 The chair notes the time is six o'clock. I call this meeting of the Amherst Zoning Board of Appeals to order. My name is Steve Judge. As chair, I want to welcome everyone to this meeting. Pursuant to chapter 20 of the Acts of 2021 and extended by chapter 22 of the Acts of 2022, this meeting will be conducted via remote means. Members of the public who wish to observe the meeting may do so via Zoom or by telephone. No in-person attendance of the members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means. Additionally, the meetings recorded may be viewed on via the town of Amherst YouTube channel and the ZBA webpage. In accordance with the provisions of Massachusetts General Laws chapter 40A in article 10, the special permit granting authority of the Amherst Zoning Bylaw. This public meeting has been duly advertised and notice thereof has been posted and mailed to parties at interest. We will begin with the roll call of the ZBA members and panel for tonight's meetings. Steve Judge is present. Ms. Parks. Here. Mr. Maxfield. Here. Mr. Gilbert. Present. Mr. Sloveter. I can see him, but... Now that I'm unmuted, I'm here. Okay. Thank you. Also attending tonight is Chris Brestrup, the planning director for the town and Steve McCarthy Planner and Rob Morrow. I just signed in as well, building commissioner. The Zoning Board of Appeals is a quasi-judicial body that operates under the authority of chapter 40A of the General Laws of the Commonwealth for the purpose of promoting the health, safety, convenience and general welfare of the inhabitants of the town of Amherst. One of the most important elements of the Amherst Zoning Bylaw is section 10.38. Specific findings from that section must be made for our decisions. All hearings and meetings are open to the public and recorded by town staff. The procedure is as follows. The petitioner presents the application to the board during the hearing after which the board will ask questions for clarification or additional information. After the board has completed its questions, the board will seek public input. The public speaks with the permission of the chair. If a member of the public wishes to speak, they should so indicate by using the raised hand function on their screen via Zoom. The chair with the assistance of the staff will call upon people wishing to speak. When you are recognized, provide your name and address for the board, for the record, and all questions and comments must be addressed to the board. The board will normally hold public hearings where the information about a project and input from the public is gathered, followed by public meetings for each. The public meeting portion is where the board deliberates and is generally not an opportunity for public comment. If the board feels it has enough information in time, it will decide upon the applications tonight. Each petition heard by the board is distinct and evaluated on its own merits. And the board is not ruled by precedent. Statutorily for a special permit, the board has 90 days from the hearing to follow a decision. For a variance, the board has 100 days from the date of filing to follow its decision. No decision is final until the written decision is signed by the sitting board members and is filed with the town clerk's office. Once the decision is filed with the town clerk, there's a 20-day appeal period for an aggrieved party to contest the decision with a relevant judicial body in superior court. After the appeal period, the permit must be recorded at the registry of deeds to take effect. Tonight's agenda, public hearing ZBA FY 2023-09. On Susan trustee, Yupeng Zhang, request a special permit to modify previously approved special permit, ZBA FY 2009-16 for the proposed modification to conditions three, four, six, nine and 10, as they relate to the changes to the site plan and management plan under sections 10.33 and 10.38 of the zoning bylaw, located at 290 West Street, map 20A parcel 39, neighborhood residential, RN zoning district, ZBA FY 2023-10, College Street 1957, LLC, Cara Valley Property Management. Request a special permit to construct a building addition and to allow a change from the use from a one family to tax dwelling to a non-owner occupied duplex dwelling under sections 3.3211 and 10.38 of the zoning bylaw, located at 300 West Street, map 20A parcel 101, neighborhood residential, RN zoning district. A public meeting, ZBA 2006-00002, a new owner, Amit Khajuva, requests approval of a new sign and with a new name of the business campus PISA, formerly Sunset PISA, and a review of the special permit management plan in light of the change in ownership under conditions five and seven and nine of special permit ZBA 2006-0000 150 Fearing Street, map 11C parcel 36. And that is now have a zoning district for that. Following that a discussion format for the zoning board of appeals meetings in person or virtual and lastly a general comment period on anything not on our agenda tonight and then any new business. Are there any disclosures by members of the ZBA regarding tonight's agenda? Then our first order of business is a public hearing, FY2023-09, Han, Susan, trustee, UPang Zhang request a special permit to modify the previously approved special permit ZBA FY2009-16 for the proposed modification to conditions three, four, six, nine, 10 as they relate to proposed changes to the site plan and management plan under sections 10.33 and 10.38 of the zoning bylaw located at 290 West Street, map 20A parcel 39, neighborhood residential art and zoning district. We conducted a site visit on Wednesday. I'm gonna go through that site visit. I know that Mr. Slotever as well as Ms. Brestrup was at the site visit. And so please add anything that I may have not mentioned. So one of the things we did, we reviewed the post lights out in front of 290. We looked at the screening from the existing parking lot and the screening that's gonna be removed, vegetation that's gonna be removed and the location of where new planting would take place. We looked at some of the foundation planting that is not there, but was called for in the original site plan, which is not included evidently in the new site plan. And we generally went through some of the items that differ from the plans from 2009 and the new site plan proposed by the applicant. We also discussed, yeah, and that's what I have for 290 West Street. Mr. Slotever, Ms. Brestrup, do you have anything else important to state for 290? No, that covered it. I think that was it. Okay, also we need to go through public submissions or submissions totally on 290. We have a ZBA application revised one. We have a management plan. We have an additional, we have some reference photos. We have a project description, a sample lease, exterior light fixtures, detail and specifics. We have the FY 2009 amendment summary. We have a site plan, which includes a partial plan, a site plan sheet L, lighting plan and building plans. Those are all applicant submissions. We have a planning staff submission, which includes a project application report dated March 9th, 2023. And we have the applicants waiver requests and plan requirements, a building plan and from the waiver of the landscape plan. I don't think we have any public comments on this matter. Any submissions? Do we? No. No? Okay. So then who wishes to speak for the applicant? Allen St. Heleras here. He's the property manager. I'm Michael Liu from Berkshire Design Group. Allen, do you want to starting, just give a synopsis or something? And if there's some detail questions, we can get into those about the site. Yeah. So Mr. Chair, Allen St. Heleras, Valley Property Management Amherst, just give a quick summary of what's proposed here tonight and then turn it over to Mike of Berkshire Design to kind of get into a little bit more of the detail on the updated site plan. So this property was approved in 2009 to be a duplex and there is common ownership interest with the property next door, which will be heard later. And the purpose of this proposal is to make some changes to the property line to afford land to the property next door and also to make some changes to the exterior lighting to bring them more into compliance with dark sky and to also make them a bit more durable and protected from physical damage by getting them up onto the building as opposed to being out into the yard. There are no changes other than the lighting to the building, no real changes to the management plan. The site plan will have some slight changes with plantings and such, but other than that, the parking, the driveway, the curb cut, the access is all going to be consistent with the original plans. Mr. Liu, can you give us your, just give us your name and address for the record? Yeah, Michael Liu, Berkshire Design Group Four, Allen Place, Northampton, Massachusetts. Thank you. Do you have anything to add regarding the site plan specifically, you can pull up, if you want to for the benefit of board members that weren't at the site visit, you pull up the site plan and just show us where you're going to remove the lighting and where the changes. Can I have some trouble sharing screen? Mr. McCarthy, can you help? Give it a try now. Okay, hold on. There we go. Let's see, let's see if, whoops, wrong one. Try that again. Screen one. That's some blue eyes. Sorry about that. That's actually kind of scary. Here we go. All right. I hope you, can you see that plan? You sure can. Okay, sorry about that. That's all right. Too many, there's too many screens popping up there. Too many choices. Not a problem, Mr. Liu, thank you. So 290 is the parcel that's outlined in blue here. West street is over here on the west side. I just want to quickly say this project is very closely related to the proposal that you'll hear next for 300 West street, which is this parcel in the red rectangle. At 290, it's proposed to basically cut out this piece from 290, which is highlighted in purple hatch and add it to 300, bringing 300 into compliance with zoning dimensional regulations. The remaining land at 290 would also still be in compliance with the dimensional regulations. And they're summarized here over on the right side. If we have any questions, we can go over that. But I'm going to just, I think I'm just going to stick with this plan for now instead of trying to hop around. But if we zoom in the brown, it represents the building here. And I should say that this parcel, this was taken from a survey by Eaton associates. So the position of the building and the driveway, et cetera, is more or less accurate, I'm going to say. But the driveway comes in off of West street here and then enlarges to basically like a double-loaded gravel parking lot shown in this dashed line right there. The existing lights that were mentioned, they're not actually shown on here, but they run along this old gravel walk. I believe there's five of them. And then I think there's three lights out front here at the front, from the front stoop out toward West street. Some of these, at least one of them has been hit and it's kind of like bent over a little bit, but they're at a very low mounting height and they've been damaged. So in bringing this plan kind of up to more current standards and what Valley Property Management has done with their other properties, it was decided to use the building-mounted porch-type lights to provide lighting into the parking lot and light up the walkways and replacing porch lights at the front as well. And that's included in the site plan package. The other parts of this involve some reorganization, I guess, of the parking. These long rectangles here, eight of them there, the concrete tire stops that are proposed to be used to identify the parking spaces. And then in the existing conditions, there are five large stones along this side on the north of the parking. They're proposed to be relocated here to the east to help in preventing cars from, you know, driving off the gravel into the backyard, which is grass. I don't know, I don't, it doesn't seem like there's an issue with that right now. When you walk out there, there's no tire tracks or worn areas in the grass, but we, you know, the applicant will relocate the stones to this side and that will help, you know, keep people and visitors, et cetera, from, you know, driving onto the lawn area. The dumpsters, they're currently, I think that the trash and recycle bins, you know, they're basically kept outside here in this location. And I believe this unit keeps them over here from time to time. They get brought out to the street and back. It's proposed to make sure that they are located at the rear of the building so that they're not visible from the street. In addition, a bike rack will be added to the back here to serve both units. And again, you know, that will be also shielded from the right public right of way here on the street. There aren't any, as you mentioned, there are not proposed to be any plantings added to the foundation around the building. That is something that the applicant would like not to have to do, just to keep the site a little bit more simple and clean. And, you know, so that we don't have a lot of litter and stuff accumulating, you know, in the beds. Part of this, I just want to touch on, I think one comment that or question that somebody had at one time was whether or not any stormwater was involved with this project. There is no stormwater per se for 290 because nothing's changing on the site. The building's not increasing. Impervious areas not increasing, but part of the land that's being taken for 300 along here, between the two parcels will be used for stormwater for 300 West Street. So I just wanted to clarify that. Let me see. I'm not sure if there were some other questions or issues. I know that there was some history with this site. Originally it was proposed to have like a covered or sheltered garage, well, not a garage, but like a parking, I can't think of the word, parking shelter and shed for bike storage. Those, I think that the applicant has stated that those are things that for whatever reason, they were never installed and they're not really needed. They would just provide or result in additional maintenance issues and trying to, with the upkeep, and wear and tear. So the other properties that they manage don't have such features and bike racks and outdoor parking is perfectly sufficient and works fine. So that is not in the proposal at all to add those elements back as per the 2009, I believe, approval. There is some vegetative screening that's proposed, but it will be along on the new property line for 300 West Street to provide screening between the two parcels. The two parcels are in common ownership. So, and the plants are required to be maintained in perpetuity, so having just that screen for 300, for the development at 300 West Street, we felt was sufficient to be functional for acting as a screen between the two parcels. I think that's it and I guess we'll entertain or take any questions or comments. I just have a couple of quick comments. Yep, I have a couple of quick comments. The first is what you're proposing is a change in the site plan and then we adopt the site plan. And so even though the site plan from 2009 may not, the site plan in 2009 would not be in effect anymore, this new site plan that you've submitted would be the one you'd have to live up to. Is that correct? Right? Yes. Yep, and so I have a couple of questions on that. And there's a list in the project application report of some of the changes from that in the site plan just from then to now. Couple of questions, it says parking place is nine, I only see eight, what is it there? Oh, I'm sorry. This is, I think I flipped up a plan. We made the revision on the submittal, it actually does say eight, part