 So it is 737 PM. It is November 16th, 2021. Good evening. My name is Christian Klein. I'm the chair of the Arlington zoning Board of Appeals. I call this meeting of the board to order. I've confirmed that members and the anticipated officials are present. From the board of appeals, Roger Dupont here. Patrick Hanlon. Pat, you're on mute. Are you here? There we go. I'm back off mute. Oh, sorry. I'm here. Wonderful. Not entirely as you can tell, but I'm here. Oh, good. Kevin Mills. Here. Shawna Rourke. Here. Aaron Ford. Here. And Steven Revlak. Good evening, Mr. Chair. Good evening. And so assisting us from the town is Kelly line of my she had to jump off to start another meeting in town, but she'll be back on. Apparently there are 13 meetings going on in town today. So she's assisting another group getting up and running and then she'll be back. And then joining us are. Beloved. Consultant Paul Havity Paul. Good evening. Good evening, Mr. Chairman. So this open meeting of the Arlington zoning Board of Appeals is being conducted remotely consistent with an act extending certain COVID-19 measures adopted during the state of emergency signed into law on June 16 2021. The meeting includes an extension until April 1, 2022 of the remote meeting provisions of Governor Baker's March 12 2020 executive order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law, which suspended the requirement to hold all meetings in a publicly accessible physical location. Further all members of public bodies are allowed to continue to participate remotely. Public bodies may meet remotely so long as reasonable public access is afforded so the public may follow along with the deliberations of the meeting. For this meeting the Arlington zoning Board of Appeals has convened a video webinar via the zoom webinar application with online and telephone access is listed on the agenda posted to the town's website, identifying how the public may join. This meeting is being recorded and it will be broadcast by ACMI. Some of the materials that have been provided members of this body are available on the town's website unless otherwise noted, the public is encouraged to follow along using the posted agenda. So, many of you who are participating will note that I am apparently the only person who at the moment had live video. Zoom has our understanding is that zoom had a an update to their software and until everyone has had an opportunity to reinstall zoom or to at least update zoom. Some of the video features have been disabled so most of the business will be conducting this evening. We will not be relying on sort of a communication more it's going to be discussion over documents so I appreciate everybody's indulgence to allow us to to continue this meeting as we're the board has certain time constraints with regards to this evening's business. So, turning to item two on our agenda this evening, which is the continuation of the discussion of the draft decision for Thorndike place. At our October 20, 2021 public hearing the board voted unanimously to close the public hearing for Thorndike place this marked the end of the acceptance of new testimony and new information in regards to the project. The board initiated a 40 day period for the board to consider and render its decision on October 28 2021 the board initiated its deliberations. They were continued on November 3 and November 11, and we continue them again this evening. The board's discussions and deliberations are being held openly and publicly for the board is unable to accept comment from the applicant, the board's peer review consultants the town or the public. For this reason tonight's meeting is being conducted using the webinar platform, which allows the board to limit who may participate in the discussion. On behalf of the board I appreciate everyone's understanding. In the finalist discussion using the draft decision available on tonight's agenda. It can be differentiated by the text in the footer noting in 1111 21 revision date. The board will briefly review the revisions proposed at the previous meeting, then resume the discussions with the findings discussing proposed revisions and few proposed substitutions. And at the end of tonight's meeting the board may either vote on the final decision or vote to continue the meeting to continuous deliberations under state regulations the board must issue a decision by November 30 or request an extension from the applicant to further continue its deliberations. So with that. This is the 1111 draft. The meeting is on the town's website. At the last hearing, we started with the ages. And we continued through with those until the end of the eyes. So apart from some recent recent information that Mr Mills was looking up this afternoon. Are there any questions about what we had done in terms of H the H is in the eyes. No. So there are a few items here that we were still intending to come back and review again. So at this point, we can either go back and start in with some of the questions that we had had additional on the I section. Mr Mills was looking into on our behalf today, or we can start with the findings and then come back to the conditions. Mr Chairman. Mr Hanlon. I'd suggest that we, particularly since we have Mr have it here and we won't have him here on Thursday, that we take advantage of the opportunity to go as far as we can on the conditions first and then turn to the findings after. Okay. Okay. So then I'll go ahead. So this is 18. So I 18. So there's a, there's a question that we had from before as to whether I 18 and C2K were redundant in regards to what they were covering. So I had asked if we could look into a few of these, these potential conflicts between earlier sections and the I section to see if they're in fact were conflicts or if they were things that he felt we should continue to include in both. So, for I 18. So they're both to I 18 and C2K both deal with locating the groundwater elevation in general. So I 18 is looking for the site using in general using prescribed methodologies and C2K describes confirming the seasonal high groundwater elevation specifically at the stormwater basins. So the question before the board was, then did we want to maintain both sections or did we want to work on combining them. And I recall last time part of the question was in I 18 is this the phrase at the start notwithstanding the provisions of condition to C2K. Mr Chairman. Yes, sir. I wonder if Mr Mills could explain to us his recommendation as to what to do with this one. So I recall he had one. Mr Mills. Well, they seem to be different pattern. When was the first one. I 18 I should say goes into great depth and detail about how the methods should be done for measuring the flow table, if you will, throughout the site and that's not really defined. And I'm not, you know, up on all these methods. The next section specifically recommended monitoring where the drainage pits will be specifically into see if it agrees with the previous borings. So it looked like one was just to generally look at the whole site. And the other was to look at just where they're going to have the drainage area and confirm that the other readings are generalized to that specific site. So I do think they're different. What is the Mr Chairman of Mr Mills or Mr habit he can. I'm not quite sure I understand what the, what the work is that's being done by notwithstanding the provisions of conditions C2K. I think that is probably me who added that and it was basically to imply that C2K would hold but that what was coming up in I 18 would not super mess would not supersede what was required under C2K but would be an adjunct to it. I see. I would say that probably most lawyers would read it exactly the opposite. Okay, they would, they would say notwithstanding another word C2K doesn't apply what applies here is I 18 that sort of is what usually notwithstanding the provisions of C2K would mean and I think what your intention is is that both implies. Yes, this doesn't somehow preempt C2K. I agree with Pat, and that first sentence notwithstanding could be eliminated and the rest of C2K could stand on its own. The applicant shall through the documentation. I think is how that section should start. What does Mr have any ever have a view. I mean, I don't necessarily think that the notwithstanding the provisions of conditions C2K supersedes C2K. I think that is intended to basically say that C2K stands on its own and that this condition imposes, you know, if it imposes requirements above and beyond that it's not limited to the requirements of C2K, but probably draft it so that it's a little clearer. Mr Chairman, would it be better to say in addition to the provisions of C. I think it might. be limited by the provisions of conditions C2K. The sort of thing would be helpful to me because I must say I was led to the long conclusion by the notwithstanding clause and so I may not be the only one so any of those alternatives would be okay as far as I'm concerned. So if we said not limited to the provisions of conditions C2K the applicant shall and then go on. Honestly, I. You hear me. We can't. Oh, sorry. I'm not lighting up on the board. I like something more along the lines of what Mr Hamlin suggested, in addition to the provisions of C2K, because not limited to again sounds a little bit sort of in between. You know, I think it may raise those same questions as notwithstanding. So I'd rather just have it say in addition to the provisions, you know, set forth in conditions C2K the applicant shall. I agree with that as well Mr Chairman. I will switch it to do here in it so in addition to the provisions of conditions C2K. Yes. Okay. Mr Chairman. Yes, sir. So I think that that in what may very be the least controversial question that we have before us tonight. I think there should be a quotation mark and then quotation mark at the end of this paragraph. The whole part starting with the word estimate. Oh, rotation from the handbook and we don't have a close quotes. Okay. So we think it goes to the very end. Yep. Okay. So we'll move on from. Excuse me before we go further. I have a question for Paul. Yes. The second section is C2K did not go into a great deal of detail on how the testing should be conducted as it did in IEA team. Should we be going into more detail or is that sufficient? It's not my area of expertise. It just seemed to be lighter, if you will. Well, ultimately they're going to be doing the test pits consistent with condition IEA team because it's essentially for the same purpose for the stormwater basins. So I don't think you need to repeat it in C2K. But you might want to say that in C2K the applicant shall perform additional test pits consistent with the methodology set forth in condition IEA team. Exactly. Thank you. Sounds good. And then you just cross referencing the two. