 Okay. What that message meant. I don't know. I've never been on the other side to see, you know, what, what it means. So now that we're recording, I can start correct. Oh yeah, I guess it is. Yeah, this recording and we have two members. And we have all the members present who are filming right. Okay. Hello. Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the January 11, 2023 meeting of the Amherst Historical Commission. I am the chair Robin Fordham opening this meeting at 633 p.m. And I am opening this meeting in accordance with the provisions of MGL chapter 40 a an article 3.6 of Amherst general bylaws. Oh, not reading the wrong thing. I knew that was going to happen. Where's the other. No, you sent it to me Ben. You sent me two legal notices and I pulled up the wrong one. Let's see. I don't have it immediately in front of me. Hold on. Let me just see if I can grab it from my email. Apologies, everybody. I did start doing all of this at six o'clock, but it's your first time right now. There it is preamble. That's what I needed. All right, there we go. The preamble. All right, pursuant to Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law. GL 3, GLC 30 a section 18 and pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 and extended by chapter 22 of the acts of 2022. The state legislature on July 14, 2022 and signed into law on July 16, 2022. This public hearing and public meeting of the town of Amherst historical commission is being conducted via remote participation members of the public who wish to access the meeting. So by Zoom or by 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 adequately access the proceedings in real time by technological means. A hyperlink to the hearing will be posted on the town's online calendar. Do I need to read anything else, Nate? Okay, thanks, 35. So I think you could read the legal notice. Okay. I mean, you, I mean, most of it was kind of summarized there, but I guess we could start with the, you know, the notice of public hearing. Okay. So that was what I was reading before. Correct. Yeah. It was, so I think we could just, you know, the describe the two hearings. Okay. Yeah, and just open them. So we are having two public hearings this evening, one regarding 117 Amity Street, Donald Fisher and Susan Haas, a request to demolish an attached one car garage and replaced with a new garage that is wider has new door siding windows, trim and adorned roof in front and back. Second, 214 Cameroi Lane, Amherst Poor Farm LLC, a request to demolish large timber frame barn and replaced with a new barn. So with that, I would be opening the, I'm opening the public hearing for 117 Amity Street. I know there's two members or one person here. Yeah, I'm promoting you to a panelist and then you can join the commission. Good evening. Hi. Thanks for joining us. Thank you. And then you go ahead now, Cindy, I'm new to the chair rule. So while I make my way through this. Yeah, so typically we ask the applicants if they want to make a presentation or have anything to share. I mean I could share the screen too as well like the plans are available online I don't know if you want me to pull an image up or if you want to do that. You have the ability. Yeah. So, that would be great if you could pull up the demolition plan. Yeah, we just I'll share first I'll share the image of the. Let's see. I'm just in my Chrome browser so the Let's see. Where are we here. Sorry, I'm going to bounce around for a minute. So just for everyone to see, here's an existing image of the garage. This is just from this wall over to be demolished. And for Maybe it's this is a document to see. Yeah. It's not visible for everyone I can make it a little bigger. Looks good to me. Moving moving here so here's the, you know, the garage outlined here in this little box. I can't I can't tell what people see or don't see but Yeah, I can see. Yeah, we can see we can see the plans. Yeah. Is that good Zinnia or do you want to go? Yeah, I mean, we're looking to demolish the existing garage structure so we can rebuild it to look the same but work properly and be new. It'll be a little bit, it'll be about three feet wider and it's going to have a little, you know, little balcony off the end, but, you know, basically it's it's falling apart as it is the foundation that is completely broken. So we're, we're looking to get your approval to demolish what's there so we can put anyone in. Great. Did you have any other comments? I don't, I don't think so. Okay. So then do I open up discussion for our question. I mean, I can provide a little bit of information. So, you know, the, this house is contributing structure in a national register district. I think it's a little bit of a, a little bit of a, a little bit of a little bit of a problem. Considered significant. And now you know, the commission's role to determine if the changes will be, you know, detrimental or somehow. You know, kind of inconsistent with the structure in the context. So what I'm showing here is the proposal to build a new garage. So it would have cloud board siding here. I'm with a dormer on the backside. I'm just going to show you a little bit of what we're trying to do. So we're trying to match the. Slope of the dormers with the existing house, you know, line up the. Height of the. Of the roof and from the front, it will look pretty similar. Down here with dormers and a garage door. There'll be some, a few wall lights. And what was had changes that where this window is shown here, there'll be actually a door with a balcony. And so that's what we went. The district. The historic district commission reviewed this the other week, and they approved it. So they, you know, they didn't find anything. You know, they found it to be appropriate. You know, they had some minor conditions, nothing that dealt with the demolition or anything, but they, you know, they approved it. Yes, we've seen it before. I remember it. Yeah, I'm totally behind this. Yeah, so what happened, this was presented before and then essentially it expired, it lapsed, and so they're back again. And so it's not. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, so the, you know, right now with the bylaw, for instance, if this were to be approved and permit wasn't wasn't taken out, or if it was and then it. Didn't happen, you know, it wasn't acted on within six months and there wasn't an extension, then it, you know, essentially it follows the building permit guidelines after this. Okay. So was there anyone on the commission who was not on the commission that the point that it was reviewed before for whom this is new. It's new to me. Okay, so do you have any questions or. No, I think the drawings and renderings make it quite clear to me. I know I had asked. I think I'd asked in the past whether the doors were salvageable or reusable. And I believe that they weren't but yeah. I would wonder if the material for this dormer window for the shed dormer, the new shed dormer, if that will be. It's so similar in shape and dimensions as the dormer and the existing building, like immediately adjacent to it. So is this material is going to contrast or will they be, will you try and sort of match them. They're, they're going to match as as closely as possible we have replaced some of the windows near near there actually the ones in the at the front door where the little bit of railing is we've replaced all of those. So it's going to be about three or four years ago. So they will look identical to those, those windows, and they will be as similar as possible to the historic windows. That's nice. It's nice to know that they're so similar. So it's not juxtaposition really. Any other questions for the presenter from the members of the commission. No, okay. So having no further questions, I believe this is the point where I would close the public hearing is that correct. I'd keep it open and ask if there's any public comment. Oh, okay. There's any public comment. If there's any public comment at this time on 117 Emily street, believe what we raise your hand or I can't remember what the telephone prompt is. Right. Yeah, I forgot the telephone. But yeah, so I think the, I don't see any hands raised. Okay. Yeah, if the commission has any other questions or comments, we don't think we need any new information. We could close the hearing. You have a motion to close the hearing and then have a deliberation after. So do I have a motion to close the public hearing for 117 Emily street. Yes, from me. I'll start with the second. Okay. All right, so all those are now we're going to do a roll call vote I think to close the hearing so I'll start with Becky. Yes. Okay. Madeline. Yes. Patty. Yes. And I vote yes. Okay. So I think the commission would close the meeting, the public hearing for 117 Amity street and open the commission up to discussion about the matter in front of us, which is a request for demolition permit for this garage. I'm just going to start quickly to say that last time and this time. I appreciate the fact that the historic district commission has approved it and I have no objection. I agree. I agree. I agree. Okay. Is there any other discussion or should we move ahead to the vote? In which case we will again need a motion we'll need a motion to issue a demolition permit for 117 Amity street for the garage. I'm happy to make that motion. Patty. One second. I second. Okay. So again, we'll go with a roll call vote. This is a vote to issue a demolition permit for 117 Amity street garage, Donald Fisher and Susan Haas. Madeline Homer. Yes. Any startup. Yes. Becky Lockwood. And I also vote yes. So that is a four to zero for permission or for issuance of the demolition permit for 117 Amity street. Thank you for coming to our meeting. Thank you. Thanks. Yeah, so we'll work through that. You can reach out to Jen or, you know, I'll try to get something going this week in the open gov permitting software. Great. Thank you. Thanks. Okay, so now I have to open the public hearing for 214 is separate. I open a separate separate public hearing correct. Right. Okay. So I'm at 647 I'm opening the public hearing for 214 comroy lane Amherst poor farm LLC request to demolish a large timber grain barn and replace with a new barn. There is a number of there are at the end of the year to make a presentation they can be admitted to the public hearing. Yeah, Ryan and Sabina. I will promote you to panelists. And whoever like to speak. Good evening. Good evening. Is Ryan here. Yes. Good. All right. I did. I can't see you. I'll make a quick presentation. We purchased this land in 2019. It's just next to where we grew up. And it was always a farm. And they were going to develop it into 14 homes. So we purchased it with the intent of returning it to its original purpose. At least since the 40s. And that is as a farm. And the barn it's, it's since we came on board it's been derelict if, if you, if you will. It's, it's, it's at a point where it's really quite unsafe for, for people to be in it. We've sealed it shut. And we are working now with right builders to seek a demolition and we have the plans for the, for the new barn, which is going to really be a production facility. In the same square footage and the same sort of. You call it the same footprint. And it's going to be the geothermal and solar and high efficiency, just to be sort of a