eight. Yeah, exactly. On my, it says eight, so I just wanted to make sure, right? Okay, and then, so that is P1 parcel plan one. And then in terms of the propane tanks over on the up on top of the, I guess it'd be, yep, right there. What's, I failed to look at those during the site visit. What is in front of it? Is that a wood fence? Some screening material or what is it? Yeah, Alan, if you could clarify, I believe it's a six foot wood fence. It is a six foot vinyl fence. Oh, okay, vinyl. And I do, when you're done with this line of questioning I have a Google street view loaded up to kind of show how well those are actually screened from the street. So I'm prepared to show that when the time is right. Okay, thank you. And then I just had one other question on the terms of the lighting. So the post lighting comes out and I noticed from the lighting plan that you've got lighting for the sidewalk that covers most of the sidewalk in the back coming from the parking lot and the additional lighting on the front the lower duplex, you have lighting that comes there which is you don't have any lighting currently. So that's a change from the existing conditions in terms of the lighting plan. Are there any other questions before we go to the propane street view that shows the propane screening, Ms. Parks. Hi, I'm just wondering, I see the new property line. Will the tenants at 300 be able to actually use that property or is that just or to be a part of that of 300? In other words, is there, is it, what use does it have for 300? Alan, I don't know if you wanna take that. I mean, there's currently some existing vegetation here some mature trees actually and undergrowth that kind of bisects, the yard space, 300 yard spaces here. This is green, this is a green yard space. So, if the applicant feels like they wanna add that or allow the residents at 300 to be able to use this, there would probably have to be some kind of path, pathway developed through the woods there. It would be a short run, but that's something that I guess I, Alan would might wanna answer from a maintenance point of view. Yeah, I'd be happy to add to that. The biggest reason for that property line relocation is to afford the land necessary under the zoning dimensional regulations. The property at 300 West does have sufficient recreation space. And so there really wasn't a plan to make that accessible to the tenants of 300 West Street, for throwing around a football per se because there's enough green space on the other side behind 300 West Street. I will say that during our site visit Ms. Parks, we looked into that area, it's pretty overgrown with vines and that area, the new area exactly, that area would take some work to make it accessible to residents of 300 to use it on a regular basis. All right, I guess I was just thinking that you were adding that land so that 300 was in compliance. And so it just seems like if you're adding it, you should do something with it. That's just an opinion. Other comments. Quick point of clarification, Mr. Chair. So with respect to reviewing the new proposed property line, that's gonna get carved out and given to 300, is my understanding correct? I'm looking at your P1 parcel plan here. Is the overall dimension or area, if you will, of that being driven by the requirement for the additional lot area on 300 of 6,000 square feet, it looks like based on what you guys are carving out, that gets just above that at 6,001 square feet, just trying to understand the dimensionality of that. Yeah, essentially that was the logic in carving out that specific square footage is to bring 300 into compliance with the dimensional regs. Okay, right, yeah, because I mean, I'm just looking at it and I was curious if it would make more sense to sort of shop, sort of basically like follow the, let's say the southern part of 290s parking rather than bumping it up and grabbing that extra area, but understanding that you're just scraping by with the additional lot area of 300, that's why you got to kind of increase it. Right, it resulted in this big kind of bump out in the back. Yeah, not a problem, just wanna make sure that I'm following with the logic in there. The other comment I have is on your lighting plan, just taking a look, you guys are proposing these L1, L2s, and it looks like the only area where the L1 will exist is the south, let's say, east corner. Right, southeast corner. Right, so is there any benefit of, let's say keeping all these L2s and putting an L2 there and then perhaps an L2 at the just northern, south, let's say, east or just east rather, I suppose, east corner of the duplex in order to provide some more illumination towards those parking spaces? Yeah, I think I understand what you're saying. So right now there's an L1 proposed at this corner. Correct. And then there's the L1 where your cursor is, L2 above where you first showed. You're saying maybe at one here or? Yeah, so what would prevent you from, say, doing exactly an L2 where your cursor is now and an L2 at that bottom southeast corner? I'm not really sure that would buy, get you much. The L1 fixture in this corner gives you pretty good coverage through the parking lot except for this corner, the northeast corner and the southeast corner of the parking lot. I don't know if adding a light here would, I mean, it would certainly make the area brighter but it might cast more light out to this space at the northeast in combination with the other lighting but I'm not sure that would actually get you much. Yeah, I feel as though maybe the only real benefit would be sort of walking around the building. Exactly, exactly, right around there. There is an entry here, so you get better lighting there. Perhaps another approach could be simply keeping that L1 where it is and sliding it up just to the north of that facade a little bit. Say where what I presume is like a shed or something of the sort, exactly, like right there. That's a bulkhead and I guess we'd have to see where the windows are. But yeah, it was a little tough for exactly that reason whether you should provide more lighting than you need but I understand we could, that would result in more lighting in this corner here where the two buildings kind of meet and there is a slider here and a small deck. I don't know, we could take a look at that and I don't know if Allen would be willing to consider even just adding one or adding an L2. Mr. St. Hilar? Yeah, I just wanted to add to that discussion and Mike kind of alluded to this, Mr. Liu kind of alluded to this where in prior projects we've done of this nature with these lights, they are downcast, they do distribute the way they're shown but they're quite bright and at the end of the last arc in the yellow color, it doesn't just abruptly stop. There is continued illumination. It's certainly something where you wouldn't need to flashlight on your phone to see where you're going and our concern was to provide adequate lighting but not overdo it because a big concern is spillage onto the neighboring properties. The primary entrance is on the north side of the North unit. That slider is not used as often and so that little bit of a slightly lesser illuminated corner from a management perspective is not a concern. And as I said, I don't have photos of other projects as implemented but they are definitely sufficiently bright and there's no lack of visibility on these properties. So for concern of over illumination, we felt that the proposal was sufficient. Yeah, I mean, if there's also an architectural element as Mr. Liu alluded to perhaps a window or something, just let's say towards that bulkhead, of course you want to keep the more powerful light with the wider spread towards that corner. So this is just food for thought. We're considering somebody entering into that northern unit along that path but if your assumption is correct and you think that that foot candle will extend over adequately and again, perhaps there's some architectural significance on that back edge then that's fine. It's just kicking something out here, trying to understand why it's located right there what that fixture changes, sort of doing for us. Right. That's all I've got here. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Gilbert. Any other questions, comments from Boer's members? Let me just run through here real quickly guys before we leave it to see if there was, I had some notes down. We dealt with the propane tank, it was my note. Okay, I have no other questions and I don't see any other hands. You can take down the screen share if you would, Mr. Liu, thank you. Good. So there's no other questions from board members. Mr. McCarthy, Stephen, do we have any, I'd like to go to public comment if there is any. Do we have anybody who wishes to? I am seeing no hands raised besides Chris. Ms. Brestrup. Yeah, I just wondered if you wanted to take up Mr. St. Hilaire's offer to show you a photograph of what the propane tanks look like from the street. And I think he was about to do that before and that would be useful. And then I shut off the screen share. Yep, good. Please do that. Alan, you should be able to screen share if you try. Oh, you're muted, Alan. Thank you, Mike. So this is the frontal view of the property on Google Street View. And there are one, two, three, four, five public shade trees that were planted in front of the property that do provide some screening from the public view. And scanning over here to the far end of the house, you can see the fence that it was put in place as part of the 2009 site plan to screen the propane tanks. And if I continue all the way to the edge of the property looking from the perspective of the neighbor, there's just a little tiny bit peeking out there. And then you get into all this natural vegetative screening that's gonna block it from view. So it is, you know, the large majority, there's two tanks back there. You can only see a tiny slice of one of them is in fact screened from public view. And while I have this up, I just did wanna point out as well this, all of this yard space on the left side will be maintained for the residents of 290 West Street. It's a big lot and it's almost all maintained lawn. So that is just something I wanted to point out while we have this view up. Mr. St. O'Leary, I think at our site visit, you mentioned something about reclaiming the sidewalk in the front that had gotten grown over or some sidewalks had gotten grown over where the post is now. Is that supposed to be a sidewalk? What does your new site plan do with that, if anything? Yes, Mr. Chair, there was a question in the project application report as to whether the sidewalks from the original site plan were implemented. They were in fact implemented their compacted gravel similar to the driveway, but for lack of use, they've kind of been reclaimed by the lawn, but we could certainly, you know, reestablish those, put some weed killer down and edge it. The material, of course, is still there. It's just been grown over by lawn and weeds. I suspect it doesn't get much use at all because nobody comes in from this, very few people come in from the street and there's no parking there. So it would probably look better if you had a sidewalk up to those steps, but it's not because it's being used a lot, I think. Is that correct? I would agree. And lastly, one other question I have since you do have the rocks here, these large stones here to prevent parking from the street onto the property. You have eight parking spots in the back. Has your history been, that is sufficient for use of the tenants and any guests, the eight parking spaces? It has. We haven't had any complaints from the tenants or the neighbors for disorderly parking. And as you point out, those stones actually do run right around into the driveway. So there's really not a lot of poetic license that the residents can take for parking. Great. All right. Any questions from board members? Ms. Parks. Hi, I'm sorry. I wasn't able to go to the site visit, but is the parking on gravel? Is that the surface for it? Yes, it is. All right. And is the parking for 290 changing or is that staying the same? Staying the same. Okay. All right. I'm just, I'm looking at Google Earth as well, where the, I don't know how old this is. So the parking looks like it doesn't match what you had. Okay. Thank you. You are going to, are you installing additional? My understanding is you're installing additional parking's concrete stops there. Is that correct? That is correct. Okay. So it should, if the site plan is implemented, it will look different than it does today. That part will look different than it does today. Is that correct? It will look different in so much that it'll have concrete wheel stops at the beach parking place. And that was to satisfy one of the requirements to clearly indicate the parking places. A lot of times on blacktop, you know, you can paint lines, which you can't do on gravel. So the concrete wheel stops work well as an alternative. Does that answer your question, Ms. Parks? Okay. Great. All right. Any other comments from board members? We have no public comment. All right. I'd like to move to the, while keeping the public hearing open, I'd like to, in case we need additional information, I'd like to move to a public meeting to discuss the conditions and findings. But first, I guess I'd like to get a general sense of where people on the board, where board members are on the application. And if you've reviewed some of the proposed conditions, this is a good time to give me your, share your thoughts with the rest of the members on the first application on 290. Ms. Parks. Just a clarification. So we're voting on changing the property line here? Well, we're voting on changing the property line. We're voting on changing, but I'm not sure that we have to approve the, I think we have to acknowledge the property line changes. We are voting on adopting plan and lighting plan. The management plan stays the same, but those are the essential changes. And then there's some conditions that people have that have been suggested. But I think I would lead that up to Mr. Moore or Ms. Breastrup to tell us if we have to approve the lot line changes, Ms. Breastrup. The lot line changes are really part of the site plan. So they will go through a different process with the planning board, which is the ANR process. You've probably heard about that. It's a plan that is called ANR. It means approval not required, but the planning board has to sign off on it. And then it gets filed at the registry of deeds. But you are essentially approving a new site plan to fit within that new property line. So in a sense, you are approving the new property line. Okay. Thank you. Great. So I'd like to another general comments on the application. What I'd like to do is review the conditions, propose conditions for this application and then go to findings. I find that I can't make those findings unless I know what the conditions are. And so what I would propose as we've done in the past, we go through the conditions. If anybody disagrees with one of these conditions or is uncomfortable and wants a separate vote on any specific condition, that's fine. We'll do that. Otherwise I'd prefer to vote the conditions and block. I just have one vote to the extent that we can do that. So the first condition is pretty much standard. We have to, the project shall be built, maintained and managed according to the plans that have been provided, have been applied for. And those are listed in the draft project application draft project application report. The second condition is this permit shall expire upon change of ownership. Unless prior to the change of ownership, the prospective property owner shall appear before the ZBA at a public hearing