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. So I think the last time we looked at this paragraph, there was also a question where you start off with if it is difficult to determine the seasonal high groundwater elevation. Does anyone remember that coming into question at the last meeting? Yeah, they're talking about the frimpton methods. Yeah. And what I was thinking in, and perhaps Mr. O'Rourke and Mr. Hamlin, you know, as experienced litigators could probably comment on this but where I read if it is difficult to determine to me that's like I go out there it's a rainy day and my boots get stuck in the mud. And so it's difficult as opposed to if the seasonal high groundwater elevations cannot be determined with a reasonable degree of precision or certainty or something more along those lines. Maybe I'm splitting hairs, but you know that seems to me that when you say is if it's difficult to determine that seems to me that you're referring to the actual process as opposed to the outcome which is the reasonable degree of precision or certainty. So I don't know maybe I'm overthinking it but that was kind of how that that whole sentence struck me. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. In principle I agree with Mr. DuPont's remark, but the provision in here, if it is difficult to determine is not our language it's quoted it's in the middle of a quotation from the Massachusetts stormwater handbook, which is going to apply no matter what we say. So it seems to me here that it might be better just to stick with the language that's already in the regulations. Thank you for pointing that out I completely lost sight of that. Come back to under K. Was this the what was recommended utilizing the methods detailing condition 18 the applicant shopper for additional test pits. That the correct adjustment for C2K. Works for me. Okay. Usually we just raise our thumbs, but we can't do that tonight. So this next one here. So this is I 27 and C1 F. So Kevin, I don't know if you want to explain this one a little bit. Okay, I'm going to expand that in my glasses on that. I can make it bigger. Yeah. I 27 is redundant with C1 F. So I think we stay with C1 F. And get rid of I 27. You were recommending an amendment to the first sentence. Yeah. Because that was that operational phrase, if you will, was included in I 27. But wasn't in C1 F. You know, C1 F just started out. Does the applicant must provide a compensatory flood storage plan. I said the applicant shall submit for review and administrative approval by the board or restoration plan. And then continue on for the compensatory blah, blah, blah. Just the compensatory storage plan already include a restoration plan. Yes. When you get down to four, five and six. Do you have any concerns with that? Nope. That's your view and approval by the board. The compensatory flood storage mitigation plan. So we're looking to do. Yes. Exactly. Okay. Thank you. And then go back down. So that just can be deleted in my opinion. We will remove that. And I didn't want to go back quickly up. Because I think there was some other. See. So there was that change. And then. We had wanted to put in that. It was that the maintenance would continue in perpetuity. I think that does not occur elsewhere in here. And that was 27. The next one is I 30. So again, Kevin, if you could just outline this for us. Again. They're largely redundant in the C1F is more deep. Killed in comprehensive. So I thought we would just make a few edits. To C1F. Okay. And all the intended information would be there. And that was that change under sub six here. Yes. I took out the line with healthy plants of identical species in similar size. And then I put in that additional information. The applicant must admit. That was from I 30. Some of the different plants. You know, if the original plants didn't live, putting in the same identical plants is not a good idea. As most gardeners would agree. You know, for whatever reason, whatever you plant in there is not making it. You're going to go for another plant. Has the same goal, but, you know, a different species. For whatever reason. Okay. Some of the different vocabulary. I mean, different words from my 30 into this one. Any questions from the board. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. So the question I have has to do with sort of. Yeah. I mean, if you recall, C is all has to do with. Providing. Certain. Certain reports. Add it at an early time. It's specifically plans. So they have to outline what they're intending to do. Correct. Is C is generally about submission requirements. And C one is about. I mean, whether or not pursuant to a permit, the applicant is supposed to do a whole bunch of things. And I guess the question I have is, is, maybe Mr. Havarty expresses an opinion on this. Is whether moving language and I 30, that is directly, that doesn't have anything to do with plans. And it's just directly applied to. The applicant. I mean, I mean, I see Mr. Handlin's point, you know, the conditions and C one effort. Designed to be the requirements, you know, for pre-building permit. So you're supposed to be getting all this stuff. Providing a plan, which plan will eventually be binding on the applicant. Whether in making that change in location. We are losing anything that we don't want to lose. Have any. I mean. I see Mr. Handlin's point, you know, the, the requirements. So you're supposed to be getting all this stuff before you pull a building permit. I mean, if you include it as a requirement somewhere else. It's still a requirement. They would still technically be supposed to do it before they pull a building permit. The question is, does it get overlooked if it's not within the list of conditions required to obtain building. So I do see that concern. Mr. Chair. I've, I've looked through the, this compared these two as well. And I felt, I felt like there was a, the two had different scopes. So C one F seems to be, you know, largely concerned with the compensatory flood storage area. Where, but whereas I 30 doesn't have that qualification. I mean, it's in the I section, which is wetlands floodplain and environmental conditions. But I, it, to me, it seemed like I 30 had a broader area of applicability than, than C one F. Steve, the one thing I think I'd have to take a look at the whole area because the last sentence does we've mentioned the compensatory flood storage area specifically. That being said, I do agree that that's assessment that perhaps, you know, these two things should be separated. Yeah, that, yeah. And that was another thing I had written down is that the, the last sentence of I 30 that deal specifically with the compensatory flood storage area seems like it should go someplace else. So if since switching from this version to this version here. So, so in section six, the original was the applicant must submit proposed recommendations for a placement of the board for its review and administrative approval. Applicant shall submit the contact information prior to responsible for monitoring. I think I would hear that, I think that would be a supplementary flood storage area. And then. So it seems to me that we could maintain this. In C one F. Sub-six. But then also maintain, I 30. I 30. But just, I 30. Yes. If you just delete the words within the compensatory flood storage area. then that last recents in red seems to me to work fine. So I felt something such as that. Anything further on this one? Mr. Chairman, you guys are following this, I think Ed and I, why wouldn't we in the I sector just say we should be just keeping the condition to address Mr. Hamilton's concern that they follow the plan section C and just so there's no duplicative language or is that not enough? So I think that the concern was that C1F is specific to the compensatory flood storage area, whereas I 30 is a more general. Oh, gotcha, gotcha. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Just to be clear, I'm not 100% sure that there really is a gap between the two. There may not be, but I think that it's a good idea just as a kind of a catch all clause that if there's anything that falls in the cracks, I 30 should be there to pick up, to pick up on it. And if it turns out that there isn't anything in the cracks, then no harm is done. I agree. So then as shown here, this I 30, we're good with. Yes. Perfect. Grab I 36 and Mr. Mills, if you don't mind giving. And again, this may be the same problem where one is general and I really didn't pick up on that to be honest, where the CIE and G sections may be just particular to the flood condition. I mean, the compensatory storage where I may be more broad. So maybe I may be incorrect in assessing I 36 be struck out. A little odd that I 36 starts off as if it was a finding, which it's not. An adequate quantity of vegetation. I see one E already talks about an adequate quantity of vegetation or areas under the jurisdiction of section 24. Now we already have something that they have to submit to basic species plan. So I would agree with Mr. Mills initial assessment. If we have C1E and C1G, then I 36 is really just duplicate the first sentence duplicates one and the second sentence duplicates the second. Mr. Chair, I came to generally the same conclusion as well. Go back to that again, please. Could you put it up with perhaps previous climate about specificity maybe from the I section, you want to strike out the phrase relating to the aura. So I think in I 30s, we were going to strike I 36, I think. Totally. Totally. Okay. Other there 27 covered by 18 we covered. Mr. Chair. Yes, sir. I think one of our question marks from earlier was in section C1IV. This was the all-electric section. Yes. I would like to make a proposal. Now let me go C1I. Mr. Chair, I did find a reference from Ms. Noyes committing to that. I put that another email. What was your proposal, Mr. Revillac? That we do have a, that we do apply the all-electric requirement to the duplexes. You know, my thinking is, you know, for us, our concern is whether we propose a condition that is challenged as making the project uneconomic. And I mean, based on some of the information distributed a while ago when we were working on, you know, having the clean heat article brought to town meeting, I came away from that with the understanding that, you know, at least air source heat pumps are, you know, in the same general price range as, you know, other, as conventional heating as other forms of heating and cooling. And I kind of get the sense that the applicants might want to just do it anyway. So I would suggest we make the, I would suggest making the all-electric requirement uniform throughout the project. How do people feel about that as applying everywhere? And I guess because the part of the question would be, obviously it would apply to not only heating, but also to the heating of hot water and to any cooking appliances. