 This meeting is being recorded. That takes care of it. So let's see. Okay. Seeing a presence of a quorum, I am calling the regular meeting of the community resources committee of the town council to order at 432pm on February 16 pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 and extended by chapters 22 and 107. This meeting is being conducted by a remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so via zoom or telephone. No in person attendance of members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time. Just an announcement, although everyone may have heard it, but this meeting is being recorded. I'm going to now call the roll to make sure that all committee members can be heard and can hear everyone else. I will start with Shalini. Present. Thank you. Pat. Present. Mandy is present Pam. And Jennifer. Present. We're going to take our agenda out of order today and do the discussion item on duplex triplex town home converted dwelling subdividable dwelling revisions first and then around 530 we will move to residential rental by law and regulations. And then we'll continue the rest of our agenda in order from there, but we're just switching agenda items three and four. Because I am a sponsor of the proposed zoning revisions I am passing the presiding officership for this discussion item to our vice chair Pam Rooney as I felt that was the most logical and transparent and fair thing to do. And I will be doing that every time that this item is on the agenda, and I'll make that announcement every time it's on the agenda. So with that Pam. Okay, and I'm looking at the agenda which has general public comment as as item number five. I'm actually tackling item number four first, which is the duplex triplex townhouse that Mandy just mentioned, followed by the residential rental by law so we'll have public comment between the duplex triplex and the residential by law and regulation for the rest of the conversation so Mandy Joe Hanna key and the Angeles are the sponsors of a fairly broadly sweeping proposal to change zoning permitting process. And we've talked that maybe they do a slightly shorter version of that presentation, since there will be a full and complete reading of it as public hearing in two weeks. Mandy and Pat. So, I'm going to share the screen. So that we can see it all. And I have generally been doing these, but it says a lot of things slides but we're not going to, we're going to breeze through some of them. But I if Pat wants to deal with this slide and talk a little bit more. That opportunity. Okay, I think that's okay with me doing most of it. I apologize to the committee and but it's really still hard for me to do be that focused I apologize. Okay, so I, this is in the packet so we're going to breeze through like I said a couple of them but I want to talk a little bit about the goals and defining principles that led Pat and I to this proposal and what we kept thinking about as we were making this proposal. And one of, and we put four up here. Two of them are primary ones which are equity and housing and addressing the housing crisis. We know we don't have enough housing in town we know our housing is quite expensive, both rental housing and home ownership housing. And that leads us to believe that our housing policy is not working right now. And that includes zoning because zoning talks is sort of what controls what you can build and where you can build it and how hard it is to build something and how dense you can build stuff and all and so doing nothing isn't going to help our housing crisis so we're proposing something that we hope will help it. So we hope we'll encourage more housing opportunities. Equity and housing. It has been shown through the reparations for Amherst people group, as well as just nationally that zoning is not always equitable and in fact much of zoning, and particularly with respect to single family only zoning policies is very inequitable and was done for, you know, discriminatory purposes we're trying to rectify some of that by eliminating exclusion that exclusionary zoning policy allowing more than just single family homes to be built just through a permission or building permit without public hearings. We're trying to diversify the housing stock within all the neighborhoods. And that goes back to again that single family only we want more than just single family homes in many of our neighborhoods and to do that we believe we need to, you know, change the permitting pathway. We hope some multifamily housing is more sustainable than non multifamily housing so that's the sustainability and we looked at the use table with a little bit of logic, you know thinking about how things are permitted now. What types of housing are permitted how and making that a little more logical and more of a flow between less intense uses to more intense uses. So that was a lot on that one. For systems I'm not going to explain too much, but special permits are discretionary. They send a message out that says you know we're not sure this type of housing or this type of use it doesn't have to be housing any use in the table is actually appropriate for that entire zone. So in our town to be able to say no you can't build that use in this zone in that area of the zone in other areas you can, which is different than site plan review in that it sends a message and it's not just a message sending. It's it's the actual law site plan review is we admit that this is a use that is appropriate in the entire zone on all the parcels in the zone. We want some control, some say in what it looks like so the public hearing still needs to be there and all of that still needs to be there, but it is a by right use in site plan review. And so when we approached a lot of this we said is a duplex we asked ourselves questions like is a duplex appropriate in all of the RG zones. Well if it is it belongs in the site plan review category not special permit category is a townhouse, townhouse appropriate development in all of the RG zone or all of the BN zone. If so, it belongs in the site plan review not the special permit category. And so those were some of the questions. I'm going to skip these because we can read all of them. RO and RLD gets complicated in our proposal because they are in the same column on our use table. We recognize they are very different zones but because they're in the same column. We have to also recognize that if we think of development, a use is appropriate in part of the RO zone, for instance, that you might want to build a duplex say and I'm just picking duplexes in one section of the RO zone, but maybe it's not appropriate at all in the RLD zone. Well you can't have a know there because then you can't build it where you think it's appropriate in the RO zone because they're the same column. So that's a, it's an odd quirk of our zoning bylaw that we have to deal with and recognize that that special permit is there for a reason here to recognize that it that use may not ever be appropriate and RLD but if we say no to RLD we say no to RO too. And so I want, we ask people to consider that duplexes, pictures of duplexes, they can be side by side they can be up down each unit has a separate entrance. And oh those pictures are all from Amherst and all duplexes and I believe they are all technically duplexes and Amherst. And so, you know, what we're trying to do we have one change in the business district and it's to change non owner occupied from special permit to site plan review believing that if a duplex is if an owner occupied or affordable duplexes is appropriate in those in that business zone, then so is a non owner occupied duplex. The changes here are to in the residential zones to move all owner occupied duplexes and affordable duplexes to yes. I'll talk about this parentheses section later to mean that just like a single family home if you comply with the bylaw you can present your plans to the building commissioner and the building department and get a building permit to build that you can comply with the bylaw but if you do you would get your building permit, just like a single family home and we're trying to treat owner occupied duplexes and affordable duplexes as similarly to single family as we do now. Another mention of this is that recently the town council adopted an accessory dwelling unit. ADU bylaw changes. That's not a use under the use table it is an accessory use so it's found in a different one but it is now by right the equivalent of a yes in the use table. So we believe owner occupied duplexes and affordable duplexes are should be treated the same as the ADU's which just go to the building commissioner for for their permits a non owner occupied duplexes we recognize are different. And so we're proposing site plan review for them in all of the residential zones. The conditions are basically what we're trying to do is match them to the ADU conditions. The ADU's are essentially two units on a property, one of which has to be on our occupied. And so those conditions make sense for duplexes which are two units on a property, whether or not they have to be on our occupied. The non owner occupied ones come with more conditions, including management professional management requirements, multiple management plans, things like that. Triplexes this is one of the ones I want to spend a little more time on. We don't have this category in town right now. It is a triplex is considered an apartment building. If it is side by side with all three units having their own entrance at the ground floor, it's under townhouse and we intend we propose to keep that type of trip three family under townhouse townhouse so this is why we have at least two of the unit sharing a entrance and why it would be an up down. And so, since we're proposing a new use category, new use completely. We have to propose everything the nose match all the other zones. The SPR and business matches the duplexes in the business neighborhood in the residential. We again took the approach that triplexes are appropriate for all of our residential zones in town. And so the SPR use permitting pathway would be the appropriate one this slide shows some of the minimum lot sizes under our dimensional table that would be required to put three units in some of those zones. Conditions, these say them all but design guidelines apply multiple management plans required they closely mirror some of the adu conditions they also mirror some of the apartment conditions they're kind of a mix of them and all. And because it's a new use category, it requires or we believed it required adding triplexes to uses that are permitted and some of these development methods cluster development planned unit residential development open space development and then in section nine the non conforming lots. So it's just a matter of adding that word there. Town homes townhouses are three to 10 units all have entrances at the ground level. The proposal is to change the use from a special permit to a site plan review