 to propose amendments to the calisoni. I appreciate you all coming out and sharing your thoughts. I want to thank Orca for being here to record this meeting. Donna Fitch has graciously accepted to take notes so that we on the planning commission can listen with our ears wide open. And he hopefully had both eyes open. We've got both ears open. The agenda, let's just start by introducing the planning commission. I am Melanie Keene and I've been an admin in condition for ten years. John McCullough, I live right against corner. My name is Jan Olson and I'm missing in Gary Root who normally comes. Sometimes a little late with some goodies so we'll go ahead and still hope for that. About the planning commission, Melanie brings information relative to keep us relative to state statute. Gary brings a perspective of institutional history. He's been on the longest. John's specialty basically is the information that he provides us from years of being on zoning administrator and the issues that have come from that as well as he does a lot of our map work and I consider him our map guru. I also wanted to share with those of you who were not here before that how the planning commission works pretty much is by consensus. We do work on writing standards or writing these regulations. We have it up on this little thing up here. We work together on how, what is it that we want to say? How do we want to say it? And so basically you've got a consensus here as to what the language is. The next thing I wanted to mention before we get going is the process of approving amendments to write for these regulations. We do have to meet state statute and so this planning commission is required and it has a warning and with that warning was a set of language that was put out. Tonight the opportunity is here for you all to comment on it. We will take notes. We've already heard some comments from a group of people. After this meeting, the planning commission will meet however long it takes to restructure or rewrite some of this if there is going to be a rewriting. Which there probably undoubtedly will be. We must write notes documenting the changes that we made. The new regulations will get printed, the notes will get printed, those will go to state and then it goes to the select board. Now the select board has to have their own public hearing. Once the final or what we dubbed final goes to the select board, they have an opportunity to make changes but they have to also let the planning commission know if it's a substance and any changes have to be made. If there's no changes made in substance the planning commission or the select board then calls for a public hearing. They have to follow the same warning procedure. Everything has to go out to the abutting towns and it has to follow through that procedure. Once the planning the select board meets and approves this language then it goes to vote. They will be called on a ballot and the whole town votes on it. So those are the processes that we follow that will be following to get this approved. What we're going to do tonight, we've got a few power points to go through possibly a few maps to kind of lay the ground work of what we've done and then we're going to open it up. What I would like for each of you to do when you speak is give your name where you live and then make your comment kind of like town meeting, you know, so that we can hear it and have it be distinct. Okay, are you ready John? John by the way did the power point get it going. So what were we talking about we toned in first on water quality and we decided in reviewing maps and everything that we thought the shoreland district the way it is today provided or has several parcels that are quote unquote in shoreland but actually have no shoreline. So there are several parcels that are in a shoreland district that are nowhere near the lake and it's a matter of how that district is designed. We also looked very closely at all a lot of the current cottages and current dwellings that are along the edges of the lake a lot of them are in the buffer many of the parcels are non conforming they don't meet the three acre standard of the shoreland district at all. So we have non conforming lots and we probably have quite a few non conforming buildings. On looking at the dimensional standards of the shoreland district and looking at the dimensional standards of the, and we're going to have a slide and we'll kind of go through that a little bit more looking at the dimensional standards of shoreland and comparing it to the dimensional standards of rural residential they are almost identical. And so our thought was well if we really want to concentrate on what happens around the lake then maybe let's just have an overlay that absolutely concentrates on what there is around the lake and how it helps with the water quality. The last thing to mention is that we've had quite a few people who live on the lake area that voiced a concern of having totally different standards compared to the state. And so our goal also was to have more alignment with the state so that there wouldn't be as big a discrepancy with what the state shoreland protection act was and what we had. The other thing that we have added is erosion and stormwater control measure which is in section 3.15. In doing our research relative to buffers what came across from us or to us from the state was the greatest importance was preventing erosion. And so we have in this there is a whole new section on erosion control and stormwater management that will apply to all districts not just shoreland. On flood hazard and river quarter the next big item which is marked or highlighted river quarter we're adding a whole new overlay. Now this is important for a variety of reasons. There's this thing called an emergency relief and assistance fund we call it ERAF. And when a federal disaster is called the federal government provides assistance. And what happens is the state can also provide assistance and they contribute anywhere up to 7.5%. The state could provide 12% and the state goes up to providing 17.5%. So what happens is the town is responsible for providing less money with the more money that comes from the state. So it becomes a financial goal or an asset if you will to reach the 17.5% level. Calis is currently at 12%. When we add a river quarter overlay we bring it up to 17.5%. And that's why we are adding the river quarter overlay. Not only for that but also to protect the river quarter and in that there's no new development allowed in the river quarter. And also there's some stricter measures about what you can do in the river quarter. In addition and we'll show you that on some of the maps that come up putting part of river quarter are streams that are 0.5 to 2.5 square foot in volume square miles. Whatever in drainage as it goes down those are also considered river quarter. And we have to map them and there's a 50 foot buffer on each side of that river quarter. So it's actually almost I think as important in many ways is what there is with the shrub. Okay John let's go on. Oh no. In the historic history we changed some things relative to the design advisory board. There's a new project registration form that we created that would be working, would be useful for certain things in the design advisory board. A waiver which is not as strenuous as getting a variance that the DRB can use and also a whole new set of definitions. We put all definitions in one chapter. The way our book reads now is you've got definitions in 5.4 and you've got definitions over in 3. something else. So definitions are kind of all over the place in the current wrecks. What we decided to do was to put all definitions in