standard for farms of the future. I hope to be, we're working with many graces flower farm and we've also got a forest management plan for the land that used to be also part of the farm but now is a forest. That's, I think the long and short of it I think we're just seeking the rights to demolish it simply because it's no use to a future farm that needs to use it for a completely different function than cattle and little chickens and so forth. Thank you. Did Ryan want to add anything. So being a good point, you know, we've actually we've looked at ways of trying to salvage any of the materials here. They're kind of beyond repair we expect that we may be able to use some of the siding and possibly some of the framing. But for the most part, you know the materials are beyond their use at this point, fortunately. We got a public comment this point Nader commission usually staff and then some commission discussion or question. I am. Yeah, I mean I put some aerial older aerial photographs in the packet. Just to show that I can share the screen in a second. You know so this was determined to be significant. For, you know, a few reasons, the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission a few years ago we asked them to look at outbuildings that could could have some history and so this was one of 100 that they identified, they didn't actually inventory at the point where they said, you know, so here's an 56 aerial photograph. I'm assuming this is the barn you know things have changed slightly but you know this was a, you know an active, you know, early to mid 20th century, 20 centuries farm in South Amherst. Here's a 1939 aerial photograph so whether or not it's the same structure but there was something here back in the 30s. So in terms of the significance, you know there's, you know this is it was an active farm for a long time. Here's existing conditions that were uploaded today there's some additional photographs thanks Ryan. And so just you know if we scroll through these quickly, you can see the condition of the structure is really deteriorated. And so a neighbor actually has written a letter that was sent today. Actually saying she's glad this will be removed and that a new barn will be going up in its place. I'm just in case the commission members hadn't seen that so you know I do think there's probably been years of neglect with this structure. And you know I in terms of history of the of the property I think that was mentioned a little bit that it was near the poor family from standard and poor. There was a farm there's not a lot of this property wasn't inventoryed so you know there's a lot of inventory forms throughout town but this property was never had a form be completed and they're what there's really not a lot of what I could find through a search of some special collections and other things photographs or you know a written narrative of the history or family here. You know just just some aerial photographs from the 20th century. You know and it's not visible to visible from the street. I was just going to share some interior photographs. And so here's, you can just see from the interior, the construction of it. It's kind of a hybrid. And the balloon framing and not even sure how structural some of the post and beams are but was it tobacco bond. Interesting thing I think at some point it might have been used for a little bit of tobacco, a minor amount. Yeah, because there are some hinge doors on the outside, or hinged boards. Right we thought maybe, you know, I would see some animals, maybe I hope it was a cattle farm, but it was really a gentleman's farm I think that's what I was trying to imply. This was a family that was based out of New Jersey and, you know, wanted to have a little farm, and they had a little farm. What sources did you consult for the background on their standard and for history that's really interesting. Well, when we were growing up, my father used to pause and say, you know the farm next door, the poor farm that's standard and poor, you know, we always knew it was in the 40s that they purchased it and purchase land from various neighbors. And it was sort of post depression period. So they grew the farm area a little bit. And yeah, that's what they did they had cattle and when we were growing up in the 60s and 70s it was still some some cattle. Right. Go ahead. I'm not sure that it was. No, okay. So do we go to public comment at this point. I guess if there's, unless there's any more questions or comments from the commission commission members have any questions or comments for the presenters. Okay, so in that case we will go to public comments is one attendee for another later agenda topic but I'm not sure there's any hands raised for this right now. So in that case, we can bring the public hearing to a close by motion do I have a motion to close the public hearing for this property. Oh, is that Becky. Okay. Okay, and do I have a second. I have a second. So the meeting for 214, I lame for request to demolish large timber grain barn. Open away with a vote sorry. So roll call vote. Becky Lockwood to close the public hearing. Yeah. Malin Homer. Yes. Patty startup. Yes. I also vote yes. So the public hearing is closed. And now we can move on to any commission discussion commissioners have comments for each other. Before we consider a vote to demolition permit. I just have a comment about, you know, when, when you hear that it's a poor farm. Those are particular kinds of structures in, in a generic sense of places that people live to, who were indigent, for example, or in rural communities so I just think when when this gets written up that it's very clear that we make it clear that it's a standard and poor farm, whatever that means that it was from the family of standard and poor. I'm trying to Google stuff while we're in deliberation, but I. There were two families. Okay. And one of them was the poor family and together they formed the company standard and poor, which to this day evaluates companies worthiness to be on the stock market. That's, that's the context in which I. Right. And when we, when we thought it was such a funny thing to name it the poor farm, we didn't realize there were indigent and handicapped people in the mid century that were put in places called poor farms and they were working for shelter. So it's not the best name. Yeah. It might change. Their biggest problem right now. Other people in town though do call it the poor farm, you know, I just think because the family right from where they can't you know it's just oh wow someone from standard and poor is an Amherst and so it's not right it's not like the community poor farm and so it's actually have, they still might have some remnants of foundation walls or other things. And now that you know they're becoming people recognize well we could interpret these sites and so it's not, it's not that. Right. So for example in the town of Asheville the poor farm is now part of the bullet reservation owned by the trustees of reservations. So they're very, very different things and I just think I want to make sure that the, you know that we're, you know, get the message out that we're not, we're not demolishing a community town owned. Because you say poor family. Yeah. Yeah, something like that. Yeah. Other comments. I had a question what is your with the timeline for the demolition of the farm. I see me as long as Ryan works with the permitting department. Okay, do that. Just like that within a month or I'm asking because I'm just curious about the commission has been working for a while on developing kind of a preservation plan around barns, not just preserving them but also documenting the conditions that are being taken down before they're taken down and I was curious what the timeline was. I spoke with barn assessment professional who suggested to me a particular type of computer program that can be used to assemble photographs and unfortunately I was looking through my notes so I couldn't find it but I just be wondering if there was going to be time enough for us to do any more photographs I think the ones that you've taken are great, but that were a possibility. I think Ryan can answer that I think this is our first and foremost concern is a 10 year old child getting in there. Yep. That makes sense. So our intent was to demolish it as soon as possible and be in preparation for permitting and and building a new barn in the spring. That's not to say someone couldn't go in and document further I mean we could take videos of it or something along those lines. We don't have a 3D imaging or scanning device per se but right add significant cost but so. Yeah, no this would be a geography or something like that would. I think I mean I think the photos that you have are great and I'd love to get just a little bit more information. I don't know. This is a question for Nate for later, whether it's whether it would be appropriate to assemble any research that we could just for the potential for and be formed but we can have that discussion maybe later in the process. Do commission members have any other comments or questions. So, I am, I do. I guess I, I think this sort of raises our recent Congress sort of issue that we've been discussing about kind of neglect and demolition by neglect and I just don't want. Just to kind of encourage the process of neglect in order to just justify demolition. And, yeah, I mean I think it sounds as though it was already derelict and in poor condition when the latest owners acquired the property so that makes it seem more justifiable to me. But I just, it would, it wouldn't sit as well if if I knew that it was just sort of allowed to to deteriorate over time. So that we could reach this conclusion. Yeah, I agree. I agree, Madeleine. It's a slippery slope. I agree the slippery slope, however, it's not a slippery slope in this particular case. Yeah, I think the condition of it is pretty clear that it's probably taken a pretty long time for it to get in that condition. And it's also not, it's not unusual and we don't have any sort of affirmative maintenance bylaw so that the reality is that these buildings that are hard to maintain and this one has reached the point maybe reached the point of, of its lifespan so. Yeah, so I think, yeah, so just quickly if the commission, you know, were to vote for a demolition permit we could have a condition that we get out there to take more photographs or something. You know, there is a Ryan in the in the application there was a floor plan that was submitted. And is that an accurate of the existing bar in the footprint. So it's kind of a Yeah, it's accurate to the extent that we had a or to being a had a an engineer out of get a survey of corners. Yeah. Yeah, so you know I don't know if that's if we think the commission thinks that's necessary to get any more photographs like you know one from each side or if we think there's enough digital documentation now. I could, you know, you could for instance you always say issue the demolition permit with a condition that there be, you know, additional photographs or something taken before demolition. Yes, Becky. I think that's fine but I would not want to hold up the demolition, because it really to me looks like that needs to happen with safety. The information we've been given is pretty thorough. But