for review and approval of management plan, parking management plan, parking plan and lease agreement and to determine whether additional conditions are needed to meet section 10.38. That has been one of our standard conditions that we've imposed over the last couple of years. All rooms to be labeled on the floor plans with approval with ZBA FY2009 permit. So that maintains the same floor plan as previously approved. Any dwelling unit on the property being rented shall be registered with the residential rental property by-law. The approved management plan shall be followed by the property owner. And any changes to this plan shall return to the zoning board of appeals at a public meeting. No more than four unrelated individuals shall occupy each dwelling unit. All exterior lighting shall be designed and installed so as to be shielded or downcast and to avoid light trespass onto adjacent properties. Lighting fixtures shall be selected according to dark sky compliance and ZBA rules and regs. Street numbers shall be marked for both buildings, both units I mean. Parking shall occur on the parking services only and it shall be maintained. Parking shall be clearly delineated. I think that the concrete tire ramps do that. Individuals parking spaces should be marked or otherwise delineated. I think that it does the cement tire stops do that. Under no circumstances shall the basement of either dwelling be used for sleeping or living place. Note the number of total persons for dwelling unit is limited to 10 or fewer people at any time. And this total shall include the lessee in residence so as not to limit a large number. So as to limit a large number of people on the property, any gathering shall be coordinated so not to coincide with any gatherings held by the other unit on the premises without written permission of the lessee less source agent. Overnight stays for any one guest limited to four days in any consecutive 30 day period or 14 days during the least term. An overnight stay is defined as any stay within from the hours of 11 to seven. And the maximum number of overnight visitors per unit shall be four people at any one time. Those are from the lease on the property. I also, in the past we have been also including conditions which require the, for non-owner occupied rental property require the owner to number one file any complaints they get with the town and two upon their annual approval application for rental project, the rental registration regime that we have in town that they have to disclose the any complaints they have. We've done that from in the past. Do we have language that does that? Either Ms. Brestrup or Mr. Mora. Do we have language available? I have some language from an old. I sent something today that we used for 51 Spalding streets. You could take a look at that. I sent it in an email and I cannot, I don't think I had the ability to share my screen but maybe Steve or Steve McCarthy could bring that. You can give that a try now Chris. Did you get that email that I sent Steve McCarthy? I've stopped sharing my screen. You can give that a try. I can try to pull it up as well. Oh, I don't have it. I'm trying. It's an email that I sent this afternoon. I sent a copy to Steve Judge. I think I do have that Chris. I wasn't sure if I can, here it is, not this one. Steve, if you'll allow me to share my screen. I use this, I will allow it. Is this, this is one that I've found on the, oh geez. This is what we used at fairing and sunset. And I'm trying to see how I can share my screen at this time, share a screen. This one, but if I remember Chris, you sent me something else earlier today. Here it is. No. I can't find that, Ms. Brestbrook. I can probably find it and read it to you. Okay. This one, I think the one that I have up on my screen, is it being shared now guys or not? Can you read this, the applicant show log and maintain? Yes, we can see that. I think this is more detailed than we've been doing for a lot of our other properties. But I think the one that I have used, that we have used for the last year has been the requirement to log. I don't think we needed the specific violations of the lease. And this is a requirement for the applicant to log and to log and maintain actions taken by the property owner. And then upon the annual renewal, these are given to the town. The complaint violation shall be given to the town and also available to inspection services. Do you want me? I could work with Mr. Judge on the exact wording of that. Maybe tomorrow, does that make sense? That does make sense. I mean, I think, does anybody object to that regime? We've done it in the past year we've been doing this. Seems to make sense to me. Any objections from members of the board? If, all right. If not, then we'll put in that language together and putting it in the conditions. Am I right? Are there any comments on conditions? Members? Does anybody wish a separate vote on any condition? If not, I move that we adopt the conditions on the project location report with the, Mr. Mora. Would the board like to add a condition about maintaining the front sidewalk edge and free of vegetation? It was talked about a little while ago. If you like that, we should make it a condition because it's not indicated on the plan anywhere. Oh, that's good catch. Thank you. I would like to do that. I raise that issue. Anybody else object, Mr. Maxfield? But I like that condition. I guess I just wanted to ask the rest of the board here. I've never been a big fan of the conditions of limiting how many people can be on a property at one time in the special permit. But am I alone in that? Does everybody else love that condition? Because if we do, I don't care enough to fight about it. But I've never been a big fan of that one. If they want to put in the lease, sure. But I just never liked that from the special permit. What's kind of everybody else's feeling on those, that condition? I'll speak for me. I know in some instances it's really for the approval of the project to have a limitation on total number of people on the property at any time. And I hate to be in the position of saying, well, it's important we do it in X, but we don't really have to do it over in this other area, in this other place. And so we tend to lead it up to the landlord to say, what are you comfortable with? And then impose what the landlord has in the lease. But if it's a really concerning situation where there's been a history of large gatherings and the neighborhood has been objected, we still can impose a condition. And it's not just being, we're not doing it arbitrarily, it's one in one area, not in the other. So that's kind of how I have looked at it in the past. Because I'm sensitive to what you're saying is that why should we limit that? But in some places it's really important to approving a project, those limitations. So that's my thinking. Else? Ms. Brestrup? Can't figure out how to raise my real hand. I just wanted to say that the inspections and enforcement is often done on a complaint basis. So if the tenants of this building have 12 guests and they're very quiet and nice, nobody's gonna complain. But if they have 12 guests and they're really a problem then somebody will complain. So it's not as rigid, the police aren't gonna come by and check and count how many people you have if you're not causing a problem. Right? Yeah. Yeah. It was just to follow up. I mean, my thing on this always, it's just if somebody wanted to throw a graduation party for themselves, that was, well, friends, family, that sort of thing, the daytime. If you just have somebody who does complain-driven does complain about something that I think everyone would agree is perfectly appropriate but you just got a neighbor who doesn't like it. If they're now in violation of their special permit for what's otherwise, respectful gathering, it's just the reason why I've never liked that condition. But in a sense too, I feel like it's also splitting hairs over, I think a niche case that I doubt will come up. But- Yeah. Mr. Sloveter? I would like to be able to depend on people's common sense and sense of consideration but we've seen too many examples when that would not have actually worked. I think it's useful to have the limit in place as Ms. Brestor said, the police are not going to count noses. People aren't going to complain if there are 12 people instead of 10. But if something gets out of hand, I think it's useful to have the mechanism in place that there is an actual violation taking place as opposed to something arbitrary. So I think that this conditions should stay in place and if it's not abused to the point where somebody needs to be called, it really won't be much of a factor. Any other comments? Mr. St. Allaire? Just wanted to add a bit to that conversation from a management perspective and I do appreciate Mr. Maxfield's concerns because there are plenty of vocal neighbors and Amherst. We get the police reports every Monday, we read them every Monday and I can't believe that some of them are even calls. There are some legitimate ones but there are some other ones that are two in the afternoon with four people listening to a radio having a barbecue. And I'm not asking to change the condition on this permit but I do think, and I recall from a prior application where a neighbor hired counsel to wordsmith our lease and we insisted on the ability to give a written exception and that was specifically to address Mr. Maxfield's concerns over, I'm gonna have a graduation party. There's four of us, we each have two parents. So now we're up to 12 or 14 people in the backyard. It's two in the afternoon and the neighbor calls in a noise complaint and to Mr. Maxfield's point, technically we're now in violation of the special permit. So I think that if the landlord knew about it and signed off on it, it's almost like the party registration program that's in town where, the issue is not gonna be the barbecue. The issue is gonna be the one o'clock in the morning with all the friends gathering on social media which as property managers, we don't condone that. Anyway, so if there is some mechanism in place where the property manager can take ownership or the landlord can take ownership and say, yeah, I can give an exception, maybe three times a year for example, or twice a year to allow some of these events that are harmless and also keep themselves out of trouble with an inadvertent conflict with the special permit conditions. In your experience, have you ever had to, when you had one of those conditions, have you had been in any implications from the special, the validity of your special permit? Has it been threatened at all in any case? Or have you been able to work it through pretty much and go to town and say this was not a problem and there was no implications for the existing special permit? How did it work? We have not, Mr. Chair. I think a big reason for that is we only have a handful of special permits. And I do think it's a minute possibility and I also like to think that there would be some warning mechanism from inspection services before an outright violation was issued and I'd like to think there's some room for interpretation. I just do agree with Mr. Maxfield that there could be an unwarranted complaint. Could be, yeah. Thank you. Mr. Maxfield. I was going to say, if everyone's all right with it, do we want to just change that language to do what I believe we had done a couple of years back was I believe, I think it was Mr. Greg Stutzman's special permit where we just added language specifically to include without prior approval of the landlord for any sorts of gatherings like that. Is that something we would want to include? Is there people amenable to that? Prior written authorization, I guess we should say. I would not be opposed to it, Mr. Maxfield, but I'm just thinking that it's probably such a rare problem that we're trying to figure out a solution to something that doesn't happen very often at all. I really, I don't know that there are many special permits that are threatened or there's a threat to be in violation of them because of a graduation party or a 12-year-old's birthday party or all those kind of obnoxious gatherings. And while there are, you know, Amherst has found, I'm sure, where there's a lot of people who object to anything that I just haven't heard of those situations really being followed up and threatening the special permit or threatening the operation. So then we're just putting another kind of bureaucratic thing in the least thing. Well, now if you want to have that as opposed to just going ahead and doing it, now you got to get something in writing from the landlord to do it. And then I don't know, it seems to me that we're trying to solve a problem that isn't a real, a big problem. And we're just leaving it, we're just incorporating what's in the lease anyway for the landlord right now. We're not going to be more strict than the landlord himself. But I'd leave it up to the board on that. That's my feeling. Yep. Ms. Brescher. Doesn't the lease say unless prior written permission from the landlord or something to that effect? So I think maybe Mr. St. Hilaire can answer that, but I think the lease does give an ability for the landlord to grant a specific approval for some, for one thing. And maybe Mr. St. Hilaire would be able to answer that. It does, in fact, Ms. Brescher, but I think Mr. Maxfield's point is, even if we give that permission, the condition as written forbids it. That's what I mean. That's what I was trying to get at. So the condition is not the same as what is the lease. Yeah. Well, Mr. Maxfield. In that case, I think if we're really at the point of conditions, I could just make the motion to adopt the conditions as we have them written with the amendment, or I could just make the move to amend that condition. Yeah, you should just move to amend that condition if that's what you wanna do. And then just procedurally. So rather than to believe this, do we wanna make the motion to adopt conditions and then I make the motion to amend the conditions? Is that? I think what you wanna do is you wanna make. Ms. Brescher. Yep. Do you hear me? Yeah, I'm sorry. I think what you wanna do is make a motion to amend condition 13. Oh, we have it in condition 13 says. So it's the limit a large number of people on the property and a gathering shall be coordinated. So it's not to coincide with anything. Oh, that's just for the next property. So I think you wanna amend number 13 to state the total number of persons is 12 is 10. Unless you get permission from the land, unless permission from the landlord is granted, you can say written permission, which would be similar to what's at the end of 13. So total number of persons per dwelling unit is limited to 10 or fewer people at any time. And I would say unless written permission, permission is given from the less or less agent for a greater number. For a specified number, I'd say, specified number. Yeah, I guess I'll move to just include that language of unless written permission is granted by the less or lesser's agent for a specified number. I'll make that a motion. Is there a second? Second. Second. Any discussion? All right, we got a second on that motion to amend. Any discussion? Okay. No discussion. There's a vote on this. This would be a, we'll need four votes. Chair votes aye. Mr. Ms. Parks. Aye. Mr. Maxfield. Aye. Mr. Goldberg. Aye. Mr. Slaveter. Aye. All right, no motions adopted. Now we have the other conditions with the addition of the sidewalk as Mr. Mora talked about and the registration and reporting of complaints language that Ms. Brestrup and I are going to work on. Are there any other amendments or questions about conditions for this application? If not, I'd entertain a motion to approve the conditions with the as amended and as specified on the sidewalk and the additional language that we're developing. Do I have a motion? Mr. Maxfield, do I have a second? Second. Motion is seconded. Any discussion on the amendment? If not, the motion occurs, a vote occurs on the motion to approve the conditions as amended with the two stipulations as previously stated. Chair votes aye. Ms. Parks. Aye. Mr. Maxfield. Aye. Mr. Gilbert. Aye. Mr. Sloveter. Aye. Next we need to go to findings and based on the conditions we have approved, we make our findings regarding this particular application. And those findings are as follows. We find that the, that this is in compliance with section 3.3 that indeed not on our occupied duplexes are out in this zoning district. It requires a property management plan, which it has and, which is provided complaint response plan, which is provided and is provided for either a management company or the presence of an on-site manager and there's a management company here. So it complies with that. It complies with article seven, the parking restrictions. There's sufficient spaces required and it complies with the, continues to comply with the lot coverage and dimensional regulation of footnotes under section 3. Under section 10.3, and again, we're doing, we're doing this the same way we've done the conditions. If anybody objects to any of these findings, make it your objection known. Otherwise, and we'll vote on it separately. Otherwise we'll vote on all these conditions and block or all these findings and block. 