yes if you in it's present with if you recall the paving ends right about here right now at the end where these parking spaces are so we're we want to repave this drive and then pave this what is currently a gravel parking uh gravel turnaround and gravel parking spaces so that's going to better define where cars are are parked formally so that you know one car doesn't take up two spaces etc on the gravel and then the gravel moves around every year with maintenance and plowing and so forth um so that's kind of in pervious area on the site has actually kind of expanded over the years I think unfortunately um so this is going to better define you know what's vehicle versus what's green or pedestrian so yeah so my question is uh would you continue with the repavement in the areas that are uh they could turn to the you know permeable pavers there or would you not do those areas uh with the risk that they you might have to pull up the you know right so if I and Kevin if you're there correct me if I'm wrong but the schools uh willing to commit to putting permeable pavers in these purple areas here the parking spaces and the fire lane and deferring this area you know given that three-year time limit to try to execute that the the change in the deed restriction you know with the state um this would be if this if they can do this this construction season this would all be asphalt in the in the front part of the driveway but if for some reason they can't execute it then yeah they're going to have to bite the bullet and and cut this pavement out and install the permeable paving but they've made a commitment to do it here up at the um turnaround and with the realization that that's a betterment to the project overall the the dilemma is that the apron portion as we're calling it at the front of the drive is is the most decayed portion of the asphalt it's the worst section of all it's completely pothold so we have no choice but to improve it in the meantime um right and just looking at you know what other areas could possibly accommodate it it it just didn't make sense to do permeable anywhere else and unfortunately with the driveway there you know it requires that long of a distance from the property line basically almost to the to the opening of the uh that first parking lot on the right you know to be permeable to get that coverage percentage down below 25 percent now hopefully we don't have to you know we can the paperwork can be executed and and everything's going to be fine and dandy and well under the 30 percent that zoning allows plus the D restriction would be modified or amended to 30 percent um if that's the case then you know where then the site would be well under um the 30 percent and i might add that i went back and did a calculation that if everything was asphalt if there were no purple areas and we kept the six uh parking the paid parking spaces here along the driveway the coverage would be 28.9 percent so even if it was completely all paved with asphalt we'd still be under the 30 percent however we have this this you know this deed restriction of 25 percent now that is really putting you know a crimp in in the plans but you know overall i think we're still going to get a better project if the school is willing to do the permeable up in this area thank you thanks i see uh david now and then next will be dug uh hi mike hi kevin um i'm sympathetic with the operational concerns and uh and the goals of the project for sure but but i'm still trying to track track the logic of your presentation mike and here i think is my question so you're saying that as proposed with the permeable pavers and the the change in the to the to the taking out some pavement putting in some grass and green space there on it'll fall it'll be under 25 percent of what would be in pervious surface of the lot of the total lot 20 25 percent of the lot that's outlined in red a lot that is outlined in red under this proposal yeah be now um uh uh be now sorry i'm looking at a different string a screen um uncut it would be covered that would and preventing any uh the growth of any vegetation right so the as proposed here this driveway is under 25 percent of of a covered surface preventing the growth of vegetation but then so and that's the total lot area yeah so then you're also saying that for the that apron that that last little bit that connects to the street which is currently paved if that were paved which you'd like your you're asking us to approve that would bring the lot coverage still under closer to it would increase the lot coverage to 30 to closer to 30 percent of the lot is that is that no it would it would push it over the 25 but we we'd still be yeah we would still be under 30 percent right so as proposed your proposal is to actually not reduce the impervious surface but is to increase the impervious surface however a portion of that will be permeable pavers no is that right no go ahead kevin if you have a comment no a portion of that is sure the the parking spaces and the the area for the fire truck access are permeable pavers and that allows you to do the calculation of either 24.9 or somewhat more than 25 but less than 30 yes is it am i tracking that am i following what the presentation is what the proposal is yes i think so basically this plan that you see on the screen puts the red area which is described in the deed in compliance with the deed restriction of 25 percent if however the zoning allows 30 and yes if the deed can be amended within three years then we can we don't have to do the apron quote unquote out front at the beginning of the driveway but you're correct if we if that area is paved it will push the coverage of the red area over 25 now if they build it you have that number michael you know i don't i'm sorry 26.2 when okay 20 and you want to do that paving now because operationally it makes more sense right so you want to yeah that's part of the presentation tonight is to do that paving on the on the apron what we're calling what i'm we're calling the apron the last little bit to the road yep that that's that makes most sense to you if we if we don't approve the paving of that then you the more expensive option is to do the permeable pavers but that's the less preferable option from your point of view that's right that's exactly right exactly so the here's my confusion so thank you for thank you for helping me follow for walking me through that a little bit more easily for me as i read i'm reading i'm now looking at the deed okay and the deed reads in part so subject also to a conservation restrictions and then it cites cites the mass general law in favor of the town of amherst granted it by the grantor hint here in requiring that at least 75 percent of the surface area of said premises shall always be maintained uncovered by any structure or pavement and in a condition suitable for the growth of vegetation so i and that's where you get that 25 figure 25 you know right i i believe yes however i read the deed now and and that seems to me to be referring to 75 percent of the whole lot needs to be needs to remain remain open to vegetation which to my mind would include the buildings whereas your and i don't know how that figures into your the driveway and parking lot calculation we didn't talk about the buildings but all the structures on the site plus all the current what's currently paved and gravel because the town considers gravel as impervious and the buildings all together um i can't i think the coverage on the lot currently is already at 20 i think it's 28.2 or 28.3 percent you're already in non-compliance already with the deed restriction so so you're including in your calculation the the amount of the the the area that the buildings yes and other structures yes prevent the growth of vegetation on the slot correct okay thank you very much i'm sorry i'm so slow on the uptake here but thank you very much i didn't mention it earlier i might have we might have talked about that um at the last meeting i don't quite remember but yep it i'm glad we can clarify that so if what we heard from mr. um campbell is if you do what you're proposing here it will be at 26.2 with the hope that within your asking for three years that the deed would be adjusted to to allow a higher amount and you could just leave it the way it is but if that is not possible then at that time you'll go into the apron area and turn it to impervious exactly okay so that's what they're proposing i'm gonna go Doug is next and then i see janet mcgallon so Doug thank you my first question is for maybe for chris breastrup um what is the duration of a planning board approval typically oh do you want me to answer that um christine yeah oh yes he's directing it to you so go for it a plan the duration of the planning board approval is really um into the future there's no you know cut off um what we what we normally say is a site plan review approval is um good for three years or excuse me for two years um but if you start doing the work that is described within the application and you continually work on it then it can last longer than that but um i think what you're asking is would the site plan review approval allow a three-year duration to complete the work described and i think if it's specifically spelled out in the conditions it would allow that but you're saying that if work starts within two years we wouldn't even need to put it as a condition because as long as the work keeps moving along nobody's going to object i think you would need to put it as a condition because it's um deviating from what uh the applicant actually wants to do the applicant actually wants to pave that right hand portion of the driveway um and you are allowing him to explore whether or not he has to in fact um created as an as a pervious area and if he does not have to create it as a pervious area then he'll just leave the pavement there so you're allowing him you know three years to kind of figure that out okay thank you so my second question is for mr. Campbell um you cited the two years of interim leadership as a reason for the extension say from two years that mr. Zomek was proposing to what you are requesting um i assume during the next two years this interim leadership team would be actively working on resolving this question with this state and that you wouldn't just wait two years for the new leader to arrive and have dump it on his or her plate oh on i mean on the contrary we you know it's in our best interest to make this go away as quickly as possible okay thank you so yes thank you all right and then you also uh said that a couple of years in the future it might be a hardship for the school to have to come back and spend six thousand dollars to put in the remaining permeable pavers if you were unsuccessful with the state uh would you be willing to put up a bond now to ensure that the money is available to do that i didn't say it would be a hardship in the future i said it would be a hardship now and it might be a hardship you know i i simply wanted to ensure that it didn't become a hardship and it didn't become an issue of sorts and i i'd hate to have to over complicate this with with a bond but i'm not sure how to you know well i guess the question sort of behind my question is say three years goes by and you've not been successful with the state how do we compel you to complete the work and you know as shown i guess that's for you to tell you to tell me so can i throw it back to chris bestra if we put this in as a condition chris what happens if a condition does not get fulfilled um then someone can complain and the building commissioner will um issue an enforcement order and he can um he can slap a fee of i think it's three hundred dollars a day for someone out of compliance with um approval so um so that could be a remedy no further questions that's a good incentive i mean i would say for what it's worth is that the school is out of compliance at the moment and um in terms of best faith we're proposing we're already bringing it down from 28 plus to 26.2 percent to a goal of 24.9 so we sure are headed in the right direction um of of trying our best to to become in compliance after such a long period of time thank you i recognize janet and then next will be michael thank you i think i have three quick questions um for for the common school folks or mr lou um can you just tell me what the process is for advising a deed restriction with the state um what the probability of getting approval is and then do you need the town support since the town holds the conservation restriction uh kevin i you probably have some more insight into this but the town has already well given its approval back in whatever it was 2002 2003 the paperwork was already started luckily that was found um but it went to i and i don't know for what reasons but it did go to the state but they never signed off on on the um the amendment to that deed restriction so i don't i don't know what the process is i'm not familiar with that but it has to go to the secretary i think the secretary of environmental affairs because this is a conservation restriction so technically it has to go to the state to get uh to be changed or amended and for whatever reason that process was just not completed there we have we have kevin correct me if i'm wrong but i think we have some signed paperwork from the town already um that um you know that shows that this process was initiated i just don't know the history you know from back then of why it was kind of put aside do you do you have any idea of whether it's likely just to be approved or not because part of me is just you know i'm feeling very flexible about your quest but i'm wondering if it's just here to spend the six thousand dollars now and just move on but i mean is it likely to be approved doesn't anyone know i we can't we mean we can't we're going we're we're the little bit we know as we've done our research here and we've been working as closely as possible with Dave Zomek on this is uh we're we're proceeding based on a couple of things one is the existence of of evidence of the town's support for this uh and and recorded and um and then conversations with Dave as part of this proposal perhaps the one thing we're leaving out is that the proposal um puts forth that that that the school would submit application with the town's support um so that is what we're we're hoping and assuming will happen and continue to happen and three it's um while we don't know the outcome all of the previous documentation which was significant between the school and the state but ended up never being signed i mean one letter after the other back and forth back and forth in 2002 all of it led to the belief that this was going to be signed um i'm not a lawyer but the the state on the state's end the state's position was why do you need an amendment to do this that was the if you read the text of all the letters they said over and over again why do you need an amendment to do this we think this he didn't say it's a matter of right they did not see this as as um that maybe we were somebody was over complicating this at the time and then it just fell off the map nobody at the common school remembers from back then why it just ended but it did um so that's a long way of saying um we have a fair amount of belief that this is worth pursuing and that and that it wouldn't take a long period of time to get an answer one way or another okay that's all i want to know thank you chris bestrip i see your hand up yeah i wanted to let everyone know that i did speak with james omec today and he confirmed the fact that the town is in support of this application to the state he also had mentioned to me previously that um he believes that the person who was supposed to sign the document whatever the document is um either moved his office or left his office and that's why it was never signed there wasn't the objection on the part of the state it's just that they never followed through on their end so that's just what i wanted to share with the with the planning board thank you i recognize michael burt whistle thank you in talking and talking through the question of a 25 percent coverage and a 30 percent coverage uh which is apparently what the zoning requirement is for 30 for a 30 percent and this since this falls well below the 30 percent why are we concerned with the deed if if as a planning board our responsibility for site plan review is to make sure the zoning bylaw is is upheld uh why are we even concerned with this deed restriction that seems to be a matter between other parties and that seems to me we should simply approve the project as it's proposed because it meets the 30 percent requirement chris do you have any i'm not really sure i i don't really know what to say to that you know that's kind of my that was my feeling about a month ago and since then um you know there has been a lot of conversations so i i don't really know exactly what to say to that was legal counsel asked no but i guess what i would say at this point is why don't you just approve what is being proposed and hope that um the school can manage to to revise the deed restriction and if they can't then the plan that's in front of you now is what will be built okay michael do you have anything else no he's good so i don't uh do you so i don't see any uh new hands going up i see um two members going coming about again i'm going to answer those and then we're going to open it up to public comment um so janet and then i see david um i was just going to move so move christine's um idea but i i think we should listen to the public first um david and then i see jack i'm responding to uh chris breast strips um suggestion the thing that that i'm sort of wrestling with whether i should be or not i don't know but um is that is that the proposal asked the planning board to approve something that we know to be violating the deed sure it means the zoning law zoning zoning by law but but we're and then and then we're and then we're approving as i understand it and it's a little confusing to me still i'm not quite sure why it's so confusing to me where what we're approving is the paving of the greater surface which makes a lot of sense but with the promise that if if the deed can't be um revised to allow for a larger covered surface if the deed cannot be revised in three years they'll dig that up which makes no sense or and they'll put in permeable pavers which still we're kicking the question about whether permeable pavers is meets you know is is is not is a structure is not covering the surface we're kind of punting that now i'm willing to punt that i don't what but um i i just find that we're we're being asked to approve something that per that is giving the school what it makes sense what it wants with but maybe they'll dig it up it'll never get dug up so we're effectively approving something that we know to be contrary to the current deed even though it might be better than what's the current state well sure it'll be better than the current state that's why they want to do the improved project that that's all i'm i'm i'm troubled by that i don't know if anyone else is that's it thank you i see jack and then doug jack oh i'm sorry i was wondering technical question from mike what what factor is applied to the permeable pavers is it is it zero percent pavement or 50 pavement or is i'm just wondering about that i'm sorry could you repeat the first part i didn't quite hear okay um the permeable pavers it's not a hundred percent pavement is it zero percent pavement or does it contribute thank you 50 we're we've been we've with we've talked to dave zomek and i guess we're agreeing that 50 it's about a 50 percent open call it an openness ratio if you will okay so that you can get grass to grow within those voids and i this um these pavers are used at nine research drive if you're familiar with that um i worked there i worked there okay um that's exactly what we're using on the parking for the parking spaces and there there is vegetation i don't know what they planted there um it might be some kind of fescue or something but you're talking 15 research drive is it 15 or nine yeah right sorry i'm thinking of yeah 15 is the next building i was thinking of the first one yeah 15 research drive sorry um but that is what they're using at that site too and i went by there just to make sure and there is vegetation growing in those voids it's it's not lush green grass um but you know i think that would take a lot you know a lot more work to for with fertilizers and what have you i think they've chosen some other type of um of like i'm saying like i think of fescue that requires less maintenance you know less watering fertilizing etc something that's a little bit more green although not really the color green well i i'm sure that i'm in the minority but i've seen just grass work pretty good as parking you know emergency parking you know you know most of the time uh hicker ridge had overload when they were a function of golf course had an overflow parking lot there um and you know it's you know i'm just wondering if that isn't a consideration just to get you know cut through all this uh consider you know just lawn as as you know like where the fire is that's never been a road anyway so i mean we all want fire protection there but i think if it's just lawn that's leveled and graded properly we'll get you to the same place um anyway there's just some thoughts there Doug yeah i was gonna just suggest i assume we need a drawing to go with whatever approval we have and that the drawing before us is not adequate and that we ought to have a note around the apron area that says this area shall be permeable pavement completed within three years unless you know uh not required by the deed in which case it'll be asphalt i think we'll have that in the conditions if that's what goes i think we can add that note on the plans um as i mentioned we did submit a full set of um black and white site plans with this project i just thought this would be a lot obviously a lot easier to to use as a presentation tool the the plan you see in front of you i'm just i'm just saying that i think somehow we need i think it would be useful and maybe i'm the only one but i think it would be useful to have some plan of graphic a graphic depiction of the alternate reality that might be the final result so Doug we can put that in the conditions and refer to a plan it's however we write up the conditions so when we look at conditions we can we can refer to a plan um anything else uh Doug or i'm gonna move to public comment i think he's uh okay so at this point i'm looking at attendees and if anyone is here to speak on a comment or a question regarding this project please raise your hand uh pam i'm just going to double check with you in case there's any on the phone um so i see one hand at this point and i just when i call on you please say your name