one section separating out what was flood hazard definitions and keeping everything else and we've added a lot of new definitions which are highlighted in red. Okay let's go. So shoreland, current shoreland district only involves these lakes. Curtis pond, I don't want to say the list and more popular. And these are 20 acre lakes so they don't meet the lake the state. With the shrod, with the overlay we add little mud pond, adamant pond, pond and soda pond. So those are 10 acre lakes. The biggest change is in this adamant lake. Adamant pond is not in shoreland. So when we add adamant they become part of the shoreland overlay district and in doing that the folks in adamant said they were willing to reduce their village and have a higher rural residential. Let's look at what's existing right now. Right now in the current shoreland district you have a 50 foot buffer. You have 150 foot development. This buffer, it's a 50 it's a buffer of 50 feet, vegetation buffer. The setback is there and you have an 800 foot total depth. You have a three acre minimum parcel size there is no maximum clearing. There is a 10% maximum coverage in terms of impervious surface. That's the dimensions and what's in the shoreland protection district. Now when you go to the overlay the state has a 100% foot vegetative buffer. So we're increasing the buffer by 50 feet. The upland zone of this is 150 feet. So it's kind of an expansion if you will from this 150 foot to a 250 foot over here. So it's a 250 foot total depth. The parcel size is what the underlying district is. If the underlying district is rural residential it's three acres it's got the same setback. And by the way both of these have a 300 foot shoreline. Yeah, they have 300 feet of shoreline requirement. And right now we have the proposal list to have a 20% impervious surface in the overlay. Another way of looking at this is to look at what it, look at Bliscon. There is it familiar? So what you see here is this little tiny green is the 50 foot buffer. This is your 150 foot setback. Here's your 800 foot depth. And then there's all of this is three acres parcel size. But it could also be a three acre rural residential. No maximum cleaning allowed and you have a 20% impervious surface. Now it's 10. We forgot to change that. It's 10. Sorry. It's alright. We're all human. The proposed shrub, this is a picture of the proposed shrub. So you've got your 100 foot vegetation buffer. The 150 foot setback goes to here. The parcel size is at base of what's underneath rural residential in this case. And in this there's a 40% clearing, maximum, and a 20% maximum impervious surface. So that's what we have relative to the shrub. We're calling it the shrub because the shoreline overlays. Okay. Where do we go from here? The next slide is a river corridor one. Okay. Let's just go straight to a river corridor. Or I could go to the PDF. Go to the PDF. I think it's better. Any place you want to look at? Oh, this is the PDF. This is an overall graphic representation of our existing, right now, existing zoning is here. It looks pretty complicated. But here's Curtis. Here's all of these non-conforming parcels. You've got some big parcels over here. You've got this parcel, like here, doesn't really have any shoreline. Nor does this. So you've got a lot of people that don't have shoreline that are in shoreline. Can we get to, is there any other way you want to show on this one? This is Curtis Pond, the way it exists now. Now, let's do the proposed. So if we take this off, now this is what's proposed. So here's our buffer. Here's our 150 foot limit. Now on the east side, we have made a 700 foot popland zone. Popland zone, yeah, sorry. At the request of some of the people from the lakes and streams in conservation. So we could also take this. Go to Adamant. Can you show Adamant? Yeah, I just want to do something real quick. So you can see here that when we took shoreline out, instead of having the village, which is the yellow, move in, rural residential wraps around Curtis. The only place village comes closer is at the southern end. So this area here is So this hatch mark, this is rural residential, keeping with the three acres. Here's your village. So you've got some parcels in and rural residential. But you go down here where everything is village. This is the southern end and the water flows down that way. And so even though yeah, there is some, we want to protect here, but this is the village center where it is. John, can you show farther over? Whoops, sorry. Maybe I can. I used this mouse. Well, if I said it so that I can scroll and zoom, then panning becomes a problem. So the northern part is here. So we still have your three acre minimum rural residential and you've got your 100 foot buffer and your 200, 150 foot overlay upload. So that's the northern end. And so what you're saying, the purple, there is no development here, or I'm not quite sure what to be done. It has a tighter and pervious surface standard than the underlying district. There are a couple of uses that are a little different, not much. You got the three acre minimum, which is the more stringent large size standard, but that shoreland district had the three acre minimum anyway. So that's really not it. That's not a change. So it's, I'd be hard for us to say what the difference is between this and what we have now except for the 100 foot vegetative buffer. Does anybody else want to see the adamant or any of the other lakes in the area and how it's affected or are you okay with moving on? I did have some very unique things that we're proposing. They had their original village up here. Village used to go all the way up to the quarry. After meeting with them, they were willing to move their village down to here and make everything rural residential around it. Again, the village is here. The designated village center is there, so we are keeping village with village. And again, the water flow again, looking at all of this was the water flow most of those out this way. Sod upon was added. So all of those issues around sod upon has been added. A question. Aren't we rural residential? That just means you have to have three acres. Is that kind of what it is? Yes, three acre minimum rural residential. Village has unlimited. They don't have any acreage requirement. Rural residential has a three acre minimum. And the whole point of it from the state planning perspective is with your village is where you want your concentrated economic development. And so when you apply for some grants and you are in the village district and you happen to be also a nonprofit and you can get grants, this is where the center of development is. At number 10 pond, when we take the district that moves in to take its place, as you can see the yellow area, that is village and it goes all the way to the point where Memorial Hall is. This was a request from the people in North Calus because they were going for some stuff, village center designation and they wanted the village district to go to actually go up and have the hall in the zoned village district. So this became the village district for the North Calus area. But the more stringent requirements would apply as far as environmental stuff so they still have the shoreland district, the vegetative buffer and the space with limited development clearing. That's about it for the shoreland. I'm going to look at River Porter seeing some of those maps and then we're going to let you talk. I think what I wanted to do was share with you some of the things that the planning commission has to look at. The town and the entire town relative to economic development, where you want that development and yet how do you keep and protect the