 Still not seeing Jen. I know what's going on, but not seeing her and I'm not getting a response from her via text. Fletcher, do you want to just start the show and then we'll, if, if she's able to join will. Yeah, that's fine. I can get started. I'm ready. Welcome, everybody. It's the town of a response race commission Wednesday, January 25. We're doing a little bit of technical difficulties, but we'll start moving along. As the vice chair, I don't have any comments. But I will take it away to Dave, you want to fill us in some what's been going on. Fletcher, I think for the sake of time and the length of the number of hearings and matters before the commission, I think I will. I will just reserve my comments till your next meeting. Okay. Appreciate that. Let me just give me a few moments. I'm happy to jump right in. Yeah. So I talked to Jen today about the land use policy. She is going to, she basically has said that because of her work schedule, she'd prefer if Dave and I just sort of finalize the document and she'll take one last look at it before we put it into use because she just, she didn't think that she was going to be able to, to make it happen. And then, then the other quick item was the polar plunge request, which was a land use application. I believe Kathy. Yes, she is here. I'm going to pull her in if that's okay. Fletcher. Yeah, that's fine. That's great. And also just let me know if you don't hear me. I have issues with this microphone. Kathy. Yeah. Good thanks. Hey, do you want to just kind of give us a rundown of the polar plunge? What do you want to do at Puffer spawn? So, we are interested in doing a polar plunge. I work at the Center for Women and Community and we are a nonprofit based at UMass. And each year we do a fundraising and awareness raising event in the community and started during COVID and is kind of morphed, but last year we did a hike the notch challenge and this year we were interested in doing a polar plunge challenge. It happens in April as an event to raise awareness around sexual assault and services that we have. And so the idea is that we would have like a two hour block. We have a day morning at Puffer's pond and invite folks to register in advance. They'd have a waiver to sign. We did get a certificate from insurance from UMass for the day where people could come and plunge in the cold water basically. You know, we'd have educational table was available on the beach for people who weren't plunging about services and topics that we work with for anti-violence work. And in preparation, Aaron, Aaron was kind of helpful and guiding me on kind of what what I would need to do to start looking into this and so I talked to the Amherst police chief. I mean, the fire chief who said that they don't have an approval process necessarily, but Tim Nelson was the chief that I spoke with and he said he's happy to talk with anyone about concerns. He did give me the name of one of their medical guys who does kind of coordinates the EMTs and the rescue folks and gave me some things to think about in terms of what we would want to have there. And it seems like there's all sorts of safety levels that you can work with, but there would be like two guys after hours or two staff after hours that, you know, we wanted to have like people water safety certified and all that kind of stuff. But I didn't get further than that in terms of making a solid plan for what we would do UMass has its own EMTs. And it seems like South Hadley has done one of these before and so I was going to reach out to them to see if what they put in place you know because I think you could have EMTs on the ground you could have EMTs in the water, there's all sorts of different ways to go on that so I'm still investigating that. I do have a drafted liability waiver. I don't know whether we'd have to do water quality testing at that time period on what that would entail. And I also know that there are folks that do the in water training at Puffers and so we could also figure out where I think there's some areas where you can walk in and, you know, you can just keep walking in and gradually decline and then I think that there's some areas where there's drop offs and so my hope is that we would be able to figure that out and kind of nowhere to instruct people or have ropes or something so we don't get the drop off areas. And we would have to get porta potties and we got, we found out where that happens and it seems like two porta potties that are ADA accessible is the way that we would go for that. So there is, there is a company that does do trash, but they bring trash barrels and pick up. I don't know how big the event will be at this point I imagine like 5050 participants would be my guess. But, you know, if worse came to worse we can load up the trash in our cars that's kind of a nonprofit that's kind of what we're used to doing is, you know, everything ourselves but we have funding to not have to do that as well so if you all wanted us to make a choice we could do that. And what else. So trash removal, the parking. I think we would just act as if we were, you know, folks at the beach so during the summer there's parking and think all down that street so I don't know if that works for the town but that would be my guess and then we could let Amherst police department know that that's happening. I don't know if there's any other considerations that I didn't think about or that you will have concerns about. Keep on working on it. Well, great. Thank you. Just one thing about, as you said, is it free or is your, are you charging. It's just a fundraiser. It's a fundraiser but we always the way that our event is set up is that we value people spreading awareness as much as we value as much as we value people giving money and we don't want to the event to like, make it prohibitive. And what we're going to try and do is like encourage certain fundraising like, you know, for sponsors for people to get sponsors and raise money but they don't have to and so there's no cost to attend. And that porta potty thing you said you just wanted to have to or was that that come from our side. I don't know. I think that was. I guess, so yeah, I guess we're getting that and Dave's got a question, Laura's got a question. Dave, why don't you speak to this a little bit more about what your thoughts are on. Yeah. So, yeah, a couple of thoughts. First of all, I appreciate all the work that you've done in advance of this meeting and it sounds like you've you've hit on a lot of the important points. I also I guess would not want to take too much of the commission's time tonight. No, because it seems like some of these, these issues need to be worked on over the next couple of months this event is not until April so, you know, I would be happy for the commission to kind of charge staff as we often do with many events on information land once if you're in agreement to allow this to happen we could work on the details later with the applicant but it sounds like you know my most important thing, or a couple of things were the liability. I think it's it's pretty critical that you actually have those off duty firefighters on the beach. I don't think you need them in the water. Certainly we could certainly arrange for you to meet with our staff, our field staff to talk about where you want to do this I presume you'd want to do it on the main beach off of State Street. I will say that even though this is being done in April I didn't catch the date what is the date again it's early April. Yeah, so, so that water is going to be quite cold even though it's April a lot of polar point plunges happen in January December January February but it's still going to be very cold and buffers. But I think, you know, we could work out a lot of the details with you further I do think having porta potties there would would make sense I'm not sure you need to have the ADA porta potties. I think one for that size group might be fine, but we can talk about that. I also want to kind of work with you a little bit because April is also a big fishing month. So, I can also see that there would likely be Fisher, people fishing on the on the main beach in April. I think a lot of those details we can work out with you, you know as the event gets closer but liability insurance requiring that you have those EMTs on the beach makes perfect sense porta potties parking should be fine on State Street. Yeah, so I'm happy to help if the commission has additional questions of you and and or of me. And a quick question. Is there going to be a limitation on the number of participants I know it says between 1500 but is there going to be a cap number. I didn't plan on having a cap number, because when I figure, like what happens there in the summer is like it can kind of hold a bunch of people I just imagining we haven't had more than that register for any of our challenges in the past. So, and we're like narrowing down our pool of crazy people that will jump in the water and cold right so I don't think we're going to get more than that but you never know and you know I one of my concerns was more just because of the the campus being right there and liability in terms of kids who are, you know, something a little bit wild and like what would I mean but that's why I think Sunday morning is kind of a better time to offer it so that's what we're hoping to reduce the potential impact of students are getting too excited about it because it would be your land Sunday. Yeah, you have a quick something. Sorry, it took me a little bit to get the mute off. I'm just wondering if maybe you would be able to like cordon off a little area there, just for your own, for your own reliability purposes just to make sure that this is the area people go to and kind of keep the keep the rescuers focus a little bit narrowed down and so on I'm sure you can take care of that with you can address that with the fire department and so on but. Yeah, and I think I don't know if you have field people who kind of know the layout of the river I mean the layout of the pond that would be good because I mean I'll go in there I will go in there and figure it out. If somebody already knows that that would be good and according enough if there are drop offs would be a smart thing. We can we can work with you on that I mean, you know, I've never done a polar plunge but I used to be a competitive swimmer and and I am very familiar with them and yet people do want to, you know they want to dunk their head and get right out for the most part. So this is not a spring triathlon so they want to get wet and get get the heck out of the pond so we can we can work with you on that I think I think kind of narrowing the focus is a good idea so we can work with you on that. Thank you. I was just going to say that at least in the summer if you're facing the pond from main entrance the left side is like the kids side which is more gradual and beachy and then the Fisher men and women are usually on the right side where the river comes out so there might be some easy natural separation between uses and also just waiting in so that's just my pro tip. Good point, very good point. So, it sounds like Aaron and David you'd be willing to work with Kathy here. I guess that there's any issues like come back to the conservation commission or is it. I feel like you guys can probably work this out. I mean I'm in favor of it. So I don't know. I think as long as the commission is supportive of it, you know, I would encourage you to, you know, approve it subject to, you know, some of the things we've talked about, working with staff on parking, the fire department is liability insurance and you know, focusing the event itself in one part of the beach and not taking over the entire beach so other people coming to the, to the two puffers can do their thing whether they're fishing or, or whatever. And I think Michelle's suggestion is probably focused on the left side of the main beach off of State Street makes sense. Excellent. All right well that sounds like we're moving forward there so anybody want to make a motion. I'll make a motion to approve the polar plan scheduled for April 2, 2023. Laura on there for motion. So I can do. You go Cameron. You go Kathy yeah there we go. We're getting it you get that polar plan. I'm sorry, voice vote Laura. Do I have to do voice vote. Yes, Jen. I, Andre. I, Michelle. I, Cameron. I, and I for Fletcher. Let's talk to David and Aaron and then you guys I'll finalize some stuff like all the things that Dave just listed for you and. All right, we challenge all of you to attend. You're going to say that right. All right have a good night. Thanks so much appreciate it. Take care. