 Okay, Mr. Marshall. We are live. You are a co-host. The attendees are coming on in here. Amherst Media is here, so we're good to go. All right. Here we are in 2022. Welcome to the Amherst Planning Board meeting of January 5, 2022. My name is Doug Marshall and as the chair of the Amherst Planning Board, I am calling this meeting to order at looks like about 633. Yeah, okay. This meeting is being recorded and is available live stream via Amherst Media and minutes are being taken pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021. The planning board meeting, including public hearings, will be conducted via remote means using the Zoom platform. The Zoom meeting link is available on the meeting agenda posted on the town's website's calendar listing for this meeting, or go to the planning board web page and click on the most recent agenda, which lists the Zoom link at the top of the page. The meeting attendance of the public is permitted. However, every effort will be made to ensure the public can adequately access the meeting in real time via technological means. In the event we are unable to do so for reasons of economic hardship or despite best efforts, we will post an audio or video recording, transcript or other comprehensive record of proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting on the town of Amherst website. Board members, I will take a roll call. When I call your name, unmute yourself, answer affirmatively, and then place yourselves back on mute. Maria chow. Jack gem six. Tom long. We know that Andrew McDougal will be joining us later. Hi Doug Marshall and let present Janet McGowan here. And Johanna Newman present. Board members if technical issues arise we may need to pause temporarily to fix the problem and then continue the meeting. If the discussion needs to pause it will be noted in the minutes. Please use the raise hand function to ask a question or make a comment. Please see your raised hand and call on you to speak. After speaking remember to me, remute yourself. The general public comment item is reserved for public comment regarding items that are not on tonight's agenda. Please be aware, the board will not respond to comments during general public comment period. The public comment could also be heard at other times during the meeting when deemed appropriate. Please indicate you wish to make a comment by clicking the raise hand button while when public comment is solicited. If you have joined the zoom meeting using a telephone, please indicate you wish to make a comment by pressing star nine on your phone. Please identify yourself by stating your full name and address and put yourself back into mute when finished speaking. Residents can express their views for up to three minutes for at the discretion of the planning board chair. If a speaker does not comply with these guidelines or exceeds their allotted time, their participation will be disconnected from the meeting. All right, so the first item on our published agenda is is the minutes. And for those of you that have looked at the agenda you'll see that we actually are going to talk about minutes later in the meeting as as item number seven on page two of the agenda so we're going to skip that. This is item two, which is public comment period. The time is 637. And I'll remind listeners who may want to speak that this time is for items that are not on our agenda. So I do have a comment on either of the subdivision plans or the solar bylaw discussion that we're, we will have later in the meeting, or the SPR that's under old business. Please hold your comments for now. We will entertain them later. Preface. Is there anyone who wants to speak as a public comment on items which are not on tonight's agenda. All right, I see one hand. You'll have three minutes for this item this comment assuming it's not about something on the agenda tonight. Pam, would you bring Paul Robinson in and let him begin speaking. Hi Paul you should be able to unmute yourself and speak. Okay, thank you. I'm Paul Robinson on sheet spray road I hope that the proposed moratorium is not considered part of the solar bylaw discussion, because that's what I wanted to talk about. I'm of course in favor of the town producing a proper solar bylaw that will allow evaluating solar projects using appropriate and clear criteria. I'm also in favor of a project moratorium until we can produce that bylaw. I have heard the argument that a moratorium is pointless because there are no projects currently in process. I believe that a better way to frame this is that a motor moratorium is harmless because there are no projects currently in process. Furthermore, enacting a moratorium will prevent unwelcome surprises to potential developers. I promise you that the last thing a developer wants is surprises that affect their planning moratorium is therefore beneficial to those developers, knowing that a solar bylaw is coming and they will be bound by it be extremely helpful. Thank you. Thank you very much Paul. I don't see any other hands. So I guess we will end the public comment period item two. So item three is a continued public hearing. This is concerning a preliminary subdivision plan request. The time is 640. And this is concerning SUB 2022-02-446 and 462 Main Street Center East LLC. It's continued from 6 from December 15 of 2021. Approval for a four lot preliminary subdivision plan under MGL chapter 41 sections 81L and 81S map 14B-66 and 14B-68 all in the BN zoning district. Chris, do you want to tell us whether you will be making the introduction or whether John Robleski is here to speak on his behalf? John is here. John Robleski is here. I see that Tom Reedy, who represents John is also here and there may be technical representatives that John would like to bring over. So I would ask that you recognize John and his team. John, I have the floor to make your presentation. All right. Yeah, this is regarding a four lot preliminary subdivision plan basically to free zoning to where it was prior to the submission. And I'll let my attorney Tom Reedy address it. Great. Thanks John everybody. For the record Tom Reedy attorney with Bacon Wilson and Amherst here on behalf of John Robleski. Center East LLC for 462 446 Main Street preliminary subdivision plan and John gave you a little bit of a heads up. And I think if you read Ms. Breastrop's memo to you, I think she does a really incredible job of just contextualizing why we're here. This is a subdivision that is not going to be built. It is a subdivision that we have sought really to avail ourselves of a zoning freeze, and particularly a zoning freeze as it relates to the mixed use zoning bylaw that was recently passed I think in December by Town Council, there's a couple of items there. If you're familiar with the site which I expect all of you are. It is the only land in town that is zoned as it is zoned neighborhood business. I don't think there's anywhere else in town besides that little cluster right on Main Street that is zone neighborhood business. John practically has had issues renting it for office space and so we completely appreciate what the planning board is trying to do with and what the town really is trying to do with the mixed use bylaw and really invigorating the streetscape. This is just a little too far off the beaten path, based on john's experience, and then also the provision in the mixed use bylaw about the, not only having the space on a street front, but then requiring no more than 50% of any one type of unit within the building itself. So John and I had a conversation I explained to him what 48 section six and case law allows as far as zoning freezes and so that's really what we're looking to pursue here. And so just as we're going through, you know, so this is a preliminary plan we're looking to get feedback from the board we will be submitting a definitive plan. So we require to submit that definitive plan within seven months of submitting that preliminary plan. And then, once that definitive plan is endorsed. The zoning is frozen from the time that we actually submitted that preliminary plan for a period of eight years. And so that's the zoning that's the operative zoning bylaw that will be used, moving forward for this site. But it's just a little context because as we're talking about it. It's somewhat counterintuitive because you're, if you're familiar with subdivisions. I know, you know, Amherst Woods has been in front of you often that's a residential subdivision. I don't know that there's been many other subdivisions besides I think Paul Cole subdivision off of West street, which was a subdivision that had been approved and actually, you know, was able to avail itself of that eight year zoning freeze. Because there's, you know, there's not many that come in front of you. We're going to be talking about this, but knowing that we're not ultimately going to build it is literally just a mechanism to freeze that zoning so we want it to be open and transparent just so you knew we weren't going to try to, you know, build there. Well, why, what are you going to do about the existing building. And I would say, you know, you're approving what's on the plan, and if the build if there's a line a lot line that goes through that building, then ostensibly, we would be taking that building down if we were ever to build this. We'll have more of these conversations as we get into the definitive plan, because at that point we'll be asking for certain waivers, and we'll be asking for certain conditions that if we were in fact to build this, then, because we can respect that you would need a condition in a way to say if you ever do build it. Here's what we're going to need, because by endorsing it, ultimately, you are giving us the approval to build it so that's somewhat of a conversation for another day. But we just wanted to give you a little bit of context of where we're coming from why we're doing it and just how we expect the conversation to evolve so I'm happy to talk about that more broadly we will certainly. I don't know if either Jeff squire or Mike from Berkshire is here, they can they can present the technical aspects of the plan, and we can have that discussion but we just wanted to give you some context for why we're doing what we're doing. Thank you Tom. I do see Jeff squire in the attendees list. Do you think we should bring him over now or just I think so yeah I would I would think this was a good time. Can you name someone else. Yeah, if Mike Lou isn't here then I didn't know who was Jeff or Mike this evening, one or the other. Well there's a Mike. Mike Lou I don't know. Mike Lou if that's you can you raise your hand. I don't believe Mike is here tonight, but. Okay. All right, so we'll assume that that is a different Mike. So Tom thanks for that intro, you did already answer one of my questions which is why I didn't see the existing building on the plans. And I don't know whether I should ask my other question of you or Chris but bluntly, do we have the opportunity to deny this plan. It's something that you know we're really just going to be talking about the details and you have as a right of right to file a subdivision plan. Yeah, so you, you of course have the right to deny it if we don't comply with the subdivision rules and regulations intent for you doesn't matter why we file this really should have no bearing on your decision. And also frankly, if you deny our preliminary plan that doesn't matter for the zone freeze. Really our job is to follow up within seven months with the definitive plan and then have that definitive plan endorsed so you know we're hopeful of, we don't. We're respectful of the process we're respectful of your time and so we don't want to just come in and blow it off and say this is never going to be built so you know john has obviously spent money and Berkshire design, go out and design it. Certainly you could deny it. But we would need a basis in the zoning by law to do that. Subdivision rules and regulations. Right. So this is nothing to do with with zoning. Besides, I guess, lot compliance, which I know that being in the BN district the way it is, the lots have been designed to be compliant. We're not asking for any certain use on those lots this is just ostensibly saying here are lots that we can now create and it's really those internal ones that wouldn't have frontage, but for the creation of that cul-de-sac if that wasn't there. We would have frontage on up on either main street or I think that's gray street that's the cross street there. And so we could just do up and our plan at that point. But it's because of the creation. So that's really what subdivision is there to do is to say, we're creating a roadway, and now we have frontage on this new roadway that we're creating and then you're just saying, ultimately, yes, you do do you have the infrastructure that we have the radii, you know, town engineer sign off fire department sign off, and then the the lots are approved. And then, you know, presumably if, if you were just doing this and somebody was going to build it, they would come back at some point in the future and say, on lot three, we would like to build a whatever it is and then they would go through the appropriate permitting process whether it's you or the ZVA at that point. All right, thanks for answering those questions. So let's, first of all, Chris, did we have a site visit this morning that would have a report, or would we simply hear more about Tom Long slipping and sliding around Pellum Road. Why don't you hear from Tom because he was the one who made the site visit. Okay. Hi, Tom. Hi, how are you. Yeah, so yes I made the site visit. It was quite slippery. And it was the first time I've been on the property I've driven past it and I think your clarification Tom was really helpful in that I'm looking at a building that seems relatively new and wondering why we're taking it down to put for four different projects here, standing there walking a perimeter feeling very confused and realizing that this is likely has nothing to do with an intent to build this thing and this is really procedural and that I'm standing here in the freezing rain for almost no reason. And so I left and that was my experience. So that's about all I say, I do have a quick question though well I know Janet had a question, her hand raised but do we do we have, do we have to know the intended use of these lots based on the fact that the preliminary plan should be submitted out for non residential subdivisions and so I'm wondering if there's a sense that this is definitively non residential. In that case. Tom. Yeah, I mean, when we approach this, we don't distinguish between residential or non residential subdivision I understand that your rules and regulations seem to distinguish. So for, I believe it's for residential you have to file a preliminary plan because then it gives really the planning board the opportunity to discuss it. As I see in your rules and regulations. The difference is with the timing of your action as a board after we file the definitive and how long you have to make a decision and I want to say like one is maybe 90 days ones maybe 120 days, depending upon which path we choose you know again. What will end up going there, likely not within the lot lines are some mixed use buildings to stay in concert with what john already has there and that will be not the last too many streams here but that will be a separate site plan review process with the planning board just for what john is going to propose on that site so likely mixed use which I believe is technically a residential use category in the emerson zoning bylaw. Like I said when we approach it. It's not like we're thinking about single family homes on these lots and maybe if Chris, if there's another distinction that you or the town draws between residential and non residential besides that temporal element. You know we can get it we can think about it some more but that was just our approach. So, so Tom, you've one question that I'm going through my head is. I mean, some of this is you guys educating us. I mean this is the first time we've really looked closely at a subdivision plan that wasn't sort of wasn't in the context of an a and r. I think for pretty much all of us. Maybe Maria or Janet or, or Jack maybe your exceptions to that because you've been on the board longer. But in the. So when you come back and you want to talk about a mixed use building are we are is that conversation not going to be defined by the lot lines that you're showing now. Correct. So, so that's so the lots now showing now is going to be essentially irrelevant to that conversation with the exception that you used this drawing to freeze the zoning. You got it. Yeah, and that's, and it's a, it's a fine point to make because, and I don't want to say that every subdivision that comes in front of you is going to be like this. So that's the other caution, the way that the law is written or the way that the case law has interpreted the way the law is written and it's broken stone is the case. It's well settled law it's quote unquote the land shown on the plan. And that was the SJC master premium judicial court was very careful to say, it doesn't even matter the layout, or what use they were proposing or thinking about proposing during that preliminary subdivision definitive subdivision plan process. It's sufficient for the land to be shown on this plan. And that's what's for the zoning is frozen as it relates to that land. And so that's where the lot lines are fiction, right there, they're fictitious so yes. That is different in a traditional subdivision context and if we ever have another one in town and I'm fortunate enough to be part of it we can talk you through that and so, for example, not to belabor this or to bore anybody but with Paul Coles, the terrorist Applebrook. We couldn't change the location of the street, because that's part of the subdivision. Once we had that definitive plan done and endorsed by the board and recorded. We could then because that's a street, change how the lots were laid out, like the width, the frontage the depth through and our plans. So if we started to change the roadway, then we would have to amend the definitive subdivision plan. So, as you'll see, you know, when you get into those other ones, you'll see that they're different from here, but the point for us here is that it's the land shown on the plan, which is frozen as to the zoning that wasn't affected at the time that the preliminary plan was filed. And so ultimately when we come back, likely during the definitive process you may have two processes going processes going at the same time. The site plan review will not have anything to do with where these lot lines are you'll you'll see in fact that they're probably straddling some of the lot lines. Okay, thank you, Chris you have your hand up. The site plan review won't have anything to do with this subdivision just like Tom said so it's really not even worth it to talk about them in the same meeting it's going to be based on the existing buildings that are there