and your address and um and welcome so i see one hand and i'll call on kevin noonan and i think you're allowed to talk if you yes i can welcome i appreciate it thank you uh my name is kevin noonan and i live at 36 jeffrey lane and if you look at the the posed purple spur for the emergency access road my property is right in the middle where this little spur off of that spur is uh begins our property begins there there is a proposal that we only learned about last time you met that they want to move the dumpster there first of all we don't know why it would be preferable to move the dumpster closer to the children's parking a children's playground but our other concern mine and the my neighbors on either side of me is that it's going to bring rodents and and we've had bear in the neighborhood it's going to attract more wildlife to that spot there's going to be odor there's really no reason to put the dumpster there rather than where it is i think that the justification that mr. loon used last time was that they had to give up one parking spot but the if you know the first parking lot on the right just after that area of the apron which we're referring to almost never gets used and when it when there is an event it's rarely full plus the old hitch hop hitchcock center there's parking spaces in front of that that are rarely used so it just seems to us that to be an impudent idea and we're also concerned about what might be stored around the dumpster currently where the dumpster is now they store the material to treat the the asphalt the existing asphalt for snow during the cold weather and they also have some other recycling there we're just concerned that there's going to be noise when the truck and the truck is going to come up that emergency access road and probably crush those non-permeable i mean those permeable favors because as we all know any anyone who has a dumpster it's they leave ruts wherever they go and of course they always say they're not responsible for that so we appreciate that the we appreciate the common schools in neighbor with but there for 30 years this is not an envy situation we want them to stay we really value what they do we're a little disappointed that didn't communicate with us because we had been asking for the last month to talk with someone but there's in our minds no need to put a dumpster right at the edge of our property when it can stay where it is or be moved down to where the if you notice just beyond that apron you refer to there's a barn and there's no reason the dumpster couldn't be put there if they need the space so uh you know we're just concerned and then recently there was somebody had discharged deeter paint or something in that area so we're worried that this is going to become an industrial area and you know there's i think mr lew referred to there's nothing but roots there well the previous administrator of the common school not not the current one on the guys of uh under the guys of safety felt that the trees needed to come down because they might be diseased and when they came down there was really no evidence that they were but nothing has been replanted and so that's why there's nothing about roots and the ground has eroded there so um you know i know that mr lew was referring to this as an improvement over what's there and that that would be true now but it would it would appear that someone should have replaced the trees that had been cut down before there was also a tree at the at the beginning of the driveway which was removed i think because it blocked the site of the drivers and there was nothing wrong with that tree either so there's about 18 trees they're now missing and are affecting the watershed in our opinion so anyway our primary concern is that please don't put the dumpster right on our property line when it when you have other options and we're asking the committee to please ask them to amend this this proposal so that the dumpster does not go there thank you thank you um at this time i see no other hands um so i'll come back to board members um i just have one question um so we're looking at a property in the red line does the dumpster need to stay on the property for that or could it go on to the other properties just wondering i i don't know if i can provide a full answer for that but where the dumpsters currently sit as you know is right here uh on it would be on your left side as you get to the end of the paved drive um right in this area um if we were to put the dumpster dumpsters back there we would you know we would lose at least one space which is not the end of the world um but it is it has been troublesome and an inconvenience to get refuse and recyclables and so forth out to that location because they have to come from the buildings and somehow you know get get the items down across the gravel drive etc um to this location uh the reason we put it here uh off of the emergency road is that um since there is a quote unquote you know semi paved drive there it made sense to allow the dumpster truck to use that as well and pick up the refuse and recyclables uh here it's a much easier path or much easier um task to get the refuse and recyclables from the buildings down this walk and over to the dumpsters rather than having to you know cross over the gravel area and in this case if it was back here the you know they'd still have to you know whatever cross over the the pave the pavement um there there might be a couple or one or two other areas to consider I I guess I'd have to um I'd have to have a discussion with Kevin at a minimum about about those locations but um I don't you know Kevin do you have any thoughts about that do we do are we can we make a commitment that we can not put the dumpster location here up against or closer to the property uh to the neighbor's property um do we need time to look at that or think when we need time to look at it I don't want to I can't make a commitment especially if we're going to jeopardize I don't approval in any way because then that would that would completely jeopardize our time frame but um Mr Noonan if it would be of any I mean well two things one um not being somebody who works directly at the school but nevertheless I apologize that you've been trying to speak to somebody over there and nobody's gotten back to you but two one of the parts of the plan that doesn't show up on here is that that the dumpster area unlike as it is now would be enclosed all right there would be a you know a fence enclosure around it especially on the back side of the property um so that and it would it would be it would be enclosed on the front as well so bears would not be able to get in there but also you would not be able to see the dumpsters from the from the rear of the property so that's that's one thought um the other thought is is we we we surely would look at alternative options I don't further away suggesting the barn the barn location which if I'm assuming this is the structure Mr Noonan was referring to I mean that's like you know double the distance of what they're doing now to haul um you know whatever carts or whatever down the road is I think they'd need to get some carts and or something impossible for the students to empty trash or recycling or anything and there is a hill that's just far away I think um I'm gonna recognize um Christine Bestrup and then go back to the board members I see Maria has her hand up I just wanted one quick question where the dumpsters proposed right now and the red line I was at the site visit but I can't remember what kind of fence or is there a fence what what runs along those properties current oh it's weird right now I mean there is screening uh there is vegetation but you you know you can see through the trees to to the neighbors um some of the neighbors have more vegetation than others along the backs of their lots um but there's not a fence there there's no there's no I think there's one neighbor that has fence right see that simply right okay this neighbor has the neighbors that put up fences the school does not have a fence on that property line correct okay thank you we are proposing some evergreen screening around the back of that dumpster location as well that's good to know that's what those little circles are they're plantings yes thank you so I'm going to recognize Chris Bestrup and then I see Maria's hand press so I wanted to suggest that you could create a condition that would deal with this you could say that you would approve the plan as it is shown in this in this drawing and then have the applicant come back to you prior to actually paving the parking lot in the driveway to show where the dumpster might be relocated and if it's not possible to relocate it they could make that statement at that time have them come back to you at a public meeting and perhaps at that same meeting they could come back to you with a revised plan showing the note that mr. Marshall talked about putting on that area down at the apron of the driveway about you know stating exactly what was going to occur there and when so that's just a thought does that sound reasonable mr. Lou mr. Campbell I think so yeah yeah it'll give us a little bit of time to discuss you know what we can do with the dumpster I have a couple ideas but you know obviously I like to get right Kevin that way we could move ahead with this but then you just have to come back before you start before we start or before we're finished Chris yeah that's what I thought um I'm gonna recognize Maria well um no I yeah I just thought my hand um I wanted to mention it's not shown on this drawing you're looking at but on one of the drawings it looks like the dumpster is actually about four feet lower than the adjacent property so not only will it have trees right dancing they're talking about it's actually sunken down quite a bit so I'm pretty comfortable with the location because of the access for the trucks the proximity to the students and staff being able to get to the the dumpster and you know wherever it's located along that um north property it's going to be next to an adjacent property you know a neighbor and so you know because the school sounds like they're being good neighbors I assume that they're going to you know take the proper precautions of a good neighborhood with their um dumpster and also I just wanted to go ahead and move that we approve the plan with the conditions that Miss Brestrup just mentioned about um possibly locating the dumpster although um I'm actually fine with it as is but it sounds like there was um discussion leading to having that as a condition as well as the condition Mr. Marshall mentioned about noting the permeable permeable paving possibly coming if the deed restriction is not revised in the three-year time period so I think that was a motion and that would be also closing the public hearing um is there a second to that you're second okay I hear Doug for a second may I say something yes Chris did I did send you some possible conditions in an email today they're pretty minor but you might want to take a look at them before you actually vote I was gonna go through those I have them in front of me thank you Chris for that reminder um I do want to go back to Mr. Lu um Maria brought up a great point I had forgotten about that you had talked about this is the last time he came to us about lowering that um a hammerhead area and how low would that go so would that set the dumpster down yes it would um the and the the reason why it's lowering well the approach to that area is pretty steep and the fire department has said when they tried to drive a truck there sometimes they can't even get up that initial incline so they required that the emergency drive be at a five percent maximum slope if we do that it requires um I believe that the road is cut down approximately two feet lower than worth what the existing ground is so there's going to be a an embankment if you will cut around that dumpster area to be able to you know just have it cut into the hillside so to speak so it will be lower um in grade than what then then the elevation at the property line and I didn't check it but I appreciate you're looking at that Maria if it's about four feet I guess you know that that's we'll take that bit of information and and and run with it so we have about a four foot gray difference from where the dumpster is to the property line so would there be a retaining wall on that L that's not on the drawing but we'd be losing some of the uh we probably have to thin out some of the trees right at the face or you know right at the tree line now but we are again we're trying to add the evergreens in there um to have a more solid screen uh visually to the name for the neighbors um if it's to remain in that location so I I can't remember exactly I know there is a hill and you're cutting into it so we're saying somewhere between two and four feet you'd be cutting into that putting a retaining wall and then putting evergreen on top of that there's no there's no retaining wall we're just cut bank embankment um so how many feet two or four because wouldn't four have an erosion no not necessarily you know we we can still do a two to one slope there and that's easily managed you know with vegetation okay that's sure if you plant things that will help hold it um okay at chris your hand is up do you have any comments on this right no I'll lower that um so at this point I'm going to ask are there any other comments from the board um if not I'm going to go through the conditions I we did receive them today um late in the day um but there are there's four of them um I don't know if you have them Pam I'll just so so Mike I'm gonna I'm gonna ask you to to stop sharing your screen and I can share mine okay thank you there is that all right is that set yes thank you so the first one was the driveway and parking area shall be built uh substantially in accordance with the plan submitted to the planning board on whatever date that is um and that's standard okay so the second one the driveway and parking shall be management plan um and approved on with the exception that the six parking spaces along the driveway will be returned to grass which I think the new plans we have show that they're back to grass yes the third one landscaping um planting plan continually that looks pretty standard and the third fourth one okay applicant shall work with the town to seek relief the state from the deed restriction limiting the amount of impervious surface 25 percent if this relief is not granted by the state the applicant shall install permeable plan uh uh paving at the entry drive or the apron as we've been referring to it as shown on the plan entitled overall site plan option two uh reduction of the impervious dated june 10th 2020 within two years of construction seasons of the date of this site plan approval so maria you made the motion uh it was unclear whether you were proposing two years or three years um in your motion sorry I can match the conditions what it says written well these are draft so we can change these conditions to whatever we want so I have you in the seat now um this is and we get you can we could do three and then debate or we can do two you know and have people talk but um speaking about three years as the what was presented as the preferred time period the applicant would prefer three they originally proposed five and it was countered by the town for two and now they're coming back asking for three okay uh I feel like our discussion it as three um please correct me if I'm not speaking correctly well I will look so if if you're saying the motion contains three we're still in the discussion part um of the motion so if we just put it out there right now as three and then if any of the other board members have a comment or an issue we'd like it to be two they can raise their hands um also any other board members can raise their hands if there's additional conditions they want to include um and Miss Besser please if you've got anything else to add um Chris I see your hand so did you want to add a condition about coming back to show um potential other location alternate location of the dumpster or do you want to just let that be we leave it as it's shown um and we keep the condition as number the number four condition as three years um as well as conditions one through three if those are um clear enough so that's the new motion is leave the dumpster as is um have the four conditions and have the um applicant come back in three years or do the work within three years yes do that and hopefully they'll hear from about their deed before then okay uh Chris your hand is up is do you want to make a finding that this um proposal meets the relevant requirements of the section 11.24 of the zoning bylaw and you're talking about all sections that I can't remember what that part is or is that uh 30 percent that section is the section that we normally go through on a big project we'll go through it line by line and say whether it does or does not meet that particular criteria it's the list of um of site plan review criteria and normally on a smaller project or a more simple project you just make a blanket statement that it meets the require the relevant requirements rather than going through those items step by step because you've gone through them and you know okay yes then of course included um I'm seeing no other hands so at this time um we have a motion on the table we have conditions and a finding um and we'll take a vote I do see Doug's hand just came up yeah I thought I'd second Maria's motion great thank you all right I see no other hands um Chris I'm going to put your hand down I don't think yep okay so at this time I will do a roll call for the motion um lost my list though I know Michael's on it first Michael yes Maria approve David approve Jack move um Janet approve and myself approve did I forget anyone Doug approve thank you so that's unanimous we have seven so I thank our applicants for coming thank you very much thank you all right thank you I I can I know you all worked really hard I never thought uh just some repaving a driver would be so hard either did we sure but thank you thank you for your good night so we're going to move on here to our agenda we're going to move on to the next site plan review um this is it is now 751 and in accordance with the provisions of MGL chapter 48 this public hearing has been duly advertised and notice thereof has been posted and it's being held for the purpose of providing the opportunity for interested citizens to be heard regarding SPR 2020-11 Amherst community television DBA Amherst media corner of gray street and main street request site plan review approval to construct a new building and associated site improvements for Amherst media a 501c3 educational institution under section 3.330 point zero of the zoning bylaw bn zoning district map 14b parcels 250 and 251 so first I'll just ask uh are there any board disclosures raise your hand if anyone wants to make a disclosure statement I'll give that a second um and then we will move to the applicants um I'm seeing no hands so I'm going to introduce we have I know bucky sparkle here representing the applicant he's the engineer um yes would you want me to give a history of the sure first or do you want to introduce everybody first um let me just identify who's here for them um and then yeah just um I was gonna say raise your hand chris and I won't forget about you um just so I'll just ask mr sparkle who else do you see um who else is here for the applicants all right well this evening we have you're a little quiet so yeah no this is good this is what we work out okay I'll uh raise my voice as best I can normally this works just fine is that better yeah you're a little quiet is everyone else can you hear him okay yeah I get some so-so so just a little quiet speak up I I'll do my best to speak up I know I'm going to be speaking a while tonight I don't want to burn out I know it's also possible to adjust volume on your end so I'm hopefully we can keep this together but uh to answer the question about who is available tonight um Jim Lesko the executive director of Amherst media we have board member Ed Severance is here Bill Gillan the lead architect from Gillan Collaborative Architects is on the line and uh I'm not seeing any other names from the team on the screen it is possible we have John Krifka as well as attorney Michael Pill our legal counsel may or may not be waiting in the wings this evening um lucky I could not see those people or I could not see those names in the attendees so it's possible they may not be here tonight there were various things happening in their lives that okay they feel that representation is adequate okay I think we have some don't we Pam I see Bill Gillan and I have moved Bill Gillan in as an attendee and Ed Severance and Jim Lesko so it was um attorney Pill and John Krifka that I could not see okay all right so thank you for coming um at this time I'll just ask if Miss Bestrup director of planning would like to give us an introduction or a summary because this did come to us like a year ago yes I just thought I would give a little bit of a history on this project um it's been a long time coming so I'm Chris Brestrup planning director and um the property was formerly all one property which included the Henry Hills house the two front properties on which the Amherst media project is going to is proposed to be built and three single family home properties along Gray Street that was all one big property the Henry Hills house was formerly used as the Amherst boys club some people will remember that in 2007 and 2008 um it was the property was subsequently purchased by two LLCs um I think at least one of which was associated with Barry Roberts and subsequently Jerry Godera bought the property and subdivided it into six parcels so we had the one parcel containing the Hills house the three along Gray Street and the two frontage lots that we're talking about tonight in 2013 town meeting rezoned the two frontage lots on Main Street along with other parcels along the north side of Main Street from RG to uh which is general residence to BN neighborhood business this was done to create a small village center in this part of town the property on the other side of Main Street had already been rezoned to business village center at around that same time so Mr. Godera and others moved the homes that are along Gray Street from other locations in town to create a new streetscape along the west side of Gray Street formally that had been lawn area and a lot of trees and brush the Henry Hills house was renovated and it's now owned by new owners and I believe it's operated as both a single family home and a bed and breakfast but they may be able to create correct that later if that's not the case at the time of the rezoning Mr. Godera had been discussing the two frontage lots with