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I'm sort of nervous about this, but we are now dealing with a provision in the town bylaws that I was a major proponent of. And so it's embarrassing not to be all out for it. But the bylaw that we passed actually would allow for a gas hookup for cooking. And I think that Mr. Revillac is quite right with respect to water as well. The issue with respect to water is primarily in large part of the building and not in the duplexes. I do note though that there's a lot of word out there that to the general effect that there's a relative shortage of people who really know how to handle the heat pumps in the appropriate way. And I'm sure that the applicant could find people who would testify to practically anything here, not because they're dishonest, but because people have different perspectives on this and different degrees of experience. So I'm a little bit worried about it from that point of view and I'm worried about it even more. If there's anything that we know that we do not have the authority on our own book to impose, it would be this requirement because even town meeting didn't have that authority. And until the state legislature either adopts our whole rule petition or the Department of Energy Resources adopts some sort of a net zero building code. We're in a situation where it seems to me legally that's vulnerable. And the main thing that we have going for it is the possibility that nobody will pay any mind because it doesn't matter that much economically. And so I'm just a little bit nervous about rocking the boat. And I wondered if Mr. Havardy could just give us his assessment of this because I remember at an earlier point, it was a different provision that had to do with imposing unequal conditions that I thought he had said could be appealed even in the absence of making the project uneconomic. And I wonder what would be our position here if we adopted Mr. Gavalak's suggestion and then the applicant tried to appeal just that. Could they do that? So if the provision to be adopted is something that is not applicable to unsubsidized housing developments in early thin, then it would be subject to being stricken by the HAC if there were an appeal irrespective of whether it contributed to rendering the project uneconomic. Again, I mean, I think that Mr. Handler's point is very well taken that if the town felt that it could not go so far as to include that as a requirement in the zoning by-law, then it's not appropriate to include it as a condition in this decision. In this situation where the applicant has themselves in multiple meetings that they're intending for the project to be all-electric, it's still a proper requirement. At that, the applicant has committed to using all electrical services for the project. If they add a provision that states that if the applicant wishes to change to something other than electric service, then it shall follow the procedures set forth in 760 CMR 56.0511 for modifications of comprehensive permits. Mr. Chairman, I wonder if I could just put I focused on this too, obviously, and I have some language that would do sort of more of what I have in mind, and ultimately we have to decide what to do here. But I would have said the applicant has committed to using all-electric service for the senior residential building. If any gas services to be provided for an emergency generator or other similar facility or for the duplexes, a gas service location shall be included on final plans. And I guess the underlying thing here is that, you know, until the duplexes came back, they weren't really talking about that. And in the material that Mr. Mills turned up, the question had to do with the residential building that is to say the multi-family building that is the air to that. And the question didn't come up with respect to the duplexes. So I feel pretty comfortable about holding the applicant to its word when it comes to the multi-family aspect of it. It's only with respect to the duplexes that I feel that we're getting beyond what they made representations for. And so I would like to job on them and would do that in a finding that we talk about later on. But I was nervous about doing something that would have the problems I had discussed a long ago. I was going to say, I like the language Mr. Hanlon suggested a few moments ago for emergency generator or similar facility or to the duplexes. Because the other question I had is, I know the applicant has expressed that in the new living building there and attending on having the possibility of a food service for at least one meal a day. And I do not know the current status of electric commercial kitchenware and whether something like that is possible to do electrically or whether, something like that would have to rely on gas. Mr. Chair. Yes, sir. I do believe with the introduction of induction technology and cookware, you can create dishes as hot off faster with electricity than you can with gas at this time. I don't think that'd be a limiting function. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. My understanding is that in some restaurant situations, particularly, your grilled steaks and things like that, that there's some resistance by the restaurant industry. But I'm just going to go with, my view would be to go with what Ms. Noyes said and she didn't make any qualification with respect to using all electric for the senior residences. She made the commitment that it should apply to the question was generally to the building. And the answer was that she did continue the commitment she had made before to that. And it seems to me that I don't really necessarily see any reason to ask if we're less than she offered. So you would you recommend then changing the word project? Yes, senior residential building should replace project. And that I think is consistent with what Mr. Mills discovered when he went back and looked at the record. So would this then be the final language? For me, it's up to the rest of the board. I'm good. I'm good. Also. All right, absolutely. Discussing, we discussed last time. That may be it for the conditions. Other ones that I have flagged at the end of last time. When D 16, which we still haven't come to a full conclusion on which is the construction hours. Particularly we're not stabilizing it on the Saturday. And the other was D 31. So I did look, so I did find to the general laws that hold for protection of what we've been referring to as street trees is chapter 87 12. But that refers to them not as street trees but as public shade trees to make that change. Mr. Chairman, is public shade trees a defined term? Do we know what the difference is between the two? So public shade tree is the term that's used in the under mass general law for protection of public trees and refers to trees that are bordering on streets. But I can't recall off the top of my head if it's specifically defined a term. Is so chapter 87 second one finds public shade trees as all trees within a public way or on the boundaries thereof, including trees planted in accordance with the provisions of section seven shall be public shade trees. And when it appears in any proceeding in which the ownership of rights in the tree are material to the issue, that from the length of time or otherwise the boundaries of the highway cannot be made certain by records or monuments. And for that reason it is doubtful whether the tree is within the highway. It's taken to be within the highway and to be public property until the contrary is shown. So basically any tree within the layout is presumed to be a public shade tree. Okay, so then the only remaining question in the conditions then is the construction hours question. So with that in mind, are we comfortable moving on to findings? Mr. Chair, I can propose a resolution to the construction hours. Or if you'd prefer I hold my tongue, I'm happy to hold my tongue. If we can close this question, I would be happy to do so. So I reviewed the public, I reviewed my notes of the hearing where we discussed this the last public hearing. I counted nine members of the public who provided testimony, four opposed work on weekends and holidays and five did not express a preference. So my sort of my proposal for this is then the neighbor, I believe the, initially I think the applicant was interested in having the option of doing construction throughout the weekend and the abutters did not wanted the opposite. So I think splitting it sort of as it's worded now where there are hours allowed on Saturday but not on Sundays or holidays would be a reasonable thing to do. Other members forward think. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I agree with Mr. Reveley. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. What are the general statutes as it relates to construction activities in general? Is there a specific? So in town the construction hours are governed by the noise ordinance. And? And those are eight to six Monday through Friday and nine to five Saturdays, Sundays and holidays. Oh. Yeah. I'm surprised it includes Sunday and holidays. Thank you. Yeah. Mr. Chairman. We have the problem of limiting this project, you know, saying it's just an affordable project if you will, if we're not limiting other projects. What limitations did we put on Mass Avenue? So Mass Ave, I don't think we adjusted the hours but there was a specific request and the discussion during the hearing between ourselves and the applicant in regards to the work hours because they had wanted to shift the weekday hours earlier. And so we had sort of a discussion with them and discussing that this is at the back of a residential neighborhood with only access through the residential neighborhood that we could, we would consider shifting the work, the weekday work hours earlier in exchange for removing Sunday hours. And I believe in my notes that I have it that they had at least tacitly agreed to that. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I thought that something was like that in the discussion here as well. It was a little bit less precise, but it was clear that Mr. Klupkel was very attracted by the idea of having somewhat more flexibility on the weekdays and was actually willing to give up a little bit on the end of the weekdays in order to be able to use his construction crews in a more efficient way. And so I have viewed this all along as being a kind of a negotiation, if you will, between the applicant and residents of the community to find something that is beneficial to the applicant that's a win-win situation, right? That the applicant is benefited by some part of it and not by other parts of it. And you come to a resolution that makes sense. And I do think that that was certainly at the end of that meeting what I had come away with is that there was flexibility on the applicant's part and really the hard part was just defining exactly where the line should be drawn. And I must say that based on my memory, the provision that is in the current red line for D16 comes pretty close to what I thought was acceptable to the applicant and represented something that made, if not everybody a little happier than they were before. So are we comfortable with maintaining the regular Saturday hours or was there any concern about that? Mr. Chairman, I would not, for the reason I just said, this is kind of a fine tuning sort of thing and I wouldn't push our luck. If we could get Saturdays and holidays, I'd be happy to get that much. Otherwise, I think we're back to where we were before. The applicants have to start at eight, but they get to work all through the weekend. And I don't think that would be, that would be advantageous to this neighborhood. Getting a couple of days of rest would be, or one every week and an additional one every once in a while would be a definite benefit for the community. Okay. And I do have a note from Mr. Havity earlier on that, whereas this is a variation from what's in our town bylaws that we should also add a waiver to cover this change. Correct. I still have that in my notes. All right. So we'll leave this as it is then. We're okay with that. Have any questions on the procedural? Okay. I was closed on the 21st. