 Excellent. And then David, Tom and myself are present in the room. So before we get going on the agenda this evening, we have an opportunity for public comment. I actually shared, are we amending the agenda to include the discussion point? Well, we can just bring that up under, because it's already on under zoning regs. So if you want to do that under public comment No, that's fine, zoning regs is fine. So if anyone either online or in the room has anything they would like to offer to us on the commentary that's not for items that are not on the agenda. This is the time to raise your hand, be recognized and we'll go from there. Okay, hearing none. So tonight first item we're going to be doing talking about is discussion for the town plan updates. Sharon, could I have you maybe move that chair? Yeah, a couple chairs out of the way, just slide them off to the side. Perfect. Thank you, Courtney. Oh, oh, I didn't see that put it back please. Thank you very much. All right. So you're gonna lead the way for us? Sure. Or is Josh going to tell us? Yeah, really, Josh, we're going to punt over to Josh. Cat, I just did want to say that Catherine extends as her apology. She has a personal matter that came up and was unable to make the meeting. Okay. Thank you. Josh, how we doing? Let me unmute there. We are proceeding along the thing that we are coming to actually, I don't honestly have lost track of time. Have we spoken since our event at town meeting? Have I presented since then? No. Oh, okay. Well, then I have a lot to say. The town meeting presentation was really quite, quite good. I was there for about an hour and a half. And I had the ECC next with me. I had the current town plan and I was just there to answer questions. We had up the built, not the billboards, but the boards with the five different sort of subject areas, five, six different subject areas, outlining what input had been. I believe I shared that with you at the last meeting or the meeting before. And it was actually, it was quite good in that most people said pretty much the same thing, that they were in favor of the public comments that we'd received, the direction we were headed. And if I could sum all of it up into a very pithy executive summary, it would be more cohesive, better connected, I think, in all seriousness. I think a lot of people, both with, both in person at the town meeting, presentation, and throughout our visioning process have wanted denser development in the places where they wanted denser development. And to keep the rural areas rural in the sense of working landscapes and if at all possible infrastructure being highly prized. And tying that into such things as environmental and economic resilience and diversity. But again, a real big outgrowth, I would say, of what we did with ETC in terms of what people want. And what we're doing right now as part of the work group, or my part of the work group is we're attempting to put this into a clear executive summary that will then guide everything else. But the input has been so remarkably consistent. I think that's been shared with you in a packet previously. But the input has been remarkably consistent that I don't foresee any road bumps there. Remember, the point of this process was to get input on the earlier end, as opposed to on the back end where people were just getting it up or down. And I think the town has pretty clearly spoken with what they want in terms of, again, the separation between where we build, sort of how we build with respect to density infrastructure, and then leave the places rural role as sort of a guiding principle behind everything. So do we have, between you and that and the Town Plan Committee and staff, do we have what we envision as the next step in this process? What are our next steps along the road? I believe that the conservation trails in Kent, you might be able to jump in there, had to cancel a meeting due to weather of our storm. And they were going to put something together to present to the Planning Commission with their comments. So I think we still need to do a little weaving of pulling those documents together. I was going to say, is that an expectation we should ever announce that staff is going to try to bring some of that commentary together and then present it to us in mass? Or do you think we're going to, if you guys had discussions at this point, are we ready to dive in and start looking at different sections? I think I'm going to punt to Josh on that. Josh, my understanding was that you are going to do some of the babysitting, if you will, of certain groups and where they were at with things. I know that Catherine was working a little bit. Kent was working with the conservation trails to try to pull it together. Kent, I don't think that you were going to do the write-up for them was the group themselves going to prepare something? That's my understanding. So we need to do a little more follow-up there. Yeah, we need to, if I can jump in, we are going to need to do a little more follow-up just in terms of all the other groups. The energy committee, for example, is working on their parts in, whoops, I closed the thing, chapters two and five. And so it is a matter of pulling all of that together. And as Sharon said, sort of babysitting and figuring out what sort of workable thing. Okay. Are we working to target timeframe? I don't have a target for the town plan as of yet. I can give you something for the regs, but that wasn't related to me at this point. So maybe Josh has a better idea of what your timeline is. As far as I know, we're still on, and again, this would have, Catherine would have had that document, but the timeline that we presented, again, I think it was two meetings ago. And so, yeah, which, again, I'm looking for, I'm sorry about that. That's fine. I mean, let's maybe put it on the docket for the next meeting, even though it's Yeah, I think that'll be, yeah. Let's put it on the docket to start the next planning meeting. No, the next meeting. The next planning commission meeting, because well, hopefully all of us will, yeah, all of us should be there at that point. Okay. So for the first meeting in April, April 13th, you're saying to put the town plan? Well, let's, let's put the timeline. So that, I mean, it's another business type of item, not necessarily the detail yet. Well, let's just get in on, on track to sort of establish some targets right now. They can always move. And they always have. Yeah. True. But let's set a target. I think it's something to work towards. Does that fit, Josh, with what you? Yeah, no, that's yeah, that's fair. Put that on the, at the end of, we do have three applications. It's other business. Okay. See, I just think it's other business. Okay. Another business item. Yeah. Very good. Yeah. And yeah, it's a matter of, like I said, bringing all of this input together and something workable, because the, the other committees are working on stuff, like I said, specifically, we will dodge something earlier this week about the chapters there, sort of working on that. So that's a matter of saying, yeah, the timeline and here that we have. Yeah. Okay. Commissioner's any questions at this stage? I'm going to throw it out to the folks in the audience. If anybody has any questions, that was a more of a status update, not, not a lot of detail yet, but anyone either online or here in the room have any questions? I just would like to be kept updated on it more frequently. And what's going on at what point the discussions are and, and a little bit of information about what's coming in for information from the different committees. Well, right now, I think it's safe to say that, that we don't have it either. So it's not, it's not something that as far as these updates, they haven't been packaged for presentation. Is that a fair statement, Josh? Yeah. Yes, that's accurate. Nothing is being, nothing, there's nothing to withhold, if you will, like we're still working on collating all that information. Place to keep track. So will, will we be apprised of some of that information before it becomes finalized? Absolutely. I mean, definitely. Yeah. Okay. That's my concern. It still hasn't come to this table for discussion yet. Okay. So it's, it still has to come here. And we still have to review it. I mean, right now, the, as we talked about, you were here for many of those earlier sessions. What we wanted to do this year, and we've done, is reach out for input before everything was already mostly written in. But I didn't want that to be the thing that happened before it was sort of put before the public. So the public could also have input if they're not on a computer. And, and I think we're all, we're on those lines. It's like I said, it still has to come here at the, the, the difference or, you know, good thing is that this year we're going to get something that's look at that's already been seen by more people than have ever seen it in the past when it gets, is in front of us. And, and I, I think the process has been really good in that respect. I just didn't want it to all of a sudden get finalized without we still have to lay in front of you are, you are right there. We still have to have public hearings. We still have to public discussion, which we haven't done yet. One unrelated question. I don't think so. If I could just add before you ask a new question that we still, the planning commission is still maintaining their second meeting of every month, which is the fourth Thursday, be planning only. And that's when you'll hear these discussions on the workshops and the town plan and the zoning. Well, that makes sense. Can I join the way? Sure. Was that your question? Was that your question? Yeah. Now, I don't have visibility to the hands online. So you guys are going to have to watch for that. Yeah. Anybody have any other questions? Yes, sir. I got a good question and something that I've been easy. Thank you. And if you could state your name for the record, please. Thank you. So my name is Ethan Lawrence. I'm an Essex resident. I live on 135 Osgood Hill Road. One of the things that I have noticed about the town plan as before, and I know it's going to be brought up as it moves along, but there's not a very clear or defined distinguish between the zoning and I would call it the upper part of Essex, but between conservation, what we call rural and agriculture. The agriculture district is basically within the high to low density residential. It's not protected as agriculture. And then the rural area is more along the Browns River Road. And then you get up on, you know, Fixby Hill, Osgood Hill, West Sleepy Hollow, Sleepy Hollow, and that's all conservation. So I think that the, and I don't know how this is done. I'm not a town planner, but I think there needs to be a further distinguish of those groups and how those groups are split up as far as, you know, preservation, developing and, and, you know, all around utilization to the town. And I know that's something that's been in the works for years, but it's just one of those things when we, as we continue to work the town plan and make it the way that we, you know, foresee Essex for, you know, constituents who give us the feedback, I think it's clear that we need to distinguish those different areas and what the definition is. So it would be, it would be good, Ethan. Do you mind? Yeah, no, go ahead. It would be good if we can have this discussion with the zoning map in front of us. Yeah. Sharon, is that, or Cain, is that something you could bring up? Because I'm, what I'm hearing, I can, I can send you some stuff. What I'm hearing though is, is, is non zoning map related terminology. That's what I want to make sure that we aim for the right, the right phrasing. Cause every, every part of the town has a zoning designation. Right. I'm conservation up on Alaskan Hill road, but 800 feet from 800 feet from me is rural. Yeah. And then you get down, not until below Browns River road and then it's, and then it's agriculture. But in the town plan, we don't have a designated plan for agricultural land. You know, a lot of the agricultural land is zoned as low to high density residential. Okay. So just didn't know how we're going to distinguish, you know, different lands in their uses. How we zone something agriculture as well as it's overlapped in residential and vice versa. Yeah. I think, I mean, where you're, what you're alluding to isn't really correct. It's not really town plan, town plan is high level visioning. Right. It's more towards the zoning. It's the zoning subdivision. Yeah. Which we're going to talk about in a second that really deal with all of those three things you're talking about. Yeah. Okay. But what, what we would potentially, where we could maybe tie into that idea in the town plan is to come up with a vision statement for agricultural preservation. I mean, that, what you just described as far as not specific delineation between and this, but town plan wise, it would be more of the vision statement for agricultural preservation or delineation or such and such. And then that's the enabling, the town plan is the enabler for any of the regulations. That would tie it together. So big visioning, town plan, like what you'd want to see in the ag zone, and just visioning, like how you see the town, how you see an ag zone versus a conservation zone. And then what happens is the zoning and subdivision regs take that vision and actually put it down into the nuts and bolts, what you can and can't do. And the question always is, is when you write a reg is you have to look back and say, was that the intent of the town plan? Was that the vision for this zone? So I think you've got the, you don't have the right documents, but you've got the right idea of what needs to happen. Awesome. Appreciate it. Thank you. So this means basically, since you've come forward and have been so eloquent that you're going to be tapped for more opinions and commentary. But that's how this works. You volunteer people like that. All right. Thank you. We have a question online from Lorraine Saloon. Go ahead. Go ahead, Lorraine. Unmute with this. Yes. Hi. Hi. Thanks for taking my question. I'm wondering if Chair, if Joshua could let us know in terms of jumping off what Ethan just said, did that come up in the town, in the visioning process? Because I'm also concerned about our future in terms of food resiliency and water and so on and so forth as we enter this new climate change century and want to make sure that we don't put all of our eggs in one basket in terms of being able to feed ourselves. So I was just wondering if the public weighed in on that. I totally support what Ethan's saying. Thanks. Yes. And if I glossed over that too hastily before I apologize, that that was definitely a point of public input with respect to the connection between working farms and food resilience and environmental resilience in Essex. That was absolutely a point. And in terms, I don't know if you saw the big word cloud we had and other documents, but yes, that was absolutely a strong point of the connection between working farms and food resilience at that visionary level. And then again, the regulations going from there. So yeah, that was definitely captured, Lorraine. I don't see any other hands. Okay. So you probably wrote more eloquently than me, but I think I just wrote a note that we want to look into coming up with basically a vision statement for ag conservation future preservation. Something to that effect, but I think we would reach out and this may be something we can follow up on. Well, thank you, Ethan. Thank you, Lorraine. Next on our discussion, is there any other questions before we move? Next on our agenda is going to be discussion of draft zoning regulations. And I think Sharon, we wanted to put somebody on front. So we did have a request. Courtney Bhutan of SB Signs was asking today about a permit for lighting and she the newest thing out there, I guess it's called push through signage