if we need to get out there now we should do it within the next week or so before we start the demolition. I don't want you to hold it up. That's something that the commissioners would be expected to do or staff and commissioner go. I can share the image again I mean I do feel like we have photographs of the exterior from all sides. And then, you know, interior photographs so I you know you typically would ask you know at least from, you know, say the four sides or four corners or however it works. And we have that so I, you know, I just suggested that so, as opposed to sometimes we would say well we're going to issue a delay to get more documentation. And this instance we wouldn't necessarily issue a delay we'd actually, you know, allow for the demolition, but with a condition that you know, before the work is done we want, we'd like some more photographs I, I just suggested that I'm not saying that that's the case I just, you know, I was not providing that as a, as a possible solution so I don't know if it's necessary either. Yeah, I would say I don't know that it's necessary either and I don't know if any of us are in a position to get out there and do it in a professional enough manner to that would be better than what's already been submitted so. I mean, Daniel, it may be worth showing the floor plan with the photos, a key plan with the photos on it. If you wanted to share that you could see where we've taken photos from and so maybe that'll give you a better idea of the extent. Yeah, is that is that visible again the. Yeah, I think the. There was a photo key. Right and so here's, you know, a nice. Great. Right. So that does indicate every. But in my opinion that's more than sufficient that's really excellent. I agree. Yeah, I agree. All right. Okay, so do commissioners have any more questions or comments. Just someone want to forward a motion to issue a demolition permit for the timber frame berm 214 Fomaroy Lane. I motion. Do you have a second. Yeah, exactly. Okay, so we'll have a roll call vote. This is a vote to issue a demolition permit for 214 Fomaroy Lane, the demolition of a large timber frame barn. So we'll start up. Yes. Becky Lockwood. Yeah. Madeleine Helmer. Yes. And Robin part of my vote. Yes, as well. So the motion has passed. And I'm assuming Nate will be in touch or the town will be in touch with. Further information and we really appreciate you coming here and sharing this with us. And we'll give a good evening. Thank you. Thank you. So next on the agenda are announcements of which. I have none. Anyone have announcement for the. Mission. No. Hearing none. Item two presentation discussion of updated plans for the North common. I will turn over to Nate. I was just going to just. I know the person in attendance was here for 261 Everett road. So I don't mind if we. Flip flop agenda item just to have that person. So that's a item four. So we want to move item four up. Right. Yeah. So item three, just quickly, the North Amherst fire station, the staff. That had planned to be here is out unexpectedly. So that, you know, they had planned to move that discussion until, until the next meeting. So they had planned to show images with different colors or material for where the red had been planned. And that, you know, obviously isn't available tonight. So. Okay. So. Item four discussion of with the owner of 200 and. To 60 Levitt road about possible changes to their property. So. Thank you. Want to bring the owner into the panel discussion. Yeah, Kevin. I thought I. Yep. Invited you to become a panelist. With these connecting to audio. So all Kevin's connecting in the packet. I did submit. I did. I did submit. I did submit. I did submit. The street view of two 60 Levitt road. And then the inventory form for the property. And those can be available to share. And then I also have, you know, just the Google maps. Is up. We'll be up shortly. And so some background on this property is about a 12 acre. It was 12 acres. And there was a, the previous owner. I've done a lot of landscaping and gardening on this. And Kevin recently purchased it. And I'm not sure if you, if you were, if you drove by, or if you looked online, some of the landscaping and some of the, you know, what's happened on the property is, you know, from the previous owner. Because Kevin's not quite connected yet. Well, Kevin's trying to connect twice now. Let's see. Oh. We have him now. Kevin, can you hear us? We cannot hear you yet. Oops. Oh, I see. Do you have any suggestions, Nate? Yeah, I mean, Kevin, I guess you could call in. And then have your computer muted. So sometimes if you call in or on both it, there's an echo. Sometimes it's, if it's over a Wi-Fi, you know, if there's trying to connect over a Wi-Fi or something on a computer can be slower than just calling it on a phone, but. Oh yeah, the call in is on the agenda. That number. If he needs the number. And maybe we could try to pull up on that. Yeah. If you want to review the images while we're. I think. Let's see. Kevin, are you, it looks like you're connected, but. It's like the town's GIS is not working right now. Can you message him the phone number? Or I can't. Yeah, I can pull that. Yeah, the phone number is four or. 312. 626. 6, 7, 9, 9. And then there's a webinar ID you need to enter. Which is 817. 2527. 2684. And, you know, I had an emailed. I think it might be in your email too, as well. If that's available. So just as a, you know, kind of a. Introduction. So. Kevin's, I think recently purchased the property and. You know, has some ideas about whether or not. To modify the house or structures on the property. And so I said, you know, it'd be good to have a conversation with the commission before. Formally applying for any permits or anything. And so this is really just an introductory discussion. And, you know, just to. Right. Talk about what. We know it could be his ideas for the property. So. So. Did everybody get a chance to look at the inventory form? Yep. Pretty interesting. Yeah. I've been working on. Completing. Inventory forms. I'm working at the. Paranger Valley planning commission right now. And it's really making me. Allowing me to appreciate buildings like this. Because so many of them have been sited over and lost. So. I think that's a good point. I mean, isn't it the case that. Amos doesn't have very many Greek revival houses of this scale. And. Right. That's what this inventory or form says. Can we go on to the next item and come back? And is that a possibility? I think Kevin's joined us by phone. Okay. Sure. Kevin, you should be able to speak now. Can I do that? Talking's permitted. Why is that still. I don't make sense. You get back to Kevin. Yeah. Yeah. So I just want to say Kevin, I mute the phone. It's star six. You have to hit star six on your phone. How about now? Great. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I think Nathan. Nathan sent that up pretty well. An old farmhouse that we bought about five years ago. We've been living overseas. And just paying someone to maintain the grass and keep the property up. And what we'd like to do is quite honestly demolish the farmhouse. And build a new one. And I was advised to seek your guidance and your advice on. How to build a new farmhouse. I think that would be great. Thank you. Thanks, Kevin. I think if you mute your phone, unless you wanted to add more, we can open up discussion with the commission members. Kevin, you're on the computer too. I think if you. If you. Turn off your computer, then we can just have you on the phone and then that might work without having an echo. Kevin. I think we lost him on the phone. I think we did as well. In terms of agenda items, if we're. You know, let's see, we don't really have, and some of them are just. A little bit more in depth, the one we skipped. I don't want to want to start it. And then. We want to have a small discussion right now about. Just generally what I know that Kevin may or may not be able to talk about it. I think that's a good idea for us. But. Amongst the commission members. Thoughts on this particular property. And then I know I certainly have. Some thoughts. Does it seem like a good idea? Or should we. Try to. Be when we can have him. Participating. Yeah. I mean, I said Kevin was here for the discussion. Yeah. So maybe we could move. I mean, Kevin. I guess we can move on and wait till he calls back again. Okay. So did we want to go to agenda item two? Or did we want to. Maybe go to CPA recommendations. So that's a shorter discussion. Kevin looks like you're back. Oh, there we go. If you start six. Again. Kevin, I'm back. Nice. We're just going to have a discussion with the commission members. And you right now. Property. That's all right. That's great. Okay. I'm going to. I guess I'm going to start the discussion by. Reviewing. If this. If the owner. If the owner would like to demolish this particular building. For our new demolition delay review process. Town and or the town in. Coordination with the commission would determine whether it was the significant structure. So that would be the first step. Correct. Now that we're in our new, new phase of. Demolition delay. And then. Again, just reminding the commissioners and. The. Well, I won't say applicant, but. The owner that. A determination of significance does not mean. That a demolition delay is automatically put in place. Just. That would be the step that brings it to us. For review by the commission. And it is from the inventory form in my opinion, it is a particularly. As I was saying before, it's particularly well preserved in terms of its historic character. So that would be my first basic comment. I would want to have a pretty. In-depth discussion about this property. And in consideration of demolition. Is there anybody else want to add comments? Okay. Yeah, I was just like, I guess. We don't know a lot about this. And the data is pretty late. But I would like to find out like what. Why it's being demolished. Is it in that shape? Is it just. A crackling to build a different house. So I'm not sure. You know, I just didn't really bad shape. Like the barn was. That's a different story than just always, you know. One. I feel like we need more information. Okay. No, I agree. I mean, I intend to submit the full application. I'm trying to get your guidance of. What would be when we call it a significant historical structure. What is the criteria to designate it as that. And is it the building itself, the house has been added on to. Multiple times it's been renovated and. And restored multiple times. So there's very little left outside of the. Exterior front facade that is original. So I'm trying to figure what, what is the, what would make it significant historical structure? I guess. I think that the. The fact that the exterior looks like it's, it's pretty intact. And the exteriors are generally what we lean towards when reviewing structures, because they're part of the public view. There's a lot of historic character and a lot of historic integrity. At least I'm looking at the form B form right now. I think that that way is pretty heavily on the side of it being, being historically significant. If it's interior was intact as well. That it, that's not as much of a, as much of a consideration for the commission, but certainly, I think we all as preservationists, you know, would lean