10.380 and 10.381, the proposal is suitably located in the neighborhood in which it's proposed. The proposed non-owner occupied duplex is allowed within the R&D district by special permit review and approval. The subject property is located in neighborhood along a highly traveled road in comprised of a broad range of architectural styles, including single family and two family homes. 10.382, 383, 385 and 387. These are generally dealing with the nuisance and disrupting the neighborhood. The proposal does not constitute nuisance due to air, water, pollution, flood, noise, odors, dust, vibration, lights, or visually offensive structures or site features. The proposal would not be substantial inconvenience or hazard to a butters, vehicles, or pedestrians. The proposal reasonably protects the adjoining premises that can stand for mental and offensive uses on the site, including air and water, pollution, flood, noise, odor, dust, vibration, lights, or visually offensive structures or site features. The proposal provides convenient and safe vehicular pedestrian movement within the site and in relation to adjacent streets and property. The staff review and says the proposal does not constitute a nuisance to air pollution. There's little change in the area. The proposal provides convenient and safe vehicular pedestrian movement within the site. 10.384, adequate and appropriate facilities would provide it for the proper operation and proposed use. Utility services are found. There's no change. 10.386, the proposal ensures that it is in conformance with the parking and sign regulations. The applicant states that they are, I mean, it is in compliance with the parking spaces that provides eight and four is required. Proposal provides convenient and safe vehicular pedestrian movement within the site and hasn't changed. And it currently does and that has not changed. The proposal ensures adequate space for off-street loading and this is not applicable. Proposal provides adequate methods of disposal and are storage for sewage, refuge, recycling and other waste resulting from the use. A trash cycling bins will be stored as per the site plan. They'll be stored in the back of the two and they'll be brought out in the front. I mean, that's was identified on the site plan and by the during the presentation and it's connected to the town's water and sewer. 10.0, the proposal ensures protection from flood hazards. It's not in the flood zone. 10.391, the storage features is applicable to point 392. Provides adequate landscaping and screening of adjacent properties. The proposal maintains existing landscaping and proposes new evergreen screenings to show the parking to the adjacent property. 10.391 provides protection of adjacent properties by minimizing intrusion of light. We've seen that in the lighting plan that does not wash over the adjoining property and they are dark sky compliant. 10.394 is not applicable to the project. 10.395, the proposal does not create disharmony with respect to the terrain and use of scale structures. There's no basic change in this application to the building structure. 10.396, the proposal provides screening for storage areas that's contained in the site plan and the screening of the trash and the propane tanks. 10.397, the proposal provides adequate recreational facilities, open space for the proposed use. There's sufficient open space on the site. And 10.398, the proposal is in harmony with the general purpose intent of this bylaw and the master plan. Demographics and housing, Amherst master plan states that the mix of housing should be provided to meet the needs and is affordable to the broadest possible spectrum of the community. The existing duplex helps this meet this need. Those are our findings. Is there any questions, concerns about those findings from members of the board? If not, I would entertain a motion to make these findings. So moved. Second. Ms. Parks moves the motion. Is there a second? Second. We got to make these findings, guys. We can't approve it. Can you? Or does somebody not want to make this? Is there a problem with the findings or just am I not hearing from anybody? Beauty and Ears. Yeah, you have an audio issue. Mr. Judge. Mr. Maxfield approves, second the findings motion. Great, so before us is a motion to approve the findings. Any discussion on that motion? If not, the vote occurs on the motion to approve the findings. Chair votes aye. Ms. Parks. Aye. Mr. Maxfield. Aye. Boy, I'm having trouble hearing anybody. Is everybody else hearing? Are you hearing everything, John? You are. Yeah. I'm here. Mr. Maxfield affirmatively accepted the findings. Right again. Can you hear me now, Mr. Chair? You know, I got these new earphones because I was always, my old ones wouldn't last an hour and now I've just lost the volume for anybody else. It's good, but for the chair, you've got to be able to hear you guys. Okay. We can hear you now, just fine, Mr. Chair. So put those away. All right, so I hadn't, Mr. Ms. Parks, I think was a yes. Mr. Maxfield was a yes. Mr. Gilbert, aye. Yes, aye. Mr. Slavitor, Slavitor. Aye, and this. So however you need it, you have the vote. We got five votes. The motion is, it's unanimous. Now the vote occurs, the motion is to approve the, to approve application before us, which is special permit FY, FY, 2022 23-09. Do I have a motion? So moved. Second. All right. The motion is to approve special permit application 2023-9 with conditions as approved. Any discussion? If not, the vote occurs on that motion. Ms. Parks. Aye. Mr. Maxfield. Aye. Gilbert. Aye. Mr. Slavitor. Aye. Chair votes aye. The vote is unanimous. The application is approved. That's the first order of business. The second order of business is, ZDA FY 2023-10, College Street, 1957. LLC, care of Valley Property Management. Requests a special permit to construct a building that addition to allow a change of use from one family tax dwelling to a non-owned or occupied duplex dwelling under sections 3.3211 and 10.38 at the zoning by-law. Located at 300 West Street, Map 28, Parcel 101, Neighborhood Residential, RN, Zoning District. Submissions for that. We have, let's grab the application report. Before we do that, we had the site visit and items regarding 300 West Street. We looked at, we spent a lot of time looking at the drainage area in the back of the property and the new drainage that's removal of the existing pipe and putting new drainage pipes in. We reviewed the parking area and it's moved, the new parking area where the curb cut would be. And we walked into a lot, we looked at the new lot line, observed the property there. We observed stormwater drainage in the backyard. As I said, we observed the plan for filling the existing driveway to avoid having water into the existing garage, which will not be used as a garage. We confirmed that the first floor is, den will not have a door on it to prevent it being used as a bedroom. We discussed that the new vinyl siding on the property, on all the property, both the new and the old structure. And I think that was pretty much what we discussed. We also discussed the kinds of plants that will be put in between the two properties to provide screening and how they'll be our varieties. Starting at, I think, four to six feet. That's what I think it was called for. Anyway, Mr. Sloveter or Ms. Preskup, do you have anything to add to the site plan? Thanks. No, that was quite comprehensive. That covered everything. Great. Submissions we have. We've received submissions from the applicant, which is a ZDA application, a management plan dated to revise 2923. Additional reference photos, project description, vehicle and parking policy, a sample lease, guest policy, marijuana addendum, rules and regulations, policies and procedures for the rented property, mandatory recycling information, landlord disclosure of smoking policy, exterior light fixtures, these tails and specifics, bike rack information, site plans, which includes sheet P1, L1, L2, S1, L1, L2, L3, L4, L5, L6, which are lighting plans, demolition plans, layout and planning plans and grading plans. Building plans prepared by Mohammed Umer of Umer Design Services. We have sheets A100 through 106, and we have a stormwater drainage report dated July 11th, 2022, prepared by the Berkshire Design Group. Planning staff submissions include a property map, aerial map, topographical map, zoning map and a project application report dated revised, dated March 8th, 2023. And the applicant's waiver requests from plan requirements, site plan, a sign plan is the only waiver requirements. Mr. Santolaro or Mr. Liu, who's representing the applicant in this? Yeah, Alan, you wanna go first? Sure. Yes, Mr. Chair, both Mr. Liu and myself are representing the applicant, myself from the management side and Mr. Liu from the site and survey. And I know it's tedious, Mr. Santolaro, but we need your name and address just for the record. No problem. Alan St. Hilaire, Valley Property Management, Amherst, Massachusetts. Thank you. So the proposal before the board this evening is to convert the existing single family dwelling to a duplex dwelling to provide for additional housing. It will be all new construction. The existing structure will remain as configured with the exception of changing the garage, as you pointed out earlier, to more of a basement storage space accessible from the exterior only. And there will be a two-story addition in the rear of the property, which would be to the east side of the existing structure, which will allow for a new unit for bedroom, two bathroom. The parking will be configured as shown on the site plan, a piece of input we received from the fire department was to expand the driveway to 20 feet wide to allow for fire apparatus to get within 50 feet of the primary entrance of the addition. So that was incorporated between submissions to the board. There, as pointed out on the previous proposal, there'll be some screen plantings added along the new property line to screen the parking from both sides of the property line. And trash will be stored in rolling 96-gallon poly containers screened from view by the buildings. Lighting, Mr. Lu will get into, but is achieved by the same dark sky LED downcast wall-mounted lights. And the existing property is a split level with a one-car garage drive under and the parking presently serving that structure is in front of that garage. All of that will be eliminated and infilled and loaned and seated to match native grades on either side of the driveway. And all of the parking will be consolidated to the newly proposed parking area. That is the broad brushstrokes. If you'd like me to go through the architectural plans before I hand it over to Mr. Lu, I'd be happy to do that or answer any questions at this juncture. Yeah, Mr. Sandler, why don't you show us the architectural drawing so we can see what the new built, the new structure will look like, the new duplex. We'll do, get that open here. All right, is that visible on everyone's screen? Yep. Great. So zoom in a little bit here to focus on the property. The hatched area, this is the ground level plan. The hatched area is the existing structure. This area here where it says existing is the existing garage, which will be partially covered when the grade is raised on the outside. There'll be a hatch way, like you would see into a basement to access this space. The proposed structure is this 10 by 12 connecting room and a 25, 25 and a half by 32, a 27 by 32 footprint to show the room layouts. The, there'll be a slight modification to the existing structure. There's a bedroom with a dividing wall, an area for a desk, an area for bed. This wall will be removed to make this one continuous room and the door on the family room will be removed to dissuade that from being used as a bedroom. In the addition, there'll be no basement. It'll be much like the existing house concrete slab on grade. So there'll be no basements space below this. There'll be kitchen, living, den and dining room. The mechanical and laundry room will be located between the two structures. On the upper level, there'll be four bedrooms and a full bathroom. And the existing house has family, living, dining and three beds on the upper level. For the facades, let me get to that, elevation views. This is the existing structure as seen today. There's a small peak of the addition that will protrude above the roof line foot or perhaps 16 inches. Other than that, there will not be any structure visible from the public way as part of the addition. That is the West elevation on the East elevation. The, this section here is the existing structure and the gable end wall here is the addition, the proposed structure. For the North elevation, this would be the end view from the school side, the neighbor school side. This section, the gable end wall is the existing structure and this is the proposed structure. South elevation, very similar existing structure on the left proposed structure on the right. Any questions about the architectural plans or any other elements of the project? You know, why don't we go to Mr. Unless you have anybody has a specific question on this. Yep, go ahead. Yeah, I have a, sorry, no sparks. No, go ahead. Mr. Gilbert. Okay, thanks. Can you walk through what's occurring with the existing garage? Yeah, so the existing garage is a one car under the house and the access to that garage will be eliminated when the parking is moved to the north side of the property. So there'll be a foundation wall poured up to grade and a hatchway so that the space can still be accessed for storage, but will no longer be usable as a vehicle parking place. Okay, thank you for that clarification. So can you flip to the plan then of the existing building real quick? So there will be, I mean, you said a hatchway, there should be a door. Oh, okay, hatchway door, I see what's going on. Okay, so that's gonna be completely converted. The main entry to that house should be occurring where that stairwell is. What's, is that just not visible? Did he just not place that there? On the architectural plans, it's beneath the overhang. I can bring up a photo of the house to show what that looks like. It's just an exterior