in most of the business areas and from a site plan review to a special permit in the BG area that switch in the BG to a special permit complies and matches what we did with apartments to preference stuff that has retail on the ground floor. In the other areas, it matches the mixed use building preference as transitional zones, we believe town homes, townhouses are transitional to more residential areas and therefore are appropriate in those areas. In the RN RV CNRG and RV CNRG site plan review for the same reasons in the RN, we recognize that this is a special district. This is an odd district in our town, and it's supposed to be medium density you'll see on this use chart that apartments aren't allowed, but, as it says later in the slides, Puffton Village, Brandywine, Presidential, Solonial Village, all of the Bradley Road apartments they're all in the RN district so despite quote apartments not being allowed we have a lot of apartments in that zone. And so if apartments are in that zone, we believe town homes could be in that zone, hence the special permit proposal from a no. The RO zone and RLD special permit proposal for the reason I mentioned about why it's one home. Town homes may not be appropriate in the RLD. I don't know but there are certain sections of the RO that town homes may be truly appropriate I've highlighted one here that it might work in. The Long Meadow Drive is already an apartment complex. It is close to the Glendale neighborhood is adjacent to the Pomeroy Village Village Center. That is an RO that is adjacent to a village center. So we didn't want to say no in this one because there may be some areas of this RO that a three unit town home or a four unit town home could be entirely suitable and appropriate but if you put the no there, you've excluded that possibility completely. The definitions were not changing other than some language converted dwellings. The definition of a converted dwelling is important. It is a building that's already there that already houses a residential unit that is going to add more residential units but you can't do it because it's building new alone. And the thing that is also important is that in the business areas you can't go convert to more than six units and in the residential areas you can't convert to more than four units so we have to keep that in mind. The site plan review was our proposal because they are very limited to that in the business areas six units and in the residential four and since these buildings already exist. It is the most logical infill development. And so I think we should, we thought we should preference it. Same in the RN site plan review and then same in the RO and RLD for the reasons I said, and these are the conditions were retaining adding modifying or deleting I want to talk about a little bit of the deleting ones the management plan and landscape plan requirements are being deleted not because they're not required, but because we've added a line that says the conversion of a dwelling is really a development method in a sense it doesn't tell you what's going to end up there. And so we've added a condition that would say match you have to comply with the conditions in the zoning bylaw that will most that for the use that that converted dwelling will most closely match when it's complete. So that's an apartment complex you have to comply with the apartment conditions if it's a duplex, you have to apply with the comply with the duplex conditions, and those conditions have all those requirements for management plans for landscape plans for all of that and so we were trying to eliminate that that sort of duplicativeness of some of that. That's where we talk about that parentheses section that parentheses refers to this aquifer recharge protection district it's the blue hashed line, and it is a zone it's an overlay district that covers that overlays over RLD RO and RN in South Amherst to protect our water supply and the Lawrence swamp aquifer. So we are proposing not to allow town homes in that aquifer recharge protection district, we are proposing that converted dwellings could only be allowed by special permit and that they would have to be on public sewer facilities and duplexes would be allowed by site plan review no matter what type of duplex you are, because this is something that in order to ensure we are protecting our water supply that we would want a board and all looking at very closely. Subdividable dwellings all we say about this is when we talked to the planning staff about this Rob more recommended it be deleted so in our proposal we're deleting it. So that is the shortened. I'm not sure it was shortened I think it was quicker. It's quicker. I page through things. It was quicker. That's what I'm saying quicker. Right. Any comments or questions from CRC members. No. I have I have a number of comments but I want to let other people have a chat. Charlie. Yeah, this is again as everyone has stated in other committees and meeting this is so much work and thoughtfulness like hats off to you for going there. I'm just curious if you know it is over. It's a very comprehensive and nuanced changes with huge impacts, potentially. So my first question was, did you have an idea of how what's a pathway for us as a CRC to walk through this process like in my mind for instance I'm thinking like okay what are the obvious or least controversial or least impact changes or the ones that project the most favorable change or which are the most logical exam. Some reason I can start with that and then move through it or did you have any other parts how to move forward. Um, you know there's a couple of ways right you know when Pat and I were working on this. We looked at it multiple ways right we looked at it across the use. What do we think about home owner occupied duplexes what do we think about those where should they be allowed and across that use and across a triplex use and across a town home use we looked at it sometimes that way but we also looked at it what I would call vertically in the RG. What do we want in the RG what is the RG zone what is it for where is it and what is most appropriate for that in terms of that so you know I would say that in my meetings with the planning board is they've been looking at this and I've been listening to them and responding to their questions they've they've looked at that both ways to you know you you'll see the presentation I did sort of looked at it across uses right it took a use and then looked at it across the district they've looked at it as where do we want town homes and where you know and so each each committee can approach it differently. But those are sort of the two ways Pat and I looked at it in formulating it. But also I would say planning boards kind of approached it both ways to do we want at some point today, maybe we can come to an understanding of how it's CRC would might want to. Start looking at it because it's really otherwise it's like whoa and I want to say no to everything because it's so scary. But of course I know there's a lot of good in it there's a lot of changes are town needs, but then what can be supported by, you know, our sewer systems or water supply and so coming from the staff. You know, and then where what what is that change going to really look like and how is it going to change that neighborhood and just like I mean so I think for me it would be really helpful if we go maybe looking like you said just are or each zone and say okay what is that zone what is the purpose and then really diving deep into that and seeing what are what is the infrastructure already there to support the kind of change we want to see. That's how I that would be my preference anyways. Great thank you. Jennifer. Do you want to go first pan, because you said you had. Some general comments and also some very fairly specific concerns. I'm happy to go first. If you want to if you want to wait. I mean mine are more general. So, I don't want you to use first time. So I, in part, my comments are going to reflect that I was at the planning board meeting last night and so, of course, we all share the goals of wanting to provide housing for low moderate and middle income households the households that were losing in Amherst, and that we need to have more of. And I live in a general residence district, which already allows for triplexes. I mean, it's interesting they don't, I guess don't call them triplexes but there are triplexes on my street, you know three unit houses that have been converted to three units that's already permitted duplexes or everywhere we have townhouses. So this for the residential district I live in. This is the least change. But I was really struck I was a little perplexed at last night's planning board meeting the chair said that maybe we should begin implementing these changes these proposed zoning revisions in the general residents and the village center districts and kind of see how it goes. And what surprised me about this is, they're already permitted at least in the residential district so we know how it will go because it's been going for decades and how it goes is that the duplexes overwhelmingly 90 over 95% the duplexes the houses that have been converted to three, what I would call triplexes and townhouses are rented to students because that's where they make the most money. You know if you have. So, I mean I have two student houses on a flag lot behind me each has rented for bedrooms each to four students around the corner there's a duplex for bedrooms in each unit rented to eight students that house rents for $8100 a month to eight students. I mean when you have four students each one is just paying for a bedroom. We have a non student household the one or two adults let's say average that are paying for the unit have to pay for all the bedrooms and that's why four students can afford to pay some can pay for three or four bedroom a unit what a single person or a couple or a family with one or two adults could pay. And so that's so we don't have to see what will happen we know what will happen. And then I was really surprised that the planning board chair also said that we have a situation in Amherst that requires fulfilling student housing needs as a first priority. There's something to be effective I haven't gone back to listen to the tape that the residential housing would sort itself out afterwards. And to me that felt like wow play saying the quiet part out loud. We have all these students that need housing, let's provide housing for them, you know, and then we'll kind of get to the rest. And that's what I fear and again it's already happening in my neighborhood so this isn't changing anything for me personally, but I can see that playing out throughout town. And then it also got discussed last night in the planning board of really how many duplexes is one affordable, you know, that meets the criteria for someone who would qualify for affordable housing, and they kind of said none that that just doesn't really