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I don't know what the thing was I went through three years. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I'll take over. What time is it. We do want to do another other business item we have until 730 of eight minutes Aaron. Yeah. We got a request for an extension to order of conditions for the southeast Commons property, which is the large project that's behind Florence savings bank. I went out and had a look at the property. Overall, they're in compliance. They've been providing weekly monitoring reports to me. There was a couple issues with erosion controls behind the construction trailer. Just, there's like one section of failed controls and then there's a piece of like some kind of construction debris foam that's behind the controls that needs to be cleaned up. Other than that, the site is in good shape. The monitor, the replication area looks great. So, the owner has requested an extension to August 31 to 2024. I would be fine with that extension. Usually applicants will ask for a full three years and this is, I think, a good opportunity for us to have a short extension and continue monitoring the restoration area, give them a little more time to button up the site and I can take care of addressing the outstanding issues on the site before I release the extension. I do have site visit photos if you're interested in seeing them. Is there something else we can cover in four minutes? Or should we look at some photos? Yeah, I'll show you some photos. I can get a sense of what it looks like out there and they might be in backwards order. I apologize. I was kind of scrambling to get these uploaded. Yeah, so this is going backwards. This is going from Florence Savings Bank side. This, I did ask them about this because this is an outfall for the storm water system, but they've told me that this is just a puddle that seems to be forming. This pipe is not actually discharging water at this point. It's not online. The retaining wall is up, which looks looks good and actually is kind of a nice because it eliminates that slope there. The erosion controls along this section are in really good shape. And I'm going to mention to them about snow storage because they've been pushing the snow storage up against the replication area a little bit and it hasn't gone over the fencing, but I'll just mention to them about snow storage. Yeah, the replicate that's the replication area it's it's doing really well looks great. It's holding water. This is the area of concern behind the construction. This is the construction debris that's back behind the fence but you can see it's like this. This fence is flapping in the breeze there's no straw waddle here so I'm going to get them to correct that. You see is that everything. This is just looking back at the wetland and then from the street. If you're okay if you're comfortable till till then, I'll make that to make a motion to extend it to say August 2024. August 31, 2024. August 31, 2024. Can for a second. Again. So a second for Michelle voice vote Michelle. Hi. What's your. Hi. Cameron. Hi. Laura. Hi. Andre. Hi. I'm also an eye unanimous. Great. Okay. So let me see what else can we cover in four minutes. I'm assuming we don't want to get in. Do we want to talk about the DPW memo now, maybe. Sure. Yeah. Let's let's cover that quickly because they're not planning on coming so. Right. So I can introduce this topic. So this is something I mentioned briefly at our last regularly scheduled meeting. What is the location of that. All that they dug up Aaron. It's a great question. Let me see if I can get the address. I want to say it's 400. I want to say it's 400 West street. It's definitely on West street. I don't remember the number. But basically there was the DPW went in and cleaned out. I don't remember the number. Probably at some point was some sort of culvert. But it's clear from the photos, which I can try to pull up Aaron. If I got them. That I mean, this was like an excavator on their uncovering a culvert that had been buried by years and years and years of accumulation. So that was like an excavation of a culvert. Instead of regular maintenance of a culvert. And when Aaron, so there was a complaint about it. And when Aaron inquired with the DPW, there was pushback and a reference to this being kind of regular maintenance activities are not requiring any kind of. RDA or NOI. But clearly that is not regular maintenance. That is like reclamation of a culvert that's been buried for a long time. And I think the best route is to encourage the DPW to have some sort of blanket NOI to cover these ish, these items that are just more than regular maintenance, very similar to what we have with UMass. And that will kind of take the stress off of Aaron to communicate about every single thing like this that comes up. And hopefully encourage communication and kind of collaboration between us and the DPW. I see your hand Laura, just let me get through this. Okay. I'm going to start with the intro. And so we need to accomplish two things. One is encouraging them to clean up that site. And two is kind of thinking about how we would move forward on a blanket. Like NOI. That's not a like lift. So we're going to have to think hard about like. Kind of how we. Help them do that, essentially. So we were thinking the best approaches to kind of write a memo. And say, like referencing this site, this is more than regular maintenance. Please, you know, put in some sediment erosion controls and clean up the site and let us know like what the best forum to work on collaborate on some sort of NOI for situations like this that are more than just maintenance. Okay. Erin, did you want to say anything else about the details of that? No, I think you covered it beautifully. Okay. Laura, did you have a question? Just really briefly, I had a question. I was reading the, the email thread. Is there, it seems like, and maybe I didn't, there might be context and missing, but it would seem like, even though of course we're going to keep comments anonymous, it would seem like we would want to share with DPW. I don't have any complaints that we receive about their work just in general. And it seemed as though there was a reluctance to do that in the email thread. And I was just curious why, because if I provided an anonymous complaint, I would actually hope that it would go. I mean, that's how people improve their work. So I was just curious as to why we didn't, why we weren't transparent there. Yeah. So that's, thank you for bringing that up, Laura. Thank you. Thank you. The, the notification about that work came to me third hand. So a resident contacted another staff member and then that staff member notified me. I went out and did the site visit to confirm if it was accurate. There was nothing provided to me in writing. I didn't even know the person's name other than there was excavation going on at this location. There was an implication made by the DPW director that I had some information to forward to them. And I don't really know where that came from because I didn't say there was a lot of complaints. I just said I was notified that there was work going on here and I didn't know who did it. And it kind of like spiraled out of control in the email chain. And in the end it was the implication was made that I was trying to withhold information, which was absolutely not accurate. I said, it came to me third hand. I don't have anything in writing to share with you, but my, my ordinary practices that if a complaint comes to me in writing or otherwise, if somebody wants to remain anonymous, I won't share that with anyone. If it's a verbal, I won't share it, but if somebody doesn't care or wants to be known, then I will release it. But I have no problem releasing if I had like a series of complaints and I, for example, blacked out someone's name or something. Yeah, exactly. Even if it was anonymous, you don't have to say who was, but okay, I just wanted to clarify that. Yeah, no, I appreciate that. And I mean, the long and the short of it is that. This was a violation. So it kind of doesn't matter where it came from. Now that we know that it's there, we have to figure out how to get it fixed. Yeah, no, I would, I just want to make sure as a policy, like as a government, everyone's like, Hey, I hear all these things coming. I'm passing it over to the right group. Right. Totally. Yeah. So do you feel that a memo with a, after we just, what we just covered there. This is a DPW okay with this idea. Yeah, I mean, my thought was about this or we're talking first, we're going to throw a memo at them about a blank NLI or is there already conversations happening with this one? Or is this all going to happen? Well, my thought was to also in the memo, invite DPW to come talk to the commission and say, we'd like to have an open dialogue with you. If, if you guys would like to have a conversation with us more than welcome, I also shared examples of several, I got several examples of bundled notice of intent from DEP, the other towns use just to try to help them out. And I offered that I would help in any way I could. So I've been trying to keep that line of communication open. It's what's difficult for me is like sort of the checks and balance because it's another department. And I want to make sure I'm being transparent that this happened and I'm working with them to try to resolve it and also be clear with DPW that like we have to follow up on this and make sure that we have a policy in place. Great. And in this case, we need to be kind of the structure and the backbone for this because it's not a good position to have Erin enforcing her colleagues in these situations. That's just. Yeah. It's just. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, right. But Flutter, you know, I hear what you're saying. We got under. We got to follow through the steps. So I'm just wondering. Yeah. That's all. I was wondering if a memo was enough. Yeah. I mean, the other thing we could do is. Email them. Right. Like, you know, what, uh, I guess, like, Do you think that there's a less formal compromise that kind of. Yeah. I mean, I already emailed and, um, there hasn't really been any follow up on it. And I felt like maybe if it came from the commission. That it would be. A little more, uh, a little less of an optional, um, response and a little more of like, we need you to do this response. Right. Yeah. I think that there's also some like. Document trail that will extend into different, you know, director ships and staff. With that as well. In addition to whatever else you guys think it's appropriate, but yeah, I think formal is good. Okay. Yeah. I agree with you guys. I think, uh, I think that this point, if the emails, uh, we haven't. Produced much in terms of reaction than. A memo and we can talk. Talk to them. Okay. And, you know, we can share Aaron, I'll draft something really short. Maybe you can share it with a commission for feedback. Um, and make sure guys that I'm hitting the right tone. You know, like the goal is to be collaborative, but we need to have a system here because this is an affair basically, and they violated the Wetland Protection Act. So there's that. Alright, so just let me know anyone raise your hand or if you have any further concerns let me or Erin know, but otherwise sometime in the next week you'll get something from Erin to look at. I won't go from there. I'm seeing nods, thumbs up. Okay, okay, thanks everyone. With that 736, I think we can jump into our first hearing, which I think I have to open. Oh yeah, thanks Erin. Sorry, I'm gonna have a hard, Jen, I'm gonna make you co-host because now that I'm sharing my screen I can't see if somebody raises their hand. Okay, okay, so I'll just open this. So, okay, so how do I open an ANRAD, I guess, with NOI? I would use NOI and just substitute ANRAD with it. This public hearing is now called to order. This hearing is being held as required by the provisions of chapter 131 section 40 of the general laws of the Commonwealth and act relative to the protection of wetlands as most recently amended and article 3.31 wetlands protection under 10 Amherst general bylaws. This is the abbreviated notice of resource area delineation and RAD, coarsely wooden group on behalf of the town of Amherst for confirmation of resource area boundaries at 70 Southeast Street. This is the Fort River Elementary School. Is there gonna be anyone here, Erin? Yeah, so there should be Amy Ball and I can start sharing to help. Amy Ball and I'm there, let me think, let me jump out for a second so I can look in the list. Donna. Yes, yes, Donna Dinesco, yep. Okay, I got her. And if there's anyone else in the audience who is representing this ANRAD application, please raise your hand. I see you, Amy. Hi, Donna. Hello. I think Tim Cooper. Okay, I see him. Thank you. Yep. And I don't know if Kathy Shane is in the audience. She is, should I bring her in? That would be great. She is the proponent and the last person would be Margaret Wood, who is the owner's project manager for the project. Got it. I think, I think that's all of us. Oh, wow. Okay. Thank you. Yeah, of course. Hi, everyone. So I should have gone over this at the top of the meeting, but I'll do it now just so you guys know the way we run these hearings is we usually shoot for about maximum of 20 minutes per hearing. And the way we delineate that is a five minute overview by the applicant or the applicant's representative, five minutes of kind of update and comments from staff kind of where we are on the punch list of the application status and any site visit photos, five minutes for a public comment where we really try to keep it to one to two minutes per person, and then five minutes for questions and comments from the commissioner. We try to be really clear about if we're not able to close the hearing kind of what further information we need if we continue in order to move forward at the next meeting. So with that, if the applicants and applicants representatives, if you guys want to introduce yourselves and I don't know, Donna, would you be the one kind of presenting the status of this and rad? Actually, I'll turn it over to Amy Ball, of course, Ruth, but while I'm unmuted, which I'll just say my name's Donna Dinesco for everyone with Dinesco Design and we're the architects of record for the Fort River Elementary School Project. But I'm going to let Amy do her thing and we're here just to support. Great. Thank you, Donna. Thank you. Good evening. The record involves the senior colleges with a mostly written group. I have a handful of slides, mostly pictures, that I thought I'd share with the commission, if I can share my screen. Yeah, you should be able to share. There should be a, yep, there we go. We see a slide. Slide for the school. Okay, great. So we're here for the abbreviated Notice of Resource Arialization at the Fort River Elementary School. We thought she'd give you a little context. I'm sure most of you probably know where this is in town. It's in the sort of eastern portion of the town itself. It's along the Fort River, which makes up the eastern property boundary. Intermittent Stream Fearing Brook makes up the southern property boundary. And then there's Route 9 to the south and west and southeast street is off just to the west. Again, this is just a quick aerial overview with the property outlined in red. You can see that for the most part, the school's property is occupied by the school itself, a lot of play fields and parking lots. And then there's a sort of a forest portion that occupies the better part of the eastern property. So we're looking to confirm the resource area boundaries of a number of resources that are associated with the Fort River and where the Taring Brook, including VBW, land of the water, inland bank, riverfront area, an area subject to storm flow, and then of course the associated buffers. We fully recognize that there's a good portion of the property is also located within the flood zone or watering land subject to flooding. However, we're not seeking confirmation of that right now under this AMRAD because we understand that the town is in the process of adopting the updated FEMA maps. And that does not become effective, I believe, for at least a couple of weeks until February sometime. So this is a sort of an overall color rendered compiled plan that we submitted. There were 10 sheets, I believe, but this is a compilation of project plans. The school there is obvious. There's the tree line that kind of delineates the areas that are to the east. That is where the Fort River is. In a couple of the areas of BVW, riverfront area is almost exclusively within that forested area. The two wetland areas that we are focusing on for the purposes of the AMRAD are wetland B, which is in the northern part here, and wetland C, which is connected to wetland B for like a 12-inch, I think it's 12-inch pipe. Let's go with that. And then there's this area subject to storm flowage that eventually the waters will get to Fearingbrook. So the BVW little said there are two wetlands area B and area C. These up here on C is this finger-like projection that comes into the fields. Area B is a forested transitional shrub swamp and emergent marsh has an interesting characteristic in that it also extends out beyond the tree line and into the playground area. I should mention if we haven't already that SWCA, wetland scientists, did the original delineation when Horsley-Witton was brought on for the project with the architect from Dinesco Design. We took over their wetland boundary, but then did our own independent assessment of what the resource areas were. And this is one of the little areas that we made slight adjustment from their original delineation to include this area of fragmites that is growing up through the playground chips in wetland B. Wetland C is, as I said, is connected by a pipe beneath an existing pathway. It extends out into the fields just to the west of the tree line. It is more of an emergent marsh situation with a couple of small shrubs in there. This view on the left here is facing more or less north. You can see that we had the resource areas reflagged last August by the Berkshire Design company who did the survey work. We left pins in the ground for safety purposes. This is part of the play areas for the elementary school children. I guess we were going to have a site visit yesterday, but I can understand why we did not, given the snow cover that you all have. So there's just a couple of more views here of this emergent marsh community. This is sort of the opposite view of the one on the left here looking south, and then sort of an oblique view looking back toward the school. There are two or three other BVWs who are not actually seeking approval of the boundaries, so there was limited information provided to the commission. Wetlands D&E are well within the forested portion beyond a chain length fence and are not really going to come into play at all with the future school project. Wetland F is up in the far north western corner of the property. It's largely fed by stormwater, as you can see because there's their twin elliptical culverts that go to discharge from this wetland area through the parking lot across the playing fields in the southwestern corner of the site, and then eventually discharge into the faring brook. So as I mentioned, Riverfront area is located almost entirely within the forested portion. I think there's a small portion of the grassed fields that also fall within the front area to eliminate it by the meaning of high water, the high water of the Fort River. So there's a couple of images of the Fort River, which I'm sure you're all familiar with. And then the faring brook to the south has been delineated as inland bank. There's no little BVW associated with it. It's well defined, scoured out, and is clearly being fed by at least some stormwater from wetland F, if not from other sources. And then there's an area A, and it is this sort of dark shadow, finger-like projection that comes up between the fields in the southwestern corner of the site and the main baseball fields. I think SWCA had originally qualified it as a border vegetated wetland when we took an extra look at it. We found that there were, yes, a few hydric soils within this swale. The photos in the upper right are from the SWCA report, and also very few, a handful of sedges. But when you look in the other direction, the pink flags along the chain link fence here, the one at the edge of the tree line, and the one just ground here next to the pole, those discharge into a stilling basin of sorts. We found that this black pipe here isn't actually an underdrain within the field itself. And so after discussing this with Ms. Shaq in, I believe, was that October, early October that we went out there, we determined that it is more suitable to describe this as an area subject to storm flowage. And while this is not part of the ANRAB process, per se, we also wanted the Commission to be aware that there are some additional site constraints. There will be a future notice of intent filing with the Commission at some point, and Donna can probably weigh in on that timing. But we do have two various PCs, two species of special concern, the wood turtle and the creeper, which is a freshwater mussel. But just to reiterate, the only resource areas that we're looking for confirmation under the ANRAB at this point are the areas BNC for the DVW, general consensus of the land under water bodies in the Inland Bank, and the riverfront area that all comes from the Mino-Hai water flagging, confirmation of the Inland Bank, the fearing book, and then the area subject to storm flowage, and then of course the associated buffer zones, but not the flood zone. And I think that's it. So I will turn it back over to the Commission. Thanks Amy. That was really thorough. I appreciate it. Erin, did you have any additional information or guidance to add? Yeah. So by way of background and my involvement, Amy and Ms. Dinesco contacted me back in October about a site visit, which I attended with them and viewed the wetlands sort of that were in question. I do have photos from that site walk if you guys are interested in seeing them. So just to delve in a little bit more to that swale, because that sort of was a little bit puzzling