 So yeah, Dave, do you want to chime in with anything or give us any little updates? Sure. I'll be fairly brief. I know that Brad and Tyler are going to be joining us. In just a few minutes, I believe to do the. To do an outline and overview of kind of the field projects for 2022. But I did just want to take a moment just to update the presentation on the Hickory rage project. I know that there was some correspondence from. Concerned residents and. There was some. Was an article in the Amherst Indy. And I'll be working with the, with the town manager to. Address some of those concerns outlined in the email that was sent to you and the planning board and. In the town council in the next few days, I was off yesterday and part of today. So just coming back to that, but, um, you know, I just want you all to be aware. I mean. We town staff are, you know, very much, you know, involved with and, and, um, And concerned that, um, you know, we do the best job we can at oversight of that project. Um, it has been a highly regulated project. It has gone through the commission. It has gone through the ZBA. It's gone through the natural heritage program. It's gone through the, the department of environmental protection. So this is a project that has been permitted over the course of many years. That does not mean that there won't be. Uh, things to address during the, during the construction. Uh, every project, every construction project, whether it's a home or. Uh, or a commercial building or a golf course or a solar site. Uh, we'll have issues that do come up, but we are acutely aware that this is on town land and that we will do our very best to, uh, to oversee that. Um, Erin could jump in at any point, but I also want to make sure that, you know, you recall, um, that there will be an environmental monitor, uh, on the site. When the main part of the construction starts. And Erin and I are looking at this really in three phases. Uh, if you will, um, the tree clearing, which happened a couple of weeks ago is kind of the, the early pre-construction phase. Uh, amp then needs to improve the bridge over the Fort river. So we'll, we'll be overseeing that work as well as well as our building department. And then of course the, the actual construction of the solar panels and the solar field, actually the two solar fields. So it's, it's a project that we will be keeping a close eye on. Um, we have a good and transparent working relationship with amp. I think there are some, uh, concerns expressed about dynamic the company that is a, the subcontracted company to actually, uh, construct the arrays. We know that they, there have been challenges, uh, on other dynamic projects in the region. So we'll, we're aware of those and we will keep a close eye on, um, the project from start to finish. I think the other thing, and I've had some, um, emails and phone messages from folks recently about the tree cutting. And, um, we're going to do a couple of things. We did send out something that's on our website and we had a couple of articles in local newspapers. We're also going to be putting some signs up at the various trailheads to kind of inform folks of the start of the, the, the main part of the project, which is when the solar arrays actually will be constructed and constructed, construction fencing will go up and, and those kinds of things. I think for many people who may not know the full history of the project, there's a feeling that, um, and honestly, I think we all feel it is a wonderful, beautiful site. Um, but the project was, was permitted to happen by various boards and committees at the town level and state level. And so, um, um, the solar will happen on the site. And I think for many people who may not know, again, all the history, there's this feeling that solar, why do we have to do solar at, at Hickory? And, and the, the short answer to that is that the town would not have purchased the property, would not have been able to purchase Hickory Ridge unless solar was already part of the project. We did not, um, we were not part of bringing the solar project into the project that was already agreed upon long before the town purchased the land. So that goes back to the previous two owners. So the reason the town was able to get the property at $520,000, which is a huge bargain sale, was that solar essentially took a great deal of the value out of the land. So to purchase that land outright, as we did in, in March of 2022, would have been north of $2 million. And there was just no way the town ever would have moved forward with that. I can, I can tell you that we would not have had the CPA funds or other dollars to do that in this climate, in this, uh, uh, funding environment. So we're very fortunate to have gotten the 150 acres for $520,000. But one of the compromises in this agreement is that there'd be 26 acres of solar. So there will be some changes there already are with the tree clearing and then the, the actual solar. So that's a long-winded explanation. And, you know, we've been talking about this project for five years. So there's been hundreds of hours of discussions and negotiations and permitting process, uh, behind us. But, but we still have a long ways to go here to make sure the project is constructed properly. So I just wanted to kind of put some of those points out there because I am answering a number of emails and a number of phone calls from folks who are asking, why do we have, why does the town have to have solar on the property? We came into the project at a point where solar was already predetermined on the site. There was no option for us to buy without solar on the site. So I just wanted to, for some of you, that might be a reminder, but some of you who are newer to the commission, it's, it might be new information. So happy to do that. Thanks, Dave. That's really interesting background. Yeah. Yeah, I think for a lot of folks, they, you know, some of the calls I was taking last week with the tree cutting and people are like, why is the town taking down on these trees? Why do we have to have solar? Let's just leave it the way it is. That wasn't an option. We would not have been able, it would have been in private hands and the solar project would have been happening essentially without any public component. Now at least we own the 150 acres. We are planning trails. We're planning an ADA trail. On part of the land we can plan for the use of the frontage where the clubhouse is, we can make the connections to the neighborhood. And we're protecting in perpetuity. Most of the property will be protected in perpetuity. And never mind the work on the Fort River. Yes. And we're doing all this great work on the Fort River. And we're eventually we will, with your help and guidance, we will decide on a conservation restriction for a vast majority of the 150 acres. Keep in mind that amp has to mitigate for their impacts with 17 acres of riverfront. Riverfront. Sorry. Long day. For the mitigation. So that is that that's on their, their nickel, their dime. So yeah, there's a lot of benefits to this project, but the compromise was 26 acres of solar. And you're going to, is there plans to cut that close, close the trails obviously during construction? Or is the whole place going to be closed or how's that? We're not, we're not planning. We're going to work with amp and dynamic. I have signs up in various intersections, if you will, of existing trails so that. Essentially the property would, it will be open except for those areas inside the construction fencing. So the whole south side of the property south of the four river. We'll all be open. There will be no construction fencing on the south side of the four river. It's really only on the north side where the two arrays will be constructed and probably the, the, the roadway between them where there will be construction fencing. But other than that, the property will be open for cross country skiing, dog walking, birdwatching, running, biking, et cetera. So we will be putting up some signs because I think there are some people who are new to the project and may not have. Kind of, you know, the more comprehensive history that, that I do. And I think we just have to be open to that because many folks have just discovered Hickory and said, why do we have to do anything there? Can't we just keep it the way it is? And the answer is that was predetermined before we purchased it. And we, yeah. Thanks, Dave. I appreciate that. And it's nice to hear there's some clarification from that. As you said, that was part of the deal. The solar is going in before even bought it. Yeah. Could I just ask? Amazing. Wester, could I just ask Aaron, because she and I have had some conversations again, I really want to put the emphasis on. We will be keeping a very close eye on amp and dynamic. Both of those companies understand that this is a highly scrutinized project. That the public will not be barred from the site. So everything they do will be out in the open. As you all know from knowing the site. It is a very open and, and easy to access sites. So the public will be walking and I'm sure. Watching what dynamic and amp do. And we will be as well as part of our permitting process. And I think that would be great. I think that would be great. I mean, if you wanted to say anything about, you know, the next phase, which would be the work on the bridge over the Fort River. Yeah. So, you know, prior to the tree cutting, Dave and I did have a pre-construction meeting. And I think what, the way I see it is there's going to be a series of pre-construction meetings. So the first pre-construction meeting was with the tree removal contractor. The second pre-construction meeting is going to be for the pre-construction meeting for the road construction. And when ground breaks on the solar project, there's probably going to be yet another pre-construction meeting. I, Dave was at the meeting. Actually, Alex came to the meeting too. I was very clear with these folks that we're going to be watching this, the public is watching this, that they cannot take any missteps and they must follow the permit. And I even quizzed them on it. I said, did you read the permit? I'm going to be monitoring the meeting. So there's definitely going to be a series of meetings. And I'm going to meet with every single contractor who enters that site. And I think the fact that the public is open to enter the site is really, the project's going to be monitored by an environmental monitor. I'll be monitoring as well. But the public can monitor, you know, the public out there walking, they can see what's going on. So, there's a lot of opportunities for us to oversee what's happening and I think that that's something that's valuable on this site. And I, one of the things I emphasized with these folks and I'm going to emphasize again and again is how sensitive the site is. It is an extremely sensitive site, the flood plains, the wetlands, the river. It's, it's I told them all this is probably the most sensitive site you will ever work on. And for that reason, it requires a lot of respect and caution. And also not not just for the resource areas but also for safety, because the river floods so frequently, and the flooding can happen, you know, in a very flashy manner, just a couple inches of rain and that river comes up quickly so they have to be prepared for that and to use caution and trying to just repetitively reinforce these things and have a continuous line of communication with them when work is going on out there. The day the tree removal was going on, I had four phone calls from dynamic during the course of the day asking me specific questions about the permit and I said to her, I don't care if you call me 100 times a day. I just, here's my cell phone just call me. I would rather that you ask and be clear on something before moving forward so I'm going to do everything I can to make sure that I that it's done right and that we're keeping a close eye on things. Yeah, in conclusion, I just, I just wanted to say something that reiterate what Aaron said about it is a very sensitive site. But the topography of the site is dramatically different than many of the other sites that solar has