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Well, in the area that you've just got there, I'm wondering whether we, my general sense is that we have a provision and maybe I'm just wrong about this and that Mr. Havity should straighten me out. But I thought that A2 would be the final proposed project. And I mean, when we get to that, we've got a whole things. And I think that it's not really a very good idea to repeat something as fundamental as what the project is in more than one location. And I don't really see what the language that you have marked out there adds and why it is that it would be desirable to have that rather than just to rely on the provision later on. Mr. Chairman, I agree with Mr. Hanlon. I think we're better off having it only identified in one spot. If you wanted to call it out, you could certainly cross-reference the condition that identifies it. But you could say, you know, the final site plans are identified in condition A whatever. We went to condition A. I think it's specifically A2. Mr. Chairman. I believe it's a vision A2. Yes. I was just going to say what you've already put in there. This was still say, the proposed project is depicted on the final plans listed in condition A. It's not the final plans, those are the approved plans. Mr. Chairman. All right, Pat, I lost you. Oh, I'm sorry, am I here? Yep, I can hear you now. Okay. I was wondering, well, I was ready to go on to paragraph paragraph 13 if you're ready to do that. Sure. Could we stop at 12 along the way? Certainly. So in the 1, 2, 3, 4th line, there's a plan numbered, it's written as C2-03. Oh. I believe that should be C-203. Oops. And then 13. I'm right, what I'm wondering is, why, what purpose is, well, actually the 13 I'm looking at is the one that's just off the screen. Anyways, we have 12, 13, which is deleted. And then 12 again, which is a different 12. Okay. So are you talking this 13? Yeah, I'm talking about that 13. Okay. So I'm not quite sure I understand the rationale for including all of the, by name, all of the submissions of the applicant. And then just generally referring to, and by the way, there are a bunch of beta peer review comments and the conservation commission and town departments and staff. I guess I wonder whether, I would just delete the part starting the including and just say the applicant provided additional detail and assessment of the revised concept project plans and just leave it there. Now, if in fact we wanted to have some, I mean, an issue will come up later on as to whether to include reference in this. And if we did, we might wanna have an appendix that actually listed the key or the things that were referred to. But other than that, I don't really see why we have to, I mean, this just goes to show how much work the consultants and Ms. Kiefer did. And that's not necessarily something that is really part of this. Sir, having any, is there any issue in removing the dates? No, none at all. Pat, where were you intending to cut? After the word, after where that comma is after the word plans, I put a period and delete the whole rest. Just if that sentence or through the end of the... That is actually, that is the end of the sentence. Ah, okay. This may be the only suggestion that I'll make in this entire one that actually makes the document shorter. But I have a suggestion on 14 as well. Okay. I think that 14 in the, including one, anyone who's lived through all of the hearings that we have would find that it was, they were sort of weekly described by saying during the extensive public hearing process, there was significant public input, including strong local opposition. It seems to me that what I went live through was a lot more consequential than that. I remember that at least one of the people who were commenting on this provision suggested that we indicate that there was strong opposition also from the legislative delegation and from the select board. And I think that that's right. And that probably significant input from the Arlington Land Trust is a little bit underplaying exactly what they did. And I guess I would at the very least rewrite this by including Ms. Keith's suggestion saying that the opposition included the legislative delegation and the select board. Maybe that's all that you need to do. But I think that ultimately what anyone who sees this ought to understand is what we understand is that the opposition to this project was nearly universal. And that included both the legislators and it included the select board. And we ought to say more about that. That we shouldn't just say, well, we received correspondence from them as if that correspondence didn't have a pretty strong theme. So changing that last sentence then to strong opposition was also expressed by the select board and the town's state house delegation. Yes, Mr. Chairman, that would be helpful from my point of view. But you would also mention we should be a little more explicit about the Arlington Land Trust and the Mr. River Watershed Association. Right, and again, I would say significant expressions of opposition or input and because some of it is quite constructive actually. It wasn't just opposition. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I'm wondering if those sentences should go up after the at the end of the first sentence. And I'm wondering whether the first sentence should say instead of significant public input, just significant, just say strong local opposition. But I'm not married to it. My feeling was during the extensive public hearing process there was strong local opposition. And then opposition from the select board and the unbuck me to hear thoughts from others. Perhaps strong, there was a strong opposition from the select board, the town's state house delegation and from local residents. Very good. I would probably leave with the residents because they're the most relevant to the inquiry. That's fine. Mr. Chairman. I wonder if, just to make it clear that it was not just strong local opposition but broad opposition, I'd say something like many residents or something that shows that we had, when you eliminate the significant public input, you're eliminating the reference to just how much testimony there was. And I'd like to have some word in there that recognizes that it wasn't just a few people's talking a lot, it was a lot of people talking over a long period of time. And maybe you leave it as is, Mr. Chairman, because we may be overly worth smithing it. Okay. So do we want to proceed in this vein or do we want to go back to the way we had it? My opinion, the significant public input is fine. Then with the strong local, the broad strong local opposition, and you can add in the way you have it with the residents in the select board and delegation. Maybe change local opposition to local. I'm sorry, remove the word local. I said that backwards. Sorry about that. There's a local in there and we only need one. All right, I have input twice in a row. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. So the next thing that I have is also the note for deliberation. And if the board is willing, I'd like to explain where this came from. The part that's in red there, or that's shaded. In 15. Comes from Ms. Kiefer. And the part that's in blue originally came from me when I did all of this. And this will come up more in the suggestion that I made on transportation earlier on. As far as I'm concerned, there's only one application in front of us, only one proposal. That's the proposal for the senior living and the duplexes. And the applicant's insistence on our comparing it with the proposal that they had just before they had this one is really changing the subject or at least it's a diversion of the board from its task, which is to decide whether or not the balance between local concerns and the regional need for housing are such as to justify approving this project. So I attempted to basically draw what I thought was the sting in the first part of paragraph 15. That does actually though, it's not just a matter of looking at the, that it's better than in the past, but it includes a number of specific things that we will want to refer to at some point in indicating what they've done in order to address some of the concerns that we'll be getting into in more detail when we get into the specific factual findings. I'm not sure that we actually need this paragraph at all. And I don't wildly disagree except for the notable improvement, which it seems to be excessive. But so I would be happy to eliminate it. And I mean, I just, that's the reason why it is, it looks the way it does, where the first sentence says one thing and the second sentence largely takes it away. That's because the first sentence was written by one person and the other one was written by a person with a somewhat different perspective. I was gonna say something similar to Mr. Hamlin and say we take out the whole paragraph. I don't think it's necessary for our decision. I concur. And also the end of 14, the last sentence then needs to be struck out strong opposition was also expressed by the select board because you set it up above. But I think just strike that out. But Mr. Chairman, let me, I should just emphasize that some of the specifics that we struck out here will need to be referred to when we get to the actual issues when we make our findings. We shouldn't lose it all because, and we won't lose all of it, but we should just keep in our mind that they've done a number of things and we need to take into a consideration the things that have been done to mitigate the concerns that we will have. And Mr. Chair, I mean, the only word, you know, with 15 as a whole does not, I'm okay with. And even though there is an element of giving something and then taking it back, I think that actually captures a portion of how the hearings went, but I would like to see the word notable struck. If I may, Mr. Chairman. I don't think that this paragraph fits here at all anyway, because this is procedural history. And if you have and it's gone now, but where you have a sentence that starts out the board finds, that's not procedural history to me. And so I thought that at the bottom where Mr. Hanlon had constructed that last sentence, if you wanted something in there, you could say whether or not, or regardless of whether the final project is an improvement, it's the duty of the board because I do think at some point, it is important to say that as was suggested that there may be parts of this that have to go somewhere else, saying that there have been iterations and some of them are probably preferable to what came before. But I just don't think that this whole thing fits there anyway, because I don't think it's a not, a finding doesn't go in this area. So I'd be good with taking it all out. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Mr. DuPont just said more clearly that I did the reason why I suggested eliminating Ms. Berger. All right. Anyone uncomfortable with removing it? No. So removed. Okay. Moves us onto jurisdictional finding. And these are, I believe, mostly boilerplate. Couple of minor things. I just added some commas after the years. So 16 is just project eligibility. 