happen somebody's not going to build a duplex or convert their house to a duplex and then probably rented out at below, you know well below market rate, even though we would, you know that would be nice but it just doesn't really happen. So, and I would say what doesn't make sense to me is why, for example in an RG, we would, since there's a lot of these multiplayer, we're doing our part. But why would we not let a townhouse go before the zoning board of appeals that was we currently do for a special permit I mean it feels like redlining one district and saying you the district. is really fulfilling a lot of our multifamily housing needs we're going to reward you for that by not letting you get the special permit. And there is absolutely no evidence that anybody is not building, you know, a townhouse development because they have to go through the special permitting process, and to say well if it's allowed in the district anywhere in the zoning district then it should be by site plan review. It doesn't make sense because if a townhouse is going to go clock down, you know in the middle of a quiet street, which you could it's allowed to do that in the RG. Well you, you know, maybe want it to, you know the special permit to accommodate that in a different way than it's in the middle of a busy thoroughfare. So that just, I don't understand that it's like you're punishing the district that's doing the most. So, those are my comments kind of it, you know, 1000 feet. Thank you. Yeah, I've got some comments to I didn't mean to put you on the spot Jennifer. Couple of my comments we do have lots of options for small and large scale residential development. And I think it is an urban myth that that people shy away from it because it's a special permit. I think that had more to do with the business arena than it does with with residential. Jennifer started this conversation but the RG is very full of diversity of housing types, we have everything. And I'm not sure how, how loosening this process improves on that. I think we're, you know, we're in. Again, we accommodate a lot of the housing needs in town. In thinking about your horizontal rose, I get townhouses and I have to stop a townhouse. And I'm going to call that I think I like the idea of it being four units or more. When I get to townhouse. Jennifer just mentioned it. We're not if we're talking anywhere in the RG we're not talking just along the main road just for there's bus stops and traffic. We're talking middle of, we're talking middle of neighborhoods perfectly legit by this process. And the planning board says, it's come to us it's in the middle of a neighborhood. We don't have the right to question the appropriateness of a large scale development in the middle of a neighborhood. And I think, without reason, I think every single, every single district should remain as a special permit for townhouses. It is a different ball of wax it's simply a small scale apartment. So I would, I would suggest strongly that we keep all townhouses as special permit. I was curious why in the duplexes, the elimination of the design parameters, which are, which are the ones that the design review board currently applies. What owners, they say some very basic things like reflect the character of your neighboring structures, if it's a historic structure. And I don't mean that it has to be on the national register, if the if it's an historic structure, every effort should be made to maintain and and augment that building rather than demolishing it. And I think eliminating 3.2040 and 3.2041 for or do like this does not have to happen. I would put that right back in North Hampton has a section number 6.11 some really wonderful detailed graphics and descriptions of expectations for all of their duplexes. So, by the way, those, those guidelines were put in place before they loosened some of the permitting process so they did it in the right order, which I've always, I've always put forward here. We have lots of converted dwellings, we have lots of add-ons, a New Zealand style farmhouse is very much sort of in the mode of a triplex or duplex just because they kept adding on in the back or adding a lot at the barn. And I wasn't sure why you called out the triplex definition as as stacked only. I think duplex triplex can be any, any building any structure that has three dwelling units in it. I think we should add back into that definition or horizontal. I don't, they could come about a triplex could be built. There are several on Lincoln Street in fact that are sort of built onto the back of a big old house in the front. We don't need to limit it to stacked only. It's frankly the least attractive of just about any housing type. Subdividable dwellings. I happened to have been on the planning board when that came through and in fact, I think it has not been well advertised. I think it's a very elegant solution, which means someone comes in new construction. And they can decide if they're going to be able to adjust their living arrangements from single family to duplex to triplex three family within the same structure but they actually think about it ahead of time. And it's not a, you know, a retrofit. It's, it's planned out in advance. They have to show that they have enough that they have to have enough parking and that kind of thing. So there's sort of a management plan. It seems onerous perhaps, but for a three, a three unit building. It's actually kind of kind of cool. And I would, I would like very much to, before that gets eliminated to see if that doesn't have broader appeal. Well, I got 30 different comments. So I'm not going to go into them all. So generally, it's very far reaching. I appreciate Shalini saying, how do we tackle this? How do we get our heads around what's doable, what's acceptable, and in what order that it happens. So thanks, Jennifer. Yeah, I'm sorry, I didn't want to really end so on a negative note because I really, you know, I think the stated goals of the zoning revisions are really laudable and what we all want is more housing for, you know, low moderate and middle, you know, income. I would say non-student households because there will always be building for students, but how do we ensure that some of that housing is for, you know, the households that are the stated goals of these proposed revisions. So I have trouble thinking, you know, I always come back to some sort of policy or to have some zoning bylaw that would complement this package of revisions that would say that not all the rental dwellings in Amherst can just be rented to, you know, kind of the highest bidder and that, you know, there are particularly university towns that say you need have to limit the number of student houses on a block. And that means that the other houses, if people want to rent them and they can't rent them to students, then they're going to have to price them to rent to non-student households. And it seems like if we could pair the two, we would be achieving the goals that you want to achieve. That's it. Andy or Pat, do you want to respond, any of them? If Pat wants to go first. I agree that there needs to be a plan to go through this together in a collaborative way. I'm still, I'm still deeply concerned about the divide between the focus on students as negative forces in our community. And so I wrestle when I hear that and I'm not denying there are some legitimate concerns, but it feels to me like it's a flashpoint and we can get everybody scared. And therefore we can't make changes. Exclusionary zoning was designed to keep people out, not just students, but people like me who are working class who were Polish who were black. And those zoning laws have become so codified across the nation that we think they're normal. And I think that really trying to eliminate, you know, so if I want to build a single family home, I have the same I have the same guidelines or zoning rules. But if I want, I want to build an owner occupied duplex. If I want to build a tripla triplex, I never really know how to say that word. So I'm concerned about that. One of the other thing I'm concerned about is, there is minimal logic that I can see to how zoning in Amherst has been developed across districts. One of the primary and most important things I think that we're trying to do is to bring logic to zoning laws. Instead of keeping it so that there are these ways of avoiding certain kinds of mixed neighborhoods, really mixed neighborhoods. So, so that's, that's where I'm stuck and I'm, you know, Amanda. Yeah, maybe you wanted, you want to reply or. Yeah, um, you know, I, I agree with Pat, and I always go back to, you know, one of the things that I struggle with, with a lot of these conversations is, for example, the first proposal of, you know, pairing it with something that is generally referred to as minimum distance requirements, right. I said this when we were looking at the redistricting of the town, and a prior Districting Commission had a thing that said split the students up. Right. That not the one we passed to our create our Districting Commission but, but a prior one passed with a line that basically said, spread the students among as many precincts as possible. And when I hear something about a minimum distance requirements that only allows a student to rent a certain number of houses in a neighborhood but not other houses in a neighborhood. I go back to thinking, well, if I substituted the word black person or substituted the word elderly person or substituted the word immigrant non citizen for the word student. Would we feel differently about that proposal would we feel differently about saying, well only immigrants can write certain things I don't think this town council or this town would ever be acceptable to saying, if you're not a citizen you can only rent a third in a third of the neighborhood or a tenth of the neighborhood. And so I struggle when we talk about students in the same manner, you know, students are not our only renters in town. And that's one of the things Pat and I broached this as you know, students are not the only renters who live not with family. We have a number of immigrants that may be undocumented that work at some of our restaurants that crowd into some of our rentals, because that's all they can afford. They are unrelated, you know, and, and so, so I struggle with how do we get the conversation beyond that to talk about a rental that is two dwelling units on a property that includes management plans that we've put into this proposal that would require things like managing parking managing this doing a lot of the things we're trying to do with our rental permitting and saying zoning is different than the permitting part than the behavior part zoning is what you can build zoning should not be who can live there. Limit what you can build you can use it as a proxy for who can live there and that is what we have seen many towns in this nation do and what Pat and I are trying to eliminate to get to some specifics. Well, I can just