been proposed or built on in other parts of the region. So through the permitting process and I want to kind of reiterate that, again, there are, you know, wetlands permits ZBA permits natural heritage permits DEP is reviewed all of that. And then there's also a lease agreement with the town of Amherst so work can only go on in three areas of the site 150 acres. The only areas that work can go on through amp and dynamic are the access road to the river. And the road to the eastern array between the arrays and the Western array. So amp is very clear that there's no work to be done anywhere outside of the least area. And the area outside the least area is some of the most, as Aaron said, some of the most sensitive areas, you know, on the site river riverfront and wetlands and vernal pools and, and the like. I just want to reiterate kind of the layers of permitting but also the layers of review that this has gone through. And again, there will be bumps in the road but every project has those but we will be watching closely and I'm sure that the public will as well. So thank you. Any other questions while you have us we will be communicating information to the town council. The planning board anyone else and any of the members of the public who might be concerned or interested as we go. Yeah, quick question. We're, we're going to be discussing that letter a little later on is that correct or is this is that going to be part of the discussion right now. I don't have my time to maybe try to front load that that address if there are any other questions later. I'm happy to take them whenever Fletcher works. You have said something that's really needs jumping out there Andre so like to get moving with. Oh no not at all. I was just just, I don't want to talk about the letter if we're not going to talk about it. Yeah, and I think Dave, Dave I think I'll just add one thing to to what you were saying is because of the fact that this has been going on for about five years or so. That's why we were hearing during our last discussions about cutting the trees and so on that yes this has been approved already. And I think it's just for for anybody but didn't catch that there. That's, that's, that's that. Thank you. Thanks. I also appreciate David Aaron, the due diligence are doing on this and I know your eyes are going to be on it and I understand. And you know, these contractors kind of show show up and you guys are going to hold them to it and we appreciate that. And we appreciate the input from the public so please if, if anyone listening on this call any commissioners. Again, the land is not going to be the benefit here is it's public land this is not a private site it's not a off the beaten path 150 So if anyone sees anything if anyone's concerned about it, please email or call Aaron or myself commission members members of the public members of any boards or other Amherst boards or committees, please call us email us and we will get back to you. So we appreciate that we can't be everywhere all the time so we appreciate it. We're good. Is brand Tyler in the house here. Yep, I can move them on in if that's okay. Yeah, if you don't mind controlling that I appreciate course. Fletcher I'm also going to make you a co host just because once I get into sharing my screen. I won't be able to see the attendees if a hand is raised. So once I'm sharing my screen if you could just keep an eye out for that. Yeah, we'll do. Thank you. Tyler, Tyler. How are you. Good man. I apologize I got home to getting ready to pop on this meeting and we lost our side to go from to my way from to sit in on this so it's a little little building but we'll make it work. Say a guy internet and light that hey, the heat works. Yeah, exactly. All right. How you doing Brad. I'm good. How are you. Good, good. Thanks for coming you to so if you guys just want to take it away share screen and give us the low down or what's going on with. We greatly appreciate it. Brad, do you want me to share on my screen or would you prefer to know if you don't mind I would appreciate it. Thank you. Okay. This is okay. All right. So, I guess for those of you who don't know me yet. My name is Brad board a week I'm the land manager with the conservation apartment. And I've been working for Dave's omic for about 13 years. I graduated from the Arbor program at the Stockbridge School of Agriculture and the forestry program at UMass. But it's been a while since we last met. And I think Brendan was actually the assistant land manager at the time, and he's since moved back to Minnesota to be with his family so some of you may not know Tyler yet. Tyler worked for the town previously back in 2017 through about 2020. He's also an alumni of the Stockbridge school where he went through the agriculture program as well. And he's an avid outdoorsman. So, meet Tyler. Hi everybody. Nice to meet you. So, this was a kind of a neat little picture actually it's on Robert Frost trail in the Lawrence swamp and you can see that's a moose that we came across so we were doing some trail work, which was kind of cool it was actually it had a calf following her which was really neat but yeah so lots of different animals use our trails. I think we can go to the next one. Tyler and I are kind of going to go back and forth here so Tyler if you want to tackle this one. Yeah, so we got our tree work that we tackle on our trail systems, townwide. These are a little bit of the more challenging ones I think we have pictured here but you get involved shapes and sizes, especially in the frequent wind storms that we experience. Typically throughout the whole entire year, just the other day as you probably all recall over the weekend, really, really high winds so obviously that that causes things to come down and be, you know, prohibitive to crossing our trail systems so we find them as we're out and about our daily duties, doing different types of work throughout our conservation areas. We get a lot of reports of them from avid trail users as well which is very helpful to us because there's a staff of two of us and we can't be everywhere at one time so we compile with throughout the year and and actually now in the February winter month here is a great time of year that we try to get out and knock a lot of a lot of those trees out to make the trails passable again. So this is the interpretive trail signs that we've been doing. Actually the bottom left one is is the storybook trail that's been installed for a little while now I don't think we talked about at the last time but it's kind of a neat thing that we teamed up with coals on where families can kind of stop at each signpost and read a piece of a children's book as they get exercised down in the Mill River Woods. And then the kind of the upper section of the slide here shows the bluebird meadow interpretive trail, which we teamed up with a local volunteer Carol Gray. And I think there's three of those signs that you can see we installed with the DPW borrowed tool cat auger, and then we teamed up with DCR to get that bigger kiosk on the top right in. And we've had a variety of volunteer help with brush cutting the trails and mowing and it's actually gone really well and hoping that some local school groups will actually come and kind of enjoy it. And there's actually a really nice view of the holy oak range from one of the slides. Or sorry one of the signs as well. And then on the bottom section is a more recent interpretive trail that we helped install. It was really spearheaded by a volunteer group that Dave hooked up with. They were related to the Fort River watershed. I forget exactly what the name of their group is but they were a very energetic group and they did a really nice job with the signs and they put up all of the material on the post and kiosk that we installed on either section of the Emily Dickinson trail so you can get to that either from graph park or from the DCR parking lot Mill Lane. I think we're ready for the next one. Yeah, so our bridge projects kind of our theme going into 2023 and we did a fair amount of it in 2022 as well. As many of you know we do have an extensive trail system throughout town and many of it. Many of those trails do have, you know, seasonal wet areas and all the time where there is that do require bridging of some sort. You know the theme to go into the season this year is to kind of maintain and fix, replace, repair what we already have out on our trail systems. A couple years ago we received a grant to do some work on the Robert Frost trail where new bog bridging was put into place where, you know, it either needed replacing because it was pretty tired at that point. And permitting was involved to add such bridging in areas that needed it. So, it came out really well for the most part is new construction out on those certain parts of the Robert Frost trail. But there are other sections throughout the Robert Frost trail and other townwide trails as well that are getting to that little bit of weather point. So we get again just kind of similar to the trees, a lot of trail users report to us, you know, 10 foot section of bog bridging on trail X is snapped in half making it, you know, somewhat of a hazard to go over so. Again, during these, I guess we can call our slower months, just ramping up before our busy spring and summer push. When the water is nice to get this type of work done. We're spending a lot of time going through lists that we have compiled over the last year to the Brad and I have put together ourselves from things we have recon as well as volunteer help to. You know, just trail users in general that report to us what needs doing so some of it will require permitting some is just standard, you know, just placing what's broken and making it passable again. If you have anything else that I'm bridging Brad but that about sums it up. So, Tyler. Yeah, you did sum it up really well. Our goal is to maintain what we have and kind of really make a nice trails network, and all of our different trails and Amherst. So some of this is upcoming bridge work that ties into that and the big picture on the left is some of you probably already know is the Robert Francis bridge, which is pretty close to State Street near Puffers pond and we're going to try to get that repainted and we're going to work with Aaron on that as well I guess we're going to work with Aaron on all of these projects. We've already started. Some of the other pictures like the small one on the top left is the brickyard bridging that leads up to the National Guard Bridge and we're going to try to make that a little bit easier to pass through even though it's probably in the challenging category as far as trails go and same thing on the top right that's the KC trail that goes between Southeast Street and the rail trail and as you can see there's some broken planks on the bog bridging that we're going to replace. We have a lot of sections like that around town that we are going to be focusing on this summer. Hopefully we'll be able to focus on a lot of it with the people in the center top photo which is a lot of our volunteers. This is an example of a volunteer group that Tyler actually had set up with some folks down in Amherst Woods. We're in conjunction with a program that we're doing with the Kestrel Land Trust where we're trying to reach out to as many local folks as we can to get more of a good work base going on on some of these trails and so far it seems to be working and I noticed Michelle is one of the people who I've been speaking with about this and there's debt there's I think maybe probably 50 more of them that we've been talking to even throughout the winter, which is nice because as Tyler noted it tends to be slower months for hiking but people are still out there and very avid on the trails. The center photo there is the large hill boardwalk which is also going to get some much needed TLC this summer. And the bottom left picture is the Robert Frost trail that goes between Stony Brook Road and the Echo Hill neighborhood and the landfill. So that's just kind of a snapshot of some of the bridge work that's coming and there will be more soon that there's just a ton of it all over town and