more heavily in favor of. Trying to prefer preserve something that's particularly well preserved in the interior and the exterior. So our. That gives you a little bit of a sense, but just because the interior doesn't match what it was historically, the exterior is pretty heavily weighted. And is it the original farmhouse or the additions that have been added on over time? Is that part of the consideration as well? The additions that have been added on over time. Their context would depend on when they were added. Sometimes historic additions can become historically significant. Probably the best example is that a lot of houses were transitioned from gale roofs and demands for groups. That would be the sort of thing where it was a change to the building. But the additions may or may not factor into the significant portion of the building, depending on when they were completed and what style. Also, Kevin. Look into the. Sorry. If you look, I'm looking at the second to last photograph of the house. So far that the front of the house and the side elevation with the tree. It doesn't look like there's been any real alteration to the original 1830 house. And what has been added is actually very typical of northern New England. Rural dwellings like this and. The fact that this is documented as owned by a minister farmer is really fascinating. So it's your, your building is significant, not just for its original front facade facing the public view as Robin was saying, but it's also significant historically. That's what's contributed to its value over time. In a kind of non-monetary sense. Also, it seems to have got, you know, much of its land with it. And, you know, I don't, it sounds like there was someone before who was landscaping and on the property quite extensively. So, you know, I would be very interested to know, you know, how you might handle the land as much as the, the building in terms of what can be seen from, from let's see, I'm trying to orientate myself here from Leverett Road. I think I sort of know where the house is. I've driven that road before it's an extremely beautiful road. That you are on. You are on, you know, and so, you know, what happens there is, is, is important because of how good the house looks from, from the front. And it's obviously been taken care of. I think there was another photograph in the packet that we were sent that, you know, shows it's been painted, maybe not the same colors as in the original inventory. Form, but, you know, I think that that's also, you know, it tells you something about the stewardship of this property over time. It's a very old house for Amherst actually, it's not the oldest, but 1830 is, you know, it's not original to the town history, but it's, it's early. And this particular style of architecture is not, it's not like, there's not millions of examples as there might be in other parts of New England. So I think I'll leave it at that. Yeah, that's it. That's a good point. Another another factor that we weigh is, you know, sort of the relative rarity of something that, you know, if it was lost, it was, you know, it would be one of, you know, one of the few examples. Just to continue on in the process, if it's the, if you were to apply for demolition permit and the commission, the commission's power is the option to impose a 12 months demolition delay. So that's the full extent of our power. It doesn't prevent the demolition of the house at the end of that time period. What our intention is, is the commission is to, if we feel that the significance warrants a demolition delay and we issue a demolition delay, it's to allow time for an alternative solution for the possible preservation of the house. So that just gives you an idea of our, of our intent and the ultimate process. So I don't know if that's, if that's helpful. Well, it's very helpful. No, it is. We looked at one option, which would be to keep the original farmhouse before the additions are made on, add it on to remove the additions and then add a new, more modern addition. But to do that would mean again, gutting the old farmhouse to integrate it with the new addition. And the additional cost would be north of $200,000 and we just can't afford it. Right now the, there, there are problems with the, the, the most of it's out of code, of course, but the stairs are very steep. There is no bathroom up where the bedrooms are. So I can't have my parents stay here that it's very cold. It's hard to sustain it. So we run the heat almost constantly, which bothers me because I'd like to go much more environmentally sound here. And it's just very hard with these old buildings to do that. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Madeline or Becky, do you have any other comments? I think you covered it. You and he so far. Kevin, do you have any other questions for us? No. So the additions could be considered part of the historical. Structure as well. Am I clear there? Yeah, I mean, without, without further state, without further information, you know, when the house was inventoried it, you know, it didn't, it was inventoried in 1988. And it, you know, it considered the whole, you know, the structure at the time. It didn't reference that there was a more modern addition that wasn't, you know, integral to the house. So it would take some research to determine when those were built. You know, one thing too, the commission has the ability to ask what's happening in its place. And so I know there is some acreage on the property. You know, it was there ever a consideration of leaving the house and building a new one and not demolishing it. Or, you know, oftentimes we ask the owners if they could, you know, right, we're not concerned as much with the interior as we are with the exterior. Sometimes the assemblage of buildings, right, the massing of the house with the barn is really important in terms of its view from the street and how, you know, how those buildings were developed at the time and, and used. And so, you know, although you said you've looked at it, you know, if we were to the commission were to issue a delay, we'd want, you know, we'd ask for your assistance to, you know, we might have an architect go look at it as well or have someone take a look at the property to say, okay, could there be chances to salvage pieces or how could it be reused? There is CPA funding available, Community Preservation Act funding, which can be granted to private owners to preserve and restore historic buildings. And, you know, they're for different reasons. And one could be that the, the view from the street that this property, the barn in the house, just the view shed is important enough that CPA funds could be used to preserve it. And so, you know, when Robin said that there was a delay enacted, then, you know, the commission and staff tries to determine, as she said, alternative. So is there funding sources available? Are there reasons why the owner, you know, wants to take it down? Or could there be other reasons to try to save it or incorporate it into a new design or use? And so, you know, that's what the delay would be for. And, you know, so the more you provide at the time of application, the better. So if you're, you know, the commission could say, well, for instance, you know, what if you were putting in another, a building, but it modeled that pretty similar in terms of style and massing, you know, that could be, that could help. So the commission can ask for that information while deciding whether it should be granted delay. And so, you know, if they don't have enough information, they, you know, the hearings can be continued until they feel like there's enough information to make a decision. No, I understood it was actually helpful listening to you go through the process with the other people applying for permits to see how a good application should be put together. It was helpful. And I will submit the application probably this week, hopefully with a lot of photos and an architect or actually any of the board are more than welcome to come by any time and take a look at the place as for the rest of the property, I think was asked earlier, my intent is to farm. I retired after 40 years in the Navy and I want to be a farmer and I'm currently a 60 year old freshman at Stockbridge School, learning about sustainable agriculture. That's fantastic. So that is my goal is to be a farmer and hopefully we get some credit because when we bought this place, it was being split up into six buildable lots. And we emptied the bank to buy the whole property because it's been a farm and it should stay as a farm. And that's certainly our intent. So while I get it, it's hard to let go of an old farmhouse that is appealing and it does look pretty from the street. I understand that the whole property is being preserved and how it was originally intended to be. The other point I'd make is we intend to use the same footprint and use a post and beam building habitat building that I think will fit the neighborhood pretty well. We've seen a lot of new buildings, new houses on the street and they all seem to respect the old look and we like that as well. All right. Thank you for that. I just wanted to add that as a 55 year old who just got a degree, I commend you on your new journey. Well done. Well done. No, it's been interesting being the. The gray hair in the classroom with the kids, but. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's a long shot, but that's also a possibility. And I just wanted to add that as a 55 year old who just got a degree. I commend you on your new journey. Well done. Well done. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the classroom with the kids, but. Yeah. I managed to keep up most days. All right. Well, if nobody has any other comments or questions, I would just really like to thank you for coming and discussing your property with us. And. Oh, I just wanted to mention one more thing. Nate, we still generally do site visits when we have a demolition. So I think it would be great if the commissioners could arrange to come out and take a look in person, which I think would be helpful too. So I think it would be great. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure we'd love it. So thank you very much. And we will, I guess be talking to you soon. Thank you. I'll be in touch, but I'll start working on the application. Yeah. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. So agenda item two, the Nate presenting and discussing on the updated plans for the North common. Sure. So the. Oh, sorry, wrong. I'm just, I'm getting it pulled up. So for the commission members or some new ones, but I, you know, I don't want to say how long, but it's been many years that the town's been working on. You know, it's called the North common, but really it's the town common outside town hall. So for the commission members and the people out there. I mean, I mean, the town is actually on the main street and spring street. Uh, we received funding a few, I guess it's private a year ago. Um, and we've applied for CPA funding. In the last, you know, five or six years to build up a budget to renovate that area. So the, you know, parking lot outside of main street down to the spring street parking lot. And, Um, the commission had looked at. Plans. I know I had looked at some and the concept hasn't changed much we what I'll show you in a second is you know probably like 95% complete plans and so you know the overall concept was eliminate the parking lot outside town hall put a plaza in and then you know most of it's just landscaping walkways and seating so there's really no vertical elements there's no structures being proposed. It's just taken a while to get plans to a point where we feel like they can be shown again, where we know, you know, the grading better and some materials and so what's, if this I was going to zoom in one more time maybe it's a really large plan so it takes a quick reload. So quickly this is north is up so here's main street here's town hall in the white. And the idea is to, you know, from the edge of the building rework the sidewalk. Another a new crosswalk across main street, and then have both would be one way south. And have this be a plaza area for your cars can drive on it, but then when there's events to have you know a gathering space, having where the parking lot is now to have this lawn area. With some terrorist seating that are about you know a foot tall and then have a moral on area up here have wide sidewalks along the front. I will say that between you know one side here south pleasant street to town hall there's like five or six feet of grade change and from main street to spring street there's 10 to 12 feet of grade change and so what what the plan really is is to only is to cut down trees existing trees so there was one Norway maple the merry maple and one other tree but most of the existing trees will remain and so we're really not trying to do much grading where there's already green space and so you know we've incorporated diagonal walkways that are accessible and so there's a lot of steps within these walkways their wheelchair accessible they're fully ADA. It does present some challenges with grading and you know the desire lines we're trying to match as best we can. You know one of the goals was to try to activate this space and so you know right now when during coven we put picnic tables out the town did in this space they're they're used a lot and so we realize that this can be. An active space and so what you're seeing here and I guess it's brown our benches, we have a central Plaza that could have up to 30 tables and chairs we have the WCTU fountain that will now have a little Plaza area and seating. We have some crescent shapes off the walkways. There's a lot of seating around the perimeter a bike share station. And then, you know we're using rain gardens underneath some of the tree areas and seating areas to try to help direct traffic and just to provide water so there is an engineering solution right now there's a lot of run off. You know a lot of the green space adding more green space will help but there will be, you know some cash basins and some, some ability to try to prevent any any existing run off. And, you know the space hasn't we're not necessarily programming it you know I said there could be events we're hoping that, you know the wedding of the merry maple will continue that you know if we're having flag raising events that we can gather there's the flagpole here is another flagpole here sort of maintaining two flag poles. You know we but you know if if an extension of the farmers market or some event wants to use the Plaza or the sidewalks or the green space that could happen and so we're really thinking about opportunities here to use this and activate the space. We are. And we will have interpretive signs the hope is for the fountain and maybe one or two explaining as part of the grant funding. You know, heat island effect and the use of increasing urban tree canopy and what that does to the space them, you know the micro climate here. The circles are those trees. These circles here. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so these are all existing. If you remove the merry maple is here where the seating Plaza is. And there's maybe one other tree. I don't know if there's an worry maple here here that would be removed, but otherwise these are these are just showing existing. The ones that are, you know, say up here that are smaller and different colors those are new. I think we're going to try to plant one, you know, maybe one or two more shade trees. But yeah, most of these are trying to maintain the existing. So this is, you know, this, I think it's probably easier to read than the actual plan. I can scroll down a little bit. We're adding a sidewalk to this east side. So the boat would being one way where there's proposed to be parallel parking here, and then sidewalks on both sides. Just, you know, so someone can get out of power and not walk on the grass. We're not changing the sidewalk on spring street. And now we have a you know the walkway comes in here with another seating area. So the sidewalk ends, you know, there's already this diagonal pathway, which are, you know, maintaining, maybe in a little different location. And now, you know, one option is to have, which may happen at the time of construction or after having some stepping stones here if there's a desire line to cut this, this, you know, this path here so there is a curb here. So this is a pretty steep grade change to make this level with this walkway and then, you know, there's a few feet of drop off here with ground cover. So we know people may want to just cut the corner not walk up or around. So we have, you know, the idea that we could have some there, but we don't want to form a walkways within the root zone of the tree. You know, I think that's it for now. I can go to the other plan, just to show quickly, you know, more detail, you know what, you know, where it is now. You know, that's the rendering was taking this and actually making it a little bit more legible but we have, you know, we have worked it out in terms of grading accessibility. So for the materials we're doing a lot of granite walls and curbing that you would see. You know, these are granite walls sitting sitting granite blocks sometimes we're sitting. You know concrete sidewalks on the exterior asphalt, maybe in the interior and then where these plazas are could be stamped material it could be or stamp concrete. And, you know, a different variety of plantings and then the plaza here would be what is the new material for crosswalks on Mass Ave. And so it's a, it's a tactile surface that's I don't want to say it's embedded in but it's laminated on top of concrete or asphalt and so it's both for vehicles and for pedestrians. So there's you know we're trying to simplify material pallets. And most of this will be on the ground plan anyway so it's not highly visible but what will be visible will be, you know, granite walls and seating walls. And you know there's granite six inch orange granite curbing along parts of the walkway. What specific feedback are you looking for from the commission. So this was basically a return of the space to its historical use right before it was turned into a park and a lot it was a comment. That's correct. Right I mean it's been right or it's you know in the 20th century at you know the parking lot has changed over time. It's a pretty big step to say we're removing the parking up here. And so you know I think the feedback was just if there was any, any particular comments about, you know materials or, you know, the fountain is being moved with, you know having some seating around it. You know I think when we brought this originally we hadn't had this level of detail and so we're bringing it back to the disability access advisory committee saw it yesterday. And the board will see it again and so it's just a, you know, really an update. And if there's any, any other comments or questions. You know the goal is to try to get this ready for bidding, you know the next, you know this winter so construction can start in the spring or summer. Any comments. I'm very excited about this plan and this project. Yeah, I think it's, it's kind of fun how the curve of the plaza area sort of mimics the curve of the town hall at the corner there and just, I'm just trying to think about how views of town hall will incorporate this, the new design. Yeah, that's interesting you mentioned that we in the run range you had consultants, you know a few years ago they, you know, had, you know, showed an image looking this way with town hall and so you know, and some of the designs that two flag pools were right here, and the decision was to move them. So they're actually not blocking town hall so if someone this is actually also this corner is one of the, you know one of the the highest points in town and really visible so we're trying to keep this corner open just so this, this, this lawn and plaza area and there's still a view to town hall from, from the streets and so it does become a well, you know welcoming view if you're coming into town. I think my other question was just who will be maintaining that these power beds in the sort of Northwest corner. Pretty extensive. Yeah. You know we've, you know with them. Yeah it's a really good question I think the town obviously will and maybe that you know if there's a friends group or you know there's anyone else the bid might, you know, offer some assistance we might ask them to so you know right right now it's, it's, you know would be public works and so with the addition of the Kendrick Park playground and then you know we we've renovated graph park two and a few years ago. We've realized that the right upkeep and maintenance is as important as the, you know, a new design and construction and so I think that's become people are more aware of that so in terms of budgeting and future capital funding or you know, ongoing funding I think that's becoming more, you know, a little bit at least a little more on the, oh, you know, more awareness there so I don't I don't have the exact exact answer but I know that right I think the maintenance is a big one and so. It's just so prominent yeah. You know the Commission couldn't volunteer enough. I know, you know the town does a great job you know before COVID UMass had the service day in the fall and so we would often use the public works would often use, you know, 20 to 30 or more members of UMass to help say clean up West Cemetery or a cemetery or a park and so that's something that I love to happen again and have this become you know could maybe there's an annual cleanup with the community. That's not the same as weekly maintenance but, you know, it'd be great to have, you know, a few different sources of help. Yeah I think activating the space is just great for the whole downtown I mean for the, just the health of these of the historic buildings surrounding it as well and just maintaining a thriving economy. Thank you. I just wanted to say I love that. Well, I'm excited about it, too. But I love the design of it. I love the things that are put there that will preserve. But what I really like is the whole concept of removing that ugly old parking lot and giving the town back. The common part of the common which originally way back in the day it was something that everybody shared with their cows and you know whatever else. So, we're getting it back. I mean, is that the historical view behind you? Yes, that is of you. Someone asked me what year that's from I haven't looked it up to know, but