wasn't I'm not wasn't familiar with it. I asked her if she could come in and just show she has a little brief, she has an example, so she can give us a little brief few minute presentation. And if you have questions, maybe something you might want to consider for either this round of zoning regs or a future round of zoning regs. But Courtney, if you want to come on out. I'm going to plug these in if that's okay. So like Sharon said, we have a client. Pretty narrowly worded zoning regulations. That's it. Doesn't allow facelift, but it must specify that it has to be which it is. And the way that first is the lighting comes directly out of the back of the sign reflects officer behind. It's very common and you see them all over, especially in Vermont, because like I said, facelift isn't allowed. So not necessarily new, but a different type of non facelift illumination is called it's a push through letter or push through logo, push through signage. And when you do this, it accomplishes the same, essentially the same thing in that it's not a facelift. This is a standard facelift, which you don't see a lot of compounds in the model out most don't. This would be a routed letter still facelift, but it's just the letter or the logo is showing. This is a push through letter. So the face of the sign cabinet is routed out and the acrylic or other plastic letter comes through. It's an opaque face. So no light comes out the face of the sign. It's just coming out the side of the letter. This is much more achievable for very small letters or logos, logo elements. It's hard to fabricate this really small or impossible because you have to have a can that's big enough to hold the LED illumination. You have to be able to have the power supply, all of that coming out of the back of the letter. So this enables you to route out something really small on the face of the sign and still achieve that same no face lighting. The lighting just comes out the side of the sign. Can virtual see that? Does that reach where you can show? Do you want me to dim the light a little bit so you can see what the light looks like a little bit better at night? You know where the switches are, right? Are there different lumens? Can that be obnoxiously bright or is it always kind of? The only way really to make it brighter would be to have a very, very deep acrylic. So you'd have a lot of light out the side. Is that better? Can you see? Yeah, that's great. So I sent Sharon, you can't put up the picture I sent you earlier. Can you have that America sign? Okay, no worries. So I sent an example of a sign at night so you can see it really when it's really dark. Comparing the two, we're talking about, especially in something like this, it's something that's smaller. This type of letter, depending on the size of the letter, you're going to have, this can be really bright. As far as I understand, the regs and Essex don't talk about the lumens, the brightness, anything like that. So if you have this stood off, feet inches, 12 inches, it's going to throw a lot of light, right? If it's really, really close, it's a little bit less, but it's not, this isn't any less light or any more light necessarily than you would have from a push through. Both of them are achieving the same thing. Neither of them have the glare, they have neither of them have that front lip look to them. So somebody was joking with me a couple of days ago, they should just start calling that halo push through and it would essentially be the same kind of, you know, the same kind of thing. They don't, but. So we do, excuse me for a minute, we do have some lighting ranges that we have and I can't pull it up online, but this is what she had sent me. So that's his cabinet sign, a pre-standing sign that we did in Williston. We're working with Williston. They have the same rules about halo lit signage being the only type of illumination. They did allow the push through for this instance. So this is a cabinet sign. We did a push through letter, same kind of thing. It's not face lit. The only light is coming around the sides and it enabled this client to have the illumination while still keeping a small nurse. And honestly, from a client standpoint, it was, it's much more affordable to make a push through sign than it is to have the whole logo in tiny little channel letters. And that's one of the reasons why we're looking at doing this in a cabinet sign situation. It's a, it's a much more attractive, but affordable way to go than having five Gooseneck lights off the top of your cabinet sign. So to follow up on Dave's question that he asked, is there variability in the light source? Yeah. There can be. Yeah. I mean, you, you could say it's, it's hard to measure. The reason I asked is going back in time, put your way back hat on, because we had a conversation similar to this when Lowe's came in and we had to evaluate the halo using LED. And it was a animated discussion from my memory. And it was, we started talking about, you know, the, the, I forget the, the measurement through, like, no, I know it was the, it was the gradient, the, Oh, the kelvin temperature, kelvin temperature. Yeah. Yeah. Blue light versus daylight. But it was because of that changes the amount of the glare that changes the amount of appearance, you know, the changes the overall appearance and the effect and so forth. So we, it actually got very granular into that discussion. Nope. It's, I will tell you from a, you know, from an industry standpoint and talking like national fine industry regulations and stuff like that, it is really hard to measure, you know, and it's really hard to control. Most towns don't, because you have to have the equipment to measure it. You, you, you can say, okay, you're only allowed to use this range of an LED of white, you know, so you have like the bright white, daylight, but when you get into the brightness, you know, you have a four foot tall letter that meets code versus a letter that's like this, you know, where, where do you say what's too bright and what's not? And I think we got into the discussion on where it fell in the scale and the, and the kelvin scale as well, because of the, whether it was blue, whether it was yellow, whether it was red, and I think those were great turns. It's been a while. Well, and you can see it, I mean, even just with like fluorescent lights that we use, you know, in like a sign, in a sign cabinet, you would use a bright white of daylight and it will affect the warmth essentially, the cool white of, of the light that it's emitting. So in towns that you've seen that have allowed the adoption of this and it just been, I'm sure it's a mix, but have you seen towns implement some restrictions on it, or is it just the flat out they allow this new type of push through? I don't know of any towns, we permit all across New England, but the majority here in Vermont, I don't have any towns that I've ever had to show them the color of the light, the color of the light, as long as they're allowed lights, it's, it is, it kind of is what it is. And it's, you know, you run into, you know, say in Williston, for example, I mean, you're allowed, say an 80 square foot sign, that's going to put off a heck of a lot more light than a 24 square foot sign. And, but the difference between those is pretty hard to measure. And, and you can have the same lumens, but at a different size, and it's going to change, it's just going to change the whole formula. And the measuring of that is going to be really from an enforcement standpoint. A nightmare. Good luck. I think one of our concerns has always been light spillage, obviously, like, you know, how far away can it be seen? For example, the CVS sign when it was first proposed was going to have been a lighthouse along Essex Way. It's, it's not, it's not anywhere near the intensity that it was expected to, and that's primarily the color, well as the brightness of the sign. And I think that your biggest, the best way to control that is by saying no facelift, and it's not glaring in your, you know, it's not fingering at you. And by controlling the size, which you've done, I mean, your, your bigger chair, and you can speak more to, I'm not entirely familiar with, but it's, you know, 5%. Do you have a cap on? We do. So, I mean, we have everything from Kelvin temperature for externally aluminum. We went through a lot. Yeah. We nailed down a lot. Yeah. Because we were worried about. Right. You, you want to have something to fall back on in case it does turn out to be a light. We're transitioning to a new technology as well. Right. That was the big, that was the big thing. Right. And LED, I mean, you can do a lot with it, but controlling, you know, and I think size is the big one when we don't have 200 square foot signs yet. So, so our reg is the area of the side sign shall not exceed 5% of the area of the side to which it is attached or 15 square feet, whichever is greater. So, if you have a things God. And you don't cap it. No. But we do in the business design control, I mean, there's areas where we do. I mean, something like Lowe's. Yes. How did you, I mean, 5% of the area. Did they try to put up a 500 square foot sign? Or did they, I mean, they're also going to be reasonable. Yeah. What's affordable, right? But if the side of the building cat is could be larger than the 5% or whichever is greater. So, so if it's more than 15 feet, we just stop at 15. Oh, I thought it was the other way around. I thought you were allowed to be larger. Yeah, it's not. It's whichever is greater. So the size of the size of the 15 is even if you have just a little tiny one that can go or you can go 15 feet. Yeah. Is that another push? And that would be not allowed currently. The regs say, do they say specifically reverse halo? Halo reverse channel. Yeah. So you throw the reverse in there and that's where it's that's specifying this type. And that's so, you know, like I said, it's pretty narrow. Yeah. Okay. So it says what's allowed. No, it's not. And that's most of, I mean, like here or in Willis and anywhere that allows internal illumination that's not face lit, you see reverse halo. You see it like everywhere. But there are applications where this is, like I said, it's accomplishing the same thing. It's just called something different. So if the regs are written, you know, so if the regs were written no face further, no face lit, then that gives us more options. But the way they're written, though, the reason I'm asking specifically as I have a client who's we're trying to design some signs for them where channel letters are not going to work very well, you know, because their sign, their free standing sign is limited to 35 square feet. So I can't have 12 inch channel letters on there because it's too small of a sign box. So we have to go smaller for their logo. And if they want illumination, it's going to have to be a push through or it's going to have to be goosenex, which, you know, from an aesthetic standpoint, aren't quite as. So would you be happy if the push through was restricted to a smaller size? To the depth. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if that made you feel better, like it made you feel like if there was more control, I think that would be fine. I mean, you can say half inch, three quarter inch. I mean, it's not the depth, not the depth, but also the height. Don't give up the depth though. Yeah. Oh, oh, the height. I mean, of the letter. Yeah. But it's not, I don't think that that would be. It seems like there's a lot, there could be a lot of light coming out of the side. There's no reason I'm asking. So if it's smaller, there's not as much light coming out. Right. But if you, I would say you could control that better with the depth. You know, if you, if you let somebody have something that's this thick, that's going to throw up. Whereas if you said, you know, you can have a max of five eight seven inch or something like that. And that's something that you could do. It throws enough light, but it's not, I mean, again, even, even a two foot all push through letter is not going to throw more light than a two foot tall chip or reverse halo letter, especially if you space it further away from the wall. It seems like it would send a more direct light out the side. Is that true? When I look at the example, it just seems like you look at that. Really? So it's going to diffuse. I was just going to say it's diffused. Yeah. Yeah. It's not, it's not a like clear light. So I mean, yeah, you could restrict it to anything. But I would think that we could get generic enough to allow this style of lighting and just right in the reg, exactly what it is we're trying to prevent, which is light spillage off off the sign off the letters. I mean, reading through our pretty conspiring hands. I haven't read these in a while, but I mean, we have a lot of very specific criteria surrounding our current lighting legs and depth and distance and the size of channel lighting. And I don't think it would be too hard to lock this down easily. But I would say that your best bet for controlling this village would be going with it. I don't know, you know, just from experience with making, I've never had somebody produce, we do a lot of installs for nationals too, where they send us the free built sign. I've never had one come through with a huge depth. It's just not how they're made. Then you have to have really thick acrylic and that would be really cost prohibitive. So usually you're using at the most like a half inch acrylic. And this is actually less because this is carved out of that acrylic. So the acrylic panel is on the back too. That's what's holding it onto the back of the sign. And you realize the same standards would probably apply for like no blinking, no, you know, all that. Yeah. And that's a general statement. Yeah. I want to jump to the guys online. Josh, Chu or John, any thoughts, questions? Yeah, I'd like to know what was the term you used when you were saying, you were saying you could just call it something like a cap or a block or something like that. What was that term you used? Did I say halo push through? Halo push through, but you gave like one more description of it that was very specific. That sort of kept it from, I don't remember what you said. It was a cap or it was something. I can't remember now. I don't remember. I think that was a joke though. Oh, that's too bad if it was a joke. That's too light. Well, that part I got. Okay. So never mind. Yeah. Josh, how about you for tonight? I mean, in terms of the detail, there's a lot to take in, but I like the idea of finding it a lot. I think it's interesting. John Mangan. I'm fine with it. I'm actually quite familiar with it. And to me, it's less obtrusive than a lot of the other kinds of lighting. It's a lot more refined and detailed. So I'm fine with it. Okay. So I stole David's manual here for a moment standards. And it's not just the lighting. It's also talking about freestanding signs, which I don't have cutouts or penetrations, but should have solid face. We got that to deal with. Lettering shall not be less than six inches nor greater than four feet. So we need to make sure if you're talking about smaller processes. So we've got other restrictions that we've got to wrap into this. When you say no cutouts, is that so it's not a shape sign? You're looking for like a rectangular? It says freestanding ground signs shall not have gaps, cutouts or penetrations, but instead shall have a solid face or area without opening. So I would consider this a solid face because there's no hole. But you've got the acrylic bumping out. So it's a cut. I'm done. I'm not. No, no, no. And I think it comes to the intent. So we're beyond the intent a little bit. We got it. Or interpretation. So what I would like to propose is potentially to have you work with staff, if you're willing to do this, look at this regulation and find out where your lighting would fit into it. And I would take a very restrictive view such as