we're just doing the best we can to get as much of it taking care of this summer as possible. I think we're ready for the next one. Beaver's or pesky beaver friends. We've had, we had quite a few issues with them damning up certain areas. This bigger photo here on the left is we're at the Plum Rupon Loop. We had some time over there with the mild fall season we had they stayed pretty active when they typically wouldn't. So it was, you know, a little bit of a project going up there to just break and breach the dam as best as we could and it was, it was kind of getting comical as soon as we would do it. They'd have it built again. We got our steps walking back and forth with pitchforks up there to break that up. Yeah, just, you know, there needs to be that important balance between trail access for our trail users and hikers and and trail enthusiasts in general. You know, in conjunction with how we manage beavers because they are becoming problematic throughout town on our conservation lands and as you can see in these photos. These are definitely highly used areas where, you know, foot traffic and in a hike or presence is very present. So that's definitely something we deal with every year and it was definitely more so of an issue this fall or I guess later into the season and we typically deal with them. So definitely trying to, you know, structure and make sure we have that good balance of management. Along with, you know, how people are accessing our trail systems. So puffers pond is a is kind of an overloved conservation area, and we are working to make some much needed repairs around there. As you can see, in the bottom right is actually a picture I took a while ago. It's been kind of coming up a lot lately where people ask, where are all the trees and unfortunately due to the storm damage that we've had over the years, we've had to remove some of them. Tyler and I actually spent some, I think close to a week over there, a couple years, maybe three years ago pruning some of the trees to try to make them healthier and the whole beach safer but we're also going to be working with Aaron on some driving and some beach sand around the pond as well as on the perimeter trail. I think we can go to the next one. Yeah, so here we have some new infrastructure at Fort River Farm. We spent a lot of time down there, installing it or you know making the parking lot. You know new adding TRG spreading making the nice level parking lot. The split rail as well, you can see that was all new added this year between borrowing. Actually, I think we actually rent an excavator with an auger head to install that particular fencing split rail fencing that is moving forward, you know Fort River Farm has this type of split rail. Public conservation areas another one. As we do these types of new infrastructure projects really want to our goals to shoot for a uniform look in all these areas. And you can note the signage as well. It's a little bit of rebranding I suppose from what we typically had before with the wooded wooden routed signs you see on a lot of trail heads and throughout our trail systems. So these types of infrastructure projects and what we're doing with the signage uniform split rail look. The rolling out spreading and adding of TRG it just gives a more welcoming feel we feel to conservation users, especially down at a community garden such as Fort River. Pretty proud of the work we did down there and the many hands that were involved in it as well. I apologize pictures a little hard for me to see but we installed that kiosk kiosk as well. Very well made product. And just again moving forward with some of these different areas that's that whole uniform goal is what our goal is trying to achieve and just make that overall presence known that this is, you know, our ownership as as a town. You can take pride in these areas. So yeah, here's the one next slide that you just had up. Yep, Potok and Catherine Cole there so you can see the same similar style split rail as Fort River farm. So, you know, the Fort River farms obviously more than the south part of town whereas Potok and Catherine Cole are in the north. But regardless of location, you can see we're shooting for that uniform look. All right, so over at Amethyst Brook, this is kind of a reminder of the some of the damage that took place. You can see in the top right, we had ice the size of a mattress coming through and a lot of it. And it took out that bridge which we've since removed and cleaned up and we are working as a team, Dave and Rob are working on a new design that we can hopefully get installed soon. So, other than that, Amethyst, we have some bog bridging to do in there and we've been helping the animal welfare officer with some of the dog poop stations while she's out on medical leave. And that's it. So yeah, here's some of us. Oh, go ahead. Over at Sweet Alice. We installed a new bridge and some signage along the pond loop trail this summer. And we also, which came in front of you folks for the permitting we did the de watering project with the contractor. You can see we sealed off the dam so that the water would build up against that piece of plywood in the top right. And it actually it ended up working out well they were able to replace the culvert and then the final product is the ship lapped lumber. That we replaced the boards with in the bottom right. So yeah, here, here are some great picks that show the field and brush mowing brush hogging open space management management that we try to achieve every year. So, as you can see some of these areas. They do grow back pretty heavily with different invasives buckthorn and what have you so it's sort of a. It's a constant battle every season to knock a lot of that down and try to regain a lot of that that grassland habitat that we're shooting for. But typically every year, we try not to mow until, you know, mid July, July 15th to date, we typically use when the majority of messing birds and pollinators are finished doing their thing. But it's, you know, the challenge with that is when one thing's done something else might be in an effect so we get some pushback once in a while from different people that see this out and about mowing at certain times of year. You know about why we're there specifically that time of year but you got to do it when you can weather plays a big factor into it to this past season was really dry throughout the summer so we were able to hit some of our larger areas such as plains flats. That's one of our really big ones that is multiple days on site trying to knock that out with the resources we have with our two tractors and brush hogs. Same with West Over Meadow was another big one but yeah we're able to we are still actually cranking along now on just being such a mild winter lack of snow. You know, a harder ground now to be able to be out there to get caught up on some of these areas. It's actually, it's been a benefit this year so far throughout the fall and into the early February month that we're in here now. So yeah, the timing is a big thing when it comes to this open space management and brush hogging stuff again the weather is an effect. Seems like we're losing Tyler a little Brad you want to jump in. Sure. I think he pretty much covered them on you want to skip. You can probably skip this one too because we talked about Hickory a lot earlier. And sorry Brad I didn't or Tyler I didn't mean to cut you off but you. Something happened with your connection. Hickory we're good with Hickory because we talked about Hickory. Okay. We've had it Hickory has actually been very positive the folks have been very happy every time we've been out there cleaning up and mowing the trails and making the bridges safer it's it's actually been kind of nice. It's been really busy with the dog walking and people hiking with strollers so we'll move on to signage which has actually been kind of a fun project this year we've done a lot of signage which people also seem to appreciate. This year we replaced the Kevin flood sign we kind of worked with the family to who donated the material for the sign and we replaced that sign that had since fallen over. We also, as I mentioned earlier replaced all of the or installed new signs over the sweet Alice conservation area for the pond loop trail. And the bottom picture is all of the handicapped signs that we've been putting up at the parking lots that Tyler mentioned earlier. In the bottom right picture is kind of a zoomed in picture of the kiosk at Podak. Again everything has been kind of uniform and looking nice and then the top right picture has been kind of a challenging sign for us it's been the E. Coli management signs I guess you could call it so every week we do a water sampling of Puppers pond and that sign is to alert the public that we've been having a tough time with the E. Coli over there so hopefully that doesn't happen this year but that gives you kind of a snapshot of some of the signage we've been doing we're going to do a lot more this summer with the project with the Kestrel land trust. They got a grant to replace a lot of the Robert Frost trail signage along the trail and they are working with a designer and the town and we're going to hopefully get that up soon. So the next one is kind of upcoming projects and we have been pretty much focusing on new bog bridging, replacing bog bridging and keeping our parking areas like the trail heads like the first thing you see when you get to one of our places. Nice. So this is kind of an example of some tired. And trail heads and bog bridging and it just, it's stuff that we're going to try to make a little bit nicer this year and as you can see on the right it'll be hopefully with the help of a lot of our volunteers. The only other thing I didn't mention I guess is the ADA trails so an example of that would be the Robert Francis bridge actually leading up to that as the Kevin flood trail which is one of our ADA trails. Another good example would be the large hill trail network. That's another TRG based trail beyond the boardwalk. And I think we have five or six more that we're going to try to get some new gravel delivered to and get them regraded and kind of back up to snuff again. If you want to go to the next slide. So our goal is to reach out to a bunch of people around town and we hope that all of you won't be strangers. We know a lot of you hike. You can read that but we're just looking for all of you to reach back out to us and we're looking for people to be our eyes and ears out on the trails. We really do appreciate that and it works out awesome. So I've included my email address as well as Tyler's and the our phone number and some fun pictures of the Puffers pond south beach we had some deer come through the trail system over there during COVID. And then more recently we had some bears come through the Arboretum. So I guess this is probably the best time if anyone has any questions or comments that we can talk about. I know we're running short on time but. Shall you have a question. Yeah I'll just be real quick. Um, yeah so I got a list for you Brad. Some things I found in North Amherst. Yeah everybody when you're on hikes right take pictures right things some things down. There's a bunch of signs down on. There's a lot of pictures of women and center male so but I got some pictures to show you. I just had a question regarding the ADA trails. So, as a mom who once had strollers and small kids these trails are actually really great for young families like with toddlers and strollers. I'm not sure if we have a list of these trails like on the website because I think that young families would would also enjoy them in addition to the ADA component they sort of serve those two purposes. But I think it would be a great resource for just like young families and Amherst. And that's it. That is a really good idea. I'm not sure if we have publicized that well specifically on the website, but yeah, you're right we should. We're working on making a nicer, more welcoming spot on our website for the trail requests to come in, as well as making it a little bit easier for people to sign up as volunteers. Right now you kind of have to navigate the website