topography and the water quality that we have which is immense in the town of Calus. The River Porter I don't know how well you can see this but these gold lines are River Porter. So you can see River Porter comes all the way around here. Now River Porter automatically has a 50 foot buffer on each side and this is an idea or a drawing of what River Porter has. It has to follow the meandering of the river and it has this around each side so that it automatically is 50 feet on each side. Reduces the bank erosion, slows the flow and tries to keep it in a straightened channel. Can you go back to the map again? Now these little red things here this is the 0.5 to 2.5 square mile streams that are also part of River Porter and those also have a 50 foot buffer meaning no development in those 50 feet. What we've proposed though is that 35 feet of that 50 feet is to be vegetated, right? Did we get that right? That would be vegetated buffer and therein starts some of the discussion about mowing up to the 35 foot mark. So that's just a very brief map of River Porter and I think it shows you the extent of everything that is there and how it affects all of Calis. It's not just around the lakes what we have with River Porter affects much more in the land. Is there anything else that we have? Any other slides? No, that's it for slides. Do we have any other maps? Or we can be ready to have maps if there are some questions? The River Corridor stuff is all available to see on the interactive web map which is what you see on your screen. No, we don't have the interactive back yet. Now we're here and we've got our ears open and we'll take notes and if you have something to say it is being recorded, state your name, where you live and either you have questions or have comments. I just wanted to ask about existing structures. That's all the band file there. You said they are not conforming. I just wanted you to speak to the existing structures and stuff. Existing structures in River Corridor or in the Shrod? On the shoreline. I didn't hear the question. I just wanted to speak. If you go ahead and shed is there something on the shoreline? Is that brand file? Or do you care about that? Do you understand the question? I think I do. Right now the minimum standard for new development, if you're within 100 feet of the water there's no new development. If you go all the way to the edge of Shrod, 250 feet from the water's edge, we are still having a conversation about what should be allowed. It had been considered that in addition on the back of a building away from the pond didn't increase the level of non-compliance, but we've heard a lot that says any new impervious surface is something that has to be controlled. So there are some folks who would like to see no expansions of existing non-compliance structures if they're within the proposed Shrod. And for sure in the buffer, the non-compliant has to stay within the footprint and you can't enlarge. That's what we're thinking about. And for sure there's also a non-compliant standard that's not part of the Shrod that the DRB has to look at and that non-compliance you can't make it larger. So the people that have their dwellings and their cottages that are in the buffer both the shoreland and also people that have dwellings that are already in the river corridor there's definitely it's going to affect those people living in those dwellings. Or any closer to the shoreline with the current draft. So look that over and let us have your comments on it. You can maintain. And you can repair. The regulation really is intended to curtail an increase in impervious surface. So anything that you do that maintains it is fine. That's permitted. But anything that would increase the exposure of impervious surface has to be reviewed in a way that will decrease its impact on those close by waters. And by the way this is Gary Root the fourth member of the Planning Commission. Sorry I was late. I'm particularly sorry I didn't bring any cookies. Please tell me too. Yeah normally Gary brings the sweet stuff to keep us going. Run it late and I came straight here. Yeah that's awesome we'd rather have you here. No sugar is allowed. Okay. Anybody else want? Sarah Gallagher. I live on the north random road north side of Perth con. My concern is the deleted extension for extraction of materials associated with agricultural or forestry operations. Our land is developed on north end of Perth con and we can afford to do that because it's in a land use forestry management plan. So we're concerned if you're going to make it so that we can't follow the forestry plan that we need to follow in order to keep it in a land use. That exemption was part of what section was that? 4.4. It's the section that relates to overall extraction. The reason why we got rid of that exemption was because of what happens north on 14 where a farm purchased the property and has totally denuded the property by saying that it was for his agricultural purposes. Well maybe it was, but there are certain things there that the former DRB chair was pretty upset by it because they could not do anything because of that exemption. Now as a town it's like yeah, I mean I'm good, but the farm isn't there. They specifically purchased this land. It's an empty land and they are not farming that land. If they were it might be different. They truck that sand all the way down to their farm. And I am a little sensitive to it because they did the same thing with the property across from where I live. That property was given two times. They could excavate 3500 something or another cubic feet of sand per year for two years only. They were supposed to regrow it or redo something with it and they have never done it. So we just have this thing with a bunch of sand and trees falling. So I think that's one reason. A little bit personal maybe and I don't mean to be personal about that, but that was the reason for the exemption. I understand that unfortunately it occurred, but we may not be the only people who have, you know, it's also possible to responsibly manage forests and not damage the environment. So you can't make a town-wide regulation based on one mad actor essentially. Well forestry is silviculture anyway. Forest and silviculture and regular agriculture are exempted. What's going on with that was we said you cannot excavate. The issue was the excavation of the sand. When you're saying agriculture and forest you're actually mining it. Yeah, it's in the excavation section. I don't know if it says forestry. Anyway, the same 250 feet, which would be the shrod overlay, that is also the State Shoreland Protection Act and I'm not sure how the state says that the town has to exempt certain ag and silviculture practices. Yes, exactly. As long as it meets certain conditions. You have a state approved forest management plan. You should be allowed to... No, I agree. I do not know how the State Shoreland Protection Act relates to that though. The State Shoreland Protection Act probably wouldn't allow cutting within 100 feet of the water. Great, that's about it. It's bigger than that. And then the remaining 150 from the vegetative buffer to the extent of the shrod, that's 40% then from 250 up it's raw residential. But you're in current use so therefore you're following the principles of forest, silviculture and agriculture so you're protected. But the shrod that we're proposing isn't increasing. So how close to the shoreline can we cut a tree down? No closer than 100 feet. After that you just can't. Unless it's on its way out. There's all these standards about how do I identify a dead and down tree. What about road building? God, I suppose if you followed the silviculture standards