Amherst media so this was back in 2013 who needed to recognize that they needed a new home Mr. Godera showed town meeting a plan for the Amherst media building which was located at the southeast corner of the two lots with the parking lot for the new building to be located on the western portion of the two lots so that was shown to town meeting back in 2013 at the end of 2013 Amherst media which was then known as Amherst community television purchased the property and they've been working on developing the property as their new home since that time in 2019 Amherst media submitted a site plan review application for a new building that was to be located on the western portion of these two lots and it received a lot of criticism from the planning board from the public and eventually from the local historic district commission Amherst media withdrew their site plan review application in the summer of 2019 so that was about a year ago and then they began a lengthy conversation with the local historic district commission about a new building designed by a local architect for these two lots so after months of public hearings with the local historic district commission the commission issued a certificate of appropriateness for the design that you will see tonight so i just thought that information would be helpful to you in your review thank you thank you that's helpful um so at this point i'll turn it over to mr. sparkle who is going to um give us a presentation is there anything you'd like to share on your screen christine can i just interrupt one yeah did you ask for the board disclosures i think i did okay were there any i'm sorry i missed no there weren't no there weren't and um so we'll have the uh applicants presentation and then we'll get into the site visit and stuff okay thanks bucky you should be all set to share your screen as a panelist i cannot hear you at all yep you're muted or oh i can barely hear you you're really quiet is that any better a little better i might be having a microphone troubles here today i apologize normally zoom and my system worked just great i did uh just move my office so maybe i dropped my microphone i will speak as loudly as i can um and i'm sorry that tonight's the night that i'm finding out i have a microphone issue that's okay while you're speaking we can all up our volumes too to better hear you okay hopefully this works out um can i verify do you do you see the screen with my logo on it yes all right great all right i see what appears to be your first slide yes it is uh first of uh several i'll warn you now there's quite a bit of information to cover on this project a lot of details that have been considered now for a couple years and have been through multiple versions of public processes so we've already done a little bit of discussion regarding the application team myself namers media we have jim lesko here executive director at severance as well as their supporting our supporting personnel architect who is more than supporting is really the the lead on this project in terms of site design and building design feeling collective architects and uh a legal council of michael pill who may or may not be here this evening it's already been stated that amherst media is a 501 c3 nonprofit educational institutions been operating at amherst since 1977 been performing public service on that entire time and this evening and for this project the goal is a permanent home an office supporting the educational mission and community services that it strikes a balance between the interests of the local historic area and the needs of a modern basically technology enterprise which really is what amherst media is and before i dive a little further into my presentation i do want to give jim lesko an opportunity to chime in and unmute himself i know he has a statement he'd like to present to the board before i continue so jim if you're available please go ahead a good evening madam chair and planning board members amherst media is architectural and site plans to build our new media facility on a gray street property has significantly evolved since we were last before you on march 20th of 2019 since that time we have secured a certificate of appropriateness from the local historic district commission as christine has already stated our journey to this point in time has been shaded publicly by those opposed to anything being built upon this parcel of land this included the widely distributed thought that amherst media was offered sufficient money for our land and part of land be turned over to the town as a park we were to move into one of the schools and everyone would be satisfied to quickly clarify the amount offered for our land was 25 percent less than the properties assessed value the town expressed concern and doubt regarding the allocation of funds to maintain the donated parkland and finally the preliminary discussions with the school department raised some limited possibility that would require an addition to be built to attached high school regardless of being told in editorials that we should accept this offer if we really cared about the amherst community or else we should expect no financial support for our capital campaign it is obvious amherst media did not agree with either part of that argument now we are in the midst of a COVID-19 pandemic the town's financial picture is very precarious the schools are trying to reorganize their classrooms and general facility space to accommodate the new state safety reopening mandate the proposals would not have been made everyone not have made everyone especially Amherst media satisfying we are here to offer an opportunity to the residents of Amherst to witness the construction of a new independent media center a center propped up on the shoulders of those residents and students staff and board members and most importantly viewers who for the past 44 years created captured and watched the political educational cultural history of this community it is within this building we see the publicly called for expansion of civic dialogue and interaction for all people the Amherst area and beyond to have the opportunity to be heard that has always been our mission and will continue to be so while the site plan you have tonight is not the same plan submitted by us last march this plan does however reflect the advice this body gave us the one piece of advice you gave that proved to be the most beneficial was quote to adhere closely to the recommendations made by the local historic district on quote the filing points for the recommendations the LHDC made to Amherst media and presented to you on march 20th 2019 one explore the possibility of placing the building on the east portion of the property two considering lowering the ridgeline of the building three examine alternative building forms that reflect the historic setting on the north side of the main street and four retain a professional registered architect suitable to design a building appropriate for the significant important property in Amherst the planning board reiterated the LHDC recommendations adding a desire for a 3d model lot size verification collaboration with Tom engineered explore alternative groundwater control and size and materials for all signage what was vehemently stressed by both yourselves and the LHDC was the need to and i quote secure a professional architect who can assist in looking at the project holistically with great sensitivity to the adjacent parcels and scenic view we followed your collective advice the level of professionalism in cooperation displayed by gilin collaborative and responding to LHDC commissioners and community input regarding the building's design was of the highest order we are equally appreciative of our site engineer bucky sparkle who overcame the numerous obstacles inherent to the property their expertise and high professional standards makes this submitted submit a worthy of public appreciation and support i'd like to now introduce you to again our site engineer back to bucky sparkle who will walk you through the submitted plans plans that reflect the LHDC certificate of reprogramminess and thank you for giving me this time thank you it's formal presentation time so in terms of an outline i'll get to the formal application request we'll do a little more background some of this has been covered so i can move quickly a little about the historic district commission process we'll talk about the site plan architecture content of the application there are a couple of waivers that we are looking for regarding parking and traffic and then we'll wrap it all up here tonight the formal request is that we are seeking site plan review approval under amherst bylaw section 3.330 non-profit educational institution we are requesting waivers from bylaws 7.004 point 103 11.22 i can't see it because there's stuff on my screen that has everybody's face on it you can probably read it and i can't that's funny oh wait 11.221 i figured out my technology and 11.2436 plus the planning board rules and regulations article 2 section 3b additional information item 6 the last three of those have to deal with traffic studies impact statements the first two of those have to do with with parking so i'll get into those details a little bit later we talked about some of the background i'll move quickly the lot was created by the previous owner of what is now the hendry hills house the zoning was changed in 2013 amherst media purchased it in 2013 after the zoning change there was a comment that the previous developer gedera presented a plan that was amherst media's proposal or something along those lines i want to be clear that that's not true that plan was not amherst media's plan that was a concoction of that owner and developer in fact if you look at the little tiny text on the side of that plan it says something like ssc building it was not for amherst media and that proposal was on the gray street side a three and a half story building so if people were happy with that back in the day we're proposing something much much smaller but i think that's just a minor misconception we did apply previously 2019 and brought in gillian collaborative architects who then spent several meetings going through the process of redesigning the site with the historic district commission and we earlier this year did receive a certificate of appropriateness jim already talked about these is do my job says we need to the board said hey get a get a more qualified architect we brought in gillian collaborative who if you're not aware is an architect bill gillian himself helped write the rules for the historic district the rules and regulations has been involved in many historic property projects in the town of amherst i don't think his offices are directly across the street from this project it has a vested interest in maintaining a beautiful view of henry hill's property and i don't think he could get a more perfect match for this project on this site in this town than gillian collaborative so i think it was a very lucky stroke that we were able to obtain them we did provide some 3d modeling for the historic district commission i'll show some screenshots from that basically we have adhered very closely to the historic district commission recommendations one of the strongest of which is move the building to the east which we have done the local historic district commission we had seven hearings with them between august and january that had a major impact on the site plan there were many versions of the building and the massing and the placement and juggling all the things that a building needs to have and the commission said you know you need to do a few things you know you definitely have to preserve the historic muscape so that was the primary thing we've done several things to change the building a little bit so that it fits both the residential character of the buildings on gray street because this is transitional property we have residential zoning and residential homes on one side of the lot the other side is business and there are businesses to the east and to the south so we wanted to have a facade that sort of reflected that and still be the character of historic buildings in order to put the building on the east side below part of the site we had to move the stormwater management system or portion of it just the infiltration to the uphill portion of the site so i have made water go uphill for this project and other things that the district commission said was we don't want any anything to block the view so we can't have any tall landscape features on the west side so we don't have any trees or similar plantings that would obfuscate the view and the commission did write a letter of support in addition to the certificate of appropriateness that letter was to the planning board and i'll just quote one sentence saying the commission approved the plans because the placement on the property makes the building consistent with the historic character of the district you'll find wording like that multiple times in the letter of support so we think we've done a really good job meeting the commission's requirements which were heavily based upon not just the commissioners opinions but a great degree of public input briefly uh the lot itself there was a question the lot size is 24,010 square feet according to our surveyors so just over a half and acre it's friendly vacant it's slopes to the southeast the parcel IDs have been stated for the record it is zoned neighborhood business historic district i also want to point out if you were to go to the master plan and look at the economic development uh the growth of existing businesses including creation of downtown business and mix you bucky uh you're cutting in and out oh no yeah i have a question jack you have something to ask what why maybe you should just call in with his phone and just use the audio on his phone is that possible and still share the screen yes you you stay where you are and add add another all right more technology here to get around my technology um and you sound okay but just it just started to start cutting up then okay it does not seem we're moving a wire yeah so you have a mic issue somewhere a short no wire i i guess i do you will need to mute his zoom microphone i will do that once i get us through thank you don't we can tell everyone who are the zoom experts now i thought i had this down all right so give me a second while i guess i talk to a computer and input the id can i just verify while i'm waiting it says three one three six two six six seven nine nine can you confirm the number i'm to dial that number should work yes it is ringing and then she'll bring you on you'll have to start i'm gonna say star nine oh it tells me to let me try it again three one three six two six three one six two six six seven nine nine i'm somewhere between laughing and crying right now keep breathing it'll be fine and i think there's a secondary number which is six four six eight seven six nine nine two three yes okay i'll try that one next because the other one went to a message is it asking you would push star nine it says no one is available to answer the call so i'll try the six four six number um six four six eight seven six his voice is coming through pretty well now i know okay well i'll just leave that number on on my screen yes so if we'll let you know if it starts to get weird again and we'll try the other news i'm and i do apologize i i have no idea why the tech is leaving laying down tonight don't worry that's murphy's law that's what of course i have at least a zoom meeting a week this is the first time i've had this problem so all right i'll i'll keep going here um i had been speaking a bit um about the master plan and the village center and just emphasizing that the type of development before this land is is very much in line with what the master plan and the village center ideas are so let's start looking at a couple of plans then this is the existing site right now the darker green is the property later green is residences around gray street is to the east main street is to the south it's presently open the original site plan showed a retaining wall on the northern property of 14 gray street some fencing shed a little bit of pavement landscaping that was all moved about two weeks ago so this existing condition plan is a little out of date and as much as there is now even less on the property there's a blank slate with a couple of stumps you can also see on this plan where we did soils testing which is in particularly important at this point but it could be later looking at the proposed site plan the simplified version of it here so the building in yellow and the parking area in gray you have a retaining wall on the northern side and i'm going to zoom in a little bit just so we can see some of the detail here i think that makes it bigger for everyone so you can see the retaining wall that will be a fieldstone retaining wall and more of a goshen stone style designed to match the existing retaining wall that belongs to 14 gray street we have an emergency egress only on the east side which is why it doesn't have a continued sidewalk the main entrance from the parking lot is on the northern side of the building in this area and then we have the pedestrian entrance for the main street that will have the sort of front entrance through here the parking lot is effectively sunken and well hidden by the building to the south and we'll see there's landscaping and other features we can get into that and briefly going to the dimensional regulations well we have nearly twice the lot area we need we have more than twice the punchage that we need we have the setback that we need and this i'll take a pause a moment there had been a point raised that bucky it happened again then okay um is it better now it is yes are you touching a wire or something i i am not touching anything i have a mic that sits on my desk and i'm not touching it so uh i i'm not sure what else to tell you right now but just keep letting me know don't lean back and look up right as long as you stay leaning forward is there a wire running on the floor no it no okay i'm sorry i wish i i wish i had better information here just okay let me know when i go out but the the setback issue i think is important to bring up at this point and that is because part of the bylaw indicates that for an educational use or religious use that the setback would normally be doubled for most zoning districts we had some confusion around this and the building commissioner rob mora wrote a letter this afternoon that clarified that section 6.6 does not apply to this application um and that the setbacks as shown are appropriate for the project so we have what we need and um that may come up later in the meeting but the commissioner has determined that we're okay you've cut out bucky okay um now you're back in thanks for letting me know we'll just have to manage this i guess help us on the table lean forward all right i'll get i'll get as close as i can here maybe that'll make a difference but so building coverage we're just over half of what's allowed a lot coverage we're you know what bucky you're gone again okay let me try the phone number try the other one let me let me i'm ready okay dialing for dollars could be thunder enlightening it could be yeah that's okay now he's an east captain i am in leads i just moved oh well it looks clear there did i make a pen um one phone call in listener yes okay where are you are you 4004 yes all right i'm going to move you into the panelists all right and i'm going to mute my pc's speaker here oh i can't move him into a panelist but i can allow him to tap let's try that okay so now now i'm in now you need to mute your computer basically yeah mute my mic is that better yes yes okay because i do need to hear everybody else talk but then my phone picks up that same sound um so the next question is am i able to manipulate so do you see the site plan now yes yes okay and then dimension okay so here we go again um uh just to cut it short we need all the dimensional regulations all right moving down the line here this is a drainage and utility plan what we are looking at is a let's see the details most of the utilities run out of the north side of the building connected gray street so the sanitary is in green we have blue for water we are proposing a hypothetical gas service doubt we'll ever get to use it but we at least wanted on the plan in case we have that opportunity we have power and communications coming from the nearby utility pole over the northeast corner and then all of the orange is the storm water management system we have the detention tanks these 12 000 gallons of underground storage through here with control structure that would feed a new storm manhole on gray street this has been reviewed and approved by jason skeels and we have on the west side the infiltration system which is all of this area through here involves a collection tank we collect the roof water we put it in the settling tank we have a recharge volume and a pump and that's how we get it uphill and in this orange shaded area is a pressure distribution system that will then disperse the storm water over a three-day period at a rate of roughly five one hundredths of an inch per hour so that's how we get the water back into the ground in a very slow drip fashion also we do have site lights proposed and we have a lighting plan later but we have two poles one on the west side one on the east side the height of those light fixtures is 10 feet we also have a bollard over on the east side to make sure that these parking spaces are reasonably illuminated and under each doorway oh we also have a building mounted light a wall light here that illuminates this arching section of the parking lot and above each door there's a light i'll talk a little more about lighting later i'm going to back out so this is the architects elevation drawing with approximate colors that they put together for the presentation and seeing what would the building look like when you're not a bird and we did receive unanimous approval from the historic district commission in terms of the certificate of appropriateness for this building this is the main street side this is the business east side of the building it's a broad structure it's about 105 feet wide and it has a relatively modest roof line considering there's a television studio underneath it it's a 26 foot high to the peak from the finish floor level and it has a nice entrance area a lot of glass fenestration and a series of other windows also we do have a sign a pin mounted sign over the main door and over on the edge of the the building on that side toward gray street it's a greek revival style and it definitely blends the residential and commercial character of the neighborhood going back in time just a little bit hopefully i won't give