a little bit tough to find it. And it's the way I'm working with Angela Mills in the town manager's office and she's really good with that. She's been using and it's going to be a lot easier for people to get to us with all of that stuff so we can add the ADA trail stuff to that. So Brad that was going to be my question so for folks that want to volunteer there so you have to go through the website to access or make a request or what's the best way for folks want to volunteer. For people who already know me, they can just ask. If you don't. Yes, the website really is the best. All right, so there is a forum on the websites, but I apologize I haven't looked for it so there is one on the website for folks. It's tough to find and we're working and that's part of what we're working on. Angela's really been pretty helpful with that. So that is coming really soon. Great. Yep. Great. I know we have to move on I just want to take this opportunity to thank Brad and Tyler and all the volunteers. You know this was kind of a 2002 summary, you know leading into and looking forward. We have 80 miles of trails, couple thousand acres of land, we have two full time staff. We have Aaron, we have myself, and we have help from the planning department DPW is, is, is wonderful to work with they often help us on big trees and, and big challenges. You know, there, there are limits to resources and funding. We're trying to be more creative where we need to we will hire private contractors to help us with larger projects larger bridge bridge projects, something like the Amethyst Brook Bridge which we have some funding for is probably something that we will contract out. That's a big project. So we want to do it once and for a generation we do not want to come back at the next ice storm or the big, big spring fresh it and find that bridge gone so thanks to Brad and Tyler for all this great work, or we have some CPA funding to spend on the community and the town council we have some capital money. So we have a chance, we really have a chance to fix it, fix, fix it first and fix some of the things that need addressing out there so it's going to be an exciting couple of years to, to make our trails even better than they are. Thanks, hey thanks Brad Tyler I know you guys have a ton on your plate and there's a lot to do and there's a lot of public watching and you guys are doing a great job we appreciate it. That's a constant, highly used outdoor areas. It's great. Thank you. And people notice I mean it's it's one day like, obviously it's really easy to complain. Like that's the easy thing to do. But when there's people really do appreciate stuff and see stuff like you know not you don't get that a lot and so I just, I think it's a really good job that you guys are doing a really good job you are working really hard and people do notice that it's just you just, you know, you know, I'm not going to call you say great job but if I have something to say bad and I'll call you, you know, it's just so it's just, I just want to reiterate that you guys are doing a great job and keep it up it's really noticeable especially if you go to other towns and look at their out there recreation areas and stuff. We're pretty lucky to have you guys out there. You've been extremely productive land manager here man 13 years like good job. Thank you. It really is nice when people tell us that things are bad though. Okay, it's very helpful. I'll do that. Okay. How's that. Thank you so much for that agreement. Thanks I think maybe we should do a thousand thinking a conservation commission team building volunteer time sometime with probably be a good idea if we could maybe organize that for ourselves and we'll get you involved. That sounds awesome. Cool. Thanks guys. Thank you. All right. We are moving on. We're moving up. Our 730 is 753 we got the notice of intent as WCA for the 52 fearing street. Do we have anyone here for that. So, for 52 faring it's going to be a continuation. They're, they've already given me notice and writing that it's okay to continue. Oh, great. Let's make a motion. I move to continue the public hearing to March 8 2023 at 730 p.m. Second. Great camera move Michelle with the second camera can I get an eye. Hi, Michelle. Hi, Andre. Hi, Alex. Thumbs up. I see you. And I for Fletcher. Great. Hi. Yeah, I got you. I got you. I got you the thumbs up. It's all recorded. Okay, we're going on to the RDA then. This is already, but I don't need to open this is already been open. Right. And do we have somebody here with this application? Yeah, I think Kristen McDonough. I'll pull her in. I don't know if anybody else is on. Tom, if you want to come in, raise your hand. Okay, there we go. All right. I think that's our folks. Hi, everyone. I'm Kristen McDonough. I'm. With SWCA and I'm here to present the continuation for a request for determination of applicability regarding the relocation of a historic home from 174 Sunset Ave to 175 West street in Amherst, which is an empty lot. We opened the hearing on January 25th and we also had a site walk with the agent earlier that day where we added just a couple additional wetland flags. So when I met with you on January 25th, we continued to wait for the engineers to update the site plans, which would reflect those additional flags and then the adjusted buffer zone. I can pull up. The revised plans. If that's okay. Yeah, great. So this is the site plan. And then this sheet, the second sheet is the. I can't see below your photos. I think this is the grading erosion control and grading plan. So on the first sheet, what we show is this additional flagged area, which it looks like it coincides with a little bit of a drainage swell. We revised the estimated buffer zone impacts. So the original proposal was to relocate a historic house within an existing lawn of the vacant lot. So we added a couple of high-bushed, blue-ray shrubs as mitigation. We estimated the revised proposed impacts within the on-site buffer zone as 12%. So that is below the town bylaw threshold of 20%. This includes all town buffer zones. So we added a couple of high-bushed, blue-ray shrubs as mitigation. We estimated the revised proposed impacts within the on-site buffer zone as 12%. So that includes all temporary and permanent impacts. So including site preparation and grading as well as just this little bit of the detached garage and the deck. And a little bit of the driveway. Just to go down to this grading plan. And let me. Kristen, can I ask you a clarifying question? Just on what you just said. The buffer zone impacts is the entire buffer zone within 100 feet. Yes. And the entire on-site buffer zone. Okay. Perfect. Just clarifying that. Thank you. And then we also had the engineers add these callouts to the distance to the, to the wetland line because that changed. So even though originally we were hoping to stay outside of the 50 foot with that addition of the wetland flags, we're now inside the 50 foot for the limit of work. But again, limit of work includes temporary site work. And we added these high bush blueberries in order to. Add diversity and vegetative structure to the buffer zone, which includes a lot of non-native species. Unfortunately, these plans don't show the, the ortho photo in the background. I've got this, which isn't great, but I can pull it up. This is just a screenshot from my ArcGIS online with their CAD plans. So this yellow line here is the limit of work. And this just kind of reinforces that the entire limit of work is within the existing lawn. This is the, where the shrubby area over here, and then this wetland down here is forested. Erin can maybe pull up photos and I have additional photos. If we want to see what this buffer zone looks like, but there are a lot of invasive species in here. And those high bush blueberries are proposed right at the toe of the driveway slope here. So I'm going to pull this up. I'm going to pull this up. It was sort of a. Double intent here, one to add a little bit of vegetative diversity and structure to this very heavily invaded. Non-native kind of shrubby area over here, but also maybe to consider any potential sheet flow coming off of this driveway before it enters the buffer zone. I'll just pull this up. Again, in case any commissioners have any questions, I do have a second question. I just have a question for you. What is the negative determination for the relocation of this historic home to the weekend lot? Kristen, I actually, for some reason. I think my photos didn't make it into the. The project folder. Do you have photos to share? I sure do. Unfortunately, photos always load very slowly for me. So. I have some from our site walk. I know they're in here. I just, I'm trying to track them down. Well, you two figure that look for those. We were out there with when they adjusted the wetland boundary. Yes. Yep. Thank you. Yeah. And just so that the commission knows, there is an area of the. The property that's not lawn. And, and I think Kristen's photos show it well here. It's kind of like a shrubby area. That area was a little soggy and we did check the soils in that area and they didn't come up as hydric. I did ask to check that area pretty. I checked it pretty extensively. I just wanted to make sure that that wasn't coming up as wet and it seems to have upland soils. We were there at kind of a tricky time of year because the ground was frozen and the water table is high. I did see some evidence of hydrology. Coming in sort of the footprint, but I think it's, it was surface water runoff coming from the slope because it's a very steep. Lot coming from the roadway down to the back of the lot. I can walk you through. So this is a limit of work steak. And then maybe you can see there's a pink flag over here. That was one of, I think our new wetland flag. I'll show you. All right. And then there are revised wetland flags. And here's another one that ties in. So this is kind of that drainage whale right here. There's one, there's two. There's three and there's four. So those four wetland flags are all new. And then that ties into, let me just pull this up really quick. So that's this one, this one, this one and this one. And then that ties into the old wetland flag, which was right there. because it won't matter. So going back to my photos, so that is looking west towards the wetland line. The wetland is pretty much there's a very clear topographic break down here. This is that shrubby area. There's a lot of glossy buckthorn and multi-flora rose, a little bit of bittersweet. Can I scroll through photos with this? Darn it, let me move it over here. Here we go. This is looking north, I think. Again, these are a limit of work stakes. That's a wetland flag, maybe. No, wait, maybe this is south. I think that is looking north. It is looking north. You can see right in front of that middle stake, you can see there was a little pocket of water there. We took a core there to check it because there was standing water there, so we checked it and it was not hydric. Yeah, that's the plug actually. Thank you, Erin. Yeah, and then these are those two flags that match up with that corner right there. So yeah, thank you, Erin. Sorry, I can't scroll through without sliding my photos over because they're, let's see. And then this is also looking north. This is going to be the toe of the driveway here from what it looks like on the plans. So there is, again, just to pull up the plans, some riprap armored stone right here. And so this is that area that coincides with that photo. Come on, right here. And so then the high bush blueberries are proposed to be just over here to the left. And then this is facing towards 116. So this kind of shows the grade. This is pretty much where the driveway is proposed right over here. Again, just to remind the commission, there are a couple of mature trees on site, but the contractors and the applicant propose no mature trees need to be removed. They can go around them. Then I have some from earlier in the year. This is facing south from 116. This is, again, the curb cut where the driveway will come in. This tree is proposed to remain. I hope I'm not making you all dizzy. This back and forth. Again, this is a big tree