respond to some of the stuff some people said specifically town homes. I'd have to talk to Pat, we didn't propose side by side because that's as a triplex, because that's covered in town homes. It might be okay to move town homes from a minimum of three to a minimum of four and make triplex the three dwelling unit development use right but but that was one of the reasons we went up and not sideways was because sideways was covered by town homes. So, we could look at that. You know, let's see some of the other things affordable duplexes don't really happen that's interesting right because we want some of that. So, do we need that as a category if it's not really one that's used again similar to subdividable dwellings I don't know I think we wanted in there. So why an RG. I think I wrote it is would we not let a townhouse go before ZBA for a special permit, right. I think was one of the questions sort of Jennifer kind of asked. So the RG zone is our most dense zone residential defined zone. It is defined as a medium to high density zone. I, my belief is if we're going to have a medium to high density zone, we need to allow medium density building without a special permit. You know, because otherwise to me it's not a medium to high density zone, because you can deny the special permit, you could get a ZBA that says, well it's a special permit we're never going to allow any town home in that zone. That's what you could get from a ZBA we can't guarantee a ZBA will always look at things the same way and so saying it's a site plan review is making a statement that says that use that duplex that triplex that single family home is always something we want built in that district. We might want some control over it with a site plan review, but we believe this district whether it be that medium to high density district isn't appropriate district to put town homes in. We just have differences of opinions but but the message is sent when you say special permit that you don't think town homes or apartment building or pick pick whatever bus stops right, you know, talk about some commercial uses. We're not sure that commercial use is appropriate in that area so we want to be able to deny that commercial use. So we're going to say site plan special permit. It sends a message to the people that are looking at our zoning and are looking at our values and are looking from the outside saying, what do they value in town and when we say a town home is not always appropriate to build in the neighborhood we designated as the densest residential neighborhood in our town. You're sending a message that says people that can only afford town homes, maybe aren't wanted in that neighborhood, always, you know, and it might just be a difference of opinion for us on CRC but you know, we, we came down with in residential neighborhoods residential building should be the primary building and we should allow more of that on a suitability attainable, not, you know, permit, not on a well we can deny it permit. Jennifer. I think Shalini first, I think Shalini was first. You're in, in the order. Okay. Yeah, I don't know where to begin to respond to that that is a complete smokescreen about the students, students are not a protected class. Nobody is discriminating to go from there. I'm Jewish the first house I bought it actually said in the original covenant that I could not live in that neighborhood so I get this, but this is crazy. We live in a student town, a university town students drive the market rates of the rents. So the undocumented and I chose to live in a neighborhood of multifamily housing so I have, I grew up in an apartment in New York City, I have no issues with people that rent or live in apartments. And the undocumented workers that you were talking about working in a restaurant, they can afford to live in my RG district, because they're being rented to students at a high price. And, you know, let's not debate households a household can be one person it could be to be it could be me and two roommates. That's why we say non student household because students are household, but because of how the market rates are driven and there's so many more students than non students looking for rental housing that the non students are being priced out. And in terms of the special permit, I am not aware of any time in the RG districts that a townhouse has not been permitted because it had to go through the special permitting process, and I don't want to get personal. But for you to say that I am being discriminatory about townhouses when even with these changes. In both woods and Amherst Hills will not have any townhouses feels very wrong. I mean if you're, if we're that committed and we think it's discriminatory to even have a special permit because it may be denying a townhouse when that never happens. Yet townhouses are not going to be permitted in every residential district in town. And I on doesn't. Doesn't compute, frankly. The proposal we've made would allow townhouses in the RO and RL district RLD district by special permit, but not in the aquifer. I would be happy to allow it there if, if I thought it was appropriate for that and we don't always and I'm not Pat and I talked about that but to say that to say that we have not proposed to allow town homes in the RO and RLD district. I'm not talking about if they're not to be in every district because they can't be in the overlay. That's an overlay that's a different that's not the RLD district. But, okay. Anyway, I, I am not. I, I take umbrage at being told that I am trying to discriminate against townhouses and people who live in townhouses, because I would like to maintain the special permit in an RG district, which for decades has allowed townhouses to be built and I'm not. I don't know of any instant when the special permitting process has denied an applicant to be able to build their townhouse. So I think it's a kind of smoke screen. Thank you. Shawnee, and then, and then Rob. I think Rob had his hand upset. I'd like to hear what he had to say first, if he wants us to speak. Thanks Rob. Yeah, I just wanted to mention about the aquifer recharge. You know, the reason for the, the knows that we believe had to do with septic systems and, you know, the, the septic system. The title five regulation only allows a four bedroom septic design and that translates to a number of gallons per day that's put into a septic system and it's limited the four which, you know, really doesn't make townhouses. They don't work, you know, unless they're one bedroom townhouses. So, you know, I just wanted to make sure that that, you know, was part of the understanding of maybe the old, the old regulation before town sewer was kind of expanded to those areas only because I happened to do that research when I was reviewing this several months ago. Just wanted to share that. Okay, so quick question Rob, is there, is there an opportunity to overlay this proposal with existing infrastructure. So we have whatever is on water sewer. We could see that. Yep. Could be done. We can do that. Thanks. Shalini. Chris has their hand up too. Why don't you go ahead because you've had a while. Sure, minor general comments. So I've been reading up a lot of strong towns, which I think many of you subscribe to. It's a website that talks about incremental development and thoughtful slow development. And so a lot of my comments now are based on that I'm happy to share the links to the articles that I've been reading, which are like gasoline. One thing that I did read was, you know, we all know that housing is a national problem. And I think it's behooves all of us to rethink and recalibrate what we're used to in terms of our neighborhoods and how we can allow for more housing. That being said, that's kind of the trends that the strong towns is promoting is about zoning reform across the board. But what they did notice and say was that along with the zoning reform, the better enforcement of our existing bylaws is really important. And I think that's what we saw in the rental registration as well is that, you know, what is really creating this issue, you know, whether it's students or tenants, whoever those people are, if there's trash and litter and noise and all of those things in our neighborhoods, we don't want that. So I think as we're considering this, we also want to definitely think about how do we better enforce the bylaws in our town. So that was one point. And the second point that strong town, and I kind of like that approach is the incremental development. And so what they recommend is just going one level up to, you know, so if RO does not allow or it allows but it's special permit for duplexes then what will I don't know literally, you probably know by heart, but just go one up would be like make it SPR, you know, so that way we get to see what are the unintended consequences of these zoning changes. But it's also moving in that direction, it's not like out of fear of what's going to happen we don't do anything. So the idea is to just look at our zones and if it makes sense because maybe in some cases, two steps might be appropriate because, and I agree like Amherst Hill, I look around I'm like, whoa, that's a lot. And we moved here by the way that was a sacrifice we made that we can walk to a cafe we gave that up intentionally because we wanted more space around. Which is why the arrow is the way it is like you have more space and privacy but then you don't have the convenience or walking downtown to the bar or a cafe and whatnot. That being said, I still look at our arrow and I'm like, this can definitely taken more duplexes and so forth so you know opening up some of the zoning would be really necessary it's really important. Another thing I thought that was interesting is there's a lot of talk about the missing middle, and they're not really referring to the middle income, which of course is its own problem of workforce housing and so forth. But there's a lot of talk about the missing middle which refers to the homes in between a single family home and apartment buildings. That's another big push right now which I think what manager and Pat are posing really meets that need for filling the need for missing middle housing. And I think again near downtown what's coming up is a lot of apartment buildings, which are needed but I think allowing for more capacity, including in our districts and across the board having these different types of housing in between just a standalone home, and then having apartment building so having triplexes duplexes and so forth. I think that really moves the needle in a very positive way. So those are some of the general comments. Thank you. I see Chris Brestrup goes in and out of her mountain, mountain view. There she is. Hi. So I just had a few things sort of general comments about special permits. One is that special permits, the zoning board of appeals rarely denies a special permit. Sometimes special permits are withdrawn when it becomes obvious that the zoning