and providing access to those buildings. So this is a completely separate thing. And even though it's, you know, somewhat. I hate to use the word fictitious but somewhat not that doesn't have a real intent. I think we still need to take it seriously and try to make the preliminary subdivision plan. Meet the requirements of this of the subdivision regulations and I've made some notes here about meeting those requirements. They're pretty minor. And so I think if you get those requirements down, they're noted in my memo to you. And they were also noted. I think some of them were noted in a side email that I sent to Tom and John Roblesky and their team. And I think there's a lot to do with comments regarding the narrative that went along with this application such as I think there was a statement made that there were no historic buildings on the property and that's not true. So when this comes back to you as a definitive subdivision plan and there's a narrative about the definitive plan, that type of thing should be remedied. Also, the subdivision needs a name. The plan needs to have the name of the record owner and the applicant. And it needs to have the names of all the butters. So those kinds of things they're technical and in the long run. I'm not going to make a difference, but this plan will get the definitive plan will get recorded at the registry so it should be in accordance with the regulations to the degree that makes sense. I did have a conversation with Tom and John Roblesky earlier this week, and we talked about the fact that when they come back with a definitive plan. They're probably going to ask for some waivers from things that would be required if the subdivision we're going to actually be built, but shouldn't be required if it's not going to be built so at that point you may wish to put these things into conditions. So once you get around to reviewing the definitive plan, there may be a list of conditions that you have that you say, yes, you must dig test pits before the final plan is allowed to go ahead and different things like that, but it doesn't really make sense for them to know if it's now if they're not actually going to build the thing, but those kinds of questions and answers can be dealt with, once the definitive plan is filed but at this stage I think at least we should try to make the plan in accordance with the subdivision rules and regulations. Thank you. Okay. Janet. This is. This is more. Janet, you just froze on my screen. Yeah, I can't. Um, so the goal. Can we, are we here. Okay. It says my intricate internet connection is unstable. So I understand the goal here is not to be required to put 30% of non residential use on the first floor or whatever you build but it seems to me that we can. We could require that for more. You know, when in the context of a permit hearing so it was is that that's a kind of a question for Chris like if it's a special permit could we say, you know the goals of this business neighborhood business is to have businesses and keep it vital. And so we think this building needs, you know, more commercial space on the first floor and I think we could have done that with the building that has been built instead of having a small 300 square foot office and a large which turns out to be almost a large apartment building so maybe some wondering, you know, that's my question. Could we impose that requirement or condition on either a site plan review permit or a special permit. You know saying the goals in the master plan the goals of the bylaw aren't being met by, you know, not having enough space so that also isn't really that pertinent to what you do what the applicant is seeking today but I just wanted to put that out there. Okay, Chris you want to answer that. Mixed use buildings are allowed by site plan review in the BN zoning district so you have to be kind of careful about what kinds of additional conditions you put on that are not, you know, strictly tied to the zoning bylaw so it's certainly a conversation that you can have with the applicant. And, you know, perhaps have a negotiation about that. But I would be reluctant to say, you can absolutely require more than 30% of the ground floor to be non residential as part of a site plan review. Okay. All right. So, Chris, what does Tom need from us tonight. He needs a list of recommendations for coming back with the definitive subdivision plan. He also needs to know if you approve this if you approve it with conditions or if you don't approve it. All right. So anything, Jeff, that you would like to say do you want to give us the overview of the site plan itself and show us what you've what you've drawn up that's going to sit on a shelf at the registry. Sure, I'd be happy to share. Yeah, just a plan so we all know what we're talking about tonight. So quickly Gray Street running north and south on this plan main street to the east and west. And this, this project really encompasses, you know, two parcels for 46 and 462. There's the building that was recently constructed is in this portion of the site now. And this preliminary plan, you know, effectively creates four new lots off a cul-de-sac which meets all of the standards and requirements. There's four lots with frontage on the on the roadway. They would each be served by a sanitary sewer and, and, you know, new water services. They have conceptual stormwater, you know, system subsurface. And again, really, the intent of the preliminary plan is to demonstrate that we can meet all of the various standards and area requirements and that the utility systems to be shown in a preliminary fashion. I recognize that there were some comments about, you know, sanitary sewer from lot one getting to this manhole which is, you know, slightly uphill. I would imagine that, you know, if this were to become fruition, we would work out those particular invert elevations and or, you know, worst case scenario they have an ejector pump. You know, for the, for this corner site, but it, again, it's, it's sort of a just topic for conversation. With respect to, you know, about our owners and other compliance that, that, you know, Chris brought up. You know, we'd certainly be happy to comply with an updated plan for the next meeting. You know, those are small updates. And I, again, I think for the purposes of demonstrating that we have complete package and have satisfied as much of the preliminary plan requirements as possible. You know, we're certainly happy to do that. So, I, if I could, Jeff, maybe just to hop in, I mean, we'll accept an approval tonight with conditions, you know, that we have to do those things that Chris identified just to really, really save us time, save you time, and then we'll get right into the definitive plan. And then the next time you'll see us for this will be with a definitive plan so that's a suggestion maybe to spare everybody some time. Yeah, good point. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Jeff. Board members any discussion. Okay. Do we have any attendees that want to speak to this topic, since we are in a public hearing. I don't see any hands raised from, oh, there's one from. Let's see, who is that. It's Hilda Greenbaum. It's Hilda Greenbaum. Yes. Yeah, why don't you bring Hilda in. Please state your name and your address Hilda. I have a question about this for attorney Tom, probably all Chris. When was this become a paper street and I'm thinking of two examples offhand one just west of the junior high school, where the developer was allowed to build, but couldn't build on top of a lot line had to build on a little little complication to that one, but it was allowed to be built. The other one was Hope Church which was very contentious. West of Rolling Ridge Road on a big metal volume mass off North wasn't street that was not allowed to be built that was allowed to be illegal so my my question is, if you're approving this cul-de-sac as a street, but it's co-located with an existing building. I don't get what you can do with regard to the issue of buildable or not buildable on top of paper streets. Thank you, Hilda. Tom, you want to answer. Yeah, no, I appreciate the nuanced question, Hilda. Only from me, Tom. Always. I expect nothing less. Yeah, so at least at this preliminary stage, it certainly wouldn't become a paper street. At the definitive stage, I think what we would look to do is to have some condition about, you know, only if it's created will it become a street. So that really would, I think, obviate the need and the chain of title for folks if they come across it, and they say, oh, wait a second, we see that this subdivision was approved because I can and Jeff can probably speak to it as well that subdivisions approved are approved often that aren't necessarily built, maybe not often, but they're approved and they're not necessarily built. So I think what we would do in the definitive plan is just to include a note on the plan that this is not to be considered a street unless and until it's actually built. And what Hilda's talking about is more of a title concern. And it could probably run into developability, but I think that's the way around it is. And so Jeff maybe we just make the note on our plan to say this will not be considered a street or right of way unless and until it is actually built on the ground. Yeah, I think I totally agree with you, Tom. And the only thing I would the only other thing I would, you know, offer or think about is whether town acceptance actually is the sort of the, the, the, the step that that makes that a paper street otherwise if nothing's accepted if they're, you know, nothing's, if no street has been accepted by the town there is no, you know, legal street, I guess on record. I don't know, certainly something we can work out. Okay, thank you guys. Chris. I think that a street being accepted as a long way from where we are right now. The street has to be built and it has to be inspected and it has to meet all the town standards so I, I think that Hilda's question is legitimate. Whether or not the street ever well the street. I won't go any farther than that. I don't think anyway, that's all. Being as I live in the neighborhood held it was talking about west of the junior high with paper streets I'm much more interested in this than most of you are. So maybe I'll have to talk to Tom offline sometime. I don't want to, in addition to the, the corrections that Chris had mentioned, I also remembered that she had asked that the existing building be put on to the, to the, to the map, and I think that's a good add. Or the existing there's one building, I mean actually one of the building is there but the new building isn't there and so that's kind of, I think it'd be more orienting to have that big building in there. Okay, so thank you for that comment. Tom I'm, I'm watching your facial expressions and wondering whether you think that's a benefit, a prudent thing to do. Yeah, I'm not a very good poker player. You know, I, I, we can probably come up with a sheet that shows how that building would be cited on the plan that we've shown. I think that's one of the definitive requirements of definitive subdivision plan rules and regulations to see if that is a requirement I wouldn't doubt that there's an existing condition plan that's required. But again, this is to the whole the narrative that, you know, in our mind's eye, we're creating these four separate lots, and in this scenario that we're talking about that building would not be there. We can back up and say, however, if we wanted it to be there we could always come through an and our process in the future to eliminate the lot lines between three and four. We hear what Janet saying we'll we'll take it under advisement and take a look to see in the next iteration. If at the least we provide a plan showing it so people can you can say okay here's where it is, but then we'll have to make a decision on whether or not you know maybe we go down to three lots. Or but we'll take it under advisement. Okay, thank you. I'm seeing one other hand from an attendee. Seal the Madeline. Pam, could you bring them over. Yeah, seal. Seal, can you unmute yourself. Yeah, you should be able to unmute yourself. Give us your name and your, your address. Hi, I think I had a hand up accidentally sorry about that. Okay. Thank you. Now I'm seeing a hand from Pam Rooney. Please give us your name and your address. Hi, this is Pam Rooney, 42 Cottage Street. This is strictly a technicality. I'm curious why you went to the trouble of creating four lots when in fact you did just built there is just built a new structure on the property. It would still be existing when like, why did you not somehow end up with maybe just two parcels. It would still be a subdivision and it would still meet the regulations of what you're trying to achieve by just freezing the zoning just totally out of curiosity. Why did you go to so much work. Thank you, Pam. Thank you. Sure, thanks. Mr Chairman so Jeff I don't know if you want to talk about why we went to for my directive to Berkshire was to make sure that we had at least one parcel that didn't have front, a new parcel that didn't have frontage because I thought without a doubt that would be the direction of a subdivision because without that, you know, if you had frontage on a public way, you wouldn't need to actually subdivide I still do think that that would be lawful and it is a subdivision. However, this way that was, you know, unequivocal that it would be a subdivision and so that was my direction to Jeff I don't know if there's anything, any more magic to it than that. Yeah, I would just say I think that given the existing building and the subdivision regulations and dimensional requirements that setbacks and lot coverage and all of those things would have come into play and you know this this was a very easy way, simple way to again just disregarding the existing structures to comply with all of the standards and and get to where we needed to go so that was really the end goal. Okay, thank you. Any more hands. Board members. Would anyone like to make a motion that we vote on this call the question. Tom. So moved. All right. Anybody want a second. Don't jump at once, Maria. Second. All right, so. We have to vote now to call the question and then we have to vote to probably should have asked for a vote to. Anyway. Okay, so, well, Chris can withdraw his motion and make a motion to close the public hearing and approve the plan with conditions as outlined in the memo in your memo and your email. Yeah. So would you have any interest in doing that. I will withdraw my previous motion and make a motion to close the public hearing and to approve the site plan with the amendments by Chris Breastrop in her email and her memo. I believe there are conditions right conditions. All right, thank you, Tom. I'll just go ahead and second it. All right, board members. Let's go ahead and vote. Maria. Jack. What are we voting on. We're voting to close the hearing and to approve the preliminary site plan with the conditions that Chris has outlined in her memo and email. All right, approve. All right. Tom. And Andrew is so absent. I'm a an approve Janet. And Johanna approve. All right. So it's six in favor one absent. Thank you very much. Good seeing everyone. Thank you, Tom. All right, so the time is now 716 and we'll go to item four on the agenda this evening. A second preliminary subdivision plan. This is SUV 2022-01 11 and 13 East Pleasant Street from Archipelago investments. This is September 25, 2020. It's continued from August 25, September 29, October 20, December 1, and December 15, 2021. Request approval for a two lot preliminary subdivision plan under MGL 41. Chapter 41. Chapter 41 L and 81 S map 11 C 275 276 277 309 310. And they're all in the BG zoning district. Chris, do you want to introduce this topic this evening. Thank you. So Archipelago filed this preliminary subdivision plan for the same reason that Mr. Robleski did to freeze the zoning on the property. They have a proposal to build a building there. And the proposal to build the building has been approved by the planning board. The reason they filed the preliminary subdivision plan was that they were concerned about the upcoming zoning changes such as the inclusionary zoning bylaw and the mixed use building bylaw. They have agreed to comply with the inclusionary zoning bylaw. Based on their new plan that was approved by the planning board. And they believe that they can comply with the mixed use building bylaw so they don't feel like they need to go ahead with a further submission of a definitive subdivision plan. So they would like to withdraw the preliminary subdivision plan and they've submitted a letter which I had sent to Doug earlier today and Pam could bring it up on the screen. It's a request to withdraw without prejudice. Sorry guys. In an effort to make things easier for myself. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I wonder. Here we go. Can you see it? This is the one about John's project. Yep. Hold on. There it is. Can you actually open it? It's not open. No, we're seeing your Windows Explorer. So if you click on it and double click on it. That's what I did. Do you want me to put it on the screen? If you can, Doug, since I seem to be struggling. All right. Well, let's see if I can do this. So I'm going to stop your sharing. Whoops. I think I had just gotten it. That's okay. Go for it. I don't know why I struggle with this. All right. You have it. All right, there it is. Yeah. So not a lot of explanation, just, just the facts. So you would need to close the public hearing on this. And vote to approve the withdrawal without prejudice. If that was what you intend to do. And. Let's see. Janet, I'm seeing your hand. Another question for Chris. So what is the phrase without prejudice mean in this context? Because usually if you're withdrawing a motion or something without, or a case without prejudice, it means you can come back. You know, you're not barred from coming back again, but in this situation, it seems like if they withdraw the application, they've missed their timeline to file it before the zoning takes effect. So I don't think it would make sense for them to come back with a preliminary subdivision plan. It's just sort of language that we use, but it's probably not necessary. So if you wanted to, you could change your approval to say that you approve the withdrawal, but you don't approve it without prejudice. Yeah. Couldn't, wouldn't we be better off to just not indicate prejudice or no prejudice and simply say we approve the withdrawal. Yeah. I think that it seems odd in this context, but I don't know what it means. Yep. Sure. Just go ahead and move to approve the withdrawal. A good point, Janet. Any other questions? Any comments from the board? You know, I mean, we have spent a fair amount of time continuing this. And, you know, if I wanted to be prejudiced, I could be. So, and we've spent a lot more time than, than Kyle has in our meeting. I don't see any hands from board members and I don't see any. Is there anyone in the attendees that wants to comment on this? In this hearing. Okay. I'm not seeing any of those either. So could I have a motion to close the public hearing. And approve the withdrawal of this application. By archipelago. Hannah, I saw your hand. Finally. I moved to close the public hearing and. Accept the withdrawal of archipelago of their subdivision plan. Thank you. Anybody want to second it? Maria. Okay. All right. Any further comment? Let's go ahead and vote. All right. We'll start with Jack. What is. What was the motion again? We're, we're, we're voting on whether to close the public hearing. And accept their withdrawal of their application. Okay. So I would be an eye. Yeah. Good. Tom. I. I don't see Andrew yet. So he's absent. I am an eye. I'm not seeing any of those either. I don't see Andrew yet. So he's absent. I am an eye. Janet. Approve. Thank you and your honor. Hi. And Maria. Approve. All right. Thank you all. Okay. And now the moment, I think most of our attendees are waiting for. The time is seven 24. And we're up to item five on our agenda, which is discussion about the zoning. Solar bylaw. And. So item A says begin discussion of zoning amendment on large scale solar installations. I guess I'd like to make at least one. Couple of introductory remarks. Okay. You know, this is the first conversation about. What we might actually create as a zoning bylaw. It's not yet even a public hearing. And I think given that the conversation we had about the moratorium, there was a lot of conversation about doing a solar study. In some relationship to the development of the bylaw. So I think one of the things I'd like to get out of tonight is some discussion about the process. And how those two. Those two items relate to each other and. And what, you know, when, whether we ought to even think about the bylaw until the siting study is finished. You know, at the moment in my relative ignorance. I feel like we could talk about the parameters of the actual zoning bylaw. And we can. As written with things like heights and setbacks and minimum or maximum acreages and things like that. While the, while the solar study is going along. But I don't know if that's going to be the case. Or if that makes sense. So with that. I would like, let's see, do we have, yeah, we have. Both. And we have Steve Roof present coming from ECAC, the Energy and Climate Action Committee of the town. You know, in our last hearing, we were told that the, that ECAC was sending us a letter. And I think we all received that letter, but it was after we had our vote on the moratorium. So it seemed like it might make sense to start with letting those two individuals in to sort of present their letter or, and whatever else they wanted to give us as initial guidance or recommendations as we enter into this. And so Pam, if you're able to bring Dwayne and Steve over, I think that might be a good place to start. Chris, do we need to ask them to give us their names and addresses or can we assume that since they're on the committee, we have a record of that somewhere. I think it's a good idea to ask them for their name and the fact that they are members of the Energy and Climate Action Committee. And you could ask them for their address, but I think it's important for them to state that they're a member of ECAC. Okay. All right. So welcome Steve and Dwayne. Thank you. Maybe Steve, I see your photo. So maybe you're a little bit farther along than Dwayne. I think I got unmuted, but I, I could, I could take a picture. Okay. If possible, but Steve can start us off actually is, actually was the, is the plan. So. Okay, good. Good evening, folks. I'm Steve Roof. I am a member of the Energy and Climate Action Committee. I live in Amherst on Southeast street. I'm 1680 Southeast street. And I work at Hamptree College. Just as an overview, I think you'll folks will find the letter that the ECAC approved. I think it was immediately before the planning board meeting back in December. You'll find I think it's on page 26 of your current packet. It's a fairly lengthy letter because we wanted to put sufficient detail in there to set the stage. I think at this point, the most important. Aspect of that letter. Was the. Desire the indication from the ECAC. That the solar siting study or solar resource assessment study more, more accurately. Should be completed before solar zoning by law. And I think we, we really want to. And get that information out there so that we all fully understand the nature and the magnitude of the solutions. That are required. Solar solutions to achieve our commitments to climate action. Otherwise that I feel the conversation will tend to. Be about more what we want rather than what we need. So the key points of our letter that was discussed and approved at the ECAC meeting back in December was we really need some, some key data, I think, to frame. The entire discussion. And that is one of those is how much solar do we need in Amherst to meet our commitment and responsibility for greenhouse gas reduction goals. And that we believe should be guided by the Massachusetts decarbonization roadmap and clean energy and climate action plan. I think we all, we also stated that we need to understand better what kind of land is in Amherst. What land qualifies for solar under existing programs and restrictions. So that would include wetland restrictions, natural heritage, bio map to and priority habitats. And then there's a whole menu of incentives and disincentives for different kinds of lands. And then land that has other kinds of protections, whether it's chapter 61 or other kinds of protections, we really need an inventory of that to understand what is the range of land in Amherst in particular that we're talking about when we are thinking about forming a bylaw. And I think what we would be really useful would be kind of a GIS study of that would inventory. Those lands would be forests by stand age, if possible. Agricultural that could be subdivided into active fallow abandoned conservation lands. Amherst has a wonderful range of conservation lands, categorized developed lands, commercial, residential, academic, municipal, and a lot of other areas. So we can identify parking lots, potential places for parking lot solar canopies. Also right of ways, the electrical power lines and railroad, water bodies, the protection status of forest lands, private forest lands, whether they're in chapter 61 or protected by mass wildlife or bio map. All of that I think is really, really necessary before we can identify how much solar do we want or tolerate within Amherst. And that should guide, I believe, should guide the development of the bylaws. So I'll pause there. Dwayne has a lot of expertise in this area. So I'll hand it over to him to continue. Yeah, thanks, Steve. And I'm not sure if I need to do anything to get a picture, but I think you can hear me, but in any case, Dwayne Breger, I'm also a member of the ECAC committee. My address is three Thistle Lane. And my day job is at the University of Massachusetts, and I direct the clean energy extension there. So, as Steve points out, the letter was really about the, our, our thoughts with regard to the important of studying solar, our solar resources and potential in Amherst before setting up definitively at least solar bylaws and particularly also understanding as we've laid out in ECAC of what, what our goals are with regard to a community, with regard to our climate goals and our renewable energy goals and really how much get a really good sense of, of how much solar we might really need for this town if we were to provide our fair share say of what the Commonwealth needs or at least enough solar in the community within our community to meet the needs, the electric needs of the community. And I think those are important. That's important information before, as part of the zoning process. What I'd also like to add is that what Steve laid out in terms of a really strong GIS based resource assessment of solar of land opportunities and where you might or might not, might not, definitely not, definitely want to put solar or places in between is really critically important to get a sense of where that might fit in, in, in, in town. There's also a lot more to solar planning in our minds as well for a community to consider. And I would put forward that the clean energy extension at the university that I work with has just completed a project with the National Renewable Energy Lab to develop a solar, a community solar planning toolkit. And we're about to launch that publicly in the next month or so. So we'd really be open to the opportunity to work with the town through, and I imagine with the planning committee and other town, town departments as part of this solar study to look at some of these planning issues as well. Such things as looking at, part of it is the solar resource, but also looking at how does, what are the preferences within the town, town constituents, where do they tend to want to have solar? We have some surveying mechanisms to provide or offer surveys to the town to provide some public input. And also importantly, what does the town want to get out of solar in terms of potentially economic benefits, the potential to own the solar versus third-party ownership where a lot of the economic benefits leave the community. And then a process by which a solar plan can be put together for a town. So I just wanted to put that out there as well. It's part of the letter as well. I think all that can be done sort of somewhat in parallel with the planning, with the solar resource assessment, but the university and my group at the university would be also really keen as working with the town on planning, helping with the planning process. Thanks, Dwayne. Chris. So it sounds like, thank you very much Dwayne and Steve for your presentation. And I wanted to ask or say, I guess, that it seems like for one thing, it takes us a really long time to get zoning approved in Amherst. We've had an experience of the last year where, you know, we did manage to get some things approved, but it took a long time. And one of the comments that was made was that we didn't have enough time to talk about it and we didn't have enough information, etc. So I sort of have the feeling that it would be a good idea to start to put together a framework of the text of a solar bylaw and not necessarily have a map to go with it as we're putting together the framework of the text, but we would leave blanks where it says X number of acres of forest can be taken down or X is the largest size of a solar installation or you can't put solar on agricultural land. Those kinds of things could be left out. But meanwhile we could be putting together, you know, like I said, a framework or an outline of a solar text and, you know, put in things like, you know, what do we do about decommissioning? What kinds of, how do we, how do we define various types of solar installations? You know, I've been reading the PVPC guidelines and they seem to have a lot of good information that's sort of very general and generic and it doesn't get down to where are we going to put it? So I guess what I'm suggesting is given how long it takes us to get zoning amendments through, doesn't it make sense to have a parallel track where we're putting together an outline of our solar text at the same time that we're working on this solar assessment and the end result of the solar assessment, I would imagine, and I could be wrong about this, but I would imagine as a map showing places where we think solar could go, that it could be approved, and maybe that would end up being a zoning map that would accompany the text, but it seems I'm reluctant to wait to have this solar assessment and the map finished before we engage in the text of the bylaw, because I think it's going to, otherwise it's going to take a really long time to get this through. So I wonder what people think about that. Tom, do you have a response to Chris? Yeah, thanks Doug and thanks Steve and Dwayne and Chris for comments. I think that's where I was going to start as well Doug and Chris, that I had read through, I don't know this was 150 pages, but I read quite a bit of this document. And it seems from town to town there are just staples that are in there, that are boilerplated a lot from the PV, PC documentation or from the state. And they seem like things we can start putting together and compiling as a boilerplate to really begin this process and then await some feedback and details and more nuanced responses from a survey and from mapping and so on. The second part of my comment is part comment question. And I think it relates to what I'm hearing a lot about what the town needs and what we need to meet certain requirements or goals. And I guess I have a question about how land and therefore energy is capital and at what point do we have a conversation less about what we need and how people want to capitalize on their own land and how the town is going to regulate that. And whether that's part of what Amherst needs or if it's a different way in which we think about the economy of solar versus the what's a feel good way to put these along power lines. Okay, that makes sense from a town perspective, but how are we regulating people's backyards that are over an acre in terms of wanting to make a capital investment and actually make some money out of this. So I guess I'm curious if there are two parts to that or how we have that conversation and just a thought. Okay, thanks Tom. I will say Chris I was kind of along the same lines that we probably needed to have some parallel by law development process associated in parallel with the study. And depending on how long you think the study will actually take, you know, I mean, I know there's a lot of people that we've heard from last month and are probably in the audience this evening who are eager for us to have something on the books to prevent, you know, all of privately owned Amherst from being cut down and replaced with solar. So, you know, I wondered whether we ought to even really be putting in place sort of an initial by law that doesn't really tackle some of the sort of controversial preferences, I guess I'd say, but gets a kind of baseline for, you know, we don't want any bad behavior. Or, you know, we want to avoid the problems that other people have had without going too much farther. I guess the other thing that occurred to me, Steve, when you were talking about demand is that it made me think of the legislation that I guess the state has enacted that was governing solar arrays that said towns were not allowed to impose unreasonable limits on the implementation of solar. And I realized that there's no case law yet to define what reasonable or unreasonable means, but if we get into a conversation about where do we want it, then we're also getting into a conversation of where we don't want it. And, you know, that starts to get into whose perspective is it on whether it's reasonable. So, you know, I don't know where we go with that, but I guess it seemed like based on the town or on the state legislation, you probably want to start with, you know, where is it really a problem to put solar in terms of public health, safety and welfare and have that as your baseline. And then you kind of decide how much you want to potentially litigate with other people about whether further restrictions are reasonable or unreasonable. So that's a couple of thoughts. I see a whole bunch of hands here from the board, so we'll go through that. Steve, I see your hand. Do you want to respond to anything you've heard so far? Sure, there's kind of a lot there. But starting with what Chris raised, I think, yes, there are things that could go on immediately concerning some basic boilerplate best practices for ground-mounted solar facilities. There's some wonderful ones. Dwayne and his team have developed things like pollinator guidelines, so that's larger solar facilities are resources for pollinators and wildlife habitat. There's a whole array, as you guys know, of other towns that have developed guidelines that concern things like screening for solar farms and that sort of thing. So yes, those can go forward and those can be studied and we can decide what ones are appropriate for Amherst. I think, though, in my perspective, the thing that we need to keep front and center is how much solar do we need to basically save civilization and to meet the commitments that we've already made. We have to keep that in mind, so that we don't tend to veer towards, we all love forests and we don't want any forest or agricultural land or open space of any sort to be put with solar. We need to know what we need to do to prevent catastrophic climate change and to meet our moral and legal commitments to that. So that has to stay kind of close to the center of our thought process. The second point is that I think a bunch of the things that I outlined and that the ECAC outlined is sort of this resource inventory. It's not hard to do. It should not take much time to do a GIS analysis of existing land. There's already a wonderful one that Dwayne and his team have prepared or at least they have linked to it on their CEE site. It already shows what lands in Massachusetts are restricted from solar development through the smart program and the Massachusetts natural heritage program. And just eyeballing that roughly half of the land and almost all of the forested land and Amherst is already precluded from solar development based on those. I think some of the other aspects, the data is out there. It's a matter of analyzing it. And I think there are groups at the university or otherwise that could pull that together quite quickly. So yes, a parallel process of some boilerplate stuff that we should consider, keeping in mind what our obligations need to be and gather a bunch of data that can help frame the conversation. And the last thing is I think most of us citizens don't really know what the existing process for protecting land is in Amherst. You guys in the planning board know and the conservation commission knows these things, but I don't think the general public knows. So part of this study really needs to help inform all the rest of us in Amherst is to, how do these things play out? How do we ensure? How do you guys and the conservation commission and others ensure the protection of land? There's a lot of protections out there, I see. And a lot of hardworking folks like you guys. So if we can emphasize that, make sure people understand that. I think that will also help alleviate some fears. Thank you, Steve. Okay, Janet. I'm glad we're having this conversation. There's just a lot to say. I think the great question is, how much solar do we need in Amherst? And that's, you know, to me, that's the threshold question. And, you know, at the last meeting, I felt like somehow we had to do our whole carbon dioxide thing through solar when that doesn't seem immediately obvious to me. And so one thing I was wondering was, you know, like when I looked at some of the materials, it seems like half of the carbon dioxide emissions