that's proposed to be remaining. Maybe if I make you guys, here we go. OK. Another one. This is facing north. Again, the driveway would come down here. So this is a good photo that shows the topography. This existing lawn area is where the historic house would be located to. Just another photo facing north with the buffer zone over here in the wetland off camera. Here's another photo of the buffer zone. I'm not sure if that's still loading or if it's just blurry. OK, so here's another photo of the buffer zone with the wetland in the distance. We did take a couple of field reference data points of the cranial stream, which I think is the Fort River. And it is we are well outside of Riverfront. So we know that we are not in bordering land subject to flooding or riverfront area. I could keep going. I have a lot of photos. So I don't want to take up too much time, but I am happy to continue to scroll. Here's another one facing north. This pretty much shows the work area. The buffer zone. OK, that's been very helpful. Thank you. Michelle, you have a question you want to hop on here? Sorry. Yes, go ahead. Yeah, OK. So 12% still within our discretionary allowances, right? So it's over 20 where we would require mitigation. So I just want to ask about what you're doing. And I'm glad the the vaccinium is going in there. You said a couple. But is that the actual number that's going in there? What I see on the plans. Yes, we proposed 15. But again, we're open to discussion. If you prefer, you know, a cornice, maybe cornice mo-mo, we're happy with that. Or a drier cornice that would be better in the buffer zone. We're OK with that. We suggested a vaccinium because it has, you know, bird habitat value, but so does cornice. So yeah, that's good. I guess my concern is whether or not the homeowners are going to know that that is a mitigation effort, they're going to see it and they're small and they're going to pull it out and start landscaping. So I guess what are the things in place to ensure that that doesn't just turn into a burning bush hedge or something? Right, we did talk about that. And I'm not sure if Tom's also in the audience and you want to chime in on behalf of the landowners, but we did discuss that. We did discuss, you know, maintaining the existing lawn area as existing lawn and considering some sort of benchmarks to maintain a no-mo area within the buffer zone. Yeah, I'm here. Kristen, thanks. I mean, whatever the commission wants, really. I think we're pretty flexible on this one. You want bird boxes, we can put up bird boxes. You want boulders, we can roll boulders down there. I don't know how rocky this. I mean, obviously, we like to get the boulders from the site if we can instead of importing them from somewhere else. If we have them, we can use them. Otherwise, we can do bird boxes or something else, right? You know, really, we're open to whatever the commission is suggesting here. I'll just open up for the commissioners before we go to public on this. Because any commissioners have anything right off the top ahead they want to bring up? Erin, you want to say something? It looks like you're ready to say something. Well, I was just going to say that if we are going to require boulders or demarcation, we typically require that sort of like along the 50 foot buffer, but in this case, because the limit of work line is extending down into that area, that we might want to sort of give an indicator. Like for example, would the boulders be placed at the limit of work in this instance? If the commission's considering allowing the project to go a little bit closer than ordinarily would be. So like just to make sure we have language that specifies where those boulders or demarcation should be placed. Right, that's a good point. So beyond the, I know you just showed me all those pictures. So beyond that limit of work, there's like a 25 foot gap of like moat, of lawn right now, right? Kind of, I know it changes with the. Yeah, it's not consistent, I don't think. Like the. I just wanted to confirm, I appreciate what you just point you're making. It looked like meadow. I mean, not really. There's a little bit of the development encroaches onto that little meadow there, but there is a portion of lawn that I think is not getting disturbed with the development. Yeah, I think it's maybe, so the toe of the slope is kind of to the right of that photo where that riprap would go with the toe of the driveway. And then this is the limit of work. Gotcha. OK, thank you. Go ahead, Michelle. I mean, I just would propose boulders of the limit of work unless, you know, I'll start the discussion like that, but I would feel comfortable with that. Thank you. Well, can I share with anything else? You want to kind of chime in on here? I'll jump in a little just to make it to kind of move things a little bit quicker. I did come up with some. Requested conditions for a potential determination, and I drafted the determination to basically be in the format of an order of conditions. So there'd be conditions under the wetland protection acting conditions under the local bylaw, and they would include the general boiler plate that we include for orders of conditions for, you know, monitoring the site and just, you know, our standard boiler plate, but then some additional conditions for and I'll click to the side so you guys can see it. But I did ask Tom earlier today, because as I was looking at this plan, one of the things that had occurred to me was the slope and the driveway. And is the driveway proposed to be paved? Yes, yes. And so the question that I had asked Tom was about putting a little strip of like stone along the edge of the driveway just to infiltrate the runoff coming off the driveway. And I know Tom was hoping to check with the engineer to see if that would be OK. Yeah, and I talked to Barry and then Phil Henry, the engineer. They both thought it was fine. So we're fine with what you had suggested, Erin. OK, awesome. So I was just hoping that we could condition that in to do, like I'm not picky necessarily about the width, like one to two feet of crushed stone on one or both sides of the driveway, depending on what the commission feels is appropriate. And then like maybe four inches deep just to add a little bit of infiltration along that driveway because of the steep slopes. And then I added permanent demarcation of the NOMO at the limit of work to be, you could do like the split rail or boulders or whatever you think is attractive or whatever just to be maintained in perpetuity. And then I'm sorry, I'm losing my voice a little bit. So if I cut out here, I'll try my best. But standard boilerplate, native plantings only, no snow storage in resource areas. Let's see, contractors should be provided with the order of conditions. Environmental controls have to be maintained by the contractor. That one was actually, some of these were boilerplate. So I apologize if there's duplicates. I was rushing sort of towards the end of the day today. Environmental monitor and really what you guys feel necessary like weekly inspections or monthly inspections to check on erosion controls. Preconstruction meeting is pretty standard for all of our projects. And then erosion control inspection reports I usually ask for on a monthly basis. It kind of depends on the site, but really whatever you guys are comfortable with. But I'm personally fine with this being permitted as a determination so long as the applicant knows that it's going to have to be completed within three years to work. Before I get to Alex, is that something that you see comfortable three years of work, Tom? Yeah, I'm hoping, I think we're hoping to be done in six months of work. Excellent, OK. Yeah, that's good. Yeah, there's no problem here. OK, Alex, do you have a question? No, I don't have a question. I just want to turn my video on and get it to turn off. Anyways, I wanted to support Michelle and in looking for some permanent demarcation. I think it would be appropriate to have the demarcation as permanent as what's being constructed. So boulders? Boulders, something like that, because houses get sold, new people move in, things get forgotten. And so something where she's got permanent down there that she's typing now, but something. What's this say boulders? Something as permanent as what's going on. Yeah, I agree. I think that's a good idea. If Tom wrote boulders, the driveway, two feet of crushed stone, probably a little bit more or four inches would probably be better. Six inches at least, something, whatever that grit, whatever you're cutting down that the asphalt and the base layer is going to be, get down to that same level. So what's that? Six or eight inches, maybe? Yeah, I think so. Just something that does infiltrate a little bit more. Because I don't, yeah. So you see where we're trying to get out here with that. And obviously we're going to catch it. It's going to catch it. Thanks, Fletcher. You're welcome. And catch it at the riprap at the bottom of the driveway. Any other commissioners? And then I'm going to bring it to the public real quick. All set. Does anybody in the public have any questions about this project? If you do, raise your hand. Pretty bigot. We do have a participant raise their hand. When you get on, could you please just say your name and where you live? And do you have that permission there? Is that up to me? Oh, there she is. Yep. Here we go. Just got to unmute yourself, Dorothy. There you go. OK. This is really just a comment in demarcation. I wouldn't much prefer split rail, because I think it's more in keeping with the woodhouse and woods and fields than boulders. Where I used to live in Norfolk, there was a huge field in back of my house. And along the road, it had split rail. And looking at field and meadow through split rail and woods is very nice. Boulders are kind of like, I don't know, I don't think they fit that look of that historic house. That's just my comment. Thank you. All right. Well, thanks, Dorothy. Appreciate it. We're just looking for a permanent demarcation. So that's where we're trying to split that difference there. No pun intended. Michelle, do you have a comment on that? Yeah. I mean, I agree about the aesthetics comment. I just split rail fence rots, and it needs to be replaced. And that becomes the onus of the landowner. And maybe they don't want to do it, or it starts looking worse than it started. So ultimately, I think I'd like to stick with something permanent like boulders. And that's, yeah, in boulders, obviously, Tom, we're not talking 10 foot tall boulders. We're talking about something, you know, we probably don't need basketball court-sized boulders. But obviously something big enough that's demarcated in that also when the grasses grow, that when they go over that boulder, it's going to be big snow over at the corner of Snell and Baker Street. We had done some boulders over there. Erin, I think that was some demarcating boulders. So right behind you drive south, I think those are boulders that are demarcating over there. Yeah, we use boulders quite a bit. I mean, the only thing about boulders, and again, this isn't going to have an order of conditions tied to it. So it's not going to be recorded on the deed. We're not going to have ongoing conditions for it. The only thing about boulders is people can go around boulders with a lawnmower if they so choose to. So fencing is a barrier that people can't go in between or, you know, around. I mean, it's their costs and benefits to both. So just to keep those things in mind. We could say boulders or split rail in the order. We don't have to nail it down right now. Let the applicant decide what they think, you know, would work the best on the same. I think we need to be a little bit more directive. I guess it. Right. I mean, we want a permanent demarcation. Let's get permanent demarcation. I appreciate it. I do like a split rail fence myself, but it's true. They do just rot and fall down. And then next thing you know, there's a lawnmower in the back. OK. Fair enough. Alex, you have something else to say? Yeah. I hear the aesthetic question and I just want to ask is a stone wall out of question. It's permanent. It's