board is not going to approve something. But I think the general tenor of the work of the ZBA is to work with the developer to get to yes. And how can we make this project whatever it is acceptable to the town and acceptable to the butters and make it a better project so I think they work very hard to do that. My own opinion is that special permit, because it can be denied often gives a developer more of an incentive to work with the permit granting authority, the ZBA to adjust the plan so that it is more acceptable to the town. And I think that the project that was recently approved on Sensor Avenue is kind of an example of that, that the developer and the zoning board of appeals work together to make that a better project. They did get a lot of recommendations from the planning board, but the developer had an incentive to work with the zoning board of appeals because he didn't have the assurance that he was a by right use. So I just thought I'd offer that as a as a some food for thought. Thank you. Thank you. That's very helpful. Mandy Joe. I know we're almost out of time. I want to say if the planning staff is supportive of special permits in the aquifer recharge protection for town district for town homes, I would be absolutely supportive of that. But we did not believe they were, which is why we kept them enough. But I would absolutely support removing that end and putting special permits for town homes in the RO and RLD and RN neighborhoods with the requirement of public sewer hookups which we already have for converted dwellings and I actually think town homes just in general conditions require public sewer hookups anywhere in town. So, you know, it if if they're supportive of that in the ARP, I would support revising our proposal to do it that way wholeheartedly. I do have a question for Chris as she mentioned special permits. I don't want to be denied I believe special permits take longer to get through the permitting process than a site plan review on average and cost more to get through the permitting process. And so I'm curious is that your, your experience that the applications remain in hearing and across in ZBA is much longer than they do in the planning board and if so isn't that an increasing cost driving up the cost of the ultimate cost of the development and the project and it goes into it if you have to spend extras tens of thousands and extra months not actually building because it takes you an extra seven months to get your permit. I have two things to say. I don't think that special permits take longer on average than site plan review. There was a recent site plan review for a project that is proposed for North Amherst that started out last July, I think, and it just got its approval in December. So, and that was a site plan review project it had an adjunct special permit for a dimensional modification but that really wasn't an issue. A site plan reviews can take a long time. And I wanted to respond to Mandy's comment that that followed my previous comment. My previous comment about special permit was not about townhouses in the ARP it was a comment about special permits in general. I just wanted to kind of give my experience working with special permits and I wasn't specifically talking about townhouses and ARP I was talking about special permits in general so thank you. Thank you very much. Jennifer Shalini and then we're going to try to wrap it up and go to public comment. I don't know what you're going to say now but I'm going to come back to this. Would it really be such such a sacrifice to keep? They're going to call on you shortly. To give special permits to the RG. I would just ask that that be maintained. I don't think it's asking very much so I don't know where. I guess what I'm wondering is where in the form in the process do we actually kind of get our requests. I guess as I may be part of my question is how do we go from the presentation to what we're actually going to carve out and present back to council. Yeah, good question and that was Shalini brought that up to begin with. That's great. Shalini please. Yeah, I don't know if you want to spend the last few minutes just deciding how we want to move forward. I think I was just going to say that from some of the smaller businesses in particular a doctor, a local doctor who wanted to build. And locally they had a huge problem with the special permitting process and then I've spoken to a lot of smaller landlords. There is a perception either it's a perception but also the fact that a special permit entails hiring lawyers and every time and that's what I'd heard from the small business as well was that every time they had to show up they had to have a lawyer to navigate that. And that's very expensive so it does increase the cost and if you look at strong towns website. The purpose of some of the zoning reform is to make it more affordable for small and especially when we're looking at owner occupied like to me that's the really lowest hanging route is owner occupied duplexes which is we encouraging you know and that's what we heard, you know from tenants also they enjoyed and love living with landlords when they're right there we know the properties are maintained better when the owners are there so to me owner occupied duplexes triplexes should definitely be something that we create an easier track for them. Also I had a question I don't know if this is going to open another whole bag of beans or whatever the phrase is, but what we were supposed to hire a form based zoning design consultant and that was in the last council that was agreed upon that there was going to be a hire of a form based zoning consultant. So can we get an update on that. Because I think that would really help also some of the challenges that we're encountering or fearing the fear is that we're going to have all these random things coming up without any kind of a plan and that's why that design consultant was supposed to be hired to take care of that. Thank you Chris, I think you might want to answer that. So yes, we do have money for a design consultant to create design guidelines for the downtown. But then in, I think it was either the summer or the fall we applied for another amount of money so we have another $75,000 so we have $175,000 now and we have a an RFP that we've written and we're almost ready to put it out but we want to make sure that it covers the work that the $75,000 would cover as well as the $100,000 and we think we can get a good product out of that. We're not quite ready to put that RFP out. But I did want to, if I can take one more minute, make a comment about the attorneys and we often find that people bring their attorneys to site plan review as well. So essentially follows the same pattern in terms of the public hearing process as special permit does and there are potential pitfalls during this site plan review process as there are during the special permit process. So, you often find that people coming for site plan review bring their whole team of designers, landscape architects, engineers, attorneys, everybody. They all come to the meeting so I don't think that there's a particular need for an attorney in a special permit process as opposed to a site plan review I think there's, it depends on the complication of the project but both types of projects often have their attorneys there. Thank you. I think I'm just going to weigh into there are often a number of small projects that that homeowners or whatever bring to the ZBA that clearly don't have lawyers either I mean there are convergent dwellings they become they show their, their, their drawings and they don't necessarily have to go through a lawyer to do that. Jennifer and then we are going to switch to public comments. Just quickly, in terms of townhouses, they're, they're always done by major developers it's never like a small, you know, kind of homeowner that's going to come and propose a townhouse their, their major undertakings. Yeah. So actually, and I'll make a comment because I haven't spoken back to townhouses as well. I don't believe personally that they are appropriate in all of the RG. They are appropriate in some portions of the RG, just as they might be appropriate in some parts of the RO. And that really needs to be tightened up so that we're not, we're not generalizing what's appropriate in, in each of these districts, I think it takes a lot more scrutiny. Okay, we are going to go to the public and the attendees, I see one hand, and I do not have the ability to bring them, but I can just say their name. The first person who has a hand raised is Carol Lewis, and someone bring Carol Lewis in please. I'm, I'm sorry, I was the one that was handed host and I didn't realize that so it's me. Thank you. And this is just to confirm this is the general public comment period you get up to three minutes and all item five. So this is for anything under CRC jurisdiction, and you said Carol. Yep. So Carol, you should be able to unmute. Again now unmute I think can you hear me. Okay. I want to speak sort of as myself and I guess, well I guess I better just speak as myself. It seems to me that zoning can only do some certain things. And the housing crisis exists in the country, if not in the world, it exists in Massachusetts it exists everywhere. I guess I have a really simple question to ask you and that is, I understand I understand that there's students and you wish there are mostly what I wish is not that there weren't students but that there were more families that could afford to live here. That's what we think we're all trying to figure out and how to have the housing be affordable. But I do not see that anything is going to help any of those problems if what we do is continue to have zoning that means that there's less housing. The proposal that you've made or to make there be more housing available. That's not going to fix everything it can't. But it can make there be more housing that someone could live in. And the rest of the problems. They can't all be solved by zoning I don't believe. I just don't see how, if you continue to have zoning that makes it so you can't have more houses, you're going to solve anything because the fundamental need is there's more ways to have more people house. Thank you for listening. Thank you. Mandy, I'm assuming you're taking this back you're no longer talking about. That's fine. Thanks for formally passing it over. Thank you Carol for your comments. Next up with a raised hand is one is Dorothy Pam please unmute yourself state your name and make your comment. Hi, I'm Dorothy Pam to tonight amity street, and I want to say that I totally agree with Carol that we need more housing, but what we're talking about in many of the neighborhoods is we're talking about money. I think that if we did a study of the rent changes and rent in the last number of years, we would see that we are talking about outside money coming in, building and developing and making homes that workforce people who work for the university