in our town are from the universities and college or Amherst college. And then I, you know, I had the Carlton college example where they are heating their buildings and cooling them with geothermal and they reduce their carbon dioxide footprint by 50%. With geothermal into wind turbines and they're on their way to the other 50%. I've also learned that Amherst college is also planning on geothermal. So that takes some of the money or the carbon dioxide off the table. It may be wonder what UMass's plans are. And so, you know, what they're looking at and when their plans and, you know, how much we can expect from them or for what. And so I know those are ongoing conversations, but I think those need to be part of our conversation. And also it's not completely obvious to me that solar is the answer, especially in New England. And I think some of the commentators had referred to this in my son, who's studying energy policy at Vermont law school said, you know, solar is not a great pick for New England, you know, for a bunch of obvious reasons, including just time of day, and that they see wind power is really the solution for what we can, you know, and then hydro if we ever can get it from Quebec. And so also with the geothermal option. And so, so how much solar do we need in Amherst? You know, how much can we, you know, use other methods? We might go out and buy, you know, green energy from other sources too. So those are really big threshold questions because what's the goal? And how do we get there? Doug, I completely appreciate those, the information you sent. I love reading through the Ethel study. I didn't make it through the PVPA one. And I started scanning through the different bylaws. I'm super excited that we have all these bylaws because I think that's, I think writing the bylaw is going to be the easiest part. The question is, what are the choices that we want to make? And so I would, to me, that to me, it made sense to figure out, you know, how much solar do we need? You know, what, you know, what energy mix are we looking at? And then where should it go? And that's going to be a hard question. And that's a question of a lot of decisions by the community about where it should go, how big in what the safeguards should be, or, you know, the best places were. So I do think we can push the, my first reaction was, you know, since we have all these templates around all these great examples, Athol had a really good bylaw. You know, the pollinators were in there. I was just like, oh, this is great thinking. I thought we can push that off to later, but I also don't see a downside to just putting all this together and sort of a big, you know, bylaw and then kind of shaping it as the community discussions and the go on. So kind of my first idea was like, let's do it later when we figure out what we want. And then I also could see just putting together some language and, you know, putting the blanks in or saying, this is the absolute best one. And then maybe saying, well, maybe it's a little onerous. So we'll cut back on the language and make it a little, you know, easier for people to comply with. So I'm kind of both ways, but I'd be super excited about doing draft, helping draft or analyze bylaw language, because that's kind of one of my things. Thank you, Janet. Chris, do you have something you want to say before I call on Maria? I want to make an announcement that Mr. McDougal has arrived. Thank you. Happy new year. Happy new year, Andrew. Okay, Janet, you'll take your hand down. Maria. Thanks everyone who presented and spoke to this. I was trying to take notes. I agree with your point, Chris, about, I do think we should do the parallel track. I think that will help because, you know, and like Tom, I did not read the 143 page packet that we got. I kind of skimmed it just to get a sense of what the information was, but having that sort of drafts will help inform not only the boards, but the public about, you know, just what the, what the parameters are. So we're all educated as we move forward in this. And then the second point about the, a lot of the questions that have been brought up are going to be answered when we do these studies. I think right now hypothesizing about where and how much is, they're all good questions, but rather than talk around in circles about it, I think immediately getting that GIS and then starting that study about energy analysis would be great. I don't know if that moves forward, but I think those will really inform us in that way as we move forward, we're making informed decisions basically based on data rather than what we hope and wish for. And then I guess the point you made Doug about, you know, where that's exactly right. It's like the studies will provide that I think as far as locating where and how much. So I'm excited about both of these tracks moving forward just because of all the public interest from the, the discussions we had at the moratorium issue and I, I have a lot to learn. This is not my purview, my world. So, yeah, I'm excited to just sort of start seeing data really honestly, but yeah, again, I think Chris's point that we should definitely move forward with the text of it as well. Thanks Maria. Johanna. Thanks so much really interesting conversation. I also like the idea of a parallel track where we, you know, let's work on a solar bylaw that puts in place the best practices. To, you know, yeah, maximize the kind of ecological value. I see the hunger for that in our community and the desire to, you know, want to know about like have clarity on what we as a community are going to do around citing larger scale solar arrays. And, you know, as I was reading through the packet, I definitely found myself thinking like, but where's the goal, you know, like solar is going to be an important part of our energy future. We should come up with a goal, but I think we don't have quite enough information yet to set that goal and that's where the study comes in. So I could imagine doing a, you know, moving forward on a bylaw now that just takes the basic guidelines, basic parameters, like setbacks, like screening, like, you know, best practices, decommissioning, et cetera. And then when the study is done and EECAC has kind of come through it, then I could imagine us actually, you know, putting in place another, basically a local law that codifies our goals and puts in place some action steps to help reach those goals. Okay. Thank you. Chris, on the subject of the study. Is that something that the planning staff ought to be procuring a consultant and managing? Is it something that EECAC ought to be getting a consultant and managing? Is it something that we ought to be asking the UMass extension Clean Energy Center to be doing grotesque? You know, what are our options for how we get through that? I'm not entirely clear on what all the options are, but we have been talking about it internally. I've been talking about it with Stephanie Ciccarello, who's the sustainability coordinator and she's the staff person for EECAC. I've also been talking about it with Dave Zomek, who has, you know, kind of the ear of the town manager and the finance director. So we're trying to figure out, you know, how we get the money to put this thing together. Stephanie has reached out to a contact of hers who does this type of consulting to put together a scope of work and a cost estimate for the solar study. And we don't have that yet. So, you know, once we have that, we'll know what the scale of the task is and what the scale of the cost is. There is some money already available to analyze municipal properties. And so that's a start. I think Stephanie has $15,000 to do that. And EECAC has some money that they have the ability to work with. And I don't know exactly what that's earmarked for, but I understand that some of that might, could be used for this. I also think that Stephanie may be asking for some capital money to further the effort of, you know, what she's going to find out from this consultant. So we're kind of trying to figure it out, but I think this is a good, it's a good question. It's a good discussion. And hopefully next time we meet, we'll have more information about that. Okay, great. Janet, I see your hand, but you talked a couple of times. I'm going to let Jack go first. If you don't mind. Jack hasn't spoken much tonight. Yeah, I just wanted, I thought, you know, this would be a good opportunity for Steve to Steve to kind of clarify, because we have this forest versus solar and, you know, what is, you know, what, what is best for the, for the planet with regard to having a small, you know, stand a forest versus a solar array. And I think it has some strong opinions there that, that need to be stated that I haven't heard tonight. So, so I'd like, you know, Steve to speak to that. Okay, Steve, I think we heard a little bit of your opinion during the moratorium hearing. Yes. Yeah. And some of this you may have also have heard during my presentation to the ECAC back in November. Thank you, Jack. You know how to like get me excited. I could go into a detailed analysis how I have compared the carbon benefit per acre of land in forest versus solar arrays. If you wish, I'd be happy to unload that on you. I'm not sure if that's what you want to get into that level of details at this moment. Steve, do you have that written at any, you know, is that something you could rather than, you know, go on for a while this evening? Is it something that maybe you should just put in writing and we could circulate to the board and post in a packet next time? Yes, that's a good idea. I could do that. I have summarized that in some draft form and I could refine that a little bit and make sure it's correct and then present that or provide that to you in the next day or two. Well, would you mind kind of in a minute or so giving us the gist of the outcome of what you've analyzed? Sure. The process I went through was I looked for solar. I looked at what the Hampshire College arrays, ground mounted arrays produce 20 acres plus or minus two acres produce. They produce roughly 5 million kilowatt hours per year. I looked up how much CO2 is emitted per kilowatt hour of energy when it's generated by natural gas in Massachusetts. That's about a thousand pounds per megawatt hour. I did some calculations and looked at what the CO2 avoidance is through ground mounted solar. That comes out to be about a hundred and nineteen, hundred and twenty metric tons of CO2 avoided per year per acre through solar. That's through avoiding electricity generated by natural gas. There's a series of studies. I focused on one that look at that the carbon of forests, the carbon benefit of forests. There's a series of them. They're roughly similar, but I focused on one that was done by the Harvard Forest Group that was published a couple of years ago in Finzi at all. And they looked at how much carbon is stored as well as how much carbon is sequestered per year. And when you when you balance those out, the solar provides a carbon benefit that's 50 to a hundred times greater than the forests. Now that doesn't mean I want to cut down forests and replace them all with solar. That's that's not the point here. The point is that solar has a huge carbon advantage over forests. Forest in New England absorbed maybe one, seven percent of our annual emissions of CO2. So they absorb some CO2 that's been put into the atmosphere, but it's a small fraction. You know, if you think of the atmosphere as a bathtub and we're filling it up with CO2, we're dumping in a hundred gallons, say of CO2 and the forests are taking out seven per year. So we can we can increase that of the forests. Maybe we can get it to 10 or 12, but that's still one tenth of what we're putting out. If we replace a small amount of forests with solar, we can get a much bigger gain in terms of CO2 in the atmosphere through a small amount of solar. And by small, I mean two to three, maybe five percent of land in Massachusetts. And that's based on the Massachusetts 2050 decarbonization plan, which which analyzes energy like incredible detail. So Janet, you're you and your son would love to get into that. Read about that. It looks at how solar can produce during the day, but when can produce throughout the night and when is good in the winter and solar is better in the summer. All of that stuff is detailed and really, really detailed study there. So that's probably more than you wanted to hear, but I can I can outline to some more detail. Okay. Thank you. Janet. I have just a quick recommendation. I think it will probably help us with public comment. So I know we're going to have solar bylaw on our website. And I was wondering if we can take people's written comments. And put them on that part of the website, because a lot of times we do public comments and we're just doing it by date. And so they're all kind of mixed in. So I wonder for this particular issue, actually every issue or every bylaw, if we can just take written public comments, put it into our solar bylaw part of the webpage. And that would help me when I go back and look or, you know, think, oh, somebody said this and I don't have to go through like seven weeks of comments. So I was wondering if maybe that can be put together in that way. People also kind of feel heard because, you know, it's, it's in a spot and we can all reach it and people, you know, maybe town counselors would like to look or anybody else. So that was my administrative plea. Great. Chris. Yeah, I think we can do that with Pam's. Pam's acquiescence because she's the one who has to make it work, but she and I can work on that together. And I think this is an important enough issue that's going to take a while to work through. And we have both the solar bylaw and the solar assessment or solar study that we're working on. So I think that it's, it merits a separate page and a separate. Place for public comment. Okay. All right. So at this time, I don't see any more hands from the board. And we've had a whole bunch of people. From the public patiently waiting probably to make some comments. So at this time, I would like to solicit public comment. But given that this is very early in the process. And that we're not in a public hearing. We're not in a public hearing. We're not in a public hearing. So what I'd like to try to do is to ask people. To limit your comments to one minute. You know, just give us the essentials of what you want to say. So Pam, if you can set the timer to one minute. And the other thing is. You know, if you don't, if you, if what you want to say is really just a repeat of what somebody else said. Consider, you know, not saying it. But, but if you really need to, you know, get on record as having said something tonight. And if you can just say, you know, You know, Joe said exactly what I wanted to say, or Joe covered my issue earlier. That would help us get through this. You know, I'm assuming there's going to be. Dozens of people that want to make comments tonight. And if that's not the case, maybe we can talk for longer, but let's try one minute to start. Okay. I do see Michael. He's got his hand up. And so far, he's the only one. So maybe I'll get two minutes. Maybe, maybe we're not as popular tonight as I thought. Okay. So thank you. I'm Michael Dick. I live in shoots very, I'm not an Amherst resident, but I am a member of the planning board in shoots, very and the author of the last two amendments to our solar bylaw, which I think is the best practice bylaw. So I'd say we have credibility. Without getting into the values, just as a planning board members, a few things to know. Doug, there is case law on chapter 40 a section three. It's actually the SJC is her hearing oral arguments on March 7th. And it's based on a wall damn case. I'd also point out that both your legislators. Joe and then Mindy co-sponsored bills. That are affirmatively allowing towns to regulate solar. So that's a current thing. I support the idea of you going forward with something. I would suggest that. You might want to consider differentiating as we did. And other towns have done between small scale and large scale. So ground mounted can be either. But the definition of small scale. And shoots for, for example, it's an A&R for under an acre. You know, so you just have to do that. And then the last thing I would say, since I ran out of time is people had mentioned the boilerplate. I think there's issues that are not controversial, but they do require discussion. There's a lot of things because these are very complex projects. So beyond screening and decommissioning. If you look at the shoots very one where, you know, Pellum's got a similar one that was based on ours. Just go down the list. They're not controversial. They're not controversial. They're not controversial. But I'd say it's really important for the protection of any municipality to sort of make sure you touch upon all those points. And I'm happy to be a resource at any point. My email is on the shoots very planning board website. Okay. Thank you, Michael. Next, we have Brian Katzman. If you would give us your name and your address. Hey, my name is Brian Katzman. I'm at 55. Why lack lane. Thank you for our conversation. Thank you. I haven't had a chance to read the letter. I just found out about the meeting. But just want to cut, say, you know, Doug, you mentioned at the start, it's about process. And what I would say is, it's also about objectives and how to prioritize when making trade-offs and those hard decisions. And so I think Margaret talked about this as well. But, you know, what, what are we prioritizing when it costs comes to cost and complexity, speed. Building on a built versus a non-built environment, you know, what are we going to prioritize and when and how. And I think it's about time. And it's maybe even about prioritizing. The types of environments we do over time, right? So from my perspective, 30 years is a long timeframe. I think there's going to be, you know, continued to be small improvements in efficiency. There's going to be reductions in how much we use based on improvements in our deficiency. And of course, better and more transmission. So what I can be concerned about is that we might have a rush to go build utility scale solar and cut down for us because we want to meet these high goals. And in reality, over time, other things may say that we may actually may not need as much or that other things come to bear. So my, my, my, my desire, my, you know, what the opinion I want to express is just that, you know, to the extent that we can prioritize, you know, and do the more costly and complex projects on top of the built environment that already exists, that as a, as a resident, that's my preference. Okay. Thank you, Brian. Next. Pam, could you bring Jack Hirsch and. And please give us your name and your address. I'm sorry. I live on Flat Hills Road in Amherst. I'll brief brief. I would just like you to really keep in mind in when you consider this solar. Zoning bylaw that solar is really a temporary structure. It's something that's, the contracts usually are 