 Good morning so that we can get started. Hello everyone. I did want to say boo, but hello. So, oh, I. Oh boy. Yep. I forgot all about that, but I have to say all that stuff. And that's in I was putting things in folders and that is in a folder that I did not bring to the table so give me a minute. Well, I want to find that folder. I've got the right folder. Give me a minute to find it. And I helped Dorothy. I'm looking for the. Email, which has all the words in it that I'm supposed to read at the beginning. Can I give you the words? Yeah. Sure. So it's 703 if you want to call the meeting to order. Yeah, I will call the meeting to order. And we're having it moat with a special set of words, which. So we have the presence of a quorum. We're meeting. By a remote means pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021. And next, we're going to announce that we're recording via zoom. And you can take the role for our members to make sure that everyone can hear and be heard. Let me just get with that. Okay. Okay. I'm present. And Anna. I'm going to do everybody's name on a Devlin go to a. Present. Okay. And do Andrew Steinberg. Present. Present. Okay. Okay. Dorothy Pam, present. And Anika Lopes. Present. And I believe that's it. Two, three, four, five. Yes, we're all here. Good. Thank you. So we have an agenda, which. You know, next time I won't try to get organized because my organization just confused me. Okay. We have certain major things we have to do the parking permit. Program revisions. And we have the staff here for that. We have the committee work plan and timeline. And we have the town manager appointments. Those are the major things that we have. And unless I'm told otherwise. I'm going to start with the, I'm not quite sure where we pick up. On the question of the parking permit recommendations. So I think that I would like you to tell me where we're picking it up today. Okay. I'm going to start with this. The town manager would like to do the appointments first. I think you should do everything the other. I think the order you had was right. Okay. All right. So. We were going to start with the, I'm not quite sure where we pick up. We're picking it up today. Want me to go ahead, Dorothy. Yes, please. So there's a couple of things. So. You'll notice in your packet tonight, there was a new version of the parking. Permit regulations. And preparing for the meeting. Athena actually identified. That the version we had done track changes to that you'd seen previously had other changes from the parking permit regulations that are online. There were some sort of formatting changes and some other sort of clarification type changes, but we felt it was better to go back to the permit regulations that are posted online and give you that version. So you can see what we're proposing relative to what actually currently are the regulations. So the, the version in your packet called. Original parking permit system with markups. That's the version you want to look at. You can have it on your screen probably best. And I can share my screen too if people want. So that's the version I think we want to react to and use going forward. And my suggestion, I guess on next steps would be, we can either go through this again. And I can highlight the changes or I, you know, I've started coming up with a short list of sort of the, the key topics that people have raised at this, at TSO and what we've heard from others. And we could, I could just let raise those and you could talk through them. Anyone have any particular thoughts on this? Do all of you have the newest addition in front of you? Because if not, I think we'd probably want Sean to share his screen. Do you have a comment? I was just going to ask Sean, can you just repeat the title of the document that's the most. Yeah, original parking permit system with markups. That's the one you want. Yeah. And so you'll see it looks, I like the other version better, which is because it had clarifications in it. This version you'll see looks a little more. 2005 ish. Which is when it was last updated. So. So, yeah, so we can decide how we want to. Just the formatting and the clarification piece. If there's worrying changes, we can work on those too. But the primary changes that we put in here so you can see those. So I'll share my screen. And make this a little bigger. So I think the major difference between the other version, this version that you're seeing is the, just the order in which things come up. So this one, the permit area is at the beginning. So we just put in a table to how I was worried for, put it in a table format and Jen, were there any new streets that have been added since the original, since the original permit regulation was put together. Not that I can see, but I will double check again tomorrow to make sure. Okay. So that's one of the major changes is putting that into a table format. The other change throughout that one of the other changes throughout the document is that where it says select board, we've put in town manager. So that that pops up in a few places. So that's the section access to parking spaces. So where it says no parking permit space shall be dedicated for or restricted to the use of any individual permit holder. I added other unless otherwise noted because again, we know there are some reserve spots that an area that's been set up in the garage. So I wanted to make sure that wasn't overly confusing. And then the annual parking permit fee. So there's a section here again that says annual fees for parking permits and passes established under the section shall be set and passed. So that's where it's listed. And we put in town manager where it before it said select board or designate. And then in the fee section, we can, we took out the way it was worded before and put in what you saw in the previous version. So that same sort of. Structure. And then includes information on the visitor pass and the, the permit replacement fee. The permit year. The dates have been. The proposed changes here to change it to a full year. As opposed to a nine month. In this section around. The effective hours of parking permit spaces. So again, we switch select board to town manager in terms of determining those effective hours. And that might be it. Yeah. So the primary changes again, are the, the fee schedule obviously is the big one. And then insertion of town manager where currently says select board. So for a conversation starter. I think the thing we've received a lot of feedback on our, is the, the level of the fees and whether the phasing is right. We're proposing three years of, we've heard feedback that that might be too long of a time span, or maybe it should be done differently. I'm looking to see if anyone has their hand up, which is, but I didn't do before. Okay. Well, I, I, I have a general. Worry concern. Oh, Anna, your hands up, go ahead. Anika's hand is up before mine. Oh, I can't see that. Okay. Getting a contrast background for the hand is something we all have to work on. Okay. So Sean, I have to apologize. I had a computer mishap. And so I lost my marked up version of this. Okay. Can you say, did you have you change these since the last time that we looked, did you change the, the one that I was particularly bugged about, which was the reserved spot permits. The amount. Yeah, the amount. No. So we haven't made it. We left that the same as what you discussed last time. I think, you know, talking to the town manager, I think what our hope is tonight or tonight, if we can, is what changes does the, does the committee want to make to this so that there's a chance for people to react to. So. If there are changes the committee wants to, to make, I think now is the time to propose them. And we can, and we can track that in our, in our document. Great. I'd like to see that height. Okay. That's my helpful. That's my helpful feedback right now. Okay. That's, are you talking about reserve spots in boltwood? Yes. Long term ones. Okay. Right. Okay. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So Sean, did you say that the concern was, I'm sorry, I didn't quite hear what you said about the feedback regarding the, the length of time. Yeah. So I guess it's not broad feedback, but I've heard, I think from. Mostly counselors that. The, the feed doesn't increase. Fast enough. High enough and fast enough. So. So that. Again, so I think that's an overarching theme to look at is whether maybe three years is too long, or maybe not three years for all of these. In terms of a transition plan and is the end results. The right level. All right. So. I gotta do this. And I'm sorry, just to follow up. Was it, is it possible to revisit after some time? Yeah, absolutely. To see how. Yeah. So I think what. If the, these go through the way they are now, the town manager would have the ability to consider these fees like we do all the other fees, which is every year. We sort of, we review fees and see if they're matching. The cost of providing that service. So. That's one benefit of having the, the change from select board of town managers. It gives him the ability to review those on an annual basis. Thank you. Okay. I guess Andy. Go ahead. I can't hear you. I just realized that I had myself muted. Sean might be able to help with this. We had discussion at the. Finding this committee meeting about some of this too. It was the first round discussion. We're going to come back for a second round discussion. Also. There were a number of issues that were raised. On the page that we're on. I think that there were doubts where a lot of discussion around. Accelerating. The. Changes. There was questions raised and John. You can help on, on the resident. Permits. Wanted to. Look a little bit more closely. At vehicles that are not registered in Amherst. And whether those fees. Sufficiently reflect the amount of tax. That's being paid in other communities not being paid in Amherst for. Vehicles that are. In Amherst more than half of the year. So those were. Two of the issues that we were talking about. There were some neighborhoods that we were. Talking about it did have some initial discussion. About the location. In the boundaries of the neighborhoods that are covered. By the resident parking system. We were very conscious of the question of how much. Money. Is needed within the transportation fund. What we're trying to generate in the way of new. Revenue and. Matching that against what we're doing and whether we're. Doing it quickly enough to achieve. So that we had the revenue available to us because. If we're going to be running in a deficit for a period of time afterwards and we haven't raised fees. We're going to be running in a deficit for a period of time. So. There was some discussion about. Comparison to other communities nearby. We have similar systems. In particular was discussed. So anything I missed, John. No, I think that that sounds right. And Jen has taken a look at like the average excise tax bill to get a sense of how much it is and. And whether. The difference that we're showing here is, you know, I think the average excise tax bill is somewhere around a hundred. Maybe a little bit more than a hundred. It's hard to go by the average because. Yeah. Every vehicle is different. You know, some vehicles will be a hundred. Some will be 600 depending on the vehicle. So I think the average is hard there, but we are, we could look more into those numbers to see if there's a better way of estimating. That sort of lost excise tax from vehicles registered outside of town. But we were thinking about just for the committee's. Understanding of this is that we want to make sure that we are also thinking about having a parking fee system that. Does more to encourage students who are here. You know, nine months out of the year to. Register their cars and Amherst and we can't encourage that. If we don't have a sufficient. We thoughtful. Policy. On parking. So those are the kinds of issues that we had in the first round of discussion. And we were going to follow up. Unfortunately, our next meeting. Is really right for. The. 10th when we have the. Forum. A little earlier, Andy, didn't we move that up? Yeah, right. We got a little more time now. So we will have a little bit. That's right. We did. I have to go back and look at my notes on that too. Because I'm doing all of the soft memory right now. So I think that's basically what's going on. What's happening within the finance committee discussion. Which in the end. You know, we were. Finance committee reports to TSO. I'm the crossover point. And then TSO is ultimately the one that's going to be making your recommendation. So I thought, yeah, I think that would be the end of my. Report. Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. Shalini. I don't know what, whether your hand came up after mine, but I will speak after you speak. How's that? No, go ahead. You were actually before me. So please go ahead. All right. So my, I have a concern. And that is that. This is going to be kind of cast in stone. I'm trying to get this to minimize. Damn. Okay. Trying to get rid of this thing. Okay. We're going to get revenue from raising these permits. And the revenue will be used. Very good form. It'll be used to hire more people and to put some money in a capital fund for transportation, all of which is good. But my concern goes as to, you know, behind the question of what are we charging is that we have the public way, which are roads streets. And we're giving permits for people to park in a system that is not what we were told it was going to be. We were told that people who live downtown would not have cars. And that the landlords, the builders did not have to provide parking or adequate parking. And it turns out that many of the permits are in fact for people living in new structures downtown, which do not provide parking for them. So. The planning department yesterday at the planning board. Said that it will be looking at the municipal parking overlay, which allows that to go on. That that will be probably something they look at in the fall. And I'm very glad to hear that because I think that we need to revisit that. But. I probably would like to see some major changes in how we are, you know, cars that are permitted. By going to these fees, which, you know, we're all talking about them revenue. Yes, it's revenue. And it's revenue we could use and revenue we need. I just want to make sure that if we do this, we're not selling it. We are therefore forever stuck into getting the revenue we need for our transportation system this way. So that, that is my worry and concern that we will be locked in to this system. And so if I'd love to have some answers from. From Sean or. Yeah. So I don't think you're not locked in. It could all be. Adjustment in the future. I think one of our goals for this is to try to. One of the reasons why we put town manager in here. Is to try to make it nimble. To be able to make decisions and react to things. Maybe more quickly than it could if it had to go through. The process we're going through now. So. I think that's one, one goal that we have in mind is how do we make this nimble and able to react. And adapt to things more quickly and build it into our normal processes a little bit more. Okay. All right. Thank you. Shalini. Yeah, I also feel that. The rate is too low, given. What you mass is charging with. The apartments themselves. So I think that's one goal that we have in mind is how do we make this nimble and able to react and adapt to things. So I think that's one goal that we have in mind. That the apartments themselves are charging. So my question was who, I guess. My understanding is that these are mostly used by people who are living there. Am I right. In those areas who uses these permits other than employees. Jen, do you have the breakdown of. Resident versus employee. Permits. Or do you have the estimate for roughly how many resident permits there. I don't know. I don't know. I don't have it on hand right now, but I know that. The resident permits are far more than the employee permits. And so for the resident permit, they have to be, it is only for residents of downtown. I can get that number while you're looking. I think it's. Somewhere around 500, but I can pull it up. Right. And so if mostly the people who are using this and we, so we shouldn't increase employees. That's for sure. So I think it's important for people who are living there. And. They don't have many choices in the, and the choice we are providing to them is so much lower than the apartment buildings are living in, or even going to UMass. So I think they completely justified in increasing our. Fees for that. So I really highly recommend. And what might be the concerns that is there something that we're not thinking through that staff or Paul, that you are concerned about. In the hesitation to. Increase it. Yeah, I mean, on my end, I think there's a, one of the reasons why we wanted the phase. And so we could track the impact. So each year we could track if there was any impact on the number of permits issued. I think one concern would be the. I mean, if we were to go higher, we raised the price for this parking. Potentially the less likely people are going to use this parking and may try to find other ways of circumventing the system potentially. Or maybe they are more open to using the meter or the parking lots. If this becomes. You know, the cost benefit of this becomes less. For them. So I mean, that's one concern. I think what I keep coming back to is we're open. If the, if the feedback is to increase the fees, I think the hard part is what are we basing it on? Again, we base these levels on how do we get enough revenue to dedicate a certain percentage towards capital? If we're going to go beyond that, you know, how do we find that? I guess that sweet spot. And one alternative could be, you know, again, if the changes go through with the town manager has the ability to modify this each year. You know, maybe we only have to decide on the first step. And then the town manager could evaluate based on the demand. And if it, if the demand does not drop off the way. Potentially it could. The fee could be adjusted again the following year. Can I jump in Dorothy? Yes. So, so I think the goal for tonight is to decide what you want to advertise. It's not, you're not making a final decision. It's what you want to put out there as the first call for action. Once you decide what you want to advertise, we're going to notify all the permit holders and everybody to say, here's what the council is considering. And then you'll, we'll get some feedback from it. And so I think you want to put out there what you think you're going to feedback and probably going, you know, either using this or going to where you want to go in terms of higher would probably be the wise thing to do. It's because you can always, it's easier to lower the fee structure. I think Sean's concern is that you can only charge fees to, to support the activity. You can't make money. You're not allowed to make money as a town basically off of parking. We have to charge the fees that promote, provide the service. And I think shall any, if you're looking at the resident permit vehicles registered outside of Amherst. Or the reserve spot permit, because they're two different things like the. Just want to be clear what you're referencing in terms of increasing things. I would say both, but I was just looking at the, I mean, the, the residents permit, not the reserve spot, but even the reserve spot for sure. So the reserve spot is, is similar to what the apartment complexes have on their property. And that's what's in the lower level of the boatwood garage. The resident permit is what's on the, you get permission to park on the street. In certain neighborhoods and some people will just move to a place where you don't need a resident permit to park. So what might be the options for people like Sean was saying that they could circumvent and so what, what are the options that people have down, down. Like what are we afraid will happen. Yeah, I guess, I mean, for me, I, if there's, if there's side streets that maybe aren't. Aren't marked potentially parking on side streets, you feeding the meters instead of using these spots. Yeah, I mean, again, I think we don't know that whatever we do here, it seems like it's going to be a pretty drastic increase to the existing fee level. So trying to predict. We've done it before. So trying to predict what the outcome will be is going to be difficult. And one last question. If we do the public forum with this fee structure and then we get feedback and people like not many people show up or there doesn't seem to be a reaction and then we want to increase it. Will we have to do another public forum? No. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Last thing can we, can we might Tracy had sent from TAC, they had sent us a comment and I'm sorry, I didn't get to read it and understand it fully, but I don't know if you want to invite Tracy in at some point and also if the staff wants to speak to the recommendations from them. That's all. Well, I think that her recommendation is, is more to do with a different type of permit for residents, meaning people who live on the street. And I find it confusing to talk about that while we're talking about this. So if anyone wants to argue with me, please do. But Anna, have you read. Tracy's comments from TAC. I have read Tracy's comments from TAC. Yeah. I mean, I think those are, they had some really good suggestions and I know Tracy's here, I think. Yeah. And they had some really good suggestions about kind of which streets correspond with the different areas. And so I would love to hear the staff's feedback on those. I don't know if you all have had a chance to read them, but I'd love to hear your feedback on this as well. That was not my initial question. Dorothy, is it okay if I ask my. Right, but her comments were not on what we're talking about now. They were not on parking permits. That are given to people who pay a yearly fee. They were about people who live on a street who need to get a permit to be able to allow to have a guest park there, I believe, or to park on the street. Jen, clarify for me if I'm wrong, but they're still buying those permits, but it's for a specific zone. So they can only, they're only eligible to buy that permit if they live on that street, but it is, it would be subject to the same fee structure. Still a resident permit. Yes. Still a resident permit. So Dorothy, it is related. It's just not about the specific fee structure. It's about which streets count for which. Areas. So it is related. It's in this, it's in this report somewhere. I think. It is, it is somewhere in there. Okay. So say what you want to say. Okay. So well, I'd love to go there next after we finish the fee structure conversation. I think that could be a really good second spot. Sean, you know, I mean, I hear you saying we aren't, we aren't allowed to like make revenue off of this, but I think one thing that would be really helpful is to look at. The projected. I'm going to use the term revenue just because I don't know enough about this world to know what I should be using, but the projected revenue as compared to what your needs, what the needs are for parking. That would be a really helpful table to see as we consider the, the stages of the increases as well as the general rate, kind of a comparison would be really helpful to kind of see like, at what point are we getting what we need in terms of. Is this because I'm assuming we're allowed to use these fees to pay for things like meters or the program, like the software that and things like that. So that would be a helpful comparison. Maybe if it's possible, like a five year. Projection. Just because we just came from JCPC and you had some beautiful tables there. So I'd love to see those for this. You're saying that table game is not. Yeah. No, table game, table game is pretty strong elsewhere, but I'd love to see the comparison here. The other question was, you know, I think when we think about the, the downsides of this and the challenges, and I think Anika, I believe you brought this up. The concept of a hardship provision. You know, I think that's something to consider. And I recognize that that's a fraught conversation when you're talking about specifically students because income level doesn't always match. Bank account level, I guess, for lack of a better phrase, but I do think if there's an, if there's some sort of way for folks to petition for, if that's relevant, I think some, some option for that. Paul, I, it's a vague concept, but I think that for me is the only downside of like, if we are upping this in a way that isn't sustainable for someone who's living downtown, it would be a question for me of what is the, what is the avenue for support in that sense? Yeah. Because I mean, I'm looking at this and the, the fiscal year 25 resident permit for folks registered outside of Amherst comes down to 33 bucks a month. And I think you said the resident permits for the apartment buildings, which I know are closer to where they're living. I mean that worked out to a hundred, a hundred and twenty five bucks a month. So I mean, we're still talking big monthly difference here. So I'd love to, that's one of my reasons for increasing the fees there. Even though I recognize that it is a different parking situation. I see Paul has his hand up. Thank you. Yeah. So we cannot do a hardship provision for a hundred and fifty dollar permit, the work that would go into having them provide income tax information. We're not going to, we can't go into that role. And if someone, and this goes to speak to who is being charged the fee. And, you know, I think what I worry about is we have residents come into town every year who are renting apartments or in, in our neighborhoods and in order to park on, and there's not enough parking, they would like to park on the street legally. And then we're telling them, you're going to pay through the nose to, to get a parking permit. And this is to try to legalize what people are doing. And we don't want, there's always the adverse impact of whatever fee you, you charge. So you want, we want to look at the administrative costs of administering the fee when you, when you decide on what a fee should look like, the revenue potential and whether it's worth collecting. But also what's the behavior modification that will happen when you start to charge fees. And so I think several people asked, well, what are the adverse consequences? And so we see it in the town hall parking lot, where they don't get out of it. People want to park there overnight who live in the neighborhood. They'll come in, they'll park at eight o'clock or whenever parking enforcement stops. And then they don't get out of the lot until they know parking enforcement doesn't start till nine. So they're parked in the lot until nine or 10. They take, they say, maybe I've got an extra hour. People coming to work. There's no place to park, you know, and so they would go to say CVS lot. They go to other parking. You know, you know, you know, you know, you know, if you've been a college student, you're saying, I don't have money to pay $400 for a permit. Are you crazy? You know, I'm going to put my car at the high school parking lot and just leave it there and hope they don't do anything to it. You know, so I think there's good. That's why taking it, taking steps along the way with the ability to go up is, you know, as a dial instead of a switch, I think it's the way to approach it. Okay. All right. Anna. So yeah, Paul, I hear what you're saying and I think that we still, I guess Sean, maybe that's reinforcing my, my desire to see that sort of chart of like, what's the need versus what, how do we get there? That, that reinforces that for me because, you know, I think. We want to, we need to meet the needs and, and I recognize that we'll change behavior. And so what we're trying to figure out, Paul, if I'm not wrong is, what's the tipping point where we can raise this without deeply