again I would talk to the State about that. Both the town regs and the State are going to remain in effect. People are going to have to get permits for both. You're going to have to get a permit from the State Shoreland Protection Act books and you're going to have to get one from the town. Until at some point the State delegates responsibility to the town to manage the State Shoreland Protection Act. But I don't see that happening. Only a couple of towns in the whole State have gotten that delegated that responsibility. The State's not giving it up. Bill, what about where you have open land on a lake or on a river. That's going to be able to do that? I think on the Shoreland there's mowing of lawns. And then there's on the stream levels 3.1 whatever it is. We talk about brush hogging and mowing that goes up to a stream. What we have currently proposed was that were you talking about a stream or pond or you want to know about both? Both. I think what we have for the Shoreland is going to be in section 2.4. Bill, I'll send it to you. It's lawns within the Shoreland buffer zone legally existed on January 3rd, 2005 that's the current date or current zone. Which are mowed at least once every two years may be maintained if no new development takes place. This is in the current draft. However, the area of mowed shall not be expanded into the buffer and failure to mow at least once every two years there shall mean that the provisions of this section apply, but thou shalt not know the general rule apply, and the area may no longer be mowed. We also have had comments to phase that out. So it's good to get input what people want for the town. I remember a meeting was a year or two ago, three years ago. Somebody didn't want it for one year, and I said well that doesn't work if you're away for a year, and people don't come up to their camps. We heard that. I didn't take that right away from people because they were taking it. That would not be in favor of that. And then the mowing for the under 3.4 doesn't have what we changed it to, but we no longer call it grandfathering. We call it pre-existing. I don't think it was ever called that in the zoning, but it's like a name for it. That would be offensive. So now we're shifting to the buffers and requirements of 3.14ab. Buffer requirements, exceptions So the general rule, except it's provided below, any new development shall be prohibited in buffers as established in accordance with this section. This is the section that talks about repairing buffers, 35% on each side, wetland buffers, like any surface water buffer that's not a labor or farm in shoreland. This includes new mowing, clearing, filling, grading, or storage of material. So the general rule is you can't do it by scrolling down to B3, pre-existing mowing. A landowner who has mowed in a buffer of surface water other than wetlands, because we can't touch wetlands. That's a state thing. Other than wetlands within, and it has two crossed out and five filled in. Is that what we were proposing, I guess? Of the effective date of these regulations, January 1, 2015, I guess that's when the surface water buffers were adopted, may continue to mow the same area following adoption of this bylaw. However, the area mowed shall not be expanded and failure to mow at least once every five years shall mean that the provisions of this section applying the area no longer be mowed. That's what we have in our current draft. I guess why would they both be the same? Isn't water water? I mean, five years should both be the same. Well, it could be the same for two years. We were really trying to address, in the one case we were trying to address lawns, and in the other case we were trying to address fields. One of the things that we discussed is that for people who want to maintain a field and not lose their view, we really would prefer that they mow less rather than more. If somebody wants to send a tractor out of their rough pocket once every five years so that they maintain their view. We were going to change it to two. We have it at five now. What's left behind is much better as a water protected buffer than if it's mowed like a lawn. How do you juggle those two things together and still have them make sense? Our current regulations call for five years and when we were doing this at first we thought let's do it two years and then we realized you don't want to promote mowing every two years so we went back to five years. The other issue is that it's also bad for water quality and mow so at some point do we phase that out? At what point do we, the point about pre-existing provision is to prevent unfairness of surprising new regulations on people who didn't know they were coming? So we've been hearing from others that maybe we just phase that out after a few years so it's good to get input on all sides on these issues and figure out what's best for the town. Anything else? Anybody else? You're saying maybe I can go up to four? Yeah. My name is Larry Bush. I live on Bliss Pond. I'm the vice chair of the conservation commission in Calis. The chair is Stephanie Kaplan and she couldn't be here tonight and apologize for that. The other members of the commission currently are Julie Hand, Neil Maker, Mark Brown, and Tracy Kuvich. We've given the planning commission tonight a set of comments about the shoreland zoning provisions in this overall package. It doesn't address the flood hazard or the erosion sections. There are copies there may still be copies up here on that table I didn't know how many to bring so the comments will also be put online probably at the conservation commission's page on the town website that will take a couple of days. A few comments. I would like to make this short rather than going through these because our document has 15 number of paragraphs of specific comments and I'd like to avoid that if the understanding is that this is submitted to the planning commission and will be taken into account in the same way as if it were read verbatim I think we would all prefer that. That sounds reasonable to me. Maybe we should object to that. I'll just make a couple of points about these 15 paragraphs. First of all, we have a friendly disagreement with the planning commission and we think that it should continue to be a shoreland district. There's potential for confusion and difficulties with inconsistencies between the underlying district and the shoreland district. Beyond that, it's kind of a philosophical question. We think shorelands are very important natural environments and then a shoreland district, a full district, and we think it should stay. We also believe that the shoreland district, which is now a maximum of 800 feet under the state law and the proposal of the planning commission that would be 250 feet, which is the 100 foot buffer that everyone now agrees on and then the extra space behind that. The conservation commission is urging that the standard be 500 feet instead of 800 feet because there is some pretty good scientific indications that 500 feet is not only a depth that protects a lot of the wildlife that live on the edges of the pond but even more importantly perhaps in many ways because of our obligation both for the town and to the state to maintain water quality the 500 foot depth permits the best form of filtration and protection. And if you're interested this is a document on the back of our proposals which is an attachment to it. It was prepared by the state and it's called the WITSA short Lakeshore Vegetation for Lake Protection and it has a list of things and how much land away from the pond needs to be undisturbed in order to provide the protection for manual birds and so forth but also for water quality