17 is the board did not meet its statutory minima. Somebody had provided this. Mr. Chairman, you could just put the data. I remember Ms. Ray gave us a date and we'll easily see it if I could do a search of the email. I'll just, I'll leave it as it is right now because it's easy to find. Yep. And then the board asserted its claim. This is probably as a board appealed its decision October 15 that how the appeals committee have held the decision for housing community development. And then as this decision was not a final decision, the board was not able to pursue an appeal pursuant to 30A14 at that time. The board reserves its rights regarding the sale of the Harvard claim. Mr. Havard, is that written appropriately? Yes. Okay. My beautiful highlighting. The grant to go conference and permit and that result in commencement, construction of more than one, three-tenths of 1% of the land area. And those are the remainder of those, 18, yep. So that gets us to factual findings. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. We're getting close to a place where I have had a suggested amendment, but not quite there yet. What I would, I need to upset myself for just a minute, but it's when we get to paragraph 21, I think that is the key thing. But in any event, there's that, and I think that there's a reason for bringing up what now is paragraph 23 to include in here. But I will be back in just a minute. All right. Yes, Mr. Chair, when we get to 19, I will have a proposal. Okay. Although it's changed since I wrote down what I was going to suggest. So let me see if I can reconcile this while we wait for Mr. Hamlin. These changes to 18 and 19, I believe are mine. So I was trying to address the language. So 18 is the term low line has had several different terms over the different drafts. And the issue is that the site has, as we're well aware, a portion of it is not entirely within the floodplain, or excuse me, not entirely within the flood zone. And then the remainder of the site is either within the flood zone or within a floodway. And so this was just trying to have the language be a little more explicit about its condition. And then in 19, all I was trying to do was just I think trying to make it so that we refer to the duplexes and the apartment building in the same order consistently in the paragraph because it sort of reversed itself. Mr. Chairman, I'm back. Okay. So in your absence, I had just mentioned that in 18, I had added the final sentence there just to sort of clarify what low lying means in the first part of the paragraph. And then in 19, the recommendations I was making was just so that the paragraph, as it mentions, both the duplexes and the apartments that it refers to the duplex first and the apartment second, every time it references them. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Sorry. I was wondering if the material that is right here is literally about the location of the project. And I think it's sensible to have something that just is about that. And that doesn't get into evaluating this or that thing. And it seemed to me that the material that's in paragraph 23 below this one is a useful set of facts that talks about the location and is really orients the reader to what's going on. And I wondered if it would make sense to take that, which is the first paragraph in the wetlands and flooding section and bring it up here to set the stage. If we did that, I would put it between 19 and 20, just because in the order in which we deal with this, wetlands comes before transportation. Okay. Mr. Chairman, I bring up my proposal for finding 19. Absolutely. Okay. I will provide an additional sentence for the end of the paragraph, which will need a little wordsmithing to mesh properly with what's before it, but we'll just start with the new sentence first. So I would propose adding overall, the project is consistent with the zoning bylaws definition of the planned unit development district and accept is waived, comma, and accept is waived, comma, the dimensional regulations for that district. And my rationale is, I guess you could say, it's one of the incongruities that's been constantly in the back of my head throughout these entire proceedings, where if you read the definition of the district and you look at the district's dimensional regulations, this project is not a bad fit. Now I understand that being a member of a zoning board, I am guilty of thinking about things in terms of districts far more readily than I think of them in terms of neighborhoods. But I mean, to me, this is, I think I felt like a lot of the objections, in terms of the size and scale of the project, were really more directed at the bylaw than the project themselves. So I mean, the PUD district regulations are something that we decided. Our town meeting voted on them in the past and they've been on the books for over half a century at this point. And I understand the numerous objections from all quarters, but there's a part of me that says that we as a municipality have given this, have sort of allocated a purpose to the set of parcels. And I do think there should be a little bit of an obligation to follow that. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. So I hardly ever disagree with Mr. Revillac. So this is going to be a novelty for me. But let me start off with the observation that this paragraph has now evolved in such a way that it's not really about the location of the project anymore. And for a reason that is similar to a paragraph that we had before, that what really was in procedural history, if it's worth making this point, it's not a point that seems to me properly here. Second, I think that it's a little bit dangerous. I'm not sure. I don't, the rationale for originally making this a planned unit development had no relationship, whatever to the kind of project that we have been here. And it had no relationship to all of the forces that are relevant to our decision. I don't feel any sort of obligation to follow the principles of PUD in this particular case. And if we're going to, it is true that to a considerable extent, the dimensional requirements are met, the multifamily is only conditionally allowed and that's what we're dealing with. So I'm not quite sure I understand why it is that we have anything more to say about this than that it is currently located within a planned unit development. But this wouldn't be the place to go about making an argument about what that means and that generally, and particularly an argument that ends with the sentence that suggests that this is presumptively an appropriate thing to do because I don't think it is presumptively an appropriate thing to do except in so far as the 40B framework creates a certain presumption in favor of affordable housing. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I would concur with Mr. Halen on that. Okay, if there is, so if there is concern with that addition then I will concede to taking it out. With regards to sort of trying to keep this paragraph related strictly to the project, if I was to remove the highlighted portion and just leave the two sentences under 19, would that make sense or is that incomplete? Chairman, I would have no objection to that. I missed that Mr. Chairman, could you repeat that? Sure, so I was, so we had one of the things we had discussed briefly was sort of making sure that things that are under location of project. So 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, making sure that those items strictly relate to the location and as such in 19, the first two sentences relate to the planned unit, sort of the location in the planned unit development but the remainder of that paragraph is much more descriptive about the buildings themselves. So I think if I was to erase the part that is highlighted and just leave the first two sentences in 19 would that be acceptable? Yes. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Just let me point out that a discussion of height and excuse me and its relationship to the PUD is perfectly appropriate when we get to the neighbor, the compatibility with the neighborhood. And in fact, part of the purpose of the duplexes is supposed to be to increase the degree of compatibility. So the substance of that does have a place to come up that just isn't here. 20, this is the paragraph that we had slid up. This is the former 23. This relates to the location relative to the minimum bike path that way. Access is from Lake. There's no direct access route to brings us to 22 if former 21 and I believe Mr. Hanlon, you've had a recommendation. Chairman, I wonder, I especially think I need to have you put this up on the screen because I can't seem to look at this. I submitted on Monday, I think I've gotten a proposal to strike paragraph 21 and substitute something which the board should have before it. So I have one, is it the one from this morning? No, I did this yesterday, I think, or maybe even the day before, but I think yesterday. The beginning says strike paragraph 21 and substitute the following. I think I found the correct one now. It's called paragraph 21 substitute 1115-21 is the name. So under the circumstances, let me just tell you briefly what this is for. And meanwhile, those of you who can read faster than I can might figure out what it says. The existing paragraph 21 I think is originally, originated with me with lots of amendments as this was always the case here. And it was aimed at a transit-oriented development that the applicant really essentially is backed away from in this most recent iteration. And so now we are dealing with a different set of things. For the reasons I said last time, it seemed to me that the best way to approach the findings of fact here are to relate each of them to a series of local concerns. And then to determine in each case how it is that the project does or doesn't address those concerns. So the purpose of this is essentially to be a signposting paragraph, to eliminate and to, excuse me, to list and to provide an order for the concerns that seem to me to be the major ones with occasionally a sentence afterwards that explains why it is, it's a local concern. So if we decided to do this, it implies sort of moving things around a little bit and not necessarily a lot, but moving things around a little bit and some providing some additional categories that we don't already have here. The beginning one would be the need for affordable housing and Mr. Revolak has circulated, I think yesterday or the day before a proposal for that. And the main idea there is that we shouldn't be find ourselves in a position where we're arguing that affordable housing is something imposed upon us and is only relevant in so far as it competes with all the other things we care about. This is a community that cares a lot about affordable housing too. And we ought to be prepared to say that. Flooding in wetlands, we've dealt with a lot there. Climate change, I wanted to pull out a little bit for two reasons, one was to provide an opportunity to talk about building electrification in net zero, which as it turns out is at least something that this project is doing that is helpful in the overall scheme of things for Arlington's policies towards climate