cutouts, meaning you got cutouts in that sign. And let's see what we would need to, how we would need to massage this. Because there's enough touchpoints in this. I mean, I would have a hard, I would like to, but I would have a hard time accepting that as a signage mechanism today, because there seemed to be a number of touchpoints in this rule through no fault. Because we were trying to make sure we weren't, we weren't blindside, so to speak, blindsided by, you know, signs. Bad term. Yeah. And things change in the industry. And so it's covering your bases, but broadly, you have to be narrow enough to make sure you're not going to get something that's totally out there, but you also have to be broad enough to, you know, take on changes. It's, this is, you know, this is what we do, but I also live here. So we're not, and I, you know, we talk all the time about how much nicer it is, even though we install signs that we don't have to avoid some giant signs. And so, you know, but at the same time, we're looking to help make sure that the towns that we work with understand the terminology and what's possible to regulate to, because some things, you know, you can, you can say it has to be this, this and this, but if you have no way to regulate that, it, it can't be all subjective. Right. Exactly. Well, the LED lights were brand new when we did this round. And the temperature ranges and, and we're wide and we would just have this fear that all of a sudden the cost of LED lights was going down and we had this fear that all of a sudden now we're going to have these bright signs everywhere. That hasn't happened in part because we were so specific, but in part also because it just didn't work out that way. So we have a little bit, I think, less fear now. Just go to John Mangan, your hands up. Yeah, I just wanted to say, regarding that comment on cutouts, I think that could be as simple as adding the word, no open cutouts, you know, to the regulation. Because I think that was the intent. Yeah, go ahead. I would say these are very similar to like shadow box signs. I think that was probably the term used before pushed through lettering, where you have a back, a box that's lit up and then you have a cutout with some type of diffused material that only shows what you intend the light to see. It's very similar to that. I think David, you'd made the point or somebody made the point that we need to understand what we're trying to prevent. Maybe it was even you. We need to understand what we're trying to prevent. And we identify that upfront instead of just saying what we allow, say what we're trying to prevent. And then we can list, you know, how we do that. And that would potentially leave us some room to interpret a new technology coming in the door without handicapping. That's like, I feel we are right now. But I mean, this sounds like it's the next thing yet. I think one thing that would be helpful, when you have a chance to meet with staff, is that there's any regulations that you've already seen in Vermont that you feel like are good regulations that cover it well. So we don't have to start from scratch if, you know, just have something good to already look at. We have 252 towns that start from my house in Vermont. And there are 251 completely different websites, which is really, which ones work easier. And also, and also potentially some images of the different sizes, like what's the largest that you put up with this technology or this format at night? So I mean, if our fear is light spillage and this beacon, let's make sure that we don't have that. I'll see. I mean, usually this is what we would recommend for something smaller. And partly it's material, right? You're limited by acrylic comes only in certain size. So you're not going to see a 12-foot acrylic push through. Today. But yeah, yes, I'd be happy to show it to you. I think this, this would be helpful. And we're in the right time for this. I don't know that, I mean, I'm not going to, I don't think we can say tonight that, yes, we could approve that as a signage without some serious discussion. And this sounds like it's an appropriate thing to get into the regulations now. When I'm, you know, as we have this specific client in mind, is this a process that would take weeks versus a process that would take months to get approval? We're getting very close to, you know, putting the regs, finalizing the draft regs. So, and I think we're looking to, we're getting a little bit ahead, but we're looking to warn them, you know, in May, end of May. So I'd say the faster you can move in, but we're not going to, the PC is not going to react quickly. So worst case scenario, it doesn't make it into a current round. It will go on the list and we'll go on the next. Do we have, this is, pretend you're not listening to me. Do we have the opportunity to put waivers in place for lighting sources in this, in whatever district her client is? I don't need to know specifics. Okay. So first of all, it's in the BDC design control. So this particular signage would have to come to you. If we, so yes, do we have any specific regs right now? Not really. Okay. But I was just wondering is, because if we, if we see with intent of a redesign of this, provision, we're in general agreement that we know that it's going to be going through the process, could we, could we accept a light source for an application before we enable this? Could we accept it with a waiver on design control standards if we've got this rework in flight? So I would say a couple of things that I'm going to have to. I don't need an answer today. I'm just, I think this is a question because if you have a client that was your answer, if, because I'm hearing, I'm hearing general acceptance of this design or approach, but we don't have enabling language for it yet. And if we get to the point of having a reworked, you know, standard, it's going to take time to go through the process because it has to go through our public hearings. It has to be worn for the select board. It has to go through their public hearing. So it's not a, it's not a quick, quick turnaround. But if we're, if we're putting something forth and there's agreement on it, there may be just logically, it may be appropriate to put it in place. But anyways, that's, that's getting way ahead of the game. Okay. Thoughts, questions? You only get three a night. So use it well. I don't think you're going to have these in your district. No, my barn's lit up online. But my, my question is if we're really concerned about light pollution, because that's what I hear just the word light pollution, where do we factor in the gas station parking lots that are lit up all? Well, the only ones that are, that aren't regulated are the ones that have been there in existence since before the regulations were put in play. Any of the ones that have come online since the regulations have been tightened up have a very strict adherence to lumens. So they either fall under something different. They do, but every one of those that's come through Maple Fields is a great example. They're, there's the lights, if you look at them are more recessed than, than they want. Generally, they want ones that are well exposed and cast a very broad light. And many of the ones that we've, that've gone through have not. They've had to be more recessed so the light is more restricted. There's safety designs and so forth that come into play. But I was, I was thinking along the lines of like, no, Essex, the beverage system, because when they closed the store to show up all the lights, but I didn't know if there was a possibility where you could allow a different type of sign under, you know, operating hours or, you know, midnight. We have that. You're only allowed to have your sign on an hour after the business. It even, it already says. So we've got it. I mean, this is, these are good questions. These are good questions is also different to the heights of poles. So you can see a light from a long way away, but it may not be casting as much light if it's up higher. So we balance a number of light poles versus the, the illumination by raising some of the light poles in some instances where you can see it further away, but it doesn't use as many poles. It does. I mean, there's all sorts of different things that factor into what is the use? What is the district? And for the non, for non-sign stuff, like gas station or even, let's say, industrial building in Sackton Hill, we get a lighting analysis that shows the average and specific lumens that each, that each light fixture gets. And then the spillage is the light fixture shield goes in. So we actually analyze that and they have to do a lighting analysis and provide it. Like you said, a lot of the buildings are grandfathers. I think of the post office, because I drive by the post office every single day, and I, it's always bright. I guess my question is how many, all right, I was not sure, should I say how many, but there's the existing is grandfathered period. Until something comes in for a new application. And that's the only way you have, whenever an app, whenever a building, an application goes in, it goes in under the zoning requirement, regular zoning subdivision regulations at the time that it, that it comes in for us. If they change, there's no requirement that an application change until they come back for something new. So these are all good questions. Thank you. You only got one more, remember? All right. Thank you very much. Thank you. Yes. And I think that, you know, the effort is, this covers a fair amount of different items in here, and it would be good to have a, an opinion on what could be done with what's here to enable that sort of lighting. So I think if you guys can keep in mind the two, two points, one is what are we trying to do? So I mean, the rewrite of this section should potentially identify what we're trying to prevent. And then leaving future-proofing the regulation to allow an examination of the new light source without out now canceling. So if, for example, if we had a clause that allowed us to evaluate a new, a new style technology and adopt it on the fly, and then incorporate it into the regulations going forward, something like that under a laser. And so a light waiver for signage. But, but specifically to incorporate, not just because, hey, I want a waiver. Right. But a waiver for new, to adopt new technology. Yeah. That meets the intent. That meets the intent of the regulation and, and achieves the goal of the section. You only, there are only a couple of districts that allow limited kind of general effects to one that the, like, I'm, I'm sorry. I haven't had my noses to sign rags a lot lately either. But we want you to talk to the microphone. Oh, I'm sorry. You can't hear me talk about that. Okay. Yeah. Because I think some of the districts don't allow lighting at all. So really it's only in what you're talking about the different. It's usually in the business control areas are not, not business design, but in business areas, commercial districts. Yeah. So, and not to steal Sharon's thunder, but I think that under 310, I sign permits and administration says in the event a particular situation is not set forth here in, which in the opinion of the Board of Adjustments, consistent with philosophy set forth in this section, the Board of Adjustments may on appeal, may approve the proposed sign, provided that all the other provisions of this section are satisfied. There may be a. So we could submit an application potentially to have, I mean, if we're going to the DRB anyway, any commission anyway, that's it's possible. I mean, I would double that's Board of Adjustments. All right. So that's that would require ZDA, but Sharon will help you with all that. Sharon, that's awesome. Good. Thank you all very much. Hey, we're done for the night, right? Almost. Good zone. All right. What's the next on our on our topic list, Sharon? Okay. You can always turf it again. Okay, so right now we are looking to try to put forth, how to get these regs wrapped up as quickly as we can, because as we all know through the years of experience, they just keep coming at us. So we're shooting for the second meeting in May, or a proposed public hearing, which means we'll have to get these wrapped up into you, you know, soon enough. So with this particular meeting, I prepared additional proposed changes to the regulations to what you've already seen so far. And I'll just run through them real quickly. Most of them are housekeeping items. So Article 1, Table 1.1, which is the exemptions to the regs, just adding in some language that ground solar shall not be located outside of the commercial industrial zoning districts, and shall have zero net impacts as identified in the scenic resource area. That's the same language taken right out of the town plan. So it made sense to put that there. Article 2 in the Resource Preservation District, this was discussed at your previous meeting, and I didn't walk away with your final decision. Did you want to consider additional sound barriers in the RPDI zoning district, such as firms, additional mature landscaping or fencing to assist as noise barrier to any residential developments? In the areas of the 100 or 200 foot buffers that do not have adequate habitat, additional plantings can encroach into the buffer, and the landowner shall be required to provide staff a yearly forest management plan for its buffers. That's a talking point for you, for the Planning Commission to determine. What does additional plantings encroach? Well, such as, for example, Alcena Cole up on Red Pine Circle, yeah, Red Pine Circle, in Saxon Hill Road. There was a buffer there, but it wasn't a grown buffer. The 200 foot buffer wasn't grown, so he volunteered to plant extra, and I don't know. I think some is within the buffer. It's all within the buffer. It's all within the buffer, thank you, to provide a quicker growth. So, again, that's... But let's run through it, and then we'll come back in two lines. So we're not talking about these as we go here, because I mean, I personally don't need you to go through every one of these unless we're going to talk about them, because I read them before the meeting. Okay, so I was mostly doing that for the audience. But if so, if we're going to take that effort, do you want to talk about them while we're on them, or are we going to... It's up to you guys. Let's drill into it then, since we've got an interruption of flow. So... Keep going. The buffer. Okay, the buffer. The buffers. When you talk about forest management plan of the buffers, who owns the land? It would be the landowners. So new applications that come before you... So we want a forest management plan for which buffer? The 200 foot buffer? The 200 foot buffer, yes, or the 100 foot buffer, but... And maybe not a forest management plan, other than a condition that says they have to maintain the buffer. See, that's where we start getting into what I think is... You guys can shoot me down here, but I start thinking... So as we start getting into maintaining anything in the buffer, other than a single forest management plan, which is by the owner of the overall tract of land, then we start getting into very disjointed processes. Who owns what? Who's going to be responsible for what? Well, when you buy the lot, you know it's defined. I mean, I was going where you were going, which is there's no way it's cost-effective, or does it make sense to have a forest management plan for a buffer? It's just like that would just be cost prohibitive to do that every year. But you'd see an applicant coming before us, putting forth a landscaping plan, having part of that landscaping plan encroach into either, you know, removing or replanting the buffer, which we keep waving and allowing, and then having a condition that says, for the life of the project, you've got to maintain all of that to the, as we always do, to the landscaping... But that's the 50-foot buffer on the internal... No, I