standards like nutrient removal instead of filtration. This also will be on our website without proposals. We've prepared this. It was done by the what do you want to say? Yeah, I didn't see who had done it either. It's the ANR and I believe they... Pardon? I think it's on here somewhere. I'm just not seeing it but it's done by the state. It's available on their website. From the DEC.Germain.gov website. Department of Environmental Conservation which is part of ANR. Okay, so there are those two points. We urge that it remain a district. We urge that the width of it be 500 feet rather than the current 800 or the proposed 250. There was a little discussion earlier about the interplay between the state regulatory process and the town regulatory process. We urge very strongly that it be clear in the current, in the proposed or in any new zoning regulations that both the Vermont Shoreland Protection Act and the callous zoning regulations apply and the regulatory and review process at both levels be maintained. Why is that important? Well, for one thing, the state standards and town standards will likely diverge on a number of points. And the state doesn't care what the town standards are if ours are stricter. So the only enforcement mechanism that we currently have is through the zoning administrator and the DRB and we're proposing that that level stay. So there's the substantive differences that argue for the maintaining the existing callous level supervision and regulation. There's also and this is not something I think a whole lot of people think about a lot, but it's very important that the public know about things that happen in environmentally sensitive areas. The state process doesn't really permit the kind of public notice that the town's process permits. Under the state's Shoreland Protection Act regulatory system, someone who wants to develop within the Shoreland makes an application to an office at the state. The only notice to the rest of the world that anything is happening at that point and thereafter is the applicant is supposed to file a copy of the application also with the town clerk, but there's no requirement that the town clerk post it or otherwise notify the public about the existence of this application. The standard says that the town clerk can post it in the town office if he chooses to. So then the state has this and there's a 30-day period of time when it's sort of like a notice period and the state is supposed to have a website that you could go to if you were interested in seeing what permits were out there and it would keep this on that website for 30 days. The problem at the moment, well the problem could be that I just can't operate a computer but I'm relatively proficient and I have tried and tried and tried to find on the state system where those permits are located and the only place I found it, the page wasn't operative. You couldn't actually find any of the permits on it and that's unlike the permitting system for wastewater and various other things as the state regulates. So I don't know what's up there, I haven't talked to the state people about this but the idea that the general public has to notice what's going on is in our judgment because the only other requirement is that if you get the state's permit you are required to put it of record in the town. After it's all said and done you have to put it there. So Larry, my understanding is when the applicant goes to the state, the state does what it is they do but that applicant also has to go to the permit to the zoning administrator who has to verify whatever the state does and that's not changing in these regs. Nothing like that is changing everything. So even though I can't see it on the state website, the fact that it's going to John and it's been approved or whatever and then whatever or any future zoning administrator, it's still going to go to the calisoning administrator for a permit. The problem is that the way that these regulations are currently drafted and I don't know if you have plans, a number of things have been included which make it clear to anybody who's given a fair reading that for many, many subjects if you get a permit, that's it. You don't have to comply with anything that's untrue. The current draft, we understood that and you gave that to us already before and we said that we would be looking into it. So it's all I'm going to say now right now. All we can react to is what's illegally I think is the written document that was posted with your warning and I understand that you guys are making changes in it but those aren't formal. We can't respond to any changes you might make in this document. I understand you're telling me that things might change and therefore things in our document might not. I appreciate that and I think it's good for everybody to hear the concerns to the document we're all looking at tonight and that spot on. I did want to just come out. The environmental notice bulletin page on Aner's website you can't really know this bulletin it's called. You can sign up for an email that you're not going to want because you're going to get it every week with everybody's permits but if you just want to go in and scroll you can type in Callison it'll call up every type or you can type in Shoreland I can show it to you later. Okay I'd like to see that because I did find a page that had other permits that ANR marked. There's a whole page full of them and I looked at some of the Callison's but Shoreland was not on that page that I found. Bill do you have a question to Larry? No I said something else. Okay we'll let Larry finish and then I know you want to be next. Okay just here's one example I'll get one of another. Let's beat it today. In the Shoreland buffer zone standards which are 2.4G the proposed language says that development within the buffer zone shall be conducted in compliance with the Vermont Shoreland Protection Permit for Approval in the second sentence applies to property which is on the other side of the road the significance of that is under the state's standards in the state's statute all of the Shoreland regulatory provisions that otherwise would apply do not apply if there's a public road that separates the pond on one side from the balance of what would otherwise be the Shoreland Covered Area, the Shoreland zone. So I live on Bliss Pond for instance. Everybody knows the whole south side of that pond has a road along it and the road is probably the biggest contributor to the eutrophication that we're seeing where it's becoming a big lily pond. But my point is the road is maybe 25 feet off the pond it's another 30 feet wide. Some of the good folks who live on the other side of the road are within the 100 foot buffer zone except that the state law says no you're home free. There is no buffer zone because the rest of the road is there. Now one of the wonderful things that the planning commission is doing and we hardly applaud is getting rid of that anomaly. So public roads won't be a barrier to enforcement of environmental regulations that affect the quality of the water in the pond. So basically what this says is there's two situations in this particular provision. One is land that's within the state's jurisdiction that is not across the road. And if all of your land, the part of your land is in that then what this says is that it's conducted in compliance with a Shoreland, Vermont Shoreland Protection Act permit or approval period. It goes on to say if the applicant has property for which a portion of the shoreland over the area extends beyond the road the standards listed below shall apply. And there is a list of very good standards. Our proposal is that that list of standards apply