okay, yeah. Yeah, the, yeah, the, yeah, the removing the parking is really interesting we had a parking consultant a few years ago and they said you know you always want parking central, you know, it's visible. But then they even said, Well, wow, you know when you come into downtown Amherst in front of your historic town hall there's an ugly parking lot. I'm not sure that's the best location for it and it was interesting that a, you know, a parking consultant said that, right. They say not only is it parking, you know you want it visible but you will sometimes you also don't want it to detract from what people are coming to see or you know what the attractions are so. It's a big decision though to remove it. Okay, any other comments? Okay, thanks, Nate. Yeah, so I think just quickly the process will be you know we have to send this to the state for the grant program they wanted us to have review the final plans and then mass historic this is a landscape and a National District and so they, they looked at the preliminary design they didn't have any comments that this would you know they thought it was nice to but we'll send them these plans as well. You know I think sometimes they're concerned that someone will put in a structure or, you know, really change the the landscape or space and so when we apply for the grant we submitted a product notification form and they didn't have any any issues at that time so I'm not envisioning they would now either. Thank you. Okay, agenda item five is a review of CPA recommendations. Take away Nate. Yeah so I don't yeah I don't have anything pulled up, you know the CPA committee has, you know they're trying to fund everything. Right so they're trying to figure out a way to support all the projects, not at the, not at you know the full budget. I think I think I can give a quick recap. The South church was was recommended at the full amount so this and just to remind everybody the CPA committee reviews all the applications and votes on a recommended slate so they can vote projects down. They can send them on and then but they're the slate is just a recommendation it's a recommendation that goes before, I think review before the finance committee, and then has to be approved by town council so CPA does its part in moving projects forward, anything that the CPA decides not to not to approve the town council cannot act against that. And the slate go forward so the big projects were, let's see the South church was recommended for the fall amount. Maybelline is Todd painting conservation was recommended at the full amount. The barn and outbuilding preservation program was recommended at a lower amount of $10,000, which felt like was a pretty good start for what pretty much a pilot project. The, the, the Wildwood cemetery project, I believe the applicant reduced their ask to, I think it was 97,000 and that was recommended. And the North church was. I have a question about that that that followed over into the CPA committee, and it was tabled for further feedback from the applicant and the town will hopefully be working with the applicant to help get a better, better project for the funds needed to address the most immediate issues and, and preservation restrictions were taken off the slate. And then funds removed into each of the recommended historic preservation projects to cover the cost of a preservation restriction so that was that was something new. Each project I think got an additional $5,000 to be used for the legal fees that are required for the preservation restrictions. Yeah, which is really nice so I think you know, it's a, you know, a soft cost of projects but you know usually we want documentation of the building historic narrative, sometimes elevational drawings and, you know, in the past. There's no fun, the funding isn't requested for that so usually it comes on either the town's expense or the applicant somehow needs to figure out how to do that so it's it's nice to fold that into a project at the beginning. I do think you know Robert and I talked the other day the North church, where the Korean, is it Korean Zion. Yeah, North Amherst they the CPA committee has put money in reserve with the hope that in the next month or two there's a better estimate for what needs to happen to that structure and so staff is hoping to reach out to them and get something. We've had some internal conversations about trying to, you know, do that in the next few weeks. I know we've had. You know, it's interesting, because the CPA committee is somewhat reluctant to provide due diligence funding for a project safe for instance to hire an architecture engineer without knowing that the, there's actual preservation work happening but in this case we really do need to know, you know, what's the priority for that structure. And I know the permission and mentioned that so the CPA committee. We're still trying to keep some money available for that if it can be worked out. Yeah, and I think what we ended up doing was folding back. Basically, the amount for their roof ask was, I think around $154,000 and that's the money that we put in reserve so there's still CPA funds that can cover a repair and we're hoping, hoping that it would be less than that that's kind of the idea to get more estimates for the work that actually needs to be done and get a better perspective of additional additional work that might need to come before the CPA in the future. So the funds were retained to make sure that that project wouldn't be left out and the committee can be reconvened to review the project again. Before, I don't know before what like the beginning of June I guess. So that is, does anybody have any questions about the CPA recommendations. Comments. Okay. So agenda item number six is discussion of policy for historic preservation restrictions. Yeah, we talked about this as a committee before a commission before. How, what kind of a policy do we want in terms of the size of the project, the length of the preservation, the work for staff to cover the restrictions and the funding for it so that's kind of what this agenda item is about. Yeah, I think we can, you know, have a more in depth conversation in the next few months, you know, Ben had researched this a little bit so the CPA language says that you know you can, you are required to get a CPA restriction a historic preservation restriction when CPA funds are used to acquire an interest in property. And so typically that has been interpreted to me when you actually purchase a property for historic preservation now when you rehabilitate it. And so in the past, we've said that no matter the amount of funding or type of project even a $20,000 preservation project requires a permanent preservation restriction. And a permanent restriction needs to be approved by the Massachusetts Historical Commission and follow their guidelines and standards and that is a timely and costly endeavor sometimes and so you know North Hampton for instance. They often don't require a preservation restriction, you know, it's a certain dollar amount or certain kind of project. You know the town attorney's recommended, you know a dollar threshold or some other kind of thresholds, you know, below which could be a 30 year or 15 year above which could be a permanent restriction. And, you know, I think it's something that's worthwhile to consider because the CPA committee has asked a little bit. And I think it'd be great to have the commission kind of be on the forefront of that discussion and then, you know, recommend something to the CPA committee in town. You know, for instance, when properties acquired with CPA funding for open space, it's really easy to put a conservation restriction on it, you know, the town's purchased it outright there's nonprofits that hold these restrictions like the Kestrel Land Trust. And that system has been established long enough that it works easily. In terms of historic preservation restrictions, you know, we don't necessarily have an agency that monitors them. You know, there isn't the Historical Society isn't an agency that monitors them we don't have a you know antiquity society or something that's too local. And so it's always been a, you know, an issue with historic preservation about, you know, even if there is a restriction is it if it's in perpetuity we need to have Massachusetts Historical Commission approve it and then it gets filed and it's an encumbrance on the property and there's not a lot of monitoring or maintenance of it. And so, you know, I think it's something that commission can talk about. You know, for instance, I think a 30 year restriction is one where some of these institutions or properties that are requesting funding. You know, probably within 30 years they would probably ask for CPA funding again. And so then another 30 years is just rolled on to it and so in essence it becomes a permanent restriction because, you know, if they, you know, in year 25 or year 20 they want CPA money for a preservation project. Essentially we can keep rolling out you know extending the deadline of the restriction in the sense so that there is something in place. And my question was around around the concept of of monitoring. So the purpose of having a preservation restriction is to assure that that both their eyes on the property and also that the owners are sort of instructed and how to be good stewards for their building so there might be changes that someone would undertake I think I gave the example of a monitor or a restricted property, not knowing that they couldn't replace their windows which is a pretty common upgrade and a lot of a lot of people don't realize the importance of historic windows to the integrity of a building. So, when I was doing my graduate work up in Vermont, the preservation restrictions that they have up there are usually that a lot of them are helped by the preservation trust of Vermont. And they have a yearly monitoring program where they go and they check on the property and they make sure that you know that they coordinate with the owners and make sure that they understand what needs to be done or not be done. Over the course of time so I would want to make sure that we have some sort of monitoring in place because I just don't see the point of a preservation restriction that has nobody checking on it, and it really should be done on a yearly basis and I like I said before I mean I like to sell it more as engagement with the owners as opposed to like, you know, monitoring monitoring sounds a little or enforcement sounds a little bit more negative, but to just engage with property owners on how to maintain the building and once this changes are permissible or not in the hood of contact with it questions. And so for the commission I know previously I think, you know, even a $500,000 I think there was a $500,000 kind of threshold maybe over which could have been permanent under which maybe was a staggered term. And so those are things that we'd like to discuss, and then present to the town. You know it's interesting for instance with the South, South church, we're preserving a steeple for a fair amount of money. But it's a small piece of the architecture of the building but it is, you know, important for the character of the structure and so, you know, some people might say that needs to be a permanent restriction some might not