know. I'm saying if we agree to do it with the one and two. See, and I'm stuck on the 200-foot buffer basically being no intrusion other than... We had an intrusion or utilities, and that was it. Everything else needed a forestry management plan that was encompassing the entire 200-foot buffer. True, but since the settlement agreement with Alcenacol and lots were being sold, it was now not one owner. It's, as lots were getting sold, it's many owners, and so the forest management plan that was in place kind of goes away as he sells his lots, so... See, that's, I guess I'm... I think that's something that's a different discussion point because there needs to be a contiguous forest management plan for that buffer, and it's almost like a covenant. Yeah, I mean, right now it says the 200-foot buffer shall be maintained in an undisturbed, vegetated state. No tree clearing or removal of vegetation shall be allowed with the exception of such activities authorized pursuant to a forest management plan approved by the planning committee. Oh, that's a good way to do that because they don't have to have a forest management plan if they don't want to do anything, so... See, I think this is what we're getting into. The whole RPDI thing is going to... We can talk about the internal buffer, and we can say that the internal buffer... I would be willing to codify that the internal buffer can be used for water management. The 50-foot buffer? The 50-foot buffer can be used for stormwater management, no structures. Right. What is it when it's... I don't think there's any issue with the 50-foot buffer. I think that... Except that we continue to mark it as a waiver. So maybe that discussion point becomes, do you get rid of that waiver? I mean, not get rid of the 50-foot buffer and require a landscape after construction, some type of your own landscape. I mean, right now... Some of the 50-foot buffers aren't landscape. Some are, but... Some are, some aren't. Some are, some aren't. But the planning commission due to construction and getting the construction in there and where the driveway goes, usually it ends up... The 50-foot buffer usually gets cut and then re... So the language that we put in for the waiver, we continually put it in there. We support the waiver for the use of the 50-foot buffer for stormwater retention and revegetation to mantis so that it's a more continuous, contiguous sort of... That's in the front of the buildings, the back of the buildings. But that's a difference. So right now our regs under table 2.14, it's very specific under buffers for both A and B, the 200 and the 100-foot buffer. The last sentence in both of those sections says, the planning commission may not waive buffer requirements and the 200 may not waive in the 100. And then on section three, which is the 50-foot buffer, it's very specific about granting a waiver. If a waiver, you know, that it can be done, if a waiver is necessary, if a waiver is granted, what has to happen? So like right now, 10,000-foot view, we've drawn a hard line. Nothing in the 100 or 200 will waive the 50, but it requires a landscaping buffer. So maybe we're going off a little bit in a different direction, but the intent of this proposed reg was a lot of the 200-foot buffer and some of the 100-foot, but mostly the 200-foot buffer. The landscaping is in the sky. It's trees, so it's not helping sound barriers for the neighbors. And so, and even though if they are maintaining, you know, doing their own forest management, so that's where we're trying to capture. Do you want a berm in front of the buffer? Here's the difference on that. That 200-foot buffer is not for sound barriers. If we need to make sound barriers part of it, that's what we need to add in, because currently that 200-foot buffer is just an undisturbed area. It's not a sound barrier. Okay. And those trees have been sticks for a long time, since before pretty much any development has gone on in there. So, again... But people are asking for a sound barrier. Right. That, to me, is the key point. It's not, do we allow them into the buffer or whatever? We're saying the buffer is done. You can't touch it. So then maybe just the first sentence of this in the resource, somewhere in the RPDI district, you know, add the sentence, the planning commission shall consider additional sound barriers, such as berms, additional mature landscaping, or fencing to assist as a noise barrier to any residential developments. Period. And then forget the sentence. I don't even think you need to say additional. I mean, if we're going to continue... If we're going to consider sound barriers... Okay. I mean, let's go to the line. Two, John, Josh, thoughts, question, weigh in. And we have somebody in the waiting room. I just, I just let him in. I definitely think it's worth considering. I just, interesting conversation. I'm, I'm learning as you guys are talking, but I think having this natural sound barriers is generally a good idea. I just don't have enough details yet exactly where we're talking about. Right. I would, yeah, I would tend to say that if the issue and the requests are actually about sound barriers, then we don't need to change what we're doing with the 200 foot barrier and make, make sound barrier, 200 foot buffer, rather than make the sound barriers, the things that we're talking about regulating and enforcing and mandating. If that's, if that's the actual thing, because as you said, those have been trees for a long time and they've been in the sky for a long time. And if sound barriers, the issues, and let's talk about sound barriers, right? The pushback you're going to get from developers or any owner is you've, you've cut me back and you said I can't touch 100 feet or 200 feet. And now if you want me to do sound mitigation, I have to be outside of that. So now I'm back, you know, 200 feet from my line and you want me to build a berm there. I'm not saying it's right or wrong, but I'm just saying that by not allowing, you know, it's clear in the regs that the buffers were for, it says visual screening between industrial and adjacent streets. It's always what it's been. But if we start to talk about these firms, it's going to be outside of that. Now you're really crunching your developable area. I'm just pushing back. Yeah. Shoe. Yeah. Just stay out of the 200 and 100 foot buffers. That's all I can add. So if, if I'm not arguing against that, but I would, I guess if we're going to bring sound into it, number one, we got to, we got to have measurement. We have a sound ordinance now, I think, right? We have a noise ordinance. Noise ordinance, well, okay. Well, let's ignore that for the moment. I don't want to see a structure built at 200 foot buffer. I don't want to see fences in the 200 foot buffer. We want to talk about a berm. I know Al talked about putting a berm along Saxon Hill Road. And I think he did that and put some trees on top of it. You know, that to me is a natural, a natural, you know, it's just, I don't want to use the term structure because I just, I didn't want to see structure. It's a natural deployment of a sound barrier that's, that's a living sound barrier, not, not a wall. So how do we allow that if David, with David's language of and then there? Well, can't the regs say may consider? It doesn't have to be a shell. You may consider some type of sound. Or is that what you negotiate at the table? Without a regulation yet? Where is the sound coming from? Is the sound from trucks with an engine down low or the HVAC system on the top of a building? Like, or sometimes the use and sometimes the use. So far, all of it where I think if you're trying to get at the noise problem, it's going to, you're going to have to see like where, what's it coming from and like, what are your noise options for that? I mean, I was over in the Saxon Hill the other day just walking around the woods. I just could hear this drone of noise. It was just coming, but I was also hearing a helicopter and a fighter jet and like, it was, there was this noise, you know, a lot of noise. So, I mean, I think it's a good concept to think about just like the visual screening, but then, you know, I was trying to articulate a little bit better what's the noise we're trying to reduce because if it's an HVAC system issue, maybe there's a site specific way of lowering that noise or from trucks idling. Maybe there's a different issue instead of and firm would have to be really hot. Not in some cases, it doesn't have to be as high because the ground is slow. So that was one of the reasons that the berm worked on Saxon Hill is because the industrial use was significantly lower than Saxon Hill road. There's a downslope to it. So I, so for now, and again, these were talking points from your last meetings that all came together. So if because we're close to wanting to get these regs wrapped up, I would strike it. Do you want to strike it or put it on a list? Or do you want to just keep the first sentence? It just and you can change the word shall the Planning Commission may consider additional just gives us enough. So I think I'd almost like to put the burden on an applicant in on a lot. The applicant does the Planning Commission may consider. Encouraged. No, may consider requirements for sound. Sound mitigation within the lot. And that goes to what Kent was just saying. Is it Truxie? Is it HVAC? Is it, is it? It just, I don't think it belongs in this section. I think it's the fundamental problem because the purpose of the buffers, it's crystal clear, is for visual screening between industrial. And so unless you want to say that a berm is enhances that visual buffer, if we're going to get down the sound path, I think we got to take it out of the buffer section and find another area to your point to put it that enables us to consider that as a condition. I agree. So I agree with all those points. I think that either we strike it or we put it on the list when we have, you know, for the next program. I don't know what the rest of the commissioners right now. We'll check. But given that we've had such a rousing conversation about this, I don't see what you're thinking of. So I'm going to go to commissioners. One more time later. I want to ask a question about this. I have somebody. Yeah, I see the hand. Thank you. I see the hand up there too. So we're going to go, Paula, you first, you wanted to ask the question. Well, I was I was just thinking about what what Dave had said. Oh, sorry. I have to get a stand. Scott put it in the middle of the room just to what Dave had said about berms being in a different category, but couldn't there be a reference to whatever category berms are in or if noise pollution or whatever is a separate category. Couldn't there be a note linking the what are the other ones called the buffers with with the other section as sometimes coming into play to accommodate sound. I'm going to hold that thought for you. If I'm remembering correctly, Al didn't actually put anything into the donor foot buffer. He did it within the right away by the road. Right. Well, I'm pretty sure on Saxon Hill we did it. We did it within the road right away or they're not 200 foot buffer coming from about. I think we had the same conversation and it was the construction of a berm within the within the buffer that didn't fly. I think we can go back and check that. So your point, Paul, I think we're still stuck on intrusion into the 200 foot buffer for any purpose. Okay. The other thing that I had thought about in conjunction with the buffers is that people are concerned about creating more wildlife pathways and those buffers can easily become wildlife pathways. That's again, they shouldn't be used for anything at this stage other than basically town utilities or utility. Visual. You said it shouldn't be in it for anything, but I thought the buffers were for visual. No, I mean intrusion. There shouldn't be any intrusion. We shouldn't be going in to make trails. We shouldn't be doing anything other than leaving it at this stage without except for utility. And on the 100 foot buffer, a driveway. Good. Good. Gina. Hi. Thanks for taking my question. I am in the Maple on neighborhood where our backyard of butts, the which is now blodget, and that hope, the noise that you're hearing whoever brought that up is the endless sound of the trucks. I think it's 36 loading docks that went in behind our house on a clear cut 50 acre lot. When we bought this property, IBM was up and running. It was beautifully designed with the trees all in the parking lot, all the way up to the building. It was, it was wonderful. I could never hear IBM. And IBM was, despite what I had been told, IBM was up and running when we bought our house. That 200 foot buffer, I agree with Dusty, should not be touched. That is space that separates us from those massive, massive, massive warehouses behind our home. The way the buildings are designed, which I could see this incoming, it's three large buildings with the loading docks in between the giant walls. So what happens in our neighborhood is the sound of bounces from building to building to building aimed directly at our neighborhood. And unfortunately the road was designed to go right along the buffer. So the trucks, these giant trucks drive, they can't get from one building to the next. They threw on the Allen Martin side, they have to drive right behind our houses. And if it's cold out, they will run their trucks 24 seven all night. So you hear an endless drone, plus you can smell them of trucks, just idling with their headlights 24 seven. So that 200 foot buffer, I agree with Dusty, should stay. And then a berm should also go in on their property side to block us from the light and the noise and all that. You should not touch that land. It's just drastically changed our neighborhood since we bought our house 20 years ago. And it's sad. It's really frustrating. So I please don't touch that buffer. I want to just say my apologies. My intent was to make more landscaping come up because if maintenance isn't being done, new growth isn't coming up and scrub is taking over. It seems to, it's been decided by the planning commission that we're taking that sentence out about the 100 or 200 foot buffer. Yeah, and it seems to fall over and new growth is coming up because since they cut up to the 200 foot space, those trees are really kind of spindly and tall and they have fallen over and there is new growth coming up underneath, which is cool to see. But that is just enough space to at least move the buildings away from us. And we really should have had a buffer that whole time. And the design really should never have let that road cut along the back of all our neighborhoods. And then the trucks just park there. I mean, they're 18 wheelers that park there running like all night. And they're allowed to if it's cold out. I would like to say that I just recently spoke with Blodgett, the folks at Blodgett and the gentleman I was dealing with who was very responsive to me when I would call with the, with complaints when they would come into me has retired and I introduced, I know who the new person is and I've made contact within the last week and he's supposed to be reaching out to these people. This is a business that's allowed to run 24-7 but their manpower is way down. So Gina, continue to call me. Complaints should come back to me. In light of the design though, it should never, that road should have been along the Allen Martin side, not along our neighborhood side. Like so in future designs, like the one that's going in, I think red circle or whatever, if somehow the buildings could be buffers in and of themselves to send the sound the other way, instead of it literally just tunnels right into our, right out of our yards, like all the time. So just in considering the designs of Saxon Hill when you're building, there should have been another way for the trucks to get from one building to another instead of along our backyards. Because you have the 18 wheelers