across the board. But the point here is a fair reading of this says if you've got something that requires a state permit and you get the state permit then there's no role for the town. I mean that's what it says right now. But if you have land that's not covered by the state law and not subject to a state permit, which this new land which would be on the other side of the road, then all of a sudden there's this very robust list of standards. And there are a number of places in this which I hope will be dealt with that make that point over and over again. And there's language that's taken out of existing standards that makes that point. I can't understand why it was taken out unless you know I'm I guess we're here trying to curtail the state permit system with the town in your right. Well the problem dealt with is that you're replacing the state level regulation and oversight with just I mean the town level with the state's level. That's the effect of this language in so many places. Thank you for pointing this out and your comments are specific in where they point to that. I appreciate that thank you. That certainly was not our intention and I appreciate your helping us to focus in on those places. Alright, well I appreciate that very much and I appreciate you looking at that. If you find any errors or problems with it I'd be grateful if you would let us know. I'm not going to go through a whole lot of this. We have provisions on what should happen if the overlay district is, that concept is maintained and the idea of a full district is rejected. We have comments on how change shouldn't be made to the underlying districts unless it's determined that they won't have an adverse effect on the shoreline provisions and the zoning regulations. Can you give an example? Yes, well I'm not sure if this applies because I'm not sure now where your draft is on a requirement of minimum lot size requirement for the development but it's my understanding there is no minimum lot size in village districts and frankly the only serious concern here probably is in the various village districts Adamant, North Calis a little bit of Curtis Pond which can be very confusing and difficult to deal with if you've got very strict shoreline requirements and you've got that overlay district where there's a very strong policy drive as there should be in a village district to concentrating development, concentrating buildings but our concern is that that latter policy and drive could potentially undermine the equally as not in the minds of many of us the more important concern about maintaining the environmental quality as best we can. Now what this recognizes is that existing nonconformal structures aren't really bothered here. What we're talking about in most all cases are making changes in those structures that increase the impervious surface or entirely new development that wasn't there and would not be in compliance with these standards. Okay, so Mary, if I can just address that for a second we actually looked lot by lot at all of the places where changes were going to be made as a result of these new regulations and the places for instance North Calis village right now. The lot that there is a lot that comes under the heading of just what you're describing that is now part of a village district and is also drains into the pond. Is that Memorial Hall? That's Memorial Hall. And that is nearly the only lot in town that will change and become less regulated as a result of these regulation changes. In other cases the for instance North Calis village almost all of it is below the surface of the pond mean water level of the pond and so they are still controlled by the waterway, by the stream regulations but they're below the surface of the pond and within existing regulations in theory could apply for a variance as a result of that drainage pattern even with our current and existing stuff. What really is happening is that because we're increasing the number of ponds, we're also increasing the number of properties that affect a waterway and so we're actually adding restrictive regulations to those properties rather than because right now there are none and there are a bunch of ponds in town for which that's the case. So there are you know the there's no regulations around the big one of course is adamant that it's not currently it's not in a shoreland district and we're trying to add so we're actually adding regulations to that pond and southern pond that currently don't exist. So yes there are properties that are on those ponds that are upstream of particularly of southern pond all of all of those properties are upstream of southern pond but right now they're not being regulated so we're adding regulations to those things. So with the exception of Memorial Hall really we're looking at a net increase in stringency all across the town by changing it to an overlay instead of Right, our concern at this point is with future changes not really what you guys are doing with this overlay but just because there's an overlay in underlying district it's conceivably possible to make changes in the underlying district that either aren't addressed in the shoreland overlay or otherwise there is an otherwise would be applicable better different than they are today that could type set up. That's true with every aspect of these regulations. Well it's true that regulations are coordinated to this point. But any future is to go through the same process that we're doing tonight. Any future change of any of that is going to go through an iteration and a review and believe me this person is not going to be the funds person. Ok, alright very quickly we're proposing that the existing shoreland district dimensional standards that are in the law currently be maintained. There would be of course no clear cutting in the vegetative buffer zone other than what the state law I believe permits a 100 square foot clear area or a maximum of 6 foot wide path to the pond. Both actually. Sorry? Both actually. Right, that's what I said and the two. And the cleared area can't be any closer than 25 feet from the line. And we're saying we're good with that but it shouldn't be any more clear cutting in the buffer zone because that's the point of the buffer zone is to have this vegetative buffer that provides in the same area though for the upland zone I think we're probably on the same page that you are and saying that maximum cleared area in the upland zone be limited to 40% of this 40% we just think it needs to be made very clear that that's 40% of the upland zone itself. Yes. That's the case. We're good. Yes. Ok. And again you've specifically enumerated that in your comments? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I think there's a copy there. I sent you one in the mail to you. No, no. Ok. Thanks. Just a couple more things. Won't make a lot of people in this room or some people in this room happy but we are as others have done proposing that there be a phase out of mowing lawn except for the cleared areas. We just talked about the 100 square foot and a 6 foot path to the lake. That's our proposal. In which area? In the whole 250p? In the vegetative buffer. Well, the vegetative buffer, there is no mowing in vegetative buffer anyway, right? Well, there are laws. But those are currently under current law. Those are certainly legal. They have been legal. Under your provisions they would remain legal. I'm sure with great humility suggesting that they shouldn't be. Ok. There are a number of other small points but I will not try to cover them here and I would hope that the Planning Commission would be able to review this and if you have any questions or concerns or if we've made any mistakes I appreciate letting us know. And for the general public there's not a copy and they seem to be gone. We will be getting this on the website as soon as our incredibly talented webmaster for the town gets it. Ok, I think I'm done. Thank you. Thank you. We will be taking these. We will be working with them. I think right now you're allowed to develop a three per lot with 300 feet of frontage but you don't need road frontage. This is adding that you need 500 feet of road frontage. I saw that. I saw that. That's a recommendation that they're making and we have to look at it. I think we have 300 feet currently, right? In Shoreland road frontage the proposal would be 500? No. I think it's between Shoreland frontage and road frontage. Right now I don't think you need road frontage at all. Well no, in Shoreland district your current Shoreland district requires a 300 foot minimum road. Road and shore. I think it's in either or. There's a 300 and your Shoreland frontage is 300 foot. That's what you have currently. Unless you're not on the Shoreland. If you're in Shoreland district and you have no Shoreland it doesn't matter because I don't have 300 foot in my property. That's the discrepancy that we see with having a district that's got three acres. I think you need to keep the 300 foot shoreline frontage. If you're on the Shoreline it's 300 foot. Bill? As a rebuttal of what was said by the Transportation Commission I think what the the Planning Commission has done is fair. I don't agree with some of it, but you know life goes on. I think it's fair. I would ask that it just be as easy to read as possible. I've dealt with the state with their Shoreland stuff. Found it very easy to navigate and understand and go out and figure it out myself. It seems sometimes though when it comes to the town one has to go kiss the ring and it should not be that way. One should be able to figure it out for themselves and then ask for help. But to have hopes and dreams dashed like what's happening up on Baking Moldy Road is something that we don't want to have happen. We want people to be able to figure it out and say yeah I can do it, no I can't do it. And then ask for help and see what can be done. That's what I'd say. If I could I apologize. There were two quick other points I wanted to make for you as well as the audience. On the impervious surface I believe the current regulations are at 10% and I think your proposal is to go to 20% and our point is our view is that it should remain at the 10% and also while we're on the question of things that are 10% it's our proposal that that driveways and development not be permitted on slopes greater than 10%. That 14% road that they put in next to the pond over on Nelson Pond would be exhibit A. I think the state's already had to go in there and do some work for the erosion that was occurring on that 14% and I don't know this for a fact John but I'm told that the erosion problems began it was only a year ago that it was approved. The concern is and I don't hear in this document have sites to scientific support for that but the concern is land within the 250 feet or whatever it's going to be of the pond that have slopes greater than 10% shouldn't be developed because it's the runoff from those slopes that's one of the more significant things obviously where it's developed or not and so the question is how can you slow down that runoff on these streams and the steeper the slope the more the runoff I see is a problem. There is some truth to that. There's also the concept of how you put your driveway. You don't do it straight. You make a couple curves in the driveway and you put what are some of the things in the driveway you could have rain gauges and all those other kind of things so the idea of saying you have something and these are the kinds of things that we do consider in terms of that so it's not just the degree of slope it's what you do when you're developing the driveway and that's also an educational thing I don't know but I mean I've got a driveway that does a lot of curving so it's just all part of the discussion that we can have. That's similar to the question of mitigation which is a broader concept that comes through it. When you read this document you will find that conservation commission is no big fan of the concept of mitigation and what that means is you can get around the regulations by cutting a deal off. That's not so. Mitigation can also, by the way, help in stopping erosion. Oh absolutely. So there's a positive aspect of mitigation and I just want to make sure that we know that there's a positive aspect of mitigation and it's not all negative. So would conservation commission like to see the steep slope standard for the entire town ten percent? No but why not? Kind of edged out of that. It is our recommendation that for the rest of the town it would be fifteen percent instead of twenty. But only ten percent in shoreline. Because of the sensitivity of the bodies of water that are at the base of those slopes and what nobody goes into is what happens if it's a slope going the other way. But I won't get into that. Okay. Anybody else have anything? Yeah. I'm just cleaning out around the north at the first time. And I too would like to thank you guys for all the work you've put in. This isn't easy and there's no piece of land that fits any one of these rules perfectly. And that is the hard part I think of this whole thing. The other thing is it's getting to sound like I've got to go to the state, I've got to go to the town for every little thing that I might be doing on our piece of property. This seems like it's causing a burden on everybody. And the part that I don't like is that it may be creating like I'm going to go ahead and do it and let him catch me later. Because hopefully there's going to be so many rules. It's not so many rules but it's the same rules by different people. And you have to get approval for this and that. And I would like to point out instead of all these rules and I personally think mitigation is the way to go. I mean there's a number of ways to fix any one thing. And if we're saying outlawing everything we begin with it just makes it just frustrating for me as a landowner. But I do appreciate all the hard work that you guys have been doing. Because everybody wants to make sure the ponds and the rivers are good. That's why we live in one. Thank you. My name is Noreen Bryan and I live on Curtis Tons. And I'm speaking tonight for the Calis Lakes and Streams Committee because it's a fairly informal group of people. But I guess Curtis is into wanting to see these lakes and ponds and streams preserve future generations. I guess we look at this from a point of view that we need to follow the science in deciding how best to protect these ponds. Many of us are one of them who have the luxury of living in the shoreland and the structure right at the edge of the pond. Everything would tell us from science that that's really not good for ponds. And so I think that these committee wants to make sure that we support regulations that do not allow people such as me to further impair the lakes and ponds that we all love so much. And me too am I that. Some of the people who are on this lakes and streams do live in non-conforming structures from different ponds but we're also feeling aware that we're extraordinarily privileged. And because of that we're lucky or whatever you want to say but because of that we feel I guess the lakes and streams don't feel that we have a responsibility to be sure that we don't do any more harm and if possible protect against that. That the conservation commission has brought forward for you to look at. And I guess I'll just put