20 to 25 years. It's not something that's lasting forever. What other kinds of temporary things. Do you give specific bylaws to govern? And how would you view construction of a large, of a very large site? If you knew it was only one, you know, for 20 or 25 years and then there'd have to be some reuse imagine. I would also hope that in considering the bylaw, that you give very strong preferences to the disturbed ground and places that are, are low hanging and easy to plant on. And also maybe incentives for agribusiness and have solar incorporated with sheep farming or other kind of farming, but clearly solar in an old forest is not the best site. So thank you. Thank you very much, Jack. Next, we have Sharon Weisenbaum. Please give us your name and your address. Hi, I'm Sharon Weisenbaum. At 86 Henry. I'm a farmer. Hi, I'm Sharon Weisenbaum at 86 Henry street in Amherst. I want to thank you for your work. And my comment is specifically directed toward the planning board who we depend on to make well considered decisions on our behalf. I think I'm going to take more than a minute because I planned this thinking I had. A little more time, but it's still pretty brief. I was at the last planning board meeting during which 16 of the community members who spoke urged the planning board to recommend a moratorium to the select board. My neighbors spoke eloquently about their concerns and it was clear that many people had done considerable research into the issue of clear cutting forest to make way for a company to come to our town to build large scale solar installations. It was very impressive and moving to me. As I have considered this issue myself, one of the most striking aspects of it is its complexity and importance. We're dealing not only with the idea of building a huge industrial site in our town. It also has impacts and implications that relate to potential damage of our water supply, flooding, erosion, and most poignantly to what's best for the future of life on earth. I know that I've committed many hours and days to educating myself on the various aspects of this issue. One neighbor asked the planning board to please if they decided to vote no to give their reasons. After all of these comments, you all discussed the issue of the moratorium. As we know it was a five to two vote and you voted not to recommend it to the select board. Even after the heartfelt words of so many of your constituents, some planning board members still gave no reason for their no vote. One member stated that she was voting no simply because she didn't like the idea of moratoriums. And one member said that creating bylaws at the same time as the industry may be pushing its project through is as easy as chewing gum while walking. Another member said what do trees do for us anyway? They just suck up water and evaporated into the air. You can see that there are reasons why I was not sure that we, the public, were heard or that the board understood the details or weight of this issue. I know the planning board is busy and very devoted and that you may not have the time to explore or understand such complex questions adequately. However, this issue asks more of you all than superficial answers to well thought out concerns of your constituents. I'm asking you to listen to us and address our issues. Many of us have put a great deal of research into some of the complexities. Some of us are even experts in the related field. I'm also asking you as you participate in the designing of the town's bylaws to please take time to understand the many parts of this as deeply as possible. We're depending on you as our representatives. Thank you. Thank you, Sharon. Okay. Next, we have Jenny Callak. Please give us your name and your address. Good evening, everybody. Jenny Callak. I live on Shootsbury Road in Amherst. And it's wonderful to have this moment where we're beginning to think about the solar bylaw. My only contribution tonight is to ask that we also look at the chapter three of the master plan, which directs us to think about land use. That's been very well thought through. It was looked at by town council in November of 2020. So even though it's an older document, there's a lot in there. That describes what the town is about and what it wants to be about. So let's have the master plan. Be part of our discussion. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. And next we have Janet Caller. Janet, if you could give us your name and once again, your address. Hi, I'm Janet Caller. One 20 pulpit Hill Road in North Amherst. And I would like to focus on two things. The first is our drinking water supply. And the Atkins reservoir, as I understand it, supplies. 50% of our water. And that becomes really important for you to look at in terms of how the forest and the land, undeveloped land around them is treated. And we can't live without clean drinking water. So I'm making a plea. For you to look very carefully at the impacts. On drinking water supply. And the second thing I would like to say is that. For seven years, I raised the funds for and. Raised three quarters of a million dollars for the. Rhode Island greenhouse gas. Reduction plan and headed that effort. And I would like to. Also. Back up the comment that we should be looking at all the factors that contribute to Karina house gas. Emissions and therefore drive climate change. And what part solar should. Play in that it surely has a part. Of the impact or after reducing emissions from. Buildings. From mobile sources. So let's do this really right. And, and. Do the best. For the people. Of our community. Thank you. Thank you, Janet. Next we have Eric. Eric, if you could give us your name and your address. Good evening, Eric. Two seven seven shoots very road and Amherst. I'm delighted that the planning board is considering the town's need for a solar bylaw and hope you'll consider the following. At the December 15th meeting of the committee public commentary revealed that potential projects built on watershed protected water. And that was the first step of critical consideration. In fact, in 2005, a discrete bylaw to restrict activities on all parcels providing ground and surface water. To the Atkins water supply protection area was never created. What are the implications of industrial solar to the quality of drinking water in town. And on its public and private well systems. Also, as Jenny mentioned, it's not only about natural and cultural resources sections. Calls for a developing an updated inventory of natural resource areas using data and input from the town. Conservation organizations and land owners. The identifying permanently protect. Highest quality habitats. And see identifying permanently protect lands. Buffering Amherst water supply wells and reservoirs from development. And the bylaw should reflect the objectives and strategies of the 2010 master plan. I also will. And that, yes, I, I too also believe we need a maximum amount of solar to mitigate the, the relentless effects of fossil fuel on our climate. And, but I also think that we need to. We need to be able to do that. And I think the solarization of our region. An area is really a, a, a, our, our solarization of our state is a regional issue. And secondly, I think also part of that issue is where are, although it may only account for seven to 10%. Of versus solar panels. Where, how are we going to sequester carbon? We need trees to do that. And we need to be able to do that. I think I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to plug in the energy from a 360 degree perspective. Thank you. Thank you very much. All right. So next Michael Lipinski. Could you forgive us your name and your address? Yeah, I'm Michael Lipinski. One, six seven to shoot spirit out Amherst. And I just I want to respond to some of the things I've heard tonight at first of all, by the logic that some people have had of saying they had to have a solar study but they wouldn't support a moratorium in order to give time to do a solar study. I'm still stretching my head at that one. I do want to assist you with this solar study. The shoots very road site. It has been withdrawn without prejudice. There's that prejudicing again. That one is on the bio map to 100% of it is critical natural landscape. And over 50% of it is core habitat according to bio map to, and yet that proposal started its way through the town. And as far as I can see there are no protections from the town that would affect that. And one last thing I just want to say, if a private landowner rents their land to a solar developer, is that really the town of Amherst doing their share. Okay, thank you very much, Michael. Looks like next we have Phil rich, if you would give us your name, your address and see if you can keep your remarks to one minute. Okay, can you hear me. Okay, let me just tell my sound here. Excuse me one second. Okay, I am. I agree with it. Phil we stopped being able to hear you. Okay, can you hear me now. Yeah, could you move a little closer to the microphone. Okay, how about this. Before you go Pam would you restart the clock for Phil. Thank you. You're on Phil. Okay Phil rich 187 shoots free road. And I am like Mike Lepin ski before me a direct about it to the shoes be road project which is really a commercial installation. I just want to go on record, agree with everything that we said, what hasn't been said though is also protections for people like me who would direct land about us and the effect that this might have on my land. And this one is an example, they can put a 15 foot wide gravel access road, literally at where my when my property line ends which we going right through my backyard. We're on downhill that means water runoff. So I'm also concerned about how the town will be addressing in the bylaw, protecting property rights protecting property values and protecting frankly, the right to live life that I hope to live when we moved here. I'm very patient to everything else that's been said, and I will stop right there. Thanks. Perfect. Thank you well done. All right, next we have Stephanie Chickarello. What would you like to say Stephanie. You don't need to tell us where you live I suppose but you could tell us all that what your position is with the town. Thank you Doug yes this is Stephanie Chickarello sustainability coordinator for the town and I am liaison to the energy and climate action committee. A few things I wanted to point out and sort of in reference to your question earlier about process, I would hope and I've been advocating for a solar bylaw working group that's put together to discuss this and develop this bylaw so that it's really not just sitting solely with the planning board although you would obviously be the key. You know the key agency for moving this forward but that there'd be more input and development that engage other sections of the town as well so for instance including energy and climate action committee members or other residents of the town with specific projects. I would also hope that it is a really engaged process as we develop the bylaw, and I agree that it should be a parallel track. I do want to address some of the concerns from some of the residents that I heard expressed about Amherst not having those protections and I do want to say that one of the reasons the main reason why the shoots very project was road project was withdrawn had to do with those protections. Specifically those relating to wetland and habitat that the wetlands administrator had it brought up and the developer had to withdraw the project to actually enable them to answer those questions. There are protections that are in place and they are enacted and the town is enforcing them and that's actually why the project was withdrawn. So, I just want to sort of allay people's fears that that doesn't exist already because it does. And all I really have to say I just was sort of advocating more for the working group idea and yes I am working on trying to get some idea of what an assessment would cost the town I am working on that right now. Okay, thank you Stephanie. Since you mentioned cost to the town I'm just going to ask Dwayne and Steve directly. You know, both of you are in your professional position seem to have resources and staff that are interested in this kind of thing and do this professionally. Is there any opportunity for us to get a free ride on some of the expertise you have, or, you know, maybe that maybe you can't answer that and that needs to be a town gown conversation or something. Yeah, at least talking for myself and for you mass. I'm not sure whether we're in a position to do it all sort of pro bono that being said I think we can work something out with the town we want we want to we want to provide service to many municipalities but particularly our home one so I think I think there's some something we can work out for sure, you know, maybe more so like supporting a student intern that would work with the town directly to do to do the work with with staff in the background, to some extent. Okay, thank you. So, Steve, do you want to say. Remember I'm at Hampshire College, and you all know where we stand financially. I'm actually on half time right now as part of the budget relief program we're there so bad news is we don't have the resources of Hampshire college the good news is I have maybe half of my time that I can devote to this so I love Stephanie's idea of a solar bylaw working group that includes town staff and experts and and community residents. I think that would be a great way to go forward and I'd be happy to participate at that level. Okay, thank you both. So back to public comment. Jack, do you think you can hold off. Okay. Next we have Lenore brick. Lenore if you could give us your name and your address. Hi guys, Lenore brick 255 Strong Street. I'm not feeling that well so I hope I'm coherent. I, I also love the idea Stephanie suggestion for a working group, and I would ask that there be experts from different silos in different areas that will impact the final solar bylaw. Not just energy renewable experts which we do need, but when you're going to interact with a natural ecosystem, you're going to need people that understand that also you're going to need forest ecologist conservation biologists hydrologist speaking of the watershed protection. And that's one of the problems is that here we are in this pickle, because everybody's in different silos not just in our town in our state in our country in our world. And there hasn't been enough coming together of all that expertise for something like solar industrial installations on forest which is like a perfect example of where these very sincere, you know I appreciate Steve's passion for meeting our climate goals, but the moral commitment, like what is the goal. As, as Janet was saying, the goal is not solar solar is a tool towards the goal, the goal is to address climate and biodiversity collapse, and to have a livable planet. And our little job here in Amherst is to do what we can do and I want to also let us know, as Michael DK arrow was saying there are things happening on the state level that are going to impact what we can and want to do on the town level There are regional approaches being looked at there's regulation being looked at because, because we know that this Amherst can't do this by itself. No town can and even Western mass can't. And if even on a state level Western mass has land to give an eastern mass has built lands, landscape to give we can't each as a town just like I can't separate my liver from my heart and my body. I just think we're going to act as these contained little units and we're going to meet our climate goals by having X amount of solar. And I know that I've, I don't know if I've probably gone over so I also the last point I want to make is to last points. I'm going to be sending a packet to you and to the town council with different scientific data. And if I'm getting to that, there's information there on how solar has gone wrong in different places like in Williamsburg in the southeastern part of the state and the pine barons fragile landscape that can, even though those are not our areas it can inform what we do because we also don't have any environmental bylaws that exist. We want to look at what we want to anticipate the circumstances and irreversible consequences that solar companies clearly have not been able to do because that's not their lens. And we also want to anticipate what what is cutting forest do not just in terms of the carbon metrics of yes solar is going to come out ahead in that regard, but there's sacrifice that we're making for. We're at three minutes. Oh my God, you were very kind to let me go on. This will continue thank you so much for your good work. Okay, thank you. All right, the last public comment hand I see is Renee Moss. If you could give us your name and your address and see whether you can keep your comments to one minute. Renee Moss shoots Berry Road. And I definitely can keep my comments to one minute because virtually everything I was going to say has been said I had something prepared for three minutes and I'm not going to go into it all. Basically, I, I just want to just support everything that has been said, and also say that, you know when we think about doing our fair share and I know that this comes up a lot and I know that that's where Steve is coming from when he talks about the amount of solar we need, you know we know we have renewable energy energy conservation and carbon sequestration. And with the forests, when we take down a forest, we're letting all this carbon dioxide out into the air so that into the atmosphere so that's something to consider. And so I think that when we think about our share fair share, and we think about us as a region as a state as a country as a planet. We just need to think that maybe our fair share is protecting and sequestering and just taking care of those forests that are one piece of the picture. Thank you. Thank you so much for taking this so seriously and for, you know, having the patience to and, and the will to hear from your constituents thank you. Okay, thank you very much Renee. All right, that is the, that was the last comment that I see on the zoom screen. Jack, you've been holding back for a while. What's what's on your mind. You know, one to say, you know, there's a lot of science behind this, you know, I think Steve has supported, you know, you know, this, the carbon trade off between solar panels and forest land is fairly clear. And I guess, and also perspective, you know, these, these solar installations are really small scale, we're talking about acres, not square miles. They're very small. And, you know, within a watershed, they tend to be, you know, just very small percentage within the small within the watershed. So when we talk about, you know, you know, impacts on, you know, hydrology and things like that, I just, I think people need to, you know, keep that in perspective, because the impact is just, it just, you know, it's obviously I'm a hydro geologist and I have done studies on solar farms and so I, you know, I'm the one that said, you know, the trees suck up water so I have to defend myself a little bit. But the important thing is that these things are, you know, constructed and maintained in a, you know, using best management practices because if some, you know, a contractor goes in there willy nilly. And, you know, isn't, you know, following, you know, you know, you know, where, you know, the, you know, called stormwater pollution prevention plans swipes. They need to be, you know, those, those are there for a reason and you know, all this can be done in a way that that, you know, protects the environment. But, you know, there is, you know, some, you know, responsibility on the solar developer. And I think these bylaws need to speak to that. I guess, yeah, I think that's all I, you know, have to say about that but it would be interesting to see if Steve has any response to the public comment. We're really, we're really putting Steve and Dwayne on the spot tonight. They may not want to come back to talk to him. I saw him shake his head so. Also, I want to add. I also want to add I'm on the, I'm on the groundwater supply. Protection committee, and we're going to talk about this. Body or is that a pioneer valley. No, that's Amherst. So we're the Amherst. Yeah, water supply protection committee, we're meeting January 27. This was kind of put on, put on our agenda. So we're going to, you know, address it at that time as well. Good. Yeah. All right. Chris. I just wanted to say that I appreciate people who call me and send me emails and I'm learning a lot. And one of the things I learned was that people who are concerned about solar arrays aren't just concerned about groundwater recharge or, you know, how much water is going to run off in a road land. They're also concerned about battery storage and the chemicals that are used in the making of the arrays and whether any of those chemicals could eventually leech into the water supply. So I think all of these things need to be thought about carefully. And I appreciate the information that people have been forwarding to me. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. To that, you know, and I've been in studies, Chris, where I've tried to look at contaminants from these things. And they're really, it's minimal. I mean, there's just, they don't bring a lot to the site. It's, it's just, you know, it's more about the erosion and proper construction and erosion control and controlling, you know, runoff. That's the main concerns that, that I've seen, but in terms of contaminants on the site. I just, I can't. Yeah, I've done a lot of research. I just can't find anything that that that raises that to a level of concern. All right. Well, I'm going to ask a couple of questions. One. And I suppose, again, Steve and Dwayne, you guys are probably the ones in the best position to answer it, but should we be thinking about wind at the same time, or is this area just useless, you know, it doesn't have adequate wind. And you know, if somebody were proposing a 300 foot tall windmill on in this town, I think we'd have a similar number of a similar amount of public concern and public comment. Should we get ahead of the curve and be trying to look at that too. I guess I can take that. I'm not sure if it would hurt but I don't, I wouldn't expect anything to come forward. I live in the Pioneer Valley. It's a valley. Generally, the wind goes to the route to the mountain tops or the or the great plains of the central part of the country, or in the case of Massachusetts offshore. You know, Massachusetts did have a pretty strong build out of wind energy on land in the, you know, about 15 years ago and sort of ramped up with some aggressive policy and Governor Patrick sort of supporting it. And so we quickly we fairly quickly got to 100 megawatts, but it's stalled there and nothing has been and it's all in, you know, the Berkshires and some coastal communities with with their own siting problems. Absolutely. But there's been no really progression of wind energy on land for the last 10 years and I wouldn't expect any. It just not a good resource, particularly in the Pioneer Valley. I would say, you know, but but you know offshore we're in we're in the, what's sometimes referred to as the Saudi Arabia of wind of offshore wind right off our coast. So that's definitely where Massachusetts is and should be putting its attention. Okay. All right, so we could do it but we'd kind of be wasting our time because we'd never have a project that came. Yeah, which is fine, which is fine. And I could fight me, but you don't come back to bite me but I wouldn't expect anything. Okay, well maybe we should put in one, you know, two sentences that say any wind project requires a special permit and and go walk away from it. Yeah, I mean there are there are like very small residential or small commercials when turbines that people can put on top of buildings, or potentially even their backyard and it may not be somewhat for an economic commercial sort of operation but just because they want to do that. And maybe it's somewhat of an experiment I know you know you mass used to have a wind turbine. I don't know about the other colleges but but in terms of commercial, you know, real commercial development, I would not expect that at all. Okay. All right. Steve, do you want to say anything I've seen you nodding your head. Yeah, yeah, my colleague at Hampshire College studied wind at Hampshire College and totally agreed with that it's just not economically feasible for any large scale wind in the valley. And it was an attempt, some years ago to put some wind turbines on Mount Tom I think that was a UMass researcher but but I don't think that went anywhere. No, it did go somewhere. And it's still there's remnants of it today. That was that was strictly an experimental turbine. Okay. All right. Well the main thing I wanted to say is that the backbone of the Massachusetts 2050 decarbonization plan is wind power offshore wind power. We're not trying to power everything with solar. It's, I forget what you know 20% 25% of our state's need would come from solar and the majority of it would come from wind. If, if our neighbors out on the coast, don't object to the wind, the wind installation, we're talking like 1000 wind turbines of the biggest sort that are available today. That's what we need. In addition to solar that we've been talking about. I encourage folks to look at the Massachusetts 2050 decarbonization plan. Great. All right, thank you both. You know how to you have your, your hand up it's my little invisible. I need a consult from Tom on how to change the color of my little hand. And this may be something that if we get a working group put together. Like Doug your question was about wind, but the other kind of clean energy renewable energy source, or, you know, type of installation that I think we can expect to pop up is storage. So I wonder if it shouldn't be like a solar plus storage working group or you know, I don't know, renewable siting working group or something like, or you know, just so that it reflects the reality of what is likely to come down the pike rather than, you know, just saying okay this is solar and then when a battery project comes up you know I mean we have a bylaw that guides the siting of that already. But we may just want to roll it in more explicitly. I did see that on some of the sample bylaws that there is acknowledgement that frequently there it makes sense to put a battery in association with the solar array to even out the discharge to the grid and that kind of thing. And I would just add if I may large scale solar of the type that people are talking about and have some concerned about generally in Massachusetts require for regulation getting getting the incentive, require battery storage with them so they will come hard together. So it is something I don't know if the pvpc zoning bylaws address the battery portions but that is probably something you want to address together with solar, but also have their there could also be certainly a storage battery and other types but mainly batteries at this point storage independently of solar just located by themselves as well. Okay. So UMass has a battery project and they could offer some input with regard to the process and permitting the town of Amherst permitted it, but any issues with regard to the siting and safety issues. Yeah, UMass Amherst has some experience with that. Okay. All right, so we're at a quarter of nine and we often take a break at eight. So looking at the agenda for this evening. This discussion was really just the first part that we had on a listed on the agenda. We had also to review examples of other towns bylaws and review the PVPC solar best practices guide. I'm wondering whether we should just postpone that both of those items for the next meeting or you know whenever it makes sense on the next agenda. Maybe I see Stephanie has her hand up and I'd like to let her say her piece and then I think we should just take take a five minute break and then move on to the next topic when we come back. So, Stephanie, would you like to say, make a comment. Yes, thank you Doug. I just wanted to respond to the request about battery storage that the Metagrant that we just recently received just definitely does include analysis for the feasibility of solar paired with battery storage. The request that I have of the community wide investigation of solar feasibility and getting a quote does also include battery storage so anything that we do in the future going forward in terms of solar development will include battery storage. Stephanie do you and I mean from what you know or or Dwayne or Steve. Are we ever likely to have a proposal for battery storage that is not associated with solar. Absolutely. You know that the project the university is, you know independent of solar projects themselves. And, and there's business cases for for battery storage, located independent of solar. Okay, businesses at utility utility stations and so forth. Okay. So, go ahead Stephanie sorry. I was just going to say that storage I mean as we move forward and a lot of a lot of what the ECAC has looked at in terms of, you know, net zero buildings and moving towards electrification of buildings is going to require more, obviously electricity generation so there has to be storage to accommodate that increased needs so you know, I think battery storage is definitely in inevitability. Okay. All right, and then, I guess one question I had, and I'll just throw it out we don't need to answer it this evening. But when we're figuring out kind of what the demand side is for electric electricity so people can think about what, how much do we need or how much are we willing to do. What we need to increase our expectations based on phasing out natural gas and phasing out the use of gasoline for transportation and diesel. So that in fact, you know, all of our energy source goes electric. That was the goal of it. Yeah, that was the goal of of our climate action plan really is to move us away from from fossil fuels entirely. Okay, yeah, but I guess I'm thinking in the context of it if ever source told us, you know, we're using 100 megawatts in town right now. We wouldn't use that as the capacity that the demand that we want to target, we would increase right you to take on the additional energy needs that are currently met with fossil, you know, fossil fuels. Absolutely. Yes, exactly. Yeah. Okay. Great. So the time is 850. And so why don't we take a five minute break and come back at 855 and board members if you could turn off your camera and mute yourself. And we'll be back in five. Hello Pam. Okay, let's see. Looks like we have all the full all the board members back. So I think we're finished with the solar bylaw conversation for this evening. So Pam, I think you could move Dwayne and Steve back into the attendees. May I just say thank you very much to Dwayne and Steve for coming tonight and offering their expertise. Thank you for having us. Yeah. And you don't have to move me I'm going to just leave the meeting. Okay, Dwayne. Thanks. Okay. All right, so the time is 858 and we're resuming our meeting. The next item on the agenda is old business. The first item under old business is site plan review 2019-07 with Amir. If that's pronounced right for 133 and 143 Southeast Street. Review of proposed change from brick to hearty plank for the approved mixed use building in accordance with conditions established by the planning board on October 17, 2019. We have 15C parcels three and four in the BVC zoning district. Chris, how would you like to introduce this? Well, I expected that Mr. McChee might send a team or representative to talk to the planning board about this topic. But I don't think he's taking us up on that offer because I don't see anyone here that I believe represents him. I suppose we could ask if anyone in the attendees represents Mr. McChee, but I don't think so. Yeah, if there is an attendee associated with that project, could you raise your hand? Yeah, I think you're right, Chris. We don't have anyone here to talk about that. So we'll bring it back when we table that and maybe he'll go ahead with the break. Okay, so the next item was to review some of the older planning board minutes and select those from selected communities in Massachusetts. Kind of as a kind as a context for our ongoing conversation about how specific and detailed the minutes for our meetings need to be. Chris, were there specific examples that you sent that you wanted us to kind of use as an illustration or, you know, I think we've all had the packet. We've had a chance to look through those minutes that you sent. Janet had sent some other minutes, some links to those minutes. And so, you know, I think I did, in addition to looking at the minutes I went back to the open meeting guide and looked at what it said the minutes needed to contain. So that seemed to me to be a useful reference point. You know, the sort of operable bullet point on that guide was that it said we needed a summary of the discussions, rather than, you know, more very specific. It really doesn't say anything more than that. So, I guess we could argue over what's the summary and what's not. So, and, and, you know, we still we we proposed, we had this topic on the on the agenda for our last meeting. Janet since you had to leave for your travels. We postponed talking about it until you were part of it. Obviously, you've been a big part of the conversations about what should be in the minutes. So we didn't want to have the conversation without you. So, you know, is there any board discussion that people want to start out with for this for this topic. No, I don't think that's the right time. Chris were there any, you know, I mean, I think I have said in the last meeting that I felt like we should be a little more differential differential to the staff and letting them be letting them basically decide the level of specificity and and what's appropriate for each topic that we discuss, and that I wanted to start being more supportive of their opinions and decisions rather than just, you know, trying to get a lot of changes made. So, I still feel that way. And, you know, obviously we've got some minutes to review and discuss this evening. And, you know, if there's no other conversation we can move right on into the minutes, but Jack, I do see your hand. I mean, I have to know kind of apologize because I didn't, you know, realize when I was chair that we were in arrears of the minutes to the extent we were. But I would like, you know, I'm wondering, you know, from Pam's perspective, and Chris, you know, perspective. What happened, and, you know, what this is all, I think fair game in terms of, you know, I know, you know, Janet is a heavy editor and and that's that's that's fine. But, you know, I'm trying to like, we should have an open discussion I think as a board with regard to what's, you know, what has happened and what we need to do, you know, moving forward. All right. Thank you, Jack. Chris. In addition to the minutes that we sent, and we sent them in your last packet we didn't include them again in this packet because there was enough in this packet already. But I took a look at the minutes that the town council approves and their minutes are fairly short and to the point, even though their meetings tend to last, you know, five or six hours but I think Lee Reardon does a very good job of taking minutes for them and I think from time to time Athena takes minutes for them for them and they don't really go over the minutes very much they, you know, unless there's some egregious mistake they just go ahead and approve them so you know, they, I believe, have said well, and we have said there's a video out there if someone is really interested in exactly what was said and what tone of voice was used or whatever. They can go and see the video but to capture every nuance or every statement is really over and above. And so we're really just looking for a summary of what was said. I think, you know, I have been guilty of going overboard in the past and examples from 2007 and 2008 when I was doing minutes, you know, showed that minutes were really long they were like 10 pages long. And now they're 10 pages long so I think we want to try to get away from that so we can produce minutes on a regular basis. But that's kind of the goal this discussion kind of grew out of the, the situation that we got into with not having minutes for all of those meetings because we were so fixated on making sure that we captured everything so I think that's, that's what this discussion is all about and we want guidance from the board as to what the board wants us to put in the minutes and so that's all I'm going to say. You know, I looked at some of them, done a little research on in a couple of towns around here before, before we got into the conversation and before you sent the minutes that you did send. And it seemed like in many of the small towns around here it's probably planning board members who are taking the minutes. So they didn't have the benefit of staff. And, you know, some of them were were just as short as the board discussed the question. You know, I mean, it was really very personal. It did seem like they they took pains to identify anyone that made a public comment. And, but there again it was just a sentence and maybe two for each of the public comments. So, you know, and some of those meetings were three or four hours and they weren't 10 pages. So it just seemed like, particularly because we've had a fair amount of conversation about this and I wish we could kind of reduce that. And also because our, we were asking the staff to do a lot. And I'd rather have them doing preparing materials and analysis for our meetings van writing minutes. So, that's two cents from me. Thank you. I am less interested in like re litigating how did we get into a situation where there was a backlog over the course of 2021 and more interested in seeing if we can get on the same page about what is required for minutes