in our backyards all the time. So, Asin, help me remember here it's a way back machine, but there was a Vermont state regulation against idling overnight. There is, there's a law for no idling. There's a law on, a town has an ordinance no idling on the street and people at Reinhardt foods now called performance foods, they do it there. They can get ticketed. You have to be, you know, the problem is you have to catch them in the act. And this is happening during, you know, one, two, three o'clock in the morning on, on, on, um, Alan Martin, um, Blodgett. So, but we're aware of it and, um, the police have been informed. So we need the complaints. Again, I, it actually is legal if the truck is of a certain year and size because you don't want them to, you know, it's cold out. You don't want the truckers they're driving from wherever they, they need, they need to not freeze in their trucks. So they are allowed to idle their trucks if it's a certain year and if it doesn't have the generator inside the cab or something when I called about it, the law. Okay. So what, let's, thank you, Gina. Yeah. Let's move on for this thing. But I think what I would like to put in, in our, in our bucket for further review is, is finding a way to enable not intrusion into the buffer one, but finding a way to maybe add some teeth to soundproofing, um, industrial development. I think I might just link this into when we heard the public feedback for the town plan update, people did mention the negative impacts that come from development. And trying to think about this broadly on those are some good comments that Gina had about using the design of the building locations in and of themselves to help block, you know, it could be sound, it could be views, you know, trying to think maybe more proactively when development projects are coming to us about the impacts they're going to have on the neighborhood and maybe just kind of trying to highlight that a little bit too, because it's all these things. Um, you know, and there's other issues that we haven't talked about to the fall down lower. But that was an issue that came up during the comments for the town plan about the impacts. And not, not to diminish any of those comments, but we may actually want to bring in economic development. I mean, it's a little bit for additional review, because this is the, this industrial park is still very, very valuable to this community as an industrial park. And how do we balance that, you know, how we balance that value against some of these mitigation steps. And that's where I think, if we can, if we can enhance the tools that we have to guide the development, as you just mentioned, can we use, and Gina mentioned, we, the building position, the roadways, would we sacrifice the buffer more of a, more waivers for the buffer onto Alan Martin to provide protection on the other side to the developments? Stuff like that. You can probably have more effective use of that space. So, missionaries, final thoughts? David? Good. John? Chu? John? Yeah, I just wanted to add that, you know, what Al Svanickl did over on Saxon Hill Road was additive, right? You know, whether it was in the right-of-way or whatever, he's trying to add stuff back in. And the whole idea behind the buffers is to, you know, provide that buffer of sight line and hopefully sound too, if it were to grow in. So maybe the language could be not so much about intrusion in the buffer as maybe you could allow additive, like, you know, as some of these big spindly trees fall down that are between Blodgett and, you know, the neighborhood, can they put stuff in? Can we allow them to do that? Not cut stuff down, but maybe add it in, you know, I don't know. It just, it's, additive seems like the thing that we want to be doing and then not allow anything else. Just a point of view. Good point. I mean, I think this discussion, to me, shows that we need to discuss it more. Right. So I'm going to put that on the list for... I think it's fair. Okay. Okay. So moving along would be the next one is the business design control at the last couple of meetings that talked about putting in some sort of measures. And we came up with waste management, pavement maintenance, landscape maintenance, fire and safety hazards. And yeah, so I'm assuming that you, the people, volunteers have read all that. So I guess I would say... Sean's just shaking his head. If you're not prepared to, to say that you want to put it in the regs for this round, we can talk about it again before the May 25th one, if you want to or... Let's go around the room. Okay. Chew, you're first. Okay. I'm good with it. All of it. It's easy. Josh. I'm, yeah, I'm fine with putting it in now. John? You know, I'm fine with putting it in. Yes. I got a question though. The town's responsible for keeping, pick up trash. I'm 75 foot between... Oh, the town's responsible for keeping the 75 foot buffer along the 15 clean, clean of the trash. The town will own that. Yes. That's where the greenway would be. Yeah. But doesn't that like include some of the buildings? No. And so, right now, Rick Bove owner has been maintaining that and grooming it. And that will continue until we decide to take it over. I'm not sure if that will be when more of his buildings are done. I'm not really sure with that. But ultimately, I'll speak to Catherine about that. If that sentence should go in at this time or not. I'm just, I'm just questioning it because it seemed like some of the buildings are closer than 75 feet. So that would include like, trash around some of the buildings. Okay. I'll confirm that. I'm not sure if some of the buildings are that close. Either way, I'm good with that, I guess. I just, it was just a, you know, a surprise. Well, that's mainly coming up. Okay. Can you be online, have any questions about, is anybody familiar with the basic changes or in-room questions? No, I, it's hard to hear you guys. This is a verse. I don't get accused of that too often. I second that. So basically, this is, this is maintenance. Yeah. Maintenance, we're giving some teeth to the BDC for maintenance. And that's garbage and appearance and landscaping and tape pavement and so forth in those areas that have been, where owners have been negligible. That a fair assessment? Yes. Okay. Keep it in. Okay. And you're a yes too, Dusty. Yes. Okay. The next one is table 2.6B. I proposed adding, which is also in the BDC. So I guess maybe that answers that question, but I just wanted to call out that it's the same language that's in the section 7.7 violations. However, 7.7 violations had, it reads an enforcement act. If an enforcement action has been initiated on a property, the zoning administrator shall reject any new application for zoning permits. Planning commission approvals or zoning board of adjustment approvals, blah, blah, blah. I've changed that to applications. So the intent in my mind was they can't, I can reject a zoning permit application, but if they want to come in, if they've got active violations going on, we don't want a planning commission application nor a zoning board application. So I wanted to clarify that with you because that was a discussion. But I don't think that's a proper sentence. Well, it might not be proper sentence. We can massage that. This was a quick on the fly, get it out. So I just wanted to confirm that that was your understanding that it was any application, not approvals. So then it goes on to read, and I did add this sentence. This shall not apply to planning commission or zoning board of adjustment applications, which may be required to cure a violation. So if you need. So I would change that first sentence and get rid of the zoning minister and just say the ZBA shall reject any new application for zoning permits. The planning commission shall reject. Planning commission and zoning, whatever. Okay, so massage it so that the ZAs out of it and. Well, no, the ZAs in there because you've got them included. You've got the zoning ministry shall reject any new application to zoning permits. Right. Planning commission applications or zoning board of adjustment applications are said property until the, until the violation is cured. You've got that. You're right there. You said the zoning administrator is the only one who's going to be rejecting anything. Okay. Well, that's right. Well, yeah, application that comes in does an application coming into the door. Does it go to the zoning administrator or does it go to the staff? It goes, it goes to staff, but. I think the second sentence I kind of that is being kind of silent. Somebody walks in the door staff is going to take an application. If it's ZBA, it comes to me. If it's subdivision, it will go to Kent. So I guess if you, we can massage the wording, but I just want to make sure that I have what the intent is, is the intent from your last discussions that you don't want any zoning permits to be issued if there's a violation and do you want any new. So for example, if he's got an active violation right now out in the door, can he come in with building G and H with another site plan, a new building, or is your intent to say, no, no more construction or approvals until the violation is cured. And maybe this is too deep of a discussion for this round right now. We've struggled with this for years back even back into the, to the other David years. And if we're going to draw a line, and I would, I would actually be a little more specific and say that no applications zoning or planning shall be accepted, nor shall any zoning permits be issued while an athlete while a violation is in place. That's, that's how I would rephrase that. It's going to be that specific about it. No applications, no, except for the ones required to correct a violation. That's what that, that's what it feels like you're trying to get to with that. So chew on that. Well, my only, so my mind goes to, you know, I'm just playing devil's advocate. My mind goes to a multi large lot subdivision and let's say one house is nearing completion and you issue a violation or something, you know, that, you know, let's say, whatever, let's say it's something that had that can't get cured until the spring because of whatever they got to regrade. They got to do retainable something, but they're under a violation for that one house and they want to go pull a permit to build the next house. Let's say it's just Ducevich up the road, but they're multi. So you're going to not allow a single other. So in a circumstance like that, I would condition a CO. They'd likely have to post an S girl. Okay. And then I would let them. Maybe it's not that bad. Maybe it's, I think what I would see this is, is they want to come in for a whole new building. And we've already got a lot with a couple of buildings on it with some violations for a plan master plan and a proposal. They want to come in for a new building that they have existing. And I'm not talking residential. This is more of the commercial. And maybe that's what we need to say. I don't know if you feel the issue is commercial and or well, you know, we, we bet it's both. We bounce back multifamily housing in my mind is residential and commercial. So, well, given that, that, I mean, if Ducevich is all residential, if he had a violation, that really was a violation that I couldn't, you know, just say, okay, the weather is against you. If this was something bad, for example, like the road that they have up there, I did not issue another building permit to him because they didn't clean the traps and it was backing up the water system. And it's like, yeah, okay. And they weren't sweeping it. Now in fairness, the weather was bad and they'd sweep it today and you have to sweep it again the next day and stuff. So there was a lot of variables. But nonetheless, they, there were things they could have done that they didn't do. So if, let's be granular a little bit. There's, there's two developers that we don't need to name. There are two developers in my history that had been really driving this clause. One was a Susie Wilson Road development, multiple buildings being developed in Susie Wilson Road and the ones up in the town center. In both cases, there were significant open violations on an adjacent property owned by the same developer. And we really didn't have the teeth to prevent the next application from coming in the door. So are we talking about a developer or are we talking about a parcel? Well, obviously legally, we're talking about all of it, not, not a specific person. We're talking about the protection of the town, whether it be here or there or otherwise. But if somebody owns two properties on opposite sides of the town and they have a violation in one and they want to permit any other. That's happenstance. So it happens to be the same developer, but we're violating the property, not the landowner. I mean, it would be nice to have some flexibility so that you could leverage it to get the teeth, actually get something done if you're really having a problem. But if there's really a developer with two totally separate properties and they're having a challenge in one spot, you're not automatically bound to have an impact on another location that they're trying to work. If you really feel like, you know, things happen, you know, and you could use your discretion. It'd be nice to have a system that allows you to do that and you're not stuck with one way. See, the earlier one was a developer had numerous violations on the property. They wanted to continue to develop more. Dave Rodgerson was advocating for not allowing them to do anything because they had open violations on another parcel, another separate parcel. Right. So in this situation, we're really talking about when it's development on the same parcel. Right. Not the same lot. This one's Dicey. Oh. I mean, I thought it was clear when we started, but when we talk about it, is, you know, if they sell the lot, is it still falling into the same bucket? We start worrying about it. Do we talk about it? If it's within the master plan, if it's within an area that has a master plan, there's a violation on the parcel within the master plan. It was violated. But again, some of those parcels may have been sold off. We're not talking different owners. Or we're talking one. This is where it's... Well, that particular parcel is one parcel that was master planned. So even though we're calling them separate lots, it's still one parcel. So that's... And he can count all that density, you know, that's why we have that complicated... So does that mean that we need to wrap that into here? It is violations on a single parcel. Existing violations on a single parcel. You guys online are getting off easy today. Going in. I would wrap in the master plan to try to... I mean, we're trying to get a specific thing resolved, right? We're trying to fix a situation where we're an owner of a parcel, which has multiple lots in it, keeps multiple violations in flight, continues to want to develop new. And there's no... There's a proven history of violations and leaving them in place. So we're looking to potentially say, unless you have cleaned up your other violations, you're not going to do anything new. That's almost like spot zoning if we're not careful. Well, but it's one... Even though they're referred to as their own lots, it's a master plan and it's not its own lot. It's on one big parcel of land. So that's what we have to target. That's what we have to identify them. Right, so... If they're different owners, you don't want one guy screwing up another guy. Now, the only thing to tweak to that statement is he can sell the building. So Dunkin Donuts building is a footprint lot. That owner doesn't own that. And the current landowner of the master plan doesn't... As is with the bank, New England, federal. But they wouldn't own the dumpsters. No. They wouldn't own the trash traps. They wouldn't own the paper. So it's still false to the master plan, the owner of the development. Development, master