impacting behavior that does harm, right? So, yeah, I think that Sean would be really helpful as well as the impact of the excise fees. And kind of what, what the gap is that we are getting there. Yep. So are we saying then that we're not going to take any decision on this until we see charts of this nature? Or are we going to make any, do something else? Well, and Andy had his hand up and then back to Anna. Yeah, I was just going to ask Sean. It's the funniest committee meeting I asked you to pull out. I think the July memo and that one table. That showed. What the. Enterprise fund pays for and what we, what our goal was. And I thought that was helpful for the discussion there and might be helpful here. Yeah. So this isn't, it's not a year to year plan. Like Anna was asking for, but. I can just do a quick background. Yeah. Is it larger? Is this. Larger. Was that good? Okay. So what this is, one of the hard parts about doing the five year plan on it is the transportation fund was, is all over the place with the pandemic. But what we tried to do with this was look at pre-pandemic, what the revenues were as an average, what the expenses were as an average. We then rolled the expenses forward, taking into account salary increases and things going up, pension costs going up and things like that. And then to kind of back into a revenue number that we would need. To be able to dedicate. In this scenario, $200,000 per year to capital, either through debt service or through capital. So, so that's how we sort of came up with the ballpark of the, the amount of revenue we were trying to raise. And then. This chart here. Is the one that sort of tracks. Roughly the numbers in each. And that level is seen as a per unit type and what the increase in revenue would be on a yearly basis. So this total, 115,000. But it's actually a little bit higher. Cause I think we had 20 reserve spots and it's actually 28 reserve spots. So that'll actually go up a little bit more. So that was sort of our rationale for how we came to, to that number. other than to suggest to Sean what we'd like to see for next time we come together. Is that correct? I see Sean. That's correct, yes. Actually, what you're deciding is what you're going to advertise in the newspaper. So thank you. What words are you going to put in there? So I looked at the public hearing notice and I'm. It doesn't say. Well, numbers are not there for money. And so you mean in the links. So it says the above reference general bylaws are available here. Do you mean that in that here? The document, there will be numbers there because I looked at the sentences and it, I didn't see anything that. Tied us to raising it any percentage and it didn't have that kind of numbers in it. I see it has her hand up. I can't see or find so. I just can't see you. Okay. So in the past, the way we've done, these hearing notices is to. Link. I can bring it up if that's helpful, but if you've all seen it, then. I won't bother. But the hearing notice in the newspaper is. the TSO committee is holding a public hearing on behalf of the town council on permit parking regulations at the date and time via the zoom link and there's instructions for joining. And then the longer one that we put on the bulletin board has more information and that one does contain a link to the specific changes that we're making to the permit parking regulations. So that's what we need to know. We need the document to link to that meeting notice and you know if there's any feedback about the notices in general then we can talk about that as well. Right so there's general bylaws as one link and town council policy regarding the control and regulations. So that is this document that we're talking about right now that would have to be correct. No we're talking about the the proposed changes to the permit parking regulations. Well I'm looking at I've got the document and I'm okay hang on let me bring it up. So yeah I printed it out so I could see it. Okay. Because the one on control of public ways is actually just the general policy on public ways does not have these things in it. Sorry I'm a little slow with all these windows open. So this is the this is the draft notice for the bulletin board. So right here it says the town council will review and act on permit parking regulation changes proposed by the town as shown in the document here addition shown in red deletions shown in red strike through. So it's the document that connects here that we need to finalize so that we can post these notices. Okay I do see that I to me that's not clear but I mean do you have a suggestion that we can clarify it better? If that works then that's fine. I'm just wondering who is going to read this and who would know. So but I guess when I see additions and deletions I think of a document that's in process I don't think of well I guess it is in process. Okay so that's right. Yeah you know if people have understood that in the past then I'm sure that those who would care would understand it in the future. I just wouldn't be one of them that's all. I've just opened this up in words so if we have suggestions that this is not posted yet so we can make changes if you'd like to. Shalini has a hand up. Ah Shalini please. Yeah actually had the same reaction as Dorothy that it felt like a lot of mumbo jumbo and I'm in government and I was like what the hell and so if just a resident is reading they'll be like what and they just skim through. I wonder if there's a way to write it like who is this for or what impact is it gonna have you know like in terms of that or and then how to participate and then maybe have that in accordance with and all of that could be at the bottom so the legal stuff which needs to be there but can that be put at the bottom and the important things can be like up you know hey we're changing this thing and here is and do we can we also explain why we're doing that this hasn't changed in so long that we're gonna do that and here is what we're proposing please come we want to hear from you submit using language that's really like talking to the people and not so legally unless we need to be so legally in our language. Probably do need to be so legally though but Andy do you have some thoughts on this? Yeah I mean speaking for the lawyer side of me I think you do have to start where we're starting because it does have to do with section 3.14 in town council regulations what you can do though might be better just to emphasize it is to bold some language and to make sure that town council review an excellent permit part that not that section but I would bold the next paragraph for the most part and I would include in that time council review and act on permit parking regulations proposed by the town which include increases in fees yeah yeah yeah that's good for on street parking permits for on street parking permits maybe that is the best way to do it. Well it's includes garage too so I think permit fees is probably best just leave it a permit fees because of the garage element okay on street and garage parking permits or that sentence would make see people say oh I have an idea of what this is about so if you by bolding it I think that it grabs the attention that that's the key paragraph even though we've had to include the language from the prior paragraph right and the rest of it has to do with how you participate and I think the people who get past the bold and are interested in participating will know what the rest of it means. Yeah I think those are good suggestions any other any other comments on this Shalini. Yeah I wonder if you can put like bullet like subtitles or something like proposed changes how to participate or something that kind of just because I mean I think people who read blogs and stuff very quickly these days look at the title subtitles and kind of skin through and so it will just organize and how to participate and blah blah blah yeah and that could be proposed changes or something. I think I think those are good because I think you're correct that people are reading very fast and not very well a lot of the time and this should call because if somebody does in fact park on the street or have a permit they would like to know about this or have a friend see it and say hey you should you should tune in on that because it is important to alert people who would be involved that this is going to be on the on the agenda. Okay Paul. So it's important that you know that this be sort of a neutral almost a neutral thing but I think it's important to do what what you just did which is you know we're increasing fees like put the big three things that are impacted increasing fees for the garage and increasing fees I don't think there's a whole lot else we're adding you might say what adding Cosby and Paige if you're going to do that but also be alert that we will send something that's you know that will also be sent electronically to all of our permit holders so they will get an individual permit and invitation a notification of it so that the people who are most directly impacted will hear about it as well. Okay that's good I know you said that before but I'm glad that you're saying it again that's really important Anna. I have an accessibility question in those documents if we're only using color as the only differentiating component for the text that's added is that and this is a little bit of an unfamiliar area for me but is that considered fully accessible for folks is it possible to also make the additions bolds or something like that Athena I think Athena has a good answer for me. We actually have a person who can answer that Paul I believe you're officially colorblind can can you see this because this is a really quick one. They're real standards I mean Paul you're great but they're an actual standard for this and that's why I just there's a hip of violation right there. I defer to Athena on this. So when these are posted there we do have accessibility on the town website I haven't tried using the reader to see if it reads the text in a different color font if it lets you know that there's text in a different color font but this is the standard that we use when we're making changes to bylaws and so forth so I think that's worth investigating to see if we can do that in a more accessible way if the readers don't but that that might be something that needs greater research than we can solve right now because that's how we do regular and zoning bylaw changes at the moment. Thank you yeah my only quick research just came up with that color shouldn't be the only differentiation and so yeah it'd be awesome to look into that at some point happy to help if I can. Thanks. Great thank you and I think Athena's statement that there's a reader on the website and they'll check but how the reader does it is a very good thing to do because this applies to a lot of documents a lot of things. Okay so any other comments on this do you want to Anna do you want us to say in addition to color we choose different fonts? No I think I don't I don't know if I'm comfortable continuing to research it but I do I would like to see it addressed at some point going forward I know that we're kind of under a time crunch here so okay okay Paul. Just to add I mean the council should standardize its practice on this right now this is our standard practice if the council wants to change its practice to being and if we're not in compliance with ADA we can find that out but I don't think every committee should be using a different method for showing changes to documents. Totally agree thanks Paul. Yep good okay so what is our next step here are we going to say I guess the committee accepts this as the format for the ad is that correct is this a voting matter or a consensus matter? I think if there are no other changes we cannot agree by consensus that I'll go ahead and post that. Okay thank you very much Athena. Okay and Shalini your hand is still up. Do we need to train look at the print version this is the web version could we just quickly look at the print version if that also needs to say something about the proposed changes and rates. I think I remember seeing that it didn't say there were going to be changes in rates. Yes okay there's two versions there's one is the public hearing notice I guess the other one is the newspaper this short one yes so you would say that the same changes that were made in the longer one should be here is that correct? I think that what we need to understand is that newspaper advertising is by the length and is very expensive and you then also have to recognize that it's also very fairly far in the newspaper very few people probably see it and it is there because the legislature tells us it has to be there not because we think that it's a grand form of reaching a large number of people so I just caution trying to make it longer just for those reasons. I certainly understand that however I believe that the number of words added would be under 12 so. So just to be clear ads like this can be several hundred dollars in your ad words it's like ten dollars a word I don't know exactly what that's very expensive so we try to keep the words to a minimum and it's just it serves a legal function it doesn't serve a true notification function but you know there's certain things that are required in a legal ad and we have to put those in and when you have to put text in it can be hundreds I just paid a bill for my council for seven hundred dollars for one legal ad. Okay okay Shalini you have your hand up. Yeah I can't think on the thing but I feel like we can improve this without increasing the number of words so but I can't think on my feet about this but um like I think the main thing is it changes in the rates which is the big change that everyone should know about just even that changes to average permit parking rates. Is that inaccurate? Athena has a hand up. Okay well how come I can't see this I don't see Athena at all. Maybe I tried to change. I'm here but my comment isn't about this so go ahead. When you put your hand up Athena but please