anybody tremors here this was what we were originally proposing came from a different designer who was not an architect familiar with historic district principles it met amherst media's internal needs very well but we we definitely understand why the community just thought that maybe this wasn't the most appropriate building so the outline of the new building has been transposed in that orangeish color and you can see that it's it's a lower structure it's a more elegant structure in almost every regard if we do want to get into details of the architecture and elevations i'm i'm happy to do so the only one i really want to point out at this point is the gray street view and vista so this is the east end of the building along gray street and this structure has is the part that is to blend much more with the residential feel of gray street so the peak of the roof while it is 26 feet high it is also not it is lower than the building just up the street and the width of the building is about 55 feet which is less than the width of some of the buildings abutting it so in terms of scale and mass it is a more diminutive structure and has a much more residential feel the entrance is more like an old-time you know classic new england front porch entrance uh even though this is not actually an entrance i will say this is just an emergency exit but from an aesthetic standpoint it's a residential look and feel looking a little bit on the inside i might have to drag this just to give a sense that there there is a television studio and a control room and another small studio so that takes up a good third of the inside of the building there are several offices for various tasks we have a conference room break room you know it's a business lobby and entrance as well as a computer center that and this is part of the educational aspect of this business here and looking at some of the views this is part of the 3d modeling that we're able to provide to the local historic district commission and uh there there could be a lot of information that we can go through so i'm going to try and minimize where i might bring attention so i'm going to look at the bird's eye view for a moment and so main street and gray street are here this is the property in the slight pink coloration and this is the dimensional model of the building itself relative to all of the other buildings so all of these buildings are to scale and we're developed by a UMass architecture student on our behalf and to give a sense of where things are relative to everything else you can see that the building height just to the east are fairly significant and quite in line with is being proposed on gray street the building across the street at 401 main street is actually a story to maybe a story and a half taller than this building so the large when you're coming down up and down main street you'll notice that 401 main street will be the the largest bulkiest tallest structure in the rear here we have the emmer's women's club and the henry hills house at 38 gray street and from this aerial i want to point out that if uh what there's a talk about view scape so we the old building was way over here on the west side it was located relatively in front of the henry hills building so we've moved it to the east as far as we can place it and the setbacks have been fine tuned by the historic district commission they wanted to match main street and gray street and what was in the neighborhood so that's what we've got and as far as taking if you were to be walking or driving up main street the objects that prevent a clear view of what was this is all once open lawn we now have you know beautiful homes here and trees so it is impossible to see the henry hills building until you are roughly here if you were driving westward or walking westward you wouldn't be able to see that building till you got pretty much to the end of the proposed amherst media building so the the building as we're showing it is making very little impact on the view scape and the the primary open and dead on view of that gorgeous architectural feature is fully unobstructed by our proposal and if we want to get into some of the other details of what you can see from where we certainly can but i do want to keep moving this presentation along looking a little bit at the landscaping zoom in a bit again what we are proposing are a couple of larger trees on the east side we have a disease resistant elm a white oak tree various perennials and shrubbery around the building and the smaller trees here are more diminutive like there's a magnolia there's a weeping ketsura and a service berry that will provide a lot of color and as well as some food for wildlife and importantly on the west side we have a bank of they look like boxwoods that's what is stuck in my head and what did i do there sorry i'm trying to get the name of that particular tree is it's called a steed Japanese holly it is a broadleaf evergreen tree if you know what a boxwood looks like that's it's very similar it looks nothing like an arborvite and we're glad that's the case arborvites are not they're not my favorite and definitely not the architects favorite this was a landscape plan it does have my title block but the landscape layout was designed by hand by taylor davis landscaping so they're really the brain trust behind this i can answer rudimentary questions on it but i'd have to go back to the landscaper if we get into you know what one species need versus another i was just the drops person on this particular plan moving on to the lighting plan we i talked briefly about it first i'll zoom back into the site itself we do have a photometric plan of foot candles that's what all the chaotic numbers and crosses are all over the paved areas so we we had a lot of conversation with the light designer here who is by the way oh now the name is escaping me but is the same light designer that has designed virtually every light that the town of amherst has installed in the last decade all the downtown lights the historic lights they're very familiar with amherst and the preferences of the municipality as well as many projects in town so they're they were a really good source for this particular project and we're trying to balance you know historic areas usually there isn't a lot of bright light so we were really trying to minimize and get down to just what was needed to provide safety and make sure that we're not you know crossing lot lines with any illumination so we've been pretty successful in that we have just a little bit of light on the sidewalk which will help if there are pedestrians when vehicles are coming and going we've got a nice gradient in this green areas for the sweet spot of light attenuation we have on the northern neighbor which is was about most concern of ours being a resident the vast majority of these points are zero point zero there is an odd anomaly and we talked to the guy about the model that even though we have zeros here here here here here somehow past it we have a couple of point ones point one and i do want to point that out because the late designer says that the software itself will it's not a glitch but its margin of error is zero point one foot candles so it's his opinion that since there are zeros in front and zeros all around it that that's just sort of statistical whirling in the software and i do want to point out that that this is there's a trench drain here and this part of that property is a relatively steep slope it's not a place where people hanging out there's quite a bit of plantings and vegetation through here so even if somehow the software was right and it went from dark to light again from zero to zero point one there are plantings that really the light would never get there anyway and it's nowhere near the building so that was a lot to say that i think we're good at the lot lines there are three lights that we do want to keep on for safety around the clock at night and those are the three lights over the doors all the lights in the parking lot will be on photometric sensors and timers and they're designed to turn off at 9 30 p m embers media closes at six but you know sometimes people stay overlay at work so we wanted to make sure that people were able to get in and out safely and have a dark parking lot at a reasonable hour adjacent to a residential neighborhood so even all of these values out here and in the street they would all blank out at zero at 9 30 p m and take a moment to look at the signs a little bit need to back up here so the the way the information was presented to me it comes in two sorts so we have what are pin mounted signs and i pointed these out on the facade of the building above the door and on the east side several feet off the ground these are attached to the building with pins they're only four entire letters so they're fairly diminutive and just adequate to be able to read from the street but definitely not distance a more ornamental sign is proposed on the site oh i should point out where that is so let me go back to here so on the north side of the driveway entrance is the ornamental sign so this will be a sign that would have a stone facade such that it will reflect the stone walls along the back of the retaining wall and the neighbor stone wall so going back to that image you can see the hand drawn sketches here from the architect where it's it's you know an elegant and fairly stately sign with the embers media logo and a stone facade that would match the goshen stone at the top it has a slate cap if you look in the cross section has a two foot wide slate cap a little hood for a led light that would just just like the face of the sign it's shielded on three sides so you would have to be directly under the sign to get any light bleed off from that the ends it's it's going to be on the ends in the north side all look like that stone wall that is pre-existing and we are going to match looking into getting away from some of the visuals and getting into the application content we we do have to talk about a management plan so quickly there isn't going to be a dumpster on this site it's just going to be barrels that are hauled off to the side when it's time for pickup professionals are going to handle landscape and snow the operating hours are i think 10 a.m. dimension that or 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and that's important to remember when we get into the traffic and school school scenario discussions as far as employees there are three full-time employees plus interns of a varying number and they're in a usually a part-time state as far as sound and storage and deliveries they're very minimal and similarly noise dust odor and building maintenance are also minimal all right so a little bit into the i said i talked more about parking so this is this is part of it so we the facility has been around i wrote down 45 years i realized it's only 44 years so i do have an error in my presentation i apologize but for 44 years amherst media has been operating they're well aware of what their parking needs are that this is not a new building a new office a new shopping center where people are making a guess about what they're going to need their needs are very well understood there are just three staff and a couple of interns a couple of short-term visitors that come and go for brief periods of time after reviewing their use and photos from the blessing of satellites or curse there of satellites the i've never seen more than four cars in the parking lot the amherst media says that they rarely rarely get over five vehicles in the parking lot and when i look at various photos historic data the average number of cars in the parking lot is 2.5 and this is one of the reasons that we feel that our waiver requests to have fewer parking spaces because we are requesting a parking spaces versus but the bylaw would normally require for an office which is 15 parking spaces so it's a it's a big difference however we know we don't have more than five cars at a time on this property and we also are very concerned about the site layout and the aesthetics we can hide in a car parking lot behind the building and at the bottom of a four foot slope and and add a little bit of shrubbery to the west side and those cars are going to virtually vanish from the main street and the triangle street perspectives you will of course be able to see into the parking lot from the driveway entrance on gray street but that is not a well-traveled not a well-traveled street except unless you're a student we can get into that a bit more and another reason that there are so few cars in a building of this size four and a half thousand square feet is that many of the users of this building are students or interns and they walk from school they ride their bikes they take the bus and the bus stop pvta is at the corner of gray and gray and main street so it is right there and that's one of the reasons one of the several reasons that Amherst media is interested in this site particularly is that it provides excellent public access to bus routes it provides excellent proximity to the high schools to the middle school to Amherst college and a short bus ride from UMass and these are many many of the visitors to this facility so the location on main street is is excellent and also significantly reduces the parking requirements for Amherst media and i do want to point out i know off or on street parking is sacrosanct you know you can't use it and we're not planning on using it but i do want to talk about the fact that it exists and there are 25 almost completely vacant parking spaces 24-7 on gray street that are on the same block you don't have to cross the street to go between Amherst media and a vast quantity of potentially overflow parking we have eight parking spaces we rarely need more than five on average we need two and a half but in the very very statistically unusual occurrence where we would have a full parking lot then there is safe and convenient parking that is almost never occupied adjacent to this building and i also want to point out that residential use of of street parking you know for a party or birthdays these are evenings and these are weekends where all of a sudden you get a big surge of parking for several hours those residential use peak times are not when this commercial business would be operating you know monday through friday 10 to 6 is usually not when somebody has a big party so in the extra rare occasion where Amherst media would need extra parking and residents of gray street would need extra parking these two things are not going to occur at the same time by any reasonable probability so it's sort of a the fallback position i know we can't use it officially but i just want to point out that it is available and it is substantially underutilized i know i sent a letter to the town which showed several satellite photos and they were usually zero cars parked there sometimes two cars parked there so there's quite a bit of availability all right this details a little bit with the traffic impact statements as well as waiver requests three of the five waiver requests are about traffic studies impact statements we're talking about an office with about three full-time staff here that would be driving we're not this another retail establishment or church or restaurant facilities that generate up to 20 times more traffic per square foot than a business and what we're really talking about is the use that's going to generate about as much traffic as one and a half residences so if you were to talk about you know adding one or two homes to gray street it would be extremely surprising for somebody say oh we should do a traffic impact study and see what impact one or two homes will have on gray street because it's pretty common sense that it would have virtually no impact and I do want to point out that and this is very important that it is understood that there is sometimes quite chaotic traffic on gray street with buses and young drivers people coming and going to the schools up gray street that traffic is real and it happens but it does not happen when Amherst media would be generating traffic these events occur at different times of the day Amherst media opens at 10 a.m schools are already in session by then school is let out and traffic is gone by 6 p.m when Amherst media closes and that's three staffs that work there would not be traveling at the hours that the understandable chaos that the schools generate occurs excuse me other than the schools gray street is a is a very low volume dead-end road I think when roughly that I know there's cross streets but it doesn't feed a larger neighborhood beyond during the sidewalk yesterday I did point out that I personally didn't notice one single car during the time we all met on site and maybe people noticed other things but when it's not school it's a very very quiet street additionally Amherst media's driveway is only 83 feet from Main Street it will be the first driveway so visitors to Amherst media are going to be coming from Main Street almost exclusively just because that's the nature of traffic in that part of town so the vehicles that would be traveling to Amherst media would not go in front of a single other driveway they don't drive down anybody's in front of anybody's house so the impact on gray street is is very very small I did mention that many of the visitors they don't drive they take the bus they bike they walk and it's I would say a bit of a hardship to have the traffic impact study done to demonstrate what I think logically in common sense I'm demonstrating now that there's very little traffic being generated by Amherst media for the situation moving on to comments we received two letters from Berkshire design group BDG this is an engineering company I have a lot of respect for and in this particular case they have been hired in by one of the neighbors that has the financial ability to bring in legal counsel and another engineering firm to do their best to make as look as bad as possible and that's their their right to do but the letter that we received first was about stormwater it had 13 points in it I did respond and provided a letter to the board as well as that other engineer the town engineer got it jason skeels had zero comments relative to the berkshire design group comments he had a few very minor points the largest of which was that he would like to see a belt and suspenders approach to make darn well sure that there's no possibility of ice ever coming over the sidewalk so he would like us to add a bit of a cut-off drain a curtain drain on part of the property just up hill the sidewalk which we're going to add to the plan just as jason recommended berkshire design group also provided a letter with 17 points regarding the site plan the vast majority of which were very minor and I talked about those in a letter and I'm happy to go into them but I'm doing a lot of talking here if you have questions we'll do that there was one point which I already touched upon that berkshire design group brought up and that was section 6.6 of the zoning bylaw and this is when my mic was cutting out so maybe I didn't make my point but 6.6 would say that an educational use or religious use would have to have a double setback requirement if you were to have a large church or a research facility or a dorm this makes an awful lot of sense the building is proposed while it does function and is you know charted to be an educational facility its use is really an office and it is a very small building relative to to a church or university building so doubling the setback doesn't make sense but more importantly and this is a quote from the building commissioner who released a letter this afternoon he says that section 6.6 of the zoning bylaw does not apply and the additional setback is not required so that's why I'm confident that the site as design does meet all the dimensional requirements of the town I am necessarily have to talk about waivers a little bit here I'll try and move through this quickly bylaw 7.004 talks about parking spaces and how many spaces the the gist of it is we are we're looking for eight instead of 15 and bylaw 7.90 allows waivers by the board for safety aesthetic and site design reasons we have very strong aesthetic and site design reasons in this particular case being in historic district primarily to preserve the viewscape this is a critical motivation for the plan and virtually every aspect of it the viewscape of course to the emmerce women's club which is mostly obscured by its own vegetation which is gorgeous but you can't see the building very well but really the Henry Hills house we we want we don't want to put a parking lot in front of that or we don't want to force the building to the west just to have 15 parking spaces when we only use two and a half parking spaces on average so additionally the historic district commission had stipulations that we did want to hide the cars we did want to preserve the lawn and even though that lawn on the west of the property is not no longer belongs to 38 Gray street Henry Hills it does still feel like it is contiguous and historically it was contiguous with that property so we are able to preserve that continuity and historic significance by having a small parking lot and it does also minimize the impact on the neighborhood the parking lot does meet all the design standards meet or exceeds them and the spaces of the eight proposed spaces also exceeds the building needs we have 44 years of parking and the average we have two and a half cars there almost never more than five cars so eight spaces are even that's going to be more than necessary almost every single day every hour of every day so we have confidence that the parking lot is proposed is more than adequate bylaw 7.103 this talks about you can't normally by the bylaw park a car within eight feet of the building or drive a car within five feet of the building and in a pre-submitted meeting with Mike Roy the fire safety officer fire safety officer I think is his title at the fire department he indicated that that rule is because there's concern about if a car catches fire we do not want to ignite the building that it's next to this is makes an awful lot of sense but he also said that well you can use fire retardant materials in the construction where you are less than eight feet from a parking space where we are less than five feet from a parking space and that takes care of the concern so this is what we're proposing we're we are using intermittent paint and or fire engineered materials within those areas of the construction just to ensure the the protection of the building itself that is definitely in Amherst media's interest as well going down the list all of these bylaw 11.221.2436 and the planning board rule and regulation dot dot dot item six talking about traffic study traffic reports traffic