parcel, whatever the rate terminology is. I say the master plan seems to... We'll get to your hand in a minute. I think that might be Ken. Josh? I was going to say, and it sounds like Sharon already said, I think that hanging our hats on the idea of the master plan for the larger parcel as a whole makes a lot of sense to me. Because we're thinking of where one part of a developable whole that was planned out is in violation. And we don't want the rest of that plan development on that same master plan to proceed. And we're seeing that as sort of one cohesive thing. And so it makes sense that those be the violations that we would target to stop applications from coming in the door. When we're talking about, I think the happenstance of someone having a parcel here and then having a parcel all the way across town, like I don't think that's what we mean. We're talking about like a plan development over time where the implicit or explicit conditions of that plan development over time are not being met. Such that we need assurances and teeth that when further development happens, those conditions will be met. So I think that however we phrase that as part of the overall master plan or larger parcel as a whole or something, like it's clear to me, that's what we're talking about. A plan development over time, not just this parcel or that parcel, because you're right, I'll see that would be very spot zoning. But I think the idea of master plan is where we're headed or where we need to go. I agree. But in a master plan, aren't there different owners? And if one owner has a violation, then the other owner can't develop. That doesn't seem right either. So I don't think, yeah. This one I think needs more massaging. Okay. I mean, if there's a specific violation that's happening right now, you just have a way of addressing that specific violation that you're talking about. It's through zoning. It's not, it doesn't come into play today. It really can't come into play in the planning application because there are no teeth in the... It comes out of a violation. Ultimately, it will go to court, which it has. Right. I mean, it seems like the next thing to do, like if it's a violation, it goes to enforcement. Yeah. I think you've got to like literally spell out what it is you're trying to avoid. It's almost like you've got to get down into the granularity of saying, if an applicant comes in for an application on a property in which the applicant owns another parcel that's part of a master plan or part of an already approved development that has an outstanding violation, they don't get to move forward with that one until they cure the violation. Because that's really what it is. It's just if two parcels owned by the same applicant in the same approved master plan. Master plan. Because to Tom's point, that's sort of where my head was at is like if one of the properties in the master plan sells off the bank or something, you're not going to tie up another applicant who has nothing to do with the bank if the bank has a violation. It's really if the same applicant who owns multiple parcels in an approved master plan is under violation, they don't get to continue until they cure the violation. And if you use the term parcel, that would get away from the footprint law issue or to accommodate the footprint law. Because the footprint law, I mean, it's not that case, it's not the building owner per se, unless it is, I don't know. Or we just get right away from lots of people talk about applications. You're not allowed to pull a second application under a master plan, which you're the common owner if there's an outstanding violation. That's what we're trying to stop. Right. So I will come back to this. And I honestly, anyhow, good. I got online. Is it is it can the Essex Retorder? Yes, it is. Sorry about that. I was driving when I got on the meeting. So I couldn't change my profile settings. So you solicited public input. You said the public is getting off easy. Did you want public input on this? No, I was talking to the other commissioners. Yeah, he was saying online commissioners were getting off easy. But he was saying I wasn't saying enough. Okay, okay. You're good. I'll give you one very quick point. Just keep in mind that the owner of a parcel can be relatively easily changed and LLC can be set up. So an individual owner with a problem can get rid of the problem by simply transferring the property to a new company that he might create. That's just something I thought of. You might want to consider that. Thank you. So in this case, we're back to if there's open violations on development on a previous something. I mean, we've got a massage. I think that it just needs more work behind the scenes. I think I might need to reach out to Ellis. Can we just give the zoning administrator a unilateral power to do whatever? No, I'll keep up with that. But I think one other point is this has come up very rarely. And when there are violations, it's unlikely that they're going to come for another application. So it's not going to help that much. And the last time we started putting in the staff report current violations, right? So that was like a way of highlighting the violations. I think we reacted to that last time. So I think it's a good idea. I think it's going to be very rarely used with other mechanisms. I think the other thing is the idea is that what we're trying to do is we're trying to cure the problem through some kind of punishment. Like there's another step behind the violation or not allowing enough application to go forward. And that step is to actually get the darn place cleaned up and fixed. That's what we really want. So I mean, it's you're talking about punishment and keeping somebody from doing something. But I mean, I kind of like the idea of can you make them put money in escrow that is an equivalent of fixing it. I know that's crazy. I don't want to go down that road tonight. But I think what we're trying to do is we're trying to clean this mess up. And it's in the form of a violation. So now we're trying to punish these people I'd rather see rather than a punishment to figure out a way to make them fix it. Okay, so I'm going to take it off for now. Yeah, but the last thought is maybe we just it's as simple as the planning commission is allowed is may consider existing violations when reviewing new applications. Well, you already something like that. Greg, we have that reg in there. Yeah, that may call out. No, but we can use it as a put it in there as a right to give us the right to negate an application based on existing based on existing violations. So I have more than teeth other than to just call it to your attention because calling it to our attention doesn't necessarily do anything. Right. If we don't have anything, if we can't do anything with that, then then it's just it's just words in the report. Right. But if we have the ability to negate an application or to deny an application based on existing violations, we can look at the history. We can look at the duration. We can look at the circumstances. Yeah. And that would give us the ability to do what we wanted to do quite a long and simplify the get rid of the whole. Who's the owner? Who's the, you know, a big of a parcel? And it's another handoff. OK. Fred Lorraine. Oh, Lorraine. And I see Lorraine's handoff. Thank you for taking my question. I don't I love where you guys are going with this because we don't have a lot of leverage. I don't view this as punishment more as leverage and a carrot. And so six one half does the other that we don't have a lot of ability to be able to kind of control the violations and each violation, of course, choose up a lot of staff time. It's not going to impact fees. It costs us a lot of money. You have to chase that stuff down and going through court. And to me, this is part of the responsibility. So I really appreciate you guys taking a look at that in a serious way. And I really don't like the word punishment here. It's really to me leverage in terms of negotiation. Thanks. OK. And did you have something else? Your hand is still up. No, sorry. I'll get it down. OK. OK. Onward. So actually, so as I said, that was already in proposed section seven point seven of violations that you guys already agreed to. So shall I take it out of there as well? Yeah. And I think it was worded a bit differently. Well, yes, I added a sentence. So let me get you what it. Well, so in seven point seven, if an enforcement action has been initiated on our property, the zoning mayors shall reject any new application for zoning permits. Planning commission approvals or zoning board of adjustment approvals for said property until the violation is cured. This shall not apply to applications which are required under these regulations to cure a violation. So that's something that you listened to earlier along in these rights and you've accepted. Do you want to keep that or shall I strike it there too? I think it's going to have same problems. Right. I mean, it only makes sense to me if you're striking it there, you should strike it here. OK. OK. So going on article three, section three point three dwelling dwelling area requirements. The last go around of these rights that were adopted, you reduced the size requirements of the single family house and multi family house, which landed at 300 500 feet for a single family house and 350 square feet for multi family. The question comes up is, do you want it? There's been discussions past meetings making it smaller. Do you want to change that number to something smaller or get rid of it completely? Oh, and also I did note here that there was an email that I thought went up in your and I don't think it did. So I provided it to you. I'll read it to the record so that the PC virtuals will hear it. Thanks for your help the other day getting my permit. I spoke to Alexia briefly about short term rental permits for the town of Essex and she suggested to contact. I am working on an affordable housing solution which involves the use of tiny houses on wheels. The idea is to utilize a homeowner's backyard or driveway for the parking of a tiny house to be used as an affordable housing rental. The tiny houses are self-contained. No connection to the primary residents. I have found a working solution for waste water disposal which I've worked out with the wastewater administrator for Chittenden County. Essentially black water or composting toilet waste is transferred to an appropriate facility. The issue is classification as they could therefore be classified as an RV and subject to those regs. I'd like to know where there is any of this that could be classified differently to stay in place longer. We do have as Tom is aware that I tried to get that changed years gone by that we have RV regulations which allow I think it says up to no more than six months and it cannot be used as a permanent housing solution. I can't find it real quickly in the regs right now. And no time period any six months during the course of the year. So I feel like like we already have that. It sounds like he's asking for something longer like permanent. I say that in the past I have received some calls of people allowing the RVs to go on the lines on the property. Complaints have come in from neighbors. They placed it within the front yard setback and other places on the lot not meeting setback requirements. But the cure for that was to put it with you know get it out of the setback and then of course I start a little log to make sure it's not longer than six months. Somebody online. John shoe. Yeah. I just wonder that that six months you're referring to is an occupancy time. Yes. It says yes it is. I wish I could find it. So I mean if we're looking at what you're asking about minimum dwelling area requirements I think we're I mean while I think that this is applicable to this discussion I think it's we're kind of mixing. Oh yeah sorry. Mixing metaphors here because yeah email deals with portable right portable solutions something that's on wheels and can be moved. This one deals with minimum and the record the last time we did this I wanted to get rid of it completely. This I don't think there should be a minimum. I think we have enough protections in terms of potable water wastewater like if someone wants to build a I mean tiny homes are popular enough someone wants to build a permanent hundred square foot house. Good for them. Oh so we have the water and sewage and and yeah they still yeah I mean like why do we care what how big it is. So I think we ought to just dump it but that's my opinion. I would support that. Did it. I'm with I'm with Dave as well and there's the passage in the the document says if delete an entirety we should document there's no minimum size is required and I'm fine with that and just cutting the whole thing I think Dave's right on if we have the other protections in potable water etc like don't worry about the size that let them do it. We had an application or discussion a sketch come in for potential tiny home development over there off of more road that we couldn't do because there wasn't wasn't allowance at that point. This other one I have some concerns over that you know if you're there's a difference between allowing that on say a farm over to Ethan's if there's if you've got a lot of seriously you've got a lot of room you want somebody to park a trailer small home on a portion of your a lot for a period of time and there's no real impact anybody other than the owner so what but if you're going into some of the existing neighborhoods that we have in this town where there are very small lots in the first place quarter acre lots and you put a another family dwelling on it then you have you don't just have your kids aren't using your camper for a couple days or something like that in the yard you have another family and is that is that small home well away from the lot lines as it is a visual is a noise impact is all that intrusive I mean we have those regulations right now for a second dwelling to go on a property and it does without the frontage if it's got the acreage it can it can go on of course driveways and it can't be more are you talking about ADUs or are you talking about no I'm talking about second full-blown house okay right excuse me so I just wanted to point that out yeah but this temporary one is temporary this yeah that's already with the potentially indeterminate period of time right indefinite period of time right and that's more of a you know I know that promoting is a short term but it's not short-term housing if it's a rental it's a money making for the for the owner right you know and that's that's a commercial enterprise and so does that bring in another facet to a home business versus you know parking your own RV and your yard for a period of time I mean I would love to see us figure out I mean we're under a national and a very specific Vermont housing shortage so I'm fearful of what you just said I'm fearful of this turning into a pop-up RV park but there's got to be a way to figure out how to allow one or I don't know two words appropriate got to be a way way to figure out how to allow this because nationally the trend is people are parking tiny homes on places and living for six eight nine months on them and if done properly you know following the setbacks enough parking got water got all the other things figured out I think on some lots it's completely appropriate I would hate to see us just flat out say no I would agree I think it's it's it's some lots some lots that I think are completely inappropriate I agree well it's on don't forget it would be on wheels so it's not like a tiny house it's a tiny house on wheels well no that's there's two types of tiny homes portable ones and permanent right portable ones are getting good legs and there's one on I maple on whoever lives over on maple there was one Reggie right past by the end of the third they make them yeah they make them and they've been parked there