speak. Athena do you want me to go because it please about yeah please go ahead. So Shalini I think there are more because they're when we get to like the TSO recommendations about which streets go where that is also impacted by this so it's more than just the fees but even though the fees are probably the part that people would yeah I don't know I don't want to I don't want to guess about that. Okay she is okay. Okay I clicked not seen on video participants and I see Athena's box now okay so Athena do you still have you have something to say? Your hand is up. Yeah I have a comment I think if if what you're looking to do is to raise more awareness about this public hearing then I think there might be better ways of achieving that Brianna is really good at adding things to the in the news items on the town web page our communications manager so I think if we were going to add an in the news item to the town home page we can ask to do that and that will probably reach more people than changing the words in this public hearing notices Paul said not a lot of people go digging through public hearing notices in the newspaper and I you know I don't object to adding the word fees or anything like that here but I think if your intent is to reach more people and to let people know what's going on here that might be a better way to do so. Okay Shalini is that okay with you? I mean I do understand the desire to if you're doing it to do it but I think that what Athena's suggestion would in fact reach more people and then you could not be counting each word and whatever is that okay? I seem to have lost Shalini now. Yes I think we can move on. That's a good suggestion thanks Athena. Good very good okay so we will move on these are the ads have been put together and they have been approved by the committee to be posted. Okay what do we need to do at this point on this topic? Yes Shalini. Oh can we take oh yeah Paul do you want to go first? So the document that Sean was sharing initially that is the change and that's the document that you're actually going to be acting on so I mean not I mean he's got some adjustments to it but in terms of getting the substance if that done basically what do you want that first set of fees to look like? I didn't hear any other things and then so I think you have to decide on the fees that you want to put on and then the second thing is you want to look at whether you want to expand resident only permit area two per the recommendation of TAC and I think that's the one that would have to be advertised. Okay so the discussion of fees we've heard several points of view one is to raise them quicker the other argument has been by doing it gradually somehow one is allowed to I guess do research get an idea of what impacts what causes the other changes of parking patterns that result from a certain raise and again we won't know till afterwards so there were a number of people who spoke in favor of higher fees sooner. Does somebody want to lead that argument? Okay Sean I see your hand. So I think one area that I've heard feedback on and and then the information we got from I forgot the name of the apartment complex the big new one in the center town the information we got on what they charge came in sort of after we put this together so I think it may make sense at this point I can pull it up if you want at the word version of the changes to increase the reserve spot permits maybe increase it so the top end is 1500 for now and then I can increase each incremental step and we can see if there's support for that. Okay Anna. Sure so I mean I was one of the people that was pushing for higher fees I think that Sean if you can show us the kind of that I'm calling it a table maybe it's not a table I don't know but show us that the relationship between what we need to pay for and how we can get there then I will happily reconsider to fit within that because like Paul said we aren't making money off of this but I want to make sure that we're meeting the needs that we have in terms of parking so I'm comfortable working within those parameters I just don't I'm unclear on what those are and if that's somewhere that I missed I apologize and happily will be directed to it but especially with with any changes that we're thinking about for the boltwood spots. Okay and Andy. Yeah I was a question for Sean and that is do you have any information based upon industry practice industry being cities and towns or otherwise that this incremental approach is recommended as a way of testing increases before you go to the next step? I guess not that I know of but I don't know of any other place that's increased it so sharply I guess this is again we haven't touched them in a long time so I don't think there's a lot of I don't know of any yeah any other thing like that so I think in general when we when we know that a fee is out of alignment and it's got a quite a ways to go to get to where it reflects the the service being provided we try to to do it over a path that's at least painful path to the resident. So it's part of the graduated fees I desire not to make this the insult of the day where people are going to start writing crazy letters and getting very very upset I mean nobody's going to like a fee increase but if the fee increase seems to be unreasonable and irrational people do express themselves I see Jennifer's hand up. I just want to throw it out there to be a little bit mindful to the admin portion of it because we are going to hear it frontline from the people depending on how sharp of an increase it is and I like the form of doing it on a more gradual basis and reviewing it annually because that way it's easier on our staff in the office so I just want to throw that out there. Thank you Paul and I'll get to you Anna after Paul. Just to amplify what Jennifer said parking they deal with a lot of people who get parking tickets they come into the front door they're screaming at the people in the window it's and Jennifer holds all the parking hearings when someone wants to dispute a parking ticket she has to sit down with them one-on-one and they get dispute their their upsetness to her so I think as you go more aggressively that's going to generate a lot more aggressive behavior because people will be really upset about they won't understand there's it's really hard for the staff then to explain why because we don't like you parking on our streets or whatever it is you know it's it's going to be I think this courtesy of that would be appreciated. Okay and Anna. That makes sense and I think you know if that if the increases that you're seeing or that you're showing now are the least likely in your mind to get vitriolic responses I understand that and I think looking forward at okay what are yours four and five then if that's the case if that's if up to year three isn't getting us where we need to be then what are year four and five doing to get us closer right so I think with again without bringing more anger my other question was just a clarifier on and I swear I'm I'm trying to go back and find my notes from the MMA conference but this is an enterprise fund and so is are the funds from this I mean the two areas that I'm thinking of are resurfacing parking lots or feasibility studies for things do those fall within enterprise because they are directly pertaining to parking or no I'm thinking about possible uses for this in the future. Yeah yeah it could so parking lot repaving is part of this fund the parking lots that we have that generate the revenue yeah okay that's a really a good thing for us all to remember when people come to us about on this issue that there's a lot of expenses and Anna there you moved okay you mentioned earlier if we're talking about new software for some of the parking kiosks that would be something but I think I believe that is something we're going to be doing is that not Sean it's something we're considering we have to make a decision on what to do with the meters we have the agent meters so it's either replacing them with with other meters or kiosks mm-hmm okay so we have expenses coming up Andy I think you were first and then I see oh Anika I don't see your hand that easily has it been up for a while no I think Andy was all right yeah I was going to add that also the PBTA some of the PBTA costs come out of the transportation enterprise funds and there are some other costs related to trying to generate business within downtown which then generates more parking revenue which is the reason that we pay our bid dues out of the transportation enterprise fund too so there are other expenses and then of course there's another major one I think there's been talked about is electronic systems and you know there's a lot of exploration that needs to be done there about whether we can develop signage that says where spaces are available um whether we can have linkage to the park mobile system uh or whatever system we'll use for that the park mobile purposes and other software that we're using there are a whole lot of technology things that may be on the plate to improve the parking system too right right okay that those are all good points Anika uh yes so most of what I was going to say has been covered but just you know up first since I am still becoming a driver I do not have as much of a dog and rice as others but I do think that because you know with their there is a steep increase considering and also that I think we know in comparison to anywhere these uh these rates um are low and would continue to be low and also seeing as there will not and understandably I understand the reason why we would not have mechanisms in place for hardship I think that it makes sense to go with this and you know take it you know after the year or whatever time and see what's going on okay so you're you're first the gradual increase to allow us to see and to study what's going on okay uh shallony uh given what Jennifer said I agree with Anika that um although what I was going to say is that we wait till the hearing and see what sort of feedback we're getting from people and then go from there and the second thing is that given that people will be the upset does it again make sense to then provide the reasoning for the increase or just even a mention in that um in the announcements that we're making not in the published one no additional words but at least in the online one can we maybe just add a sentence or something that says that you know parking rates have not fees have not been changed for the past so many years blah blah blah years and this is what we're considering so even just that one line will soften I think okay I have a very technical question so we put down we attach to our notice whatever we've decided the fees are going to be okay and right now we're moving towards accepting what Sean has proposed but I believe he said he was going to raise the long what's it the the dedicated spots on the on the first floor of boltwood okay so now we have a hearing public hearing and after the public hearing we say you know what we're not going to do the three-year we're going to let's do it all at once are we allowed to do that because we didn't advertise it we said we were going to do a three-year thing so I'm the question I'm having is how much do we have to tell them that we're going to do ahead of time in order to be able to do it and I see paul was nodding his head so explain that to me how we can do it yes you know as long as it's sort of within the scope of what you were talking about so you're talking about permit fees you're talking about increasing them in these this is a range that's been recommended you can go above that so okay so we could in fact do what shalini has suggested we could at this moment say we're going to submit this thing with the three tiered three years though anna is wondering about years four and five and and a more detailed chart of some of the expenses that would come out of the fund but after the hearing we could then deliberate and make a number of changes okay all right um so do we have to do anything more on this I know we're going to about to invite tracy in to talk about the um other part of this uh that had that involves street only parking um so um I will do that when you tell me it's time to do that um anna you've got your hand up uh tracy's no longer in the attendees ah okay um all right so are we going to discuss that other part now then shawna has a hand up okay shawn good I couldn't see that so do you I just want to clarify I just increased the reserve spot permit but I wanted to make sure everyone sees it and is comfortable with it um real quick is that okay if I share the screen really quickly enough um so I just I increased the um FY 25 to 1500 it was 1250 and then 1400 for FY 24 and 1200 for FY 23 um because I think this was the area where we sort of flagged it was the most uh low lower than uh comparables so you have 200 and then you have 100 yeah so it's sort of two big chunks and then a small chunk so okay similar to the other um increases yep um anna see your hand sorry I was raising it preemptively to talk about something else so okay all right so does this look fine to everybody shawn your hand is up I don't know if it means you still want to talk because if you want to talk just talk no I can't put it down until I stop sharing so um okay okay good all right a little dance is sometimes hard to do okay so um that seems to be okay we seem to have flexibility in what we can do in the future um which is good um Anna are you now ready for the next point I'm now ready I was going to give Jennifer and Sean had had a chance to look at the TAC recommendations and if they had thoughts on them I personally don't have any issues with them but I wanted to hear uh if you'd read them otherwise I can recap them for you yeah so I looked at them Joan I don't know if you had time to look at them I mean it was essentially adding streets right to um the permanent only areas yeah adding streets in resident area two and then updating the list in section seven to include yeah and then the