rock and it's more attractive. And very expensive. I think I think that's going to be the rub on our side with all your excavate. You got to dig out and put a base layer on. Yeah. And you got to make that thing do it right. Yeah. Yeah, we do it right. That's a lot. That's a ton. I'll be a small fraction of the total project. I think it's some type of permanent demarcation. If the land or ever decides it wants to put in a stone wall, I think we'll be totally open for that. But at this moment, I don't think we can force them to. I just was hearing the aesthetic comment that Dorothy Bamm made and I fully understand it. And I like fences too. So just thought I'd ask. Copy. And then we got the blueberries going up as well. There's anything else that maybe should we put some flowering dogwood or something to help with the aesthetic? I think the applicant can be creative in that as well. Just throwing that out there as well. We are leaving the victory. The victories are staying, which is nice. We appreciate that step being taken. I do notice that beach every time I drive by. So with that, there's anything else. Are we comfortable? Somebody comfortable doing a motion? So just before you guys jump in with a motion, I just want to make it clear if you're going to just say with the noted conditions that the noted conditions that are listed include the cross stone, the permanent demarcation of the NOMO at the limit of work, and then the conditions that I ran through at the beginning. I will also point out that Heritage did respond on January 26. I think I forwarded that letter to the commission and they responded that there will be no adverse impact to the actual resource area of State Protective Rear Wildlife, but we are anticipating a turtle protection plan if work occurs during the wood turtle active season, which we're not entirely sure we will need. If it's basically after April, we're going to prepare and implement a turtle protection plan. Right. Tom just said six months, not this thing. So that's a great point, Kristen. Thank you for reminding me of that. And so it might be good to just have a condition that NHSP conditions be followed. Right, we're going to need a motion. I'll do it. Maybe someone could, Erin, make sure I'm doing it correctly. You don't have to list all the conditions. We've already sorted that out. You can just read this section. I moved to issue a positive determination checking box five by a law negative determination. Checking box three WPA with noted additional conditions for 175 West Street. Second. Andre the second. Or just Andre seconded. Are you in a second? All right. Voice foe, Andre. Aye. Michelle. Aye. Alex. Aye. Cameron. Aye. And I for Fletcher. Hey, thank you, you too. Thanks a lot. Good seeing you. We're very interested to see the house come downtown. Get your popcorn ready. Yeah. Thanks, everyone. Have a good night. See you. To the notice of intent or 740 notice of intent. OK. So I'm just going to stop sharing so I can check the attendees. It's a little hard to flip back and forth because I can't see attendees. And I don't see if it might be the 508 number is Glenn. He mentioned that he might have to join by phone. Yep. So everybody here from EBT, Environmental Consultants on behalf of HOD, is it how do you say AMHAD? AMHAD. It's Amherst Hadley. Oh, gotcha. Yeah. Discussed that last time. Less Dorothy, you want to take it away? So I do want me to add the number. It's a 508 number, so I'm fairly confident it's Glenn. Now, Glenn is handling multiple hearings tonight. So just he might be kind of doing triage in multiple hearings at once. So before I bring him in, I'll just say I've reviewed the material that we all we are waiting for with some detail on the replication area because there was some indications that the replication area wasn't built to spec on the original permit. So Glenn provided that to me. I'm satisfied with the information that's been provided that we can issue an order of conditions tonight. I think that the one thing that the commission needs to specify in the order of conditions when we're ready to go there is so there's currently an old order of conditions that had permitted the replication area. So the replication area was designed and originally constructed as part of the original 23 green leaves development. It was constructed, but it wasn't constructed exactly to the specs of the plan, which it should have been larger and it also shouldn't have been so deep. It's actually just like looks like a little sort of pond right now or a vernal pool. And there's a strip of upland in between that area and the wetland. It was supposed to be connected to the wetland and it was supposed to be a little more shallow to actually provide additional BVW habitat. So what I'm getting at is that there's no certificate of compliance that's been issued for the green leaves original subdivision. That order of conditions is still hanging there. Ordinarily, DEP doesn't like to have multiple orders of conditions open on a given property. And so the commission should consider if what we're saying is the order that we're issuing hopefully tonight is going to basically kind of take over the replication area in terms of governing it, how we want to handle the certificate of compliance. So for example, do we want to say, OK, once it's constructed, we can issue a certificate of compliance on the original. Do we want to close out and have them submit a request for certificate of compliance now and reference the new order of conditions in it, something like that, so that they're tied together somehow? The other thing that we could do is wait to issue a certificate of compliance on the original until it's completed and has been monitored. So those are all options that the board could consider. But we should address it in some form or fashion that the two are connected. And I will try. Can we can we can we combine? Can we just combine them? No, the permits expired and yeah, it's long expired. So like if it was if it was an amendment, we could tie them together. My recommendation would be either like what you're comfortable with is to say to the applicant submit a request for certificate of compliance and we issue a partial and note in that partial certificate that the replication area was constructed not to spec and that the new order of conditions and reference the file number will be handling the replication area. So henceforth, something to that effect would be an option. Yeah, so something to think about how you guys would feel comfortable dealing with that. But I think the main objective here is to make sure that it's clear that the replication area must be completed and monitored. That's understandable, but that's a little tricky. Michelle, you have something you want to chime in on? I was just curious what's what would be the timeline of the henceforth condition permit? Is it another three years or is there a shorter timeline on it for the complete like fix again, basically? Well, so in the new order of conditions, typically they're monitored for three years. So when you do a replication area, it would be constructed and then we would require monitoring for three years once it's constructed and we would require those monitoring reports for the life of the permit. The idea being that like in the course of a three-year period if like 50% of the trees died that they would, you know, they would have to be replaced. Well, for streamlining. And we don't have a request for certificate of compliance before the board tonight, but I think that this is just an important, like if we issue tonight, we can issue and we can close it and say we're issuing the order of conditions, but we should give the applicant some guidance with regard to how we want them to handle the requests for certificate of compliance. Should they just wait until the other permits closed out or do we want them to close it out beforehand just so that there's not two orders hanging there? I'm just worried about us getting caught somehow, you know, like caught up in something, but doesn't seem, I don't, you know what I mean? Like I don't want to get... Well, this happens a lot. I get it. Yeah. Commissioner, is there anything else to say? I mean, I think that last option was we, if we're okay with moving forward and putting this condition and then asking them to come back with the partial, she's talking about compliance. It doesn't seem like the applicant's on either so we couldn't get, go ahead, Andre. So just to make sure what's happened, what's happened is that we have the old permit with some conditions that were not entirely met. And then we have a new permit that they're looking to get or... Right, that's for the water line. It's for a water line connection between the buildings. Okay, yeah. And so I guess in my mind, there are two separate things. Wouldn't we want them to tie up the first, it's a wrap up the first one and not mix them or what would be the benefit of... That would be the ideal, but the first permit expired so it's no longer valid. They can't do the work under the original permit. That's why the second permit, they can combine it into that permit and that's what they've asked you to make it so that it's done right. And what would be the negative repercussions of doing that then? There really is none other than, like so for example, the only negative repercussion could be if they didn't construct it at all and we issue a certificate of compliance and it never gets constructed and then the new certificate just hangs out there and they never finish it or monitor it. So that's why, like I have the monitoring reports as a condition on the certificate of compliance. The certificate of compliance are on the order of conditions. The order of conditions is recorded. So it's an encumbrance on the deed. So it's really hard for them to do anything going forward with that hanging there. They're gonna wanna resolve it but it's really the old order of conditions kind of that's just sitting there but there's nothing that can be done under it because it's not a valid permit anymore. I'm sorry, I've got a terrible cold. I'm doing a bad job explaining. No, it's fine. I think we should, well, let's let that marinate a bit because we still have to talk about the current application. Yeah, so Glenn did present it at the last meeting but if you guys want to revisit it at all, I just am trying to avoid having Glenn come on and then have him have to step away or something for another hearing if we can talk about some of this stuff before he comes up. It seems pretty straightforward from last time. Sorry, go ahead. Yeah, so these are kind of like sort of the standard boilerplate that I have been including on all of our permits like in the last round that we issued last meeting, the local and state boilerplate conditions, only native plantings, no snow storage and resource areas, contractor must be provided the order of conditions and sign that they've read it. They have to maintain the erosion controls if they don't, they're subject to enforcement. Drainage must be installed using survey to make sure that inverts are properly placed. Permanent boundary markers at the wetland restoration area as built plans must include the mitigation area, signage at visible intervals along the mitigation area indicating that it's a wetland area, no mowing, dumping, cutting. I don't want to run through all of these, you can read them yourself but this is sort of the standard that we included on the last round and then it also includes site monitoring, the erosion control inspections to be submitted on a monthly basis but erosion control, the inspections have to be done weekly, the monitoring reports submitted monthly and then quarterly reports on the wetland mitigation area which must begin within six months of construction and they have to be done quarterly until the construction is completed on the mitigation area, at which point we get a final report and that final report is part of the request for certificate of compliance. Okay. I mean, I don't have, yeah, I don't have any issues with this part. Commissioners, do you have any, anything with this particular part? Okay. Is there, did we ask the