to me of why they would have included that as BVW. There were no, I mean there was a small section closest to the fence, which was sort of like a pocket of sedges were in the grass, and again closer to the fenced area we could see some evidence of hydric soils, but as you moved north in the swale, sort of adjacent to the ball field, there was, it was just field grass and there was no hydric soils of any kind. So I'm not really sure what was going on there if that was just sort of an overly conservative delineation or what, but I said my biggest concern there was stormwater and historic context I have related to stormwater in that location is that there is stormwater outflow that comes into the faring brook and caused a scour on the brook, which when Beth Wilson did her project to restore the floodplain of the faring, there was that requirement to install that little detention basin to reduce some of the erosion and sedimentation that was happening at that outfall. So I felt pretty comfortable concluding that to be an area that they should ensure is dealt with from a stormwater standpoint, and that they pay special attention to dealing with stormwater adequately in that location, but that it wasn't a BBW. Yeah, I just quickly ask Amy, could you go back to the wetland map that had A, B, C, D? Sorry, Erin. Okay, that's much help. That's better. Thank you. Yeah, so Erin's talking about A, Fletcher. Is this the Sarah down here? Yeah. Okay. Okay. Thanks, Erin. Do you want to share any site photos quickly? Sure. Do I need to stop sharing? I'm not sure. No, I think I can just steal it. So we walked, we walked the entire site and going back, I didn't check every single flag along the river. This was one area, again, Amy addressed this, this was one area where I asked for flagging to be adjusted because clearly there was some encroachment of the BBW onto the playground, and really the playground shouldn't be in that location. And yeah, so very similar, you know, we were both taking photos. This is another photo, the swale is kind of behind here, as I recall, behind the community garden. This is the one plug we found with hydric soils in that area A of the storm flowage area. So, yeah, and we did take a number and you can see that there was no evidence in other locations of anything. There was a test well being done at this point when we were out there for the or the geothermal well that the town was exploring there. Yeah, so that that was that we were going to have another collective site visit. Obviously, there was a big storm on Monday or yeah, on Monday and then the site visit was for Tuesday. So we had to cancel that meeting. There was really no point of doing it. So I think from my standpoint, it was really just to get a read from the commission as to your comfort level with the delineation itself. SWCAs looked at it, Horsley-Wittons looked at it, I've looked at it with them. And just to kind of get a sense of, are you comfortable with the delineation? Do you want to have a site visit prior to approving this? Thanks, Erin. Yeah, so what I was going to say is I think we should take public comment, but commissioners, you know, in my experience with Anne Radz, I think this is extremely thorough and I'm comfortable with it. I think the question is, do we want to delay this to schedule a site visit? Do you guys want to see it? Are we comfortable with kind of Erin's review? So I'll kind of leave you with that thought. Let's take public comment and then come back to a commissioner discussion. So if you are in, if you are an attendee of the Conservation Commission meeting and you have a comment or question about the resource area delineation that we've been discussing at the Fort River Elementary School, please raise your hand. I'll take this moment while I wait for a few minutes to see if anyone has any questions or comments to just say at the top of your comments, if you can identify yourself and your address and then please limit your comments and questions to two minutes. We appreciate it. You have a lot of people in attendance. There are 26 people in attendance right now, but nobody's raised their hands. Okay. I'll keep an eye on it, but I'm not seeing any raised hands. So commissioners, comfort level with us? Any technical concerns about the ANRAD? I don't have any issues. It looks really thorough to me. I mean it's a very wet place, but yeah. I'm surprised to see all that frag coming into the playground. The frag in this one is really special. That should be unlike some educational slide. Okay. Dave, do you have a comment? Yeah, I just want to quickly add, I wanted to concur with Erin about the area A that drainage going toward the Fearing Brook and I wanted to make sure that the team working on the site and Erin, maybe you could confirm with me, does the Dinesco team have all the information from that was part of the earlier NOI for the Fearing Brook project, the floodplain registration, because of course a fair bit of work was done on that on the north side of the Fearing Brook. So have we gotten them all that? I mean we should have as built you know for how that drainage was constructed. Yeah, so to connect the dots, I mean Dave's saying that the town probably has as built with pretty detailed elevations. That could be helpful. That would be helpful. I think Erin could work with Beth Wilson from our DPW to get you that for that area A. That would be great. Thank you. Thanks, Steve. Are you commissioners? I think we're looking for a motion. Make a motion to accept Dan Red from Fort River School. Okay, so I think Erin, will you share a slide? Of course. Yeah, I'm sorry I'm taking notes here. And I did draft a motion that sort of spells out what the and I'm so sorry about the PowerPoint it got hung up in my like outbox somehow it didn't send. No worries. Yeah, so there if you could just read that for for posterity that would be great. There we go. All right, yes, I'll make a motion to confirm the resource delineation is to an order of resource area delineation for 70 South East Street approving only 1121 linear feet of BDW. Is that correct? Yes, that's what was in the permit. Yes. Yep. Thank you. Sorry. Now I see it BNC 700 linear feet of inland bank and 1660 linear feet of riverfront area land underwater slash area subject to storm flowage and buffer zones. Mission will be for a second. Second. That you Cameron. Yes. Okay, voice vote. Fletcher. Hi, Michelle. Hi, Andre. Hi, Laura. Hi, and Cameron. Hi, and I'm also an I great. Thank you Amy. Thank you very much. Thank you everyone. Have a good evening. Yeah, you all too. I'm slowly going through. Okay. All right. Great. Next up. The RDA. Okay, so this is a new RDA. So when we're going to open the public hearing, this public meeting is now called to order. This meeting is being held as required by the provisions of chapter 131 section 40 of the general laws of the Commonwealth and act relative to the protection of wetlands as most recently amended in article 3.31 ones protection under the town of Amherst general bylaws. This is the 735 agenda items request for determination of applicability. Wendell wetland services on behalf of Christopher and dn riddle to determine whether work to install a geothermal well is subject to the wetlands protection act and whether the area and or work depicted on plans is subject to the town of Amherst wetlands bylaw slash regulations at 252 strong street. Do you know if anyone was going to be here for this? If you are an applicant or the applicant's representative, if you could raise your hand so I can bring you in as a panel. Oh, Aaron already did it. Hello. Hi, it's Smith here. Oh, do you hear me? Yep. You can hear you. Thanks, Ward. And we see you. Okay. Okay. Are they there? Are they here too? Yes, they are here. Shall we give you a new one? What would you like? Do you have a copy of the plan you could put up, Aaron? Yes, just bear with me one second. I'll grab it. Yeah. And so just to kind of catch everyone up on this, I think this project is not really a concern. I think this is going to be a negative determination. We just wanted to be sure how the tailings from the well drilling operation were being handled. So I think hopefully that's what Aaron's pulling up is just a detail on exactly how tailings from the drilling itself will be handled. I'm going to do a screen share so you guys can see the plan, but there was an email that provided some details. And we might need a condition to just make sure that we're, you know, make sure that, yeah. I just want to start just an overview of this. The wetland boundary was originally delineated by Chuck Dauchy in 2014 with blue flags, some of which I could still find in the field. I re-delineated it. My delineation was, I would say, generally in agreement with him. His is a little slightly higher in places. The main place it diverged was actually closest to where the proposed geothermal well is going to be. You can see here my flags A16, A17, and A18. The area between Chuck Dauchy's line and mine, I agreed with him it didn't have hydric soils, but it was all sensitive for an dominant soft rush, which is a pretty strong wetland indicator. And I don't know if the hydrology has changed, but I kind of did a cautious delineation in that location. We're about 51 feet as measured by tape in the field from the proposed geothermal well location. The well is going to be drilled and there will be a four-foot deep hole in the ground for the the water coming out of the well, allowing the water to infiltrate. And the water will then be pumped from that pit to a dumpster, which is shown above in the upper right-hand corner of the screen there. A wine dumpster with filter fabric that will be encircled with double-staked hay bales, as will the proposed geothermal well location and the settling pit. Chris, do you want to expand on that a little more? No, I'm not an expert. I'm just going to give you an overview. It says that this is a net zero house here, and we would like to accept for the fact, accept for a small amount, and we're trying to get it up to net zero, and so converting the air source to ground source heat pump will do that. The payback is in the order of 525 years. I just, one thing I failed to mention is all of this is located within an existing lawn, and when it's done, everything will be put back, the soil will be put back, and everything will be restored to lawn. Where will this set, I see the proposed location of lined dumpster, once it's filtered out of the dumpster, where is the pit? There is no pit there, but I'm thinking about it. The pit is going to be over near the well location, between the well location and away from the wetlands. So there's no pit proposed there, but I don't think we have a really good answer for how much water is going to go into that dumpster. I'm hoping it's not going to be very much, but as a precaution, I think we could propose a infiltration trench temporarily to the north. I can't see it on my plan, but there is an intermittent stream. I think it's more than 100 feet away from the dumpster, but it is downhill from the dumpster. So it could be, would be possible to make an infiltration trench, maybe just like two feet deep by 10 feet long on the down gradient side of that, so that any water that comes out of that dumpster, which there will be some, but again, I don't have a good handle on the volume of that, and I don't think Chris got a good answer from the contractor. I've seen this done before, and when it's pumped into the dumpster, it's not a tremendous amount of water, and usually when it's flowing through the filter fabric, it's moving sort of slowly out of the dumpster. I think that putting in an