taking out the word parallel yeah I didn't have any I mean I don't know if Paul or Jen did I didn't have any strong reactions against those recommendations I think it would be interesting to see particularly number one where you add streets if anyone has comments at the forum or the hearing but I didn't have any major issues with these recommendations um could I could I ask a question there um I I guess I've discussed this a number of times and I'm still confused by it um we're talking about streets where there is no parking of any kind on both sides there are no parking permits of any kind right you cannot park which means that a resident if they had to have a guest or something could not have them park on the street or is this a street where there's no parking except for people who've already bought permits who live somewhere else not on the street but have been paying their 25 a year and the people who are on the street want to be able to buy a park permit too and they hadn't been allowed to but this is I just haven't really got the sense of what's been going on uh Paul you took your hand up and you took it down I mean Jen do you get questions about these two streets I think it's the question I haven't had one question about these two streets and all the time that I've been reading parking appeals and talking to people about it um but that doesn't mean that it's not a concern just people and it is a no parking on these streets currently do you know there is it's not permitted so you can't you can't park there with a permit anyway I said that's question one I wanted to know so there are no private permits on these streets well one of them paid street which I believe she wanted to add is a very narrow street um so there's no parking because it wasn't seen as possible for parking I guess I I just I I haven't really gotten the issue on this one okay Paul your hand is up yeah I mean I think we'd want to talk to the town engineer about the recommendations on changing putting parking on a prior on a new street or the I just think you'd want their advice before you put that out as a change and yeah um Anna yeah sorry this isn't saying that it's adding parking on page street or be can be best in streets excuse me it's just saying that they could buy a permit for area for to park in the other designated areas in area two but why can't they're not in the eligibility area so it's just expanding the eligibility area not the parking lot right park well the eligibility area is downtown if you live in downtown Amherst you can get a parking permit so Dorothy there's there's three zones when it's so the residential parking structure that we have the fees that you've looked at there's three zones there's resident area one resident area two and then all other essentially sort of everything else in resident area one and two you have to live on specific streets in order to have access to those permits and what this is proposing is to increase the um the eligible streets to have access to those resident area permits for resident only area permits and so basically it gives you sort of like a dedicated area where only those residents can park and they don't have to worry about competing for spots with the rest of downtown okay and there are no private parking permits on those streets already as indicated by section this is according to Tracy um which is this is very thorough as indicated in section three of the permit parking regulations only McClelland oh my gosh Cosby are eligible for area two and on-street parking is prohibited entirely on both page and best and during certain hours on Cosby right so I know that okay so now I did not catch this Tracy is now in the audience okay great okay thanks Andy so I don't have that would be very nice to bring Tracy into the meeting I'm bringing her in great okay Tracy I was doing my best I'm so glad you're here yes so by the time I was going to admit you you had disappeared so Anna was yeah I'm sorry my family wanted dinner and stuff so the the thing that the thing that we had done here is the tack I mean I had looked at this area one I mean Sean had brought it up at one of the meetings right and he said that when they were considering the changes to the permit parking regulations they didn't look specifically at area one or area two but that was something that could be looked at and I was pretty intrigued about why these streets were treated differently and you know why they have these special rules so I mean I did spend time on these streets like looking at them so the one area the area one I'll just tell tell you is that basically they include like frats and they're right next to frats they're like right back up against UMass and so and that's why those permits are there and a number of those streets around there like Phillips which is the one at the well I I don't know if you guys have maybe Sean if you have a map like the town center permit parking map but you could people could see what I'm talking about yeah I'll try to find that I mean I have a copy if I'm allowed to share my screen if that's okay with people that would be fine with me but I'm not the technical master I I have this do you want me to share it Tracy and tell me if this is the right one yeah that's fine it's just the one on the from the town website is this the one you're talking about um sort of blurry I'm not sure if it's helpful yeah sort of I mean I was looking at the PDF version because the PDF version this is actually interesting because I've I've always looked I've always liked the PDF so much because I printed it out so so this green area is just you know these are the streets where you're allowed to have these special residential only passes and the idea right was to make sure that you mass students who didn't live on those streets were not parking on them and then what's interesting about this orange area is that so if you look so there's a section of McClellan which is residential only area two and so people are allowed to use that park in those spaces and the day I was there there were no people parked there but people are allowed to park there if they live along that section of McClellan and then also if they live along that section the along Cosby so it's a little strange to me you know that basically so Cosby doesn't even touch McClellan but they're saying well if Cosby people need overflow parking that they can come down to McClellan and park there and the issue of this was brought to us by somebody who lives on Page and who has a small driveway when when they had visitors they were told there was no place that their visitors could legally park because they aren't you know as they aren't in the parking on the allowed streets for parking and that they are their guests would have to park over in a Kendrick park and that was the only option available to them and so this was just to I mean I think that somebody on Cosby had specifically asked for it I don't know the history of it and also on that section of Cosby there's a special the one side of the street the north side of the street allows parking from 3 p.m. on which is not coming that's anywhere else in the system I think that you know in some cases the town has been responsive to concerns raised by residents but this was a concern raised by a Page Street resident and just said what are my visitors supposed to do and so we just asked that it be that the Page residents and the best and residents have that privilege just like the Cosby residents do I don't really see that there will be a lot of demand for it I'd be interested in how many people actually take out these residential area two permits but you know Page all the residential properties along Page have driveways all the residential properties on Cosby have driveways all the residential properties on Beston have driveways and most of the ones on McClellan do as well I mean so it's really just an issue of when you have visitors and your visitors are saying I need somewhere to park is this is a courtesy to those people and I mean this issue comes up a little bit too if you think about some of the sections of Lincoln where people aren't allowed to park so if those people if those residents have guests where did those you know where do they park so it's just an issue because it's sort of on the fringe of what's so I crazy I have a question I have driven on those streets and I see permit parking signs I had taken that to mean people who did not live on those streets but who live downtown had bought permits from the town to park there so those permit signs how would somebody know if somebody has a parking permit and they see that there's a parking permit sign on those streets wouldn't they think that that's where they're allowed to park you're saying that those Dorothy I'm not sure what you've seen I know when I looked at those streets closely I spend time walking around them pages marked where it says no parking I don't mean page I'm talking about and Beston is marked where it says no parking I mean Cosby allows parking at certain times of day yeah but I thought Cosby and then along McClellan on Long McClellan I think it's the south side of McClellan you know there's the orange zone for the apartment and then there's the yellow zone which is the main downtown zone yeah so Jen and the other the other main question I mean the other main comment that the tack had was just about North Pleasant Street or Kendrick Park and we just wanted to bring that to the council's attention because um as I wrote up in the memo you know in December when the council was evaluating the was was considering what they wanted to do with North Pleasant Street West to Kendrick Park in terms of providing additional parking for park visitors in terms of calming traffic and everything um the tack had recommended that you don't allow parking on the west side of North Pleasant Street west to Kendrick Park because we are concerned about the safety with the number of the driveways there and the sight lines and so on and it was agreed that with the park it would be safer to have the parking on the east side of the street right next to the park and so it just seemed that in the right up on the parking permit regs that that change wasn't reflected and so that was our comment there because the current list keeps the old list that says permit parking is allowed on the west side of the street and the council in December said parking is prohibited on the west side of the street so we were just pointing out that inconsistency okay um uh Anna uh so I think uh and I'm I want to be mindful of time because I know this is just the first thing on our agenda today so uh Dorothy is what you're asking is do the different areas have different permits like are they a different color or different shape or something that's I think that's what you're asking Dorothy which would allow then people to know if area two people within that radius were parking in that designated spot so I think that's a Jennifer question yeah um yes there's different color signs for the different types of places like the Town Center parking permit signs are blue and I believe the residential ones are labeled area one area two and they're green and um each of the three different parking permits are a different color and sometimes we try to make them a different shape as well so they really stick out okay so to answer Dorothy's question people from downtown are not parking in area two because their permit would look different right okay so now that that is clarified I would say that I um agree with Tracy that the little cut out for paging best and doesn't really make sense and that they should that should just be one area there that is um an opinion that I have and if anyone has a counter opinion please do it I so it's so that it's I understand the system better I because when I had seen it I hadn't noticed those little differences um but it doesn't seem make sense on that um the other question Tracy brought up I've had several calls recently about the west side of Kendrick Park and I think that that if Tracy is correct that the town council made a decision and somehow it didn't get reflected that that should be tracked down and clarified um but there's um one piece that was left hanging which was the south coming bike path that the traffic is going north on the west side of Kendrick Park there had been talk and it was kind of like we finished this but we hadn't quite dealt with the south coming bike trail so I'm just bringing that up because I had some calls on that um so let me just take other people take my hand down um Anika yes do we know why uh that section of page investment was cut off good question do we have any did Jennifer do you know I really don't know what the thought process was when those areas were created it's a very small amount of streets to be added it I think it's harder to exclude them than to it would be easier to include them um in terms of and we will reach out um as Paul said we'll reach out to um public works and and have them they can let us know if there's any public safety reason why um you wouldn't want to expand okay thank you so I've got that scribbled down um okay I'm going to remove my lower my hand which I can't see up there anyway I'm looking for hands um I don't see any okay so um that was the suggestion from TAC and Jennifer has said that if the signs are clear and people do know where they're supposed to park and they can follow that um I raised the question that has been brought to me by a number of people about finishing up well okay so first we have to decide is Tracy correct that the town council said the parking would be on the east side of north pleasant street on the park side and did that get changed in the record um once that is decided then the question of the bicycle path would be then discussed I don't think you can discuss the bicycle path until we figure out what the parking is doing um any comments on this I'd suggest we can look at what the council voted if if there needs to be a technical correction to the regs we can include