so that we can minimize the amount of time our staff spend on it and minimize the amount of time we spend in meetings going through the minutiae of, you know, edits. So that's my two cents. Okay, thank you. I will say, at least when I talked with Chris and Pam, you know, last year when we started to have the open meeting law complaints. It seemed like it was not just the detail level of the minutes it was that we were meeting so frequently. And so, if we can keep the twice a month, maybe three times schedule, I think we'll be able to keep up better is at least that's the sense I have from Chris and Pam. So, Janet. So, I did look at some of the past minutes and it seems like our minutes are kind of average for the past. I think you know we've had some really long meetings like three, four, four and a half hours and so that's a lot of stuff to cover so maybe it's like two meetings worth of minutes, you know, that we're looking at. One of the, I've noticed that there's especially a lot of detail when we're in a permit hearing and I think part of the reason for that is, you know, to help later when Chris is writing a permit decision. You know, to get those down so I, and I also you know I did notice that people's public comments were really recorded. And so I thought that, you know, the permit hearings actually are almost like verbatim of what we're saying or what points people are bringing up and so, you know, I don't know if we should continue doing it I think it's sort of useful, you know, when you're three months later trying to figure out what to do in your decision or the permit, but I leave that to Chris. I do feel like sometimes like perspectives aren't included that people don't agree with and there's sort of this unconscious kind of leaving out of stuff. And so I that's kind of, you know, I noticed that with Michael Burt whistle I feel like sometimes I'm you know often like I'll say something and it doesn't appear and then someone's the other thing so I do think it's hard to take notes on something you agree with. I also feel like last year like I never want to go through that again. You know, we met so often and the planning department staff was so overworked like it wasn't just our meetings every week, you were at CRC meetings you'd be, you know, at town council meetings that go to like 11 o'clock at night. And so I don't know how you could have kept done those minutes in that context and so I think that kind of fell to the way said because of that year but I hope we just never do that again. And so, so that that's basically my comment is Emily reared in our note taker now is is that is, I noticed her name sort of cropping up because we were talking about getting a note taker. Is that coming to you know to my knowledge we have not talked about getting a note taker. We did get some help from someone to listen to some of our backlog of meetings. We did listen to the recordings and. Okay, that person helped us get caught up. But, Chris, do you have anything else to comment on that. No, that was strictly for catch up and we did have to pay for that out of our budget or we, we think we'll have to have to pay for it out of the budget so, and we don't have the budget going forward to hire somebody so we're very grateful that Emily was able to do that but it's not going to happen in the future. The last thing I want to say was, as I was reading the state law summary, we're supposed to be listing the documents, like not, we don't have to provide the documents we're supposed to have a list of the documents that were, you know, part of the meeting or something which kind of things like I feel like that might be covered by the packet or I don't know how that just just generally the packet has all the documents, except that we have like the interim, the ones that come in later. And so I just, I just was a little befuddled but that I've talked, I remember like Christine Gray Mullins was always concerned about things that came in after the packet and whether we should post them and stuff so anyway. Well, Chris, how do you, how do you usually deal with that. Pam's been putting a link to the packet on the, on the minutes when she publishes them. And I think if there are additional things that were posted as part of a packet that she also puts those on the minutes at the end of the minutes. So, yeah, I mean we can do a better job of trying to capture other things that come in during the meeting. But that's kind of what we're doing instead of listing things. Yeah, because I think it really long link putting the packet. Okay. Janet I assume you're finished. Yes. Doug, I, I would like to submit or resubmit the, I think it was you who said Doug where we stopped taking a lot of the edits that keep getting sent throughout the week for the minutes because I'd like to follow up with just trusting the planning staff and having that knowledge where they know they're not going to get a barrage of edits. I think we'll make the minutes go quicker for them because they know we're just going to do these succinct summaries. We're not going to capture everyone's perspective, we're not going to write, you know, all the sort of dialogue people can go watch the videos. I'd like to. Yeah, I think, I think it was you Doug who was, it was like, you were going to be more discretionary about accepting edits because I think that takes up so much of our time, so much of the staff time. And as they're preparing it, I think they're worried about that and so then they're taking even more time on the minutes and I just want to avoid that altogether there's so much great work to do. Something that's worthwhile I think so I'd like to propose that. Yeah, they get worse shorter they're more like the town council minutes, and we stop considering a lot of edits that keep getting sent in that are describing a real specific statement that's one perspective that might have been missed I don't think that's worth it I don't think it's worth the staff time I don't think it's worth our time discussing it. I'd like to just avoid that moving forward. It's a very administrative thing. I don't, I haven't seen boards getting sued over and not having lengthy minutes that cover everything and we've got so much stuff that we want to do as far as amendment changes with this new town council. Things coming our way I'd much rather work on that spend you know 20 minutes 30 minutes the beginning of all our meetings talking about minutes. That's my plea in this discussion that we just, you know, make it very just not saying rubber stamp but just not make it an ordeal anymore. I would just please. Okay. All right, Jack. Yeah. I just want to say I'm 100% behind what you know Maria said, you know, it's, we know we can't have, you know, we're almost approaching, you know, having you know a transcript. What's that legal person. Recording. Recording. So it was like, you know, it's like what's the point. I mean, is this like, give it our best shot and then just let it go. And, and, and we do have all the Amherst media, you know, recordings of all our meetings, if they want to get to more things. So I just think that's what's happening this, this day and age and I hate to encumber our planning department with, with this level of, of, you know, editing when they have so many other things more important that they need to be doing. Okay, thanks, Jack. Andrew. Thanks, Jack. I was. Thanks, Doug. I was reluctant to raise my hand just because like, I'm making the process longer by even like talking about. Should we put on the one minute stop? I'll keep it under a minute. I mean, we all think it should be shorter, but no one likes to do it, but we do have to do it. The only thing that I was going to add maybe new to the conversation is. And, and like, not reluctant to do this because it would be some more research or reading, but like, would it make sense for us to just look individually to look at the minutes of the past year and just everybody pick the one we like the best or thought was most appropriate and had something tangible to actually talk about because less more I mean it's totally arbitrary. It's the least level of conversation. So I thought the ones that I did to me felt like it was an appropriate amount of detail. But most of us felt that way. Well, and the thing is like the shorter the minutes like in many ways the longer it takes to prepare them, because now you have to actually apply some thought and aggregate, you know, the tone and the ideas. You know, you're like participating the whole meeting. So like, yeah, if the objective is to try to make it less onerous for the person doing the minutes. The transcript might actually be faster as silly as that sounds. If the idea is to have a public record that is less specific, then I think that's a different goal. Thanks. Thanks Andrew. Yeah, I was thinking. We probably the proof will be in the pudding. You know, it's like, we can say what we want right now. But when we go to the next topic, which is to approve a bunch of minutes, we're going to talk about a real example. And we're going to hopefully not be quite where we were before but we'll probably be not too far from there. I thought I saw another hand up was that you Janet. Yeah, I'm good. You're good. Okay. All right, well, anybody want to say anything else about in general, you know, Pam you've been silent and I know you do a lot of this. Maybe yields. Okay. Chris. I just want to thank Pam for getting the minutes of December 15 done despite having Christmas and New Year's and having her relatives visiting and she had a new baby born in her family and there's a lot going on in the last couple of weeks so thanks Pam for getting those December 15 minutes done. Welcome. Okay, so why don't we just move on to the minutes that we have before us. And since we included the December 15 minutes we have five sets of minutes to approve, hopefully this evening. The first one is from February 17 last year. Did anyone have any comments on the minutes that they want to propose. I don't see any hands. So maybe get a motion to approve the February 17 minutes as drafted by the staff. You know, you changed your, your hand color. I did I figured it out. I moved to approve the February 17 minutes as drafted by staff. Thank you. And Andrew are you going to second. I would like to second that. All right, thank you both. All right. Starting with Tom this time. I approve. All right, and I'm going to prove. I. All right. Shannon. I. Thank you. Johanna. I. Maria. Jack. I. Great. So that's unanimous. I think we're going to have a week later than the first set. Anybody have any. Comments about that. Other than that, they're so great. Andrew. I was only going to ask. If someone has a, someone look at the digital copy. So they can just say what page number. I'm just trying to scroll around. I know it's like in the nineties or something. Okay. Thank you. Okay. I'm on 83. This is February 24th. Not February. Right. It's 83 89 is the last page of them. Okay. Okay. Thank you. I'll make a motion. You want some time to look at it. No, I have, I'm just trying to like. Pull it up. Okay. Yeah. All right. So you made a motion to approve. Yes, please. Okay. I'll make a second. I'll second. All right. I'll call. I'll recognize Tom is having second. All right. Any, any further comment? No. All right. Let's go through it. Maria. Approve. Jack. Approve. Tom. Approve. Andrew. Hi. Janet. Hi. Yohana. Hi. And I'm an eye as well. All right. All right. The next set. This will be. A little more conversation. These are the minutes from July 14th. And. I was the one that drafted them originally. Although Chris went through and edited made a few edits. I think. And then. Janet, you had. Looks like spent a fair amount of time on these. Because there was an alternate set that was sent. By Chris. And. So. I think it might be good for you to explain what you. Why you thought. The earlier set needed to be edited. Well, always hard to hear criticism, but this was a really long meeting that we had that covered. I think four different zoning amendments. I can't remember now. And they came, I thought they came in kind of thin at like five pages. And so I, when I saw that, I just just like, you know, I thought that the details of the zoning amendments was really important. And I actually find these things useful. I'm sure the public does. And so what were we talking about? And so, so I, so that's what I just did. And I think I could have edited it some more. And made it more brief. And I just kind of, you know, kind of, I mean, I was watching the tape and typing in and stuff like that. So I'm not married to the length of these, but I do think that the information I was putting in is really really important. And so I think that, you know, I think that there was specific information about the zoning amendments, things that Maureen said, comments, people had, I should have ramped it down. I was actually kind of upset at the beginning of it because. You know, the line was Janet McGowan felt rushed. And then there's like a six point rebuttal of Chris. I don't think anyone would even understand what that was about. And I just, at that point, I felt like I was being edited out of the conversation. And I just felt like, you know, I felt like I was being used for zoning amendments. And so that was probably the way where I really felt like I was, you know, you know, and also I don't really like I, I, I didn't feel rushed. I thought we would be rushing, you know, and so I don't know. I just felt like that was to me, that statement I made about the information I had was really important. I thought, and it was important to put in the record. And so the rest of them, I think are just sort of, you know, this is the details. I don't want to cut it back, but we were covering like four zoning amendments. And I thought, and that meeting went on forever. And so I think this is an example of like, you know, we have examples in 2008 of a three hour meeting that's 12 pages. And this was like almost a five hour meeting. And so I thought they deserve more, more stuff. So I don't, I don't want to go line by line, but I would make a pitch for just approving these. And I don't want to argue about it, you know, ad nauseam and stuff like that, you know, the 20 minutes or whatever. But I did think I was, I thought there was a lot of beef that was kind of left out and people who would not really understand what the zoning amendments were saying. So that's it. Okay. All right. Any other discussion? I think eventually we're going to need to have a motion. To, you know, to approve one or the other. And so I do see two hands, Jack. Yeah, I'm wondering, you know, if the board can use, you know, Janet's expertise and, you know, would, would Janet be willing to do the, the initial draft and present it, you know, to the, to the planning board, maybe that would be the, you know, expedite the whole process because you mean on a regular basis. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, it seems like Janet's thing. And, you know, why not if you're willing. You know, Jack, I think the, the planning department does a really good job on the minutes. And so I'm not, you know, I feel like there's some emissions and some things I think need to be put in, but I, you know, I looked at the cup last couple, you know, like in 2008, they're good minutes, you know, I look back. I mean, one of the things about this whole process was we need to have timely minutes so I can, you know, we can remember what we said, but I do think these minutes serve a purpose. And I think that planning department is generally doing a very good job with it. It's just that it was too much of a job last year. And I think we're struggling minutes because we didn't do them, you know. Yeah. I mean, we had twice as many meetings as, but I don't think I don't want to become a midtaker of the planning board, but thanks to the offer. But I, I mean, you know, all right, Doug, sorry. I mean, yeah. Okay. You made your comment. The work though. Maria. So these are the minutes I want to avoid. I just want to put that out there. I don't want to see minutes doubling. And I think maybe looking at the big picture of what's important, whether, you know, your own comments were included or not versus the staff time, I think you need to just consider the bigger picture of like what minutes are for. If people are really interested in revisiting points, they can go back to the videos. And yes, it's a slog to have to click through, but there's an agenda on every packet. They can kind of see how it was about halfway through. I'm going to listen or watch that portion. I don't, I think this is a big waste of time. Honestly, I'm just going to put it out there. All the blue text. I don't think that was necessary. Okay. Thank you, Maria. Andrew. Thanks. I would say to me, like the only thing that. That concerned me was that, that basically two people wrote minutes for this, right? Like we had Doug writing and then Janet writing it essentially. So that, I think that's a frustration, but, but in general, like. What I've read. That Janet added to this, I think does accurately produce it. I think it would be silly to, to not submit it. So I'd like to make a motion that we approve the minutes as, as modified by Jan. All right. Thank you. Does anybody want to second that? Tom. All right. Anybody want to talk about. Talk about this more. Okay. All right. So why don't we go through and. We'll have a roll call vote. Let's see. Why don't we. Why don't we start with Janet this time? Oh, I, sorry. Hi. Okay. And then Yohana. Hi. Maria. Hi. Tom. Hi. Andrew. Hi. And I'm going to abstain since I wrote the original ones. All right. Jack. Oh, Jack, I'm sorry. Hi. All right. Okay. So Janet. Or the minutes as, as amended by Janet would be the ones we adopt. All right. The next set was for. July 28th. Is anybody have any comments on those? Chris, did I see your. Yeah, I thought I saw your. So I wanted to talk about these a bit because they did get to be really long. It was a really long meeting. And the reason that they're long is because we included. All of the conditions and. Findings. And so we do include conditions and findings in the decision. So I guess the question is. Does the board find it useful to have. All the conditions and findings in the minutes or. Is it enough to just have them in the decisions? All right. This was particularly long because there were. For, I think there were at least four. Applications that you were considering. And then there was a fifth one that was withdrawn. Okay. Andrew. Thanks, Doug. Aren't the findings in the packet. They're direct findings in the packet. And then when you talk about them, you refine them. And that's what gets captured in the minutes. You have the 100. All right. I'm with you now. Okay. The conditions are also in the. In the conditions that we sign. Right. When, you know, when we've made a decision. We've made a decision. Right. And I'm not sure if people actually have time to. Review the decisions when they're sent out. So maybe they find it's easier to review the minutes and then