door that comes into this landing and either goes up or down to the upper level. Okay, so it's at the midpoint you hit the landing and that's why we're not seeing it here because this is below. And then I guess the first floor plan would be above. So you'd be walking down to it. That's correct. Okay, okay, cool. Trying to understand that. The other plan comment that I have is regarding, let me see, regarding the new build. What is the reasoning for getting all four bedrooms up on the first floor with one bath? The main reasoning for that is that we are trying to build it to simulate a colonial structure where you have the shared spaces on the lower level and the bedrooms on the upper level. And because it's being built on a concrete slab, the plumbing being upstairs for that bathroom is easier. Yeah, I follow the stacking of the bathrooms. I guess my concern is just having four tenants in that space with one bath, the other one having to be located on the downstairs, going down, flipping basically all the way back around. Had there been any consideration of perhaps changing the den that's shown on the ground level which is immediately adjacent to the living area which is half of the footprint of the house basically for a social space into a bedroom and allowing direct access to the bath or is there a specific rationale again to have those four up on the second floor? The other rationale is to provide a bit of a separation from the common space and the sleeping space. If someone wants to watch TV and someone needs to get to bed early, it's a bit of a sound buffer and kind of keeps things a little quieter. Okay. Similar floor plans in place and haven't really had complaints about the inner functionality. Okay, yeah, my concern is just the four with the one up there but just want to voice that sort of off of that. Other than that, the only other question I have is the existing, the existing building, is that a one and a half bathroom? Okay, so I mean, in fact, for four tenants in that case, you really only have one tub or shower for everyone and that's as it currently is, correct? There's no reno in place there, that's how it's built. That's correct. Okay, thank you for the clarification. That's all, yeah, that's all I sort of had on my mind here, thank you. You're welcome. Thank you, Mr. Gilbert, Ms. Parks. Hi, I was just interested in that the space between the two buildings is a laundry area. Yes. And I'm wondering, do both units use that as their laundry area or is that only for the newer unit? That is only for the newer unit. There is no connectivity across this wall. It's a joint wall between the two units but there's no connection whatsoever. The existing house does have a laundry on the lower level that's currently in use and would continue to be used. Okay, and then the area that is directly below the laundry storage, is that a green space? In the proposed, oh, here? Yeah. Yes, that would be loam and seed for lawn, yes. Okay, all right, thank you. You're welcome. The questions about the architectural drawings or the building plan, okay. If not, Mr. Lu, do you wanna talk a little bit about go over the site plan with us and specifically the drainage? Sure, sure. All right, hopefully you can see that plan. Okay, Michael Lu with the Berkshire Design Group Northampton, Massachusetts. Looking at this illustrative site plan, let me blow it up just a bit here. Whoops. Okay, so on the existing property, this is the existing house shown by this rectangle and just to clarify, there is a front porch out here that's partially covered. Currently, people enter the house from the driveway which would be in this location. There's a small set of steps that bring you up onto this landing and then into the door. That would be switched over to this end of the landing with the new parking location. But the addition is shown here in this hatched area. We'll talk a little bit about the drainage. The existing driveways to be removed, it's currently, you've got like four to five cars parked in this driveway and two or three of them are actually parked within the town right of way because the house is rather close and there's not much room for parking there in the pavement. There is a small area drain at the bottom of the driveway about right there and it's piped underground and it runs around in this direction and discharges in the backyard here. There is an existing catch basin in the backyard which essentially does nothing. It's raised above grade and it's in really rough shape. I don't know if you went out back and took a look at that. But it's basically like a structure that's crumbling and as I mentioned, the frame of the catch basin is set so that it's higher than the existing grass. So it really doesn't do anything except for the fact that the existing piping is cracked so any buildup of water does get into the drainage system. The existing drainage is piped to southward is it Mount Holyoke Road or Mount Holyoke Drive? So it goes out here in the southerly direction and continues south of this existing house here at the butters. Similarly, there's a sewer line that extends along the east side of the property and runs southward into Mount Holyoke as well. So the driveway is gonna be removed and the front yard will be regraded with a swale so the water will continue to flow around toward the backyard but at the surface level instead of via piping. As much of that piping will be removed as possible. Portion of that pipe does actually run through the corner of this addition. So the new driveway, as Alan had mentioned we had some feedback from the fire department and they wanted to have a 20 foot wide access to within 50 feet of the front entry of the addition. So the driveway was basically we made it this is shown in the darker hatched area. This is a 20 foot wide paved driveway. The parking spaces are along the north side and these will be gravel parking spaces, 10 spaces in all. And again, we're gonna be using the bumper, concrete bumper or tire stops to indicate the spaces. In relative to the proposed drainage the backyard will continue to be a low point. It's an existing low point and it's actually catching runoff from part of the neighborhood to the east here. Water runs across these properties and through the woods and eventually ends up pooling in the backyard here. So that condition is unfortunately, I mean we'd obviously rather not have that happen but water is flowing there. So the catch basin is proposed to be taken out because it's really not functional. So we'll have a more contiguous yard space here but we're creating a low point here by removing some of the existing piping and we'll have an inlet at the existing pipe here at the tree line. So essentially the low point will be moved from the center of the backyard here to along the south side along the tree line. So we'll get that a little bit out of the way of the usable yard space but maintain that functionality. In terms of the new drainage for the, or the proposed drainage for the increase in impervious, the parking, the driveway and this, the roof I should add. We're piping, we're using roof leaders, gutters and leaders to bring roof runoff to this detention basin. The light lines here you can see are contours. There's a bit of a swale on this end but the main detention area basin is here. It's roughly three feet deep, three and a half feet deep. We'll catch water that flows off of the pavement and parking and is directed by piping from the roofs of these units where it will enter and be attenuated. It will overflow back into the right-of-way swale here. This symbol right here is a double catch basin. Excuse me, an existing double catch basin in the town right-of-way where currently water is flowing to this swale and being caught into a piped enclosed pipe system. Our engineer did communicate with Jason's skills about this many, many months ago. And Chris, I don't believe we received any comments back from engineering but I'm assuming that Jason's taken a look at this and I know he's talked about the design with our engineer. The drainage does function and meet peak runoff in the two 10 and 100-year storm events. And again, we are providing some screening here as shown by these three symbols between the two properties and trying to maintain as much of this existing tree wooded area as possible. The trash litter will be placed under the deck here. There is an existing deck and I think there's a gazebo in the backyard here that's all gonna be removed. The deck will be made smaller with a set of steps that come down to the driveway here and to the parking spaces. That'll be able to bring residents right up into that first floor instead of at the bottom level. There is a slider at the bottom level underneath this deck. So there's access from the parking area as well as access to the front. I'm not sure how many people actually use the front door in this case, but there's certainly the opportunity given the layout of the parking that people could enter either the front or the back of the existing building and then obviously into the front of the addition here in close proximity to the parking spaces. Concrete tire stops are also proposed at the east side of the driveway and parking to prevent people from driving off and parking and using the lawn space for vehicular parking. The concrete tire stops are easier to deal with snow plowing rather than large stones. So the applicant would like to use those instead. We're continuing, there are some existing stones that exist along the front of the property. Whatever is in the way, we will relocate to this side, to the southern part of the frontage on the road. We are also proposing to add two shade trees here in the town right of way to continue that treatment of shade trees, the plantings that were done to the north in front of 290. This is an existing tree that will be maintained. Unfortunately, there's also a large evergreen that you might have seen approximately right in this location. We thought we could save it when originally we had the driveway exiting onto West Street at 12 feet wide. But with the widening of the driveway, I don't think there's any chance of saving it. And if we had to prune it up to, I believe it's a 16 foot height that the fire department requires that we'd basically be taking off, almost two thirds of the canopy of that tree. So given its proximity to the earthwork and new paving, we just didn't think there was a chance of saving that tree anymore, unfortunately. But we are providing some additional evergreen plantings here to screen the parking from West Street. And as Alan had mentioned, the litter and recycle bins are screened from the road being placed in the back here. There's also a bike rack proposed to be placed in that location. I will go down to the lighting plan. Whoops. All right. With the lighting, we're proposing to replace existing, there's some type of lantern that hangs on a chain here on the landing here. We're proposing that that be removed. And one of those type L2 porch lights be used here. There's an L2 porch light main entrance in addition here and an L2 with a mounted shield to prevent spillage over the property line at this rear entrance here. I'm not sure how often that will be used, but it's, I think by code, a light is required there. And then one of the larger, or one of the wall mounted lights that has a larger spread, the L1 fixture here, you can see we are getting lighting out here, but without adding more lights, which again is probably not needed. We do have darker areas at the far corners of the parking, but as Alan had alluded to last time, it's not a direct cutoff where it turns from light to pitch black, it's graded out. So anybody getting out of their car seat or still, we'll be able to follow their way to get to the buildings. It's not gonna be pitch black, it's just a very, very low level of light. No, that's below 0.2 foot candles. So I guess we'll open that up now for comments, questions. So Mr. Liu, the trees that you're going to, you're removing existing trees up here on this, the line here with the other property. Yeah. The light from the cars parking. What are these arborvites and how tall will they be? Yeah, let me just double check on the planting. Whoops, come on, leave it's on here. Yeah, we have our arborvite at five to six foot at planting. Okay. The street trees are sized at two to two and a half inch caliper. All right. So again, number of screenpines here and here. Along here, okay. And then this remains this sort of thicket and trees off to the right of these arborvites remain. And then you also find some shoot, okay. Correct. The backyard is really wet. And I read through, I looked through the drainage report that your group did, is the net result that the backyard will be drained of the standing water by the connection to the existing pipe that takes it out of the pot and moves it to the, I guess it's to the south. Yes. We feel that this will result in less standing water because the water will continue to flow to that new low point. Whereas now, if water built up, it would pool to a point where it would have to overflow into the structure. Yeah, the ground is sunk. Yeah. The existing pipe, it doesn't make any sense, yeah. Right, right. And the soils are silty back there. So there's not good infiltration. Is there any, are you doing any infill? You're not filling this ground at all, are you? No, it's just, whatever's disturbed will be, topsoil and seeded, mainly around the edges of the parking and the new building addition. And then one other question I had is the, this little, I guess there was a doorway here on the connector between the two units. Is that correct? Is there, or maybe Alan, Mr. St. Hilaire, you can talk about this, but there's a doorway in that connector, which has the laundry room. Is this your doorway and that's your second exit? It is, Mr. Chair. That is the second egress as required by building code. And where would, so then the facilities, the laundry would be on the opposite wall? Yes. Okay. All right. And that's why, even though there's no sidewalk to this or anything else, is there, there's not a sidewalk back here. There's a lighting to be able to get in, but there's no sidewalk or pathway. Correct. Okay. All right. Those are some questions that I had about people have other questions. Members of the board, Mr. Sloverter, hope you're muted. Okay. Thank you. In the backyard where the water pools and there is that above ground catch basin or drain, there's a large fairly poor condition pipe, partially above the ground. Is that going to be removed completely? Yeah. I mean, parts of these pipes, you can see they're exposed and not buried. This is the pipe. Here's the catch basin. The pipe runs in the southerly direction here. And I believe there's, you can see pieces of it here uncovered, opposite this planting bed. And here's this four inch PVC that comes around from this area drain at the driveway. I think it wraps around and comes in this direction and then just discharges. There's also another one here, which we don't really know where that comes from, but that might've been part of the original drain. And then maybe it failed for some reason. And then this piece was added or vice versa. We're not really sure, but there are exposed pieces of pipe that are surveyors, obviously, they picked up here. So all this smaller pipe is proposed to be removed as much as is found. And then this catch basin and piping until we hit basically the tree line here will be removed. And it'll just be regraded and seeded, but there'll be a flared end opening added to the existing pipe here. And so the new low point will be in this area and water will flow from basically east and north toward that new low point. And