that I don't think part where the bicycle path is a topic that was advertised for your meeting tonight you're just talking about parking um so I know it's on the carryover um document so we okay make sure you can talk about it yeah okay um okay and Tracy is still here uh I don't know if this is the right place but I know that there's some correspondence about the um back in parking and I will admit I watched a video and it kind of had an effect of making me change my mind about the safety of back in parking but Tracy has brought up the issue of at the moment some are going backing in some are going in front in and is the town enforcing that yes sorry Dorothy I think we're still on the parking permit fees and I and I yeah thank you right she did talk about the back in parking but it was just to strike the word parallel from the yeah yeah okay all right so what is our next step at this moment we have discussed this sufficiently or not we're not making any votes or anything um because we're not doing that well we're supposed to make a decision I don't see I don't get this I think we say a big we don't vote until after the hearing but on the other hand we make a decision as to what is in the document that is presented in the link to people who come to the hearing so um Shalini yeah I think at this point first I just want to thank Tracy again and uh tack for uh you know thanking our uh committee of experts to look at those things that we are not we don't have the skills to look at so thank you for doing that for us and what I'm hearing is that the staff is going to look at the implications of what was recommended by tack and how and they're going to report back to us at a later point along with the Kendrick Park parking those two things the staff is going to get back to us and at this point I don't think we have to make any other decision okay Paul no what's important for the committee to do tonight is decide what you're putting on the table for consideration so I think what I said in terms of Kendrick of North Pleasant Street near Kendrick Park is that if the council had already voted something we can make a technical correction to the rules and regulations and include that in the advertisement but if you if you're okay with all the other changes that Sean had shown and that's what we will put on with the change made to the fees okay and I hope that we get a copy sent to us so that we will know what we have said right so so in order for us to advertise for a March 10th public hearing it has to be posted 14 days in advance I think that's right Athena and so you need to decide tonight what you want to advertise and it doesn't mean you're deciding that you just we're just saying what is the what are the parameters here so but is that a vote that we do we say yes we're ready to go with whatever it is that we have discussed that Sean has written down and kept track of for our advertisement for our hearing I mean I'm I'm I'm fine with it but yeah so far the only changes I've made to the document is the fee increase that we discussed and then I think to points made by others we can make those other changes um after the the hearing if um once we hear back from public works and the and we review the recommendations from the TAC more so um Athena do you know if this has to be a vote or again can this be a consensus with the document we have currently I think it can be consensus and I just like to um ask that we work together to make sure that the the formatting in your newer document yeah very forward so so I think we can clean things up a little bit and present a nicer red line version sure when we go to advertise if that's all right and it sounds like there aren't any further comments so I think we're done at this point Dorothy unless there are any other comments from the committee we moved on to the next thing if this does this have to be done tomorrow for the 14 days I know that we were on a time frame here so it needs to be published into successive weeks in the newspaper the first at least seven days in advance so I think we decided that it would be published on March 3rd and February 24th um because that needs a few days lead time so I'm hoping to wrap things up tomorrow and it sounds like there aren't any further comments about the notices so those can be posted tomorrow and I'll work with Sean to make sure that um the the nicer draft of the regulation changes is linked to the bulletin board notice and with Paul's permission I'll ask Breonna to publish it and then news and announcement great great so that we don't have nobody has to pull in all nighters while I was trying to check out okay all right um so finding the um agenda somewhere um so I think we can thank Sean and Jennifer for being here yes thank you Sean I can't see Jennifer anymore but oh there you are thank you Jennifer and actually you really did give some very good information when we needed it so it was very very helpful so thank you thank you both good night okay um committee work plan and timeline um I I guess what I would like to do is to do the um town manager appointments first because the committee work plan and timeline is a discussion which might not be completed today does that make sense to anybody besides me okay so um let's do these appointments um um we all receive them we have six I believe um and we'll do them in the order that the town manager well they're printed here which shall I read out the what's the a is the conservation commission okay so there's one appointment to the conservation commission Andre Gidera um Mr. Gidera is lives on Bay Road uh he came to uh he had to do some work with the conservation commission it had experience working on some work on his house that he was getting a permit for became interested in their work he's retired and has extensive experience with us fish and wildlife speaks fluent Spanish and has lived and worked in Latin America specifically Bolivia I believe Peru yeah um and has extensive a lot of experience with animals which I think is a skill set we do not have on the conservation commission so um I do not remember the format which is I guess I'm supposed to say some I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm not gonna say I'm gonna ask somebody to make a motion but I believe it's that TSO is going to recommend to the town council that the town managers um appointee be approved is that more or less the correct points yes okay so um someone like to make that motion I want to do it because they're taking my spot uh is that okay so uh all right great thank you so I would like and you just said it never at hand I would like to uh recommend to move there we go move that TSO uh recommend the town managers move to hang on I'm starting over it's hard sorry I would like to move that TSO recommend to town council the recommendation of Mr. Paul Bachman of Andy Guadera Andrew and Andre Guadera to the conservation commission what I miss thanks Andy any second Andy second oh okay great thank you good okay so the motion has been made and seconded therefore I will call the question and um um Anna Devlin okay uh Anika Lopes hi Andy Steinberg hi Shalini Balmilne yes Dorothy Pam yes okay we have five to zero very good okay so when we now go to the elementary school board committee and again so we had a vacancy when Dwayne Chambl resigned he was a resident member of the committee so he had done outreach and Angelica Bernal of Hickory Lane put her name forward she has a child in both she has a child in Fort River she has a child in Wildwood she has a special needs child that and she's the vice president of the CPAP the special education parent advisory council she's a professor at the university comes from a multiracial multilingual family and is very interested in this primarily because of her experience in the schools which she has valued but also recognizes the she's very articulate about how the physical structure of the building impacted her child's education and that was a perspective we hadn't heard before so and it's a good voice that that we would have on the on the committee I think okay very good and I will now entertain a motion from someone else so I therefore will move that the town services outreach committee recommend to the council the town managers recommended appointment of Angelica Bernal to the elementary school building committee that's correct and do we have a second to that motion second second okay and let us vote um Shawnee Balmille yes Anika Lopes I Dorothy Pam yes on a go to a devil and go to a yes and Andy Steinberg yes okay that has passed unanimously okay and we now go to the energy and climate action committee okay so just to make a note that all of these committees had a lot of people really highly qualified people who are interested in serving which was very exciting for the committees and so there's really hard decisions along the way so and what we tried to do in to reference so when we interview it's usually someone from the residents advisory committee the town manager the staff support or the and or the chair of the committee who are in the interview for all everybody who puts their name and gets interviewed and so when we're looking after we interview everyone we sit down we talk about the needs of the committee based on the staff and the chair of the committee's point of view and what what what can bolster the committee and where anything bolster up weak spots so for the lm the energy and climate action committee there are two women that we are putting forward which is actually something that was requested to add women to to the committee lori goldner of obinwood road is a physics professor at the university and has been very worked extensively um on at the national institute of standards and technology and one of the things that she she has a vested interest is does her daughter and climate action and making and having feeling really strongly about that but what was impressive to me was her we are going to be measuring our um progress and we want we needed someone who had a technical background and could think through some of the ways that we were going to be measuring our carbon footprint and how we're making progress on that so that was to sort of advance that she had on it and also she had experience with in a different arena with how to affect social change not from the top down but from the ground up and that was a key interest of hers as well uh stella d as um has a child at wildwood brings a uniquely different perspective um as um as a um apricot culture she's getting her phd but she's also been climbing trees if you go to her website it's kind of wacky but she's climbing trees you know pruning and cares a lot about the um the uh environment based on uh the not the built environment but the the vegetation and had those very articulate much more articulate than me about how vegetation impacts climate change as well so um and so it was like it was a vision that we did not have duplicated on the committee at all and so again a passion for climate change lives her life um as and along these work these times and so that's why we chose these two people okay and do we have a motion uh shallony so i just had a question about the ecc do we have any people of color or or we had one by think he resigned so i don't think we do okay i mean given the huge implications we are learning now about how it impacts certain communities i think making an extra effort to it's i know it's really hard that's good i that's a good point okay um andy yeah i just question uh during the uh interviews uh were you satisfied that um the two candidates you're recommending are committed to um working towards the implementation of the goals that were previously adopted by the council on the recommendation bcac for uh the climate action yeah they were both familiar with the work of the ecac um and yes i'm you know we didn't ask that specific question we mostly focus on whether they're able to make the time commitment that ecac requires it's pretty heavy time commitment that's required for ecac um but they didn't seem to be express any concerns about what the recommendations were from ecac and so part of those conversations were stuff and part of our interviews were Stephanie chickarello and laura drucker as well hey ana i wanted to answer shallony's question i believe there is at least one person who self identifies as a person of color on ecac right now based on the last meeting i was at i think maybe if they've left in the meantime but it's possible um but i agree that it'd be great to do more outreach to those communities okay um so are we ready to have emotions yes shallony i can go um i move that uh the town services and outreach committee recommend to the town council to accept the appointments made by the town manager to appoint lori gold goldner and stella d in the ecac committee second okay call the question um all right andy steinberg yes uh anika lopes hi shallony balmille yes ana devlin goche yes and dorthy pam yes okay um five to zero okay and our next person is um let's see jones library why don't you take it take it yeah so and ana you're right there is a person who self identifies as you know that uh for the ecac uh so this is another highly competitive we had a lot of people interested in serving on the jones library building committee um we settled on alex lopez um he uh has two children at crocker farm um and very um plugged into communities and very interested in organizing communities um who aren't typically represented and participating has a union organizing background um and uh brings a critical eye to i think we'll bring critical eye to all the work um that we're doing um and you know he had very creative ideas about how to reach out to folks as well so i think he will be really strong in this lot that we have is sure for someone who can be a good big good outreach to the community so we're pleased that he offered his services sounds good okay um and we have a motion or any discussion or questions okay anika okay so i move to uh i move that the town services and outreach