infiltration trench just for that would be a little overkill, but I do like the idea of having the double-staked hay bales along the boundary of the area where the dumpster is going to be, just in case there's any, because I'm not worried about the water, I'm worried about sediment in the water, so the bales would just slow it down, plus that area is all vegetated there, so I think that that'll add to the filtration. I'm also comfortable with the double-staked hay bales around the four-foot pit, I guess, or dewatering area, whatever you want to call it, and the four-foot bales around the well location. Okay, okay, great. Yeah, I guess I didn't know how much water we're talking about. So you have seen these in action then before, Erin, because I have it, and they're kind of up and coming, and there's going to be more and more of them. Yeah, if the dumpster is done right, you shouldn't really even see the water coming out of it, it's kind of just like it drips out in drops, as opposed to a river of water flowing out of it. It moves really slowly. And I didn't mention it, but all of the stuff in the dumpster obviously is going to be taken off the site and removed, so that's the idea for that. Okay, thank you. Erin, did you have, that was kind of your rundown, right? Do you have anything else you wanted to add about this? Let me just look at my slide really quickly. Keep getting kicked out of my virtual, yeah, so my, I did a site visit on 124. I'll show you guys some photos in just a second. I would like to have the name and contact information of the contractor prior to the start of work, do an erosion control inspection and a pre-construction meeting prior to the start of work. I was looking for specifics on the erosion and sediment controls for the dewatering area, but sufficient details been provided to me since I drafted this to have a better understanding of that. And then the site should be fully stabilized upon completion of work and then a final inspection prior to removal of erosion controls. And let me just get to the photos and I'll show you the photos of the site. The delineation looked great. You can see such a clear break in the vegetation here. And when you see the photo, you'll kind of get an idea. You can see where the lawn breaks and you get the native vegetation. And again, you're seeing the soft rush and the sensitive fern right along that border there where the lawn ends. It's, if you can't see it well, it's kind of like right along here in wards flagging. You can see maybe a little bit better in the next photo. Let me delete my invitation. Yeah, it's really hard to see the flags in these photos, but they are there. I did confirm I could see them. This thing's not letting me zoom in, unfortunately. But you can see where the boundary is very clearly on the edge of lawn. And then this stake here indicates where the geothermal well location would be. And then if you turn around and face the opposite direction, this stake here indicates where the dumpster would be. And so this is sort of the edge of driveway. And then there's like a lawn area back here. All right. Thanks, Erin. Let me open up to public comment really quickly in case there's anyone who has a question or comment. If you're here as an attendee at the Amherst Conservation Commission and you have a question or comment about the RDA for a geothermal well on Strong Street, see Sherry. I'm bringing you in, Sherry. Sherry, you're in as a panelist, but you're muted. Oh, you did it again. We should be able to... Oh, yeah, Sherry, we should be able to hear you. Strong Street, which you saw the house in some of the pictures. But I wholeheartedly think this is a wonderful project. And I hope the riddles can go forward with it. Great. Thank you. That was all I wanted to say. I'm in a lot of support of it. Okay. Great. Thank you, Sherry. Appreciate you being here. All right. That's nice. Okay. All right. I think that's good for public comment. Commissioner, does anyone have any questions or concerns about this? Looking good. All right. Erin, do you want to share again and we're looking for a motion? Thank you, Ward and Mr. and Mrs. Riddle for the thorough details. I appreciate that. I can make the motion. Thanks, Cameron. I move to issue a positive determination under the wetlands bylaw checking box three in a negative determination under the Wetlands Protection Act checking box two. Second. The second from Laura, Erin. Voice vote Cameron. Aye. Laura. Aye. Fletcher. Aye. Michelle. Aye. Andre. Aye. Lemon aye. Unanimous for the geothermal well on Strong Street. Thank you. Thank you everyone. Have a good night. Thank you very much. Next up. Another RDA. So this is a new one. Let me open it. Erin, do you want to bring folks in while I'm? Yes. This public meeting is now called to order. This meeting is being held as required by the versions of chapter 131 section 40 of the general laws of the Commonwealth and act relative to the protection of wetlands is most recently amended an article 3.31 wetlands protection under the town of Amherst general bylaws and this by way of introduction is a request for determination of applicability SWCA environmental on behalf of the top of Thomas Reedy to determine whether the area depicted on plans is subject to the Wetlands Protection Act whether work to relocate a historic house construction of a deck and driveway subject to the Wetlands Protection Act and whether the area and or work depicted on plans is subject to the town of Amherst wetlands bylaw slash regulations at 175. I think this is 175 West Street. Yes. Kristen and Tom. Hello. Hi everyone. So you guys know the drill. If you wouldn't mind giving us a five minute overview of the RDA application. That would be great. All right. My name is Kristen McDonough. I'm a certified wildlife biologist and wetland scientist professional and scientist at SWCA. I'm here presenting a request for determination of applicability for Tom Reedy regarding the relocation of an historic house from 174 Sunset Ave in Amherst to 175 West Street in Amherst which is an empty lot on the site. There's an area of maintained lawn and an abandoned garden and the house is proposed to be relocated in the area of maintained lawn. The property is located within priority and estimated habitat and when we started working on this project with Tom we started out as assuming this was just going to be a MISA project review or a Mass Endangered Species Act project review and then we kind of realized mid-process that there were some wetlands to the west side of the lot. So we revised our approach and we got this RDA together. The project is for buffer zone only and the proposal is to maintain the limit of work outside the 60-foot buffer zone. There is some site prep involved with relocating this house including a little bit of grading and the driveway placement. The house footprint is 1,344 square feet in area and there is a an 832 square foot detached garage. We estimate there's about 1200 cubic yards of fill associated with the driveway. We did a sidewalk today with the wetlands agent and we moved a couple of flags further closer to where the house lot or where the house will be placed. I think there's maybe about 20 feet of difference and we haven't had a chance to get our GIS to revise that flagging so I don't anticipate we'll close tonight. We also haven't heard back from Heritage so we don't have our response letter from Heritage yet but we know that we are maybe 350 feet from the Fort River so it's wood turtles we're anticipating a turtle protection plan but there is no riverfront. We did take GPS points out there and we know we're outside of riverfront. I'm happy to do a screen share and show you site figures and site photos if it would be helpful. All right yeah I think just a plan view of the proposed location of the house relative to the resource and I understand Kristen just to reiterate everyone so based on the site visit today they move some wetlands in towards the proposed house site so we have to wait on some final plans. Yeah I do have the ArcGIS map pulled up I can show you that but let's start with the topo so this is the lot it's right on West Street right across from Shays as Erin can attest parking right here is really difficult this is all guardrail it's 116 and right there everyone goes super fast on shade so it's kind of a sticky spot to park at. We did the delineation in September so we have some earlier photos this is kind of facing northeast that's 116 with the guardrail right there this is the driveway it's going to go kind of right in there there are no major mature trees that are proposed to be removed this is facing north again just kind of showing the existing like maintained lawn area this is facing south this is pretty much where the house will go right here and then this is from the maintained lawn facing down gradient towards the wetland which is west so the fort river is way down there and then this is the bvw that we flagged and then right in here I think is where we expanded it kind of right where the photographer is standing is where we expanded it today and that was it's kind of a drainage swale we think and there's a little bit of an upland berm in between the wetland line and that drainage swale that we included in the flagging today and you can see it's all multi flora rose so that's probably why we missed it and then this is this is you know deeper down into the wetland area let me just grab this really quick this isn't clean so forgive me for it being a little bit messy but this was this is an aerial photo this is the existing lawn right here this is pretty much where the house will go this purple line was our original wetland line and then these new flags right here where we're going to bump out the wetland so it is going to move out you know maybe 20 feet or so and we just need to get some calculations from the engineer on what percentage of onsite buffer zone is proposed to be impacted um and revise our wetland line and we'll get that to you along with the heritage response okay just pull up the plans here um this is the site plan so north is actually this way this is a little I would have to turn this to make north going up so just be aware of north goes that way this is the dry boy coming off of 116 this is a big tree to remain I think that's an oak um this pine will remain this maple will remain in this beach will remain this is the this is the it's riprap at the toe of the driveway and there's there is some topography here um we don't have any soil borings to give some more detail on the soil but when I poked the auger in it seemed like there's some shallow ledge or maybe some fill down here this is the grading plan again so this is the driveway north goes to our right and this is the family home that's going to be relocated right here so there is some grading associated with this little bit of site prep this plan shows a straw wattle but Aaron and I spoke in the field today and the applicant Tom you can correct me if I'm wrong but I think we're amenable to um increasing the erosion controls given the site topography to sulfense and straw bales that's no problem that was going to be my first question just amping up um sediment erosion control given the topography and the site prep um that's great thank you Tom do you have anything to add on timing yeah uh great question so we're looking so this is the house that's at 174 sunset Barry Roberts um 175 uh west street LLC they're looking to move that house in March and so that's that's really the timing of it there'd have to be some so I ideally you know I know uh Aaron and Kristen went out there today gave some great feedback we've talked to Phil