work in the town could not possibly afford that young families could not possibly afford homes and streets that were affordable are not affordable now. It's a very simple really boring ranch and you're here told, Oh, they pull in $8,000 a month rent from the students. Now you tell me none of us could afford that, at least, unless you have secret money that we don't know about. So, we need to increase housing, but just increasing housing in the RG particularly, that is not going to make housing affordable for any of the people that were mentioned in terms of social justice. I think that perhaps, instead of our arguing with each other. Let's get a study to show the effect of the housing boom that's gone on, and the rental thing that is happening. The only we have a bright spot in town. And Carol knows this, whether we're doing I think a really good job on building affordable housing, and the only affordable rental housing is going to be coming up and balling. There's not a word in this whole thing about ownership. But ownership is really important. And when we talk about reparations we talk about generational wealth, and we talk about the fact that Blacks were denied the opportunity to enter in many programs, which made ownership possible. So, I just think that we have to kind of get out of the theory and look at what's actually has happened and is happening right now. And we want people who are, we do want to have keep a good number of year round residents because we have some streets in our district, which don't have any. You would not want to live there. In fact, you would not even to want to walk there sometimes, because they are just places that don't feel safe, are completely run down houses not kept up. And I'm not saying the students hurt the houses. I'm saying the landlords didn't keep them up. Okay, because some people just see students as a cash cow. We see them as neighbors we have students who live in and have apartments in many of the homes, when we have our week, a monthly brunch, we have students all the time, we have students integrated in our neighborhood. So it's not an anti student move, but it is about how the money is being used and what the rents that are being charged, and how it is driving out any possibility of workforce housing and new families coming in, and that's not good for the town. So, you know, we need to kind of clarify what we're really talking about, not what we wish were true, but what is happening now. And we should I think we should get that study. So, thank you, I know you're all working towards trying to solve important problems. Okay, I do understand that. But I think that we have to get a little more reality about what is going on in the money world, which is it's just become an investment when a neighborhood's an investment. It stops being a neighborhood and an asset, I think to the town, but an asset to people who live, not even in the state, you know, out of town out of state, who are seeing this as a place to come invest your money and walk away. Thank you. Thank you directly for your comment. Seeing no other hands. I just had that was raised as I was saying that we will have our last public comment or Kitty Axelson Barry please unmute yourself state your name where you live and make your comment. Yeah, thank you Mandy Joe I'm sorry I raised my hand at the last minute. I'm Katie Axelson Barry 89 stony Hill Road that's an Echo Hill South which is a dense neighborhood comparatively in Amherst, and I'm wondering if Shawnee or you could please refer me to studies of towns like ours actual college towns with an over with more undergraduate than year round residents, approximately because I know it's really difficult to tell who lives where and who's an undergraduate student and who isn't. But could you refer me maybe, you know, just send me studies of actual college towns that have similar populations to ours and why building, building building, you know, sort of the yimby. Yes, in my backyard would help us. That is my comment of course it's a question. Could you please send me studies. Thank you. We keep talking over each other thank you for your comment slash question kitty. With that public comment is closed and we're going to move on to our action item for the day, which is duplex triplex and all and we're going to start right in with where we left off last week. Excuse me. Sorry. Yes, we're into our registration. Thank you. Thank you. I pulled I shared the right thing. We're starting off right where we left off last week at section K. So, you know, we will I know we've had a listening session since that last discussion that may have brought up some changes between a and K that we might want to but I want us to get through this and then the regulations before we go back to a to K, a to J. For any potential changes there and see if we can do that in the next 40 minutes or so. And with that, are there any section K is disclosure notification and other requirements are there any concerns questions thoughts requested changes on section K or above. Okay, section K. I'm just going to note that this, this will require some coordination with the real estate offices in town. And I think it's a conversation that that is high time that we have in, in fact, in notifying people that when they buy in Amherst. So there are some responsibilities or to the community, and it's not strictly just an investment opportunity. My only question I think was on number five and it is a really simple one that we were missing a period. So, I'm going to add it in. Any other comments questions requested revisions on section K. Can we go back to number four. Yeah. And I think we have in the regulations I think we have a little more detail here or maybe it should be in the detail in the regulations instead of here, like number three and four. The description of the information sheet that we provide as part of the town leasing or the permit process. I just think we need to kind of read through it again and just double check that it's that it's actually asking for what we want. It looks a little it looks a little redundant and I frankly have not read it line to line again recently. So I would just say I want to go back and review this again. Anything else section L consent. I have a bunch, I will just start going through mine while other people do it some of them are just Scrivener stuff so I'll start with those L one. A reason for suspending or revoking, I think this word should be an or not an and the failure of a owner to permit an inspection after notice is is given shall constitute a withdrawal of the permit application, a reason for the denial of the application, or a reason for suspending or revoking a permit already issued I don't think it's an and I think it's an or I think it's correct. In section two there was just a the word bylaw needs capitalized section to be this is the. Let me see if I can. We can get the whole thing on. This is the lease terms. I get concerned. I'm dictating terms having the town dictate what needs to be in a lease I worry about that right we heard a little bit about that on Monday night with other things but the town sort of saying, here's what you must put in your lease. I mean, does the town become liable if that provision is instituted or not, you know, like all sorts of things and so I would like to delete. I don't be. I don't know whether I a but um yeah I would like to delete be. Pam. I thought I had heard from various people that in fact the town does have some parameters that they require or request to get added to leases. And I think there were a couple of people in the audience who probably could answer that because they both manage properties and right leases. So before we, before we eliminate it let's find out if don't we already do that a little bit. I think our current one has at least a I don't know whether it has be. So, I mean, aside from what the current bylaw says we, we often do get into that a little bit. You know it really has to do with things like parking management or gathering sizes or guest policies. And usually, if it's not done, it's either done by the zoning board of appeals to the special permit process boards done during an enforcement or kind of bringing a property into compliance with the code enforcement officer, by adding terms to the lease of, or, you know, just establishing kind of conditions moving forward from that date. That's one of the reasons it is currently being done. Okay, Pam. Thank you yeah that that's what I remember. So then this this be in particular about leases becoming void you don't have a problem with Rob worked on. Well I'm not sure if we can, we can have a lease become void. So that might be a question, you know if that's something that needs to remain. That might be a question for KP lots on point, whether or not we can actually cause of these to become void. I'm not sure about that. I've taken up a bunch I have a couple more in this section but is there anyone else that has stuff in the section. So section three the notice to tenants. I was going to add initial or renewal inspection in this sentence here for all inspections other than the initial or renewal so sort of the standard inspection. Then it's a 24 hour notice. I think we've received comments that the seven calendar days might be kind of long. I wanted to revisit that sort of seven to three to I'm curious what Rob and john would like to see on sort of the inspection timing. We say 24 hours now. I mean when there's when there's leases involved they they almost always address this. And when we are dealing with a situation one of the first things we typically do is ask for a copy of the lease and will follow what you know what is prescribed in the lease and I john if you have more to add about this I've never seen one more than 2448 hours. Sometimes we can't coordinate the meeting or inspection that quickly. But I've never seen one go out this far. Language in the typical leases and templates we've reviewed. Can we say advanced notice per per each lease. I was wondering if maybe we delete the first sentence and just say for all inspections. The owner shall make a good faith to to arrange access within 24 hours of the request or something like that. That's what it says now. And just essentially delete the first line the first sentence that work for people. Yep. I'll speak for me anyway. I'm just wondering if there are any recurring objections. And then. Oh, Jennifer. No, I was just saying I agree because this is really is john this is getting to an emergency situation or semi in a way you have to. I mean, you know, the way it works now if there's a complaint about something. I asked to come in and see it. Yep. Often it's. Quite often it's, you know, the fire department's been there for something they've seen something they think I should see it. They don't think I need to come out in the middle of the night to see it, but I should certainly see it. Soon. Yeah. And my last one in this section sorry I had so many in the