statements and I've always spoken about this a fair amount we are generating 12 to perhaps 20 trips per day that is about the same as one and a half residences peak hours only to see two or three trips if you look at them the numbers of it the access is off a low volume road off of gray street you know so long as it's not during school hours which we are not and there's the users of the building unlike a lot of offices do use public transit and walk and bike quite regularly so it diminishes the the traffic trip generation look this one says wrap up so I do want to mention that you know the project does address all the bylaw requirements we have followed the board's recommendations from 2019 we do have the support of the local historic district commission not just with the certificate of appropriateness but with an additional letter of support and we have made significant improvements to the building and to the site from its original our original submittal more than a year ago and substantially diminished the neighborhood impact and I would like to close with kind of a hypothetical of what if I really believe that this project is going to succeed in the permitting process but I do want to provide information to a small degree to the planning board but in a larger sense to the general public and the reality of what we're looking at two viable buildable lots on main street these are prime real estate in the historic district and if embers media is not successful then what happens next what if they're not successful and the project is denied so the land is going to be sold that is the logical next step and because if embers media's project after going through the process it has is not approvable then really no local small business is going to be willing to step in and pick this up so if in this business district somebody wants to buy the two lots that are there and use them as a single developable lot it's in all likelihood going to be some corporate entity so they're going to have a non-local interest they're going to have deep pockets and they're going to already know the history of these meetings and be ready to propose something that they think is going to work and they're going to have the wherewithal to to work that through the permitting process assuming they meet the regulations and appropriateness everybody has to do that but what's really more likely is that it won't be sold to a business it it will be left as two lots and sold as two single-family residences in the historic district and in that case many of the the dissenting perspectives that I've heard about this project the the concerns are made much worse with two single-family homes going up here for several reasons one and from a technical standpoint single-family homes do not have to manage their storm water so there's going to be increased runoff from the site the ici walk condition will in all likelihood continue and the the mitigation that is being offered by this commercial development is going to vanish that one of these lots only has frontage on main street in the turning lane so for them to get in and out of their house they're going to have to go through a relatively tricky intersection well not intersection but the lane widening it's it'll be a dicey little area to be getting in and out of from a residential driveway but is absolutely permissible by the bylaw and putting you know the the homes that would go up on these sites they're they're not going to be small little capes not not with the prime real estate in a historic district they're going to be commensurate with the large and beautiful homes on gray street so you will see a two-story home with an attic probably on each of these properties one of which is smack dab in front of the Henry Hills house so that viewscape is going to vanish they're going to have trees eventually and much of what people are fighting for to preserve this view is is going to be utterly lost when somebody comes and built a house there because the house doesn't go in front of the planning board goes in front of the historic district commission that you just have to provide appropriateness very very hard for any municipality as i know the board knows to say well you can't build here because we just don't want anything there if it's a buildable lot and the proposal meets the bylaw requirements the the building is is virtually guaranteed it has to be appropriate but it's almost certain to go forward as two single family homes if a project like embers media doesn't go forward and embers media is locally oriented it's been community service for many years they're going to manage their stormwater they're going to manage the stormwater coming at them from uphill from the embers women's club and from the Henry Hills house and this project pushed down to the east and low side of the site is going to really preserve the view of the Henry Hills building so these are things that i want the board to keep in mind and really the public to keep in mind that from my perspective that the embers media proposal is just about the best thing that could possibly be put on this property i know many people say nothing should go there if you want a bunch of property and had somebody tell you you can't build on it that's that's a bit of a problem to say property owner rates are real and this has been slated for development for a number of years so this this is what we're doing we're trying to meet the community needs and move forward with this village district and ideas for the town so with that thank you for your time and dealing with the technical difficulties i've been managing here and i turn it over now to the board for questions comments we'll go back and forth a little bit i'll turn my volume up and hopefully if you get echoey let me know but thank you thank you mr sparkles no that was all very informative and to be expected a lot of information um we'll give you a break for a minute um and that might be a good time for us to do our site visit report and then we'll do questions um from the board uh jack jumpsick i think volunteered to do the site visit report are you can you do that jack yes um so yeah a group of us met there i think everybody uh except Doug and Maria um and they had outlined the footprint of the building with a string and had a survey tripod set up with the with the actually the survey uh stick ruler whatever that so we get an idea of not only the horizontal layout of the structure but as well as the height of the crust of the of the roof line and on different ends of the building too as well so that was uh it was a very good site visit in terms of seeing what had happened we observed that the drainage coming from the henry hills house was converted into an underground drain that connects to the to the sewer on gray street uh so we saw you know a disturbed area as a result of that that obviously looked like it probably remedied quite a bit with regard to the storm water uh or the surface water runoff that was coming off the uphill property we observed the new retaining wall on the abutting house to the north on gray street um and and then what else would we talk about anyway just just general background yeah i think that's that was basically a um chris do you have anything else to add in regard to questions that were asked or anything and will a report eventually be generated from that um i can write a report if you would like me to that would probably be a good idea i took a lot of notes during the site visit one thing that we did note was that um what mr sparkle said with regard to the view of the henry hills house there are some birch trees that currently block the view of the hills house until you get past the birch trees when you're coming from the east so the we observe that the west end of the building is going to be roughly where those birch trees are so you have to so you'd get past the building and you'd be able to see the hills house immediately past the new building if it does get built we talked about the fact that the western portion of the lot would be relatively the same as it is now i think it's going to be raised 10 inches and graded to meet the surrounding grade so we we sort of noted where that was going to be and we talked about what the entrance where the entrance drive would be over towards the east and we also talked about the fact that the town when it was constructing the turning lane onto triangle street encroached onto the samurse media property and that the town is going to obtain an easement for members media because of that encroachment i think that's it great um yeah the only other thing i want to add is it's great having this slide up right now that when we stood to the west of where the building is proposed that you can see the building is actually sunk a little bit into the hill you can kind of see that there um and as jack was referencing we actually had like a ruler showing the end of that building will be about 18 or 19 feet up and um chris talked about adding they're going to grade a little bit more right to that to the left there on the west side i think mr sparkle had said it was like 10 inches of dirt or something that would be spread over that area and raise it a little bit which will only hide this building even more and i think the peak the center part you can see there i think that was 26 feet correct me if i'm wrong mr sparkle or someone um i think that height was 26 which is equal or less than the next building that is to the north of it the residential house so that was a lot thanks jack um at this point i'm going to open up to questions for from the board um but i just want to clarify one thing we will be this hearing will be continued to our next planning board meeting uh which i believe i think is the 15th yeah for two weeks from now the 15th so we got a tremendous amount of documentation with this project that we've been all reading and going through and we will have time later to get into the weeds of different letters and reports that we have um tonight i would like to focus board questions on the presentation that happened and questions that can be um given to mr sparkle or the architect mr gillen um or even uh amherst media itself their representative so at this time i see one hand um and when i don't see any more hands in a bit if we don't have more questions for tonight then i will open it up for public comment and um so i see dug and then i have jack i don't actually have a question for anyone but i did want to take the opportunity at the start of this deliberation to state what i understand to be our role in this process and that is uh contrary to what a number of neighbors and maybe other people in the community uh think we are not in the position of prohibiting or stopping this project uh the owner of this property has the right to build on the property and we are here to review and help optimize the site plan for uh in consideration of the surrounding neighborhood so you know people don't like it you know this has come been been a project that's been coming for a number of years and uh unless the town or somebody else wants to buy the property and uh that something's going to be built here that's all i want thank you Doug uh just so to remind everyone that is what we're addressing tight word addressing a site plan review and not a special permit um so uh it jack you're next and then i uh michael's next um yes i i was just looking at a pdf and uh i lost it um anyway i thought that the presentation was excellent uh very thorough uh this design uh just i don't want to say it's flawless but it is so much improved and uh and uh quite impressive and i know the storm water was something you had to solve so i'm glad that you you figured something out uh in that regard and and i guess i had okay here i have the diagram it's your grading drainage and utilities plan sheet 414 and um you know i it appears that you addressed the comments by uh bursher design group which is fine and then you know the city engineer or town engineer did not have any comments subsequent to that um and i just i guess i'm just curious about the storm water the the water that's going up into the field is that all just uh water from the roof only all right i think i'm back online you are we can hear you um so the roof water the vast majority of that water is being collected um i think i'm getting it i can hang on let me there is a little echo i'll turn you down here um turn me down that's so odd most of the roof water is being collected and through gutters and brought in there's a little pipe back here i'm gonna zoom in a bit um a pipe back here that collects water from the roof and a pipe through here that collects water from the roof a gutter system um and uh that that water is considered clean as it it doesn't have any runoff from the earth it's not a metal roof uh we are also there's a catch basin down here so in addition to the roof area um which is i should say that there is a minimum of 65 percent of the impervious area that's being created that we capture that and insultrate that on an average annual basis the roof area is not sufficient to achieve 65 percent however uh if you were to look at the property so you can see that there's a slope you know these contours that run this way we have a slope coming at us from the Amherst swimming club and 38 Gray street that brings in two and a half acres of water into our system that flows over the ground and we're a half acre site so we are collecting two and a half acres of runoff and through this catch basin and then we are more than meeting our recharge requirement in fact we are going to be putting a huge volume of water back into the earth far more than is necessary just because we're going to be collecting it and in times where overflows which will occasionally happen the overflow will go through the pipe system through our detention system be detained in most circumstances and then go to the town's storm drain i'll point out that right now there's a catch basin uh on the street here and catch basins on the street here that are collecting the runoff from all of the what is now grass area so it goes directly to the town's drain system in this current condition including over the sidewalk which is part of that icy condition so we're grabbing that water we're putting it through a settling tank we're grabbing a volume of it we're pumping it into this it's not really a drain field it's it's an irrigation system in some ways it's a very specialized tubing with small emitters but we're going to be recharging with roof water as well as the currently unmitigated runoff from the 38 main and the Amherst women's club great well well thank you it looks like a very smart design i'm glad you were able to engineer something where you're able to move the building to the east and make use of the the free board above the water table over there on the on the west side for the infiltration that you needed to have so nice job i grew as an engineer on this particular design so uh it was good thank you for the compliment okay uh next is michael and then maria thank you i echo every what everyone's been saying uh particularly uh doug's point that uh we are here to improve the project if we can and not to uh to block it i i would i recall when i first moved to town and when i lived in the dickinson house for not 10 years uh that the hills house and the women's club both had huge lawns in front of them and there were no buildings on the side of gray street up to the women's club up to where the boys girls club was at that point and that was a beautiful landscape um and i wish that were still a beautiful landscape and it is not uh i think uh mr gillum and mr sparkler put together an excellent solution to uh the need for and the inevitability of a building on this site much as i would hate much as i hate to see a building on this site nonetheless there's going to be one and this is going to be a good one i think i do have one question relative to the studio usage and its relationship to the amount of parking that's provided um i don't know exactly what kind of studio production activities are planned uh i do know that uh when you have studio production you have a certain number of technical personnel involved and a certain number of on-camera people uh i can't imagine many fewer than five or six people uh involved in any kind of even modestly complex program uh i'd like to hear uh someone from embers media speak to uh what their production schedule is in the building and how many people that generates and what kind of uh building usage it it involves other than the three people who are staff people who work there on a regular basis jim i hope you can address that question uh i think i'll try can you hear me yes we can yeah okay um the question is kind of making me almost smile and it hurts is that during the pandemic our studio's sitting there pretty much empty at the moment but when we were up previous to the pandemic uh you usually have a host and two guests at the most uh with sometimes one uh camera person and one person to two people in our control room so with three staff members taking that you're looking at just a minimum of three people coming in for a half an hour or an hour uh we don't do big productions in the sense of like plays or some things like that so it's a very small number of the few number of people but also for a short period of time i hope does that answer your question uh yes thank you okay um i recognize maria um thank you bucky for that uh marathon presentation that was really i have to say this is exactly what this site needed a really careful look by professionals to really examine what this site needed for this amenity of amorce media and um i just want to thank both amorce media and this design team engineering team for their dedication to carefully examining this and responding to multiple boards and members of the public um i i mean jack wasn't too far off when he said this is just you know this is perfect as well as i i really think this is just what the site needed it needs to hide the parking but provide just enough so that the site could be preserved the views could be preserved architecture matches the the context really nicely and um and yeah i just want to thank the whole team and the staff at town hall for their dedication as well to really make this project come together because it's such an amenity we really need amorce media like all the public has been saying and um we just really need a good building for this site and i i think it's the most appropriate thing they can do with the spaces they have and the topography um and you know as far as the neighbors concerns um i think like on another project we're saying you know these are members of the community they're going to be good neighbors they're going to respond to when something comes up they're not going to just you know put on blinders so um i'm sure amorce media is the same way and so um anything to do with traffic or noise or lights you know those things will be worked out they're not going to turn a blind eye but um but i just want to really thank everyone's hard work over the last year on this um this design and engineering it's just um it's just what the site did i i really i think the only thing i had was um you know you said you had no dumpsters so you just have those rolling bins just think about where they might be located because you know like one's garbage it might be smelly so it might still be outside somewhere but um but really i honestly it's just um i don't really see any issues at all and um it's already been so thoroughly vetted by so many boards and people that um i feel like we just need a few key bits of information about some stormwater or some sort of code related issues but honestly i think as far as the um overall design um i just really appreciate all the hard work that's gone behind it and it turned out great right um so i'm not seeing any other hands at this time and i'm going to move to public comment um and i just want to reiterate that i agree with what my other fellow board members are saying this is a well thought out well detailed well engineered um just so many aspects have been um entered into this design and i thank Amherst media for being flexible and this is a very modest design um and they've really tried to i think get away with as little as they can to not have an overly large building and uh looking at the waivers that are being requested you know they're they're not going to have an impact on the traffic um there's no need for that in my mind um you know those eight parking spots and they've really detailed like how the hours of operation um and if there are existing traffic issues in the area this uh facility will not be making it worse so um and the parking spaces uh i always feel don't build more parking than you need so i think they've adequately addressed their needs and like they said it's not the full answer but there's a whole street of parking over 20 25 spots that are out there that are needed you know if they are needed for an hour or two um and that's what they're there for so um i still see no other hands so i'm going to move to the attendees now and i remind everyone if you're going to speak say your name your address and um you do have up to three minutes but you know think of everyone's time um and try to be efficient with your speaking and then just remute yourself after you're done so at this point i'm only seeing one hand um if there's any other people who want to speak tonight oh there's some more hands going up now okay so i'm seeing four hands um and pam you're gonna work with me here i'm gonna see the first one is daniel finnegan and i'm gonna click allow to talk or pam did good um so welcome um again just introduce yourself you're still muted i can see that you can hear me now i can welcome okay thank you very much my name is dan finnegan i'm an attorney and i represent harmsway llc which owns the property at 38 gray street um just just a just a couple of comments i just i just wanted to address the issue that bucky raised about the setback um i know he has a letter from the building inspector i haven't seen or had a chance to review that letter i am just going to tell you that i just do not be away in which section 6.6 does not apply to this project um they chose to characterize themselves as an educational use that was their choice they got a benefit from characterizing themselves as an educational use they got to avoid going to the dba for a special permit now they want to turn around and say for purposes of the dimensional requirements they're not an educational use section 6.6 says and i'm quoting it all structures approved after january 1 1994 by a permit granting authority for educational uses which will have a minimum setbacks twice the distance shown on table three there's no ambiguity in that if they're not going to be treated as an educational