public last time about this? I forget. We did, there was one public comment but there's definitely no harm in asking again. Is anybody in the public concerned or have any questions about this project or the water line replacement green leaves? You can chime in. Yeah, Ed, you can come on in and just say who you are and where you live. That'd be great. I got two participants. Do you wanna go one at a time or? Yeah. Okay. So I just brought Ed in and I might just take a second for it to catch up. Yep. If you go ahead. Yep. Let's get on mute and you'll be all set. Yeah, I'm Ed Perkins and I'm a resident of the Green Leaves project. This project has been going on for almost two decades as you probably know to get these buildings built. And I was wondering if there's a way to include a timeline for the work to be completed under your purview. Yep. The permit's three years, is that correct? So the permit is good for three years. But is there a deadline by which the work needs to be completed included or is that not under your purview? For example, the work must be completed in six months, the work must be completed in 12 months, anything like that. Right. I don't believe so because we're actually dealing with the last, correct me if I'm wrong, Eric, because we're actually gonna talk about the order of compliance from the last one. Well, so I think what he's getting at is the construction window and it's difficult for us to say like how long it's actually gonna take for them to do the work and complete the work. We could certainly say something like we encourage the applicant to be expeditious with how they complete the work so that the site's not open for a long period of time. And I think that would actually be really a good condition because a portion of the work does go temporary, there's temporary disturbance in a BVW for the waterline to be installed. So they're excavating in the wetland to install the waterline and then returning it back to its previous condition, putting all the soils back and stabilizing it. So I do think that we, and that's part of the whole monitoring, right? Cause it's weekly monitoring done during construction. And so it keeps their budgeted costs down to require that. So it's in their interest to move quickly and get it completed so they don't have a monitor out there every week and do reports every month. I think that's an excellent idea, yeah. Great. Okay, thanks, Ed. Yeah, we'll be watching. We've got anyone else? We had a couple of hands up earlier. You're muted, Erin. I'm muted. I've just promoted Sue to Susan Cummings to panelist so she could speak. You just unmute yourself, Susan, and we'll, you can speak. Hi. Can you hear me? Yep. Oh, okay. So as I understand this, you could approve tonight so that they could start construction, you know, as soon as they wanted to. Is that correct? If you approve tonight? You're muted again, Erin. Erin, you're muted. The permit has to be issued first. So the commission, the first step is the commission approves, then the permit is issued. Once the permit is issued, there's a 10-day appeal period. During the 10-day appeal period, like a grieve to butters, if there were any could appeal the permit. And then after that 10-day appeal period lapses, they're free to begin working. Okay. So if all goes well tonight, when would you issue the permit? It really depends. The last round took me 21 days to issue just because we were so backed up. We have had a lot of permits being issued recently. So it takes almost a full day to issue a permit like this. It's a pretty administratively intense process. So yeah, the goal would be as soon as possible and my hope would be in the next two weeks it would be issued. Okay. So I wanted to ask you, I know this isn't in your bailiwick exactly, but do you know because you're in government there, I think they, to get the certificate of occupancy in building 28, they need this conservation commission approval. Well, yeah, okay, I know. I'm just trying to understand the process. Say you issue the permit and I think for the certificate of occupancy for them to start doing certain things in the building, they need the water. They need the water supply, I think. Is that what your understanding is? Well, we're not really concerned with what's going on in the building. We don't have any. Yeah, I know that. They need to get into the wetland and so we're working with them. I know, I knew that. I just wondered if you knew the process. Yeah, okay. All right, that's okay. I can find it. I'll find it, okay. Okay, thank you. All right, thank you, Susan. Is there anyone else? Okay. We don't have anyone else. Michelle, what would you like to? What do you have? I was just wondering, is this older permit? Was it, there wasn't really an issue with like delinquency. It was more that the design implementation wasn't correct and so it didn't work. So I'm just- Kind of delinquency. Weighing risks here with how we bundle this permit. Is that true though? I mean, it wasn't, we're not watching out for them getting the work done. It was just them to fix what was not done right in the first place. So this permit was issued in the early 2000s and I don't know exactly like was the permit recorded on the order of condition on the deed. I don't know. All I know is the order of conditions was issued approving the work. They did the work and they just kind of moved forward. They never got a certificate of compliance on it. So I think that the biggest risk or the least risk involved would be just to issue the order of conditions and say we're not gonna issue a certificate of compliance until this work is done and has been monitored for three years. And then at that point, we would consider issuing a certificate of compliance. So that would be the safest route to go if you were worried about it, which is completely fine. That seems pretty straightforward. As long as we're able to say that and I feel pretty comfortable with that. Commissioner, what do you think? Yeah, okay. I mean, I appreciate you bringing that up and it's an important piece. We just wanna, you know, as we like to keep all our ducks in a row here. Okay, if there's anything else with this permit, I think if commissioners maybe we'll get a motion and make sure we state that the other certificate of compliance won't happen until we get this completed after three years. Is that pretty straight? Yeah, straight point of us. Yes, and I did add in those additional conditions here just to show for the record what the conditions would be on the order that commission encourages the applicant to be expeditious with construction to reduce impacts to wetlands and stabilize the site. And then project must be monitored for three years before the commission will consider a certificate of compliance, sorry. Yeah, that's very important, okay. Certificate of compliance on original order of conditions. This is the one we can see. You can see this from the bike path, right? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Do you guys want to go straight to a motion or do you want to pull Glen in? I know we're running kind of late here, so it's up to you guys. Okay, I think I would be happy to do a motion to anyone else. Okay, I'm just going to pull the motion back up then so you can see it. Because I can't see the attendees while it's open. Yeah, you're okay. I can see it right now. I moved to close the public hearing and issue an order of conditions for 23 and 28 green leaves drive with noted conditions. Second it. Nice job. So we got Andre, motion, Cameron, second. Voice vote, Cameron. Aye. Andre. Aye. Michelle. Aye. Alex. Aye. And I for Fletcher. Nice job team. Thank you, Susan and Ed. Good luck. Keep your eyes out on it. Okay, so I'm just going to stop sharing for a second because I know I saw Virginia on, Virginia's with BSC Group and she's representing Eversource and Star. Yep. I'm voting her to panelist. The people are dropping off, so I just want to make sure she gets in and before I share again. You're doing great, Erin. Keep it up. I'm limping along here. You are getting a little horser and horser. If you are a trooper. Get it, Virginia. Hello. He just got just a quick, quick, quick overview and we were at. Yeah. So I'm here on behalf of Eversource for the 797 South East Street underground cable replacement and junction box installation project. So basically at the residence of 797 East Street, there's underground cable that's been there. It's about 40 years old. There's an existing transformer there and due to multiple cable faults where the residence often loses power, they really need to upgrade and replace this line. And they've decided that adding underground conduit and PVC up through the driveway to the transformer is the thing to do. They don't want to install poles there or anything. The driveway bisects large wetland on both sides of it. Yeah, clearly it was built a while ago. So everything within the project, the project, almost everything within the project limits can be considered exempt utility maintenance because it's replacement of the existing line right next to, is replacement with the conduit right next to the existing line. The transformer is also going to be replaced in that. However, midway up the driveway, they do need to install a new junction box because the driveway is about a thousand feet and it's too long to pull all that conduit and all that cable up on its own. So you want to share a map? Yes, we love maps, we like pictures. I've got a thousand foot. This is a thousand foot driveway? Yeah, I think that's the bad thousand foot driveway. It goes all the way back. You wouldn't even know there's a house back there. So it's kind of like hidden. Oh, I don't have the pointer. Okay, so this is Southeast Street that you can see on the right side of the screen there. They're going to trench up the first half of this driveway to about the fence line and you can see that there's an HDD mark there. So they're going to use horizontal directional drilling for the rest of the driveway to try to pull that up. As you can see down, we have this purple mark and a little yellow mark on the map. I'm pointing at my map, like you guys can see it. That habit I have. Anyways, so within this area, we're going to, they're proposing to install the junction box, which is an 18 by 36 inch green box that you would probably see on, along other people's driveways and stuff like that. To do this, they have to put a two, about a two foot by three foot trench in outside of the driveway layout, which puts it right in the buffer zone and pretty much within five feet of the edge of the wetland there. After they pull the concrete through. Two by three foot? Yeah. So it's like a six square feet and that it would actually be temporary impact because once they install the silo in the junction box, that portion of the trench will be covered back over and it'll be stabilized, seated, loamed, strawed, whatever needs to be done to get it back to pre-construction conditions. So the only thing that is actually going to be an impact is about 4.5 square feet of above ground impact from that junction box itself, which is just going to sit right on the edge of the driveway. It will be outside of the wetland, but it is right against the edge of the wetland there. We have talked with the contractors about installing appropriate sediment and erosion controls about any excavation they do need to do because they will have to have pulpits within the driveway layout along the path to get up to the other transformer. So they intend to put straw waddles or whatever appropriate erosion controls around those as they do their test pits to make sure they're not hitting the communication line that's there, the electrical line that's there and the water line that's already there. How many test pits? Up to five test pits is what they think that they need. And I think... That's like dig safe stuff, you just, you got to dig down. Yeah, to make sure that they're still on the right path and then they can also put the PVC in through those pits and pull it up the rest of the way. So they're pulling the line. Yeah. There are two culverts that they will plan to go over or under whatever they