Henry the engineer he's getting us the the calculations I don't see anything with the you know the change of the wetlands line that's going to be overly detrimental to the project um and so hopefully we get approved you know provided we can get NHSP comment back on by February 8th and then you know ideally we start to do the work uh end of February and prep for that march move and there's just a lot of coordination for the march move because it's coming right down the center of town um north pleasant street south pleasant street all the way down here so yeah I mean that's it as far as our timing goes but I think I mean Kristen did a great job a lot of balance here on the site between proximity to wetlands trying to keep it away NHSP uh you know endangered species and keeping those trees was a big thing too you know there's you'll see that the 24 inch maple the 48 inch oak and then that big beach treat we really wanted to keep all of those trees and so that's why like citing the home where we did uh making sure that as you pull off the the 116 the driveway flattens out for a bit as you'll see before you actually like get into the site so it was just a lot of balancing to get where we got to so uh yeah all those trees um no the the big ones at least are gonna remain we thought that that was an important thing for the site so yeah and this is this is a good shot this really kind of shows where where the house is going to be situated um and then the wetland is to the right of the photographer down here is that the beach tree right there yeah this one yeah all right yeah that's old it's a gorgeous tree okay okay thanks christin and tom that's extremely thorough I think um yeah just seeing the revised delineation and if possible on those new plans just call out the distance between that delineation and the limit of disturbance and then where the building will be just so we know exactly how it is relative to the bylaw 50 and 60 foot buffers um and yeah again moving moving in March it's going to be sloppy like we just know that now so anything anything extra for sediment and erosion control and like again like I'm starting all these hearings now with like I know you know this but proactive communication with Aaron when this is going to happen pre-construction meetings I mean this is part of our boiler plate conditions but I'm saying this as much as possible because there's so much going on in town as you know um anything you can do to communicate with Aaron but we can go through this again um at the next hearing um commission let's see let's um open for public comment quickly um so if you are here as an attendee of the Amherst Conservation Commission meeting and you have a comment or question about the RDA for a single family home at a lot um at 175 West Street you could raise your hand not seen anything again we still have 18 attendees but no raised hands okay commissioners um Kristen would you mind stopping sharing just so I can see everyone I'm sorry thank you um commissioners anyone have any further concerns or questions other than the ones I've kind of forecasted here seeing a nope I'm seeing all right so I think Kristen Tom do you have any can we be any more clear about kind of what information we need in order to close this at the next hearing no thank you yeah I think I I think I have everything that I need it was really helpful talking with the commission and with you Aaron earlier today so we appreciate it thank you yeah awesome Aaron do we have everything that we need for you know just legal stuff in to the commission like did you bring in the stuff today I brought in yeah the advertisement check the certificate of mailing or there's the certified receipt for heritage and the certificate of mailings for butters yeah I think as far as administrative I think you're you're good let me just check my um check my checklist here legal ad fee butters were notified the letter from NHSP we're waiting for um and just the revised plan set I think is what we're looking at looking at great okay so um thanks everyone commissioners we're looking for a motion to continue the public hearing for 175 West Street to February 8th 2023 at 735 and a so moved is fine so moved it's Michelle second second kind of second from Cameron voice vote Michelle hi watcher hi Cameron hi Andre hi Laura hi and I'm also an I thank you we'll see you in a couple weeks see you soon bye okay all right somebody put the coffee on hang in there hang in there with all right um all right so this is a continuation from our last hearing this is the notice of intent ebt environmental consultants on behalf of am had development corp for the installation of approximately 1250 linear feet of waterline at 23 and 28 green leaves drive and replacement of an existing failed culvert culvert and just to remind everyone this is the one where there was an active order of conditions that included a replication at the site um that was in place and we kind of need to get that sorted out because before we can move forward with a new any kind of new permit and associated order of conditions so we were kind of waiting on detailed information on how that was going to get sorted out at our last meeting um Aaron Glenn Glenn somebody Glenn Krawalski yep I see him there I can grab him I just got him a panelist Glenn is the I think he might be the only rep okay did you move him over you grabbed him I I did did he not make it in sometimes it takes a minute that's weird oh there we go he's back there all right oh no the kid it says that he's rejoining the webinar as a panelist ah there he is Glenn we see that you're part of our group but we can't hear you oh you hear me now yes hello welcome welcome thank you um so you wouldn't mind introducing yourself and giving us kind of a three minute overview three to five minute overview of the project and application that would be great Glenn Krawalski from ABT environmental relative to the site that actually began in 1998 for phase one and this was phase two it's a proposed completion of a water line to to loop that water line from building 28 to building 23 through a causeway shown on the original plan I did walk it with Aaron and I believe we we did review the wetland line the piping system is there I believe it's something the town wants to see that we don't have two dead-end lines and this would be to complete that loop line there's also a reinforced corrugated metal pipe excuse me that is rotted and we had proposed to replace that with a plastic hot and plastic pipe and that would go in before we put the we would put the water line in under first and then put the new pipe in at the same invertebrate elevations that would exist there now so that we don't drain the wetland or increase the elevation height of the well we had just today also brought in the replication area which is uh was that the last moment we agree and the commission would and Aaron would most likely I believe want to look at what we submitted today but it was 1926 square feet that was proposed on the road which access is building 23 we did have La Vesta Vega out there last week we've been trying to get them out there for a while to pin the the five corners of that replication area because we didn't believe ebt ink did not believe that it was constructed to its proper width or or depth so that is talking to Aaron was to add that into the notice from 10 we have now to ensure that we have a proper replication we would bring the elevation of that replication up it was it's too deep compared to the elevation of the existing adjacent wetland we did give a detail on my wetland replication detail that I created in 87 and modified in 07 and keep modifying which shows that we would identify the existing adjacent wetland in the field although it is at approximately elevation 175 we would then use rich organic material 18 20 percent by weight bring the elevation of the area that was dug too deeply we would also expand a prior to that point the replication area into a pine grove east in white pine where it didn't appear and I have not been back to see the stake so I have to confess that it was just staked during the rain event late last week I'm out of oxford mass again I'm sorry if I fully explain who I am Glen Kawasaki ebt environment consultants oxford mass since 86 we've been doing these well and consulting and so so we want to ensure that the replication area meets the performance the end of the 1055 4b 1 through 7 clearly there also appears that there's not a hydrologic connection maybe a 5 to 7 foot space although it does have some gray birch in there fact it's also has a quite a bit of that eastern white pine in the separation between the natural wetland and the replication we would make sure that connection is completed for hydrologic connection ensure that obviously we have hydroxyls within 12 inches of the final silk sole surface which would not be hard to get attained in this location where where the present unfinished replication is found okay if that is great I'm going to stop you there for one second I think this level of detail without a plan might be a little bit lost I should have asked Aaron to put it on the screen okay it's okay but I think what we should do given what you've already acknowledged that Aaron got the plan at 2pm today I think with this overview I'm going to propose that we take public comment so we can do that portion of this hearing and then let Aaron take a look and do a full review before our next meeting so we can continue this hearing tonight to our our next meeting on February 8th if that's okay I just think it would be I really appreciate the overview but I think it would be helpful to have Aaron have done a review of the plans and look at the plans as a commission before we go too much more into the detail if that's okay with you who's the chairman one more time yes that will be here for that night but I think I have four other hearings that might also okay you know so it obviously it's nice that it's soon but we'll be scrambling around that evening Wednesday is a very good year yeah so we could continue to two meetings from now if that would be better for you I would just if possible just assume to see how I can fit this in between where I am now going in person to meetings in this zoom so if I have to call in and then describe it when I'm on a phone in the parking lot of some other town hall I would still like to keep moving this thing forward okay I could I could also just say for the record I don't have any issues with this application the installation of the waterline is all temporary disturbance the replacement of the failed culvert is a necessary needed item and also the final corrections to the replication area are also appreciated and necessary so I think I can have a look at it if I have any questions or concerns I can check in with Glenn but I have a feeling once I do the final check of the documents that were submitted today it's not going to be a very difficult next hearing okay great so Glenn I guess the point is if unless other commissioners have very detailed questions based on the information we currently have in front of us I think you should if you can call in we'll try to keep it brief for the for the final hearing next on our next meeting on February 8 but before we get any further let me just make sure there's no public comment if you're here as an attendee oh Judy Posar bringing in Judy can I just reiterate if you could identify yourself and give us your address and then also if you'd be willing to limit your comments to about two comments or questions to about two minutes okay that long yeah I'm Judy Posar I'm a resident at Green Leaves and a lot of us I think are