change. And then to focus again then back on resiliency looking at the way in which there are both pluses and minuses for the project. And in particular, I would like to express a concern if the rest of the board agrees with this concern that while we've done a lot better than the initial proposals and actually the applicant has more or less agreed with what the conservation commission has asked them to do, things are going to deteriorate, we're going to have more severe storms, the 100 year storm is going to get to be more often the 50 year storm and so on. And while there are some provisions for resiliency that the, excuse me, resiliency that the project has and I don't want to minimize that, I think that it's appropriate for us to say that we have some concern that when you run climate change into the future, this project and said lots of the rest of Arlington are not really fully prepared to deal with the future. So that's a reason for talking about climate change separately from talking about flooding and wetlands. Traffic and transportation, neighborhood compatibility are both subjects that are already on our list and they may need a little reorganization but they're there. And then we say a lot about construction impacts eventually but we don't have a corresponding set of findings here about the concern. And it seems to me that a few paragraphs that mentioned that, I will say that probably the construction of the approved project will involve bringing rather than brining large trucks. Although the idea of brining large trucks is very appealing. And then finally, I'd like to turn back on the principle of Latin grammar that you come back with the strongest word at the end. The question of open space and property management which we dealt with a lot on the last day which we deal with in various places through here and in the conditions and which it seems to me we should take the opportunity to draw all together to explain what the issue is and to explain the way the board has dealt with it so that there's no confusion. So if the board were willing to accept this as the basis and you go obviously not necessarily every single word of something that you've barely seen, it would have an implication for the way in which we'd structured the rest of the findings of fact. And I think this does a nice job of sort of organizing. The way that we approach the findings going forward. I agree, Mr. Chairman, thank you Mr. Handlin. Yes, agreed. Agreed also, thank you. I missed my thumbs up. I agree too, this is great, thank you. I was to grab all of this, right? It's the former 21, the current. Now this again is this notably question. Do we maintain this paragraph? Mr. Chairman, again, this is simply an attempt to do the summary of argument. I think that we should deal with the, let me just sort of say, for the reasons we already talked about, I don't feel it's relevant to be talking about how this relates to earlier proposals. The earlier proposals were not things that were accepted then. They're things that have been drawn by now and they're not of any concern to us anymore. So this is subject to the same objection as before. And there's also however, at the same point is that this is a summary of the conclusions. And so we shouldn't lose the substance, but I don't think that I think it's too, it's too quick. We've got a lot more discussion before we can get to these conclusions. I don't know if we get to them at all. So we would be essentially striking 22 in its current location and possibly reallocating it later on. Right, okay. So Mr. Chairman, if we follow the organization that was previously set out, I think the next thing that comes up is Mr. Revelag suggestions on affordable housing. So I should also say that I've got a suggested amendment here too, which is actually more technical than anything else, but it might be useful to bring that up, it's a red line. This was just a minor edit on Steve's, is that correct? Yeah, what I've done, yes it is. It's a technical effort. It includes a number of lines, but the basic point of it is to avoid saying anything that undermines our position that we are entitled to save harbor because we comply with the general land area minimum provision in the regulations. And that's what all that in blue is intended to do. The substance is pretty similar to what the original substance was, I think. I think Mr. Hanlon's proposal is quite worthwhile. So as you'll see that the part four, the fourth paragraph, which deals with all electric will be is incorporated in a suggestion that I'll make some time later on on climate change. But if that suggestion is accepted, it wouldn't appear here, it would appear there. Is there one at it? Taking the opportunity to raise this earlier. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I'm a little uncomfortable with the language after the first, I kind of like the original language in paragraph 67, I kind of feel like we're exceeding our authority as a board talking about the reasons, you know, getting into the minutiae of the shortfall of affordable housing. I would respectfully go with the first sentence in the new paragraph, number one, and then go right down to paragraph two and just say nevertheless the project, which is similar to the language in paragraph 67 as it exists. I think it's, I'm a little uncomfortable going that far talking about this much detail as a zoning board. Thank you. Just trying to find where nevertheless was. We go right after the, right at the beginning of the start of paragraph two. Okay. You would be removing the portion I've highlighted in blue. Yes. How do other members feel? Mr. Chairman. Yes, Mr. DuBois. So I had questions. I wasn't necessarily in disagreement, but I was trying to clarify the rationale behind some of the language. So in the second sentence, there's another nevertheless there. Nevertheless, the town falls far short of meeting the town's own goals for affordable housing. When I read falls far short, I, when it says goals for affordable housing, I think are we referring back down to those other statistics that are defined in the town's current housing production plan? Is that what, is that what that relates to? Because I wasn't clear on that. Mr. Rivillac. So actually, is that my light was that? No, Mr. Chairman, I, this is in blue, so it was my language. In my intention was- I forgive me, Mr. Chairman. I meant to say that after the word nevertheless, you then go down to paragraph two. I'm uncomfortable with the making of finding that the town fell short of its own goals. Oh, I see, okay. Yeah, forgive me. Sorry about that, Mr. Hamlin. And I don't, if I may, Mr. Chairman, I don't think it's necessarily a bad idea to say that the affordable, the percentage of affordable housing in Arlington is 5.64%. I mean, if that's a fact as of some legitimate source, that's a fact, and which does not comport with the statutory minimum of 10%. I don't have any problem with that being in there to sort of lay out where we stand today. The rest of it with respect to the housing production plan, I don't know maybe if that should be someplace else, but I think that I would not have that language from the town's current housing production plan necessarily in this area. And the other question I guess I have, and this is sort of more a lawyer question is, when we relate to, when we refer to this housing production plan, is that something that we are able to refer to according to the requirements of the decision we're making? Because it's actually something that's published within the town. And I guess that's a question for Mr. Haverty. Is this like judicial notice that we're taking of something that is part of the corpus of town laws? I wasn't clear on that. I mean, I certainly think that you have the ability to take notice of a document that has been adopted by the town. All right. Mr. Chairman, point out that it's also been approved by the state. Right. So partly, if I could just continue, I mean, there are two things. One is, is that the town's goal is actually not 10%. Town has never actually glommed on to any particular thing. And 10% is something you pick up by analogy from 40B itself. It does seem to me, the purpose is really to say that the town falls far short meeting the town's own goals for affordable housing. And those of us who've been really active on the affordable housing front, I think know just how true that is. And at every town meeting, there's a huge amount of activity that is designed to figure out the way in which we, the way in which we can make some progress in this regard. Much too much to be really specific here. So looking at the provision, the sentence about 5.64% is really bringing forward something that was said earlier in the jurisdictional statements and attracted no notice from us. I think of the town's current housing production plan as providing another example of the way in which there is a difficulty and feel actually more comfortable with just saying the fact that we have 1121 affordable units and over 5,000 potentially eligible households is enough. But if you read the housing production plan, it's a rather long document which demonstrates far more than this example does. Just how far short we were then and we're not any better off now in meeting the town's own objectives. And that's really the point of this is that apart from the objective that is established by state law, the town is still struggling to do better and to do adequately individually. So I'm not so sure that we need to, if you were going to think about how to simplify this somewhat, I think that the target shouldn't be the numbers which are clear and a good example, but maybe we don't really need to include the sentence that begins the difference between the number of deep restricted affordable units. And what that implies, if you just eliminated that and then just went directly to the shortage of affordable units is continuing concern that would say what you need to and without belaboring unnecessarily the housing production plan. Sure, does this get at your concern? Yeah, I like, I agree with Mr. Hatt, leaving in the last sentence is fine. And then taking out the money you have there is great. The data, the town's current housing production plan, that's if that's what it is, I just wasn't sure that that was outside of something we were considering for this hearing, but if that's what it is, Mr. Havity says, it's town law, that's fine. It's the nevertheless language down to the word, it's in blue, down to the word, the town, and it still would, I think might be a little bit more, almost opinion than I'm a little comfortable doing. I welcome everybody's thoughts. Mr. Chairman? Yes, Pat. Since, I mean, the main purpose of all of this was, basically to emphasize that we're not conceding when we say that we're way short of the 10%, we're not conceding that we don't have safe harbor. So the important thing was to draw the distinction between 3B and 3A. That being said, if, I mean, the numbers under the one important indication sentence, those numbers are already there in the jurisdictional findings. So one would have a hard time falling on one sword to preserve numbers that are already in the, the only thing that's different is the implication here that's drawn