use for the setback requirement then they have to go to the planning board for a excuse me the zoning board of appeals for a special permit for the the use in general they can't have their cake you need it to they can't be treated as an educational use for one circumstance one section of the bylaw and not as an educational use for another so i just wanted to point that out i do think as a result of that they're here prematurely this needs a variance from the zoning board of appeals given that setback requirement and i don't think at the end of the day it's tenable again to say that they get to characterize themselves as educational in one circumstance and not educational in another so that's the only issue i have tonight i may want to speak again after reviewing the letter or on some other issues of when the hearing reconvenes on the 15th if that's okay with the with the board and i think there are other representatives uh chris chamberlain from berkshire design who may want to speak tonight as well thank you um i next see demetria shabazz if we allow great welcome miss shabazz i don't know why we're not hearing you you are don't appear to be muted miss shabazz you there oh pam are you doing that i am not interesting hello can you all hear me yes we can okay yeah it took a while to figure out i don't know what's going on uh thank you i am demetria shabazz i am uh the president of the board of directors at amherst media and i just wanted to uh thank you all for reviewing our new plan it's been a little over a year since march 2019 when we met with this body and sought approval for our design as you can see we've taken your advice i remember maria stating very um you know succinctly that we needed some experts to help us out appreciate that sought help from the experts in the field gillian and associates and architects and of course you you saw our brilliant engineer bucky and uh carefully and thoughtfully we created an attractive and what we feel is a suitable building we brought this new design to the historic commission through several meetings the lhdc made substantive uh suggestions that in the end we feel that made the project better we have a design that meets our needs and respects them we just lost and we hope the planning both in the end agrees so that we can begin building our long awaited home and i just wanted to say again thank you thank you all right i see four more hands so i'll go to mathiam uh massingill do you see that pam i do you should be ready are you there not missing go he's muted yeah how about now yes we can hear you now can hear you so um i just have some since it's a first night i just have some uh just general thoughts about um some of the things that are can you introduce yourself and give your address first and then i need to turn to mathiam massingill i live at 12 77 south east street i also represent harm's way uh the owners of the hill house okay thank you i wanted to clarify just a couple of points um and a couple of concerns i have uh first and foremost uh the owners of the hill house that's a single family residence that's not a bed and breakfast okay it is uh robert and tony um are raising their their small children at the house um and and they're good neighbors they are not suing the town of amherst nor are robert and tony suing the local historic district amherst media is suing the local historic commission in the pioneer piley planning commission all right i want to make sure to get people understand it we shouldn't just assume because i heard it several times tonight that the neighbors are well funded bucky has made it a point in letters and telling you tonight how amers that my clients have all this money and that they are just spending this money and hiring whomever they want to do whatever they want my clients are good neighbors they want um they want a nice resolution of this property they are not the issue and this when the board and members and when bucky turns this around and says that amherst uh that amherst media is totally innocent but the clients up the hill are causing problems it's just unfounded and just one last point this this letter from rob mora i don't i don't understand why this was not presented to the public if bucky got a letter from rob mora the town should either posted this letter or circulated the letters they knew that we were around and we would like to see what he had to say that's all i have for tonight thank you the next uh and the q i c is a felicity hardy hi can you hear me we can welcome hi i i do use my um professional name felicity hardy but uh actually this evening i'm speaking as a resident of amherst and in that uh regard i'm known as felicity barry so i use my married nato home i live at 574 station road in amherst welcome thank you i'd like to make a point about the parking um for further consideration and deliberation by the board uh when it next convenes and that is that while mr. sparkle has suggested that this site plan uh presents eight parking spaces in fact it's quite a few fewer parking spaces um because there are four parking spaces that run along the north side of the parcel that will be immediately adjacent to the retaining wall and so what will happen with those parking spaces is that the drivers will be able to exit the cars but nobody else would be able to exit the cars so you know i think it's he's drawn in lines to indicate that there are eight spaces but in fact all of the spaces on the north side are essentially unusable because they can only be accessed by the driver because they're parallel parking and they're going to be against a retaining wall which is right against the property line so i'm sure there are going to be many other comments um and concerns raised during the course of this hearing but that's one that i'd like to get on the table um at the outset which is amherst media really is supposed to be building 15 parking spaces they're proposing eight and in fact at least four are essentially unusable thanks for your time this evening thank you the next in the queue i see uh chris uh chamberlain and i'll turn you on there we go are we am i on now you are chris love these pandemic public hearings um and welcome yeah thank you please yes i will i'm chris chamberlain i'm a professional engineer with berkshire design group uh i bucky made reference to a couple of the letters that i wrote um a little bit earlier um you know i am i was brought on um by some of the budding property owners to do an engineering review plans um and uh despite working for um folks who who as it's known are opposing the project you know as an engineer i've got a professional obligation toward objectivity just like bucky does um representing his applicants and so in those letters you know sort of take the uh the point of uh just like we would for a peer review on behalf of the town really just trying to make sure that the board has the perspective of what an engineer might see in some of the plans uh and how they compare with good engineering practice and some of the bylaw standards and so we submitted a couple of letters uh we received bucky's responses to some of them uh he addressed the comments that we made uh sometimes uh in in ways that reasonably resolved them in other cases there's still components that that we see is problematic and i just wanted to highlight um the couple that that stand out for us still um the first one is the retaining wall on the north side of the property um you know we've got concerns about the constructability of that wall as it's presented it's a five-foot retaining wall supporting a neighboring property which has a large tree at the top also a driveway um the way the plans are drawn it appears as though that's to be built with a seven-foot unsupported cut which is pretty concerning right along a property line um and you know one of our recommendations was that a supportive excavation plan be provided to show how that um work can be done safely um the comment the the response to the comment that we got was well that the contractor is confident that the wall can be built i've worked with a lot of contractors in my career i know bucky has two and sometimes those promises fall short um nothing bad to say about the contractor on board they are a good group um and then regarding the design um you know we'd be curious if uh the submitted site plan is the only stamped plan of the wall that's going to be submitted um if it is you know the the design doesn't detail any of the assumptions or loading requirements or assumptions about the soil pressures if the the issue is if this wall were in the middle of the site it's something that could be probably solved down the road but if the wall has to move at all as the result of design changes it impacts the parking lot which is already tight and problematic which is the the second piece that that i wanted to touch on you know the bylaw requires that parking lots have quote adequate access and maneuvering areas um and we identified a number of concerns on along those lines in our initial letter um you know among the responses that were given was that an 18 foot driveway is provided and that's what was required that's all well and good but driveways and access aisles are not necessarily the same thing and those dimensions are minimums but the standard is still the maneuverability um you know we pointed out that some of the tracking analysis that was provided in the plans shows that it actually is quite difficult to get in and out of this parking lot the response to that comment was that well it's a full-size passenger vehicle like a full-size pickup truck and to you know and and so we would reply that yes it shows that there's problematic maneuvering with a full-size passenger vehicle um it was also uh responded that it's really only a problem if the parking lot is full and it's uh almost never going to be full but you know as you know my opinion is that if the parking lot is not maneuverable when it's full then it's then it's not functional um and even in that case if there were four or five vehicles parked in the right spots it may still act as full even if it's not actually full um and so you know that is as you know not nitpicky stuff but really fundamental to to the site plan here um and then you know finally touching on the stormwater management system you know obviously sir i can just let you know your four minutes in so sorry just no engineer it is my last point um is that with the stormwater management plan you know commend bucky on doing a lot of work on on this project um but you know we raised the concern about the initial stormwater uh calculations didn't account for the uphill flow onto the site um that was uh revised and he did look at that but at the end of the day i know jason skills is comfortable with it and that's fine um but the stormwater analysis does show that in the two in the 10-year storm uh runoff has increased from the site which is which is not the standard um it's sort of up to the boards uh how to see that um so those are just the things i wanted to highlight um you know got the last response letter today we may fill in some more detail before the next hearing we'll see thank you for the time thank you next i see uh lc federman you can unmute your staff you are you should be set i'm lc federman uh on logtown road had been a resident of amherst for over 40 years and i just want to say that i really depend on amherst media for everything that's going on 93 years old and i find all of their services i just so wonderful and then i just recently they just got an award they got a grant from the humanities council to produce a documentary about holocaust survive the starting a temple and the kind of work that they're doing and i just want to say i went to practically every one of the meetings of the historical commission and i heard bill gillen i heard the different presentations and i just want to know if there's anything i can do as a community member of over 40 years to let everyone know whether it's the planning board or anyone else how valuable amherst media is to amherst thank you for calling in i see one last hand um christopher godara and this is the last hand i see in the public comment for tonight okay are you there mr. godara yes i am thank you can you hear me now yes we can welcome thank you very much um the one i just want to say one point which is um well actually two one is that um uh i i don't want to assume that everybody knows the um the experience of orchard design with water flow and management they're the ones who corrected the problem that had been caused in the first place there i didn't say that uh the properties two properties that about this i manage my family owns 14 gray street to the north and 446 main street to the east are both our properties so um the the one thing i want to say though is that um what was not mentioned before when there was uh talk about if if amherst media doesn't get to build this it doesn't get approved and it'll be sold in two more residential buildings will go up um what perhaps could have also been mentioned then is the fact that one one or more neighbors have offered to purchase repeatedly this property and donate half of it if i'm not mistaken donate half of it to the town the part where the building is going up and keeping the other half uh donating that first half as a park area to be left open and leaving the other part open as their own property so um i i don't know if this is news to anybody in this meeting but this has been brought up many many times so i'm surprised that that this was not presented and instead it was presented as um as uh other buildings will go up that's my only point thank you thank you so i see no other hands at this point i'm going back to the board um i'm taking all right so time it's it's 941 um we've been over three hours into this and we still have other things for tonight um i suggest at this point we um oh we're not we're postponing or uh rescheduling it for the 15th are there any board members who would like to make a motion i also throw out there chris bestrip is there anything you want to say should we reiterate any things that we're hoping that will come back to us um for next time um i think i'm going to look at the development application report and probably revise it i think we submitted a a draft development application report and we've received a lot of extra information um tonight and so we're gonna do that and i also wanted to um you know remind people that um they can always email me or call me to say um what's the latest information that you've received so we're not holding back any information we're not posting this information on the website like we do for some really big projects but um if anybody wants information they can certainly email me and i'll be happy to send it to them okay the only thing i could think of is um some more details Mr. Sparkle on this retaining wall just how high it is we were hearing people say five feet yet when we were at the site visit i know parts sounded more like we're only two feet high so maybe if we could have a drawing um showing the elevations are you there mr. Sparkle yes i i do hear you christine uh that you're interested in perhaps an elevation view of the retaining wall it's probably worth our going out there and reevaluating the grade as we know that there was a construction through there and it seems to me that the elevation is actually now lower which would lower the height of the retaining wall um but that'll just happen so i can definitely bring that to the next meeting i expect i think i can get that information done and at least an elevation drawing done and if i could have a minute or two just to briefly uh address the public comments and normally i get a bunch of time and i know we're gonna have uh another meeting on this and it's late uh but it's also fresh may i may i do that christine sure all right thank you um just the things that caught my attention um you know uh dana finnegan the attorney would like to see rob more's letter i'm happy to provide it i would be quoting it now is to say his reasoning but i i think it's sound reasoning why the educational use does not necessarily necessarily apply to each and every application to section six point six um uh is is not a blanket statement according to to rob and that's those are my words of paraphrase um i i uh we heard from attorney matt masochil the second attorney um for this presumably not well funded a butter and they uh talked about emerson media is causing problem and causing lawsuit this is a very convoluted situation that i know i am not uh you know in in the legal note to talk about and if we do need to get into legal concerns i would be great to know that so we can be sure that our attorney is able to address those things because i know i'm not qualified it is not just as simple as uh emerson being some too happy organization they are not a well funded organization um and we heard from um felicity hardy who uh is going by another name i didn't drop that down i apologize felicity uh as a resident of course she was previously the another the third attorney representing harm's way but tonight she's not speaking as that and did talk about parking spaces um the those parking spaces are a little extra wide and there is a green strip buffer between the pavement and the wall so there is adequate space to get out it is uh again i talked at the same meeting it's a it's a tight parking lot but it will work and of course most people in this country drive around with just one person in the car and all those individuals would be the drivers easy to get out um the matter of retainer wall constructability with virtual design group and we're talking about matters of opinion here uh technical opinion we'll try and provide more information um and we'll start about storm water we can get into that um if we do allow and we don't have to we could just let the neighbor's water go around our site and just ice up the sidewalk that we can do that we don't want to do that um so we are achieving uh discharge rates during uh very heavy storms the two year and the 10 year storms of a hundred and six percent and a hundred and two percent of the ideal guideline for discharge so smaller storms than that which are most storms aren't aren't going to have that problem and one way to fix the problem is to just let that water run around our site but it makes a lot more sense to put it underground not have it go over the sidewalk and put it back into the ground uh through groundwater recharge we heard about purchase offers uh it's true offers have been made as Jim Roscoe said earlier this evening those offers were substantially undervalued and that's just the cost of the land it doesn't include the the time and effort and multiple building design years of design development professionals like myself that have been involved uh attorneys that have unnecessarily and unfortunately had to be involved uh as well as the fact that Amherst media is uh being evicted from their current place and they don't have a lot of options down they've been trying for years I think it looks at over two dozen locations so the the amount of money that somebody could just come in and right away Amherst media's investment and problems and the the stakes that it would be facing and potentially ceasing to exist there's no monetary offer anywhere near that that I am aware of as well as the fact that the town is not interested in owning a park here so it it's not really uh I mean that's is there red herring is that the word um but I thank you for allowing me to address those few uh public comments which were almost exclusively from representatives of harm's way and we'll come back next time with some more information on the retaining wall as far as height and elevation uh is there anything else that I can do for the board tonight um thank you for that response I usually look for the handrails and I and maybe you're not yeah we're having our technical so thank you for speaking up um so great um and stay there Mr. Sparkle because I'm going to and um call on some board members and they might have some additional suggestions or questions for you yeah so at this point I see uh Janet Doug and Michael so I'll call on Janet first hello um so I just want to say at the beginning is that I see the planning board as enforcing the bylaws requirements and approving projects that meet them and that's the requirement we have in site planning view is that the project has to conform with the bylaws requirements and so that's sort of my framing or understanding of what what I'm doing here what we're doing here um I I have a bunch of just a few issues I'd like to bring up um so hopefully we can talk about them next week or in two weeks um I was very concerned about the um section 6.6 about whether it was a 10 foot set foot or 20 if we were in special permit or site plan review so I would like to see Rob Moore's letter and understand that because at first blush um I thought those that was concerning I also looked at this very late in the afternoon um I had a question you know because I know how important this view of the Henry Hills house I know I know um I was wondering if the building could be pulled a little bit closer to Gray Street in what you know if that was considered or rejected or the um with the historic commission about that um I do want to say that I drive by ACTB all the time and there are very few cars in the parking lot like noticeably few um the other thing I'm kind of concerned about I have really no way of dressing with my background is the stormwater issues and I understand Jason's skills and saying well we don't usually model uphill watershed you know water water coming off of uphill sites and not being concerned about that and I appreciate the effort to try to take the water from those two lots I also was driving around on Thursday by hospital hill because I was I was driving by I thought oh this is you know a 40 r project with form big zoning I think I'll take a look at it and at the bottom of hospital hill on the west side there were about 10 neighbors all with umbrellas and there was a huge pile of water at the bottom like right in front of the last house and it was such it's so deep that I didn't want to go through with my forester and I thought nobody designed this project thinking this would happen and it wasn't I mean I'm sure they had a cloud burst I'm sure it was intense but I just I don't I can't address those stormwater issues but I really those are important to me that the project really hold together so I'd like more information or more back and forth or some consideration for that if there's serious questions I don't have a way of resolving them but I'm very interested in that and so I think that's pretty much it for what I can see but I do recognize that this property really has been in contention for a long time you know it came