we're using the existing drain to carry that flow into the drainage system at Mount Holyoke Drive. Thank you. Other questions, comments, suggestions from the board? Ms. Parks. I just have one more question about the bathroom situation. So are there two full baths in the proposed addition? Is there one and a half bath? In the proposed addition, there are two full bathrooms. In the existing structure, there's one and a half. Okay. Okay, I just wanted to clarify that, thank you. All right. If there are no other comments from board members, we could open this up for public comments. This is a public hearing. So Mr. McCarthy, can you see if we have people who wish to speak to this? Members of the public who wish to speak? I am seeing no hands raised. We'll give it just a second for people to raise their hand if they wish. Seeing none, there's no call for public comment at this time. Back to the, any final comments from the applicant or final comments from board members. Mr. Liu, I guess the thing that I, the only comment I have is that I look at this and I see it's 157, 156, 157, there's not much slope. And you're, to gather that water in the backyard, there's not much slope to the drainage area. And right where you intend to put the pipe right there, it's a little bit less, it's maybe a foot less, but that's not gonna be perfect yet. Your company did the stormwater or at least they endorsed the stormwater study. And it's your feeling that that will be sufficient to, I mean, not to give us a desert dry backyard, but to take away the standing water and move that away from the... Yes, I mean, but we have minimal pitch from the north here where the 157 contour is flowing south. But if that's problematic, this can be filled a little bit more to create a little bit more pitch, in which we result in a little bit more earthwork in the backyard. But there is pitch, according to the plan, yet water flowing from the north to the south. Okay. And the catch basin, that new catch basin is in that lowest circle of 156. The new one. The new one, yes, that's the new low point, yep. Okay. All right. Good enough. And then the other drainage area is up there by the parking area, where you're creating this sort of a catch basin, which has got three foot difference. Yeah. Okay. All right. And then we'll move half up to the overflow right here. Got it. Okay. Any other questions, comments from board members or the applicant, before we move to the public meeting portion? Okay. I'd like to move to the public meeting on this, keeping the public hearing open for the time being, in case we need to gather more information or need to go back in. The public meeting portion is where we consider conditions and make our findings. First thing I would say is that we have any general comments from board members and generally it's not a time for the public to speak. Ms. Bresta, you can start. I see your hand is up. I just wanted to note, I'm not sure if you close the public hearing on the previous case. So you might want to take a vote on that because I was reminded of that because you said you would keep this public hearing open and you kept the other public hearing open. So I just want to make sure that you close the other public hearing before the end of the night. Thank you. That's all. Okay. I guess that should have been in my motion to approve as to close the public hearing. I'll do that. Make sure your mind has to do that at the end of the, after we finish this. That's a good catch. Thank you. General comments from people regarding adding this non-monoroccupied duplex? Ms. Parks. I guess I would just like to ask town staff about making this little, it almost looks like a flag, like a little flag backyard behind the other property in order to have enough minimum lot coverage for this new building. Does it matter that that new construction isn't really going to be able to use that space or I mean, I'm assuming that there's minimum requirements for a reason. And so I'm just wondering is there, are you concerned at all about this new construction that they can use that backyard? Rob, I'm looking at you right now. Mr. Mora. Yeah, I'm not concerned about that. We do have frontage requirements, building circle requirements, lot area requirements, but we don't have with requirements or any particular shape. So it's not unusual to see oddly shaped parcels in order to just to create the lot area that's needed. I think there's adequate yard space remaining for both properties, which we like to see. We wanna see some amenity space, but on the flip side, we don't wanna see areas too large that can accommodate really oversized gatherings or attract other, I guess, unwanted activities by the manager of the property. So I don't have any concerns about it. Okay. There's no requirement in the zoning by-law if there'd be compactness of lots, correct? They don't have to be a regular shape. They can be correct. It's not like congressional district redistricting. We can gerrymander here without a problem, right? I guess what's on my mind is also if one were sold to someone, not the same owner, then that kind of use becomes a little unusual. So I'm good, I'm fine. Okay. Other comments, questions, or just concerns members of the board have. All right. I'd like to do this with the same process we used with the earlier one, which we tend to do is go over conditions first and then make findings. The project application report has proposed conditions beginning on page 11, excuse me, beginning on page 10. Possible conditions include the standard that the building has to be built as and let's look, the site improvements have to be in compliance with the submitted materials. That's condition one. And it lists those submitted materials, including the building plans and the other lighting plans, demolition plan, management plan, parking permit, et cetera. Second, the permit shall expire upon change of ownership and less prior to the change of ownership, the prospective property owner shall appear before the zoning board of appeals that are public hearing for review and approval of a management plan, parking management plan, that's the management plan, parking plan, we've got to, I think we have a typo there. Should read management plan, parking management plan, parking plan I think and lease agreement. And to determine whether additional conditions are needed to meet sections 10.38 planning under the zoning bylaw, but under those should still be made in accordance. That's number two and Chris or Rob is, do we have both a parking management plan and a parking plan? In this case, we don't have a management plan, we have a parking plan. The parking plan is what you see on the site plan. And then I think there's also a written parking management plan. So they're both, okay, thank you. All rooms shall be used as labeled in the following floor plans sheet A 102, that's everything. And that includes just for everybody's knowledge and information, no doors on the den, make sure that they're not being used as a bedroom, an extra bedroom. Correct, Mr. Singeler? Good. Management plan shall be followed by property owners and they change returns to the ZBA, a public meeting, no more than four related individuals shall occupy the dwelling unit. All exterior lighting shall be designed and installed to be downcast. Street numbers shall be visible. Parking shall occur on improved services only. Parking shall be maintained as needed, constructed in accordance with article seven, while parking shall be clearly delineated and shall be provided with permanent dust-free surface and adequate drainage. Individual parking spaces shall be painted or marked or otherwise delineated. And I think there's delineated through concrete wheel stops. Total number of persons per dwelling unit is limited to 10. I assume we'll have the same amendment that we had in the last special permit application regarding limitation and approval of the landlord. Overnight stays are limited to four in any consecutive or three-day period and 14 days during the lease term. That's from the lease and the maximum number of overnight guests shall be four people. I'd also like to also include the two other provisions that Ms. Breschtrup and I are working on that we had with other non-owner-occupied rental properties. And that is the collection of information and submission of that information when you get the annual rental registration application. And the limit on the number of people who can gather, right? Correct, and that's with the written permission as amended in the earlier and the last one. Right. Yeah, we'll mirror that. All right, any other conditions that people wish to impose or consider or talk about? Are there any conditions that people wish to discuss or amend? If not, let's vote on the conditions and block before we turn to the findings. I entertain a motion that we approve the conditions and block as drafted and as amended by as previously stated with the number of people and the development of language that Ms. Breschtrup and I will provide tomorrow. So moved. Is there a second? Second. Moved and seconded. Who was that, Mr. Maxwell? Maxwell? Yep, I had the second. Thanks. Any discussion? If not, the vote occurs on the motion to approve the conditions as amended. The chair votes aye. Ms. Parks? Aye. Mr. Maxfield? That's a silent aye, I know I can see it. Mr. Gilbert? Aye. Aye. Mr. Sloveter? Aye. All right, motion carries, unanimous vote, motion carries. The conditions are approved. Now we have to go to the findings. We have several findings to make. The first is that this is a use permitted in that district and that zoning district and that it meets the requirements of section 3.3211 which include a management firm to property management entity. It includes a applicant's management services, contact information, complaint response form, et cetera, are all provided. So I think we can find that 3.3211 is met. Article 7, this provides more than sufficient parking. This dimensional regulations under table three, it meets the requirements for the new dimensional requirements. 10.38 and 10.381 deals with suitability of location in the neighborhood. It's a non-unoccupied duplex is allowed in this area and their subject property is located in a neighborhood that has a highly diverse source of housing and highly traveled streets. 10.382, 383, 385, and 387. The proposal does not constitute a nuisance due to air pollution, flood, odor, dust, vibration lights or visually offensive materials or features. Proposal does not provide a substantial inconvenience to pedestrians. Proposal reasonably protects the adjoining premises against detrimental or offensive units, uses, excuse me. And the proposal provides convenient and safe vehicle and pedestrian movement within the site. Some of the plantings remain, others are there are new plantings to buffer this property from the neighbors. There's also dark sky compliant lighting which the lighting plan shows that it does not bleed up into the abutting properties. And there are the trash and the recycling containers are kept out of the public view. 10.384, adequate and appropriate facilities would be provided. Utility services are found to be adequate for the operation of the existing proposed use. 10.386, the proposal ensures that is in conformance with the parking and sign regulations and bylaws. Four parking spaces are required, eight are proposed. The 10.387, the proposal provides convenient and safe vehicular and pedestrian movement within the site in relation to adjacent streets, property or improvements. We can find that safe vehicular and pedestrian movement will be found on the site. 10.388, the proposal ensures adequate space for off-street loading and unloading of vehicles. It's not applicable, 10.389 provides adequate methods of disposal and are stored for sewage recyclable. Trash and recycling bins will be stored, serviced via four rolling carts. Containers will be screened from view. Water and sewer connections exist. 10.390 ensures protection from flood. It's not a flood zone, but the storm drainage, which is proposed by the applicant should meet the needs of draining water away from this property and not onto other properties, no budding properties. 10.391, the proposal protects to the extent feasible, unique or historic, natural or scenic features, not applicable, 10.392, adequate landscaping, including screening of adjacent presidential uses. We find that there is some existing landscaping, others will be added, arborviety along the driveway and along the North edge and along West street. Other storm water, water improvement and storm water detention and movement off the property into piping. And the proposal also includes an addition of two street trees planted in front of unit A. 10.393, protection of adjacent properties from intrusion of lighting, light poles, et cetera, parking lot lighting all or everything is dark sky compliant and the lighting plan provides for illuminated parking areas and walkways, but not bleeding onto neighboring properties. 10.394, poles of a voice extent feasible impact on steep slopes, that's not applicable. 10.395, the proposal does not create this harmony with respect to the terrain and to use scale and architecture of existing buildings and vicinity which have functional or visual relationship there too. Within, we don't have to deal with that. Tom, within any district for business section to remain in the staff review, the property is located in the RN zoning district and does not occur within the boundaries of the National Historic Register District. There are several multifamily dwellings and single-family rental properties along this section of West street. The neighborhood is comprised of a broad range of architectural styles, including single-family, two-family, multifamily condos and apartment buildings. There is also retail dining, bars, farms, commercial businesses, and proximity to Pomeroy Village Center. Sections 3.321 deals with high proportion scale shape landscaping of two family dwellings, meets the requirements of section 3.321. There's no particular note order of the neighborhood information, except that more than 50% of the structures in the immediate neighborhood are non-owner occupied rental property. 10.396, the proposal provides screening for storage areas, loadings, dumpsters. We've already discussed that and it utilizes the building and screening from the new deck. 10.397, proposal provides sufficient recreational facilities and there's sufficient open space on the site. 10.398, the proposal is in harmony with the general purpose and intent of the bylaw. Section four of the demographics and housing of the Amherst master plan states that a mix of housing will provide to meet the needs and of and is affordable to the broadest spectrum in the community. With the applicant providing a second dwelling as redevelopment on an existing property, the proposal has met the intent of the master plan by providing a mix of housing within the neighborhood. The board finds that the proposal meets the applicable zoning bylaws. Sections 3.211, 10.338 and 10.388. Those are the findings that we have to make. I believe that we can make those findings. I would entertain a motion that those findings be approved. Ms. Parks moves. Mr. Slovidr seconds. I can. Is there any discussion? If not, the motion is, the motion occurs to make the findings as stated and blocked. So there was the findings in the project at draft project application report. If there's no further discussion, we will vote on that motion. The chair votes aye. Ms. Parks. Aye. Mr. Maxfield. Aye. Mr. Gilbert. Aye. Mr. Slovidr. Aye. So we have approved conditions. We've made our findings. The vote now occurs on a motion to close the public hearing and public meeting on ZBA, what's the number of the ZBA? ZBA 23-10 and approve the special permit application with conditions. Do I have a motion? So moved. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? This requires four votes. I vote aye. Ms. Parks. Aye. Mr. Maxfield. Aye. Mr. Gilbert. Aye. Mr. Slovidr. Aye. The vote is unanimous. The motion carries the public hearing on ZBA 2023-10 is closed. Now I want to return to ZBA 2023-9 and close the public hearing on that application which we have approved. Do I have a motion? So moved. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? If not, the vote occurs on the motion. The chair votes aye. Ms. Parks. Aye. Mr. Maxfield. Aye. Mr. Gilbert. Aye. Mr. Slovidr. Aye. The motion is unanimous. Motion carries. Congratulations, Mr. St. Hilaire and Mr. Liu. You have your two special permit applications approved. And thank you for providing additional housing in the neighborhood and for the town. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your time. Have a great night. All right. The next order of business is a public meeting and a public meeting to grab the next thing. A public meeting on ZVA 2006-002 with new owner, Amit, and you'll have to help me with your name, Mr. Kanuja. And- Kanuja. Please say it again for me correctly. Kanuja. Kanuja. Yes. New owner, Amit Kanuja, requests approval of a new sign with a new name of the business, Campus Pizza, formerly Sunset Pizza, and a review of the special permit and management plan in light of the change in ownership under conditions five, seven, nine of special permit ZVA 2006-002 150 Fearing Street, Map 11C, Partial 36. There was not a formal site visit in this case. I drove by the property. I'm familiar with the property. I've walked past it numerous times. I'm familiar with the old business sign and the business there. Does any member have anything to add? Regarding a site visitor or review of the property. All right. The only submissions we have are from the applicant which include a photograph of the new sign, a management plan, an amendment to the management plan, which really just, which only as far as I can tell has the change in the name and the change in the sign. Everything else seems to be the same. We also have the old special permits from 2006 and we have special permit from an earlier time, 2005, I guess, when it was Chicago Pizza. Anyway, those I think are the, Ms. Brestrup, are there any other submissions that we have on this? I don't think there are any other submissions. I just wanted to point out that Mr. Kanuja's attorney is in the attendees, in case you wanted to bring her in for any reason. Sure. Just in case she needs to, that's fine. So, who's representing the applicant? Mr. Kanuja or Mrs. Steebo? We're actually both together. Okay. Both give your name and address and please provide a quick presentation for the board. Sure. Hi. Hello. Rebecca Teebo here from Dory Wallace Pillsbury and Murphy. I'm here representing Amit Kanuja. My address is one modern place in Springfield, Mass 01144. And Mr. Kanuja, what's your name and address again please? Hi, my name is Amit Kanuja. I reside at 10 Shepherd's Hollow Road in Leeds, Mass 01053. Great. Thank you. Proceed. So thank you for the opportunity to speak. As you see, there's a special permit that was granted in 2005 and there were certain conditions on there, including conditions that if there is a sign change with respect to the sign, and if there is an ownership change that we need to come before this board for approval for these changes. So that's why we're here. We understand this to be a public meeting where you'll be considering whether or not these changes are de minimis enough to just sign off on them as possibly as you did in the past with a memorandum as opposed to doing a public hearing. Mr. Kanuja recently bought the business and hopes to operate it and open it soon. With respect to the sign, there really is no significant physical changes either in how it's lit up or its size. It basically is just the name that is being slid into the old or the existing sign. And it's the same material and same lighting. As you saw in the management plan that was submitted, that largely follows previous plans that have been submitted and is responsive to all the questions on the application. There are no significant changes. A little bit of background about Mr. Kanuja and he can of course elaborate on this, but he's been in the restaurant business himself for over 20 years, including in a family run business that's been operating in Northampton for about 40 years with a presence in a community. He obviously cares about how a restaurant operates within a community. He will be personally on site in managing the business and present as it gets started under his ownership to oversee and make sure that it runs in accordance with the management plan that was submitted. I think that's all I have. And if you have specific questions, we'd be happy to answer them. In review of the application of the request of amend the management plan, which is I think about all you're really asking, the only change that I noted was the sign. Is there any other change that you're requesting other than the sign? No. Yeah. Okay. I have no other questions. Is anybody on the board have a question? Ms. Brestrup, I think all we have to do is approve the change in the management plan. Is that correct? We don't have to do anything. We have to make any findings. This is, we don't have to go through 10.38 all over. Do we? You need to approve the sign and acknowledge that you've reviewed the special permit and the management plan and then approve the management plan. So I think that's all you have to do. All right. I would entertain a motion that we approve the change in sign, signage, that we stipulate that we've reviewed the management plan and that we reviewed the special permit and that we approve said items. So moved. Is there a second? Second. I got a motion and a seconded and a motion is seconded. Any discussion? No discussion? Vote occurs on the motion. The chair votes aye. Ms. Parks. Aye. Ms. Maxfield. Aye. Ms. Gilbert. Aye. Mr. Slobiter. Aye. Motion is unanimous. Motion carries and congratulations. You've got your sign. Good luck with your business. That's been there for a, there's been pizza sold there for a long time. I'm sure that will continue to be sold there for a long time to come. Good luck. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Next order of business is a public meeting. We had noticed that we wanted to have this discussion about when we can have a public rehab. Will we continue to have meetings via Zoom or will we be able to meet in person? And I think there is some recent, recent development on this. I have not read the email, Ms. Brestra, but you did send me something I think that talks about a recent decision or a notice that we maybe at a point coming up where we might actually be in person again. Can you give us a lightness on this? What's going on? So the ability to hold public meetings remotely is due to expire at the end of March, March 31st. The house in Boston has passed a, I don't know what exactly it is, but it's a law that would allow remote meetings to continue through March of 2025. The Senate has not passed that yet, but I understand that they're working on it. And we think that they will pass it, but we haven't heard anything to the contrary, but it hasn't been passed yet. So we may be able to continue meeting remotely until March of 2025. I think this item was put on the agenda at the request of a new zoning board member. A new zoning board member, an associate member, and you may want him to speak about it. I think he feels that having meetings in person is beneficial both for board members as well as the applicant. There may be a difference of opinion about that. So anyway, this was put on the agenda at the request of Vince O'Connor with the acquiescence of Steve Judge. So why don't we talk about it? You can talk about it. I know that Mr. O'Connor cannot be here tonight for this discussion. He is here on the phone. He's on the phone, so you can have him speak if you wanted to. Yes, I didn't realize that was him. So Mr. O'Connor, you're the one that wanted to put this on the agenda. What's your thoughts? He has to unmute himself. Steve, can you help him to unmute himself? Yes, I have- There he goes. There we go. Mr. O'Connor? Yeah, I've been trying to get through for about two hours now. But yeah, I'll speak to this. I think that it's, I think it's essential that we see people in person that the zoning board sees people in person. Consultants and experts who want to provide information from their homes or their offices in Hartford or Greenfield or something like that, that's perfectly okay. I think we should provide for that kind of an opportunity. And I think that anyone who has any kind of concerns, that they make, you know, health related concerns and so forth, that they could either participate remotely or either members or members of the public or applicants. They could appear by Zoom or wear masks. But I think that the idea of having, I've been to a lot of meetings in person. I've presented three matters to the zoning board, myself in person. I think it's- I've attended and spoke at probably as many planning board meetings as any member of the planning board ever has. And I think there's just a world of difference between participating remotely and participating in person. And I don't think there's any- I mean, this is- it's not like we're having a Massachusetts town meeting with the governor or something like that. This is a relatively small town. There's probably 15 to 18,000 year-round residents. And I have no idea why this should continue beyond any health emergency necessity. I'm sure that there are public officials who would like never to see a member of the public in person again and suits their style of governing. But I don't think that should be our style of governing in what is a relatively small town. Okay. Well, it seems to me that we've got a couple of trigger things that we have to look at. Number one, whether the state will continue to allow Zoom- not in person and allow us to continue to have a Zoom meeting. It may not. And so then we have to comply with the open meeting law. And so as of April 1st, we could be in a situation, if I understand it, Chris, as of April 1st, we could be in a situation where we have to have public meetings. And that's one possibility. The second possibility is that they do pass legislation. And that legislation says it's up to the town as to whether they want to have public meetings or not, or whether you continue in Zoom, or whether we have some kind of a combination public meeting and a Zoom meeting and in-person meeting. And I think that's really, that will be a decision that the town has to make and that will guide us and they will tell us what we can do in terms of having a public meeting or having a hybrid meeting. And the hybrid meeting would be great, but there's costs to that. And there's broadband, I think there's broadband concerns about the town. And so I just don't know if that's a possibility. So, you know, I'm not sure. I'm not sure just a second, Mr. O'Connor. I'm not sure if we'll, what they, what the town manager or the town council will suggest at that point, but we'll have to follow what they, what they tell us we can do and what they, and the resources. I am one who I've not been able to chair, I've said this before, I've not been able to chair a CBA meeting in person. I'm a chairman and I would generally love to be in person, especially if we could be in person with a, with the ability to have people still call in in some way and to hybrid care about who are, who want the convenience of participating in their town, town government from the comfort of their home. But that's a question of really resources of the town, whether they can allow that. So I would love to hear what other people think about the possibility of meeting in person or meeting in a hybrid. In a hybrid status. Ms. Parks. Hi, I'll just say that having done both, I actually prefer the zoom meetings and I prefer them because I think they are more accessible to, to the public. I've been to meetings where there were elderly people or people who had other health conditions were having to go and then sit for two hours waiting for other matters. So I think that's a great question. I think that was a great question. And I think that what we've already discussed was very difficult for them. And I also, for me, it's travel time and parking. And it's, I'm more comfortable. Sitting where I am sitting right now, not because I don't want to talk to the public or see the public, but I'm just more comfortable here for three hours at night to be in my own home. But the other thing is that I've been to meetings where a lot of people don't want to discuss an issue and it will really intimidate the petitioner because they feel like now there's this kind of negative pressure that's in person. And so I, I initially really didn't like the zoom meeting, but I have come to appreciate it. And so I'll just say that those things, I would not look forward to meeting again in person, although I like to see everybody in person. But it does add a half an hour on the beginning and the end of the day. And so I'm, that's my two cents. Other comments. Mr. Gilbert. Yeah, just echoing what Ms. Parks mentioned, the, you know, biggest advantage to virtual zoom meetings is accessibility for every member of the public. Right. They don't have to travel. They don't have to work around schedules or, you know, circumstances that might prohibit them from being in person. They can simply log in voice their opinion. And from what we have seen so far, right, at least in the past two years that I've been here on the board is that even with that availability, there's not a whole lot of members of the public who are hopping on. So I think that, you know, it's disservice to limit people's opportunity to participate. Also personally as a member of the ZBA, the reason that I'm able to be a full-time member is because this is virtual. If this was an in-person thing, this is something that I would not be able to contribute my time and services to. And, you know, just again, echoing some of Tammy's comments from the comfort could be comfort, could be scheduling. I work full-time. The simple fact is that I'm able to offer my, you know, time and services here in the town by virtue of this being continued remote. Mr. Maxfield. I mean, I guess I got to go in the opposite direction here. I'm going to be wrong. I like the convenience of my home as well. You know, it's nice when we're going through all of the specific findings and being able to, you know, clean up some papers, take care of a couple of things around the house while I'm listening to that. And, you know, I don't know if I'm going to be able to do that. I don't know if I'm going to be able to do that. Play here on my couch. Don't get me wrong. It's certainly convenient. But the, I think the appeal of, of doing this kind of work was for myself. A way of. Connecting with members of the community in person. I think was really the draw for me. And I think part of. When we're certainly just doing. I think kind of, kind of, I don't know if you want to say rudimentary. Kind of approvals, you know, changing a sign to another sign or something like that. In those cases, I think it's, doesn't really matter whether it's virtual or in person, but when you get to, I think more contentious cases. I think there's a benefit from being in person as opposed to just a faceless person on a call. Who's sharing. Whatever their opinion is about the case, I think it can lead it to being more contentious. And I