section because we haven't looked at it a lot. Tenant authorization this number four. I just lost my. You know, tenants must consent I don't know what our current bylaw says will provide the consent waiver. Do do tenants have I guess my question is do tenants have to consent or is it owners shall should we be using that good faith effort again to get consent like. I just curious from Robin john's point of view. So there's three essentially. Yeah, so there's no there's no former waiver now. But we do, we won't enter a unit if we, if we don't know if we don't at least ask the owner if they've received consent so we do leave it to them. If we, you know, there's so many different situations but if we're concerned about it, we will have that discussion in writing with the owner of the property and asking them if they've can, you know to confirm that they have authorization for the inspection to be conducted tomorrow at nine and will look for that, you know, in that format but a lot of times it is just a, you know, normal conversation and acknowledgement that it's occurred. In any case we don't want to we don't want to manage that piece of it we just want to we want the owner to manage that piece of it with their tenant. So basically just keeping the first sentence would be good for you and deleting the next two would like if we did that. That would be fine with me. Other committee members. I'm good. It's good with Rob. To simplify this. Does that mean. What does that mean that the tenant must consent. I don't know that that happens now when I asked to come into a place I suggest that the landlord, you know inform the tenants and meet me there with all the necessary keys. I don't know that they've notified those tenants or not. So are you saying maybe delete the whole paragraph. State law. I mean what what under the rental right. What is what is the sanitary code from for housing says 24 hours notice. It also says that a tenant needs to be present. We don't. We don't use that in the bylaw in the rental bylaw, you know. I mean, I won't go in a so much room if they're not there. Rob. So I just so this is clear. I mean we. Maybe maybe john isn't the receiving proof of consent, but a tenant can object to the inspection. If they object to the inspection, we, we are relying on the owner to inform us of that and we will not go in and do that inspection. Even if they've provided the notice. We really leave that up to their decision. It's a, it's a really. It's a really big decision for them to make whether or not they enter that unit if the tenant has told them no, we've, we've have had that situation. And we won't go in until you know their attorney or somebody has gotten involved and, you know, come to terms with that otherwise we would go to court and get proper authorization into that unit. And I think, you know, whether it's, you know, tenant will consent or tenant will not object. I'm not sure the best way to word that right now but I think some language has to remain. The question I have is, does, if the language remains versus not there. Do we put the town at a potential legal peril if we have language there versus if we don't, you know, if state law covers some of this and it, you know, by having the language there I guess do we insert sort of a town responsibility that doesn't necessarily exist now that falls on the owner only. Does that question makes sense. And if we are, do we, are we making an affirmative decision to add a town responsibility in that, you know, Yeah, I would be fine with adding that the owner shall receive consent to the inspection to make that clearer but I do feel like these regulations are for the tenant as well. And knowing that that exists to their benefit, I think is important. So we said, if we said, before someone can expect the owner shall obtain consent of the tenants, something like that owner slash manager whatever the person in charge. Yeah, so owner, something like that. I think that that's better than what we had. Rob john. And maybe just to cover your concern Mandy, that's a, you know, another KP law highlight. Just to think through you know the emergency situations where maybe consent getting consent isn't there isn't time for it there isn't the ability to do that for whatever reason, during a true emergency event. We have to kind of back that out somehow. I was, I was reading this as the regular predictable inspection series that I, but I understand now that you're talking could be that or an emergency one. So we've treated that in the past in an emergency situation is if the fire department's there, they hold the scene. They invite me in. I'm there as an inspector. You can check with KP law I did before when I started this job and that was, that was recognized as the way to do it. Okay, so I think we just need a little bit more thought from KP law on this one. So does this apply to emergency situations as well. Yeah. Okay, anything else in section K, or L that was L. I think I'm going to vote to not proceed into M. relations. Any particular reason. My dinner was. But I fixed before this meeting is probably ready. I don't know if I should normally go till 630 though. Right. Oh, you're right. It's my confusion Pam. Do you have to turn the stove off. I've been smelling something and I wondered if I should. Sorry, I didn't mean to be rude like that. No, hence my confusion. If you need to leave Pam, but we're going to adjourn before six by 630. We've already done everything but minutes and announcements so we'll stop this at 625 or so and finish those up. Anything for violations enforcement and penalties. At this point. I had a question like, how is this changing from what is already present because that's what we heard from the listening session. The other day was people were people saying that this is going to really increase like the increase in fees and late fees and this and that and that's going to really add up to the cost that's going to be passed on to tenants. So I was just wondering, these seem reasonable to me. And so how different are they from what already exists. I think the biggest difference is the suspension and revocation line and setting forth this notice of violation in order to remedy I believe is new from what we have now. But I could be wrong on that one. But the suspension revocation is definitely flushed out more than it currently is is in the current bylaw. I can page down more when we get down there. But Rob and john might be able to talk more about the notice of violation one monetaries in the current bylaw. So I don't think that one's changed. Pam. I'm trying to think of M one a B and C in light of the nuisance, the nuisance regulations and nuisance bylaw. So, I just want to make sure that that they stay abreast of each other. This says if, if there is violation of this bylaw, it subject monetary or non monetary penalties. So a non monetary penalty might be that you may not get a fine for the garbage on the lawn, but it adds to your, it adds to your violation count if you will toward becoming a problem property. So if, if that's the case, and I'm just going to take trash on the lawn as the example. What if what is the if B means every day in which the violation continues. In other words, if they don't clean up the trash. After they're notified that becomes the second violation for the same issues that how we're reading that. Yes, but the trash would actually have to be a violation of this bylaw not the public nuisance bylaw. Well, we're we're including upkeep and maintenance issues as part of the nuisance bylaw. They're not part of this bylaw and so they might not formally violate this bylaw. John. So, it's not currently a separate violation. It's, if you didn't do it seven days in a row, you got find seven times. It's the same violation. It's not, it's not seven violations. So I think the separate offenses so that you can find them seven times. I can find them 14 times right now. Is number C is letter C, a different than separate violation. Is that what that's talking about. So I think that would be if you didn't have a permit and if you lied on your permit application, those would be considered separate violations of this bylaw. And you could get a $300 fine for each of them instead of combining them into one violation for $300 total. So if you violate two different sections of the bylaw. Yeah. You can get a fine for each of those section violations. So that's how I would read letter C. Yeah. Yeah, this is the same language is what we currently have. If I drive by a house and there's three cars on the lawn, those are three violations. I'm sorry, I think I've asked this, but I'm still not clear. In my head, all of these things are all going around and they're all mixed up. I keep hearing about the separation between tenants violations and landlords. Did we decide that whatever the violation is is going to the landlord because that doesn't seem fair still. Does that make sense? Did we answer that question already. So the requirements of this bylaw, I think we have to keep the public nuisance bylaw and this one separate. What is, what does this bylaw require a property owner to do? It almost doesn't require anything of the tenants right now, right? If you think about this bylaw, a property owner must have a permit. A property owner must not lie on their application. They must be truthful on the application. They have to have an inspection. They have to have the energy efficiency proof. No violations of the zoning bylaw and health and all of that. If there are violations of that, you know, those, those are the sort of the, what, what does this bylaw require? If there's a violation of this bylaw, then you're violating this one. And I think almost, I think if not, almost all, if not all of what this bylaw requires is owner, you could argue is owner responsible. I think. Jennifer. Yeah, I just wanted to add on Shawnee's question. So is it really the nuisance bylaws what applies to the tenants? The occupants. Because the nuisance bylaw applies to all parcels. So the occupants, yeah. Whether it's a rental or an owner, the nuisance applies to everyone. So it's the occupants. Okay. So then the problem properties for, is that only for nuisance but not for, you know, it does, it does come in here in the inspection for inspection purposes. So. So we attempted to sort of integrate both, but the problem property, I think we see it down in suspension or revocation in this one, which we might have to do some modifications to depending on what we do with nuisance or when we finish nuisance and all versus when we send this on. But no, this one's, this is the permitting bylaw basically. And so it's what, what are you required to do to get your permit? How can you get your permit suspended? What requirements do you have to meet to get a permit? And if you don't, if you don't meet those requirements or you violate some of those requirements that you've attested to on your application, then you're violating this bylaw. So we have something in