committee i'll recommend to the town council to accept the appointee made by paul bachmann to the jones library building committee okay and do i have a second to that second oh andy that's okay andy can have it hi you can have it great and i will i must say uh whoever is keeping minutes which i suspect may be athena i haven't written down i can't think in right with the hands the motion makers and the motion seconders but i am all going to be in the minutes i'm capturing those and i'm tweaking the motion language to be in the format that we usually use even though those are not everywhere i think i think people are doing a great job great job of these motions and um you know all will be experts soon because this is a bunch of motions um did i do the vote on that one just then not yet but on it okay i have a question athena would it be possible for you to write a sort of a motion not like an official motion sheet but because we're going to be doing appointments again and again and because for whatever reason this does not stick in my brain could you write just the sample language one time they are in the previous tso report and they are in the previous minutes that you have in your packet thank you you're welcome thank you as my granddaughter would say how does she do she just thumbs up okay all right good so i will um call the question it was made it was seconded okay i believe yes okay ana how vote you i vote yes and andy yes and anika hi and shallony yes and dorthy yes okay great doing great okay we now have a public shade tree so um these are two canids for reappointment um this is a committee that has not had a lot of interest and so you know we we held off on henry lappin who's been on for a very long time he's he's going to stay involved no matter what but given that they're the dearth of candidates for the shade tree committee i'm going to reappoint ask you to reappoint shashana king um and henry lapham to the public shade tree committee very good uh it's a great committee if you've ever joined a tree planting um which i did in front of my house in the pouring rain once but it was great and i thank the town for having planted about six or eight trees up and down amity in my area ana your hand is okay i'm ready now so uh i move to recommend the town council approved the town manager reappointment of shashana king and henry lapham to the shade tree uh committee effective immediately for a term to expire at a point that is somewhere in this document expires june 30 of 2024 ha ha yes that is correct we usually do put the expiration date in the motion which i had forgotten so thank you so much that beautifully worded motion do we have a second minutes second great okay i'll call the question and shallony okay yes what uh do you vote yes or no or did you say my name i'm sorry i said anika anika oh i i okay and andy yes i and ana yes and dorthy yes okay we have done that okay and the last one is transportation advisory committee okay so this is we have two appointments to the transportation advisory committee and trace is still in the audience so i thank her for participating in these interviews uh stefan sedge cjek and christine lindstrom mr cjek is i grew up in amherst um has gone to you mass work for the mbta for a number of years um has returned has a driven a bus and been a supervisor for the pvta so he knows a lot of the ins and outs is really interesting about the pvta system so he is one candidate the other one is christine lindstrom who um is very strong about alternative means of transportation and caring about bike lanes and walking in sidewalks and things like that because the way she leads her life with she and her family tried to live as best they can without a vehicle okay um any questions or comments okay all right um let's have a motion okay all right i i put my minutes away so i'm gonna screw this one up now um um no one else wants to okay i can help if you want i move um i moved to recommend to the town council the appointment of can you say the names etina and the name is stefan cjek and christine lindstrom thank you of stefan cjek and christine lindstrom to the transportation advisory committee effective immediately with a for a two-year term which expires june 30th 2023 okay and do we have a second second okay um all right i call the question um andy stein steinberg yes anika lopes i shalini ball mill yes anna devlin gotye yes and dorthy pam yes okay so um on tech um you have all the members now for on tech no we'll be doing reappointments pretty soon we'll be getting a slew of reappointments and that's when you'll see a few there's a few more that need to be done for reappointments on that one okay all right good and other committees as well yep good so how many how many appointments do you have lined up to make yet oh well ever we haven't even started this is these are just filling holes in the past we haven't really started the big reappointment process where you'll get a a sheet of 20 at a time probably oh great okay so everybody go study those minutes and practice your motion the language but the the reappointments are pretty easy because we do that all in one fell swoop um and so because we're not interviewing if it's so intelligible for a reappointment but gives you the opportunity to say what is this person's attendance record whatever you want to ask if you want so we can ask a few questions but then we can move the whole group of 20 in one motion yes very good thank you so much okay all right so looking at the agenda if I can find it again okay now we get to the work plan um okay there's I took what you sent in and did something with it which I can find somewhere um but there have been other things that have been coming up and and that we may have brought put on our plate whether we asked for them or not um so I guess the thing to do is to try to find okay what I sent out ah there's something else before I do that um this was not advertised but I don't know whether it needs to be advertised we got a memo today from um Lynn Griezmer um where we have to the TSO committee um is supposed to one of the members would be a liaison perhaps to the disability access advisory committee and the other one would be to the transportation advisory committee so and then all counselors are asked for other other committees so I don't suppose that we take any action now so I guess I'm just drawing it to your attention um on the agenda for tonight excuse me it's not on the agenda for tonight so I just brought your attention to that that memo came out and people are to think about it yes thank you um Shalini oh but I was wondering if we need to discuss as a committee especially having had the retreat about the process how we're going to prioritize our priorities and that is why the guide sent to Dorothy are we on the topic yet you're talking about the priorities yes okay yes okay um yes um yes so there's two things Shalini sent um a way of looking at how we're going to talk about things which I think that we need to talk about before we talk about a specific thing okay but um this was kind of to see what people what their priorities were there are other things besides what our priorities are though that will determine our agendas and that is when the town needs something or when the town is ready for something um so some of the things that are not on here um we well we we've actually we've told we're going to get a presentation on potholes and maybe on sidewalks will sidewalks be part of it okay and the timing of some of these things is not necessarily up to us okay potholes and sidewalks uh but we're going to get something on um water system and sewer system at some point but I'm not sure when can I answer those questions oh yes please so so water regulations will be given to the council on the February 28th and likely referral to the TSO depending on what the council does but that's likely so you'll have water regulations coming up during march um in march we're prepared to make a presentation on paving roads paving and prioritization of road paving and it's it's really interesting presentation actually I think you'll enjoy it um and sidewalks as well and then uh down the road at the end of march we'll be presenting sewer regulations um and then you'll have to entertain those review those during April probably so those are the the the regulations are going to be referrals the road paving thing is something that was expressed as an interest by members of the TSO committee okay if I can we request right we did um then last night at the planning board um the planning department gave a whole list of priorities and interests and there was one that was related to um some of the things we've been talking about that they might get to in the fall which was to do looking at the which had been on our list here the municipal parking district that the the planning department will be looking at that um so are there other things of that sort that it would within a kind of town time frame that we're going to be having that you know of Paul not off the top of my head I don't have okay so I see tell okay Andy your hand is up so um I guess so one thing on the municipal parking district is that's really within the CRC and I'm not sure that it belongs within our committee at all because it is a zoning overlay district question and I think that it is a minimum that the chair needs to talk to the chair of CRC but I don't think that it is assigned to us there are a number of things and this was of course what my point was why it was listed I was sort of protecting the process as opposed to stating my personal preferences and that is that things that have either been assigned to us or that have been worked on by the prior um TSO and were carryover items um need to sort of have a have a specialized slot and that we need to go forward um and I'm not sure and I think that Paul can answer this question as to where the North Amherst traffic changes fit into that description whether that's the prior expectation that this committee would take that up at an appropriate time so need feedback on that one um so I can answer that yeah so so the North Pleasant Street sidewalk and improvements are there's no funding source for them at this point in time so that's not a high priority it's a it's we've made an initial presentation but it's going to be an extensive involvement process so at the earliest the second half of the calendar year okay in the North Amherst traffic changes yeah we don't have funding because that was one that we were looking for a grant yeah we have no money for that okay Shalini yeah I was suggesting that we as a committee come up with a process for prioritizing and decision making so for example you know we got these different items and I created a matrix which looked at the impact of these on our goals like climate action goals social justice and equity goals economic goals and then the community at large and then what is the staff priority like it's coming from the start like of something I don't know and then um uh this and then the on the other side we have to look at the staff time and and the cost involved like does involve an external consultant and whatnot so it may be important but it's we don't have the money for it as Paul just said so when you start putting all of these things into a matrix then we can see which priorities are tackling solving multiple problems in our addressing multiple goals in our town and it kind of gives us something to talk about rather than uh randomly choosing or having our own pet projects for example and we're just fine to have pet projects also like we're passionate about that um but at the same time as a group to decide how are we going to make these decisions um I do understand what you're saying um I guess I I could see I could see that working as a theoretical thing and then not actually mesh meshing up with what we have to do so um but I think that we certainly should do that I think that but at the first moment or two I thought it would be interesting to really good to find out which is related to your matrix what's ready to go what is is for example if we did your matrix the north pleasant street traffic and sidewalk would be you know not on our plate right away but um and I think I think that the question of the carryover items that was people said okay I'm not going to really rank too many of those because we have to do them so the order of the carryover items and what they are um we need to kind of get more guidance on that however there's some things that a number of people put in here that don't link up to any of the things that the staff has brought to us or that has been referred to us at this time and maybe we in fact won't do anything about them but I think that some people wanted to at least discuss um and that the two areas are where I don't think I don't see anything that's that's been brought to us services to the vulnerable and the underserved and services to senior citizens and it may be that we won't do anything about that but yet I think some people wanted to say something about that and to get some kind of feedback from um the town manager to see whether in fact that's something that we would be doing um I mean in other words sometimes people want to do something a little proactive and not just reactive and it may be that we can't that we can only be a reactive committee so um Paul I want to know what your response to that is yeah so I mean if you have a topic that the members of the council members of committee want to address well we can come to you we can have that discussion we can have the appropriate people here to talk about it um I think you are going to need to manage your time um in terms of how much you want to allocate per agenda and starting to chart these out over the next three to six months will probably and I think that's one of the things we're looking at in terms of what's what are you going to get referred what's going to what's the council going to refer to you right so that's that's got to be a higher priority than other things um there