a personal note having grown up on a pond in Connecticut and watching it completely disintegrate into a mass of algae my heart is in we don't want that to happen here. I know no one else does but I think we need to be careful that we don't let it happen. So I think those regulations are worthwhile and thank you. And I don't think we need to figure out how to do the rights right now. Thank you. John. John Rosenblum, I have read it but I think I'm at 500 foot for more frontage on what I call Curtis Swamp. Which is not even on the map. Somehow this is the map. I know it's quite a big location. Yeah, there it is. But not there. You see it's always like it looks like it's land but about half of my parcel which is what's coming off the bottom of Curtis Pond for about a quarter of it is swamp. My property life's right about the middle of the swamp. So what, is this it here? Is this your land? Yeah. But where do you go? Do you go, does your land go to the It goes to the road. It goes to the road. And it goes to the culvert in the process from Curtis Swamp to Curtis Pond. So I swim in Curtis Pond across Curtis Pond from the swimming area to the island. But I think about 60 mornings a year restricted by weather. I'm really happy that I really want to praise the planning group for the work they do. So you're not, okay, you're paid and this is for the goodness of your heart. That's great. And I'm grateful for the Calis Conservation Mission and Lakes and Streets. My understanding of Curtis Pond and the other ponds in Calis is that they are already polluted more than they can handle. We've actually done more damage to them over the years through building right those, through faulty septic systems, through it's already too much, right? So they're already if you look at the area in Curtis Pond near the dam the cove that's called, the fictionally called Coronaco. When I came 20 years ago, you could swim right across anywhere in that cove. Now it's just a water lily path. It's just the only part that's open is what Don maintains with his boat. So that's what's happening. What we're doing to the Curtis Pond, what we're doing to all the other ponds in Calis is we're destroying them through over-development. We've already done that and we can't take that back and it doesn't make sense to say, okay, the rain's got to take up our house and plant trees there or something. That's not going to happen. We know that. But we don't want to do more to these ponds. We don't want to hurt them more than we already have. They are going to die based on the love to death, right? We're loving them to death. That's what we're doing. So let's just admit it. But let's slow it down as much as possible. And so I support the Calis Conservation Commission and their input into this. And I hope you take them seriously and I hope you think about our love for these ponds, that we are loving them to death. That's just sort of, you know, like a little kid squeezes a puppy until it can't breathe anymore. That's what we're doing. That's a wonderful line. So let's just keep that in mind and try to keep them alive for our future generations so that my children can swim across the pond, my grandchildren hopefully can swim across the pond. I don't think so. I think in 100 years, Curtis Pond will be able to have a place, you know, and they won't be swimming. So let's just see if we can keep it going 50 years more, rather than 25 years more. So it's just like, this is for our children and for the future of Calis. This is our resource. And when we don't have Curtis Pond and we don't have numbers and ponds, we will have a lower value to our grand list and everything else. So, you know, I just think that we should love our danger and not to death as quickly. I'm glad to see you sort of halfway face to face. I have stood on the road and looked at your swamp and admired it and been concerned about how the drainage that goes up toward Worcester drains right into that section. And for me, that was one of the pivotal observations that made me determine as a member of this body made me determine along with other people. I'm not taking credit for it. But that was the thing, that visual input was the thing that said to me, I don't know if it was of anything that we can't let the shoreland regulation stop on the road. And it was your swamp that made that so clear. Cool, thank you. Colleen, you just said we, a whole lot of us here have been doing loose strike and fragmites and it doesn't know the story, but we had a fishing game out, they came out in their busy schedule, one man, and then he came out and picked it up, that was great. But Mike Buchowski, who's also a Calis resident, and he's a baseball coach and all that, and they're saying, they put barbed wire as their edges. That's what fishing game does. And this barbed wire that we've been, you know, stepping over and saying we need to bring clippers, but someone's going to get really hurt, is there. And when they put it in, it was 40 times. That's the set up that came down at the fishing game. I mean, to what you're saying, it was such a graphic, you know, it wasn't a bar graph, it was a fence that now is this high. I was blown away with it. And it proceeded into the pond, of course. That's just what the plan is. Anybody else? Well, thank you for everything. Our next meeting and planning is October 4th. We will certainly review the conservation commission's documentation. We've had the documentation from Noreen. We've had a lot of, even before this meeting, reviews. And so we do have some issues that we're reviewing. There will be changes, I'm sure. And being humans, we don't always do things right the first time. I mean, that's all part of learning and that's all part of living. So there will be changes. You will get notified when the changes are made. There will be a report that has to go with the changes, the documents, what the changes are. And this will be printed out before it goes to the select board. But that will be the next time you'll probably have another public hearing, will be the select board's hearing. And I think that's the way the process is that we're directed to do. Jan, on that point, I remember that at a meeting not long ago, you were talking in general terms about the time frames for this. And you mentioned some of them, but my specific point is now, at that time you seem to indicate that you thought probably this revised draft that you'll be in the process of making now, would probably need to be done around the middle of October so that it could get to the... Yeah, I have a personal goal, but that's I think we know, we're probably not going to make the March date that I wanted. I said we are probably not going to make the March date that we wanted. I look at the select board's agenda. We aren't even on it at all. I have warned the select board three times that Planning Commission is working through this, but if they don't get it onto their agenda, it isn't going to be done this year. I mean, I have a reality check on this. It's not what I like, but I also want to say is we want to do it right. And if it takes us until the middle of November to get the final draft, then that's the way it's going to be. I just have to get off of my own personal agenda. And I have a personal agenda for a variety of reasons. But anyway, so don't worry, we will try to do it the right way. And if we I don't know if we can do a, I don't know if we can pay for a special vote in June, but anyway, if it has to go to next November, so it does. We've been at it for years, some of you were at some of the earlier public meetings about certain sections of it. Thank you. And with that, I guess we'll say that this public hearing is over.