just curious about when this will happen this the water lines and the culvert does it doesn't have a plan of when this work would be done thank you thanks for the question Judy I'm just going to leave you here to have this discussion so for this like what we were just talking about is the permit through the conservation commission and we're talking about being relatively confident that we can issue that at our next meeting which is on February 8 and then so Glenn I'm going to let you take over as to when the work would actually happen weather permitting the applicant again does have the stockpile of the piping at the site it's then just the bedding that goes underneath it the causeway is partially constructed we would look to and I would have a better a very clear answer for you for the next meeting but where I believe we're looking to move forward soon as the probably February would not do anything but there's a potential for March we do know how it could be Titan March or whether wise March April I would say April be the latest but I'll give you a definitive a closer idea as soon as the next meeting or I can email it to Erin when I talk to the two clients within the next day thank you I'm not sure who Erin is that Aaron is our town staff representative so Judy if you wouldn't mind just shooting Aaron an email you can find it on the Amherst Conservation Commission website then she can forward any information from Glenn to you that'd be great thank you very much great thanks for being here all right any more comments or questions from attendees about this notice of intent for green leaves nothing okay Glenn I think we have a plan thank you for being here thank you for improving the replication that wasn't done right the first time we appreciate that and we appreciate the transparency and it sounds like we'll talk to you if at all briefly next time so go ahead I'm sorry I'll be there sorry to do no problem great commissioners we're just looking for a motion to continue the public hearing for uh this is the wrong side the public hearing for what's the address um oh weird sorry about that no no problem I'll get it right move to continue the public oh well that's weird why why the public hearing for green leaves drive to February 8th at 7 40 or at 7 40 p.m all right I will make a motion to continue the public hearing for 23 and 28 green leaves drive to February 8th at 7 40 p.m who who got that was that Fletcher Fletcher got it okay I'm going to do a voice vote Fletcher hi Laura hi Andre hi Cameron hi Michelle hey and I'm also an I all right thank you thank you Glenn have a good night all right so I think we are through everything except uh the Hickory or Ridge order of conditions for 190 West Pomeroy Lane um give me a second um so okay yeah so I'm going I'm going to give a quick recap from where I stand and then I'm going to hand it over to Aaron for further updates but basically where we left off on this was um that we had a special meeting last week um to review minor administrative changes to an already permitted project um and it seemed like all of the engineering changes to the plan were not a problem um but there was um some kind of we needed further information in order to move forward with a cutting plan given the recent um kind of status change of long-eared bats um and also concerns for birds um hibernating and nesting in the trees on the property um so we have kind of some ideas about how to come to a middle ground on that and move forward um but I also wanted to let Aaron provide an update because I um that you guys should know about kind of additional activities and developments on the site that went on this morning um first yeah so um this morning when I was going by at about nine um I saw a couple um tree removal vehicles in the public parking lot of Hickory and I was kind of puzzled and then I saw a pickup truck sort of in the back by the access road so I called Dave first um and then called um Lawrence and um I spoke to Lawrence and Lawrence said oh no they're they must be just be scouting because there's no tree removal due today um so I went about my site visit at West Street and then when I got done with my site visit um connected back with Dave and found out that there was cutting going on so I went back to Hickory um the I guess there was there was a miscommunication between amp and the tree contractor as to what day the work was beginning it was supposed to begin tomorrow um after we meet tonight and um the trees in the eastern array um were almost entirely um removed I think there was a couple still standing but the trees um the new trees for removal the trees that were part of the most more recent request I don't believe were impacted by the cutting today um those new trees uh ran along the access road and those I uh I do have photos so that that they were still standing so um and I as I was there the tree removal trucks were driving down the road so I believe that they had finished what they were doing for the day um so that that is the update of what what happened today um and I do see Lawrence in the attendees so I'm going to pull him in if that's okay with you Jen yeah let me let's uh give me okay sure so the other thing Erin just to add is that you called Lawrence who then stopped work right right right so that's not like they finished for the day and they might come back tomorrow work work is stopped right okay um and then um we we do have a nine a.m. appointment tomorrow morning with dynamic who's a contractor for amp and the tree removal contractor to basically put out there sort of the um town of Amherst expectations um and whenever so this permit is a little bit unique because of sort of the phasing of how we're coming into it and so ordinarily we would have a pre-construction meeting where erosion controls are installed and I go out to do the pre-construction meeting meet all of the contractors discuss the permit make sure they've read it etc in this case um because the tree removal is being done prior to the sort of staging of erosion controls for the initial start of work um we'll be having a meeting with the tree contractor and um dynamic to go over um I want to make sure that each of them sign my order of conditions indicating that they've read it that they understand it um and my expectations for the site staying stable during the tree removal process um etc so and that's pretty standard okay so to recap to you I think two things to take home from this are one the trees cut were permitted so they weren't part of the additional ask for minor administrative change so that's the five kind of trees at issue here were not cut today that being said you know there should have been a pre-construction meeting and Aaron should have been contacted and notified that this was happening um sounds like that has been course corrected and will happen tomorrow instead um but I just wanted to be very clear about kind of what has all gone down on this property since we last met about it um so with that I want to bring in Larry I mean Lawrence excuse me I do the same thing why do I do that it's because we had Lawrence Larry Lawrence as our concom member and it's hard to break that habit of like shortening someone's name yeah that's bad um I won't be offended I'll just uh may not respond I'm sorry Lauren I'm so sorry um do you have any further information about well first of all an apology yes uh it was not the intention to start the tree cutting today there was a miscommunication um the communication between ourselves and dynamic was after Wednesday um they took what after Wednesday to mean from Wednesday rather than at the at the end of the day um you are quite right the trees that were cut down were part of the original permit they were none of the additional trees that we were requested were touched um so uh the other thing was that uh after the meeting uh last week uh and one of the suggestions was to have a biologist um assess the trees before coming down um that was never kind of concluded um as as a as a path forward and as you mentioned the the trees that came down were originally permitted and that that was no requirement for for those trees to to be assessed in that way but there was a biologist that was on site that um examined the trees before they came down to confirm that there was no nesting roosting hibernating uh animals um within that um so yes apologies for that miscommunication um it's not the way we uh intended to start the project um and obviously we will have the on-site meeting tomorrow uh and introduce Erin to all the the other parties as uh as well great thank you Laurence um so I think just to cut to the chase commissioners it um it sounded like a possible compromise spot on those five trees was to have a biologist inspect the trees before they're cut down is that something that we're all on board with and comfortable with would that enable us to move forward with approving all of the minor administrative changes yeah Andre? Yeah I um I've had a chance to look at uh the information that uh Alex had put together and uh sent out to us and Alex great job by the way and thank you um and I have no objections to it at this point great thank you thank you Alex for the work on that and Andre for offering that up front um other commissioners any concerns I think we could be um in a position to move forward on kind of a motion to approve these the entire set of minor administrative changes um so that we can review it in the in the mouth with comfortable Jen great thank you Laura great thanks Cameron commissioners any other questions or comments I'm I'm comfortable can I have um just one minute after we approve it to just comment on the the bat information sure yep after this all over yeah okay cool Dave I see your hand up sure no I I I want to just acknowledge Erin's work and and you know the coming together tomorrow with Lawrence and the entire team makes you know complete sense I also wanted to let the commission know that we will be um I met with a reporter from the Gazette today we're working with amp um we will be getting some press out some things on our website that the project is beginning that will likely go out tomorrow or Friday um I've already had a couple of calls there are some folks who are using the area for dog walking and hiking and what not who may not know that there's going to be 26 acres of solar out on the 150 acre site so our our our intention all along was working with amp to get out some of that information as Erin said this will be a phased approach the trees will come down and the trees will be on the ground for some time as amp's team then works to re-deck the bridge over the Fort River so that equipment can get from the south side of the the fort to the north side to remove the trees put up erosion control and and begin the the project the solar project itself so I wanted to let the commission know that we will be getting some press out on that and I'm sure my office will take some questions and we'll have some emails and uh we'll also put up some additional signage on the site just with kind of a what to expect over the next couple of months so I just wanted to let you all know that that will be happening great thanks Dave yeah and our special meeting last week we brought this idea up to Erin just kind of like getting up front and communicating that work was starting at the site and she assured us kind of filled us in on these plans so um thank you for doing that and thanks for fielding all of the questions that will come there will be questions no doubt yeah absolutely um all right well in that case um Erin would you share your slide deck because there is a motion prepped for this commissioners