to us in town meeting to rezone the historical commission wanted to buy it but the price they couldn't meet the price of the previous owner and there's a lot of feeling on this and I just want to acknowledge that and I was completely dreading this project because I just had been I voted against the rezoning in town meeting I love that view and I have to say that I am very impressed by what we're looking at it's it's you know it's you know being on the site and looking around and I could see the effort and time and thoughtfulness you know and the seven hearings produce something you know so I appreciate the effort of the historic commission and actv and everybody so thank you okay um and now I recognize Doug and then there'll be Michael okay I uh I wanted to say to Bucky that for the next meeting I would like to have very detailed information about the tiebacks that are used to stabilize the retaining wall and uh some clarity about the relationship of those tiebacks to the property line since I assume you need to keep them on your side of the property line in order to not run afoul of the neighbor who is clearly not excited about the project um secondly it sounded like Christine was looking for a motion to continue the conversation to another meeting uh am I right Christine that it was yes you are the July 15th meeting yes so that's going to be another fun one um aren't they all chris we have a time that we can nail this too yeah so okay I'll make a motion that we continue the hearing to uh July 15th meeting um and I'll end my comments there thank you and if chris you can add a time I think that's going to be 635 we do not have any other public hearing scheduled for that night unless Pam um corrects me about that and if uh I'll take a shot that I'm aware of chris okay I'll take a shout out if someone wants to second that well I had my hand up I was going to make the same motion so I'll second it right fantastic okay so um any so uh I'll put down Doug's hand and Michael's so is there any discussion of problem with that any hands I'm not seeing any okay so um roll call yep I'm looking for my list again Michael roll call if you uh I don't hear you Michael whoops yes yes Maria uh yes David yes jack yes Doug yes janet yes and myself so I think that's unanimous so thank you um everyone who came tonight um and we will uh continue this at 635 on the 15th of July we'll be taking public comment again and again as miss bestrup said people can always reach out to her and I'm sure she'll be in contact with most of these people thank you particularly mr sparkle you're welcome I don't know if you can still hear me but yes I'll come up with a new microphone new microphone next time I promise and are you still sharing your screen or um I am so I can stop that thank you here we go hey welcome back still there all right so um thank you and we'll see you in a couple weeks yes thank you very much good night good night thank you all right so the board we'll move on to item uh four old business item a master plan update and zoning bylaw rewrite discussion about schedules and priorities um chris would you like to speak on this first or do you want me to speak or well I can speak very briefly um which is to say that um there's been a lot of work that the planning board planning department staff has been doing on things other than the master plan and the zoning bylaw rewrite we've been working very hard to help the businesses downtown to get started again so that they can um you know come back out of this uh COVID-19 epidemic so really we haven't done much on the master plan since um March 18th I think and more recently we did talk a little about it we have received comments from planning board members and um so that's all I can really say about the master plan the zoning bylaw rewrite seems to be really more um of a priority to uh people that I've been speaking with planning board members um town council CRC and um just people in general so um we've been considering uh kind of putting the master plan potentially in a little bit of a holding pattern and um moving on to the zoning bylaw which I think you know in the end everybody is really eager to make changes to the zoning bylaw including myself and um Rob Maher and the building commissioner so that's all I really have to say about that um so maybe Christine can can carry on from here okay thanks um I'm sure as the other members have been giving us a lot of thought um so if we zip back in time for COVID and last year and we were trying to sort of um sort ourselves out on our priorities and and what we wanted to focus on but yet we also got some direction from the town council and CRC which was that town council's desire was to have a master plan update which is needed to be done um and was overdue but they wanted an update so that they would feel more comfortable with adopting the current master plan and with that adoption then they were going to be willing to um feel more confident moving forward and bylaw changes well a lot has happened since then and my feeling is that I would like to put the master plan update on a hold um and potentially for like a year because even if we were working on an update we're not sure how we're gonna come out on the other side of this COVID thing when it's gonna end when we're gonna get back to normal or what kind of economic development damage is happening or um what the situation will be so I think in some ways we're smarter just to wait but with that when I'm asking you all is what are your thoughts about us voting and having a recommendation to town council to say hey can you rethink this um and remove this sort of request you put on us and we would like to focus on getting bylaw changes done over the next year so that's my little statement and please raise your hands and I'll call on you I see David um I'll call on David he's the only hand I see right now hi thanks um yeah I would support that and I'd be willing to make a motion to move this thing along um I think that uh chris and the planning department's time is the most valuable resource that town has the planning right now and that that's time that's not well spent um revising the master plan with kind of really updates and cosmetic kind of things I thought I think it's in the charter perhaps that's part of the motivation for the master plan update but I would um urge the the master plan to be put aside that the draft revision chris sent be sent to the town council so they could see the kinds of work that would be involved in doing anything like that and how really unnecessary how it doesn't move the ball forward um in in that the town council needs to wrestle with contentious issues whatever they may be um uh that's and and then and then provide the priorities for the zoning law zoning zoning updates the master plan update is not gonna again move that materially forward that's what I would support as well thank you thank you I see Janet McGowan's hand up um so we have a master plan and we've approved it and it's an effect and so um what was interesting to me about reading for the master plan was how much was left to implement like the section 10 implementation stuff and so you know we went through that I mean we should be updating the master plan every three to five years and all that stuff but we have a master plan that needs implemented implementing it's you know when you read that chapter it's full of good ideas um you know looking at Christine's breast strips first draft she didn't have that many revisions to the master plan more kind of like oh what's next next steps or implementation steps and so um I don't know what I'm saying at this point but it I love to see us go to like the mopec which you know the master plan implementing committee which actually will lead to zoning bylaw changes because the master plan is full of ideas for zoning bylaw changes so I think we have a good working plan um you know the planning department wanted to take most of the responsibility for the update but life has really changed in the last few months as we can all see and so maybe that's not such a great you know idea or process right now so I'm all for implementing the master plan that we have the planning board has approved and looking at that section 10 implementation and using that as well as you know the zoning subcommittees you know that that matrix that we had in and the planning department's ideas of where the problems are really just focusing in on implementing the master plan bylaw changes whatever so yeah I think I'm agreeing so that's it okay I don't see other any other hand so I guess I'm thinking can we make a recommendation something like request for them to consider adopting the approved master plan the way it is for now and let's get through these times and focus on bylaw changes and that we can revisit this at a later time and and they can determine that too how would that sound is a recommendation that we could vote on and then forward to them sounds good okay so I'll take that maybe as a second and Chris second on the motion written down is there anything else we want to include in that um I'm thinking of anything right now okay sounds good to me okay so I'll take a roll call vote on this wait a minute I'm a little bit confused who made that motion this Christine Gray Mullen made the motion David seconded okay excuse me I have a hand up before you start voting I think then several that are several hands up they popped up since my last because I try to watch but um so David's down okay so I see Michael Jack and then Doug so Michael yeah I think I think we're going in the right direction with diminishing the importance of the master plan revision and increasing the importance of zoning bylaw change however there are two caveats here one is that Janet's point about implement the implementation matrix is really important and I think we really need to do something with that now whether that needs to be done by the existing zoning subcommittee or whether that we need to have it in another implementation subcommittee I don't know but I think that if we're going to really pay attention to what the master plan is even though we're not going to revise it right now I think we really need to look at the implementation of it and follow through where that leads us which partly will lead us to zoning changes but not entirely now as for zoning changes are you suggesting when we focus on zoning change the kind of wholesale zoning bylaw revision that Rob Moore is working on or are you suggesting specific individual things that might come out of the existing zoning subcommittee four or five of which are already sort of in process what do you what do you mean by focusing on zoning changes I think it could be from either or all or other sources I think Rob Mora is trying to continue to do his recodification and I know CRC and town counselors are they themselves are getting fired up to do some bylaw changes and I think COVID situation is making us realize we really need to address some of this sooner than later we for zoning bylaw are mostly just a recommendation committee for that kind of thing but I think I'm just saying that we want to free up Miss Bestrup and town resources this affects them even more than us for them to be able to have the bandwidth to work on zoning and that we're willing to let go of some of our demands for what is in our purview which is the master plan and say let's just wait a little while now just to address your first part on chapter 10 the master plan and MPIC implementation committee that is more in our purview actually Michael and I would propose that over the next month or two we talk about that chapter because we still we're trying to free up Chris's and the planning department's time but we could still amongst ourselves be picking through that and figuring out well what can be down in the next year maybe maybe it can't be done but maybe some can start and then that is our world so we can address that but I'm trying to just sort of move the update and and open up for bylaw did that make sense yes now I understand what you're really talking about that's fine good um so I see Jack I see Doug and I see David and I see Janet so Jack um I would offer that as opposed to just you know pushing back and no changes maybe simplifying it to a minimal sort of edit effort where I'm thinking like the the the use of end notes uh just to reference the plans that they want to see referenced I mean just something that would only take maybe 10 hours or somebody's time to put in some end notes to satisfy what their major concerns were that there's just plans out there that exist and and uh you know put you know stay away from major edits but maybe that would satisfy the the CRC and town council is all just a very very minimal effort to you know reference using end notes or foot notes and I just um counter that with the thought of you could be right but can we just tell them we want to put it on hold and then see what they come back maybe they will come back and say we're not comfortable with adopting it the way it is we want this this and this but I just want to remind everyone that this master plan update was supposed to be a kiss keep it simple it was supposed to be minimal and I think what Miss Bestrup found is even minimal and simple still is a large amount of her time and other staff that she would have to draw from for resources and updates so I'm just proposing you could be right Jack but right now for our motion that's on right now could we just push back to them and then see what they want does that make sense I don't know so I'll call on the other members and maybe they have you know please play with you know think about this how what should we do Doug is next then David then Janet yeah I wanted to I guess I'll just say that I support the motion because it seemed like in the conversations we've had about the master plan update that we were intentionally avoiding changing what I would call content of the master plan I mean it was mostly let's get the wording changed from town meeting to town council and and then reference whatever products we've done in the last 10 years which are already on the on our planning board or other town websites they're already public documents so you know since we weren't really going to change anything you know substantive from my point of view you know why not just stop thank you thank you you did make me remember one other part that town council wanted and Chris maybe you know where the status is but they really wanted environmental and green issues to be included in this mass plan that would be one of the parts that it got updated and with that they have that committee that's working on a report that pre-covid was supposed to be done in May and June and then last I heard now they're thinking November December so you know that that's pushing this even longer too which as Doug just said that would still be if they approve that report it's still a standalone report that is useful and there whether or not it's referenced in the current master plan but Chris what group is that could be that could be incorporated by reference once it's been finished there is a real push on this summer to work on that there's there was supposed to have been a meeting on Tuesday night which they did record and they're going to make it available to a lot of people and then they're going to have meetings throughout the summer to seek input from staff as well as members of the public about what should be in this climate action and resiliency plan so so that is definitely moving along and Stephanie Chickarello and the ECAC are putting a lot of effort into that so I I think it would be worthwhile seeing what comes out of that Stephanie hasn't had a lot of time to go through all of the chapters in our master plan and you know insert things that are relevant so it could be just that when we get the report from that group it could be incorporated by reference just like the housing production plan and the housing market study and all these other plans that we've done so we might want to just wait and see what comes out of their efforts thanks for that update I see David okay and then there's Janet and Michael again I agree with Doug I think that it there it should be stopped the master the work on the master plan perhaps to uh in the recommendation to the town council that we have a motion to vote on um perhaps I could we could add or draw the attention of the town council to the implementation grid and ask them for their you know best wisdom on how to utilize that and and to to further the ends and but that's I think that's sufficient we need to move past this thank you thanks uh so Janet and then Michael so um I'm wondering if next meeting we could take some time to talk about like the implementation of chapter 10 the like mopec the master plan implementing committee and maybe um if Rob Mara could either send information to the zoning subcommittee about what he's working on or to the planning board or both of us just to see what's happening and then not maybe the next meeting but at some point to have Stephanie come in and give us a sense of what they're working on because it does seem a little odd that you just get at the chapter at the end and not know a little bit more about the process and things like that and then my final plug is that we do need to get some kind of there's so many plans out there when I was looking at the master plan I could have been finding new plans and a lot of great kind of small plans and so I wonder you know maybe we can talk about it later but just putting them into the master plan and we can just add them in a more easy accessible way or someplace where you can find them all so that's it thanks Michael um I I think what I was going to say is probably not relevant anymore so I'll just put my hand down sorry okay Chris best your hands up so I wanted to report on Rob Mara Rob Mara Mara's efforts um you know he met with you in February and I think he met with you again in March um since then we've had COVID-19 he's again also been working very hard with the merchants and the restaurants downtown um putting in a tremendous amount of effort in you know sitting up tables sitting up barriers making sure that they operate in a healthy manner he's in charge of the health inspectors putting his his staff out there to help and and he's really feeling like he's probably not going to be able to devote a lot of effort to the zoning bylaw until towards the end of the summer because you know right now he's doing all his regular work plus this huge effort to get the downtown back up and running again so you know that's being realistic about it um that's what I have to report thanks yeah in terms of Stephanie we can certainly invite her to come to a meeting and if you wanted to invite her to the July 15th meeting I could do that but I wanted to remind everybody that we did also talk about bringing back chapter 40 r on July 15th so we can certainly put off chapter 40 r or we could put off a discussion of the master plan it's really probably going to be one or the other because we're going to have to dive back deep into Amherst media on the 15th and that's probably going to take you know an hour and a half or two hours I agree I think we should pick one or the other either the 40 r or the master plan discussion um I do see Michael's hand up next I'll call on him but after Mike you know if anyone else has an opinion of which we should deal with first yeah that's not so much about that um it sounds to me like both Rob Morris busyness with other things which reduces his interest or his ability to get make progress on the zoning revision and the difficulty with the planning department with moving ahead with uh but with rewriting the master or the rewrite light of the master plan seems to me that now we have two things that were major events on our schedule which really aren't going to be quite so pressing as they as they were and that seems to me to be an opportunity to do two things one is to see whether see try to figure out in what way this environmental action stuff ought to fit into the master plan whether as little pieces of other existing units or whether as chapter 11 all by itself which is a possibility it seems to me we're not limited to the 10 chapters of the master plan those are suggested chapters things that should be there but if they're not necessarily the only things that have to be there the other other possibility is to follow up on what Janet was talking about is really working seriously on the implementation matrix and i think we can do that as a as a board without really involving at least at the beginning the heavy heavy lifting from the from the planning staff seems to me we can have a good discussion about what the implementation matrix can do and isn't doing uh and then kind of figure out where we might want to go with it whether we want to go further with it or just leave it for the next master plan but at least we can get started on on that issue i think without heavy involvement with from staff so may i just cut in for a minute and ask are you suggesting that you do that on July 15th no not necessarily uh i think one of the two suggestions that have already been made about July 15th are are perhaps more pressing uh but this could be uh July well August okay how about we get this chapter 10 rolling in August and that gives everybody a little bit of time i know we've all read the master plan and have comment but to give the chapter 10 a real good read with a focus of thinking of the times we live in right now and you know what can we do to be useful and helpful um so i see no other hands so 40 are we'll bring that back in two weeks and have a talk about that i think we need to sort of get settled on what we're doing with that too what was the other option beside 40 are the Amherst media project yeah there was one other thing that might come back i said either the master plan or 40 are right okay or we can also have Stephanie come and talk about that group's report that's right which i think that could get probably get put off till august also okay just so if we just do the 40 are and Amherst media at the next meeting that makes sense okay good i'm seeing thumbs up so that's good um so we need to vote on this recommendation um to send to town um council um so if this any more comments or can i do a roll call can we repeat what that recommendation is i'm a little confused as to what exactly okay um do you have that chris i have to look through my notes yeah that it that the planning board would like to put the master plan update on a hold during this time and that we do that knowing that it was the town council that requested we take on this initiative uh for this year because they wanted an updated master plan to adopt and we're asking them for their uh thoughts on putting this on hold and what would they be