will be some time sensitive some timely things like the the road paving that will be timely I think you you're getting a lot of questions about potholes and things so um bringing that up is good and then in terms of projects that we're getting ready to move forward you know a paving project or you know like this the parking regulation something that staff have been working on for quite some time we'll present it to you and you can manage it whenever you think you can get to it okay um Anna I see your hand up there yeah so I mean some of the things and I think I wrote this in my email back to Dorothy was you know my list of priorities I looked at them as the first two are our areas I want to focus on then the last two for me were like these are initiatives that have been started and I'd like to like Andy was saying right like continue to they're on our plate we can't just ignore them and so things like um I think lunch cart lunch cart policies was on mine like look I love a lunch cart but it's not like a passion project for me it's that it's in our lab and we got to deal with it right so I think that that's I'd like to see those moved forward but when I think about you know I also think it's really important to consider our scope when we look at these so I set climate action and then service to the vulnerable and underserved like thinking about that second one we think about town services that are in partnership with community services like something like pregs doors right there there are some areas that I think as we get into this there may be some things that like oh that's actually a CRC thing not a TSO right like I think that as we dig into this it might be more apparent for me the climate action one um is something that there are there are um components of the legislation proposed in CARP that are directly impactful to TSO and would be under our net so I just to be to be clear like that these weren't very just tossed out there there are specific measures within each of them that I'd like to move forward right and for example climate action could go with the composting thing which I I guess is I don't it's it's being worked on or somehow it has come to us or it got started I'm not sure I think it's on a carryover but I know we can't really talk about it because it wasn't on the agenda well priorities on the agenda so I meant sorry I was going to go into the that was more a note to me Dorothy not to you of like don't don't start reading off all the things I know about composting now okay good um so I did tune into something of an MMA thing yesterday for part of it and it is fascinating it's fascinating what other people are doing but I believe that the the example they gave was a town that did its own collection did not have people and then it's you know not having our own collect town collection there's a lot of things we can't do okay Shalini do you have your hand up yeah I had a question about the outreach plan which is also part of our responsibility to create one and related to that I've been meeting with the group from Yamas and I was wondering if anyone else from the this committee wants to join me or should we create like a subcommittee that's working on the outreach because otherwise it's going to be left out again um so how do we go about that I mean since that's on the priority list so it's not a new topic I'm imagining so Shalini first could you tell me what UMass group are you talking about oh yeah I forget that nobody not everyone knows about it so this was an initiative that started with the CRC because we needed outreach for the housing policy and I was spearheading that and reached out to UMass computer science department who received a grant to improve the outreach especially of in the minority communities and that was the grant for that and so they're creating technologies as well as processes for better community engagement which we sort of used in one of the last tack no TSO committees anyway so moving forward they want to continue you integrating and offering their technologies for our community engagement projects like it could be Jones Library or whatever so I've been meeting with them with Madi Jo and now that she she's not really interested in doing that and she feels like the TSO should be really taking that on so basically the idea would be to interface with them and then work with them and our own to come up with a process for community outreach that we create in TSO but then we share it with the rest of the council and each committee can then adapt that outreach process in whatever way they right so so this is where I ask a question of Paul because I have I was talking about outreach and I believe you'll have to do it again Paul because you corrected me and said it's not our job to do outreach it's our job to do something else so exactly what our path is is what I need to know what are we to do and it's what Shalini talking about in our committee design so outreach is in your name so town services and outreach so it's it's not your middle name but it's in there so in terms of what you what you your purview from the charge from the town council is to look at how the town is doing outreach and we're happy to report to you how we're doing things you can feedback us how we how we should be doing things and we just need to know sort of like the parameters that you want to talk about because outreach takes a lot of different forms and we talked a whole lot just about a legal ad today you can spend the whole day you know talking about outreach so if you can define what it is you want to know if you would like our cpo's to come to one of your meetings to talk about the their outreach efforts one of our staff Brianna has been going to the UMass groups that Shalini has gone to we had a lot of other people going but it is just a huge time commitment and but Brianna is the one that's most adept at working with that group and so you know in terms of you know I it's how you want to frame the issue really is how you what you want to accomplish I think you don't want to just open it up and say let's have a general conversation that's not very productive of everyone's time so if you have an outcome that you'd like or a report from the cpo's which is that they are supposed to do according to the town charter you could ask for that but I use we said that we were not to do particular outreach actions but we could talk about or define outreach so Shalini working with UMass to on their computer assisted and and Brianna is going to um our role would be to say that sounds like a good system it does not or we recommend the town use it or we do not but it's not that we use it is that correct right so so every counselor does outreach on your own you're talking to more people than anybody people are contacting you so what I'm talking about what is the TSO committee's role that's what we want to focus on right so Shalini yes what I had in mind was that you know when we're creating a new bylaw or a zoning change or we're discussing housing policy that as having a process where and Paul you can tell me like which part is our role and which part so I don't imagine us doing what Brianna is doing for instance but I do imagine us having a process where there is an you know like we did in our retreat almost where there's a problem statement that's created then the town has to know the the different members of our communities need to know that the council is working on this issue and then who do we need to reach out to for that who is it impacting who do we have to reach out to in just that that's phase one of informing people that we're talking about that and then comes the part about community engagement or collection of data and you know like we created a survey for the housing policy and talking to renters talking to students talking to homeowners having different surveys and so what sort of data do we need to collect and so there's a data collection phase and then there is a phase of sharing that sharing that data collected with the community and this is what we're going to do with it and then coming up so kind of having like a process and actually at different times different people are are coming into it because even the councilors play a role in that like having the same questions across all district meetings for example I think we did that decided that last time for something some issue or maybe that was in CRC where we said that hey can we we're working on this issue and we and the CRC wants feedback from residents could we pass on the same set of questions to all the district councilors so that in their district meetings they are able to get that feedback right so kind of and then there is a commit town committees as well it feels like everyone is doing their own outreach and it's like not really synthesized so what I was envisioning for this committee is to create some sort of a process and then every committee can obviously tweak it in how they want to use it but have the same systematic sort of approach for doing that. I'm going to ask that we pump the brakes on this conversation because it's getting a little bit into solving a problem and rather than planning the work of the TSO committee it sounds like Shalini has some really clear like a clear vision of where some ideas that should like to maybe present at the next meeting and have an agenda item about outreach at the next meeting. Okay I think that sounds like a good suggestion and I will be very interested in how that fits in with the town's idea of how committees work because I am reading Paul's mind which I may be doing wrongly but I think that maybe he doesn't want all the committees to be doing their own research but this is you know we are it outreach is part of the name and it's something that hasn't really been dealt with as to what that means in TSO so I think that we're going to have to find out and you know Shalini if you can put some stuff together we would really appreciate it. Right and yeah and do we continue I suppose in the next but just to clarify I don't mean that every committee will do its own research it's just that we create the process and we can discuss more of the process in the next meeting when it's on the agenda but it's more identifying which party which stakeholder is going to do what part of the process. Okay that's all. Okay and Andy I see your hand up. Yeah this is Saturday at nine o'clock and we're getting beyond our time where we're trying to adjourn. This is my suggestion that we take this list that we've now developed and discussed today I noticed that Lynn is still in the attendee list so that Lynn Paul and Dorothy can take that list and pair it up with the priorities of the council as a whole so that we make sure that we are attending to what the council needs most which is really what some of that carryover stuff is what the council needs Paul will be telling what the executive branch needs and to come back at our next meeting with a list that gives the priorities maybe even with some tentative dates suggested for them so that we have a document that then we can react to at that point but allow some work to be done outside of the committee is similar to what we did in the finance committee this year and it has turned out to be very effective. Sean Mangano was a key player in making that happen as a staff person of that committee so I would make that recommendation to our committee here. I think that's an excellent recommendation and Shalini I will be mindful of your matrix and seeing how that fits in with dealing with some of these because we're really talking about timing importance staff I mean some of the things that you mentioned those will be some of the determinants in deciding the order of how they get done so. Anika has her hand up. Oh yes Anika. Well I agree with Andy and also thank you Sean I think it's great to incorporate especially that grid that we had during the retreat and I know also it's been clear it's cleared from me just really hearing our role in terms of outreach because coming anew you hear so much about outreach outreach outreach and TSO needs to do outreach so knowing this now I appreciate the pause because I had that was one of my points of putting outreach towards the top just from what I'm hearing and then also the others you know I put in of course my particular concerns and then those coming from district 4 that I'm hearing the most of so I think that just having some clarity as to what out the what TSO's role is now regarding outreach it's I know like I'd appreciate that pause to kind of revisit. Excellent. Any other comments or questions and then it being 920, 919 we could consider adjourning. For minutes to the next meeting or do you want to do this quickly now? Yes well I have read the minutes I found no problem with them I see that that Andy has said that we which it's not as clear in my mind that we had voted that the chair could finalize the minutes I also thought that we'd said that the whole group committee would look at the minutes so I did make a point of reading them and I found that they were fine did anyone have a question with the minutes or comment on the minutes? Okay can I have a motion to accept the minutes? Move we accept the minutes of February 1st 2022. Great and do I have a second yes thank you okay is this a roll call for minutes? Athena yes of all things yes okay Anika. Hi Andy. Yes Anna. Yes sorry. Shalini. Yes. And Dorothy yes okay we have accepted the minutes and thank you for the minutes Athena. Is that what we have done have we done what we need to before we adjourn? Public comment not that there is much but there are people. Oh public comment thank you so much yes it is floor is open for public comment I probably should have done this earlier I'm sorry I don't see a hand so I will say that that at this moment that there is none okay I would entertain a motion to adjourn. You just declare us adjourned Dorothy. I can declare you I can declare us adjourned thank you. I think my motion. All right good night everyone. Thank you. Good night. Good night.