that this indicates how little and that the magnitude of the difference indicates how big the problem is. And that is, but the underlying idea of that whole sentence is to draw the contrast so that you can see that if we, if we took that part out, then I don't think that there would be any great, any great difficulty. In other words, the one important indication sentence is sort of optional, in my opinion. Yeah, because that's what I think I could be, I mean, just sort of editing it down so one indication of the shortfall is the percentage of low and moderate income units as compared to the states of that's housing inventory. Right. Or just referencing back to the earlier section in the jurisdictional findings about the, saying the one in the town fall short of meeting its own goals and affordable housing is presented in the jurisdictional, the jurisdictional findings or whatever those findings work, excuse me. Mr. Chairman, I would, I would feel more comfortable to saying one important indication of the shortfall of affordable housing is the percentage of low and moderate income units as compared to the subsidized housing inventory, which was 5.64% as of 2016 and then leave the rest of it out. The fell far below the 10% and so forth. I mean, somebody can draw their own conclusions about how far off 5.64. The information is all there. It doesn't need to be belabored. I don't believe, I actually think that paragraph is a bit tighter now that it's with those changes. We just, the only other thing we still need to do is fill in this X. Are we okay with that paragraph that is now? Hey, Mr. Chairman, thank you, Mr. Hanlon. The only other question I have, I'm not as up on this issue as you guys are, Mr. Hanlon, Mr. Reveley, because the town falls far short of meeting and preparing the 5.6 versus the 10 is, we need to stay far or is it just short? Because I don't understand the metrics on that. Mr. Chairman, I think the truth is far short is almost another statement, but I'm perfectly happy to take that kind of word out. Something else paragraph one, I had a question in paragraph two, which was just the first sentence, we referenced 75 and older. And even though we do go back and notice that it's the project is 62 plus, I was, or should this should be 62 as well? Or I think that makes sense for consistency. Are people who are 62, are they considered seniors? Mr. Chairman, they are. Okay, thank you. The question though is, I guess it is for Mr. Reveley, did the 75 come from the housing production plan? That came from the original text of finding 68. I see. Oh, okay. Mr. Chairman, I wonder why, if we necessarily have to have a 62 and older and just why couldn't we just say seniors? That certainly works. I think that as Mr. Havardy, if it's a deed writer or a deed restriction on the affordability. Deed restriction. Although it's, I mean, there's a deed writer that gets recorded. What number, what are you looking at here? It's just under paragraph two, it's referencing the. The deed writer is appropriate. It is a restriction, but it's called a deed writer. Okay, perfect. And it should go without saying that the parenthetical note at the end of the paragraph can be struck. Absolutely. That's just lineage. We're just putting in bold. Graph three, there's a hard 24 units, 25 such units affordable. Graph four, now four, we were talking possibly about locating elsewhere, was that correct? Yeah. Chairman, I, in the suggestion that they came out, even at the very last minute on a section on climate change, this language was included in that section. Driver, does that seem reasonable? That seems entirely reasonable to me, Mr. Chair. Comfortable with adding this in these three paragraphs. Yes. No exception here. Goodbye, me. Back to this document. Okay, without making the whole thing go nutty. Now I'll take a little cleaning. All right, so that's our new affordable housing. Need for affordable housing, so we go to affordable housing, then flooding in wetlands. Does anybody care if it's wetlands and flooding or flooding in wetlands? When in doubt, alphabetical order. Okay. Then now it's in the same order that it was in this paragraph here, so flooding in wetland. So this paragraph here, I think we already relocated. Yeah, this is now gone. So do we need a new introductory paragraph? Chairman? Not to indicate specific language, but just that I think we, because we've relocated this introductory paragraph, we kind of need to put something back in its place. We'll have to work on that. It's for capacity over the years. All still good. Memorandum from Weston and Sampson. One more question. So for a statement, for a paragraph like this, where it starts to bring in questions about climate change, do we want to leave that here or do we want to relocate it to a section in regards to climate change? Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I haven't fully done that, but that is part of what the intention was, is to, I mean, essentially the organization with climate change is essentially that with the NOAA-14 data that the Conservation Commission requested, that the commission itself indicated addresses the situation as it exists now. And it does not address the situation that existed or that is likely to exist with the continued exacerbation of the climate and with storms in the future. That last part, I'm trying to get into the climate change part. And the first part I want to, I'm trying to get here. And the Weston and Sampson paper is one of the major sources that we have for things getting worse and why it is the NOAA-14, plus data only take you so far. So anyway, that's a long way of saying that I would like to incorporate 24 into the climate change section. Okay. And I think 25, actually that's, no, so that's current, so that's not climate change related. 26, or 26, would we want to, 26, 27 are both sort of climate related. There is a funny, a fuzzy line in this area between flooding and climate change. Mr. Chairman. Yes, Mr. Hamlin. I'm not sure. I think the underlying point of 20s, I don't know where all this came from. You'll no doubt have to exclude the failing memory of an elderly person when I say, I can't remember reviewing the climate, Cambridge climate change vulnerability assessment in flood viewer, but I'm sure I must have done that at some point. I've done practically everything else. But the beginning in 26, my understanding of what that's for, and maybe Mr. Revillac can, or one of the others can do this, but I think that what they're trying to do here is to demonstrate that the elevation of the first floor of the senior living building and the first floors of the duplexes are high enough to get above the existing 100 and 500 year flood elevations, so that essentially that's talking about, well, some of it is talking about the future and some of it is talking about now. The underlying point is that they're high enough to be an appropriate response. I agree that that seems that that is, to me, that comes across as a point. Sort of the whole, all the stormwater stuff is, does get fuzzy between the current and the future. So the main thing about the current is that the stormwater management system is being designed to withstand storms based upon today's precipitation levels. Correct. That's really where the difference between present and future is. Now, dealing here with how high do the elevations need to be, that's important. And I'm not quite sure how it fits. And maybe we should just go, I need, we need to go back to the drawing board on this, although I certainly appreciate Mr. Revillac taking a look since both my personal experience and professional training, he's more adept at the stuff than I am. Not necessarily professional training. It's actually not professional training. I just happened to live in a floodplain. The very same floodplain is a matter of fact. At a slightly lower elevation. At a slightly lower elevation, my basement is 5.6 feet. So. So Mr. Chairman, we're getting, it's getting a little bit late and I'm wondering whether it's possible for us to put this on a list of things to go back to. I think that the line between climate change and the current flooding problem is a little harder than a first thought. And I think that it's not a good use of our time to try to solve it right now if we can, if we can do some other things. No problem. So I believe 30A, sub A sub B, I believe these are your as Mr. Hanley, is that correct? Yes, Mr. Chairman, those, that area, excuse me, the number eight, this was added into the draft at the point when we made a new one for the public. So that must have been, I think, October 13th. And we had the material from Mr. Hessian that was supported by beta as well. That goes into much more detail in response to our question to explain exactly what the flooding issue is. And so this is basically the source of much of that. So the origin here comes from the applicant but it's been reviewed by beta and beta agreed with it. Okay. So the idea is that we would just sort of streamline these into the findings. Yes, this is really the heart of what the current issue is, right? The question is why do we have all this flooding that we do today? And this sort of sets forth several different reasons for flooding and where the problems appear to be. And it would be the basis to prove this that certainly this would be very important as to the reasons why. Okay. This one again, this is more climate. I think number 29, 30 should be good where it is. 31 is good, 32, 32, I guess that belongs here. It starts talking about, still about compensatory as it's 33, 34, jumping back quickly. After we did flooding in wetlands, we're going to go on to climate change. I'm just going to header. Mr. Chairman, the section that was now called existing conditions in open space would be on the last section or would be incorporated into the final section about open space and management of the conservation. Climate change would be traffic and transportation. We have so the management, so open space management conservation parcel is these parts here. Now as a finding, do we want to include anything about the ongoing efforts to prepare a memorandum of understanding? Mr. Chairman. Yeah. I actually think we should sleep on that. What I think is useful here, the whole structure is now organized in a sort of a signal response kind of way. And I think that when we find that the very last thing you should get to in the findings is an explanation for what the state of play is with the MOU, the uncertainty that is there and what we have done to address the situation. So I would envision that there'd be something like that. Currently we have a lot of, I mean, we had material about the applicant has proposed a series of things and reality has kind of moved beyond the applicant's proposal at this point. And we will have conditions that if there isn't an MOU the conditions that we've imposed will be the ones that will take place. And a lot of people will be interested in that. And so it seems to me that it's important for us to say as clearly as we can, just the way in which we are dealing with the extremely strong interest in preserving open space and ensuring the appropriate management of this parcel with the uncertainty about the procedurally about how that