green here. Do notices of violations get placed on land records in the clerk's office? Or is this a vestige of pulling some of this language from a completely other state or something? I saw John Thompson shaking his head. Absolutely no. So I think the purpose of that was to find, have a place that the public could see the violations. And so is there another way to word it here for that to happen? You know, Rob, when you do a notice of violation, does it show up anywhere in town records? Not at the moment. It used to. They used to link to GIS and the Complaints and Violations tab under the property parcel information. And we hope to have that again sometime, but we currently don't have that. The only thing we have now is if I write a housing order to correct, it shows up in the OpenGov on the property tab for whatever property it is, but we haven't opened the Complaints and Violations module for OpenGov yet. Could it be opened? I mean, is it possible to? I think so. I would prefer to have it show up on the GIS map. I think that's definitely a goal of mine is to get some backup for people can see it. I don't think that GIS software is supported anymore. I think that's why it doesn't show up there anymore. So we kind of have to find the right wording for where it might show up and when we can do it. If we could go to the actual wording, the notice of violation that it shall be mailed to the owner at their last known address. I don't think that's the wording. We by bylaw have them, you know, give their name and address and contact information. So it better not be there. Second, second latest. I mean, just mail to the owner. She'll be mailed to the owner. Yeah, make it simple. And then the rest that that next half just needs reworded appropriately. And then I had a question I think, oh no, I think it was section C. The C1 that still has green and things not filled in. The wording of it. And three separate notices based on different within a one year period. So, so, oh, this was it more than a certain number. I guess I was curious. Rob and john. I wish you a notice of violation if you go into inspect a unit, and it has six code violations. Does that all go on one notice of violation or does it go on six separate notices of violations. The way it was being tracked. The one way we're using munis to track these was I would write a notice of violation and it might have, you know, 10 violations on it. Each of those would would be a ding so that would, you know, ring, ring the bell 10 times on that. And then after a year when you saw the total, and you said, well, there were, you know, 465 complaints and violations, each of those 10 were in there and counted. Okay, so that makes it a lot harder to do this more than a certain number in a certain amount of timeframe, because I might my brain was thinking. Like, if you've had violations written on three separate trips to the home, not one trip that had 20 violations for this for the sort of, because we're in suspension and revocation here. But john it is one notice of violation or one order to correct that might have 10 pieces to it. I mean, maybe you could count it that way. Yes. I mean, as far as I understand what you're doing for for tracking those violations for reporting purposes but that's violations not notice of violations. So I think, I think we do sometimes end up, you know, during one situation or one visit end up with two notices of violations because we might take all the code health and safety fire code put it into one notice of violation and then deal with, you know, occupancy limits in another notice to violation. Yeah, there's avenues for appeals are different. So those are the that's maybe a situation where we would could possibly generate two and one instance but it's usually pretty bad situation. So is there is there a viable number of notices of violation and or and orders to remedy. Like, at what point would you want to suspend or revoke a rent rental permit, because they just can't get their act together on these inspections and complying with code. Like three within a year, five within a year, and within two years like, do we have an idea of what might be appropriate. And these are I'm, I'm taking this since we just talked about the registration by life sort of the registration and the management of the property. These would be typically the more health and safety issues. Yeah, or zoning or zoning or zoning violations. Yes. I mean, or Rob, let me just ask this question or do you not want a suspension possibility for those types of violations. I think we're probably not going to want to suspend or revoke a permit when we're talking about three notices of violations over a certain period of time. Yeah, but this does say may, you know, because what we really, what we're really hoping for is to deal with, you know, repeat offenses. Can we think about that some more, if we want to put a number to it or maybe differently. Maybe john I can talk more about that specifically, because part of it is part of it is holding someone speak to the fire that, you know, typically might not otherwise address the issues or just come right back and just again to the next 10 students at top dollar. Yeah. Um, any other thoughts, this is Pam this is where the public nuisance one is we have to we might have to revisit C3, depending on what goes on with the public nuisance bylaw. I think that's the last of them. Oh, this one has robbed this one the order to vacate has you scheduling the hearing. Is that the appropriate person. Yeah, I think we'd have to, I think we, you know, we'd have to be able to coordinate that. Okay. I think it's sorry. I don't have any other hands. So I'm going to stop this share and we're going to at 625 so we're not going to get to the regulations today, Shalini. Yeah, so that part about revoking the license permit because of nuisance. We are we going to talk about, like, it sounds like yeah so this is something we still have to discuss and agree right whether. If because a lot of the nuisance is created by occupants. And so one is what is nuisance and that's going to be clarified there but here we saying that they, you know, it could be revoked the rent because of that. So have the agreed. Or do we need to discuss this further. Um, I think you bring up that we might need to discuss it further. We don't have time today. Okay. And we haven't really discussed the nuisance by law to agree any way yet. On what it would actually include and all. Okay, so I've made the note that we need to discuss whether to keep it in there too. And it is 625. And so we're not going to get to regulations today. It will go on a future agenda. Okay. So we do not have any minutes. We do not have the February 13th special meeting minutes yet. So any changes to the February 9th meeting minutes. I didn't actually see them in our packet. Oh, did I not? Are they not there? I didn't see them either. Oh, then that's probably my fault. We'll move them both to the next meeting. Sorry about that. I thought they made it in. That is probably my fault. I said, Oh, I haven't, I haven't even read them. I will make sure they're actually in the next packet along with the February 13th ones, which, which have not been produced yet, but it's only been two days, right? Announcements I've been putting as part of the announcement. We closed the survey, the engagement survey, so that no one else can respond so that we could make final sort of printouts and reports. So those final pools of the, the responses are in that folder in the various ways we've presented the other ones. So I'm going to put it on the announcement section multiple times just so people can see it. It is linked to, I believe we have a link on the CRC webpage as well as on the engage Amherst webpage for that folder. So it is findable. The agenda preview. March 2nd is the public hearing. I, it starts at 435. I'll do minutes before the public hearing so that we get minutes done. And all, and they shouldn't hopefully they won't take long. And then we will do the public hearing. We might do public comment before the public hearing to on non public hearing stuff just to cover the whole agenda. The question I have for all of you is, our rules do not permit any one session of a public hearing to go beyond three hours. I don't know how many people will show up for this public hearing. But I suspect, I suspect number one that we will not close it on the second. But the next one is I don't know if a lot of people show up. I don't know how long it will take to get through them during the hearing itself on the second. So it would, if everyone could let me or Pam or both of us know how late they can stay. We like to keep our meetings to two hours. I don't even know the answer myself because I haven't looked at my calendar, but it would be good to know and to be able to announce going in. When we're going to have to make a decision on the vote on to vote to continue the hearing at what time of day. Because we don't have committee members left. I think it'll help Pam, and I sort of plan the agenda, sort of timing and all and plan for timings of that hearing if we know how late people and or can't stay. Jennifer. I just wanted to ask you, do you think maybe almost a week in advance or so we'd get the link if we want to let constituents know the link you already have. It's already posted. Oh, okay. The zoom link. Great. Okay, zoom link is already there. It has to be there by the notice was printed in the paper on the 14th and so everything had to be up by the 14th. So it is already there. You should even have your panelists link. But the public link is already posted. And just for the public who's still listening, this is for duplexes, triplexes. And, and can we vote on how we want to pronounce it so we say it's the same. Everyone pronounces it differently based on the region that came from I think triplex. I've always said triplex. I think it's just based on your region where you grew up. I think it's just based on your region where you grew up. I think it's just based on your region where you grew up. So triplex. Triplex. We're just going to have to agree to disagree. March 16 tentatively residential back to residential rental bylaw and public nuisance. That all depends on the public hearing continuation date. Obviously. I think it's just based on when things are this planning board public hearing is March 1st. So we'll know on March 2nd. What date they continued assuming they continue the hearing, what date they continued the hearing to, which may. Affect what date we potentially continue the hearing to. I don't have anything else on agendas or unanticipated. Does anyone else. You have to be ready. Okay. So I don't know what the time is. No, I'm sorry. Oh, Shalini. When, when is the, the survey discussion coming back again? Potentially March 16th. We have to figure out what's going on with the public hearings. Okay. Thank you. See nothing else. Journey, the meeting at 631 PM. John and Rob, thank you. Thank you. You.