and we need someone to read it yes and just for the record some of these items have been provided but because of the um hectic nature of the day today I haven't had a chance to look at them so the the motion still stands with the outstanding requirements um I just wanted to make sure that was clear because I know that that amp has worked to get us a couple of things like for example the letter from the engineer I just haven't had a chance to read it the um promise to for the willingness to cover the cost of the footbridge etc Erin um are you intending to include those as conditions um to a revised order of conditions that all of this is provided to the town's satisfaction or is it what do we present I'm sorry could you say that again um Lawrence so are you going to condition um the the the information that you're requesting um as part of a revised order of conditions or are you going to want us to to represent us such time that you've had that chance to review no the idea is um it's basically saying that the the commission would be approving the changes that were presented to them on the 18th um with the conditions that like the letter be provided which it already was I just haven't looked at it yet um with the condition that the um final plan be stamped um by the engineer the um containment details are provided prior to construction um etc so it's mostly saying the changes are approved but there's like other administrative things that um okay are requirements of the approval understood all right brave commissioner for a motion please do it I'm just going to do the bold all right the motion here we go a move that the only change identified during the 1823 meeting are acceptable to the conservation commission with the following conditions one condition conservation needs a letter stamped inside of the engineer stating that the road will be will not add fields the morning land subject to flooding two a stamped plan must be submitted to the commission three containment is required for the equipment pad the equipment pad containment details must be reviewed and approved approved by the wetlands administrator prior to construction four a letter must be provided by amp outline the willingness to cover the cost of the footbridge slash boardwalk structure northwest of the eastern array five stormwater trenches from draft plans from 12 23 2022 will be incorporated in the final plan set six the tree removal is not completed by 215 23 nesting raptor survey should be completed prior to cutting note the floodplain mitigation shown on original approved plan is still required although not shown on the revised plan set seconded all right voice vote that was a second from Cameron Aaron voice vote Laura voice vote Cameron hi watcher hi Michelle hi Andre hi Alex hi Laura are you there yeah hi and I'm an eye all right Lawrence thank you for working through us through this with us again I will say and I know you know I'm repeating myself but there's a lot going on in town and Aaron is spread very thin but as you've seen we really proactive communication could really help us with this project so anything you can do to communicate early and often we really appreciate okay but what what I would propose to do is we do have weekly and monthly update reports with a two week look ahead I would be happy to share those with you assuming no commercial commercially sensitive information is in them but certainly is the two week look ahead just and put you on an email chain so that when we have those meetings we can share them with you so you understand where things are moving in the next few weeks great and just including Aaron is fine and she can kind of flag as necessary yeah I'm in with Aaron yeah great thank you so unless you have any other questions or comments I think we can say good night for tonight great thank you very much thank you Lawrence all right Michelle long year bat yeah so thank you Alex for putting that together it was very helpful informative summary I guess my only question and I'm sorry I didn't do this on my own time but when you came across that the data that was used to make the map was that based on like systematic statewide surveys or incidental observations and I guess what I'm getting at was their survey done in the Amherst area and they found no bats or like is it a no data or is it uh or is it that they sorry I'm turning into a pumpkin already but yeah I know I could I got to tell is it no information therefore assumed no no detection in Amherst or was it no data which the difference would be like do we just revisit this every year and see if anyone found anything or we don't know so I guess that's the implication like how how competent are we ever um because there's I think it's probably a lot easier to detect bats and caves and it is um under you know bark and trees but I'm that's I'm just curious about yeah the origin of the data and how they put that together and maybe you don't know that but I was just wondering the short answer is none have been reported okay so we don't know then what the survey don't know don't know any anything other than getting on mass wildlife's website and typing in the species and producing the map they have all the data I all I know is what I found and there was no background to answer your question yeah it's I mean you need like special sonar equipment to survey for bats so I unless they they might have done a statewide survey I don't know maybe I could ask for like mass but I'm just trying to understand what that data says okay just just so you know I put a call into NHSP or I sent an email to NHSP about this question um and I'm hopefully going to be getting a message back from I think her name is Eve Vogel she's a one of the um wildlife biologist at NHSP who deals with the with the bat data so I can ask her when she gets back to me if there's any data available and or if they have an answer to your question okay thanks that's it guys thanks but I was just gonna add I think it's a great question Michelle I was going to say my my best guess is that they don't have data because it is so hard to survey for bats um you know one of the things that I've learned through the years of living and working in Amherst and the valley is that you know if you draw concentric circles around UMass it's interesting to see how many rare and endangered species have been found as you go out from the university because there's been so many undergraduate and graduate studies emanating from from UMass the undergraduate programs and graduate programs so you know I always kind of look at the natural heritage data with a kind of a critical eye and say whoa has anybody looked for wood turtle in that town or or looked for you know eastern spade foot toad in that in that in that area if there's a if there's appropriate habitat and like you said you know it's kind of hard to to um to survey bats particularly if it's not in their hibernacula right if they're actually out you know uh under bark in in some tree um it's very hard to uh you know to survey them during the summer so anyway um any so we'll have to get more information I'll be curious what comes back from Erin and natural heritage okay I think that's it for tonight Erin did I lose track of anything well the the only comment I was gonna make um is I see a lot of folks on the call and um I have public comment on Hickory Ridge I don't know well so I mean on every agenda in town we're supposed to have a public you know opportunity for public comment at the end of the meeting so um or at some point during the meeting and there's a lot of folks in the room so um I think it would be a good idea to um see if anybody has anything to add okay yeah there's consistently been a lot of people in this meeting um all right so if you are in attendance this Amherst messages its conservation commission and you have a question or comment about Hickory Ridge or any of the well I guess we can't any of the other business items we discussed tonight if you want to raise your hand I can bring you in that's no raised hands yeah just we have seven attendees hanging on so that's what um just by point of observation they seem to be a lot of the same attendees for my solar bylaw working group meeting so I think um perhaps they're listening in in the event that we do talk about solar so okay all right well I think that's it um everyone thank you very much for all the extra like work um to figure out a compromise and a way to move forward with Hickory Ridge I know it's really hard um so Alex thank you and and Andre and Michelle um and yeah that's all I've got I have an administrative question for Erin which I can probably ask uh tomorrow on the phone it has to do with the fact that I actually did show up and rather than miss the meeting and can I watch the tape so I'm not penalized yes I can send you the um the meeting proceedings Alex and um you can watch and uh I think I'm trying to think that so the first one was closed the second one was closed um so really it would be um the the third and fourth hearings that you would want to view 175th street and the green leaves hearing yep those two Alex thank you welcome I apologize for being late I'm glad you could make it um and so we might be scheduling a special meeting to talk about Amherst Hills between now and February 8th is that possible Erin yeah it doesn't seem like it's going to be super urgent um it yeah it might be in February mid February or something so I'll keep you posted okay great all right motion just looking for a motion to adjourn I'll make that motion to adjourn the second that 904 who was the second was that Alex oh Andre Andre uh all right second in somewhere there you go all right Laura in favor and unison hi hi I think that was unanimous yeah I'll see you on February 8 thank you all right see you guys everybody take care hey Erin yes yes uh the site meeting tomorrow yes and where is that um so it's uh it's a pre-construction meeting with the true removal folks at Hickory Ridge um it's it's not really like a uh pre-permitting meeting that where I would advise commissioners to attend it's more so me reviewing um the permit with the contractors on site and making sure that they're um fully aware that they're um liable to follow the permit and uh that I'm expecting that they follow the conditions and how I expect the site to be treated and etc kind of that type of thing so like ordinarily for site visits I would have you come out for like if somebody files a permit you'd come out if you're going to be voting on it in this case where it's a pre-construction whenever there's a pre-construction it's usually just staff that attends um so there's no obligation for you to go would it be awkward um I mean if you felt like you wanted to attend that would be fine I think it's um I just don't know anything about Hickory Ridge and I thought maybe it would give me an opportunity to learn something but I don't I don't I don't want to do something that um would be misinterpreted or awkward or any of that yeah yeah no that's fine um and I have to go back up to New Hampshire so I don't know what time the site visit's going to be right so the site visits at nine o'clock if you do decide to come it's going to be um the uh West Pomeroy Lane entrance to Hickory Ridge which is not the main entrance by the clubhouse but it's the entrance that comes in there's sort of a long skinny driveway and it goes back to two Morton buildings it's right next to Taylor Davis so like you pass Taylor Davis on your right and then it's the next driveway it's it's just a very kind of obscure looking driveway going back um so just be up front with me um of course um would you prefer a knot um you can say