dictate is the best way to go and mitigate those along the driveway. But like I said, everything is within driveway or considered replacement up in that transformer area. And there's no, you're not touching the culverts, there's no replacement or maintenance or anything like that. No, they won't need to do anything with those. And just to, I know from the site visit that this transformer box is being moved further out and away from the wetland and that they're putting down rubber mats to get in there with the equipment to remove that box. So that there is a reduction of impact there. Also, just to point that out. Yeah, they're going to completely remove that one and actually place it upland about 20 feet away on a ledge. So it's going to be further back and they're going to take that old one out and get that completely out. Because that one sits right on the wetland edge. Included in the NOI for the junction box installation, we put a small footprint of temporary matting down, which is also, I believe it was 90 square feet. And that is precautionary. So just in case, because they're on the wetland edge, if any of the equipment needs to maneuver off of the driveway, that whole area would actually be protected. And they're not the big temporary timber mats that you often see on transmission lines, but they're like the smaller rubber alternative matting that can support the equipment without causing rutting or permanent damage to the area. They think they can do it all from the driveway, but we said, we should probably include it just in case. Okay, thank you, Virginia. Erin, do you want to share pictures or you? Yes, bear with me for just one second and I'll pull those open. Sorry, I'm doing a share screen and I've got two screens, so I've got to figure out which one to share. Hold on one second. So this is standing at the residence and looking down. The residence is at my back. There's like a little cul-de-sac kind of at their turnaround in front of their house. This is looking out toward Southeast Street and you can see the well and flagging running on both sides of the driveway. This is the existing transformer rather here and then there's also another piece of equipment there. And then this is pointing to the area where the new transformer would be located. And then this is walking down toward Southeast Street and in this one, Virginia's stand, sorry, Virginia's stand, right where the junction box would be located. Is that six square feet? I'm not measuring it, but maybe. I do have other pictures of that area if you guys need them from a different view or with vegetation or anything like that, but... Seems straightforward replacement. Commissioner, do you have any questions? We'll give it to the public in a second, but Commissioner, it seems pretty straightforward here. Yeah, like the thumbs up, tired eyes and thumbs up. Anybody from the public that wants to have anything to say to this project? Raise your hand. Maybe one second. There's nothing outstanding. Virginia, sounds pretty straightforward. I appreciate the little, a couple of extra steps you're trying to do, try to make sure everything gets done on the driveway. And using the geotextiles and stuff to move things around. I appreciate that. Obviously you're going to be working with Erin, so we want everything, you know, ducks in a row and blinds communication open. Right. If there's any other questions or comments, Commissioner, I'd like to see a motion, please. I move to close the public hearing and issue an order of conditions for 797 south E street with standard boilerplate conditions under WPA and MRS bylaws. Second that. And under the second, thank you. Voice vote, Andre. Aye. Michelle. Aye. Cameron. Aye. Alex. Aye. And aye for Fletcher. All right, thank you very much, Virginia. Thank you. Have a nice evening. Yeah, you too. Thanks. Doki. That was good. Thanks, guys. Erin. Oh, the emergency cert. Yeah, if you want to get on that. Yeah, I'll jump right in here. Yeah, let's get on that. That's 133 Bay Road. They have water in the basement, Sump Pump. They had a new Sump Pump drainage. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if this is going to be switched screens. Can you guys see this? Yes. OK. All right, so I'm going to give you a little just a sort of a quick. Snapshot of this situation. This is the this home is located immediately next door to the ever sourced Montague to Fairmont line. This landowner previously had a Sump Pump in her basement and following the ever sourced work, which was completed this winter. So this this winter since that time, she has had serious flooding problems with water coming into her basement. So the issue is sort of twofold. The first is the certificate of compliant or excuse me, the emergency certification basically to repair the outlet of the Sump Pump and bring the water away from the home to try to hopefully mitigate the flooding that's happening in her basement. And so that's kind of the main piece that the commission would be looking for action on tonight. The Sump Pump line comes off of. You know, it's the entire work is on her property, but you can see this is where the ever sourced line work was that it the outlet comes out near that line. And she has a temporary piping pulling it over into this area just to get the water because what was happening was there was so much water coming out of her basement and the area where they were pumping it to was very low lying and flat. And when the water was coming out, it was going into the road and causing like a giant freeze giant frozen pond puddle in the roadway. DPW had a problem with that because it was putting water into the road. So they added this temporary measure of the pipe just to carry the water across the right of way so that their water could move down to a low point that wouldn't cause a safety hazard in the roadway. So simultaneous to this, though, there's also sort of a dispute going on with the landowner and ever source. Excuse me, the owner is basically trying to negotiate with ever source to address some of her concerns relative to the drainage, which she thinks is related to the ever source right of way. There's been a lot of emails flying around about this. I've been trying to sort of be an intermediary to be supportive of both sides and encourage it resource to help where they can to resolve the issue, basically. But I don't there have been sort of some allegations made by the landowner that ever source has wetlands violations out there. I visited the site. I reviewed the permit. I issued the original permit. In my opinion, there are no violations on the site. I'm losing my voice. There's no violations on the site currently. There are some changes in the way that the site, I mean, when the commission issued the permit, they allowed the installation of a new structure. And so there are some changes to the site, but I believe those are permitted changes. So I just want to be completely transparent that I don't see any violations on the site. I'm not getting in between ever source and the landowner with regard to her private issue. Just trying to help sort it out so that I can kind of be supportive to all sides. I'm going to end up losing my voice, I can tell. Thank you. So that aside, our jurisdiction for the emergency service is the trenching and this line going into the wetland for the sump bump. And it looks like the site is in, I think doesn't look like you had any issues with what was there and what's been done. It doesn't sound like there's any issues with the ever source line replacement or structural replacement. So I think let's just stick with, great job. I mean, thank you for trying to be a intermediary for all this. But let's just stick with this emergency certification. If you're OK with it, then that's what needed to get done. And that's what got done and got the water out of the basement, great. I think let's just stick with that right now. Whatever happens with ever source and landowner, that's up to them unless there's some egregious wetlands violations, we'll surely get pulled into it. And that's OK, that's what we do. But I think let's just thank you for doing what you're doing. And let's just stick with this emergency certification of the trenching getting done for the sump pump drainage. Alex, you got something? Yeah, I was just curious, Erin, help me out here. What's our jurisdiction? What's at stake for us? Yeah, so there in the ever source right of way, there, this is the wetland begins in this approximate area. So there's her house, the ever source line. And then in the ever source right of way, just beyond this limit of work where you can see the disturbance, there's a wetland on the, I guess it would be the west side of the right of way. And this, and I just want to make it clear, ever source just wrapped up work in the winter of 2022. This straw that you see is their stabilization measures after they removed their timber mats. So this isn't associated with the work that the landowner is doing. The work that the landowner is doing stops on her property. Other than that, just temporary pipe carrying the water out from away from the road. Her work, I would say this section right here is within buffer zone. So most of her property is out of the buffer zone. It's over 100 feet, over 100 feet from the wetland. It's just this tiny part that's, I would say, maybe the first like 10 or 15, maybe 20 feet of this trench from her property line where it meets the ever source line coming east. So those red flags, wetland flags? No, I think that those are dig safe for utilities. Yeah, okay, so. That's our jurisdiction right there, Alex, is from that where her pointer is. I'm using my pointer. Yeah, the buffer is like 20 feet, probably about like here or something. Yeah, to the straw, which is the ever source right away. Right. Thank you. I'm done. Thank you. Thank you for the clarification though, that's very important. No, it's a good question. I think if we can get a motion to ratify this emergency service, that'd be excellent. I moved to ratify emergency certification for 133 Bay Road. Second. Thank you. Voice folk, Cameron. Hi. Michelle. Hi. Andre. Hi. Alex. Hi. Hi. Hi. I'm Eric and I for Fletcher. Hey, do you want to push through? Erin, you want to just call it? It's totally... Yeah, it's totally up to you. This one was just received today. I still have to look into it a little more. No, it got received today. We needed it on Friday, sorry. I appreciate it. New parking area. We can pick that up on another one. We talked about Hickory Ridge communication with DPW, memo drafted, we haven't reviewed it, we can, we will review that memo. This is what we're trying to get a blank NOI due to a violation that happened. Maybe I can call Dave or something and we can get the, I don't know, do we need the town manager involved in this one to maybe help mediate? That's a different topic of conversation, but. Yeah, I mean, I think maybe we issue the memo and then just try to have a dialogue with DPW about it and see where it goes. It's totally up to you guys. There is a memo drafted in the correspondence folder of the OneDrive. If anybody has any edits to that, I'm hoping to be getting that out in the next week. So if anybody has comments on it, you can just send them along to me or if you want to bring it up tonight, you're welcome to. Okay. If somebody in the commission could look over it and just get a couple views on it, at least we can get that memo out and start getting that ball rolling. That would be appreciated. I can look at as well. It's right in our packet just in the OneDrive and. Yep. Okay. I think that's doable and we'll get that. It'll be nice to get that memo out and hopefully we'll get a response and we can just try to get this moving a little bit more. I think that's good. We're good. Erin, you gotta go to bed. I think we need a motion to adjourn here, folks. I moved to adjourn at 9.05 p.m. Thank you. Back in. Thank you, Andre. Voice vote, Cameron. Hi. Andre. Hi. Michelle. Hi. Alex. Hi. And I for Fletcher. Good night, everybody. Good night, everyone. Good night, Erin. Thank you all. Have a good night. Bye. Thanks for all your work, Erin. Yeah. Thank you, guys. Bye.