and so I think we have some past projects we could do as, you know, as examples of, you know, would that would we want that to be permanent or say 30 years or something and then that could help guide the policy as well. So should we, should we develop some sort of, you know, proposed to the commission to develop a proposed structure do you want to propose something to us, like with examples like that that we could kind of give a give us a framework for future discussion. I think I know Ben and I had started something and I can try to resurrect that and then you know provide some more information for the next meeting. Okay, I think it would be good timing so you know the CPA recommendations that are moving forward now would be voted on in the spring, and then funding available in July so we could have something in place for those for the newer proposals. And if not at least from moving forward or you know I don't know we could we could say it's applied retroactively as well but it'd be nice to have some, some guidance. Okay. Does anyone else have any comments or questions. Okay. Next up is old business national register nominations. Yeah, I put that on there I just you know sometimes you have old business on an agenda and it, we can it be a quick update I was going to add one other thing there, just so we don't forget about it I, I, you know talk to Shannon. It seems like mass historic or National Park Service really does want. I think it could be really new forms. You know in the process of getting these districts and Amherst expanded or new district nominated it just taken a while so we do have $25,000 available of CPA funding, which I think could be used for this and so I think maybe I'd want you know it could happen if not tonight to you in the last meeting we could say you know we could actually have an agenda item and the commission could vote the use of those funds for those nominations I think it was kind of agree to last meeting but just to formally to do that and then we can you know how try to get pvpc under contract. The, you know, I think mass historic really won't move it forward without without that. So, so this summer, I, I did a project this summer working for the virtual regional planning commission on all of their first missions and understanding the role of historic mission so it was very enlightening for me. And so I just want to give like a quick overview of how I think I came to understand a town's inventory and national register nominations. And then I can ask you Nate, what we're specifically thinking about bumping up for the national register level, but in my analysis in Berkshire County. One of the questions that my boss had me answer was what was the status of the town's inventory. So was it up to date was was it insufficient, and we didn't really have a good metric for it and over the course of the few weeks. I figured out a way to kind of categorize things. And basically, what happened in terms of getting things into an inventory that's our form B forms those are those are things that are not on the national register they're just background information. And then they have to meet certain guidelines. There was a big push of them and in my report I used charts for each of the towns, so that you can see how many forms were filed when. And then you see is this curve of like 1970 to 1980, and then down to like 2000 and then depending on the town you might have a curve up again in the early 2000s or the 2010s, but an inventory that was insufficient and out of date and then there are two things so you don't have to know what the form is, and if your forms are out of date. So the form that we saw today for the Levitt Road property that would be considered an out of date form. The forms that are submitted today have much more, much more architectural detail and architectural narrative and much more historical narrative. What I don't know is what the status of Amherst inventory is, and then I also don't know what. Once you've got a good, my understanding from this project was that masses sort of won't consider working on a national register nomination for you until your inventory is up to date. So that means cleaning up all or a good section of items that need to move from a 1988 sheet to a 2023 sheet, and then deciding which properties move to the national register level. Do you know the status of our inventory in that regard and what this money would be, we'd be giving to PVP or we'd be contracting with PVPC to do work on the inventory or is it just for national register nominations? I think it's both. And so Amherst has in the late 80s and then the 90s there's like 800 properties were inventoried and those forms are, you know, as we would say out of date and then there's been subsequent inventory forms completed. And so what we've, you know, the three projects of three areas were an expansion of the East Village, a new depot district, and or an expansion of the Dickinson district and those were filed with Mass Historic, they had site visits. Essentially they were completed on our end, they were then forwarded to the National Park Service. I think the National Park Service has said, well, my understanding is just that within those districts themselves the inventory forms are out of date. And I would like, you know, just say those specific properties, but you know, that could be 120, 150 properties need to have new inventory forms, and then possibly new nomination forms developed. So that's where that's, to me, that's where the money would go not to update the townwide inventory forms to take say something on Southeast Street but really to focus on those three nominations that, you know, our have entered process and are really close to being completed So, but I think we'll take a little more research and PVP sees part to complete the new inventory forms and so, you know, when we had a few years ago we had the inventory about 100 outbuildings and Mass Historic did this so many of the properties have been inventory the main structure but not the outbuildings and when we actually had a grant through Mass Historic to do it, and when we submitted the inventory forms they said well even the original inventory forms on the main house have to be converted to the new forms. Right. So, you know, new photographs taken new descriptions written and luckily they didn't make us do new research on the properties but it sounds like for the nominations that might need to have a little bit more research done on property so these nominations are all district nominations. They are individual individual. And it's the East Village and the Dickinson expansion in the Depot district. So around the train station. Okay. So that's three. I remember that. Before Ben left Nate, he told me that we don't have a form before the fire station central fire station. And if I had more time I would offer to do one but I know we need one for that building. Yeah, I think my understanding is the challenge is to get a well the form I don't quite understand the form be processed that well. I mean I think there is work that commissioners can do because I for my summer job and we met with the commission from a large expert who they didn't have any money to hire consultants to do a planning, any updates of inventory firms that they were doing research on their own. We sort of encourage them to, you know, it's fine to develop a file of information you don't have to prepare the form be. You know, file resources and bibliographies to help when ever funding goes through for a particular property that's possible to do. I don't know what the master's commission would do if you know somebody with enough training we can write a good inventory be formed just wanted to do one as a volunteer and submit it if it was up to their professional standards I have no idea. I don't know how they feel about that I just know how they feel about it when you're doing big grants that involve their money. Yeah, I agree I think that had you could, if you wanted to start a file. You can download the form be from mass historic website and, you know, off when we were, for instance doing local historic district study committees where we're looking at different properties the volunteer study committee completed many of the inventory we work with. Sorry, I'm happy to have a go at the central fire station. Yeah, and so some of it is, you know, special collections we work with. Do you want to share it with me too, how do you, I can. Yeah, yeah, that would be good. I'd love to have a partner in crime, Madeline. I mean I have been I've now that I'm working there I am I'm like right now I'm working on historic narratives for months and and I've done architectural descriptions to so I'm getting a much better sense of what is required. So, you know, I can help in that regard as well. Great. Yeah, that the only other my only other thought about our inventory is if and when we're going to start. Like, moving into the next phase of history, particularly mid century modern petty and I have talked about doing inventory forms for, you know, these more modern buildings that are just kind of scattered around town and, you know, just kind of fun, in general, but to think about that as kind of the next, the next push to sort of, you know, the newer Amherst. Start getting up. It's, you know, we're, we're 223rd year of the 21st century so in two years will have been a quarter of our century. And that's kind of staggering. I just read today that Tintin Tantan, the famous cartoon character, he's 94 years old this year. And that gives you some perspective on what is really historic these days. Right, right. So our 1950s, you know, there's franchises, franchises are coming. But they're coming to their own in terms of, you know, they need to be recognized in terms of the inventory so. I just had one question about the, the amount of money. You said there's about 25,000 we could use to start with the new story. How much can you get done with that? Like, I don't know what it costs. I don't, I'm not sure anymore either. You know, I'm hoping that we wouldn't need all of it to forward the nominations and there would still be some left over, but you know, we'd have to, you know, have a cost estimate from PVPC and just see where that goes. You know, at one point we could say, Oh, I know if you, you know, this is now, gosh, like four or five years ago, six years ago, we could say, Oh, it's a, you know, a few hundred dollars a form. Right. But I don't know what it is. And especially if mass historic is asking for a little bit more research and narrative on each property. Yeah, the standard is really quite different from the form we saw today. Yeah, I think the, an 88 I don't know if it was just to try to get as many done as possible but sometimes there's just not, you know a lot of it's incomplete. So it's nice to have a starting point but there really wasn't a lot written or researched about the property. Yeah, and I mean, what I'm able to do sitting in front of a computer, you know, in eight in seven and a half hours a day I mean it's astonishing. I mean, how quickly you can, you know, you could go through a deep title chain back to the original owners you've got historic maps that you can pull up you've got genealogy bank that obituaries you've got newspapers.com. I mean, it's incredible. We don't need