willing to adopt the current master plan and then just see what they say and maybe they'll ask like jack was saying they'll still have some requests they know what the environmental and climate resiliency report that's going on that was part of what they were waiting on okay christie we have to make a motion out of this yeah so all of that no no no up but just up to the point where i said that we're asking for that we're giving a recommendation that we put it on hold and that um that we we are asking this knowing that they were the ones that asked us asked asked for us to take on this initiative last year as a priority because they wanted an updated master plan to adopt so we also secondly ask them if they would be willing to adopt the current master plan in these times or please advise us pam and i can get together and put some wording together and uh we'll send it to you and you can look at it but the just i think you've got the gist of it yeah yeah yes so if we run with that right now and we have a second we've had discussion i'll call on jack and then i see michael yeah i was just wondering in addition to the covet and all that um pressing staff for time is there not um are we looking at you know budgetary problems when we don't we don't have an economic director right now we probably won't have i mean aren't aren't there a lot of other things that we could be uh presenting to the town council of as why this could be put on hold well i'll tell you one really good reason it's been put on hold for us in addition to all the covet stuff we also have um i feel like we've got two big rabbits moving through the snake right now we've got amorce media and we've got the valley cdc project at 132 north hampton road and that is taking a tremendous amount of time of the planning department and has for the last month at least zoning board of appeals is holding public hearings on that right now it's got a lot of public scrutiny we want to make sure that the public hearing goes exactly right so we have meetings with the chairperson of the zba and we have meetings internally and we're studying documents and it's just um it's a really huge thing that doesn't necessarily rise to the surface of getting in the daly hampshire gazette and we don't talk about it at the planning board very much but in terms of time spent um it is a big time time consumer and it's a very worthwhile time consumer but that's just one of you know other things we do have other things but those two things amorce media and the valley cdc project in addition to the covid and the restaurants is just like big it's a big project wait chris how did you describe that two bunny rabbits in the rabbit's moving through the snake yeah the process and the snake ate the rabbits and now they have to kind of slowly make their way through the and now wait are you the snake in that because you're consuming those projects i don't want a visual not enough of that i've never heard that that that that that turn phrase before oh my goodness i've heard it a million times i think that was different people i guess um michael you have your hand up i do a technical question is this a request or a letter or whatever this is going to the crc or going to the council to the council because it came from the council so we're going to be it's going to be a long time before we get an answer because the council's going to refer to the crc and then the crc is going to send it back to the council and then we're going to answer and then we'll get an answer in two months at best so let's send it to both let's send it to town council and crc so but it's so effectively we get what we want then that is a pause things in limbaugh we shouldn't hope can't we that'll be only a two or three month pause what we're looking for is a longer pause than that i think but we're looking for a longer pause and yeah we've got other stuff to work on so all right i see no other hands i'm going to take a roll call um michael yes uh david yes jack yes janet yes maria yeah and myself yes you forgot about dog dog you know the things are bouncing sorry dog best for last that's you forget well i was trying to go down the right i probably should have just gone through the screens but anyways sorry yeah and dug yes no yes you can always just you know so now with dog yes that's seven yes good thank you if you could um draft that up and just send it out to us so we see it before it goes to them okay yep great so if we move on to old business i'm sad to say uh we have b there is a topic not recently reasonably anticipated 48 hours chris yes so this um has to do with the applebrook subdivision in south amherst and you'll probably remember that it was approved as a subdivision back in 2007 and then it came back to the planning board in uh 2017 and 2018 it came back a couple of times um the most recent well one of the most recent things you did was that you released lots you released all the lots except for lot four and i think that was back in september of 2019 now tom reedy who represents the owner of the unsold lots there is coming back and asking us to or asking you to trade one lot for another one of the lots that was released was lot two and the lot that was held kind of in escrow or it's not really escrow but held so that um the developer would have an incentive to finish the roadway and this may bring back memories of a different project but forget about that other project we're focusing on right now so in any event what tom reedy would like to do he has a buyer for his client of lot four and um they would like to close in the middle of july i think for that lot four meantime he would like to so lot four is being held in order to make sure that the developer finishes the road what tom reedy would like to do is trade that for lot two so in other words put lot two under under the covenant and that the little cursor is hovering over lot two right now and release lot four so he's given us a letter and a covenant that's filled out i don't know i did send this to christine gray moan to ask if we could talk about it tonight i don't know if i sent it to the rest of you but pam has it on the screen here so pam can bring up the certificate of performance which says that the lots designated on the plan as follows lot four provided lot four would be released provided however that lot two shall be subject to the above identified approval with covenant contract so what we would need to do is have you vote to trade the holding of lot four and release lot four and instead hold lot two and you'd need to vote that and then you'd need to come in and sign this document um and i can make arrangements to have to meet you and have you do that so you have any questions i see michael's hand up and then dogs was there any particular reason that lot four was initially chosen to be the covenant covenant lot and pam can you pop the map back up yes i did not hear any reason and i don't remember tom reedy giving any reason when he came to talk to you i think he they probably didn't know which lots were going to go more quickly than others and they just chose lot four maybe because it was at the end of the road and i don't really know i can only speculate okay Doug and then david don't we want them to finish the road sooner rather than later sounds like we've now got an opportunity what does that mean i mean why would we want to delay finishing this road by hopscotching around the subdivision until there's only one parcel left well one of the reasons that that we don't allow or we don't encourage a developer to completely finish the road before most of the houses are built because what that means is that the road is going to get really beat up by by the construction of the houses and i think there are at least two and maybe three houses that are under construction now in this subdivision but you know there are several more that need to be built so the town engineer is reluctant to say okay just go ahead and put the top code on and finish all the curbs and do everything and and you know have the road be finished if there's still going to be a lot of activity on it so we want to hold one lot to give the developer an incentive he won't be able to sell that lot until it's released and that will give him an incentive to to finish the road does that answer the question yeah i i i get that and that seems that's a that's a valid uh chain of argument but if that's the case then why don't we just why do we need to even name a lot at all why don't we just say the developer can't has to not sell the last lot before finishing the road as a lot well each lot is um is recognized on the subdivision plan i think it would be hard to um keep track of that um this way the developer has to come back and ask for a release of lot two once um once he considers the roadway to be done and i'm not sure that there'd be an easy way to keep track of it otherwise okay and to be frank this is the way it's always been done so this is the way i know how to do it so okay so this is not an uncommon occurrence no this is okay holding one lot is not an uncommon occurrence trading one lot for another is an uncommon occurrence but i've gone over this with rob mara the building commissioner who also develops property in belcher town and he didn't think there was any problem with this trade okay david and then janet david you're muted i forgot i forgot i'm sorry i forgot can you hear me now thank you yes we can hear you thank you it was it was really a year ago at the end of a long meeting we were presented with this is really this is a situation which evokes what's being asked here because it evokes what it involves now is is what's held um in escrow to guarantee performance of the building of the road without you know and that that that that decision last year was just like now we want to get the meeting over with um it sounds like they've there they've got a buyer in middle of the month middle of the month which is when our next meeting is and so we're kind of under the gun to make a decision and i feel very uncomfortable doing it at this point because i don't remember i wasn't actually a part of the board when this cluster this is a cluster that subdivision cluster development was approved and um it seems to have also a history of being more of one for a while like that Amherst Hills or whatever that other one's called so i'm just uncomfortable with this um seemingly nonchalant request that um i don't i don't know more about um at coming late in the evening thank you very much so tom reedy is not here but i could get him on the phone would that help that's only it's only it's i mean i wouldn't want to anyone to be calling me at 10 30 at night i mean that's a bad news time call i'm serious that's a scary call that's not nice i want to so i that i i want to be comfortable motivating that request but uh so yes that's all that's all that's my point tom reedy asked me to call him if things didn't go well and so um i kind of feel obligated to call him but on the other hand maybe he should have been here so i don't know tell me what to do um i'll call on janet well i was going to say ditto to david because i don't i feel like i'm too tired and i don't really know this project and i'm kind of wondering how i it looked to me like most of those buildings were built but i'm not sure and i'm just exhausted i'm wondering how much is the road going to cost how much does a lot go for um and then you know i i wasn't here for the amherst hill's decision but you know that's had a lot of repercussions that nobody anticipated that i mean we went on meetings now for four hours and i'm feeling a little punch drunk um and i'm not sure i mean i i know just doesn't it i just agree with what david said it just doesn't feel right to me i don't feel like i understand what's going on that much i mean are most of these how many lots were open and how many buildings are there how much does it cost to you know fix the street how much is a lot worth you know i just our goal is to protect you know the people who are there and i'm not sure i could do it right now based on this information um michael uh i think for me on the surface of it the switch makes sense on the other hand uh i'm willing to uh defer to the to the lawyers in the group who seem to have a much better sense of what what process ought to be going on so i think maybe we ought to either get uh readie on the phone or postpone this until the next meeting yeah would you like to do christine if tom asked you to call him and and we're at it where i think i think he gets a call i mean yeah give him a call but it just doesn't this is not an informed decision and and i don't know whether and not that so i see a lot of hands christ give him a call and just tell him it's not going well and i just want to tell the board um i had been waiting to say my concern i wanted to hear what you guys were thinking um so we're all a little burned from amherst hills a little bit on and so when i hear holding lot i hear the lot has a value and it costs a certain amount of money to do a road so if you look at lot four and there's a building circle and the top of the building circle and lot four has a drainage easement that's what that funny shape is so you can't really build on a you know a drainage easement but there's still a lot of building circle left so you can pretty much see how you could get the house and it's not going to mess with it but then if you get on the lot two at the same time we're going to just turn off chris talking about the apple brook so um so if you go down and look at lot two that funky shape there that's also a drainage easement but the one that so i put some questions out to chris but right for the meeting this all came through this afternoon so it wasn't like there was a lot of time i said well i've never the drainage easement is in the middle of the building circle so what does that mean hence does value reduce on lot two compared to lot four so is there less money with that lot knowing it's going to cost a certain amount to fix the road does that make sense to people that was my concern so i would like some answers on that um michael i do see your hand up i don't know if you have something to say or oh and i can't hear you i said that does make a lot of sense and that's a good reason why lot four and lot two were were chosen i guess as the original lots to be or the lot four was chosen as the original lot because it's it's it is more buildable in that way and lot two really seems like it's problematic if but right i'm unsure if it is problematic or not well yeah but from the diagram from the plan we're looking at it appears to be problematic so chris two things first did you get in touch with mr eddie and is well i can't we turned you off sorry chris hold on where are you sorry here i am great there you are yes he i left a message for him okay but i don't really want him to call me back now he's gone to bed you'll have to turn your phone off so i explained to them and i don't know if you had gotten an answer i had talked about the two drainage easements lot four it's on the edge of the building circle and lot two it kind of drives right into the middle of it can you build on a drainage easement or what kind of complications does that impact on a design in a building sorry we can't build on a drainage easement but the drainage easement is so i i understand your question yep okay that's a good question yep okay looks like there are two drainage easements one is um protruding from the south and the other one cuts off the northeast corner oh yeah a lot two yeah so my concern was just that lot two is valued less than lot four and how much money to finish the road or whatever finished the neighborhood do we need the value of a lot four or is a lot two enough and will it ever sell i didn't know how problematic this would be as a lot those are good questions which means we can't deal with this tonight so do you just call or talk to mr. Rudy tomorrow and sort it out what if they can postpone closings or if we need to meet sooner whatever okay and i recognize dug i see your hand i'm sorry i was looking over people well um first of all you know if we want to pick up a lot that has more value make sure we're not going to end up short you know there are other circles out on that plan that don't have any drainage easements in the buildable area um secondly you know it's not unknown for closings to be delayed so i don't exactly especially sold something you can't sell we haven't been given a lot of notice i don't think we're in being unreasonable to say this needs to be delayed you know now obviously we've we've sort of uh already scheduled our June 15th meeting i hate to say it i would be willing to come back and talk more with more people who are more informed a week from tonight if that was really necessary but again i feel like we're kind of bending over backwards when we haven't really been you know integrated into a process that's all so chris i think you have to have a dialogue i'm with mr reedy michael i see your hand yeah i uh i don't think we should be coming back for a meeting next week i think we should put this on our next regularly scheduled meeting uh if and make room for it if we need to and if if there's a an urgency that they are that they're pressed that they need to do it fine but not not under these not under these circumstances and we need a little more documentation uh also i think every lot is every lot is has started building except the one behind the lot where we looked at the uh screen porch a couple weeks ago so i can't i can't read what number that is but it's a little a lot of the flag seven seven which is probably more valuable than two if that easement is is an issue so maybe seven is already sold it just hasn't started so chris is any of the others not been sold you not know which ones have been sold so we can't choose that too yeah which ones have been sold which ones are built on and which ones are still open and mr reedy will know all that so yeah chris give him a call uh david yeah hi one comment and then i'll make a motion to continue with us my comment is that i don't i mean it it doesn't seem to me to be the board's role i i easily could be mistaken to get into the value of this lot over that lot or or what's been sold and what hasn't been sold our interest is in this case i believe is what is securing performance for the completion of the road when the problem when it's timely to do that and and the the applicant after many years this is like a 15 year project close to i think isn't it chris yeah 13 13 years after many years now coming you know getting closer to the finish line um there's there's a a change we i mean whatever we that the interest is in what's securing performance at the end of the day so that we don't get it and that's it that's all i think but but maybe i'm wrong maybe we are interested in the value of the lot and what's sellable and what's not but that's i think that's business that's not planning board i think that's the business that i'd like to make a motion to continue this to our next meeting you don't really need it right i don't think we need a motion right let's move on so um i just want to say that i think ask mystery i think some value is important this is why amherst hills gets that problem because maybe we need two lots now i mean if they're gonna have us redo the so david what this usually happens in the beginning of a subdivision i don't mean i don't mean the recap no no so they're asking i'm just saying what information i feel i need from mr reedy so if they're going to have us re-step back into a covenant well it's going to be today's dollars not what was set up over 10 years ago because we want to make sure the road gets finished so that's why i want to know numbers um so chris have that conversation with mr reedy tomorrow and let us know email or whatever what's going to happen or if it's coming on the on the 15th or sooner or something okay so uh we'll just move on to new business was there any new business chris item seven five sorry no not that i know of okay good um six uh a and r's no a and r's uh zba applications oh there are a bunch of them but i can't remember any of them and i don't have the sheet that tells me um nothing big pam no there's there's nothing big and i don't have the seat in front of me either okay when when is the next zba hearing on the um north hampton road project tomorrow night tomorrow night thank you yep uh upcoming spps pr sub applications nothing no good so um section nine is planning board and liaison the reports does anyone from well maybe michael we do want to hear about what happened with your um right cpaq last night voted to rescind its approval of the million dollar of to be bonded recommendation for library and to request that the library return with a specific itemized uh request devoted entirely to the uh historic preservation aspect of the building uh including fire suppression and uh air conditioning and material storage so that the the the the compromise that was was arrived at was to both rescind the million dollar recommendation and to invite slash request uh the library to at its earliest convenience submit a specific detailed uh proposal with with budgetary specifics so you did end up having a meeting because last we had heard you weren't even sure okay well attended uh many attendees i'm sure okay and what's the so they'll submit that and then you'll meet again well we assume they will submit that we've invited them to do that we don't know what they'll do given the fact that the library process seems to be in a kind of holding pattern uh my our understanding is that the library has requested a one-year delay uh with the state library commission of the board that uh supplying the grant uh so we don't know what how pressing things are at this point from either the library's point of view or the town council's point of view mr bachleman seemed to suggest that the town council would not be taking this issue up in the near future so i don't know what that means okay thanks for that update any other uh committee updates uh like any other hands i don't see any hands or just speak up okay uh report of chair it's um 10 50 so i'm gonna say no report of staff chris no report um we i just wanted to note that christine green mullen and i had a plan to end this meeting at 10 o'clock and we were going to be very strict about it so we did the best we could we did the best we could yes thank you all for sticking with us i was hoping for 10 30 so i'm only 20 minutes past but anyways uh do i hear a motion for adjournment so i moved back in great all in favor to say hi hi all right we're done thank you everybody good night all thank you thank you all nice to see you all it is thank you everybody thank you pam thank you chris bye bye welcome stop recording we want to stop thank you emerson media yes god you people are