have the decisions based on the minutes. So anyway, this is an example of the whole ball of wax. I'll put into 20 pages. But it's, and it's not duplicating information. We have received in another way because. You know, I think what we see earlier are the drafts, not the final. That's correct. This is fair to say that this is a copy, paste exercise. I mean, you, you've got this. Down on paper anyway. You're essentially copying and pasting it into the minutes. I'm not something created specifically for the minutes. It's either created for the minutes or it's created for the decision in this case, the decisions were written before the minutes, which is backwards. But essentially it was copy, paste, reformat for the minutes. Good. And, you know, if we didn't get this with the minutes. And we wanted to find the final findings. Could we find them on the town website? You could find them by going to the property that you were interested in and looking under permits and complaints. And there you could find them, but it's a little bit circuitous. Okay. All right, Tom. Yeah, I mean, my, my experience of this, and this is a long time ago, we read these out loud. Isn't that the case? So in many ways, there's still a transcript of the meeting and there were things that were stated verbally at the meeting. And therefore I feel like. We might as well include them because they were part of that. Let's call it discussion. I mean, I think this was part of the experience of that meeting and. I don't see a problem with them being there. I think it's easier for people to find. All right. But I think some of the question from Chris is. Do we want her to do this going forward? And I think it's a practice, right? I mean, I think we are going to wind up reading these out loud when we have decisions, right? And when they're read aloud, I think we want them to be included in the meeting. It's the way I see it because it's decisions, decisions that are being made. Within a meeting. And they're specific to what happened in that meeting. I don't know. Okay. I feel about it. And I don't think it's any more work than. I mean, if it is just copy and paste. Okay. Janet. I think I agree with Tom. And then if it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think I agree with Tom. And then if it's, I think it's, if we're in the right sequence and we have the decision in the minutes, then you can just cut and paste that and put it into your decision and maybe clean it up a little. So I think, I think, you know, I saw some older minutes that had that. And I thought, well, I see a used that partly because it is really hard to find a decision. You know, I've actually looked for decisions myself and I've not been able to find them. And I wind up asking somebody for it. It's easier for the public and it's not more work for you. You know, it seems fine to me, just, you know, they're long minutes, but. And then if we, as we've gone more paperless. You know, maybe the, the additional pages of on a PDF or not a big deal. Yeah. I'm swimming in paper right now, but you might be the same thing, but I think I do think, you know, if it's easier for you, Chris, or you, it's not adding work, I would maybe just stick them in, you know, this is a really long thing, but it was for different decisions. And it was like a five hour meeting. And I remember like just, you know, how exhausted we were at the end. So. Okay. All right. Maria. I think that was what you always did, Chris, you, you needed to write this report anyways. And so you literally wrote it in the minutes and then you use that or made them for your report. So it's not like in another, I mean, the other extra steps is literally just make that your report that you submit later. So I'm fine with it being in the minutes because it's not like you're creating it solely for the minutes. So that's fine. I think that's why some of the older minutes were so long. Right. I don't know. Okay. All right. So I don't see any more hands. Anybody want to make a motion to approve as drafted by the, by Chris and Pam. You're on a. We'll move to approve the minutes for, oh gosh, what was it? July. 28th. 28th as drafted by Chris Brestrup. Second. And Tom. Tom second. Yeah, I was seconding, but I think Janet. I got in there. I think so. All right. All right, starting with Maria. And Jack. And Tom. Andrew. I. Janet. Hi. And I'm an eye. All right. One more set. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. The infamous December 15th minutes. Any comments? Andrew. I had one. So this is actually another where I was debating what to even do about it. There's something attributed to me on page nine. I don't think it's exactly what I said or what I meant, but I didn't go back and check the transcript. So I would just ask that we just strike. The. I would just ask that we just strike that. And if folks are comfortable, I would, I would then move to approve them. I'm sorry. I've lost track of where we are. What minutes. Andrew. Am I right that you have made a motion to approve these minutes? I think I was trying to say something different with that. But. Let's just take it out because it's not a transcript. Okay. I saw. I would ask. I would ask that we just strike that. And the folks are comfortable. I would, I would then move to approve them. I'm sorry. I've lost track of where we are. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I made a motion to approve these minutes with the one change. To strike the one paragraph. The fourth of the third full paragraph on page nine. Yeah. And apologies for rushing that out of other folks had comments, but if they don't. We can, we can talk after we have the motion. Fair enough. Then I'll put the motion out there. All right. So I'll second the motion. And do we want to talk about the motion now. Okay. I'm sorry. What minutes are we on? I'm sorry. I've gotten completely lost. December 15th. Oh, thank you. Okay. Sorry. Page nine on those ones. Thank you. Sorry. Okay. All right. Not seeing any hands for discussion. Does any. All right. I suppose now that we're talking, I guess. Fine. So let's do a roll call vote. All right. I'll start. I'll say I. Janet. I think that was an eye, but she needed. I, sorry. Thank you. Thank you. And thanks, Tom. Your honor. Hi. Maria. And approved. Jack. I apologize for using the word suck. But I approve. All right. Tom. Hi. And Andrew. Hi. All right. So approved with the one edit. As proposed by Andrew. Unanimously. All right. So that's the end of old business. And the end of our minutes discussion for tonight. Any new business. Chris. I can't think of any new business. All right. Any form A or A and R's. We do have a form A and Pam will bring it up on the screen. This is a property in South Amherst. It's at the corner of middle street and Bay Road. And it's called small ones farm. And this property shown in yellow is part of a larger farm. So the property is in two zoning districts. R O and R L D F C. But the R L D F C is just a small piece of the upper. Left corner. And Pam, do you have the actual plan? Yeah. So I've gone over this plan carefully with the applicant and with. Rob Mora. And we agree that it works. It divides the property. Properly. So what they'd like to do is. Carve off that piece to the north. And both lots are over 30,000 square feet. So most of the property is in R O. As we said, only a small bit of the northern. Corner is our. L D F C. That's this little wedge that you see that little wedge. There is R L D F C. But the majority of the parcel is R O. So it requires 30,000 square feet of lot area. And both of these lots have more than that. So it requires 150 feet of frontage and both of these lots have. At least 150 feet of frontage. And then it requires the building circle to be 150 feet. In diameter. And so. That's what this shows. So they meet all the zoning requirements. So we would ask that you authorize Doug. To sign this plan on behalf of the planning board. All right. Thanks, Doug. I think I've asked this before and I already forgot, but is there any reason why our zones don't coincide with parcel boundaries? Because that's what's, that's what's happening here, right? Like we've got a parcel that's split into two different zones. Like why, why would they not just follow parcel boundaries for clarity? I mean, I can think of one answer, which is that over time, the parcel boundaries change faster than the zoning. So I think that's a good question. I don't know if it changes, but Chris, why don't you give your answer? So my answer is that when. Amherst was zoned. And I think this was mostly done back in the 70s. They did a sort of broad swath of. Something along the frontage. And in this case, it looks like it's 200 feet along the frontage of middle street and 200 feet along the frontage of Bay Road. To be one zone. So I think that was a, that was a larger lot area zone, or a more rural zone. In this case, it was residential low density. And they put a farmland conservation over it. And then the parcel was carved up when. Some of that was put in an APR, but some of it was reserved from the APR. So the area in the yellow was reserved from the APR. So the area in the yellow was reserved from the APR, agricultural preservation restriction. So that's in this case, in this particular case, that's what's going on. That's why the boundaries don't coincide with the zoning district. But when we're rezoning an area, we do try to make the zoning. Align with property. Borders to the extent that we can. That was a really good answer. Thanks. Janet. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Before I'm looking, I have in my hand. The map with the yellow. Yeah, like this, this one I'm holding. Before this is carved up. Is this all one lot, including the farmland? No, the area in yellow has already been taken out. It's already been carved out. And then they're cutting the lot in half. That's essentially it. If you look on the back of. The colorful plan that Pam put in your packet. Yeah. Yeah, an area that's in yellow. So that's an area that was excluded from the APR. It's shown on this plan here. So that was excluded from the APR, meaning that you would be able to do things with it. You could build a house on it or something like that. But the APR is specifically for agricultural activities. And you can have a farmhouse on APR land, but it makes it harder to sell if it's all encompassed by the APR. Okay. And so, yeah, so to six a dash 42 is a lot. And that's being divided. And then to six a dash 43 is the farm. Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you. All right. Thanks. All right. Okay. Any other comments. And we need a motion, I guess, for the board to allow me to sign this. And are. You can just have a general agreement. Just a sense of the meeting. Okay. Other than that, it's already been a long evening and you want to go. I wanted to end. Okay. All right. Does anybody object to my. No. All right. Janet, I assume your hand is legacy. Okay. All right. So I think we have a sense of the meeting that people are okay with that. Chris. And now we're up to upcoming ZBA applications. Uh-huh. There's a master. There's just one upcoming ZBA application. So on January 27th, the ZBA is going to take up an application for 272. Amity street. Which is going to be the, the request is for a change of a variance condition. So this is a detached barn style garage that sits behind the primary dwelling. And in 1995, a variance was requested to demolition and rebuild. This barn style garage, it was already a non conforming shed. So they did receive a variance with the condition that. The shed garage could only be used for non residential. So now the current owner is requesting. To remove that variance condition and. To be allowed to think about using it for residential use. All right. That's it. So the question would be. Does the board want to. Have a presentation regarding this application. Absolutely. Any thoughts, sander. I was just going to, thanks. Could you go to the map. I'm not sure what properties. And I'm just curious. I don't know if that's. I don't have it. Okay. Well, that's fine. Like, is this anybody familiar with this property? I don't know what that structure is. Like how sort of non conforming it is. I can tell you that. So back in 1995. So it's a side setback. It was a non conformance. So it needed to be 15 feet. In the RGR and zoning district for the side setback. And at that time in 95, what was existing was. Well, so it was already non conforming. And the new barn shed that they approved. Was only six feet. So. All right. Any other. Comments. Questions. Do people want to have a presentation on this? And it does it. I guess. Would anybody raise their hand who would like a presentation on this? Right. So I'm not seeing any hands. I think. I know that it's a bit difficult, but I guess that's like we can let the ZBA go ahead and share process. And we don't need to. Insert ourselves into it. Okay. I'm getting a note that. I have sort of low internet bandwidth at the moment. Everybody can hear me. Okay. All right. Good. All right. So I guess that's it for ZBA applications. I think I've told you before that there's a project on Wagner farm on northeast street to establish a farm stand there, and then we're also going to hear from Amherst college about their new lyceum which is at 197. South pleasant and I think you've had a presentation about that previously from Amherst college so those two things will be coming to you on January 19. Okay. And just in terms of our agenda that night. Do you think there will be a, there will be a lot more to talk about with the solar bylaw. Only if you want there to be. Kind of up to you to pace this. What can do work in the office and then, you know, when we're ready we can come and show you something or you can, you know, want to have it on your agenda. Well it seemed like some of the, some of the conversation needs to be about how quickly could the town. Get, you know, the solar study lined up. Maybe that's not something that would you'd have anything to report in the next couple of weeks. But then we had a fair amount of conversation about a parallel process to start mock, you know, outlining a bylaw, and do you think you would have stuff for that or not. I could work on that. We'll see how far we get to keep the solar bylaw on our agenda just to keep it present and make sure everybody knows what's going on. Mm hmm. Okay. All right, Janet. And also, Stephanie Chicorello had an idea about sort of like a bylaw working group I can't know what she called it so I think it'd be interesting, a solar bylaw working group and so I think it'd be interesting to talk about at the next meeting to see how to proceed. And maybe she'll have some more ideas on that for more conversations with different groups. Thanks Janet Chris. I'm probably going to be up to the town manager to make the decision about whether there is going to be that group and then to format group. So, you know the planning board could offer the town manager recommendations but it's really going to be in his, his jurisdiction to do that. That's my understanding. I thought I thought we might be part of the group to So I assume that whatever product that group comes up with eventually would come to us for and I mean would it go from the working group straight to town council for referral to planning board or would it would we be involved in drafting it before it went to town council. I guess that's a question to be figured out. Yeah. If you would prefer to have it come to you and have some input in it before it went to town council I think we learned the hard way that bringing things to town council too quickly is not a good path to follow. So, I think it would be good to have it come to you and I will do my best to make sure that that's part of the conversation. Okay. All right. Thanks so much for that. So, committee and liaison reports. Jack you want to say anything about PVPC. We did have a meeting, I think on December 16. And I just kind of reviewing, you know, the agendas and and that I don't think there's anything, you know, noteworthy to present to the board here so. Okay. Great. We don't need, we can move on. Yeah. CPAC Andrew. No real major updates we did have. We do have a new member. Who is replacing Anna Devin got the got here. Laura. Paul these have I got the name wrong. And, and essentially getting the draft report ready to send out to send out but we have not met and we don't have another meeting scheduled. Okay. Tom DRB. No new updates. All right. And Chris CRC. Do we have a CRC yet. I don't know, but I think we must have one because they're having a meeting on the 10th. They're having a public hearing about the solar moratorium on the 10th. Okay. And I don't know if Mandy Joe is the chair or not. But we'll see what happens on the 10th. Okay. All right. I don't have any, any remarks other than to say. I'm looking forward to a little bit easier year with you all. And I'm also wondering when we might be allowed to have a meeting or two in person. The meetings in person won't begin until after April 1. We're allowed to hold remote meetings until April 1, according to the governor's ruling. And the town manager is not inclined to have in person meetings of boards and committees until then. Okay. All right. Any staff report Chris. Oh, just to make sure that everybody knows that Lynn Griezmer was elected president of town council, and that Anna Devlin go tear was elected vice president. So I was pleased to report that. Okay. Janet. Another question for Chris. Are there any other zoning amendments being worked on? And if there are, can we have a preview of that? Like I thought there might be something with that. I'm blanking on it. Well, there were several that we worked a little bit on last year and then they put felt of the wet wayside things like the BL district and I was thinking of like converted dwellings or something was there something cooking on that or. The ad use. I thought you were doing anyway, so if there are none, I'm happy. So we're going to have a meeting next week of planning department staff with Rob Mara and sort of go over what what happened last year and where we go from here and come up with a planning department list of what we think our zoning priorities should be. One of the things that we worked on last year will probably be brought forward again. But we'll also be working on flood mapping. And that has a text zoning by a text that goes along with it. We also have, you know, the things that we never actually accomplished like demolition delay. And I think we might be bringing that to you fairly soon to get your take on it. So we do have some we do have a list of things that the planning department is hoping to be able to work on. And we haven't heard from town council or CRC about what they might think is important. So, as soon as we get our list together, I can bring it to you and we can talk about it. Okay. Great. All right, so I think that's it. It's 959 and we can adjourn. Thank you. Thank you. It's a little bit easier. Oh, please. Bye bye. Thank you. Bye bye. Thank you.