and I was like if someone live in there now they're just building them and selling them but they literally had it parked in the driveway no I mean in that case if no one was living in it it was just a vehicle that was a trailer that was parked in the driveway right they are there Ethan oh the third it's his third it's the last one all right struck curiosity in my I don't know this of night night can my uh I'm getting I'm getting tired here so I'm running out of ideas but when I was listening to this conversation what I think of is the tiny home as soon as you drop down for stabilizers and put that on blocks that's and maybe I'm wrong here but then qualc classifies it as not a mobile device right as soon as it's secured I mean I could build a house and have four center blocks in each corner yes it'd be you know sufficient as a is that true if you just put them up if you jack it up it's not affordable just like a shed I can build a shed on wheels as soon as I put it on cement blocks it's like it's under regulations of sharing the shed policy you could build a slab this big and put it on top of the slab I mean it gets we have to write the mobile home I thought it was it I thought it didn't change classification though but it still had wheels and it was able to move I thought it was still mobile it's if it still has wheels until your car is parked in your yard for six months and then it's no longer a car yeah but it's not a car no it's a house I thought it might take it off the trailer and put it on blocks no if so if you keep the wheels on if you leave the wheels on it but it's on blocks it's okay no if it's still an RV all right so it's still mobile it's still it's still a portable thing even though it's jacked up I think the point's a good question well I'm just asking because of can I build a 40 foot shed and just throw an axe underneath it and I can put it wherever I want I'll tell you I move it I don't know for tiny homes you know what I mean no like I have all I have all seriousness when it when it's mobile you know what where does where do we define mobile you know because that that could open up and this is just I was sitting in the back room and I'm like I'm gonna build a 40 foot shed and put an axle under it I think that's what we're talking it's a trailer you know what I mean what what you know you put it you put a you put a dwelling unit up against in my backyard it's a quarter acre lot right it's gonna be it's gonna have an impact right to to two neighbors maybe if somebody across the street as well the deer in the back might not like it but you know it's it's different than if you've got 40 acres and you want to put a one or two even on there so we have a definition for recreation vehicle a vehicle which is built on a single chassis a b 400 square feet or less when measured at the largest horizontal projection c designed to be self-propelled or permanently towable by a light duty truck and D designated primarily not for use as a permanent dwelling but as a temporary living quarters recreational camping travel or seasonal use so now we just put an E in there to wrap in we put in tiny homes that are potentially longer term so that would be B 400 square feet or less when measured at the largest horizontal projection so I would if we're starting to call tiny homes out I would I would suggest making it an E not a B and then it's going to come down to defining whether or not it can be classified as a permanent residence because if you say six months or eight months or 10 months or 12 months or 24 months or whatever then you're going to have to enforce like a permanent process so you're going to have to we can allow this house also if it's going to be there more permanently and we're going to change you're going to be taxed as a second house right not assess value or you know not taxed at all right so so in this email that came to us it's a housing it's affordable housing rental so now we're into rental units unit units so you still need to meet your acreage you know it's still if it's going to be a house tiny house whether it's 3,000 square foot house or a 100 square foot house you still need to meet your acreage and your frontage I'm sorry you took away the frontage so and plop it on the plop it on the property meeting the setback requirements you will be you know a single family home a second single family home you will pay on a recreation impact fee you will share driveway of course because it can only have one driveway for a lot and you will be assessed assessed accordingly now obviously a tiny home isn't going to I would I would think would bring in not much more tax but it would be taxed whereas an RV for six months does not no oh my god you're touching the mic I just lost my train oh so it would also have to meet stay within lot coverage requirements right yeah but in the R2 that's never usually a worry well we're not just uh this isn't necessarily talking about just R2 email I think this is a bigger discussion so yeah so as as far as as the initial thing as far as the minimum structure size I mean your point David was to was to just remove it I would mean how do we feel about that yeah that's good guys online Josh you know already yeah I agree to that that's fine that's fine strike that yep and it sounds like the amount of back and forth right here including tiny homes is a desire but I don't I'm not getting the impression that we know enough yet to be able to come up with language tonight to include them but it sounds like it's something we want to we've actually had this discussion more than once about trying to find a way to to accommodate them in the community um yeah we can I think we need a high-level discussion and maybe the town plan is a good place to vision this but given the national and specifically Vermont housing crisis I think we need to look at the statutory language with accessory dwellings our current language which allows a second home our shared driveway language and just kind of step back and ask ourselves in which ways can we promote some affordable housing that doesn't end up resulting in the fears that we're concerned with which or maybe some of us are concerned with which is you know an inadvertent RV park or too much you know intrusion into setbacks or too much density I mean how can we how can we make this work but it we're not going to solve it tonight but there's a lot of moving pieces that I think would be cool to talk about this is one idea this is one idea but I think the law of unintended consequences would bite us hard if we just adopted this and say yes to this and by removing section 3.3 dwelling requirements you've already opened the door a lot for either they can already do or in their minds if they don't understand that okay it's a tiny home I want to just build this so that's going to a lot now maybe not for this round but maybe want to change how many tiny homes on a lot like you're only limited you're already can I hit one oh because the driveways right well EUD yeah or a scenic resource well true anyhow we drift so yeah Paula you had a question yeah I mean I think you also have to consider the impact on the neighborhood agreed and the other thing I mean when you're talking about a 10 by 10 space I mean what do you consider livable right well I think getting getting the tiny home world involved as a whole well I know but but you know how I mean I see those as not permanent permanent it's something that is you know I mean a hundred square feet you don't have room for you know that's 10 by 10 I think that's a qualitative decision that individuals have to make for themselves there's a lot of there's a lot of articles and videos and so forth about people who just love that small space they they they declutter they they live simply oh I know and I've I've looked at the plans and I've seen them but you know how I continue as a broker to get requests from buyers looking for land where they can like their dream is you know how do I get the $40,000 tiny home and a piece of land that I can lease or buy to park it on you know so when you're looking at a you know houses up the road at 700 in their life that's a specific thing but in general to have no limit yeah seems to me to be opening yourself to a whole host of issues and and that's also where you can unbolt the wheels and throw it on blocks it's a and it's a manufactured house yep because one of the thoughts I don't know where this falls in but one of the thoughts that I've always had is and I don't know like where it would fall in in the in the rezoning or land but you know coming from from from Milton right there on Barnum Street you know they they took a chunk of land and it was a project with Habitat for Humanity but it's just along the same idea yeah you know they took a chunk of land and they split it up where you only needed I think it was like 16th of an acre right they were they're basically stacked on top of each other but you know they had nice little yard around them and these were these were four to 800 square foot single family homes that you can do because that's about the size of of an efficiency or assessment yeah an efficiency apartment but my idea was I don't know like I said I don't know if this is in there where it falls and I still got a lot reading to do and read the updated red ink so but uh you know there's a different sections in towns in the town where that could fit in but it's not going to be a standard you know maybe you could maybe you could put zones where you know you would allow a single family home community of 25 homes or you know it's something that's affordable because I think the biggest crisis right now along with with you know the renting is if you could put a family in a home for six to 800 even a thousand dollars a month where they could own it and maybe they wouldn't have five acres and you know view them out Mansfield but they could own a home and build equity and contribute to the community in a larger sense of you know and paying with the taxes and then you know eventually they get to the point where they can buy another home and so I think there's it's a larger picture I don't know where it is and we got to be careful that we don't say we're going to create a zone here and create a zone there because that brings up the the term that makes everybody go go go right spa zone so we we have to look at the zones and see what's appropriate per zone we're confident and I think there we do have zones for for this sort of structures and and the PUD can be a reality with with tiny homes right yeah we take out this section Jen I didn't hear what you said the a PUDs plan you you know can be a reality for tiny homes so you can cluster them and get more on and we could even I mean we've we've got it on the docket to re-evaluate the PUD well that's on my list you want me to get there yeah well can I make one come at first about the the letter we received yeah you said he had a solution for black water I would be concerned about gray water because if they're just plan on dumping it then it might go to the neighbors or whatever so it's just something to consider if they're right up against also set back too many yep commission planning nights when we sit there and talk and talk and talk this is planning right the applications we deal with what's in front of us what the regulations are these nights are the ones where we get creative and try to see what the future is going to break so the next one is article 3 section 3.4 fences you've already seen it you've already approved what was there although I'm going to ask to make sure it never made its way into the full document so I just put it out there as a reminder and for confirmation but I have you guys look at it can you reread it I don't have my my thing in front of you so so the first one no wall fence or shrubbery shall be erected maintained or planted on any lot which obstruct or interferes with any traffic visibility triangle and we deleted on a tangent section or curve or corner lot of what the red red maintenance of any landscape placed on the property line shall be the responsibility of the person who planted the shrubbery trees gardens etc on the property any fence or while located adjacent to a publicly owned or maintained sidewalk bike path or pedestrian way shall not be located closer than two feet from the easement requirement the fence is the next easement requirement what does that mean from these so if the easement is a 10 foot easement or an 18 foot you've got to be two feet further that makes it a 12 foot easement so maybe maybe just strike the word requirement no closer than two feet from the easement right thank you so why do we need to be off the easement for public works is for their machines so when they dig it up they're obviously going to go outside of the easement so they want anything right up to the easement like a fence yeah but that that means that the easement is not the easement the easement is at the easement plus two feet so this came from public works let's see it's true I don't I I I think no I mean if they want more they want more feet then they got to ask for a bigger easement okay so delete that one well but we've got a lot of easements already but they didn't ask for extra two feet but I'm just talking this is property line this is personal property line I know I heard you're saying but I mean I think I can get it with the easement you can't you can't you know do that the easement but the easement should be the extent of the disallowed area if there's a concrete footing there's a concrete footing going to be I don't know but I just I mean that because if we say you can't do anything within two feet of the easement that's the easement plus two feet yep you if you had a 10 foot easement you're essentially saying you got a 12 foot easement for free you know so I I I don't think we should make any requirement or any limitation beyond the easement you need more space than you asked for a bigger easement and that's you're just saying there's like a two so that's a yes yes maybe no you do want to ask the other two guys online John John and I think Josh might have just stepped off you have a lot of chaos going you're saying yeah you could you could strike it I don't I don't see a need for it I agree with I agree with what Dustin said and I agree with striking I do have a question on the traffic visibility visibility triangle is there any definition on how big that should be depends on what the intersection is but that's what's being deleted oh the the visibility triangle I thought you added that the any traffic visibility triangle was the first sentence on this one right here or re-rager the one I I'm looking now 3.4c no yeah sensor shrub yeah so so it now will read no wall fence or shrubbery shall be erected maintained or planted on any lot which obstructs or interferes with any traffic visibility triangle period everything else so what's deleted is on a tangent section or on a curve or corner lot within the triangle area formed by the lot lines along the streets and allowing connecting them at points 30 feet from the intersection so what I'm wondering is if that triangle is defined in size because it it could take up half the lot if there's no definition it's subjective all right so then I say that we just strikes the whole thing keep keep what we had and not put a propose for that so I noted this one is that agreeable okay yeah I'm back to the fence a little bit so just a point is kind of pandemic but if the fence is on the line of the easement they have a concrete footing to for the post can the footing go into the easement or not so if anything goes in the easement public works is taking it down and it's at so they just have to know that they can't put in a concrete footing that right if they want to use concrete they may want to be half a foot in to allow for the concrete footing okay so I just have to know that okay so the next one all fences or walls shall conform to 24 vsa blah blah blah just