we almost don't need to leave our desks for anything. So in the one sense it's, you know, I'm not sure that. I mean, I'll just say that the, a lot of a lot of prices haven't kept pace with the wages or vice versa. So, and I think in, you know, I think in the 70s and the 80s, there was just a tremendous concern to begin to build the inventory to build up the National Register and now it's, it's just, it's got to be much more in depth. So, but the capacity is there which is just pretty cool. Okay, are all of eight, all those 800 or so forms for Amherst those are on MACRAS through MHC, sorry. Yeah, so MACRAS has a database where the MACRAS maps now which is a nice way to enter the data, you know, to view that information so they are so they, you know, there's a few that are missing. So they had an Amherst or they had a, they had an older PDF but somehow it's not attached to the maps, but they you know they did have them all, they have them all electronically and the district nominations and some area forms. And so it's all there. Yeah it was looking for one for the first mill today on MACRAS maps and I didn't see it and it seemed like that was, I'll have to look in MACRAS because it's good to know that because I thought, I thought I'd seen one before. I was surprised that it wasn't there. Yeah, so yeah, yeah, so I found that like you know on Baker Street there had been, I don't know if it was just a, for instance, there was a labeling problem or they, when they read inventory forms, they just, I am loosely show you know they show the location by drawing little blocks on a map. And then when mass historic transfer them to the map, they assign them to the wrong property. So, you know, with the gristmill I don't know maybe it's just if you did a street search and went through the database and not the map you might be able to find it but. Yeah, I think you're probably right. Any other comments. Okay, seven B is barn tours. I don't know where we were with this. I had suggested I worked with a barn expert up in New Hampshire this fall, and he does talks around the region, and I asked him if he would ever come as far as Amherst and he said, yes with good weather and mileage reimbursement. He's a really wonderful guy named John Porter. And so I thought it might be a great idea to have him invite him to come to give a talk we could possibly coordinate with the. What is it the Western Massachusetts historical on mission coalition, if they wanted to support something like that. But as far as getting barn tours going I'm not sure what other folks had in mind. But isn't there a pioneer valley network for American history or museums local history. I think I'll check Robin and I'll let you know that they might cosponsor in some way. Yeah, you know, I don't, you know, we probably have some ideas I mean I was just thinking when if you know come nicer weather, you know if we could find a few property owners were willing to have a tour it could just you know it could be a slow start but, you know, like we said when we had pvpc meet property owners to outbuilding inventories, it's amazing. You know, sometimes how much information the family has, and they're really willing to share it and so, you know, may not be public it may have old photographs and some of it is just to gain an appreciation for, you know, the outbuildings and barns in town. And so, yeah, I mean, I'm hoping it becomes you know an education piece that maybe a preservation piece but I don't I don't have an idea at all really right now how to get it started or how to program it but I'm going to just throw out there that we could make a goal for this, maybe the early part of the fall, if we keep it as an agenda item and just go from meeting to meeting to aim to have something developed for September I mean I'd be excited to try to get that going I'd love to get the assessment program bar tours and a barn speaker and one year maybe get a little cross would be a really great great opportunity for us to, to, like I said have outreach and and finally, finally, cross those off the list. Did you say September. Yeah, what do you think about that. And maybe even incorporate a tobacco barn and mean that's the season isn't it. Yeah, you'd want to do the tour and the speaker at the same time in the same month Robin or this would it be all one day you know, like a speaker in the morning and then we'd go off and look at stuff for that's what they used to do in New Hampshire with the preservation Alliance barn tours was that's a good idea. We would meet somewhere centrally located, preferably in a barn, stored, and then we would go off and look at barns and then that would be it. Yeah, yeah, well, I saw john's presentation at, you know, at a little, it was a church or meeting house. You know, she has a slide show and everything. Right. Yeah. Great. Okay. All right, well we'll carry that forward till next time and see what we do what we come up with between them and now. Great. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. Sorry about that. Next item on the agenda is public comment. We have anyone in the audience. No one in attendance right now. Oh, no. Okay. All right. Any unanticipated items. One thing I was going to just mention. You know, I think we're going to have a little bit of an update on that. Again, and. VPC is hoping to get all the surveys live, you know, this month. And, you know, so then we can figure out, we might do some mailings, but we'll at least have it online. We can link to it from the website. They'll have it up. And so we'll start that process to get the public input as part of the preservation plan. Update. Yeah. I mean, can we promote that or somehow can it come out from the town or the bid or. Yeah. Can you send me an email just saying that and then I can. Yeah, usually we'd have it, you know, we can put it on Twitter, but it's interesting. You know, if the town's Twitter account might not really be as followed as an individual. So. Right. It'd be nice to. I guess I'll just, I can at least ask the public outreach officers to be able to do that. Okay. And yeah, and any other social media. I mean, any other social media that I use, but. I just want to, I made a note. To ask the question of whether the commission would be. Interested in and what the town's plans are for. Meeting in person. I can say I personally think I would enjoy some in person meetings. I appreciate the convenience of. You know, I think it would be nice to go back and forth. But. Find the discussion challenging. And I'm just curious if we've, if we as a culture have shifted permanently to zoom. Or. If we're going to go back and forth or if we're going to go back to in person meeting. It would be nice to go back and forth. Sorry, Becky. No, it's okay. Yeah, I think that's a technological question that is up to the town. Yeah. Honestly, I think hybrids really. Is a really. Difficult and not really good way to go. No. We have to then have someone in the town room and we're going to go back and forth. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a technological question that is up to the town. Yeah. Honestly, I think hybrids really is a really. Difficult and not really good way to go. Yeah. Yeah. We have to then have someone in the town room and we're basically. Acting as a hybrid meeting for people who call in, but then some people have to be in person and other people can be at home. I've, you know, I think it's a really difficult thing to manage. So. You know, we don't know yet what the state will do. Honestly, I like zoom. To me, it's a really good work life balance. If we're back in person a lot, it, you know, it's not, it's not as great for me. I think we still could meet in person say every three months, like every third meeting or something could be in person, but I, I find the zoom meetings to be really easy to share information. And to, you know, to allow the public to attend. And so. You know, the interesting thing is if. I don't know how the regulations will work if. You know, can we go from zoom one month to in person the next month, or do we have to always have some type of video. Live video, which, you know, I don't know if it's a live video. But I think those are the things I think that has to be worked out because if we have to have some type of live video, then it becomes, you know, only one room in town hall is capable of it. And then it, you know, could become a scheduling conflict. And so. Yeah. I mean, I'm hoping we have some guidance in the next two months because I think it's. Changes in April of this coming. This year. Okay. Yeah. I mean, that's the thing that I would say about it is that there's this. I agree with you on the convenience factor is huge. And that at the same time, there is this kind of, you know, stiltedness that. I would love to have a schedule, or it was maybe two Tuesday meetings and one in person, just kind of, you know, bring that, that, that flow back with, but I understand that it's. It's up to the state to figure out how to move forward. So. Right. It may not. Yeah. It may, you know, they may say that it has to all go back in person. Right. Yeah. I will say, okay. Any other unanticipated items. Okay. So we need to establish our next meeting date. We have it on the books. We have a meeting on the calendar night. I'm not sure we do. You know, if, if, you know, if the owner of two 60 lever road. Submits an application. And we have to hold the hearing within so many days. And so. You know, how we want me to determine it to be significant. So. I mean, I don't, you know, I don't know what, um, you know, Wednesdays are usually not the typical meeting day or what, you know, what would be preferable. I think we've been meeting Wednesdays pretty regularly. Lesson. Lesson. Since last fall, I would say, right? Yeah. Yeah. I think that's right. Yeah. Why don't we pick. Is the 15th good. Yeah. Yeah. I may have another meeting that night. 22nd. That would be fine. Yeah. Will that work if, um, do we need to have a, another dated mind if we get a demolition application or. I can't do the 22nd. Okay. Let's go back to the eight. The eight. Go with me. Works for me. Let's do the eight temp. At least tentatively. And we'll see. Yeah. Would we, if we couldn't do the 15th with the 14th work. I'm just saying, I'm thinking that. Say we say that to 611 road applications. We. In a week. And then we determine we need to hold the hearing. We need two weeks notice. Yeah. Yeah. And the eighth is a little, you know, it's actually really, you know, is, is difficult just because the timing to get everything. Right. We may end up having to meet again. I can't do Tuesdays anymore after the 24th. Yeah. What about the 16th? 16th I could do. Yeah. Yeah. That works with everybody. Yeah. Okay. Good. Yeah. And that'll work too. Then if we do receive an application, that could also probably become a public hearing. Night. So. You both. Okay. All right. So the 16th. February. That's a Thursday. That's six 30. Great. Good job. Oh, thank you. Thanks for bearing with me. Great work. So I think I don't need to call about for us to adjourn. I just had to adjourn, right? That's my one power. Yeah. Okay. So for all, for all general agreement, I will adjourn this meeting of the historic commission at 832 p.m. On the 11th. I wish you all a pleasant evening. Thank you. Bye everybody.