will come about and how we're dealing with that uncertainty. So I think of that as a very strong finding sort of thing and would encourage putting it in there. Was there a direct analogy to the neighborhood compatibility? Neighborhood compatibility I think is one of the subjects in the revised thing. I envision switching it in order with transportation to go from wetlands to transportation and then to neighborhood compatibility because as you'll see the last part of the transportation insert would lead us naturally into talking about the overall compatibility of the project with the neighbor transportation. Okay. But that is no longer called the transportation network but and all of the text has been replaced by the insert that I've proposed to everyone. Just to be clear about it because it's a little confusing but late Sunday or early Monday, I guess it was, I submitted a partial draft. Oh, I'm losing track. The point is that there's a second draft that includes more than the first one that I shared at around the time of our last or said I would share it around the time of the last meeting. So the one that you need to check to see which is the most recent version. No, we have an existing section on civil engineering and site design. Would that be then divvied up among the other sections? Was that here? I think so. I think so. We'll have to look and see whether there's stuff left over that we need to find in there. But a lot of it is similar. Okay. While you're in the area, Mr. Chair, I you might want to consider striking the old numbers 68 and 69 since they've been relocated. So Mr. Chairman, just one thing that I think we'll struggle with and we'll probably get to next Monday is the provisions that are down here around 70 and 71. And we'll, we need, I think to consult with Mr. Havarty on that. I'm not sure just how much we have to find in order to be able to approve this project and this is written on the assumption that the project would be approved. But some bits of it, I mean, I have no basis for finding that what we're proposing to do doesn't make the project uneconomic because we've been concluded really from having any data on that to begin with. So, all we can say is whether it does or not, we think that local concerns justify it. And, you know, this is a light and shade in this. They've done a lot and a lot has been required. And I think that they've made, not only have they made progress, but that this in some ways is a good project, but there are still things that concern me and that I don't think that we can fix. And one of them has to do with what is going to happen in another 20 or 30 or 40 years when storms get more severe than they are now. And this project is probably more designed than many to deal with that. But I can't see how any of us could be could be comfortable in envisioning that prospect. Nor am I very comfortable in envisioning the prospect for this neighborhood, even if this project isn't built with the intensifying whether that is in store. It's a youth problem and something that I think we have to address. So I think that we got to find as little as we can and still meet our obligations under the law. And I would like as when we get to that to have Mr. Averdee, educate us as to what we must find and what is worded verbiage that we don't really meet. It is 10 o'clock. So we do have a session scheduled for two nights from now on the 18th. Unfortunately, Mr. Averdee is unable to join us for and then I think we're going to have and then we have a meeting scheduled for the following Monday at eight. Again, with Mr. Averdee, where we were sort of hoping we might be in a position where we could essentially be complete and be ready in time, ready to vote. But sort of given the nature of the findings at this point, I'm a little nervous about being able to wrap them up on Thursday. And I want to see what other people sort of thought about that. I can certainly easily take a whack at reorganizing things and making the corrections that we had discussed earlier this evening, but in terms of being comfortable with findings by the end of the night on Thursday. I was curious where people are feeling. My gut expectation is that we will need a portion of Monday. I like to be an optimist, but I'm sure we'll make good progress Thursday. I'm skeptical that we'll be quite finished or entirely finished. What do others think? And we also set aside time potentially for Tuesday. So it's not currently on the agenda for Tuesday. The thing with Tuesday is we already have like four other hearings. So we wouldn't, if we were to want to discuss anything in relation to this, it wouldn't be until, I mean, we could do it at 730 and delay everybody else, or it would not be really until after 10, 1030. Yeah, that would not be ideal. No. Mr. Chairman. Yes, Pat. I wonder if just to preserve our options, we could put it on the agenda for Tuesday. And if we were finished on Monday, we wouldn't, we wouldn't have to do it. And if you do it the other way around, and you're not finished on Monday, you have 48 hours before you can do anything again. And that brings us to Thanksgiving pretty much. So maybe we ought to at least reserve the time and work hard at not meeting it. Okay. I could certainly talk to, talk to Rick about putting it on the agenda. Mr. Chairman on Monday, had we set down eight o'clock? We have said eight o'clock on Monday. And what was the reason for that? Mr. Ford has a prior commitment earlier. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if that's fair. Fair enough. Thanks. Are we comfortable taking a, taking a break from this at this stage? Yes. Go ahead. And I can have a motion to continue. The meeting for Thorndyke place until Thursday, November 18th at 730 PM. I moved. Thank you, Mr. DuPont. Vote of the board, Mr. DuPont. Aye. Mr. Hanlon. Aye. Mr. Mills. Aye. Your work. Aye. The rebel act. Aye. Ward. Aye. Chair votes. Aye. So we are continued. Go back. I don't know if I actually updated the slide with our schedule. But this is the schedule coming up. So obviously this was tonight was the 16th. Thursday at 730. So we'll just continue to. And then we had. Seriously decided we would meet. Monday, the 22nd at eight. For Thorndyke place. And then Tuesday, the 23rd. We have Robin's road, Highland out of Swan place and Palmer street. And I will go ahead and ask Rick to put. Thorndyke place on. As a place holder for that night as well, just in case. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I just wanted to point out that for Tuesday's hearing, I'm going to have to recuse myself from Swan place. Ah, okay. Okay. So just to make sure that there are enough folks here. For that. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate that. And Mr. Chair. Yes, sir. If we do add Thorndyke place on the agenda for the 23rd. Um, would there be an advantage or would there be any practical advantage to starting at six 30 rather than seven? Um, so we could start at six 30 with Thorndyke place if we wanted to. That's what I was thinking six 30 with Thorndyke place. Um, yeah. And then, you know, cause obviously the others have already been advertised for seven 30. That's correct. Um, I couldn't start early Thursday. I apologize. Yeah. Sorry about that. Nope. Nope. I'm not sure if Mr. Mr. Havity would be, is it available or not? I am actually not available on the 23rd. I've got another hearing at seven. Put it on at the end of the agenda. I don't anticipate that I'll be later than eight or eight 30. If you wanted to put it on the end of the agenda, I almost certainly will become available and I could switch over. Okay. We could text you if needed with that. Absolutely fine. Not make you sit through it. That's fine. And of course, hopefully we won't need to do it anyways. Absolutely. Absolutely. And then you'll note after November 23rd, the next hearing date scheduled is December 21st. So we do. Once we have that taken care of, we do have a fairly sizable break. What's our closing date for this? So we can get done by the 30th. Okay. So if on the 22nd, if we're really worried and we don't think the 23rd is going to do it, we could discuss pushing into that beginning of that following week. Okay. I think that's a good start of Hanukkah. If that matters. To people. Also that we did. In our discussions with the applicant, we did indicate that we had wanted to try to be done before Thanksgiving. I don't, you know, I would really rather stay away from holidays and stay away from. Pushing it to the absolute last moment. And then the main goal is to make November 18th. Count. Absolutely. And. We might, we have generally been. Stopping at around 10. We've been talking about procedure now for a few minutes, but. We may need to. Go a little longer. Very well. All right, that's our. That is our upcoming schedule. Anything further for tonight? Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. I wonder if someone could send us instructions as to what it is that we're supposed to do to restore the functionality to Zoom so that we can all see each other. We did okay tonight without it, but I have no, I mean, Ms. Rae did say that you had to update something but my Zoom isn't calling for me to update anything and I'm not quite sure what it is I'm supposed to do. Yeah, I'm not sure what I would have done to be able to be on here. I'm guessing that being the host made a difference. But it can't be that you have to make all of this host in order to... Yeah. Mr. Chairman, I wanted to, I was on Zoom calls on my same computer all day today, so I didn't have any other issues, so. I was going to say usually for the option to update, I have to sign in and then after signing into the Zoom app, there's a little menu for check for updates. Yeah. I don't really want to impose any real burden on anyone, but if the town does know exactly what we're supposed to do is somebody could IT or someone could just give us a hint that would make it easier for us to be ready to participate appropriately next time. Yeah, I can follow up with Kelly and Ben on that one. Al, so I'll go ahead and conclude tonight's meeting. Thank you all for your participation in tonight's meeting of the Arlington Zoning Board of Appeals. Appreciate everyone's patience throughout the meeting, I especially would like to thank Rick Valorelli, Vincent Lee and Kelly Lanema for all their assistance in preparing for and hosting this online meeting. Please note the purpose of the board's recording of the meeting is to ensure the creation of an accurate record of the proceedings. It's our understanding of recordings made by ACMI will be available on demand at acmi.tv within the coming days. If anyone has comments or recommendations, please send them via email to zbaatown.arlington.ma.us. That email address is also listed on the Zoning Board of Appeals website. And to conclude tonight's meeting, I would ask for a motion to adjourn. So moved. Second. Thank you, Mr. Mills. Go to the board, Mr. Dupont. Aye. Mr. Hanlon. Aye. Mr. Mills. Aye. Mr. Rourke. Aye. Mr. Revillek. Aye. Board. Aye. Chair votes aye. We are adjourned. Thank you all very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Safe travels, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. Good night, everybody. Thank you, gentlemen. Good night.