a sentence added to the end all fences shall be maintained in an aesthetically pleasing condition at all times have fun with that one zoning administrator okay so that's bad no well that's it are you gonna see your head that the judging jury unesthetically pleasing yeah no that's why I said that's bad right right to me no so is there a way we can capture what are we trying to do so complaints are coming in that people aren't taking care of their fence and it's leaning and it's it's this and you know mine it's like sorry that's a about about structural make structurally maintain center I mean in a structure yeah no structurally maintained yeah that that because shall be structurally maintained yeah that that accounts for disrepair that accounts for tipping that accounts for at all times okay okay good Kent's got to think about that one but that's okay that gets away from the the offenses shall be um structurally maintain at all times is how it's gonna read so yes I don't know about all time okay just because I mean if if if breaks in the winter and if right if something happens and you can't get out there and do something right it just needs to be structurally maintained right fine next offenses maybe are erected on the side in rear property lines and shall not exceed eight feet in height and shall not block any traffic visibility by the roadside fences shall not be placed atop one of of one another that doesn't read so well but and you know where we're going with that one the land owner shall repair or replace the fence in a timely manner any non-transparent fence located in the front yard shall not exceed 29 inches in height unless it meets the front yard set back for the zoning district in which it is located so front yard or front property line as front proper front yards could also include a sideline side so um are we looking for road frontage so these changes were were um similar to what when we were merging what the village had okay so here's my two cents number one we strike the eight foot we leave in the fences on top of each other and we strike if you want to the height limitation it's only in the on road frontage that's my thought and now you guys can poke on that and doesn't the the land owner shall repair or replace the fence at a timely manner how does that jive with all fences shall be structurally maintained yeah it's redundant seems it well yeah we we don't need that part you could actually take that in a timely manner and put that into the what we talked about because that would account for if there's damage during the winter and you can't get out there and do it because of weather conditions or whatever okay so take out in a timely manner and put it in to the other the one that we recrafted okay I'm going to show repair or replace the fence right no the structurally maintained in a timely manner right all fences shall be structurally maintained in a timely manner oh that doesn't do well either let's just strike it in both spots okay we have issues with fences um never now and then it kind of goes in spurts okay before we go off from that okay Ethan you had a question uh yeah I just want to circle back to the triangle because uh I was just curious when you when you say easement is that like right away from centerline because that is based on the class of the road which should be easily identifiable in all the all the separate districts so what I hear is two now comments I say we don't make any change to what it's then we just keep keep the triangle discussion in there so no change to A or whatever number it's because like a 10 a 10 foot easement wouldn't that be a 25 foot well we're mixing two things though centerline the easement they were talking about was for for fence structures along town property oh okay triangle with sight distance you know sight distance from exiting a property exiting an entry onto a property so entrance or egress whatever the way so it's like a corner like alder lane you know if you're coming up to the stop sign you can't put a fence on your property line okay so just fences yes I was thinking like shrubs and brush and well that's what says no no wall fence or shrubbery shall be erected maintained or planted because in you know like different scenarios that I've seen throughout the town the town maintains a clear path of vision and from my understanding is I don't know if they've been using the triangle method or if it's just happens to be that way but it was always based off from center line of the road the road was 25 25 but the center line they went 25 foot 25 foot and they drew a straight line and that's where you need to be able to see that's on a straight line we're talking we're also talking about corner lot so that's what I mean on a on a corner lot you go 25 foot on osgoode 25 foot on handling and they need you know it would let's just say it's 13 feet from B going to a residential area though and look at that look at a lot coming up when you have two houses and then fence coming up they went out onto 35 mile an hour road and if you have a let's just say you have a huge cedar bush there what discretion do you have to maintain the safety of the of the public on of on a town road going on to a state highway yeah you know what I mean a little bit given that we're talking about fences on on property slightly different slightly different target I mean this is a fencing section that we're proposing languages so I think sharing your point of leading it the way it was I agree it's good yeah yeah or um Lorraine has a question now Lorraine used up all her questions or no Ethan took you used up I got one more and you're gonna hit the point next Lorraine go ahead yeah Ethan you can keep the questions down thank you chair just curious can I just have a little background of context for I live on the roof 15 so I'm just curious about the the genesis of the was it 29 inches on a front yard why why the fence why do we want a 29 inch why is that limitation to my front yard I think it's what it's what Sharon mentioned that was more of a carryover when we were looking to potentially align with the village before the separation was formalized and we were looking more towards continuity so I think the 29 inches so if you're driving a car you can look over it and see oncoming traffic before you pull out that's the but that has to do with the visibility if the visibility is there and you're here with the step back the reason I asked because those of us who suffer from the the noise and the pollution on roof 15 one of the mitigation that's recommended is a solid fence and so I'm also concerned with setbacks from being on a highway having having a close house that's close to the road that wasn't well trafficked like it is nowadays when it was built and then also knowing someone that just went through a thing where they discovered their setback was in their living room so there are some houses that the setback is you know it didn't seem like it was grandfathered in and to me are we even reviewing what the what the setbacks are and who's impacted by that and also kind of limit what I can do to mitigate some of the issues with living here so remember that that many of the houses in in that area were built prior to the zoning regulations existing right oh the discussion of setbacks and so forth you know if you get a 38 40 foot setback from the road in your house is that 38 feet you're kind of stuck great and I'm personally aware of that situation as well I'd like to make a suggestion that I just take another stab at this and kind of now that we're at a different place I bring you back what might be a sentence or two that might be our word or two or three different so we can just move on from the fences and you can relook that good in other words she's telling us to be quiet there's one more part in the fencing that needs to be addressed is the 50 miles of fencing that needs to be removed for this change on tower zero because it says there will be no barbed wire electric fences other than ARC one and R1 I think ag and I'm central that all that property that 119 acres is a central what was it isn't that ag though nope it's center isn't it zone blue no I know not the zone isn't it an ag use you're talking about the past set set of cells right it's an ag use it's exempt it's exempt okay right under that wording yes I think it's in there all right let me look under under state stature too I believe I believe okay I just saw the word I'll check I'll check that that has been one of our operating assumptions for couple decades which is why sugaring operations go in where they go in and cows can go where they go and barns can go where they want to go and not or in the house that's true okay Sharon okay park that one for the time being you're going to read read re-massage that re-massage that one yep so article three section 3.6 height waivers you see something where it says the zoning administration that was a question mark there I've answered that and so that's not going to be proposed I just deleted f in an eye rooftop solar and win because that mirrors table 1.1 so that's just a cleanup table 3.5 signage I added a mark key sign in the mxd pud b1 you guys should you know I just kind of picked some numbers here for square footage so when you get this document back you know when you'll have another review we can discuss it then unless you have feelings about that size area of 80 square feet and height of 15 feet did you just sort of I asked I asked the person who asked for it yeah and so I'm sorry I'll sit there for a second so if and then a couple more things about signage but if you have no no issues I can move on backyard I have a question so sorry on this on the marquee so yeah 15 feet high 80 square feet that's only like five feet long yeah this person didn't wasn't sure what to ask for you've got to give me something well okay it seems odd I'll try to I'll try to firm it up unless you guys have suggestions I can give an example of what what they're looking for to see whether or not you know maybe I'll have them find out again isn't it didn't they bring it compared it to the size of the Flynn marquee sign it's a lot bigger so okay so I'll I'll look into that I think your point Tom we asked for the right amount and not right ask for a waiver later yeah right okay um section 4.2 chickens I added a sentence except lots located outside the ARC one zones are greater than 1.5 acres shall be allowed up to 12 female chickens so so some of the lots like our one might have a you know it's a I think a one acre lot but they might have two acres two and a half acres do you want those lots that have more acreage the lots that are greater than 1.5 acres shall be allowed to have up to 12 female chickens with all setback requirements being 50 feet from the property line which is what is existing so did you want to create that exception for the AR lots located outside the ARC one zone so that could be in our two zone too or do you want to just keep it the way it is does anybody bug you to make it yeah somebody somebody has a it's in the R1 zone and they sell chickens by I think six pack when you buy them so which is why I put 12 there I stopped for a six pack a bud late ones but I've never stopped for six pack chickens not yet just just to add to that it's the state wall that you have to buy six that you can buy seven eight nothing to tell you oh okay so that's no it's just losses that you know that it's now a state wall so it's like 2015 because people would buy two chickens for the two baby chicks for their kid at Easter and then dump the chickens at my house any other farmer or whatever you know they'd be on the side of the road stuff like that so just for clarification you have to buy six but you can buy many after that so so everybody has full permits have fed when they go to the stores to buy them they only sell them by sit yet by sit so that's why yeah that's why well now we know so yeah okay so you're fine with that residential care home residential care homes that language was deleted but that was approved previously and evidently didn't make it into the rig so we can skip that plan unit developments well clearly we didn't get to that so so so sorry it's not in red so I'm surprised by that well it says that you guys need to do another review so it's it's already called out that it's not ready for prime prime time right but I don't know if that was just carried over from from the minutes it's not ready ready for prime time okay are you interested in seeing it with with the package or is it on the list well can I ask is that last one remember we had that presentation by rich gardener yes so I don't want to I mean that was we said we would we're open to to talking about that so I'd hate to if there's an easy fix there I don't know if there is but I'd like to I think we ought to do with just a discussion on PUDs yeah I agree just just a discussion on PUDs before you get a chance to leave sorry if we're if we're thinking about tiny homes with PUDs then it's probably less it might be less than five acres well that was another question I have in there oh forget so it might be it might be a step we need to take anyway yeah I don't think my my thought and we're not talking PUDs tonight but we we're we started at six we dropped to two we're back to six is six too high I mean two is too low acres are dwelling no no dwelling six dwelling units is six you know six I mean you guys that's a dramatic going from a six to a two but I'll bring that back up when we start I think let's let's talk about PUDs because there's yeah we're gonna we're either gonna get rid of it or we're gonna make it more robust and usable yeah and not something that each time it comes in we have to yeah completely re-evaluate what are we thinking well that's why I'm trying to get some clear answers from you Shay okay so see minutes of 10, 27 page you got two minutes left to get any clear PUDR zone and answers from us she just so in a dig there was no sneaking you it was like okay that was my PUDR discussion so I see I did it lastly okay so lastly just to tell you that we are shooting for the May 25th as a public hearing and maybe you might get some minor little tweaks as a result of this at that meeting we'll bring them to you sooner if we can do that okay that's all I have there hmm questions John Chu I'm good no okay audience good okay then we have a minute we have minutes after both of them or just one of them I got the minutes for March nine one was a set as a reference okay so I'd like a motion for the minutes of March nine I thought I wrote Tom's I'll move approval second David Tom any discussion does anybody want any modifications to the minutes of March 9th as presented all those in favor all right closed minutes carry five zero Josh Commissioner Knox says I have to leave the meeting hey Sharon I was at that meeting okay uh yeah I have you down there do you have a virtual were you in in the room oh no he was not you were virtual oh there it is up there I sorry I was looking at the others present my bad sorry I'll be quiet I'm sure yeah and I have one more thing before then other business yeah other business so just and I apologize I didn't get this earlier but back to the rags things that we didn't include the hotel as a use in the business control district is that something that we want to consider I thought that we had that discussion in it was proposed on the other side of the road Maplefield side and not on the other side okay all right and then the other businesses I'm leaving you all you have to be more specific I apologize yeah so I'm gonna uh be done end of May so for our first you'll be here for our first public hearing yeah I'll be here for that so I'm sorry to lose you all but we'll miss you Tom yes moving on yeah I don't think we voted on that thank you so much thank you for being part of this it's been been nice okay anything else nothing for me movie adjourned second all those in favor all right hi we are adjourned 832