think that there's a benefit to it being in person. We are a small community. I think we do benefit from coming together in that way. So I'm certainly more pro of. Of being in person. I know my, my term ends. This summer and. I'm kind of holding off to see what happens, whether or not we, we go back to a fully in person or stay, or if we stay fully or remote, or if we can go to some sort of hybrid or some combination. I think it's going to be the determining factor of whether or not I would be able to stay on this or whether I would choose to do another term, but. It's, if it comes down to us where we have some type of choice and what we would like to do, I would like to see some sort of hybrid, even if that hybrid is sometimes we're in person, sometimes we're remote. That would be what's something I would like to see, but I can certainly see being fully in person, something that might be a not doable for, for most people. Thank you, Mr. Mr. Maxfield, Mr. Slover. Well, I'm an old guy who's been in business a long time. And I always believe that personal contact was very important and I still do. But that said, I am very pleasantly surprised at here at my first ZBA meeting of how effective this meeting was tonight by zoom. I feel everyone was heard. Evidence was presented well. I didn't feel that any corners were cut or that any part of the process suffered because it was a zoom meeting. I also think that the public health issue, which a lot of people brush off as being basically finished, is not necessarily finished. And that, that working by zoom. Is a very useful tool, which I would not like to simply throw out because we all want to be together. And that would of course be nicer. So before zoom came into being, I would not have believed that it was this effective. I always leaned towards personal contact. But I think that all of these should be kept as options. A hybrid meeting is useful. A fully in person meeting might be useful, especially if it's an application that is controversial or has a large public response. And I would be willing to defer to the chair to determine if an in person meeting seems to be more required than not. I don't see anything about tonight's meeting that required an in person meeting. So I think that continuing by zoom or hybrid makes a lot of sense. It's far more convenient. And if the weather is terrible, we don't have to go out. There's all sorts of advantages. And I think that zoom works very well. So I think they should all be options. And we should find a way to exercise the option. That's most appropriate. Thanks. Mr. O'Connor, I know you probably want to respond to some of those points because you've raised this originally. And I want to give you the chance to do that. Yeah, I do have a couple of responses. One, I think that the concern about applicants being intimidated by their neighbors. Well, that's the old if you can't stand the heat. Stay out of the kitchen. If you, if you don't want to hear what your neighbors have to say about your proposal, then maybe you shouldn't propose it. And I do think however it goes, I think this, this matter should be not the matter, not the decision of a single individual who is not elected. But the decision of the boards and committees themselves based on their best judgment as to how they can best do their jobs. And finally, for those who think it was a great meeting, I, I participated by phone. There was no announcement about how to raise your hand by phone. I attempted to do so numerous times. Because even though I'm an associate member, I also am a member of the community who has some interest in Crocker Farm and the child who goes there. And I had some concerns about these proposals, the first two proposals, which I was unable to voice because I couldn't get recognized through this process, which everybody else seems to think is great. And so I had, I spent, I listened a lot, and I spent a lot of frustrated time trying at the appropriate moments to get recognized. And so it's not all, those who think that it worked fine, I can, I just want to assure you that it did not. And that a member of the public, I myself, who wanted to have something to say about the first two proposals was unable to do so. So I think that, and, you know, and actually I actually am pretty busy myself. I get up every morning before six o'clock to drive people to work and school. And so Mr. O'Connor, just let's just go, go with that point right there. First of all, I'm sorry that you didn't get on. That's a problem. Well, I, you know, I'm going to write the board a letter within the specified statutory time period. And I hope the board will consider what I have to say before they sign any decision. Let's, let's, let's do this. Part of the thing that I do in the beginning is try to tell people how they can access the meeting. If I think that if it wasn't clear, I should write in my statement in writing my opening comment that makes it easier to get, to tell you how a telephone call in person would be able to access the meeting. I know it has to be part of the, I have to be part both at the beginning and when you asked for public comment. Exactly. Because it was not clear how to do that. I agree. And so I'll have to, I'll have to put my comments in writing, but I do intend to do it. And I, I would ask as a courtesy that the board members who thought that they had heard all that was to be heard, not sign any decision until they see my written comments. What I'm telling you is that I understand you had a problem. I'll try to fix it for the next one. Okay. Right. This matter I still have a concern and I hope the board will, will respect the fact that I tried to participate and wasn't able to do so. And I will put my comments in writing within the statutory period. And I hope that the board will take my comments seriously. Okay. We'll take a look at them. Please send it to, please send your comments to the staff. Please send them to Ms. Brestrup. Yeah, I'll take, I'll bring them in. I'll bring them in and writing. Yep. And don't send it to us directly because it's. No, I wouldn't have any way to know how to do that anyway. Okay. Okay. All right. And then I didn't mean to cut you off. You were talking about. No, that's fine. I think I had, I said what I had to say. All right. Good. I think Mr. McCarthy has his hand up. Mr. McCarthy. Yes, just for the record, Mr. Chair, the way to raise your hand on the phone is by pressing star nine. Okay. So we should. Yeah. Okay. That's easy for me to include in the, in future introductions and when we open up public comment. It's a problem we haven't had before, but I'm glad we know now that there's something to do and we'll solve it. All right. Any other discussions about the, so it looks, it seems to me, Ms. Brestrup, it seems to me that we're not going to know whether we can meet in person or not, or we're not going to know whether the town has the resources for a hybrid meeting or whether we're required to have Zoom meetings until sometime after April 1st. And that that decision will be made by the town. If we are, if there is flexibility there, that decision will be made by the town council sometime after that. Is that right? That's right. So I, I'm puzzling. I'm thinking about what Mr. O'Connor said. And I know that if you're still in a meeting, if you're still in a meeting, even if you've closed the public hearing, I think you can open the public hearing to receive information. As long as it's within the same meeting. Have you encountered that before Mr. Judge? No, I haven't. I haven't encountered the fact that you could. Well, you know, I. You know, if you're still in a meeting, you would have to. You would have to. Renotice everything. And that's, you know, expensive and cumbersome. But I think. On the same night that you can reopen the public hearing, but you, what you would have to do is. Vote to reopen the public hearing. And. Then. Hear what was going to be said. And then vote to close the public hearing. And the applicant. Oh, one of the applicants is here. Mr. St. Hilaire is still here. So he would be able to hear the comments. It's just, um, something you could consider. Pretty sure you're allowed to do that. You know, I, I don't know that we're allowed to do that. And I hate to jeopardize. I don't know what the rules are. You know, and, and I hate to jeopardize. The, um. on a unanimous basis to do this with not knowing exactly what the implications of reopening it up without much notice. Does that provide a ability to appeal? I don't know what all the things are. And I don't think you're, it does appear to me that you're certain either at this point. I'm not certain, no. And so I think, and I also know that we can review what Mr. O'Connor wants to send us. But the meeting has taken place and the vote has taken place. And if we're going to open it up again, we'd have to vote to open it up again. We'd have to vote to have a new notice. So I'm not inclined to open it up at this point because of the uncertainty. If we find out that we can in the future, if we meet to have this situation, that'd be a good thing to know. But I'm not inclined to open up the hearing again. But I would, if other people want to do that, I'm open to it, but I'm not inclined to want to do that. Can I point out one other thing? It is possible also for people to submit comments and writing before the meeting. So if someone has strong comments about something, they can do that. So we did not receive any comments before the meeting. No comments. So I guess my request would be two things, Ms. Brestrup. Let's figure out what the answer to this question is in case this comes up again in the future. I don't want to create a potential legal basis for appeal or basis for a rejection of this based upon reopening it after we closed it. Because we specifically voted to close in both. Let's find out what the answer is for the future. Okay. All right. I guess now is the time for Ms. Farps. I just wanted to add two things. I know it's not necessary, but the other thing I like about Zoom is that when I was talking about people being intimidated, there were a lot of people who are shy and doing public speaking, especially in front of an intimidating board, which is up on a raised panel, can be very uncomfortable. I myself have talked to the water board and it was very uncomfortable for me because I'm addressing this panel of people on high. But the other thing that I like about the Zoom meeting is that I can see everyone's face. And when I was in the live ZBA meetings, often I would try to get the board's attention and it was difficult to do, or I couldn't really see what was happening with the other ZBA members. And for me, there's a value in me reading what's happening with people. If they're looking like they don't like something or they do like something, when you're sitting on the board, you can't really see each other. And so again, I just wanna say, I also, those two things, I'm done. All right. Okay, Ms. Parks. All right, thank you. If there's no other discussion, the next order of business is public comment on any matter before the, any matter except that, which was before the board tonight. So anybody in the public can speak on any item, as long as it isn't dealing with the three applications and the discussion item we had tonight. Okay. With that, there's no public comments. I guess the new business is just the upcoming schedule, Ms. Presto. I think we see, we talked about this a bit before the meeting began, but the next meeting is March 23rd, which is, we have something on Canton Avenue. Dylan, you're gonna chair the meeting. I don't think that Mr. Gilbert or I can be there, so we'll need to get associate members to fill two spaces. 4-6 is 515 Sunderland Road. If regular members are not available, let Chris know and we'll get, we'll assign associate members to fill that spaces. The next meeting after that is 4-13. There's a new nightclub. The spoke management wants to have a new nightclub. And that's on 4-13. And we have a third meeting in April on 4-20s. I think it's 4-27. And that we don't have an agenda for yet. No agenda. We have cases in the wings, but we don't have anything teed up to go on that night. We have a new comprehensive permit coming up, a large development with affordable housing. Is that something I've read about that? Is that something that we have before us or not? Yes, you have two comprehensive permits coming up. One is proposed for property on Ball Lane, in the corner of Ball Lane at 63. And that's a relatively small project. I think it's 30 units, some of which are going to be market rate, but the bulk of them are going to be affordable. And those are going to be home ownership units. So that will be coming before you. And then the second comprehensive permit is a larger one. That is one that the town put out an RFP on. And we're working with Wayfinders, who is an organization that builds affordable housing throughout this part of the state. And they are proposing, I believe it's 70 units altogether. And I think around 40 of those are affordable. And that's on two sites. One is the East Street School site. And the other one is the Belcher Town Road site that the town just purchased, that's east of where the Sonoco Station used to be on Belcher Town Road. So those are the two comprehensive permits that will be coming before you. Okay. Those entail lots of work. We'll be doing some, we'll do some training. We'll have a training session before we begin the comprehensive permit again, because it's a different process. Mr. Gilbert. Yeah, very quickly. Chris, was there a date on the Wayfinders project? I work for that organization, not on that project, but just to have that on my radar, is that something that I would have to sit out on it? There is no date yet. We haven't received an application. I think we've received a project eligibility letter. That went to the town and we have 30 days to respond, but we have not received an actual application yet. Okay. I can confirm that internally and just sort of be aware of that moving forward to that no conflict on my end. Great. Well, those are two exciting things. That's great. All right. Any other new business? If not, nope, we're all set, I think. If not, I guess the last, before I go to the vote, last thing is Chris, you'll let us know what the legislature does, what the Senate does, and what the town has decided. And if asked, tell them if there is split feelings here in the ZBA, but that if there is the money for greater bandwidth to allow hybrid, where you can have both, it might be a good compromise. It will give people the ability just to do it conveniently and those of us that would like the occasional in-person meeting, we could do that as well, but that's a question of resources and I don't know if the town has them, so it'd be something to think about. Okay. Well, thank you all. I'd entertain a motion to adjourn. So moved. Maxfield moves. Mr. Yes, Mr. Slaughterberg, Sloveter. Seconds. Mr. Sloveter. I'll give you the second. And this is not debatable, so the vote occurs on the motion. Chair votes aye. Ms. Parks. Aye. Mr. Maxfield. Aye. Mr. Gilbert. Aye. Mr. Sloveter. Aye. I mean, I'm gonna get this right. Mr. Sloveter. Sorry. Yes, absolutely. I'm voting aye, no matter how you pronounce it. Whatever I call you, you're gonna vote aye. I'm not going to vote you all vote aye to adjourn and we did it before nine. So, all right. I say one more thing. I wanted to thank Stephen McCarthy for stepping in to do the Zoom master thing on this meeting because I can't do it and thank you very much, Stephen. Thank you, Stephen. My pleasure and thank you all for your service today. All right. Good night. Have a good evening, everybody. Thank you. Good night. Thank you all.